UPDATED 13.10.2020
Please enjoy our newest V6 User Guide which is more in depth and includes tips and tricks to help you update your site in an accessible way.
New A4 User Guide - Final 2020.pdf
User Guide
V6.5 websites
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2
The Basics
Page Management
Editing Text Boxes
Uploading Documents
Uploading Images
Adding & Removing Links
Meetings
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5-6
7
8-10
11-12
13-14
15-16
Committees
People
Bricks
News Stories
Events
Planning
Members Area
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19
20
21
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23
24-25
Carousel
Heading Images
Organisation Display
Gallery
Areas only Vision ICT can edit
I still need help, what can I do?
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29-30
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Contents
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On this chapter, we’ll work from the top of the web page, detailing what the various
components mean and how to use them.
In the picture to the right you can see a simple page set-up with a site-header
image (this can only be changed by us) at the top and the navigation bar
underneath. Then a full text component and bricks component. The site-header
image and navigation bar are static, but other components can be moved and will
nearly always have a title at the top and a line at the bottom.
The editing cogs, which you can see dotted around the page (and on the row of
icons below), are what you click to edit or change a component. Each component
has its own cog.
To the bottom left of each component are move/delete icons. The first icon is an up
or down arrow, allowing you to move that whole component up or down the page.
Next is a bin icon which will delete the entire component. Take care when deleting
components as you cannot recover them yourself.
The last icon is a double headed arrow which will stretch a component across the
screen when pressed once and then constrain it to the middle when pressed again.
The Basics
NAVIGATION BAR
FULL TEXT BOX
BRICKS
Edit Up/Down Delete Constrain
SITE HEADER
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So now we know how to move and delete components and have seen some
examples, how do we add new components?
At the bottom of every page, just above your footer is an “Add Component” section
with a drop down underneath it. Click on the drop down and select which component you would like to add then click the thumbs up and your new component will
appear at the bottom of the page.
You can then use the icons next to the component to move it up and down the page,
delete it or stretch it across the page as explained above.
So what are some things you can add?
Heading - This can be used as a title on your page, though for most websites we use
the first component title as the heading.
Heading Image - This is used when you want to add an image which stretches
across the whole page. They are mostly decorative.
Text options - You have a few text box options here. The first is a full width text box,
the second will give you two columns, the third gives you one smaller column and
one bigger column (this is often used when you have an image and some accompanying text), the forth will give you three equal width columns, the fifth will give you
two smaller columns either side of a larger column, the sixth gives you four equal
width columns and the last will give you six equal width columns.
Use the text box that best fits the content you have to add, experiment with using
different ones for better layouts.
The Basics cont...
Notes and Tips
Please note that you cannot use the
text columns as a table because on a
mobile phone, each column will stack on
top of each other.
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This chapter will explain how to add, move and delete pages and sections on your
site. If you click the cog to the left of your home page in the navigation bar, you will
be taken to the Page Management area.
Adding Sections and Pages
The add new icon will add new pages and sections to your site. The very first one
you see (just under the “key”) will add a section.
These sections (e.g The Council, Documents etc) are displayed in your navigation
bar. To the left of each section in the list is another add page icon. This one will add
a sub-page to this section (for instance the “The Council” section has a sub-page of
“Members Area”).
When you add a new section it will appear at (or near) the bottom of the list. When
you add a new sub-page it will appear at the bottom of the sub-pages in that section.
For now this is a draft page and will be called, “New Page”.
I will show you in a moment how to change the name of this page and get it to
appear in your navigation bar.
Editing and moving pages
Next to each page and section are a series of icons. The first, as we have covered
already, adds a sub-page. The second will give you the properties of that page. The
third will delete the page (note you cannot delete a section until all its sub-pages have
been deleted). Finally we have up and down arrows. These will move a sub-page up
and down within a section or move a section up and down within your navigation bar.
Page Management
Add New Properties Delete Up/Down
Notes and Tips
To move a page from one section to
another or move a sub page onto the main
navigation bar, you will need to email us.
We also cannot delete the landing pages
that appear to be duplicates of the
pages in the navigation bar.
VIDEO
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Page Properties
If we click on the properties icon next to a page, a menu will appear allowing you
to edit the page title, subtitle (not often used unless your site is bilingual) and
page status. If you have a members area, you may have some additional options.
These will be covered on the Members Area page of this user guide.
Page Status
• A live page will be able to be viewed normally by visitors to the site.
• A draft page will not be visible to the public, this allows you to build and
make changes to the page without the public seeing it until you are ready
to set it as live.
• A hidden page can be linked to but will not show up normally on your site.
This can be used for example, if you want a separate page for each council
service but want those pages to only be accessible via the Council Services
page. You can access these pages anytime via the Page Management Area.
Remember to press “Save Changes” when you’re done!
Page Management cont...
Add New Properties Delete Up/Down
Notes and Tips
Certain page names will cause an error
message to show on the website (such as
words with “na” in them). This is a technical
error that we are trying to fix. Until then,
if your page shows an error, please contact
us and we will fix it.
VIDEO
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For adding a text box and the differences between them please see our
components page. Once you have your component, you can click on the cog next
to the words “Edit title if needed” to add a title or click on the cog under the text
“content coming soon” to add text and images. When you click on the cog you will
see the editing mode of the text box as can be seen on the image to the right. You
can click into the box and start typing to add text.
