Dear all, Welcome to the February newsletter! This month we've made improvements to a number of features and added several new systems. We have also introduced a number of GUI improvements, and added some new management tools. Those of you with larger libraries will also be pleased to hear of a price reduction this month for additional storage. Price reductions and special offers ----------------------------------- We have reduced the cost of additional storage by 10% this month, to £2.25/GB/month + VAT. Annual rates are £22.50/GB + VAT. This is a reduction of 10% on our 2004 price list. As the cost of storage falls we will continue to reduce prices where possible. Every gigabyte of data you store is duplicated a further two times to our backup infrastructure, and we only use enterprise grade hardware to ensure the integrity of your storage. We apply storage fees instead of charging for bandwidth or the number of pictures or users. We are pleased to offer all Royal Photographic Society members a discount of 10% on the cost of any IMS product purchased between 10 January 2005 and 30 June 2005. The offer excludes setup fees or non-IMS services such as web site design. If you or someone you know is an RPS member, now is a great time to invest in IMS. If you are already an IMS customer, we also operate a referral scheme through which we will credit your account if you refer a new customer to us. For details please contact sales@thirdlight.com. Search engine ------------- The IMS search engine is now able to distinguish between singular and plural forms of most words. As a result, the chances of returning close matches are now improved for words which are plurals of the search term used. A-Z feature now optional ------------------------ The 'alphabet', normally displayed at the top of the page when viewing top level albums, is now optional. If you find the alphabet unnecessary for some users, but useful for others, you can switch it off as required. The new option appears under your user or event options in the Manage menu. The checkbox is labelled "Show A-Z Alphabet for Album Listing". Minor GUI improvements ---------------------- We have made a number of small changes to some interfaces in IMS. These changes include ensuring that the admin menu bar is centred in all browsers (previously, it may have been left-aligned in Mozilla for some themes). We have also made a number of usability adjustments to forms where the back button would lose data. These changes and further improvements will be made to other parts of IMS in a forthcoming release. Request Account page improvements --------------------------------- The 'request account' button allows users to sign themselves up to your IMS. This feature is enabled from the Site Options page. Users can now choose their own username and password instead of being issued with an automatically generated value. If the username has already been taken, users are prompted to supply a different username until they have chosen one which has not been taken. We have also extended the 'request account' page to ask for a number of extra pieces of information: Telephone number Business details New text options when viewing albums ------------------------------------ When an album's thumbnail page is being viewed, you can now include the 'welcome text' on this page as well as the main index. This is an album option which can be set by checking the box labelled 'Show Login Welcome Message' on the album's Edit page. You can also now supply a separate piece of text, called the 'Album Message'. This is accessed by clicking the Edit button for the album. The 'Album Message' text is displayed above the thumbnails when you view an album. This text is optional. Technical tip: If you wish, you can put HTML into the Welcome Message or Album Message. This allows you to insert content of your own into IMS, including external images, tables, bullet point lists and so on. Highlighted picture feature --------------------------- When IMS is used in Gallery mode, the highlighted thumbnail is normally the first picture in the album. We now also allow you to choose a particular thumbnail to highlight, or to use a random thumbnail. To choose which thumbnail to highlight in an album, click on the album's Edit button. A pull-down box labelled 'Thumbnail for Gallery View' allows you to select whether to use the first picture, a random picture, or a named image from the album. You can also browse using a small clickable thumbnail view to find the image you wish to highlight. Note: using a random picture as the album thumbnail can be slower as the thumbnail will change each time the page is refreshed. Site Terms and Conditions ------------------------- If you wish, you can now switch on a system to force all visitors to accept a page of terms and conditions before they can use your IMS galleries. To use this feature, you need to complete two steps: 1) Define your terms and conditions in the new Tools -> Site T&Cs page 2) Click the 'Enable Site T&Cs' option on the Tools -> Site T&Cs page, or the Tools -> Site Options page. If your visitor has already accepted your terms and conditions, they are not asked to accept them again provided they are accessing IMS from the same PC, and their browser accepts cookies. If you change your terms and conditions, click the 'Reset Terms & Conditions' button to force users to re-accept your terms. Users who have already agreed to previous terms will be prompted to read the new terms and asked to agree again. Site Index suspended -------------------- Until further notice the Site Index has been suspended; we are re-evaluating how to offer this facility. In the meantime please be aware that the 'description' box, on the Site Options page, can be used to help search engines understand the purpose of your site. Enter a sentence, not keywords, for best results. Google will display this text underneath your URL when your site appears in their index, and use your text to correctly categorise your page. To improve your page ranking in Google, obtain reciprocal links with other sites or use a dedicated web site to accompany your IMS pages. For more information on Google page ranking please see http://www.google.co.uk/intl/en/webmasters/. Richard Corbett Photography wins Newmarket Business Of The Year 2004 -------------------------------------------------------------------- We are delighted to report that Richard Corbett has won the Newmarket Business Of The Year Award 2004. Richard also won the 'Innovative Use Of Technology' award, in recognition of his achievements in using the internet to sell his photography services and products. Commenting on Richard's success, the judges from Suffolk County Council remarked, "We were impressed by the quality of the product, its delivery, the planning within the business and the innovative use of a range of media to satisfy the needs of its customers". Richard Corbett has been an IMS Premium customer since 2003. Our warmest congratulations to Richard on his successes. For more information on Richard Corbett Photography please visit http://www.richardcorbett.co.uk/. Feedback -------- Please do keep sending your feedback about IMS. We keep a thorough record of all feedback and aim to implement the features that are most requested as part of our ongoing development plans. Simply reply to this email (support@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 Photography Ltd. http://www.thirdlight.com/ -- You are receiving this email because you are a user or administrator of a fully-subscribed Third Light IMS system, or subscribed to this list as part of an IMS trial. If you do not wish to be contacted with news regarding your system, please visit http://www.thirdlight.com/support.htm, where there is a form to unsubscribe from this list.