MediaWiki talk:Community Portal

This is the place for discussion of topics that affect the entire wiki. Some topics that would ordinarily be here have merited their own pages:

	Specific Discussion Subjects
Moving From Wikia: Arriving Leaving Complaints New Ad Policy: Ads Bookworm Database-Crash: Damage Control Central Project:Bookworm Crash Leaving Take 2 Server Move: Arriving Take 2 Relicensing: Relicensing Dealing With Vandalism: Vandalism GoBots Sister Wiki: Discussion on the place of GoBots in this wiki Wiki Technical Information: A Not So Brief Summary of the Horrible Things That McFly and Co. Have Done To Keep This Wiki From Melting Down

Template proposal

I'm getting really sick of cleaning up fiction note templates, so, hey, here's an idea. Every single one from now on has to actually be brought up here before the community before it's implemented and not done willy-nilly by one person or a small group of editors. I realize that, as a wiki, we are going to inherently have continuity boners, but the recent trend of drowning character pages in notes is annoying and intrusive. The idea that we need to mention every point of continuity minutiae even in articles like fucking universal greeting is obnoxious and needs to stop. Saix (talk) 11:13, 8 January 2016 (EST)

I agree. Things like "Regeneration One is a continuation of the Marvel Comics continuity" don't need to be in the middle of character write-ups. -Foffy the Sheep (talk) 12:30, 8 January 2016 (EST)

The Marvel thing is a unique case that at least is relevant to character write ups—it tells readers that the Marvel UK stuff mixed into the Marvel US stuff doesn't count. (Of course, this only applies to articles that actually have sections for the original Marvel comics.) The text in the notes could stand to be trimmed down, though. Saix (talk) 12:53, 8 January 2016 (EST)

Do you have some other examples of unnecessary notes we could discuss specifically? I caught the 2001 Car Robots note you mentioned from universal greeting, and I agree it's pointless unless there's actually an RiD vs. CR distinction to be made. --Xaaron (talk) 13:04, 8 January 2016 (EST)

Wings, Classics, RG1 on pages without the continuity they're referring to. Ask Vector Prime. I'm bringing this up now because we need to develop a better way of vetting templates that are theoretically going to be used on many pages. One or two "yes" reponses on some hidden talk page most people don't notice shouldn't be used as a community-wide consensus on things that dramatically alter the reading experience across multiple pages. Saix (talk) 13:12, 8 January 2016 (EST)

And looking at the other stuff we have, Template:Notecmn could easily be made as part of the actual prose and flow more naturally that way, for example. ("In a divergent timeline, blahblah"). Saix (talk) 13:17, 8 January 2016 (EST)

And there's Template:Notemoviebio, which explains what is a regular occurrence in all of Transformers fiction for no real reason. Saix (talk) 13:19, 8 January 2016 (EST)

A similar one is Template:Notetitantlg, which I tried to make pointless when we overhauled the movie character pages a while back and which I think we ditched most uses of, but is still out there. - Chris McFeely (talk) 13:22, 8 January 2016 (EST)

Not quite the same situation, but I'd like to chime in that I'm not a big fan of Template:ongoing. Most of the time, editors completely forget to include it on the appropriate sections, it reiterates something that's obvious ("if there's information missing here, you should add it.") and it's a note that only gets put up so that it can be eventually be taken down. --Ascendron (talk) 13:27, 8 January 2016 (EST)

I agree that it's quite useless when we already have stub templates. Either information is missing or it isn't and people just leave it up on pages that really don't need it because it's not that noticeable. Saix (talk) 13:33, 8 January 2016 (EST)

Ehhhhhn. I'm willing to let "ongoing" live, as, well, there's a TON of "dead" fictions and only a few currently-updating ones, and letting people know which ones are likely to actually continue and not just be a storyline dead-end is at least marginally informative. "Stub" can mean "it came out already and no-one's bothered yet", which is... different than "this cuts off because the scheduled continuation hasn't come out yet". --M Sipher (talk) 08:12, 10 January 2016 (EST)

Also, if you find yourself overburdened with certain tasks, don't be afraid to ask for help. --Ascendron (talk) 13:08, 8 January 2016 (EST)

Thanks for taking care of the CR note. Saix (talk) 13:12, 8 January 2016 (EST)

No prob. As for the RG1 note, I agree that it would look nicer as a single line of text. I'm having difficulty reducing it in length without leaving out something crucial though. I'm putting it on the back-burner for now, but I'll keep it in mind. --Ascendron (talk) 13:18, 8 January 2016 (EST)

Tried cutting it down a bit. The G2 bit was redundant. Saix (talk) 13:43, 8 January 2016 (EST)

Ah yes. Much better. --Ascendron (talk) 13:48, 8 January 2016 (EST)

Yeah, that's equally informative, but also far less intrusive. Nice work, Saix -Foffy the Sheep (talk) 13:53, 8 January 2016 (EST)

I just wanna say that I'm glad I'm not the only one who thinks we have too many goddamned templates. Escargon (talk) 15:03, 8 January 2016 (EST)

Two templates for discussion: Template:TransformersComicMagazin and Template:GIJoeTransformersfiction. Necessary or not? I feel like the former states what's already obvious by the fact that it's in its own section ("Comic-Magazin is not Marvel"), while I dunno about the latter. Saix (talk) 15:43, 8 January 2016 (EST)

Transformers Magazin could probably be done without. The {Gi joe transformers fiction} one, on the other hand, should probably be kept. With the way we use the {noteukonly} and generally treat the US and UK comics, I feel that we kinda need to point out "hey, unlike just about everything else from Marvel US, this doesn't actually fit into the Marvel UK 'verse." -Foffy the Sheep (talk) 15:53, 8 January 2016 (EST)

The Joe one is terrible. It's just plopped into the middle of fiction write-ups with no specification as to what text it refers to. - Chris McFeely (talk) 16:04, 8 January 2016 (EST)

Yeah, I can understand the purpose, but the execution just doesn't work at all. And I don't think it belongs on the issue pages. Saix (talk) 16:06, 8 January 2016 (EST)

Collapsable continuity notes?

I don't do much fiction-section work anymore, but if I can identify part of the problem with the fiction itself... unlike most franchises, TFs has a metric fuckton of "major" divergent splinter timelines. I mean, how many different Marvel G1 comic timeline spinoffs do we have now that don't actually relate to each other? It can be difficult at first look of a page to tell the difference between a series of proper, one-timeline sequel-series and, well, the clusterfuck that is post-Marvel-G1-related stuff branching out like a hydra. So I'm loathe to just run with the "well everyone reading thew wiki should know this" mentality.
So, can see why the templates began, but when we started getting more and more branches? A bit out of hand. And worse, it's not quite a thing the base wiki organization tools are good at adapting and making obvious. (Frankly I find it tricky to tell sometimes the difference between a ===-subsection and a ====-subsection, but that's another quibble for later).
I think a good amount of this can be mitigated with some creative rewriting of the sections' openings, "ten years after the battle of Klo" or whatnot. And certainly that doesn't even need to be brought up if it's just a one-off page of a piece of minor technology from one issue of a spinoff. But for larger pages with a buttload of timeline-fragments?
We might want to look into collapsible Notes. Just a single template that can be adapted not just for this, but, well, for anything. Whack it up top, collapsed, have it say "Continuity Note: (more)" (not as a default), then people can click on it and see "well this continuity branches off from blardeeblar and has no relation to blardeeblar". This way the clutter is minimal, the information on our confusing mess of fiction is right at the fingertips.
Just a thought.--M Sipher (talk) 16:31, 8 January 2016 (EST)

This sounds useful. S.H.I.E.L.D. Agent 47 (talk) 16:47, 8 January 2016 (EST)

I love this idea. Collapsable notes could solve a lot of the problems we've been having with the templates as of late. -Foffy the Sheep (talk) 17:12, 8 January 2016 (EST)

I just took a brief look at the voiceactor template, since that does basically what I'm looking at, and even that template's workings are beyond my ability to understand and adapt into a collapsible Note. So um. --M Sipher (talk) 18:26, 8 January 2016 (EST)

