User talk:Briess

Extension request

(mostly copied from User talk:senso)

A string manipulation extension would allow things to be dynamically created from raw files and other powerful templates. With the upcoming big change to creature structure in DF, something that pulls info directly from raw data would really help rework the creature pages. I've been looking through some extensions, and one of these would fit well (in order of preference)

1. http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Extension:MultiReplace
2. http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Extension:RegexParserFunctions
3. http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Extension:StringFunctions

The first one is a replacement function that can preform multiple replacements in one call (and it supports regex). The second one is a straightforward regex engine, and the last one is a collection of string manipulations. For my suggested purpose just one of the three would be enough, but none of them completely covers the tasks the of others. So, if possible, having all of them would be best. VengefulDonut 21:35, 15 September 2009 (UTC)

Their functionality does overlap a lot. The differences are as follows:

• Multireplace can preform multiple replacements with one call, which the second one cannot. It can evaluate regular expressions for the replacement.
• RegexParserFunctions can preform a regex replacement. It can also be used for a regex search, which multireplace isn't meant for.

Multireplace would be better suited for a template that generates diagrams. Regexparserfunctions could do this by nesting the function call many times, which I don't think is a good idea.

Regexparserfunctions would be better suited for a template that pulls information from raw data files. Multireplace could do this by matching everything before and after the matchtext and cropping it, like so: (.*)(matchtext)(.*)=$2. However, to do this multireplace is effectively matching the entire page at once. VengefulDonut 22:50, 15 September 2009 (UTC)

This is a possible alternative: http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Extension:RegexFunctions VengefulDonut 05:04, 27 September 2009 (UTC)

Archive Subdomain problem

Sorry to bother, i sent an email to senso, but it seems that you are the new admin. Grats. Yesterday i was surfing the archive [1] and suddendly it started to redirect to a french blog. Now it redirect to the main wiki. (Actually every subdomain redirects to the main wiki, also invalid ones) Can you bring it back? I know that it's rarely used, but sometimes it's funny to build 2D nostalgia fortresses. --Tempus 09:13, 16 September 2009 (UTC)

Contact info?

Thanks for stepping up. Are you going to have an e-mail contact addy, for less public communication? --Albedo 17:31, 16 September 2009 (UTC)

Favicon

The favicon for the previous wiki seems not to have been copied over. VengefulDonut 18:36, 17 September 2009 (UTC)

http://web.archive.org/web/20071127071819/http://www.dwarffortresswiki.net/favicon.ico VengefulDonut 01:35, 18 September 2009 (UTC)

You may want to watch this page

Dwarf Fortress Wiki:Spamreport VengefulDonut 01:41, 18 September 2009 (UTC)

Short delay for new accounts?

Some wikis have a policy of a short waiting period between the creation of a new user account and the ability to edit an article. (On the main wiki, I believe this is 30 days.) This delay achieves 3 things, but the only one I'm really concerned with is that it would seriously slow down bots and spammers. As a side benefit, it also prevents confused newbies from editing before they have a feel for the wiki as a whole, and spontaneous, ill-considered or mean-spirited contributions from a variety of other less-than-serious sources, such as the occasional spur-of-the-moment vandal or the late-Saturday-night beer-goggled comedy writing team. I think 1 week would be ample, but even a 48 or 72 hour period might slow the spam bots. No editor who has a worthwhile contribution to make would resent 48 hours to consider their first effort.

Just a thought.--Albedo 02:09, 18 September 2009 (UTC)

IP numbers instead of sig?

When I was trying to use the standard --~~~~ sig, IP numbers are coming up instead of the user/date. See Talk:Furniture Industry. Don't know what's up wi'dat. --Albedo 06:39, 27 September 2009 (UTC)

Is it possible you were logged out at the time? I enabled
 anonymous edits for at least a trial period earlier today...

