Wikipedia talk:Signatures/Archive 11

Update needed
The guidelines state: This needs to be updated to show the correct icon that currently appears above the edit window. -- -- -- 02:50, 21 October 2014 (UTC)
 * What is "the correct icon"? Users who are not logged in (and those who have not altered certain user prefs) are shown [[File:Insert-signature.png]], or something very like it. -- Red rose64 (talk) 08:08, 21 October 2014 (UTC)
 * The icon I am shown is quite different (I didn't alter ed any prefs pertaining to the signature icon). -- -- -- 02:48, 22 October 2014 (UTC)
 * It's not a matter of altering anything pertaining to just signatures, it's a matter of using a different toolbar altogether. That said, WikEd_sign.png could probably be added since it is what the icon looks like for those using wikEd. — &#123;&#123;U&#124;Technical 13&#125;&#125; (e • t • c) 14:26, 22 October 2014 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 3 November 2014
I have read your write up and the poem In Flanders Fields. Beside the poem there is a copy (I assume) of the original poem. If I read correctly it should read "In Flanders Fields the poppies "GROW". Please check this. 67.193.190.27 (talk) 14:48, 3 November 2014 (UTC)
 * Red information icon with gradient background.svg Not done: this is the talk page for discussing improvements to the page Wikipedia:Signatures. Please make your request at the talk page for the article concerned. -- Red rose64 (talk) 15:05, 3 November 2014 (UTC)

Can we replace/remove the unsigned notice to fix the signature?
When we forget to sign, it adds "Preceding unsigned comment added by". Are we allowed to remove this and fix this signature, providing we keep the original timestamp or something? If so, will the SineBot auto-sign the new edit too? Zeniff (talk) 07:21, 6 November 2014 (UTC)
 * Yes, you can edit your own comment (although it's best to not change it once others have responded), and people often simply replace the entire "unsigned" message with four tildes to create a proper signature. You don't have to worry about the original timestamp. It is useful to get in the habit of previewing each comment before posting, including checking the signature at the end. No, Sinebot will not re-sign after a valid signature. Johnuniq (talk) 10:01, 6 November 2014 (UTC)
 * Note that you can leave the date added by SineBot and just sign with three tildes instead of four. This generates your normal signature but does not append a new date.  This can be helpful to avoid confusion about the order of who said what, when, if you happen to come back to (re-)sign your post after others have posted replies.  It can also make it easier for other editors to find original comment diffs in the page history. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 15:31, 6 November 2014 (UTC)
 * Awesome! Very helpful replies! Thank you both very much! :) Zeniff (talk) 03:07, 9 November 2014 (UTC)

"New section" in signature
Didn't see anything in the guideline about this so wanted to run it past the page. Are there any restrictions on links to create "new sections" on a user's talk page directly from their signature? (E.g., " czar [ ♔ ] ") czar  ♔   05:47, 23 November 2014 (UTC)
 * Not a good idea. The purpose of a link to your user page or your user talk page is to allow people to see it. For example, if someone wondered if you had been notified about something, they should have a quick look before adding a new section. Also, many editors would not want to click a link in a signature and find that they were half-way through an action. Also, that would be confusing for new users. Johnuniq (talk) 07:09, 23 November 2014 (UTC)
 * The idea would be to put anything worth reading in the page notice. But point taken czar ♔   07:37, 23 November 2014 (UTC)
 * It certainly shouldn't be surprising, as it is in your example. If I click on something like "leave a message", I don't mind ending up in a "new section" edit window. If I click on "♔", I expect a page about crowns, and certainly not an edit window. If you must have an "edit" link in your signature, you should also have a direct link to the page itself. —Kusma (t·c) 14:09, 23 November 2014 (UTC)

I disagree with requiring userpage links
I have reverted the last edit. It is discussed here. Gryllida (talk) 23:37, 6 December 2014 (UTC)
 * Reverted it on the basis of what? People shouldn't be warned that failure to have a link to their userpage that isn't prefixed with a colon will break the effects that require them to work?  — &#123;&#123;U&#124;Technical 13&#125;&#125; (e • t • c) 00:25, 7 December 2014 (UTC)
 * Discussed there, I have raised my argument there already. Gryllida (talk) 00:47, 7 December 2014 (UTC)

No mention of the Inuit population?
I have only a brief comment: The article on Baffin Island has what I regard to be a stunning omission:  the complete absence of any reference to, or discussion of, the native Inuit populations that have inhabited the island for centuries. Only Euro-centric viewpoints seem to matter. Astonishing!
 * This is a talk page about Wikipedia's signature policy. Please leave your comments about improving Baffin Island at Talk:Baffin Island. Thank you! :) -- Amaryllis Gardener  talk 18:37, 18 December 2014 (UTC)

Automatically sign talk posts
(Renamed from "Allow super-opt-in to SineBot")

Please allow users to affirmatively opt in to having SineBot automatically sign talk posts for us without calling us out for not having signed the post. If it's something that always needs to be done on talk pages, why not automate it? It's more user-friendly.

I've posted a complementary request at the bot author's talk page but they might require consensus here that it's a good idea.

Thisisnotatest (talk) 00:13, 22 December 2014 (UTC)
 * Yeah, I'd oppose this. It's needless extra editing by the bot tying up resources (regardless of how many or few).  It's not that hard to type ~ or click on the inject link in the bottom to add it at the end of your posts.  FLOW will do this automatically, but there is no reason we should do this now. — &#123;&#123;U&#124;Technical 13&#125;&#125; (e • t • c) 00:30, 22 December 2014 (UTC)
 * Why isn't it built in to Wikipedia to automatically sign? No, it is not hard to actually type the four tildes, but if I haven't posted in a while or I'm focused on my response, it's hard to remember. Call it a disability if you like. Doesn't have to be done by the bot, but Wikipedia is a computer program and can be programmed to autosign, so why isn't it? When I make forum posts to various bulletin boards, they all automatically add my name and the date. I don't understand why it needs to be a manual process on Wikipedia. Thisisnotatest (talk) 01:18, 22 December 2014 (UTC)
 * Changing the talk system to forum software is being proposed, see WP:Flow. Meanwhile, please preview all edits, including comments, and check they are what is intended, including a signature. Johnuniq (talk) 04:32, 22 December 2014 (UTC)
 * Spend some time on more talk pages in more areas, particularly very active ones. They're considerably more dynamic and non-linear/non-forum-like than you likely imagine or have experienced thus far, which creates unique issues when it comes to treating them like forums when they're used to being used as general-collaboration spaces. -- slakr \ talk / 05:35, 22 December 2014 (UTC)
 * On a related note, most forums aren't encyclopedias or wikis; their goal is to facilitate the interpersonal discussion of personal opinions on topics. That's not the case here; we try to facilitate the creation and maintenance of a product, not facilitate discussion of people's opinions of the topic. In that vein, it's likely more important that our talk pages be more free-form (to facilitate content building, review, and maintenance) than restricted-in-format (to facilitate discussion of opinions). -- slakr \ talk / 05:49, 22 December 2014 (UTC)
 * This question comes up from time to time, on this and other discussion pages, see for example Wikipedia talk:Signatures/Archive 9. -- Red rose64 (talk) 12:20, 22 December 2014 (UTC)

WP:SIGAPP bullet 2
There is a discussion at An entire parameter for sections? in which and I seem to disagree. It is her position that WP:SIGAPP bullet 2 doesn't apply in cases where the user is consciously inserting a line break where common sense does not bar or requires. It is my position that bullet 2 says it is not permitted; not in preferences, not in a substituted template, and not if added manually. I believe that saying that it is okay to add it manually is an attempt to GAME the system, but I would like to hear from the community as to what their views on this are. Thank you. — &#123;&#123;U&#124;Technical 13&#125;&#125; (e • t • c) 15:53, 5 January 2015 (UTC)
 * WP:SIGAPP is concerned with how the final signature is rendered. One should not sign with a linebreak because it may disrupt surrounding text. Wether that linebreak is inserted automatically or manually makes no difference.  17:08, 5 January 2015 (UTC)
 * I don't sign with a line break. Link break is outside the signature. Best regards, Codename Lisa (talk) 05:36, 6 January 2015 (UTC)
 * and show that you do. — &#123;&#123;U&#124;Technical 13&#125;&#125; (e • t • c) 14:02, 6 January 2015 (UTC)
 * These are the diff in which I told you what exactly is my sig. and therefore the line break is not inside it. Either show me a policy that says the use of is entirely not allowed in the same edit that contains ~ or else I don't see any reason to dignify this discussion with a response. Codename Lisa (talk) 00:21, 7 January 2015 (UTC)


 * Please try harder to not worry about things that don't matter. --Floquenbeam (talk) 14:14, 6 January 2015 (UTC)

Yellow text

 * "For guidance on how to use color and other effects to customize the appearance of your signature, see this tutorial."
 * The mentioned tutorial uses yellow text on white background as an example. This is nearly unreadable. Is this a good example (or good implied guidance or suggestion) for new users or others that happens to find this signature advice page?
 * The mentioned tutorial uses yellow text on white background as an example. This is nearly unreadable. Is this a good example (or good implied guidance or suggestion) for new users or others that happens to find this signature advice page? Iceblock (talk) 05:35, 29 January 2015 (UTC)
 * Fixed [//en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia%3ASmurrayinchester's_signature_tutorial&diff=644686661&oldid=642075615] NE Ent 11:18, 29 January 2015 (UTC)
 * Thanks a lot! Iceblock (talk) 22:32, 29 January 2015 (UTC)

How to add your custom signature to a bot-sig
I propose the following addition:
 * If you see that a bot signed your post, but you would rather see your custom signature, this can be fixed. The bot will generated this, or similar, code: " — Preceding unsigned comment added by User:Example (talk • contribs) 15:27, 31 January 2015‎ ". Change it to this: " 15:27, 31 January 2015‎ ". Save the timestamp that was placed by the bot, but replace the rest with three tildes, which will add your custom signature without the date.

I suggest putting this under the heading "Dealing with unsigned comments" under the subheading "placing your custom signature after a bot signs your post". Oiyarbepsy (talk) 15:28, 6 February 2015 (UTC)

Question
Am I allowed to sign with... --82.136.210.153 (talk) 11:38, 8 March 2015 (UTC) Instead of the regular... ? For IP editors this changes the first internal link. (Hover your mouse over the IP addresses to see the difference.) --82.136.210.153 (talk) 11:38, 8 March 2015 (UTC)

Hyphen (or Em Dash)
The signature and timestamp function (in edit mode) inserts two hyphens in front of the tildes, and this used to be the normal way of formatting a signature (by my recollection). But I've noticed that many signatures no longer include the hyphens. My personal preference is to include the hyphens because they help visually identify the signature (as distinct from the comment). But it would be nice to have the preferred method explicitly described on this page.--Tedd (talk) 16:28, 4 April 2015 (UTC)
 * Two hyphens is a relic left over from email signatures (see Signature block). It's purpose was to allow software to recognize where the signature block (name, address, witty comments and other junk) began, so it could be formatted differently. There is no reason for hyphens or dashes before a signature at Wikipedia, and the default signature does not use them. Johnuniq (talk) 02:11, 5 April 2015 (UTC)
 * The RfC at Wikipedia talk:Signatures/Archive 8 covered several things, including which of the various horizontal line characters should be preferred. -- Red rose64 (talk) 13:47, 7 April 2015 (UTC)
 * The default four-tilde signature doesn't use them, this is true; but clicking the Insert-signature.png or Signature icon.png button above the edit box inserts two hyphen-minus characters before the four tildes, like this: -- Red rose64 (talk) 14:58, 7 April 2015 (UTC)
 * Thanks, I'd forgotten about those buttons. I still think the two hyphens are derived from old email habits, but some good editors like them and two dashes are no problem. I was just observing that two hyphens are not part of the default four-tilde signature, and they had a purpose for email signature blocks that does not apply on a wiki. Johnuniq (talk) 23:37, 7 April 2015 (UTC)
 * I don't know why the hyphens aren't removed from the buttons. All guidance says to use four tildes.  In fact,  is incorrect when it says: "If you are using the edit toolbar option (it usually appears above the edit screen as a default), click the signature icon: Insert-signature.png or Signature icon.png, to add the four tildes."  I doesn't say anything about adding two hyphens as well, which could confuse editors who mistake   for six tildes (or six hyphens).  —sroc &#x1F4AC; 06:07, 8 April 2015 (UTC)
 * I think that the hyphens remain on the buttons because it's built into the MediaWiki software, and as such is shared with the other languages and Wikis (Commons, Meta, Wiktionary, etc.). Removing the two hyphens either means making English Wikipedia inconsistent with the others, or it means removing them from all languages and wikis, which may be controversial. -- Red rose64 (talk) 16:13, 8 April 2015 (UTC)
 * Ah, interesting. In any case, shouldn't the above documentation be revised to note this idiosyncrasy?  —sroc &#x1F4AC; 07:04, 9 April 2015 (UTC)
 * I'd the documentation accordingly.  —sroc &#x1F4AC; 08:08, 13 April 2015 (UTC)
 * These technology-derived explanations don't ring true to me. I suspect the double hyphens, which are a standard typological convention where em dashes aren't available, derive from the formatting used for quote attribution (as, for example, in the Chicago Manual of Style). The purpose is to visually distinguish the attribution from the rest of the text, for clarity. This same point is raised on the talk page that User:Redrose64 linked to, above. That is also why I prefer the method.--Tedd (talk) 03:26, 13 April 2015 (UTC)


