Difference between revisions of "The re-PSUPedia talk:Manual of style"

Revision as of 20:43, 14 August 2007

Open polls

VOTE: Weapon template

Before we go any further with weapon template implementation, let's make if official with a vote like we did with the other standards. Please cast your vote below by posting your choice in bold followed by your signature (and reasoning, if you want). Also, if anyone has another template that they would like to propose, please do so. In such an event, if your vote is swayed by a new entry, please feel free to update your vote.

• Qwerty's template
• F Gattaca's template

Voting will be open from now until 12:00a.m. Tuesday, August 21. EspioKaos 00:22, 14 August 2007 (BST)

• Qwerty's template - I prefer this template. The seperated tables allow for users to easily find what details they need. Natasha Milarose 19:29, 14 August 2007 (GMT +10)
• Qwerty's template --Beatrixkiddo 00:46, 14 August 2007 (BST)
• Qwerty's template - I like the general idea of this one, but now that I've seen it filled in on a few occasions, there are a few things that I don't like about it. For one, when shop and pricing information is put into its respective table, it begins to squash together the other tables, making them look, well, bloated. (Heh, for a lack of a better term.) I've been trying to come up with an alternative based on this design that solves this, but so far, I've had no luck. I'll keep trying, though, and submit my version if I'm successful. So, for now, my vote goes with this one. EspioKaos 01:05, 14 August 2007 (BST)
  • I noticed the same thing on a few pages. It's due to "Unknown" taking up a lot more horizontal room than an actual price would, never fear. :P I was gonna change the unknown to "???" but didn't feel like messing with Q's pages. --Beatrixkiddo 01:48, 14 August 2007 (BST)
  • http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v328/beatrix_kiddo/Clip_10.jpg. In this example pic, sample prices are put in, making the boxes not get squished. --Beatrixkiddo 02:11, 14 August 2007 (BST)
  • It only looks squished if you use something less than 1280 x 1024, which I figured was more or less standard. >_> --Qwerty 06:12, 14 August 2007 (BST)
    • Here's a pic showing how the template is fine at a higher resolution. --Qwerty 07:03, 14 August 2007 (BST)
  • In other news, pricing can replace grinding in the second line, which in turn would move down to a third. Such a change could be easily implemented, but isn't necessary at 1280 x 1024 and above, and I'd imagine anyone playing PSU (at least on PC) can support that resolution (even if PSU has to run lower). Regardless, the change is easy to make if deemed necessary. --Qwerty 06:50, 14 August 2007 (BST)
    • I used to have my monitor set to 1280x1024, but for some reason, it kept squealing every once in a while. D: I finally just knocked it down by one spot and it stopped. I'm building a new computer very soon (well, as long as my new motherboard that should be arriving soon works this time), so once it's set up, I'll see if I can get away with a better resolution. I preferred 1280x1024, anyway.  :) EspioKaos 15:35, 14 August 2007 (BST)
• F Gattaca's template - I'm a lurker and often use the PSUpedia but never edited yet, so I guess throwing my say wouldn't hurt either. Qwerty's has some several advantages, namely being squashed to fit in half of a screen(in my resolution, at least) thus allowing on checking quickly the stats of a weapon, but I preffer F Gattaca's overall. It's breathier, spacier and feels more encyclopedic. Plenty of space and no risk of entries of squashing up into a mess. While it takes a screen, it's still pretty small and spacy. So, yeah, my vote's for F Gattaca's. Emryl Denjay 01:42, 14 August 2007 (BST)
• F Gattaca's template - I prefer the non-squished look. Firehawke 01:53, 14 August 2007 (BST)
• Qwerty's template. - Mewn 10:40, 14 August 2007 (BST)
• Qwerty's template. 12 10:45, 14 August 2007 (BST)
• Qwerty's template. Clover 12:15, 14 August (BST)
• I can't say I'm a fan of the redundancy displayed with the "Rank" field of Qwerty's template. "Rarity" already has that covered, so couldn't we find a better use for that field? - Miraglyth 18:37, 14 August 2007 (BST)
  • Well, the table looks really lopsided without it, so unless you can suggest something better to put there, then that's really a moot point. --Qwerty 18:53, 14 August 2007 (BST)
  •  :O I just realized a "version" (i.e. PAU/AoI) field would work well there. At any rate, stuff like that is easy to change in the template. --Qwerty 19:04, 14 August 2007 (BST)
    • A version field would be great. Of course, keep in mind that TECH weapons present a new problem. They only affect one stat (TP), thus leaving one stat box open (the one that was for ATA in striking and ranged weaponry). Any ideas? EspioKaos 19:07, 14 August 2007 (BST)
    • Wouldn't Rowspan 2 solve that particular problem? - Mewn 19:22, 14 August 2007 (BST)
      • Yeah, planning on just rowspan for the TP issue, but a version field would be nice once we get a vectored logo for regular PSU to match the AoI one. --Qwerty 19:25, 14 August 2007 (BST)

VOTE: Item template

Let's make it official on this one, too. Right now, I think the only proposal out there is mine, but I'd like to open up the floor once again in case anyone else has any ideas. If so, please submit your ideas! As with before, please cast your vote in bold followed by your signature.