Moving our attention to the top of the text box, there is a drop down. For body text,
this will be set to “Normal”. If you need to add a heading, you will need to click on this
drop down and select “Heading 4”. If your website has boxes around links and you
want to do this too, highlight your text and select either “heading 5 “or “heading 6”
from the drop down.
The first icon which looks like a broom can be used to remove formatting for
example when pasting directly from Word, fonts and styling from text by clicking on
it and then clicking “remove all word specific markup” and then “cancel” to dismiss
the box (take care to never press “remove all HTML tags” as these are crucial for
accessibility and website function).
The second and third icons tell you the keyboard shortcuts to cut and copy text.
The forth icon is redundant but the fifth allows you to paste text from word or another
website, and will automatically convert it to plain text ready for this website. This is
essentially another way to do what you can do with the first icon but this one will
also remove all links and heading styles. These tools are used to keep your site
professional and consistent but also removes any colours which may be inaccessible.
The icons for bullet points, text alignment, indents, bold, italics and underlining are
the same as those on most word processing software. The other icons can be used
to add images and documents which will be covered later in this guide. The arrows
can be used to undo and redo an action you have made since clicking on the cog.
When you have finished editing the text box, click on the thumbs up directly under
the text boxes to save your changes.
Editing Text Boxes
Notes and Tips
Text or images deleted while in this mode
cannot be recovered once you have pressed
the thumbs up. If you think you have made
a mistake, click the back button on your
browser or click to a different page.
DO NOT CLICK THE THUMBS UP
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To add a document to your site, you first need to write the name of the document in
the text box so you can link the file to it. (Please bear in mind that following the WCAG
2.1 regulations, it is no longer proper to link text or hyperlinks to the words “here” or “click
here”. )
Click and drag with the mouse to highlight the appropriate text or image and go to
the “downloadable files” icon in the top left ( it looks like the PDF icon). This will
bring up the Downloadable Files Box (pictured).
Folders
To keep files tidy, we recommend uploading into folders (this should be done at the
beginning as files cannot be moved). To make a new folder, click the icon or button
of the folder with a star in the top right. A box will pop up asking you to name the
folder- ensure this is short and relevant. You can create as many folders as you like,
but once a document has been uploaded, it is impossible to move it without having
to redo the links on the page.
Click into your newly made folder or an existing folder. Now click on “upload” in the
bottom right. This will take you to the files on your computer. Find the document you
want to upload, click it and then click “open”. Pay attention to the box that pops
up now. If it says “File Uploaded Successfully”, then great! You can click on okay to
dismiss the box. If it says anything else then the file has not uploaded successfully.
There are a few reasons for this:
• The document is too large or too close to the upload limit (4MB). Send the
document into support@visionict.com and we will upload it for you.
• The file name has punctuation in (hypens and underscores are the only
accepted punctuation)
• The file is not a .doc .docx .pdf or .xls
Uploading Documents
Upload
Doc
New
Folder
Rename Back
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Now your document has been uploaded to the file store, you should see the
document in your folder and the URL box should be full. To the left of the URL box
is a drop down that says “target: not set”. You need to click on this drop down and
select “new window” (this ensures that the document will open in a new tab, leaving
the current screen unchanged BUT only do this for PDF files). Whether you chose to
leave these unset so they open in the same window or set to new window, please
be consistent so that users know whether to hit the back button or to close tabs.
Please note that this is not necessary on Word or Excel Documents as they generally
download to the users computer, rather than opening in a window.
Now, click “insert” in the bottom right of the box. If you have linked the document
successfully then the text you had highlighted should now be blue and underlined.
Click the thumbs up at the bottom of the text box to save your changes. You can now
click on the link to check that it has worked.
Renaming files and folders
If you want to rename the file to something more descriptive, this should be done
before you click “insert”. To do this, click on the box to the left of the document name
so a tick appears. Now click on the pencil icon to the right of the document name. A
box will pop up, type the new name of the document and click okay. The process is
the same for renaming folders however, if you rename a folder after uploading documents into it, you will need to re-link all of those documents. Files beginning with “_”
are important to certain components on your site and should never be renamed or
deleted.
The last icon we’ll look at is the folder with a green arrow. This takes you back to the
previous folder. E.g. If you had clicked finance and then 2019-2020, you could click
the back folder icon to be taken back to finance.
Uploading Documents cont...
Upload
Doc
New
Folder
Rename Back
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Deleting Documents
To delete a document, you must first click and drag to highlight the text of the
document you want to replace/remove. Then click on the broken chain icon to
remove the link.
While the text is still highlighted, click on the downloadable files icon. Find the
document you want to delete and click the white box to the left of the document
name. Now click on the scissors in the top right of the box. A box will pop up asking
if you are sure you want to delete the file. If you are, click OK.
Replacing Documents
Like deleting a document, to replace it you first need to unlink the document from
the word(s) it is connected to. Do this by clicking and dragging to highlight the
word(s) and clicking on the broken link icon. While the text is still highlighted, click on
the downloadable files icon.
Now you can select another document from the file store to insert by finding it,
clicking on it and pressing insert or follow the instructions above for uploading a
new file.
Please note that if you are uploading a new version of a file, the new one MUST have
a different name than the original.
Uploading Documents cont...
