User talk:Chieftain Alex/Archive 10

Page not loading properly

Seems like this page doesn't load properly: Special:ActiveUsers is being cached slowly and only shows 1 person, sometimes 12 persons and sometimes just 3 persons. Seems too random and broken. Do you know why? and can be fixed? - Saelyth / Aens Windstorm Talk 12:59, 13 July 2015 (UTC)

Hi, I've no idea why that special page isn't working properly. I'm just a volunteer user so I don't have access to back end server stuff to take a look. Maybe this should be brought up at GW2W:BUGs instead? -Chieftain Alex

15:16, 18 July 2015 (UTC)

feedback preload

If you're going to use JS, it might be better to leave the edit box blank on initial load, then put a hook on the submit button to append the signature. —Dr Ishmael 15:44, 24 July 2015 (UTC)

Hmm I wouldn't know how to do that (yet). Plus if they've previewed the page then the url will be missing any sign that it was feedback in the first place.

The main point of sticking any text in the editing box was so that users would see something they could edit + change it. If I present them with a blank box, I dunno if they would be less or more likely to leave feedback. I'm open to better solutions to highlighting bits in the edit box though. -Chieftain Alex

15:52, 24 July 2015 (UTC)

Hide the preview button? Just tell them "Type your feedback in the box, then click Save." Dunno. —Dr Ishmael

15:57, 24 July 2015 (UTC)

Skill infobox

Greener and I have questions regarding the skill infobox template; details and links are on your gww page. --Falconeye 01:08, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

Weapons infobox carrying skin chat link

I know that some weapons never linked properly when their item link was placed into the chat box, specifically some of the Black Lion items, but has this now affected other weapons?

If item links are out the window, then I think we may be able to make things easier on ourselves by mirroring the API even closer. What if we were to only put the Skin ID # into the item infobox (rather than its skin name), and have the wiki look up which skin it is (provide the skin name and chat link)? This is relying on us having an up-to-date skin list from the API, but updating the weapons and armours could then be done by a bot.

There would be outliers, like pages which hold multiple item IDs, but those can be done manually once a list of them is gathered. G R E E N E R 16:43, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

Afaik no item chat links produced by the game + written as IDs in the wiki actually work ingame anymore, for example I've tried Twilight + Beacon of Light and both show up blank.

If we want the trading post + external links to work then we must use the item ID - the skin ID won't work for those.

I have made the lightest possible change to the infobox so that pages with the skin parameter will work, and pages without will be untouched. -Chieftain Alex

16:50, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

Oh right, I overlooked your edit in the middle of my submission... I guess we could use the skin id. Less intuitive to editors perhaps. -Chieftain Alex

17:02, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

If adding skin names is slowing users down then you could potentially use something like [[User:Chieftain Alex/Templates/skin id to name]]... which would be used like

{{subst:User:Chieftain Alex/Templates/skin id to name|150}}

-Chieftain Alex

17:07, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

Thanks for that template! I'll see if I can use that alongside smiley's webpage when I'm updating some of the items. Knowing that I can actually do something with the skin ID number rather than passing it by is a nice addition. G R E E N E R 17:25, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

Just noticed that the template produces the name twice, deliminated with a comma. G R E E N E R 00:01, 31 July 2015 (UTC)

An example id producing two skin names please? The few ids I tried worked ok... -86.154.232.105 00:41, 31 July 2015 (UTC)

Kodan Axe, Kodan Axe from {{subst:User:Chieftain Alex/Templates/skin id to name|4447}} G R E E N E R 01:29, 31 July 2015 (UTC)

Fixed. -Chieftain Alex

12:21, 31 July 2015 (UTC)

Seems like it's only a small subset of equipment. I checked some generic loot (Soft Wood Longbow (loot)) as well as other weapons from the Exotic Hunter collection (Guild Defender, Cobalt, and Poyaqui's Noggin) and they all work fine. I'd recommend reverting the template changes, since it seems that most equipment is unaffected. And it just seems more confusing than not to give skin links in item infoboxes. —Dr Ishmael

03:07, 31 July 2015 (UTC)

Hmm. Perhaps I should have checked a few more pages then. I still don't like that, of all the chat links not to work, the legendary item preview codes are borked. Would you feel it to be equally misleading if I were to add the skin link to the item infobox separately to the item link? -Chieftain Alex

12:10, 31 July 2015 (UTC)

How about something like User:Chieftain Alex/sandbox4? -Chieftain Alex

12:21, 31 July 2015 (UTC)

That looks fine and could actually be useful. Just move the skin link below the item link. —Dr Ishmael

13:09, 31 July 2015 (UTC)

Article talk page content

Yeah I know what your saying. I don't want to break rules or appear to be a vandal myself, I guess I'm just very into having the wiki be on topic. And even if talk pages stray off topic, I really personally object to talk pages being a gathering place for whining or a supposed forum that will actually achieve something. Having said that, is there something we can do regarding trash like that? Is it possible to archive it out of sight or to move it to the users own talk pages? I'm not an accomplished wiki editor, and I don't really know a lot of tricks. (or some of the rules for that matter ._.) Puk (talk) 01:45, 2 August 2015 (UTC)

We moderate talk pages as little as possible. Off-topic discussion is rarely disruptive, tends to be brief, and allows people to feel comfortable in using talk pages to communicate. As long as it's not harming anyone (disrupt actual discussion or attack people), we can leave it there. Rather than hiding it, what you should do is make an appropriate reply so anyone reading understands talk pages are not forums and bring the discussion back to the article.--Relyk ~ talk < 04:20, 2 August 2015 (UTC)

So a sort of educational slap on the wrist so to speak? If that. (not being facetious) Puk (talk) 07:53, 2 August 2015 (UTC)

If it's just complaining, then a simple "This is not a forum for your issues about the game; if you want your criticism to be seen, post it on the official forums" is enough. —Ventriloquist 10:04, 2 August 2015 (UTC)

If this were facebook, I would "like" your guys comments. Thanks for feedback, won't make the hasty edits again. :) Puk (talk) 04:01, 3 August 2015 (UTC)

Leftover facts

I'll just bug you since you are currently active. So, when I redirected Acolyte Shoes, Acolyte Shoulders and Acolyte Cowl it basically left all their facts intact, so that e.g. Template:Skin list still links to them. Do those get wiped at a certain time or is this a bug? Tyndel (talk) 18:40, 2 August 2015 (UTC)

Looks fine to me, have you tried the good ol' refresh? —Ventriloquist 19:14, 2 August 2015 (UTC)

I sort of fixed Acolyte Shoes by leaving the skin link out before redirecting, however Apprentice Shoulders (skin) still has Acolyte Shoulders in the list (for me). Seems you need to blank the page before redirecting? Tyndel (talk) 19:18, 2 August 2015 (UTC)

Oh I noticed this earlier! (I have redirects displayed as bright pink). After a quick test it appears that the properties linger after covering the page with a redirect. Either blank the page, then separately add the redirect... or delete the page entirely. I don't think those are linked from anywhere anyway. -Chieftain Alex

19:24, 2 August 2015 (UTC)

I'm getting flashbacks from the old blank-move-unblank thing we had to do for every moved article. —Ventriloquist 19:29, 2 August 2015 (UTC)

No, issues from redirects began way earlier than that :P--Relyk ~ talk < 18:22, 4 August 2015 (UTC)

PvP items autopopulating wikicode from API

I can't even get the API to respond in my browser for a regular link at the moment (let alone js), but I've been playing around with some code (untested)

/* PvP Armor Insert button
 *  Instructions: Enter an armor item ID into the textbox on a page (it should otherwise be blank). Press the new button on the toolbar. Now fix any obvious mistakes.
 */
(function addPvpArmorButton (document) {
   var editToolbar = document.getElementById('toolbar');
   if (editToolbar != undefined) {
     /* Make a button */
     var fetchItemAPIbutton = document.createElement('div');
     fetchItemAPIbutton.id = 'fetchItemAPIbutton';
     fetchItemAPIbutton.className = 'mw-toolbar-editbutton';
     fetchItemAPIbutton.innerHTML = '';
     fetchItemAPIbutton.style.backgroundImage = 'url("data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAABcAAAAWCAMAAAAcqPc3AAAAB3RJTUUH1QUSCAQ2GRI2fQAAAAlwSFlzAAAewgAAHsIBbtB1PgAAAARnQU1BAACxjwv8YQUAAABFUExURWt7kEhge0NZeP///3WIo4aYsZCjvZOmwAAAAJeqxJqtx56xy6O20Ki71a2/2LDD3bPG4LrN573P6MHU7sTY88nc9tfn/uHM7uoAAACZSURBVHjadZA5AsIwDATlBIh83/z/qawSFyaY8RaaKU37EqL9vUL96RvtvXf+BmX0PjN6a42xwWUNvdbKdUYMvZTC8k5wyAp6zpnzjBh6SomxwWUJPcbIcUYMPYTA8k5wyAK69579jBi6c46xwWUO3VrLdkYM3RjD8k5wyAy61pr1jBj6cRy3/0RBf61Af65Af6xQRGr7RdEHEWEVNe7pmpoAAAAASUVORK5CYII=")'
     fetchItemAPIbutton.onclick = function insertAPIDatafunction(window, document) {
        var ids = $('#wpTextbox1').val();
        if (ids !== '') {
           var queryURL = 'https://api.guildwars2.com/v1/item_details.json?wiki=1&item_id=' + ids;
           $.getJSON(queryURL).done(function (data) {
              /* Retrieve facts from JSON */
              var wikitextID = data.item_id;
              var wikitextTitle = data.name;
              var wikitextRarity = data.rarity;
              var wikitextType = data.armor.type;
              var wikitextClass = data.armor.weight_class;
              var wikitextSkinID = data.default_skin;
              var wikitextSet = wikitextTitle.match(/(.*) ([\w']+)/) [1];
              