It depends how you want it to work. Something like {{cnote|text 1|text 2}} to produce:

text 1 text 2

Or just {{cnote|text 1}} and

text 1

It wouldn't be difficult to knock either of those templates up --Emvee (talk) 09:50, 9 January 2016 (EST)

Expanding off of what Emvee posted here, I've worked up a collapsible note template which can display a custom header, custom visible text and hideable text that is either custom or derived from a preset name. The first draft, examples and documentation can be found here: User:Tigerpaw28/Sandbox/Template:CollapseNote. All critiques are welcome. --Tigerpaw28 (talk) 18:50, 9 January 2016 (EST)

Is there a way to put that in a gray box so it matches with the rest of our Notes? I think this has legs. --M Sipher (talk) 23:49, 9 January 2016 (EST)

D'oh! There is. In fact, I actually did have the box but the CSS for it is only available in my personal CSS file at the moment. I'll go integrate that into the template itself for now, then once this is approved maybe it can be moved to a site wide CSS file to reduce template clutter.--Tigerpaw28 (talk) 01:40, 10 January 2016 (EST)

Okay, the CSS is now included in the template so users besides myself can see the gray box. --Tigerpaw28 (talk) 01:50, 10 January 2016 (EST)

I love it. Nice work, Tigerpaw. -Foffy the Sheep (talk) 03:37, 10 January 2016 (EST)

Seconded, good stuff. --Emvee (talk) 04:16, 10 January 2016 (EST)

I'll stick the css in the common file when everyone's happy. --abates (talk) 16:29, 10 January 2016 (EST)

Speaking of notes and templates, can we also scrub the IDW notes that say "Revelation was shorter than it should've been because Simon Furman was fired." and the Dreamwave notes that say "Because Dreamwave collapsed, plot threads were left dangling."...unless those notes are specifically contributing something to the character's page? --Xaaron (talk) 13:53, 15 January 2016 (EST)

I'd say yes. Saix (talk) 14:16, 15 January 2016 (EST)

More Prominence for IDW

I'm going to propose a change, because the above discussion reminded me of something I find annoying -- the position of IDW in the Fiction sections. At this point, I believe IDW is the longest running continuous fiction in Transformers history. Yet while the 30 year cartoon and Marvel Comic are easy to pick out due to their position at the top or their multitude of subcategories, IDW is typically found near the bottom of the list, nestled in between Japanese micro-continuities, Sticker Adventures and, god help us, The Beast Within.

Is there a better configuration we could work with? I'd be supportive of a "Major Fiction" and "Minor Fiction" breakdown for the traditional "Fiction" section, if we could all peacefully agree to what counts as Major and Minor. Another thought I had was to do away with the Ongoing Fiction Template, and just have "Ongoing Fiction" automatically at the top and "Previous Fiction" underneath.

Any of this sound worth looking into more? --Xaaron (talk) 21:08, 11 January 2016 (EST)

Absolutely friggin' not, never or ever. Organizing fiction due to perceived prominence is counter to the very spirit this wiki was founded on. (It's also amazingly subjective and would be a headache to argue over indefinitely.) --ItsWalky (talk) 00:36, 12 January 2016 (EST)

Wasn't that the point of changing the disambiguation pages though? So that the more prominent stuff was at the top and had pictures to help people? omegatron (talk) 12:23, 12 January 2016 (EST)

That kind of potential slippery-sloping was why I had misgivings about that change in the first place. But Disambig pages are navigation pages, and articles are not, and I have faith that we can recognize the different needs for pages according to their utility and not just make everything the same just because it makes our brains feel superficially happier. But let me put it this way: Imagine Grapple's page. In a "we put IDW first because it's important" world, a dinky subsection in which he appears in the background twice is given precedence over a Big Looker storybook in which he is a major character. IDW isn't always super important to a character's page just because its fiction's gone on a decade! And here's the kicker -- for those folks who've appeared a buttload in IDW, those sections are split off into their own subpages and navigation at the very top of the page leads you right there, effectively already giving everyone this proposed functionality. And without losing the information of real-world chronological release order that levels the canonicity playing field, I might add. --ItsWalky (talk) 14:00, 12 January 2016 (EST)

Right. The disambiguation page thing wasn't something brought up on a whim. It's not a thing I'd propose for any other "type" of page, because disambig pages serve a different purpose than almost every other. That requires some special consideration. --M Sipher (talk) 14:15, 12 January 2016 (EST)

No, no, no, no and no, with a side order of no and no for dessert. --M Sipher (talk) 04:08, 12 January 2016 (EST)

Just throwing this out there as an alternative suggestion to moving the sections around: what do people think of the idea of bolding major sections in the table of contents, so for Optimus you'd end up with something like this. For the sake of preventing arguments we'd reserve it for the really prominent G1 continuities (G1 and BW cartoons, Marvel, IDW and possibly Dreamwave comics), since it's not generally a problem for other continuity families. I'm thinking this could be done very simply in CSS without having to edit a ton of pages, though it would mean that characters with only an IDW fiction section would have it bolded in their contents listing. --abates (talk) 17:30, 12 January 2016 (EST)

That's got some potential, I think. I don't think single-fiction character with bold in their TOC would be a problem. --M Sipher (talk) 17:48, 12 January 2016 (EST)

This ties into an old proposal from way back that I'd also found in my Community Portal re-read, and was brought up on Allspark (and I'd briefly mentioned here recently); the visual differences between subheaders are really quite minimal. It's hard to tell at a look where one continuity-line ends and the other begins. there's got to be something we can do just visually to make these divisions easier to identify by sight. Can we make the header-text for continuity-breaks centered? If we wanna get fancy, can we make a graphic the header? --M Sipher (talk) 18:47, 12 January 2016 (EST)

Okay, apparently you CAN center section headers. --M Sipher (talk) 19:32, 12 January 2016 (EST)

Did some experimenting and found a way to do this. Requires a little bit of HTML/CSS inside the header but easily doable I think. --Tigerpaw28 (talk) 23:04, 12 January 2016 (EST)

Since the initial concern, at least, was IDW, can someone sandbox a G1 character with an IDW section to see how that might look? Pipes (G1) seems like a good candidate, since he's got a good-sized IDW section that also isn't so big it should just be a subpage. -- Dark T Zeratul (talk) 23:13, 12 January 2016 (EST)

I've grown pretty iffy on using images as headers, honestly. There's a lotta "standalone" timelines that don't really have logos and having only SOME major headers be logo images... ehhhhhn. Might be best to just stick with text, maybe a thin bar above, with a wiki-wide change to a thicker tier-1-header-bar. --M Sipher (talk) 00:12, 13 January 2016 (EST)

Actually? Second thoughts, no. This would likely start too many arguments. Sky Shadow (talk) 10:05, 13 January 2016 (EST)

Another proposal after I had a thought just now: dashed overlines. The difference should be enough to differentiate from the underlines on h2s, and they nicely group together related stuff. --abates (talk) 18:46, 26 January 2016 (EST)

The Goal Of The Wiki

(slight editing of something I posted to the Allspark's wiki thread)

A little while back I decided to rummage through the Community Portal archives... from the beginning. The earliest stages, when we were hammering out how to lay out the damn pages, what we should disambiguate by, etc. Saw the suggestions for making information more readily-accessible (character appearance tables, the GO! Box, the navigation templates), the "common wiki" practices we rejected because they just could not apply to this franchise (character infoboxes, for example, thanks to the many many many bodies the characters could have), up through the big move away from Wikia when they started really fucking us over with their ads.

And during that lonnnnng string of arguments with Wikia staff, when we tried (repeatedly) to explain why this "only not-signed-in readers will see the ads so why are you complaining since you don't see the page-ruining ads see this will somehow make money!" thing was utter bullshit...

"We create the content on this wiki FOR casual readers."

Re-read that. RE-FUCKING-READ THAT.

The wiki lost that mentality somewhere. At some point in the last few years, the wiki stopped being about the readers, what would make the vast ocean of material accessible and entertaining to them. It became a micro-minutia-based circlejerk. It became editors confusing anal-retentive busywork (based on the strictest interpretation of rules that always were meant to be applied with a slight degree of malleability because our subject matter absolutely HAS to be handled that way) with productive and useful updating. And with the advent of the Facebook AVP, it became "gee now I can make Real Transformers wheeeeee" with even more micro-minutia and bad-faith gaming of the canon policy that was originally meant to give equal space to the obscure so we wouldn't have the "prominence = more deserving" mentality (plus stuff very specifically made to create circumstances to middle-finger policies that have served us well for a decade prior).

