5 Step Tutorial on Text Based Real-Time Interaction

We are using Webboard a commercial product from O'Reilly software. The product supports both asychronous "bulletin board" "newsgroup" and synchronous "chat" style interaction. The product organizes its features into boards and conferences. A board is a virtual version of the full product that you can customize for completely different purposes -- each board will have a unique web URL and users of one board may never realize that the software is supporting several different boards. Each board can support multiple conferences. A conference is analogous to "topic." Each conference automatically supports both asychronous and synchronous interaction.

User Requirements

• Internet connection (modem at 28.8 works okay)
• Netscape 3.X or Internet Explorer 3.X
• If you know what "cookies" are and have enabled your browser to check for cookies: Please turn off this feature. Webboard only uses cookies to maintain state between different web pages, it is not trying to invade your privacy. (note: the default setting for "cookie" checking is off in most browsers, this requirement only applies to people who have changed their default setting)

Getting Started

1. Please type in your username and password when you see the screen below (password and username will be emailed to you).

2. When you are logged in you will see the screen below. This screen has several conferences (e.g., About the ISWorld Net Virtual Meeting Center). You can click on the plus symbol to see what is in a particular conference and post your own contribution. You can personalize your account along with changing your password by clicking on the Profiles button and then clicking on "Change your personal profile." This is reccommended because other participants in the session will be able to learn more about you by clicking your name.

3. To participate in a real-time "chat" session, click on the chat button on the menu bar. You will see the screen below.

4. Choose the session (chat room) that you are in. You will see the screen below:

5. You are now ready to get started with the session. Type your comments in the text box and press ENTER to submit. The screen below shows a session with two people. Look below for some useful commands.

• If you would like to send a longer comment, click on "compose"
• Clicking on compose will also allow you to send larger sized text in different colors
• To see a list of current users click on "users"
• Clicking on the cloud next to a person's name allows you to send a private message.
• Click on the person's name to get more information about them.
• If you type in r=0 and ENTER your refresh rate will change to zero (see below). That means that the screen will no longer automatically update itself unless you change it to another number or press Refresh manually. (the default is ten seconds). If you are on a slow connection you may get better performance by setting your refersh rate to 15 or 20 seconds.
• You may also want to review tips and suggestions for participants and moderators
• Online help is also available from Webboard after you have logged in.

ISWorld Net Virtual Meeting Center