Talk:Bromilow Library
I appreciate the additions, but I wish editors would mind the page layout and avoid removing content. TY--Raystanwick 21:28, 24 March 2007 (UTC)
Mobius Edits
Mobius187, We seem to have a small difference of opinion on how some Pages should look... this post concerns your recent edits and reverts to the Riddell Museum, Bromilow Library, and Fanning Cinema Location Pages. Frankly, I initially mistook your 4/1/07 (Fool's Day) edits as pranks, hopefully, I am right now in assuming your intentions are with good faith. Also, I understand and appreciate the importance of having Standards for the Location Pages and I try to respect them. I recognize that you do also, Mobius. I don't think a standard is the issue here.
Regarding the general Lay-Out of the Pages
You say this in a recent edit-note for the Library: "Moved image to top of page. Descriptions work better below images, as the text has a visual reference."
I assume this was intended for me and is what prompts me to write this post now. I didn't want to reply with a note in a counter-edit. I explained the following in your talkpage and I thought we had an understanding - when this is done the whole top left of a page is BLANK. It looks UGLY. When someone first visits the page that is what they see. I know nothing about webdesign/whatever, but even I can see that that space is valuable and should be put to better use. I made the flavor texts just long enough specifically to complement the location block template on the right. If the pic fit into the top-left corner it would be different.(something to consider before settling on a standard pic size) EDIT: we may be using different monitor resolutions....
About the Library Description specifically
1) you say this in your talk page: "The history for the library took on a "Cthulhu" turn in my last update, but I intend to limit that topic to the library only." Actually, the lovecraftian element was already there in my original description. I was subtle with it to maintain mystery/intrigue/whatever. I did use the 'cthulhu' template, so it wasn't totally vague. You're edits, imnsho frankly, are much more heavy-handed, and replace my (attempted) use of allusion with a brute exposition. I did, btw, loosely incorporate the other structures into the mythos sub-plot, in lines on the library page itself and very casually in the others.
2) Your changes to the dates (1971 to 1951) create an inconsistency- there were no IMAX theatres in the fifties.
3) the way you Slipped your contributions into mine, seperated integerly related points and disrupted the course/pacing of my tiny tale. I would love to see additional material... just not intrusively interjected into mine. In short, the changes you made removed my work.
about my Attachment to these Pages
I of course understand that nothing grants me "ownership" of these pages and I make no such claim, but I do think my initial contributions should be respected. The subject, meaning, style, and spirit should not be radically altered by subsequent contributions. There are plenty of ghost-pages waiting for new content after all. When I wanted to create new content I specifically choose blank pages.
I made them to enrich the UD environment and experience. I tried to add some detail... some 'flavor' - a whole little story. I tied the three "seperate Buildings" together to add depth to the City. It all fit the internal logic of the game/genre. I saw a museum and cinema- and imagined a science center and planatarium. (I "made" it an IMAX theatre for a reason... and long before the '300' hype)
I've thought of working on other projects, but sadly this whole situation has discouraged me. It would be neat to flesh out a "City Medical College" for a group of Hospitals and Schools somewhere... --Raystanwick 13:10, 3 April 2007 (BST)
- I am currently investigating the "image shunt" problem, as I like to call it. As you noted above we are viewing these locations in different screen resolutions. I admit to not testing at a smaller resolution, but I had good reason to believe this would not be a problem. At work I use 1024x768, where you noted that you are in fact using 800x600. I was not originally concerned that a formatting error of this magnitude was occurring because my browser, IE, handles over-sized images by clipping them behind templates. So at 800x600 about 50% of the image was hidden, but it did not impact the wikipage's formatting. As stated, on your browser it had a different effect. Because the image was too wide for the space provided (calculated by me to be 275 pixels, roughly) it shunted the entire image to just below the template so it could display its entire width.
