User talk:Jumping Jack

Welcome!

Hello, Jumping Jack, and welcome to the Paragon Wiki! Thank you for your contributions. I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Feel free to fill out your personal user page so we can get to know you. There is a collection of Userboxes you can easily add there. Please sign your name on talk pages using four tildes (~~~~); this will automatically produce your name and the date.

If you need help, ask me on my talk page or place {{helpme}} on your talk page and someone will show up shortly to answer your questions.

Don't forget to drop by and introduce yourself in the Forum, which will use the same name/password that you used when you signed up with the wiki. If you ever feel the need to change your password, you will need to do so there instead of here in the wiki. And there's even a RSS Feed, if you're into that.

Also, make sure you take a look at the Help page. There is a lot of preloaded images, missions, and contact info, and what you want to add might already be there.

Again, welcome! - Snorii 22:34, 17 October 2007 (EDT)

=^^=

Hii! Welcome to the madness! since it isn't in some of our more standard welcome msgs, I though I'd point out that you can get a hold of any of the Adim here through this page if you have any question about local policy, technicalities, or whatnot. Anyway, pls enjoy your time here!--Sleepy Kitty 13:24, 18 October 2007 (EDT)

o.o well.. actually I think the only template for test jumping is {{clr}} here, we usually just use it and <br> for most of that stuff.. if you want to import those other two clrs, feel free, just make sure they don't conflict with anything already here =^^= --Sleepy Kitty 22:51, 18 October 2007 (EDT)

Image Categories

Regarding Image Categories - No worries, putting them where you thought they should go is excellent. Mostly, I was just moving a few down to subcategories. Keep up the good work.  :D - Snorii 09:20, 19 October 2007 (EDT)

Dialup

I would copy your dialup userbox to my page, but after three years of playing coh on dialup, I am now on dsl. - Snorii 09:23, 19 October 2007 (EDT)

Feel free to make a "Recovering Dialup user" userbox! :) --Jumping Jack 09:42, 19 October 2007 (EDT)

Bases

@.@ where to begin.. I guess with Category:Base Items By Type.. the text you have in that category page doesn't make sense, its a category, it sorts alphabetically, and doesn't let you sort things how ever you want to. Where you perhaps thinking of nested categories? dropping a Category:Control and Category:Power or such in and sorting from there?

^^ also, I don't know about the WoWWiki's handling of it, but Category pages are treated as folders here, and we usually only put brief descriptions of what the category is intended for on the cat's page section (random examples: Category:5th Column Images, Category:Blaster Secondary). That is to say, something brief (think notes in programing code for example) and we usually leave off the headlines and headers.

o_o that said, for any of these folders/categories you make, please make sure to nest them in the proper parent folder =^^= --Sleepy Kitty 14:26, 19 October 2007 (EDT)

I do intend "Startup Base Items", "Workshop Base Items", etc, by the restrictions for what items can be placed in which rooms. That is, all items that are restricted as "workshops" go in the workshop base items category, etc.

I have just put the first polish on {{BaseItemBox}}, and intend to have the type entry automatically create a link to the item category. Similarly, having the BaseRoomBox provide links to categories that apply for particular lines in it. (IE, Oversight center would have lines linking to workshops, startup, storage.)

True, usually the headlines are left off. I found an example amongst the template pages that was otherwise, so assumed that the occasional exception was useful. The headline in this case can be omitted, I think. --Jumping Jack 14:32, 19 October 2007 (EDT)

o_o please please do not make a template here that auto adds a page to a category, those things are a pain and create awful category sprawl...

Looking at that template.. it could use a bit of revision.. Name is pointless, the articles title will have it in there.. the Pic is better if its to the right hand side, and with the very wide range of base item dimensions, having it restricted by a template would be a bad thing. I'm assuming you will have the fields that have no data in them not show up? oh, Type is also not really needed as its determined by the page its on.. o.o actually, here, these are the two main formats that where mostly use when I created the base pages last year. All the fields you'd need should be on one of those two formats.--Sleepy Kitty 15:07, 19 October 2007 (EDT)

I wasn't intending to use it to add a page to a category (though I've seen that be useful elsewhere), I was intending to add a link to the appropriate category of item, to the line in the room description. ... Of course the template could use revision. It was a first draft, I did say... :) However...

• Name - see {{Infobox Contact}}, which I based this off of. To be honest, on other wikis, I've found the title of this sort of box to be a good touch, despite it being the page name. You've been here longer, though, and I can bow to your wishes.
• Image - I guess we can try having the info box on the left and the pic on the right... Or have the pic follow the info box in a thumbnail? Again, I followed Infobox Contact for a guideline. Worst case, the pic can be removed and placed individually. *shrug* whatever works.
• type - same argument. The fact it is in the "Energy Base Items" category doesn't mean that you'll actually look down to the bottom of the page and see that. And again, I'm easy, if you feel strongly about it. Also, it is optional...

