BBC Sherlock Fan Forum - Serving Sherlockians since February 2012 / Secret Santa Fic Exchange 2014

**Posted by La Jolie** November 11, 2014 6:35 pm

Here:
http://sherlock.boardhost.com/viewtopic.php?id=5754

I think Liberty, besleybean and Wholocked volunteered as non-participants, which makes more sense than the participants beta reading for each other.

**Posted by Harriet** November 11, 2014 9:48 pm

I volunteered, too - I have already one, so one more should still be possible

**Posted by La Jolie** November 11, 2014 11:39 pm

Sorry Harriet, I didn't exclude you on purpose. Just lost count. Thanks for helping us out!

**Posted by silverblaze** November 14, 2014 1:33 pm

Hi people, sorry, I've been away from this board for a while, I put all my fandom time in the little fic and to be honest I also let that lie for a while. But just to come back to stating the prompt, I'd much rather do that below the story because the prompt contains spoilers. And now I'm thinking about it, I'd rather also have the name for the recipient below the story, because otherwise it is spoiled for that person. Anyone else want to do that too?

As for author's notes, I think mine is gonna be: 'This story is EVIL!!!'

Muhahahahah

**Posted by SolarSystem** November 14, 2014 3:00 pm

Well, we did mention all these things in the prefixes last year, and I don't think it was spoiled for anyone. You basically have the same at Archive of Our Own, so I don't know... what do the others think?

**Posted by silverblaze** November 14, 2014 3:03 pm

Yes, I know but my story works in such a way that it would be a spoiler. I'm not saying that anyone else should do it, just that I'm doing it.

**Posted by SusiGo** November 14, 2014 3:14 pm

I think this is up to you, silverblaze. If it is important, you can add it at the end and everyone else can start with the dedication and possible notes and explanations.

**Posted by Schmiezi** November 14, 2014 3:47 pm

silverblaze wrote:
Yes, I know but my story works in such a way that it would be a spoiler. I'm not saying that anyone else should do it, just that I'm doing it.

Knowing the prompt you got I can imagine why you want to do it that way.

One thing would be lovely, though. Please write a little note at the beginning of your fic, saying that you left out the name of the recipent on purpose. Otherwise I fear that I will forget it was on purpose and will "help" you by adding it because I 'll think that you just forgot.

**Posted by silverblaze** November 14, 2014 6:45 pm

Thanks Schmiezi, I just wanted to have the prompt and the name at the bottom. But I'll include a note.
Good writing everyone.

**Posted by Schmiezi** November 22, 2014 6:40 pm

Hi everybody!

I thought you might like to know: I have received one finished fic and one note from someone who won't be able to make the deadline.

How is everybody else?

**Posted by Kerkerian** November 22, 2014 8:10 pm

Schmiezi wrote:
Hi everybody!

I thought you might like to know: I have received one finished fic and one note from someone who won't be able to make the deadline.

How is everybody else?

Hi! My fic is stubborn and refuses to end. Since I'm stubborn as well, I'm hoping to finish it some time this week.

**Posted by SusiGo** November 23, 2014 12:13 am

You can have mine whenever you want.

**Posted by SolarSystem** November 23, 2014 10:34 am

Just send it to her already!

**Posted by silverblaze** November 23, 2014 2:24 pm

Ok, I must be really dense, but I can't for the life of me work out how to send something in bbc code. The only way I can think of is to chop it up in bits and send the story via pm. Would that work? Isn't there a better way?

**Posted by gently69** November 23, 2014 6:57 pm

Mine is finished as well. Just wait for response of my beta reader.

**Posted by silverblaze** November 23, 2014 8:15 pm

Mine's almost finished as well, just have to implement the corrections my lovely beta reader has given me. I'll just pm it I guess, seems the easiest way. Maybe tomorrow or Tuesday.

**Posted by La Jolie** November 24, 2014 7:59 am

silverblaze wrote:
Ok, I must be really dense, but I can't for the life of me work out how to send something in bbc code. The only way I can think of is to chop it up in bits and send the story via pm. Would that work? Isn't there a better way?

Silverblaze - I think what you should do is to send your fic to Schmiezi in a Word doc, but if you want any specific formatting, such as italics or bold script, you put the BBCodes directly into the word text. So Schmiezi can copy and paste the text directly into a forum post and doesn't have to do all the converting for us by hand (which she would have to do if you sent your text to her in a PM!).

Example:

If you want this to appear on the boards:

----------------
SHERLOCK (gesturing to his own left cheek): Punch me in the face.
JOHN: Punch you?
SHERLOCK: Yes. Punch me, in the face. (He gestures to his left cheek again.) Didn’t you hear me?
JOHN: I always hear ‘punch me in the face’ when you’re speaking, but it’s usually subtext.
-------------

with the proper formatting, you send Schmiezi a Word doc containing the following text:

----------------
SHERLOCK [ i](gesturing to his own left cheek):[ /i] Punch me in the face.
JOHN: Punch you?
SHERLOCK: Yes. Punch me, in the face. [ i](He gestures to his left cheek again.)[ /i] Didn’t you hear me?
JOHN: I [ b]always[ /b] hear ‘punch me in the face’ when you’re speaking, but it’s usually subtext.
-------------

Just without the empty spaces inside the brackets.

Schmiezi, correct me if I'm wrong.

Last edited by La Jolie (November 24, 2014 8:06 am)

**Posted by SolarSystem** November 24, 2014 8:24 am

Okay, I just typed this with the code as suggested by LaJolie in a word document and then copied it in here...

SHERLOCK: (gesturing to his own left cheek) Punch me in the face.

JOHN: I always hear ‘punch me in the face’ when you’re speaking…

Looks okay...

Last edited by SolarSystem (November 24, 2014 8:25 am)

**Posted by La Jolie** November 24, 2014 8:33 am

And if your fic is VERY long and/or you have a lot of formatting, our resident tech wizard Harriet also came up with a method to automatically convert Word docs into BBCode:

http://sherlock.boardhost.com/viewtopic.php?id=5799

But it's a two step process via HTML, and the result is not quite as reliable as doing it by hand. So it's really only worth trying if you have pages and pages of complex formatting. Not if you only have one or two words in italics on every page.

**Posted by silverblaze** November 24, 2014 10:33 am

Ah, thanks a lot, people, I'll do that. I thought it'd be a lot more code.