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New change to asking support questions in the Hub
From today, the way you ask Lamplight support questions will be from the Hub directly.
What changes are being made?
We’ll be gradually moving away from our current system (third party software called Zoho) and into Lamplight over the coming days and weeks. This means that you won’t now be able to ask or respond to questions directly by email.
Click ‘Your questions’ on the main Hub menu and you’ll see all the current questions you’ve asked (from today), and any responses. The rest of your team can access these questions and add information. You’ll receive a no-reply email notification when we add a response.
Why is the way you submit support questions changing?
The main reason for the change is so you can see your questions and responses at any time, giving you more control over your support. Any questions your organisation asks Lamplight via the Hub will be visible to you and the rest of your team. If someone in your team has previously raised an issue, you will all be able to access the answer in the same area.
Another reason for this change is so that we can be more transparent about how Support Pack time is used. Each question will show how much time we’ve spent, to the minute, and you’ll be able to see a full breakdown.
What impact will this have?
To get started we’ve added 30 minutes support time to all customers. If you do not yet see these 30 minutes, or any existing purchased support time – don’t panic. We’re still working our way through the update.
Any time that you have left available from your implementation package will be included, along with any current support pack purchases.
If you’re a system administrator, there will be the option to purchase support packs whilst you’re in contact with our team when you need to. But of course any bug reports or similar questions won’t reduce your support time balance.
Introducing The Enhanced Publishing Module
The Publishing Module enables you to use data from Lamplight to keep your website up to date and user-focused with event listings, online bookings, searchable partner directories and direct referrals. Updates to the module itself mean that this is now possible without the need for coding and web developers.
What is the Publishing Module used for and is it right for us?
Your website is an important part of keeping your services accessible and with regular, relevant content you can engage your service users directly.
Thinking about what your website visitors need in order to understand and access your services is good practice and Charity Comms give further guidance. You can develop a set of online ‘Content Principles’ to help you focus on what’s important to optimise your website content production.
What can we achieve with the Publishing Module?
The Publishing Module enables you to publish and receive information directly through your website to/from Lamplight keeping your service users up to date and saving you time on administrative tasks.
List Events
Up and coming events recorded in Lamplight can be shared on your website so that people stay up to date with the support you’re offering.
Take Bookings Online
Reduce the time you spend on administration by enabling people to book on to your events and services directly via your website.
Enable Direct Referrals
Create a profile and link it to a referral record for you to take forward.
Include Searchable Directories
Profiles you choose to publish from Lamplight can be included in your website as an informative ‘About Us’ staff page or a helpful partner agency directory.
This is all secured in multiple ways – only records you explicitly publish are available to be published so you are in control of your data at all times.
New Publishing Widgets make this simpler
Optimising your website with the Publishing Module has become achievable without the need for coding thanks to a recent update. New publishing widgets now let you create a snippet of html in Lamplight that you can copy and paste into your website, and it just works!
Creating a widget:
1. Make sure the settings you need are enabled
2. Create a widget – choose the type you want, give it a name, and set any details you need
3. Copy the html from Lamplight and paste it into your website
Can We Create QR codes to automate event and session registers?
The Publishing Module enables you to employ a QR code registering process for events and service user sessions which has multiple advantages from Health and Safety to saving significant time for both your staff and attendees.
Further functionality
The Publishing Module enables further functionality with the support of a web developer using the Lamplight API enabling you to:
- Create multiple profiles and link them together for more complex referral flows
- Accept bookings to work records, or add to a waiting list if the session is full
- Create relationships between profiles
- Build a member portal which draws on and updates data in Lamplight
Full Specification:
- List profiles including custom field data
- Configure settings to control exactly which profiles and which fields are available through the API
- Add new profiles and update existing profiles, including custom field data
- List published work records including custom field data. This can include a limit on the number of spaces, and whether bookings can be taken via the API on a record-by-record basis
- Add attendees to work records (using email or ID as an identifier)
- Create relationships between profiles
- Create referral records, including custom fields
- Add profiles to waiting lists and manual groups
Try the module free for one month
As with all our modules you can trial the Publishing Module free for one month and it will cost £5 (+VAT) per month if you choose to keep it. To start a free trial, go to system admin > your account > add or remove modules or projects > and tick the publishing module box.
You’ll have access to help resources showing you how to use the module so once switched on in your system, visit The Hub for further resources and tutorials.
