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| Forums, Threads and Posts |
What is a bulletin board? A bulletin board is an online discussion site. It's sometimes also called a 'board' or 'forums'. It may contain several categories, consisting of forums, threads and individual posts. How is all this structured? The bulletin board as a whole contains various categories (broad subject areas), which themselves contain forums (more specific subject areas) which contain threads (conversations on a topic) which are made up of individual posts (where a user writes something). The board home page has a list of categories and forums, with basic statistics for each - including the number of threads and posts, and which member posted the most recent message. How do I find my way around? When you click on a forum's name, you are taken to the list of threads it contains. A thread is a conversation between members or guests. Each thread starts out as a single post and grows as more individual posts are added by different users. Threads can be rated (?) to show how useful or popular they are and may contain polls (?). To start a new thread simply click on the 'new thread' button Threads can be ordered in many different ways. The default is to have the thread with the most recent activity at the top. But you can easily change this ordering, for example to have the thread with the most posts at the top, or the highest rating. Simply click on the appropriate column heading at the top of the list of threads (Thread, Thread Starter, Rating, Last Post, Replies or Views). You can also reverse the sorting order by clicking the arrow next to the name of the active option. (Note that 'sticky' threads will always be at the top no matter how you change the viewing options). Multi-page views When there are more threads to display than will fit on a single page, you may see the 'Page' box, which contains page numbers. This indicates that the list of threads has been split over two or more pages. This method of splitting lists of items over many pages is used throughout the board. What are sticky threads? 'Sticky' threads are created by moderators or administrators (?), and remain 'stuck' to the top of the listing, even if they haven't had any posts recently. Their purpose is to keep important information visible and accessible at all times. How do I read a thread? To read a thread, click on its title. Each post in a thread is created by a member or a guest. You'll see some brief information about the member who created the thread above the main post message. In some cases it will be to the side of the post. To post a reply to an existing thread, click on the 'Post Reply' If enabled, there will also be a 'Quick Reply' box where you can quickly enter a reply without having to go to the 'Post Reply' page. You may need to click the quick reply button On long threads you may want to change how the posts are ordered. For more on different ways to view and navigate threads, click (?). Is there a faster way to get to forums? If you know which forum you want to go to, you can use the 'Forum Jump' control, which appears at the bottom of many pages within the board. How do I find out more about members? To view information about a particular member, click on the user name. This will take you to their public profile page (?). What is the Navigation Bar? The navigation bar at the top of every page has links to help you move around. A 'breadcrumb' area at the top left shows where you are now. A form on the right allows you to quickly login. With one click you can reach areas such as: the User Control Panel (?), FAQ (which you are reading now), the Calendar (?), Search options (?) and Quick Links (?) to other useful features. What is the 'What's Going On?' box on the board home page? On the board home page you'll see a section at the bottom that tells you what's going on at the moment. It tells you things like the number of registered users online, the number of guests, and even things like birthdays, and forthcoming events. Can I change the way the board looks? You may be able to change the styling of the board by using the style changer in the bottom left of the page. This lets you choose different skins which change the color scheme and appearance of the board. If this option does not appear, the board cannot be restyled. |
| Searching Forums and Threads |
How do I search for something? To quickly find a thread or post of interest anywhere on the bulletin board, click on the 'Search' link in the navigation bar at the top of most forum pages. Then, type in the keyword or phrase you wish to search for, and select either 'Show Threads' or 'Show Posts' to view the results. By selecting posts, you will be shown only the actual post in which the search word appears. For more control over the search, select 'Advanced Search' from the drop-down box. The advanced search page allows you to restrict your search to individual forums, find posts or threads by user, or return results based on tags (?). There are also options to find posts from a certain date, or threads with a certain number of replies. How do I search a specific forum or thread? If you are browsing a forum, you can quickly search for a thread or post within it by clicking on the 'Search this forum' link near the top of the page (it's above the list of threads). You can also search for individual posts within a thread by clicking on the 'Search this Thread' link at the top of any thread view page. |
| Viewing New Posts or Today's Posts |
How can I see the latest posts? There are two ways to quickly view recently created or updated threads. If you are not logged in, the 'today's posts' link will show a list of all threads that have been created or updated in the last 24 hours. If you are logged in, the 'Today's Posts' link will change to 'New Posts', which gives you a listing of all threads that have been created or updated since your last visit. The administrator can also set up the forums so that each thread you read is marked in the database. If this option is set, then new threads (or threads with new posts) will not be marked as read until you have actually read them. There is a built-in time limit to this, however, that will automatically mark all threads as 'read' after a set number of day, whether you really have read them or not. The default setting is 10 days, but the administrator could make this higher or lower. |
| Rating Threads |
| For users of good standing with a post count of 250 or over, it is now possible for you to rate threads. Threads can be rated using the "Rate Thread" menu function that appears on the top right hand corner of the post you are reading
We think this is a useful feature which should give people an idea what is of interest. You can only rate a thread once. You cannot rate your own thread! Canvassing for votes is grounds for removal of access to the system for any user involved |
| What are Tags? |
Tags are keywords that Moderators can add to multiple threads either in the same or different forums to tie threads related to the same subject together. By clicking on the tab keyword at the bottom of a thread, you will get a list of related threads across Tenths that may also be of interest |
| Can I add a tag to a thread? |
| Only Moderators can set up new tags. However, if you want to add an existing keyword to a thread, you may do so by typing the keyword into the Tag field at the bottom of the thread. |
| What are Notifications |
| Notifications will appear on your main screen whenever you access Ten-Tenths. We use these Notifications to advise you of anything of interest that is happening on the site.
