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Thread links on Main Page

Hi There - I'm relatively new to the DFwiki, and I noticed that some of the thread links on the Main Page don't work correctly. I logged in to try and edit the page, but when it wasn't an available option, I realized that it is probably restricted to administrators, given the 'please report vandalism' thing in the site announcements header.

The Team17 forums have closed, so the Team17 link is a dead one. The SomethingAwful.com forums link is behind a login wall, so I'm not sure if you would want to remove this as well? I believe that they do occasionally rotate forums (such as Games) to be available to non-logged in users though, so it would perhaps be available intermittently.

~~Team17 Forum Thread~~
~~Something Awful~~

Agreed and removed. Thanks! --Loci (talk) 20:02, 15 August 2013 (UTC)

The Penny Arcade thread is also no longer available or at least incorrectly linked. – unsigned comment by Ispil

Removed. —Lethosor (talk) 01:27, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

The dead links are back. 88.195.209.206 15:04, 9 October 2014 (UTC)

Fun Comic

What happened to the Fun Comic at the Losing page?--Doktoro Reichard (talk) 21:22, 23 January 2014 (UTC)

Weird. We had a problem with an image server a while back, so this may be related. I'll get Briess to check on it. —Lethosor (talk) 21:26, 23 January 2014 (UTC)

Good to know (and to help). In case the file's lost, there's a crawl of it at the Internet Archive. I also observed similar problems over at the Dwarf Fortress webcomics page.--Doktoro Reichard (talk) 21:29, 23 January 2014 (UTC)

File:Comic df3.png doesn't have an edit history ([1]), which usually means that it hasn't been uploaded, although that could be incorrect. Same for the rest of them, except FunComic.png. —Lethosor (talk) 21:34, 23 January 2014 (UTC)

I'm rebuilding all the images now. --Briess (talk) 21:54, 23 January 2014 (UTC)

The problem should now be fixed. It appears any time one of the webnodes loses a connection to the image server, it starts invalidating the images in question. I'll investigate ways to automatically rebuild the images when that happens. --Briess (talk) 22:02, 23 January 2014 (UTC)

Amount of double redirects or how to fix them?

I come across several cases of double redirection which, as stated both here and in the rest of the wikiverse, are not a good thing to have.

Recently I found about the Special:DoubleRedirects page. There are roughly 350 double redirects on the wiki. From experience here, they could be easily fixed, because most redirect to the alternate name of the page, instead of the proper page itself.

As I've been adverted slightly due to a wrong fix I did I ask now if there are a set of guidelines, particularly because of the namespace usage here, that are or can be used to begin a duplicate removal process (which as stated, would be a mostly trivial thing to do, albeit costly in time).--Doktoro Reichard (talk) 17:15, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

Originally, the policy was to deliberately use double redirects when going from the global namespace to version-specific namespaces and then to specific articles within those namespaces (e.g. "Green glass" -> "DF2012:Green glass" -> "DF2012:Glass") to avoid problems when new pages were created (e.g. if "Green glass" redirected straight to "DF2012:Glass" and somebody created "DF2012:Green glass" as full page, then "Green glass" wouldn't redirect to it properly). I don't know what the actual policies are anymore, though - perhaps one of the admins can chime in with more information. --Quietust (talk) 18:08, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

That actually doesn't work. I moved the grazer information to the grazer article last week, and, until it was fixed today, main:grazer was still linking to DF2012:pasture. It appears the wiki software is caching the double redirect, so it behaves similarly to an un-updated single redirect. Sure the errant redirect can be fixed, but so can a single redirect. In some regards the double redirect is worse, because everything looks correct, yet it doesn't work. The underlying fact is that the wiki software was not intended to support double redirects, and it does so poorly at best. The current policy is available at DF:REDIR, though it isn't set in stone.--Loci (talk) 20:21, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

For now, I only recommend changing double redirects to point directly to the destination page if they don't work. They should all work, but some of them don't and there isn't a single, definitive reason we've found yet. Basically, feel free to change non-working double redirects, but you don't need to go through the list and change all 350 of them. (This wiki is actually set up to allow up to 10 consecutive redirects, unlike most WMF wikis, but since that feature isn't used by many wikis it tends not to be perfect.) —Lethosor (talk) 20:38, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

