This issue keeps cropping up as a side issue to other posts so I thought I would post it here for posterity

The question is, how do I include part or all of someone's post in my reply? First let's deal with the obvious question of 'Why would I want to do that?' This forum uses a flat presentation where each post and all its replies follow one another in chronological order. If someone wants to reply to a point raised in the original post (OP) or a subsequent reply, but there have been other replies in the meantime, then it becomes very difficult to relate the reply to the question.

So this is where the QUOTE feature comes in. When you view a post you will see that the OP and every reply has a blue button way over on the right hand side of the screen that says QUOTE. If you press that button instead of the REPLY or QUICK REPLY buttons, the system will copy the OP or reply that you selected, into your reply.

In its simplest form, the entire OP or reply will be quoted and you can add your comments.

However, you may want to reply to just one point in a long entry. You can do this quite easily by editing the quoted text to remove the unwanted text. But there is one thing you need to be careful about!

When the text is copied into your reply you will see that it is prefixed and suffixed with some commands in square brackets - quote=name of poster and /quote. The system uses these commands to figure out where to draw the box that surrounds any quote, where the quoted text starts, who to identify as the poster and where the quoted text ends. It's really important that you do NOT delete either of these commands or the square brackets that surround them. If you do then the system will not be able to recognise the commands, which will have unpredictable results but will usually mean that the quoted text will look no different to your reply.

If you are unsure whether you have done it correctly there is a way to check before you commit your post. If you look at the bottom of the edit screen you will see three buttons Preview Post Cancel. As the name implies the Preview button will show you what your reply will look like but will keep the edit window open below so you can make changes. When you are happy, press Post and your reply will be posted.