Who do they apply to?

Everyone, nobody is excused from them, and it is the users responsibilty to keep up to date with changes to the rules.

General posting guidelines

We have already established ourselves as one of the best new webmaster forums regarding post quality. Our staff it setting an example as far as posting good quality messages is concerned and our members are already following this example. Webmaster Tips & Tricks is trying to offer some of the best topics and posts possible, meaningful information, so that you don't waste your time with useless chatter.

As a general rule: your posts should be replies or new topics with relevance for the subjects discussed at Webmaster Tips & Tricks. If you don't have too much to add to a post, please don't post. Our moderators will delete any unnecessary posts so your post count won't increase.

Do not post one liners. We try to offer a lot of useful information and keep the chat to a minimum level. The one line posts don't count and will be removed. Please post at least a 2-3 sentence message and with relevance to the subject. We have already a 40 character count as minimum lenght, so that the script will not post your message if it's shorter than that. It's not a big requirement, 40 characters is almost 1 normal post row.

Don't post chatty messages - If you really can't contribute with an information in a message, then better keep from posting. Having messages like 'me too', 'wow, cool', 'don't know, hope I'll find out from you' don't contribute to the topics and they will get deleted.

Don't welcome members that were here before you were - If you see a 'hello' message made by someone who has joined us before you did, welcoming them would make you look funny. Since you are the newer one, they should be welcoming you.

Topic bumping (double posting) is allowed ONLY after 48 hours since you initiated the topic. This is mainly for the reviews section or the 'members support' category. Please be patient and someone will reply. If not, you can bump your thread after 48 hours. Bumping it earlier will result in a warning and thread deletion altogether. .

Warning and banning

The staff team at 'Webmaster Tips & Tricks' is trying to provide you with a safe and nice place to learn about development and share your experience. We delete any content we find unsuitable, edit links and signatures when we find them to break the rules. Signatures that don't comply with the rules will be edited with the text 'Please read the guidelines for signatures!'. This is a sign you put a smilie, or too many links, or a link we found to be breaking the guidelines.

Spam is deal with the most severely. If a member is being caught spamming the PM system or the forums or posting illegal content on the forums, he can lose his account instantly. For posts and threads that break the guidelines the member will receive a notification PM to find out what guidelines he broke.

Respect the staff and don't question the measures.

Since most of our members are educated webmasters and some even forum admins themselves we expect to have no problems with respect. The staff is chosen from the best members here, they are devoted to the forums, they know the community and they are spending their time to help this community grow. This is why respect towards them is mandatory and will be enforced. Should you think you were mistreated or fail to see what guidelines you broke, please send a polite PM to inquire about the issue. Being disrespectful towards the staff will cause instant account termination. As a general rule we don't explain why we take some of the administrative measures we take, but we are still willing to offer some input in private. Don't start threads in the forums about this. They will get deleted.

Account termination

As a member in the community you benefit from a lot of features. Your activity here must be within the guidelines. Your activity here is not mandatory and we understand that you might have other things to take care of and not only stay and post here. This is why we find the 'good-bye' threads to be inappropriate in this case. You are not required to be here day by day, you can return after weeks and months and find your posts and account as they were before. We treat the 'good-bye' threads as 'drama posts' and delete them on sight.

We don't delete accounts. Please don't ask us to remove your posts since we don't do this. As a member in the forums you participate in the discussion and also promote yourself. Your posts become the property of Wtricks.com as soon as they have been made. We have the right to edit, delete and keep them here, but we won't post them elsewhere. Should you wish to be no longer linked to the site, we'll edit your account with a general nickname and delete all your personal information. After being edited your account will have banned status and you won't be able to re-join the community in the future.

Aggressive Behaviour

Aggressive behaviour towards members, or staff will not be tolerated. We don't accept any forms or verbal aggression, foul language or flame wars. Please make sure you are using a common sense language and don't get involved in altercations with other members. Should you feel like a post was directed to you and you consider that to be offensive, please notify the Administrator through a PM. Replying to the offence in the thread makes you as guilty as the member who initiated the attack.

