Zelda Wiki:Discussion Center

Userboxes
How do you make user boxes--Zanramon 13:25, 24 January 2008 (EST)


 * To create a new userbox:
 * 1. First, choose a name. This should always be (where xxxx is your description)
 * 2. To create it, just edit any page (such as the Sandbox), type and preview. This will give you a redlink to your desired userbox template.
 * 3. Then, just copy and paste the code from any other existing userbox. Substitute a new image, text, hex colour codes (help available here), and usage instructions. --Adam (talk) 11:44, 25 January 2008 (EST)
 * 4. Make sure that the category is correct. It should be, (where aaaa is the first letter of your description) This correctly sorts the userboxes in the category.--Mjr162006 18:24, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Movies
How many movies are on the wiki?--Link hero of light 14:21, 7 February 2008 (EST)


 * All of the pages which contain videos should be listed here; I add to the list each time an article not already listed there has a video inserted into it. --Adam (talk) 15:02, 7 February 2008 (EST)

Merging
How do you redirect/merge page? At first I thought only sysops could do it, but I've seen other non-sysop users do it.--Link hero of light 23:53, 12 February 2008 (EST)


 * Merging two (or more) pages into one is actually quite simple:
 * First, you should identify the articles which you want to combine, and ideally check that there is a general consensus from others that merging is a good idea (either the tag should be placed on the article beforehand, or the merge be discussed).
 * The initial step of the merge itself is to identify which article is to remain (i.e. which of the articles you will merge all the information into). The other will later act as a redirect to this article. Usually, the smaller of the two articles will be merged into the larger, however if for example one article has an incorrect name, the one with the correct name would be retained. For simplicity, I'll call the article where the information will be merged to A, and the article which will be cleared to make a redirect B.
 * After having decided step 2, the next step is to read all the information in A and B, and decide where and how the information in B should be inserted into A. It will normally have to be rephrased slightly, although sometimes it can simply be cut and pasted. It may be appropriate to place the merged information from B under it's own header within A. Try to avoid duplicating any information already within A.
 * Once the information from B has been transferred to A, the final step is to delete all text from B and replace it with the syntax:
 * #redirectArticle A
 * This turns B into a redirect page. If the information added to A has been placed under a new header, it may be appropriate to point the redirect there:
 * #redirectArticle A
 * I hope I've explained clearly enough, please leave a comment here if you have any other specific queries. A good place to start merging would be the articles here, or in Category:Articles to be merged (as long as no objections have been raised on the relevant talk pages, it's safe to assume that everyone is happy for the merges suggested here to go ahead). —Adam (talk) 01:42, 13 February 2008 (EST)

The new game link templates
So... what exactly is the criteria under which these are used? Are we now to use these instead of piped links, or what? --Ando (Talk) 15:51, 7 March 2008 (EST)


 * They're used to automatically generate exactly what you would type manually to create a piped link. For example, typing instead of Four Swords Adventures has the exact identical result, but you type only 13 characters instead of a whopping 73! Good time saver, no? (I got sick of hand typing these links a long time ago...) —Adam (talk) 16:12, 7 March 2008 (EST)

Alright, awesome. I guess I'll start utilizing these. :D --Ando (Talk) 16:16, 7 March 2008 (EST)

something strange
Something strange happened and I was wondering if someone could explain it. I attempted to flag a picture that was no longer in use for deletion. I saved and saw that everything looked fine. I was just checking the recent changes and I saw Captain Cornflake had deleted it, well there would be nothing strange about if my contribution had not been recorded in the recent changes and my cotributions, I even checked and made sure that I hadn't clicked the "hide my edits" button.--Link hero of light 23:46, 8 March 2008 (EST)


 * When an article is deleted, all revisions to that article are also deleted. That's why they would disappear from Recent Changes. Does that clear it up? —Adam (talk) 07:18, 9 March 2008 (EDT)

Yep.--Link hero of light 11:31, 9 March 2008 (EDT)

Subdivision formatting
Many pages use subdivisions containing the name of one of the games, but many of these pages use different formats. Some pages don't italicise the game names, whereas some do; those two pages also demonstrate how some pages use the subdivisions to link to the games mentioned in the subdivisions, and others don't. My point is, this creates a great inconsistency throughout the Wiki, and needs to be addressed. I personally prefer just a straight-up, non-linked subdivision (most articles have a link to the game right under the subdivision anyway), italicised to match the rest of the mentions of the games. --Ando (Talk) 09:58, 9 March 2008 (EDT)


