Guild Wars 2 Wiki talk:Practices and processes/Archive 03

Trivia

For Votive Cathedral, since it's pretty unorganized, is there a system in place to correctly list trivia (if I'm not mistaken that there is indeed fragments of trivia in there). Also, is there some sort of segment whether to tell if its waypoint? It says it is but personally I think it'll be nice to have some sort of icon beside it. I'm relatively new here and have been reading up on formatting the best I could but couldn't find anything to answer this question, could my question be answered by a possible future area info box yet to be designed? Luke.out 03:40, 12 March 2012 (UTC)

Lots of suggestions

Some suggestions:

• Items should be categorized as [[Category:ItemType]] and [[Category:Item(s)| ]]. For example, Human would be categorized as [[Category:Races]] and [[Category:Humans| ]]. Category:Humans should be inside Category:Races as well. It's not redundancy, it's making things easier to access. Also, note how I use blank space instead of a symbol. Using blank space leaves the categorized element above all the others. Example, note how those categorized with blank spaces are outside any type of character classification, making them completely distinctive.
• Linking ([[Link]]) to the page you're on is bad, very bad. The better solution is '''Link''', which gives the same output, without adding extra traffic to the calls the wiki does.
• Categories and lists are different things. Saying a category is a list is bad. This: example is a list.
• Navigation templates could have direct view and edit symbols, so people can edit them easily. Example, look at the upper left corner of the navigation template.
• Images to be used often and/or in templates should follow a naming pattern. The best, imo, is NounNounNoun, ordered by relevance. For example, an icon of the face of a sylvari male should be called File:SylvariMaleFace.png. Why this? easier navigation, and easier use from templates. Look at this, for example: Template:Currency. It looks nice, doesn't it? well, coins won't work with how the image is named right now. Could I make it work? yes, but it would overcomplicate the template.

I'm sure I'll have more as I get deeper into editing, I'll update the post then :).--Lon-ami 17:37, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

• I disagree. As one of the main users who restructurises categories I feel adding both a sub-category and a top-category to the same article is redundant; the sub-category is already part of the top-category. It further also clutters up the categories on articles. Objecting to that suggestion.
• Impartial; it doesn't slow down the wiki to the extent that changing this system benefits the wiki. If we change this, it'll be a lot of work (preferably done by a bot).
• Agreed. I personally hate it when users treat categories as list. Categories should be kept efficient and, well, categorising. If people want lists, they should find them on articles formatted as List of <whatever list you want>.

So all-in-all, I'm 50-50 here. - Infinite - talk 17:49, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

• Example: If I want to open all the organizations one by one, with redundancy I need to open each category, and then, inside of each of those categories, open the organization. With redundancy, you don't need to open each organization's category unless you want to know more about them. Articles shouldn't enter into the category tree layout, and categories should make stuff accessible. Races should be inside a "Races" category, no matter they may have their own category already on "Races" category.
• Well, it may not slow it too much (I'm all for efficiency) but it's ugly and bad. There's no need to start changing everything, but the policy from now on could be "don't do it", and that's all. We can fix it slowly as we edit.

Added a new one, by the way :P.--Lon-ami 17:57, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

• But that is using categories incorrectly; an organisation doesn't classify as organisations, which is why they have their own category. If you want an overview of organisations, you should be navigating to the article [[Organization]] (which doesn't exist yet, mainly because of the incorrect use of categories as stated by your 3 point in your first comment), or to Category:Organizations. The means to get there should not be found on sub-classifications of these too (so not via an organisation). Categories should remain in their purest form; to assign an article to a category where they most specifically end up in (omitting all higher-up possible categories within the same sub-tree).
• Ugly and bad are in the eyes of the beholder here. This argument works for both the self-linking and the bolding of the first instance. What one finds ugly and bad, another may find clean and organised. I am still impartial myself, mind.

I'm just *really* protective of the categories. :P - Infinite - talk 18:06, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

• I agree, a view and edit link should be introduced on all navigational templates. - Infinite - talk 18:06, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Look at this: example. Try to access all those novel pages without using the categorized article. You'd need to open each category, and then inside each category, open the article.

Later on, as we get more and more information, you'll notice how some articles deserve more and more categories, and you'll have to break that law if you don't want to make the tree look chaotic :P. Think of categories as database tags: you want organizations, bam, you get organizations. No need to get into other categories to find the articles asap.

I'm sorry if I look too chaotic, but I've lived through these problems before (in fact, I fought redundancy too, and later changed opinion), and it's better if they are discussed now, before we have 50000 articles. I'll try to convince you all, but if I can't I'll stick to the consensus :).--Lon-ami 18:17, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Our current system works since we have access to DPL (or possibly SMW in the future) to do the aggregation for us. Essentially, we say that in a given category tree, there's one place for an article. That way, you don't have, for example, 3 semi-redundant categories on a page (root, sub-root, leaf). --JonTheMon 18:22, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

(Edit conflict) Personally I prefer having [[this page]] over ''this page''. The performance gain is negligible, the former is easier to see and read when looking at the wiki syntax, and the former does not bold the text if the page was included in another one, but instead links to it. I'm also not a huge fan of formatting text inline but would much rather have the wiki do it for me. Let's just guess that at some point in the future we no longer want self-links to be bolded. If they are actual self-links we just need to change the CSS once and be done with it, but if they are bolded specifically we need to go through each and every one of them manually (or with a bot).

This is exactly why we added {{gray}} on GWW, for extra effects in concise skill descriptions. When concise skill descriptions were added to the game, we started out by italicizing the extra effect in articles. Later on it was decided they should be gray, just as they are in-game. Let's just say, a lot of edits happened that day. :P — Rhoot 18:24, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

But, are they really redundant? just get back to my example above. That's not user friendly at all :S. You should be able to access directly to the article of each race from the "Races" category, without needing to go through any other category.