              /* Subquery for skin name */
              var queryURL = 'https://api.guildwars2.com/v1/skin_details.json?wiki=1&skin_id=' + wikitextSkinID;
              $.getJSON(queryURL).done(function (data) {
                 var wikitextSkin = data.name;
                 console.log('Skin name = ' + wikitextSkin)
                 
                /* Produce something we can use */
                var wikicode = '{{Armor infobox' + '\n'
                             + '| icon = ' + wikitextTitle + '.png' + '\n'
                             + '| status = historical' + '\n'
                             + '| level = 80' + '\n'
                             + '| skin = ' + wikitextSkin + '\n'
                             + '| type = ' + wikitextType + '\n'
                             + '| rarity = ' + wikitextRarity + '\n'
                             + '| class = ' + wikitextClass + '\n'
                             + '| set = PvP ' + wikitextSet + ' armor' + '\n'
                             + '| bound = acquire' + '\n'
                             + '| id = ' + wikitextID + '\n'
                             + '}}' + '\n'
                             + '\n'
                             + '[[PvP ' + wikitextTitle + ']] was a [[PvP reward (historical)|PvP reward]] available from [[rank Reward Chest]]s, or crafted at the [[Mystic Forge]].' + '\n'
                             + '\n'
                             + '== Acquisition ==' + '\n'
                             + '===Contained in===' + '\n'
                             + '{{contained in}}' + '\n'
                             + '===PvP recipe===' + '\n'
                             + '{{PvP recipe' + '\n'
                             + '| mat-1 = ' + wikitextType + ' ' + wikitextClass + ' Token' + '\n'
                             + '| amt-1 = 1' + '\n'
                             + '| mat-2 = rank Token' + '\n'
                             + '| amt-2 = 1' + '\n'
                             + '| mat-3 = Arcane Crystal' + '\n'
                             + '| amt-3 = 1' + '\n'
                             + '| mat-4 = Arcane Powder' + '\n'
                             + '| amt-4 = 5' + '\n'
                             + '| rank = ?' + '\n'
                             + '}}';
                $('#wpTextbox1').val(wikicode);
              }); //end of skin json query
           }); //end of item json query
        }; //end of blank id if statement
     }; //end of onclick function
     document.getElementById('toolbar').appendChild(fetchItemAPIbutton);
   }; //end of toolbar undefined if statement
})(document);

Stuff still to do: link it to a button press on the toolbar. Test it >.< -Chieftain Alex 17:00, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

just needs fixing now. -Chieftain Alex

17:58, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

Can you dumb the function of this for me? I no understand. —Ventriloquist 19:49, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

Push button.
*AUTOMAGIC SPARKLES*
PvP item page is created.

—Dr Ishmael

20:21, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

Go to a pvp armor page. Enter the item id into the editing box. Press new button... Content replaced with api data into armor infobox. Needs some tweaks but almost good to use. -86.131.76.243 22:07, 5 August 2015 (UTC)

Meh I can't fix it to query for the skin name + insert the result on the page. I suspect it queries for the skin ok (I can see the skin name in the console) but that it updates the wikicode variable before the skin. -Chieftain Alex

10:07, 6 August 2015 (UTC)

.done() is an AJAX function, i.e. it's asynchronous. The browser's JS engine will continue executing the code without waiting for .done()'s return value. If you want to wait on the return value, then you have to put your code inside .done(). —Dr Ishmael

12:29, 6 August 2015 (UTC)

Great, thanks for clarifying the problem. -Chieftain Alex

13:11, 6 August 2015 (UTC)

That seemed sarcastic, so I edited your code to demonstrate. :P

For further clarification, when an AJAX function like .done() is called, the main JS thread kicks it off as a child thread, then continues executing without waiting for it to complete or return anything. The child thread executes completely independently of the main thread, other than initially inheriting all of its defined variables/etc., and can't interact with it further. —Dr Ishmael

14:35, 6 August 2015 (UTC)

I was actually being genuine (!) but I only updated the version in my common.js. I do appreciate the help though - I haven't used json or ajax before. -Chieftain Alex

15:18, 6 August 2015 (UTC)

Ahhh... if I'd paid attention to things besides talk pages, I would have seen that. /facepalm —Dr Ishmael

15:59, 6 August 2015 (UTC)

Personal request: Can you either archive your talk page or edit this section? Reason being that I usually browse on an iPad and ios's lack of horizontal scroll bars renders this page in such a way as to fit in that long, unbroken line, ie stupidly. — snograt 11:35, 2 October 2015 (UTC)

eh, we've got white-space: pre-wrap; in both vector and monobook stylesheets so it really shouldn't render wider than the rest of the page.. -Chieftain Alex

12:05, 2 October 2015 (UTC)

hmm upon research it looks like mobile devices don't do some CSS3. Has my edit fixed the appearance now? -Chieftain Alex

12:17, 2 October 2015 (UTC)

That did it! Thanks, oh brainy one. — snograt

20:28, 3 October 2015 (UTC)

Table for armours with fixed attributes and costs

General challenge for all those that love tables and templates

Tables for cultural and order armours are out of date (e.g. Dreadnought armor and Whisper's Secret armor (light)). The attributes got buffed with the specialization update.

Given that these armours only come with one set of attributes, would there be a way to pull the level/prefix from the respective pages and drop them into a table, à la {{Dungeon armor set stats}}? Super Bonus Happy Points for somehow getting the price of the items to appear.

I am reluctant to replace them with the {{armor skin set table}}. G R E E N E R 02:12, 11 August 2015 (UTC)

Use {{item stat lookup}} and {{prefix attributes}} for the attribute values. The prices can be generated with "Template:vendor item table row".--Relyk ~ talk < 03:00, 11 August 2015 (UTC)

Is this rough draft what you're looking for? —Dr Ishmael

03:11, 11 August 2015 (UTC)

I think I should give up on trying to challenge all of you. As for that draft, yes, that's basically what I was looking for. I don't quite know what the general user of those pages would want, but I can slot that template onto the pages without much loss of information (other than the totals for each attribute). G R E E N E R 03:27, 11 August 2015 (UTC)

Frankly, I never understood the point of putting totals on tables like that. The totals are going to be exactly the same as all other armor for the same level/rarity, there's nothing special about *this set of armor* that makes the stats any different. —Dr Ishmael

03:34, 11 August 2015 (UTC)

Good point. Just toss a parameter that I can play with, and I'll give that template a home. Much appreciated.

Oh, and much like brownie points, Super Bonus Happy Points are non-redeemable. They're just good at negating any accrued debt. G R E E N E R 03:45, 11 August 2015 (UTC)

Morning. I've added a sort key property (Property:Has armor type number) which will take a few minutes to filter through all the pages with {{armor infobox}}. This will sort the table so that it goes Helm-Shoulders-Coat-Gloves-Legs-Boots, but will temporarily screw up the appearance of the new template. -Chieftain Alex

08:23, 11 August 2015 (UTC)

Thanks. I'll run through it after my 8 hours of beauty sleep. Oddly, that's never enough. G R E E N E R 08:25, 11 August 2015 (UTC)

Thanks for making the sort key - I had thought of it last night, but it was too late for me to implement it. —Dr Ishmael

12:19, 11 August 2015 (UTC)

Yeah I've wanted easier logical sorting for a few templates. Would it be worth adding sortkeys for weapon + skin infoboxes? (All those queries where I've had to use an arraymap to get it in the right order...)

Also, anyone have a list of templates which we use to set infobox-like properties with?

