Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/User subpages used to subvert Mediawiki limit on signatures


 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the miscellaneous page below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the page's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.  

The result of the debate was withdrawn. I'm withdrawing this MFD, because the specific cases that it was brought for have been voluntarily deleted, and the lists at User:Xenocidic/sandbox/s1 s2 and s3 need massaging. Furthermore, a preventative technical measure to prevent subst from being used in the signature preferences box (discussed at WP:VPP) may be simpler. It seems clear, however, that the general consensus is to disallow signatures more than 255 characters. – xeno cidic ( talk ) 23:47, 25 June 2008 (UTC)

User subpages used to subvert Mediawiki limit on signatures
Per the guideline at WP:Signature, signatures should be kept short, not taking up "more than two or three lines in the edit window". Mediawiki truncates custom signatures to 255 characters. Also per Signature, transclusion of signatures are forbidden. While these signatures are being subst'ed, they may still be targets for surreptitious vandalism. This MFD covers all such signature subpages, and specifically User:American_Eagle/sig (363 characters) and User:Ezekiel_of_Howdypedia/Sig (449 characters) (both deleted on request per db-u1 - MFD still covers other such pages). – xenocidic ( talk ) 16:58, 23 June 2008 (UTC) '''America †alk 17:35, 23 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Delete all, as nom. – xenocidic ( talk ) 17:04, 23 June 2008 (UTC)
 * In the interest of disclosure, this issue was informally discussed before this MFD here. – xenocidic ( talk ) 17:18, 23 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Delete all per nom. To save reposting lengthy arguments, my reasoning for this is discussed at length here. – iride scent 17:10, 23 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Delete all and make an addendum to WP:SIG to prevent this type of circumvention in the future. J.delanoy gabs adds  17:14, 23 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Delete all, link to this mfd (if successful) in WP:SIG per j.delanoy. I cannot think of one valid, encyclopedia-building reason why anyone needs a subst-sig (and I can think of many reasons why they should go including busted archive bots).  Stretching the "customization a bit towards the Ridiculous, needs to be nipped in these two instances, and nipped on sight when found again in the future.  Keeper   |  76   |   Disclaimer  17:20, 23 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Comment - you all are so annoying and uncaring. I have shortened the sig. Hope you're happy. --
 * Now that your signature is less than 255 characters, you can paste it directly into the preferences as a raw signature. Substing the signature still places an unnecessary strain on the servers. Finally, please refrain from personal attacks. – xenocidic ( talk ) 17:37, 23 June 2008 (UTC)
 * American Eagle, it's called Wikipedia policy, something that all users abide by. D.M.N. (talk) 17:49, 23 June 2008 (UTC)
 * None of you told me, you just warned me for telling another user that he can do it to fix his signature (I thought you could) and then nominated my page for deletion. Nobody told me it was too long or that I should shorten it - nobody cared. It wasn't a personal attack. It was just a response that I would have changed it had somebody told me it was too long. The signature doesn't work in the box, it says, "Invalid raw signature; check HTML tags." Sorry for getting upset, but one of you should have told me. --

'''America †alk 18:02, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

I side with my friend American Eagle on this one. It's kind of stupid when you think of it. Oh well I guess there's nothing I can do. You can verify my signature now and delete the other page if you want. I wont need it. Sorry about all the trouble guys.-- '''Ezekiel <font color="lightsteelblue">†alk 18:02, 23 June 2008 (UTC)


 * Apology accepted, and sorry for not talking to you ahead of time (though the guideline is outlined in WP:SIG#Length which I reference on EOH's talk page). I've repaired the HTML in your sig (you were missing a closing  tag), try now. –<font face="Verdana"> xenocidic  ( talk ) 18:07, 23 June 2008 (UTC)


 * Weak keep deletion is not that exigent, we can wait for the user to take action phasing out the template. Chimeric Glider (talk) 18:04, 23 June 2008 (UTC)
 * I already tried to convince EOH to shorten his sig here. –<font face="Verdana"> xenocidic ( talk ) 18:14, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