 * I usually only insert double hyphens in front of the tildes when the last word in my post is linked, thus separating the links in my signature from the preceding Wikilink. -- Roger (Dodger67) (talk) 14:03, 13 May 2015 (UTC)
 * I invariably insert two hyphens before the tildes. The only exception I can think of is when I post a line that says "Header added by" or the like. --ColinFine (talk) 16:03, 13 May 2015 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 29 April 2015
I think someone should change the color values in the note under Appearance and colors to actually be the color so you don't have to be a genius / have an external tool to figure out the color. This is (would be) just a minor change.

Randomdude999 (talk) 14:36, 29 April 2015 (UTC)
 * Red question icon with gradient background.svg Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format. —  15:26, 29 April 2015 (UTC)


 * ✅ I think  is what Randomdude999 was getting at, and a reasonable suggestion since examples are given for large text, for instance.  —sroc &#x1F4AC; 16:10, 13 May 2015 (UTC)
 * Pictogram voting comment.svg Note: Ahh. Okay, that's fine. I've updated your change to use Colorbox which gives a slightly cleaner result (and actually shows the colors). —  16:23, 13 May 2015 (UTC)
 * Ah, thanks! I wasn't aware of that template.  —sroc &#x1F4AC; 05:27, 14 May 2015 (UTC)

Article links in signatures
A discussion at the Help desk has uncovered the lack of definitive guidance about including links to articles in signatures. As can be deduced from that discussion, I would support an explicit prohibition of such links. Roger (Dodger67) (talk) 13:55, 13 May 2015 (UTC)


 * To be honest, the fact that it's taken ten-plus years of Wikipedia for the question to be asked suggests that this isn't a common enough problem to be worth framing specific policy for. Arguably, the more general issue is already dealt with (implicitly) by WP:SIGLINK and WP:SIG, while still allowing for flexibility and common sense interpretation. (Perhaps we should explicitly discourage proselytizing and political campaigning as examples of inappropriate use?  I fear, though, that this will attract more POINTyness than leaving the matter alone.) A firm rule against article links in signatures also has the potential to interfere with "good" or "constructive" use of such links.
 * I think the more important point (that we should take from that specific Help Desk discussion) is that a signature should avoid links and text which make the user's identity difficult to discern or ambiguous; further, it should be readily ascertained which links in the signature point to the user's talk and/or user page(s). Ultimately, the two core purposes of a signature are to identify the user who wrote something on a page, and to allow other Wikipedia editors to communicate with that user. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 14:14, 13 May 2015 (UTC)
 * This about sums up my thoughts on the matter as well. —  15:05, 13 May 2015 (UTC)
 * I agree with Toat on all points. I went to Signatures (in response to that same Help desk request) not thinking about the link at all, but expecting to find something about misleading signatures (which was my concern). --ColinFine (talk) 15:59, 13 May 2015 (UTC)
 * FYI, I recall one user formatted the date elements in their signature as wikinks to "on this day" type articles for that date. It may have been a problem for correctly formatting dates, but provides an example of how wikilinks to articles can be harmlessly included in signatures.  —sroc &#x1F4AC; 16:17, 13 May 2015 (UTC)
 * Oooh! If we're going to start having article links in signatures maybe I should change mine to something like this: I am ONU  nicorn (Talk&#124;Contribs)!!!  /sarcasm. ~  ONUnicorn (Talk&#124;Contribs) problem solving 19:25, 13 May 2015 (UTC)
 * I used to have a link to Random article in my signature (before I changed my username). Nobody ever complained.  &mdash; An  optimist  on the run! (logged on as Pek the Penguin) 14:35, 19 May 2015 (UTC)

Persistently Broken Signature
A few days ago, I customised my signature to be —SarahTehCat (Note: that dash is an em-dash.)

Until now, it was working just fine: all I had to do was type 4 tildes and that would be inputted. Now it's not working, and just shows what it would normally show except the HTML won't render, like so: – SarahTehCat (talk) 17:52, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

I did go to WP:FIXSIG, but it didn't really help... It's still not working. :I

And if I put it in manually, the HTML works just fine...

Could someone clear this up for me? I can't figure out what's out-of-place here... :/

– SarahTehCat (talk) 18:02, 3 June 2015 (UTC)
 * Is it possible you've accidentally unchecked the "Treat the above as wiki markup" box in your preferences, under the signature line? --Floquenbeam (talk) 18:08, 3 June 2015 (UTC)
 * Please do not use the tags in signatures. A signature is supposed to be inline content, which the div element is not. -- Red rose64 (talk) 14:32, 4 June 2015 (UTC)

Floquenbeam: Well, this is weird. You see, what happened was I never had it checked to begin with, and it worked just fine up until then. Once it ceased working, I went to WP:FIXSIG and it said to check that option if I'm using HTML, so I checked it, but it kept giving me the error message Invalid raw signature; check HTML tags. . Just now, after reading your message, I said "what the heck" and went back to Preferences to try it again. I checkmarked the option and it no longer shows the error message. Weird... σ_δ

Redrose64: I know that the element is block-level-formatted, but that doesn't matter with my particular signature since I don't want it to be inline. I like my signature one line below my content and aligned flush to the right. So for my case, the tag works best because it doesn't matter where I put it; it will always be as such. – SarahTehCat 17:43, 4 June 2015 (UTC)
 * Your signature is taking up two entire lines. While you aren't technically using linebreaks, I think your signature still violates WP:Appearance and color. Monty  845  17:54, 4 June 2015 (UTC)

Monty: I agree. I apologise. I did not intend for it to take up 2 lines, and I don't know why it is. Before, it had not done that; it had always done it on one line only, albeit a line below my content as I want it.

What I really want is for it to be like normal, but right-aligned and on its own line. But I only want it to be one line thick. That doesn't violate any WP guidelines/policies/etc, as far as I know. I want it like how it is below. It works whenever I do it manually, like here:

I changed my signature to just – SarahTehCat and just typed below ~ (I also unchecked "Treat the above as wiki markup" under Preferences.)

Do you know how I could customise my signature to be like this? – SarahTehCat (talk) 18:32, 4 June 2015 (UTC)
 * Yes I do; but I'm not saying how. Please remember that what you like is not necessarily what the community wants. What the community wants is that the writer of each comment on a discussion page be easily identifiable. If your signature is way over there, the connection between it and your post is not clear. -- Red rose64 (talk) 20:38, 4 June 2015 (UTC)

If it truly is unclear, then I'm fine with keeping it on the same line. But you don't have to be rude. I respect and understand the needs of the community and I'm willing to do what I need to do to maintain that position.

Regarding your statement, I'd like to now ask: how exactly is the connection between it and my post not clear? Very often, quotes are signed with an en-dash-then-name flush-aligned right on the line below the quote itself. – SarahTehCat (talk) 23:38, 4 June 2015 (UTC)

Relgious messages in signatures
Is it acceptable for signatures to contain religious messages? (For example, let's say "Praise the LORD" as an example). 217.44.208.185 (talk) 02:44, 8 March 2015 (UTC)
 * I would say yes, it's not like it's obscene or a threat. -- Amaryllis Gardener  talk 02:46, 8 March 2015 (UTC)
 * Yes. NE Ent 03:25, 8 March 2015 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the replies. This is a surprising and disappointing response. If this is indeed Wikipedia policy then I thoroughly oppose it. 86.136.150.96 (talk) 12:22, 12 March 2015 (UTC)
 * We have a name for that.... Zeke, the Mad Horrorist  (Speak quickly) (Follow my trail) 19:20, 18 April 2015 (UTC)
 * So, could I have a signature that says "Hail Satan?" —Мандичка YO 😜 23:34, 7 June 2015 (UTC)

unicode/non-Latin characters in signature when not in username
There's a section of this guideline which says, effectively, you're welcome to have a non-Latin username, but "As a courtesy to the rest of the contributors, users with such usernames are encouraged to sign their posts (at least in part) with Latin characters." Indeed this makes sense if the "end result" of a signature, according to the guideline, should be "easily readable by virtually everybody" [on the English Wikipedia]. Doing so makes it possible to search for names, easily reference names, etc.

Several times now I've encountered Latin usernames with non-Latin signatures. Generally speaking I'm ok with people doing what they want with signatures as long as they're consistent, but doing this makes it a cumbersome process to, say, find someone's comment in a long thread/page.

