Semi Protection

UESPWiki:Community Portal/Archive 18

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This is an archive of past UESPWiki:Community Portal discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page, except for maintenance such as updating links.


Unacceptable Usernames

We need to make a clear cut line between what is acceptable and what is unacceptable for usernames. Do we allow curse words in usernames? Do we allow slanderous words? Words that have bad connotations? We need to remember that we have young teenagers on this site. I know there is nudity with Daggerfall and whatnot, but we need to make a rating for the site. If the IRC is PG, should that be the same for the entire site? I am essentially okay with either direction, but we need a direction. –Elliot talk 00:28, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

I fear this may turn into a great philosophical debate over what words and phrases are acceptable and what isn't. Let me start with adding that some people can be offended by the slightest whisper. For example, while I was moderator of a specific message board, I once received a reported post in my email inbox. The reporter complained about someone's signature, as it said "Hey baby, wanna kill all humans with me?" (for the oblivious, that's a reference to Futurama's Bender). The reporter read it too literally.
I've always been bothered a bit by the, in my opinion, strong language control here (both wiki and IRC). If someone feels he need to utter a couple of swear words, that is fine with me. All it can do for me is that I take the editor less seriously. There's a limit for me, ofcourse, swearing every other word will annoy me as it makes your comments harder to read.
I also know that other people are bothered sooner than me, and we need to have a place everyone can feel comfortable.
One thing I disagree with, is a rating for the site. Ratings are usually bad attempts to categorise the world in green wide meadows and mutilated (naked) limbs flying around. It isn't the precise words we wish to filter, but the intent behind them. See for example the fictional (and exaggerated) usernames "LoveThisFuckingGame" and "IHateFuckingBugs". The first is just from an overly enthousiastic user, the second is one from a user bringing along negative feelings. My point is, we should address these on a case-by-case basis, not simply filter on a variety of words.
Are there usernames we should ban on sight? Yes, usernames that are prohibited by law (e.g. racism), harass other people, spam or just plain nonsense. The rest we should just judge on a case-by-case basis, and not necessarily attract undeserved attention to them. Cursing is often a way to draw attention, and mostly ignoring them can be most effective. --Timenn-<talk> 14:57, 17 December 2009 (UTC)
Another important consideration is "Don't Feed The Troll". The original post was triggered by one particular new user's name. My advice was to ignore it because it had the look of the sort of person who would make one or two posts and then never come back again, which, so far, has been the case. Asking a user to pick a new name or unilaterally renaming them is far more likely to end up posting the offending name over multiple pages, spreading exactly what was originally intended to be contained. –rpeh•T•C•E• 15:35, 17 December 2009 (UTC)
We can't have some vague shadow of a policy that insists we take it case-by-case (this topic is extremely subjective). Adding rules to it would slam the door shut and have the ease of acting on what has been established. If an editor really wants to edit here, then they won't mind what their username is (at least in these terms they shouldn't). If they gripe, we can kindly point them to policy. Or, we could just add it to the blacklist, stopping them before they start yammering on about rights. If there are multiple bars of "resistance" to wording, then we need to side with one of the lower bars, not one of the higher ones. I am not really against cursing in a reply, but having to see it over and over again in a username is more than I would want to see. Also, we can't use a prediction of activity to base our decisions upon something, since like you enjoy saying, we aren't clairvoyants. And your "Don't Feed the Troll" idea is rather bothersome. That is like not punishing your kid just because you know they will act out. Also, it implies that they are a troll (which is assuming bad faith). We could just say to them that their username is not appropriate for the site. Sites have rules all the time, and to be a member, you have to follow them. So asking them to abide by rules is no stretch of a task. –Elliot talk 21:36, 17 December 2009 (UTC)
I think a policy that insists we take it case-by-case is the best. Take a look at the latest example. It's not what I would consider an appropriate username, but they seem like a genuine user so far. I personally don't care about anyone's username. I suppose others are more likely to take offence, but I consider that their fault. That's why I don't really feel the need for a strong policy, but there are of course usernames that should be banned on sight. Like Timenn said, it's not the username itself, but the intention. Talk Wolok gro-Barok Contributions 22:22, 17 December 2009 (UTC)
It is beyond subjective to take it case-by-case. It could potentially spur wheel-wars or something worse. Having some vague idea of what should be done is typically what spurs the largest conflicts on the wiki. No one should have curse words in their username. Plain and simple. –Elliot talk 22:30, 17 December 2009 (UTC)
"Don't Feed The Troll" is a standard Internet way of dealing with this. You're making mountains out of... not even molehills; out of something that doesn't even exist. –rpeh•T•C•E• 22:47, 17 December 2009 (UTC)

/=> If I have a problem with people's usernames, then it is a problem. Don't undermine my opinion because you disagree. There is absolutely not reason someone should have "fuck", "bitch", "ass", or any other possibly offensive word. –Elliot talk 22:54, 17 December 2009 (UTC)

