Mindplace Support Blog

Hi everyone;

Andy Broughton here, MP Forums administrator. Over the past month or so, there have been some big changes to the MindPlaceSupport page and the forum. I plan to use this blog to discuss updates and let you all know about changes and new stuff that you can do on the site.
Any issues or questions at all regarding the site, please post in the Site Support forum. Also, any feedback, changes, suggestions, let me know in that same forum.

REGISTRATION AND USER GROUPS

When you first register to the forum, your user group is called "New User". As a new user, there are a few limitations as to what you are able to do on the site. The reason for this is protection against spammers and spam robots which are rampant nowadays. They register to unprotected forums and cover them with advertisements, links to questionable websites, and generally make things annoying for forum users. As a valid new user, you can make posts, download attachments and so on, but your posts will first be "moderated", meaning that they first have to be approved before everyone else can see them. Once you've made a couple of posts and it's clear that you're NOT a robot, your group will become "Registered User". Once you are at that level, you are free to add an avatar, a signature, post links and attachments and even create a blog and a picture album. Good things come to those that wait!

BLOGS

The default for blogs is that comments do not need to be moderated (i.e. "approved") before they appear to the general public. You can change this setting so that the comments need your approval before showing. This can be done in your settings (Settings/Blog/Default Entry Options) What makes that tricky is that they are readable to you at all times, regardless of whether or not they have been approved, and the only indication that they are NOT viewable to the general public was a little icon on the post that looks like this: - Quite hard to see, so I made a change. Now unmoderated comments will appear in red background so you can tell right away that they need approval.

To change your settings to not allow comments without approval, go to your settings (Settings/Blog/Default Entry Options) and check "Moderate comments before displaying".

To edit a blog, hover your mouse over the title of your blog, and you will see a little pencil appear (). If you click that pencil, you can edit your blog post.

BBCODES

There is a new BBCode type that looks like an orange cloud on your editor toolbar. It's for soundcloud links. Good for any samples of music you want to share. Check Neuroasis' blog (e.g. this one) for an example. Thanks to Neuroasis for the tip!

OTHER

Stay tuned for an update coming soon to the forum that changes the editor. It's a better editor with more capabilities and support for more browsers.