Data Direct module – New Enhancement
We look at the benefits of adding the Data Direct module for your Evaluations and Outcomes to your system. We’re also excited to announce a new improvement to the module – which can help you get even more detail from your service users.
What Is the Data Direct module For And Is It Right For Me?
Having the ability to send your evaluation forms and outcome diagnostic tools electronically can help you reach out further and at a time that works for your service users.
The Data Direct module makes this possible: Your evaluation forms and outcomes measures can be sent to your service users online and become accessible to them on their computers, tablets, and phones so that they can respond wherever they are. Their responses return directly into your Lamplight system ready to be viewed and reported on.
We know that your face-to-face interactions are invaluable in the work you do but we hope that the ability to reach people no matter the situation is an additional layer of outreach that can help you as you make the difference you want to make.
Evaluations
Data Direct can extend the reach of your evaluation feedback and is an inclusive way of inviting the voice of multiple service users remotely. Evaluations can be made anonymous for general evaluation feedback or can be personalised to show in the profile of the respondent. You can invite the responses of any number of people in one campaign which can save you a lot of time!
This data will support your understanding of what your service users think of your service and ensure that their views are taken into consideration as you develop and evolve. NPC provide some helpful examples of the types of questions you might include in such surveys:
Do people enjoy the service? Rate it? Find it useful?
Would they recommend it to someone else?
What aspects do people rate the best/least?
What is the quality of relationship you establish with them?
How could the service be improved?
Outcomes
Here’s the new improvement!
Data Direct now enables you to send out multiple diagnostic tools in a single campaign. This way service users can respond to the range of outcome measures which are relevant to them and may include any combination of measures you use to track their development and tailor support.
Here you may be using bespoke measures or those from Triangle Outcome Stars which have versions of the Star tailored to the needs of your sector and the service users you support.
Try The Module Free For One Month
As with all our modules you can trial the Data Direct Module free for one month and it will cost £5 (+VAT) per month if you choose to keep it. To start a free trial, go to system admin > your account > add or remove modules or projects > and tick the data direct module box. You’ll then have access to help resources showing you how to use the module, so once switched on in your system, visit The Hub for resources and tutorials.
Want To Make Your Reporting More Effective?
Master meaningful work record reporting on our full-day, online deep dive course which equips you with the skills you need to run your output reports with confidence.
What Will I Learn?
Lamplight has the tools to achieve streamlined, relevant work record reporting but it’s just as important that you have the skills to know how to make that happen. There’s a best way to achieve this and we want to share the process with you right from data entry through to running the exact reports you need. By looking at the process in depth, you’ll achieve greater understanding of where in Lamplight you will find the answers that you need and you’ll gain clarity on the parts played by lists and data views.
Equipped with the knowledge you’ll learn across a full day, you will enjoy the benefit of having an effective work record reporting process that is fully adaptable to the evolving needs of your organisation. Successful work record reporting is particularly far reaching as work records are one of the main record types in Lamplight – The ability to analyse all things connected to work records is therefore highly important.
What Will The Day Involve?
You’ll spend the day with colleagues from across the sector and there will be time to discover independently, time to reflect, opportunities to actively participate and scope to create important connections with fellow participants. We’ll consider a variety of reporting scenarios from query searches to statistical reports to enhance your repertoire and reinforce your confidence.
Course Content:
- Understanding data entry of work records
- Viewing work records and creating activity templates
- Creating lists based on work records
- Creating data views based on work records
- Running work record reports
- Troubleshooting work record data
- Enabling efficiency savings
- Carrying out quality checks
What Will It Cost?
We’re pleased to be able to offer the Introductory price of £240 plus VAT per person which includes a 30 minute follow up session where you’ll have the chance to revisit your new skills 1:1 with a member of our team.
How Do I Book?
See below for dates for forthcoming courses, and email training@lamplightdb.co.uk to book. Please be aware that places are limited to ensure that you get the best learning experience.
View list of activities for Members of a Group
We just added a new feature to Lamplight that lets you view the listing of activity records (work, referral, outcomes etc) filtered for who’s listed on those records. Select the group/list or waiting list with the profiles you’re interested in, and the activities listed will have at least one profile from the group.
To use this, go to activity > view on the main menu and in the filters you’ll see a drop down to select the group or waiting list you want to use.
This doesn’t update the group/list first, though, so you may need to view the members first if you’re using an auto or merge group/list. We may change this if we hear from you that it’s something you’d like.
