Xenforo Move FAQ

[Cyndi Kingsley]

FAQs


Questions you might be pondering and a few you probably didn't know you should ponder!​

I'm so confused. What is happening?

Please check out Nick's announcement for details and then come back here and read through the rest of the FAQs.

Ok, why didn't you warn us?

The short answer is that even though we wanted to let you all know what was going on, we weren’t entirely sure what our options were for moving our data until a few days before we turned the site offline. We didn't want to get anyone’s hopes up about what we could move in the event it didn’t move properly and felt that simply going forward in this manner was the best option for everyone.

Why was the site down for so long?

This site is a pretty big, specific one and there was a lot for admin and staff to work on to make HNZ member ready. In fact, we still have a lot of work to do (see below), but we didn't want to delay your access to the site any longer. We are going to be asking for your continued patience in working with us as we continue to work on the site.

I'm really confused about how to navigate the site. What should I do?

We know that change can be scary or exciting, anxiety producing or fun, so as with any other change onsite, we ask you to take some time to digest the information, and take some time to look around. Just like when you were a new member on HNZ, it will take some time to get used to where everything is and learn all the ins and outs. But unlike other times, we're all in the same boat and learning together. So, be patient with yourself and with others.

Feel free to poke a Global Moderator for assistance after you've looked around for something on your own and are still completely lost, and if you discover a neat trick that you think would be beneficial to everyone, why not post it in this topic for everyone?

In Character Spotlights, everyone mentions that their favorite part about this site is the community, so I know that we'll come together as a community and work through this change together.

Alright, I'm looking around...what are sub-accounts?

Think of a sub-account as your secondary, tertiary, or whatever the word would be for your 70th account. On Xenforo, your main account is known as your parent account and all of the other accounts that you can link to your parent account are called sub-accounts. Linking sub-accounts to your parent account will enable you to easily receive notifications from all of your accounts to your main account and will allow you and us to better track whose accounts belong to who. It will also us to better help you verify information, retrieve information, and reset passwords. Receiving notifications and the like for your other accounts to your main account has been something various members have been asking for, but it simply wasn’t capable on Zetaboards. Now, you’ve got it!

How do I set a sub-account?

Glad you asked. Head to your profile on the top right of the page. You’ll want to hit your avatar to open that drop down. From there, hit sub account. You’ll see an option to either add existing or create new. We encourage you to add your existing accounts before creating new account(s). When you hit add existing, you will type the name of the character (s), hit the ‘add existing button to confirm. You’ll then be taken to a list of all the accounts that need confirming. You then must log in to the other accounts where you will receive an alert to go to the sub account area to confirm what you did on the parent account. Please make sure to double check before you click to confirm because you or another member might have made a mistake and entered any incorrect character.

Once you're all done, the ‘login as user button will have a red number indicating you have alerts on another account. Hitting that will give you the option to quickly switch between all of the accounts you have linked to your parent account!

I set up a sub-account. Now I need to know how to customize my posts, font size, add justify, add the remove styling button, etc.

Ah, you're talking about the items that were in the Code Control Panel on HNZ. Those were additions made specifically by Nick, and unfortunately those didn't carry over in the move. As we move to make major functions work [think Apps, Gradebook, Shop System, Quidditch system as our priorities] on Xenforo, items covered by the Code Control Panel are not priorities at the moment.

Hmm...so are there any cool new features you mentioned?

Right! So with the switch to Xenforo, all members do currently have access to send group PMs! This is something people have asked for for plotting purposes like Roulette and for in character purposes like club PMs.

All users do have access to create a couple of post templates as well using this area and they'll show up in your reply box.

As mentioned with sub-accounts, once you've linked your sub-accounts to a parent account, you'll be able to see when you have messages/notifications to one of your sub-accounts from your parent account. This means fewer missed notifications!

Classic themes is fully responsive for mobile, which we all know I love

Did you get any trophies when you logged in? Those are a fun new feature meant to encourage you to keep on joining us.

You saw it in the preview, but something we’ve all been digging are the stats on the side bar. I’m also personally liking all of the watch this thread options in the preferences.

Finally, you’ll note that the board is now way more secure as we now have SSL connection. No more ‘the site is not secure’ messages.

I'm looking around, and I know I used to have access to something but don't see it anymore. Help!

First, double-check that you really should have access to this area with the character you're logged into. If you still believe you should have access, poke an admin.

I'm having the opposite problem. I know I shouldn't have access to something, but I can see it and post in it. Help!

First, check to see if there is a note in the forum area explaining who has permission to post. Just because the reply box opens up doesn't mean you should post there. Second, we are going to trust you all to use common sense. If you’re a student, you shouldn’t be posting in the wizarding world unless school is on a break. If you’re a non-professor adult, you shouldn’t be posting in the school if you find yourself with access.

If you're still confused, poke me or Emzies prior to posting.

Ah, ok. But why is my avatar gone?

