User talk:Mtew

General,  Talk,  Projects,  Documents,  Special Pages,  TOC

Talk,  Archives,  Flames,  The Sewer,  TOC

Max's Discussion page...

I will remove material that I feel is a personal attack. I will not delete material simply because it disagrees with my point of view.

If a particular comment does not rise above the 'obvious vandalism' or 'egregious personal attack' threshold and is irrelevant to the topic under discussion, it will be archived in The Sewer.  That space is specifically for 'Troll droppings and similar dung'.

I may and probably will move emotional discussions to User talk:Mtew/flames.  The following topics have been moved:

• RC list noise

Your own wiki

What does GW2W have that you wouldn't be able to have on a wiki you set up yourself? --JonTheMon 14:06, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

Hey, I'm working on that. The family server is ANCIENT. It runs Red Hat (not Fedora) 8. I'm trying to upgrade, but with less than 256MB of main memory, most modern distros simply don't even begin to install properly. It's got more stuff on it than you want to know about and taking it off-line for any extended period would cause economic hardship to not just me but the whole family. I'm having enough trouble feeding people here that I've got to do the upgrade carefully. So, as I said, I'm working on it. --Max 2 16:19, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

i suggest buying a memory stick, and downloading the required mediawiki software and extensions. I Use WOS, which essentially is just a wiki on a USB stick (that being the idea), you're capable of upgrading it with whatever extensions you chose, as you would a normal wiki. It would allow you to make as many tiny edits for whatever purpose you'd like, until you've got what you want. PheNaxKian 21:34, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

'Scuse me. I have the stick. I install it and the machine becomes unusable. MoBo power regulator problem, not external power supply problem. No native USB on that machine. As I said ANCIENT. A few $K or a regular income would speed things up immensely, but medical problems have me on the ropes financially and emotionally. The details are quite painful so I really don't want to discuss it in any detail. Getting the OS software updated properly and I can get a WIKI up, but I'm having to practically build a custom distro, and that takes time. (I might even be able to turn that into real money, but that is neither here nor there for this.) --Max 2 01:57, 21 July 2009 (UTC)

Wait, wait, wait, you don't have a USB Drive on your normal, everyday computer? (I'm assuming the machine you use for stuff like the internet and the machine that is your family server are separate machines.) --Riddle 06:16, 21 July 2009 (UTC)

There are eight machines in the house. (When I was working, I tested network configurations at home before deploying them at work.) Only one has web server capability and it is the one we are discussing. Only one of the others is able to run Guild Wars. Another might be able to run Guild Wars if I put a high end non-Nvidia video card in it (or if Nvidia fixed their graphics library to work on AMD 32 bit machines). The fourth belongs to my daughters and runs Microschlock and can not be trusted as a server as a result. The laptop (which needs a new AC adapter) is older and less capable than the server. One is non-functional for other reasons. The other multi-media machine lacks a monitor and has issues with its mountable media, and the last is a bastion server which handles security and nothing else. All, except the laptop and the kid's machine, were put together from pieces. If money was available, I'd get a couple of displays (the current monitors glitch occasionally which indicates they could die at any moment), then the server upgrade, then a hard drive to replace bad one in the non-functional machine (which should have it's MoBo replaced as well). However all this is really just pipe dreams since there is no money.

Come to think of it, exchanging the file/web and bastion servers might improve things; I'll have to think about that... --Max 2 17:19, 21 July 2009 (UTC)

Use MoWeS. I'm going to assume one of your machines has A Windows OS. With MoWeS, the flash drive acts like a webserver, and so when you start it up, you only need to go to your web browser and type 127.0.0.1 into your address bar and it will take you to your mini-server. Perhaps the only thing that you can't do with it is have people access your mini-server to see your results. But, that shouldn't matter anyway once you get your project ironed out and whathaveyou. --Riddle 18:35, 21 July 2009 (UTC)

Sorry, the only windows machine belongs to my daughters and resides in their bedroom. I do not have regular access to it. (It gets infested fairly regularly and has to be wiped and re-installed from time to time, but that's the way they want it... They're both over 21, so who am I to argue...) I do have an un-opened XP distro, but I've never installed it and have no intention of doing so... --Max 2 23:16, 21 July 2009 (UTC)

What about the computer, you are running Guild Wars on? What OS has that one? poke | talk 07:05, 22 July 2009 (UTC)

Fedora 11 and wine on a dual core 2.4GHz Intel with 4GB main and 250GB SATA. It lets me run two instances of GW and a browser if I need to. I've pulled and installed the RPMS for the web servers and extensions about two weeks ago but need to configure them and bring them on-line. The server machine is on 24/7 but the fast machine is powered down maybe half the time and I sometimes do not have access to it when it is on. My daughter, who introduced me to GW, fusses when it lags. Yeah, I know, excuses... --Max 2 14:08, 22 July 2009 (UTC)

(Reset indent) Have you considered wikia for testing? There are 2 wikis that are dead that you might be able to do your stuff on (and even ask the wikia staff to get the right extensions installed) [1] and [2] --JonTheMon 15:52, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

Need to work on my home systems anyway and, while some changes to the new templates might be useful, they are not in play right now. So, if I don't get my own WIKI up, I will definitely consider your advice seriously. --Max 2 15:59, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

Categories in categories

I don't think there's a need for [[:Category:Template categories]] since Category:Templates can serve the same purpose with the added bonus of keeping all templates within that one category - it's the hub for templates and template categories. That's what the subcategory section is for, and it works well when used. -- Pling \ talk 12:46, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

Also, I'm not sure what [[:Category:Category]] is for, nor why it's categorised within itself. -- Pling \ talk 12:48, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

But technically, the template categories are not templates and there are special pages for listing templates...

Could you explain about template sub-categories? I am under the impression that they get created automatically when a category is listed as belonging in another category.

The Category:Category is the top of the category tree. It needs to be categorized and what else is it but yet another category? --Max 2 12:57, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

Yes, the template categories are not templates, but they are subcategories containing templates. It's the way we categorise on GWW, and I think we should have a similar system here - it works, it's effective, it's familiar, and it's less complex than having categories for articles and categories for categories (even when having categories for both articles and other categories works). -- Pling \ talk 13:16, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

I've had trouble with DPL when categories and articles got mixed together on GWW. I think labeling the 'Templates' category as 'Template category' is just enough clearer as to what should bear the tag and what should not. Specifically, templates in general should be tagged with the kind of template they are, not just as a template. --Max 2 13:27, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

Imo, Category:Template categories is redundant because it's re-using "category". And since Category:Template seems to be understood, shorter is better. And you know that you can exclude categories (or include namespaces) when doing DPL so that really shouldn't be an issue. --JonTheMon 13:30, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

To me Category:Template reades: This page contains a template and could be attached to all pages in the Template name space and to all other pages in other name spaces that are transcluded. Catagory:Template category reads: This page contains template categories. And, yes, categories can be excluded in DPL to get the pages needed if you go in and put additional categories on pages that are poorly categorized, I've had to do exactly that on GWW. It is not needed if the categories are named to clearly indicate what they should contain. I am not arguing that the category is not needed, just that the name needs to be improved, and the time to fix it is now, before a lot of stuff ends up with the old name on it... --Max 2 13:46, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

But with the sub-category system, Category:Template also includes any template categories. See what I did there? --JonTheMon 13:50, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

Oh, and I don't think we should have to change the system around to cater to poorly categorized pages. --JonTheMon 14:05, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

Yes, and that is EXACTLY what should NOT be done.!!! You are mixing two entirely different kinds of thing – templates and template categories. As it stands, a DPL search for category=Template gets you both kinds of item, which makes the category useless for isolating EITHER kind of thing. It should be fixed now before any more pages are poorly classified. --Max 2 14:10, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

Then what's the point of sub-categories? Or are you saying that there should never be any articles at any location in the category tree other than at the end of a leaf? --JonTheMon 14:24, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

