Autodesk Discussion Groups Feedback

[#1]

I'm mentoring some students.  I've encouraged them to post on the Inventor forums and I'd like to "follow them."  That is, I'd like to automatically be subscribed to their posts and notified of activity.  At least I'd like to be able to add them as a "friend" and check up on them without having to remember their "handle."

[#2]

Hi Geoffrey,

The best way I can think of is to use the search tool and either create an RSS feed or permalink. To do this:

1. Head on over to this page: http://forums.autodesk.com/t5/forums/searchpage/tab/message
2. Click on 'Advanced Search'
3. In the 'With one of more of the words' field, put in all of the student's forum usernames (no commas or ANDs necessary).
4. Click 'Search'

You should get a list of all of the threads they've been involved with. Click on a few to be sure, but it should take you right to their post in the thread no matter how long it is.

To mark this search more permanent so you don't need to go through the steps above, you can either:

• Use the 'Subscribe to RSS Feed for this Search' tool by just clicking the link and following the directions.
• Use the 'Permalink' funtionality. The permalink will provide a link to this search with all of your specifications that you can keep coming back to. It works best to put the permalink in you favorites or something similar.

Hope this helps!

[#3]

If you wanted to have a definite list of all your students, you could instruct them to put a specific keyword under "Biography" (in My Settings). Then you could create a Search for Users with that specific keyword in their Biography.

This would not provide the direct link to their posts as per Jillian's suggestion, but you'd have a full list of your students and a link to their profiles. You could also easily find them to add to your 'Friends' list with this, which you can do from their Profile Page.

[#4 · Accepted solution]

The best way I have found is to subscribe to the users RSS feed.

To do this just click on the user name and at the bottom right of the box with their recent messages in it you will see a View All link click that link then their will be a Message Options drop down box in the top left hand corner choose Subscribe to RSS Feed then the reader of your choice and  all of the past and future post from that  account will sent to your reader.

Thanks
Discussion_Admin

[#5]

OK, I'm new to RSS feeds but I tried it and this works.  I set the RSS feed notification to be a button on my Firefox Bookmarks Toolbar.  I have a button for each student (I actually have a total of 13 students I'm mentoring but only a few are currently active on the forums).  This is how to do it:

• Ask the student for their user name.
• Search the forum for a post by them.
•   AutoDesk Discussion Groups > Search > user name > "no matching results"
•   Click on the Users Tab > user name > "New member x posts"
• Click on x posts > all their posts will be shown (this will populate their post history.  If you just click on a new users name; their page won't show their posts).
• Click on Message Options > Subscribe to RSS Feed. > your RSS feed application's options dialog box will come up.

I'm set for now.  Thank you.