denise: Image: Me, facing away from camera, on top of the Castel Sant'Angelo in Rome (Default)
Denise ([staff profile] denise) wrote in [site community profile] dw_news2012-03-17 01:42 am

Dreamwidth Update: 17 Mar 2012

Hello, Dreamwidth! As usual, I bring you apologies for the long gap since the last [site community profile] dw_news post (there is always something to prevent the good long chunk of time I need to write one, but I'm sick and tired of doing things that won't pan out for ages by now!) and a whole slew of interesting things to discuss and share.

Behind the cut, we bring you:

* Development update
* Text Captcha
* Icon-Related Changes
* A note from the antispam team
* Custom dictionary expansion
* Default styles poll
* Dreamwidth Arts & Culture - "Delights"




Development update



The period since last we've spoken has seen two code tours. (For our new neighbors: the "code tour" is the regular listing of all the changes, improvements, and bugfixes we've added to the codebase during the period in question.)

First off, there's 1 Feb 2012 through 22 Feb 2012, all of which are now live on the site and many of which you may have noticed already. In addition to some changes that I'll get to in a few sections, this includes:

* Opening up the Support History page to everyone, so if you're looking for a support request you filed ages ago, you can locate it again. (This page isn't linked on the main support pages yet -- we're still trying to figure out where to put it.)

* The ability to only track a single user's posts to a community (instead of tracking the community as a whole). This option now shows whenever you hit the "track this" icon or link for a community (as a whole) or an entry in a community. (And, while we were at it, we rearranged the options for tracking an entry to make them a little less overwhelming.) (Edited 3/21, I'd forgotten the exact implementation there!)

[I should point out, by the way, that the bug for adding that feature was bug #8 -- logged well before we actually opened our doors -- and was also the last single-digit bug we had remaining. Hooray for resolving older bugs!]

* Displaying the number of screened comments on entries with screened comments (to those who have the ability to see the screened comments on those entries, I mean) -- previously, if you had 2000 comments on an entry but only 20 were visible, the comment count on the entry would say "20 comments". Now, it will instead say "20 visible | 1980 screened comments". For now this is only available on site-skinned comment pages (including the light mode entry view), but now that the hard part's done, we can do the tedious part of enabling it in individual styles' custom comment pages.

Then, we have the code tour for 22 Feb - 13 March. Most of these improvements aren't available on the live site yet, with the exception of the FAQ changes that were made -- they're still in testing. But, you can take a look to see the interesting stuff that's coming up.


Text Captcha



One major change we've made recently is to the "human test" shown across the site when we want to make sure that it's an actual person on the other end of the keyboard, rather than a spambot. Previously, we used a service known as "reCAPTCHA" -- this is the familiar "type the words you see on your screen" image-based human test most people are familiar with from many, many other sites.

Those human tests are very bad for accessibility, though -- they're impossible for people with low vision or screenreader users to solve (the service does have an audio version of the test, but those are widely considered to be much more difficult than the visual version). The reCAPTCHA service has been making their human tests more and more difficult lately, because spambots have gotten better and better at solving them. And, finally, we'd been getting multiple (and annoying) reports of people being unable to load the human test at all, because their computers couldn't contact the service.

So, for sitewide use, we've replaced reCAPTCHA with a new service known as "Text Captcha", which asks you to solve a very basic question -- something like, "Tomorrow is Sunday. If this is true, what day is today?" They're written to be very simple for humans to solve, and harder for computers to solve. The advantage is that they can be solved much more easily by screenreader users, and it eliminates a very bad accessibility barrier. (Accessibility is one of our prime commitments -- we want Dreamwidth to be usable by anybody.)

The disadvantage of text captchas is that they're harder for non-English speakers to solve, so it is a slight tradeoff. Given how simple the questions are, though, translation software should be able to handle them fairly well, and Dreamwidth itself isn't translated into other languages (for many, many reasons), so it's a tradeoff we were comfortable making.

We know that many of you use the human test for commenting in your journal (for anonymous comments only or for all comments) to minimize spam risk, though, and your audience may be different than the audience for Dreamwidth as a whole -- if you have multiple non-English-speaking commenters and no readers who are screenreader users or who have low vision, you may want to go back to using the image-based human test. If that's the case, go to the Privacy tab of Account Settings and look for the "Anti-Spam Type" setting. You can choose between text-based and image-based human tests for your journal. (It won't change which version you see elsewhere on the site, but it will hold for your journal.)


Icon Changes



As many people noticed, our last code push changed a few things about how icons are displayed, and there are a few more changes coming.

Multiple Pages of Icons

The page that shows all of an account's icons -- username.dreamwidth.org/icons -- is now paginated. Each page will show 50 icons to a page, and there's a navigation box to move forward and backward in the list. (There's also a "view all" link, if you'd still like to see all the icons at once; right now you can't easily get to the "all icons" page when sorted by keyword order rather than upload order, but that will be fixed with the next code push.)

This was done for several reasons. First, we're in the process of letting people choose to show the icon page in journal styles (rather than only being available in site skin) if they'd like, which is part of a major and ongoing effort to make everything that has to do with your journal display in your journal style. (The other major effort there involves the profile page.)

Second, one of the pieces of feedback we hear most often is that it's very, very painful to view and manage icons once you get up over a certain number. Because we're working on a way to let people buy more icon slots if they want (more about that in a second), fixing up icon management and display for large numbers of icons was a pre-requisite. Many people with slow connections, older computers, or mobile browsers were already having trouble loading icon pages past a certain number of icons, and it will only get worse as we allow people to have more icon slots! (Watch for further optimization efforts in the next few months as we gear up to releasing icon add-ons.)

Changes in hover text

With the last code push, we changed how hover text on icons is formed, so that instead of being "username, icon keyword" it is now username, keyword, and description. (Well, that's a slight inaccuracy: currently it's username, keyword, comment, and description. Seeing it in action, and based on feedback we've received, it's clear that the comment field shouldn't be there; it will be removed with the next code push, along with fixing a bug that's causing all keywords for each icon to display instead of only the keyword used to select the icon.)

We've been going around and around in circles on this since, I kid you not, 2010. The reason for making the change: the Description field on the icon management page is intended for people to write descriptions of the icon, which will be read to people who use screenreaders and shown to people who are using text-only browsers. So many people use icons as an additional channel of metadata about their comments, or as a hint about how their comment should be interpreted, and that information was totally lost to people who weren't browsing or weren't able to browse the site visually. The Description field was one of the first accessibility improvements we made to the site (and a lot of people who don't browse the site visually have told us they really, really appreciate it!)

The problem was, most browser make it nearly impossible for someone to get at the "alt text" (the text displayed in lieu of an image) without viewing the source of the page. Many people weren't even aware of the reason for that field being there. By putting the description into the hover text (which is shown in graphical browsers) as well as the alt text (which isn't), we hope to make it more clear to everyone what the description field is used for, thus encouraging more people to fill out descriptions for their icons.

Similar changes were made to (HTML) comment notification emails -- adding in the description and the keywords used for each icon -- to sync with the way icons are displayed on the site.

All of thse changes are to follow one of the core "best practices" of accessibility: there should be no information that is only available to users who are accessing your site in one particular way. (For instance: there should be no information only available to sighted users, or only to people who can use the mouse to hover, or only to people who are able to use the keyboard, etc.) We know we're not perfect on this yet -- there's still a few things that you need to be able to mouse in order to use, although we've nearly gotten to a point where we're happy with screenreader users' experience -- but accessibility for people with disabilities is one of our key values as a site, and we'll keep chipping away at the problem.

Icon add-ons brainstorming

As I mentioned up there, we are in the process of designing the icon add-on system for paid account holders to buy more icon slots if they feel they don't have enough!

Our current thoughts on how it will work, and our questions for you about how you would want it to work, are in the Brainstorming: icon add-ons post in [site community profile] dw_biz. If this is something you're interested in, head on over there and give it a read-through, then weigh in.

(I'm actually trying my hand at coding this one myself. Meep.)



A message from the antispam team



The increase in traffic and usage we've been seeing in the past few months -- we've nearly tripled our regular traffic over the past four months -- has brought with it a corresponding increase in spam, since spammers gravitate more towards more-active forums. It's thanks to the tireless efforts of our antispam team (who enjoy smacking spammers with a visceral glee) that we've been able to hold off the incursions so far -- spammers choose targets based not only on the service's activity and search engine visibility, but also on how well the service is protected and how quickly spam is removed.

If you receive spam comments, delete them and mark them as spam, whether they came from a logged-in user or an anonymous user. This is the best and fastest way to report spam and the way that will result in the quickest handling of spammers. It's tempting to report spammers spamming from a Dreamwidth account to the Terms of Service team, and if you do that they will still get handled, but the antispam system is still faster!

Please don't mark things as spam if they're not actually spam -- which is defined as commercial promotion, unwanted bulk solicitation, or automated gibberish (used to test a site's search engine visibility). Marking other things as spam only wastes the time and energy of the antispam team and prevents them from handling actual spam as quickly as they otherwise could.

Things that are not spam are generally aimed at a specific account or community and unique to that account or community: a single individual leaving comments that are critical of you or your community; a group of multiple individuals trying to disrupt your discussion with low-volume but annoying comments; a single individual leaving comments that are unpleasant, obnoxious, outrageous, or otherwise antisocial; low-volume trolling; comments designed to "page break", contain large/disgusting images, or otherwise disrupt the discussion; other general acts of asspimplehood. All of those things are definitely obnoxious and unwanted, but they aren't spam. They can be dealt with by turning on the "human test" (which may discourage the casual asspimple commenter), enabling comment IP logging, and in the worst cases by disabling anonymous comments and banning logged-in commenters whose comments you don't want.

If you're in doubt as to whether something is a wider automated spam campaign or if there's a human behind it trying to disrupt your individual account or community, it's okay to report it anyway -- there'll always be some false alarms and sometimes it's hard to tell the difference between one person doing ill-advised self-promotion manually and an automated spam campaign. Still, you can help us fight automated spam by making sure that you only report things that are spam.


Custom dictionary expansion



Way back in the dawn of Dreamwidth, we made a few changes that would let us define custom words in the dictionary used for on-site spellchecking. (This is the system that you can access when you preview and spellcheck your comment, not the computer-specific system that highlights potentially misspelled words as you type them with squiggles/underlines/highlights/other as-you-type indicators.) At the time we added a bunch of words we thought should be in the dictionary and then said we'd come back to the question after a few years once our users had had a chance to build up more site-specific vocabulary.

We're marching steadily towards DW's third anniversary (oh my goodness where has the time gone?), so it's time to re-visit the question! If you've noticed anything missing from the spellcheck dictionary, take a second to pop over to the Custom Dictionary brainstorming entry on our development wiki and add your contributions. (Editing is limited to logged-in users, but you can log in with your Dreamwidth URL using OpenID -- just enter your journal's address, such as http://denise.dreamwidth.org.)

