Communities overview
What a community is in Zanfia, how channels, groups, roles and members fit together, where the creator editor and the member view live, and which article covers each task.
A community is a product type: a private space on your own platform where members read and write posts, chat, join events and message each other. You sell or give access to it like any other product, and you run it from two places: the community editor in your dashboard and the community itself, where you take part as its owner.
Key concepts
| Concept | What it is |
|---|---|
| Channel | A place for one kind of conversation. A Channel holds posts with comments and reactions, a Chat is a live conversation, a Link is a shortcut to an external page. |
| Group | A section that keeps related channels together in the navigation. |
| Feed | The member's home view: posts from every channel they can read, in one list. |
| Member | A client with access to the community product. Members appear automatically when they buy, sign up, or get access from you. |
| Role | Owner, Admin, Moderator and Member are built in. Custom roles add permissions or unlock restricted channels. |
Two places to work
| Place | Address | What you do there |
|---|---|---|
| The community editor | /communities/<productId>/editor in the dashboard | Structure, events, members, roles, moderation and settings. |
| The community itself | /app/community/<slug>/feed on your platform address | Posting, commenting, scheduling posts, announcements, pinning, and everything your members see. |
You open the editor from the product: in the sidebar choose Products → Communities (/communities), open the community, and on its Community tab click the Community editor tile. The Go to community button in the editor header opens the member view in a new tab. The editor needs a desktop-width screen; on a phone it sends you back to the product.
The editor at a glance
| Section | What it holds |
|---|---|
| Overview | Tiles for reports, members and the next event, an activity chart, member levels, a leaderboard, quick actions. |
| Channels | Channels, chats, links and groups, with drag-and-drop ordering. |
| Events | The community calendar. |
| Resources | Other products bundled into this community's plans, shown to members as materials. |
| Members list | Everyone in the community, with roles, status, import and export. |
| Roles | Built-in and custom roles with their permissions. |
| Moderation | Reports from members waiting for your decision. |
| Settings | Four tabs: Appearance, Access & features, Notifications, Gamification. |
Access and pricing
A community has no pricing of its own. Members join through the product's checkouts, a free checkout, a manual grant or an import, exactly like other products: see Plans and prices and Grant access manually. A community counts toward the published-product limit of your plan (Product limits) and its members count as clients (Client limits). When a subscription ends or access is removed, the member loses the community too.
Coming soon
Two entries you may see in the editor are not available yet: Support (private support tickets inside a community) shows a Coming soon tag, and the Live room picker on events stays hidden until live rooms launch. Both are left out of these articles.
Articles in this category
- Set up a community: create it, tour the editor, set its name, icon, layout and features.
- Channels and groups: channel types, ordering, read-only and restricted channels.
- The community feed and search: what members see first, sorting, pinned posts, post search.
- Write a post: the composer, attachments, polls, drafts and comments.
- Schedule a post: publish later, change the time, cancel.
- Notifications and announcements: what members are told about, and Notify all members.
- Weekly digest: the weekly summary email.
- Gamification: XP, levels, leaderboards, streaks and level-gated channels.
- Roles and VIP channels: custom roles, restricted channels, roles granted by a plan.
- Manage members: add, import, export, change roles, remove.
- Moderate a community: reports, removing content, muting and disabling members.
- Community events: the calendar members see.
- Public community: let guests read without an account.
- Member profiles, connections and messages: the member side of the community.
- Troubleshooting communities: the most common problems, with causes and fixes.
Letting the Assistant draft posts, replies or starter channels is covered in Run your community and content with the Assistant. Reading and writing community content from your own tools is covered in Community structure in the API.
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