In other words, if the files were uploaded from a different board, WebBoard 6 will not load them.  I'll talk more about this point in section 4

Also: it's very important that you use double quotes around the file name, and that you don't put a space between the equals sign and the double quote ... at least if you ever intend to move the post into a "global help folder" page.  (I'll explain this shortly.)

As you may know, each board in WebBoard is configured by a series of HTML pages, or "templates".  These templates contain various replaceable "WebBoard tags", such as those which set the background color, text color, and link colors for each page.

These templates are contained in the (main) HTML folder.

Since WebBoard lets you customize each board, each board has a subfolder that's named via the board alias.  If you're a WebBoard administrator, you already know about board aliases.  And if your board's URL has a "tilde" (the ~ character, sometimes known as a "squiggle"), then the board alias appears after that character.

Why have this structure?

Suppose that your board is used exclusively by the accounting department.  Let's assume that the alias of this board is accounting.

You might want to put particular information about the accounting department (such as the New Years' party annoucement) on various pages associated with that board.

For example, every board has an "intro" page (this is known as the "Welcome" page in WebBoard 6).  That might be a good place for the New Years' Party announcement.

WebBoard works via a method known as inheritence.

When it looks for the "Welcome" page for your board, it will first look at the subfolder of the HTML folder for the Welcome page ... in other words, it will look in the accounting subfolder of the main HTML folder.

If it doesn't find the Welcome page on the accounting subfolder, it will look in the main HTML folder.

As it turns out, the "help" pages for WebBoard are stored on a special subfolder of the main HTML folder, called (suprise!) "help".

This is the main help (sub-)folder.

Interestingly enough, each board has its own help subfolder.

Help folder pages are referenced with a very special syntax.

To see this, try the following: right-click on the "more" link on your toolbar, and open it up in a new window (for WebBoard 4 "no frames" users, this link is found on the conferences menu).

Now overtype the "options" part with help?logintricks.

This is the help page that you know of as "login tricks".  Actually, this page is called logintricks.html, and it resides on the help subfolder of the main HTML folder.

It turns out that inheritence also applies to the help subfolder, and each board has its own help subfolder.

So if you had a file called logintricks.html on the help subfolder of the accounting board's folder which is on the main HTML folder, then this file would be loaded instead of the file by the same name on the help subfolder of the main HTML folder.

Let's see that in graphical terms:

What if someone tried to load this file, and they were on another board?  Unless their board had a help folder, which contained LoginTricks.html, they would see the version of LoginTricks.html that resided on the main help folder.  If they did have a version of that file on their board's help folder, then they would see that version, instead.  But under no circumstances, would they see the version of that file that resides on the accounting board's help folder!

How do you discover the message and conference numbers for the regardED post?  Take a look at section 1 for more information about that.

There are two kinds of "red regarding" links.

Inheritable red regarding links will "propagate" themselves through all replies.

In other words, all replies to the post will carry the red regarding link.

Do you want this?  Well, it depends on your application.

For example, you might not want "inheritence" if your post is done in a conference that only the board staff can access, and the only purpose of red regarding link is to alert other staffers to a renegade user's post.

However if the red regarding link points to (say) a budget proposal, you might wish all replies to reference the regardED post.

The decision is entirely yours.

Note that there's a checkbox which asks whether the regardED post is a "full-page" post.

If you check the box, then there will be only one link displayed.  When that link is clicked, the result will be the same, as if the original full-page post is accessed.  That might mean that the post will load in the messages frame, or in a new window.

How do you the message and conference numbers for that post?  Take a look at section 1 for more information about that.

How do you the message and conference numbers for the posts involved?  Take a look at section 1 for more information about that.

For more information about "red regarding" links, please view section 5.

For more information about "reply redirection", please view section 6.

And because you've learned a lot about how WebBoard folders work (as described in section 2), you'll code the following in a post:

<SCRIPT LANGUAGE='JavaScript'>
window.open("upload/New_Plan.ppt", "newplan");
</SCRIPT>

Well, in case you were wondering ... WebBoard is here to save the day!  In particular, WebBoard won't let you post that, because WebBoard's designers assume that all such posts are designed to attack your board with spam, or other undesireable information.

I wrote this system, in part, to prevent WebBoard from "(over-) protecting" you in this way.

Let's take a closer look at the additional options that this system allows ... when you post a message:

The first option is selected by default whenever a staff member (such as yourself) posts a message.

"Forbidden word" conversions are designed to prevent WebBoard from "protecting" you against HTML tags such as <form>, <SCRIPT...>, <META ... >, and any number of other tags that you might want to use in full-page posts, or other posts that you might want to move to the board's help folder, or the main help folder.  (For more information about the folder structure of WebBoard, please see section 2).

The second checkbox lets you prevent WebBoard from automatically adding HTML to the text of a full-page post.

For example, WebBoard 4 is particularly "mindless" in this respect.  Suppose you've coded an image file reference like so:

http://mysite.com/images/me.jpg

If the "allow active images in messages" option is selected for this conference, Webboard will automatically make this image link "active", i.e. it will convert this code into:

<img src="http://mysite.com/images/me.jpg">

But that may not be what you desire, particularly if this text is within JavaScript, Visual Basic Script, or is used for some other special purpose.

A similar analysis applies to the "allow active links in messages" option for WebBoard conferences.  By selecting the first checkbox (see above), you free yourself from WebBoard's efforts to "protect" you in this manner.

The last checkbox should only be used if you're unsatisfied with the results from your post.  This system will automatically "escape" and "unescape" posts, as needed.

What's "escaping"?  Escaping refers to the translation of characters, in a way that WebBoard's likely to ignore, when attempting to "protect" your board from invalid posts.

Most characters besides digits or letters have an "escaped" equivalent: for example, a space is translated to %20.

To repeat, the system so clever about escaping and unescaping posts that I can imagine very few instances in which you'd need to "manually" control its behavior.