Talk: Community portal/Archive05

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Admin selection

Since this might get a lot of discussion, I'm going to start it on a separate page: Project talk:Admin selection. — Eyes 17:42, 27 March 2012 (UTC)

Skins?

Are we going to see the missing three skins again? Karika^Communicator 20:12, 30 March 2012 (UTC)

I'd been hoping with the upgrade, we'd get STOklingon and STOborg back. I don't think we'll be getting Cavendish back. Unfortunately, the skins may be what's holding up the upgrade. I thought I had fixed all the compatibility issues, but there may be some Curse-specific issue I don't know about, and I don't think I can get a update until after the weekend. — Eyes 11:13, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

Since we're discussing the upgrade, I would suggest you get them to install ConfirmEdit and use the Asirra module to screen user creation, at the least. We have it at GuildWiki, triggering on user creation and edits that add external links, and it has drastically reduced the amount of spam we see (it's a level above even AbuseFilter). —Dr Ishmael 15:54, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

I've already requested that configuration. ^^ — Eyes 17:09, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

I thought you might have, since I believe Curse has added that to their default wiki setup, but figured I'd mention it anyway. —Dr Ishmael 17:42, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

ConfirmEdit is bundled with 1.18, and yes, Asirra is being installed on all English language wikis on our network. And to answer your questions, Yes, it is skin issues that are holding up the upgrade for STO. it's really important that you guys work out a vector based skin (skins) before the next major update of the software. -- Wynthyst talk 08:16, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

Just an update for you, STO Wiki will be upgraded to 1.18.1 tomorrow (4/13). The deploy is scheduled for 9:30 am (CST) and should be a non-service interupting deploy, but the wiki will be in Read Only mode while the upgrade is being processed. This should take 5-15 minutes. The upgrade includes your custom skins (all of them). -- Wynthyst talk 21:52, 12 April 2012 (UTC)

"Ships item" link

On the main page there's a link named "Ships Item" in the "equipment" category. This link send you to the starship equipment page which only talk about engine and deflector. I was wondering if it would be a better idea to link it to the Starship Components page which talk about every items you can put on a ship. What do you think about that? Bimanolc 02:55, 5 April 2012 (UTC)

Misconception between Hubs and space stations/starbases

I post here because there's many page related to the problem. I discovered recently a misconception beteween Hubs and space station/starbases on STO wiki. As I thought, space station/starbases were artificial creation that float in space and Hubs were social like gathering place (don't get me wrong, I know some space station are considered like hubs but not all of them and hubs also include some planets and the battle group omega). While navigating amongst different pages treating that subject I found pages misinterpreting:

• Hubs as space Station/starbases like Guide: Starbases
• Space station/starbases as Hubs like Hub
• fusionning both like List of space stations

What I say is not that these entire pages are wrong. There’s really valuable information on them. The only fact is the information needs some reorganization. I certainly would like to give it a try but I would need to make major changes and maybe show you a plan of what I think could be good (i'm not used to the system here yet). What do you think about that? Bimanolc 15:35, 5 April 2012 (UTC)

Guide: Starbases just needs to be moved to Guide: Hubs, and that problem will be fixed.

The Hub article looks fine, and the definition makes sense - a location with access to bank/mail/Exchange and other services. The presence of these services tends to draw more people to visit the location, which leads to the location also serving as a place for social gatherings. The majority of hubs just happen to be space stations: ESD is both a space station and a hub, while First City is a hub but not a space station.

The category problem is due to the infoboxes being used on the individual articles. Space stations should use {{Stationinfo}} while planets should use {{Planetinfo}}, but there are a number of planets like Risa using the wrong template. Someone needs to correct these to use the correct infobox. —Dr Ishmael 16:25, 5 April 2012 (UTC)

I agree for the guide! that's what I was thinking. For the Hub article, I'll try to elaborate the definition a little i think i can make it even better and maybe try to update the article cause "spending emblem" and things are not up to date. I'll also try to take a look into the category problem ... if I have the time (added to my to do list :P). Just to let you know, I've tried something for the Space station article. I'll post it soon! Let me know what you think. Bimanolc 18:51, 5 April 2012 (UTC)

"Under Construction"-Update

The "Under Construction"-section needs an update. I'd say we should keep Guide: The Foundry and Corsair Flight-Deck Cruiser in, though.

New links could be to Utopia Planitia Shipyards, Mission: Alpha, Mission: Klingon Academy Event, Odyssey Science Cruiser, Odyssey Tactical Cruiser, Bortas Battle Cruiser. --Akira-sensei 09:22, 7 April 2012 (UTC)

1.18.2 upgrade

First of all, I don't know why Special:Version is saying this is version 1.18.2 when we were going to get 1.18.1 (though it doesn't matter much). STOborg and STOklingon are back (though Cavendish isn't). Also noticable on Special:Version is the black-on-dark-blue text that has to be selected to even be seen. Karika^Communicator 14:51, 13 April 2012 (UTC)

Well, back when was told about it, it was 1.18.1 we were going to get, but it doesn't really matter. I was expecting the color issue with the tables and the updated CSS has fixed it.

