eXo Platform 3.5

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## Chapter 3. How To Use Forum?

The section provides you a guide to use all Forum features or to configure the Forum portlet to make it work in your desired manner.

In Forum, the role of each user group is clear and very important. Each role has a set of tasks that they can execute. Administrators and moderators are responsible for setting up and maintaining Forum. With the highest rights, the administrators are in charge of the entire management tasks, including form configurations, users management, permissions, categories, forums, topics, and messages. With sub-sets of administrative permissions, the moderators will manage the respective sub-sets of the forum.

The user interface will indicate which features are available to you, based on your role.

- As a regular user, you will have the User bar and Action bar with the basic actions.

- As a moderator, you will have the User bar and Action bar with a sub-set of certain capabilities.

- As an administrator, you will have the Administration bar which is basically the User bar with more administrative actions. You also see the Action bar with the advanced actions on forums and categories. Most of management tasks are shown via these bars.

To have an overall look of actions which users of each role can do in the Forum application, see the following table:

Features | Description | Administrator | Moderator | Owner | Regular user | Guest
--- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | ---
View details of Forum | View categories, forums, and many another information. |  |  |  |  |
Subscribe to RSS feeds | Provide the link to Forum for easy sharing. |  |  |  |  |
Attach a file | Upload attachments to a topic/post, preview and download attachments. |  |  |  |  |
Search | Do the simple and advanced search. |  |  |  |  |
Bookmark | Bookmark category, forum, topic. |  |  |  |  |
Add a post | Post reply, quote, private post, quick reply. |  |  |  |  |
Edit a post | Edit post, quote and private post. |  |  |  |  |
Delete a post | Delete post inside specific topic. |  |  |  |  |
Add a topic | Start a new topic. |  |  |  |  |
Edit a topic | Edit topic in a specific forum. |  |  |  |  |
Delete a topic | Delete topic inside a specific forum. |  |  |  |  |
Lock/Unlock a topic | Lock/Unlock topics inside a specific forum. |  |  |  |  |
Add a poll & Vote | Add a poll to topic and vote poll. |  |  |  |  |
Rate a topic | Evaluate a topic by rating star. |  |  |  |  |
Add a tag | Create new tags and tag a topic. |  |  |  |  |
Private message | Send or receive private messages. |  |  |  |  |
Watch | Subscribe to categories, forums, topics to receive notification mails of new posts or topics. |  |  |  |  |
User Settings | Change profile settings, personal forum settings. |  |  |  |  |
Stick/unstick a topic | Stick/unstick topics inside a specific forum. |  |  |  |  |
Lock/unlock a topic | Close/open topic inside a specific forum. |  |  |  |  |
Split a topic | Divide one topic into two separate topics. |  |  |  |  |
Merge topics | Combine two or more topics into one. |  |  |  |  |
Manage a poll | Create, edit, delete, close and reopen polls. |  |  |  |  |
Move a topic/post | Move one topic/post from a forum/topic to the other forum/topic. |  |  |  |  |
Approve a topic/post | Change new topics/posts from pending status to normal status so that guest, normal user can view. |  |  |  |  |
Uncensor a post | Allow a topic which has censored content to be displayed. |  |  |  |  |
Show/hide a post | Allow posts to be shown/hidden. |  |  |  |  |
Manage pending tasks | Manage all topics/posts waiting for moderation in one place. |  |  |  |  |
Manage a watch | Manage the subscription (watch). Edit and delete subscribed email. |  |  |  |  |
Ban a user | Ban users from accessing specific forums or categories |  |  |  |  |
Add a forum | Add a new forum to a specific category. |  |  |  |  |
Edit a forum | Change the title, description, moderator, permissions of a forum. However, moderators cannot set moderators for a forum. |  |  |  |  |
Delete a forum | Delete forums from a specific category. |  |  |  |  |
Lock a forum | Lock a forum so that it can be viewed only. |  |  |  |  |
Unlock a forum | Unlock a locked forum that allow doing basic action on unlocked forum. |  |  |  |  |
Close/open a forum | Close/open a forum. Closed forum are still manageable by administrator and moderators. |  |  |  |  |
Move a forum | Move forum from one category to the other category. |  |  |  |  |
Export a forum | Export a forum in the format of a .zip or .xml file. |  |  |  |  |
Import a forum | Import a forum from .zip/.xml file into the Forum application. |  |  |  |  |
Add a category | Add a new category. |  |  |  |  |
Edit a category | Edit a category and change properties. |  |  |  |  |
Export a category | Export categories in the format of a s.zip or .xml file. |  |  |  |  |
Import a category | Import categories from .zip/.xml file into the Forum application. |  |  |  |  |
Delete a category | Delete a category and all forum, topic, post inside it. |  |  |  |  |
Administrate Sorting | Sort forums, topics according to specific conditions. |  |  |  |  |
Administrate Censor | Define keywords that will be censored in forum. |  |  |  |  |
Customize the notification template | Define the content of the notification mails. |  |  |  |  |
Customize BBCode | Add, edit and delete the BBCode tags used in writing posts/topics. |  |  |  |  |
Add a topic type | Add topic types that help users easily know what topics are about at a glance . |  |  |  |  |
Set up auto-pruning | Set up auto-pruning to clean a large amount of obsolete and inactivate topics based on criteria. |  |  |  |  |
Ban IPs | Ban IPs on the whole Forum application (only administrators) and on only specific forums (both administrators and moderators). |  |  |  |  |
Manage users | Manage user's profile, promote users, ban users, view topic and post of a specific user. |  |  |  |  |

### Note

Owners are those posting questions or answers. Actually, they are regular users but can perform some extra actions on their posts and topics.

## Regular users

This section describes actions that a regular user can perform in the Forum application of eXo Platform.

### View details of the Forum application

Once clicking Forum on the Administration bar, you will be directed to the Forum homepage. Here, you can see all categories of forum, all forums of each category, and the number of posts, and more another information as below.

#### Search

Like in Answers, you can do either of two search types (Quick Search or Advanced Search) anywhere in the Forum application, right on the homepage or inside each specific forum or topic that makes it easy to find the expected information.

##### Quick search

With Quick Search, users can directly type a search term in the textbox. All the categories, forums, topics and posts that have the keyword matching the search term will be quickly displayed in the Search Result form.

For example:

- The Search function on the main bar to search for items related to categories, forums, topics, and posts.

