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Moderator guide

Cătălin Frâncu edited this page Jul 13, 2020 · 17 revisions

This guide aims to document actions that can be performed from the Dignitas web interface my moderators. There will be a separate guide for actions that require sysadmin skills.

Accepting answers and setting statement verdicts

Moderators can see a checkmark next to each answer. Click it to accept that answer as proof for the statement.

To set a verdict for the statement, edit the statement. Only moderators can modify the verdict field.

Managing canned responses

You can define canned responses that address common problems concerning the style, format or contents of statements and answers. Users who comment on those items can pick a canned response (and possibly change it before posting it). For example, if a lot of new users post off-topic statements, you can define a canned response explaining why that is not acceptable.

The link to the canned response manager is on the moderator dashboard.

Managing author types

Every author must have a type (person, party, government body, company, church etc.). Fresh Dignitas installations begin without any author types defined; therefore you must define at least one type before users are able to add new authors. Each author type has a name like "person" or "party" and several checkboxes:

  • Whether authors of this type may have loyalty or be the object of loyalty. For example, we are generally interested in people's loyalty to political parties, so you may wish to check the "has loyalty" box for the "person" author type as well as the "object of loyalty" box for the "party" author type.
  • Whether or not authors of this type may have colors. In particular, parties and alliances generally have a color.

The link to the author type manager is on the moderator dashboard.

Managing relationship types

Every relationship must have a type. A person can be the mayor in a City Hall, the deputy mayor or a spokesperson. Similarly, a person can be a prime minister in a government, a justice minister or an education minister. These relationship types must be defined explicitly, including:

  • The name (for example prime minister).
  • The "from" and "to" author types (for example from "person" to "government").
  • The weight, which is a fractional number between 0.0 and 1.0 and is only relevant when the "from" author type has loyalty.
  • The "symmetric" checkbox. For example, kinship is symmetric. If A is related to B, but B is not related to A in a symmetric relationship, the system will complain during its nightly integrity check.
  • The "membership" checkbox. If checked, relationships of this type will be listed on the target author's page. For example, the person-to-party relationship should be checked as a membership, so that users visiting the party page can see a list of its members.

Managing link domains

Some items have external URL links:

  • statements can and should provide links to a reputable press source;
  • author profiles should link to their official page;
  • author relations should state their source.

By default, Dignitas displays the domain part of these links, such as en.wikipedia.org. A moderator can map these domain names to more user-friendly values such as Wikipedia. The link to the domain manager is on the moderator dashboard.

Managing static resources

You can configure static resources (images, HTML, Javascript, CSS) to customize certain pages. These are currently limited to the home page for anonymous users and for logged in users.

The link to the static resource manager is on the moderator dashboard. The default configuration looks for homepage-top.html, homepage-bottom.html, homepage.js and homepage.css for anonymous users, and does nothing for logged in users. Feel free to create additional resources (such as images) if your HTML requires them. Each of these resources has a URL link so you know how to include it in your HTML.

Every resource specifies the locale it uses. When multiple resources exist with the same name, the system will load one in this order of preference:

  • the current user's locale;
  • the "any" locale (this can be useful for language-independent resources such as images, Javascript and/or CSS);
  • the lexicographically smallest locale.

Sending out invitations

Moderators can send out email invitations, if these are enabled in the configuration file. Recipients can click the link in the email to join Dignitas. Currently, invitations cannot be revoked. The link to the invitation manager is on the moderator dashboard.