Free Information Security Tools from The National Cyber Security Centre
The National Cyber Security Centre is doing some great work to make information security topics more accessible. As information security can be a complex topic, the people-focused approach taken in these resources mean that they are very user friendly. We’d like to share a few resources we feel are highly beneficial for the small to medium charities that we work with.
1. Online learning to help your staff get to grips with cyber security
The training is suitable for small organisations and provides a good grounding in information security for all your staff. It highlights the actions you can take to reduce the likelihood of you becoming a victim of the most common cyber-attacks and actively involves your staff in answering questions, identifying possible issues, and making suggestions for how to prevent, and tackle common cyber security challenges. We used it as part of our induction last summer and feedback from our team members was positive.
2. New alert service to help detect cyber threats
The Early Warning service notifies you early if they detect online attacks targeting your network. It’s free, it’s very quick and easy to sign up, and it provides another layer of information security for your organisation. The service will send you notifications if an issue arises. As time is a priority in these cases, being warned as soon as possible is an integral part of rectifying and solving the issue.
This resource is specifically for small charities to help them improve their information security and to feel better-equipped in the face of challenges that can come with rapid technological advancement. It covers a range of valuable topics from ‘backing up your data’ to ‘using passwords to protect your data’ and is super simple to download.
Related post: Why It’s Important To Review Your Operator Security Policies
Introducing The New Audit Module
The Audit Module is a dependable way of knowing that you can retrieve reliable data about all events that occur within your Lamplight system. Having a log of all activity in Lamplight means that when needed, you and your team can confirm the exact dates and times that views or updates have been made in your system and by whom.
What is the Audit Module used for and is it right for me?
This module has been created based on the feedback and requirement needs of charities we work with. When managing sensitive data alongside multiple system operators, we know that charities like yours:
- May have information security requirements to log all activity within your system
- Could need additional reassurance about data confidentiality
- Might require a full log of operator activity to help you comply with quality standards
- Would find it useful to retrace activity to catch unexpected errors or accidental deleted records
The Audit Module logs the detail of all activity on a read-only, searchable register that can be viewed at any time by those with system administrator access. It will detail every action carried out within your Lamplight system including the log in times, views or edits to records and it will list any instances of deleted items.
Providing you with clear records
When you view the logs recorded by the Audit Module you’ll see the most recent actions that have taken place in your system. This is listed by time, operator, subject and ID (if relevant). You can search these logs in the usual way in Lamplight – by using the ‘filter’ function. You can search by:
- Time and date of the action
- Type of record or action involved
- Related system operator
- Record ID
Try the module free for one month
As with all our modules you can trial the Audit Module free for one month and it will cost £5 (+VAT) per month if you choose to keep it. To start a free trial, go to system admin > your account > add or remove modules or projects > and tick the audit module box. You’ll then immediately start recording your system’s activity, and will have access to help resources showing you how to use the module as well as full details of how the log data is stored, so once switched on in your system, visit The Hub for resources and tutorials.
Questions about the module?
Speak with our team at hello@lamplight.co.uk
Have you subscribed yet?
We’ve got a lot of goals for 2022, and our first priority is making sure you’re getting the most out of your system. To do this we’re aiming to provide top tier support and resources to help you level up your Lamplight skills. So you don’t miss anything – please make sure you and your colleagues are subscribed to our mailing list.
You can expect the following news in your inbox:
- The latest training dates and courses
- New modules and services
- Help resources (including video tutorials and written guides)
- Updates to the system
- Partner and customer opportunities
newly discovered software flaw doesn’t affect Lamplight
You may be reading reports in the news of a new software vulnerability nicknamed ‘Log4Shell’. It affects a software component, Log4j2 that manages logging for Java applications. Lamplight isn’t written in Java and so does not use this application directly; and the version on our servers (used by some server management tools) is not affected by the issue.
Lamplight servers update themselves daily with the latest updates. The strong advice is to make sure your machines, software and devices are too, at home and at work. Apparently this ‘Log4Shell’ vulnerability is present in Minecraft, and your machine can be taken over by someone sending you an in-game chat message.
System Update – Printing Diaries
We’ve added a new personal setting to allow you to customise the information shown when you print a diary from the home page or a profile. Your print version can now show more or less info, depending on what you need.
In personal settings scroll down to ‘Template to use when printing diary items’
Here you can use the same template strings as the main diary. For example:
‘{start_time} – {end_time} in {location}. {SUMMARY} with {staff_names}’ – or whatever you need to see on the printed diary.