I am also aware of the "Change protection" button issue (being it exists on this very page). That's on me, as I thought I had already modified the skin to deal with it, but apparently, I got ahead of myself. I'll submit the needed change after a few days; I want to wait to see if we find any other problems that require changes to the core skin files.

I checked on Cavendish about a week ago. It's not a standard MediaWiki skin, but a separate project, and it doesn't look like they've even released a version compatible with MW 1.18 yet. So even if Curse sorts out the analytics code issue they have with multiple skins, Cavendish will probably still not be an option. <imagefont color="#999999">— Eyes 15:28, 13 April 2012 (UTC)

I have an error to report. Images in Galleries have a white background that really distacts from the images. For example:

• 

  See the white background?

- Mitchz95 16:31, 13 April 2012 (UTC)

Fixed. — Eyes 16:54, 13 April 2012 (UTC)

Catagory tags at the bottom of pages seem to be spaced out a bit differently after the upgrade, where as prior they were more tightly spaced, is that intended? — Rɪᴘʟᴇʏ^[<span=help title="Ripley's Talk Page">^T|<span=help title="Ripley's Contributions">^C] 17:54, 14 April 2012 (UTC)

Not intentional on our part, if that's what you mean. Apparently, it's a change in the common styles for 1.18. If people don't like it, we can almost certainly override it. — Eyes 18:21, 14 April 2012 (UTC)

When you do a search now, the results page includes the checkbox of namespaces. It didn;t used to. The other problem with that is now the results are forced down under the page fold. users may not be aware of where the results are and get confused thinking that there aren;t any results. --Drmike 16:42, 15 April 2012 (UTC)

I just noticed on the File:Combat_Mugato.jpg page that the metadata at the bottom is unreadable. When you view it, it appears to be white text on a white background. Not sure how it was previously but it;s a concern now. thanks --Drmike 14:39, 16 April 2012 (UTC)

Fix in place. You may need to use shift-reload (or your browser's equivalent) to load the new CSS. — Eyes 15:22, 16 April 2012 (UTC)

The show/hide javascript is broken. I've upgraded Template:AssignmentChainsNav to use MW 1.18's built-in collapsible elements, but I don't know if that JS is used anywhere else. —Dr Ishmael 16:50, 16 April 2012 (UTC)

Fixed. The problem was just another JS function (addOnloadHook) they dumped in favor of jQuery. This particular switchover has caused me headaches before... — Eyes 17:14, 16 April 2012 (UTC)

Surely I cant be the only person to notice that images are failing to load, seemingly at random. This breaks most pages on the wiki that have icons or screenshots. --Zutty 18:49, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

Yeah, I've noticed that too, but only starting a few days ago, so I don't know if it's related to the MW upgrade or not. —Dr Ishmael 20:17, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

Several users including myself have noticed this. I do not know the cause but it needs a fix asap. --MatthewM 22:51, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

If my understanding of Mediawiki is correct (its been many years since I worked with PHP!), I think the server is dispatching requests to the /Images subfolder to the wiki PHP code instead. Example...

http://tinypic.com/view.php?pic=28aibyd&s=6

Not sure why it does it intermittently though. Is STOwiki load balanced maybe? --Zutty 12:56, 12 May 2012 (UTC)

Probably. The skin bug affecting certain special pages (those that show a talk page button) is also happening intermittently, and there's no other reason I can think of for that to happen. Not that I'm complaining, since the bug would otherwise be breaking them consistently. Hopefully, Curse will apply the patch soon. I don't think the image issue is related to the skin problem (can't think of any possible connection), but I made a request to fix the issue with transparency when resizing PNGs too. I suspect they probably changed something image-related at the same time they applied the skin update. — Eyes 13:24, 12 May 2012 (UTC)

The skin bug appears to be fixed now, but we're still having image problems, I see. I'll make sure to bug Curse about it by Monday at the latest. Probably can't get this looked into until after the weekend. — Eyes 14:22, 12 May 2012 (UTC)

I just the following error when trying to upload an image...

"The upload directory (public) is missing and could not be created by the webserver"

I tried again and it worked. A bit worrying. The upload page also doesnt load licensing text consistently either. --Zutty 15:42, 12 May 2012 (UTC)

I just wanted to let you guys know that this issue has been reported, although it is unknown what is causing it. It seems to be on the server side, so sysops are checking it out now. I'll be sure to come back and update this if the issue is fixed or we find out what is going on. The images are breaking because the "I" in images on the URL is auto-capitalizing, although the wiki was never configured like that back end wise. --BUMBLE 21:28, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

Thank you very much indeed :) --Zutty 21:45, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

Another update, after looking around a lot for what was causing the issue, we were unable to find anything. Our php lead feels the best option right now is to run a link refresh against STO Wiki in the morning (it's 5 pm where he is so he's getting off work and doesn't want to run it and have to sit there and watch it). Hopefully, in the morning you will see that all of the images have been fixed, but if not we'll continue to look for the issue. --BUMBLE 21:57, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

Hi BUMBLE. Did the update take place? If so, it doesn't seem to have helped. Is there anything we can do to help resolve this issue? --Zutty 08:52, 16 May 2012 (UTC)

It seems to be fixed now. I assume it was someone at Curse, so thanks very much! :) --Zutty 09:56, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