Main Page New Version

Toady has announced the new version is due around the beginning of July 2014 (which is pretty soon). This is as big as DF news gets. There should be an announcement and link on the front page. – unsigned comment by ‎67.170.60.84

What exactly are you suggesting? Aside from a wiki-specific announcement regarding migrating the wiki to the new namespace, I don't see a reason to announce the upcoming release here – anyone who reads the devlog or forums already knows, and very few of those who don't would check the main page of this wiki regularly instead. Also, what link are you referring to (devlog, Bay 12 report)? —Lethosor (talk) 22:10, 21 June 2014 (UTC)

Raw errors

There is something up with the raws for a few of the trees:

It appears to be spill over from the previous entry. Any idea how to fix this? Brightgalrs (talk) 03:25, 15 July 2014 (UTC)

This is actually intentional, since comments (i.e. non-raw text) in the raws usually refer to the raws following them (see most creature pages). It shouldn't be affecting the templates that look up information from the raws, but let me know if it is. —Lethosor (talk) 20:59, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

Object Testing Arena: Helmet Snake

For some reason I cant spawn them in Object testing arena. When I was looking through Syndromes I came across it and saw how many effects it has and thought I might have some fun with it. When I searched for it, it didn't show up? Can someone help me with this problem Thank you.

Put Japanese language wiki on sidebar

Can't seem to figure out how to do it myself. link to the wiki. Brightgalrs (talk) 12:04, 4 March 2015 (UTC)

Do you mean an interwiki link? —Lethosor (talk) 01:47, 7 March 2015 (UTC)

Can't really see what else I would mean. We have the french and russian one up there, why not the japanese? Brightgalrs (talk) 04:26, 19 March 2015 (UTC)

It requires database access, apparently, which I don't have. Aside from installing or putting together an extension to handle this (which I plan to do eventually), User:Briess is who you should ask. —Lethosor (talk) 20:57, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

Sidebar ad format breaks Webkit

I have the site loaded up on my WiiU, which uses Webkit as the rendering engine, and I noticed a small issue with the positioning of the sidebar ad. I have div#p-googleadsense.portal at 160px by 655px, right on the edge of the screen. The div.body just inside is 140px by 611px, slightly smaller. However, the ins#aswitf_1_expand inside that is 160px by 600px - 20px wider than the div.body (but the same width as the .portal). This wouldn't be an issue if the ad was right on the edge of the screen, but the div.body has padding specified for 0.5em above, and 1.25em to the left (using the div#mw-panel CSS). My suggestion for fixing would be to force the ad's div.body to use no left margin (forcing this results in a fixed display until another page is loaded), but this requires a modification to the Wiki's core. In any case, just pointing this out so it could hopefully get fixed at some point. 104.172.191.147 20:05, 18 April 2015 (UTC)

Thanks, we'll look into it as part of the upgrade we're doing to the core installation! --Briess (talk) 03:44, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

New sidebar link: Random page in current namespace

I have a feature request/suggestion for a new link on the main left sidebar: Random page in current namespace. Would (at this time) link to: http://dfweb4.dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php/Special:Random/DF2014 (unless there's a Special:Random/<token> that always means the latest NS, which would be better.)

I sometimes want to just browse through random pages, hoping to come across something interesting I'd not seen before/not thought to search for.

Random page is not much help because it is more likely to return pages for old versions than the current. I can go to Random by namespace and click DF2014, but then if I want to keep going through random pages I have to keep hitting back and clicking it again, or make my own bookmark to that link.

It's a small thing but it would be quite handy if there was a link dedicated to Random in the current NS.

