Talk:Main Page/Quote

How to add quotes:

Go to the line of the last quote.
Add a line immediately after it (this should be before the closing }} brackets)
type "|YOUR-QUOTE-HERE" on that line

(The quote number is not functionally necessary, but it allows keeping track of how many quotes there are without counting)

Look at the first line of the template

It should look something like this:

{{Choose|c={{#if: {{{1|}}}|{{rand|37}}|{{#expr: ({{rand2|10}}+27)}} }}

Adjust the number that is in the place of the 37 to reflect the number of quotes in the list.
Adjust the number that is in the place of the 27 to reflect ten less than the number of quotes in the list. (in this case.. 27)

The purpose of the first number is to choose a random element from the list of quotes.

The second lets us pick from among the last ten quotes in the list.

Preview your reply to make sure nothing is broken (or someone will be able to see it on the main page before it gets fixed)
Profit!

VengefulDonut 00:34, 27 February 2008 (EST)

When to add quotes:

So. We have a small problem here. People add quotes, people remove quotes, people un-remove quotes, and people make edit war. Suggestion:

Rough guidelines for Main Page/Quote:

New quotes are freely added.
Those quotes are freely removed.
If <user> wants to get quotes re-added, <user> can make a section here stating that they should be and asking for opinion.
If consensus doesn't state "no, don't re-add them" for a while, the quotes can be freely added.
If <user2> wants to get quotes re-removed once the previous consensus is old, <user2> can make a similar section.
Etcetera.

--Savok 18:24, 7 March 2009 (EST)

I approve. --Senso 18:53, 7 March 2009 (EST)

Screenshots

The russian wiki has made use of the system here to show random DF screenshots rather than quotes. I think this is a rather clever idea. Maybe we have a good spot where we could place something similar? VengefulDonut 14:59, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Neat Idea. We could have one quote and one screenshoot. But we should define a standard size for the screenshot. --Karl 15:36, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

200x150 would make it fit the 800x600 curses, with proportional distortion all around, without taking up much in the way of page real estate. If the real estate is deemed not quite so valuable, then 400x300 would work even better, suffering half the overall distortion (but still maintaining a relatively small footprint, and keeping aspect ratio intact.) Unless we're happy with the smaller size I suggested, a page overhaul is going to be needed to find a place to put it, such that it doesn't make a jumble out of the rest of it. (Conversely, I think the 200x150 would fit very neatly in the space already allotted to one of the quotes.) --Edward 21:58, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Also, it could easily be arranged so that quotes and screenshots are paired. That way each screenshot has an accompanying caption. It would take quite a bit of work to get images for the current ones, though. I guess we could start them off as random stuff and switch them out as we go. VengefulDonut 02:40, 21 April 2009 (UTC)

"[B]loats"

For what it's worth, the nowiki formatting around square bracketed 'B' in the Toady quote about boats was simply in the interests of quoting accuracy; the original word was not capitalized and I still have that kind of formatting in my heart from college paper citations. --Alfador 12:16, 24 March 2008 (EDT)

Ah. It looked to me like a weird, failed boats/bloats pun. I don't think it really matters; you can change it back if you like. --Savok 17:19, 24 March 2008 (EDT)

Thank you! And done. --Alfador 11:27, 25 March 2008 (EDT)

Quote removal

Say, why was the "interrupted by carp" quote removed? I loved that one. --JT 02:58, 13 April 2008 (EDT)

Blame Savok, he thought it was unfunny. --GreyMario 16:22, 24 April 2008 (EDT)

And regarding VengefulDonut stripping off that last one, PTTG's quote was simply hilarious. If you can't laugh at yourself, who can you laugh at? --JT 02:19, 29 April 2008 (EDT)

Thinking on this some more, the idea that anyone can just reverse a quote at their leisure strikes me as unusual. If a quote is an obvious spam, that's one thing; if a quote is something that you don't think of as funny, I think there should be some sort of consensus system involved. There are at least a couple existing quotes that I don't find funny in the slightest (Spiders Everywhere, you've been processed, GreyMario's), but I don't remove them. --JT

My 2☼ on the subject:
Unless a quote is offensively directed at a particular user/person, I don't see how there are any grounds for removal.
If it is, it's perfectly acceptable for the addressed person to remove it, if they so choose.
Additionally, you may remove quotes of yourself, whether or not they're offensive, regardless of who added the quote.
In all cases, it's the sole responsibility of the addressed person to remove a quote, not someone else.
I think that makes sense.. but perhaps I'm too far off base? --Edward 07:37, 29 April 2008 (EDT)

When anyone is able to add a quote at their leisure, we will naturally end up with plenty of quotes that aren't funny. If anyone is able to remove a quote at their leisure, quotes that aren't funny will disappear. This is parallel to the wikipedia editing process in general, and I think this kind of process has decent results. Although I am open to other proposals.

