We're excited to announce that you can now choose to make your projects and profile publicly visible, making them much easier to share! *cue cheering*
Project visibility options
You might have noticed that there's a new little box at the top of each project page, indicating its visibility status:
At the bottom of the project form (when you edit or add a project) the last field you'll see now is "Who can view this project?" You can choose from:
- Only me
- Textillia members
- Everyone (public)
"Only me" can be useful if you're working on a gift or a swap project that you don't want the recipient to see until they've received it, or really any other projects that you just want to keep private. Just don't forget to set it to "Textillia members" or "Everyone" once you mark it as finished, otherwise nobody else will get to see it!
"Textillia members" is the default we've been using up until now, which means that everyone who's a member can see it once they're logged in.
"Everyone (public)" means that someone who doesn't even have a Textillia account can see it when given the link to the page - so for example, if you share a project you've finished to Facebook, your friends can all see it without needing to log in! When you choose this, it also enables the "Share" links on the page for Pinterest, Facebook, and Twitter (they appear below the grey sidebar box on desktop, or at the very bottom of the screen on mobile).
Note: Publicly visible projects will also be indexed by search engines, and people will be able to find them via Google.
A tip for sharing on Facebook
Sometimes Facebook doesn't suck in the photos the first time it encounters a new link. If you drop a link in a Facebook post, and you don't get their image picker right away, just reload the page and try again, and you should see them then. This is an issue on Facebook's side, but I've always found refreshing the page and trying the link again works!
Have a ton of projects on Textillia and want to make them all public?
If you were an early member and have accumulated too many projects to set to public one by one, but want to make them all public now, drop me a note through the contact form. I can update them all in one fell swoop using my admin super powers, and it'll only take a minute! (This offer only applies to those who uploaded a large number of projects before we added this functionality, I won't be able to do it for projects added in the future.)
Profile visibility options
You'll see a similar option set when you edit your profile as well. At the bottom, there's a new field, "Profile privacy", which lets you choose:
- Textillia members
- Everyone (public)
"Textillia members" is the default we've used so far, where your profile is only visible to someone who was logged in.
"Everyone (public)" changing to "Everyone" will allow anyone with the link to view your profile page without logging in or needing a Textillia account. The biggest benefit to this is when you link to your Textillia page, say from your blog or your Ravelry or Instagram profile, someone can see it right away when they click the link.
Not everything shows publicly that's shown to logged-in members, for example your bio shows, as do your username and social media links, but they can't see everything in your studio area (like your stash, queue, and all your projects), and we've hidden your location to those who aren't logged in.
Note: Publicly visible profiles will also be indexed by search engines, and people will be able to find them via Google.
Making projects show up on your public profile
Maybe the best part of this is that when you set your profile and some of your projects to be publicly visible, then those projects will also display on your public profile! It's like a mini sewing profile with your recent projects highlighted. You can make in-progress projects public and let everyone see your process, or wait until they're finished to make them public, so only FO's (finished objects) will show up.
Share your work + spread the word!
The ability to make your profile and projects public means now you can both share your FO's with your friends and family more easily, and as a bonus help spread the word about Textillia!
Have you gotten your blog badge yet?
Make sure your sewing friends can find your profile and friend you on Textillia by grabbing your badge! Just look for the red "Get my badge!" button on your profile (on the left side on desktop, or just before your bio on mobile). When you click it, it will generate a handy HTML code snippet that you can paste into your blog sidebar - it comes with the link to your profile, and the image code all built in!
Help Textillia succeed: use it and share it!
People often ask us how to help spread the word about Textillia and help us succeed, and one of the best things you can do is just use the site and share links to it! Add your projects and help build up the database, then share your projects, as well as patterns and fabrics you like to your favorite social media platforms and online groups.
Thanks everyone for your help making this happen!