Newcomers guide - posting guidelines, access to features etc.

Welcome to Hexus!
This post is intended to give a brief explanation of the posting ethos at Hexus and how forum functionality opens up at different stages.

Hexus is a family-friendly place for (mainly) tech-related discussions. As a general guideline for posting please keep things respectful - disagreement is fine but personal attacks are not. Promotional or other posts trying to take advantage of Hexus will be subject to disciplinary action.

Constructive posts
As a new user your posts may be (pre- and post-) moderated based on their constructiveness. Constructive posts are posts which make a useful, timely, contribution to the forums. Posts which are brief, off-topic, appear not to have read the thread, replying to an old and now out-of-date question or are otherwise made without much thought etc. may be deleted. If this happens don't worry, just use a bit more thought next time. Once you've been here a while we don't enforce this so much since you'll already have the post count benefits listed below through your constructive posts.

Post count rewards (a.k.a. why can't I see PMs/my profile etc.?)
The rewards and privileges for remaining a contributing member of the HEXUS.community are listed below. Only constructive posts are counted:

• 5 - Enables the ability to post URLs
• 15 - Enables "Thank user" option on individual posts
• 15 - User Control Panel access
  
  • Lets you amend your profile, change settings, add your system details, add or change your signature, etc.
  • Enables Personal Messages (PMs). Limit of 70 saved messages.
  • Lets you post on other users Visitor Message boards
• 20 - Scan2HEXUS free shipping - SCAN2HEXUS - Free shipping - Information and Rules and SCAN2HEXUS - Free Shipping setup guide!
• 100 - Enables access to the Classifieds section to buy and sell second hand tech - Please read the rules for this forum before posting
• 200 - Enables you to change your Custom user title (below your forum name)
• 200 - Enables HEXUS.Gallery on your account (HEXUS.gallery)
• 500 - Enables you to specify a custom Avatar

Forum functionality changes take an hour or so to come into effect; the Scan free-shipping offer will take at least a day. See SCAN2HEXUS - Free Shipping setup guide! for more details.

SCAN2HEXUS Free shipping
For the SCAN2HEXUS Free shipping you will need your user ID, this is in the top right hand corner of the forum, under Welcome, Username. It can also be found in the footer right at the bottom of every forum web page.

Please read the following threads first: SCAN2HEXUS - Free shipping - Information and Rules and SCAN2HEXUS - Free Shipping setup guide!

Useful links

• BB Code List - Shows all the available BB codes available on the forums. And a couple that aren't. The "Attachment" and "Signature Picture" tags are not supported.
• Forum Rules - Official forum rules statement.
• User Groups - This shows all the mods, admins, staff and special users. See below for what the colours mean.
• Smilies - Shows the smilies and their codes supported by the forums. You can also click the More link below the advanced message box.

What the user colours mean

Dark Red = Moderator
Orange = Admin not employed by HEXUS
Light Blue = Admin employed by HEXUS
Dark Blue/Navy = care@HEXUS - moderators for company-specific forums
Green = HEXUS.Social membership

(Thanks to TAKTAK and Saracen for these with a bit more detail here)
(Full list of all members of all the special user groups)

HEXUS.Social membership
We have a social section for real-life meet-ups. Attend several and get a green username! This needs 3 or more "social points"
A Meet is 1 point, a LAN is 1 point and a Mini-meet or partial attendance is 0.5 points.
OR
Special recognition up to 3 points, for keeping the social organiser sane/helping out with arrangements.

More details here: HEXUS.social - Big Changes afoot... Watch this space!

Questions?
Feel free to post on the suggestions board with any questions/comments you have. Or if you have enough posts for a PM drop a note to any mod/admin.

(Thanks Funkstar for the original version of this post)