Forum IT Support Question - how to remove "Spoiler" text from BBCode spoiler

[fochie]

I asked the following question via the forum contact interface a couple of times in the last month or so but never got a reply.
Thought I'd try again here ....

Hello,

I'm using spoiler BBCode tags in my signature to cut down on the initial visible size of the listed Spyder mods in my signature (which tends to annoy some members ... myself included ;-).

I can't seem to find a way to turn off the text "Spoiler: ..." from preceding my title on each spoiler button. An internet search suggested maybe a BBCode template can be modified to only include "Spoiler: " if the title is empty (?)

Anyway ... would appreciate any help with this.

I currently have 3 BBCode spoilers in my signature which shows this issue.

Thanks !!
Steve

 

[Gwolf]

Spoiler

TEXT

[spoiler] TEXT [/spoiler]

Not sure you can turn off the word spoiler, that is what identifies it as BB code.

Spoiler

EMPTY

 

[Peter Aawen]

I must admit that I haven't really searched, but off the top of my head/without looking too hard, I also don't know how to get rid of that 'Spoiler' text, and I really doubt that convincing the owner to modify the template &/or platform software will be all that easy/do-able either - doing anything like that adds to the cost & ongoing effort required to keep the Forum running glitch free; they introduce all sorts of issues, including security issues; and it was at least partly an ever increasing excess of those 'little fixes' that then required testing and upgrading every single time any upgrade or change was made to the platform or the BBCode that drove the move to this more up to date & user friendly platform!! So I really doubt that we'll see too many 'tweaks' or add-ons here, simply because as they accumulate, they just make things too hard and expensive to run! So don't hold your breath for that!

That said, why don't you start a new thread for all this sort of thing on your Spyder, maybe with a title something like '@fochie's 2020 Masala Red RTL Mods, Bling, and Other Stuff', and put it in the RT General Discussion section where you can continually add posts, with pics (no more than 6 each post tho, please ) to talk about/show everyone what you've done; what you're planning on doing; and give us updates on how it's all going - maybe you could even include your States visited map in there too?? That way, you could leave nothing but your 'Great minds...' Quote, your Spyder description, and a single link to the thread in your sig line; and by doing that, you'd significantly reduce the size of your signature block, making it a whole lot easier for people to see/navigate around, especially those using small screen devices.

Just Sayin'

 

[Gwolf]

Might try this

Spoiler

Your hidden content here.

Spoiler Buttons

None of the custom button text bb code or even inserting the spoiler button code with an empty string will work on this platform.
It appears the basic spoiler button is only one style and that is with the word on the button.

 

[fochie]

I must admit that I haven't really searched, but off the top of my head/without looking too hard, I also don't know how to get rid of that 'Spoiler' text, and I really doubt that convincing the owner to modify the template &/or platform software will be all that easy/do-able either - doing anything like that adds to the cost & ongoing effort required to keep the Forum running glitch free; they introduce all sorts of issues, including security issues; and it was at least partly an ever increasing excess of those 'little fixes' that then required testing and upgrading every single time any upgrade or change was made to the platform or the BBCode that drove the move to this more up to date & user friendly platform!! So I really doubt that we'll see too many 'tweaks' or add-ons here, simply because as they accumulate, they just make things too hard and expensive to run! So don't hold your breath for that!

Yeah ... I hear ya ... spent 39 yrs as a software developer/tester at a "big blue" computer company, mainly in the role as a test engineer. Had never used BBCode up until now and this just seemed like an ill-designed UI control ... sorta like having the text "Button ..." preceed the title of all html buttons on a page ... not to mention most people not knowing (or rightfully not caring about) what a "Spoiler" is. Saw lots of posts on XenForo and elsewhere seeking the same capability with some mentioning template fixes, 3rd party addons, CSS formatting, etc.

I do tend to read the mods listed in member's signatures which has led me many times to investigate (and buy/incorporate) ones I didn't know about. "Long winded" signature lists do tend to clutter up a page especially when that member replies multiple times within a thread ... thus leading me to investigate the "Spoiler" solution.

Oh well, no big deal, maybe I'll try your suggestion of pointing to a personalized mods thread.

Thanks for the input

 

[Gwolf]

Really don't see any problem with using the spoiler buttons like you have them now. It has closed up about 15 or 20 lines of text behind 3 spoiler buttons, with room for plenty more. The forum does allow some BB code, not sure how much. BB code is not very well standardized, but it works.

