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[PandorasThinkpad]

Hello!

This is my first day in this forum and i like to ask a special question, this would be a question to all the admins in here...

Why there is no avatar functionality? I would like to have an avatar, but there will be no way to place one in here.

So why this is at it is?

Thanx for answering me.

Greets,

PT

[ajkula66]

Welcome to the forum!

Avatars are custom-enabled for Admins and Mods only.

[PandorasThinkpad]

Hello in there or out there!

That's quite a sad thing, by the way, are there any other people from germany out or in there?

Best wishes,

PT

[ajkula66]

That's quite a sad thing,

You'll get used to it.

by the way, are there any other people from germany out or in there?

Best wishes,

PT

Many German users are present here, as are the ones from pretty much every corner of the world.

Enjoy your stay at TPF.

[PandorasThinkpad]

Again many thanx for answering.

Another question, which people should this be and how would i be able to find any of them?

Any suggestions on that?

Best regards,

PT

[Ibthink]

German user (ibmthink) reporting in, seems like our forum (http://thinkpad-forum.de) is gone. I don´t know why, I hope its online again soon.

Maybe it will be online again tomorrow or so, I hope.

[ajkula66]

Again many thanx for answering.

Another question, which people should this be and how would i be able to find any of them?

Any suggestions on that?

Best regards,

PT

Here you go:

http://forum.thinkpads.com/memberlist.p ... up&g=11707

http://forum.thinkpads.com/memberlist.p ... group&g=89

[PandorasThinkpad]

@ibthink:

Yes, at the moment it is offline. And this is the main cause i got member in here. But another is, that i am able to speak four languages and it is not a bad thing to prove some of the language (from time to time), so i am here and that's even the whole show.

[BillMorrow]

we USED to have a german language place here, many years ago, but since I don't speak german it was not easy to manage and those who DID speak german did not manage it so well..
I would have no problem supporting a german language forum parallel to this forum if some german speakers were to be able to help..
and other difficulties could be overcome as they would present themselves..

as for avatars at the inception it was agreed to limit them since storage was limited at that time..
this decision could be revisited but avatar content and size would be limited..

[PandorasThinkpad]

Oh, nice to write with the funding Thinker of this pretty forum.

Well, it's even a several years ago that i have had real contact with anyone out there, especially the us or south america, this is life and it's more and more an highly technologized but also cold hearted life. All the people with their smart phones and no more real human interaction at a example.

It would be a great thing if i would be able to create my personal avatar, just in the allowed pixels, but even able to create one by my own.

Now, i signed up here, but i am even member in the german thinkpad forum, where the server is down or whatever.

Nive to meet any people with a good taste for the best in the product area of laptop computers.


So nice greets to us,


PT

[RealBlackStuff]

I doubt very much that you have a widescreen T23 as mentioned in your signature.
AFAIK these do not exist.

[PandorasThinkpad]

That doesn't matter at all, because there would no need to prove it to anyone.

Believe it or not, it doesn't depend on me.


And no, i wouldn't "discuss" this out, even no need at all.

[rkawakami]

My guess is that he is referring to an SXGA+ screen. While it's not a "widescreen" in the accepted sense (i.e., aspect ratio greater than about 1.5), it is different from the standard XGA panels that were more commonly found in the T23. Any factory T2x system can only have a 4:3 screen in it or else there will be a gap at the top or bottom. If he persists in claiming that he has a widescreen T23, I'd simply chalk it up to a language incompatibility.

ref: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Display_aspect_ratio

Getting back on-topic...

Avatars are fine in forums that are not meant to be places that are serious and/or technical in nature. The avatars here have been generally limited to the admin and mods (there are a couple of exceptions). And in case you are wondering why most of them are "avian" in nature, it's because the owner (Bill Morrow) is quite fond of parrots (see his signature above). It was decided that each admin or mod have a choice of their own bird (again, with a couple of exceptions). In my case, I used to have a small flock of cockatiels as pets.

[PandorasThinkpad]

Correct, rkawakami, you got it. Because this type of display "feels" to be wider than the other, the typical displays of that series.

It makes sense that such avatars are limited, and even if there is not a really free choice in chosing it....i wouldn't have one by my own.

Thanx for getting this right back on the way.

[Saucey]

I find it amusing that after two years of joining this forum my house happened to get a parakeet from a friend who couldn't keep it.


I should post more so I can get a feather!

