Getting Started: Create a Guide
Guide Look & Feel
Create a Guide (this page)
More Support
Need more help creating a guide? Springshare has a guide on this very topic!
Private vs. Published
When you first create a guide, its status is Unpublished. Other CUL LibGuides authors can see what you've done, but no one else.
That means you're free to think, try different approaches, change your mind, make mistakes, and learn as you go without worrying that what you've done is out there for everyone to see.
When you're ready to get feedback, you can change the status of your guide to Private. It still won't be listed among the CUL LibGuides, but can be viewed by anyone to whom you give the URL: other librarians, faculty, friends, colleagues at other institutions, etc.
When you're ready to make your guide Public, there are several steps you need to take. For more on that and on changing a guide's status, see the Review & Publish page.
Your LibGuides Group
Have questions?
Email our team!
libguides@libraries.cul.
LibGuides Implementation Team
| Candice Kail | LDPD |
| Evelyn Ocken | LITO |
| Ted Goodman | Avery |
| Paula Gabbard | Avery |
| Matthew Baker | Burke |
| Meredith Levin | H & H |
| Thai Jones | RBML |
| Krystie Wilfong | Sciences |
| Lauran Hartley | Starr East Asian |
| Gary Hausman | Global Studies |
| TBA | Social Sciences |
Create a New Guide
Creating a New Guide
- From your LibGuides Dashboard, click on Create Guide (under "LibGuides Shortcuts" near the center of the page).
- Don't worry about the "Group Assignment" section--just leave it as-is.
- Under "Apply a template," select which CUL template you want to use. Your options are:
- Tabs layout (for tabs along the top of the guide)
- Side-nav layout (for tabs along the left-hand side of the guide)
- Ignore the "Copy an existing guide section" unless you want to copy an existing guide's content and/or layout. If so, then move to the next tab in this box ("Copying an Existing Guide").
- Under "Guide name," give your guide a title.
- Include a brief description.
- NOTE: the title and description can be easily changed before publishing.
- "Password" is not recommended (as it locks down access to the guide). Leave this blank.
- Under "Guide type," select the appropriate option:
- Choose "Course Guide" for CourseWorks guides. (Example: JOUR 6002: National Affairs Journalism Course)
- Choose "Subject Guide" for Research guides. (Example: Journalism Guide)
- You can optionally choose "Topic Guide" for a Research Guide with a very narrow topic. (Example: National Security Resources for Journalists)
- Sharing restriction: We recommend that you don't restrict your guides; however, you have this option(so that no one else may copy it). Even if you don't select this, you will be notified by email when someone (at CUL or another institution) copies any part of your guide.
- Click on "Create Guide" and you're ready to format the guide and add content. (See the third tab in this box.)
- Don't forget to create a Friendly URL for your guide! (See fourth tab in this box.)
Copying From an Existing Guide
- From your LibGuides Dashboard, click on Create Guide (under "LibGuides Shortcuts" near the center of the page).
- Don't worry about the "Group Assignment" section--just leave it as-is.
- Ignore the "Apply a template" section.
- Under "Copy an existing guide" choose "Copy content/layout from an existing guide."
- Choose what type of guide you wish to copy. You have the option to copy from 1) one of your own guides, 2) another CUL guide, or 3) "community" for guides from a different institution that uses LibGuides 2.
- Click into the textbox marked "Search for a guide" and start typing the name of the guide from which you want to copy.
- If you copy an existing guide, all of the content (tabs and boxes) will be copied into your new guide for use as-is or for editing.
The rest of these instructions are the same as "create a new guide."
- Under "Guide name," give your guide a title.
- Include a brief description.
- NOTE: the title and description can be easily changed before publishing.
- "Password" is not recommended (as it locks down access to the guide). Leave this blank.
- Under "Guide type," select the appropriate option:
- Choose "Course Guide" for CourseWorks guides. (Example: JOUR 6002: National Affairs Journalism Course)
- Choose "Subject Guide" for Research guides. (Example: Journalism Guide)
- You can optionally choose "Topic Guide" for a Research Guide with a very narrow topic. (Example: National Security Resources for Journalists)
- Choose "General Purpose" for pages on library collections, policies, services, etc.
- Sharing restriction: You have the option to restrict your guide so that no one else may copy it. However, even if you don't select this, you will still be notified by email when someone (at CUL or another institution) copies any part of your guide.
- Click on "Create Guide" and you're ready to format the guide and add content. (See the third tab in this box.)
Formatting Your Guide
- The first tab in a guide is called "Home" by default, but it can be changed.
- In the grey bar underneath the tabs, select "Page."
- In the drop-down, select "Title/Description."
- Enter a new tab/page title.
- Hit the Save button.
- You can optionally add a description of the page. The description will appear when a user places the cursor over the tab for that page.
- You can also change the column layout of your guide (see link for more).
- For more on formatting tabs or boxes, look at the tabs at the top of this guide.
Friendly URLs for Guides
Friendly URLs keep our guides findable, and are how we link course guides into the CourseWorks system. You must create a Friendly URL for your guide before you publish it.
You can create a guide Friendly URL by clicking on the pencil icon to the right of the existing guide URL.
Friendly URLs for Tabs/Pages
You also have the option to create Friendly URLs for your Tabs/Pages.
Adding Content
- Content is added to guides using content boxes arranged on pages (tabs).
- See Add/Edit Tabs for details on how to add more pages/tabs to a guide.
- See Add/Edit Boxes for details on the different types of content boxes and how to add them to a page.
- Don't forget to check the "Reuse Content" tab to see how to make the most of your content!
Guide Title: Best Practices
Your guide title & description are the first things your users see when they see the list of guides on your site, so making sure your titles / descriptions are useful is very important!
Best Practices
- Keep it simple!
- Use short, but descriptive, guide titles.
- Descriptions should give the user enough info to know what's in the guide without being too wordy.
- Don't use jargon - unless our users would use the same jargon.
- Use Friendly URLs
- Friendly URLs make it easy for folks to remember how to get to the guide.
Changing the Guide Title & Description
- Once on the guide edit screen, click the guide title or description. (They'll be underlined with a dotted blue line.)
- Update the text in the box and click the blue checkmark icon.
- Change your mind? No problem; just click the "x" icon.
- Want to delete all of the text in the box? Sure! Just click the small gray "x" that appears at the right of the text box.
LibGuides 2: Creating a Guide (Video)
Learn best with videos?
Below is a helpful one from Springshare, and they have many more video tutorials!
Prefer written instructions? Just scroll down.