New Editor & Tags - Tables, Auto-Save, Undo & More

[Miz]

Well there has been a lot of fumbling around recently by us admins after the lovely people at vBulletin updated our new forum system to vBulletin Version 4.1.4. (If you haven't noticed this, its because we administrators always do our work in the shadows... "I am one with the Shadows?")

This version includes many updates but the most obvious is the new editor that they have (forcefully) incorporated. For those of you who have utilized a Content Management System before, such as Drupal, you might find this editor familiar. That is because it is the famous CKEditor, well a version made for vBulletin Forums anyway...

With this new editor comes many different features from the "Auto-Save" Content Recovery System (Which will allow you to recover content that wasn't posted but was saved prior) to some new buttons and tags. To hopefully prevent future mass confusion I will be posting below the details on each of the changes that we have included into our forums, and how you can best utilize them!

Restore Auto-Saved Content

This is probably one of the nicer features added in this new editor. The Auto-Saved Recovery System, allows you to restore the most recent content that was typed into the editor box. This is important incidents where your browser crashes, or you receive an error during posting.

To utilize this feature, when typing your posts you should notice a tiny yellow popup appear that says "Auto-Saved". When you see such a popup that means your current content has been saved. So that if lets say you leave the page accidentally, you can simply click at the bottom of your editor box the button that says "Restore Auto-Saved Content" to restore all of your lost data.



The editor will conduct an auto-save after every minute.​

Remove Format Button

This feature isn't necessarily new but it is much more prominent in the new editor. The Remove Format Button, is the first button that will appear in your editor box toolbar. What it does is for the most part self-explanatory in that it will remove the formatting from any highlighted entries in your editor box.​

Undo and Redo Buttons

This feature is an update to the previous undo feature that appeared in some browsers which users could utilize by right clicking the editor. The current Undo and Redo Feature however is much more powerful than any previous system, allowing you to go back and undo any previous actions you may have preformed. The redo option is also brand new, allowing you to undo any of your undos!​

Video Tags/Button

Well for as long as many of you can remember we have always utilized Youtube Tags on our forums. This new editor has allowed us to change that. By clicking the Video Tag Button (), you can now access many other mediums to put in your posts. The current supported video services include: YouTube, Hulu, Vimeo, Dailymotion, Metacafe, Google and Facebook. The previous [YOUTUBE] and [GOOG] Tags are still functional and can be utilized over the [video] tag. As well, any previous posts that used the Youtube or Google Video Tags will still function normally.​

HTML Tags/Button

This feature isn't a new one, but it is more prominent on the editor now. HTML Tags are similar to the PHP and Code Tags, in that any HTML code you enter inside of the tags will be displayed in a code box but similar to the PHP tags, the code inside will be color-coded based on the HTML syntax. This is a nice feature for those in the Webmaster's forum.

<p>Look at the colors <span style="color:red;">man....</span></p>
<a href="#">Link</a>

Subscript and Superscript

Subscript and Superscript are new features included with the new editor. To utilize the Subscript or the Superscript Tags you can simply click on their designated buttons or type [noparse][SUB][/SUB][/noparse] for [SUB]Subscript[/SUB] or [noparse][SUP][/SUP][/noparse] for [SUP]Superscript[/SUP]
​

HR Tag/Button

HR Tags are a new feature that allows users to create a Horizontal Line, which can be used as a separator. To utilize the HR Tag. You can click the HR Button () (Which is the last button in the toolbar) or simply type [noparse]

---

[/noparse]

---

​

Tables Tags

This is a feature many of you have asked for, and for some reason the people at vBulletin desired to grant it. Table Tags, with these tags you will be able to set up basic Tables inside your posts. Fortunately these tags are safe to use and will not permit any broken tables to be displayed.

Table Tags are assembled from three tags put together: Table, TR and TD. For those of you familiar with HTML, or at least HTML Tables, the usage of these BBCode Tables will be a breeze. Others of you that aren't so familiar you might want to pay attention to how a table is formed.

