FEATURES you would like to see

[VirtualPlay]

As is obvious, the board is lacking a bunch of stuff we've gotten used to on the SMF board. As has been mentioned many times, SMF was full of security holes and the switch had to be made; in other words, we are NOT going back to the SMF board.

However, Chris has said that a lot of the SMF board features (and new features it didn't have) can be implemented in vB by putting the right code in. And since the poll and the "Problems/Suggestions" thread are both rather cluttered, I figured there should be one clear space for just a list of suggestions. These are the reasons I am posting this topic.

TPM Forum Suggestion Box

If there is a feature you would like to see on this board, whether from the SMF board or something else entirely, post it here. Please remember this is a SUGGESTION box, and it's unlikely that everything can or will be implemented.

This is NOT a topic to whine, complain, or yell about features you don't have. It's simply a list of items that we (the members) would like to see on our board, so that the admins can see and (hopefully, if possible) implement for us.

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On that note, the main thing I'd like to see is moving the little ad bar that appears after every first post back to the top of the page. I know that as it is, we would see it less often, but (for me) it's in an extremely annoying position that interrupts my smooth reading of the topic.

EDIT: If this belongs more in the Pokemasters.Net forum, go ahead and move it.

[Poryhedron]

I'm kinda surprised that the Spoiler Block feature is not available here. On vBulletin boards the code

Caption:

Type stuff here

should produce a quote that is "closed" (with the caption visible) and you can press a button near the quote to "open" it. This is especially useful for people who want to put a lot of stuff in their sigs; they can stuff it all in an Sblock so that the people who want to see it can take a look, and the people who don't aren't annoyed by its length. Also, obviously, it is useful for its intended purpose; you can write something like

Viridian Gym's Leader:

It's Giovanni!

And people who don't like spoilers don't see it. In fact, the default caption if you just use is "Spoiler:".

[Houndoom_Lover]

I want longer Custom name things!

[Chris]

I'm kinda surprised that the Spoiler Block feature is not available here. On vBulletin boards the code

Caption:

Type stuff here

should produce a quote that is "closed" (with the caption visible) and you can press a button near the quote to "open" it. This is especially useful for people who want to put a lot of stuff in their sigs; they can stuff it all in an Sblock so that the people who want to see it can take a look, and the people who don't aren't annoyed by its length. Also, obviously, it is useful for its intended purpose; you can write something like

Viridian Gym's Leader:

It's Giovanni!

And people who don't like spoilers don't see it. In fact, the default caption if you just use is "Spoiler:".

We did have a spoiler tag but I haven't readded it yet. Give me a minute

(Spoiler:) test

I want longer Custom name things!

What is the limit according to your profile?

[Houndoom_Lover]

Um, like, four words or somthing. It was kind of dissapointing, but I'll get over it.

[Chris]

Um, like, four words or somthing. It was kind of dissapointing, but I'll get over it.

Okay, give me a second and I'll change it

edit: I've changed the limit to 30 characters, that should be enough.

[Poryhedron]

We did have a spoiler tag but I haven't readded it yet. Give me a minute

(Spoiler:) test

That's great, but what I really wanted was the sblock tag for its ability to hide several paragraphs in a single line.

[Fai D. Flowright]

One thing I would love to see be implicated, if possible, is making it so that even though you may not have looked at every single new topic/post in a forum, when you refresh the main forum page, the logo comes up for already being read. Reason being that most people don't look at EVERY SINGLE post that is made and not being able to tell when a new post that you might actually be insterest in is quite bothersome...

Anything that can be done about that?

As well as text editing... It may sound lazy, but is there any way to make it so that you don't have to close every last code tag to make them work properly?

[Jeff]

There are a couple features that I really liked from the SMF board. The first one is where clicking the quote button dropped the quote code right into the quick reply box. The other one, I don't believe we had in the old VB but I could be wrong, is when someone makes a post before you, you get a warning, very helpful. I don't know if this is already on the new VB, haven't encountered a situation like that yet, but I'd really like to see that back too.

[Kevin]

One thing I would love to see be implicated, if possible, is making it so that even though you may not have looked at every single new topic/post in a forum, when you refresh the main forum page, the logo comes up for already being read. Reason being that most people don't look at EVERY SINGLE post that is made and not being able to tell when a new post that you might actually be insterest in is quite bothersome...

Anything that can be done about that?

As well as text editing... It may sound lazy, but is there any way to make it so that you don't have to close every last code tag to make them work properly?

On the front page near the bottom, before the "What's Going On?" box, there's a link that says "Mark Forums Read". Click that and everything will go gray.

As for the text editing, there's not much we can do about that.