- The Search function inside one specific forum to find topics, and posts in the forum only.

- The Search function inside one specific topic to find posts related to the topic only.

Do a quick search

1. Enter a search term into the relevant search textbox.

2. Click or press the Enter key to perform your search, or click the Search button if you want to search in one forum or topic.

Depending on your selected object, the results which contain the matching keyword will be displayed in the Search Result form.

`See also`

- View details of the Forum application

- Advanced search

##### Advanced search

The Advanced Search allows users to make a search with the particular criteria corresponding to the object you want to find. Using the Advanced Search, you can find forums/topics/posts exactly.

The Advanced Search icon is placed anywhere in the Forum application. To perform the advanced search, do as follows:

1. Click at the top right of the Forum homepage when being in the Forum application or in the search pop-up or in the Search this category/Search this forum/Search this topic/ on the Action bar of each selected object.

Basing on where you want to search: category, forum or post, the search criteria will be changed accordingly.

2. Define values of properties corresponding to each object that you want to search.

3. Click the Search button to do search or Cancel to quit. Also, click the Clear Fields button to reset the inputted values.

The list of the found objects will be displayed in the Search Result form or there will be an alert message when no objects match with the input properties.

- To find in categories, select Category from the Search in drop-down menu.

Details:

Field | Description
--- | ---
Terms | The keyword related to your desired categories.
Scope | The search scale. With the 'Full' option, returned results are those matching both title and content containing the entered keyword. With the 'Titles' option, only results matching the object's titles are returned.
Username | The name of the category creator. Input the name manually or click to select users from a specific group.
Created between - and | The created date interval for searching. Input dates manually or click to open the calendar pop-up.
Moderator | The name of the category moderator. Input the name manually or click to select users from a specific group.

- To find in forums, select Forum from the Search in drop-down menu.

Details:

Field | Description
--- | ---
Terms | The search keyword.
Status | The status of the forums.
State | The state of the forums.
Posts | The interval of forum's posts number you want to search. Simply click and drag your cursor on the slidebar to define the post interval.
Topics | The interval of forum's topics number you want to search. Click and drag your cursor on the slidebar to define the topic interval.
Moderator | The name of the forums' moderators.

- To find in topics, select Topic from the Search in drop-down menu.

Details:

Field | Description
--- | ---
Terms | The search keyword.
Type | The type of the topic specified by the topic type name and its icon. It can be selected from the existing list.
Status | The status of the topics.
State | The state of the topics.
Created between - and | The created date interval in which you want to search for topics.
Last Post between - and | The last post's created date interval in topics in which you want to search.
Posts | The number of the topic's posts interval in which you want to search for those topics. Simply click and drag the cursor on the slidebar to define the post interval.
Views | The mumber of the views interval of topics in which you want to search. Simply click and drag the cursor on the slidebar to define the views interval.

- To find in posts, select Post from the Search in drop-down menu.

Details:

Field | Description
--- | ---
Term | The search keyword.
Scope | The search scale to search. With the "Full" option, returned results are those matching both title and content. With the "Titles", the results only match the post titles.
Created between - and | The created date interval in which you want to search for posts.

`See also`

- View details of the Forum application

- Quick search

### Topics

#### Start a topic

1. Go into the forum where you want to start a new topic.

2. Click .

3. Enter the topic title, content. The title must be less than 100 characters (special charaters are accepted). You may set other optional properties if you want.

- Click the Attach files link to attach files to your message. The max size for the attachment is 20Mb. Click the trash icon next to the attachment to remove it.

- Use BBCodes to format text, or to insert images, videos, and links.

4. Click Preview to see before submitting, or Submit to finish your topic.

### Note

If the moderation feature is activated for a forum, it means that new topics must be reviewed and approved by a moderator before they are published. Once a new message is posted in a moderated forum, the forum will tell you that the topic must be approved before being published.

When creating a topic, you can also add extra properties to this topic:

- Select a topic icon.

- Set the topic options.

- Control who can view or post in your topic.

##### Select a topic icon

When posting a new topic, you may also assign an icon to the topic for the quick visual identification as follows:

1. Go to the Icon tab in the New Topic form.

2. Select an icon category and click your desired icon in the right pane. The selected icon is surrounded with the red border and with its name as below.

##### Set the topic options

Go to the Options tab, you can select status, state, type of the topic, and more.

Details:

Field | Description
--- | ---
Type | Type of the topic specified by the topic type name and its icon. You can select it from the existing types. The administrator can add a new one by clicking the icon (Note that only administrators can see icon.
Posts Moderation | Check this option if you want posts to be moderated before being viewed.
Posts Notification | Check this option to enable the notification email when there are new posts in your topic.
Sticky | Check this option to stick the topic. A sticky topic will be located at the top of the topics list. A sticky topic will not fall down in the list if any new posts are added.

##### Set topic permissions

Go to the Permissions tab, you can set rights to view and post on your topic for another users. By default, all users can view and reply on a topic.

To set the "post" or "view" right to certain users, enter usernames manually in each textbox or click one relevant selector next to the textbox.

- Click

  to select users.

- Click

  to select users defined by specific roles.

- Click

  to select groups.

#### Edit a topic

Follow this method when you are in your topic.

1. Click on the Action bar. For regular users, this button is only shown when you are the creator.

2. Click Edit from the drop-down menu to open the Edit Topic form.

3. Make changes to your desire. Also, leave the reason in the Reason field if needed.

4. Click Submit to finish.

#### Create a poll

Each topic may have a poll question with pre-defined options for users to select. As a regular user, you can only add a poll question to your own topic. Meanwhile, administrator and moderator can add the poll to any topics.

1. Go to the topic you want to add a poll.

2. Click on the Action bar and select Add Poll from the drop-down menu.

3. Enter the poll question and options.

Details:

Field | Description
--- | ---
Poll Question | Question raised for polling that is required.
Poll Options | Brief content of the poll.
Close Poll After | Period after which the poll is closed.
Users may change their votes | Allow users to change their votes or not.
Allow Multiple Choices | Allow users to vote for multiple options or not.

4. Click Submit Poll to complete. After adding a poll to the topic, is then displayed in the topics list.

To perform further actions on this poll, simply left-click More Actions on the Poll pane to open the drop-down menu. Here, you can edit, close/reopen or remove the poll by clicking the relevant button.

