News posts

Write, illustrate, and publish bilingual news posts and updates on your public website — title, story, cover image, and date in both English and Arabic.

News posts are the short articles and updates that appear on your public website — a field visit, a milestone reached, a thank-you to supporters. Each post has a title and a story, and you write both in English and Arabic so every visitor reads it in their own language. You'd come here whenever you have something to share with the people who follow your organisation.

Writing a post happens in two stages. First you create it with just a title, which gives you a draft to work on. Then you open that draft and fill in the rest — the date, a cover image, a short summary, and the full story. A post stays a private draft until you publish it, so you can take your time getting it right.

Who can do this. Creating and editing a post needs a website role that grants create and update — typically the Site Editor or Site Manager. Publishing a post (making it visible to the public) and deleting one need the stronger Site Manager role; a Site Editor can write and save posts but won't see the Publish or Delete buttons. If you can't reach the News screen at all, your role doesn't include website access; see Members & roles.

Where to find it. Your website → News.

The News screen

The News page lists every post you've written, newest first, as a grid of cards. Each card shows the post's title, whether it's published or still a draft, and — once published — a link to preview it on your live site. A counter at the top tells you how many posts you have, and you can search by title or filter by year when the list grows long.

From a card you can open a post to edit it, toggle it between published and draft, or delete it. The New post button sits at the top right.

The News screen showing the grid of post cards with their published or draft status, the search box, and the year filterScreenshot to be added

Create a post

Press New post

At the top of the News screen, press New post. A small form opens with two things to fill in.

Choose a slug

The Slug is the short, web-friendly name that becomes part of the post's address on your site (for example field-visit-zanzibar). Use lowercase letters, numbers, and single hyphens — no spaces or capitals. Pick something readable; it stays fixed once the post is created, so it can't be changed later.

If you choose a slug that another post already uses, WAQAF tells you so and asks for a different one — two posts can't share the same address.

Write the title in both languages

Enter the Title in English and in Arabic. Both are required — a post can't be saved with only one language, because your site shows the right one to each visitor.

Create

Press Create. WAQAF makes the post as an unpublished draft and it appears in your list. Nothing is public yet — now you open it to add the rest.

Fill in the post

Open a post from its card to reach the full editor. The form is grouped into three collapsible sections — Basics, Media, and Content — and everything you change is saved together when you press Save at the bottom.

The news post editor with the Basics, Media, and Content sections, and the Save button at the foot of the formScreenshot to be added

The Basics section repeats the bilingual Title (you can refine it here) and adds two more fields:

Date — the article's date, shown on the post and used by the year filter. It's optional; leave it blank if a post isn't tied to a particular day. Pick a date from the calendar field.
Related project — optionally link this post to one of your projects. Linked posts can then be filtered on your public news page. Leave it on — None — if the post doesn't belong to a project.

Media — the cover image

In the Media section, add a Cover image. This is the picture shown on the post's card and as the banner at the top of the article. Drag an image onto the box or click to choose one — WAQAF accepts PNG, JPEG, and WebP files. Once it's uploaded you'll see a preview, with buttons to Replace or Remove it. A cover is optional, but a post reads much better with one.

The Media section with a cover image uploaded, showing the preview and the Replace and Remove buttonsScreenshot to be added

Content — the excerpt and the story

The Content section is where the writing lives, and like everything else it's bilingual:

Excerpt — a short summary, in English and Arabic, shown on the post's card and in listings. Keep it to a sentence or two.
Story — the full article, written in a rich-text editor that lets you add headings, lists, links, and emphasis. There's one editor for English and one for Arabic; the Arabic editor reads right-to-left as you'd expect.

Save

Press Save. Your changes are stored and a confirmation appears. You can come back and keep editing as often as you like — saving doesn't publish the post.

A draft is only as good as both languages. Because your site shows English to English readers and Arabic to Arabic readers, an empty Arabic story leaves Arabic visitors with a blank article. Fill both sides before you publish.

Publish a post

A post stays a private draft until you publish it. Publishing is a separate, deliberate step so nothing reaches the public before you're ready.

Press Publish on the card

On the News screen, find the post's card and press Publish. Its status changes to published. To take it back down later, press Unpublish on the same card — this returns it to a draft and removes it from your live site.

Publishing a post isn't enough on its own to make it public. A news post is visible to visitors only when three things are all true: your website is published, the post itself is published, and your site's News page is published. If a published post doesn't show up on your live site, check that the News page has been published too — see Publishing & preview.

Delete a post

If a post was created by mistake or is no longer wanted, you can remove it entirely.

Press Delete and confirm

On the post's card, press Delete, then confirm. The post is removed from your list and, if it was live, from your public site.

Deleting a news post is permanent. Unlike your financial records — where nothing is ever deleted and mistakes are fixed with a reversing entry — a deleted news post is gone for good, along with its title, story, and cover. If you only want to take a post off your site for now, Unpublish it instead of deleting it.

Why a button might be missing

If you can open the News screen and write posts but never see Publish, Unpublish, or Delete, that's not a fault — your role allows writing but not those stronger actions. Those buttons belong to the Site Manager role. Ask whoever manages your members if you need them; see Roles reference.