 * I'm sure you and I aren't the only ones to have pondered this subject in the past. I've always had trouble myself deciding which of the many options I prefer; I don't think they should be links (as you point out, any correctly written article will reiterate the game name below the header, making a title link redundant), and I don't think it's necessary to use the full "The Legend of..." prefix. Am I reading correctly that the format you'd propose is as below? (If so, I would concur) —Adam (talk) 10:30, 9 March 2008 (EDT)

 A Link to the Past 


 * Yep, that would be what I'm thinking. I guess we'll go with this then, eh? Sounds good. --Ando (Talk) 10:35, 9 March 2008 (EDT)

Questions
Moved to The Heart Container

Tables
How do you make the tables that have an abbreviation of the game, times beaten, times started, and Greatest completion in the game that i see on some peoples user pages? --David (Talk) 18:25, 4 April 2008 (EDT)


 * Well, the easiest way to do it is to just go to edit the user's page that you see one of these tables on, only instead of actually editing it, just copy the code for the table off of the page, then paste it onto your page, editing it as necessary. Tables start with  {|  and end with another }, so it should be easy to find. --Ando (T : C) 20:00, 4 April 2008 (EDT)

Thats the problem. I am having a hard time finding the persons user page. I will continue to look though. --David (Talk) 20:35, 4 April 2008 (EDT)


 * Well, Douken has one, which he ripped off of me, which I ripped off of someone else whose name escapes me at the moment. :P --Ando (T : C) 20:37, 4 April 2008 (EDT)

Yes! That was his name! I'm going to write it down. Thank you. --David (Talk) 20:48, 4 April 2008 (EDT)

Oh boy, make sure you add that little bit of info to your user page "I ripped this off of someone's user page who had ripped this table of of someone's user page who had ripped it off of someone else's userpage". LOL.--Link hero of light 20:54, 4 April 2008 (EDT)

I will be sure to do that!

--David (Talk) 21:05, 4 April 2008 (EDT)

Help!
Okay, these problems are killing me! I was making changes to my user page, when all of the sudden, I notice that when I leave and come back, there is nothing changed on the user page, yet when I go to the editing box, all the changes are still there! Please help me! It's happening on other peoples user pages too! I can't see my edits or their edits on the talk page unless I click on edit! This is so annoying! Thank you for listening. --David (T : C) 15:20, 6 April 2008 (UTC)


 * This just happened to me too, but it wasn't on a user page. My last edit Ambi's Palace isn't showing on the main article, even though the history says it should (or rather, shouldn't) be there.  Oddly, the Possessed Nayru link isn't working either, even though I've made that article since the shown edit of Ambi's Palace. --Douken 15:47, 6 April 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for answering, Douken. The only way i can read what you wrote is by editing what i said. I think that we may have to make new accounts If we cannot get this straightened out. At least we'll be able to copy and paste our user pages onto new accounts ;). By the way, I had asked Jase the question, so we'll have to see what he says. --David (T : C) 15:54, 6 April 2008 (UTC)


 * Hm, I'm not having this issue. I'm able to see all edits made since the update. :/ I guess it's really just a matter of seeing what happens (and what Jason has to say about it). --Ando (T : C) 17:10, 6 April 2008 (UTC)

Huh... It seems to be working normally for me now. For a while it was just the Palace page that was messed up, but now even that's working. Hopefully it'll just be a time-solving issue with you too, Seablue. --Douken 17:43, 6 April 2008 (UTC)

I got it fixed. It was my browsers cache. I dumped all the files and now everythings back to normal. Thanks to all who anwsered :) --David (T : C) 18:13, 6 April 2008 (UTC)

Image template thing
I'm not sure I understand about the new image template ting. I read what Jason said but I don't understand it. Could some one help?--Link hero of light 22:49, 6 April 2008 (UTC)


 * Alright. Basically, what they are, are templates that let whoever's viewing the file know where the image comes from. There are three templates right now:
 * The FoundImage template, which says that "We got this picture from such-and-such site" (preferably only Zelda Wiki sites).
 * The c-nintendo template, which says that "This picture comes directly from Nintendo" (such as official screenshots, box art, etc.).
 * The Imagenosource template, which says that "We don't know where we got this".
 * Just pull up any image page that lacks a template and throw one in. We're also, I believe, working on a template for self-made images (screenshots that a user made, for instance), so that should be available soon, hopefully. --Ando (T : C) 04:36, 7 April 2008 (UTC)


