User talk:The Retro Gamer: Difference between revisions

<font size=4>External resources</font>

<font size=4>Things you can do</font>

*[[MarioWiki:BJAODN|See what you shouldn't do in an article]]

*[https://twitter.com/SMWikiOfficial Follow us on Twitter]

*[https://www.facebook.com/smwiki Like us on Facebook]

*[[MarioWiki:Manual of Style|Start an article]] ''(when [[MarioWiki:Autoconfirmed users|autoconfirmed]])''

*[[Special:Mypage|Create your user page]] ''(when [[MarioWiki:Autoconfirmed users|autoconfirmed]])''

{{#ifeq:{{NAMESPACE}}|User talk|Feel free to delete this message when you're done reading it.<nowiki> </nowiki>|}}We hope this information is helpful, and that you'll have a great experience contributing to our knowledge-base and our community. Remember to enjoy your experience here and to also have fun!

Hello! I'm a supporter of DKWiki merging with Super Mario Wiki. At the suggestion of {{user|Alex95}}, I came here to point out some good articles from the DKWiki whose Mario Wiki counterparts would be significantly improved if they had the others' information: [http://www.dkwiki.com/Bonus_Level Bonus Level], [http://www.dkwiki.com/Funky%27s_Fishing_(minigame) Funky's Fishing] and [http://www.dkwiki.com/Crosshair_Cranky Crosshair Cranky]. Just some help with the job. Many people agree with the proposal and there's currently no opposition. My question is, what's gonna happen to DKWiki articles that are equally as good as their MarioWiki counterparts? Would be a pity to delete them simply. -- {{User:Super Radio/Sig}} 11:28, 27 March 2018 (EDT)

:In regards to the merging process, I am planning to systematically review all articles on DKWiki. After an article is reviewed on DKWiki, a review indicator will be applied to that article (either a template will be added or the page will be deleted; I haven't finalized the review marking method.) During that review process, many of the articles will have no new information or be identical (i.e. likely copied from Super Mario Wiki). These can be safely marked as reviewed. Another group of articles will have new information, or obviously improved formatting, and will be integrated into Super Mario Wiki's version of the article. For the rare case where the information is comparable, but the style is incompatible, a judgement call can be made on which style to retain. Most articles will not have this problem; the information and style of DKWiki is relatively comparable to Super Mario Wiki.

*[[User:The Retro Gamer/table begin]] - Same as first point.

*[[User:The Retro Gamer/para rq]] / [[Template:Para needed]] - ...Why do we need a template that displays an error? Wouldn't it just be easier to fill the parameter rather than adding an extra template calling for an error? This doesn't seem useful at all.

:And [[User:The Retro Gamer/music]] doesn't need to be a separate page. You can just stick it in your sandbox. No need to create multiple pages tied to your userspace. {{User:Alex95/sig}} 23:02, 22 April 2018 (EDT)

:Regarding <nowiki>{{</nowiki>[[Template:para needed|para needed]]<nowiki>}}</nowiki>, it can be later expanded to an error category in case a parameter is overlooked. It's a nice catch for mistakes, but if it ''really'' isn't wanted, it can always be deleted and removed from the templates it's on. The DK levels templates reduced a great deal of redundancy, allowing changes to the tables to be made in 1 place instead of 7 (before, to change the section headings, one would have to ''individually'' modify the section heading for each world's section.) This removal of redundancy and clutter can be clearly seen in <span class="plainlinks">[https://www.mariowiki.com/index.php?title=Donkey_Kong_Country&type=revision&diff=2428160&oldid=2427853 this cumulative diff]</span>, which reduced the page's size by 5,000 bytes.

:You seem concerned about the number of pages in my userspace. Reading through [[MarioWiki:Userspace]], I see nothing concerning about having multiple subpages as long as they're related to the wiki. If I wanted to I ''could'' move everything to the sandbox, but it's a personal demarcation: the sandbox is for testing things, and other subpages are for other organizational hierarchies. [[User:The Retro Gamer|<span style="color:red;">--The</span>]] [[User talk:The Retro Gamer|<span style="color:green;">Retro</span>]] [[Special:Contributions/The Retro Gamer|<span style="color:blue;">Gamer</span>]] 23:13, 22 April 2018 (EDT)

::Thing with para needed is that it's an error call, which is something editors usually try to ''avoid''. How we usually have it set up, like in cases with infoboxes and other tables, if a parameter is ignored, it is excluded from the transclusion.  

