This page will lead you to resources to help you use the Collage web publishing system. In addition to the resources listed below, Collage provides an extensive, context-sensitive Help system that you can access from the Help link in the top, right corner of every Collage window.
1. Collage Reference Guide
Most questions about performing general tasks in Collage can be answered by the Collage Reference Guide, usually distributed during Collage training sessions. The Guide provides an overview of how to navigate around Collage, create, modify, and publish web pages, and work with the site structure. Use this link to download a PDF version of the Collage Reference Guide. (BC username and password required) (1.76 mb)
2. Tips List
For more specific questions, the Collage team has compiled a running list of tips that are not answered in the Collage Reference Guide, but occur regularly. Please see below.
- How do I get Collage Training?
- How do I get a new line without a blank line before it?
- How do I get a non-breaking space?
- How do I fix the error “HTTP Status 404 - Asset (-1) could not be found in database”?
- What causes Internet Explorer to crash with the error: Application Error: The instruction at "0x0bbab0c5" referenced memory memory at "0x00000034"?
- Why does my deployed page still have an old link that I changed?
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How do I create anchor links? (Links that direct a user to a specific part of the page)
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How do I remove the border around an image? (The BC site design automatically creates a small border around every image)
If you would like to attend a Collage group training session, you can find the next session and sign up for training on the ITS Training Calendar. Be sure to request access to your organization's site before you sign up for training.
- To upload images (jpg or gif) or documents such as Acrobat PDF files, begin in the Content Contribution view.
- Navigate to the appropriate folder (jpg, gif, pdf, etc.) within the meta-elements folder of your site that matches the type of file you are uploading.
- Click the Upload button on the toolbar.
- Click Add Files.
- Browse to the file you want to upload and select it. Click OK.
- Click Upload.
- Be sure to approve the file before you deploy it to the production server (BC public web site - www.bc.edu). You don't need to approve it to deploy it to the webwork test server.
To update an existing image or PDF, you can upload a new version, and you won't need to update links or references to the file.
- Edit the image or PDF file and save it on your computer with exactly the same name as the file you want to replace (and the same dimensions if it is an image).
- In Collage, navigate to the folder (within meta-elements) that contains the file you want to replace.
- Select the file and click the Upload button on the toolbar. hide
- Click the Browse button and browse to the new version of the file on your computer.
- Select the file and click Open.
- Click OK.
- Verify that the new version is correct and approve it.
When you want to create child pages for a page that has no children, you first need to create a Child Pages folder to hold these pages. The naming of this folder is important. The folder name must exactly match the name of the parent page (without the file extension).
Example: if your existing parent page is named "programs.xml" you make a folder named "programs"
Here's how:
- Get into Content > Contribution view.
- Navigate to the folder than contains your parent page.
- Click the New Folder button.
- Fill out the dialog box. The name field should contain the name of you new folder that must match the parent page's name without the extension. Set the Folder Type menu to "Child Pages Folder". The description field is optional and can be left blank for folders (or leave yourself and others a brief note on what should go in this folder). Click OK.
- Your folder should now exist in your file/folder list (if not, use the refresh link to get a revised list).
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Click on the name of your new folder to open it. You can now make one or more child pages for your parent page in this folder. Instructions for making new pages are found in the Collage Reference Guide, but the basics are: Click the New Document button, give your new page a name and a description (required: this description shows up in search engines!), then start adding your content in the page edit window that appears.
There is always an extra line after a paragraph in a Web document. To eliminate an extra line after a paragraph: press [Shift] and [Enter] together at the end of the paragraph.
Note that when you you use [Shift] + [Enter] keyboard combination after a paragraph, both lines of text will have the same style/formatting. When you only press unter the [Enter] key after a paragraph, you can format the paragraphs with different styles.
If a certain string of text was too long, a normal space would split the string and have it continue on the next line, while a non-breaking space would keep it on the same line.
