Nov 22 2010

A guide for forum moderators Posted 1 years 178 days ago ago by sooz     0 Comments

This guide is copied from the forum documentation.

Moderating Posts from the Moderation Queue

Posts end up in a moderation queue when there are posts in a moderated forum by users who are not administrators, moderators, or when the user is not trusted. Posts that are in moderation queue do not show in the forum thread view nor do they get counted in forum statistics. Posts in moderation queue cannot be edited by the original poster at this point either.

Creating a Moderated Post

When posts are submitted by a moderated user the module checks to see if notifications are enabled for this module. If they are, all moderator email addresses are retrieved from the database for all moderators of that forum who have their personal moderation notifications enabled and an email is sent notifying them that there are posts in the moderation queue. (This is set in the User Settings explained in a later chapter)

Accessing Moderated Posts

There are a couple of different ways to access posts in the moderation queue. If the moderator has moderation notifications enabled, the email they receive contains a link which can take the moderator directly to the moderation area of that particular forum. This is the quickest way to get to the post to moderate. The other way is to click the Moderate icon at the top of the initial forum and threads view when the moderator is logged in as shown in Figure 1.

Figure 1 – Clicking the moderate icon.

Click the icon will take the moderator to the moderation queue area. For each moderated forum the moderator is a moderator of, it lists all forums which have at least one post in the queue.    If the there are no posts in the queue, then no forum names will be displayed here. Also, moderators can only see posts to moderate of forums which they are assigned moderators of. An example of the moderation queue with one post requiring moderation is seen in Figure 2.

Figure 2 - Moderation queue when there is at least one post that needs moderated

Clicking the icon or forum title will navigate the user to the moderate posts screen. When the moderator first sees the list of posts, it is a top to bottom list which has the oldest posts at the top. The top most post is the post which has been in the queue of this forum the longest. For each post, you will see its subject in the upper left. In the left user area you will see the link to the user‟s profile, which is seen when clicking their alias, with the number of posts they have contributed and had approved as their total post count.
Below that is the date they joined the community, which is their site registration date. To the right of that is the time the post was submitted, with a list of moderation actions below that which look like buttons. An example of this view is shown in Figure 3.

Figure 3 –Moderate Posts: Single post awaiting approval

Approving a Post

After reading the post in the moderation queue, you are going to want to do one of several actions. The first is approving the post. You can approve a post one of four ways. The first option is for the moderator to click the Approve button. This will approve the post and fire off any necessary email notifications. When each post is approved, all subscribed users receive an email containing the content of the post. The original poster is also emailed informing them that their post has been approved. After all this happens in the background, the moderator is returned to the screen with a new list of posts to approve, if any remain in the specific forum.

The moderator could click the Reply link, which is the last second button displayed from the left. Clicking this will approve the post and take the moderator directly to the add post screen as a reply. This will act as a reply to the post you just approved. This is the most convenient way to answer posts as you moderate them. This action is the same as if a user was viewing the approved post and clicked the Reply button.

When a moderator clicks the Edit post link, the normal approval process goes on in the background, but then the moderator is taken to the edit post screen. This allows the moderator to approve the post then quickly make edits to the post and then click update. In the future, inline editing will be performed prior to the post actually being approved.
The Move link is actually another way to approve a post but some other actions occur in that background process. This will be explained shortly. The Move link is only available if the post is the first in the thread. All posts which are replies in a thread cannot be moved but instead they can be split, which will also be explained shortly.

Deleting a Moderated Post

The point of moderation is to be able to remove or alter posts which are found to be not acceptable. Because of this, you need a way of deleting posts which are found to break your policy. Deleting a post keeps it from showing up to all users who are able to view the forum the post was posted in. Deleting a post removes it from the database and there will be no record this post ever existed.

To delete a post, you would follow the same process as approving except you would click the delete button. This is going to navigate you to the Delete Post screen. This area gives you the option of clearing the posts content completely or simply deleting the post. There is an area for you to send the user details on why their post is being cleared or deleted. This is sent to them via email. After this is finished, the moderator is navigated back to where they came from by clicking the delete button at the bottom of the screen and accepting the warning popup.

Figure 4- Delete post screen

Moving a Thread

Often, users post topics in a forum that are much more appropriate in a different forum. Because of this, the ability is here to move an entire thread. Before I explain how to do that I think there are a few things you should understand before doing so based on a couple of different scenarios.

