Web Site Committee

Meeting Minutes -- June 13, 2007

A meeting of the Mountain Lakes Web Site Committee was held on June 13, 2007 at the Mountain Lakes Borough Hall.  In attendance were Chairman Andy Bulfer, Clive Knowles, Nilesh Shringarpure, and Borough Council Liaison Steve Shaw.  Absent was Mark Watrous.

Activities Since Last Time

• Andy Bulfer ran his link checker on the entire site and found more bad links.  Some he fixed himself and some he asked other team members to fix.
• Mark Watrous helped the secretary of the Environmental Commission with meeting minutes uploading.
• Clive Knowles fixed a link on the Shade Tree Commission main page.
• Nilesh Shringarpure added information for the 9 & Up track schedule requested by Michael Palazzi
• Steve Shaw arranged for the Web Committee to be on the Borough Council agenda to discuss the broadcast e-mail proposal.
• Andy Bulfer updated the swim team site at the request of Kim Lappe, mainly by completely updating the swim team calendar replacing the outdated 2006 events with those of 2007.
• Mark Watrous changed all uploading instructions at Chairman Bulfer's request to save as "Web Page, Filtered" instead of "Web page" when using a Microsoft Windows PC.  This eliminates one or more broken links on every file uploaded.
• Clive Knowles removed SMAC from the Health Clinics page.
• Nilesh Shringarpure changed the time and place of a Sunday track meet.  This was requested at the last minute and Shringarpure worked on an urgent basis to correct the schedule since it is a reference used by track coaches and players.
• Andy Bulfer updated the Environmental Commission membership list at the request of Environmental Commission chairman Kevin Edwards.
• Clive Knowles repaired a bad link found by Andy Bulfer's link checker on the ~townclub page.
• Nilesh Shringarpure and Andy Bulfer worked on and then gave a presentation on broadcast e-mail to the Borough Council.
• Andy Bulfer added the 1967 class union to Community and Links pages
• Clive Knowles repaired bad links found by Andy Bulfer's link checker on the League of Women Voters page.  He also made several other minor changes at their request.
• Andy Bulfer added "Movies in the Park" and a calendar of recreation events for the next few months to the Recreation page.
• Clive Knowles updated the Hub Lakes page.  It had previously contained a list of the coaches and schedule for each event.  Knowles has not yet received 2007 schedule information so put on an up-to-date coaches list only.
• Andy Bulfer added information on the summer reading program to the Library page.
• Clive Knowles replaced the Shade Tree Commission's Tree plan pdf form.
• Andy Bulfer changed the price of non-resident library cards on Library page.  This was considered urgent by the Library because it had experienced a library card applicant demanding the old lower price because it was on the Web.
• Clive Knowles updated the Garden Club pages.  He also removed reprint of the booklet Successful Gardening in Mountain Lakes at their request.  He reported that they plan to replace it with an updated version later.
• Andy Bulfer added the 1987 class union to Community and Links pages.
• Clive Knowles did a cleanup job on the Notice Board program files to prepare for making the proposed changes (described below).
• Andy Bulfer put on photos and descriptive material about the Citizen of the Year and the Janice B Hunts award winners at the request of the Mayor.
• Andy Bulfer formated and put on material about George Dawson, Mountain Lakes' 100^th Eagle Scout, at the request of the Mayor.
• Andy Bulfer developed a clever way to do top-of-page banners.  Previously, these had been done by a former Committee member using obscure, specialized software and since she resigned from the Committee, we have had no way to add or change banners.  Now we do.
• Andy Bulfer added the water letter and the water ordinance at Gary Webb's request.  Later, Bulfer replaced the original ordinance with a corrected one.
• Andy Bulfer developed a graphic chart showing Mountain Lakes' water usage.  The chart can be administered by the Borough Manager using an html form.  Bulfer also put a thumbnail on the front page under "shortcuts".

Public Comments

None.

Old Business

• Broadcast E-mail System -- The Committee discussed the reaction of the Borough Council to the presentation.  The Borough Council appeared to feel the system was valuable but did not indicate either support or non-support for any of the possible applications.  Instead, it decided to ask the Borough Manager to study how it could be used and what procedures and policies were required.  An answer is not expected until the fall.  The Committee discussed if there was anything it should be doing in the meantime and decided to look into the steps required for setting up the system, what tools are provided to bulk upload addresses, and to begin assembling the seed list. 
• Home and School Association -- Although the Web Committee had been informed some time ago that the site is nearly ready, we have not heard or seen anything recently.
• FAQs -- Steve Shaw reported he has not made much progress so far.
• Requirements for Notice Board Improvements -- At its March meeting, the Committee discussed a list of possible improvements for the Notice Board software.  Andy Bulfer was assigned to write requirements.  The Committee discussed his proposed draft requirements.  The following was decided.
  
  

  No.	Requirement	Decision
  1.	Add an explanation of the review process	Approved with addition of admonition to keep notices short.
  2.	Add a link to policy statement	Approved with a wording change.
  3.	Remove character set limitations	Clive Knowles will study this.
  4.	Translate entity references	This need only be done on the home page.  Clive Knowles will study.
  5.	Allow editor to put in html	Clive Knowles will study.
  6.	E-mail back to the submitter on A) approval, B) disapproval, C) expiration	Eliminated
  7.	E-mail upon approval to borough hall for printing and insertion into bulletin board tray	Hold for Andy Bulfer to discuss with Bulletin Board committee
  8.	Add a 'headline field' that would be in bold at the beginning of a notice	Decision to eliminate this.
  9.	Automatically add events to community calendar	rejected (last time).  It may be done on a separate calendar input form.
  10.	Add function for library to put on closing notice	deferred (last time)
  11.	Change sort order	rejected (last time)
  12.	Write rss file	deferred (last time)

• Town Club, Swim Club and MAC -- Clive Knowles reported that he has contacted the Town Club and that their current Web coordinator who is moving has made the last changes before she leaves.  Steve Shaw explained to the Swim Club that they either need to assign someone or allow the Web Committee to manage their content.  They chose the latter.  Nilesh Shringarpure has contacted MAC but doesn't have a solid answer yet about who will coordinate their material.

No Progress

• Search Engine -- The Committee would still like a Search Engine on the front page.  We had one with the previous server.  One of the things that makes it difficult is a self-imposed requirement that the schools site (mtlakes.org) be included in the search results. 
• Monthly Traffic Report -- Each Committee member currently receives a daily e-mail report on traffic handled by the Web site on the previous day.  However, we would like the daily statistics rolled up into a monthly traffic report that could be distributed to a wider audience.
• Leech Web Sites -- The memo to the Borough Council explaining the issue and our concerns has not yet been drafted.

New Business

• Girl Scouts -- In Mark Watrous' absence, there was no report on this. 
• Top-of Page Banners -- It was decided to not generate these banners dynamically but to simply generate them once and save them on the Web site as image files. 
• HPC Access Database -- Andy Bulfer reported that he has received a CD from the HPC containing the MS Access database of house data that underpinned Mountain Lakes application to be listed on the state and national registers of historic places.  The CD has only the database, not the maps or photos that together with the database formed the application.  The database consists of three tables, addresses, other resources such as bridges, dams, lakes, borough-owned property, and structures which lists details of each building.  The Web Committee agreed that it is wise to have a redundant copy so that it is not just in one place.

Date for Next Meeting

Due to the anticipated difficulty of obtaining a quorum, the next regular meeting will be on Wed September 12, 2007 at Borough Hall.

Andy Bulfer,
Chairman