Digital Tools Workshop

Knitters' Guild NSW Camp 2015

Ravelry Groups and Forums

Why have groups? Groups are a way to join a community of like minded people on a particular

subject, be it a podcast group or a particular pattern group, like socks. A place where people

can interact with each other, passing on information or asking questions, or just generally

chatting for the fun of it.

Searching for a group.

Browse all groups

Browse groups by location

Browse groups by category

Search by tag

Search all swaps

Knitalongs Crochetalongs other-alongs

Start a group now

Looking for events

(you can also scroll down below your list of groups on this page to find the most recently

started groups)

Joining a group

For example - type in 'socks'

Notice 'options' on the left hand side

where you could choose the craft type,

in this case Crochet, Knitting or

Spinning. The group type (knitalong,

general etc).

Scroll through the groups until you find

one that interests you.

Click on group.

Click 'join group'

Choose a forum tab.

If you have already set up some forum tabs these will be

displayed. If not then either create a new tab or if you

just press 'save changes', this new group will appear under

the 'Misc' tab in your forums page.

I have a 'Socks' tab, which is where I have placed this group.

After clicking on Socks a box comes up to show the groups already

in that tab.

Click Save Changes.

What a group looks like.

First is introductory information

of the group which is written up by

the one who started it.

There are avatars of those who

have recently joined this group

with the number of members just

above those and a number of how

many are on line at the moment.

On the right are recently shared

projects or stash and blog posts

from other members of this group.

Moving down to the discussion

threads -

The green arrows indicate a

sticky thread - meaning it will

always appear at the top of

the forum.

The next column shows when

the last comment was posted,

then how many comments you

have not read yet and how

many comments altogether in

that thread.

Note that some 'unread'

numbers are in bold and

others are not. The bold ones

indicate that you have opened

and read comments in that thread at some stage, with the number showing how many you

have not yet read. The unbold figures show that you have not opened that thread at all.

Note - any group member can open a new thread for discussion by clicking on the tab just

above all the threads 'start a topic'.

The last column sometimes has a star or

coloured dot. If you click on this you can

choose to either go to the first post,

go to the first unread post,

watch a thread,

ignore a thread,

mark unread

or mark all read.

If you hold the pointer over a particular thread, a box

appears with information from the very first post of that

thread. (if you have ticked that preference in settings)

When you open a

thread for the first

time you will be taken

to the very first

entry which will be

from the person who

has started the

thread.

There is information

at the top about the

thread then each of

the comments from

participants.

If someone has

replied specifically to

a particular comment the replies are shown on the right of that post. If you want to reply to

a comment from a specific person, click the 'reply' button at the end of their post. Or if

you want to add a comment to the general thread then click on 'reply to thread' at the top

of the page.

If you want to know more about the person who has posted a comment, click on their avatar

which will take you to their home page, showing their projects and details.

Forums Tab

Click on the 'forums' tab at the top of the Ravelry page.

The advantage of the Forums tab is to see, in one place, all the groups you have joined and of

the recent activity of each group.

Notice the tabs at the top of the forum page. The first one being 'your boards' which

covers every group you belong to. The rest are the individual tabs you have created for

sorting the groups into categories.

As you click on one of the top tabs you will see the

groups you have placed in that category.

For a quick glance at unread messages, click on the

'hey You have xx unread replies' under the tabs.

Otherwise you can click on any tab and scroll

through your groups to see new activity.

Settings.

The last tab at the top of your Forum page is 'Settings'. This is where you can change or

update your groups and categories.

The first settings, 'select your

Ravelry-wide boards' are for

groups of Ravelry specific

subjects. You can un-tick any

that you don't want to be

involved in. The information or

questions could however be quite

helpful and worth keeping your

membership.

The next settings are for the

voting buttons you would like to

see at the bottom of each post

to allow people to tag their thoughts about the posts.

Next are 'moderator settings' which you don't need to worry about unless you are setting up

your own group.

Further down are a few other options you can choose, which we won't go into here.

Next are all your groups in

their specific categories.

This is where you can move

groups from category to

category or create new

categories and adjust how

much you can view of each

group.

To add a tab click on the

'add new tab' button. This

adds a new tab at the

bottom of the page, so you

may need to scroll down to

see it.

Cick in the 'untitled' box and type in

the name you want for this tab. Click on

the next box 'small boards'. This

determines how many threads of the

board will be shown in your 'forum'

view. Medium is a happy medium

(pardon the pun).

You can then move groups from other

tabs into this one or add new groups as

you join them in the future.

Other settings

Activity

This section shows the most recent posts in each group subscribed Mark a thread to watch

Browse

Choose either one or your tabs or a group name to see all the latest threads.

Radar

This is a fabulous ticker involving all Ravelry groups showing all the comments being posted

right now.

Added to all of the above, there is much more to be learnt on the home page of Ravelry

almost every day.

KnitCompanion - Created by Sally Holt

Knitcompanion.com - main home page with all tutorials, classes etc

(Designer series - incl videos and full instructions - kCUniversity - to master kC)

Create2thrive.com -

patterngenius.com

in conjunction with

Patternfish.com

Package is free for quickstart projects - otherwise

1. kC Bundle (1yr) $10.99 ($13.99 Aus)

2. kC Bundle (30 Days) $.99

3. Magic Markers (1yr) $3.99)

4. Setup (1yr) $9.99

Intro to package -

Opening screen

Designs - contains free patterns with package + anything purchased from Patternfish

PDF's - again free patterns + installed (local and Dropbox)

Live Events - Intro classes - webinar (need to be connected to internet to see classes and

register)

Sam Seymour - kC mascot and super helper

Projects - What you are working on (Export to Dropbox in settings.)

Starting a pattern - Open in kC from Ravelry library or elsewhere

- import from Dropbox

- Local PDF

- Designs

Knit now

Demo Clapotis

Demo Dither - smart counters (only work on charts so far).