We may not add every suggestion to the dictionary -- there are performance implications to a large custom dictionary -- but the wider the initial list, the better.


Default styles poll



Another thing we do here now and then is poll all y'all about what the default style and theme for newly-created accounts should be. (This doesn't prevent people from changing their styles, and it doesn't change the style for people who have already created their accounts; it only specifies what style should be used for newly-created accounts.)

It's been a while since we've done that -- the last poll was October of 2010, in which the default theme was selected as Neutral Good for the Practicality style. We've added a shitpot (that's a technical term) of new themes and styles since then, thanks to the hard work of the [site community profile] dreamscapes crew, so it's more than time to pick a new default.

Below please find a poll for which style you think should be the default style. Once we've chosen that, the next news post will include a poll with all the themes for the winning style. Once that poll's had a chance to run for a bit, that theme will be set to the new default theme.

(In this poll, I have removed Practicality, Skittlish Dreams, Transmogrified, and Negatives, all of which have previously been the default styles, so that the new default style will be one that hasn't been featured before! I've also removed EasyRead and Tabula Rasa, which are specialist styles designed for accessibility needs and for CSS skinning, respectively, and Zesty, which is a legacy style from our early closed-beta days.)

You can view all the base styles all at once. Each style in the poll is linked to all the themes available for each style. We hope you enjoy the chance to look through all the awesome styles and themes we've been adding!

Poll #9894 The 2012 Default Style Poll
This poll is anonymous.
Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 467

Which base style should be the default style for newly-created accounts?

View Answers

Abstractia
69 (14.8%)

Bases
11 (2.4%)

Basic Boxes
13 (2.8%)

Blanket
12 (2.6%)

Boxes and Borders
11 (2.4%)

Brittle
15 (3.2%)

ColorSide
10 (2.1%)

Compartamentalize
18 (3.9%)

Crisped
24 (5.1%)

Crossroads
20 (4.3%)

Drifting
7 (1.5%)

Dusty Foot
31 (6.6%)

Five AM
91 (19.5%)

Fluid Measure
15 (3.2%)

Funky Circles
18 (3.9%)

Marginless
6 (1.3%)

Modish
4 (0.9%)

Modular
26 (5.6%)

Nouveau Oleanders
9 (1.9%)

Paletteable
9 (1.9%)

Refried Tablet
10 (2.1%)

Stepping Stones
3 (0.6%)

Sunday Morning
11 (2.4%)

Tranquility III
24 (5.1%)




Arts & Culture - "Delights"



As many of you may remember, previously I've tried to include a section in news updates highlighting some of the awesomely creative things that DW users make, do, create, and share. I haven't been able to do this for a while, because it's an incredibly resource-intensive thing that I just haven't been able to keep up, but I've really missed having it -- DW users are doing some amazing things out there and I love seeing them!

But! Fear not, because [personal profile] pinesandmaples has volunteered to assemble a "Dreamwidth Arts and Culture" section in news posts. (And if you have something awesome that you've made/done/created/shared, drop her a PM!) I'll turn it over:

"Delights"
My theme this week is inspired by my recent reading assignments in early Quaker theology. Some of Dorothy White's words in an early tract pushed me to "look to the small delights, enjoy the world we have."

  • [personal profile] michiru tells a delightful little story of beans in her comic [community profile] chibibeans. Recommended is Prince of Tennis bean!

  • [personal profile] sneezer222 posted the only picture of snow that has ever caused my little Southern heart to squeal with glee, captured with only the flash and unaltered! The gentle glow of the falling flakes makes this view a sweet taste of wonderland.

  • [personal profile] noelleno offers art that shows a dramatic range of facial expression via very simple lines. Follow the progression down the post; don't just take my word for it!

  • The team at [personal profile] namsan_daily posted a photograph and description of hiking around Seoul, South Korea. Their post is a mini-vacation, a little jump away.

  • [personal profile] lorres shared one of her recent knitting projects and the process it took to get there her knitting blog. The cohesive neutrals were no accident, and they slide together so well. Beautiful.

  • [personal profile] argentumlupine blinded me with some mad science! A rad crash course on electric circuits basics (complete with diagrams!) makes all of these visual delights possible. I love electricity.

  • *

    And that's it from us for another update! As always, if you're having problems with Dreamwidth, Support can help you; for notices of site problems and downtime, check the Twitter status page; if you've got an idea to make the site better, you can make a suggestion.

    We'll see you in a few weeks for our next update. (And oh goodness I just previewed this entry and noticed that the styles poll actually looked like a poll in the preview. I always forget how many absolutely awesome little fixes we've done until I see them in action.)
    deird1: Fred looking pretty and thoughful (Default)

    [personal profile] deird1 2012-03-17 06:00 am (UTC)(link)
    So, for sitewide use, we've replaced reCAPTCHA with a new service known as "Text Captcha", which asks you to solve a very basic question -- something like, "Tomorrow is Sunday. If this is true, what day is today?" They're written to be very simple for humans to solve, and harder for computers to solve.

    THANKYOU. This is excellent.
    bluewolf458: (Eagle)

    [personal profile] bluewolf458 2012-03-17 07:44 am (UTC)(link)
    I'm with deird1 - I've been finding captchas harder and harder to decipher, and the text captcha sounds as if it's an excellent alternative.
    nimueth: (P!nk: Hell yeah!)

    [personal profile] nimueth 2012-03-17 02:09 pm (UTC)(link)
    Thirding this - lately I've had to refresh captchas a bunch of times, before I could make out what the words were and it's incredibly frustrating. So thank you SO MUCH for this alternative!
    unixronin: Galen the technomage, from Babylon 5: Crusade (Default)

    [personal profile] unixronin 2012-03-17 07:40 pm (UTC)(link)
    I'll keep my fingers crossed for it. The conventional captchas long since passed the point at which they are harder for real humans to solve than for computers. I'm guessing the text captchas won't last too long before they're cracked too. Ultimately, it's a losing strategy, but I don't have a better idea.
    lannamichaels: Matt Smith holds two thumbs up, before heading into Certain Danger. Cap from season 5 promo trailers. (yay)

    [personal profile] lannamichaels 2012-03-18 03:09 am (UTC)(link)
    Joining the chorus of thank you's for that. :D
    twisted_times: Animated icon saying "Sing like nobody's listening, live like you'll die tomorrow, dance like nobody's watching..." etc (dance)

    [personal profile] twisted_times 2012-03-18 02:54 pm (UTC)(link)

    Thank you! Image captchas are getting trickier to decipher, whereas natural language questions are far easier for me to parse, personally.

    the: (m. cotillard ☛ ( bedroom hymns ))

    [personal profile] the 2012-03-17 06:22 am (UTC)(link)
    with regards to hover text on icons, i've just been wondering since i switched, why is it username rather than the name field? is there any intention to put the name field in there? i personally find it more useful than username (since the username is already there to read, if i hover over an icon for a person or, in the case of rp, a character's name, it lets me know how to address them). just wondering!

    i love how you've paginated the icons, because the view all option is there too as a sort of semi-opt out. c: it must be a huge relief for those with slower connections or older machines!
    darjeeling: (Default)

    +1

    [personal profile] darjeeling 2012-03-17 06:30 am (UTC)(link)
    I've wondered this as well, and just seconding that I'd love to have whatever is filled into the Name field in the profile appear rather than the username on hovering.
    denyamenti: (Default)

    Re: +1

    [personal profile] denyamenti 2012-03-17 02:53 pm (UTC)(link)
    Except it would require people to copy and paste the same piece of info into the Description box of (conceivably) 250 icon spaces, and that's before you've introduced icon addons, so for argument's sake let's double the number to 500. Just speaking from experience, if I wanted the same information to be available on 500 of my icons, I'd hope there'd be a way of doing it without filling it in 500 times.

    Alternatively, would it be feasible to include the name perhaps not in the hover text of each icon, but maybe at the top of the contextual popup instead? If you kept the restriction of length even down to something like 30 characters, it could go under the user name so it would look something like:

    darjeeling
    "my name here"
    send message | grant access
    subscribe | ban user
    journal | profile

    It wouldn't be as useful for those with screen readers or those without the ability to hover (such as myself on this smartphone), but it doesn't detract from their usability either. The ones who are currently visiting the profile to get the "given" name of a journal will still do so, but those who are already using the hover function will be able to save a step.
    ana: (Default)

    +1 hoverbox

    [personal profile] ana 2012-03-17 03:08 pm (UTC)(link)
    I didn't even think of the popup thing, is that a possibility? It sounds like a good compromise to me as it wouldn't affect accessibility.
    ceesoo: Howard Link's face shooped onto Zelda!Link (Link} he come to town)

    Re: +1

    [personal profile] ceesoo 2012-03-17 08:40 pm (UTC)(link)


    I was bored and decided to make visuals, I guess. Though your text representation probably explains it just fine.
    darjeeling: (Default)

    Re: +1

    [personal profile] darjeeling 2012-03-17 02:54 pm (UTC)(link)
    (Sorry, the above comment is still me. I swear I spend more time in my RP journals than I do in my own brain.)
    the: (m. fassbender ☛ ( you go squirrel girl ))

    [personal profile] the 2012-03-17 06:37 am (UTC)(link)
    oh i didn't know they could be that long! wowsers. yes that would be unwieldy. and certainly i realise people use them differently ( my name isn't actually drogue, for instance ) so i figured that would factor in. apologies for forcing you to rehash something that's come up a bunch before. like i said, i was just curious as to your reasoning, since i know the dw team always makes, well, smart and logical decisions based on all the evidence and opinion. i can't even begin to fathom some of the stuff you guys take into account but i'm always interested to know what it is. thank you for getting back to me and for all your hard work!
    sends: (peer ☾ On the day you left...)

    [personal profile] sends 2012-03-17 07:33 am (UTC)(link)
    Can the display names really be that long?

    I recently tried to make the display name for one of my journals "Intelligence program CTN 0452-9 'Cortana'" and was told it was too long to use. It was actually that length on LJ, which surprised me since the reason for not allowing the display names to show on hover was because they were supposed to be able to be that much longer. I've ended up getting along fine without the display name hover (though I'd still very much like it, personally) but it strikes me as odd that I wouldn't be able to use that.
    inabook: (Default)

    [personal profile] inabook 2012-03-17 08:13 am (UTC)(link)
    I'm with the other people requesting that the "name" field replace username on hover text. It seems to me that knowing the "name" would increase accessibility, because the person's username is already present, and knowing the "name" of a person can be very important/useful for all kinds of interaction on the site (not just limited to RP.)

    The main concern seems to be the length of the name, but I just tested it and the limit for the name field is 50 characters. That really doesn't seem that unbearably long even for a person who must fill out every bit of space they have...