I don't really want to be picking on anyone in particular here, because there's nothing personal about this whatsoever, but there are three names that immediately come to mind: ("μηδείς"),  ("Мандичка"), and  ("Fixut͉͇̞͖͉̼̭͉͓͑̈̉́͑ȗ̹̲ͨͮ̂̂̄ṙ̫̥͚͚̜͙͍̰́̈́ė̺̩̞̗̓̉ͧͩ̿ͤ̎̆"). I apologize to the three of you for using your signatures as examples -- I'd really like for this thread to be about process/the guidelines rather than to comment on specific editors -- I just think it's hard to convey what I mean without examples. As will be obvious at the end of this post, I'm certainly not in a position for faulting anyone for stylizing a signature. &mdash;  Rhododendrites talk  \\ 22:37, 7 June 2015 (UTC)
 * I'll note that has already changed his/her signature. If there are others who have used such a signature in the past and no longer do I'd be happy to change the examples above so as not to appear to be making this about specific users. &mdash;  Rhododendrites  talk  \\ 22:43, 7 June 2015 (UTC)
 * I don't mind you using me as an example, but I'm not going to change mine. I don't see the logic behind this and think this guideline needs to be improved. First, it is not true that "names that cannot be pronounced cannot be retained in memory" - we are blessed with visual memory as well (as the very memorable File:Prince logo.svg once stood for the Artist Formerly Known as Prince). Second why do we need to pronounce or "retain in memory" someone's signature or username? Note that unique usernames are not even required; many editors are simply IPs. I don't think people read out the string of numbers in an IP signature or "retain in memory" the IP beyond a few seconds. And while they may be "illegible" to some, they are not graphic images but are unique unicode characters and will be recognized as such as by screen reader software for accessibility purposes. Additionally anyone who replies to me can see my user name as Wikimandia, and either call me that or Mandichka or "the above editor" or whatever. The only issue I can see would be if names are nearly identical characters such as Easily confused Chinese characters. But I think people would have to be going out of their way to do this, and the same thing could also be accomplished with Latin trickery, as you can see small vs smaII (smaii). However, I don't think the font in Fixuture's (former) sig should be allowed as it obscures the other text.  —Мандичка YO 😜 23:30, 7 June 2015 (UTC)
 * I don't mind being used as an example. Nor do I intend to change my signature.  A signature is used by people editing talk pages.  People with that level of skill will see my underlying Latin user name when editing, as will anyone who merely scrolls over my name.  I am aware of users whose actual user name is not Latin, which seems a more fundamental issue, but I won't name names.
 * I am much more worried about users who constantly change their signatures to the point you will miss that they are really the same person. I have had the same signature since I began this account, it is easily searchable by a mere cut and paste.  Users who constnatly change aliases by renaming themselves entirely in multiple new signatures are a problem that should be addressed. μηδείς (talk) 02:24, 8 June 2015 (UTC)
 * I agree that repeatedly changing the text of a signature is more problematic, but let's save that for a separate thread.
 * Our username policy allows for either Latin or non-Latin usernames -- as long as the signatures are readable [in Latin text]. I can more easily empathize with someone who has a non-Latin username who simply signs their username (in the non-Latin characters) than someone who intentionally obscures their username by using non-Latin characters (though I realize "intentionally obscures" may overstep as far as ascribing intent goes).
 * If I respond to a thread, I can see your username, yes. But if I go to some long ANI, RfA, Village Pump, etc. page/archive and look for your contribution for whatever reason, the first thing I have to do is find a post by you, copy/paste the signature, then do a search. If I'm also looking for other people or other topics altogether, it's not simply a matter of repeatedly pasting -- I have to repeatedly find one to copy. Is it impossible? Of course not, but the point of this guideline (at least the part that I'm concerned with here) is that the signature is intended to be easily readable. &mdash;  Rhododendrites talk  \\ 03:18, 8 June 2015 (UTC)
 * I am not quite sure I understand your complaint about cut paste searches, since I do this with IP's and other names all the time, regardless of the alphabet, and I may not know by memory how the name is spelt, or what the string of numbers is, so I too have to find a post by that user (or, easier, search for user:mjuyhnbt in the search field and cut and paste from there when I find it. I find muliticolor and nonstandard fonts, and especially bright cyan and yellow signatures very hard to read, but if the users are consistent, and I really need to search for their names, I can still do a cut and paste search.
 * As for purposefully obscuring the name, it didn't even occur to me to register in Greek or I might have. I chose the Greek signature specifically because it stands out while not being in a nonstandard font or funny colors and the like.  (I am of an age when advanced high school students and candidates for a bachelor's were expected to know the Greek alphabet, regardless of whether they studied it, and vision related issues are much more salient to me than alphabets.)
 * Basically, the easy fix to the problem as stated would be to give each person his own computer generated signature, such as the names from Logan's Run, THX1138, or A Brave New World and have done with it. In any case, I don't see myself as the poster-user for any cause, so I don't want to imply by arguing further that my current status needs explaining or justifying. μηδείς (talk) 03:54, 8 June 2015 (UTC)
 * "Our username policy allows for either Latin or non-Latin usernames -- as long as the signatures are readable [in Latin text]." ← This is not true at all. I don't know of any policy that states signatures must be readable in Latin text. They must be unicode and thus readable for accessibility. Like Medeis, I'm also perplexed by the issue you're having. In which case would you go through some long ANI and not be able to find someone's contribution because their sig is not in Latin? I think even if you can't easily pronounce a name, you should still be able to visually spot it quickly. Personally, non-Latin signatures jump out at me and are more noticeable because they do not blend in with surrounding text. —Мандичка YO 😜 07:01, 8 June 2015 (UTC)
 * I don't know of any policy that states signatures must be readable in Latin text -- no, not "must be", but it's "encouraged" per this guideline (see above). And if it's "encouraged" to sign non-Latin usernames with Latin text (that's what the guideline says), it's seems quite contrary to the spirit of the guideline to sign Latin usernames with non-Latin text. That's my point. As far as recognition, etc. it's not a matter of standing out, it's a matter of typing in. If I'm looking at a 700k archive, I don't want to scroll through it to find a name that visually stands out, I want to "find on page". I can't do that with your signature. &mdash;  Rhododendrites talk  \\ 15:14, 8 June 2015 (UTC)
 * There's a big difference between "required" and "encouraged." And I still don't see what the issue is regarding looking for someone's old comments or think this would be a common occurrence. If you're looking at an archive, there's no guarantee the person will have the same signature now as they did then, even if both are in Latin characters. (Signatures are not dynamic; notice my signature at the bottom message from six months ago.) If you really can't find it, just hit edit and do a CTRL-F for the username. This seems like an imaginary (ie not likely to occur more than once in a blue moon) problem with many simple solutions that do not involve changing policy. —Мандичка YO 😜 07:38, 10 June 2015 (UTC)
 * I will stick my nose in here, along with, despite the length of time since this discussion was active. There is a very real reason for encouraging at least a portion of each signature to be in Latin text, and that is that many people do not read or understand other alphabets (i am, obviously, speaking of English speakers here), which makes retaining the signature in a different alphabet difficult.  If i may use an analogy ~ when i read a Russian novel i often struggle to remember if i have come across a particular character or name previously, because when i read, though i read quickly, i verbalise certain words within my mind, but my skills at doing so with long words with uncommon (in English) letter combinations are somewhat rudimentary, so i tend to gloss over such words or names and therefore do not necessarily recognise them later.  I suspect that many people do not have this particular issue with the way they read thus, perhaps, people who use different alphabets in their signatures mayn't realise that they are actually causing difficulties for some users.
 * That all being say, the guideline only encourages the use of some Latin text, does not require it, and i don't expect that to change any time soon. There are workarounds, as have been suggested above; though, like many workarounds, they are less than optimal, they are sufficient.  Cheers, LindsayHello 11:51, 21 June 2015 (UTC)

Unrelated post
I am sorry for his this I will read over what needs to be done I am sure your a busy person and he doesn't know that I did this, he got pissed and went to bed.. I will read there everything. And try my best is not then I guess he will be will have to deal not having one fore his business. It kept saying that he was advertising his business over wiki. And that's what he kept getting made at. He kinda has short temper so I am sorry for any anything that this my have caused for you or any other editor. Ian I am going to take a break to night and try again latter. When I get to a computer.don't stress about it. I'll make sure that I am the only one that is writing for now on under DravenFrost.. No news for a reply to this unless you feel it is needed.

Shoot I forgot to sign the last thing I said about DravenFrost --Jw271988 (talk) 05:02, 26 June 2015 (UTC)
 * Presumably this relates to User talk:Jw271988. -- Red rose64 (talk) 07:14, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

Mark WP:SIG as policy?
I reverted, which was made with the argument that a guideline may not 'forbid' anything. I think that is oversimplified, but it warrants discussion anyway. Meanwhile, I regard the stated rationale for not allowing transclusions in signatures as self-evident. 12:06, 12 June 2015 (UTC) PAGE''' ]]) 04:01, 1 July 2015 (UTC)
 * Support raising WP:SIG to policy. To paraphrase my comment of 18:02, 3 January 2014 (UTC), as I understand it, one of the problems (for there are several) with templates in signatures is similar to the case of images within sigs: if the template is amended, every single page where that template appears will need rebuilding. There is of course a concern with the server load required to do that: some users (like me) post on several discussion pages each day, so that's a lot of pages to be added to the job queue. But the point is that the hypothetical new version of the template might be completely different from the old, thus all of the signed posts containing this template change their content (and possibly their meaning), which is contrary to the idea of WP:TPO. See also Wikipedia talk:Signatures/Archive 9. -- Red rose64 (talk) 14:22, 12 June 2015 (UTC)
 * As the community considers using templates in signatures to be disruptive, an editor who chooses (despite this guideline) to put templates in their signature would be subject to the Disruptive editing policy. Accordingly, I don't think elevating this particular section(?) to policy is necessary. –xenotalk 15:53, 12 June 2015 (UTC)
 * The community may consider it disruptive, but is it explicitly described as disruptive anywhere outside of talk pages? If it's not, there are those who will say that SIG#NT isn't a hard and fast rule, and may even invoke WP:IAR. -- Red rose64 (talk) 16:08, 12 June 2015 (UTC)
 * I support anything that might reduce the nonsense associated with signatures and this guideline. I saw the edit but didn't have time to formulate a proper response, and I can see that liberty people would be offended by the suggestion that something might be "forbidden". My feeling is that a guideline should give guidance, and telling people that sig templates are merely "strongly discouraged" is silly—an editor insisting on such a template would force editors to waste hours explaining the issues, when the simple fact is that anyone who insists on a template after explanations will eventually be indeffed. What xeno says is correct, but that path means hours will be wasted when someone insists on their template sig. I would be happy with a compromise that keeps language like "forbidden" ("are not permitted" might be less inflammatory) if people don't want to make it a policy. Johnuniq (talk) 04:50, 13 June 2015 (UTC)
 * How about "not allowed"? Same meaning.  08:18, 13 June 2015 (UTC)
 * Or how about "are considered disruptive", which ties it back to the policy. --Ahecht ([[User_talk:Ahecht|'''TALK

The less new policy the better. Saying it is considered disruptive is both true and makes it fall under existing policy. I agree with Ahecht. Chillum 04:08, 1 July 2015 (UTC)

Drop shadows
I suggest that we add a caution about drop shadows to the WP:SIGAPP section. Apparently, some editors believe that drop shadows do not hinder accessibility. Andy Mabbett ( Pigsonthewing ); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 13:00, 27 July 2015 (UTC)
 * I disagree very strongly with this proposal. Many editors (myself included) have drop shadows in our signatures.  So unless there is a clear rationale, preferably backed by sources, for concluding that drop shadows dramatically affect accessibility, damage page layout, or otherwise cause a nuisance, such a change would at a minimum need to be supported by an RfC in which interested parties were all notified.  I don't think, given the prevalence of this practice (and other custom sigs that are far more complicated than a simple drop shadow), that such an RfC would have a snowball's chance of coming out with an outcome recommending against them.   Sławomir Biały  (talk) 14:23, 27 July 2015 (UTC)
 * My eyes work fine and i can barely read your signature with the pale blue over fading grey. Drop shadows affect the contrast on signatures and thus affect the readability, this is sky is blue territory. 213.106.233.97 (talk) 14:38, 27 July 2015 (UTC)
 * Had it for years. Not gonna change it, barring some massive consensus from an RfC.  If some administrator wants to indefinitely block me, they can go ahead.  You folks have gotten to the point of bullying and harassing productive volunteers because of diacritics in their username and drop shadows in their signatures.  What kind of treatment is this for a volunteer?  Shame on you.   Sławomir Biały  (talk) 14:57, 27 July 2015 (UTC)
 * You were the only one who mentioned diacritics. The main point of the thread was that the posts actually being made by were being signed as if they were made by a different person, . This is apparently still true. -- Red rose64 (talk) 20:04, 27 July 2015 (UTC)
 * Yep, still true. You apparently missed the part about how this is a legitimate use of an alternate account because of the diacritics in my username.  Disagree?  Well, feel free to continue to gang up on me over at ANI if you want.  Or just block me indefinitely, since apparently having signatures that comply with some never-before-written-down rule is more important to the encyclopedia than generating useful content.   Sławomir Biały  (talk) 20:52, 27 July 2015 (UTC)
 * You were politely asked to modify your signature to make it accessible. Volunteers in many fields are expected - far more strongly than here - to behave in a way which makes the host organisation's customers or clients feel welcome, not to inconvenience them unnecessarily, and especially not to discriminate against them on the grounds of their disability. In some circumstances, the latter is a legal requirement. What kind of treatment is your sig, for the hundreds of volunteers who have to try to read it?  Andy Mabbett ( Pigsonthewing ); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 20:23, 27 July 2015 (UTC)
 * It's also policy not to harass other users. If you believe that I am not in compliance with "legal requirements", then you should lobby to have me indefinitely blocked at the appropriate forum.  I am not going to be bullied by passive-aggressive legal threats.   Sławomir Biały  (talk) 20:52, 27 July 2015 (UTC)
 * Harassment is a serious allegation. Take it to WP:ANI, or stop being such a dramah-monger. Andy Mabbett ( Pigsonthewing ); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 21:14, 27 July 2015 (UTC)
 * Oh, please. You templated me with a "warning" on my talk page.  Then you responded there with a curt "You appear to labour under the erroneous belief that it only concerns the specific examples that it then lists."  Hopefully you can see how that comes across.  So, no, I don't plan to comply with this rude request.  And there is not a damn thing you can do about it.   Sławomir Biały  (talk)
 * As anyone can see, I left no "warning" on your talk page. Andy Mabbett ( Pigsonthewing ); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 21:21, 27 July 2015 (UTC)
 * Template:Uw-sigdesign1 is a "user warning template". Sławomir Biały  (talk) 21:30, 27 July 2015 (UTC)
 * And again as anyone can see, the navbox on the template's page divides its content into "notices" and "warnings". Uw-sigdesign1 is placed in the former section. Andy Mabbett ( Pigsonthewing ); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 09:51, 28 July 2015 (UTC)
 * Maybe you should take it out of CAT:UWT if you don't want it to be confused with a "warning template". Or, you know, just don't template the regulars.   Sławomir Biały  (talk) 13:20, 28 July 2015 (UTC)
 * Or maybe, and I might be reaching here, you could not assume a template is an attack and consider that maybe there is a reason why someone notified that there might be accessibility issues with drop shadows. Some people might find signatures hard to read with them, it would be nice if they weren't used for that reason. Nobody has said "You must remove the drop shadows or you will be punished", what has been said is, "You may want to consider remove the drop shadows because they make life difficult for some of our editors". If you read it in that tone, do you think your reaction has been proportionate? SPACKlick (talk) 13:33, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