#### Rate a topic

The Forum application provides an intuitive rating experience through a five-star scale. Your choice of five stars means the highest rating for the topic.

1. Go to the topic you want to vote.

2. Click on the Action bar.

The Rate This Topic form will appear.

3. Rate the topic by clicking the star. The number of selected stars will be changed from grey into yellow.

### Note

Each user can only vote for a topic once. The function is disabled in closed topics and with banned users.

#### Tag/Untag a topic

This function is for all logged-in users. Tags are keywords which are used as labels to describe or categorize the topic contents. One topic may have several tag names. Using tags allows you to categorize topics based on the actual content. Even, it can be a better way to find a specific topic than a full-text search.

Tag a topic

1. Click on the Action bar.

An input text box will pop up.

2. Enter a tag name or multiple tags separated by a space or select existing tags in the suggestion list that appears when typing.

3. Press Enter or click Add Tag.

Tags assigned to the topic appears as follows.

Untag a topic

The first way

- Simply click

  next to that tag.

The second way

This way allows you to untag one or multiple topics.

1. Click the tag name to be directed to the tags management page.

2. Ticking your desired topic checkboxes from the topics list.

3. Click on the Action bar, then select Untag from the drop-down menu.

### Post

To post a reply, select the topic you want to reply to. You can reply to any topic as long as it is not closed and restricted. While you are viewing the topic, you can reply to it via either of the following ways:

- Type a message in the Quick Reply box at the bottom of the topic.

- Click the Post Reply button which is on the top or bottom of the topic.

- Post a private reply, or reply with other post quoted.

#### Post a quick reply

You can post a reply quickly with plain texts without taking into account its format.

1. Scroll down to the bottom of the topic to see the Quick Reply box.

2. Enter you message here. You can use BBCodes in your reply to insert images, videos, or links.

3. Optionally, click Preview to view your reply before submitting it.

4. Click Quick Reply to send you message.

After posting your post, it will be highlighted so you can notice it easily.

`See also`

- Edit your post

#### Post an advanced reply

You can post a reply with the full editor as follows:

1. Go to the topic you want to post a reply.

2. Click on the top or bottom of the topic.

3. Enter your message in the textbox. Use BBCodes to format texts, or insert images, videos, and links.

Optionally, you can:

- Attach files to the topic by clicking the Attach files link. The max size for the attachment is 10 Mb by default.

- Select an icon or smiley for the post in the Icons and Smileys tab.

4. Optionally, click Preview to view your reply before submitting it.

5. Click Submit to finish.

If your post is the last one, its information will be shown at the Last Posts column of the forum.

The icon in the topic title allows you to jump to the last read post in that topic.

`See also`

- Edit your post

#### Post a private reply

You can send a private reply in a topic, which only allows the responded user to view the message content.

1. Go into the topic you want to post the reply.

2. Click under the post to open the Private Post form.

3. Enter your message and send your messages as described in the Post an advanced reply .

### Note

Private posts will not be checked for approval when it is posted in a topic that has the 'Posts moderation' enabled. Private posts are displayed with the label 'private!'.

#### Reply with a quote

You can include a quote from the previous message in your reply to a specific post. This may substantially increase the readability of the discussion topics when it is used correctly.

1. Click under the post you want to quote.

This will bring up the "Quote" form, with the previous message already quoted in the textbox.

2. Enter your message. Edit the quotation if necessary.

i. In the Content tab, the quoted content is wrapped between BBCodes tags [QUOTE][/QUOTE] which is automatically generated. Add your message content before or after this quoted content. You can create a quoted content manually by clicking from the WYSIWYG editor toolbar:

This will generate the quotation BBCodes tag for your message. After getting the quotation tag, enter your quotation between [QUOTE] and [/QUOTE].

ii. In the Icons and Smileys tab, select an icon for your reply here.

3. Click Submit to finish.

#### Edit a post

After submitting your post, and you want to change it, you can do as follows:

1. Click under the post you want to edit.

2. Make changes on the post, then click Submit to accept your changes. When you edit a post, you also have the opportunity to upload an attachment, or delete an existing one.

#### Delete a post

1. Click under your post that want to delete.

2. Click OK in the confirmation message.

### Use BBCodes

BBCodes (Bulletin Board Codes) are special tags in bulletin boards to help users enrich their posts with formatting and inclusions. They are useful to provide guarded formatting capabilities to the forum users without the risk of breaking the html markup of the page. BBCode itself is similar in style to HTML: tags are enclosed in square braces "[" and "]" rather than "<" and ">" and it offers greater control over what and how something is displayed.

Depending on the BBCode template customized by administrators only, you may find it very easy to add BBCodes to your posts through a toolbar above the message area on the posting form. You can either type the BBCode tags manually or use the toolbar in the posting form. To easily get the BBCode tags without typing them, simply click on the respective icon which is shown in the toolbar above the message area.

Click on the tool bar to get the full list of build-in BBCode explanations and examples.

### Public user profile

Every forum member has a publicly viewable profile. This includes information provided by the member, either during the registration process or later via the User settings.

Whenever you see a member's name in a topic, you can view his public profile quickly by clicking his username and select View Public Profile in the drop-down menu.

The View User Profile form will be displayed.

### Private messages

This function is for all logged-in users to send messages to other users privately. These messages will not be moderated and only viewable to the receiver.

#### Send a private message

1. Click the user name of the member you want to send message, then select Send Private Message in the drop-down menu.

The Private Messages form will appear.

2. Enter the username of the receivers and type your message title and contents.

3. Click Save to send the message.

#### Receive a private message

When you have received a private message, there will be a notification on your User bar.

Click Private Messages to open the Private Messages form.

Details:

Tab | Description
--- | ---
Inbox | All received messages which can be viewed and deleted.
Sent Messages | All sent messages which can be forwarded and deleted.
Compose New Message | Where to compose new messages.

### Bookmarks

In the Forum application, the Bookmark function is to collect links to a category, forum or topic you have visited, so that you can return to that category, forum or topic directly. Bookmarks can be created and managed by yourself.

#### Add a bookmark

This function is for all logged-in users to save links to categories, forums or topics into the Forum Bookmark.

1. Go into the object (category, forum or topic) you want to bookmark.

2. Click on the Action bar or right-click the object title and select Bookmark in the drop-down menu. The bookmarked link will be added to your bookmarks list.

