Literature Thumbs Tutorial

Literature thumbs

Overview;

• Introduction
• What are thumbs?
• What are these different lit thumbs and when do they show?
• What makes the default lit thumb show up?
• How to set a preview image
• How to set a lit author tag
• Mature content on my deviations
• Browsing mature content
• tl;dr

Introduction
I find people wondering about this time and time again so I thought I'd put together a tutorial explaining the different literature thumbs, and most importantly, when which one will show up (and thus, how you can choose which thumb you get)!

Many of you will already be familiar with much of the information under the first one or two points but to make this tutorial as accessible as possible, we'll start small – with the basics.

<sub>What are thumbs?
(I told you, we'll start small.)
A thumb is a small preview of any deviation. You can find them virtually everywhere where people, or dA itself, link to deviations, such as the browse page, in people's galleries and on their pages, or in +news features. Clicking a thumb takes you to the page of the deviation itself to see the full piece, to comment etc.

Thumbs can be used in a news article, a thread in the ThumbShare +forum, your journal etc. You simply have to copy-paste the thumb code that shows to the right of any deviation page.</sub>

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Yes, but... what are these different lit thumbs then?
There are these four kinds of literature thumbs on dA. In the preview image above you can see one example of all kinds. I'll now explain what they are, and when which shows up (note that the names I mention for all of these aren't all official names – but they're all more or less common and we'll use them for the purpose of this tutorial).

• To the top left is a text thumb. This contains the title of the deviation (in bold on top), your Literature Author Tag (to the left – will be explained later), and a preview (consisting of roughly the first 100 characters or so) of the body text. When you hoover your mouse over the body text, it starts scrolling so that you can read more of the preview (and, if you please, the entire text, but of course not as conveniently or as properly laid out as on the deviation page itself!).
  So when will it show up? Well, this is the most basic one – it will show if there's no reason for any of the other kinds of thumbs to appear.
• The top right hand one is dA's default lit thumb image. Unlike the preview image (to the bottom left), this image does not show up on the deviation page itself.
  So when will it show up? Because this is a rather complicated case, I will explain this separately – see What makes the default lit thumb show up?.
• The one to the bottom left is a preview image. This will be seen as the thumb, and will also show up on top of the deviation page – for an example simply look up on this page. The image with the example thumbs is the preview image created for this tutorial. You can create your own image or use someone elses if you have their permission.
  So when will this show up? The preview image will show up only if you specifically select one during the submission process. How you do this will be explained soon (under How to set a preview image).
• Lastly there is the mature Content thumb. To the bottom right. Like the default thumb, this always looks exactly the same.
  It will show up on deviations marked as mature content, for anyone who is below 18, or who has their browse settings to not show mature content. (Also see: FAQ 220: What is Mature Content?)

What makes the default lit thumb show up?

If the literature deviation is not marked as mature content, and if it doesn't have a preview image, it will usually show the scrolling thumbs – as mentioned

• "Share features & links" is set to "Discourage and members only".
  This option – set at the submission page – disallows people who aren't logged into deviantART to see your piece. The default lit thumb shows up to prevent the text from still being available for example to be found through Google. When you're not logged in these thumbs show as a grey picture with a lock.
• You selected a category which does this by default.
  Within the Literature gallery, these categories are;
• Visual Poetry
• Concrete Poetry
_{(These are two forms of poetry that heavily rely on the visual presentation of the text itself, besides the imagery implied in the words. Often these poems will be submitted in the form of an image from your computer, but it's also possible to submit text to these categories. Often due to the creative use of decoration and/or spaces and indenting the text would be illegible from the scrolling thumb and I imagine that's why it shows the default image instead.)}
Out of other galleries that accept writing, the following use the default lit thumbs:

• Contests
• Resources & Stock Images
• Community Projects
• deviantART Related > devious fun (deviantART suggestions does allow scrolling thumbs!)
• Scraps

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How to set a Preview Image
During the submission process, first enter the deviation text in the text box (when you've clicked Add Text). Underneath the so-called 'file deck', a "Preview" feature will show up. You can now click 'Choose' > 'Upload File' to select an image from your computer.
Though it will not stop you from clicking Upload File several times and to add more images to the file deck, only one (most likely the last one you select) will eventually show up as preview.

How to set a lit author tag
Hoover over your name at the top menu, and choose "settings" in the drop down menu (it will take you to this page). Scroll down to Literature Author Tag and simply follow the instructions there!

Mature content on my deviations
A deviation needs to be marked as mature content if it contains nudity, excessive violence, blood, gore, or other potentially upsetting or offensive material (from FAQ 220 – for a more in-depth description see FAQ 554). If the deviation you're uploading contains any of these, select one of the "Yes" under "Contains mature content?" on the submission page.
`Strict´ means anyone under 18 won´t be able to see your deviation, 'warning' means they have to confirm they want to see it.
This makes no difference to people of 18 or over that have mature content hidden – they will only get a warning in both cases.

Browsing mature content
If you are below 18 (and/or entered your birthday as such, of course), mature content will automatically be blocked for you (either completely or just with a warning as described above). If you are 18 or over, this is optional – you can switch this on or off in your browsing settings (to go to your browser settings from any dA page, hoover over your name at the top, click 'settings', and choose 'browsing' in the left hand menu).

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TL;DR – which thumb your literature deviation gets depends on A. whether it's mature content or not, B. whether you set a preview image, C. whether you allow non-members to see it, and lastly D. the category (in that order).

I think that covers it all... if it leaves any questions, you can always ask!