General Discussion

Is this image (File:Boomerang SSB4 Wii U.jpg) appearing for anyone else? For some reason, the image is not displaying at all, and that includes its past revisions.
 
Walkazo said:
Baby Luigi said:
Well I like this idea. I'd like to see an example of it if we were to change the bestiary though, as I get lost in descriptions.
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It'd basically be the same idea as the horizontal infoboxes I've drafted so far (User:Walkazo/Essays#Infoboxes), but with less rows (2 max whenever possible, more like the PiT one at the end than anything else) and no alternating background colours, multiple-column-spanning notice/tattle/log rows, or other template trimmings.
Click to expand...
Why are we not going to do a full entry in one go? The main reason these lists are annoying is the fact that to get info about a specific character, you have to consistently move back and forth between the three tables. It's kinda frustrating, and I'm going to guess that it is the bane of mobile user's existence. I can only image this going. Like this: User_talk:Megadardery/Sandbox. The colors could be modified slightly, Maybe add a few more points, but other than that, I don't feel like it looks cluttered or something. For the info in the third table in that page, it could be either implemented in the table, or left in the enemy's page. It's a bit too technical for me.
 
Time Turner said:
Pi said:
Time Turner said:
Is this image (File:Boomerang SSB4 Wii U.jpg) appearing for anyone else? For some reason, the image is not displaying at all, and that includes its past revisions.
Click to expand...
I can view the image.
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Good to know; it seems to show up on Firefox, but not Chrome, and it's only that image. Weird. Hopefully, it'll fix itself by tomorrow.
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Nope, the image is still gone. This is what I'm seeing.
 
If you log in, does the image appear?
 
Megadardery said:
Walkazo said:
Baby Luigi said:
Well I like this idea. I'd like to see an example of it if we were to change the bestiary though, as I get lost in descriptions.
Click to expand...
It'd basically be the same idea as the horizontal infoboxes I've drafted so far (User:Walkazo/Essays#Infoboxes), but with less rows (2 max whenever possible, more like the PiT one at the end than anything else) and no alternating background colours, multiple-column-spanning notice/tattle/log rows, or other template trimmings.
Click to expand...
Why are we not going to do a full entry in one go? The main reason these lists are annoying is the fact that to get info about a specific character, you have to consistently move back and forth between the three tables. It's kinda frustrating, and I'm going to guess that it is the bane of mobile user's existence. I can only image this going. Like this: User_talk:Megadardery/Sandbox. The colors could be modified slightly, Maybe add a few more points, but other than that, I don't feel like it looks cluttered or something. For the info in the third table in that page, it could be either implemented in the table, or left in the enemy's page. It's a bit too technical for me.
Click to expand...
The only downside to that style is that the ordering function's lost (i.e. it can only be in alphabetical order, and not able to be toggled to go by encounter/bestiary number, or location, or whatever), but I feel like having everything in one compact chart instead of three of them does outweigh that - plus, it'll be simple to input and consistent with the infoboxes (no counting "|"s anymore, just using the standardized input fields), which also means that once it's set up here, all the infoboxes around the wiki can be easily updated via cut and pasting (since they don't have the nutty-gritty stuff currently). The "AI" and "Notes" stuff could possibly be combined into an optional "notes" field that can go underneath the tattle, like how the TTYD and SPM boxes have logs and tattles with a thin blue line separating them, but I also feel like a lot of the info there can just go in the enemy articles, like you say. Design-wise, I'd advocate for leaving the colours as is - again, for consistency with the infoboxes (and nav templates, which is where the colours are from); I also feel like there should be thin blue lines separating the entries (like the forementioned log and tattle separations), rather than having the tattle and following header touching directly.
 
