Avid blog readers, personal historians, and all-purpose stalkers might remember a post I wrote in 2009 detailing the launch of the ISUtv website.
That work has come full circle.
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Tag Archives: ISUtv
Leadership and Motivation
Editor’s Note: I originally posted this article in the Winter 2009 edition of the Midwest Notes, a publication serving the Midwest district of the national honorary band fraternity Kappa Kappa Psi.
Within every organization, there tends to be driving force for member participation. Whether it’s a common goal or a set of beliefs, each group has a set of factors that inspire its members to work together and accomplish something. Though different, each organization tends to share one thing in particular: a leader charged with inspiring his or her members to do their part. As a brother of the Iota Omega chapter of Kappa Kappa Psi, a brother of a social fraternity (Beta Theta Pi), and a member of other student organizations, I’ve noticed a number of positive and negative leadership traits that impact motivation within a group. The following are a few traits in particular – I hope you can apply these to your own life, wherever you may go: Continue reading
Launched: ISUtv Website
I did it, folks. Although is posting is about 4 months tardy, I launched the ISUtv website running on a WordPress-based CMS (content management system). What does all of this mean? I’ll explain
ISUtv Website
WordPress is best known as a blogging software and provider, with websites at WordPress.com and WordPress.org. Users can make both posts and pages, and they have the ability to organize them and add them as they please. WordPress also provides plenty of documentation for altering site templates and manipulating the software to customize a personal blog. With such flexibility, it’s been very tempting to use the WordPress software as a content management system, or a software system that makes updating and maintaining a website very easy.
I decided to go with a CMS for the ISUtv website because I knew I’d only be around for a couple more years, and if we had a sustainable CMS operating the website, it would simply be a matter of passing along the password to the next webmaster of the organization. Also, WordPress has great features, including plugins that are developed by people across the world, and an RSS feed option.
I customized the basic template, using PHP to display only posts with certain categories and certain tags on the main page. I also used the jQuery UI library to make the rotating carousel on the front page. In fact, anything marked with the tag ‘front’ will appear in the carousel. The tagging option is available when writing a post.
Use of WordPress on the ISUtv website was split between pages and posts: the posts acted as the “news” items and shows that I wanted to appear in the website’s feed. Pages served as more of an informative look into the station and things pertaining to more static information. Another benefit of using pages is that there is a built-in commenting system, where users can speak their mind on a particular post.
After a bit of CSS, JavaScript, and PHP work, the site is running. While there is still quite a bit of development yet to be done, I think it has served the organization well as a new medium for broadcasting its content.