Instructions for Use

Policy

BEBAC provides a global forum to promote the free exchange of ideas, opinions and informations on Bioavailability and Bioequivalence studies.

We expect a basic knowledge on BE/BA or related fields and the willingness to begin first with the Search function for similar problems. Read our FAQ section, where questions about technical aspects of the forum are answered.

Please discuss topics relevant to the chosen category, and make subject headings as specific as possible.

BEBAC reserves the right to delete material that contains obscene, profane, or vulgar language. Troll posts, advertisings, job postings, or posts that are commercial in nature are prohibited and will be removed without further notice.

Sockpuppets (i.e., multiple falsified indentities) will be resolved based on the IP-address and may lead to blocking of the account.

Thank you in advance for your adherence to this policy.

Disclaimer

The content expressed on the forum is the sole opinion of the person making the post. Neither BEBAC nor the poster make any representations or warranties regarding the accuracy of such content.
Please note that:
• anybody using or relying upon information or opinions set out in the forum, does so at their own risk;
• BEBAC stongly advise that independent professional judgment be exercised and/or independent professional advice should be sought before using or relying upon such informations or opinions; and,
• some of the views and opinions expressed by posters may be their own and may not necessarily represent the views or opinions of the companies or organisations by whom they are engaged or employed.

For information on data protection see here.

Etiquette

Search!
If you are interested in regulatory requirements, please consult the guidance collection first.

The forum contains lots of threads from people who have already sought and received actual help. Chances are that you may not be the first person to experience the particular issue(s) that brought you to the forum.

Use the Search feature in the top right hand corner of the main page to query the database for existing threads that may already answer your question; use keywords, restrict the search to a particular category, etc.

If you can’t find what you’re looking for, then start a new thread and hopefully others will find that thread useful in the future.
Be nice!
This is the golden rule and bears re-stating: ‘Post unto others as you would have others post unto you.’

Most of the people who visit these and other on-line forums abide by this rule as a matter of course. Occasionally, however, we encounter someone who succumbs to the temptation to be, well…, not so nice. On these rare occasions, everyone is affected. Nobody likes to have rude or mean comments directed toward them, and nobody needs to read such comments directed toward anyone else. In addition, as a practical concern, the likelihood of receiving help is always better when you’re nice.

So please, if you can’t post nicely, then do not post. All of the registered users reserve the right not to respond at all to rude or otherwise not-nice posts, or to respond in kind (while we try to exercise restraint, we’re only human).

According to RFC1855 use of only CAPTITALS may be interpreted as if you’re SHOUTING; use bold letters instead.

The forum’s administrator / moderators reserve the right to delete posts that they deem to be overly rude or otherwise not nice.
Be polite!
It’s nice to start your post with a salutation, and include a signature as well.

You may save a signature with your User’s data; it will be automatically attached to your posts.

An example of an inpolite post is given below:
Be specific!
Select the category which you consider most suitable to your question. Give a short description in the subject line.

Please don’t post the same text in different categories; post only in the most suitable one—you may add an additional keyword in the subject line.

Some problems may be related to a national regulation; in such a case please include the target country.
Don’t be shy about helping!
Aside from the administrator (HS) and current moderators (Jaime and Ohlbe), there are lots of regular participants in the forum who help fellow users. The help these colleagues provide is invaluable in terms of the time it saves the rest of us.

If you know the answer to a question or the solution to a problem, please feel free to jump right in and post it!
Post a URI to your reference!
If you post a message referring to a document which is available on the web (i.e., a regulatory guideline), please include a hyperlink.
Stay within the thread!
It’s quite common in a forum that topics within a thread sometimes move away from the topic of the original post (the ‘thread shift’-phenomenon). Even if your question was not answered exactly the way you expected it, try to stay within the thread (and don’t open a new one just to say ‘thank you!’).

Unnecessary new threads may be moved by the administrator to another (more suitable) thread or linked by an moderator to another thread and closed to further replies.
Don’t fork!
‘Old’ threads are not necessarily ‘dead’ ones; sometimes replies are posted even months later—which may not help you with your current problem, but others using the ‘search’ feature of the forum. Threads are sorted by the date of the last reply by default, i.e., a recent answer to an ‘old’ post will move the entire thread up to the forums’s entry page.