Okay, that must have been it - I had no notification that it wouldn't accept my edit, so...
Otoh, I, for one, do have a problem when a page gets edited by 24.198.25.175 - how do I respond on their talk page? More, don't some smaller ISP's still share IP numbers between users over time in the same area? So... who, exactly, made that edit? Everyone with that ISP? Lastly, when keeping getting a feel for who is editing what, and their style, hard to mentally keep casual track of an IP addy. Just one vote, but in this case, it's one of dissent.--Albedo 18:30, 27 September 2009 (UTC)

Well, you da boss. You may want to make a general announcement, perhaps on the "current events" page? It's rather jarring to see IP's instead of user:names, and I would never have guessed that their :talk page would work - might want to mention that, too, for all the other ignorants out there. (Also, if I never "don't log in" again, I'll never see any response to the one IP edit I did make, right? 2 user pages for each editor w/ a user:name? And even more if they (don't) log in from different locations/IP's? hrmmm...)--Albedo 08:42, 28 September 2009 (UTC)

You're on 'er, yer honour. Sleeep gooood...--Albedo 09:33, 28 September 2009 (UTC)

leave

User AcpasNorol wants to leave the wiki (see edits). I think he was blocked before, are old spamaccounts still blocked? --92.202.37.191 13:01, 8 October 2009 (UTC)

Personal

Thanks for cleaning up after me, including the formatting on the joining page. --The Architect

Deletion Policy

Redirects serve two purposes - links from other articles, and Searches. These fit under neither category, or none that also fit other policies (like singular/plural article names). And a lot depends on what links to them - since most of these were orphans (or effectively so, any reference only being a conversation re deletion) what are the odds of a search?
Re plurals - I guess on one hand once they're there, they might as well stay, but they do set a bad precedent, and they are serving no good purpose except as an undesirable crutch.
As far as "bizmuth bronze", that's a terrible precedent imo - do we start allowing any and every misspelled word to be "redirected"? If it's regional (armour/armor) or a common confusion (adamantium/adamantine) I support it 100%, but misspellings? Bleh. Remind me to make a redirect page for the metals iorn and steal, and sliver and goaled, among others. Double bleh.
Personality modding was someone's pet project that was never started beyond posting the (almost blank) page, and abandoned and forgotten by late '07, not updated until user:I2amroy copied/pasted the entirety of the personality page onto it without further comment. It had no links except on 2 user pages, one where we were recently wondering "WTF IS this?", and another that's listed under "old forum links". Since the page itself was 2 years old, and has nothing that the original didn't... I think it's another that could get trimmed without loss, as the odds of anyone typing in "personality modding" are slim to none.
So my position is "Lose 'em all, no one will ever miss them, and it's a cleaner site without" - but that's my opinion - the final policy is up to you.--Albedo 18:19, 20 October 2009 (UTC)

.... Er, I really meant if you still disagree, I'm more than willing to continue discussing what
 the appropriate course of action should be over any editorial policies we may have on this wiki.

Nah - I'm opinionated and vocal, but that's not the same as being always adamant in that opinion nor believing that means that I'm "right" (nor always spoiling for an argument/fight, some evidence to the contrary). I've voiced my point and the reasons behind it, and I believe you've weighed that (Respect) - so if in your estimation it doesn't wash, that's all good by me. (In this case.) ;) The policies are a collaboration as much as the content itself, and we've held to that process. So, until next time... ;D --Albedo 23:57, 20 October 2009 (UTC)

graphic gone missing

, from the pump page, is MIA. I have no idea why or how, she gone.--Albedo 09:52, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Quote page - Karl's recent deletion constitutes vandalism

Karl is continually removing any and every quote I add to the quote page while leaving alone anything added by anyone else. Ie, he's clearly attacking me rather than trying to improve the quote page. This behavior is strikingly aberrant especially because he seems to be in favor of keeping any other quote no matter how bad.

