Instructions for Using the Class Forum

Text adapted from the Rutgers University Writing Program's Forums Tutorial
The following HTML tutorial has been adapted especially for our online course and allows you to navigate with the Table of Contents or to simply scroll down to follow the instructions. You can find a printable version of the Writing Program's Forums Tutorial, complete with screen shots to guide you, online in Word or PDF formats. Part Two of the Forums Tutorial, which covers Private Messaging (called Part Eleven below), is also available in Word or PDF formats. Visit the Instructional Technology section of the Writing Program Web site for more details.

Table of Contents

• Part One: Using the Forums-Getting Started
• Part Two: Using the Forums-Main Page and Control Panel (cp)
• Part Three: Posting in the Forums-Replying to a Thread
• Part Four: Posting in the Forums-Making a New Thread
• Part Five: Posting in the Forums-Editing Your Post
• Part Six: Posting in the Forums-Attaching a File to Your Post
• Part Seven: Posting in the Forums-Viewing or Downloading an Attached File
• Part Eight: Posting in the Forums-Deleting Your Post
• Part Nine: Managing Your Forums-Subscribing
• Part Ten: Managing Your Forums-Miscellaneous Features
• Part Eleven: Private Messages

Part One: Using the Forums-Getting Started
1. Once you are a registered user of forums, you can get to our specific class forum by clicking on the "Class Forum" (which will always open in another window). If this is your first time visiting our forum, you will need to go to the following URL to register as a user and learn about our forum system:

http://www.classguide.net/rutgers/forums/

Once you are at this URL, you can see all of the forums that use the Writing Program's forum system, including ours (listed under "Expository Writing 101 Forums" near the top of the page).

2. If this is your first time visiting these forums, you may want to read the FAQs. These cover some basic issues about registering and using the forums. You can read them by clicking on the "FAQ" button located near the top-right corner of any page in the forums. To return back to the main page, click on the "home" button, which you can find near the top-right corner of the page.

3. Once you have read the FAQs, you can register to become a member of the forums:

• To get to the registration page, click on the "register" button located near the top of the page.
• Read over the rules of the forums, and proceed as directed.
• After you agree to follow the rules of the forums, you will be taken to a page where you will be asked to input some information. The first section is for registration information, so you will be required to fill out all of the fields:
  • First, choose a user name for yourself. This will be the name that will appear on the forums every time you make a post, or reply to someone else's post. It does not have to be your name, but it is something you will have to live with for the semester. I suggest it be a nickname or some version of your name.
  • Second, make a password that you will be sure to remember. In the event that you lose your password, you can send a request to have your password e-mailed to you. But since you don't want to get stuck not posting on time because you forgot your password, I suggest it be something easy to remember.
  • Third, type in your e-mail address. This has to be your actual e-mail address (see below).
  • Fourth: when you have entered the required information, you can type in optional information about yourself, such as the URL to your personal Web site, your ICQ number or AIM screen name (IDs used at AOL), location, interests, and whatever other fun facts about yourself that you want to include for other members of the forums to see. Remember, though: anyone who visits our forums (including people who are not registered for our course) will be able to see these facts, so I suggest you practice some discretion.
  • Finally, the last section on the registration page is for forum preferences. The information you put here will determine how the forum appears in your web browser
    • The "signature" text box is for entering text that you want to be seen after every post you make in the forums (perhaps a quote that you especially like). This is optional. You don't have to have a signature, so you can choose to leave this blank. Most people will probably leave it blank.
    • If you will generally access these forums in a lab, or some other place where other people use the computer you are on, set "automatically log in" to "no." If you are using your personal computer, you may wish to set it to "yes," since this will save you time in the future.
    • IMPORTANT: set the "offset time" to -5, EST. You have to scroll UP to see that option. If you select some other standard time (such as the time in Australia) your posting may be recorded as late. It's therefore important that you choose Eastern Standard Time -- option -5.
    • If there are fields where you don't know what you should select, simply leave it set to "use forum default." Other than the local time setting, no optional settings are important and you will be able to change all of them later (see below on using the Control Panel).
• When you're done typing in all the information for registering, click on the "submit" button. This will create your membership account.
• You should be taken to the main forum page. Ta-da! You're done!
• Next time you visit the forums, you can login using the login box located in the lower right-hand corner of the main forums page.

