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Templates and server load?

Could anyone explain to me the relation between template use and server load? Is just the fact that they require the movement/copying of data from one page to another? I've seen a template (ironically) disparaging the use of templated signatures as they increase server load; is this actually a significant problem? --aClashInRedSnow^|talk 21:49, 23 December 2008 (UTC)

I'm by no means an expert, but I've read that the server load increase is insignificant, if any. The main objection is that they are prime targets for vandalism (once the whole Developing Suggestions was posted in someone's sig,) and the server load one. Linkthewindow  Talk  22:55, 23 December 2008 (UTC)

Template parameters

Does anyone know if there's a way to change the output of template parameters so that if "location_type=police dept" is entered it can display "police department" in the category section of Template:Locationblock? It's also needed for Necrotech buildings, libraries, cemeteries. If I can't figure out a way to do this, I'll probably have to rollback to the old system -- boxy ^{talk • teh rulz} 11:42 30 December 2008 (BST)

signatures

how do you change your signature?--Sgt Gonnella 01:17, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

See this. Linkthewindow  Talk  05:45, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Time Travel?

Ok, something is seriously up with the timekeeping all of a sudden for me. I was happily reviewing my bot and checking the odd edit to make sure it hadn't broken anything. My refresh of RC yielded no new results though. Fearing it had crashed I checked my program, it was still trodding along happily. I pasted a page to check the edit history. It had updated just fine and at the current time.

Looking closer at RC, it's fucking jumped a hour off and fucked the edit history over.

My bot was working in alphabetical order, and the mass of edits certainly helps me a bit here...

This question started at 23:45 UTC and posted at 23:58 UTC.

Recent Changes, top of list, show bots on.

(diff) (hist) . . b User:DangerReport/St. Louis's Hospital (Edgecombe)‎; 00:24 . . (+39) . . DangerReportTimekeeperBot (Talk | contribs) (Bot Edit. Over 1 month since last update, status set to Unknown.)
...
A ton more bot edits here, you get the idea.
...
(diff) (hist) . . b User:DangerReport/St. Ferreol's Hospital (Dartside)‎; 00:20 . . (+81) . . DangerReportTimekeeperBot (Talk | contribs) (Bot Edit. Over 1 month since last update, status set to Unknown.)
(diff) (hist) . . N User:A Helpful Little Gnome/A8‎; 00:20 . . (+956) . . A Helpful Little Gnome (Talk | contribs) (New page: {{UDGame| top=Somewhere| NW_location={{UDBox|B7|a field}} | NW_color=Field66|)

All these times, and notice the usual edits too, have suddenly jumped an hour into the future!

The bots edits were being made at the correct UTC time though, and had gotten stuck deeper into the stack, inamongst edits that had been made an hour previous (the edits from an hour before have now jumped an hour ahead, remember)

See how the alphabetical order has continued! Louis Hospital to Luke Cathedral. The non-bot edits I believe were made from the hour ago streak. Thus the edits are getting interwoven.

(diff) (hist) . . b User:DangerReport/St. Margaret's Church (Wray Heights)‎; 23:24 . . (+90) . . DangerReportTimekeeperBot (Talk | contribs) (Bot Edit. Over 1 month since last update, status set to Unknown.) 
(diff) (hist) . . b User:DangerReport/St. Luke's Cathedral‎; 23:23 . . (-14) . . DangerReportTimekeeperBot (Talk | contribs) (Bot Edit. Over 1 month since last update, status set to Unknown.) 
(diff) (hist) . . Lockettside Republicans Army‎; 23:23 . . (-2) . . Devilz-fury (Talk | contribs) (→What we do - ) 
(diff) (hist) . . m User:Rikev‎; 23:21 . . (0) . . Rikev (Talk | contribs) 

So...WTF?

If there's some edits during actual UTC 00:20 to 00:24, they should intersperse with an unbroken bot edit streak. If anybody else is getting this error, you could turn turing on bot edits in RC and seeing the result.

For the record, this is the streak as of now, currently just far enough into the future to be undisturbed.