[Medessec]

I've always wondered why the forum never allowed avatars for normal users... the limited resources thing makes sense, but I've grown used to it, and of course there are advantages to no avatars... the forum can be more professional, it just looks cleaner and the admins don't have to worry about monitoring them for... inappropriate content.

If avatars are ever allowed: My personal vote would be a format limitation of .jpg, .gif(just .jpg maybe) and to ban animated .gifs, because I'm sure most will agree that those really don't serve any helpful point. I'd be fine with an extremely small size limit, but I'd personally vote for something like 200x200.

No images in signatures is just fine. The one thing I see people abuse on forums is signatures...

[Temetka]

When I fist joined up, I wanted to use the same avatar on other forums. But that was years ago. Now I really like the avian motif Bill has here. It's nice and clean.

[rumbero]

After i registered, one of the things i immediately liked here was the default absence of avatars.

Whenever i register on a forum, one of the first things to configure is to turn off avatar display. They uselessly waste the precious limited bandwidth i have to pay for and i don't see why i should accept lower loading times just for pointless vanity purposes.

EDIT: Hey, what is that feather showing under my username for? Only noticed it now after submitting my "rant" against pointless avatars.

[rkawakami]

EDIT: Hey, what is that feather showing under my username for? Only noticed it now after submitting my "rant" against pointless avatars.

The board has been set up with "ranks". Once you reach certain posting numbers, you're automatically assigned a rank. Right now you're a "Junior" member. Ranks above that are "Senior", "Thinkpadder" and "Senior Thinkpadder".

[Tasurinchi]

I'm also not a fan of avatars. Some forums allow huge pics that distracts me a lot when reading threads, but maybe it's just me getting old

[PandorasThinkpad]

Of course there will be real good arguments for it and against it, but i think it would help to give everyone a little bit more diversity, not, that this is completely missing, each one in here is writing in its own special way, but for me, there is much less color in here, such an avatar would be able to give this to such a forum, or am i totally wrong?

To allow everyone to use his own special avatar in an limited size wouldn't be that bad, this is my personal opinion.

[Medessec]

I do agree that there should be an opportunity for users to differentiate between each other, and show what they'd have as their representative image.

As long as there's an option to disable the viewing of avatars, I'd fully support putting it in.

[BillMorrow]

IRT avatars in the forum..
we can address this after some other decisions are made..
and after the forum is moved from one server to another server..
and a few other issues are taken care of..

since bandwidth is less of an issue these days and storage is much less of a limiting factor if the mods and admins agree AND there is no other issue I think a size limited avatar can be allowed..

assuming phpBB allows it with some control and complete safety..

[Medessec]

We're moving servers? I'm down, I've been noticing the SQL errors.

Me and my British friend use some Canadian server datacenter for our Minecraft server and our own forum website... we don't experience any problems, just some nameserver issues on rare occasion. We do experience far less traffic than this website I assume...

And upgrading phpBB I imagine would be quite the task... there's so much information on this forum...

[Temetka]

Pshh

Export everything to a CSV file. Import it into MS Access and convert it to SQL.

That should bork things nicely.

[PandorasThinkpad]

Hello Bill,

may be the forth with you to realize everyone a limited avatar and this very soon.

I hope that the move to another server will be without any problems.

Greetings,

PT

[Temetka]

The lack of avatars is one of the biggest things I love about this forum. No annoying .gif avatars, nothing offensive. Just a nice clean polished look.

I hate change.

This board is about technical matters, nostalgia, a sense of community and more. Let's not clutter it with garish avatars.

[Cigarguy]

^^ My sentiments exactly. If you really really, desperately, need to express yourself in that way, there's Facebook, Google+, Twitter, Photobucket, etc just to name a few. Honestly, an avatar does nothing to improve my knowledge.

Besides Bill and crew have more important things to do such as time with the family over the Christmas holidays and getting this site to load and work better.

[PandorasThinkpad]

Oh, that might be your point of view and you may have it.

But i would find it a nice thing to create my own avatar and to get it on here, because i am an artist and i like it to give anything even a little bit more color. Because this world is loosing color and diversity at every moment of time.

So this is my opinion. If i would be able to do so, this would be really great.

Dear Bill, just think it over and let it be

Sincerly,

PT

[RealBlackStuff]

Which one are you, a wannabe artist or a piss artist?
This forum is colorful enough as it is...