-Chieftain Alex

13:11, 11 August 2015 (UTC)

(Reset indent) It seems that if there are two vendors for an armour set, the cost is grabbed twice (e.g. Vigil's Honor armor (light)). Could that be limited to one vendor? Merci! G R E E N E R 16:10, 11 August 2015 (UTC)

Wark. —Dr Ishmael

17:15, 11 August 2015 (UTC)

Removal of merge tags on tutorial events

Do you have an explanation for such? We have a multitude of events that take place in instances which have the details of the events covered in said instances. The tutorials are no different, but they (and the Flame and Frost instances) have the events as separate pages. For example, No Refuge has an event for each fight, but we have (imo, reasonably) made no article for those events. There is, ultimately, no need for those articles. It's just repeated information; redundancy. Konig 18:13, 12 August 2015 (UTC)

Hey Konig. Well I was running through the tutorial missions today and they do strongly resemble fully fledged events. They have markers on the map, objectives, reward medal popups and their own dialogues. Plus I went and fixed the infobox so that the locations work too. I just didn't see any reason for them not to have their own pages. -Chieftain Alex

21:18, 12 August 2015 (UTC)

I would set the criteria like this:

Does the event give the usual event rewards? (xp/karma/coin)
- yes - it's a standard event, make a page for it
- no - it's part of a story instance, no page for you

Like Konig said, if we already have full walkthroughs on the story's page, there's no need to make separate pages for the individual events that comprise the story. —Dr Ishmael

21:37, 12 August 2015 (UTC)

Agreed. The events' pages don't offer anything that can't just easily be placed onto the story instance page; it always bothered me that we documented each specific event in the Braham/Rox instance, and I'd like to see that trend go away. —Ventriloquist 23:26, 12 August 2015 (UTC)

The irony is not lost on me that I carried out the merges of the Rox/Braham pages (primarily because they had been sitting around for ages). -Chieftain Alex

23:34, 12 August 2015 (UTC)

I remember starting event pages on those first living world instances and immediately regretting it. The fact they used the event ui for the instances was such a terrible idea. So glad they switched back to story ui.--Relyk ~ talk < 02:25, 13 August 2015 (UTC)

"They have markers on the map, objectives, reward medal popups and their own dialogues." So do the in-instance events in Season 2 that I mentioned. But they're all part of the story instance with no fail state - it's a linear path that, in the case of the tutorials only, happens to be skipable dependent on other players in the tutorial. I don't think they're unique enough to merit individual pages.

@Ishmael: I'm pretty sure the two events during No Refuge offers rewards. I think they all do. However, I do not think this merits them having their own article, when they cannot be skipped and are quite literally part of the story instance's objectives and stories. Konig 01:25, 14 August 2015 (UTC)

Regarding skill and trait list navs

Sure, I agree that skills and traits are different, but at the same time they are very closely related; they're both combat abilities that you create a build from. Skills trigger traits and traits enhance skills, and for complete understanding of one's abilities you need to know about the other. I'm not saying that merging the two navs would be the only option to facilitate this, but it was a suggestion I thought would be worth discussing. In my opinion it wouldn't be as outlandish a change: Template:SAB nav has links to items, skills, maps and achievements, but the overall idea is that when you're on one of those pages, you're very likely to want to see the others as well; WoW Wiki also links between abilities and talents for a given class in their nav, among other things; and even Wikipedia has navs with various topics, such as a band's members and other personnel, albums, films, tours and other links, without making a separate nav for each. Whatever the case, I understand the opposition to this merge, it's just that I believe it would still be much better than the current situation, where navigating between skills and traits is a pain.

The second thing that should probably be discussed and changed is how to handle elite specs. Their pages include information about available skills, mechanics and weapons as well, so putting these pages into the trait list nav only is extremely counter-intuitive. We could list the specs, skills and traits in one giant nav, considering the overlaps the elite specs create, or we could add all of those skills and traits into the core list pages and leave the specs out of the nav. But we need to do something about it before HoT launches, otherwise no one will be looking at the wiki for information on elite specs when it's so hard to find. 09:05, 13 August 2015 (UTC)

"so hard to find" We have a search box... —Dr Ishmael

12:33, 13 August 2015 (UTC)

By that logic we don't need to use any links or navboxes anywhere, since we have a search box... The point of navs is to quickly traverse between pages focusing on related topics; you shouldn't need to search for dragonhunter just to find their skills when you're on List of guardian skills, you shouldn't even need to know the guardian's elite spec is called dragonhunter to begin with; that information should either be on that page or linked from that page's navbox.

17:38, 13 August 2015 (UTC)

Nice reductio ad absurdum. ;)

On a serious note, there are lots of ways that these pages can link to each other without having to cram them all into a single nav box or even include multiple nav boxes per page. To your example, the profession skill lists already link to weapon pages as well as the healing, utility, elite, and downed/drowning pages through the headers of those respective sections. We should do the same thing for the elite specializations: make a section for it rather than merging them into the core h/u/e lists. Thus, no need to put it in a navbox. —Dr Ishmael

18:42, 13 August 2015 (UTC)

Well, suggesting that we don't need to change anything about the navigation because "we have a search box" seems more absurd to me, but whatever...

Sure enough, having a link like that would definitely be enough, I don't think that the specs should be in the same nav anymore either; what I meant is that the link shouldn't just be hidden in a paragraph of text somewhere, it's just the wording I used was wrong. Whatever the case, I still haven't really seen any actual arguments against this suggestion, so I'll ask more directly:

What are the disadvantages of having both active abilities (skills) and passive abilities (traits) in a common navigation template? To me it seems very helpful, the concepts are interconnected as it is and the resulting nav isn't that big anyway.
What are the advantages of putting each elite spec's skills under a separate header in the skill lists, as opposed to putting the skills throughout the list into the respective tables with a new column specifying the required spec? If it's done that way, 1/ there won't be any place anywhere on the wiki with a comprehensive list of all skills a profession has access to in each skill category since it would be scattered across multiple sections or pages; and 2/ the page will be needlessly long if each elite spec will add a separate table for each mechanic and h/u/e skill whose headers take twice as much space as the single skill in some of those categories. The elite spec pages themselves have a list by spec, so we might as well list them by different categories elsewhere. (And if the response is "all healing skills will be at Healing skill etc.", I'm fairly sure more people look at a list of all skills on the complete lists rather than on those pages.)

I'm not saying we must do it my way, but I also don't want you to say it must be done your way. I wanted to discuss the merits and drawbacks of the suggestions and come to a consensus, not to hear "I don't like it". If I read enough to convince me my suggestion is stupid or I see a different, better approach of easing navigation between these various pages and information, I'll stop, but so far the elite specs' integration to the rest of the wiki is a mess, and I realized this change I was thinking about since the betas could potentially be made along with it.

20:56, 13 August 2015 (UTC)

Alex's broken signature

Hi guys, firefox 40 update hit me earlier. My signature previously had the code "font-size-adjust:0" on it - which now gets interpreted by firefox as hiding my signature text entirely :( This unfortunately affects all talk pages that I've signed my comments on.

I previously had this to over-correct some horrible font-size-adjust stuff that we had going on, but I'll remove it for future signatures. >.< -Chieftain Alex 21:58, 13 August 2015 (UTC)

I have no idea how my signature appears in chrome, but IE11 at least interprets it as originally intended. -Chieftain Alex

22:00, 13 August 2015 (UTC)

The original version still looks fine for me in Chrome 44. —Dr Ishmael

22:38, 13 August 2015 (UTC)

Point of Order

"don't use set for anything level rewards related " Then don't tempt me with red-links this late at night. Besides, those sure looked like swindler pauldrons to me. G R E E N E R 09:18, 16 August 2015 (UTC)

showCostContext

You don't need that... Just display a link if it's an item.--Relyk ~ talk < 20:44, 16 August 2015 (UTC)

It's not going to align nicely (at all) if it does align-right for coins, and left for everything else + display text. -Chieftain Alex

20:56, 16 August 2015 (UTC)

Uhhh, that's already an issue in the current case. I don't think there are any examples where one item costs just currency and another item costs just an item within a tab. The right-align isn't very good in the first place. I say left-align currency and don't stick in a wiki link.--Relyk ~ talk < 21:35, 16 August 2015 (UTC)

What is going on

...here? It seems to be adding a "further result" to the last skin piece, the Studded Plate Greaves, for no reason. Also, the list is in incorrect order, it jumps from chest to leggings, then lists gloves and boots. —Ventriloquist 18:37, 26 August 2015 (UTC)

I've broken that many times, to the point where I've got a check-mechanic as I go along. G R E E N E R 18:51, 26 August 2015 (UTC)

Thank you. It's good to know it's a human error and not a template going funky. —Ventriloquist 20:38, 26 August 2015 (UTC)

Deleted Image

Hey, you deleted an icon http://wiki.guildwars2.com/index.php?title=Special:Upload&wpDestFile=Bile-Coated_Harpoon_Shot.png that I was still using, stating it is a redundant image. Can you point me to its copy? Thanks!

Ventaurion (talk) 18:29, 30 August 2015 (UTC)

File:Fire (Trebuchet).png is the replacement. Tyndel (talk) 18:39, 30 August 2015 (UTC)

Much appreciated! Ventaurion (talk) 19:27, 30 August 2015 (UTC)

[as one admin to another...] Alex, if you include a link to the replacement image in the delete reason, that would alleviate situations like this. —Dr Ishmael

22:24, 30 August 2015 (UTC)

Recently I've bothered to add a link to the delete button with the existing delete tag reason in it. older files were done by robot because I'm lazy when it comes to pressing delete 300x. -Chieftain Alex

22:30, 30 August 2015 (UTC)

Gotcha. I didn't look through all your deletions to see how you usually do things. —Dr Ishmael

23:46, 30 August 2015 (UTC)

Although, if you can think of a way to get a pywikibot deletion list to use an individual delete reason for each file that'd be better. -Chieftain Alex

11:00, 31 August 2015 (UTC)

"has description" in Slot Skill Table Row template

Hello, I'm not sure if it is me, but Template:Slot skill table row is not returning any skill descriptions. I have limited testing abilities, but this fails in my firefox, and my unmodded chrome. So I presume that there is some issue with the template, but I'm not familiar enough with these "ask" parameters to look into the issue myself. Are you able to see descriptions on any of the skill pages using this template? Quickly I tried Gyro, Rage, Shout and Legendary Dragon Stance at random. I should also note that various (the ones I looked at) revisions of the template show the same things (looking at the example on the template page) Venom20 18:01, 16 September 2015 (UTC)

Excellent spot. I accidentally nuked the description completely earlier when i missed out a pipe from #dplreplace (this is unfortunate since I spotted that I'd made the same error on effect infobox). Apologies for the inconvenience + thanks for bringing it to my attention. -Chieftain Alex

18:05, 16 September 2015 (UTC)

"let skin take multiple values."