To insert a space character that doesn't cause that type of line break: Press [Ctrl] + [Shift] + [Space]
Site Structure, Folder Names and Folder Hierarchy
When you add new pages to your site or rearrange the hierarchy of your site structure, you need to make sure the folder structure stays in sync. For example, if you have an about.xml page and it’s the parent page of contact.xml, then contact.xml should be directly below about.xml in the site structure and the page contact.xml should be located in a folder called “about”. If your site structure and folder structure are not in sync, you will get the error “HTTP Status 404 - Asset (-1) could not be found in database” when you try to use the left navigation in Collage preview. To fix it, you can either adjust the site structure or rearrange files and folders to match.
Also make sure that the file name and asset name of the parent page (e.g. about.xml) match the name of the folder that contains the children pages (about). Remember too that all file names should be in lowercase and relatively short.
Moving Assets in Site Structure
If you get an error message saying "Could Not Move Node: Illegal Move," when you are moving nodes (pages) around within the site structure, it is because you are clicking on the node you have already selected to move. You need to click on the blue arrow of another node, either to the left or right of where you want the selected node to move.
In the example below, you are moving the "sample" page so that it appears above the "Hours" page in the left navigation.
- Select the "sample" node by putting a check mark in its check box, and make sure that no other nodes are selected at the same time.
- Move your cursor over the yellow box of the "Hours" node until you see a blue arrow.
- Click on the arrow in the bottom left corner of the "Hours" node.
IE Crashes with the error: Application Error: The instruction at "0x0bbab0c5" referenced memory memory at "0x00000034"
This is usually caused by a conflict between Collage and one or more installed browser extensions. To test if this is the cause of your browser crashes, in IE, open Tools | Internet Options | Advanced. Under the Browsing section, uncheck the option that says "Enable third party browser extensions". You will need to restart IE for the change to take effect. If the problem no longer happens, then there is a conflict between Collage and one or more installed browser extensions. (Third party browser extensions include things like the MSN toolbar, Google toolbar, etc.) You will need to remove or disable them one at a time until you find the one causing the problem.
Like most things in Collage, new and changed external links links need to be approved before they will deploy to the production web server. To approve links:
- Get into the Content > Deploy Folders view.
- Open the System folder, then open the Links folder within it.
- At the top right of your screen set the Filter pulldown menu to: "Needs Approval"
- All the links now showing need approval. We recommend you approve them all even if they are not links you created or changed. We think all links should be approved automatically and are hoping Collage will someday eliminate this step. Meanwhile we can all help each other by approving all unapproved links when we find them. Select all the links using the box at the top left of the list and the Approve button on the button bar (or on the More menu at the end of the bar). (If you only have one or two you can also just click the "check mark" icon in the far right column of the link list for each link.)
- Set the Filter menu back to "All" (otherwise as you start moving to other folders you'll only see items that need approval).
- Deploy the pages that have the changed links in the normal ways. The updated links should now appear in the pages.
Anchor Links
To create an anchor:
- Put your cursor in the spot where you want to create the anchor.
- Click the Anchor button in the toolbar.
- Select Insert/Edit Anchor.
- Give the Anchor a name (no spaces).
- Click OK.
To create a link to an anchor:
- Select the text where you want to create the link.
- Click on the Link button on the toolbar.
- Create the link as follows:
- If the anchor is on the same page, click on the Current Page tab and select the anchor.
- If the anchor is on another page, find the page under the Internal tab and select it. Then click on the Local Anchors button and select the anchor from the pull-down anchor menu.
- Click OK.
- Note: keep reading the section immediately below on how to hide your anchors in for finished page.
Hiding Anchors Showing As Underlines in Pages
This is a new bug in Collage and we are working with Serena to get it fixed. Meanwhile here is a workaround.
- Click in the content panel so that the toolbar becomes active.
- Click the Anchor button and choose Hide/Show Anchors to hide the anchors.
- Don't save with the Save button. Instead hit the Preview tab.
