Forum:Newbie Questions
The First Question
Hi, my names Thomas Barclay (kaladorn on COTI and in the TML).
- Welcome to the Traveller Wiki. Two notes of style: We try to use inline comments, which you indent by using a ":", and a reply will use two colons "::", and so on. It keeps the conversations together. And please sign your posts with four tildes like: ~~~~
Laconic Bio: Started Deluxe Trav boxed set 1981, still gaming. GMed mostly, played some. Was a hardcore completist from the late 80s up until T20. Picked up MgT stuff. Still like MT rules though. Have run multiyear campaigns in CT/MT time frames and in ATUs. Once ran a 19 year D&D campaign. Software developer/analyst. Want to help support Trav tools that help all Trav players.
I wanted and want to do a wee bit of helping out with some small things - I started on a couple of polities filling out their member planets. I did so by grabbing an example which did not use the automatic population of the planet list, it used a bulleted list and, as the automation wasn't pulling the membership in these polities, I figured following the example that did show data made sense. (N00b mistake)
BackwoodsTraveller pointed out the {{ClusterWorlds2}}e should pull the list if the pages have the correct Category tagging. Except, in the cases in point I was muddling around, the automation couldn't because they weren't tagged and most of the worlds' pages were not yet defined.
Anyway, this brought up some questions and Tom Jones-Low kindly got me some starter links then told me to report here with questions and points of discussion.
So: 1. If MgT stuff is mostly off limits, but you have data in there that is (at least on attribution on a very sparse page) indicated to come from one of their sources, where's the boudnary? I'm guessing from what I've seen now, UWPs may be fair game, and a wee bit of the text for some entries. Is that fair to say?
- The some data published by Mongoose (e.g. the UWPs) was supplied and vetted by Marc Miller and FFE, and available via other sources (Traveller Map in particular). We have a license to use all of the material owned by FFE. Copyright describes the technical details. Tjoneslo (talk) 08:30, 28 August 2020 (EDT)
2. If I have found (as I have with Tech-World in The Borderland subsector) a case where text that seems like it came from the an MgT supplement mentions 4,000 people (and 1 million bots) but the UWP pop digit is a 1, and I confirm this (I have looked it up: MgT Aslan and Trojan reach UWPs have a 1 in the pop digit and Aslan talks about the 4,000 people so their stuff is broke - I posted on their forum to let them know), and check the MgT Errata (none found) ... if it is inconsistent (appears to be broken in Aslan & Trojan Reach), and MgT hasn't issued an errata yet, what's the policy? Leave it broken? If so, how would I call attention to that on the world page? Some sort of 'alert box'?
- The fact that the text description of Tech-World doesn't match the UWP is, as noted, an item of errata for Mongoose to resolve. You have placed a note in the Talk page for the world which is the best starting place. Like librarians having precise page citations and quotes of the problems are requested. The problem has been if we fix the wiki, we get questions back about why doesn't the wiki match published source X. Tjoneslo (talk) 08:30, 28 August 2020 (EDT)
3. Your style guide is useful, but, in reading it, I found it reminds me of the stuff that people who understand a thing well write (the nuts and bolts) with very little higher level linking text. Would you be open to either adding to the style guide or providing a related page to show 'best practice implementation examples' or 'how all these components can and should be used on a page'?
- I would love to have a style guide. Traveller:Style Guide looks to be a good place to start. There is no page there currently, so anything you would like to add to make this a better article would be wonderful. Tjoneslo (talk) 08:30, 28 August 2020 (EDT)
4. Also there are examples, but they totally resemble the output of code snippets vs. the *places you should be using those snippets* or any sort of fulsome examples (like say build an example of each sort of template as a fully populated dummy with all cases embodied) so that there is a tangible best case example. Would that not make some sense? I say because having stepped on a mine (pulled a bad representative example by random choice) and I think a single well done repository of fully fleshed examples could be a great guide to anyone new (plus a reminder to anyone who has been away from things for a bit).
5. I was looking particularly for an exemplar of the page for a polity which describes the polity and the planets in it. I see them show up linked into individual planet pages, but I did not see an example in the Style Guide of what bits go into one of those pages. (and again, pulling from another random page might not be representing the latest thinking/standards). Should there be a template?