Evidently you have no problem using those words on a "Community Portal" while trying to protect the "Community". Neither do I see how mentioning an Internet phrase so common that not only does Wikipedia have an article on it, it also has redirects from 47 related phrases is undermining your opinion. –rpeh•T•C•E• 23:00, 17 December 2009 (UTC)
I'm rather bothered by the thought of becoming a "nanny" site. While it seems to you that this is a "plain and simple" topic, it gets complicated. What exactly is considered a curse word? As we've learned before, "crap", which is such a mild word in the US that it's common to hear small children utter it, is considered a fairly-obscene word in the UK. We're different than most websites in that we rely quite often on judgment calls from administrators, and it seems to work incredibly well. I don't see why we can't simply trust our admins to decide on a case-by-case basis what's appropriate or not. --GKTalk2me 23:09, 17 December 2009 (UTC)
I agree with GK there. So far we haven't had big issues with usernames, and usually the duty of an administrator covered it. --Timenn-<talk> 13:58, 18 December 2009 (UTC)


Uncategorized files

There were 24 files in the Special:UncategorizedImages list, so I added categories to all of them. I don't know anything about licensing though, so someone who knows more about it should double-check my choices. I probably wasn't very consistent. Some were proposed for deletion or were user images, here are the others:

Atlasbin.zip
Cookie.jpg
CharacterSheet.zip
Daggerfall Dungeon Layout.png
Dagrep.zip

  

Download.php?id=16683le.jpg
Fishystick.jpg
MWdevTeamBW.jpg
Oblivion Merchant Info.zip

  

Obliviontt.zip
Redguard-CatacombsTriangularButtons.gif
SI-mod-SplitInfinity-RandItem.png
SI-effects-tracker.png
SkillVsManaEfficiency.jpg

  

TR3-map-Kemel-Ze-v2.png
Thawbin.zip
Transparent.gif
Unshield-mac.zip
Vir2L_logo.jpg

Joram 04:06, 28 December 2009 (UTC)

Those are not the only uncategorized files. {{Esimage}} adds a category to the files it is used on, so those won't show up on Special:UncategorizedImages. All the map files are uncategorized for example. -- Nx / talk 22:32, 10 January 2010 (UTC)
Oops - I didn't see this when you first posted it.
I have a RoBoT task that scans the images and looks for ones without proper categories, because Nx is right - there are many more uncategorized files than that. It takes a long time to run though. I'll try to run it sometime soon, but there is a lot of change on images at the moment and I'd rather any list it came up with wasn't made obsolete almost overnight. –rpeh •T•C•E• 22:37, 10 January 2010 (UTC)
This is relevant because of this. I created two cats (Category:Oblivion-Map Images and Category:Shivering-Map Images), but didn't want to start categorizing images in case you can do it with a bot. -- Nx / talk 22:40, 10 January 2010 (UTC)


Wanted Categories

I went through Special:WantedCategories and created categories for most. There are 3 left.

  • Category:Oblivion-NPCs without Editor IDs comes from Template:NPC Editor ID. It may be removed according to the template's talk page so I didn't create it.
  • Category:User comes from User:SerCenKing/Sandbox 3. This will be removed if the page is moved to Stirk space so I didn't create it.
  • Category:Signature templates comes from User:Darth Storm/sig. A category makes sense if more users do this, or an admin can remove the category, or we can leave it wanted. Feedback?

Joram 05:11, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

I created the Signature templates category and added my own /sig page so scratched out that too. ? Joram?Talk 23:49, 10 January 2010 (UTC)


Trail Template

I just posted a new version of the Trail template (the links at the top left of every page). It's used all over the site so please tell me if any problems crop up and revert it if necessary. Joram 02:27, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

So far I haven't seen any problems. The template certainly seems to make things simpler. --Timenn-<talk> 15:55, 14 January 2010 (UTC)


userboxes

can someone tell me how to get on your page"this user is a breton" and "this user is knowlegable about oblivion and "this user is knowlegable about Knights of the nine — Unsigned comment by Thedrunknord (talk • contribs)

See UESPWiki:Userboxes and its subpages for a list od pre-defined userboxes. See UESPWiki:Userboxes#Rolling Your Own for information on how to create customized userboxes. If you see an userbox on an user page that you like to use, the best way to find out which userbox it is is to view the source of that user page (click the edit button or add &action=edit to the page's URL). --Michaeldsuarez (Talk) (Deeds) 01:49, 9 January 2010 (UTC)


Written by Anonymous

Currently, we have a large number of books that are apparently written by someone called Anonymous.