What item needs to list multiple skins? —Dr Ishmael 14:15, 21 September 2015 (UTC)

I suspect that there are at least some gem store consumable items that fit this, but I could be wrong. I added it because it was requested on Talk:Baroque Mask, not sure if we'll end up using it yet. -Chieftain Alex

15:00, 21 September 2015 (UTC)

Ah, I should've realized you put that in the item infobox, not the armor/weapon infoboxes. That use case makes perfect sense. —Dr Ishmael

15:40, 21 September 2015 (UTC)

wiki being slow and shit today?

per title. -Chieftain Alex 09:36, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

Both wikis, yes. For a few hours so far as I've seen. G R E E N E R 09:50, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

Great, though it was on my end. Pretty annoying, have to keep refreshing to submit anything. —Ventriloquist 09:57, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

Yeah, and here I budgeted time and caffeine towards getting more skins up. Now I just have a podcast chatting away in the background, and nothing for me to do but read the news. G R E E N E R 10:06, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

I felt so motivated this morning, too! Seems to be a bit better now, but ehh. —Ventriloquist 11:08, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

Ex-scientist?

Wh'appen? — snograt 11:48, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

that job ended, and I'm searching for the next one. -Chieftain Alex

13:00, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

Oh thank goodness - I thought you'd been scientifically defrocked or something. — snograt

19:50, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

Here I was expecting a "lab accident, now I run around in tights" joke. Konig 19:53, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

Pages with no discussion being considered as broken links?

Pages that have no discussion count the discussion link as a broken link for the purposes of Category:Pages_with_broken_file_links. An example would be Alisa where the only red link is "discussion", yet it still appears in the list. Reelix (talk) 07:03, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

That category is added to any page linking to a file that hasn't been uploaded. In the case of Alisa, the icon for Orichalcum Mining Pick was broken (showing a padlock). I found the problem on the pick page, and the category has now gone from Alisa. I imagine that same icon error affected many pages + it will take a while for the category to update its contents. -Chieftain Alex

08:06, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

Is there any way to monitor the update process, or specifically check on a page if it still has a problem? With a page like Apprentice_(huntsman) I can't tell if your Orichalcum Pick update fixed it, or if there's still another bug somewhere (Nothing directly visible) as it remains in the list :) Reelix (talk) 14:25, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

If you absolutely can't wait for the job queue to process, you can perform a null-edit on the page - click on "edit," then immediately click the "Save" button without changing anything. This will force MediaWiki to re-parse the page, including refreshing all metadata related to links, templates, and categories. —Dr Ishmael

15:08, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

It is a few hours later now, but the category has been fixed on Apprentice (huntsman) - or someone did a null edit (edit page -> make zero changes -> press save). I don't know if/how to track category updates, but the job queue might cover it.

The job queue can be found here - its currently at 48 tasks. (every time a template is updated, all the pages that use it enter the job queue, the change is processed, it leaves the queue, and the number goes down by one. Changing a well used template might stick the job queue up to a few thousand tasks, so 48 is basically "not busy". -Chieftain Alex

15:11, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

Suggestion: Make self-reference page links a different color (Invalid)

As it stands, links that link to their own page are bold. The problem is that the "Broken File Links" page considers these to be broken (Tested via converting multiple instances to the proper bold tag). As they simply display bold, it makes it incredibly hard to tell what's actually broken on the page. I'd suggest altering them to the normal broken link color. Reelix (talk) 07:10, 2 October 2015 (UTC)

Example page please? (self links are very frequently used and I doubt this is the case) -86.131.74.34 07:21, 2 October 2015 (UTC)

Checked your last contributions; no self linking is not the cause. Null edits would produce the same function. Those pages all had the same missing icon as we last discussed (mining pick) -86.131.74.34 07:26, 2 October 2015 (UTC)

After additional research I came to the same conclusion... Time to revert a bunch of changes. I apologize for the inconvenience. Reelix (talk) 07:32, 2 October 2015 (UTC)

Which it seems that you had already done. You are extremely fast :) Reelix (talk) 07:36, 2 October 2015 (UTC)

Activities

A user requested a Weekly activities page, akin to daily activities which shows the current and future weekly bonus; and a matching link as shown on gww's main page. Can you help? --100.32.136.225 08:52, 4 October 2015 (UTC)

Spiral Shell

I've (accidentally) reverted your edit on Spiral Shell's drop table, before looking at the history. I assume you removed the template in order to show levels specific to the trophy, or was it something else? —Ventriloquist 14:37, 5 October 2015 (UTC)

No worries, I did want to denote which dropped the shell... I made some guesses based on the talk page. If I go and verify each spiral shell npc i'll have a better idea of what I'm doing before making another edit. -86.131.74.34 14:49, 5 October 2015 (UTC)

Honestly, if the template allowed a "description" tab or something similar, it'd help a lot. It could be personalized for each page and would allow for comments on enemies' drop rates, such as levels. —Ventriloquist 15:05, 5 October 2015 (UTC)

You mean the {{drops}} template right? (or do you mean the {{dropped by}} template?)

I can add a description parameter easily enough - either a generic description note for all items listed under an NPC, or a 1:1 mapping with each drop to description (e.g. level 80 drops Spiral Shell, level 1 drops Shell). I don't know where I'd display this information at the end though...

Creature	Level	Race	Location
Arctic Crab	19-80	Crustacean	Frostgorge Sound Snowden Drifts
Hermit Crab (Spiral Shell only dropped by level 60+ versions)	5-80	Crustacean	Metrica Province Caledon Forest Sparkfly Fen Mount Maelstrom Kessex Hills Bloodtide Coast Southsun Cove Diessa Plateau Timberline Falls Fireheart Rise Labyrinthine Cliffs The Mists

^ if I do it like this, then the locations displayed for each item might not seem consistent between left + right (i.e. no level 60s in Metrica Province)

For a clear display of results, we would need quite a lot of information (NPC location, NPC level, which one drops each item), and I really don't know if anyone can be bothered to do that. hmm. -Chieftain Alex

15:32, 5 October 2015 (UTC)

Or split the NPC page so you aren't mapping a single property to multiple NPCs.--Relyk ~ talk < 15:33, 5 October 2015 (UTC)

True that'd work too. Pity quite a few/a lot of NPCs appear in a large number of locations and have slightly different loot. -Chieftain Alex

15:59, 5 October 2015 (UTC)

I was referring to the dropped by template, sorry for not making it clear. The template is okay in its current form, although it is hard to differentiate which levels of the enemies listed drop the specific loot. I guess the easiest solution would be to list in the notes or in the intro sentence. —Ventriloquist 17:33, 5 October 2015 (UTC)

For this item in particular (and everything else under Trash Collector in general), the level ranges are uniform for all monsters that drop the item. E.g. Spiral Shells are dropped by level 60+ monsters of the "shell" family. It would be easier to just add a note on the Spiral Shell page to clarify that for the entire "dropped by" table. —Dr Ishmael

18:37, 5 October 2015 (UTC)

Happy birthday!

Happy birthday, ol' chief, hope it's a good one. —Ventriloquist 15:31, 6 October 2015 (UTC)

^ — snograt

17:08, 6 October 2015 (UTC)

Thanks guys, everything I received was useful so that was good. Also some company got back to me with a job interview offer which was unexpected after my terrible phone interview earlier in the week. Things are looking up. -86.131.74.34 23:10, 6 October 2015 (UTC)

^belated--Relyk ~ talk < 15:24, 15 October 2015 (UTC)

Well well well

Still going strong on the wiki's eh. Remember me? :p How are you these days? Magamdy 13:41, 14 October 2015 (UTC)

Oh fairly strong. You get good at something and stick at it.

I see you've gone back to doing some gw renders... not tempted to come do some renders of gw2 stuff I suppose? :P (you know, gw2 being free and all...)

I've been hunting for a job for too long though, finding jobs which I can and want to do is the tricky bit. I did have a good interview last week so maybe they'll get back to me. -Chieftain Alex

15:00, 14 October 2015 (UTC)

Yep, was bored and decided to shrink my unfinished work. I'd love to do GW2 tho (I bought it on launch day, just never got into it :/), actually I just tried it and it seems to work, however it's more complex than Gw1, which is already pretty complex to me. I guess we can talk ingame. It's just Chieftain Alex again?