Look at [[:Category:Category]]. It has sub-categories of which [[:Category:Template categories]] is one. Template categories has 11 sub-categories, some of which have sub-categories of their own. ALL the stuff under Category:Category are catagories. If you want to find references to specific pages in that category, go to that category page. As for pages at other than leaf nodes, they should be about ALL the sub-categories or about a particular sub-categories. A page describing Template categories or even describing a particular Template category might be tagged [[:Category:Template categories]] but pages that belong in a particular template category should not use the Category:Template categories tag. However, a better place for the descriptive information is on the Category: page for that category, rather than a page in any other name space. So, yes, references will be mostly on leaf nodes if the category structure is well categorized. --Max 2 15:04, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

To me, and possibly anyone else who's created or worked on a category tree, what you're doing is bad categorisation. You're trying to fix something that isn't broken, making it worse in the process. If you're trying to use DPL for something, change or add the DPL parameters and whatnot instead of changing the entire category tree and its workings. It's like trying to fix a tap by changing the structure and directions of the pipes and the nature of water instead of just... fixing the tap; assuming that the tap is even broken in the first place. -- Pling \ talk 15:19, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

Pingggggg: Yes, you can select on name spaces in DPL, but that is only useful if the categories make sense and are well structured. To use your analogy, it's like using the water pipes as the neutral return for your house wiring. (It is not even a very good idea to have more than one connection for the 'earth' ground of your house wiring.) It may not appear broken, but it sure isn't right to do it that way. Bluntly, the category structure on GWW is something of a mess. Re-creating that mess here can be avoided if it is fixed now. --Max 2 15:52, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

"notnamespace=Category" should remove any categories from the DPL result set. --84.128.214.229 16:02, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

I think you are missing completely the point of categories, mtew. We categorize pages not other categories. If we do the latter, then only for creating a category structure, so that you can browse deeper in one category by selecting a more special subcategory. Categorizing categories, as a "list" of categories, is not possible with MediaWiki and wouldn't have any positive side. You use categories, and subcategories to categorize pages, nothing more and nothing less.

If you have the problem that you are getting subcategory entries with DPL queries, then you are doing something really wrong, because by default that is not the case (because DPL is called "dynamic page list" for a reason). poke | talk 15:23, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

Poke: You miss the point of the 'Un-categorized category' special page. Think about that... The Category: name space pages are what categorize the categories, so technically you are correct as one level, but you are confusing your abstraction levels. What is wrong, is not my DPL. I did get it to work, but it required me to add categories to some of the pages to do so. If the category structure were rational, I would not have had to do that. --Max 2 15:52, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

Can you link me to that? --84.128.214.229 15:57, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

To what? Maybe you mean Special:UncategorizedCategories --Max 2 16:28, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

The mother of all categories are the biological classification schemes for plants and animals. Have a look at them over at wikipedia. Example: The order is called "Lepidoptera" and not "Lepidoptera suborders" because everything in its suborders is a butterfly (or moth or related). All animals (i.e. the butterfly outside your window right now) is simultaneously considered to belong to its species, its family, its suborder, its order, up to the kingdom: while it wouldn't be listed with the animal kingdom directly, it certainly is a member.

Because of this relationship, if you call a supercategory a category of categories, you cannot have any other objects but categories as subobjects in it, which means all categories in a category:categories category technically have to be empty.

In a well-designed category system, a category describes the superset of the pages in the transitive closure of its subcategories; i.e. all the nodes in the category tree below it. It does not describe the category tree itself. In fact, the category tree itself needs no description, since its structure is quite simple.

A different consideration: :In OO programming, the base class is called "object", because everything that inherits it is an object; it's not called "object class". --84.128.214.229 15:57, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

84: If you were to classify an actuall living thing only as a plant the professional biologists would laugh at you behind their hands. There are levels in many hierarchies that require further classification. I've labeled those levels with 'categories' here. Further, closure is not always possible. As for OO programming, I've taught that subject, possibly before you were even born. So please stop with the pedantry. You don't do it well and that is anoying. --Max 2 16:58, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

Well, categories are meant to be structured in a multi-level structure (call it a tree if you like), but destroying the subcategory feature by categorizing categories in a very flat structure makes no sense at all. I also have no idea what the special page has to do with that; you can simply put those categories in an appropriate category to enhance the whole category structure, but what you did makes no sense. See Category:Guild Wars Wiki on GWW for an example of how a full category tree works.

In reply to your answer to Pling above: If the categories are bad structured, make it better, this is a wiki at its very beginning. However your one-template-category-main-category simply removes the point of a multi-level structure. Because there is no way to browse deeper (or higher) from any point inside. And there is no need to explicitely split categories from articles in the category view, that is already done in a very nice way by the software. poke | talk 16:02, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

Whoa. wait a minute or two while I catch up... --Max 2 16:28, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

Poke: I fixed what I could on GWW, but to do it right would take a massive number of changes and the crew of you admins have made it clear that 'that is just not on' there. I am trying to make it right here, however your mis-characterization is not helping. The Category:Template categories already has sub-categories. It is not, and is not intended to be, flat. --Max 2 16:58, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

It would be great if you could explain, what exactly is your problem with the structure, because I still don't get it. And as I said, categories that only hold categories inside are worthless and don't do any good for a real categorization structure. And putting all template-related categories only in a main category for template-related categories does indeed make the whole template-related categorization structure very flat, because you have at most one level you go down from that main cat, although there is are more relations between single categories (and their pages!) than the fact that they are "template-related". poke | talk 17:18, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

Biologists would say, "mm, you seem to have un unknown plant there, let's see if we can classify it further". A wiki has to accomodate an influx of new editors who don't always know how to properly sort their contributions, so sorting something into Category:Templates and leavingit to others to classify it further makes sense to me. The rest of your post, alas, consisted of personal attacks; as per your page header, maybe you wish to remove it? --84.128.214.229 17:32, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

After the were done laughing, maybe. Your behavior is annoying. I get the impression you are doing that deliberately. I have no idea if you are annoying personally. There is a difference between criticizing your action and attacking you personally.

Really, stop it. You are once again ignoring multiple comments against you, without even providing good arguments except "for myself" or something like that. poke | talk 17:24, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

YOU stop it. The only difference between 'Templates' and 'Template categories' is the NAME and I have tried to explain why the name is wrong, and all you've said is 'I don't understand'. Well, TRY to understand, rather than just engaging in an edit war! If I tried that, I'd get BANNED for it, but, you, being a sysop, won't. That REALLY sucks the hairy root! --Max 2 17:40, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

so tell me something then, if all that's different is the name...what difference does it make to have "template categories" as opposed to "templates"? 84.43.107.85 17:42, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

And one difference is that Category:Templates will hold generic templates as well, but Category:Template categories won't given from the name.. Also the name is just bad, as explained above subcategories are already listed in a special place on the category page... poke | talk 17:45, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

Then create a category 'Templates that need classification' and put that under 'Template categories'. Putting it under 'Templates' makes it look like it is properly categorized, when it is not. --Max 2 17:57, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

Eh? Why do you think that pages in the general templates category are not properly categorized? A lot templates simply don't fit in the existing subcategories, and creating a new subcategory for only one template is rather senseless.. Also given that the template is a template, it really fits into the category that contains templates. In the same way as generic image templates that are neither fitting for one of the subcategories are in exactly that category and not in some subcategory "Image templates with no further classifications" - because that is really senseless given that MediaWiki obviously makes it possible to have both articles and subcategories in one category.. poke | talk 18:07, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

Just because you can do something does not mean it is a good idea. 'Odd', 'Unique', 'Other', 'Miscellaneous' or 'Un-categorizable' could be used to describe that kind of template. On the other hand, if you really insist on mixing templates and template categories on the same page, put a note on the Category:Templates page warning that 'notcategory=Categor' or 'category=Category' will be needed to seperate the two sets when using DPL. (Being a technical note, I'd put that as section on the discussion page so it would not confuse the novice wikian.) --Max 2 18:28, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

People who are working with DPL (and that are really not many) will probably know that, or at least notice it (as you did) when trying something like that; on the other hand it's very unlikely that they look on a category talk page for that.. poke | talk 18:36, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

Probably – Still, there should be a note on the discussion page. --Max 2 18:51, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