I don't think we'll ever get to change how article names look in normal text, but if you were willing to, then it would be better to create a new template to avoid conflicts with the already existing functions :P.

Anyway, added another new one.--Lon-ami 18:40, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Even though we're not likely to ever change them, the developer in me screams "no" at inlining style. I also see the already existing functions as bonuses. Replacing self-links with actual links on inclusion is a useful function. — Rhoot 18:53, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

I feel they are in fact redundant, mainly because the category novels should indeed contain the actual novel articles in your example. The sub-categories there are redundant to me, as most of the content feels like it doesn't merit a sub-category like that. In fact, most of those sub-categories contain articles that are completely unrelated (at first glance, to an uneducated outsider) to the actual novel. Characters are one thing to sub-categorise, but locations and objects unique to a novel are past what we document here; we document the game, not the novels or thier content. We simply document the actual novel and note-worthy characters and keep them in their own categories (not an over-arching category).

You also shouldn't navigate to an individual race from the category Races. Races is plural; it depicts all races, where individual races should have individual categories. That's the cleanest a category tree can get. - Infinite - talk 19:04, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Whatever is inside of those wasn't my point >_<.

The structure of the category tree shouldn't limit the articles on it. Take this: Category:Organizations and reason me why Seraph isn't on it, while Wolfborn is. Because Seraph has its own category, that is inside it? So, to open Wolfborn, it's handy, but to open Seraph I need to open the Seraph category first. That doesn't make too much sense :S.

There's a reason why Wikipedia has it like I say, and the reason is accessibility.--Lon-ami 19:55, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Don't jump to conclusions please; GW2W (as well as GW2) is not ready yet. We are still sorting the perfect structures and frames to run our wiki with. Once we're done with everything I can assure you that there will be no individual organisations categorised in the organisations category. They will all be in sub-categories of it. - Infinite - talk 20:05, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Category policies

Bringing this topic back. Category policy is bad, and no decent wiki follows the model used here, because it's not user-friendly. Guild Wars 1 wiki does it. Wikipedia does it. WoWPedia does it. Wookipedia does it. Everyone except us does it.

Redundancy isn't bad when you make navigation easier. Our system is flawed. If I want to open the page of each creature from Category:Bestiary, I can't, and I need to open each category to open each page. Tell me that's not bad design.--Lon-ami 20:09, 29 June 2012 (UTC)

Categories are not meant to ease navigation, that's just what most wikis do because they feel it's easiest. A category is meant to categorize. And the more detailed a category something can have, the better. An random ring item shouldn't have Category:Accessories, Category:Rings, Category:Equipment, and Category:Items (and so on). That is the very definition of redundant. The argument "everyone else does it, thus so should we" is just a very, very meaningless argument. - Infinite - talk 20:28, 29 June 2012 (UTC)

I don't really know why you'd exactly want to open so many pages at once. The only reason that Woflborn does not exist as a category yet (I think so?) is because it simply doesn't, yet. Including all pages of subcategories on their top category page doesn't really accomplish much because we'd have only 200 pages per category page, then the next 200 on the second category page and so on. Like Infinite said, the system is not yet complete. Also, Wikipedia doesn't do it. I think that category is a much better example to compare to something like Category:Bestiary. Your way of doing category tree would force us list every creature on the Category:Bestiary which is in essence the same thing if Wikipedia listed every country in the world on their Category:Countries page. Allowing instant access to everything does not guarantee organization, and organization is they key to successful accessibility. Mediggo 20:33, 29 June 2012 (UTC)

@Infinite: Categories are meant for navigation. Why do you want to categorize if they aren't? Also, you're taking it to the extreme. Categorization is a rule of main 3: Type, Self and Parent. For example:

• Gendarran Fields: Category:Zones, Category:Gendarran Fields and Category:Kryta
• Hero's Band: Category:Rings, no self, no parent
• Tengu: [[:Category:Races]], Category:Tengu, no parent
• Shining Blade: Category:Organizations, Category:Shining Blade, Category:Kryta

Get it now?

@Mediggo: Well, normal people open all the pages they want to read, or do you want me to go back again and again and again for each race? And Wikipedia does what you said, and it's fine (look at my example link). Better have Category:Bestiary filled with 30 races than to have it empty.--Lon-ami 21:05, 29 June 2012 (UTC)

I agree with Lon-ami. Even if it's just for organization, then how does make sense for Category:Organizations to only contain the organizations that aren't important enough to have their own subcategory? That category should contain ALL organizations directly, not have them split between there and the subcats. —Dr Ishmael 21:23, 29 June 2012 (UTC)

Hypothetically, how would you deal with an article that would fit in 1 main category and 2 nested categories? Would it be in all 3? --JonTheMon 21:40, 29 June 2012 (UTC)

Any particular example? I'm not sure about what you mean, but I hope this is the interpretation you seek:

• We have too many races that match a subtype, like, reptiles (it's an example). So we make a category named reptiles, and we put it inside Bestiary. In that case, reptiles shouldn't appear at the bestiary, but Reptile page should.

When I say "Type" and "Parent", I mean the direct tier above. In the case of Wikipedia, each continent has a "Countries of X" category where countries are put on, so it's not needed to put countries of a continent on "Countries" category. For characters, for example, we wouldn't use Category:Characters only because it would be a mess. We would add "Characters by race" and then inside it "Human characters", "Norn characters", etc.

