StrategyWiki talk:Community Portal

This page is for discussion of general community issues; if you just want to ask a question to more experienced users of the site, please use the staff lounge. To start a new thread [ click here]. Resolved threads are gradually archived; see the archives box to the right.

PC keys?
Should there be a Category:PC keys? I think it would be useful, but I'm not good at graphics, so I'm bringing it up here as the template told me to :). -- Mason11987 (Talk - Contributions) 20:38, 22 October 2006 (CDT)
 * I'd say something more like Category:Keyboard buttons since it isn't for only PC's but all computers (minor distinction :P). -- Prod (Talk) 21:07, 22 October 2006 (CDT)
 * Separated out other talk so we can get more comments about this. -- Mason11987 (Talk - Contributions) 15:29, 25 October 2006 (CDT)
 * Yea, sorry about that. I kinda hijacked your thread. The category is probably needed, especially for games like Final Fantasy VII.  My image skills are pretty bad, but I'd suggest probably white keys, black borders, raised inner square with a nice large letter in the middle.  Also an Enter button shaped like the old ones (the triangle thing).  -- Prod (Talk) 16:34, 25 October 2006 (CDT)
 * DavysBigKeyCaps is a nice font for that. Another way to make keyboard buttons is to make a template with a plain square keyboard image as a background and the letter centered, with special cases for irregular keys. Then, it'd be more accessible as well. --blendmaster 11:45, 29 October 2006 (CST)

Strategy guide for... Strategywiki?
I think that one of the things that this site needs is a guide on how to use it. We should upgrade the help page to have all of the scripts for strategywiki such as how to categorize, place things such as stub tags on articles, how to write the guide correctly and to clean-up. It'd make more sense for new users to know how to use this stuff correctly rather than to have more experienced members use their time to clean up their articles and add the proper tags. --Navy White 13:10, 14 November 2006 (CST)
 * We are slowly putting together a couple of pages here, which describe things in decent detail (I think; if you think otherwise please bring it up on the relevant guide's talk page, and I'll see what I can do). I believe that if we imposed all this "red tape" on new users it would discourage them from contributing. It's better to have a core team of people who really know what they're doing cleaning the place up, rather than a load of people who've quickly read some documentation and are using their own interpretations of it. That said, having the documentation there doesn't hurt. :-) --DrBob (Talk) 16:37, 14 November 2006 (CST)
 * I started Help:Writing guide which covers various things, but there's still a lot missing. GarrettTalk 18:42, 14 November 2006 (CST)
 * Though it's a bit of a tanget, I actually think this could be a really good idea. In the interest of being less Wikipedia-like (and I have always hated the inherent difficulties of locating instructional Help and Special pages for editing wikis), we could use the strategy guide book-format to walkthrough various levels (beginner, advanced, etc.) of editing, and to collect all pertinent information in a single easy to understand place. This would be easy enough to over-complicate and turn into a complete disaster, but I think it could also turn out well. The goal would be to organize the creation of a new strategy guide into a minimal set of simple steps, and to use lots of images to drive points home. A Table of Contents could look like (I would expect the In-Depth guides to grow somewhat rapidly, and have included these only as a sample of how the overall guide could work):
 * The Basic steps for creating a strategy guide are in bold. Other steps cover more In-Depth concepts you may want to skip.
 * Sign Up -- ''Would contain a brief explaination that to edit any pages you must sign up for a user account, hint at the fact that content will be in the public domain, and walkthrough the process of signing up (with pictures)
 * Change Your Preferences -- ''A quick explaination of user preferences and what they do
 * Ask Questions -- ''Introduce the various places for getting help, how to use talk pages, and how to leave a signature
 * Create a Guide -- ''Searching for any existing guide, creating a new page,, basic wiki markup
 * Do Your Homework -- ''Minimum game info, where to find info, how to handle uncertainty
 * Add Pizazz -- ''Images, nav bars, sidebars, other common templates
 * Save Your Work -- ''Previewing and saving, edit summaries
 * Look For More -- ''How to stay involved with StrategyWiki, a complete outline/list of help pages and policy pages
 * And almost all Footer_Navs would contain two links in each direction, the most noticeable ones leading to the nearest Basic step, and the alternate ones leading to In-Depth steps, probably identified with icons and font sizes:


 * [ID]  = In-Depth guide
 * --inarius(T) 01:35, 15 November 2006 (CST)
 * Sounds good. Do you want to have a go at doing this? Once you've laid out the basic structure you're envisioning, I'm sure people will be able to help. :-) I suppose this would render the pages I linked to as policies, rather than help. --DrBob (Talk) 11:05, 15 November 2006 (CST)
 * I definitely won't have time to get to this until the weekend, and don't have anything against someone else who wants to get it started. I'll make sure to work on it when I get some time. --inarius(T) 14:03, 15 November 2006 (CST)
 * If anyone wants to help make a basic guide, I'll pitch in. A good idea would probably be a starter's page with some basic wiki-code and how to use it as well as strategies to writing a strategy guide. I'm thinking a page called Beginner's Guide for this stuff and later creating pages with all of the fancy things like templates.--Navy White 16:35, 15 November 2006 (CST)

Going mainstream
There are a few things which I think we need to get done (in order) before we can become a "mainstream" website. -- Prod (Talk) 13:26, 30 November 2006 (CST)


