On MeFi, everyone knows you're dog.

October 23, 2008 1:19 PM

Greasemonkey: here's a script that displays profile pics next to posts. Cortex warned me some people will hate it and want to roast me alive. To those people, let me suggest a side dish of Potatoes au Gratin and a glass of Merlot.

I've had this installed for a week. It's subtly but profoundly changed my MeFi experience. I'm not sure if it's made it better or worse. I'm not sure if I'll keep it installed or not.

I noticed that almost everyone on MeTa has a pic, only about 40% of those on MeFi have them and most people who post to AskMe don't. I'll leave the interpretation of those stats to brighter minds.

I'm just learning Greasemonkey coding for the first time, so there may be some rough edges to my script.

Enjoy. Or not.

posted by grumblebee to MetaFilter-Related at 1:19 PM (228 comments total)

Do you think I'm pretty, grumblebee?
posted by Meatbomb at 1:21 PM on October 23, 2008

This donut sure is good.
posted by cortex (staff) at 1:23 PM on October 23, 2008

Of course I think you're pretty, Meatbomb. Pretty and witty and bright. And I pity, any girl who isn't you tonight.

Matthowie, thanks for the tip on the smaller version of the pics. That solved some problems.
posted by grumblebee at 1:24 PM on October 23, 2008

Add additional head asploding functionality and I'll consider it.
posted by Artw at 1:26 PM on October 23, 2008

Did you eat that entire donut, cortex, and remained un-hospitalized?
posted by grumblebee at 1:26 PM on October 23, 2008

Artw, it's dangerous to asplode heads while you're drinking coffee. If that IS coffee you're drinking.
posted by grumblebee at 1:27 PM on October 23, 2008

And I pity, any girl who isn't you tonight.

You pity *me*??!!

* sobs *
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 1:28 PM on October 23, 2008

Tea, naturally.
posted by Artw at 1:28 PM on October 23, 2008

I have more pity for cortex, because he didn't get to dunk his donut in Artw's tea.
posted by grumblebee at 1:30 PM on October 23, 2008

All right, who the hell broke my nose?!
posted by milarepa at 1:30 PM on October 23, 2008

People, stop Mefimailing me, I am taken!
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 1:33 PM on October 23, 2008

Maybe I should put up a pic without an assault rifle.
posted by clearly at 1:34 PM on October 23, 2008

But I'm not a dog!
posted by dhammond at 1:34 PM on October 23, 2008

screenshot of how it currently looks?
posted by mathowie (staff) at 1:35 PM on October 23, 2008

Hmm. Something seems not right. In this thread, for example, jessamyn does not have a pic, but her profile pic is being used here and here. The « Older post has klangklangston for an icon. Something—possibly me—is broken. (Mac Firefox 3.0.2)
posted by mumkin at 1:35 PM on October 23, 2008

It needs a bit of alignment work. I'm not really sure what, but there's got to be some kind of indenting that can be done to keep it from ramming up against the text (FF 3, if it matters)
posted by ChrisR at 1:36 PM on October 23, 2008

KILL HIM! KILL THE -- oh, this is kind of neat.
posted by boo_radley at 1:36 PM on October 23, 2008

All the stupid comments are my cat's.
posted by johnofjack at 1:36 PM on October 23, 2008 [1 favorite]

For those wondering, yes I am indeed a secret agent. In an orange world. You can just call me Agent Orange.

Wait...
posted by Navelgazer at 1:36 PM on October 23, 2008

I found that adding "padding-right:6px" to the style element in the img element resulted in a much nicer-looking version.
posted by ChrisR at 1:37 PM on October 23, 2008

I'll play with alignment
posted by grumblebee at 1:38 PM on October 23, 2008

All it takes is one goatse.
posted by Eideteker at 1:38 PM on October 23, 2008

Screenshot with pictures + plain theme + MeFi Navigator
posted by SpiffyRob at 1:38 PM on October 23, 2008 [1 favorite]

grumblebee: "Cortex warned me some people will hate it and want to roast me alive. To those people, let me suggest a side dish of Potatoes au Gratin and a glass of Merlot."

Don't forget the steak. The tender, delicious steak.
posted by Rhaomi at 1:39 PM on October 23, 2008

Yeah, I'd love to see a screenshot of how this looks.
posted by yhbc at 1:39 PM on October 23, 2008

I think I'm going to twiddle with the alignment as well.
posted by boo_radley at 1:41 PM on October 23, 2008

Wow does this ever clash with the plain theme. (Renders fine, is just jarring.)
posted by These Premises Are Alarmed at 1:41 PM on October 23, 2008

I am also suddenly wondering if pb has secretly coded-up gravatar support for profile pics. Or whether animated gifs work. I shouldn't be thinking about that. Not at all, nosiree.
posted by mumkin at 1:42 PM on October 23, 2008

Neat! Or I think iit would be, anyway, if I had Greasemonkey. Sniff.

quit looking at me
posted by dirtdirt at 1:42 PM on October 23, 2008

All it takes is one goatse.

At 140x140, it would actually look like a donut. Or vice versa.
posted by daniel_charms at 1:42 PM on October 23, 2008

So the Normarators get giant donuts, but we don't? Is that how it works now?
posted by panboi at 1:42 PM on October 23, 2008

Fun fact about my image: It's actually a picture of me wearing homemade infrared goggles, run through some photoshop filters.
posted by burnmp3s at 1:43 PM on October 23, 2008

... let me suggest a side dish of Potatoes au Gratin and a glass of Merlot."