Magamdy 16:13, 14 October 2015 (UTC)

Yeah, ChieftainAlex.2851 ingame. My ping is about 1.6k today so its basically unplayable but I'll log in for a bit. -Chieftain Alex

16:34, 14 October 2015 (UTC)

Property:Has mastery experience requirement

"Requires mastery experience"? I hate four word property names.--Relyk ~ talk < 23:52, 19 October 2015 (UTC)

Gem Store vendor list

You disabled the subobject that allow vendor list to display values for Gem Store related items, and now they all display null values. It'd be nice to either go back to the way things were (the only issue was the subpage not loading?) or tinker with it, if it isn't much trouble. —Ventriloquist 13:47, 21 October 2015 (UTC)

In addition to preventing the gem store subpages from being accessed, some of the vendor queries weren't working (this was before I disabled the subobjects). I can't fix the problem with the information how it is laid out now. -Chieftain Alex

14:05, 21 October 2015 (UTC)

I previously thought that the problem was due to there being too many subobjects on the subpages, but i might have fixed it. -Chieftain Alex

14:42, 21 October 2015 (UTC)

Thanks a bunch for the swift fix! —Ventriloquist 15:37, 21 October 2015 (UTC)

Well hot damn, thank you for getting that fixed! G R E E N E R 15:49, 21 October 2015 (UTC)

Probably another issue after I restructured the pages and chagned the templates to match.--Relyk ~ talk < 01:21, 23 October 2015 (UTC)

For your most excellent HoT design work

I hereby present you with TWO coveted gratz barnstars.

Wear them with pride. - Felix Omni 15:38, 22 October 2015 (UTC)

This made my ~~day~~ week. -Chieftain Alex

16:27, 22 October 2015 (UTC)

So glad to see the wiki conforming itself to my standards! G R E E N E R 16:34, 22 October 2015 (UTC)

Woot! for high-fidelity art! ;) --Wolfie

(talk|contribs) 21:24, 22 October 2015 (UTC)

^^ {{Custom CSS|form|css=div { cursor: url("/images/thumb/3/3c/User_Felix_Omni_Barnstar.png/30px-User_Felix_Omni_Barnstar.png"), auto; } }} -Chieftain Alex

21:36, 22 October 2015 (UTC)

What kind of cursor magic... —Ventriloquist 21:36, 22 October 2015 (UTC)

It is rather like throwing glitter. -Chieftain Alex

22:04, 22 October 2015 (UTC)

N00b template help

Hey. So I tried messing with the devil and made {{tl|gather}} and {{tl|gathered from}} for all those pesky unformatted items gathered from nodes. Naturally, I copied the code from {{tl|salvages into}} and its other template, but with obvious corrections. Since resource nodes are objects and not items, I removed the icon parameter or whatever. How'd I go about adding map icons for wood, ore and plant nodes in the template results? Also, the gathered from template, when used, doesn't link to the item, as seen here. —Ventriloquist 13:58, 24 October 2015 (UTC)

Okay, managed to get linking ready. Thanks random article on the internet. —Ventriloquist 14:19, 24 October 2015 (UTC)

Well done. Updating the property name to where you moved it meant that everything works. -Chieftain Alex

14:23, 24 October 2015 (UTC)

Heart of Maguuma mastery tracks

You forgot to leave a redirect. Noxx managed to move it back.--Relyk ~ talk < 20:51, 1 November 2015 (UTC)

And fix Central Tyria mastery tracks too :D--Relyk ~ talk < 20:52, 1 November 2015 (UTC)

#expr behavior

Hi, Alex. I got a question about #expr. The following snippet returns an error, if called by a template:

{{#expr: {{{1|1}}} * 2}}

I try setting a default value and it returns an error. I checked and it seems like if that param contains nothing (wasn't set), it doesn't default to 1. Did I miss anything? – Valento ^msg 21:53, 5 November 2015 (UTC)

I think you want 1/1, not 1|1 --Lustre Of Havoc 話 22:44, 5 November 2015 (UTC)

Test: 2

Seems to work fine here. If you're passing a non-numeric value (including the empty string) for parm 1, then of course you'll get an error. —Dr Ishmael

22:48, 5 November 2015 (UTC)

Yeah if you pass 1 = (blank) then its gonna break. Either make sure passing it a blank isn't an option in the first place, or wrap the 1 in an if statement.

{{#expr: {{#if: {{{1|}}} | {{{1}}} | 1 }} * 2}} -Chieftain Alex

23:15, 5 November 2015 (UTC)

What if this {{{1}}} comes from an #ask query, and it's expected to be blank? I see that {{{stacks|1}}} from {{Skill fact}} works the way I expected, the only difference from my test is that I'm passing a value that might be blank and it comes from the query. It seems, though, that if I simply print {{{1|1}}} it does output 1, but if I use inside #expr it seems to simply output nothing... o.o – Valento ^msg 00:06, 6 November 2015 (UTC)

That's because the #ask query is passing the empty string to the formatting template. You have to do what Alex showed. —Dr Ishmael

00:46, 6 November 2015 (UTC)

This is rather interesting. Passing empty parameters with normal template works for the defaulted option, but passing a query value does not. I find this buggy... – Valento ^msg 11:02, 6 November 2015 (UTC)

No. {{User:Valento/Sandbox/Result template}} is not equivalent to {{User:Valento/Sandbox/Result template|1=}}. -Chieftain Alex

12:21, 6 November 2015 (UTC)

to clarify a bit, {{User:Valento/Sandbox/Result template|1=}} is what I meant by {{User:Valento/Sandbox/Result template|1=(blank)}} -Chieftain Alex

12:30, 6 November 2015 (UTC)

Another clarification:

In {{User:Valento/Sandbox/Result template}}, parameter 1 is not defined at all, meaning {{{1|1}}} will properly default to 1.
In {{User:Valento/Sandbox/Result template|1=}}, parameter 1 is defined but empty, meaning {{{1|1}}} does not use the default.

#ask will always define every parameter for formatting templates, as in #2, regardless of whether the page in question has any values for the property. —Dr Ishmael

16:48, 6 November 2015 (UTC)

I did as Alex suggested to avoid exploding my head. It worked! Thanks. ^^ – Valento ^msg 16:51, 7 November 2015 (UTC)

Nature Spirit

I found an accessory called Nature Spirit, and I was going to check up on it in the wiki here, but when I search, it brings me to Ranger spirits. Can we get "Nature Spirit" separated from spirits? --Lustre Of Havoc 話 06:19, 6 November 2015 (UTC)

~~Suggest create an article called "Nature Spirit (item)", then could add a {{Otheruses}} on each to link to the other.~~ Scratch that, why not just edit the redirect article to point to the item article? --Wolfie

(talk|contribs) 08:45, 6 November 2015 (UTC)

Don't know how to do that yet. Not well-versed in wiki editing. --Lustre Of Havoc 話 09:00, 6 November 2015 (UTC)

Nature Spirit (the item) is already documented. Nature spirit redirects to Spirit because thats what they were called in gw1 I think. I'll add a note at the top of "Spirit" explaining the redirect. -Chieftain Alex

09:18, 6 November 2015 (UTC)

If you have more characters going through the PS...

Please take note what happened to the Letter of Commendation and Letter of Commendation (1000) obtained from Retribution and Victory or Death, if you would. Konig 21:01, 6 November 2015 (UTC)

I've run all my five character slots through the original personal story, so I can't help I'm afraid. -Chieftain Alex

09:40, 7 November 2015 (UTC)

I'm leveling my revenant at the moment, so I'll keep an eye out. —Ventriloquist 10:09, 7 November 2015 (UTC)

Programming/config questions

Tiny heads-up regarding #arraymap'd #ask queries

Just a tiny heads-up, when using #arraymap you may want to test the output values from the query so that you don't run into this issue (note comma separator):

{{#arraymap:{{#ask: [[Is in trait line::Water]][[Has trait type::Major]][[Has trait tier::Adept]]|link=none}}|,|@@@|[[@@@]] }}

{{#arraymap:{{#ask: [[Is in trait line::Water]][[Has trait type::Major]][[Has trait tier::Adept]]|link=none}}|,|@@@|[[@@@]] }}

Bye! – Valento ^msg 16:55, 7 November 2015 (UTC)

I already deal with this problem frequently... hence my frequent usage of "),", "^" or ")^". Just create a subsection to the above section if you want to persist with coding topics :p -Chieftain Alex

23:57, 7 November 2015 (UTC)

Aight! – Valento ^msg 13:25, 5 December 2015 (UTC)

User group

Is there a way to grab the user group in-wiki? Or some way with the widgets extension? I'd like to create a template for a fellow wiki that sets properties depending on the user group, but so far I haven't found something like a magic word for that. – Valento ^msg 13:25, 5 December 2015 (UTC)

The question is a bit vague, care to expand on it with an example? e.g. A) a template that detects the user-group of the current person viewing the page, B) a template which if used on a page belonging to a user in X user-group, C) a page that only renders with a given user-group.. (dunno if I can help) -Chieftain Alex

16:30, 5 December 2015 (UTC)

You'd have to write some JavaScript to access it through the mw.user.getGroups() function. Either implement it as a widget if you have the extension installed, or as global JS like we do for Template:UTC time. —Dr Ishmael

16:57, 5 December 2015 (UTC)

I'll look into that. Alex, I'm trying to create a way for users to rate builds in metabattle, I thought about adding a SMW Rating extension to the SMW Forms, create a form for that, but there'll be two types of rating: community and Metabattle folks (not sure how they go about that, but those are separate). So I needed to know if the user currently rating a build is a sysop or any other type and store that in the correct property. The way they do things now is very manual and I'm trying to collaborate in that matter. :) – Valento ^msg 11:03, 7 December 2015 (UTC)

Bah... it proved somewhat too squishy to do. I run this script in the widget:

<script>

if (wgUserGroups.indexOf("sysop")>-1) {

document.write('y');

}

</script>

But the output value can't be used with #if correctly, I try checking if it's set and it always returns true. I found the SMW API Interface (not sure how to call this), so I'll pass along this to their admin to do it programmatically. – Valento ^msg 13:17, 7 December 2015 (UTC)

All JS executes after the page has loaded. So if you're doing anything with JS, you have to do it all in JS - any template stuff gets parsed before the JS executes.