If you feel that your post did not gain the attention you expected, you may reply to your own post in order to bring the thread back to the top of the forum. A reasonable waiting period is two weeks or if the thread has left the entry page of the forum. Only one ‘reminder’ is suggested; consider the possibility that nobody has an answer or is not willing to share his/her experiences. Further ‘reminders’ are discouraged and may lead to closing of the thread by moderators or the administrator.
No orphans!
It’s considered bad style to start a thread with a—sometimes not so trivial—question, and afterwards never login to the forum again.
Please remember, that all users of the forum are posting answers in their leisure time. It may be quite frustrating to offer elaborate answers, which are not even read at all.

As a further reading I would recommend Eric Raymond’s essay ‘How To Ask Questions The Smart Way’ for more suggestions, and for insight into people’s behavior on technical mailing lists (but don’t try asking people at catb.org questions about BA/BE).

Thank you for abiding by the Etiquette of the Forum.

Registration

Step 1
Please do not register if you don’t want to post in the forum – registration is not required to read post. Inactive accounts will decrease the forum’s performance.

Click Register in the top right hand corner in the forum’s main page.

A form opens, where you may fill in your User name (may be your real name, or a nick), a valid e-mail address (in the example: User name ‘foo’, e-mail ‘foo@bar.com’) and a password.

Note
Do not use your e-mail address as your User name – spam-bots and e-mail-harvesters will love to fetch it! Your User name should be at least close to a name/word in a human language. If your e-mail address is asg14nk77@example.com, please don’t choose ‘asg14nk77’ as the User name. If replying to your posts, other users may be resistant writing salutations like ‘Dear asg14nk77!’…

Although blanks are acceptable in the User name and/or the e-mail address, please use an ‘_’ instead (User name ‘foo_bar’, e-mail ‘foo_bar@example.com’ will always work, whereas ‘foo bar’, e-mail ‘foo bar@example.com’ probably will not – blanks sometimes are ‘lost in hyperspace’ corrupting the e-mail address). Multiple e-mail addresses are not supported – although they may work on some systems (and are classified as spam by others).

Do not use diacritical and accented characters in your User name; use ASCII-codes below 128 instead (A-Z, a-z, 0-9, hyphen, underline). Avoid commas and any character which may break your User name and/or e-mail address. UTF-8 coding will be available in the next revision (1.7.7) of the forum.

Clicking the button will send an activation key to you by e-mail (if there is already a user registered with this name/e-mail, you will get an error page—in this case please choose another user name.

Note
With the registration you confirm that you have read and accepted the Policy of the forum. It must be quite plain to you that your message(s) will be traceable over years by search engines on the internet.
Step 2
Open your e-mail client’s inbox; you received an e-mail with the subject ‘Forum registration’ and sender’s address ‘Bioequivalence and Bioavailability Forum <forum@bebac.at>’. If you do not find the registration e-mail in you inbox, please check also your junk-/spam-folder.

You must click within 24 hours on the given link to activate your account (if your e-mail client does not support hyperlinks, copy the link to the address line of your preferred browser).

Type in your user name and password. If you want to be logged in automatically every time you visit the forum, use the checkbox.

You are logged in… (your user name is displayed in the top right hand corner of the forum’s main page).

Post a new Message

Screenshot To start a new thread click New entry in the top left hand corner in the forum’s main page.

A new form opens:

Screenshot

Choose the category most suitable to your post in the select-box—currently the following categories exist (note: order may change according to the number of threads/posts):

Regulatives/Guidelines
Design Issues
Bioanalytics
Software
General Statistics
Sample Size
Study Performance
Metrics
R for BE/BA
Dissolution/BCS/IVIVC
GxP / QA
Off Topic (Post here if no other category fits your topic.)
Forum Internals (registered users only)
Outliers
Tips/Tricks
Conferences/Workshops
Nonparametrics
BA/BE News
Sandbox (If you want to learn the functions of the forum, post here.)

Give a short description of your question in the subject line; try to be as specific as possible (something like ‘HELP!!!’ or ‘BE statistics?’ is just not a good idea).

Write your message in the textarea below.

