# Avatars using Xenforo



## perpend

Anyone feel more pressure due to the bigger space devoted to the "Ava" in the new system?

I sort of do. Succumb to Ava's allure? I'm on the fence. Does an avatar affect/influence a reply/entry? Could it even discourage one?

Moderator note: We are moving all discussion of WordReference's new software to the Comments and Suggestions Forum, where they can be seen and considered by WR's owner, Mike Kellogg.

If you have a concern about how your avatar appears or need guidance in adjusting it, ask your question in this thread.

wildan1, Moderator


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## DonnyB

perpend said:


> I sort of do. Succumb to Ava's allure? I'm on the fence. Does an avatar affect/influence a reply/entry? Could it even discourage one?


Interesting question!  I've always had one, and always used the same one on here.  I think it adds nice touch of individuality to something which could otherwise be quite bland and boring (no offence, perp ).  I don't skip questions asked by members with no avatars, but on the other hand I find distinctive avatars help me to remember who people are, more so than just their username.

But what does my avatar say about me? Does it put people off interacting with me?  Would I change it if I thought it did - probably not.


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## Parla

I find avatars unnecessary, distracting and, in many cases, distinctly off-putting. I'd like to have the possibility, as we did with the old forums, of not seeing them at all.


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## EStjarn

I think I prefer avatars to question marks and gender symbols.

Perhaps if we were all compelled to provide an avatar with the option not to view them (as Parla suggests above), then everyone would be happy.


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## Kelly B

They're important to me, as they help me a great deal in customizing my responses. If I recognize you, it's easier for me to decide whether I should respond to you in my native language or in yours, and whether it is safe to offer guesses that will lead you in the right direction, instead of waiting when I know my answer will not be perfectly phrased. I can figure those things out by looking at your name or clicking your profile, but I really like the quick cue offered by an avatar. 

It's perfectly ok with me if you don't want to display one, but I'll often respond more quickly to someone I know. For what it's worth.


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## swift

I whole-heartedly agree with Kelly.


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## Myridon

EStjarn said:


> I think I prefer avatars to question marks and gender symbols.


I find the emphasis on everyone's gender (or desire to not answer the question) quite disturbing especially on the message list. It seems to be suggesting I might want to select questions to answer based on gender.  It's not a dating site!   I now have an avatar for the first time (over 5 years without one) because of that.


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## DonnyB

EStjarn said:


> I think I prefer avatars to question marks and gender symbols.


I'm not too keen on those, either.  I think country flags corresponding to language spoken would be more useful as "default avatars".


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## perpend

Calgon!!! See most of you have killer avatars. It's like you rolled out of bed and were like: This will look good for my avatar today.

Most of us can't.

This one always gets me from "Sun".
http://forum.wordreference.com/threads/on-regular-basis.3014701/

Do you have to be a programmer or a genius or super-photogenic to produce an avatar like that?

Sun?

Now, Donny, Myridon, swift, Kelly, ES, don't get me wrong, your Avas are quite spectacular, telling a certain story, I assume.


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## Loob

I think I am finding that the 
	

	
	
		
		

		
			








 and 
	

	
	
		
		

		
		
	


	




 are putting me off responding.

They're vaguely _sinister_, somehow....


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## Sun14

perpend said:


> Calgon!!! See most of you have killer avatars. It's like you rolled out of bed and were like: This will look good for my avatar today.
> 
> Most of us can't.
> 
> This one always gets me from "Sun".
> http://forum.wordreference.com/threads/on-regular-basis.3014701/
> 
> Do you have to be a programmer or a genius or super-photogenic to produce an avatar like that?
> 
> Sun?
> 
> Now, Donny, Myridon, swift, Kelly, ES, don't get me wrong, your Avas are quite spectacular, telling a certain story, I assume.



This picture is one of my favorite character in a Japanese animation. I agree with what Kelly said in post 5 since It helps people recognize you quicker if you don't change it too often.

I suggest the forum could set a limit for the change of the avatar that once the avatar is chosen it could not be changed within certain days.


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## perpend

Thanks for the candid reply.