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Part Two: Using the Forums-Main Page and Control Panel
There are a number of features to notice on the main page:

• You can login by using the boxes located on the lower right corner of the main forum page.
• Once you are logged in, you'll have the option to view a list of all new posts since your last visit. To do this, click on "View New Posts," located below your member name near the upper right hand corner of the main page.
• If you scroll down past the list of forums you will see links that allow you to log out or mark all forums read.

You will also want to take a look at your control panel. Reach the control panel by clicking on "user cp" in the top navigation bar.

The Forums Control Panel
After you click "user cp" (for "control panel"), you can do the following things:

• You'll first see the "My vB Home" page, which acts as something like a homepage for you in the forums. You'll be able to see any private messages waiting for you (see separate instructions on the private messaging system) and you'll be able to track your subscribed forums and threads (more on subscribing below).
• Click on "Edit Profile" in the control panel navigation bar. Here, you can change some of the information about yourself that you entered in the registration screen, such as signature, ICQ number, or homepage.
• "Edit Options" in the control panel navigation bar lets you change options that affect your configuration of the forums. Options include logging in, messaging, and thread views. You'll find brief explanations of these options on this page.
• "Change Password" in the control panel lets you change your forums password.
• "Edit Buddy List" lets you control your buddy list for private messaging. Please see the separate handout on the private messaging system.
• "Edit Ignore List" also controls the private messaging system. Here, you can list people from whom you don't want to receive private messages. Please allow your teacher to send you private messages, though!
• Finally, the "Private Messaging" page keeps track of your private messages. See also the separate handout on the private messaging system.

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Part Three: Posting in the Forums-Replying to a Thread
For this online course, you will generally be asked to reply to the teacher's thread for an activity and then to reply to one of your peer's postings in that thread. So replying will be your most common form of posting. When you are in a forum, and you see a thread in which you want to make a reply, you can do so by clicking on the "post reply" button, located on the right side of the page.

1. When you click on the button, you will be taken to a page that looks just like the "post thread" web page in the step below.

2. Be sure to give your response a title for easy identification. In the "Subject" text box, type in an original subject line for your reply. (You can choose to have a message icon, as well. To choose one, use your mouse, and click on the radio button of the icon that you want to use.)

3. Then, you can type in your reply in the large "Message" text box. To change the look of specific text in your reply, you can use the features of the "vB Code" section. You can add smilies to your reply by using the panel of smiley faces located to the left of the large "Message" text box.

4. Then, you'll see some options for posting, and attaching files. When you are finished typing your reply to the thread, you can choose to preview your reply. Do this by clicking on the "Preview Reply" button. Or, you can go ahead and post your reply by clicking on the "Submit Reply" button. After you submit your reply, you will automatically be taken to the thread to which you replied.

5. If you want to quote the message you are replying to in the thread, click on the "quote" button for the specific message you want to reply to. You will be taking to the same screen you'd use to a reply to a thread in general, but the message you want to quote will be included for you. Simply add your reply after it. (Note: it usually is not a good idea to quote whole messages, since they are available for everyone to read and quoting will force some users to read the post twice).

6. Be sure to logout from the main page when you're done in the forum.

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Part Four: Posting in the Forums-Making a New Thread
Normally, you will probably post messages by replying to a post from your teacher or to a post from another student in our course (see Part Three, above). But all registered users are allowed to initiate threads in any forum (though non-useful postings will be deleted and problem users may be removed from the forums -- so please only post useful comments). Try it out.

