DBabble Forums

DBabble Help

DBabble Forums

DBabble forums allow a group of users to discuss a topic in detail by posting articles to the forum. Articles can remain on the server from anything from 1 day or forever depending on how the discussion is set up. Forums are similar to Usenet (NNTP) news groups, and can be linked to such news groups it the creator of the forum desires. Any user is free to create new forums. Forums can optionally be restricted to allow only certain users to have access to them.

Finding a Forum
Using a Forum in a Web Browser
Using a Forum in Windows
Creating or Modifying a Forum

Finding a Forum
Forums that you have visited before are listed in your subscribed discussion list. Just click on one of these to go to the forum. To find a forum you haven't visited before, see finding forums and chat rooms
Using a Forum in a Web Browser
1. Overview
  When you first go to forum, it lists the sender and subject of the most recent articles in the forum. Articles with a plus to the left indicate that there is one or more replies to this article. Click on the plus to expand it and see a list of replies. To view the content of an article, just click on the title of it.
2. Pages
  When you first view the forum, it lists the most recent articles in the forum. On this DBabble server, it is the 50 most recent items, but this may differ on other servers. You can browse through older items by using the page down and page up buttons. Since articles are ordered by date, replies posted to articles may not be on the same page as the original article. In order to view all article headers for a single thread of replies, you can choose the View Entire Thread link which is available when viewing the content of an article.
3. Files
  Any article posted in a forum can optionally have a file attached to it. You can download or view an attachment from the bottom of the article content page. However, you can find specific attachments more quickly by clicking on the files link in the forum window. This will list all attachments posted to the forum rather than articles, with links to download the file, or to view the article it is attached to.
4. Posting Articles
  You can post a new article to a forum by clicking on the Post link at the top of the forum window. However, if you are wanting to reply to an existing article, you should instead click on the Reply button available from the article content window.
5. Finding Articles
  DBabble provides the ability to search for article with a particular subject within a forum. Just enter a list of words to find and click the Search button. Articles that contain the specified words in the subject or senders name will be matched. If the Match All Words checkbox is selected, only articles that contain all the specified words will be found. If it is not selected, articles containing one or more of the specified words will be found. You can also choose to search through the list of files where in addition to the subject and sender, the search also looks at the filename when matching.
Using a Forum in Windows
1. Overview
  When you first go to forum, it lists the sender and subject of the most recent articles in the forum. Articles with a plus to the left indicate that there is one or more replies to this article. Click on the plus to expand it and see a list of replies. To view the content of an article, just click on it. Alternatively you can double click on an article to open in another window.
2. Pages
  When you first view the forum, it lists the most recent articles in the forum. On this DBabble server, it is the 50 most recent items, but this may differ on other servers. To see older items, click on the Get More Articles button. Every time you press this button, it will download the headers for 50more articles. Since articles are ordered by date, replies posted to articles may not be near the original article, and you would have to press the Get More Article many times before the original would be available. Instead, you can right-click on the article title and choose Download Entire Thread Headers to get a full list of articles in that thread.
3. Files
  Any article posted in a forum can optionally have a file attached to it. If you are reading such an article, the attachment name will be listed in red at the top of the article. Right click on the attachment name to view or save it to disk. By clicking on the Files tab in the forum window, a list of articles that have attachments is listed. In this way you can find articles with attachments more quickly.
4. Posting Articles
  You can post a new article to a forum by selected New Post from the Post menu in the forum window. If you are wanting to reply to an existing article, you should click on the Reply menu option instead.
5. Finding Articles
  DBabble provides the ability to search for article with a particular subject within a forum. Just enter a list of words to find and click the Search button. Articles that contain the specified words in the subject or senders name will be matched. If the Match All Words checkbox is selected, only articles that contain all the specified words will be found. If it is not selected, articles containing one or more of the specified words will be found. You can also choose to search through the list of files where in addition to the subject and sender, the search also looks at the filename when matching.
Creating or Modifying a Forum
1. Creating a New Forum
  In Windows, to create a new forum, either click on the button in the Discussions Panel in the Main Window, or the option in the Create menu. In the web version, click on the Create Forum link at the top of the main window.
  The only thing you have to enter is the name of the forum. After entering any of the other optional values (which are described below), click on the Create button and the forum is created. It will be automatically added to your list of subscribed forums and chat rooms.
2. Modifying a Forum
  You can only modify a forum if you are the creator of it, or the creator has given you permission to modify it. In Windows, from in the Forum window, choose Modify Discussion from the Discussion menu. In the Web Browser click on the Modify Discussion Link in the Forum window.
3. NNTP news group name - This value is only necessary if you choose to link to a NNTP news group. This value is only necessary if you choose to make visible to NNTP news protocol. This is what the forum will be called when seen by other news-reading programs. Unlike the forum name, it can not contain spaces and must be all lowercase. Names usually look like rec.humor, or rec.puzzles.crosswords
4. Introduction - This is a few lines of text that users can choose to see whenever they read the forum. It can say anything you want.
5. Make visible to NNTP news protocol - If this option is enabled, the forum is made visible to external news-reading programs. After creating the forum, you can set up your favorite news-reader to see this forum, by specifying it's news-host to be discuss.softvelocity.com. If you specify this option, you must also supply a NNTP news group name.
6. Private - This makes the forum only accessible by specified users. If this is not selected, all users will have access to the forum. For information on specifying the users who are allowed to access that forum see Specifying Chat Room and Forum Members.
7. Worldwide - This option is only available to users who are allowed to create global forums. Most users on this DBabble Server are not allowed to. When a forum is selected as global, users on other DBabble servers will be able to access it. Note that a forum can be both private and worldwide, in which case only specified users will still be able to access it, but those other users will be allowed to be on other DBabble servers.
8. Adult - This option indicates that this forum is intended to be used only by adults.
9. Default users can Post to Forum - This option is normally enabled, but if you disable it, only specified users will be able post new messages to the forum, but any user will still be able to read messages.
10. Automatically Subscribe New Users - This option is only available to administrators. If enabled, all newly created users will automatically be subscribed to this forum.
11. Categories - The categories selected only apply if a user searching for the discussion specifies discussion categories to search for.
12. Moderated - If a forum is moderated, any articles posted by users who are not moderators for this forum will not be visible to other users until a moderator has accepted the article. If the forum is available via NNTP, each article will not be visible to NNTP users until all prior articles have either been accepted or deleted by a moderator.
13. Store Items for x Days - Items will be deleted from the forum after this many days. Items are deleted in batches, so some items may last longer before being deleted. Items more recent than this value may also be deleted if the server is running low on disk space. Items will never be deleted before they are 1.0 days old.