Upload
Doc
Remove
Link
Delete
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To upload an image into a text box on your site, first click on the cog under the text
box. Then click in the box so the cursor is where you want the image to go. Now click
on the insert image icon in the top left corner.
An insert image box will appear. If you think you will be uploading multiple photos to
this page you might want to create a folder to keep them organised. This is the same
as making a document folder (instructions on page 7).
If you’ve made a folder, click into it, now press “upload” in the bottom right box. This
will take you into the files on your computer. Find the picture you want and press
“open/insert/select” (this will depend on your computer). A box should pop up, pay
attention to this. If it says “File uploaded successfully” then great!
If not, it means the image has not uploaded correctly. There are a few reasons this
may be:
• The image is too large ( the max size allowed is 350 KB)
• It is not a JPEG, JPG or PNG
• The file name has punctuation in (the only accepted punctuation are
hyphens and underscores)
If you need help making the image smaller please see our help and support website
of give us a ring and we guide you through the process.
Click OK on the box to dismiss it. Now we need to add a brief description of the
image into the Alternative Text box on the right (this is required by the Website
Accessibility Guidelines to aid the visually impaired).
Now click “insert” on the bottom right of the box to see your image in the text box.
We can edit the size and alignment of the image now.
Uploading Images
Notes and Tips
You should never paste an image onto
a page. It will cause the page to load
incredibly slowly and in some cases, break
the website. It also does not allow for
the use of alternative text.
Insert
Image
New
Folder
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Editing images
If you want to edit or replace an image that’s already been uploaded, you can double
click on the image when in editing mode. This should bring up the IMG box as shown
on the right.
If you want text to run around the image, you can set the alignment by pressing on
the drop down which says “not set” next to the words “alignment”. You can also add
borders using the border size and colour boxes.
You can change the width and height of the image as well by typing in the
appropriate boxes but it will decrease the quality of the image if you try to make it
larger and wont change the proportions of it. If you need to change the proportions
of a photo, you should do this in a photo editing software before uploading the
photo. If you uncheck the constrain proportions box and then resize the image the
image will be stretched and distorted.
Spacing will add some space around the edges of your photo.
When you’re done, click OK and then the thumbs up to save your changes.
If you want to centre an image and using the alignment drop down isn’t working, you
can double click on the image, select the “General” tab and in the “Css Class” box
type “center-block” (please make sure to use the US spelling for Centre).
Replace a photo
Double click on the image when in editing mode to bring up the IMG box. Next to the
URL box there is a button that says “browse”, click on this to go to the image store for
your website. You can either select a photo you have already uploaded or follow the
insert image instructions to upload a new image.
Uploading Images cont...
Insert
Image
New
Folder
Notes and Tips
If you are uploading an image of a
poster, you must have text linked in
a document or somewhere nearby for
the visually impaired in order to comply
with the WCAG 2.1.
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You may want to add links on the website to external sites, internal website pages or
email addresses. This chapter will help you learn how to add, edit and delete these
links.
External Website Links
Click on the cog under a text box to enter edit mode then type in the name of the
website. Click and drag over the text to highlight it, then click on the insert link icon
in the top left of the text box. A box should appear like in the photo to the right.
Write or paste the web address in the box labelled URL. The address must begin
with either http:// or https:// or the link will not work. If done correctly, the “Type”
drop down should change to “http://” or “https://”. If it hasn’t changed you can select
http:// from the drop down yourself.
Click on the drop down next to “Target” and change this to “New Window”. Then
click OK. The highlighted text should now be blue and underlined. Click the thumbs
up to save your changes.
Email Link
This is similar to external website links except when clicked on, it will open the users
mail software and allow them to send an email right away.
Type the email address into the text box. Click and drag to highlight the email then
press Ctrl and C on your keyboard to copy this text. While it is still highlighted, click
on the insert link icon. This will bring up the link box. Paste by pressing Ctrl and V on
your keyboard the email address into the URL box and then select “mailto:” from
the Type drop down box. You will now see the word “mailto:” in the URL box.
Click OK at the bottom right of the box. Then click the thumbs up to save your
changes.
Adding and Removing Links
Notes and Tips
Due to the WCAG 2.1 it is no longer
appropriate to attach links to the
word “here” or “click here”. You must
be able to tell from link text where
the link is taking you.
Insert Link Remove
Link
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Internal page links
You can direct users to certain pages on your website (even hidden pages) using
these instructions.
First, go to the page on your website that you want the link to take you to (e.g. for
this planning application link I would go to the planning page). In the URL box at the
top of the browser window, click and drag to highlight all of the link text after the
“v6-5admin.visionict.com” part (it should start with /Sites). Copy this text using the
mouse or by pressing Ctrl and C on your keyboard.
Now go to the page you want to make the link on (in this case our useful links page).
Click the cog under a text box to go into edit mode and write your text. Click and
drag to highlight where you want the link. Now click on the insert link icon.
A box will pop up as shown on the image to the right. Click into the URL box and
paste the page URL you just copied using your mouse, or by pressing Ctrl and V on
your keyboard.
You do not need to select anything from the “target” or “type” boxes as you want
the page to open in the same window. Press OK (the link text should now be blue
and underlined) and then click the thumbs up to save your changes.
Removing a link
If you want to get rid of a link, click and drag to highlight the link text, then click on
the remove link icon.
Adding and Removing Links cont...
