Kitz Forum
Announcements => Site Announcements => Topic started by: kitz on May 13, 2021, 06:05:36 AM
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It has recently been brought to our attention that size of some of the ookla speed test results used in signatures have become rather large and can be up to 6x that of the actual forum post. We have already asked some users to please amend their signatures.
Whilst re-reading an old thread last night, I noticed a post from 2019 where the users signature was literally taking over the whole thread with these enormous graphical results. It looked pretty awful (not to mention monotonous and overbearing) as I scrolled down the page on a PC, so goodness knows what it must be like on a mobile device. :(
To give an indication; these images are 750 x 400 pixels on a monitor with a screen resolution of 1920 x 1080... which in old money is 9¼ x 5 inches. If you are anything like me and often have other things on the go and never view your browser in full window mode, then this one image is literally taking over half my visible window. When the same user posts more than one reply in a thread, it soon becomes messy and an eyesore.
Based on the fact that this particular user hasn't visited the forum for a couple of months I can only assume that Ookla has recently changed something their side as I'm not aware of it being a problem until the past week. I have tried to set a limit on the maximum signature size, but this doesn't appear to have any effect on signatures that were previously in place before I made the changes.
If you do have an Ookla speed test result in your signature, would you please check its size and if necessary, change or remove it. Admins will automatically delete any that we come across without any notification to yourselves.
Thank you for understanding.
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This also affects speedtest.net.
What a stupid thing to do. They've increased the image size 4 fold and I cant see anything in the links that give an option for size.
It will only result in a lot of forums banning their use in member signatures. :-\
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Ten fold? As far as I can tell they're just over four times the size they used to be. This happened (at least for new tests done) some months back
I'm guessing since then they have been slowly re-generating historical images which seems an utterly baffling thing to do for the reasons you describe.
I really can't see why they did this, its not like EVERYONE is using high DPI screens and even those that do usually have 150-200% scaling set on their PC anyway. Seems to me this will actually break scaling not improve it, perhaps where your ten-fold is coming from?
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They likely doing it to try and gain attention to their site, but as kitz said it will backfire as forums will ban them.
Its a shame windows has no DPI setting to shrink below 100%, so much stuff seems to be about making all UI elements bigger these days as if we using 4k screens.
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Call me old fashioned, but I'm afraid I have never seen the point of sigs in forums, even less the point of speedtest results in a sig. I never use one and always tick the box not to display them on any forum I subscribe to.
Asbestos suit donned in readiness!!
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Agree! it seems like jungle ape chest beating, or just juvenile showing off.
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I have mixed feelings about signatures. I feel that on a forum such as this it is worth posting details of your setup (OS maybe ISP Router etc) as it saves re-typing it all when you post about problems and on some other forums I add that kind of detail if relevant to the forum subject, but it usually just one to two lines of text.
Stuart
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>>Ten fold?
Not sure where I got that from. I distinctly recall thinking the old one was about 100 pix... but my fingers obviously typed something else as you are quite correct it should be four fold. Thanks for pointing it out - I will change it as it's not what I intended. :-[
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You guys have signatures! :o
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Err, I don't. Or should that be a question mark rather than exclamation mark?
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Its only the ookla and speedtest.net sig because of its new large size.
The rules on signatures can be found here (https://forum.kitz.co.uk/index.php/topic,6.msg21036.html#msg21036). There is a stated recommended max image size, but when I checked the config this morning there wasn't anything set in the forum software configs. Bearing in mind that was about 15yrs ago it's highly likely that one of the major updates such as SMF1 > SMF2 has set the default back to 0 (no limit). Even if there had been I doubt it would have made any difference as it only seems to affect new sigs, not those which had later been resized.
Some people feel the speed test result is relevant as it gives an indication of the type of product they are on. Some sigs do get repetitive though, but the ones I dislike the most are those where you can't tell if it is a signature or not. There's one forum in particular where I find they are annoying and ask you to rate the reply... but because its 'normal text' your eyes follow on and your re-read it many times in the same thread.
This happened (at least for new tests done) some months back
I'm guessing since then they have been slowly re-generating historical images which seems an utterly baffling thing to do for the reasons you describe.
Thanks. yep sounds logical as I'm sure someone would have noticed sooner.
