quick updates to FAQs 86 (importing) and 4 (paid accounts) and 98 (crossposting)

[ursamajor]

1. Added the following paras to the Importer FAQ:

If you have set a default security level for your Dreamwidth entries, please note that entries you import will be posted with at least this security level. For example, if you have set a default security level of "access-only" for your Dreamwidth entries, any entries you import that were public in the journal you are importing will become access-only.

Entries that were posted to a custom filter in your old journal will always be imported as private entries to your Dreamwidth, no matter your default security level.

Edit: And that's what I get for late-night FAQ editing - being inaccurate! *facepalm* I've removed the custom filter paragraph, but need to rewrite it accurately, and won't be around for the rest of the day.

Basically, the practical visibility of a given imported entry depends on whether you import your "friends" along with your entries. (Importing your entries automatically imports your "custom security groups.")

If you do import your friends, said friends will not be able to see the custom-filtered entry unless they are logged into the OpenID of an account that had permission to see the entry on the old journaling site. So, say I put xb95-on-LJ in an LJ custom filter - any entries he could see on LJ, he would need to be logged into his xb95.livejournal.com *OpenID* on Dreamwidth to see those custom-filtered entries; won't work for him to be logged into his xb95-on-DW account.

If you don't import your friends, the CSGs will remain empty unless/until you decide to import your friends, and your custom filtered entries will only be visible to you.

*

I hope I wasn't stepping on any toes by doing so - support people were looking for a FAQ editor because of requests seen tonight and I happened to be around.

2. Added the following para to the crossposting FAQ:

Free accounts can configure one external account to post to at a time. Paid accounts can configure up to three external accounts for crossposting, and Premium Paid accounts can configure up to five such accounts.

And I added a line into the Account Features table in the Paid Accounts FAQ about the crossposting # of accounts bit.

(And now, bed, and back to Comms FAQs tomorrow! Happy open beta, guys!)

Comments

[kyrielle]

So, wait, I can't import my groups (empty) and keep the custom securities? ...yipe.

[matgb]

That must be either a chance or wrong, I just checked and my (small number of) filtered posts have it seems all got the right filter.

I imported on the first day it was available, so if it's changed since then I wonder why?

[kyrielle]

Hopefully that paragraph about custom @ old site is just wrong, then - I'll wait to hear whether it changed before I chance the import attempt, though. Having all my (manymany) custom filtered posts come in private would be better than not having them, but only if it was never going to work right, otherwise I'd rather have them filtered right. And having as many as I do, no way am I editing them all to the right security by hand if it is doing that....

[ursamajor]

Mea culpa; I should have checked more carefully last night.

Just checked in with devs, and they confirm:

- If you import both your "friends" and your "custom security groups," this will let people from your custom security group see custom-filtered entries when they are logged into the appropriate OpenID accounts. They hope to make this smoother/better, and let people "claim" their OpenID accounts with their regular DW accounts, but right now, the only way people can see imported custom-filtered entries that you don't otherwise tweak the filters of is by being logged into an OpenID that had permission to see that entry on the old journal site.
- If you do as I did and only import your CSG, the entries are labeled as custom, but the effective security level is "private," as no one but you will be able to see those entries.

Either way, it's not ideal, but better to err on the side of too few people being able to see an entry than too many, at least on a mass import. But I need to go figure out a clearer way to state that.

[kyrielle]

Phew! All I was hoping for was the groups to be created empty. What you wrote led me to believe the security would be explicitly set to private. This is much better. How about something like this text? (Apologies for typos, doing this from iPhone.)

Imported entries that had custom security (groups) on the other site. If you import your friends list from the other site, the groups will be filled with the OpenId accounts for those users in the group. Otherwise, the group will be empty. Either way, once it is imported, you can add and remove OpenId and Dreamwidth accounts to set the group membership as desired. If a post is filtered to only groups with no users in them, only you will see it, until and unless you modify either the post security or group membership.

[kyrielle]

By the way, "cross post" doesn't find the crossposting faw due to the space. As a user, having to know the namung conventiom (or guess it) to find it is disconcerting. (I searched on cross, which both found it and described my feeling at that moment....)