I forgot to say it, but the Self category should be categorized under Type and Parent. A clearer example:

• Gendarran Fields: Category:Zones, Category:Gendarran Fields and Category:Kryta
• Category:Gendarran Fields: Category:Zones and Category:Kryta

That's the model I'm proposing. Then you can add as many other different categories as you want, but these are the main ones, that make the vertebra of the category tree.--Lon-ami 22:02, 29 June 2012 (UTC)

Well, one situation i can think of is if our tree is Beastiary->Reptiles->Krait, what categories are the main Krait article in and which ones are "Unique Krait Boss" in? --JonTheMon 22:16, 29 June 2012 (UTC)

Krait would be in Type:Reptile, Self:Krait and Parent:None. Unique Krait Boss should go inside Cat:Krait characters/enemies/NPCs, which would in turn go inside Cat:Krait. Non-generic stuff shouldn't go inside "major" categories. Same for organizations, it's better to put members into "Cat:Members of X" instead of "Cat:X". We get the possibility of making a parallel "Characters by membership" category this way, too.--Lon-ami 22:37, 29 June 2012 (UTC)

I can see that going only to an endless argument about dragons being or not being reptiles and undead creatures having category of their former race while they have nothing to do with the living counterparts of their former race. Also, normal people use tabs when browsing. Mediggo 16:12, 30 June 2012 (UTC)

I agree that Category:Reptiles would be overkill. Bestiary should be subdividied at the race/species level (or whatever the game mechanic equivalent is for things like undead) - there's no need for artificial groupings like Reptiles or Amphibians or Humanoids etc. —Dr Ishmael 16:19, 30 June 2012 (UTC)

Bestiary->Reptiles is an EXAMPLE. Do you really need to keep taking examples to the extreme, instead of discussing the actual idea? Please >_<.--Lon-ami 21:53, 30 June 2012 (UTC)

Perhaps you should give an example more practical to this wiki and game. You're clearly suggesting that if we implemented your idea, we'd have a redundant intermediate category between krait and bestiary. Categorising creatures like shark and armorfish into same intermediate category of fish would not only be redundant, it would also be misleading, because there is absotelutely no relation between these creatures types when it comes to game mechanics. The purpose of category tree is to clearly classify every area and entity in the game into its own place. For instance: Category:Kryta includes all the zones within the region as subcategories, and only locations and entities not within those subcategories are listed as being part of region Kryta in general. If you want to access all explorable zones in the game, we have an article for that. Similiarly, the article of bestiary is there you need to head to take a look at all the races. Like I said earlier, your model is not granting any increase in usability or accessibility because it is sacrificing organization that is currently in practice within current category tree. You need to know where you can find something before you can access it, and the current category tree is doing exactly that because it's built logically, and its purpose is to categorise.

If we were doing a family tree in this way, we'd have to draw boxes around or lines between each cousin and each sibling and we could no longer see the tree after that. Mediggo 12:59, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

Okay, that was an awful example. Still, what you fear won't happen, because you misunderstood the example. Being redundant with the "rule of main 3", doesn't imply we need to be redundant with everything, and intermediate categories as you view them aren't what they are supposed to be with my idea.

Also, using Bestiary isn't as useful as navigating through the category, because it doesn't show all the current items inside the category.

If you want a quick summary of my idea, without any confusion or examples: Every article should have the type category, no matter it's inside its self category.

Anyway, since I'm going to give a bad example, suggest a problem yourself, and I'll solve it (clear enough, I hope).--Lon-ami 15:20, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

Having subcategories (aside from boss subcategory which has worked in GWW) for each creature type or race is also extremely redundant because characters refer to player characters and all enemies are NPCs. All the entities of a single race or creature type documented here are always NPCs. Mediggo 15:44, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

What if you want to find an enemy of a specific race? You would need to read across all the NPCs in the entire game, which, to make things worse, would be all inside a single category, making the list pretty huge and chaotic. Bad design, imo.--Lon-ami 16:07, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

You'd need to use the search tool like every other wiki user. If you were looking for information about a particular type of krait, you wouldn't go to Category:Krait. You'd use search tool to go to Krait, and then read the list of all known krait. Simple as that. Now, if you can't present an actual problem with the current categorisation model, I'd suggest we let this go. Mediggo 16:33, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

And what if the list isn't up to date? What if the data changed? By that point of view of yours, categories are useless. We could remove them anyway, if they aren't supposed to be useful, couldn't we?

I want to open Category:Bestiary and see all creatures linked there, without needing to go to any other place. That's the problem of this model, and the reason why 99% of the other models used in the rest of the wikis are the one I'm suggesting.

Speaking of problems, what's the problem with the model I'm suggesting?--Lon-ami 17:32, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

@Mediggo, there is nothing wrong with redundancy in categories, as long as it is useful redundancy. My example of Category:Organizations demonstrates this quite well: the base category should list all organizations, not just the minor ones that don't have their own subcategories; for the major organizations, they can also be listed in their subcategories (with sortkey '*'). This way, anyone browsing categories — OR writing a query based on the category — can find all the organizations at once, without having to look into subcategories. Logically, it also makes sense to list all organizations together, instead of only listing the minor ones directly and obfuscating the major ones by only placing them in the subcategories.

The Bestiary is a very complex place, and the previous examples using it seem to have only muddied the issue. I would advise against using it for any further examples on either side. —Dr Ishmael 17:42, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

I think that all organizations deserve their own subcategory when there's enough articles about subjects within each organization – that is the reason they don't have subcategories. The organizations themselves are also very distinct from each other, and I don't see any reason one would wish to make a query on them, for purposes of generating a table with contents of a category as table's contents (I assume this is what you're referring to). However, I don't see a reason why an exception couldn't be done in a category where this including an article in multiple categories would be useful, but I also can't see why we should restructure the entire model for the sake of one or two groups of subjects. Right now, I just don't see any problem with using the current category model, except that it's obviously not ready yet, so I'm just stating my own opinion on the whole thing and the way I see it. Mediggo 19:19, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

Ok, so I might be getting a grasp of the "more than 1 category" point. A page can be in 2 categories if it is the head page of a category named after it. So, Kryta would be in both "cat:continents" and "cat:Kryta" since it is both a continent (normal place to put it) and is the head page of Kryta. --JonTheMon 20:29, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

