Author Topic: New Signature Limitations (Read 18839 times)

TIfanx1999 · « **Reply #30 on:** July 27, 2013, 03:20:33 pm »

@Eeems: Yes I did realize it said request, even if I didn't separate it from my reaction to the actual rules. That's why it's got an "*", but I suppose I could have made it clearer. "Relevant" is rather vague in the context you gave so I felt the need to explain.

DJ Omnimaga · « **Reply #31 on:** July 27, 2013, 04:37:07 pm »

On an off-topic note, the /me command and red text looks really bad in quotes

Also @Eeems, do you think for animated GIFs there could be an exception for Z80 and monochrome Casio calc screenshots, providing they are less than 50 KB? This used to be a common practice on older calc forums way back in 2003-05, but this changed after some sites added stricter signature rules and due to how hard it is to make a small animated GIF with WabbitEmu compared to CalcCapture (since it allowed 4-5 FPS capture). I usually just used a still pic, though.

lkj · « **Reply #32 on:** July 27, 2013, 07:38:07 pm »

Quote from: Eeems on July 27, 2013, 02:51:10 pm

Actually the current thought is to make it smaller. That size is almost the size of a post with very little content. If the signature takes up that much space then too much of the topic is filled with excess and people have to sift through to get to the actual content. Albeit it is not as bad as before, but it is still going to be a bit much.

Looking at the average size of posts, a smaller sig than 800x200 would just create more empty space because of the info about the poster on the left of the post content, which is much taller than a short post. A small post still fills over half of the height of my browser window. You could say my screen is too small, but on (most) other forums (calc example: cemetech) three to four short posts fit on it.
If you want to waste less space with not-so-relevant things, you should think about doing a redesign of that part too, for example showing more of those things only in the profile that shows up when you click on the username.

Levak · « **Reply #33 on:** July 27, 2013, 07:46:25 pm »

Quote from: DJ Omnimaga on July 27, 2013, 04:37:07 pm

Also @Eeems, do you think for animated GIFs there could be an exception for Z80 and monochrome Casio calc screenshots

My modern laptop (that has an i7) activates its fan when browsing on some omnimaga topics because of animated GIFs in sigs.
On other pages where said signatures are not present it is fine. Why would we bother consume such power to browse on unrelated topics ?
Obviously, if there is only one or two animated GIFs (which was the case in the said "back in 2003" forums), my CPU is fine, but what would prevent all other people to put animated GIFs if one has the right to ? Either limit their usage or simply forbid them.
Just put a static image with a link to your project and fill your project topic with these animated GIFs.
As I said in the other topic, your sig is not your portfolio, you can quickly describe your hobbies with a single sentence, you can put a link to a topic describing all your projects, you also can put other links related to yourself and on what your love doing, not on what you did, it should be static in time.
Why not ? Regarding some sig, it looks like it has become an area to prove you have the most beautiful projects or the most enormous sig. Sorry to say that but it is a stupid way of mind. The sig is not for your promotion, it is for people wanting to know more about you, to identifying you easier, to understand if, without knowing you, your post can be trusted for sure.
I hope this little more detail on what a sig is according to the netiquette (without talking about limitation) has opened your mind.

On the other hand, Admins are talking of drastic limitations, most because a lot of people abused of the sig concept and its advantages to be present in every single post they make.

DJ Omnimaga · « **Reply #34 on:** July 27, 2013, 08:52:19 pm »

Quote from: Levak on July 27, 2013, 07:46:25 pm

As I said in the other topic, your sig is not your portfolio, you can quickly describe your hobbies with a single sentence, you can put a link to a topic describing all your projects, you also can put other links related to yourself and on what your love doing, not on what you did, it should be static in time.
Why not ? Regarding some sig, it looks like it has become an area to prove you have the most beautiful projects or the most enormous sig. Sorry to say that but it is a stupid way of mind. The sig is not for your promotion, it is for people wanting to know more about you, to identifying you easier, to understand if, without knowing you, your post can be trusted for sure.
I hope this little more detail on what a sig is according to the netiquette (without talking about limitation) has opened your mind.

First, just to make it clear, what you just said here is your opinion, not facts, so 1) I doubt it's the official netiquette (every forum can apply their own rules) and 2) you should have said something like "I think it's a stupid way of mind" rather than "It's a stupid way of mind". Don't try to force everyone here to switch from their mentality to yours. [FRENCH] S.V.P arrête d'essayer de forcer tout le monde sur Omnimaga à se conformer à ta mentalité. Aussi tu as le droit de dire ton opinion, mais nous avons le droit de dire la nôtre aussi sans se faire dire qu'on est stupide de penser comme ça.