Thus, people who've worked for a decade to make the wiki something huge and special and a wiki other fandoms look at and go "holy shit, we need something like this" find themselves frustrated and edging away as the spirit of the whole thing turns into this sour, solipsistic nigh-gatekeepery up-its-own-ass wank festival, especially when certain subjects just won't. Goddamn. STOP.

From one of our newest regulars:

"Hell, I've only had to deal with one day of GoBots discussion and I'm already sick of it! I can't even begin to imagine what it must be like to deal with this shit on multiple different occasions over the course of several years, but I bet it's unpleasant."

So when I see "hey why don't we move IDW sections up because I think it's more important" or "why don't we rename every character in the Japanese-fiction writeups to their Japanese names", yeah, I'm gonna respond harsher because it's kind of hit that point where we have to start bringing the hammer down hard to keep this thing even remotely accessible to anyone who isn't fully engaged in the minutia of TFdom.

I think wiki editors (and others) need to stop and have a good think about WHY they're doing what they're doing, and who they're actually doing it for, and, ultimately, if they should actually be doing it.

There's an important difference between "can" and "should", and too many don't see it. --M Sipher (talk) 04:08, 12 January 2016 (EST)

look i already apologised for the japanese name thing okay

Well, said, though, and you've given me something to think about. --Riptide (talk) 05:21, 12 January 2016 (EST)

...Yeah, I'm taking exception to this.

Because of recent events, I wasn't expecting anyone to jump for joy, but this is a bit much. First of all, "hey why don't we move IDW sections up because I think it's more important" is reductive and dismissive to the facts on the table and the argument I presented. IDW being "ongoing fiction" isn't my subjective opinion, it's a fact. It's also the longest running mass-market fiction not only ongoing right now, but also in Transformers history. So I'm not some weebo saying, "I like Japan, so other people must want Japan to be more prominent, too." (no offense, Riptide -- just for the argument) We were discussing a case of factual prominence, not the "perceived prominence" just inside my own silly head.

And I don't need "We create the content on this wiki FOR casual readers." repeated back to me because it was you, M "Not lovin' this idea" Sipher I was thinking of, saying those very words, which made me think this was a good idea.

Maybe we have different ideas about what casual readers are, but I think of them as new/returning fans who came here because of some ongoing fiction they just saw, and might like to learn more about. If they're watching Robots in Disguise or Rescue Bots, that's cool -- most of those character pages are traceable by (RID) or (RB) disambigs, which is simple enough to figure out. And their Fiction box sections are (mostly) minimal enough to glance over and find what you wanted.

But what about the comics? Well, first they have to know IDW is Generation 1, which isn't exactly on the cover of the comics. Then they have to know the Fiction section on a character's page is organized by release date. You and I know that, but is that rule actually posted in a FAQ somewhere so we could expect a casual reader to know it? The way Sunbow and Marvel subdivide on most pages, a casual reader could be forgiven for thinking the most prominent stuff is already on the top. And even assuming they're visiting the Wiki on a full-screen computer and not a mobile device, for the 1987 guys or earlier "IDW Generation 1 continuity" is likely going to be "below the fold". And if you made it to the end of this paragraph thinking TL;DR, imagine the casual reader going through this in real time. THAT was who I was thinking of when I suggested the Ongoing Fiction content that the casual reader might be looking for when they come here be easier to find somehow.

I'm not trying to throw your words back at you, M Sipher, but again it honestly was a post you made this week defending the Ongoing Fiction Template that made me think of this. You said, "letting people know which ones are likely to actually continue and not just be a storyline dead-end is at least marginally informative". But the current razor-thin, World's Smallest Template Note doesn't really accomplish that. A casual reader may stumble across it by accident, if they squint, or they'll find it if they're already looking for it, but that's it. Floating Ongoing Fiction to the top of the Fiction sections negates the need for the template, lets new readers find what they were most likely looking for more easily, and those Fictions can just as easily be shuffled back down into 'release date order "dead" fiction' once they are no longer ongoing.

If this was a bad idea, fine. But maybe you could provide me a definition of "casual reader friendly", because obviously my WWMSD? bracelet doesn't help when I'm too stupid to know the answer. --Xaaron (talk) 09:09, 12 January 2016 (EST)

There's a Table of Contents at the top of just about every character page. The wiki software even automatically makes a TOC if a page has enough subsections. That TOC has "IDW continuity" in it, which links directly to said subsection. Easy.

Your proposal is nothing but arguments waiting to happen over what's "more important", to become more arguments over which "more important" fiction takes prominenece over the other "more important" (comics or cartoons?) with no actual benefit. It is furniture-shuffling. --M Sipher (talk) 13:19, 12 January 2016 (EST)

Not to put words in Sipher's mouth, but I don't think the main idea he's putting across is really about your proposal, Xaaron, you've just said it at a moment in time in which we are seeing a lot of what Sipher describes (but trying to dub something "more important" will lead to arguments - I remember way back when when people would complain we were putting the Marvel comic ahead of the cartoon). To repost something I've also said on the Allspark - which I don't consider to relate to your proposal, Xaaron - I have been saying for a long time in private conversation what Sipher is saying now, and several months ago, I tried to explain how we're basically responsible for breeding this attitude into our readers. It's the same attitude that caused the AVP brouhaha - we are seeing editors now openly state that the wiki has been a gateway to a lot of this stuff for them, and that they have fixated on the minutiae and the continuity-fondling, which is such a small part of what Transformers, and the wiki, is about that it's the wrong lesson to come away with. Wiki projects ATTRACT those with mindsets focused on categorization, organization, and pattern-observation. It took years before we had editors who were able to reconcile that way of thinking with our "and also fun!" approach, but they now exist, and are more interested in trying to make sure all the headers are precisely the same, that everything is in exactly the right continuity-order and header-structure and category, that all the disambigs are exact - that absolutely everything fits into its little imaginary box, and that nothing breaks the rules by coming out of its box unless there's a seventeen-week debate about it first. ORGANIZATION IS IMPORTANT, but - with the greatest of actual respect to our new editors, because it is thankless hugging busywork and its impressive that you're dedicated to it - as Sipher says, this "moving of the furniture" is all that newer-guard editors actually seem to want to do, or to be capable of doing. It's very, very easy to paste a one-or-two sentence nugget of information from AVP into the wiki, which is why so many people do it and why it got so out of control - but you don't see anyone falling over themselves to add Spacewarp's Log stuff, even before the two-week delay, because it's not presented in nugget form, it's a piece of prose that you'd actually have to - shock, horror - read and summarize, and - oh christ no - it's NOT full of references to pre-existing things so you can't just paste it into existing articles or throw the AVP stub template in. When - just for a recent example - I can go to the article of a major character like Ironhide or Thundercracker and still find tons of material that needs filling in, that says "it doesn't matter that it's been ten years, there is a lot more important work to do than making sure that header is a level 2 or a level 3 one." - Chris McFeely (talk) 13:32, 12 January 2016 (EST)

I just want to be clear that people who take the time to do "busywork" like, say, fixing links so they no longer lead to a redirect page are unquestionably welcome to. That's good, that has a tangible benefit to our wiki (reducing server load). That kind of "busywork" is absolutely okay. It's the seemingly-endless stream of talks about reorganizing hundreds of pages, arguments over disambigs, and yeah, the "easy" trivia-nugget work that's grinding here. --M Sipher (talk) 14:01, 12 January 2016 (EST)

I get the concern over the AVP-inspired editors, and even counseled Giggidy about this very issue above. In hindsight, I probably should've waited for the dust to settle more on the GoBots matter before suggesting something similar for different reasons, but like I said, the idea was sparked by the above discussion about the Ongoing Template.

And I completely agree that a Major/Minor Fiction split would likely lead to more arguments than benefits, which is why I also proposed Ongoing/Not Ongoing. That's completely binary and objective. It's not subject to debate over which fiction is "More Ongoing" than another.

