Aurora SEO: Regulate content crawling by search engines using robots.txt
When you publish content in the community, search engines (web robots or web crawlers) crawl these newly published pages to discover and gather information from them. After crawling the content, the search engines index these pages to provide relevant search results based on the search queries. It is important to instruct the web crawlers to crawl only the relevant pages and ignore the pages that don't require crawling activity. Using Robots Exclusion Protocol (a file called robots.txt), you can indicate the resources that need to be included or excluded from the crawling activity. When a new community is created, the Khoros platform configures the robots.txt file with the default rules for the community. The default rules include instructions, which are generic for all the communities. Admins and members with permissions can view the Default Rules in Robots.txt Editor (from Settings > System > SEO area). In the editor, you can also add Custom Rules that are appended after the default rules. Note: You cannot edit the default rules. How does Robots.txt work? You can find the robots.txt file in the root directory of your community by appending “robots.txt” at the end of the URL (https://site.com/robots.txt). The file includes the list of user agents (web robots), community URLs, and sitemaps with instructions indicating whether the user agents are allowed or disallowed to crawl the specified URLs. When the user-agents or web crawlers enter your website, they first read the robots.txt file and proceed further with the crawling activity based on the instructions added in the file. The user-agents gather information only from the community pages that are allowed and are blocked from the pages that are disallowed. Robots.txt syntax The robots.txt includes these keywords that are widely used to specify the instructions: User-agent: The name of the web crawler for which you are providing the instructions. Example: User-agent: testbot To provide instructions to all the user agents at a time, enter * (wildcard character). Example: User-agent: * Disallow: Command to indicate the user-agents not to crawl the specified URL. Note that the URL must begin with ‘/’ (forward slash character). Example: User-agent: testbot Disallow: /www.test1.com Allow: Command to indicate the user-agents that they can crawl the specified URL. Note that the URL must begin with ‘/’ (forward slash character). Example: User-agent: testbot Allow: /www.test2.com Sitemap: Indicates the location of any XML sitemaps associated with the URL. The Khoros platform automatically generates sitemaps for each community when it is created and adds them to the robots.txt file. Example: User-agent: testbot Sitemap: https://www.test.com/sitemap.xml The following is the sample format to allow or disallow a user-agent "testbot” to crawl the community pages: User-agent: testbot Disallow: /www.test.com Allow: /www.test1.com Sitemap: https://www.test.com/sitemap.xml Using the Robots.txt Editor The Robots.txt Editor enables you to add, edit, and remove custom rules to robots.txt. You can look for more information provided by Google and other crawlers handling rules in robots.txt. Let’s take an example where you want to add a custom rule to disallow a user-agent “testbot” from crawling a member profile page of the community. To add a custom rule: Sign in to the community as an Admin. Go to Settings > System > SEO. In the Robots.txt Editor, you can view the Default Rules and Custom Rules sections. In the Custom Rules section, click Edit. In the Edit window, enter the instructions and click Save. The rule appears in the Custom Rules area of the tab. You can edit or remove the existing Custom Rules by clicking the Edit option. The new custom rules get appended to the robots.txt file located in the root directory: After you edit the custom rules, you can validate the robots.txt via the Lighthouse tool. Learn more about robots.txt validation using lighthouse. Note: The Audit log records the member actions made in the robots.txt file.Aurora: Create and map a localized category
The Localized Communities feature enables you, as an admin, to create multiple “versions” of your community—each one in a different language. After you map your top-level categories to the languages you have enabled in your community, your customers are directed to the language category that best matches their browser settings. To enable Localized Communities in your community, you must first open a Support ticket. Create a localized category Important: We recommend that you set up your localized categories on a stage environment before setting them up on your production environment. Doing so enables you to reference the stage setup during the production setup for a quicker configuration process. Additionally, if your production community is already live with your customers, we recommend that you set up your localized categories during non-peak activity hours. Note: Creating a localized category is a similar process to creating a regular category in the community. However, after you have enabled Localized Categories with Khoros Support, additional configuration is required to map your categories appropriately once you create them. To create a localized category: Go to the Community Structure page. At the community level, click Add (plus icon). On the window, enter a Name and ID. The ID displays in the URL for the category. Note: The ID must be a single word made of only letters, numbers, dashes, and underscores with no spaces. It cannot be changed later. Optionally, enter a Description and add an Avatar for the category. Click Create. For your new localized category to work properly, you must next map it to a language. Map a localized category to a language After you have created your localized category, you need to map it to a language so the community can be translated to the correct language for the category. Click the Features > Localized Categories link in the Action Needed alert. Or, navigate to Settings > Features > Localized Categories. On the Language Mapping screen, in the Mapped to column of the language you want to map to your new category, select that category. After you map your top-level categories to the languages you have enabled in your community, your customers are directed to the language category that best matches their browser language. However, as a secondary measure, they can use the language selector to change languages. Related topics: About Localized Communities Configure localized category settingsKhoros Communities: Aurora 25.04 Release Notes
