Dear all, Welcome to the April 2008 newsletter, our regular update on developments at Third Light and news about changes and improvements made to the IMS product. This month, we will be releasing further updates to the new template systems, and have adjusted or improved several other aspects of IMS. We've also started a new 'Hints and Tips' page to help you make the most of your software. Features mentioned below will be released on Thursday 10 April 2008. Please follow the instructions at the end of this email if you prefer not to receive our newsletters. Hints and Tips page IMS offers a very wide range of features, many of which are added as part of our continual updates. We hope that by keeping in touch via our monthly newsletter, you can enjoy the full benefit of the latest changes made. However, if you would also like to read short examples on using selected features of IMS, we have now launched a Hints and Tips page, which you can visit here: http://www.thirdlight.com/ims/tips Is there a particular topic you would like us to cover? Please drop a note to support@thirdlight.com. We would be pleased to hear from you. New Viewing Mode: "List Mode" Sites using the latest templates (released in March 2008) will see a new Album View Style become available on 10 April, called 'List Mode'. List Mode provides a tabular view, with one album per row on the main gallery page (the page seen immediately after a user logs in). This is designed particularly for presenting top level albums as categories. The list format provides extra space, compared to a thumbnail layout, meaning longer and more descriptive album names can be used. List Mode is appropriate in situations where many albums are exhibited publicly with no sub-folders, where it can be used to avoid adding large numbers of events. To set a user or event to use List Mode, open Users & Events -> Manage Users -> Edit User and go the 'Display Options' tab to change the Album View Style. Keyword Suggestion Tool This feature is available on IMS Corporate Appliances only, from 10 April onwards. Entering keywords in the Picture Editor while using the Controlled Vocabulary now causes IMS to suggest keywords. The keywords are based on the existing keywords in the vocabulary, with particular emphasis on keywords used on other pictures in the same album. This function is designed to reduce the number of synonyms entered inadvertently, and simplify the keywording process for day to day administration. e-Commerce Changes There are several changes this month which affect e-commerce sites. These changes significantly enhance the way that print products are purchased from IMS, and we recommend that all IMS users with e-commerce galleries consider upgrading to the latest themes to use these features. Simply open the Configuration -> Manage Themes menu and click 'Create New Theme'. 1) New on-screen basket IMS now offers an on-screen basket function, which is modeled on the lightbox concept used in the latest templates and within the administration console. As well as a convenient view of the photos in the basket, a running total is displayed. 2) Purchasing functions on thumbnail pages In order to help customers buy products in a simple and direct way, IMS now allows pictures to be placed directly into the basket from the thumbnail views by clicking on a shopping trolley icon. The choice of product and quantities is then separately managed from within the basket, as part of the checkout process. The result is a smoother and more familiar way of using the IMS e-Commerce function which resembles a typical purchasing process for online shopping. 3) Due to the potential for confusion with lightboxes and rights managed downloads (up to now also called 'lightboxes') we have renamed the rights managed service to "Licenced Downloads". This change of terminology affects the latest templates, and the administration console. Although previous templates are unchanged, we recommend that all e-commerce sites adopt the latest templates if possible. As well as resolving this problem, the new templates deliver far greater functionality for no cost. 4) Smart Folders and Collections can now have their own, independent e-commerce settings, such as subvendor, price plan or licence plan. There is also an option to retain the existing behaviour where individual images use the e-commerce settings from their source album when they are opened through a Smart Folder or Collection. As previously, if any user settings for price plans or subvendors are set, these take priority. Upload Approvals Tool This feature is available on IMS Corporate Appliances only. The Upload Approvals feature of IMS provides administrators with the ability to specify criteria that an uploaded file must pass before it is accepted into the library. For example, it can be configured such that incoming pictures must be keyworded using the Controlled Vocabulary before they are approved. This feature is designed to be used with normal user accounts that have upload privileges enabled. After uploading a set of files with this upload tool, items that do not pass the criteria will be presented back to the user with a description of what they need to change. The user then has 24 hours to make the necessary changes, and items that do not meet the requirements will be deleted after this time. Upload Approval settings are configured from the Upload Options tab of the Edit User Page: Users & Events -> Manage Users -> Edit User -> Upload Options. On the same page, the 'Specify upload target' and 'Specify upload action' settings are used to control where files are uploaded to and whether they should be merged into existing albums or placed under new albums. Miscellaneous Changes The following minor changes will be made live on 10 April. 1) A fault in the ZIP download module has been resolved. This problem arose in special cases, with symptoms that certain file types would not download correctly, instead resulting in a zero length ZIP file. 2) The new Colour Picker, introduced in March 2008, now supports changing the colour of the header of the site independently of other palette colours. A preview function has been added to make it simpler to see changes made. A clickable magnifying glass icon appears when changes are saved. We have added updates designed to encourage web browsers to flush cached copies of the header logo, when a new logo is uploaded. 3) Performance improvements have been made to the Controlled Vocabulary tool, to reduce page load times in older browsers. 4) On IMS Appliances, the disk quota system is now linked directly to the exact remaining capacity of the server's disk system. 5) The Desktop Upload Tool now automatically filters "http://" from the server address. The Desktop Uploader has also been updated to work transparently with Proxy Servers using NTLM authentication. This is particularly designed to solve problems experienced with Microsoft ISA 2006 and WebMarshal proxies. To update before 10 April, please use this link: http://www.thirdlight.com/ims/features/uploader 6) Keyword searches for hyphenated words are now correctly interpreted by IMS and do not cause the second part of the word to be excluded from the search scope. Web Design Assistance As we focus on the technology and software behind IMS, we are unable to provide help with web design and branding issues. This is especially true of customised templates. If you need help implementing a particular look and feel, then we recommend making contact with Siftware, our web design partners, who will be able to help you. For more details and prices, please see: http://www.siftware.co.uk/services/ims-integration/ Feedback Every feature of IMS is based on your ideas and feedback. We keep a thorough record of all feedback and aim to implement the features that are most requested as part of our development plans. Simply email features@thirdlight.com to send us your comments. For support questions, please use the Help menu support tool, as this allows us to track your queries and answer questions more efficiently. With regards, Third Light Ltd. http://www.thirdlight.com/