Links

This doesn't really work. If you're going to edit those pages in order to remove the redlinks, it would be a lot better if you either replaced them with the actual colours (you could look at the equivalent GWW templates to find them), or create the template so there's no redlink issue. -- Pling \ talk 22:08, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

Are either of those really a good idea? It's stuff lazy users simply copied from GWW and mostly just inappropriate here. In all but a few cases, the replacements really are just as good as the originals – they are ignored. By converting transclusions to bold text, almost all the original information is retained and can be restored quite simply. As for creating the templates, that would be making a big assumption about professions in GW2; something I am not willing to do. (If you want to, by all means, go ahead.) As for killing red-links, that's way to much for me to do by myself and is sure to create much more noise than applause. The 'wanted templates' and 'wanted categories' are actually small enough that I've been able to make a very noticeable reduction in their size (with a bunch of expert but less than voluntary help <grin/>). --Max 2 22:24, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

This is very much minor issue, but I figured if you were going to edit those pages, you might as well fix them. In future, those templates might be created (though that has a small chance of happening), so leaving them might help those users more than replacing the template calls with bold. I'll leave it with you though.-- Pling \ talk 22:53, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

I've just about gone as far as I can go at the moment. There are still a few categories and templates on the wanted pages. All the stuff dealing with professions is now inactive, so that is no longer a problem. I've copied a formatting template that does not imply any content from GWW (Template:3/4) and I will probably do Template:Any-color shortly, The rest of the stuff seems to be content related, but what the content is would require looking stuff up on GWW. I might do that, but to actually convert the stuff would probably require quite a bit of judgment on my part, and the lot of you don't seem to think very much of that. I don't entirely blame you for that. I do sometimes deliberately create controversy when I see a problem, a decision is needed and no one else is making the decision. The Category: thing above is an example of that. There is now only one un-categorized category and that category is not used. (In fact, I just marked it for deletion.) I don't remember the exact number from when I started but clearing that list actually puts the whole WIKI on a much more solid foundation. Similarly, there were about 50 wanted categories when this started, and there are now less than 20. O've probably just stuck my foot in my mouth, but I do that when I get tired and grumpy. Best stop now. --Max 2 09:19, 26 July 2009 (UTC)

Categories

Could you try to use plural names for the categories? For example "Category:Edit button icons" instead of "Category:Edit button icon". Thanks :) poke | talk 15:47, 26 July 2009 (UTC)

OK, If you promise to actually delete the old category pages fairly quickly after I've tagged them... --Max 2 15:50, 26 July 2009 (UTC)

lol, I'll try my best :D poke | talk 15:53, 26 July 2009 (UTC)

8þ --Max 2 15:57, 26 July 2009 (UTC)

Civility Policy

I completely forgot to cite my sources! I'm sorry about that. ^^ To be honest I don't know if all Wikias follow the rules of Wikipedia, or if they each apply rules as they see fit, but I know Wikipedia itself has a civility policy here. Basically it's just saying that it's possible for people to be offensive without actually making personal attacks (such as purposefully being uncooperative, making things difficult for people, having an arrogant, rude, condescending, impolite, or just generally disagreeable attitude, etc). Now, again, I don't know if this site promotes that policy or not. ^^ But, that's the one I was talking about. I'm very sorry about taking so long to answer your question; I didn't see it until tonight! :) Anyway, have a good evening! --Amannelle 02:49, 11 May 2010 (UTC)

If a sysop promotes the policy, then the policy is promoted. No real policies have been created for this wiki yet, and for the moment sysop discretion (which is mostly based on GW1W policy) will rule. Hasn't been a problem so far, to my knowledge. --Kyoshi (Talk) 02:53, 11 May 2010 (UTC)

Oooh I see. :) thank you for the info. ^_^ I didn't know quite how it worked, seeing as how I'm still a bit of a newbie when it comes to wikia. :) --Amannelle 03:00, 11 May 2010 (UTC)

S'fine, asking questions is rarely discouraged, so feel free to bring anything else up. Probably not to me, though, I just know a lot about particular bits and pieces. --Kyoshi (Talk) 04:41, 11 May 2010 (UTC)

Actually, it is the SysOp team that is most uncivil on GWW. They set the tone here and while I sometimes over-react, as I'll admit I did in this case, this is nothing compared to what the effective policy really is here. --Max 2 17:09, 11 May 2010 (UTC)

Just a note, a wiki is different to Wikia (a company that hosts multiple wikis). Wikipedia is a separate wiki, and its policies only apply there (though most of them have good points to learn from). pling 17:04, 11 May 2010 (UTC)

File:Sample_skill.jpg

It redirected to a user image that was uploaded with improper naming, so I tagged it for deletion. I didn't mess anything up that you were working on, did I?-- Shew ♠♠♠ 01:05, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

Yep, you did. It's an example for the template:Skill infobox. It should not be a seperate file, simply a link to some other icon. I'm in the process of putting it back with a little more explination. ou're quite fast... I was in the process of fixing it and improving the documentation when I found it was gone. Give me a moment and check again. --Max 2 01:10, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

RE:Crafting Materials

I've left a reply on my talk page. As a side-note it took me a while to identify your comment as yours (because of the way your signature is different from your username). Anyway, I've put an example of my own forward, which is mostly an aesthetic change based on your proposal. I'll leave it up to you to pick a location to continue discussion, and I'll happily join in. :) - Infinite - talk 14:58, 15 June 2012 (UTC)

My sig is a link to my talk page as is usual. The sig text is a semantic shift that is intended to correct some of the jumble my initials usually create.
Please continue on User talk:Mtew/Materials. --Max 2 18:44, 15 June 2012 (UTC)

Icons

I'm not sure I get the point of uploading all those images with working file names, or names that have no correlation to the object. Could you explain that? --JonTheMon 03:39, 17 June 2012 (UTC)

They can simply be 'moved' to the proper place once that place can be determined. Meanwhile simply being able to review the entire set will speed up finding the correct icon for whatever purpose it is needed for. --Max 2 05:53, 17 June 2012 (UTC)

Simply 'moving' them will require thousands, if not tens of thousands, of redirect deletions. Waiting until we know what the icon is for and then uploading it to a proper name will save a lot of work in the long run. -Auron 10:20, 17 June 2012 (UTC)

So give me the power to move things without creating redirects. Or is this just one of your crusades against thinking ahead? This will save a lot of other people work trying to find the icons they need. --Max 2 10:29, 17 June 2012 (UTC)

If you don't mind me asking how did you get the icons without the matching names for the items? Is there a tool to examine/extract from the Gw2.dat?XeroKitsune 10:51, 17 June 2012 (UTC)

While I suspect that there is such a tool and that it was used to make the archive of icons Rhoot posted, I don't have one myself. Since the names of objects change depending on what language is used, I suspect that the game really uses these names internally and has another table that provides readable names of each icon. If I was running this wiki, I'd set up a bunch of redirects to handle the multiple language issue, but I'd ask poke about the best way to handle that. --Max 2 11:10, 17 June 2012 (UTC)

Whilst moving isn't immediately a bad idea, many icons are used for multiple items. Since we upload icons as if they were all unique, moving doesn't apply to many icons for that reason. - Infinite - talk 11:36, 17 June 2012 (UTC)

I was thinking that when an icon with a working name was identified and a name for it was decided upon, the working file would be moved. If there is really that much objection to that kind of movement and the clean up problems, a redirect from the new name to the working file could be added instead of moving. Redirects could also be used where an icon has multiple uses, but that is an entirely seperate issue. --Max 2 11:58, 17 June 2012 (UTC)

A quick note regarding the one icon per item—unless I'm reading it wrong, scanning the gallery of icons uploaded shows that there are already definitely repeats in the icons being uploaded (in terms of a file having the same art as another file), so I don't know if that addresses that issue or not. Redshift 12:11, 17 June 2012 (UTC)

Yes, there are duplicates, but if you check the roll-over drop-downs in the gallerys you will note that I have not actually uploaded the duplicates. (I may have misunderstood how the upload process works and duplicated stuff. I hope not.) --Max 2 12:25, 17 June 2012 (UTC)

As I understand it, attempting to upload a duplicate should give a warning, so if another user would try to upload an image that was duplicate of one of those icons, they would see that such an icon already exists. However, I don't think this is very accurate recognition. Possibly even one pixel difference in resolution might break dupe recognition, so it's not guaranteed that no duplicates will be uploaded by other users.

