GETTING STARTED WITH YAHOO! GROUPS
 

Making a Group Site for your EV Online course

With these directions open, open a second browser window and go to Yahoo! Groups at http://groups.yahoo.com.  This will let you refer to the directions as you fill in the required information.
 

Getting a Yahoo! ID

• First get a Yahoo! ID and email address and set up a Profile.  To do this, visit  http://edit.yahoo.com/config/eval_register and sign up for an account.
   
• If you already have a Yahoo! ID and email address, please sign in.
   
• Be sure to check the box Remember my ID on this computer.
   

Creating your own group

• Visit Yahoo! Groups at http://groups.yahoo.com.
   
• Click on Start a group now under Create your own group.

Step 1 of 3: Select a Yahoo! Groups Category

• Select the category Schools & Education and subgroup Distance Learning.
   
• Click on Place my group here.

Step 2 of 3: Describe Your Group

• Decide on a name for your group.  It's easiest to make it all one word with no spaces. For example, if you are doing a course on "Using the Internet to teach writing," you might call it internetwriting. You may also use two or more words, e.g. Internet Writing. Choose wisely, as this name will appear at the top of your group page.
   
• Next, decide on the email address for your group. It is simplest if you just use the name of your group for your email address. So in the example above, just use internetwriting (Yahoo adds the tag, @yahoogroups.com).  If you have spaces in your group's name, be sure to write the e-mail address as one word or use underscoring, e.g., Internet_Writing.
   
• Next, type in a short description of your EVO session in the box Describe your Group. This description will also appear on your Group's front page. Click Continue at the bottom of the page.

Step 3 of 3: Select your Yahoo! Profile and Email Address

• Select the email address where you want to receive mail from your Yahoo! Group. You will also be asked to choose a Profile (some people have more than one for different purposes), or if you do not have one yet, please click Create a Profile and complete the information that you would like others in your Yahoo! Group to know about you, e.g. your real name, location, gender, occupation, hobbies, favorite quote, and homepage if you have one.  Finally, type in the security word you see under Word Verification at the bottom of the page (this is to ensure a real person is setting up the group). Click Continue at the bottom of the page.
   
• You should now be on the page that says Congratulations! Your group xxx has been created . You will want to click on Customize Group in order to continue setting it up. (If you want a little break at this point, you can also edit your group later by going to its address and clicking on Management. There is a related explanatory file in the Setting up a YG Folder at our group training site.)
   
• We suggest you don't invite members yet--explore your group a little first.  Or if you wish, click to invite your co-moderator or your mentor(s). You will need their e-mail addresses.
   

Customizing Your Group

There is a nice explanatory page to get you started with the "wizard." Click Get Started, and don't worry, you can change things from the Management area of your group itself.

Step 1: Membership options

It is suggested that you customize your group to make it unlisted, allow people to join only with approval, and allow only group members to post messages (private discussion group).  Doing so will prevent spammers from leaving messages.  See the illustration below, using a hypothetical "testgroup05":

Click Next to continue.

Step 2: Messages and Features

See the illustration below for the settings we recommend: messages delivered immediately (without approval by you), all group members receive messages, and all web features will be active.   Having messages delivered directly will help you manage the amount of mail for the group.  If you have dozens of messages to approve each day, the discussion will bog down very quickly.  If you receive spam, you, as moderator, can delete it and ban the spammer. You will also want all Web features available so that members can archive good resources, files, and links.

Click [Next] to continue.

Step 3: Privacy Issues--message archives and web features

• The next illustration shows the settings for who the archives should be available to.  We recommend that only members be allowed to view archives and access the web features of the group.  Thus, select "members" for all options.

• Click Finish to continue.

• You should now be at the second Congratulations! page.  Click on Go to Group to see how it looks.  You can invite people from the Members area there. 

• While at your Group, click on MANAGEMENT (see illustration); then, under Group Settings, click Messages.  On the Group Settings page, click Edit to change the Posting and Archives options.

• Select the Remove option under Attachments.  This will allow only email messages without file attachments to be sent in order to prevent viruses, porn, and spam.  Files can instead be uploaded to the Files area in the Yahoo! Group.

• Click Save Changes.

Please refer to the Settings tutorial on the Index page at http://daf4.free.fr/settings/yg-index.htm for further instructions on customizing your Yahoo! Group.