- You should be prompted to save. Use the "Yes" button to save your changes.
- The page previews with invisible anchors and now you can exit the page.
Forwarding links in left navigation
First make any edits to the Collage page, since it will be tricky to edit it after the later steps.
Even though the page will be appearing only momentarily, you should make sure the content is up to date, and there should be a link to the external page, just in case the forwarding doesn't work.
- Go to the Metadata of the page.
- Make sure Hide Page in Left Nav is set to No.
- Paste the following code in the Head Code field: <meta http-equiv="Refresh" content="0; URL=http://www.bc.edu/REST-OF-URL">
- Change the URL part of the code to match the URL that you want the page to forward to, as in the following example: <meta http-equiv="Refresh" content="0; URL=http://www.bc.edu/schools/cas/webology/faculty/alphabetical/joesmith.html">
- Save the page, and approve it. Once you deploy the pages to Webwork, the forwarding should work when you click on the link in the left nav for this page.
Now here's the catch. Once you've done this, it's tricky to edit the page. If you try to edit it in Collage, it forwards you to the other page. Here's what you have to do to get back in:
- Start from the Contribution view under Content.
- Select the file and click the Metadata button on the toolbar.
- Select all the code in the Head Code field and choose Cut (Ctrl-X on Windows).
- Click OK. You can now make edits to the page.
- When you’re done making edits, you can paste the forwarding code back into the Head Code field to restore the forwarding URL.
- From the Collage login page (before you log in), click on the gray triangle.
- Click on Options & Components.
- Click on System Checks.
- Click on Classic UI. This will check to see if your system has the correct setup for Collage (browser, java, ActiveX).
Recommended Browsers and Versions
In general we recommend the Internet Explorer browser for Windows users and the Firefox browser for Mac users. Since browsers change frequently the newest version of a browser may not always work with Collage. Collage may need to be updated to work with newly released browser versions and it takes Serena and ITS time to test new versions and schedule updates to Collage. Here are the current recommended browser versions:
Windows: Internet Explorer version 6 on XP or version 7 on Vista
Mac: Firefox version 2.0.0.3 - NOTE: at the moment the newest versions of Firefox do not work with Collage. Use the links below to download the listed versions (save the installer on your computer, quit Firefox then find and doubleclick the installer file to run it).
Mac Firefox version 2.0.0.3
Make sure you set Firefox not to automatically download and install updates (under Tools/Options). Collage does not work correctly with Firefox version 3 on either Mac or Windows. In particular, you are unble to upload files using this version of the browser.
Update Java to Latest Supported Version
Note: these instructions assume you have an older version. If you have a newer version, see the next section below on Rolling Back to an older version.
For Windows users:
- Go to http://java.sun.com/j2se/1.4.2/download.html.
- Select the "Download J2SE JRE" in the middle of the page. Note: There are other downloads available, be sure to select the JRE (Java Runtime Environment) download.
- Select "Windows Offline Installation, Multi-language". This will download a file called "j2re-1_4_2_13-windows-i586-p.exe".
- Run the downloaded file.
- Choose to do a "Typical" installation.
- When the installation is complete, restart your machine.
For Mac users:
- Go to http://www.apple.com/support/downloads/j2se50release4intel.html.
- Click on the Download link in the Download Details box.
Rolling Back to an OlderVersion of Java VM
Note: the instructions above assume you have an older version and need to install a newer version. If instead you need to "rollback" from a newer version and you are on Windows, you should first uninstall any newer versions using the Add or Remove Programs control panel that you reach from the Windows Start menu then install the correct version for Collage. If you are on Macintosh and have a newer version of Java, contact your TC for assistance because rolling back to an older version of Java is quite complicated.
To verify your installation or to find out what version you currently have installed, go to http://www.java.com/en/download/installed.jsp and click on "Verify Installation".
