Take a tour of Aurora
Welcome to Aurora. We've put together this video training course to help you get familiar with key features and concepts about Khoros' re-imagined Community Experience. This 12-video series is grouped by four community roles: Managers Moderators Developers Members The entire course takes about 1 hourto complete. Note: We will be updating these videos and adding new ones as we continue to roll out new Aurora features. Subscribe to this article to be notified when new videos are available. Community Managers Community Overview Building your community structure Designing your site Configuring feature settings Roles and permissions Gamification Measuring success Community overview (3:49) Building your community structure (6:03) Designing your site (7:54) Configuring feature settings (4:52) Roles and permissions (4:51) Gamification (4:23) Measuring success (3:08) Community Moderators Moderating your community (9:14) Community Developers Getting Started as a Developer Getting Started with Handlebars Creating Handlebars GraphQL API Getting Started as a Developer(4:58) Getting Started with Handlebars(6:56) Creating Handlebars(4:20) GraphQL API (3:54) Community Members Personalize your community experience Getting around and finding the content you want Contributing to the community Using your inbox Personalize your community experience (3:45) Getting around and finding the content you want (1:54) Contributing to the community (4:55) Using your inbox (2:46) What to read next: Getting Started as an Administrator Getting Started as a Community Manager Getting Started as a Site DesignerWhat's changed in Aurora from Community Classic
This article captures some of the high-level changes (terminology, features, and concepts) that have changed (or will be changing) in Aurora from Community Classic. Terminology changes For Aurora, we have updated several terms that were previously used in Community Classic. Kudos are now called Likes. Subscriptions are now called Follows. Discussion Styles are now called Content Types. Content Types is the collective term used to describe the different types of boards community supports (forums, knowledge bases, blogs, etc.). Group Hubs are now called Groups. Tags and labels have been combined are now just all called Tags. There are two types of tags (preset and freeform). Tool changes and enhancements The site-building tool Studio has been replaced with Designer and Dev Tools. In Aurora Designer, you can edit your site’s Theme and manage Page Templates. In a future release, you'll also use this area to manage Email Templates and text strings. In the Dev Tools, you will find the tools needed to develop and customize your site. The Content Editor has been enhanced with several new features and meets accessibility requirements. Auto-save is enabled by default for all content types. Members have access to full version history of content with the ability to Delete, Edit, Compare, and Restore versions. Integration with Unsplash image libraries for Blog cover images and Page Template sections. Community Analytics is no longer a separate tool and now is built into the Community application. Where did it go? Not sure where something moved to? Here’s a list of some of the bigger things that have moved to a new place in Aurora: Admin Settings: Several of the settings pages have been simplified (or removed) and grouped differently. Settings pages that used to be in the “Community Admin” or “Admin” area are now available under Settings. Each card (tab) groups related settings into a new page. As we continue to build out more Aurora features, more cards/tabs will be added to the Settings area. Content Management Areas: Most content-related management tasks (find and edit drafts, review and manage reported abusive content, Spam Quarantine, and Moderation) are now performed from the Manage Content space: Developer Experience Aurora is built on the philosophy that internal and external developers should have access to the same development tools, empowering everyone involved with your community's user experience while providing a seamless, simple, and powerful SDK to help you get the most our of Khoros Communities. Why React? We chose React to power the web layer of our technology stack because of its ubiquitous nature and powerful built-in toolset. React, coupled with React Bootstrap, offers developers the ability to create powerful customizations to the user interface without losing out on the popular Bootstrap DLS that has been a part of the success of Khoros Communities over the years. Add the powerful Apollo Client state management library makes takes the communication between your React components and your community's data to the next level. It provides GraphQL call management, a catchable data store that monitors and responds to data updates. This update gives developers a better toolkit without taking away some of the most popular time-saving capabilities our developer community has come to appreciate. Why GraphQL? GraphQL is the query language for all of Aurora's APIs. This solution is consistent across our entire user interface, giving external developers the same backend experience we use to create Aurora's built-in features. REST API served us well in Khoros Communities for many years, but in Aurora, we wanted to give developers access to a more precise, flexible, and capable API to make data more accessible across the board. Where communities once relied on custom REST endpoints or multiple individual calls to retrieve necessary data, GraphQL can handle multiple operations at one time, and return only the data you need when you need it.Aurora recommended font and image file types and sizes
Throughout the Aurora community, you’ll find many different features that support images, such as page templates, ranks, and badges. Below, you'll find required and/or recommended sizes and file types for various features. Avatars Admins: SVG, JPG, or PNG format Square image required Minimum recommended dimensions: 300px square Badges PNG or SVG format Note: SVG images might not currently load properly in email notifications. Minimum recommended dimensions: 240 px square Custom fonts TTF, WOFF, or WOFF2 format Favicon PNG format Minimum dimensions: 512 px square Hero banner image JPG or PNG format Maximum recommended size: 2000 x 600 px or a similar ratio An image without text or logos is best; the hero area is designed responsively and the visible area may change based on viewport. Logo PNG or SVG format Size is flexible; you can update Logo Height within Designer > Page Templates > Header & Footer. Content images Blog banner images Otherwise, use a large, quality image and it will be resized for you. JPG or PNG Recommended dimensions: 800 x 500px Post images JPG or PNG Member has a choice on size; image will be resized on upload. Place avatars SVG format 400px square Ranks PNG or SVG format Uploaded images are converted to 16 pixels in height and up to 100 pixels in width wherever they appear in the community (square images will be 16 px by 16 px). Note: Your image will be scaled to fit the supported dimensions, so we don’t recommend using a really tall image as it will be difficult to see when it’s scaled to 16 pixels high.Glossary of common Community Aurora terms
