MediaWiki talk:Community Portal/Arriving

“	We're movin' in!	”
—Optimus Primal, "Optimal Situation"

• Transformers Wiki:To-do

Moving day! It took almost two full days, and it looks like we might have lost a few images in the process (User:Suki Brits is tracking down the errors responsible,) but we're here more-or-less intact.

Report any problems as you run into them!

Congratulations

A move well done as far as I can see. I've an image missing at Ark shuttlecraft but I have it on my laptop and will re-upload it later in the day. Otherwise, kudos and credit to all involved.

Incidentally, I didn't delete my user page at the other place, and it now appears to link to my new user page here anyway. I'm not too bothered about it, but was it automatically wiped over there or do I need to go back and remove it manually? --Emvee 09:19, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Oh, this all looking lovely. :D Glancing over some pages I worked on before the move, I see a few missing pictures, and Hydra doesn't appear to have come with us, but that's hardly the end of the world... - Chris McFeely 09:22, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Now I look at the upload log, I think images are still being added to the site. Maybe give it a day for them all to be uploaded before re-uploading them? --Emvee 09:24, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Let me just congratulate you for finally getting it done first. We'll see about the problems later. First task for me: Sift through my last pre-database dump edits on the old Wiki and copy them over here.--Nevermore 10:04, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

That may be challenging, as everything on the old Wiki seems to be redirecting here right now, leaving one unable to just click "Edit" and copy out the formatted text. I can't imagine Wikia will let this bit of sneakery last very long, though...? - Chris McFeely 10:14, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Open links on the old Wiki with right clicks. Worked for me. I'm done there and am now fully here.--Nevermore 10:34, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Ha, man, that redirect really didn't last, did it? - Chris McFeely 12:50, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Live long and prosper in your new home! GreenReaper 10:40, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Congratulations on the move! I'm really liking the look of this place. Mink 11:09, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

I am loving the new skin Gspro15198 13:00, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Yes, indeed, congratulations and thanks for all your hard work! - Jarod

Problems

• This server's ImageMagick makes a hash of .gifs (example: Spectro, and cannot render .svg thumbnails.) This problem does not exist on the test server.
  • The server also doesn't thumbnail animated gifs as animated gifs. (Wikia would,) but that's a lesser concern. -Derik 00:47, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

    ImageMagick's now installed and running, or at least should be. Unfortunately, each image will need to be regenerated-- can the bot do that? It's probably too many to do manually, although can be done by going to the image page, and adding ?action=purge to the end of the URL. --Suki Brits 10:51, 26 September 2008 (EDT)

• Are we having search function troubles?
  • The search tells me that "matrix of leadership" (no quotes) turns up no page title results. I've had other similar results this morning. -- Repowers 15:40, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

    I tried that string without any trouble. It could just be a caching thing; can you lemme know if that persists? --Suki Brits 16:52, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

    It looks like a capitalization issue. I tried all lower case and got the same no page title results, and then tried with appropriate capital letters and it brought up the desired page.--65.7.68.222 20:29, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

    mySQL matching queries (such as the one being used for this matching function) are supposed to be caseless by default... but I ran into an instance 2 months ago where we were switching servers where the new server was case-sensitive by default. (It's very bizarre, yes?) We just adjusted the mySQL query to make it explicitly caseless because it'll never affect anything except user-entered matches like this. I don't recall the adjustment offhand... Suki, do you have FTP access yet? (Yes, she's been working magic all week with just command-lines. It amazes me.) -Derik 19:06, 18 September 2008 (UTC)

    I'm absolutely at a loss here, because if I search for "matrix of leadership", it pulls up the right title match just fine. Are there any other strings I can test? A screenshot? I need something to work with, I can't reproduce this at all. It's crazy. --Suki Brits 17:26, 19 September 2008 (EDT)

    The behavior has changed recently, but is still at least partially broken. The search function is NOW returning case-independent links... but their SORT ORDER is inverted. (If you search for "matrix of Leadership," it is the LAST suggestion on the list-- if there were more links the 'closest match' article wouldn't even appear...) -Derik 17:57, 19 September 2008 (EDT)

    ...okay, was gonna mention that this is still a problem, but looks like Derik beat me to the punch.... -- Repowers 19:35, 22 September 2008 (EDT)

    Um, speaking of search problems...it looks to me like the "search for text" function only brings up results for pages that have been edited since the move. --Greenygal 12:45, 2 October 2008 (EDT)

• Template recursion depth needs to be increased by at least 1. Mediawiki is throwing recursion errors for a single level of include suddenly. (Is happening on Wikipedia too.) This is a new/changed behavior.
  • -Derik 20:48, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

    Do you remember how? Let me know what I need to change. --Suki Brits 01:52, 18 September 2008 (UTC)

    ...I thought I did, but now that I'm looking up further, it looks like MediaWiki's default behavior has just changed in a recent version and it doesn't tolerate self-inclusion at all. You can see on This page how the documentation's self-including examples (which used to be valid.) are now throwing errors.

    I'm just gonna patch it for epnav and ask some Mediawiki ppl what's up with that... -Derik 19:02, 18 September 2008 (UTC)

• The edit/discussion/etc tabs miss the stuff they should line up with in Opera
  • 
    Note the pixel gap under the tabs. Also notice that the little Earth crashes into the left side of the red bar, and is cut off at the bottom. - Reboot 16:55, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

• "I-Beam" (text pointer) on Navigation Panel
  • When I hover my mouse over the links on the left hand menu I get an I-Beam mouse pointer rather than the usual pointy hand. Not a major problem but it looks odd - Omnisvalidus 16:15, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

    I cannot reproduce this issue. Which browser are you in?--Rosicrucian^Talk 16:17, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

    IE7 - I don't have any problems with other sites so far as I know but I will browse around a bit and see if it crops up on other sites and points to a problem at my end. - Omnisvalidus 16:24, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

    I have just checked on another machine running IE7 and the same thing happens there too. I checked both machines with Google Chrome and everything is normal with that. I can't find any other web sites with the same issues so it seems to be an issue with this site and IE7! Is anyone else seeing this??? - Omnisvalidus 18:45, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

    Yeah, it's doing it for me at work with IE7. --M Sipher 19:10, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

    It's doing it for me at work on IE7, and at home on IE6. --Salt-Man Z 01:42, 18 September 2008 (UTC)

    Should we wait until everything is definite and working before patching the articles? GWolfv2 02.20 GMT 17 Sep 2008 (UTC)

    I think I've fixed this, but I don't have access to IE7. Can someone confirm? --Suki Brits 02:07, 18 September 2008 (UTC)

    • fires up IE*

    Confirmed fixed on IE7 (although, is the hover-highlight meant to wipe out the right-hand border? It looks weird) - SanityOrMadness 02:36, 18 September 2008 (UTC)

• Site's name is wrong! (page title)
  • The localSetting for the site's name ($wgSitename) should be changed to 'TFwiki.net' -Derik 18:49, 18 September 2008 (UTC)

    The details of this are complicated and frustrating, but the bottom line is this is now fixed. And took several hours of searching for a solution. I am not happy. --Suki Brits 17:26, 19 September 2008 (EDT)

    Er- is this is fixed, why does MediaWiki still produce "Transformers Wiki"? -Derik 17:57, 19 September 2008 (EDT)

    The consensus on Transformers Wiki talk:Ads was to set the site's name to "TFWiki.net - The Transformers Wiki" for now. -Derik 05:06, 28 September 2008 (EDT)

• Go Boxes get locked on most individual pages.
  • The random gobox inage and link does not change when a page is refreshed or visited later. (example: go to a Random Page. The Go Box that loads will be loaded any other time you visit that page unless you clear your cache). --FortMax 15:55, 20 September 2008 (EDT)

• Monobook left column is borked in IE7
  • The left column in Monobook on IE7 (with no custom CSS applied) has a huge gap between the column and the content area, because the content area is in the same place/is the same size as in "Monacobook", despite the much narrower left column. This does not affect Firefox 2 or Opera 9. - SanityOrMadness 23:10, 20 September 2008 (EDT)

    Oops, sorry, my bad. I know exactly what's causing this. It should be fixed now. --Suki Brits 10:51, 26 September 2008 (EDT)

Resolved problems

• The logs/galleries/users section on RecentChanges is missing.
  • Solution: Update MediaWiki:Recentchangestext to include the links. (Replace witht he text from MediaWiki talk:Recentchangestext... needs an sysop to do the port.) -Derik 17:57, 19 September 2008 (EDT)

• I routed aroudn this problem on doc, but doing the same on the episode nav would cause problems. I'm gonna leave it for 24 hours and see if the problem can get fixes. :( -Derik 03:17, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

  I think this should be fixed now. Can you confirm? --Suki Brits 01:52, 18 September 2008 (UTC)

  ifexist is currently "WORKING." FYI? It wasn't working on the test server either--- so the problem lies with this MW install, not the server.

