From newsletter_admin at netadventist.org Thu Jun 4 17:15:16 2009 From: newsletter_admin at netadventist.org (NetAdventist Newsletter) Date: Thu, 4 Jun 2009 19:15:16 -0500 Subject: NetAdventist News & Notes - Volume 4, Issue 11 Message-ID: [image: netAdventist newsletter header] *Vol. 4, Issue 11, June 4, 2009 * *In this Issue:* - Customizing Your Robots.txt File in Your *net*Adventist Site - How to Make Good Quality Videos for Your Site - How do I reorder files within a Document Group? *Customizing Your Robots.txt File in Your netAdventist Site * *net*Adventist 3.0 gives you the option to customize your robots.txt file (which talks to Web robots). Web robots are programs that automatically crawl the Web. They have several uses, including indexing Web content for search engines like Google. They are also used for HTML validation, link validation, ?what?s new? monitoring, and mirroring. In addition, spammers use them to scan for email addresses, among other things. Why would you want to customize your robots.txt file? Your robots.txt file tells search engines how to access your site and can request that they do not index specific areas. To make changes to your robots.txt file, click on the *Settings* tab in your *net*Adventist Dashboard. Then select *Web robot files* from the left menu. If you know which Web robots you want to prevent from accessing your site, you can enter them here. Be sure to select *Save*before exiting. To learn more about robots.txt files, click here. *How to Make Good Quality Web Videos* Video clips enliven any Web site, but shooting video that looks good when viewed in a Web browser involves more than just pointing the camera and pressing a button. You have to consider sound, framing, lighting, etc. Whether you want to create a pastoral video greeting for your church home page or a promotional video for your school, here are a few tips to help you in creating good quality videos for your site. - Pay attention to your audio. Good sound quality makes a video more enjoyable. Watch out for background noise, like an air conditioner or highway traffic, as it will drown out dialogue. Make sure your subject is no more than a few feet from the camera. If you're shooting an interview, where clear dialogue is important, be sure to use an external microphone. - If you use music in your video, make sure you have recording rights to do so. - Avoid pans (horizontal movement of the camera) and zooms (focusing in and out) because not only does it look bad on the Internet, but unnecessary movement also slows down the video stream. - Don?t be afraid to use a tripod. This keeps your camera steady. No one wants to feel like they?re on a rollercoaster ride when watching your video. - Pay attention to lighting. Don?t shoot your subject in front of a window or with the sun behind him, unless you want your subject to appear in silhouette; the best light source comes from behind the camera. Don?t ever shoot outside a noontime?the light is too harsh. And make sure your lighting is consistent. For example, if your face is in the sun and your arms are in the shade, it?s going to look weird on camera. - Avoid meaningless background movement, such as trees blowing, fireplaces, traffic, etc., when the primary focus is on a person's face. The background movement will confuse the video compression program and create larger files with weird-looking facial features. - Pay attention to the framing of your subject. When doing an interview, leave a little headroom at the top of the frame. Position your subject a little to the left or right of center and leave nose room to the opposite side. Also, instruct your subject to wear solid, bright colors on camera. No stripes or patterns please. - Keep your video short. No more than two minutes long. People are busy and don?t have time to watch lengthy video clips. - Use FLV (Flash Video) or MP4 for your video file format. Once you?ve created your video for your site, be sure to post it on YouTube as well. It is free publicity for your ministry. In fact, consider creating a video series for YouTube. Then, get extra mileage by making it available through iTunes. By the way, external video players (such as those from Ustream) can also be embeded in the source code of a *net*Adventist content page. This can be an easy way to embed a live stream in your *net*Adventist site, or a way to embed videos you are hosting on another service. *How do I reorder files within a Document Group? * You can change the display order of your files within a Document Group. It?s really as simple as dragging and dropping them into the order you want. This is helpful if you want to arrange your files alphabetically or numerically. To do this, click on the *Website Pages* tab and then click on *Document Groups*. Now select the Document Group you wish to change and click on *Edit *. Scroll down to the bottom where all your files are listed. Put your cursor over them and drag them into the order you wish them to display. Then click *Save*. You can do this with any document collection. [image: netAdventist newsletter header] *www.netadventist.org* *To submit a question or an article idea* for future newsletters, click here to email Nicole Batten. We also encourage you to share your user experiences with us. We may use your story in an upcoming issue. Great ideas and innovative content are meant to be shared! We also encourage you to share links, content, or applications that you think would benefit other *net*Adventist users. *To submit a change of email address* for your own subscription or to unsubscribe, click here.This newsletter is published twice monthly for *net*Adventist users. *Publisher:* Office of Global Technology & Software, General Conference of Seventh-day Adventists *Director: *John Beckett *Editor: *Nicole M. Batten *This e-newsletter is a service of netAdventist and the Office of Global Technology & Software.* -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://lists.netadventist.org/pipermail/newsletter/attachments/20090604/05190e40/attachment.html