The HTML toolbox doesn't work! How can I post a link?

October 2, 2004 4:33 PM

I can't post links within a thread on any of the Meta sites. I've seen how the text tools box appears under the comments box when using a PC at work. I'm using Explorer on a Mac running OS 8.6. Any ideas on how I can rectify this?
posted by floanna to Bugs at 4:33 PM (16 comments total)

That's just a nicety, it doesn't show up in a lot of browsers; You don't need it however, you can just use HTML in comments and posts. For instance, to get

A link to metafilter.com

type

<A HREF="http://www.metafilter.com">A link to metafilter.com</A>
posted by fvw at 5:07 PM on October 2, 2004

you need a modern browser to take advantage of the scripting required to do the link, bold, and italics tags. Like firefox on OS8.6.
posted by mathowie (staff) at 6:26 PM on October 2, 2004

If you can't find Firefox for OS8.6 (I couldn't, but only looked for 5-10 minutes), you might try an older build of Mozilla (1.01) for OS8.6.

You won't find all of the features that the current Mozilla/Firefox versions offer, but I'm sure you'd find it more useful than whatever version of IE you're currently using.
posted by mkdg at 6:59 PM on October 2, 2004

Thanks, just gonna test the HTML just in case it works and I'll have a look at the Mozilla/Firefox

A link to metafilter.com

Oooh yay it works when I do the preview :D Cheers fvw.
posted by floanna at 7:52 AM on October 3, 2004

*shakes head sadly*
posted by quonsar at 9:35 AM on October 3, 2004

actually, I couldn't ever get those buttons working in firefox on my pc. Works fine in IE, never in firefox. sigh
posted by bob sarabia at 10:52 AM on October 3, 2004

i don't even see any buttons in frefox. do i have some kind of l33t option enabled somewhere?

me 'n quonsar can program teh html.
posted by andrew cooke at 12:52 PM on October 3, 2004

ooooh, no - there they are!

so, how do you use them?
posted by andrew cooke at 12:52 PM on October 3, 2004

they're handy, and enhance the useability of the site. just for clarity's sake, that was a "on the internet but it doesn't occur to use the internet to find out how to do internet stuff" headshake, not a "i am teh 1337 kewl cuz i can make teh HTMLz0rz" headshake.
posted by quonsar at 1:16 PM on October 3, 2004

Sorry quonsar but I'm not a techie, don't know ANY HTML and I thought it might be a mac/browser/Meta access thing (considering I'm running 8.6 and getting left behind). I would update to 10.whatever but my CD writer is kaput (need to backup) and need more memory and cash to remedy that situation. I would use another browser otherwise.

The HTML tag was very handy, thanks. As I don't have the time to learn the coding, if you can let me know the HTML for the italics and bold I would be very grateful so that I can participate in this thing (I actually quite like) called a web community.

Thank you.
posted by floanna at 3:13 PM on October 3, 2004

italics is <em>...</em> (em for emphasis) and the bold thing from those buttons is actually <strong>...</strong> (i think you could probably participate quite well without them, though).
posted by andrew cooke at 3:24 PM on October 3, 2004

Here's a little html cheat sheet you might find useful.
posted by monju_bosatsu at 3:41 PM on October 3, 2004

<pedant>
Actually, <em> and <strong> are as you mentioned for emphasis and strong; This doesn't necessarily translate to italics and bold though, that's up to the browser or screen reader or whatever viewing aparatus the user is using. To actually force italics or bold, use <i> and <b>. (In most cases you actually should use the semantic markup instead of the presentational)
</pedant>
posted by fvw at 9:11 PM on October 3, 2004

Thanks again, as all suggestions have been really helpful. Thanks andrew for the participation comment too and it adds to my welcome into the fold. If I'd have known I could use the HTML within the comments box without the quick links I'd have done so before. It's been very annoying not being able to add relevant links in the post's comments, especially as I had been lurking for years without membership!
posted by floanna at 1:28 PM on October 4, 2004

floanna, if you want, you can keep a cheat sheet on your desktop (as a stickie or notepad thing, or even a text document) with all of them listed--i used to do that, and it's simple to copy and paste the ones you need.
posted by amberglow at 2:22 PM on October 4, 2004

amberglow, i'm already on the case :-)
posted by floanna at 2:48 PM on October 4, 2004