The new "Address Book" tab

Last week, we added a new tab to the Navigation Bar in the Blogware Control Panel: the Address Book tab:



Clicking this tab takes you to the Address Book section, which has four pages:
  • List Users
    This page provides a list of all the users who have special permissions for your weblog. The special permissions are:
    • Trusted Reader
      Trusted Readers are allowed to read any category in the weblog, regular or restricted.

    • Trusted Poster
      Trusted Posters are allowed to read and post to any category in the weblog, regular or restricted.

    • Admin
      Admins are administrators, can read and post to any category in the weblog, and have full control over it.

    • Custom
      People with Custom permission are allowed to read or post to specific categories which you choose.
  • Add User
    In this page, you can either add new users to the system and specify what special permissions they have or you can grant permissions to existing users.

  • Invite User
    This sends invitations to become one of the following for your weblog:
    • Reader
      Invites the user to become a specialized reader of the weblog. If s/he accepts the invitation, Blogware grants him/her Trusted Reader permissions for the weblog.

    • Poster
      Invites the user to become a specialized poster for the weblog. If s/he accepts the invitation, Blogware grants him/her granted Trusted Poster permissions for the weblog.

    • Admin
      Invites the user to become an administrator for the weblog. If s/he accepts the invitation, Blogware grants him/her granted Admin permissions for the weblog.

  • Groups
    This lets you organize users into groups, which allow you to give permissions to collections of people all at once rather than having to assign permissions to a large number of people one at a time.


All this week, we'll cover the use of the Address Book section. Today's topic will cover giving someone who already has a Blogware account "trusted reader"privileges.


Adding a trusted reader to your weblog

What is a "trusted reader"?

Blogware allows you create restricted categories, which cannot be read by just anyone -- they can only be read by people who have permission to do so. Only a reader who is logged in and has permission can read such categories.

Readers can be granted permission to read categories on a per-category basis, or they can be trusted readers -- readers who are allowed to read any category, regular or restricted.

You can use the "trusted reader" permission to separate your readers into two categories: those who see the "public" portion of your weblog:
  • Those who see the "public" side of your blog: Strangers, potential employers, perhaps your mom -- basically anyone who should see the entries and photos that you don't mind sharing with the world at large.

  • Those who see the "private" side of your blog: close friends, co-workers, significant others, spouse, business partners, perhaps your mom -- basically anyone whom you trust enough to show entries and photos that you don't want the rest of the world to see. These are your trusted readers.

Making a reader a trusted reader, step by step

In this example, we're going to give the person with the username "exampleuser" trusted reader privileges.

1. Go to the Address Book section.
Log into your Blogware Control Panel and click the "Address Book" tab of the Navigation bar.



The default page of the Address Book section is List Users, which lists all the users who've been granted some kind of permission for your blog. In this example, nobody has been granted permissions yet, so the list is empty:



2. Go to the Add User page.
Click the "Add User" item in the submenu:



You'll be taken to the Add Blog User page, which looks like this:



3. Make sure "Trusted Reader" is the selected permission type.
It's the default selection in the Permission Type menu, but it never hurts to make sure.



4. Enter the person's username into the Username text box of the Existing User section.
The username is the name that they person uses to log into Blogware. In the case of this example, the username of the person whom we want to add as a trusted reader is "anotherexample":



5. Click the Add User button.



You will be taken to a page that displays the message "User added" and shows summary information about the person you just added as a trusted reader. This is the page you will be taken to whenever you edit this person's permissions for your blog.



If you click on the List Users item in the sub-menu of the Navigation Bar...



....you will be returned to the Address Book page, where you'll see the newly-added person:



Now let's suppose that your blog has a restricted category called "Members Only". Let's also suppose that "Members Only" contains stuff that you'd like only certain people to see. Here's how it would appear in the Article and Photo Manager section of the Blogware Control Panel:



In this example, the entry "First Post!" is in the "Main Page" category, while the entry "Eyes Only" is in the "Members Only" category.

Let's see how your blog would look from the reader's point of view:



The picture below shows what your blog would look like to someone who isn't logged in. Note that only entries in the "Main Page" category are shown and that the "Members Only" category isn't even visible under "Topics" (where categories and photo albums are listed):



Now let's look at the blog as seen through the eyes -- or more accurately, the account -- of "anotherexample", the trusted reader:



Being a trusted reader, "anotherexample" sees not only the articles posted under the "Main Page" category, but also those posted under the "Members Only" category. Note that "anotherexample" sees the "Members Only" category under "Topics". Also note that entries posted under restricted categories have a lock displayed beside their titles.


Next: More on trusted readers, plus trusted posters, admins and giving people custom permissions.

[Blogware]