Livingdocs Release September 2023: Ticker Articles, Further Multi-Language UI Capability and Drag & Drop Metadata Image Handling

Ticker Articles

Livingdocs now offers a tool to create ticker articles with ease. As per our product strategy and "roadmap", we listen to the needs and desires our customers articulate, and allow this feedback to inform the feature development within Livingdocs. The Ticker feature is no exception.

Single ticker entries can be written and published individually and immediately in order to fulfil the objective to provide up-to-the-minute news. Ticker entries can be included directly when the article is delivered to readers; additionally SEO is improved.

As this feature is making its Livingdocs debut in the September 2023 Release, we expect to make improvements in subsequent iterations. In this regard, we are open to and, in fact, welcome feedback from our users who experience this new feature in action so that we can be best informed on where and how to make future developments. Please direct your feedback to your contact at Livingdocs.

Further Multi-Language UI Capability

With the July Release, we took a step towards a full multilingual UI experience with users gaining the ability to configure all the configured labels in multiple languages. As promised, the September Release is taking this capability one step further.  

With this release, users are now able to configure their preferred UI language from a configured selection. In addition, we added French and Italian label translations; Livingdocs now offers all labels in German, English, Italian and French.

Drag & Drop Metadata Image Handling

Previously, Livingdocs users had to enter images into an article's metadata using the Media Library, images already in an article, or by uploading them though a local drive. In an effort to streamline this workflow, Livingdocs now offers a more user-friendly way to add these images to a metadata form.

Images can now be added to the form via drag and drop from local files, the Livingdocs Media Library or the Comyan DAM. Not only does this enhancement save users some clicks, but also allows a Comyan-based workflow which doesn't require users to insert images from Comyan into the article itself in order to include it in the metadata form.

Further improvements in the September 2023 Release include:

1. Cross-Project Capabilities

   In large Livingdocs setups spanning numerous units in a single organisation, it could be favourable to set up one project per unit. Thanks to the improvements included in this release, it's now possible to configure several projects as a cluster in order to allow users to link to documents from other related projects.

2. Anchor Linking

   When creating a hyperlink within a text to a separate article,  users are now able to link to a specific subtitle section within that article. In short, users can now click a link and land at a specific section within a separate article, thus avoiding scrolling  and searching for the desired reference point. 

3. Publish Control

   The visual clarity is improved when required metadata are not provided yet. Additionally, we improved the UI in a situation that previously led to some confusion: When a user makes additional changes to a document that is already scheduled to be published, the notification that is activated before an immediate publish to inform other users of these changes is now more clear. 

4. Filters 

   In the July 2023 release, we introduced in the possibility for users to create configurable filters. Building on this work, users can now configure filters for document references. This is particularly useful in scenarios where departments, categories or authors are managed as data records, and one wants to see the articles of only one specific department on the dashboard, for example. 
   
   While this was possible beforehand with custom filters implemented in the downstream, this addition renders it no longer necessary to maintain custom code for this use case.

5. Topic Pages Based on Automatic Tags from iMatrics or Retresco

   With this release, generating topic pages based on automatic tags from iMatrics or Retresco is more straightforward. Building on previous work on indexing and filtering capabilities, one can now enable indexing for automatic tags, and then load published articles using the Public API filtered for one or even multiple tags to generate topic pages.

Breaking Changes & Upcoming Deprecations

In order to keep Livingdocs as streamlined and user-friendly as possible, we periodically remove features when we have found better solutions to the problems they solve. We will always give you ample notice so that you have plenty of time to make adaptations to your setup. You can find a comprehensive list of deprecations and changes that may affect your newsroom in the Technical Release Notes.

Breaking Changes

The changes below are immediate and could create blocking issues if not taken into account. 

1. Legacy Dashboards

   Starting with the September 2023 Release, it is no longer possible to use the legacy dashboards.

2. Metadata: No more Angular Components

   It is no longer possible to use custom Angular components for the Metadata Form.

Upcoming Deprecations

The deprecations below are coming down the pipeline. Please make note of them so they don't creating blocking issues for you once they are in full effect. 

1. Publish: Prepare Publish Flow → Publish Control

   We are phasing out the old Prepare Publish Flow in favour of Publish Control. Looking ahead, Publish Control will be put into full effect in the November 2023 Release. You can already opt into using this improvement.

2. Filter Sets

   As we have now enhanced the flexibility of dashboard configuration with different filters and columns, along with the ability to organise them in the main navigation, we are deprecating the Filter Sets feature which allows you to organise different filter settings and apply them from the Filter Bar. If you are using the Filter Sets feature, please contact us directly to discuss possible replacements for this functionality. The Filter Sets feature will be removed latest in the January 2024 release, with the potential for earlier removal if it is no longer being used by any users before the January Release goes live. 

3. Certain Custom Publication Date Configurations

   With Publish Control having been available for over a year, we are deprecating old ways of configuring custom publication date fields used for some special technical scenarios. Please take note if this scenario applies to you.

To get more in-depth, technical information about this release, please refer to our documentation site. There, you can stream the recordings and peruse the slide presentations of our Feature Webinar and Developer Webinar, as well as gain insights into the technical specs.

We look forward to showing you what’s in store for our next release!