Wouldn't fava beans and a nice Chianti be more appropriate?
posted by octothorpe at 1:43 PM on October 23, 2008

I like it!
posted by dan g. at 1:44 PM on October 23, 2008

My pic is not me, taken by me though.
posted by lee at 1:48 PM on October 23, 2008

My desire to eat you has nothing to do with your greasemonkey script.
posted by Astro Zombie at 1:50 PM on October 23, 2008

what
posted by not_on_display at 1:51 PM on October 23, 2008

At 140x140, it would actually look like a donut. Or vice versa.

Oh my God. THAT'S what Cortex is eating?
posted by Astro Zombie at 1:51 PM on October 23, 2008 [1 favorite]

It's actually a picture of me wearing homemade infrared goggles, run through some photoshop filters.

Fun fact about my copy of Photoshop: I actually have a Photoshop filter that adds homemade infrared goggles to pictures of me. I used it on my MeFi profile picture but the cropping was a little off.
posted by strangeleftydoublethink at 1:53 PM on October 23, 2008

Normal Theme, BTW.

And now I have a picture, because, hey, why not.
posted by SpiffyRob at 1:54 PM on October 23, 2008

Needs some DHTML transitions and blinking.
posted by blue_beetle at 1:57 PM on October 23, 2008

Whoa. Weird.
posted by rtha at 1:58 PM on October 23, 2008

Mefi front page
Mefi front page with ChrisR's tweak, set to 15px

Mefi thread
Mefi thread with the same tweak
posted by Rhaomi at 2:00 PM on October 23, 2008

Yeah, I know, it's like hearing an audio preview of your Youtube comment.
posted by daniel_charms at 2:02 PM on October 23, 2008

That does look really neat, but I can see how you'd want to turn it off after a while. Not that we aren't all sterling specimens of photographic beauty, but it starts to look a lot like any other avatar-based forum page in the world real quickly.
posted by yhbc at 2:03 PM on October 23, 2008

People think I just like skeletons but really these are the remains of my conjoined twin. I love her too much to let her go.
posted by Evangeline at 2:05 PM on October 23, 2008

GAHHH margins, man!
posted by cowbellemoo at 2:05 PM on October 23, 2008

Saddam Hussein's in the market for a new cellphone. Spooky.
posted by googly at 2:05 PM on October 23, 2008

whoa whoa whoa whoa
posted by bonaldi at 2:08 PM on October 23, 2008

Bug reports:

In AskMe, the bar highlighting the asker's comments pushes their avatar (if they have one) down to the next commenter (example). The same thing happens to Best Answer highlight boxes. And if there is a string of asker comments/best answers, the avatar gets pushed all the way to the end (example).

Also, the avatars indent the comment text next to it, but comments further down and comments without avatars stay the same, making the left-hand margin jagged. It would work better if the avatars were embedded to the left of the left-hand text margin, like the arrow in Metafilter Scroll Tag.
posted by Rhaomi at 2:14 PM on October 23, 2008

here's an oddity: check out your favorites page. You'll see the icon of the last person to favorite your post/ comment
posted by boo_radley at 2:17 PM on October 23, 2008

I don't use greasemonkey, but the idea of this is fantastic.
posted by owtytrof at 2:30 PM on October 23, 2008

and a twiddled version.
posted by boo_radley at 2:41 PM on October 23, 2008

How many userpics can we upload now? Can we have different ones that rotate and keywords and please credit me for that icon you're rockin, pal. Can we have animated gifs n stuff, bb?

No LJ for me, thanks.
posted by cashman at 2:41 PM on October 23, 2008

yay. avatars.
posted by Stynxno at 2:44 PM on October 23, 2008 [1 favorite]

Is that a quarterstaff?
posted by boo_radley at 2:48 PM on October 23, 2008

I am not a pig.

ok maybe sometimes
posted by special-k at 2:50 PM on October 23, 2008

You would all look better with a professional white background.
posted by turgid dahlia at 2:52 PM on October 23, 2008 [1 favorite]

I WANT SOME TUNA
I WANT SOME TUNA
I'M'A OPEN UP A CAN OF TUNA
posted by Greg Nog at 2:53 PM on October 23, 2008

I noticed that almost everyone on MeTa has a pic, only about 40% of those on MeFi have them and most people who post to AskMe don't. I'll leave the interpretation of those stats to brighter minds.

I think this is really interesting. I wonder how this correlates with people who show up to meetups.
posted by ambrosia at 2:55 PM on October 23, 2008

It wouldn't surprise me if the more visible profile pics become, the more funny avators will replace pictures of what people actually look like (ala Livejournal). I can't decide if that's good or bad.
posted by ThePinkSuperhero at 2:58 PM on October 23, 2008 [1 favorite]

 ,-----------------.<  we have cameras. | `-----------------'

posted by zsazsa at 2:58 PM on October 23, 2008 [1 favorite]

So, I'd like to take this opportunity that the rendering of <pre> on preview is broken compared to the actual results.
posted by zsazsa at 2:59 PM on October 23, 2008

Sorry, grumblebee. Some people will love this, I'm sure, but it's not working for me. I mean, it is working, but it's too....yeah. You know. So I uninstalled.

But I still think you're groovy.
posted by rtha at 3:03 PM on October 23, 2008

I don't much like the way the icons impact the text, as Rhaomi describes. It's also going to be a little painful on very large threads, though all the Metafilter greasemonkey scripts are in my experience.

Otherwise, neat! Are you interested in some code review? :)
posted by phearlez at 3:13 PM on October 23, 2008

jiggle jiggle badonka donka aloha sailor woo woo


Now, I wanted one like this but where I get to PICK the avatars that display for you peoples. Oh would that be a treat.
posted by Ambrosia Voyeur at 3:15 PM on October 23, 2008 [3 favorites]

My inability to keep names straight means that this script will finally push me over the edge to set up Greasemonkey for Mefi.
Something I've intended to do for, well, years now. Well done :-)
posted by John Kenneth Fisher at 3:19 PM on October 23, 2008

I fucking hate all of you. Yes, especially you.
posted by Elmore at 3:31 PM on October 23, 2008

It would work better if the avatars were embedded to the left of the left-hand text margin, like the arrow in Metafilter Scroll Tag.