(diff) (hist) . . b User:DangerReport/St. Louis's Hospital (Edgecombe)‎; 00:24 . . (+39) . . DangerReportTimekeeperBot (Talk | contribs) (Bot Edit. Over 1 month since last update, status set to Unknown.) 
(diff) (hist) . . b User:DangerReport/St. Louis's Hospital (Chancelwood)‎; 00:23 . . (-18) . . DangerReportTimekeeperBot (Talk | contribs) (Bot Edit. Over 1 month since last update, status set to Unknown.) 
(diff) (hist) . . b User:DangerReport/St. Lazarus's Church (Paynterton)‎; 00:23 . . (+57) . . DangerReportTimekeeperBot (Talk | contribs) (Bot Edit. Over 1 month since last update, status set to Unknown.) 
(diff) (hist) . . b User:DangerReport/St. Laurence's Hospital‎; 00:23 . . (+44) . . DangerReportTimekeeperBot (Talk | contribs) (Bot Edit. Over 1 month since last update, status set to Unknown.) 
(diff) (hist) . . b User:DangerReport/St. Joseph's Hospital‎; 00:23 . . (+74) . . DangerReportTimekeeperBot (Talk | contribs) (Bot Edit. Over 1 month since last update, status set to Unknown.) 
(diff) (hist) . . b User:DangerReport/St. John's Hospital (Lockettside)‎; 00:22 . . (+82) . . DangerReportTimekeeperBot (Talk | contribs) (Bot Edit. Over 1 month since last update, status set to Unknown.) 
(diff) (hist) . . b User:DangerReport/St. John's Hospital (Gibsonton)‎; 00:22 . . (-105) . . DangerReportTimekeeperBot (Talk | contribs) (Bot Edit. Over 1 month since last update, status set to Unknown.) 
(diff) (hist) . . b User:DangerReport/St. John's Cathedral‎; 00:22 . . (+24) . . DangerReportTimekeeperBot (Talk | contribs) (Bot Edit. Over 1 month since last update, status set to Unknown.) 
(diff) (hist) . . b User:DangerReport/St. Joachim's Church (Starlingtown)‎; 00:22 . . (+60) . . DangerReportTimekeeperBot (Talk | contribs) (Bot Edit. Over 1 month since last update, status set to Unknown.) 
(diff) (hist) . . b User:DangerReport/St. Jeremy's Hospital‎; 00:22 . . (+58) . . DangerReportTimekeeperBot (Talk | contribs) (Bot Edit. Over 1 month since last update, status set to Unknown.) 
(diff) (hist) . . b User:DangerReport/St. Hubertus's Hospital‎; 00:21 . . (+86) . . DangerReportTimekeeperBot (Talk | contribs) (Bot Edit. Over 1 month since last update, status set to Unknown.) 
(diff) (hist) . . b User:DangerReport/St. Holy's Church (Starlingtown)‎; 00:21 . . (+16) . . DangerReportTimekeeperBot (Talk | contribs) (Bot Edit. Over 1 month since last update, status set to Unknown.) 
(diff) (hist) . . b User:DangerReport/St. Henry's Hospital‎; 00:21 . . (+91) . . DangerReportTimekeeperBot (Talk | contribs) (Bot Edit. Over 1 month since last update, status set to Unknown.) 
(diff) (hist) . . b User:DangerReport/St. Helier's Hospital‎; 00:21 . . (+72) . . DangerReportTimekeeperBot (Talk | contribs) (Bot Edit. Over 1 month since last update, status set to Unknown.) 
(diff) (hist) . . b User:DangerReport/St. Helena's Hospital (Roachtown)‎; 00:21 . . (+43) . . DangerReportTimekeeperBot (Talk | contribs) (Bot Edit. Over 1 month since last update, status set to Unknown.) 
(diff) (hist) . . UDWiki:Administration/Vandal Banning/Archive/2009 03‎; 00:20 . . (+132) . . Zombie slay3r (Talk | contribs) 
(diff) (hist) . . b User:DangerReport/St. Gall's Church (Pennville)‎; 00:20 . . (+49) . . DangerReportTimekeeperBot (Talk | contribs) (Bot Edit. Over 1 month since last update, status set to Unknown.) 
(diff) (hist) . . b User:DangerReport/St. Ferreol's Hospital (Dartside)‎; 00:20 . . (+81) . . DangerReportTimekeeperBot (Talk | contribs) (Bot Edit. Over 1 month since last update, status set to Unknown.) 
(diff) (hist) . . N User:A Helpful Little Gnome/A8‎; 00:20 . . (+956) . . A Helpful Little Gnome (Talk | contribs) (New page: {{UDGame| top=Somewhere| NW_location={{UDBox|B7|a field}} | NW_color=Field66| 

