On most forums you will find it impossible to post new topics or reply to existing ones, unless the Admin allows this explicitly. So, in order for you to be able to participate in the discussion, you would likely be required to register. By registering you will also obtain access to many other features of the forum such as:

• Email Notification, when someone replies to your messages
• Customized signature, avatar, personal tag etc...
• Ability to send private messages to one or more members of the forum
• You'll be able to choose a time zone so that forum's time is equivalent to that of the region you live in

Registration for the forum is completely free and requires only minimal information such as your email address and a nick name of your choice.

Bella Vista Babelfish uses cookies to store a small bit of information that allows the forum to see if you are logged in or not. If for some reason your browser does not support cookies, the forum will instead use sessions, which do not store any information on your computer. During the login process you can choose to bypass the cookie system and opt for the session system, this is recommended if you are using a public terminal. Doing so will prevent the possible identity theft, which may occur if you do not logout after using the forum. In most cases however, you probably should leave cookies enabled as it is much more convenient in the long run. For example, you will not need to login each time you visit the forum.

To remove the cookie set by Bella Vista Babelfish, simply click the logout link and it will automatically delete the cookie.

As a forum member you have a personal profile inside which you can store various information about yourself, such as IM client ids, signature, biography, etc... Your profile also stores various settings, which deal with the forum. Any time you are logged in you may change your profile settings, you should be aware that most data inside your profile can be viewed by other forum members. So, you should try to not store any sensitive information that you do not wish other people to see.
Your profile has an option Show Email Address, which if set to No will hide your email address from view. You may want to use this option if you do not want other people to see your email address.

Signature is a string of text that you may automatically append to the end of every message you post. In your profile you have an option, Use Signature by default that will enable or disable this feature by default. However, on every post form you can change this option for that particular post.

In addition to plain text, this string can contain (if allowed by administrator) various tidbits such as links to favourite URLs, personal photos, etc...

If you do not wish to see the signatures of other people, you can turn them off by setting the Show Signature to No in your profile.

If cannot remember your password for Bella Vista Babelfish, you should go to the reset password page, on that page enter your email address inside the text box and press the Reset Password button. This will send you an email with a special URL, when you access that URL your password will be reset and you will receive a new email with your password.

Note: Your passwords are stored in a one-way encryption format called MD5 hash. This is military grade 128-bit encryption, there is no way to restore your password. It works by encrypting the data every time you enter it and then comparing against encrypted version. Therefore if you forget your password it can not be restored back, so, upon a restore password request the forum will randomly generate you a new password.

Custom Tags can only be assigned by the forum administrator(s), so if you want a custom tag, ask the forum's Admin for it.

Avatars are images that appear below your user name on the messages that you've posted as well as your user information page. Bella Vista Babelfish supports three types of avatars, some of which may or may not be enabled by the forum's administrator. You may choose an avatar for yourself from your profile page.

• Built In - These are the avatars the Admin has made available, you can choose one of those avatars and it will become your avatar as soon as you submit the change to your profile page.
• Upload Avatar - You can upload an image that would be your avatar to the server. Once uploaded, it would need to be approved by the administrator before it becomes your avatar.
• Specify URL - You can specify a URL to an image, that you wish to be your avatar. If approved by the administrator, this image will become your avatar.

Note: You may change your avatar at any time, however the uploaded & URL avatars will always need to be approved prior to going live on the forum.

A buddy list is your own little list of forum members with whom you wish to converse more frequently. By putting a person on your buddy list, you will be able to see their birthday (if they entered one) as well as easily choose them as recipients of your Private Messages.

Ignore List is a database of forum members who's messages you do not wish to see as well as not allow these members to send you private messages. On every message there is a quick link that would give you an opportunity to add the author of that message to your ignore list.