Welcome to Daily Journal

Daily Journal is a site is designed to help you in your walk of faith through a community-based daily bible study. Each day there are 3 readings and user-contributed thoughts using the SOAP bible-study method. Sign-up now to contribute your thoughts on a reading for a future date, or take a look at past readings to see examples of previous entries. If you need help getting started...keep reading!

 

Signing-up

Signing-up to contribute on a day is cake. On the navigation bar above - click 'Write an Entry'.

Select a day

Simply click a day on the calendar to view it's readings. Days that are unavailable will appear greyed-out, and days that have been claimed by others will have a checkmark in the lower-right box for the day. Once clicked, your selection will be confirmed by the calendar page graphic on the right.

 

You'll notice that the readings for the day show up directly below the calendar page graphic. Just click the readings to open them in a new window if you care to review them. Click the 'sign-up' button to commit to that day.

Commiting to a day

Once you've clicked the 'Sign-Up!' button - you will be presented with another window. [below] That window will ask for two pieces of information: your e-mail address, and your group code. Your E-Mail address is needed because you will be sent a link that you'll need in order to edit your entry. Make sure your E-Mail address is a valid one, and check your spam filter if you don't receive it within a minute or two. (add dailyjournal@concordiastl.com to your address book to avoid it going into your spam filter.) The Group Code is a bit of information you'll need before you signup too. If you're not sure what the group code is - check the publication you read about DailyJournal in - or contact Professor Tony Cook. Once you've entered your group code and e-mail address, you should be able to click the "Sign Up!" button. You'll see a confirmation message But you're not done yet...

Retrieving your E-Mail

You should have received an e-mail message in your inbox. That E-mail has some very important info - so you may want to flag it. The first thing you should do is click the link entitled 'Click this link to Verify your selection." THIS IS IMPORTANT - because that day will still appear available until you verify your selection. Click that link any time you wish to edit your entry for that day.

Editing your Entry

Editing your Entry is easy. If you're not on the edit page - just click that link in your sign-up email, and you're in. From there you are given the opportunity to add a title to your entry, a username, a short biography of yourself (i.e. "Jane Smith is a staff member at Concordia Seminary St. Louis") and of course the S.O.A.P. comments. Each S.O.A.P. item has an explaination of what should be reflected in each text box. (You will notice that you have the option of including links and images in your entries - as well as use of some basic formatting tools) Click the 'Save Changes' button any time along the way to save your entry.

 

You can come back at any time to edit your entry (by clicking the link on that e-mail) that is, until the day it is published. Your entry will not be publicly visible until: 1) the day of the entry and 2) you have checked the 'complete!!' button at the bottom of the edit page. (Even after clicking 'Complete!!' you will be able to edit - until the day it's published)

Adding an Avatar

Part of editing your page is providing an Avatar. This is a small (80x80 pixel) representation of yourself to be shown with your profile. DailyJournal uses a service called Gravatar to manage Avatars (commonly used also in WordPress Blog sites.) it's real simple to sign-up, and all you need is a valid e-mail address. The benefit is, once you sign-up for a Gravatar account - that avatar can be used across the internet - using a secure version of you're e-mail address to identify you graphically. (And besides - it's safe!) If you're interested in learning more about a Gravatar account, visit the Gravatar webpage, view the video and sign-up if you're so inclined. (otherwise, we'll just use a generic 'DJ' graphic for you.)

Un-Commiting to an Entry

Please don't do this unless you really need to. Maybe something's come up - or you're otherwise unable to complete the entry for the day you selected. (bummer) please click the link in your sign-up e-mail to enter the edit page. In the upper-right corner of the page, you will see an un-commit button - click it. You'll see a dialog box appear - and after confirming, you'll see a message. This process will delete any work you may have done - and make the day available for others to contribute to. Again, please don't un-commit unless you need to - and especially if your entry is only one or two days away from being published (because it's likely few will be able to committ to a date in this short of time.)