I've acted in good faith to improve the quote page, and am trying to participate in a dialog about the other deleted quotes which I honestly don't feel belong on the page on their own merits. He's judging quotes i've added solely on the basis that I added them. He's also deleted other quotes i've added previously, and appends his recent changes summary with smilie faces as if he thinks he's being funny. This amounts to vandalism pure and simple. Needless to say, this is unacceptable behavior.

--Squirrelloid 16:29, 5 November 2009 (UTC)

Addendum: My attempts to talk with him about it on his talk page caused him to merely delete my text with no response. I hate to ask it, but i'm asking for administrative action - he's clearly incapable of separating personal from substantative differences. --Squirrelloid 16:31, 5 November 2009 (UTC)

The quote I removed was based on the way you remove them, they were not grade-A funny quote. A taste of your own Medicine. You judge quote based on your biased opinion, saying they need to be funny, which is not the case, it's written nowhere on the wiki. You try to impose your own twisted sense of humor on this wiki. The fact no one cares about the quote make it hard to add them back, even if me and corona wanted to have some back, you opposed your veto, saying it was hardly a consensus.

You are by the way really condescending vs me and corona, talking about whining and all, did it ever occur to you that humor might be a personal taste ?

Oh, and by the way, it's unnecessary to copy/paste your rant on multiple page. --Karl 16:44, 5 November 2009 (UTC)

As much as i hate to have a discussion with you on someone else's talk page

First, the discussions, while on related issues, served different purposes. Namely a referendum on the quotes talk page on those quotes versus talking with an administrator about the appropriateness of particular editing behavior.

Second, you're applying a different standard to quotes I've added than to other quotes on that page, which means you're targetting them because I've added them. Ie, exactly what I've said above. I doubt anything which I add you would ever consider grade-A funny, solely because i've added it.

Third, they certainly aren't quotes crafted by me - i've merely noticed them and decided they should be added. They deserve to be judged on their own merits. You're not hurting me by removing them because I added them, you're hurting the page, and you're penalizing the people whose material it was originally.

--Squirrelloid 16:49, 5 November 2009 (UTC)

This is stupid and childish. I suggest the two of you cease contact and stay away from the quote page. --Iban 07:20, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

Number of regex evaluations allowed per page

The number-of-functions-per-page parameter in the regex parser functions extension defaults to 10. Limiting it to a small number isn't warranted since computation time is based more on the complexity of the expressions involved rather than the quantity. A higher limit would allow template:diagram to be used more than three times on a single page. I've compared the serve time of these two pages: a b, and found the difference was usually about 0.003 seconds. Based on this, I don't think its use is dangerous. VengefulDonut 17:38, 10 November 2009 (UTC)

Hmm. If the ceiling is a few hundred, we probably won't bump into it. VengefulDonut 13:02, 11 November 2009 (UTC)

When you were testing template:diagram, the limit you bumped into was the post-expand include size limit for templates. Templates are not allowed to generate more than 2MB of data on a single page. Since trying to display 2MB of data in one article is a bad idea anyway, this limit is very reasonable. If you want to see the include size, serve time, and other properties of an article, they get added as comments the page's html source when served. VengefulDonut 14:00, 16 November 2009 (UTC)

Cannot add new accounts

The wiki will not allow new accounts to be created as the picture thing seems to be set up wrong

To help protect against automated account creation, please type the two words you see in the box below: 

This reCAPTCHA key isn't authorized for the given domain. More info 

Please fix, I would like to set up and account versus being just an IP

I found this other site "http://www.dwarffortresswiki.net/" by googleing "Briess contact wiki" which looks very simular, and reCAPTCHA works on. That .net site did let me make an account and post the above message. Then it showed up on the .com site, and then the .com site let me log in. Larek 00:33, 12 November 2009 (UTC)

Well I still can't post on the .com site as each post seems to require the annoying reCAPTCHA thing (which doesn't work). But any thing I put on that other .net site, shows up on the orginal .com one very quickly. Larek 00:37, 12 November 2009 (UTC)

Briess asked, The .com site is the First (and Second) hit on google when searching for "dwarven fortress wiki" which is http://dwarf.lendemaindeveille.com And yes I know that its "Dwarf Fortress" not "Dwarven Fortress", is just that when I speak to others about DF "Dwarven" is usally said since it is Dwarfs that build that Fortress.