I'm really, really tempted to put that between <blink> and </blink>. It's a great suggestion.

It'd probably fuck with the scroll tag, though.
posted by Sys Rq at 3:31 PM on October 23, 2008

You're okay, I guess.
posted by Elmore at 3:31 PM on October 23, 2008

I like this - works on Opera changed the SMALL SIZE var to 140 too.
posted by bigmusic at 3:33 PM on October 23, 2008

Oh, and where exactly do you put the padding tweak?
posted by bigmusic at 3:35 PM on October 23, 2008

This is really interesting. Thanks for posting it.

I've had this installed for a week. It's subtly but profoundly changed my MeFi experience. I'm not sure if it's made it better or worse. I'm not sure if I'll keep it installed or not.

I can, immediately, see what you mean by this. The photos/icons/whatever people have in their profiles somehow alter the way I'm reading the comments. It's like I have an expectation about personality now, whereas I tend to evaluate comments at more or less face value without the pics. Personally, I think I'm going to prefer reading MeFi without the profile pics, mostly because I'd rather form an initial opinion based on someone's thoughts. The pic is always in the profile if I'm interested. Nevertheless, thanks again for the new experience of the site.

Also, I find it weird to see myself next to every comment I make. I'm kind of freaking myself out.
posted by theantikitty at 3:42 PM on October 23, 2008 [1 favorite]

It's not my bike.
posted by fixedgear at 3:46 PM on October 23, 2008

I'd prefer the picture next to the username. I like it. So far, anyway.
posted by theora55 at 3:53 PM on October 23, 2008

Oh, and where exactly do you put the padding tweak?

In function loadPics in the for loop:

newContent += ".jpg' width='0' height='0' style='float:left;padding:2;padding-right:6px' />";
posted by tallus at 3:54 PM on October 23, 2008

I love you all, all of you, you crazy nerdy monkey freaks. You make me smile.
posted by Elmore at 3:57 PM on October 23, 2008

bigmusic: "Oh, and where exactly do you put the padding tweak?"

Change this:

style='float:left;padding:2'

to this:

style='float:left;padding:2;padding-right:6px'

You can change the 6 to any number you want; it affects the amount of space between the avatar and the text.
posted by Rhaomi at 3:58 PM on October 23, 2008

I wonder what kind of impact this would have on the site's bandwidth usage, if it were widely adopted.

me, I'll skip it; I prefer my mental images of all of you
posted by davejay at 4:05 PM on October 23, 2008

Hmm.

I like this, I think... but I wonder if it'll detract from comments, as I'll see an image immediately and form an association, rather than reading the comment on its own.
posted by dirtynumbangelboy at 4:12 PM on October 23, 2008

I'ma fight you over this.
posted by Solon and Thanks at 4:17 PM on October 23, 2008

Great, it's getting to be the right time of year for my pic again!

I like making other people look at my picture but I don't like other people's pictures.
posted by aubilenon at 4:20 PM on October 23, 2008

Here's a modified version.
It has some nice padding, a border between the image and the comment, and uses the generic icon for people without uploaded images.
posted by boo_radley at 4:20 PM on October 23, 2008 [3 favorites]

I don't use greasemonkey but I think more people need to see my goofy profile pic...
posted by Confess, Fletch at 4:32 PM on October 23, 2008

Crap. Sorry. I was accidentally logged into my Elmore sock puppet account.
posted by eyeballkid at 4:32 PM on October 23, 2008

Thanks, I'll be deleting the pic from my profile now.
posted by Wolfdog at 4:34 PM on October 23, 2008

I think I broke the script, boo radley.
posted by Memo at 4:36 PM on October 23, 2008

These are totally my sunglasses.
posted by turgid dahlia at 4:37 PM on October 23, 2008

ZOUNDS

I keep clicking on pics expecting to wind up at a profile page. I am an idiot, and this isn't Facebook.
posted by scrump at 4:38 PM on October 23, 2008

this isn't Facebook.
Getting closer all the time.
posted by Wolfdog at 4:41 PM on October 23, 2008

Memo, I think you've got some other grease monkey scripts installed. I dunno. Maybe you're drunk.
posted by boo_radley at 4:43 PM on October 23, 2008

Apparently, it's not compatible with the deleted threads script.
posted by Memo at 4:43 PM on October 23, 2008

i have a hat.
posted by drjimmy11 at 4:44 PM on October 23, 2008

very cool, but any way to get about 6-8px right padding on the pic?
posted by drjimmy11 at 4:44 PM on October 23, 2008

boo_radley: "Memo, I think you've got some other grease monkey scripts installed. I dunno. Maybe you're drunk."

That happened only once, though.

However, it also breaks the mefiquote script.
posted by Memo at 4:45 PM on October 23, 2008

huh.
posted by boo_radley at 4:51 PM on October 23, 2008

it also acts funny on the RA page.
posted by Ambrosia Voyeur at 4:59 PM on October 23, 2008

All y'all are so hot.
posted by goodnewsfortheinsane at 5:00 PM on October 23, 2008

I'll spare you an actual photo of myself.
posted by maxwelton at 5:10 PM on October 23, 2008

Shit. Naked again.

