In eXo Platform, you can manage your knowledge base easily through the Knowledge application. Knowledge includes 3 main portlets: Forum, Answers and Wiki. With Knowledge, you can share information, seek supports throughout helpful answers and post your ideas.

This chapter covers the following topics:

  • Build a wiki

    The Wiki application provides the content productivity to portal users as a tool to forge the unstructured knowledge. With Wiki, you can create and edit pages by using a simplified markup language or a WYSIWYG editor. Also, your company can use Wiki as an internal reference, such as work policy or a public wiki for a comprehensive product information. Wiki along with Answers and Forum will complete the ideal combination that helps users enhance their experiences on collaboration activities and build valuable knowledge center for clients.

  • Build a forum

    The Forum application is designed for the group discussion and user-generated content in which participants with common interests can exchange their opinions on a subject. While Answers is an ideal site for you to find answers quickly, Forum gives deep discussion through your posted topics.

  • Build an Answers & FAQs system

    The Answers application is a collaborative Question & Answer system similar to Yahoo! Answers or StackOverflow.com but for your own enterprise, where the collaboration is encouraged. With this application, you and your collaborators can post a series of common questions and find answers on a specific topic. Here, you can edit questions, provide answers and edit them. FAQs takes this content as input and publishes it in a clean and quickly browsable manner. You can point a FAQs portlet to one or several Answers categories. As a publishing portlet, it is impossible to edit questions and answers in FAQs.

In the Knowledge application, each user group has different privileges to perform actions. Some actions can be limited to some specific user groups. Advanced users have the ability to control and assign functions or features that other users can and cannot do within the application. There are five user groups: administrator, moderator, regular user, banned user and guest.

Notice that there will be no section dedicated to anonymous users. You can refer to the table that summarizes all the actions that different user roles can perform in each application.

See also

  • Work with Wiki pages

    Steps to perform actions on a Wiki page, including: creating, editing, moving, deleting, viewing page information and watching a page.

  • Work with attachments

    Instructions on how to perform actions related to attachments: viewing all attachments in a page, adding attachments, and inserting images.

  • Use the WYSIWYG Editor (Rich Text editor)

    Introduction to the WYSIWYG editor that allows you to edit a wiki page using the Rich Text editor.

  • Syntax Help

    Introduction to the Syntax Help feature of Wiki.

  • Work with Macros

    Steps to use Macros to apply extra formatting, functionality and customization to your content.

  • Work with page versions

    Introduction to the Page History view, and steps to view versions of a page, compare different versions of a page, or restore pages to a version.

  • Work with Spaces

    Introduction to the permanent bookmarkable URLs to all wiki pages.

  • Search

    Steps to do Quick Search and Advanced Search supported in the Wiki application.

  • WebDAV support in Wiki

    Introduction to the WebDAV support in Wiki, steps to access your workspace and to edit a page by using WebDAV.

  • Wiki Administration

    Steps to change Space settings and manage Permissions that are for administrators only.

This section provides you with instructions on how to use all Wiki features and configure the Wiki application to make it work in your desired way. Before going further, you should know some basic concepts about Wiki through accessing the Wiki application. You will be directed to the Wiki homepage as below:

Details:

Item Description
The Breadcrumb which shows the page hierarchy.
The Wiki administration area which allows administrators only to configure the space settings.
The Search box.
The pages tree view.
The Page Control area which helps users take actions with the current page.
The page content.
The page information. Click View Change to see changes in the latest versions. Click Attachment(s) and Revisions links to open the Attachments details pane and the Revisions pane respectively. These two panes can be collapsed by clicking the relevant links again.

Page hierarchy in Wiki

The Wiki content is organized as a page tree in which each page may contain many sub-pages. The hierarchy is reflected on UI by the Breadcrumb and the page tree in the left pane. When a page is added, it is always defined as a sub-page to the current one. You can have wikis for portals, wikis for groups or users.

Wiki Spaces

Space is a set of pages, so the spaces partitioning means that spaces are independent trees. This separation enables Wiki to provide knowledge spaces for different groups.