 * 1) (done) Set up the website, get the admins, basic stuff.
 * 2) (in progress) Set up policies, tell people how to use it. Essentially, have enough documentation so that within 10 minutes they can start editing, but easily find more in depth info after (or at least some direction).
 * 3) (mostly done) Set up a good amount of background guides which follow the policy and are good examples of how to continue other guides.  Having one main example is good, but we should probably have a few that show different aspects of what can be done.
 * 4) Plan a specific opening date.  Get lots of advertisement (probably should have a page with suggestions for this).  Plan some kind of event for that day (abxy should be able to help with that).
 * 5) Make sure there are proper controls so that if we do get a lot of people, there are ways for us to make sure things stay under control.
 * 6) By getting lots of people around the same time, it will show how active the site is, and it will help the any ratings that require a huge jump to become notable (ie. Alexa.com).  To this effect, I might suggest allowing anonymous edits for a few weeks around that time, depending on how bad vandalism is.  Once people are hooked they may be more willing to register (just my opinion).
 * 7) Profit!!! A new layout would be great to release at this time.  Something to show that the site is going from "Beta" to "Official".

This is quasi on-topic, but I put a blurb about us in the latest Retrogaming Times Monthly, and that gets a good amount of traffic, so hopefully some new users might start showing up from there. Procyon 16:25, 30 November 2006 (CST)
 * We should probably keep all these promotions together on one page, just to see what kind of reach this site has. Perhaps Promotions? -- Prod (Talk) 17:54, 30 November 2006 (CST)
 * Let's make that Statistics (and some various related/subpages). We'll just copy Wikipedia on this one--they have a good format.  ech elon  22:30, 30 November 2006 (CST)

Main Guide page content
How far into the game should the main page go (ignoring the one page guides)? What kind of guidelines should they follow? My thinking is: Main page should essentially be an advertisement for the game. It should tell a bit about the history (main infobox points in words), and from there be essentially an advertisement for the game. Include a bit about the story and some unique features of the game. If there are any major flaws in the game they should also be discussed on the front page. Anything more indepth about the game should be in either /Story, /Getting Started, or /Walkthrough. Thoughts? -- Prod (Talk) 01:13, 3 December 2006 (CST)


 * Must say i agree with this. Also the mainpage should go BRIEFLY over the Information about the Game and not go More in-depth that Absoutly Required. Like the Geist Page which myself and Prod were speaking about. I tossed a whole ton of Info and thankfully Prod Helped my Half Asleep Mind to Relize it was overkill and summerized the page for me. As for Major Flaws they should Prob. Be Mentioned on the mainpage also. And there may be a need for an /About page for further Information about the game. WillSWC 01:18, 3 December 2006 (CST)
 * As reference, here is the edit. I think I may have cut too much (info is moved to Geist/Getting Started).  -- Prod (Talk) 01:22, 3 December 2006 (CST)
 * I would agree with that. --DrBob (Talk) 07:58, 3 December 2006 (CST)
 * Though i must say he did a rather nice job. I will see if i can work in a little bit more Info. WillSWC 11:08, 3 December 2006 (CST)
 * I added a little more content to the Page. WHat do you think?WillSWC 16:10, 3 December 2006 (CST)

MySQL Database Errors
Is anyone besides me getting these errors? I just want to report that it makes this site REALLY crappy and is causing me from upgrading guides, etc. I'm hoping its just me. --Notmyhandle 03:15, 10 December 2006 (CST)
 * I also got one this morning, but the edit I was making did save. I'll talk to the server guys about it. --DrBob (Talk) 05:23, 10 December 2006 (CST)
 * This is preventing people from uploading or creating new pages, however editing existing pages seems to still work. --Minimaul 08:10, 10 December 2006 (CST)
 * The message said that some part needed to be restarted. Everything seems to work again, so I guess they fixed it. -- Prod (Talk) 11:02, 10 December 2006 (CST)
 * I have the distinct uneasy feeling that we're going to have some downtime and reinstall the entire operating system, because everything has been falling apart for over a month now. I have no idea what was causing the transaction errors, but strange quirks like this have been showing up ever since somebody messed up the PAM authentication. FTP doesn't work (we have to use SCP for all file transfers), su doesn't work, permissions are sporadic. We're not locked out of the box, of course, but it's very difficult to operate. Anyhow, we should do a reinstall within a week's time. I want database/upload backups in everybody's hands just in case.  ech elon  11:22, 10 December 2006 (CST)

All of the above issues were resolved when we formatted the server on December 21st and reinstalled it on the 22nd.--Dan 22:58, 3 January 2007 (CST)

Sidebar Navs
Keeping them? deprecating? adding? -- Prod (Talk) 13:11, 10 December 2006 (CST)


