Forum Tips


Using Your Community Forum

The forum is the heart of our community. It gives us a place to ask questions and find support. It gives newcomers and oldtimers a chance to share the process together.

Forum messages remain posted so others can follow the conversation and get help and encouragement for their own process.

Several features are designed in so you can customize your experience. These help you find, read and respond to the messages that interest you. Tips on how to use the features are gathered here.

TIP: Print this page and keep it handy while using the Community Forum.


Remember, this forum belongs to you! Use it to support your healing.

Welcome to our community!

Kathleen               

 

Reading The Forum

The forum is set up to make it very easy to find what you want to read.

By selecting "Search" at the top or bottom of the page you can narrow the listing to what you would like to see. This speeds up the down-loading and the "refresh" time for your modem.

Under "My Preferences" you can set it to list the messages by date -- select and see what has been posted in the last day or two -- by what is called a "thread," or chronologically. A thread allows you to follow the conversation as it develops among different members.

Note: At this time our forum is so well-used that messages may not be available after a few days. If you see messages you want to save, save them now. Or subscribe to the digest so you can save them all.

You can choose to look at all the messages a given person has written. Just put his/her name or email in the search list. Or you can look for messages on a given topic. If you want to see what people have written about being "fat," just put "fat" into the search criteria line.

When you have selected your choices for personalized viewing, "View Message Index" will get those messages for you.

 

Subscribing to the Digest

If you subscribe to the forum, you will receive in your email every day or two digests of all the posts that have been posted since the last digest. This may drive you crazy or it may be the perfect way to save the posts you most like for future reference. Remember posts are deleted over time, so if you don't want to lose them, subscribe, please.

 

Posting on the Forum

The forum is set up for you to write your message, see what it will look like and make changes before you post it.

 

Posting a Message

The "Post A New Message" section of the forum page is for adding a new topic to the forum. After putting your name, email and subject in the labelled boxes, type in the message section what you wish to share.

If you prefer to not show your email, leave it off. If you include it, only the moderator will see it so she can respond to you privately by email if necessary. It must be included if you choose to be notified by email when someone responds to your post.

Enter your thoughts in the Message Box, using the "Return" or "Enter" key twice to start a new paragraph or skip a line.

Please be liberal in your use of the Enter key to make new paragraphs. It is much easier to read and understand what you are saying if there are several paragraphs rather than everything all in one.

Once you have written your post you can see it the way it will appear on the forum. Before you do, click the small box just underneath the message box if you would like to be notified when forum readers post a response to your post.

 

Seeing How Your Post Will Look and Making Changes

To look at your post, click the "Preview Message" button below the message box. This will take you to a new page showing your message just the way it will look on the forum.

If you want to make changes (or correct typos) use the back button on your browser to go back to the page where you entered your post into the message box. You can make any changes you like and then click on "Preview Message" again to see how they look.

If you click on "Preview Message" without making any changes, you will get a "Duplicate Message" error. Just use your browser's "Back" button to go back and make a change in your main message - any small change will do. Then click on the "Preview Message" button to see your revised post.

You may use the Back button on your browser and the Preview Message Button as many times as you like until you get your post the way you want it. Once you do, click the "Post Message" button. This button is at the top of the Post Preview page and also at the bottom of the Post a New Message page.

 

Submitting Your Post

Once you have clicked on the Post Message button on either page, your message is submitted for posting (but held until Kathleen gets a chance to read it). It usually takes from a few hours to most of a day to show up on the forum.

 

Posting a Response

To post a response to a message on the forum, use the same method with the "Post a New Response" form on the page with the message you wish to repond to.

 

Receiving Email Responses to Your Forum Posts>

Filling your email in the box when you post a message on the forum allows you to get email on your post in two ways.

  • Kathleen has your email available to post a response to you privately.

  • If you click the small box below the big box containing your messages, any responses posted to your message on the forum will automatically be emailed to you.

If you are not getting the email responses you expect, check to see that your email account is not set up to refuse email from unknown addresses.

 

The Need for Speed

Some of you have experienced difficulty on the forum. Either the time it took to load the posts seemed excessive or the some of the features didn't work right when you submitted your posts. We are working on the problem. The solution of course will be a faster, better experience for all.

In the meantime, here a few things you can do to speed access in the forum.

  • Use the forum "Search" feature and limit the posts you are loading to the last day or two. Instructions for this are above.
  • Use the fastest browser. Netscape is fastest, Internet Explorer is next, America On-line is a very slow last. No matter what computer or internet service you use, you can use the fastest browser for free.

  • Consider buying a faster modem. Modem's are available to upgrade most computers for less than $100, sometimes half that. The time you save will quickly pay the difference.

 

Using Your Email Address in Posts

As most of you know who have been around for a long time, we have set the system up to honor your desire for privacy and will not include your email address in public posts. And you do not have to include your email address in order to post.

