Signatures

When posting in the forum or on Talk pages, you can sign your posts. For help on how to sign your posts, read on.

Signing your posts on talk pages and on the forum help to identify who posted what. Posting signatures help other users to identify the author of a comment, to navigate talk pages, and so on. Discussion is important in wikis as it helps other users to understand the progress that's going on.

Why use signatures?
Signatures on the Wiki identify's you as a user, and your contributions to the wiki. They help identify the author of a comment as well as the date and time at which it was made.

When signatures should be used
Any post made to user talk pages, article talk pages, on the forum, or other discussion pages should be signed.

When signatures shouldn't be used
Edits to articles should not be signed, as nobody owns articles. Signatures also don't need to be used in the edit summary as the history of the page shows who added what.

How to sign your posts
There are two ways to sign your posts:


 * 1) At the end of your comments, simply type four tildes (~), like this: ~.
 * 2) The edit toolbar above the editing window has a button ([[Image:Sighelp.PNG|The signature button]]) that adds the four tildes for you.

Your signature will appear after you have saved your edit.

Different signature forms
Typing four tildes results in the following:

Since typing four tildes adds the time and date to your resulting signature, this is the preferred option for signing your posts in discussions.

Typing three tildes results in the following:

Since this does not date-stamp your signature, feel free to sign this way when leaving general notices on your user page or user talk page. This is also a convenient shortcut (rather than typing out SampleUser ) when you want to provide a link to your user page.

Typing five tildes results in the following:

Rules for making signatures

 * Note that all signatures must have a link to the user's userpage.
 * Users must not have more than one signature.
 * Signatures should not have more than two pictures per signature: large numbers of pictures may slow down some computers.
 * Signatures must not contain pictures that are larger than standard text size.
 * Signatures must not contain line breaks (as this upsets the numbering in signature lists, etc).
 * Signatures that use HTML tags must be balanced, for example every must have a matching.
 * Signatures should not span multiple lines of text. In other words, they should be one line of text in vertical size.
 * Please add the code  to the end of your signature to properly categorise it.

Customising your signature
Registered users can customize their signature by going to Special:Preferences and changing the field "Signature". If you want to know how to customise your signature, see Help:Customising your signature. Your signature should contain a link to your userpage. Also, no more than two pictures per signature are allowed.

Want a signature?
If you want a signature, post on Requested signatures. A user will help you and soon you'll have your own cool signature!

Once you have your signature code (either through writing it yourself or using the requested sigs page), go to Template:Signatures and create a page called Template:Signatures/yournamehere (substituting your username for yournamehere), place the code in the page, and hit Save. Then go to your preferences page, and in the box that says Signatures, put this:

Once again, substitute your username for yournamehere. Check the box that says "custom signature" and hit Save. Now, when you sign a page using ~, the signature in your Template:Signatures/yournamehere page will appear on the page you sign. If you ever wish to edit your signature, just edit the code in the Template:Signatures/yournamehere page.

Some people create a signature code by placing the raw code in the signatures box and skipping Template:Signatures entirely. This is no longer allowed as it places raw signature code on each page you sign, taking up unnecessary space.

Dealing with unsigned comments
If you see an unsigned comment, feel free to use the template. The table below shows how to use this template.

You may also want to remind users to sign their posts if they aren't, or if they don't know how, direct them to this page.

Sign here!
Feel free to post your signature on this page! Simply put to sign. If you update your signature, remember to erase the old one and put the new one where the old one was. Note: If you are using the template system your signature will automatically update.