#### View bookmarks

To view bookmarks, click on the Action bar. This will bring up the My Bookmarks form, with the list of your bookmarked links. To view the bookmark, click a desired bookmark title from the list.

#### Delete a bookmark

Simply click corresponding to the link that you want to delete.

The selected bookmarks will be removed from the bookmarks list.

### Subscribe to RSS feeds

This function is for all users to subscribe to a specific category, forum, topic. If there are any changes, the feed of the subscribed category, forum or topic will be updated. To get the RSS feed, click on the Action bar;

Or right-click the item you want to subscribe to.

The detailed information of the category/forum/topic is displayed on another tab. Depending on which browser you are using, this page may look different. In this example, the browser is Firefox 8.0.

The following illustration demonstrates the RSS feed subscription using the Firefox Live Bookmark:

- Category feeds contain all posts from all topics in all forums in a category. The category feeds shows the title (title of the category), description (category description), link (permalink to the category), pubdate (creation date of the category).

- Forum feeds contain all posts in all topics in a forum. The forum feeds show title (name of the forum), description (description of the forum), link (permalink of the forum), pubdate (creation date of the forum).

- Topic feeds contain all posts in a topic. The topic feeds show title (title of the topic), description (the content of the topic's initial post), link (permalink to the topic), pubdate (the creation date of the topic).

### Watch

This function is for all logged-in users to keep track of changes in categories, forums or topics via notification emails. Whenever there are new changes, such new categories, new topics or new posts, you will receive a notification from the Forum application.

To watch a desired object, go into the object (category, forum or topic), and click on the Action bar; Or right-click the object title and select Watch from the drop-down menu:

The watched objects are also listed in the My Subscriptions tab in the User Settings form. When being unwatched, they also have been existed in this list.

You will receive the notification message of the successful watching. You will receive the email notifications about new posts/replies of the forum that you are watching as well. In the notification email, you will be provided links that help you go directly to the topic or go to reply to the post. After clicking this link, the new posts in your watched topic will be highlighted.

### Note

Once a category/forum or a topic has already been watched, the Unwatch option will appear in the right-click menu or on the *Action* bar, so you can unsubscribe from the object.

### Permanent links

This function is for all users to view and copy the link to a specific forum/topic and share it with others.

1. Go to Forum/Topic which you want to share link.

2. Click Permalink label at the right corner.

### Note

The page link you want to share is displayed in the address bar of the web browser. You can copy and share it to others.

### User settings

You yourself may configure your settings, such as personal profile, forum settings, and subscriptions.

Click on the User bar to go to the Settings form. Once you opened the Settings form, you can control your personal settings, options and preferences via the following actions:

- Edit your profile.

- Change your avatar.

- Change the watch settings.

- Change forum settings.

- Edit your subscriptions.

#### Edit a profile

By selecting the Profile tab, you can see your personal information and other preferences.

Here, you can:

- Edit your screen name and title displayed in forums in the Screen Name and User Title fields.

- Edit your signature which will be displayed at the bottom of your post. Enter your signature in the Signature textbox. Tick/Untick the Display Signature checkbox to enable/disable your signature.

- Change your avatar by clicking the Update link. Tick/Untick the Display Avatar checkbox to show/hide your avatar.

- Follow your created topics by selecting the Watch topics I start checkbox. You will receive email notifications when there are any new posts added to your topics.

- Follow topics which you have posted by ticking the Watch topics I post in checkbox. You will receive email notifications when there are any new posts added to your created topic.

#### Change forum settings

Go to the Forum Settings tab in the Settings form. You can change preferences, such as time zone, date and time formats and other display options.

Check/Uncheck the Show Forum Jump if you want to show/hide the Forum quick navigation at the bottom of the Forum page.

#### Edit a subscription

Go to the My Subscriptions tab in the Settings form, where you can update or delete existing subscriptions.

- In the RSS column, you can subscribe or unsubscribe your subscriptions by selecting/deselecting the respective checkboxes, then click Save. The selected objects (categories, forums, topics) will be updated to the Your personal feed URL is field. You can use this link to view the content of your subscriptions.

- In the

  column, you can edit or delete your subscription email. Select an email, then click the trash icon to delete. Enter a new email address into the Your watches are sent to field. Click Update to add your entered email addresses in the

  column.

- Click

  to remove your watched category, topic, post. After being removed, you will no longer receive any email notifications of the removed object.

Next, click Save to accept your changes.

## Moderator

Moderators in Forum are responsible for managing contents of posts and replies before and after they are posted to the category where they are assigned as moderators.

### Moderate forums

Moderators can manage all the forums inside their assigned category. If you are a moderator of any category, you can do the following actions:

- Edit a forum

- Lock/Unlock a forum

- Close/Open a forum

- Move a forum

#### Edit a forum

1. Go to the relevant forum.

2. Click on the Action bar, then click Edit from the drop-down menu.

3. Edit the forum properties.

4. Click Save to save all the changes.

#### Lock/Unlock a forum

Locking a forum will prevent all members from creating new topics and posting replies in this forum. All topics in a locked forum will be locked also, but their contents are still viewable. Moderators can only lock/unlock the forum that they manage.

1. Go to the forum.

2. Click on the Action bar, then click Lock/Unlock from the drop-down menu.

#### Close/Open a forum

Closed forums are invisible to regular users. To administrators and moderators, the contents in a closed forum are still viewable, but creating topics and comments is disabled. Moderators can only close the forum that they are assigned to manage.

1. Go into the forum you want to close or open.

2. Click on the Action bar, then select Close or Open from the drop-down menu.

#### Move a forum

You can move a forum into another category as follows:

1. Go into the forum you want to move.

2. Click on the Action bar, then select Move from the drop-down menu.

A list of existing categories will appear. Select a destination category to which your selected forum will be moved.

### Moderate topics

The followings are actions that a moderator can execute on topics:

- Approve a topic

- Edit a topic

- Move a topic

- Delete a topic

- Close/Open a topic

- Lock/Unlock a topic

- Stick/Unstick a topic

- Merge topics

- Split a topic

#### Approve a topic

Moderators can approve pending topics in forums that enable the 'Moderate Topic' option. All new topics added to these forums will be pending for approval. It means that nobody can view these topics except administrators and moderators of the forums. Pending topics are only viewable when they are approved.