I agree that the IDW links above the main character images remove any need for my proposal...for the characters who have them. My concern rested with characters like Jazz or Soundwave who do not have IDW subpages, and that continuity is 21 or 24 listings down on their Fiction TOCs, nestled between things like Q-Robo and Henkei! Henkei!. But, as I believe Chip suggested on the Allspark, a way to resolve all this is to just be more lenient with allowing IDW subpages in the first place. --Xaaron (talk) 16:31, 12 January 2016 (EST)

I too proposed that. Is there a specific reason why that tab system isn't more prominent. Heck, maybe it would even work for stuff like the Marvel and Sunbow cartoons. Those tabs are a simple and brilliant way to get our readers to what they are looking for. A casual coming here after googling say "Prowl Transformers" needs to be sent to were they need to be efficiently as possible. A page tab on his page header right at the top with IDW staring you in the face ks a good solution that doesn't deal with any of the parliamentary bojangling that's been such a hot topic latelyLush City (talk) 01:25, 14 January 2016 (EST)

Continuity Stream Bullshit

I suggested this on the Allspark, and there's some momentum for it so I'll put it here.

As M Sipher said above, arbitrary furniture movement is bad. That said, all the continuity stream minutae is even worse, and serves only to bloat our pagecount with duplicated information in articles that will only ever be stubs forever. Why do both Primax 984.0 Gamma and The Transformers (issue) exist? Or Marvel Comics continuity if you think the continuity is more important than what the Universal Stream indicator actually decodes to, although if there weren't significant opposition I'd argue that since the stream encoding to a piece of fiction is a 1:1 mapping that we should respect that directly.

Since a Universal Stream page will not contain any useful information other than its actual stream indicator (and VERY occasionally some detail such as "this universe is destroying another one"), I'd like to propose that all universal stream pages either be redirected to the actual single piece of fiction that the stream indicator decodes to, or to the Continuity timeline page that best describes it - and somewhere on **that** page we try and find a place for the universal stream number. Perhaps in the same fashion we originally handled alternate names - directly below the introductory paragraph, in bold?

If this causes problems, feel free to disregard... but I've heard enough discontent about the matter and there's been enough push for it there that I feel confident enough to put my next foot forward on this happening. Sky Shadow (talk) 10:32, 13 January 2016 (EST)

My proposal is that rather than stream pages, major continuities would all get pages. a Marvel g1 universe page, a sunbow cartoon universe a Classicsverse page and so on. Then, stream numbers used in universe would be redirect to those pages. Minor streams would get redirected to the current list pages we have now; AVP additions to minor streams would go in notes on the works main page. (For example, Ulchtar would go in the notes of that videogame)Lush City (talk) 10:51, 13 January 2016 (EST)

I just noted that the already existing Universal Stream pages could be converted into continuity pages in some instances , http://tfwiki.net/wiki/Classicsverse could be simply renamed "Classics Continuity/Universe" for exampleLush City (talk) 11:07, 13 January 2016 (EST)

I'm not seeing how universal streams are logically any different than random crap namedropped without context in stories all the time. Pralmtzurlz VI, Vaulted Heights of K'th Kinsere, and Payload of General Frightening have less content than most universe pages. There also isn't really a way to effectively have real-world information and then fictional universe information on the same article; Transformers: Mystery of Convoy isn't going to look any better if you put all of the To Die Game! stuff on it. (Primax 984.0 Gamma is also not limited to "The Transformers", so, uh, what?) Saix (talk) 13:10, 13 January 2016 (EST)

The difference is those pages are not wholly redundant. For example, yeah, maybe the city "Gygax" only got mentioned offhand in one story. But as it gets a page, it goes in the Category listing of "Cybertron cities" (or whatever it's actually called) and then when, oh, say, a TV cartoon writer wants to look up cities for references...

In other words, BAM, the whole reason we did this wiki. The obscure was given an outlet, and it got used again. And this is far from the only instance.

But this is not a functionality that serves any real purpose for the named Streams. You need to know the code to make any sense of them, at which point you can easily make up a code for any piece of fiction that exists. And every piece of Transformers fiction that exists IS canonically its own universe, and simultaneously wholly-subsumed parts of other universes, because of quantum (read: pseudoscience arglebargle translation of a meta-based concept with no real defined rules because we, and I literally mean WE as in me and Trent, made it all up and jesus on a tilt-a-whirl some people think way too hard and too rigidly about this). All these pages do is create a hoop for people to jump through unnecessarily. We don't need the pagecount bloat.

If people are REALLY concerned about stuff not from, say, that one storybook that some FunPub gag-strip or Facebook post placed some wacky new event, then there is a simple solution. NOTES SECTION. One bullet point is really all you need in the overwhelming majority of cases. Something else, a subsection under notes called, oh, "Use in Other Fictions" will cover it. --M Sipher (talk) 15:49, 13 January 2016 (EST)

Yeah, the "club fiction adds a bunch of stuff to some random micro-continuity" scenario is really the only one where the stream pages are even remotely good for anything - the Shell Game/Megazarak universe springs to mind - and in those cases it is potentially useful to have the info from a bunch of separate AVP things (or whatever) collected. But as you say, Sipher, that kind of thing could happily live in the notes section of the fiction article. Jalaguy (talk) 16:06, 13 January 2016 (EST)

From a group complaining about "moving the furniture around", there sure have been a lot of suggestions recently about deleting a lot of pages and taking all the info in them and putting them onto slightly harder-to-find pages. I'm not even sure I have an opinion on this proposal, but the observation struck me as odd. --Giggidy (talk) 16:09, 13 January 2016 (EST)

Context is important, and the context here is bandwidth issues and reader experience. Those are fucking important. Every time we bounce a reader to another page, that's another tick on our sever, and these pages are, as noted, almost wholly redundant info when we could send them to a page that has the whole thing. And you're gonna sit there and claim that a listing of made-up words and number gibberish is somehow easier for a reader to use than just putting the relevant information on a page titled in plain English they're vastly more likely to find on their own. Okay, sure, whatever. --M Sipher (talk) 16:17, 13 January 2016 (EST)

I think at the very least, there's little reason to argue that stream indicators for major continuities shouldn't just redirect to the continuity page, i.e. Primax 984.0 Gamma to Marvel Comics continuity. -- Dark T Zeratul (talk) 16:35, 13 January 2016 (EST)

Let me put this another way... the stream pages feel akin to having a page for "Khrapovik" then listing only the things Prime Ratchet did in the Russian comics on it. Again, technically a different universe, sure, but it's part of the bigger universe and splitting it out really only obfuscates info in the name of pedantry, and it's just better off folding it into the main. --M Sipher (talk) 17:09, 13 January 2016 (EST)

That makes a lot of sense to me. This might be one of those situations where we want to use flexibility. If there is a continuity page that already exists, maybe the redirect goes there and we have a fiction section. If there's a universal stream and little else, maybe that can just go away. And if there's a lot of information about the stream, maybe we just keep it. --Giggidy (talk) 23:06, 13 January 2016 (EST)

So should we start compiling solutions for wn eventual vote. I'm behind the idea of replacing stream pages with pages for the continuity. In fact I think a good way to deal with extra Avp infor is to use are already existing arrow system. Thede added storiee are just like,say Regeneration One added to the end of Marvel US in a way, so for example. Mystery of the Convoy would get an arrow that goes to To Die Game, Shell Game would get an extra a avp write up detail.

