It's that great getting up morning: The new site is nearly ready for you.

[Senegoid]

kaylasdad99 asks:

@kaylasdad99

I generally do all of my vBB coding by hand. Am I going to have to learn new coding protocols?

Chronos gives a partial answer thusly:

@Chronos

From what testing I’ve done, Discourse supports both vBulletin-style tags and their own style. For instance, you can bold something by typing either [noparse]bold[/noparse] or bold. The new format might be a bit easier to use, but if (like me) you’re used to the old format and don’t want to change, you can do that, too.

Here’s more:

Discourse seems to prefer a different standard called “Markdown”. It also supports some subset of the BBCodes that we all know and maybe love. Here are some references that I found somewhere on the Discourse site:

Markdown reference: Markdown Reference

BBCode reference: BBCode tags reference

The BBCode reference appears to be some kind of standard, and that is not necessarily exactly the same as what vBulletin or Discourse support. In particular, Discourse seems to support some subset of the BBCode set. One code in particular that it does NOT seem to support is [noparse][/noparse]. So no more [color=red]evil red warnings from the mods, and no more orange quotes from the Orange One.

I haven’t experimented much yet with some of the other codes like [noparse][font=whatever] and [size=whatever][/noparse].

But note also: It says somewhere that Discourse posts can include some subset of bare native HTML tags. So we shall see what evil horrors can be perpetrated that way!

[Senegoid]

@Dewey_Finn

Please let us know what the rules are for the password (minimum length, must contain uppercase letters, lowercase letters, numbers and some “special characters”). Sometimes work-related sites don’t tell you that until after you’ve tried a new password only to have it rejected.

I don’t know if password rules are a customizable option that the individual sites can set to their liking.

On the demo site, the only rule seems to be that the password must be at least 10 characters. I gave a password with only lower-case English letters and digits, no capital letters or punctuation marks or emojis or hieroglyphics.

It rejected a six-character password but accepted a 10-character password.

[Anxious_Squirrel]

@BigT

I’ll do you one better: I’ll explain what it is here, so you won’t stumble upon pics while looking it up.

It’s a pic of a guy holding his bumhole open very wide, taken straight on.

If you want more info after reading that, you can just read the Wikipedia page, which also has no pics.

Here’s another really interesting article about Goatse. No pics appear on the page, are just linked to. Twas a fascinating read if you were interested in learning about who Goatse was in real life.

https://www.dailydot.com/unclick/goatse-revealed-kirk-johnson/

[Senegoid]

Here’s a detail that seems annoying, and possibly could be disruptive to our SDMB culture in ways not immediately apparent:

A great many web sites, including the current Board, have a navigation menu at the top of every page. At the top of this thread page, for example, we see:

Straight Dope Message Board > Main > About This Message Board
It’s that great getting up morning: The new site is nearly ready for you.

Discourse thread pages, at least on that demo site, have no such thing. Furthermore, I couldn’t see anywhere on the page where it says what Forum the thread is in.

But you can arrive at a thread page in many ways, with links from other pages, or even from other off-board sites, or those “Suggested topics” at the bottom of the thread, or the list of recent posts on the home page.

This means you can get to a thread page and not know what Forum you’re in!

I found that to be a little disorienting, even on that dinky demo site.

You can’t even easily tell if you’re reading a public thread or a private conversation. When I signed up, I was engaged in a conversation with their new-user bot, which walked me through a beginner’s tutorial. I couldn’t find where that thread was in any of the forums, and it took me a while to realize that it was a private conversation.

But here’s the problem for our Board culture: Every forum has its own posting rules, and its own moderation style and strictness. How often have you needed to double-check what forum you are in before posting that opinion, or political jab, or flame?

I think we may see people making inappropriate posts because they forget, or don’t know, what forum they’re in and can’t easily find out. The moderators may need to calibrate their moderation styles to accommodate this.

OR: Can the admins configure the site to include a navigation menu, or some equivalent, on each page?

[GreysonCarlisle]

@Senegoid

I haven’t experimented much yet with some of the other codes like [noparse][font=whatever] and [size=whatever][/noparse].

For all the Discourse forums I’m familiar with, there is no font, size, or color functionality. There is <big> and <small>, <del> and <ins>, and that’s about it.

But note also: It says somewhere that Discourse posts can include some subset of bare native HTML tags. So we shall see what evil horrors can be perpetrated that way!

See here if you’re able to view it.

Not mentioned is <iframe>, which Discourse supports, but there is a very small, editable list of domains that can be so used.

