Forum Terminology - 2

Forum Glossary - part 2

off-topic
Going off-topic on a thread means to post material or questions that take the the discussion into a different area to the original subject. This is the easiest sin of all and we are all guilty at one time or another. However it makes the forum impossible to use as an information resource, since material is scattered everywhere. It doesn't matter for informal discussions such as those in The Lounge, but especially for any technical topics it is a strongly negative influence. Forums (ie their Mods, in practice) interpret the 'no off-topic rule' with varying degrees of severity. In some forums anything goes, in others as soon as the slightest deviation is seen, a Mod intervenes. It depends on what the community (or the site owner) have decided appropriate.

OP
Original poster - the person who started a thread.

OTOH
On the other hand.

OT
Off topic - a post that takes the thread off the subject, which is unwanted.

pagecode
The pagecode generated by forum software is universally awful. In code validation terms, or any other measure of quality, it is quite often appallingly bad. As well as the code being poor, any number of other sins are also seen. In fact, a good way to find the worst possible web code is to examine the sourcecode of some forums.
   There is a market niche here for a team of coders who can produce a forum that outputs half-decent code, since that would help in the commercial area, and such a forum would work better than others. Since almost all forums are equally poor, none has a real advantage except Kunena for Joomla, since that starts out with big advantages in the area of code quality. In the end, in standalone forums, the forum with the best SEO plugins has the best commercial chance (as these are designed to correct the faults), and that is vBulletin. Luckily, search engines love forums, and since all are equally poor, traffic is fine in the end.

phpBB
A very popular forum solution, noted for its capable, fully-granular ACL, and its large community. It is probably the most capable free/open-source solution, but webmastering phpBB is not for beginners since admin usability is not a strong point and requires an expert. There is a parallel here with Plone, the famous CMS, which likewise is extremely capable but not for novices. There were some past security issues (said to be with a common extension, not the core code) although these should now be resolved. PhpBB is probably unique among modern server software in that there is no plugin system, the core code is hacked for all extensions.

PITA
Pain in the butt.

pinned
qv sticky

plugins
All dynamic sites (those that run off a database) use plugins to extend their functionality or features (phpBB is the only exception we are aware of). Webapps are normally limited in features out of the box, and the required capability is simply plugged-in. This is a much better system than integral functionality for three important reasons: (1) every user's requirements are different; (2) including a number of core functions / features raises the cost and complexity, when many users will not want those capabilities; and (3) main application developers are less capable than 3PDs (3rd-party devs) in coding additional functionality, as is universally proven. This applies to both large and small software originators - take MS Windows for example, no experienced computer user would dream of using the built-in defragger, for good reason. 3PDs do a far better job with add-on functionality for those who need it.

PM
A private message, using the facility that most forums have whereby messages can be sent between members. Such messages are normally of a private nature or contain material (such as links) that the forum does not permit to be displayed in public.

PMSL
P....ing myself laughing.

poll
A series of questions on a topic, often organised into a formatted table of questions that require a checkbox to be filled. Having done so the visitor is then shown the current results for the poll.

post
A message placed on the forum. To 'post' is to place a new topic starter or a reply. A post is made to an existing thread, or to start a new thread within a board, or as an official announcement. All contributions are posts.

poster
A person who posts a message. The OP, original poster, is the person who starts a thread.

postcount
This refers to the number of posts (messages) that a user has made, and is listed under their username. It may be useful as a measure of that user's experience on the forum or in the subject. As an example, a frequent poster might have a count of over 1,000; a long-term member of a mature forum 5,000 posts; a senior member of a well-established board 10,000 posts; and a top support tech on a mature and popular board, 40,000 posts.

postbit
A term for the physical area that surrounds the text of a post, or the code that results in the area being displayed. The formatting / CSS that presents the text.

POV
Point of view. 

PRATT
Point refuted a thousand times. As in, "This is a PRATT argument, please desist". The implication is that the poster is not too intelligent or has an unreasonable fixation with the issue.

preview
A halfway stage in saving a post, that allows you to check how it looks and correct mistakes. In general, it should be used freely.

privileges
A forum is run on a privilege system, and this is at the core of its operation. Indeed, the sophistication of the privilege system and the security of its operation help to define the success of the forum. Additional privileges are afforded to usergroups or users on a rising scale of rank or user facilitation or according to membership categories. Such privileges include the ability to post on the forum, to see additional content such as messages or boards, to be able to interact with the forum in more ways, and to be able to manage messages more comprehensively. Another way to describe or define the privilege system used in dynamic server software is the term ACL (more common in CMS use), which means access control levels or lists. The lowest level of visitor is the Guest, who has no privileges except the ability to view public areas of the site. Bots normally belong to the Guest group unless otherwise restricted or granted privileges. 

profile
A registered member's personal details, which may be viewable by the public, only other members (as is normal), or admins only.

profile linkspam
Spammers are paid to create bogus forum members, with homepage links in their profiles to the websites being promoted. To stop this, profiles need to be viewable only after login, as this prevents search engines accessing the profiles, so linkspam is worthless. Alternatively, online members' names should not be viewable at the foot of the index page unless logged in, although that is only marginally successful since member profiles are publicly visible via several other routes. 

profile pic
A picture that is placed in the user's profile area. It may be a photo of the user, but more often is a graphic of some kind. It might be different from the avatar, if those are allowed.

promotion
A promotion system may be used to elevate a member's privileges, or to raise their usergroup membership. For example a newly registered user may start as a Member, and have limited privileges. Afetr a certain amount of time or number of posts, they may become a Full Member, with better rights.

