Resources
Events
Find your voice with Aswat.
Find your voice with Aswat.
How do I...
Register with Aswat as a user?
Change my password?
Obtain a new password?
Change my user information?
Protect my personal information on Aswat?
Subscribe to newsletters?
Choose which news feeds appear on my homepage?
Browse the Resource Library?
Comment on content?
Recommend an article, document, or posting?
Contribute content to the library?
Start my own blog?
Start my own forum discussion?
Add an event to the calendar?
Create an RSVP to an event?
Send a message to the invitees?
Start my own group?
Submit a picture with a posting?
Add a video to a posting?
Subscribe to groups, blogs and/or forums?
Subscribe to RSS feeds?
Contact other users?
Allow other users to contact me?
Register with Aswat as a user?
To register as a new user, choose to view the homepage in your preferred language. Click “Create New Account” in the “User login” section. You are required to enter your username and a working email address. All other information is optional. Note that any information you provide on this form can be viewed by other registered users. You are also required to click the “Accept Site Terms” box indicating that you have read and agree to the rules and conditions of site use.
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Change my password?
To change your password after you have logged in, click “My Account” in the navigation menu. Click “edit.” Enter your new password in both fields under “Password.” Click the “Submit” button on the bottom of the page to save your changes.
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Obtain a new password?
On the home page, click “Request New Password” in the “User login” section of the main navigation menu. Enter either your email address or your user name. Click the “E-mail new password” button and a message will be sent to your email address with further instructions. When you receive this message, click on the link provided. If you do not use the link within 24 hours, you will have to make another request for a new password. Enter your new password in both fields under “Password.” Click the “Submit” button on the bottom of the page to save your changes.
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Change my user information?
To change your user information such as your name, email address, biography and subscriptions or to upload a picture, click “My Account” at the top of the page. Click “edit” and then make your changes. Click the “Submit” button on the bottom of the page to save your changes. All information except your email address and password will be accessible to other users who view your profile.
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Protect my personal information on Aswat?
Registering on Aswat only requires a valid email address. This email address will not be given out or displayed unless you choose to send a message to another user through Aswat, and then it will be displayed only to those members you wish to contact.
Any other information you add to your account will be accessible to all users who view your profile.
The Aswat administrative team will be able to view user email addresses. However, these addresses will only be used by the Aswat team to send out administrative notices or newsletters. For more details, see our complete privacy policy.
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Subscribe to newsletters?
Click “My Account” on the top of the page. Click the “edit” link above your account information and then click “my newsletters.” You can subscribe or unsubscribe by checking or unchecking the box next to each newsletter title. Click the “Submit” button to save your settings.
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Choose which news feeds appear on my homepage?
Choose which news sources appear on your homepage by clicking “Choose Feeds” on the navigation menu. Check the boxes for each source you would like to receive news from. Click the “Save” button at the bottom of the page to save your choices. Headlines from your news feeds will appear on your home page when you are logged in.
You can suggest additional news sources to be included on the site by clicking on the “contact” link on the footer and sending a message to the Aswat team.
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Browse the Resource Library?
The resource library is repository for training manuals, reports, workshop materials, sample documents, multimedia resources, and other informational materials on a wide range of topics related to democracy, civil society, political parties, women’s and youth issues, and reform issues, to name a few. Each document is “tagged” with terms that relate to its content and make it searchable so that users can easily find materials related to their interests.
To access the library, click on “Resource Library” from the main navigation, then choose to browse the library materials by topic, country, region, document type, or specific interest group.
The resource library is designed to continuously evolve as users contribute their own comments, votes, and new content.
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Comment on content?
Submit a comment on any content including a blog, forum discussion, library content or featured voices posting by scrolling to the bottom of the page, entering your comment in the “Comment” box and clicking the “Post comment” button. See site usage policy for guidelines on posting comments.
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Recommend an article, document, or posting?
To recommend a piece of content, click on the plus sign under the orange number of votes. If you do not see a plus sign that means you have already voted for the item. Each user can vote only once per item. The items that receive the most votes and are
most recently voted on appear on the home page.
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Contribute content to the library?
If you have documents you believe would be useful to others on Aswat, you can contribute them by attaching the content to an email and sending it to contact@aswat.com. Note that all material will be reviewed by the content administrators before posting.
