The Irish Farmers Forum (FarmersForum.ie) has been developed by farmers, for farmers and is a one-stop shop for all things farming.

A comprehensive website which offers the following to farmers: an online discussion forum, an online Vet for queries and advice, a blog, a classifieds' section to place your adverts, a business listings section which includes premium listings, a notice board, a calendar where you can add upcoming events, a special offers section, an online auction site, a swap section and much more.

A premium listing means placement of your business on page 1 of the search results returned for the chosen category. The maximum number of results allowed per page is 14.

Business featured listings provide you with three categories in which to outline your business. Features such as your company logo, company name and address, telephone and fax, e-mail and website address, images for uploading (4 max) plus a Google location map are all available to you 24 hours per day, 364 days per year.

Standard Business Listings are FREE.

Premium Listings start from €100 per year (excl. VAT), your Business Featured Listing is displayed on FarmersForum.ie.

Yes

A typical Premium business listings profile page displays the following information:

• Name and full address, contact details (telephone number, fax, mobile, e-mail, website address), a brief profile description of your business, and up to four images which can be uploaded.

• To upload the images, click the Images link beside the camera (bottom of the page on the right hand side). Note: ensure that the image format used is JPEG / JPG only and a maximum of 800kb in size.

• From this page, a potential customer can contact your company directly with an enquiry (by e-mail) and also forward the profile details to a friend.

• They can also print the profile details check the Google Map on the same page to check the company location.

The following section provides a brief explanation of the main elements of a forum which may be useful to those unfamiliar with using forums:

• Forum: Forums are governed by a set of individuals, collectively referred to as staff, made up of administrators and moderators, who are responsible for the forums' conception, technical maintenance, and policies (creation and enforcing). Most forums have a list of rules detailing the wishes, aim and guidelines of the forums creators. There is usually also a FAQ section contain basic information for new members and people not yet familiar with the use and principles of a forum.

• Administrator: Administrators (short form: "admin") manage the technical details required for running the site. As such, they may promote (and demote) members to moderators, manage the rules, create sections and sub-sections, as well as perform any database operations (database backup etc). Administrators often also act as moderators. Administrators may also make forum-wide announcements, or change the appearance (known as the skin) of a forum.

• Moderator: Moderators (short singular form: "mod") are users (or employees) of the forum who are granted access to the posts and threads of all members for the purpose of moderating discussion and also keeping the forum clean (neutralizing spam and spambots and so on).

  To view, read, post or perform another action, a user may need special permissions. Contact a moderator or board administrator to grant access.

• Topic: See below.

• Post: A post is a user submitted message enclosed into a block containing the user's details and the date and time it was submitted. Members are usually only allowed to edit or delete their own posts. Posts are contained in threads, where they appear as boxes one after another. The first post starts the thread; this may be called the TS (thread starter) or OP (original post). Posts that follow in the thread are meant to continue discussion about that post, or respond to other replies; it is not uncommon for discussions to be derailed.

  The board administrator may have decided that posts in the forum to which you are posting require review before submission. It is also possible that the administrator has placed you in a group of users whose posts require review before submission. Please contact the board administrator for further details.

• Thread: A thread (sometimes called a topic) is a collection of posts, usually displayed - by default - from oldest to latest, although the option for a threaded view (a tree-like view applying logical reply structure before chronological order) can be available. A thread is defined by a title, an additional description that may summarise the intended discussion, and an opening or original post (common abbreviation 'OP', which can also mean original poster) which opens whatever dialogue or makes whatever announcement the poster wished.

  A thread is contained in a forum, and is displayed in chronological order from newest to oldest, where the date is taken as the date of the last post (options to order threads by other criteria are generally available). When a member posts in a thread it will jump to the top since it is the latest updated thread. Similarly, other threads will jump in front of it when they receive posts.

  A thread can contain any number of posts, including multiple posts from the same members, even if they are one after the other.

To view the most recent posts:

1. On the Home page of the Farmersforum website, go to the center of the page to view a number of the Latest Forum Posts displayed under the FORUM button.

   This section shows the date and time the post was added, 2 / 3 lines of the post's description and the author. The posts are listed in date order with the most recent showing at the top of the list.