There are 3 space types:

A portal wiki is published for every user who can access that portal.

A group wiki can be understood as a space wiki. The wiki application of a space works as a group wiki for that space ("/Spaces/name_of_space" group). The group wiki can be accessed by members of that group.

For example:

Every user has his own wiki. The URL to an user wiki is in the following format: .../wiki/user/name_of_user.

For example:

See also

Pages are places where information in Wiki is stored and shared. Pages are stored within a space. Actions that a user can perform on a specific wiki page depends on permissions assigned by the administrator. See the Page Permissions for detailed permissions.

Viewing page information is accessible to users who have the View permission on that page. The page information provides details about related pages of the current page, the hierarchy structure of the current page, the page history, and more.

1. Select the page you want to view the information.

2. Click More from the page toolbar, then select Page Info from the drop-down menu.

All information of the opening page, including page summary, related pages, page hierarchy, recent changes will be displayed.

Here, you can do the following actions:

This feature allows you to add pages related to your page. This function can be done in the Page Info view and is activated to users with the Edit permission.

1. Click Add More Relations in the Page Info view, then select the related pages in the Select a page window.

2. Click Select to add the selected page to the list of the Related Pages.

The related pages of the opening page are displayed in the side pane as below.

To access the page history, just click View Page History in the Page Info view.

The History Page appears.

Details:

Item Function
Compare selected page versions.
Allow you to select two versions that you want to compare.
Allow you to specify the version labels of the page and link to view a specific version.
The date and time when the page is changed.
The authors who make changes of the page.
The reasons why the changes are made (optional).
Restore a page to the selected version.

Attachments are any files enclosed with your pages. The attachments may be images, documents, presentation or multimedia files.

View all attachments of a page

1. Open the page you want to view attachments.

2. Click the Attachment(s) link in the Page info area.

The Attachment pane of that page will appear:

Here, you can:

Add an attachment to a page

There are two ways to add an attachment to a page:

The first way

In this way, you need to open the Attachment pane of the page.

1. Click the Upload New File in the attachment list pane. The upload window will appear.

2. Select a file from your local device, then click Open. The file will be uploaded automatically then.

The second way

You can use this method when editing the page content by WYSIWYG editor (Rich Text editor).

1. Select a page to which you want to add an attachment.

2. Select Edit at the Page Control area. For more details, see the Edit a page section.

3. Select the Rich Text editor on the page toolbar.

4. Click on the toolbar of the Rich Text editor, then select Attached File... from the drop-down menu.

The Link form is displayed as below.

5. Select a file to upload. Now you can upload a new file or select one file from existing files.

  • Upload a new file:

i. Double-click Upload new file, or click Upload new fileSelect in the Current page or All pages tab.

ii. Click Browse to select a file from your local device, then select Upload.

  • Select from existing files: Click the file, then select Select.

The form to edit the link parameters appears.

6. Provide the link label and tooltip.

7. Click Create Link to update the link.

Insert an image

1. Click on the text editor, then select Insert Image...

2. Select an inserted image of the current page, or click the All Pages tab to select an image attached to another page in the space.

3. Click the Insert Image... button.

By using macros, you can apply extra formatting, functionality and customization to your content. You can easily add macro tags by using the Rich Text editor.

1. Switch to Rich Text editor.

2. Click Macros, then select Insert Macros... from the drop-down menu.

The Insert Macros form appears.

The macro is classified into different categories: Content, Formatting, Navigation.

3. Select a macro category.

4. Select your desired macro from the selected categories list, then click the Select button, or simply double-click it. For example, if you select the Box macro, you will go to the macro parameters form.

5. Enter parameters into the corresponding fields for your selected macro. Click Insert Macro to perform your macro insertion, or click Previous to return to the initial Insert Macro form.

The following table describes specific functions of common macros.

