Commas, anyone?

Why does the signature field have a problem with commas and apostrophes? Or is it just me?

a reply to: quercusrex
I have no clue. I could swear I had one before I got the thing I have now.

ETA: Nope. I was mistaken. I had a hyphen.

Let's see...

Nope, no commas or apostrophes in mine, either.

Yeah. My sig would be better with a comma or two. I tried slipping various tags into it. No dice. Had to rewrite it.

originally posted by: quercusrex
Why does the signature field have a problem with commas and apostrophes? Or is it just me?

Not necessary as is supposed to be a statement (in fact) regarding your idealog (made up word); excess punctuation becomes confusing fluffery (another made up word) regarding the point of your epitaph.

a reply to: quercusrex

Dont know about the commas thing but I tell you what is irritating, the stupid videos from Ora or whatever it is. I dont usually sign in unless I have something to add to the conversation but now I have to because ATS has decided in their great wisdom to add these annoying videos.

a reply to: Dwoodward85

What are these Ora videos? Ads? I've never seen them.

a reply to: quercusrex

They're just too darn expensive.

a reply to: quercusrex

It’s not just you. And while we’re complaining, can we PLEASE get read of the ungrammatical, redundant ‘because’ at the end of 'Edit on [date] because: (must be filled in)’ so that we can actually explain in English why we edited our posts instead of just typing gobbledygook?

Thanks in advance, Board Staff.

I have a remedy for this:

Step 1: Bookmark the following link — The HTML Document Character Set
Step 2: Open Word/Open Office Text Document and type out your desired quote
Step 3: Select Edit --> Find and Replace
Step 4: Replace all special characters (second column from left) with their relevant Decimal code (left most column)
Step 5: Copy and paste into the signature box of your account settings and submit.

It's a pain at first, but after some practice you will get the hang of it. Just keep submitting your signature and checking to see if it comes out right.

For example, to make your signature display like this:

"I think, therefore I am."

Change it to this:

"I think, therefore I am."

The "," replaced the exact spot of the ","

a reply to: quercusrex
This was first noticed when the site had a re-formatting near the end of 2010.
Signatures which were already in place before then were unaffected. That's why I can have two commas in my own signature, which I would undoubtedly lose if I tried to change it.

a reply to: Dark Ghost

Much gooder! Thanks for the info.

ALL: copy-n-paste into signature, hit 'submit', then it is parsed with expected (or not) results displayed.

One could go all kinds of html evil doing this...

a reply to: AdmireTheDistance

I cannot be the only one. They appear when I'm not logged in and usually after the first three or four comments. I say Ora because I think that's the company who produces Jesse Venturas videos but I may be wrong. But they are annoying because they auto play as well.

a reply to: Dark Ghost

You have no idea how happy you've just made me! That has been bugging me for two and a half years.
Thanks for adding that post.

a reply to: DISRAELI

Why have you got two commas? Isn't the first one unnecessary?
( I'm not trying to point you out as some kind of comma-glutton here - have as many as you like - it just seems superfluous).

originally posted by: Dark Ghost
I have a remedy for this:

Step 1: Bookmark the following link — The HTML Document Character Set
Step 2: Open Word/Open Office Text Document and type out your desired quote
Step 3: Select Edit --> Find and Replace
Step 4: Replace all special characters (second column from left) with their relevant Decimal code (left most column)
Step 5: Copy and paste into the signature box of your account settings and submit.

It's a pain at first, but after some practice you will get the hang of it. Just keep submitting your signature and checking to see if it comes out right.

For example, to make your signature display like this:

"I think, therefore I am."

Change it to this:

"I think, therefore I am."

The "," replaced the exact spot of the ","

OMG, there IS something Phage didn't know!!!

Thanks for the info, you've made many people happy with your post.

a reply to: StoutBroux

you've made many people happy with your post.

I appreciate the cleverness, but count me unhappy.

Why should I have to type all that machine language? This is a big flaw in the (famously buggy) ATS code.

a reply to: Dark Ghost

Did I just read War and Peace?

originally posted by: beansidhe
You have no idea how happy you've just made me! That has been bugging me for two and a half years.

Thanks for adding that post.

Glad I was able to make you happy

To be honest, though, I am just passing on knowledge that was passed onto me by another member a few years back. I don't recall the member or thread, but it was filled with people unhappy about the comma glitch, so when I saw this thread it rang a bell.

originally posted by: zazzafrazz
a reply to: Dark Ghost

Did I just read War and Peace?

LOL. As I said, it is painful at first, but when you get used to it, you will be quick.

I agree with others that you ought not need to jump through so many hoops just to be able to display commas, but the system currently is what it is.

a reply to: beansidhe
There are two commas in that quotation because I was punctiliously copying out the RSV (Isaiah ch1 v18).
Any criticism of the punctuation should be addressed to the translators.

P.S. Actually, I've only just noticed that the "and" isn't in their text. I seem to have added it. Unless it was there in a previous timeline.