Improved Import

Well this has been a long time coming, but Signup Ahead can finally(!) import from an Excel spreadsheet directly. Go ahead and upload those XLS and XLSX files, no need to convert to CSV first! It also supports LibreOffice/OpenOffice ODS files.

Also, the CSV export column format has changed slightly. The Start column used to have both date and time. Now there is a new Date column which holds the date, and Start is time only. Not to worry, the old format is still supported on upload.

Features and Fixes

Many changes found their way into the latest update for Signup Ahead.

New Features:

By popular demand, you can delete sheets either from the Manage page or the My Sheets page.

You can also copy a sheet from the Manage page.

The Manage page and CSV export now include the date and time when a slot was claimed.

Bugs Fixed:

Reload now works correctly on the Manage page. (Previously, reloading after saving changes would re-save the sheet, possibly discarding signups that happened after the last save. Ugh.)

The slot checkboxes now check and uncheck properly in both edit (pencil) and view (magnifying glass) mode on the Manage page. (There were a few cases where unchecking a checkbox would not clear both, causing some actions to apply to the wrong slots.)

Signup slots on the Manage page are now marked with "autocomplete off". (If you were logged in, some browsers would automatically fill all slots with your email, signing you up for every slot.)

Daylight Savings Time...sucks

Today, all the slots times were displayed one hour later than they actually were owing to a bug in the date formatting code. Annoyingly, this bug only manifests on the actual day of the changeover. This was purely a cosmetic goof: the times on the sheet were correct, they were just displayed wrong. Still, it is very confusing for anyone looking at sheets today.

I hate daylight savings time.

"Events" are no more

The "Event" concept was intended to staple several signup sheets together and allow volunteers to consult a single "master" signup page for all slots in all sheets. It never really worked as intended, and confused users to boot, so the event interface has been removed.

Week view for signups

Two more new signup sheet formats! You may now select:

• Week - Just Description
• Week - Just Name

which shows the slots in a calendar-style week format. Hovering over a slot will bring up a summary of the slot information. Handy for booth duty at the Fall Festival...

Calendar view for signups

Just added three new signup sheet formats. You may now select one of:

• Month - Just Description
• Month - Just Name
• Month - Just Time

which shows the slots in a calendar-style month format. Hovering over a slot will bring up a summary of the slot information. The original list formats have been renamed to:

• List - Name, Time, and Description
• List - Just Name
• List - Name and Description
• List - Name and Time

to keep them all grouped together in the format menu.

D'OH!

A configuration error on the signupahead.com site prevented pretty much any access to the site for the past 24 hours. This has been corrected and the site is working normally again.

Email confirmations

The signup sheet now sports a checkbox to send an email confirmation of the slots you signed up for. Yay!

Fixing "recent"

User feedback pointed out that the "my sheets" and "my slots" pages / emails were less than helpful, in that they listed items based on when the item was created, rather than the more intuitive last update. Plus, "my slots" was sorted by sheet rather than by slot.

This has been corrected; all three "my" pages / emails now use the update time to select and sort items in the list. So now when you ask for recent slots, you get a list of recent slots.

"Publish Sheet" is no more

The "Publish" feature was intended to prevent volunteers from signing up for slots before the owner had finished setting up the sheet. But unlike craigslist.org (on which the feature was modeled), sheets are never publicly available; the owner has to give the signup link to each volunteer. Thus there is no need to prevent untimely signups, and so publish is no more. The sheet is ready to go as soon as it is created.

You can still close a sheet to prevent volunteers from signing up, and re-open it later if you change your mind.

Show and hide slot details

A new feature of SignupAhead is that you can select which slot details are shown on the signup link. From the Create or Manage page select "Show slot details" to pick whether you want to show

• Name, Time, and Description
• Just Name
• Name and Description
• Name and Time

Name, Time, and Description show all the slot details. Use this for sheets like booth duty where you need to specify both a shift time and location.

Just Name only asks for the volunteer's name and email. This is perfect for when you just need a list of names, like people attending a seminar.

Name and Description is useful for potlucks and barbecues, where you want people to sign up to bring something, but everyone will be arriving at the same time.

Name and Time works well for classroom volunteers or preparing meals for a family with a newborn, when you need people to cover specific dates or times.

CSV import!

The second-most requested feature for Signup Ahead is a way to create sheets and slots using a spreadsheet. Good news! Now you can import slots for a sheet from a CSV file! Details can be found here: http://signupahead.com/import.html

(The first most-requested feature is re-ordering slots. That's next on the to-do list.)

Signup Ahead downtime

SignupAhead.com was offline from Friday August 8 thought Tuesday August 18 due to hardware failure. OUCH! My apologies to all for the extended outage.

Note to self: Netgear "Pro" switches aren't.

Slot info links

We decided to get rid of the old link icon for slots. If you add a link to a slot it now makes the slot info a clickable link. We also added a visual cue (shamelessly stolen from Trac) to make links more visible.

Example Sheet

Finally got around to creating an example sheet demonstrating various features for slots. Take a look: http://signupahead.com/signup/examples

Management fast track

Based on user feedback, we have eliminated the email confirmation step for new sheets. It used to be that after you created a sheet you would have to wait for an email with the manage link before you could edit or publish your sheet. But frankly, that's annoying, and it really doesn't help make things more secure. So we dropped it. Now when you create a sheet you will be taken to the manage page immediately. We still send an email confirmation, mostly so you have a copy of the manage link you can use to get back to the sheet later.

Registration (finally!)

It took a lot longer than we planned, but the registration forms are finally working. You can now register for a Signup Ahead account, login to the site, and reset your password.

When you register for an account, you will be asked to confirm the registration by clicking on a link sent via email. This may seem annoying, but this way we know that you really own the email address you used to register.

Those of you who have already created a sheet or signed up for a slot don't need to register: you can go straight to the confirm page (http://signupahead.com/confirm) and enter your email address.

Why register for an account? Probably the most useful feature is that you don't have to enter your name and email address when creating a sheet or signing up for a slot. Likewise when looking at your sheet and slot lists; since we know who you are, we can show you the sheets and slots immediately instead of emailing the list to you.

is this thing on...?

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This is a test of the Emergency Broadcast System.
This is only a test.