On the topic of racy jokes: I'm sure there are plenty of group-targeted jokes that could be stated in DF terms that would be very funny; just pick a group, a metaphor, and a stereotype. But even if you tell a member of that group to grow a thicker skin or to stop taking themselves seriously or learn to take a joke, it doesn't turn the joke from something alienating to something entertaining. In the right context, those kinds of jokes can be very funny even to those on the butt end of them. Standup comedians succeed or fail based on their ability to create it. But I don't think that the front page is the right context. VengefulDonut 10:24, 29 April 2008 (EDT)

Unless its blantantly offensive I don't think "unfunny" is a reason to remove a quote, we each have our own sense of humour, such debate should be placed here on the discussion page imo. --Markavian 20:30, 25 May 2008 (EDT)

Bleh. I'd like to, but nobody answers most discussion page debates in reasonable time. If we become more regularly active in discussion page debates (which isn't hard - we've got several that any experienced player can add to), we might be able to do that. As it is, the responses are usually at least a few days, often months apart. And then, occasionally, we get one that has five people with fifteen comments in a day or two. --Savok 23:45, 31 May 2008 (EDT)

As I've said before, if you want to revert those of my deletes that you really think should stay, that's fine. The way I see it, and the way some have said before me, anybody can, if they think it's funny enough, add a quote to the page. Of course, we will get some pretty poor quotes that way, so anyone can, if they dislike it enough, delete a quote from that page. If an edit war occurs, we can take it to the talk page (with the war attention, we'll actually have commenters), where it can be resolved. We Are Not Wikipedia. We're too small for that; everyone knows everyone else and anyone can monitor all edits if they have a little time to spend.
--Savok, rambling at 23:45, 31 May 2008 (EDT)

Too untasteful?

I found this on the forums:

Belbezevost Närangagak Äkig:
Goatsects the Raw Red Anus of Stretching

For? Against? --Savok 22:56, 24 June 2008 (EDT)

I'm for it. DF has people exploding in gore. Besides, these words are in the game anyway. -- InquisitorSaturn 01:44, 3 July 2008 (EDT)

I'm for it. Lets be honest; how many people are likely to come to this wiki that aren't mature enough to enjoy a little mature humor. If anything people are more likely to complain that it didn't make them laugh then that they are worried that kids might see it. --Silver 01:29, 23 July 2008 (EDT)

Nobody gives a fuck about the kids, man. --GreyMaria 22:32, 29 October 2008 (EDT)

For - Very funny and clever --cultiststeve 17:33, 15 January 2009 (EST)

Multi-Line Quotes

I assumed your multi-line quote was an error because it rendered incorrectly when it appeared on http://www.dwarffortresswiki.net/index.php/Main_Page/Quote , and did so again when you restored the original. I've re-re-restored it in the interests of peace but I do note that the text extends outside the box and one line actually appears below the box. I'm less certain whether it appears this way on the main page. Perhaps we need a different way to enter multi-line quotes? --Corona688 15:39, 31 October 2008 (EDT)

The quote that's causing problems is kinda long, either way. How about we just bonk it on the head?--Maximus 19:15, 31 October 2008 (EDT)

But it's funny. :( --Corona688 01:55, 1 November 2008 (EDT)

Just out of curiosity, what browser? It appears just fine in Firefox 2. --GreyMaria 17:39, 4 November 2008 (EST)

Firefox 3. --Corona688 15:19, 11 November 2008 (EST)

My multi-line quote (shown below) doesn't appear to break anything (browser used: Firefox 3). --Beerdude26 15:26, 22 January 2009 (EST)

|Zander J: "Is there a way to stop immigration without setting the population cap?"
Yanlin: "Magma."

Okay wtf who broke shit where.

On the main page, the second random quote is just a '. WHAT GIVES? --GreyMaria 14:32, 20 November 2008 (EST)

I can't find any recent changes to the code of the selector, and given that the first selector works, it's hard to blame a syntax error either. The mainpage does a weird thing to guarantee the quotes are different, passing |1 to the page as a parameter or...something. Someone who knows wikicode may know what's going on. --Corona688 15:13, 20 November 2008 (EST)

The problem is a bit deeper. template:rand and template:rand2 use the mod function inside a #expr to mod the current timestamp and return a number in a specified range. The mod function is returning negative values for large inputs (this is a bug). Since it seems I can't guarantee a positive number will have a positive mod, I don't know how to modify the templates to make sure they keep returning positive numbers.

