This document provides important and useful information on the various services the AROC website provides to AROC Chapters. Please take a moment to review this guide which will be useful for your chapter.

Most of these new services and features have been designed to be used "self serve" by affiliate chapters officers with no intervention from the AROC webmaster. Of course, if you encounter a problem or if you are not sure about how to do something, don't hesitate to ask ! There is no such thing as a silly question, only silly mistakes made because someone didn't ask! Help is only an email away (webmaster@AROC-USA.org)

This help page / user guide has been provided to help you getting the most out of the AROC website.

Compatibility requirements : the AROC website should work with any recent version of Internet Explorer or Netscape. Older versions will usually work but there are a few known issues with Netscape 4.x which is now completely outdated, please upgrade to the latest version.

The site has been optimized for fast loading and we avoid fancy but often slow Flash animations and Java applets. Some pages use Javascript when needed so Javascript should not have been disabled in your browser.

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Chapter Data and various chapter features are password protected; there is one login per chapter. All services are accessed from a single login page : www.AROC-USA.org/php/index.php

Type in your chapter number (including leading 0 if 1 through 9, ex 04) and your chapter password (no caps), then click on the [Login] button. If successful you will be taken to your chapter Services Menu page.

Retrieving your password :

If you are a chapter officer and do not have your chapter login info, it can be emailed to you automatically. Go to the chapter login page, type in your chapter number and your email address. Click on the [Retrieve] button.

If your email address is among those already listed in the chapter database, the password will be emailed to you immediately. If you are not listed on your chapter page, please check with your chapter as we can not email passwords to affiliate chapter officers not already listed.

Changing your chapter password :

Request for password changes should be emailed by one of the chapter officers to webmaster@AROC-USA.org. Once the password is changed, existing officers will need to retrieve it from the login page. If you are changing the password to prevent a past chapter officer to change any data, make sure this email address is removed from the chapter data page to prevent him from retrieving the new login...

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Once logged in, you will be taken to the chapter Service Menu, the page from which you can access all of the online chapter services. New features will be added to this page along with help pages. After you login, your session will remain active until you logout or close your browser. If you will leave your computer unattended, please make sure that you logout or close all open browser windows.

Select one of the links to access our various services.

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Simply put, there is just no excuse left for your chapter not to have a professional looking website. The new chapter home pages bring all the essential information visitors and members expect to find including annoucement, upcoming events, newsletter, and more. All the information is pulled from the AROC database resulting in always up to date pages.

Best of all, you don't need any special skills or software... all updates are done thru simple online forms.

If your chapter has its own website, you can still use some of the features we offer; combining both will give you maximum flexibility, but if you find it difficult to keep you site up to date, consider at least using the new homepage.

Step 1 : update your chapter data. Login and go to the chapter data update page. Fill in the officer information, contact, etc...

Step 2: Adding content. The most important and visible part of the sites are the annoucement, main text and event information.

The announcement is shown in the top left portion of your home page and should be kept fairly short (a few short paragraphs). Used it to attract attention to upcoming events, meetings, etc...

The main text can be significantly longer and is shown in the main body of your home page. It should include a presentation of your chapter, recent news, etc...

Both are updated from the Chapter Content page

Upcoming event information is shown in the left side of the page, under the annoucement and data is pulled from the main AROC Calendar. All you have to do is add your chapter events to the main AROC calendar; events will automatically be shown on the AROC online calendar AND on your chapter site!

It's easy, just click on the Online Calendar link on your main chapter menu to go to the AROC Calendar page. Click on the Add Event button at the top of the page and fill out the online form.

That's it ! you're done... while it doesn't fully use all the capabilites we offer, your chapter now has a usable website...

Optional Features

Custom text at the top of each page: (contact, calendar, officers, etc...). This is useful as an introduction to your pages, or to refer visitors to additional pages on your own website. For instance, if you already have a past event section on your own site, you can put in text and a link on the Feature page to encourage visitors to visit that page. Or you can add general information about events, contacts, etc... Set your text from the chapter Site Content page, can include basic HTML code for special effect, links or even images...

Home Page Pictures: You can upload two images on your home page from the Chapter Site Content page. One is displayed in the left column in the announcement section, the other one in the main section of the page. Click on Browse buttons to select an image on your computer and upload it to the AROC server (Note that the image must be a JPG or GIF file and should not exceed 100k. Note that your images are resized when they are shown but to reduce page loading speed, you should resize the announcement picture to 250 pixels wide and the main picture to 400 pixels wide before uploading. When saving JPG images, always set compression at 30% to further reduce file size.