Please do not include any (X)HTML-Tags (like <br /> for line-break, <b></b> for bold etc.), series of blanks, or tabs in your text. All Tags will be shown as plain text (not be rendered); series of blanks and/or tabs will be stripped and cut down on a single blank. Both multiple blanks and tabs may look nice on your system, but awful on others.

Do not use UTF-8 encoded characters; use characters available in the forum’s codepage ISO-8859-1 instead:

hex

…0

…1

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You may use following BBCodes to format part of your message as

[b]bold[/b] ⇒ bold,
[i]italic[/i] ⇒ italic,
[u]underlined[/u] ⇒ underlined,
[o]overlined[/o] ⇒ overlined,
[d]deleted[/d] ⇒ deleted,
[sub]subscripted[/sub] ⇒ _subscripted,
[sup]superscripted[/sup] ⇒ ^{superscripted},
[big]bigger[/big] ⇒ bigger,
[small]smaller[/small] ⇒ smaller,
[color:red]red[/color:red] ⇒ red,
[color:green]green[/color:green] ⇒ green,
[color:blue]blue[/color:blue] ⇒ blue,
[serif]serif[/serif] ⇒ serif,
[cursive]cursive[/cursive] ⇒ cursive,
[sc]Small Caps[/sc] ⇒ Small Caps,
[hr] ⇒
[box]framed[/box] ⇒ framed,
[mark]marked[/mark] ⇒ marked,
[nb]nowrap prevents linebreak[/nb], or
[code]monospaced[/code] ⇒ monospaced, and
any combinations thereof.
Example:
[color:blue][big][serif][i]C[sub]p[/sub](t) = C[sub]0[/sub] · e[sup]-k[sub]el[/sub] · t[/sup][/i][/serif][/big][/color:blue] gives
C_p(t) = C₀ · e^{-k_el · t}
Lists are supported by following BBCodes
- Unsorted list (bullet: filled circle)
  [list]
  [*]foo
  [*]bar
  [/list] gives
  - foo
  - bar
- Unsorted list (bullet: dash)
  [list=d]
  [*]foo
  [*]bar
  [/list] gives
  - foo
  - bar
- Sorted list (decimal numbers)
  [list=1]
  [*]foo
  [*]bar
  [/list] gives
  1. foo
  2. bar
- Sorted list (lower characters)
  [list=a]
  [*]foo
  [*]bar
  [/list] gives
  1. foo
  2. bar
- Sorted list (roman numbers)
  [list=I]
  [*]foo
  [*]bar
  [/list] gives
  1. foo
  2. bar
Since the syntax is a little bit tricky, you must use the before posting!
[indent][/indent]: Paragraph with left and right margins. Example:

Lorem ipsum ea ullum corrumpit consetetur eam. Cu vidisse conceptam interesset mea, ponderum appellantur suscipiantur ius id. Minim lucilius gubergren no sea, verear utroque iracundia pri ad. Patrioque maiestatis voluptatum per te, sea no quando corpora incorrupte, nihil quaerendum mel ea. Assum noluisse dignissim cu est, mucius eirmod tritani cu eum, vel no quod atqui quodsi.
[center][/center]: Centered paragraph. Example:

At mei augue suscipit dissentiet, id nisl fuisset adipisci qui, an consul sanctus deseruisse est. Errem utamur recusabo te has, ius partem labores offendit cu. Pro assum saperet mediocritatem no, et qui probo posse oporteat, eos eu nominavi perfecto indoctum. Omnis error labores his ut, at commune detraxit consectetuer pri. Has at euismod graecis, eos an unum harum adipiscing.

Note 1: [indent][/indent] and [center][/center] create new paragraphs in the text. Be sure to use them not within another paragraph. XHTML will not be valid any more. Although the result may look acceptable in your browser, it may look awful for others.

Note 2: [code][/code] allows you—with a little patience—to construct basic tables, e.g.,

[code]
| P1 P2
----------
S1 | T R
S2 | R T[/code] gives:

| P1 P2
----------
S1 | T R
S2 | R T
Do not use tabulators, but series of blanks instead!

Often needed symbols (≤, ≥) may be constructed as:

[u]<[/u] ⇒ <
[u]>[/u] ⇒ >

With activated JavaScript you may also use the buttons at the right side of the input-area to format your text.