Well I don't know what you have access to, and how lowlevel you can get on the webserver. But a Robots.txt that prevents google from indexing the .com site would fix my issue.

I can't find any trace of a 301 redirect on the .com site through IE6 or Netscpe. Also redirect checking tool http://www.internetofficer.com/seo-tool/redirect-check/ seems to think there is not redirect either. Hope this helps. Larek 15:17, 13 November 2009 (UTC)

Interwiki links to russian DF wiki

We previously had the ability to create interwiki links to the corresponding page on the Russian DF wiki. It seems that this functionality has been broken. VengefulDonut 06:15, 15 November 2009 (UTC)

The russian wiki is at http://www.dfwk.ru/ VengefulDonut 14:01, 16 November 2009 (UTC)

Custom namespace on the wiki for DF mods?

I'm one of the people working on the Ark Project, a collaborative DF mod. So far we've been using a user talk page on the DF wiki for planning purposes, but we were thinking it'd be nice if there were a custom namespace called "Mod" on the wiki. This would also help clean up the problem with mod pages in the Main namespace.

As an aside, it might also be helpful to have a "Utility" namespace for utilities, which are in the same boat as mods.

I noticed the DF wiki already has custom namespaces for bloodline games, so hopefully this isn't too much to ask. Thanks!

Oh, and apologies for contacting you via both this and a PM. I sent the PM and then noticed you hadn't logged onto B12 forums in a while, so I didn't know if you'd get it.

--Footkerchief 21:24, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

Thanks a ton! This'll be really helpful. One thing though: the new namespaces don't seem to have subpages enabled, and a lot of the people currently hosting mods on their talk pages are using subpages. I know people can switch to using categories instead (we may do this), but it's something to consider. Also, this is pure irrelevant nitpicking, but namespace names usually use the singular.

--Footkerchief 21:08, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

Awesome, thanks!

--Footkerchief 21:45, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Could you mark me autoconfirmed?

Hey, I don't know what the rule is for this, but if I'm not autoconfirmed when you see this, can you mark me as that? The captcha is really annoying when I'm trying to develop the Dwarf_Fortress_2010 page. Thanks! Mason11987 22:25, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

Vandal

This guy has been adding trash to a bunch of the creature pages. Quietust warned him already on his talk page for unconstructive edits to Scamps (one of these edits were undone by you yourself), but he continues to make edits to the gremlin page. ---Iban 11:08, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

Can I have admin rights?

Hey. I'm working on developing wiki pages for the new version of DF. These pages are listed here. There is a lot to do for this and most people probably won't be too interested for a couple weeks after release. I'm hoping to have something in place for structure, and also for new users before release. In doing so I'm trying to rearrange some of the pages I've made and make them more useful. I've done a few moves but I'm going to have a lot of move over redirects to do at some point and I need admin rights to make sure I clean up the mess I make. I've been admin on a dozen or so wikis, and effectively ran sporewiki for months myself. If you give me admin rights you can feel free to monitor all my actions to make sure everything is kosher. I just hate having to bother someone else to fix tiny things. Thanks! Mason11987 17:11, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

Just as a side comment, it's usually been my observation (from many different places) that directly asking for admin rights is a really good way to ensure that the answer will be "no", especially for somebody who only registered on the wiki 1 week ago, but that's just me. --Quietust 21:32, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

I suppose on a forum or site where admin matters, but on wikis my experience is that if people have a reasonable use for the tools and don't look like they intend to screw anything up, then who cares? But then again, that's only because everything is able to be undone so it's a zero risk situation. I don't know why people would want to make a wiki and then restrict people who seem helpful from editing it easily, kinda counter-productive imo. Mason11987 03:01, 1 February 2010 (UTC)