• If you go to the main forums page, you will see that there are lots of forums for different classes and subjects. To go to a specific forum that you want to look at, just click on the link to the forum. The link will be in blue, bold text. Or use the "Class Forum" link on our Web site.
• Make sure that you're in one of the forums. If you want to start a new thread, look for the "new thread" button, located near the upper-right corner of the page, and click on it.
• You will be taken to a web page where you can type in a new thread. Look for the text box labeled "Subject." Here, you can type in the name of what you want the thread to be.
• After you type in a subject name, you can choose whether or not you want to include a message icon in your post. There are quite a few icons to choose from, such as smiley faces, thumbs up, and others. To pick one of the icons, use your mouse, and click on the radio button of the icon you want.
• The next section after the message icons is for formatting your text. This is called "vB Code", and it allows you to change the look of your text in your thread. You can use your mouse to select such options as making your text bold, italic, or underlined. You can change the size, font, and color of certain text. If you want to be a little daring, you can even add in hotlinks to web sites, e-mail addresses, and images to your thread. For images, however, the image must already be saved at an online location in order for it to appear in the thread.
• When you're done playing with the text features, you can then type in the actual message of your thread in the large "Message" text box. All you have to do is type in there as you would if you were using a word processor, or e-mail.
• To help compensate for the lack of body-language in the forums, you can add in smilies. If you look to the left of the large message text box, you will see a small panel will smiley faces. By clicking on any one of them, you can add a code to your message that will make a little smiley appear in your message when it is posted.
• Below the message box, there are some options for posting. You can do things such as having the signature you created (see above) appear after your message, or choose to have an e-mail sent to you every time someone replies in your thread.
• Under the options section, you can choose to attach a file to your message. By clicking on the "Browse" button, you can search for you computer to find a file you want to attach to your message. If you have ever sent an e-mail with an attachment, this is very similar to doing that. You can find detailed instructions on adding an attachment below.
• Finally, you can also choose to add a poll to your message (which allows users to rate your posting). When you are finished typing in all your information for posting a new thread, you can choose to either preview what you have typed (do this by clicking on the "Preview Post" button), or you can just go straight ahead and click on the "Submit New Thread" button to post your thread in the forum. When you have submitted your thread, you will automatically be taken to the thread.

Be sure to logout on the main page when you're done in the forum (especially if you are using the forums in a computer lab).

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Part Five: Posting in the Forums-Editing Your Post
1. To edit your post, click on the edit button on the lower right corner of the post you intend to edit. This will take you to a page that looks similar to the "post thread" web page (see above), only now your original message will already be in the region to type your message.

2. Make any changes that you wish. If you do not like the changes you made, you can click on the "Reset Message" button at the bottom of the page to put your message back to its original form. Once you are done editing your message, click on the "Save Changes" button at the bottom of the page to update your post. When you submit the change, you will be taken back to the thread. Note that when editing a post, you can no longer attach a file to it. This must be done when first posting.

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Part Six: Posting in the Forums-Attaching a File to Your Post
You can attach word processor documents (.doc, .wpd, .rtf, and .txt ONLY) and image files to your posts. To avoid spreading viruses and to help students access your attachments more easily, please use either .rtf or .txt formats for all word processed documents. All word processors can save as .rtf or .txt (use File>Save As to select one of these formats).

Below the region where you type your message for a post, there is a field for attaching files. Click on the "Browse" button, navigate to your file on your computer, and select it. This will enter the file's location into the text box. When done, click on the "Submit" button to send your post with your attached file. When you are done, you will be taken back to the thread.

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Part Seven: Posting in the Forums-Viewing or Downloading an Attached File
In a post with an attached file, click on the attachment's name to open it directly. The attachment will now open in your web browser's window. To return to the post, click the "back" button from your web browser. Please be careful opening posts in Word's .doc format since they are prone to carrying viruses.

If you'd like to download the file instead, right-click the attachment name and select "Save Target As" (it may also say "Save Link As," depending on your browser). The "Save As" window will pop up. Navigate to a location on your computer where you would like to save the attached file and click the "Save" button.

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Part Eight: Posting in the Forums-Deleting Your Post
To delete your post, click on the edit button on the lower right corner of the post you intend to delete. This will take you to the same page in Step #1 of Posting in the forums - Editing Your Post above.

The first table on the page is called "Delete Post". Check the box next to "Delete?" and click the "Delete Now" button. Note that if the post you delete is the first message in a thread, deleting this message will delete the entire thread.

This feature is useful if you accidentally make the same post twice. Please be sure to delete the duplicate to save the moderator from extra work!

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Part Nine: Managing Your Forums-Subscribing
You may want to subscribe to the forum for your class. This will give you more direct access from your user control panel. In addition, you may also want to subscribe to threads that you have started or in which you're actively participating.

To subscribe to a forum:

1. Navigate to the forum you wish to subscribe to.

2. Towards the lower left corner of the page, you'll see a link for "Subscribe to this Forum" (below the New Thread button).

3. Click on this link. You will be subscribed to the forum and then returned to the forum's main page.

4. To unsubscribe from a forum, go to your user control panel from the top navigation bar. You'll see a list of all subscribed forums. Below the forum name is a link to "Unsubscribe." Click this link to unsubscribe from the forum.

To subscribe to a thread:

1. Navigate to the thread you wish to subscribe to.

2. At the bottom of the thread you will see a link that says "Receive updates to this thread." Click on this link to subscribe to the thread. You will be sent an email notifying you when a new posting has been made. You will not receive additional emails for further new postings until you check back in. This means that if 5 people post, you won't have to deal with 5 emails. You'll just get one email letting you know something is happening on your thread.

