Websites are ephemeral, and domains/hosts must be paid for to keep them active. If you've created a site that you'd like to capture for more longevity, here is a guide that can assist. We will use a tool called Conifer, which is an easy tool to set up. The GitHub information is available in this link . Please note that sites should be your own content or you should have express permission of the content creator to preserve a site. Note also that this tool is not necessarily recommended for most social media at the time of this writing, since it is not always as effective. There is a site created by Conifer that is a guide as well, at this link .
1. Enter this URL into your browser: https://conifer.rhizome.org/ .
2. Locate the "sign up" option, click on it, and sign up with your information and a password, and hit "register".
3. A confirmation email will be sent to your email address, which you must confirm to continue, and follow the link to find your collection page.
1.On the first page you will see will show your profile name and the words "New Capture." You will see a box that has "URL to capture," and below that you will see a box that says "default collection." You can use the default collection, or if you'd like to create a new collection or change the title, click on the box. It will highlight and drop down to give you the option of creating a new collection, which you may do at this point if you wish.
2. You will see a box that allows you to "use current browser," and if you click on and highlight that box, you can drop down to use a remote browser. It will give you a choice of several browsers. I've had better luck using a remote browser, so I recommend that. I often use the Chrome remote browser option, but you're welcome to try others if you prefer.
3. At the top of the New Capture page, let's bring our attention back to the URL to capture box. Enter the URL of the website you wish to capture, and click the green "start capture" button.
4. This will bring you to a page that shows the capture process. Interact with the site as you normally would, and be sure to click on each page and link within the pages to ensure they get captured. If there is a lot of content on the page, I recommend using the "Autopilot" button in the top right corner. Click this button, and the tool will automatically scroll through the page on its own to capture all the content. It will turn green when it has completed its process.
5. Once you have scrolled and captured each page of content, you can hit "stop" by hovering over the button that reads "capturing." A page will pop up showing each captured page with its time stamp, and each of these represents a capture.
6. You will see several options here, and you can start a new session within this page as well. You will see a button that says "Private," and if you'd like these sites to be public, then click on it and change the option to "Public."
7. Under the words "Collection Resources," you'll see the word "lists." If you would like these to be publicly viewable to others, click on the plus (+) sign next to lists to add a list, hit "create a list," and title it to represent your site title or how you would like it to be viewable to others.
7. Once you have made a list, it will show in the left side margin under "Collection Cover." Drag the captures from the center of the page and drop them onto the list that you want them to fall under. The list will contain the pages and captures that will be viewable as a collection, so make sure that all the captures that you'd like to see together fall within the same list.
8. Now that you have created and populated a list, click "Collection Cover." This will show the collection with the captures as it can be viewed by the public, or by yourself later if you've chosen to keep it private. You can choose the tabs for overview, and you will see a browse tab as well. It is advisable to browse your captures to make sure they've captured effectively.
9. When browsing, you have the option to patch a URL, or capture it again if you'd like. Hover over the "browsing" button and these options will pop up. Alternatively, "Collection Manager" will bring you back to the lists where you can edit your captures, and the "current browser" button will again drop down to allow you to use a remote browser, once again.
10. Congratulations! You have created your website snapshot.
For questions or getting started, email Joanna DiPasquale (dipasquj@union.edu) or Sarah Schmidt (schmids2@union.edu).