Updating your Twitter Status from your ICS Site

SIDEARM provides the ability to send tweets from the backend of your site. The process is simple. After creating your account at http://twitter.com/ sign onto your site then find and click:

Social Media > Twitter

You will see this screen:



To update your Twitter status, you first need to add your Twitter account to your site. Do this by clicking “Manage Twitter Account Information,” click “Add Account” and then enter your Twitter username and password and hit “Save Changes.”

Return to the previous screen. Select the account that was just added from the dropdown menu in the “Account” field. If you already have a current status it will be displayed in the “Current Status” field assuming you have an account selected above.

Send a tweet by entering text into the “New Status” text area. The number of characters you’ve used will be displayed directly beneath.

If you are placing a link in your tweet, it may be a good idea to use the “Get Short URL” field to shorten the link in order to help meet the 140 character maximum. Simply paste the link into the field and click “Get”. Using the URL shortening service bit.ly, a shortened version of your URL will be generated and placed above.

For example, the page http://demo.internetconsult.com/news/2007/11/6/MSOC_1106070404.aspx can be shortened to http://bit.ly/7nQXrZ

Click “Update Twitter” to finish and send the tweet to your Twitter account.

Player Names Linking Back to Last Year's Bio Info?

A common question throughout this fall and early this winter season as people enter new rosters into their SIDEARM software is: "When I write a story and use the # signs around a players name to link to the player bio or insert a link via the Player Lookup features, it is linking back to last year's player bio info, why is this?"

The answer is quite simple and involves a two-step process to resolve this.

The reason:

If you see this occurring, this is because you have failed to enter a date for the season which you have classified this roster in. For example, if you have a season that spans over two years such as Men's Basketball 2009-10, these seasons must have a start date of 7/1/2009 and for single years such as Men's Soccer 2009, these seasons must have a start date of 1/1/2009.

Thus, when the system sees an inserted player reference in a story it looks through the database and is searching for the most recent season with a start date associated, thus the link would go to a previous year or the last year with a date associated with it.

The Solution:
Step 1
On your left navigation within SIDEARM, go to Site Settings (expand + sign), click on Seasons. In the top right frame of your SIDEARM software you will see the seasons listed in a pull down menu. Select the season you want to edit and click edit season. In the frame below, you add in the start date as outlined in the above examples.

Step 2
In order for this to adjust on your stories previously posted, you will need to rewrite your stories. This is done by clicking on Stories in your left nav area of your SIDEARM Software. In the top right frame is your search functionality of stories and just below those search criteria is a link for Rewrite Stories in orange text. If you click on this it will update all the previous stories that are linking back to older roster bios.

If you have any questions, please contact Customer Support at support@sidearmsports.com or 315-443-1872.

FAQ's While Using SIDEARM

Easy fixes that can make your SIDEARM experience a much smoother one.

Below are some common problems that clients come across when using SIDEARM. Here are a few easy fixes that can prevent these problems and save you a lot of hassle.



My story has different formatting than I intended. What can I do to prevent this?

When you create a story, and you don’t write it in the back end of the site, be careful on how you copy and paste. There are three (3) different paste buttons in your editor: the regular paste button, the paste as plain text button, and the paste from word button. We recommend that you use the paste as plain text button (the middle one) and format the text in the editor in the back end of your site. This will remove any unwanted formatting that Microsoft Word or another program has added.



The picture I put in my story doesn’t show up. What did I do wrong?

When you put a picture in a story, make sure you have uploaded it to the back end of the site and use the media objects button to insert an image. If you just copy and paste the image, it will not show up on your site.





All the rosters and schedules for the 2010 season don’t show up on the front end. Why is this?

When creating a season, make sure you enter a start date for this season. We recommend that you use 1/1/2010 for the start of the 2010 season and 7/1/2009 for the 2009-2010 season.


Also, make sure your rosters and schedules are set to current, and your links are built to the current roster or schedule.











I cannot link to my sport file or story; it keeps linking to a different one. How do I fix this?

