Wikipedia talk:Signatures/Archive 6

message: Undated comments should be legitimate. First, Wikimedia supports them itself with the three-tilde macro, second, they expose more working hour habits than is necessary to any purpose and nice to privacy. Of course you can always look up a date from the history, but having it readily available in the current document only makes it easier for automatic harvesting. Please be respectful of contributor's choices in this case and do not run bots which automatically date undated comments.  --lynX (talk)  —Preceding comment was added at 11:40, 29 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: But harvesting it is trival anyway. Are you aware of Special:Contributions/SymlynX? Besides, the datestamps are important so that bots can keep track of automatic archiving of a discussion. --ais523 13:06, 29 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Allow for undated signing 

message: Editors watching this page might be interested in the following proposal:
User signatures should link to both the user page and user talk page by default. — Carl (CBM · talk) 22:06, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Hmm. Looks like it has changed within the last couple hours. Suddenly today I'm getting dashes and the talk link in my sig. It's OK I guess, it's just funny discussions about changing stuff like this always happen in obscure corners of the wiki when I'm not looking. -- Katr67 (talk) 19:06, 16 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I've updated. -- ADNghiem501 (talk) 06:06, 17 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Looks like they changed it back? Or did they change it so any custom sig won't be affected at all (before it was giving me my custom AND a talk link) ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ 21:28, 1 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: And now it's changed back again? What is up? Katr67 (talk) 22:55, 4 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: It was reverted accidentally, apparently, as part of the effort to rewrite the parser. The new behavior was restored in r28156. — Carl (CBM · talk) 00:07, 5 December 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Proposal for default signatures 

message: Now, what is the code to generate such a time?  I am referring to this:
21:35, 7 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Also, I don't mean five tildes.  I mean so as you can edit the font as well.  UncleMontezuma 21:36, 7 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I suppose you could use ,    (UTC). With altered font, it would look something like: 19:17, 12 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Why can't you just wrap the five tilde code in FONT/DIV/SPAN tags?  Like this: "timestamp ~~~~~ with obnoxious color formatting" becomes timestamp 20:14, 24 December 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  The time at the end of a signature 

message: we should be allowed to use  tags at the beginning of our signatures to ensure that long signatures won't break, and those with ,  etc. won't disrupt surrounding text. This seems reasonable to me. Thinboy00 talk/contribs 19:17, 29 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Um, no. If there's a problem, use a shorter sig, this isn't myspace, it's Wikipedia. using linebreaks in sigs will break threaded discussion. --ST47Talk·Desk 22:05, 17 September 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Using a  doesn't break threaded discussion, since it's not a real linebreak (thus making a new paragraph with wikicode), it's part of the  element generated by wikicode.  See?  I'm still at this indent level. Though, I don't recall that  is actually forbidden in sigs. If it is, it should not be.--Random832 17:36, 19 September 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Does anyone object to making this change (in other words, does consensus exist)?  --Thinboy00 talk/contribs 00:41, 21 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I think using forced line breaks in a signature is something to be strongly avoided.  It makes assumptions about the user agent ("browser"), including text width, wrapping behavior, and indeed, that it's a text-display-based agent at all.  What if I'm on a cell phone, or listening to a screen reader?  If your signature is so long or complicated that wrapping is a problem, your signature is broken.  Wikipedia is an encyclopedia first.  —DragonHawk (talk|hist) 20:04, 24 December 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Suggested change:Limited use of <nowiki><br/></nowiki> 

message: I didn't see this in the archives, so sorry if this has been mentioned.  But my signature has the link to my user page as "".  Note the bare pipe at the end.  That is rendered as follows: "DragonHawk".  It is a MediaWiki feature that a bare pipe gets interpreted as "drop all the qualification stuff from display".  So explicitly specifying my user name, as in "DragonHawk", is redundant, and (I feel) clutters the source wiki text of a talk page needlessly.  That's why I made my sig that way.  But here's the weird part: When MediaWiki actually copies my signature into a talk page, it fills in the actual text on the right side of the pipe, turning my bare pipe into the redundant version.  Anyone know if there's a reason for this?  Is it just a quirk/bug?  —DragonHawk (talk|hist) 20:27, 24 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: This is by design, this pipe trick is always expanded on saving, just like ~~~~ ∴ AlexSm 04:08, 25 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Oh.  Huh.  So it does appear to be.  I could have sworn that it didn't work that way, but I guess it does.  Maybe I'm losing my mind.  Well, anyway, thanks for straightening me out.  —DragonHawk 17:14, 26 December 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Bare pipe getting filled in 

message: I'm confused, this page doesn't actually tell me how to change my sig, I mean how do I change the font/color? Is there another page for that? THANKS! Legotech (talk) 00:57, 13 January 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  actually how to? 