To me, it makes more sense that these "authors" are removed, which would cause all affected books to display nothing for their authors. With the removal of /author subpages, this is pretty easy to do with a bot - or even by going through one at a time. Since this is changing content rather than simply re-organising it, it's necessary to consult the community first. So, community, what dost thou think? –rpeh •T•C•E• 22:06, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

Makes sense to me; however, I think we should probably keep it for the few that actually say "Anonymous", like Ahzirr Traajijazeri. --GKtalk2me 05:12, 12 January 2010 (UTC)
Good point. Assuming this goes ahead, I'll have the bot exclude those cases. –rpeh •T•C•E• 14:43, 12 January 2010 (UTC)
Yup, agreed (both with the proposal and GK's suggestion)! Still waiting for community to say something though. ;) --Timenn-<talk> 11:51, 14 January 2010 (UTC)
Just to make it clear to me, the books rpeh linked to are books which have no author in the game itself and are therefore books we labeled as written by anonymous? And the book GK linked to is a book which has as author "anonymous" in the game? If that's the case I agree with the proposal and GK's suggestion. Talk Wolok gro-Barok Contributions 18:22, 14 January 2010 (UTC)
Wolok: yep. --GKtalk2me 18:43, 14 January 2010 (UTC)
Okay, it's been a week so I ran it. If a book says "Anonymous" as an author now, I'm 99% sure it's because it says that in the game. In case you're interested, the only one in my original list that is supposed to say Anonymous is Trap. rpeh •T•C•E• 18:44, 16 January 2010 (UTC)


Gameinfo Template

Recently, I made a change to the front pages for most of the games, combining the tables and images, and Joram followed up with a new {{Gameinfo}} template. Elliot reverted all of these changes. Compare the current versions listed below along with the revisions beside them that show the pages using the new template:

Personally, I feel that it looks much better to get that little table out of the middle of the page and on the side, under the main box art. Any thoughts from anyone else? --GKtalk2me 03:45, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

I like it both ways. The template gives consistency to all the games which is a bonus. If a small table is preferred the same template can be used by removing the box art. ? Joram?Talk 04:16, 12 January 2010 (UTC)
I think the new layout - with the template - is much better than the old version. I've never liked having a table stuck in the middle of the page but putting it beneath the first box picture works really well. Update: I'd make the box a bit wider though. Not too much, but I get quite a bit of wrap going on with some of the games. –rpeh •T•C•E• 09:35, 12 January 2010 (UTC)
I like it too. There is definitely better layout to be won from using the template and it looks so much better with the infobox placed under the cover. --Krusty 11:51, 12 January 2010 (UTC)
I liked the initiative shown and I prefer the new layout. It reminds me of the usual informative sidebars of Wikipedia, which look better unorganized than the loose table and images. All I would suggest is to increase the top and bottom margins of the table a bit, to make it better distinguishable from the cover images. --Timenn-<talk> 12:08, 14 January 2010 (UTC)
Like this? [Removed by author]
I tried it as a single table but couldn't get the cells above and below the middle table to be transparent and borderless. ? Joram?Talk 19:33, 14 January 2010 (UTC)


\=> You don't need a table if you just want to align a couple of elements. See here for my example on how it would appear with the extra margin. It seems that the thumbnails already require some margin themselves. --Timenn-<talk> 12:48, 15 January 2010 (UTC)

Even simpler and it gets back to the thumbnails used in the original design. I was getting a tad table-happy. ? Joram?Talk 20:00, 15 January 2010 (UTC)
Tomorrow will be a week since the proposal, so can I request one of you update the template so it can be used? Thanks! --GKtalk2me 02:09, 18 January 2010 (UTC)
I'm on it. ? Joram?Talk 03:56, 18 January 2010 (UTC)
Got distracted but it's done now with a minor improvement. ? Joram?Talk 04:54, 18 January 2010 (UTC)


A couple of questions

Is it okay if I upload a picture of my character to my user page, even if I'm using third-party mods for PC for my armor? Also, I tried joining IRC (#UESPWiki), but it said I was banned from it. Why is this? I've never even been to it before, unless temporarily joining for a second, with nobody else I could see on, and not saying anything is ban-worthy.
-- Renas (Talk • -- Contribs) 23:30, 13 January 2010 (UTC) --

continued at User talk:Renas --GKtalk2me 00:00, 14 January 2010 (UTC)


Category Changes

For all the template designers, I noticed a few problems with the Template categories and have made some small changes. Some templates that were in :Category:Sub-Templates I moved to Category:Template Subpages, what was left were all metatemplates so I created a new category for them and proposed the old one for deletion. – Joram↝Talk 20:32, 18 January 2010 (UTC)


Hidden Categories

One feature that the MediaWiki added is "Hidden Categories".

I'm sure most people reading this will be familiar with the Category system that we use. It has its problems because of the organic way in which the site has grown, but basically it works well. With the later releases of MediaWiki, there is a __HIDDENCAT__ magic word that can be used to hide meta-information from users (unless they really want to see it). This page gives you the basic information, and this page from Wikipedia shows you how much the facility is used over there. The effect of adding this word to a category is that users only see it if they have ticked the "Show hidden categories" option in their preferences.

The key here is, in WP's words, "the categories that should appear here are the maintenance categories, that is, categories reflecting the present status of the encyclopedia article, rather than classifying the article subject." I propose that we use the same kind of template WP does to hide the same kind of categories for the same reasons. Every category in Needs Maintenance (and sub-cats) would get it, and project-related categories like the ones for the OBNPCRP would also have the magic word added. The effect would be to hide admin- and project-related information from the 95% of users who don't care about it.

