Planit Purple Version 2.0
March 20, 2008
Phase 2 of PlanIt Purple focused on user requested features as well as specific bug fixes. Additionally, minor usability improvements were made. The delivery date was met on February 27th and all features were deployed to the PlanIt Purple production server.
1. Bugs that were resolved
- Event Export did not import into Meeting Maker.
- In the Add Event form, the Contact Someone Else area displayed a scroll bar in Internet Explorer.
- On the Edit Event form, the audience fields would reorder themselves at random.
- On the Add Event form, an event was entered as 12:00 PM, but was saved in the database as 12:00 AM.
- On the main PlanIt Purple page, selecting either month or year would not change the calendar if a user did not also click on a specific day.
- XML database queries to the server caused latency.
2. Improvements Added:
- On the Edit and Add forms, typing a full name into the state field truncated to the first two letters (I.E. "Texas" truncated to "Te"). A drop-down menu with state abbreviations was added to avoid confusion.
- On the Edit and Add forms, the zip code field would accept any alpha-numeric value. Zip code validation has been added to accept only numeric characters or a hyphen.
- On the event detail screen, the "Send this event to" field would accept any alpha-numeric value. Email validation has been added.
- On the event detail screen, the "Send this event to" field allows multiple email addresses, but it was unclear what separator would be successful. Logic was added to replace expected separators (such as a space, semi-colon, or colon) with a comma. Unexpected separators trigger the email validation warning message.
- On the main PlanIt Purple home page, event display was limited by a specific number per page. Event display now lists an entire day's events on one page. When there are fewer than 25 events per day, multiple days will appear on the same page.
- The location of the 'Add to Schedule' button was confusing. The location was changed.
- On the calendar management screen, phone numbers could be entered in various formats or characters. Phone validation was added as well as logic to auto format all phone numbers to a specific format.
3. Features Added
Drawing from suggestions from users like you, the Office of Web Communications, in the Department of University Relations, has rebuilt the University's online events calendar. Here are just a few of the improvements we made based on users' suggestions:- Delete Calendar access was added to the Web Communications administrative interface.
- Statistics were added to the Web Communications administrative interface.
- ASG was granted special access through the interface to administer student calendars.
- On the calendar management screen, the ability to use a text-based events search was added.
- The ability to save, view, and modify XML feeds was added to the dashboard.
- XML feeds now generate a fixed url, eliminating the need to change the url with every calendar addition or deletion.
- The ability to save, view, and modify a HTML calendar was incorporated with the XML Builder Tool.
- A "submit to observer" checkbox was added to the add and edit event forms.
- Observer was granted special access through the interface to select events for publication.
- A "add to student events email" checkbox was added to the add and edit event forms for student calendars.
- A 'Send me the Student Events' link was added to the ASG administration screen.
4. Feedback
The upgrades we've made to PlanIt Purple were a direct result of feedback we received from users like you. We're committed to continuous improvement of the system -- which means we continue to need your feedback.
Visit the PlanIt Purple home page and give us your feedback. Tell us what you think of what we've done so far, and what features you'd like to see in the future!
Questions?
email: planitpurple@northwestern.edu
phone: (847) 491-4870
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PlanIt Purple Team
Northwestern University
Office of Web Communications
Department of University Relations
620 Lincoln St.
Evanston, IL 60208
planitpurple@northwestern.edu
(847) 491-4870
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