What the webmaster actually does

Ver 0.3 Mick Wilson 14 Nov 2020

Before every monthly meeting 

Update the front page with agenda and linkages for the next monthly meeting
Update/ maintain announcements of upcoming events as needed
Prepare bios for each presenter

During every monthly meeting 

Video

Capture the meeting video using the Zoom recording function
- or -
Download the  captured video from YouTube

After every monthly meeting

Video

Edit the raw video  to remove dead air, add the intro and outro as well as the intermission.
Upload the clean video to YouTube and
    add the meeting agenda to the video description
Link the clean video onto the website from YouTube
Create a cover for the monthly video 

Textual material 

If ppts contain embedded video
    Extract mpgs/ avis etc to separate files before generating pdf
    Create a cover for each video
    Upload each video to YouTube under the playlist “RASC Ottawa short videos”
    Add content “Video - short” to web site

Extract ppt to a pdf
    each of the presentations
    observing challenges
    observation reports 

Create covers for each pdf

For each presentation
    If the presentation is buy a new speaker
        Add content “Presenter” to the web site entry with bio and and photograph 

Add content “Presentation” to the web site
    Add link it to Its time-marked point in the clean meeting video on YouTube
    Add its cover
    Add reference to any short video included in this presentation
    Add reference to the presentation to the monthly video entry 

Add content “Observation reports” to  the web site
    Add the cover
        Add link it to Its time-marked point in the clean meeting video on YouTube

Find Observing Challenges” compendium for the appropriate month
    Do not create a new piece of content
    Upload pdf
    Insert new rows into table

Create content ”AstroNotes”
    create a cover for it

Operations, Maintenance and Reporting 

Identify and correct issues such as stale content and broken links
Identify, prototype and deploy as appropriate new and evolving capabilities for the web site
Maintain the ottawa.rasc.ca internet domain
Maintain the hosting arrangement with GreenGeeks
     Apply updates and patches as made available through scripts provided by GreenGeeks
     Support mailing list servers such as official-from-council@ and council@
Maintain the Dropbox account for RASC Ottawa Council
Maintain direct mail accounts such as secretary@ottawa.rasc.ca
Maintain the mail forwarders for accounts such as a librarian@ottawa.rasc.ca
Report to Ottawa council regarding website operations, budget, and maintenance tasks
Run regular backups
    Copy these down to my local PC and re-install on a local version of Xampp
    Test each local installed backup to make sure that it's actually recoverable
Maintain off-line repository of all web materials
Train other people in how to edit content with Drupal and provide on-going support
    FLO director
    Secretary
    Starparties coordinator
    etc.
Report to Ottawa council regarding website operations, budget, and maintenance tasks 

Archiving 

Recover historical information and prepare for publication on the website
    Historical meeting recording, texts and DVD's
    Historical copies of AstroNotes
    Photographs of past RASC events
    Etc.

Other

Participate in the Ottawa centre council
Participate in RASC National Information Technology Committee

Overview

The webmaster needs to be familiar with web content management systems, in the current instance (2022) Drupal 7, and understand that  the site will migrate to Drupal 9 in 2022-23.

The webmasters task is not about providing the #1 Astronomy Site in the Known Universe and Beyond - there are plenty of other organizations out there that have those goals and they have dedicated budget, journalists, graphic artists and other professionals to make it so, and good luck to them. We are a bunch of volunteers. Ottawa centre can not and should not pretend to be compete in the domain of common public interest, not strive to be the top search result on a web search for "astronomy canada"... but maybe for "astronomy ottawa".

Ottawa centre's purpose since 1906 is to promote interest in and understanding of astronomy to the people we can best strive to serve. The centre's web site is one means for supporting that goal.

The Ottawa webmaster's role is to promote the centre and the competencies of its volunteers.

At the moment, that means ensuring that:

1. fresh content is available to the public:: the main source are the presentations at our monthly public meetings including observation reports
2. fresh opportunities are available to members to learn of - and adapt - skills and techniques for observing:: the main source is ability to access the people who make presentations
3. intellectual and personal legacy of the centre is preserved, and that the members and the have public opportunity to discover those who've built its reputation:: the main sources are the AstronNotes archives and the video library of presentations by past luminaries
4. the service is reliable i.e. available and error-free as far as possible.

Achieving this - keeping up with new content plus wrangling historical content - costs me about 20 hours/ week, peaking around monthly meeting time. When and if the historical backlog is contained then that will drop to to 2-3 hours/month.

Looking as tasks 1-4 above, the webmaster needs to

• be comfortable with dealing with re-packaging text, graphic and video content, both current and historical. Most of the content we receive needs packaging to make it web-friendly
• manage the interlinkages among content that lead to discoverability and possible connection e.g. a presentation -> has a presenter -> may have images and videos etc...