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Start my own blog?
You can choose to keep an online log, or blog, on Aswat. In it you can post photos, articles, your own opinions, or anything you feel would interest other users. You choose the topics and other users can respond by commenting on what you have posted.
To create a blog, click “Aswat Blogs” in the main navigation menu, then click “My Blog” and “Post New Blog Entry.” Enter a title for your blog entry. Under “Language” you can choose to allow all users to see the blog by making sure the language drop-down menu is set to blank. If you want to only show your blog to people who view the site in Arabic, select “Arabic” from the drop-down menu. If you want to only show your blog to people who view the site in English, select “English” from the drop-down menu.
Assign category tags to your blog according to relevant interest groups, regions, specific countries and topics. Hold down the Ctrl key while you click each item with the mouse to select multiple entries per list. Type in your main content and/or upload an article, document or photo. You can also assign your blog to a particular audience by checking the box next to listed groups. Click the “Submit” button to save your work.
Note: Please tag your items carefully and do not choose too many tags. Users will search for content based on tags that you apply to your content.
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Start my own forum discussion?
Forums are open discussions about a particular topic area. All registered users can participate in these discussions, and you can vote for a discussion if you find it useful. Discussions with the most recent postings are highlighted on the homepage.
You can choose either to add your comments to an existing discussion forum, or you can create a new discussion under one of the preset forum topics.
Click “Forums” on the main navigation menu, and then click “Post New Forum Topic”. Enter a topic subject. Under “Language” you can choose to allow all users to see the forum by making sure the language drop-down menu is set to blank. If you want to only show your forum to people who view the site in Arabic, select “Arabic” from the drop-down menu. If you want to only show your forum to people who view the site in English, select “English” from the drop-down menu.
Assign category tags to your forum according to relevant interest groups, regions, specific countries and topics. Hold down the Ctrl key while you click each item with the mouse to select multiple entries per list. Click the “Submit” button to save your work.
Note: Please tag your items carefully and do not choose too many tags. Users will search for content based on tags that you apply to your content.
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Add an event to the calendar?
If your organization is holding an event, or you know of an event that other members might be interested in knowing about, you can add it to the events calendar. Events may include an election day, a conference, a rally or even an internet event such as an online chat with an expert or a broadcast of a speech or debate on television, radio, or the internet.
Click “Events” in the main navigation menu, and then click “Add Event.” Enter the start date, end date and the title. In order to be readable in the event calendar, the title must be as short as possible. You can create a longer description in the “Body” field, which users will see when they click on the event from the calendar.
Under “Language” you can choose to allow all users to see your event by making sure the language drop-down menu is set to blank. If you want to only show your event to people who view the site in Arabic, select “Arabic” from the drop-down menu. If you want to only show your event to people who view the site in English, select “English” from the drop-down menu.
Enter a longer description of the event in the “Body” section and assign it category tags according to relevant interest groups, regions, specific countries and topics. Hold down the Ctrl key while you click each item with the mouse to select multiple entries per list. Click the “Submit” button to save your work.
Note: Please tag your items carefully and do not choose too many tags. Users will search for content based on tags that you apply to your content.
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Create an RSVP to an event?
If you would like to invite other members to come to an event, either click “RSVP” under the event on the calendar or “Create RSVP” while viewing the event. Enter a title, a message and the list of email addresses of the users you would like to invite, separating multiple email addresses by commas. Click the “Create RSVP” button to send your invitations.
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Send a message to the invitees?
To contact event attendees after you invite them, either click “View RSVP” under the event on the calendar or click “Manage RSVP” when viewing the event. Click “Send Message.” Enter the message subject and body and click the “Send Message” button to send the message to your attendees.
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Start my own group?
Groups are a way for users to draw from all aspects of Aswat by gathering blogs, forums, events, and other resources that are of interest to a particular set of people. For instance, local councilors in Morocco might choose to create a group so that any local councilor coming to the site can access all information other local councilors have found useful, and view upcoming events they may want to attend.
You can add your own group or join a pre-existing group to interact with users who have similar interests and stay updated on what is going on in relation to your particular interests.
