Smarter Network User Guide Smarter Network is essentially a learning network - a place to discuss, debate and share ideas, experiences and insights into how we can deliver better learning environments for Scotland's schools. As an invite only site, Smarter Network provides a closed forum for key players involved in creating better schools in Scotland to share and exchange ideas and knowledge. The two main features of the site are the discussion forums and the photos application, which are both described in more detail below. Discussion Forums The discussion forum provides a way to interact with other members, to share experiences and voice your opinions. You can reply to an existing discussion or start your own. Creating a discussion: Navigate to the “Forum” tab to check out existing discussions or start your own by clicking the "Add" button.

You can reply to a discussion by clicking the "Reply to This" link under any comment you'd like to reply to, adding your message to the comment box and clicking "Add Reply" when you're done. Alerts for new discussions:

To be notified when new discussions are added you can click the link to "Follow - Email me when there are new discussions" at the bottom of the main 'Forums' page.

Please note - this only notifies you when a new discussion is started, and not to any of the subsequent replies to the discussion. Please follow the instructions below to ensure that you are notified when new replies are left.

Alerts for replies to specific discussions:

To follow a specific discussion and be noted by email when there are new replies, got to the page for that discussion and click the link to "Follow - Email me when people reply" - which is located at the bottom of the page.

If you're already following a discussion and would like to stop doing so, this link will appear as "Stop Following". Clicking that link will stop email notifications about new replies to the discussion.

We will also be starting to post some of the questions generated at the Local Authority Network Group event on 9th March – these are the issues that you thought would be most helpful to discuss, so please start sharing your experiences and knowledge with others. Photos and Videos You can upload photos and videos onto Smarter Network to share with other members. You may want to add images from recent projects or from other inspirational projects you know about. You can add up to 100 photos at a time. The following formats are supported: .jpg, .png, and .gif.

Uploading photos: To upload photos using the bulk uploader, go to the Photos page and click the "Add Photos" link. Then, click the camera icon to select which images you'd like to upload from your computer.

If you want to select multiple photos at a time, just hold down the "Control" or "Command" key on your keyboard and click each photo. Photos you've chosen to upload will display as a list in your bulk uploader. Once you're ready to upload, click the "Upload" button. On the next page you'll be able edit the "Title," "Description" and "Tags" field for each photo. You can also choose to create a new album for those photos or to add them to an existing album. When you're done, click "Save" if you've added more information. To upload photos individually, you can also use the simple uploader, located just under the bulk uploader. Add one photo to each field using its "Browse" button. When you're finished, click the "Add Photos" button. Browsing photos: You can browse all of the photos everyone has uploaded to Smarter Network by heading to the Photos tab. You'll see the thumbnails and titles of the photos along with who uploaded each, sorted in order of those most recently uploaded to the Network. Videos: You can also add videos to your network from other services, such as YouTube or Vimeo, using embed code. From the "Add Videos" page, scroll to the bottom of the page and locate the section that says "Add videos from YouTube or Vimeo" and click in the box. Paste the embed code for the video into the box and click to save.

We hope this basic guide has been useful - please contact dominique.robin@ads.org.uk if you are having any problems using Smarter Network.