    Regardless of this issue, I'm very pleased with Dreamwidth and the experience I've had on the site so far. Thank you very much for your hard work and effort.
    ana: (pic#1149173)

    [personal profile] ana 2012-03-17 09:41 am (UTC)(link)
    It seems to me that knowing the "name" would increase accessibility, because the person's username is already present ...

    This was my thought as well! I am speaking as an RPer primarily, where I would really appreciate the name in hover, but also in personal interactions it's nice to know what name people prefer to be called without going to their profile page like I've been doing on DW.

    It seems like a tiny thing but copy-pasting names into hundreds of icons worth of descriptions is an exhausting solution. I know nothing about screen-readers, though, or what the majority of users put in the name field.

    Your explanations are always appreciated, Denise. ♥
    inabook: (over the shoulder)

    [personal profile] inabook 2012-03-17 12:26 pm (UTC)(link)
    And in a similar vein, for the argument that some don't use the name field for their name - more people do use the "name" field for their name than use the "Description" field for their name. It seems to make more sense to have the name field show up than expect everyone on the site to realize they should put their name in their descriptions.
    ninetydegrees: Art & Text: heart with aroace colors, "you are loved" (Default)

    [personal profile] ninetydegrees 2012-03-17 12:27 pm (UTC)(link)
    It seems to me that knowing the "name" would increase accessibility, because the person's username is already present

    If you're on a screenreader, usernames are printed later in the flow of things. Userpics come first so you get to know who posted entries/comments sooner if usernames are in the description field.

    That really doesn't seem that unbearably long even for a person who must fill out every bit of space they have...

    50 characters isn't long when it provides useful info; as Denise explained above, the name field is used in many different ways including not to display any kind of 'name'.

    /my2cents
    inabook: (curious princess)

    [personal profile] inabook 2012-03-17 12:36 pm (UTC)(link)
    But it's a field that's intended to be useful info, thus it being "Name." Whether people use it for that or not is up to them. I'm sure people with screenreaders also may wish to know what to call the person they are responding to. Right now they'd have to open up a profile page and check the name box (and then profile, if the name box isn't filled in) - which would be even more time-consuming, wouldn't it? Especially if the name box actually *is* filled.

    Basically, it seems overly silly to deny many people the useful name info because a few people like to put quotes instead of names. Not everyone uses the description fields correctly either, but yet they exist and can be useful when they do.
    ninetydegrees: Art & Text: heart with aroace colors, "you are loved" (Default)

    [personal profile] ninetydegrees 2012-03-17 12:42 pm (UTC)(link)
    I'm sure people with screenreaders also may wish to know what to call the person they are responding to.

    In addition to having the name field actually filled with any sort of name, this supposes screenreader users want to do that. I'd never call you Estelle for example. To me, you're inabook because usernames have more value and are more useful for me and I never look at names, wherever they are. It would be easy to decide what's actually useful info if everybody was using the site the same way but we don't. If you add to that that nobody can force users to use the 'name' field in the way you intend it, I sincerely doubt names would be more useful than usernames for a majority of users.
    Edited 2012-03-17 12:44 (UTC)
    inabook: (Moe)

    [personal profile] inabook 2012-03-17 12:47 pm (UTC)(link)
    But the key word is "may." I "may" not care about your icon keywords or descriptions either, but I can still see them... Many people do find the name to be useful, so I'm merely arguing the position that there doesn't seem to be harm in adding it.

    Of course, that's provided that it's accessible. The real test would be to ask a person with a screenreader which system is easier or whether it matters, rather than speaking only in hypotheticals.
    ninetydegrees: Art & Text: heart with aroace colors, "you are loved" (Default)

    [personal profile] ninetydegrees 2012-03-17 01:09 pm (UTC)(link)
    The real test would be to ask a person with a screenreader which system is easier or whether it matters, rather than speaking only in hypotheticals.

    I believe this change is actually the result of several discussions with screenreader users. You can find them on dw_accessibility.
    whitelighter: (NCIS » :|a?)

    [personal profile] whitelighter 2012-03-17 08:25 am (UTC)(link)
    Along with what users like [personal profile] sends and [personal profile] madheroking have said, I think it should be worth asking that if the userbase wanting a name field hover-text is so small... is it possible to add the option into the admin_console to let those of us that want it seek it out, while those who don't care won't know it exists?

    That would lessen on the options fatigue, but still be available to those of us who are generally all in the same circle (roleplay) and have already established ways of spreading this information around to everyone who would care. In the same vein, it would be kind of nice to be able to take out the hover for descriptions, possibly also with an admin_console command. It just makes some hover-texts very long in the way I think you guys were trying to prevent, and giving an opt-out if it's not too much trouble would be incredibly lovely.
    glampuss: (Default)

    [personal profile] glampuss 2012-03-17 08:46 am (UTC)(link)
    255 characters does seem rather long for a name field. Perhaps shortening the number of characters available would make it less unwieldy in the hover box?

    Also, since a lot of people are using it to put in a saying or quip, maybe the profile could have another field that has a longer character limit and is called something like "catch phrase" or "motto"? The would then allow people to put in quotes as well as names.
    redbird: closeup of me drinking tea, in a friend's kitchen (Default)

    [personal profile] redbird 2012-03-17 11:57 am (UTC)(link)
    A lot of my friends are either leaving the "name" field the same as the username (because they think of that as their real name, or it's the identity they want shared here—and I do know people whose name here and/or on LiveJournal matches the name they get phone bills under) or using it to play with. Mine for a while was a silly math-based pun; a friend of mine swaps from one silly thing to the next, none of them being what any of us call this person.
    fools_journey: (hmm?)

    [personal profile] fools_journey 2012-03-17 01:27 pm (UTC)(link)
    I can understand not including a display name in the alt text for icons or in any sort of hover-over for icons, both for the convenience of screenreaders and because if you're just presented with an icon, for example, it makes sense that the unique screen name be the first thing you want to identify with it. However, that said, a screen name is not the only means by which - or even necessarily the primary means by which - people identify their journals here.

    Consequently, would a possible useful compromise be to include display names in the hover text for usernames?

    When I'm hovering-over a username, I'm already looking at the username. I don't need to see the username again, and I'm going to add to the chorus of people who would, if this option were available, use it to see what name an account is actually listed under.

    Also is not the display name meant to be a name? Even if there are people who use it for other purposes, why should that bar people who wish to use it for its intended purpose from getting any use out of it? By that logic, why should we have the 'description' field for icons displayed at all, when a lot of people (in my experience, which I admit is pretty limited) either don't bother to fill it out or put quotes and things there instead of a description of the icon. I am also guilty of this.

    That aside, when people are using a display name for its intended purpose, we have to go to their profiles to see it. This seems to me (though I admit I am not very knowledgeable about what things besides icons take the most work from the servers) to be unnecessary work on our fronts and unnecessary extra traffic for you guys, as it means instead of a single data field being loaded on an already loaded page, instead it involves loading an entirely new page.
    Edited 2012-03-17 13:32 (UTC)
    ceesoo: Howard Link's face shooped onto Zelda!Link (Link} he come to town)

    [personal profile] ceesoo 2012-03-17 08:42 pm (UTC)(link)
    I was making visuals of the ideas people were suggesting so... don't mind me, just leaving this here...

    ceesoo: Ranma and P-chan (Ranma} Pajamarama)

    [personal profile] ceesoo 2012-03-17 10:11 pm (UTC)(link)
    I imagine this is probably something to take over to the suggestions comm, but you seem to get asked the username vs. display name thing every update and I don't know if you want to deal with it in two places...? So just.. COMMENTING HERE FOR NOW /o/ But yeah, I really don't think this is a thing that can just be left as-is as long as a good chunk of users want to see the display name somewhere easy to access on the comment pages.

    Anyway, this idea by [personal profile] fools_journey and this idea by [personal profile] darjeeling I assume both have accessibility issues? If, as the original post says, the aim is to make sure all users--whether they're on visual browsers, screenreaders, or mobile devices--are able to access the same information, then obviously hover-over style solutions like a title/tool-tip on the username link or a new piece of info on the contextual hover menu won't be accessible to everyone.

    Sooo, I was thinking, is it too cluttered to put the display name next to the username on the comment bar? Like this:
    An image showing the comment bar with the display name in parenthesis next to the username
    This way screen readers and mobile devices can see it no problem, and everyone has access to the display name. I double checked and there is indeed a 50 character limit on the display name field, so it's really not going to get much longer than what's seen in the picture, unless someone used 50 W's I guess. Aaand listed as username first, it leaves the display name field open to be used either as intended (with a name) or as a sort of signature quote, quip, or whatever. Should be less confusing than notifs, anyway?

    Problem: since when you edit your profile it says "Your name will be displayed on your profile and in search results" would having it display on the comment bars this way be a problem for the dw's search function?
    nometal_alchemist: (pic#2786403)

    [personal profile] nometal_alchemist 2012-03-18 01:08 am (UTC)(link)
    For my own two cents, this actually looks very nice, from the point of view of a sighted user who would really like to be able to see the "Name" associated with journals I'm replying to. In fact, I prefer this to the LJ way of doing things (the hover/mouse-over), and it has the benefit that an additional action (said hover) isn't required to view it, making it easily accessible to mobility-impaired users too.
    pne: A picture of a plush toy, halfway between a duck and a platypus, with a green body and a yellow bill and feet. (Default)

    [personal profile] pne 2012-03-21 05:27 pm (UTC)(link)
    I like that idea, too!
    madheroking: (glance)

    [personal profile] madheroking 2012-03-17 06:32 am (UTC)(link)
    I've been wondering about the username instead of name field thing too. This is especially relevant to me as most of what I do is RPing, and being in some rather large games with high character turnover, it's nice to be able to identify characters I don't immediately recognize from the icon/username without having to click all the way to their journal profile. That, and having the name field in the hover text is useful for those people who like to change their usernames periodically...
    madheroking: (studious)

    [personal profile] madheroking 2012-03-17 07:39 am (UTC)(link)
    In theory you can, but there's a marked difference between filling out literally dozens of descriptions, and simply putting information in a single field. Also, back to RP accounts in particular, in those cases many people when they do keyword icons frequently use descriptions of some kind as the keywords to begin with, since they're largely just many, many different images of the same character. Plus, as someone else mentioned the username is already sitting there right next to the icon, so it's a little redundant...

    Basically, while I definitely understand where the issue of what the overall userbase uses versus what the minority uses is coming from, from a purely pragmatic standpoint it makes more sense at least in RP-land to use names instead of usernames in the hover text. Personally, I prefer it that way by far for personal journal use as well, because I've known quite a few people who are prone to changing their usernames every time the whim strikes, and again personal journal icons really aren't likely to feature images that identify the user either. So I don't really see how a good description helps in that case- it identifies the image, sure, but not the user who's using it. And the latter is the information that'd be nice to have without clicking through to profiles all the time.

