Welcome to the Ryan and Bran forum, powered by the Simple Machines Forum software (or SMF for short). If you've been caught at the forum index and you're not sure what to do, then you've come to the right place. This help page should help guide you through what it takes to talk to Ryan and Bran fans on this forum.
Although you can read other people's posts to your heart's content, you'll need to register to reply to other people or to start your own topics of conversation. Once you've registered, you'll need to consider the different aspects of the forum that will let you communicate:
- the navigation tabs
- the forum index
- the board index
- the topics
the navigation tabs
The navigation tabs are the rectangular buttons beneath the regular navigation buttons. These buttons allow quick access to forum-specific functions, and are thus only visible if you're accessing some portion of the forum. If you're reading this page as a guest, or you've logged out of your account, the navigation tabs should look something like this:
- Home, which takes you to the forum index.
- Help, which takes you to this guide.
- Search, which will allow you to search the forum's topics for certain phrases.
- Login, which allows you to log in if you're registered.
- Register, which allows you to register.
Once you've registered and logged in, however, the navigation tabs should look a little different:
- Home (as before).
- Help (as before).
- Search (as before).
- Profile, which allows you to make changes to your profile settings.
- Logout, which allows you to logout again if desired.
Forum administrators should also note the presence of an additional Admin button (though why an admin would be reading this page is beyond me).
the forum index
The forum index is your portal to many aspects of the forum, but its primary use is to access the boards. The areas used to access the boards are actually quite simple when boiled down to their basic components:
| Boards |
 |
Board Name
Board Description |
Number of topics and posts in this board |
Date, time, subject and author of last post |
- The board name links to the board index for that board.
- The board description describes the board's content, and may also include links to child boards and/or specify the board's moderator(s).
- A play icon indicates that new posts have been added to the board since your last visit, if you were logged in while visiting. A pause icon indicates no new posts.
the board index
Once you've picked a board from the forum index, you will see the board index for the board you're in. Like the forum index, the board index is pretty straightforward. Its function is to list the topics within the board.
 Topic you have posted in
 Normal Topic
 Hot Topic (More than 15 replies)
 Very Hot Topic (More than 25 replies) |
 Locked Topic
 Sticky Topic
 Poll |
|
- The line at the top of the board is a breadcumb trail showing your path through the site.
- The page numbers link to further pages of the board.
- The Mark as Read button enables registered members to mark all posts in this board as 'read'.
- The Notify button enables registered members to subscribe to email notification of replies to topics in this board.
- The New Topic and New Poll buttons are for starting new topics and polls, as described in the posting help.
- The Subject, Started by, Replies, Views and Last post links enable you to sort the columns by these parameters (with Last post also toggling between descending and ascending order as indicated by the little arrow).
- The topic icons in the leftmost column are explained by the key below.
- The topic subject links to the start of the topic, with extra links for subsequent pages and new buttons to take registered members straight to their first unread post of the topic.
- Where the topic has been started or last replied to by a registered member, their names link to their respective profiles.
- The Jump to menu provides a convenient quick method of navigating the forum.
the topics
Topics, often called threads, are where you find the actual posts (messages) by the members of the forum:
|
Author |
Topic: Topic Subject (Read x times) |
- The line at the top of the board is a breadcumb trail showing your path through the site.
- The page numbers link to further pages of the thread.
- The Reply button enables you to reply to the topic.
- The Notify button enables registered members to subscribe to email notification of replies to the topic.
- The Mark Unread button enables registered members to mark the topic as 'unread', which means that it will still be listed as new and can be effectively 'saved for later'. Note that this button changes to Add Poll in the bottom button set for users with permission to add polls to existing topics.
- The Send Topic button enables registered members to send a link to the topic by email.
- The Print button creates a simplified, printer-friendly rendering of the page.
- The author name links to the author's profile
- The author details in the lefthand column may be accompanied by further personal information.
- The topic subject links back to the start of the topic.
- The Quote button enables you to quote the post.
- Further Modify and Delete options are normally provided to enable registered members to edit their own posts.
- Report to moderator enables you to report abusive or wrongly-placed posts to the forum staff.
- Logged indicates that the IP of the author has been logged. The actual IP is only available to board administrators
- The Jump to menu provides a convenient quick method of navigating the forum.
Quote
Logged