I started to notice numerous images stop working today that were fine earlier this week. Can this get confirmed that others are seeing it, and if so is the problem on Curse's end? --MatthewM 06:33, 9 June 2012 (UTC)

Confirmed. I'm seeing it too. --Zutty 09:20, 9 June 2012 (UTC)

(Reset indent) Might be something different this time. Last time, I had trouble getting to the actual images when they were affected (it would treat the file path as a page title instead). This time they just seem to be randomly not loading on the pages, but the direct links do take me to the image each time. In any event, I'll report it momentarily. — Eyes 13:32, 9 June 2012 (UTC)

I think this issue may have disappeared. Is anyone still noticing any images not appearing? — Eyes 16:30, 12 June 2012 (UTC)

It appears to be working fine from here, as well. --MatthewM 21:33, 12 June 2012 (UTC)

Signatures in the mainspace

I have been noticing an increase in user signatures in the mainspace for quite some time. Could an AbuseFilter entry be added to filter this? Karika^Communicator 14:19, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

I doubt it. The abuse filter variables are generated after the ~~~~ is replaced. I'm also against using the abuse filters for simple mistakes. Instead, I tried to make the message on the edit page clearer and the "talk pages" part stand out more. — Eyes 15:30, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

For me, at least, bold text doesn't stand out very much in a white-on-dark color scheme, so I'm not sure how much that is going to help. —Dr Ishmael 16:19, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

Okay, modified it that whole bullet point only appears when editing a talk page. I think that's the best we can do. — Eyes 16:45, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

I didn't know you could use parser functions in the MW: namespace like that. Spiffy! —Dr Ishmael 18:27, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

It's message-by-message. Some get fully parsed, some don't. We got lucky that this one does. — Eyes 18:55, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

It is possible to get filters to id signatures, you could have it simply send them a "warning message" explaining that signatures are not appropriate in the mainspace, or, an alternative would be to just have the filter flag the edit when a signature is included an have an admin contact the user directly and explain. -- Wynthyst talk 23:48, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

Moving {{infobox}} and {{coloricon}} into SMW

I've modified the infobox template (current test at User:Karika/infobox) to use SMW properties (tech demo at User:Karika/infobox/test). I've also created a replacment icon template (User:Karika/Icon) that is tied to the new infobox template via SMW, and also to replace the very similar {{Icon}}, {{Coloricon}}, and {{Iconlink}}. Any suggestions/ideas? Karika^Communicator 16:14, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

CSS: why force size on a?

Something that's been bothering me for a while is that the CSS here forces a font-size property on the <a> element. I can't find it in any of the MediaWiki:*.css pages accessible on the wiki, so I assume it's in the core skin files, but Chrome's page inspector shows this rule:

a, a:visited, .plainlinks a {
  color: #6dc7e3;
  text-decoration: none;
  font-size: 10pt;
}

Why does it force all links to 10pt? A link is an inline element and should normally inherit the font-size from the parent block. We currently have a number of annoying hacks to override this (a number of them in MediaWiki:Stocommon.css, {{Item}}... can't remember where else I've seen it right now), but there shouldn't be any need for that in the first place. —Dr Ishmael 18:03, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Special:WhatLinksHere

The 'what link here' functionality is broken. Observe...

http://www.stowiki.org/Special:WhatLinksHere/Template:PCshipinfo

--SomeGuy 17:16, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

In what way, exactly? You mean that the link on this page doesn't count? The wiki treats that as an external link and doesn't count it. That's by design. An internal link like this one will be, though. — Eyes 17:37, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

Never mind. Now I see it. Worked fine a moment ago... I think I know what's going on. — Eyes 17:49, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

I've sent Curse a fix for this issue. — Eyes 18:42, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

Looks like a fix has been deployed. This issue doesn't appear to be cropping up today. — Eyes 14:22, 12 May 2012 (UTC)

I'm Back, Baby!

Hi all. Long time no see. I regret just disappearing without saying anything. I had kind of fallen out of love with STO and decided not to play anymore. However the Cat Carrier has tempted me back, so I thought I'd swing by the old wiki! TBH I still have my reservations about STO, but I actually kind of miss it. Plus Im still keen for the wiki to be the No.1 source of information on STO, so its back to work for me! --Zutty 10:50, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

Welcome back, Zutty! — Eyes 11:25, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

New Logo

Hi again all. I've taken my sweet time with this one, but I finally got around to applying my proposed new logo to Eyes' sandbox wiki...

http://sto.aeongarden.com/wiki/Main_Page

If you approve I'll apply it to the main wiki. I was only able to log in to the old 1.16 sandbox wiki, so I may need to port the changes in STOCommon.php, but its a pretty simple change.

The logo itself is the new PW/Season 5 STO logo, with the word WIKI added in the closest font/colour/style as I could get it. I used Inkscape; if you want the source, let me know. Thanks --Zutty 19:27, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

I like the logo, but I don't like how it breaks out of the layout into the left gutter. I don't know what could be done to avoid/fix that, though. —Dr Ishmael 20:19, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for the feedback. This is easy to change, but I didn't like the way the horizontal bars in the STO logo sat on top of the horizontal line in the blue header frame. It looked a bit awkward to me. If you have either Google Chrome or Firefox with the Firebug plugin, you can tweak the CSS to see what you think. Change top: -15px to, say, top: -3px.