  I'm gonna poke my own install (where it works) and compare it to the test server (where it doesn't) -Derik 09:15, 22 September 2008 (EDT)

  add the following lines to LocalSettings.php. (50 is an arbitrary number, it's currently set to 0.)

  ## Expensive Parser Function limit must be > 1 for #ifExist:

  :::$wgExpensiveParserFunctionLimit = 50;

  -Derik 05:06, 28 September 2008 (EDT)

  Suki = awesome. -Derik 11:01, 1 October 2008 (EDT)

• User Javascript pages are broken
  • MediaWiki is linking to my user javascript page (the script tag in in the HTML) but there's a typo in the url--, the &'s are rendering as &'s (and thus causing it not to load.) This is rather annoying since I've been wanting to work on some JS stuff. -Derik 20:10, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

    • smacks forehead*Okay, the markup is odd, but the include is working... I've just been banging my head up against a DIFFERENT issue all week. ...let's pretend this never happened. -Derik 06:09, 20 September 2008 (EDT)

• We appear to be missing the last week's worth of edits.
  • Nothing after September 8th shows up. Do we just have to eat it, or... ? -- Repowers 12:41, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

    It takes like 12 hours minimum just to perform an import. And if the archive we got Saturday wasn't up to date- there's no real reason to assume a new one would be any moreso. I'm assuming we have to eat it and patch by hand. -Derik 12:45, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

    *sigh*I was afraid of that... -- 99.146.195.12 14:03, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

    I already ported over all of my own post-September 8 updates from the old Wiki by hand. Which were about half a dozen, so it wasn't that difficult. If anyone just ported over his or her latest changes from the old Wiki, that'd be less fixing-trouble for others.--Nevermore 14:15, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

    Roger that, seems I lost Nautilus, Hopper and a few others...I'll get on it tonight or tomorrow and port my last few changes over --81.141.34.109 14:28, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

    on the old wiki some one said about this thing called curl which will transfer over any data we missed, shall we use that?212.74.27.54 12:41, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

    At his point, it's gonna have to be a manual porting. :( -Derik 17:57, 19 September 2008 (EDT)

• Default site time is set for GMT
  • Set the site for East Cost time (Consensus when issue was last discussed, it's where Rhode Island is.) The first example on this page seems to cover the needed setting changes. -Derik 09:49, 19 September 2008 (UTC)

    Done, I think. Someone needs to confirm, I already set my timezone. --Suki Brits 17:26, 19 September 2008 (EDT)

• The foreign-language links @ the bottom of the main page don't work.
  • I commented them out. (Do we care? At all? Yes we do so we will get right on it!) -Derik 09:39, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

• Monobook logo is hotlinked from Wikia
  • Currently, if you select Monobook (and haven't customised Monobook.css to change the logo), it hotlinks to the image here (I tried uploading the current TFWiki.net corner image over the same image here, given the wiki name is TFWiki.net and not Teletraan I, but that was how I found out about the hotlink.).
    
    The kludges involving CSS overwriting of the default images should probably be removed anyway... - SanityOrMadness 03:37, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

    Fixed! Well, sort of. If you want regular Monobook to have a different logo than the default skin, then you have to do it via CSS. As far as I'm aware, the default logo set is universal. But I figured we want the new one anyway. --Suki Brits 01:52, 18 September 2008 (UTC)

    Well, yeah - I was suggesting that the default logo should be universal :). [And not hotlinked, duh] - SanityOrMadness 02:40, 18 September 2008 (UTC)

• I miss the clickable shortcuts (like <nowiki> at the bottom of the editing window.
  • Suggest porting over EditTools system-string. (Probably requires javascritp to support it, may require php changes...?) -Derik 09:52, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

    We have the "CharInsert" extension installed, so simply porting over the Wikia or Mediawiki EditTools page should work. (Editing this page here requires an admin.) -Derik 01:05, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

    Could we also have the extra characters (at least the macrons) show up? Of course, I'm probably the only one who uses them, but it'd be nice to not have to copy and paste them. Interrobang 04:35, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

    Done! Including the macrons. --Suki Brits 02:07, 18 September 2008 (UTC)

• The "Wheremi" template (used by the old epnav) is bitching about recursion errors.
  • (It wasn't doing this on the test server.) We should just transition epnav into using the TV-utilities template instead of wheremi. (have been putting it off.) -Derik 09:39, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

    Because of the problem Also affects the TV-util template, wheremi has been recurse-escaped for now. -Derik 17:57, 19 September 2008 (EDT)

• Login problems
  • I don't know if this happening to anyone else, but I can't log in. Do I have to create a new account or what? Someone give me some info. BTW, I had to manually put in the link to my page.--AWT88

    You essentially have to recreate your old account. IE, create a "new" account with the same username and password. It'll run a quick check against Wikia's login to make sure you're not fibbing, and then you're in business.--Rosicrucian^Talk 16:33, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

• Watchlist is empty
  • I can see my old Contributions, but my Watchlist is now empty. Do I need to retag the pages I want to see updates for, or can I restore the old Watchlist somehow? --Xaaron 19:44, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

    Go over to wikia, call up the watchlist, click "edit raw watchlist", copy the list, edit the raw watchlist here and paste. Done! --mendel (84.128.224.164 22:22, 15 September 2008 (UTC))

    Beauty. Thanks! --Xaaron 16:04, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

• We cannot upload .ogg files. (Suki needs to add them to the permitted file extensions list.)
  • -Derik 00:04, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

• The left-hand navigation is covering a lot of the content
  • I don't know if it's common for everyone but it is quite problematic. --Detour 13:57, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

    Dito here on a narrow-screened work computer. -- 99.146.195.12 14:03, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

    (that was me.) -- Repowers 14:05, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

    Well my resolution is 1024x768 and I'm using IE6... So I don't see why the left-hand navigation is so screwy... --Detour 14:11, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

    Same here, also on IE6. Chip 14:19, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

    I haven't gotten a chance to look at it in IE6 yet. I'll get to that. --Suki Brits 16:05, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

    Looks like you just made the sidebar wider to enclose the Search box? That works. Also: the random article image is broken, and the Toolbox links are (oddly) double-spaced. --Salt-Man Z 17:33, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

    Woo! It works both at work and at home for me now. Looks like that's fully resolved. 69.255.158.72 22:36, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

• I'm having trouble editing my profile back on Wikia!
  • Try turning off Javascript. (This redirect lasts until the 16th.)

