The signature tag will print a combination of a text signature with or without an image of their handwritten signature.

Signatures are stored with default text that usually includes the person's name, title and department which can be customized in the Signature admin tool. An image of the person's handwritten signature is required for the signature tag to work. Accepted image formats are: png, jpg, tiff, gif, and svg. The preferred format is png.

Aliases may be applied to the signature to aid in assigning different people to a role. For instance, you may want to have a signature with an alias of "provost" and then assign that alias to person currently in that position. If that person leaves the position, you can reassign the alias to the next person in the position so you don't have to edit a large number of templates to adjust the signature tags to the new person.

Tag Attributes:

Attribute Required Description
hawkid Required if alias not used The Hawkid of the signature owner. Example: hhawk
alias Required if hawkid not used The alias of the signature. Example: provost
scale Optional The percentage to scale the image in the signature as a fraction of 1.0. Example: 0.5 will scale the image to 50% of its native size.
image Optional A boolean to indicate if the image should be displayed in the signature.
text_signature Optional A signature may have more than one text signature assigned. If you want to use a saved text signature for person that is not the default, you can specify it with this attribute.
style Optional If you want to override any of the CSS styles assigned to the image in the signature. Also note, that when a signature is rendered, the image is assigned a CSS class of "signature_<hawkid>".

Signature best practices

To achieve the most usable signatures, it is suggested you follow these guidelines when preparing signatures:

  • Scan or convert the image as greyscale.
  • Scan the image at 300DPI. This should reduce the need to use the scale attribute to adjust the size of the signature image when it is rendered in your template.
  • Save the resulting file as a PNG for uploading into Dispatch.
  • If a signature is widely used in multiple templates, you should consider using an alias. With aliases if a person leaves a position you just need to update who the alias is assigned to rather than touching multiple templates to change the hawkid referenced in the signature.

Examples:

Our example person is Thomas Jefferson (hawkid: tjefferson). There are two text signatures for him along with an uploaded signature image as well as being aliased as "president":

Text signatures

default:
Thomas Jefferson
President
United States of America

rector:
Thomas Jefferson
Rector
University of Virginia

Example 1: Just Hawkid

<@signature hawkid="tjefferson"/>

Would render with the signature image and the default text signature:


Thomas Jefferson
President
United States of America

Example 2: Alternate text signature

<@signature hawkid="tjefferson" text_signature="rector" />

Would render with the signature image and the alternate text signature:


Thomas Jefferson
Rector
University of Virginia

Example 3: Alias

<@signature alias="president" />

Would render the signature for the alias "president" which is assigned to "tjefferson":


Thomas Jefferson
President
United States of America

Example 4: Scale

<@signature hawkid="tjefferson" scale=".5" />

Would render as the signature image at 50% with the default text signature:


Thomas Jefferson
President
United States of America

Example 4: No Image

<@signature hawkid="tjefferson" image="false" />

Would render just the default text signature with no image:

Thomas Jefferson
President
United States of America

Example 4: style

<@signature hawkid="tjefferson" style="border:1px solid red;" />

Would render the default signature and apply the custom CSS supplied to the <div> containing the signature image:


Thomas Jefferson
President
United States of America
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