message: The Internal links section of this rules now states that "the default signature links to the user page. At least one of those two pages must be linked from your signature, to allow other editors simple access to your talk page and contributions log".
But the older version of the rules does not have such a clause. This modification (16 July 2007) was made by User:Quiddity, but it's not trivial to find out the reason. So, why do we need such a requirement?
The concern expressed here that the signature does not "users to identify the author of a particular comment, to navigate talk pages, and to address specific comments to the relevant user(s), among other things" may be easily objected.
# It may identify the author of a particular comment, if the signature consist of a nickname equal to the username though without an automatic backlink);
# the backlink is stored in a page history and can be found if needed, thus addressing the other points. --Yuriy Lapitskiy ~ 10:35, 13 January 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: My question is: are you trying to make navigation more difficult for other users? Imagine if everyone signed without any links (cause "hey, they can find me in the page history") and then some users also changed their nickname with every post (cause "hey, that's allowed as well") ∴ AlexSm 15:51, 13 January 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Not including a link is borderline disruption. John Reaves 16:55, 13 January 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  No links in a signature 

message: I'm really tired of seeing stupid signatures like JIMMYWHALES. All I want is a link to their userpage and perhaps their talk page, in the same format as everyone else. Is there anything I can do about this? --Henry W. Schmitt (talk) 21:15, 26 January 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Considering using ~~~~ puts in the sig's actual code, I imagine not. ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ (talk) 21:58, 26 January 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: If you ever decide to start a discussion on a better guideleine (I mean Wikipedia:Signatures), please let me know and consider me a very strong supporter. Prohibiting images in signatures but still allowing color backgrounds and borders imho is simply stupid. P.S. I can also share some CSS (for Opera/Firefox) that helps to tone down some signatures (not all, unfortunately) ∴ AlexSm 06:17, 27 January 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Any way to just see default signatures? 

message: It says in the External Links section that external links are not allowed. But it is focusing on promoting your website, and it might get search engines to look there, etc. But what about to the Toolserver? I would think that would be exempt, but I am not sure. Soxred93 | talk count bot 00:18, 2 February 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I guess a link to the toolserver would technically qualify as an external link.  In my opinion, however, such a link would be okay; it would be more similar to an internal link (internal to Wikimedia) than to an external link (external to Wikimedia).  I'm kind of surprised we don't have interwiki links set up to the toolserver.  --Iamunknown 17:16, 11 February 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I don't think it's ok, because this seems to fall into «disruptive internal link» category, and definitely falls under «It is better to put information on your user page, rather than in your signature». In other words, please advertise your toolserver editcount on your userpage: make it the 1st link, and make it bold. P.S. Interwiki prefix is tools: / AlexSm 19:44, 11 February 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree with AlexSm. Sigs in general are best kept as-short-as-possible (or left default). Editcounts especially are a drain on toolserver cycles, and are often inaccurate: You're better off to use the number given at the top of Special:Preferences, and add a userbox to your userpage giving a rounded-off number. -- Quiddity (talk) 19:54, 11 February 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Toolserver? 

message: * On Wikipedia, four tildes result in: Tneumark (talk) date_time_info_here
* On MediaWiki wikis that I administer (1.9.3, not too old), four tildes result in: Tneumark date_time_info_here
Is there a setting or something that makes the "(talk)" section display? Is there a better place to ask this question? Timneu22 (talk) 21:30, 24 February 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: See MediaWiki:Signature, and the archived thread at Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals)/Archive 5#User signatures should link to both the user page and user talk page by default, which should answer any questions :) -- Quiddity (talk) 21:51, 24 February 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  I appreciate the quick response. However, I'm not sure what I'm supposed to do. My wiki didn't have a "MediaWiki:Signature" page (I did add it), so does this mean my version (1.9.3) is too old?? Am I supposed to do something else? It doesn't seem like I need to upgrade my entire wiki for this one little change. Please let me know what I need to do. Thanks in advance for your help. Timneu22 (talk) 22:33, 24 February 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  Nevermind. Looks like I just add the code to parser.php. ThanksTimneu22 (talk) 23:08, 24 February 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  "(talk)" in my signature - a MediaWiki versioning thing? 

message: Suppose I wanted to put a link in my signature that would be directed to an internal page like AGFC. Would that be allowed? Discouraged?--Filll (talk) 16:59, 24 April 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Internal links are generally ok. Just keep the code and end-result-appearance simple, and everyone will be happy. :) -- Quiddity (talk) 18:22, 30 April 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Sort of policy question 

message: this part is full of flaws. no need to be re-cached as they are substed so they don't get updated! – ThatWikiGuy (talk | life | I feel like I'm being watched) 00:19, 3 May 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Transclusion of templates 

message: Dear Sir, I Thanks for your valuable response and guidance.  The question putup by me has not been understood in correct sense.  I am intrested to know that the B Sc. Agriculture degree awarded by  Birbahadur Singh Purvanchl Viswavidyalya, Jaun Pur UP. India is science stream or Arts  stream. Some says it is Arts stream and some say that it belongs to science stream.  How is the classification of courses carried out in universities in UP.  Is there any governining body which desids the classification.  Is there any Government order regarding the classification.  The university does not respond to email.  Please provide the Web address of the sites which may be usefull in resolving this issue.
 