• Our Favicon is broken.
  • Can I request we get a different one while we're transitioning? (Or change Wikia's?) I've gonna be jumping back and forth a lot, and the visual cue would he helpful. -Derik 09:52, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

• Links to Wikipedia are broken. (And probably inter-wikia links.)
  • Shooooould be fixed now. The one thing is that you'll need to resave articles for the interwiki links in them to work right. --Suki Brits 17:13, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

• Our GFDL notice is insufficiently prominent.
  • We should edit MediaWiki:Copyrightwarning to be more like the phrasing from Wikia's notice. (Requires admin) -Derik 10:55, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

    Well, don't look at me! I don't seem to be a Sysop here yet! - Chris McFeely 11:08, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

    More importantly, I've got the GFDL notice in the footer now. Somebody else can worry about MediaWiki:Copyrightwarning. --Suki Brits 16:52, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

• Sysops have not been re-sysop'd yet. (Probably because not enough users had re-registered when Suki went to bed.)
  • Sysops who are registered: User:Chris McFeely

    Everyone except Walky's been given their sysop privileges. Walky gets none because I'm usurping his position he has no power so hasn't reregistered yet. It may take a bit of time. --Suki Brits 16:52, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

    5 sysops, 2 bureaucrats, all accounted for. Resolved. -- mendel 84.128.192.191 18:32, 25 September 2008 (EDT)

Important: License

Where do I find information on the license the new Wiki is working under? I'm being told that using articles created under GNU HAVE to be used under GNU again, anything else would be ILLEGAL. Is that correct? I'm also being told that Wikia could sue us if we were using their texts without a GNU license even if every single author from the Wikia Wiki were to agree with the move.--Nevermore 10:41, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Project:Copyrights - Last paragraph of the last section. This Wiki's contents are GFDL.

And AFAIK, Wikia doesn't own any rights to the material except the right to use it... I think only an editor whose content was misappropriated in a non-GFDL way could sue us. Wikia isn't a content-creator any more than Geocities is a fanfic-writer. (Did you hear this wikia-could-sue-us think anywhere specific?)

We do need to make the GFDL notice more prominent though... -Derik 10:47, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Yes. I'm being told the information needs to be EASILY FINDABLE from every single page on the Wiki.--Nevermore 10:51, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

...like by clicking on the "Project:Copyrights" link at the bottom of each page while editing?

I ask- because the pages on Wikia itself have no notices that they are part of GFDL when just viewing them, it's only there while editing them.

Allow me to repeat my politely-worded inquiry in a non yes-or-no fashion? Who is saying this? -Derik 10:59, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

German Transformers website owner. Also a very hot-headed guy who will complain about stuff nobody else would even notice. (He appears to be right, though. GDFL specifically requires you to put texts under GDFL again.)

The easiest way to solve this would be to add the GDFL note on the bottom of each page, next to "Privacy Policy", "About Transformers Wiki" and the currently empty-page "Disclaimers".--Nevermore 11:16, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

From a legal standpoint- we already are putting the text under GFDL. It says so right on our Copyrights page. (Which in turn in linked to whenever you're editing a page.) There was never any discussion of making the content non-GFDL. The exact terms of GFDL were discussed when we were first getting ready to move, to make sure we knew exactly what we had to do.

As for how prominent the notice is... I agree, it should be more prominent, just liek it is on wikia. Makign that adjustment is on our to-do list in the section above this one, and the change will be made shortly. Tell him to take a chill pill. -Derik 11:35, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

How about simply putting it into the general disclaimer linked on the bottom of every page? The disclaimer is currently empty anyways.--Nevermore 11:46, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

So, this is at least a temporary solution.--Nevermore 12:04, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Good call. Wikia makes one of its footer notes do the same thing. -Derik 12:06, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

The "Enhanced" Recent Changes page

Was that proprietary to Wikia, or is there a CSS/JS mod we can install to facilitate porting it over here? Because lemmetellya, that saved me some work tracking edits.--Rosicrucian^Talk 15:35, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

It's just not on by default. I believe you can turn it on in your preferences. --Suki Brits 15:47, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Aha! Excellent!--Rosicrucian^Talk 15:50, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Problem: Attempting to expand a collapsed list of changes gets me an error page stating, "RCI1

There is currently no text in this page, you can search for this page title in other pages or edit this page."--Apcog 17:35, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Is it still showing up like that? I'm not able to replicate it. --Suki Brits 20:54, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

It still shows up for me, yes. I've managed to upload an image here. (Maybe this means my trouble with the image for Megatron's page has passed?)--Apcog 21:43, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Well, problem solved somehow. I abruptly realized it might be due to NoScript running on this computer, so I told it to allow tfwiki.net. That had no effect the first time. Either the computer didn't listen or the scripts were somehow changed later on, because I just had to allow the site's scripts again. THIS time, it fixed the problem, so now I can expand collapsed change lists as before. Ooh, and I see we now have the formatting shortcut buttons above the edit window again! Ah, one-touch signatures are here again...--Apcog 04:00, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

IE7

Sadly, this is what I'm forced to use at work, and the sidebar is all screwed up there. All the sidebar is pushed under the article window, excpet for the search bar, which ends up OVER the article window, obscuring text. --M Sipher 16:03, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

As noted above, you're not the only one (and yeah, it's drivin' me nuts.) Suki is looking into it. -- Repowers 16:54, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

I actually tanted to talk with... Suki and Rosicrucian... about making vanilla monobook a selectable skin along with our custom version of it, for exactly this sort of reason. (Though I'm not cure what that entails...) -Derik 17:47, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

It's fairly easy to add skins, really. I was hoping we could do such with Deceptibook as well.--Rosicrucian^Talk 17:59, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

So you know how to add skins so they'ee selectable in the Mediawiki preferences...? -Derik 18:28, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

In fact I do. I researched it when I was farting around in Monobook. Details here.--Rosicrucian^Talk 18:35, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Personally, I would suggest that the skin variant be called "Autobook," for symmetry with "Deceptibook."--Rosicrucian^Talk 19:38, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Right now it has another name, but I'm willing to rename it. I've fixed the worst problems with IE, I think-- but all the same, regular vanilla Monobook is also available as a user skin. You can change it in your preferences. --Suki Brits 20:37, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

I just like the idea of having Autobot and Decepticon versions of the same skin. It warms the cockles of my little geewun-raised heart.--Rosicrucian^Talk 20:39, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Missing Images

Should we go ahead and reupload them? Jeysie 16:05, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

No. These images might have been removed because they contain copyrighted content.

Moving Pains

Okay, reregistered without incident, it seems. My personal edit history is gone (as I suspect is the case for everyone), but c'est la vie.
I mentioned this on Megatron's discussion page, but when I ported over a big edit I prepped just before the move, I found, among other things, an image SFH had uploaded was missing. When I downloaded it and tried to re-upload, I got an error message, saying the image couldn't be renamed.

In addition, the handy little tool tabs (bold, italicize, signature, etc.) that were at the top of the edit windows previously aren't here. Granted, doing such things manually isn't difficult if you know what to do, but we don't have the Handy Tips for Newbies box visible, so they may be left in the dark.--Apcog 16:10, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Everyone's contributions lists still exist, actually... the only thing off is the number of edits in your Preferences thingy. Jeysie 16:15, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

• • Ignore - found the answer**

Hm...odd. Okay, they're all still there, all right. Wiki's being darned slow calling up the pages, though. Could be server troubles resulting from the storms. (Speaking of which, hope Walky gets electricity again soon.) So that just leaves the problem of being unable to upload the image.--Apcog 17:40, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

The server's been alternately slow and fast all night- I'm blaming the rolling DNS re-routes unless the problem persists through Wednesday. -Derik 17:48, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Usernames

It claims that my old account doesn't exist here, so I'm using the name Spin-Out until we get the old members back. So... Do we need new names, or are our old accounts still up? Just asking.

I just found the same thing. The answer is buried away further up the page. You need to recreate your account using the same username and password. I have just tried it and it works. Omnisvalidus 16:45, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Scorched Earth

So, will the Defenistration-tagged stuff at the old site need to be manually deleted, or can we set a bot onto it? -- Repowers 17:13, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

'bot doesn't have delete-permissions. Ops are gonna have to do it manually.