I think you mean region, not continent — but yes, that's basically what the original point was. —Dr Ishmael 20:42, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

Except the original point was, at least how it sounded to me, to add redundant intermediate categories between sub categories and top categories. I'm not sure how listing all organizations in Category:Organizations as well as also including each organization's article in their subcategory makes navigation easier in any way. It's just one click away, and like I said above, using browser tabs is pretty efficient in navigating through categories. I could understand the model being put into practice with some categories, but I just can't tell which categories would possibly benefit from it. Regarding regions, the current Category:Locations has a bit different purpose than simply listing locations and regions of Tyria; playable regions which are accessible are included as subcategories, while inaccessible and general location terms are listed as individual pages in the category. IMHO, the current system makes this particular category grant a very good overview of which regions are accessible and which are not, and it's quite easy to tell which articles are documenting general location terms. If we listed Kryta as a location alongside Janthir Bay or Deldrimor Front, it wouldn't make any sense because those two locations are inaccessible and documented on the wiki only because they appear prominently in lore, maps or in GW1 while being closely related to events of GW2.

Like I said, I understand what the proposed model would accomplish, it just doesn't seem beneficial in any way. There's a few categories which might, though... Category:Orders (which is not only part of lore – it is big part of gameplay and personal story) and certain articles like those within Category:Chests, though I'm sure that the real category tree task force (Infinite, plus anyone else? I don't remember) would have something to add to or against this. Mediggo 10:56, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

Existing consensus

Archiving, signing comments where required, etc. etc. etc. Or is there some other page where all these commonly approved practices and processes are listed? Mediggo 19:28, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

To put it bluntly, no. The P&P is a system that is based on dynamically agreed on practises. It's common practise here to archive talk pages, so that is what the current P&P includes. Writing them down would result in an old-fashioned policy system, which is exactly what P&P excludes. - Infinite - talk 20:17, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

But how does a new user know what the P&P are without having them written down somewhere? —Dr Ishmael 20:57, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

(Edit conflict) They obviously shouldn't be enforced in any manner like policies in wikis of old, but I'd just prefer having some kind of reference of processes that have been widely agreed on by community and which can be considered to be commonplace on this wiki. We can't expect everyone to know how GW2W works, or even how a wiki works in general, and I don't think P&P covers that very well - for example, the practice of refraining from discussing speculation, giving feedback or gauging of skills in the talk pages of the subjects. Mediggo 21:07, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

I think those points are all clear examples of why the stub tag exists on the P&P. Expanding them can be done by anyone, as long as the content being expanded with is actually representing us (but not in an air of enforcing). - Infinite - talk 21:10, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

We've got Help:Archiving and Help:Signatures, although the latter could do with a little improving (which I'm starting atm). pling 21:13, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

Linking them from here would be very useful, but I don't feel comfortable editing it myself since I'm still getting used to this paradigm. —Dr Ishmael 21:17, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

I'm not sure what would be the point of significantly expanding this page. Let's be frank - most users are not going to read whatever is in this article before editing, nor should they have to. When they make mistakes, they can be corrected by being told what they did wrong in their main pages; doing so in a friendly way is better, IMO, than pointing them to a "list of rules". This section was created after an user ignored quite a few explanations about what he has been doing wrong; I can assure everyone that a link to a rule set would only lead him to either ignore it, or try to find loopholes in whatever rule set we had to justify his behavior. Erasculio 21:32, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

I actually rather enjoy explaining "how-to" on a personal level, but I feel terribly uncomfortable of pulling the explanation from nowhere. What I had in mind here was strictly a reference of some kind that every user can understand and hopefully abide by without telling them "no you can't." Everything in P&P at the moment are general guidelines of how GW2W is supposed to work, something that is widely accepted by its community, yet not strict rules which don't allow for community to adapt to dealing with problems outside common consensus. Mediggo 21:40, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

(Reset indent) For the records, and since this is the reason this section was created in the first place: I'm not so sure we need to prevent people from deleting anything on their talk pages. It can be somewhat annoying when the first interaction someone has with the community is being told she/she did something wrong in his/her talk page, then trying to hide the mistake by deleting it, then being told by a massive amount of users that people are not allowed to remove content from their talk pages. This kind of thing makes the community feel a bit hostile, more worried about abstract rules (that don't necessarily make much sense from the point of view of someone new) than about welcoming a new user. I have seen this pattern repeated over and over and over again, so perhaps we should give new users some leeway in this kind of thing.
Of course, someone who replies to a friendly warning with "OMFGWTF LOL! kthxb n00BZZzzzzz!!!11!!!" and then tries to delete everything probably isn't going to be the best wiki contributor in the world. In those cases, reiterating the "rules" over and over is hardly going to achieve anything, IMO. Erasculio 23:35, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

Leeway is fine as long as they show they are willing to learn the ways here. The most recent case shows quite the opposite. I think the current system is fine as long as we don't forget to appoint new users on their accidental mistakes in a kind and understanding fashion. - Infinite - talk 23:39, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

(Edit conflict) No, there's no need to strictly prevent anyone from doing anything except harming the wiki, but not archiving content deleted from talk pages can make it much more harder to find desired information in future (I hate browsing article history, and I do that every now and then, dunno about the rest of you) - this of course depends on the exact case and scope of the information. If you feel the page here is explaining that incompletely, please improve. But if this is about user Phoenix Inertia, they have failed to respond earlier questions, deleted very useful answers and information by other users, and refused to participate in discussion about controversy/issues of their edits entirely. Mediggo 23:47, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

I think Phoenix's case is an interesting example of the kind of issue I mentioned. In one hand, we have an user who apparently isn't that willing to adapt to this wiki. In other hand, I wonder how much has the situation been escalated by having so many people telling him so many times that he should not delete content from his talk page. I believe there is a fine line between telling someone about his/her mistakes, and being hostile in agressively trying to enforce rules on new users. Erasculio 00:00, 6 May 2012 (UTC)