2. Click on the date and time to open and view the article in full within the forum itself.

To access and use the Forum:

1. From the Home page on the FarmersForum website, you can either click the Forum tab or either of the Forum buttons in the centre of the page.

2. The main page within the Forum is displayed. This page consists of the following three main sections:

   1. Top Section:

      • General Search box and Advanced Search feature: allows you to search the entire forum site for topics, threads and postings using the Search box. If you want to be more specific in your search for example, search for a specific author, specific subforum, use keywords and so on, use the Advanced feature.

      • User Control Panel: From here, you can monitor, view and update your profile, preferences, subscribed forums and topics. You can also send messages to other users (if permitted).

      • View your Posts: view all of your existing posts to date.

      • Return to the Main Site: returns the user to the FarmersForum Home page.

      • FAQ: a complete Frequently Asked Question section for the Forum itself.

      • Members: list of all members currentl linked to the Forum.

      • Logout: logs the user out completely of both the Forum as well as the FarmersForum website.

   2. Middle section:

      • Clink on the links to quickly view all unanswered posts, unread posts, new posts and active topics.

   3. Bottom section:

      • General statistics: this section shows various interesting statistics including, the number of registered currently online, most users ever online, the total number of topics on the forum, total number of members registered on the forum, latest member and so on.

To create a new topic:

1. From the Home page on the FarmersForum website, you can either click the Forum tab or either of the Forum buttons in the centre of the page.

   The main page of the forum is displayed.

2. Access the relevant section in which you want to create the new topic, for example, Ask the Vet (under Online Veterinary Clinic) and click New Topic.

   If you haven't registered on the main website, you will be prompted to do so at this point.

   If you are not logged in you will be prompted to do so.

   The Post a New Topic page is displayed.

3. Type an appropriate subject for the topic in the Subject field.

4. Type the message in the main text box and use the formatting buttons, if needed.

5. If you want to add an attachment, for example a picture, click the Upload Attachment tab. Browse for the file, add a comment and attach it to the post.

6. Once everything is complete, click Submit. A confirmation message states that your new topic has been successfully created.

7. To verify this, return to the main forum page and click the Ask the Vet link - you should see your newly created topic showing at the top of the list.

To reply to an existing topic:

1. From the main page of the forum, click the title of the relevant section, for example Ask the Vet and view the existing topics.

2. Click on the title of the topic in which you want to post a reply, for example, Cows Lame.

3. On the View Reply page, you can see all the replies to date to the post.

4. Click Post Reply.

   If you haven't registered on the main website, you will be prompted to do so at this point - enter your username and password details.

   If not, the Post a Reply page is displayed.

5. Type an appropriate subject for the topic in the Subject field.

6. Type the message in the main text box and use the formatting buttons, if needed.

7. 1.If you want to add an attachment, for example a file, click the Upload Attachment tab. Browse for the file, add a comment and attach it to the post.

8. Once everything is complete, click Submit. A confirmation message states that your new topic has been successfully created.

9. To verify this, return to the main forum page and click the Ask the Vet link - you should see your newly entered reply showing at the top of the list.

The Q&As listed in this section cover only a number of the basic tasks required to use the forum.

If you need additional help in using all of the remaining facilities on the forum, please use the existing internal FAQ - click the FAQ link on the menu bar inside the Forum itself (top of the page, right hand side).

To view all classified adverts:

1. From the Home page, select either the Classifieds tab or the Classifieds button in the centre of the page to access the section.

   The main Classifieds page is displayed which shows the following:

   • Links on the left hand side represent the different categories / subcategories available in the system.

   • Under All Categories (centre of the page), a list of all of the classified adverts placed in the system to date is shown

     Each of the adverts displayed in the central section shows the name of the advert, the first 3 / 4 lines of the description of the item, the location and an image of it, if available.

2. To view adverts in a specific category, you can either:

   • Click on any of the icon buttons on the menu bar which represent some of the different categories.

   • Click on the relevant link on the left hand side of the page - some of these main links have sub links, for example, Livestock, so click on the sub category you want to view.

3. To view more details on a specific advert, click on the name in the central section on the main page (or, if on more than one page, click Next to view entries on subsequent pages).