 * I started out with them cuz I thought they looked cool, but then the whole site seemed to be moving in the Footer/Header nav direction, so I started removing mine in order to be consistent. Every page I've made thus far has used Footer/Header navs instead.  Procyon 13:35, 10 December 2006 (CST)
 * I like the way it's used on the Contra III: The Alien Wars page. But on Contra, Metal Storm, Final Fantasy VII and Solar Jetman: Hunt for the Golden Warpship, I think they're redundant.  Keeping it synchronized with the ToC is another step, and they're at the top of the page with the AGN anywayz.  I think they should be deprecated as nav's within guides, but used to link within a series or group of guides on only the front page. -- Prod (Talk) 13:50, 10 December 2006 (CST)
 * So the sidebar navs work for the games themselves rather than the broad category of games that they exist under. So what I'm really saying is that the side-bar nav should have more general links regarding the game in terms of what it is categorized with.  The sidebar nav should link to other games in a series for example rather than reiterating the ToC.--Notmyhandle 17:07, 10 December 2006 (CST)
 * Actually, that is pretty cool, I just took a look at that. I could do something similar with all of the Pac-Man pages.  That's a great idea guys, thanks.  Procyon 17:23, 10 December 2006 (CST)
 * Should we deprecate their use as ToC's for the guide? -- Prod (Talk) 13:00, 11 December 2006 (CST)
 * Didn't we just say that the ToC shouldn't be included in the sidebar nav? Since it's on the page already it shouldn't be repeated and the generalized additions that the sidebar could have would enhance the article.  --Notmyhandle 13:05, 11 December 2006 (CST)
 * As they're already there, is it worth getting rid of? I'd also like to get a few more views on this (more than just 3 people). -- Prod (Talk) 13:10, 11 December 2006 (CST)
 * This is slightly off topic, but Community Issues hasn't been getting the kind of traffic it used to. I wonder if that because things are generally running smoothly and there's less to figure out, or if people have less interest in the bureaucracy of StrategyWiki and more interest creating content (which of course is not a bad thing, just interesting) Procyon 13:19, 11 December 2006 (CST)
 * I'd say they're OK for linking games in a series, but not for ToCs (basically, I agree with all of you above). Make sure you don't get too reliant on them, however, as there is a planned re-skin sometime, and the sidebar may just disappear. --DrBob (Talk) 14:00, 11 December 2006 (CST)

Personally I think the Sidebar ToCs CAN be much better than the header ToC's the only problem they have is they can get very long so they do need some CSS work. I think if we could make them expand/collapse by section (like the whole header ToC expands) that it would be much cleaner and be much more usable than header ToC. For example on the FF VII sidebar ToC I would have the following Section headers visible and then expand to view the sub listings: Intro (would expand to show Characters, Story and Controls sections), Walkthrough Part 1 (Would show Disk 1 and 2), Walkthrough Part 2 (would show Disk 3, Minigames and Sidequests), Appendix (would list Materia, Equipment and End matter items). That would be four main visible sections on page load that would (IMHO) display much cleaner than expanding the whole Header ToC. This would be especially usefull for the really long books like FF7 and OOT. --Argash 00:56, 12 December 2006 (CST)
 * I disagree with this. As I said before, we can't guarantee that the sidebar will exist when we re-skin, so I'm not putting all the work in for some wonderful solution, just to have it made redundant. Additionally, it's a seriously bad idea to have your main navigation for a guide in a 1" wide space on the right-hand side of the screen. Nobody looks there. --DrBob (Talk) 01:40, 12 December 2006 (CST)
 * I would agree that the right hand side is less preferable to the left hand side. Perhaps the whole right sidebar should be moved to the left side below the existing menu there? --Argash 04:22, 12 December 2006 (CST)
 * Much easier said than done, and that still doesn't address the problem that when/if we re-skin, the sidebar may not be there. --DrBob (Talk) 11:38, 12 December 2006 (CST)
 * Not improving something simply because things may change in the future is non productive. Just because the whole site layout may change at some unspecified date doesn't meen we shouldn't improve what we have now.  That said I have cleaned up the  FF7 Nav menu and re-skinned it to match the main toolbox (the CSS obviously is not site wide as I can't edit that so if you want to try it out copy my CSS to yours.  Now that I've finished this I think it's time to start working on the next version that I think should replace the sidebar navs AND the more common dropdown ToCs.  I have an idea on what should be done but I'm going to mock it up first before going any further. --Argash 22:34, 17 December 2006 (CST)
 * I must admit, that is quite impressive :). However, on my screen that space is about 3 cm, which greatly limits the length of words and font size.  I think it would be great to use for the earlier discussed intergame navigation, but I still feel it's somewhat too small for a game specific navigation.  I also don't think that date is that far off since they have been hinting at this reskinning since ABXY came out (check the main page announcements). -- Prod (Talk) 00:30, 18 December 2006 (CST)

Skin Independent Solution Proposal
Ok I've mocked up a new ToC system that is skin independent using the Suckerfish solution. I think this is a MUCH MUCH MUCH more elegant solution than the current ToC system (either the header based or side bar) and it can be done vertically or horizontally! I personally think the best way to do it would be vertically from the left sidebar however horizontally floating from the top (so it scrolls with the page) probably would work good too. My basic goal here is to have something that is accessible from any part of an article.

Now the only problem with this solution is converting it to work with media wiki's html output wont be fun but once we do we can easily style the thing anyway we want. As for the styling I'm average at best with CSS so I can help but if anyone out there wants to improve it please feel free.