Quote from: Levak on July 27, 2013, 07:46:25 pm

Quote from: DJ Omnimaga on July 27, 2013, 04:37:07 pm
Also @Eeems, do you think for animated GIFs there could be an exception for Z80 and monochrome Casio calc screenshots
My modern laptop (that has an i7) activates its fan when browsing on some omnimaga topics because of animated GIFs in sigs.
On other pages where said signatures are not present it is fine. Why would we bother consume such power to browse on unrelated topics ?
Obviously, if there is only one or two animated GIFs (which was the case in the said "back in 2003" forums), my CPU is fine, but what would prevent all other people to put animated GIFs if one has the right to ? Either limit their usage or simply forbid them.

Quote

providing they are less than 50 KB?

Also on MaxCoderz, Casiocalc.org, Omni and Epic Studios, my Pentium II 350 MHz running Windows XP could go through hordes of Metroid, MLC, XXR and Reuben Quest animated GIFs pretty fine. It was a little choppy during scrolling, but not bad enough to make my CPU overheat or stuff like that. Of course the screenshots were much smaller back then, which is why I suggested a strict limit on amount and size. However I like your idea of just using a static screenshot that links to a screenshots thread.

Quote from: Levak on July 27, 2013, 07:46:25 pm

As I said in the other topic, your sig is not your portfolio, you can quickly describe your hobbies with a single sentence, you can put a link to a topic describing all your projects, you also can put other links related to yourself and on what your love doing, not on what you did, it should be static in time.
Why not ? Regarding some sig, it looks like it has become an area to prove you have the most beautiful projects or the most enormous sig. Sorry to say that but it is a stupid way of mind. The sig is not for your promotion, it is for people wanting to know more about you, to identifying you easier, to understand if, without knowing you, your post can be trusted for sure.
I hope this little more detail on what a sig is according to the netiquette (without talking about limitation) has opened your mind.

I agree about the portfolio part and hobbies description part and I wish that some people who shrank down their sig had not removed the projects from them. I'm fine with a project list and links, though.

I disagree with the rest, though. As I said earlier you have your opinion but I have mine and none is superior to the other. Just so you know, most forums disallow creating topics for the sole purpose of advertising your own site or selling stuff, except in your signature. In fact, some forums even encourages users to put their personal sites and stuff in their sig just so people won't start signing up just to spam. Omnimaga has similar rules as well. Besides, I find it ironic that you say that sigs are not for promotion, when you're actually using your site for it (links to 3 sites). IMHO it's fine to use part of your sig for that, since it's discrete.

In case you didn't know, all the profits of my music sales are donated to Omnimaga so that they can afford the next hosting bill and contest prizes. If sigs were really not for promotion and I stopped advertising my music in all forum sigs, then maybe Omni wouldn't even be online anymore today. And on my Bandcamp traffic stats page, a lot of visitors came through Omnimaga topics.

Levak · « **Reply #35 on:** July 27, 2013, 10:14:47 pm »

Quote from: DJ Omnimaga on July 27, 2013, 08:52:19 pm

Quote from: Levak on July 27, 2013, 07:46:25 pm
Regarding some sig, it looks like it has become an area to prove you have the most beautiful projects or the most enormous sig. Sorry to say that but it is a stupid way of mind.
First, just to make it clear, what you just said here is your opinion, not facts [...] you should have said something like "I think it's a stupid way of mind" rather than "It's a stupid way of mind". Don't try to force everyone here to switch from their mentality to yours.

So, if my english is not crap, what I understand is that you encourage people to prove they have the most beautiful projects using the most enormous sig ?
What I wanted to underline is the contrary of the latter, and I did not thought there were any argument in favor of it, but, if there is, pardon me, of course you can think what you want, I just think it is a stupid way of mind.

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Besides, I find it ironic that you say that sigs are not for promotion, when you're actually using your site for it (links to 3 sites). IMHO it's fine to use part of your sig for that, since it's discrete.

I am just saying by these 3 links that I am the co-administrator of TI-Planet and Inspired-Lua. This helps peoples that do not know me but TI-Planet or Inspired-Lua to understand who I am, not what I've done. If I link my personal website, it is to remove every single gorgeous links to all my projects or my creations. Thus, I do not find this ironic at all.

