In May 2004 we began hosting e-mail-based discussion groups (aka forums) for the community of San Leandro. These discussion groups are a way for people to exchange and share ideas and information about things specific to San Leandro. Our current list of categories and forums is:

• News
• Announcments
• Weekly Updates
• Parenting
• Daycare / Preschool
• Schools K-12
• Kids' Activities
• Dads
• Moms
• Community
• Marketplace
• Recommendations
• Advocacy
• Lending Library
• General
• General
• Family Profiles

Other categories and topics may emerge. Please if you would like to propose another category or forum.

Registering

Anyone can read the topics in any of the forums. To post to a topic to a forum, you must first register. It is a simple process whereby you create a user name and password for this site.

You have the option to subscribe to the discussion groups in one of two ways:

• By e-mail where you read and send messages using your e-mail software
• By logging in to the forum web site and reading and posting messages like a bulletin board service

When you subscribe to any of the discussion groups that interest you, you will receive e-mail to your inbox from other members of that group, and you can send e-mail to that group. Alternatively, you can choose to check the forum web site for new messages or to post a new message.

All e-mail messages for each topic are saved in the online forums so that you can always browse or search any messages that have been sent or posted previously.

Subscribing to forums via e-mail

When you subscribe to a forum, all of the topics for the forum will be delivered directly to your e-mail in-box, instead of having to go to the forum web site to check for new messages. As well, you will be able to post messages to a forum by simply sending an e-mail message to the group, instead of having to go to the forum web site to log in and post a message.

To subscribe to a forum:

1. Go to the forum site and log in. You will need to register if you have not already done so.
2. Click on the link near the top called "Subscribe via email"
3. Under the "New subscriptions" heading, you will see a drop list which contains all of the forums available on our site. Select one you are interested in and click the Subscribe button.
4. You need to repeat step 3 for each forum you are interested in.

If you choose to subscribe to the forums, you will probably want to turn off the feature "Always notify me of replies" option in your User Profile. This is a separate feature from the forum subscriptions. If you have both features configured, you will get two e-mails for the same forum posting.

E-mail addresses for posting to discussion groups

The following is the mapping between the existing forums and their associated e-mail addresses. You may want to make your own e-mail alias in your address book for the forum e-mail address. To post a message to the list/forum, you just send an e-mail to one of the following addresses:

Forum Name E-mail Address Daycare / Preschool Schools K-12 Kids' Activities Dads Moms Marketplace Recommendations Advocacy Lending Library General Family Profiles

 

Tips for using the forums

• e-mail Notification: If you do not want to subscribe to all messages in a forum (described above), you can opt to be notified via e-mail of any replies to a topic that you post to any forum. You can select this option as a default for all messages you post by editing your profile (click the Profile link at top) and choosing and "Yes" for "Always notify me of replies." You can also turn this option on or off at the time you post a new message.
• Read just the new posts: You need to log in first. Then when you are on the main forum index page (the one that list all of the categories and forums) you can click the link at the top right of the page to "View posts since last visit" -- this will bring up a page of all topics that you have not yet seen.
• Read just the posts to which no one has responded: If you want to see if you can answer someone's question or post (someone who has thus far not been answered), you can click the "View unanswered posts" link on the top right of the main index page.
• Searching: If you want to search the forums for any content (see if anyone has recommended a plumber on any forum) you can click the Search link at the top of any of the forum pages and enter any words you like.