Talk:Jurassic Bark

Sample Infoboxes
I love the new infobox. It cleans up the articles by removing the lists from the bottom. Totally cool. My only concern is that it needs a left-margin. The text is crowding a little close. It's making me claustrophobic. [edit]: Eep! I just tried it myself. I don't know how you people work with the crazy wikicode for tables. Yowch. I'll just leave it up to you... --Buddy 10:43, 19 April 2007 (PDT)


 * Heh, it takes a little getting used to but once you learn it it's actually a lot simpler than html table syntax. I see what you mean, and I'll tweak it now. Gopher 10:51, 19 April 2007 (PDT)


 * Oh, another thing. If we can make this happen somehow, there's some code I'd love to add to allow custom hidden sections. I think it would be great if the complete crew credits could be put in such a section; I thought it would be too much to include both lists in the infobox. For an example of this in action, check out the "Appearances" section on the character articles on Memory Alpha (example). If we got this feature working (some functions need to be tweaked to our needs and pasted into the right .css and .js files on the server), we could add the complete "appearances" sections even for the major characters, which we chose to omit for major characters because the long lists would be so ugly. Gopher 10:56, 19 April 2007 (PDT)

Cripes! I swear I frigging did that, and it didn't work!!! *smacks forehead* I'm very tired. I probably made some stupid mistake like putting a 9 instead of a g... --Buddy 11:06, 19 April 2007 (PDT)


 * Don't feel bad, god knows I've had those moments more times than I could recount in a month of sundays. I do my best coding at 2am, but I do my best debugging/troubleshooting at 10am. :) Gopher 11:07, 19 April 2007 (PDT)

Hm, I suppose you could base it on my Template:Character infobox, like this Template:Episode infobox, yes I created it just now. --SvipTalk 15:42, 19 April 2007 (PDT)


 * I think it might be a little wide, it's about the same width as the article in 1024*768 screen res. - Quolnok 18:39, 19 April 2007 (PDT)


 * oops! I feel silly, good call Qual, I forgot most people don't use maximized web windows at 1400px wide. I'll cut it by about 25%, see how that looks. Gopher 19:29, 19 April 2007 (PDT)


 * oh, and svip, I modeled mine after wikipedia, just as a starting point; yours is virtually identical, except for the lack of color in the header and the justification on the left column. When we start using them, we'll let the community decide which way to go and then modify them for consistancy before making infoboxes for EVERY page. Ultimately we'll probably want to build a generic base template and derive the specific templates from it, so we could make broad style changes to all infoboxes without changing each one (such as the heading color, text size, etc). As I said in the conference table, I somehow missed your character templates when getting caught up, and didn't see it until someone pointed it out to me. We'll wait until after the upgrade and the general style changes are made before making the decision, though, so we can see the infoboxes in the context they'll ultimately be used. Sound good? Gopher 19:35, 19 April 2007 (PDT)


 * I modelled mine in turn too after Wikipedia, but I based mine on those from those created for episodes . I try not to be rude, but I do actually think yours is ugly with those borders, and because the background is the same colour as the background of the entire page.  I attempted to make mine a slightly darker colour to created the illusion of a border.  In turn, I don't think ours are virtually identical... --SvipTalk 03:10, 20 April 2007 (PDT)


 * Also, I think I will add my template next to yours for comparison's sake. --SvipTalk 03:15, 20 April 2007 (PDT)
 * Svip, I'm tempted to revert your edit there. Please keep in mind that while we should be comparing the two, yours having in my opinion a better colour scheme, we should be remembering that this page is not a toy. Putting two of them on the same page destroys the article, which will be viewed by non-editors, I suggest shoving yours on another episode instead. - Quolnok 07:33, 20 April 2007 (PDT)
 * I see your point, I will revert that, and shove them both in this talk page. --SvipTalk 07:48, 20 April 2007 (PDT)
 * [edit] Done... --SvipTalk 07:51, 20 April 2007 (PDT)
 * Heh. I *also* modelled mine after the Wikipedia episode template - the REAL one. The futurama articles do not conform to WikiTV's style guidelines and use their own, custom templates. The Stargate articles, by comparison linky do use the correct TV Episode Infobox template. Gopher 08:06, 20 April 2007 (PDT)
 * Actually, mine looks more similar to that than yours, but that is probably because of your darker blue and vivid borders. In any case, as I think you will agree on, we should in turn let the users of this Wiki decide (it almost sounds like I am backing away from my Wikipedia statement before, but when given food for thought, this can happen).  Of course, I think that wither box is picked, it needs a bit more modelling, and perhaps some extra options (and hopefully the parse extension will come soon o_o). --SvipTalk 08:34, 20 April 2007 (PDT)
 * For a more fair comparison, I set up svip's template in the previous episode article, Bender Should Not Be Allowed on Television. Seeing them side-by-side is good, but seeing them in the context of a real article is also good. I agree with your last remarks, and I definately did not intend my infobox to be "complete." Mine was just a mockup, a starting point for style discussions. I chose to go with a bold color, what I think of as "Futurama Blue," because I think our articles could use some color, but I might change my mind when we update the wiki's base css.Gopher 08:57, 20 April 2007 (PDT)
 * Indeed, the CSS may change the outcome. I shall make some images of each infobox with my currently proposed CSS (note, my CSS may also change, and probably will). --SvipTalk 10:27, 20 April 2007 (PDT)
 * I think the infoboxes needs the following items more: Caption reference (must be optional with parse extension), Episode no. (1-72), Broadcast code (Using broadcast order), Opening cartoon (the cartoons appearing in each episode has an origin, we need information on this, Wikipedia already have), Guest Star(s) (voice actors)... that's all I think of now. --SvipTalk 13:12, 20 April 2007 (PDT)
 * I agree whole-heartedly; I concidered adding "Opening Cartoon" when I made it, but decided to wait for reactions to the basic infobox first. There's a website, I forget which, that has a nearly complete list of the opening cartoon references; it would be good form to ask permission before copying it, as I believe a lot of work went into even identifying most of them (many are VERY obscure, and afaik some have continued to elude identification), but if we're nice about it they'll probably let us reproduce the information, if we credit him and his site in an article listing them all. Gopher 15:59, 20 April 2007 (PDT)
 * Gopher, as yours replaces the navbar it should include a link to the commentary article. - Quolnok 06:04, 22 April 2007 (PDT)
 * Gopher, perhaps also a Nomination(s) option (optional though with parse extension) for episodes nominated for awards, and then a notice if it was won. Let's not write that it was "lost". :p --SvipTalk 13:21, 22 April 2007 (PDT)


