About M / F

[Rxpert83]

I understand, but then why say this:

The problem others are saying with updating forum software is that you have to pay someone to code the change. Then each time the forum software gets updated you typically have to incorporate all of the custom changes all over again.

I think a perfect example for this would be ROM devs. Each time an update is pushed out for your device they basically have to start all over adding in their modifications and removing bloat from the new base. The same would have to be done for the forums each time it gets its software updated .

so that is why if this was accepted it could wait till next update and would not be done by itself. he thinks this,(if accepted) needs its own attention, (by his post), no it can wait till next update.

I'm not quite sure you got the full grasp of what I was saying. It was kind of an addition to and an attempt at giving an example of what was said before by martimus and unforgiven(quoted below). I was typing from my device so my apologies if it seemed short or not fully explained.

And as others have stated, implementing this would most likely require custom programming. And custom programming both costs the site owner money... and makes it impossible for the developers to upgrade the vbulletin software in the future without a lot more testing and modification... and that costs the site owner more money. Since it wouldn't be prudent of us to spend Rob's money... or maybe it would ... I suspect that the final decision on any sort of custom programming would be his to make.

Over that past couple of months we have seen custom mod after custom mod disappear due to unacceptable degradation to the performance of the site. Many of these are missed by several members (especially me) but were removed necessarily (as deemed by the Admin and site devs) in order to make the site useable for the members.

So I'm not saying the forum will never get updated or that this update has to be done now. What I was trying to say is that as the quoted users pointed out, each time a custom modification is made to the forum code the modification has to be re-done each time the forum software is updated. Much like a ROM dev has to do each time the device gets an OTA update.

Is this clearer? Maybe I made it more confusing

 

[EarlyMon]

I get that. But if and when a new update for the forums comes out, if you have to redo the whole thing (which you have to do or if in there redoing things anyhow) how hard is it to incorperate this too (if accepted) is what i'm saying??? some and you are talking about cost/money, if have to update you need to redo????? RIGHT?????

you all think i'm wanting this done now today, NO, when a new update is ready to come out.

Please don't speculate on what we think.

As to how hard is to incorporate, Xyro, Martimus and I have already responded. No further discussion on that is on-point at this time in the discussion.

Cheers, thanks.

 

[cwhatever]

I'm not quite sure you got the full grasp of what I was saying. It was kind of an addition to and an attempt at giving an example of what was said before by martimus and unforgiven(quoted below). I was typing from my device so my apologies if it seemed short or not fully explained.






So I'm not saying the forum will never get updated or that this update has to be done now. What I was trying to say is that as the quoted users pointed out, each time a custom modification is made to the forum code the modification has to be re-done each time the forum software is updated. Much like a ROM dev has to do each time the device gets an OTA update.

Is this clearer? Maybe I made it more confusing

yes it is and does not need a special reconstruction of the site now, when the next update at which has to be redone anyways.

 

[Petrah]

Anytime I have referred to a member by the incorrect shorthand and they let me know, a quick "oops, sorry" in a subsequent post has been more than enough to smooth any ruffled feathers.

But wouldn't it be nice not to have ruffled any feathers to begin with? It's like rubbing a cats fur backwards.. annoying lol.

Just sayin.

 

[Petrah]

In the end, the problem is the assumption people are making. Stop using he/she if you don't know the person. Earlys comment is dead on.

If female members really feel like this is needed, I'm Ok with it.

I just doubt there's that big of a need for it when the problem can easily be corrected by not making assumptions.

Unfortunatley this assumption is something we cannot change with a mere "don't do it anymore!" post. It's learned behavior all over the Internet (too many jokes making fun of ""everyone thinks everyone else on the net is male"... no joke, honestly, Google it).

I don't think that it should be a required question though. Perhaps even make it just like the option to add your device information. The option to fill out the info is there, it's just not "in your face".

You cannot use forum avs to guess gender. Over on one of the other Android forums one of the guys has an avatar of the girl he is in-love with. He eventually had to add a new title that said "Not a girl!!". My own previous Av was a picture of Keith Urban (cuz he's just hawt). One of my friends here PMed me to tease me about my "five oclock shadow" lol.

