Visual, not BBCode as default setting please

[Former Member]

Jan 30, 2013 2:00:16 GMT -8 Pharmerphil said:

 anything to help...

One question though related to maxxborchovski's;  Maybe you can tell me...

I never set ANY Preferance in my profile here at Proboards support...and the editor opens default on the visual editor...
On my board, the default is BB code...
so, How'd My board come with the default at bb code...and when I come here it was visual...
And can I set it to default on my board??

Rita, Admin, Admin helper...anyone??
 

Jan 30, 2013 2:07:42 GMT -8 @ritab said:

Hi Pharmerphil - I don't think there is a forum default setting for this, the only setting I know of is in our own profile... unless anyone knows any different.  

Jan 30, 2013 10:20:09 GMT -8 Brian said:

Pharmerphil: All new accounts now start with BBCode as the posting default. If you'd like an option to change what people default as, I suggest making a feature request.

Jan 30, 2013 13:31:42 GMT -8 @ritab said:

Please do Pharmerphil as I'd quite like the default on my forum to be visual.

[channonite]

Definitely needed please!

When I converted my forum, in the first 24 hours I had to deal with a succession of complaints about BBCode being the default (It seemed to be slower as well). Even when I posted an announcement, the general tone was 'why is it the default anyway?' and 'why can't you alter it?'

[Ryan Roos]

Hi Everyone,

The default is BBCode and will remain that way.

There should not be complaints about that from members who just converted. For the last 13 years ProBoards default posting has been BBCode. That is why we made it the default in v5. It is what people are used to using. People are also then used to click the Preview button after they have typed out their BBCode. In this case that means clicking on the Visual button to preview what they've typed. Just like v4. Just like it's always been.

We then included a way for you guys to change your default in your profile. One and done. by which I mean switch it once and you never have to touch it again.

To me this is a lot like the gender argument. Should we default to Male or Female? Either way we're offending half of the members and they have to edit their setting. But they only have to do this once ever. Now imagine that for all 13 years of ProBoards we've only had female members. And suddenly there is an option for male members. We still have a majority of people female. They all have their setting set to female because that's what it's been. I don't think it's unreasonable for people to go and set their setting one single time to male in their profile for each account to the setting that they want to use the new thing.

You can edit your setting in your profile in each account you use. You can even have different settings for different accounts if you choose.

I hope I explained why this is so simple and why the default is what the default is.

Thank you for asking though.

[channonite]

That sounds reasonable, but why can't the Admins have the option to change the board default?

The thought occurs that "It's always been that way" is no good reason for continuing down that path.

[Former Member]

I think channonite has made a good point.

[Ryan Roos]

Jan 31, 2013 9:49:05 GMT -8 channonite said:

That sounds reasonable, but why can't the Admins have the option to change the board default?

Because that's just one more option to fill up the admin area. And it really isn't needed. It's a personal choice for what each member wants their settings to be. And they can all ready set it once and be done with it forever. On no other feature do we let the admin dictate what the default is before a member selects what their default is. That's redundant. If we were to support that I can only imagine the requests we would get for setting the default on every other feature.

Jan 31, 2013 9:49:05 GMT -8 channonite said:

The thought occurs that "It's always been that way" is no good reason for continuing down that path.

You haven't been around support long enough.

We have people that don't even want to convert to v5 at all, ever. The "it's always been that way" argument is the only way to make people comfortable. That exact argument is the only reason Headers and Footers even exists in v5. Plugins completely negates Headers and Footers. There is literally no code ever that should ever be in the headers and footers that shouldn't be a plugin instead. Not one. In fact you could even make a plugin called headers and footers. We were seriously considering that. But people need it to be "the way it always been".

With regard to something like Visual or BBCode "the way it's always been" is a very useful tool for determining the default. You like Visual, I like BBCode. Who is right? Neither of us, or both of us. It's an opinion. So we can't go off that. What about how many people use each one? Right now I guarantee you that it's BBCode and not because it's the default. It's only been the default for less than 2 weeks. But I suspect in a year or two it will be the visual editor (regardless of what we set it to be by default). So let's just say that's a draw. That leaves us one other option for picking a default setting. What has it always been? What are people used to? What is going to require the least amount of Support when it doesn't behave how people expect? That's how we picked BBCode.

Additionally, we were getting lots of complaints from people pasting BBCode into the Visual editor and telling us it wasn't working. Because it's a new feature and they didn't understand what was going on. Remember that Visual has been the default for a while now in the beta. V1, v2, v3, v4, v4.5 all had BBCode boxes. The quick reply is BBCode. The shoutbox is simple BBCode. The Visual Editor is brand new. The reverse is impossible as well with regards to complaints or mistakes being made. We aren't going to get complaints that people pasted something into BBCode and it dosn't appear the way they wanted. We always intended to make the default BBCode, it only recently got set to that. And it's a good thing too. We were getting complaints and it wasn't even launch yet.

Anyone who wants Visual mode can change the setting one time; and I think it's great if they do. But BBCode is the standard default for reply boxes. It just is.

[Former Member]

It's not a case of who is right or wrong IMO Ryan Roos, it's a matter of preference and what admins think suits the majority of their forum members.

My concern is for brand new, novice and elderly members who haven't got the foggiest idea what the Visual and BBCode tabs mean.