A Table in BBCode is created by utilizing the

Tags. - Being the Cells inside each Row - being the Region. - Being the Rows in the Table [noparse][TABLE="width: 100"] [TR] [TD]Row1:Col1[/TD] [TD]Row1:Col2[/TD] [/TR] [TR] [TD]Row2:Col1[/TD] [TD]Row2:Col2[/TD] [/TR] [/TABLE][/noparse] Along with these tags you have two features that can be utilized with tables. The First is Class which if included makes it so that the tables have borders. There are two kind of borders "grid" which makes sure every box in the table has full borders, and the other is "outer_border" which only makes it so it has an outer border. Neglecting to have a Class will make it so the tables will not have a border. The other feature is Width, it is a required option that decides how large your Tables will be. [del]Without a designated width, your table will not display.[/del] Table Examples: No Border (Default) Row1:Col1 Row1:Col2 Row2:Col1 [noparse][TABLE="class: width: 100"] [TR] [TD]Row1:Col1[/TD] [TD]Row1:Col2[/TD] [/TR] [TR] [TD]Row2:Col1[/TD] [/TR][/table][/noparse] Grid Row1:Col1 Row1:Col2 Row2:Col1 [noparse][TABLE="class: grid, width: 100"] [TR] [TD]Row1:Col1[/TD] [TD]Row1:Col2[/TD] [/TR] [TR] [TD]Row2:Col1[/TD] [/TR][/table][/noparse] Outer Border Row1:Col1 Row1:Col2 Row2:Col1 [noparse][TABLE="class: outer_border, width: 100"] [TR] [TD]Row1:Col1[/TD] [TD]Row1:Col2[/TD] [/TR] [TR] [TD]Row2:Col1[/TD] [/TR][/table][/noparse]

, and

 

[Sevion]

Coolio. Will be using this. <3

 

[Weep]

Restore Auto-Saved Content

This is probably one of the nicer features added in this new editor. The Auto-Saved Recovery System, allows you to restore the most recent content that was typed into the editor box. This is important incidents where your browser crashes, or you receive an error during posting.

For the privacy-minded: where is this data saved, on the server, or locally? If locally, where - a cookie, the cache, that newfangled local database protocol? Regardless, through what process may it be cleared?

Also, what happens if you have more than one reply page open at a time - do they overwrite each other as they each periodically save?

 

[UndeadDragon]

I like these updates. The only one which I don't think has ever affected me would be the auto-save feature, although I imagine it to be very useful for people who may be writing very long posts.

 

[Miz]

For the privacy-minded: where is this data saved, on the server, or locally? If locally, where - a cookie, the cache, that newfangled local database protocol? Regardless, through what process may it be cleared?

Also, what happens if you have more than one reply page open at a time - do they overwrite each other as they each periodically save?

I believe its locally, because I don't see any other way it could be saved practically. I am not entirely sure in what form locally though. I will try to look that up.

Unfortunately I do believe they overwrite one another, or it will pick favorites or something.

 

[celerisk]

> that newfangled local database protocol?

"protocol" might be pushing it a bit, but, no, it's ajax based.
Sending the content and some general house-keeping stuff, like "parentcontentid: 165273" to know where it's from.

Presumably, this URL:
http://www.thehelper.net/forums/ajax.php?do=autosave
is then perfectly save to use and abuse

 

[sqrage]

For the privacy-minded: where is this data saved, on the server, or locally? If locally, where - a cookie, the cache, that newfangled local database protocol? Regardless, through what process may it be cleared?

Also, what happens if you have more than one reply page open at a time - do they overwrite each other as they each periodically save?

What's so private about a post you'd be posting on a public forum?

 

[Weep]

What's so private about a post you'd be posting on a public forum?

Doesn't matter. It is never bad to have control over your own information.

But if you must have a practical example: forget clipboard contents, paste, real name and address go into text field by accident, autosave procs. Now what?

Of course, if it does just overwrite, all you have to do is start a new post and wait a minute.