The block that contains your article list can be edited in the same manner as any other element via the toolbar that appears above the block when you enter page editor mode. But, more importantly, there are a special set of controls at the bottom of the list that you can access whenever logged in to the account that created the article list.

This innocuous little box contains all the options that determine what your article list shows. At first, however, it only tells you what that article list is displaying, including the number of articles shown, how they are organized (most recent, most popular, etc.), and from where they come (section, user, etc.). It also gives you a link that says “Edit Sections” and takes you to your Section Manager. To change the settings you need to click on the button at the bottom, “Edit Settings.” This will reload the page with a few more options that have appeared in place of the button you just clicked. These are the various sources from which you can grab articles.

• “All” brings in all the articles on the iHigh Network. This is, obviously, the broadest category from which to take articles, and that also makes it the least versatile. There are basically just a few things you can do with this. You can show the most recent articles posted on the iHigh network, the most popular articles on the iHigh network (by views), and the highest rated articles on the iHigh network. Those are basically your options with the “All” option.

• “User” brings in all the articles from any single user on the iHigh network. This could be yourself or anyone else. On my personal page, for instance, I have an article list that displays everything I've written under that profile. On the front page of iHighSchools, on the other hand, with my administrator profile I've set up an article list to display all the articles posted under this profile, askihigh. This is a pretty handy tool.

  

   

• “Section” is the most common way of bringing articles into an article list. When you write an article you can set it to be stored in a certain section, like a file folder, along with other articles of a similar nature. (**NOTE:If you want to post to a section you've created it will be under the channel iHigh People and the Site name will be your profile name.**)

  

   

• “Pick” is a less dynamic method but it is also the most versatile. With this you can pick and choose exactly which articles you want to display from a list of every article on the iHigh network. Use this method if you want to display an article or articles on your page and you don't want it to change. An article list set to “Pick” will not change until you change it, while an article list set to one of the other options will update every time a new article is published to the place from which they are drawing. If you have a schedule for a sports team written into an article you can use this method to display it on your page as a more static element. The difference between this and a static “Text – HTML” element is that others can still put this content onto their own pages or call it into their own article lists but they can't do anything with a “Text – HTML” block. (**NOTE: Don't worry if this window comes up and you don't see any articles listed, there are a lot of articles without names on the system. Scroll down past those to just about the point on the scrollbar shown below.**)

  

   

• “Filter by Category/Subcategory” - This gives you the option of further filtering your article list to only the articles in certain sections. If you are pulling in all the articles from a certain user but you only want the articles they post that relate to sports or music, and not their personal blog entries about what they ate for lunch today, you can check this box. A menu will appear that lists all the categories and subcategories into which sections are organized. Before you do this, however, make sure that the sections you want have actually been categorized. If you are trying to pull in all of the articles you've posted to different sections that relate to sports, you have to go into your section manager first and categorize those sections.

• “Number of articles to show” - This is self-explanatory, but I'll humor you anyways. This box is where you type in the number of articles you want to display. Right now the max is 99 but even if you have more than that to display you can get them all in there with the pagination option (see below).

• “Show Image Icons” - Whenever you write an article you have the option to assign a thumbnail image to it. This option allows you to turn on or off these images. We recommend, since the icons take up an entire column of space in your list, that you not show these images if your article list is in a narrow column.

• “Show Summaries” - By default, all articles are automatically summarized but you can edit these, as well, for each individual article.

• “Show Full Text” - This will display the full text of the article from start to finish. This is recommended if you are only trying to show one to three static articles, such as a schedule or a list of world records.

• “Show Title” - Unless you are displaying the full article text this option should usually remain checked. The title of an article is also the link that you must click in order to read that article.

• “Show Date” - This shows the original publish date (not the date of the most recent edit).

• “Show Author” - Displays the name of the user that published the article.

• “Show Rating” - The article rating is a simple voting system that allows readers to give the article a score, from 1 to 10. There is also a ratings option for each individual article, so unchecking this box will only keep the ratings from being displayed in your article list, and not necessarily on the article's display page.

• “Show Tags” - Tags are a simple search method. There is a text box in the advanced options for each article (in the right column of the Writing and Publishing Center) wherein you can write various keywords or phrases that relate to your article. When you show tags in your article list it shows these words and phrases, allowing you to click each one to find all the articles tagged with that keyword.

• “Show Comments” - This turns on or off the commenting features of the article list. This does not turn off comments for individual articles, for that you have to go to the advanced options for that article. For more help with comments, click here.

• “Show Pagination” - This works in conjunction with the number of articles displayed to make sure all the articles you want are brought into your list and displayed in a clean and simple manner. When this option is checked, two links appear at the bottom of your article list: “Previous” and “Next.” These buttons control movement through pages of articles so that, even if there are more articles on the network than you have chosen to display in the list, you can still view all of the articles that fit the criteria of the list. (**NOTE: On the first page it only displays the “Next” button and on the last page it only displays the “Previous” button**) Here's what an example of this would look like:

  

   

• “Allow Users to Publish Here” - Just like it says, when you check this option any user who comes to your page will have the option to publish straight to this article list.

• “Require Approval” - Any articles displayed here first have to be approved by you. When you check this option and click save, the page will reload and there will not be any articles in your list anymore. To approve articles, click “Edit Settings” again. This time a list of unapproved articles will be shown below the settings box with the options to “Approve” or “Remove from this List”