You're welcome to start with mine if you like. -Derik 17:49, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

DONE. --24.235.158.104Suki Brits 01:38, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

Our new logo

Um... should we not remove the "Teletraan-1" from it? --M Sipher 17:37, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

We can, very easily. I just wasn't asked to.--Rosicrucian^Talk 17:40, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

I don't know if I have the authority to ask, but I think it should be a top priority for it to say "TFwiki.net" ASAP. (As far as I could tell, that was the majority pick.) - Jackpot 18:55, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

I still don't see what's wrong with Teletraan-1. --Detour 19:05, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Do you want to have this conversation all over again? I think all the reasons for and against every option have been well explained, and the majority support seems to be for "TFwiki.net". (By the way, the Main Page HTML title still says "Teletraan I" too.) - Jackpot 21:13, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

I can have this changed in a heartbeat when I get home from work. I just need specifics. It can have "TFWiki.net", it can have nothing in particular. It can have Monzo's birthday. Just let me know what.--Rosicrucian^Talk 21:30, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

I don't recall a general consensus having been reached... nor do I recall any admins agreeing to the name. --Detour 21:32, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

After "TFwiki.net" was suggested, by my count the vote was:

8 for TFwiki.net

2 for Teletraan II (it looks like 3 at first, but Zadok Rox changed his vote to TFwiki.net)

1 for Vector Sigma, Teletraan I, or Underbase.

If we count you right now, then we can move that last number up to 2. Still pretty far down. Considering how long the discussion has been open and how much was said about it, I'm happy to call it done. But I've made a new section to have a more official vote right now and settle it for good. - Jackpot 22:27, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

I know that I'm sorta the go-to for issues related to the move right now, so I would just like to state for the record that-- after having spent the better part of the last three days working out the technical details of the move-- I have absolutely zero opinion on the matter. The logo isn't protected, anyone can update it, preferably without my involvement. --Suki Brits 22:14, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Since I'm about to be off to work and away from image editing software, I've uploaded a version of the logo that says "TFWiki.net" instead of "Teletraan-I." It can easily be reverted if this was premature, but this seemed to be the current consensus.--Rosicrucian^Talk 15:42, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

Images.... vanishing?

So Emvee edited Nightbeat's article and pointed out in his edit summary that an image was missing. So I went to the old Wiki, saved it and re-uploaded it here... only to find that as soon as I did, two other images of Nightbeat disappeared! What the heck is going on? --Detour 17:37, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Good question-- Suki reported there were some odd errors during the image import process. I imagine this is the cause. It shall be tracked down... eventually. -Derik 17:55, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

I've spotted a few, and they're rather easy to re-upload, but the pattern of what images are missing is so damn random that you pretty much have to stumble upon them. Can we get a script or bot edit to fixamatazz this?--Rosicrucian^Talk 05:39, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

A good starting point would be the ImageList. --mendel(84.128.221.113 06:26, 16 September 2008 (UTC))

See Transformers Wiki:Wikia file list, Transformers Wiki:Wikia file list 2|Wikia file list 2 and Transformers Wiki:Wikia file list 3|Wikia file list 3 for active lists of existing and missing files. --mendel (84.128.221.113 07:12, 16 September 2008 (UTC))

Thankee for that! I further went through those lists and culled out a page with just the red-linked images on it for further noting. Whenever someone re-uploads an image, it'll turn into the little preview like the first image on that page.

Whenever the last red-linked image is uploaded, could whoever does it leave a message either here or on my talk page? Jeysie 15:18, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

I edited my 3 lists to have "just the red links" as well; they load faster, stress the server less, and have wikia links to click directly to the wikia image page. --mendel (84.128.240.196 20:02, 16 September 2008 (UTC))

Doesn't sound like the same problem, but the images on Spectro, Spyglass and Viewfinder's pages are all pretty bad-looking. Like a transparent JPG that was put on an incorrect background....--G.B. Blackrock 23:50, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

Deceptitran's been using Jeysie's page (scraping it, and gathering all the red links.) And it looks to be mostly demolished. (About 450 images.) Are there more missing images hiding elsewhere?-Derik 23:57, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

Looks like these are the only files that can't get ported over: Media:Favicon.ico, Media:Introdump_bwep1_thepain.ogg, Media:Márcio_Seixas.jpg, Media:Tf_sound.ogg, Media:Windrazor.ogg

Favicon.ico wouldn't upload because it was a renamed .png file. I've uploaded it as a old version of . Image:Media:Márcio_Seixas.jpg is actually File:Márcio Seixas.jpg. --FortMax 19:48, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

Guess some files got a bit mangled in the saving/reuploading process, though... Jeysie 23:54, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

they can be- Suki just has to make 'em allowed file types. -Derik 23:57, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

Oops, I thought I already had. Done. --Suki Brits 00:36, 18 September 2008 (UTC)

I just uploaded the missing OGGs, then, and it seems everything else either isn't really missing or was deleted anyway, so... I think that's it for missing files! Yay! --Jeysie 01:00, 18 September 2008 (UTC)

is currently missing.--Nevermore 12:57, 28 September 2008 (EDT)

Re-uploaded. --Jeysie 13:08, 28 September 2008 (EDT)

Image uploading

I've been trying to upload some images that I was holding off on and I can't seem to upload them. Is this a growing pain that will be fixed or is it something else we should worry about? -- SFH 18:44, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Suki is all- "Hrm. How interesting." (But also at work I think.) -Derik 19:50, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

I'm working on it. Can you upload one of the files that won't upload somewhere else for me to try? I'm trying to work on this from the backend, but I'll need something to test with. --Suki Brits 19:58, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Hey, it works now! -- SFH 20:32, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

"We are currently working on X articles"

On the main page... links to [[1]]--Nevermore 22:02, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

More oddly, it seems to think there are only 10 articles on this wiki.--Rosicrucian^Talk 22:18, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Vote for the new name

The cases have been made, so let's cast our votes. What do we call this wiki? Just write your preferred name and sign it:

TFwiki.net - Jackpot 22:27, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

TFwiki.net --M Sipher 22:31, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Teletraan I --Detour 22:33, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

TfWiki.net -Derik 22:36, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

TFwiki.net, if we get to do the whole TF-knowledge-entity-based rotating subtitle or fake disambiguation thing at some point. (I thought that was a funny idea/compromise, at least...) Otherwise, Vector Sigma. --Jeysie 22:39, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

TFwiki.net (with the 'too much knowledge' Underbase quote in there somewhere) - Tribimat 22:41, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

.....are my eyes deceiving me, or did the name of the old site change in the last few hours? If they're not using TT1, why shouldn't we? --Thylacine 2000 23:54, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

TFwiki.net --Mink 00:12, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

Teletraan I, because oldwiki seems to have dumped the name. --FortMax 01:16, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

Teletraan I, because it seems appropriate now we've got the old skin back, and reclaimed the pic of the Ark's computer in the corner. I'm cool with TFwiki.net, though however, and I rather like Derik's point in the next section: this is the TF Wiki. --Blitzflipper 13:10, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

If the old wiki did drop the name, then I'm for Teletraan 1. --Professor Icepick 15:11, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

TFwiki.net--Dave 15:19, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

Teletraan I—Starfield 16:11, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

Considering Wikia's complete scumfuck actions, up to making the move notice on the old site "oh it's just a backup server at those addresses cough cough", using the old name is a BAD IDEA. This needs to be a BREAK from Wikia, and part of that is a new name. Plus, nobody fucking calls the place anything but "the TF wiki" anyway. --M Sipher 17:08, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

^ this. With the swearing. --Emvee 17:36, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

I agree with Siph. Although I actually LIKE "Teletraan I," we need to do something different. Even if Wikia goes with something else eventually (or already?), we need to do whatever we can to say "we're not them." TFwiki.net (or TFwiki.info) is as good as anything else I've seen, and better than names like "The Allspark" that, while appropriate, are too easily confused with other sites.--G.B. Blackrock 22:11, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

Teletraan I or TFwiki.net, I'm just going to keep calling it Teletraan I personaly so it's easier to remember for me.--AutobotFreak643 17:35, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

I like TFWiki.net -- Dark T Zeratul 04:34, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

Teletraan || or TFwiki.net, i like both but i think Teletraan | if wikia changes the name of the old wiki oh and is it possible to have that fake disambugation link on the main page (i think its meant to be like "welcome to tfwiki.net the transformers wiki for the alien resource about transformers see vector sigma the transformers wiki" bla bla bla) 81.108.233.59 15:02, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

And our new name is...