- Manual of Style/polity has an example of a page layout for a government. Manual_of_Style#Suggested_organizational_layouts as a list of page layout templates by type. If you can review these as part of the Style Guide and examples it would be great. Tjoneslo (talk) 08:30, 28 August 2020 (EDT)
6. Nothing I ran into explained how the automation used {{ClusterWorlds2}}e to pull in list contents based on a Category tag. Where is that? Shouldn't that be in the style guide or an accompanying obvious place? "What things are automated and where you want to use them, Billy!"
- One of the broader issues is understanding that terms wrapped in double braces are templates, and they are pages in the Template namespace. Template:ClusterWorlds2 is the original page for the template, and contains directions for working with and a brief explanation of why it is used.
- The Template List also has a collection of templates and suggested uses. Tjoneslo (talk) 08:30, 28 August 2020 (EDT)
7. I see there is support for Eras. Traveller Map right now doesn't support GT (could, but Josh said no big drive to make it happen from anyone) and I think T20 also not supported (though I don't know enough to even know how divergent it was... I bought the rules, but Trav and D20 never sat right with me...). I think Thomas Jones-Low is a GT afficionado. Would it make sense to try to compile GT data and get it into the map, and then into the Wiki, or is the UWPs/Systems not work with the particulars of the GURPS Traveller limits? (I did a quick look, but not clear to me yet)
- There are a few templates, eg. Template:GURPS Worlds paragraph to support the GT world information. The Eras in the wiki are for the content of the, and not so much for the technical details. The challenge here is we do try to separate Milieu as a era of time within the Traveller Universe from the Versions of Traveller. Tjoneslo (talk) 08:30, 28 August 2020 (EDT)
8. The explanation of the userbox in the style guide is kind of flippant but not very illustrative. Was this just an 'in case' expansion option? It doesn't look like anything was ever added to the list of userboxes though it seems like one might want them. (Again, kind of related to not having higher level guidance on how to glue the bits together on various page types which might hint where userboxes could be used usefully).
- The section was put together and then never reviewed. If you would like to fix that, it would be great. Tjoneslo (talk) 08:30, 28 August 2020 (EDT)
9. If I edit a page, is there any queue for review or how does that work? Or does it just stay as it edited until someone is concerned and they examine the list of edits?
- There is no queue for review. I look through Special:RecentChanges just to check that nothing terrible has happened to articles. But the general rule is you, and all contributers, are trusted to make good and constructive edits to the articles. For general items we map post suggestions to your Talk Page, please take them in the spirit which they are offered; as improvements. Tjoneslo (talk) 08:30, 28 August 2020 (EDT)
10. What's your definition of a minor vs. major edit?
- The definition varies with user. Spelling mistakes, grammar fixes, any change of a few characters or less are the general rules. If I remember to check the box. Tjoneslo (talk) 08:30, 28 August 2020 (EDT)
That's it for now. :)
Thanks for inviting folk in. I hope I can gradually work on small things to fill in bits here and there.
TomB
How many answers?
Regarding question 9
No. There is no formal review. But there are a bunch of people who watch changes and start a discussion if they don't think it fits for some reason. On top of which anyone can edit almost anything so your carefully crafted work can get undone/reworked/replaced at any time!
Regarding question 10
Personally I mark it as minor if its spelling fixes, fixing links. Anything else isn't.
Regarding question 7
This is one of the areas of contention. "How do you represent eras". Just a timeline doesn't work because 1140 in GT and 1140 in TNE are so very different. There isn't (as far as I have found) a consensus. On the other hand the histories of some things don't all appear in a "History" section e.g. Planetary Demographics; Planetary Atmospheres, etc.
Regarding Documentation notes
You are correct. Documentation is not all it could be. You aren't the first to mention this. Any contributions you can make would be appreciated. Part of the problem is finding "Good" examples. What is "Perfect" doesn't always remain so. The world may change (e.g. new publications), the page may change (more edits), the templates may change (they aren't static either).
BackworldTraveller (talk) 03:31, 28 August 2020 (EDT)
Another set of answers
In general your questions are all good ones. While we've tried to put all the answers in the wiki, it has become large with bits of information scattered about.
One point of general knowledge, please sign your posts by adding four tildes ~~~~.
- Question 1 - Mongoose
- Question 2 - Tech-World
- Question 3 - Style Guide
- Question 4 - Style Guide examples
- This is a great suggestion. I think many of us have been here for so long we no longer see the need of new people.
- Question 5 - Page layout templates
- Question 6 - Cluster Worlds template
- Question 7 -