How do you format your posts?

[borrofburi]

So due to some discussion in another thread, I wrote this. Then decided it was really off topic, and could actually possibly be viable as its own topic (we all might learn things). So, in response to Inferno and jenne, I present to you my general method of response.

Yes I did mean your quote Inferno, but I could not quote it as I cannot work out how to see the previous pages of the thread when I am posting a reply. You are welcome to enlighten me; it is baffling.

Just open a second tab, it's the only way that I know of. You go back in the thread, you copy the message you want to quote, you click on "quote" in your reply, you Ctrl+V the message into the quote brackets and you enter

without the *.

I do it with that little "quote" button in the upper right hand corner of a post. If I'm only responding to one post, I left click it. If I am responding to multiple posts, I middle click it (opens a link in a new tab). If I'm responding to multiple posts then I copy and paste whole (quoted) posts from each of their tabs into a single response tab. This has two benefits: if I middle click all the posts I might want to respond to, I don't have to go scroll back and find what I wanted to discuss (though I may have to close some extra tabs (but hey, middle click on a tab kills it too...)), and the other advantage is that using the "quote" link means that the post you're quoting automatically comes with all the same formatting information, so you don't have to add any, just delete and rearrange. Also, it's a great way to learn how the formatting works...

After I have full quotes of the posts that I want to respond to all placed in a single response tab, I break the quotes into proper pieces (usually cutting each post down into bare essentials) by adding [ / quote ] to the end of each quote-piece and copy and pasting the [ quote = "person" ] to the front of each quote-piece. I separate closing quotes from opening quotes by several lines, then I put my words in... It sounds laborious, but it's pretty fast because I let software do most of the typing for me (through the use of the quote button for the posts I'm quoting, and through the use of copy-paste for the quote tags themselves). About the only thing I type is my actual response, the rest is just a little bit of clicking and hotkeys (sometimes I type the end-quote tag because it'll be faster than copy pasting it).

Writing my responses is the time consuming part. I almost always use the preview button... Often, I use it several times. Sometimes I even use the edit button.

 

[Prolescum]

Depends on what's being responded to for me. If it's a long post, I'll use the quote button and split as necessary. Most other formatting is quicker for me to type by hand. I've been known to use the size button.

Sometimes, for the sake of clarity, I'll write out the [ quote="such and such"].

 

[televator]

I tend to toss out proper paragraph format in favor of isolating different ideas and/or points I'd like to see addressed. I think it makes my posts easier to read as well as easier to multi-quote.

 

[Squawk]

Only thing I ever do is ctrl-c the

part, then just ctrl-v to insert it as I want breaks to appear in the text. If I've split a post into more than 1 or 2 quotes I frequently preview to check if the quotes work.