Here's a list of common terms you'll encounter when using an Aurora community. Note: Some of the glossary terms presented here might be for features or terms not yet available in the Aurora Community experience, but will be as we continue to build toward feature parity with Community Classic. Accepted Solution: A reply to a message that contains a solution or answer to a posted problem/question that has been marked as the solution by the person who posed the question. Administrator: Community administrators are responsible for configuring how community features behave, setting up member roles and permissions, and building out the overall community structure (board, forums, categories). Community Administrators do most of their work in Community Settings, Page Builder, and Theme Editor. Analytics: Place when you can view reports and dashboards to gain insight about site traffic, member engagement, and other valuable community metrics. Article:A post in a Knowledge Base; post is the generic term. Replies to articles are called comments. Attachment: A file (for example, an image, PDF, or ZIP file) that has been uploaded and associated with a post. Avatar: A graphical representation (visual icon) for a community member or place on the community. Badge: A badge is a type of visual reward that community members can earn for completing specific community actions or for achieving important community milestones. Badges are a great way to encourage members to use different community features and spend more time engaging with the community. Blog: Contains member-generated posts where entries are made in journal style and typically displayed in a reverse chronological order. Board: A collection of posts and comments/replies within a community content place. Category:The second level in a community's hierarchy; a subdivision of a community. Categories can also be nested within other categories. Comment: A member-added reply in response to an article (not intended to be a discussion). Content Types: The different content features (forum, blog, knowledge base, etc.) supported on an Aurora community (called Discussion Styles in Community Classic). Contest: Community feature that enables you to engage community members and stimulate interest in a community by hosting idea competitions to solicit feedback from community members. (Not yet available.) Community Developer: Community developers are responsible for building out the community site and customizing its look and feel to match the corporate branding guidelines, extending the platform to provide custom features, and publishing changes to the community stage and production sites. Community developers spend most of their time in the Designer area or using other Khoros and third-party tools to design and build their site. Content Editor: The main writing tool for community content (called the Message Editor in Community Classic). Discussion: A combination of topic posts and replies between community members in a forum. Event: A collection of community-hosted activities (seminars, meet-ups, conferences). You can notify community members of online or in-person events by publishing them in the Events calendar. Floated Message: A post that has been deemed of sufficient importance or commonality that a moderator or admin has pinned it to the top of the board. (Not yet available.) Follow: Ability for a member to be notified of new activity in topics, boards, categories, or members that they are interested in (called Subscribe in Community Classic). Forum: A place for members to ask questions or start discussions on a topic related to the content theme (a product or service, for example) for that forum. GraphQL:GraphQL is an open-source data query and manipulation language for APIs and a runtime for fulfilling queries with existing data. GraphQL is the main way to access Khoros Community APIs via the Aurora experience. Group:Groups deliver an enhanced experience for Community members to engage around a common theme or purpose. Each group has its own configurable set of content types (forum, blog, knowledge base) to organize content and communication. You must be a member of a group to participate in that group. Group memberships can be open, closed, or hidden. Ideasboard: A content area that enables members to submit suggestions to the company that hosts the community. Knowledge Base: A collection of informative, brand-trusted articles about a particular topic. Knowledge Bases are made up of articles with comments. Leaderboard: A list of objects that highlights the top objects of a particular functionality; for example, a tagging leaderboard could be represented as a list of members ordered and highlighted by how many tags each member has used. (Not yet available.) Likes: Units of approval, like a thumbs-up, given to a post (called Kudos in Community Classic). Member: Community members are community users who have signed up and registered with the community. Community members can be assigned specific roles, earn ranks and badges, and build an online reputation in their community profile. Community members spend all their time on the community boards and forums. Mentions: When members are mentioned in posts, they are sent emails to let them know. A way to call out specific members in their posts and invite them to join the conversation. You can also mention content. Moderator: Community moderators interact with community members by publishing new articles and responding to posts and questions. Moderators also protect the integrity of the content being posted on the community by reviewing content for appropriateness and relevancy. Moderators spend most of their time on the community site or in Khoros moderator tools. Page Templates: