Cover Page Management

Meeting Cover Pages

BoardCloud allows control of cover pages in three levels:

  • System (Admin)
  • Committee
  • Meeting

Default Cover Page

The system default cover page is loaded in the Admin section.

It is used by default for any committee or meeting that does not specify a cover page.  The image below shows the Admin Cover Page Manager. (Admin > Manage Cover)

Your default cover page will be automatically assigned to any new committees created.

To view detailed page sizes in pixels for BoardCloud meeting packs: Click Here 

Best Practice for Cover Pages in BoardCloud

Ideally, a carefully designed cover page background will apply to all of the committees in an organisation. Thus a cover page would need to be specified only once, in Admin - Default Cover Page. Thereafter, the same cover page will automatically be applied to all committees and when building a meeting pack the cover details would be overlaid onto the default cover, creating a perfect pack cover page. 

Cover page backgrounds work hand-in-hand with Cover Page Overlays, which are set per-committee. Prior to our overlay feature, company secretaries had to edit their covers to reflect the latest meeting information.

Read more about overlays: Click Here

Below is an example of a generated cover page for a meeting of the Operations Committee. The background was designed to cover the top and bottom areas of the page, while the overlay text was printed in the middle of the document. The result is a board pack cover that looks pleasing and has the full meeting information printed on it.

Sample cover page

Note: Changing your default cover page at Admin level, will affect any committee or meeting that does not have a cover page specified. Committees with custom cover pages will not be affected.

Cover Page Hierarchy

There is a simple hierarchy which governs cover page application in our system.

1) The default cover is used for any committee that does not have a cover page specified.

2) A committee can have a custom cover page if it is specified using the Committee Cover Page Manager. See image below:

Committee based cover page manager

When the above option Cover Page Manager is clicked, the cover page manager will open and it will allow for a custom cover page to be selected for that committee.

Once this is done, the selected custom page will be used for all meetings for that committee.

3)  A meeting can also have a custom cover page.

In this case, a custom cover page is specified at the meeting level and a custom cover is loaded for a specific meeting.

Once a custom page has been loaded it can be reset to default if required. (See below Reverting a Custom Cover Page)

Admin Cover Page Manager

The Admin version of the Cover Page Manage looks a little different but it operates in the same way. As you can see from the image below, a default cover page has been loaded. 

Manage Default Cover Page in Admin

Loading a default cover page is simple. Click on the green Upload a Cover Page button and then browse for your cover page file, which should be a single page, sized correctly, in PDF or Microsoft Word format.

Behavior of the Default Cover Page

Make sure that you understand how the cover page hierarchy works 

Cover Page Sizing

It is vital to ensure that your cover page is sized correctly. If not, the first page of your packs built with an incorrectly sized cover page will be noticeably larger or smaller than the pages that follow in the pack.

Sizes for the following formats are supported:

  • [A4] 800x1100px
  • [LETTER] 822x1033px
  • [LEGAL] 822x1260

Cover Page Manager

Reverting a Custom Cover Page

Once a custom cover page has been specified, it is simple to revert to the default cover. When option the existing cover in the Cover Page Manager the option button at the bottom of the manager will now say "Reset to Default' instead of 'Upload Cover Page'. (See image below)

Clicking the Reset to Default button will elicit a confirmation prompt, which when clicked will result in the default cover (set in Admin) being reinstated.

Reset Cover Page to default

Cover Pages A4, Letter and Legal

Below are the three page size formats currently supported for BoardCloud meeting packs.

Pro Tip

When viewing a board pack, it is easy to see if the cover page is sized correctly for the rest of the pack contents. 

Below is an image of a correctly sized cover page as viewed in the viewer. Note that the pages of the pack staring with the heading Operations Committee are almost the same width as the cover page.

When there is a disparity between the cover page sizing and the pack contents, the areas highlighted below in yellow diverge wider and further than the example below.

Catch cover page sizing issues tip

How Cover Page Overlays Work

We use the term overlay to refer to a template for the board pack cover page, that is dynamically adjusted based on the specific meeting details.

An overlay in the context of board packet covers refers to the printing of text that is meeting specific against the background of a graphically designed cover page.

Overlays are committee specific and draw text from following meeting settings:

  1. Committee name
  2. Meeting title
  3. Meeting date
  4. Meeting time

Note: Cover templates are not mandatory. It is possible to use an cover per meeting or per committee that is uploaded per meeting or else that is applied to all meetings relating to that committee.

Read more about dynamic cover pages:
Click Here

Background Cover Templates

These kinds of templates are single page designs that are sized to exactly match the standard paper sizes supported by BoardCloud. 

These sizes are: 

  • A4
  • Letter
  • Legal

To view detailed page sizes in pixels for BoardCloud meeting packs:
Click Here 

Designing Cover Templates

There can be a single cover template that is applied from Admin - Default Cover Page, that is applied to all committees. Or else the system allows for a specific cover template per committee.

 

 

 

See also