GUIDE TO THE EVS PLATFORM http://evssd.

eu/elgg/

Carl von Ossietzky Universitt Leuphana Open Universiteit Universitt Lneburg

International Sakharov Environmental University

Charles University Prague University of Antwerp FernUniversitt Hagen Karl Franzens Universitt Graz University of Bucharest University of Maribor Universidade Aberta University of the Aegean

Introduction

The heart of the EVS is group work on case studies in sustainable development. These groups are composed of students of different nationalities, universities and disciplines. Many of them have never met in real life, nor have they met their tutor or case study expert before. Yet they have to collaborate intensively to produce high quality outcomes. To enable collaboration in a web-based environment, social factors are important. The environment must facilitate the establishment of social relations and sense of community. This is why, after 10 years of running EVS on a Blackboard platform, we now run EVS on a social network platform (based on Elgg open source software). The new EVS platform has a range of facilities and tools to help both students and staff to get to know each other and to stimulate the sense of belonging to a community, the EVS community. In this guide, I will introduce you to the structure, the tools and the rules of the new, social EVS platform. If you have any comments, questions or suggestions for improvement of this guide, please place it as a comment to this document on the EVS platform.

Joop de Kraker, October 2011

Structure of the platform

The platform is composed of three main elements: home page group pages profile pages

Home page: This page is both the external, public face of the EVS community and the portal to the community. As the external face of the EVS community, it gives visitors a flavour of the community: the members, the activities, the groups and the topics discussed in EVS. For the members of the EVS community it functions as a portal. After login, it provides access to your personal profile, your groups and the tools of the platform. It also gives you inside information about the state of the EVS community: news, latest activities, new members, groups, and tag cloud. Note that the information on the home page changes after you have logged in. This is because for every contribution on the platform a specific level of access can be set, ranging from public to logged in users to private. 2

Group pages: The group is where it happens in EVS. The most important groups are EVS Students, EVS Staff and the case study groups. In the group, you will find tools for informing, discussing, and sharing at group level. Profile pages: The profile pages for the members of the EVS community are extremely important, because they give faces to the community. This is meant both literally (with a photo) and by way of speaking (with personal information). In addition to the information in your profile, you can also use the profile page to post files, photos or blogs; in fact, anything you want to share which is relevant to the EVS community. The message board allows you to leave a note at another members profile page.

Tools of the platform

The tools of the platform can be accessed in many ways, but the most important way is through the top menu bars. These menu bars are always available, wherever you are on the platform. On the green top bar, you find a number of options that do not represent different tools, but are meant for navigation to specific pages on the platform: Home, My profile, Course info, and EVS stages. It also has the Log out button and a Search box. The mailing tool (My mail) in EVS is of limited use: you can only send individual messages to personal contacts. The idea is that the other communication tools make a special mail functionality unnecessary. However, there is an alternative to checking the platform every day for new posts: the notification tool. Access to this tool is a bit complicated (we hope to change this!). If you point with the cursor at My profile you will see your avatar appearing together with three tool icons: Edit profile, Edit icon and Settings. If you choose the latter option, you are confronted with a new set of options, including Notifications and Group notifications. You can (and are strongly urged to) use the Group notifications to receive Email messages when new content is added to the groups you are a member of. (In EVS we will not use or explain the Site option). You can use the Notifications option to be informed when actions are performed on your own content (e.g., when another member comments on a file you have uploaded to the platform). You can also use it to follow (as in Twitter) specific members of the EVS community (your contacts), and you will receive an Email message when this member makes a contribution to the platform.

On the white top bar, you find the major tools of the platform. Members gives you access to the list of EVS community members. The tab Newest gives the complete list of all members in order of latest addition. The tab Popular gives the list of best connected members. The tab Active shows which members are currently logged in. User search via tag is still dysfunctional, but User search via name works well. The members list not only gives you access to the profiles of the members but also allows you to perform actions on the members without the need to first go to their profile page. If you point with the cursor at the lower right corner of a profile picture in the list, a triangle appears on which you can click. Among the list of options that then becomes available is Make contact. If you make a member of the EVS community a contact, you can follow the activity of this member on the platform through Email notifications (see explanation above). Groups gives the list of all groups in the EVS community, similar to Members. This tool can also be used to create new, special purpose groups. Although any member of the network can do this, you are requested not to do this without permission from the EVS Central coordinator. Contacts gives the list of all members who are your contacts or who have made you their contact. (Note that this is not the same in effect: you may want to follow John, but John may not want to follow you.) If you click on Contacts in the menu you can make and see collections of contacts. Collections are useful when you want to follow tailor-made groups of members or to give them access rights to your contributions on the platform. Pages gives the list of all pages on the platform and allows you to comment, edit and add web pages to the platform. The advantage of pages over files is that the content is directly visible in the browser, there is no need to open it in another application such as Word. Files gives the list of all files (of various types) on the platform and allows you to upload files to the platform. Note that when you use this option, the file will be placed on your profile page! To upload files to your group, you should use the Group files option in the group. As with all contributions on the platform, Files provides the option to place comments to the particular contribution. Blogs and Photos are tools similar to Files and the same explanation applies. Google Docs and Skype are external tools for group work. Separate registration and log in is required for these tools. When you did not log in to an external tool before logging in on the EVS platform, these menu options will bring you to the general homepage of these external tools.

The tools of the EVS platform are not only available through the top menu bars, but also at the group and profile pages. At group level, the tools can be found in the left hand menu. These tools allow you to contribute various forms of content to the group: discussion posts, pages, blog posts or files. All posts are visible and can be accessed and commented upon through the various widgets on the group page (blocks with collections of contributions of a certain type). The discussion tool is only available at group level. Be aware that this is a rather simple discussion tool, allowing only structuring at one level (per topic) and not by multiple threads within one topic. The idea of the EVS social network platform is that comments and discussions can take place around contributions in the group (e.g., files), and not that all contributions are discussed in the discussion forum. As a social network platform, the EVS platform offers group members ample opportunity not only to contribute content, but also to comment and rate contributions, to filter information (with RSS feeds) and to share with other social networks (with the Share tool). In case of sharing with other social networks, you do not have to worry about privacy issues. Access rights are set at the level of individual contributions by the contributor. If a person does not have access rights (e.g., because it is not a logged in user), that person cannot access the contribution you are sharing. At profile level, the specific tools are limited to edit functions (for profile icon/avatar, profile text fields and profile page layout). Note that when using the contribution tools from the green menu bar (pages, files, blogs, photos), all these contributions will be placed on your profile page. To make contributions to a group, use the tool menu in that particular group.

Rules of the platform

The EVS platform is a social network platform. This means that the users (student or staff members of the EVS community) are in control. To prevent total chaos, the rights of the users have been limited to some extent by the administrator, but still the users are in control of functions vital to the effective operation of the platform. The two major functions concern: Setting access rights: Whenever you make a contribution to the platform, you will have to set the level of access to this particular contribution. The default level is logged in users and most of the time this is appropriate. However, for many of the

contributions in the case study group, access should be limited to the members of that particular group. In case of doubt, consult the EVS central coordinator. Tagging: Whenever you make a contribution to the platform, you will have the option to add tags and often also to indicate categories. Tags and categories make your contribution searchable. In a social network, this function to find relevant content is very important because most of the content is not neatly organized into structured folders or hierarchical menus. The difference between tags and categories is that tags are free form, you can make any tag you think appropriate. The advantage of tags over predefined categories is that tags are shown in the tag cloud at the home page. The tag cloud allows you to see what the major topics are in the EVS community and by clicking on a tag in the cloud, the search function is activated for all contributions with that particular tag.