I don't know what the SMW API has to do with this. That provides a portal for accessing the semantic data on the wiki, similar to the official GW2 API. There's also a MediaWiki API that serves as a portal for non-semantic wiki information, but you shouldn't need to use either of them for this. —Dr Ishmael

16:51, 7 December 2015 (UTC)

I expressed myself quite badly sorry. You're right, one thing has nothing to do with another. I was starting to think about a way to store ratings in SMW with a custom SMW ratings extension, but then I realized that Metabattle rating system is very well-done in terms of usability and it would be a waste to scrap it all and redo everything (with the SMW extension). So I'm just taking another route to have rating data inside SMW. He'll have to adjust his extension to store ratings in SMW programmatically.

Either way, it's nice to know the order of things. I kind of thought about JS being executed after, but wasn't sure. Thanks! – Valento ^msg 19:18, 7 December 2015 (UTC)

It's because JS is executed by the user's browser. The server parses all the wikitext on the page and in templates, but the global and widget JS doesn't do anything until it gets to the browser. —Dr Ishmael

19:49, 7 December 2015 (UTC)

Job queue

Could you please tell me how are these variables set in this wiki?

$wgJobRunRate
$wgUpdateRowsPerJob
$wgRunJobsAsync
$wgJobBackoffThrottling

Metabattle has a hard time whenever I touch some heavy templates, and it makes the wiki go down. It doesn't happen when I'm not changing anything, only when I change a massive template that's widely used, so I'm thinking that maybe it could be related to job queue. --– Valento ^msg 19:53, 18 January 2016 (UTC)

:/ No idea, I'm a front end user. My guess is that the settings are probably grandfathered off GWW (still no idea what those settings would be), I don't think there is a way to find out as a front-end user without asking someone like Justin or maybe Poke. -Chieftain Alex

21:05, 18 January 2016 (UTC)

Unfortunately, I don’t know the current values for the job queue configuration. But I can ask about it tonight. We also should have some older values on one of GWW’s TECH pages, so you could look there for a start. In general, you want to set the values pretty low.

Does the wiki crash immediately as you save the page, or only delayed after you’re done saving? poke | talk 08:20, 20 January 2016 (UTC)

Once you save the page, the server load spikes like crazy for up to 30 minutes. During that time, the website is extremely slow and most of the time it shows "Sorry! This site is experiencing technical difficulties.".--Galaxian (talk) 15:08, 20 January 2016 (UTC)

Poke asked me to chime in here. $wgJobRunRate is set to 0.1 for the GW1 and GW2 English wikis and 0.5 for the German, French, and Spanish wikis. For what it's worth, I do see frequent spikes in the job queue lengths (I track them in Graphite) which do seem to generally correspond to template edits, though the web and database server loads don't seem to noticeably increase due to the job queue spikes. Also, the problem with infinite job execution still exists on the wikis despite supposedly being fixed in SMW 2.1. Hopefully the next planned upgrade will resolve this. I would periodically truncate the job table though I've not done that in a while so they're sitting at 149, 14, and 60 for English, German, and French, respectively. Justin Lloyd (talk) 22:57, 20 January 2016 (UTC)

For completeness' sake, I should mention I didn't put values for the other three parameters because they are not overridden from their defaults. Justin Lloyd (talk) 23:03, 20 January 2016 (UTC)

Thank you for the help. We'll be monitoring how things go over there. :) – Valento ^msg 10:57, 26 January 2016 (UTC)

I see two possible solutions:

Use Special:SMWAdmin to perform a full data rebuild. Unfortunately, there's no guarantee that this will correct the issue, while all of our wonderful semantic templates would be non-functional for a while (I think the last one took 8 hours?).
Drop it like a hot potato and convert all the infoboxes to use a different property name, say, Property:Has context, where we avoid the silly allowed values from the first.

—Dr Ishmael 01:30, 9 November 2015 (UTC)

I think we've tried the full rebuild before and it didn't work (?). Option two sounds best since we can't alter the allowed values on the existing property. However, this would mean we've gotta go adjust all the semantic templates to use the new property name...

Would removing the property from all of the infoboxes individually, waiting for it to depopulate, then changing the allowed values work? -Chieftain Alex

09:17, 9 November 2015 (UTC)

I doubt it. Usually, once SMW gets borked up, there's no way to de-bork it.

Using SMW's ability to "query for queries," I was able to come up with a list of the major pages/templates that utilize this property. There may be more, but SMW has a hard limit of 5,000 results.

{{#ask:[[Query string::~*Has game context*]]
| ?Query size
| ?Query string
| sort = Query size,
}}

List of historical skills
List of historical traits
Template:Area infobox (note: move the #var derivations inside the #if block below them? this would vastly reduce the number of queries since the majority of location pages are PoIs)
Template:Item icon
Template:NPC service list (seems redundant, since Property:Has service only gets set by Template:NPC infobox)
Template:Skin list (also redundant, Property:Has skin is only set by the armor/weapon/back infoboxes)
Template:Skin set chat links table (ditto, the "Has skin xxx" properties are only set by Template:Skin infobox)
Template:Trait link table
Quite a few NPC service pages (e.g. Arena Proprietor) have an exposed query. But once again, querying for context is redundant here. (And this should probably be templated itself, anyway, or just replaced by the existing service list template.)

{{#ask:[[Has game context::NPC]]
       [[Has service::<PAGENAME>]]
       [[Is historical::N]]
|?Located in
|format=ul
|template=Location result format
|link=none
}}

—Dr Ishmael

17:08, 9 November 2015 (UTC)

I'd propose that we create the new "Has context" property in parallel with the old one (i.e. annotate both on the infoboxes temporarily), then go around and delete the old one once we're happy the properties are up. -Chieftain Alex

20:04, 14 November 2015 (UTC)

I've noted my progress with the updates so far on Property talk:Has context. Yellow ticks indicate I've left "has game context" active on those pages - mainly because I want the properties to update properly before I change the property name it looks for on Mediawiki:ChatLinkSearch.js. -Chieftain Alex

22:25, 15 November 2015 (UTC)

If you're going to remove "Has game context" from infoboxes while still having the JS query that property, would have been nice to have a notice somewhere that chatlink searches will not work, or to modify the JS to handle both the old and new property. Transition is not smooth. --BryghtShadow (talk) 23:25, 16 November 2015 (UTC)

Unless I overlooked something, chat link searches are currently working - chat link using infoboxes should temporarily have both SMW properties set. I'll swap the JS property used, then remove the old property without breaking any JS searches. Did you find a problem? -217.43.189.45 23:48, 16 November 2015 (UTC)

Whoops, missed backwards functionality on the effect infobox. Thanks. --217.43.189.45 00:19, 17 November 2015 (UTC)

Table coding

On my character page for Lustre Of Havoc the table alternates colors. What do I do to keep them all the same color? --Lustre Of Havoc 話 09:23, 9 November 2015 (UTC)

I found a way to fix it, but I still wonder if there was a simpler way. --Lustre Of Havoc 話 09:34, 9 November 2015 (UTC)

Set the background-color on the table. e.g. {| {{STDT}} style="background-color: white;... or don't use STDT... or set it to {{STDT|engineer}} or something. -Chieftain Alex

09:36, 9 November 2015 (UTC)

What exactly is {{STDT}}? --Lustre Of Havoc 話 11:06, 9 November 2015 (UTC)

Template:STDT. It just types class="<option> table", where "<option>" is any of these. -Chieftain Alex

11:21, 9 November 2015 (UTC)

I see, thank you --Lustre Of Havoc 話 11:52, 9 November 2015 (UTC)

Number of occurrences

Hi, Alex. Another question here: do you know a simple way to retrieve the number of occurrences for a string within another string? For example, in the text "My*test*string**oh*Lord", I want to know how many times * is contained within the string (that is 5). The only thing I thought was using #arraymap with a var to count the number of occurrences, but looks ugly. – Valento ^msg 13:22, 16 November 2015 (UTC)

{{#len:{{#arraymap:My*test*string**oh*Lord|*|@@@|1|}}}}--Relyk ~ talk < 23:37, 16 November 2015 (UTC)

Modifying the example slightly: {{#expr:{{#len:{{#arraymap:My*test*string*oh*Lord|*|@@@|1|}}}}-1}} = 4 because the number of elements is 1 greater than the number of separators. And it only works when there is actually something between every instance of the separator - #arraymap ignores null elements (when two separators are seen next to each other, e.g. "string**oh" in the original example). —Dr Ishmael

03:01, 17 November 2015 (UTC)

The null element caveat is sad, but your approach is way better anyways. Thank you! – Valento ^msg 17:55, 17 November 2015 (UTC)

Then I had a eureka moment.

