The Celestial Matters Forum is the interactive complement to the Celestial Matters website. It is open to everyone that enjoys to discuss, share or participate in creating quality software, artwork, 3D work, astronomical or cosmological information or data... It does not have to do with an existing CM topic, as our goal is simply to inspire and help each other: genres are unimportant to accomplish that. Membership is free.
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The group providing this board is the Celestial Matters Team; you can read more about us and find contact information on this page.
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Have you been banned from the board? (A message will be displayed if you have.) If you are a registered member of the CM and are not banned - and still cannot log in, please double-check your username and password. Usually this is the problem; if not, send a note to monalisa [---] celestialmatters [---] org with your problem.
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If you want to post and respond to messages in our forum, you need to be a registered member of the CM.
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If you do not check the Log me in automatically box when you log in, the board will only keep you logged in for a preset time. This prevents misuse of your account by anyone else. To stay logged in, check the box during login. This is not recommended if you access the board from a shared computer, e.g. library, internet cafe, university cluster, etc.
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Don't panic! While your password cannot be retrieved it can be reset. To do this go to the login page and click I've forgotten my password. Follow the instructions and you should be back online in no time.
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First check that you are entering the correct username and password. If they are okay then one of two things may have happened: if COPPA support is enabled and you clicked the I am under 13 years old link while registering then you will have to follow the instructions you received. If this is not the case then your account need activating: you were sent an email about this when you registered your account. Just follow the instructions there. If you did not receive this message please check that your email address is valid.
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The most likely reasons for this are: you entered an incorrect username or password (check the email you were sent when you first registered) or Mona Lisa has deleted your account. If it is the case then perhaps you never posted anything? We tend to remove such inactive accounts. You are free to register again.
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Click the Profile link (generally shown in the sidebar to the right). This will allow you to modify all your settings.
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What you may be seeing are times displayed in a timezone different from the one you are in. If this is the case, just change your profile setting for the timezone to match your particular area. Please note that changing the timezone can only be done by registered users. So if you are not a member, this is a good time to become one!
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If you are sure you have set the timezone correctly and the time is still different, the most likely answer is daylight savings time. The board is not designed to handle the changeovers between standard and daylight time so during summer months the time may be an hour different from the real local time.
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You can upload or link to an Avatar in your Profile page. This must be a gif or jpg file no larger than 80x80 pixels, and not bigger than 20 Kb.
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If you are a member, just click the relevant button the page where you want to post. If you are not, you must register your account first.
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You can only edit or delete your own posts. You can edit a post (for only a limited time after it was made) by clicking the edit button for the relevant post. If someone has already replied to the post, you will find a small piece of text output below the post when you return to the topic that lists the number of times you edited it. This will only appear if no one has replied. Please note that you cannot delete a post once someone has replied to it.
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To add a signature to a post you must first create one; this is done via your profile. Once created you can check the Add Signature box on the posting form. You can also add a signature by default to all your posts by checking the appropriate radio box in your profile. You can still prevent a signature being added to individual posts by un-checking the add signature box on the posting form.
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When you post a new topic, look below the main posting box to find the Create Poll options. You should enter a title for the poll and then at least two options -- to set an option type in the poll question and click the Add option button. You can also set a time limit for the poll, 0 being an infinite amount. There is a limit to the number of options you can list.
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As with posts, polls can only be edited by the original poster. To edit a poll, click the first post in the topic, which always has the poll associated with it. If no one has cast a vote yet, you can edit or delete it. However, if people have already placed votes, it is locked.
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Only registered members can vote in polls.
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If you cannot access a forum, it is because it has been locked by Mona Lisa. There may be various reasons for this.
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BBCode is a special implementation of HTML. It is similar in style: tags are enclosed in square braces [ and ] rather than < and > and it offers greater control over what and how something is displayed.
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No. HTML is disabled since it interferes with the posting of code to be reviewed in the Developers section.
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Smileys, or Emoticons, are small graphical images which can be used to express some feeling using a short code, e.g. :) means happy, :( means sad. Try not to overuse smileys, as they can quickly render a post unreadable.
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Images can indeed be shown in your posts. However, there is no facility at present for uploading images directly to this board. Therefore you must link to an image stored on a publicly accessible web server, e.g. http://www.some-unknown-place.net/my-picture.gif. You cannot link to pictures stored on your own PC (unless it is a publicly accessible server) nor to images stored behind authentication mechanisms such as Hotmail or Yahoo mailboxes, password-protected sites, etc. To display the image use either the BBCode [img] tag or appropriate HTML (if allowed).
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Announcements often contain important information and you should read them as soon as possible. They appear at the top of every page in the forum to which they are posted. Only Mona Lisa can post an Announcement.
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Sticky topics appear below any announcements and only on the first page. You may create a thread as Sticky if it contains generally (and not time-dependent) important information.
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Locked topics are threads Mona Lisa has closed. You cannot reply to locked topics and any poll contained inside is automatically ended. Topics may be locked for many reasons.
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Mona Lisa is our Forum Admin. She controls all facets of board operation which include setting permissions, banning users, etc. She also have full moderator capabilities in all the forums.
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There may be two reasons for this; you are not registered and/or not logged on, or Mona Lisa has prevented you individually from sending messages. If it is the latter case you should try asking her why if you have not already recieved a message about the matter.
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If you keep receiving unwanted private messages from someone, please inform Mona Lisa -- she can prevent a user from sending private messages at all.
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We are sorry to hear that. You should email monalisa [---] celestialmatters [---] org with a full copy of the message you received. She will deal with it.
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This software (in its unmodified form) is produced, released and is copyrighted phpBB Group. It is made available under the GNU General Public License and may be freely distributed; see link for more details. The special implemenation of this software for Celestial Matters were created by rthorvald.
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You should contact monalisa [---] celestialmatters [---] org.

Please note that phpBB Group - the creators of the software running the CM forums - has absolutely no control and cannot in any way be held liable over how, where or by whom this board is used. It is absolutely pointless contacting phpBB Group in relation to any legal (cease and desist, liable, defamatory comment, etc.) matter not directly related to the phpbb.com website or the discrete software of phpBB itself. If you do email phpBB Group about any third party use of this software then you should expect a terse response or no response at all.
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