BBCode

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Lightweight markup language used in message boards

Not to be confused with BBC.

BBCode ("Bulletin Board Code") is a lightweight markup language used to format messages in many Internet forum software. It was first introduced in 1998.^[1] The available "tags" of BBCode are usually indicated by square brackets ([ and ]) surrounding a keyword, and are parsed before being translated into HTML.^{[citation needed]}

Tags

[edit]

Example in HTML/CSS BBCode Output

bolded textb>

^[2] or

bolded textspan>

[b]bolded text[/b]

bolded text

italicized texti>

italicized textspan>

[i]italicized text[/i]

italicized text

underlined textu>

underlined textspan>

[u]underlined text[/u]

underlined text

<s>strikethrough texts>

<del>strikethrough textdel>

strikethrough textspan>

[s]strikethrough text[/s]

~~strikethrough text~~

<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org">https://en.wikipedia.orga>

<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org">English Wikipediaa>

[url]https://en.wikipedia.org[/url]

[url=https://en.wikipedia.org]English Wikipedia[/url]

https://en.wikipedia.org

English Wikipedia

<img src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/70/Example.png" alt="Example image">

[img alt="Example image" ]https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/70/Example.png[/img]

<img src="Smileys/Face-smile.svg" alt=":-)">

:)

[:-)]

This would be another way to use the [img]url_img[/img] and must be pre-configured by the forum administrator.

(This and other emoticons, depending on the variant. Most BBCodes do not enclose emoticons in square brackets, leading to frequent accidental usage.)

(Specific image and size vary.)

<blockquote>quoted textp>blockquote>

(Usually implemented in more advanced ways.)

[quote]quoted text[/quote]

[quote="author"]quoted text[/quote]

(including optional author)

Using a Wikipedia template:

quoted text

-- author

<pre><code>computer codecode>pre>

[code]computer code[/code]

computer code

<pre>monospaced textpre>

[pre]monospaced text[/pre]

monospaced text

Large Textspan>

Smaller Textspan>

[style size="30px"]Large Text[/style]

[style size="85"]Smaller Text[/style]

[size="30px"]Large Text[/size]

[size="85"]Smaller Text[/size]

(The unit of measurement varies with each BBCode variant and could represent pixels, points, or relative HTML sizes.)

Large Text

Smaller Text

Text in fuchsiaspan>

Text in fuchsiaspan>

[style color="fuchsia"]Text in fuchsia[/style]

[style color=#FF00FF]Text in fuchsia[/style]

[color=#FF00FF]Text in fuchsia[/color]

(Both HTML color names and hexadecimal color values are generally supported, although on some boards, you must omit the # from selecting a hexadecimal color.)

Text in fuchsia

<ul> <li>Entry Ali> <li>Entry Bli> ul> <ol> <li>Entry 1li> <li>Entry 2li> ol>

[list] [*]Entry A [*]Entry B [/list] [list=1] [*]Entry 1 [*]Entry 2 [/list]

Some message boards do not need the square brackets around the markers.^[3]

(Many variants for li and /li, list types - unordered and ordered, with different bullets or counter formats - etc.)

Entry A
Entry B

Entry 1
Entry 2

<table> <tr> <th>column header 1th> <th>column header 2th> tr> <tr> <td>table cell 1td> <td>table cell 2td> tr> table>

[table] [tr] [th]column header 1[/th] [th]tcolumn header 2[/th] [/tr] [tr] [td]table cell 1[/td] [td]table cell 2[/td] [/tr] [/table]

(Some variants for thead, rules, etc.)

column header 1	column header 2
table cell 1	table cell 2

Source:^[4]

Implementation

[edit]

BBCode is typically implemented by applying a series of regular expression string-replace operations upon the input. Because regular expressions are limited in analyzing the structure of text input, this has the artifact that any non-hierarchical BBCode input will be transformed into invalid non-hierarchical HTML without error.^{[citation needed]}

Applying traditional parsing techniques is made difficult by ambiguities in the markup, such as in [quote=[b]text[/b][/quote], where the input can either be interpreted as "text" quoted from someone called [b, or the bolded text "text" surrounded by [quote= and [/quote], i.e. [quote=text[/quote].