• EspioKaos' template
• Other; please elaborate.

Voting will be open from now until 12:00a.m. Tuesday, August 21. EspioKaos 15:51, 14 August 2007 (BST)

• EspioKaos' template EspioKaos 15:51, 14 August 2007 (BST)
• EspioKaos' template. - Mewn 17:02, 14 August 2007 (BST)
• EspioKaos' template --Qwerty 17:49, 14 August 2007 (BST)
• EspioKaos' template - Bit of a no-brainer. But as with shop buy/sell stats, I'm not sure about the presence of PM feed stats. The star value and item type (e.g. Ingredient in above example) is already given, no? - Miraglyth 18:26, 14 August 2007 (BST)
  • Yeah, I put that there as filler, but it's just kind of stuck. Other stuff could go in its place. EspioKaos 21:24, 14 August 2007 (BST)

VOTE: Color-coding

Another one to get out there and finalize. At the moment, the only discrepancy I've come across with the color-coding system is in the shade of red used to identify an item that has not been officially released. In the current tables, it's of a lighter shade than what has been proposed. As before, if anyone has another suggestion, please post it. In the meantime, cast your vote in bold followed by your signature.

• Color proposal #1
• Color proposal #2 - The only change is in the shade of red.
• Other; please elaborate.

Voting will be open from now until 12:00a.m. Tuesday, August 21. EspioKaos 15:59, 14 August 2007 (BST)

• Color proposal #1 EspioKaos 15:59, 14 August 2007 (BST)
• Colour proposal #1. - Mewn 17:02, 14 August 2007 (BST)
• Color proposal #1 --Qwerty 17:49, 14 August 2007 (BST)
• Colour proposal #1: Edit - Ah, I see what's being voted on here. Actually I used the lighter red initially because I found reds that were much deeper stole too much attention from the text. It's arguably too pale now, but I didn't expect availability to be too important a detail. In any case, #aaccff and #ffaaaa can of course be shortened to #acf and #faa - Miraglyth 18:20, 14 August 2007 (BST)

Weapon listing table

And now we have a complete proposal for the tables used to list weapons. Really, the only thing that's changed is the addition of the column used to identify items exclusive to the expansion (thanks for the icons, F Gattaca and Qwerty!).

Rank	Name	Maker	PP	ATP	ATA	Req.	Ver.	Comments
1★	Sample		230	72	42	27		--
	Samplesou		260	64	38	29		--
	Shigga Sample		200	76	45	30		Drop: Sample Monster Lv01~09
Rank	Name	Maker	PP	ATP	ATA	Req.	Ver.	Comments
4★	Sample Mk. 2		333	302	149	164		--
6★	Sample Mk. 3		356	450	212	266		--
	Samplesou Mk. 2		403	402	189	281		--
Rank	Name	Maker	PP	ATP	ATA	Req.	Ver.	Comments
7★	Shigga Sample Mk. 2		340	553	253	325		Drop: Sample Monster Lv80~99
Rank	Name	Maker	PP	ATP	ATA	Req.	Ver.	Comments
10★	Shigga Sample Mk. 3		380	732	373	488		Drop: Sample Monster Lv100+
12★	Shigga Samplec		300	625	618	617		Still unreleased in JP.

Opinions? EspioKaos 20:43, 14 August 2007 (BST)

• • Quick adjustment. Changed the Att. and Acc. columns to ATP and ATA. EspioKaos 20:54, 14 August 2007 (BST)

Weapon template standard proposal

• Qwerty, Beatrix and myself have come to a consensus on which weapon template we prefer: this one. Any objections? The whole decision process on this matter is taking a lot longer than we'd hoped, so we're just trying to speed things along. EspioKaos 19:25, 12 August 2007 (BST)
• Yes, this particular issue has taken too long. I have no particular objections. If there is enough objection a vote will have to be set up, but I don't forsee that. - Mewn 19:32, 12 August 2007 (BST)
• Just one tiny thing. 'Base rate' is mostly useless information; I'd rather see the chance it has on a pure PM. Perhaps both but people don't usually synth guns on armor PMs so... Au+ 21:43, 14 August 2007 (BST)

Page-stretching and so forth

• Well, I was able to fix the stretching of the page with the addition of the code and nowiki tags, but the result is now a bit more jumbled, as line breaks are no longer obvious. We'll have to mess around with it some more to see if we can make a work-around. Of course, we could always take it out of table format and just have the section divided vertically. (The first part is "what you type" and the second part is "what you get.") EspioKaos 19:02, 31 July 2007 (BST)
  • The code part of the table probably doesn't have to be "as-is." It may be possible to modify the appearance of the code on the page, while the actual text (when copypasted into a edit box) will produce the same result as what's seen. F Gattaca 19:21, 31 July 2007 (BST)
    • I've played around with it some more, but I can't seem to come up with a way to make the code retain its line breaks so that the table will show up properly when inserted into a new page. (I'm still kind of green when it comes to wiki-coding, so I probably missed something.) So, until we can figure out a way to resolve this using the side-by-side comparison, I'm going to change things over a bit to where the code and result display vertically. We don't want people trying to use the jumbled code to think it doesn't work right because of the lack of line breaks, right?  ;) EspioKaos 15:47, 1 August 2007 (BST)

