News Queue

This is a page is about how news gets posted for www.osgeo.org. It is currently partly out of date, and does not reflect changes related to the new Drupal platform.

= News Editor = News for osgeo.org goes through a news editor that ensures some degree of consistency and appropriateness. Currently the news editor is Frank Warmerdam with backup editor Jo Walsh. The News function is a function of the Website Committee, though it is normally handled by the news editors.

= Submitting News =

Email new news items to [mailto:news_item@osgeo.org news_item@osgeo.org]. This goes to the news editors. Projects, committees or other interested parties can submit a news item to that mailing list. Then the editor (or if they are unavailable, the backup editor) would take care of formatting the item for consistency and putting it on the news page. Community visible details on submitting are documented at:

https://www.osgeo.org/content/news/submit_news.html

It might also be reasonable for the news mailing list to be "subscribed" to an email feed from the various project announcement do-hickies, but I'm not really sure if they produce email or if this is worthwhile since the announce feature isn't currently much used.

On occation the news editors may also post items based on stuff they see happening without explicit direction, though this isn't the main task of the editor.

What's on the News Queue
On The News Queue - notes on what is coming up.

= Mechanics of Posting =

CVS Repository
To get data out of the www project CVS repository, visit https://www.osgeo.org/servlets/ProjectHome as a logged-in user. The CVS links and instructions appear on the left. You need "project developer" role/privileges to be able to commit changes. Talk to the Website Committee members / chair about this if you are keen and/or desperate for access.

News Items
New news items go into www/content/news/news_archive/news_archive.html in the www project CVS repository. Please use similar styling to what is there (h3 headers for item, include date). HTML is currently constructed by hand. If the item is going to be very long, a separate HTML file should be created in the news_archive subdirectory, and the addition to news_archive.html would be a summary with a link.

Periodically items should be moved from Current News to Archived News. I imagine anything older than 2 months should no longer be consider current.

The news item should also be posted via the Announce mechanism. Roughly the same HTML used in news_archive.html should be suitable for use here.

A clean plain text version of the announcement should be sent to the announce@mail.osgeo.org mailing list if the news item is significant (we aim to keep announcements down to 2-3 per week on the announce list). Please ensure that these emails follow good email styling. Less than 80 characters per line, plain text (no html!), formatted for easy reading as text, spell out urls fully with http prefixes so that url detecting email programs can turn them into followable links. Use the title of the item as the title of the email. Using your own email address as the From: is fine, but remove any personal "signature" from the email.

Event Items
New events should be added to www/content/news/event_archive/event_archive.html in the www project CVS repository. Please use similar styling to what is there.

Please move events that are in the past down to the Past Events section.

While missing now (July/2006) it is intended that events should include a link to a VisCom wiki page about the OSGeo presence there, so that folks can help man the booth, etc.

Generally speaking we should only be listing events that OSGeo will appear at in some fashion, or that are especially pertinent to our mission.

Events can also be Announced though I'm not sure what the best timing for that would be.

Developer Spotlights
Developer spotlights currently live in www/content/spotlights in the www.osgeo.org project's CVS repository. These aren't strictly the news editors reponsibility at this time (as far as I know).

= VisCom Press Releases =

Some effort should also be made to ensure that any VisCom press releases make it into the news stream, and vice versa that major announcements are proposed to viscom as press releases. (need to link to viscom pr page...)