Sometimes you just can't turn down a friends advice. Especially when they know 10 times more about Wikipedia than I do.-- '''Ezekiel <font color="lightsteelblue">†alk
 * No problem. Thank you for understanding and please paste the signature into your preferences. ( I repaired your HTML ). Feel free to squeeze as much as you can into the 255 characters provided. –<font face="Verdana"> xenocidic ( talk ) 18:22, 23 June 2008 (UTC)


 * Comment Yes, they can be subject to vandalism. However, this is not the case if they have a .js at the end, as this prevents anyone but the user in question from altering the page.  Therefore, my proposal is that we do not delete these pages, but request that the users move them into the same name, but with a .js at the end.—  Dæ dαlusT@lk / Improve  <sup style="color:Green;">Contribs   18:32, 23 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Yes, but that's only one reason for prohibiting transclusion. There are other reasons for limiting the length, explained at WP:SIG. –<font face="Verdana"> xenocidic ( talk ) 18:34, 23 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Thanks for fixing it. But I had really thought you could have a subpage and do that, I thought I was helping him. You may delete the page, I don't need it. Cheers -- —Preceding unsigned comment added by American Eagle (talk • contribs) 14:33, June 23, 2008


 * Well I guess that settles that. Thanks for fixing my HTML too. If theres any more problems or you just want to talk to me you can contact me easily.-- Ezekiel <font color="lightsteelblue">†alk 18:35, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

Hey you guys can argue but leave me and American Eagle out of it. We've had enough of this for one day. Of course I guess it is a little true, but I can't take sides on this I'll see you guys around.-- Ezekiel <font color="lightsteelblue">†alk 18:39, 23 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Per your U1 request, I deleted your signature subpage and struck it from the nomination, this MFD will continue so as to determine community consensus, however you do not have to participate further. –<font face="Verdana"> xenocidic ( talk ) 18:44, 23 June 2008 (UTC)


 * Wow that was quick it only took 10 seconds for you to delete it. Thank you though for doing so and AE has yet to recommend his but he'll get around to it. Good Night to ya's all and God Bless yas-John Lennon.-- Ezekiel <font color="lightsteelblue">†alk 18:48, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

Please don't delete my subpage yet, I'm still working on shortening it. So far I have it down to about 361.—  Dæ dαlusT@lk / Improve <sup style="color:Green;">Contribs  19:25, 23 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Don't worry, we'll let the MFD run. Suggestion: It's highly unlikely someone would feel the need to email you straight from a comment. If they want to send you an email they can drop by your page and click "Email user". Suggestion #2, you can use user page redirects to shorten some stuff. –<font face="Verdana"> xenocidic ( talk ) 19:29, 23 June 2008 (UTC)


 * Delete all - Including mine, I had been meaning to refactor it for ages, at least this prompted me into action (not that it was over 255 anyway, if I remember correctly). <small style="font:bold 12px Trebuchet MS;display:inline;"><font color="#630">RichardΩ612  Ɣ ɸ 20:01, 23 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Comment - I have been bold and added a line to WP:SIG about subst:ing templates to bypass the 255 character limit. If people feel that it is not warranted, etc. feel free to trout me! <small style="font:bold 12px Trebuchet MS;display:inline;"><font color="#630">RichardΩ612  Ɣ ɸ 20:20, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

So far I have it down to 284 characters.—  Dæ dαlus Improve <sup style="color:Green;">Contribs  20:26, 23 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Any ideas?—  Dæ dαlus Improve <sup style="color:Green;">Contribs  20:27, 23 June 2008 (UTC)
 * This will get you down to 259 -  Dæ dαlus Improve <sup style="color:green;">Contribs  . You'll need to add the "dash" manually. –<font face="Verdana"> xenocidic  ( talk ) 20:39, 23 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Well, I managed to shorten it, be sure to delete my User:Daedalus969/Sig.js page now. Besides that, add what dash manually?—  Dæ dαlus <font color="Green"> Contribs /Improve  21:00, 23 June 2008 (UTC)
 * The dash at the very beginning. Just tag the sig.js with u1 if you don't mind =). –<font face="Verdana"> xenocidic ( talk ) 20:58, 23 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Don't know if that will work, WP counts it as a Javascript page, so it appears as code.—  Dæ dαlus <font color="Green"> Contribs /Improve  21:07, 23 June 2008 (UTC)
 * It still kosherfy's it. ;> –<font face="Verdana"> xenocidic ( talk ) 21:43, 23 June 2008 (UTC)


