Text you post to the TIC site can be formatted using forum code. Forum code interprets special "tags" in square brackets as directives to format text. This forum code is designed to work similarly to many other web forums, so if you are familiar with others then there shouldn't be much to learn.

Probably the most important text to format is the link. Web addresses beginning with "http://" will automatically be detected as links and formatted as such:

you type: http://www.google.com/
your post looks like: http://www.google.com/

If you want to link some text to an address, use the [link] tag:

you type: [link=http://www.google.com/]this is a link to Google[/link]
your post looks like: this is a link to Google

Note: Many other forums use the tag name [url] rather than [link]. This site supports either one; they work exactly the same. So, if you're used to [url], go ahead and use [url]. (In my opinion, though, [link] is a more accurate and intuitive name for the tag.)

If you want to write an URL and have it be linked, but you are finding that text placed before or after the URL is being included in the link when you don't want it to be, you can explicitly delimit your link by placing it in square brackets, like so:

you type: [http://www.google.com/]
your post looks like: http://www.google.com/

Don't forget the "http://"!

Now, here are the rest of the tags:

you type: [b]this is bold[/b]
your post looks like: this is bold

you type: [i]this is italic[/i]
your post looks like: this is italic

you type: [u]this is underlined[/u]
your post looks like: this is underlined

you type: [s]this is struck out[/s]
your post looks like: this is struck out

you type: [h1]this is a heading[/h1]
your post looks like:

([h2] and [h3] also work for progressively smaller headings.)

you type: [color=red]this is red[/color]
your post looks like: this is red
Most common colors are supported. Alternatively, you can use #xxxxxx notation (like in HTML) to specify any 24-bit color. Remember that you can always use the "preview" button to see if the color you chose works.

you type: [size=1]this is really small[/size]
your post looks like: this is really small

you type: [sub]this is subscript[/sub]
your post looks like: this is subscript

you type: [super]this is superscript[/super]
your post looks like: this is superscript

you type: one two three four five [hr] six seven eight nine ten
your post looks like:
one two three four five

---

six seven eight nine ten

you type: earthy lemonpeel[br]lingering, wailing princess[br]brightens wetly, clean
your post looks like:
earthy lemonpeel
lingering, wailing princess
brightens wetly, clean

you type: [list][-]item 1[-]item 2[-]item 3[/list]
your post looks like:

• item 1

• item 2

• item 3

You can make numbered lists by starting the list with [list=1], lettered lists with [list=a] or [list=A], and roman numeraled lists with [list=i] or [list=I].

you type: [image=URL]
your post looks like: (the image at the given URL)

Be sure you have permission from the image's host to post it. If you do not, the host may get angry and may replace the image with something bad. In general, you should only post images hosted in web space that belongs to you.

[table] creates a table. You must specify the number of columns in the table as a parameter. Then, use [-] to begin each cell, like you would with [list]. Example:

[table=3]
[-]Cell 1
[-]Cell 2
[-]Cell 3
[-]Cell 4
[-]Cell 5
[-]Cell 6
[-]Cell 7
[-]Cell 8
[-]Cell 9
[/table]

Looks like:

Cell 1	Cell 2	Cell 3
Cell 4	Cell 5	Cell 6
Cell 7	Cell 8	Cell 9

you type: [code]this is code[/code]
your post looks like:

this is code

you type: [center]this is centered[/center]
your post looks like:

you type: [spoiler=Some Movie]this is a spoiler.[/spoiler]
your post looks like:

you type: [quote=Some Person]this is a quote[/quote]
your post looks like:

you type: [indent]this paragraph is indented blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah[/indent]
your post looks like:

Finally, it is sometimes useful to be able to type stuff in brackets and make sure it isn't interpreted as a tag. If whatever you type does not make sense as a tag anyway, then you have nothing to worry about -- it will look like you expect it to. But if you want to type something that normally would be a tag, you must do one of the following:

• Use the [lbracket] tag. If you type [lbracket], it will be replaced with a left square bracket. However, this square bracket will not be used in further tags. So, if you type "[lbracket]b]", your post will appear as "[b]" without causing anything to be written in bold.

• Use [] -- an empty tag -- to break the parsing of a tag. [] will be removed from the text of your post anywhere it appears, but if it appears inside the name of a tag, it will stop that tag from being parsed. For example, if you type "[quo[]te]", your post will come out as "[quote]", without causing anything to be quoted. You can also prevent URLs from being automatically linked by placing a [] between the colon and the two slashes, such as "http:[]//virtualatdp.berkeley.edu". To actually make "[]" appear in your post, you need to type "[[]]". To make "[[]]" appear, you need to type "[[[]]]", and so on.

This page, for example, uses the above two methods in order to show you how tags are written without causing them to be parsed.