Dear HarmonySite administrator,
This email announces the latest set of improvements made to your HarmonySite. In this episode, the EVENTS system got a large number of enhancements. There are a couple of other improvements to other areas of your system, and those are listed at the end of the email.
EVENTS SYSTEM ENHANCEMENTS
1. Unlimited attachment to events
The SONG Library has, for a long time, offered you the option to attach as many files as you wanted to each song, including MP3 files, sheet music, YouTube videos, etc. But each event in the Event Calendar could only have a fixed number of attachments - one for the public, one for members, one for admins, and one for the "Past Performances" page. Plus a single YouTube video for the "Past Performances" page. Now, just like the Song Library, you can attach as many files/videos as you like to each EVENT.
To do so, find the "Add new file/resource" link at the top of the event's page...
Each attached file/resource can be one of the following...
- A file directly uploaded from your computer
- A file linked from Dropbox
- A YouTube video (which gets embedded on the event's page)
- Embedded HTML code that represents some sort of plugin/widget (e.g. Soundcloud). Don't worry if you don't know what that means.
As well as the file/resource displaying on the event's page, you can also nominate whether each file should be displayed...
- On the "Past Performances" page
- On the "Minutes" page
- On the home page, in the "Upcoming Events" section
All your existing event attachments have been converted to this new system. Also, all your existing members with admin privileges over the Event Calendar have been given admin privileges over this new Event Files/Resources system.
2. Predefined Event Venues
It's likely that many of your events occur at the same venues, time after time. When creating new events in your calendar, it's always been a bit tedious to enter the full details of the venue AGAIN, including the address for the Google Map. Now you don't have to. Now you can simply select from a list of predefined venues.
You will, of course, need to create this list of venues. To help you with this, we've create a new page just for these venues. It's even got a nice Google map of them all. To find it, log in as an administrator and locate the link called "Manage Event Venues" in the "Administration" box. This page allows you to create new venues - either manually or by copying the venue details from an existing event. For each venue listed on the page, you are also shown the list of all upcoming events for that venue.
Once your set of venues is created, and you are adding a new event, you now have a choice: You can either select one of these new predefined venues from a drop-down list, or you can type the venue details in manually, as you've always done. If you do BOTH, the system will give precedence to the manually entered venue details.
3. Restrict visibility of an event to ONLY members of the event's ensemble
(This is only really useful if you manage multiple ensembles within your HarmonySite)
We currently have a configuration option in the system which, when turned on, prevents members from seeing SONGS that are for ensembles that the member is not a part of. We now have a similar system for EVENTS. So if you turn this new option on, then events in the calendar will only be visible to members of the ensembles that are selected for the event. If a member is not part of an event's ensemble, they won't be able to see the event at all - unless the event is visible to the public.
To enable this new option:
- Log in with "Webmaster" access
- Click the little "cog" icon in the top-right corner
- Click the cog icon next to "HarmonySite"
- Click the "Configuration" tab
- Scroll down to the "Privacy" section
- Tick the box called "Each event is visible only to members of that event's ensemble(s)"
- Save your changes
4. Reminders for event availability non-responders can now also be sent via text message
There's already a mechanism in place to send reminders to members that have not yet responded with their availability for an event. Such reminders are currently sent by EMAIL. There's now a new option to ALSO send them via SMS/text message. See screenshots...
If you click the button indicated above, you get this screen...
Note the new tickbox just above the "Send" button.
Texts will only go to members that have a mobile/cell phone in the member database. The "from" number will be the mobile/cell number of the logged in member that's doing the sending.
As usual, text messages are charged at 11 cents per message per member, billed to your group's account annually. The person logged in and doing the sending is NOT paying for these text messages personally themselves.
5. New section on Home page: Upcoming Events
It's long been possible to have an "Upcoming Events" section on your home page - if you were happy to have it in the "footer" of the site - the lower section of the page, with a darker background. It's now possible to have that same "Upcoming Events" section appear in the MAIN section of the home page - where the "Latest News" section would typically be.