When creating a sport file, do not rename the Filename, leave it the computer generated name. When you name your own sport files or stories, you run the risk of naming two sport files or stories the same name. If you have two different sport files named facilities, when you try to link to the facilities sport file, the server will not know which one to show.



If you have any problems or concerns that you need assistance with, feel free to contact SIDEARM support using the ticketing system at www.sidearmsports.com/submit_ticket.aspx

How to Create a Gallery

This is a basic guide on creating a gallery for your athletics site. Unlike most other features on your site which are manageable exclusively on SIDEARM, creating a gallery requires the use of a third party FTP client.

The location where you manage galleries on the backend of your site is under Media > Gallery, but before heading here, we first need to transfer our gallery images to the site via FTP.

We generally recommend using the Filezilla FTP client as it’s a free, open source and lightweight program that you can use on all platforms (Windows, OS X, etc.). After you’ve installed the program, you just need four pieces of information to log onto your FTP server: a host, username, password and port number.


This information will have already been provided to you, but if you need any information reset then you can just email support@sidearmsports.com and let us know.

After successfully logging in, you should see a folder in the right half of Filezilla called ‘gallery’ (this right side is the FTP server that you logged into; the left side is your computer’s directory). Open the gallery folder and you will see another folder called ‘load’.

This ‘load’ folder is where you will place all the images you would like to have in a single gallery. Simply find the images on your computer that you would like in the gallery, and then drag them over into the ‘load’ folder. Be sure that the only items you place in the ‘load’ folder are images you want in the gallery. Don’t place other folders inside the ‘load’ folder either – just images.

After you’ve placed images in the folder, you’ve done all you have to do with the Filezilla for this gallery and you can log onto the backend of your site to finish the process of creating the gallery.

On the backend of the site find Media > Gallery > Add Gallery.

If you’ve FTP’d the photos correctly, the system will detect the number of photos it’s found and you can hit Continue.

On the next screen you will be asked to create a ‘Folder Name’. This refers to the name of the folder that will be created upon completion of adding a gallery, in which all the photos you’ve placed in the ‘load’ folder will then be moved.

This means that after you’re done creating the gallery, the ‘load’ folder will be empty and you can begin right away creating a new gallery.

When creating the ‘Folder Name’, be sure to use a consistent and conventional file-naming method. For example, the name of your folder may look something like “MSOC_vs_State” or “WBB_2009”. Make sure there are no spaces in the folder name.

The ‘Gallery Title’ field refers to the title of the gallery as it will be displayed on both the front end of your site and on the backend.

The ‘Sport’ and ‘Season’ fields will determine where this particular gallery will be located in your site’s overall photo gallery. For example, on the frontend I can search for galleries with season and sport filtering options, so it’s important to properly designate your gallery so users are able to find what they’re looking for.

Finally, ‘Gallery Display Date’ simply refers to that date on which the gallery was published. Hit Continue when you’re done with this screen.

On the ‘Image Order’ tab, you can simply drag and drop photos in the gallery to reorder them, or you can skip this step entirely.

On the last tab, ‘Captions’, you can write captions for your gallery photos and give photo credit to individual photos (or set a default credit for all images in the gallery). Also in the ‘Captions’ tab is the option to select one of the images as the gallery’s primary image which will be displayed on the list of galleries on the frontend of the site. ‘Save Gallery Changes’ when you’ve finished.

That’s it. The ‘load’ folder you used when using the FTP client will now be empty and you can start creating another gallery.

Generate Revenue via Sponsorships

You may have received an email from us the other day informing you of a new partnership that ICS SIDEARM Sports has made with University Sports Publications (USP). For several years many of you have been asking us to help provide you sponsorship opportunities on your Website and with this partnership we can now fulfill this need.

The process is easy and the end result is money back into your athletic program. Let us know if you are interested and we will get you the agreement.

Over the past week we have received many inquiries. Below I will address the frequently asked questions.

Why USP? USP understands collegiate athletics and works with over 500 colleges, universities, and conferences across the United States. They already have the relationships with potential sponsors and they have a sales force that can make this a success.

