GuildWiki talk:Sigpic


 * "Seasonal images"? Are we having a movement to mass-encourage people to upload new sig-images for various special events?  Just wondering. -User:PanSola (talk to the [[Image:follower of Lyssa.png]]) 02:37, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
 * Pan, the way this works is that some admin changes the .css, and all participating users display the same image. In the case of this demo, the small buffalo would come up all over the wiki in different users' signatures (but only those that changed it in their preferences to participate, it is strictly "opt-in"), and they wouldn't have to a thing, no uploads or anything. -- ◄mendel► 03:00, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
 * I think this has a potential of creating even more mess with users who don't know what they're doing, but want one cus "it's cool." People seem to steal mainspace Icons all the time as it is, and request help with sigs, and then we have to tell them how to get a custom sig and to upload their own image.  Just imagine what this could do.  Why not just change your real sig for the season, and then change it back?  Nothing fancy here.  RoseOfKali [[Image:RoseOfKaliSIG.png]] 02:43, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
 * The advantage is, you change your sig once, and you'll always automatically get a seasonal image, no mess, no anything. The way it works is that you change your sig to  and check the "raw" checkbox in your preferences, and that's it! You can have a more complicated signature, of course, but that would be entirely optional. -- ◄mendel► 03:00, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

To clarify: the image goes away when the season is over, and is replaced by another image when a new season begins (this happens automatically when a GuildWiki sysop makes the central change). That means you can change your signature now, and when dragon festival starts, all of the posts you signed after the change get the buffalo. There'll be a GuildWiki page to show off the images and decide on new ones together. -- ◄mendel► 03:07, 21 January 2009 (UTC)


 * I don't see the point of this, other than possibly reducing redundant image uploads, or being used to differentiate certain users from others ("Look at me, I'm participating in the wintersday raffle/Dragon Festival party/aware of breast cancer!"), but whatever. It's exactly the same thing you did for the holiday "iceboxes"; well, the concept is the same... "I don't want to see them" is irrelevant because it is opt-in, and you cannot force another user to change their sig just because you don't want to see it, either. (Well, with this, I could disable them from showing up via .css, but that is another matter) [[Image:Entropy Sig.jpg]] (T/C) 03:15, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
 * The point is that I grabbed the festival mascot off guildwiki.de and while I would have used it as my personal signature image it seemed fair to allow anybody to use it; and usually that would've meant that everybody who wanted would have had to upload their own copy plus all the yada yada that Rose mentioned. This way, the mascot can be shared, image redirects are not needed, and it can become a community thing. -- ◄mendel► 03:48, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

Licensing Issues

 * Assuming it's done with padding + background image trick, I'd be a little uneasy unless the license of the image used is easily findable by other visitors/users. "Easily" is of course subjective, but let's say at least without using firebug or viewing the CSS code, and without going through recently uploaded files one by one.  Can it be pulled off without complicating the syntax? (By saying "I'd be a little unease" instead of outright demanding certain conditions, I try to dodge a particular double-standards question...) -User:PanSola (talk to the [[Image:follower of Lyssa.png]]) 05:24, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
 * Well that is simple to address. Simply have the image redirect to the page where images are decided upon, and make sure to copy the copyright info to that page (which would be on the image's page anyway). [[Image:Entropy Sig.jpg]] (T/C) 06:19, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
 * The double standard issue is that the license of our user sigs can only be seen by backtracking the redirect and then viewing the page source (I wondered why guildwiki.de doesn't redirect its signatures and thought that might've been a reason) . We have no licensing link to the GuildWiki logo and no info on the page it redirects to; I have no idea how the monobook book background is licensed because it's not even in Image: namespace.
 * Concerning the ox, the issue is moot because it's in the public domain. Concerning the Creative Commons licenses, section 4d of this states at a minimum such credit will appear where any other comparable authorship credit appears, and that means the credit on the Image: page suffices, a direct link is not required. GFDL probably works in similar ways.
 * Entropy, your fix wouldn't be simple because it would completely change the concept: signature images that don't link to the user's page would certainly be a contentious issue.
 * See Sigpic. -- ◄mendel► 11:59, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
 * I beg to differ.
 * In any case, I don't see what the problem would be. If you already have a sig image, that redirects to your userspace, so it is fine. Yes, it would mean slight changes to GW:SIGN, but I think it would be acceptable.
 * The main problem arises for users who do not have images in their signatures. Thus the problem becomes - how to make it completely obvious that it is not a normal sig image? One thought is to put that extra 50px width to use and add some text like "DF '09". Another is to make a very small link which is also added using the sigpic class, which links to here. Finally, it could be put onto the sitenotice for the duration of the "season" so that people can identify what it is. [[Image:Entropy Sig.jpg]] (T/C) 12:56, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
 * Entropy, the point is, the license for the logo is just as easy to find (or not) as the sigpic license is. I do not see any difference between the two in that respect, and given the licensing terms, there is no need to get fancy.
 * Why do we need to make it obvious it is not a normal sig image? Ok, we've got space in the "What's new" box on the mainpage we're not using, and we can put a pointer to here on CSS classes and into the site css itself, so there are ways for inquiring minds to find out. -- ◄mendel► 15:15, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
 * Well if someone clicks on the sigpic and thinks it is a sig image, then ofc they will get confused, so that's bad. Or if they learn to identify people by signatures, that will confuse them. I agree that if this is going to go live it ought to be publically announced in such a way. [[Image:Entropy Sig.jpg]] (T/C) 17:06, 21 January 2009 (UTC)