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## Sun14

My pleasure. I appreciate the use of Avatar, it might demonstrate the traits of someone and make the members more interesting and real.


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## perpend

That is exactly part of the dilemma, Sun! I like what you have written.


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## JustKate

I had to get a new avatar when we went to the new system. My former little green tractor was too small, but even worse it was proportioned incorrectly for the avatars the new system allows, which meant I had to smoosh it into untractorly dimensions. The way I found a new little green tractor was that I googled "free tractor avatars." Within seconds, I had a dozen perfectly suitable little green tractors to choose from. I briefly considered going red - there are lots of those too - but decided to stay John Deere-like. 

So all you have to do, perpend, is figure out what you want to be and see what's out there. There's a *lot* available.


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## velisarius

I hate the gender sign, as my gender is not all that relevant to what I write on the forum, and the giant question mark sometimes (especially early in the morning) gets me considering whether I really exist or not.

I considered an avatar and in fact I had one for a few days, just to see how it felt. It felt a bit odd, and a bit off-putting to see it there at the bottom of any threads I opened, prompting me to reply to questions I had no intention of replying to.

My avatar was a photo I took myself, of my favourite ancient amphitheatre. It had a pretty blue sky that I thought blended in very well, but it was too big. I don't have the know-how that would enable me to shrink it.

I hate it when members chop and change their avatar. I think it might be worth doing a psychological study though; it must reveal... something.


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## perpend

"untractorly dimensions". Quite priceless, Kate. I didn't want that gem to go unnoticed. 

But, "...figure out what you want to be...". Dunno. I don't think anyone does that in their lifetime. If you do, you are sort of dead.

I really liked velisarius' avatar, since I've been to that part of the world, and, it's just a scene (BRING IT BACK)!!!

It's not a brand of some sort, if you follow me, Kate, but I see where you are coming from.

I'm none the wiser for starting this, but hope to be.

The big "question mark" does make me go "WTF"?

I am pretty surprised Xenforo insists upon unveiling the gender of the forum member, or is it just a remnant?

Please enlighten us, WR.

I have a team in Hollywood working on my avatar. It will take quite some time.


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## Myridon

perpend said:


> But, "...figure out what you want to be...". Dunno. I don't think anyone does that in their lifetime. If you do, you are sort of dead.


It's not a tattoo.  You can change it as often as you want to.
The question mark appears if you select (unspecified) as your gender.


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## swift

perpend said:


> See most of you have killer avatars. It's like you rolled out of bed and were like: This will look good for my avatar today.


Well, I change my avatar every once in a while. But I have to confess my current avatar is not a picture I took myself. I use royalty-free, or creative-commons, images that I pick from Flickr.


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## jann

perpend said:


> I am pretty surprised Xenforo insists upon unveiling the gender of the forum member, or is it just a remnant?
> Please enlighten us, WR.


WR has long had a gender field in the user profile because this information is relevant to many grammatically gendered languages in which the speaker's gender determines the inflected forms of various words.  Filling in the field has always been optional, although software limitations on our old forum platform made it impossible to switch back to an unspecified gender once one had ticked "male" or "female."  It is now possible to change back to "unspecified" if you wish to conceal your gender.

The male, female, and question mark images are default avatars from Xen (our new software platform).  Transitioning to the new software is a process, not an event. In the upcoming months, our forum admin will be making a number of tweaks -- both visible and behind the scenes -- to customize things to better suit WR's needs.  For the initial move, non-critical parameters (like avatars) were left at their default values.


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## EStjarn

velisarius said:


> I don't have the know-how that would enable me to shrink it.



I might be misunderstanding the situation, but if this is about cropping it can easily be done in Paint, a graphics application included in Windows. Here are some instructions, just in case:

1. Make a copy of the picture file in question (so as not to accidentally destroy the original).

2. Open Paint. In Paint, open the copied picture file. The picture will snap to the upper left corner of the white area.

3. The Crop tool is toward the left in the toolbar. If it is dimmed out it's because it is selected by default; then you can just go ahead and crop. If the tool is dimmed out and you can't crop, use Ctrl + A to select the picture to make the Crop tool selectable.