But over all I am for us having Continuity pages instead of streams. Like was said above we don't need Primax Whatever Gamma AND Marvel US continuity pages. Lush City (talk) 10:30, 14 January 2016 (EST)

Alternate names

When we mention a character's alternate names (i.e, on X's page, we note that "he is sometimes known as Y), there seems to be a bit of confusion as to exactly where we do it. Some pages place such information near the top in the continuity note, whereas others put it at the end of the opening paragraph. Is there a policy on this? I don't particularly care one way or the other, I'd just like to see them made consistent. -Foffy the Sheep (talk) 01:08, 17 January 2016 (EST)

I prefer them to be in the top rather than in the bio.--Primestar3 (talk) 14:54, 17 January 2016 (EST)

The continuity notes are cluttered enough already. Put them at the end of the bio. Saix (talk) 08:57, 20 January 2016 (EST)

I think, barring the unusual case of an obscure alternate name that is seldom used, the end of the continuity note is the ideal place. But I'm not sure consistency is absolutely necessary, as long as the information is conveyed in an appropriate way.--Giggidy (talk) 10:14, 20 January 2016 (EST)

I concur with Saix. --Khajidha (talk) 10:45, 20 January 2016 (EST)

I prefer the end of the intro over the continuity note. It leaves more room for multiple names (in case a character has 2 or more alternate names) and also makes room for context (like, when and where and why is the character sometimes called by that other name). --DrSpengler (talk) 13:54, 20 January 2016 (EST)

I prefer the end of the intro as well. Take a look at Hot Rod. He has all his names in the continuity note, and it's a mess. If we're going to pick just one way to do it (and I think we should), it should be at the end of the intro. -Foffy the Sheep (talk) 15:45, 20 January 2016 (EST)

You've convinced me that the intro is a smarter spot. --Giggidy (talk) 16:09, 20 January 2016 (EST)

How about Vector Prime's alternate names? He's never made a solid appearance using any of them, so should they be in both the intro and in the AVP story section? S.H.I.E.L.D. Agent 47 (talk) 15:23, 21 January 2016 (EST)

That feels like a great place to make an exception and only list them in the fiction section or the notes.--Giggidy (talk) 15:44, 21 January 2016 (EST)

• tl;dr-r (too long; didn't re-read), but absolutely agree that if Miscellaneous Convoy is also called Miscellaneous Magnus, then [citation needed]. i did Megascream. see also --Rhymus (talk) 05:25, 24 May 2016 (EDT)

Parodies

I think we should have one page that lists notable parodies and stuff. Just to get them out of the way. HarbringerOfDoom (talk) 08:29, 20 January 2016 (EST)

They're already out of the way, by virtue of being not on this wiki. --Riptide (talk) 08:43, 20 January 2016 (EST)

I noticed recently that the other place has started listing stuff like characters' appearances on Family Guy and Robot Chicken in their main profiles, which gives us even more reason not to. --Emvee (talk) 09:01, 20 January 2016 (EST)

I can see the appeal, but I suspect it would quickly get out of hand. Transformers gets referenced in a lot of pop culture. Every show, movie, and Web comic is somebody's favorite, so I suspect any such page would quickly become an unbearably long and tedious list. So what would that leave us with? A page saying Transformers often shows up in pop culture? I'm not sure there's any value to that. --Giggidy (talk) 10:13, 20 January 2016 (EST)

You guys have got to just be doing this on purpose now. Lush City (talk) 10:53, 21 January 2016 (EST)

I will get myself banned before I will allow this wiki to cover Family Guy and Robot Chicken. --Riptide (talk) 11:23, 20 January 2016 (EST)

NO. Like, a thousand times no. I believe similar discussions have been had in the past, and the answer was a resounding no. (I can't find that particular discussion at the moment; I'll post it here if I find it.) -Foffy the Sheep (talk) 13:43, 20 January 2016 (EST)

We have episodes of cartoons and issues of comics that are stubs and primary character articles that need to have their fiction sections filled out, but ok, yeah. Let's start pedantically listing every time Family Guy has referenced Transformers. That should be a priority. --DrSpengler (talk) 13:53, 20 January 2016 (EST)

**Condescending Wonka image** --M Sipher (talk) 15:00, 20 January 2016 (EST)

The only page that would make sense (to me) while keeping in line with the spirit for this wiki is a simple list of times that official product was used in movies and television.

• This toy was in such and such movie in year 19XX.
• Transformers episode so'n'so was seen the background of movie in year 200X.
• A number of toys were shown featured in McTV show in episode whatzitz.

References are out. Parodies are out, and it's only a single page as to not clutter up the rest (similar to what we do with unofficial Transformers guides.) --Bluestreak7 (talk) 02:36, 22 February 2016 (EST)

I really don't see any potential benefit to that. Are we going to make a page full of stuff like "Some G1 toys showed up in Flight of the Navigator" and stuff like that? Why? It's pointless, and it would just open the floodgates for more of the same pointless crap, not to mention how bloated and useless it would be. Before long, people will use that page as an argument for including bullshit from Family Guy and the Chevy commercial with the car that turns into a robot and god knows what else. Information about references to Transformers in other media is something for Wikipedia to cover. -Foffy the Sheep (talk) 12:24, 22 February 2016 (EST)

Question about GoBots....not the one you are thinking of

Discussion moved to Transformers_Wiki_talk:Community_Portal/GoBots#Question_about_GoBots....not_the_one_you_are_thinking_of

Is there a category for images from the Timelines Facebook pages?

Do we have a category for all the images posted on the Timelines Facebook pages like Ask Vector Prime, Renegade Rhetoric, etc? As I've been going through the uncategorized images, I've noticed that quite a few of them are from those Facebook pages. -Foffy the Sheep (talk) 17:16, 8 February 2016 (EST)

"Requested URL could not be retrieved"

I can't seem to find any kind of technical place to post this, so I'm just going to post it here in the hopes of getting some attention. For some reason, I've been locked out of the site; trying to access the website on either of my main computers results in a white page and an "ERROR: The requested URL could not be retrieved" message. I've tried clearing my cache, deleting cookies, all that stuff (I can still post on my phone). I suspect that it's some kind of internal server problem (I don't think I've done anything to break the wiki on my end), but I'm not sure? Any help would be appreciated. Grum (talk) 19:09, 28 February 2016 (EST)

That might have been me being too zealous with the spam blocking. I'll send you an email shortly. --abates (talk) 20:36, 28 February 2016 (EST)

Thank you! I will see if it works. Grum (talk) 20:56, 28 February 2016 (EST)

Did you get the email? --abates (talk) 22:14, 28 February 2016 (EST)

sorry for the late response, it got put into junk mail. Clicking the link just takes me to a blocked site. Grum (talk) 22:43, 28 February 2016 (EST)

OK, I think you should now be unblocked. Give it another try! --abates (talk) 22:57, 28 February 2016 (EST)

It worked! Many thanks! Grum (talk) 23:03, 28 February 2016 (EST)

No problem - sorry about that! --abates (talk) 00:05, 29 February 2016 (EST)

Facebook-exclusive characters

Given the copious quantity of characters debuted through the Tornado and TransTech Facebook pages who have no toys and have yet to appear in any other fiction, would it be appropriate to create a "Facebook-only characters" subcategory of "Fiction-only characters"? S.H.I.E.L.D. Agent 47 (talk) 19:59, 1 March 2016 (EST)

Not a bad idea. I'd also be down for "Online-media exclusive characters" or something along those lines. --Ascendron (talk) 20:15, 1 March 2016 (EST)

Yeah, that sounds worthwhile. -Foffy the Sheep (talk) 20:19, 1 March 2016 (EST)

Furthering the use of list articles

Looking at Chris McFeely's sandbox for the GoBots list article, I think that maybe similar list articles would be a nice way to handle some of the minor Shattered Glass and Kre-O characters. Pages like Broadside (SG) are rather useless, and I think that consolidating such pages into a list article would lead to a better reader experience. (To save us from pointless page moves, I would suggest just turning the old pages into a redirect to the list article, keeping all the categories.) -Foffy the Sheep (talk) 19:38, 3 March 2016 (EST)

No. Saix (talk) 19:41, 3 March 2016 (EST)

Would you care to elaborate on that? -Foffy the Sheep (talk) 20:20, 3 March 2016 (EST)

We only used a list for GoBots as a compromise for the endless debate. Applying that concept to inarguable Transformers characters is senseless and leads to more arguments over what counts for a list and what doesn't. You're just causing more inconsistency and headaches for no benefit. Saix (talk) 20:39, 3 March 2016 (EST)

I still hate the list pages for Gobots, I don't want to have to spread it further. Escargon (talk) 20:25, 3 March 2016 (EST)

Lists are not ideal. - Chris McFeely (talk) 20:26, 3 March 2016 (EST)

Fair enough. It was just a thought -Foffy the Sheep (talk) 20:41, 3 March 2016 (EST)

