Will there be codes where we can OPT OUT of certain feature

[Skidjit]

So far, I can't get my members to try out the BetaZone trial site. They peeked and said it looks good but continue to only post on our regular site. I was going to abandon it. But from the PM this morning saying it's enevitable, I see I have no choice. So I thought I'd better get to working on the BetaZone site to see if I can straighten things out. 


Here are a few things about the PM sent this morning. Let me post some feedback from this admin so far.  

LIKES/LOVES

The "Colors & Theme Creator" section of the Admin Panel makes it extremely simple for you to customize the look of your forum.

Notifications to help you stay on top of the latest updates to threads you've participated in and more.

Create a unique, custom avatar inside of your forum with the new Avatar Maker.

Create custom web pages and Forum Portals directly on your forum using our new Custom Pages feature.

A new Visual Editor for creating posts. See exactly what your post will look like while you make it!

Lightning fast forum navigation on every page with our new drop-down navigation tree and improved hotkey support.

At the top of each page you can see if any of the topics you've participated in have been recently updated.

Coming Soon: Our new Theme Library and Plugin Library provides you with one-click installation for custom themes and plugins. No coding knowledge needed to make your forum look great and add new functionality!

Things I'm on the fence or have questions about:

Host all your forum's images directly on ProBoards! No more relying on third party image hosts!

Does this mean that we no longer can use photobucket or tinypic? I'd like the option. And does this mean I have to store on my computer each new smilie etc just for them to work on my site?

Upgraded attachments system that allows you to easily attach even more files to your forum posts!

I thought we already have this available to us. Still, we've never used this option before since we didn't know what it was for.

Direct access to the forum's HTML and CSS for those hard-to-reach tweaks.

I don't know what this means. And I know I'm showing my ignorance.. but I'm happy to say, I'm in the progress of learning.

Things I'd like to opt out of:

The new Forum Dashboard helps you keep track of what's happening on all your ProBoards forum accounts all in one location.

Is this for each member or staff only? I take it that this means all staff members will be able to see ALL of my other sites and have access to them. I DO NOT want this at all, if I am thinking correctly. I really hope that I'm wrong.

New Live Search functionality that brings you search results as you type; Never wait for your answers again.

I don't get it... is this linking our sites to resource sites (such as: google or wikipedia or dictionary.com?) If so, will we have the choice to what links our site links to? Could we add sites that are more useful to our members?

A Shoutbox integrated directly into your forum!

Oh gosh no! I've talked with a couple of other friends, who were admins. They said that the shoutbox took over their sites. No one posted when they could just use this option. Eventually, hurt feelings from the site not being used correctly ended up in no one going there anymore. My members do not even know it's an option for me right now. I don't want my site to die like my other two friends sites did. So I'd like to opt OUT of this feature if I can.

Per-user activity feeds with the ability to follow other members.

The ability to "Like" posts!

tagging to bring a member's attention to a post.

Actually, I know my members. Several have confidence problems and if they are not liked and often by all others there, they tend to withdraw. I'd like to opt out of ALL three of these. If someone comments it's enough to put into words what they think about a person's post.

With that said, I know I have a lot of tinkering to do. I hope to see if this will be something I can fix before my members crossover to the other side. Please help. Believe it or not. I'm holding out for hope.

[Tressa]

You can still use TinyPic or Photobucket if you want.

The Dashboard of part of your Proboards account. Everyone has their own when they upgrade their account, and nobody else sees your Dashboard.

The search is internal in your own forum, for finding users and posts on the forum.

You do not have to enable the Shoutbox. If you don't want it, it does not have to appear on your forum.

You can turn off the "Like" feature for your forum if you don't want to use it. There is a plugin available to block the "Following and Friend" features if you don't want to use these.

[Brian]

Host all your forum's images directly on ProBoards! No more relying on third party image hosts!

Does this mean that we no longer can use photobucket or tinypic? I'd like the option. And does this mean I have to store on my computer each new smilie etc just for them to work on my site?

You still have the option to link to an existing image already hosted online.

Upgraded attachments system that allows you to easily attach even more files to your forum posts!

I thought we already have this available to us. Still, we've never used this option before since we didn't know what it was for.

