A few questions about account details.

[TheCleanerDragon]

Near the top of the account details page there is this selection

Near the bottom there is another.

1. Why are there two?

2. Why does one have more options than the other?

3. Why is there a "no selection" and "do not display?" Wouldn't they both have the same effect? (not showing anything.)

 

[Valka D'Ur]

One means you've made a choice but don't want anyone to see it. The other means you haven't made a choice at all.

Not sure if that's a standard XenForo thing or if the admins tweaked something.

@leif erikson? Can you answer this?

 

[The_J]

You got it already right there, I think.
The first options are the default Xenforo options, and they are displayed next to the post.
The second options are our custom options, which sadly don't override the default options.

 

[leif erikson]

The_J has it correct.

Tried to change the default xenForo and found it beyond my programming skill.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

If that was awhile ago, maybe someone has since found a workaround and posted on the support forum? (just speculating)

 

[The_J]

Yes, but the instructions are quite complicated, I'm afraid :/.

 

[leif erikson]

The last time I tried it affected the whole forum in a negative way. So changed it all back and decided it was not within my capabilities.

 

[TheCleanerDragon]

So if the second selection doesn't do anything, then why is it even there?

 

[The_J]

yeah, good question.
I guess we could consider removing it.

 

[Synobun]

From a Xenforo developer two years ago:

XenForo no longer has a gender field by default.

We did this explicitly because we acknowledged that the original "Male, Female and Unspecified" options would not be sufficient. If you had XenForo 1.x and updated to XenForo 2.x we converted the field to a custom field so that admins themselves can add whichever gender options they wanted to.

However, new installs starting with XenForo 2.0 no longer include a gender field at all. If it is needed, we recommend creating your own gender field with the desired options.

The default field shouldn't be a binary option anymore unless CFC hasn't updated its Xenforo in 2+ years.

However, there is also a Style Settings page in the ACP that should let you remove the default Gender field and assign the custom Gender field. Xenforo calls the postbit "message info" instead.

 

[The_J]

I've not found yet the admin panel, but I do think you might have the right idea regarding the updates...

 

[The_J]

So if the second selection doesn't do anything, then why is it even there?

yeah, good question.
I guess we could consider removing it.

I've test-wise removed it now.
There's the option to re-instate it, if necessary.

We had a quick consideration if we should not remove the gender option at all. There are good arguments for it, there are good arguments against it, and there's probably never a definite conclusion on this. I do wonder though what the preferred option here is. Someone please give me some indicator if there's an interest in polling this out.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

I've test-wise removed it now.
There's the option to re-instate it, if necessary.

We had a quick consideration if we should not remove the gender option at all. There are good arguments for it, there are good arguments against it, and there's probably never a definite conclusion on this. I do wonder though what the preferred option here is. Someone please give me some indicator if there's an interest in polling this out.

A poll would probably be a helpful thing, since even the number of responses could give you an indication of whether it's something most people here think is important.

Personally, I prefer when a forum gives that option. I'm a woman who very much dislikes being addressed as "man" or "dude" or "bro" or referred to as "he" or "him". There are several other female members who feel this way as well. I remember someone telling me during my early days here, "You can't be a woman. Girls don't play Civ!"

Um, yeah, we do... I hung out in the Civ section of the forum for years before wandering down to the Colosseum. I still read and post in Civ II.

For awhile I had the usertitle "Warlady" - thinking that might give people a clue (this was over a decade ago). But it's just simpler to have a gender field, which people can use or not, as they wish.