Most Notifications can be removed from your main screen after you have read them - removable Notifications will have a red X at the top right of the Notification. Click on this and you will not see the Notification again. |
| What are announcements? |
Announcements are special messages posted by the administrator or moderators. They are designed to be a simple one-way communication with the users. If you wish to discuss announcements, you will have to create a new thread in the forum, since you cannot reply to announcements. |
| How do I use the calendar? |
| To view the calendar, click on the "Calendar" option on the menu.
To request an event be added to the Calendar, contact the Calendar Moderator. |
| What does the User title mean? | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
The User title is there to allow you to quickly and easily work out what connection the user has to the forum.
On occasion, you may see a user with a title that is different to the ones on this list. Yes, the administrators can put in custom user titles and sometimes we do. Hey, we need to have fun too! :) |
| Can I send email to other members? |
Yes! To send an email to another member, you can either locate the member you want to contact on the member list, or click the This will usually open a page that contains a form where you can enter your message. When you have finished typing your message, press the [send email] button and your message will be sent instantly. Note that for privacy reasons, the email address of the recipient is not revealed to you during this process. Note that if you can not find an email button or link for a member, it either means that the administrator has disabled email functions for this forum, or that the member in question has specified that they do not wish to receive email from other members of the forum. Another useful email function is the ability to send a friend a link to a thread you think they may find interesting. Whenever you view a thread, you will find a link somewhere on the page which will allow you to send a brief message to anyone you like. Your referrerid is added to the link you send, so if your friend registers on this forum as a result of viewing the link you sent to them, your referrals total will automatically be credited! Registered members may also be able to send messages to other members of this forum using the private messaging system. For more information about private messaging, click here. |
| How do I use the Member List? |
The member list contains a complete list of all the registered members of this forum. You can view the member list ordered alphabetically by username, by the date that the member joined the forum, or by the number of posts the members have made. The member list also has a search function, which allows you to quickly locate members according to categories you specify, such as searching for all members who have joined in the past week etc. |
| User Reputations |
| For users of good standing with over 100 posts, it is now possible to "rate" fellow users. As this is quite a complex system, we've set up a separate area in the FAQ for it, which you can find here. |
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| Can you add my favourite picture/smiley/avatar/flag/other....? |
| In general, no! If we put every image that people wanted to use on the system, we'd have to buy a new server!
The only exception to this would be in a case where we have an incorrect flag for a country or the country is not represented. If that is the case, then please contact us and provide us with a .gif file of the flag you would like. Please note that we will only put up country flags (or in some cases province flags if appropriate). We will not put up local flags, county flags, team flags, football flags, pirate flags, racing flags or any other kind of flag you can think up!!! |
| Quick Links |
What is the Quick Links menu? The navigation bar at the top of each page has several helpful links. One of them is a dropdown menu called Quick Links. (It appears only to registered members who are logged in). Clicking it once with the mouse will make it drop down and show the following options:
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| Where can I find the RSS feed? |
The feeds are currently provided in two formats, RSS and RSS v2. The differences are as follows:
To add this to MyYahoo click here. The forums to which this applies can also be limited to specific guest viewable forums by adding another paramater to the URL containing the forumids as follows: |
| What is Threaded Mode? |
| Threaded mode is an option that we don't currently support. More information will be available if we decide to use it. |
| Journals |
| The Journals feature has been discontinued, effective Feb 2009. As part of the recent upgrade, we now have the facility to provide a full Blog system. Determining what facilities will be made available is still underway. Users will be notified by Announcement and Notification when the Blog facility becomes available and who it will be available to. |
(you may need the right permissions to do this).
button. If the 'Post Reply' button does not appear, it could mean that you are not logged in as a member, or that you do not have permission to reply, or that the thread has been closed to new replies.
in a post to activate the quick reply box before you can type into it.
button on any post made by that member.