Insert Link Remove
Link
Notes and Tips
If this page is live on your site, you can
just go to your website in a new tab
and copy the full URL from there then
insert it like an external site link.
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Some Councils may only have one committee, in which case they will only have
one meetings page. Other Councils have multiple committees so they will have a
committee landing page and then separate meetings pages for each committee.
Below each meeting you will find the familiar editing cog, delete and add new icon.
Add a new meeting
To add a new meeting click on the “add new” icon under any existing meeting or just
below the “select year to view” box, You will then be taken to the “add new meeting”
page (bottom right image).
In the box that says “date” you need to write in the date of this meeting (the format
must be YYYY-MM-DD with hyphens). To add an Agenda, click the “upload file”
button besides “Agenda” and select the appropriate document from your computer
files. When the file is uploaded it will say “File Uploaded” followed by the file name
next to “Agenda”. Minutes can be added in the exact same way by pressing the
“upload file” button next to “Minutes”.
You can remove an agenda or minutes by pressing “remove file”. You can then
replace the file by pressing “change file”. The “other” file upload is generally used
for additional documents. As well as PDF, Excel and Word Documents, you can also
upload Zip Files to your meetings.
If any of the files do not load successfully, this probably means the file is too large or
has punctuation in the file name (only . - _ are allowed). You can send these files to
support@visionict.com and we will upload them for you.
If you wish, you can type the start and/or finish times of the meetings by using a
24 hour clock in the format HH:MM. The Misc Text field can be used to denote an
extraordinary, special or finance meeting; to display the venue of the meeting or
to let residents know the meeting has been cancelled/postponed. When you are
happy with your meeting, click save changes to be taken back to the meetings page.
Meetings
Edit Delete Add New
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Editing an existing meeting
You can edit an existing meeting by clicking on the cog under it. This will take to the
“Edit the meeting” page. The options here are the same as on the add new meeting
page.
Delete a meeting
To delete a meeting click the “delete” icon underneath it. Please note that we
cannot bring back a deleted meeting and it will need to be added again by you if
deleted in error.
Adding future and past meetings
You add meetings for the future or past in the same way as explained above, you just
need to change the year in the “date” box. For future dates, this will add a new tab
to the “please select a year you to view” from the dropdown.
Please be aware that when adding meetings to a future or previous year, when you
click save changes you will be taken to the minutes for the current year, not the year
that you have just entered. You will need to select the appropriate year from the
drop down box at the top of the page and press submit.
Meetings cont...
Edit Delete Add New
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If you are a larger council, you might have our committees component on your
committee/meetings page. In this guide we will refer to the page with the committee
component as the “committee page” and the individual meeting pages for the
committees as the “meetings page”.
Add Committee
To add a new committee, you need to click on the “add new” icon just under the
page title. This will bring you to an “add new committee” page where there are a
few fields to fill in:
The only field you need to fill in is the Name.. You can fill in the start and end
times in a 24 hour format. In the short description box you can add details about
the committee that you want to be displayed on the committees page under the
committee name. The “description” box text will appear on the appropriate meeting
page.
Leave the page set to “New Page” and click “Save Changes”. This will add a meetings
page for that committee as a sub page to the committee section. This meeting
page can be edited normally as explained on page 14.
Delete Committee
If you ever do need to delete a committee, there are three steps you need to take.
First, you should delete all meetings listed for the committee on the meetings
page (this will stop them showing up on the upcoming meetings component) Then
you need to click the bin under the committee name on the committee page to
delete the link to that meetings page. Finally, you will need to delete the meetings
page using the page management (page 4).
Edit Committee
You can edit a committee at any time by clicking on the cog underneath the
committee name on the committee page. This will allow you to add a short and long
description and also members of the committee.
Committees
Edit Delete Add New
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Committee Members
To change or add committee members, you will need to go to the committee page
and click the cog under the committee name. On the right of the page there is a
heading that says “Members of this Committee” with a drop down underneath it.
This drop down has the names of any people you have added to the site.
Find the committee member from the drop down and click “Add Member” to add a
new member. You can then use the icons to the left of each member to move them
up and down or delete them from the committee. Clicking the edit icon next to the
member does nothing.
Members added will display on the appropriate meetings page. In this case, my
members would show on the “Full Council” page under the meetings. On this page,
there is a drop down under the members which says “change the component
layout”.
Feel free to experiment with this until you find a layout you like by clicking on the
drop down, selecting a layout and pressing “Change Layout”. If you don’t want any
members to display then delete all members from the “edit the committee” page.
This is better than deleting the whole component as you can change your mind in
the future.
Committees cont...
Edit Delete Add New Up/Down
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This chapter will teach you how to add, manage and delete people from your site.
Adding a person
To add someone new you can click on any “add New” icon on the page. This will take
you to the “Add new person” page with some fields to fill in. You should try to keep
each person consistent with the others by filling in the same fields where you can.
Most of the fields are self explanatory, name, telephone and email for example. With
the address field you can separate lines by adding commas.
For those of you with staff pages or councillors separated by Ward, you may have to
select the right ward/page from the “type” dropdown under the councillor name. It
is always best to check if this drops down or you will lose the person and have to add
them again.
You can add a councillor photo by clicking on “upload file” to the right of the word
“photo”. This will take you to the files in your computer, find the correct photo and
click open. You can also add a register of interests or declarations of interests in the
same way by clicking on the “upload file” button to the right of the word “attached
file”.