The administrator and moderator will know the total number of pending topics at the right corner of their Forum Administration bar and User bar:

Moderator can view the list of topics to be moderated. See View all pending moderation tasks for more details.

Approve topics

The first way

1. Select topics by checking their relevant checkboxes, then click on the Action bar if you are in a list of topics.

Or if you are in a topic, simply click on the Action bar.

2. Click Approve from the drop-down menu.

The second way

1. Click on the Action bar and click Approve from the drop-down menu. The Waiting for Approval form opens.

2. Select checkboxes corresponding to the posts you want to approve. You can preview the post when hovering your cursor over the post title.

3. Click Approve to accept your approval. Approved posts are shown normally for regular users to view and take some actions.

#### Edit a topic

1. Select a topic to edit by ticking its respective checkbox.

2. Click on the Action bar.

3. Click Edit from the drop-down menu that appears.

4. Edit the topic as you wish. Leave the reason for the editing in the Reason field if needed.

#### Close/Open a topic

Only administrators and moderators can perform these actions. Closed topics will be invisible to regular users. Moderator can only close or open topics in the category that he manages.

1. When you are in a topics list, select a topic by checking its corresponding check-box, then click on the Action bar.

When you are in a topic, click on the Action bar.

2. Click Close or Open from the drop-down menu that appears.

The icon of the closed topic will be changed to automatically.

#### Move a topic

Only administrators and moderators can perform this action. This function is used to move topics from a forum to another one. Moderator can only move topics between forums that he manages.

1. Select a topic by checking its corresponding check-box, then click on the Action bar when you are in a topics list.

Or, if you are in a topic, click on the Action bar.

2. Click Move from the drop-down menu.

3. Click to select a destination forum to move.

### Note

The moderator of a forum will be checked for permission. The moderator cannot move topics to:

Closed/locked forums that he does not manage.

Forums to which he does not have the right to add topics.

Forums which are in categories that he is restricted.

Therefore, only the forums which the moderator can move topics are shown in the list of destination forums.

#### Delete a topic

Delete a specific topic

1. Select topics by checking their corresponding checkboxes, then click on the Action bar when you are in a topics list.

Or, if you are already in a topic, click on the Action bar.

2. Click Delete from the drop-down menu, then click OK in the confirmation message.

Delete topics of a specific user

1. Click the username of the poster or simply hover mouse over the poster's avatar.

2. Click All Topics By [User name].

All topic posted by the selected user will be displayed.

3. Click corresponding to the desired topic, then click OK in the confirmation message.

#### Lock/Unlock a topic

This function is for administrators and moderators only to lock inappropriate topics. All posts in a clocked topic are still viewable, but posting reply will be disabled.

1. Select a topic by checking its corresponding checkbox, then click on the Action bar when you are in a topics list.

Or, click on the Action bar when you are in a topic.

2. Click Lock or Unlock from the drop-down menu that appears.

#### Stick/Unstick a topic

This function is for administrators and moderators only to stick topics which will be located at the top of the topics list. The topics will not fall down the list if any new posts are added.

1. Select a topic by ticking its corresponding checkbox, then click on the Action bar when you are in a topics list.

Or, click on the Action bar when you are already in a topic.

2. Click Stick or Unstick from the drop-down menu that appears.

You can see the sticked topic in the top of the topics list.

When creating a new topic, you can also make this topic sticked by ticking the Sticky checkbox in the Options tab.

#### Merge topics

When there are two or more related topics, you may want to merge these topics into one as follows.

1. Go to the topics list.

2. Select more than two topics to be merged by checking their checkboxes.

3. Click on the forum Action bar.

4. Click Merge from the drop-down menu that appears. The Merge Topics form opens.

5. Select a destination topic which will be the main entry of the merged topic from the list of the existing topics. Give one name for the new topic in the New Topic Title field if you want.

6. Click Save to accept. After being merged, selected topics will be joined into one topic. All posts of the other topics are displayed as posts below the main entry.

#### Split a topic

A topic with more than two posts can be split into separate topics.

1. Go into the topic you want to split.

2. Click on the Action bar and select Split from the drop-down menu. The Split Topic form opens.

3. Enter the name for the new topic in the New Topic field.

4. Select posts by checking their respective checkboxes.

5. Click Save to complete.

The new topic will be displayed in the topics list with the new name. The last selected post will become the main entry of the new topic.

### Moderate posts

As a moderator, you have some specific rights on a post. To moderate a post, you need to select that post first by checking its relevant checkbox.

Next, click on the Action bar and select a desired action from the drop-down menu. All the moderation actions will be reached via this menu.

The followings are actions that a moderator can perform on a post:

- Approve posts

- Move posts

- Delete posts

- Hide posts

- Show posts

- Uncensor posts

#### Approve a post

All posts in a topic that requires post moderation will not be viewable before approval. This function is to approve posts which are pending for approval.

You can select to approve a single post or multiple posts at the same time. The moderator can view the list of tasks to be moderated. See View all pending moderation tasks for more details.

The first way

1. Select the posts to approve.

2. Click on the Action bar and select Approve from the drop-down menu.

The second way

1. Click on the Action bar and click Approve in the drop-down menu. The Waiting for Approval form opens.

2. Select checkboxes corresponding to the posts you want to approve. You will see the preview of the post when mouse over the post title.

3. Click Approve to accept your approval.

Approved posts are shown normally for regular users to view and take some actions.

#### Delete a post

The first way

1. Click on the Action bar and click Show in the drop-down menu.

2. Click OK in the confirmation message.

The second way

1. Click under the post you want to delete.

2. Click OK in the confirmation message.

#### Move a post

You can move posts to a topic of your choice.

1. Select the post that you would like to move.

2. Click on the Action bar and select Move from the drop-down menu.

3. Select a destination topic in the topics list that appears.

The moderator will be checked for moving permission. He can only move post inside the forum that he manages. Therefore, at the destination topics list, only the topics which the Moderator who have the move permission, are listed for moving.

#### Hide a post

When a post is hidden, only administrators and moderators can view and mange it.

To hide a post, select on the Action bar and click Hide from the drop-down menu.

After being hidden, the hidden post is marked by 'Post Hidden!' label and regular users cannot view it.

#### Show a post

You can show a single or multiple hidden posts at the same time:

The first way

- Select the post to be unhidden and click

  on the Action bar, then click Show in the drop-down menu.