 * Yeah, that's pretty much it. Except that has to be on almost every image (excluding only the non-game-related stuff), i.e. every image containing Nintendo content in any form. Also, the wording of  applies only to extra-Wiki sites, so I guess we'll need another similar one for "Masterminds" images... Fear not, all will become clearer as it's put into practice, and once we have all templates set up I'll write an "idiot's guide" (excuse the phrase ;) to the whole thing! —Adam (talk) 06:06, 7 April 2008 (UTC)


 * But what if it's not by Nintendo, but by Phillips instead? For example, a picture of Ganon from Link: The Faces of Evil, which was produced by Phillips for the CD-i instead of by Nintendo for the Super Nintendo. Is it c-nintendo, because they invented the character, or ImageSelf, because I captured the image myself? —mrfunnyd 19:33, 26 April 2008 (UTC)


 * Erm, both. It's a safe assumption that, for almost any image uploaded here, the legal copyright holder will be Nintendo. However, it's also important that the source of the image is attributed (i.e if it was obtained from another website or if you produced it yourself. That make sense? --Adamcox82 14:32, 27 April 2008 (UTC)

Rules
Okay, here goes...

Every new image uploaded must be correctly attributed to its creator/editor/redistributor. There are four possible options when doing this, and a template for each:


 * 1) FoundImageZW -  Applies to images taken from one of the sites connected to ZW.org.
 * 2) FoundImage - Applies to images taken from any other website.
 * 3) ImageSelf - Applies to images scanned/captured/photographed/drawn/photo-edited by yourself (in other words, "your own work", copyrights notwithstanding.)
 * 4) Imagenosource - Applies to images whose source is uncertain, unknown or currently undeterminable.

To correctly attribute your image, simply go to the image's page after upload, and add one of the above as appropriate, in the format  

In addition, should the image depict any characters or elements of Zelda games, or other Nintendo games (including, but not limited to, all screenshots, artwork [official or otherwise] and symbols), you must also display the template c-nintendo. —Adam (talk) 20:51, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

Okay I have just one more question, if you are positive you know that a picture was taken by someone other than yourself, may you add the Imageself template to the picture as long as it says that it was taken by the person who actually took it? Or does the person who took the picture have to add the template themselves?--Link hero of light 03:59, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

I'm going to go ahead and add that Imageself template to a few pictures, tell me if I shouldn't.--Link hero of light 02:12, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Sound Clips
To help people know more about some pages, I think that Sound Clips should be used. For example, see the trivia section, point 4, the page Death Mountain for Twilight Princess. If someone could show me how to add a sound clip, i'd be greatful.



DanBinstead


 * Right. Well, I've never actually uploaded an audio file before... And there isn't actually an example of that happening on Zelda Wiki. In fact, it may actually need an extension we don't have (Jason would be the most likely to know that). I'd say that right now your best bet is to just link to another site's hosting of that particular audio file in the manner of Audio file from (website) . An example can be found on Saria's Song. --Ando (T : C) 22:45, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

Wanted Pages
I noticed that many of the links in the wanted pages have only the wanted pages link refering to them. Is it supposed to be like this?--Matt 20:14, 24 April 2008 (UTC)


 * Um... what? If you're talking about all the wanted pages with "1 link" next to them, all that means is that only one other page on the site has a broken link to whatever the wanted link is; a page that isn't the Wanted Pages list. To see which pages have these red links, just click on the "x links" text. Is this what you're referring to? --Ando (T) 21:07, 24 April 2008 (UTC)


 * What he was referring to (as far as I can tell), is that, apparently, somewhere down the line someone decided to make a page called Wanted Pages This pages contains many links, some which are the only links of their kind. Because of this, many wanted pages site wanted pages as the only article that links to them.--Magnus orion 23:28, 24 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Yes that is exactly what I'm saying.--Matt 11:59, 25 April 2008 (UTC)


 * Yeah, that was me. It worked very well almost a year ago when I first made it, and the wiki had well over 1000 wanted pages. Now it's reached the end of its usefulness, and clearly a year on the links to many of the articles which had been listed on Special:Wantedpages no longer exist. For clarity, the original scenario was a list of many hundreds of articles with only one link. These were a mixture of valid Zelda content, irrelevant non-Zelda links and clogging talk pages. The goal was to elevate the valid Zelda wanted pages to 2 links, hence making them easier to find and create. Anyway, I can either recreate the page now based on the current Wanted Pages, or delete it entirely. —Adam (talk) 21:18, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia has...
I don't know if anyone has noticed, but wikipedia has got a new little gismo, so that while users type something into the search box, a little tab below, shows all the possibilities of what you could be wanting. It's hard to explain, but search for something at wikipedia.org, and you'll see what I mean. Now I have no idea what it would take, or cost to get that, but possibly a good edition to our wiki???...... --Melchizedek 08:49, 29 April 2008 (UTC)