A final note this solution is compatible with all major browsers. --Argash 03:09, 18 December 2006 (CST)
 * Well I tried to start converting the CSS to adjust for how wiki outputs it's html list code but so far no luck. Anyone else willing to give it a try? --Argash 00:56, 19 December 2006 (CST)

Ok so apparently when I wasn't looking it started working. To see it you need to copy my css to your css file before you go to my sandbox to see it in action. It still needs a bit of tweeking and cleaning up but with a little bit of work I think we will have a MUCH better solution to work with. --Argash 01:46, 2 January 2007 (CST)

I copied and pasted like you said but it didn't change anything when I checked the sandbox. --Notmyhandle 02:25, 2 January 2007 (CST)
 * Sorry I forgot to mention, when you change your css file you have to be sure to clear the cache, in FF you can do CTR+F5 or hold CTR and click refresh. --Argash 02:54, 2 January 2007 (CST)

I just tested it in IE6 and it does not appear to work properly at all (the place I got the script from says it should work though) so that might be a problem. I don't have IE7, safari or opera to test on can someone else check it out in those browsers. --Argash 03:12, 2 January 2007 (CST)
 * I tested in IE7, it doesn't work but the formatting works, so it looks like a nice looking bar with the top sections. The drop downs didn't work is all.--Notmyhandle 04:08, 2 January 2007 (CST)
 * odd, I'm looking at the code and trying to figure out whats going on.  I may have to wait till tomorrow before I can really get at it.  Also I don't have any access to IE7 (I run ubuntu at home and my two work PCs HAVE to have IE6) so if you or someone else with IE7 can help me debug that would be great. --Argash 04:33, 2 January 2007 (CST)
 * I apologise for being blunt here, but I feel it is necessary. I don't think this is a good idea at all. The current ToC solution works fine, fits in with the wiki theme, and falls back gracefully if people don't have JavaScript enabled/available, or a sufficient level of CSS support to use :hover. Your solution has hacks all over it, doesn't fit in with the wiki-theme (imo, anyway), and you're wanting all sorts of changes to be made to the layout of the site. Our re-skin has been on the table for months now, and certainly isn't going away. There's also another flaw with using menus: people won't always categorise things the same way. You may think it perfectly reasonable to put "Glitches/Errors" under "End matter", but others wouldn't. They can't use their browser's find functionality, because what they're finding is hidden. They'd have to presume that there isn't such a page, or go all the way through all the menus to find it. At least with one expandable ToC section (as we have at the moment), people can use their browser's find tools, or quickly scan the list themselves. --DrBob (Talk) 07:33, 2 January 2007 (CST)
 * Heh well I wont argue that it's riddled with CSS/JS hacks to make it work in IE, however with the find feature we could just include the ToC page in the menu and you could go there If you want to find your way through it. By no means am I saying "this is how it should be done!" I'm just throwing it out there as a possibility for when we do the redesign because IMHO it can be much more elegant and user friendly then the current version.  Also I love challenging CSS projects and I work 3rd shift so I'm bored as hell and had the time to try :) --Argash 08:03, 2 January 2007 (CST)

Section Transclusion
An example of what section transclusion can do for you is visible on Ragnarok Online/Jobs/Magician using the transcluded section at Ragnarok Online/Job TOC. I've replaced the wikiTOC with something much prettier and more appropriate to the content; other guides may want to implement similar methods. Karimarie 21:14, 10 December 2006 (CST)
 * Yeah its a good idea, although I don't know how to make templates. Someone needs to make a game company one based off the one at Wikipedia.  --Notmyhandle 16:41, 11 December 2006 (CST)
 * company perhaps? --DrBob (Talk) 01:38, 12 December 2006 (CST)

Logo Image for MonoBook
Yo, I'm a noobie, fresh off Wikipedia. I changed my prefs to MonoBook, and discovered there's no logo there. Instead, it says "Set $wgLogo to the URL path to your own logo image. Can anyone fix this with a good logo? Meowster 17:13, 11 December 2006 (CST)
 * I wouldn't be the best person to do this, but I'll see whom I can run the idea past. A difficulty would be matching any MonoBook logo with the BlueCloud logo's style; I'm not sure how we could do that in a square logo very easily. It'll take some skill to do this properly.  ech elon  22:47, 17 December 2006 (CST)

Downtime and Upgrade
The Abxy and StrategyWiki server has been experiencing some difficulties as of late. There is probably little doubt that many of you have seen the website go offline for extended periods of time. This is an embarrassment to our community, and we're going to fix the problem by taking approximately a day or two of downtime to change the OS to Fedora Core, which is certainly less likely to fail us in the future.

This said, I would like you to help in this effort. I'm going to offer backups of the database and file uploads; I'd like a handful of you to offer to keep them just in case. Please sign up! Additionally, I would like to upgrade MediaWiki to the latest version, so if one of you wouldn't mind finding out the discrepancies from this version and the latest version, that would be great. (I've more than got my hands busy with the server upgrade and coding, so help here would be excellent!) I would especially like to know which files changed, if any of our hacks/modules will be incompatible, and if there are any schema changes to be mindful of--especially the schema changes!

The database backups I'm making are going to XML-based. If any of you know of a more appropriate format, let me know.