To add hyperlinks use [link]http://www.example.com[/link] / [url]http://www.example.com[/url] or [link=http://www.example.com]Target[/link] / [url=http://www.example.com]Target[/url]. The first syntax gives http://www.example.com, whereas the second one comes up as Target.
You may also use the link button to open a new window where you may paste URIs from other sites in the first box and a description (which will be displayed in the post) in the second box.

Use [img]http://www.example.com/image.jpg[/img] to add images to your post.
You may also use the button to insert the BBCode into your post. Acceptable image formats are JPEG, PNG, and GIF. For technical illustrations (plots, screenshots, etc.) a lossless format (PNG, GIF) is preferred. Size is limited to 640 px (longest side) and 100 KB; larger images are downscaled by the software (which may result in poor quality). If your image is too large in terms of filesize, you may consider to reduce the number of colors from truecolor (24 bit) to 256 colors (8 bit).
Optionally you can justify the image left ([img|left]…[/img]) or right ([img|right]…[/img]).

If you want to use the signature saved in your personal data, keep the checkbox ‘Attach signature’ checked.

If you want to be notified by e-mail if there has been a reply to this message check the next box.

Note

After you have typed your message please use the button first, to make sure you used the code tags properly. A new page will open, and you may check the visual appearance and edit your text.

When you are satisfied with the results click the OK - Submit button and your message will be posted to the forum.

Reply to a Message

Screenshot Open the message and click Post reply in the lower left hand corner.

A new form opens:

Screenshot

Note

All lines of the original text are lead by ‘» ’; please delete any lines which are not specific to your reply (avoiding ‘TOFU’), but please do not alter text of the original poster. The preferred method in the forum is an ‘inline reply’.
If you want to delete the entire text of the previous post (a ‘full quote’) you may either:

with active Javascript click the link delete text completely on top of the message area, or
without Javascript place your cursor in the message area. On Windows/Linux systems use the key sequence CtrlA / CtrlX to mark/delete; on Mac systems use A / X.

If you want to quote another post in the forum (‘cross-linking’), use the following BBCode:

Navigate to the post you want to quote; click to open.
Identify the ID of the post. The post’s ID is given in the subject line (see examples of Mix and Thread Views below):
The number after the # (4402) is the ID of the post.
Now you may quote the other post as [msg=4402]your link text[/msg].

You are encouraged to change the subject line giving a short hint of you reply’s contents (though you cannot change the category of the post).

After using the Preview button (and optionally correcting your post), OK - Submit your reply.

If chosen by the original poster he/she will be notified by e-mail about your reply.

Data Update

Screenshot You may change your data clicking your name (foo in the example).

A new page opens showing your current user data.

Screenshot

Clicking Edit User data opens a new form.

Screenshot

Note

We would suggest to give at least your Location (Town/Country; answers may differ depending on the local legislations you are bound to), and the time zone difference (time zone of the forum’s server is CEST [UTC/GMT +2 hours]: to the east the difference in hours for you is positive, or negative if you are located to the west).

Please tick the E-mail notification box only if you cannot use the RSS Feed (see below). Using the notification may result in a lot of e-mail traffic, not only to you personally, but the forum’s e-mail server may be classified as a bulk-mailer / spammer and blacklisted – which could affect all users.

RSS Feed

The forum offers also an RSS 2.0 feed.

Behind the button in the lower right hand corner you find the link to the RSS feed (http://forum.bebac.at/rss.php).

Windows users may click the right mouse button to copy the link and insert them in their preferred aggregator / feed reader.

Modern browsers (e.g., Firefox 2+, Opera 7.5+, IE 7+) have news readers already integrated.

Frequently asked Questions

May I post messages without registration?
No, although you may read all messages without registration, you must register to the forum in order to post new messages (and to reply to old ones as well).
I registered already but still cannot login!
Registration is a two step process due to security reasons: most likely you did not activate your account within 24 hours after submitting you data. For details see Registration (especially Step 2).

