Other people's signature length

[Steve Machol]

Originally posted by qwaz
Wonder if I can get a response from some other people about this.

It's funny because shortly after posting I was thinking of removing the links to my buttons, I received emails from two separate people thanking me for these button sets. I did remove two lines from my sig however.

I have to admit that I really don't know which sigs you specifically have a problem with. If it's eva2000's, then I happen to agree with James that his links are very useful. In fact I've only seen one sig (with a large image) that I think is overboard.

To each his own I guess!

[Paul J]

But, why do we need all the links to mysql.com? Don't we know that the site exists?

[JamesUS]

It's a lot easier to find the pages through George's sig than going to mysql.com

And lots of his links point to one of his own sites, where he's written lots of useful articles about server and mysql configuration - I refer to those very frequently.

[Paul J]

Whether or not his links are useful is a different story.

His signature is 22 lines long!

It seems everyone except for the mods here are in agreement that sigs of that nature are rude, extreme, unecessary and not well liked.

Do you really think that telling your customers to turn off signatures to avoid ads is a fair request?

[JamesUS]

Originally posted by qwaz
Whether or not his links are useful is a different story.

His signature is 22 lines long!

It seems everyone except for the mods here are in agreement that sigs of that nature are rude, extreme, unecessary and not well liked.

Do you really think that telling your customers to turn off signatures to avoid ads is a fair request?

That's because we as mods have found that George's signature has saved us lots of time in answering questions because people follow the links in it before asking us.

And yes I do personally feel that it's a fair request to ask people to turn signatures off if they don't agree with our policy on signatures here. We currently have no signature limits here. Obviously we would rethink the policy if everyone started having unacceptably long signatures filled with ads for their site or big images, but George's sig isn't for his benefit, it's for everyone else's.

[mjames]

Originally posted by JamesUS
Obviously we would rethink the policy if everyone started having unacceptably long signatures filled with ads for their site or big images, but George's sig isn't for his benefit, it's for everyone else's.

If eva's signature (among others) is not "unacceptably long", I'd be interested to know what is.

Yes, that signature is helpful. I will not disregard that, but your argument that there should be no limits on signatures because it is helpful for moderators in answering questions is weak. How many moderators are there? Compare that with the number of members here who make these forums tick.

If you all, as moderators, truly need those links as helpful resources, bookmark them and add them to your IE Links Toolbar. It'll save members like myself and qwaz time from scrolling past the alarmingly lengthy signatures and getting to the actual content.

Moral of the story, I think people should be more considerate with their signatures. I don't mind five or six lines. Heck, smachol's isn't bad, it's bearable when you compare it to some. But signatures like those of eva and PPN are out of control. The whole point of signatures are to include your name, e-mail, web site, and a favorite quote or saying. Much more than that is, well...

[Paul J]

Wow. And jelsoft doesn't even support "modifying the code" yet PPN has 20 lines of links to his code hacks.

Looks like that's benefiting himself and vb.org, not us.

[Steve Machol]

Originally posted by mjames

If eva's signature (among others) is not "unacceptably long", I'd be interested to know what is.
.
.
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If you all, as moderators, truly need those links as helpful resources, bookmark them and add them to your IE Links Toolbar.

I am sympathetic to the sig length issue, but I respectfully disagree with this solution. Do you have any idea at all how much time of his free time George spends on these forums helping people voluntarilly (i.e., without pay)? To ask him to spend even more time doing this thankless job is not a solution at all.

[Paul J]

Asking us to sympathize with those that "VOLUNTEER" their time here is not a solution either.

[Steve Machol]

Originally posted by qwaz
Asking us to sympathize with those that "VOLUNTEER" their time here is not a solution either.

Frankly I don't want your 'sympathy'. And clearly you are not interested in any viewpoint that differs from your own. I was simply trying to point out we do this for all the Members and don't get any compensation for this. To ask us to spend even more of our free time at this is not an equitable solution.

Sorry to disappoint you, but I have the right to my opinion. I'm done with this thread. Good luck with your crusade!

[Paul J]

I'm looking for a mutual solution. I'm open to it, and have made suggestions. You're putting words in my mouth once again.

All I've gotten is "no, we won't change our obsessivley long sigs". How that means that I won't listen to another opinions is beyond me.

[Nicole]

Golly.
Sigs are cool- and helpful, part of the fun of these boards arent they??
I don't even notice them most of the time- and when i do bother to read them, I usually get some useful information.

And I enjoy the creativity of some of the sigs too.

People sure find funny things to be bothered by.
Whatever makes a person happy is cool with me.



When I get my board going- I love the vb- I don't plan on restricting sigs.

[George L]

geez people talking about my sig and only just coming across this thread

Some people have dial up, some people even pay their ISPs by the amount og time they spend online.

With some of the signatures here that are 25 lines long full of advertisments, that can lead to a lot of load time, and costly ISP bills.

Is there a possibility that signatures can be limited in size?

one thing you forget is vBulletin.com's pages are gzipped and compressed... limiting sigs to 4 lines compared to what exists already will probably only save 0.5 - 3.5 kb per page

since a 260kb uncompressed page in gzip mode can be as small as 16kb

so essentially you save around 1 - 2 seconds on 56k dialup. Of course it would be different if pages were uncompressed since then that would add alot to load time

I'm looking for a mutual solution. I'm open to it, and have made suggestions. You're putting words in my mouth once again.

All I've gotten is "no, we won't change our obsessivley long sigs". How that means that I won't listen to another opinions is beyond me.

1. a mutual solution would be defined as one where both parties agree

2. listening to another's opinions doesn't mean you have to agree with them. You've made your suggestion and we have taken it into account.

3. my sig is 25 lines not 22 lines (including spaces)

4. my sig will not always be that long, but that's irrevelant since you're arguing for a community wide standard but who's going to police that standard? This is a support forum for helping vBulletin owners with vB/mysql/server related issues and that would and should dictate our priorities (defending the usefulness of my sig which has probably helped out more vB owners than the average total posts for each members here)

5. will my sig get longer? probably not

[Floris]

Seriously waste of my bandw.

I do not like to start/participate in a flamewar, but I just have to mention this...

You complain about signatures that are long.. uhm, and?
It is just 'text'. Which is fairly light to load. Besides gzip being used here, the signatures in this thread have no images (except now mine). I seriously do not understand why you have a problem with that.

The compromise here is to disable "show signature". And if you disagree on that, uhm.. then it is not our problem. The excempt of the users you have met here, add them to your IE toolbar, as your suggested yourself.

I'd bother more about the limit of avatar's getting loaded, turn those off and the pages fly..

The threads hardly have any images, goto any design page on the web these days and they are 85% .jpg/img/flash and 10% text, the remaining 5% is just tcp/ip overhead :P

As far as I am concerned, I hope users do not disagree with my signature. It doesn't include 'ads/spam'. It is just a representation of where I have used my vBulletin software, and where users can register. The rest are quicklinks to my template/style hacks and a few of the most commenly issues I have seen here on vBulletin.com

When users disagree with my signature, they can goto a moderator and complain, because only if a moderator approaches me that there is some kind of objection, I'll consider altering my signature. But I currently see no reason why, for I have no differ content in it, then the majority on this forum.


If you are on dailup, and you are involved with being an administrator of a forum, especially vBulletin, you MUST consider this: MOST of the vBulletin stuff you do, is done ON-line, not off-line. Working on a forum, .. it isn't a static something.html so ./. oh why bother!

[Chris Schreiber]

I setup a poll here: http://www.vbulletin.com/forum/showt...threadid=40416