Capitalization and so forth

• I've been looking at the Wikipedia Manual of Style for inspiration on getting this section going, and I realized that they prefer the capitalization of titles to follow the rule of the first letter being in caps with all subsequent words (sans proper nouns, of course) being in lowercase. I know we don't have to follow this since PSUPedia is not a part of Wikipedia, but should we follow it? Personally, I actually like how it looks. What are you guys' thoughts on this? EspioKaos 18:43, 31 July 2007 (BST)
  • This kind of thing seems highly dependent on the organization's preference. I tried looking up manuals of style that deal with subheadings (as these would be). This college's First-Year English FAQ demonstrates the APA's way of treating headings and subheadings, which in some ways could be applied to a wiki.
    
    Meanwhile, the AJA's manual of style says to capitalize only the first word and important words but not to put a period or other punctuation at the end of the subheading.
    
    The MLA says that each word in a title is capitalized, except for articles (a, an, the), prepositions (against, between,in, of, to), conjunctions (and, but, for, nor, or, so, yet), and the infinitive to.
    
    I guess it's mostly up to what we want to see, but I'm predisposed towards using capitalization of words in high-level headings ("==" type), but not in lower-level headings. F Gattaca 19:22, 31 July 2007 (BST)
• I think we should follow it, but let's wait and see what others say first. - Mewn 19:26, 31 July 2007 (BST)
• I think we should follow the MLA-type standard, since it just makes the most sense, and is how everything (books, movies, articles, magazines, etc.) is titled. --Qwerty 20:15, 31 July 2007 (BST)

A few things

• Not sure exactly if these are supposed to be in this Manual of Style, but a few things for consideration:
  • Any names (of NPCs, items, missions, places, etc.) that have been translated from Japanese due to the lack of an official localization are to be put in parantheses until the official localization is known, at which point the localization takes precedence. An example is Fight For Food, which until the US closed beta shortly before release was known by its Japanese name of (Farm Plant Recovery).
  • Item types should be referred to by their proper names if possible, i.e. Line Shields instead of Armor.
  • To head off any future problems, weapon type names should be made consistent - particularly Cards/Throwing Blades/whatever the flavour of the month name is. I propose we use Cards, as that is how the Perfect Bible and PSU-Wiki refer to them.
  • When writing the star rarity of an item, use the ★ symbol consistently. Don't use * or anything like that. It can be reproduced by copy/pasting or switching to Japanese input and typing 'hoshi' (then pressing Space to change it).
  • For consistency, since the game is in US English, we use US English here as well. See here for the major differences.

If I think of anything else I'll list it here. - Mewn 19:26, 31 July 2007 (BST)

• Excellent! I'll get started on working these things in. EspioKaos 20:40, 31 July 2007 (BST)
• er, not trying to make much of a point here, but just for the record, in Europe the game was released with dialogue in British English plus three other European languages. I agree to preserve US English preferences for the wiki articles though, if only to adhere to the dominant standard. - Tycho 17:26, 6 August 2007 (BST)

Abbreviations

• Dun dun dun! Now we get to the abbreviations and what we'll consistently use when it comes to type names. I, for one, side with Sounomi's proposal, which creates a case-insensitive, easy-to-recognize abbreviation for types that would share letters under the abbreviations that originated from the Japanese wiki. For example, Fighgunner and Fortegunner would be FI and FG, respectively. I haven't added in the type abbreviations to the list just yet, as we first should come to a consensus on what we'll use. EspioKaos 19:45, 31 July 2007 (BST)
• Ah, this spectre. I personally support and use the PSU-Wiki abbreviations and have no real problem differentiating between fG and FG, but whichever is clearer to the majority would be the one to go with. My vote goes to the PSU-Wiki abbreviations, though. - Mewn 19:53, 31 July 2007 (BST)
• I will definitely and adamantly support the traditional (i.e. FG/fG) style abbreviations, simply because they have been used by the vast majority for almost a year now. I have no difficulty distinguishing between FG and fG, especially given context. Furthermore, I do not see the need to be meticulous when it comes to Att. versus ATP and the like. To be absolutely honest, I think that it is stupid that there is even a difference in game, and I never see people use Att., Def., Eva., and the like. I do not see why we can't just use ATP/ATA/DFP/EVP/MST/etc. for everything, simply because it eliminates confusion and those are the abbreviations most commonly used. However, I reckon my opinion will be in the minority on that issue. --Qwerty 20:06, 31 July 2007 (BST)
  • That's an excellent point, Qwerty. I think I'll actually merge a few things together, making Acc. and ATA under the same listing with a general description as opposed to the "in reference to weapon stats" descriptor. EspioKaos 20:25, 31 July 2007 (BST)
  • I strongly side with Sounomi's style. It's much better to have two unique letter combinations for a type class, not to mention "FI" is a nod to the "first two letters" abbreviation rule of the old PSO days. it's also not case dependent; that helps avoid confusion with mis-capped abbreviations or people who just throw the shift key out the window (I've encountered situations like this before!). I personally use it for my user page as well as my signature on PSO-World.
    
