including quotes

[Scritzy]

When there is a thread with multiple quotes in multiple boxes, am I the only one who scratches her head trying to figure out who said what?

Yes, we asked that posters trim the quotes as best they can while keeping the context intact, although I'm not sure if it was deemed not allowed.

The trick is to keep the person's name in the quote. If, for instance, you're quoting me, keep [quote author = Scritzy link = topic = 12345767.msg1234567 date = 1234567] (I have put spaces in between the = marks so it doesn't come out as a real quote. Then delete the part of the quote you don't want, down to the [/ quote] (again, without the space).

Do the same thing for subsequent quotes by different authors.

It takes a little time, but it does avoid confusion.

[aventurine]

When there is a thread with multiple quotes in multiple boxes, am I the only one who scratches her head trying to figure out who said what?

The trick is to keep the person's name in the quote. If, for instance, you're quoting me, keep [quote author = Scritzy link = topic = 12345767.msg1234567 date = 1234567] (I have put spaces in between the = marks so it doesn't come out as a real quote. Then delete the part of the quote you don't want, down to the [/ quote] (again, without the space).

Do the same thing for subsequent quotes by different authors.

It takes a little time, but it does avoid confusion.

Thanks, Scritzy!  I'm trying this, because, no, Cass, you're not the only one.


btw:  It didn't work like I thought it would.  Do you put spaces before and after every equal sign in the tag?

[Ceallach]

When there is a thread with multiple quotes in multiple boxes, am I the only one who scratches her head trying to figure out who said what?

The trick is to keep the person's name in the quote. If, for instance, you're quoting me, keep [quote author = Scritzy link = topic = 12345767.msg1234567 date = 1234567] (I have put spaces in between the = marks so it doesn't come out as a real quote. Then delete the part of the quote you don't want, down to the [/ quote] (again, without the space).

Do the same thing for subsequent quotes by different authors.

It takes a little time, but it does avoid confusion.

Thanks, Scritzy!  I'm trying this, because, no, Cass, you're not the only one.


btw:  It didn't work like I thought it would.  Do you put spaces before and after every equal sign in the tag?

You don't need to put the spaces in at all, just ensure that when deleting data from your quota you retain all of the text between the [ and the ].   And keep the brackets themselves in place too       So if you want a particular person's name to still appear so that it's clear who said it, keep the whole section that shows their name, from [ to ].   

Scritzy put spaces in her example above because otherwise it would appear as an actual quote and you wouldn't be able to see what she was doing.  But you need to keep everything between those brackets... don't add any spaces to it. I hope that helps!

[aventurine]

You don't need to put the spaces in at all, just ensure that when deleting data from your quota you retain all of the text between the [ and the ].   And keep the brackets themselves in place too       So if you want a particular person's name to still appear so that it's clear who said it, keep the whole section that shows their name, from [ to ].    

Scritzy put spaces in her example above because otherwise it would appear as an actual quote and you wouldn't be able to see what she was doing.  But you need to keep everything between those brackets... don't add any spaces to it. I hope that helps!  

So in other words, keep doing it like I've been doing it, so it will look like my example above.  Okay.  

I was thinking (hoping) there was a way to make the quotees' names appear in between their quotes in the tree, so that's what I was hoping would happen.  As it is now, when there's a long quote tree (which I hate, too, BTW) there's a stack of names above a stack of quotes, and I get crosseyed trying to figure out who said what.

Thanks for the clarification!  Now I understand what Scritzy was doing.  

[Ceallach]

You don't need to put the spaces in at all, just ensure that when deleting data from your quota you retain all of the text between the [ and the ].   And keep the brackets themselves in place too       So if you want a particular person's name to still appear so that it's clear who said it, keep the whole section that shows their name, from [ to ].    

Scritzy put spaces in her example above because otherwise it would appear as an actual quote and you wouldn't be able to see what she was doing.  But you need to keep everything between those brackets... don't add any spaces to it. I hope that helps!  

So in other words, keep doing it like I've been doing it, so it will look like my example above.  Okay.  

I was thinking (hoping) there was a way to make the quotees' names appear in between their quotes in the tree, so that's what I was hoping would happen.  As it is now, when there's a long quote tree (which I hate, too, BTW) there's a stack of names above a stack of quotes, and I get crosseyed trying to figure out who said what.

Thanks for the clarification!  Now I understand what Scritzy was doing.  

Technically you can do that, but you'd need to move the coding around.  I do see posters do that from time to time.   Basically anything that's between that start string of [ to ] as shown by Scritzy, and the end quote piece (which looks like "[ / quote]" ) will appear as by that person, if that makes sense.

Another way people do this is by quoting separately.  e.g., quote a post and write some of your response, and then scoll down and click "insert quote" on the next one you want to put in.  That way you can put your own comments in between.    (This is usually if you want to quote multiple people rather than a string of conversation).  I hope that helps!

