Discussions Tips and Hints

Include a direct link to an external reference or site

Concise arguments, questions, and a good title go a long way toward promoting a conversation. If you refer to an outside reference or site, include a direct link to it. You can use HTML, which is a hypertext language, to easily create a link in your post. The coding will look like this:

<A HREF="Internet Address">these words will show up as the link</A>

 Yes, all those carets, quotation marks, and slashes are part of the code. Here’s a before and after example:

Before

This is a great discussion!  You might also be interested in <A HREF=" http://news.morningstar.com/news/ms/Strategist/Dogs/strategistdogs.html">this article</A> on Morningstar.com.  

 

After

This is a great discussion! You might also be interested in this article on Morningstar.com.

 

It's cumbersome to type in a complete Internet address, commonly called a URL, so here's a shortcut: Open the site you want to link to in your browser and highlight the URL in the browser's address line. Then click the right mouse button to bring up the Copy/Paste menu, and choose Copy. Return to your message in Morningstar Office and position your cursor to the spot in your message where you want to create the link. Use the Ctrl/V command to paste the URL into your post.

Click the Preview button, located below the Conversation Message window, to make sure everything appears the way you intended.

 

Target your audience

Please post your topic only once, to the appropriate forum. Posting the same topics to multiple forums breaks up the replies and makes for a less cohesive conversation. That’s why a moderator will delete multiple posts, leaving only one available for replies. It’s okay to re-post a topic that lacked an initial response or originated in the wrong forum. But please use the forum descriptions to guide your post to the right audience.  

 

Some general "netiquette" tips

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