I haven't watched this page for long, but from the lack of traction I got in the thread I started above (concerning what is, to me, a much more obvious readability issue), I suspect there won't be much support. Nonetheless, personally I would support any RfC seeking to make signatures more readable (my own not withstanding). &mdash;  Rhododendrites <sup style="font-size:80%;">talk  \\ 20:26, 27 July 2015 (UTC)
 * While I am not particularly fond of drop shadows (or of anything with a &lt;span&gt; tag), I strongly believe we should try to leave people's signatures alone as much as possible. More signature policing will only make this an even less fun place to be in (and it will stop the great advantage of truly obnoxious signatures: they tell you their owner is not a reasonable person, so you can safely ignore whatever they say). —Kusma (t·c) 13:35, 28 July 2015 (UTC)
 * As opposed to actually making unreasonable people go away? —Keφr 15:48, 28 July 2015 (UTC)
 * Do they ever? —Kusma (t·c) 15:54, 28 July 2015 (UTC)
 * Rarely. Still, it may help. —Keφr 16:14, 28 July 2015 (UTC)
 * I didn't suggest "policing", I suggested that we "add a caution". If we do not, new editors will continue to create inaccessible sigs. Andy Mabbett ( Pigsonthewing ); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 20:59, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

My Signature
Ok, so I was just told that I need to change my signature, because of the aircraft images in it. After reviewing this page it seems that the biggest problem is when it is disruptive. I don't think mine is disruptive because I put it together in such a way that it would be the same height as the text and it wouldn't be distracting. It is also black for the same reason. Any thoughts from others?--Airplane Maniac (talk) 15:50, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

My signature: --Airplane Maniac (talk)
 * No images is signatures is policy WP:SIGIMAGE - no exceptions allowed. Please change yours. --<b style="color:navy">Neil N </b> <i style="color:blue">talk to me</i> 15:54, 5 June 2015 (UTC)
 * It doesn't matter how big they are; what matters is that there are images at all. WP:SIGIMAGE, which is policy, is clear: images of any kind must not be used in signatures. -- Red rose64 (talk) 15:55, 5 June 2015 (UTC)
 * Is there anything to do to replace it?--Airplane Maniac (talk) 16:01, 5 June 2015 (UTC)
 * There was a suggestion on your talk page to use a unicode version. --<b style="color:navy">Neil N </b> <i style="color:blue">talk to me</i> 16:04, 5 June 2015 (UTC)
 * Could you explain that?--Airplane Maniac (talk) 16:19, 5 June 2015 (UTC)
 * NeilN means to use a character and not an image. This was suggested at User talk:Airplane Maniac where an example was provided. -- Red rose64 (talk) 16:23, 5 June 2015 (UTC)
 * No, could you explain how that works. I don't even really understand what Unicode is...--Airplane Maniac (talk) 16:52, 5 June 2015 (UTC)
 * All you have to do is copy/paste "✈" into your signature in place of the images. ​—DoRD (talk)​ 17:01, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

Is there a way to create my own Unicode images?--Airplane Maniac (talk) 17:09, 5 June 2015 (UTC)
 * No, unicode is an international character encoding standard. A table with all of the available characters is available here. ​—DoRD (talk)​ 17:18, 5 June 2015 (UTC)
 * I just found a helicopter (🚁) as well. There are several other airplane symbols, but most of them don't display for me because I apparently don't have the correct font(s) installed on my computer. ​—DoRD (talk)​ 17:28, 5 June 2015 (UTC)
 * All instances of File:Airplane GA Black.svg and File:Black aicraft icon.svg in user signatures have been eliminated, per WP:SIGCLEAN. -- Red rose64 (talk) 20:15, 1 September 2015 (UTC)

Mary Jean Eisenhower
Please do not put the "personal life" paragraph back in. It is inaccurate and imposes on her son. Thank you and thank you for the privacy. PS Mary Jean's Mother died September 19, 2014, the family tree is inaccurate as well.174.58.159.176 (talk) 18:38, 2 October 2015 (UTC)mje174.58.159.176 (talk) 18:38, 2 October 2015 (UTC)
 * You're on the wrong talk page entirely - this page has nothing to do at all with the page you're editing, Mary Jean Eisenhower. See your user talk page at User_talk:174.58.159.176 to find the users you need to contact. Thanks. ~  Nott Nott  talk &#124; contrib 18:42, 2 October 2015 (UTC)

So, uh...
What's the punishment for not signing a post on a talk page? I'm scared. Widgetdog (talk) 21:37, 27 October 2015 (UTC)
 * A simple reminder that you ought to do it.-- S Philbrick (Talk)  21:44, 27 October 2015 (UTC)

Signature Font Family and Style
How can I add { {SCRIPT|ARAB|مانجزهدي|مانجزهدي} } / { {SCRIPT|ARAB|مانجزهدي} } to my signature ? And how to vrite it to use the font "Andalus" ? Thank for help. ΜΑΝΓΖΕΔΙ / مانجزهدي (talk) 20:50, 14 August 2015 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure what you are asking. I'm seeing your signature show up correctly:  User:Nemzag is piped to display what looks like a name in Greek capital letters followed by a slash followed by a word or name in Arabic.  As for the font, you can try something like this:
 * <span style="font-family:;font-size:;color:;background-color:;;">
 * which renders as
 * <span style="font-family:;font-size:;color:;background-color:;;">
 * Here is a shorter version that you can use in your Signature:
 * This is in the Andalus font
 * which renders as
 * This is in the Andalus font
 * Note: I cribbed this by using  and seeing what would happen, then going back and revising this edit to insert the shorter, usable version.  This is necessary since you can't use templates directly in your signature.  davidwr/  (talk)/(contribs)  18:37, 24 October 2015 (UTC), Updated: davidwr/  (talk)/(contribs)  18:44, 24 October 2015 (UTC)

Hi, k‑tʰang 帑 كتأنجى vor ħêlph حلف, well I managed with the help of Anupmehra  -  Let's talk!, he gived me this code :

Buth I would like to make a signatune with two size for the Greek text normal size & Andalus and for the Arabic part 5px. The problem his that "preference don't allow many character, how should I do ? How to optimize the command ? Rêmci, pêaqë...

ΘϷΕΝΑΝΑΤΕΣΟΣ (dôr.) ΤϷΗΝΑΝΑΘΕΣΟΣ (att.) ΑΟΛΙΕΥϷΟΛϜ ΜΑΝΓΖΕΔΙ / <span style="font-family:Aldanaus,Andalus">طشأنانثس أعليهوسعلۋ مأنجزهدي (talk) 12:13, 23 November 2015 (UTC)

MPEG-4 videos in signatures?
Is there any way I can use a video for my signature, preferably in MPEG-4 format? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.152.26.98 (talk) 19:41, 2 July 2015
 * No. First, only logged-in users can have custom signatures; second, the use of any image (moving or not) is forbidden, per WP:SIGIMAGE. -- Red rose64 (talk) 20:17, 2 July 2015 (UTC)
 * To anyone reading this: Using symbols in existing fonts is generally allowed (see this edit by User:King_of_Hearts for an example), but the rationale of "Images in signatures give undue prominence to a given user's contribution" may apply in specific situations (e.g. if King of Hearts specialized in uploading images of playing cards, other editors could reasonably argue that this rule applied but it wouldn't be a slam-dunk).  The rest of Signatures and other Wikipedia guidelines and policies apply - using symbol characters in a way which is likely to be disruptive or misleading should be avoided and may be challenged.  davidwr/  (talk)/(contribs)  18:55, 24 October 2015 (UTC)
 * I don't think that "undue prominence to a given user's contribution" has anything to do with what images you have uploaded/work you have done on other pages. I think the issue is using icons to draw attention to the contribution that your signature is attached to.  The problem is a signature that uses icons (or colors, or anything else) to say ► ► ► PAY EXTRA ATTENTION TO MY COMMENTS ◀︎ ◀︎ ◀︎ ◀︎.  WhatamIdoing (talk) 06:56, 31 January 2016 (UTC)
 * "images in signatures give undue prominence to a given user's contribution" is just one of eight reasons listed at WP:SIGIMAGE and some of these - particularly the first two - are much more important reasons not to use images in sigs. Only a few of these reasons will apply to characters found in a font. -- Red rose64 (talk) 14:33, 31 January 2016 (UTC)

Yes Imammuddini (talk) 20:52, 6 November 2015 (UTC)

External links to unobstructive projects
It seems as though all external links are disallowed. Is this a matter of an umbrella guideline, or would it be acceptable to add a link to a project which shouldn't distract from Wikipedia? Say I wanted to add a link to Wikia–would that violate the rules, or could I do that? Thanks! <font color="#FF0000">Just <font color="#FFFF00">An <font color="#000">Ing  (<font color="#00FF00">Talk )<font color="#993333">{USER} 21:36, 4 February 2016 (UTC)
 * Sorry, signatures are for the benefit of this community in order to assist develop the encyclopedia. No external links. Johnuniq (talk) 00:21, 5 February 2016 (UTC)

If you forget to sign, what should you do?
I almost always sign any comments I make to talk pages - and in fact, I think my editing of Wikipedia consists rather more of comments in talk pages making what are intended to be helpful suggestions than of actual edits to pages. The only times I don't sign these comments are the very few occasions when I have somehow forgotten to.

I'm just wondering what one should do if one discovers that one forget to sign a comment on a talk page. Do you just go back and edit it, even if that edit is just to add the 4 tildes? Would you still do this if you discovered the omission weeks or months later?

I think I did that on one or two occasions; but I really don't know what is officially the way to deal with this. I've just discovered an old comment I forgot to sign, but I saw that some robot did it for me later, and somehow knew my user-name. But it does it in a slightly different way.

The article of which this is the talk page doesn't seem to cover this, so I would appreciate knowing. Thanks.

-- EDIT SECONDS LATER: Ooops, as I did just now! Sorry - Freudian slip, perhaps. M.J.E. (talk) 14:09, 18 April 2016 (UTC)
 * If you don't spot it until some time later (and the bot hasn't done the job for you) it would be confusing to add the 4 tildes later, as that would give a misleading timestamp. Better to add the correct time, and I find that the easiest way to do that is with Template:Xsign. --David Biddulph (talk) 15:12, 18 April 2016 (UTC)
 * If I realise at the time (or soon after), and nobody else has posted to that thread, I just sign with four tildes and an edit summary, a few minutes of "inaccuracy" on the time is of little consequence. If it's some time later, I sign with three tildes, and in the same edit I will manually add a timestamp, that being the date and time of the original post. Often, you may find that in such cases has already dropped by and signed on your behalf. Don't rely on it though. -- Red rose64 (talk) 09:23, 19 April 2016 (UTC)


 * You can also create a similar solution as on the Finnish Wikipedia: fi:Toiminnot:Väärinkäyttösuodatin/78, an edit filter that warns users if they forget to sign their comments. --Stryn (talk) 09:07, 24 April 2016 (UTC)

Thanks for these comments. I don't actually really understand them, but I will look into these suggestions further if I need to; I guess there are help pages which explain all those things in detail which a bit of searching would find. M.J.E. (talk) 11:29, 7 May 2016 (UTC)

Using signatures with the Visual Editor
This page should describe how to use signatures with Wikipedia's Visual Editor. Right now, typing in  results in a message saying that Wikitext is not supported and you should switch to the source editor. It does look like there is a way to insert a signature in the Visual Editor via "Insert" -> "Your Signature", but it looks like it's grayed out sometimes and I have no clue why. -Thunderforge (talk) 18:04, 3 June 2016 (UTC)

It’s annoying to remember!
How about, At least at the times when I click on “new section”, it automatically includes the four tidles on the second line, because once the edit frame is ready I forget all about it. Another way to prevent user forgetfulness is when the user clicks on preview, it adds this string: “Preceding unsigned comment added by…” (no name, or date) to remind the user to add the ~ ~ ~ ~. Charlieb000 (talk) 03:30, 28 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Hello Charlieb000, see Village pump (miscellaneous) <kbd style="white-space:nowrap;color:#456;"> → User: Perhelion 12:17, 28 June 2016 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 5 July 2016
please change 2001:DB8:CEEE:21B:DB60:07FE:4277:63FF to 2001:DB8:CEEE:21B:DB60:7FE:4277:63FF because leading zeroes are unnecessary.

