what is aawaj? why should i use it?

do you ever find yourself at some place trying to figure out which of your friends may be near you, or what is the closest place you can go for a quick lunch?

aawaj is the nick name of somewhere in… bangladesh community. it is about learning and connecting with local communities, people and businesses around you as well as your friends from both near and far. you can simply click on a user’s community (area) link and open a map of surrounding areas. you may browse through what people are saying or doing in that local community or find businesses, restaurants and shops from that area with their information and latest updates or messages. you can even add your friends on your network and easily learn who is where and doing what. add photos to share with your friends, communicate with others through web or mobile – without sharing email or mobile number plus so much more. for all this you may choose to visit the website – view everything in bangla as well as english. or you may even do almost everything while you are away from a computer – just by using sms from your mobile phone!

why is aawaj located at www.somewhereinbangladesh.net?

while you can still access aawaj from www.aawaj.com, the service has now found a new home under www.somewhereinbangladesh.net/community - where it belongs as a tool to bridge communities in bangladesh.

 

what is the purpose of the collection of large and small words on the right side?

the collection of words is called “tag cloud”. this collection is automatically generated from the most used words on each section of the site to present an idea on what is being talked about most. popular words appear bigger in a tag cloud. click on a tag to view where these words appeared.

 

how can i change my display picture?

your display picture appears with all your activity updates as well as your profile page and comments you post.

to change your display picture, login and click on the display picture area of the orange post bar on top or go to settings > profile information tab > avatar. from this section you may upload multiple images and select the one you wish to make your default display picture for aawaj.

why does every message show “from” next to the sender’s name?

this part displays the user’s local community – ie, the home location of the user. the area name links to the community page of that particular area where you can see a map of the area plus messages, users, attractions, photos and new members from that neighborhood.

 

what can i search for? how?

you may use the search field at the top right area of the site to search for content throughout the site. you can type in single or multiple keywords in either bangla or english and search. you may also expand “show options” to apply more control on what you want to search for.

i want to use bangla on this site? what bangla features are available?

by clicking the “bangla” button at the top header you can switch to the bangla interface of the site where all elements of the site except user-generated content will be translated into Bengali. you need to have Unicode Bengali script support installed on your computer to view Bengali properly.

if you are using windows xp system and cannot see any bengali characters, you may setup Unicode Bengali script support through the iComplex tool provided by OmicronLabs.

if Bengali characters appear too small or difficult to read, follow the procedure below to configure your browser to display Bengali in a good Bengali font:

1. download and install a good Bengali Unicode font such as Siyam Rupali available from OmicronLabs.
2. go to your browser settings/options/preferences and find settings for default fonts for different language scripts. you may find these setting under “content > fonts > advanced” (for firefox) or “general > appearance > fonts” (for internet explorer) or “preferences > advanced > fonts” (for opera).
3. choose “bengali” under “fonts for” or “language script” or “writing system” (depending on your browser).
4. select “Siyam Rupali” as default font for all types under Bengali font settings.
5. set “Unicode (UTF-8)” as default character encoding if the option is available.
6. [optional] go to your OS “display settings > appearance > effects” and set “Clear Type” as the font smoothing option.

for more detailed guidelines you may additionally refer to Bengali Support on somewhere in… blog.

writing Bengali is also easy. whenever you place the cursor inside a text input field, a keyboard selection bar appears on screen. you may choose from the following options:

phonetic keyboard: with this option selected, you can type Bengali in its english pronunciation and it will be automatically converted to Bengali script as you type. click here to view the phonetic guide.

unijoy: a standard Bengali keyboard layout which is similar to “bijoy” except that preceding “kar”s (like e-kar, i-kar” etc.) need to be typed after the consonant.

english: regular english text input.

 

what features of aawaj can i use on my mobile phone through sms?

you will need to have a verified* mobile number associated with your somewhere in… user account to be able to use the sms features of aawaj. please browse to settings > account info to add your mobile number. sms features (currently limited to grameen phone, aktel and banglalink subscribers) include:

1. update your activity – your message will publish on aawaj web with a mobile phone icon indicating this update was sent through sms.
   sms: ! <your activity message> to 5455
   eg, ! planning a weekend trip to cox’s bazaar for the rakhain festival
2. view someone else’s latest activity – you will get a reply sms with the user’s latest activity updated on aawaj.
   sms: <nick>? to 5455
   eg, asif?
3. view friends’ latest activities – you will get a reply sms with latest activities updated from users in your friend list, sorted as most recent first.
   sms: friends? to 5455
   eg, friends?
4. view latest updates from community home page – you will get a reply sms with latest (publicly viewable) activities on aawaj by all.
   sms: aawaj? to 5455
   eg, aawaj?
5. comment on someone else’s latest activity – this will publish your message as a comment under the user’s latest activity update
   sms: <nick>! <your comment> to 5455
   eg, asif! wow! that’s great. wish you have lot of fun.
6. send a private message to someone – a message will be sent to the user directly on his/her mobile and also appear under messages on aawaj web that is viewable only to the recipient.
   sms: <nick>: <private message> to 5455
   eg, asif: let’s meet up at my place tonight to discuss the project.