I think that a better approach here would be to start by identifying each icon before uploading them. There's plenty of recognizable icons in your gallery, like Marksman's Bracers, along with the rest of that armor set. Mediggo 09:09, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

To make the work clearer and more direct, you should hold off on uploading until you know what the file corresponds to. Others have access to the same images from Rhoot, so if they can identify them, they can upload them as well under the right name. --JonTheMon 12:45, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

(Reset indent) Actually the resolution doesn't even have to differ for the duplication check to fail. It could have the exact same pixels, but be compressed differently. — Rhoot 13:17, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

MW stores an SHA-1 hash in the database for each file, and uses that to determine what images are duplicates. Something as small as a single unit difference in the red value of a single pixel would generate a different hash. —Dr Ishmael 14:15, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

BTW, I don't think fixing those links in galleries will do any good. If a link on the gallery was broken, it would indicate to any user that the image linked to is either missing or moved into its proper filename already. Mediggo 14:34, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

You know, before embarking/continuing this project that's (in its current fashion) going to create a lot of unnecessary work for people, you could have asked for work saving ideas. If people absolutely needed to see the images before they could identify them, you could have uploaded an aggregate image (9x9-16x16) and get that labelled before uploading any individual icons. That way, we'd have 80-250 less moves and redirect deletions. --JonTheMon 15:42, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

Since some people don't like my idea, I will suspend work on this when I finish uploading the stuff for the current page. However, I think there are two problems with what you are saying:

The actual moves are not all that much work and can be done by someone who does not have access to the icon images themselves. That lets a lot more people get involved in improving the wiki than would otherwise be able to take part.

Deleting the redirects should not happen until I have had a chance to update the gallery. The rate that happens is limited to how fast I can work, so it should not overwhelm the sysops doing their usual maintainance.

Yet another point is that you are asking me to do a ton of extra work. Building an aggregate requires more work on my part than simply uploading the icons and putting them in a gallery. It puts the burden on me or someone else with access to the icon images to upload them later and requires an extra communication step getting the information about what the images should be called to us. If the images are already in place, they can simply be moved by the people who identify them.

Really, you are arguing for an eletist group doing all the work. I'm trying to spread the load. I can do the technical scut work and let the less technical community members do the work I am not suited for. --Max 2 16:19, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

You could also upload them to a Flickr or imgur album instead of directly to the wiki. —Dr Ishmael 16:04, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

Yet more technical tools that most people don't have and would require extra work to use... --Max 2 16:24, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

Uh, they're not technical tools - they're image hosting websites that anyone can access: Flickr and imgur. —Dr Ishmael 16:27, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

They are still tools, and that makes it even worse. These are ArenaNet Images and should NOT be posted to such third party locations. --Max 2 16:38, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

Again, this argument is pointless. If someone wants the icons they are just as easy to browse in the zip as they are in your gallery (easier actually since you don't have to click 'next' all the time). Uploading an icon is not technically demanding. Also, regardless of whether or not the redirect pages will have to be deleted at the same time, you are still creating over 2000 temporary pages that will have to be deleted sooner or later. — Rhoot 16:45, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

delete reasons

"Orphan" is not a correct delete reason for those pages. They are either move remnants (if they've been moved to the proper name) or redundant (if the same icon was already at the proper name). —Dr Ishmael 15:21, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

It was a move redirect that has now become an orphan. That makes it an move remnant. Please do not get prickly about the phrasing, just delete the damn thing. --Max 2 15:28, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

They were already tagged for deletion with an appropriate reason. I'm saying there's no need to edit them to change the reason to something that doesn't make sense. —Dr Ishmael 16:05, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

The original request was highly improper. The redirect was in use and adding the delete request broke the redirect. It also was inappropriate to mark the request speedy since the redirect was in use. Whoever made that request was not folowing the guidelines properly. And you are complaining to me? --Max 2 16:34, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

Guidelines you say? Guidelines aren't rules, thus sysops have some freedom in how they do things. Having a redirect from <random number>.ateu.png to the actual icon is not useful to anyone. If the only use is in your gallery page, then by the same guidelines you speak of they should be called User Mtew <random number>.ateu.png. But again, guidelines aren't rules.

Regardless, this whole argument is pointless. How about we leave it at this? — Rhoot 16:39, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

(Edit conflict) Agreed, guidelines are not rules, but they are there for a purpose. If there were rules, I would have said something stronger than simply improper, and I would have asked for an admin action. However, I will change the naming convention I use on future uploads; I'll call them 'User Rhoot <number>.uteu.png' files since they are actually your files. 8Þ. --Max 2 17:02, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

(Edit conflict) This entire "upload for the purpose of movement" plan had fail all over it from the beginning. The redirects are unnecessary, as such they are well deserved of a (speedy) deletion. As Rhoot has pointed out, a file of <random number>.ateu.png has no logical sense remaining as a redirect for mainspace wiki. You have started the upload an move project, and as such you must accept some of the responsibility. Maintain your own user galleries when broken redirects are being presented. Cheers. Venom20 16:45, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

Bullshit. I'll admit the names are not quite right, but you broke the redirects while they were still in use. --Max 2 17:02, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

Changing the naming won't change the fact that you are uploading a ridiculous number of temporary files. And how hard is it to use a screen capture of images in a directory as your aggregate image? --JonTheMon 18:10, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

You are stuck in a rut or fail to understand what can happen. They need not be temporary. Several have already been moved to their proper location. --Max 2 18:17, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

It seems that you are missing the gist of a lot of these comments: instead of uploading, moving, and deleting redirects, have a way to figure out the final page and upload straight to that. Having aggregate images reduces the cleanup required. --JonTheMon 18:20, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

I think I understand you. It is just that what has been suggested is illegal. Posting the unaltered images here complies with ArenaNet's posted licence terms and express permissions in respect to this site. Anything else is a technical violation of their rules. That means no other sites and no aggregate images. If you want to get really picky, Rhoot's posting could be considered to be a violation, but they have had more than enough time to have posted a take-down notice and that has not happened, so I guess they are going to let that pass. They could get upset if there were further postings elsewhere. So, please, think a bit more about what you are saying. --Max 2 18:38, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

How is making an aggregate image and saying that it is copyright anet illegal? Afaik, alteration (at least of this type) doesn't violate the use rules. --JonTheMon 18:42, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

I'm no good at legal stuff, but I thought that fair use actually existed in America or somewhere. Mediggo 18:48, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

The aggragate is a derivative work, and I suspect that if they got really up-tight, they could complain. I'd perfer not to push it. I have been fairly careful to label everything I've uploaded as belonging to ArenaNet. The rules are actually pretty much what ArenaNet makes of them, with some limitations. It might (and probably would be in fact) OK to put up an aggragate, but, since I am not absolutely sure, I don't want to risk their rath. Doing the individual uploads also allows more direct action by other community members. The only clean up will be when I by-pass the redirects in the gallery, so that part of the problem is not quite what you suggest either.

I actually have studied 'fair use' some. IIRC one of the policies of this site is not to go for fair use. The only real way to determine fair use is to have a Federal Judge rule on the particular instance. Not going there if I can help it! --Max 2 19:07, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

I meant that if you would create an aggragate and upload it somewhere else - not this wiki - would probably count as fair use of copyrighted material? I also don't think that ArenaNet would ever complain about, yet alone actually go to court with, community effort to document their game. Mediggo 19:14, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

I am not the one uploading them and I am not the one using them in the user namespace. They should not have my name regardless of the fact I was the one who extracted them. — Rhoot 17:10, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

You're no fun. No sense of humor. 8Þ Still that makes it clear you don't want that level of attribution --Max 2 18:17, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

(Reset indent) Mediggo: Posting ArenaNet art anywhere but this site is against the rules AreanaNet made whenever someone gets access to their stuff. They don't have to go to court. They already have lawyers paid for who can, and do, send letters when they get peeved enough. If you don't get a lawyer to answer their letters, all they have to do is batch up a bunch of unanswered letters, pay a single fee to the court and get a default judgement. Go 'pro se' and you are very likely to mess up, so you best do what they ask and write them a nice 'Thank you, we have done that.' letter. NOT GOING THERE. --Max 2 19:31, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

If anet bitches about it, then we change. Otherwise we can do what seems reasonable. In this case, it is more reasonable to not upload everything with the intent of moving it. And if someone else wants to help, then it changes when the uploads happen: to when they are actually in the correct places; before then, they can help identify where they are to go with aggregate pictures. --JonTheMon 19:19, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

'Reasonable' in your opinion, not mine. And how is your non-technical user going to know what icons are available? My gallery lets them see what is available.