MacroFunction
Excerpt Create additional information for the current page and it can be set to "hidden" in the current page, but displayed to add more information as the summary about the page when it is used with the Page Tree macro.
Include Page Include the content of another page in the current page.
Box Draw a box around the provided content.
Color Change the text color.
Code Highlight code snippets of various programming languages.
Error Message Display an error message note.
Float Allow content to 'float' on the left or the right.
Info Message Display an info message.
No Format Keep the content displayed like you type.
Note Message Display a note message.
Panel Embrace a block of text within a fully customizable panel.

Table

Table cell

Table row

Inset a table.

Insert a table cell.

Insert a table row.

Tip Message

Display a tip message block.

Warning Message

Display a warning message block.

Anchor Create an anchor in a page.
Children Display the children and descendants of a specific page in the current page.
Page Tree Display the hierarchy of a page in the current page.
Related Pages Render the related pages of the current page.
Table of Content Generate a table of content for the current page.
Section & Column Write the content in columns.

When editing the content of a page, Wiki will automatically create a version of that page after it is saved. Thanks to the page versions, you can make changes on the page safely and roll back to an earlier version without worrying about messing things up.

In the Page History view, you can see all versions of a page.

Each version includes the following information:

  • Revision numbers.

  • Author making changes.

  • Date and time when changes are made.

  • Summary (if any).

Note

All functions, including viewing, comparing and restoring, can also be done by clicking the Revisions link at the Page Info bar. One pop-up pane appears right under this bar, allowing you to do the same steps as described below.

View versions of a page

To view a specific version of a page, just click a version label in the Page History page. The selected version of that page will be displayed.

At a version of the page, you can do the following actions:

Compare page versions

Wiki keeps track of histories of changes on a page by maintaining a version of the page each time it is modified. To compare two versions, select two checkboxes corresponding to each relevant version, then click .

A page which shows the changes between these two versions will be displayed.

The changes between two versions will be marked with colors:

Restore a page version to the current version

When you notice that there are changes in the current page version that you are not satisfied, you can rollback to an older version of that page quickly.

To restore an older version, click corresponding to your desired version in the Page History page.

The administrator has the highest right in Wiki. The administrator can delete a page, change the space settings, set the Edit permission for users and more.

Wiki gives you the choice to make a space or an individual page to be open or restricted to specific users, groups or memberships. There are two levels of permissions in Wiki:

Each space may have its own permissions. Space permissions determine which actions a user can do within the space. A permission can be assigned to any users, groups or memberships.

To change the space permission, open a space, then click Browse and select Space Settings from the drop-down list. Click Permission in the Space Settings page that appears.

There are some permissions on a space as follows:

Permission Description
View Pages Specify who can view and watch pages of this space, its attachments and history.
Edit Pages Specify who can edit pages of this space.
Admin Pages Specify who have the administration rights on pages of this space.
Admin Space Specify who can administrate the space permissions and settings

In the Space Permissions form, you can:

When adding a new page, you are not required to write the content from scratch. You can start by selecting a page template which is actually a Wiki page with predefined content.

In the Space Settings form, select the Template tab and the form to manage templates appears.

Here, you can:

  • Regular users

    Detailed instructions on how to do common actions that are for regular users, such as creating topics and posts, subscribing, using BBCode, or changing user settings.

  • Moderator

    Introduction to the Moderation tasks that are for moderators, and steps to perform them, including: moderating forums/topics/posts, viewing all pending moderation tasks, or banning IPs.

  • Administrator

    Introduction to a list of common tasks which are for administrators only, and steps to manage categories/forums/users and other administrative tasks.

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 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 your post Edit post, quote and private post.

Delete your 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 (administrators and moderators).
Manage users Manage user's profile, promote users, ban users, view topic and post of a specific user.

Note

(*): Regular users can only edit/delete their own posts/topics.

Before reading, please notice that this document is divided into 3 parts which correspond to different user roles:

See also

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

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.

The Advanced Search allows users to make a search with particular criteria corresponding to the object you want to find.

Perform your advanced search

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.

Based on the criteria you want to search, such as category, forum or post, the search criteria will be changed accordingly.

2. Enter the search criteria.

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

Matched results will be shown in the Search Result form. There will be an alert message when there is no object matching with the search criteria.

Find in categories

Select Category from the Search in drop-down menu.

