I've always copied and pasted a <tab> if I really needed it, but seriously, there's got to be a way? <ctrl>+<shift>+<tab> or something? (Using FF).

If you use the code tags ([ code][ /code] without the spaces) any tabs are preserved. If you are trying to indent paragraphs, there's no need to do that.

There's a Firefox extension called tabinta that allows you to use "tabs in text areas". It never worked all that well for me though. It will insert tabs all right, but the function that's supposed to keep it from tabbing out of the text area has never worked, so using it constantly causes loss of focus. Perhaps you'll have better luck.

In any case, it's a moot point here, because the LQ software converts everything into standard html, which condenses all contiguous whitespace into a single space. Unless it's inside a code block, of course.

Here's a quick test of tabinta.
Inside code tags (one tab between words):
The same outside of code tags:

foo bar baz

That's why my double-spaces between sentences always look like single spaces! Because they are single spaces...

To me single-spacing between sentences looks weird. Dunno why, but I've always double-spaced out of habit. The spaces between all these sentences were doubles when I wrote them, but now they're singles.

I'm talking specifically about writing code within CODE tags. But in general I find it hard to believe that there's no good way in FF (or any browser that I know of) to enter a tab in a form element.

You would need to write the code in an editor that accepts tab spacing and then copy it to the post submission box and wrap it in code tags.

Yeah, I have run into this LQ/vBulletin issue myself, and I just copy/paste code, as XavierP said, into CODE tags and add descriptions for the code.

Of course, you should also get into the habit of linking to source or script code from an external site (like Launchpad for instance).

Did you try the tabinta extension I mentioned earlier? It does exactly what you're asking, if it works correctly.

@MrCode: Yes, that's right. Although to be more exact, I should've stated that it's the rendering of html that condenses the spaces. You'd have to deliberately insert non-breaking-space characters into the html in order for it to display more, which can't be done through the intermediary bbcode markup available here. If we were allowed to use html markup directly then the pretty much the entire unicode chart, including a variety of different space characters, would be available to us. Maybe it's a good thing we can't.

And yes, double-spacing between sentences is, or at least used to be, proper typographic form (see the link above). That's what I was taught to do in the typing class I took in high school, and I also prefer it to the digital-era single-spacing style. It's more readable when sentence breaks stand out clearly from the rest of the text.

Of course traditionally the "tab" was not a character at all, but a control for quickly moving the cursor/typehead to a particular location on the line. It's only due to historical word-processing conventions that the "hard tab" was developed as an actual character. Html will still render them as single spaces unless protected by pre tags.

You could also get a tab by typing (in a terminal):

and then copying it to the clipboard and pasting into your post (Ctrl+V) every time you want to insert a tab.

Here's where it will make sense:

Problem worked around.

No need to Ctrl+V, just use the middle button! Remember, select to copy, middle to paste, no menus or shortcuts! I wish more people knew that, I don't know how I lived without it!

Anyway, this is even easier:

It puts the tab right into the clipboard, middle-click or Ctrl+V to paste.

The xclip command is very handy. With the -o option, it prints the clipboard to stdout. With the -i option, it puts stdin into the clipboard.

Wow that is nice. For about 9 months now I've been using PuTTY at work and have grown used to the fact that a simple select puts text in the clipboard, and miss it in Linux. This is even nicer because I have the best of both worlds. Thank you.

Where does this come from? Is it built into X, gnome, ...?

AFAIK it's general to X, i.e. not tied to any specific DE. It works here on Xfce.

It's built into X.

Another thing I like that's built into X: sloppy focus (that's what it does with no WM). I've always hated the Windows click-to-raise model, what if i WANT to have a window above the focused one (and I do quite often). But for some reason all the major desktops chose Windows compatibility by default instead of common-sense convenience.

Here's a more n00b-proof way to go: Press Ctrl+Shift+U, letting go of the U but still holding Ctrl+Shift, and type "0009", then let go. You've just inserted the tab character.

Example:

Didn't know about that.

An easier way to think of it would be "Type 'u0009' while holding down Ctrl and Alt".