Dear HarmonySite administrator,

We've added a few new features to your HarmonySite...

1. Position Privileges

This is (was) the most requested new feature in our "New Features Suggestion" tool, with 89 up-votes:  https://feedback.userreport.com/1694176b-63ec-45de-9c7d-66daaa593485/#ideas/popular

The suggestion was:  If a position is marked as needing administrative privileges over certain areas of the site (e.g. the Song Library), then any time a member is added to that position, the system should automatically update the member’s login record to add the needed privileges (if they're not already in the login record).

A further enhancement was also suggested, whereby if a member is removed from a position, that position's privileges should be automatically revoked from the member's login record.

In case you're not aware (and most HarmonySite administrators are not aware), it's already possible to stipulate that anyone who holds a particular position (e.g. "Membership Coordinator") should be given administration privileges over certain areas of the system (e.g. "Members" and "Memberships").  To see what I'm referring to, update any "position", scroll to the bottom and you'll find a section called "Advanced" (meaning that a certain high level of understanding of the HarmonySite system is recommended).  In that section you can designate which privileges (admin areas) anyone who holds the position should have...

If you stipulate some required admin privileges, and a member who holds that position doesn't have those privileges (in their login record), then you'll see a warning on the "Officers" page like the following...

As you can see, it's always been easy to add the missing privileges (via the first link in the above screenshot).

The suggestion was for this to happen AUTOMATICALLY.  We have not done that.  In my experience, doing something like that automatically will likely create more problems than it solves.  Instead, we've revamped the "Access Summary Report" (found on the "Members" line/row of your HarmonySite's Admin Dashboard.  The revised Access Summary Report NOW allows you to...

• See all the positions that each member holds
• See what privileges each of those positions requires
• See which privileges the member does not hold yet
• See which privileges the member holds that they perhaps don't need to, according to the positions they hold
• Add missing privileges (either one by one, or all at once (per member))
• Remove unneeded privileges (either one by one, or all at once (per member))

Here are some examples in the updated Access Summary Report...

• The FIRST circled area above show that anyone with "Webmaster Access" automatically has all of the required privileges (see the green ticks).
• The SECOND circled area above shows that the member has a bunch of privileges, but all of them are possibly not needed, either because they don't hold any positions, or the positions they hold have not stipulated any required privileges.  Note the link at the bottom to remove them ALL at once.
• The THIRD circled area shows a member that holds FIVE positions, TWO of which have stipulated required privileges (green ticks).  The member doesn't hold THREE of those privileges ("Website Pages", "Assessment Result Types" and "Memberships").  Note the link at the bottom to add them ALL at once.

Several of you have commented that if someone's login record holds unnecessary privileges, those privileges should be removed from the login record automatically.  The problem with this request is working out what "unnecessary" means in this context.  Perhaps the privileges were manually added for a specific purpose, not related to the "positions" system.  Perhaps no-one has bothered to specify the required privileges in the position record(s).  So it's much too risky to remove such privileges automatically.  We've made it easy for you to do it manually.

This system is new.  If you have any suggestions as to how it could be improved, please reply to this email.

2.  Event End Times

Original suggestion is here:  https://feedback.userreport.com/1694176b-63ec-45de-9c7d-66daaa593485/#idea/290379  (38 up-votes)

Up until now, HarmonySite events have let you specify the start date, start time, end date, and DURATION.  There was never an "end time" - we used "Duration" to imply the end time.  There's no inherent problem with that, except for when such events are exported to Google Calendar or iCal:  THOSE systems don't use a "duration", they use an "end time".  So, for compatibility with those external calendars, we've deprecated the "Duration" field, replacing it with "End time".  The "Duration" field is still there, but it's no longer used when exporting events.  It's simply displayed on the event's page, and that's all.

3.  Assessments - List of outstanding assessment submissions

Someone asked us recently, "Where can I see a list of all assessment submissions that have not been processed yet?"  I was amazed to realise that there was no such feature in HarmonySite.  It seemed like a glaring omission.  So this has now been added, on the "Assessments" page...

As soon as this feature was enabled, we had a flood of emails saying "What's with the new list of outstanding assessments?  We have over 200!"  That means, of course, that more than 200 recordings have been submitted by members for assessment and have not been marked/scored/processed.  In other words, the section leaders are dropping the ball.

We've since amended the system so that...

• Submissions for songs that don't require assessment are excluded
• Submissions by members that are no longer active are excluded
• Submissions older than the "age (in days) when assessments expire" are excluded (you can specify that age in your HarmonySite configuration)

But the lists were still long.  So we added an option to disable that new feature entirely (in your HarmonySite configuration).  We don't recommend that you turn it off - that's a very useful list!  Instead, take the time and go through the list, deleting the ones that are no longer necessary, and asking your section leaders to mark/score/process the rest.

4.  The "Mark as Paid" button appears in more places

Membership invoices appear on the "Financial Members Report".  Each one has a "Mark as Paid" button.  There was also a simple green "tick" icon on the "Orders/Invoices/Bookings/Donations" page.  But that's all.  If you wanted to mark a membership invoice, merchandise order, event ticket booking, or donation as "Paid", you needed to go to one of those two places.

For convenience, we've now added a "Mark as Paid" button to more places...

• The event ticket list, on the "Manage Tickets" page for the event (note that you'll need to click the "Include unpaid/pending bookings" link to see all the unpaid bookings).
• Each invoice/order/booking/donation page - the page where you can PAY for it, using whichever payment methods you've enabled.  If you're an administrator, you will now see the green "Mark as Paid" button at the bottom of the page.

Enjoy!

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

mark@harmonysite.com

www.harmonysite.com