Normally when you first log into Collage, it prompts you to run an application from Serena (the manufacturer of Collage) which installs an ActiveX component that drives pull-down menus and other features. (See pages 6-7 of the Collage Reference Guide.)
If Collage does not prompt you to run this download, it's probably either because you don’t have admin privileges on the computer, or because of settings in the browser (or both). Try this procedure:
- Log into the computer with admin access. You may need to contact your Technology Consultant for help with this.
- Log into Collage and open a page for editing.
- Collage should prompt for installing the ActiveX component. If so, follow the procedure in the Reference Guide, and you will then be all set to work in Collage.
- If you still are not prompted to install ActiveX, check the security settings on the browser, and if necessary, temporarily change the ActiveX settings to allow prompting for downloads. In Internet Explorer, you select Tools/Internet Options/Security/Custom Level.
- Log out and log back in to Collage, and return to step 3.
- Restore the previous security settings when done.
Once ActiveX is installed, you won’t need to run this procedure again.
By default, images on the BC web site appear with a small border around them. Setting border=0 will not remove it. To display the image without a border, you set the class to "original." In the image dialog box when you create or edit an image, you just enter "original" (without the quotation marks) in the Class field. If the image has transparent areas, the "original" class will also allows those areas to appear transparent on the page and the background color will show through.
Sometimes Collage creates empty folders. This usually occurs if you create an incorrect link ending in a slash (/). These empty folders remain even after you correct the links. To see if it is safe to delete a folder, do the following:
- First open the folder to make sure it is empty.
- Select the folder and click on Properties on the toolbar.
- Click on the Information tab. This shows what pages currently link to the folder.
- If one or more pages link to the folder, those are incorrect links. Edit the pages to correct the links, and approve the pages.
- If no pages link to the folder, you can delete the folder.
- If you try to delete the folder and Collage warns you that pages still link to it, you may have neglected to approve your changes. Approve the pages you updated and try deleting the folder again.
If you have an image that does not fit correctly on a page, you will need to resize it in an image editing program. For example, if you have a photograph that is 1000 pixels wide by 800 pixels high, it will not fit within a page.
Note: It might seem easy to resize the image by dragging its borders in the Collage editing view, or by changing the height and width, either in the Collage image dialog box, or in the HTML source code. However, either of these methods is likely to cause the image to be appear distorted or in poor resolution, and should be avoided. Instead you should edit the image itself as follows:
- Save a copy of the image to your computer. (Windows users can right-click on the image when previewing the page and select Save Picture As.)
- Use an outside image editing program, such as Photoshop, Fireworks, Windows Picture Manager, or iPhoto (Macintosh) to edit the image. Resize and/or crop it to the dimensions you need. If you don't have any image editing software on your computer, you should be able to crop and resize your image at Snipshot: http://snipshot.com/
- Give it a new filename. (You could add the dimensions to the original filename, such as photo_100x100.)
- Upload the modified image to the appropriate folder within Collage (usually meta-elements/jpg).
- Open the page on which the image appears for editing.
- Select the image and click the Image button on the toolbar.
- Select the new version of the image that you resized. It should now appear with the correct dimensions.
- Make sure to approve both the page and the image before deploying.
The standard fonts for the BC web sites are defined in cascading styles sheets (CSS). You won't be able to duplicate the look by choosing fonts and sizes from the toolbar. Instead, you need to remove any font information already specified (often from the source from which the text was copied). The easiest way to do this is usually to select the text and click the Clear Formatting link at the bottom right corner of the editing window. (If the selected text includes bold or italic formatting, that will also be removed and you will need to reapply it.)
Since a large amount of extraneous formatting and code comes along when you copy text directly from Microsoft Word to Collage, we recommend that you copy from Word to a text editor (such as Notepad) first, and then copy the plain text from the editor into Collage.
When you start typing new text in a Collage page, the font may appear smaller than the standard font. Once you press Enter to end the paragraph, it should change to the standard size. If not, select the text and click on the Styles button of the toolbar, then select Normal.
