How about a search engine where if I want to know details of ideas for building an L3 bird, I could place that in my search parameter and it would pull those comments that are in the forums up, along with related links. As I typed this in, I was thinking that this could be a near impossible task and I do not know how it could be done. I know that with all the pages of forum comments out there on the website, I sometimes wonder where I need to go to learn about the specifics that affect M, N, O, etc. flights that are not common to an L2 flight. What is a good way to secure the shock cord? Some say anchor it to the motor and others do not. I do not want to continually re-invent the wheel and I know others have dealt with these issues before me, so has it been mentioned in the forums and how do I find it? Another thought is an alphabetical index of all the topics so that I could find it easier instead of going through all the general topics before I find the specific topic I am looking for. Both of these sound near impossible to me yet they are on my wish list and hope others would find that of value; or if it already exists, then please edujimicate me . I know I have been told before that I need to quit thinking, that is my first problem, which will solve all the others.

As a new member it is clear to me that there is a ton of information in the forums...but it requires manually digging through it. And it seems to me that their are some true experts within the organization with deep knowledge.

I read some posts discussing a possible "NCR University" to share member knowledge...and it seems some of the information from the forums could be structured/re-structured to support that. Possibly a content management system (CMS), that would allow "authorized authors" to publish course materials...without the webmaster needing to format documents/load files/setup security, etc. A learning management system (LMS), could be used to make sure members are aware of safety rules, making progress through NCR University, etc.

Other thoughts:
- Streaming video (onsite? 3rd party site integration?), for everything from launches to "NCR University Distance Learning".
- Social Media Integration:
--Facebook page for truly "Public Facing/New Member Recruitment".
--Twitter - Launch/Meeting GO/No Go
- Enhanced links to other sites (NAR/TRA/4-H/Schools/Vendors, etc.)

Some excellent ideas there Greg. The only one I'd have to shoot down is streaming video - we don't have the hosting space and more importantly, we don't have the bandwidth available to support it without a significant increase in our hosting fees. We receive thousands of page-views per month - over 2.4 Million page views since August 5,2005 when the site went live to the club.

I very much like the idea of a Facebook page - Tripoli Colorado has one, and it should be an easy thing to add. Other social media integration would depend on the API. I don't want to give automatic access to just anyone with a Facebook account - some sort of vetting operation such as we do now to ensure that the user IS in rocketry and a member of a club would be necessary.

The "Wiki" idea I mentioned is very much what you are talking about when you say "NCR University". There are dozens of excellent forum articles that could be migrated into that format. We are already on a CMS - PHPNuke. What we need to figure out is how to change the site format and organization so that the information you're talking about - launch rules, bylaws, etc. is more easily findable. Better links page, better readability, etc.

A better search capability is probably the most important thing to teasing out the gems amongst the forum posts. On the other hand, a more active hand moderating and pruning the forums and keeping them trimmed down to important content and current events might serve just as well. We COULD add the Google search API internally, but I'm really trying to avoid anything that makes interior site content available externally - to protect our users' privacy and save us from email address mining.

Twitter might be interesting as a way for President Joe to update the Launch Status window I'd like to add.

Keep going with the ideas folks. How about a mobile App for iPhone/Android integration?

Personally I would love to see some more pictures of peoples projects. Especially during constructon. I think an easy way to upload pics would be cool.

I'm going to go back and reiterate that we don't have the storage space to host a significant amount of photos - linking through to Flickr or Picassa, perhaps with some code to thumbnail the photo, is our best option from a hosting perspective. Same holds true for video.

Unless we have a significant increase in storage from our host, I'll continue to tell everyone to host externally (lots of choices out there) and post a link to the pics or use the IMG tag to include it in your post. KEEP IT to no larger than 640x480 if you want the page layout to stay sane.

How about spell check, bold, italicized, and underline in the forums?

Pretty sure those options alreadyexist. Click on the little box under the subject line then un-click when you're done using the specialty function. Spell check is a different story.

We do have ALL of those options Bear. Spellcheck is automatic - thanks Jeremiah Johnson for that. The Bold, Italic and Underline are an automatic part of the forum system we use.

You are correct Joe, except that I did not see spell check. Now I am embarrassed. Should I go back and delete my previous post before too many people read it?

Spell check works when I access from my MacBook. From the PC I am still as dumb as a turnip.

I have not observed spell check being operational from my PC. (Dell, XP Pro)

Spell check is automatic as you type and underlines the bad spelling with a red line. There is no MS Word-like popup window offering alternative spellings, all it does is check the word and underline if it doesn't know how to spell it. If that isn't happening, you may have settings on your browser that disable Javascript to some degree. Try a different browser. Most of this site was developed and tested using Firefox and IE7 and IE8. I did do a couple tests with a borrowed Mac and that browser (Safari?). This sort of thing hasn't been looked at since 2008 or thereabouts so if we have a problem, we should address it as our new group of web developers get up to speed.

One thing I should say here - there is an expectation that people using this site will be relatively current on their computer and browser. That doesn't mean a new computer, but one where you have installed all the patches and security fixes and are running a browser that fully supports the current HTML standard, full javascript functionality and that allows cookies from our site. We haven't tested with a browser older than IE7 or Firefox 2.5. Windows XP is cool, but forget about anything older than that. My personal machine is an 8 year old system with Windows XP or a 10 year old system running Ubuntu 11.1 and Firefox.

We also expect a minimum screen resolution of 1024 x 768 or greater. I personally run 1600 x 1200. If you think we're going to downgrade the site so that you can use your 16 year old system running Windows 95 and IE3 on a screen of 640 x 480, dream on....

That said, one thing I hope we can add to the forums is a "Like" button or a simple way of voting a post up or down.

Warren,
For whatever it might be worht, I have I.E. 8 on my machines. I also have Firefox installed on all of them and I use it frequently. This machine that I am working from has Vista. My laptop is XP and my desktop at home is XP Pro. They are all current on all of their updates and all are 2.0 gig processors or faster. They all have at least 2G of Ram and more than 150G of hard drive space available (none of which should matter in this issue). I have spell check working in my Outlook and it works fine. I have never seen the red underlined words that show me that something is mispelled. That just means to me that a setting is turned off on all three of my computers and my droid, and or, it may not be working on the website. Maybe others could comment on wheterh the spell check is working on their machines. Any solutions you can offer would be appreciated. I used to be an MCP - Networking, and I have an A+ certification on computers, but that in no way indicates that I really know what I am doing and certainly not in every situation.

Bear,

I would suspect you have HIGH security set on IE8 (which also carries over to Firefox by the way) and have scripting disabled at some level. Answer a question for me - if you go into Contests and select the Mile High Contest and see the list of flyers - when you float over different names or flights, does the right hand column change to reflect the flight data for the flight?