I've finished page 5 and will let thing settle before adding more. --Max 2 19:41, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

What do you mean what icons are available? They look at the aggregate image, and below that is a table with links/locations of where the image is supposed to go. Easy. Also, don't continue adding more until we come to a consensus here. --JonTheMon 19:49, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

'WHAT aggragate? There isn't one here that I know of. Posting one somewhere else is a definite no-no. Even posting an aggragate here is questionable. You seem to getting ahead of yourself. And read what I just posted about continuing.

This has gone on long enough now. Since you apparantly don't have the balls to create a listing someplace else, I did it myself. Even a non-technical user can right click, save as and upload to the wiki. — Rhoot 19:52, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

Keep it civil! And you've posted it to the public? At least you included an ArenaNet copyright notice and terms of use. It takes forever to upload... --Max 2 20:12, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

The balls thing was meant as a joke, no harm intended. I put a link to it on my user page. — Rhoot 20:16, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

Joke... OK, but :P or 8Þ (&THORN;) helps. --Max 2 20:23, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

Because we're not getting through

I've consolidated Template talk:Value into the following points:

• Reasons you have provided for adding text functionality to the template: 1 (and its vague)
• The number of times you have asserted that you need this functionality: 5.
• Number of users who have told you to put it in your userspace: 5 (myself, Jon, Alfa-R, Mediggo, WT).

Finally:

• Users who have argued that this change is a good idea: 1 (you)
• Users who have stated that they don't like this change: 9 (myself, Infinite, Dr. Ishmael, JontheMon, Mediggo, Torrenal, Alfa-R, Venom20, WT)

Nine users, many of whom disagree on other things, all agreeing that the change is a bad idea is as close to consensus as one gets. The reason you provided is that we need them for tooltips. If we ever decide to go the "tool-tip route," we will undoubtedly make them real, functional tooltips that can include images. So move it to your userspace, please, because the change is not supported. Also, I cba to go through your entire interaction history with Jon, though it seems to me that you're calling the "personal vendetta" card because you think that will enhance your argument. It doesn't. Jon is, perhaps, one of the more impartial admins (IMHO), and saying that he reverted the change (after everyone except you voiced their opinion that it wasn't a good change) because he is biased against you for some reason is absurd.
tl;dr Just put it in your userspace; don't force your change on a mainspace template. Aqua (talk) 20:06, 20 June 2012 (UTC)

'vague' is squishy and I think incorrect. The current implementation assumes that the only use of the template is graphical. I found a situation where that assumption caused problems.

You note that some others did not like the idea but none gave reasons other than personal preference for not making the change. I, at least, stated a problem to be addressed.

There was a need to check for breakage. There was none reported. Given that, The changes could have been copied to my space and the main page reverted, but given the situation, that was not absolutely necessary, and the time to do it would have been well after the arguments started. As it stands, the reversion was totally political and completely ignores the principle of least action.

So you did get through, but what you got through was basicly a threat of mob violence. Fuck that! --Max 2 20:42, 20 June 2012 (UTC)

The principle of least action ceased to apply when you made the change in the first place against current consensus. Also, having a "me against the world" view is not a good idea for any wiki-er. Wikis are founded on consensus which is, in turn comprised of individual opinions.

Because we seem to be dancing around what you intend to do with it, care to explain, exactly, what you are planning to do with this added functionality? Aqua (talk) 20:54, 20 June 2012 (UTC)

1. There was no opposing concensus when I made the change. A probable concensus against the change was definitely forming, but Jon forced the issue.
2. The explination is on the discussion page. Further debate on that topic belongs there.
3. It is not me against the world It is just a small clique who have a policy of harasment. The clique has hangers-on, but has admited, at least in my eyes, to having nothing more than political reasons for their action. You don't seem to be in their circle. You actually respond rationally some of the time. 8Þ --Max 2 21:17, 20 June 2012 (UTC)

(Edit conflict) No, a threat of mob violence would be saying my cousin, Guido Mostaccioli, is going to break your kneecaps if you don't stop arguing. Which, by the way, he will. 21:00, 20 June 2012 (UTC)

See! I told you The Mob was involved! 8Þ --Max 2 21:17, 20 June 2012 (UTC)

"There was no opposing concensus when I made the change" Is that because you voiced your intent at 03:59 and then implemented it at 05:33? Perhaps in the future you can leave some time after suggestion and before implementation for a discussion to occur; at least more than approximately an hour and a half. Especially when making changes to a widely used mainspace article. This wiki is global in nature and many people do take some time away from the wiki during the course of a day. Also this may be stern and perhaps slightly hard for you to swallow, but you generally use the word I when stating a need for this certain change. The wiki is not an I project, but a we project. If you alone would like to use something and you alone appear to have the need for it, as has been suggested, why not just create a replicate of the template in your userspace? Venom20 21:47, 20 June 2012 (UTC)

That is a formula for never doing anything. When I started on this wiki, years ago, I asked exactly about that. I was told specifically that the expected procedure was to make the change and then wait for discusion. If there was contreversy, the change would be backed out when a real concensus was reached. That works for a lot of people. There are, however, cliques with certain people as their targets. The clique will complain about anything their targets do, and, being vocal, they get a lot of notice and a following. This is what is happening here. So, strictly speaking, I should not have had to post a discussion topic, and the amount of time to wait could be as short as a few seconds. You are suggesting that a day aught to be the minimum delay. It could be argued that a week should pass first (since some people only visit on the weekends). That simply panders to the cliques. So I must conclude that you arguing from a 'politically correct' point of view, and I reject that on principle. --Max 2 22:59, 20 June 2012 (UTC)

Because I couldn't find the exact reason in the discussion on Template talk:Value, how about you restate here? And I'll rephrase that, you're making this a "me vs them" thing, which is also not what wikis are about. Wikis aren't which group (or individual) yells the loudest, its what the entire community wants. You seem to be missing that point. Aqua (talk) 22:32, 20 June 2012 (UTC)

Simply no. That discussion belongs on the other page.

For the rest, tell that to JonTheMon. Go look at our history and consider that his original objection was strictly an 'I don't like it (or you)' response with no reasons stated. Until you have done that, I will consider this discussion closed. --Max 2 23:00, 20 June 2012 (UTC)

Being passive aggressive about the reason won't get you anywhere. If you can't provide a clear, thought-out reason, then I'm going to assume that there isn't one, in which case I should revert. If you provide a reason I might at the very least be able to assess whether this is the best way to do it. Aqua (talk) 00:06, 21 June 2012 (UTC)

Excuse me, but I am not being 'passive aggressive'. I know verry well how to do that and that is not what I am doing here. You are aggressively trying to make a factual issue into a personal one by trying to discuss it here. The descussion of the template belongs on the Template talk:Value page where all the people involved can comment. I have, and will continue the discussion there. By trying to discuss it here, you exclude the more rational members of the audiance. --Max 2 00:55, 21 June 2012 (UTC)

(Reset indent) Guys, please don't beat Mtew to death with the consensus hammer- you can't just "have consensus" in one day anyway. The discussion at Template talk:Value is still ongoing and may yet be productive, so I encourage you to participate in that instead. 03:36, 21 June 2012 (UTC)

File IDs

The file IDs on Rhoot's files don't mean anything. They were assigned sequentially by the program that unpacked his dat file, and everyone's dat file is going to be ordered differently. So unfortunately, the file ID isn't useful information. —Dr Ishmael 12:37, 26 June 2012 (UTC)

There is evidence to the contrary:

1. The numbers are not sequential.
2. The same numbers have appeared from seperate sources.
3. The numbers would change after updates and they apparently do not.