I see the image and I'm using FireFox

I also see the image when I use Chrome
 
Walkazo said:
Megadardery said:
Walkazo said:
It'd basically be the same idea as the horizontal infoboxes I've drafted so far (User:Walkazo/Essays#Infoboxes), but with less rows (2 max whenever possible, more like the PiT one at the end than anything else) and no alternating background colours, multiple-column-spanning notice/tattle/log rows, or other template trimmings.
Click to expand...
Why are we not going to do a full entry in one go? The main reason these lists are annoying is the fact that to get info about a specific character, you have to consistently move back and forth between the three tables. It's kinda frustrating, and I'm going to guess that it is the bane of mobile user's existence. I can only image this going. Like this: User_talk:Megadardery/Sandbox. The colors could be modified slightly, Maybe add a few more points, but other than that, I don't feel like it looks cluttered or something. For the info in the third table in that page, it could be either implemented in the table, or left in the enemy's page. It's a bit too technical for me.
Click to expand...
The only downside to that style is that the ordering function's lost (i.e. it can only be in alphabetical order, and not able to be toggled to go by encounter/bestiary number, or location, or whatever), but I feel like having everything in one compact chart instead of three of them does outweigh that - plus, it'll be simple to input and consistent with the infoboxes (no counting "|"s anymore, just using the standardized input fields), which also means that once it's set up here, all the infoboxes around the wiki can be easily updated via cut and pasting (since they don't have the nutty-gritty stuff currently). The "AI" and "Notes" stuff could possibly be combined into an optional "notes" field that can go underneath the tattle, like how the TTYD and SPM boxes have logs and tattles with a thin blue line separating them, but I also feel like a lot of the info there can just go in the enemy articles, like you say. Design-wise, I'd advocate for leaving the colours as is - again, for consistency with the infoboxes (and nav templates, which is where the colours are from); I also feel like there should be thin blue lines separating the entries (like the forementioned log and tattle separations), rather than having the tattle and following header touching directly.
Click to expand...
Feel free to adjust the design as you like, it's your design in all cases. The thing that matters the most for me is that all the data for each enemy should be in one place, not scattered between three tables. I'm not sure if this needs more discussion, or if it is ready to be purposed by one of you guys.
 
So I previously started a conversation about how it's awful how the {{conjecturaltext (Template:conjecturaltext)}} template gets used in headers, but I found another reason why they shouldn't be there: if you've edited an article that uses the template in a header, and then try to access that header immediately through the Recent Changes (Special:RecentChanges), then that doesn't work. So again, why do we do this?
 
OK, this freakish thing is supposedly drafted...

User_talk:Megadardery/Sandbox

Few notes:
  • Probably the first thing you noticed is the linked titles in the draft, this can be fixed by one of three ways
    • Change the color of the links in the actual article (messy)
    • Change the template color scheme entirely. (not keen on it)
    • Do some Common.css magic that automatically does that for us (it should be possible)
  • Some entries are a bit too tall. This can be theoretically fixed by decreasing the image box by a bit, I tried that, but it didn't work in practice, and I don't feel like debugging it right now to see what went wrong.
  • All line breaks have been removed, including line breaks in the tattles.
  • Some images are too big... I didn't bother editing them to say the truth.
  • It's not possible to sort the table anymore unfortunately.
  • The draft can be edited freely as it is in my talk user-space, so feel free to do so. The template can only be edited by admins, who can redesign it as well if they feel like it.
 
Cool. Although, next time, I recommend waiting until the design and coding's finalized before making the entire draft: it means less corrections, and it's easier to reload as you tweak things over and over. Just use a handful of examples that'll give you a good range of image sizes, and lengths of "moves" and "locations" inputs for width balancing purposes.


I built in {{color-linked-piped}} (and bolding) for the titles: by default "name=x" will be both the display name and the link, but in cases where the name's like "Bowser (1)", also use a second "link=y" input to pipe the link. Much more ideal and simpler than messing around with the css.

Italics should also be built-in if you really want the tattles italicized, but I feel like that's unnecessary: current infoboxes just use regular text, which is easier to read than italics anyway.

I got rid of the built-in "N/A" stuff, since it's better that if an input is left blank, it shows up as blank, since that could mean the data's just missing, and not actually supposed to be "N/A". I also switched the image to the "upload one now" thing for consistency with the infoboxes.

I got rid of the "bonus" variable for the coin stuff: just write it all out in the normal "coins" input: less messing around - hence I coded it that way for my infobox drafts in the first place.

I also added those lines I mentioned earlier between the tattle and title blocks too.
 
Walkazo said:
Cool. Although, next time, I recommend waiting until the design and coding's finalized before making the entire draft: it means less corrections, and it's easier to reload as you tweak things over and over. Just use a handful of examples that'll give you a good range of image sizes, and lengths of "moves" and "locations" inputs for width balancing purposes.
Click to expand...
In reality, it only took around 3 seconds of computer power. I created an app that reads from tables. It was basically a test if it worked or not, and I did like the look of it. So if minor changes are required, we can use the built-in Find and Replace, otherwise I can quickly draft a new one.

