Newsletter Template Help

Newsletter Template Help

1. To begin, insert the HTML for the template into the Source Code of the Newsletter Template's HTML Template tab.

2. You can insert these variables into the header section:

   Variable	Description
   %%date%%	Displays the date entered on the newsletter date field
   %%volume%%	Displays the volume as entered on the newsletter volume field

3. Define the article section with the code below
   
   1. Article Section

      <!--cinews:contentstart-->
        
          <!--cinews:sectionstart-->
          <!--cinews:sectionend-->
        
          <!--cinews:articlestart-->
        
              <!--cinews:subjectstart-->
              <!--cinews:subjectend-->
           
              <!--cinews:authorstart-->
              <!--cinews:authorend-->
        
              <!--cinews:readmorestart-->
              <!--cinews:readmoreend-->
        
              <!--cinews:backstart-->
              <!--cinews:backend-->
        
          <!--cinews:articleend-->
        
      <!--cinews:contentend-->

4. To display the article's section, subject, author, text, and read more link, insert the following variables into the appropriate sections listed above.  If you do not add one or more of these variables, that information will be omitted. 

5. Variable	Description
   %%sectionname%%	Displays the name of the section or group where the articles are located
   %%subject%%	Displays the article's subject
   %%author%%	Displays the author of the article
   %%abstract%%	Displays the article text
   %%articleurl%%	Displays the "read more" link that will link to a specified page URL or full version of the article generated by our system
   %%linkalias%%	Adds a link alias to the read more link for each article
   %%thumbnailurl%%	Adds the image URL for each article

   Article Section

   <!--cinews:contentstart-->
     
       <!--cinews:sectionstart-->
           %%sectionname%%
       <!--cinews:sectionend-->
     
       <!--cinews:articlestart-->
     
           <!--cinews:subjectstart-->
               %%subject%%
           <!--cinews:subjectend-->
        
           <!--cinews:authorstart-->
               by %%author%%
           <!--cinews:authorend-->
        
           <img align="left" src="%%thumbnailurl%%">
           %%abstract%%
     
           <!--cinews:readmorestart-->
               <a alias="%%linkalias%%" href="%%articleurl%%" style="font-size: 12px">[FULL STORY]</a>
           <!--cinews:readmoreend-->
     
           <!--cinews:backstart-->
               <span id="article_fullstory"><a href="%%backurl%%" style="font-size: 12px">Back</a></span>
           <!--cinews:backend-->
     
       <!--cinews:articleend-->
     
   <!--cinews:contentend-->

6. Here's an example of a styled article section with a horizontal line at the bottom to separate each article

   Example Article with Formatting

   <td style="padding: 0px 0px 24px 0px; border-bottom: 1px solid #cccccc;">
       <!--cinews:contentstart-->
           <!--cinews:sectionstart-->
               <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" width="100%">
                   <tbody><tr>
                       <td style="border-bottom: 1px solid #E7E7E7; padding: 0 0 6px 0;"><strong><span style="color:#336699;"><span style="font-size:18px;"><span style="font-family:lucida sans unicode,lucida grande,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size:14px;">%%sectionname%%</span></span></span></span></span></strong></td>
                   </tr></tbody>
               </table>
           <!--cinews:sectionend-->
     
           <!--cinews:articlestart-->
               <!--cinews:subjectstart-->
                   <p><span style="padding: 3px 0px 0px 3px; margin:4px 0px 0px 0px; font-size: 15px; font-weight: bold; padding-top: 3px;font-family: Arial, Verdana; ">%%subject%%</span></p>
               <!--cinews:subjectend-->
                
               <!--cinews:authorstart-->
                   <p><span style="padding: 0px 0px 0px 3px; margin:0px; font-family: Arial, Verdana; font-style: italic; color: #333; font-size: 13px">by %%author%%</span></p>
               <!--cinews:authorend-->
     
               <img align="left" alt="" height="100" src="%%thumbnailurl%%" style="float: left;" width="100">
               <span style="font-family: Arial, Verdana; color: #333333; font-size: 12px;">
                   %%abstract%%
               </span>
               <!--cinews:readmorestart-->
                   <p style="font-family: Arial, Verdana; font-size: 12px;">
                    
                       <a alias="%%linkalias%%" href="%%articleurl%%" style="font-size: 12px">[FULL STORY]</a>
                   </p>
               <!--cinews:readmoreend-->
               <p style="font-family: Arial, Verdana; font-size: 12px">
                   <!--cinews:backstart-->
                       <span id="article_fullstory"><a href="%%backurl%%" style="font-size: 12px">Back</a></span>
                   <!--cinews:backend-->
               </p>
                
               <p>&nbsp;</p>
                
           <!--cinews:articleend-->
       <!--cinews:contentend-->
   </td>

7. If you would like to automatically add a Table of Contents, define the Table of Contents section with the following HTML code inside of a table cell:

   <!--cinews:tocstart-->
    
       <!--cinews:tocrowstart-->
           <a href="%%toclink%%" style="line-height: 20px; font-size: 12px">%%tocname%%</a>
       <!--cinews:tocrowend-->
        
   <!--cinews:tocend-->

   Variable	Description
   %%toclink%%	Link generated inside of the table of contents that will link to each article
   %%tocname%%	Automatically adds each article title inside of the table of contents

    

   Table of Contents Example

   <td>
   <p>Table of Contents</p>
    
       <!--cinews:tocstart-->
    
       <ul style="padding-bottom: 0px; list-style-type: none; margin: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px;font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
         <!--cinews:tocrowstart-->
           <li style="padding-bottom: 0px; line-height: 20px; list-style-type: none; margin: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; font-size: 12px; list-style-image: none; padding-top: 0px; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><a href="%%toclink%%" style="line-height: 20px; font-size: 12px">%%tocname%%</a></li>
         <!--cinews:tocrowend-->
       </ul>
        
       <!--cinews:tocend-->
   </td>

Two Column Layout

The newsletter template will generate one or two columns of articles.  To make some or all of the articles appear in two columns, please follow these steps:

1. Open the Newsletters folder
2. Click Newsletter Sections
3. Click Add Newsletter Section 
4. Name the section
5. Select 2 columns from the drop down column menu
6. Click Save
7. Navigate to the Newsletter Articles menu folder
8. Create or open an existing Newsletter Article
9. For the Section drop down, select the section you just made with two columns
10. Now all articles saved with this section will be displayed in two columns instead of one
11. Tip: when creating a newsletter with the Newsletter Creator, arrange the articles so that they're in order and grouped by section