I could perhaps take the horizontal lines out of the logo, so they don't clash, but I wanted to keep it as close to the original as I could. Shall I try that and upload it as an alternative? --Zutty 20:59, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

I don't have an issue with the vertical positioning. I'm talking about how the letters "ST" of "STAR TREK" are outside the left edge of the rest of the page layout. The solution isn't as simple as reducing the left: -60px value, as that would make the lower points of the delta-shield start interfering with the article title. And I suck at graphic design, so I don't know what else could be done. —Dr Ishmael 21:22, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

Oh I see! Sorry, I misread your original comment. Yeah, it would be trick to fix that without either changing the site layout or mangling to logo. --Zutty 22:02, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

I agree with Ishmael. The logo doesn't look good the way it is set up. Also, I have to say it does look like it's just the STO logo with a "wiki" added to it. There's nothing special or recognizable about it - while the current logo certainly isn't perfect, it feels more like it actually represent the Wiki on its own. --Backyardserenade 10:18, 12 May 2012 (UTC)

Well, the current logo is just the previous official STO logo with the word 'wiki' added to it! My reasoning for wanting to use the stock logo is that we've been officially recognised by Cryptic, so I think we should reciprocate. I hate to use nonsense marketing terms, but there is an element of brand recognition here. There are 1,000,001 'Star Trek' games and websites and such out there, all with very similar identities. Theres only so many ways you can reuse Trek fonts and the insignia! I personally think it helps us to be recognised as part of the STO community specifically if we use their logo.

I am working on an alternate version with STAR and TREK stacked vertically, but I am having to hack it together in the GIMP/Inkscape, since Cryptic doesn't provide a media kit for fansites or the press. I'll upload it later so you can see what you think. Perhaps we could ask them for some media, but we may have to wait for all sorts of legal/corporate machinations. --Zutty 11:17, 12 May 2012 (UTC)

Ok, I have come up with an alternate logo. I haven't changed the PHP and CSS on Eye's sandbox wiki yet, but I've uploaded it and taken a screenshot. I could not get good enough results my cutting up the logo image in the Gimp, so I had to reconstruct it from scratch in Inkscape. It looks reasonably similar, but I'm still not happy with it. With that said, here it is...

http://sto.aeongarden.com/w/skins/stocommon/logo_alt.png

and here it is side-by-side with the official logo...

http://tinypic.com/view.php?pic=168xzpe&s=6

What do you think? I spent quite a lot of effort on it, and I still don't think it looks that great. I still prefer the official logo. I'd quite like to get a decision on this soon (or I'll get bored and forget about it again!). If anyone feels very strongly in democracy then we could have a vote, but otherwise just some opinions would be nice. --Zutty 21:45, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

The new logo looks nice but the bottom of "online" melts into the dark background. From a quick glance, the only reason why I know it's "Online" is because of that's the name of the game. Not sure if that would be important since this is a niche site. Just wanted to point it out. Does look nice though. --Drmike 22:51, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

Looks good! :) Agree with Drmike's little complaint. But I'm also not sure whether it needs to be fixed. Those coming here already know that it's "ONLINE". -- Backyardserenade 10:27, 15 May 2012 (UTC)

Thanks guys :) I think Eyes is working on something at the moment, so we'll hold on off making a decision for now. Also, if anyone wants the SVG source or some higher-resolution samples, let me know. Im sure a proper artist could make some improvements! --Zutty 08:55, 16 May 2012 (UTC)

changing the front page

May I make a suggestion that an admin edit the front page and point it to the FE reruns? Considering we have f2p listed in each of the banners, I suggest editing the top f2p one and leaving season 5 as it is. thanks --Drmike 21:50, 12 May 2012 (UTC)

Good idea! I have made some changes to the main page. --MatthewM 22:58, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

Might be a good idea to change the pictures as well. I didn't even notice there's new text in the banner cause there's still the pic of the Enterprise and ESD. --Backyardserenade 10:30, 15 May 2012 (UTC)

Agreed, I'll see what I can do about getting some series-appropriate images up later today. --MatthewM 17:50, 15 May 2012 (UTC)

I added some images. Hope you don't mind MatthewM. --Zutty 19:50, 25 May 2012 (UTC)

May I suggest adding in those two new assignment chains to the Under Construction tab? Caitian Diaspora and whatever the other one it? Thanks --Drmike 21:45, 25 May 2012 (UTC)

Done. Thanks Zutty, it turns out the program I used to make images with transparent gradients has not yet been installed on my new computer and that's why I didn't do it a few days ago. --MatthewM 21:59, 25 May 2012 (UTC)

Yet another "Under Construction"-update

Bortas Battle Cruiser, Mission: Klingon Academy Event and Odyssey Tactical Cruiser can be removed.

