Add a Document Link to Your Page

The Shared Files web-part is a practical tool for organizing and sharing multiple documents on your page, but sometimes you just want to share a one or two documents (e.g. your admissions PDF form, or a supplies list for your class) and having a the folder structure from the Shared Files web-part doesn't really make sense. In such a situation, you can create a link to a document. The link will open the document for anyone who clicks it and they can then view and/or download the file.

Step-by-Step Instructions

In this example, we will create a link to a document using the WYSIWYG editor, but the concept can be applied anywhere in SchoolFront Portal CMS that you can add a Link using the "Browse Server" button (explained below).

Before you begin, make sure you have already prepared the document in a digital format. If all you have is a hard-copy of the document, you will need to scan it and convert it to a digital format such as PDF. Save the file on your computer in a location that is easy to find.

1. Open (edit mode) your content in the WYSIWYG HTML editor.

2. Use your cursor to highlight the text or image you want to link to a document.

3. Click the Link button ().

4. The Link properties window will open.

5. If you were going to hyperlink to an external source, you would type the URL into the URL field, but since you want to upload and then link to a specific document, you will click the Browse Server button instead to locate the page on the server.

6. Once you click the Browse Server button, the File Browser window will open.

The folder structure used to manage the files that make up your CMS website are located on the left.

7. Find the folder into which you would like to upload the document file.

8. Double-click the folder to open it, OR click the New Folder button to create a brand new folder.

Note: If you create a new folder, it will be created in whatever folder you have selected at the time--for example if there is already a folder called "school_documents" and you want to create a sub-folder in the school_documents folder called "Cats" in order to keep your documents about cats intuitively organized, you must double click the school_documents folder to open it and then type "Cats" into the field next to the New Folder button. Then you'd click the New Folder button and the sub-folder would be created in the parent folder, school_documents.

9. Next click the Browse... button in the upper-right area of the File Browser window.

10. Use the file browser to locate the document file that you saved on your computer and open it.

11. Click the Upload button. The File Browser window will refresh.

12. The file you uploaded will now appear in the Selected field.

13. Select the file and click the Select button.

14. The document file path will now appear in the URL next to the Browse Server button.

15. Click the Target tab.

16. Choose a Target from the drop-down menu:

• <not set>: This is the default and pretty much the same as indicating "Same Window (_self)." If the user clicks, the new location will populate in the user's currently opened browser window.
   
• New Window (_blank): If the user clicks, the new location will populate in a brand new browser window.
   
• Topmost Window (_top): If the user clicks, the new location will populate in the user's top-most browser window.
   
• Same Window (_self): If the user clicks, the new location will populate in the user's currently opened browser window.
   
• Parent Window (_parent): If the user clicks, the new location will populate in the window from which the current window spawned.

17. Click the OK button.

18. The link to the document has been added.