- The last time I witnessed something like this happening it was when I worked with the "Left", "Center", or "Right" properties of the Image tag, wherein it would force the image below a template. For some reason that is happening on your browser, but not mine. I admit I am surprised that the Wiki tags are behaving differently between our two browsers. At this time I will begin an investigation into this matter, as you may know, I use this template format for all of my location wikipages so at this time about 400 locations are experiencing this issue with regards to the browser. Obviously I would like to know which one you are using.
- I will now address each numbered point to the best of my ability:
- 1) After some thought, obviously not before starting my work on Rolt Heights I decided that I would try and give the suburb a Lovecraftian setting. As you know as much about this as I do, no doubt, I need not stress any further details. I admit I have a habit of editing other people's work, which I allow myself so long as I never: delete, counter, or misdirect their original work. It is never my intention to assume that my work is superior, but I can certainly see how you may take exception to it. Therefore if you have not done so already you may revert those edits to your work. I will make no attempt to edit them again unless it's strictly in a grammar/spelling capacity (which I'm sure you check for, but then so do I and I often miss things here and there from time to time).
- 2) That is correct, but if you will note I changed the timeline to account for IMAX being a later addition to the cinema. I suggested that the building (i.e. Planetarium) itself was older 1950's era, but that to draw in the crowds they added in an IMAX in later years: "...Later in the 90's the cinema was expanded to include an Omnimax...". My reasoning for this was to age the buildings in Rolt Heights. I had hoped for 1920's buildings all across the board, but I realized it was a bit late for that thanks in part to my own work to the contrary. As funny as that may seem. :)
- 3) As I noted above, you have my apologies and the right to revert that section of text to use your original work.
- I also prefer to work with blank location wikipages, but as part of my work here on the UD Wiki I have set about updating the suburbs of the NE Corner. I started with Dulston and expanded until I came to Rolt Heights. During these updates I have encountered other location wikipages that were already created and I try to integrate their contents into the format I have been using in order to create a sense of consistency. As I explained, I do also have a habit of editing other people's works, but never with the intention of ruining or misdirecting their original content. I try to respect what has already been included for a location and then proceed to add to it. I expect that other people may do so in the future with my other locations, as I commented to you before that your "story" description was an interesting idea. You are free to write story captions for any other location in the wikipages I have already worked on to continue the process of evolving those wikipages towards a greater work. I may be finished with some of them, but that does not mean they should remain static. I would like to see them improved upon.
- To close, I would ask that you not be discourage and instead consider my responses. I have admitted to making mistakes on part of my edits of your work, I do not argue it, so in that regard you can revert them and not expect to see me commit the same act again. Furthermore I encourage you to create similar descriptions for other locations. I have given Lovecraftian elements to other locations in Rolt Heights that you may wish to work on: The Fevin Monument (Shadow over Innsmouth), Club Cosenes (Shadow over Innsmouth), St. Romuald's Church (Shadow over Innsmouth), Factory 84,10 (Shadow over Innsmouth), Horder Avenue School (Pickman's Model). To name a few. My goal, like yours was to create a link between these locations that read a bit like a story. I hope that my reply will encourage you to continue your work. If you have any other problems please let me know, but I hope there will not be any except the one I am investigating (i.e. image shunt issue). --Mobius187 April 3 2007, 1:06 PM
- I appreciate your patients with me AND I appreciate the lengths you have taken to understand the problem. I figured it may be a difference in screen resolution when you mentioned "moving the image up" while all I saw was the text being forced down. I use 800x600 resolution and the FireFox webbrowser(v2.0 I think- didn't know browser could matter, btw) This is what I currently see for Bromilow Library- top of Library page- TOP middle of the page- MID Does Wikia have a "suggested browser" or a "suggested screen resolution"? [just spent 10 mins looking, found nothing, will cont]
- Of the Solutions you offered on my talkpage, I like #2 the best. These would be my priorities: "should just fit...lets users view full-size image...fast update." I'd avoid the thumb frame if it can still permit full-view on click; the pics are awsome and should themselves not be diminshed. I know very little about computers or code. I can't offer much help with forming a solution, but I can help implement one; I'd need you to tell me what to do and where.