I think Admin is the wrong word. These kinds of people are janitors or managers or something. Admins are people who also manage users, sometime you don't want a person to have access to. --Iban 03:16, 1 February 2010 (UTC)

Depends what environment you are familiar with. On Mediawiki-based wikis (Wikipedia for example) the phrase "Admin" often refers to the user group that has a few powers like deleting pages, blocking users, protecting pages, editing system messages, because these are the default for the sysop group. I really only have a desire to use the deleting pages power, but there is a lot of opportunity to work on the system messages here as well. I posted this hear because even though the average person doesn't know that admin = person with a couple extra powers on a wiki, I assumed Briess (who is a bureaucrat) would know. Admin is in Media-Wiki terminology correct, the person who manages users is a bureaucrat on wikis. Mason11987 06:05, 1 February 2010 (UTC)

Wouldn't it be less problematic to just create Category:Deletion_requests or something? Oh, we already have that at Category:Deletion. I don't know if Briess knows about it though. --Footkerchief 06:17, 1 February 2010 (UTC)

Well I don't see any reason why it's problematic to just hit the button on the user rights page. Just because some people seem to think that admin on a wiki should be like a reward system instead of a set of tools doesn't mean that's the right thing to do. Especially when the two bureaucrats aren't even on here most days (or so it seems). Mason11987 08:25, 1 February 2010 (UTC)

I'm not inclined to make a decision about this just yet, give me a day or two to mull over it. If you want to continue discussing this, please do by all means. Also, I am aware of the deletion request page, and actually pruned it this last week. :) --Briess 10:36, 1 February 2010 (UTC)

Sounds good, just remember that all sysop actions are revertible as well, as well as the decision to make someone a sysop. You can always just mark deletion and then visit this page once a day to make sure I wasn't deleting useful things. Most of what I intend to delete will be my own pages anyway, or redirect pages. I read your comment on your deletion policy on albedo's talk page and that's pretty much my philosophy as well. Mason11987 18:42, 1 February 2010 (UTC)

Saw the wiki admin page and your note. Sounds reasonable to me. I'll fill one out when I get the chance (work has been VERY busy recently). Mason11987 11:32, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

Wİkimedia Commons

I've been thinking that it would be nice to add some photos to the wiki, such as of trees, stones and animals, for example. Wikimedia commons would make an excellent source, since from what I gather the whole point of it is that the images are meant to be freely reused. However, apparently third party wikis such as this one can link to commons directly, if it's enabled. (see http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Manual:$wgForeignFileRepos and http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Manual:$wgUseInstantCommons) So is there any chance we could get that enabled? (Excuse me if this is already enabled, but unless I am mistaken it is not.)--Ar-Pharazon 01:07, 8 February 2010 (UTC)

Help with Bloodline Games

I've started a couple of games (see my user page) but although lots of people seem interested from various discussion pages I'm guessing they're not watching that page to see that games are now being hosted. Is there any way for me to send emails to these interested parties or have someone who already has access to their emails to do it for me? I would like to get these games on the go and alot of people are interested on the Wiki without knowing about them! -- Melek 06:35, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

deletion not gone

Briess (Talk | contribs) deleted "File:Fireman.jpg"

And yet, it's still there... http://dwarffortresswiki.net/index.php/File:Fireman.jpg

(And you really should delete some of the older topics on this page. Sheesh.) ; )
--75.62.155.145 09:44, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

Cannot login

I can't login. :( bombcar

Policy on Labour/Labor, etc

Some clever rabbit just took it upon himself to edit about 60 pages, changing every British-spelled word he could find to American spelling ( Special:Contributions/Thromordyn ). I "undid" all the colorful/colourful and favourite/favorite changes, but most are labor/labour and armour/armor - and that is less clear, so I wanted a policy call.

