Welcome! Saint Mary's Athletics is proud to announce the launch of a new application that will help keep Gael fans better connected with SMC teams and up to date on all the latest news about their sports teams. The Saint Mary's College Athletic department, in collaboration with Real Time Matrix, has created an easily downloadable application that feeds the latest news to you faster and easier. The application is free to download, and can be added to many of your favorite social network sites or personal homepages (i.e. Facebook, MySpace, iGoogle, etc.) as well. The application, created by Real Time Matrix, is referred to as a Vortex. The Vortex will feature a scroll of the most current news articles from SMCgaels.com as well as video clips and highlights. The Vortex will also allow you to be able to connect directly to the Saint Mary's Athletics home page, the ticket sales webpage, the online merchandise store, as well as the West Coast Conference website. The Vortex is a new way to keep close with Saint Mary's Athletics without having to go to the home page every time.


How to copy the Vortex to your desired location:
1. Click on the "copy me" button that is located in the bottom right corner of the Vortex
2. A pop up window will appear that gives you a list of options as to where you can copy the Vortex
3. Choose your desired location to copy the Vortex to from the list
4. After deciding where to copy the Vortex, you will be connected directly to that site to set up your Vortex

Saint Mary's College Vortex Features:

The Saint Mary's Vortex allows you to use the application in a number of ways. The Vortex has an embedded video player. The video player will be frequently updated with video clips and highlights of SMC teams and athletes. The video clips will include some of the most exciting plays and dramatic finishes from all the SMC sports teams as well as interviews with players and coaches. The video player has the ability to be enlarged by clicking on the button in the bottom right corner of the embedded video player next to the volume control that has an arrow pointing to the upper right.

Explaining the buttons from left to right that reside above the embedded video player:

The "Jump to" button is located to the extreme left of the five buttons and has an icon of an arrow looping over a piece of paper. The "Jump to" button when pressed will open a drop down menu of locations on the SMCgaels.com website that you can connect directly to. The majority of options to "jump to" are individual sports teams personal page on the SMCgaels.com website.

The "More RSS" button is the second from the left and has an icon of multiple pages stacked on each other with the corners folded over. The "More RSS" button allows you to have the ability to customize your Saint Mary's Vortex, giving you instant access to the sports that matter to you most! Once you choose what RSS feed you want it will be automatically added to your channel options. The Channels are the three overlapping pages that have scrolling articles on them. The only channel that can be changed at this moment is the last one; all SMC news and Men's Basketball are permanent channels as of right now. The channel will reset to the default channel (i.e. Women's Basketball) each time you close the Vortex.

The "Reset" button is in the middle of the five buttons and has an icon of two arrows going in opposite directions. This button does exactly what it says; it will reset your Vortex to the original default settings.

The "Tell a Friend" button is the second to last button on the right, it has an icon of a yellow star next to a little person. When you click on this button a pop up menu appears that asks you for your email address and the email address of the friend you would like to send an invitation to. The pop up menu also gives you the option of sending a message to your friend that you are inviting.

The last button is the "About" button that has the Vortex symbol on it, the capital "V" with a circle around it that has jagged edges like a sun. When you click on this button it gives you a brief explanation of what the Vortex does and offers you the chance to learn more about the Vortex by clicking on the "Learn More" button.

Explaining the buttons located at the very bottom of the Vortex from left to right:

The "Ticket" button located to the furthest left of the three button choices. This button allows you to connect directly to Saint Mary's official ticket office online. Allowing you the opportunity to purchase tickets to any event Saint Mary's is selling tickets to.

The "Shop" button is the center choice of buttons at the bottom of the Vortex. The "Shop" button will connect you to the online store where you can purchase your Saint Mary's memorabilia.

The "Copy Me" button is the last of the three choices and is located to the extreme right at the bottom. As explained above, the "Copy Me" button allows you to copy the Saint Mary's College Vortex to any of your desired locations from the list provided.