Help & User Guide
This guide walks you through everything, one small step at a time. There's no rush, and you don't need to read it all at once - come back whenever you have a question.
First, the most important thing: you can't break anything here. Tap around, look at your teams, read the conversations. Nothing you do will cause a problem, and there's always a way back. Take your time.
Threadspore is a private place for your group to work together. Think of it as one tidy spot that holds your teams, your conversations, and the to-dos your group is working on - instead of scattered emails, texts, and phone calls.
Only people who have been invited to your organization can see it. It is not public, and it is not social media. It's just for your group.
Back to the topThere is no password to remember. That's on purpose - passwords are one more thing to lose.
Here's how you sign in:
The sign-in link works for a couple of hours, then it quietly stops working - just to keep your account safe. If yours has expired, no problem: go back and ask for a new one.
If the email doesn't arrive in a minute or two, check your junk or spam folder. It helps to add our sender to your contacts so future emails come straight to your inbox.
Back to the topWhen you sign in, you land on your home page. This shows the teams you belong to. If your group has more than one organization, you'll see those too, and you can move between them.
Along the top you'll find your account and a few buttons. If you ever feel lost, look for the word Teams or the Threadspore name near the top - tapping it brings you back home.
On a phone, there is a menu button at the top left (three short lines). Tap it and a panel slides out with everything in one place: What's new, Volunteers, your teams (tap a team to see its Chat, To-dos, Polls, and the rest), and at the bottom your account, Help, and a way to send us a note. If you belong to more than one organization, they sit in a strip down the left side of the panel; tap one to switch. This is the same panel the Threadspore app uses. Tap outside the panel, or swipe it to the left, to close it.
Back to the topA team is a group of people working on one thing together - for example a committee, a project, or a work crew. Everything for that group lives in one place: their conversations, their to-dos, their shared links, and the list of people on it.
To open a team, just tap its name. To come back out, tap Teams near the top. You can be on as many teams as your group needs.
Your teams are listed in alphabetical order, so each one stays where you expect it. If you would rather see the busiest teams first, choose Last active under Sort; your choice is remembered on this device. A team you have starred always sits at the top either way.
Back to the topChat is the main way your team talks. It works a little like a group text or a bulletin board: someone starts a conversation, and people reply underneath it.
Open a team and tap Chat. Tap any conversation to read it. New messages you haven't seen yet are marked for you.
Tap the button to start a new conversation, give it a short title, type your message, and send it. Your teammates will see it - and, if they've chosen to, get an email about it.
Open a conversation and type your reply at the bottom. To point your message at one particular person, type the @ sign and start their name - a little list appears so you can pick them.
You can add a little shape to a message if you want to. None of this is required, and a plain message is always fine.
You don't have to worry about sending something to the wrong place. A conversation only goes to the people on that team. And if you make a typo, that's perfectly fine - everyone does.
Think of your organization as a building. The Lobby is the room you walk into first, and everyone who belongs can talk there. Your teams are the private offices down the hall, each with its own chat.
It is the first thing you see when you open your organization, on the website and in the app. To come back to it later, look for Lobby at the top of the list on the left, or in the menu in the app.
There are no topics here. It is one open chat: type a message, send it, and everyone in the organization can see it. In the app you can also add photos. Mention someone by typing @ and their name so they are sure to hear about it.
By default you are told only when someone mentions you, and the Lobby tells you so the first time you open it. If you would like to hear about every message, open Settings and look under The Lobby (in the app, open Account and look for The Lobby). Turn it on for each organization you want. You can turn it off whenever you like.
New people are added automatically when they join the organization, and removed when they leave.
A to-do is simply a task for the team. Open a team and tap To-dos to see the list. Some may be assigned to you.
When you've finished something, tap the little box next to it to check it off. That's all there is to it.
Nothing bad happens if a to-do doesn't get done, or if you check the wrong one by accident - just tap it again to un-check it. It's only a list to help everyone remember.
A poll is a quick way for the team to decide something - like picking a date or choosing between options. Open a team, tap Polls, and tap your choice. That's your vote.
You can see how the group is leaning, and in most cases you can change your answer if you need to.
Back to the topTeams can keep useful links and files in one place - a shared document, a sign-up sheet, a photo, and so on. Open a team and tap Files to see them. Tap any one to open it.
To add a link, tap Add link and paste the web address. If your team has file sharing turned on, you will also see an Add file button - tap it to upload a document or a PDF straight from your device (up to 4 MB each). If you do not see Add file, your team has not turned on file sharing yet.
Photos go somewhere else now. If you try to add a photo here you will be sent to Photos instead. That is deliberate - photos there are tidied into albums, made smaller automatically, and do not email everybody each time one is added.
Back to the topOpen a team and tap Photos. On a phone, open the menu and tap Photos under the team's name. Photos are kept in albums - one for each event, usually, like "Beach cleanup, June".
Open an album and tap Add photos. You can pick as many as you like at once, up to thirty at a time, and they will be added one after another while you watch. Photos straight from your phone camera are fine: they are made smaller automatically before they are sent, so you do not need to shrink them yourself and they will not use up your organization's room.
This is the important part. Adding photos to an album never emails your team, however many you add. Your team is told twice at most: once when the album is first started, and once more when you tap Tell the team to say it is ready to look at.
So take your time. Add ten photos, come back tomorrow and add ten more, and nobody's inbox fills up. When you are happy with the album, tap Tell the team.
Tap any photo to see it full size. Use the arrows to move through the album, and tap Save this photo to keep a copy on your own device.
You can remove any photo you added yourself. Your team lead can remove any photo in the team.
Back to the topOpen a team and tap People to see who else is on it. This is a handy way to know who you're working with.
Every organization has a coordinator - the person who runs it. If you need help with anything to do with your group, they're the person to ask, and their contact details are shown on your organization's page.
Back to the topThreadspore can send you an email when something happens - a new message, a new poll, a to-do assigned to you, and so on. This is so you don't have to keep checking the app.
You are in complete control of these emails. In your Settings you can:
Getting too many emails? You never have to put up with it. Every notification email has a link at the very bottom that takes you straight to these settings, so you can turn things down anytime.
If the words feel small, you can make everything larger. Go to your Settings and turn on the larger text option. The whole app grows to a more comfortable size, and you can turn it off again just as easily.
Back to the topIn your Settings you can set the name your teammates see and add a photo if you'd like one. Neither is required, and you can change them whenever you want.
Back to the topIt's completely normal to get stuck when something is new. Here's what to do:
And remember: you can't break anything. If a page looks wrong, closing it and opening it again fixes almost everything. You're doing fine.
You help run an organization, so you can do a few things volunteers can't. This part of the guide is still growing - here are the essentials for now.
As a coordinator (or a moderator helping you), you look after your organization from its pages. The most common things you'll do:
Coordinators can do more than volunteers, but the same rule applies: you can't break anything that can't be undone. Take your time, and reach out through the contact page anytime.
Still have a question? Ask your organization's coordinator, or get in touch. We're glad you're here.