Signature lengths

[Lee Enfield-Burke]

Folks,

A little digging has shown me that one of the causes our database size is so inflated is the size of people's signatures. There are a lot of messages, and I mean a LOT of messages, where the signature is longer than the entire message content: sometimes twice as long, occasionally three times as long.

For a long time, while the forums were small, our limit for signature lengths was six lines. Now, unfortunately, we're going to have to decrease that.

The new limit is three lines. I'd appreciate it if everybody would please go into their profiles and cut their signatures down to size.

Oh, and one other thing: NO IMAGES IN SIGNATURES, please. They drive the database size up something fierce. Where I or the other mods find them, from now on, we're going to delete them. So...a word to the wise.

Thanks.

[Tiamat]

Random question here...:

Wouldn't avatars also take up a lot of space too?

[Kathy Li]

Tiamat--that's why avatars also have a size limit: 100x100.

I'd also like to add that I'm taking this dictum to mean that the three lines includes separators and blank lines. Make 'em short and sweet, folks. Best of all--don't use a sig at all, or only as needed.

[EricG1793]

My sig used to be four lines, but a few weeks ago I figured out how to make it three. They're three full, long lines, but it still looks good and meets the limit specifications. It's a good thing that I have accomplished this a while ago or I may have struggled for a while.

Something that I do to try and keep space usage down it to disable the signature when the post I'm making is short (possibly a one-liner) to compensate for space.

[Tiamat]

...If you call me an idiot, I won't get mad. ^^' Heh.

Alrighty, I can take out my siggy and look for a smaller avatar! That's something we can all do~ ^o^



(And to tell you the truth, I didn't even know why had a avatar size limit... ^^" Oy...)

[Kathy Li]

Originally posted by EricG1793:
My sig used to be four lines, but a few weeks ago I figured out how to make it three....

Uh... Eric, counting the separator line, it still looks like four to me. Maybe link the words "this video", instead of putting the whole URL in the sig? And as I've mentioned before, if a post is a one-liner or shorter than your sig, you may simply want to reconsider whether you should post it at all.

Tiamat, yup, everybody can help save space by looking at their avatars and sigs, and avoid the Wrath of the Admins by reading the Board FAQ.

[EricG1793]

kli6:
Uh... Eric, counting the separator line, it still looks like four to me. Maybe link the words "this video", instead of putting the whole URL in the sig? And as I've mentioned before, if a post is a one-liner or shorter than your sig, you may simply want to reconsider whether you should post it at all.

The divider is one line, yes. The second line starts with the word "Have" and ends with "me!". The third and final line starts with "Watch".

I understand how to make the links have customized text, so I understand how to make appear "this video" in regular posts, however I don't know how to do this in the signature box (I don't know the commands/codes for it).

Edit, a few days later:

I just figured this out, for me it's three lines. And for a few other people it's three lines. For some people it's four lines. Probably because I made my signature (and 99% of the time view the forums) on my laptop, which is widescreen. I suppose on non-widescreen displays it appears to be four.

Sorry for the confusion, Kathy! If someone can tell me the code to make the link words such as This Video I'll change it immediately after I get the directions.

[Kathy Li]

Ah. Different screen widths. Got it. Try using HTML for an "a href" link if the UBB "url" tag doesn't work. If all that fails, let me know, and I can try editing it for you.