According to Walky's press release, "the newly independent wiki now goes by the name TFWIKI.NET". If people still disagree, of course it's a free Internet and we can keep discussing. But the branding process has officially begun. - Jackpot 16:48, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

And as you can see, the masthead has long since been adjusted accordingly.--Rosicrucian^Talk 16:59, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

Indeed, thank you. I didn't mean to diminish your contribution - it's just that a logo can be switched back easily (as you said when you made the new one), but you can't un-send a press release. We have now undeniably begun the march in a new direction. - Jackpot 17:04, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

Unfortunately, the "Title" tag (shows up at the top of most browsers) still says "Transformers Wiki - Teletraan I"--G.B. Blackrock 18:23, 18 September 2008 (UTC)

Suki needs to change that in our settings file. Easily adjustable. -Derik 18:46, 18 September 2008 (UTC)

Incidentally, I only notice this problem on the main page. Other pages seem Teletraan-free (at least in this regard).--G.B. Blackrock 15:29, 19 September 2008 (UTC)

The Wikia site's name

People are starting to say that the Wikia site is dropping the name "Teletraan I", but I'd like to know what the evidence is. What I see is that the text on the Main Page has been changed to just "Transformers Wiki", but the HTML page-title, logo, navigation menu, and improvement-drive title all still say "Teletraan I". Unless there's some more fundamental change that I don't know about, it looks halfhearted and easily reversible to me. So it could easily just STAY the way it is, with "Teletraan I" still plastered in prominent ways, or they could even decide they like the name after all and retype "Teletraan I" in the few places it's been excised.

And there's the rub, when it comes do our decision here: Whatever they end up doing, we have no control over. The one name that we know they CAN'T use is our URL.

- Jackpot 03:09, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

IIRC They offered to change thw name for us back in the day if we wanted. (We did not.) I doubt they're gonan change the sit's name unless whoever end up in charge requests it.

(I think we should go with TFWiki.net for just that reason-- let Wikia be the site that has to use a funny name to identify itself. We are the TF Wiki, no further disambiguation needed. They are also-ran.) -Derik 03:15, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

And there's the rub, when it comes do our decision here: Whatever they end up doing, we have no control over.

Given the behavior exhibited by Wikia in the last 24 hours -- de-opping all admins less than a day after the move, sending over a "helper" to "improve" things (in a most hilariously inept fashion), repeatedly reverting the move notice to something that completely fails to convey what's happened -- I think this is the crucial point. Wikia clearly regards us with animosity at this point, and I would not put it beyond them to pull further tricks.

I would love to keep Teletraan-1 as our name. It's a great name, and I think as such it helps build the sense of community. But with the move, it's become untenable. We are TFWiki now, like it or not. Let's run with it. -- Repowers 17:15, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

Hm. Just noticed another place where they haven't removed "Teletraan I". I have a feeling the name is buried in all sorts of nooks and crannies, and even if they want to change it (which I still see little evidence of), it'll take a fair bit of dedication and manpower to do a thorough scouring job. Of course, we would need to do that same thing if we changed our name, but I think we've got the dedication-and-manpower thing covered better than they do. - Jackpot 03:17, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

"MonacoBook"? Really?

Now, my custom skin transferred, so I'm pretty much set (should probably change a couple of things, but still...), but trying to mimic Monaco? REALLY?! - SanityOrMadness 16:26, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

I think it's only so named for the text style in the sidebar. I've suggested it be renamed to "Autobook" as it is the Autobot variation of two skins I did on this theme.--Rosicrucian^Talk 16:30, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

Well, I was surprised at the Monaco-styled elements like the sidebar (the name was "gravy"). I thought we wanted to get away from that stuff... (it cuts a bit close to saying "you were right" to them, no?). - SanityOrMadness 16:39, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

They WERE right about a few things-- the look of their sidebar was earnestly a good idea and I even liked it at the time. I'll change the name to what Rosicrucian said when I get to making the Autobot and Decepticon skins seperate, at least for the skins themselves; but I DEFINITELY like the idea of taking the only good ideas from Monaco. The only unique things Wikia has now are faults. --Suki Brits 16:54, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, sorry for nagging on that. I'll have the Decepticon logo ready tonight. I just did up the Autobot one this morning before I left for work.--Rosicrucian^Talk 17:30, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

Shouldn't it be the G2 Autobot (and Decepticon) logos if the G2 Autobot logo is the site favicon, BTW? - SanityOrMadness 21:41, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

Advertizing?

So. I assume that we're going to have some real ads up soonish. What are we looking at... Project Wonderful? Google? A combination? We should probably have some ads lines up, especially if we're going to advterize the split with any level of aggression and up our hits... --M Sipher 20:20, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

I have attempted to start up discussion at Transformers Wiki talk:Ads (natch).--Rosicrucian^Talk 21:45, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

Image degradation?

On the Battle Beasts page, the thumbnail image of Blackthorne #1 seems to have had its colors reversed or oversaturated or SOMETHING done wrong to it. The full resolution image is normal. What gives? --Thylacine 2000 23:50, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

Our thumbnailer doesn't handle gifs as cleanly as wikias does. (It's also causing trouble on the Star Upper page.)

If you converted it to a .png, it's probably work better... but we really ought to fix the problem at the source for long-term reasons. -Derik 23:54, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

It seems to be interpreting black pixels as transparent. --FortMax 23:55, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

I think the bigger issue is that it turns GIFs into smaller GIFs with the same colour list by a "nearest neighbour" algorithm. IIRC, Wikia's thumbnailer thumbnails GIFs as full-colour, resampled PNGs. The Battle Beasts full-size cover already has black as transparent. - SanityOrMadness 00:03, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

Wikia's thumbnailer didn't do that to animated .gifs though. -Derik 00:06, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

Well, animated GIFs are a special, evil, case, yes? - SanityOrMadness 00:07, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

My MW install doesn't have this problem and it's signifigantly older. I suspect it's just a setting in the thumbnailer. 'll try and track down what flag we need to set to make the problem go away. -Derik 00:10, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

Also, whis setup doesn't like the old Image:Favicon.ico . I keep getting the "corrupt filename" notice. That, and we don't have .ogg or .svg support yet. --FortMax 23:59, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

Keep a list of the .ogg and .svg's handy, won't you? -Derik 00:01, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

I have a list of the images that spit out errors or won't upload. Others that show up as red links were because of nameing issues. --FortMax 00:21, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

The degradation is not present on the original test server, so it's not a mediawiki setting causing the problem... it's something with this server's ImageMagick. I have no idea how to adjust that, but I'm guessing Suki does. -Derik 00:45, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

I don't think ImageMagick is even installed. I don't actually have the power to do that; I'll try to get ahold of the person who does, but... well, it might take a few days, given the hurricane. I know what the issue is and as soon as he's available, it should be easy to deal with. --Suki Brits 01:37, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

Links in

It should be noted that a lot of other sites have links in to the old Wikia site to pages that only exist here now like GEEWUN and such. Someone or ones might want to make a concerted effort to clean up sites like http://tvtropes.org of links to the deprecated wiki. -- 70.174.10.244 11:59, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

Aggressive linking/advertising the site

As has been noted, one of the hurdles we have is of google ranking. We need to make sure this place is getting linked to. Suggestion time, and these are things I think everyone here should do.

• WEBBOARD SIGNATURES: Put an active link to http://www.tfwiki.net in your signature for any messageboard you belong to. For those with better knowledge of Google than I... will the fact that this then puts hundreds, if not thousands of active links up (depending on your post count and the archives and all that) per person help, even if the pages are old? And the more you make new posts with that sig-link should definitely help, yes?

• BLOG POSTS: Got a blog? deviantArt account? Anything bloggish and might attract geeks? Make a post about the move, with an active link to here. Have your friends post about it too.