Most wanted pages: Assignment: Decrypt Facility 4028 Files for Information‏‎, Assignment: Infiltrate Database of Facility 4028 for Prisoner Information‏‎, Photonic‏‎

--Akira-sensei 10:36, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

Hello? Anybody feeling responsible for this?^^ --Akira-sensei 09:18, 21 May 2012 (UTC)

I have been looking for that mission, the KDF one, for weeks without luck. When I do find it I will update the mission. --Aoav160 10:06 12 Jun 2012 (UTC)

There's a double listing now. I've also created the articles on Photonic, Par and Missile. This leaves us with the following three red links to be added to this section: Assignment: Decrypt Facility 4028 Files for Information‏‎, Assignment: Infiltrate Database of Facility 4028 for Prisoner Information (NOT the same!), Facility 4028. --Akira-sensei 17:28, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

Since the Under Construction box is proving to be quite useful in motivating edits and would benefit from much more frequent updates (more frequent than we admins are likely to be able to keep up with by ourselves), I've decided to try opening that up to registered users through {{Under construction}} and see how it goes. — Eyes 11:32, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

LCARS-like Vector-based skin

Since I'm pretty close to starting to write user interface code for the duty officer extension, I decided to take a break on work on another project I've been hoping to get to (largely because I wanted to have the skin available for testing UI layout).

It's not entirely finished yet, but you can get a good idea of how it looks at this mockup of our main page on one of my sandbox wikis.

Switching to this skin would have some advantages. Our current skins are fully custom, require a supporting extension, and usually need upgrading and coordination with Curse at each wiki upgrade. Problems with that coordination delayed our upgrade by weeks last time, and similar problems mean better positioning for the footer still hasn't happened.

This skin is essentially the Vector skin packaged with MediaWiki, the software our wiki runs on. It's just heavily modified with CSS, images, and one small and simple extension. Only problems with the extension would require us to ask Curse for any fixes, and the simplicity of the extension will probably make that rare. Problems with images or CSS could be fixed by admins through the wiki itself. So, comments? — Eyes 14:04, 12 June 2012 (UTC)

I admit that the technical issues are over my head, so my questions pertains the style only: Is it necessary to be LCARS? I've been on various fan-sites, some using LCARS, others (e.g. Bernd Schneider's EAS) not, and found that I prefer non-LCARS-style. Memory Alpha and Beta do not use it, either, although it is very Trekkie. --Markonian 14:16, 12 June 2012 (UTC)

Well, as an alternative to our family of skins, I had an idea that with this one, we could, in time, provide alternative stylesheets. Registered users can add their own CSS through User:your username/vector.css. It'd be easier to modify once everything is worked out.

In this case, my preference is to stick with the LCARS look because of the resemble to the game's loading screen. It's also a lot easier to do without images for tabs (which is trickier in Vector since we can't change the HTML), and I don't see how we could very effectively replicate the in-game look without doing that. — Eyes 14:32, 12 June 2012 (UTC)

What will happen to the other three skins, and will there be an option for a "blue-themed" (like the current STOfederation skin) Vector skin? Karika^Communicator 16:20, 12 June 2012 (UTC)

Curse will no doubt remove them as options, unless they've updated their systems to load the analytics code on all skins. As for turning it blue, color changes would be relatively trivial to make a new stylesheet for. In fact, it might be possible to use the Gadgets extension for this so you could just check it in your preferences rather than having to copy CSS into your personal style page. I'll check and see if it works with CSS. — Eyes 16:24, 12 June 2012 (UTC)

I'm just a lurker that makes occasional minor edits, and comes through for information, but I love that vector skin. I'd love to see it, in the 24th century greens and yellows or the 25th century blue. Excellent work if nothing else...nice background too. Rayfire 17:50, 12 June 2012 (UTC)

Right, I should point out the backgrounds are actually random. We'll be able to add new ones by adding the wiki file names to MediaWiki:Sto-vector-backgrounds like we do for MediaWiki:Sto-skin-banners. It's meant as something of a tribute to our current skins. The two backgrounds on the sandbox wiki are just two backgrounds from the official site. — Eyes 18:04, 12 June 2012 (UTC)

When I try to view Recent Changes on the sandbox wiki, I get this News extension error. Also, have the high-use complicated templates like {{Doffpage}}, {{Assignmentinfo}}, {{Traitheader}}, {{Missioninfo}}, and {{Infobox}} been tested with the new skin? Karika^Communicator 15:38, 14 June 2012 (UTC)

No, the high-use templates and some MediaWiki interface stuff is the unfinished stuff. I also intend to test it on 1.19 to see if... (heh, who am I kidding?) what CSS they changed for the interface. I try to keep compatibility one major version ahead. (Too bad last time we got updated two major versions ahead... >.>) — Eyes 15:54, 14 June 2012 (UTC)

If it has to be an LCARS design I would have three suggestions:

• The color scheme should be more 2409ish (blue tones, colored accents) to better fit the game. The current version is likely too colorful even for 24th Century LCARS design.
• Please consider LCARS guidelines (e.g. [1] or [2])! Some of the LCARS features in the skin are amateurish and wrong - especially sizes, frames, caps, colors!
• Make sure that header, frame and font sizes and the like are kept at the same proportions. The current mock-up looks very odd with banners that are wider or smaller than the rest of the content. Also the buttons on the left side are hard to decipher. Actual LCARS usually only uses three different font sizes! --Backyardserenade 10:41, 21 June 2012 (UTC)

I never intended to be 100% authentic, (though, in fact, the color values are authentic 24th century; just the combinations may not be). I've had to make concessions due to cross-browser issues. In theory, proper LCARS style endcaps should be simple with a wide left and right border and a large border-radius. In fact, works beautifully in some browsers, but in Opera on Android, if the end-cap is wider than the curve, it cuts off the inner corners and curves them to a point.

