PUBLICATIONS: OVERVIEW

Under WUCRSL’s “Reports & Publications” option you can select from a variety of reporting options. The “Publications” option is used primarily to prepare output in format similar to either the format of the Course Listings Semester hard copy book that is no longer printed OR the Undergraduate Bulletin, which is also now only available online. The procedures to generate these two types of publications are listed below. See following page for other report options.

After all information has been entered into WUCRSL for a semester, it is critical that a printout be made to review what will be published. The various publications output options can create nicely formatted versions of your courses, some of which can be opened and printed from your word processor, and others which can be printed directly from the WUCRSL print options. The two most important WUCRSL options are the Course Book Semester Listing and Curriculum Bulletin. From Application Functions on the menu toolbar, select Reports & Publications, then Publications again, and then the screen below will display. Then, follow the steps documented below.


1. Under Reports (shown at the left of screen), choose Publications. Then, in general, you’ll likely choose either Curriculum Bulletin OR Course Book (Semester Listing). When selecting the Bulletin, the information printed will be that contained in your CURRICULUM, and when selecting the Course Book (Semester Listing) the information printed will be that from your specified SEMESTER records.


2. After selecting either the Curriculum Bulletin OR Course Book (Semester Listing) the report option, you will be asked to enter the semester, school/division, and department. Then, click on the Open folder icon in your left menu bar.


3. Then, review & update the Instructions options (shown on the right half of screen). You can do the following:

  • Include or exclude the bldg/room info
  • Include “home” course descriptions in cases involving cross-listings
  • Include special logos (but you’d need to acquire the logo graphic image from the Office of the University Registrar to install on your PC)
  • Shrink or collapse long instructor lists for research/independent study courses involving lengthy numbers of sections
  • Indicate the sequence in which you’d like the title or the department/course number to print out
  • Check the course levels you want to include
  • Indicate whether you want to see only approved courses/sections or all courses/sections (an important distinction if approvals have not yet been made by the dean’s office!)
  • Lastly, you should print your titles “as listed”, making sure you check that your titles are entered in BOTH upper and lower case as required by the majority of publication standards!
  • Note: Normally, the options you typically need (in order to format the output to look most like the specific book selected) will automatically be selected for you by default, so accept the default settings and examine the results to proof our work. You probably will also want to check the box to include the printing of full “home” course descriptions for any “ident” courses you may have. If you have any doubts or questions about what you’re seeing, please contact your Dean’s office or the Office of the University Registrar to get things resolved.


4. Now update the “Write to file” box as needed; you may change the default file name to write your file to a disk or to another directory (like your desktop). Simply click on the “Browse” button to change your save destination.


5. Now click on the Save icon on the left vertical menu bar. Click OK. The save process will display an “About to begin writing….” and various “retrieving” messages. Progress reports will display on screen as it retrieves data for your file; when it is finished an “output complete” message will appear (again click on OK). The requested text is now in the named file. (Note: The time this takes will depend on the speed of your PC and the size of the department/school selected.)


6. Open the resulting text file into your word processor and print it.

  • If you use Microsoft WORD, make certain your “File Open” screen has “ALL files” displaying in the field called “files of type”, so that you can find the correct file you just saved in the steps above.

ADDITIONAL PUBLICATIONS INFORMATION

Department Header/Course Listings Header Text (A.K.A. Department “Front Matter” Text)

If you examine the course listings books, you can see that some departments have generalized text and verbiage included at the beginning or in front of their course listings. This departmental “front matter” is unique and specific to the department. Many departments have none at all; others have general text which explains policies of the department; others have text listing instructor members assigned to specific sec-tion numbers for research and independent studies; etc.

Departmental users can access and update this departmental “header” information directly. To access header information, click on the Departmental icon (the “key” icon) or go to Application Functions>Dept Info Update. Once on the special “departments” window, then click on OPEN, and open your department for the semester at hand. The system brings you into a window with several fields accessible ONLY to Dean’s and registrars; however, departmental users have everyday privileges to scroll down and click on the large text field area labeled: “Course Listing Header Text”. In this text block you may enter information as you see fit. Examine prior course listings books to see examples of how this may have been used for various departments.

Note: Additional information on Course Listings Header Text can be found under the Department Info Update section of this guide.

Example: International and Area Studies

Much of the header information may get reformatted for actual publication, and this is likely to be especially true for the course listings displaying on the web. On the Web, this header info also gets displayed at the top of the department’s courses. Thus, you’ll want to examine any header text you enter by viewing your courses on WebSTAC to make sure you are happy with the final results as formatted and displayed.

For individuals using this text block to list all instructors belonging to independent studies sections, keep in mind that what you enter in the header block should match the instructor information entered under the independent studies sections set up in your semester course sections. That is, if section 01 is to be as-signed to Professor XYZ, and section 02 is to be assigned to Professor ABC (etc), then your instructor connections in WUCRL’s corresponding sections pages should also match accordingly. If this type of arrangement or need does not apply to your department, please ignore. Any questions about this should be ad-dressed to the Office of the University Registrar.

NOTES ON FORMATTING

As you enter information into the header text area, the system will wrap all of your text together into one large block; however, pressing the ENTER key will force a line break on the screen and on the printed copy. By pressing the ENTER key TWO times a new paragraph block can be typed, similar to how a simple word processor operates. However, no bolding or underlining is permitted. Final formatting for book publication purposes may require special typesetting adjustments. Please notify the Office of Student Records if this will be the case or if you have any questions relating to this feature in WUCRSL. Special note: Departmental header text can NOT exceed 8,000 characters.

NOTES ON HEADER TEXT FOR UNDERGRADUATE BULLETIN

At this time, there is no method for entering header text that would be needed for the annual undergraduate Bulletin. In the Bulletin, header information generally includes instructor listings, along with details of majors and minors and requirements, etc.