    That's just my 2¢, though. I'm not really expecting it'd make any big difference, but just to give you a little more perspective on the other side of the issue.
    vinesofregret: Cho Hakkai from Saiyuki (i humbly beg this of you)

    [personal profile] vinesofregret 2012-03-17 08:51 am (UTC)(link)
    Well, if you use descriptive keywords, all you need to do is copy and paste - I did the description section on this account in under five minutes. And if you aren't (lyrics keywords or whatever), your icons probably need describing anyway, in that case.
    pne: A picture of a plush toy, halfway between a duck and a platypus, with a green body and a yellow bill and feet. (Martin)

    [personal profile] pne 2012-03-21 05:26 pm (UTC)(link)
    you can actually get much of the same effect by a well-written Description field!

    I thought Description was supposed to identify the *icon*, not the *person*?

    For example, my default has a description of "A picture of a plush toy, halfway between a duck and a platypus, with a green body and a yellow bill and feet." Which describes the icon, but still leaves no hint that [personal profile] pne is Philip.

    I'm also one who would like to see the display name, for the sake of those who do use it to indicate an actual name, though I reluctantly concede that there are many people who do not use that field for a name.
    ciaan: revolution (Default)

    [personal profile] ciaan 2012-03-19 10:46 am (UTC)(link)
    Of all the dozens and dozens of people I interact with on DW and LJ, maybe only a handful use the display name for something that is a name they want to be called separate from their username. So showing it with every icon would give no useful information and just clutter up the hover text with excess characters. I would be firmly against it.

    Now, whether your experience or my experience is more common site-wide is something that the DW admins know, not us.
    fairwells: Dear Dr. Seuss ([dear] Dr. Seuss)

    [personal profile] fairwells 2012-03-17 06:29 am (UTC)(link)
    I'm glad that I can write descriptions for my icons because I do have a friend that is sight-impaired. And thank you for the Text Captcha option. It was hard choosing in the poll. So many great styles from which to choose.
    fairwells: Dear Henri Matisse ([dear] Henri Matisse)

    [personal profile] fairwells 2012-03-17 08:35 am (UTC)(link)
    I didn't even realize the description is visible in hover text. I need to write better descriptions. But thank you again for making this option available, one of the many reasons why I love your site =)
    delight: (Default)

    [personal profile] delight 2012-03-17 08:34 pm (UTC)(link)
    Yeah, as someone who is visually impaired but loves to be able to use icons I always feel bad that I have a total mental block preventing me from being able to actually write the descriptions. Oh, autism, you can be such a problem.
    azurelunatic: Vivid pink Alaskan wild rose. (Default)

    [personal profile] azurelunatic 2012-03-17 11:44 pm (UTC)(link)
    I know that some communities have a good-neighborhood sort of thing about image and video descriptions, where if someone has something to share but isn't equal to the task of describing it for others, lets the community know that this is [media] but they're not entirely able to describe it at the moment, and the community pitches in.

    I'm not sure if this is something that you would be comfortable with asking if others feel like doing for your icons, or if you'd be open to accepting descriptions if people offered them to you, but if you are, that could possibly be a thing.
    napple: (ff12; ashe)

    [personal profile] napple 2012-03-17 06:34 am (UTC)(link)
    I'm really sorry if you guys get bugged about this a lot, but I was wondering if you were considering the "Name" field to be added into the icon alt-text? I'd even suggest replacing the username field with that (like they did on LJ) since the icon is always beside the username anyway, but I'd understand if that was for accessibility as well.

    It's just really handy to hover for people's names without going to their profile, most especially in RP so you at least know the character's name.

    WHOOPS ignore me I see that you've responded to that already. I was sitting on this page too long.
    Edited (hurp) 2012-03-17 06:34 (UTC)
    kore: (Default)

    [personal profile] kore 2012-03-17 06:39 am (UTC)(link)
    I really love the accessibility concerns -- thank you! It's great.
    ceit: (Default)

    [personal profile] ceit 2012-03-17 09:20 am (UTC)(link)
    I don't need the accessiblity functions (yet!), but that focus is one of the biggest reasons I felt positive enough about Dreamwidth to move over here from LJ.

    The accessiblity point reminded me of bug #2415 (NNTP feeds) and the discussion about alternate access methods & screen readers that came up at that point. It looks like there hasn't been any activity for a bit over a year, so I was wondering if it's on permahold due to lack of manpower, permanently off the table, or some other state. If it's the former, I've been doing Perl on both the network & web sides for about 15 years and would be happy to join up as a DW dev and pitch in. Should I start over in dw_dev?
    elialshadowpine: (Default)

    [personal profile] elialshadowpine 2012-03-17 06:45 pm (UTC)(link)
    I also really appreciate all the work you've been doing, particularly in that you've also been focusing on how to make things more accessible for people who get migraines. That is actually what led me to not renew my paid account elsewhere; they completely ignored the complaints of about 1000 people who got migraines from a site change.
    ninamalfoy: a few blue flowers in a glass vase in front of a window, spring-like coloring (blumen:strauß)

    [personal profile] ninamalfoy 2012-03-17 10:24 pm (UTC)(link)
    Major kudos to you! *tips hat* I'm disabled myself (though, being deaf isn't that much of a hindrance for using DW, I'd say...), so I do appreciate this a lot. Also, thank you to bringing the alt-text/screenreader issue to my attention! *zips off to check on her comment descriptions*
    inoru_no_hoshi: The most ridiculous chandelier ever: shaped like a penis. Text: Sparklepeen. (Default)

    [personal profile] inoru_no_hoshi 2012-03-17 11:45 pm (UTC)(link)
    *g* It really isn't, unless you happen to hang in circles where videos are a Thing and subtitles/transcripting isn't very (the woe I have, I tell you...).

    I try to nudge my circle/etc., about it every now and then because apparently it's hard to remember to try and be accessible to the can't-hear(-well) people. xD

    (Also, hi fellow deaf person!)
    ninamalfoy: cutout of a picture of Harry & Draco, foreheads touching and looking at you, blue tint, lower right corner: 'OTP <<33' (hp:my first otp)

    [personal profile] ninamalfoy 2012-03-18 01:32 am (UTC)(link)
    Oh - yeah, in these circumstances, that can be quite an issue... *recalls begging to various lovely LJ folks to transcribe an interview with her OTP* I just wish the beta audio caption thing on YT would be more reliable...

    And yeah, it's often an 'oh, oops, didn't remember/know' thing. *wry grin* These days, I'm mostly laid-back about the whole thing, also because I'm not as active in fandom anymore. But I totally hear you.

    (*waves* Yay, another deaf fandom person! And I see you like Harry Potter, Firefly and knitting? Be still my slasher heart! I hope you won't object to me friending, err, adding you to my reading list? *smiles*)
    inoru_no_hoshi: The most ridiculous chandelier ever: shaped like a penis. Text: Sparklepeen. (Default)

    [personal profile] inoru_no_hoshi 2012-03-18 01:41 am (UTC)(link)
    Heeee, I honestly didn't care much about video accessibility not being a Thing before I went and fell into RPF fandoms! Watching interviews is sad though because most have either shitty sound (I'm looking at you, Yahoo...) or the interviewee mumbles and/or talks fast and I just want to SHAKE THEM. *G*

    I am pretty laid back IMO but I get so fed up with how invisible deafness can be. People seriously don't seem to realise how much of the world they process via their hearing, and how unfriendly things can be if you can't hear (or hear but don't understand) said input.

    I am obviously preaching to the choir here, heeee. :D

    (Hee, not at all! I haven't written in HP in years, but I'll always have a soft spot for it. :D)
    ninamalfoy: Jessica looking off to the side, grinning broadly (suits:jessica!grin)

    [personal profile] ninamalfoy 2012-03-18 02:15 am (UTC)(link)
    Oh, yes, RPF. Lovely that there's (often) so much content out there, easily findable via tumblr/Google/etc., but for folks like us, video interviews and the likes are the bane. -.- I'm in football (the European kind *g*) RPS myself, or rather, was (still follow the beautiful game, though), and therefore... yeah. At least my OTP at the time was so kind to post updates on their respective homepages and tease each other that way, which, OMGSOSLASHY (they even switched laptops once at training camp - they always shared rooms *coughs* - and posted on the other one's page!). But when they did some videos together... yeah, that's when I had to resort to begging. *g* (Sadly, they are no more, at least not publicly, but still are good friends in private.) /*stops being ranty/flaily* Heh. But yeah, RPF fandoms...

    I get so fed up with how invisible deafness can be. People seriously don't seem to realise how much of the world they process via their hearing, and how unfriendly things can be if you can't hear (or hear but don't understand) said input.

    You took the words right out of my mouth! (Or rather, hands...) This, so much. *nods frantically* And people's first line of thought is often that you must be a. a foreigner (weird pronunciation, bane of my communication experiences/fails) or b. retarded ("Huh?/What?", not getting things, etc.), not that it's just that we can't hear! Gah.

    Preach away! Venting is always good for the soul, and doubly so when it's with people who know exactly what you're experiencing, y/y? :-)

    (Ah, I don't mind! You are very prolific, and omg, so many fandoms! I'm mostly a terrible, terrible lurker, used to write some but my muses are currently on a cruise and don't seem to want to return any time soon... *g*)
    inoru_no_hoshi: The most ridiculous chandelier ever: shaped like a penis. Text: Sparklepeen. (Default)

    [personal profile] inoru_no_hoshi 2012-03-18 02:30 am (UTC)(link)
    Lol, nice of them to basically just ship themselves! *g*

    And people's first line of thought is often that you must be a. a foreigner (weird pronunciation, bane of my communication experiences/fails) or b. retarded ("Huh?/What?", not getting things, etc.), not that it's just that we can't hear! Gah.