Advertising
The only place our members can advertise their services is the 'market place'. After having 20 posts in the forums you'll be able to post there and place your ad. You are NOT allowed to advertise anything related to illegal activities.

Language

As you might have already noticed, we are trying to offer a family friendly site with good information and content. This is why our members are encouraged to use proper language and try to write as good as they possibly can. We are aware that the chat style is already a second nature to many of our members, but we enforce the proper use of the English language. We don't spell-check your posts or enforce a perfect syntax (since many of our members are not native English speakers), but we want you to try to write the best you can.

We don't tolerate foul language. We have underaged members and we want to provide them with a pleasant and safe environment to grow their webmaster skills. Please refrain from using foul language and report the use of such words.

Signature rules
The general rule is that we allow our members to have 2 rows of text in the signature and 3 clickable links.

NO images, NO animations, NO scripts in the links. Smilies are considered graphics too, so please do not add them.

Do not place duplicate refference to a site (the main domain and afterwards in the other link a subdirectory of it). In other words, don't have the same site in 2 links: a main site and then the forums for instance. Each link must be a completelly different domain name.

Your links can be named with the site title: Dojo Design for instance, but not advertising slogans like: 'best free script' or similar. Do not post slogans like: 'join now', 'visit now' and similar. They will be considered ads and the signature removed. Do not post PRICES and ADS in the sig. Do not place affiliate and refferal links in the signatures or in the posts

No refferal links
We consider it unfair for other members here to post referral links and try to trick them into folling them. This is why we accept ONLY normal quality links. Affiliate links in signatures or in the posts will be deleted and the member warned.

Warez, porn, illegal, etc

Linking to malicious programs, pornography, etc. will not be tolerated at all! We don't want these links or similar topics to be related to our site, so don't use them.

Asking and offering site reviews

You can get a detailed review for your site and forum as long as it is not warez, adult related or another questionable content. Should you feel like you are not sure if the site can be eligible for review, PM the administrator and you will get a response for this question. We don't review anything related to adult or warez content.

How to ask and deal with a review

As a general rule, plese see the review as a chance to get feed-back on your layout and not as a chance to recruit members or advertise your site. Should we feel you are trying to 'fish' people and are not interested in a review, we'll delete the topic. When asking for a review please make sure you give us the URL and some information about what you wanted to achieve. Not posting an URL makes people's review work harder and some won't be willing to do the detective work. So, provide information and a clickable link. Do not mention in the post anything like 'If you like the site, why not join' and other incentives. You are asking for a review, don't use the thread to promote or hire members.

You should als be aware that maybe some of the members here won't think that the site is as good as you thought it was. Be prepared to HANDLE the constructive criticism. If you can't handle the tips and comments, then maybe you are not yet prepared to ask for a reviw. Becoming defensive and picking on the members that have given you some tips to improve will cause the thread to be delted. Please remain polite and thankful for the fact our members spend some of their time to help you create a better site.

We don't review stock templates and forum skins! It's not that we don't appreciate you effort into working on a template, but we think only installing a template you have downloaded for free or paid for with not too much customization is not something worth of a review. Prepare to handle some criticism and be redirected to working more on the template. Should we see you didn't work at all at the site, we'll remove the thread since we won't have what to review.

How to offer a good review

A good review takes into account the layout, site activity, content, navigation, ads placement and so on. Please make sure you offer a positive input. Praise the good sides of the site and offer input for improving. Don't tell anyone 'your site sucks'. This is not how a webmaster should review a site. Be polite and give ideas for improvement. If a site is using a template with little customization, please make sure you announce the thread started that he should work more on the layout.

Username

Short and easy to remember. Do not use your site title since it will be considered advertising. Don't use something like 'wtricks.com' as an username, for instance.

ONE user only
You are required to have 1 user only. Should we discover a double account you'll be asked to chose one to continue your activity here.

PM system
As any forum, 'Webmaster Tips & Tricks' is offering you a private message system for you to discuss privately with other members. Don't use this to recruit other members. This would be considered spam and you'll lose your account here. Should you receive such PM messages, please report the abuse.