 * The logo is something people can just type "logo" into the search box and can figure out the license with sufficient ease. For the festive icons, I think for ease of license discovery it needs to go into the sitenotice with an id increment.  BTW the festive icons won't be clickable correct?  Not sure if that has good or bad implications. -User:PanSola (talk to the [[Image:follower of Lyssa.png]]) 18:17, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
 * They are clickable, and they link to the link they're associated with (and they can only be associated with links). So if you click on it, you can just ask the user who has it on where he got it. -- ◄mendel► 20:17, 21 January 2009 (UTC)


 * Ah thanks. I mistakenly thought you were going to be using the padding + background-image CSS trick.  Is it going to be JS-generated instead? -User:PanSola (talk to the [[Image:follower of Lyssa.png]]) 20:39, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
 * By "clickable" I intended to mean links to its Image: page, but I didn't word it clearly. I'd still advocate having the info in sitenotice with id increment. -User:PanSola (talk to the [[Image:follower of Lyssa.png]]) 20:47, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
 * Who do you think needs it? -- ◄mendel► 20:50, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
 * Other people visiting our wiki and wish to use that icon for their own purposes need it. Our spirit and the spirit of our licenses need it.  We should make a good-faithed effort to make the information on the license of the images we use easily discoverable.  The GuildWiki logo info can be easily found by searching for "logo" on the wiki (and linked from About.  Default MW/Wikia interface images are part of the software skin and the license for those isn't within our responsibility (covered by the software's copyright/license sections whereever they are).  But if the license info of the seasonal icons is so obscure it requires asking selective other users in order to locate it, we might as well not tag any images with licenses and just say "For license info on this image, ask on the uploader's talk page". -User:PanSola (talk to the [[Image:follower of Lyssa.png]]) 21:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
 * Well, GW:IMAGE and such would also apply to these sigpics, and so they would need to have license info on the image itself; and it has to be readily available (unless I am forgetting the policy). So in that vein I think PanSola makes sense. [[Image:Entropy Sig.jpg]] (T/C) 23:55, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
 * The image is properly tagged, and always has been. I see nothing in GW:IMAGE that conflicts with sigpic. -- ◄mendel► 00:15, 22 January 2009 (UTC)


 * Entropy, GW:IMAGE says nothing about "readily available", and thus I am arguing for something currently not codified. Mendel, IMHO properly tagging is useless if you can't easily find a link to the image info page containing the license tag when you see the image.  That is my concern and why I advocate a sitenotice with incremented ID to address the concern. -User:PanSola (talk to the [[Image:follower of Lyssa.png]]) 02:22, 22 January 2009 (UTC)
 * You already explained that. I think that we have several avenues to publicise self-linked versions of the current sigpic signature image that we can explore, and that there's no need to decide on any one of those (or limit ourselves to just some) now. -- ◄mendel► 02:35, 22 January 2009 (UTC)
 * I don't mind exploring the various avenues, though we should get it settled before the first application of it. Should we particularly table the discussion (avenues to make license info easily locatable) for anything? -User:PanSola (talk to the [[Image:follower of Lyssa.png]]) 03:16, 22 January 2009 (UTC)


 * BTW, the double standard issue is that back when I proposed having favicons for external links, it was done with the padding + background-image CSS trick, and thus it's not easy to find the license info of those images used. Regular images in signatures is easy to find license, and is not at all part of my originally mentioned double standard issue. -User:PanSola (talk to the [[Image:follower of Lyssa.png]]) 20:42, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