My reason for suggesting this is that some pages have lots and lots of admin-related categories. This is mainly my fault for wanting the OBNPCRP to be as granular as possible, but even without that, there are stub pages also marked as incomplete and requiring verification. The profusion of categories hides - or at least - camouflages potentially useful information. If anybody is genuinely interested, they can always show the hidden categories by ticking a box in their preferences.

Does anybody have any objections or suggestions? rpeh •T•C•E• 21:38, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

Sounds like a great idea! ? Joram?Talk 22:21, 20 January 2010 (UTC)
I used to be neutral about this, but lately I've been convinced this will be a good idea. The OBNPCRP categories spring to mind as excellent examples on why it may be useful to hide the meta categories. The option that you can choose yourself whether you wish to see the hidden categories is what convinces me this won't be a bother for the editors actually needing those categories. --Timenn-<talk> 14:31, 21 January 2010 (UTC)
Sounds good to me. The category box (especially on NPC pages) is overwhelming and it is a great idea to hide them - with the option to make them visible if necessary. --Krusty 17:02, 21 January 2010 (UTC)
It's all been said, and it makes sense to me. Any editor interested enough in those types of categories can just tick the box in preferences. --GKtalk2me 19:13, 21 January 2010 (UTC)
Okay, for the moment I've added it (via new template {{Hiddencat}}) to the OBNPCRP categories so people can see how it works. For the rest, I'll wait a week from my original post. rpeh •T•C•E• 20:38, 23 January 2010 (UTC)
All done. There were rather more of those than I realised... rpeh •T•C•E• 13:02, 3 February 2010 (UTC)

Maybe it's just me, but the text is shoved up to the very top of the box (the hiddencat template). Anyone know why? --GKtalk2me 22:11, 23 January 2010 (UTC)

It was a Firefox issue. Chrome, Opera, and IE all vertically centered the text, Firefox didn't. Should be fixed now. ? Joram?Talk 23:48, 23 January 2010 (UTC)


What UESPWiki is not

I'd like to propose the adoption of a new a policy page: What UESPWiki is not. I've made a draft in my sandbox. Please feel free to edit the page for writing style, better explanations and simple spelling errors. If you wish to change the actual points it tries to make, it's best to discuss them here first.

Part of the points suggested on this page are already applied by several editors, this mostly concerns the reversal of "forum-like" posts to articles. Since Wikipedia has an "is not" article, I felt we could use our own. Please let me know what you think of it.

I'm not trying to restrict the casual talk between editors here, it should be clear that off-topic talk is acceptable from time to time, but this should set the guidelines in print. --Timenn-<talk> 14:45, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

Looks good to me. There are a few text tweaks I'd make, but it's probably a better idea to get any debate about content settled first. The one point I'd make is that there needs to be some way that Fanfiction can fit in. The way the proposal is written at the moment would seem to forbid fanfiction, which would mean we'd need to delete all of the current stories. I'm not necessarily against that, but I know others would like to keep it. Either an exception for fanfics needs to be added to the policy or we have to consider what to do with it (maybe the TES Fanon wiki would be a good destination?) rpeh •T•C•E• 16:33, 21 January 2010 (UTC)
Yes, fan fiction should be OK of course. At some point I thought about making that clear in the text, but it seems I forgot to place it there when I was actually writing the thing. A statement about that should still be added. One could be argue that fan fiction doesn't belong on this wiki, but I don't have any problem with it. --Timenn-<talk> 23:48, 21 January 2010 (UTC)
To tell you the truth, I hate the whole thing. I'm not saying the ideas behind the policy aren't good, I'm saying that most of the points in the article are either common sense or, in my opinion, bad.
  1. I have little problem with.
  2. This is common sense. How many authors have tried to write personal Walkthroughs outside of userspace?
  3. Actually... [[Tes4Mod:Mod_Ideas]]. I'd also have zero problems with someone making a list of things they want in their personal user space.
  4. Once again common sense.
  5. Frankly, this last one befuddles me. It seems like we're trying to limit personal expression on the UESP. I think it is quite clear that we're not facebook already. This one just sounds really draconian, and personally, it goes against how I view our goal here at the UESP. Our main goal has always been to document the Elder Scrolls series, but I believe that building a community of fans is a major goal. I think that people who make personal connections to other editors are more likely to continue to help the wiki. I mean, is there a huge problem with prostitutes joining our wiki and offering 'companionship'?
Just because Wikipedia has a What Wikipedia is not page doesn't mean we need one.--Ratwar 22:13, 23 January 2010 (UTC)
No.s 1-4 seem like things that are covered already, whether it be in Getting Started article or one of the articles linked to from there. I wouldn't be opposed to clarifying some of these points on an appropriate article, but I don't see the necessity of a new article, and I think it could introduce some redundancy and confusion. In regards to the fifth point, I see no harm in users "networking" with others interested in TES games. I suppose, however, that that point might need more discussion. --GKtalk2me 00:30, 24 January 2010 (UTC)
Lots of users have created personal walkthroughs outside of userspace. Another example just got created: here.
And if people want facebook, they know where to find it. I have no idea what point you're trying to make with your "prostitutes" argument but this isn't the place to tell people about all aspects of your life. I have certain views on religion but I don't want to cause arguments on this site by talking about them here: go to a different wiki or a proper social network to do that. rpeh •T•C•E• 11:57, 24 January 2010 (UTC)
Another good example. Please can you explain how User:ModderElGrande/Games/Dontgetrickrolled|this fits in with UESP's goal of documenting the Elder Scrolls? rpeh •T•C•E• 14:36, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