    YES. I think I mostly get the retarded, since I tend to speak rather clearly - but also I'm an accent/syntax SPONGE but apparently I default to sounding British, which is endlessly hilarious because I've never been outside west coast US! I've considered getting an "I'm Deaf, Not An Idiot" button to wear when I go out. xD

    Heeee, true! :D

    (... You know, I hadn't even really considered myself "prolific" until I started uploading stuff to AO3 a few days ago and realized I've already got 30 works up there, and that's not even half of all my stuff! I always feel like I'm one of those dabblers, you know? xD)
    ninamalfoy: 'The transfer window fucked up my world.' ('the' and 'fucked up' in white, otherwise black) on red background (footie:transfer fuck up)

    [personal profile] ninamalfoy 2012-03-18 07:36 am (UTC)(link)
    These were the good times, yesss. ^-^ Football is a cruel fandom, though. Your pairings can get ripped apart anytime because of club transfers/coaches dropping players from national squads/etc., but then, you also get surprise!pairings whenever this happens, too. Music RPF must be less annoying - you still get your hiatuses, band break-ups, etc., but I feel like there's more forewarning. -.- (I confess: I stumbled into LJ fandom due to a N*Sync story. *g*)

    I often get people switching to English (I'm German, btw) when I ask them to repeat something. *facepalms* I now mostly communicate via scribbling notes, so much easier and this way they actually realize that I'm NOT stupid (yay for flawless written!language skills!). Aw, you sound British? Now that's hilarious! *g* I once got told by a speech therapist that I sound like I'm from South Bavaria. (Yeah, SURE.) But funnily enough, people understand me better in English-speaking countries. I guess that's because Americans/Brits are used to such a broad range of accents/dialects/etc. that my garbled pronunciation is still understandable. *g*

    I've considered getting an "I'm Deaf, Not An Idiot" button to wear when I go out. xD

    YES. XD I've got this top, it's a word play seeing as 'Taube' can mean both 'dove' and 'deaf woman', so I'm saying 'Am a dove/deaf woman'. It also makes people stare at my boobs, which I don't mind much, actually. *g*

    (I looked you up, wheee! Am totally unfamiliar with MCR and the anime fandoms, but Glambert is the best. \o/ I'm also on AO3 (same name), but haven't posted anything in two years, and my fandoms will look extra obscure to you! *laughs*)
    inoru_no_hoshi: The most ridiculous chandelier ever: shaped like a penis. Text: Sparklepeen. (Default)

    [personal profile] inoru_no_hoshi 2012-03-18 08:22 am (UTC)(link)
    Lol, maybe a little forewarning - although, I don't think MCR is ever going to break up; they'll go til they die in studio or something. xD And backing band shifts are interesting enough (Adam Lambert currently only has two of the people from GNT backing him, only one of which was there for the whole tour. Funtimes!), I can't imagine a whole band splitting up! (Confession: I swore up and down I didn't and wouldn't ever do RPF for years. And then Adam Lambert came along and, well, so much for that. *G*)

    ... Seriously *facepalm* there. Do you ever understand them better in English? That would be kinda ironic. xD Hm, at some point I'll end up solely communicating via written notes - and have done that in the past! - but I like to try for as long as what remains of my hearing, well, remains. *g* (Progressive sensorineural; I still have some, but it's bad enough I'm legally disabled even with my hearing aid, so, you know, have started just saying "I'm deaf", especially since that'll be 100% true at some point in the future. xD)

    English having tons of dialects/accents/etc. might be a contributing factor, yes; although that bothers me a lot because I've been speaking and listening to it all my life and omg accents are my baaaaaane. ...Also people who speak really quietly/fast/have beards or mustaches... *cough* I'm opinionated, clearly. xDD

    Heeeeee, that's an AWESOME shirt! The pun - and intended message - would fly over most peoples' heads over here, though. xD ...I do have a blank tee and fabric markers, though... HMMMMM.

    (I bet it was easily to look me up, since same name and all! And yeah, I only have a slice of my fandoms up. I'm working on it all piecemeal. I may go look you up, though - it'd be funny if I actually knew/recongnised any of yours. ... And lol HP and Remember the Titans are the only ones I recognise. xD)
    ninamalfoy: Donna turning her head and looking straight at you, lips pursed with wide eyes, sassy posture (suits:awesome!donna)

    [personal profile] ninamalfoy 2012-03-18 10:00 am (UTC)(link)
    (Adam Lambert currently only has two of the people from GNT backing him, only one of which was there for the whole tour. Funtimes!)

    Oh, I didn't know that background musicians get shuffled around a lot. Yup, must be fun... *g* Is Tommy Ratliff (yes, I remember that hullaboo around the snog!) still with him? And I can totally see why he would make you reconsider your stance on RPF. Totally. I used to read some Adam/Kris stuff when they were still all BFFs in public (and crushing on each other, hee). Good times...

    *snorts* Nah, I do notice that it's English, but... I just want them to speak slower and more clearly, not switch to another language, gah. It's happened only rarely, luckily. I so could not carry on an entire chat in English, lipreading is a bitch compared to German where the words are spoken exactly as they're written (well, 95% or so), so the switch to English is more difficult. I did muddle through in my various holidays in English-speaking countries, though. :-) - Ah, gotcha! In your case, might a CI be helpful? I've got some hard-of-hearing friends whose hearing deteriorated over the years and all of them have a CI.

    Ooooh, yes. I also so totally can't lipread any German dialects. Only straight-up High German for me, otherwise I'm all 'bzuh?'. I can understand them in written-out form, though. And your woes, man. *nods* Chronic mumblers should be lined up and shot. I still get the shivers when I think back to a prof of mine who had this thing where whitish saliva threads would collect in the corners of his mouth while he spoke, EW. (Didn't lipread him because I had interpreters, but I couldn't help looking - horrified fascination...)

    Heh, yeah, not applicable in not-German-speaking countries! *g* I've custom-ordered a hoodie from Spreadshirt, which has a big '/' on the back and below 'We are everywhere.' NO ONE (in RL, that is) gets it, ahahaha. *loves being mysterious*

    (Way too easy, woman! *g* Looking forward to more of your stuff. And ugh, my HP story... so long ago. Eons. *facepalms* And the Remember the Titans story, the plotbunny is by now pretty much mummified. I wish more people would write Gerry/Big Ju, though...)
    inoru_no_hoshi: The most ridiculous chandelier ever: shaped like a penis. Text: Sparklepeen. (Default)

    [personal profile] inoru_no_hoshi 2012-03-18 11:31 am (UTC)(link)
    Your question about Tommy is hilarious because he's the only one that's been with him since promo for For Your Entertainment! Cam (keys during GNT) has her own stuff going on, LP (drummer) switched out with Isaac literally a few shows before European leg of GNT, Monte (guitarist)...is back to doing stuff for Madonna, and sorta persona non grata amongst Adam fans. So now Tommy's doing lead guitar (and being awesomely awesome at it!), Isaac's still cheerfully on drums, new bassist is Ashley Dzerigian, and is apparently pretty awesome at it, and new keys is Kevin... somebody. Kevin apparently also does guitar, but not as awesomely as Tommy. (I haven't been keeping up with promo because A) lots of it, and B) hearing people on my feed have been complaining of bad sound in a lot of vids, so...) /probably more than you wanted or needed to know, lol.

    Also, one kiss? Sweetheart, almost every show on GNT had a kiss. Some had very EPIC kisses - Amsterdam's concert comes to mind. ;D Good times indeed - which won't be repeated unless we get Adam's boyfriend up on stage with him next tour, because they are riiiiiidiculously in loe and adorkable and heeeee. :D

    I just want them to speak slower and more clearly

    YEEESSSSSSSSSSSSS. Omg this. PEOPLE Y U NO REALISE THIS. /woe Also, I wince on behalf of English, because, guilty as charged. xD A CI would almost certainly not help, as the problem is not my cochleae; it's down literally in the governs-the-hearing-and-such nerves, which... Yeah. I'm kinda SOL - just my luck to have one of the rarest types of hearing loss, lolol. (And even there I must be special: I'm pretty much 100% deaf in my right ear, and, IDK, 80-90%? deaf in my left... but I've been losing hearing in left ear from lower ranges up, instead of upper ranges down, like ~normal~ people do.)

    Heeeeeeeeee. I always wonder if people find it disconcerting that I just waaaaatch them, steadily, when they talk. :D

    (I feel like most of my HP stuff is OOC in some way, so I'm sitting on the fence about uploading it to AO3. I don't want people to think that's the CURRENT quality of my stuff... /o\ OTOH, I don't want to irrevocably lose it anywhere, so. /o\)
    ninamalfoy: Leia clad in white and holding a gun, looking serious, light blue background, above: 'Girls kick ass' (star wars:leia kicks ass)

    [personal profile] ninamalfoy 2012-03-18 11:54 am (UTC)(link)
    Heeeeeeeeeeeee! XD Aw, brave Tommy, soldiering on with Adam. *pets them* And oh, why is Monte (heavyset guy, right? OMG why do I remember this?!? -.-) the guy to hate? *is curious* But yay, good to know that Adam (and band) is going strong. ♥

    Every show a kiss? *LOL* Damn, now that's very slash-friendly, eh? Re Sauli: aw, yis! Does he do anything music-related, too?

    They should make it part of schooling (diversity/culture subject thing, whatever) that people (abled and disabled!) learn how to approach/handle people with different disabilities. No more handing out BRAILLE menus to deaf people etc., YIS.

    Re your hearing loss - wow, you really are a speshul snowflake, eh? *winkwinkwinks* /meant in a totally JOKING manner, in case you're all 'WTF' *g* - That aside, so there's only... waiting until you've reached 100% in both ears? Gah. A friend of mine decided against a CI, but she loves music (soul, hip hop, jazz, whatever) and writes song lyrics and all that, and she knows that her hearing will get worse and worse... agh. *flails* I can't even say 'I get you', because I was deaf from birth, although I did have hearing aids (big, clunky things) that didn't help much - only heard REALLY loud sounds - so I ditched 'em. Since then, silence! But then, it's not really a silent world because, vibrations! :-)

    I once read that hearing people tend to perceive the stare of deaf/hoh people either as threatening or as an attempt to flirt. WTFNO. *lols*

    (I totally hear you - I uploaded my stuff because of the 'OMG what if LJ goes belly-up and everything is lost!?!' thinking, so. Maybe a disclaimer 'LOL people I write SO MUCH better now but feel free to LAUGH at my less-than-mediocre attempts way back then?' *g*)
    inoru_no_hoshi: The most ridiculous chandelier ever: shaped like a penis. Text: Sparklepeen. (Default)

    [personal profile] inoru_no_hoshi 2012-03-17 06:47 am (UTC)(link)
    other general acts of asspimplehood, the casual asspimple commenter— HEEEEEEEEEEEEEE! I ♥ you. :D

    As always, DW continues to be awesome. Also, I had no idea Abstractia looked that cool. I feel the need to go do some themeing! :D
    Edited (Because reasons.) 2012-03-17 06:48 (UTC)
    chiming: (Default)

    [personal profile] chiming 2012-03-17 03:16 pm (UTC)(link)
    You guysssss. /blushide
    velithya: (Default)

    [personal profile] velithya 2012-03-17 06:49 am (UTC)(link)
    If we have html or DW links in our icon descriptions (eg giving credit, using usernames to identify people in the icon, etc) the hover comment is including all the code as well. Is that intended or should we be re-working icon descriptions not to include any HTML at all?
    velithya: (Default)

    [personal profile] velithya 2012-03-17 07:20 am (UTC)(link)
    Ah righto, that makes sense.

