Help & Support

Your Cbox embed code is available at your control panel. You need this code to install your Cbox on your website.

Also on that page is your Quick Link — a URL which you can use to access your Cbox directly in your browser or on your mobile device.

Once you have created your Cbox account, go to the Publish page of your control panel. The code and steps for embedding your Cbox are provided there for a number of common platforms.

If you install your Cbox and all you see is code, or nothing at all, your web host may be removing or otherwise interfering with the HTML iframe tags that Cbox uses. Your Cbox code needs to be pasted into an area of your site that accepts HTML without modification. This may mean switching your editor from "rich text" or "WYSIWYG" mode into HTML-editing or "raw" mode, or you may need to open your template files in a plain-text editor like Notepad.

Remember that you always have the option of posting or sharing your Cbox Quick Link — this gives visitors direct access to your Cbox in a full-screen layout, so it's perfect as a mobile option or for stand-alone use.

Go to the Theme editor in your control panel. There you can specify the fonts and colours of your Cbox, using a point-and-click editor. You can always reset your theme to one of the preset defaults there, if you would like to start again.

If you have a Premium or Pro Cbox you can edit CSS, which gives you complete control over presentation.

If you have a Premium or Pro Cbox, you can create a moderator name for yourself at your Users page, and then log in on your Cbox using the "profile" link. You will see a delete icon [x] next to each message in your Cbox, and you will not have to log in at your control panel at all to delete messages.

Alternatively, visit your Messages page to delete messages individually or in bulk. Deleted messages are removed from your public Cbox history, but are preserved in your Archives.

Yes. In the Theme editor, simply delete the colour codes for the main and form background ("BG") elements. This will make the Cbox transparent, allowing whatever is behind the Cbox to show through.

Note that any pop-ups generated by a transparent Cbox will have the default background colour — usually white. If your font colour is light, it may be invisible in popups. You can fix this by editing the CSS to introduce a background-color rule for popups.

Cbox supports private messaging to and from mod and admin users. You can enable PM for your Cbox at your Settings page.

You can also type out the PM command: enter //pm username message..., where username is the name of the person you want to send your message to. This method works if the username conforms to Cbox "strict name" or "ASCII name" policy, i.e. comprises alphanumeric characters only and includes no spaces. Otherwise, you will have to refer to the user by ID.

By default, ordinary users cannot send PMs to other ordinary users. One of the two participants in any private conversation must be a mod or admin.

Opting in and out

Registered users can opt in to sending and receiving private messages from other registered (non-mod) users, by entering //pm on. The command //pm off revokes this availability.

Errors on sending

Private messages can fail to send for a number of reasons. If you get an error, it will likely either be due to the target user not being online (see below) or due to policy regarding who can send and receive private messages (see above). If the target user is not online, you may need to wait just a few seconds before retrying. Refer to the onliners list to confirm whether Cbox recognizes the user as present.

Message delivery

Private messages are sent via the streaming interfaces. The target user must be viewing and connected. Users on old browsers or restricted networks may not be able to receive PMs. When your message has been accepted by our servers for relaying, you will see an indicator (by default, a tick symbol). When the message has been received by the target user, the indicator will change (double-tick symbol). If that doesn't happen, your message probably wasn't received. Note that Cbox does not know that a message has been read, only that it has been delivered.

Persistence

Cbox does not store private messages for future delivery. New messages are relayed only if the user has an active connection. If the user has gone offline or is otherwise unable to receive your message, it will not be sent again, and nor will it be seen by that user when he reconnects. If you do not see the two-tick "received" indicator within a few seconds of sending a message, you will need to re-send your message later.

The account name that you log in with at the Cbox control panel is also your Quick Link address. You can change your account name at the Account details page. This will change your Quick Link address at the same time.

If you have forgotten your account name and are unable to log in, you can reset your password at this page.

These links and all other ads are removed automatically when you upgrade your Cbox to a paid plan.

This may be caused by the Google toolbar's AutoFill feature. You can turn this feature off. First open the toolbar options page (click the "G" icon in the search bar and select "Manage..." from the drop-down list).

For older versions, click the More tab, and then under "Extras", untick the "Automatically highlight fields that AutoFill can fill" option. Newer versions just require that you untick the Autofill box on the Browsing tab, and still newer versions have the AutoFill option on the Features tab.

This is the message that shows when your Cbox is accessed from an address other than the one specified at your Publish page, when you have the option "Allow access only at this address" enabled.

A common reason for this to happen is that you have entered an address that is more specific than it needs to be — for example, including the "www." at the beginning when your visitors don't need to include that to reach your website. Most of the time "mysite.com" works just as well as "www.mysite.com", but if you have specified "www.mysite.com" as the only address to allow access at, then Cbox will show an error when you arrive at your site via "mysite.com".

The solution is to simplify the address so it covers all the legitimate routes to your page, or turn off the option "Allow access only at this address."