Help Sheet 12

 Discussions 
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Discussions

A discussion page can be used to find out the opinions of your members on a range of topics.

It is a good idea to structure this page into high-level discussion forums or themes (1). You can then create message threads or sub-topics (2) within them

People have to be registered users of essexinfo.net in order to participate.  If you only wish your members to participate, then set the 'Permissions' (change by selecting ‘Manage website' and ‘Use standard pages' and ‘Discussions' and ‘Permissions') to be available only to your members.

You (or your users) can receive all replies to a message or discussion by email in order to keep in touch with what people are saying without having to look at the discussion forums every day as it will be emailed to you. Simply click 'Request Notification' in the appropriate discussion or message thread to activate this. You can choose from the drop down how often you wish to be notified.

If you no longer wish to be notified click 'Unsubscribe'

Adding a discussion forum

• Enable the ‘Discussions' page from the ‘Manage Website' and ‘Use standard pages' menu
• Select the ‘Discussions' page from the left hand navigation menu
• Click the link ‘Add a Discussion' and fill in the details
• Create a name and purpose for your discussion
• In the ‘Presentation' section choose whether you want your discussion to be Flat or Threaded. Flat only allows replies at the end of the discussion. Threaded allows your visitors to reply to any post in the discussion
• Choose your ‘Posting Policy'. This allows you to monitor the posts that go up on the site.
• 'Open' allows any registered user to post and their posts will appear on the site immediately.
• ‘Moderated' means posts must be approved by an administrator before they are published.
• ‘Closed' means that only approved administrators may post a discussion.
• You can also choose whether users can create new discussions. If you choose ‘no' to this option, users will only be able to reply to existing discussions, otherwise users will be able to create new discussions.
• Click ‘OK'
• You will then be taken back to the discussion page where you will see your discussion forum displayed

Note: Once established you can create new discussions via the route Manage Discussions - Create a new Discussion

Editing a discussion forum

• Select the ‘Discussions' page from the left hand navigation menu
• Click on the discussion name you wish to edit
• Click on ‘Manage this discussion' at the top of the page
• This will take you to the original form where you added the discussion, make any changes then click ‘OK'

Posting a message thread in a discussion

• Select the ‘Discussions' page from the left hand navigation menu
• Select the discussion you would like to post your message to
• Click on ‘Post a New Message'
• Fill in a subject and your message
• Click the ‘Preview' button to see your message before it appears on the website. You can choose to subscribe to this discussion thread from here and then either ‘Post' or ‘Edit again'
• If you do not want to preview your message simply click the ‘Post' button straight away. The message will then appear on the website (or as soon as a moderator approves your message)

Moderating a discussion

If you have chosen to ‘Moderate' your discussion you will need to regularly check for any changes (or use the ‘Receive notification' link to be automatically notified).

• Select the ‘Discussions' page from the left hand navigation menu
• Click on the discussion name you wish to moderate
• Click on ‘Moderate this Discussion' at the top of the page
• You will see what messages that are ‘Pending', these are waiting for you to check
• You can Edit, Delete, Move thread to other discussion, Move thread to other thread, Approve or Reject the message by clicking on the appropriate link. See ‘Editing, moving, rejecting and deleting a message thread' below
• Select ‘Approve' when you want to publish the message

Editing, moving, rejecting and deleting a message thread

• Select the ‘Discussions' page from the left hand navigation menu
• Click on the discussion containing the message you would like to edit
• Click on the subject title of the message thread you wish to edit
• Click on ‘Edit' to update the message
• Click on ‘Move thread to other discussion' if you wish to have the message displayed as the first message in a new discussion
• Click on ‘Move thread to other thread' to have the message displayed as a thread within a different discussion
• If your discussion is moderated, you can click ‘Reject' to remove a message
• Click on ‘Delete' to remove the message that has already been displayed. It will ask you whether you are sure you want to delete the message. Click ‘Yes' to delete it

To delete a discussion

• Select the ‘Discussions' page from the left hand navigation menu
• Click ‘Manage discussions' from the discussions page
• Remove the tick for the discussion you wish to stop in the ‘Enabled' column

You can reach the Help Desk on: 01245 436559 or via email support@essexinfo.net

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