Anybody know what the hell's going on? --  RoosterDragon  23:58, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

The same thing was happening to me. Oddly enough, the wiki was awfully slow around that time. Linkthewindow  Talk  00:03, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

I thought maybe a DST change, but that's not til late this month. It also happens at 1/2 AM depending on whether we're stepping on or off. My preferences reports the server time correctly, and my local time correct too (not hard, no offset) I am considering making an edit summary that will "pre-empt" another edit just for the awesomeness though. --  RoosterDragon  00:06, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Yup. One awesome for me.

(diff) (hist) . . m User:A Helpful Little Gnome/A7‎; 00:11 . . (0) . . A Helpful Little Gnome (Talk | contribs) (eh x2) 
(diff) (hist) . . m User:A Helpful Little Gnome/A7‎; 00:10 . . (0) . . A Helpful Little Gnome (Talk | contribs) (eh) 
(diff) (hist) . . N User:A Helpful Little Gnome/A7‎; 00:10 . . (+922) . . A Helpful Little Gnome (Talk | contribs) (New page: {{UDGame| top=Somewhere| NW_location={{UDBox|B6|a field}} | NW_color=Field67| N_location={{UDBox|B7|a field}} | N_color=Field66| NE_location={{UDBox|1Wood1|Woodland}}| NE_color=Woodland| W...) 
(diff) (hist) . . m Wiki Questions‎; 00:09 . . (+1) . . The Rooster (Talk | contribs) (→Time Travel? - I am using my time travel powers to known the AHLG is about to create a page in his subspace, titled A7. Then double eh when it goes wrong!) 

And minus half an awesome for the "known" typo as opposed to "know". Or maybe that is correct. Bloody time travel, screws with tenses. --  RoosterDragon  00:11, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

I've asked Kevan. I suspect it's just a weird bug. Linkthewindow  Talk  00:16, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Aaag, what's going on? --  AHLGTG THE END IS NIGH! 00:25, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

conflicted Time's caught up Gnome, we'll be fine now.

Good show, Link. I'll just wrap up with this bit, I had the bot run 6 extra edits just to show how the edits got interwoven. (Seven, if you count that fact it then recorded that brief streak in the UpdateReport) Compare to the earlier list I posted before time caught up.

