Digital publishing is moving in many directions at once. In our course, we have already seen how blogs are used for digital publishing; how technologies like Twitter and Tumblr are used as micro-blogging tools, and therefore 'micro-publishing tools,' for various kinds of media; and how presentation technologies like Prezi and Slideshare have contributed to the production of 'digital essays.' In the final section of our course, we will learn how Scalar contributes to the practice of digital publishing.

The purpose of this project is to present Scalar's unique features in an easy to use/easy to learn format. Scalar's own tutorial is focused and straight forward, but its interface can be difficult to navigate if you are not familiar with website design or similar digital publishing formats. After working through this project, you will be able to move on to more complex features and operations within the Scalar interface.

I have organized this project into three paths. Each path will teach you how to build basic components of your project. Each path also features basic instructions. All paths lead back to the front page of the project. So if you get lost or want to move ahead in the tutorial, remember that the front page serves as an anchor.

Before you get started, take a look at Scalar's promotional video to get a sense of what you can do in the Scalar interface:

Although Scalar gives you the option to upload some media and create new pages as you edit each page of your project, most media should be uploaded within the 'Dashboard' interface of your project. Before we discuss Scalar's publishing features, we will work through the Dashboard interface. Click on "The Scalar Dashboard" link in the main menu to your left.