    I have a lot of cosplay icons and I have been identifying the cosplayers by username in the description field; I'll work on swapping that out to the comments and keeping the description plain text in the future.

    Thanks!
    velithya: (Default)

    [personal profile] velithya 2012-03-17 07:38 am (UTC)(link)
    Not a problem at all! As you said in your first comment, tags are disruptive for screenreaders/etc which I hadn't realised, so it's the decent thing to do :)
    (Yep, I think that's what I'll end up doing. Makes the most sense!)
    runpunkrun: j.d. looking down at his pink scrub pants and hearting them while dr. cox walks by (they make me feel pretty)

    [personal profile] runpunkrun 2012-03-17 07:35 pm (UTC)(link)
    There really shouldn't be any HTML in the description field anyway

    I've been wondering about this. I used ♥ in the description of several of my icons, but felt uncomfortable about it because I don't know what screenreaders do with that information. Is it just a garble of characters? I should probably find another way to get that idea across, huh?
    runpunkrun: john sheppard biting his lip, text: "I've made a huge mistake." (sheppard makes a huge mistake)

    [personal profile] runpunkrun 2012-03-17 10:06 pm (UTC)(link)
    I was afraid of that! I shall fix them.
    cesy: "Cesy" - An old-fashioned quill and ink (Default)

    [personal profile] cesy 2012-03-17 06:50 am (UTC)(link)
    Ooh, I like the Dreamwidth Arts and Culture bit.
    falena: illustration of a blue and grey moth against a white background (Default)

    [personal profile] falena 2012-03-17 09:28 am (UTC)(link)
    +1
    oxfordtweed: (Ford - Mad Grin - H2G2)

    [personal profile] oxfordtweed 2012-03-17 06:59 am (UTC)(link)
    I love the new Captcha! As a kinkmeme mod, the Captcha is the biggest frustration, because all it does is just annoy the users. We now no longer have to try the Captcha eight times before the comment goes through.


    And as someone who recently had to just go delete some icons to make room for some new ones, I cannot wait for more space! :D
    oxfordtweed: (Harry - facepalm)

    [personal profile] oxfordtweed 2012-03-17 12:29 pm (UTC)(link)
    The current highest tier has four? fewer slots than I had on LJ, which were already all full up before I imported my account. I could probably fill up 1000 slots if they were available, though. I have a horrible icon addiction, and like making icons as well, so that's where they all go. XD
    jumpuphigh: Text: I survived Open Beta and all I got was this lousy icon. (DWOpenBeta)

    [personal profile] jumpuphigh 2012-03-17 08:44 am (UTC)(link)
    You can choose between text-based and image-based human tests for your journal.

    Oh. That is very nice.

    jumpuphigh: Lavender rose with the word "BLOOM" across it. (Bloom)

    [personal profile] jumpuphigh 2012-03-17 08:57 am (UTC)(link)
    Every time I go to my icon page, I think, "I really need to add descriptions to my icons I imported from LJ." All of my icons added after moving to DW have descriptions but the amount of work to update my older icons just feels tremendous. This post inspired me to just update five of them. I think I'll just update one each time I'm on my icon page until I'm done.
    jumpuphigh: Mozzie in the hospital playing with bendy straws. (Bendy)

    [personal profile] jumpuphigh 2012-03-17 10:00 am (UTC)(link)
    Or, you know, I could just gradually update them all tonight. (Only 5 to go!)
    jumpuphigh: Mimi with flowers falling from the sky. (Flowers)

    [personal profile] jumpuphigh 2012-03-17 10:15 am (UTC)(link)
    I appreciate the nudge! It really was something that I have been meaning to do for ages.
    jumpuphigh: Thefourthvine's Earthling with text "Two Thumbs Up" (Earthling)

    [personal profile] jumpuphigh 2012-03-17 10:29 am (UTC)(link)
    Done! Done, done, done! DONE! All done! As in completed, finished, concluded, accomplished and DONE!
    lienne: Several beads painted with smiling faces. (emotion: friendly)

    [personal profile] lienne 2012-03-17 12:30 pm (UTC)(link)
    From over here, your disability ninja appears to be holding a cutlass... XD
    limikkin: Drawing of a girl wearing a kinfisher headdress with a big smile (Kingfisher :D)

    [personal profile] limikkin 2012-03-17 05:09 pm (UTC)(link)
    Obviously the victor in the latest pirates vs. ninja matchup. :D

    Now I think I had better go add descriptions to my icons as well.
    twisted_times: Animated icon saying "Sing like nobody's listening, live like you'll die tomorrow, dance like nobody's watching..." etc (dance)

    [personal profile] twisted_times 2012-03-19 02:17 am (UTC)(link)

    I was about to say exactly the same thing! Great minds... :D

    rainbow: joss whedon's mutant enemy "mutty" wearing a capt jack harkness coat and a dr who scarf in pride colours. drawn by me. (that's *capt.* grrr arghness)

    [personal profile] rainbow 2012-03-23 12:39 am (UTC)(link)
    \o/ go you!!
    jumpuphigh: Thefourthvine's Earthling with text "Two Thumbs Up" (Earthling)

    [personal profile] jumpuphigh 2012-03-23 12:51 am (UTC)(link)
    Thank you! I am, admittedly, very proud of myself for completing this. :D
    rainbow: (Default)

    [personal profile] rainbow 2012-03-23 01:02 am (UTC)(link)
    and you bite-sized it! ♥
    twisted_times: Animated icon saying "Sing like nobody's listening, live like you'll die tomorrow, dance like nobody's watching..." etc (dance)

    [personal profile] twisted_times 2012-03-19 02:16 am (UTC)(link)

    In a similar vein, I just updated all the descriptions of my icons! I probably noticed the description field at the time I was adding a couple of new icons after importing my LJ, but never put anything in them.

    What is the character limit in the description field, and is it likely to get increased any time soon?

    twisted_times: Dreamwidth logo  done with red stiching on greyish background. (DW)

    [personal profile] twisted_times 2012-03-19 02:41 am (UTC)(link)

    Fair point; it's just tricky to adequately describe some animated icons within the character limit, but it also encourages brevity, which is probably a good thing. :)

    azurelunatic: Rotating selection of NOT LUBE images.  (not lube)

    [personal profile] azurelunatic 2012-03-19 08:57 am (UTC)(link)
    It's sort of cheating, but even if a link won't autolink, it can often be copied and pasted -- I might do this one, shorthand, as "An animated slideshow of many things that are not lube; full description: [link to entry in which I describe it fully]"

    (Crisco is great for fisting but bad for latex.)
    twisted_times: Boxes ticked for Bisexual, Kinky, Polyamorus, Horny "And I'm still not  sleeping with you" written underneath. (bipolykinkyhorny)

    [personal profile] twisted_times 2012-03-19 10:45 am (UTC)(link)

    I prefer using Liquid Silk for lube personally, for fisting or otherwise...

    lilacsigil: 12 Apostles rocks, text "Rock On" (12 Apostles)

    [personal profile] lilacsigil 2012-03-17 08:47 am (UTC)(link)
    Thank you for the new CAPTCHA! Even better, the option to choose!
    wishgrant: (225)

    [personal profile] wishgrant 2012-03-17 09:12 am (UTC)(link)
    Thanks for the new CAPTCHA! I will kind of miss the hilarious sudden symbols and non-latin [?] characters it expected us to magic up, though.
    Edited 2012-03-17 09:14 (UTC)
    copracat: (scully)

    [personal profile] copracat 2012-03-17 09:50 am (UTC)(link)
    Thank you for the improvements to captcha choices.
    dame: (Default)

    [personal profile] dame 2012-03-17 10:05 am (UTC)(link)
    I love the new captchas!
    alchemy: Nichelle Nichols in Star Trek ([st] I'm tripping over you.)

    [personal profile] alchemy 2012-03-17 10:15 am (UTC)(link)
    I noticed the new CAPTCHA the other day and was thrilled. Naturally, improving the usability there wasn't enough for you guys; you went a step further and gave people the option to use the old version on their journals, too. This sort of careful consideration is why DW is amazing.

    I had been wondering about the username vs. name field hover issue (Like so many people above, for RP reasons), but you've explained it perfectly and I totally understand your reasoning. Furthermore, for the first time I fully understand the purpose of each of the extra icon fields and can now go forth and use them accordingly! Thank you!

    Also, I wanted to mention that I absolutely CANNOT WAIT to be able to skin my icon and profile pages. As a web design geek, I wanted something like this from LJ for years and years. This one change has the potential to set you apart from other LJ code-based sites in such a big way and I'm super excited for it. :D
    crosspistols: (Curiosity)

    [personal profile] crosspistols 2012-03-17 09:17 pm (UTC)(link)
    I just tried the code on my layout and it worked! There was no CSS though so it looked quite plain.

    But I'm wondering if we'll be able to disable this feature when we view them? I'm all for having pretty custom profiles and userpic pages, but there are occasions when I'd rather just see the default for the sake of easy reading and clarity. I always liked the option for me to view things in the site style instead of the custom CSS (such as comment pages) without asking the other user to disable it for themselves.
    exor674: Computer Science is my girlfriend (Default)

    [personal profile] exor674 2012-03-17 09:32 pm (UTC)(link)
    Yep, that option'll come when we enable things sitewide
    crosspistols: (Happy)

    [personal profile] crosspistols 2012-03-17 09:33 pm (UTC)(link)
    Awesome :D thank you!
    exor674: Computer Science is my girlfriend (Default)

    [personal profile] exor674 2012-03-17 09:28 pm (UTC)(link)
    I should add a note here that there's no guarantee, before we properly enable things site-wide, that any changes won't break your custom icon page styling horribly.
    Edited 2012-03-17 21:29 (UTC)
    wychwood: chess queen against a runestone (Default)

    [personal profile] wychwood 2012-03-17 10:55 am (UTC)(link)
    I agree with all the Abstractia voters that that's a really beautiful style - but the themes for it seem to tend very dark; they're nearly all light-text-on-dark-background, and a lot of people aren't keen on that. Maybe get some lighter themes together for it?
    inoru_no_hoshi: The most ridiculous chandelier ever: shaped like a penis. Text: Sparklepeen. (Default)

    [personal profile] inoru_no_hoshi 2012-03-17 11:25 am (UTC)(link)
    A good point - jewel tones look amazing in Abstractia, but I'll be a good girl and make some dark-on-light themes for it. *makes note to self* :D
    Edited (Grammar, I can haz, promiz.) 2012-03-17 11:28 (UTC)

    [personal profile] sagealford 2012-03-17 03:41 pm (UTC)(link)
    +1

    Please, please do some dark-on-light schemes for Abstractia. I really need those as I love the theme, but can't use it because of problems with my ability to see the light-on-dark combos.
    chiming: (Default)