Anything else? --M Sipher 18:08, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

It might be amusing if we start our 'sell' with an amusing question or comment like "Transformers is Serious Business" or "Trukk or Munkey? These answers and less on http://www.tfwiki.net, the Transformers Wiki." Of course on that last one, there's a danger of you Americans taking that literally and thinking this place has very little answers. :D --FFN 18:51, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

Doesn't quite work after Multimoog restored much of the "funny" Exodus articles.--Rosicrucian^Talk 19:19, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

I've announced the move on four major TF-related message boards I post at (TFW2005, the Allspark, TF Archive and Don Murphy's). With the exception of the DM board thread, all those threads have garnered a considerable amount of pageviews and replies, the latter of which mere overwhelmingly supportive of the move. I've already seen people on TFW2005 specifically link to articles on the new Wiki.

Oh, and this.--Nevermore 19:39, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, every TFArchive link to the old wiki being bot-replaced is going to help a good deal. Nice thing, that.--Rosicrucian^Talk 20:11, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

I'm new here, but I stuck the slogan "By the fans, for the fun" in my signature on the one board where I'm a member and it seemed relevant. Feel free to use it if you like it. Blitzflipper 19:47, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

I gotta say... I really like that little slogan. --M Sipher 19:54, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

I would even support that slogan going on the mainpage in the big banner of leaders.--Rosicrucian^Talk 20:14, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

I like it too, but I say we reserve it for advertising. The Main Page is loaded down with enough text as it is. - Jackpot 00:14, 18 September 2008 (UTC)

I made a post about it on my DA journal already (one step ahead of ya! ;) ), and I just left a note on the TV Tropes wiki that we've moved. (I didn't want to just go around changing willy-nilly, since I didn't really know what their wiki polices are regards that stuff.)

I would have made a post on Seibertron about it already, if they hadn't been down for the past few days :P , and I'm not sure what the policy would be on the IDW boards. I could make a post in Chit-Chat, perhaps... --Jeysie 20:37, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

I've been using the phrase Trukk AND Munky on the boards to advertise the site, honestly. I figure it make ssense for the fan friendly board to be a little bit self referential.198.146.55.127 04:08, 18 September 2008 (UTC)

I have TFwiki.net somewhere in all my sigs on forums (but unfortanutly its not a link) + im paying a friend £1 per month too advertise this site, i hope you guys are grateful, i only have about £12!

All of the TF art pieces in my portfolio have descriptions with links that now point to articles here. Maybe not the most aggressive bit of advertising, but it's one more thing to help push Google in this direction. - Jackpot 18:25, 19 September 2008 (UTC)

Also, I've been running Google searches for "Transformers Wiki" and seeing where TT1 pops up that we could be too. For instance, I noticed its page here and decided to make one for us too. If anyone thinks they can do a better writeup, please have ats! I tried to strike the right balance between conveying our trademark smartassery and describing what's actually here. - Jackpot 22:33, 21 September 2008 (EDT)

Reads well enough to me. I've done my own (passive-)aggressive link-modifying on at least a voice actor page or two. So far, it seems to have avoided reversion.--Apcog 23:02, 21 September 2008 (EDT)

I cant find us on google searches for any thing transformers! Hopefully though when people go on teletraan-1 and see how horrible the layout is and then come here (by the link at the top of the pages) and see how butiful the layout is they will stay with us and tell there friends81.108.233.59 12:29, 24 September 2008 (EDT)

I took out an ad on Something*Positive.net. It'll only be up for about 2/3rds of the day, since it's eeeexpeeeeensive, but we should get a huge flow of traffic today. (Whee!) --ItsWalky 15:06, 24 September 2008 (EDT)

Woof. Out-bid, and the highest bidder now has their bid at at least $150/day. So, uh, we'll show back up once that dude runs out of cash. --ItsWalky 17:55, 24 September 2008 (EDT)

Maybe we should look at a square ad in some other awesome webcomics. What's Wonderella commanding on Saturdays? --M Sipher 18:06, 24 September 2008 (EDT)

Wonderella seems to have four Button ads, not a square ad. Its current bid asking price is $1.10 per tiny strip. They're not terribly high-trafficked -- in fact, PW cites their stats at a little below ours. --ItsWalky 19:05, 24 September 2008 (EDT)

It's up again, but here's the URL to the ad graphic, if anyone wants to see it later: [[2]] --ItsWalky 22:43, 24 September 2008 (EDT)

SoulGeek has hella ad budget. They buy ads on a lot of sites I browse.--Rosicrucian^Talk 19:14, 24 September 2008 (EDT)

I now have links to tfwiki in my sigs and im currently engaged with a, well, lets call it a "debate" with some one else so im making quite a few posts81.108.233.59 11:08, 25 September 2008 (EDT)

Anyone thought of writing something up about the TF Wiki moving in reponse to Wikia's meddling and getting it noticed at someplace like Digg or other Net News sites? Wiki editors unhappy with intrusive ads and wonky code seems like the sort of thing they'd eat up, plus it'd help call attention to the cause of other Wikia sites still stuck dealing with the mess. (I'd suggest Slashdot, but that would kill the server and probably attract a bunch of trolls, for starters...) --Jeysie 18:37, 27 September 2008 (EDT)

Just wanted to mention that Google is starting to recognize us. When this section was started, we were effectively impossible to find if you Googled "Transformers wiki". But now we're fifth on the list (after two TT1 pages and two Wikipedia pages, in that order). It's impossible to say how much of that has had to do with our own conscious prosthelytizing, but hey, it sure can't be hurting. Now, that having been said, if you Google just a TF name (like "Starscream"), we're still nonexistent, and TT1 remains as prominent as Wikipedia. But it's good to know we're making progress, slowly but surely. - Jackpot 05:09, 16 October 2008 (EDT)

Our page for Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen is only 8 positions behind the wikia version too, though both are pretty far down the results. Neither wiki shows up for "Transformers movie" and we're pretty far back for "Transformers sequel". Those are likely to be the popular searches in the near future... --abates 06:44, 16 October 2008 (EDT)

Of course, we're not a news site and won't have any information about the sequel til after it's released, which renders my comment rather moot. :) --abates 06:48, 16 October 2008 (EDT)

You bring up a good point, though, which is that we're in a TF-content lull right now. We won't really know how well we're doing in the broader Internet community until the cartoon returns and the movie sequel is released. Then we'll see, between TT1 and us, who can snag more new users and Google-relevance. - Jackpot 07:18, 16 October 2008 (EDT)

I'm wondering if there'll be a blossoming of movie info on TT1 simply because we're not there to restrain rumors any more. Even if it happens, I'm not sure how big an impact it'll have.--Apcog 10:59, 16 October 2008 (EDT)

We are doing nicely, a search for transformers wiki brings us at 5th and a search for tfwiki puts us second! We are almost there, just a little more and we may overtake wikia!81.108.233.59 12:54, 2 November 2008 (EST)

One advantage Wikia has (or had, until TX55 was made the admin there) was that they were essentially unmoderated, and random people could report all sorts of stuff like unofficial news and set photos. --FFN 13:19, 2 November 2008 (EST)

Defenestrated

Special:Whatlinkshere/Template:Defenestration needs cleared. - SanityOrMadness 03:05, 18 September 2008 (UTC)

Maintenance script boo-boo

I feel that it should be pointed out that the maintenance script uploaded lots of old versions of files from Wikia and gave them numbered names based on the date they were uploaded. [1] Essentially, we have a lot of useless images languishing in the memory. Dunno if you guys want to do something about it or not. —Interrobang 20:17, 19 September 2008 (EDT)

Having trouble making your account?

This is so people who are having trouble making there account because the answer can be hard to find. Recreate your old account! Yes, thats the answer! If your old account is called prismatix and your password is rainbow then on this wiki you have to create your account with the username as prismatix and the password rainbow! This is because if the username you use exists on the old wiki then it will try to log into the account on the old wiki using the password you have suplied so no one can steal your account.81.153.53.63 07:22, 21 September 2008 (EDT)

Anybody checking the old site?