Further, the game has to have a consistant way to reference the images (and other files) internally that is language independent, so, unless you have definite information to the contrary, please assume the IDs are consistant. If they are not, they can be removed later, but until then, they provide an internal cross reference that can be used for consistancy checking. --Max 2 12:48, 26 June 2012 (UTC)

My evidence is the source code of the unpacker program:

for (int x=max(0,sid); x<min(MFT.ItemCount,eid+1); x++)
{
    printf("Processing file %6d: ",x);
    DumpFile(x,MFT[x]);
    printf("\n");
}

...

void DumpFile(int num, MFTEntry *m)
{
    ...
    sprintf(Name,"%.8d",num);
    sprintf(newname,"GWDat/Unsorted/%s.raw\0",Name);
    ...
    [giant nested case statements that determine file type and re-generate newname with the correct folder and file extension]
    ...
    WriteFile(newname,Output,OutSize);
}

void WriteFile(char *Filename, unsigned char *data, int Size)
{
    FILE *f=fopen(Filename,"w+b");
    ...
}

The GW/GW2 game engines reference files through a Master File Table that resides in the dat file, but this also uses arbitrary (non-sequential) indexes to refer to the files - there are no formal "file names" in the game engine or the dat file.

As for different people generating the same numbers, I will concede that's probably possible because we all have very "fresh" dat files - if two people download the entire dat file at the same time, they'll be very similar. It's game updates that do most of the file rearrangement, and we've only had a few of those so far. I know from experience in GW1, though, that after a couple years everything will be completely mixed up. —Dr Ishmael 13:13, 26 June 2012 (UTC)

That is convincing! It looks like C++ code (with the declaration in the for statement). Please send me a copy of the whole source file at 'max at mtew dot isa-geek dot net'. Thanks in advance. --Max 2 13:26, 26 June 2012 (UTC)

Hmm.... I might have to partially eat my words now, due to information I was not aware of before. Later in the thread I linked you to, it looks like Rhoot himself updated the unpacker to use indexes from the MFT for the filenames, instead of loop counter. However, I'm not entirely certain if that's what the code is actually doing because it's in a super-complicated object-oriented/packaged format that uses external tools, so I'm having trouble following the variables through all the functions.

If it does do that, then different people using the new GW2DatUnpacker to unpack the exact same build will get identical filenames. Unfortunately, it's very likely that the MFT indexes are mutable between builds, so there's no guarantee that you'll get the same filenames if you unpack again after a game update. In the end, the IDs still don't have any real significance, and I don't see much value in adding them to the file pages on the wiki. —Dr Ishmael 15:15, 26 June 2012 (UTC)

Thank you for the pointer BTW. OK, that puts the IDs back into play. They don't have to mean anything, just be consistant. I'm not going to go on a massive edit to add the IDs, but I'll add them if I touch the files for some reason. As I said, they provide raw data for consistancy checking. --Max 2 04:57, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

Not sure why you would think the fild IDs don't have any real significance when in fact they're quite important and never change. 78.47.250.35 05:13, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

Maybe I should have said no absolute significance since they are arbitrary. The numbers, as numbers, mean nothing. Their invariance is their only important property and even that could change if ArenaNet did a 'de novo' reconstruction of their database. They might do that for the release, but even that is unlikely. --Max 2 10:57, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

Account vault

Would you be willing to make an RfC about this? I feel that it lacks a little polish for mainspace and needs a little outside perspective. --JonTheMon 15:43, 4 July 2012 (UTC)

Also, naming and capitalization (Account vault, not Account Vault). --JonTheMon 15:46, 4 July 2012 (UTC)

The stuff I moved to main space is in main space because I had reached the point where I have little to add to what has been done and others were actually doing a better job of adding to it than I was. Since it is in main space, I have no objections to other people, especially senior people like you, making corrections. If you think the name needs adjustment, by all means have at it! I believe that is how wiki are supposed to work, isn't it? The only thing that I really would not like to see happen if for it to disapear.

The stuff still in sand boxes is stuff I need to add to before I think it is even close to ready. --Max 2 04:03, 5 July 2012 (UTC)

While I didn't explicitly say that it shouldn't be in mainspace yet, i can see how that comes across. Now that it is in mainspace (and since it needs polish) that's even more reason to RfC. --JonTheMon 05:01, 5 July 2012 (UTC)

OK. I've moved the stuff to the name you said was proper and I've asked that the move remenants be deleted. That leaves the RFC to finish your action list. --Max 2 03:21, 6 July 2012 (UTC)

A reminder

No one is out to get you, no one is oppressing you, no one is discriminating against you, and even if they were, your responses would still not be appropriate for the wiki. Tone the hostility way, way, way down. If you find yourself typing a post in anger, erase it and step away from the wiki until you have calmed down; the discussion will still be there when you get back. - Tanetris 21:09, 10 July 2012 (UTC)

First, there is the 'tall puppy syndrome'; the tendancy for a gang to focus on discenters and others that stand out from the crowd.  You are correct in the sense that it focuses on any exceptional person indescrimenantly, but it still focuses on individuals.  I simply stand as a lightning rod for their malicious intent.  In that sense, I know that their attacks are not personal.  I have been careful not to attack the persons responsible, only their actions.

Second, the anger is focused on the lies, deceptions and malicious misrepresentations.  Those do not go away with time and thrive in darkness.  "For evil to triumph, it is only necessary that good people do nothing."  Well, I shine the light of truth on these evil actions and they really do not like the result.  It would be irrisponsable of me to let this kind of activity pass unremarked and unchalanged.  --Max 2 06:30, 11 July 2012 (UTC)

Don't make the mistake of thinking you're the only one capable of "shining the light of truth on evil," because quite frankly, it's bullshit. If your light shining crusade gets in the way of this wiki project, it will be stopped. No amount of unwarranted self-righteousness will prevent it.

You have a history of an inability to field legitimate criticism to your ideas and suggestions. You assume it's personal when it isn't, and now you're trying to assume it's meta-personal; that your ideas are being shot down simply because they're different, and not because, y'know, they've been looked at and given a fair shot, but in the end were just not right for this project. This came out in your recent argument with Ishmael, JonTheMon and Valento - they all took an honest, unbiased look at your id suggestion and decided that it wasn't in the best interest of the wiki. At first, the discussion was almost sensible; you put forth your points, they put forth their rebuttals. Then you flew off the handle, started soap boxing and stirring drama - leaving the actual argument behind in favor of some Karlos-level martyr case (complete with the "I'm the only one capable of seeing the light"). That is not the proper response, and it is not one that will be accepted or allowed on this wiki.

The other participants in the discussion treated it like a discussion. They contemplated it, attempted to ascertain the purpose of your proposal, and in the end, decided against it. The decision wasn't reached because you're you, and it wasn't reached because they're frothing at the mouth trying to maintain the status quo at all costs. It was simply a decision. When the majority of participants in a discussion come to the same conclusion, we generally call that "consensus." You pitched an idea, and attempted to alter consensus with your argument - that's fine, that's how wikis work. But when it became apparent that consensus was firmly against your idea, instead of saying "oh, consensus is apparently against this idea," you start calling people obtuse and claiming that you're the only who who cares about the "quality and consistency of the information in this wiki." No. Just no. That will not fly here.

A good chunk of being part of a greater whole is understanding just that - the whole is greater. You can feel one way about a topic, and the entire wiki can feel the other way - but does that give you a right to trample over this community, throwing a fit because you didn't get your way? Damn right it doesn't. You've got a rap sheet for disruption - on both wikis. You can choose to play nice with the community, or at least pretend to play nice, or you can choose not to be a part of the community at all. If the latter is indeed your choice, continue doing what you're doing. The issue will sort itself out. -Auron 08:58, 11 July 2012 (UTC)

(edit conflict)Okay. One of the wiki's guiding principles is assuming good faith; that is, that everyone (vandals aside) shares the ultimate goal of improving the wiki for everyone, even if they have vastly different ideas how to do so. Rather than viewing yourself as the light against the darkness, I need you to take a step back and take a fresh look at things with the following assumptions in mind:

• That Jon and Ishmael, and in general anyone you're having a disagreement with, honestly believe what they do/want to do will lead to the wiki being better for everyone.
• That they have fully read and given due consideration to what you say to them.
• That they are trying to explain their views fairly and honestly.
• That anything they do or say that seems to contradict the above be some combination of miscommunication on one or both sides, human fallibility on one or both sides, a fundamental disagreement on an underlying premise, and/or high frustration levels on one or both sides.

