Working with the Approval System


For Contribute Web sites managed by a small number of individuals, the person who makes the changes often decides whether the altered page is ready to be published or notand if so, publishes it. As organizations grow in size, the content contributor updating the site is often separate from the individual clicking the Publish button. It's not uncommon for the Contribute users in a department to consist of one manager with publishing privileges and one or more assistants who handle the workload; when a job is done, the new draft is sent to the manager to review and potentially publish. In larger organizations, there are likely to be several layers of review: a writer might make the initial update to a page and then pass it to a copy editor, who will look it over for proper grammar and sense; when the copy editor is satisfied, the draft is passed to a manager for final approval. The larger the organizationand the more important the Web site is to the bottom linethe more levels of approval are likely.

Luckily, Contribute has a built-in approval system that handles it all. As you've seen, every role has a publish option. If the publish option is enabled, users in that role have both Publish and Send for Review buttons in Contribute's Edit mode; if the option is disabled, those users only have the Send for Review button. What happens when the Send for Review button is clicked? Here's a typical scenario:

  1. Wally Writer makes changes to a page and then selects Send for Review.

  2. The Send for Review dialog box displays a list of users with two options: send a link to a temporarily published draft via email to someone, or send the draft to one or more users for review.

  3. Wally chooses to send the draft to his immediate superior, Pat Publish. In a note area, Wally describes the changes made to the page and then sends the page for review.

  4. The next time Pat opens Contribute, a note informs her that she has a new draft to review. The draft from Wally is listed in her Pages panel.

  5. Pat opens the page and reviews the description of changes. After looking over the page, she makes a change in the order of sentences and publishes the page.

The draft might just as easily be sent with more suggested changes back to the writerwho, when ready, sends it back to the publisher for another round of review. Throughout the entire process, a history of the draft is maintained and accessible at any point.

Another key feature in Contribute's approval system is the Draft Console. The Draft Console, available from a link between the Pages panel and the How Do I panel, displays information about three different types of drafts: drafts the user has chosen to work on, drafts the user has received to review, and drafts the user has sent for review. Click any hyperlinked draft listed to open that page in the Contribute browser.

To demonstrate the approval process and help you understand the options available, you'll start in the role of the Writer, who has no publishing privileges and must send the draft for review.

1.

In Dreamweaver's Files panel, expand the report folder and select annual_report.htm. Click Put; when Dreamweaver asks whether you want to include dependent files, click Yes.

2.

Switch to Contribute and select Edit > My Connections; when the dialog box opens, highlight the Publishing Services server and click Disable. Click Enable. In the Log in to Publishing Services dialog box, enter wwriter in the Username field and write in the password field. Click OK. Click Close to dismiss the My Connections dialog box.

When you switch users in this way, no immediate change is evident. You won't notice a difference until you begin to edit a page.

3.

Select Choose; when the Choose File on Website dialog box opens, expand first the file root, if necessary, and then expand the report folder. Select annual_report.htm and click OK to open the file for browsing. Choose Edit Page.

Note that in this role, there is no option to publish the page, either as a button or in the menu system: Those in the Writer's role can only edit pages and send them for review.

4.

To the main heading, Bounty General: We're Here for You, add a hyphen and then thefollowing text: Year In and Year Out. Place your cursor in the Meeting Challenges subheadingand choose Heading 2 from the Style menu. Click Send for Review. In the Send for Review dialog box, select Pat Publish from the list of users. In the Description of Changes area, add the following text: Added new clause to headline and changed subheading to right style. Leave the "Notify recipients through e-mail" option unchecked and click Send. When Contribute acknowledges that your draft has been sent, click OK.

When the Send for Review button is selected, a list of available users appears. A draft document can be sent to one or more individuals or to all members of a role group. You can also opt to send an email notification that a draft is coming; however, Contribute handles the notification chores quite well, so (to my mind) the email notification is redundant. On the other hand, some users may find being notified by email a helpful reminder.

After immediately sending the draft, the user has the option to pull it back by clicking Undo Send. An area at the bottom of the page reminds the user of who the draft was sent to, as well as offering an option to see the Draft History. You'll investigate the Draft History later; to see what a sent draft looks like, you'll need to switch to another user.

NOTE

If you're working through the lessons in this book in order, you'll need to first reassign the user Pat Publish to a different role.

5.

Select Edit > Administer > Website. In the Users and Roles category, if Pat Publish is listed under the HR Manager role, select that user's name and click Reassign; when the Reassign dialog box opens, select Publisher and click OK. Click Close to dismiss the Administer Website dialog box. Choose Edit > My Connections. In the My Connections dialog box, select the Publishing Services server entry and click Disable. Click Enable to reestablish a connection. When the Log in to Publishing Services dialog box appears, enter ppublish in the Username field and publish in the Password field. Make sure that the Remember Password option is checked and click OK. After the role in the My Connections dialog box changes to Publisher, click Close.

