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05:32, 29th March 2024 (GMT+0)

Proposal: External Portrait Images.

Posted by Waxahachie
Waxahachie
member, 145 posts
The horn that wakes
the sleepers
Fri 27 Jan 2017
at 02:37
  • msg #1

Proposal: External Portrait Images

Proposal: External Portrait Images

Summary
  • Currently, the only source of character portraits is the RPOL hosted portrait gallery, populated previously by users e-mailing specially formatted pictures to a moderator, who then had to manually sort, categorize, and upload all of the images.
  • The management of the portrait gallery is a burdensome task for the moderator in question, and has reached the point where new submissions to the portrait gallery have been suspended indefinitely.
  • While 10,000 seems like a large number and one might imagine that most needs are covered, some needs are covered extensively and some not at all.

Proposal
Allow users to set their own portait based on an externally hosted image.

Spoiler text: (Highlight or hover over the text to view)
There are a variety of ways this could be done, but here's one approach:
  • On the Character Details page, provide a Character Image Link field for an image URL to be entered.
  • When the field contains a URL that ends in an accepted image format extension, the character portrait will render the image from the URL, limiting it to 100 x 100 pixels
  • When the field is blank, no character portrait will render unless one has been selected from the gallery.
  • If something not recognized as an image is entered instead, it can be blank (or if that's not possible or hard, render the image not found icon it uses when using the <img src=""> tag with an invalid link)
  • If a character portrait is selected from the gallery, it will clear the existing image URL, and the selected gallery portrait will display as normal.


Benefits
  • Moderators won't need to categorize and upload images
  • RPOL/Shannara won't have to host more images than what already exists in the gallery
  • Users can instantly have any portrait they can imagine for a character



Disclaimer:
I know there are hundreds of such features in the pipeline, and I know jase does this as a hobby (for which I am infinitely grateful), and I have no expectations. The existing portrait gallery is pretty awesome, and I know Shannara and others have put in a lot of hard work into it. But with submissions to the portrait gallery shut down indefinitely, I think this might be something worth considering and potentially prioritizing.

This message was undeleted by the user at 14:13, Fri 27 Jan 2017.
Evil Empryss
member, 1522 posts
Try tasting your words
before spitting them out
Fri 27 Jan 2017
at 02:46
  • msg #2

Proposal: External Portrait Images

Actually, a group of volunteers is already on the ball to get the gallery updates back on track.  With multiple helpers working on it, we hope that it won't bog down again.  No need for drastic changes to the system just yet.  ^_^
Skald
moderator, 758 posts
Whatever it is,
I'm against it
Fri 27 Jan 2017
at 04:32

Proposal: External Portrait Images

And that would be a no, for all the reasons given every time this comes up - we'd have absolutely no control over whether an image was offensive or copyrighted.
Waxahachie
member, 146 posts
The horn that wakes
the sleepers
Fri 27 Jan 2017
at 04:46
  • msg #4

Re: Proposal: External Portrait Images

Skald:
And that would be a no, for all the reasons given every time this comes up


My apologies - I searched for other times this came up and didn't find anything. Not my intention to be repetitive of an old request.
This message was last edited by the user at 05:05, Fri 27 Jan 2017.
Skald
moderator, 760 posts
Whatever it is,
I'm against it
Fri 27 Jan 2017
at 05:17
  • msg #5

Re: Proposal: External Portrait Images

Apologies not necessary - never hurts to ask a question !  <grins>
drewalt
member, 55 posts
Fri 27 Jan 2017
at 11:39
  • msg #6

Re: Proposal: External Portrait Images

Skald:
And that would be a no, for all the reasons given every time this comes up - we'd have absolutely no control over whether an image was offensive or copyrighted.


I sincerely mean no offense, but this response genuinely baffles me.  The site already has links to remotely hosted images that the administrators and moderators have not previously approved, and the power to suspend/ban/flag accounts which link to inappropriate images would not be removed under this proposal.
Shannara
moderator, 3706 posts
Keep calm, drink more
COFFEE!!!!
Fri 27 Jan 2017
at 12:53

Re: Proposal: External Portrait Images

drewalt:
Skald:
And that would be a no, for all the reasons given every time this comes up - we'd have absolutely no control over whether an image was offensive or copyrighted.


I sincerely mean no offense, but this response genuinely baffles me.  The site already has links to remotely hosted images that the administrators and moderators have not previously approved, and the power to suspend/ban/flag accounts which link to inappropriate images would not be removed under this proposal.


No, but it just has the potential to make the damage more widespread if misused, and lessens the ability of GMs to help police inappropriate images.

Anyone who wants to use an externally hosted image in their posts currently already has the ability. With the use of the in game scratchpad to hold the code, the effort required, should someone want to do it, is, IMO, pretty minimal.

Most of the sites that do allow people to use any image for an avatar allow one avatar .... that is used for every game the user is in, and using code to import their 'character' pic in any post they want it in is the norm.  Of the sites I've used, only 2 give the user the ability to use multiple pics simultaneously, and the other site is set up pretty much like RPoL in that regard.
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