New Forum Features!

[Cheryl]

With the today's upgrade of our forum to the latest version of vBulletin, a number of new features are available that members might notice and in some cases enjoy immensely! This feature list is roughly sorted in order of more interesting to less interesting changes.

PM notifications now include message
If you have elected to receive notification of new Private Messages via email, you will now receive the full text of the PM in the email, rather than just a note that you have a message.

Multi-Quote -- for when you want to reply to multiple posts in a thread
Users simply tag multiple posts that they wish to respond to by clicking a small button on each post. Once the user clicks the reply button, each tagged post is quoted.

By default, only posts within the current thread are automatically quoted. If you have selected posts in other threads for multi-quote as well, a message will show at the bottom of the reply window asking you to verify if you want those posts in other threads to be added to your reply or not. If so, they will pop in without the page being reloaded.

Quote tag linked back to original post
Quoted posts since the forum upgrade will have a small arrow icon next to the quoted posters name which is linked back to the original post. Click it to see the original post from which the quote was pulled.

Restrict PMs to buddy list members only
Users now have the ability to choose to only receive private messages from members on their buddy list, rather than either having fully enabled or disabled private messages from everyone. This is a great way to limit who can contact you privately, should you have problems with harassment or simply not want to be open to messages from everyone. Please note that even with this limitation enabled, you will be able to receive PMs from admins and moderators whether we are on your buddy list or not! You will find this option in your user control panel under Edit Options.

PM limit pre-warning email
You will now receive an email message when your PM box is 90% full -- giving you the chance to delete message before it is full and can therefore not receive new PMs from members. Please note a useful feature that isn't new (but that I only recently discovered) is the ability to have the entire contents of your PM boxes emailed to you or downloaded as an XML file. This is handy when you don't wish to delete messages forever, but have a nearly full PM box. If you need specific help with finding this option, just post a request for help!

PMs to multiple recipients can be seen
Previously when you sent one PM to several members, the recipients couldn't tell that anyone else received the same message. Now they will be able to see everyone that the PM went too -- unless you choose to designate some/all recipients as "BCC" (blind-carbon-copy, like you can do in email).

Many actions now occur without page reloading, such as:.
Mark forums read
Editing buddy list and ignore list


Reason for editing now available in quick edit box
If you're using the quick edit feature rather than advanced edit (which is what pops up first when you click to edit one of your messages), there is now a field that will show for you to enter a reason for the edit. Moderators will probably find this especially handy as we always try to enter a explanation as to why we edited a message, while members are free to enter a reason or not as they desire.

Unsubscribe links in emails no longer require logging in
When you receive a forum or thread subscription message in email, and wish to unsubscribe, you will now be able to do so via a link given in the message without having to log in to the forum with your username/password.

Show threads or show posts in Quick Search
When performing a quick search, you can now choose whether you want the results to return threads that match, or just the posts that match (previously this option was only found in advanced search).

Announcements Shown when Viewing New Posts
In previous versions of vBulletin, announcements were only shown when a user viewed a list of threads in a forum. As some users only viewed new posts by clicking the “New Posts” link (ie, getnew), they never saw the announcements. vBulletin 3.6 displays those announcements at the top of the results.
Combined with this, announcements now include real read marking. They will be considered new until you actually read the announcement, instead of being considered old after a certain amount of time.


These are all the changes that users are likely to notice, though I may have missed a few minor things. Most other changes affect admin/moderator functions, many of which have me jumping for joy. For example, guest posters now have to verify an image to post, similar to when you first register for the forum (that's where you have to look at a graphic and type in the letter/number combo you see, to verify you're a person and not a spambot). This will probably let us open the forum back up for guest posting!

[Apocalypse]

Cheryl - it's looking great! I like the multi-quote button, but not sure when I'll get to use it!

[Jax]

You still allow guest posters?

[Cheryl]

We did up until a few days ago when the spam blitz hit, and will likely do so again since there are new protections against spambots.

[Lady Maelin]

This all look wonderfull, although I haven't quite figured out all of the old goodies that were on here yet...I am sure the true computer wizards will love all of these new gadgets.. .. and me too once I figure out how to use them.

[Greenrider Tresa]

Very interesting, though I don't think I'll use all of them...

[Greenrider Tresa]

Erm... is the new quick reply with the circling arrow supposed to take 6 minutes? Or is something else going on?

Cause it was just sitting there telling me it was posting, instead of refreshing and showing my message as it did when I made this one using the Post Reply button.

[Cheryl]

No, it shouldn't take that long, something must have hiccupped either on our end or yours.

[Greenrider Tresa]

Must've. It was fine the next few times.

[Jax]

When that happens I just click it again, sometimes I think it times out.

[Jax]

When that happens I just click it again, sometimes I think it times out.