The description box doesn’t need to be filled but can be used for councillor bios or to
list committee/outside body membership. When you are done, click save changes
at the bottom of the page.
You may find that not all the information you put in is displaying. This is due to the
layout of the councillors. To change this click on the drop down under the words
“Change the component layout” near the bottom of the page. You can experiment
with changing this layout until you find one you like.
Edit and Delete person
To edit a person you just need to click on the cog under their details. The “Edit the
person “ page is very similar to the “Add new person” page. To delete a person just
click on the delete icon under their details. You will need to contact us if you need to
reorder the list.
People
Edit Delete Add New
Notes and Tips
Replacing and deleting photos and
attached files is the same as replacing
and deleting minutes and agendas.
If you have any problems or aren’t sure about something, please call us on 01392 669497 or send an email to support@visionict.com.
We’re always happy to help and would prefer our customers to be well informed and happy rather than quiet and unsure!
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We use the word “Bricks” to describe the images and text typically on a home page
that link to sub pages. These are used as a navigational tool to direct people quickly
and easily to pages you consider important.
Bricks will look different from site to site. The ones described on this page are ones
you can edit yourself if you have a photo editing software but others may not be as
easily editable. Any bricks that are not easily editable by yourself can be changed by
us if you email in to support@visionict.com.
Editing brick text and link
Easily editable bricks will have a cog under the brick title. Clicking on the cog will
bring up the “edit the brick” page. Clicking on the drop down next to the words
“Link Address- Page” will give you a list of pages on your website that you can link
to. Select the one you need from here. If you want to link to an external website then
you need to select **Other** from the dropdown and paste the URL (for example
https://www.bbc.co.uk/) of the external page in the “Other” field.
Change the words in the “Heading” box to change the main brick text. As always,
when you are happy with your changes, click on the “save changes” button.
Changing Brick Photos
To upload a new photo, you will need to edit a photo to be around 270 x 230 pixels.
Then, click on a cog under any text box on the website. Press on the upload image
button making sure that the image file name does not have any spaces in it and then
onto the folder titled “_BricksBackground”. Now upload the image as you would
normally but don’t click insert. When you are done, click cancel on the insert
image box and the thumbs up on the text box.
Going back to the bricks, click on the cog under the title. When you click on the
“Background Graphic” drop down you should see the name of the image you
added. Press on this and click “Save Changes”.
Changing the number of bricks on your website is something you will need to ask us
to do for you.
Bricks
Insert
Image
Edit
Notes and Tips
The text box on the brick edit page adds
subtext to your brick. This could be used
to let people know you've made updates.
If you have any problems or aren’t sure about something, please call us on 01392 669497 or send an email to support@visionict.com.
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Letting your residents know what’s happening in their community and their council is
integral to good transparency and our easy to read news stories helps you to do this.
Adding a news story
To add a news story, click on the “add new” icon under the page title. The title box
is where you add in the title of the news story. If you have multiple news displays, you
may need to select a “type” from the type drop down to ensure your story ends up
on the correct page. If the only option is “na” then don’t worry, you only have
one news component on the site.
The URL field can be left as “na” unless you would like the news story to open up
directly onto an external site. If you would, then paste the website URL in this box
and skip the instructions regarding the “Description” box.
The published date as a default will be the date that you are writing the news
story on. You can change this by typing in a new date following the format
YYYY-MM-DD.
The short description box should only be one sentence long, enticing people to
click on the full news story. The main bulk of the story should be placed in the
“Description” box. Text can be styled as you normally would and images can be
added here. When you are done, click “save changes”.
News story images
Once your story has been added, click on the “add image” icon under the short
description. Adding and changing images here is the same as on the people
component. You will need to resize the image before adding it onto the site,
though large images will be shrunk automatically to fit. Please avoid uploading
any images that have important text on them (including posters) as they will be
too small to read and inaccessible to those with screen readers. Posters should be
added to the “description” box and have a text alternative nearby.
You can edit a news story by clicking on the cog under the short description and
delete it by clicking on the delete icon.
News Stories
Insert
Image
Edit Delete
Notes and Tips
If you click on the news story
on the editing site, you have the
options to share it on
Twitter or Facebook.
If you have any problems or aren’t sure about something, please call us on 01392 669497 or send an email to support@visionict.com.
We’re always happy to help and would prefer our customers to be well informed and happy rather than quiet and unsure!
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An events page is a good way to advertise to your community which events they can
participate in.
Adding an Event
You can add an event by clicking on the “add new” icon under any event or above
the “search events” box. This will take you to the “Add new event” page.
Fill in the title, start and finish times if appropriate, venue and date of the event.
You also have options to add in a short description (this should be no longer than
10 words and appears under the event details on the event page) and description
boxes. The description box can be used to display a poster or give more details
about speakers, stalls or cost of the event and can be edited like a normal text box.
If you want to link the event directly to an external website, instead of filling in the
description box, you will need to change the dropdown under “Link” to “yes”. You can
then link to a page on your website by selecting one from the “link to page” drop
down or select “**Other**” and then paste the website URL into the “other” text box.
You can also set the event to repeat every “X” number of days by selecting “yes”
from the “Repeat Event” dropdown and filling in the “Repeat every x day” and
“How many repeat event” boxes. When you’re finished press the “save” button at the
bottom of the page.