PWI
Posting while intoxicated - used as a disparaging comment on the sanity of a post. Probably a play on DUI, the US term for the offence of driving under the influence of alcohol.

qv
See elsewhere here.

rep
qv karma. 

ROFL
Rolling on the floor laughing.

ROFLMAO
Rolling on the floor laughing my butt off. 

RTFM
Read the manual.
If you have to ask what the f stands for, you have no sense of humour :-)

SEO
In the past SEO referred purely to search engine optimisation as a process of optimising a website solely for search engines, though now it tends to mean a process of improving all quality and marketing aspects (or alternatively, a trashy quick job of stuffing keywords and buying links). Since forums have easily the worst native pagecode of all webapps, the technical phase of this process is not easy. The majority have sourcecode of such appalling quality that there is little point in trying to compete with standard websites in any kind of quality measurement, only with other forums.
   The two best forums for SEO are Kunena and vBulletin - Kunena because it is a plugin forum for a top-class CMS, Joomla; and vB because it has the vbSEO plugin, which fixes around a hundred SEO sins in the original forum. Nevertheless Kunena is the winner by a mile as the CMS starts out far ahead in quality terms. Unfortunately Kunena is severely limited in capability compared to vB, so it is normally used for 'basic' forums, it is not appropriate for big-boards qv. 

server load
A forum loads the server harder than any other server software. This is for many reasons, all of which combine to make a busy forum the hardest workload of all for a server. Some of these reasons are: to serve a page, the server has to make dozens (sometimes hundreds) of database queries; users are writing to the DB all the time; and caching may not be of much use since a page may be constantly changing. In practice this means server resources are used up faster than for any other type of website, and a busy site needs to go to multi-server operation faster than any other type of website. This brings its own problems - qv cloud servers.

session time
The time period that a user or admin is logged in for. It is normally limited in two ways, for security: (1) There is a finite limit, often around 15 minutes; (2) A user with a valid cookie, placed on their computer by checking the Remember Me? option, has an unlimited session time. When a finite session time expires, the user is automatically logged out.

shill
A person who is paid to advertise for another. They place links or promote the product or service in an unreasonable manner, acting as a fanboy but with a commercial agenda.

sig, signature
A tagline placed automatically below each post, for those members who are allowed to have one and who have made use of the facility. A sig may contain a witty quotation, some personal detail of the user's, or a link to their website. Sigs are a privilege that may be granted to some or all.

sig links
Links to another site, in a member's signature. A frequent source of abuse, as linkspam is a natural result. To cut this down, on forums where it is possible (such as vBulletin) two usergroups are used for ordinary members - new members and full members. The first group, new members, has no sig privilege.  After say 10 posts they are auto-promoted to full member, which has a sig or sig link privilege. This way, new members cannot linkspam the forum.

SMF
The Simple Machines Forum is the benchmark in forum software, due to its popularity and capability. It handles most tasks well, although is not outstanding in any area. Possibly its best point is simply that it has no serious flaws, unlike many similar server applications. SMF is open-source, ie free. Most plugins are free although some are commercial, though inexpensive. SMF is appropriate for small and medium-size sites, but not so useful for big-boards since the functionality is not as extensive as that of vB or phpBB.

smiley
Icons of various types that represent a common emotion or action such as laughter or frustration. Very common usage in forums, even by those who would never use such a device elsewhere, and for very good reason. The smiley started with the simple graphical representation of a happy face that was so popular in the 80s, just two dots for the eyes and a curve for a smile, within a circle. This came to be represented by punctuation, and there are hundreds of simple and complex variants. Then, coders provided a punctuation-to-gfx facility, and this completed the circle :)
   Emoticons such as this have a valuable contribution to make because it is very hard to gauge mood accurately and thus the true meaning of short text posts, and therefore the writer's intention may be misinterpreted. This problem is amplified by the fact that most people are not skilled writers; and contributions by skilled writers may in turn be misinterpreted because an appreciation of irony or subtle sarcasm is not always present. The smiley fixes the problem - a simple and immediate way of showing the intention.

sofa, the
qv lounge

SMS code
The use of harsh abbreviation as is necessary in cellphone texting due to space limitations - for example C U L8R. It is not required on a forum and tends to annoy.

sockpuppet
A mouthpiece or fanboy qv controlled by a third party. Generally an unpaid fan, although they may receive other benefits (sockpuppets sometimes promote a product range).

spam, spammers
An unauthorised advertising attack on a forum, usually consisting of linkspam. Spammers are those who use the forum for unauthorised advertising. However spam is often used in a generic way to refer to anything unwanted.

spambot
A bot whose job is to find forums, penetrate them and post spam links. Spambots have to be defended against by using Captcha tests and the like.

spider
A spider is a search engine bot that trawls sites looking for content and links. It continually reports on pages and other resources that can be indexed. Spiders are welcome visitors as they are part of the process that ends with a website being placed well for searches, which is where most visitors originate.

