It Is More Than Just Emails

Our TVAUG Support Forum is one of the favorite features of our club’s members.  It is a web application from groups.io that allows our members to not only post their technical questions and get answers from other members 24×7 but it is also where we have details about up-coming Zoom meetings and other private announcements that go out to only our members.

Many of our members only use the TVAUG Support Forum by sending an email to it if they have a problem and then viewing the various email replies they receive in response to it.  They may also just be viewing the various emails and replies regarding issues that other members posted to the forum.  This is particularly true for those who previously were members of our Google Group forum before we migrated to the Groups.io platform.  That was basically the only option available back then.  Our new forum offers so many more features than just emails and replies — IF you access it via its website.  If you’re not familiar with how to do so, it is covered in the FAQ here.

Features Overview

Let’s look at some of those features and use this screenshot as a reference.  Details are covered in separate FAQs for some features if you want to delve into them deeper.

1) Help

The online Help that is built in to groups.io is described in the How Do I Find Help FAQ here.  They cover literally EVERY feature in their system including some that we are not using.  We may turn them on later if there is enough interest and a need but at this point we want to get as many members up-to-speed on the basics.  Groups.io also has a Glossary and their own list of FAQs on their Help page.

2) Subscription

A very common question we get is “How can I manage all the emails I’m receiving from the forum?”  You can change the default of receiving each message in an Individual Email to any of 5 others, ranging from a Full Featured Digest to No Email at all.  These are described in the Forum Emails Frequency FAQ here.

3) Calendar

The Forum Calendar is where you can find details about our club meetings (both in-person at Saddlebrook and online via Zoom) and any other special events we may have – like guest speakers, for instance.  Details about how to use the Calendar are in this FAQ.

4) Files

Occasionally our forum moderators or admins may upload a document to our Files section – typically a PDF – and are stored in this section.

5) Search and Filter

Using the Search and Filter options deserves its own FAQ and is covered here.