- There is ONE last aesthetic point: even if the we can get all the pics to fit beside the loc-templates, I still think a little flavor text at the top is nice- there is already a "graphic" on the top of the page with the template... HOWEVER, I would NOT shuffle the 'regular' descriptions around to fit. And you're right that the in-game descrips are not long enough to fill the space; that was my main reason for "adding" to them. (Since I did write those with that in mind, it would be nice if we can perhaps accomodate them as intended; I do not think that would violate the wiki's standards and it's only 3 pages.)
- ...that's just one small thing though anyway. The big question is: Who's changin screen-res and browser?!? lol JK... it makes it even harder to "lay-out" the pages when we have to account for alternate settings. It's clear that we both want the pages to look nice. It's a shame these mechanical discprepencies are causing this issue. Let me know what you think we should do.--Raystanwick 19:08, 4 April 2007 (BST)
- I checked the screenshots you provided and they match what I had expected to see after your previous explanation. Here are two examples of what I see when I convert my desktop to 800x600 and view the Bromilow Library wikipage at this resolution: "top of the page" and "below the image". As you can see I imagined that, at a lower screen resolution all that would happen is the image would be hidden behind the template. FireFox apparently handles it differently. I will install FireFox and investigate my potential solutions. The Wiki does not provide a suggested browser, but both have always had formatting problems from what I read while researching a solution. It's for this reason that I want a format that works for both browsers rather than just the one I use.
- On the matter of the solution I will consider #2 to be the one we will go with if we cannot find a better solution. As I mentioned elsewhere the only other option, to increase the image size would be to use height rather than width, but this would still involve reformatting all the images as reconfiguring their dimensions on the fly certainly wouldn't work too well. Rather I would likely end up creating entirely new images for every location in that case. Not that I'm against the work, but that endeavor would take a few weeks if I set to it. For now though this will go under "if we can't find a better solution".
- After I have discovered what solutions are open to us in terms of fixing the image problem we can then discuss the design/aesthetics of the wikipage design in further detail, as depending on the results of my investigation it may limit our options. Of course as I noted above you are free to undo any edits I made to your original text (descriptions/story). For now I'll get back to installing Mozilla FireFox.
- On a side note, I mentioned the possibility of replacing the current Fanning Cinema with a new version. This is the image of a planetarium, so it has that 1950's appeal, but the glasswork has that modern feel that looks like it's been renovated to support an IMAX. Let me know what you think. If you don't like it let me know and I'll try and find a better one. If I can't, well, no loss. Take a look. --Mobius187 April 4 2007, 5:18 PM
Wow. You're screenies don't look much better... the text 'sticks out' and the pic gets chopped pretty bad... We should probably give all of this some deeper consideration before deciding on a fix and jumping at the work. It would be nice to find a good solid solution to the formating issue caused by variations in setting/browser; esp if it's a widespread problem. One last thing- frankly, for Fanning Cinema (and the others), I would prefer the history I previously provided- I liked how they were all part of the same construction project, and I had really put a lot of thought into writing them and relating them that way. Anyway, I think I'll be busy soon, and you're more capable of finding a solution, so I'll prob be taking a break from the wiki for a few weeks so you can just let me know what to do when you decide on something.--Raystanwick 01:00, 5 April 2007 (BST)
I found two possible solutions, both involving the wiki Table tags, but neither solution was perfect. The first solution, placing the image in a table (tags) forces the text to appear below it and retains the formatting for both IE and FireFox (I tested both at 800x600)... but the image overlapped onto the template map obscuring 50% of it. Not good. The second solution, based on what I learned from the previous result, was to place both the image and the map template into one table. This worked great from a format perspective, no more overlap and format stayed the same... except the width of the entire wikipage increased to account for it. Ah well. Right now I'm discussing the possibility of setting an image size standard on LSG's talk page. Feel free to join in. My current suggestion is to set all location images to a standard 275x360 size. If agreed, then I will format all my images to use this. Of course it may take a while to get through them all. --Mobius187 April 5 2007, 12:32 PM
