Community User Guide

CBA Community is an exclusive online community where members can ask advice, share expertise and connect with other members.  Below are steps to help you get started. *If you are not a Colorado Bar Association member you will not have access.

HOW TO LOGIN

  1. Go to http://community.cobar.org and click the "Sign In" button in the top right corner.  
  2. You will be redirected to the member login page on the CBA website.  Enter your CBA member login information. If you don't know your login credentials, click "forgot username," or "forgot password" in the login box.  You can also email membership@cobar.org.
  3. When logging into CBA Community for the first time, you will be asked to read and agree to the "terms and conditions".
    • If you are having troubles logging in, try clearing your browsing history or use a different browser.

UPDATE PROFILE INFORMATION
To update your profile, click the drop-down menu in the top right corner and select "Profile". Under the profile, you can add an image, update your community notifications and more.

PRIVACY SETTINGS
Once you are in your profile, an important area to update your Privacy Settings.  This is where you choose what information you would like other members, contacts or the public can see.   All contact information is defaulted to "Members Only".

To access your Privacy Settings, click on the "My Account" drop down menu and then select "Privacy Settings".



Once in the Privacy Settings section, you can choose which information you would like for people to see by clicking the drop-down menu next to each category:


COMMUNITY NOTIFICATIONS (EMAIL SETTINGS)
In your profile, under the "My Account" options, you can manage your notification settings under the "Community Notifications" option.  This will give you control over how you'd like to receive emails from your communities.  To access this area, click the "My Account" drop-down and then click "Community Notifications".



There are currently five subscription options:

  1. Real Time: You will receive the messages to your inbox as they are posted. This is the default for Listservs and was how posts were sent prior to the upgrade to the community site.
  2. Daily Digest: You will receive one email per day, combining all of the posts made to that specific community for that day.
  3. No Email Notifications: You will not receive discussion notifications via email. However, you can still access, read and reply to any posts online.
  4. Plain Text: You will receive an email in plain text as discussions are posted.
  5. Consolidated Digest: You will receive an email once a day or an email once a week, combining all of the posts made in a consolidated format.  

You are currently defaulted to receive the "daily digest". If you would like to change your notification settings, simply click on the drop-down menu to the right of each community you belong to (you can customize for each) and choose which notification option you would like:

You can also set up an alternate email address, for your notifications that doesn't interfere with the email address you have listed to you receive from CBA and CBA-CLE. Under "Discussion Email" click on the "add override addresses" and enter an email address and pick the community notifications you would like sent to that alternate email address:



FIND YOUR COMMUNITIES

To see all of the communities that you belong to, click the "Communities" drop-down menu and select "My Communities".

START A DISCUSSION
There are different ways to start a discussion on the site. 
1) After deciding what community you want to start the discussion. Go to the community homepage and next to "Latest Discussion Posts" you will see a button labeled "Add".  Clicking on the button will pull up the discussion editor where you type and send your message. Note that the "To" section is already populated.  



The discussion editor will populate, the "To" will not be populated so you will need to choose the discussion by click, "Select Discussion".

3) On the site landing page, community.cobar.org, you can also start a discussion by clicking the "Add" button.  Again, the discussion will not be populated so you will need to choose the community.

REPLY TO A DISCUSSION
To reply to a discussion, select the thread you wish to reply and click "Reply" which allows you to reply to the thread publicly.  You can also reply offline privately by clicking on the carrot to the right of "Reply" and selecting "Reply Privately".

If you want an expanded editor for posting, click the three buttons on the right of the toolbar.


FOLLOWING A THREAD

By utilizing the "reply" option, you will automatically be subscribed to the thread and follow it. To un-follow, once inside the post, click the gray star to the
right of the title of the thread and it should switch to an outline which will signify you are no longer subscribed to the thread. Please note, following a Thread enables real-time emails of the discussion and overrides any current communication settings. 


ENGAGING WITH OTHER MEMBERS

To find specific members, click on the "Members" tab from the individual community home page:


Once you find the member(s) you are looking for, you can send them a message.

You can also add members as Contacts.

Adding contacts creates an organized list in your profile where you can easily access who you are looking for. To add a member, click on the button at the right where it says “Add as Contact”. That member is now saved in your contact list.

Benefits of Adding Contacts

  • From your profile, you have quick access to your contacts’ profile information and the ability to send private messages faster.
  • Other members can see who your contacts are, which helps you connect with more members.



NEED ADDITIONAL HELP?

For further assistance, please contact the CBA Community Team at community@cobar.org.