What should I do if interested? We have a standard agreement that we will send you which you just need to sign and fax back to us. THAT IS IT. We do the rest.

How many ad locations will you use? All we ask is for three ad locations on your homepage (one banner location and two right side locations). Each location will rotate through no more than 4 ads.

Will this interfere with my current sponsors? Absolutely not. We will add in the 3 additional ad locations so they do not interfere with anything you are doing.

What kind of ads will be sold? USP’s strength is in local advertisers. USP also understands the type of advertisers that colleges and universities do not want o their website and stay away from anyone that would be inappropriate.

Can I restrict certain organizations from being solicited? Absolutely. You can provide an initial protect list and you can modify the protect list at anytime.

Do I have to maintain the ads? No. USP and ICS will do all the work. We will put up, take down the ads.

So what do I have to do? Nothing. After you sign the agreement we do all the work and you simply receive a check every quarter.

End result. We realize we are still in a down economy and budgets have been cut. We believe your website should be thought of as a revenue stream and not an expense. This is one way in which SIDEARM can help your bottom line.

The Company Picnic

All of us at ICS recently took a much needed break to celebrate the ending of a busy, yet successful summer. We stepped away from our computers for a Friday afternoon and headed to Long Branch Park at Onondaga Lake for a company picnic. We had delicious food and enjoyable company, as well as a rare sunny and warm Syracuse day. The highlight of the afternoon however, was a fierce kickball game and endless rounds of cornhole. Unfortunately most of us were sore from the kickball game and depressed by fact that a kickball game has the ability to make us sore...regardless, we all had a blast. The picnic also created a new office, or mostly Jamie obsession, cornhole. Click here to see pictures from our picnic!

Observations from a "Zebra"

Being a sports junkie I found that after my playing days had passed by, I increasingly missed being involved in the sports I loved. To help with this situation, I started to participate in officiating. It started with my main sport of hockey about ten years ago and then that has passed that last three seasons to the hardest officiating I have ever done: being a Pop Warner Football official.

This blog isn't meant to be any sort of war stories, or an amusing interaction with people - but mainly as a list of observations/comments that I see as a disturbing trend in our youth sports today. Many of us that follow or participate in this blog love sports and have children that will hopefully soon be as interested in sports as you are.

Observations of a Youth Football Official

1. A large majority of youth officials come from community based professions. In my group of officials, we are dominated mostly by teachers, school administrators, firefighters, and law enforcement. We all share the love of the game of football.

2. The younger the child, the more the parents care about who "wins" than the child. I officiate Pop Warner kids from the age of 5 to the age of 15. I have come to find that the younger the age group - the parents get more difficult to handle. When a child is learning the game from the age of 5 to 9, it is our job to make sure that they are safe, and that they have a good time playing. Officials understand that throwing flags at this level will make our kids bored to play, and they quickly lose interest. I've found that kids lose interest when their parents are screaming at the officials about a neutral zone violation, or that little Johnny grabbed a jersey 20 yards away from the ball. We understand that the children are our key to being still able to officiate a sport we love in the future.

3. Officials take making mistakes very, very hard. Officials unfortunately are still human. We beat ourselves up over the inadvertent whistle that causes a game to change, or that call we missed that led to a major game change.

4. Parents treat Saturday like Sunday NFL. This is the worst offense I have seen in my years officiating. I have seen parents drag their kids off by the facemask while screaming at them how much they "suck" at football, or how could they drop that pass or fumble that ball. It is important to teach kids to play to win and be successful. It is MORE important to teach a child to always give their best, and to treat setbacks as learning points to acheive more in the future.

5. Blaming the officials to make it 'OK' to lose. I hear this more and more each year. "We were robbed by the officials" "We were cheated" "Home team brought their own refs" This is the wrong thing to teach children. I have never met any official that I have worked with that contains any bias towards a particular team or child. We do our best on every play to make sure we have a fair, and FUN, game.


Thank you for reading my thoughts on something that is very important to our children, and hopefully if anyone does any of these things, you now see a little bit into the other side of the ball.