(diff) (hist) . . b User:DangerReportTimekeeperBot/UpdateReport‎; 00:24 . . (-2) . . DangerReportTimekeeperBot (Talk | contribs) (Bot Edit. Last update has been recorded.) 
(diff) (hist) . . b User:DangerReport/St. Louis's Hospital (Edgecombe)‎; 00:24 . . (+39) . . DangerReportTimekeeperBot (Talk | contribs) (Bot Edit. Over 1 month since last update, status set to Unknown.) 
(diff) (hist) . . b User:DangerReport/St. Louis's Hospital (Chancelwood)‎; 00:23 . . (-18) . . DangerReportTimekeeperBot (Talk | contribs) (Bot Edit. Over 1 month since last update, status set to Unknown.) 
(diff) (hist) . . b User:DangerReport/St. Lazarus's Church (Paynterton)‎; 00:23 . . (+57) . . DangerReportTimekeeperBot (Talk | contribs) (Bot Edit. Over 1 month since last update, status set to Unknown.) 
(diff) (hist) . . b User:DangerReport/The Elson Building‎; 00:23 . . (+76) . . DangerReportTimekeeperBot (Talk | contribs) (Bot Edit. Over 1 month since last update, status set to Unknown.) 
(diff) (hist) . . b User:DangerReport/St. Laurence's Hospital‎; 00:23 . . (+44) . . DangerReportTimekeeperBot (Talk | contribs) (Bot Edit. Over 1 month since last update, status set to Unknown.) 
(diff) (hist) . . b User:DangerReport/The Edgecombe Museum‎; 00:23 . . (+96) . . DangerReportTimekeeperBot (Talk | contribs) (Bot Edit. Over 1 month since last update, status set to Unknown.) 
(diff) (hist) . . b User:DangerReport/St. Joseph's Hospital‎; 00:23 . . (+74) . . DangerReportTimekeeperBot (Talk | contribs) (Bot Edit. Over 1 month since last update, status set to Unknown.) 
(diff) (hist) . . b User:DangerReport/St. John's Hospital (Lockettside)‎; 00:22 . . (+82) . . DangerReportTimekeeperBot (Talk | contribs) (Bot Edit. Over 1 month since last update, status set to Unknown.) 
(diff) (hist) . . b User:DangerReport/The Eden Museum‎; 00:22 . . (+50) . . DangerReportTimekeeperBot (Talk | contribs) (Bot Edit. Over 1 month since last update, status set to Unknown.) 
(diff) (hist) . . b User:DangerReport/St. John's Hospital (Gibsonton)‎; 00:22 . . (-105) . . DangerReportTimekeeperBot (Talk | contribs) (Bot Edit. Over 1 month since last update, status set to Unknown.) 
(diff) (hist) . . b User:DangerReport/The Dunham Building‎; 00:22 . . (+61) . . DangerReportTimekeeperBot (Talk | contribs) (Bot Edit. Over 1 month since last update, status set to Unknown.) 
(diff) (hist) . . b User:DangerReport/St. John's Cathedral‎; 00:22 . . (+24) . . DangerReportTimekeeperBot (Talk | contribs) (Bot Edit. Over 1 month since last update, status set to Unknown.) 
(diff) (hist) . . b User:DangerReport/St. Joachim's Church (Starlingtown)‎; 00:22 . . (+60) . . DangerReportTimekeeperBot (Talk | contribs) (Bot Edit. Over 1 month since last update, status set to Unknown.) 
(diff) (hist) . . b User:DangerReport/St. Jeremy's Hospital‎; 00:22 . . (+58) . . DangerReportTimekeeperBot (Talk | contribs) (Bot Edit. Over 1 month since last update, status set to Unknown.) 
(diff) (hist) . . b User:DangerReport/The Doubting Building‎; 00:22 . . (+44) . . DangerReportTimekeeperBot (Talk | contribs) (Bot Edit. Over 1 month since last update, status set to Unknown.) 
(diff) (hist) . . b User:DangerReport/The Dooley Building‎; 00:21 . . (+75) . . DangerReportTimekeeperBot (Talk | contribs) (Bot Edit. Over 1 month since last update, status set to Unknown.) 
(diff) (hist) . . b User:DangerReport/St. Hubertus's Hospital‎; 00:21 . . (+86) . . DangerReportTimekeeperBot (Talk | contribs) (Bot Edit. Over 1 month since last update, status set to Unknown.) 

What fun. --  RoosterDragon  00:29, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

No, I can't edit my userspace still. Summary from a page I tried to create "funny thing is, this page isn't in my contributions or RC, yet the code is here and there's a history. It also goes straight to the edit window from A8" --  AHLGTG THE END IS NIGH! 00:31, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Well, everything seems fixed, including my userpage problem. This wiki never ceases to amaze me. :O --  AHLGTG THE END IS NIGH! 16:33, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

Template Creation

People appear to use templates for creating awards/badges for all manner of things and I was wondering if there are any rules outlying their creation? I've considered creating my own several times for different purposes (mostly fun) and I want to know if there any requirements I need to fulfil? Category:Templates and Help:Templates have told me how to make one but not if I'm allowed to.

On a side note putting Category:Templates does not include it as a link... why is this? (It's actually in both sentences without the <nowiki> tags! --Kamikazie-Bunny 19:57, 31 May 2009 (BST)

Use [[:Category:Templates]] if you want to make it a link that doesn't include the page in the actual category. There is no specific rules about template creation, but unless they're used on multiple pages (or likely to be), mostly it's better to just put the code on the page itself -- boxy ^{talk • teh rulz} 03:06 1 June 2009 (BST)