HOW-TO - Posting in a Thread

[Admin]

This message board has many cool functions to enhance the posting of the users. In this thread I will explain how to do the most popular and frequently asked about functions.

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POSTING IN A THREAD

These tips will explain the different effects available when posting on the board, and how to accomplish them.

When you start or reply to a thread there is a section above the text box with a number of controls. We'll take these one at a time... Simply click one of the buttons and a set of tags will appear. They look similar to this: [b][/b].


The 1st button of for making Bold text.



Just type your desired text between the brackets.

Example: [b]THIS IS HOW TO MAKE BOLD TEXT.[/b]

RESULT: THIS IS HOW TO MAKE BOLD TEXT.




The next button is for making Italics.



Example: [i]THIS IS HOW TO MAKE ITALICS.[/i]

Result: THIS IS HOW TO MAKE ITALICS.



The next button is for underlining your text.



Example [u]THIS IS HOW TO UNDERLINE.[/u]

Result: THIS IS HOW TO UNDERLINE.



The next button is to strike through the text.



Example: [s]THIS IS HOW TO STRIKE THROUGH.[/s]

Result: This is how to strike through.



The next button is for making your text [glow=red,2,300]Glow[/glow]



When you hit this button you have some choices. The code that appears looks similar to this:

[glow=red,2,300 ][/glow]

You can change the color of the glow by typing what color you prefer (ie, Blue, Green, Yellow, etc...). The number there is for the amount of glow. I would recommend just leaving that alone.


Example: [glow=red,2,300 ]THIS IS HOW TO MAKE GLOWING TEXT.[/glow]

Result: [glow=red,2,300]THIS IS HOW TO MAKE GLOWING TEXT.[/glow]



The next button creates a [shadow=red,left,300]Shadow[/shadow]



Here again when you hit this button you get choices. The code looks similar to this:

[shadow=red,left,300][/shadow]

You can change the color as above, and you can change the direction. The number is the size of the shadow.

Example: [shadow=red,left,300 ]THIS IS HOW TO MAKE A SHADOW.[/shadow]

Result: [shadow=red,left,300]THIS IS HOW TO MAKE A SHADOW.[/shadow]

The next button is for making a Marquee, or moving text.



Example: [move]THIS IS HOW TO MAKE A MARQUEE[/move]

Result: THIS IS HOW TO MAKE A MARQUEE



These next 5 buttons affect paragraph formatting.




The 2 buttons highlighted in red affect how the text will be wrapped in the post. They are usually best left alone, as they can cause large page viewing.

The 3 buttons in the middle affect where the text ( or photo) is aligned within the thread borders. The center is the most useful for most people. It aligns the text in the center of the page.

Example: [center]THIS IS HOW TO CENTER AN OBJECT.[/center]

Result:

THIS IS HOW TO CENTER AN OBJECT.

This next button affects the text size.



By increasing the number you make the selected text larger. Default forum size is 2, so all numbers above that enlarge the text, while a value of 1 will make it smaller.


Example: [size=4]THIS IS HOW TO MAKE LARGER TEXT.[/size]

Result: THIS IS HOW TO MAKE LARGER TEXT.


The next button changes the font style on your text. You will need to know the style you want to change to, as there is not a drop down to give you a choice. Default style is Verdana.



Example: [font=Comic Sans MS]THIS IS HOW TO CHANGE THE FONT OF YOUR TEXT.[/font]

Result: THIS IS HOW TO CHANGE THE FONT OF YOUR TEXT.



This next button allows you to change the color of your text. You'll see a drop down box. When you click that you'll see your color options. Click on that color for it to be enabled.



Example: [color=Red]THIS IS HOW TO COLOR YOUR TEXT.[/color]

Result:
THIS IS HOW TO COLOR YOUR TEXT.




The effects can be combined as well. You can make bold italicized underlined green text move across the screen. Just remember to insert all other codes IN BETWEEN the brackets of the previous code.

Example: [b][i][u][move][color=Green]THIS IS HOW TO DO MULTIPLE EFFECTS.[/color][/move][/u][/i][/b]

Result: THIS IS HOW TO DO MULTIPLE EFFECTS

[Admin]

This next button is for block quoting.



Block quoting basically groups a paragraph together in an indented fashion.

