Get the most out of New Forest Knowledge
Here we have an introduction to the website, which will hopefully make your use of it as enjoyable and easy as possible. If you have any questions not covered here or in the downloadable guides below please do not hesitate to contact the team.
Jump straight in
The search bar at the top of the page searches the whole site including image captions so can be a great place to start exploring. There is a regular rotation of articles on the front page which may be linked to specific events or anniversaries, new donations or be content curated by local groups or volunteers. So, make sure you come back regularly to discover something new.
Another good start point can be through the map; why not expand it and play with the various layers and see where you end up?
Refining your search
New Forest Knowledge can be accessed via indexes; Times, People, Places, Subjects and Sources. They can be found at the top of the page and are a way of enquiring into the large amount of information held on the site.
The results displayed from using either the indexes or the general search bar can be refined using the further search and filters in the panel on the left of the results page.
User Guide
The user guide allows you to find out more about the website and how to use it. If you are just beginning, the Getting Started section takes you through the initial steps. You can read the guide in two ways:
Either – click on the sections from the guide to read it now:
Making Comments and Contributions
Or – download the whole guide as a PDFfile, save it, and read or print it when you wish:
Contribute
New Forest Knowledge brings together a wide range of source material and information, but will only ever be as good as the community using it so we really encourage you to sign up and begin contributing to the New Forest’s story.
Potentially anybody has some piece of the jigsaw which together builds the story of the New Forest. Whether something has sparked a memory; a photograph, story, letter, diary, drawing, postcard, recording (film or sound), poem or souvenir; all can add one more piece to our New Forest Knowledge.
You can start contributing straight away by adding comments to existing material on the website, or contributing an article. Before doing this, you need to register on the website and log in. Click on the head and shoulders figure at the top of the page and select Register.
Add a comment
You can add comments to existing items on the website by clicking on Comments at the bottom of an item’s page. Your comment could help:
- identify places, buildings and people
- correct misinformation
- give further information
- answer questions
- provide anecdotes or stories connected to an item
- start a discussion
Contribute an article
Contribute an article by clicking on Contribute at the top of each page. You will be taken step-by-step through how to add it. The more information you can provide, the more useful it is to everyone else. The details you add when you contribute an article make it searchable through the search bar, ensuring that everyone can see and enjoy it. We also highly recommend adding images to your articles to help illustrate your research or story.
Don’t worry if you can’t add all the information straight away; this is where the community element really comes into its own, helping to build a more complete picture and potentially producing new avenues for research.
For more on contributing an article, read Making Comments and Contributions in the User Guide.
Local Groups
Local Groups may be a local history or archaeology society, an animal or plant wildlife group, a cultural or artistic group, from an environmental or conservation organisation, researchers from a college, university or other organisation, or another such group.
Information contributed to the website can be linked to a local group and a search performed for material which has been linked.
To register a new group, see Groups in the User Guide.
Copyright
When adding content we ask that you confirm to us that you have the right to upload the item to the site and you need to do this by confirming that you’ve read the Terms of Use especially the Copyright Guide. If you would like any advice or guidance on this, please contact the project team.
All content on the site must also be licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Licence for educational and non-commercial purposes. Contributors are asked to agree to these terms in order to add their content.
For more information please read Licences and Copyrights
If you believe an image that you hold copyright for has been uploaded without your permission please contact us immediately and we will take it down. We endeavour to respect all copyright and ask our community of users to do the same.
Tips and tricks
Social media
We encourage you to share interesting articles and media you find on New Forest Knowledge with your social networks. This could lead to more information being added to a photo or article or help unearth new New Forest related material. We have had great success with this bringing to light New Forest material from Newcastle to New Zealand.
Community rules
This website will work best when we all use it as a community and treat it as an education resource available to all. As such, we request that all contributors and visitors ascribe to the following simple requests
- You agree that you shall not take any action to upload, post, e-mail or otherwise transmit content that:
- (a) Infringes the intellectual property rights of a third party;
- (b) Is known to you to be untruthful or inaccurate;
- (c) Amounts to an actionable breach of confidence or an infringement of the rights of privacy of any third party;
- (d) Is obscene or defamatory of any person
- (e) Involves you in the impersonation any person, collective or entity without their consent
- (f) Falsely states or otherwise misrepresents your affiliation with any person, collective or entity; or
- (g) Trivializes, sensationalizes or demeans either any person, subject or organisation associated with the Content
- (h) Violates any law or regulation of England and Wales or is otherwise inappropriate.
- You agree that you shall not remove any digital watermark, credit line or any other technical protection measure used in association with the Content.
- You agree that you shall not hack, interfere or remove Content held on the website.