Your files will be uploaded when you click on the Submit button at the bottom of the page. It may take a moment to upload the files, please wait for the uploads to complete and the confirmation message.

Image Manager: you can now upload a vitually unlimited number of pictures or graphics to the AROC website and use these images on your website. Example of use include :

• Custom graphics, logos or header bar at the top of your pages. If you want to set up a custom header on your pages, this is where you would upload your logos, etc...
• Small images you may want to embed in the introduction on each page (in the text you set in the chapter site content page)

The Image Manager is accessed from the chapter services main menu. Click on browse button to select a file on your computer, type in an option caption and click on upload button. Image will be uploaded to the AROC server and its thumbnail will be shown in the chapter Image Library section once the page refresh (scroll down).

You can add as many images, logos, etc... as you wish. The full link is shown in the list so that you can copy and paste it in any html tag you may use on your site. A delete Picture link is provided if needed.

 

Notes and Tips:

• Be careful when using background images, make sure that they are very light otherwise your pages will be hard to read.
  
  
• Keep your top header image as narrow as possible to maximize screen space usage. Dont' forget many visitors have their screen size set a 800x600 so if your header is 400 pixels high, there' isn't much space left for content without scrolling...
  
  
• If you do not have a special title graphic as shown above, you can just use text and place your chapter logo on the side (see screenshot to the right)... or without a logo altogether...
  
  
• Using HTML in the various data field: you can add HTML tags in the various data field to add special features such as colors, styles, or even links. An HTML tag is a set of command inserted in the text between arrows that gives instructions to the browser. They always come in pairs, with the affected text in between.
  
  Ex: <b>you can join online</b>, the Bold tag will make this text appear bold. note the / in the second tag to instruct the browser that the text following should no longer be bold.
  
  Common tags:
  • <b>bold <b>
  • <i>italic</i>
  • <font color="#CC0033">red text</font> (see color codes samples)
  • <a href="http://www.yoursite.org/page.htm>click here for details<a/> to include a link to a page on your own website
    
    
    

If you have any question or are not sure about how to format your page, please email webmaster@AROC-USA.org for assistance.

If you want to use your AROC hosted pages as your chapter main site, you probably don't want to deal with the long address like http://www.AROC-USA.org/chapters/main.php?chapter=se79

Instead, we can setup a shortcut like www.aroc-usa.org/chapters/SFAROC or www.aroc-usa.org/chapters/AONE which you can use in promotional material.

much easier to remember... please email webmaster@AROC-USA.org to get this setup.

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Until now, adding articles and stories to your chapter site always meant having to rely on someone to take care of it... You can now upload content to your chapter site without having to wait or learn any new program.

Prepare your article: Most people use MS Word or any word processor, and that's fine. When you are ready to upload your article, save it to a Plain Text file which will remove all formatting, like colors, graphics, etc... Use the File - Save As command the select Text or Plain Text under File Type. Your file will automatically be renamed ending in .txt No other format will be accepted by the uploader.

Important note about MS Word : MS Word uses non standard/plain text compatible single and double quotation ( curly ’ and ” instead of ' and ") which may cause display issues after you upload your file. Try using Wordpad or Notepad to write your articles instead of Word.

Prepare your optional Thumbnail: On your chapter feature page, articles are listed and optional thumbnail image will appear when the visitor's mouse cursor passes over the article title. You can upoad an uptional thubmnail at the same time than you upload your article. Your thumbnail must be 225x168 pixels, use your favorite image software to reduce its size. If you don't have a program, you can download IrfanView, a free program available at www.irfanview.com which will allow you to do most of the image editing your need. Your thumbnail must be saved as JPG file.

Prepare your optional Images: you can now upload as many images as you wish with each article. Pictures are displayed near the top of the article in a slideshow. Your pictures shouldn't be more than 400 pixels wide to leave enough room for the text to flow around them. See above for tips on resizing images.

