A while ago I published a couple of articles with some of my hints on how to navigate Newsvine and it seems like they went over fairly well. So I decided to continue with some additional hints and explanations on how things work around here. Remember these are some of the ways I use Newsvine and there may be a better way to do it. I welcome any and all additions and corrections to what I offer here. My way is not absolute, it's just the way that works best for me. If you have a question that I haven't addressed here please feel free to ask and if I don't know possibly someone else can answer it for me
How to keep the comment section tidy
Ok this is one of my pet peeves so I'm going to put this out there and hope no one gets offended.
When you are making a comment in an article or seed there are ways to keep things tidy and easy to follow.
First is whether to use the reply function, or not. If you are making a comment that is in reply to someone else's comment then use the REPLY button.
If you are making a comment to the author or in response to what you have just read it is proper to read all the other comments and when you get to the bottom of the comments, leave your own comment.
Please don't just jump in at the top and use the REPLY button on the authors first comment just to be ahead of all the rest. It usually obvious when you do this that you probably didn't even bother to read the rest of the comments and possibly are repeating what has already been said below.
If you want to reference a comment made above and someone has already used the reply ahead of you it's best to use the comment number at the start of your comment. An example would be (@comment 1.3 whatever you wanted to say) that way everyone knows who you are speaking to and there is no confusion.
Conversely if you are responding directly to someone's comment (ie: thanking them for their comment) please do use the REPLY button.
You can also link to the comment using the link button if you prefer.
How to link to a comment
I copied this conversation and thought it might be helpful:
Newsviner
I have a question. How do you put a thread like that in a comment so that you can click on it and go to the article. Still kinda new and trying to figure everything out. Thanks to anyone who can help:)
Ah....first click on the little number in the lower left of the comment you want to link. Then go to the address window ( http : //blahblah) and copy the entire link. Then you write your comment and highlight the word (s) you want people to click on to get to the link. While using the "normal mode ...not the XHTML mode, click on the chain link icon. A little box will pop up. Paste the url that you copied into that little box. Click the "insert" button. That's it!
That will take you to the specific comment you wanted.
Did that make sense?
Paragraph breaks
When writing an article break up your paragraphs for ease of the folks reading. It makes it really hard to read a whole article that has no breaks in it.
You can do this with two carriage returns at the end of your paragraphs.
If for some reason this doesn't work try using this HTML command <br>. Use as many times as you like to put a break between paragraphs.
Some times I use <br> to force my paragraphs to appear beside a particular photo. You will have to play around with how many breaks are required to end up with what you want. Here is an example of the result after using the <br> command. Notice how the paragraphs line up with the pictures.
This is an update on the br command: Since we have changed to a new system of editors, the br command doesn't work. You now need to use <& nbsp;> command to get a blank line. I generally use at least a couple of these each time to separate paragraphs. Note: You will need to remove the space between the & and nbsp
How to make a supporting document note
This is a comment I found on Jim Dent's column that I thought might interest some:
Newsvine 101: To Link, or Not to Link...
Want to spice things up a little? How bout we number our points and provide supporting documentation (links) at the end of the article. Did you catch my hint? Use the < sup> tag (no spaces).
If you type... "Thats the facts jack, so stick it in your ear!" < sup> 1. < /sup>..... it will look like this..
.......yada yada...in your ear! 1
Now you go to the end of your article, type in the < sup> 1 < /sup>, create your link, name it, and it will look like this....
1 In Your Ear, Bubba.
How cool is that...
How to locate a particular group owner when they haven't accepted your request to join
You can find out who owns a group by going to the Groups page and typing in the group name in the bottom group search window.
I recommend copying and pasting that group owner's name into your top search window (the one where you can choose Full Text, Tags, or Users) and choosing Users. Then go to that person's column to look at the "Last Seen" date to see how active that person has been on Newsvine. If that date is several months ago, you're probably dealing with an unmoderated group. If the date is recent, the person just might not have received the join request email or couldn't accept/reject it at that time.
Use the Contact Author link on that person's column to send an email requesting group membership. I have seen Tyler say that if you can't resolve it, write him an email and possibly he can get you into the group.
How to search for a group that encompasses topics you may be interested in
There is a way to search for a group, on the groups page, just type in a word in the search box and see what comes up!
You can trick the search box to give you everything by typing three spaces, that will give you every group in order of # of members. (it takes a while to come up)
Note: This info about groups may be changing in the future, but until then the above works. There is an ongoing discussion about Newsvine Groups V2 going on, Here is the link if you care to check it out.
How to invite friends that are not already on Newsvine
If you have a friend that you believe would like to join Newsvine, there is a way to help them do this and bypass The Greenhouse. Note, you are in essence vouching for them so you should be sure they aren't a spammer or something....(smiles)
The way to do this is click on Friends up on the black bar of any page.
Once you are there, In the box that says: Add/Invite Friends use Method 1: Paste in e-mail addresses of your friends, separated by commas. This will send an invite from Newsvine to your friend. It doesn't hurt to warn them you are doing this so they don't think it's spam or something...
Once they accept they will have skipped the Greenhouse, already have a stalk of Vineacity and as an added bonus, you will get paid for 10% of their pageviews! Pretty cool huh?
This is the third in a series of hints I have done, to see the others here are links:
