Chat rooms are grouped as General (course) chats or Personal chats. You can only access General chats from the appropriate course. You can access Personal chats from anywhere in Learning Environment.

Do one of the following:

• Click Chat on the navbar.
• Click Edit Course on the navbar, click Chat from the Communication section on the Course Administration page.

Add a chat message

Type a message in the text box at the bottom of the chat room, and press Enter on your keyboard or click Send.

Refresh your chat window

If you think new messages are not appearing on your screen fast enough, click Refresh at the top of the chat. This option appears when you select New Messages in Settings.

See who else is chatting

The Participants pane displays a list of users currently signed in to a chat room.

1. Do one of the following:
   • On the Chat List page, click Settings.
   • Inside a chat, click  Settings.
2. Enter a new alias in the Alias field. Depending on your permissions, you can change your alias, or chat name, if you want to appear as a different name, such as a nickname, to other chat participants.
3. Select the check boxes for Bold or Italics.
4. Set an Alias Color.
5. If you want to change the message order, select New to Old or Old to New. If you want to see new messages only, select New Messages. This requires you to manually refresh the screen, to see new messages and remove all old ones.

   Note You can change back to see all messages, which restores all messages for that session, even if they were not visible while New Messages was selected.

6. You can change your sound settings so you can hear a sound when someone enters the chat, leaves the chat, or when there is an incoming message. Select a sound from the following drop-down lists:
   • Incoming Message Sound
   • Person Enters Chat Sound
   • Person Leaves Chat Sound
7. Click Save.

The chat’s archives stores each chat session, where you can view it at a later time.

The system archives a chat session once all chat members leave the room or after more than 20 minutes of inactivity. Chats appear in the Chat Sessions list.

Access an archived chat session

1. On the Chat List page, click View Sessions from the context menu beside the chat you want to view.

   Note For a general chat, you must be in the org unit where you created the general chat to see its session archives.

2. Click the link in the Start Date column.
3. When you are done reviewing the session, click Done.

1. On the Chat List page, click View Sessions from the context menu beside the chat you want to view.
2. Select the check boxes for the sessions you want to delete.
3. Click Delete.

Note For personal chats, only the chat’s creator can delete sessions from the archives.

Print an active chat session

1. Inside the active chat, click Print.
2. Click Print, then click Close.

Print an archived chat session

1. On the Chat List page, click View Sessions from the context menu beside the chat you want to view.

   Note  For a general chat, you must be in the org unit where you created the general chat to see its session archives.

2. Click the link in the Start Date column.
3. Inside the archived chat, click Print.
4. Click Print, then click Close.

You can create personal chats to talk with peers or other friends at your organization. You can create personal chats from any org unit, and you can access them within any other org unit.

Personal chat rooms can only be accessed by users who have been added to the personal chat’s Participant List. When users are added, the chat room displays under Personal Chats in their list of chats.

Note Depending on your permissions, you may not be able to create personal chats.

Create a personal chat room

1. On the Chat List page, click New Chat.
2. Enter a Title.
3. Click Personal Chat.
4. Enter a Description of the chat.
5. Click Create.

Tip Give your chat a unique, descriptive name and provide a description for it using the Description field to help users distinguish the chat from other chats they are enrolled in.

1. On the Chat List page, click View Members from the context menu of the personal chat you want to add users to.
2. Do one of the following:
   • Click Add Members. You can add users from different course offerings by clicking Select Different Course.
   • If you want to add a personal contact, click Add Personal Contact.
3. Select the check box beside the name of users you want to add.
4. Click Add.
5. When you are finished, click Done.

1. On the Chat List page, click View Members from the context menu of the personal chat you want to remove users from.
2. On the Chat Members page, select the check box beside the users you want to remove.
3. Click Delete.
4. Click Done.

You can edit the title and description of chats you create.

1. On the Chat List page, click Edit from the context menu of the chat you want to modify.
2. Make your changes.
3. Click Save.

1. On the Chat List page, click Delete from the context menu of the chat you want to delete.
2. Click Delete in the confirmation message.