Thanks guys!  ech elon  00:45, 18 December 2006 (CST)
 * Count me in. :-) --DrBob (Talk) 01:12, 18 December 2006 (CST)
 * Me too. -- Prod (Talk) 10:23, 18 December 2006 (CST)
 * I'd be happy to host data. Perhaps torrent files for transferrence?  --Notmyhandle 19:27, 18 December 2006 (CST)
 * I have a ton of spare storage on my dreamhost account if you want to set-up a mirror or something like that--Argash 23:48, 18 December 2006 (CST)
 * Leave a message on my talk page and I'll be able to do it when I get back to school mid-january probably. -- Mason11987 (Talk - Contributions) 01:47, 19 December 2006 (CST)
 * Will there be a useful placeholder page in lieu of the main page (strategywiki.org and strategywiki.org/wiki/Main_Page due to potential bookmarks)? -- Prod (Talk) 20:59, 19 December 2006 (CST)

w00t We're back online. --Notmyhandle 05:01, 23 December 2006 (CST)


 * w00t is right. --Antaios 08:58, 23 December 2006 (CST)

I notice we're still at version 1.6.6. Will we be upgrading to 1.8 or waiting for 1.9? -- Prod (Talk) 12:18, 4 January 2007 (CST)
 * I'd love to do the upgrade, but in reality it's up to echelon whether or not we should upgrade, and when it should be done. I'll bring it up with him once he's done playing RL.--Dan 14:12, 4 January 2007 (CST)

Citing sources
Could we get the Cite extension installed? It really makes it a lot easier to cite sources then --Argash 04:41, 18 December 2006 (CST)
 * I'll look into it. --DrBob (Talk) 02:02, 4 January 2007 (CST)
 * Install'd--Dan 02:20, 4 January 2007 (CST)
 * Thanks --Argash 03:13, 4 January 2007 (CST)

Marking games as Windows NT games is inaccurate
I think games should be labeled as Windows games rather than Windows NT games. From my understanding, Windows NT is a kernel used in the recent releases of Windows (Windows XP, Windows 2003, etc.), while Windows is the operating system itself. Marking games as Windows NT games would be saying that the game that runs on the *kernel* (and virtually no game in existence runs on a kernel.)--Dan 20:06, 2 January 2007 (CST)
 * I think it's supposed to mean that they are incompatible with windows 9x. -- Prod (Talk) 22:46, 2 January 2007 (CST)
 * Windows NT is the name of a series of Windows releases based on the NT kernel. Although games do not really depend on the kernel, the NT series changed a few things around (like dropping DOS), which does affect which games can run on it. As Prod says, marking games as purely running on "Windows" would mean that we're saying the oldest Windows games (such as the original Worms) can run on Windows Vista, which they can't. --DrBob (Talk) 06:18, 3 January 2007 (CST)
 * Well, I got Warcraft Orcs & Humans to work on XP and Vista is supposed to be backwards compatible... I've also played Commander Keen & King's Quest 1 on XP.  --Notmyhandle 16:50, 3 January 2007 (CST)
 * Most games seem to work on newer systems. They aren't totally supported, but XP comes with a compatibility mode to run as 95, 98/ME, NT 4.0, or 2000.  I'm sure Vista has something similar, since it's supposed to be a complete rewrite of the code, ie. breaks compatibliilty.  It works more as a minimum system requirements I guess, since we include the earliest version that supported it. -- Prod (Talk) 17:01, 3 January 2007 (CST)
 * Windows Vista, regardless of what you hear, is *still* using the Windows NT kernel, so it appears that the real issue here would be renaming the "Windows 9x" category into something broad enough to cover Windows ME and 3.1.--Dan 22:08, 3 January 2007 (CST)
 * Nope. Windows ME is on the 9x kernel, so fits into that category, and then we already have a category for 3.1. --DrBob (Talk) 02:01, 4 January 2007 (CST)
 * The reason for the Vista cat is that some upcoming Games for Windows titles (such as Halo 2) won't work on XP. GarrettTalk 14:41, 4 January 2007 (CST)

Better outlining that a talk page doesn't exist
On Wikipedia, pages whose discussion pages don't contain any content are colored red, while talk pages who do contain content are formatted with the regular linking style. I think our design should adapt to this by possibly tinting the discussion box pink. Opinions?--Dan 22:22, 3 January 2007 (CST)
 * something, anything! this has been bugging me for awhile.  Not sure if pink would work well with the site color scheme but something definitely needs to be done. --Argash 23:43, 3 January 2007 (CST)
 * There is a new skin under development. I'm not sure how complete it is, but I guess a suggestions page would be useful right about now.  Please post complaints with the current skin, suggestions for the new skins, and anything relevant there. -- Prod (Talk) 23:55, 3 January 2007 (CST)

Categorization
Just so it doesn't get missed I wanted to link to this discussion so I can get some feedback. --Argash 01:04, 4 January 2007 (CST)

Moving images to a dedicated httpd
Echelon and I have had this idea for a while now, and I think it's time that it's put to action. StrategyWiki, at the moment, runs shared on a single Apache server. dsmeet.com and abxy.org are also served on the same server, alongside strategywiki.org. But the bottleneck isn't in the other sites. The undeniable truth is images take up almost over 50% of our bandwidth, all of which belong to StrategyWiki. Today, I plan to move all of the images onto a dedicated httpd with a reputation for serving files with a low memory footprint and low CPU usage. This should, almost certainly, speed up downloads of StrategyWiki images and StrategyWiki page load times as a whole. So, if you encounter any image problems while editing, it is just me installing thttpd.--Dan 11:43, 4 January 2007 (CST)

