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CollectionBuilder

Change Log

This page lists major changes to the CollectionBuilder templates over time. The records might help debug issues if you are working with an older project.

Google Features removed

2024-03-04

Built in helpers for Google Analytics and Custom Search have been removed from the CB templates. These features were not commonly used and required updates to stay current with Google’s changes. Rather than support these specific Google products, we will focus on simple platform-agnostic customization.

To add analytics to your site (Google or any other platform!), rather than using the “_config.yml” option google-analytics-id, paste the snippet provided by your platform into the file “_includes/head/analytics.html”.

If you would like to add Google Programmable Search (i.e. Custom Search / CSE), check the guide in CB-Docs to add an alternative search page.

CollectionBuilder-CONTENTdm Deprecated, use CSV!

2023-11-03

The CollectionBuilder-CONTENTdm template has been fully deprecated. CB-CDM has not been actively developed for years, and use cases are better served by the more powerful and flexible CollectionBuilder-CSV. Details specific to CB-CDM have been removed from the main cb-docs (check the “docs” folder in the old template for reference).

Existing projects using CB-CDM will continue to work fine! However, for all new projects please use CollectionBuilder-CSV.

object_transcript convention update

2023-10-16

The convention for referencing files in the “object_transcript” field has been updated to follow the relative url convention used in other object fields. A reference to a local transcript file should now always start with a /, (e.g. /objects/demo_01.md). Template logic also now supports including transcript files from any folder in the project repository (e.g. /transcripts/example.txt or /text/demo_003.md, etc).

See CB-CSV metadata docs for details.

Alt Text and Transcript Fields

2023-05-30

CollectionBuilder-CSV now supports two new metadata fields aimed at increasing accessibility in collections:

  • “image_alt_text” is used to provide custom descriptive alt text for “image_small” and “image_thumb” where they are used throughout the template. Separating this from the metadata “title” or “description” field allows you to more carefully craft appropriate alt text to communicate information about the image to users. If your metadata does not have the “image_alt_text” column or values, the template will fallback using the previous behavior.
  • “object_transcript” is used to provide a basic transcript on the Item page. This is aimed at audio and video objects which can be greatly enhanced by providing users with descriptive transcripts, an essential for accessibility.

These fields are documented in the CB-CSV metadata section, with examples in the demo metadata and template.

A variety of other minor accessibility improvements have also recently been pushed to the templates, such as improving logical heading order on pages, keyboard focus, and hiding decorative icons.

Item Page Design Refresh

2023-05-10

Default Item pages in CollectionBuilder-CSV and CollectionBuilder-GH have been refreshed. Moving away from the two column layout divided between object representation and metadata, the new item pages feature a single column with larger object display followed by the metadata section. This arrangement better highlights media items and makes the space more flexible for larger features, such as the panorama viewer. A link button (“Item Info”) still highlights and provides quick access to the metadata section.

Compound Objects Option Added

2023-05-10

New display templates for “compound objects” have been added to CollectionBuilder-CSV (2023-05-10) and CollectionBuilder-GH (2023-05-30). “Compound objects” are a concept used in some repository platforms to describe items that are made up of a set of digital files intended to be treated as one singular connected record in the system. These types of items can now be added to CollectionBuilder projects by using the new display_template options and following the metadata conventions to represent your objects.

See the Compound Objects docs section or “docs/compound-objects.md” in the CB-CSV repository for full details.

Rake Tasks Updated

2023-05-02

Contributor Mortiz Mähr refactored CollectionBuilder-CSV’s “Rakefile”. The updated “Rakefile” uses the MiniMagick gem to simplify support for ImageMagick versions and the ImageOptim gem to add image optimization to the rake generate_derivatives task. Most users should not notice any change to the tasks. Linux users with legacy ImageMagick will no longer be required to tweak the IM executable option!

Check “docs/rake_tasks.md” in CB-CSV for details and options.

Updated CSS filename

2022-12-23

Due to breaking updates in the gem “jekyll-sass-converter” used by Jekyll, the main CSS file of CollectionBuilder templates were changed from “assets/css/custom.scss” to “assets/css/cb.scss”. This should have no impact on new projects.

However, if you are using a CB template copied before 2022-12-23, with the most up-to-date Jekyll packages, you might encounter a build error with the build failing on “custom.scss”. To fix it in your own existing template the best option is to rename the “custom.scss” file:

  1. look for the “custom.scss” file in the folder “assets/css/”, and rename the file to “cb.scss”
  2. Edit the include “_includes/head/head.html”, changing the line where it says <link rel="stylesheet" href="/cb-docs/assets/css/custom.css" type="text/css"> to be <link rel="stylesheet" href="/cb-docs/assets/css/cb.css" type="text/css">

Alternatively, in your older existing projects, you can prevent Jekyll from updating the jekyll-sass-converter gem which is causing the issue. To do this, edit the “Gemfile” in your project, adding gem "jekyll-sass-converter", "< 3.0" on a new line. Delete your old “Gemfile.lock” then proceed as normal (i.e. bundle exec jekyll s). The older version of jekyll-sass-converter will work.

Updated to Bootstrap 5 and removed jQuery

2022-05-07

CollectionBuilder updated from Bootstrap 4 to the current version, Bootstrap 5. Because there are significant, breaking changes between Bootstrap 4 and 5 CollectionBuilder templates received some major changes in code and libraries.

The migration should not impact most projects, old projects do not need to update, and new ones will have the updates baked in already.

However, if you are attempting to migrate or update a previous CB project into the new template, you will have to be aware of potential issues. Metadata and configurations should be fully compatible. If you did customizations with Bootstrap or jQuery in your project they will need updates.

Important changes include:

  • Several Bootstrap class names and qualifiers have changed (e.g. l / r qualifiers have switched to s / e, like ml-3 to ms-3).
  • Bootstrap data attributes used to initiate features in html have changed (e.g. data- to data-bs-).
  • The color theming system has been updated in “_sass/theme-colors” (the old version used functions that are being deprecated).
  • CB templates no longer includes jQuery (if you have custom javascript starting with $ it is jQuery and would have to be updated).
  • CB templates now use Bootstrap Icons instead of FontAwesome.
  • CB templates now use spotlight gallery instead of Lightgallery.

CollectionBuilder-SA Deprecated, use CSV!

2021-11-04

The CollectionBuilder-SA template has been deprecated. The concepts and use case it represents have been migrated into the more powerful and flexible CollectionBuilder-CSV. Details specific to CB-SA will be removed from cb-docs.

Existing projects using CB-SA will continue to work fine! However, for all new projects please use CollectionBuilder-CSV.

Feature Includes Updated

2021-06-19

The Feature Includes have been redesigned and simplified. These updates will make it easier to add collection items and external media to your content pages. For a demonstration of all the include options, check out the new Feature Includes Bonanza Page!

If you are migrating an existing project into a new template, you may encounter errors where the old includes do not exist. Search your project for {% include feature/ to find where to update the includes to the new version.