A longish document describing how to make your own conference poster with attached images. **** Introduction This document describes how to build a poster in BioMOO and how to attach images to the panels of the poster. I assume you have already been to BioMOO and are familiar with using the posters there. Building a BioMOO poster is easy, but not instantaneous. Don't be surprised if it takes you almost as much time to make as a physical poster, depending on your familiarity with BioMOO and whether or not you can easily have your pictures scanned and made available on the internet. More detailed information on image scanning, making images available onver the internet, and adding images to objects in BioMOO is provided elsewhere. If you already have computer scanned images available on the internet, this document will be sufficient for describing how to build a poster. If you have 35 mm slides or negatives but don't know how to scan them into computer files, or you have scanned images but have no site to put them on the internet, BioMOO personnel may be able to provide the additional services you'll need. Contact Eric Mercer (mercer@seqvax.caltech.edu) for more information on this. Just a note: BioMOO is a virtual reality system for biologists. All BioMOO posters should be on topics obviosly of interest to biology professionals. Also, no commercial advertising on BioMOO posters is permitted. **** How to Build the Posterboard and Poster Panels As you may know, the things you find in BioMOO are called "objects", including the posters. All BioMOO objects are derived from preexisting template objects, that are then modified. This section will describe how to make your own posterboard from the Generic Conference Posterboard (template object #2365), and a set of poster panels from the Generic Poster Panel (#3270). Once you have these components, the next section will describe what to do with them to personalize your poster. You will have to be connected to BioMOO to build the poster; it can't be done over the Web (World Wide Web) alone. In addition, you must have a registered BioMOO character. Guests cannot build objects in BioMOO. Getting a character requires that you provide an e-mail address. To register, connect to BioMOO as a guest, and enter "@register". Then just follow the instructions for automatically creating your BioMOO character. Once you are connected to BioMOO with your registered character, you can build your own posterboard with the command: @create #2365 named , The angle brackets indicate parts of the command where you substitute your own information. Don't include the angle brackets in the command. The running title is a shortened version of your poster's full title, similar to the running title used on the top of scientific journal article pages. The alias is usually a three or four letter alias people can use to refer to your poster instead of using the running title. A typical alias is derived from the first initials of some of the main words of the running title. You must include the alias at the end of the running title in parentheses, as well as after the comma. For example, if the title of your poster is "Feeding Habits of the Mono Lake Brine Fly", you might create your posterboard with the command: @create #2365 named Brine Fly Feeding (bff), bff There should be no commas, semicolons, nor double quotes within either the running title or alias. It is preferable that the alias not be an english word. You may use the posterboard's alias to refer to it in all later steps. Once you have created the posterboard you will be carrying it (you can see what you're carrying with the "inventory" or "i" command). If you wish to destroy a posterboard you've created, you can use the command: @recycle After asking you for confimation, the BioMOO computer will destroy the posterboard. Next you'll need a set of panels for your poster. On a simple poster, which I'll be describing, there is only one image associated with each panel. Panels can also carry only text, and an introduction and a conclusions panel may be set up this way. Like on a physical poster, it is usually best to assign one major point to each panel. The posterboard can carry at most twelve panels. You'll need to create a separate panel object for each panel you want on the poster. Each panel should have a short title (two to five words) that will let the user know the panel's subject. You don't need to add aliases to the panels. Create each panel with the command: @create #3270 named In later commands that require using the panel's title, it is recommended you also surround it with double quotes. Experienced BioMOO users may already know when this is absolutely required. As with the posterboard, the panel title may not include commas, semicolons, or double quotes. You should probably have one panel named "Introduction" and one named "Conclusions." You can check your inventory afterwards to make sure each panel has been created. **** Adding the Text to Your Poster This section will describe how to add the appropriate text to your posterboard and each panel. The next section will describe how to attach images to the panels, and the following one will tell you how to put your poster together and set it up where people will find it. There are four types of text you can put on your poster for people to see. The first is the running title of the poster and the short titles of each panel that you have already added. You will also add a full title, author list, and author's associations to the posterboard, a major panel text to each panel, and optionally some figure text that will only be seen by people viewing the poster over the Web. Your poster's description comprises the full title, author list, and author's associations. To enter these, type: @describe as You will be told to enter lines of text, and to enter a line with only a period on it to indicate you're done. The information should be entered in the order I just described with author list and author's associations starting on fresh line. Don't