Or not.. I just tried a quick reply and got this

The following errors occurred when this message was submitted

There was no error listed, the message showed up just underneath the Quick Reply words, above the quick reply text box...

[Jax]

Ok, so it's telling me there's an error and that it hasn't posted, when actually, it has... :shrug: I refreshed the page to post it properly and the posts were there!

[Greenrider Tresa]

Yep that's about what happened to me, minus the error message - when I returned to the page after posting the second message, the first was there.

[Cheryl]

Hmm, odd that a couple of you are getting occassional errors. Let me know if it keeps up.

[P'ter]

The "Post Quick Reply" comes up with the text that Jax spotted but on the next line down it gives what the fault is if there is one. If there isn't; it posts "okay" and posts it without any further action on our part.

[Anneli]

It happens with me too Every time I use the "quick reply" I get an error message, but then I just refresh the page and the post is there. Go figure

[Cheryl]

For those of you having this Quick Reply issue, what browser(s) are you using when it happens?

[c_ris]

I haven't had any issue with quick reply at all! (firefox)

[P'ter]

Msn

[Cheryl]

MSN meaning IE? what version please?

[P'ter]

Its claims to be "file version 6.0.2900.2180"

[bisbe]

I don't when I'll ever use all the changes but they look good to me.

[Jax]

Originally Posted by Cheryl

For those of you having this Quick Reply issue, what browser(s) are you using when it happens?

I'm using Mozilla firefox 1.5.0.6 and yep, I'm getting it every time I use the quick reply

[Greenrider Tresa]

IE, same version as P'ter.

Edit: I only had the problem once here, then the other day something similar on the KT, except that one took care of itsef after a few seconds. ::shrug:;

[Anneli]

I'm on Mozilla Firefox 1.0.7 and I get the error message every time I use quick reply, just like Jax

[c_ris]

Originally Posted by Jax

I'm using Mozilla firefox 1.5.0.6 and yep, I'm getting it every time I use the quick reply

That's odd, since I'm using exactly the same version, and have no problems!

[granath]

Ditto! I've never had any problems with firefox on this board...

[Greenrider Tresa]

Maybe the server wasa busy or somehting. I haven't had any real problem since that first time.

[Jax]

I'm still getting it every time *shrug*

[Anneli]

Jax, are you my secret online twin?

Same for me

[Jax]

is that even possible?

[Anneli]

*shrugs* Probably not given the age difference But no need to rub that in

Originally Posted by Jax

is that even possible?

Edited to add: and this was the first "quick reply" I've made that didn't show up the problem we've been talking about

[Anneli]

However, it seems that while it's OK to use a Quick Reply using the Quote button (cf my last reply to Jax), I've found elsewhere on the board that just using the Quick Reply button still results in the same error message

[granath]

That's really odd... I've had no problems with quick reply. The firefox circle of dots barely has time to do its thing once. I think it's funny that you get the loading symbol in the post as well as in the corner of the browser.

[Jax]

I just tried to do a 'mark this forum read' and it didn't work... *shrug*

[Myt]

Very, VERY good!

[Cheryl]

I have a new theory (oooh watch out!) about a possible cause for the Post Quick Reply seeming to take forever sometimes and/or erroring out. To those of you it has happened to -- do you perhaps sign in to the site without checking the "remember me" box? If so it would be possible that your session had timed out from inactivity, and the forum software hungup rather than telling you to log in again.

Sessions used to time out after just 10 minutes of inactivity, a time I chose so that you wouldn't still show on the Who's Online list for a long time after leaving the forum. However this is rather too short a period of time for composing longer posts, so I recently bumped up the timeout to 30 minutes -- which hopefully is causing fewer people issues with timing out!

[GinnyStar]

Originally Posted by Cheryl

I have a new theory (oooh watch out!) about a possible cause for the Post Quick Reply seeming to take forever sometimes and/or erroring out. To those of you it has happened to -- do you perhaps sign in to the site without checking the "remember me" box? If so it would be possible that your session had timed out from inactivity, and the forum software hungup rather than telling you to log in again.

Sessions used to time out after just 10 minutes of inactivity, a time I chose so that you wouldn't still show on the Who's Online list for a long time after leaving the forum. However this is rather too short a period of time for composing longer posts, so I recently bumped up the timeout to 30 minutes --which hopefully is causing fewer people issues with timing out!

I know I been login and reading or looking at new Threads related to my e-mail. I am still a bad speller and sometimes this keybord will be stick or my eye not fast to stop a mis spell.

I did rember to logout when there was a storm here before comming back online. Trying to log-in.

I still feel like a watch-wher who is ready to go to sleep 4 or so day of and on in a row.

I did thank everyone who help out on my pass word code problem.