Inviting or adding members

Now that you’re past the initial set up (adding profile questions, groups, photo labels and awards) it’s time to get members involved.

EITHER

Invite members: If you want the yeargroup to log in and add their own content. We recommend this option, as it’s a really quick and easy way to collect photos and text.

Add members manually: If you want to add content on behalf of members, and they won’t be logging in. Useful for younger yeargroups.

Share and edit your invitation code, and invite friends via Facebook too.

adding_and_inviting_members_screenshot

You can manage members in the  “Members & groups” tab, and you can promote members to editors if you need to.

 

Adding profile questions, groups, labels and awards

So! Time to get started 🙂

Whether you are inviting your yeargroup to log in and add content, or if you are adding everything on their behalf, it’s a good idea to set a few things up first. Once you have added these, you will be ready to create profile pages.

  • Adding profile questions: Think about how to best represent the fun your yeargroup has had. Ask many individual individual questions (e.g. In Year 7 I was…) or a general question (About me, or Message to the year).
  • Adding profile groups: Add individual form/house groups or one group for the entire year. Add separate profile groups for teachers/staff members.
  • Adding photo labels: Organise your photos with labels. Members can apply the labels to photos they upload, and editors can use labels to filter search results when adding photos to pages.
  • Adding awards: Add award categories and choose from having all members as nominees, or adding a custom list. Members can vote online.

You can add/edit all of the above information from the “Design & manage yearbook” tab.

screenshot_of_design_and_manage_tab

Browser Support

Having problems logging on to the site, or finding things don’t work quite as you expect?  It may be down to the web browser you’re using, have a read below for some pointers.  If you continue to have problems please do get in touch with us – that’s what we’re here for!

We support:
– Chrome, Firefox and Safari (latest versions) on desktop
– most mobile and tablet browsers
– IE10 (released February 2013)
– IE9 (released March 2011)
– IE8 (released March 2009, 4.5 years old) – some of our new features are not supported in IE8
– IE6 and IE7 only if Chrome Frame add-on is installed

We don’t support:
– some of our new features are not supported in IE8
– IE7 (released October 2006, 6 years old)
– IE6 (released August 2001, 11 years old)

We probably support:
– IE11 (but not tested as not yet released for Windows 7)

If you’re using a mobile device have a look here for some more information: https://support.allyearbooks.co.uk/mobileandtablet/

More information:

Windows XP (released October 2001 – 12 years old) does not support IE9+, so people using XP can only upgrade as high as IE8, hence why we mostly support IE8. However, XP is reaching end of life and IE8 is 4.5 years old so really no one should be using XP these days.

Some of you will still be using this though, so we do support it. You can of course install Chrome/Firefox on XP as well, but we often find that schools tend to stick to Internet Explorer.

Chrome Frame is a great solution for schools, particularly if they have to use IE6 or IE7 for one reason or another. This is an add on that effectively lets you use Google Chrome through Internet Explorer. You can download and use it successfully on both IE6 and 7, meaning you should then be able to access our site perfectly normally.  Please speak to your IT department about installing it – perhaps they’d be able to apply it to all computers, and save everyone some time 🙂

If you find any bugs in the system please report them to us – let us know what you were doing, and which browser you were using, and we’ll do our best to fix them up or suggest another solution.

You might find you discover bugs that we haven’t come across yet so please do pass them on to us!

If any IT department would like to talk about any problems please ask them to contact us – Jake (our Managing Director and technical guru) will be happy to discuss the problem with them and hopefully find a solution for you 🙂

Why choose AllYearbooks?

So many reasons to choose AllYearbooks

Quite simply, we’re probably the best yearbook company in every way.

1. Market leading low pricesWhen Jake first started creating yearbooks other companies were charging ridiculously high prices for them. By building a website that did the bulk of the workload for him, Jake was able to take less time per book and hence charge less to you. And as the website develops, we’re able to pass on more and more cost/time savings all the time.
 2. Professional, high-quality books
We cut costs by having a great web-based system, not by providing poor quality books. We’ve spent a lot of time choosing just the right paper and binding options to suit most budgets without sacrificing quality. If you find a company offering cheaper books than us then be aware that they may well have compromised on quality.
3. Fast printing and delivery
You’ll find yearbook companies quoting several months for delivery of their books. This is often because they produce the books in old-fashioned and time-consuming ways. Our books take between 10-17 working days to print and deliver depending on which book style you go for so you can get your hands on the finished product in super-fast time!
4. Advanced online system
This is key to almost all other reasons to go with us. Jake has spent absolutely ages developing a web-based system that enables both you and AllYearbooks to do nearly everything online. It’s revolutionized the way yearbooks can be created, bringing many, many benefits with it. Only a few such systems exist and Jake prides himself on having created one of the best and most appropriate systems for making yearbooks. Our system works very differently to the few created by other yearbook companies so don’t be fooled by poor imitations.
5. Collaborative creation process
Everyone does their bit for the yearbook… online. No fussing around with bits of paper, scanning photos, copying and pasting chunks of text. The yearbook is for the whole year and the whole year can get involved. This is a top reason as to why our system is better than those offered by many of our competitors.