 * Good ideas, and don't worry, I'll make some far more sophistcated and complete templates soon. I unexpectedly landed a new, full-time job Friday and had to spend the weekend doing some housework and other stuff before I start being out of the house 40 hrs a week. Fear not, I don't sleep and I find writing wiki templates and such to be relaxing. That's why I didn't get the upgrade done this weekend, though; had to clean the kitchen, wash the car, and go clothes shopping (worked from home for a looong time, and my wardrobe required a major upgrade.) I'll get the upgrade done in the next couple of nights, then we'll do some fancy templates, visualy and feature-wise, including autolinks to the commentary articles, as well as external links to the transcripts of the episodes and commentaries on TNP. How do people feel about next/prev links in broadcast as well as production order, where they are different? Gopher

Infobox comparison
This is the infobox comparison... to not "destroy" the page for now. :)

--SvipTalk 07:49, 20 April 2007 (PDT)

TOC... Why?
Why do the TOCs need to be there on every article? Almost none of our articles are more than a couple of pages long; it just seems assinine to me to then waste half a page at the top of the article on a little table of contents, when every article has the 3-4 main sections, and sub-sections are a single pragraph (if there are subsections at all). These articles are not confusing in any way; having a TOC seems to me like drawing my friend a map instead of saying "the bathroom's down the hall." Do you honestly think it's necessary, or are you just enforcing the notion out of habit? If everyone else thinks we need TOCs, then we're going to have to find some compromise, maybe forcing it to show only top-level sections or something. Like buddy and redirects, unnecessary TOCs are a pet peeve of mine. Gopher 08:18, 20 April 2007 (PDT)


 * I like to refer people to a specific part in articles, even very small articles. And when people read the link, they see the bookmark, and realise where in the article I want them to read.  I can still get the bookmarks without the TOC, but it is a lot more hassle. --SvipTalk 08:35, 20 April 2007 (PDT)


 * ... how is it easier exactly? Section names are section names; what's in the TOC is the same as what's in large bold letters at the top of the section. Gopher 08:56, 20 April 2007 (PDT)
 * Not entirely, all special characters are replaced by the value that would be displayed in the URL, except the % is a ., notice the question mark in this section... --SvipTalk 10:25, 20 April 2007 (PDT)
 * Oh, right, you're a URL guy. Well, bear in mind, our focus should be accessibility and ease of use for normal people, not for us. :) We want a typical random visitor from Google or wherever to find what they want easily. I personally don't think the TOCs are that helpful on the short, formulaic articles typical to the Infosphere. Hopefully everyone will at least agree that shorter articles (2-3 sections, a paragraph each, fits on one or at most two screens in an 800x600 browser) should have the toc hidden? Gopher 11:12, 20 April 2007 (PDT)


 * Buddy's 2&cent;: No one is "enforcing" TOC's. They just pop up when an article has more than a certain number of headings. I think it's three or four. Next to the word "contents" however, is the word "hide", which hides the contents and will continue to hide contents across pages until you unhide it. Super short articles (can't link an example at the moment) should probably have TOC's disabled, though. Would episodes count? TOC's look kinda silly next to the new infobox thingy, so probably... I honestly have no strong feelings one way or the other on this one. Perhaps a vote? Obviously "short" would have to be quantified first... *wanders off* --Buddy 13:22, 22 April 2007 (PDT)


 * No, I commented because Quol had specifically added it back to the Jurassic Bark article. He removed it again, but it put the issue in my head. Thought it should be mentioned before a real tug-of-war could start.Gopher 17:59, 22 April 2007 (PDT)