"How Do I....." on NavyDads

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Permalink Reply by NavyDads Admin (Paul) on July 30, 2009 at 11:49pm

Your Profile Page

You can change many aspects of your profile page by clicking Settings on the main page- as shown below by the red arrow.

That will take you the a default page that allows you to select what aspect of your profile you want to change. There are four main areas that are selected by clicking the vertical tabs on the left side of the page. The default order is Profile, Privacy, Email and My Page. Profile should open first. On this page you can change things such as your name, your answers to profile questions, etc.. There is also a tab on the bottom of this page that you can click to Leave NavyDads (gasp!) if you no longer want to be a member. Naturally we don't ever want to see you click that........

The Privacy tab allows to change settings that direct your visability on the site- such things as who can view your events or blog posts, etc..

The Email tab allows to to set what notifications you would like sent to you via e-mail- things like member activites or discussion posts, etc.. If you have everything set here you'll get alot of emails from NavyDads alerting to almost everything that happens on the site--- that can be a bit much for some people, so select what notifications you really want to see to limit your mail volume.

The final tab is for "My Page"- this allows you to click the appearances page and change your theme or to clcik and open the application directory.

By exploring the tabs you'll see that there are a lot of options you have that help to define to look of your profile and the content you wish to see.

Note that each page has a SAVE botton at the bottom....you must click SAVE to record your changes and let the system update your settings accordingly.

Explore the options when you get a chance....but remember to record or take a screen shot of what you change so you can get "back to normal" so to speak if you do not like the results.

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Permalink Reply by NavyDads Admin (Paul) on July 31, 2009 at 10:55am

About This Site

On the right side of most NavyDads pages is a very important area that can answer many of your questions about NavyDads and about life at Great Lakes and your sailor called ABOUT THIS SITE

Each of the topics listed is a clickable hyperlink to another page or website that deals with some important aspects of your son's or daughter's journey in the Navy.

There are a couple that are very important to our new NavyDads and moms-----

The first is How To Contact Your Sailor:

When your sailor arrives in Great Lakes they are assigned to a training ship and division. Your sailor's recruiter has access to this info though they might not be able to pull it up in the system for a couple of days after they arrive at RTC (Recruit Training Command). When you get this info from your recruiter, or wait for the famous "form letter" you can click this address link and the correct addresses for mail are displayed. This ia a link to a RTC website and should be the latest most current address information.

The second is FAQs for Fanily and Friends:

When you click this link you'll be sent to a RTC webpage that has a number of FAQs and answers that you can browse through that will answer a number of questions you may have about your sailor's Great Lakes experience. You'll see the question and then under the answer area you'll see a "+/-":

To save space the answers are compressed and will not be displayed until you click the "+/-" :

There is a lot on info avaiable here, so take the time to explore the FAQs. The staff at RTC has collected the most common questions that parents and friends have when they have a sailor at RTC and have posted them in this area--- so utilize the resource and learn about your sailors early journey in the Navy.

the other link in the area are a collection of links that EG, Terry and myself have posted that tyou may find interesting or useful.....in particular the PIR Dates link:

This link will show the projected PIR dates for your sailor's division. Remember that bootcamp is a dynamic environment and the actual PIR date may change according to illness, injury, or other unplanned event. BE FLEXIBLE with you plans!

Explore the other links as there is some interesting information available there!

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Permalink Reply by NavyDads Admin (Paul) on August 6, 2009 at 2:50pm

How to Generate a Hyperlink

One of the features that makes browsing the site easier on everyone is the use of hyperlinks. What's a hyperlink? They are the text, photos, graphics, banners, etc., that you click on and you your browser takes you to another page or website. They make browsing much easier than having to copy text and to paste it into your address bar. So hopefully after this tutorial you too can make a hyperlink and help organize your page a little better for those that read through it.

Now a note- this works for IE7 and IE8 as those are the borwsers I have used. If you use Firefox or Chrome or any of the other browsers, you may have a different look to your page, but the thought will be the same. Also- depending on your security settings yo9u may or may not get a warning about scripted windows. My settings are kinda high so I always get the warning....you may not.

First- browse to the website you want to create a hyperlink for. I've browsed to a site that lists Medal of Honor citations for the Vietnam war through today. When you right click the address bar you should get a menu that allows to to Copy the hightlighted text. If not, you may have to click the address of the site and then right click to select copy:

I've decided to add a blog post and have entered text for the title. In the comment box you'll see an icon in the header that looks link a chain link--- guess what.....this is the icon you clink to create a hyperlink. When you do so (on my system at least) you get a warning box at the top of the window about the website trying to use a scripted window:

When you click it you get a box that opens that you'll need to click to verify that you want to temporaily allow a scripted window:

Click it and enter some text in the comment box that will be your link. This text is what the viewer will click to open the page for the website you are creating the link for. You can see I've entered some text: Click for Link to Medal of Honor Website. Use your cursor to actually select the text for the link. If you do not do so, nothing will be "clickable" and you won't have a link. So be sure you have something highlighted:

Now you click the hyperlink icon again and a box should open at the top of the page. This is the script prompt when you will paste the website address you selected earlier:

Right click in the prompt area and you should get a menu that allows you to paste:

You can see that when you click paste the address is written into the box and when you click OK the script replacing the highlighted text you had in the comment box:

The script looks a littler different-- the system adds from commands that tell the computer that this is a link, colors it blue and underlines the link.