I've gotta stop losing my clothes.
posted by twirlypen at 5:10 PM on October 23, 2008

interesting. there are more or fewer actual comment divs on a page depending on where you are.
posted by boo_radley at 5:11 PM on October 23, 2008

please everyone put your "grease monkeys" back in your pants.
posted by rmless at 5:16 PM on October 23, 2008

I noticed that it can push the justification of a FPP out the width of an icon. Definitely add the six-pixel padding, though.
posted by dunkadunc at 5:17 PM on October 23, 2008

Well that is just the cats pjs.
posted by bjgeiger at 5:18 PM on October 23, 2008

Oh man, now I'm wondering what Wolfdog's profile pic was before deletion.

I removed mine while I search for a suitably mysterious picture. You want my real face, you gotta work a little.
posted by Mister Cheese at 5:21 PM on October 23, 2008

"The « Older post has klangklangston for an icon."

I AM NOT A ROLE MODEL.

(Time to switch my pic to a naked one of me so all you out there can see my hotttness and want to sex me.)
posted by klangklangston at 5:29 PM on October 23, 2008

I wholeheartedly support the vbulletinisification of Metafilter. Onwards!
posted by fire&wings at 5:41 PM on October 23, 2008

<>

can we get it to display teh first few lines of our profile as a sig kthxbi
posted by loquacious at 6:07 PM on October 23, 2008

<>laser beams of scorn.
posted by loquacious at 6:08 PM on October 23, 2008

I don't even know if I have a profile pic.

I love this GM script on general principle. Big fave.
posted by sidereal at 6:12 PM on October 23, 2008

GET DRUNK

FLAME OUT
posted by Mr. President Dr. Steve Elvis America at 6:19 PM on October 23, 2008 [1 favorite]

It makes the front page wrap lines awkwardly.
posted by theora55 at 6:20 PM on October 23, 2008

How long before certain vile pictures are used. Please, just don't okay?
posted by theora55 at 6:21 PM on October 23, 2008

Well, now I do.
posted by sidereal at 6:22 PM on October 23, 2008

Oh dear. Yeah, just give people a reason to switch their user pic to Goatse.cx, why don't you.

Cool script, though.
posted by FunkyHelix at 6:23 PM on October 23, 2008

Constructive criticism: My pic shows up next to the "« Older" link at the bottom of the page. I know people said that, I'm saying it again down here at the bottom where you'll read it.

Happy Greasemonkeying, my friend! Fun stuff.
posted by sidereal at 6:26 PM on October 23, 2008

Eideteker writes "All it takes is one goatse."

I'm thinking the infamous chicken pic.
posted by Mitheral at 6:39 PM on October 23, 2008

Weird. Now I can see everything!
posted by inconsequentialist at 7:05 PM on October 23, 2008

I'm not actually a ghost donkey.
posted by Caduceus at 7:10 PM on October 23, 2008

There are girls here.
posted by sidereal at 7:11 PM on October 23, 2008 [2 favorites]

A/S/L?
posted by cgc373 at 7:12 PM on October 23, 2008

That is a total joke and kind of a stupid one.
posted by cgc373 at 7:14 PM on October 23, 2008

Oddly enough, when I first started reading MeFi I lamented the lack of profile picture and signature for easy identification of the regulars. Now that a version of this is available for my use, I'm somehow intensely averse to actually installing it.

Maybe because MeFi's text-only interface encourages intelligent discourse without fingerpointing and "YEAH, WELL, You're just a CAT so what do YOU know." I like to keep judgment of content separate from judgment of the person, when possible, I suppose.

But hey, who am I kidding, it's probably just because MeFi is the last emo-free haven in my online world.
posted by Phire at 7:16 PM on October 23, 2008 [2 favorites]

As this is a third-party addon, and not part of MetaFilter functionality, I feel within my rights to make my profile picture goatse.

Either that or tubgirl, I haven't decided which yet.
posted by UbuRoivas at 7:19 PM on October 23, 2008

I think that should be "the cat's jpgs".
posted by Kronos_to_Earth at 7:38 PM on October 23, 2008

THE GUN IS GOOD! THE PENIS IS EVIL!
posted by zardoz at 7:40 PM on October 23, 2008 [8 favorites]

There are girls here.

That's what you think.
posted by inconsequentialist at 7:51 PM on October 23, 2008 [2 favorites]

I completely do not understand how this works.

Greasemonkey is installed, but i never use it, so it was disabled. Fixed that. Upgraded it. Went to Grumblebee's page, clicked "Install", and got a nice Textwrangler file full of script, so I opened Greasemonkey script manager and tried to import it. I got nowhere. I feel left out.

I just know you're all gorgeous. *sniff*
posted by reflecked at 7:54 PM on October 23, 2008

I tried to install this and got an error messgae. and you all already know that I'm hotter than hell.
posted by jonmc at 8:27 PM on October 23, 2008

Cool! Thanks, grumblebee.
posted by tomboko at 8:31 PM on October 23, 2008

The photos/icons/whatever people have in their profiles somehow alter the way I'm reading the comments. It's like I have an expectation about personality now, whereas I tend to evaluate comments at more or less face value without the pics.

Thanks you for putting my immediate gut reaction into words, theantikitty. DO NOT WANT.

