Notes and tips for Newbies

First Years! Over here! First Years!
C'mon, follow me. Mind yer step, now!
Don't worry about your luggage. They'll handle it.
Yeh'll get yer firs' sight o' Hogwarts in a sec. Jus' round this bend here.
No more'n four to a boat! Everyone in? Right then -- FORWARD!


New members, commonly known as “Muggles,” start in The Hogwarts Express.
The Hogwarts Express, a sub-forum of Diagon Ally, is for Introductions & Greetings.
Introduce yourself by starting a NEW TOPIC (a.k.a. "NEW THREAD") with your nickname as the subject line.
You might tell us where you're from (country, not too specific), what some of your interests are,
and how you ended up coming to HPC.


An Avatar is the little picture next to your name. You can edit this. More on that later.
Under your name is a title (rank). This title is determined by the number of posts you have made to date.

Post #2 ((Psyduck) ~ Rank
#3 (Psyduck) ~ Fun and Games
#4 (Psyduck) ~ * Site Map *
#5 (Psyduck) Where is everybody? Marauder's Map, Languages, Time Zones
~ (Seiyo Grasson) "Soft delete." Empty shell, demo of deleted post
#6 (Gingobibble) ~ Group Memberships
#7 (hedwig123) ~ How can I edit or delete my own post?
#8 (Gingobibble) ~ How do you put a picture in your post?
#9 (shirlincairns) ~ SPAM
~ ~ (Psyduck) ~ Soft Delete
#10 (Seiyo Grasson) ~ Avitar (INCOMPLETE)
#11 (Psysquid) ~ Chat Box
#12 (Psyduck) ~ This site is so slow!
#13 (Psyduck) ~ What are the rules, again?
#14 (Gingobibble) ~ Edit Profile + Signature (INCOMPLETE)
~ ~ ~(Psyduck) ~ Soft Delete
#15 (Psyduck) ~ elaborate signatures (INCOMPLETE)
#16 (Psyduck) ~ So many clubs!
#17 (hedwig123) ~ no more than 4 smilies in a post or PM (INCOMPLETE)
#18 (Psyduck) ~ Off-Topic or three words
#19 (Psyduck) ~ What happened to my shouts?
~ ~ (Hermione_is_Cool) ~ soft delete
#20 (Psyduck) ~ e-mail notifications
#21 (Psyduck) ~ Send it by Owl Post
#22 (Psysquid) ~ Living Avatars
Also ~ Multiple quotes in one post

The main reason for this system is to keep out bots and spammers.
If you are interested enough to make a few posts, you’re Ok by us.
Twenty (20) is the magic number. Once you have 20 posts you'll be able to roam freely.

In the beginning, you can not see or use the Live Chat Box; Owls (private messages);
Member Profiles; Hogsmeade; the Arcade; or the "Hogwarts Dungeons," which includes the
two forums: "Harry Potter Original Fan Fiction" and "Harry Potter RPG (Role Playing Games)."
These things will come in time.

When you have made the number of posts at which you should be promoted,
it takes some time for the system to acknowledge the new rank.
Please be patient. Better yet, go to bed, or do some homework or chores.

X = Guest. May read most of the forums, but need to register before posting.
0 = Muggle. Can post an introduction, but may not start threads in other forums.
1 = Pre-Sorting Hat. Just say hello to your other little friends on the train.
5 = Squib. You can now see the Chat Box and the Great Hall, but not the Hogwarts Dungeons.
20 = First Year. Permission to start new threads in other forums.
- - - Permission to read and participate in RPGs and FanFic (Hogwarts Dugeons).
100 = Second Year. Permission to upload pictures for signature and avatar.
200 = Third Year. Permission to visit Hogsmeade.

Muggle glitchs: Some (all?) newbies can see the ChatBox, Hogsmeade, and show an avatar.
The system is not supposed to allow that. These things go away when you become a first
year and will return when you reach the appropriate rank.
To see an old thread about First Years losing their Avatars, follow this link: Help!

Beyond that, you won't find any new surprises.
It’s just about bragging rights:

Fourth Year = 400.
Fifth Year = 700.
Househead 5th Year = 1200.
Sixth Year = 1800.
Househead 6th Year = 2500.
Seventh Year = 4000.
Prefect = 6000.
Hogwarts Graduate = 8000.
Ministry of Magic = 10,000.

Note to Old Timers: Let me know if I’ve gotten any of this wrong
or if you have anything to add. I’ll edit it into this thread somewhere.

Ok, so you only have two posts and need to wait for the Chat Box, Fan Fic and RPGs.
We still have other little games.

Games in the “Muggle World” forum:

The best, of course, is Trivial Pursuits , with 229 replies ~ http://www.harrypotterchat.org/muggle-world/5624-potter-trivia-pursuit.html

We also have:

Imponderables or ponder this ~ 142
Does The Person Below Me…? ~ 1,187
What I like about you ~ 67 replies
A special Harry Potter Party ~ 62 replies
Hope this title caught your eye ~ 43 replies
Hermione's PhD Thesis *Riddle* ~ 33 replies
Three Things To An Island ~ 59 replies (Does anyone see a reason to make this one "Sticky"? )
This or That ~ 888 replies
Word Game ~ 785 replies
Would You Rather? ~ 1,207 replies
Who do you think would win in fight ~ 467 replies
What would hapen if....? ~ 43 replies

* Site Map *

Hogwarts Dungeons
~~ Harry Potter Original Fan Fiction
~~ Harry Potter RPG

The Wizarding World

~~ Diagon Alley: introduce yourself, The Daily Prophet, general conversations.
~~ ~~ Hogwarts Express: Introductions & Greetings. All muggles start here.
~~ ~~ Polls
~~ ~~ Muggle World: For topics not directly related to Harry Potter.

