Forum:CT:Restrictions on custom user signatures

This page is an archive of a community-wide discussion. This page is no longer live. Further comments should be made in the Senate Hall or new Consensus Track pages rather than here so that this page is preserved as a historic record.
The result of the debate was to allow signatures to have a small (appropriate) picture, one font color, and an optional link to talk page.–Sentry^Talk 00:31, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

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This topic concerns establishing restrictions on user custom sigs – should they be established, and if so, what? RMF 14:27, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

Discussion

As I mentioned here and here, I think we should establish some basic restrictions on custom user signatures. If you read the first link you see the basic rationale as to why we should restrict them:

• Unnecessary use of server resources (and therefore slowdown)
• Clouding of page source (for example take a look at [1] – very distracting, in my opinion)
• in most browsers, images do not scale with the text, making lines with images higher than those without

There are various restrictions we could set in place – we could ban images, we could restrict sigs to a certain number of colors/links, we could restrict the use of {{PAGENAME}} variables (or require them to be subst'ed), etc. Thoughts? RMF 14:27, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

• • Definitely require them to be subst'd, and require images to be small, if not absent. —Silly Dan _(talk) 14:30, 14 May 2006 (UTC)
    • I meant require {{PAGENAME}} to be susbt'ed, specifically. RMF 21:05, 21 May 2006 (UTC)
• How about a vote? I got some options...feel free to add more. StarNeptune^{Talk to me!} 15:12, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

Ban them all!

No pictures, one font color, optional link to talk page

• This option is the bare bones. One color, and an optional link to your talk page.

1. StarNeptune^{Talk to me!} 15:12, 14 May 2006 (UTC)
2. —Jaymach Ral'Tir (talk) 19:41, 14 May 2006 (UTC)
3. RMF 03:55, 15 May 2006 (UTC)
4. Dark Spork 03:40, 16 May 2006 (UTC)
5. Sikon [Talk] 18:58, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
6. Breathesgelatin 10:03, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
7. SparqMan 21:02, 21 May 2006 (UTC)
8. It's an encyclopedia, not a self-promotion resource. -- Havac 20:52, 28 May 2006 (UTC)
9. No attention getters. Riffsyphon1024 04:48, 7 July 2006 (UTC)
10. Sig pics are just plain annoying. –Sentry ^[Talk] 05:37, 7 July 2006 (UTC)
11. Timifer 20:08, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
12. Muuuuuurgh 18:02, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
13. i dont mind the different colors but the different sizes and pictures are very annoying. Ugluk 19:47, 3 September 2006 (UTC)
14. I'm chaging my vote, I've decided that, these sigs are starting to get out of hand. Fatguy2006 21:51, 3 September 2006 (UTC)
15. Pointless pics...Jedi Dude 21:53, 3 September 2006 (UTC)
16. Cull Tremayne 21:15, 1 October 2006 (UTC) Shameless self-aggrandizing :P
17. Tinwe 14:11, 2 October 2006 (UTC)
18. Sulgran 03:11, 3 October 2006 (UTC)
19. Imp 15:24, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

Small (appropriate){{n|1}} pictures, one font color, optional link to talk page

• Same as above, but with a small picture.

1. Could be persuaded to have all pictures removed too. I note that wikipedia lets people put tiny flags and the like in their sigs, though. —Silly Dan _(talk) 15:16, 14 May 2006 (UTC)
2. I like my little Imperial logo. Come on, at least let us have one tiny picture. Fleet Admiral J. Nebulax ^{(Imperial Holovision)} 15:24, 14 May 2006 (UTC)
3. Adamwankenobi^{Talk to me! My home.} 15:27, 14 May 2006 (UTC)
4. Small pictures are fine. Just so long as we get rid of line breaks and other format-bending stuff, I'll be happy. jSarek 21:41, 14 May 2006 (UTC)
5. MandalorianWarrior_talk 04:03, 15 May 2006 (UTC)
6. DarthLumiya 13:35, 17 May 2006 (UTC)
7. MarcK [talk] 06:04, 21 May 2006 (UTC)
8. Mirlen 00:10, 23 May 2006 (UTC)
9. Jasca Ducato 13:22, 29 May 2006 (UTC)
10. Thetoastman 08:37, 24 June 2006 (UTC)
11. --Xwing328^(Talk) 05:51, 25 June 2006 (UTC) How about 1 pic/one color, or no pic/two colors? If not, I can deal with it I guess.
12. I'm in favor of Xwing's plan. —Mirlen 14:35, 7 July 2006 (UTC)
13. I agree with the Picture, one font color and optional link Fatguy2006 20:27, 8 July 2006 (UTC)
14. Snoop 15:20, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
15. --Blue-one 11:50, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
16. I like my signature the way it is, with the little icon and contribs log thing. This vote is still active, right? — Aiddat ^{(Holonet) (Contribs Log)} 00:23, 19 August 2006 (UTC)
17. See my comments below. --Gem (talk) 00:32, 19 August 2006 (UTC)
18. I think as long as 20px is enforced, that's fine. Atarumaster88 14:18, 29 August 2006 (UTC)
19. I'll lower mine to 20px--Darth Oblivion^Comlink 19:49, 3 September 2006 (UTC)
20. I already am set. 20px is my kind of size. --Jabbathehuttgartogg 23:29, 3 September 2006 (UTC)
21. Roron Corobb 21:46, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
22. Angel Blue^(Holonet) 22:19, 1 October 2006 (UTC)
23. This is outrageous!Next thing you know, they'll be taking away our "fanfics"!--IG-Prime^{(Sentience Core)} 13:37, 2 October 2006 (UTC)
24. Jaina Solo^{(Goddess Stuff)} 13:39, 2 October 2006 (UTC)
25. Green Tentacle ^(Talk) 17:45, 2 October 2006 (UTC)