Cropping is done by placing the mouse pointer on the side of the picture that is to be cropped, so that the pointer becomes a double arrow. Hold down the touchpad button and move the pointer.

Note that you have to use the Rotate tool (found below the Crop tool) to rotate the picture in order to crop its upper and left sides since cropping can only be done from underneath and from the right.

You can "uncrop" by using Ctrl + Z.

4. When done, save the picture.


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## velisarius

Thank you very much for those clear instructions EStjarn. I'll make a note of them and try it out.
I was thinking  about making a smaller avatar (like Loob's or Kelly's) and I'm not sure whether that would be "cropping". I'll fiddle about with it anyway. Thanks again.


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## EStjarn

I've tried to do that, too (mainly by using Paint), but have failed.

I wonder if presently it is possible to manipulate the size of _new_ avatars at all. I doubt it, suspecting the reason avatars such as Loob's and Kelly's are smaller to be that the avatar dimensions got "frozen" in the switch from the old software.

I may be wrong about that, though.


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## broglet

i am trying to upload a new avatar and it won't work - are there restrictions on size?  are there instructions anywhere?


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## JustKate

I haven't found anything really definitive, but the "Avatar editor" (which is the box that pops up when you try to upload an avatar) says in small type, "It is recommended that you use an image that is at least 200x200 pixels." It doesn't list a maximum, but surely there is one.


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## siares

broglet said:


> trying to upload a new avatar


This didn't work for me either.
I deleted my previous avatar and tried to upload a new one.
The software kept bringing up my previous avatar (which I'd deleted), and wouldn't replace it, no matter how many times I tried uploading the new avatar.
I tried logging out and all, didn't help.
But now I've read your question, I've tried again (after two days or so), and it worked.


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## Loob

EStjarn said:


> ... I wonder if presently it is possible to manipulate the size of _new_ avatars at all. I doubt it, suspecting the reason avatars such as Loob's and Kelly's are smaller to be that the avatar dimensions got "frozen" in the switch from the old software.
> 
> I may be wrong about that, though.


What happened to me was that on Switchover Day my avatar became exceeding fat, with the feet and part of the head chopped off.  Mike then did some magic, which means that in individual posts it reverts to its Vbulletin size & shape.  However, when I bring up the "my Content" list I'm back to being not-a-pretty-sight.  I'm clearly going to have to Do Something....


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## Kelly B

You look perfectly proportioned to the rest of us, though, and we can't access your My Content list, so if you can tolerate the funhouse mirror effect there's no rush.  
I don't think mine went through that weird phase yours did. I didn't do anything when we switched over, and I probably won't bother now.


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## Loob

Kelly, it's not that I'm _vain_ or anything, but don't I look odd to you when you click the tabs on my Profile Page?  (You look fine when I do the same to you, by the way.)

----

You're right that there's no rush, though!

EDIT Actually, now I look at you again, you are a bit truncated on your Profile Page tabs....


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## Kelly B

Oh, how about that. I looked at your main profile page and it's perfectly normal, but it's true that when I click the tab to see your posts, then yes, the top of your head and your feet are cut off.* Still svelte, though - the overall proportions didn't change.

*In WHAT shoes?


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## Loob

All this is by way of a warning to veli re post 22: best not to aim for a small avatar!


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## EStjarn

Loob said:


> However, when I bring up the "my Content" list I'm back to being not-a-pretty-sight. I'm clearly going to have to Do Something....



For completeness, Loob, your alert avatar looks like that too (i.e. the image that accompanies an alert).

(I'll be honest and say that in neither case do I find it _terribly_ disturbing. )


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## Loob

Thanks EStjarn!


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## broglet

this is totally weird.  it has changed my avatar (from palm tree) but when i go to avatar editor it is still showing palm tree.  the avatar editor is clearly malfunctioning and needs attention


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## DonnyB

Your avatar is showing up for me as red white and blue trails in the sky, broglet, above a green forest.  It's not a palm tree.  

Perhaps you need to clear your browser's cache?


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## perpend

Copy what Donny said. That's also what I see, broglet.