Av's should be an expression of who you are, not what you are.

 

[Petrah]

I'm not quite sure you got the full grasp of what I was saying. It was kind of an addition to and an attempt at giving an example of what was said before by martimus and unforgiven(quoted below). I was typing from my device so my apologies if it seemed short or not fully explained.






So I'm not saying the forum will never get updated or that this update has to be done now. What I was trying to say is that as the quoted users pointed out, each time a custom modification is made to the forum code the modification has to be re-done each time the forum software is updated. Much like a ROM dev has to do each time the device gets an OTA update.

Is this clearer? Maybe I made it more confusing

Adding a gender icon and option is that easy. It's either a mod (or addon if you will) or it's already a default option that comes with the forum software. If it's a mod then you merely just drop it in the appropriate folder where the forum is located on the hosting account and enable it through the admin panel. I'm gonna guess that if a mod is used will already come with the two gender icons. If it's default with vBulletin, then ticking a box to enable it takes two seconds.

It's been years since I've messed with vBulletin, and the hosting clients I had that did use it were able to install it without my assistance.

 

[Petrah]

Personally, and this is simply my opinion, I do not think it would be prudent to display gender information in member posts. After all this isn't a dating web site where gender roles play a part in the interaction between members. That said I do understand that in the Lounges and in some discussions they can find their way into the conversation. One example that comes to mind is that a growing number of people respond to others with things like "Thanks Man!". Apparently I must be ancient since I only say "Thanks!"...

If something like this were to be implemented I'm thinking that the site owner would probably want it to be completely optional. In other words, someone could indicate "Male", "Female", or nothing at all. And we probably would not want that field to be populated manually from a field in User Control Panel. Otherwise we could end up with people responding with "Often", or "Yes Please", or "Huh?", etc...

If someone needs to make this information known then they currently have options oto do so. If they are a Premium member they can add this information to their custom title. If they aren't a Premium member, or would prefer to not display this in the title field, they could add it to their signature (though it will only be displayed once per page). If I recall correctly, one of our Guides, Baby Blues, added an icon to her signature identifying herself as a "Girl Guide".

I hear and respect your opinion. However, here's some more food for thought;

Every male on this forum (and every other forum or public medium out there) doesn't even think about the replies they get. You see it all the time people refer to you as "dude, guy, man, mate" etc. etc. etc. You see this and you think absolutely nothing of it. It's normal for you to see this.

But for women, we see this all the time too and a lot of us definitely take notice each and every time it happens (I guarantee this happens more than you might think). It's annoying to always be refereed to as something you are not. I'm not saying that all women are bothered by this, because I'm positive there are those out there who just don't mind. I'm one of those people who do mind simply because it happens so much.

I would like the option to choose my gender in the forum preferences, and have it show somewhere on the left side of each of my posts.

 

[EarlyMon]

What about the people that call me EarlyMom and insist that I'm a woman? Absolutes are often tricky.

 

[cwhatever]

What about the people that call me EarlyMom and insist that I'm a woman? Absolutes are often tricky.

we all see an avatar for the first time and whatever we associate it with that sticks forever until you find out different. like me seeing yours the first thing that hit me and to this day still that you might be a person that loves to get up early and get the day going. funny huh.

 

[wetbiker7]

I'm just going to say this and then leave this subject be. It has been brought to the attention of the AF Mods and I'm sure a carefully thought through decision will be made on whether or not to add the option.

I would also like to say thank you for taking the option in to consideration. I think it would be a nice addition.

Have a great day everyone!

 

[EarlyMon]

we all see an avatar for the first time and whatever we associate it with that sticks forever until you find out different. like me seeing yours the first thing that hit me and to this day still that you might be a person that loves to get up early and get the day going. funny huh.

Actually, that's what a lot of people call me in real life, often with a Jamaican accent. That or Early.

And fwiw, we use a heavily customized vBulletin to manage a million+ member site, simple pretty much left long ago.

Absolutely though, admin will see this, and the mod position expressed here is consistent - so long as it's not required and doesn't cause problems and is worth it, we're not opposing it.

 

[Phases]

I don't see a problem with giving this a shot. You should now see a gender section in "Edit your details" of our User CP.