Aurora tool used to design layouts for pages for your community site. Tool you use to view and publish site changes. Permission: A community setting that can be granted or denied to community members. Through permissions and roles, community admins can control exactly what each person can do or see on the community. Place: A designation of placement in the community. As such, you can have a community-level place, category (or container) places, or board-level places (forum, knowledge base, blog). Post: A message, article, comment, reply submitted to a community; the generic term for all types of content. Also, the act of submitting content to the community. Private Message: Messages members can send to other community members from their Inbox rather than posting them publicly; similar to email but only a community username is required. Profile: Published personal information about a member. Rank: An achieved level of performance (usually based on a combination of the quality and quantity of the member's engagement) recognized within the community. Ratings: A light-weight way for community members to vote on the relative value of content in the community. (Not yet available.) Reply: A comment made by a community member in a forum discussion. Role: An admin-defined set of permissions that enables users who have the role to to view or do certain things on the community. Single Sign On (SSO): Enables member authentication using the customer's directory as the master. Can be implemented either with cookies or without (using long URLs). Spam Quarantine: Khoros Community feature that enables customers to monitor/review the posts that get automatically categorized as spam by the system. Tag: A type of metadata involving the association of descriptors with objects. Tags can be freeform (created by any community member) or preset (pre-defined by the Community Administrator.) In Community Classic, preset tags were called labels. Theme editor: Area where you can design the look and feel of your community site (colors, fonts, etc.) to match your brand. Thread: A collection of related posts, such as a post and its replies. User: An unregistered community participant (as opposed to a fully registered member). Widget: A self-contained, customizable component (like a recent topics list or contributing members list) you can add to a community page.Flood controls for Aurora communities
With Khoros, there are limits on how often people are allowed to post, upload images, videos, and attachments, tag content, send private messages, and other community actions before triggering flood controls. Flood controls are in place to help combat potential spam. Note: Those with the Administrator and Moderator role are exempt from flood control restrictions; these thresholds affect only regular members. The following table lists the default flood rate settings for various actions performed by the member within a specified period of time. Actions Flood Controls Post content A member can't post more than: 3 posts in 30 seconds 15 posts in 10 minutes 50 posts in an hour Send Private Messages A member can't send more than: 1 private message in 30 seconds 5 private messages in 10 minutes 20 private messages in an hour Upload Images A member can't upload more than: 100 images at a time 1000 images per day 1000 images in the community Upload Videos A member can’t upload more than 50 videos per day in the community. Upload Attachments Members can’t upload more than 100 attachments per post per day. Like content A member can't give more than: 50 likes per minute 500 likes per hour 5000 likes per day Tag content A member can’t add more than: 20 tags per minute 500 tags per hour 5000 tags per day Mention people A member can’t mention more than 10 members in a single post. To configure these flood controls, contact the Support team.Aurora Accessibility Support
Accessibility is a critical component for communities that want to ensure their web content is accessible to people with disabilities. Aurora strives for a WCAG AA level of compliance for all the major community features. To ensure that we meet these standards, we have rigorous internal testing (automated and manual) that are part of the standard Aurora development process. Each release, we test keyboard navigation, heading levels, field labels, and interactive page elements to make sure that content is accessible and being read out correctly by screen readers.We also use a third-party vendor to manually assess the user flows, identifying and resolving accessibility violations. As part of the Aurora site-creation experience, we have also added several accessibility features. Alt Text for Images Members can add alt text while uploading images to the content on the community. Screen-reader friendly headings Admins can add headings for widgets that are visible only to screen readers. Color Contrast Verification The Theme editor's contrast-checker ensures that there is sufficient contrast between the background colors and foreground colors you choose. Skip to Content link on navigation bar From the navigation bar, you have the option to skip past repetitive content and go directly to the main content. When you navigate with the keyboard, a control appears that enables you to navigate beyond the repeated content.Building your first site on Aurora
Most of the basic concepts and approaches you take to designing and build your community site are the same in Khoros Community Classic as they are in Aurora. Aurora just makes them easier, faster, and more fun. When building your first site, we recommend the following approach. Basics Goals (think before you build): Community Managers are the face of the community. They own the day-to-day management and implementation of the brand’s digital community strategy. As the Community Manager, you are primarily responsible for building and leading your community to align with your company's goals. Apart from these, in support of your company goals, you’ll be working to increase user engagement and advocacy, accelerating innovation, driving sales, and reducing sales costs. Before you start building your community, you must: Understand the audience: Who is the intended audience? What are they looking for? What is their level of experience? Decide the type of content that best: meets the audience needs drives site traffic improves peer-peer communication keeps users engaged Understand the stakeholders or internal audiences, including: Marketing team Product team Support team Analysts Legal