Editing and Deleting Events
You can edit an event by clicking the cog underneath it. You can delete it by
selecting the delete icon underneath it.
Events Page Options
When you click on the event title (if you didn’t add a URL) it will take you to a page
with text that you put in the description box. If you don’t want the event title to take
you anywhere, you can use the “change component layout” dropdown under the
events to change this. You can also change the number of items you want to display
on the page by typing a number into the “number of items” box and pressing
“change”.
Events
Notes and Tips
Only future events will show
on your events page but you can
use the search events function to
find previously listed events.
Edit Delete Add New
If you have any problems or aren’t sure about something, please call us on 01392 669497 or send an email to support@visionict.com.
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Our planning component makes viewing planning applications easy. We can even
separate them by year if you want.
Adding a planning application
To add a planning application, click the “add new” icon above the first application.
On the “Add Planning item” page, fill in the address, reference number and
description of the application. Then on your county/district council planning page,
find the application by searching with the reference number. Go to the planning
application summary and copy the URL then paste this into the URL box. Click “save
changes” when you are done.
The reference will now link to the application summary and allow your residents to
see more details and comment.
Editing and Deleting a Planning Application
To edit an application, click on the cog under it. To delete the application, click on the
bin icon.
Planning Page Options
You can change the number of applications shown on a page by typing a number in
the “Number of items” box at the bottom of the list and pressing “change”.
You can change the layout by selecting an option from the “Change the component
layout” drop down at the bottom of the list and pressing “change”. “4 Bricks Short”
will display only the address and reference number whereas “4 Bricks” displays the
description as well.
If your applications have the year at the start such as 20/XXXX/FUL then we can
create archive pages for previous years. If you would like this on your website,
please contact our support team.
Planning
Notes and Tips
If you don't fill in the URL box
then clicking on the reference
number will just refresh your
planning page.
Edit Delete Add New
If you have any problems or aren’t sure about something, please call us on 01392 669497 or send an email to support@visionict.com.
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A members area is a page or section that requires a username and password to
view. To set up a members area you need to first create users and permissions, then
create pages and set the permissions for them.
Permissions
You can add different permissions for different pages or you can just have one
permission such as “Member”.
Firstly, you will need to locate the User Management area. This is normally in the
footer but may be in the navigation bar, it is cog next to a button which reads “Log
Out”. Click on the cog and you will be taken to the User Management Settings page.
Click on “Manage Permissions”.
You can see a list of permissions on this page, You can Delete a permission by
clicking the “delete” button next to it or edit it by clicking “edit”. To add a permission,
type in the box to the left of the “Add Permission” button. We’ll use “Member” as an
example in this guide. Click “Add Permission” when you’re done.
Click the back button in your browser or click the cog next to the “Log Out” button to
return to the “Manage Users” page.
Users
On the “Manage Users” page, click the “Add User” text under “Search User Name”.
You need to fill in a Username, Password (with no spaces) and Email Address.
For Permission Level and Access Level, please see below:
• Access and Permission set to “Member“ - Can log in to view and edit
restricted pages
• Access set to “Member”, Permission “NA” - Can log in to view restricted
pages but cannot edit it
• Access “NA”, Permission set to “Member” - Can log in to edit a page that is
viewable to the public
• Access and Permission set to “NA” - Like the public, no editing capabilities
and can view only editable pages
Members Area
Notes and Tips
Where we say “Member” in the users
box, you can substitute in your own
Permission name.
If you have any problems or aren’t sure about something, please call us on 01392 669497 or send an email to support@visionict.com.
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When you have set the access and permissions, click “Save Changes”. You can
delete a user by clicking “Delete” to the left of their name on the “Manage Users”
page or edit them by clicking on their username. You will need to inform the user of
their User Name and Password.
If the User puts in the wrong password too many times and gets locked out of the
account, they will need to ring us to have this unlocked. However, resetting their
password will be your responsibility.
Page Set Up
Now you have your permissions and your users, you need to set up your members
area page. Go to page management via the cog to the far left in the navigation bar.
Either add a new page or click the properties icon to the left of an existing page. You
now have the option to set the Permission and Access Level (as well as renaming
the page and setting its status). Use the instructions below to set up the page:
• Access and Permission set to Member - You have to log in with the correct
permission to view or edit the page
• Access NA, Permission set to Member - The page is visible to all but can only
be edited by a user with the Member Permission
• Access set to Member, Permission set to Admin - You have to log in with the
correct permission to view the page but it can only be edited by the *Admin
• Access NA, Permission set to Admin - This is how most pages are by default.
They can be viewed by the public but can only be edited by the *Admin
When you are done, click on “Save Changes”.
*Admin: The admin is normally the clerk, or whoever logs in to edit the website via the
Vision log in page with the website username and password.
Members Area cont...
Properties
Notes and Tips
Where we say “Member” in the
Access and Permissions, you can
substitute in your own
Permission name.
If you have any problems or aren’t sure about something, please call us on 01392 669497 or send an email to support@visionict.com.
We’re always happy to help and would prefer our customers to be well informed and happy rather than quiet and unsure!
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Carousels are wonderful ways to add visual interest to your website. You may have a
custom carousel which does not look like the one in this guide, in which case, you
will need to send any photos for it to us at support@visionict.com and we will add
them in for you.