To quickly clarify my position on the last point: though networking with others who're interested in TES seems - to me - to be acceptable, using our space to talk about things that never have and never will benefit the wiki don't belong here. I just don't want it to sound like we're saying, "If you're here, work! Don't chat and have fun with people!" --GKtalk2me 15:40, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

That's a personal walkthrough? Looks more like a page created because a user wasn't familiar with the wiki and couldn't find the proper page, so he created his own, and it was promptly marked for deletion. If that's what you call a personal walkthrough, it would appear that you've made it illegal to make new pages. To me a 'personal walkthrough' would be an attempt to diverge pages, and have something like GameFAQs where they have many walkthroughs that are essentially the same. Of course, I would also like to note that since the page is already being deleted for being redundant, I see no reason to create policy on it, which will never be read by the vast majority of new users, who will continue to make pages such as that. To sum it up, we already have a policy for it, and creating another policy won't help the situation.
I'm certainly not condoning people getting to a discussion/argument about religion because I know from experience that those never end well. Still, I think it is stupid to outlaw people from expressing that they follow a certain religion. My prostitute example was based on your statement about the UESP not being a dating site. I was merely sarcastically exploring the accusation of the UESP being a dating site, since I know of only one pair of editors that dated on the UESP, I had to assume that there were prostitutes running around. I think it is quite clear that we aren't a dating site or social network.
As for ModderElGrande's page, it really isn't helping us document the Elder Scrolls. Unless of course ModderElGrande gets pissed and leaves. Then we've lost an editor, and that is no good. Personally, I can't see how that page hurts the wiki. We're not hurting so much for server space that a page like that is going to degrade performance, and I highly doubt that the 16 times that page has been accessed is draining our bandwidth resources. --Ratwar 18:04, 24 January 2010 (UTC)
Ratwar's clumsy sarcasm aside, it should be obvious to every editor that actually spends time looking at the site that more users are doing nothing but creating a user page and taking several edits to do it. Last night's example was Doogle423?, who would have us believe that he honestly follows the teachings of the nine divines. Do a recent changes on the User namespace to find more because my time is better spent improving the site than finding examples of just how wrong Ratwar is. Other users create accounts and add yet more ways to kill Umbra, join the Dark Brotherhood, feed as a vampire, etc, etc. All these seem to have passed him by. None of this improves the site and it takes time for patrollers and admins (ones who bother, I mean) to deal with such edits.
How he goes from two people (who actually got together on IRC, FYI) dating to assuming that prostitutes are present on UESP is something probably best left unexplored unless somebody wants to document psychosis in forum administrators. Incidentally, there are at least two other "couples" on this site, but again I suppose you have to bother editing and reading the site to spot that, something that some editors would be advised to spend more time doing before bestowing their opinions upon the site like a fruitbat expelling the results of a day's digestion. rpeh •T•C•E• 05:22, 25 January 2010 (UTC)
I have to agree with Ratwar on this one. There is absolutely nothing wrong with people expanding their user pages or having large user pages. It becomes a social networking site once members who greatly expand their page edit nothing else. Obviously we should avoid that. But to just sit here and tell someone what they can't have on their page is ridiculous. If you don't like it, ignore it. If you don't want to patrol it, then don't. Do I think subpages should be geared towards the wiki? Yes. So deleting ModderElGrande's page wouldn't be much of a problem. But at the same time, it isn't killing anyone. A simple move to his userpage would be enough to satiate the outlandish wants of some.
There is nothing wrong with userpages, from Uniblab's to VergilSparda's, but rather, it is what they do on the wiki. VergilSparda has been asked not to use the wiki as his medium for sometime now, ignoring everyone's requests. That is one case where I think we could hammer down. But Uniblab's page, despite being non-related to the wiki, hasn't been changed in some time. Stupid insults aside, there has never really been a massive problem with "social networking" on the wiki, so this seems as if we are trying to dissect something with a machete. –Elliot talk 07:39, 25 January 2010 (UTC)
It seems some form of clause needs to be added concerning the userpages. I don't think it's anyone intention that we must limit what users should be able to put on their userpage. I hated bringing up examples for these kind of issues I was trying to address, as it may give the related editors the idea they are doing something wrong. It seems that not bringing up examples didn't really work either, so I will try to name a few. I must emphasize that these can only show a handful from the numerous times they occur. First let me state that I do not think I'm repeating policy already stated elsewhere (could you link me to it, otherwise?), nor do I believe I'm inventing it on the spot. It's a summary of what I found more editors than just me practicing when checking the edits made on this site. I feel we need to support these editors with a page that contains this kind of embodiment.
