zz Template Play

In the time since I created this little guide, the anchor tag has been added to the list of BBCode available to us here on RPR! It can be found on the BBCode page in the site's Help documentation here: https://www.rprepository.com/help/bbcode#513

I will still be keeping the guide up for two reasons:

1. The anchor tag a different set of usage limitations.
   • Reliable setup requires you to be able to write it into the spot you want to jump to.
   • It's intended for linking to a spot on the same page. (For example, creating a "table of contents" for a long post that allows people to jump to certain parts.)
   • Anchor names are user-designated, which leaves a small window to create a link to a different section of the page than intended either by accidental repeating or (maybe, unconfirmed) by someone else managing to hijack the anchor to a different spot.
2. I was a little confused by its use, so may add some clarifications once I've spent some time testing it out more.

If you find yourself needing a link that the anchor tag doesn't work so well for, the guide for all that remains below!

Current as of January 24, 2022.

Have you ever wanted to send someone to a specific forums post or character widget, but the best you could do was link them to the page it's on and tell them what to look for or about how far they need to scroll to find it? Maybe you've seen someone else manage to make a link take you directly to a specific post or widget, but you're not sure how.

Hopefully, this little guide can help you out! I won't go over all the ways you can get the right URL/address, since there's actually quite a few. I'll just go over the simplest methods I know of, specific to RPR. (And a thanks to Claine for pointing out I'd originally goofed on dealing with posts in groups!)

Not sure how to actually use the URL? Just pasting it directly in your message will still work, but if you want a prettier link with custom text, here's RPR's guide for BBCode links!

This method works in the main forums and in groups both, and can also be used to get direct URLs for widgets in a character's profile! It can be used all over the internet, really, but some places may make it more complicated than others. The biggest limitation on this one is that it'd be a lot harder to do with a mobile device. This is for use with most standard browsers on desktops and laptops.

The first piece is easy: just grab the URL of the page that the post (or widget) is on, and paste it in a notepad or document somewhere. Go ahead and add a # to the end of that URL, too. Depending on where you're doing this, you should now have something that looks about like one of these:

• https://www.rprepository.com/g/GroupName/topic/00000?page=0#
• https://www.rprepository.com/group-site/0000/topic/00000#
• https://www.rprepository.com/community/forums/topic/00000?page=0#
• https://www.rprepository.com/character-site/0000000#
• https://www.rprepository.com/character-site/000000/000000#
• https://www.rprepository.com/c/CharacterName#
• https://www.rprepository.com/c/CharacterName/000000#

(If the URL already has a hashtag near the end when you grab it, followed text/numbers, it's already pointing directly at something on the page! You can check what in a new tab/window. If it's not the thing you want it to go to, remove everything after that hashtag.)

The second part is getting the ID of the thing you want to link to.

1. Move your mouse/cursor to the top of the post or widget you want to link to and right-click.
2. On the menu that appears, select "Inspect" - it's probably at the bottom of the menu. This will cause an additional panel to open, showing you that section of HTML and the relevant CSS. You only need to pay attention to the HTML for this. If you're unfamiliar with these, HTML is the one that has lots of angular brackets < >.
3. Locate the ID of that item; it's a piece of text that actually reads id=" " with a number and possibly text in the quotes, and it will appear inside a set of those angular brackets. It may look intimidating, but try moving your cursor over the HTML; browsers will usually highlight an item on the page when your cursor is over its piece of HTML. To find your ID, you want the highlighted part to be either the header/title space of the post or widget, or sometimes that entire post/widget. You may need to click some of the arrows to display more of the HTML, or try right-clicking again on a slightly different spot to see if that gets you closer.
   
   As an example, if I right-click on the title of this widget, the line it'll draw my attention to is:
   
   Code:

   <h3 class="widgetTitle">Getting the ID from the HTML</h3>
   
   That doesn't have an id, though. But if I step "up" a little bit:
   
   Code:

   <li id="widget_1001932" class="widget"> <h3 class="widgetTitle">Getting the ID from the HTML</h3> <div class="text-widget-contents">...</div> </li>
   
   It appears! If I hold my cursor over that top li piece, this whole widget is highlighted, and nothing else. And there in the li is id="widget_1001932". The part I want is what's inside the quotes: so in this case, widget_1001932. If you double-click that part, it should highlight that piece of text and allow you to copy (or edit) it like any other text.
   
   For posts, the ID will just be numbers, and you'll be looking for something like:
   
   Code:

   <div class="postheader" id="0000000"></div>
4. Now that you have your ID, you'll just add that to the end of the URL you grabbed before, after the hashtag. For this particular widget, that ends up looking like this:
   
   https://www.rprepository.com/character-site/35214/413201#widget_1001932

And that's your direct URL!

Something to keep in mind when using this for widgets: a URL is a path. It's a set of directions, and each piece between the slashes / is a step in the path. The above example basically translates to "go to rprepository.com, look in the place character profile are stored (character-site), find the profile numbered 35214, go to the page there numbered 413201, and display the item called widget_1001932." If you move or change things around, you can make your directions point the wrong way! Let's say I moved this widget to a different page, for example. (Just moving the widget to a different part of the page won't hurt anything.) The directions still say to look at page 413201, but page 413201 no longer contains widget_1001932. Fortunately, page 413201 should still load so long as the rest of the directions to get to it are correct. The #id is like looking for a specific person once you've successfully arrived at the location. Mess up a different part of the path, though, and you might have told someone to look for a certain house on the wrong street, or even in the wrong city, etc. That's when you get lost and your URL results in an error page, usually a 404 Not Found.

This is actually super easy, though it does differ slightly between posts in the main RPR forums and posts in groups hosted on RPR. The basic rule of thumb: look for the post's timestamp! Be aware that this does not work when looking at the topic/thread in chat mode.

Step 1: Locate the post. You want to be looking at the actual post you want to link to.

Step 2: Locate that post's timestamp. The exact location differs depending on if the post is in the main RPR forums or a group's forums, but in both cases you'll be looking along the left side in a standard browser. (In groups, the timestamp gets centered in mobile views.)

1. In the main RPR forums, the timestamp is in the bar at the top of your post (in the same bar, you'll see the options to Reply or Request Mod to the right side). Technically, you can use any part of the left half of that little header bar, but aiming for the date/time keeps things simple.
   
2. In group forums, the place to look is under the icon/avatar of the author of that post. In this case, you specifically want the time of the post; it's displayed under the date in a standard browser and next to the date in a mobile view. (Note: This is only partly functional last time I checked, and only works for posts on the thread's first page due to a piece missing from the URL it provides.)
   

Step 3: Grab the URL. There's two ways to do this. Once you have the URL, all that's left is pasting it where you wanted to put it!

1. Click/tap that timestamp link. The page will reload, and the URL in your browser's address box is now one that leads directly to that specific post! Just copy it from the address bar and paste it where you need to.
2. If your device allows you to open a menu via right-click or long-tap, do that and select "Copy link address." It's likely near the middle of the menu. The direct URL to that post is now copied and can be pasted wherever you wanted to put it!

Bonus Tip: If you just submitted or edited the post you want to link to and haven't navigated way yet, the URL you want should already be in your address bar!