Sometimes mailservers (or even DNS-routers) may be offline preventing a timely delivery of the registration e-mail to you (the forum’s software tries to deliver e-mails for one week) or you simply did not look up your e-mails (don’t forget your junk-mail folder…). If you receive the e-mail more than 24 hours after the first step in the registration process and click on the activation link, you will get this message:

In such a case you will have to register again (starting with Step 1).
Is it possible to edit my message when it’s already posted?
Editing is possible only for 24 hours after the original submission. Open your post and click on in the lower right hand corner.

We would recommend to use the preview function to keep editing of already posted messages at a minimum.
Altering a post after it has been replied to robs the reply of its original context. It can also be confusing. Before you edit, consider taking the following steps:

Use strike-through or a placeholder to show the post has been altered.
- Strike-through is marked with BBCodes [d]like this[/d] and ends up like this.
- A placeholder is a phrase such as “[Thoughtless comment removed by the author.]”. This will ensure that your fellow repliers’ irritated responses still make sense. In turn, they may then wish to edit their reply with something like, “[Irritated response to deleted comment removed.]”.
Is it possible to change the category and/or subject of my message?
Yes, open your post and click on in the lower right hand corner. Now you can change both the category and the subject line.
Note
- Changes are only possible within 24 hours after the original submission.
- Change of the category is only possible for the first (top level) post of a thread.
- If you think it’s absolutely neccessary to recategorize an entire thread after 24 hours, contact the administrator as soon as possible.
May I contact other users by e-mail?
No e-mail addresses of users are published in the forum. Only if a user has agreed to be contacted by other users, it is possible to send a message by means of a contact form.

Click ‘User’ in the main page: a list of registered users opens. If a user has agreed to receive personal messages from other members of the forum, a letter is displayed next to the name. Clicking opens a contact form, or
within an opened post click on the User’s name in the top left hand corner; the profile opens, where the icon shows the agreement for receiving messages.
What should I do if I have forgotten my password?
Click Log in in the top right hand corner of the main page; the Log in form opens.

Now click Forgot your password?

A new form opens.

Fill in your user name and e-mail address; a new password will be sent to you.
Where can I get such a forum?
This forum requires PHP≥4.2 and a MySQL≥4.1 database installation on the server to generate XHTML 1.0 Strict. Scripts were written by Alex. The current version is 1.7.6, licensed under GNU GPL.
What is the difference between Mix and Thread Views?
The ‘Mix View’ displays all posts within a thread in a single page (paragraph’s left indentation denotes the structure of the tread); this is the default.

The ‘Thread View’ displays a single post per page and a tree-like structure to select individual posts.

You may choose between these types according to your personal preferences, either by using the links in the header (of both the forum’s overview or within a post), or in your profile (Standard View).

Mix View (forum and opened thread):

Thread View (forum and opened thread):

You may set your preferred view as a standard in your profile.
Buttons to insert links/smilies are not working.
Automatic insert of these BBCodes requires JavaScript. If you are not allowed to use JavaScript due to your company’s security policy, please insert BBCodes manually. A list of BBCodes is given here and to the right of the text area.

Furthermore if replying to a post the link delete text completely is not functional without JavaScript. Please delete not needed text manually as described in the Reply Section above.
My timezone is not available for selection.
With the current version of the software only a simple approximation of timezones (in whole hours) is possible. The issue may be resolved in the next revision, where non-integer timezones for e.g., +5:30 (India) or +5:45 (Nepal) will be implemented.

Nevertheless, we would suggest selecting an close integer timezone, because this will show posts at least approximately in your local time, rather than in the local time of the server.
My question is not answered; how can I contact the administrator of the forum?
Click Admin contact in the lower left hand corner of the main page.

A contact form opens, where you may send your request to the administrator of the forum.

A Final Remark…

Please understand, that I (the Forum’s administrator Helmut Schütz) cannot start personal e-mail conversations; this was one of the reasons opening the BE/BA Forum. Please register to the Forum and post your question there; I—or another member of the Forum—will answer, time allowing.

If you are sending personal e-mails to BEBAC (either with your e-mail client or through the Forum’s contact form), we assume that you want to initate a professional relationship based on our consultancy services.
Rates are available upon request.

Bioequivalence and Bioavailability Forum’sPolicy / Terms of Use / FAQs

Bioequivalence and Bioavailability Forum’s
Policy / Terms of Use / FAQs