You can add any other text and stuff you want to the comment area....just do not change anything in the script text that the system has authored. At the very bottom of the page, typically for blog posts, you have a choice to publish or preview the post. Until you get some practice it is a good idea to preview what you've done:

You can see the link in blue text and the options you have, now at the top of the page to either go back and continue to edit, or to publish the post. When you hit publish you'll see the final blog and the hyperlink:

Mind you, you do not get the preview option for discussion posts link this one or comments to other pages.....

It is much harder to describe these steps that to actually do them.....it only takes a couple of minutes to do and they make your comments and blogs much easier to navigate around. Once you master these, you can add hyperlinks to photos and graphics as well--- an example is the USO graphic on my page....when you click it your browser should open the USO website and let you either make a donation or browser for more information.

Let me know if you are interested in this technique and I'll see about trying to put a How-To together for that.

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Permalink Reply by Cora on August 6, 2009 at 3:22pm

Nice idea!! Glad to see this layout explanation! You guys are doing a great job with this website!

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Permalink Reply by NavyDads Admin (Paul) on August 13, 2009 at 10:32am

How To Find A Group

I thought I'd show all how to find a group. Often (at least I know when I post) we'll say something like "check the PIR - Tips and Hints" group or "check the USS Theodore Roosevelt group". Those of us that have been on the site for awhile know how to root through the pages to find what we need....but the newbies out there might not understand that there is A LOT of info not displayed on the main page and you have to know know where to look for that stuff.

So--- let's say I want to look for a post that was made in the USS Theodore Roosevelt CVN 71 group. It does not show on the home page--- that is because the home page displays the groups in order of the the most recent activity. That is why the Bootcamp group and is usually at the top of the page...those groups less visited are down aways in the activity ratings and won't show up on the main page.

So--- the main page looks like this:

As you can see there is no USS Theodore Roosevelt Group showing--- that tells me ther hasn't been any recent activity and I'll have to search for the group. At the bottom of the groups section there is a Show All Groups link....

When you click that link you'll go the Groups area of NavyDads and can search of the group you want:

You'll see that there are 5 pages of groups---- almost 95 Groups have been added to NavyDads so if you don't see what you want on the first page you can go to page 2 and then 3, etc..

It's kind of fun to root trhough the pages and see what there is. Or if you know what you want you can search for the Group by text by entering search criteria in the Search box:

You can see that I have entered "CVN 71" in the search box. Be careful with your search criteria because CVN 71 is not the same as searching for CVN71...Little things like spaces and dashes in the Name can confuse the search engine so if you don't find what you want in the first search try another. I've entered CVN 71 and will ckick on the search button (the magnifying glass) and lo and behold, all the groups that mention the search phrase "CVN 71" are displayed:

You can click on any of the links to go to that post.

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Permalink Reply by Gene Hinson on October 27, 2009 at 7:26am

Find a password to download gate pass?

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Permalink Reply by katie99 on December 6, 2009 at 9:32pm

Why can i not see the videos....? Dumb mom question......
Thanks Katie99 :-)

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Permalink Reply by NavyDads Admin (Paul) on December 6, 2009 at 9:54pm

I'm assuming you mean the posted ones like EG's tribute vids? If you cannot see them then there is something associated with system not set correctly...or...your internet connection speed is too slow to download...I'll think about a diagnosis over my next days off (Thurs-Sat)

katie99 said:

Why can i not see the videos....? Dumb mom question......
Thanks Katie99 :-)

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Permalink Reply by Kayde's Dad on January 15, 2010 at 2:06pm

How do I get the password for the gate pass? Just got the call from our "Sailor" Yahoo! PIR is 22 Jan.

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Permalink Reply by NavyDads Admin (Paul) on January 31, 2010 at 8:53pm

very odd...didn't know you could do that and I'm thinking maybe it is a system thing. Did you try exiting your browser and restating it to see if it might be related to you computer? Let me know....

Mark Zimmerman said:

Somehow I set my discussion page so that everyone's profile photos are blanked out. How do I get them to show up again?

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Permalink Reply by BLR on February 21, 2011 at 1:24pm

How do I view any clips or photos from Class 287 during the phases?

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Permalink Reply by NavyDads Admin (Paul) on February 21, 2011 at 1:59pm

someone would have to post them unless thay have a Facebook site and they are posted there.....

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