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Wiki and Confluence Overview

This is a short user guide for Confluence. Complete user guides are available at the links below.

What is a Wiki?

What is Confluence?

  • Confluence is an enterprise wiki. It incorporates functionality appropriate for multiple users and groups, with fine grain permission capabilities so you can choose who can view, create and comment on spaces and pages, and a WYSIWYG editor for content contribution.
  • Overview of Confluence video

Complete Confluence User Guides

Typical Use

There are a number of features available in Confluence. This is only an introductory guide and does not even come close to covering all of them. However, you can find more features on your own using the Complete Confluence User Guide. Browsing and reading content on the site works in the same way as any web page. This document outlines the basic features that most of you will want to know to post and share content.

Adding Pages: Pages are the main building blocks of the wiki. You will use pages to organize your content into lower-level groups. You should create a new page whenever you want to create a whole new category of content or discussion, if you want to add a set of related content that makes sense to group together in one place, or if you want the content to be accompanied by a longer description and it would take what feels like too much space on an existing page. Once a page exists, you must link to your page from at least one other page so that people can find it. Then you can link to it from as many other pages as you would like as well.

Adding links to pages: On any page, you can add as many links as you wish. The links may be:

  • A link to another page on the wiki, e.g. related content that someone else posted
  • A link to another web site / page (not on the Wiki) or URL address, e.g. articles, organizations, other reference information, reports posted on other web sites.
  • A link to a downloadable attachment, e.g. a file you post to the Wiki to share with others. These work just like normal web links. You can add as much text around the link as you wish to describe it.

Adding attachments: On any page, you can add as many attachments as you wish. For example, PDF files of reports, or images. Note that you can also make images appear directly on the page. If the attachment you wish to share is already hosted on another Web site, sometimes it is best to simply link to the original Web page where you can download the document. This may be easier to do than uploading an attachment yourself.

Common Tasks in Confluence

  • Accessing Confluence
    •  URL and login credentials
  • Navigating through and around Confluence
    • hierarchies and searching
  • Working with pages
    • creating/adding a new page
    • editing a page ->update comment and minor update check box
    • adding an attachment
    • page permissions (hiding a page)
    • commenting
    • links
  • Working with news/blogs
    • viewing news
    • adding news
  • Tracking Updates
    • watching a page/space
      • digest or email on every update
      • notify on your own updates
  • User Profile
    • editing profile

Accessing Confluence Wiki

Access to Confluence requires an internet connection and browser

  1. Go to http://papyrus.baruch.local:8080/confluence/pages/editpage.action?pageId=622594
  2. Enter your Network Username and Password (this is the same information you use to login to your computer)

Navigating through Confluence Wiki

  • Spaces - In Confluence, content is organized into spaces. Each space has its own pages, news items, comments and access permissions. Spaces can based on any theme or topic. Confluence treats each space as an independently managed wiki. This means that each space functions autonomously within your site.
  • Dashboard - The Dashboard is the front page of Confluence. It provides an overview of the site, access to all of the spaces you have view access, and a list of the most recent content updates. Read more about the Dashboard
  • Search - A search box, located on every page in the wiki, allows you to search Confluence wherever you happen to be in the site. By default, Confluence will search all content in all spaces (global and personal), including attachments, that you have access to view. Read more about searching and filtering results
  • Browse - Within a space, the 'Browse' menu, gives access to wiki content such as pages, news items, etc, and allows you to browse the People Directory. If you are an administrator, the space and site administration options appear here too.
  • Read more about Using the Confluence screens and page options

Working with Pages

Adding a New Page

  1. Go to a page in the space, open the 'Add' menu and select 'Page'. The 'Add Page' screen opens.
  2. Enter a name (title) for your page. This is how it will be referred to from other pages.
  3. By default, Confluence will add the page as a child of the page you are viewing. If you need to move the new page to a different space or a different parent, you can edit the 'Location'.
  4. Enter content for your page using the Rich Text editor box below the title. You will see some buttons at the top of the box that look like buttons in Word or other office applications at the top of this area. Use the Bold, Italic and Underline buttons as you would with any document. Use the format drop down menu to create sections of the page. Use bullets and numbers for lists. You can even insert images, select text color, and add links (described below).
  5. Click 'Preview' if you want to see a preview of what the page will look like before saving it.
  6. Click 'Save'.

Editing a Page

  1. Go to the page and click on the 'Edit' link. This will bring up the edit screen.
  2. Make changes to the content or add new content as you would when you create a new page.
  3. Click 'Preview' to view your changes, and click 'Save' to keep them. Confluence will auto save a draft periodically, but we suggest that you save often, especially when adding a lot of content.

    On the same line as the Bold, Underline, Link, etc. buttons, there is a "Toggle to Fullscreen Mode." When clicked, it changes the window so the the editing area fills up the whole computer monitor, which may be easier if you are working on a long page.

Deleting pages

  1. Go to the page and click on the 'Edit' link.
  2. Click on the 'Remove' link located at the top of the page.

Adding an attachment

An attachment is any file that is included with your page. Images, word documents, presentations, PDFs, multimedia and sound files are some examples of attachments. Attachments are useful when you want to share information that exists in another file format. in confluence you can attach files to any page.

  1. Go to a page in the space, open the 'Tools' menu and select 'Attachments'. The 'Attachments' view will open.
  2. Click the 'Browse button.
  3. Browse through your files and select the file you'd like to attach.
  4. Enter a description for the attachment in the 'Comment' text field (optional).
  5. Click 'Attach more files' if required.
  6. Click 'Attach File(s)'.

Once you attach a file, you can then provide a link to it from a Confluence page. (see linking below) When a user clicks on the link, the attachment will open, so long as the user has the software application needed to open the attachment. In the case of image attachments, Confluence allows you to display attached images on the page.

If you attach a file with the same name as an existing attachment, Confluence will create a new version of the existing attachment.


Adding an Attachment and Link to it at the Same Time

  1. From the page and location you wish to link from, click on the 'Insert Link' button on the toolbar (the one that looks like a globe with chain link in front of it). A pop-up screen will appear.
  2. In the pop-up screen, click on the tab labeled "Attachments." To add a new attachment, click on the "Browse" button to get to files on your computer, and select the appropriate file.
  3. Next click on the "Attach" button, and the file will upload. When done, it will show up just above the "Browse" and "Attach" buttons in a list. This is a list of all the attachments to that particular page.
  4. Select the attachment you just uploaded from the list and a reference to it will show up in the "Link" field at the top of the pop-up screen.
  5. In the field called "Alias," enter the words you wish to appear to represent the link on the actual page. For instance, you might type "click here to see our latest report,". The link can appear in the middle of a paragraph, and may simply be part of a sentence.
  6. Another way to enter the words that will form the link is to highlight the words in the edit window before clicking the 'Insert Link' button. These words will automatically appear in the "Alias" field and all you have to do is add the attachment info.
  7. When ready, click the "OK" button at the bottom of the pop-up screen.

page permissions (hiding a page)

commenting

links

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