    As far as the "Att." and "Acc." issue, it might be a good idea if the weapon tables link to Stats and the corresponding stat, so that people who aren't PSOldschool will understand it's the same thing. F Gattaca 21:26, 31 July 2007 (BST)
    • Well, FI might be slightly less confusing to some, but FG/fG has been used as the standard for a year, and I must favor precedent. --Qwerty 21:47, 31 July 2007 (BST)
      • Good idea on linking the stat abbreviation to its article, Gattaca. I'll see if I can do some cleaning up of the stats page and we can get everything linked over as we go with page redesigns. As far as the type abbreviations go, we're tied with two for the JP wiki style and two for Sounomi's style. EspioKaos 15:38, 1 August 2007 (BST)
  • I just found something interesting on the abbreviation thing at the JP wiki. Apparently there was much debating over what the abbreviations they use should be, and the issue of confusion between fG and FG was brought up many times. Some suggestions users over there made to get around this include Fr to stand for "forte." So, FrF would be Fortefighter. Also, someone suggested FFi, FGu and FTe for Fortefighter, Fortegunner and Fortetecher, respectively. Many more suggestions were made, but that's way too many to list. EspioKaos 03:57, 4 August 2007 (BST)
    • In my not-so-humble opinion, those all are even more unnecessarily confusing than either the traditional system or Sounomi's. Just my two cents. --Qwerty 05:39, 4 August 2007 (BST)
      • Oh, I agree. I just wanted to point out some other suggestions that were thrown about on the issue.  ;) EspioKaos 14:46, 4 August 2007 (BST)
        • I mentioned that even they couldn't agree months ago. - Miraglyth 19:10, 10 August 2007 (BST)
          • At least we'll finally have a standard set come the end of tomorrow. Moving in the right direction and all, right?  ;) EspioKaos 19:12, 10 August 2007 (BST)

Template Nonsense

• I just made a metric ass-load of templates for use on weapon pages. This should make them much easier to put together, requiring less memorization of the confusing color-codes (or alt-tabbing to another, completed, article's edit page, which is just as silly), less typing for the image tags, and general happiness through technology. Check Rifles, it works out the same, and saved a bunch of text. Not going to add it to the style manual until I garner praise and cookies from you all though. --Beatrixkiddo 04:48, 1 August 2007 (BST)
  • Lolk after some fun times, I've found out that A) Templates only work if they are one-per-cell. B) Multiple Templates in the headers of tables don't get along and C) Template descriptions don't work so well with the color-code templates. Other than that, have fun with them! --Beatrixkiddo 05:31, 1 August 2007 (BST)
    • Excellent work! I don't see why these won't be approved, but I'll wait for more feedback before adding them in. (Or, I could add them in with the pending title until it's made official.) EspioKaos 01:57, 2 August 2007 (BST)

Am I just blind, or what?

If one of these weapons is not yet released in the Japanese version of PSU, use the code style="background:#fff2f2" in the row divider above it (|-).

• I cannot tell the difference between this color and pure white, at all. It's not really important, I guess, but maybe we should try a slightly darker tone? --Qwerty 06:06, 1 August 2007 (BST)
  • It should appear as a faint red. This should actually be changed to the red used in the new color-coding table I added. (style="background:#FFAAAA") Of course, I need to verify first that this is the standard. EspioKaos 01:54, 2 August 2007 (BST)
    • Querty, I noticed in your weapons page proposal that you chose very dark grey colors for your tables, where the "wikitable" format already has a significant division of color; maybe your monitor's brightness is set too high? F Gattaca 22:00, 2 August 2007 (BST)
      • Lolya. My brightness is set at 100, and contrast at 28, but my monitor color always seems off if I change it. But I yeah, I suspect that is what's going on. --Qwerty 23:02, 2 August 2007 (BST)
      • Oh, wow. I mean, wow. I played around with some settings on my monitor and driver. Honest to God, I never knew the wikitable class had background colors pre-assigned, they always showed up as pure white on my screen. With that in mind, I think I need to change my Weapon Template, as those colors really are too dark. --Qwerty 00:37, 3 August 2007 (BST)

Voting on pending issues of style

• OK, we're getting an excellent start on this by getting a standard established for the PSUPedia. Now all we need to do is vote on a few subjects at hand (the pending issues in the manual) to move even further. So, how should we handle voting? Maybe leave it open for a set period of time (one week?) and then go with the decision from there? Or maybe we should just close the polls once we get votes from everyone participating in the creation of the manual? Other ideas? EspioKaos 04:49, 3 August 2007 (BST)
  • I'd say, set a deadline of one week to vote, and mention it on the frontpage so any visitors can come and vote. - Mewn 10:42, 3 August 2007 (BST)
    • OK. When I put it on the front page, would a little blurb in bold below the welcome line but before the actual paragraph be good? (Like where the mention of our Super Holy Light week and the addition of Her Secret Mission was located.) I can just link to this page from there. EspioKaos 03:30, 4 August 2007 (BST)
    • Yeah, that sounds good, people will have to know what they're voting on and it might help grab their attention. - Mewn 10:27, 4 August 2007 (BST)
    • I think there have been wiki extensions emulating polls floating around, if you want. In fact, I think I there was one installed earlier actually... Probably got killed during all the transfers and server moves and whatnot. - Tycho 17:53, 6 August 2007 (BST)
    • Er, actually... >_>
      • Ah, cool. I'll look into the proper markup for writing a poll (since it's not detailed there, unless I just missed it) and see if we can use it for the next one we need. Thanks for the tip! EspioKaos 19:09, 7 August 2007 (BST)