Details:

FieldDescription
Terms The search keyword.
Scope The search scale. With the "Full" option selected, returned results are those with both titles and content matching the keyword. With the "Titles" option selected, returned results are those with titles matching the keyword.
Username Filter search results by the category creator. Input the name manually, or click to select users from a specific group.
Created between - and Filter search results by categories created within an interval. Input the date manually, or click to select a date from the mini calendar.
Moderator Filter search results by the category moderator. Input the name manually, or click to select users from a specific group.

Find in forums

Select Forum from the Search in drop-down menu.

Details:

FieldDescription
Terms The search keyword.
Status The status of the forums ("Locked" or "Unlocked").
State The state of the forums ("Open" or "Closed").
Posts Filter search results by the minimum number of posts in the forum. Click and drag the slider bar to set the number of posts.
Topics Filter search results by the minimum number of topics in the forum. Click and drag the slider bar to set the number of topics.
Moderator Filter search results by the forum moderator. Input the name manually, or click to select users from a specific group.

Find in topics

Select Topic from the Search in drop-down menu.

Details:

FieldDescription
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 ("Locked" or "Unlocked").
State The state of the topics ("Open" or "Closed").
Created between - and Filter search results by topics created within an interval. Input the date manually, or click to select a date from the mini calendar.
Last Post between - and Filter search results by the last post's created date in the topic. You can input the date manually, or click to select a date from the mini calendar.
Posts Filter search results by the minimum number of posts in the topic. Click and drag the slider bar to set the number of posts.
Views Filter search results by the minimum number of topic views. Click and drag the slider bar to set the number of views.

Find in posts

Select Post from the Search in drop-down menu.

Details:

FieldDescription
Term The search keyword.
Scope The scale for searching. With the "Full" option selected, returned results are those with both title and content matching the keyword. With the "Titles" option selected, returned results are those with post titles matching the keyword.
Username Filter search results by the posters' usernames. Input the name manually, or click to select users from a specific group.
Created between - and Filter search results by posts created within an interval. You can input the date manually, or click to select a date from the mini calendar.

See also

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

2. Click .

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

  • Click the Attach files link to attach files to your message. The maximum size for the attachment is 20Mb. Click 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 complete your topic.

Note

In a forum that enables moderation, new topics will need reviewing and approving by moderators before being published.

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

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

Details:

FieldDescription
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 (Note that only administrators can see .
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.

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:

Also, you can:

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. Use BBCodes to format text 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

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 attachment size must be less than 20Mb.

  • 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

BBCodes (Bulletin Board Codes) are special tags in bulletin boards that 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 the respective icon which is shown on the toolbar above the message area.

Click on the toolbar to get the full list of built-in BBCode explanations and examples.

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 or avatar and select View Public Profile from the drop-down menu.

The View User Profile form will be displayed.

You may configure your settings yourself, 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

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

Here, you can:

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 your subscription

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

Next, click Save to accept your changes.

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

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 a topic

The first way

1. Select topics by ticking 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, then 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.

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

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

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 from the drop-down menu. The Unapproved Topics List form opens.

2. Select checkboxes corresponding to the posts you want to approve. You will see the preview of 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.

The administrators and moderators can uncensor all topics, posts containing censored keywords. These censored keywords are specified by Administrator. All topics and posts containing these keywords will be labeled with 'Pending and Censored' respectively.

The first way

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

1. Select censored posts/topics by ticking their checkboxes.

2. Select on the Action bar, then click Censor 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, then select Censor from the drop-down menu. A list of hidden posts appears.

2. Select hidden posts by ticking their relevant checkboxes.

3. Click Show.

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 all forums, while moderators can only ban IP from forums which he manages.

Ban IP on a specific forum

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

2. Click on the Action bar, then 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.

With the highest rights, administrators are in charge of the entire management tasks. In another words, administrators have the global role of doing significant jobs, including: configuring and customizing the Forum portlet, backing up data, managing users and granting permissions, managing categories and forums.

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

1. Click PortalPages.

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 to open the Edit Mode.