[Kevin]

I'm kinda surprised that the Spoiler Block feature is not available here. On vBulletin boards the code

Caption:

Type stuff here

should produce a quote that is "closed" (with the caption visible) and you can press a button near the quote to "open" it. This is especially useful for people who want to put a lot of stuff in their sigs; they can stuff it all in an Sblock so that the people who want to see it can take a look, and the people who don't aren't annoyed by its length. Also, obviously, it is useful for its intended purpose; you can write something like

Viridian Gym's Leader:

It's Giovanni!

And people who don't like spoilers don't see it. In fact, the default caption if you just use is "Spoiler:".

Guess What:

Spoiler block is implemented now.

[mr_pikachu]

Just a convenience request... would it be possible to add back the "Last Post" thing at the bottom of the forum? That made it easy to see if anything was happening on TPM. It's nice for people like me who do dozens of things at once for hours on end. ^_^;;

[Poryhedron]

Check out the top of the forum for a link named "New Posts". I'm not sure what the exact settings are, but currently it's displaying all topics that were updated within the last 12 hours or so, in order of most to least recent.

[Lady Vulpix]

Wow, that was quick!

I'm not asking this for me, but for most members, especially those who post at the fanfic forum. Would it be possible to allow members to edit the titles of their own topics? That way they'd be able to show their updates in the titles again.

If that's not possible, I guess the updates thread can be revived.

[mr_pikachu]

Didn't Chris already take care of that?

You can edit thread titles again because I set the title-editing timeout to 9999999 minutes

It seems like he already made the change. Or is it a moderator-only thing again?

[Negrek]

Since a fair number of people on these boards like to always post in a specific color/size/font face text, I think that the default BBCode hack would work well here. Basically, it lets users input a code so that every one of their posts will automatically begin with that default formatting--for example, you could set it so that all of your posts will be in dark blue and a slightly larger-size font, without you typing in any formatting tags when actually going to write up the post itself.

If you're interested, there's more information at the link up there, and as you can see, antialiasis (Dragonfree) made it, so I'm sure she could help you out if you needed it...

[Lady Vulpix]

Didn't Chris already take care of that?



It seems like he already made the change. Or is it a moderator-only thing again?

Ah, cool. Since some people complained that they couldn't, I thought it was mod-only again. Or maybe they can't edit the titles of the topics that were made before the move?

[mr_pikachu]

Since a fair number of people on these boards like to always post in a specific color/size/font face text, I think that the default BBCode hack would work well here. Basically, it lets users input a code so that every one of their posts will automatically begin with that default formatting--for example, you could set it so that all of your posts will be in dark blue and a slightly larger-size font, without you typing in any formatting tags when actually going to write up the post itself.

If you're interested, there's more information at the link up there, and as you can see, antialiasis (Dragonfree) made it, so I'm sure she could help you out if you needed it...

It would appear that your wish has been granted. Check the User CP.

[Kevin]

Since a fair number of people on these boards like to always post in a specific color/size/font face text, I think that the default BBCode hack would work well here. Basically, it lets users input a code so that every one of their posts will automatically begin with that default formatting--for example, you could set it so that all of your posts will be in dark blue and a slightly larger-size font, without you typing in any formatting tags when actually going to write up the post itself.

If you're interested, there's more information at the link up there, and as you can see, antialiasis (Dragonfree) made it, so I'm sure she could help you out if you needed it...

I just tried installing that mod. Let's see if it works.

EDIT: Seems to work ok.

[VirtualPlay]

Weird, the Default BB Code thingy doesn't seem to work for me...unless it doesn't show in preview-only...

EDIT: nope, not working at all...

[Negrek]

Weird, the Default BB Code thingy doesn't seem to work for me...unless it doesn't show in preview-only...

EDIT: nope, not working at all...

It seems to be working fine for me, as this post will hopefully demonstrate. The color tag is a little bit finnicky, as it requires you to put the # before the hex code if you're using that, but it seems to be recognizing the standard color "equivalents" without problem; did you make sure not to close all your tags?

However, it isn't working for me when I edit a post--it will show up in the initial post, but after I edit it, it will be restored to normal font.

Edit: And never mind, it only works when you use "post reply" apparently, not when you use "quote" to begin a post. In addition to not working with editing.

[Alucard]

Being able to delete your own topic would be nice~

[Poryhedron]

Being able to delete your own topic would be nice~

What happens now if you try to delete a topic that you started and nobody has replied to?

If you're asking for the ability to delete topics that have multiple people posting in them, just because you were the one that started it, no. That's always at least moderator-scope.

[Alucard]

I can't delete a topic period.

