The Liberal Judaism Forum
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The Liberal Judaism Forum |
Getting Started
Welcome to the Liberal Judaism Forum. We hope you get used to it quickly and find it valuable.
The Forum uses standard software that has a wide range of features which, at first, you might find more complicated than you need, so here is a Getting Started Guide. Read this guide once you are logged in to the forum and can see the various screen layouts and features.
1 Registering. You will need to register to use the forum. This ensures that only those people who are entitled to view different discussion boards can in fact do so. Open the forum and click on Register an Account. You will need to choose a username that you will use to log in with, your email address, and choose a password. You will also be asked to indicate your congregation and your role within your congregation, so we can make sure you have access to the appropriate parts of the forum. You will be able to change the name under which your postings are displayed once your account is activated. You will also need to click to accept the terms of usage before clicking Register at the bottom of the page. You can post to the forum as soon as you have registered.
2 Security. You will be able to access the open area on the forum immediately. If you want access to closed areas, such as those used for Education, please mail your registration details to forum@liberaljudaism.org. Your additional access will be set up, usually within 24 hours.
3 Personal Profile. Once you are logged in , take a moment to populate your Profile (click the Profile button on the top button bar towards the top of the screen); in particular, please then click on Account Related Settings and change the Name so that everyone will know who has been posting what. You can change your password on the same screen.
4 Browsing the forum. The forum is divided into a number of different Boards (Bulletin Boards - electronic versions of a noticeboard). On each board you can post and read Topics, which have a Subject (a title) and content (what you actually want to say). Against each Topic you will see one or more Replies. Feel free to post a new Topic on a Board if you are starting a new thread for discussion, or you can add a Reply to a Topic or to a previous Reply.
5 Navigating. There are a number of different ways of navigating the forum. The easiest is to click on the heading of the Board you want to browse. The symbol to the left of the board's title will be in dark blue if there are new postings since you last logged on. You can then click on each Topic heading of interest and expand it to see the Topic details and the Replies. The most recent Topics are at the top. Once you are in a Board you will see a hierarchy of pages that will also help you navigate.
6 Adding a Topic. To add a new Topic to a Board click on the New Topic button on the right of your screen. Give your Topic a Subject so that others will know what they are reading about, and then add as much detailed text as you wish. You can also add attachments - much like email - which will then be stored centrally although there are limits to the size of attachments that can be loaded - click on Additional Options. You can use the different formatting symbols to give more meaning and colour to your posting as well - it can be fun as well! (When you apply formatting you will see strange symbols added to your text, but they will display OK. To make a link active if you are posting a link to another website, highlight the URL and click on the Insert Hyperlink icon)
7 Adding a Reply. Adding a Reply is the same as adding a Topic, you just start it while reading a Topic rather than when you are just looking at all the current Topics.
8 Notification. We recommend you click on Notify on the right hand side alongside the Board(s) in which you are interested. That way you will get an email every time a new Topic is added to that Board, which will you keep you up to date with what is happening. You can also request notification against a particular Topic, so you get a mail when some-one replies. You can turn off notification at any time.
9 Searching. One of the best ways of using the forum is to start by searching to see what has previously been said about your particular subject or interest. Click on Search on the top button bar. Then you will know who the experts are, be able to see the way other people have been able to s solve similar problems in the past, and so on. Of course, you can also post a new Topic asking for other people's thoughts.
10 I'm lost! If you get lost in the various screens, you can always click on Home on the top button bar and go back to the beginning.
11 If it all goes wrong! Don't Worry! Just send a mail to forum@liberaljudaism.org and we'll do our best to sort it all out for you - including a deleting a posting if you wish. You can also browse the Help - click on Help on the top button bar.
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