10 Minute Guide to Lotus Notes -Lesson14.htm

Lesson 14

Joining a Discussion Group

In this lesson, you’ll learn to join a discussion group, post a message, answer a message, and exit the group.

Joining the Group

A discussion group is a database shared among those in your workgroup and is usually focused on one topic, such as an advertising campaign, a new product line, or some ot her special interest. Think of a discussion group as an informal meeting place where you can share your ideas on the subject at hand.

When you join a discussion group, you add your comments, questions, theories, and so on to those of your co-workers. All discussion is stored in a database that you can open and read like any other. To join a discussion group, follow these steps:

In your Notes workspace, choose File, Database, Open. The Open Database dialog box appears (see Figure 14.1).

Figure 14.1 The Open Database dialog box gives you access to discussion groups.

In the Server drop-down list, choose the server on which the discussion group database resides. If you’re not sure where the database is located, use the Browse button to access the network. (You can also ask your Notes administrator if you canno t find the database.)
In the Database list, select the discussion group database. Ask your Notes administrator for the name of the database if you’re unsure.
Click the Add Icon button.
Choose Done. Notes adds the database to your workspace.
To open the discussion group database, double-click its icon on your workspace. Notes opens the database. Figure 14.2 shows an example discussion group database.

Figure 14.2 A discussion database lists main topics for discussion.

Viewing the Discussion Window

The navigation pane (on the left side of the discussion database window) provides several views you can use to find and organize messages. The default view is the All Documents view shown in Figure 14.2. The All Documents view displays all messages in the database listed by date, topic, and author. You can rearrange the topics by clicking the Date button in the document pane. By default, Notes sorts the messages from the most recent to the oldest dates. If the items in your navigation pane look different from those in the figure, click the Navigator button on the tool button bar.

The second view, My Favorite Documents, looks just like the All Documents view. The difference between My Favorite Documents and All Documents is that My Favorite Documents view displays fewer messages because you save only the messages you want. If you run across an important or particularly interesting message in the All Documents view, you can click and drag it to the My Favorite Documents icon in the view pane. Notes copies the message for you to keep.

The third view is By Category. All messages stored in the database are created within a specific category, or section. To view the categories, click the By Category icon.

In the fourth view, By Author, Notes displays a list of all documents by one author directly under that person’s name. The date and the topic of the message are also displayed.

Icons in the Navigation Pane

Some databases enable you to display the views by icon instead of by standard folders. To change the look of the view pane, click the Naviga tor tool button. To change back to the default view, click the Standard Folders button.

Posting a Message

You can join a discussion group by opening the database and reading messages from those in the group, or you can compose your own messages to ad d to the discussion. To post a new message to a discussion group, follow these steps:

In the discussion database, click the New Main Topic tool button. The New Topic window appears (see Figure 14.3).

Figure 14.3 Create your own messages to add to the discussion.

Enter a topic in the first set of brackets. The topic is the name of your message, and it is what Notes displays in the database window.
Click the down arrow next to Category to choose the category in which your message fits. The Select Keywords dialog box appears, with General selected by default (see Figure 14.4). A document may f it into one, two, three, or more categories at the same time.

Figure 14.4 Choose the category under which you want your message listed.

In the Keywords list, click on the keyword for the category to which you want to assign your message. Notes displays a check mark beside it. You can click on a selected category to deselect it and remove the check mark. When you’re satisfied with your choice, click OK.

Add a Keyword

If you want to add a keyword to make it a category, enter it in the New Keywords text box in the Select Keywords dialog box. Press Enter< I> to add the category and close the dialog box.

Position the insertion point between the text brackets and enter your message.

When you finish entering the message, click the Save tool button.

Click the Close tool button to return to the discussion group database.

Reading and Replying to a Message

In addition to creating messages, you’ll want to read the messages from others and reply to them. You can respond to a message from the message itself or from the database window. Follow these steps to read and respond to a message.

From the database window, double-click any message you want to read. Notes opens the message, displaying the topic, author, date, and category at the top (see Figure 14.5).

Figure 14.5 Open a message and read it, and then respond to it or close it.

To respond to the message, choose the Respond tool button. The New Response window shown in Figure 14.6 appears.

Figure 14.6 Enter a message in response to the one you just read.

Enter your topic and your message in the New Response window.
(Optional) If you need to refer to the original message, click the Preview Parent button on the tool button bar. The screen splits in half so you can see both the original message and your response.
When you finish the response, click Save and then Close.
Close the original message to return to the discussion database window.

You’ve Got a Reply!

In the discussion database window, responses appear directly below the original message and in a different color. In addition, Notes displays the numbe r of responses you’ve received to your messages beside your name.

Response to a Response?

In the database window, you can respond to a message without opening it. Simply select the message and choose the Respond tool button to d isplay the New Response window. Click the Respond to Response button to reply to a message that’s a response to an original.

Exiting the Group

You close the discussion group database as you would any other database. Choose File, Close to return to the workspace. If you have created mess ages but have not saved them, Notes displays a confirmation dialog box prompting you to save. Choose Yes to save the messages you’ve created.

In this lesson, you learned to join a discussion group, post a message, answer a message, and exit the group. In the next lesson, you’ll learn to work with documents within databases by opening them, marking them, and moving around in the document s.