Happy New Year! 2016 is off to a great start with the 15.12 release.  In this release, we made several usability improvements, such as making it easier for users to search for private messages and making it easier for users to save and share multiple TKB articles. We are continually keeping pace with search engine algorithm changes to ensure that our communities have effective SEO and as such have made some improvements to SEO.

We are excited to announce the new Developer Documentation Portal, which centralizes all of the Lithium developer documentation in one place on the Lithium Community, providing developers with an easier way to find the content they need.

 

New Features

• SEO Improvements
  
  • Support for manually overriding a TKB article’s canonical URL
  • Removal of keyword field in Edit Properties
• Improvements to Private Message search
• Create a single PDF file of all articles in a TKB
• Expiration time for moved message placeholders
• Accepted Solution Notification email template improvements
• Developer Documentation Portal

SEO improvements

Support for manually overriding a forum post’s canonical URL

We have added the ability for permissioned users to manually override the canonical URL for individual forum posts. This capability is provided with the Approve, recall, or reject topics and posts and Update Communities permissions, which are granted to Admins and Moderators by default. You can use canonical (or “preferred”) URLs to prevent duplicate content issues and improve SEO when the same content is accessed through multiple URLs.

Learn more about using canonical URLs to improve link and ranking signals.

In addition to the permissions listed above, you must also configure each forum node where you want to enable admins and moderators to override the canonical URL.

To enable a forum to support the overriding of the canonical URL:

1. Sign in to the community as an Admin.

2. Click Choose next to the Community name and navigate to the forum you want to configure.
3. Go to Discussion Styles > Posts & Topics.
4. Click Settings and scroll to the bottom of the page.
5. Check Allow canonical URL for Forum posts to be overridden.
6. Click Save.

To edit the canonical URL for a forum post:

1. Sign in to the community as an Admin or Moderator.
2. Go to a forum post and click Edit.
3. Edit the URL in the Canonical URL field:
   
4. Click Post.

Note: If the post is later moved to a different board, these canonical values are carried with the article and are not changed.

Improvements to Private Message search

In addition to the support for Advanced Search in Private Message search we released in 15.11, we have made several more improvements to the Private Message search, including:

• Bulk processing controls: On the search results page for Private Messages, you can now open the Options menu and perform bulk actions (Delete Checked, Delete All, Check All, or Uncheck All).
• Search result highlighting: Search terms are now highlighted in the auto-suggest drop-down menu for private message searches.
• Search field sorting: You can now sort the private message search results by specific columns by choosing a sort option from the Sort by drop-down menu:
  

Create a single PDF file of all articles in a TKB

There are times when you might want to read a TKB article or group of TKB articles when you’re offline, or you may want to share TKB articles with other people who do not have a community account.

 

While we have always had the ability to print/save a single TKB article to a PDF file, you can now print/save all articles in a TKB to a single PDF file. You can then view or print this PDF offline, as needed.

 

To print a single TKB article to PDF:

1. Sign in to the community and go to the TKB article you want.
2. Open the Article Options menu and click Printer Friendly Page.
   
3. From your browser window, go to File > Print.
4. Choose the options to print/save the file as a PDF and click Ok.

 

To print all the articles in TKB into a single TKB:

1. Sign in to the community and go to the TKB article list page.
2. Open the Options menu and click Print Knowledge Base.
   

A new tab/page opens with all the articles consolidated into one page.

3. From your browser window, go to File > Print.
4. Choose the options to print/save the file as a PDF and click Ok.

Note: When you create the PDF file of all articles in a TKB, the articles are presented in the order they appear in the TKB. Any filtering you’ve done to this TKB is ignored when you create the PDF.

Note: At this time, the ability to print all articles in a TKB does not work if you’re using the Responsive Peak skin.

Tip: If you configure the TKB to use the manual sort option, you can use this print option to create a well-organized PDF guide.

Expiration time for moved message placeholders

You can now set an expiration time for placeholders that are created when you move messages and choose to create a placeholder. For example, if you set the default expiry time for placeholders to be 7 days, when you move a message and elect to create a placeholder, that placeholder will expire (be removed) after 7 days from when it was created.  

 

To set the default expiration time for moved message placeholders:

1. Sign in to the community as an Admin.
2. Go to Mod Tools > Message Placeholders.
3. In the Set placeholder expiry time field, enter the number of days to wait before removing a placeholder for a moved message.
   
4. Click Save.

Note: The placeholder expiration setting is used only when the person who moves the message selects the Expire placeholder field when moving a message, shown here:

Accepted Solution Notification email template improvements

We’ve made the email templates related to Accepted Solution notifications a bit smarter. Previously, when the person who marked the accepted solution received the notification, the email template used the person’s user name, instead of the more informal, second person (“you”).

To make these emails a bit friendlier, we have updated these templates:

• Accepted solution notification
• Answer accepted as a solution notification

If you have already modified the text of these templates and don’t want to re-apply all your modifications to the new, default templates, you can copy/paste necessary changes from the new templates and add it to your modified ones.

 

To edit your email templates:

1. Go to Studio > Text Editor > Email Text.
2. Open the Select Email Template menu and choose the email template you want to modify (Accepted solution notification, or Answer accepted as a solution notification).
3. Click View.
4. In the text in the Editable Email Text pane, copy and paste the text below into the plain text and HTML versions of your modified email templates, as needed.
5. Click Save.

Changes to the “Accepted solution notification” template

Your answer on ${community.title} has been accepted as a solution!

changed to

#if($isAccepter)

        You marked your answer on ${community.title} as an accepted solution!

#else

        Your answer on ${community.title} has been accepted as a solution!