Weapon table revision

• Since our S-rank listing is using a darker red to point out items that have not been released in any version of the game, shouldn't our new weapon table do the same? Or is there a reason that it uses a lighter shade of red? EspioKaos 03:49, 4 August 2007 (BST)
  • I believe the notion was that it was too dark/bold for general use in other temples but let me mess around with it, and see how it looks. --Qwerty 05:40, 4 August 2007 (BST)
    • Any updates on this end?  ;) EspioKaos 19:14, 7 August 2007 (BST)
    • Yeah, I was wondering this myself. The sooner finalized templates can be shown by the both of you, the sooner we can vote on them and institute a standard. Oh, by the way, something neither of you seem to have considered at the moment is AoI - if you are working on your templates at all you might want to add a place to put which versions of the game an item is available on, for future use. - Mewn 21:23, 7 August 2007 (BST)
      • Perhaps we can make the text for the item name yellow...while still retaining it as a link to its own article. Not sure if this is possible, or if it'd even look good though. But a seperate coloumn would probably be a lot easier anyways. - Saiffy 21:36, 7 August 2007 (BST)
      • I'll see if I can mess around with the tables some to add a column for AotI-exclusive items. Same for the individual item templates. On that, I'm trying to come up with some ideas for templates on other non-weapon stuff like traps, materials and consumables. I'll try to get some things done on that as soon as possible. EspioKaos 21:59, 7 August 2007 (BST)
      • OK, here we go. I quickly added in a column before the comments section to display which version of the game an item is from. As I state in my notes there, I think the italics look a little silly, but I don't want to make a double-standard since game titles are supposed to be italicized anyway. Perhaps we could use a small icon similar to the manufacturer icons? EspioKaos 00:41, 8 August 2007 (BST)
      • For tables, I suggest we do use something like a very pale yellow as Saiffy suggested, or put in the extra column as Espio did. Alternatively, we could use a very small icon to denote AotI-only things in tables and lists. For articles addressing a bunch of AotI-only content, I suggest we just use something like below. --Qwerty 06:16, 8 August 2007 (BST)
      • Me again. Here is an example of two possible ways to denote an AotI item/quest/whatever in tabular/list form. As noted there, I'm more so fond of the little icon (), as it can be more widely applied. Also, too many varying colors in a table is both hard to remember and confusing to the lay reader. Anyway, comments plx. --Qwerty 06:50, 8 August 2007 (BST)
      • I prefer the column directly stating PSU or AoI, it'd be good for any future expansions, and the colour has the flaw of not telling us if the item is released or not. - Mewn 11:14, 8 August 2007 (BST)
• Check this out. I opted for a scaled down version of the Illuminus logo as opposed to the exclamation point from the beta. I just like it better.  ;) Now we'll need a logo for just the base game. EspioKaos 20:07, 8 August 2007 (BST)
  • Hey, I can do pixel art; if I make a knockoff logo based on the PSU icon and the AoI icon, would those work? F Gattaca 08:13, 10 August 2007 (BST)
    • No real point; we might as well just shrink the official logo, no one seems to care. --Qwerty 18:54, 10 August 2007 (BST)
      • Yeah, the official logo shrunk down will work just fine. Quicker, too.  ;) EspioKaos 19:18, 10 August 2007 (BST)
        • I suppose. I figured transparent pixel art icons would have looked better alongside the manufacturer icons, which have transparent backgrounds themselves. F Gattaca 03:50, 11 August 2007 (BST)
          • What about vector art like the manufacturer icons? (I think it's called vector art.) If someone could do that with the Illuminus logo, we could scale it up and down without distortion so it could be used for multiple purposes. EspioKaos 15:38, 11 August 2007 (BST)
            • That'd be better, since the manufacturer logos are also made from vector graphics, although they're .png files. Following the same pattern, I could do that with Flash and make a big vector .png of the logos--but if you're thinking about that .svg stuff, I've no clue how those vector graphics work. I've only seen them used on Wikipedia ... F Gattaca 19:37, 11 August 2007 (BST)
              • PNG would be great. Give it a shot, if you don't mind.  :) EspioKaos 19:50, 11 August 2007 (BST)
• I just finished a rough design of the Kazarod page. Of course, we still need a picture to add to the upper right, but this is what I think individual weapon pages should look like. (I still need to add drop info in, however. Not sure if I want to do it as text or a table...) EspioKaos 16:58, 12 August 2007 (BST)
  • I guess we'll need to do a referendum on the weapon pages. That's three style propositions now, heh!
    