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In case you didn't know, all the profits of my music sales are donated to Omnimaga so that they can afford the next hosting bill and contest prizes. If sigs were really not for promotion and I stopped advertising my music in all forum sigs, then maybe Omni wouldn't even be online anymore today. And on my Bandcamp traffic stats page, a lot of visitors came through Omnimaga topics.

Maybe you took the "your sig is not your portfolio" from my post to a personal attack, and it was not.
I was speaking to people reading my post in a general way, that may have been a bad English written part, sorry.

If I had to comment on your sig, I would only say that the "Reuben Quest Illusiat" is completly offset and may be removed. Of course I do not know what it is and what it represents and you may interpret what you want from this : Why not a reduce it or even make it a text-link ?
On the other hand, the upper part of you sig is completely homogeneous and I have nothing to say on its content since it does not disturb my topic walk-through.
Anyway, you absolutely do not own the worst sig, your sig even could be an example for some people...

DJ Omnimaga · « **Reply #36 on:** July 27, 2013, 10:43:25 pm »

Nope, I never said that I encourage people to have enormous sigs. My opinion is that we shouldn't force people to resort to text-only sigs nor disallow them to showcase any of their project/website. Just because I disagree with your opinion doesn't mean I encourage the total opposite. In fact I feel the new signature rules are a good idea. I'm just not annoyed about the sigs *as much* as you are and would personally not have made as much a huge thing about it nor tried to force others to think my way.

Quote from: Levak on July 27, 2013, 10:14:47 pm

Quote
Besides, I find it ironic that you say that sigs are not for promotion, when you're actually using your site for it (links to 3 sites). IMHO it's fine to use part of your sig for that, since it's discrete.
I am just saying by these 3 links that I am the co-administrator of TI-Planet and Inspired-Lua. This helps peoples that do not know me but TI-Planet or Inspired-Lua to understand who I am, not what I've done. If I link my personal website, it is to remove every single gorgeous links to all my projects or my creations. Thus, I do not find this ironic at all.

Well it's still (unintentional?) promotion in some ways, so if you have these 3 links there, then other members should be allowed to link to sites too. Otherwise it's a double-standard. By the way I think the links are fine.

Quote from: Levak on July 27, 2013, 10:14:47 pm

Quote
In case you didn't know, all the profits of my music sales are donated to Omnimaga so that they can afford the next hosting bill and contest prizes. If sigs were really not for promotion and I stopped advertising my music in all forum sigs, then maybe Omni wouldn't even be online anymore today. And on my Bandcamp traffic stats page, a lot of visitors came through Omnimaga topics.
Maybe you took the "your sig is not your portfolio" from my post to a personal attack, and it was not.
I was speaking to people reading my post in a general way, that may have been a bad English written part, sorry.

Not really a personal attack, I just thought you wanted every single member (including myself) on this forum to never ever post their own sites in their sig again, regardless of the reason, and I disagreed (to a certain extent) with that and specified my music example.

Quote from: Levak on July 27, 2013, 10:14:47 pm

If I had to comment on your sig, I would only say that the "Reuben Quest Illusiat" is completly offset and may be removed. Of course I do not know what it is and what it represents and you may interpret what you want from this : Why not a reduce it or even make it a text-link ?
On the other hand, the upper part of you sig is completely homogeneous and I have nothing to say on its content since it does not disturb my topic walk-through.
Anyway, you absolutely do not own the worst sig, your sig even could be an example for some people...

So my sig is the second worst one??

Just kidding

Reuben Quest: Ev Awakening was not only the first 84+ grayscale RPG ever made in existence (and the second 83+ grayscale game overall), but it achieved that feat in hybrid BASIC before xLIB APP even existed. The entire Reuben series made ticalc.org front page in 2004-2005 and GamesRadar in 2009. Illusiat is a series of 13 RPGs and remakes that came out in 2001-2002 but only gained in popularity in 2009 because of their retro factor and ASCII animations (perhaps the TI-81 port of Illusiat also brought more attention to the rest of the series). Now there are people who want to create Axe Parser remakes of some games in the series and Sorunome hosts two sites about the games.

Personally I was not gonna include the two logos in my sig, but Sorunome kept insisting every few hour so that I do. It was supposed to be userbars, but I had none and never felt like making them >.< . I want my sig to look nice, but while keeping it as small as possible (and hoping that people take example by shrinking down their sigs).

AssemblyBandit · « **Reply #37 on:** July 27, 2013, 11:02:31 pm »

I am definitely in favor of people displaying their projects in their sig, and pictures (especially gifs) draw my attention to them a lot more than just a name and a link. Sigs should be all about promotion and representing the member. They also make the pages a lot more colorful, fun, and personal. Who wants a boring text only forum? (not mentioned in this topic, just worst case senario) Out of all the forums out there, I am here the most. Not necessarily because of the unique sigs, but they do help to set the atmosphere.