[Senegoid]

@GreysonCarlisle

See here if you’re able to view it.

Just tried that. It requires me to sign up and sign in before I can see anything. So, no lurking.

Can you give us a TL;DR what that site’s all about before I sign up there just so I can see what’s there?

[GreysonCarlisle]

@Senegoid

Just tried that. It requires me to sign up and sign in before I can see anything. So, no lurking.

Can you give us a TL;DR what that site’s all about before I sign up there just so I can see what’s there?

It’s the NaNoWriMo site, a place for aspiring authors to challenge themselves to write 50,000 words in a month (November).

It switched to Discourse from a vB-like system about a year ago, so that post is a list of the codes that could be used. The site is supposed to be viewable by all, whether logged in or not, but that’s evidently not the case.

I’ll just try to repost here.

[GreysonCarlisle]

Most of the formatting you’ll want to do can be done from the edit bar. But sometimes it’s easier or faster to use code. Discourse supports some BB Code, some Markdown code, and some HTML.
[noparse]
Bold Text
BB Code: This is bold text.
HTML: This is <b>bold text</b>.
HTML: This is <strong>bold text</strong>.
Markdown: This is bold text.

Italic Text
BB Code: This is italic text.
HTML: This is <i>italic text</i>.
HTML: This is <em>italic text</em>.
Markdown: This is italic text.

Bold Italic Text
BB Code: This is bold italic text.
HTML: This is <b><i>bold italic text</i></b>.
HTML: This is <strong><em>bold italic text</em></strong>.
Markdown: This is bold italic text.

Underline Text
BB Code: This is underline text.

Strikethrough Text
BB Code: This is strikethrough text.
HTML: This is <s>strikethrough text</s>.
HTML: This is <strike>strikethrough text</strike>.
Markdown: This is strikethrough text.

Inserted Text (Turns text background green)
HTML: This is <ins>inserted text</ins>.

Deleted Text (Turns text background red)
HTML: This is <del>deleted text</del>.

Superscripts
HTML: This is a superscript: πr².

Subscripts
HTML: This is a subscript: H₂O.

Small Text (Makes text smaller)
HTML: This is <small>smaller text</small>.

Big Text (Makes text bigger)
HTML: This is <big>bigger text</big>.

Horizontal Rule
HTML: <hr>

Keyboard Text (Shows text in a little box)
HTML: <kbd>These boxes show keyboard text.</kbd>

Preformatted Text (Maintains spacing in text)
HTML:
<pre>This text is preformatted.</pre>

Quoted Text
BB Code:

This is quoted text.

HTML: <blockquote>This is quoted text.</blockquote>
Markdown: >This is quoted text.

Quoted Text With Attribution
BB Code:

@User Name

This is a quote with attribution.

Hyperlink
BB Code: A link to the Forums
HTML: A link to the <a href=“http://forums.nanowrimo.org/”&gt;Forums&lt;/a&gt;
Markdown: A link to the Forums

Email
BB Code: Send me some [email=johndoe@fakeaddress.com]email!
HTML: Send me some <a href="mailto:johndoe@fakeaddress.com">email</a>!

Spoiler Text (Shows a clickable spoiler. There’s also a blurred version.)
BB Code:

Click to show or hide

SPOILER!

HTML:
<details>
<summary>Click to show or hide</summary>
<p>SPOILER!</p>
</details>
[/noparse]

There are many other things that can be done with code, such as posting images, oneboxes, lists, and tables.

NOTE: Make sure the quote and /quote tags are on lines by themselves or it’ll break your quote.

[Senegoid]

@AHunter3

Will the ten zillion links to other posts that are sprinkled all over the place, by any remote chance, reconcile in some magical way once we’re over there, landing one on the converted equivalent?

@TubaDiva

The developers tell me all the links will be intact.

@TubaDiva, are you sure you asked them the question the right way?

From what I could see, with just a brief exposure last night, it looks like URL’s exist for each thread, but it wasn’t obvious if a URL exists for each post.

In vBulletin, you can link to any thread, or you can link directly to any individual post (in several ways, in fact). It wasn’t obvious (to me) if Discourse has any way to link to individual posts, other than the kinda-sorta-links that appear in quote boxes (if even that).

Have you clarified if links to individual posts will work?

[Ponderoid]

Okay I have questions I haven’t seen answered yet:

Will the new site preserve user ID#s?

Will the new site preserve saved friendships?

Will the new site preserve all my subscribed threads and the folders I had them organized in?