The second way

- Follow this method to show multiple posts.

1. Click on the Action bar and click Show from the drop-down menu.

2. Select hidden posts by selecting its checkboxes.

3. Click Show.

#### Uncensor a post

The administrators and moderators can censor all topics, posts containing censored keywords. These censored keywords are specified by Administrator. All topics and posts containing these keywords will labeled with 'Pending and Censored' (for post).

The first way

- Follow this method to uncensor a specific post/topic.

1. Select hidden posts/topics by selecting its checkboxes.

2. Click the Moderation on the Action bar and select Show from the drop-down menu.

The second way

- Follow this method to uncensor posts/topics in the list of existing hidden posts/topics.

1. Click Moderation on the Action bar and select Show from the drop-down menu. A list of hidden posts appears.

2. Select hidden posts by selecting the respective checkboxes.

3. Click Show.

### View all pending moderation tasks

Administrators and moderators can manage all pending tasks in Forum easily. The total number of pending topic/posts that need to be moderated are shown right on the User bar/Forum Administration bar.

To open the list of pending tasks, click Pending on the User bar.

The pending topics and posts are shown in the Waiting for Approval form.

This form lists all the pending topics, posts and the created dates. From here, you can approve or delete topics/posts.

Approve a pending topic/post

1. Click the topic/post title in the list.

2. Click the Approve button to accept approving topic/post.

Delete a pending topic/post

To delete pending topics/posts, simply click the Delete This Topic/Delete This Post button. The pending topic/post will be removed completely from the pending list and its forum.

### Ban IPs

This function allows banning IPs that may be used by users who abuse the forum functions or violate the forum rules and policies.

This function is similar to the Ban IPs tool used by administrators. However, the Ban IPs tool used by administrators can ban IP from the whole forum, while moderator can only ban IP in a specific forum only.

Ban IP on a specific forum

1. Go to the forum you want to ban IP.

2. Click on the Action bar and select Banned IPs from the drop-down menu. The Banned IPs form opens.

3. Do the same actions as the Ban IPs section of Administrators.

## Administrator

With the highest rights, administrators are in charge of the entire management tasks, including configuring and customizing the Forum porlet, backing up data, managing users and granting permissions, managing categories and forums. Administrator has the global role.

### Set up the Forum portlet

After adding the application to your Space, you have to configure the portlet settings to make it work in your desired way.

1. Click --> Portal --> Pages.

The Page Manager page will be displayed.

2. Click that corresponds to the Forum page in the pages list.

3. Hover your cursor over the Forum portlet, then click in the quick toolbar.

The settings form allows you to configure the Forum portlet in various aspects.

#### Specify the category scoping

In the Scoping tab, you can show/hide categories and forums in the Forum portlet by selecting or deselecting their respective checkboxes.

#### Enable/Disable Forum components

In the Panels tab, you can enable/disable some components in the Forum portlet.

Simply select/deselect checkboxes of the components that you want to enable or disable.

The following components can be enabled/disabled:

- Show Forum Jump

- Show Poll

- Moderators

- Show Quick Reply

- Show Icons Legend

- Show Rules

- Show Forum Statistics

Forum Statistics:

#### Enable/Disable a bookmarkable Forum URL

Before doing this function, you first need to have a knowledge of Ajax. Ajax (Asynchronous JavaScript and XML) is used in the Forum application, aiming at updating a whole webpage or a part of the webpage.

This feature defines how the links are generated in the Forum portlet. You can select to use Ajax or not.

- By not using Ajax, the Forum will generate plain URLs in the links. The added benefit will be bookmarkability and better SEO as the links will be permalinks.

- Using Ajax, the links will be Javascript based and generate Ajax calls. This makes your browsing faster because the whole page is not reloaded.

### Manage categories

Only administrators can do categories-related management tasks. To manage forums better, the administrators usually build a good forum structure using categories. So, a category is a set of forums containing all discussions about the same subject. See the following diagram to learn about one typical Forum structure.

#### Add a new category

Only when you are assigned as an administrator, you can do this function. Normally, one category is created as public and it allows everyone to access without any restrictions. Meanwhile, one restricted category only allows specific users/groups/memberships to access. Also, you can assign moderators to your category and specify a set of permissions for members in the category.

1. Click on the Forum Administration bar. The Category form will be displayed.

2. Enter the category title into the Title field which is required. (Special characters are accepted).

In the Category tab, optionally you can also:

- Enter the order of category in the numeric format into the Order field.

- Give a brief description for your category into the Description field.

- Make the created category restricted by limiting the number of audiences via one of the following ways:

The first way

Enter names of users/groups/memberships that can access this category into the Restricted Audience textbox. The different values are separated by commas.

The second way

Use selectors next to the Restricted audience textbox.

i. Click to select a specific user from the groups list.

ii. Click to select all users with the specific membership in a group.

iii. Click to select a group of users.

Optionally, select the Permissions tab to specify the category permissions.

- Do the same ways as setting the "Restricted audiences" of a category.

3. Click Save to finish.

#### Edit a category

1. Select a category to edit from the Forum homepage, then click on the Action bar when you are in the categories list.

2. Click Edit from the drop-down menu.

3. Make changes on the category properties.

4. Click Save to save your changes.

#### Delete a category

1. Select a category to delete from the Forum homepage, then click on the Action bar.

2. Click Delete from the drop-down menu.

3. Click OK in the confirmation message.

### Note

When a category is removed, all its forums are also removed.

### Manage forums

#### Add a new forum

When creating a new forum, you can also configure the forum notification settings and specify the permissions for members in that forum.

Add a new forum to a specific category

1. Go into the category to which you want to add new forum.

2. Click on Forum Administration bar or click on the Action bar and select Add Forum.

3. Enter the forum title which is required and description in the corresponding fields in the Forum form. The forum title must be less than 50 charaters.

4. Click Save to finish.

The administrators and moderators of a forum may want to get updated of what is new in forums under their management. This can be done when creating a new forum.