And the authentic font will have to be abandoned. Being a compressed font, it's just too small compared to other fonts. 20px is a pretty large font size for most fonts, but what you see on all the buttons is the authentic LCARS font at 20px and it looks like its 10-12px. This means I can't select reasonable fallback fonts since when it falls back to another font, it appears at double the size.

I suppose I'll try to blend this into a little more of a LCARS/STO UI hybrid, but due to time issues, I'll probably have to delay making any alternate color schemes. Of course, if it does come to the live site, any other editor would be free to. — Eyes 12:12, 21 June 2012 (UTC)

Of course my observations are very much prone to personal taste. I just have the feeling that less is more sometimes - if you can't/don't want to make a more authentic LCARS style, than maybe the skin should only incorporate some LCARS accents - tone it down, basically. The current Wiki skin does a pretty good job at invoking an LCARS feel without it actually trying to be LCARS. With the skin you showcased I have the feeling that it might be trying too hard (and not hard enough at the same time). Do you get what I mean?

My request would probably be, to not push this to become the default skin, just for the sake of it. I remember that the current skin was pushed live without taking some of the criticism into consideration (or at least it was never openly discussed).

I also did not suggest an authentic LCARS font - that is pretty hard to read in most cases. I would probably not even use it in the menu in the frame. It just looks too different from the normal text font and pretty much distracts from the main content. Again, personal taste, of course. :)

And I hope my criticism isn't too harsh. I appreciate the work you do, Eyes. It's just that I have the feeling this should be done right from the start (and maybe even delayed, if necessary) and not half-heartedly. :) --Backyardserenade 12:35, 21 June 2012 (UTC)

There are a few important things to consider when comparing the change to our custom skins to any future change to this skin:

* This is just a modification of a the well-proven Vector skin (the default for Wikipedia and MediaWiki itself], so we don't have to worry about missing functionality like we did with these skins.

* All of the CSS for this Vector modification will be visible and editable by admins on MediaWiki:Vector.css. You can see it on the test wiki right now here.

* All of the images used in the skin will be uploaded to the wiki normally (example). We'll protect them, but if there's a problem with an image, we can just upload a new version to fix a problem. We won't have to ask Curse to change it.

* While the extension that provides the random backgrounds will have to be on the server, it selects from a list of uploaded files on MediaWiki:Sto-vector-backgrounds, so we can upload new ones and change which ones can show up.

So please don't be too strict in the idea of "done right from the start." 99% of this skin can be adjusted or tweaked "on the fly", so to speak. That also makes it a lot easier for other members of the community to make (or test) their own adjustments through their [Special:MyPage/vector.css|personal CSS pages], which they can't do while it sits on my test wiki.

That said, while I'm with Zutty on wanting to get away from the blue scheme, I'll work on changing the "default" look to the blue, especially since the font fallback issues have dissuaded me from using the authentic font. — Eyes 14:29, 21 June 2012 (UTC)

FE rerun box has to be removed

The reruns are over. Some box pointing to Season 6/fleet progression would be better. (season 5 should be removed then as well.) --Akira-sensei 12:45, 14 June 2012 (UTC)

I can get rid of the rerun banner but we have *very* little Season 6 information at this point, and no date in mind. Ideas? --MatthewM 17:41, 14 June 2012 (UTC)

Blue version of Vector skin

A page with description, a screenshot, and links to the sandbox wiki is here. In case the discussion gets long, please make any comments on this page. — Eyes 11:58, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

"Under Construction"-Update

Remove Catian Diaspora Chain-link and add Rezreth Destroyer.--Akira-sensei 16:53, 5 July 2012 (UTC)

Done. Kudos to those who helped with the Caitian chain article. --MatthewM 16:59, 5 July 2012 (UTC)

The link to the Foundry guide (no longer considered a work in progress) should also be replaced with Ability: Push Back Resistance‏‎. --Akira-sensei 21:55, 5 July 2012 (UTC)

File:Energy credit icon.png and {{infobox}}

The background transparency doesn't work with the new EC icon from Tribble. Could someone more familiar with CSS look at this? Karika^Communicator 17:33, 8 July 2012 (UTC)

-_- It's losing transparency when it's resized. I had thought Curse had fixed this, but now I don't remember. Probably something to do with ImageMagick configuration on their end, I'm guessing. I'll report it again today and follow up tomorrow morning. — Eyes 17:46, 8 July 2012 (UTC)

If someone has the files from Tribble, energy credits, fleet credits, expertise (formerly bridge officer skill points), and skill points have all gotten new icons. I tried my best to get what I could from screenshots but you're right that there's some problem with the resizing. --MatthewM 18:12, 8 July 2012 (UTC)

Okay, there's just seems to have been something peculiar going on with that image file. I converted it to XCF and back to PNG, and now it seems to work fine. Strange... but thanks to Curse for trying to track down the issue for us nonetheless. — Eyes 15:59, 9 July 2012 (UTC)

