Help me sort out the Styles and Display Modes

[extendidwarranty]

What the difference between
standard,
brightlinks,
Straightdope,
Straight Dope Message Board vBulletin Board 3 style

None of those terms bring anything specific to mind, and they seem virtually the same.

display modes - I think I have these figured out:
Linear mode seems right. Fairly similar to the old style.
Threaded makes you work really hard to read all the thread.
Hybrid adds a "tree" that would be helpful if people responded to individual posts instead of just adding onto the end, but everybody seems to just add onto the end. I know other boards have a good, visual nest arrangement, no separate "tree" needed, but vB just doesn't display that way.

What styles are closest to the old format?
For example, are there any that let you start a new thread without going back to the forum list? I miss that.
And any with the reply box at the bottom of the thread?

[Chronos]

It's probably for the better that we can't start a new thread without going back to the forum: It makes it a lot harder to accidentally click the wrong button, and end up with your intended reply in a new thread. And for the quick-reply box, that was certainly a nice feature, and it'd be nice to have it back. But it was a custom modification, rather than a standard vB feature, and I'm not sure that anyone has yet figured out a clean way to do it in the new version. We may see it back eventually.

[Algernon]

And for the quick-reply box, that was certainly a nice feature, and it'd be nice to have it back. But it was a custom modification, rather than a standard vB feature, and I'm not sure that anyone has yet figured out a clean way to do it in the new version. We may see it back eventually.In the previous version the SDMB was using it was a custom mod, but the new version should have it as a simple configuration option.

I'm the administrator of a vBulletin installation at work, and it's a simple yes/no selection for the following option in the Quick Reply Enabled administrative option in the Message Posting and Editing Options... If you enable Quick Reply, a box will appear on the showthread.php page allowing users to reply to the current thread without needing to load the full newreply.php page.

If Quick Reply is enabled, users still have the option to click on the reply button in order to use the full newreply.php page. I'm running "3.0.0 Beta 7", and I note that the SDMB is running "3.0.0 Release Candidate 4". There is of course the possibility that my version has the option but the SDMB version does not.

[Algernon]

Oops. Forgot to answer the OP.

The "Straight Dope" style seems to me to be the closest to the old format. I happen to prefer the "Straight Dope Message Board vBulletin 3 Style" myself. YMMV.

I do not discern any differences between my preferred style and the "Standard Style" and the "Bright Links" style, though admittedly I've only given them the cursory glance.