Smaller inputs would be nice, but I need it to vary with time, and those are the ones that are blowing it up. Also, I don't have absolute value or any binary number operations, so those methods are out. Absolute value would be available with a newer version of parser functions, but convincing Senso is an obstacle there. I'm really not sure how to remedy this. Anyone have ideas? VengefulDonut 19:43, 20 November 2008 (EST)

I say divide the end result before modulusing by 4. That'll still give pseudo-random numbers, just less often, and might work until a better fix rears its not-so-ugly head. --GreyMaria 20:12, 20 November 2008 (EST)

~~Good idea. I'll try it. VengefulDonut 20:21, 20 November 2008 (EST)~~

Didn't work. VengefulDonut 20:23, 20 November 2008 (EST)

Feel free to fool around with template:rand and push a fix if you can find one. Just make sure to preview. VengefulDonut 20:24, 20 November 2008 (EST)

Ah well, it was worth a shot. I'll see what I can come up with in the sandbox. --GreyMaria 20:31, 20 November 2008 (EST)

UPDATE: It appears using {{#expr: ((({{LOCALTIMESTAMP}} / 1024) + {{CURRENTDAY}} + {{CURRENTMONTH}}) mod {{{1|100}}}) + 1}} seems to produce positive numbers for now. I'll go update Template:Rand2 and see if it works. ~~So much for that, but at least it was returning positive numbers. --GreyMaria 20:42, 20 November 2008 (EST)~~

Okay, I blame certain things being slow for the fact that it works over in the Sandbox but not in the Main Page/Quote template. :S But the good news is, it's at least producing a result over at the sandbox. --GreyMaria 20:54, 20 November 2008 (EST)

Can you use an {{ #ifexpr: {{{num}}} >= 0 | {{{num}}} | {{ #expr: {{{num}}} * -1 }} }} to replace abs? (I may have the syntax slightly wrong.)--Maximus 04:09, 21 November 2008 (EST)

Good call, Maximus. VengefulDonut 09:04, 21 November 2008 (EST)

You know, I thought of that just last night but was too busy falling asleep. :( --GreyMaria 15:21, 21 November 2008 (EST)

I stole it off your desk.--Maximus 18:06, 21 November 2008 (EST)

Here we go again! It's started displaying the telltale ' again. D: --GreyMaria 00:05, 27 November 2008 (EST)
UPDATE: It's just gone away again. Might be worth a try to check the conditions next time it does it D: --GreyMaria 00:08, 27 November 2008 (EST)

Should be fixed now. VengefulDonut 18:04, 6 December 2008 (EST)

What's This Jreengus Stuff About, Anyway?

Googling it just gets me pages telling me it's funny for those in the know somehow. If any place ought to have an explanation it's the wiki. That's what it's there for! :) --Corona688 13:05, 21 November 2008 (EST)

Kobolds speak gibberish. The code that named an event allowed the kobolds to name it (when they won? maybe.), and that caused the name of an event to sometimes be a single word of gibberish. Toady mentioned that somewhere in some part of the dev notes.

That's it. --Savok 17:17, 21 November 2008 (EST)

Döbesh Udosdeb has been ecstatic lately. He was forced to eat a friend to survive. He enjoyed a truly decadent meal.

Haaaaawhaaahahahahahahahahahahaaaaaa. Awesome. We need more quotes that are as funny as this. --GreyMaria 17:48, 25 November 2008 (EST)

Long quotes

"Engraved on the wall is a masterfully designed image of a dwarf engraving a wall. The engraving is a dwarf engraving a wall. The engraving is a dwarf engraving a wall. The engraving is a dwarf engraving on a wall. The engraving is a dwarf engraving on a wall. The engraving is a dwarf mining out a wall." Yes this is a long quote but it's also funny, why ditch it? I didn't see any long quotes breaking the mainpage the way multi-line quotes did. --Corona688 15:59, 12 December 2008 (EST)

They make the main page look like crap by stretching the quote box and pushing down everything else. VengefulDonut 16:31, 12 December 2008 (EST)

Surely there are other places to put funny things. VengefulDonut 16:33, 12 December 2008 (EST)

Not really, unless you mean 'keep this stuff off the wiki'. No, quotes aren't a big deal. They're just fun, i.e. 'the entire point'. ;p The Quote_Archive is an obvious aging relic, and ought to go anyway since there's no sense having multiple, separate pages of slightly different functionality and identical content patchily duplicating each other. I wonder if the quote wikicode could be done the other way around... I might play around on my talk page and see if I can build a useful something. --Corona688 17:33, 12 December 2008 (EST)

The Quote Archive was originally created as a place for quotes to go to never be deleted, so that it wouldn't be that bad if someone lost a quote from Main Page/Quote. When I created it, I didn't realize the effort it would take to update it, so I'm going to go over there now and clean it up, making it all plaintext.