To get the full effect of what another user sees, it's best to enter Contribute from a fresh start.

6.

Choose File > Exit to close Contribute; when it's fully closed, restart Contribute. When the program launches, an alert opens to inform you that a new draft to be reviewed has been received; click OK to acknowledge the message. From the Pages panel, find the draft to review, as indicated by the arrow-and-page icon; click Annual Report to open it for evaluation and possible editing. Review the note in the lower-right portion of the page sent along with the draft.

Sometimes the changes made are not immediately obvious, even with review notes. Contribute provides a method to view the currently published page to help you pinpoint the modifications.

7.

From the message bar at the top of the page, click Click Here to view the current page in your system browser. After comparing the two pages, close your browser. Click Send for Review; when the dialog box opens, make sure that the option "Send the draft to another Contribute user" is selected. Choose your name (in the Administrator role) and enter the following text in the Description of Changes area: The picture is too close to the textplease adjust and publish. Click Send; when the message confirms that your review has been sent, click OK.

Users in Publisher roles have an additional option when they send a page for review. If the "Send e-mail with a link to the preview of this draft" option is chosen, Contribute publishes the draft to a temporary folder on the site and generates an email message with a link to that draft. After the draft has been published, the temporary file is removed.

For the final leg of the approval service journey, you'll don your Administrator's hat.

8.

Choose Edit > My Connections and, in the My Connections dialog box, select the Publishing Services server entry; click Disable. When you see the red slash through both the Publishing Services server and the Design_Deploy site, click Enable. In the Log in to Publishing Services dialog box, enter your user name in the Username field and designdeploy in the Password field; click OK. After the role in the My Connections dialog box changes to Administrator, click Close.

Again, to better experience another user's role, you'll close and restart Contribute. This time, however, you'll investigate another route to your assigned drafts: the Draft Console.

9.

Choose File > Exit to close Contribute; when it's fully closed, restart Contribute. When the program launches, an alert is displayed to inform you that a new draft to be reviewed has been received; click OK to acknowledge the message. At the bottom of the Pages panel, click Draft Console. When the Draft Console appears, click the Annual Report entry under the Drafts to Review section. When the page opens, read the Description note and choose File > Actions > Edit Page Source in External Application.

The Draft Console is a very handy central location for checking the status of various drafts. You can view any of the noted pages by just clicking the hyperlink.

To handle the requested change properly, you'll need to complete the edit in Dreamweaver. The right way to adjust the spacing around an image is to use Cascading Style Sheets (CSS).

10.

In Dreamweaver's CSS Styles panel, expand the <style> entry (if necessary) and select the bg_ct.css file. Click New CSS Style; when the dialog box opens, change the Selector Type option to Class and enter .leftImage in the Name field. Click OK. When the CSS Style Definition dialog box opens, switch to the Box category. Deselect the Margin Same for All option and enter 8 pixels in the Right field; click OK. Select the image of the mother and baby and, from the Property inspector's Class list, choose leftImage. Choose File > Save All to store both the HTML and CSS files; select File > Close All to complete the operation in Dreamweaver.

Remember that there's no need to Put the files sent to Dreamweaver from Contribute: All you have to do is save them and return to Contribute. Once you've done so, it's a good idea to check the draft history and see whether any other changes are needed.

NOTE

There seems to be a problem with Contribute not recognizing changes in dependent files, such as external CSS, when returning from editing in Dreamweaver. I find that if you open the page for editing in Contribute, the files are handled correctly. If the CSS in this exercise is stil not appropriately updated, return to Dreamweaver and Put the bg_ct.css file from the css folder to the remote site.

11.

In Contribute, click Edit with Contribute to reopen the page and verify the CSS change. When Contribute reminds you to close the files in the external application, click OK. Select Draft History at the bottom of the page. In the Draft History area of the dialog box, select each entry to review the comments in the Description of Changes area; click Close when you're done. Click Publish; if you receive a congratulations message from Contribute, click OK.

Larger organizations depend on a clear division of labor to efficiently tackle their workload. Contribute's approval system helps users focus on their particular tasks while keeping the decision to publish where it's needed.



Design and Deploy Websites with Macromedia Dreamweaver MX 2004 and Contribute 3(c) Training from the Source
Design and Deploy Websites with Macromedia Dreamweaver MX 2004 and Contribute 3: Training from the Source
ISBN: 032128884X
EAN: 2147483647
Year: 2006
Pages: 130
Authors: Joseph Lowery

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