eCommunity For Students

http://ecommunity.ucf.edu

The eCommunity is used throughout the university as a means for students and faculty to send e-mail to the entire class or individual students. Your instructor may use it to send class announcements and course adjustments. They may also require you to send copies of completed assignments to them or as a way for you to get to know your classmates.

It works like a Distribution List. The eCommunity is a database that provides an e-mail function as well as biographical information for each student in the course. It is separate or outside of the WebCT portion of your course.

Accessing eCommunity

1. To access the eCommunity, click on the "eCommunity" button in the left navigation panel.
2. Click on the "Enter" link.
3. The new screen will ask for your UserID and Password. You will use your NID to enter the eCommunity. The NID is the "Network ID" used to identify UCF students for computer labs, e-mail, your pages (on Pegasus) and your WebCT classes. The NID is also used to gain access to the "eCommunity." (You can obtain your NID at https://connect.ucf.edu ) The NID follows the convention in this example:
   Example:
   We will login as Smokey The Bear, who was born December 19, 1982.
   

   The NID is: sm721630
   (where "sm" are the first two letters of the first name and "721630" is a six-digit randomly-generated number)

   The initial Password will be the letter P (uppercase) and your birthdate. We enter P821219 (where 82 is the year, 12 is the month, and 19 the day)

4. Once you have entered this information, click on the "Login" button.
5. You are now in the database. The classes you have registered for will appear under My UCF Communities. If you have signed up for more than one course, you will see more than one choice.
6. Click on the link for the course. You will be able to view the class roll. This gives you a list of the students in your class and their preferred e-mail addresses, (providing they have entered this information into the database). This is the list of students in this particular class.
7. To view a student's biography, click on their name. Notice also they can choose a picture of themselves and have their preferred e-mail address listed. (E-mail within WebCT cannot be sent to your preferred address.)
8. Click the "Go Back" button to view other students in the class roll.

Creating Your Profile

1. Click on the “Profile” button in the left navigation panel. From this screen, “Student Profile/Edit Profile”, you can enter your biographical information.
2. Homepage address: Enter your homepage address, if you have one.
3. E-mail address: Enter your e-mail address. If you prefer your e-mail address to be the same as the address entered in Polaris, click the radio button next to “Polaris”. Otherwise, click the radio button next to “Other E-mail” and enter your preferred e-mail address in the text box.
4. Mail program setting controls what happens when you click on an e-mail link or when you click on the “Mail” button inside eCommunity. Select “External” - , to have your browser open your preferred e-mail program (for example - Outlook, Netscape Mail, Eudora, etc.) when you click on an e-mail link. Select “Internal” - to use eCommunity’s own e-mail program. The Internal e-mail program has fewer features but will work if your computer has trouble opening an e-mail program.
5. Access type restricts the student population who have access to your e-mail address and biography.
   • Select “University”, to allow anyone in the university to find your information.
   • Select “Major,” to allow only students within your major to have access.
   • Select “Class”, to allow only students within your class to have access to your information.
6. Biography: Enter a short bio in the text box provided. Remember to only enter information that you want to make public. You can create your bio in a word processor and then copy and paste it to the text box. If you desire, you can use html codes to improve the appearance of the text or add a link, but it is not required.
7. Picture: Click in the radio button next to your desired picture option. If you use one of the “generic picture” caricatures, you need to be sure to also click in the radio button next to the desired image.
8. Click the “Update” button to save your profile information. At this point, you can review the information listed. If something is incorrect, click on the “Edit” button to return to the Edit Profile screen.
9. *** There is one very IMPORTANT thing you need to know about the information you just entered:
   The e-mail address you entered is the one used throughout your class by your classmates and your instructor to send you e-mail. If your e-mail address changes, YOU must go into the eCommunity again and enter the correct e-mail address.

Send an E-mail

1. Scroll down and select the student to whom you want to send e-mail by clicking the check box next to their name. You can select several, however, if these students have not entered their preferred e-mail address, they will not receive the e-mail.
2. Click the "Mail" button. If your browser is configured correctly for your e-mail, you can type in a subject and then type a message and select send.
3. If the email is returned or is not sent, check the Internet Options or Preference settings of your browser to make sure the settings list your email program. You can also change the settings in your eCommunity Profile to use the "Internal" e-mail option. This will allow you to e-mail without having to worry about the browser settings, however, you may not have all of the options as you do within your preferred e-mail program.
4. If you choose to e-mail the entire class, you simply click the "Select All" button in the middle of the page. Then click the "Mail" Button.
5. When you're finished, you click the "Logout" button and close the eCommunity window. You will then be back at the home page for your course.

Help

If at any time, you need help while in the eCommunity, it is just a click away. You will see question mark icons throughout the community. When you click on the icon, you will see detailed information about a particular feature of eCommunity.