##### Configure the moderation settings

When creating a forum, you can set moderation-related options as follows:

1. Select the Moderation Options tab in the Forum form.

2. Do actions in the relevant fields.

Details:

Field | Description
--- | ---
Moderators | The username of the moderators.
Auto-fill the moderator's email | Check this option if you want the moderator's email is auto-filled. The email address will be taken from in moderator profile.
Email addresses to notify when there is a new post | Enter the list of email addresses which will get the notification if any new post is created. This field will be filled automactically if the Auto-fill the moderator's email is checked.
Email addresses to notify when there is a new topic | Enter the list of email addresses which will get the notification if any new topic is created.This field will be filled automactically if the Auto-fill the moderator's email is checked .
Moderate Topics | By default, new topics must be always approved and visible to everyone. If this option is selected, new topics will be pending for approval before being viewable.

#### Delete a forum

Only administrators can perform this action. When a forum is removed, all of its topics will then be deleted.

1. Go into the forum you want to remove.

2. Click on the Action bar, then select Delete from the drop-down menu.

3. Click OK in the confirmation message to accept your deletion.

### Manage users

To take this action, click on the Forum Administrator bar. The User Management form will be displayed.

Now, you can search for specific users to edit their profiles or remove them from Forum.

#### Promote a user

The administrator can edit profiles of members and promote any user to an administrator or a moderator.

1. Click on the Action bar. The User Management form will be displayed.

2. Click corresponding to the user you want to promote. The profile of this user will be displayed right below the users list.

To promote the user, you have to edit the Moderator fields in Profile tab.

Field | Description
--- | ---
Screen Name | The name displayed in Forum.
User Title | The title representing the role of user, by default. However, you can enter anything you want.
Forum Administrator | Grant the Administrator role to a selected user or not. The Administration role of the default administrator can not be edited in the User Management form.
Moderator of Categories | The list of categories moderated by the selected user. Click to select a category.
Moderator of Forums | The list of forums moderated by the selected user. Click to select a forum.

#### Modify user's forum settings

You can modify the forum settings that users had set in their User settings.

Go to the Settings tab in the User Management form.

Now you can modify the forum settings that the selected user has set in their User settings. See User settings for the detailed descriptions in the User Settings form.

#### Ban users

There are other methods to ban users from the Forum application or specific forums and categories. In case you know the username of the user who violated your forum policies, you can search and ban this user quickly.

In the User Management form, go to the Ban User tab.

Details:

Field | Description
--- | ---
Banned | Ban one user or not.
Duration | The interval during which the user will be banned. This field is only edited when you ban this user in the 'Banned' field. In the ban duration, the banned user only can view forums and topics but he/she can not post replies or send messages.
Reason | The reason for banning this user.
Ban Count | The ban times of the user.
Bans Log | Other log information.
Ban Date | The date when the ban takes effect.

`See also`

- Ban IPs for moderators

- Ban IPs for administrators

### Administrative tasks

All of administrative tasks can be reached via the menu that appears after clicking on the Forum Administration bar. You can select a desired action from the following drop-down menu.

In this section, you are going to learn how to perform all of these administrative tasks and customizations:

- Set up Sort Settings

- Define censored keywords

- Customize email notification template

- Customize BBCode

- Customize the topic types

- Set up Auto-pruning

- Ban IPs

- Back up Category/Forum

#### Set up Sort Settings

Click on the Forum Administration bar and click Sort Settings from the drop-down menu. The Sort Settings form opens. Now, you can set properties for how forums and topics are sorted in Forum.

- Sort Forums by: Sort forums by several criteria: name, order, lock status, creation date, modification date, topic count, and post count.

- Direction: Sort forums in the Ascending or Descending order.

- Sort Topics by: Sort topics by name, lock status, creation date, modification date, date of last post, post count, view count, attachments count.

- Direction: Sort topics in the Ascending or Descending order.

#### Define censored keywords

Censored keywords are those which are specified as inappropriate in the Forum application. If any topics or posts contain censored keywords, they will be hidden until being verified by Administrators or Moderators. Click on the Forum Administration bar and click Censor Keywords from the drop-down menu. The Censor Keyword form will be displayed.

Enter censored keywords in the Censored Keywords field. Keywords are separated by commas.

#### Customize an email notification template

If there are new posts in the category or topic that a user has watched, the user will receive the email notification like this.

This section will describe how to create and edit the email templates that can be used to send notification emails to users.

Click on the Forum Administration bar, and click Notifications from the drop-down menu to open the Notifications form.

The Notification form consists of two tabs:

- New Post Notification: allow you to customize the template of the notification email when there is a new post/topic in categories/forums/topics that users are watching.

- Moved Notification: allow you customize the template of the notification email when a category/forum/topic/post that is being watching is moved to another location.

Details:

- Notification Subject Template: The template for the notification subject.

- Add a prefix to notifications: Tick the checkbox to add a prefix to the email notification.

- Content Notification: The template content of the notification email of new topics/posts that can be modified with the built-in Editor.

The followings are variables which can be used in the template:

The common variables for both tabs:

- $VIEWPOST_LINK: Will be replaced by the public link referring to the new topic/post.

- $VIEWPOST_PRIVATE_LINK: Will be replaced by the private link referring to the new topic/post.

- $REPLYPOST_LINK: Will be replaced by the private link referring to the topic and a form to reply will be automatically opened.

The variables used in the New Post Notification tab:

- $OBJECT_WATCH_TYPE: Will be replaced by the watched object type (category/forum/topic).

- $OBJECT_NAME: Will be replaced by the name of the watched object (category/forum/topic).

- $ADD_TYPE: Will be replaced by the newly added object type (topic/post).

- $ADD_NAME: Will be replaced by the newly added object name (topic name/post name).

- $POSTER: Will be replaced by the topic/post owner.

- $POST_CONTENT: Will be replaced by the topic/post contents.

- $TIME: Will be replaced by the time when the topic/post was added.

- $DATE: Will be replaced by the date when the topic/post was added.

- $CATEGORY: Will be replaced by the category name.

- $FORUM: Will be replaced by the forum name.

- $TOPIC: Will be replaced by the topic name.

The variables used in the Moved Notification tab:

- $OBJECT_PARENT_NAME: Will be replaced by the forum name (if moving topics) or the topic name (if moving posts).

- $OBJECT_PARENT_TYPE: Will be replaced by the type of the moved parent object, such as forum (if moving topics) or topic (if moving posts).

- $OBJECT_NAME: Will be replaced by the name of the moved object (topic name/post name).

- $OBJECT_TYPE: Will be replaced by the type of the moved object (topic/post).

These variables are used to load the content dynamically. Thus, you should not edit them. In case the template is changed unexpectedly, you can go back to the default template by clicking . You can use the text editor to format the template as you wish.