    Anyway, I finally found the time to work on the vector graphics version of the AoI logo. Tell me what you think:
    
    
    
    You can view the full size (250x250) here. F Gattaca 21:09, 13 August 2007 (BST)
    • Perfect!  :D What program do you use for this? I'd kind of like to try my hand at creating some logos like this for other in-game icons such as status effects and materials. EspioKaos 21:22, 13 August 2007 (BST)
      • I personally used Flash for this, using its Export Image feature to turn my working movie into a still image .png file. There's some dedicated vector graphics programs out there, but I've found Flash can handle many of the same things. F Gattaca 21:30, 13 August 2007 (BST)

Individual item pages

This format seems to be going over very well considering that Beatrix, myself and a few others have been faithfully using it over the past few days as we add new articles to the wiki. Considering that, I assume it could more or less be a set standard, but I'd still like to see if anyone has any opinions on the style that maybe they've just kept to themselves. A few things on it, though:

• I've opted for a more bold set of colors for the star rating as the ones selected for the table cell backgrounds seemed a little too light against the normal white background. The green star was especially difficult to see.
• I'd ultimately like to set up a number of more organized categories, such as what we're doing now with these small articles, as opposed to the 500+ categories we have now that split everything up into smaller and smaller pieces. I mentioned this at Raffon Field Base, but I'd like to say it here, too. I really think we need to clear out a ton of the unnecessary categories.

Anyway, I think that's it. Comments, suggestions? EspioKaos 18:31, 11 August 2007 (BST)

• • Well, for the star rating, I guess you could try a wikitable thing to get a darker background. Something like:

{| class=wikitable
| style="background:#A7A7A7" | <font color=blue>★★★<font color=cyan>★★★<font color=lightgreen>★★★<font color=gold>★★★
|}


Which gives:

As for the categories, they were originally intended to be there because we can't really get the advanced search functions a more conventional database can have and this was a work-around. They've never been used really and are archaic, they're also intrinsically tied with the old, broken template system. They should be deleted so we can have cleaner categories. Special List pages can be set up if necessary. - Mewn 20:21, 11 August 2007 (BST)

• I am pro special list page.  ;) We could use that to sort out which categories to keep and which to axe. EspioKaos 04:40, 12 August 2007 (BST)
  • • I personally think the way Espio is doing them looks fine, and the grayish background table for the stars would just look out of place. I'm also curious if the board table I used on my sample weapon page might look better for the individual item pages as well, rather than the textual board and ingredient description. The colored star rarity would also fit in well with my weapon page, if we choose to do that one. --Qwerty 01:03, 12 August 2007 (BST)
      • Create an example of what you have in mind and we can judge from there.  :) EspioKaos 04:40, 12 August 2007 (BST)
        • Nothing too fancy, just a simple little table, easy to read and standardized. Here be the example. My pricing table could be thrown in too, but I think that might be a bit much. Also, for my sample weapon page, I could just put the color-coded stars below the item description as on the item pages, or possibly in the weapon name title line (with reduced text-size, obviously). --Qwerty 07:03, 12 August 2007 (BST)
          • Yeah, the pricing table would probably be too much, but the synthesis table looks great there. EspioKaos 15:01, 12 August 2007 (BST)

• As an aside, it's worth standardizing exactly what types of items are to use this style - obviously synthesis materials and traps use it, but I also assume that consumables, buff items, room goods, redecoration tickets, boards which don't particularly belong to another page (e.g. conversion boards), PA Disks and Clothes/Parts will also use this standard? - Mewn 20:40, 12 August 2007 (BST)
  • Yeah, that sounds about right. I plan on doing some more item pages later today, possibly finishing off the synthesis materials section. In the meantime, however, I'm going to head off to the gym for a bit while I've got a chance. (There are weights to be lifted there, and it just so happens that I'm the only one who can lift them.  :D) While I'm there, I'll be going over these things in my head. EspioKaos 20:58, 12 August 2007 (BST)

Synthesis board suggestion

(Copied from the scape doll talk page.) I really hate questioning something that we're trying to set as a standard, but I think this might be a valid point. While working on the scape doll's board info, I realized that the rarity of the board and the rarity of the item are different. While I don't think this is a common occurrence, I think we should address it before we begin a mass implementation of synth board tables, especially since the board rarity is never mentioned anywhere. I suggest changing the title of the table to the board name and then changing the current board name cell to indicate rarity. Like so:

I think we should do this, unless we're going to make individual pages for each board. Actually, that's something else. Should we do that, or just make a synth board redirect to the page of the item it creates? EspioKaos 18:40, 13 August 2007 (BST)

I'd be all for individual pages for boards, but the simplicity of putting board and item on one page is clear to me as well. --Beatrixkiddo 23:17, 13 August 2007 (BST)

• I have to admit, I'm not much a fan of this style. Why?

Seems a very strange way of arranging it to me, and not particularly conductive to finding out the desired information on a synthesis quickly. Additionally, there's a lot of "style="background:sixcharacters"" expressions in there which - while easily eliminated by a template - would surely be better off made header cells (start with ! instead of | ) and then just make the "title" cell darker manually.