Additions to Infoboxes
For games that revolve around a website, or have a large connection between the game and website (such as WoW), I think that the infobox should have a section added to it that says Website, and then a website can be specified so that people have quick access to it (currently most links reside within the external links section, which new viewers might not see or know about). If it happens, the infobox should have the parameter |url= to save space.--Notmyhandle 20:00, 6 January 2007 (CST)
 * Sounds good. If you do this, make sure you make the parameter optional. :-) --DrBob (Talk) 02:37, 7 January 2007 (CST)
 * I added the url section (shows as Game Website on the infobox); although I would really like to modify it somehow (I don't know how) to make it so we can truncate the url to remove the http or simply use our own text. For example the url might be really long or it might be something completely unrelated from the game; in these cases we should be able to change it to something that reflects the game/website accurately.  For now though, perhaps we can add a separate parameter (|url trunc= ??) and take that data, run it to the url element so that we can put it in a url tag ( ???) If 1)someone knows this would work and 2)we decide that we should do it (I think we should) then please do this and report that it's been done.--Notmyhandle 02:57, 7 January 2007 (CST)
 * I've made the link an external link (using single square brackets: ' [url] '). If you want, you can add a parameter for the name to display for the link, and put it into the square brackets, with a space separating it and the URL (see Wikipedia). --DrBob (Talk) 05:44, 7 January 2007 (CST)
 * I added the parameter "url text," which will change the link into whatever is specified. It would work much better if we could have a script that set the link to simply the url IF url text is not specified.  Right now if you use url, url text is mandatory otherwise the link looks like:  . --Notmyhandle 18:08, 7 January 2007 (CST)
 * I think that gets a bit to complicated. Leave it like the preceded/follow by section. If they want it to be a hyperlink, let them make it a link.  It can still follow all the regular url rules, without requiring figuring out some special cases.  I also changed the text to Website, since we know it's a game already. -- Prod (Talk) 19:21, 7 January 2007 (CST)
 * I cannot thank you enough. Such a simple solution.  Mmm I'm salivating.  --Notmyhandle 19:40, 7 January 2007 (CST)
 * Heh, no problem. However, I realized that Infobox, All Game Nav, Footer Nav, and Continue Nav are the major templates used on LOTS of pages (job queue got huge after changing anything in these templates).  They seem to have gotten fairly stable, so I'm suggesting that we protect them. -- Prod (Talk) 19:54, 7 January 2007 (CST)
 * Quite a sensible conclusion Prod. I must say that my intentions were quite similar to what you have proposed.  Perhaps this community issue page is important after all.  --Notmyhandle 20:00, 7 January 2007 (CST)
 * Umm... I actually found that last comment to be a bit insulting. Procyon 20:15, 7 January 2007 (CST)
 * I apologize, it was. I'm glad it could be identified though.  Don't take me seriously Prod, you do good work 'round the interweb. --Notmyhandle 20:29, 7 January 2007 (CST)
 * I think I missed the insult...but then again, I'm half asleep. I only take people who take me seriously seriously, so I can't seriously take you seriously.  Anywayz, thanks for taking care of the rest of the url stuff, forgot about those. -- Prod (Talk) 23:18, 7 January 2007 (CST)

Archives layout @ the top of this page
Why are they limited to such a small space within that table? Why not have them spread across the entire width of it? Why is there a  tag at all? Doesn't it auto fit content into the table? --Notmyhandle 00:27, 8 January 2007 (CST)
 * Er, what? Why is what limited to such a small space? What table? You're not making any sense. --DrBob (Talk) 04:32, 8 January 2007 (CST)
 * Ummm, Its not just you DrBob....I don't get what he's saying either... WillSWC 06:26, 8 January 2007 (CST)
 * I'm guessing you're talking about the archives box at the top right of this page. It doesn't autofit as the size isn't set.  I personally don't like the pages where they spread it out across the top.  It just gets in the way of using that top area of the page. -- Prod (Talk) 09:53, 8 January 2007 (CST)
 * I fixed it so that you could see which tag he was talking about. This is such a small issue, and for the sake of brevity, I'll continue the discussion on Notmyhandle's talk page.  Procyon 10:05, 8 January 2007 (CST)
 * Whoever changed how it looks now, me likes. Twas a suggestion in the first place.  --Notmyhandle 18:17, 8 January 2007 (CST)

