adding quotations

[timfost]

I'm a little ashamed that I am 29 years old and can't figure out how to quote short sections in replies. I know people my age are supposed to be good with computers, but let's just say that I am electronically challenged.

For my pride's sake, please do not respond if you are over the age of 50. j/k

 

[NaphtaliPress]

Highlight the text and a box should pop up saying "quote". Click on it and the highlighted text is copied to the reply box with the correct tagging.

 

[Cymro]

Thanks for relieving my elontronic challenge as well!

 

[VictorBravo]

For my pride's sake, please do not respond if you are over the age of 50. j/k

OK, won't respond. But I did quote you. [using the method Chris described. You can also use the "reply with quote" button]

Another thing you can do, (please disregard that I just turned 57) is to select and copy text and then put html tags around it. The tag:

put before the text tells the browser to prepare to display the text as a quote. For it to work, you need a closing tag after the text which would be /quote (but surrounded by the square brackets).

I didn't actually use the square brackets around the /quote tag in this response because the browser would have then taken it as a command and not printed the "/quote" or the "

"

So now you're on your way to learning basic html coding for forums, which, like typing, is useful in every computer operator's skill set.

 

[God'sElectSaint]

Lol I thought this was going to be a KJV defense of not having quotations to be honest.

 

[timfost]

Thanks! I feel like a "tech" now.

 

[Ask Mr. Religion]

I didn't actually use the square brackets around the /quote tag in this response because the browser would have then taken it as a command and not printed the "/quote" ...

Use the [noparse][noparse][/noparse][/noparse] tags to show the codes used to format text manually. Then you can post the codes without them being parsed by the vBulletin software, as in:

"Enclose text being quoted using the quote tags, e.g., [noparse]

yada yada yada

[/noparse]"

In other words, my manual crafting of the sentence above in my post editing window looked like this before posting:

[noparse]"Enclose text being quoted using the quote tags, e.g., [noparse]

yada yada yada

[/noparse]"[/noparse]

Of course, the discerning Geek will know that the sentence immediately above also included extra [noparse][noparse][/noparse][/noparse] tags around it all. This particular BBcode (bulletin board code) is unique in that its starting and end codes must be typed to even show how it is being typed.


If quoting and responding section by section to a long post, make sure to include at least the first set of beginning quote tags that includes the username and post ID. For example,

[noparse]

Something wonderful Victor posted

[/noparse]

This will let others go back to the original post in question to see its full context.


To the general reader...

Let's say you want to respond to a long post paragraph by paragraph with your responses interspersed between each paragraph. You start by clicking "Reply With Quote" and a window opens containing the full text of the person to whom you are responding.

With that, take the first quoted portion that includes the username and a unique post ID number and leave that alone, along with their starting paragraph. End that paragraph by adding the end quote tag [noparse][/quote][/noparse]. Now type your response to that section.

Now go to the next paragraph and just add a starting quote tag [noparse]

[/noparse] and an end quote tag [noparse]

[/noparse] at the place you which to stop. Again type your response.

So in the end your post will look like this when viewed in the PB post editing window before you submit it:


[noparse]

[/noparse]<--do not change this initial quote tag as it contains a link back to the original post!
Person's first portion of relevant text you are responding to
[noparse]

[/noparse] <--never forget to use the end quote tag on each portion
Your response here


[noparse]

[/noparse]
Person's next portion relevant text
[noparse]

[/noparse]
Your second response here


[noparse]

[/noparse]
Person's subsequent portion relevant text
[noparse]

[/noparse]
Your third response here


...and so on until you are done. Key here is to always bracket the person's content with beginning and ending quote tags: [noparse]

[/noparse] yada yada yada [noparse]

[/noparse]


Before submitting your post select the "Go Advanced" option and the "Preview" option to review your post to make sure you have began and ended each quoted text properly...adding any beginning or ending [noparse][/noparse] you may have missed before submitting your post.


To see all the possible codes that can be used, visit this PB page:
BB Code List - The PuritanBoard

I have a macro utility I use to construct longer posts offline in a plain text editor. I copy and paste another's post into the editor and then manually format it with the relevant BBcodes. The utility lets me enter short keystrokes that expand into the full BBcodes that are required on sites that use VBulletin (e.g., PB) or phpBB (e.g., my RTI site) software.

Crafting complex posts offline avoids the unfortunate situation wherein the browser hiccups and you lose all your wonderful comments, or the errant fatfinger selection of one of the keyboard's left right navigation arrows that moves the current browser page away from your PB post editing window, losing all the work in the process. Even then, I use a Chrome extension, Lazarus, (also available for Firefox), which captures keystrokes in text editing fields such that I can actually resurrect (well it is called Lazarus) my post text in most situations. In fact, there is a MS Word utility that can scan a Word file containing Word formatted text, e.g., boldface, italics, etc., and convert these formatted texts into BBcodes. The same folks make utilities for extracting Bible verses to create Bible verse indexes for lengthy docs or books. See here.

And, Tim, my 32 year old son, with his fancy CIS degree from ASU, only wishes he was as tech savvy as his 62 year old Dad.

 

[timfost]

Thank you! I just tried it and it works!

 

[VictorBravo]

Thanks, Patrick, I was too lazy to look it up that tag.