DJ: There's nothing wrong with your signature, I think it looks professional.

Xeda112358 · « **Reply #38 on:** July 27, 2013, 11:20:12 pm »

I agree with AssemblyBandit, but I still cleaned up my signature some.

I definitely think spoilers are beneficial for keeping signatures compact, too. For example, if I decided to link to the other 100+ projects I have worked on and completed, I would want them in a spoiler

I don't think they would all fit, though, since the size limitation was set to 3000 characters instead of 10000 >.>

I also want to say in response to a previous post that my 1.6GHz computer that is three or four years old has never had trouble with heat issues loading pages. The only time my fan comes on is when Windows Update decides to update the .NET framework, when I run a virus scan, when I press F1, or when I am doing something else that eats my CPU. Maybe your ventilation is being blocked? Speaking of which, I haven't cleaned my fan in the past year >.>

TIfanx1999 · « **Reply #39 on:** July 28, 2013, 12:19:08 am »

Quote from: AssemblyBandit on July 27, 2013, 11:02:31 pm

I am definitely in favor of people displaying their projects in their sig, and pictures (especially gifs) draw my attention to them a lot more than just a name and a link. Sigs should be all about promotion and representing the member. They also make the pages a lot more colorful, fun, and personal. Who wants a boring text only forum? (not mentioned in this topic, just worst case senario) Out of all the forums out there, I am here the most. Not necessarily because of the unique sigs, but they do help to set the atmosphere.

DJ: There's nothing wrong with your signature, I think it looks professional.

This pretty much sums up how I feel. I do think the idea of adding some restrictions is good to keep signatures from getting out of hand. However, I dont think they should be so restricted that you cant use them for much of anything. I'm sure we will be able to find a good balance.

DJ Omnimaga · « **Reply #40 on:** July 28, 2013, 12:39:09 am »

Also I want to point out that regardless of the sig rules that are chosen, Omnimaga will not be able to please everyone.

Levak · « **Reply #41 on:** July 28, 2013, 01:48:03 am »

Humm, there are some misunderstandings of my posts, I would say.

Quote from: DJ Omnimaga on July 27, 2013, 10:43:25 pm

My opinion is that we shouldn't force people to resort to text-only sigs

Where have I said that ? The initial "complain" was about animated gifs that disturb reading and slow down the display (and "activates the fan of my laptop", not "overheat"). Plus spoilers in sigs that margin a lot more than a simple text and is abused to hide tons of useless content (in general, don't make me say what I did not).
I was also reminding, that according to the usage and good-practices (also called netiquette for the net) sigs is neither a portfolio nor a junk but a place to identify the poster. Obviously, I am wrong since this does not apply to forum where there is a left describing part. Good point.
However, it could be a really good idea not to think the contrary. I recognize that saying my opinion as such may display me as a pure troll in order to return to text-only sigs, but honestly, all started with some abuses in some people sigs : I only wanted to reopen the debates of what a sig really is. It appears, contrary to my thoughts, that people to not own a place to expose their projects and removing them from their sig would hurt them.
My message is : "make it as homogeneous as possible and think of any readers that cares more about the topic than your sig".

Quote

I'm just not annoyed about the sigs *as much* as you are and would personally not have made as much a huge thing about it nor tried to force others to think my way.

Honestly, I have been reading omnimaga for a long time now (~2y) and saw the sig evolution going worse and worse. I did not had the time to express myself on the topic due to a lot of school projects going on. Now I have some time to discuss, I did it, but it's hard to maintain a constant flow acceptable for the readers. You may have thought my reaction was oversized maybe because of my long silence time.

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Quote from: Levak on July 27, 2013, 10:14:47 pm
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Besides, I find it ironic that you say that sigs are not for promotion, when you're actually using your site for it (links to 3 sites). IMHO it's fine to use part of your sig for that, since it's discrete.
I am just saying by these 3 links that I am the co-administrator of TI-Planet and Inspired-Lua. This helps peoples that do not know me but TI-Planet or Inspired-Lua to understand who I am, not what I've done. If I link my personal website, it is to remove every single gorgeous links to all my projects or my creations. Thus, I do not find this ironic at all.
Well it's still (unintentional?) promotion in some ways, so if you have these 3 links there, then other members should be allowed to link to sites too. Otherwise it's a double-standard. By the way I think the links are fine.