Keep them the way they are now

• This option means keeping excessive tags in your sig like multiple font colors, the {{pagename}} tag and links to things other than your talk page.

Discussion (continued)

While it might be close (11 to 14), can we please end this already? Fleet Admiral J. Nebulax ^{(Imperial Holovision)} 20:23, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

• Okay, now 11 to 15. Fleet Admiral J. Nebulax ^{(Imperial Holovision)} 12:01, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
  • Great, now it's even closer - 12 to 15. --Xwing328^(Talk) 18:19, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

I would suggest a new kind of limitation. Limit the number of characters of the sig code. A limit of 50-100 characters would be good. Image height shouldn't be more than about 20 pixels. And the sigs should always be subst:ed. If a user changes a sig and it is included in many talk pages, the wiki will recache all of those pages. --Gem (talk) 00:32, 19 August 2006 (UTC)

In the recent Mofference it was agreed that a new discussion and vote will be started, as a new suggestion was made which many people actually liked. It was proposed that a user signature is limited to 40-50 characters plus the mandatory link to the users user page. I have not started a new vote/discussion myself, waiting for an admin to do so. --Gem (talk) 18:00, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

• [Does not know what to say]--SWME
• Can't we use some kind of referential signatures like certain forum softwares do, so that all the signatures point back to a single source that when edited, would update all instances of it? That would keep them from being hardcoded into the talk pages at least (the timestamp would still have to be, of course). – Brynn Alastayr 03:08, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

Notes

{{note|1}} By appropriate, I mean small icons no bigger than 20px, and they should not be depicting anything inappropriate...like porn.

Comments

Oh great... Now Dan is restricting me on my custom sig! although my sig looks like this: [[File:Phaze I Clone Armor.jpg|62px]] [[User:SWME|<font color="gold">'''SWME'''</font>]] [[User talk:SWME|<font color="sapphire"><font size="-49">''(Holocron Comms. Network)''</font></font>]] [[Special:Contributions/SWME|<font color="crimson"><font size="-50">What I do</font></font>]] It actually is made of this ! :

[[File:Phaze I Clone Armor.jpg|62px]] [[User:SWME|<font color="gold">'''SWME'''</font>]] [[User  talk:SWME|<font color="sapphire"><font size="-49">''(Holocron Comms. Network)''</font></font>]]  [[Special:Contributions/SWME|<font color="crimson"><font size="-50">What I do</font></font>]]

What do I do now ?!--SWME, the guy who does not now what to do.

• Use a smaller image? —Silly Dan _(talk) 20:47, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

(These comments were deleted by SWME because he no longer likes his sig)

• • Seeing SWME's signature makes me want to vote to have them all banned. -- I need a name (Complain here) 21:14, 1 October 2006 (UTC)
    • Indeed. - breathesgelatin^Talk 21:22, 1 October 2006 (UTC)
      • Complain all you want!--A user who is obviously SWME
        • Whats wrong with multiple font colors? Ugluk: Destroyer of Redlinks>^{Whine Here} 23:37, 2 October 2006 (UTC)
          • Well, here's one possible objection. When you're editing a talk page:

jSarek's signature looks like this: [[User:JSarek|jSarek]] 03:09, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

My signature looks like this: —[[User:Silly Dan|Silly Dan]] _{[[User talk:Silly Dan|(talk)]]} 20:47, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

Your example signature looks like this: [[User:Ugluk|<span style="color:red;">U</span><span style="color:green;">g</span><span style="color:blue;">l</span><span style="color:orange;">u</span><span style="color:red;">k</span>: Destroyer of Redlinks]]>^{[[User talk:Ugluk|Whine Here]]} 23:37, 2 October 2006 (UTC)

It can make the wikicode look messy. —Silly Dan _(talk) 03:14, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

• Sorry Dan i meant that as a joke and only used it once, man i have to remember that tone of voice doesnt travel well over the internet. i would never use one that grossly ridiculous. Ugluk: Destroyer of Redlinks^{Whine Here} 03:17, 3 October 2006 (UTC)
  • It's OK, I thought you were kidding there. 8) —Silly Dan _(talk) 03:18, 3 October 2006 (UTC)
    • Twas mostly a satire of a certain other sig. Ugluk: Destroyer of Redlinks^{Whine Here} 03:32, 3 October 2006 (UTC)
• The thing i think will happen is it wont be enforced. Ugluk^{Whine Here}_{Fight Night} 18:18, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

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The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.