A powerful formatting language developed specifically for this application allows you to format your posts without knowledge of HTML. This formatting language is easy for both HTML users and non-HTML users to learn quickly. There are examples after each major section.

Contents

Introduction to Formatting

All formatting tags have the following structure:
\code{Arguments or text to be formatted}

The code is a keyword to invoke the desired formatting (for example, green to produce green text and b to produce bold text). Formatting tags are case sensitive. Formatting tags may be nested within other tags. A comprehensive list of available formatting tags is available in this document (although the system administrator can turn off certain tags).

To use formatting, enter the appropriate code(s) in the text of your message or subject line. When you preview your post, your formatting will be displayed so you can verify that you have entered your tags properly.

• Simple Features (bold, italics, etc.)
• Colors
• Text Size
• Miscellaneous (font face, blinking, etc.)

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Simple Features

Tag	Description	Example
\b{Your Text}	Bold Text	Your Text
\i{Your Text}	Italics Text	Your Text
\+{Your Text}	Superscript Text	[Reference]Your Text
\-{Your Text}	Subscript Text	[Reference]Your Text
\fixed{Your Text}	Fixed Width Text	Your Text
\u{Your Text}	Underlined Text	Your Text
\c{Your Text}	Centered Text	Your Text





Examples

Input:		\b{Show me some bold} and \i{italics text}.
Output:		Show me some bold and italics text.
Input:		H\-{2}O has a density of 1.000x10\+{-3} kg/mL.
Output:		H2O has a density of 1.000x10-3 kg/mL.

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Colors

Tag	Description	Example
\red{Your Text}	Red Text	Your Text
\orange{Your Text}	Orange Text	Your Text
\yellow{Your Text}	Yellow Text	Your Text
\green{Your Text}	Green Text	Your Text
\cyan{Your Text}	Cyan Text	Your Text
\blue{Your Text}	Blue Text	Your Text
\purple{Your Text}	Purple Text	Your Text
\white{Your Text}	White Text	Your Text
\gray{Your Text}	Gray Text	Your Text
\black{Your Text}	Black Text	Your Text





Example

Input:		\red{Red} and \green{green} are pretty colors.
Output:		Red and green are pretty colors.

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Text Size

Tag	Description	Example
\2{Your Text}	Largest (size +2 text)	Your Text
\1{Your Text}	Large (size +1 text)	Your Text
\0{Your Text}	Average (size +0 text)	Your Text
\-1{Your Text}	Smaller (size -1 text)	Your Text
\-2{Your Text}	Smallest (size -2 text)	Your Text





Example

Input:		\2{You} \1{can} \0{size} \-1{your} \-2{text}.
Output:		You can size your text.

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Miscellaneous

Tag	Description	Example
\greek{Your Text}	Greek (symbol) text	Your Text
\strike{Your Text}	Strikethrough	Your Text
\blink{Your Text}	Blinking text	Your Text
\rgb{Hex_code,Your Text}	Color text by hex code	Your Text: aaaa00 color
\font{Font_face,Your Text}*	Font face	Your Text
\char{ASCII code}	Character (0-255)	Ê (ASCII code=202)
\indent{Your text}	Indented (blockquoted)	Your text
\quote{Your text}	Quoted	Quote: Your text

* = see note about escaping commas under "Special Characters"



Examples

Input:		\rgb{5aaa7c,This is a strange color}.
Output:		This is a strange color.
Input:		\font{Times New Roman,This is in a different font}.
Output:		This is in a different font.
Input:		\font{Comic Sans MS\,Tahoma,Note the escaped comma here}.
Output:		Note the escaped comma here.

Special Characters

Modern browsers support the display of special characters, such as the "degrees" symbol (°). There are a number of available characters.

Tag	Result		Tag	Result
\ch{->}	®		\ch{<-}	¬
\ch{/ |}	­		\ch{\ /}	¯
\ch{t}	†		\ch{tt}	‡
\ch{dot}	•		\ch{TM}	™
\ch{c}	©		\ch{<<}	«
\ch{R}	®		\ch{deg}	°
\ch{+-}	±		\ch{=/=}	¹
\ch{<>}	¹		\ch{int}	ò
\ch{:)}	J		\ch{:(}	L
\ch{:|}	K		\ch{mu}	µ
\ch{1/2}	½		\ch{>>}	»
\ch{A}	Å		\ch{/}	÷
\ch{nullset}	Ø		\ch{forall}	"
\ch{<=}	£		\ch{>=}	³
\ch{<->}	«		\ch{inf}	¥
\ch{= =}	º		\ch{del}	¶
\ch{DEL}	Ñ		\ch{=>}	Þ
\ch{therefore}	\		\ch{line}
\ch{br}	<BR> (HTML)		\ch{nbsp}	&nbsp; (HTML)

The "Symbol" font, supported on Windows platforms, allows the incorporation of Greek characters which is especially useful for mathematical notation in many scientific disciplines. The following table gives available Greek characters in groups of 5.

Tag	Result		Tag	Result
\greek{abcde}	abcde		\greek{ABCDE}	ABCDE
\greek{fghij}	fghij		\greek{FGHIJ}	FGHIJ
\greek{klmno}	klmno		\greek{KLMNO}	KLMNO
\greek{pqrst}	pqrst		\greek{PQRST}	PQRST
\greek{uvwxyz}	uvwxyz		\greek{UVWXYZ}	UVWXYZ

Backslashes, and curly braces have special meanings to the interpreter. If you wish to use these characters as text within a tag, you must "escape" them as with a backslash. Additionally, when you are using a tag that requires 2 or more arguments and you want to include a comma within the arguments (and not have it interpreted as a separator), you must escape it with a backslash. See the examples.

Code	Result
\\	\
\{	{
\}	}
\,	,

Examples

Input:		This program is \ch{c} 1997
Output:		This program is © 1997.
Input:		\b{No need, to escape, these commas} in a tag that takes only one argument.
Output:		No need, to escape, these commas in a tag that takes only one argument.
Input:		\rgb{0000aa,No need, to escape, these commas} in the last field of a tag.
Output:		No need, to escape, these commas in the last field of a tag.
Input:		\font{Times\,Roman\,Arial,You need to escape the first two commas in this case}.
Output:		You need to escape the first two commas in this case.