You're taking my words too literally ; Of course it's an advertisement for TI-Planet ! Anyway ...

Next person :

Quote from: AssemblyBandit on July 27, 2013, 11:02:31 pm

I am definitely in favor of people displaying their projects in their sig, and pictures (especially gifs) draw my attention to them a lot more than just a name and a link. Sigs should be all about promotion and representing the member.

For sure, I just don't like the way peoples abuse of it making their sig 10x taller than the topic itself, thus, I was reminding what a sig was (for example in emails or back in 90' text-only forums). This helps to contrast between the abuses and this "picture". It also helps to describe new limitations face to those abuses.

Quote

They also make the pages a lot more colorful, fun, and personal. [...] Not necessarily because of the unique sigs, but they do help to set the atmosphere.

It creates an atmosphere and I'm not the one who will disagree, but as I said the main reason this discussion exists is because of abuses.
At first I only examined the abuses and it appeared that a good part of the loss of space was to list all the made projects using a lot of animated gifs.
Regarding the sig I do not mind, indeed, there are promotions of projects, but made cleverly, and with care of the reader.

Next :

Quote from: Xeda112358 on July 27, 2013, 11:20:12 pm

I definitely think spoilers are beneficial for keeping signatures compact, too. For example, if I decided to link to the other 100+ projects I have worked on and completed, I would want them in a spoiler

The spoiler acts like a link to a topic listing your projects. Having spoiler made certain person want to create that topic inside of their sig.
Spoilers are indeed a good idea to collapse the sig (in order to silence people like me), but as said above, abuses of this concept broke the line of trust : at first it was a single spoiler, then spoilers of spoilers, then an entire page that would not fit in a 24" screen...). Since it is not only one sig affected, what would you do ?

Quote

I also want to say in response to a previous post that my 1.6GHz computer that is three or four years old has never had trouble with heat issues loading pages. Maybe your ventilation is being blocked?

Activating the fan is not only a source of heat, but also a source of throttle the CPU (or GPU) has to run in order to prevent the heat.
Modern browsers optimize the areas to re-render, but it became insane facing animated GIF all over the page with different framerates and sizes.
As I said in the post you're referring, I did not encounter this behavior on every pages, just pages where said people had posted consecutively.

End : feel free to hate me after this long post.

DJ Omnimaga · « **Reply #42 on:** July 28, 2013, 02:22:35 am »

Ah ok thanks for the clarification Levak. I wasn't sure if you wanted sigs to really be as limited as possible at first, but it appears to not be the case. I understand your concerns about the recent abuse. As for why I might have been worried at your topic it might have been due to the short amount of time that elapsed between our recent misunderstandings and the sig topic. Also the topic title was a bit misleading since it said ponies instead of GIF abuse.

Quote from: Levak on July 28, 2013, 01:48:03 am

saw the sig evolution going worse and worse

I agree, and I'm glad you weren't here in July 2006. That psychedelic smiley art still holds the record for most annoying sig on a calc forum.

AssemblyBandit · « **Reply #43 on:** July 28, 2013, 02:37:57 am »

Levak: I don't think anyone is going to "hate" you over your opinion! I think its a good thing that you brought it up to keep the signatures in check. I realized that I really didn't need two videos in my signature

I also realized that not everyone has the fastest internet speed (especially after looking through the post your speed topic) and crazy sigs might really get annoying! I remember when I had to use my cell phone to connect to the internet. No 3g, just my iden phone plugged into my computer and I only had close to dial up speeds, images were not an option

TIfanx1999 · « **Reply #44 on:** July 28, 2013, 03:05:50 am »

@Levak:I actually appreciate the explanation. Thanks. I understand more where you're comming from now.

Author Topic: New Signature Limitations (Read 18839 times)

TIfanx1999

Re: New Signature Limitations

DJ Omnimaga

Re: New Signature Limitations

lkj

Re: New Signature Limitations

Levak

Re: New Signature Limitations

DJ Omnimaga

Re: New Signature Limitations

Levak

Re: New Signature Limitations

DJ Omnimaga

Re: New Signature Limitations

AssemblyBandit

Re: New Signature Limitations

Xeda112358

Re: New Signature Limitations

TIfanx1999

Re: New Signature Limitations

DJ Omnimaga

Re: New Signature Limitations

Levak

Re: New Signature Limitations

DJ Omnimaga

Re: New Signature Limitations

AssemblyBandit

Re: New Signature Limitations

TIfanx1999

Re: New Signature Limitations