Walkazo said:
I built in {{color-linked-piped}} (and bolding) for the titles: by default "name=x" will be both the display name and the link, but in cases where the name's like "Bowser (1)", also use a second "link=y" input to pipe the link. Much more ideal and simpler than messing around with the css.
Click to expand...
I thought that adding a new class to the css was simpler than adding the color-linked-pipe every time or messing with the template code, but this implementation is looking quite nice, good idea. Give me a few minutes and I should update the whole draft to suit the new linking feature.

Walkazo said:
I got rid of the built-in "N/A" stuff, since it's better that if an input is left blank, it shows up as blank, since that could mean the data's just missing, and not actually supposed to be "N/A". I also switched the image to the "upload one now" thing for consistency with the infoboxes.
Click to expand...
The main reason that I added these N/A when I was messing around is to see how the template is organized, since all entries (I think) already have data. I didn't bother to remove it.

Walkazo said:
I got rid of the "bonus" variable for the coin stuff: just write it all out in the normal "coins" input: less messing around - hence I coded it that way for my infobox drafts in the first place.
Click to expand...
To be frank, I thought about this multiple times, maybe put the whole total in one location, but I decided that putting it in brackets is the least confusing choice. And I just now noticed the tooltip that appears when you hover over the coins parameter. Damn.

EDIT: This is actually a bit more annoying that I thought, first off, entries with references are counted in the whole link. And entries that should not be linked (or should be double linked, like Gombario (Lee)) are playing it fun. I'm going to mess around with my css to see if it's worth the shot or not

EDIT2: Ok, I tested css and it didn't turn out to be complicated and it saves the headache of editing all links, also allows us to specify boldness and italicness as needed per boss an (even though this is not practical, the color changing idea that I had before is not very appealing and I don't think adding the word "boss" or "support" is pretty either).

EDIT3: the code has been edited correctly, the only thing missing is the css
 
My philosophy is generally to avoid adding stuff to the css as much as possible: it just makes life easier to have things self-contained rather than needing to mess around with the css. The only things you can't do with the color-link-piped solution are the double-links and refs, but really, seeing as the plain Duplighost entries are right there anyway, it's not even necessary to have second links anyway, and the refs aren't an absolute must-have either since they'll be in the enemy articles already, which is where people will be looking for that sort of info. Another option is using the "notes" input for this sorta thing as well as the AI stuff and whatnot, assuming we're not just leaving those for the individual enemy articles too.

Overall, I just really would prefer the color-link-piped method.

In addition to the tooltips, the chart should be preceded by a legend, like the current pages have, which will explain the coin business (and all the rest). I also recommend having a legend on the template itself, with explanations and the specific input names, like in my drafts (User:Walkazo/Test) (the one part is basically the hover text in table form, but condensed for some lines due to space restraints).
 
From the wiki:

I have the NDS Pocket Guide, and it has a list of stats for the karts. I don't know how the stats listed on the wiki were approximated, but they generally match up, except that the guide (mostly) rounds to the nearest unit. However, it also lists a sixth stat: weight. I don't know if this is useful, but I can post the full list of stats if someone asks for them.
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It got buried in the recent changes, so I'll post this here.

What's the word on cut-outs from mags and guides for artwork? I have a (crappy) scanner that can produce (crappy) scans for Luigi's Mansion, including a bunch of artwork that I haven't seen on the wiki. Here's one example for Biff Atlas. The dots are a part of the guide itself, but I might try quickly cleaning the glass again to see if that helps. Thoughts?
Edit: Round 2. It kinda looks better.
 
Time Turner said:
What's the word on cut-outs from mags and guides for artwork? I have a (crappy) scanner that can produce (crappy) scans for Luigi's Mansion, including a bunch of artwork that I haven't seen on the wiki. Here's one example for Biff Atlas. The dots are a part of the guide itself, but I might try quickly cleaning the glass again to see if that helps. Thoughts?
Edit: Round 2. It kinda looks better.
Click to expand...
They're better than nothing.
 
