Adding Shared News

Begin by going to www.shared.aces.illinois.edu and clicking the   button at the very bottom right corner. From there, log in with your Shared username and password.

On the black bar, which should appear at the top of every page once you are logged in, go to Content -- Add Content -- Shared News.

Headline

This should be the story’s full title written in sentence style – only the first word should be capitalized.

Category

Check the box of each ACES site on which the news story should appear. This will publish the story to the front page of each of the selected sites. Some categories can be expanded . For example, a news article may be particularly relevant to a research sub-section. If the article should appear only in that sub-section and not on the department’s front page, check only the most specific box (EG: for the path Crop Science -- Research Areas -- General Biology, check only the box for General Biology).

News Category

Shared News categorizes articles based on their content. This system helps readers search for articles. Check the category that best represents the article. Multiple categories may be selected.

Thumbnail

Thumbnail refers to the small image that shows up as a preview for the article. Thumbnail images must be a specific pixel size: 103 wide by 54 tall. If images are not properly sized, they may break the page. Do not worry about doing this manually – Drupal has an easy, built-in tool to help crop and upload images.

It is also important to ensure, before using any image, that you hold the rights to its use. ACES photography or purchased stock images are acceptable; Google search images are not.

Click Browse to find an image on your computer. Click Upload to attach it to the article.

If your image is already the proper size, continue. If it must be resized or cropped, use Drupal’s automatic editing tool.

Drag the thumbnail box to the desired position. Click and drag the diagonal corners of the rectangle to increase or decrease the zoom (portion of the image shown).

Next, notice the alternate text and title fields. It is very important to give all images alternate text. This should be a brief, one sentence description of the picture. Users with screen readers will process this text in place of the image. Title text is displayed when a user hovers over the image and is usually the same as alternate text.

Images

Only one image needs to be uploaded here: a “featured” image for the front page of ACES News. The front page will display these pictures along with the most recently published articles. This image may come from the same image as the thumbnail. This image will also be displayed in the article body.

Again, make sure that you hold rights to the image before uploading. Drupal’s tool will help crop and resize images to their necessary dimensions. Click Browse to find the image and Upload to attach it. As with thumbnails, be sure to give alternate and title text.

Body, Author, and Source

Body should contain the full text of the article separated into appropriate paragraphs. No additional color formatting or images should be inserted here. Do not use HTML or links in the author and source fields.

Keywords

Type keywords separated by commas. The grey circle on the box’s right side indicates that the field is a “Look Further” field. If you start typing in a term, “Look Further” will search through for previously used synonyms and relevant terms. This ensures that an article will meet as many searches as possible.

Kill Date

The news item will immediately delete itself from all checked websites on the selected date.

Related Websites, Photo Contact, and Media Link

All of these optional additions will appear in a box below the published story. Do not use HTML or special formatting.

Saving and Publishing

Once all fields are entered, click Preview to view the article or Save to publish. If you would like the news to appear on a department’s website, you must import the news from Shared to that website.

Leave shared and log in to the department site. On the top black bar, go to Content Management -- Import Shared Content. On that page, click the button to Import Shared News Content. Provided the department was checked under Category, the news should now appear on its front page.