Chat

Chats are scheduled real-time discussions. More informal than regular Discussions (which provide a more structured setting, better-suited to long-form compositions), chats are meant more for conversations, quick thoughts, real-time replies, and so on.

The lifecycle of a chat:

1. The course instructor schedules the chat.
2. Once the chat's start time has arrived, everyone in the course—teachers, students, auditors—can participate in the conversation.
3. The chat ends when A) either a new chat begins or B) the instructor ends the chat session.
4. After the chat has ended, anyone in the course can review its transcript.

Get to a chat

Go to the course and click the Chat view. You'll see a list of chat transcripts with the current chat at the top. Click the current chat to read the conversation and contribute to it. Click a transcript to read a past chat.

What can you do in a chat?

Obviously, you can write stuff and post it. Just type or copy-paste text and post it to the chat (either click Send Message or hit the Enter key on your keyboard). You can also...

• Upload a file: Just choose a file from your computer and click upload. If someone else posts a file, just click the filename to download it to your computer.
• Use emoji:Emoji are silly little cartoon-like characters. So of course we felt we had to include them in Populi. Use them to lighten up the chat.
• Embed stuff: Embed a URL from YouTube, Vimeo, Scribd, Instagram, or any image URL to post it directly into the chat.