I also found {{Base Additional Info}}, which had most of what I wanted, but didn't display it the way I wanted. I was hoping for something that better echoed the item info dialog in the GUI.

I eagerly await your further comments. --Jumping Jack 15:27, 19 October 2007 (EDT)

o.o the {{Infobox Contact}} for their use, are really good, unfortunately, base items are a whole different kettle of fish (tuna, if we're lucky). >.> Contacts have very large pages filled with mission information, background story.. their intro.. base items are just the information on their placement requirements, benefit, and description. Most base items don't even take up enough page room to really justify their own page, but we do it anyway.

@.@ what I'm saying here is that while a box template is good, we want something like this pages, and not a right hand upper corner hugger. o_o and as previously mentioned base item pics should not be constrained by the box.. and here are two good examples as to why. Crystal Ball (floor stand version) and Ley Tap. o.o one is very very long (that isn't a very good pic there) and the other is very tall but slender. Properly taken pictures of both of them would require completely different dimensions to restrict them down and still look good. o.o reversely, contacts are usually human shaped, thus, similar in proportions and easy to have a fixed thumbnail of.

I'm certainly willing to let the base item pages remain unmolested by a "BaseItemBox" for now... Some of it, I suspect, would fall under "not invented here", but hey, I've enough to do right now. Perhaps also, I fell into bad company when I wandered into the base item realm.

But Arcane seems, to me, to be a cautionary tale on how not to describe the decorative items. I don't think we'd be well served making individual pages for each decorative item, but I do think we need something better than that... (Thanks for pointing it my way, too!)

Perhaps... a template that provides a thumb-like box, but has a field for price, and an optional one for issue, perhaps, both to be displayed at the bottom, the name in small print either at top or bottom? --Jumping Jack 15:57, 19 October 2007 (EDT)

Base Pictures

o,o wanted to tap you on the shoulder before you went to far but.. lets add those pics to cats based on what tab their under.. so for those chairs, it would be Category:Base Chair Images, which would be a sub cat of Category:Purchased Base Items Images. --Sleepy Kitty 16:52, 20 October 2007 (EDT)

Holding off for a moment. I wanted to create larger categories, since most folks won't be looking at *these* categories.

• Furniture: chairs, cabinets, desks
• Lighting
• Themed: arcane, tech, sewer, etc
• other?
• don't much like the Purchased base item category, as almost everything falls under that. If you like, perhaps as a side category (see below).
• also: Functional (workshops, control, energy, etc)

Either subdivide funtional into "crafted/salvage" (either name works) and "purchased", or put the images into two categories (functional and crafted or purchased).

I'm'a gonna lay low for like 15 minutes here and let you reply and/or categorize images. By default, I'll put the chairs into furniture unless you've moved them yourself or given direction.

other categories for another day. --Jumping Jack 16:58, 20 October 2007 (EDT)

>.> there's another and much more pressing reason to group these by their natural categories.. some poor smuck is going to have to go through all 400+ base item pictures and match all of them.. thats one horrific seek time per image..

o.o you want to create a larger category for images? or for base items themselves? for images, there isn't a reason too since this sort of thing is back end and only the editors usually see it, not the common browser. If you mean for the items themselve.. lets take this to the forums then, as it'll get complicated fast. --Sleepy Kitty 17:03, 20 October 2007 (EDT)

Images only. Didn't think that a 24-image category was so very nifty. But note that the names I have chosen will sort by category. ... assuming we can keep to that scheme. I can be satisfied by "chair", "Cabinet", "Desk" categories, but thought them puny. And recognized right off that no, didn't want ALL base items in one lump. Or even all decorative. Or even all themed items... there are a LOT of Arcane, Tech, Sewer images.

"Larger category" - lumping several of the smaller tabs together, but leaving separate categories for the larger tabs.

Lighting should be in a separate tab regardless (which fits your scheme anyway), as placing them requires different gymnastics.

I am trying to maintain a common "distance to object" to provide comparable sizes. Works fair with the chairs and cabinets at least. Arcane may blow me away, though. Some of that stuff is HUGE! --17:09, 20 October 2007 (EDT)

o.o part of the worry on this is about the amount of seeking that would be required for adding the images in, the other part is, the devs have been promising to overhaul and update the bases for well over a year now. I know office furniture is likely to be left untouched, but there's a decent chance that what is a 20 picture category now will turn into a 50 one in issue 12. ^^ since I'm the Admin nominally in charge of base thingies, I'm suppose to worry about this sort of thing, even if it is kinda silly. --Sleepy Kitty 17:37, 20 October 2007 (EDT)