Thanking You,
Yours sincearly,
Satish Chandra.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 117.199.179.127 (talk) 13:47, 7 May 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: You could try asking at the Reference desk, but you might have better luck asking at the regional Wikipedia. See the list of languages at http://wikipedia.org/ to find a Wikipedia in your own language. -- Quiddity (talk) 05:30, 11 May 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Information about B Sc. Agriculture degree 

message: This page seems to attract loads of spam for some reason. What am I missing here? Enigma message 22:14, 25 May 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Well, it's linked from , which a lot of new users are going to see; that may be why many of them end up here. And spammers are more likely to be new users than established users. --ais523 22:44, 26 May 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Spam honeypot? 

message: If the templates are not acceptable but is the user template ok? ElectricalVandilize Me 19:42, 11 June 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  templates? 

message: If the templates are not acceptable but is the user template ok? ElectricalVandilize Me 19:42, 11 June 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  templates? 

message: Can someone tell me in simple step-by-step terms as to how to change my sig color, size, etc.? Thanks  Skeletal S.L.J.C.O.A.A.A.T.R.  21:02, 28 June 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  How? 

message: This page seems to attract loads of spam for some reason. What am I missing here? Enigma message 22:14, 25 May 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Well, it's linked from , which a lot of new users are going to see; that may be why many of them end up here. And spammers are more likely to be new users than established users. --ais523 22:44, 26 May 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Spam honeypot? 

message: Is there any obvious reason why new code can't eventually be added so that all talk page edits by logged-in users are automatically signed? Four tildes isn't a huge hassle except for those of us with shoddy memories...
Seb144 (talk) 09:24, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: There is a bot, User:SineBot, that watches for unsigned posts and adds the appropriate template to identify who made them. Anomie⚔ 01:05, 2 July 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Auto-sign? 

message: It states on the page that using a template for a signature is forbidden, with the main reason given as that it is subject to vandalism. If I have my signature template protected, so that no vandalism can occur on it, will it be permitted then? --fone4me 10:03, 1 July 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Read the section carefully. There are more reasons given than the one you have chosen to supply, above.  DDStretch  (talk) 10:10, 1 July 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: The second point doesn't apply, since archiving will still archive my sig. --fone4me 10:40, 1 July 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  Try the point where the system administrators said to worry about the performance drain. Anomie⚔ 01:06, 2 July 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  I think that it makes sense that the signature text field has a fixed character limit. It's there for a reason :) Gary King (talk) 07:08, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

text: You don't seem to understand the point about archiving. Most archiving bots parse the sig to decide whether to archive the page. They don't recognise templates as signature so it will indeed be a problem. In what circumstances did you think the template thing is a problem? And what makes you think your use of templates is special Nil Einne (talk) 11:58, 26 August 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  template usage 

message: I'm afraid I don't see the point.  When I was too ignorant to sign my post, the following text was appended: "—Preceding unsigned comment added by Jqavins (talk • contribs) 01:50, 15 July 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: The "unsigned signature" thing is not an automatic feature, that was someone else comming along and adding the  template at the end if your comment to help others figure out how said what. Granted there is at least one automated bot out there that is pretty good at catching and atributing unsigned comments on most talk pages, but it's not rely something you should be relying on, so just sign your own commetns. --Sherool (talk) 22:44, 28 July 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Also the bots are run by contributors. They can go down at any time, may start to misbehave and have to be blocked, can make mistakes and can miss things. You should not be relying on user bots to do something you should be doing yourself. From a editor POV, you're liable to annoy others and more likely to be ignored if you always don't sign your posts. You may not think that's fair, but from ther alternative POV, why should other people waste their time with people who can't follow basic etiquette. Nil Einne (talk) 12:07, 26 August 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Purpose? 

message: I made wp:unsigned redirect to the Dealing with unsigned comments section, if that's okay. --WikiWes77 (talk) 03:43, 31 July 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Redirect 

message: This page says "if you must use color...". What about the advantage of using colour - that your signature is easier to pick out among others, so it is easier to follow who said what? Richard001 (talk) 08:40, 4 August 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Yeah, I guess it differentiates. Makes it a more "personal" signature. Not necessary. Vast majority of editors just leave their signature as the default. Enigma message 22:10, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

text: Too much colour is more likely to be distraction... Nil Einne (talk) 11:59, 26 August 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Colour in signatures 

message: subhead added and thread split/refactored by -- Quiddity (talk) at 04:41, 18 September 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: A tangential example: I asked admin Docu just a few days ago, to include a link in his/her signature, but was gently rebuffed. -- Quiddity (talk) 19:08, 9 September 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Refusing to provide a user- or user talk page link is a problem per the guideline, which reads: "It is common practice to include a link to your user page or user talk page (often both); the default signature links to the user page. At least one of those two pages must be linked from your signature, to allow other editors simple access to your talk page and contributions log."  The lack of timestamp is also problematic (not on the user's talk page, necessarily, but on other talk pages).  I've left the user a message asking him to modify his sig.  Exploding Boy (talk) 19:31, 9 September 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Unlinked signatures