h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Glad you made it here.

Did you not manage to transfer your old account? For help with that email gurusATh2g2DOTcom (replace with other characters as necessary) (well, I hope that's the correct email).

Bel

Still not convinced that the 'settings' function will allow
me to input the punctuation marks that are essential to my
old identity. I have been playing with the nickname settings
on this one and nothing happens. I have added several different
suffixes to this new identity of 'hairy horse' but none of them
ever appeared. It just occurred to me that it may be necessary
clear that field entirely and delete all the current nickname
before re-entering it again with the added suffixes. Will give
that a try and report back.

HtH

The suffix is disabled cause we don't need it any more. It was a work around for us on h2g2 when the beeb decided a character limit for all nicknames across the BBC boards. That means that you can just enter your full name in the 'screen name' box.

I don't think the Beeb allowed special characters for the sign-in name, though, so you should be fine with whatever you had there before.

Hmm...
Well I tried deleting the nickname field and re-entering it
with an added tagline but nothing has changed after 20 minutes.

Then I saw your latest reply.

And now I am completely baffled.
Part of it may be the use of the terms suffix and taglines.

In the old days we could have over a hundred characters in
our nicknames, including punctuation marks and we called
these taglines. Then came Barlesque with a 30 character limit
and no punctuation but after an outcry the 'suffix' function
was added. But it created problems in the other skins, either
not being visible or being doubled up, etc.

Since our move to noohootoo I see many people have been
amending and adding taglines to their nicknames (Halloween
anagrams, etc.) and it seems to be working for them. I
notice that you have a square bracket around a copyright
symbol and ACE and CE designations that were not part of
your old ID. No doubt these were put in before the function
was disabled.

Presumably a fix or a return to the old 100plus characters is
possible at some point. I will continue to wait and hope.

Thanks Bel.

HtH

OK I tried the settings page again and now realise
that the field is now called `screen name`. I have
no need or intention to change the `Login name` on
this or my old account, I just want to be able to change
the `screen name` here and test for some of the
punctuation I need in my old ID.

Then I noticed this tiny tiny error message:

>> Warning: odbc_exec(): SQL error: [unixODBC][FreeTDS][SQL Server]Unclosed quotation mark after the character string ' WHERE [UserID]=14993288 '., SQL state 37000 in SQLExecDirect in /var/www/noresearcherleftbehind/application/models/Users.php on line 349 <<

Not sure what that means might it might mean something to you
or the gurus.



HtH

I just found this example as Geggs screen name:

>> Geggs - So, are you saying that our screen names can be incredibly long again? With lots of silly characters and stuff? !"£$%^&*() |\@~{}¬ #; Yay!!! <<

Hopefully I too will be able to make changes to my screen name.


HtH

My tagline was changed yesterday after Pastey had disabled the suffixes and now we can have our proper names again, with no character restriction. But PLEASE do NOT go into the preferences. They are broken and will be disabled soon. Go into your SETTINGS at the top of the screen (if you are in brunel).

However, if I were you I'd really try to transfer and reactivate my old account. But then maybe you're happier with the new one?

It might have been helpful in referring to Geggs if I had
mentioned that the U number is 201647


HtH

I'm not sure in how far that is relevant to your old account?

Yes it took me a while to figure out that Preferences
is totally broken. In discussion with kea (guru) who
helped me create this new hairy the horse account I
finally discovered the `Settings` button and it is that
page that is now not allowing me to change my screen
name on this account. (See error message above)

I do want to go back to my old ID and this account is soley
for exploring the possibilities of the screen name functions.

As noted above I can see that Geggs is using the full spectrum
of punctuation including the ones I need to appear in my old ID
so I am hopeful. But so far I am unable to get this account to
accept any screen name changes and am still fearful of screwing
up my old one when I Transfer it.

Sorry to be taking up so much of your time with unclear and
fuzzy questions but I am very grateful that the noohootoo is
being so helpful.

I think the Preferences versus Settings question should be made
more clear in an ASK h2g2 or Announcements thread somewhere.
It was not something I encountered in any of the Help or ASK or
Announcement threads I read at Noesis and have not seen it mentioned
anywhere here except in your posting above. I found Settings quite
by accident on my own when trying to get back to Alabaster.

But it continues to ignore any changes I try to make since my
first registration. (See error message above)



HtH

My old account screen name had punctuation that was
not allowed after Barlesque came online. I was warned
by others who lost some of their ID screen name features
that if I tried to add any taglines I would lose what
I had. So I did not try to change anything for several
months and my old ID remained up to the end of BBC
by default and it still appears on my old postings.

But I am afraid that when I Transfer it will ask me to
input new data in all the Settings fields - it will of course
come up in default Brunel and I will be required to reset
to my preferred Alabaster settings. I wanted to know if that
would cause my screen name to lose its punctuation.

Now that this new account is not allowing me ANY changes
to Settings I have no guarantee that my old ID will be any
more compliant. And yet it seems people such as Geggs are
able to make changes to theirs at will.

I must be doing something wrong but the error message tells
me nothing I can understand - something about an unclosed
quotation mark and there are no quotes or inverted commas
in my input.


HtH

Oh, OK. I see your problem now. I tell you waht: I'll go and transfer my other account now and see how it works (I've forgotten, so many other things happened between transferring this account and now).

I'm not sure you *have* to fill in your screen name.

I think it's sufficient if you fill in the user number, cvorrect login name, correct password and email address. Once transferred, your account should come up as it looked three weeks ago.

If I do NOT try to change the Screen name in Settings but DO change
the Alabaster Settings from Frames to Standard or from Basic to
Advanced it seems to accept those Updates and automatically goes back
to my homepage with the changes made. I have done this back and forth
several times.

But no matter what I put into the screen name field it gives me an
error message and leaves me with no option to navigate away from the
Settings page except to close the page.

I think I'll try Brunel and see if that makes any difference.

HtH

Yes I can change to Brunel, with various Frames/Standard or
Basic/Adavanced settings and it accepts these changes and goes
back to my homepage automatically every time.

But nothing I put in the screen name field is accepted and I get
the error message with no escape but to close the window or
leave the screen name field as it was originally set as hairy
the horse.

I have emailed kea, the guru who got me here and asked her to
review this conversation and see if she can see what's going on.


~jwf~

I have to admit I'm baffled. If I go into my settings the forum style is Standard and the user mode is Advanced. I didn't type anything in right now, though, because I'm happy with my tagline as it is.

Hey, are you afraid to lose your ~wings~?
I could try them in my tagline.

Ahem.

Yes my wings.


Wings are there among the many marks used by Geggs
so it seems they would be allowable if I had to input
all new data in my Transfer login process.

The real trouble here still is that ANY change to
the screen name in this account is being rejected
and it gives me the error message about unclosed quotes.
All the other data fields can be changed and be accepted.

I want to figure out what I am doing wrong here before
trying to fiddle with my old account since my ~wings~
are a big part of who I really am.

~ ~
~HtH~

You are trying that whilst signed in, I suppose? I really haven't a clue why it doesn't work for you. But then I'm in brunel.

Yes, signed in.
The Settings button only appears when signed in.
And I keep other windows open to other pages where HtH
has posted so I can get back here when it all freezes over.

Anyway, I shouldna taken advantage of your kind ACE-ness
to pursue this obviously technical question better suited
to a guru and not what you signed on for as an ACE.

Hey, I just noticed that kea is up now on the other side
of the planet and will no doubt be along shortly to show me
the error of my ways.

Thanks Bel.


~ ~
HtH

Yes, it's the job of a guru to find out, but then it's our job as ACES to try and help in every possible way. I really hope you'll get this sorted soon.