3. To unsubscribe from a thread, go to the user control panel from the top navigation bar. You will see a list of your subscribed threads. If you do not see any threads listed, it's probably because there hasn't been any new activity on those threads. Click on "View All Subscribed Threads." You will then see a list of your threads, as well as a link you can use to unsubscribe from a thread.

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Part Ten: Managing Your Forums-Miscellaneous Features
The software we're using for the forums is incredibly robust. There are a number of additional features that you might want to be aware of, though you may not ever use them.

• You can search through the forums by clicking on "search" on the top navigation bar. The search page has options to search by user name or by keyword, as well as options that let you specify which forum to search.
• Icons designate forums with new postings. A yellow indicates new posts in a forum. Icons also show activity in threads.
• Custom titles. After you've made 10 postings in the forum, you can have a custom title attached to your user name. You can set your title (such as "Super Poster") in the "Edit Profile" section of the user control panel.
• There are even more options with this software. We invite you to explore and try them all.
  

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Part Eleven: Private Messages
Private Messages (pm) are messages sent to other members that only they can view. To use Private Messages, you need to have them turned on. To turn them on, edit your profile options in the user control panel (see Part Two above for more information about the user control panel).

Sending a Private Message
There are three basic ways to send a private message to another member.

The first method is through your personal control panel:

1. From the Forums home page, select "user cp" to access your personal control panel.

2. On the right side of the page, click on "Private Messaging."

3. Near the bottom of the page, click on the "new message" button. This will take you to a page similar to the "post thread" page.

4. Type the name of the person you would like to send a private message to in the Recipient field or find their name by clicking on "Find user names."

5. When you are done writing your message, click on the "Send Message" button near the bottom of the page. After clicking on "Send Message," you will be taken to your own Private Message inbox.

6. Note: If you would like to send a private message a multiple recipients on your buddy list, click on "pm to buddies" instead of "new message." Select the names of all your buddies you would like to write, and click "Compose Message" to write your private message.

The second is from the user list:

1. From the Forums home page, select "members" near the top right corner of the page. This will take you to a list of registered forum members.

2. Find the name of the member you wish to private message and click on their name. This will take you to their member profile.

3. Click on "Send 'username' a Private Message!" where "username" is the person's name. You will now see a page similar to the "post thread" web page.

4. Follow the same procedures for posting and click on the "Send Message" button when done. After clicking on "Send Message", you will be taken to your own Private Message inbox.

The third method is from a post:

1. From a post, select "pm" from the buttons at the bottom of a post to private message the post's author.

2. Follow the same procedures as you would to post a message and click on the "Send Message" button when done. After clicking on "Send Message", you will be taken to your own Private Message inbox.

Checking Your Private Messages
1. To check your private messages, click on "user cp" from the Forums home page. You will be taken to your user control panel.

2. Under the first heading, you will find all of your new private messages. To view all of your private messages, click on "view all private messages" on the right side of the page or click on "Private Messages" from the blue links. This will take you to your private messages inbox.

3. New messages will have a yellow message symbol, while read messages will have a blue message symbol. Click on the private message you would like to view.

4. To view private messages that you have sent, click on the "Jump to folder" drop down menu and select "Sent Items." You will be taken to a list of all your sent private messages.

Deleting Your Private Messages
To delete a private message, go to private messaging in your user control panel to access your private messages inbox. Check the check box to the right of the message you would like to delete and click on the yellow "Delete" button.

If you are viewing a specific private message and would like to delete it, check the "Delete?" check box near the top left corner of the message and click on the "Delete" button.

Replying to a Private Message
When viewing a specific private message, click on the "send reply" button near the bottom of the message. Type your message as you would a regular post, and click on the "Send Message" button. You will be taken back to your private messages inbox page. The message you replied to will now have a blue message symbol with an arrow over it to indicate that you have sent a reply.

Message Tracking
Message tracking lets you find out if your sent private messages have been viewed by their recipients. From your private messages inbox, click on the "pm tracking" button near the bottom of the page. You will be taken to the Message Tracking page.

All of the private messages you have sent that have not yet been viewed will be shown. Here, you can cancel any messages that you do not want sent so long as they have not yet been read by the recipient. You can also restore any messages that you have cancelled so that they will be sent again.

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