Your Control Panel

Your Control Panel is your "home page" for the forums. You can access your Control Panel at any time (while you're logged in) by clicking on "Control Panel" in the forum menu at the top of any forum page. Depending on what you've chosen in your Display Preferences, your Control Panel may be displayed automatically when you login.

Your Profile and Preferences
Message Center
Friends Online
Post Reminders
Favorite Threads
Favorite Forums

The first section in your Control Panel relates to your profile and preferences.

Your profile picture is displayed on the left. If you do not have a profile pic, you'll see picture indicating that (the shape of a head with a question mark on it). To put a picture in your profile, you'll need to edit your Basic Profile. (More details here.) If you see a broken image there (a box with an X in it or the like), then something is wrong with your profile pic. Please investigate, or ask for help in the Profile Request forum if you can't figure out what's wrong.

To the right of your profile pic, you'll see some basic information (your title and the number of posts you've made), and some useful links:

• View Your Profile — Takes you to your public profile, so you can view it just as others view it. (Details here.)
• Show All Your Posts — Does a search for all the posts you've made which are still in the database.
• Edit Basic Profile — This is where you fill in your public profile, change your password or email address, and change a few basic settings. (Details here.)
• Edit Display Preferences — This is where you choose how you want things to look and function - fonts, time zone offset, thread mode, posts per page, etc. (Details here.)
• Edit Email Preferences — Choose whether you want to receive reply notifications and/or private message notifications via email. (Details here.)
• View / Edit Address Book — Users in your address book show up in your "Friends Online" (see below), and you can send them PMs more easily. (Details here.)
• Edit Bozo List — Users on this list cannot send you private messages or see you in "Who's Online." How this works:
  • 1. If a user on your Bozo List tries to send you a PM, they will be greeted with the same error they would get if you weren't accepting PMs at all ("Sorry, but this user is not accepting private messages").
  • 2. You will always be invisible to them on the "Who's Online" screen, regardless of your "visibility" setting in your Basic Profile Settings. (Also, if they add you to their Address Book, you will not show up at all in the "Friends Online" list in their Control Panel.)
  • Note: You cannot put Moderators or Administrators on your Bozo List, as this would prevent them from effectively doing their jobs.

This section, on the left, is where you access your Private Messages. You'll find three links here:

• Send a Private Message — Click this link if you'd like to send a private message to another user. (More info)
• Inbox - Messages Received — This takes you to your list of received messages. (More info)
• Outbox - Messages Sent — This takes you to your list of sent messages. (More info)

If any users in your Address Book are currently on the forums, they will be shown in this section, on the right. (Unless they've chosen to be "invisible" in their Basic Profile Settings.)

You can add posts to your Post Reminder list to remind yourself to go back and reply to them later. The first five (the five which you added most recently) will be displayed in this section of your Control Panel (on the left). If you have more than five on your list, you'll see a "...view all" link — click this link to view a full list of all your Post Reminders.

Post Reminders are removed from your list when you reply to the post in question. If you'd like to delete one (or more) manually, just click the box to the right of the post you want to delete, and click the "Delete Checked" button.

How do I add a post to my Post Reminders list? When you're viewing a post, you'll see a little reminder icon () on the upper right (below the "Reply" button). Just click that icon.

You can add threads to your Favorite Threads list if you'd like to easily view them later. The first five (the five which have most recently had a new post within them) will be displayed in this section of your Control Panel (on the right). If you have more than five on your list, you'll see a "...view all" link — click this link to view a full list of all your Favorite Threads.

Favorite Threads are not removed from your list until you manually delete them. To do so, just click the box to the right of the post you want to delete, and click the "Delete Checked" button.

How do I add a post to my Favorite Threads list? When you're viewing a thread, you'll see an icon and a link at the top and bottom right of the page ( Favorite Thread). Just click that link.

This is the last section in your Control Panel. You can add forums to your Favorite Forums list for easy access from your Control Panel. These will be organized by category, and displayed to you with some basic information (# of threads, # of posts, time of last post).

Favorite Forums are not removed from your list until you manually delete them. To do so, just click the little eraser icon () to the right of the forum you want to delete.

How do I add a forum to my Favorite Forums list? When you're viewing a forum post list, you'll see an icon and a link at the upper right and at the lower right of the page ( Favorite Forum). Just click that link.