~~ Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry: Discuss the main characters
~~ ~~ The Great Hall: Discuss the Houses in general, Quidditch.
~~ ~~ ~~ Dumbledore's Army
~~ ~~ Gryffindor
~~ ~~ Slytherin
~~ ~~ Ravenclaw
~~ ~~ Hufflepuff
~~ ~~ Hogsmeade: Third years only.

~~ Platform Nine and Three-Quarters: Discuss the movies, actors…
~~ ~~ Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone
~~ ~~ Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets
~~ ~~ Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban
~~ ~~ Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
~~ ~~ Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix
~~ ~~ Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince
~~ ~~ The Actors

~~ The Restricted Section of the Library: Discuss the books.
~~ ~~ Year I: Sorcerer's Stone
~~ ~~ Year II: Chamber of Secrets
~~ ~~ Year III: Prisoner of Azkaban
~~ ~~ Year IV: Goblet of Fire
~~ ~~ Year V: Order of the Phoenix
~~ ~~ Year VI: Half Blood Prince
~~ ~~ Year VII: Deathly Hallows
~~ ~~ ~~ The Room of Requirements: This forum will contain spoilers.

Harry Potter News: Link to news stories and rumors
~~ ~~ The Daily Prophet: news stories and rumors
~~ ~~ The Daily Prophet World Report: readings of other sites

Harry Potter Community
~~ Play Madam Pomfrey in the hospital wing: help problems with this website.
~~ Ministry of Magic: We'll make website announcements in this forum.
~~ The Common Room & Howlers: Rules, general forum questions

The Owlery
Arcade
Live Chat
Owl Post (Private Messages)

We do have a live chat room, but this site is mostly a bulletin board.
Our members are scattered all over the planet and we come and go at different times.

If you want to see who’s around, scroll up to that brown bar at the top:


Click on “Quick Links” for a drop-down menu, then click “Who’s Online.” I call this the Marauder's Map.

You’ll see yourself and your current location, maybe a few members, an anonymous guest or two
and a bunch of Slurp Spiders (a spy, but the good kind.)
If anyone is around, click on “Live Chat” and start talking. Someone will answer, if s/he is paying attention.

For a list of our members around the world in their respective Time Zones, click Prime Time?


You’ll find that our writing skills range from eloquent to unintelligible. That’s because we have a very eclectic group. Ages range from the pre-teen to the elderly-and-feeble. We also enjoy the company of many to whom English is not a first language. I can’t keep up with all the languages I’ve heard mentioned here -- English, Bangali, Italian, Finnish, Dutch, German, French, Russian, Farsi/Dari, Hindi/Urdu, Pashtun, Serbian, Russian, Croatian, Montenegro, Bosnia, Hersegovina, Croatian, Spanish, Greek, Portuguese, Chinese. We’re pretty spread out.

When I signed up, I was given a choice.
I chose Griffindor, which still shows on my profile.
I am given the option to leave Griffindor if I wish.
I haven't yet found a way to sign up to another group.

To Edit your own post, click the little brown box at the bottom right that says "Email."
(I know, it makes no sense. What I don't know is how to change it. Deal with it...)
So, you've re-opened your post. Now you change whatever you like and when you're done, hit the little "Save" button.

To Delete your own post -- This feature hasn't been working lately.
So, we have three options. In all of them, you first edit and gut it, and leave a quick message.

1) Say "Please delete completely." After I've done it, no one will ever know it was there.

2) To get something like the deleted message above from "Seiyo," say "please delete content of this post." It will lose it's post number, which will change the numbers of all the posts below it.

3) If changing the numbers will create a problem, just gut it and leave some simple, inoffensive one-liner. This will leave the post number and the full signature.

to Quote someone else's message, click the little brown "quote" button.
To Multi-Quote a post (a fancy word for putting more than one quote in a single post)
click the squished up button in the middle.
If you're quoting someone like Gingobibble, a code in brackets will show:
Bracket - equal - Gingobibble - numbers - end bracket.
Then comes the text (Now is the time for all good men to come to the aid of their country.)
and the close quote: bracket - slash - Quote - end bracket.

If you don't mess with the codes at all, it'll look like this:
If you cut the name and numbers out of the brackets, it'll look like this:
If you want to make it easier for the rest of us to read, you can cut out
the parts of the quote that are not relevent to your response:
By the way, while reading a post as a Muggle, the Quote button and the
MultiQuote button are there. But that other little "quick reply" button is gone. ~ Psyduck

I have only figured out a way to add a picture that is already on the net.
I use my bebo page to upload pics to and then I copy the url into the window that pops up when you 'Insert Image'.

Does anyone know an easier way?

• You'll be contacted either by OWL / A comment on your Profile Page or in the Thread concerned
• You'll be given the chance to Edit /Remove the material
• If you don't, a caretaker will delete your post/s and you'll loose posting points.

Avatars*

To put it simply, an Avatar is a picture that is posted along with your posts.
An avatar is sometimes automatically resized if it is too big so try to keep them small.
You can load an avatar 2 ways;
First- By browsing and using an existing file on you computer.
Second- By using a upload site such as imagshack or photobucket.

During your Pre Sorting Hat and Squib days your avatar may be visible but once you reach First Year it will disappear. Don't be alarmed this happens to many of us and it comes back during the second year and remains there.

If you would like to change your avatar you merely just do either two of the ways to upload your stated above.
[Note: I do not know much about the Living Avatars]


(from Nov 29, 2006)