Finding a specific Community group by name

1. At the Community Home page, select a location to search from the list and click Search. 2. Enter the name of the group and choose an area at the Where field. 3. Click the Go button. A search does not find unlisted groups; you must be invited to join a group that has chosen to be unlisted.

Signing up to participate in the Community site

To participate in any community group as a leader or member, you need to identify yourself to the system so it can recognize you when you return to the site and display links to the groups you've joined. At a minimum, you need to provide a user name and a password. If you provide more information, the system can more specifically tailor information and displays to your interests. We respect your privacy; please read our Privacy Statement. A user name or password can contain only alphabetic and numeric characters. Please be sure that neither the user name nor the password includes spaces, hyphens, punctuation marks, brackets, @ # $ % ^ & * underline, + / \. The user name can be up to 32 characters and the password can be up to 32. Within those character limitations, you can provide any user name you like, real or fictitious, so long as the user name and password combination has not already been used by someone else. The user name is displayed to public view in several situations, for example, if you are the leader of a listed group.

Creating a public profile

This optional profile is displayed when site users click on your user name at member lists and message boards or other postings. 1. At the Community Home page, click Create a personal profile. 2. Click Edit my public profile. 3. Fill in all fields that have an asterisk and as many optional fields as you choose. At Photo URL, enter the location on your hard disk of a graphics file. The file will be uploaded to our servers. At Homepage URL, enter the Web address of any personal Web site. 4. Click the Enter Profile button.

Creating a private profile

This profile is never displayed on the site. The information you choose to provide is protected as described in the Privacy Statement. It is used to identify you to community groups that require membership approval, to facilitate providing you with maps and directions, and to display appropriate advertising for local businesses. 1. At the Community Home page, click Create a personal profile. 2. Click Edit my personal profile. 3. Fill in all fields that have an asterisk and as many optional fields as you choose. 4. Click the Enter Profile button.

Managing your memberships

Joining a group: To join a listed group, click the link at the Home page. If you receive an email invitation, click on the link, sign up if necessary or sign in, and then click the Join link. When you join a group, you can participate in those activities that the group leader has assigned to members, which may include viewing all parts of the site, posting newsletter items, posting to a message board, adding events to the calendar, adding links, adding text or graphics to pages, and inviting other members. The group will be listed on your Community Home page under "my groups" and the group's events appear automatically on your community calendar. You may receive email from the group leader and from other members. Viewing events for all your groups on one calendar: At the Community Home page, click "View my community calendar". Unsubscribing: To remove the group's name from your list of groups, go to the group's Home page and then to the Member List. Click Unsubscribe.

Inviting a friend to join

1. Go to the Member List page. 2. Click Invite a friend. 3. Enter the email addresses of the friends. When you enter more than one address, end each address with a semicolon. For example: george@city.com; mary@city.com 4. Check that your own name and email address are correct. 5. Enter a subject line and your message. 6. Click the Send Invitation Now button. The group leader may set up a group so that only the leader can invite members to join. In that case, you will not see a link for inviting a friend.

Sending email to your group

1. Click Member List. 2. Click Send email. 3. Click the box next to the name of each member of the group to whom you wish to send the message. Or click Send to all members. 4. Write a subject line and your message. 5. Click Send. The group leader may set up a group so that only the leader can send email to members. In that case, you will not see a link for sending email to the group, unless you are the group leader.

Viewing topics in a message board

1. Click Message Boards. 2. Click the topic to read. 3. Reply to any topic.

Posting a new topic to a message board

1. At the message board, click start a new topic. 2. Fill in a topic name and description. The group leader may set up a group so that only the leader can post new topics. In that case, you will not see a link for starting a new topic.

Viewing events of a listed community group

1. Search to find the group. 2. At the group's Home page, click Event Calendar. 3. Choose Day, Week, or Month view. Click the arrows to move back or forward in time. The group leader controls whether or not guests can view a listed group's events. If guests are not allowed, you will have to be a member and you must sign in to view the group's events. A guest will not see a link to the group calendar. If a group is unlisted, you must be a member to view the site.