We probably need to clarify what we don't do with user talk pages, since we will have a lot of users coming in with preconceived notions of talk page conduct. Personally, my only beef is if the user doesn't communicate. That's it. --JonTheMon 00:05, 6 May 2012 (UTC)

That is what irritates me most, personally - turning away from discussion. I admit I could have left one of my own comments out, the one (or two?) with edit conflict, but I didn't want to. In fact, the "escalation" that happened here tonight proved necessary, to me at least. It's not pretty, but in the end somebody who actually has the experience and authority of solving these issues finally stepped in. But yeah, aside from the recent, you should edit the article here to reflect the process here... I don't feel particularly well on my contribution there, and would appreciate it if someone could improve it better. Mediggo 00:18, 6 May 2012 (UTC)

I too wonder like Erasculio about how much these things can be avoided with a more moderate community response. I've previously greeted other users that have wiped their talk page like this [1] with minimal conflict. Granted the personalities are vastly different in each case, but careful and concise use of language goes a long way. Personally, i can care less what someone does with their talk page. Unless the person is a higher profile editor, user talk pages don't contain much useful information. Yeah communication is important and necessary, but leaving multiple WoT or hostile comments that talk about policy doesn't help especially if that person refuses to communicate. If someone isn't a team player, they won't last long on this kind of wiki anyway. --Lania 04:05, 06 May 2012 (UTC)

Do many or any other wikis have such a religiously enforced user talk archive policy? I'd prefer a policy which allowed people a bit more leeway for deleting personal and spam content rather than archiving it. So what if the only people who get annoyed about it aren't team players who won't contribute much. It is drama, and causing that much drama over what amounts to clearing spam is pretty dumb. -- aspectacle  16:45, 7 May 2012 (UTC)

Smaller wikis tend to not have any policy regarding the user space. Wikipedia prefers to archive user talk page comments but is not required. But they do have a essay that discourage restoration of user deleted comments from the talk page as that can be seen as harrassment. Other game wikis like wow wiki also suggest archive over comment deletion but note that comment deletion w/o a reply may be seen as a rude act. I prefer the "who cares" approach when it comes to what people do with their user talk page. Because some who deletes comments w/o replying to them over and over again tend to not last long on a wiki. --Lania 17:50, 07 May 2012 (UTC)

Thank you Lania for the information. I think 'who cares' is a good approach - usually those talk pages with interesting wiki business on them are owned by contributors who've been around long enough to appreciate why archiving is easier to use and will do so anyway for the convenience to themselves and their fellow contributors. -- aspectacle  20:10, 7 May 2012 (UTC)

(Reset indent) So is this to be the new consensus then? Who cares if anyone signs their comments on pages, how large their signature icons are, where they redirect to, how you indent comments, how talk pages are supposed to be archived, or how everyone is supposed to work together and assume good faith? Who cares if community is giving ridiculous amounts of leeway to users who don't respond to comments and persistently act against community advice and instructions, or who cares if we need admins to deal with problems like telling a user to archive their talk page? "Core principles in any area include being bold with contributions, discussing with other users to resolve disagreements, and finding consensuses." Discussion is healthy. Ignorance is not so.
I think it's a very good thing all of this has happened since maybe we can come to some kind of agreement on how to instruct new users to behave as expected from everyone else who have already spent years building the wiki. When it comes to strict rules or firm policies that anyone can enforce by leaving a short-link to appropriate policy as their only comment, I'm just as much against them as everyone else here. The point is that we can find some kind of common point of view on things, and when debate arises, deal with those situations as individual cases instead of always applying same, silly rules like only revert once (a good principle on how to resolve things, but very bad policy). Mediggo 06:23, 8 May 2012 (UTC)

That's a big straw man argument :-P Not signing is something rather detrimental to the wiki, since it makes a mess when trying to find out who said what when. In other hand, does it really hurt the wiki if someone deletes common chatter from his talk page? In this example, while the user in question was jumped at for deleting a few comments, no one was nearly as emphatic about telling him how to sign. I think less of following rules just to follow rules and more prioritizing what is actually detrimental to the wiki would be better. Erasculio 12:25, 8 May 2012 (UTC)

I had hoped that we could move on to discuss about how to make common consensus more well known and how to let new editors know how they get started here. Mediggo 12:57, 8 May 2012 (UTC)

The "who cares" approach should only apply to the user talk page as long as it is not disrupting the rest of the wiki. If people are that clueless on how to behave like a human being but are willing to learn how, then they can read wiki behavioral guidelines, which are for the most part, common sense values on how a human being should work with people. Generally with a few exceptions, people who are asshats right from the beginning and not play well with anyone tends to not care about what others think and will in many cases be trolls. Those people also will not read P&P or the help section to try to improve their understanding of a wiki. For some, no amount of help, discipline, or guidance will help them work better. People who genuinely care will listen to people and read p&p and other essays/guidelines on how they can improve their editing...

Also, I don't think it's unusual for people to ask to be emailed instead because in some wikis, that's something practiced by some people, and even in the wow-wiki, it's within the scope of accepted behavior. --Lania 15:31, 08 May 2012 (UTC)

In order to use Special:EmailUser, you have to have supplied your own email address. Some people are paranoid and don't want to do that, other people don't even want to register an account so they edit as an IP, thus their only way to contact other users is by user talkpage. Therefore, it should be "common sense" that a user can't demand that other users contact them solely by email. To state a preference for contact-by-email is fine, but not to demand it and then constantly blank their user talkpage. —Dr Ishmael 15:50, 8 May 2012 (UTC)

Emailing is also slow and prevents everyone else but the sender and recipient's from participating to conversation, which is also something to be avoided in a wiki. Thus proper talk page use and archiving should be used instead of having private discussions or sweeping comments under the rug.