95.49.33.102 (talk) 21:55, 5 July 2016 (UTC)
 * Red information icon with gradient background.svg Not done: this is the talk page for discussing improvements to the page Wikipedia:Signatures. What you are asking for is a change to the MediaWiki software, which would be handled via a request on Phabricator. -- Red rose64 (talk) 22:32, 5 July 2016 (UTC)

Help request
How can I combine two accounts? 2601:1C0:8100:5E68:B04A:8E38:65D8:C7E2 (talk) 13:21, 15 July 2016 (UTC)
 * You can't. The best thing to do is, decide on one of the accounts and use only that one, and (to avoid any suspicion of sockpuppetry), leave notes on the user pages explaining the relationship. You could use the User alternative account template, or one of these user boxes. JohnCD (talk) 14:05, 15 July 2016 (UTC)

Idea for including the "even if [...]" info, in the appropriate section
This is a suggesting for moving (or copying) certain information from one section to another.

As it stands now
Currently, the section Signatures already says (among other things) that (blockquote #1):"Any posts made to the user talk pages, article talk pages and any other discussion pages must be signed." IMHO, unless we expect it to be obvious -- (and, at first, it was not obvious to me!) -- I think that it should explicitly state, whether or not that includes editing that is being done without logging in. The last time I checked, it did not.

Eventually, I did find the answer (stated explicitly). It was a little bit further down -- in the section called "Signatures". There, it says -- (among other things) (blockquote #2):"Note that if you choose to contribute without logging in, regardless of whether you have an account, you should still sign your posts."

IMHO It should be [or "also" be] "where it belongs"
However, I was (initially) looking for that kind of information (i.e., blockquote #2) in the section where I was expecting to find it -- namely, in the section named "When signatures should and should not be used".

I would have no objection if that kind of information could "also" be found elsewhere -- such as in the "How to sign your posts" section. However, I think that this "informative" Signatures page would be more helpful to those users (editors) who do not already know this stuff, if that kind of information could [at least!] be found in the section where it seems to belong ... namely, in the "When signatures should and should not be used" section.

Any comments?
--Mike Schwartz (talk) 07:02, 14 August 2016 (UTC)

CASE CLOSED

 * The above suggestion project was implemented, (via an edit to the project page) on 5 September 2016‎. For details, see the DIFF listing.




 * --Mike Schwartz (talk) 16:14, 5 September 2016 (UTC)

Custom signature problem
Have a look at this edit to my user talk page. I did not recognise the problem immediately, but the user had of course used user preferences to change their signature, apparentl\y without having the slightest idea what they were doing.

It got me wondering, should we be more explicit in telling people not to do this, either in this guideline or on the user preference special page? Or even both? Andrewa (talk) 01:19, 9 September 2016 (UTC)

Is making a reference to one's username in a proposed deletion template acceptable?
Recently an editor complained that I add my username to proposed deletion templates and that it violates this policy, and removed it. Now, of course we do not sign articles. However, Template:Prod does include and even requires an explanation. As part of my explanation I ask anyone who comes to remove it to follow PROD best policies and notify me of it. As people have not been doing that often, few months ago I added a link to my talk page to my prod rationale, so that lazy people do not have to check history for who prodded, and have less of an excuse not to follow PROD best practices. Considering that prod templates will be removed one way or another in ~week, I do not believe that I am abusing any policy or gaining undue visibility, I just want to make the PROD process as easy as possible for everyone involved. I've been doing it for few months, with numerous admins seeing my prods, but nobody complained about them till now. Seeing as this policy does not discuss this case, I think it would be good to ask for other opinions on this, and if there are no objections, I'd like to add a note to this policy that refering to one's user page is allowed in prod. Do note that I could create a WikiProject subpage somewhere, ask people to edit it when deprodding my prods, and watchlist it for a similar effect, but what's the harm in telling people to post to my talk page? Again, if anyone does that, the template is removed anyway. Let's not forget that the rule against signatures in the namespace is there to prevent people claiming authorship, and there is no way my reference to my talk page could be confused for anything like that. Thoughts? --<sub style="border:1px solid #228B22;padding:1px;">Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus&#124; reply here 09:54, 11 September 2016 (UTC)
 * I agree that adding a link with your user name has some benefit, and the verbage displayed by Proposed deletion is sufficiently weird that adding a user name seems a minor issue. However, the general rule is that articles never have a user name or link, and that's the way prods always work. Further, there is a team of wikicleaners who search and destroy such links because that is how things are done. I don't think this is the right page to discuss the issue. Perhaps Village pump (proposals) would be better, or the talk page of the prod template. Johnuniq (talk) 11:55, 11 September 2016 (UTC)
 * I certainly understand how this can my the job of removing unwanted user signatures (i.e. practically all others) from mainspace more difficult, but this could be solved I think by either creating a whitelist of the few editors (myself?) who do it in prods, or excluding prod trasnscluded template from appearing in searches for those using the relevant script. Through now that I think about it, perhaps creating a WikiProject Deletion subpage where we would ask people to notify others about de-prods may be the best solution for everyone - it would not interfere with cleaning signature tasks and would give prodders a centralize place to check for prods being removed. PS. I did annouce this discussion at WT:PROD, I don't think we need input from VP yet. --<sub style="border:1px solid #228B22;padding:1px;">Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus&#124; reply here 04:00, 12 September 2016 (UTC)
 * As Johnuniq mentions, the general rule is no links to user or draft space in articles. There are multiple reports out there that find these links including Database reports/Articles containing links to the user space and this.  Piotrus, you are only person who does this with Prods and you've been doing it for only a few months.  As you often prod 10-15 articles a day, it can get very annoying trying to remove the bad from your prodded articles.  Your proposal wouldn't work.  The database report does not get any info from other sources.  The other report is language agnostic... currently every language Wikipedia it scans is like English Wikipedia, no user space links.  Bgwhite (talk) 15:57, 12 September 2016 (UTC)
 * I am amenable to finding out a solution that works for everyone. Now, can you tell me why "Your proposal [for a centralized notice page linked from prod template] wouldn't work"? I don't follow. --<sub style="border:1px solid #228B22;padding:1px;">Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus&#124; reply here 06:15, 14 September 2016 (UTC)
 * The database reports only look at what is in the enwiki database. It does not look elsewhere.  The reports are also run on other wikis.  Again, you are the only one who does this.  Bgwhite (talk) 06:50, 14 September 2016 (UTC)
 * A history search is generally required to determine who has proposed a deletion. I commend for transparency in including a link in prods. We should try to find some means of clarifying who is responsible for a prod. Including a signature in the prod reason is apparently not the best solution. ~Kvng (talk) 14:45, 15 September 2016 (UTC)
 * Right. The extra 10-20 seconds that an (experienced, newbies may need more) editor needs to figure out who proposed a prod (so that they can notify them it was declined, or otherwise engage in a discussion) is a waste of time that can be solved with a signed prod. Now, I still see only two compromise solutions: a) rewrite the code for checking for sigs in mainspace to ignore sigs in code or b) create a centralized page where declining prods would be discussed. So far nobody endorsed either of those, so I am not seeing an acceptable solution (and I'll repeat: signing prods is NOT against any policy). I am sorry that signing prods makes life more difficult for some editors, but it makes practice easier for people dealing with prods. --<sub style="border:1px solid #228B22;padding:1px;">Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus&#124; reply here  05:32, 19 September 2016 (UTC)

When not to use
I see that in the template Template:Requested move there is the option to use "|sign=no" to suppress the signature on the RM. Is this ok to do or is there a requirement that the signature be there? I was wondering because I created an RM this way and someone re-added my signature anyways. If it's not proper to use the "|sign=no" then why is it an option? Fyunck(click) (talk) 08:51, 17 September 2016 (UTC)


 * If you read Template:Requested move, it says: "Requested moves are required to have a section header and signature, so these parameters should rarely be used, generally only by experienced editors repairing malformed requests." --David Biddulph (talk) 08:30, 21 October 2016 (UTC)

Proposition regarding signature length
As WP:SIG is a guideline, not a policy, there is room for common sense regarding user signatures, as such I would propose the following:

Keep the signature length just as it is, but allow for a case-by-case review of the signature in question if it exceeds the stated maximum length. For example: this signature (check 's colorful signature), is over 255 characters, but renders short and is not disruptive versus this signature, (Nathanrdotcom's) which is below the 255 character limit, but it V - E - R - Y streched out and distracting. versus this user's signature which is again over 255 characters, but is neither retinal burning, over large or disruptive. versus this individual's signature which is over 255 characters, retinal-burning, long and definitely over-large!

Signatures like #1 and #3 would be allowed per this proposal and WP:IAR, not to mention that they're not disruptive, nor retinal-burning, nor distracting, and once again, due to the fact the WP:SIG#Length is a guideline, not a set-in-stone policy. Signatures #2 and #4 would be dis-allowed per this proposal, while #2 is not more than 255 characters, it's disruptive because it's stretched out and is taking a lot of horizontal space and #4 pretty much speaks for itself, a big, retinal-burning eyesore.

After all, we're not using Lynx to view Wikipedia, so we're not looking at raw code, we're looking at the rendered code for everything, including signatures.

In addition, consensus has repeatedly rejected proposals to do away with personalized signatures so often, that's it's now a perenial proposal. It's a fact, personalized signatures are popular, in fact so much so that in the actual perenial proposal itself the closer has actually written: '' Most custom signatures cause little or no trouble. In addition, they are popular throughout Wikipedia, and forcing users to give them up would create more trouble than it would be worth.''

