Talk:Main Page/Discussion

So... as a Wikivirgin, how does this thing work then?

That's the thing about wikis - they start off as a blank canvas, and you need to add both content and navigation structure.

As reasonable first step might be to create a set of top level categories, and a set of links to articles under each category.

If articles are assigned categories (with [[Category:Foobar]]) the category pages should automatically list articles assigned to them. --John Stumbles 13:13, 16 December 2006 (GMT)

A good place for this is the main page. You then start creating those pages.

I'm happy to do that part, if it will make things easier.

Yes please --John Stumbles 13:13, 16 December 2006 (GMT)

Structure

I think we already have a basic structure in the existing FAQ. We might beneficially look at importing that into wiki format before worrying too much about creating new content

Ok, that sounds like a sensible move. I will try to spend some time creating an index this weekend.

Using the + tab to add to a discussion

(Only in these 'discussion' aka 'talk' pages.)

You are prompted for the name of a new section and your contribution is appended to the page.

'Show Preview' only shows your addition, not the context in which it will appear.

--John Stumbles 11:51, 16 December 2006 (GMT)

Talk ('discussion' tab) pages -- signatures

Appending your signature when you add a comment, particularly when replying to something already written, makes it easier to identify who's saying what, a la web forums. --John Stumbles 11:59, 16 December 2006 (GMT)

Here's a reply to the above --John Stumbles 12:11, 16 December 2006 (GMT)

It would be nice if the wiki kept track of threads and increased the indent for each reply but it doesn't seem to do that (although some users on wikipedia make it seem to do so using <blockquote>tags around their text</blockquote>). --John Stumbles 12:02, 16 December 2006 (GMT)

This quickly gets messy if you try to hand-craft multiple layers of indentation as you have to put your own <blockquote>tags</blockquote> before the closing </blockquote> you're replying to.
Kids: don't try this at home!

Trouble with category pages

I added a [[Category:Plumbing]] tag to the Plumbing page but when I followed the Category: link at the bottom of the page I got:

Editing Category:Plumbing
From DIYWiki
Jump to: navigation, search

You've followed a link to a page that doesn't exist yet. To create the
page, start typing in the box below (see the help page for more info). If
you are here by mistake, just click your browser's back button. Preview

Sorry! We could not process your edit due to a loss of session data.
Please try again. If it still doesn't work, try logging out and logging
back in.

If I just 'Save page' with an empty page and again try to follow the link I get the same error. However if I create a page with some random text and save that I get correctly directed to the newly created Category page. I can then edit it and delete the random text, save again and I still get to the new page (which is what I want). Odd.

Logo

Can we have a $wgLogo please, pretty please?

Maybe one could be made using cooltext.com

--Owain-test 23:09, 20 December 2006 (GMT)--Owain

Something like http://wiki.diyfaq.org.uk/index.php?title=Image:UkdiyWIKIlogo.jpg

--

There are 2 problems with that logo:

1. It's too wide. When I resized it to 135px wide, it became too small to use. The logo ideally needs to be approximately squarish, around 135px wide.

2. In order for it to look right against the background, it needs to be transparent. I can make the image background transparent, but the effect is far cleaner if the logo itself has fairly well defined lines, rather than a fade.

Happy to put a logo up if you make one that's about the right shape.

--Grunff 10:23, 24 December 2006 (GMT)

--

The input form on cooltext doesn't seem to allow a line break, or to pick transparent bg. Sorry. --217.158.132.41 21:22, 24 December 2006 (GMT)

Would it work ok if you put the text in 2 lines to make it squarer, and fade to a white background?

--

It doesn't do line breaks.

Would it work if it was rotated 90deg to have the text running vertical, it would push the left menu down a bit? -- Owain

Could you make 2 pics and splice them together?

I'm quite happy to get our graphic designer to create a nice logo for the wiki, but since this will be quite costly, I'd rather wait until we are sure we're going to keep the wiki.

I'm not keen on splicing etc - it never looks good.

--Grunff 12:12, 26 December 2006 (GMT)

2nd attempt is at [Image:Wikilogo1.gif] I'll leave it to you to resize and make transparent; hopefully the edges aren't dithered and the incompetence in editing will disappear when it's shrunk.

--Owain-test 16:56, 26 December 2006 (GMT)

Hi Owain, sorry, I had a look at that one, but it's too pixelated. Leave the logo issue with me, I promise I'll get something sorted out for it if the wiki is still attracting interest in say 3 months - does that sound ok?

--Grunff 20:58, 30 December 2006 (GMT)

Deleting images

I uploaded a bunch of image files for an article then realised I didn't need some of them, but there doesn't seem to be any way to delete them.

They're shown in Special:Unusedimages

--John Stumbles 18:21, 3 January 2007 (GMT)

There are a few redundant articles could be deleted too. Whatever the method, it may be best to delete the how to after its been done! NT 19:14, 3 January 2007 (GMT)

Revert

How do you do a 'revert' then? Could be handy to know. NT 06:07, 4 February 2007 (GMT)

Go to history and find the version you want to go back to, go into edit and save it without making any changes to the text (but do fill in the Summary to say you're reverting it, and why, of course!)

--John Stumbles 12:15, 4 February 2007 (GMT)

Ohh - easy! Thanks. NT 22:08, 4 February 2007 (GMT)

DIY pages on wikipedia

There are some middling to bloody-awful DIY related pages on wikipedia which need some work:

Do_it_yourself could do with UK-ifying and putting in some decent links (like to here!)
DIY_culture
Handyperson <groan>

Naming & Capitalisation conventions

Some time ago I put in the Naming section:

When referring to one article from another it helps to have a consistent naming convention. Perhaps we should follow Wikipedia's naming convention [[1]] especially regarding capitalisation of article names and whether they should be in the singular or plural [[2]]

However no-one (least of all me :-)) seems to be doing that so maybe we should change this to reflect actual practice which seems to be to Capitalise All Initials and use plurals for subjects which are a class of things e.g. Round Tuits

I agree, for one reason or another it hasnt been followed, and its less confusing to stick with what we've got, so thats what I do for now. NT 05:27, 15 February 2007 (GMT)

OK I've changed it to reflect more-or-less what we've got now, although what we've got isn't consistent as to whether we capitalise all words in an article name or just the main ones, but wtf, life's too short :-)

--John Stumbles 11:25, 15 February 2007 (GMT)

See you here!