AAS Website Gets Upgrades to Design & Functionality
Richard Fienberg AAS Solar Eclipse Task Force
If you're a regular visitor to the AAS website — and if you're not, you should be! — you've undoubtedly noticed some changes on our homepage. More useful information appears higher up on the screen, whether or not you've signed in with your AAS username and password. We still have a big, attractive astronomical image at the top, but it's now mostly in the background so as not to displace other content. You can bring the image forward and see its caption by clicking on the magnifying-glass icon that appears in its lower-right corner. Once you've done that, it'll be obvious how to return the image to the background.
We've upgraded our online calendar too. It now includes both upcoming events and upcoming deadlines. We've also refined the layout to improve readability and provided more convenient options for searching and browsing.
Another improvement makes it easier to submit content for publication on our website and distribution via our email newsletter. As before, when you sign in to the site with your AAS username and password, a new button appears on the right side of the main menu: POST. Submitting deadlines and events for our online calendar has always been easy, and now it's similarly easy to submit news items and other types of articles, because we've dramatically simplified the form by which you compose such content.
We've correspondingly simplified the step-by-step instructions for posting, which no longer resemble the instructions for use of the zero-gravity toilet in the movie 2001: A Space Odyssey.
More upgrades and improvements are in the works as we strive to improve our service to AAS members and the broader astronomical community. If you have comments, suggestions, and/or questions about our website, we encourage you to email them to us.