You can now attach multiple files to posts, instead of just one.

Direct access to the forum's HTML and CSS for those hard-to-reach tweaks.

I don't know what this means. And I know I'm showing my ignorance.. but I'm happy to say, I'm in the progress of learning.

Instead of adding <style type="text/css"> or <script type="text/javascript"> codes to move things around and change things on your forum, you can just go in and do it yourself directly. No complicated codes necessary.

The new Forum Dashboard helps you keep track of what's happening on all your ProBoards forum accounts all in one location.

Is this for each member or staff only? I take it that this means all staff members will be able to see ALL of my other sites and have access to them. I DO NOT want this at all, if I am thinking correctly. I really hope that I'm wrong.

This will only be visible to the member that is logged into that account.

New Live Search functionality that brings you search results as you type; Never wait for your answers again.

I don't get it... is this linking our sites to resource sites (such as: google or wikipedia or dictionary.com?) If so, will we have the choice to what links our site links to? Could we add sites that are more useful to our members?

The search bar you see on the top of this thread and on top of any boards will show you thread results as you're typing them, similarly to how Google functions these days.

A Shoutbox integrated directly into your forum!

NO WAY. I've talked with a couple of other friends who were admins and said that the shoutbox took over their site. No one posted when they could just use this option. Eventually, hurt feelings from the site not being used correctly ended up in no one going there anymore. My members do not even know it's an option for me right now. I don't want my site to die like my other two friends sites did. So I'd like to opt OUT of this feature if I can.

You have the option to enable or disable the shoutbox. Upon conversion, the shoutbox is disabled by default.

~Per-user activity feeds with the ability to follow other members.
~ The ability to "Like" posts!
~ tagging to bring a member's attention to a post.

Actually, I know my members. Several have confidence problems and if they are not liked and often by all others there, they tend to withdraw. I'd like to opt out of ALL three of these. If someone comments it's enough to put into words what they think about a person's post.

There are plugins to hide the follow features. You can disable the Like system in your forum settings.

Can you explain what you believe to be detrimental about tagging someone in a post, Skidjit? (< that's a tag) All it does is notify someone in their profile that you've tagged them in the post. It's no different than typing their name normally.

[Skidjit]

Apr 4, 2013 11:32:29 GMT -8 Tressa said:

You can still use TinyPic or Photobucket if you want.

The Dashboard of part of your Proboards account. Everyone has their own when they upgrade their account, and nobody else sees your Dashboard.

The search is internal in your own forum, for finding users and posts on the forum.

You do not have to enable the Shoutbox. If you don't want it, it does not have to appear on your forum.

You can turn off the "Like" feature for your forum if you don't want to use it. There is a plugin available to block the "Following and Friend" features if you don't want to use these.

So the Dashboard is what links all of a person's memberships to other Proboard sites?

Thank you Tressa. You are already helping relieve some of my fears.

I'm going to look for the "Like" feature right now. Also, I have a ways to go before I figure out plugin's. Lot's of reading to do.

Thanks.

[Celeste]

Apr 4, 2013 11:37:32 GMT -8 Skidjit said:

So the Dashboard is what links all of a person's memberships to other Proboard sites?

The dashboard is part of the global login, which makes it possible to easily switch between one account and another if you belong to more than one ProBoard (like your own forum and Support). Nobody can see your dashboard except for you, so no one will know what sites you visit or have access to them. Ryan Roos made an excellent video about the global login system here.

[Skidjit]

Apr 4, 2013 11:36:57 GMT -8 Brian said:

Does this mean that we no longer can use photobucket or tinypic? I'd like the option. And does this mean I have to store on my computer each new smilie etc just for them to work on my site?

You still have the option to link to an existing image already hosted online.

I thought we already have this available to us. Still, we've never used this option before since we didn't know what it was for.

You can now attach multiple files to posts, instead of just one.

I don't know what this means. And I know I'm showing my ignorance.. but I'm happy to say, I'm in the progress of learning.

Instead of adding <style type="text/css"> or <script type="text/javascript"> codes to move things around and change things on your forum, you can just go in and do it yourself directly. No complicated codes necessary.

Is this for each member or staff only? I take it that this means all staff members will be able to see ALL of my other sites and have access to them. I DO NOT want this at all, if I am thinking correctly. I really hope that I'm wrong.

