"Some of you may have seen my 2010 fly-in website, located at www.dpa2010.com. This website uses the same software, design and layout that the deafpilots.org website uses, which is part of my concept of creating groundwork and paths for future fly-in websites to be much easier for a person to work on by having a website template ready to go, if they choose to use it.

"I would like to give you a list of features on the new website:

(Online = feature is online and ready to use)
(BETA = feature is online but not available to the public, and is being privately tested)
(Planned = feature is not online but is planned in the near future)

• • Online - Online payment for membership, with expanded membership options; plus the ability to accept donations online

  • Online - Online Membership Registration

  • Online - Brand-new FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions) database
    

  • Online - Membership database that anyone can access. This will also allow members to easily find and contact other members, and also it is great for the DPA administration to be able to send mass emails to all DPA members. You will also find great profiles full of information, and the member database is integrated with the forum (no need to sign up seperately to use the forum)

  • Online - Ability to set up different levels of access - Public, Member, and Administrator. Individual components as well as whole pages can be modified to show up for a certain level of membership (For example, the certain menus will only show up if you are actually logged in as an Administrator. Certain areas of the website are limited to Members only, and the general public cannot see those Member-only areas, which encourages support for the DPA)

  • Online - Forum

  • Online - Chat Room (Chat room is up and running, but is limited to 5 simultaneous chatters; we are working to sove this issue)

  • Online - Video capability

  • Online - Mutiple levels of authors, making it very easy and simple to add, modify, and remove news articles - Someone can be allowed to ADD and article but not modify or remove it... or allowed to MODIFY an article but cannot remove it... or allowed to DELETE an article but not modify it... it is entirely custom. Articles are VERY easy for anyone to write whatever they want, provided they are allowed to do so and have author access. For those who are allowed to modify an article, you can do this easily with only one click

  • Online/Planned - Photo and Video Galleries (Photo Gallery is online; Video Gallery is being researched and may or may not be implemented)

  • Online - The ability to print out any individual article, or email it to someone.

  • Online/Beta/Planned - In some cases, it works hand-in-hand with facebook, twitter, youtube, and other popular networking sites, allowing us to expand our reach.

  • Online/Beta - RSS feed capability - not many people know about this or use this, but for those who do, it is a very useful tool that makes it easier for you to keep up to date with the DPA. (Feature is online and assumed to be working, but is not confirmed or tested)

  • Beta -Calendar and Event Registration

  • Planned - Comprehensive list of sponsors with some graphical advertisements

  • Beta/Planned - A DPA store, where we can sell items with DPA logos on them, as well as other things

  • ...and more!

"I am very excited about this new venture, and I am proud to be such an integral part of this, and hope that this website brings new excitement for you!

Todd