h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Good morning all, we have another announcement to make about display names in BBC iD (the new registration system) and h2g2. Here's a messgage from Nick Reynolds to explain more:

"Hello there,

I have another announcement to make about BBC iD, the new registration system.

Essentially, the top line is 'Don't Panic!'. Really, don't panic. If you notice any change to your h2g2 UserName (Nickname), just go in to your h2g2 Preferences and change it back the way you want it.

Bascially, from today, BBC iD - the new pan-BBC registration system - will not allow nicknames to be over 30 characters long. (Here's a link to my blog post about it: http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/bbcinternet/2009/12/bbc_id_name_change_to_30_chara.html) On h2g2, DNA will start displaying the sub-30 character iD 'Names' (the equivalent to our h2g2 UserNames or Nicknames) of those folk who have *already* upgraded (migrated) their account over to the new iD registration system.

If you haven't upgraded (migrated) your h2g2 account yet, then you don't need to do anything at all. In fact. You can stop reading now. (Although do bear in mind you will have to upgrade your h2g2 account *eventually*.)

If you have previously upgraded your account, and you do notice that your h2g2 UserName (Nickname) has been clipped, just simply go to your h2g2 Preferences and change your Nickname back to the older long one - if that's what you want to do - and that will be the UserName (Nickname) that displays to everyone else.

This is a temporary measure we've set up for h2g2 users - those of you who want to use longer names - until a more permanent site-specific solution can be found.

An inside tip: Don't leave your BBC iD 'Name' field blank. Because if you do, all we'll have to identify you with on this site to other users will be your h2g2 Login Name, which you might not want to display publically.

Any problems, post here and I will do my best to respond."

- Nick Reynolds

I don't know whether to love or hate Nick Reynolds.

On the one hand he uses the h2g2 substitute italic apostrophes, which is sweet of him, but on the other hand we still have to use apostrophes instead of italics, which is a bit Cilla.

*pats Roymondo*

I still think it's great that people take notice of the fact that we have history and customs of our own.

On a side note it would be nice to know the results of the MOT thingummy at some point, espically if we're going to have features such as [i]italics[/i].

Thanks for keeping us posted, Nick.

I'm pretty sure the results of the MOT Thingummy were announced.

When it's all done and dusted and we have our website community engine powered by DNA running at full potential, will the BBC DNA communities be listed. With the BBC communities brought together under one banner and clearly linked to the BBC home page links to Twitter and Facebook, as presented on our front page, may prove to be superfluous ?

Well, I remember Natalie saying that we did better than they hoped, but I don't remember being able to find a report or anything. Does anyone know where to look?

At the end of the day, hootoo is the tops and the T.P.T.B realise this -as the advert says "your worth it"us that is

Nick and the Eds, thanks again for making this work for is

As someone who hasn't updated yet...

>>
An inside tip: Don't leave your BBC iD 'Name' field blank. Because if you do, all we'll have to identify you with on this site to other users will be your h2g2 Login Name, which you might not want to display publically.
<<

Do I need to understand that, or will it become clear when I register with BBC iD? Is the iD name the same as the h2g2 user name i.e. one we can change?


Roymondo, classic first reply

Yes, the iD name is the same as the h2g2 user name. It's the bit that is displayed to other people.

For example, my Login Name is (a variation on) laura_sheep. That's not the name that gets displayed to everyone else - that's my iD Name, Vip.

If you leave your iD Name blank (the Vip part), the system has to display something, so will display the Login Name (the laura_sheep part) as a stopgap measure. This isn't very secure, because you will be giving away your login name which could be used to hack your account.

I hope that helps.

>>>Do I need to understand that, or will it become clear when I register with BBC iD? Is the iD name the same as the h2g2 user name i.e. one we can change?

Hi Kea, it should be pretty clear when you go to upgrade your account. And yes indeed - the BBC iD 'Name' is the same as the h2g2 UserName (or 'Nickname' in your h2g2 preferences). It's the name that gets displayed to everyone on site.

For instance, if you upgrade your account, you'd just put 'kea' in the iD 'Name' field. Now, in BBC iD you won't be able to have a name of more than 30 charcters but you can always then go back to h2g2 and have a longer name again by changing it in your Preferences. That's our temporary way of getting round the 30 character limit for h2g2 users while we try and sort out a permanent site-specific suffix.

However, if you put nothing in the BBC iD Name field, DNA won't know what to 'display' so it will automatically pull in the other bit of information, the BBC iD User Name (this is the same as the h2g2 LoginName). Anyway, don't worry about it. Just don't leave that BBC iD 'Name' field blank.

hmm, interesting.

I upgraded my account and if I login via BBC iD (eg on Nick's blog) and look at my preferences then the 'Name (optional)' bit shows as blank.

Yet my H2G2 nickname is unchanged and still displays correctly.

'I still think it's great that people take notice of the fact that we have history and customs of our own. '

That might be a good thing for people who stray no further than h2g2 but for the rest of us it's a pain in the bum.

And not in the good way.

Vip and Eds. Out of curiosity, can the iD name be changed as often as one likes (within the 30 character limit) like the h2g2 one can?

Roymondo - this is the place to respond to your comments, so I've left you a message on your Space.

Kea - it is possible (I just looked) but finding it on the BBC site isn't easy. There's a bix for 'Settings' once you're logged in, and once you've confirmed your password you are able to change the display name.

Sorry, Roymondo I mean this thread *isn't* the place. Failure to preview...

I'm confused now. In the other announcement, you suggested to leave the BBC ID name field blank because then it would automatically 'draw'in our h2g2 nickname - and now you advise us not to do that (which I did, btw), saying it will be our login name that's displayed?

I'm just trying to find out if there has been a change since I did that, because last time I checked my nickname was shown, not my login name.

(Could be a while, though, it's at snail's pace, I can't even log in at present).

Hi B'El, sorry for the confusion. Today sees a new DNA release which overwrites to some extent what we said before. DNA, the system that h2g2 runs on, will now use the new BBC iD registration system as its primary source of information about users. So, if you change your details in BBC iD, it will automatically update your details here in DNA.

This changes what we previously said about leaving the BBC iD name field blank. That was a temporary fix then, to allow h2g2 users to user longer UserNames (Nicknames). At that time, a blank BBC iD 'Name' field meant that your h2g2 USerName (Nickname) would display as per usual.

But now if you upgrade your account to iD and leave it blank, it will display your h2g2 Login Name because that's the only info it has to display anywhere in the absence of anything being written in the iD 'name' field.

Basically, fill in your BBC iD field and if you want to change your nickname to any name you want go to your h2g2 preferences and do it there

B'Elana, I think the new advice - not to leave the name blank - overrides the previous statement.

So does this mean that h2g2 will not show "Research 18695" if the nickname is blank, like it used to? Or does? I'm still confused about when the change actually takes place.

Oh, thanks for explaining.

I checked, and it shows my h2g2 username - even with added tagline, although that's much longer than 30 characters. But then I upgraded back then. So can I take it that my name will remain as it is although I left the field blank back then?

Sorry, you must think I'm being thick, but then - well, I am.