So like with any move, some things do get lost and avatars are unfortunately one of those things. While site staff continue to sort a number of things out, we do have some quick things that you all can do to help:

• Give yourself a new avatar!
• Please note that images in posts must be re-sized off board as using

  [img, 100,100]

  no longer functions.
• Edit your account preferences to make sure you're receiving the notifications you want, how you want them.
• Fix your tables! Tables have gone wonky, though Nick has worked to significantly fix this. Still, you may go into your bios and see additional coding that must be removed to make your table look how it did before.
• Fix your links! If you have a bio that includes links to roleplays, you'll have to fix the links because they link to the old forum.
• ROLEPLAY!! We want you all to get back to having fun on the site. 1 week away was long enough, right?

I have so many lessons to catch up on! Ok, that wasn’t a question but I’m concerned!

The good news is that you have exactly the same amount of lessons to do as you did when the site went down last Friday. Professors did not have secret access to be their evil professor selves and post. . We will ask professors to begin posting week 6 lessons starting Monday. And we will ask professors with Friday/Saturday/Sunday lessons to either post both lessons on your designated day or be willing to give students an O for lesson 5. Finally, we ask professors to hold off on attempting to grade lessons until further notice (we will post details for you all soon!)

Finally, instead of 1 week after week 6, we will be allowing 2 weeks for you all (and us too ) to catch up on lessons. Exams and graduation are officially pushed back 1 week. Check out the calendar for details!

Should we get back to duels?

Yup. All currently active duelers will have 48 hours to reply or the duel will end on whomever last posted.

Will sorting be happening?

As of right now, yes, we are anticipating that sorting will take place as normal. We will make a further announcement about whether or not transfer applications will open during sorting as we get closer to that happening.

Ah, yes…Apps. So how I can I submit one?

Well, all applications, including general apps like group changes, are closed while we work to get ourselves stabilized with this change. As soon as applications are open, we will post an announcement with links!

What about shouty? Why can't I use that?

Unfortunately, shouty is not currently active. Although we moved a lot, certain features that Nick worked on personally are not up and running at the moment as they are not priorities. We encourage you to head to Green Eggs and Spam for some conversation. Please note that the HNZ discord will be closing imminently. is now closed.

Ok, what about the gradebook and shop system? Are those ready?

Both are a work in progress with gradebook as priority one. As Nick completes things, we will be sure you’re all updated. No data has been lost in these systems, we simply have to update them to work with our new home. These things take time though and, again, we ask you to be patient.

And Quidditch?!

Unfortunately, the quidditch system is not up and running so we will not be running any games for the foreseeable future. Although super fun, we have decided that the systems that are used by the greatest number of characters -gradebook and shop- need to be prioritized over this one. Once the system is up and running, you'll see an announcement.

I hope these questions have helped you to begin to orient yourselves to the site. Please enjoy looking around. While site staff is always a PM and skype message away, we do ask that you take the time to review this FAQ, the ‘Let’s learn together’ topic, and search around prior to messaging us. Please also be patient with us as we are juggling many hats, including our RL ones, as we worked on and continue to work on this move.

Looking forward to some fun times with you all in our new home!

~Cyndi

(on behalf of the site staff)

 

[Cyndi Kingsley]

I forgot to mention something: in the move, the blogs that some of you used to keep in your character profile areas were moved to a blog forum which can be found in the character development area.

This forum area will be disappearing in a month, so if you would like your blog moved to a new space (a plot development or bio area, I'm assuming), please message Donna with the links to which blog topics you want moved and specify where you want them moved to and then be patient while she manages the PMs she receives.

Thanks!

 

[Nicolas King]

On the note of sub-accounts: the bug where you couldn't remove an account (pending or otherwise) that you had listed as a sub-account has been resolved.

 

[Nicolas King]

Our lovely GMs have put together the following FAQ for the upgrade we've installed today:

I see new buttons in the top right-hand corner of each post! What do they do?
Well spotted! The first button allows you to grab a quick link to the post to share it with whomever you'd like. The second is a nifty new bookmarking feature. Using the bookmark button you can save your favourite threads and posts to come back to them at any time! To find your saved bookmarks, click on your username at the top of the page. Your bookmarks are in a tab that appears beside 'Your account'. You can filter your bookmarks using labels to make searching for saved posts even faster!

How do I react to a post?
Easy! Just hover over the 'Like' Button at the bottom of the post, and click your selection!

What is URL unfurling?
So, this is a nifty new feature which allows a preview of whatever site you're linking! Note: this feature only works when the link is not named. It's a handy way to send people to whatever post you're referencing. You simply need to insert the link, without a name, and the preview will pop up in your post!

Example:

Jody Wilson-Raybould: Three ways this could be a problem for Trudeau

Allegations of political interference have turned into a major headache for the Canadian PM.

www.bbc.com

Round Avatars?
It's a brave new world, folks! I personally love the new avatars, they've come in with the new Xenforo update, and they're really reminiscent of the round avatars we see in most social media. They're also JUST. SO. PRETTY!!