Sick Of Arguing About GoBots II

Discussion moved to Transformers_Wiki_talk:Community_Portal/GoBots#Sick_Of_Arguing_About_GoBots_II

RID Kre-O

Since we're unlikely to get any more Kre-O fiction, and all of the RID Kre-O articles are pretty sparse in content, maybe they should just be merged to the main RID character articles? Saix (talk) 15:27, 8 March 2016 (EST)

I'll be honest, I'm not averse to this at all. --M Sipher (talk) 17:13, 8 March 2016 (EST)

I guess nobody's really opposed to this or cares, so I'll go ahead and do it. Saix (talk) 13:48, 9 March 2016 (EST)

After looking through the Kre-O pages... I feel like the comic-only cameos should all just be merged to whatever they're referencing. After merging all of the Iocus crap, it feels right to do the same to articles that are pretty much just "BWII Galvatron, but as a Kreon". They're very specific references removed from their context for really no good reason. Maybe not a popular suggestion, but throwing it out there. Saix (talk) 16:50, 9 March 2016 (EST)

So long as it doesn't mess around with characters that freely switch between different incarnations of themselves, or are composite homages that can't be neatly classified. I can't think of any way those could be neatly merged into another page. --Ascendron (talk) 17:10, 9 March 2016 (EST)

Yeah, I'm mostly focusing on unique characters (Fractyl, Atari, Tarn, etc.) and not the big archetypes like Optimus or Bumblebee. Most characters with toys will be left alone. Saix (talk) 18:35, 9 March 2016 (EST)

I'm extremely cool with this. Never been big fan of giving them individual articles in the first place. Like, honestly, in a more organized world where this stuff hadn't been created on an incremental basis, "Fornax" almost certainly wouldn't be a thing and it'd all be Iocus. - Chris McFeely (talk) 17:48, 9 March 2016 (EST)

Again, no real objection, if a tepid "sure". I mean, I'm not really convinced that Kreons based on existing characters who DO have toys but no fiction (like a hefty chunk of the "Class" sets) really need to be split out. A page from Kreon Topspin seems... overly redundant. --M Sipher (talk) 22:29, 9 March 2016 (EST)

Yeah, I'm looking around more and it seems like there's only a select few that couldn't be encompassed by their main versions. Most of the Class series is guilty of that, but there's also lots of Kreons based on one-shot characters (Wingspan Hawk, Barrage (Kre-O)). We have a lot of pages that are just "this exists and is obviously this other thing" from both the toyline and the comic. Saix (talk) 00:39, 10 March 2016 (EST)

You probably are doing this, but be sure to add the "Kreons" category and such when condensing. --M Sipher (talk) 00:53, 10 March 2016 (EST)

Ehhh... I disagree. I mean, the Kreon Class ones, sure, but I'm less certain on What about the likes of the Soundwaves and Convoys and Starscreams? I'd probably vote strong "yes" to merging the Class of 84/5 guys, weak "yes" to merging the fictionless Kreons (and maybe the non-Transformer comic cameos, I don't know), but a strong "no" to anyone who was actually in the comic. --Riptide (talk) 06:55, 10 March 2016 (EST)

We do have a couple of examples where character pages have sections that cover more than one character already. The Masterforce transtectors and the BeCool cartoon come to mind. Does it really serve anything to give those tiny one-panel cameos in a referential comic their own pages? Saix (talk) 09:03, 10 March 2016 (EST)

As I've noted before, there comes a point where we're just being pointlessly pedantic, making people jump through hoops (and incrementally hitting our bandwidth limits) for... no actual benefit near as I can tell. Seriously. What's the benefit? What is the purpose? "Consistency"? Sorry, this franchise has grown and mutated too big for us to try and cram everything into no-exceptions rules. We HAVE to be flexible and make exceptions in some places, and when it comes to overly-redundant pages, that's where I'm more than willing to make exceptions.

I'm down with low-content one-pages for one-panel unique characters to be certain, like the Hideous Brain Guy, but for Basically The Well-Known G1 Character But In Brick Form? ehhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhn. --M Sipher (talk) 16:45, 10 March 2016 (EST)

Should we merge [[Soundblaster (Kre-O)]] into [[Soundblaster (G1)]]? Their colors aren't exactly the same, but they're both black repaint clones of the main Soundwave. S.H.I.E.L.D. Agent 47 (talk) 00:02, 14 March 2016 (EDT)

Sure, whatever. If another independent G1 Soundblaster pops up, that's probably where they're going anyway. Saix (talk) 00:54, 14 March 2016 (EDT)

So what are we doing about Kre-O toys who unambiguously represent a single established character? Back on March 25, Sipher undid the merger of Kre-O Ravage, but on May 5, Chris merged Kre-O Megaplex. S.H.I.E.L.D. Agent 47 (talk) 13:25, 15 May 2016 (EDT)

Informing new users of the recent anti-spam measures

(Slight re-editing of something I posted on the Allspark) I think we may need to put something in the welcome template and/or on Main Page/editing-tips about how new users are unable to create pages because of all the spam stuff; it seems to be confusing some people. -Foffy the Sheep (talk) 12:45, 13 March 2016 (EDT)

I've just reduced the timeout for creating new pages down to 6 hours, which should still slow down the spammers but not be quite as much of a burden on legit new users. --abates (talk) 15:50, 13 March 2016 (EDT)

Is any active admin still getting emails sent to the webmaster mailbox? I ask because I'm getting a ton of them: Looks like new IP/User Agent blocks, and I haven't touched this setup since... 2014? McFly (talk) 23:12, 23 March 2016 (EDT)

We now have a new captcha based on the Transformers Name Generator, which should hopefully be harder for the spammers to crack. Also my apologies to the non-spammers caught up in the blocking - all of the user agent blocks have been rolled back by now, so hopefully no one should be blocked from viewing the site. (Also as per McFly above, I've redirected the webmaster email address to me) --abates (talk) 20:18, 25 March 2016 (EDT)

I hope the new signup test is not too difficult - I notice we haven't had any new signups since implementing it. I changed the notice to be clearer and provided an example. --abates (talk) 22:30, 27 March 2016 (EDT)

Memobots and Deskcepticons

For those not in the know, the Hasbro Facebook page posted a bunch of new "characters" for April Fools, The Memobots and the Deskcepticons. While awesome, there's very little material for each "character" to have its own page. (All there is are photoshopped pictures of office supplies, some tech-spec stats and some very brief blurbs.) I'm thinking maybe each "faction" could have a single page, listing each of its members, instead of a very bare page for each "character." Thoughts? --Ascendron (talk) 22:53, 2 April 2016 (EDT)

Just so long as they're represented here somehow. --ItsWalky (talk) 23:08, 2 April 2016 (EDT)

Possible partnership with the German Transformers Wikia

I've been approached by the main admin of the German Transformers Wiki[1] about forming a partnership with them. We've had a long running partnership with Wookieepedia, which is also hosted on Wikia. They'd link to our pages from their pages and vice versa. Possibly we could set them up as an interlanguage link - I'd have to look into what's involved. --abates (talk) 16:51, 7 April 2016 (EDT)

Beast Wars reorganization

Demonstration. It's evident that all of the conflicting continuities and crap is out of control, so this seems like the cleanest approach now. It's based on the movie approach we're using, since it's a pretty similar situation. Thoughts? Saix (talk) 16:23, 15 April 2016 (EDT)

That's fine by me. The old chronological way is becoming a clusterfudge. --ItsWalky (talk) 16:33, 15 April 2016 (EDT)

GoBots discussions consolidated

Since we've been discussing this topic for literally years, I thought it would be useful to consolidate it all in one place, in order, with summaries of the key decisions. It can be daunting to keep track of it all, and in recent months the rules have changed several times. Transformers Wiki talk:Community Portal/GoBots. Summaries could use some work, but I tried to stick to the simple facts without editorializing. I think the important thing with the summaries is that they succinctly say roughly what was discussed and what, if any, decisions were reached. --Giggidy (talk) 16:47, 28 April 2016 (EDT)

"Transformers Trilogy" manga

(Although I'm not sure if that's the actual title.) Turns out I have it on my hard drive: [2]. Feel free to do with as you please. Saix (talk) 01:03, 17 May 2016 (EDT)

