Welcome to "dlio", the space we will be using for the online community phase of the UdG Agora. This is like a discussion board you use in a Learning Management, but with more flexible features. It is an open source community platform called discourse. If you are curious, see a topic from last year that explains the reason for our choosing "dilo" a the name for this place.
Dilo is a Public Space
The Agora is an open place and dlio is public to the world to read However, we limit the people who can write or converse those who are part of the UdG Agora project. Participants from 2015 may show up too.
Your first task is to log in with information you will receive by email during our face to face sessions in June, 2016. If you are reading this, you likely got an email with a special link that will create your account.
Navigating
In dilo, you begin discussions with a new topic and other people then reply, much like other discussion boards. When you enter dilo, the first view will show the newest (Latest) topics first:
And you can use the top links to view topics or replies within topics that you have read or not read. The Top link presents the most popular topics in terms of numbers of views and replies. Topics are also organized into three possible categories:
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Open Agora (2016) is our main discussion/conversation area. You can starte new topics here and/or respond to ones started by other people
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Noticias (2016) include important announcements from UDG Agora facilitators. You can reply to any topics if you have a question about an announcement.
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Dilo Tips (2016) includes information to help you use dilo. You can reply to any topics if you have a question about an announcement.
Customizing Your Account
One of the first things you should do is edit your profile on this site- use the icon in the upper right corner, and select Preferences from the menu.
One important setting is you can change the language of the interface (all of the menus and button names) to be in Spanish rather than English. Just select es under Interface Language
You can enter information about yourself, select an image to use on your profile background (see my profile @cogdog and your card (the small window that shows on the site when you hover over your name)-- here is what you see if you click my icon anywhere on the site
You can also decide how much email the site should send you as notifications, or for your computer, to turn on small pop up notifications when their is activity on your posts.
Communicating in dlio
We engage here in conversation, each one starts as a topic, with a series of replies. You have tools on each post or reply to 
bookmark it (if you want to remember it) or to 
"like" it.
You can "mention" people like in twitter with the @ symbol, just start typing their name like @nancyw or @tannis to indicate them (this will notify them as well they have been mentioned).
There also useful tools to reply to someone else's post. If you highlight a block of text, you will see an option to "Quote Reply"
This starts a new post with an indicated quote from the source. In this way, you provide a connection from your post to what someone else has written.
For tips on using the dlio editor and other tools, see http://dilo.theagoraonline.net/t/some-tips-for-using-dilo/61
Give these a try in your first week!
What's Next?
- Practice finding your way around dilo
- Customize your profile (Look for Preferences under your icon menu in the top right)
- Send a greeting or reply to someone else's message in the Open Agora area
- Keep doing Daily Tries
