Message Board

Jump ahead to:

• Categorize the Messages on the board
• Pin the Messages to the top
• Sort the Messages on the board
• Format text and embed images
• Schedule to post later
• Choose who to notify
• Remove the Message Board tool

Posting in the Message Board of a project is ideal for making announcements, pitching ideas, asking questions to everyone on the project, and more. 

When you want to post an idea that doesn't necessarily belong in a text doc or in a Chat room — but you do want others to see it, and for it to have a more permanent place to live — Message Board! It's a happy medium for those middle-of-the-road conversations.

The Message Board doesn't aggregate conversations that happen elsewhere — it's only for messages and discussions posted here:

To create a new message, enter the Message Board and click "+ New message."

Categorize the Messages on the board

Messages can be classified into different categories. Consider the default options we use at Basecamp ourselves: Announcement, FYI, Pitch, Question, and Heartbeat. Or create your own! Anyone (including clients) can edit the categories in the project(s) that they are a part of.

When you go to post a new message, you’ll see a new option above the title to select a category. It’ll look something like this:

When your message is posted, the emoji will appear at the beginning of the title in both the index view and the message itself:

You can also filter messages on the Message Board by clicking on the "All messages" dropdown menu:

Admins and owners can change message categories. To do this, visit Adminland. Under "Administrators," you'll see the option "Change message categories."

From there, you'll get to a menu that allows you to customize your message categories:

Pin the Messages to the top

You can also pin messages to the top of your Message Board:

Pinned messages are helpful if you need to welcome new people or kick off the project, or you just need to highlight some of the messages at the top for any other reason.

Sort the Messages on the board

By default, the most recent posts appear at the top of the Message Board. Sometimes, you might want your posts to be sorted alphabetically (like a table of contents) or by most recent comment (so the newest discussions float to the top).

To change the sort order, open the menu in the upper right of the Message Board. You'll see an option below "Bookmark" that says "Sort messages by"

Once you click "Sort messages by," in you'll see a dialog with three different sorting options. Choose the option that works best for your project and click "Save changes" to apply:

The Message Board will reload and posts will be organized in the new sort order. If you've selected something other than "By original post date," you'll see a note at the top of the page indicating how things are sorted and a link to change it:

Format text and embed images

Text Formatting

Format your text with the editor toolbar:

You can change the color of your text or highlight it, add headings, and bulleted or numbered lists. Press the Tab key on your keyboard to make a sublist.

Embed Images

You can embed images into your message! Click and drag pictures from your computer into the message to embed them in-line. (JPG, GIF, and PNG supported.)

If you have several images, you can make a side-by-side gallery of images by  uploading multiple images at the same time. You can do by clicking the paperclip icon and selecting several files, or by dragging and dropping files directly into your message post:

If you need to, you can split up the gallery by putting your cursor between images and hitting return. Or, if you prefer a different arrangement (like maybe the third image should be first!), you can click and drag an image to its desired spot, then release that click.

Attach a file to your discussion by clicking the attachment icon (the paper clip!) to attach a file, or click and drag the file from your computer.

To remove an attachment or picture from your draft, just click it, then click the trash can:

Schedule to post later

If you don't want to post your message right away because of the time zone differences or other reasons, you can schedule the publication of messages on the day and time you want:

Your scheduled messages will be saved in drafts. The small link at the top of the Message Board will remind you if you have any scheduled or normal drafts to be posted:

If you change your mind and decide to publish it right now or want to change or remove the schedule, you can do so by going to the footer of the draft and clicking on "Change...". From there several options will allow you to make any changes you need.

Choose Who to Notify

• Notifying the 7 people on the project excludes anyone who reduced notifications to "just following"
• Notifying everyone means every person who is a part of this project, whether they're just following or not.

The last two options give you freedom to notify specific people or post without notifying anyone. If you're not ready to post your message just yet, click Save as a draft and Basecamp will keep it saved for when you're ready.

Remove the Message Board tool

You can hide a tool from a Project if it's not needed. See if a clear space really does organize the mind!

Here's how: Setting up Tools

Next up: To-Dos →

Jump to:

• Intro to the Project Tools
• Chat
• Message Board (you're here!)
• To-Dos
• Card Tables
• Hill Charts
• Schedule
• Automatic Check-Ins
• Docs and Files
• Doors
• Templates
• Forwards
• Drafts
• Boosts
• Searching
• Trash, Archive, and Restore
• Moving and Copying
• Printing
• Embedding Outside Content
• Lineup