Protection and help
--Prod (Talk) 10:39, 8 January 2007 (CST)
 * 1) Copy over the wikimedia help. It would give our help section a nice boost and somewhere to build from.
 * 2) Protect All Game Nav, Footer Nav, Continue Nav, Infobox.  These are major templates, and they have become fairly stable.
 * 3) Move Community Issues to StrategyWiki Talk:Community Portal.
 * I've dealt with #2, but I'm leaving the others for now. --DrBob (Talk) 11:43, 8 January 2007 (CST)
 * I can take care of #1, just want to know if I should go ahead with it. The reason being that we will have to go through the pages and clean them up for use here. -- Prod (Talk) 12:14, 8 January 2007 (CST)
 * I'm not sure I understand the purpose of #3. I'm not against it, I just don't understand it.  Could you explain the reasoning?  Procyon 12:17, 8 January 2007 (CST)
 * I just thought it might be something to discuss, so here are a few points.
 * We don't use the talk pages for either the community portal or the issues pages.
 * As most of the major issues have been cleared up (new users don't really need this page) the link can maybe be removed from the sidebar and replaced with Staff lounge or something.
 * The community portal is afaik unused, moving it there would draw more attention to it (it could use an overhaul anywayz)
 * We would get the "Edit +" link at the top since this is a discussion page, not an "information" page, and fits in with the community portal "theme".
 * I still haven't decided if I think it's a good idea or not yet, but I think it's worth a bit of thought. -- Prod (Talk) 12:42, 8 January 2007 (CST)
 * Cool, thank you for explaining it. I understand your points about the community portal, and my only argument against moving this page is because I'm so used to it being here, which isn't necessarily a good argument, so I would support the move. Procyon 12:45, 8 January 2007 (CST)
 * Now that you've explained your reasons (I probably should've asked, but I knew they would be good ones regardless), I would support #3. Do you want to do this Prod? For the moment, I say we should leave the Wikipedia help where it is, and just refer people to it where necessary. We could link to it from our help if/where appropriate. --DrBob (Talk) 15:11, 8 January 2007 (CST)
 * Are we going to leave this page redirecting to there? Should I have the talk pages changed to point there (the one's already subst: as part of Welcome)? Should we move the Archives? (My answers: Yes, No if there's a redirect yes otherwise, Yes) -- Prod (Talk) 15:43, 8 January 2007 (CST)
 * Sounds good. :-) --DrBob (Talk) 16:56, 8 January 2007 (CST)
 * I agree with the points brought up on #3. The talk page for the Community Portal is indeed unused and moving Community issues there would bring more attention to the Community Portal page. I have to admit, in the time I've been at Strategy Wiki, I've never really visited the Community Portal. 0-172 00:26, 9 January 2007 (CST)
 * DrBob took care of #2, I took care of #3. About #1, just to note that the help pages are public domain, so we can just copy them over whenever we deem necessary. -- Prod (Talk) 12:28, 9 January 2007 (CST)
 * The sooner the better I say. --Notmyhandle 12:45, 9 January 2007 (CST)
 * I say we leave them where they are. That way, we can direct people to them, but we also get the benefits of wikipedians constantly maintaining them. --DrBob (Talk) 16:57, 9 January 2007 (CST)

Headline Spacing
Well, I'm sorry for all these small issue things but small = big, the headlines (all tiers) are by default for all wiki's created with a space in mind (between the equal signs and the text; for example == Example == like that). But think about it, by removing the spaces thats like 2+ bytes saved per page (which would be like several megabytes at this stage). Could someone change the templates or whatever to make it so the spaces aren't there? Even if no one cares or doesn't want to remove the spaces, can someone just tell me why they are there? I always remove them manually anyways, also, if people don't like issues like these, is there somewhere else I can post them? --Notmyhandle 18:49, 8 January 2007 (CST)
 * Just to note, whenever a page is saved, it re-saves the whole text, not just a diff, so saving the 2+ bytes takes up a lot more. I also think this may be in the software itself (it's definitely not a template) so you should discuss that on www.mediawiki.org. They are also there to separate the words I think (try holding and presssing left and right arrows in the edit box).  The '=' gets counted as part of the word without the space. -- Prod (Talk) 19:35, 8 January 2007 (CST)
 * Prod, are you sure about that (re-saving the whole text, not just the diff)? I was under a vastly different impression, and now I'm not sure who's right. Procyon 19:47, 8 January 2007 (CST)
 * It's off to mediawiki we go! --Notmyhandle 20:11, 8 January 2007 (CST)
 * This is where I read it, though I guess it isn't the best source. However, I've used Special:Export a few times and it stores complete histories as well. From [] it seems that they gzip each revision and store it separately. -- Prod (Talk) 20:39, 8 January 2007 (CST)

Compressing Pictures
So Prod mentioned to Procyon and I about a program, WP:Pngcrush, to help compress PNG's. As I was browsing one of the image categories, I noticed that some of the file sizes were large (big pictures) for png's; so I ran a quick test on Image:Css sg-552.png by using index mode rather than RGB, and it cut the size down by about 11kb (65kb). Then I tried a normal RGB version, compressed as a JPEG (worst quality), came out as 37kb, although comparitively worse (not bad as a thumbnail though). The final test was the use of PNGCrush; reducing the file from 65kb (66,437 bytes) to 60kb (60,903 bytes). Anyways, as you can see, there's a possibility of freeing up a lot of space if people want to waste the time.

Opinions, good/bad thing to do? --Notmyhandle 22:50, 10 January 2007 (CST)

By the way, since I have the compressed file (it looks identical to the current version) of that sg-552, should I upload it? --Notmyhandle 22:54, 10 January 2007 (CST)
 * Just leave them. If we ever get short of space, we can run a shell script on the server to automatically pngcrush all PNG uploads. :-) --DrBob (Talk) 00:18, 11 January 2007 (CST)
 * Now that's a cool tool. --Notmyhandle 01:32, 11 January 2007 (CST)
 * Thanks for taking the time to test all of that and report your findings Notmyhandle. Procyon 09:09, 11 January 2007 (CST)

Tournament
Forklet has started up a ladder (rules). Are we going to support this? -- Prod (Talk) 10:39, 13 January 2007 (CST)
 * Hmm... I'd probably say no. How does it benefit the guide? --Antaios 10:41, 13 January 2007 (CST)
 * What exactly are those rules for? I don't see how it's relevant to anything. I wouldn't support it. 0-172 16:47, 13 January 2007 (CST)
 * Yeah, I say we delete them. They're more personal and not beneficial to the guide in any way. --Antaios 11:21, 13 January 2007 (CST)
 * I took care of it and recommended that they move the tournament to the gamefaqs message board for that game. This is definitely something we don't want to encourage. Procyon 12:17, 13 January 2007 (CST)
 * 0-172, I wanted them to see the message I left for them. Procyon 12:20, 13 January 2007 (CST)
 * Oy... forget it. :P Procyon 12:21, 13 January 2007 (CST)
 * Why don't you leave the message on their talk pages? Or I could just restore one of the pages? 0-172 18:21, 13 January 2007 (CST)
 * Done. I left the message on Folket's talk page. 0-172 18:27, 13 January 2007 (CST)