Will the new site preserve my ignore list? I saw someone mention that ignores on another discourse site had a timeout period, but I didn’t see any official response about whether that’s true here.

I will not be happy if the new site doesn’t preserve these things.

[Senegoid]

@GreysonCarlisle

Most of the formatting you’ll want to do can be done from the edit bar. But sometimes it’s easier or faster to use code. Discourse supports some BB Code, some Markdown code, and some HTML.

@GreysonCarlisle, thanks for posting all that. What you’ve listed here seems to include a lot of options that I think are NOT mentioned in the references I posted several posts up. So kaylasdad99 and I and perhaps many others should want to keep this post handy!

ETA: I’ll go a bit further and suggest that TubaDiva should make that post into a sticky thread unto itself!

I note that the BBCode you show for spoilers is different than the BBCode we use here for spoilers. In the BBCode reference I linked, I noticed some other differences too.

Is there any equivalent for the “noparse” … “/noparse” tags?

[GreysonCarlisle]

@Senegoid

In vBulletin, you can link to any thread, or you can link directly to any individual post (in several ways, in fact). It wasn’t obvious (to me) if Discourse has any way to link to individual posts, other than the kinda-sorta-links that appear in quote boxes (if even that).

I don’t know if it’ll work for transported posts, post that were moved to Discourse from vBulletin, but I don’t see why it wouldn’t.

To get the url for an individual post on Discourse, copy the link in the date or time the post was made. It’s similar to copying the link to the post number on vB.

It’ll look like boardaddress/t/titleofthethread/threadnumber/postnumber?u=username

You can get rid of everything after the ? if you want.

[Senegoid]

Well, I gotta run and do some other things for a while now, so I’m outta here for the next few hours.

L8R!

[GreysonCarlisle]

@Senegoid

@GreysonCarlisle, thanks for posting all that.

Anytime! I would also note that @ actually works on Discourse. You’ll get a notice in your notifications that someone mentioned you.

ETA: I’ll go a bit further and suggest that TubaDiva should make that post into a sticky thread unto itself!

If so, I’ve got a whole tutorial for people new to Discourse. You evidently have to make an account to access it though.

Is there any equivalent for the “noparse” … “/noparse” tags?

Not that I’m aware of. I usually use ASCII codes in place of the square- and angle-brackets to get around that.

[Senegoid]

@GreysonCarlisle

I don’t know if it’ll work for transported posts, post that were moved to Discourse from vBulletin, but I don’t see why it wouldn’t.

To get the url for an individual post on Discourse, copy the link in the date or time the post was made. It’s similar to copying the link to the post number on vB.

It’ll look like boardaddress/t/titleofthethread/threadnumber/postnumber?u=username

You can get rid of everything after the ? if you want.

Okay, kewl, I hadn’t noticed that.

I notice that the u=username there is my own user name, NOT the name of the user who made the post in question.

@GreysonCarlisle

Anytime! I would also note that @ actually works on Discourse. You’ll get a notice in your notifications that someone mentioned you.

[ . . . ]

If so, I’ve got a whole tutorial for people new to Discourse. You evidently have to make an account to access it though.

Yes, I noticed the @ usage. Y’oughtta put that whole tutorial someplace where we can all get it and post a link, or maybe send it to @TubaDiva and maybe she’ll make a sticky of it.

Again, L8R!

[GreysonCarlisle]

@Senegoid

Y’oughtta put that whole tutorial someplace where we can all get it and post a link, or maybe send it to @TubaDiva and maybe she’ll make a sticky of it.

I could probably do that. Need to wait until we’re actually on the new board, though (and images would need to be enabled).

[Gary_Robson]

Thank you, Jenny and all the rest that are making this happen. I know what a major undertaking it is and how much work you’re having to put in. Makes me glad I’m not a mod anymore

There will be some funky transitional issues, and some people who grumble about every minor difference between the old and new boards, but that happens if you change the default typeface!

@TubaDiva

I’m pretty sure short of tapping into the Straight Dope Message Board in the parallel universe to ours (where everyone will have a goatee and Be Evil instead of just some of our members), we can cope with most anything that presents itself.

Since I already have a goatee, Evil parallel me will have to either be clean-shaven or have muttonchops and a handlebar mustache.

[squeegee]

This is wonderful news.

[Czarcasm]

I am looking forward to The Straight Dope, Part 3(In 3-D).

[Senegoid]

@Czarcasm

I am looking forward to The Straight Dope, Part 3(In 3-D).

…and four-part harmony!