team The answers to these questions help you develop a community strategy that connects members and your brand content, leading to the structure of your community. Before you start building your community structure, you must understand what your business is trying to accomplish with your community. Hence, the structure of the community must align with the community's goals and objectives. Site Structure: When you have figured out the overall purpose and goals for your site and a general idea of the categories and boards you want to launch your site with, it's time to build the skeleton for your site. Check out these Community Structure Best Practices, and when you're ready, start building out the structure of your site. Site look and feel: Your site should reflect the colors and personality of your brand. With Aurora Themes, you can create the look and feel for all the visual components of your site. Review your company's brand style guide, and when you're ready to start designing your site's visual theme, head over to the Theme editor in Designer. Page design: Aurora includes a complete set of page templates so that all your category, forum, blog, knowledge base, event, idea, and group pages are consistent. You also have complete control over your Community Home Page and Member Profile Page. Start designing how each page on your site should look. Must-haves Roles and permissions: Roles and permissions control what parts of the community members can access and the actions they can perform. Aurora provides some common roles (admin, moderator, new member) out-of-the-box, but you can also create custom roles to mix permissions and give different members elevated capabilities. Like your community structure, start small and focused. Only add more roles if and when you need them. Learn more about Roles and Permissions. Member and Feature defaults: When you launch your community, you can define precisely what the default settings are for the member experience and each product feature enabled for your community. Check out the Settings area and review the settings for each community area. Beyond the Basics Groups: Groups deliver an enhanced experience for Community members to engage around a common theme or purpose. Each group has its own configurable set of content types (forum, blog, knowledge base) to organize content and communication. Learn more about Groups. Using GraphQL: When you need a bit more power, you (or your community developers) can use GraphQL (Aurora's query language) to access all of Aurora's APIs.Aurora registration and sign-in
Registration is the first step in your community journey. All anonymous users are prompted to sign in to or register with the community when they try to participate (for example, Start Discussion, Reply, Comment, Like, Send Message, Report Abuse). New user registration Sign-in for existing members Supported characters Username Password New user registration In the community you want to join, click Registerat the top-right corner. Enter a Username. This is the name you will be known as in the community. It must be at least 2 characters long and can contain letters, numbers, dashes, and/or underscores. Enter the Email address you want associated with your community account. Enter a strong Password. Learn more about password requirements below. Click the Terms of Service link to read the community’s terms of service, then select I have read and agree to the Terms of Service. You can select Keep me logged in to stay signed in on this device. When this option is active, the system will ask for your password only when updating sensitive account information. For security reasons, don’t use this option on a public device. Click Register. Check your email for the E-Mail Address Verification email sent by Community Mailer, and click the link in that message to verify your email address. Note: All unverified users are prompted to verify their email address before they can participate (e.g., Start Discussion, Reply, Comment, Like, Send Message, Report Abuse) as full members within the community. Sign-in for existing members In the community where you want to sign in, click Sign In at the top-right corner. On the Sign In window, enter your Username and Password. Note: If you have forgotten your username and/or password, click Forgot your username or password. Enter your email address and click Send the Instructions. Follow the instructions in the email message to recover your username and/or password. You can select Keep me logged in to stay signed in on this device. When this option is active, the system will ask for your password only when updating sensitive account information. For security reasons, don’t use this option on a public device. Click Sign In. Supported characters Username Aurora supports the following characters for usernames: Unicode letters Unicode digits - (dash) _ (underscore) Password Must be between 6-20 characters Cannot use HTML-like characters ( < ) Cannot use periods ( . ) Cannot be any part of your username Stronger password requirements may have been configured in your system, in which case, the following may apply: Contains at least one lowercase character Contains at least one uppercase character Contains at least one digit No repeated sequence of 3 or more characters If any of the above are specified, a windowopens to outline the requirements.A green checkmark appears beside each of the criteria as you meet them. If you do not meet these requirements, you cannot create your account. The window may contain one or more of the following requirements: 8 or more characters No repeating characters Lower and uppercase letters At least one number Not part of your usernameBrowsers supported on Aurora
Khoros Community Aurora is designed to operate on most web browsers that support modern web standards.For the best possible experience, we recommend using these browsers on the following operating systems. Windows 10+ and MacOS: Chrome: Last 4 major releases Firefox: Last 4 major releases Edge: Last 4 major releases Opera: Last 4 major releases Android, iPadOS, iOS: Chrome: Last 4 major releases Edge: Last 4 major releases MacOS, iPadOS, iOS: Safari:≥ 16 Limited support for Chromium-based browsers. These browsers should work but are not officially supported. Brave Browser Opera GX Vivaldi Examples: Chrome 112 - 110 (112 is latest as of April 12, 2023) Safari 16.4 - 16.2 (16.4 is latest as of April 12, 2023) Internet Explorer has been deprecated by Microsoft and is no longer supported.