--
eke struggling to type today - that took ages (nrly an hr to make one single post). My fingers don't seem to be typing what my brain is thinking. I even struggled with a one sentence text earlier today. (MS neuro flare)
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I agree with what Kitz was saying. Signatures drove me mad because of the repetition especially seeing as I was originally using a small iPad, for ~4 yrs, so long ago I searched for the required setting and turned signatures off with a great sigh of relief. Turning them off also saves byte count seeing as I pay for downloaded bytes. I hate to think what it would be like on a mobile phone with all the repetition, or to a blind user who, like someone I once knew, uses a screen reader or speech synthesiser to read the page aloud.
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My take is that signatures are essential on support forums.
If you are asking for support on a subject and you get a reply from someone, who are you more likely to take seriously? The person who has no signature or the person who has listed their configuration and its somewhat similar to what you are asking about?
When you spend a lot of time on forums it gets INSANELY tedious to have to explain every single time WHY your opinion is relevant. Sometimes I will just fire a quick response and hope the user sees from my signature why my opinion is to be taken seriously.
Also the fact its taking up more space on the screen I find beneficial, its often easier to identify who is posting from their signature than their little profile box.
I seem to recall on this very forum I've had one or two users PM me purely because they saw something in my sig. I will even often refer back to my own sig to remind myself of things in the middle of a discussion.
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Alex has an important viewpoint. I shouldn’t complain because I could, and did, turn them off. So I’m happy, because I had the choice.
However to make both me and Alex happy, perhaps a (very short-named) link to each sig or some javascript wizardry that expands a sig when you select it would suit us both. But here I’m redesigning the UI!
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Get people to add "width=100" to the img tag? That gives a thumbnail which links to the results page.
E.g. [URL=https://www.speedtest.net/result/11107962508][img width=100]https://www.speedtest.net/result/11107962508.png[/img][/URL]
displays as
(https://www.speedtest.net/result/11107962508.png) (https://www.speedtest.net/result/11107962508)
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My take is that signatures are essential on support forums.
I agree.
However sometimes they can just be absolutely huge and unnecessary.
A text signature is sufficient, with a text link to any graphs/images/BQM's.
I recall a thread in the last couple years discussing your old signature.
You had a fairly large BQM image for both of your lines in your signature.
On threads where every 2nd post was from you I would have 8-10 BQM images filling my desktop view.
Edit: found it (https://forum.kitz.co.uk/index.php/topic,25272.msg424023.html#msg424023)
As a signature is on every single post made it can start to take up a considerable amount of screen space with the same image repeated over and over.
It looks like the forum only has an option to stop showing all signatures and no option to only block images within signatures.
That would have been a handy feature.
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I agree.
However sometimes they can just be absolutely huge and unnecessary.
A text signature is sufficient, with a text link to any graphs/images/BQM's.
I recall a thread in the last couple years discussing your old signature.
You had a fairly large BQM image for both of your lines in your signature.
On threads where every 2nd post was from you I would have 8-10 BQM images filling my desktop view.
Edit: found it (https://forum.kitz.co.uk/index.php/topic,25272.msg424023.html#msg424023)
As a signature is on every single post made it can start to take up a considerable amount of screen space with the same image repeated over and over.
It looks like the forum only has an option to stop showing all signatures and no option to only block images within signatures.
That would have been a handy feature.
The thing is though, when the signature length is limited you can run into a problem where you can fit hardly anything in there because a few links eat up the entire quota.
My sig is maxed out right now and I can barely fit more than a single line of text, can't link to details of OpenWRT, etc, which I think is useful if someone sees it and goes "oh, what's OpenWRT?".
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The killer is the repetition; in a back-and-forth conversation the signs go on and on and on and on … that’s why I turned them all off, it just drove me mad ;-) (or more mad ??? )
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The killer is the repetition; in a back-and-forth conversation the signs go on and on and on and on … that’s why I turned them all off, it just drove me mad ;-) (or more mad ??? )
Just think what it is like for kitz, roseway and b*cat. We have to see everything, for obvious reasons . . .
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The killer is the repetition; in a back-and-forth conversation the signs go on and on and on and on … that’s why I turned them all off, it just drove me mad ;-) (or more mad ??? )
That's the thing though, its a personal thing and depends on your device. I totally agree that on a device where swiping is the only navigation down the page, its more annoying, in fact I can't stand browsing the web at all on phone or tablet, its too cumbersome.
However on PC, I find the repetition helpful to track where I am on the page as I can scroll down MUCH faster and it gives me a visual indication of where I am.
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That's the thing though, its a personal thing and depends on your device.
I view on a PC and really don't find it helpful or pretty. There is no need for a repetitive 750 x 400 pixel image that takes up practically half the visible window, every other post. Goodness knows what its like for those viewing on smaller res screen.