Now it's happening to File:Zen icon.png. Karika^Communicator 16:47, 18 July 2012 (UTC)

Fixed it by saving it as a .pdn image and then back. Karika^Communicator 16:53, 18 July 2012 (UTC)

I suspect any conversion will do. Anything that forces the PNG to be completely regenerated from the raw image data should take care of whatever it is causing this issue. Just avoid converting to any formats with lossy compression like JPG, though (obvious to many of us, naturally, but not to everyone). — Eyes 17:12, 18 July 2012 (UTC)

A link in the Season 5 box

I'd like to suggest that the following link in the Season 5 box be changed from:
[[Borg Invasion|STFs]]
to:
[[Borg_Invasion#Stage_3:_Revised_Special_Task_Force_missions|STFs]]
That way, readers can go straight to the specific section on the page.--Rockfang 03:21, 9 July 2012 (UTC)

The Season 5 banner won't be up much longer, but I have changed the link in the meantime. --MatthewM 10:03, 9 July 2012 (UTC)

Season 6 Banner

I wanted to ask whether I might switch out the Tholian picture in the current season 6 banner on the main page? I think it doesn't really go well with the rest of the page (color-wise, mostly). I actually think it's kind of an eyesore. -- Backyardserenade 07:23, 10 July 2012 (UTC)

Considering such a major part Tholians are to Season 6, I think they should be represented as part of the banner but if you want to select a more aesthetically pleasing Tholian picture, that may be a good idea. --MatthewM 12:25, 10 July 2012 (UTC)

Agree that a Tholian should be in the banner. I uploaded a new version, and I think it's easier on the eyes. Tell me what you think. :) -- Backyardserenade 05:40, 11 July 2012 (UTC)

Who's taking care of removing the Season 5 banner and setting up a proper Season 6 banner? --Akira-sensei 14:47, 13 July 2012 (UTC)

Apparently no one^^ ;P --Akira-sensei 19:03, 13 July 2012 (UTC)

Back from vacation and thought I'd make an attempt. --MatthewM 10:26, 14 July 2012 (UTC)

Starbase Projects

How should we do this? A single page listing all the projects, or giving each one its own article similar to how the duty officer assignments are? For a Tier 0 starbase, there's 2 tactical, 2 engineering, and 2 science projects, 6 special projects, and 1 limited-time special project. --MatthewM 10:26, 14 July 2012 (UTC)

Zen conversion

I sorta just realized that all the (now) Zen-store item prices on the Wiki are still on the C-point standard, while the game itself has moved onto the Zen standard. While it would be a monumental undertaking to go through and replace every instance of C-point with Zen, we could at least post on the main page: "Due to recent conversion to Zen, anytime you see a price cited in C-points, please multiply by 1.25 to reach the equivalent price in Zen". Svpaladin 15:25, 16 July 2012 (UTC)svpaladin, 16 July 12

Could a bot do this? Karika^Communicator 15:45, 16 July 2012 (UTC)

It might be doable with AutoWikiBrowser with a find and replace. I've used AWB quite a bit, and I'm willing to investigate the possibility of using it.--Rockfang 17:13, 16 July 2012 (UTC)

I'm not sure it'd actually be that much easier with AWB. There is Category:C-Store items to help get the list of pages, you'd still need to get a list of values for the find and replace because I don't think AWB has any kind of feature to do the math for you. And if the category doesn't include all pages that need to be changed, there's the added work of identifying all those that do. That said, I don't think doing it manually or by bot will actually be all that bad; the category only has 68 pages. — Eyes 17:56, 16 July 2012 (UTC)

For player points conversion, they rounded up fractional totals. Did they round down resulting fractional store prices? I'd check myself, but I'm on a computer that doesn't have STO installed on it.--Rockfang 19:50, 18 July 2012 (UTC)

Correct me if my math is wrong, but the issues with conversion needing rounding came from balances that aren't evenly divisible by 4 (because 4 C points = 5 Zen). Since (IIRC), all C-store items are priced on items evenly divisible by 4 (to help their C-points to $$$ tracking), this shouldn't be a problem. Svpaladin 23:24, 22 August 2012 (UTC)

Links to Starships & Chart

Someone please replace them by Playable starships and Non-playable starships. --Akira-sensei 01:40, 19 July 2012 (UTC)

Someone pleeeeeease take care of that ;) --Akira-sensei 14:15, 19 July 2012 (UTC)

The Expanding Universe-section is out of date

This section is clearly out of date and I wonder whether it's necessary at all... Nevertheless it should be filled with the following links: Season Six, Fleet Advancement System, Fleet credits, Events, List of starbase projects, Tholians --Akira-sensei 15:28, 20 July 2012 (UTC)

Updated. Thanks! --MatthewM 16:58, 20 July 2012 (UTC)

An odd block log entry

The entries on this block log seem a bit odd to me. I find it unlikely that a person not logged in can actually delete pages. If they just cut content out of articles, a different block message should probably be used.--Rockfang 22:38, 23 July 2012 (UTC)

Removing information from an article is technically deleting information. Ariyen 19:26, 6 August 2012 (UTC)

The new CAPTCHA seems just plain broken

I can't update any external links on my User page because the new CAPTCHA asking on to select cat pictures just doesn't work, or doesn't have the correct submit button.