* if you have registered via mobile phone, you will not need to verify your mobile number. for web registered account you will need to add your mobile number from settings > account info and verify the number before you can use sms services.

why should i add friends? how is that done?

ones you add as your friends always get your messages and activity updates in one place in focus. for yourself you can find out what your friends are up to by just looking at a page with all your friends’ updates instead of looking at their profiles individually. adding friends also allows you to easily find out through web or mobile which friends are near you and exchange messages privately as well as share your activities and photos.

click on any user's name or profile picture to view the user's page there you will find "add as friend" link. click the link to send a friend request to the user.

what is activity update? who can see my activity update?

what are you doing right now? post it to the community so the message gets conveyed to your friends and whoever requests to know about you – may be on the web or through sms on mobile phone. by default this is shared with all, but you have the option to specify who you want to share these updates with.

when do i use activity update and when do i use private message?

activity update is used to share a message or information with a community or friends. alternatively, private message is meant for a single particular recipient and is not visible to anyone except the sender and the recipient.

how do i choose which of my information to display publicly?

every logged in user can edit settings through the settings link at the top of the site. in the settings page under “site settings” you will find options to control how much information you want to share with whom.

 

what can i do with photos? how does the photo album feature work?

after logging in to the site, you can create and upload pictures and maintain multiple photo albums. you have the option to share albums with all, friends only or no one. you can apply sharing options either collectively through privacy setting on the settings page or from individual album pages. new shared albums and photos appear on home page, user’s community page, friends page and personal page depending on sharing settings.

you can add or edit captions to your uploaded photos and users that can view your photos can also comment on each photo which you may reply to.

 

how can i synchronize my aawaj activity update on external services like facebook?

if you use a facebook account at www.facebook.com, you can share your activity updates from aawaj automatically as your facebook status.

to enable this feature you need to:

1. click here to add aawaj to your facebook profile
   
   
2. log in to facebook with your facebook username and password if prompted with “Facebook Login” screen.
   
   
3. "allow" aawaj access to facebook if prompted.
   
   
   
   
4. click on “+ allow aawaj to update facebook status” on the main page of aawaj on facebook application.
   
   
   
   
5. when prompted “please log into your aawaj account…”, use your aawaj username and password to log in.
   
   
   
   
6. “allow status updates” from aawaj
   
   
   
   

to change sharing preference for updates by sms, please log in to aawaj and go to settings > privacy settings > sharing on external applications.

this feature currently supports one-way synchronization to facebook profile only. sms support is currently limited to grameen phone subscribers.

 

report offensive or undesirable content

somewhere in bangladesh community is powered by the community of its users. therefore, the system employs an automated content moderation system that works based on feedback from the community. it is free of any forceful moderation and only users can disallow abusive content or block another user.

how? it is quite simple…

 

 

click on the downward arrow next to any update message while you are logged in on aawaj. from the action bar click on “report abuse” and confirm to continue if you are sure others too will find the content abusive. you are done!

if a certain number of users report a message as abuse, the message will disappear from all pages except the author’s own profile.  the same user getting abuse reports for multiple content will get a ban from using aawaj for at least 15 days.  banned user will lose all abuse reported content from his/her profile permanently.  if the user receives more abuse reports after the ban is removed for the first time, the ban may be extended or made into a permanent ban. if the author does not cause any further abuse reports, the “abuse points” will be gradually dropped and eventually status reset to normal.

do not misuse the “abuse report” function.  if you repeatedly report other members while others do not, you may also accrue abuse points for unnecessary harassment.

 

 

what is community page? why and when should i use community pages?

community page of a particular includes a map of the area plus messages, users, attractions, photos and new members from that neighborhood. visit community pages to view a summary of activities in and surrounding an area. from your area’s community page you can learn more about your neighbors and neighboring businesses and attractions.

what are “attractions”? who can join aawaj as an attraction?

public service organizations, public figures, popular places, businesses, shops and restaurants can join aawaj as a community attraction. joining aawaj as an attraction connects you to the people of your community with an opportunity to deliver free advertisement, news and offers to your local community members and marks your organization on the map with address, contact information and personalized messages.

who are members and followers of attractions?

members are authorized users of an attraction who can update or post messages on behalf of the attraction. membership requests are subject to approval from the owner of the attraction. followers are users who choose an attraction as “favorite” and subscribe to update messages. followers cannot post or modify any content on behalf of an attraction. becoming a follower generally does not require any approval from the owner of the attraction.