Familypedia:Watercooler/Archive 2

(Copied on last weekend of 2006. )

GEDCOM conversion
Weary of manually converting my html pages into pages for this site, I have taken an easier, if somewhat less elegant solution of writing a program. As I only started it two days ago, it is still somewhat crude and is not picking up all of the gedcom details. ... If any of you are interested in the program, with somewhat limited support, you can contact me. Yewenyi 11:01, 12 Sep 2005 (UTC)

(See Help:Loading Gedcoms)

We were the 5th-biggest wikicity in September 2005
3.5 MB according to http://www.wikicities.com/wikistats/EN/TablesDatabaseSize.htm

Thanks, Brian!!

Robin Patterson 05:18, 10 Oct 2005 (UTC)

Milestones
As of a couple of hours ago, we have over 3,000 articles, thanks mostly to Brian in Sydney. Robin Patterson 01:22, 6 Nov 2005 (UTC)

Recently passed 4,000, thanks to Brian and some new contributors (not yet showing on the detailed statistics). Robin Patterson 00:42, 13 March 2006 (UTC)

Multipurpose names, such as "Adam"
We have a page for the original "Adam". OK so far.

Soon, however, someone with an interest in that first name and/or the matching surname may want to create a separate article about it, along the lines of "Khan" and "Ferguson". Which one gets the plain single four-letter word as its page name?

Can we make a universal "rule" for it (to minimise confusion and rewriting)?

See (and please continue discussion on) separate new page Genealogy talk:page names. Robin Patterson 00:27, 20 Oct 2005 (UTC)

(moved some later discussion )

 Hey, guys, you're doing well there, but this discussion was already threatening to be too big for the Watercooler when I added my (obviously not clear enough) request last year: "See separate new page Genealogy:page names" - 'Please create some new talk pages for specific subjects whenever discussion gets to be more than a couple of paragraphs! Robin Patterson 05:44, 7 July 2006 (UTC) ''

All Wikicities were down for several hours last week
I read about it in the wikicities email news. But one reason for having a couple of days without contributions is that nobody contributed. Never mind - most families last for ever; and some Wikicities are much less active than this one. Robin Patterson 00:42, 13 March 2006 (UTC)

Our very own Wikia Tour
Do a brief guided tour as part of the Wikia tour system. Then you can suggest pages that we should add to it. There you may also discuss the TourBusStop. --Robin Patterson 06:34, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

A Better way?
''An extensive discussion of ways to simplify data input was carried out by various parties beginning in January of 2006. Ultimately this led to the creation of a "Create a Page" link on the sidebar that takes people to a page where they can select from various templates for the creation of "People Articles". To simplify the watercooler (getting hard to see the trees for the forest) most of that discussion has been transferred to a subpage .''

The original "People template" is highly detailed, and provides considerable information of use to users trying to create a new page. On the other hand, it requires a lot of editing if one wants to get rid of those helpful explanations when trying to set up a new page. To a novice computer user, it might be fairly daunting. I think something simpler would help people get started with this. ... 


 * "it requires a lot of editing to get rid of those helpful explanations when trying to set up a new page." - it shouldn't; it wasn't meant to; you can leave alone all the things inside "comment" tags unless one of us old hands has goofed in not closing some. Robin Patterson 06:38, 26 September 2006 (UTC)


 * Hi Robin. As you may notice I've pared this discussion down, and placed the original in a subpage where it can be viewed for reference purposes.  If you feel this older material needs to be retained on the discussion page I'll revert it. Per your comment above, I think there's some benefit to be had for providing those explanations---particularly for new users.  The "standard template" is in fact fairly complex.  When I first used it, I found the inserted explanations very helpful in figuring out how to use it, and why things were set up as they were.  After the first use or two, those explanations started getting in the way.  Since they were inside "comment brackets" they didn't detract from the article---but they got in the way of the editing.  This is particularly the case when building a long article.  So, when I reached the point where the comments were becoming a hinderance rather than an asset, I created a new template to fit my specific needs---and in the process got rid of the "comment brackets".  Now I have templates that are a bit easier to find the parts that are needed.  But others may find the explanations useful, particularly when starting out.  That's the reason for leaving the "standard template" intact. 

We now have a range of templates that can be used to meet different peoples needs. Also, there's no reason someone has to use the same template all the time. Usually I personally want a research template, but sometimes, just a blank page will do, or perhaps just the basic "simple template". Depends on the context. We will probably need to tweak these templates, and we may need others as well, but this seems to cover the range of needs. In any case, what I'm trying for are templates that are pretty much easy to use, and don't get in the way of the user.Bill 11:37, 26 September 2006 (UTC)
 * Blank
 * Simple
 * Standard
 * Resarch
 * Going well, Bill. (And I've pruned some of the above even more, as it is now on the subpage.)