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Current Version: Wednesday, 19-Jul-06 18:43:53 PDT
What is going on with the website?
If you have visited the website recently, you will have noticed the website's new look and feel. Such a drastic change does not happen frequently but was done this time around to introduce a more intuitive and expandable navigation structure, allow the website to become managed by subgroups, and make it easier for Kilohana members to find relevant information quickly. This FAQ will hopefully address any questions you may have about the site.
What are quicklinks?
Quicklinks are links on the right panel of a webpage that will allow you to visit webpages that are of immediate interest to the reader. For example, when the Crab Feed was ongoing, every page in www.kilohanaocc.org had a quicklink that directed you to the Crab Feed page. Now that the Crab Feed is over, the quicklink is gone.
Can I still pay my dues using Paypal?
Yes.
Is it true that I can get the most recent current flow forecast for Redwood City?
Check out the Practice Info page and click on "Directions to RWC" then Bay Area Current Map.
Will this help my time trial time?
It will help you understand how the current affects your canoe. Naturally, if everyone takes advantage of the current and you don't...uh...
Also check out the wind map, weather forecast and tide tables. Lastly, if you are late for practice, check out the traffic report page.
Where can I find old pictures of Archie Bie?
Our picture page has been revamped. You can go here to see our latest photos and videos.
I found errors in some of the pages. Who do I contact?
Email me. If the problem is small, I should be able to make the appropriate changes within a day (usually a lot sooner). If it is big...uh...Bernie made me write it. :)
How often are news articles added to the website?
The website is typically updated within 24 hours of a major event that the club is tracking. For example, we announced the all hands meeting the day it was published. Pictures from the crab feed started appearing on the website even before the crab feed was over. Such updates are necessary because of the time sensitive nature of some of the news articles.
Can we advertise on the website?
Definitely! While the club has not defined advertising policies for the site, we currently support a scrolling banner that can be used to display various advertisements to our reading audience. Please contact the webmaster if you are interested in putting your ad on the site.
How can I contribute to website development? What are the major ongoing projects?
A big reason for the website's existence is to serve as a news service for our ohana and prospective paddlers. A news service can only exist if it receives a constant stream of well-written, balanced and timely articles that represent Kilohana properly.
Events that need coverage include:
- All races that Kilohana participates in. Check the
race schedule
for dates and location.
- All preseason long distance races.
- All upcoming Kilohana regattas
- All out of town races by Kilohana members racing under the Kilohana banner
- All Kilohana non-paddling events including club luaus, novice days, corporate challenges and all-hands meetings.
- Workdays
Articles must be positive in tone since we strive to keep our website upbeat. Ideally, the article should come with pictures. No knowledge of HTML is necessary since, as part of the final editing process, I will strip an article of all HTML tags and presentation, edit for grammar errors, and retag the article to make it conform to the website's uniform look and feel, and neutral writing style.
If you would like to submit an article, please let me know which event you want to cover and I'll put you down for that day and follow up with you before and after the event
Kilohana's website is currently going through a fairly significant technological change with its adoption of PHP and MySQL in the backend.
If you are comfortable with HTML, CSS, XML, XSLT, databases and server side scripting (aka PHP) and would like to contribute to a unique Kilohana endeavor, please contact me and I can walk you through the work that is being done. If you are really curious, you can try and find the set of pages that are in fact PHP. If you find them, tell me how you think they are generated.
Do you have a list of specific projects you plan to work on?
Here is a list of well-compartmentalized projects that I will be targeting in the next few months together with their scope.
- Kilohana canoe history and genealogy. 2-3 weeks of writing, research and picture-taking. Some HTML is needed because we need to determine how best to present our canoe history. Even better if we can use Macromedia FLASH. [Current status]
- NCOCA race history. 4-5 weeks of data mangling, schema manipulation, and a lot of web usability design work. This project has been largely completed. We just need to load data for 1999-2004 plus new regatta results for 2006 and beyond. [Current status]
- Kilohana picture submission and presentation system. 2-3 months of part time but very rewarding work. To complete this project, you need to create a system for streamlining the submission, reduction and presentation of pictures submitted to us by Kilohana's rabid photojournalists. This project has been completed. [Current status]
- Online Kilostore. 1-2 months. This is an e-commerce trial balloon. Given our experience with Paypal, I imagine the majority of the challenge will be in making the e-commerce site self-managing - i.e., it should be trivial for someone running the Kilostore to use the online Kilostore to manage the store's inventory and fulfill orders.
- Training Page. 1-2 months of writing, research, pictures, etc. This website will become a repository of outrigger training advice. Topics like ama-flying, steering, reading tides and currents, safety, wave-riding, etc. will be addressed. This project is ongoing but is nearing completion. [Current Status]