Add a Carousel Image
Firstly, you will need to find out how big the photos need to be. To do this, go to any
text box and click the editing cog. Now, click on the “insert image” icon. This will
bring up the Image storage box which stores all of the photos on your website. Click
on the folder named “JCarousel”. In here there will be a subfolder for each carousel
on your website. Click into one of them and click on an image already uploaded.
Looking in the bottom left corner of this box you will see the width and height of the
image in pixels. Make a note of those numbers and click cancel and thumbs up to
close the text box editor.
For this part you will need a photo editing software. Follow the instructions for your
chosen software to edit the photo to the size that you jotted down before and save
them somewhere easy to locate. The image name will need to be descriptive as this
is where the alt text for the image (needed for accessibility) will be taken from.
You can delete carousel images by clicking the box to the left of their name and
clicking the scissors in the top left.
You need to go back to the JCarousel folder (see instructions above). When you’re
in the correct sub folder (you can tell by looking at the images in them), upload the
image as you would normally. Once all images have been uploaded, click cancel
and thumbs up to exit the text box and refresh the page.
Image Order
The order the images show up in on the carousel is dictated by the name. This is by
numerical order then alphabetical order. To change the order that images show up
in, name them before uploading or change the file name by clicking on the pencil to
the right of the image name.
Carousel
Insert
Image
Edit Delete
Notes and Tips
Keep in mind with naming your
images that numbers 10-19 will
show up after number 1 and
before number 2 etc...
If you have any problems or aren’t sure about something, please call us on 01392 669497 or send an email to support@visionict.com.
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Heading images are functionally very similar to carousels except that they are static.
You may find that this page is extremely similar to the previous one but there are
some key differences.
You can change the heading image on a page to another already existing heading
image by clicking the cog above it. This will take you to the “Edit Heading Image
Picture” page where you can pick an existing image from the dropdown and press
“save changes”.
Adding a new heading image
Like for the carousel, to add a new image, you need to find out the image size first by
clicking the cog under any text box and clicking insert image. Now click on the folder
titled “_HeadingImages”.
Here you can see all heading images that have been uploaded already. Click on an
image and look to the bottom left for its width and height in pixels, make a note
of these numbers. While you are here, you can rename an image (this should be
descriptive for alt text) by using the pencil to the right of the image name. Now click
cancel and then thumbs up to exit the text editing box.
For this part you will need to use an image editing software. Crop and resize an
image until its dimensions match the numbers you jotted down earlier. Now go back
to the website and click on the cog above the heading image. To add a new image,
press the “change file” button then find and open your new heading image. Press
“save changes”. The image has now been added to the dropdown but you will notice
the heading photo has not changed.
Click on the cog above the heading image again and select your new photo from
the drop down. Now press “save changes” and you will see your new image.
Deleting heading images
You can delete heading images by pressing on the cog above the heading image,
selecting an image from the dropdown and pressing “remove file”.
Heading Images
Insert
Image
Edit
Notes and Tips
Clicking the bin icon to the bottom
left of a header image will delete
the whole component, not just that
one picture.
Constrain
If you have any problems or aren’t sure about something, please call us on 01392 669497 or send an email to support@visionict.com.
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For councils that want to make a directory, or with a large useful links page, we may
have set up an organisation display. This makes adding new organisations, their
contact details and important information easy.
Adding an organisation
To add an organisation, click on the cog above the first organisation name. This
will bring you to the “Add new organisation” page. Adding an organisation can
look overwhelming at first, but you don’t need to fill every box, they are merely
suggestions. You will most likely want to fill in the organisation name, address, phone
number, email address, website and maybe the contact name.
If you add a post code then the organisation page will display a Google map so that
people can find the organisation easier.
The short description will display underneath the organisation name on the
organisation page. Anything placed in the “Other information” box will show
underneath the contact details on the organisations specific page and can be edited
like a normal text box.
If you have multiple organisation pages, you may need to select a “type” from the
“type” dropdown. We rarely use the “area” dropdown but its a good idea to check
this too just in case.
Editing and deleting an organisation
To edit an organisation, click the editing cog underneath its name. To delete an
organisation, click on the bin icon underneath its name.
Organisation Display
Edit Delete Add New
Notes and Tips
The website URL must have
http:// or https:// at the beginning
or the link wont work.
If you have any problems or aren’t sure about something, please call us on 01392 669497 or send an email to support@visionict.com.
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Photo galleries are a useful component for any page where you have multiple
photos that can’t easily be peppered throughout text. These are especially helpful for
showcasing an event or project.
Depending on when your website was built, you will either have a responsive gallery
or our regular gallery. The responsive one is newer and allows the photo to expand
to its full size when clicked on. However, both work the same way in terms of editing
in this chapter.
Adding Images
There are a couple of ways to add new images to a gallery. The first is by clicking
“upload file”, finding the right image on your computer, clicking on it and clicking
“open”. You will then need to click save changes or click “upload file” to upload
another one. The downside to this method is that you have to upload photos one at
a time, but the advantage is that you can upload larger images this way than with
the next method I’m going to show you.