STFU
Shut the hell up. Not normally used when addressing another member as this would contradict the 'no attacking another member' rule - but often used when discussing the pronouncements of politicians etc.

sticky, sticky thread, stickies
A sticky is a thread that is fixed at the top of a list of threads for a board. Stickies are normally announcements by admins, or similar types of posts. To sticky a post or a thread is to fix it at the top of the list so that it never recedes down the page. Some forums call this 'pinned'.

Super Moderator, SuperMod, Smod
The highest level of Moderator. A SuperMod has access to all forums and all rights, unless removed per user / per forum by an Admin.

tags
Keywords added to a post in the correct place, to allow it to be found more easily in searches on those topics.

templates
All modern dynamic server-resident website creation software runs on templates for control of layout and appearance. This means that content is separate from layout - the information is independent from the page structure. There are a hundred advantages to this but from the point of view of forum users there is one benefit: many forums allow users to select their own template, and thus view the site in different ways - with different colours, fonts and so on. This is very helpful to those with vision preferences such as a dislike for bright white backgrounds or similar. Normally a forum with multiple template capability will provide at least a light and dark template. A mobile template option is also very useful as it cuts out graphics that are not wanted.
   Templates are also called skins, themes and styles, according to the preference of the application devs or users.

thread
An original message, or starter topic, and its replies. An ordered list of a conversation in sequence.

TIA
Thanks in advance. Normally used by an OP at the end of their post, in order to offer thanks for answers to a question posed.

tinyurl.com
bit.ly
These are the most common free URL shortening or replacing services. Usually they are blocked on forums since they can be used to substitute innocent-looking links for spam sites, banned sites, or affiliate links.

title
Users normally have a title under their username, in the left column where the person responsible for the post is given. It is designed to help others identify that user and the possible value of their information. By default these titles run something like: Member, Full Member, Super Member, Senior Member and so on. However local preference may be to use a title that reflects the forum's theme area.

TLDR
Too long, didn't read.

TMI
Too much information.

topic
The main theme of an original post, or thread starter, is its topic. In general it helps if replies stay on-topic, as that results in a logical discussion. The forum itself normally has a main topic, and so all discussion is normally directed toward that theme in some way or another. qv off-topic

treatment
Forum admins may put some users in treatment for a period of time to dissuade them from disruptive activities. This is most easily done by vBulletin admins as there are a range of plugins to accomplish this, one of the most famous being Miserable User qv. The treatment results in forum use being made more difficult and less enjoyable for the affected user. This is normally time-limited, such as for 7 days, and cannot affect the user elsewhere offsite as it is simply a restriction on use of the specific server. Often handed out to minor trolls and fanboys.

troll
Someone who engages in trolling. Some persons register for that purpose and have to be banned immediately. Trolls are negative contributors whose agenda is to disrupt and destroy. The term does not refer to a misshapen creature that lives in caves in Scandinavia - see next item.

trolling
To post irrelevant, confrontational, defamatory, or inflammatory messages, in the hope of causing an argument and for the purpose of disruption. While we might all be a little guilty of the occasional slide in this direction, trolling is normally a sign of someone with personal problems or a dispute with the forum administration, and they have to be banned. Sometimes the material posted by a troll is called flamebait, as it is designed to start an argument.
  Note that the term refers to trolling in fishing - towing a line with a baited hook behind a boat and hooking anything unwise enough to bite on the bait.

user CP
The member's individual control panel, in which they can adjust their site preferences. This varies from comprehensive and capable, as in vBulletin, to basic in the simpler forums.

usergroup
A group of persons who have a prearranged set of permissions.

username, userID
The username is the forum name or nickname of a member. These range from real names, through hard to decipher codenames, to the far out.

URL
A technical name for a website or web page address - the location of a resource on the web.

vBulletin
This forum software is generally recognised as the most capable, having a large range of plugins and some excellent SEO solutions. It is a commercial program although inexpensive.

vulnerabilities
qv exploits

water cooler
qv the lounge

WB
Where have you been?

word filter, word censor
An auto-deletion of certain words in a post that should not have been used. This is a useful feature as it prevents a slip of the tongue (or keyboard, that is) going public; however it can also cut in to remove the word when it is a totally-unrelated constituent of another word (called 'match within' in coding), and results in gibberish.

YMMV
Your mileage may vary, in other words "...but you might get a different result".

zombie threads
Old threads that are many pages back in a board's list of threads, that a member posts in and brings back to life. Zombie threads are not generally liked because they may contain out of date material or stop a fresh approach being taken. Some forum admins lock threads that have not been posted in for a long period, to stop this; or lock threads of over a given number of pages, eg 100 pages; or archive old threads so they cannot be posted in. 

3PDs
3rd-party developers, who build extensions (plugins) for example.



Part 2 of our comprehensive forum glossary and listing of forum terminology, forum terms, forum abbreviations, forum acronyms and forum slang.