There are three standard BC heading styles available from the Styles button of the toolbar. This is what they look like:
BC Heading 1
BC Heading 2
BC Heading 3
These styles are used for section subheads within the content panel. We recommend BC Heading 2 for the first level of subheads and BC Heading 3 if you need a second level of subheads. If you think you need three levels of subheads we don't recommend that you add BC Heading 1. In general if you think you need three levels, your page is probably too long and you should consider splitting it into multiple pages.
Once you have set some text to a style there is no easy way to "undo" that change (Clear formatting or click a different style will not work). You're best bet is probably to delete the text and retype it as long as it is only a few words. If you are comfortable working in the source code view you can find the text and remove the <H#></H#> tags around it.
The content area on a standard Template #1 (single column) page is 540 pixels.
Be sure that any fixed-width elements are narrower than 540 pixels, for example,
photos, tables, form fields. If two or more fixed-width elements need to sit side by side, be sure the sum of their widths is less than 540 pixels. If you preview a page and the content area lands below the left navigation column, that is a sign that something in the content area is too wide.
Security Information
Collage now runs under https, which provides additional security for user credentials. When previewing a page in the Collage environment users will be prompted with the following dialog box.
Please click "YES" when presented with this dialog box.
If a deployment fails or changes you made do not show up as expected after you run a deployment, here some things to check:
- Did you check in and approve all the assets that you modified? Images, PDFs, links (more about approving links), and site structure changes all require separate approvals. Remember that when you deploy to Webwork, Collage publishes the latest version of the assets you publish, but when you publish to Production, only the latest approved version is published. For example, if a document has nine versions and the eighth one has been approved, version 9 will be published to Webwork but version 8 will be published to Production.
- Did you include everything you changed? If you run a selected assets deployment after you make changes that involve images or PDFs, for example, you will need to include them in the assets you select for deployment. If you made changes that affect the left navigation, you will need to republish all the affected pages in order for the changes to appear.
- Did you choose the correct deploy map? If you have access to more than one deploy map, make sure you chose the correct one for the server you want to publish to (Production or Webwork) and for the site that includes the pages you changed.
- Did you refresh your browser when checking the changes? Depending on your settings, your browser may cache copies of the pages you visit. If you viewed a page on the live site before changing it in Collage and republishing it, you may still see the old version of the page when you first check on it after deployment. Click the Refresh button to see the current version of the page.
- Did you select "Only fatal errors"? Remember to change the "Deploy termination error level" from "Loss of data errors" to "Only fatal errors." Otherwise the deployment may stop as soon as it encounters minor errors and your pages won't be deployed.
- Did you run a changed assets deployment? We currently recommend against running changed asset deployments. While it's a convenient way to publish everything that has changed since the last deployment, occasionally these deployments get stuck on the "Impact Analysis" step and may take more than an hour to run. If this happens, don't send more deployments until the first one has cleared. You can delete it, which may speed the process a little, but it could still take more than an hour to clear. Instead, we recommend using either selected assets (using the Advanced button) if you have made relatively few changes, or a full deployment if you have made many changes.
Checking the Errors Reported link can sometimes give you a clue about why your deployment didn't work (although deployments sometimes work fine even when there are errors reported).
Deployments can be set to occur automatically on a schedule, such as once a day during the evening hours. The advantage to this approach is that you don't need to run a deployment manually whenever you update a page. You can make the changes, approve the page, and your updates will be published to the production server overnight. If you have urgent changes, you can always still run a manual deployment to publish your updates immediately. If you have a full deployment scheduled to run daily, you just need to make sure you don't approve changes until you are ready for them to appear on the site. To request a scheduled deployment for your site, contact collagehelp@bc.edu.
3. Further Help
If neither the Collage Reference Guide or Tips List answer your question, please email us at collagehelp@bc.edu.
Last Update: 2/10/2008
Test: 2008.6.8 - 7:27 AM - JONeill