As I've already said, I'd perfer to have Visual as default - new members who fully understand the difference between Visual and BBCode will opt for the latter when editing their profile I'm sure.

BTW I soon discovered, the hard way, that if I wanted to copy and paste I had to do so from the BBcode tab.

[Ryan Roos]

Jan 31, 2013 14:15:39 GMT -8 @ritab said:

It's not a case of who is right or wrong IMO Ryan Roos, it's a matter of preference and what admins think suits the majority of their forum members.

My concern is for brand new, novice and elderly members who haven't got the foggiest idea what the Visual and BBCode tabs mean.

As I've already said, I'd perfer to have Visual as default - new members who fully understand the difference between Visual and BBCode will opt for the latter when editing their profile I'm sure.

BTW I soon discovered, the hard way, that if I wanted to copy and paste I had to do so from the BBcode tab.

It's not right or wrong. That was my point. No one is right, no one is wrong. Both opinions are valid. So we can't go on opinions.

	BBCode	Visual
PROS	Useful. Very Organized. In depth control of elements. People are used to it.	Useful. What you see is what you get. Already a preview. Faster to learn.
CONS	Confuses people not familiar with the internet. Has a steeper learning curve for learning to style things. You have to click once to see a preview.	Confuses people not familiar with the internet. Confuses people used to any forums. You can't paste BBCode into it. Influx of people come asking for help more.

It really just comes down to it's what people expect. Whether that's because that's how it's always been. Or if it's because that's how all forum services are. Or whatever. People expect BBCode. They expect that they can paste BBCode into a reply and it's going to render it. But a Visual editor contradicts that. It literally will post what is displayed.

Anyways I can't stres it anymore than I have and I really can;t spend much more time discussing it than we already have. You can set your option once and forget it.

Edit: This isn't part of the argument, but I personally find it 1000x easier to edit that table above in BBCode mode than I do visually. Because I can copy past and control all the elements. Obviously there is a learning curve involved but that should never be an argument against learning anything (including the visual editor).

[Former Member]

You are far better placed than me to know what the pros and cons are.... I can only guess.

I flip between visual and BBCode - as for what people expect, I reckon most have been surprised to find they have an option, I know I certainly was.

My aim is to have a very user friendly forum - the majority of my members are interested in talking about gardening and wildlife and not the intricacies of using fora and or the internet and they aren't really interested in the whys and the wherefores, they just want to login and post.

Having said that, I do think that v5 is far more user friendly than v4.5 certainly as far as 'admin' is concerned and I must thank Support again for making it so.

I rest my case.

[channonite]

Jan 31, 2013 14:51:52 GMT -8 @ritab said:

You are far better placed than me to know what the pros and cons are.... I can only guess.

I flip between visual and BBCode - as for what people expect, I reckon most have been surprised to find they have an option, I know I certainly was.

My aim is to have a very user friendly forum - the majority of my members are interested in talking about gardening and wildlife and not the intricacies of using fora and or the internet and they aren't really interested in the whys and the wherefores, they just want to login and post.

Having said that, I do think that v5 is far more user friendly than v4.5 certainly as far as 'admin' is concerned and I must thank Support again for making it so.

I rest my case.

Are you me?! 

Substitute soccer/football (depending whether you are in North America, or the rest of the world!) for gardening and wildlife and that is exactly how I feel about it.

[Ryan Roos]

Thank you both. I have a feeling that it takes a certain personality, a certain effort and a drive, to be an admin. I think many of you are more alike than you realize and I think that many of your members are alike each other as well. Admins and members both have their own unique types of needs. It can be tough to predict those some times. And in a case like this sometimes either answer is going to seem wrong to someone. So we just have to go off of the higher expectation. Thank you all too.

[AshFR]

Can't you edit this in you're profile when you register?

[Ryan Roos]

Feb 4, 2013 3:09:01 GMT -8 AshFR said:

Can't you edit this in you're profile when you register?

You can edit this in you're profile right after you register.

We tried to simplify the registration process down to the most basic of options and information. It's important to make it as simple as possible to sign up in order to increase membership. You are never more at risk of losing a member than during the signup process. The more complex your registration process is, the more people you will lose. That's why in v5 it's very quick and very simple to signup. Even more so if you have a ProBoards Global Account already. Signup is almost nothing at that point.

I hope that makes sense. Thank you.

[channonite]

Feb 4, 2013 7:46:38 GMT -8 Ryan Roos said:

Feb 4, 2013 3:09:01 GMT -8 AshFR said:

Can't you edit this in you're profile when you register?

You can edit this in you're profile right after you register.

We tried to simplify the registration process down to the most basic of options and information. It's important to make it as simple as possible to sign up in order to increase membership. You are never more at risk of losing a member than during the signup process. The more complex your registration process is, the more people you will lose. That's why in v5 it's very quick and very simple to signup. Even more so if you have a ProBoards Global Account already. Signup is almost nothing at that point.

I hope that makes sense. Thank you.

I have just signed up to another ProBoards Forum, using my global account and it seemed idiot proof. I see I am set to Visual there as well as on here and my board. Does it pick that up from my personal settings?

Very impressive, if so.

[Ryan Roos]

It's entirely possible that we have detection for certain settings like that. Most of those settings are managed from your Global Settings. That is not one of those though. If you only have a single other forum account it may default your settings to match. We have lots of little things like this all over the place. I myself am not aware of this one. But if that's what happened, awesome!