    [personal profile] chiming 2012-03-17 03:14 pm (UTC)(link)
    I'd always intended to make more light themes, too. It's a little more work because you have to make individual transparencies for it in order for things to look nice (as opposed to the dark ones, which all use the same set). But it's always been in the plan. /gets crackin'
    azurelunatic: Vivid pink Alaskan wild rose. (Default)

    [personal profile] azurelunatic 2012-03-17 11:48 pm (UTC)(link)
    You know what would be gorgeous and go with some of the current ones? A kind of marble-looking set. White marble. Pink marble.
    chiming: (Default)

    [personal profile] chiming 2012-03-18 01:41 am (UTC)(link)
    That does sound gorgeous. Hee! I'll look into it. :3

    Right now I've got like eight in the works, but that sounds REALLY nice.
    azurelunatic: Polished piece of rainbow fluorite (huggy rock)

    [personal profile] azurelunatic 2012-03-19 09:12 am (UTC)(link)
    I'm so glad people like the idea! :D
    inoru_no_hoshi: The most ridiculous chandelier ever: shaped like a penis. Text: Sparklepeen. (Default)

    [personal profile] inoru_no_hoshi 2012-03-17 11:50 pm (UTC)(link)
    Oh, so the background is actually an image, and doesn't pull from the colorset you pick? Or am I misunderstanding? *ponder*
    chiming: (Default)

    [personal profile] chiming 2012-03-18 01:32 am (UTC)(link)
    The background is an image, yes. X3 They're all images because I wanted it to work in more browsers.
    elialshadowpine: (Default)

    [personal profile] elialshadowpine 2012-03-17 06:48 pm (UTC)(link)
    Yes, that's why I didn't actually vote for it. While I love light-on-dark themes (they're great for my migraines), I at this point can have trouble reading them because my vision has deteriorated. And I know a lot of people who have agreed they have difficulty reading them, so I'm not sure it's a great idea for a default.
    chiming: (Default)

    [personal profile] chiming 2012-03-18 01:57 am (UTC)(link)
    /plans to fix thissss

    I mean, it's okay if it doesn't become the default, but I'm looking at this as a great opportunity to make new themes for it. So far I've got nine planned light themes based on the original background, and also a lovely suggestion to do some pale marble themes.
    elialshadowpine: (Default)

    [personal profile] elialshadowpine 2012-03-18 02:50 am (UTC)(link)
    Woot! :)

    It's an amazing theme aside from the color issue! If that gets sorted out, I think it would be great. I'll be looking forward to seeing what you do. :D
    chiming: (Default)

    [personal profile] chiming 2012-03-18 05:11 am (UTC)(link)
    ♥ So far I've got an orange, a pale red, a pink, a purple, a green, and a blue-green, in addition to the tan and the blue that were already there. They're finished and have been put up for the next code push.
    sophinisba: Gwen looking sexy from Merlin season 2 promo pics (gwen by infinitesunrise)

    [personal profile] sophinisba 2012-03-17 09:28 pm (UTC)(link)
    Right, and as far as I can tell none of them have a white or off-white background. They're very pretty but none of them are easy for me to read.
    chiming: (Default)

    [personal profile] chiming 2012-03-18 01:55 am (UTC)(link)
    /adds "white" to the list of versions to make
    sophinisba: Gwen looking sexy from Merlin season 2 promo pics (gwen by infinitesunrise)

    [personal profile] sophinisba 2012-03-18 03:03 am (UTC)(link)
    Thanks a lot for working on this!
    chiming: (Default)

    [personal profile] chiming 2012-03-18 04:25 am (UTC)(link)
    How's this? I had this one already in the queue. I'm also going to do an off-white marble-y, but I am curious about what you think of this one.
    yeahscience: (Default)

    [personal profile] yeahscience 2012-03-18 07:56 am (UTC)(link)
    Chiming in, I still find this much too dark to read comfortably. Definitely not for a default, anyway.
    sophinisba: Gwen looking sexy from Merlin season 2 promo pics (gwen by infinitesunrise)

    [personal profile] sophinisba 2012-03-18 02:12 pm (UTC)(link)
    Again, it's very nice to look at if I'm not concentrating trying to read. But I would only choose to use a theme with a white background for the entry text (or almost-white like the site scheme) and much higher contrast on the other titles and links.

    [personal profile] boundbooks 2012-03-18 04:28 pm (UTC)(link)
    I really like this one a lot, but an off-white marble one would be amazing too! :D
    twisted_times: Black on white image of a tiger seen from head on, walking directly towards the viewer. (Tiger)

    [personal profile] twisted_times 2012-03-19 02:19 am (UTC)(link)

    Heh, I like light-on-dark journal layouts; they make for easier reading for me as you get a better contrast coefficient.

    [personal profile] rob_t_firefly 2012-03-17 11:20 am (UTC)(link)
    I wish more service providers used technical terms like "asspimplehood" and "shitpot" in their user-relations postings! :-D
    inoru_no_hoshi: The most ridiculous chandelier ever: shaped like a penis. Text: Sparklepeen. (Default)

    [personal profile] inoru_no_hoshi 2012-03-17 11:28 am (UTC)(link)
    *sticks a gold star on this comment*

    Random question

    [personal profile] amethystfirefly 2012-03-17 11:54 am (UTC)(link)
    Are there plans to expand the number of mood themes? The handful we have are pretty blah and I'd love to see more options.
    moem: A computer drawing that looks like me. (Default)

    Re: Random question

    [personal profile] moem 2012-03-17 07:02 pm (UTC)(link)
    Seconding this. That would be lovely.
    zvi: self-portrait: short, fat, black dyke in bunny slippers (Default)

    Re: Random question

    [personal profile] zvi 2012-03-17 11:26 pm (UTC)(link)
    You could take one if it was curated from appropriate CC or public domain images, couldn't you? Or is there a further technical limitation such that you'd want it to really, actually be made by the individual?

    Also, with inheritance, one can do it in as little as 15 moods, though that's not terribly satisfactory … maybe if there were a list of the ones that were most crucial to have? Like, most of the angry ones are fine with the same, but stressed would be better with something different probably…
    pne: A picture of a plush toy, halfway between a duck and a platypus, with a green body and a yellow bill and feet. (Default)

    CC mood icons

    [personal profile] pne 2012-03-21 05:40 pm (UTC)(link)
    As I understand it, using a CC image requires that you include the licence text or a URL to it; the name of the author; the title (if any); and the licensing/copyright URI (if any).

    Those last three are qualified with "reasonable to the medium or means You are utilizing" and the final one even further with "to the extent reasonably practicable" - but even so: what does it mean?

    That every little 20x20 px happy/sad/angry mood icon needs to have "'Happy' by pne, CC-by-sa" text next to it?
    angelikitten: Rhyme thinking (Thoughts - Thinking!Rhyme)

    Re: Random question

    [personal profile] angelikitten 2012-03-18 10:09 am (UTC)(link)
    My Rainbow Child mood theme was completely made by me. It isn't very good - in fact, I keep meaning to do an updated version but I haven't found the time yet - but if it's of any use to you, then *shrugs*
    ninetydegrees: Art & Text: heart with aroace colors, "you are loved" (Default)

    Re: Random question

    [personal profile] ninetydegrees 2012-03-18 10:17 am (UTC)(link)
    I think it looks awesome! Cute, simple, clear, big enough, what's not 'good' about it? ;)
    angelikitten: Female centaur blushing (Blush - Fantasia)

    Re: Random question

    [personal profile] angelikitten 2012-03-18 11:43 am (UTC)(link)
    It's probably just that I made it, to be fair - if someone else had made it, I'd probably love it XD
    turlough: large orange flowers in lush green grass ((mcr art) squeee!)

    [personal profile] turlough 2012-03-18 07:25 pm (UTC)(link)
    It's adorable!!
    angelikitten: El Dragón on a computer (Tech - I have a hard on for technology)

    [personal profile] angelikitten 2012-03-18 08:37 pm (UTC)(link)
    Thanks *blushes*
    angelikitten: Upside down Roo, looking confused (Thoughts - Confused!Roo)

    Re: Random question

    [personal profile] angelikitten 2012-03-22 04:29 pm (UTC)(link)
    Have I done it right? I mean, I think I've done everything you asked, but I've never done anything like this before.
    exor674: Computer Science is my girlfriend (Default)

    Re: Random question

    [personal profile] exor674 2012-03-31 07:15 pm (UTC)(link)
    Yep, you did it right. Now you've just got to wait for someone to come along and do the annoying technical work ( as D puts it ).
    pne: A picture of a plush toy, halfway between a duck and a platypus, with a green body and a yellow bill and feet. (Default)

    Re: Random question

    [personal profile] pne 2012-03-22 01:34 pm (UTC)(link)
    Those are pretty cool!
    angelikitten: A happy orange kitty with a halo (Default)

    Re: Random question

    [personal profile] angelikitten 2012-03-22 04:30 pm (UTC)(link)
    Thanks!
    rainbow: post-it note saying "Excuse me. Squee!! Okay, I'm done." (squee note)

    Re: Random question

    [personal profile] rainbow 2012-03-23 01:04 am (UTC)(link)
    oh, i *adore* this and would use it in a heartbeat! 'sides, it matches me!
    mage: (weapon of choice)

    Re: Random question

    [personal profile] mage 2012-03-18 06:42 pm (UTC)(link)
    Does every single mood have to be different? I know on LJ some of the moods were repeated images for their moodthemes.

    I might have a shot at it if I ever get time. Also I know Lierre at LJ made some really nice moodthemes. She let some of them be used for InsaneJournal so she might be happy to have them be used on DW?

    http://li-moods.livejournal.com/

    I'm not sure how you would go about asking her.
    Edited 2012-03-18 18:42 (UTC)
    jd: (Default)

    Re: Random question

    [personal profile] jd 2012-04-22 05:18 am (UTC)(link)
    No, there doesn't have to be a unique image for each mood, but each mood needs to have an image defined. I think someone said upthread that the bare minimum is 15, but in general the more discrete images the better.
    algeh: (question)

    Re: Random question

    [personal profile] algeh 2012-03-19 10:12 pm (UTC)(link)
    Would you be interested in a theme in the style of my user icons? I originally made them for that purpose over on LJ about 8-10 years ago but never finished the set when it because clear that LJ was not looking for new system icon styles (the partial set is still my personal icon set over there - I should get around to transferring it over here, I suppose, although I don't use moods much anymore). I'd want to start over from scratch on some of the moods at this point (some I've never been happy with and some I'd like to keep for just my icons), but I'd be happy to work on it gradually over the next few months.