This form allows you to configure the Forum portlet in various aspects via the following actions:

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:

For example, if you have the Moderators or Show Statistics panel enabled, you will see it as below:

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.

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.

Managing forums can be performed through the following actions:

Add a new forum to a specific category

1. Go into the category to which you want to add a 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. Its length must be less than 50 characters, including spaces.

Optionally, you can:

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.

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

2. Do actions in the relevant fields.

Details:

FieldDescription
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 automatically 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 automatically 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.

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

Here, by clicking corresponding to the relevant user, you can do the following management actions:

Note

You can first search for your desired users to do the management actions quickly.

In the Profile tab, you can promote your selected user to an administrator or a moderator by editing the following fields:

FieldDescription
Forum Administrator Grant the Administrator role to a selected user or not. The Administration role of the default administrator cannot 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.

Also, you can modify the user's profile in the following fields:

FieldDescription
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.

This function is to ban users from the Forum application or specific forums and categories. To do so, go to the Ban User tab and tick the Banned checkbox.

Details:

FieldDescription
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 cannot 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

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.

The administrative tasks include the following actions:

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 email notifications to users.

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

The Notifications form consists of two tabs:

Details:

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

The common variables for both tabs:

The variables used in the New Post Notification tab:

The variables used in the Moved Notification tab:

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.

By default, there are some default BBCode tags that are initialized via plugins: "[B]", "[I]", "[U]", "[FONT]", "[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, then select BBCodes from the drop-down menu to open the BBCode Manager form.

Here, you can do the following actions:

1. Click Add BBCode in the BBCode Manager form to open the Add BBCode form.

2. Input values into the Add BBCode form.

Details:

FieldDescription
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} Allow BBCode tag to have option or not.
Preview Click this button to preview your rendered BBCode.
Click this icon to see descriptions of each field.

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

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 of its forum, topics, posts and properties are also exported. This exported file can be used to import into the Forum application.

Backing up a category & forum includes the following actions:

1. Click on the Forum Administration bar.

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

Details:

FieldDescription
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 categories and enter the file name into the File Name field.

4. Click Save.

  • Regular user

    Introduction to the common actions that are for regular users and step-by-step instructions on how to perform them, such as submitting/answering/commenting/sharing questions, searching, or editing user settings.

  • Moderator

    Introduction to tasks that are for moderators and steps to perform them, such as managing categories, moderating questions and answers.

  • Administrator

    Introduction to actions that are for administrators only and steps to perform them, such as setting up Answers and FAQ portlets.

Before using the features in Answers, you should get familiar with the Answers interface. Once you have logged in and accessed Answers, the interface looks like this:

The Status pane displays information of the currently viewed category, including the total number of open questions, pending questions and the total questions.

The Categories pane lists all categories in the hierarchical system. With one click on your desired category, you will be directed to the Answers viewing pane.

The Breadcrumb bar is to navigate between categories and sub-categories easily. This bar also includes the search box with simple and advanced options.

The Action bar is to add categories, questions, and to manage questions, import, export, print, and do settings.

The Answers Viewing pane displays all questions and information about score and the number of answers of each question in the selected category.

Remember that this interface may look different for each user group. Some actions for advanced users will not be shown in the interface when you log in as a regular user.

The following table summarizes actions which each user group can execute in Answers.

Features Description Administrator Moderator Owner User Guest
View details of the Answers application See all categories in Answer and their activated questions, details of a question (its content, its answers, uploaded files, image preview).
Submit a question Submit a question with an attachment in multiple languages.
Send a question Send a question via email.
Print Print all questions with their answers of a category and of its sub-categories, or print details of a question.
Search Simple and advanced searches for a specific category or question.
Watch/Unwatch a category Watch a category to receive email notifications on new questions or any changes. If you do not want to receive email notifications any longer, unwatch the category.
RSS Subscribe by RSS.
View user profile View the profile of a specific user: questions, answers or comments.