Also, I concur with Vengeful that the long quotes are overly ugly on the main page. --Savok 22:35, 12 December 2008 (EST)

Not arguing with that. I usually run screens at a high resolution so I didn't notice the stretching myself. I do think multiple quote pages is pointless though, 'specially considering folk like me will happen upon them and helpfully transfer stuff from one to the other... Not that I would, but I had often considered doing so, obviously misunderstanding your intent in all that duplicate information. --Corona688 00:15, 13 December 2008 (EST)

I agree in principle - many recently deleted are not (imo) a dealbreaker, but there has to be a limit somewhere. I just posted a guideline at the top of the page which reads:

LIMIT QUOTES TO 150 CHARACTERS (as most are below)

LONGER QUOTES MAY BE SNIPPED OR DELETED!

- which seems the max currently. (Only visible when editing, allcaps for max visibility/impact.)

I also edited several existing long quotes into shorter, acceptable format - some of those were funny, and while changing others' quotes is not my preferred option, this is a wiki, and it's that or lose them.--Albedo 04:05, 29 May 2009 (UTC)

Edit Warring

I see GreyMario has taken it upon himself to remove quotes by the dozen, most of which had previously been added back after someone noticed their mysterious absence. Clearly your sense of humor is not everyone's or people wouldn't have to keep adding them back, could you just leave it be instead of editwarring? Can someone give us a revert, please? --Corona688 23:24, 4 January 2009 (EST)

Except they were removed because they were unfunny by popular vote. People should really put it up to a vote when it comes to adding them back. --GreyMaria 01:24, 5 January 2009 (EST)

I must have missed this, where did it happen? --Corona688 14:21, 5 January 2009 (EST)

In general, I think the replacement of deleted quotes is more of a problem than their deletion. As long as they are added just once and deleted just once, we won't have an edit war even with conflicting views of humor. VengefulDonut 09:28, 11 January 2009 (EST)

I agree, most of those votes were not funny. They were not even remotely close to my "mind like a +whatever trap+" quote, and it's hard to be worse than that and still funny. Anyway, edit warring=no, people should ask what happened to them and it then should be explained exactly what did happen. Personally, I think that they should be left on the quote archive, but not popping up on the main page for all to see.--Destor 12:12, 5 January 2009 (EST)

6 deleted quotes - call for opinions

Here are 6 quotes that were deleted after being added. I believe they are worth keeping - wouldn't have added them if I didn't, but one other user disagreed enough to delete them all. Opinions on any or all are requested.

Look, there's sentient lava outside, & the only survivor is issuing mandates to the empty halls. This isn't going to get better.

On the forums is a masterful rendition of an image of a human reading a dwarf fortress wiki. The human has no clue what is going on.

Seeing a dwarf give birth while sparring was scary, but worse was when she picked the child up & continued fighting.

The merchants won't leave because I killed their guys & I can't drown them because there's a shoe in the floodgate.

All I do is lure the gobbos in and throw the lever to flood the central chamber, & the goblins start sorting themselves by density.

The mayor sent me to kill the crocodile that killed my last 3 characters - again... I think he's catching on that I want to kill him.

--Albedo 06:49, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

It's worth noting that these are all misquotes. They have been modified from their original versions. Since these is a list of quotes rather than just jokes misquotes do not belong here. VengefulDonut 07:57, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

IMO, we don't even credit the quotes so it's not that important to keep the original phrase intact. The quotes are here to add a funny aspect to the front page, it's not like we're quoting the President about some Important Matter. If a quote breaks the box, I say it's fine to shorten it until it fits, as long as the original spirit is kept. We could always ask the quote's author for their approval, if it's that important. Can we track the origin of those quotes? If not, let's edit them since nobody can prove they're actual quotes anyway. --Senso 13:52, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

If we're not going to pretend that we're quoting people, perhaps we should rename the page. VengefulDonut 16:16, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

I like quote 2 (forum + wiki) so much that I'ld be willing to re-add it myself; don't care about the rest. --MathFox 15:43, 30 May 2009 (UTC)