[T'Mar of Vulcan]

Another way people do this is by quoting separately.  e.g., quote a post and write some of your response, and then scoll down and click "insert quote" on the next one you want to put in.  That way you can put your own comments in between.    (This is usually if you want to quote multiple people rather than a string of conversation).  I hope that helps!

If you don't want to go through the whole process, you can just type a square bracket [, then the word "quote", put a space, type "author=", type the person's name and type another square bracket ] .  Then copy and paste the text, and type a square bracket, a forward slash, the word "quote" and another square bracket.

Then it comes out looking like this:

Another way people do this is by quoting separately.

I do that a lot.

[aventurine]

I don't know if it's an option but some forums have it set so you can't quote more than 3 embedded quotes, so the tree:

Totally awesome statement

I agree

Why thank you Person 2

You're welcome awesome Person 1

Equally entertaining add on to the conversation

In order to be able to quote the tree after Person 1's thank you, you would have to cut one of the earlier comments or the system won't let you post. If that's an option for the forum or even have it as a recommendation that no more than 3 embedded quotes, it might cut down the trees?

No idea, but that was mighty entertaining   


Thanks for all the quoting info!

[Mikayla]

No idea, but that was mighty entertaining   

I agree.  I literally burst out laughing.

Here's a somewhat related question I have.  Is there an etiquette rule or pref when you're only quoting one post, but you pluck out a couple sentences?   I generally use bold on shorter responses, but just now I inserted a *snip* instead, since I was basically quoting something from the beginning and from the end. 

Is this a situation where I should set up multiple quote boxes?   What was left out wasn't significant, but maybe that's not my call. But the multiple boxes would do the same thing (ie, leave out chunks of text).

[TootsNYC]

I think from an etiquette point of view, it can be important to indicate that you've taken something out of its context (which of course, you should never do w/ the *deliberate* attempt to distort its meaning).

and the *how* of how you do that is something that (I believe) isn't particularly crucial.

Some people put "<snip>"; others put ellipses; others simply quote a single graph out of a larger block in the assumption that people will realize that the surrounding graphs were removed; others quote the whole graph but bold the one line they want to focus on (I like this bcs it keeps the context, which is often important).

Basically--be clear, and don't misrepresent someone's views by what you left out (and don't leave stuff out sneakily).

I don't know if other people are like me, but I can interpret all those methods (and some others not mentioned here) quite readily.

[aventurine]

No idea, but that was mighty entertaining   

I agree.  I literally burst out laughing.

Here's a somewhat related question I have.  Is there an etiquette rule or pref when you're only quoting one post, but you pluck out a couple sentences?   I generally use bold on shorter responses, but just now I inserted a *snip* instead, since I was basically quoting something from the beginning and from the end. 

Is this a situation where I should set up multiple quote boxes?   What was left out wasn't significant, but maybe that's not my call. But the multiple boxes would do the same thing (ie, leave out chunks of text).

I agree with Toots, but I think how you quoted my post above is perfectly fine, and is what I find myself doing a lot.  You left out the bits I'd quoted as well as my last line, which had nothing to do with what you wanted to quote.  It wasn't missed.

I've done the bolding if the post is really long and there are many good points that refer to the particular bit I'm referencing.  I've done the <snip> as well, but not as often. 

[Paper Roses]

What I can't understand is why some people seem to think they need to include the entire OP in a quote when they post a response.  It just takes up space needlessly, as if you're responding in the thread, it's obvious what you're responding to.

[C0mputerGeek]

What I can't understand is why some people seem to think they need to include the entire OP in a quote when they post a response.  It just takes up space needlessly, as if you're responding in the thread, it's obvious what you're responding to.

That's something my mother would do, and she does it because she's not really all that technically proficient. I've seen other posters here mention that they don't know how to trim the text within the quotes.

[sparksals]

Thank you for this thread!  For the last two weeks, I have accessed ehell from my blackberry as I was in Europe.  BB's don't show the quote trees, just all the posts.  I was going to post a thread after I got back to a real computer about the difficulty reading the trees on a mobile device. 

It took me ages to read threads bc of it. So those if us using mobile devices appreciate the trimming too. 

[sparksals]

Oh and another thing - formatting doesn't display either - bolding, dim colours for spoiler alerts etc.

[Paper Roses]

What I can't understand is why some people seem to think they need to include the entire OP in a quote when they post a response.  It just takes up space needlessly, as if you're responding in the thread, it's obvious what you're responding to.

That's something my mother would do, and she does it because she's not really all that technically proficient. I've seen other posters here mention that they don't know how to trim the text within the quotes.

I think in some cases people are confusing the "Quote" button with the "Reply" button.