WebDev Archives - Occupy Toronto

BuddyPress layout is Up… & What’s YOUR Vision for this website going forward?

Occupy Toronto 04 January 2012 by Michael Holloway I think we want to create something I don’t think I’ve seen anywhere else — essentially we want a Blog, a Forum and a Wiki — all in one place. At the last web development meeting on January 3, 2012, we agreed to fire up the new BuddyPress software that will enable many of the functionalities I talked about in my last post on this (29/Dec/11- http://occupyto.org/2011/12/whats-up-at-the-web-development-team/). By the weekend (07/Jan/12) Committee ‘Group Pages’ should be up for the General Assembly and 16 active Committees the WebDEV team is aware of. Each Group page in the new BuddyPress layout has it’s own Forum and Blog space. The front page of the OccupyTO website will be a listing of most recent posts and comments from all 17 group pages. We’ve decided, as a starting place, to mirror the www.nycga.net site – but soon, many features not on the the New York City General Assembly site will be rolled out here – stay tuned… We’ve also decided that instead of playing god developer – we would ask YOU, the users what YOU want out of the new site! Bev Leroux has some ideas… ( Comment from Bev Leroux, 16 December 2011 on the occupyto.org post “Welcome Back! Please Excuse the mess…” http://occupyto.org/2011/12/hello-world/#comment-5 ) “I really hope this site is going to be interactive and user friendly. Where one can comment on posts and post ideas, opinions and announcements. “I hope it will gather all of the various committees and working groups, activities and future plans, announcements and requests for assistance–all under one big umbrella. “Please let it be the go-to place for all Occupy Toronto needs and activities. “Right now, most of the communication takes place on Facebook and I have heard a lot of people say they don’t even follow Occupy on Facebook. So what does that mean for communication? It means there’s a huge information gap and a great deal of mis- and dis-information floating around. “Let’s get a central virtual online hub for all activity. That’s doable even if we are failing, so far, to find a long-term physical home. “Let me know if there is any way I can help to make this happen. “Love you all… in solidarity Bev “PS: From my own experience, the chat portion of Livestream is a very sad place and definitely unqualified as a communication tool.” ——————— Thanks Bev. Nicely said. “Mari” said, ‘Love the new site so far! I wish I could make technology work instead or just posting things on it! lol…Keep up the good work.’ Thanks Mari. Bang-on in my opinion. The www is a 2 way conversation, an interactive collaboration space, and an old school broadcast portal. Please leave more feed back in comments … and please remember, this is Day 1 of the New BuddyPress layout — we’re just learning all the in’s and out’s too! :] mh...

What’s up at the Web Development Team?

Occupy Toronto 29 December 2011 by Michael Holloway As the Web Development Committee continues to rebuild our ‘hacked-to-death’ website, we’re trying to better understand what Occupy Toronto looks like – so we can build a web site that reflects it well. One of the ways we’re doing this is to create a ‘schematic’ of OccupyToronto: An Image of “Building a Schematic of Occupy Toronto” See it Live: http://bit.ly/SchematicOccupyTO The Doc was made with Google’s new, ‘Presentation’ application – it’s a live schematic of Occupy Toronto that’s updating daily as we get new info. All links are in blue and underlined – have a look. If you have any new info to contribute, please comment in this Google Groups thread: “Building a Schematic of Occupy Toronto” – http://groups.google.com/group/occupy-toronto-web-development/browse_frm/thread/600b0ae71c2f6092?hl=en A brief synopsis of 5 WebDEV meetings The Committee met face to face on December 13, 2011 at The Imperial Pub (minutes) – and then online on December 15th (minutes), and December 19 (minutes). We tried to meet on December 27 online (notes), but we didn’t have a quorum. Tonight – December 29,2011 – we held another meeting in Google Hangout (minutes). The next meeting is on January 3, 2012 – 9pm in Google+ “Hangout” (see below to register and attend). What’s Coming Up? The new site will have pages for all the Committees and sub-committees – with links to them through ‘Tabs’ just under the site’s Header. Forums, like Facebook, will be up for General Conversation – and also perhaps on individual Committee Pages – where anyone can comment just by signing up with an email. To make the forums as democratic as possible, a ‘Rotten Tomatoes’, ‘Digg’ or ‘Reddit’ style ‘Vote up’ / ‘Vote down’ system is being investigated. To make the communication portals useful as well as interesting, you’ll be able to switch your ‘View’ in any of the forums: see ‘Everything‘, or only ‘Official‘ Occupy Toronto posts (Blogs and Event postings from Committees, Sub-committees, and Action Groups). The holidays have interrupted our progress a little bit – but I think Committee Pages will be up soon – including one for the General Assembly. At tonight’s meeting we decided, as a stop-gap, to add an RSS feed option to the front page that will link to the General Assembly Minutes. Currently they are being posted at a Google Group – this is the feed address the new RSS Button will link to – https://groups.google.com/group/occupytorontogaminutes/feeds ). Soon we will have the software installed to create all the Committee Pages. Inside those pages will be spaces for Meeting Minutes – and much more. Also, you may have noticed that the “Living Schedule” (a live spreadsheet) is now a Live Google Calendar that updates daily. All Occupy Toronto Meetings, Announcements and Events can be found there – many with links to outside web pages. Access it through the “Calendar” link, just under the Header on the front page. Happy New Year! Michael Holloway WebDEV Committee OccupyToronto Author ———— Want to attend the next WebDEV meeting? (10/01/12 Google+ Hangout – 9pm) Leave a comment at this link: https://groups.google.com/group/occupy-toronto-web-development/browse_frm/thread/bb0a4451178f73ae?hl=en I will build a email list and when the Google+ “Hangout” is created, I’ll send out a call. (People who wish to attend should set up a Google+ account prior to the meeting – if you have a gmail account, you’re already on Google+ … while in gmail, just click on the furthest left tab labeled, “Google+“.)...