FAQ and How To's

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SteveColes

Steve
Corporate Member
Clay and I have been having a pm discussion on how to organize and where to put this type of message. As an an illustration of usiong the buile FAQ manger in Vbulletin, I greated the start of an organization and placed clay's material into it. Please read the quotes below and also look at the Official FAQs and give us some feedback.

Thanks,
Steve
Re: How to post
Clay,I would like to move this this whole discussion to the moderator's forum, Witrh your permission. Your Write up is great, the issue is where to put it.


Quote:
Originally Posted by SteveColes
I just added "How to submit a new thread" to the FAQ just as an example. See if the structure is what you would want. We can deal with the admin aspect, after, we decide if this is thew right structure. I'm pretty open to how we do this.


Quote:
Originally Posted by clowman
I have never used vBulletin before in an admin capacity, I can perhaps do some research on it if you wish.


Quote:
Originally Posted by SteveColes
Have you looked at the FAQ that come with Vbulletin? There is a FAQ manager that you can't see right now, that woulf allow us to add more FAQ to that structure including more categories.



Quote:
Originally Posted by clowman
If you have enough FAQs.. I'd almost recommend a FAQ forum. Only Admin type people allowed to post there, so it is only FAQs. Maybe change the "Site Features - How To" to just "Site Features" and then create FAQs forum under that.


Quote:
Originally Posted by SteveColes
I like it. Good work. The only thing I'm not sure about, is wether it should be added to the FAQ or some other new structure.
Any thoughts on that?

Quote:
Originally Posted by clowman
Steve.. Here is what I came up with. I started out making a real fancy post with pictures and everything, but think I thought it was overkill. Let me know what you think. You won't hurt my feelings if you want something else, or change it in any way. I'm happy to try again if you wish.

Basics of posting:

How to submit a new thread
1. Open the forum you wish to post a message
2. Press the New thread button located in the upper left hand side of the page.
3. Enter your text
4. Press the spell check button if you wish, located at the bottom of the page; you may need to scroll down a bit to see this button.
5. Press the Submit New Thread button at the bottom.


How to edit a message
1. Open the message
2. Click on the Edit button located at the bottom of the message.
3. The message will open up in a new window.
4. Enter the new text you wish to post.
5. Press the Save Changes button at the bottom of the page. You many need to scroll down a bit to find this button.


How to delete a message
1. Open the message
2. Click on the Edit button located at the bottom of the message.
3. The message will open up in a new window.
4. Choose one of the delete options located at the top of the new page and press the Delete this message button.

How to quick search for a message
1. Press the search link located on the main menu bar
2. Enter the text you wish to search for in the window and press Go


How to use the advanced search features
1. Press the search link located on the main menu bar
2. Click on the Advanced Search text located at the bottom of the window that pops up.
3. Enter the key words you wish to search for.
4. Below the key words choose either “Search Entire Posts” or “Search Titles Only”.
5. You can search for a particular user name if you wish
6. Optional – Choose the fields in the page you want to use to narrow your search “Find threads with”, “Find Post from”
7. Optional – Choose a sorting order.
8. Choose the forums you want to search. You can choose multiple forums by holding down your “Ctrl” key on your keyboard and clicking on whichever forums you want to add to your search
9. Press the “Search Now” button













__________________
Steve







 

DaveO

New User
DaveO
I think the text on "How to Post" is accurate, easy to understand and to the point. I went to the FAQ area once just to see what is included, much of it is not relevant to how this site is set-up. I think a How To forum is probably the best place to have that information and other tutorials, like on picture posting etc. They will be commonly asked questions, like Vanguards webpage on picture posting on WN, that information will be very valuable to many and help avoid the need to type a lengthy response every time the questions arises. My .02, Dave
 

Jonz

New User
Chris Jones
When you guys view this in the actual FAQ, like "how to submit a new thread" do you see each step on a new line? In firefox I see like this:

1) blah blah blah 2) blah blah

instead of

1) blah blah blah
2) blah blah
 

cskipper

Moderator
Cathy
The how to post steps look very good. I agree that a forum for this stuff would be good but suggest that you specify in its name that it is a how to use this site. Otherwise, folks might think this is where they find out how to use a tool, fix a problem..
 

clowman

*********
Clay Lowman
Corporate Member
ok.. I'm a idiot.. or at least blind. Where's the new forum you generated?
 

SteveColes

Steve
Corporate Member
It's not a forum, but a built in function in Vbullettin that I started to add heirarchy to. Go to FAQ on the top menu.

What I am trying to figure out is, you we create FAQ forum or use the builtin FAQ manager
 

DaveO

New User
DaveO
I think that a forum listed in the main menu is the best way to get the message out. People don't think to look in the tool bar for answers. Plus that is a way that specific problem related to the FAQ can be answered. I think it need to be open to all, as far as inquiries are concerned. This reply is coming from a computer idiot who some how has found his way around the website, without much assistance. Dave:)
 

cskipper

Moderator
Cathy
For my $.02 - I looked at the menu/tool bar for help. I guess it's because I live in the Windows environment so much of my computer time. It took me a little while to figure out how to find forums. Of course, I'm not always the sharpest tool in the box.
 

D L Ames

New User
D L Ames
Great post, but a thought just occurred to me as I was reading through some of the step-by-step directions above and I went to the "FAQs and How To" forum to verify it.

We need to edit some of the step-by-step instructions since Steve's latest update to the software. For example, #4 of the "How to submit a new thread" describes the the location of the spell check button as being located at the bottom of the page. With the new ieSpell feature the button is in the upper right corner of the text box now.

Just an observation.

D L
 

cskipper

Moderator
Cathy
Do we need to change the info about spell check - the fact that it has moved and how to use it?
 

SteveColes

Steve
Corporate Member
Ok, I changed it. But now I think we need to write one on howthe post a reply, both quick and Advanced :lol:
 

D L Ames

New User
D L Ames
How to post a quick reply to a thread
1. Locate the post within the thread you want to post a quick reply to.
2. At the lower right corner of the desired post is the Quick Reply button.
quickreply.gif

3. Clicking on that button will activate the Quick Reply text box at the bottom of the page.
4. Type your reply, press the spell check button
spelling.gif
if desired in the upper right corner of the text box.

5. Select or deselect any of the available options below the text box.
6. Press the Post Quick Reply button at the bottom.
 
Last edited:

D L Ames

New User
D L Ames
Little help! Can someone please give me a sanity check on the FAQ I just posted above. Feel free to edit as required.

Thanks,
D L
 

clowman

*********
Clay Lowman
Corporate Member
Looks good to me, I followed the directions to post this message. Except I don't see a spell check for the quick post response as indicated in step 4.
 
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