Clearspace HelpGetting Started | Creating Content | Collaborating | Finding Content Getting StartedCreating Content
Collaborating
Finding Content
Getting StartedWhat can I do in Clearspace?Clearspace is a collaboration application that you use through a web browser. In Clearspace you can:
How can I use the keyboard to control Clearspace menus?You have access to Clearspace menus through the keyboard. The exact keyboard combination will vary depending on which browser you're using, as show in the table below. Note that once the menu is open you can use the up and down arrow keys to navigate; press ENTER to select an item.
Creating ContentWhat kinds of content can I create?Content you create in Clearspace includes wiki documents, uploaded files, blog posts, discussion posts, and the comments users associate with these. (In a way, user profiles are also content because when you search for something, you get profiles, too.). You'll probably find that each of these types of content is best for particular uses. Be sure to see recommendations for documents, blogs, and discussions. You can also read more about the differences between them. To create new content, click the New menu, then click the type of content you want to create. What's the difference between a document, a blog post, and a discussion?Wiki documents, blogs, and discussions were born and raised on the Web, so you use them in Clearspace as you would there. The following table suggests ways to think about the content types.
What can I do with documents?Clearspace is a place to create and keep track of documents. You can use the built-in wiki documents to author and edit content or you can upload files from outside Clearspace.
For wiki documents and uploaded files, you can:
To create a new document, click New > Document. For more on the difference between open and closed documents, see How do I make sure my document isn't visible to other users until I'm ready? What can I do with blogs?Posting to a blog is a great way to say something individual to other people on Clearspace. Use a blog to express an opinion, call attention to something noteworthy you've seen (such as an article on the Internet), or make a proposal. Other users can comment on your blog posts, so that a blog is a great way to pitch ideas that could impact the team or the company. Of course, you can comment on posts, too. Your Clearspace setup might include several blogs, each allowing posts from specific users. For example, you might see "Bill's Blog" (with posts from Bill) or "Human Resources Blog" (with posts from users in the HR department). Your Clearspace administrator creates blogs, associating them with particular users. If you've got something to say, get a blog going! With blogs, you can:
To view blogs, go to the Clearspace home page and click Blog Posts. To post to your blog, click New > Blog Post, select the blog you want to post to, then click Create new blog post. To create a new blog post, click New > Blog Post. What can I do with discussions?Discussions are made for brief questions or ideas you want the community to see. Usually you make a discussion post when you want to get quick feedback or know the answer to something. You can specifically mark a discussion as a question, such as when you have a specific question that another user probably has the answer to. That will help ensure that your question gets the kind of attention it needs. When a discussion thread collects information that you want to preserve for other uses, you can save the discussion as a document. For more information, see How do I convert a discussion thread to a document? With discussions you can:
To make a new discussion post, click New > Discussion, select the space you want the discussion to live in, then click Create New Discussion. How do I display an image within content text?You can include an image in the text of wiki documents, blogs, and discussion posts. To do this, you first attach the image to the document in Clearspace, then use its Clearspace path in the text. Here's the step-by-step process:
How do I upload a file (such as a Word or Excel file) so that other users can see it?Uploading a file is a great way to include an externally-authored document or track its progress using Clearspace. For example, you can upload a document, then add collaborators so that it gets reviewed by other team members. You can also attach files to other content, such as documents, discussion posts, and blog posts. To upload a file, click New > Document, then click Uploaded File. How do I make sure my document isn't visible to other users until I'm ready?To limit a document's visibility, make it a closed document. You can do this when you create the document by selecting the Closed option. A closed document won't be found when searching. When you make a closed document, it will only be visible to users you add to the document's collaborator's list. For more on collaboration, see How do I create a document that other people can work on? How do I see how a wiki document was changed between versions?You can view the differences between two versions of a wiki document that has been edited and published multiple times. You can also delete specific versions or restore a previous version so that it is the current version. To manage a document's versions, navigate to the document and then click Manage Versions. On the Manage Versions page you can view changes in one version from the preceding by clicking the Changes icon for the later version; you can select the check boxes for any two versions to compare them. You can also restore and delete previous versions. How do I move a discussion thread to another space?To move a discussion thread from one Clearspace space to another, navigate to the discussion and click Move Thread. How do I convert a discussion thread to a document?When you want to save a discussion into another format — such as to preserve its information for another use — you can convert the discussion thread to a wiki document. When you do, Clearspace will create a new document that contains the original post and all replies in the discussion. You can edit the new document and save it. To convert a discussion to a document, navigate to the discussion, then click Convert thread to document. How do I lock a thread so others can't comment on it?To ensure that no one will be able to add more replies to a discussion thread, navigate to the discussion thread and click Lock Thread. CollaboratingWhat does it mean to collaborate in Clearspace?Clearspace is designed for collaboration. Over time, as you and others use Clearspace -- adding and tagging content, capturing ideas in documents, expressing ideas in blogs, asking and answering questions in discussions -- you'll find that the application shapes itself to your needs. Through your collaboration, you'll develop a list of tags that describes your content intuitively, a group of users who seem to always have answers when people ask, and a batch of ideas that arrive because you can see what others are thinking and working on. In more concrete terms, with Clearspace you can:
How do I create a document that other people can work on?By default, when create a new wiki document, the new document allows multiple authors. In other words, by default anyone else can make changes. You can limit the list of people who can make changes by making it a closed document and adding other authors as collaborators. For each of the collaborators you add, you can assign specific permission to do certain things. You add collaborators after you've saved the document. To add collaborators, navigate to the document and click Manage Collaboration. Under Collaborators, click Add Collaborator to enter the name of a person you want to collaborate on the document. After entering the person's name, select check boxes to indicate what role the person will have.
