Guidelines for Committee and Unit participation
WLA Web Site
Prepared by the Publications Ad Hoc Sub-committee on the WLA Web
Pete Gilbert, Nancy McClements, Barbara Kelly
The WLA web site will provide the means to create links to basic
information about each WLA committee and unit.
Committees and units may choose to submit brief information to the WLA
Webmaster for
inclusion on the WLA site, or they may choose to create a committee or unit
home page
separate from the WLA site. The guidelines will differ depending on which
approach a committee or unit chooses to take. There will be no commercial
advertising on the committee and unit websites.
If a committee or unit wants to have their basic information
included on the WLA
site:
- Creation of the basic text of the information about a particular
committee or unit will be the responsibility of the committee or unit itself.
- Text for inclusion on the WLA web site must be submitted to the WLA
Webmaster, and must meet the following guidelines:
- Total length should not exceed approximately one typewritten page.
Consider the content to be comparable to what would be included in a small,
threefold brochure.
- The preferred submission format is ASCII text, either by email or on
an MS-DOS formatted
diskette. If someone from the committee or unit knows how to do html
markup, submitting
marked up text would facilitate the process. The WLA webmaster may edit
the page to conform with other pages. Formatting will be done according to
standardized page layout developed for the WLA web site. Committee or unit
volunteers
working on this project may wish to consult with the WLA webmaster to
determine the most efficient method for submission of data.
- Submissions may be in hard copy, but it should be noted that this may
slow the process of getting information on the web site, and that elaborate
formatting may not be duplicatable when conversion to html is done.
- Committees or units should submit descriptive information that is not
subject to
frequent change. It is encouraged, though, that a committee or unit
include the name,
and contact information such as email address or telephone number for the
current chair or entire Board. All submissions should include: name of
the committee or unit,
description of the committee or unit's functions and major activities, date of
submission or latest update, affiliation with WLA.
- Submissions should allow for two weeks lead time.
- Information submitted may be of interest to a broader audience than
just the committee or unit membership.
If a committee or unit wishes to establish its own Web
site:
- Storage of the committee or unit's web site would be the
responsibility of the
committee or unit. All creation, updates and maintenance of the site
should be handled
by committee or unit representatives.
- Committees or units which choose to maintain their own site have more
flexibility
than those who want their information included on the WLA site. They may,
for instance, choose to include more current and changable information such
as current year officers, conference themes, etc.
- The committee or unit should designate a person in charge of its web
site. That
person should communicate with the WLA webmaster to insure that links from
the WLA main site remain active.
- Committees and units should follow these basic standards and
guidelines for their pages:
- Content
- Name of the committee or unit on the home page
- Name, address, and email address of the contact person on the home page
- A link to the WLA home page with logo and standard statement (provided
by WLA) on the home page
- Date of the last update on every page
- Copyright statement on every page, reading: (copyright 19__ Wisconsin
Library Association)
- Design
- Keep pages short and simple
- Provide warnings when large documents may be loaded
- Avoid very large graphics, or large quantities of small ones
- Committees and units should develop a "style sheet" for their pages to
maintain
consistency
- Use special tags, e.g. bold, italics, blinking, etc. sparingly
- Provide alternative text for all graphics
- Avoid browswer-specific tags
- Procedural/Technical
- Create a plan on how revisions will take place (a schedule for
updating, who will do, etc.)
- Spell-check and proofread all documents before mounting
- Create source code that is readable by future (human) maintainers (for
example, liberal use of line breaks and white space in the source
documents, comment lines, etc.)
- Test your pages with real users and multiple browsers, both graphical
and text-only
revised: 18 - Mar -1997