When I try to update a page, it brings forth the Edit page again with the selection of pet pictures. I select the pictures, but there is no "submit" button as the help menu dictates; when I try to use the submit button on the bottom of the page, the page simply presents me with an entirely new batch of cat pictures instead.

I must have chosen *only* cat pictures a dozen times before giving up. - Archabaddon 22:00, 28 August 2012 (UTC)

Hmm, probably an unintended side effect of adding the patroller group. I thought we were configured so that any registered user didn't have to go through the captcha, but maybe they had that set to the autoconfirmed group. I'll request a change on that immediately and start investigating why it's not working. — Eyes 22:17, 28 August 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for looking into this Eyes; just wanted to make sure I wasn't missing anything or going insane, but I didn't see any hidden or mis-coded by highlighting or using tab. Also, sorry for not signing earlier, typed this while half-asleep. - Archabaddon 22:24, 28 August 2012 (UTC)

Another "Under Construction" Update

I think we should add "Thermionic Torpedo Launcher" and/or "Disruption Torpedo Launcher" in somewhere, since we have basically no info on them. Furthermore, with the imminent end of the Tholian Lock Boxes, we kind of have to get them in soon. Perhaps we could replace “Starbase Fleet Defense”, which is well on its way to completion. - Mitchz95 01:40, 12 September 2012 (UTC)

Energy Credits

Why does the System keep taking 50,000 energy credits every so often? I had 1,340,000 and now it is down to 927,000.

 Never Mind. I found out why.

For crying out loud, TELL US THE ANSWER. "Never mind. I found out why." is the most frustrating thing to read when searching for an answer.

Temporal Lock Box Banner

Shouldn't the Temporal Lock Box banner have a picture of an actual Temporal Lock Box rather than the generic one? - Mitchz95 03:50, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

Hi, i uploaded the to wiki.When the item page was created, the in-game item weren't released yet so i guess some pages might need a photo update.
But where is that banner ? I can edit,modify,crop,cut,paste...images in Adobe CS Photoshop (temporal lock box icon is a magnified screenshot and sharpened with ~50%).If it's not an Admin-rights article a link to that page/screenshot/.. would be helpful,maybe i can help with my Adobe skills:) .- Cris333 04:31, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

Yeah, main pages are traditionally protected on wikis due to being too tempting for vandals. I took care of switching the graphic in the banner now that we have the correct one. :( — Eyes 03:38, 4 October 2012 (UTC)

Switching Sides

Can i play as klingon and still keep my Fed Ship and crew or will i lose it if i switch.

You don't "switch sides" per say; you can create a character for the Klingon faction once you reach at least level 25 on a Federation character. You won't lose anything on your Fed characters.

Also, this page is for discussing improvements to STOwiki as a whole. For questions about gameplay, try the official forums. - Mitchz95 17:35, 7 October 2012 (UTC)

The Banners

Now that the "Vector" skin has become the new default skin, it seems those banners at the top of the page no longer show up. I liked them because I thought they gave the wiki more personality. Would it be possible to bring them back, or are they incompatible with the new skin? - Mitchz95 03:29, 25 October 2012 (UTC)

Those were built into the server-side part of the STO family skins. Since it's not a good idea for many reasons for us to modify the server-side part of Vector, the only possible way we could restore that is with an extension. Even that's assuming I can find an appropriate place to attach the background, but that probably wouldn't be a problem. Ultimately, though, I'd rather not add something else that might fail during an upgrade unless its more functional than decorative. — Eyes 04:14, 25 October 2012 (UTC)

Google Attack Site Warning?

Am I the only one receiving a Reported attack site warning? Is there anything we can do? Rayfire 18:25, 1 November 2012 (UTC)

I also recieved it just now. Never had a problem with it before. 91.177.11.228 19:30, 1 November 2012 (UTC)

One of our ad providers got red-flagged, so when their ads were loaded, it caused Curse sites to be red-flagged as well. At this time, we are not aware of any actual malware being exposed through these ads. Our team is working hard on getting this matter resolved quickly, and I'll update everyone when I have more information. — Eyes 19:44, 1 November 2012 (UTC)

Also, the suspicious ad provider in question was removed from the rotation. Despite the warnings, STOWiki is currently as safe as ever. Hopefully, the warnings themselves will be pulled soon. — Eyes 20:57, 1 November 2012 (UTC)

Thanks Eyes, I thought it was weird. They really need to refine that system. I was thinking it was one of those spam accounts that triggered it or something. Rayfire 21:18, 1 November 2012 (UTC)

Just to make sure I didn't accidentally overstate anything, I can't rule out that some malicious ads were delivered. As I understand it, we were flagged because we had ads served from a flagged provider earlier today. I hope I didn't cause any misunderstandings, and I would encourage anyone who visited either late last night or earlier today to at least run a quick virus scan. Apologies to everyone for the inconvenience. — Eyes 00:31, 2 November 2012 (UTC)

page is being reported as a 'known hackers and malware' site.

Just thought anyone who is in charge would like to know that avast and comodo are both reporting stowiki.org as a malicious site now(nov 1 2012, not yesterday because i just visited)