BBCode

[Corinnebelle]

BBcode

This forum has an option to use BBcode. BBcode stands for Bulletin board code. It is based on the same principle as HTML code, but is designed to prevent errors and security issues with HTML. BBcode is processed to check for errors before translated into HTML code. It has been around since 1998.

Here are some codes:

Tags (These are the code pieces you need to format your text.)

Colors

Advanced colors

I'm sure someone will come up with something better than this, but maybe this can be a standin in the meantime. Feel free to add suggested web pages or make your own post instead.

[justheaven]

Thank you for this thread, I was just about to post something similar myself.

To convert HTML to BBCode you can use this site: https://codebeautify.org/html-to-bbcode-converter

Simply paste the html of the post in the left field and then it automatically converts it to bbcode in the right field, like so:

The em code is replaced with the i for italics.

[duome]

Markdown is also available if you need to repost something from duolingo forums and you can access the source code (i.e. if it's your own post and you can edit it to see the markdown code - just copy and paste).

[Corinnebelle]

In saving some posts from Duo the code didn't seem to bother it even for italics. It's all come out very nicely. Even tables. They were my own posts. That must be markdown.

Markdown is a lightweight markup language for creating formatted text using a plain-text editor.

Source

Markdown cheat sheet

This is Duolingo's code right?

[duome]

Yes )

[EranBarLev]

To convert HTML to BBCode you can use this site: https://codebeautify.org/html-to-bbcode-converter

Simply paste the html of the post in the left field and then it automatically converts it to bbcode in the right field

Sorry for the stupid question but how do I copy the HTML from the Duo forum? If I just copy the text then I lose all the formatting. I tried the URL button, pasting the URL of the Duo post, but it seems to get stuck.

[Jenga218]

To convert HTML to BBCode you can use this site: https://codebeautify.org/html-to-bbcode-converter

Simply paste the html of the post in the left field and then it automatically converts it to bbcode in the right field

Sorry for the stupid question but how do I copy the HTML from the Duo forum? If I just copy the text then I lose all the formatting. I tried the URL button, pasting the URL of the Duo post, but it seems to get stuck.

This is not easy and is certainly not a stupid question. I'll likely explain it badly. Also no idea if this works with other browsers/operating systems. I'm on Windows 11 using Chrome. Might have a look around for a youtube video that explains this better than I can.

Edit: maybe this one?

When you have the post you want, hit "F12" on your keyboard.
This opens a toolbar on the right-hand side of your screen that displays the source code for any website.

You can mouse over the codes and this will highlight sections of the web page in blue or orange. I find I have to click on little arrows a few times so that only the comment I want is hilighted rather than all the other toolbars on the website. I can then right click on that line of code and select "edit as HTML"

Then CTRL+A to select the code, and CTRL+C to copy. Paste it into that beautiful HTML to BBCode converter linked above and you're good to go.

The one thing I've found doesn't transfer over this way is tables. Those I'm needing to fix up manually in a markdown-table-generator.

[EranBarLev]

I'll likely explain it badly.

No, it's was a great explanation and I've just posted something in the Portuguese using your method! Thanks!

[EranBarLev]

The one thing I've found doesn't transfer over this way is tables. Those I'm needing to fix up manually in a markdown-table-generator.

We'll need to find some way to do it automatically because most important posts contain tables. I'll first start with posts without tables for now.

[eI000yo]

Markdown is also available if you need to repost something from duolingo forums and you can access the source code (i.e. if it's your own post and you can edit it to see the markdown code - just copy and paste).

Hi everyone!
Hi @duome!

You can see and copy the original posts in MarkDown if you open the JSON file.
It is very easy to see them:

• Open a discussion, for instance, https://forum.duolingo.com/comment/55121176.

• Replace forum with www, and add an s after comment.

• You'll get https://www.duolingo.com/comments/55121176

• The string in the message field is the original posted text.

• Don't copy the double quotation marks.

• \r\n is the code for RETURN. Replace each group of 4 letters with one true RETURN from the keyboard.

