Creating a community

To enable a group in your organization to collaborate, create a community for them consisting of a web page with preselected layouts, which include and position such things as forums and blogs.

When you finish defining and populating the main structures of the community (such as its forums and wikis), you are ready to change the security settings to allow members to see and use the community you created.

To start a community

1.  Choose Communities > Community List.

2.  Click Add a community.

3.  Define the community using the fields described below.

4.  Create forums that the members will need.

5.  Open the Security link at left and set the Access Settings for the community.

6.  On the other Security tabs, add members to the various community roles.

7.  Open the Roster link and bulk-add members to the community, which subscribes them to receive community announcements.

Edit Community window

This window defines a community and the graphic that represents the community.

Communities > Community List > Add a community or click the Edit link while viewing the community page

■    Name - Specifies the name of the community which is displayed on the web and in email messages sent to subscribers.

■    Community Layout - Specifies the content record for the community which uses a selected layout.

■    Default Website - Specifies the website as defined in Content Management > Site designer > Manage websites. The website must be published (not in a Working status). This setting indicates the website users will see when clicking a link included in a subscription notification or in a "report this post" message, so it should be a website that is accessible to all subscribers of the community. Also, do not select the iMIS Desktop View as the default website.

■    Graphic - Specifies the image file displayed when readers view the Community on the web.

■    Graphic Alt Text - Specifies the alternative text that appears when the image cannot be displayed or when you hover your mouse over the graphic. 

■    Short Description - Specifies a short description of the community and its purpose in one or two sentences. No HTML coding or CSS styling is enabled in the short description.

■    Long Description - Specifies a longer description of the community and allows HTML coding or CSS styling. This description appears in the side bar on the Community main page. If you find some features of the HTML editor confusing, you can download user documentation for the editor.

Note: Some features described in this external document have not been enabled for use when defining communities.

Caution! If you use the HTML editor's built-in Image Editor to modify an image that has a transparent background, the transparent background will be replaced by solid black pixels. If you need to edit images that have a transparent background, you should save a copy of the image to your local computer and use your preferred image editing program to modify it. Then upload the new version to iMIS again, overwriting the old version if desired. The easiest way to save a copy of the image to your local computer is to right-click the image shown the Preview area of the Image Editor, and choose Save Picture As.

■    Allow any member to create a wiki - (disabled by default) Permits all authenticated users to create wikis, regardless of their community role.

■    Community forums are moderated - (disabled by default) Forces every forum on the community to be subject to moderation, which means that posts cannot publish until a moderator or administrator approves them.