Walkazo said:
My philosophy is generally to avoid adding stuff to the css as much as possible: it just makes life easier to have things self-contained rather than needing to mess around with the css. The only things you can't do with the color-link-piped solution are the double-links and refs, but really, seeing as the plain Duplighost entries are right there anyway, it's not even necessary to have second links anyway, and the refs aren't an absolute must-have either since they'll be in the enemy articles already, which is where people will be looking for that sort of info. Another option is using the "notes" input for this sorta thing as well as the AI stuff and whatnot, assuming we're not just leaving those for the individual enemy articles too.
Click to expand...
eh... I'm still not super satisfied with the color-link-pipe in the actual template. In this case, clicking on Lee in some titles will still send the clicker to the Goombario page (minor inconvenient, but meh). The sacrifice is not worth the shot. I prefer the links to be customized as needed in the list. The css change would also help us in the PMTTYD and SPM bestiaries in the future.

Otherwise if the css is out of the way, I think the better choice would be to implement the color-link in the chart code. That is, using the code |name={{Color-link|Bowser|white}} (1) and |name={{Color-link|Goombario|white}} ({{color-link|Lee|white}}) etc.. As for the references, I think they look ugly the way they do in the title of the entries now anyway, I would add them to the legend before the chart.

I didn't bother yet with the "decoration" stuff, that is the template page description and legend, and the hover text (I plan on adding a hover text for all of the data) That will come after tidying everything else.

All that aside, Is the bold/italic font in the title enough to identify bosses and support enemies and whatnot? Or would it better to have another way?
 
Three pages isn't enough cause for resorting to css outsourcing, but I agree that just having the {{color-link}}s is the simplest solution.

You already have the hover text copied from my template for everything but the basically-self-explanatory HP, Level, Attack, Defence, Moves, Location(s) and Tattle inputs. You can also get the legend and explanation stuff straight from my draft too (consistency is a good thing for inputs, tooltips and instructions) - really, all you'd need to add is that the names need to be colour-linked, and remove the direction and alignment stuff.

I'm not a fan of the bold/italic legend in the first place: bold's hard to see for anything but black font, with the increased size of the names here further obscuring it, and the italics seem out of place. I find colour-coding is much better, so perhaps, since we're manually color-linking everything anyway, we could just give bosses yellow links and helpers lime (then used piped color-link for the numbers, "(Lee)"s, and whatnot; agreed that the refs should just be removed and dealt with outside the chart). I checked, and both colours look fine against the dark blue, contrast with each other well, but don't clash badly or look garish. I'd also say just make all the names bold by default (i.e. built into the template): it looks better than the larger font being all spindly.




Time Turner said:
From the wiki: (Talk:Mario_Kart_DS#Stats_from_the_guide)

I have the NDS Pocket Guide, and it has a list of stats for the karts. I don't know how the stats listed on the wiki were approximated, but they generally match up, except that the guide (mostly) rounds to the nearest unit. However, it also lists a sixth stat: weight. I don't know if this is useful, but I can post the full list of stats if someone asks for them.
Click to expand...

It got buried in the recent changes, so I'll post this here.
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Finally got around to checking this out. The article currently states:

The weight system used in ''Mario Kart DS'' is different from previous ''Mario Kart'' games. The weight class of the character is not as significant, as the weight does not create restrictions on the use of karts. However, the weight of a character can influence the weight of the kart. For example, Bowser driving on the Dry Bomber will have considerably more weight than Dry Bones on the same kart. For this reason, weight is omitted in the table below.
Click to expand...

But this feels like flimsy reasoning to omit even the base weight of the karts, since I still imagine that Bowser driving the Dry Bomber will have a different weight than if he was driving some other kart, right? I feel like it'd be worth adding the weight, but rounded values would be less ideal than the more precise values - the hope being that wherever our stats came from also had the weight and it was a choice by an editor at our end to skip copying the weight.
 
The stats, and the justification for no weight, were added back in 2006 by Wayoshi, who hasn't been around since 2011, and he unfortunately didn't leave a source for the stats. I tried looking on other sites to see if they listed their method, but no dice (they all seem to have come out after Wayoshi added the info, anyhow). My first thought is that Wayoshi's stats are close approximations of the in-game stats (File:CharacterinMKDS.PNG), but I can't find a way to confirm or deny that.
 
Hmmm, perhaps in light of the lack of a source, we should just change all the stats into the rounded numbers that can be confirmed with your guide, and which are also being used on all the individual kart articles (example (4-Wheel Cradle)) - although I'm wondering if there are x.5 values too, as some of the bars definitely seem halfway (the aforementioned kart pages have half values already: example (Banisher)).
 
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