4. On the main profile page of the selected classified advert, you can see the following details:

   Name of the item, category, a full description of the item for sale, address, price and contact details (landline or mobile number, email address and website address) and up to four images, if provided. Click any of the images to view them in more detail.

To place a classified advert:

1. You need to first log on to the Farmersforum website in order to place an advert.

2. On the Home page, select either the Classifieds tab or the Classifieds button in the centre of the page to access the section.

3. On the main Classifieds page, click the Place an Ad icon button on the menu bar (small cross on the right hand side), the Create an Ad page is displayed.

4. Fill in the form.

5. Once all of the fields have been completed, click Create Ad.

   A confirmation message is displayed to state that you have successfully placed your classified advert.

6. If you want to view the ad, click the Back button to access the main Classifieds page and search for it under the relevant category.

Check that you selected the correct category from the drop-down list when originally placing the advert. For example, if you have a tractor for sale, make sure to select "Farm Machinery" from the Category list.

If the wrong category was selected, contact the Administrator at FarmersForum to change it to the correct one.

Go to the Edit Classified page.

Go to the Edit Classified page and Suspend the ad, this sets the ad as expired.

Expired ads are deleted automatically after a certain time period

Yes you can but to take full advantage of all that Farmers Forum has to offer our registered members then why not take 2 minutes and register. ITS FREE.

Ensure that you have typed your username / password correctly.

If you cannot see any reason why your login should be refused, please send an e-mail to support@FarmersForum.ie and provide as much information as possible, including any error message that you may have received. We will respond to your email as soon as possible.

You can log out of the website at any time. Once successfully logged on to FarmersForum, the Login button (directly above the Search button) automatically changes to Hi (your name) Logout.

Click on the Forgotten Your Password link at the top right hand corner of the page and follow the easy to follow instructions

Send an e-mail to support@FarmersForum.ie to provide you with the existing username and password values.

Firstly, you must be a registered member and have permissions to add an event to the calendar.

1. After successfully logging on to the Home page on the Farmersforum website, either click the Calendar tab or click the large Calendar button (centre of the page) to access the calendar.

2. Click Add Event - the Create New Event page is displayed.

3. Fill in the form.

4. Once all of the fields have been completed, click Submit.

   A confirmation message is displayed to state that the event has been added successfully at the bottom of the same page.

5. If you want to confirm for yourself that the event exists, select the Calendar tab again and click the relevant date on the calendar. A popup box is displayed showing the information entered.

   A legend at the bottom of the calendar explains the colouring for the events, for example, blue indicates Auctions / Marts, pink indicates Farmer Markets.

To view the recent news articles, complete the following steps:

1. After successfully logging on to the Farmersforum website, click the News tab to access the News page.

   The News page provides a list of recent articles listed in date order, shows the title of the article, the date on which it was produced and the first paragraph of the article.

2. To view the article in its full, click on the title which is a link, in itself.

To view the recent news articles click the Vacancies tab in the menu.

Firstly, you must be a registered member and have a login in order to send queries to the Vet.

1. After successfully logging on to the FarmersForum website, click Ask the Vet on the Home page for the quickest access to the Online Veterinary Clinic page on the forum.

2. Click New Topic - the New Message page is displayed.

3. Type an appropriate value in the Subject field.

4. Type the question in the main text field and use the formatting buttons, if needed.

5. If you want to attach any files with the question, click the Upload Attachment tab.

   In the Filename search box, click Browse to locate the file in your local directory and click Add the File.

6. Type a comment in the file comment text box below.

7. Click Submit to send the question to the Vet. You can also preview the question before sending it or save it and send it later.

   A confirmation message is displayed to state that the message has been successfully sent.

8. If you want to view your submitted question, return to the main forum page and click Ask the Vet again.

If you have received an error message that you don't understand, please send an e-mail to support@FarmersForum.ie and provide as much information as possible, including the error message. We will respond to your email as soon as possible.

If you have successfully registered as a Member but have not received a confirmation e-mail in your Inbox, make sure to check your Junk or Spam mail boxes in case it has gone there. If not there, please send an e-mail to support@FarmersForum.ie. We will respond to your email as soon as possible.

If you are unhappy with any part of our service, please send an e-mail to info@FarmersForum.ie and provide as much information as possible regarding your complaint. We will respond to your email as soon as possible.