Treasure Island Memory Book
Frequently Asked Questions and Answers

Here is a brief explanation of some of the questions you may have about using the Treasure Island Memory Book.

Last updated January 14, 2005 


Information for New Users

Welcome to the Treasure Island Memory Book

The Treasure Island Museum Association has provided this place for you and others to record your precious recollections of Treasure Island - the Golden Gate International Exposition, your visit during military service, or anything else you remember about this magical island.

You may subscribe to this Memory Book by email. This lets you receive a notice by email every time someone posts a message. The notice contains the poster's name and the message subject, and a link you can click on to go look at the message.

For more information on using this Memory Book, see the contents of this FAQ. 



How do I see the messages?

Go back to the main page, and look down the page for all the message headers. Then click on the header you want to see.



How do I post a message?

Go back to the main page. Fill in the Name, E-Mail, and Subject boxes. Type the text of your message in the Message box. You can ignore the other three boxes. Then click the Post Message button. You will see your post as it will appear, and can approve or revise it. 


How can I post a message from my word processor?

If you are using Windows, you can bring the text up in your word processor, highlight it, and do the Copy command (or hit ctrl-C). Then go to the message board, click on Post Message, click in the Message window to put the cursor there, and do the Paste command (or hit ctrl-V). Now fill out the rest of the fields and post the message.

How do I reply to a message?

At the bottom of the page displaying the message, there is a form just like the one for submitting an original post. Enter the information just as for posting an original message, and then click on the Submit Follow Up button. The message text box is initialized with the text of the message you are replying to. You can type your reply above or below it, or delete it if you wish.



How do I send email to the author of a message?

At the top of the page displaying the message, look at the author's name. If it is underlined, click on it to bring up an email window addressed to the author. (If the author's name is not underlined, they did not provide an email address.)

How do I revise or delete one of my messages?

Once it's posted, you can't. It's kind of like a newsgroup that way. (A really really compelling request might be entertained in an emergency situation; email the board administrator by clicking the "Questions? Comments?" link on the main page.)



How do I lay out the text in my message or reply?

The box where you type your message is only 50 characters wide, but you can type wider lines and the window will move to follow your typing. Your message will look better if you don't break your lines up, but type an entire paragraph on one line. That way, when your message is viewed, the browser will format the paragraphs and it will look better on the screen. 

When replying to a message, you can type your reply before or after the original message, which appears in the text box with a colon at the start of each line. You can even mix your lines in with the original message. If the original message is very long, putting your reply at the top means the readers won't have to page down to see your reply. Also, don't type your message on a line that starts with a colon, because those lines will display in italics when the reply is posted. 



Why are there colons in the message text box when I try to post a follow-up?

Colons appear in the message dialog box to indicate that those lines are quoting the previous document. Those quoted lines will appear in italics in your post. If you don't want that text in your reply, you can delete some or all of it.



Why didn't my post show up?

Your post most likely did not show up because your browser did not reload the updated Web page, but just pulled it out of the cache on your computer. Try hitting the reload button on your browser.

If all or part of your post is missing, one cause might be using the punctuation characters < or >. These are interpreted as HTML formatting characters by your browser. 

If you can't figure out the problem, please send me an email and let me know what happened and as much as you can remember about what you did. I really want to locate and fix any problems that may be keeping you and others from taking advantage of this service, but I can't do it if you don't tell me about it. 



How do I search the posted messages?

A simple search function allows you to search all posted messages for a string or keyword. The search function appears at the top of the main message board page. To search, type the string or keyword in the box and click on Search!

The search finds all occurrences of the word or string, regardless of upper or lower case. It searches on the entire string, not on the words in the string. For example, the search key "Big Red" will match "big redhead" but not "big bad red".

Once you have found some messages, you have the opportunity to narrow down the list of messages by entering another search key, clicking Search These Messages Only, and then clicking Search!. For example, to find all messages that mention catalogs of classical music or records, you might search on "catalog", then use Search These Messages Only to narrow the list to those messages that contain "classical".



Can I put HTML tags in my posts?

Yes. Type your HTML in the body of your message. When you hit the "Post Message" button, the HTML in your message should be displayed as it will appear in the final post. This would be a good time to click on any links, to make sure they are typed correctly. If you need to make any changes, use the [Back] button on your browser. (If your browser doesn't retain the contents of your form when you hit [Back], you might think about Netscape 3.0 or some other browser that does.)



How can I put a bulletin board like this on my own Web site?

This bulletin board is implemented using CGI scripts written in Perl and created by Matt Wright. (Thanks, Matt!) They are free to anyone who wishes to use them. You can get them and many other scripts at: http://worldwidemart.com/scripts/.