 

[fochie]

Really don't see any problem with using the spoiler buttons like you have them now. It has closed up about 15 or 20 lines of text behind 3 spoiler buttons, with room for plenty more. The forum does allow some BB code, not sure how much. BB code is not very well standardized, but it works.

Agree that it functions now much better than without using it ... the "Spoiler:" text just looked silly/unnecessary/potentially confusing to others to me. I've seen other posts stating that specifying the spoiler exactly as I did would produce the button without the "Spoiler:" text so I assume there's some admin configuration setting change required or maybe something to do with the version of BBCode being used, or a bug in BBCode, or ....

I had actually tried to make my signature even smaller by having the three buttons inline (as opposed to stacked with one on each line). Tried this using table columns but the vertical alignment of cell contents is pretty squirrelly in this forum editor and could not get the buttons to all be top justified. If I could, would have then shrunk the image of the states map even further and/or placed it under the single row or spoiler buttons.

Yes, I tend to enjoy solving software quirks and getting UI's to do what I want (maybe some would say a bit obsessed )

Thanks so far for listening and for the input provided.

 

[Gwolf]

I tried the spoiler buttons with an empty string as suggested on one of the PHPBB code help websites. It had no affect on the button appearance at all. The BB code web site said that if there was only one spoiler button design for the platform the button appearance could not be changed. I don't really think the wording on the buttons is that confusing to anyone. The most likely reason for the buttons having to be stacked is the forum is used by a majority now with smart phones and the administrators are attempting to control the width to better fit on the small screens. Back when only desktops and laptops used the web, the screen size did not matter as much, but with several smaller screen devices now in use they want to make it more convenient for content to fit on a small screen. The way it is set up now, you don't have near as much space in the signature area as some using the forum.

I run into a lot of software quirks too, but have learned to deal with most of them. I am running Linux OS.

 

[fochie]

I tried the spoiler buttons with an empty string as suggested on one of the PHPBB code help websites. It had no affect on the button appearance at all. The BB code web site said that if there was only one spoiler button design for the platform the button appearance could not be changed. I don't really think the wording on the buttons is that confusing to anyone. The most likely reason for the buttons having to be stacked is the forum is used by a majority now with smart phones and the administrators are attempting to control the width to better fit on the small screens. Back when only desktops and laptops used the web, the screen size did not matter as much, but with several smaller screen devices now in use they want to make it more convenient for content to fit on a small screen. The way it is set up now, you don't have near as much space in the signature area as some using the forum.

Thanks for checking that out. One of the sites I owned in the past relied heavily on using PHPBB (pre "Spoiler" support ) Messed around a bit more and discovered that you can nest Spoilers ... so I got it down to one line now with the states map below it . Would have liked to have the states map in one of the nested spoilers but found that the ability to include an image in a spoiler has been disabled on the site.

Soooo ... I guess I've beat this dead horse long enough ... thanks again to all for the input ... maybe I'll create a thread sometime explaining how others can reduce their sig size via the use of a spoiler.

 

[Gwolf]

Yep, you got it really compact up there now. The admin would go along with you posting a tutorial on spoiler use, pretty sure. There is some off topic forums where anything not related to Can Am is posted. It ain't too well organized and some of it gets left 3 or 4 pages back before long, but that is where the posting tutorials and things go. Used to have sticky threads on the old forum, that stayed on top. This new platform must not have them available.

 

[Peter Aawen]

Yep, you got it really compact up there now. The admin would go along with you posting a tutorial on spoiler use, pretty sure. There is some off topic forums where anything not related to Can Am is posted. It ain't too well organized and some of it gets left 3 or 4 pages back before long, but that is where the posting tutorials and things go. Used to have sticky threads on the old forum, that stayed on top. This new platform must not have them available.

We still have them, at the top of every sub-forum page - they just don't stand out so much cos instead of being highlighted, they now
only have a 'Sticky Pin' that shows just to the Left of the 'Replies' space in the first column after the Thread Title.
But the Stickies are still all there.

 

[Gwolf]

We still have them, at the top of every sub-forum page - they just don't stand out so much cos instead of being highlighted, they now
only have a 'Sticky Pin' that shows just to the Left of the 'Replies' space in the first column after the Thread Title.
But the Stickies are still all there.

Yep, I see the pins and locks now. Wasn't looking for little pins. I was expecting bold thread names or something.
I got pinned tutorials on posting images and didn't even know it.

A tutorial on compacting the signature space on some of the larger ones would help keep every little short post or reply from taking up half a page on a 24 inch monitor. Only problem might be that it could be too complicated for some people without IT experience to understand.