[sumo] [meta] Sumoforum navigation primer

Sat Sep 6 10:25:41 EDT 2008

When I try to register on the forum, I get a message that says my e-mail address is not acceptable - it's the only one I have so I can't use another - 

-----Original Message-----
From: Asashosakari at gmx.net
To: sumo at webtrek.com
Sent: Sat, 6 Sep 2008 10:10 am
Subject: [sumo] [meta] Sumoforum navigation primer

In the interest of extending an olive branch...

It appears to me that many SML members who find the forum cumbersome to navigate 
have only looked at it as unregistered users, which severely limits the 
usefulness of several navigational aids, or even prevents them from being 
available altogether. So, here's a short overview of how to make the forum 
faster to use.

First off, new accounts can be registered at http://www.sumoforum.net/forums/index.php?act=Reg&CODE=00

After logging in, there are several ways of finding the most recent messages. 
For people who prefer a flat format similar to how posts might arrive in your 
mailbox, the quickest way of getting to all new messages is the "View New Posts" 
link near the top of the forum: http://tinyurl.com/673sf3

You will be dropped off at the following screen - http://tinyurl.com/5c2r5b - 
which by default shows all threads that have messages not yet read by you. For a 
longer (or possibly shorter, depending on how long ago you last visited) list, 
you can use the "Get active topics" dropdown at the bottom right to list all 
topics that were updated in the last day/week/etc., regardless of whether you 
have alre
ady read them.

To read threads, you have three different access options: Clicking on the 
subject line will drop you off at the top of the thread. Conversely, clicking on 
the corresponding "Last post by:" link will send you straight to the bottom of 
the thread. And lastly (and most importantly), clicking on the small orange 
square in front of the subject line will send you to the first new post that has 
been added since your last visit to that particular thread. No scrolling 
required and no need to remember how much of the thread you've already read. 
(Caveat: Lots of pictures in a thread can make things go a bit wonky, but that's 
an unavoidable browser issue.)

If there are threads you have no interest in, you can finish your visit after 
reading the interesting threads by clicking on the "Mark all forums as read" 
link in the upper-right corner to prevent the uninteresting threads from showing 
up on your next visit (unless they were updated again, of course).

An alternative link to all updated threads from the last day can also be found 
at the very bottom of the main page: http://tinyurl.com/649d7n

However, if your interest is limited to only sumo news (or perhaps less likely, 
only sumo games, etc.), you'll probably find it easier to access the new threads 
via the sub-forum links on the main page. Clicking on, say, Ozumo Discussions, 
will get you to this screen: http://tinyurl.com/63o5ea

Again you're free to open each thread in one of the aforementioned th
ree ways. 
The option to mark the sub-forum as read can be found by clicking on the "Forum 
Options" field here. Alternatively, a sub-forum can also be marked as read on 
the main page by clicking on the dark-blue button that indicates new messages: 
http://tinyurl.com/55bb6o

In order to navigate from one thread to the next, I usually find it easiest just 
to go back to the previous overview page (Alt + <- , Back button, or whichever 
way you prefer) and open the next thread via its orange button, but you can also 
go to the next topic by using the "Next Oldest / Newest" links at the bottom of 
the thread - http://tinyurl.com/6syzkl - however, those will drop you off at the 
first message in the thread, not the most recent update.

And while we're at that screen, a few words on posting: The most common way to 
post a response is by using the Reply button found on each individual post, 
which will automatically quote the message you're looking at. The somewhat 
confusingly-named "+Quote" button exists for quoting multiple messages at once. 
Just click +Quote for each message you want to include in your reply, and when 
done, click on "Add Reply" (not "Reply") to create a message with all the 
selected quotes. If +Quote has not been used, "Add Reply" simply creates an 
empty reply window without any quotes. Probably needless to say, the common 
courtesy rules about trimming the quotations down to the relevant parts in your 
reply apply on the forum just as they do=2
0on the SML.

Lastly, there's the "Fast Reply" button which pops open a small, feature-less 
message window at the bottom of the thread, rather than sending you to the full 
edit window as "Reply" and "Add Reply" do. This can be useful if you're just 
adding a short comment to the thread and don't need formatting options, smilies 
or the preview.

(Quick side-note: Don't try to post anything in "Essential and Informative 
Messages" which is limited to administrators, and don't try to post new threads 
in "Sumo Information" and "Featured Rikishi & Heya" which only allow new posts 
to be added to existing threads. General sumo topics should be posted in "Ozumo 
Discussions" even if you're going to ask a question, not "Sumo Information".)

Back to general thread features...at the top of each thread, you can find 
several options by clicking on, well, "Options" - http://tinyurl.com/5gkbuc - 
the most important ones are probably "Track this topic" which allows you to 
receive email notifications when the thread is updated (I never use this, so I 
can't say how many emails this will result in; at any rate, I don't believe the 
notification includes the actual message content), and the "Display Mode" 
switches. The one most commonly used is Standard mode. Linear mode only differs 
marginally from it (and might exist only for legacy reasons, I think), and 
lastly Outline mode will display only the first post followed by a threaded view 
of everything else: http://tinyurl.com/5kjltx

Finally, you 
can configure many display options by going to "My Controls" (at 
the top of every forum page), and then clicking on "Board Settings" - 
http://tinyurl.com/5cqhgz - the main ways to streamline the thread display are 
probably disabling signatures and avatars, and changing the number of threads 
and posts per page. The forum defaults are 25 for each, the dropdowns allow for 
customization between 5 and 50.

There's also an RSS feed of the forum available at the following link. I'm not 
much of an RSS user so I can't offer assistance with that, but I figure people 
who will use it already know what to do with it:

http://www.sumoforum.net/forums/ssi.php?a=out&f=2,3,4,5,8,9,11,13,14,15,17,20,21&show=20&type=rss

The f parameter specifies which sub-forums to pull updates from. The detailed 
list in case you prefer to edit it down to only a few of them:

2 Essential and Informative Messages

3 Ozumo Discussions
4 Honbasho Talk

20 Sumo Information
21 Featured Rikishi & Heya

5 Amasumo Discussions
17 Japan-Japanese Discussions
9 Polls
13 Sumo Games

15 Member Introductions
8 Off-topic
14 Public Feedback
11 Test Forum

/Asashosakari
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