This release brings new tools to help you manage and protect your community. You can now move and merge content across types, mute inbox conversations, and view history for all content types. We've enhanced security checks for images and private messages, and admins can now prompt members for feedback and export their responses. Additionally, there are enhancements to GraphQL. Several bugs are also fixed.Aurora: View the history of published content
Over time, content posted to the community can change as different people edit the content. These changes can be subtle or complete rewrites of the original content. Sometimes, changes get made that are not correct or need to be reverted to an earlier iteration of the content. Aurora gives you the ability to track the changes in every version of published content of any content type, including replies and comments. For example, each time you publish a KB article or blog post, the major version number is incremented (v1.0, v2.0, and so on). For example, in v1.0, 1 is the major version number and 0 is the minor version number. The minor version number is always zero for a published article. Each time you edit and save a published article, the major version number remains the same as the current version number and the minor version number is incremented (v2.1, 2.2, and so on). For every version, you can see who made the change and what was changed. Let's look at an example of the version history for a knowledge base article. To view the history of revisions: Go to the KB article page. Select History. The revision history of the article displays in a popup window: The published version gets an incremental version number (v1.0, V2.0, v3.0, …) From the Version History view, you can: view the revision notes that were added while editing the article. Compare the versions of the article. Edit and restore any older version of the article. Permissions Set the permission View edit history under Settings > Roles and Permissions > Content to allow members to view and compare different versions of posts any content type or replies or comments.Aurora: Internet Calendar Scheduling (ICS) file support for Events
You can add an event invitation to your calendar either manually or automatically. To add an event manually to your calendar: Select Add to calendar to download ICS (Internet Calendaring and Scheduling) files. Add community events to any calendars of your choice. Note: The ICS file downloads only upcoming events. To add an event automatically to your calendar: Select Attending or Interested for an event. A calendar invitation is automatically added to the calendar associated with your registered email address. The following screenshot shows an event that is automatically added to the member’s calendar. From here, you can RSVP and read the content of the event.Aurora: Custom widget configuration
Your organization may have created some of their own custom widgets for use in your page templates. These custom widgets can address use cases or functionality not available in out-of-the-box widgets. Therefore, there aren’t configuration options specific to the content of the widget—the options instead help you design the widget's layout and some of its properties. To access and configure a custom widget: In Designer, open the page template to which you want to add the custom widget. Add a widget section by selecting Add (plus sign) in an open area of the page template. In the Add Widget panel that opens, locate and select the custom widget you want to add. It may be located under any of the categories (Content, People, or Places) depending on what it is related to. If a custom widget has not been tied to any categories, it is located under Other > Custom. Configure any or all of the following: Widget Title: Sets the title that appears at the top of the widget. If the Visible only to screen readers option is turned on, the title remains hidden to most visitors; however, the title information is still relayed to visitors using screen readers. Visible To: Select whether you want the widget visible to Both Non signed-in and Signed-in users, Only Signed-in users, or Only Non signed-in users. Remove widget wrapper: Select this option to remove the default wrapper and padding on the widget. If you are using a custom widget with text or HTML content, select Edit Widget Content to use the content editor to add text, videos, or images (see About the Content Editor for more information). You can now view the custom widget on any pages associated with the template where you added it. Related topics: Text/HTML widget configuration Developer Docs: Introduction to Handlebars ComponentsAurora: Text/HTML widget configuration
The Text/HTML widget enables you to create custom content blocks on most page templates. These widgets can be filled with formatted text or HTML. Not only can you use this widget for the currently selected page template, but each Text/HTML widget is saved in a library so that you can assign it to any other page template you edit. Add a Text/HTML widget Select Add widget (plus icon) where you want to add the widget. In the Add Widget panel, select Text/HTML. Select Add Widget. Add your custom text using the content editor or add HTML source code by clicking More... (... icon) and then the Source code (< > icon) in the editor's toolbar. Enter a Widget name that will be used to identify the widget from the Widget Library (Optional) Enter a Widget description to add more information for the widget in the Widget Library. Select Save. Configure the Text/HTML widget as described in the section below. Configure the Text/HTML widget You can configure the following options: Widget Title: The title that appears at the top of the widget. Visible only to screen readers: When this option is active, the title will remain hidden from most visitors; however, the title information is still relayed to visitors using screen readers. Remove widget background: When this option is active, the background of the widget is hidden so that the section background shows through. Visible To: Use the drop-down menu to indicate whether the widget should be displayed to All Users, Signed-in users, or Non-signed-in users. Edit Widget Content: Select this to return to the content editor for the widget. Related topics: Custom widget configuration Developer Docs: Introduction to Handlebars ComponentsAurora: Featured Idea Statuses widget configuration
