The Chat tool is a real-time, text-based collaboration tool. You can use the Chat tool to brainstorm ideas, hold a question and answer period, have a debate or discussion, or organize a remote study group. As opposed to other collaboration tools, such as Discussions, Chat conversations occur in real-time.

There are two types of chats:

  • Personal chats: Personal chats are private and visible only to users who you have added to the chat’s participants list. Personal chats are ideal for office hours, chatting with colleagues, club/organization chats, and more. All users can create personal chat rooms.
  • General (course) chats: General chats are chats visible to everyone enrolled in the course where they are created. Instructors and Teaching Assistants can create general chat rooms to incorporate chat discussions into the teaching of a course since they are automatically open to all users enrolled in the course.

Get Started with the Chat Tool