fiction files redux discussion

HTML Tags in Posts (Advanced -- for easy linking and adding author/books, see shel's post #4 - Makin' da linky links below)

thought it might be handy if we had a quick reference to these:

please note that i removed the opening brackets on all these tags and replaced them with a capital X so i could show you the format without having the html actually work. you'll have to REPLACE the X with < or [ in the appropriate places. confused? just leave a comment. :)

to embed a:

* link: Xa href="http://www.goodreads.com">my link text
* link to book: Xbook:[book:Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone|]]
* link to author: Xauthor:J.K. Rowling]
* image: Ximg src="http://www.goodreads.com/image..." width="40" height="100" alt="description"/> (Width must be 0-400, Height must be 0-1000, alt is a description of the image. All three are optional, but recommended.)
* bold text: Xb>...
* italic text: Xi>...
* underline text: Xu>...
* strike text: Xs>...
* indent text: Xpre>...
* blockquote: Xblockquote>...
* paragraph: Xp>...
* Note: tags must be properly nested, example:
OK XiX>b>test
Not OK i>b>test

Populating your Book Shelves

i truly think the easiest thing to do to start building your shelves is to pick one of the people who has a lot of books in their collection that has similar tastes to you, and go to their profile. choose to look at the books they've read, and you'll see a column for your rating, or add to shelf. i did this when i first joined. i went through ben's list, and pulled stuff from his shelf onto mine. then i started to fill out the edges. once you've got as many "read" books as you feel you need (i'm using good reads as an inventory so these are all books i own -- i'm using the private notes to keep track of books i've loaned out) you can start figuring out if you want to add subcategories.

Following Discussions with eMail Notifications

goodreads is a little different because you don't need to check the group to see if new posts have arrived, though you can if you want to. instead, in our profile settings, there is a notifications tab. we have the option to receive email notifications which can be daily or weekly. here's a link to the page i mean.

http://www.goodreads.com/user/edit?ta...

once you're there, you can choose the rate at which you can get your friends' book reviews, or how often you'll get an email that lists out the many things your pals have been doing while you haven't been signed on. there are a lot of little boxes there.

in addition you'll see at the bottom of each thread like this one, a line of text that says "You are following this discussion" or something to that effect. if you click the edit button beside it you can change the notification rate for that particular thread.

i like this feature because i don't think i'll ever write a post and anxiously refresh the page a million times to see if anybody has responded. also, i used to keep my fiction files page open all day which ate up too much memory. :)

hope this helps!

Makin' da linky links

For a regular old link, if you put anything with http:// in front of it, it will become a link automatically in your comment. (So, you don't really have to use the XHTML tags above for just a regular link.)

If you want to add a link to an author's page, or a book's homepage, see that "add book/author" link right above the comment window? Click it.

First, you search zee database.
Zen, you peek your boooook. (Decide whether or not you want the cover or just the title.)

Or, click zee author tab to find zee writer and create zee link to zat author's home on GoodReads.

Ta-Da!

Deleting posts

I just discovered, by deleting a short post of Michael's when I meant to delete my own, that if you want to delete a post...

The reply|edit|delete|flag links that appear just over the grey bar are for the post directly preceding.

So if you want to delete your post, or edit it... bottom right, just above the grey bar that divides the post you wish to edit from the post directly below it.

There is no Ctrl + Z on that action, either.

is the delete just there for mods or for anyone?

My guess is, members can only delete their own posts...

No I almost deleted shels post. but a box popped up asking if I really wanted to delete it. so I canceled.

oh well then. now I see I've been made a moderator.

Moderators and the Side Bar

just wanted to let you guys know that only five people show up on the side bar as moderators but we have many many more - click on the members link and you can see who has moderator privileges. if you would like moderator privileges, feel free to contact one of the people already listed as moderator and say so. the order on the side is based on who joined the group first -- it is not order of importance, if it was, obviously jonathan would come first. :) i hope that clears up any confusion about the side bar.

Dear Diary:

I just tried to use my moderator status to get a reservation at a fancy restaurant, but the host didn't know what I was talking about. Un-freakin-believable! The guy must have been illiterate.

Still haven't decided if I will use my moderator powers for good or evil.

Adrian wrote: "Dear Diary:

I just tried to use my moderator status to get a reservation at a fancy restaurant, but the host didn't know what I was talking about. Un-freakin-believable! The guy must have been ill..."

as if good would ever stand a chance. :P

Collapsing and Expanding Sub Folders

I'm sure you guys know this already but the triangles beside the sub folders indicate the expand/collapse utility: this means if you don't have an interest in Etymology and Language, for example, you can click on the triangle and the topics listed under it will be hidden from view. if you change your mind and decide that you do, after all, have a keen interest in Etymology and Language, you can go back and expand it again by clicking on that self-same triangle. handy, that. :)

So I'm using my grandsons mini laptop and while exploreing lists I accidentally selected a book in lists for unforgetable characters. anyone know how I can get rid of that or even changethe choice? dam mini!

Anyone notice the chart for your average ratings? on our profile under your pic is your average rating in paarenthesescsc? w/e anyhoot if you click on that you get a little popup chart. interesting to check a reviewers chart before taking thier word for a rating.

I'm not sure what it's saying that I'm just seeing this. See... all this time I've been missing the FFiles. Now I see... it's all here... not gone... just moved. I've been checking in here every so often and seeing the Events posted. It is just tonight that I've found the there are topics and such. Ahem. Thanks for the tips here Mo. I'm sure I'll need them :)

there is a nifty new feature, they are still working out bugs, but you now can ask for recommendations:

http://www.goodreads.com/recommendati...