No Moderation to Moderated

All posts are approved and will move to the new forum you assign during the move process. This is normally not something that you have to think about.

Moderated to No Moderation

This scenario requires slightly more caution. Posts that are approved will move along with the thread to the new assigned forum. Posts that are not approved will be automatically approved and will also be moved to the new forum.

Moving a Post from the Moderate Posts View

When a moderator is in this view, they will see the last link on the right entitled Move. If the post is the first post of a thread, thus the author clicked the New Thread button to post it, this button will be enabled. If this post is a reply or quote, the moderator will see the Move button disabled and instead will see the Split link enabled. If the move link is enabled, the moderator would click the move link and then they would be navigated to the Move Thread screen which is shown in Figure 5.

Figure 5- Move thread view

To move a thread you must click the plus icon to expand the group and display a list of forums to move the post to. Once the moderator has selected a forum to move the thread to, by clicking a forum name in the expanded list, they should check the Email users of Thread Move if they want all subscribed users to the thread to receive an email notification that the thread has been moved. To finish the process, simply click the move thread link located towards the bottom of the screen. When complete, the moderator will be navigated to the moved thread‟s post view and the post will be approved.

Splitting a Thread

Splitting a thread is very similar to moving a thread. As previously outlined, a thread can only be moved if it is the first post in the thread. All other posts in a thread which were not the first post must be split, if they require separation from the original post topic in the thread. One major difference between move and split is that splitting allows moderators to create a new thread which can be located in the same forum or a different forum, unlike moving which requires the thread be moved to a different forum. Splitting also allows the option of selecting the individual posts in the thread which will be split as well. This allows a moderator to select a group of posts in a thread and create a new topic from it. This is ideal in threads when separate topics may be contained within the same thread.

Clicking the Split link will navigate the moderator to the split thread screen. From this screen the moderator can select the additional posts they wish to move into the new thread. Remember, the original post in the thread cannot be split and the one which was originally selected to be split will be pre-selected for you. An example of this screen can be seen in Figure 6.

Figure 6 – Split thread screen

Moderating Posts from the Post View Area

There are several reasons moderation goes beyond just the queuing of messages for approval or deletion. One is moderators sometimes have to edit, delete, or move posts after approval. Sometimes posts that were posted by trusted users need to be edited, deleted, or moved as well.
All links to do the moderation actions are located in the post details section of each post for those who have proper permissions. The Move button is only displayed in the original post of the thread, and when not available the split button is used in its place. All these actions listed here behave identical to the same named actions in “Moderating Posts from the Moderation Queue” section.

Figure 7- Single post in posts view

Editing a Post

Editing a post is done by clicking the edit button in the post you wish to edit. This will take you to the edit post screen. From here you can edit the subject, content, attachments, set it as pinned, or lock the thread for no further replies. This area is explained in further detail later on in this document.

Deleting a Post

Deleting a post is done by clicking the delete button here. This will navigate you to a delete post area. There is an area for you to send the user details on why their post is being cleared or deleted. This is sent to them via email. If a post is deleted, it is removed from the database. The moderator would then be redirected back to the place they came from, if it still exists.

Moving a Thread

This is identical to the one described previously in this document. For further details please see the “Moving a Post from the Moderate Posts View” section.

Splitting a Thread

This section is also identical to the one of the same name from the previous section of this document.

Moderators Managing Users

Depending on a forum‟s configuration settings, moderators are capable of managing users within the forum to a certain degree. They can change trust status as well as alter user signatures. All of this is done from the user profile screen of the user the moderator wishes to alter.

Trusting Users

Trusting a user means they can post to a moderated forum without going through the approval process. If a moderator wants to trust a user but isn‟t an administrator, they can do so by going to the user‟s profile. This is done by clicking a user alias from anywhere within the module. From here, there is a section titled “Moderator Settings”. Click to expand it, then check the Is Trusted checkbox and hit the update button. Keep in mind that trusted users also have the rights to edit their own posts. If you are an administrator, you will also see a Manage User button which will take you to that user‟s settings where the trust status can also be managed.

Signature Edits

Sometimes moderators need to edit user signatures for various reasons. This could be because it doesn‟t adhere to policy, or a number of any other reasons. If the module is configured for moderator signature edits, this will also be accessible in the user‟s profile page as shown in Figure 8.

Figure 8 – User profile screen, this is only available to moderators

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