User settings Define user preferences: Sort type, Sort by.
Comment on a question Give opinions on a specific question in multiple languages.
Vote Vote for questions and answers by rating stars.
Discuss in forum Discuss a question in the forum. When a question is discussed, it becomes a topic in Forum.
Manage a category Add, edit, delete and move categories.
Export Export answers in the format of a .xml or .zip file to back up data.
Import Import data into Answers from a .xml or .zip file.
Moderate a question Add or edit a question in multiple languages, delete and move questions.
Answer a question Give an answer for a question in the rich text format.
Edit an answer A question could have multiple answers in multiple languages that can be edited separately.
Activate/Deactivate a question Activate/inactivate a specific question. Inactivated questions are hidden and regular users cannot view.
Approve/Disapprove a question Set the approved/disapproved status to a specific question. The disapproved question is hidden in the Approve mode and normal users cannot view the unapproved question.
Activate/Deactivate an answer Set the activated/inactivated status to a specific answer. The inactivated answer is hidden and normal users cannot view the inactivated answer.
Approve/Disapprove an answer Approve/disapprove a specific answer. The disapproved answer is also hidden and regular users cannot view.
Promote a comment to answer Promote a comment to be an answer of a question.
Initialize Answers Create a category and assign the moderator role.
Set properties of Answers Define basic properties (for example, Order Type, Order by, Notify content, theme, icon) and advanced properties (for example, enabling RSS, vote, comment) and more.
Set up the FAQ portlet Add and configure the FAQ portlet on the page.

Note

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

See also

With the Search function, you can find your desired item, such as categories, questions, answers, or comments easily. In the Answers application, you can do your searches to specific search conditions easily through two types:

Do a quick search

You can do quick searches easily by entering specific keywords into the Search area. All items containing the text matching your search term will be returned in the Search Results form.

1. Enter a keyword into the Search field at the right corner of the breadcrumb.

2. Click , or press the Enter key to perform your search.

The Search Results window will open with all matching categories and questions.

Details:

Item Description
The question has been answered.
The question has not been answered.
The category containing your entered keywords.
Click this icon to go into a question or a category.

Do an advanced search

The Advanced search allows you to do a search with multiple criteria corresponding to the object that is expected to be found. Using the advanced search, you can find questions/categories more exactly.

1. Click on the Search area.

2. Define some search criteria in the Advanced Search form. The criteria may vary, depending on where you want to search.

3. Click Search to launch the search. All items matching your criteria will be listed in the search results pane below the Search form.

Moderators in Answers manage the content of questions and answers before and after they are posted to a moderated category. The Moderator can read new content (editing or removing if necessary), approve or activate answers, and more. The moderator has the category-specific role.

Moderator can only manage categories that he moderates.

In this section, you will learn how to manage categories. With a category, you can group all questions of a specific subject into one place.

To perform an action on a category, you can select one of these approaches:

The first way

1. Right-click a category from the categories list.

2. Select an appropriate action from the drop-down menu.

The second way

If you are already in a category that you moderate, you can perform all actions on this category by clicking on the Action bar, then select an action from the drop-down menu.

See also

1. Follow one of the approaches described in Manage categories.

2. Select .

3. Edit the category properties.

4. Click Save to accept your changes.

1. Follow one of the approaches described in the Manage categories section.

2. Select from the drop-down menu.

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

1. Follow one of the approaches described in Manage categories to open the drop-down menu.

2. Select .

3. Select the destination category from the list.

When adding the Answers portlet to a page, you have to configure this portlet to make it work in your desired way.

Configure the Answers portlet

1. Open the page edit mode via one of the following ways:

  • The first way

i. Click PortalPage on the Administration bar.

ii. Click that corresponds to the page containing the Answers portlet in the Page Management page.

i. Select a portal that contains a page with the Answers portlet, then open the page.

ii. Hover your cursor over EditPageLayout.

Now, you should be in the Edit mode of the page.

3. Hover your cursor over the Answers portlet, then click on the quick toolbar that appears.

4. Make changes in the Answer Portlet form.

In this form, you can:

In the Display Mode tab, you can set all the default display properties of the Answers application, including:

The type of sorting entries in the list may be: Ascending or Descending.

See also

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