    Anyway, what I have done right now looks like this: http://www.livejournal.com/moodlist.bml?moodtheme=1326&ownerid=106288 . I like them because I find animated things kind of distracting and I wanted something that didn't just look like a still frame of something that would be better animated. I don't like that it's so English-dependent, but that might be less of a problem on DW since you don't translate the site.
    algeh: (Default)

    Re: Random question

    [personal profile] algeh 2012-03-22 11:40 pm (UTC)(link)
    Ok, I'll chip away at the rest of the moods and submit it when I've got something I'm happy with. It may take a few months (this is job hunting season for teachers).

    Are there any particular specs I should be aware of when creating and submitting the images? I generally work with 200X200 pixels as my starting size and shrink them to 50x50 and convert them to jpg as the very last step, so assuming I can find all of my original files, which are a mix of Photoshop and GIMP native formats depending on the image, (I started making these suckers 10 years ago and I've switched image programs at least once during that time) I should have some flexibility to get them to the desired size and quality.
    redbird: closeup of me drinking tea, in a friend's kitchen (Default)

    [personal profile] redbird 2012-03-17 11:59 am (UTC)(link)
    Thanks for the custom dictionary wiki page. I have made a suggestion already, based on an ongoing annoyance with the built-in on Firefox (and checked that this word isn't in the current version of the DW dictionary).
    ashkitty: a redhead and a couple black kitties (Default)

    [personal profile] ashkitty 2012-03-17 12:18 pm (UTC)(link)
    Oh, thank you SO much for the text questions instead of nasty Captcha.
    pocketmouse: pocketmouse default icon: abstract blue (Default)

    [personal profile] pocketmouse 2012-03-17 02:33 pm (UTC)(link)
    Does Abstractia actually allow for all configurations of right-vs-left with the icons? I think when it first started out as a hand-mod, it didn't, or it was really buggy.
    chiming: (pic#1935752)

    [personal profile] chiming 2012-03-17 03:16 pm (UTC)(link)
    Yes, it does, now. At least, it does unless there's something I've forgotten! Icons can be left or right in the entry, and usernames can be left or right and in a variety of different places in the entry. (When I polled friends, there was a lot of different opinions, so I just added in the option to put them in all the preferred spots.)
    pocketmouse: pocketmouse default icon: abstract blue (Default)

    [personal profile] pocketmouse 2012-03-17 04:19 pm (UTC)(link)
    Awesome! That was the only thing stopping me from using it when it first came out.
    pocketmouse: pocketmouse default icon: abstract blue (Default)

    [personal profile] pocketmouse 2012-03-17 05:50 pm (UTC)(link)
    Oh, but it still doesn't take the username with the icon. Is there a way to fix that, or, better, is there an entry for this style in one of the style comms, so I don't have to bother the news comm, or see if anyone else has asked some of my questions?
    musyc: Silver flute resting diagonally across sheet music (Default)

    [personal profile] musyc 2012-03-17 06:25 pm (UTC)(link)
    *wandering by* The original submission post for Abstractia is right over here, or you can post to [community profile] style_system with questions and folks can lend a hand. :D
    chiming: (Default)

    [personal profile] chiming 2012-03-17 06:43 pm (UTC)(link)
    Hee, it's okay. I made the style, and I can put in patches for it directly if one winds up being needed.
    chiming: (Default)

    [personal profile] chiming 2012-03-17 06:43 pm (UTC)(link)
    Well, the username is a separate option -- you can set it right or left, individually.

    By "it doesn't take the username with the icon", do you mean that the username isn't positioned beneath the icon? Because unfortunately I do have good reason for not making that an option.
    pocketmouse: pocketmouse default icon: abstract blue (Default)

    [personal profile] pocketmouse 2012-03-17 06:52 pm (UTC)(link)
    Does it break something? Because it looks silly all by itself -- I'm trying to cut out a lot of the white space in the layout.
    chiming: (Default)

    [personal profile] chiming 2012-03-17 07:33 pm (UTC)(link)
    Usernames on DW can be up to 25 characters long, and the default font size renders as 16px for most users. Not to mention, the space also has to have room for "posting in" and then a community name, which can also be up to 25 characters long. I tried shrinking the font size, and was told that was probably a bad idea for accessibility. (Here's the custom CSS to shrink it yourself, if you like that!)

    Basically, the only reason why this works on LJ is that both names are restricted to 15 characters and "posting is" isn't there (which, of course, is also bad for accessibility).

    I should stress that I too have seen a million styles for DW or ported directly from an LJ style which have the username under the icon and just ignore the potential problems, but I decided it was the wrong way to go. In the end, I moved the username into only spaces that have room for the full width of the potential field.

    White space is reduced quite a bit by shrinking the font size, which scales all areas of the layout too since they are sized in em. You can reduce it a little more by putting the username in your header and aligning it to the right, since it will then be 'float'ed to the same line as the timestamp.
    pocketmouse: pocketmouse default icon: abstract blue (Default)

    [personal profile] pocketmouse 2012-03-17 07:43 pm (UTC)(link)
    Yeah, for the entire theme, it's better to be accessible.

    What I really want, I think, is a mix of this and flexible squares, or something. There's just waaaaay too much empty space in this layout, even with text shrinking. Which makes me sad, because I like a lot of things about it, but it's too empty.
    chiming: (Default)

    [personal profile] chiming 2012-03-17 07:45 pm (UTC)(link)
    Understood! It was certainly designed with use of negative space in mind. ♥ Good luck!
    pocketmouse: pocketmouse default icon: abstract blue (Default)

    [personal profile] pocketmouse 2012-03-17 08:10 pm (UTC)(link)
    I just don't want to have to formally learn javascript.

    *whiiiiiiiiiiine*
    chiming: (Default)

    [personal profile] chiming 2012-03-17 08:11 pm (UTC)(link)
    Pffft, what? Is that involved in themeing? X3
    puella_nerdii: (Default)

    [personal profile] puella_nerdii 2012-03-17 03:42 pm (UTC)(link)
    Count me among those cheering about the replacement of Captcha with Text Captcha -- I swear, half the time those images display words in characters I can't actually type on an English-language keyboard. I'm also digging the arts and culture bit; I appreciate how you and the other DW admins are interested in building both community and cool site features. :D

    I have also been instructed by [personal profile] akatonbo and [personal profile] pantswarrior to tell you that I played Suikoden I for the first time recently and managed to kill Neclord with JUST VIKTOR, and that apparently this holds some personal meaning for you!
    wytchcroft: heavent sent (luna)

    [personal profile] wytchcroft 2012-03-17 11:25 pm (UTC)(link)
    THIS is why dreamwidth rules.
    musyc: Idealized anime representation of me, with dark hair, glasses, and horns :D (Other: Anime me)

    [personal profile] musyc 2012-03-18 12:10 am (UTC)(link)
    If "just Viktor" doesn't become the explanation for a fixed bug in a future code tour, I will be so very disappointed. XD
    pauamma: Cartooney crab wearing hot pink and acid green facemask holding drink with straw (Default)

    [personal profile] pauamma 2012-03-19 02:41 pm (UTC)(link)
    *GM-mode manical grin*Iiiiiiinteresting*scribble*
    cypher: (love you for your mind)

    [personal profile] cypher 2012-03-18 01:59 am (UTC)(link)
    that is the best meta-game-cheat EVER and I'm going to have to try it next time I'm in a crap boss battle. XD
    puella_nerdii: (burninating the countryside)

    [personal profile] puella_nerdii 2012-03-18 06:50 am (UTC)(link)
    Oh my god, that is brilliant. I'm starting to wonder if JUST VIKTOR is actually a feature programmed into the game or something. And I'm going to test out the JUST VIKTOR cheat the next time I get my butt handed to me in a boss fight.
    puella_nerdii: (Default)

    [personal profile] puella_nerdii 2012-03-18 11:19 pm (UTC)(link)
    Not judging you at all! I've fallen madly in love with the series, too. My fiancee's been trying to get me to play it for about three years, and I finally caved in sometime last fall -- and I fell just has hard for the games as she said I would, and my notebooks are now full of Suikoden fic.

    (UGH, YUNALESCA. I don't even want to think of how many times I had to replay that battle. Stupid Absorb. Stupid Mega Death. Stupid nullifying status-inflicting attacks. And I thought bosses in the main FF titles couldn't get worse than the Demon Wall in FFIV...)
    twisted_times: A grey yin-yang like symbol, but with a pentagon and a golden apple incribed with the word "Kallisti" replacing circles. (Sacred Chao)

    [personal profile] twisted_times 2012-03-19 02:26 am (UTC)(link)

    I seem to recall one of my flatmates spending hours each day playing out the final the final fight in FF VII (or was it VIII?) again and again and again...

    kneewindows: ([Awkward] You see it's like this...)

    [personal profile] kneewindows 2012-03-17 03:51 pm (UTC)(link)
    I think the Abstractia layout is pretty, but I've always held that a default layout should be something basic with no fuss or frills. Which I don't feel Abstractia meets at all.

    Then again I don't really see why the default needs to change either so that could be part of it I suppose.
    haruka: (ryoma-final smile)

    [personal profile] haruka 2012-03-17 04:12 pm (UTC)(link)
    I came across the text captcha when making a couple of accounts for gaming and I was THRILLED! I'm going to recommend this to my workplace, because our customers have a terrible time with the other captcha method.

    Also, I like the Arts & Culture section, and thanks to you and [personal profile] pinesandmaples for including my wife's [community profile] chibibeans! ^_^
    fu: Close-up of Fu, bringing a scoop of water to her mouth (Default)

    [personal profile] fu 2012-03-17 04:46 pm (UTC)(link)
    We're using the captchas from TextCaptcha FYI! I hope that it proves useful to you and your customers :)
    haruka: kermit waving arms with caption yay omg (zz - kermit-yay)

    [personal profile] haruka 2012-03-17 04:48 pm (UTC)(link)
    Oh, thank you! I'll pass it on to them. :D
    haruka: (zz - waterfall)

    [personal profile] haruka 2012-03-17 04:49 pm (UTC)(link)
    Oops, link doesn't work!
    fu: Close-up of Fu, bringing a scoop of water to her mouth (Default)

    [personal profile] fu 2012-03-17 04:54 pm (UTC)(link)
    Oh oops! Make that:

    TextCaptcha (this should be the right one now!)
    haruka: (zz - bird-cardinal baby)

    [personal profile] haruka 2012-03-17 04:56 pm (UTC)(link)
    Thanks again!
    haruka: (choutarou-smile)

    [personal profile] haruka 2012-04-06 01:51 am (UTC)(link)
    Late reply, but wanted to update you. I made the suggestion about the Text Captcha to my company, and they included it as part of the monthly contest where people vote on the best suggestion out of ten. If it wins, it will be implemented, so I'm keeping my fingers crossed. :)

    [personal profile] chartharsis 2012-03-17 04:19 pm (UTC)(link)
    Everything looks fantastic ... keep up the great work, and thank you for all you do for us!

    Page 1 of 3