Example: [blockquote]THIS IS A BLOCK QUOTE. IT GROUPS THE PARAGRAPH TOGETHER INTO AN INDENTED AREA AND SEPERATES IT FROM THE REST OF THE POST.[/blockquote]

Result:

THIS IS A BLOCK QUOTE. IT GROUPS THE PARAGRAPH TOGETHER INTO AN INDENTED AREA AND SEPERATES IT FROM THE REST OF THE POST.

This next button is for posting links.



It can work in a few different ways. 1st it can make the link usable and clickable in the forum, by showing the URL.


Example: [a href="http://i77.photobucket.com/albums/j68/Axholio/Phoenix/bugs_in_teeth.jpg"]http://i77.photobucket.com/albums/j68/Axholio/Phoenix/bugs_in_teeth.jpg[/a]

Result: i77.photobucket.com/albums/j68/Axholio/Phoenix/bugs_in_teeth.jpg



The 2nd way is used to hide the URL and is helpful if the URL is extremely long. It allows you to post a small phrase that is clickable, instead of the entire URL.

Example: [url=http://i77.photobucket.com/albums/j68/Axholio/Phoenix/bugs_in_teeth.jpg]CLICK HERE![/url]

Result: CLICK HERE!



The 3rd is to show a small thumbnail image instead of the URL or phrase/word. This can be very useful when posting a picture. It will allow you to show a small picture in your post that is clickable, and will direct to the larger image. This is done by adding image tags to the link.

Example:
[url =http://i77.photobucket.com/albums/j68/Axholio/Phoenix/bugs_in_teeth.jpg][img src="http://i77.photobucket.com/albums/j68/Axholio/Phoenix/th_bugs_in_teeth.jpg"][/url]

Result: (<--- click me).



The 3rd button in this row is for FTP linking. It is used for transfering files over File Transfer Protocol. I'll skip over this as most folks never need to use it.



The next button is used for posting pictures.



This is probably the most asked about feature of this forum. Before you can post a picture here or on any other site, it must be hosted somewhere. That means that it cannot be on your computer, but saved on a host server somewhere. There are many free image hosting services out there. I personally use www.photobucket.com as mine. Once you have the picture stored on the host server you can then post it here. Click the 4th button and voila...

Example: [img src="http://i77.photobucket.com/albums/j68/Axholio/Phoenix/bugs_in_teeth.jpg"]

Result:




The next button is used for adding a clickable email address to a post.



Example: [email][e-mail].[/email]

Result: [e-mail].



The next several buttons are for inserting tables and script changes.



They are not very useful for the average poster so I will not explain them.



The next button is for inserting a quote.



Example: [quote]THIS IS HOW TO CREATE A QUOTE BOX.[/quote]


Result:

THIS IS HOW TO CREATE A QUOTE BOX.

The final button is for creating a list.




Example:

[ul]
[li] THIS IS HOW
[/li][li] TO POST
[/li][li] A LIST
[/li][/ul]


Result:

• THIS IS HOW
  
• TO POST
  
• A LIST
  

[Admin]

TAG GLOSSARY

You may have noticed that all of the above codes and buttons use a common tagging. These are brackets [] with a discriptor in them. They can be used instead of the buttons. Here is a list of those tags...


These are the most common and useful tags:


BOLD TEXT = [b] TEXT HERE [/b]

ITALICS = [i] TEXT HERE [/i]

UNDERLINE = [u] TEXT HERE [/u]

STRIKE THROUGH = [s] TEXT HERE [/s]

GLOW = [glow=COLOR,2,300] TEXT HERE [/glow]

SHADOW = [shadow=COLOR,left,300] TEXT HERE [/shadow]

MARQUEE = [move] TEXT HERE [/move]

CENTER TEXT OR OBJECT = [center] TEXT HERE [/center]

TEXT SIZE = [size=2] TEXT HERE [/size]

FONT FACE = [font=Comic Sans MS] TEXT HERE [/font]

TEXT COLOR = [color=Red] TEXT HERE [/color]

BLOCK QUOTE = [blockquote] TEXT HERE [/blockquote]

LINKS = [a href=" URL HERE "] URL HERE [/a]

OR

[url =URL HERE] TEXT HERE [/url]

PICTURES = [img] PICTURE URL HERE [/img]

E-MAIL = [email] E-MAIL ADDRESS HERE [/email]

QUOTE = [quote] TEXT HERE [/quote]


These tags can be used seperately or together to create multiple effects as well as making objects act as links. Use our test area on this forum to see what you can come up with... And have fun posting!