The best browser to view them is Firefox.
I usually use a MarkDown editor. There are several.
ReText, for example, has a preview.
The only problem is that the 3 BBCode used on Duolingo are not parsed.

If you can contact the author, a permission to copy is a good idea, even though when you post on Duolingo, you grant to Duolingo a license to use your posts, even to copy it on a third company. See Duolingo Terms.
If I am not wrong, Duolingo allows you to preserve some content according to posted at Important updates to Duolingo forums.

[justheaven]

eI000yo's post is very helpful and something I didn't know, so I'll be using it in the future.

What I've been doing to copy the HTML (I'm using Firefox btw) is just selecting the text I want, then right-click -> View Selection Source, like so:

Then a page is opened with the html code of your selection you just have to copy it and then paste it in the BBcode converter. However I'm still additionally fixing things myself when I see they look wonky after the convert. And yes, copying tables atm is a challenge, to say the least.

Another site that helps if you want to quickly replace tags with other tags: https://www.browserling.com/tools/text-replace

But I'm currently using https://archive.ph/ to just save the original posts with comments because it's less exhausting. There's just so much to save and I'm only working on the Spanish from English forum, I can't even imagine what this must be for people who are trying to preserve more than 1 subforums.

A few things I noticed while saving posts with archive.ph (in case you want to use it too):

• posts that have -5 downvotes will NOT save, it will just show the 3 loading dots. They need to be upvoted to be shown and saved effectively.
• posts with many comments/long comments with a lot of images and data won't archive completely the comment section. The post will save but some of the lower comments will be left out. This is probably because according to the archive.ph FAQ there's a limit to the page size: "The stored page with all images must be smaller than 50Mb".

So with that in mind hopefully we can use both copying and archiving to be able to preserve most of the stuff.

[EranBarLev]

You can see and copy the original posts in MarkDown if you open the JSON file.

Yay! I just copied a post in the Portuguese forum using your method. This solves the tables problem! Thanks!
I did have to correct some things manually - the accents like áêõ appear as some weird codes.

BTW text doesn't work here.

[EranBarLev]

• posts with many comments/long comments with a lot of images and data won't archive completely the comment section. The post will save but some of the lower comments will be left out. This is probably because according to the archive.ph FAQ there's a limit to the page size: "The stored page with all images must be smaller than 50Mb".

I opened a new post about this in the Troubleshooting forum. One of my post was only half saved, not only the comments but the post itself. I checked some of your Spanish posts, and you also have some half saved posts.

[eI000yo]

You can see and copy the original posts in MarkDown if you open the JSON file.

Yay! I just copied a post in the Portuguese forum using your method. This solves the tables problem! Thanks!
I did have to correct some things manually - the accents like áêõ appear as some weird codes.

BTW text doesn't work here.

Hi @EranBarLev!
Hi @justheaven!

Duolingo uses 3 BBCodes. The admin fixed the one related to BR, very important in the tables.
Please @duome, fix that one to.

An hour ago I requested to create a subforum for TEST.
The third code is text-color. I think that it works, but I haven't test it.

Considering that this forum is in use just for a few days, everything is almost perfect.

I have saved several codes, almost posted by Fierycat, my hero. Search site:forum.duolingo.com "FieryCat" in Google, Yandex, Bing, Yahoo and you will get 2K results.
You can replace this user name with another one and all or almost all the discussions with 0 or positive votes will be in the results.

Duolingo saves the accented characters as a code.
May be you can do a list of equivalences and replace them with the tool REPLACE ALL of a text editor.
This is my way to solves this problem.
Also the same issue is in the download file if you go to EXPORT MY DATA at https://www.duolingo.com/settings/account.
The only advantage is that all your post are there, also the not visible online.

[justheaven]

• posts with many comments/long comments with a lot of images and data won't archive completely the comment section. The post will save but some of the lower comments will be left out. This is probably because according to the archive.ph FAQ there's a limit to the page size: "The stored page with all images must be smaller than 50Mb".