{{#vardefine:valento|My*test*string**oh*Lord}} {{#expr:{{#len:{{#var:valento}}}} - {{#len:{{#replace:{{#var:valento}}|*|}}}}}}

5

Replace the #var with a {{{1}}} template parameter depending on your usage. You're welcome. —Dr Ishmael

18:22, 17 November 2015 (UTC)

You sir are a genius. – Valento ^msg 13:33, 5 December 2015 (UTC)

Has context

Can update MediaWiki:ChatLinkSearch.js with Has context set now--Relyk ~ talk < 23:43, 16 November 2015 (UTC)

Unsigned

How do you do an unsigned template? --Lustre Of Havoc 話 23:20, 21 November 2015 (UTC)

See Help:Signatures#Dealing with unsigned comments. Personally I use {{unsigned2}}. If your local time is the same as UTC, then you can copy the date and time of the unsigned comment from the history of the talk page. -86.137.119.202 23:38, 21 November 2015 (UTC)

hey

Click that "log in" link on the top right.--Relyk ~ talk < 01:19, 3 December 2015 (UTC)

My phone is a piece of shit. Logging in with my account makes it a) use vector (which is terrible on my phone for some reason), b) I get javascript buttons everywhere thanks to my js, c) I get rollback links everywhere, d) I could delete the main page without noticing :p -Chieftain Alex

08:41, 3 December 2015 (UTC)

I want to punch my phone every time I've try editing with it. It's annoying that I know which comments are yours even without logging in.--Relyk ~ talk < 09:23, 3 December 2015 (UTC)

Please read / review / something

Please go check this bit I posted: http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Talk:Douglas_Bird I really think it would be nice to have as trivia on the page. Not sure who else to ask, but what do you think? Flakkenmarsh (talk) 10:21, 6 December 2015 (UTC)

Agreed, I think this is probably intentional by ArenaNet. On an unrelated note, the "service" value for the NPC probably needs changing, dunno what to though. -Chieftain Alex

11:41, 6 December 2015 (UTC)

Interwiki Links

Hey, I know you can do what you want here but it would be nice if you could add the interwiki links here. Just copy-paste them from here. plz dont ban me :D --Cloned (talk) 13:30, 17 December 2015 (UTC)

Lol ok. I often got the impression that the interwiki links were to pages that weren't quite spelt right or that didn't exist. -Chieftain Alex

13:33, 17 December 2015 (UTC)

Thank you! That's right, we just don't have as many users as you on the english wiki do, that's why many links don't work. :) But if the link is here and leads to a non-existant (for example) german wiki-page, it's (a little bit) like a red link and the user can create it. And if the sites are created (often a lot slower than on the english wiki, but it gets done) it's good to know that you don't have to check if all is linked correctly. I know it doesn't sound like a big deal but I often switch beween the wikis (But I'm an exception I know :D ). I link the stuff that can't be pulled from the API, but for items the API is good enough for linking. --Cloned (talk) 13:50, 17 December 2015 (UTC)

It's also very useful for using the /wiki command in-game i.e. "de:Iron Ore"--Relyk ~ talk < 13:55, 17 December 2015 (UTC)

What'd be awesome would be a button to stick the interwiki links into a page based on the item id in the infobox... e.g. "get item id from infobox, query the item names for the different languages, generate wikitext, add to bottom of textarea". -Chieftain Alex

14:52, 17 December 2015 (UTC)

/* Add a button to insert interwiki links */
(function addItemInterwikiLinkButton () {
    var editToolbar = document.getElementById('toolbar');
    if (editToolbar != undefined) {
        /* Make a button */
        var fetchItemAPIbutton = document.createElement('img');
        fetchItemAPIbutton.title = 'Insert item interwiki links';
        fetchItemAPIbutton.alt = 'Insert item interwiki links';
        fetchItemAPIbutton.className = 'mw-toolbar-editbutton';
        fetchItemAPIbutton.src = '/images/9/96/Button_interwiki.png';

        /* Bind API function to button */
        fetchItemAPIbutton.onclick = function() {
            console.log('Item interwiki links button pushed.')
            
            //document.getElementById('wpTextbox1').innerHTML += '\n';
            var wikitext = document.getElementById('wpTextbox1').innerHTML;
            var idmatch = wikitext.match(/id = (\d+)/);
            var langs = ['de','es','fr'];
            
            $.each(langs, function (key,lang) {
                $.getJSON('https://api.guildwars2.com/v2/items?wiki=1&ids='+idmatch[1]+'&lang='+lang).done(function (data) {
                    var interwiki = '\n[[' + lang + ':' + data[0]['name'] + ']]';
                    document.getElementById('wpTextbox1').innerHTML += interwiki;
                });
            });
        }; //end of onclick function
        document.getElementById('toolbar').appendChild(fetchItemAPIbutton);
    }; //end of toolbar undefined if statement
})();

I've got this so far, and it works if you use it immediately after previewing the page. I don't know why the "add interwiki" button stops responding if you edit the text between loading the page + pressing the button though (that bothers me a bit). -Chieftain Alex

16:17, 17 December 2015 (UTC)

Flawed sword award

I actually "saw" you do that in guild-chat. I wonder how many of us went "aww...", searched our inventories and then went "oh yeah - account bound." I woulda if I coulda.

Numpty. — snograt 20:22, 17 December 2015 (UTC)

" why do all these links go to nubs from gw1.."

From your Item nomenclature edit summary - someone decided to link the stat name to the individual or group the stat was named after. As said on the talk. Why? Dunno. Don't mind it myself though it feels more worthy of a trivia line on the stat insignia/inscription articles. But since I don't know of any 'stat article' for any of the stats, I see no reason to not link such there. Konig 02:23, 28 December 2015 (UTC)

That reminds me, we need to link the ascended prefixes to the armor set pages. Bin was complaining about that earlier.--Relyk ~ talk < 03:08, 28 December 2015 (UTC)

How should we format the links? It only makes sense for the prefix to read "Zojja's" once, but if we want to link to armor and weapons (which would be logical...) then it would say Zojja's twice (one link for armor, one for weapons)... maybe do it like this: Zojja's•Zojja's (armor first, weapon second, for all the entries down the page)? -Chieftain Alex

13:20, 28 December 2015 (UTC)

Template:Vendor table row

Hey Chieftain Alex,

Not sure if this is new, but I don't recall seeing this issue a few days ago (i.e before your changes to this section}. Either way it seems that these merchant tables are rebelling and saying 'No' quite a bit. Visible in the example page itself, Zena Coinmaker, and a few other pages.

Again, not sure if this is a consequence of recent changes, but either way I figured you are the only one I know who knows how to deal with this, so here you go, more work. :D

- Darqam (talk)

Good guess, I am the source of this problem - it was however my edits to {{trinket infobox}} (and {{back item infobox}}) that were causing the problem with "No" being set as an upgrade component. -Chieftain Alex

10:53, 29 December 2015 (UTC)

Template:Unlocked by this

Clearly nobody likes it. Let's just delete it.

But what about {{Unlocked by recipe sheet}}? The thing is, it'd be nice if we had a standardized "this is what this recipe unlocks" display, because recipe pages are all over the place at the moment. Some put a link in the in-game description, some have a list in the Notes section, some just have text describing it. There are probably pages that don't even linkify the item. (This whole thing was spawned by someone on IRC not noticing the link hidden in the in-game description of the recipe.)

Relic pointed out/made {{recipe table|sheet={{PAGENAME}}}} but it seems bad to specify the page's own name on every page, hence the wrapper template. Or there's the infobox, but a lot of items have long names. I just feel we should have some standard for an obvious link to the recipe's item's page (...not that I particularly look forward to editing all existing recipe pages...). -- Dagger (talk) 16:32, 12 January 2016 (UTC)

Since there's so many inconsistencies when it comes to in-game recipes, I format them by the following rule(s):

The in-game description lists the final product of the recipe. Link it in the description. This is true for most exotic weapon/armor recipes, food and some precursor recipes.
The recipe only creates one item. Introduce the item in the first (and only) sentence on the page. True for most ascended recipes.
The recipe creates several items. List those items in the notes section. True for most (newly introduced) bulk recipes.

I don't think a recipe list is necessary on simple recipe pages; all of that information is found on the product's page, which creates repetition if mentioned on the recipe page as well. —Ventriloquist 17:01, 12 January 2016 (UTC)

Why does everything always get put into the notes section :/--Relyk ~ talk < 17:04, 12 January 2016 (UTC)

I always stick things in the notes section because then I know where to look.

Also lol - Talk:Always Angry - yet another user not finding a link in the skill description. :/ Just adding to the proof that it might be a problem.