Bearing in mind we have had complaints from members who haven't said anything in this thread, I think the majority are in agreement.... nvm the fact that it is in excess of the forum rules. I would imagine there will be quite a few other forums taking a similar stance.
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I view on a PC and really don't find it helpful or pretty. There is no need for a repetitive 750 x 400 pixel image that takes up practically half the visible window, every other post. Goodness knows what its like for those viewing on smaller res screen.
Bearing in mind we have had complaints from members who haven't said anything in this thread, I think the majority are in agreement.... nvm the fact that it is in excess of the forum rules. I would imagine there will be quite a few other forums taking a similar stance.
I was referring to signatures in general or the old speedtest image size, the new one absolutely is a HUGE obstruction.
My own personal maximum signature size is something around:
(https://csdprojects.co.uk/ping/alexatkin.png) (http://csdprojects.co.uk/ping/show/alexatkin)
and it was brought to my attention this is much too large for this forum. ;)
I don't really mind the two lines I have now, I just wish I could add more links without it eating the quota.
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Kitz,
What about the suggestion of sizing the image?
Get people to add "width=100" to the img tag? That gives a thumbnail which links to the results page.
E.g. [URL=https://www.speedtest.net/result/11107962508][img width=100]https://www.speedtest.net/result/11107962508.png[/img][/URL]
displays as
(https://www.speedtest.net/result/11107962508.png) (https://www.speedtest.net/result/11107962508)
My own view is that speed test results in signatures are usually just willy waving and totally unnecessary.
I am sympathetic to the idea of allowing more characters in the signature to allow links if the overall visible size doesn't increase. People need to remember that a signature that is only one or two lines on a PC or laptop may be considerably more on a small mobile screen.
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I just cannot see the point of signatures full stop. They add nothing as far as I'm concerned and totally distract from the post content.There is absolutely no reason at all to post router stats as a sig, that is just total nonsense, who cares what speeds you get, it has absolutely no relevance to anything.
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What liquorice said.
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@Weaver
I don't see much difference between personal text (which you use) and signatures; except the latter can be turned off by people who don't want to see it and the former can't. Also, on a short post the personal text increases the total height of a post by more than a signature with the same information.
I can't see anything wrong with what you have as personal text being in a signature. Anyone unfamiliar with the posters on here would be able to see when something you post is clearly from personal experience.
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I just cannot see the point of signatures full stop. They add nothing as far as I'm concerned and totally distract from the post content.There is absolutely no reason at all to post router stats as a sig, that is just total nonsense, who cares what speeds you get, it has absolutely no relevance to anything.
You've obviously not spent much time on other forums where people constantly ask "I'm on ISP x, is anyone else having problems?". Which is where having the ping tests embedded can help.
Or people asking if ISP x is any good? Even the odd load balancing question. Everything in my sig is based on things we've discussed regularly at some point so I felt it useful to keep it persistently there.
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Kitz,
What about the suggestion of sizing the image?
Thanks @Jelv for the width suggestion html if anyone does want to use it.
I've increased the max chars to 375 which will cover any additional html for image sizing and plus a bit more.
I trust that people will still be responsible and mindful of others opinions and that they may be viewing on differing devices. If squabbling continues though I'm more likely to want to turn them off.
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ETA
Whilst making these latest changes, I noticed that there is what looks like a small optional script that will run to apply changes to any existing signatures. If any sigs do go a bit strange it will be a result of me running the script. I am hoping it will automatically apply the max height setting to the humongous speed test result images, but I cant find one right now to see what effect it does have and its too late for me to want to play.
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Getting a tad fed up, with this speed-test screen result image thing. Its OK to make one post showing a screen shot. But please be sensible and if you are quoting someone else, do not re-include the image in the quote... otherwise that also starts complaints from other people about speed tests taking up the whole page again.
I feel like my mods & I, are like piggies in the middle trying to clear stuff up and edit posts. I've already tried to accommodate the sig size, but feel that regs should also know better when using the quote feature containing large images.
Members can use the custom title and sigs to say what they want/need. Sigs have been increased to 375 chars but please be sensible. I don't mind you using the extra chars to create html links, nor do I mind links to your own websites, and ISP staff can link to their business. As with most sites, spam links are a definite no and referral links are frowned upon, because that too has caused problems and squabbles in the past.
I acknowledge that because of the size change of the speed tests that some old posts may have increased in size but in view of the possible work load do not see any point in going through and editing posts that are no longer current.