I removed it from my bookmarks after the move, and honestly haven't been back. But there still exists the possibility of plagiarism (too strong a word?) for the lazy among us.--Drmick 15:17, 22 September 2008 (EDT)

I occasionally check it, but nothing so sinister seems to be going on. The only mirrored edits seem to be from folks that are both places.--Rosicrucian^Talk 15:34, 22 September 2008 (EDT)

Plus, I assume that it is an aggrieved ex-user who is vandalising the place with Detour abuse?--Drmick 15:17, 22 September 2008 (EDT)

One of our frequent trolls that Wikia had pretty much global-banned from every IP he had access to followed us here because the bans didn't carry over. We'll deal with him.--Rosicrucian^Talk 15:34, 22 September 2008 (EDT)

The sitenotice has been changed, nothgng points to this wiki now in an obvious place. They've banned 20 users after Suki Brits unbanned over a hundred of the old enemies (that was epic!), but none of the new bannees had a prior history, so that action had no other result than to "clean the slate", it seems. (They've not gone and removed the even older blocks yet.)

Judging by [[2]] , they mean to brand themselves as "The Transformers Wiki" now. --mendel 84.128.192.191 18:24, 25 September 2008 (EDT)

They,ve removed all reference to us, i don't believe it!81.108.233.59 05:01, 27 September 2008 (EDT)

Of course hey have. Because we're a threat. --M Sipher 12:18, 27 September 2008 (EDT)

I doubt anybody will manage to read this point, but the whole Detour abuse thing is continuing pretty strong. At the risk of incurring somebody's wrath, but I have found Detour's choice of language just ever slow slightly antagonistic on this wiki, so I can only imagine the language used on message boards. I would advise people who are regular posters on forums under the same username as here to be on their best behaviour at those sites. Be nice people! The last thing we need is somebody with a grudge going apeshit all over the wiki, which may only be an innocent victim in some twisted fanboy "blood"-feud. Drmick 14:49, 31 October 2008 (EDT)

It looks like TFwiki isn't the only to be having problems with Wikia leaving an old site up in direct competition; Illogicopedia (now en.illogicopedia.org) is having similar problems with a Wikia staffer (KyleH) removing information on the site move from their old site (illogicopedia.wikia.com). There have been enough Wikia-related problems across enough different wiki communities that an entire wiki (complaintswiki.org) was created just to archive them all in one place. In some cases, anons are using the old wikis to post personal attack articles about non-notables (my siblings are stooopid, my teacher is ghey...) which would've been deleted on sight back when those wikis had active users and admins watching for this stuff - now heaven forbid that any of it be removed, lest Wikia advertisers otherwise might want to put their ad on the latest anon-IP creation "My teacher sukks dead hamsters" *sigh*--Carlb 14:17, 2 December 2008 (EST)

The unfortunate thing is that the Wikia site still being up is hurting us despite the good Google ranking... I remember a while back seeing some of my TF fan friends busy linking to amusing Wiki articles and noticing they were using the old Wikia site... so I started explaining it had moved to this URL, and it took forever to get across the fact that this was the exact same "funny" wiki they were fond of, exact same community, and that it was the Wikia site that was abandoned and not edited by the same people who had made the wiki so awesome.

And considering I saw one of them linking Wikia-based TF pics the other day, I still don't think it's sunk in. *sigh*--Jeysie 14:51, 2 December 2008 (EST)

If anything, you'd think the fact that we have an interface that doesn't look like it came out of a cat's ass would make us more obviously the "real" wiki.--Rosicrucian^Talk 15:45, 2 December 2008 (EST)

The way I figure it, 99% of casual web-surfers will end up on Wikipedia and never even know about either Wikia's site or us. We're only relevant to the fan community, and while we've got the hardcore base on our side, the not-so-hardcore-but-still-fanboy crowd will go wherever Google takes them, and that's the Wikia site. Hopefully someday that'll change, but in the meantime we have to live with it. That having been said, I LOVE the Go-box sigs I see on message boards. I think that's the most virally effective way we can drive traffic here and cultivate awareness in the community at large. - Jackpot 15:55, 2 December 2008 (EST)

I think complaintwiki.org is the site you mean. --abates 15:08, 2 December 2008 (EST)

Yeah, I think it is too. And it does feature a summary of our situation. - Jackpot 15:46, 2 December 2008 (EST)

INSANE IDEA

Here's a crazy idea. Would it be possible to make a version of the GO! box that any ol' website could paste in their code? I was thinking of asking Suki Brit if it would be possible to whip it up for, say, Shortpacked!'s frontpage, but then I realized I was thinking too small... --ItsWalky 01:00, 26 September 2008 (EDT)

Yes. It'd need a header graphic to explain what it was though, which would probably include a link 'get this for your site yo!' -Derik 05:46, 27 September 2008 (EDT)

Something like this? - Jarod 15:37, 27 September (-06:00 GMT)

Suki Brits also finished putting one together.

http://tfwiki.net/generate_html.php <-PHP

<script type="text/javascript" src="http://tfwiki.net/generate_js.php"></script> <-javascript

<iframe src="http://tfwiki.net/generate_html.php" width="228" height="135" scrolling="no" frameborder="0"></iframe>

<-for .sigs

Now we just need to put together a page which we can link to which tells you how to implement these. --ItsWalky 20:03, 27 September 2008 (EDT)

Should we put a little text on the sidebar promoting the idea of getting a GoBox for your own site? --Jeysie 21:24, 27 September 2008 (EDT)

I think so, yeah. --ItsWalky 21:28, 27 September 2008 (EDT)

A spirit of healthy competition

Date	Wikia	TFWiki
September 15	~6,750	~6750
September 27	6,890	7,011
November 15	6,950	7,594
January 23	6,998	7,944

And while most of what we've added is... actual content, the vast majority of what they've added is a bunch of redirects. - Chris McFeely 06:32, 27 September 2008 (EDT)

I didn't think those numbers included redirects. (Mind, my 6700 number is a guess- the last time I checked the total was a few weeks before we left.)

Last time I checked Wikia I just remember thinking- "Wow, the admins just reverted a change and demanded citations because none of the sysops know enough about Transformers to determine whether information is valid on their own."

(The sadness of this overcame my own desire to exploit it for mischief.) -Derik 07:53, 27 September 2008 (EDT)

I believe it does. It's an article, after all, even if it's one that just redirects to another, but maybe I'm wrong. Aside from those, I think the largest number of new things are freshly-created talk pages for IP addresses with a "Welcome" message. But... maybe those aren't counted either. I don't know. - Chris McFeely 08:43, 27 September 2008 (EDT)

I don't think it does. I nuked a bunch of unused redirects this week, and... no change in our page count, far as I can tell. -- Repowers 10:33, 27 September 2008 (EDT)

...On second thought, there's no way they've added 140 original articles in that time. -- Repowers 10:47, 27 September 2008 (EDT)

Nor have we, despite our inherent awesomeness, created over 250. Do pictures count? - Chris McFeely 10:49, 27 September 2008 (EDT)

I think the Before numbers are just low. I was watching the numbers for a few days after the move, and IIRC it was something like 6,980 for the old site. -- Repowers 12:26, 27 September 2008 (EDT)

I agree with Rob. I thought the numbers were ~6880 before the move. --ItsWalky 21:29, 27 September 2008 (EDT)

External link-whoring

We can help ourselves by linking to external sites. While we already do this, we should, at every available opportunity, link to Hasbro's site for X Transformers toyline/cartoon/franchise on each page. For example, I've linked Hasbro's animated home page and the Cartoon Network's page on several of the Animated franchise pages. --FFN 10:25, 4 October 2008 (EDT)

Doesn't Takara's TF site keep a lot of the old stuff around? I mean, I think they still ahve the BW TeleMocha and Robot Masters sites going... --M Sipher 11:01, 4 October 2008 (EDT)

Yeah, I think they do (at the very least) keep pages for their older, out of production toylines around for reference. Hopefully linking to external pages that are relevant to our articles will help with our listing on google. --FFN 11:10, 4 October 2008 (EDT)

