Website communication

[OhioTex]

I am not familiar with listserv or google groups, will let you answer those type questions..

but what i do hear for future enhancement consideration to the web site are:
* communication aides (ability to enter and then send email and text messages to individuals and gdefined groups)
* optional discusion areas (are to either blog, or add a message board for community discusions and postings),
* user ability to add additional 'page buttons' (eg another section w/ html editor like on home page, that the user could name, and then integrate more with HTML) (idealy w/ password protection choice like other sections)

P.S. sounds like Mongoose solved the cirtical access problem, if not let us know

[iscore@tragus.org]

I am not familiar with listserv or google groups, will let you answer those type questions..

I've run a pile of mailing lists over the years on my own servers. For the last couple of years I've started using Google Groups for all new ones. It has the typical "send to one address & it goes to everyone" with archiving on the server. You can have public or private archives that are searchable. You can upload files and create pages for more robust content.

but what i do hear for future enhancement consideration to the web site are:
* communication aides (ability to enter and then send email and text messages to individuals and gdefined groups)

Though I'm just getting started with the team sites I love what FTM have done there. In particular, that they didn't re-invent the calendar and, instead, let me use my Google calendar. If there is a clean way to integrate to Google Groups for sending emails (e.g. - an FTM form on the team website that would leverage GG on the backside) that would be slick.

* optional discusion areas (are to either blog, or add a message board for community discusions and postings),

Those would be cool to have.

* user ability to add additional 'page buttons' (eg another section w/ html editor like on home page, that the user could name, and then integrate more with HTML) (idealy w/ password protection choice like other sections)

And that would absolutely rock! Whether with native editing or by framing it would be nice to add items to the left-side menu. The discussion area / blog could be solved easily with a menu item and an iframe pointing to a Google Group or a blog host.

Not to come off like a Google fan-boy but, again, FTM have done a fantastic job and I'd hate to see them reinvent the wheel where it already exists. Where there are solutions out there (be they Google or anyone else) I would suggest integration rather than replication.

[OhioTex]

I too like the FTM approach of simplicity and facilitating insertable options like google calendar, picas, flicker, mobile etc, vs re invent the wheel. I would fully expect ftm to continue with that approach for those that need/want entry level ease of use and simplification...

Still allowing those that need more advance web features to build their own and integrate iscore into their site...

[plivengood]

Can that be embedded on the home page as an iFrame? It would sure be nice, as others have asked, to be able to add pages for these purposes, and menu buttons to reflect the additions....

[FTMSupport]

We will continue trying to integrate with features of other systems that make it easy to embed (i.e. those that give IFRAME links, or URLs that can be directly linked to). If there are blogs that can be plugged in with just URLs, EMBEDs, or IFRAMES, we can add that functionality. If there are communication facilities that can do that type of thing, we can easily plug those in as well.

If you guys find URLs to use for embedding these types of things, we can add the capabilities pretty quickly.

[OhioTex]

I am not familiar with the plug in type providers/options out there, .. For Those that are. Please find and share and let FTM know .(heck google calendar "iframe" was new to me ) But Sounds like many would appreciate something similar and as simple as google calendar was to integrate for email, blog, messaging.. Thanks in advance to those that can help here..

that said, i just tried google groups, based on a posters comment. I figured out easily and quickly how to upload any file ( pdf, word, excel) and it will store it for you, and give you a url for it that you can embed as a link on your home page. That was helpful to me. I now have a link to the league schedule in pdf form on the home page that anyone can click and then download.

In the future, perhaps we have a left side menu button (with password protection) called Documents (eTeamz did this) . then using the same editor we have on home page, write private messages and post any word, excel or PDF document we want for download (via google docs as described above or other). . Currently you can do something similar under sponsors, if you create a thumbnail image of a doc and then upload the image and use the google link url. ..

So i guess one quick solve could be to make "Documents" the next Menu button on the left, after games and before photos, and have with it function like the home page with the editor, but also have the ability to enable/disable password protection like you do for other button pages. . I could then see adding Message, Blog or Email as a future buttons. ideally we should be able to enable/disable buttons so as not to create menu proliferation.

Thanks