Niftiness -- how to use special board features (Fun!)

[Proximity]

There are a lot of nifty things on BUS that you might not know about - this is a guide to some of the cool things you can do on BUS, and the awesome features we have here.

Avatars
You might have noticed that a lot of people have a picture under their username, that picture is called an avatar. You can choose from a selection of public avatars, or submit your own personal avatar to use on BUS.The current avatar wranglers are treasure and Milvus.
You can contact them by sending an e-mail to avatars@busmail.org

• how do I get an avatar? - If you go to your profile, you will see a link at the bottom saying "show gallery". From here you can go through the public folders until you find an avatar you'd like to use. When you find one you like, click the box under the picture, and then click the "select avatar" button. You cannot choose an avatar from a reserved folder - those belong to other members.
• how do I reserve an avatar? - Send an e-mail to avatars@busmail.org along with your BUS username, and attach the image you want as your avatar, or a link to where it can be found online. Please try to pick an image that we can resize to 8K or under, because avatars are limited in size. PNG files aren't very good for this kind of endeavor, so if possible, please choose another format such as JPEG. Remember that if the image wouldn't be allowed in a post here, as a rule it won't be allowed as an avatar either. If you don't know how to attach an image, send the avatar wrangler(s) an e-mail or PM telling them what type of mail service you're using (eg. yahoo, hotmail, gmail etc.) and they'll do their best to help.
• how big can avatars be? - About 100 X 100 pixels is our image size limit, and they should be under 8K. If you don't know how to edit the image to accomplish this, just send it anyway and the avatar wranglers can do it for you.
• how long will it take before I can use my avatar? - The avatars all must be uploaded manually by the avatar wranglers, so the waiting period depends upon how busy they are. It might take a couple days, or it could be up within 5 minutes. When your avatar has ben uploaded you will recieve a PM telling you what gallery it's in. If you feel like you've been waiting too long (more than a few days) try PMing an avatar wrangler, it's possible your email was lost or misdirected.
• can I change my reserved avatar? - Yup. Just let the avatar wranglers know what you want done with your old one (taken down, or made public, etc). You can do this up to five times. It's unfair to the avatar wranglers if you ask them to change your avatar every few days.
• someone's using my reserved avatar, what can I do? - Send a message to one of the avatar wranglers stating who is using your avatar, and they'll take it from there. It's also ok to pm a mod or admin about it, and they'll do their best to sort it out for you.
• do I have to reserve my avatar? - Nope. If you don't mind other board members using the same avatar as you, please request that it's made public when you send it in.
• how many reserved avatars can I have? - You may have a maximum of five reserved avatars.

[Thanks to Discarded, who wrote this avatar guide, and to notevenpretty who updated it.]

Signatures
You may have noticed that a lot of board members have some text and/or pictures that come at the end of each of their posts. This is called a signature, and it's one of the fun options you can play around with.

• How do I make a signature? - In your profile, there is a box towards the bottom where you can write your signature. You can customize it with small pictures, quotes and other text in different colors or formats, and/or even include links, such as to your place.
• What are the limitations for my signature? - You're limited to 511 characters of text on 12 lines. Tags (BBCode and HTML) count as characters, so the system may tell you that your sig cannot be accepted because it is too big. You can put pictures in your sig, but keep in mind that some of us are on dial-up, and images take a long time to load. There are some rules about how big images in your sig can be. You can see those rules here. Additionally, no more than 200 characters without spaces are accepted.
• What content is OK for my signature? - Your sig can't have anything in it which breaks BUS rules. This includes images, text, and links to other websites. We also ask that you keep controversial topics such as politics and religion understated in your signature, though they are permissible. If you have questions about what it's OK to have in your sig, go ahead and PM a mod or admin about it. If we see something that we feel is inappropriate in your sig, we may remove it, or talk to you about it. You may link to your personal website in your sig, as long as your site doesn't include anything that breaks the BUS rules.
• How do I get different colors etc. in my signature? - Lower down in this page you'll see a guide to BBCode and HTML. Using these you can add images, colors, bold or itallic text and many more fun things to your sig.
• Anything else? - At the bottom of each post you make, before you click "submit" you'll see several boxes. One of them gives you the option to include or not include your sig in that particular post. Whether or not this option is checked as a default can be changed in your profile. Remember that others will see your sig every time you have it on the end of your post. If it is really big, and/or takes a long time to load, this can be irritating, it's just something to keep in mind.

