These tags provide a powerful and intuitive way to retrieve information from your content database, while dynamically incorporating the results into your templates. Tags range from the simple—such as inserting headlines, bylines, and stories—to more advanced queries like "more by this author," "recently in this column," and "also in this issue."

By using a template and tag-based system, Dispatch remains open-ended, much like HTML itself. This allows for the ability to introduce new tags as new technologies and design needs develop. Dispatch tags can be placed wherever you want, formatted however you want, and wrapped around text or images within any template. The following represents a partial listing of tags, as well as examples of their applications:

Navigational Tags:

• Page forward and page back capabilities offer linear, print-style sequencing of stories.

• Page splitting breaks pages into short readable screens, offering a "more" or "next" style approach. Splitting can be based on word count or page weight (file size).

• Issue threading connects archived and current columns. For example, "last issue" would link to the previous column's edition. Last issue, next issue and current issue are all supported.

• Page numbering offers a quick way to jump to any page within an issue or section.

• Query tags allow "table of contents" style navigation, "suggested links," "more on a topic," "more by an author," "also in this issue," "other interviews," "this weeks features," etc. Please see querying examples below for additional information.

Specialty Tags:

• "Print friendly" provides a print-optimized format for readers who want a hard copy of the story they're reading.

• "Email story" allows a reader to enter someone's email address, and Dispatch will automatically email the story to them, indirectly increasing your readership and encouraging site traffic.

Author/Artist Tags:

• Author/Artist Names (output can be formatted as full name, first, last, middle, initials, etc.)

• Author/Artist links (email, homepage, or archives)

• Dynamic credit type (By, Edited By, Illustrated By, Photographs By, etc.)

• Author/Artist bio (often used as a footer tag-line on articles)

• Author/Artist images (automatically include image of author/artist on their articles)

Querying Examples:

• This week's stories by issue or section

• More of this story type lists other similarly cataloged stories, such as "more interviews," "more editorial," "more theatre reviews," etc.

• Recent stories by this author

• Recent stories in this column

• More on this topic

• One year ago today, or other date rules: last month, yesterday, etc.

• Other illustrations by this artist

• Full or brief archive listings by author, artist, section, or column

• Alphabetical indices of all contributing authors/artists

• And much, much more—the possibilities are almost infinite, and defined by you!

Basic Tags:

• Headline, subheadline, summary, section, and column name

• Meta-keywords and meta-description (dynamic values to aid in searching)

• Issue date (all formats supported: long, short, European, etc.)

• Volume number (decimal and roman numeral supported)

• Issue Number (decimal and roman numeral supported)

• Image placement rules (align left, align right, toggle, auto-calculate width and height, alt attribute values, etc.)

• Image captions

• File name, URL, and other technical information regarding individual stories

Additional Tag Features:

• Query tag allows querying of all elements in the database, as well as options for how the results should be formatted, and what to do if no results exist.

• User-defined macros allow for your own custom or combined tags.

• Conditional branching (For example: if there are more stories on this topic, list up to three of them, otherwise list up to three stories by the same author.)

• Looping allows you to choose how many times to repeat an action, and what to do with each element.

• Ability to nest and combine tags