Long story short, no one here is evil, and if you're acting on the premise that they are, nothing's ever going to get accomplished. - Tanetris 09:02, 11 July 2012 (UTC)

The main problem is that they use evil means to accomplish questionable ends.  In particular, their habit of asserting that their opinions represent a concensus long before a rational concensus could have formed is reprehensable.  Their deleting material that they disagree with before it can be examined and discussed is likewise just wrong.  I do assume good faith until there is strong evidence (as there is in this case) to the contrary. 

The real issue is that they claim what I propose to do would be harmful to the wiki.  They provide no rational explination of how that would happen.; only that ArenaNet or NCSoft might object.  That is at best an opinion, and there is at least some evidence that the opposite is true.  Nor do they 'explain' their point of view; they simply proclaim it as right without explanation. 

They have a very narrow view of the purpose of the wiki.  They are intolerent of other, broader, views.  They take actions to surpress others' views.  That makes them bigots.  Bigotry IS, by its very nature, EVIL.  Also note that Auron has again added a threat to stop me, probably in the same way he did before. 

Finally, I do not claim to be the only one to see the light.  I do listen to what is said.  I just hear "we don't want this" from a few who wish to dictate wiki policy and the silence or lies and deception that comes back when I ask "why not do it anyway?" as well.  --Max 2 19:03, 11 July 2012 (UTC)

Here's the thing, Max. We, the administrators of GW2W, don't actually care whether users are evil. If JonTheMon raped and pillaged all of Europe, or if Dr ishmael personally slaughtered thousands of Kurds, it would not matter here one iota. What we do care about is things that do not contribute to the overall health of the wiki and its community- for instance, users who constantly find themselves embroiled in meaningless conflicts with half the administrative team. So I highly recommend you learn to pick your fights, because it's hard to call 911 after you punch out a cop. 21:14, 11 July 2012 (UTC)

It's not that he's conflicting with admins, it's that he's conflicting with all users who disagree with him (including admins and non-admins alike). What Jon and Ish were saying on that template talk page wasn't said in an administrative capacity. Also, the admin team would act fairly regardless of who was involved in the conflict. pling 21:21, 11 July 2012 (UTC)

The template wasn't an administrative concern, no. This discussion, on the other hand, qualifies. My point is that there's no higher power on the wiki- decrying other users as evil won't accomplish anything except showing us you're not willing to be reasonable. Don't misunderstand- fairness is guaranteed, mercy is not. 21:58, 11 July 2012 (UTC)

Plainly and simply, what you believe is evidence of malice is not, and continuing to act on the premise that it is is counterproductive. Nothing can be accomplished that way. All that path leads to is a greater and greater disruption of the wiki until, as Auron alluded to in his less-than-subtle way, it gets to the point that an admin has to ban someone, and it's going to be you, because whether you feel it's justified or not, you are the one creating the disruption. Auron and I are both posting here because we don't want it to get to that point. Believe me, it would be the easiest thing in the world for either Auron or myself to simply permaban your account and never give it another thought, taking far less time and energy than these posts. Nonetheless, both of us (and all of the admin team) consider it a tool of last resort when dealing with a user who we know wants to improve the wiki and is just doing it wrong. We do still use it when it gets to a certain point, but we try to avoid it. So again I recommend you look at discussions through a filter that the people you are dealing with definitely aren't evil, and to find another interpretation to anything you view as evidence to the contrary. If you truly want to help the wiki, that's the only way to deal with your fellow wiki users. - Tanetris 21:32, 11 July 2012 (UTC)

(Reset indent) OK, I am going over the top on this, but there is a reason.  The whole issue was mis-handled from the start.  Dr I's deletion was irresponsible and disrespectful.  It was censorious.  If he had acted properly, he would have moved the section he found offensive to the discussion page, but he simply deleted it instead.  At any point in the long discussion, he could have put the discussion back into a reasonable context by posting the deleted material to the discussion page.  The fact that he did not do that says a lot about his state of mind. 

There is also the problem with failing to actually state a reason why the proposal was 'bad'.  The claims that it violated ArenaNet or NCSoft policy are speculative and weak at best.  The fact that this wiki is owned by ArenaNet and that they have not commented on the issue at least implies that they would prefer any discussion of this type occur in a venue where they have dominion.  The arguments that impute an attitude to them by people who have no business speaking for them are dishonest.  I have said as much and the only answer has been to simply reiterate that dishonesty.  To think I have not noticed the lack of an honest answer to my comments is another showing of disrespect of me and to the alleged governing procedures of this wiki. 

The only other response was to the affect of "I don't like it and I'm going to kill it no mater what you say."  Do any of you not see that as a personal insult?

So, yes, I am a contentious old man, and you might 'permaban' me, but in doing so you would completely destroy any pretense that the administration of this wiki is really concerned with the wiki's quality and would make it absolutely clear that your only concern it for your own egos.  --Max 2 01:13, 12 July 2012 (UTC)

"I don't like it and I'm going to kill it no mater what you say." No, I do not see that as any form of personal insult. In fact I'm alarmed that you do. I see that as a fairly standard, if somewhat heated, content dispute. You are not your edits. When your edit is reverted, it has nothing to do with you, only with the edit itself. I can tell you off the top of my head that I've said similar to Pling, whom I did and still do respect, when he has advocated for changing the wiki's default skin from Monobook to Vector for example (my exact words being "You can take my Monobook when you pry it from my cold dead hands"). I cannot think of any handy examples where the same has been said to me, but if it were, I would take it to mean that the other person feels very strongly that whatever I'm proposing is an inherently bad idea for the wiki, and I see no reason whatsoever to take that personally.

Also, the fact that Ish did not do what you say he should've in the first paragraph says only that he did not consider it necessary. Any motivations you infer from that are strictly assumption, and we covered assumption already. It's just as easy, and more productive, to assume that he believed anyone who cared about the topic would, upon seeing the debate, check the page history. Then, if you disagreed, you could simply move it there yourself and move forward without any offense taken on either side. Easy, constructive, non-personal. - Tanetris 02:38, 12 July 2012 (UTC)

Now stop and think about exactly what I said and how it does not quite match your interpretation.  First, 'it' is not me. 'it' is an abstraction, a point of view I espouse. The insult is due to the disrespect shown for my arguments; it implies my thinking is beneath consideration; that is grossly and personally insulting.  That kind of disrespect is rampant on the internet, and is not particular to this wiki, but it is still objectionable.  While I have not investigated the contretemps between you and Plinggg, I strongly suspect that you did not even think about deleting his description of the 'Vector' skin.  You made your disagreement with his proposal clear, but still showed respect for his point of view.  That is not what happened here.  The Consensus flowcart at Consensus flowchart has a block that says "Was the article edited further?".  It does not say "Was the article deleted?".  There is a rather large difference between the two actions.  The first indicates constructive disagreement.  Moving the parameter specification to the discussion page and labeling it a proposal would have been a properly constructive disagreement.  Deleting the change, especially when the change does not even have cosmetic effects is pure censorship; it does not provide a basis for ongoing discussion.  It is contemptuous.  It is not proper wiki behavior.  --Max 2 05:59, 12 July 2012 (UTC)

Ish didn't "delete" the content or the template, he reverted it; adding something is as much of a "further edit" as taking something away. He also provided a basic reason in the edit summary, which was the basis for your starting a discussion on his talk page. The history serves as a record of what changes were made. That's how it often works, it's common practice; person A edits, B disagrees and reverts, A still thinks the original edit is valid so they discuss. That follows the flowchart you mentioned, and that's what happened. It probably happens on a daily basis, but rarely is it taken as a personal insult, and probably never is it meant as insult.