[This guide to signatures was written by Proximity.]


Special Forums & Usergroups
BUS has a variety of different usergroups for different purposes. Joining some of them gives you access to a forum you couldn't see before, others let you post in a forum you could previously only read, and some are just as fun, or have a limited membership.
To join a group, simply go to "user control panel" (it's at the top of your screen on the right along with the search feature and the members button), in the left-hand column, you should see a link for "usergroups" near the bottom. Click on this, and you will see a list of groups that you are in, and a list of groups you're not in. Select the group you're interested in, and click "join group" to request membership. The request has to be approved by an admin or the moderator of the group. Some groups are free for anyone to join, others have special membership requirements. We try to keep up with requests for access, but sometimes we're slow; if you haven't heard back in a few days, please feel free to PM one of us. Click here for more detailed information on BUS's categories, forums, and usergroups.

• before and after - a place to really examine your self-injury urges. Anyone can read the board, but you have to join the group if you want to post there. If you join this group, prepare to be challenged -- people may empathize, but they're going to ask hard questions sometimes.
• the workshop - a fluff-free zone for working on your issues. Like before and after, anyone can read, but you must join the group to post. Unlike before and after, this area is not focused on urges -- it's about identifying what you need to change in your life or about yourself, and working to make those changes. Please do not join this group and post here if you are not willing to listen to feedback and constructive criticism.
• friends and family private space - a private group limited to those who don't SI themselves, but who are involved in some way with someone who does. (This is something different from the public friends and family board, where SI-ers and F/F are both welcome.) Membership approvals are made on a case-by-case basis. Please see this thread for details, and instructions on how to apply.
• challenge me - a place to discuss controversial questions and personal philosophies with others who are willing to examine their deepest beliefs. here you'll find religion, politics, current events, and how things should be -- all that stuff they say never to discuss at dinner. Though there is a usergroup for challenge me, everyone who joins BUS has access to this forum.
• please be healthy - a place for discussion of health issues (exercise, eating habits, sleeping habits, and so forth). Unlike the rest of the board, people are allowed to post numbers here (as long as it's done in a healthy way, of course). If you join this forum, you are responsible for knowing and adhering to its special rules. Anyone can join; it's your responsibility to decide if you're in a place where you can use something like this positively. Use the usergroups link to request access.
• welcome wagon - a group of people who want to help with welcoming new members and making them feel at home. Extra help is always welcome in the wagon, so if you'd like to join, click the usergroups link! This group is open to everyone. If you join, you will get access to the welcome wagon's special forum.
• BABS (BUS Association for Bush Scars) and SHACA (Self-Harmers Against Cat Accusations) - light-hearted groups started by members wanting to fight the pervasive problem of innocent cats being blamed for self-injury. Joining them doesn't give you access to anything else on the board; they're just for fun. membership is open to anyone.
• Revenge of the Zombies - another light-hearted group started by the crew from the random weirdness forum. Joining them doesn't give you access to a new forum, it's also just for fun. Membership is open to anyone.
• other - you will see some groups listed in the usergroups section, but membership is closed. These groups, such as "board staff" are used by the admins and mods for administrative purposes.

[Thanks to silverdragonfly for writing this explanation of BUS usergroups.]

BUS Photo Gallery
BUS has its own gallery that we can all use to host images. The image that you see featured and linked in the guide above is hosted in the BUS gallery, for example. It's the perfect place to put an image you want to post on BUS to share with other users. The BUS Photo Gallery can be found by following the link, and its keeper is Deskana.

• The gallery is a place to upload your images. They can be pictures of you, your art, fun stuff, or just any images you want to host online. The gallery has a couple categories, so please put your picture in the one that makes the most sense.
• Please use your BUS name to register on the gallery, that makes it so that we can easily know whose images are whose.
• Please do not add any images to the gallery that you wouldn't be allowed to post here in accordance with BUS rules. This includes images that would be considered "triggering" such as pictures or artwork featuring cuts or scars.
• Please do not use anyone else's personal pictures without their permission, it's just not right.