The word "labor" only appears in indirect references within the game itself (such as in engravings, "The dwarves are laboring"), spheres, and an obscure crime ("Conspiracy to Slow Labor") according to the string dump, and in the Article title on this wiki - nowhere else.

The term "armor" is a harder sell, as it's actually used in a couple places in the game interface ("armorsmith", the 3 pieces of torso protection, and "view/preference/soldiering: "armor level"), but it could still fall under the same policy/philosophy.

Do we want to discourage editing of all references of labour to labor and armour to armor, or encourage a single-minded "correct" spelling of that word? Happy to do the undos if the former, just as happy to leave them be if the policy is the latter. (Imo so long as it's consistent on a given page either spelling should be perfectly acceptable and not changed, even within links to articles and despite the main article title, but that's just me.)--Albedo 04:41, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

Thumbnail generator is not working

On the main page, I get:

Error creating thumbnail: /usr/bin/convert: Unrecognized option (-thumbnail).

--Bombcar 05:11, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

Interwiki

The interwiki link to the russian wiki is pointing to the wrong domain. The correct one is http://www.dfwk.ru.VengefulDonut 18:01, 25 February 2010 (UTC)

N00b!

So... whassup, boss? If I have questions, do I ask here, or is there somewhere better? (And you'll want my e-mail.) Got a page you recommend to learn the behind-the-scenes code? And what's the story with the "new wiki engine" on the Home Page? Is that the Wagn engine you were talking about? (Would it be better to wait and use that with the new version, once that gets released? That could act as a filter for old information.) --Albedo 16:35, 27 February 2010 (UTC)

Speaking of "oopsies", I dropped a typo on my e-mail addy in my Wagn account, so I need that deleted ("Albedo") so I can re-apply correctly. thnx (And what do you think of a central page here for Wagn Q&A?) --Albedo 07:30, 28 February 2010 (UTC)

Wagn

What are the advantages of Wagn? My first impression of the thing is a less powerful and less attractive version of mediawiki. Most of the documentation I've found on it so far reads like sales copy. I will look into it more, but right now my opinion is that this is a Bad Idea. VengefulDonut 20:12, 27 February 2010 (UTC)

Err, I broke the wagn :/ VengefulDonut 20:15, 28 February 2010 (UTC)

Dwarf Fortress Wiki:Versions

Based on your comments and input on the administration requests pages I thought you might be interested in this kind of discussion. Please bring in your comments on this page and on it's talk page and let everyone know what you think. Thanks! Mason11987 20:46, 28 February 2010 (UTC)

Could you drop by and comment on "consensus" again? [2] Mason ^(T-C) 00:31, 8 March 2010 (UTC)

Thank you

For your help on the Request for Adminship page. Sorry for having "caused" it, anyways, but I'm sorry, I'm not gonna hide who I prefer to be just for politics. Anyways, I just wanted to offer my thanks to you for that, whether I win or lose. --Aescula 00:09, 1 March 2010 (UTC)

"Current version" namespace?

I don't know if this is really what most people were thinking of doing. I think most people were supporting using "Main" as the namespace for the up to date articles. Mason ^(T-C) 00:37, 8 March 2010 (UTC)

Could things be moved en masse from "current version" to "main"? I was thinking the process (for each page) would be:

• Move article to 40d namespace (now there is a redirect, which is helpful for readers)
• Edit article to have a "version"-type template, which will auto-link to the 40d article, and do categories and everything as desired.

In this way users can always find the article they want at every point in the process. doing moves to current version namespace, then back to main would break that w/double redirects, or broken redirects. Mason ^(T-C) 00:48, 8 March 2010 (UTC)

Err.. that was complete overkill. Easily 2/3 of the wiki is going to be unaffected by the release. This means manually shifting the correct things from old to current is at least twice as much work as shifting the correct things from current to old. Also, this VengefulDonut 02:09, 8 March 2010 (UTC)

The unaffected shouldn't have to be rewritten. Is it possible for you to just copy things? VengefulDonut 02:14, 8 March 2010 (UTC)