How to Update/Create Math Dept Faculty Website

System Requirement:

Latest update of your operating system. Some of you are still using old iMac G4. Just click the apple button on the top left corner and choose software update. Wait until the update is finished. You may have to restart and update your computer several times until no more updates are found.
An up-to-date web browser available for your operating system. Mozilla Firefox is really recommended.
An up-to-date Java plug-in (JRE) available for your operating system. For Mac user, this is done automatically during your software update. However, I have seen that OmniUpdate is acting strange with Java SE 6 64 bit for Mac or Linux. For example: preview and editor do not work properly or you will experience "rotating color wheel of death". In this case, try using Java 5.0 32 bit instead.

Step 1: Get your OmniUpdate username and temporary password.

Contact Alfa Heryudono (by e-mail) to create a directory to store your files, username, and a temporary password. Usually, your username is the same as your UMassd e-mail username.
There is a chance that you already have a directory but you don't have access for that. This is why you need username and password.

Step 2: Login to OmniUpdate to access your directory.

Step 3: Login for the first time

You may see a red pop up dialog saying that your path is invalid. Ignore that. You already login to your account.
Change your temporary password. This can be done by clicking the "Current User:username" link located at the top of the page. Change your temporary password and click submit. Sometimes, Firefox reports an error saying that your password can't be updated. Actually, it will be updated.
In order to go to your directory: click Content tab. Faculty directories will be listed. Click your directory. All your files are located there.
You are now in what is called "Staging server". It is like your own local directory where you create, delete, and upload files. Also, you can create and delete directories. Your files will not be published to the web until you publish it. All published files will be located in "Production Server".

Step 4: Play around with OmniUpdate.

Make yourself comfortable with OmniUpdate. It takes time to get used to it. Note that if you upload pictures, they will go straight to the "Production Server". Therefore, you will not see those files in the "Staging Server". To see your files in the "Production Server", just click the "Production Server" tab.
The most important file should be welcome.cfm. This is the file where visitors access your website. You can easily edit the file with OmniUpdate editor. It is like working in Microsoft Word. Once you are done with editing process, save it, and click publish. If you still want to work on it, just save it without publish it. You can also create other .cfm files easily.
Happy OmniUpdating. You can see the OmniUpdate documentation as well as video tutorial in here.

Notes:

Avoid uploading files that are too large to avoid burden to our server.
Your level permission is level 8. That means, you can only work in your own directory and other directories where you have permission. The highest level is level 10 (the administrator: Nurit Budinsky). The CITS people will also have level 10.
When you login into your directory, it is possible that you have no files at all (because you are new) or all your files are located in the "Production Server." As far as I know, you can't copy files from the "Production Server" to the "Staging Server".
If you like to work on .html files instead of .cfm because the format is too limited then: upload your html files and make a link from welcome.cfm to your html files. I created a standard template .cfm to meet the standard of UMass Dartmouth.
Let me know if you need any help.

Written by Alfa Heryudono.

Email: webdevelopment@umassd.edu - UMass Dartmouth Web Development Team

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