Help for New Users

[Lorri]

Welcome to the IPL Learning Community!

Here are some notes to help out new users:

MyAccount is the "user control panel" where you can change the settings for your own account. It's also in the top left side of the blue bar at the top of the forums. This is also where you would "Edit Avatar" and "Edit Profile Picture." You'll find lots of pictures already available to you under "Edit Avatar," but you can also load your own!

QuickLinks in the blue bar toward the right takes you to a dropdown list of different tools such as for creating a buddy list and a standard signature line; you will also see linked a Student Survey for your feedback and suggestions on how we can better meet your needs!

The Communal Calendar is linked in the center of the blue bar; events that you add there will be seen by the whole community.

Private Messages are in a red link above the blue bar on the right. You can send and receive messages to other registered users by typing or pasting their username into the message. (see also MembersList in the blue bar) Note there are limits to how many messages that you can store; especially check and delete your "Sent Messages" to free up space.

Smilies are the images in the righthand box next to where you type messages. Click on a smilie to insert it into your message.

Blogs are in the blue bar toward the left. Yes, you can have your own blog here! Also, you can read and comment on others' blogs; or in your "MyAccount" user control panel, you can set your blog so that it can't be commented on and other such preferences - check out your many options under MyAccount!

Wiki pages are also available here, and if you're a registered user, you can add to wiki pages.

Posting tips: scroll down below the box into which you type the message to see additional options you can use such as "posting a poll" and "attaching files." If you hover your mouse above the images atop the box into which you type the message, you'll find you can click to add links, images, change text colors, fonts, and text sizes, and do lots of other editing techniques.

We'll continue to add more tips and info to this Help and FAQs forum, as well as more features to our IPL Learning Community! Thanks for joining us!

[mharris]

The system has only two choices for avatar, none and a predefined one. Where can we upload our own avatar?

[eabels]

If you go to MyAccount - you should see a variety of choices for edits - and one says Edit Avatar. There are a variety of avatars there and you should also have the ability to upload your own.

EA

[mharris]

Thanks, but it was because my access wasn't adjusted to student yet I believe.

[Lorri]

Great catch about the avatar settings, I will take a look at that. Thanks!

[eabels]

Was it obvious when your status was changed? We should probably include instructions about that.

EA

[mharris]

Actually, Lori told me she changed my status to student and then I just assumed things would change in my profile so I checked. There was the option to upload a custom avatar, but that plus a few other minor settings was the only difference.

[LZilinski]

I am not able to edit my avatar yet.