As Wendy mentioned, this week we will be rolling out an update to the ExhibitFiles software. There are a few bug fixes, some changes in terminology, improved help, and a series new features. Thanks to everyone who has reported bugs or suggested changes. Many of your suggestions have found their way into the new version of the site.

These are the major improvements and changes that you’ll find in the ExhibitFiles last this week:

Search - We’ve added the ability to search all of the site content (case studies, reviews, and member profiles). In addition, keywords, author names, and museum names will be clickable–allowing users to see all of the records that relate to those terms. This a major improvement over our temporary Google co-op search engine.

Comments - The ability to edit comments for up to 15 minutes after posting will be added. Web addresses that are in comments will be clickable.

Profiles - We’ve added the ability to embed RSS feeds from your blog or a favorite one. In addition, you can now add thumbnails of your latest photos from flickr automatically. (See the image above.) Also, you will be able to add co-authors to your list of publications and presentations.

Contacts - When you add someone to your contact list, they will receive an email letting them know that you’ve added them.

Favorites - Case studies and reviews will now display icons and links to the profiles of those members who have “favorited” an exhibit.

We’re still testing these new features, but we’ll send along a message once these enhancements are in place. See you on the ExhibitFiles.

As June begins, the ExhibitFiles community has grown to more than 200 members—from Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Korea, throughout Europe, and across the United States—and it’s getting bigger every day. We were at the American Association of Museums meeting in Chicago in mid-May, beginning to spread the word in collaboration with the National Association for Museum Exhibition (NAME). Karina White of the Huntington has posted a case study of Plants Are Up to Something, which just won AAM’s Excellence in Exhibition Competition for 2007; we hope to see other entrants soon.

Meanwhile, other ExhibitFiles members have been generously sharing their experiences and perspectives and helping us identify ways to improve the site. A number of fixes and new features will be rolled out in the next few days. You may see odd profiles and case studies showing up as we test the new system. Watch for details soon from Jim.