TheBloke (talk) 13:25, 13 December 2015 (UTC)

German forum link dead

Under Forums there is a link to http://www.dwarffortressforum.de/ – however, one gets redirected to http://www.indiegameforum.de/ which yields a “forum not available” message. I suggest to simply remove the link. (I have no edit rights on the main page.) --Keba (talk) 15:19, 5 January 2016 (UTC)

DFFD New address

DFFD address should maybe be updated to http://dffd.bay12games.com/ --88.195.209.206 10:02, 10 January 2016 (UTC)

Updated. Brightgalrs (talk) 21:39, 25 February 2016 (UTC)

Can someone fix the spelling

It's "dependency" not "dependancy". Mocha2007 (talk) 20:38, 19 September 2016 (UTC)

Fixed --Rriegs (talk) 20:47, 19 September 2016 (UTC)

B12G Discord

Hey, guys, can we have this Discord link added: https://discord.gg/sEeK7kX

It's a general B12G chat with a focus on Dwarf Fortress. --Shub-Nullgurath (talk) 22:12, 1 April 2017 (UTC)

How to create a new language page?

I've just seen one dwarf requesting a Japanese page.

If possible, I'll gladly translate this wiki into Korean. Korea is relatively a small country so the language is not that widely used, but surely there are some players, I guess.

I don't know where to ask about this :9

Free SSL Certificate

If the operators want to re-enable https, they can get a free (as in beer) certificate from https://letsencrypt.org/ . Instructions are on that site and it's very easy.

HTTPS is enabled now as of the June 2019 upgrades. —Lethosor (talk) 22:53, 3 July 2019 (UTC)

Re: Discord

I notice there's a Discord on this page. But shouldn't it be the Kitfox Games Discord, since that's the only official Discord for Dwarf Fortress?

AlastríonaCatskill (talk) 13:43, 12 February 2020 (UTC)

I wasn't aware of it. If that is the case, then it should probably be added to the page. OluapPlayer (talk) 16: 03, 12 February 2020 (UTC)

Yeah, the only reason there is one at all is because somebody added some random one. I changed it to the only DF discord I knew of at the time. The only way I've now been able to find it is to search for 'Kitfox Games discord'. It's not listed on the bay12 links page, a forum thread, the reddit, or the Steam pages. Anyway, I've DMed Victoria on the KitfoxGames discord to make sure they're OK with adding the invite to this page. Ziusudra (talk) 20:08, 12 February 2020 (UTC)

...Sorry, is it too late for this? I mean, while we're still discussing this, it looks like someone else got left behind as well. Add, or not? Silverwing235 (talk) 22:21, 12 February 2020 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you were trying to link to. Do you mean this: http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=163555.0 Note that the thread was locked because of drama. There's a lot of red flags: the drama, despite using the name Bay12Games it never uses the word 'unofficial', the rules channel posts are from a deleted user, the announcements channel hasn't updated in well over a year, many channels haven't been active in months. I'm not so much saying no, but I am asking: should it be linked?

There's also this: http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=157332.0 But that invite is invalid. Ziusudra (talk) 02:35, 13 February 2020 (UTC)

Ah, it's a dead discord. I see now. There was just no response to the April '17 topic, I stumbled across it all and got curious. No, I don't think it should be linked. Thanks for the analysis, anyway! Silverwing235 (talk) 11:44, 13 February 2020 (UTC)

Multithreading

Would it be OK to create Multithreading page describing why (preferably with citations)

even perfectly implemented boost would not be significant
multithreading is not something that can be bolted on complex program
DF is complicated case where taking advantage of multithreading is not obvious http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=34311.msg7833713#msg7833713
DF is filled with many gamebreaking bugs unfixed for many years, multithreading bugs are unusually awful to fix
author of DF has minimal experiences with multithreading
writing multithreaded code is hard
writing correct multithreaded code is awfully hard
fixing bugs in a multithreaded code is nightmare

and multithreading is not going to happen, ever

http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=34311.msg7833713#msg7833713 http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=107833.0 https://bholley.net/blog/2015/must-be-this-tall-to-write-multi-threaded-code.html + “At Mozilla, there is a sign on the wall behind one of our engineer’s desks. The sign has a dark horizontal line, below which is the text, ‘You must be this tall to write multi-threaded code.’ The line is roughly nine feet off the ground. We created Rust to allow us to lower that sign.” http://www.oreilly.com/programming/free/files/why-rust.pdf

Mko (talk) 03:07, 28 March 2020 (UTC)

I disagree with some of your talking points

In DF each AI actor makes its own decisions, the computations can be done in parallel for an ncores speedup
This parallelism should be built into the lowest design levels of the program, it can be done in a DF-like program
With training and experience a good developer can write and debug multithreaded code.