It's quite obvious that there are opposing views. It should be apparent that the recent increased size has amplified the situation and members should be considerate of the fact many people do use smaller screens. Please be sensible and considerate to all or I may just be tempted to turn the whole lot off.
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As with most sites, spam links are a definite no and referral links are frowned upon, because that too has caused problems and squabbles in the past.
Any problems with my link to my website as I do mention the referral being on there as people did ask a few times for Zen referral links and I figured it more convenient than constantly replying?
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There's no issue at all with your website having a Zen referral link or your signature linking to your website. I'm not sure about your link text saying about the referral as there are other Zen users on here that may not have a suitable website who could respond if someone posted asking for a Zen referral.
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I just cannot see the point of signatures full stop. They add nothing as far as I'm concerned and totally distract from the post content.There is absolutely no reason at all to post router stats as a sig, that is just total nonsense, who cares what speeds you get, it has absolutely no relevance to anything.
Agreed, thank you for pointing out how to disable them and forum avatars, the forum is so much easier to read now
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Re referrals. - Jelv has explained perfectly the stance taken by most forums.
I don't mind links to your own personal websites where you may there include any referral links, but as mentioned in my previous post not in the actual signatures please as it's prone to causing squabbles and its unfair if there are several regs wanting to give referrals to the same ISP.
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@jelv you make a good point about my own text shown on the lhs. "It doesn’t eat up vertical space" is the only thing I might whimper in my defence, ;-) but it still is effectively a signature by another name.
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@jelv you make a good point about my own text shown on the lhs. "It doesn’t eat up vertical space" is the only thing I might whimper in my defence, ;-) but it still is effectively a signature by another name.
That's not technically true:
(https://csdprojects.co.uk/forums/pedantic.png)
Apparently both the text and avatar size impacts vertical space. :P
Though I guess you can argue that extra whitespace below each post is far less intrusive than signatures, but again that's personal opinion. This really just highlights how not only devices impact our abilities, but our own spacial processing.
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Oh, understood, it doesn’t look like that in my browser, probably due to my settings being different.
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I didn't mean to convince you to wipe out your profile. :( I'd say most posts are long enough for the point to be moot and seeing your avatar reminds me who I'm talking to.
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Weaver - put your profile back. :)
Most posts are long enough for yours not to have made any difference.
seeing your avatar reminds me who I'm talking to.
Seconded.
I expect the regs to have avatars and it also helps me see who Im talking to.
I'm really not bothered about the sensible avs and sigs used by most members. It's the stonking big [speedtest] graphics that are a no.
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No, I just really didn’t want to be stretching the windows vertically
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You said it didn't happen on mobile devices though, which surely is the only place it matters?
Making it bigger is easier to read on a PC IMO, which was my whole contribution to this discussion. We're trying to find a balance that works for all, not go completely minimalist.
I'm really sorry I posted that comparison now, it was only meant to be as a joke to point out that trying to absolutely waste no vertical space is not really practical for all configurations and without becoming detrimental.
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I’m on an iPad which has a huge display. I think it’s just do to with my kitz preferences, and because the kitz web server is being told by iPadOS Safari that this is a Mac in the browser identification string, precisely to prevent ‘mobile’ discrimination madness, the server won’t know that this is an iPad.
Users who, like a friend of mine, use a speech synth to read pages aloud can turn off the sigs as I do, so they don’t have to hear repetition. I wonder if a user can turn ‘personal text’ off. I never knew it is displayed on the left of every picture, I suppose I thought it was just there for when someone looks up a particular user. the exspereience of workin with someone who is blind and being shown how assistive software works was fascinating and changed the way I think. I certainly changed my ways regarding web design for my wife’s (former) company, and I made sure everything made sense when read in linear order (as opposed to in two dimensions), there was no repetition, no use of images instead of text, every part was easy to jump to (by using ‘heading navigation’ and other methods too),and links were not ambiguous or repetitive when read out of context.
Now where’s that picture of me on the boat to Orkney many years ago…
Actually, I notice that there’s a huge amounts of white space below very short posts on my machine and that’s even with no personal text on the le
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Users who, like a friend of mine, use a speech synth to read pages aloud can turn off the sigs as I do, so they don’t have to hear repetition. I wonder if a user can turn ‘personal text’ off.
There's options to turn off the display of avatars and signatures, but not personal text. That's a strong argument that such information is better in the signature than in personal text as it gives speech synth users a way of turning it off.