If your whole group makes full use of our online system then all the hard and timeconsuming parts of making your yearbook are a breeze. Rather than a small handful of editors doing absolutely everything, the ‘work’ (which it no longer feels like as it’s so easy) is done in little bits by everyone.

7. Fun and easy to use
Not only is your yearbook a fun keepsake for years to come, but the actual creation process is fun as well – for everyone, not just the editors. It’s also very easy to use and a bit like Facebook, Bebo or MySpace in many ways.

8. Customizable yearboooks
We’re not here to put our own designers’ stamp on your yearbook. Simple, stylish profile pages mean it’s your words and your photos that stand out. Why pick your yearbook’s theme from just a handful when you want something a bit different? You can always design and make your own custom page using common programs such as Word, Publisher, PowerPoint, Photoshop or OpenOffice… it’s up to you.

9. Wide choice of styles and options
Some of our competitors offer one type of book only – for example leather-effect hardback, the most expensive option. We offer a full range of binding styles suited to all budgets.

10. Service with a smile
With us, you won’t be working with one adviser who might not be in the office when you call – you’ll be working with all of us. We’re a small team and whoever picks up the phone or checks the email first will be able to help you. We all try to know about you and your books as best we can. We often manage to reply to your emails within minutes or even seconds and really do take a lot of pride and satisfaction in the work we’re doing for you.

You can find out more about our school and university services, learn about our prices, try an online demo or contact us.

Delivery costs

All of our prices include free shipping to a single address on the UK mainland, or in Northern Ireland.  Unfortunately we cannot provide free shipping elsewhere in the world but we try to keep our prices as reasonable as possible.

For Southern Ireland addresses delivery is £2 per book, for Jersey/Guernsey and the rest of Europe it is £3 per book and for addresses elsewhere in the world it is £5 per book.

Alternatively you are more than welcome to have a courier collect your books from our UK warehouse and arrange onward shipping yourself – just let us know if you plan on doing this so we can remove your delivery charge!

 

Fast-track your yearbooks

In a rush to produce your yearbooks?!

Once the design phase is complete your books will take up to 4 weeks for us to print and deliver. Please contact us for tips and tricks on making this design phase run as smoothly and quickly as possible.

Things that can help speed up the process are:

  • Getting a member of staff on board early to help organise the book and proof read it at the end (we can’t send your books to print until they have done this!)
  • Making sure payments are processed quickly by your Finance contact/department
  • Making sure that members are logging in and filling out their profiles/uploading photos
  • Making sure that we know when and where your delivery and handout will take place – we’re happy to keep an eye on things from this side for you too 🙂
  • Submitting artwork to us as early as possible so you have time to check it

Don’t forget we’re here if you need any advice!

If you’re not sure about how to get things started, or are finding it hard to get people online then get in touch – we want you to enjoy making your books, so ask us to help! :p

Converting files to PDF format

Apple Mac OS X

Apple Mac OS X users can use an in-built PDF converting utility.

You can convert nearly any kind of document into a PDF file. To do so:

  1. Open the document in a Mac OS X application that can read its format, and from the File menu, select Print…
  2. In the print window, click PDF, and then Save as PDF…
  3. Choose a destination, and save the document as a PDF file onto your hard drive.

Microsoft Windows

Microsoft Windows users can ‘Print’ files to PDF using the free primoPDF software. Follow the guide to ensure these files are ready to upload to your yearbook.

  1. Download PrimoPDF and install it.
  2. Open your document as usual and print, choosing PrimoPDF as the printer and click ‘OK’
  3. Choose ‘Prepress’ (no need to change any other options)
  4. Click ‘create PDF’

Once converted to PDF, first check the file looks as intended before uploading it into your online yearbook.