Link to Gallery (or external image page): you can display additional pictures by providing a link to an image gallery page or to an external page related to your story. After you add images to a AROC-USA.org gallery, go to that image series and copy the link. it will be formatted as follow : http://www.AROC-USA.org/gallery/main.php?Vfnum=900&Vthread=210 . To copy the link, highlight it in the address field in your browser and press CTRL - INS. Then click in the content manager Gallery field, and press SHIFT - INS to paste the address. Make sure you get the link by opening the gallery from your own site so that your site formatting appears. You can also use a link to page located on an external website.

Upload : login and select Content Manager from the chapter services menu. The Content Manager allows you to review and edit articles already uploaded or add new articles.

Scroll down the page to the Article Uploader. Select the article and thumbnail files by clicking on the Browse buttons and fill out the ret of the form. Make sure you enter the date in the YYYY-MM-DD format!. Click on Submit button to save the form and upload the files.

That's it! Your article is automatically added to your home page as well as to the Chapter News section of the AROC-USA library.

Add your Pictures : find your article in your content list and click on Edit link. On the next page, scroll to the bottom to access your article image gallery setup. Click on the browse button to select a file on your computer, type in an option caption and click on upload button. Image will be uploaded to the AROC server and its thumbnail will be shown in the chapter Image Library section once the page refresh (scroll down).

Note that the full URL of uploaded images is shown so that you can copy and paste it in any other location you may need to use them...

Editing Content : The Content Manager allows you to edit the title and author as well as changing your story's thumbnail, pictures and gallery link. To edit an item, click on its edit link, update as needed and click on Update button.

 

 

Chapter Data

resented on the AROC website is updated by the chapters who are responsible for keeping it up to date and accurate. Access to the edit page is password protected using the chapter login info.

The chapter Data page has been enhanced to present more and more information on each chapter, all from a single location. These pages are a mini home page for chapters without their own website. The data is dynamic and pulled from the chapter database whenever a chapter page is requested and also includes live calendar and sanctioned event result information.

Updating Data :

Click on the Update chapter Data link from the chapter Service Menu to open the edit page. Most fields on the page are self explanatory or include notes.

General rules :

Blank Fields : When you do not wish information to appear or if you do not wish to use certain features, leave those fields blank, do not enter comments as "N/A", "see below", etc... Blank fields will not be displayed but comments will be and, in some cases, out of context. For instance, if you leave an image field empty, nothing will be displayed but if you type something like "none", the server will assume that this is a file name and will display a bad image link instead.

Email Addresses : Make sure you enter valid email addresses, do not try to enter two addresses in the same fields even if it fits! These fields are used to email chapter officers and having two addresses in one field will cause the message to bounce.

Preset positions : Always use the preset positions for President, VP, Secretary, Webmaster, Editor, etc... Use the customizable positions only for those your chapter may have which are not included. This will insure that the basic officer positions are properly exported to the AROC directory.

One officer / multiple positions : list the name, phone, email and address for each position; do not put "see above".

Protecting Email addresses: Email addresses are not published on the AROC website and can not be harvested by spammers. Instead, the chapter contact page includes email icons which users can click to send a message directly from the AROC site. They do not see officers email addresses.

Dual President / Vice President :

Some chapters have Co Presidents or two VPs. If this is not your case, just leave the name of the second president or VP empty.

Newsletter :

If your chapter already has its current newsletter online, you can type in the link to the newsletter and to a thumbnail image of its cover (250 pixels wide).

The thumbnail is also used inthe random chapter spotlight on the AROC-USA website so it is important to use this field. If you club doens't publish a newsletter, you can use a screen shot of your club home page, again cropped and resized to 250 pixels wide.

AROC now offers chapters the possibility to upload and archives their newsletter. If you use this service, you dont' have to update the newsletter fields on your data page as the Newsletter Manager will automatically handle the display of the newsletters and provide a thumbnail of your latest issue for the random chapter spotlight.

See Newsletter Manager for details on how to use the Newsletter uploader.

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The AROC website is always open for chapters who wish to submit articles on their events and unlike the Alfa Owner, we do not have any space limitations. This is an important features for chapters which do not have their own website because those articles are now also linked from each chapter page, with thumbnails, again acting as a showcase of a chapter's activity.

Do not hesitate to submit stories, pictures, etc... very often it is just a matter to send in what is already written for your chapter newsletter.

Before joining a chapter, many visitors like to see what that chapter does throughout the year and this is a great way to make them want to join !

