How will gravatar be supported be Neowin?


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I don't know where else to post so I decided to post here.

In the upcoming 3.0 release of IPB, gravatar will be a core component. I'm just curious as to how it will be supported. Will all members be forced to sign up with a gravatar account or will it be an option up to the user?

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We haven't decided as a site how we'll be dealing with this. I would very much doubt you'll be forced to have an account just for an avatar however.

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I know most users may not like the idea of having to create a gravatar account just so they can display their avatar but most people probably already have an account without even realising it!

Gmail and yahoo already support openID, windows live id will "soon" support it too, not too sure about the other email services. It'll be overall beneficial for neowin if gravatar is considered the primary form of displaying a user's avatar. It'll sure save a lot of bandwidth. Maybe force new users to use their gravatar? And allow original users to phase to gravatar.

I just realised I may sound like that I work for gravatar, but...I'm a strong advocate of openID and think it should be widely adopted. I'm just sick and tired of having to keep track of multiple avatars and gravatar handles the situation nicely.

Anyway, just my 2c.

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I know most users may not like the idea of having to create a gravatar account just so they can display their avatar but most people probably already have an account without even realising it!

Gmail and yahoo already support openID, windows live id will "soon" support it too, not too sure about the other email services. It'll be overall beneficial for neowin if gravatar is considered the primary form of displaying a user's avatar. It'll sure save a lot of bandwidth. Maybe force new users to use their gravatar? And allow original users to phase to gravatar.

I just realised I may sound like that I work for gravatar, but...I'm a strong advocate of openID and think it should be widely adopted. I'm just sick and tired of having to keep track of multiple avatars and gravatar handles the situation nicely.

Anyway, just my 2c.

You need to remember there are people out there that only post on neowin and nothing else. A gravatar account would be pointless to people like them. There are also people who just registered to browse the forum and not post.

Gravatar only makes sense for heavy use users with multiple forum accounts

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You need to remember there are people out there that only post on neowin and nothing else. A gravatar account would be pointless to people like them. There are also people who just registered to browse the forum and not post.

Those that only post on neowin can have the option of using neowin to store their avatar. You put it as if it's compulsory to create a gravatar account. This is not the case. It should remain optional for original users.

Gravatar only makes sense for heavy use users with multiple forum accounts

Gravatar is useful for people with at least 2 accounts. There are over 27,000 sites that have openly adopted openID including wordpress, blogger, facebook, gmail, yahoo, aol...etc etc so I wouldn't be surprised if a large quantity of neowin members already have openID accounts.

If you carry out a simple db query on neowin, you shold be collate the number of users that have openID accounts simply by their email.

I'm just saying, it should be taken into consideration of enabling gravatar for all newly registered users, this is not to say that they must have a gravatar account in order to have an account on Neowin, merely they won't have an avatar until they register a gravatar account. That way it doesn't affect current users whilst promoting openID. How much bandwidth does Neowin serve based on avatars alone? Wouldn't it be better to shift the load to gravatar so people can actually get the information they need first?

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It rest on the developers and admins to take the advantages and disadvantages of every feature of IPB 3.0 but the more features added, the harder it is to maintain.

As I said, it is up to developers to look into as rob said, and if the devs see that this might be benefitial to the site and it's members.

I personally would not use it, because I only post on neowin and no where else, just my two cents

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I think it's because Gravatar uses OpenID for registration/login, which is why it's being mentioned here.

Last I checked (just now) I couldn't see an OpenID option during the registration process.

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hmm, sorry i might be confusing myself then. I have accounts on Stackoverflow and Wordpress which uses gravatar, I must have created an account and just assumed it used openID. My bad.

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If i remember reading correctly IPB3 will allow users to have local/url avatars (like what we have now) and a option to override that with a gravtar account if you choose (and if i remember even more it will be based off your member email address) althought i have never played or touched ipb so i can't conform.

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If i remember reading correctly IPB3 will allow users to have local/url avatars (like what we have now) and a option to override that with a gravtar account if you choose (and if i remember even more it will be based off your member email address) althought i have never played or touched ipb so i can't conform.

Spot on.

With the new IPB3. The avatar options have remained the same as all IPB boards to date. You can upload an avatar from your computer which will be hosted on the site's servers. Use an online avatar or use a Gravatar email address.

As for OpenID, it's the new way of signing into the IP3 forum. Instead of using the normal username (email) / password.

Edited by Swiftie
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