But really, aside from that, P&P could use some improving and/or additions. Just like Lania said, users who actually want to fit into this community will seek out information on how to improve and edit in a way that is fitting for high standards of GW2W. Thus we should keep this article as a up-to-date reference of wiki-wide practices and processes. Mediggo 16:02, 8 May 2012 (UTC)

I don't disagree with improvements to the article - I think documenting how it is is good for all the reasons you state. Everything that you've added so far covers off what's done here and is completely uncontroversial. Neither do I disagree with being helpful and encouraging behaviour which makes for effective wiki contribution. I'm simply stating that a zealously enforced user talk archiving policy, something which has been common practice on GWW and unfortunately seems to be so here, often causes more drama and harassment than it is worth and seems to be unusual for larger wikis for that reason.

By all means be helpful and do what is necessary to keep the wiki working smoothly. Request the user plays along, if they don't then admin noticeboard it. Far too many wannabe sysops weigh into a "don't delete it, archive it" discussion which can make for a very unfriendly welcome to what is typically a friendly sort of community.

The user talk archiving policy should be recommendation not a rule. -- aspectacle  17:23, 8 May 2012 (UTC)

I don't think there are any wannabe sysops here, just people who would rather everyone mostly play along some of the most common rules for the ease of use and less time spent, cleaning up mess or trying to find information. Mediggo 17:48, 8 May 2012 (UTC)

Now I know this discussion came about because of Phoenix Inertia's behavior. It is completely unreasonable to demand that someone only use email for contacting. Some people in other wikis has a preference for it because of low activity or whatnot... The thing about "wannabe sysops" in the case with phoenix inertia is that people are calling common practices that people do as community consensus and implying that these are the rules that everyone must play by. Archiving is a must in article discussions but as far as I know, there are no discussions leading to a consensus about how people should "archive" user talk pages. The reason why bigger wikis only suggest or recommend archiving on user talk pages is because the active editors/users already do it, and the users that don't want to, generally don't contribute much or are being disruptive. Enforcing an "archiving policy" or consensus on a tense situation only makes defusing it harder to do, and creates more headaches for the admins. --Lania 18:17, 08 May 2012 (UTC)

(Edit conflict) Since we're here, a proposal:

"On user talk pages users are more than welcome to discuss any topic or issue they wish, as long as it is not disrupting documentation by breaking commonly recognized personal conduct guidelines and general good behavior (see above section)."

to

"On user talk pages, users are more than welcome to discuss any topic or issue they wish, as long as it is not disrupting documentation by breaking commonly recognized personal conduct guidelines and general good behavior (see above section). Removal of comments is discouraged (archiving is preferred) and users should remember that talk pages are for the community to interact with the user. Quick removal of content can be considered hostile or seem like the user is ignoring comments, both not productive to a welcoming community."

Yeah, it's a bit rough, but i think it addresses the how and why's. --JonTheMon 18:23, 8 May 2012 (UTC)

Yeah, I like that change. How about changing some parts to... "Users may remove comments but archiving is preferred and... Quick removal of content with out a reply may be seen as hostile and seem like..." I just don't like using the word discourage because it seems like the community will be unhappy with someone that periodically wipes the talk page after a while (a practice that is commonly used by some people in other wikis). I just like to have the language as loose as possible because I don't want the GW2W to be the most non lenient wiki when it comes to user talk pages. --Lania 18:34, 08 May 2012 (UTC)

"Old comments or concluded discussions may be removed by the user as they see fit; it is encouraged that these be archived for future reference. Users should remember that talk pages are for the community to interact with the user. Quick removal of a comment without giving a reply can be considered hostile or seem like the user is ignoring comments, both of which are not productive to a welcoming community."

I rewrote the first sentence, and made some minor edits to the second third. Lania, in deference to your comment, I flipped the tone so we could use "encourage" rather than "discourage". —Dr Ishmael 19:17, 8 May 2012 (UTC)

I like it. -- aspectacle  21:19, 8 May 2012 (UTC)

I really like the word change to encourage. Sounds positive and friendly :). I like it too. --Lania 22:25, 08 May 2012 (UTC)

But... I kinda want to discourage them from removing comments. Removing is "fine", but with a caveat. *grumblegrumblebeingnicegrumble* --JonTheMon 22:35, 8 May 2012 (UTC)

Disagreeing with recent additions

I disagree with the recent addition of "Any page that is candidate for deletion should be left otherwise intact for other contributors and administrators to review before deletion. Some exceptions to this are extremely offensive vandalism or vandalized pages with external links. These should be cleared out or reverted to a previous version immediately".
On a microscale, here's one example: the article Backdraft has currently been tagged for deletion to leave way for the Backdraft (engineer) to be renamed simply "Backdraft". However, a deletion isn't really necessary; we could simply copy the content from the "Backdraft (engineer)" article to the "Backdraft" article, leave the "Backdraft (engineer)" article as a redirect, and thus allow people to see who contributed to the articles while having no need for sysop action. This is the kind of simple fix that the statement recently added as a "practice" prevents.
On a macroscale... Really? That sounds like the kind of small and, well, petty thing that this article should avoid. One of the main reasons to avoid having a policy list was not having a set of inflexible rules to be enforced. In fact, this article really shines when it doesn't try to tell people what to do, but rather documents what we already do; that's fits the description, near the top of this article, stating "document common practices that have been agreed upon or proved effective in the past and may prove to be effective in future" (notice the "may"). I believe we should focus as much as possible on not trying to simply add rules to a list of "practices and processes", lest it becomes just a collection of policies pilled in a single place. Rather, this should be a way to tell people what we usually do, stating the reasons behind those practices, and leave it to other users to adapt the ideas described here, more than the letters, to each individual circunstance. Erasculio 22:39, 8 May 2012 (UTC)

Regarding the deletion thing: sometimes it doesn't matter when the content is removed (usually when it's a vandal page, although some admins still prefer to have the page left as is). Sometimes the content should stay there, and it should be obvious when. Basically, it depends on what's being tagged, so leave it out of PP and rely on common sense.