So what do you say? Judge sigs on their own merit (not disruptive, hateful, retina-burning, over large, blinking...etc..), or judge them solely on length ? Kosh Vorlon 21:35, 20 January 2017 (UTC)
 * Oppose relaxation of the length rule. We are looking at raw code: the first bullet explicitly states "in the edit window". -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 23:25, 20 January 2017 (UTC)
 * Comment Perhaps I wasn't as clear as I should be, during normal operation of Wikipedia, we look at rendered code, for example, when you read this you're seeing that text as bold, that's the rendered version, you're not seeing read this which would be the raw code.  Same thing with signatures, you  see  Kosh Vorlon   when you look at my signature, not (by the way this is under the limit of characters )  Kosh Vorlon  that.
 * I did see the bullet point your'e referring to, but bear in mind, some people are using the visual editor which means they never see Wikicode, they're using WSYSIG editing. Even for those of us that do edit in Wikicode,like myself, and you as well, I have yet  to run into a situation where the code conflicts with the actual text | for example, this page which is a tutorial that shows signature do's and dont's, the last section in particular is full of don'ts and each is easily distinguishable from the surrounding text.  Hopefully that makes my proposal a bit clearer.  Kosh Vorlon  13:46, 21 January 2017 (UTC)
 * Oppose removing the length limit. Besides seeing the excessively-long code in the edit window, some of us regularly read the talk page diffs to see what's new rather than trying to find what's new in the rendered page. Anomie⚔ 20:05, 21 January 2017 (UTC)
 * Also, as a side comment, your signature is both extremely long in the edit window (despite being slightly under the length limit) and hurts my eyes to look at when rendered. Anomie⚔ 20:12, 21 January 2017 (UTC)
 * Beeblebrox (talk) 20:27, 23 January 2017 (UTC)
 * Oppose. Two specific points I'd like to respond to. One, in the proposal you present this discussion as a binary choice between judging sigs on their own merit or judging them solely on length. We've been doing both for a while, and it seems to work fine. Second, Visual Editor, while it's very convenient for articles and pages in the other namespaces it's enabled in, doesn't work in many namespaces in which actual discussion takes place. For example, it's disabled in the Talk, Wikipedia, Wikipedia talk, and MediaWiki talk namespaces. Enterprisey (talk!) 22:13, 22 January 2017 (UTC)
 * Oppose The proposal seems to suggest that the sig length guideline is outdated and unecessary. It isn't. The problems it is intended to prevent are still very present. That not every obnoxious customized sig technically violates the guideline is not a reason to get rid of it. Plus every word of what Enterprisey said just above. Beeblebrox (talk) 20:25, 23 January 2017 (UTC)
 * Oppose This limits clutter, and I don't see a reason to do away with that. Headbomb {talk / contribs / physics / books} 11:50, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
 * Oppose per above. Iazyges   Consermonor   Opus meum  12:55, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
 * Oppose per above (distracting, confusing, and/or waste of screen real estate in edit window and in diffs, unavoidable nuisance in important namespaces without VE, etc.). Also, "allow for a case-by-case review"&mdash;I can think of no more pointless invitation to strife and time-wasting than the creation of noticeboard discussions over whether or not a particular editor's needlessly long signature is 'sufficiently pretty to keep'.  No one likes to be told that they have an ugly baby.  (Incidentally KoshVorlon, per Anomie and Beeblebrox, your signature is probably more difficult to read on some displays that you might realize.) TenOfAllTrades(talk) 13:16, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
 * Oppose per above, and it's signature's like KoshVorlon's (maybe it was KoshVorlon's in particular, I can't quite remember) that led me to include the following in my .css file:  Hope that helps. –<b style="font-family:verdana;color:#000">xeno</b><sup style="color:#000">talk  14:47, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
 * That's so obvious, but I never thought to do that. Thank you for posting that. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 15:16, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
 * Happy days, LindsayHello 11:33, 25 January 2017 (UTC)
 * Thank you! Super! &#32;– Modal Jig (talk) 01:43, 27 January 2017 (UTC)
 * Oppose. Signatures are required to be non-disruptive. Signatures are independently evaluated in at least three areas: (1) technical concerns, (2) how they appear on the rendered page, and (3) how they appear in the edit window. A 255 character signature is already at the painfully high end of what I want cluttering up the page in edit mode.
 * P.S. Kosh, I compressed your sig from 238 characters to 168 characters with no perceptible difference. A reduction of 70 characters. Please implement :)
 * Old sig : Kosh Vorlon
 * New sig: Kosh Vorlon 
 * Old code: Kosh Vorlon
 * New code:  Kosh Vorlon 
 * Alsee (talk) 01:29, 26 January 2017 (UTC)
 * Edited the above comment to eliminate 4 more characters. Alsee (talk) 01:39, 26 January 2017 (UTC)
 * Sorry Alsee, but your second edit creates invalid HTML: quotes around attribute values may only be omitted if the value consists entirely of letters, digits, full stop and hyphen-minus. The values of the two  attributes contain the following characters which are not among the 64 that may be left unquoted: colon, semicolon, and hash. Since it's not possible to construct a valid non-empty   attribute that doesn't contain a colon, it follows that the value of a   attribute must always be quoted. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 19:58, 26 January 2017 (UTC)
 * Red rose64, it looked like it worked fine. Is the issue that some browsers might not show it the same? Alsee (talk) 08:31, 27 January 2017 (UTC)
 * Some browsers allow the omission of the quotes in some circumstances; but not all browsers, and not all circumstances (for example, the presence of a space within the value (such as in the declaration ) will always make quotes necessary). Since you don't know the setup of anybody else, it's best not to assume that their browser will handle the omission of quotes; so it's best to include them. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 17:29, 27 January 2017 (UTC)
 * Oppose - Length limit is useful and stops unnecessary long sigs, – Davey 2010 Talk 17:57, 27 January 2017 (UTC)

Position of Signature formatting warning
Why is the paragraph beginning "Signature formatting has been the subject" in the Signature forgery section? -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 00:45, 5 February 2017 (UTC)

Link required?
Nowhere in the text does it state that a custom signature must, or even should, include a link to the editor's user page. The nearest we get is "A customised signature should make it easy to identify the username, to visit the user's talk-page, and preferably user page.", which is a bit vague, but which I think is generally interpreted as meaning that a link should be provided. It would be helpful if the section on custom signatures explicitly told editors that they should include a link to their user page. I think this is the same problem mentioned by further up this page, and the latest instance of it is on my talk page at User_talk:PamD, where a user has "signed" twice with a non-linking sig. as I'm discussing his sig here. Pam D  14:17, 15 February 2017 (UTC)
 * WP:SIGLINK says: Signatures must include at least one direct internal link to your user page, user talk page, or contributions page ​—DoRD (talk)​ 14:21, 15 February 2017 (UTC)
 * Thanks, and I'm really pleased to see that section. I think I was scrolling through the article, passed some quite obscure-looking stuff about "over-riding custom sigs", saw the heading "Links" and mistook it for "External links", ie "You've come to the end of the main part of the article, you're not going to find what you're looking for here."! Silly of me not to have looked further. Thanks. Will now return to my talk page and point this out. Pam  D  14:47, 15 February 2017 (UTC)
 * Yes, that's exactly the problem that I raised. The requirement is there but not nearly so prominent as I would like.
 * The previous discussion (well, my attempt at it anyway) is now archived at Wikipedia talk:Signatures/Archive 11. Andrewa (talk) 00:40, 16 February 2017 (UTC)
 * This edit is typical of those I was criticising. User:Bde1982 had in good faith set up a sig that did not comply (it not only contained no link, its text referred only to an obsolete account User:BDE1982 which they had abandoned), and this complicated an already problematic discussion regarding an article name.
 * I doubt that we can come up with a perfect guide that will avoid all such problems, but I thought (and still think) that some improvement is possible and highly desirable. But it attracted no interest before. Andrewa (talk) 15:56, 15 February 2017 (UTC)
 * I highly doubt that editors customizing their signature will read through this entire guideline or take it all in. Usually a pointer to WP:SIGLINK does the trick when an editor has come up with an invalid sig. If we want to cut down on instances of these then a UI change would be more effective. Change "Custom signatures should link to your user page or your user talk page." to "Custom signatures must link to your user page or your user talk page." --<b style="color:navy">Neil N </b> <i style="color:blue">talk to me</i> 16:12, 15 February 2017 (UTC)
 * Agree. Andrewa (talk) 16:20, 15 February 2017 (UTC)

I propose to add to the Nutshell the text If you set up a custom signature, it must clearly identify your user name and link to your user page or user talk page (preferably both).

I'd prefer to say and link to both your user page and user talk page but that would be a change to what the page currently says. I'd also like to make the paragraph When customizing your signature, please keep the following in mind:, which is not even a subheading at present, far more prominent.

But the nutshell is a start, and doesn't change anything, it just clarifies a little. Comments? Andrewa (talk) 16:20, 15 February 2017 (UTC)
 * Personally I think it should have to link to User and Talk page (unless one is a redirect to the other). I disagree with the real name bit, as if its linked it should be obvious who the real person is. Iazyges   Consermonor   Opus meum  16:49, 15 February 2017 (UTC)
 * Not quite sure why you've gone to such a deep level of indenting here (see Talk page guidelines), but no great harm, best not to change it now IMO.
 * This would be a change to what the page currently says, would it not? Currently it says either one or the other or both, which nicely covers the case of the user page redirecting to the user talk page (which is not discouraged or even uncommon, but I don't think the other way around should be permitted).
 * No, it's not at all obvious who the real person is. To find out, you need to go through the page history and then match the edit timestamp on the talk page to the edit timestamp in the history. This can be laborious even if the timestamps do match exactly, and they quite often don't. It shouldn't be necessary to do all this just to find out who signed a talk page post so you can send them a message.
 * Admins already do such detective work in unravelling the story behind some talk page discussions. Please, don't make it necessary any more often than it already is!
 * There is plenty of scope for individuality in sigs (yours for example) without making life more difficult for other users. Andrewa (talk) 22:13, 15 February 2017 (UTC)
 * I think I should add, there's no real name bit. Users are free not to give their real names, I do but that is my option, I'm not forced to and this is a very important principle here, see Privacy policy. We are just talking about usernames. Andrewa (talk) 00:54, 16 February 2017 (UTC)

See Village_pump_(technical) --<b style="color:navy">Neil N </b> <i style="color:blue">talk to me</i> 16:59, 15 February 2017 (UTC)
 * Looks good. Andrewa (talk) 17:08, 15 February 2017 (UTC)

Comments on the UI change can be added here: MediaWiki talk:Tog-fancysig --<b style="color:navy">Neil N </b> <i style="color:blue">talk to me</i> 20:05, 15 February 2017 (UTC)


 * I don't see a section there... should I start one? Andrewa (talk) 01:05, 16 February 2017 (UTC)
 * Look at the most recent discussion. --<b style="color:navy">Neil N </b> <i style="color:blue">talk to me</i> 01:18, 16 February 2017 (UTC)
 * Quite right... is there any reason that talk page doesn't use section headings? Fooled me for a bit, and will make archiving far less effective. Andrewa (talk) 01:35, 16 February 2017 (UTC)

Proposal
The UI should read in part Your sig must contain a clear link to identify you, either to your user page, your user talk page, or your contributions.

I still think that a change to the nutshell in addition would be good, but the only comments that suggestion received above were negative. Andrewa (talk) 01:32, 16 February 2017 (UTC)

Problem
It keeps signing my signed comments, can you fix that? --Brynda1231 [Talk Page] [Contribs] 13:15, 15 November 2016 (UTC)
 * No; but you can. Your signature, as used in your post here, does not contain suitable wikilinks. Yes, it contains links; but they're formatted as external links (and not very well either, since there are too many square brackets), which don't count. So, instead of  you should use  ; and instead of   you should use  . -- Red rose64 (talk) 20:17, 15 November 2016 (UTC)

could You please help me too? i am not sure what am doing wrong. Nector deorum et virorum 21:24, 11 March 2017 (UTC)
 * It's the same problem: your signature contains no links. Unless you understand what you are doing regarding WP:CUSTOMSIG, your best course of action is to go to, and make the following changes. First, blank out the box following ""; second, switch off the option directly below that; finally, click on . This will restore the default signature for you. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 22:56, 11 March 2017 (UTC)

Wikilinked dates in timetamps
Hi, I've noticed has wikilinked dates and years on their timestamp (IE: 02:22, March 31, 2017 (UTC)), Is this allowed?,

had raised an issue with their sig last year and advised changing it due to potential archive bot issues however the editor has since carried on using it regardless,

If it's stopping bots from archiving then it's effectively disrupting the project and is stopping archiving of various things if they're the filer?,