How do I announce something so that other users are more likely to see it?You can post an announcement that will appear on the home page for a particular space. To create an announcement, navigate to the space's home page and click Create Announcement. On the Post Announcement page, you can set the announcement text as well as when and for how long the announcement will be visible. How do I ask a question?Ask a question by posting it as a discussion. There might be another person who has the answer to your question and can post a reply. You can mark a discussion post specifically as a question when you create the post. (If you don't initially mark the discussion as a question, you have 15 minutes to change your mind. Within that time, you'll see a link in the discussion post.) To post a question, click New > Discussion, then click Create New Discussion. Under Post New Thread, after titling and describing your question, be sure to select the Mark this thread as a question check box before clicking Post Message. Note: You can also ask a question as a poll. If someone answers my question, how do I say so?If you post a question and someone replies with information that you can use, it's a good idea to mark the reply as either helpful or correct. That way, others who have the same question can quickly see which replies might be most useful for them. A helpful reply is on the right track, while a correct reply answered your question. Keep in mind that you and others get more status points for posting replies that are marked as helpful or correct! When you feel that your question has been answered, you should mark the original question as answered. That way, people will know whether or not to keep trying to answer your question. How do I create a poll?A poll is a way to ask a multiple choice question of other people in the community. When you create a poll, you define the question and the possible answers. The poll appears on the home page for the space it's created in. As people respond to the poll, results are shown graphically as colored bars. (Clearspace ensures that a person has only one opportunity to vote in the poll.) To create a poll, navigate to the space where you want the poll to live. Under Actions, click Create Poll. Finding ContentHow can I find content?There are three main ways to find things in Clearspace: by browsing, by searching, and by tags. Browsing. One of the easiest ways to browse for content is to use the menus at the top of each page:
Tags. When people assign tags and tag groups to content you can use the tags to find the content again. Clearspace displays tags in a "tag cloud" where you can click a tag to see the content associated with it. For example, if you navigate to a space home page (click Browse, then click the name of the space), you'll see a tag cloud of popular tags (by default, on the lower left of the page). Notice that the tags listed there are in alphabetical order, but that they're displayed in different font sizes. A larger font means a tag that is assigned to more content. How do I make something easier to find?To help other people find the content that you create, you can do two important things:
What are tags and tag groups?Tags are like index keywords you and others assign to content and use to look for content. When you create or edit content, it's a good idea to make sure that the list of tags assigned to the content accurately describes what's in it. One way to do this is to ask yourself what tags you would use to look for this content if you were searching for it. Tag groups collect tags so that you can find content by or assign all of the collected tags at once. For example, if you wanted to browse content via a tag group that collected the tags new_products and research, you'd get all content to which either tag had been assigned (rather than, say, any content to which both tags had been assigned). As a general rule, always try to make sure that content you edit has a useful set of tags and tag groups assigned to it. How do I apply tags and tag groups?You can assign tags and tag groups to the following content types when you're creating or editing them:
To assign tags, open the content for editing and scroll to the bottom of the page. Beneath the editing window, in the Tag box, type the tags you want to assign to the content you have open. Where possible, it's best to use tags that already exist. That way, you stand a better chance of assigning tags that users are already familiar with and that might be assigned to related content. The easiest way to apply existing tags is to just click the name of a tag in Popular Tags list; if you know the name of an existing tag (or if it's not listed), you can also just type it. How do I get notified about changes to content?To avoid having to keep checking back for changes to content in Clearspace, you can use RSS feeds and email notifications.
What is RSS?RSS is a way for you to keep track of changes or additions to content you care about. By "subscribing" to the RSS feed for content in Clearspace, you're asking to have easy access to information about content changes or additions. An RSS feed brings you a list of updates that you can view in an RSS aggregator. (The acronym RSS stands for Really Simple Syndication.) Subscribing to RSS feeds is an alternative to receiving email notifications, in which an email is sent each time content is changed or added (although you can also do both). You might prefer email notifications if you want to receive updates in a more "passive" but immediate way. You can subscribe to RSS feeds for content lists (such as a list of blogs, discussions, or documents you'd view in Clearspace), spaces, or for discussion threads. How do I use the RSS feeds I get from Clearspace?To view RSS feeds you use an RSS aggregator that's designed to collect information about content from the places whose RSS feeds you've subscribed to. RSS aggregators include some web browsers such as recent versions of Internet Explorer, Firefox, and Safari. There are also aggregator applications that are specifically designed to collect and aggregate RSS feeds. For the feeds you've subscribed to, an aggregator will typically display a list of summaries for content that has recently been added or changed. You can view the content summarized in the list and mark it as having been "read." To subscribe to the RSS feed for content, you add the link URL for the RSS feed to your RSS aggregator. One way to get the URL is to click the RSS Feed icon when you're viewing content, then copy the URL out of the address bar at the top of your browser. You can also get the URL from a list of all the available RSS feeds for a space by clicking Subscribe via RSS under Actions. Note: Some browsers will display an RSS feed symbol at the right side of the address bar (at the top, where the page URL is). If you click the symbol, you'll get a list of the RSS feeds available. This is a good way to get feeds for wiki documents, for example. What are email notifications?You can have Clearspace send you email when content you care about is added or changed. This is an alternative to RSS feeds, which require an RSS aggregator (although you can use both RSS and email notifications, of course). Because an email is sent for each notification you request, you might prefer subscribing to RSS feeds if you'd rather not get all the email. To begin receiving email notifications, navigate to the area you care about — a space or document or blog, for example — and click Receive Email Notifications under Actions. To stop receiving email notifications, click Stop Email Notifications instead. |