[Thanks to Deskana, for explaining the gallery uses and rules.]

Report Posts
Sometimes while you're viewing the board, you might find a post that you think breaks the rules, or which you think the mods and/or admins should look at. This is what the post reporting feature is for.
To report a post, you have two options. You can send a private message to a mod of the relevant forum, or to any of the admins telling us about the post you want to report, and giving us a link to it. The other option is to click on the little exclamation point icon (usually in the bottom right of every post). This will take you to a page where you can write a report for the mods and admins (all of the mods and admins will be able to see your report). If you write to us, it's helpful if you include a link to the post you're talking about, or at least tell us where to find it, and say what the problem is. (If you do not include a link, we sometimes have trouble finding the post you're talking about!)
If you use the reporting feature instead of sending a private message, it will automatically tell us which post you are reporting. It is always helpful if you explain why you are reporting a post.
The post-reporting page has several categories:

• Please Lock Thread - for when you would like one of your own threads locked or moved off the board
• Methods - posts that go into great detail about specific ways of hurting oneself.
• Numbers - posts that contain numbers (number of cuts, or weights, for example) in a forum where they're not allowed
• Graphic Content - posts containing graphic description of SI, abuse, sexual or other graphic content.
• No Spoiler - posts that should have a warning, but don't
• Unnecessary Spoiler - posts that contain a warning about content, but don't need one
• Personal Attack - for posts with personal attacks on another member
• Spam - advertisments etc. that obviously don't belong here.
• Other - posts being reported for other reasons

If your question wasn't answered here, try looking at this post.
[This guide on reporting posts was written by Proximity.]

HTML & BBCode
One of the most frequently asked questions on the administriva forum is how to use BBCode and HTML in your posts and signatures. Here is a basic guide to using them, and all the cool things you can do with them. If your question isn't answered in this guide, or if you have other fun tricks to share, there's an ongoing discussion here where you're welcome to ask questions or contribute. Please note - HTML is not currently working on BUS.
BBCode:

text you want bolded

Code: Select all

[b]text you want bolded[/b]

text you want in itallics

Code: Select all

[i]text you want in itallics[/i]

text you want underlined

Code: Select all

[u]text you want underlined[/u]

text you want in color

Code: Select all

[color=red]text you want in color[/color]

text you want in a different size (0-24)

Code: Select all

[size=10]text you want in a different size (0-24)[/size]

text you want linked

Code: Select all

[url=http://buslist.org/phpBB]text you want linked[/url]

quoted text

Code: Select all

[quote]quoted text[/quote]

quoted text with membername

Code: Select all

[quote="Proximity"]quoted text  with membername[/quote]

Code: Select all

text with code shown

Code: Select all

[code]text with code shown

[/code]

• text in a list
• first thing
• second thing
• third thing

Code: Select all

[list][b]text in a list[/b][*]first thing[*]second  thing[*]third thing[/list]

an image

Code: Select all

[img]http://busmail.org/gallery/albums/hosted/scream.jpg[/img] an image

HTML:

<b>bold text</b>

Code: Select all

<b>bold text</b>

<i>itallic text</i>

Code: Select all

<i>itallic text</i>

<u>underlined text</u>

Code: Select all

<u>underlined text</u>

<s>strike-through text</s>

Code: Select all

<s>strike-through text</s>

<center>centered text</center>

Code: Select all

<center>centered text</center>

<a href="http://buslist.org">linked text</a>

Code: Select all

<a href="http://buslist.org">linked text</a>

PLEASE NOTE: the <img> tag no longer works on BUS.

[Thanks to notmardy, who originally wrote this HTML and BBCode guide. Updates were made by Proximity.]

What if you don't find your answer here?
Try looking at the post Techie features & What to do if something breaks. It explains some of the ways you can customize BUS for yourself, and how to use some of the more technical features on BUS. Another good place to look for answers is in the BUS FAQ. It addresses a lot of technical questions both about BUS in particular, and phpBB in general.
And remember - it's always OK to ask questions, that's what the administriva forum is here for.