Click “Aswat Groups” in the main navigation menu, then click “Add New Group.” Enter a name for your group. Under “Language” you can choose to allow all users to see your group by making sure the language drop-down menu is set to blank. If you want to only show your group to people who view the site in Arabic, select “Arabic” from the drop-down menu. If you want to only show your group to people who view the site in English, select “English” from the drop-down menu.
Assign category tags to your group according to relevant interest groups, regions, specific countries and topics. Hold down the Ctrl key while you click each item with the mouse to select multiple entries per list. You can also type in a welcome message for your group if you would like to. Click the “Submit” button to save your work.
Note: Please tag your items carefully and do not choose too many tags. Users will search for content based on tags that you apply to your content.
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Submit a picture with a posting?
Anytime you submit a posting in a blog, forum, event or comment, you can also post a picture by clicking on the icon under the “Body” section with a green plus sign and a small photo.
You can upload photos by clicking the “Upload” button and browsing for a photo on your computer. Choose the photo and click “Submit.” You can also choose a photo already uploaded on Aswat. Click the photo icon, choose “My Photos” or “All Photos” from the drop-down menu. Choose the photo and click “Insert.”
Photo size cannot exceed 800K. See the usage policy for guidelines on posting pictures.
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Posting an online video on Aswat requires nothing more complicated than the Copy and Paste function on your computer! While Aswat does not enable direct upload of video to the site, it is easy to connect to another place where you can put the video. First, determine where on Aswat you would like to post a video – in a blog post, a group or a comment, for instance.
Next, in another window or browser tab, browse to the video you would like to post (from YouTube, Google Video, BlipTV, etc.). Almost all video services will have an “Embed” section, with some HTML code that looks similar to this:
<embed src="http://blip.tv/play/bbbbb" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="500" height="400" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true"></embed>
Highlight this text, then Copy it (right click and choose “Copy” or press Ctrl + C on your keyboard) so you can Paste it on Aswat.
Next, find the “Body” or “Comment” field for the section you are posting to. This is where you will now Paste the code that you copied above. Right click in the text area and choose “Paste” or type Ctrl + V to copy the video embedding code to the text posting area.
Now simply scroll down to the bottom of the section to find the “Preview” and “Post” buttons. It is helpful to press the “Preview” button to ensure that you’ve copied the video code correctly, and to ensure that the video service you are using will display correctly on Aswat. If the video displays after clicking “Preview”, you can now press “Post” to submit the video to Aswat. If it does not display correctly, double check that you have copied all of the code correctly.
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Subscribe to groups, blogs and/or forums?
If you would like to be notified via email anytime a group, blog or forum has new postings, you can subscribe by clicking “subscribe” while viewing it. To unsubscribe, click “unsubscribe” while in the particular discussion, blog, or group to which you are currently subscribed.
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Subscribe to RSS feeds?
RSS stands for “Really Simple Syndication” and is a tool that notifies you when a new item is added to a website. To subscribe to an RSS feed and be notified of all recent content posted to the Aswat homepage, resource library, etc., click on the orange button at the top of the homepage. Choose the application you would like to use from the dialogue box and click the “Subscribe Now” button.
You can click on RSS buttons at the bottom of other Aswat pages to be notified of new posts to a particular page. For example, you can click on an RSS button for any of the main categories of content in the “Topic Directory” to be notified of the latest content tagged to the topic of your choice. Only the pages with the orange RSS button at the bottom are RSS enabled.
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Contact other users?
Only users who have chosen to allow others to contact them may be contacted. Click on the name of a user anywhere in the site. If this user has chosen to permit being contacted, you will be taken to a page displaying the personal information provided by that user. Click “contact” to send a private message to the user. See the usage policy for rules on contacting other users through Aswat.
Note: Your email address will be displayed on any message you send to another user through Aswat.
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Allow other users to contact me?
You can choose to allow others to contact you by setting your contact preferences. Choose “My Account” from the main navigation menu, then “edit.” Scroll down to “Contact Settings” and check the box next to “Personal Contact Form” to permit others to send you messages. If you do not wish to receive messages, you can uncheck this box. See site usage policy for rules on contacting other users through Aswat.
Your email address will not be displayed to users who contact you.
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