Links in Forums

I'm sure many of you have encountered text left in a reply that is supposed to be a hyperlink to somewhere, but is just plain text. More often than not, the poster says they don't know how to make a hyperlink.

Any ideas on how to make it more obvious to people how to create links. If they knew it was under the Text Style Menu, that might help, but I'm not convinced that many people could create one even after reading that....

Just looking for ideas to help make this a simpler process.

I agree, Keith. I wonder if DTP (Dave the Programmer) could write a script that would generate the link code and hyperlink.

As an aside, it would be great if the text formatting bbcode for bold, italics, and underline could be done in a similar way.

--P

It's in the "Text Style Menu" pop-up at the bottom of this page, and I think all pages.

Hank: Yes I know it is the Text Style Menu as I noted in my original post. The problem is many, many members don't seem to be able to find it. The point of my post was to query about thoughts on how to make it more obvious how to create links and enable an easier mechanism for members to do so rather than using the "[url]" syntax that is required today.

I guess I don't see it as all that difficult, so I can't suggest ways to make it simpler. Maybe larger text on the Text Style Menu button?

I think the main issue is with hyperlinks, rather than 'Text Decoration'. The instructional text at the bottom of each page reads, "Refer to the Text Style Menu for text decoration."

Perhaps it could be changed to read, "Refer to the Text Style Menu for text decoration or to create hyperlinks."

Jim could make this change and then announce it in the NPN Discussion forum. This could serve as a workaround, assuming writng a script to create hyperlinks can be implemented in the future.

--P