VP CMS User guide
Introduction:
The Vibrant Pulse CMS is a simple to use editor that allows you to upload and delete photos or graphics and update your website's content. It will not allow you to modify crucial areas of your website that would affect performance (ie Template). Changes to the template can be done by contacting Vibrant Pulse.
This guide is to be used with the standard VPCMS. Extra Web Apps will not be included in this guide and are provided separately.
Some definitions:
WYSIWYG - Text Editor used within the VP CMS
VP CMS - Vibrant Pulse Content Management System
URL - Website Address
Services menu - The sidebar menu
Footer menu - The menu at the bottom of the website
SEO - Search Engine Optimisation and it is advised we do this for you
404 errors - An error that occurs when you try to access a page of your website that is not there.
Login
- In the address bar, type in your URL followed by /admin.php
(eg: http://www.yourwebsite.com/admin.php) - Enter your username and password as provided to you by Vibrant Pulse
- Click login
- When you login, you will be taken directly to the "list pages" page of the CMS
In the event you have forgotten your username or password, please contact Vibrant Pulse from the registered email address and/or telephone number.
The control panel menu
The menu you see on the CMS admin screen.
- List Pages - This is the first page you will see when you login. It allows for you to sort menu orders, publish and unpublish pages from the services menu and footer menu. This is also where you can see the date the page was last edited and access the "edit page" screen.
- Add Page - The option you click to add a page of content to your website. For example, you may want to launch a new service type where this option is needed. See editing a page to see how to use this option.
- Image manager - The area of the website where you can upload and delete images used within the content. Depending on your website, you may have several options in this area but the principle remains the same.
- List News Items - The area of the website where you can see all the news items you have made on your website if this option is enabled.
- Add News Item - The option you click to add a news item to your website.
Editing a page
All * items may or may not be visible
- Before you start, make sure you have resized any photographs and uploaded them to the image manager.
- Click the List Pages option in the control panel menu.
- Click the page title you want to edit, this will bring up the edit page screen with the following options to fill out.
- Current File Name* - This option is to show the link extension of the current page (eg http://www.yoursite.com/current-file-name). This cannot be edited.
- New File Name* - This option should not be touched unless under special circumstances like a spelling error. Reason for this is that you could damage your search engine positions on old pages. Please check the availability to make sure you do not overwrite an existing page.
- Menu Name - This area can be filled out to show the current menu name as shown in the Footer Menu and Services Menu.
- Meta Title* - Used for SEO and can be edited but advised to leave this to Vibrant Pulse.
- Link Title* - Used again for SEO and is the box that appears when you hover over the link on the front end of your website
- Meta Keywords* - Used for SEO
- Meta Description* - Used for SEO
- Header Text - Used in some cases as individual headings for each page. If left blank then this area is not used within your website template.
- Show in services menu - Select Yes or No to tell the page to appear as a menu link within the services menu.
- Publish this page - Select Yes or No to tell the website to show this page in menu links. The page is still accessible from any links you may have to it elsewhere on-site or off-site to that page. You cannot delete pages to reduce the risk of damaging search engine page positions with 404 errors.
- Display Order* - This field is not editable but shows the order position in your list pages screen.
- Page Contents - This is using the WYSIWYG editor. You can use this to type and change content on the page. Read on for a fuller explanation of the WYSIWYG
- Images available for use - This is where you can left click and drag the images you have uploaded into the General folder of the image manager to be used upon your website page. Read WYSIWYG Editor to see how to resize etc.
After you have made the changes you want to make, click save below the WYSIWYG editor.
WYSIWYG Editor
This is perhaps the most complex area of the website. It allows for control of content and styling on your website pages. We have listed the most common functions though with exploration, you can do a lot more.
- Bold, Italic and Underline Words - Left Click and drag the cursor over the words you want to BOLD then click the "B" button on the top row of the WYSIWYG Editor just like in Word. To Italic, press the "I" button and "U" button to underline.
- Link Words and Pictures - Highlight the word(s) you want to link, right click on the highlighted words and press "Insert Link". Destination is the page link you want to link to (copy and paste this from the address bar of the page you want to link to). Link title should also be filled in to be a short 3 word max description of the page you are linking to. Click insert to finish. To unlink a link then highlight the link, right click and press "Unlink". This is the same process by right clicking a picture you wish to link from.
- Alignment of Text and Images - You can tell text and images to align to the Left, Centre or Right align. Highlight the text or click the image you want to align, right click and select the alignment you want. With images, make sure that when you drag the image onto the page, you place the image at the beginning of the paragraph.
The Image Manager
Depending on the website you have, you will notice some variation in this section but the principle remains the same.
To upload images or remove them from your website, you need to go to image manager. The image manager is split into 2 sections, one for uploading images, one for deleting images.
- Uploading images - Make sure the images you are uploading are RGB (as standard) and less than 1mb in size. The larger the image, the longer it will take to upload, eat into your server resources and the longer it will be to download making the user experience slow and unpleasant. As standard, you will get errors if the images are too big or the wrong format, this will not break the website.
To upload an image, click browse, this will pop up a box that will allow you to select your image(s). Once you have selected the images you want to upload, select from the drop down box the folder you want to upload them to. The general folder is the default folder and will allow you to use the images within the content. You may have other options like "Gallery" that will allow your images to go to specific areas of your website. Customised image managers will be explained to you depending on your bespoke solution. - Deleting Images - To remove images from your website, make sure you remove them completely from pages first. To remove an image, you press the "check box" to tick the image. You can see from the file path which Folder the image resides in and see the image from the thumbnails. To remove the images, click the button named "Remove Selected Images".
The images should now be removed.
List Pages Screen
This screen allows you to control menu orders and publication of pages. You can tick the "cross" and "ticks" and direction arrows to control pages.
- Menu Item Column - This is the way you control the services menu of your site, by default, the pages like Home Page, Contact and About will be unpublished from this menu area.
- Visible item Column - This column controls if any menu links are shown (excluding hard coded menu items). This controls the footer menu items also.
- Order Column - You can control the order of the services menu items from clicking them up and down in the ordered list.