@Dagger; I think there was an issue when we began documenting recipe sheets that people expected to find the recipes on the recipe sheet pages instead of on the page of the item that it creates, so showing the recipe on the recipe sheet page at this stage is probably going to bamboozle a new bunch of users. If we can link more clearly to the page where the {{recipe}} template is used then perhaps we should consider a template though. -Chieftain Alex

19:11, 12 January 2016 (UTC)

Hmm, I remember being one who expected to see recipes on recipe sheet pages. I think I'm actually the wiki's default idiot. If you want to test something for idiot-proofing, run it by me first: I can misunderstand anything. — snograt

21:31, 12 January 2016 (UTC)

I see it as an ugly fight between where information can be stored and linked easily. Gift of Blades and Recipe: Gift of Blades show how crazy this can get if we change things.

For clarity, I'll call Recipe: Gift of Blades the Sheet, Gift of Blades the Item, and this ID the Recipe ID.

If we use the Sheet to hold the Recipe ID unlock information: We will have to link pages via the Recipe ID since the Item name is not unique enough. This method would require all of the Sheet and Item pages to also hold the proper Recipe IDs (which I doubt they ever will). Doable, but I don't have faith in matching Recipe ID's all over the place.
If we use the Item to hold the Recipe ID unlock information (current method): We rely on only knowing the Sheet name to give accurate information to the reader. The rest of the information that we add is just icing, such as the Recipe ID, and information on the Sheet page if there are multiple versions, etc. This is much easier.

Just my thoughts. G R E E N E R 23:22, 12 January 2016 (UTC)

The core of the problem there is that we don't have pages for recipes (recipe IDs), but only pages for the item that unlocks the recipe (the sheet). I'm not sure if this is something we should try to fix, since it would add an extra page to recipe documentation and require more navigating around (and in any case it'd be a big project).

But that's a separate discussion. My original point was just: we have links from the sheet page to the item page, but they're currently scattered around in different places on different sheet pages, and we might be better served with a consistent "Unlocks recipes for these items" section. That was the idea behind {{Unlocked by this}}, although nobody seemed to like the specific implementation. -- Dagger (talk) 00:36, 13 January 2016 (UTC)

Yes I gathered that, and I didn't meant to take away from your original point. I leave layout to those with better eyes for such things, because as Ventriloquist can attest, I'm far from consistent! G R E E N E R 04:05, 13 January 2016 (UTC)

@Greener, the discussion was very brief in implementation for a simple reason: storing the recipe on the recipe sheet page was never an option because there are other recipe sources. I don't remember it having anything to do with people expecting recipes on recipe sheet pages. We can start with creating a recipe formatting guildeline page and having a recipe sheet example in item formatting.--Relyk ~ talk < 14:58, 13 January 2016 (UTC)

(Reset indent) We could stick something like [[User:Chieftain Alex/Templates/Unlocked by recipe sheet]] on each recipe sheet page. (think Template:Unlocked by recipe sheet but without showing the recipe ingredients itself). At the very least we need to note that each Auric weapon recipe sheet unlocks the Auric ingot recipe too. -Chieftain Alex

15:04, 13 January 2016 (UTC)

I like it. I suppose we need to bikeshed on the exact header text to use ("Recipes unlocked"? "Unlocks", if you insert "Recipe for" before each result? Eh.) -- Dagger (talk) 23:01, 15 January 2016 (UTC)

About deletion

Saw the comment. Will make sure to leave preceding content from now on. Thanks for not spanking too hard. -Darqam (talk) 21:13, 18 January 2016 (UTC)

Great, I was going to leave a note on your talk page, but I'm lazy and you seem to have been observant enough to find it :D (obviously if the content is offensive then feel free to blank instead) -Chieftain Alex

00:08, 19 January 2016 (UTC)

Armor set, correct choice?

Not sure where else to ask so I get to spam you again. In ascended armor sets, such as Tizlak's Visor, the armor set is put as "Illustrious armor". Is this what the wiki has decided? Because if it's not I would really like to change that to "Tizlak's Armor" as the set. This would make the armor nav behave similarly to the weapons. -Darqam (talk) 03:09, 19 January 2016 (UTC)

Hmm I don't know why its like that, I would have thought it should be skin=Illustrious Visage, set=Tizlak's armor. Let's see if we can get any other responses, and then I can operate my robot on all the pages needing fixing. -Chieftain Alex

09:35, 19 January 2016 (UTC)

Sounds like something I did. IMO, a set is based on its appearance, not its stats, but I also recognize this to be completely arbitrary. I wrote up/altered a few of the new ascended weapons as part of the Terracotta set as opposed to whatever name they had. I saw that pretty much no one was agreeing with me on that and worked on other items while waiting to see an official verdict. SarielV

21:20, 20 January 2016 (UTC)

OMG, am I allowed to make a pretty bot too? Would have made my life so much easier for all those weapon/armor pages. Or is that an admin thing only? -Darqam (talk) 15:59, 19 January 2016 (UTC)

I think that's been our formatting since ascended armors were introduced to the game. It basically links to the skin set, rather than the armor set, although I can't remember if that was ever discussed. I prefer linking to the actual set, rather than the skin; it makes more sense and is consistent with our weapon pages. —Ventriloquist 20:25, 19 January 2016 (UTC)

Related to this, you can still reach 'illustrious armor' through the skin link (it's 2 clicks instead of one though), which is what people were 'forced' to do for weapons. Looking at it from a different angle, I'm pretty sure players are more interested in an easy link to all of <armor prefix>' armor than a second link to the skins. We could also just have all 3, but that might start getting cluttered. -Darqam (talk) 20:37, 19 January 2016 (UTC)

Ok I've switched the set parameter around to use the local set name rather than the skin set name. Here is what's left:

No results. [[Has skin.Has skin set::Illustrious armor (light)]][[Has armor set::Illustrious armor (light)]]

No results. [[Has skin.Has skin set::Illustrious armor (medium)]][[Has armor set::Illustrious armor (light)]]

No results. [[Has skin.Has skin set::Illustrious armor (heavy)]][[Has armor set::Illustrious armor (light)]]

We could possibly name these ones Sabetha's armor, Multifarious armor and Guardian armor? -Chieftain Alex

09:50, 20 January 2016 (UTC)

Sounds good. Hopefully "Guardian armor" won't confuse folks. If it does, we can always switch it up to "Vale Guardian", but I think it's fine. Thanks for the consistency, Alex! —Ventriloquist 20:04, 20 January 2016 (UTC)

Pretend I didn't say this: it should probably have been "Tizlak's armor (medium)".. -Chieftain Alex

20:17, 20 January 2016 (UTC)

Awesome thanks for all that. If these changes aren't done tomorrow I will start to edit those then. That being said, I would prefer using 'Vale Guardian armor' than guardian armor. Another idea for it though. Would we want to link those as a Spirit Vale armor set instead? We could do a similar thing for the weapons. Or is it better to keep those nice and separate? -Darqam (talk) 21:08, 20 January 2016 (UTC)

Hmmmmmm. Ok so, after making a first attempt at that Guardian armor page, I would like to offer something else. It seems like we are going to get one armor piece unique per boss (shoes for VG, Legs for Gorsy, chest for Sabetha) along with a few other items like the backpiece and rings. We also have an assorted collection of weapons. Odds are, when we get the new raid wings, we will get more armor pieces and trinkets. Soooooooo, might it be a good idea to classify all of those as set = Spirit Vale Armor? I get the feeling that splitting them up per boss is not very useful since the page is essentially saying, "look at all the shoes you can get".

Is there any strong opposition to this? I know this isn't typical, and if possible I would like to extend this to the weapons as well. -Darqam (talk) 19:09, 21 January 2016 (UTC)

Spirit Vale armor is now a thing. -Chieftain Alex

10:19, 22 January 2016 (UTC)

I feel like that looks much better. I'll edit the appropriate armor pieces to Spirit Vale armor set (I hope today). As well, do we include backpieces as armor or is that a trinket? Since Sabetha does indeed drop a backpiece. I'll also try to get a similar thing going for Spirit Vale weapons, not sure I'll have time to tackle that today though. -Darqam (talk) 15:24, 22 January 2016 (UTC)

@ Darqam: technically you could use AutoWikiBrowser to make some bot edits. If you were going to do it for a lot of edits, using another (new) account would be advisible. It probably won't be marked as a bot (at least at first). Alternatively, drop a request on GW2W:BOTS and I'll get around to doing it if the request makes sense. -Chieftain Alex

18:34, 22 January 2016 (UTC)

@ chieftain: Awesome, I went ahead and made User:Darqbot. I will just be using him to make highly repetitive changes much faster than a usual wiki edit. At the moment I don't know enough of AWB to abuse it anyway :p. Please feel free to tell me if I am not doing something properly. -Darqam (talk) 20:40, 22 January 2016 (UTC)

Alright, good to know. Would you mind documenting a summary of any edits (particularly any repeated edits targeting >30 pages) that you make on GW2W:BOTS? No need for huge amounts of detail, e.g. "adding set parameter to {{armor infobox}}" or something like that. -Chieftain Alex

12:47, 23 January 2016 (UTC)