  1. So far I haven't seen objections to this. If you look at these two examples, you can see they are only the latest of daily additions to a talk page. A great deal of edits are made to talk pages, and I notice a good deal is left untended (unpatrolled), so a clause for all editors to be able to remove the irrelevant comments can help keep the talk pages from being less chaotic, and useful for people looking to improve an article.
  2. When I'm referring to personal walkthroughs, I'm not just referring to the various redundant articles that pop up, but also similar talk page posts. I admit this is an old example, but posts like that are still found today. Here is a more recent one. I noticed that such comments pop up frequently, and I at least am not sure what to do with them. Revert? Deleting talk page comments is not something that is encouraged. Let it stay? Such comments are hardly helpful to other editors. Like I wrote on the policy page, no one is going to want to work their way through to dissect what fits the article. The comments may be helpful for a rare reader, but we come at the personal walkthrough issue again. If we all started to give our ideas on a how quest is best solved, we would clutter the sites with them personal walkthroughs. I believe this section can help people understand that we are not looking for such a thing here, and perhaps it will help the editors who check the edits made to this site.
  3. Ratwar actually names a series of articles that can perhaps be considered to be the worst of this site. Tes4Mod:Mod Ideas is filled with silly ideas and people commenting upon them. It's true there are actually nice ideas found there, and some modders have admitted checking those articles for ideas. One can consider it to be helpful articles that just need a drastic cleanup. The articles provide information helpful to some readers, so we can't delete them that easily. But when TES V comes out, I will oppose a similar set of articles being made for that game.
    A similar set of articles was recently deleted, Oblivion:Gripes, and I think those articles were a fine example of what we do not want to document on this site. My intention behind this guideline was not to limit what people can place at their userspace, but what kind of articles need to be created for the games.
  4. So far I've seen few people commenting on this. Ratwar says this is common sense, but I think editors deserve some kind of written guideline that can support them when conflicts arise about this. The main point I'm trying to address here is the numerous "bug reports" that are added, without fact checking, to articles. "Sometimes" is a word you'll find a lot of these reports start with. A telltale sign that the author didn't test, and the report probably needs additional checking by other editors.
  5. It's interesting that this point creates the most controversy. Those alert enough would have noticed I copied this almost straight from Wikipedia, and only tweaked it somewhat to fit UESPWiki. Common practice is to fall back to Wikipedia policy when our policies don't cover the issue. You may notice I've removed the section about uploading files for personal use, as a couple of editors are guilty of this, myself included. I don't have a problem with people uploading files to decorate their userspace, as we have enough diskspace for the moment. Most of the times the files are Elder Scrolls related, so they kind of belong here anyway.
    I think it's best to give an example of how decorating your userspace can go too far, instead of stirring up editors who feel worried that their userpage is in danger of being too detailed. My intention is not to enforce a stricter rule concerning userspace, but rather to have some form of boundary for the (very) rare exceptions. I think rpeh, as well as me, has been reminded about one particular user, Oscararon. This user started creating seperate articles (in userspace) for all his player characters, as well as uploading related images. He started signing talk page post under the names of his player characters, and was only involved in edits that were related to the appearance of his userpage (e.g. the User Rank userboxes). This brought rpeh to the point of contacting him about it.
Now to steer the discussion away from somewhat of only addressing the fifth point; I agree with GK latest saying on it, but I believe that settling the other issues is more important, as they seem to happen more frequently. --Timenn-<talk> 15:09, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

Number four:

Original research is, as succinctly as possible, a theory that cannot be proven, that is opposed to the current prevailing consensus of experts, and that is not notable enough to be a Flat Earth Theory. An example in UESP would be text stating that say, because players objected to there being no levitation in Oblivion, Bethesda would be forced to bring it back in a future game. We do not want original research.

What I believe you mean to say is, we are not only happy to include, but forced to include, evidence from Primary Sources. It still has to be factual, and if we could, we might ask that it be documented somehow, but we just cannot, really. It is still assumed to be factual, not a confabulation or a theory, and is as thoroughly confirmed by a consensus of editors as possible.