Re the talk page discussion above... it's something that I was hoping to avoid with PP. pling 23:20, 8 May 2012 (UTC)

Here was a discussion about whether to clean the page or not when tagging vandalized articles for deletion, in case you didn't see/remember it. Obviously nothing of what is currently mentioned in the quoted part of retention and deletion section overrides standard process of inspecting currently or previously legit articles (which is also mentioned in the section) like in Erasculio's example. It is still exactly what you say it's supposed to be - mentioning common practices on GW2W and stating the reasons behind them. I really don't see what's the problem of writing down community consensus. Just because it's described in organized manner doesn't make it a policy to be enforced in all and every case. But if you really feel like it's getting to that, I'd suggest you reword the article to some extent, perhaps explicitly stating that these are not firm rules or whatever. Mediggo 05:28, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

At the risk of making a hyperbolic argument I'll just say something very general that covers the talk and this section... If we write down every single thing that's "community consensus" then we'll be recreating the essays and guidelines from Wikipedia. A vast majority of things that are community consensus are also fairly common sense. There are some things that might not be clear, which is why we have a loosely worded P&P, and help section for guidance. This makes it so that sysop discretionary action is doable w/o big drama. Making P&P longer with more sub-articles will just make it easier for trolls to troll the wiki. --Lania 21:19, 09 May 2012 (UTC)

I don't think it's a big deal whether or not content is removed, and it's part of the minutiae of retention/deletion. It's better said on template:delete, if it needs to be said at all. That's more my reason for thinking it doesn't belong on PP - it's not really a policy/enforce/rule issue, but an "it doesn't really matter either way, there are more helpful things to say, shrug" thing. pling 18:30, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

Page formatting guidelines

What had seemed to me like a both prudent and wise addition seems to be receiving some resistance, so I'd like to hash this out:

I believe the wiki would greatly benefit from having standard templates created for each super-common page type. Points I think to be in favor of this are:

• This will aid in contributions, as users not familiar with wiki in general, or not familiar with our page layout can just pull the template and fill out a full, (if incomplete) page.
• This will help in article consistency, as users will have a central place to check 'what is the current accepted style' and they can update non-conforming pages to match
• This will help in page design, acting as a focal point for discussion on the design of the page as a whole, and not just the component template(s).

A last item, I'd started the NPC format page as a link under Guild Wars 2 Wiki:General formatting, but the article was promptly moved to this page. My choice for its placement on the general formatting page was not arbitrary. The link to 'formatting guides' on Guild Wars 2 Wiki:How to help takes me there, and so there is where I was placing formatting guides. I don't see how burying formatting guides away from the formatting guides page is a help. The move be a simple oversight in understanding why I was placing specific formatting detail on a general formatting page, regardless, the guides should be sensibly located.

The two points I think needing discussion are: do we need/want page templates & page type specific formatting guides (and if so, when should they be made, and when should page to NOt get them), and where do we put them so that users don't have to go digging under policies to find out the weapon specific details & advice for making screenshots of same. Torrenal 18:23, 13 June 2012 (UTC)

I think there already exists some guidelines written by users more experienced than me, but I have no idea where they could be, except for the recently created [[User:Infinite/Runes]]. There is also some discussion on NPC page formatting, so it's only a matter of time before we have that, as well as discussion on armor galleries. Finally, I think there was some talk about what kind of formatting to use for lists and tables of skills and traits. Copying and editing something like skill page formatting is effortless thanks to community's efforts at skill infobox, but you probably have something other than that in mind? Mediggo 08:08, 14 June 2012 (UTC)

This is the central page for formatting guides (among other things), which is why I placed the link here. I also improved the link on the How to help page so it points here, not to General formatting, which is a guide itself, not a central "homepage" for guides. pling 21:21, 14 June 2012 (UTC)

My thoughts are based on the fact that this Wiki is about to (is already seeing) a huge influx of content. With that in mind, I believe it would help everyone (users and editors alike) to have a framework around which that new content can be placed.

• Create a list of temp, er, boilerplate pages for all the hyper-common page types that still need creating.

• In short, if it's going to need another 100+ pages made for it, I'd consider it as candidate for a boilerplate, with respective formatting guidelines and talk page...

Candidates include crafting recipes, crafting supplies, locations, skills, bundle-items, generic items, weapons, armor, NPCs (possibly a separate 'beastiary' page), events, and Personaly Story instance-missions.

• Make these boilerplates more accessible. The link on 'how to help' is not what I'd call prominent. I might include a link on Help center. At go-live, I could see a single motd/announcement bringing attention to them.

That, is it in a nutshell. Prepare as best we can for the tide of documents, with a mind to making entry easy, while allowing the added content to be consistent in structure & content. Torrenal 01:28, 15 June 2012 (UTC)

RaceIcon template

I would like to see your opinion regarding the creation of a template of this type. For those who don't know what it's about, it's pretty simple: {{RaceIcon|Race|Gender}}, which would show a small portrait icon matching the parameters. This is useful for lists of characters/NPCs/Enemies, and gives pages better-looking aspect.

Live examples in another wiki: 1, 2, 3 and 4.

If you like the idea, the code would be done (I'm behind the last versions of it at WoWPedia, so it's just copy+paste with some adjustments). We would need some icons, which would need to be created by taking photos of models using a viewer (I could do them myself alone if there's no one else on it), and we need a naming convention adapted to the template's needs.

