2013 – Condolence Book – Gerhard Heufler

In memoriam, Gerhard Heufler (1944 – 2013)

When the head of Industrial Design at the FH JOANNEUM, internationally recognized Gerhard Heufler, suddenly passed away in 2013, I was trusted upon to create a condolence book website.

In less than a day, I wrote a system that allowed guests to write anonymous entries and had an admin interface in which multiple moderators can approve, disapprove, edit or delete comments, create auto-filter terms and manage filter-affected posts and even create and manage other moderators.

Moderation Queue

All posts go into a moderation queue by default, to prevent spam on a highly sensitive website like this. A moderator sees new posts on top of the queue, can select multiple and approve or disapprove of them with a single click. All posts can also be edited, i.e. to fix spelling mistakes.

Automatic Word Filter

In order to manage automatic spam, a word filter system was implemented. New entries that contain any of the defined filter terms are flagged as "disapproved" automatically and can be reviewed by a moderator. The interface also allows for mass-flagging after adding a new term and shows, how many posts are actually affected by a specific filter. Moderators can also see how many posts with any filtered term are actually visible on the website right now and can take down all affected posts with a single click. Posts that have been flagged as "disapproved" can be deleted manually or in bulk via the moderation queue.