What is a Community Room?

A. Summary:

Community Rooms are websites in AFSC's Star Cafe. They are places for groups to collaborate using threaded discussions, announcements, shared documents and calendars of events, and links to other sites. The Community Rooms can be seen by the public -- the entire Internet world.

B. Key Points:

· Star Community Rooms are websites for groups to share discussions, documents, calendars, etc.

· Community Rooms are visible to the public -- for reading only

· Community Room sections, or "web parts", will differ from group to group

· Community Rooms have associated Private Rooms

· Private Rooms are not visible to the public

· Link to Star Cafe's Lobby

· Link to What is a Private or Work Room?

· For corrections, updates, or clarifications on this Star Point, please email hpugh@afsc.org

C. Details:

The Community Rooms are Internet sites that are places where people with like interests can collaborate on ideas, documents, and events. They will have several sections (also referred to as "web parts"), such as threaded discussions, announcements, links to other web sites, shared calendars of events, etc. The Community Rooms will not all look exactly alike, but they will all follow the same pattern. The Community Rooms are open to the public as far as viewing; but no one without specific permission can change anything in a Community Room.

Below is what a typical Community Room looks like:




The Community Rooms will be structured according to the wishes of the "Facilitator" of the Room -- the person responsible for the Room's content.

The Facilitator is assigned by the "Owner" of the room - the person responsible for the Room.

Lists of Contacts can be imported from an individual's Outlook folder. And the Contacts folder in a Community Room can be added as a separate folder to a users' Outlook.

Documents can be uploaded from a computer, edited in the Community Room, and checked out so two users don't make changes simultaneously.

An Events section can include shared Calendars, lists of current events, and description sheets with details about each event.

Other sections can have pictures and other resources you want to share, news items and links to other Web sites of interest to your group.

Community Rooms can have associated "Private or Work Rooms" that are not visible to the public. Each Private Room is open to only those individuals defined by the Facilitator. Think of Community Rooms as the public face of a group and Private Rooms as its non-public face. Private Rooms can have sections or "web parts" like those in Community Rooms, but they will contain information you only want to share within your group. Link to What is a Private or Work Room?