It is tempting to believe that the fresh air of player participation that leads to anecdotal evidence becoming UESP's main source of information also breaks through one of WP's ossified and yet often subverted rules, but it does not. Mainly because they never got around to making a No Primary Sources rule; that would have endangered sources like the minutes of government committees and the text of laws and the Bible. If you prefer, UESP and WP definitely differ on the use of primary sources. Anarchangel 17:25, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

Although the use of primary sources may not cause problems within the gaming namespaces, it would cause problems within the "Lore" namespace. Due to the lack of secondary sources authored by "experts", the interpretation of the primary source (the games) is left to non-experts (the players). Due to misinterpretation and differing interpretations of the games, speculation, fan theories, and rumors arise. This is apparent amongst the "Lore community". A lot of original research comes from the "Lore community" and they use a lot of odd sources to justify their changes in that namespace. For example, Lore:Dwemer uses fan-created research as a source. In fact, all the text located here are fan-created. Aren't these original research? How would the "What UESP is not" guidelines affect the "Lore" namespace? --Michaeldsuarez (Talk) (Deeds) 18:09, 26 January 2010 (UTC)
Excellent point, Michaeldsuarez, and I do not have an answer to that one. In fact, because of that point I retract the unequivocal nature of my statement, "We do not want original research", and change it to, "We prefer non-original research", perhaps even in the case of non-Lore material. Lore is also an exceptional area, and may require different or additional rules. I suggest, however, that both overt permissions and overt restrictions are kept to a minimum; asking for original research in a policy is still unwise in my opinion, where allowing it in practice is fine. What rules can be devised that explain exactly what UESP is and is not, should be kept, but if they miss the mark, they won't be missed. Anarchangel 04:30, 27 January 2010 (UTC)
Links, as requested:
  1. UESPWiki:Namespaces#Talk Namespaces
  2. Same, but could possibly be better explained. I wouldn't mind a clause somewhere saying, "Just because you can't post "How I Did This" on the article doesn't mean you can on the talk article. That's not discussion. "
  3. I honestly can't find anything on this. I thought we had it covered somewhere. I agree completely with point #3 in the proposed article.
  4. UESPWiki:Style Guide#Accurate and Verifiable
  5. I can't find anything at all restricting what's done on user pages, so on second thought it might be worth it to mention somewhere.
In summary, #s 1, 2, and 4 are already covered (or could be expanded upon) on the pages I linked to. #3 could go well in the Style Guide, too. #5 should be explained somehow, just a little something, but once again it might fit better at another article; perhaps a "user page" section in the Style Guide? --GKtalk2me 00:20, 27 January 2010 (UTC)
Also, I've edited Lore:DunmerLore:Dwemer. We should not be using fan-fiction as sources for lore articles. --GKtalk2me 05:02, 27 January 2010 (UTC)
Thanks, but I think that you meant to say Lore:Dwemer, not Lore:Dunmer. --Michaeldsuarez (Talk) (Deeds) 12:39, 27 January 2010 (UTC)
Yep. --GKtalk2me 17:40, 27 January 2010 (UTC)
Oops - I didn't realize that was fanfiction when I added it as a ref. I assure you it was not intentional. As for the page, it seems like a reasonable way to stop the more predictable types of poor edits, but these edits don't happen very often anyway - and the last point seems rather strange as Nephele, who I'm sure we would all agree is one of the most constructive editors, has extensive profiles of her Oblivion characters on her user page. Of course I can't speak for her, but in terms of setting an example for new editors, it doesn't look good. Personally, I think user pages are for whatever the user wants them to be, as long as it doesn't negatively affect the rest of the site in any way. People do take it too far, and I have to agree with what rpeh said earlier about these somewhat pointless additions. Wikipedia has a page like this because people frequently misunderstand what kind of edits the site accepts as constructive. I'm not sure, but I don't think we have this problem nearly as much. -Itachi 17:56, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

\=> Itachi, I'm not trying to restrict freedom on what a user is allowed to have in his/her userspace. It's nice to get to know the editors you're working with a bit. I feel that no regular editor should ever fear that his/her freedom of profile should be restricted. What I am trying to prevent is people visiting the site for the sole purpose of creating an extensive blog and character details without ever seriously contributing to the site.

GK, I understand your stance on point 4, the section you linked to describes it adequately. I think you convinced me that section can better be expanded with the few things that are not there yet.
For point 1 I do no think that the given section provides a real boundary. Talk pages are intended to be open forums, where all editors can contribute their opinion about the content or style of the site. - this is the only phrase that deals with what goes on a talk page, but I find it rather ambiguous. It doesn't say anything about what does not have a place on a talk page and feels more like an introduction sentence than a real clause. The content of an article vs. the subject it describes is an abstract concept that not everyone perfectly understands, as we can see every day.
The same reasoning can be applied for point 2, I don't think the given section covers that at all.