Articles submitted by chapters are show :

• on the chapter page / site
• on the AROC-USA.org home page for a limited amount of time
• in the AROC-USA.org archive library

This is excellent publicity for your chapter!

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On Line Newsletter Tip - How to create PDF files :

Adobe Acrobat PDF files are an easy way to make documents available across a number of platforms. The reader is free and easy to install but unfortunately the program needed to generate the files is rather costly.

There is an alternative to this thanks to a pair of shareware programs you can download from the Internet called Ghostscript and Ghostview. The following page contains detailed information on this or you can just download the following files :

Ghostscript 8.11 (code and script) and GSview 4.5 (interface). From both of these pages, click on the link to download the versin you need, usually win32 if you are a windows user.

Details for the technically inclined can be found at www.ghostscript.com or here ...

After you install both files, you need to install the driver to any Postscript printer. You don't need to have the printer, just install the driver from your Windows CD, any postscript driver will do such as the HP Paintjet XL300 postscript. To install the driver, go to your printer folder, choose add Printer and follow the wizard's instructions.

To create your PDF, open your newsletter using the program used to create it ( Publisher, etc... ) and print it using the driver for the postcript printer you just installed. Make sure you click on Print to File; when prompted, type in a file name.

Finally, start Ghostview which you should find in your Program menu and open the .prn file you just created. Choose Convert in the file menu, select pdfwrite as a device with 72 dpi resolution and after clicking on OK , choose a file name to save to. You need to add the .pdf extension manually.

Ghostview will convert your newsletter to a PDF file virtually anyone will be able to open, view or print.

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On Line Newsletter Tip - How to create a thumbnail of the cover :

Open your newsletter in Acrobat and adjust the zoom / view / size so that the entire cover can be seen in the window.

Take a screen shot by holding ALT - SHIFT and pressing the PRT SCRN key. That will create an image of the window and copy it to your clipboard.

Open your favorite image editor and paste the screen shot. Crop the cover, resize it to 250 pixels wide and save it as a jpg image. When you save to a JPG, set the compression level to about 40% to reduce the file size while keeping a good quality level. Some programs calls this Image Quality and if that is the case, set it to about 60%.

If you do not have an image editor installed on your computer, you may want to download Irfanview available as freeware from www.irfanview.com While small and easy to use, it includes features lacking in other programs. One of the best feature is the capability to resize and rename large numbers of images in batches. If you've even taken 50, 60, 100 pictures at a chapter event, you know how long it takes to resize them and rename them manually... IrfanView does it automatically...

 

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A number of pages and services have been setup on the AROC website to be used in affiliate chapter sites and appear to be on their own site with customized graphics blending in the site design. Note that if you do not have your own site but use the chapter site offered by AROC this is automatically setup.

Currently, shared content includes :

Forums : linking to the AROC forums not only gives you access to the complete message database but when the AROC forums are called with your chapter parameter, your chapter forum will automatically be visible in the forum list.

Image Galleries : when called from your website, only entries uploaded by members of your chapter will be displayed. chapter membership is determined by the chapter affiliation selected when a member registers for the forums/classifieds/gallery.

Calendar : note that when calling the calendar from your website only events from your region will be shown unless the visitor changes the display option after the page is loaded. Using the AROC calendar on your website makes it easy to update by any chapter officer. You can include local events which will be visible ONLY from your website. Good for events you don't need to publicize beyond your membership like board meetings, private parties, etc...

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Membership Application

You can either link to these services in a frame if your site uses frames or in a full window.

Linking to the AROC site :

Link to the service home page adding the following parameter to the link ?Vclub=NN where NN is your chapter ID number ( 10, 26, etc... Make sure you use a leading 0 for nrs 1 to 9, ex 04).

examples :
www.AROC-USA.org/forums/index.php?Vclub=10
www.AROC-USA.org/classifieds/index.php?Vclub=05
www.AROC-USA.org/gallery/index.php?Vclub=19
www.AROC-USA.org/calendar/index.php?Vclub=45
etc...

This will automatically force the pages to load with your chapter customized settings. If you do not customize them, the default will be the standard AROC look. All pages called in that section will be loaded with your customization as well.