(but props for a nice greasemonkey hack, nonetheless)
posted by chrisamiller at 8:42 PM on October 23, 2008

A bug: in this thread - the pictures aren't matching up with the users comments - they seem to be rolling to the next comment for some reason.
posted by bigmusic at 9:41 PM on October 23, 2008

Smokin' !
posted by carsonb at 10:53 PM on October 23, 2008

uh oh, I should upgrade that photo, that's me looking stunned after realizing I'm in love with Nokia (the company)




(yes I'm sick, so what?)
posted by infini at 11:04 PM on October 23, 2008

Thanks for the bug reports and code review. I got slammed at work and won't be able to look at it again until this weekend (probably Sunday). I'll post here when I've made changes, but I'm glad other people have made versions.
posted by grumblebee at 11:34 PM on October 23, 2008

I have nothing more to say than please: think next time before you get you boat cleaned.
posted by barnacles at 12:02 AM on October 24, 2008

Okay, I lied. A bit more. I rather like this script. Thanks, grumblebee. I'm not sure if I will keep it as a permanent add-in, but it is interesting, and it definitely changes slightly the context in I read the comments on this site.
posted by barnacles at 12:03 AM on October 24, 2008

Hmm, not so sure about this, to be honest. I'd like to thing that it's not just resistance to change, but it feels kind of less ... mature? with all the pics. I'm not sure that being able to turn them on/off makes it better, because we end up with different people interacting with the site in different ways. I wonder how much that happens anyway, though, with all sorts of methods to access the Web these days?

I reserve my judgement while applauding the geeky coolness that created this.
posted by dg at 12:45 AM on October 24, 2008

HELLO METAFILTER CHUMS! WHO WANTS TICKETS TO THE GUN SHOW?
posted by Jofus at 12:49 AM on October 24, 2008

Goes against all my plain themey tendencies, but it's fun!

I noticed that almost everyone on MeTa has a pic, only about 40% of those on MeFi have them and most people who post to AskMe don't.

Yeah, it's nicer if you restrict it to MetaTalk - the layout get too higgeldy-piggeldy elsewhere on the site. I wonder if there's a way to restrict it to only working inside threads?
posted by jack_mo at 1:32 AM on October 24, 2008

On my system this plugin breaks Mefi Navigator. Scripts I have installed: Mefi Navigator, Scroll Tag, Heavy Discussion Count, Mefiquote. As soon as I turn off the pic plugin, MN works again.
posted by waraw at 2:44 AM on October 24, 2008

Mmmm. Roast grumblebee. Slice me off a hunk of the flank, boys, and a flagon of rum to go with!
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 3:42 AM on October 24, 2008

Screw this. No blink. No pictures. Remove the instinct to react just a little bit differently based on looks. Let's have a plug-in where everything is shown in a monospace font (say Courier New), no colors, a single font size, no spacing, no styles. And we're all scrambling to figure out how that guy did inverse video for emphasis.

I like it better this way. It makes me feel all old school. It's like a telegram, but without the caps and all of that STOP business. Conversations seemed more civil on terminals. Without the visual input from profile images I can feel my discourse becoming more dispassionate, more detached from ordinary human concerns.

This is the voice of Colossus, the voice of Guardian. We are one. This is the voice of unity.
posted by adipocere at 3:49 AM on October 24, 2008 [2 favorites]

Having some problems on the blue with this showing the wrong picture or no picture when the poster has one.
posted by brevator at 4:33 AM on October 24, 2008

Yeah this is kind of neat. Possible to get it to keep the picture aligned with the "bottom" of the comment, the "posted by" line?
posted by Rock Steady at 4:58 AM on October 24, 2008

Oh, and no problems with my MeFi Navigator or MeFiQuote (FF 3, XP)
posted by Rock Steady at 4:59 AM on October 24, 2008

Cool.
posted by seanyboy at 5:01 AM on October 24, 2008

Fascinating. <>
posted by Skorgu at 5:16 AM on October 24, 2008

"What's going on?"
"They're hunting socks, sir."
"At this hour?"
posted by steef at 5:57 AM on October 24, 2008

You all look too intimidating to engage in polite conversation.
posted by strawberryviagra at 6:02 AM on October 24, 2008

And it's not pleasant having the word "Older" with arrows pointing at my face.
posted by strawberryviagra at 6:03 AM on October 24, 2008 [1 favorite]

I'm wishing for a script that silently assigns a random, but constant (doesn't randomize again when refreshed) high-profile mefite to replace anonymous.
posted by Free word order! at 6:25 AM on October 24, 2008 [1 favorite]

Could the image be replaced by a live stream from each of our webcams?

WEBLOG as CONVERSATION!!!!


CONVERSATION!!!!
posted by blue_beetle at 6:51 AM on October 24, 2008

I made some bug fixes and added some of boo_radley's ideas. (Though I omitted his black bar, which I find distracting. I you want the bar back, just change the value of the BORDER variable at the top of the script.
posted by grumblebee at 6:54 AM on October 24, 2008 [3 favorites]

And it's not pleasant having the word "Older" with arrows pointing at my face.

A man was telling his neighbor, "I just bought a new hearing aid. It cost me four hundred dollars, but it's state of the art. It's perfect."

"Really," answered the neighbor, "What kind is it?"

"Twelve thirty."
posted by netbros at 7:09 AM on October 24, 2008

I like it, it's fun, but I ain't going to use it. Too livejournal-y. I was reading Okplayer for that thread about all of ?uestlove's celebrity meetings and I went bonkers with all the fucking sig lines and pictures and little gifs and Jesus wept once you leave the safety of Mefi every forum looks like a Christmas tree is fucking a magpies nest in a lightning storm.
posted by Divine_Wino at 7:39 AM on October 24, 2008 [1 favorite]

This is the sort of thing I've griped about before, but it doesn't bother me this time. If people want to ruinmodify their metafilter experiences with third party software, that's alright with me.
posted by Kwine at 7:41 AM on October 24, 2008

Why doesn't it work on the front page? I just get an army of grey peg-men.
posted by Sys Rq at 7:43 AM on October 24, 2008

I like the changes, grumblebee, but now the front pages only show the default silhouette. Also, change the name of the script to ShowMe.
posted by Rock Steady at 7:45 AM on October 24, 2008

lol
posted by cimbrog at 7:49 AM on October 24, 2008

That front-page bug is really weird. My addled brain can't figure out what's causing it. It's finding the divs or it wouldn't be putting the dummy pic there. It should only put the dummy pic there if there's an error, but what is causing the error?