If I may pitch in a couple of ideas:

Actually, the code for the second one isn't edit-friendly at all. But some might prefer the look so I'll leave it there. - Miraglyth 00:07, 14 August 2007 (BST)

• • I like how the vertical version looks. One problem, though: what to do with the empty cells for boards that have less than four materials? Also, I still favor the idea of keeping the title of the table the name of the board it's about. EspioKaos 16:24, 14 August 2007 (BST)
• I do too, come to think of it.

The "number of materials" thing could do with exploration. By nature, all weapons require four (Photons, Ores, Metals, Wood) and some line shields require four (Photons, Ores, Materials, sometimes event drops). Then there are Food and Item boards which take two (Natural Materials, Chemicals), Decoration boards which take two (Special Materials, Wood) and finally Grinder / Material Upgrade boards which use just one (Grinder bases and the materials, respectively).

It's the last two that bother me, since those won't fit into the "vertical with oddly-grouped" setup either. - Miraglyth 18:35, 14 August 2007 (BST)

• • We could always take the route of unique tables for each type of synthesis board, but do what we can to make them all have the same general feel. Maybe? I'll give some more thought to it to see if I can come up with another design. EspioKaos 19:10, 14 August 2007 (BST)

Closed polls

Voting has ended for the following topics.

VOTE: Abbreviations

So we can set a standard Guardian type abbreviation system for use at the PSUPedia, we're taking a vote on what the users and contributors would like to have implemented. Our two choices are the JP Wiki version and Sounomi's version. For those who might not know, here are how the two sets of abbreviations compare:

Please post your vote (and if you want, your reasoning) on this issue in this section. Voting will be open for one week from today, so you have until 12:00a.m. CST Sunday, August 12 until all votes are tallied and an official decision is made. EspioKaos 15:13, 4 August 2007 (BST)

• Sounomi: I vote we use Sounomi's abbreviation set. Even though the JP Wiki's set has been used longer, Sounomi's set solves the issue of confusion some have had over fG/FG, which is Fighgunner and which is Fortegunner. Also, I just think it looks nicer than having random lowercase letters in certain abbreviations. (I still don't understand why the JP Wiki users decided to give the Acro-types a lowercase a.) One other thing, I've seen a few people complain that the PSUPedia seems to be a rip-off of the JP Wiki, so by using an abbreviation set that didn't originate from there, it might help set apart even further. EspioKaos 15:13, 4 August 2007 (BST)
• JP-Wiki: I vote we use the JP-Wiki set. We've been using this for a while now and I think most people can grasp the difference between fG and FG (the confusion tends to come mostly from people on forums who don't capitalize, and even then it can usually be worked out from context). As an aside, for ease of reading, I suggest putting either JP-Wiki or Sounomi at the start of our comments. - Mewn 16:50, 4 August 2007 (BST)
• Sounomi. --Beatrixkiddo 17:14, 4 August 2007 (BST)
• JP-Wiki: For all the reasons I said below. However, I'd really prefer JP-Wiki style, but with capital As for the Acro classes. --Qwerty 18:04, 4 August 2007 (BST)
• Sounomi. - Saiffy 18:35, 4 August 2007 (BST)
• Sounomi, also for reasons I stated below (and what's the point of a mixed-case abbreviation for the Acro classes?). EpisoKaos also raises some valid points about differentiating PSUPedia from the JP Wiki. F Gattaca 20:13, 4 August 2007 (BST)
• Sounomi, less ambiguity is better. Malice 23:23, 5 August 2007 (BST)
• Sounomi probably. First things first: I don't see much of a reason to differentiate from PSU-wiki. Since the sites have a limited overlap in their target audiences, there shouldn't be a sense of competition. I'd rather have them credited for what they're worth to the international community than try to be 'better'. Anyway, anyone able to differentiate the old-style acronyms (these aren't abbreviations, btw) shouldn't have trouble with the new ones either. Since in Japanese the alphabet is mostly used for set acronyms rather than phonetically, they would have been less likely to get confused by them in the first place. If the amount of people that feels put off by the fG/FG confusion is significant, I feel the change is justified. - Tycho 17:03, 6 August 2007 (BST)
  • I'm not too sure why the type terms are acroynms and not abbreviations. We're talking about type classifications formed from the shortening of the full word, after all. We do the same for titles like "Fr." for Father (clerical), "Dr." for Doctor, and so on. I thought acronyms only referred to words/terms created from letters taken a phrase or multiple words, like "LASER" from Light Amplified by Stimulated Emission of Radiation or "RADAR" from RAdio Detecting And Ranging ... or maybe even "PSU" from Phantasy Star Universe, "AMF" from Alliance Military Force, or "TTB" from Triplanetary Transportation Bureau (did I get that one right?).
    