Wi-Fi
This is just an idea, how about creating a category for DS games with Wi-Fi connection? 0-172 17:01, 13 January 2007 (CST)
 * Sounds good to me. I guess we could class them under Category:Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection or Category:Nintendo Wi-Fi compatible. -- Prod (Talk) 11:10, 13 January 2007 (CST)
 * I wanted to try to do something similar for Game Boy games that support the Super Game Boy... (just a random thought) Procyon 12:18, 13 January 2007 (CST)
 * What exactly is Super Game Boy? 0-172 18:28, 13 January 2007 (CST)
 * It's an SNES cartridge that lets you plug gameboy games into it (play them on your tv). Don't they all work on the SGB? Or are you referring to the few that have added functionality when played on the SGB?  Personally, I don't think it's that important, since all you get is a bit more colors and stuff like that and that info can be put on each page by itself. However, to completely cover all info, it may be beneficial. -- Prod (Talk) 12:36, 13 January 2007 (CST)
 * Of a similar topic, how about creating a category for Xbox Live compatible games as well? 0-172 2:30, 14 January 2007 (CST)
 * We've already got Category:Xbox Live Arcade. --DrBob (Talk) 01:23, 14 January 2007 (CST)
 * Sounds good to me. --DrBob (Talk) 01:23, 14 January 2007 (CST)

Wikipedia linking
I've noticed that there's a fair amount of linking to wikipedia with the wikipedia template. I'm wondering how much linking is necessary. Having the template on every game shouldn't be necessary, since our pages should have enough information about the game. Company pages I guess would be a good place to put the template, since I think that's fairly borderline relevant to StrategyWiki's mission. Series pages are almost self completing, as historical information isn't that important, though it could be useful to see the changes in a game based on the developer. -- Prod (Talk) 15:33, 13 January 2007 (CST)
 * I'd just like to point out that something in the wikipedia template can really cause havoc with page layouts, especially when you've got an embedded table of contents. --aniki21 18:48, 13 January 2007 (CST)
 * I believe how necessary the linking is depends on the completion of the guide. If the guide has a fair amount of information, then the link isn't needed. But if there is no, or if Wikipedia has more information, then maybe the linking could be used. Having the link template on each game article isn't necessary, only on articles that might need it (if at all) or with guides with minimal information. Other than that, I believe that the wikipedia template does clutter up pages. As for wreaking havoc with page layouts, it really could mess things up, I can see how would mess things up with an embedded ToC. 0-172 2:25, 14 January 2007 (CST)
 * The only reason I like to include a link to WP is because frequently there is information in WP that does not belong in a strategy guide such as pop culture references, merchandise, and more detailed descriptions of the technology used to develop the game. In the long run, I don't personally care too much either way, I just provide it as a courtesy.  Obviously if someone really wants to look a subject up on wikipedia, they can figure it out.  Procyon 21:08, 13 January 2007 (CST)
 * Thus the WP template should be used on 1)stub-like articles and 2)articles with additional non-game guide information. --Notmyhandle 01:39, 14 January 2007 (CST)

Game specific Image Category
Support
 * 1) Notmyhandle 05:01, 14 January 2007 (CST)

Oppose

So I had an idea, and I started to go off on it as I usually do, but I stopped myself because of course consensus is a better idea.

I think that there should be an image category just to hold the categories of game specific images, such as Category:Age of Empires images; and that this category should be Category:Game images (which is under Category:Images).

Isn't this better than allowing the Image category to be filled with an innumerable amount of categories? Since, in general, every game should have one of these categories. We should begin our categorization of such a large amount of listing before it gets very large. With this cat, more would probably stem off it, perhaps by genre, or whatever. But as a first step, who votes yes and who no? --Notmyhandle 05:01, 14 January 2007 (CST)
 * I support this (I intended to do it myself sometime), but I feel I should point out that it's a bit off to put up a poll about something, yet start it anyway before anyone's replied. --DrBob (Talk) 05:31, 14 January 2007 (CST)
 * You're lucky I didn't do it first completely before starting the poll xD. --Notmyhandle 06:16, 14 January 2007 (CST)
 * I think DrBob's point is well taken. Your actions are, at the same time, beneficial to the site and detrimental to being considered part of the team.  It's not a major issue, it's just something that you might want to think about in the future.  Procyon 07:09, 14 January 2007 (CST)
 * I have no opinion on this one way or the other. I don't see how anyone would bother going through the image categories browsing for something, it's much easier to go to the game and then get the category that way.  However, I am always up for categorization, so it's ok with me.  And if you did change them all, by bot could easily change it all back very quickly ;). As for moving everything to the new cat, I can take care of that (if consensus is reached). -- Prod (Talk) 11:05, 14 January 2007 (CST)
 * So 3 for support. Proc's vote is necessary, anyone else (Echelon & Dan?) would be nice too.  When can we say consensus has been reached?  And Proc, yes I know I tend to act before thinking; I'm just glad I stopped myself this time more than usual.  --Notmyhandle 15:41, 14 January 2007 (CST)