IMPORTANT: Please ensure you do choose ‘Prepress’ as above as otherwise the quality of your output PDF may not be high enough for printing. We also recommend opening the PDF and zooming in to around 300% as this gives an idea of the quality when printed.

Alternatively (Microsoft Office 2007 only), you may download the ‘Save as PDF’ plugin here: http://tinyurl.com/office07pdf. When using the ‘Save as PDF’ dialog, click the ‘Options’ button and check the ‘ISO 19005-1 compliant’ box. This will embed any custom fonts you’ve used in the file – exactly what our site needs.

Background transparency from Photoshop
Are you exporting artwork as PDF from Photoshop and finding that you can’t change the background using our website? That’s probably because Photoshop has saved the PDF with a white rather than transparent background (often due to saving it with a ‘PDF/X-xxx’ setting). Here’s how to fix it…

  • hide any background layer you currently have in case it’s not already hidden
  • File -> save as
  • choose a name and tick ‘as a copy’
  • don’t worry too much about the other options
  • click ‘save’
  • on ‘save adobe PDF’ options page…
  • choose ‘adobe PDF preset’ of ‘[High Quality Print]’
  • untick the ‘option’ of ‘Preserve Photoshop Editing Capabilities’
  • click ‘save PDF’

To be sure, you can open this PDF in Photoshop to ensure it has a transparent rather than white background before uploading it to our site (using the ‘Custom pages’ tab).

Web-app developer: code task

Below are details of how to apply for this web-dev job.

In a system, files often need to be fetched or processed asynchronously. Given a prepare_file function, which takes a path and a callback, write a process_files function which takes an array of paths, applies prepare_file to each element, and returns the array of results to a provided callback. The result array should be in the same order as the input array.

Below is a function stub for prepare_file, which simulates an asynchronous task for processing the provided path, and returning the result. (The actual prepare_file function implementation should be considered a black box when implementing process_files.)

      function prepare_file(path, callback) {
       setTimeout(function () {
         callback(path + "_found");
       }, 1000*Math.random());
      };

Example use of prepare_file:

      prepare_file('a', function (path) {
       // path should equal 'a_found'
      });

Example use of process_files:

      process_files(['a', 'b', 'c'], function (paths) {
       // paths should equal ['a_found', 'b_found', 'c_found']
      });

Answers may be in JavaScript or CoffeeScript and should assume the presence of a global prepare_file function (you can use the prepare_file stub above for testing your solution). You shouldn’t use any other libraries.

What next?

Send your answer to the task by email to jobs at allyearbooks.co.uk along with a cover letter, CV and/or anything that might impress us.
You can also call Jake on 07791 068 122 to discuss your application.

Web-app developer job, Cambridge

Want to be part of a small, friendly team located in the centre of Cambridge (UK)? We employ exceptional people to help us create the very best yearbook product and service for our customers. We lead the market with our technical innovations and dedication to a high standard of quality.

We’re located on Mill Road in central Cambridge, a ten minute walk from the station and 15 minutes from the town centre.

Web-app developer: permanent, full-time, £COMPETITIVE

We’re looking to grow our small development team who are working on an exciting single-page HTML5 web-app which uses JavaScript on both the client and server.

You’ll be working primarily in CoffeeScript, using Node.js on the server and with the help of Backbone.js and jQuery for the desktop-client interface. You’ll be using PostgreSQL and Redis datastores and connecting our client(s) with a RESTful API. You’ll also be using the HTML5 canvas API.

Ideally you also some experience with general server setup and operation (DevOps) as well as HTML/CSS/jQuery interface construction. Node.js C++ extension development would also be useful.

Sound like you? To apply, we have a short task for you to complete.

Yearbook options

Yearbook cover options

We have four main options for your yearbooks this year.

Our standard laminated hardback is the default option for your book.  The covers are high quality, full colour front and rear, and can be used for books from 40-300 pages.

We also have a couple of premium upgrades available for you to choose from for that extra special finish. Our premium laminated hardback includes front cover engraving (as well as other great features) and is the same as our information pack -please get in touch with your address if you’d like a free copy and live in the UK!  Alternatively you can choose our premium leatherette hardback which is exactly the same but using a leather type material instead of the glossy laminate.

The fourth and final option, and new for this year, is our stitch-folded paperback  🙂 Available as a 40 page B5 book, this is a great option for those of you working to a tight budget.