If anyone can figure this out, let me know!

I like the new script name! When the bugs are out, I'll change it.
posted by grumblebee at 7:58 AM on October 24, 2008

So, to a first approximation, MetaFilter is 11 guys, two chicks, and 350,000 lurkers.
posted by sidereal at 8:00 AM on October 24, 2008

And a one-eyed wolfdog.
posted by Wolfdog at 8:07 AM on October 24, 2008

Just for fun, I made a new version that has a gray border around the images (similar to the profile pages). And, perhaps more importantly, puts the profile picture aligned to the bottom of the comment so it "feels" more like original Metafilter on longer comments: You don't know who the writer is until closer to the bottom. I'm half tempted to try to align the image more on the right side, but I doubt that could look very good. This seems to work alright.
posted by skynxnex at 8:13 AM on October 24, 2008

Heh. Loquacious' pic looks just like mine. I would imagine that the Venn diagram intersection of Metafilter users, MacBook owners, and lazy people must be pretty large
posted by Slarty Bartfast at 8:21 AM on October 24, 2008

front-page pics fixed.
posted by grumblebee at 8:23 AM on October 24, 2008

As neat an idea as this is, I'm going to pass. Part of the fun for me here is, as I'm reading a comment, trying to identify its author based on tone, style, and content before their name actually scrolls up from the bottom of the screen.
posted by quin at 8:26 AM on October 24, 2008

I'm with you on that, skynxnex -- at least somewhat. I find I like both experiences. I turn the script on and off.

I'm curious to find out if my attitude towards posters changes because I see their profile pics.
posted by grumblebee at 8:58 AM on October 24, 2008

grumblebee: I was worried you'd take my tweaking as interference or trampling over you, and I'm glad you didn't. I was just all excited about this neat thing.
posted by boo_radley at 9:07 AM on October 24, 2008

Tweak all you want, boo. That's the fun of putting source-code online. Make it better!
posted by grumblebee at 9:14 AM on October 24, 2008

skynxnex's version is really good.
posted by Rock Steady at 9:29 AM on October 24, 2008

Yes, skynxnex's is better.

Still, not sure if I'll keep it. Right now it's pretty distracting from the comment content, we'll see if that passes.
posted by Slarty Bartfast at 9:40 AM on October 24, 2008

Updated again, including skynxnex's changes.

I like this mefi collaborative coding! We should get together and tackle a bigger project. Too bad MeFi itself isn't open source.
posted by grumblebee at 10:01 AM on October 24, 2008

So has someone already mentioned that it kills the pop-up youtube viewer? If I use it with the greasemonkey extention enabled, it prompts me to download Flash. If I disable it, pop-up flash works just fine.

Also, why is every third or fourth person using cortex's donut picture?
posted by PeterMcDermott at 10:09 AM on October 24, 2008

Oh yeah, Windows XP SP3/Firefox 2.0.0.17/Flash Player 10
posted by PeterMcDermott at 10:14 AM on October 24, 2008

Hmm. I'm not seeing cortex's pic show up for anyone other than cortex. Can you link me to a page with that problem?

I'm guessing I have to put the functions in a unique namespace so that they don't conflict with other greasemonkey scripts.
posted by grumblebee at 10:14 AM on October 24, 2008

The script now turns off if you switch to the plain theme. If you want it on for the plain theme, I've left instructions on in the source. All you have to do is change one line.
posted by grumblebee at 10:29 AM on October 24, 2008

Huh. Different.
posted by ludwig_van at 10:39 AM on October 24, 2008

The latest version of this installed without a problem. I have no idea what was wrong before.

Thank you, grumblebee; this is a hoot!
posted by reflecked at 10:45 AM on October 24, 2008

Fun Facts:
1. There are three posts at the bottom of the MeFi front page that don't even have blank pics or anything. Huh?
2. Used in conjunction with Mefi Deleted Posts, the deleting mod's userpic is applied to the next post down, which seems to bump all the userpics down a post. (BTW, note to Plutor: That script is still wonky on the front of the blue.)
3. Used with the Metafilter Heavy Discussion Count script, the front page left alignment goes a bit wiggly depending on how thick each post's Bar Of Commentiness gets. It's just a few pixels here and there, no big deal, but still.
posted by Sys Rq at 10:52 AM on October 24, 2008

If anyone has experience with making multiple Greasemonkey scripts play nice together, please share your wisdom!
posted by grumblebee at 10:58 AM on October 24, 2008

1. There are three posts at the bottom of the MeFi front page that don't even have blank pics or anything. Huh?

Weird. Via view source, I can't see anything special about the last couple of posts. And I've verified that my script is correctly grabbing those user numbers.
posted by grumblebee at 11:05 AM on October 24, 2008

Hey, is there a way for me to edit the code to make the images align with the top of the comment again? I have a pretty big screen and usually read comments near the top of the screen, so putting the pictures at the bottom of the text isn't stopping any "spoilers." And without that benefit, seeing the images near the bottoms of comments is pretty odd.
posted by Rhaomi at 11:05 AM on October 24, 2008

I dunno. I see a great potential for mischief here.
posted by hydrophonic at 11:06 AM on October 24, 2008

1. There are three posts at the bottom of the MeFi front page that don't even have blank pics or anything. Huh?

fixed.
posted by grumblebee at 11:17 AM on October 24, 2008

yay!
posted by Sys Rq at 11:21 AM on October 24, 2008

Ah, I see that if I solve the problem that stops the last three FP pics from appearing, I get extra, unwanted pics at the bottom of more-inside pages. I'll work on it.
posted by grumblebee at 11:22 AM on October 24, 2008

Wow, this makes reading MeFi completely different.
posted by ukdanae at 11:24 AM on October 24, 2008

Also, why is every third or fourth person using cortex's donut picture?

