User Guide

This user guide will be a quick run through of how to use the to.uri.st site. Hopefully it's mostly self explanatory, but just in case:

Enter a place into the search box in the sidebar of the homepage to go directly to that location. Addresses down to the street level will try to be found and the appropriate zoom level for the map selected.

The "Find Me" button allows us to center the map around where you are, we figure this out either by geocoding your IP address (which is quite inaccurate) or via the Gears geo module if you've got Gears installed in your browser.

Drag the map around with the mouse by clicking and dragging on the map. Use the zoom tool on the left or double click on the map to zoom in.

Once you reach a closer in zoom level attractions will start to appear. At far out distances attractions will be clustered together.

To get back to the homepage and the search form, click the "Zoom back out to to.uri.st homepage" link at the bottom of the sidebar.

A cluster is shown as a grouping of orange markers, you can hover over a cluster marker to see how many attractions are in the cluster. Click on the cluster to zoom in further at that location and to expand the cluster.

If you want to filter down the attractions shown on the map, enter a filter into the filter form at the bottom of the sidebar and press the "Go" button. This will limit the displayed attractions on the map to those with your filter in the title or description.

To remove the filter, remove the filter text from the filter form and press the "Go" button to remove the filter.

Anyone can edit an attraction, in fact we want you to edit attractions. If you know something about an attraction that isn't listed, click the edit link at the top of the attractions description window and add it. Here are a few simple rules to get you started:

• Keep the tone of voice on target
  

• The description should not sound like a sales pitch, be informative not advertising
  

• No transitive data, for example; prices, special events, etc.
  

• All data must be your own, no copying from other sources, by submitting data you agree for contributions to be distributed under the CC ASA license.

For more information read our content policy.

Include your name in your edits and keep it consistent across edits, that way to.uri.st will allow you to look at a list of all of your edits over time by clicking on your name in the "recent changes" or "attraction history" pages.

The history of every edit is saved in the attractions edit history. Here you can see every edit and view the differences between edits.

The following tags can be added to an attractions description to mark them in certain ways. Marking an attraction with a tag allows people to easily find all attractions with that tag.

• {delete} - The attraction is surplus and for some reason should be deleted. Every now and then, we run a script that looks for all attractions marked with this tag over a month ago and removes them from the database.
  

• {dupe} - The attraction is a duplicate of another attraction. Again, attractions marked with this tag will be deleted after a month.
  

• {badloc} - The location of the attraction is incorrect or inaccurate, this is both a warning to people attempting to visit the attraction and a prompt to people who do know the attractions correct location to update it.
  

• {todo} - The attraction needs a better description to be added by someone who knows something about it.
  

• {trap} - The attraction as a potential tourist trap and should possibly be avoided.
  

• {translated} - The description of the attraction was automatically translated by machine into English and should be fixed by a human.

To add a new attraction, position the main map over the location of the attraction and then use the "Add an attraction" link at the top right of the page to open the new attraction dialog. Enter the attractions name, a description, select the attractions type, and enter your own name or handle.

The map allows you to fine tune the attractions location, and you can add a Flickr picture and to add a link to an external Web page containing more information.

Once you're done, hit the save button and you're done.

Note that your new attraction may not appear straight away due to the way we cache our data.

To remove an attraction, edit it's description to include the status tag of "{delete}". This will add a status warning to the attraction and cause it to be deleted in one months time if the tag isn't removed.

To see what has been added or edited recently we have a "recently changed" page. You'll find it linked from the top right of the page.

By default the page will just show you changes within the current view, the link at the top of the page will switch to a global list of all changes.

Need more help? Found a problem? We have a support forum at http://support.to.uri.st/ where you can ask questions and find answers. Alternatively send me an e-mail directly to paul@to.uri.st.

Unfortunately, some people want to vandalise open systems, this is just a fact of life. If you come across a place that has been vandalised, revert it back to the last good version through the attraction history.

To revert an attraction, view a specific older version via the history tab, choose "revert" and save the old version as a new version.

If there are lots of vandalised attractions then that calls for a bigger response. Let us know via abuse@to.uri.st and we'll prod the database to restore all of the old versions quickly.