Where should avatars be displayed?

Question

Hi there. I'm implementing avatars now and was wondering where people thought they should be displayed on a question or list of questions. Options include:

• To the left of the Q/A/C text (just after vote/answer counts)
• On the far right hand side of the Q/A/C text
• Just before the username (e.g. gidgreen) on the same line

Obviously this will be customizable via themes, and it's also possible that more than one of these will be offered via the options, but I want to get a sense of what people want.

Thanks!

Answer 1

I think the avatar should definitely be next to the username, wherever it goes. I think you'd be best doing something the same as Stack Overflow, using a "block" with the image side-by-side with username/points/time on the other (text on separate lines). Something like this:

----- asked 4 hours ago
|   | by gidgreen
----- 54,870 points

For actual position of that "block", just at the bottom of the post is fine, but it could also be on the left under the vote count. (In that case maybe you'd need the text under the avatar.)

Also, I don't think the avatar is needed on the comments since the text is shown smaller and they're not as "important" as answers.

Answer 2

I respect DisgruntledGoat´s opinion about that, but I think avatars should be left of the question , with the option to move answerblock and/or the votingblock to the right.

The reason for this is, that it is kind of commounly used that way. For example if the facebook freaks want to feel "at home", left hand is the indicated place. In US only are about 150.000.000 users at facebook, 1 of 2 inhabitants more or less.

The other reason is, that that way it would be easy to change it into "Avatar" "said" followed by a speach bubble including the question / answer.or similar..

If the avatar feature / usertitles feature and later the badges feature is part of the script, it will have more community style, where the "who" is very important.

I understand that some people here like stackoverflow, but it is a real (excellent) niche solution for very experienced web users. To make Your script widestly acceptable for normal people I believe the community optic is very important.

However, as long as the avatar comes in normal answerscountbox size, I am happy.as I can move it through css. Much more important for me are uploadable avatars, so people do not need to go somewhere else to get a personal one.

Its just an opinion, thanks in any case

monk333

 

EDIT:

After asking around here, everybody thinks different. So the very very best solution would be the option to set the horizontal order of "Question" "Voting" "Answers" "Avatar" freely including show / not show.

 

monk333

Comments

Facebook has avatars at the left, yes, but they are always "left of the name" rather than left of the page as a whole. The main reason I suggested the bottom is that I don't think there is room to have avatar+name on the left side (things can be moved/resized though).

One other option could be to have avatar+name+points+date in one row along the top, then votes+post in a block underneath. Some forums do it that way.

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Yes, You are right that there is a lot of info which needs to be stored somewhere. Now it is avatar - name - points and date, later it may be usertitle and/or badges as well. This would be a good argument to store it in one line or one block as You described above.

On the other hand I strongly believe that many people using this script now and in a future will have other preferences and as well i believe that this design element is crucial to reach a huge audience.

So, I would really recomend to have as much variants as possible available through an option menue. Including options what and what not to show.

After reading Your suggestion carefully I would agree to have an avatar under or above the question, maybe as a long block, left hand the avatar , than what when where, if it is edited by some one else there only should be used a mini avatar. It should be a two line block where someone as well could store later usertitles and share symbols.

Personally i like the blurtit site, they made a q&a site for a less focussed audience and they are as well successfull. There it is more community like.

Q2A can serve both markets, understanding stackoverflow and blurtit as two extremes. Thatfore I think the decision what to offer in this design area is extremely important.

If I find some time later today I will make some images to compare, now we can add them to the post ; )

Finally, as allready mentioned before, I am happy with that what gideon gives to us..

monk333

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Ok made a sample, had to add it as answer as I cant use in a comment the wysiwig.

Answer 3

I think, that avatars shouldn't be displayed on the welcome (summary) page as it will make it too noisy and get to much worthy space.

In my opinion, it should be placed on the Q/A details page on the left top side of a question, answer (could be above the vote box) and on the left side of comments.

Comments

If it is to go on that side, I would say definitely below the votes. The votes on each question and answer is much more important than who wrote it.

Answer 4

Ok, finally I made this samples. And yes, with the actual dimensions of the Answer / Votes and Avatar field it would not fit very well.

But by reducing the size to the commounly used height of around 50px like facebook / Stackoverflow / blurtit and others, I think it would fit nicely.

Please see the example:

There on the list pages it would work quite well this way. I could stay with that perfectly.

Another thing would be the single question pages.

What do You think ?

Comments

Well, in this case, I would vote for option 2, eventually 1 (from outlined ones :) The second option (with avatar only on the left side) looks more human...

Answer 5

Ohh, great, You are ready already. Looks nice and seems to be individually uploaded ?

However meanwhile I finished the single site samples. I allow me to load them up at least.

I saw a disadvantage in using avatars in the middle of the site, when working on the samples. With many one line answers I did not like it so much.

But as always, I am happy with that what You make anyway. Thank You so much!

However here are the samples i thought about:

Sample2 - Preference on Avatar.

And Sample3 - Preference on votes / voting.

 

Comments

After trying many things I decided to go with what you see on the site. It will always be possible to lay it out other ways using themes. In the meantime, you can see how it works on your 'My Account' page.

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Great, I got lost a bit in the discussion. As long as I can achieve this optics through themes I am very happy. I only hope that the facebook avatars can be imported / accesed as well. Thank You

monk

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Excellent ! I used my gravatar .

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I have uploaded my gravatar. I tried old questions and answers, but not shown.
Adding this comment to see how it is going to be displayed.

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I like sample 2, hopefully we can accomplish a similar style with advanced themes.

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Gidgreen said: ...It will always be possible to lay it out other ways using themes...So i believe we can do that once 1.3 or 1.4 is ready. In any case I willt try to do it and if I cant I am sure that he will help us.
The main functionality is ready and luckyly he decided to add both, gravatar and imageupload.

I am very pleased with that, as changes at this point of the script would have been not possible for me. The design we can change through css.

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Do you think imageupload should put the uploaded image into an "administrator queue" which requires approval before going live?  (to prevent a user from uploading an inappropriate image...)

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Dont know how gidgreen implemented it, but at least I am sure that imageupload will be restricted to users with email confirmed only. So chances that inappropiate images are uploaded are quite low.

Using such a queue is in my eyes not very user friendly, as the admins are not available all the time. However, for the next release after the actual one, i will put a flag function with autoremove after some flags to the wish list.

Then the risk of having bad posts / comments / pictures will shrink to a minimum. And if someone really does it again and again, he gets blocked.

Answer 6

On the main (all activity page) I'd like to see in place of the Votes and Answers Boxes, the avatar of the person who asked the question.

On the actual question page, I'd like to see on the left side the avatar and on the right the Votes box.

Comments

Yes! I'm for sample 2 also!