Like with headers and carousels, we can add images and delete images using
the image store on your site. To do this, go to any text box and click the cog
underneath. Then click “insert image” and find the “_gallery” folder. Within this will
be subfolders that are numbered, these are the gallery id’s. You can find the correct
file by clicking into it and viewing the images. If its incorrect, click the back folder
icon in the top left, if its correct then you can click “upload”. Find the correct images
in your computer. To upload multiple images you can hold down the CTRL button
and click on each image you need or if the images are next to each other, click the
first image, hold down SHIFT and click the last image. This will select all images
between the two you clicked. When you are done click “open”. Then click “cancel”
and the thumbs up to exit the text box.
A few things to note is that images uploaded cannot be larger than 350 KB and
must not have any punctuation in the names (exceptions are . _ -). Further to this,
galleries will only display JPG or PNG files (JPEG files will not show up). If an image
displays in the wrong orientation or as the wrong shape, you will need a photo
editing software to fix it before re-uploading it under a different name.
Gallery
Insert
Image
Back Delete
Notes and Tips
The alt text for the image
will be taken from the file name
so please ensure this is descriptive
for Accessibility.
If you have any problems or aren’t sure about something, please call us on 01392 669497 or send an email to support@visionict.com.
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Deleting Images
To delete images you will need to get back to the folder we used to upload multiple
images. To do this go to a text box, click the cog underneath it, then click on the
“insert image” icon. Click into the “_gallery” folder and select the correct subfolder
(you can tell which one you need by clicking into the folder and viewing the images.
Click the “back folder” to go back).
Click the white check box to the left of the image you want to delete then click on
the “delete” icon to remove it. You can tick multiple boxes to delete multiple
images. Please be sure you want to delete an image before you press the scissor
icon as we cannot reinstate them.
Editing image file name
Not only is image order decided by the file name, it is also used by screen readers
as the alt text for the image. Because of this you need to ensure that the file name
is descriptive, names straight from a camera will not suffice. If you are unable to
rename the photos before uploading the image, you can edit them in the image
store.
Like in the first paragraph under “deleting images” above, you will need to go to the
correct gallery folder. Once you get there, you can click on the “rename” icon to
the right of an image to edit the file name. A box will appear asking you to specify the
new file name. Please type an appropriate name and then click OK. Repeat until all
images have descriptive file names.
When you are done, click cancel and the thumbs up icon to exit the text box.
Responsive Gallery
When images are clicked in the responsive gallery, you can see the full size of the
image. That means if you have uploaded a large image the size will increase but if
the original image is small then it may appear not to change size at all. Currently
this gallery works best in Google Chrome, other browsers may not display as
intended.
Gallery cont...
Insert Rename
Image
Delete
Notes and Tips
The order of images is
decided by the file name and
will display in alphabetical order.
If you have any problems or aren’t sure about something, please call us on 01392 669497 or send an email to support@visionict.com.
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This page can be used as a quick guide to know when you should contact us
on our support email to ask for help editing an area. So which things can only
Vision ICT edit?
• Header - the very top image of the site
• Site colours and fonts - it is best to keep this consistent so we need to change
them across the whole site
• Background image - if applicable
• Some carousels - If your carousel doesn’t look like the one on the appropriate
page of this guide and you cannot find the carousel folder then it is likely
specially coded and new images will need to be sent to support@visionict.com
• Bricks - Likewise if your bricks move, or you cannot see cogs under each one
then these are either graphics which we have the Photoshop file for, or specially
coded.
• People order - Currently councillor and staff order can only be changed by us
• Social media icons - If you want to add, remove or change the link in your
navigation bar social media icons
• Footer - To amend anything in your footer, you will need to contact us
• Adding new components - As we charge extra for certain features, you will need
to request any components you can see in this guide that aren’t in the drop
down of components.
• Large files - If you cannot upload a file due to its size, please send the file to our
support email along with instructions for where to place it. If this is a common
occurrence we may feel the need to set you up with an FTP account which
allows you to bypass upload limits but has a cost
• Forms - We can add and edit forms on the website for bookings and enquiries
as and when needed though this may incur a fee
• Components - Adding any component that isn’t heading text, heading image or
text box
• Emails - Changing the email your contact form is linked to
Areas only Vision ICT can edit
If you have any problems or aren’t sure about something, please call us on 01392 669497 or send an email to support@visionict.com.
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If you still have questions or think you may need some training, we have a few
different options that may help.
Support Site
Our support site is an excellent source of information about emails, accessibility and
your website. We regularly update it with new FAQ’s, training videos and documents
so that you always have access to the latest developments to our websites.
Telephone Training
Sometimes its easier to learn by doing rather than reading. We offer training on the
phone and remotely so you can ask any questions you may still have about your site.
Have one of our members show you on your own website how to do all the editing
you need. For individuals or groups at a time convenient for you. Email support@
visionict.com to arrange a time.
Extra Hands Packages
If you don’t have the time to make updates to the site yourself or just can’t get
the hang of it, you may want to take out one of our extra hands support packages
and pay us to update the site for you. Starting with minutes, agendas and 2 extra
documents quarterly, all the way up to any content at any time, we have packages to
suit councils of every size. Contact us for more information.
Contact Us
And last but not least, we are of course always happy to support you directly via
email or phone on 01392 669497. Please use the details below to get in contact:
• Support enquiries: support@visionict.com
• General enquiries: info@visionict.com
• Accessibility enquiries: accessibility@visionict.com
I still need help, what can I do?