To use SiteBuilder you need an account on MMN. Project leaders and administrators should register for an account and then contact a member of the MMN staff at Maine Historical Society. All sites need to be initially setup by MMN staff. Once you are set up as an administrator to the site, you can begin.
If you are not an administrator but will be helping create the site for a project that you are working on, contact your project leader and have them set you up as a "site participant." See Adding Site Participants.
Your MMN SiteBuilder site will be assigned a subdomain of MaineMemory.net. The subdomain comes before the "mainememory.net" in the address. For example, "mysite" is the subdomain in http://mysite.mainememory.net. Let the MMN staff member know what you want for your subdomain.
Once you create a user's account, and MMN staff has set up your site, you can access it from the My Account section on MMN. Go to My Project Sites and you will see a list of all sites you have permission to work on. Click on the Edit link next to the name of the site and you will be taken into the "edit mode". This will give you all the tools you need to add content to your site's pages.
All good websites are planned out. Before you start to build your site in SiteBuilder, you should have planned the navigation, sections, pages, text, images, and files that you want to include. A flowchart is very helpful for this step. Think about your messages and how you want your site visitors to encounter your information. Make it as easy to find as possible. There are several books on good information design. Once you have outlined your website, you can begin building it with Sitebuilder.
A good website has useful and engaging images. The web is a visual medium. Prepare all your digital files before you start to build your site. Scan the photos you wish to use. Take the photographs you need and record the audio you want to include. Put everything in a folder or directory on your computer so you can easily find it.
If you will be scanning historic images for inclusion in MMN, and you are a collecting organization (historical society, museum, library, etc.) please contact MMN staff to set up your Contributor's account. In SiteBuilder, you can also include images and files that are not part of the MMN database. Please see Project Images or Project Files.
A project participant is anyone contributing albums or exhibits to the site. Participants also have access to the ExhibitBuilder tool from within their login account. Site Administrators must add users as Project Participants so they can create and share albums and exhibits.
To add a project participant, go to Site > Manage Participants, and follow on-screen instructions.
If you are a collecting organization, you may be eligible to become a contributing partner of Maine Memory Network. Go to the Contributors' section of MMN to read more about becoming a contributor.