 * Delete all - the sig length limit was put in place for a reason, and that reason was not to challenge users to use subpages and template substitution in creative ways. A couple months ago I compiled a list of likely signature templates, but never did anything with it. Not all are signature pages, and not all of the sig pages are used as templates for substitution, but the list is here. <font face="Broadway">Mr.Z-man 21:00, 23 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Yikes, should I fire up AWB and MFD-warn all those people? –<font face="Verdana"> xenocidic ( talk ) 21:02, 23 June 2008 (UTC)
 * That would be very bad faith, as some of the quick random sample I just did are within limits (1, 2, 3), empty (1), or obviously not signatures at all (1, 2). — xaosflux  <sup style="color:#00FF00;">Talk  02:02, 24 June 2008 (UTC)


 * Speedy Close Is this an attempt at using MFD to speedy delete any page that someone suspects is being used this way (all such signature subpages)? Now, I'm all for not having ginormous signatures anywhere, but this appears to be an end run around amending the CSD criteria, and this is not the venue for that, WP:SIG is not even a policy.  If there are specific pages that are causing specific issues, fine then; but a blanket nomination against an entire criteria of possible pages is out of order. —  xaosflux  <sup style="color:#00FF00;">Talk  01:53, 24 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Hrm, that's not quite what I meant in my VPP notice, just that a future MFD for a similar such subpage may point to this one as precedent. I see this as somewhat similar to the recent MFD on "secret pages". –<font face="Verdana"> xenocidic ( talk ) 02:02, 24 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Establishing a precedent case is fine, but this nomination specifically states "This MFD covers all such signature subpages", and such a closing is typically beyond the scope of MFD. —  xaosflux  <sup style="color:#00FF00;">Talk  02:07, 24 June 2008 (UTC)
 * What about limiting the scope to signatures included in Z-man's link, or is that still too wide a scope? –<font face="Verdana"> xenocidic ( talk ) 02:12, 24 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Note my note above, that list is not 100% accurate. — xaosflux  <sup style="color:#00FF00;">Talk  02:45, 24 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Then, I suppose this particular MFD can be closed until a more accurate list is compiled. –<font face="Verdana"> xenocidic ( talk ) 03:07, 24 June 2008 (UTC)


 * Weak Delete I don't think there's any pressing need to rush the matter; the ".js workaround" is enough to prevent vandalism; and until a sysadmin says to worry about the load of a single template subst, we shouldn't. But still, I can see no encyclopedia-building purpose served by such long signatures, so despite all those other reasons being IMO invalid I still agree subst sigs should be phased out. Anomie⚔ 02:09, 24 June 2008 (UTC)
 * There's no reason to subst the text rather than copy it into your preferences, and a copy can always be kept in a text file. I can't see any immediate reason these are needed. And, per the usual arguments, they are vandalism targets, which is why we don't permit templates used in signatures in the first place. &mdash; Carl (CBM · talk) 02:24, 24 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Keep if under limit. Substing of pages in signatures should be fine as long as the expanded length is still under the limit. This ought to have been enforced in software. Nebulous arguments about the server strain of substing are groundless. Those over the limit should simply be warned. There are legitimate reasons to want to use subst; the preview functionality is handy for testing your signature, and you can ask others to help edit your signature directly. Mostly though, I just don't want to forbid something in userspace for no good reason. Dcoetzee 02:28, 24 June 2008 (UTC)
 * I'd agree with this - my main problem is those that exceed the length limit. The argument-from-vandalism and argument-from-performance are really just secondary to the argument-from-it-takes-up-too-much-damn-space-in-the-editing-window. –<font face="Verdana"> xenocidic ( talk ) 02:34, 24 June 2008 (UTC)
 * OTOH, you can test in your sandbox by typing the template invocation directly, and once you're done testing you can easily enough just copy the wikitext into the preferences instead of using a pointless subst. Anomie⚔ 02:38, 24 June 2008 (UTC)
 * "delete", but allow time to notify users so they can make adjustments I brought this up once before, and wish I could remember the archive link. I'd be fine with redirection/blanking/whatever, as long as it's not actually being used. -- Ned Scott 05:55, 24 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Found it, Wikipedia talk:Signatures/Archive 5. -- Ned Scott 09:26, 25 June 2008 (UTC)


