The Chat tool is a real-time, text-based collaboration tool. You can use the Chat tool to brainstorm ideas, hold a question and answer period, have a debate or discussion, or organize a remote study group. As opposed to other collaboration tools, such as Discussions, Chat conversations occur in real-time.
You can create personal chats to talk with peers or other friends at your organization. You can create personal chats from any org unit, and you can access them within any other org unit.
Personal chat rooms can only be accessed by users who have been added to the personal chat’s Participant List. When users are added, the chat room displays under Personal Chats in their list of chats.
To create a personal chat with the Chat tool
- On the navbar, click Chat.
- On the Chat List page, click New Chat.
Figure: The New Chat page.
- Enter a Title.
- Click Personal Chat.
- Enter a Description of the chat.
Note: Give your chat a unique, descriptive name and provide a description for it using the to help users distinguish the chat from other chats they are enrolled in.
- Click Create.
A new personal chat room is created.
Change your chat settings
You can also customize your Chat settings, such as giving yourself an alias or nickname, sorting how messages appear in the chat, and any sounds associated with messaging.
To change chat settings
- On the navbar, click Chat.
- Do one of the following:
- On the Chat List page, click Settings.
- Inside a chat, click Settings.
- In the Alias field, enter a new alias.
Note: Depending on your permissions, you can change your alias, or chat name, if you want to appear as a different name, such as a nickname, to other chat participants.
- Select Bold or Italics.
- Set an Alias Color.
- If you want to change the message order, select New to Old or Old to New. If you want to see new messages only, select New Messages.
Note: This requires you to manually refresh the screen, to see new messages and remove all old ones. You can change back to see all messages, which restores all messages for that session, even if they were not visible while New Messages was selected.
- You can change your sound settings so you can hear a sound when someone enters the chat, leaves the chat, or when there is an incoming message. Select a sound from the following drop-down lists:
- Incoming Message Sound
- Person Enters Chat Sound
- Person Leaves Chat Sound
- Click Save.
Note: If you use a preferred name and do not have permission to manage your own Chat Alias, your preferred name is still reflected in the Chat tool.
Your chat settings are saved.
Add or remove users from a chat
Connect with instructors and learners in real time. Chats are archived for users to refer to later.
To add users from a chat
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Navigate to the Chat tool in your course.
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Click the drop-down menu of the personal chat you want to modify.
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Click View Members.
Figure: The View Members option in your personal Chat List.
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Do one of the following:
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To add a member to the chat, click Add Members.
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To add a personal contact, click Add Personal Contact. Select the checkbox next to the name of the users you want to add. Click Add, then click Done.
Figure: The Add Members and Add Personal Contact options in a personal chat.
To remove users from a chat
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Navigate to the Chat tool in your course.
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Click the drop-down menu of the personal chat you want to modify.
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Click View Members.
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Select the check box of the user you want to remove.
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Click Delete.
Figure: The Delete option to delete users from a personal chat.
All selected members are deleted from the chat.
Manage chat history
The Chat tool stores each chat session so that you can review messages later. Brightspace will archive a session once all chat members leave the room or after more than 20 minutes of inactivity. Chats appear in the Chat Sessions list.
To manage your chat history
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Navigate to the Chat tool in your course.
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Click the drop-down menu of the personal chat that you want to review.
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Click View Sessions.
Figure: Available Chat sessions on the Chat Sessions page.
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In the Start Date column, click one of the available session links.
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When you are done reviewing the session, click Done.