Livingdocs Release September 2024: Document Inbox, Document Copy & Transform Flows and Document Info Panel

Document Inbox

In very general terms, the Document Inbox is like a shared depository for each page and article in which all users can put documents, organize them and take them out again.

For example the Document Inbox can be used to send publication-ready articles to the homepage where their corresponding teasers can be dragged directly onto the page. By using groups, teasers can be organized and categorized before they are actually used.

Since the Document Inbox is shared and accessible to all users and is updated in real time, it enables smooth collaboration across roles and shifts.

Document Copy & Transform Flows

While Livingdocs has long provided the capability to copy and transform documents, with the September Release, we are adding a new Copy & Transform feature alongside the existing one that allows for more control and flexibility. Though it is not a necessary step, we encourage you to migrate to the new Document Copy & Transform Flows.

With the new Copy Flows, you can define multiple different copy instructions to copy documents with the same content type. This is especially useful if you want to let your newsroom reuse certain articles for different platforms and simply change a metadata property or two when an article gets copied. By being able to name the Copy Flows, you can add more clarity for your users about the nature of the flow.

With the new Transform Flows, you can define how an article is changed when transformed from one content type to another. This comes in handy if, for example, a user picked the wrong content type when creating a document. The new Transform Flows allow this transformation to happen provided a document has not yet been published. This guarantees that any document with the same ID does not change the rules applied to it once it has been published in Livingdocs.

If you want to make use of the new Copy & Transform Flows, please reach out to your Account Manager. We will support you in the transition.

Document Info Panel

The Document Info Panel is a new side panel we have introduced with this release. It can be used to get an overview about certain characteristics of a chosen article. 

First off, information about copy relations are displayed in the Document Info Panel. As soon as you start to use the new Copy Flows described above, you will see articles grouped according to whether they are copies or originals. In addition it will be visible which copy flow was being covered. Also the «Copy of» information of the pre-existing copy flows is displayed in the Document Info Panel; we moved that information from the metadata form to this side panel.

Further you can see details about how selected articles are linked to other documents thanks to a list of the incoming and outgoing links used in the content. You can easily jump to an article in the list, if needed.

The Document Statistics section can also be turned on to be shown in the Document Info Panel, if desired. Introduced in the May Release on table dashboards, the Document Statistics functionality gives you an idea of the nature and the completeness of an article by providing information like text length or how many images are included. With the Document Info Panel, this statistical information has a suitable place to be displayed directly in the Editor.

If you see any other information which would be worth displaying in the Document Info Panel, please feel free to reach out to product-feedback@livingdocs.io

Further improvements in the September 2024 Release include:

1. Push Message Proposals

   If you are already using the push message feature, you can now also propose push messages at any stage. For example, an editor might have a clear picture on what a push message could look like, even when an article is not yet finished or publishable, and can use this proposal functionality accordingly. Moreover, the push message proposals can also be used at a later point once an article is published and placed on the home page and pushed.

2. Document Editing Header and Toolbar

   Various UI improvements of the editing header and toolbar are included in this release. First of all, the toolbar buttons now behave more clearly and consistently: for example, when using the comments button, other side panels will close so that you are able to see the comments immediately. Secondly the header elements now use the space more efficiently, independent of screen size, e.g. the title gets a dedicated space without being shortened and the collaboration information is now displayed in a more compact, neat way.

3. More space for side panels

   We tackled another UI space issues by making the teaser side panel and the Document Inbox wider. In these two side panels, quite a lot of information is displayed, so by giving them more of the available space, you are now able to see the relevant information more easily at a glance.

4. Content Validation Errors

   In the past, if your system had many checks on the content, it was likely very cumbersome to solve them before being able to publish, as errors were displayed one by one for an indefinite duration. For metadata properties, Livingdocs already has a way to solve such issues. With this release, an indication was added which shows how many errors have to be solved before publication; now all content validation errors are shown as a list. 

5. Dashboards: Search caching behaviour

   We improved the search and filter settings caching behaviour for all dashboards and made it more consistent. When using the document search dialog for metadata fields, we no longer keep the search query and filter settings when the dialog is opened the next time, as we received feedback that this is the expected behaviour. However, if using the same search query and the filter settings again makes sense in your case, you can still opt in per metadata field with configuration.

6. New text field for internal processes

   With the new System Metadata Plugin li-system-text, you can configure a text field in your metadata that is used for internal processes only: for example a note field where users can leave information for coworkers. Changing it won't generate a new version and will not lead to "unpublished changes".

7. Template for prefilling of text fields when inserting images

   When a user drops an image into an article, Livingdocs can prefill text fields like the source or caption of the image. With this release, a template is supported for this configuration, to allow a prefilling based on a combination of metadata values.

8. Retresco: Support for main entities

   With this release, we added support for a new feature of Retresco:
   
   «In addition to the regular entity recognition, "Main Entities" can now also be automatically detected and labelled in the Topic Management System (TMS from version 2.4.0). "Main Entities" are determined using an internal relevance score based on frequency and position in the text and describe the content focus of the document. This enables a more precise classification of articles to topic pages and automatically filters out less relevant content.»
   
   With release 2024-09, Livingdocs now supports this by storing the main entities and making sure they are sent along to the Retresco Content API.

9. Label renaming: Desk-Net to Kordiam

   Desk-Net recently announced that they have changed their name from Desk-Net to Kordiam. With this release, we did a first step to adjust to the new name and have changed the labels in the UI accordingly. Other measures to fully migrate will follow soon.

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. 

In the September Release, there are some technical breaking changes and deprecations you need to be aware of as a technician working with Livingdocs. No user-facing features are affected. Please read the Technical Release Notes for a comprehensive list of deprecations and changes that may affect your newsroom.

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!