Drupal - how to change anonymous commenter's name

Tired of the old anonymous comment setting?

By default, if you choose to let anonymous posters not leave their contact information in Drupal, their name will be filled in as "anonymous." Not exactly the most creative name. You'll notice that we use "visitor from afar." We're not saying that's super creative, but we like it better than simply having it be "anonymous." We're going to show you how to change this to anything you like, but first, how to get to the comment settings?

How to access comment settings in Drupal

Browse on over to /admin/content/comment/settings, or, if you have the highly recommended admin menu module installed, which provides a nice drop-down CSS interface for your admin menu, browse to Content Management -> Content -> Settings. On this page you'll be able to set various options for comments, such as letting them appear on the same page as your post, and determining what kind of information (website, email, etc.) commenters are allowed to post. The only limitation we see here is that you can't specifically choose which information they can leave behind. At the time of this writing you can only choose to let them either leave their contact information, or not. If you choose to let them leave it (or require them to, a third option), they will be able to leave their name, email address, and homepage, in addition to the subject of the comment they're making. If, on the other hand, you don't let them leave their contact information (as a spam prevention measure, for example), their name will automatically be filled in as anonymous. Here's how to change what automatically gets filled in.

How to specify the default comment name for anonymous commenters

To change the default name of anonymous commenters in Drupal from anonymous to a name of your choosing ("passing drifter" for example), simply browse to admin -> settings -> site information (Site Configuration -> Site Information for those of you with the nifty admin module installed). Here you'll be able to fill in a customized name for anonymous commenters in the "Anonymous User" field towards the bottom of the page. Have fun!