I decided to add Araknet back to my BBS. I created the message section,
then imported the areas via a .NA file. The areas imported just fine,
but when I looked at them in the BBS, there was the message section I
created called ARAKNET. Inside of that was another section called
Araknet. Inside that section were all of the areas I'd created.

Odd.

I tried adding them manually, the same thing happened.

I noticed that the .NA file description was

"Araknet: Area Description"

and that the area description on the BBS was

"Area Description"

So, it seemed that the area chooser was parsing the name and making a subsection out of the part of the description preceeding the colon.

When I edited the .NA file to remove the colons between "Araknet" and the
area description and re-imported the areas, they imported the way I'd
expect - ARAKNET message section, which included all of the areas at the
root of the section.

Not sure if that's a bug or a feature, but it could come in handy -
especially with large file libraries.



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On Wed, 17 Dec 2025 07:45:14 -0800
"poindexter FORTRAN" (VERT/REALITY) <VERT/REALITY!poindexter.FORTRAN@endofthelinebbs.com> wrote:

I decided to add Araknet back to my BBS. I created the message
section, then imported the areas via a .NA file. The areas imported
just fine, but when I looked at them in the BBS, there was the
message section I created called ARAKNET. Inside of that was another
section called Araknet. Inside that section were all of the areas I'd created.

Odd.

I tried adding them manually, the same thing happened.

I noticed that the .NA file description was

"Araknet: Area Description"

and that the area description on the BBS was

"Area Description"

So, it seemed that the area chooser was parsing the name and making a subsection out of the part of the description preceeding the colon.

When I edited the .NA file to remove the colons between "Araknet" and
the area description and re-imported the areas, they imported the way
I'd expect - ARAKNET message section, which included all of the areas
at the root of the section.

Not sure if that's a bug or a feature, but it could come in handy - especially with large file libraries.

It's not a glitch. It's a feature.

In DDMsgAreaChooser.cfg

; Whether or not to enable name collapsing. For
; example, for groups or sub-boards in a group starting with
; common text and a separator (specified below), the
; common text will be the only one displayed, and when
; the user selects it, a 3rd tier with the sub-boards
; after the separator will be shown
useSubCollapsing=false
; The separator to use for sub-board collapsing
subCollapseSeparator=:
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Re: DDAreaChooser glitch
By: poindexter FORTRAN to Nightfox on Wed Dec 17 2025 07:45 am

I decided to add Araknet back to my BBS. I created the message section, then imported the areas via a .NA file. The areas imported just fine, but when I looked at them in the BBS, there was the message section I created called ARAKNET. Inside of that was another section called Araknet. Inside that section were all of the areas I'd created.

Odd.

I tried adding them manually, the same thing happened.

I noticed that the .NA file description was

"Araknet: Area Description"

and that the area description on the BBS was

"Area Description"

That doesn't sound like a bug, that sounds like sub-board collapsing. Do you have that enabled? Normally that's disabled by default.. In your DDMsgAreaChooser.cfg (or .example.cfg), check whether the useSubCollapsing is true or false.

Nightfox

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Re: Re: DDAreaChooser glitch
By: nelgin to All on Wed Dec 17 2025 10:28 am

It's not a glitch. It's a feature.

In DDMsgAreaChooser.cfg

; Whether or not to enable name collapsing. For ; example, for groups or sub-boards in a group starting with ; common text and a separator (specified below), the ; common text will be the only one displayed, and when ; the user selects it, a 3rd tier with the sub-boards ; after the separator will be shown
useSubCollapsing=false

Normally that's disabled by default, so it's odd that he's seeing that. Unless perhaps it was turned on at one point and forgotten about.

Nightfox

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