Push Notifications? How can I get those?
This new, and very exciting feature, will allow people to have their notifications sent straight to their device! This feature will not work on iOS or Safari, unfortunately, but on your desktops, phones, non-iOS (or macOS Safari) devices, you'll be able to have desktop, or push notifications! If you simply scroll to the bottom of the board, you'll see a hovering notice requesting to enable push notifications. If you want to tweak these notifications to your preferences (and believe us, you do!), you can do so here.

If I want to change my character's name, what's the easiest way to go about it?
It's now super easy to submit a name change request! Head over to your account details page and look for the button beside your username labelled 'Change'. When you click it, you'll be asked to enter your desired new username. You should use the 'Note' section to explain why you are requesting the change (e.g. character is getting married). Enter your password, and that's it! Here's an example request. Name changes must be approved by admin before they go through.

The Emoji Are Coming:
The board now boasts full emoji support. What does that mean? It means that emojis can now be posted to the board! AND some of them will automatically convert into the classic HNZ emoticons we know and love. So go ahead and spread some cartoon-face joy!


OOC Names:
We've mentioned easier IC name changes, but there's also another neat little name-related update coming to the board! Now, when you click on a character's name on the forum, the pop-up will also include the OOC name of the roleplayer!

Profile Tags:
Also being introduced to the board, are profile tags! Since the move, we've all become familiar with tags on topics, but not you're able to add them to your character's profile! This can be done in your account details, where you can add your own tags in the profile tags section.

Conversation Sorting:
This is one of the most exciting new changes on the board. It allows a user to create labels for their conversations, so they can keep track of what each thread is in reference to, or who it's coming from. This can be done in a couple of ways. First, you can create a "rule," which automatically filters your messages and places them where you want them. If, for example, you could set a rule where any message containing the word "Exam" be labeled as a school-related conversation. You can "edit conversation" and retrospectively label conversations which have already begun.

You can create these labels in the label tab when you click into "show all conversations." and then upon beginning any conversation, you can label it accordingly. We're all very excited about this new feature and think it will make a lot of people's lives a lot easier!

Once you've created all your labels, they'll appear below your inbox, so you can then view only the messages within that label, like this;

Are there any other subtle changes I might not notice right away?
Yep - until now, tagging users after you edited a post wouldn't cause the tagged user to receive a notification. With this update you'll find that has changed! You can now tag somebody in any post at any time, and they'll still be notified of it.

 

[Stefan Archer]

Media Gallery FAQ

What is this?
This is the new and permanent way that you will be able to to save the HNZ pictures you have without having to worry about rehosting.

What about my old images in the old system?
After a period of time they will be removed and the old system will be removed. We will give plenty of warning but from this point on please do not use the old system. All of your existing uploads have been moved to the new upload system, so while there will be a bit of change over, all that will need changed are the links.

How to Upload?
So this is exceeding simple, if you'd like the specifics for an avatar or banner go here: [[cyndi's post]]
But generally, at the top of the HNZ page you can now see the following:

There at the top highlights in a red circle is uploads, hit that button and you'll be taken to the uploads page which looks like this:

There at the top of the gallery is an an uploads button, which will give an option of where you'd like to upload your graphic to:

It is important to try to put it in the right place, but things can be moved as will be explained later. Once you've selected the folder you want to put it in, then you are taken to the specific upload page which is this:

Click on upload file, and select a file from your computer.

Then you'll open up the last page where the image is ready to be uploaded, give it a title, and a description if you'd like. Select who can use it and then any tags before hitting upload and then bam it's done!

What are The Categories
We have established a set of categories already which you can save items to, they are:
Thread Graphics

Biography Graphics​

Misc Thread Graphics​

Profile Graphics

User buttons​

Avatars​

Signatures​

Accio: HNZ's Yearbook

Accio submissions​

Out of Character Uploads

Members Only Uploads​

Temporary Uploads

These are fairly broad, but will cover every element of things needing uploaded to the site. If in doubt always speak to a member of staff and they can point it out. Importantly, to note, the temporary uploads folder, is as it seems, temporary. Things within that folder will vanish after a set period of time.

What are Personal Albums
This will be the album that you can upload to for any personal images. Once an image is uploaded it can be added to your personal album and it would enable to you to find the images with ease for use. As with all parts of this, the images upload should be related to the site. Even though these are personal albums, importantly, you can have as many personal albums as you would like, but they are still publicly visible.

How do I move items?
Once an item has been uploaded, how does it get moved? If it needs moved, here is all you need to know. You will be able to do this yourself to move items on certain accounts between albums:

I've selected an image which I'd like to move, it's (for pretends sake say it's under biography when it should be under banner graphics), I've opened the image, and then I click the three dots to open a drop down menu:

There I select the last option of move media item, and that opens this new page where I just select where it goes and hit save.