Changing pics
So let's say I activate this and I have a mini ox following my sigs on all the talk pages I post. When we get to Wintersday, won't all of the oxes change into snowflakes or whatever the next picture might be? Silver Sunlight (T/C) 12:39, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
 * Basically, yes. Except as I envision it now, there'll be periods with no picture, but of course that's not been decided yet. -- ◄mendel► 12:47, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
 * Well, there is a holiday for every day of the year, but I do not think we are that zealous. ;) [[Image:Entropy Sig.jpg]] (T/C) 12:56, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
 * It all depends on what images get proposed and accepted, so get busy! ;-) -- ◄mendel► 14:52, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
 * It would annoy me to see my posts in July have a Christmas decoration when I go back to them in December :P Silver Sunlight [[Image:SSunlight.jpg|18px]] (T/C) 15:04, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
 * Ahh, I see what you are getting at now. Hmm. I know that this can already be a problem for some people who upload seasonal sigs by uploading a new version of their current sig. The solution is to instead upload separate images and then go change one's raw signature for the season. But, this would be infeasible for class-based changes because it would make Wikia recode it each time. [[Image:Entropy Sig.jpg]] (T/C) 15:19, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
 * Yip, this would be the main reason for me not using the template in my signature. Silver Sunlight [[Image:SSunlight.jpg|18px]] (T/C) 15:33, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
 * Well, if that annoys you, this feature is not for you. This feature is for people who are annoyed with seeing wintersday sigs show up in July just because the comments were posted in winter (well, unless it's Wintersday in July week).
 * However, you can still use the ox, but you have to reupload it and use it in place of your existing sig image, or use a graphics editor to merge the two into one. -- ◄mendel► 15:35, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

(Reset indent) Your signature will behave like tree through the seasons: a tree buds in spring, has green leaves in summer, brown leaves in autumn and bare twigs in winter; and the same transformation will be visible on a talk page with signatures of participating editors: the changes in our signatures will subtly change the appearance of the whole page as the seasons change. -- ◄mendel► 23:01, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

Permanent images?
I was wondering if it would be possible to make the images permanent, so they would appear for that signature forever, like if I sign something now with the ox, and come back and look at that signature during the dragon festival. the ox would still be there, and not be replaced by a .. dragon? As it is now I don't particularly like the idea, cause it would look odd with a snowflake next to a sig that says May, but if what I said above is possible I would Probably use it. Viruzzz 03:18, 22 January 2009 (UTC)
 * Yeah it's mentioned a few sections up. From my limited understanding of css I think it is impossible to do without rewriting the code each time, which conflicts with the automated ideal anyway. I share the same misgivings. [[Image:Entropy Sig.jpg]] (T/C) 03:21, 22 January 2009 (UTC)


 * If you really love the image and want it to be permanent, you'd have to manually code your sig to contain that image during the time period you want it to show. An alternative is to add the date-information to the class field, something like   (the variables would get subst-ed when you actually sign) for the ppl who want it to be permanent, but that'd require the CSS to have a lot more additional rules to accommodate each day. -User:PanSola (talk to the [[Image:follower of Lyssa.png]]) 16:39, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

GW:SING
So basically, this is an exception to the one-image / 50px wide max rule, or must your sig still follow those rules? --- -- (contribs)  &emsp;(talk)  13:58, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
 * This would be a completely separate image which would necessitate changing some parts of GW:SIGN, such as the part about having 2 images. I think that ideally the "sigpic" should be small enough that if it is added to a user who already has a 50px sig, it isn't excessively more disruptive. (If the limit applied cumilatively, that would be a problem for anyone who has a 50px image, so that part needs rewording too...) [[Image:Entropy Sig.jpg]] (T/C) 14:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
 * Well, technically you don't have two images on your signature, although it looks as if you do. :-P But of course we could decide that people who use sig images can't use sigpic. I'm going to add a demo pic to the page using Felix, if nobody else volunteers. -- ◄mendel► 14:46, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

Userbox
Enjoy! -- ◄mendel► 21:41, 21 January 2009 (UTC)


 * I had thought about making a userbox as the means to identify users who participate in the program, and perhaps that would suffice if the sig images linked back to the userpage. But, not everyone likes or wants userboxes, and making it mandatory would kinda suck. [[Image:Entropy Sig.jpg]] (T/C) 23:55, 21 January 2009 (UTC)