Florida Floodplain Managers Association

This site employs a great deal of interactivity, and in order to take full advantage of it, you may wish to read through these instructions. Please read through them completely before you send a question to the webmaster. If your question is already addressed here, you will not receive a reply:

We decided that the best way to permit a moderated contribution system would be to use the "Blogger" engine, which allows reporters to type in their stories without needing access to our FTP servers, or even needing to know what an FTP server is. All you need to know is a limited amount of HTML so that you can create links to your sources and include pictures, bold and italics, headers and so forth.

For your benefit, we have included a few HTML-code templates that you can use (requires FFMA membership to access). Simply choose the format that best suits your story, cut and paste the code into the Blogger reporting window, and replace the fields with the appropriate text where necessary. However, we do recommend that you familiarize yourself with basic HTML tags so that you won't have to depend upon the limitations of our templates. The instructions for that are included on the HTML template page.

You should have received an invitation via email to become a team member through the Blogger engine already. If not, click here to request an invitation. The instructions for how to log on to use the Blogger are included in that email. It's really easy once you get the hang of it, and you can report from anywhere in the world that has an Internet connection to the web.

There are separate "blogs" for each site section. The news on the front page is a separate blog from the FFMA Newsletter, and the Newsletter is separate from the Calendar. So, be sure that you are logging on to the correct blog when you are ready to post a story. Alternatively, you can right-click on the links below and add them to your "Favorites" list:

Then, when you are ready to post, you can click it from your Favorites and a small window will pop up, allowing you to post to that blog. When you click "Post and Publish", the webpage will be updated. That's all there is to it!

In order to access this section, you will need to join the FFMA. If you are already a member, but you have not received a login and password, please click here to request one.

First, you will need to be a member of the FFMA. This is not a publicly-accessible forum. Log in to the members area to access the bulletin board, or click here. You can use the same the same username and password you were given to log in to the members area. Once you are in the BBS, you will need to click on the link to register. All you have to do to register is choose a username and password, then you can start posting away!

Access to the chat system requires FFMA membership. Log in to the members area, or click here. Pick a nickname and click the button to join the chat room. The following commands are usable in the chatroom:

/me
The /me is an action message.
Type /me 'does anything'
Example: /me waves hello

What it looks like:
* bossmom waves hello

/msg
Type /msg nickname (message) to start a private chat.
Example: /msg puddytat Hey tat, how are you?

What it looks like:
-> *puddytat* Hey tat, how are you?

/nick
/nick changes your nickname
Example: type /nick newnickname (limit 9 characters)

What it looks like: I typed /nick luv2quilt
*** bossmom is now known as luv2quilt

/notice
A notice is used to send a short message to another person without opening up a private window.
Type /notice nickname (message)
Example: /notice badnick Please change your nickname for this family channel.

What it looks like:
-> -badnick- Please change your nickname for this family channel.

/query
Similar to the /msg, except it forces a window to pop open.
Type /query nickname (message)
Example: /query Sofaspud^ Sooo....what's new?

What it looks like:
<luv2quilt> soooo....what's new?

/ignore
Unfortunately, there will be times when you don't want to talk to someone, or else someone may be harassing you.
By typing /ignore nickname 3, you will not receive anymore messages from that person.
Example: /ignore luv2quilt 3
To Unignore them, type /ignore -r luv2quilt 3

What it looks like:
*** Added *!*bossmom@*.dialup.netins.net to ignore list
*** Removed *!*bossmom@*.dialup.netins.net from ignore list

/whois
Type /whois nickname to see a bit more information about another user. You'll see what server another person is using, or what their ISP is. Pretty helpful when you don't recognize a nickname that wants to chat. You may recognize the IP, (Internet Protocol) and then feel more comfortable carrying on a conversation. You'll also be able to see what other channels a person is in, which might be a good indicator if you really want to talk with them or not.
Example: /whois bossmom

What it looks like:
luv2quilt is bossmom@elwo-01-094.dialup.netins.net * Enjoy the Journey........
luv2quilt on @#bossmom
luv2quilt using Seattle.WA.US.Undernet.org the time for school is during a recession.
luv2quilt has been idle 18secs, signed on Sun Jul 23 18:47:26
luv2quilt End of /WHOIS list.

/topic
Type /topic Your Topic Here to define the room topic. This topic will be scrolled across the top of the chat box, and will be messaged to any users who enter the room.
Example: /topic Floods in Central Florida

What it looks like:
The topic for this channel is now Floods In Central Florida

It is simple to subscribe to the list. You simply send an email message to floods-subscribe@topica.com. Unsubscribing is just as simple; send a message to floods-unsubscribe@topica.com.

Sending messages to the group is also easy, but it does require having some awareness of the type of email message you are sending to the group. Many people use HTML encoding in their email messages, sometimes without even realizing it. However, in order to protect the users of the list from harmful computer viruses, which often propagate through email, only plain text messages are permitted with no attachments or multipart MIME encoding.

This means that you cannot use the stationeries or formatting that you may enjoy using in your messages, nor can you send photographs or documents as attachments. If you try to send a message to this list that is not plain text, it will be ignored by the list.

You can change the formatting of your message easily:

When composing a new message, click the Format menu, and you will see an option to choose either Plain Text or Rich Text (HTML). Choose Plain Text.

To set your email program so that it always composes the emails in plain text when sending it to this group, open your Address Book, chose the list (floods@topica.com) entry. Open the Properties for that entry, and click on the Name tab. You will see a checkbox that says "Send E-mail using plain text only." Enable this feature, and press OK. Whenever you compose a new message to this group, it will format it in plain text automatically.

In Communicator:

You can choose between a plain-text or HTML composition window for creating mail messages, and you can specify whether recipients prefer to receive plain-text or HTML formatted messages.

From the Edit menu, choose Preferences. Then select Formatting from the Mail & Newsgroup Preferences category.

Choose whether you want to use HTML editor or the plain-text editor to compose your messages.

When you add a person or address card to your address book, you can specify whether that addressee should always receive messages in HTML formatting. If this information is unknown, choose one of options to specify how messages should be delivered. You can always override these settings through the Options panel of the Composition window.

Web-based email:

Most of the web-based email clients, such as Yahoo, MSN, etc., have an option in the composition window for plain text formatting. Yahoo, for example, has a link in the composition window "Switch To Plain Version", when you click on this you are given the option to format your email in plain text. You must enable this feature in order to contribute to the list.

With this in mind, it is generally better to use plain text formatting anyway, because not everyone can see HTML messages correctly, and some administrators filter them out automatically due to the security risk that may be posed by Multipart MIME encoding exploits. Also, it is easier to quote plain text in your reply, and it consumes less disk space. So, while you will have to sacrifice some formatting in your email messages, you may wish to consider switching to plain text encoding permanently.