The Featured Idea Statuses widget displays the idea statuses you choose to feature and is available on the Ideas Dashboard page template. If you reset the layout of a page with a populated Featured widget or delete a section containing a populated Featured widget, that Featured widget is deleted from all other page templates on which it appears. If you attempt to reset or delete, you will receive a warning that also indicates all other places where the widget is located. When members access the widget in the community, they can click the status name to view the All ideas page scoped to that status. Layout The Featured Idea Statuses widget includes the List and Card layouts. From the Edit Widget panel, select one of these options to change the layout. List The List layout gives you a simple view of the statuses featured in the widget along with the number of ideas (if chosen to be included) associated with each status. Card The Card layout showcases the idea’s status name in the center of the card with, if chosen to be included, the idea count of each status displayed above the status name. Configuration options List style The options in the List style section for List layouts are the following: Space: Uses whitespace to create space between items. Divide: Adds a horizontal line to divide items. Border: Creates a border that separates items into individual boxes. Widget title Enter a title to appear at the top of the widget. If the Visible only to screen readers toggle is on, the title is relayed only through screen readers. Edit Sample Featured Idea Statuses Click Edit Sample Content to open a window where you can select sample idea statuses to preview how the widget will look in the community. Click Add Status to add statuses you want to feature one by one. You can then reorder the content by grabbing it with your cursor and dragging it to the desired location. Note: The sample statuses you select here are not saved or published to the community. You must add the actual idea statuses you want to feature on the desired page in the community. There is no global source for adding places that would apply it to every instance of the widget. See Feature content, places, and idea statuses on a page. Click Preview to return to editing the widget. List item/Card elements List item elements and Card elements determine what information is included for each item in the widget. Turning off or on the toggles hides or shows the elements. In this case, you can turn on or off the indicator for the number of ideas with the Show idea count toggle. Number of items The Number of items slider enables you to indicate how many idea statuses can be displayed on the widget. More options Additional options are available at the bottom of the Edit Widget panel: Include "Show More" link adds a link to the bottom of the widget to enable visitors to display additional items once the Number of items has been reached. Related topics: Feature content, places, and idea statuses on a pageAurora: Featured Places widget configuration
The Featured Places widget displays a list of places (KBs, forums, blogs, ideas boards, and/or event boards) in the community that you choose to feature. You can configure it to focus on top-level boards only or to present sub-places within those communities as nested items. If you reset the layout of a page with a populated Featured widget or delete a section containing a populated Featured widget, that Featured widget is deleted from all other page templates on which it appears. If you attempt to reset or delete, you will receive a warning that also indicates all other places where the widget is located. Layout There are 2 layouts available for the Featured Places widget: List and Card. List style The List layout creates a vertical list of places, enabling members to identify and navigate to parts of your community quickly. Line items can include avatar images as well as descriptions, post totals, and more. There are 3 list styles available in the List layout: The Space list style divides items in the list using a blank space rather than a solid visual divider. The Divide list style adds a solid horizontal line between line items. The Border list style separates items in the list into separate sections. Card The Card layout showcases each place in a card and includes an expansion feature that opens an additional panel with any sub-places under each item. Cards can be configured by their Card Size and Card text alignment: The Card Size setting changes the overall size of the avatar and text so that it takes up more horizontal room in the card. You can choose between Medium and Large content sizes. The Card text alignment setting aligns text within each card. Aligning text to either the Left or Right places the text so that it hugs the side of the card; however, the avatar image (if selected) will center itself above the text. Configuration options Title You can enter a title for the widget to display at the top of the widget. If the Visible only to screen readers toggle is on, the title is relayed only through screen readers. Edit Sample Featured Places Click Edit Sample Content to open a window where you can select sample places to preview how the widget will look in the community. In the Places field, search for a place to add. You can then reorder a place by grabbing it with your cursor and dragging it to the desired location. Note: The sample places you select here will not be saved and published to the community. You must add the actual place you want to feature on the desired page in the community. There is no global source for adding places that would apply it to every instance of the widget. See Feature content, places, and idea statuses on a page. Click Preview to return to editing the widget. List item/Card elements List item elements and Card elements determine what information is included for each item in the widget. Turning off or on the toggles hides or shows the elements. List item/card element options include: Avatar (Card only): The place’s image. Description: The place’s description. Post count: The total number of posts in the place. Unread post count: The number of unread posts in the place. Most recent activity timestamp: The timestamp of the latest activity (in days) in the place. Lock Icon (Closed, hidden, and read only) (List only) Expand category children (Card only): An expandable section at the bottom of the card so you can view the category children. The Lead with drop-down menu in the List layout sets which element appears first in the widget for each item. The Max lines of description text slider available for both List and Card layouts sets the number of lines of description text to display for each item in the widget. Number of places The Number of places slider sets the number of places that appear in the widget before the Show More link appears. The List layout includes a slider for the Number of category children. If the value of this slider is greater than 0, child places are displayed as nested objects under the parent. More options Additional options are available in the More options section: The Include "Show More" Links toggle turns on the Show More feature if the number of places exceeds the value of the Number of places slider. Related topics: Feature content, places, and idea statuses on a page
