Make a New Topic

A simple tutorial on creating a new forum topic on KiteForum

Introduction

A Forum topic is essentially a 'category' for specific content. For instance, a topic could be on the best kitesurfing spots in the South Island, your favourite landkiting equipment or a famous snowkiter's latest trick. By creating a new topic, a 'thread' of information has been started; users can reply to the topic and see previous content posted in it. When you set up a new topic, you are effectively creating the 'category' and making the first post in it.

The "Forum" in KiteForum

The first step in making a new topic is to head to the Forum section on the website. You can do this by clicking on "Forum" in the top bar menu or entering http://kiteforum.co.nz/forum/newtopic into your browser's address bar. Then simply click the "New Topic" tab on the Forum page to load the new topic screen.

Overview

The new topic page has eight parts to it, which are marked on the screenshot below. Each section is relatively easy to complete.

Details

1. Select the category for the topic. Depending on what you want to make the topic about, this could be kite surfing, international visitors or lost and found. Make sure the category you select has "--" in front of it.
2. Type in the subject. This can be whatever you want. Try and keep it relevant, intruiging and simple though.
3. Choose the topic icon. What is the mood of your topic? Select the icon that reflects your topic the best. Don't worry if none of them suit; this part isn't that important.

Once these three steps are done, the 'making' of the new topic is acutally finished. The remaining parts to fill in on the page are to do with making the first post in the topic.

Content

4. 1. Use text enhancements. This part is optional but makes your post much more interesting to read. First roll over the different icons and find out what they represent by reading the description in the yellow box beneath them. For instance, the large "B" icon is for bold text and the film strip icon is for embedding video. Clicking any of these icons will allow to use the enhacements, although you may have to select appropriate options for some of them. Note the two icons on the far right allow you to preview what your post looks like with the enhacements you have used.
   2. Use emoticons. There are a range of emoticons to choose from, all of them optional. These fun little faces can be selected by simply clicking the ones you want. Each time you click a new smiley will be inserted into your post.
5. Type in your message. This section is where you enter the text for your post. Type away!

Finishing

6. Insert attachments. This optional part is for uploading and inserting image files from your computer into your post. Acceptable files include images (.jpg/.jpeg, .gif and .png), Microsoft Office Word documents (.doc), compressed files (.txt, .zip, .gz and .tgz (popular format for Unix and Linux computer users)).
7. Subscribe to the topic. You are automatically subscribed to the topic, which means you will receive an email notification each time somone replies to it. To unsubscribe, uncheck the box.
8. Submit the topic. Press submit to complete your topic, or cancel to exit.

On topic

You have now created your very own topic! You can reply to your topic to add extra information, or just leave it as it is.

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