Writing.Com 101

My Favorites and Fans

Favorites, just like website bookmarks, are a great way to keep track of the Writing.Com items and members that you enjoy visiting. Favorites are individual to you, and kept private. Fans, on the other hand, are Favorites that you've chosen to publicly show your support for, and are available to view from the Fans tab of your portfolio. (For more information on your Fans tab, please see: Fans Tab.

Creating Favorites and Fans
The first step to organizing your Favorites and Fans is to create some. You'll notice that when viewing a Writing.Com item, there will be a in the top right-hand corner of the Item itself (next to the Print and Email icons). In addition to items, every Writing.Com member also has a next to his or her handle, to the right of their portfolio case and the email icon. To create a Favorite, all you have to do is click that little and the item or member will be added to your Favorites list! A dialog box may pop up asking if you want to move the Favorite somewhere other than the Main folder; folders will be discussed below.

Once you've created a favorite, the will now be replaced with , a white hand with an extended forefinger that has a string tied around it. Now, not only will you have a list of Favorites for your account, but anytime you're viewing a handle or an item that you've declared a Favorite, you'll see the and know that it's already one of your favorites.

To become a Fan of something, simply click the a second time, and it will turn into a , which indicates that it's something you've become a public Fan of, rather than leaving as a private Favorite. The icon is dynamic, so you can click on it at any time to toggle between being a Favorite (private; ) or a Fan (public; ).

Organizing Your Favorites
Your list of Favorites (called "My Favorites") can be accessed a couple of different ways, either by clicking on the My Account menu in the navigation under the Writing.Com logo and going to My Favorites, or simply by clicking on the in the same navigation, right beneath your Gift Point total, between the icons for Instant Messenger ( ) and Site News ( ). By default, all of your Favorites and Fans are stored in the Main folder of your My Favorites section, and all of your Favorites are ordered from most recently updated at the top, to least recently updated at the bottom.

Once you start to accumulate a large number of Favorites, you may find yourself wanting to organize them for easier reference. You always have the option of using the Search bar at the top of the page to find Favorites with particular keywords, but at the bottom of the page, you can also create separate folders that you can expand or collapse to help organize your Favorites. You might, for example, want a folder for Blogs, another for Contests, and one for each Writing.Com group you've joined.

To create a folder, just enter in the desired folder name in the "Create a New Folder For Favorites" dialog box at the bottom of the page. When you click "Go," it will add the folder at the bottom of your Favorites (beneath any other previously created folders). You can then use the "Up/Down" links on the right-hand side of each Folder's header to move that folder up or down among your list of Favorites folders, allowing you to customize the order in which you view them.

In order to move Favorites into specific folders, you can either do so when prompted by the little dialog box that pops up when you first click the icon to add it to your Favorites, or later by clicking the check box next to an item and, at the bottom of your "My Favorites" page, selecting the appropriate folder from the drop-down box in the "Move Favorite(s) to Another Folder" section and clicking the "Move!" button. You can select multiple favorites at the same time, making it easy to organize new folders at once.

Deleting Your Favorites
At the bottom of the My Favorites page, you also have the option of Deleting Favorites by checking their boxes first, and Deleting a Favorites Folder, which must be empty in order to delete it (you'll need to move any Favorites out of the folder first).

Recently Updated Favorites
At the top of the right-hand navigation column on every page, you'll also have a list called "My Favorites." This is a list of the most recently modified of your saved Favorites. You can change the number of Favorites this list displays by going into the "Edit Preferences" section of your Account Overview. (For more information on these settings, please see: "My Account" ).

Other Features Of My Favorites
At the top of your My Favorites page, there are several links (under the Search bar) that can further help you organize and view your Favorites:

Recently Updated: Like the right-hand navigation column, clicking on "Recently Updated" will add a list of the fifteen (15) most recently updated Favorites to the page, above your folders.

Favorite Authors: Lists all of your favorite Writing.Com authors and gives you quick access to their portfolios, creation dates and more. Choose from the sorting drop-down menu to resort the order of display.

Items By Favorite Authors: Clicking on "Items By Favorite Authors" will take you to a new page with up to one hundred (100) Items from your Favorite authors. You have the option of Narrowing Favorites by including or excluding a particular type of Item (statics, forums, groups, books, etc.), as well as sorting the Items using a variety of options (by recently modified, newest, longest, most rated, highest rated, etc.). This is a great feature if you're looking to discover something new by one of your Favorite authors.

Daily Update: Clicking on "Daily Update" will take you to a new page that is broken down into three categories: "New Items By Your Favorite Authors," "Updates To Your Favorite Items," and "Updated Items By Your Favorite Authors." This page is a "snapshot," taken once per day around midnight WdC time, that gives you an overview of the activities of your Favorite authors over the past day. Use the left and right arrows above the listing to page through the last seven days! This is a great feature if you're either looking for something new by one of your Favorite authors, want to know what they're working on now, or want a list of which of your Favorites has been updated in the past twenty-four hours.

My Favorites Pop-Up
If you have an Upgraded Membership or higher, you can also set your My Favorites page to open in a slim pop-up window, rather than inside your current browser window. You can toggle this setting from the "Edit Preferences" section of your Account Overview. (For more information on these settings, please see: "My Account" ).1

Recommended Reading

1. My Account
2. Free and Paid Membership Benefits

Footnotes
1  Written by Jeff