 * This would be something to throw at Jason. I'll see what he has to say about it.--Ando (T) 22:22, 1 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Cool. Thanks for that. Keep me in the loop, so I know what's going on, and can help in any way if wanted. Regards, --Melchizedek 06:56, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

Is it alright
I got all my pictures from doing google image searches so I dont know the exact website their from. Is this alright or do I have to find out exactly where their from? --Heroofstuff 03:11 pm, May 1, 2008


 * Well, it's highly respected that you find the websites that you took the image so you can properly give credit to the websites. We do this because unless it is part of the Zelda Wiki.org Collaboration, credit must be given to the website. Although we do have a template available if you can't find the website, it is generally better to give the credit. If you have anymore questions about anything, feel free to let me know on my Talk Page. --Seablue254 21:12, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

Do you need anything?
Hello, I'm a pupil from Germany and I also worked in other German Zelda-Wikis but there are no big wikis in my language. I want to ask you how I can help this page. My English can be terrible, so I don't know if this is the right place to ask. Maybe I can find pictures for this page or translate texts. I would be very happy if I could help you Sirius 20:46, 24 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Your English? Terrible? Hardly. Your English is better than quite a few native speakers I know, actually. And besides, even if you make a little mistake, someone else can fix it for you. It's no problem. ;)
 * As for your question, I'm not entirely sure I understand what you're asking. Are you wanting to know if you can make a German-translated version of the wiki or just if it's okay for you to edit pages here? If so, go on ahead. Edit as much as you feel you can. Text, pictures, even little edits; anything is welcome and much desired.
 * If you need anything else, let me know! --Ando 21:35, 24 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Hey there! Welcome to Zelda wiki! Now, I'm sure that Ando has explained many things to you and probably answered your question, BUT, if you were asking about help on this page only, it's fine, however, there will not be much action here. Anyway, if you have any more questions, tell us here, my talk page, or the Chatroom. Happy to help :) --Seablue254 22:02, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

Thank you so much! :) Writting German articles sounds good. I made a example on my discoussion-page ( http://zeldawiki.org/User_talk:Sirius ). Maybe I can look for articles which have no pictures, and make some for them. I'm very happy that you are so friendly, thank you :)


 * OK. HOWEVER, considering this is an ENGLISH Wiki, you should try to write in English, however, in the event you try German, name the German translation "Name of article (German)", so that no one is confused :) --Seablue254 14:11, 25 May 2008 (UTC)

Okay, thank you :) Sirius 14:18, 25 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Uh... Sea, maybe not? I can't find where he actually said it, but I remember Jason stated before that it didn't seem necessary to have multi-language articles (I may be remembering incorrectly, but)... Sirius, you may want to bring this up with him on his talk page before you do anything too big, okay? (By the way, that was actually pretty cool seeing the German version of the article. :P) --Ando 18:01, 25 May 2008 (UTC)

DARN IT! I have a thing for being wrong >:-O --Seablue254 20:33, 25 May 2008 (UTC)

Talk Bubbles
With the recent attempt to make one of these, I think that we should clearly state a policy on them. I really don't like them. They don't have a way to give the time of the post. They add a bunch of nonsense to talk pages that really make it look unprofessional. The poor color choices that people make makes it difficult to read what is actually being said. This is not good for color-blind people. They are more common than you would think. (No, I'm not color-blind. Just thinking of those who are.) These talk bubbles also are too complex and therefore drastically increase loading times on the talk pages. They are too big and make the pages look too cluttered. I assume that these are the same conclusions that the staff here came up with, right? It would be better to make this not allowing talk bubbles a formal policy that everyone is made aware of.--Mjr162006 08:42, 18 June 2008 (UTC)


 * Aye, pretty much everyone on staff said the same thing (except, like, one person but whatev', right?). Heck, not just the totally color-blind people need to be thought about; I have a friend who is only slightly "color deficient", and he could almost not complete a color-puzzle at the end of Metroid Prime Hunters, so I shudder at what might happen if he tried reading some of the talk bubbles I've seen. Heck, I've had trouble reading them, and I'm totally not color-blind at all. Not to mention the annoying "catchphrases" before the actual text, and the fact that most of them contain no timestamp. I'll try to figure out somewhere in the official policies to place this and get it put in there within the next couple of hours. --Ando 13:54, 18 June 2008 (UTC)