put in any blank lines; they look bad on the final poster. To check the text of the poster's description, type: look If you don't like the description you've entered, you can use the "@describe as" command again to enter a fresh one. Next you'll add the appropriate text to each panel. Keep in mind that some people will be reading only the text of the poster and not seeing any images. For this reason, the text should include all the information people need to understand the significant point you want each panel to make. This includes a short description of the panel's image and the significance of the data shown. Information needed only by users who can see the image, such as what abbreviated labels on the image indicate, can be put in a separate area of text described later. To add the main text to the panel, type: write on Like when you added the description, you'll be given the chance to enter lines of text followed by a line with only a period to indicate you're done. If you have a computer with a windowing system, you can usually paste in already prepared text when prompted for these lines. There is a built in text editor in BioMOO that you can use to edit the text ("@notedit "), but if you are new to BioMOO, it may not be worth learning how to use it quite yet. You can check that the text has been properly added to the panel with: read To erase the text from a panel, type: erase You may then write on the panel again. If you write on the panel again without first erasing it, the new text will be appended to the old. To add text, to the panel, that will be seen only by people reading the poster over the Web, use the command: @describe as This command works exactly like the previous time you used it to describe the posterboard. Users reading the poster as only text, or as text with images will both see the posterboard description you entered, though. You can check the text of the description with: look **** Attaching Images to the Panels If your poster consists only of text, you may skip this section and go on the the section called "Assembling the poster and setting it up." This section assumes you already have images scanned and available over the internet. You must also know the Uniform Resource Locator (URL) for each file containing an image. All web-accessible files have a URL. If you're not sure of the URL for your image file, ask the person who maintains the Web site where your file is stored. The exact procedure you will use to attach images to the panels depends on what type of image file is being attached. The file should either be in GIF format or JPEG format. For either format, you first should attach the image file's URL to the appropriate panel with the command: @URL is For example, if you wanted to attach the URL "http://machine.myschool.edu/Myfiles/panel1.gif" to your panel entitled "Fly Feeding Behavior", you would type: @URL "fly feeding behavior" is "http://machine.myschool.edu/Myfiles/panel1.gif" Notice the double quotes around both the panel title and the URL. Using these will help the BioMOO computer to understand exactly what you want done. For GIF format images, this is all you need to do. If the image file is in JPEG format, however, you'll need to perform one additional step. Just type: @URL-external That's it. You should be able to check your panels now to see if the images are properly attached to each. Just start up a Web link to BioMOO for your character, and look on the displayed list of what you're carrying. You should see your posterboard and each panel listed there. You can check the panel's image by simply selecting the panel on your graphical web browser. If the image does not load properly, you may have entered the URL incorrectly. Go back to the "@URL is " command and begin from there again. If you're still having problems, contact one of the BioMOO administrators. ******** Note: At this time, before using the @url-external command, you must type: @add-feature #3417 first. Once you've added the feature, you'll have access to the @url-external command. As BioMOO's web-MOO link is further developed, this extra step will become unnecessary. ******** **** Assembling the Poster and Setting it Up Assembling your poster just requires attaching the panels to the posterboard. To save time later, you should attach them in the order you want them to appear. Use the command: attach to to do this. Repeat this command for each of your panels. You can now check the assembled poster both using the Web and with the text window. In the text window, you can look to see the panels listed and numbered. Then read on to read the major text for each panel. Using the Web browser again requires selecting the posterboard on the displayed list of items you're carrying. You should see all the panels listed, and be able to select each one to retrieve its associated image and text. If your panels are in the wrong order, you can take them off again and reattach them in the proper order. Alternatively, there is a "@reorder" command that will do this. You should type help to get information on the @reorder command, if you wish. Checking the help will also describe the poster's 'comment' command. This command allows you and others to write comments on the poster that won't appear on the panels, but only if you type "read comments on ". If you wish to add information to the poster that's not related to the work being presented (eg. that you're looking for a post-doctoral position), you'll probably want to add that as a comment, and not on a panel. To set up your poster, go the the balcony of the foyer. To teleport there directly, use "@go efb" and you'll arrive at the east foyer balcony. There you'll find a sign you can read ("read sign") that will tell you exactly where and how to set up your poster. Basically, this means going to the area on the balcony designated for your poster's topics, typing "drop ' and then "@lock with here". That's it. Now your poster is set up and ready for general viewing. Congratulations! Eric Mercer 9/21/94 (You finish reading.)