If you would like your "Upcoming Events" section to appear in the main part of the Home page, please email us and ask - it's a bit technical for you to make that change yourself. When asking, please also specify what you'd like to have happen to the existing "Upcoming Events" section in the footer - leave it there, or replace it with a "Latest News" section. Note that the "footer" section appears on MOST public-facing pages, so if you move your "Upcoming Events" section out of the footer, you're effectively removing it from all pages except the home page.
6. The "Create repeating events" system now replicates the event's PROGRAM
Already in the system is an existing mechanism for creating multiple duplicate events based on one original event - such as a regular weekly rehearsal, to save you from having to manually enter the full details of the event for each new date. That system will now optionally also replicate the PROGRAM of the event being duplicated. Note the new tickbox in the screenshot below...
Of course, that tickbox will only be visible if the event being duplicated actually HAS a program.
7. An event program's list of music can be pushed into "Songs to be sung" list
As you may know, one of the details you can enter about an event is the list of "Songs to be sung". If you then ALSO create a program for the event, then you have a SECOND place where you need to enter all the songs happening during the event. Obviously this is double-data-entry. There's a new link for each event program (see screenshot below) that allows you to extract the list of songs from the program and use that list to create the "Songs to be sung" field for the event - so you only need to enter the list of songs ONCE.
8. New field: Performers duration
Events already had a field called "Duration", where you could specify how long the event would run for (e.g. "2 hours"). And we also already had a field called "Performers' start time", being optionally distinct from the regular "Start time" of the event (for when the performers need to arrive at a different time from the audience). Well, we NOW have the missing piece of the puzzle: A new field called "Performers duration". It's fairly self-explanatory...
9. New field: Specify whether event tickets booked through your HarmonySite should contain a link for the purchaser to PRINT the tickets
In case you're not aware, it's been possible for a long time for you to set up your HarmonySite to sell tickets to your own events (for information about how to set that up, please refer here: https://www.harmonysite.com/guides/tickets.htm). Any tickets purchased through HarmonySite had a link in the receipt email allowing the purchaser to print their own tickets. It is now possible to turn OFF that link, so that purchasers CAN'T print their own tickets - in case you have a different mechanism for printing tickets. There's a new tickbox on the screen where you add/update an event's details, on the "Public" tab. It's called "Tickets purchased through this website should contain a link for the purchaser to print their own tickets". It's ticked by default.
10. Events that span multiple days now show correctly Upcoming Events page
Up until now, the "Upcoming Events" page only showed the START date for a multi-day event. This has now been fixed, so that the page shows the start date AND end date. The main Members page and the newsletter system have been fixed similarly.
ENHANCEMENTS TO OTHER AREAS OF THE SYSTEM
A. Access Summary Report
There's already a page in the system that lists all the LOGINS that members have, alphabetically by member surname. The access level for each login is included on this page. To access this page, ensure you're logged in as a administrator, then find the link in the "Administration" box on the main Members page called "View, generate and email Member Logins".
But if you want to see a summary of the access levels that your members have, this page is not enough. So we've created a NEW page, called the "Access Summary Report". This report takes the same set of logins, but summarises them by (a) Access Level, and (b) Administration area. So you can see at a glance all your members that have (for example) "Webmaster Access", or administration access over Events. Or you can see all the specific administration privileges that each member has.
Find this new report by clicking the link called "View the Access Summary Report", in the "Administration" box on the main Members page.
B. Send notification emails "from" any of the positions you hold
The system allows you to send attractive, formatted notification emails to members about events, songs, documents, news items, polls, newsletters and photo galleries. You do that with a click of a link/button at the top of the page of the event/song/document/etc.
It is NOW possible to specify who that notification email is "from". Either your own personal name/email address, or any of the positions you hold. See an example in the screenshot below...
That's it! That's all for now. More new features coming soon. We'll likely have the next big new enhancement towards the end of January. No, I'm not going to tell you what it is. It's a secret.
As usual, please let me know if you have any questions or issues with these new enhancements.
In harmony,
Mark Virtue
HarmonySite
Australia
+61 2 8005 4277 (Australian number)
In North America, call: 1-415-651-7009 (San Francisco number)
Skype name: mvirtue