I opened a new post about this in the Troubleshooting forum. One of my post was only half saved, not only the comments but the post itself. I checked some of your Spanish posts, and you also have some half saved posts.

Oh no. Can you please link me to the ones you saw are half saved. I want to manually copy them in the forum if that's the case. If it's about FieryCat's Vocab per Skill posts I'm aware and that's why I had to copy the whole thing.

I'll check some other links I posted. Damn, this is going to be more exhausting than I thought it would be.

Thank you for letting me know!

[Fnirk1]

The one thing I've found doesn't transfer over this way is tables. Those I'm needing to fix up manually in a markdown-table-generator.

We'll need to find some way to do it automatically because most important posts contain tables. I'll first start with posts without tables for now.

Has someone found an easy way to transfer tables?

[EranBarLev]

The one thing I've found doesn't transfer over this way is tables. Those I'm needing to fix up manually in a markdown-table-generator.

We'll need to find some way to do it automatically because most important posts contain tables. I'll first start with posts without tables for now.

Has someone found an easy way to transfer tables?

Yes! @eI000yo's comment above. You copy the markdown code with the tables.
viewtopic.php?p=543#p543

[EranBarLev]

Oh no. Can you please link me to the ones you saw are half saved. I want to manually copy them in the forum if that's the case. If it's about FieryCat's Vocab per Skill posts I'm aware and that's why I had to copy the whole thing.

Also FieryCat's Most Popular Sentences and Comments. It lists 100 comments, but archive.ph saved only until #73. The post itself is OK, the problem is just the archive. And these 2 don't even have any images, they're just long.

[Fnirk1]

We'll need to find some way to do it automatically because most important posts contain tables. I'll first start with posts without tables for now.

Has someone found an easy way to transfer tables?

Yes! @eI000yo's comment above. You copy the markdown code with the tables.
viewtopic.php?p=543#p543

Thanks for your reply.

However, I have no experience working with different scripts/codes. (I learned only yesterday how to convert Html to BBC, and not without problem) So I feel I am missing out on something. And this might be a stupid question.
I am on chrome if that has anything to do with my problem.
If I follow the instruction and change "forum" to "www" and add an "s" i get a page full om massive text. I can localise the original text in it, but I have no "message box". But I guess this is not Markdown code? So which part of the text am I supposed to copy and what am I supposed to do with it?

[EranBarLev]

Also FieryCat's Most Popular Sentences and Comments. It lists 100 comments, but archive.ph saved only until #73. The post itself is OK, the problem is just the archive. And these 2 don't even have any images, they're just long.

Do the missing comments have negative scores?

No, I meant the original post has a list of 100 comments.

[eI000yo]

You could check the links posted by FieryCat very recently. I paste here the message:

I found out the other day that duolingo is going to get rid of the forum, so I decided to share my lists elsewhere to save them.

• Web version: https://liuch.github.io/duolingo_courses_overview/

• Repository with the original markdown files and utilites: https://github.com/liuch/duolingo_courses_overview

The original post is at https://forum.duolingo.com/comment/5020 ... d=55982316

[EranBarLev]

I am on chrome if that has anything to do with my problem.
If I follow the instruction and change "forum" to "www" and add an "s" i get a page full om massive text. I can localise the original text in it, but I have no "message box". But I guess this is not Markdown code? So which part of the text am I supposed to copy and what am I supposed to do with it?

I don't use Chrome, so maybe someone else has a better answer.
The original post and each comment are preceded by "message":" followed by the markdown code, then another quotation mark. The original post is the bottom one. Copy the markdown code and paste it in this forum.
I hope it helps

[justheaven]

Has someone found an easy way to transfer tables?

Yes! @eI000yo's comment above. You copy the markdown code with the tables.
viewtopic.php?p=543#p543

Thanks for your reply.

