Starting Forum Discussions

Start Forum Topics to pose questions, share ideas, report issues, and encourage discussion. You can publish new Forum Topics immediately, save them as drafts, or queue them for publishing at a later date. Depending on their location, Forum Topics may require moderation before they are published. 

Forum Topics live on Forum Channels, and can be aggregated using a Forum Topics widget.

Use Cases

New hire questions

Being new to a company and not knowing where to go or who to ask makes getting answers to basic questions somewhat difficult. Start a forum specifically for new hires. This gives them a designated place to ask questions without fear of judgement and provides them with timely answers to questions.

Features and functionality

Each forum topic can include the following features:

• Archiving
• Scheduled Content
• Related Content
• Broadcasting
• Labels
• Read Tracking
• Channel Templates
• WYSIWYG Editor

How to add topics to forums

There two ways to add topics to a forum: The Add Content method, and the Forum Topics widget option. For more details on how to use the Add Content method. For more details on how to use the refer to the article, Add Content - userbar quicklink. If you would like to know more about how to use the Forum Topics widget, refer to the Forum Topics Widget article.

Step 1: Navigate to the Channel

Navigate to your Forum channel, and on the right-hand side select Add a Topic.

Note: You can also do this using the Add Content button in your userbar or using certain widgets.

Step 2: Create the Forum topic

Once you have selected Add a Topic, you will be presented with the topic creation screen. Select whether you want to: Start a Discussion, Ask a Question, Propose an Idea, or Report an Issue.

Step 3: Add a title

All content created inside the Igloo platform needs a title. This will appear above the content and be used to generate a unique URL.

Step 4: Choose a channel (optional)

When you start the content creation process from a Widget or Channel, the Channel field defaults to the Channel you selected or were on. In contrast, creating content using the add button on the Userbar results in the Channel field being blank. In all cases, you have the option to select a different Channel.

To select a Channel:

1. Click the Channel drop-down.
2. Search for a Channel by its name or the name of its parent Page or Space. This search will return up to 100 results. You will only see Channels to which you have at least Write Access, and their parent Page or Space (regardless of Access Level).
3. Select a Channel from the list by clicking on it.

Step 5: Write your article

Create the body of your article in the WYSIWYG editor.

Step 6: Add attachments (optional)

You can add attachments by either dragging files from your computer into the attachments field, or by choosing Select files from your computer. Attachments will appear directly below the body of your published article and be available for download.

Step 7: Add Related Content (optional)

You can include related content when creating new content.

Step 8: Set up a Broadcast (optional)

You have the option to have send out a broadcast upon publishing a discussion forum.

Step 9: Add Labels (optional)

You can apply labels to your forum topic to make it easier to find. 

To add a label:

1. Click Add Label.
2. Select the labels that you want to add. You can use the search box to filter labels in the following ways:
   • Search for labels that are similar to your query.
   • Enter a label group name to filter displayed labels to those that are in that group.
3. Click outside of the label window to close it. Alternatively, you can click the X found on the top right corner of the label window to close it.

For more information about labels, see Labels.

Step 10: Set a date to publish the discussion (optional)

You can schedule a discussion to be automatically published in the future. Use the fields in this area to select a date and time that you would like the content to be published.

Step 11: Adjust archiving policy (optional)

You can change when a forum will be archived, or prevent it from being automatically archived. Use the options in this field to override the default archiving behavior on the channel for the discussion you are publishing.

Step 12: Set Read Tracking (optional)

Read Tracking allows you to track whether or not a person has engaged with a piece of content, and can be enabled on any article. Use the options here to enable read tracking and customize the button text in any supported language.

Step 13: Publish, save as draft, or send to moderator

Once the article is complete, you can save it as a draft, or publish it, which will make it immediately available in the selected channel. If the channel is moderated, you will have the option to send your article to the moderator instead of the option to publish directly.