With one caveat. Sometimes, I hold a post because I would like to talk with you before I put it up. If there is no email address for me to do that, I will simply hold the post. You can contact me if you wish.

In a couple of instances, I have asked people on the board to do that. In some instances they have been unwilling to do so. It seems to be common courtesy to respond to that request and I was kinda startled to be blown off. Rather than being troubled by this or making a big deal, here's the scoop.

If I am holding a post and there is an email address, I will let you know. If you don't include an address and a post doesn't show up and you want to contact me about it, we can talk. Otherwise, I will hold it for a while and then defer on posting.

I do not care about whether people are using their real names. I do care about those who are posting being involved in the process. You all know how hard I have worked (and continue to work) to have this be a safe and healing place. I figure this will just be one more clarification.

 

Some Common Abbreviations

There are a number of abbreviations we use in internet talk. Here is a list of many of them. It's a whole new language!!!

  • NMI=No Message Inside
  • HTH=Hope This Helps IMHO=In My Humble Opinion
  • BTW=By The Way BRB=Be Right Back
  • LOL=Laughing Out Loud
  • LMAO=Laughing My A** Off
  • ROTFLMAO=Rolling On The Floor Laughing My A** OFF
  • ROOFTOP=Kathleen's Spell Checker interpretation of ROTFLMAO

 

How to Make Smiley Faces

When you use the Forum, you may notice a number of little faces used to express emotions. You can add these to your subject line or messages by typing these characters:

Smile :-)
Wink ;-)
Frown :-(
Shades 8-)
Big :D
Tongue :-P
Confused :confused
Rolleyes :rolleyes
Eek :eek
Redface :redface


These are guidelines we send out once a month for all our email lists, but they can apply to forum posting as well...don't let them overwhelm you (smile)...they will all make sense as you work with them.

Warmly,
Kathleen

Guidelines for our the forum and our lists

  1. MESSAGES GO TO EVERYONE
    When you send a note to the forum, it goes out to everyone in the community who reads it. This may seem confusing at first, but as you work with it, you will start to see the wonderful dynamic of our shared *dialogue*. Addiction is about isolation. Making connections helps you heal. The shared experience of a few helps everyone. We work to ensure that your connections are safe; keeping the forum postings moderated for approval does this, and also it will bring into your life the power of the group as a whole, which is just amazing!

  2. RESPECT OTHERS' PRIVACY
    You may find that you know someone in the community and you learn about some pretty personal information. Be as respectful of privacy as you would like to be respected. Please don't forward a personal message, even if the message is from a member, without clearing it through the author of the post first. Get permission from the author of any post BEFORE forwarding it to a non-member or sharing it on the forum or any online group list [most people are happy to give such permission].

  3. THE SUBJECT SAYS IT ALL
    Make sure the subject line tells what is in the message. If you are responding to a digest, change the subject line BEFORE you hit send (smile) If the subject has changed throughout the thread, change the subject line (smile) so that folks can see what the conversation is about.

  4. RESPECT EACH OTHER
    As I am sure you realize from the books, I want to create a tone of acceptance, tolerance and compassion on all the radiant recovery lists. I know you will participate in this. I do not tolerate *flaming* on any of our lists. [If you are new to the internet, flaming is nasty comments made to someone about something they did or said.]

  5. NO ADS/RELIGION/POLITICS/URL'S
    We do not allow anyone to promote their political or religious views, or any other product or program on the Radiant Recovery lists, either directly or via a signature tagline. Our goal is to stay on topic and to keep the discussion safe for our very diverse community. We also ask that you not include biblical references in your messages nor that you make reference to specific denominational language in your discussion. SPAM is strictly prohibited and all spammers will be banned and removed from the list. [SPAM is unsolicited e-mail advertising.] And please do not post URLs (links to other websites) unless you check with the moderator first.

  6. NO VIRUS WARNINGS
    Please do not send virus warnings to the forum. If the message says to send to as many people as you can, it is probably a hoax. A good site to check out viruses and hoaxes is: http://www.symantec.com/avcenter/index.html

  7. NO PHONE NUMBERS
    Never include your phone numbers in a post to the list. Remember this is a public place (smile).

  8. GIVE PROPER CREDIT
    If you quote something that was written by someone else, always quote the source. Since I am a published author, honoring copyright is very important to me.

  9. THESE RULES ARE FOR YOUR BENEFIT
    By continuing your subscription to the list, you are agreeing to these guidelines. I do reserve the right to review or remove your list membership if you are unwilling to abide by these guidelines. If you have any questions or concerns, please email me at kathleen@radiantrecovery.com

    Kathleen DesMaisons, Ph.D.
    www.radiantrecovery.com

    (c) Kathleen DesMaisons, 20110. All rights reserved.

    Email Kathleen if you have questions or would like more information about using the forum.

    Remember, this forum belongs to you! Use it to support your healing.