Using the forums should be straight forward for those who have used forums on other websites. For those who haven't here are some basic guidelines for using The Environmental Illness Resource forums.
All visitors can browse the forums but you must be registered and logged in to make posts.
Main Forums Page
When you visit the forums by clicking the 'Forums' link in the top menu of the site you will be taken to the forums homepage. You should see a list of the different forum categories together with the number of topics in that category, the total number of replies, and the time and date of the last post in that category.
Additionally, the envelope icon on the far left of each category will appear open if there are new posts in that category since your last visit.
Browsing the Forums
Click on a category title to see a list of all the posts in that category. You will now see each topic in that category along with the total number of posts in that topic, the number of times the topic has been viewed, the original poster, and the time and date of the last post, along with the username of the last poster.
Again, you will see the envelope icon indicating if there are new posts in a particular topic since you last visit. Click on a topic title to view all of the individual posts in that topic.
Down the left hand side of each post you will see information about the user who made the post. The information comprises:
User Name
User's Profile Image
User's Forum Rank - based on how active they are in the forums, total number of posts they have made etc.
Posts - the total number of posts the user has made.
Karma - a rating based on votes given by other users
Thumb Up & Thumb Down - a user's karma is calculated on the number of times other users click either of these icons. Click the thumb up icon if you like what the user has posted, click the thumb down if you don't.
User Profile - click the icon of the little person to view the user's profile.
Making a New Post (creating a new topic)
To post to the forums in a new topic you create you must first be within one of the categories. If you want to make a post on a topic relating to allergies for example, click the allergies category. Your should now see an icon marked 'New Topic' at the top of the page, click this. You will now see the new topic form. In this example you should see \"Post a new message in \"Allergies\"\" displayed at the top of the page.
First of all, fill in the 'Subject' field with the title you want for your new topic. Next you can choose an icon to appear next to your topic in the list of topics. If you are asking other users a questions you could select the question mark icon for instance. Now you can go ahead and write your post in the message box.
Above the message box you will see various buttons that can be used to format your text in various ways like you would in an email or word processor document. In this case however clicking one of these buttons will add a pair of tags within your message, for example to make your text bold. The text to be made bold must go inbetween the two tags.
For more information on tags click the Help button at the top of the forums.
To the right of the message box are various 'Smileys'. You can use these to add expression to your posts. Simply click on a smiley to add it to your post where the cursor is located.
Below the message box you can add an image to your post by clicking browse and locating the image you want on your computers hard drive. When you have selected the image you want click {img] to add it to your post.
Check the 'Subscribe' box if you wish to be emailed when somebody replies to your post.
You can now either submit your post immediately or preview how it will look, make any changes you wish, then submit it.
Replying to a Topic
When you are already viewing a particular topic within the forums you will see 2 buttons at the bottom of each post - 'Reply' and 'Quote'.
To post a response to any forum post simply click 'Reply' and you will be taken to the same form used to create a new topic post.
Clicking 'Quote' will do the same but your post will already contain the post you are replying to in quotes.
At the bottom of a thread (series of posts/topic) you will see the 'Subscribe' button. Click this to be notified by email when there are any new posts in the topic.
Forum Buttons
At the top of all forum pages you will see a series of buttons:
Home - takes you to the forums homepage
My Profile - takes you to your profile page
Show Latest Posts - shows a list of the latest forum posts
Rule - shows the forum rules
Stats - shows a range of statistics on forum activity
Help - takes you to a help page which gives instructions on how to use board code (tags)
N.B. not all buttons will be visible on every forum page. Which buttons appear depends on which forum page you are currently viewing.
Post edited by: Maff, at: 2008/06/26 13:28
Post edited by: Maff, at: 2009/07/19 21:04<br /><br />Post edited by: Maff, at: 2009/07/19 21:05