If the option is set to male or female, it should show in the postbit here, as you see for me:









<-----------

 

[cwhatever]

I don't see a problem with giving this a shot. You should now see a gender section in "Edit your details" of our User CP.

If the option is set to male or female, it should show in the postbit here, as you see for me:









<-----------

Thank you for this, hope it works out which it should. Thanks for listening to a suggestion, from the people. And again sorry if some of my posts to others in this thread sounded mean, wasn't trying to be. Thanks again for everything you all do here.

 

[sammyz]

There should be an announcement for this so everyone can see they can set gender

 

[Petrah]

What about the people that call me EarlyMom and insist that I'm a woman? Absolutes are often tricky.

:hahaha:
Oh goodness rofl.. now you KNOW imma have to call you mom!!

 

[cwhatever]

There should be an announcement for this so everyone can see they can set gender

I was thinking the same thing or if we post a thread in the lounge and post a post in our specific device the word will get around pretty quick that way. or an anouncement would work too. Otherwise no one will even know its there for them to have the option to use if want to.

 

[EarlyMon]

I was thinking the same thing or if we post a thread in the lounge and post a post in our specific device the word will get around pretty quick that way. or an anouncement would work too. Otherwise no one will even know its there for them to have the option to use if want to.

Please just restrict it to the Lounge for now, let us handle announcements, ok?

Perfectly ok to add a link to the Lounge thread in your sigs for now.

What one person sees as a service in a device forum, another will see as a disruption and then complain to us. You don't want that, we don't want that.

Thanks for understanding.

 

[Phases]

It will snowball anyway, as more and more people start to notice it in postbits.

 

[SUroot]

I'm not a female if that is what you thought. Don't know where you thought I said I was a female?

No, the "royal you"

 

[cwhatever]

No, the "royal you"

Oh, ok.

 

[MacFett]

I'm not a female if that is what you thought. Don't know where you thought I said I was a female?

we all see an avatar for the first time and whatever we associate it with that sticks forever until you find out different. like me seeing yours the first thing that hit me and to this day still that you might be a person that loves to get up early and get the day going. funny huh.

Sorry to say cwhatever, but when I first "met" you I thought you were female. I think it was in your Did You Know This? thread. And it was your avatar and your username. You have a lolcat avatar and I know only two males who like lolcats, Wil Wheaton and Jimiyo. And your username I always thought of it as someone starting to type a name and then after the first character gave up and put whatever, this is something my wife does so I associated it with a female behavior.

My own previous Av was a picture of Keith Urban (cuz he's just hawt). One of my friends here PMed me to tease me about my "five o'clock shadow" lol.

Guilty as charged!

I personally like this change and would love to see as Petrah mentioned a male or female graphic near the username.

Now for my own male/female confusion story.

I have a first name that is typically a female name. I grew up in a VERY small town in rural New Mexico (elementary school had 60 kids and I had to ride two buses for over 90 minutes to get to middle and high school because I had to go to the next town). I was raised by hippies, I have had long hair all my life and there was a girl in my school with the same name, I got beat up daily because I was, "gay" or "a girl."

At age 8 I started going by my middle name and did so until I got to college. I love my first name, it screams my Irish heritage, so now as an adult I went back to my first name. Now I get a job and I have to send out emails to my clients and everyone thinks I am female again and when they find out I am male I get the cold shoulder, no joke. One woman asked for someone else to handle her project because she felt "tricked" by my name.

Online I typically give out a different name than my own, a character from an H.P. Lovecraft book or Doctor Who's alias of John Smith.

 

[cwhatever]

I know that's funny how deceiving a name or picture could be. And like I said before once you assume something it gets stuck in your head until you find out otherwise. Thank you for sharing that information.

 

[treb1797]

Test

 

[Koumajutsu]

LMBO!!!! See.... this is exactly what I mean. PERFECT EXAMPLE.

Here something even funnier..... before I changed my avatar to something more masculine, people used to see my name and think Wetbiker was female. Imagine that. LOL

A Wetbike is a personal watercraft.

Here I just assumed you like to ride in the rain. (dangit, no smilies riding a chopper in the list)