However, I have no experience working with different scripts/codes. (I learned only yesterday how to convert Html to BBC, and not without problem) So I feel I am missing out on something. And this might be a stupid question.
I am on chrome if that has anything to do with my problem.
If I follow the instruction and change "forum" to "www" and add an "s" i get a page full om massive text. I can localise the original text in it, but I have no "message box". But I guess this is not Markdown code? So which part of the text am I supposed to copy and what am I supposed to do with it?

Best way to do this on Chrome:
to find the code you need to copy: hit CTRL + F to open the search box (or click the three vertical dots in the upper right corner and select "Find..."), then put the first few words of the DL post. In this instance the post starts with As you can see. This is what you'll get:

There are 2 found codes, you need the second one. Copy the text from the first to the last quotation marks, without including them, like so:

Then you can further edit the code manually or with the text replace tool. Hope this helps.

[justheaven]

Also FieryCat's Most Popular Sentences and Comments. It lists 100 comments, but archive.ph saved only until #73. The post itself is OK, the problem is just the archive. And these 2 don't even have any images, they're just long.

Do the missing comments have negative scores?

I did a test myself. Yes, the comments with negative scores do not get archived. Such comments are not visible to anyone who is not logged in to DuoLingo , thus the "web spider" can't retrieve them.

I'm glad the negative comments are not saved, after all they are usually spam. The problem is that EranBarLev is not being able to view the whole archive post, just a part of it. I'm wondering if it's maybe a problem on their end. Because another user here Sofia222677 yesterday commented in this thread viewtopic.php?t=176 that they can see the whole post no problem. I also have no problems with the archives EranBarLev is mentioning. Maybe he can test it on another browser, just in case. Hope we can figure this out.

Usually the archive post has % numbers from 0% to 100% framed around the post while you scroll down. They are on the left side:

(the screenshots are from this archived post: https://archive.ph/Omz4r)

You can also navigate through the % marks when the post is very long.

You should be able to see the 100% at the end of it. Are you seeing the 100% mark and does it look like my screenshots?

(not sure if this should be moved in the appropriate thread for this problem here: viewtopic.php?t=176??)

[EranBarLev]

• \r\n is the code for RETURN. Replace each group of 4 letters with one true RETURN from the keyboard.

Is there a way to do this automatically? For example in a text editor, what character should replace it to make it insert a true RETURN? BTW I don't see \r at all, only \n.

[Fnirk1]

Yes! @eI000yo's comment above. You copy the markdown code with the tables.
viewtopic.php?p=543#p543

Thanks for your reply.

However, I have no experience working with different scripts/codes. (I learned only yesterday how to convert Html to BBC, and not without problem) So I feel I am missing out on something. And this might be a stupid question.
I am on chrome if that has anything to do with my problem.
If I follow the instruction and change "forum" to "www" and add an "s" i get a page full om massive text. I can localise the original text in it, but I have no "message box". But I guess this is not Markdown code? So which part of the text am I supposed to copy and what am I supposed to do with it?

Best way to do this on Chrome:
to find the code you need to copy: hit CTRL + F to open the search box (or click the three vertical dots in the upper right corner and select "Find..."), then put the first few words of the DL post. In this instance the post starts with As you can see. This is what you'll get:

There are 2 found codes, you need the second one. Copy the text from the first to the last quotation marks, without including them, like so:

Then you can further edit the code manually or with the text replace tool. Hope this helps.

Thanks, that sorted it out! (Yet another post rescued!)

[eI000yo]

• \r\n is the code for RETURN. Replace each group of 4 letters with one true RETURN from the keyboard.

Is there a way to do this automatically? For example in a text editor, what character should replace it to make it insert a true RETURN? BTW I don't see \r at all, only \n.

Hi EranBarLev!

Apparentely if you replace the group with the BBCode for Breaking Return, it works fine.
I tested it at viewtopic.php?t=346, and you can see the result.
I wrote Test[br]Test[br][br]Test

Edited: In the forum-posts.csv I received from Duolingo, the code for remplace RETURN is \r\n, but in JSON of the posts I also can see \n\n
It is possible to create a script but a REPLACE ALL solves the issue, IMO.
I am not a programmer, I only know a little bit of programming codes.