::And you're right, there is no limit to userspace pages as long as they are helpful to the mainspace or are meant to be transcluded onto several pages, like a talk archive or status page. But if it's something like a simple table, it doesn't really need a page of its own, unless you're planning on transcluding just it somewhere else (which is something you don't usually do with a table). {{User:Alex95/sig}} 23:26, 22 April 2018 (EDT)

:::It does look terrible, and that's on purpose. These templates are meant for a very specific purpose, and diverging from that purpose is ''always'' wrong. A table can't skip a cell; it should always be filled with ''something''. An error could alert the current editor or any future editor that the template needs to be modified. I could have set it so that it would display "n/a" if a table cell is not filled, but I want the editor to make the conscious choice to format it that way, rather than have any risk of accidentally missing a cell. It's a bit different from a navbox, because a navbox can be expanded to add more information, while a table needs all of the cells in a row filled when a row is created.  

::::(If I may chime in) Yes, tables should be complete with information, but in the event it is missing information, it's really not so big of an issue that it needs to grab the attention of users in big, red text. An empty cell in and of itself should be enough to let users know that it needs to be filled. Having text to falsely simulate an error message and alert users is unnecessary and just makes the table look worse than it needs to. {{User:Mario jc/sig}} 01:33, 23 April 2018 (EDT)

If [[User:The Retro Gamer/stuff]] is only meant to be transcluded onto your main userpage, keep in mind that you cannot do that as per [[MarioWiki:Userspace#What about user subpages?]]: "''The following uses are NOT allowed, and will be deleted if created: [..] Pages that are just meant to be transcluded onto another page (I.e. a status update that only goes on one page, a subpage that just contains the userbox tower, <u>'''or some other component of the user page'''</u>: just put the content on the page directly. If you find that it makes your user page too cluttered, consider lessening the amount of content.)''" I know it may seem like I'm being very nitpicky about this stuff, but I'm just trying to help you learn your way around how we do things here. The template can be kept if it's meant to be somewhere else as well, but it seems more like a main userpage kind of thing. Same thing with your [[User:The Retro Gamer/working]], [[User:The Retro Gamer/links]], and [[User:The Retro Gamer/done]] pages. They don't need to be separate. {{User:Alex95/sig}} 15:51, 27 April 2018 (EDT)

::#"''I see no reason to dilute these edits into one stream if there's little overhead from creating new pages.''" It's to prevent several pages that ''serve no purpose to the wiki other than personal records''. If it's just a personal collection of project lists, your main userpage is enough.

::{{User:Alex95/sig}} 22:21, 27 April 2018 (EDT)

== Music names in tables ==

Widths, you have to remember that (a) it's not the only table on the page, they need to be consistent with each other - if they're all random widths and/or colours it's going to look bad and (b) not everyone's looking at things on a desktop browser. Frankly, I think the way you've done the tables as templates is fairly silly - everything else on the pages are still wikicode tables, there's not much of a gain in reducing complexity, and you're having to dump raw HTML into the page over wikicode. If you're going to try something like that, you need to look into (a) making the entire table ONE template, not one template ''per row'' '''and''' (b) switching from <nowiki><table></nowiki>s to a more responsive design style to justify it - there's nowhere near enough of a gain as it stands, . - [[User:Reboot|Reboot]] ([[User talk:Reboot|talk]]) 18:57, 25 April 2018 (EDT)

Okay, proof of concept putting the whole table in one template, avoiding having to have any raw table code, or multiply specifying the same variable. (Insofar as the users are concerned, at least, since meta-templates are used. And no, it doesn't hit ''all'' the beats I mentioned above. Like I said, proof of concept knocked up in an hour. For a "real" one, even if I stuck with tables, I'd be hiding unused rows/worlds with <nowiki>{{#if}}</nowiki>s and so forth): [[User:Reboot/LevelTable]] - [[User:Reboot|Reboot]] ([[User talk:Reboot|talk]]) 20:06, 25 April 2018 (EDT)

Hey there! I understand your point - since each terrain type is associated with its own musical track, it seems redundant to list both of them separately like that. That's not entirely true, however: for instance, despite being respectively set in mine and walkway areas, the minecart levels do not play their respective soundtrack, instead opting for a specific music. Same goes for the toboggan levels in DKC3. These exceptions alone make the listing of both columns necessary, in my opinion. But a viable solution would be the one you presented me, in which you make a distinct table that does just that. However, this would be inconsistent with DKCR and DKCTF, which don't really have fully designated terrain types and the music may repeat in multiple unrelated levels. -- {{User:Super Radio/Sig}} 15:44, 26 April 2018 (EDT)