Alternate Names links

Looking at Streetwise's page, I see from the top he is sometimes known as Streetstar and Streetsmart. I know Streetstar comes from Wings, but I don't know where Streetsmart comes from. I recommend a practice of making those "sometimes known as" bits into links that carry you down to the particular Fiction or Toy where the particular name comes from, like [[Streetwise (G1)#Wings Universe|Streetstar]]. Thoughts? --Xaaron (talk) 10:20, 20 May 2016 (EDT)

I like the idea, but I would prefer ref notes to section links. Also, there are cases like Bluestreak/Silverstreak, where the alternate name is used in multiple places, and we'd have to decide how much detail we'd want to go into in those instances. -Foffy the Sheep (talk) 12:36, 20 May 2016 (EDT)

Yeah, if an alternate name is used in multiple places, a reference note explanation attached to the name could better cover all of those in one go. --Sabrblade (talk) 12:42, 20 May 2016 (EDT)

I would prefer to uses refs even when the name is only used in one place. I can't quite put it into words, but using section links for this purpose just feels...wrong. -Foffy the Sheep (talk) 12:55, 20 May 2016 (EDT)

Could you try to put it in words? Because section links would be "Click here to find what you're looking for." Ref notes would be "Click here to go to some text at the bottom of the page to tell you where to look in the middle of the page to find what you're looking for." Seems like an unnecessary extra step. --Xaaron (talk) 13:32, 20 May 2016 (EDT)

I think the section link wouldn't make it very clear that it's showing you where the name is from. It looks like it's going to send you to a different page or something, then just sends you to a different section of the same page and hopes you figure out what's going on.

The ref note has an advantage in that it's already associated with addendums and citations. When the reader sees a ref note, they instantly know "this will show me some details about this bit of text", while a link says "This is going to send me to another page". -Foffy the Sheep (talk) 14:05, 20 May 2016 (EDT)

...I feel like the reader would have to be pretty stupid not to understand what the link was doing. "Slingshot is sometimes known as Quickslinger." Click the link, see a toy of Slingshot called Quickslinger, with http://tfwiki.net/wiki/Slingshot_(G1) still in the address bar. --Xaaron (talk) 14:21, 20 May 2016 (EDT)

Yeah, I guess you're probably right. Ref notes would only be absolutely necessary if an alternate name is used in multiple places. I'd still rather use ref notes on all of them, but your way works just as well and it's not really worth arguing about any further. -Foffy the Sheep (talk) 15:16, 20 May 2016 (EDT)

@Foffy: I don't see a problem for the cases I've mentioned, no, but I'm not convinced my idea is best for cases where a character is regularly known by multiple names. For instance, how would this apply to Hot Rod's page? --Xaaron (talk) 15:22, 20 May 2016 (EDT)

• tl;dr-r (too long; didn't re-read), but absolutely agree that if Miscellaneous Prime is also called Miscellaneous Maximus, then [citation needed]. i did Megascream. see also --Rhymus (talk) 05:24, 24 May 2016 (EDT)

characters without pages

i do not feel compelled to create pages for Scarytown or Scurry Down, do you? --Rhymus (talk) 05:10, 24 May 2016 (EDT)

Given that this character doesn't exist and he's telling the other injured Insecticon to "stay down," no, I don't. - Chris McFeely (talk) 05:13, 24 May 2016 (EDT)

Chris McFeely edit summary: We went through this when the episode aired - he's telling the other Insecticon to "stay down."

Thanks. Can you link me to that discussion? (Not finding it on Talk:Insecticon_(WFC) or Talk:Toxicity, maybe the Community Portal archives?) i have the DVD in my computer's disc drive right now and i really don't think he's saying "stay down"; i'm quite sure i hear another syllable in the middle there. (i also think Hardshell using the other Con's name makes more sense than telling him to stay down.) But like i said, it's hard to make out what he's saying. --Rhymus (talk) 05:37, 24 May 2016 (EDT)

I don't think there's even a discussion to link to, because editors just reverted anyone who tried to add it. He's not calling him "Scurrytown." I'm sorry, he's just not. It's the snarling voice Kaye uses. There's KIND of a "k-" sound in there, but there's no R. The Insecticon has just tried to get up, and Hardshell is telling it not to bother, and instead stay down and radio the ship. - Chris McFeely (talk) 05:52, 24 May 2016 (EDT)

A suggestion to benefit the wiki

Hey everyone. I've noticed that this wiki lacks some templates that would be beneficial to have when it comes to linking articles. For example, if I want to link to the G1 Starscream page, I would have to write [[Starscream (G1)|Starscream]]. That's sort of a pain to do. Over on SmashWiki, we use some templates to cut down on the amount of text needed to do that kind of linking. Here's an example.

If we implemented this, one would have to write {{G1|Starscream}} if they wanted to link to that page. That cuts down on a lot of text.

Is this a good suggestion? Btw, I still think that pages such as Optimus Prime (WFC) should be called Optimus Prime (Aligned) instead. It makes way more sense to do it that way and would make this template process a bit easier. John3637881 (talk) 11:39, 24 May 2016 (EDT)

Could be useful. But disambiguating by continuity family instead of franchise has been discussed to death and decided against repeatedly. --Riptide (talk) 11:47, 24 May 2016 (EDT)

I know that it's a frequently argued topic, but I think it's more relevant than ever due to the fact that we have two franchises with the same name (RID). I mean, why are Steeljaw (RID) and Grimlock (RID) not characters from the same series? It makes no sense. John3637881 (talk) 14:01, 24 May 2016 (EDT)

Part of the disambiguation by series, and not by continuity family, is because sometimes character names get re-used within a universe for different characters. For instance, we have Steeljaw the Autobot lion, and Steeljaw the Decepticon wolf, both of whom exist in the Aligned universe. Grum (talk) 14:05, 24 May 2016 (EDT)

The problem you're having is that you're expecting the disambig tags to convey information when that's not their actual job. Saix (talk) 14:13, 24 May 2016 (EDT)

It's not? Wouldn't it be simpler then to just go numerical by appearance? Optimus Prime (1), Optimus Prime (2), etc? --Giggidy (talk) 15:32, 24 May 2016 (EDT)

Because then you'd have to memorise a list of numbers in order to link to the Optimus Prime that you wanted? If disambig tags were supposed to be a source of information, every single article would have one. Their actual job is to avoid having articles named the same thing. The continuity note, i.e. the first sentence of every article, is the thing that's supposed to tell what franchise and continuity family a thing is from. Jalaguy (talk) 15:39, 24 May 2016 (EDT)

That. The current disambig tags exist to help editors remember who's who while saving us from having to type "(RID 2015)" over and over. Would you be able to tell me offhand who "Blackout III" is? They are ultimately an editing convenience and are not meant to convey every single detail about a character. Saix (talk) 16:12, 24 May 2016 (EDT)

I can see how that would be a pain. I wasn't proposing that system, just trying to reconcile the idea that tags don't convey information.--Giggidy (talk) 23:42, 24 May 2016 (EDT)

So that case would move further down the hierarchy. How does that affect the idea of starting with continuity family? And it is completely ignoring the fact that the (RID) tags (and the (Universe) tags) are ambiguous in the real world sense. True, they may not be ambiguous in the narrow wiki definition, but to new and casual readers the fact that the exact same tag can refer to two different series is confusing. We should not be increasing real world ambiguity ("Which RID series is this again?") just because it doesn't cause wiki-centric ambiguity. --Khajidha (talk) 14:15, 24 May 2016 (EDT)

oh my god you guys, no, stop --ItsWalky (talk) 16:13, 24 May 2016 (EDT)

I feel like disambiguation tag debates should be definitively banned, to be honest. They just go into circles and nothing ever changes. Saix (talk) 16:44, 24 May 2016 (EDT)

Typing [[Starscream (G1)|]] also works, is only slightly longer than {{G1|Starscream}}, and has the benefit of not including the overhead of expanding a template which adds processing time to any page when the site has to render it. That last one might not be a problem on a small wiki with only medium-sized pages like SmashWiki, but here it could be a big issue. --abates (talk) 16:22, 24 May 2016 (EDT)