Customizing your pages :

From your chapter main menu, click on the link to the Forum Customization page. Your chapter configuration will be displayed for you to edit. You can change the page background, text color, as well as the colors of the various cell background. Note that all colors must be entered as a HEX Value ( #FFFFFF, #000000, etc... )

• chapter Home Page : will be used as a link back to your home page when visitors click on home link
• Page background color : color you wish to to use as a background on the forum pages
• Regular Text Color : color for all regular text on the forum pages, used in the TEXT body tag
• Link Color : color for all links except those in colored cells, used in the LINK body tag
• Visited Link Color : color for all links already visited, used in the VLINK body tag
• Dark Cell Link Color : color of all link presented in the main header cells ( dark green cells in AROC config)
• Dark Cell Visited Link Color : color of all Visited Links presented in the main header cells ( dark green cells in AROC config)
• Table Lines Color : Color for all tables bordes ( dark green in AROC Config )
• Light Cells Background colors : color for the background of all side bars and titles ( light green in AROC Config)
• Light Cells Text Colors: Color of all text displayed in the lighter cells
• Dark Cells Background colors : color for the background of all main headers ( dark green in AROC Config)
• Dark Cells Text Colors: Color of all text displayed in the darker cells
• Page Header HTML : block of HTML code used to generate a header, displayed at the top of each forum page. May include logo and navigation links. Make sure you type in the full URL of all graphics incl http://www....
• Page Footer HTML : block of HTML code used to generate a footer, displayed at the bottom of each forum page. Make sure you type in the full URL of all graphics incl http://www....
• Back Ground image : full path to your wallpaper or background image. must include http://www....

After you update the data and click on Submit, the data will be presented again in case you need to edit it. Please use the test link provide to make sure your page displays properly.

 

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The AROC Calendar lets affiliate chapters add new events and update their own events. Events are listed in the main calendar page as well as on your chapter page.

Using the online Calendar saves you time and gives you maximum flexibility to add information about your event. The description field lets you enter as much information as you need and great for directions, schedules, host hotel information, and more! Having your events listed both on your chapter page and one the main AROC calendar page gives your chapter as much exposure as possible because they will be seen by non members who might be interested in participating in an event before joining.

Whenever a new event is added to the AROC on line calendar, an automatic email notification will be sent to other chapters in your region (to the webmaster, editor and main chapter email). Note that when you mark an event as "local" you do not trigger an email notification.

Adding your event :

After clicking on the "Add an Event" link on the main Calendar page, a new page opens with a form. Please fill out all the fields following the formatting instructions shown on the form such as date and link formats. Make sure that you select an event type from the drop down list.

If your chapter is organizing two or more events in one week end, like a Concours and a Rally, please make two separate entries so that each of your event shows when a visitors searches one type or the other.

Make sure that you format the date as shown on the page. Dates must be entered in the YYYY-MM-DD format. Ex: 2004-10-28 or 2004-01-25 Anything else will cause your event not to appear on the calendar.

Local Events :

If you do not want your event to appear on the AROC calendar, mark it as local by placing a check mark in the Local Event box. This will make your event appear on the calendar shown on your website or chapter page but not on the AROC main calendar. No email notifications are sent to regional chapters for local events.

This option is usually used only for activities where you do not need the participation of non members like board meetings or members only parties. Leave it uncheck for event where you want non members to come, including monthly meetings, shows, etc...

Editing / Deleting an Event :

You can only edit your own chapter event and you must have logged in before trying to edit an event.

Click on the small "edit" link under your event date and update the data shown in the form. To completely delete your listing, just click on the Delete button.

You do not need to delete events after they occur, they will automatically be dropped from the calendar 7 days after their date.

File uploads :

You can include a link to a flyer or entry form. If the file is already on the web, simply type or paste the full link in the Flyer/entry form field (must include http://). If your file is not alreaday on the web, you can upload it to the AROC server by selecting the local file using the browse button. Your file must be in PDF, Word or JPG format and will be uploaded when you save the page.

You can also add a picture with your calendar entry, which will be shown on the right side of the page next to your event. If your image is already on the web, just type or pase the full link (including http://) in the image field. If your image is not alreaday on the web, you can upload it to the AROC server by selecting the local file on your computer using the browse button. Your file must be in JPG or GIF format and will be uploaded when you save the page.

Note the maximum image file size is 100k. Even though images will be resized to fit in the column, please size them down to 250pixels wide and compress them before uploading to reduce load time.

Questions :

Should you have any question regarding the online calendar itself, please email webmaster@AROC-USA.org.