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## Loob

I see 'forest + trails' in your post, but 'palm tree' on your Profile Page, broglet.

Hmm....


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## DonnyB

Loob said:


> I see 'forest + trails' in your post, but 'palm tree' on your Profile


That's really strange, because I can only see the forest/trails there.  Not a palm tree in sight.


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## Loob

Curiouser and curiouser ...

I'm on an android tablet (in case that's relevant) and I was still seeing the palm tree on broglet's Profile Page 5 minutes ago. But now it's changed.  Maybe there's some sort of time delay?

Anyway, all's well that ends well!

-----

*Added*.  Broglet, is everything OK now for you?


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## broglet

Thanks all.  I now see "trails" except when I go to Avatar editor where I still see "palm tree". 

By the way, it's not a forest but the trees in The Mall near Buckingham Palace in Central London.

I cleared my cache but it made no difference.  It is all very peculiar.


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## Parla

I asked but don't think I've seen a reply: Is there a "preferences" section where we can choose not to see avatars at all? The old software let us do that, and I was grateful. I find some avatars very off-putting, giving me negative feelings (which I don't want to have) about the people using them.


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## cherine

I'm afraid there isn't, Parla. You can chose not to see signatures, but it seems avatars are unavoidable.


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## siares

Hi @Parla,
I am viewing the forum on a browser where I have image-loading disabled. Avatars look like big white squares. A problem might be that smilies are not visible either.


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## perpend

Sort of on-topic.

Is there pressure put on mods to have an avatar?

In other words, is it welcomed if mods sport an avatar?

Enquiring minds need to know. Bated breath.


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## EStjarn

Parla said:


> I asked but don't think I've seen a reply: Is there a "preferences" section where we can choose not to see avatars at all?



Also, see Jann's post in the "Welcome" thread, which includes the outline of a workaround.


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## jann

EStjarn said:


> Also, see Jann's post in the "Welcome" thread, which includes the outline of a workaround.


 Thanks for cross-referencing these discussions, EStjarn. Parla, I wrote those instructions in response to your original request to hide avatars, so please don't be intimidated by the technical aspects.  Give it a shot, and if you have problems, go ahead and contact me by private message.  FYI, I've just updated those instructions to include a link with info for people who want to hide avatars only partially.



perpend said:


> Sort of on-topic. Is there pressure put on mods to have an avatar? In other words, is it welcomed if mods sport an avatar?


Or entirely off-topic, as the case may be.   But a quick glance through the mod list should be enough to convince you (assuming you're not hiding avatars, that is) that mods are no different from other members when it comes to avatars.  We are entirely at liberty to use one or not, as we so choose.  And like the majority of the members who are particularly involved and active here on WR, most of us do... and in many cases, have done since before we were mods.


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## perpend

Thanks, jann.


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## Parla

Thanks, Jann. I'm severely technologically challenged. I think I'll forgo any messing around in Firefox, lest I create some new malfunction. I'll just live with the avatars.


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## siares

Is that a mumintroll in @entangledbank 's avatar? If so, from which book?
I don't know whether you get alerts on being tagged, entangledbank.. And whether tagging in general is OK or not. I would have asked in a PM but they are disabled.


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## JamesM

This may have been brought up before, but is there a way to shrink our post-conversion avatars to take only as much screen space as the pre-conversion avatars?  I changed my avatar after we moved here and, no matter how small I shrink the upload file size (in pixels), I still get a larger avatar than the avatars that were brought over from vBulletin.

Any suggestions?


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## siares

JamesM said:


> screen space


I am not sure what screen space you mean, JamesM - the picture, or the frame? 
If you mean the picture, then it is possible to make a coloured square - say, black - in paint , copy the smaller picture in the middle of it and upload the whole resulting file.


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## JamesM

It's the frame.  I've shrunk my "doodle" down to less than 80 by 80 pixels but it still expands into the larger frame than the ones shown from the old site.

Sorry... not the frame in the sense of the pale blue rectangle but the thin blue line around the picture.  If you look at Loob's picture on page 1 you'll see how they used to look.


