New Feature: Deadline Countdown

While we would all like to imagine a world where authors submit their proposals well before the submission deadline, the harsh reality is that a good number of them wait until the very last minute to click the Submit button.

Of course, ProposalSpace displays the submission deadline prominently at the top of every proposal and, if the deadline is less than a week away, also displays a notice with the time remaining:

Countdown Timer

While this is helpful, we’ve had a few authors mention that they felt cheated out of a few minutes because their computer’s clock wasn’t in sync with the “official” clock on the server, leading them to believe they had more time than they actually did.

To make sure everyone is on the same page (er, clock), we’re making some adjustments to the time-remaining notice and adding a countdown timer so everyone knows exactly how much time is left for them to submit their proposal.

Here’s how it works:

Continue reading New Feature: Deadline Countdown

Locked Questions for Returned Proposals

Starting today, call admins can restrict which parts of a proposal are editable when returning it for edits!

For example, let’s say you want to return a submission, but you only want the author to edit the abstract and nothing else. Previously, they could edit any part of the proposal. Now, you can prohibit them from editing anything but the abstract.

Continue reading Locked Questions for Returned Proposals

Autocomplete & Form Fields

Most current web browsers have a helpful feature called “autocomplete” that fills in form fields for you based on information you’ve entered into similar fields in the past. You’ve probably seen this if you’ve started to fill out a form asking for something like your mailing address… You start to type something in the first field (usually your first name) and the browser displays a drop-down list with suggestions for autofilling the form. If you select one of the suggestions, the browser magically fills in all the other fields in the form (address, city, state, etc.) without you having to type anything in.

The autocomplete feature can save a lot of time and effort when you’re filling out forms… but not in all cases. Continue reading Autocomplete & Form Fields