    If the class types were not an entire word as they appear to be, I'd agree that they are acronyms, but ... F Gattaca 23:56, 6 August 2007 (BST)
• Neither. I propose using Fo for forte Ac for acro and Fi for Figh. The difference between FoG and FiG is immediately obvious, no matter what standard you personally use. If you see only 'FG' you're still going to have to know which standard this place is using. Au+ 20:42, 6 August 2007 (BST)
• Sounomi looks cleaner and less ambiguity. We don't have to follow the Japanese on EVERYTHING when it doesn't make sense to. Firehawke 01:54, 7 August 2007 (BST)
• JP-Wiki: Makes more sense, only the base classes use the first 2 letters, why should an advanced class be stuck with that format as well? If Sounomi was simply meant to be unambiguous, it should have continued WA, GU and PR since those are unique as well. --JustTrio 15:36, 8 August 2007 (BST)
  • You make a good point, however. Hunter, Ranger and Force are the classes from PSO, where they were called HU, RA and FO respectively. They aren't acronyms in the same sense as FI or WT, simply a shorthand version of it. But the JP-Wiki uses this too, so... - Saiffy 18:01, 8 August 2007 (BST)
• Sounomi: It just makes sense. I actually agree with JustTrio and would have preferred GU, WA and PR (or PO) but the most important thing is getting rid of this Fighgunner/Fortegunner confusion which - like it or not - does exist. - Miraglyth 23:48, 8 August 2007 (BST)
• JP-Wiki: JP wiki sounds like the best way, except for the new jobs. Sou-whoever for the 2 new classes. --Sasamichan 21:04, 9 August 2007 (BST)
• Sounomi: This one gets my vote. I agree with trying to extinguish the confusion with Fighgunner/Fortegunner. The petition to vote was a great idea btw.--Renderingdragon 23:09, 9 August 2007 (BST)
• JP-Wiki: Just because it's the style I'm used to using. :3 *In b4 "OWTF RANT U R SUPPOS 2 B ON VACATIONZ"* Fence
• The voting period has ended and the score tallied. With nine votes, Sounomi's abbreviations will be the PSUPedia's new standard for type abbreviations. EspioKaos 06:50, 12 August 2007 (BST)

VOTE: Heading and sub-heading capitalization

We would like to set a standard for the capitalization of headings and sub-headings within individual articles at the PSUPedia. Please cast your vote on which of the following styles you prefer. Voting will be open from now until 12:00a.m. CST August 12.

• Wikipedia Standard - The first letter of the first word and all proper nouns thereafter are capitalized, but everything else is lowercase.
• APA Standard - Multiple variations all depending upon the heading type.
• AJA Standard - Capitalize the first letter of the first word and all proper nouns, but apply no punctuation to the end of the heading.
• MLA Standard - The first letter of each word is capitalized unless it is an article (a, an, the), a preposition (against, between, in, of, to) a conjunction (and, but, for, nor, or, so, yet') or the infinitive to.

If you know of any other standards that you are fond of, please feel free to cast a vote for them here, but be sure to give a source for examples and so forth. Voting on this will be open from now until 12:00a.m. CST August 12.

• Wikipedia: I vote that we use the Wikipedia standard. I personally like how it looks, plus it's very simple and straightforward with minimal rules to follow. EspioKaos 15:46, 4 August 2007 (BST)
• Wikipedia: I have to agree with the simplicity of the Wikipedia standard. Easy enough to follow. - Mewn 16:52, 4 August 2007 (BST)
• Wikipedia. --Beatrixkiddo 17:14, 4 August 2007 (BST)
• MLA:: Because it is what everything uses. Not capitalizing a noun in a title makes me :<. --Qwerty 18:12, 4 August 2007 (BST)
• Wikipedia, because it's the simplest. I like MLA better, but it will be harder to follow consistently. Malice 23:21, 5 August 2007 (BST)
• Wikipedia. - Tycho 17:14, 6 August 2007 (BST)
• Abstain. I'm not sure if it's couth to cast a vote for two things. While I prefer a standard like that of the APA and MLA (with the MLA governing what to capitalize, and the APA governing which subheadings are capitalized where others are simply written like a sentence), Wikipedia has a strong precedent ... therefore I'll abstain. F Gattaca 23:56, 6 August 2007 (BST)
• MLA: "Because it is what everything uses. Not capitalizing a noun in a title makes me :<." My thoughts exactly. Fence 15:41, 10 August 2007
• MLA: Coincidentally, isn't "Manual of Style" breaking the Wikipedia and AJA standards? - Miraglyth 19:03, 11 August 2007 (BST)
  • You're right. We'll begin making all necessary adjustments across the site once we have the results of this vote tonight. EspioKaos 20:04, 11 August 2007 (BST)
    • I wasn't necessarily making an argument about that. Just saying it's somewhat funny to see someone vote contrary to what they did. - Miraglyth 22:55, 11 August 2007 (BST)
      • Point. To be honest, before I began the manual of style here, I favored the MLA format, thus why the article is capitalized as it is. After I took a look over Wikipedia's style guide to get a little inspiration for ours, I realized that I liked their format more, and as such voted for it. EspioKaos 03:52, 12 August 2007 (BST)
• With a vote of five, the Wikipedia standard for capitalization in headings has become the PSUPedia's new standard. EspioKaos 06:50, 12 August 2007 (BST)