Thanks, – Davey 2010 Talk 23:06, 4 April 2017 (UTC)
 * It only stops bots from archiving sections where I'm the only one talking. These cases are rare, and usually mean I said something that didn't matter to anyone. When I see them, I delete them, since they're not worth archiving. The moderate benefits to me outweigh the minor problems to the machine. I'd say so even if I wasn't me. InedibleHulk (talk) 23:13, 4 April 2017 (UTC)
 * At one time it was normal practice to wikilink dates in this manner, because upon detection of such linking, the MediaWiki software would automatically reformat the date in accordance with the setting at (see Manual of Style/Dates and numbers/Date autoformatting). This feature was switched off in English Wikipedia in April 2009 (and removed entirely from the MediaWiki software in February 2013), since when the practice of linking dates has been discouraged. It is not just the archiving bots that have difficulties when these links are present, other bots (such as ) and some scripts also have problems. This is why we now have MOS:UNLINKDATES. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 23:35, 4 April 2017 (UTC)
 * In the four years I've done this, I've never even seen Legobot, let alone have a problem with him. I don't use Javascript here, so my format preferences do nothing to stop backward dates. That's why I had to do it the hard way in the first place. I think being discouraged like this is punishment enough. Wikipedia does waste a lot of my time, but I do some useful work here and have a bit of fun, too. I'd rather be barred for something more serious, if and when I need the boot at all. InedibleHulk (talk) 23:58, 4 April 2017 (UTC)
 * People don't often encounter Legobot directly, since what the bot mainly does is maintain the listings for GAs and RFCs. In doing this, it copies parts of threads from one place to another, and it expects timestamps to be in exactly the same format that five tildes will yield. Using another format will cause mis-listing. As for JavaScript, it doesn't matter what scripts that you are using; it is the scripts used by others that matter. Consider for example a user who has been to and enabled "". This script will not process your last post, since it is looking for "23:58, 4 April 2017 (UTC)" - no linking, and dmy format. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 10:01, 5 April 2017 (UTC)
 * I've never initiated a GA, and have lost interest in starting RfCs. Legobot should be safe. Whether Javascript's the problem or not, setting my preference for Month-Day just doesn't work; my posts and others stay Day-Month. If I have to choose between causing a Local Time gadgeteer or myself to see something a little unusual at the end of my post, it's fair and reasonable that I choose myself, since I see my own posts far more often than they do. Slight annoyance all the time is worse than equally slight annoyance some of the time, and it's better to be mildly offended by someone else's style than to need to use someone else's mildly offensive style yourself. InedibleHulk (talk) 04:40, 7 April 2017 (UTC)
 * Wikipedia relies on collaboration. I search pages like this for "7 April 2017" (the current UTC date) to find new comments, but your's is not found. Johnuniq (talk) 05:03, 7 April 2017 (UTC)
 * You found it another way. I try to place newer comments under older ones, and this seems to work for my collaborators. Of course, I'll never know how much wasn't discussed with those who didn't find me, or how many didn't because of my signature. Nice to finally meet you, in any case. InedibleHulk (talk) 05:58, 7 April 2017 (UTC)
 * The "Date format" preference only affects system-generated dates, such as those in your contributions list or in a page history. It does not affect dates that are written as text, such as the timestamps that are part of discussion posts; and as I said above, although it did do so at one time (and relied on special formatting to achieve that), the feature no longer exists. Almost everybody else uses the default timestamp format, and there is no point in using that special formatting technique any more. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 09:56, 7 April 2017 (UTC)
 * Sorry, I'd read it the first time without following the links, assuming I knew what you meant. Turns out I didn't, but do now. Thanks for bothering to repeat yourself. InedibleHulk (talk) 13:10, 7 April 2017 (UTC)
 * Instead of arguing and obviously getting pissed off wouldn't it be a better idea to simply stop using the current format ?, Hate to sound like a dick but everyone else uses the tildes (or atleast the timestamp) in a normal fashion so why can't you ?... – Davey 2010 Talk 00:18, 8 April 2017 (UTC)
 * I figure they consider backward dates "normal", or at least a deviation they don't mind adopting if it's easier. Maybe they don't have time to learn the markup. Perhaps they figure our day of the year articles are sufficiently Wikilinked in day of the year navboxes, or haven't grown used to signing with three tildes. But I don't, do, don't and have. So what works for them doesn't for me.
 * Since my preference doesn't work for Legobot, I'm willing to use the defult style when starting things that need to be machine-readable, and delete what archive bots can't comprehend. As for humans, I simply ask they tolerate my weird but virtually harmless style the way I tolerate theirs. I think that's a fair compromise. InedibleHulk (talk) 14:15, 9 April 2017 (UTC)

Incorrect timestamps
Is there any rule or guideline stating that a user's signature timestamp should be correct? I've highlighted to an edit that their timestamps are out by several hours, but they don't show any interest in fixing this, and in my view there is the possibility that it will cause confusion. I'd like to be able to point them at something official before raising this with them again. Cordless Larry (talk) 18:20, 18 April 2017 (UTC)
 * I guess Talk page guidelines sort of covers it, but I think the editor has now taken my advice without me needing to point them at a formal guideline. Cordless Larry (talk) 15:31, 20 April 2017 (UTC)
 * Signature timestamps that are out by one minute (earlier than the time recorded in page history) aren't uncommon, the reality is that they differ by one second or less - for instance the tildes might be expanded at e.g. 11:59:59.99 and the edit saved at 12:00:00.01 which is a difference of 20 milliseconds.
 * Then there are the people who have installed a gadget or other script which reformats timestamps, such as "". I have been in discussion with at least one user who had enabled this gadget and disagreed with me upon the time that my edits were made. Another two with this gadget even went around altering the timestamps on other people's posts as they were editing, saved these changes (contrary to WP:TPO) and weren't even aware that they had done so - and when I asked them why, they angrily denied that they had done anything. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 20:29, 20 April 2017 (UTC)
 * Thanks, . In this case, the timestamp was out by several hours (being the editor's local time, but labelled incorrectly as UTC) - see Teahouse/Questions/Archive 602 and Teahouse. Cordless Larry (talk) 20:38, 20 April 2017 (UTC)
 * Or rather, the difference between the timestamp and UTC varied - compare this with this! Cordless Larry (talk) 20:44, 20 April 2017 (UTC)

Use of emojis
Hey, is there a rule against emojis in your signature? Asking for a friend.--🐦 05:53, 17 April 2017 (UTC)
 * It is acceptable to use unicode characters, including emojis, in signatures - see 's signature in the sections above - but you should also include text that makes it clear who you are. For example, 🐦 is insufficient, but DoctorWho42🐦 or DW🐦42 would be just fine. ​—DoRD (talk)​ 12:28, 17 April 2017 (UTC)
 * To be exact, I don't use the character "🌹" directly, instead I use the numeric character reference  so that people whose browsers won't display that character can at least view the page source to see what it is, and thus perhaps look it up at e.g. FileFormat.info. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 20:13, 17 April 2017 (UTC)
 * Should we maybe amend the article?-🐦Do☭torWho42 (📼) 06:45, 26 April 2017 (UTC)
 * I think that's a great idea. The pros and cons of using the emoji directly vs. entering the numeric reference is particularly worthy of discussion. I feel like having the emoji appear in the wiki markup may be quite helpful in quickly navigating unformatted code when editing a long talk page, but I do wonder if more veteran editors would find it jarring. —jameslucas (" " / +) 17:30, 26 April 2017 (UTC)
 * Would emojis merit a section or at least a subsection? I understand "When customizing your signature, please keep the following in mind:" deals with "A distracting, confusing, or otherwise unsuitable signature may adversely affect other users." but does not explicitly reference them. For example, User:Boomer Vial was kind enough to point out that my original signature " ☭ 🎆 🌎 🎼 🎺 🐦 " (the colors were a reference to Pantone's Color of the Year) may appear confusing to new editors so I decided to eschew the original signature besides enlist the advice of this talk page.-🐦Do☭torWho42 (📼) 08:42, 11 May 2017 (UTC)