I agree that multithreading is unlikely to be done in DF; It can not easily be bolted on and I rather see the developer spend time on game-play.

Is it worth to create a wiki page for what is essentially a one line explanation?

--MathFox (talk) 18:40, 31 March 2020 (UTC)

We would essentially be writing a page about a thing that doesn't matter to Dwarf Fortress. I can't agree to the existence of a page that's basically "This subject doesn't exist in the context of the game but here's the reasons why it should or shouldn't". This is better reserved for forum discussion, not a wiki. OluapPlayer (talk) 12:54, 1 April 2020 (UTC)

Re: Discord II

Good morning.

I was confiding with some friends, who had alerted me to the "Unofficial Bay 12 Discord" posted on this Wiki. Simply put, allegations of the use of ableist slurs were thrown, as well as screenshot evidence of using hard racist slurs against people of colour.

I feel that the Unofficial Discord should hereby be removed from the social media part of the website for the following reasons:

No official connection to Bay 12 or the publishers [and, by extension, every non-Bay12 forum should be removed - especially dead ones]
This unofficial Discord is actively opposed to the standpoints that Toady One and Threetoe have posted on the bay12games site over the recent days.
This unofficial Discord uses slurs and other problematic language that actively harms the image of the Dwarf Fortress community
This unofficial Discord will likely make it so that people steer away from the game.

I do not feel comfortable with the Wiki platforming a known racist Discord server, as that is de facto support of the messages of that server. AlastríonaCatskill (talk) 12:02, 21 June 2020 (UTC)

Update: Apparently, this same Discord has been banned from the r/dwarffortress subreddit for as long as one of the mods can remember, and the link to it was banned on the official Kitfox Discord as well. I can post the screenshots I have of actively problematic behaviour on this Discord but I will not do it unless necessary, as the contents are alarming like that which will not be named. AlastríonaCatskill (talk) 12:10, 21 June 2020 (UTC)

I've removed the link. Safe to say, we don't need the wiki to be associated with this sort of people. OluapPlayer (talk) 21:58, 21 June 2020 (UTC)

The "Unofficial Bay 12 Discord" was already not linked on the main page - the only place it was mentioned is this talk page. Are you talking about that one or the Unofficial Dwarf Fortress Discord that is linked on the main page? The latter does have it's #elfposting channel, but that channel is initially hidden, opt-in only, and clearly labelled as a lawless zone. For an analogy, there are many very awful subreddits, but we still link to reddit - (yeah that's a little different but not much). Otherwise the unofficial DF discord is well modded and such behavior is not allowed in other channels. So, are you certain which discord/channel the screenshots came from? Ziusudra (talk) 22:29, 21 June 2020 (UTC)

Since there's some confusion, AlastríonaCatskill, could you confirm and/or provide some evidence that following the link that was on the main page (removed in [2]) takes you to the discord that you were referring to? The only reference I can find to a discord removed from the /r/dwarffortress sidebar is for a different discord, not the one that was linked on the main page (although it's possible that just the invite link was different). I just want to make sure that we're removing the right one here. If you have anything that you don't want to share publicly, you can PM me on the forums (same username) or email me through the wiki, which I think is working. —Lethosor (talk) 01:45, 22 June 2020 (UTC)

@Lethosor, I have emailed you the relevant images via the link you had created. The Discord that was on the main page and removed today is indeed what was being referred to, especially with the confirmation of the #elfposting channel being from said Discord. In my opinion, @Ziusudra, the inclusion of a problematic part of that community, even as opt-in, is unacceptable in my book for a community to be platformed on this Wiki. AlastríonaCatskill (talk) 03:26, 22 June 2020 (UTC)

Hello, I am the owner of the Unofficial Dwarf Fortress discord. I just want to clear a few things up and open a channel of communication. Several years ago, the original owner of the discord left, in no small part due to all the sexism and racism and such. After a few days of an having an interim owner, it was given to another user, who onboarded several users as admins, including me. The new owner tried a lot to curb terrible stuff on the server, however this often lead to drama.