Relevant quote from gw1:User:Aiiane (by Ralph Waldo Emerson): "Let me never fall into the trap of thinking that I am persecuted simply because I am disagreed with." They read your arguments, they disagreed with them, they said so. pling 14:03, 12 July 2012 (UTC)

A revert is definitely equivalent to a deletion in this case.  It left no anchor for further discussion.  Putting the information back, even on the discussion page, would have constituted my starting an edit war.  And, yes, that is what I did (not Dr I) later.  The only thing that prevented being accused of that was the amount of time and discussion that had taken place between my reinserting the text and its deletion.

Also, adding something is much the same as modifying something, but total deletion is a different mater.  Additions and modifications leave an attachment which can be discussed and modified some more.  Reversions and deletions sever the connection.  That is the difference between disagreement and censorship.  --Max 2 16:41, 12 July 2012 (UTC)

The history is the anchor; you and Ish, as the editing parties, are the anchors; a discussion that points to a diff is the anchor. The system worked - until we got to the point where instead of focusing on the issue, i.e. the id, we're now all focusing on attitude, technicalities, and other side issues. We reached that point when your comments became devoid of civility and assumption of good faith. pling 17:03, 12 July 2012 (UTC)

"Putting the information back, even on the discussion page, would have constituted my starting an edit war." Incorrect - reposting something on the talk page is considered to be starting a discussion, not an edit war. —Dr Ishmael 18:09, 12 July 2012 (UTC)

You may be correct about that, but past comments left me with the impression that such an action on my part would only have invited edit war accusations.  That still leaves the problem that the continuity of discussion was severely damaged by the censoring of the documentation.  Deleting rather than moving the content was still a strong showing of disrespect.  --Max 2 00:55, 13 July 2012 (UTC)

"irresponsible and disrespectful"

In reverting your edit, all I did was to correct the documentation so that it reflected the actual template as it existed at the time. The template did not accept an "id" parameter, thus its presence in the documentation made the documentation incorrect. I would have done the same thing no matter what template it was, no matter who had made the edit. I was simply upholding the accuracy of the documentation. I had no intentions beyond that, evil or otherwise. —Dr Ishmael 01:51, 12 July 2012 (UTC)

Definitely not the case.  The template could, can and does accept an "id" keyword parameter.  It just does nothing with it, just as it does nothing with hundreds, even thousands of other keyword parameters.  Documenting how that particular keyword was to be used was all that was needed.  It did not make the documentation incorrect in any way.  By deleting the documentation, you were imposing your view of how that parameter must never be used and suppressing my view of how the id information was to be recorded.  Deleting the documentation was not an accident; it was a willful and thus intentional act.  Your failure to own your action is objectionable.  You need to acknowledge that others may have ideas you do not completely understand and delay your impulse to strike out at others until you have acquired the necessary information.  In particular, that documentation could have been left in place forever with no ill effects.  --Max 2 05:19, 12 July 2012 (UTC)

Fine, I give in. Yes, I am evil and disrespectful (despite how I do my best to respect everyone). Yes, I have a burning hatred for everything you do (despite my attempts at starting constructive discussions). Yes, I am forcing my horribly misguided views on the wiki (despite the fact that those views are based on standards and consensus that I've absorbed over the past 5 years of being a wiki sysop). You're not going to listen to anything else that anyone says, so I may as well take the path of least resistance and agree with your unfounded accusations. —Dr Ishmael 14:19, 12 July 2012 (UTC)

Great sarcasm but you forgot to include the appropriate tags.  You missed a few point though.  I really should have been clearer.  You may or may not be evil.  I do not know you well enough to tell, but some of your actions certainly are.  You do have some really bad habits:

• You are hasty — you take shortcuts like reverting edits rather than moving the material to a more appropriate setting.
• You are over-rating your own opinions and disrespect other's opinions — at least that is one explanation of your haste.
• You think your own opinion is the consensus — you do not give the real consensus time to form and be expressed. A very few people expressing similar view is all you need to convince yourself you are right, even against opposition.
• You are a vote counter — you only take the number of opponents into account and ignore the opposing arguments presented.
• You argue based on authority, not reason — being a 'sysop' should not enter into any of this.

--Max 2 16:16, 12 July 2012 (UTC)

The first thing that jumped into my mind was lol when I read the above comment. Mtew, I don't think you have the right to accuse anyone of being hasty. I could link your contributions, but I hope you get the point. You also have to apparently understanding of the word consensus, so I'll help you out. You are very quick to alter in-use templates without a valid discussion. While it is true that templates have an infinite number of parameters that aren't in use, it is asinine to pick some arbitrarily and define them, especially if they are not presently implemented. Perhaps you should try different approaches to your ideas of improving this wiki. Involve the community a little more. Just my 0.02. Venom20 16:27, 12 July 2012 (UTC)

And you have a very poor understanding of what happened in this case.  First, I did not alter the template; I added to its documentation.  Second, look at the Consensus flowchart and note that it starts with making a change, not with discussion.  Of course more care than usual is needed in editing templates; breaking the pages that use them is a poor idea, but I have been and was careful not to do that.  Next your ad homium characterization is both uncivil and incorrect.  A mechanism for recording a particular kind of information is needed.  I specified that recording mechanism.  How that information is to be used is not clear at this point; only its connection to ArenaNet, the ArenaNet license and to a specific image is known.  Making up some arbitrary use for the new information is neither useful nor necessary.  The addition I made did not take that undesirable step.  --Max 2 01:45, 13 July 2012 (UTC)

Funny that you should bring up that flowchart... because you didn't follow it. You made an edit, then I made a further edit that you disagreed with. Instead of seeking a compromise at that point, which is what the flowchart says to do, you demanded that I revert myself and refused to work toward a compromise until I did so. —Dr Ishmael 04:00, 13 July 2012 (UTC)

No. I made an edit, and then you DELETED my edit, and I then demanded that you do the edit properly.  You did NOT edit my text; you completely censored it.  There was no context for compromise left other than starting an edit war.  Further, I did not specifically request that you 'revert' yourself; I requested that you put the material back.  You could have put it back on the discussion page, which you later almost did or you could have put an edited version back on the main page.  Compromise involves both sides doing the reasonable thing.  That means you had as much, and in my opinion even more, responsibility to do something constructive.  Bluntly, you did not do either until much delay and acrimony had occurred and even then you fudged it.  You did move far enough that I could put the material being discussed back without edit warring, but there is no indication that you intentionally provided that opening.  --Max 2 07:33, 13 July 2012 (UTC)

Ending this

Okay, at this point, you've been told by Ish that he meant no slight, you've been told by a number of neutral third parties that you're getting worked up over nothing, and you've been told that your insistence that you have been wronged is not productive. So what I have to ask at this point is: what is it you want, exactly? Would you like Ish and/or Jon to apologize? I could encourage them to do that; they're pretty reasonable people, I think they might in the name of making peace (though Ish at least might expect one back at this point). Would you like your ideas heard? They have been. Would you like your edit reimplemented? Well, that's not going to happen unless you can persuade people that it's useful, and frankly you're working against yourself at this point, as railing against Ish for something no one else thinks is a problem just damages your credibility in general... So. What exactly ends this? What do you want? - Tanetris 04:16, 13 July 2012 (UTC)

What I want is a constructive rather than a censorious attitude to prevail.  I want to have honest discussion, not Brinkmanship.  I want mutual respect rather than power politics.  An apology is not necessary; it might even be counter-productive.  What is needed is a new attitude; an attitude that really respects others' opinions.  That is what I want here.  That is what I am fighting for.  --Max 2 07:51, 13 July 2012 (UTC)

That would be great in theory, if your premise were grounded in reality. No one has acted censoriously, dishonestly, or disrespectfully, and the person at the forefront of nonconstructiveness right now is you. I don't know what's stopping you from seeing that, but at this point, it has disrupted the wiki enough. Without another way to end it, I'm ending it the hard way. Take a year off. - Tanetris 09:11, 13 July 2012 (UTC)