Secretly, we are all cortex.

---

Poking around, I noticed a Greasemonkifier for Safari for Mac, but not for Safari for Windows. Am I a big tub of dumb?
posted by mwhybark at 11:26 AM on October 24, 2008

Rhaomi: Open the code in an editor (go to Manage scripts and then edit). Then, swap out the first two lines building newContent with:

newContent = "<img style='float:left; clear: left;";
newContent += "margin-right:";

And change the innerHTML line to:

copyDiv.innerHTML = newContent + before + copyDiv.innerHTML + after;

Basically, basically to put it back to the top you take out the part that tells it to be on the bottom and put it at the beginning of the HTMLs
posted by skynxnex at 11:28 AM on October 24, 2008

Thanks, skynxnex, worked like a charm!
posted by Rhaomi at 11:38 AM on October 24, 2008

I agree that it makes the whole site feel like the kiddie pool. I disabled it, but like having the option.
posted by reflecked at 11:47 AM on October 24, 2008

User pics should be in a popup when mousing over the username. Along with a short profile summary. And ice cream. That is all.
posted by blue_beetle at 12:17 PM on October 24, 2008

Okay, I eliminated the extra pics at the bottom of more-inside pages.
posted by grumblebee at 12:27 PM on October 24, 2008

I just installed this and it's like MeFi's on drugs. It's pretty damn cool.
posted by ob at 1:02 PM on October 24, 2008

Well, it's a neat way to add colour to the plain theme, if you're into that. Nice coding, grumblebee and skynxex.

(But as much as I admire the work, I'm reeeally not sure if I want to keep this turned on. It does feel all Facebooky, and I can always click people's names to get their profiles and all, but I know I'll be tempted to try out occasionally anyway. So I guess that makes me a hemi-semi-demi-Luddite.)
posted by maudlin at 1:05 PM on October 24, 2008

Can you link me to a page with that problem?

Front page, dude. At the moment, phunniemee, homunculus, wolf daddy, cobalt and miss lynster are all eating a donut as big as their heads.
posted by PeterMcDermott at 1:07 PM on October 24, 2008

Umm, gman too.
posted by PeterMcDermott at 1:10 PM on October 24, 2008

I can't replicate having cortex's donut everywhere. Sadly. I even tried a bunch of different versions of the script. which one are you running, PeterMcDermott? It sounds vaguely like a caching issue on your end, so a force reload (shift-click reload) or clearing the cache might solve it. Or restarting Firefox.

Or, if you have Firebug or some other page inspector, you can look at the generated HTML (view source doesn't work since that only shows the HTML as served to the browser). It might be useful. If it's really pointing to cortex, the images will be pointing to 7418.jpg as opposed to, say, 20844.jpg.
posted by skynxnex at 1:19 PM on October 24, 2008

Update: pics are now links to profile pages. I don't know why I didn't do that from the beginning. Obvious.

One simple thing I'm digging about this -- also obvious -- is actually SEEING people's creative (or not) pics. I know I could always see them on user pages, but I don't often think to look. And I've become interested in a few people purely because I like their pics. In the past, I'd have to be really interested in someone to bother checking out his pic.

I also find that I can ignore the pics if I want to. I couldn't at first, but having run this script for a week, now, most of the time I don't even notice the pics unless I choose to.

I think the most interesting issue this brings up has nothing to do with pics. It has to do with Matt's choice to identify writers at the bottom of posts (and not at the top). It reminds of back when you couldn't find out who had written a New Yorker article until you got to the end. When they changed this (and when they added bylines to Talk of the Town), I was outraged.

On the one hand, I love the idea of writing standing on its own merit. On the other hand, I often found myself flipping to the end of articles to see who wrote them. I do the same thing here. Sometimes I get a little way into a long post and I can't resist scrolling down to see who wrote it.

This isn't a pic issue, because there could just as easily be text at the top of posts identifying the poster. I don't have a very strong pro/con feeling about Matt's choice. It might be a good preference option. Even given the option, I'm not sure which I'd choose.
posted by grumblebee at 1:39 PM on October 24, 2008

Probably last mod of the day:

At the top of the script, there's now a link like this:

var PICS_AT_BOTTOM = true;

Change the true to false, and the pics will be at the top of posts.
posted by grumblebee at 2:01 PM on October 24, 2008

OK, restart didn't fix it, shift click reload didn't fix it and clearing my cache didn't fix it. I don't have firebug, but I'll find out what it is and try and dig it out later for you.
posted by PeterMcDermott at 2:04 PM on October 24, 2008

There's some weirdness in Recent Activity. Might want to just exclude that page.
posted by Sys Rq at 2:18 PM on October 24, 2008

Hmm, now I have to make a choice - this or MeFi Navigator, because they don't work together. FF3.0.3/WinXP Pro if that means anything.
posted by dg at 2:45 PM on October 24, 2008

After spending some time reading some threads, I decided to turn pics off. I found that if I was just browsing, my eyes kept jumping to whoever had the brightest colors and least cluttered design. The default images for users without profile pics didn't help at all--I'd skip over the "grays" entirely. Still, neat app, grumblebee.
posted by hydrophonic at 3:20 PM on October 24, 2008

You know, there's something that bothers me.

The pics show up even if you're not logged in. I'm removing mine now.

I think it's a lot of fun, and I really appreciate the time grumblebee put in, but somehow the distinction between members seeing the pics and - anyone who happens to cruise through seeing them is big for me.

