Frequently Asked Questions about Missing Functionalities in SLATE (and Other Features that Are Difficult to Add):

  • Is there a way to directly move between the folders to be reviewed? Once I click a folder in the Queue, it takes me to the folder view and the only way to get back to the queue seems to be to click the "Slate" logo or to complete the review. Shortcuts to skip to the next/previous folder would be great.
    • Unfortunately, there is no way to jump from folder to folder like that. If you use the Faculty Reader Portal, you can use the browsers native "open in new tab" feature.
  • The back button does the wrong thing. It doesn't actually go back to the previous page, but goes to the Slate splash page. Can that be fixed?
    • The Reader is self contained and the back button does take you out of the reader and is a system design and is beyond our ability to adjust.
  • An application always downloads as "download.pdf". Is there a way to change it so that the PDF is prepared with the filename as the applicant's name?
    • We are looking into this, but I do not think we can change this.
  • Is it possible to create keyboard shortcuts to quickly access different parts of an application? (e.g., “CTRL-S” jumps to the “Statement” section)
    • Unfortunately not, the only short cuts available are displayed on the right-hand side of the Reader landing page.
  • Slate is quite easy to navigate with the keyboard arrows (e.g., I can click on the right arrow to move across sections). Unfortunately, while that works for the pdf pages (e.g., statement, transcripts), it no longer works for the dashboard tab and for the experiences tab. Is it possible to fix this and allow arrows to allow navigation across all sections?
    • This is also a system limitation. Pages in the Reader that take up the whole screen are based on a feature in Slate called portals, which is basically a web page, and it provides with a lot of flexibility around what we display and how, but it doesn't utilize the shortcuts in the same way.
  • Slate search functions / filters are quite involved to setup. Is it possible to create quick filters by typing search strings in the “search” box instead? For instance, in our previous system, one was able to search folders by using search strings like “AREA=robotics & FACULTY=Carlone & ADMITTED” or similar.
    • One of the key differences between GradApply and Slate are that the key ways of searching on application in GradApply was simple and easy, but provided specific and narrow options, where as Slate's query system is more complex, and has a learning curve, but provides much more control over what and how you report on it. When it comes to faculty searching for things in the reader, the perspective that I think is useful is to think of the views in the reader as how you choose who you want to read next, and to that end we can set up all different kinds of views that report on different kinds of information and are filtered in different ways to help faculty get a better picture of the pool. Please reach out to the GAC Chair if you would like to add specific views.


A special thanks to Nick Roy and Andreea Bobu for posing many of these questions.

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