So-o, you ask: "Why are there two separate systems?"

The downside is that the automatic e-mail list signup system requires database access: you absolutely must be able to use "tag scripts" that read the WebBoard database.

Finally in the right frame, you can also extract a list of user ID#s, login names, and first/last names: this list can be formatted in "commas-and-quotes" format, or in "tab-delimited" format.

Caveat: the detailed list of users won't necessarily be accurate, if some users have placed tabs, commas, parentheses, or double quotation marks within their login names, first names, or last names.  Although WebBoard 5 and 6 are fairly careful about allowable login names, they exert very little control over first and last names.

If you're a WebBoard administrator, you can access the users on the board, by going to the administrator menu, and selecting the "Add users to board" option.  Assuming that none of the users on your board have any of those forbidden characters (tabs, commas, parentheses, or double quotes) in their login names, first names, or last names, you can also get a fairly informative user list.

Note that the useredit page, and the new user registration pages have been altered, in order to prevent these illegal characters from appearing in login names, first names, or last names.

The same hasn't been done for the Add users option: so you can manually add users with these prohibited characters in their login names, first names, or last names.  Obviously, I don't recommend doing this.

Suppose you have a board that concerns childrearing issues.

On this board, there's a private conference for parents of "gifted" or "above average" children.

You have another board that's directed to educators, some of whom are associated with special "magnet schools" that draw in unusually capable students.

A third board is populated by child psychologists.  On that board, there's a mailing list for psychologists who treat autistic children.

You'd like to create a new board, for everyone who's concerned with the education of gifted children.  It should contain the parents who are in the first board's conference for gifted children, all the educators in the second board, and all the child psychologists on the third board, except those who are on the mailing list that focuses on autistic children.

(If these requirements seem strange to you, please try not to worry: I'm just trying to come up with an interesting example!)

Here's what you do:

• Step 1: Extract the user ID#s from the private conference for parents of gifted children.

  Go to that board, choose "manage conferences" and click on the "users" link for that conference.  Scroll down on the right until you find the "EXTRACT" button, and click on it.  For the fastest results, you may wish to check the box that indicates that you only want the user ID# list.

  Next, open up a notepad window.  Paste the list of user ID#s into that window.

  Note: if there are a lot of users, you may wish to right-click in the box and choose "select all."

• Step 2: Extract the user ID#s from the board for educators

  Go to the administrator menu (in "more options") and choose "Add users to board".

  As before, click on the "EXTRACT" button.  Again, for the fastest results, you may wish to check the box that indicates that you only want the user ID# list.

  Now paste the list of user ID#s into the open notepad window that you created in Step 1, above.  (You don't even need to add a new line between the two lists: just make sure that the comma at the end of the first list remains there.)

• Step 3: Extract the user ID#s from the board for child psychologists.

  This is essentially the same as Step 2, above -- except that there's a different board involved.

• Step 4: Extract the user ID#s from the subscriber list for the psychologists who specialize in autistic children.

  Go to the administrator menu (in "more options") and choose "manage mailing lists".  Then select that mailing list.

  As before, click on the "EXTRACT" button.  Again, for the fastest results, you may wish to check the box that indicates that you only want the user ID# list.

  Now open up a new Notepad window, and paste the list of user ID#s in.  Remember, these are the users who aren't going to be added to the new board!

• Step 5: Build your new board, and create the user list.

  Go to the administrator menu for the new board, and select "add users to board."  Then click on "show user list" and paste the users from the first notepad window into the box in the lower part of the left frame.

  Then, click the button that says "ADD".  (Be sure to wait until you get the alert which tells you that the system is done adding users.)

  Finally, click the "SUBMIT" button near the top of the right frame.

• Step 6: Remove the subscribers to the e-mail list for psychologists who specialize in autistic children.

  Scroll down in the right frame, to the box that allows you to delete users.

  Paste in the users from your second notepad window.

  Then, click the "DELETE" button.  Wait for the alert that says that the system is done deleting users.

  Finally, click the "SUBMIT" button near the top of the page.