The r/dwarffortress delisting happened after some of that drama spawned a new discord with a more "free speech" orientation, things spilling over to the forums and other places. Some time after that, she left the server to me, due to the amount of stress running that place caused her. When I took over I also tried to make it a better place, but with slower and subtler methods that wouldn't spark drama. Completely disallowing some behaviour outside of #elfposting was part of that, and later making that channel hidden by default was another. Now, the discord is much much better to be in than it ever was before, though it still has major flaws. I don't like #elfposting at all myself, but I don't rule with an iron fist nor do I know what much I can do without sparking massive drama again. Since April this year I have had some plans to make the discord quite a bit better, however some of my mods have been against it in part due to feeling it would cause bigger problems (though, as you probably know, some of them participate in #elfposting). With recent events, both within and outside the DF community, we have decided to move ahead, every mod on board, with some plans including phasing out the #elfposting channel in a way which will not create large issues for moderation. It will be fully gone within one (1) week of now.

Also, I am a tad annoyed that you posted about this here but completely neglected contacting us. In the future, could you please contact me or one of my mods when you have any concerns about the server? I really do care about these things and we need feedback. —Lonjil (talk) 10:32, 22 June 2020 (UTC)

Thank you for replying here Lonjil. Unfortunately, I cannot trust your take on this matter for several reasons.

# One of the moderators has an anti-semitic stereotype profile picture

# Even if the only place of no censorship is the elfposting channel, and even if it is opt-in, the complete chaos of racist slurs allowed there is completely unacceptable for minority players and an extremely toxic environment. There have been instances of straight hate speech on the channel / server as well, suggesting to kill people of colour and LGBTQIAA+ people.

In short, the toxicity of your Discord's community makes it not just uncomfortable, but downright dangerous for minority people playing Dwarf Fortress. As Tarn and Zach have made liberal-to-leftist political views in the past, the chances of minorities to play the game is higher - and I wouldn't want to be a person of colour signing up for a shitposting channel to only be met with over 10,000 instances of the hard-n word being used. The Discord should remain off of the Wiki until things shape up and all instances of hate speech be purged from server history. Personally I would rather all non-official channels of communication be removed from the page, period, but that is a less pressing discussion than active hatred of minorities being platformed on the Wiki via your unofficial Discord. AlastríonaCatskill (talk) 12:30, 22 June 2020 (UTC)

Small edit / follow-up to my previous message. My friend tells me that elfposting is the most commonly used channel, which goes to show the level of hatred allowed into the community. It may be best to remove the channel in entirety, and make a new meme channel with no hate speech allowed. AlastríonaCatskill (talk) 12:33, 22 June 2020 (UTC)

The admin you are referring to is a jew, who lives in Israel. I prefer to not police people of other ethnicities when it comes to negative stereotypes and such of themselves, they know what they are comfortable with far better than I ever could.

Elfposting is not, by any reasonable measure, the most used channel. It has fewer users than any other channel. It has a fair number of messages, but only because there is no rule against spamming in there. So, nearly all of it is spam, which was the point of the channel to begin with.

"It may be best to remove the channel in entirety" this is exactly what is happening, as I already said. We're giving the channel regulars a few days to hear the news, but then the channel will be gone. We already have a more pleasant meme channel from an experiment we did in April, which we are bringing back. —Lonjil (talk) 13:57, 22 June 2020 (UTC)

Hi all - thanks for keeping this discussion civil. I've been investigating the policies of other DF communities, and I've come to the conclusion that it would be best for the wiki to only link to the official DF Discord (Kitfox). I'll also make a pass through the other sites linked on the main page. I'm sorry to those of you working hard to maintain Discords and other unofficial communities out there - I know it's difficult, and I don't want to judge your communities without being a part of them. However, there will always be debates like these about whether a community deserves to be linked from a more "official" place, like the wiki, and no matter where we draw the line(s), people will be upset. The policy of only linking to the Kitfox Discord seems to have worked for other communities, which is why I'm applying it here. I would be happy to have a broader discussion at DF:Centralized Discussion if anyone wants to. —Lethosor (talk) 01:48, 23 June 2020 (UTC)