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## Peterdg

Hello James,


Are you sure the forum uses the new avatar you upload? To make sure, I would try to upload something completely different than your current avatar to see if the SW really takes the last uploaded file. When I hover over your picture with Chrome Inspect Element, it says your image is 102px X 102px, which in the style sheet is truncated to 96px X 96px
I inspected some of the smaller avatars (like mine): they have a couple of common elements:
The dimensions are asymmetrical (so, no 80px X 80px, but 75px X 80px)
One of the dimensions is smaller than 80px

I hope you can do something with that.


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## JamesM

I tried something completely different, then deleted the avatar entirely, and then tried to upload a smaller version.  It would not let me.  It said it was an invalid file. The directions say that you should upload at least 200x200 pixels.  I don't know if it checks for size and if there is a minimum.


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## Loob

Just to say, James - having a smaller avatar isn't all sunshine and roses.

Mike kindly "did something" to make sure that small/non-square avatars transferred unharmed to posts; but (see various comments above) my avatar is truncated in other situations.

It might be worth waiting.  I have the feeling, given a jann post I read earlier, that this may be something Mike is going to look at in slower time....


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## JamesM

I'll wait. It's not a big deal.    I just feel a little guilty taking up screen real estate with a big avatar.


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## Drake15

JamesM said:


> I tried something completely different, then deleted the avatar entirely, and then tried to upload a smaller version.  It would not let me.  It said it was an invalid file. The directions say that you should upload at least 200x200 pixels.  I don't know if it checks for size and if there is a minimum.



You know, I recently changed my avatar for this one. At first, when I tried to upload the new image, the forum would automatically "remember" the old avatar I had and use that one, it wouldn't even let me choose my piano picture. I deleted the image and uploaded a new one but to no avail.

So I did this: deleted my avatar and didn't upload anything until the next day, to see if I could make the forum "forget" my old avatar. And then I uploaded the picture and it worked just fine! But now, if I want to upload a new image, the same thing happens: the forum only let me use this piano pic, so I guess I would have to do the same in order to change my avatar again (which I won't do!! ).

So perhaps the forum has in its memory that avatar you have been using since the moving, so I would recommend you to delete it, wait around 24 hours and then try again.


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## Wordsmyth

DonnyB said:


> I'm not too keen on those, either.  I think country flags corresponding to language spoken would be more useful as "default avatars".


They'd certainly be prettier, but I see an enormous minefield there! Apart from the software having to cope with all the different ways people express variants of their native language (English, for instance), and their location (if they mention it at all), there are also socio-political issues associated with flags: it'd be so easy to get the wrong one! (So OK, call me a killjoy!)



Peterdg said:


> it says your image is 102px X 102px, which in the style sheet is truncated to 96px X 96px.
> 
> I inspected some of the smaller avatars (like mine): they have a couple of common elements:
> 
> The dimensions are asymmetrical (so, no 80px X 80px, but 75px X 80px)
> One of the dimensions is smaller than 80px



Just a small nerdy detail, Peter, but I don't think it's truncated. The avatar image is 96 x 96, to which is added 2px of padding (twice in each direction) and 1px of border (also twice): so that's 6px added to the height and again to the width, giving 102 x 102.

I don't think symmetry is a factor (my avatar is 53 x 53), nor that there's a size threshold like 80px. It seems to be down to something that pointvirgule discovered about the style attributes of new vs transferred avatars (see this other thread). New avatars are set to a fixed height and width (96 x 96), so that any smaller image is stretched to those dimensions. The avatars imported from vBulletin (at least the ones that appear in threads) have the much more useful attributes of max-height and max-width each set to 96px, so anything smaller is left as-is.

Ws


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## siares

Hi @Parla and others who don't wish to have avatars visible,
I've just tried Preferences-Style-Fast loading option. No avatars are visible this way, except the ones in deleted posts (like the Copyright's above).


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## Wordsmyth

siares said:


> I've just tried Preferences-Style-Fast loading option. No avatars are visible this way, except the ones in deleted posts (like the Copyright's above).


Gosh, some people's names look really naked there, without their familiar (and sometimes quite endearing) avatars! — But I'm sure Parla will be very grateful.

Ws


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