Page deleted?
I am really understand why a page including the history of a sorority was deleted I used similar templates from other sorority pages?

````DaRoyalStorms2 (talk) 13:38, 1 June 2017 (UTC)
 * Responded on their talk page. ~ GB fan 13:59, 1 June 2017 (UTC)

Making user talk page appear inactive in signature?
I don't want to out this editor at this time, but they've changed the coloring on the word "talk" in their signature to be the same, or nearly the same, as it would be if their talk page did not exist. While I think this is bad form, I'm not sure whether it rises to a level at which they should be talked with about it, and I've had a contentious enough relationship with this editor that I'm not sure my broaching the subject would go over well. Thoughts? DonIago (talk) 13:46, 26 June 2017 (UTC)


 * What do you mean with inactive? You mean a redlink? Well, many editors have red linked talk pages, it just means no one has left a message yet. How is that disruptive? Regards  So Why  14:00, 26 June 2017 (UTC)
 * Their talk page is not inactive, they've just colored the "talk" in their signature (perhaps inadvertently) utilizing the same color. In other words it's a faux redlink. I didn't say it was disruptive, but I do think it's potentially misleading. Hence my posting here to ask editors who may know more about the subject than I do whether it is a point of concern. DonIago (talk) 15:34, 26 June 2017 (UTC)
 * I know the case. I think it was discussed briefly somewhere and the view was that it was a bit disconcerting but ok. Some far worse signatures can be seen in the wild. Johnuniq (talk) 23:02, 26 June 2017 (UTC)
 * Fair enough. Thanks John. DonIago (talk) 04:37, 27 June 2017 (UTC)

Is a visible name required?
I thought this guideline required a visible name in a signature, but all I can find concerns size/color/font etc. There is a requirement for a link to the user page or user talk page or contributions. Is the following compliant with the guideline?
 * Example comment. talk 12:17 16th July 2017

It's not a big deal, but I find it irritating that a guideline does not contain clear guidance about what I would have thought was an obvious point. I suppose the fact that people show nicknames instead of their user name, and sometimes icon characters, means that a visible name is not needed? Johnuniq (talk) 00:44, 27 August 2017 (UTC)
 * Having just one link - to a talk page in this case - is fine. But
 * A customised signature should make it easy to identify the username, to visit the user's talk-page, and preferably user page.
 * So this
 * Example comment. Example 12:17 16th July 2017
 * would be OK for the signature, but not for the timestamp. Some scripts and bots won't recognise it either because a comma is missing after the time, or because the day is an ordinal. The lack of a time zone is also an issue for one of the archiving bots. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 09:23, 27 August 2017 (UTC)
 * Thanks but I can't really complain about the section at the bottom of Talk:Acupuncture if the guideline does not spell that out. Absolutely the only good thing that could be said about Flow is that it would stop all the nonsense with signatures (because there aren't any)! Johnuniq (talk) 10:36, 27 August 2017 (UTC)
 * Signatures: various user scripts and talk-page archiving bots, including lowercase sigmabot III, rely on their time stamps to know when to archive old threads. It's because of this that it's also important to avoid overly customizing the date output of a signature, as doing so can lead to stale threads persisting long after they'd otherwise be archived. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 12:03, 27 August 2017 (UTC)

Legitimate alternate accounts
I wonder if we can add a brief note to the section "Signature forgery" to the following effect: "If a user has a legitimate alternate account, it is acceptable (but not required) for the signature of that alternate account to point to the primary account user page/user talk page/user contributions page." StevenJ81 (talk) 17:18, 1 November 2017 (UTC)
 * I don't think that would work. Notifications may fail if the signature is not genuine, and bots like may treat such a "signed" post as if it were unsigned. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 19:33, 1 November 2017 (UTC)
 * Are you sure? I think it looks for a link to a user page and a time stamp; I don't think it compares it against the edit history. StevenJ81 (talk) 19:43, 1 November 2017 (UTC)
 * Let's try both of them: I shall sign this as if it were posted by my other account; wait fifteen minutes or so (to give SineBot a chance to act) and then post here to say if you were notified or not. --Redrose64a (talk) 20:53, 1 November 2017 (UTC)
 * SineBot didn't act, so it thinks that the posting was correctly signed. On the other hand, I wasn't notified. BUT ... I think notification is triggered by ~ . So now let's try something different. I will sign on as my alternate account (User:SJ81), whose ~ uses my primary account. I will ping you here and sign with tildes. Let's see if (a) SineBot does anything (I doubt it) or (b) you get notified (I hope). StevenJ81 (talk) 21:51, 1 November 2017 (UTC)
 * OK. this one is coming from the alternate account, but is being signed with tildes. StevenJ81 (talk) 21:52, 1 November 2017 (UTC)
 * notified me; did not. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 23:38, 1 November 2017 (UTC)
 * If User:Someone posts a comment, the signature should indicate that. If the signature suggests that User:Other posted the comment, the signature is misleading and should be disallowed. That's for the sanity of others checking discussions later, and to prevent wikilawyering around what people can get away with. It does not matter if User:Other has a notice or redirect to User:Someone, there is simply no reason to sign with anything other than a proper signature. Johnuniq (talk) 00:07, 2 November 2017 (UTC)
 * I can go with that. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 08:33, 2 November 2017 (UTC)
 * OK, then. And I will change the custom signature on the alternate account accordingly. StevenJ81 (talk) 14:25, 2 November 2017 (UTC)

Clarifying the project page
The project page (Signatures) includes some things that I have questions about.
 * Customizing how everyone sees your signature
 * If you wish to include the pipe or equals  characters, these must be escaped, or they will break templates unexpectedly when your signature is present. To escape the   symbol, you can use   and to escape the   character,   will work.

Well, I just configured my signature as
 * → Anomalocaris =|= Talk &#61;&#124;&#61;

and it works fine. It will appear at the end of this posting, after which I will revert to the default signature. Is the escape requirement because it works fine on talk pages, but there are templates that involve user signatures? Which templates are those?
 * Appearance and color
 * Be sparing with subscript and superscript.

What is that supposed to mean? Lots of signatures use one or both of these techniques. I did find one user who used it recursively, something like
 * → JoeShmotalk

And I might agree that  and   should not be nested, but other than that, how is a user to interpret "be sparing with"? Sould we change this to "Do not nest  and   tags"?
 * Length
 * The software will automatically truncate both plain and raw signatures to 255 characters of code in the Signature field. If substitution of templates or another page is used, please be careful to verify that you are not violating the length limit, as the software will not do this automatically.

Well, AnemoneProjectors has a signature with, viz:
 * → —  a nemone   p ro j ec t ors

and the markup is below 255 characters, but after substitution, it's way over 255 characters, and it works fine, so what is the warning "please be careful to verify that you are not violating the length limit" supposed to mean? —Anomalocaris =|= Talk &#61;&#124;&#61; 23:16, 28 November 2017 (UTC) PAGE ]]) 23:57, 28 November 2017 (UTC) PAGE ]]) 01:55, 29 November 2017 (UTC)
 * WP:Signatures is a behavioral guideline and policy, not a technical guideline. While not escaping pipes and equals signs technically is accepted by the software, it could potentially cause problems with any templates designed to encapsulate parts of talk pages. The second half of the sentence in the guideline about using subscript and superscript says to avoid cases that change line spacing, which the JoeShmo example doesn't. While 's signature isn't caught by the software due to technical limitations, it violates the behavioral guideline. --Ahecht ([[User_talk:Ahecht|<span style="color:#FFF;background:#00f;display:inline-block;padding:1px 1px 0;vertical-align:-.3em;font:bold 50%/1 sans-serif;text-align:center;">TALK
 * Ahecht: Thank you for your reply.
 * There are equals signs on talk pages, and I'm not aware of any guideline that implies that one should avoid anything like  → E=MC2 on a talk page. If it's OK outside a signature, why is it a problem inside a signature?
 * How can subscript and superscript affect surrounding text? The system does not allow users to save signatures with unclosed tags.
 * If subscript and superscript really can affect surrounding text, would it make sense to change the point to something like
 * Avoid using subscript and superscript in ways that affect the way that surrounding text is displayed.
 * What behavioral guideline is violated by the signature of AnemoneProjectors? It is less than 255 characters as coded, and it displays as just 19 characters on the screen. What am I missing here?
 * —Anomalocaris (talk) 01:22, 29 November 2017 (UTC)
 * Substitution must not be used to circumvent the normal restrictions on signature content, including the use of images, obnoxious markup, or excessive length. The limit isn't 255 characters as coded in ones preferences, its 255 characters as it appears in the page source. --Ahecht ([[User_talk:Ahecht|<span style="color:#FFF;background:#00f;display:inline-block;padding:1px 1px 0;vertical-align:-.3em;font:bold 50%/1 sans-serif;text-align:center;">TALK
 * I wasn't aware of this. I really like my smallcaps signature. Is there anything else I can do to keep it? —  a nemone   p ro j ec t ors  09:26, 29 November 2017 (UTC)
 * I've changed my signature, I'll work on it to see if I can find a way to get it how I like without substing templates. — anemone  projectors  09:39, 29 November 2017 (UTC)
 * Ok, I'm happy now. Hopefully this one is ok. (p.s. apologies for being slightly off-topic; my own signature can be discussed at User talk:AnemoneProjectors) — ᴀnemone  ᴘroᴊecтors  09:54, 29 November 2017 (UTC)
 * In plain talk page discussions (such as the one that we're having here), equals signs and pipes do not cause any problem. The problems can occur when it is not a plain discussion.
 * For instance, if you close a discussion by using the template, it's common practice to provide a signed closing summary, as in . Here, the first positional parameter is the closing statement and signature. Now imagine that your signature has a pipe in it; in such a case, the first positional parameter is the closing statement and first half of your signature, and the second positional parameter is the second half of your signature plus the timestamp - but  doesn't recognise a second positional parameter, so that desirable information is simply not displayed. It makes no difference to utilise the I've closed this because it's clear that everybody agrees. ~ syntax instead - a pipe splits one parameter from the next. Equals signs also cause problems with positional parameters - the part before the equals becomes a parameter name, almost certainly unrecognised; and the part after the equals becomes the value of that unrecognised parameter, so is almost certainly ignored outright.
 * Another case concerns Requests for comment. Bare pipes do not cause problems in RfC discussions, but if one occurs in the opening statement of an RfC (including within the signature of that statement), it will break the RFC listing pages when the statement is bot-copied over.
 * In short: we've put these recommendations into WP:CUSTOMSIG because there are demonstrable reasons why going against them is bad practice. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 23:06, 29 November 2017 (UTC)
 * Redrose64: Thank you for clarifying re pipe and equals. I welcome your thoughts on subscript and superscript, and on the use of to sneak around the 255-character limit. —Anomalocaris (talk) 23:43, 29 November 2017 (UTC)
 * Because it's extremely annoying to the point of potential WP:DE if someone's signature severely disrupts the rendering of the page, or if the signature is an inordinate amount of wikitext when editing the page. Anomie⚔ 21:20, 30 November 2017 (UTC)
 * Anomie: Sure, but I have yet to see anyone offer an example of the use of subscript or superscript that disrupts the rendering of a page, remembering that the system won't accept signature strings with missing end tags. —Anomalocaris (talk) 23:38, 1 December 2017 (UTC)

I think nesting is one of the issues (for example:

the quick red fox the quick red fox the quick red fox the quick red fox the quick red fox the quick red fox the quick red fox the quickXyzzy Xyzzy red fox thexyzzy xyzzy quick red fox the quick red fox the quick red fox the quick red fox)

but maybe also sub/superscripts containing other acceptable markup - or characters with strange sizes?

As to length the specific 255 limit is historical, "back in the day" a 64k page was considered too long, and it was important to save bandwidth and, to some extent, disk space. In addition, and this has not changed (except that some people use VE), too much ("source" being sigs makes the wikitext harder to read. Other wikis encourage the use of templates for precisely this reason.

All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 12:42, 29 January 2018 (UTC).

Excessive text shadow?
I have seen some signatures with possibly excessive font shadow. Copying the markup into my signature, we have examples like these, which I have merged into other text to help evaluate the disruptiveness of the font shadow. Please offer your thoughts as to whether you find these font shadow examples disruptive. If you do find these examples disruptive, please suggest how you would modify the project page to explain not to do what these examples are doing. (Making your browser window narrow will help make the problem visible.)

The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog. The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog. <span style="white-space:nowrap;text-shadow:#F8F8FF 0em 0em 0.8em,#FF4500 -0.3em -0.3em 0.9em,#90EE90 0.3em 0.3em 0.8em;color:#696969">Anomalocaris : talk The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog. The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog. <span style="white-space:nowrap;text-shadow:blue 0em 0em 0.8em,green -0.8em -0.8em 0.9em,black 0.7em 0.7em 0.8em;color:#000000">Anomalocaris (talk)  The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog. The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog. The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog. <span style="text-shadow: 4px 4px 15px #FF9900, -4px -4px 15px #FF0099;"><b style="color: #0000FF">Anomalocaris</b><b style="font-family:Helvetica Neue;color:#707">Talk</b> The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog. The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog. —Anomalocaris (talk) 09:21, 21 January 2018 (UTC) PAGE ]]) 14:29, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I do find all of those examples distracting to the eye, which detracts from the reader's ability to understand discussions. It's signatures like that that feed the widespread sentiment to get rid of signature customization. But, despite that fact that WP:SIGAPP is a Wikipedia policy, its enforcement is almost a lost cause. I recently spent about 4 hours of my time, over two days, convincing one editor to change the colors in his sig, and he was a new editor. I long ago gave up trying the same thing with established editors. They like their flashy sigs and they won't change them short of a community outcry against them. One longtime editor has a confusing signature, I asked him on his UTP to change it, he refused, I suggested that he add "I know my signature is confusing and I don't care" near the top of his UTP, and he did so. That's the reality we have today, and until it changes I see little point in "improving" the guidance beyond what we have at WP:SIGAPP and WP:SIGPROB. &#8213; Mandruss  &#9742;  02:58, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Mandruss: I have asked over 500 users to update their signatures to remove images, obsolete HTML tags, and unescaped pipes and equals. One responded (in their deletion comment) with hostility; some are ignoring my message; most are complying. Even if some users are intentionally ignoring policy, I think most do and will comply, and we should set a reasonable guideline, because without a standard, users can reply, "I don't think my text shadow is distracting." My proposal: In the bullets under Your signature must not blink, scroll, or otherwise cause inconvenience to or annoy other editors, add one more bullet:
 * Do not use text shadow that spreads to lines above or below your signature.
 * Or perhaps some other words that say the same thing more elegantly. Perhaps numeric limits would be better, something like,
 * Do not use text shadow with a blur radius greater than 10px or 1.0em.
 * These numbers are based on very limited experiments; perhaps there should also be a limit on the absolute value of the vertical shadow. —Anomalocaris (talk) 09:32, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Good luck. I'm regularly advised that Wikipedia does not have firm rules and that community consensus is in what editors do, not what is written down. &#8213; Mandruss  &#9742;  19:33, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
 * When it comes to poor contrast or obscured text, that is an accessibility issue. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 22:04, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Redrose64: Thank you for your observation. I was thinking about text shadow obscuring adjacent text; I wasn't thinking about text shadow obscuring the shadowed text by lack of contrast, but that can be an issue too, e.g. in my example <span style="white-space:nowrap;text-shadow:blue 0em 0em 0.8em,green -0.8em -0.8em 0.9em,black 0.7em 0.7em 0.8em;color:#000000">Anomalocaris (talk)  . This issue is already covered in the note on contrast ratio, so I don't think an additional guideline is needed, but again thank you for pointing it out. —Anomalocaris (talk) 08:49, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
 * I think Redrose64's point about accessibility applies to all use of text-shadow, not just those which are too large or the colors have bad contrast because using text-shadow is by definition is an attempt to draw the attention to one's signature and away from the text. That's why my .css file contains  for all tags. Personally, I think banning the use of text-shadow in signatures altogether is the best way to go forward.There is plenty you can do to have an individual signature already without using such code. Regards  So  Why  10:48, 29 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Yes, indeed: contrast of the directly-shadowed text, and obscuring the adjacent text (to the sides, above and below). -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 12:12, 29 January 2018 (UTC)
 * The other problem with text shadows is that many of them violate the contrast clause of WP:COLOR (which specifically applies everywhere, not just articles), and creates an accessibility issue. The first example you gave passes AA but not AAA, and the other two fail AA as well. --Ahecht ([[User_talk:Ahecht|<span style="color:#FFF;background:#00F;display:inline-block;padding:1px 1px 0;vertical-align:-.3em;font:bold 50%/1 sans-serif;text-align:center">TALK


 * In general I like it when things are memorable but not when they are distracting. That is a very fine line to tread, and perhaps why people are reluctant to enforce this policy.  All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 12:29, 29 January 2018 (UTC).


 * Agreed. Recognizing that people may find my signature annoying, I think simplicity wins and that minimal tweaking to allow us some individuality works best. In my case, I like the red, white and blue and the background is there so the white shows.-- <b style="color: red;">Georgia Army Vet</b> <i style="color: white;">Contribs</i> <b style="color: blue;">Talk</b> 15:18, 29 January 2018 (UTC)