But for now, a simple question: Would you like this implemented and being used across the wiki?--Lon-ami 12:01, 30 June 2012 (UTC)

We already have race icons and race icon templates. —Dr Ishmael 14:24, 30 June 2012 (UTC)

Try reading the idea once again, and clicking over the examples, too. You'll see you haven't understood me, and why I'm actually suggesting this :P.--Lon-ami 21:55, 30 June 2012 (UTC)

As I said about Template:Currency, I prefer individual templates like {{charr}} - they're much easier to remember, more intuitive for inexperienced editors, and work fine as they are. The only thing I think that's different to your example is the gender specification, but I think it would be better to use an additional male/female icon should that be necessary, as it's clearer to understand at a glance than a male face/female face of the same race.

I get that you're used to WoWpedia's template structure, like how they're named, parametrised, etc, but that doesn't really fit with our existing template practice. It also doesn't offer any additional benefit other than being familiar to other WoWpedia users, which isn't much of a priority. pling 22:08, 30 June 2012 (UTC)

I'll explain it again, since it seems you don't understand it: This RaceIcon template would show a PORTRAIT, that is, the face of the selected race. Not the racial crest. Why could this be useful? Well, you identify stuff faster, and we could represent other races, like hylek, tengu, krait, etc who don't have any racial crest.

And I'm not trying to "force" WoWPedia structures, I'm suggesting the same because they're the best. I was behind a decent part of the creation of that template, and I didn't suggest it "because another wiki had it and I was used to it", I suggested it because I thought it was good, the same reason I'm suggesting it here (though for this case, t:RaceIcon, I think we could improve it much more, learning from errors from WoWPedia's version).

The structure for these portrait icons could work like this: File:Portrait-Sylvari-Male.png, File:Portrait-Wind_Rider.png, File:Portrait-Human-Male-Child. Elements are separated by a "-" to avoid confusion with possible spaces ("_") inside the elements. The first element works as the link to the race, too (unlike WoWPedia, that avoids white spaces and needs a switch to link stuff properly). The structure of the name of the image MUST work with the template if we want it to be efficient; if not, we'll end up filling the template with switches all around, making the pages load slower. Efficiency > naming conventions, and it's not like anyone should use these icons without the template, so no one should care about how they're named.--Lon-ami 08:50, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

I'm aware of how this would be implemented; I just don't think it's the best choice. Looking at those pages the icons are pretty damn small. A long list of them, and it's almost just going by color. --JonTheMon 14:15, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

Probably because you aren't accustomed to them (being from another game). I recognize the races pretty well, and if that's not enough, they'll have a tooltip. If you want to check the code: <span title="{{#if:{{{6|}}}|{{{6}}}|{{#if:{{{1|}}}|{{{1}}}|Unknown}}}}">[[File:Portrait-{{#if:{{{1|}}}|{{{1}}}{{#if:{{{2|}}}|-{{{2}}}|}}{{#if:{{{3|}}}|-{{{3}}}|}}|Unknown}}.gif|{{#if:{{{4|}}}|{{{4}}}|18}}px|link={{#if:{{{5|}}}|{{{5}}}|{{#if:{{{1|}}}|{{{1}}}|Unknown}}}}]]</span> (it doesn't show the images, but you can check the url.--Lon-ami 15:09, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

Map icon naming policy

Seems these icons don't have a policy around them: and some more.

You can see the differences by looking at the names, but if you're lazy:

• Some have "(map icon)" at the end, and others don't.
• Some have the main word as the first word (Event boss, Skill point empty, Point of interest (undiscovered)), and some have it as the second (Locked waypoint, Complete heart, Plant resource).
• Some don't have the complete name and/or they don't capitalize well (heart -> Renown Heart).

So yeah, shall we talk about how they should be named and fix this?--Lon-ami 17:50, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

Well, not all of them are only map icons; Skill point icon is used in hero panel, and merchant icon, trainer icon and scout icon are also used in dialogue options. Not really sure what to do about PoI icons.

Btw, GW2W doesn't really have firm policies (which is described in more detail on the article page of this discussion page). I don't really see a problem with the current naming convention of the icons, so as long as they are clearly named, in a manner that it is easy to relate an icon to a term (like Point of Interest icon being related to Point of Interest), it's all good to me. Mediggo 18:01, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

Could removing "(map icon)" be a good idea, then? There wouldn't be conflicts with existing images, as far as I've checked, and we would remove any possible confusion. Furthermore, I think icons should include full name, well capitalized, so we can make efficient templates if we want so (efficient = we can link articles directly with part of the name, without #if or #switch).

As for the order issue, I would leave main word as the first, so the icons of the same classes go together in categories.

This would give us, for the examples above: [[File:Event Boss.png]][[File:Event Cog.png]][[File:Event Collect.png]][[File:Event Swords.png]][[File:Chest.png]][[File:Dungeon.png]][[File:Resource Mine).png]][[File:Resource Plant.png]][[File:Resource Wood.png]][[File:Renown Heart Incomplete.png]][[File:Renown Heart.png]][[File:Waypoint Locked.png]][[File:Waypoint.png]][[File:Waypoint Contested.png]][[File:Point of Interest Undiscovered.png]][[File:Point of Interest.png]][[File:Skill Point Empty.png]][[File:Skill Point.png]] (I'm missing some, but you get the idea).

Like it?--Lon-ami 20:32, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

I think that lowercase is preferred. Fairly many pages link to those files' current filenames, so the redirects need to be fixed as well. Mediggo 10:45, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

I use upper case in 2 cases: When the name has upper case (Point of Interest, Skill Point) and to describe a state (Waypoint Locked, Renown Heart Incomplete). When making a template, people usually put each field starting with upper case, so leaving "states" as upper case would make templates more efficient.

As for redirects, most uses of these icons are through templates, so it's not that much work.--Lon-ami 15:17, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

Anyway, what about sizes? I think all icons of the same "category" should have the same size. I'm including the icons for the different currencies here, too.--Lon-ami 16:54, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

Still worried about this naming policy.--Lon-ami 07:47, 23 July 2012 (UTC)