Another stupid idea

There's been a lot of effort put into advertising and pumping the new wiki, but it's still a place you come to see individual facts and cool stuff. This is all well and good but getting in regular people daily is one of the quickest ways to improve things. And i've already suggested this in chan and had Siph call me a idiot but here we go. Start a news page or blog. I don't know if you would have it IN the wiki or alongside, but the idea is a page that has the cool stuff everyone keeps on finding with links back into the wiki. Is there a new sideswipe figure? Have a news post with linking into the history of the character on the wiki. Found some awesome old box prototypes? Link em and tie it into the wiki. Got a interview? Post it referencing the info from particular episodes. This community has fantastic resources and dedication, while the majority is being ploughed back into the wiki (as it should) by having a page that has the info over time it will encourage more average readers to link up through various means that the wiki cannot support. Sure we already have the featured article, but start to think of things from a user / customer perspective. I believe this would add to the wiki.Sonictail 23:30, 8 October 2008 (EDT)

The thing is, it sounds like you're essentially advocating we start up a page with approach and content akin to a newsgroup or message board, and that's contrary to our overall approach to TF info for the wiki. We like casual, message board-style chat about neat stuff we've found, but with minimal exception (usually brief discussion on relevant Talk pages), it doesn't go here. We also eschew going for immediate/late-breaking news, because that way lies unconfirmed rumor, changeable info and the potential for outright falsehood (even if unintentional). We try to keep the wiki solidly grounded on fact, and that would be like building on quicksand.

Having said all that, we'd LOVE it if any editors with the time to set up their own news pages/blogs would link to the wiki on a regular basis. Walky already does so with every update of his Shortpacked! web site blog. Such sites could still have everything you mention; they just wouldn't be a part of the wiki per se.--Apcog 00:39, 9 October 2008 (EDT)

Why does news have to be right up to the point? (yeah, I know it wouldn't be "news" but stick with me here). Aim at the casual fan that doesn't want the drooling fan laden approach that other sites take. Collate on weekend a set of ten posts with the friendly style and stick it out two a day, tending towards news that a) is confirmed and genuine and b) has a direct link into material on the wiki. Content is king and the main problem with a wiki is that while there is always new content, there's a massive breadth more to be found.. eh there's a whole pile of reasons. But I do understand your position on the subject and you are correct, it does divert away from what is important. Anyways, I may revisit this idea after jan, and maybe even see about writing a universal greenlink protocol.Sonictail 00:49, 28 October 2008 (EDT)

It's not hard to set up a free blog somewhere. It's not hard to make a Wiki page that lists and links blogs that are exclusively about transformers or that have transformers tagged articles from time to time. It is possible to install a MediaWiki extension that allows putting a blog's RSS feed on a wiki page (but don't expect your watchlist to notice when it updates). So it is possible to bring blogs and the wiki closer together without putting the blog into the wiki itself - maybe that works for you? --◄mendel► 08:30, 28 October 2008 (EDT)

Sonictail, we take a hardline stance on news and rumours, in that we go out of our way to avoid reporting unfounded rumours and news leaked from unofficial sources. What does it say about us if we have such a policy in place and then we also have a "Just Like Any Other TF Website, or Wikipedia or the Wikia TF Wiki" style blog/board that reports all of this unofficial stuff as well? As for news being confirmed and genuine, I'm pretty sure that things like a leaked test shot of a toy from China confirms that that it is a genuine toy that exists in some form, but it still isn't official news. As for official news from Hasbro/Tomy/Dreamworks and their affiliates, we already update the relevant articles with such news anyway.

Besides, creating such a blog would be just more work, and we have too much stuff to do on the wiki right now... like re-writing the Beast Wars/Beast Machines, Armada, Energon and Cybertron character articles. They're a mess. --FFN 08:44, 28 October 2008 (EDT)

Teletraan I articles

Just mentioning this as an issue here so it doesn't get missed: all articles which mention Teletraan I in the name (Teletraan I, Secret Files of Teletraan II, etc) have "Teletraan I" in their title tags replaced with "TFwiki.net". --abates 17:08, 15 October 2008 (EDT)

Seems likely that we did a CSS kludge to remove old references rather than doing it the right way.--Rosicrucian^Talk 17:12, 15 October 2008 (EDT)

Oops. This was meant to deal with the main page only-- let me clean that up a bit so it handles that right. --Suki Brits 18:05, 21 October 2008 (EDT)

Not exactly related, but...

Guess who just joined Wikia... Which means I'm gonna have to cease working there immediately. Sigh.

Also, what's the point when they already have this?--Nevermore 19:42, 19 December 2008 (EST)

I find your solidarity (anti-darity?) with our departure from Wikia vaguely touching, but also a bit puzzling.

We, as a community, thought it was the best thing for our readers to leave. Doesn't mean you can't still contribute to other wikis on Wikia.

(Well, I suppose if you strongly feel they're in the wrong and don't want to support anything that subjects LOST fans to their interface...) -Derik 21:35, 19 December 2008 (EST)

That last bit. That, that, that. Arguably, even just going from maintaining your own user database to using Wikia's global one is a fairly significant disruption. Doing the reverse was smooth for us, because we managed to jigger it so that those that wanted to could reclaim their Wikia logins without fear of sniping, and all the histories matched up nice-like. Going in the direction they are? I don't envy them.--Rosicrucian^Talk 23:15, 19 December 2008 (EST)

And the "this message from Admin" link at the top is totally unclickable for me in Firefox. Looking at the message in IE, ironically it seems that "less adverts" was one of the reasons they changed. --abates 21:45, 19 December 2008 (EST)

Works fine for me in Firefox 3, but the bottom portion of the admin message is...er... obscured by ads.--Rosicrucian^Talk 21:51, 19 December 2008 (EST)

...ads which, due to being internal "Wikia Spotlight" boxes, do not go away once I log in. I swear, the Wikia interface has actually gotten more retarded in the last few months.--Rosicrucian^Talk 21:53, 19 December 2008 (EST)

Mass-Exporting pages

One of the things we promised ourselves when we moved was that we'd set up a system where our content was reasonably-easily portable for other systems-- so that others could spin their own wikis out of here if they wanted just like we did out of TT1.

I don't think anyone particularly wants to do so... but right now the only master copy of our data resides on a server sitting in a Hurricane zone. I'd really like the option of being able to download a complete backup of all pages (even just their current states if not the full history,) once every 2 weeks in case of disaster.

I thought I was going to be setting up the plugins to do this myself- but then I also thought I was going to have FTP access, that hasn't happened so neither has the export functionality. Anyone got any input? Know a good mass-export script? -Derik 22:52, 19 December 2008 (EST)

I don't have anything to add since I'm not well versed enough in this area (Yay for being a certified engineer in computer systems technology or whatever!), but I totally share your concerns. We should back up every once in a while. --FFN 04:06, 20 December 2008 (EST)

• sigh*

Can anyone name me a Transformer likely to compulsively backup his work? It helps to anthromorphize issues. -Derik 19:14, 20 December 2008 (EST)

Rewind? --abates 19:34, 20 December 2008 (EST)

Motormouth! Function:Backup Support -Derik 19:37, 20 December 2008 (EST)

Mainframe? --FortMax 20:14, 20 December 2008 (EST)

Compile a list of articles using Special:AllPages, then plug them into Special:Export, preferably during the off-hours (possibly exporting each namespace separately). Parse the Image: namespace and download the images, using a throttled bot over a period of several days, and after that, do only incremental backups of the images. Everybody can do it this way, it just loads the server more than running a script to compile the .xml of the current pages once a week and offering that for download... and MediaWiki does come with a script for that, I believe. --◄mendel► 21:03, 20 December 2008 (EST)

So basically... "Do exactly the most obvious thing, brute force."

Well, we already have a throttled 'bot. Ours is offsite which is a bit of a pain... but also probably better from a, y'know... "backing up" standpoint...

Is there a standard, um... "bot" used for this, or do they tend to be coded one-off? -Derik 21:23, 20 December 2008 (EST)