#end

__________________________________

 

Great job! ${actorLogin} marked your answer to a question as an accepted solution!

changed to

#if($isAccepter)

        Great job! You marked your answer to a question as an accepted solution!

#else

        Great job! ${actorLogin} marked your answer to a question as an accepted solution!

#end

__________________________________

 

<title>Your answer on ${community.title} has been accepted as a solution!</title>

changed to

#if($isAccepter)

     <title>You marked your answer on ${community.title} as an accepted solution!</title>

#else

     <title>Your answer on ${community.title} has been accepted as a solution!</title>

#end

__________________________________

 

Great job! ${actorLogin} marked your answer to a question as an accepted solution!

changed to

#if($isAccepter)

     Great job! You marked your answer to a question as an accepted solution!

#else

     Great job! ${actorLogin} marked your answer to a question as an accepted solution!

#end

Changes to the “Answer accepted as a solution” notification

An answer to a question you are following has been accepted as a solution!

changed to

#if($isAccepter)

     You accepted an answer to a question you are following as a solution!

#else

     An answer to a question you are following has been accepted as a solution!

#end

__________________________________

 

A reply to a topic you are following has been accepted as a solution!

changed to

#if($isAccepter)

     You accepted a reply to a topic you are following as a solution!

#else

     A reply to a topic you are following has been accepted as a solution!

#end

__________________________________

 

An answer to a question you are following has been accepted as a solution.

changed to

#if($isAccepter)

     You accepted an answer to a question you are following as a solution.

#else

     An answer to a question you are following has been accepted as a solution.

#end

__________________________________

 

A reply to a topic you are following has been accepted as a solution.

changed to

#if($isAccepter)

     You accepted a reply to a topic you are following as a solution.

#else

     A reply to a topic you are following has been accepted as a solution.

#end

__________________________________

 

<title>An answer to a question you are following has been accepted as a solution.</title>

changed to

#if($isAccepter)

     <title>You accepted an answer to a question you are following as a solution.</title>

#else

     <title>An answer to a question you are following has been accepted as a solution.</title>

#end

__________________________________

 

<title>A reply to a topic you are following has been accepted as a solution.</title>

changed to

#if($isAccepter)

     <title>You accepted a reply to a topic you are following as a solution.</title>

#else

     <title>A reply to a topic you are following has been accepted as a solution.</title>

#end

__________________________________

An answer to a question you are following has been accepted as a solution!

changed to

#if($isAccepter)

     You accepted an answer to a question you are following as a solution!

#else

     An answer to a question you are following has been accepted as a solution!

#end

__________________________________

 

A reply to a topic you are following has been accepted as a solution!

changed to

#if($isAccepter)

     You accepted a reply to a topic you are following as a solution!

#else

     A reply to a topic you are following has been accepted as a solution!

#end

Removal of Keyword field from node properties form

We have deprecated (removed) the Keywords field from the Edit Properties form for nodes, accessed from the Community Structure tab.

We have made this change because the method on injecting keywords has been deprecated by search engines, and crawlers no longer use keywords so there is no added benefit by adding them here. The text you enter in the Title, Title Tag, and Description fields will have much more impact on SEO.

Developer Documentation Portal

We’re very happy to announce our new Developer Documentation Portal which brings all of Lithium’s developer documentation into one place for easier access to all our developer tools.

Previously, our API reference has been located in different knowledge bases and pages across the Lithium Community. We’ve moved much of our API reference documentation out of knowledge base articles and into this new portal.

By moving reference material into a centralized location, we de-clutter the Developers Knowledge Base and make room for more examples, how-tos, and reference implementations. The portal also drives discussions and questions about the API to the Developers Forum, which creates a better way to crowdsource knowledge from our fantastic Lithium Developer community.

 

Let’s look at a few highlights

Authentication documentation has been consolidated, and we’ve created new overview material to help you understand our authentication options and how to authenticate via the API. You no longer need to go to a separate site to find the Lithium-Klout SDK reference material.

We gave Community API v2 documentation a facelift, enabling search across all API v2 collections in a new set of pages that provide expanded documentation for fields, constraints, sorts, functions, and calls. 

 

FreeMarker context object reference now exists in a single page for easier searching and browsing.

 

 

LSW reference material and examples have been moved out of the LSW API knowledge base into a sleek new format.

 

 

After we launch the portal, you’ll find a link to the new Developer Documentation portal in the Developer Network navigation menu.

 

This is the first phase in creating our improved developer documentation experience. You’ll be seeing even more improvements and enhancements in the future. As always, we welcome feedback at documentation@lithium.com.

You Found It. We Fixed It.

• Previously, metrics for hidden categories and boards were not reflected in LSI drill-down reports. They were only included in the top-level metric calculations. Now, metrics for hidden categories and boards are included in all category- and board-specific reports.
• We have fixed the display issue where some users in the group member list were listed on more than one page. This issue usually happened when a larger number of users were added to a group at one time.
• We have fixed the display issue where the Media v4 image uploader floated to the top of the page when you clicked the pencil icon to edit the image. Now, the image uploader appears in the center of the page, as expected.
• When a moderator merges a post into a thread without checking the “Bump topic to top of list” option, the Latest Post column wasn’t updating to reflect the most recent post in the thread. This issue has been fixed, and now the most recent post in the thread is listed.
• The “Float Topic for All Users” option now works properly when using the Media v4 Masonry view.
• Previously, the NPS score scale in the LSI Value Analytics report ranged from 0-10. It now displays the correct scale of 1-10.
• Previously, when you entered a search term and then clicked another tab (for example, going from the Posts tab to the Users tab), the term you entered in the search field would clear and you’d need to type it in again. Now, your search term persists as you navigate between tabs.