That's great. I had no idea. --Giggidy (talk) 23:42, 24 May 2016 (EDT)

It is kinda buried in the middle of Help:Editing. --abates (talk) 00:37, 25 May 2016 (EDT)

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGH --M Sipher (talk) 18:52, 24 May 2016 (EDT)

Well, to anyone who actually contributed to the discussion, thanks for your input. I can see that this sort of template isn't really what this wiki is looking for, although I do think it would make things a little easier. John3637881 (talk) 23:40, 24 May 2016 (EDT)

As for disambiguation by continuity family versus franchise, I've been thinking about a potential compromise that I hope has not been brought up before: Would it be possible to do both types of disambiguation? Something like Optimus Prime (Aligned/WFC) or Steeljaw (Aligned/RID), where the first part would designate the continuity family and the second half would designate the origin franchise. John3637881 (talk) 09:58, 2 June 2016 (EDT)

Stop. Saix (talk) 11:05, 2 June 2016 (EDT)

That's neither respectful nor constructive. John3637881 (talk) 11:11, 2 June 2016 (EDT)

Beating this dead horse again with overcomplicated proposals that miss the point of disambiguation tags isn't constructive, but here we are. Saix (talk) 11:26, 2 June 2016 (EDT)

This has been discussed time and again in the past and it always comes back to the current system of franchise disambiguation. Everyone who expresses disdain for changing this system has either been involved in or seen so many of the past discussions on this matter that they're just tired of seeing it brought up every time it gets brought up over and over again. So it's basically fruitless to suggest changing the disambiguation system from being how it currently is, as all the higher-ups are adamant about keeping it the way it is and would rather not have to repeat themselves from past discussions on why this system works as is and why changing it isn't a good idea. It's nothing against you, it's just that this subject is a touchy one that everyone's tired of retreading so much. --Sabrblade (talk) 11:33, 2 June 2016 (EDT)

Well, thanks for the best answer so far. To me, adding a couple more letters to the names of articles for the purpose of avoiding confusion doesn't seem like over-complicating. It became clear to me when I first brought this up that a compromise of some sort would be the most effective way to constructively and satisfactorily solve the problem. The reason this issue continues to be brought up consistently is because the system could be better. I remain hopeful that some well-received compromise will eventually pop up.

I understand that people are frustrated at the commonality of this topic, but the "I/we disagree with you, so stop talking," way this problem has been handled by many people makes the wiki look bad imo. John3637881 (talk) 11:46, 2 June 2016 (EDT)

The way I see it, the confusion your suggestion could bring about is that, at a glance, the presence of two different terms separated by a slash in the disambiguation tag would, to the uninformed, give the impression that the subject of the article originates from and/or pertains to two different series, which is a type of confusion that the tags aim to avoid. Having one term per tag is a simpler setup than having two terms per tag, and something more simple tends to be easier for people to understand than something less simple. --Sabrblade (talk) 12:05, 2 June 2016 (EDT)

For me, this always comes back to the fact that disambig tags aren't supposed to be a source of information - if they did, every page would have one. They're there so pages don't have to have the same name. The continuity note, right there at the top of the page, exists to tell you everything you need to know about the character's continuity of origin. In potentially confusing cases like Grimlock (RID), the very first thing is a disambig template saying "hey, if you're looking for the green dinosaur, go here". I just don't see the potential for disambig tags confusing people unless they're literally not reading the actual articles. (On a related note, in cases where the disambig tag is something potentially unexpected, there is almost always a redirect in place to get you to the right place - e.g. Ratchet (Prime), Sentinel Prime (DOTM), and so on.)

As for this particular proposal, I feel like it isn't very transferable beyond Aligned. Like, extrapolating that approach you'd have lots of tags that were the same thing twice (RID/RID), and even if you made an exception for those cases, you'd get supremely confusing stuff like Megatron (G1/BW), Dreadwing (G1/G2), Grimlock (RID/Dinobots), etc. Jalaguy (talk) 12:21, 2 June 2016 (EDT)

It seems unrealistic to say "disambig tags aren't a source of information" when they act as both the title of the page and the mechanism through which the search function works. They're not only the first thing visitors see on each page (even before the continuity note, and in much larger, bolder font), they're also the means by which someone will find a page in the first place. --Xaaron (talk) 13:38, 2 June 2016 (EDT)

Fair points. Though I'd argue that the current proposal of adding continuity family prefixes would probably make it harder for the casual user, who isn't big into the online Transformers fandom, to find a given character using the search function, especially with terms like "Aligned" that haven't actually ever been used by mass media. Joe Bloggs is unlikely to have a particular conception of "continuity family" and is far more likely to be searching based on the name of the cartoon/game/film whatever they saw the character in. The change that I personally probably would say "sure, why not" to would be adding years to the reused-name franchise disambig tags even when characters aren't in both, e.g. Grimlock (RID 2001), even though there wouldn't be an article at Grimlock (RID 2015). Not strictly necessary to separate articles, but could potentially cut down on the odd bit of confusion. Jalaguy (talk) 14:31, 2 June 2016 (EDT)

Yeah, I can see now how my proposal could cause more confusion than clarification. Two of you (Sabrblade and Jalaguy) give fairly good reasons why not to go through with this. Would it be possible to use a system like this for only Aligned characters, or is that still too confusing?

As for disambiguation tags not being a source of information, I have to disagree with that to some extent. Yes, we can just look at the first sentence of any given page, and yes, there are redirects, but the article names threw me off several years ago and I can imagine they would do the same thing to people nowadays. For example, I wondered what the Prime Optimus was doing on a page called Optimus Prime (WFC). It wasn't exactly clear that a video game from 2010 was the original work in the Aligned continuity or that a completely different-looking Optimus was indeed the one from Prime. Perhaps above all, it should be stated somewhere why pages are called what they are. John3637881 (talk) 14:37, 2 June 2016 (EDT)

How to request main page changes?

Hi! I'm fairly new here, so I'm sorry if this is a silly question. The main page seems to be edit-locked except for admins, which is an excellent idea. However, I'm used to having a place to request edits to locked pages - in this case, I'd probably mostly be asking for updates to the Rescue Bots "newest episodes" list. Does this wiki have one? If yes, where? Thanks for answering! Raininshadows (talk) 17:02, 25 May 2016 (EDT)

The current releases box actually runs off a separate template that anybody can edit - click the little 'V' in the corner of the box to access it and update to your heart's content! Jalaguy (talk) 17:12, 25 May 2016 (EDT)

I didn't even notice that. Thanks! Raininshadows (talk) 19:23, 25 May 2016 (EDT)

Anonymous Primal (BW) has lots of toys! You may be looking for Anonymous Primal (Animated) or Anonymous Primal (RID).

A few spot checks suggest that when a character has enough toys that they warrant a separate page from the character's main article, the toys page does not link directly to a disambiguation page, even if the character does. Looks like fiction sections don't have disambiguation links, either. How easily could disambiguation links (where applicable) be added to the {(suite)} template? So if you're trying to look up a toy and, whoa, hey, these aren't the droids i'm looking for, but that's the name on the box--maybe someone else has that name?

i bet you're thinking, "If you start by looking up the name on the box, you'll land on the disambig page." But what if an internal link on the wiki sends you to /toys or /IDW_Generation_1_continuity or whatever, and it's not the right namesake?

Maybe it's easy enough to find the disambig pages. But maybe we can make it easier. i just don't know how to edit templates, myself (and wouldn't edit them without asking).

--Rhymus (talk) 23:45, 28 May 2016 (EDT)

"But what if an internal link on the wiki sends you to /toys or /IDW_Generation_1_continuity or whatever, and it's not the right namesake?" Which doesn't happen. You are creating solutions to problems that only exist in your head. Saix (talk) 20:18, 30 May 2016 (EDT)

What Saix said. If the links are sending someone to the wrong place, what needs to happen is that we fix them, not create solutions to problems that will never arise if everything is done properly. Also, I'd really rather not clutter the suite templates; they're specifically desgned to be small and non-intrusive, and sticking disambigs in them detracts from that. -Foffy the Sheep (talk) 22:26, 30 May 2016 (EDT)