This will only be visible to the member that is logged into that account.

I don't get it... is this linking our sites to resource sites (such as: google or wikipedia or dictionary.com?) If so, will we have the choice to what links our site links to? Could we add sites that are more useful to our members?

The search bar you see on the top of this thread and on top of any boards will show you thread results as you're typing them, similarly to how Google functions these days.

NO WAY. I've talked with a couple of other friends who were admins and said that the shoutbox took over their site. No one posted when they could just use this option. Eventually, hurt feelings from the site not being used correctly ended up in no one going there anymore. My members do not even know it's an option for me right now. I don't want my site to die like my other two friends sites did. So I'd like to opt OUT of this feature if I can.

You have the option to enable or disable the shoutbox. Upon conversion, the shoutbox is disabled by default.

Actually, I know my members. Several have confidence problems and if they are not liked and often by all others there, they tend to withdraw. I'd like to opt out of ALL three of these. If someone comments it's enough to put into words what they think about a person's post.

There are plugins to hide the follow features. You can disable the Like system in your forum settings.

Can you explain what you believe to be detrimental about tagging someone in a post, Skidjit? (< that's a tag) All it does is notify someone in their profile that you've tagged them in the post. It's no different than typing their name normally.

Hey there Brian! I knew you'd find me.

Thanks for everything so far.

I'm still confused as to why someone might need to attach a file to a post? Maybe I might need to know what a file would be used for in a post. *rolleyes at myself* Yep, I'm green and it's showing right now. Eep.

As for tagging? I really don't know what it's for. (Years ago, I used to be on LiveJournal site. There I believe it meant your interests. Then once you click on that person's profile, you see all of the things they have tagged. It's like they are following those people or interests.) Of course I'm most likely way off on what I think this Tagging is.

OK... thanks for the heads up on everything else. I do have the link in order to find where certain plugins are to choose from. I'll look for those.

[David Clark]

Apr 4, 2013 11:55:04 GMT -8 Skidjit said:

I'm still confused as to why someone might need to attach a file to a post?

Just popping in to mention that a good use we've seen right here on our support board is developers being given the option of uploading their plugin files as attachments so they don't have to go through 3rd party hosting methods.

[Skidjit]

Apr 4, 2013 11:51:33 GMT -8 Celeste said:

Apr 4, 2013 11:37:32 GMT -8 Skidjit said:

So the Dashboard is what links all of a person's memberships to other Proboard sites?

The dashboard is part of the global login, which makes it possible to easily switch between one account and another if you belong to more than one ProBoard (like your own forum and Support). Nobody can see your dashboard except for you, so no one will know what sites you visit or have access to them. Ryan Roos made an excellent video about the global login system here.

Cool. I'm going to check that out. It sounds like something new to me. (A lot of things I do understand, I just don't know what they are called.) Thanks

[Skidjit]

Apr 4, 2013 12:00:29 GMT -8 David Clark said:

Apr 4, 2013 11:55:04 GMT -8 Skidjit said:

I'm still confused as to why someone might need to attach a file to a post?

Just popping in to mention that a good use we've seen right here on our support board is developers being given the option of uploading their plugin files as attachments so they don't have to go through 3rd party hosting methods.

OK I still have a LOT to learn when it comes to plugins. I have areas bookmarked for me to research as soon as I can to learn. SO thank goodness I'm getting there.  

So using the "Add Attachment" option, whatever placed there would be viewable ON that particular post? (I feel so embarrassed for not knowing.)

[Brian]

Apr 4, 2013 12:12:04 GMT -8 Skidjit said:

Apr 4, 2013 12:00:29 GMT -8 David Clark said:

Just popping in to mention that a good use we've seen right here on our support board is developers being given the option of uploading their plugin files as attachments so they don't have to go through 3rd party hosting methods.

OK I still have a LOT to learn when it comes to plugins. I have areas bookmarked for me to research as soon as I can to learn. SO thank goodness I'm getting there.  

So using the "Add Attachment" option, whatever placed there would be viewable ON that particular post? (I feel so embarrassed for not knowing.)

That's correct. Images attached to posts also come with thumbnails.