Release notes: Citizen Space v7.14

Citizen Space version 7.14 will be rolled out to your site during your standard upgrade window in the week beginning 5th September 2022.

Citizen Space is ever-evolving and this release brings innovative additions, accessibility improvements and some much-requested features to the platform. 

QR codes for activities 

Effective engagement relies on successful promotion, and QR codes are increasingly becoming key tools in the promotion of Citizen Space activities. This release introduces a QR code generator to Citizen Space which allows you to instantly download a QR code for your survey or consultation.

This will make activities easier to promote whenever, wherever - for example, if you promote an activity via flyers or posters, people can simply scan a code and have their say straight away. It’ll make taking part a much smoother process, especially for mobile or tablet users.

Many more text options

We’ve updated the text editor with a range of new options to give you more flexibility, speed things along and make it easier to create accessible activities:

  • The ‘Remove format’ button strips out any formatting from existing text, making it easy to copy-and-paste from elsewhere. 
  • The ‘Styles’ button offers a choice of 3 text sizes, allowing you to add subheadings to your text. Using a heading hierarchy improves the visual readability of larger pieces of text by breaking it up into manageable sections, but also improves the experience for people using screenreaders. 
  • Because we know mistakes sometimes happen, we’ve added ‘Undo’ and “Redo’ buttons. 
  • The ‘Table’ button makes creating accessible tables in Citizen Space simple and swift. Select this new tool to set the number of rows and columns you need, and a table will be created directly in your activity ready for content to be added. This tool makes the information in a table accessible to all, avoiding the potential pitfalls of adding a table as a pdf or image. 
  • Lastly, the ‘Maximise’ button gives you a clearer view when you’re working with big blocks of text.

Consistent messaging

You’ve always been able to change the standard email acknowledgement received by your respondents on a per-activity basis, to give them a tailored message if needed. We’re introducing a change with the latest release. Site admins will have an additional option of setting a site-wide email acknowledgement message, giving respondents a tailored message that’s consistent across all of your organisation’s activities.

Accessibility improvements and extra tweaks

We’ve made the accessibility policy text at the bottom of your homepage entirely editable, making it easy for you to directly match the text in Citizen Space with your organisation’s accessibility statement. 

Finally, this release also brings some security improvements and bug fixes.