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Suggestion: avatar file size limit

Should animations be allowed in avatars?

  • Yes

    Votes: 23 60.5%
  • No

    Votes: 7 18.4%
  • Depends

    Votes: 8 21.1%

  • Total voters
    38

aronpm

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I propose that the file size limit for avatars be raised from 20.0KB to something larger like 100KB or 200KB. The 80x80 limit is fine, even though it could potentially be a bit larger without taking up any more space on the screen.

Arguments for:
Allows a more expressive range of avatars to be uploaded. Other websites allow avatars to be up to several hundred kilobytes, with no problems.

Arguments against:
People might slow internet or low download quotas. However this is 2012, not 1992, people should be able to handle a few pictures. And if they can't, they should have avatars disabled in the control panel already. Also, there's this thing called a cache. It means you don't have to download the avatars every single time you open a thread.

tl;dr: i want animated gif avatars
 
Last edited:

aronpm

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yes but they are only a few frames, and greyscale.

good gifs are impossible to get under 20KB without making them have like 5 colours
 

qqwref

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I don't really like gif avatars... there are a few that are decent, but in other forums some people use things which flash or are otherwise irritating, which can make it hard to concentrate on posts without getting distracted. (And I don't want to just turn off avatars, because I do tend to use them to tell people apart. I could just block the image with Adblock Plus, but I'd rather not have to.)

If you ask me, a larger filesize wouldn't hurt, but I'd like to explicitly forbid animated avatars. I feel like the annoying ones outweigh the awesome ones.
 

aronpm

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I don't really like gif avatars... there are a few that are decent, but in other forums some people use things which flash or are otherwise irritating, which can make it hard to concentrate on posts without getting distracted. (And I don't want to just turn off avatars, because I do tend to use them to tell people apart. I could just block the image with Adblock Plus, but I'd rather not have to.)

If you ask me, a larger filesize wouldn't hurt, but I'd like to explicitly forbid animated avatars. I feel like the annoying ones outweigh the awesome ones.

There are already people with pretty annoying avatars, . For a while I was blocking Ben's avatars because they annoyed me every time I saw them. I'm considering blocking all the pony avatars. I also block the speedsolving banner because it's a waste of my vertical screen real estate, but that's irrelevant.

If an avatar is really annoying and distracting (like flashing colours or something), I don't see why a moderator or admin couldn't give the person a warning and/or change the avatar.
 

ThomasJE

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If you want to use gif avatars, use a file converter. There are many around the internet, and probably a few to download.

And for the file size limit, it's fine as it is now. Who needs a very complicated avatar anyway? The majority either don't have an avatar or have a simple avatar. And for us small-screen laptop users, a larger avatar is the last thing we need. If it isn't broken, don't fix it.
 

aronpm

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Hi, it seems like you didn't read the thread at all.
If you want to use gif avatars, use a file converter. There are many around the internet, and probably a few to download.
I don't need a file converter. I already have GIFs and could make my own if I wanted to. You also are able to use animated GIF avatars at this stage but due to the 20KB file size limit, it's severely restricted.

And for the file size limit, it's fine as it is now. Who needs a very complicated avatar anyway? The majority either don't have an avatar or have a simple avatar. And for us small-screen laptop users, a larger avatar is the last thing we need. If it isn't broken, don't fix it.
Besides saying that the avatar size COULD be increased, I didn't suggest that as a change. This would have no effect on people with small screens. As in, there is already plenty of space around the avatar. For example, I'll make an example of Spec's avatar. It's 80x80, and you can see there is a lot of unused space around the avatar. Before you try to say that it is so spacious because of my screen size, 1) I'm using a laptop too, and B) the CSS says 180px, so it's independent of screen size. But this isn't important, because I didn't suggest that the avatar image size should be increased.

btw there is hardly any restriction on avatar height; if you make a 1x80px avatar, it will be rendered as 80x6400 because of "width:80px"
 
Last edited:

insane569

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because I do tend to use them to tell people apart.

Agreed. It's easier to look at the pic instead of the name.

As long as you continue to put cute azn girls in your avatar I'm all for it :p

Also agreed.

I'm all down for a bigger file size if it means more quality. Sime avatars are really cool but I can't really make out any details.
 

ThomasJE

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Besides saying that the avatar size COULD be increased, I didn't suggest that as a change. This would have no effect on people with small screens.

I was mainly talking about file size. Small laptops don't tend to have the fastest internet speed. I'm sure there are some people whose internet speed is just bearable. The avatars are fine as they are; we don't need anything else regarding this.
 

aronpm

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I was mainly talking about file size. Small laptops don't tend to have the fastest internet speed. I'm sure there are some people whose internet speed is just bearable. The avatars are fine as they are; we don't need anything else regarding this.

I already addressed the issue of file size in the OP. It's actually not a very large increase at all, and the images will be cached. And if you're internet is SO bad that you can't download avatars, you should have them disabled already.

And are they fine the way they are? People have already said they want more.
 
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