Help

1. What are all these different item types for?
2. How do I post a new item?
3. How do I edit an item?
4. How do I delete an item?
5. How do Questions and Answers work?
6. What is this "esteem" stuff?
7. What are fans all about?
8. What is voting all about?
9. Can I bookmark an item that I find to be useful?
10. How do tags work?
11. How do I change the little picture in my signature block?
12. Can I create my own "home page" within the community?

Have another question about how to use our community? Ask in our SourceForge forum.

What are all these different item types for?

Our community supports many different types of items because knowledge comes in different forms.

• Questions are the perfect way to... well, ask a question. Others can post Follow-up requests, which means they need you to edit your original question and add more information. Others can also post answers, which will hopefully tell you what you need to know. You should read up on how questions and answers work.
  
  
• Blogs and podcasts give you a place to post content of your own, which others can comment on. When you're viewing someone's blog or podcast, we make it easy to navigate to the next and previous articles. Blogs and podcasts are basically the same, except podcasts can have media files attached to each article or "episode." Users can subscribe to RSS feeds that contain only your blog or podcast articles.
  
  
• Library items are intended for long-term reference materials like videos or white papers. It's okay to link to content that's located elsewhere.
  
  
• Knowledge Base articles are designed to share information, but these are collaboratively edited - that means anyone with sufficient esteem can start a new article or edit an existing one to make it better.
  
  
• Links are simply a way to share a useful URL that you've found.
  
  
• Shouts are very short little posts (think "microblogging") that you can use to let the community know what you're doing.

How do I post a new item?

Simple: Use the "Ask or Contribute" drop-down box located at the top of each page. You have to be logged in to do this.

How do I edit an item?

If you're the author of an item, and you're logged in, then you can simply click the "edit" link underneath the item's body text.

How do I delete an item?

If you're the author of an item, and you're logged in, then you can simply click the "delete" link underneath the item's body text.

How do Questions and Answers work?

Start the process by posting a question. Ask whatever you like, but make sure you're keeping with the focus of our community. Wait for other users to respond. They can do so in one of two ways:

Asking for More Information

If your original question doesn't contain enough information for someone to provide an answer, they might ask you to provide additional information. They'll specify what they need to know. You should edit your original item to add the requested information. Once you've done so, click on the checkmark icon so that everyone else knows you've taken care of the follow-up request.

Answering Your Question

Other users can post answers to your question. When someone posts the answer that solves your problem, click on the checkmark icon. Doing so will document that answer as the "correct" one, so that others will be able to find the right answer in the future. If you change your mind later, click the checkmark again to "un-accept" that answer and select a different one.

You can always visit your Dashboard to see your "open" items - that is, those items which have not yet been correctly answered. It's a good idea to check back frequently for new answers or for follow-up requests.

What is this "esteem" stuff?

Esteem is a (rough) indicator of how much respect our community has for you. When you post great items, other users will vote it up - raising your esteem. Bad content is voted down, lowering your esteem. You also earn esteem for participating in our community - for example, you're rewarded when you acknowledge a correct answer to one of your questions. Your current esteem is shown as a number in your signature block.

What are fans all about?

If you find someone whose content you really like, become a fan by clicking the "Be a fan" link in their signature. This makes all of their content available from your Dashboard, so that you can find it easily.

What is voting all about?

Voting is how our community acknowledges good content, and chastises authors who post useless or off-topic content. To vote on an item, click one of the voting buttons. . An "up" vote adds +1 to the total vote count; a "down" vote applies -1 to the vote count. Once you cast a vote, you cannot retract it. However, you can change it for a short period of time by clicking the other vote button.

Can I bookmark an item that I find to be useful?

Of course - just click the favorite icon. You'll find all of your favorite items in your Dashboard.

How do tags work?

Tags are how our community categorizes information.

• Tags never have spaces or punctuation - use "activedirectory" instead of "active directory."
• Tags are always in lowercase.

You can view all of the items having a given tag, and if you have enough esteem you can also merge tags (merging "ad" and "activedirectory" will help more people locate the content they need). You can even suggest aliases for a tag - so that someone using the tag "ad" would be prompted to use "activedirectory" instead.

How do I change the little picture in my signature block?

That little picture is a gravatar (Globally Recognized Avatar), and we get it from Gravatar.com. If you haven't given them a picture to use, they send us a made-up picture based on the letters in your e-mail address. We explain how to upload a replacement photo in the Dashboard.

Can I create my own "Home Page" within the community?

Yes! Whenever someone clicks your name in your signature block, they are taken to your "personal space," which is a bit like a home page. In your Dashboard, you can create static Pages of text that tell other users a little bit about yourself, list favorite links, and so forth. Your personal space also displays your short bio (which you can complete in your Dashboard), and provides links to all of your contributions within the community as well as links to your favorite items. Your space also contains links to your blog articles and podcast episodes, if you have posted any.