As for the integrity of the article. I don't mind it being split up if people feel the various points belong on different places. I thought of these points when spending time patrolling edits, and figured they all have in common that they precisely describe what content should not go on this wiki. That reminded me of the similar article on Wikipedia, and I believed that concept would fit the points I tried to make the best. It didn't happen vice versa (concept first, then content). --Timenn-<talk> 09:53, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

Perhaps the people arguing against Timenn's (revised) suggestion would care to look at the recent changes in Userspace for the last couple of days? Three users in particular stand out. Again, I ask how these edits benefit the site?
Nobody minds a few lines about your player character, but when that's all you do, you are mis-using this wiki. rpeh •T•C•E• 01:51, 1 February 2010 (UTC)


Permanently Salted

Just a little note: I've permanently protected Oblivion_talk:Journal from creation by new or unregistered users. It's been created multiple times by IPs, consisting only of nonsense or spam every time, since August of '09. I'm assuming it's being targeted because of the "Journal" in the title. Since it's permanent, I thought I'd bring it up here. If anyone disagrees, please let me know. --GKtalk2me 23:52, 22 January 2010 (UTC)


Kaspersky Virus Report Re: GoogleAds

Please look into this.

1/25/2010 1:44:23 AM http://pagead2.googlesyndication.com/pagead/show_ads.js Internet Explorer Processing error: Trojan.JS.Redirector.ar 98.212.219.148 06:49, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Google Ads. Not something supported by UESP, I'd think. And it's not really a major hit. Only shows that the links in the Google Ads are hitting a redirect, rather than a direct link. I'd call it a non-issue. Torinir 07:19, 25 January 2010 (UTC)


Links in Descriptions

To introduce this topic, let me paste in the soon-to-be-deleted conversation from Oblivion talk:Fort Carmala/Description

(show the old conversation)
:I added links to this description, but then I saw that the links had been removed last year. It has been done for several place descriptions. Should they be linked or not? --Mankar Camoran 10:54, 18 October 2007 (EDT)
That's true of most of them. Look at Oblivion:Places and check out the histories for descriptions with links. You'll (normally) find that the links were originally there, then got taken off (usually by Nephele), then got put back again (usually by Giamgiam). Whilst you're on the Places page, try to imagine what it would look like if every city and every inhabitant type was linked. I imagine you're picturing the same sea of blue as me. Links in the Description pages work well on their parent page (by which I mean, say, Oblivion:Bleak Flats Cave is Oblivion:Bleak Flats Cave/Description's parent) but look awful on compilation pages like Places or the road pages. I'd leave off the links myself. There will always be the map link, and people can use that to link to the nearest city instead. --Rpeh•T•C•E• 11:09, 18 October 2007 (EDT)
I agree with you. I actually saw the Venerable Vintage page and thought of adding links to those places' descriptions by seeing the parent page. But they don't look good when compiled. A link may not be necessary as well for the reason you have given. I will remove links to the 2 descriptions that I added for the sake of consistency. --Mankar Camoran 11:28, 18 October 2007 (EDT)
Yep, rpeh hit the nail on the head ;) Although on individual place pages the links are useful, on Oblivion:Places it was overkill. I started by creating all of the description pages with links. Too bad histories don't work for something like this (since you can't pull up a page that transcludes old versions of 200 other pages), because at one point the sea of blue rpeh envisions really did exist! Seeing that, I then went back through and deleted them all.
Unfortunately, it's not the only example where description pages have problems. There are other cases where it would ideally be nice to have slight differences between the descriptions shown in different places. Maybe someday there'll be time to figure out some better solutions ;) --NepheleTalk 12:46, 18 October 2007 (EDT)
Thanks for the info, Nephele :). Another thing I noticed on Oblivion:Places is, a few descriptions in between have links, but most of them don't. Wouldn't it be better if those links are removed because it looks a bit odd to have a few links in between? I suppose they should all be linked or none should be linked. I can remove them if necessary. I am saying this just for the sake of consistency. Any thoughts on this? --Mankar Camoran 15:52, 18 October 2007 (EDT)
Yep, I agree it would be good to have them all be consistent. When I finished my edits with them (a year and a half ago...), they were consistent ;) Since then links on various pages have been reinstated, and without any type of community discussion (like this) about which format would be preferred, it didn't seem worth the effort of uniformly imposing one format or the other. (Actually, for the record, there was one very brief discussion at Oblivion talk:Places#Redundant Links). If everyone is in agreement that no-links is the preferred approach, then I'd say that should be done on all the place description pages. --NepheleTalk 16:43, 18 October 2007 (EDT)
I'd be happy with the No Links option. It's definitely better to be consistent where possible. --Rpeh•T•C•E• 16:55, 18 October 2007 (EDT)
Alright then. I'll start removing them since both of you agree. Thanks. --Mankar Camoran 09:45, 19 October 2007 (EDT)

This conversation is now moot thanks to Nephele's template changes. Basically, we can now define a variable called "trimlinks" on any place page that is getting overwhelmed with links and they will no longer appear. I've already done this on pages like Oblivion:Ayleid Ruins and Oblivion:Forts. See this edit for an example of how simple it is to do. This only works with pages that use the {{Place Link}} template, but there's no reason why the same principle can't be used elsewhere if necessary.

In summary: if people want to start adding links to descriptions, they can go ahead! rpeh •T•C•E• 20:14, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Yup! Since the only issue with the links has now been addressed, nothing should stop people from adding links now. --Timenn-<talk> 15:11, 26 January 2010 (UTC)
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