VBulletin Tips and tricks

[Lex]

Post tips and tricks for the new forum software here. This stuff is a little complex, so if we talk about it, we may all become a little better with it.

Maybe you just found out about a cool feature. Figured out how to do something that wasn't obvious, whatever, post it here.

This is Post 9000 in the Chalet!

Lex

[Lex]

Ok, here's a tip. On the right hand side of the forum main page, you'll find blue arrows on the orange strip where the headings are like "primetime AV". If you click it, it minimizes the entire section. So, you could basically minimize everything and only pop open what you want to look at at a point in time to decrease the size of your page.

Lex

[Pat]

My favorite so far is this button

You can find it at the very left of the title of the thread
or after you open a thread it is at the top left.

when you click on it, it takes you to the first unread post of the thread...obviously you have to have cookies enabled.

[Kevin P]

Viewing just a section of the forum

This is somewhat related to Lex's tip above, but you can also click on a subhead such as Primetime A/V and get a page with only that section's forums listed.

Also, on the tree structure at the top of the page (HTGuide Forum > Subhead > Forum > Thread) you can click any of those to go up to that level.

Smilies messing up your post?

Say you are posting a code sample or something that you don't want translated into smilies. You can click "Disable smilies in text" under Additional Options when posting, and then smiley translation won't occur for that post.

Want a list of all moderators and administrators?

Click the "View Forum Leaders" link near the bottom of the main forum page.

Wondering who's online and what they're doing?

At the bottom of the main forum page, you'll see a section titled "What's Going On?" Click the "Currently Active Users" link to view what users are doing at that moment in time.

Don't want people to see what you're doing?

Go to User CP, click Edit Options, then select "Use Invisible Mode".

Quick Links

Check out the Quick Links at the top of the page. From here you can quickly view new posts, your buddy list, edit your profile or signature, or mark forums read, amongst other things.

[Kevin P]

Linking vs. attaching images

When we link to an image on the net does it transfer to the site and embed or if the picture link goes....it goes here as well?

If you use [ IMG ] blah blah [ /IMG ] it's translated into IMG HTML tags, meaning your browser pulls the image from the site specified in blah blah URL. The forum server doesn't see the image at all, it's just passing code to your browser and your browser downloads the image from the site. If the image is deleted from the site, or replaced with another image, you'll see the change in your post as well.

If you attach an image to your post, then you're actually uploading a copy of the image to the HTG server and hosting it there. This is handy if you have a picture you took sitting on your PC but don't want to upload it to your ISP's webspace.

[Kevin P]

Ok, here's another one:

I used the IMG tags but the image doesn't show. I just see the IMG tags.

If this happens, make sure you put a fully qualified URL inside the IMG tags. Start with http://, otherwise the img tag won't work.

[Lex]

Kevin, I wonder if we could investigate a forum mod to accept www.xyz.com/image.jpg instead of requiring the full protocol?

Lex

[Kevin P]

I'll look into that when I have a few free minutes. It'll require a code hack, I can tell you that right away.

[soopa]

you mean you want any image URL to be automatically parsed and displayed as an inline image?

could be done yeah...

i don't know of any pre built hacks out there doing this... but its a good concept. im curious why its not automatic actually...

i will probably write a little script for my sites to do this... id be glad to share with yall if ya want it. gimme couple days.


----

on another note... you guys really should upgrade to 3.0.3... its a pretty painful process...

theres several HIGHLY publicised vulnerabilities in .0 and .1 and several sites have been systematically hacked over the past few weeks since the vulnerabilites surfaced...


if you dont have any hacks installed... and all youve edited is the common templates...

it will take all of 3 minutes to upgrade... and will save you alot of time if a script kiddie comes wondering on and corrupts your data

[Burke Strickland]

Bold emphasis added:

you guys really should upgrade to 3.0.3... its a pretty painful process...
...

it will take all of 3 minutes to upgrade... and will save you alot of time if a script kiddie comes wondering on and corrupts your data

Hey, soopa, don't you mean "painless" ? IOW, if I'm reading you right, the upgrade is a quick, easy thing to do that will help the site avoid what really WOULD be "painful" -- having to recover from a malicious hack.

Burke

[soopa]

beheheh. yes... meant to say painless...