courses@JLR

Getting Started

Upon logging into the website, you'll be taken to your DASHBOARD, which has a quick link to the class group. You can also get to the front page, which has a prominent link to our group, at any time by clicking on "courses@JLR" at the top.

To post to the group, you need to start from the appropriate link in the group's sidebar. It's a quirk of the software, but if you post from your profile/menu, the content will go into limbo and not into our group.

 

POSTING

 

For all types of posts, you'll be writing in a box with word-processor-esque buttons for formatting and adding links or images.

You can click the "HTML" button or "Add/Remove editor" below to toggle between the text as it will appear and the raw HTML.

Here's the HTML code for some basic functions:

• bold - <strong>bold</strong>
• italics - <em>italics</em>
• link - <a href="http://yoururl.com">link</a>
• image - <img src="http://yourimageurl.jpg">

Embedding Videos

You may also wish to embed videos from YouTube or another website. You MUST paste embed codes into your post while in HTML view or it won't work. For example:

copy and paste...

You may have difficulties with embedded videos disappearing if you edit a post or switch views more than once. I recommended waiting to insert your embed codes until you're ready to save.

Embedding Images

There are two ways to insert images into your post. If you have the address of an image file online (a URL that ends in .jpg .png .gif etc.), click the tree button to embed it.

Or, the "Embed / upload media" link allows you to add a file from your computer (such as an image) to the post (it will appear under Files).

 

POSTING BLOGS

Click on "Group blog" in the sidebar. To create an entry, click "Write a blog post" in this sidebar. You can now enter a title and the text of your post. Please add a tag corresponding to your section -- TH3 F11 or F12 (any other tags are optional).

In the sidebar, you will see the important buttons. You can turn on/off comments (please leave them on unless you have a specific reason). You can set the access (either Public [anyone on the internet] or only your group). I recommend that you compose your blog entries in a word processor first, but you can also click "save draft" here to preserve what you're writing. There's a "Preview" button at the top to check your work. Make sure you click the "Publish" button when you're done!

 

A special note on copying-and-pasting your text from Word or other software: when writing for the web, consider using plain text format (or a text-only editor) to avoid issues in translating the formatting. Alternately, I suggest pasting your writing from Word into the HTML view. You can then switch back to the editor to spruce up the formatting, but this will prevent crazy errors in trying to reproduce Word's styles.

 

DISCUSSION/COMMENTS

Recent discussion posts appear toward the top of our group page. You will be adding a response question to a thread here for your section every thir d week. The interface for posting a comment on a blog or discussion post is basically the same as above.

 

THE WIRE

This "microblog" of short status messages doesn't appear in our group, but you can still use it to share your thoughts about the class and/or your own TV viewing. If you click "Dashboard" in the top bar, you will see the site's recent activity as well as a box to post to "the wire."

 

BOOKMARKS

You can share links to anything on the internet that's relevant to the course. Dragging the bookmarklet to your browser's toolbar creates an easy way to contribute as you web surf (you can also simply visit the add page and fill in your link). The "visit resource" link will take you to the bookmarked URL.

 

PAGES

This is a page -- they have some special features, but for this class the professor will just be using them for resource and screening posts.

 

FILES

You can upload files from your computer to share with the class. I put all handouts here for easy access. Note that it sorts files into documents and pictures, and there's a special gallery view for pictures.

 

VIDEOS

See the video how-to page for more information...

elgg, how

Last updated 476 days ago by Julie Levin Russo