[VirtualPlay]

Yes, I only put in the opening tags — [ font=comic sans ms][ color=red] (without spaces, obviously) — and I am making sure that "Use default BBCode formatting" is checked. And I only pressed the "Post Reply" button (for this one at least) and it's still not accepting the formatting.

[mr_pikachu]

What happens now if you try to delete a topic that you started and nobody has replied to?

If you're asking for the ability to delete topics that have multiple people posting in them, just because you were the one that started it, no. That's always at least moderator-scope.

Actually, I believe that was possible on the SMF. I deleted a few topics that I started on forums other than Fanfic... and even before I was modded! So that restriction was removed as long as you were the topic-starter, even if others had already replied.

[Elec Man EXE]

My number 1 feature from SMF, which saved me from bookmarking all my ASB battles/reffings, was the check mark on any topic you've posted in. You could easily scroll through a list, just looking for the checks, and easily find anything you'd been active in.

It'd be awesome if something like that could be implimented here.

[Weasel Overlord]

My number 1 feature from SMF, which saved me from bookmarking all my ASB battles/reffings, was the check mark on any topic you've posted in. You could easily scroll through a list, just looking for the checks, and easily find anything you'd been active in.

It'd be awesome if something like that could be implimented here.

There is one of those on here, Elec. It's like a little blue rectangle that appears next to the thread, on the side nearest the last poster and date of post. If you don't see it, try selecting 'automatic subscription to threads' if that's an option, (I don't remember) and it should work if it's there...

Also, my auto-formatting doesn't work either ;_; Are you supposed to put speech marks "" around the code? Like this; [ color="red"] or are you supposed to use capitals like in the old one? ( [ COLOR=RED] ) I've tried capitals and non-capitals and neither works... I'll try speech marks and get back to you all ^^"


EDIT: Nope, the speech marks don't work either... ><

[Elec Man EXE]

Oh... well then, never mind. Would never have seen it if you hadn't mentioned it though, thanks. My auto-format doesn't work either, though, Weasel.

EDIT: I've got my default BBC code thing set to [ color=#FFDD11], and show default codes is checked, no luck. Someone above mentioned downloading... do you have to download something for it to work?

[Negrek]

If you take away the "comic sans ms" font-type declaration from my dfault BBcode, the color red shows up fine without any quotation marks, capitalization, or similar; I've also been able to get the text to change to other colors, center, and bold automatically, so the [font] tag is the only one I haven't been able to get to work; I honestly have no clue why it would be acting up for you. 0_o

Someone above mentioned downloading... do you have to download something for it to work?

The board administrator has to download a vBulletin hack, which modifies the coding to do something new--however, no, members don't need a special plugin or anything.

[mr_pikachu]

Are you able to get the font tag to work when you use it normally in posts? If not, it may be that you're using it in an incorrect order. vB is a little more strict about tag priorities than SMF was. If that's it, learning the system just takes a little getting used to.

Out of curiosity, what features are you trying to add? (Bold, italic, underline, font type, font size, color, etc.?) If you're having trouble using them normally, I may be able to help if you tell me what you'd like.

[Elec Man EXE]

Personally, I'm just trying for color. Specifically, [ color=#FFDD11]. I can get it to work fine in normal posts, its just not recognizing it for the default.

[mr_pikachu]

Okay, question... with the parts you can get to work, can you see them when you choose to preview your posts? Because I'm not seeing any changes at all when I do that... o_0 That'll make testing and such easier.

[Negrek]

Are you able to get the font tag to work when you use it normally in posts? If not, it may be that you're using it in an incorrect order. vB is a little more strict about tag priorities than SMF was. If that's it, learning the system just takes a little getting used to.

Actually, the font tag worked fine in my BBCode--that's why the above post is in comic sans (I haven't used any actual formatting tags on this new board to do entire posts on this board), but I wanted it to stay like that to show that it was working for me, and if I had edited to clarify that it was working it the formatting would have gone again. I hadn't expected it to work, but it did.

Okay, question... with the parts you can get to work, can you see them when you choose to preview your posts? Because I'm not seeing any changes at all when I do that... o_0 That'll make testing and such easier.

No, alas.

Hopefully this post will be in #ffdd11.

Edit: Daaag, why won't that specific color work?

[Starry Might]

One thing I thought was cool on SMF was the option to display your gender below your Avatar (I think that's where it was located), so that nobody has to ask/guess whether you're male or female. I'd like to see that implemented here.

[Kevin]

Gender added.

[Starry Might]

Gender added.

W00t, I just noticed that now.

*GOES OFF TO DO THE GENDER THING*