 * I think it would suffice to just notify any user using a subst-signature so they can fix it. They might just not know, as happened above.  If my understanding is correct, the limit of 255 characters is given by policy/guideline as well as by the software, so there are still grounds for complaint on that front.  Once the user has migrated to a tilde-signature (possibly with some help, as in the   problem above), they can just mark it for deletion themselves, problem solved. -- tiny plastic Grey Knight   &#x2296;  14:27, 24 June 2008 (UTC)


 * Wow this is quite the topic that grew out of mine and American Eagle's problem with our signature. So what did I miss somebody tell me what's going on because this topic is interesting.-- Ezekiel †alk 14:48, 24 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Basically at this point it's a consensus building exercise to determine if sigs over 255 characters are permitted. Though since the two specific cases that were brought have been voluntarily deleted, it can probably be closed until that list of over 1000 pages can be trimmed to pages that include only sigs that are indeed over 255 characters. –<font face="Verdana"> xenocidic ( talk ) 14:52, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

Note: For the benefit of those who care, I have added the byte counts of each page to the list. Yes, the numbers are self-updating. — CharlotteWebb 15:08, 24 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Will it takes some time to update or something? Many are shown as 0 bytes that have signatures in them. I suppose we can discard anything over 500 bytes as that is probably a guestbook, and anything under 255 as that is within paramaters (though it could just be pasted into prefs). –<font face="Verdana"> xenocidic ( talk ) 15:18, 24 June 2008 (UTC)
 * It stopped showing pagesize after #500, will have to break up the list. –<font face="Verdana"> xenocidic ( talk ) 15:26, 24 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Oh shit, transclusion limit (same function used too many times on the page). Try splitting onto separate pages at the first line which says zero but obviously isn't. — CharlotteWebb 15:29, 24 June 2008 (UTC)
 * . –<font face="Verdana"> xenocidic ( talk ) 15:31, 24 June 2008 (UTC) Split into User:Xenocidic/sandbox/s1, s2, s3. Feel free to use User:Xenocidic/sandbox to create the template you mentioned and do the permutations. I'm not good enough with AWB (or whatever you used to process the page originally). Anything over 750 is probably not a sig. –<font face="Verdana"> xenocidic  ( talk ) 15:34, 24 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Thinking back on this though, it might still not be appropriate to mass-MFD these unless we know the user is subst'ing them. Might be easier to submit a request to disallow in the signature preferences! –<font face="Verdana"> xenocidic  ( talk ) 15:38, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

The ' owner' bit was for a couple of userboxen relating to guns. There are probably one or two left, but this should've caught most of them. <small style="font:bold 12px Trebuchet MS;display:inline;"><font color="#630">RichardΩ612  Ɣ ɸ 16:39, 24 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Comment - I have gone through Xenocidic's sandboxen removing any pages that were not really 'sigs' using AWB. For those interested, I used the following regex:
 * 1) \[\[User:(.*?)/sig(ma|nificant|gnbook|gnhere| owner|ns)(.*?)\)


 * Delete all but warn the users about this MfD before on their talk page, so they have time to update their signatures, and they realize the problem when coming back from a long wikibreak before they start wondering why the heck their signature is broken. There is no reason to transclude a signature except to bypass the length limit. --Enric Naval (talk) 22:44, 25 June 2008 (UTC)
 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the page's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.