Forum has a bug - avatars

[#1]

Hey all
Today I was trying to update my avatar to it's new URL. Now because I use a dynamic avatar (hit refresh and it'll change) I don't specify a filename or extension but just a trailing / at the end of the url. That triggers the server to hit the index file which in this case spits out a random image from my collection with the appropriate content-type header.
With me so far? Great.
Well today i moved my avatar files over to their new home (Thanks Bob). The script works fine and outputs an image but when I input the url into the forum profile page, instead of accepting it, the forum would DOWNLOAD the image from the url and store it locally on the forum server - as if I had chosen to upload it from my PC. I definitely had the correct radio button selected and had to try this numerous times. It even did the same when I went back to the old url too.
I eventually got around it switching the script to use the old BR avatars (they're all .jpg) and eventually after a few more attempts it finally accepted the URL as I wanted. I've now successfully got the new URL in there and the random avatars working but I thought I'd give you guys at PN a heads up.
7up

[#2]

I always thought that was by design and not a bug.
Updated mine to my random ones now 

[#3]

FWIW, I created avatastic.co.uk just for this purpose. A friend had a similar script running on another form for a few years and wanted to update it/change the avatars and nobody could find the original author/remember how the script worked. Whilst coming up with a new script to do the same the thought "Why not make it multi-user" crossed my mind and thus avatastic was born.
I'm reminded that I need to add features to it (such as resizing images down to acceptable sizes on demand ... something like avatastic.co.uk/avatars/user/120x120/random/ ) but meh ... effort 

[#4]

Yes I noticed your site the other day and checked it out but from the demo account it only showed urls for static images not dynamic.
I'd also been planning to implement a similar site at some point but I am working on other things at the moment so can't do it yet.
I like your stargate wormhole animation.. i shall be copying that into my collection lol

[#5]

Ahh you must have missed the last link (It's not made very obvious) it is simply random.gif (I've also made it work with random/ for sites that complain my .gif extension serves up jpgs or pngs)

[#6]

Yes i see it now but didn't see it at the time.
Cool site, needs a few more features but it has potential!

[#7]

I got it to the state it was ... 6 years ago ... and it's been working fine for me and it's current users, but yes being able to specify maximum width and height for different sites in the URL and either excluding the images or having them resized dynamically is one improvement that's been on my mind.
It'll already take zip files full of images and add them to your account, that was a big one for the few users I have

[#8]

Hey av..
Seeing as you like stargate avatars (and I kinda borrowed your wormhole av  :D) I thought I'd share my latest SGU creation with you:

It's one of Destinys turret gun pulse weapons - opening up and deploying - feel free to use
Also made this one too:

[#9]

Just tried the new forum and something seems odd with the Avatar I use.

It is an animated GIF file of 2 frames. The first frame should show for 5 seconds then the second one for just a tenth of a second which gives a flash from the eyes. This used to work fine on the old form site(s) but now it shows each frame for what seems to be the 5 seconds of the first frame.

I have altered the image to make the second frame last for just 100th of a second but the effect is the same with each frame lasting the length of the first one.

Any reason why this should happen ?

[#10]

Not sure about that one John. I'll ask around.

Edit: Does the same happen if you link to the avatar remotely versus uploading a local file?

[#11]

Seems to. I've just uploaded the gif image to my htdocs space and the used the from external site option to upload it.

As you can see the same thing is happening.

I suppose I could use multiple frames and make just one of them have the eyes flash to get round it but I'll wait first to see if there is a bug in the forum.

[#12]

Ok I seem to have sorted it found an option to use the Avatar from my web space rather than upload it from there.

So it looks as though Avatars stored on the forum are affected but external ones aren't.

[#13]

@7up Just thought I'd reply and give you a nudge that you can change your username during these first 30 days of the new forum as I know you preferred using a different name previously.

[#14]

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@Chris wrote:

Just thought I'd reply and give you a nudge that you can change your username during these first 30 days of the new forum as I know you preferred 7up previously.

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Err who was that post meant for Chris?

[#15]

I've edited my reply to clarify, thanks.