Adding group events to your calendar

When you join a group, its events are added automatically to your community calendar. To add a group's event to your My Stuff information, click on the My Stuff icon at the event details page.

Adding an event to the group calendar

1. At the Event Calendar, click the Add Event link. 2. At the event page, fill in the form. Most fields are self-explanatory.The event title is shortened when a user views the calendar by month, so be sure the first 150 characters convey the event's purpose. 3. Click the button labeled Add this event to the calendar. The group leader controls who has privileges to add an event. If you don't have privileges for a specific group, you will not see a link to add an event.

Adding a news item to the newsletter

Just click the "add a news item" link and enter a headline and the text for your news item (up to 2000 characters). You can include HTML for simple formatting. For a listed group, the group leader controls who can post news items and events and who can add links. If the leader allows group members and/or guests to post, the message board will have a link for adding a topic. If the leader has reserved that privilege, the message board will not display the link to members or guests. Only members can post to the newsletter of an unlisted group.

Adding links

1. Click Link 2. In the tool box, click Add Link. 3. Fill in the Web address of the link (the URL). 4. Type the text that you wish your members to see as the link text. 5. Add any description of the site you wish. If the leader allows group members and/or guests to add links, you will see a tool box with Add Link. If the leader has reserved that privilege, you won't see such a link.

Participating in the Chat room

1. Click Chat. 2. At the Group Chat Entrance, click the link to enter the chat room. It can take a few moments for the Chat window to open. When it does, you'll see the names of others already in the room. 3. Type your comments in the box and press Enter. Your comments appear in the window immediately. 4. To leave the chat room, click your browser's Back button or click the window's Close box. Click here for more about chat.

Your personal privacy and control

You can control how much information about yourself is shown on the site and whether or not your email address is available to others. Please read the site Privacy Statement and the Standards of Content and Conduct. As in all situations, you should weigh your privacy against the benefits of sharing your interests and personal information with others. This table suggests ways to control your privacy when you participate in site activities. Activity Privacy implications and controls Viewing listed community groups as a guest Your activities as a guest are not visible to anyone. The pages you view are tracked only for purposes of compiling site statistics. For example, we count how many people look at various pages; but we don't track who looked at what. Signing up Your user name appears on the site in various situations; for example, when you start a group as its leader. You can provide your real name or make up a fictitious name. Joining an unlisted group Your membership and your postings can be viewed only by other members of the group and by the Community Editor. Only members and the editor can send you email and your email address is not displayed. Joining a listed group Your membership and your postings may be visible to the general public. The group leader determines which activities nonmembers (guests) can view. Filling in a public profile You can skip any field you wish, but any information you do provide can be seen by anyone who clicks on your user name. Filling in a personal profile You can skip any field that does not have an asterisk next to it. The information you choose to provide here is kept strictly confidential. See the Privacy Statement. Simple HTML Here are some simple codes you can add to your text to enhance the appearance. Note that most (but not all) codes require a tag to turn on formatting and a tag to turn it off. Enclose each tag in angle brackets. It doesn't matter whether or not you capitalize the codes. <h1>heading</h1> <b>bold text</b> <I>italic text</I> <u>underline</u> Similarly, you can use several levels of headings: h1, h2, h3, h4 Be sure to use the end tag for these codes. <p> new paragraph It's not necessary to use an end paragraph code. <br>a line break that leaves less space above than a paragraph It's not necessary to use an end break code. <ul> </ul> <li> Begin and end a bulleted (unordered) list. Place the code for list item <li> before each item in the list. <ol> </ol> <li> Begin and end a numbered (ordered) list. Place the code for list item <li> before each item in the list. If you would like to know more about HTML (hyper mark-up language) click here.

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