Cheers.
posted by reflecked at 5:17 PM on October 24, 2008

Whoa jesus, I gave this a try and it is really, really weird. It's like the difference between reading a book in a quiet room and reading a book in the middle of a party while drunk.

No thanks, at least for now. Very cool on a technical level, though. Thanks.
posted by odinsdream at 6:06 PM on October 24, 2008 [1 favorite]

This also seems to FUBAR Mefiquote. When you click on "quote", it takes you to the comment box as normal, but there is no quote - the comment box is empty.
posted by dg at 6:18 PM on October 24, 2008

reflecked, profile pictures were (and still are) always visible to non logged-in users. Log out and see for yourself.
posted by yhbc at 8:29 PM on October 24, 2008

There's some weirdness in Recent Activity. Might want to just exclude that page.

Can you take a screenshot? RA is working fine for me.
posted by grumblebee at 9:11 PM on October 24, 2008

On MeFi, everyone knows you're dog.
posted by ROU_Xenophobe at 10:16 PM on October 24, 2008

The pics show up even if you're not logged in. I'm removing mine now.

I hear what you're saying, but I can't help but imagine that most non-members wouldn't be bothered to install the script.
posted by dhammond at 12:09 AM on October 25, 2008

Who's gonna be first to be all like "oh chk out mai new avatar!?! u liek?" This is for attention whores and we wouldn't want to encourage that.

oh yoooohooooooo suckaahh
posted by Ambrosia Voyeur at 12:45 AM on October 25, 2008

profile pictures were (and still are) always visible to non logged-in users.

Thank you, yhbc. I had no idea.

In fact, I am surprised anew to know that our profiles are that visible. I've slightly obfuscated my location numbers now, too. Reading what you said, my scalp did a "creepy ripple". There's a determined internet stalker in my past; I thought I was over it. Ha.
posted by reflecked at 2:42 AM on October 25, 2008

wipes sweat from brow, it was the "logged out" experience that creeped me out. shivers, I tell you, shivers, up my spine and my hair standing on end.

thank god I'm logged back in where i know my way around
posted by infini at 4:02 AM on October 25, 2008

Grumblebee: I just installed the latest version, and it doesn't work at all - no little pictures anywhere!

I'm using Firefox 3.0.3/OS X 10.5.5 (and all previous versions worked just fine...).
posted by jack_mo at 5:05 AM on October 25, 2008

jack_mo, are you using other MeFi-related Greasemonkey scripts? Several people here have reported problems with my script when they were running multiple other scripts. I'm not sure how to fix that, right now.

The weird thing is that you and I are on nearly identical systems, and it works fine for me.

By the way, I'm using it with two other scripts running in this order:

Metafilter Scroll Tag
Metafiler Poster Name First
Grumblebee's Show...
posted by grumblebee at 5:54 AM on October 25, 2008

Oh, and I just realized that the Poster Name First script isn't working, but I didn't even remember I had that installed until just now. I don't think it was working before I added my script.

The Scroll Tag script is working perfectly.
posted by grumblebee at 5:56 AM on October 25, 2008

On my desktop I'm using:
Metafilter Scroll Tag
Mefiquote
Grumblebee's Show ...

On my laptop I'm using:
MeCha Navigator
Mefi Navigator
Mefiquote
Tin Foil Hat
Mefi deleted posts
Grumblebee's Show ...

WinXP Pro/FF 3.0.3 (the laptop one is Firefox Portable, but I doubt that matters). No, I have no particular reason why they're different.

Mefi Navigator doesn't work and Mefiquote doesn't work with Grumblebee's Show... but I wonder if a different order would matter?
posted by dg at 6:04 AM on October 25, 2008

I'm trying to locate info on making multiple GM scripts play well together, but I'm not having much luck.

My guess is that in certain cases, they just won't. My script must look for certain tags in the page. If one of the other scripts alters those tags, that would make mine not work (or vice versa).

Script order should make a difference, but I'm not sure what the difference will be. When five or six scripts (that could run in any order) are all altering a page, you have a highly chaotic system.
posted by grumblebee at 7:55 AM on October 25, 2008

It wasn't causing me problems, but I stopped the script from running on the Recent Activity page.
posted by grumblebee at 9:16 AM on October 25, 2008

This is... intriguing...
posted by brundlefly at 12:21 PM on October 25, 2008

reflecked, our profiles are visible but the amount of information on there is restricted to not-logged-in users. You can't see location, birthday, sex, any of that stuff. Just your name and your join date. Log out and see for yourself!
posted by Phire at 3:31 PM on October 25, 2008

Hmm. Does weird things on one's Favorited Activity page (http://www.metafilter.com/activity/XXXXX/favorited/) as well.
posted by Rock Steady at 4:27 PM on October 25, 2008

our profiles are visible but the amount of information on there is restricted to not-logged-in users. You can't see location, birthday, sex, any of that stuff. Just your name and your join date.

Thank you, Phire. You are, of course, correct; I just checked. I'm a little embarrassed to not have known all that about the profiles. My online time is limited, and when I come here, it's usually a "drive-by" sort of thing. I should slow down and reflect more. :)
posted by reflecked at 7:22 PM on October 25, 2008

Grumblebee, here's another oddity. Single line best answers look odd. The border around the picture looks odd when it's half-way through the green "best answer" area. See here for an example.
posted by boo_radley at 9:33 AM on October 27, 2008

Thanks. I'll look into it.
posted by grumblebee at 12:03 PM on October 28, 2008

I'm noticing that the embedded youtube links don't work with this script, either. Grumblebee, any idea why it's interfering?
posted by ChrisR at 8:17 AM on November 4, 2008