#### Customize a BBCode

By default, there are some default BBCode tags that are initialized via plugins: "[B]", "[I]", "[HIGHLIGHT]", "[IMG]", "[CSS]", "[URL]", "[GOTO]", "[QUOTE]", "[LEFT]", "[RIGHT]", "[CENTER]", "[JUSTIFY]", "[SIZE]", "[COLOR]", "[CSS]", "[EMAIL]", "[CODE]", "[LIST]", "[WIKI], "[SLIDESHARE]".. You can add, edit or delete the BBCode tags.

Click on the Forum Administration bar, and click BBCode from the drop-down menu to open the BBCode Manager form.

Here, you can do the following actions:

- Add a new BBCode.

- Edit a BBCode.

- Delete a BBCode.

- Activate/Deactivate a BBCode.

##### Add a new BBCode

1. In the BBCode Manager form, click Add BBCode to open the Add BBCode form.

2. Input values into the Add BBCode form.

Details:

Field | Description
--- | ---
Tag | This is the text for BBCode, which goes inside the square bracket.
Replacement | The HTML codes that replace the user-entered BBCode.
Description | The brief description about this BBCode tag.
Example | The sample of the BBCode in use.
Use {option} | Show that the new BBCode tag supports option or not.
Preview dialog | Preview the rendered BBCodes.
| Click this icon to see descriptions of each field.

3. Optionally, click Preview to preview your created BBCode tag.

4. Click Save to finish or Reset to clear all input fields.

##### Edit a BBCode

1. Click corresponding to the relevant BBCode tag in the BBCode Manager form.

2. Make changes to the BBCode tag.

3. Click Preview to preview the BBCode tag after being edited, or click Save to finish your changes.

##### Delete a BBCode

Simply click corresponding to the BBCode you want to delete in the BBCode Manager form and then select OK in the confirmation message to accept your deletion.

##### Activate/Deactivate a BBCode

Any BBCode can be activated/deactivated.

- To activate an existing BBCode tag, tick the relevant checkbox.

- To deactivate an existing BBCode tag, simply deselect the relevant checkbox. The entered BBCode will be displayed as the plain text.

#### Set up auto-pruning

The pruning allows you to clean a large amount of obsolete and inactivate topics based on criteria.

1. Click on the Forum Administration bar and click Pruning from the drop-down menu to open the Auto Prune form.

2. Click corresponding to the forum you want to set the prune settings.

3. Specify the criteria.

4. Click to check how many topics will be pruned.

5. Click Save to accept settings.

After setting the prune successfully, the auto-prune will be run automatically on the forum that has been set to check for the inactivate topics.

#### Create a topic type

The topic type is the visual indication for other users to know what is topic about at a glance. When creating new topic, users can select the topic type that they are going to start. The administrator can define these topic types.

Click on the Forum Administration bar and click Topic Types from the drop-down menu to open the Topic Type Manager form.

The Topic Type Manager form lists all topic types and allows you to add new topic types, edit or delete the existing ones.

Add a topic type

1. Open the Topic Type form via one of two following ways:

- The first way

Click Add Topic Type in the Topic Type Management form.

- The second way

Click next to the Type field in the Option tab of the New Topic or Edit Topic form.

(Note that only administrators can see .)

2. Enter the topic name in the Type field, then select an icon for this topic type.

3. Click Save to accept adding your new topic type.

You will see the new topic type added.

- To edit the topic type, click

  .

- To delete the topic type, click

  .

#### Ban IPs

Administrators can ban IP addresses used by users who abuse the forum functions or violate the forum rules and policies. All banned IPs cannot be used to add posts to all forums in the Forum application. Any user who uses banned IPs to add post, will be recognized as the banned user. As a result, the banned user can only view and is prevented from most of basic actions to the forum, such as adding topics, posting, or rating.

Click on the Forum Administration bar, then click Banned IPs from the drop-down menu. The Banned IPs form opens.

- To ban an IP, simply enter the IP address into the IP textboxes and click [Add]. All banned IPs will be listed in the banned IPs table. You can view all posts which are posted from the specific banned IP or delete them from the banned IPs list.

- To view all posts submitted from a specific IPs, click the [Posts] link of the respective IPs. These posts can be viewed and deleted by the administrator.

- To remove banned IPs from the banned IP list, click the [x] icon of the respective IP.

Besides, you can also filter the banned IPs if there are so many banned IPs.

To filter banned IPs, enter a part of the IPs address into filter text box, all IPs matching with filter term will be displayed.

#### Back up a category & forum

The Export function is a best way to back up data in the Forum application. This function allows you to export categories and forums in the Forum application into the .zip or .xml file. When a category/forum is exported, all its forum, topics, posts and its properties are also exported. The exported file can be used to import into the Forum application.

##### Export a category

1. Click on the Forum Administration bar.

2. Click Export from the drop-down menu to open the Export Categories form.

Details:

Field | Description
--- | ---
File Name | Enter the name of the exported file.
Export All | Check this option to export all data in Forum, such as all categories, user profiles, and forum statistics.
Only Categories | Check this option to export the selected categories only.

3. Select category and enter the file name into the File Name field.

4. Click Save.

##### Export a forum

This function is used to export forums and all topics inside the Forum application in the .xml or .zip format.

The first way

1. Go into a forum and click on the Action bar.

2. Click Export Forum from the drop-down menu to open the Export Forums form.

3. Input the file name to export.

4. Tick the Compress checkbox to export the file into the .zip file or leave it blank to export into .xml file.

5. Click Save to get and store the exported file in your local device.

The second way

1. Go into a category containing the forum you want to export.

2. Click on the Action bar, then click Export Forums from the drop-down menu.

3. Select a forum you want to export by ticking the relevant checkbox.

4. Select the Compress checkbox to export the file in the .zip format or leave it blank to export in the .xml format.

5. Click Save to get and store the exported file in your local device.

##### Import a category

1. Click on the Forum Administrator bar, then click Import from the drop-down menu to open the Import Category form.

2. Browse the file to import.

3. Click Save.

##### Import a forum

1. Go into one category, then click on the Action bar.

2. Click Import Forum from the drop-down menu.

3. Browse and upload the selected file in the Import Forum form.

4. Click Save to accept importing.

After being imported successfully, the forum and topic data will be displayed properly in the Forum homepage.

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