User talk:Mechemik
Displacing non-portable infoboxes without consent[edit source]
Hey there, I appreciate that you've created portable versions of our templates. However, on behalf of the administrative team on The Sims Wiki, I have to say that we aren't impressed with the way you've displaced our non-portable versions of our infoboxes without our consent. Several of our administrators have been complaining about the portable infoboxes.
My own complaints being the fact that the we no longer have control over the sizes of the images displayed in the portable infoboxes. And that the portable infoboxes are wider than the non-portable infoboxes. Maybe if my own concerns were addressed, I may be more supportive of these migrations, provided that the other administrators are okay with them as well. But I'm afraid I can't really be supportive of this right now. ― C.Syde (talk | contribs) 00:06, August 15, 2019 (UTC)
- Hi Syde, I do apologize! I had reached out to K6ka on their page and thought they'd let you all know a few content team members (myself right now) were planning to work on helping get the infoboxes portable and as I wasn't sure who needed to be talked to I just reached out to an active beaucrat. If you can let me know what you guys don't like about the portable infoboxes that have been done so far (the family and game one) I can look into those to see if we can find a solution. As for the images, I do know of a possible workaround if you're ok with all images having the same size/format, though it will no longer have the option in visual editor to select a file and any captions wouldn't be a real caption (it's become it's own separate data field).
- Mechemik (talk) 00:23, August 15, 2019 (UTC)
- I can't speak for other admins or other wiki users, but the issue I have isn't with the changes that have been made, but rather how those changes were made. When someone (admin or non-admin alike) wants to make a major change to how a template looks and/or functions on the wiki, it is customary to discuss the matter and seek feedback in the community discussions forum before undertaking any changes. We prefer to iron out as many wrinkles in a particular idea or design before taking it "live" for the broader community, and we value the rights of our community of editors to weigh in on things that will affect them. Simply notifying an active bureaucrat that you're looking into changing templates doesn't meet this principle; there's a fundamental difference between "we're looking into changing something," and "we've just changed something." The outcome of that hypothetical discussion may have even yielded support for the change, but the cat's out of the bag on it now so it's hard to really say for sure. So, the issue isn't what you did, it's how you did it. -- LostInRiverview talk · blog · contribs 01:11, August 15, 2019 (UTC)
- Hi Riverview, thanks for letting me know about that and I'm sorry! I didn't mean to intentionally step on anyone's toes (most of the communties I've been helping usually don't have such an active community base so I didn't realize there was a better way to approach a community about making sitewide changes). I'll make sure to post there before making anymore changes so everyone can have a say in it and make sure no future problems arise (while admittedly a little belated for some changes, though you can revert the infobox codes if you wish).
- Mechemik (talk) 01:29, August 15, 2019 (UTC)
- Well, I don't want to personally act in a unilateral fashion. If you look at when we discussed updating the infobox themes, you can see that updating the templates from standard coding to PI coding was an eventual goal, hindered by the fact that no one on the wiki was experienced or comfortable working with that coding scheme. So I don't immediately have a problem with the fact that the templates are updated.
- I can't speak for other admins or other wiki users, but the issue I have isn't with the changes that have been made, but rather how those changes were made. When someone (admin or non-admin alike) wants to make a major change to how a template looks and/or functions on the wiki, it is customary to discuss the matter and seek feedback in the community discussions forum before undertaking any changes. We prefer to iron out as many wrinkles in a particular idea or design before taking it "live" for the broader community, and we value the rights of our community of editors to weigh in on things that will affect them. Simply notifying an active bureaucrat that you're looking into changing templates doesn't meet this principle; there's a fundamental difference between "we're looking into changing something," and "we've just changed something." The outcome of that hypothetical discussion may have even yielded support for the change, but the cat's out of the bag on it now so it's hard to really say for sure. So, the issue isn't what you did, it's how you did it. -- LostInRiverview talk · blog · contribs 01:11, August 15, 2019 (UTC)
- However, I did notice that you deleted a few of the old-style infoboxes. Those infoboxes were kept intentionally because they are/were widely used on the fanon pages. We have a standing practice of not meddling too much in how people run their fanon pages, so we had not forced fanon authors to convert to the new infobox design, we left the old infoboxes available as an option, and we didn't force-migrate to the new infobox via a bot (in fact, one of the wiki's policies is that it is generally not allowed to edit another person's fanon pages except to make minor and uncontroversial changes). This is also why K6ka reacted to you experimenting on fanon pages; we treat fanon pages as "owned" by the person that created it, so we never use them for experimenting on. -- LostInRiverview talk · blog · contribs 01:41, August 15, 2019 (UTC)
- Ah, that makes sense (I was wondering why it was labeled as being phased out but never actually phased out). I'll make a post shortly on the forums regarding the changes and open discussion regarding it. Please also let me know if you need help reverting any of the changes (including the deleted templates).
- Mechemik (talk) 01:50, August 15, 2019 (UTC)
- However, I did notice that you deleted a few of the old-style infoboxes. Those infoboxes were kept intentionally because they are/were widely used on the fanon pages. We have a standing practice of not meddling too much in how people run their fanon pages, so we had not forced fanon authors to convert to the new infobox design, we left the old infoboxes available as an option, and we didn't force-migrate to the new infobox via a bot (in fact, one of the wiki's policies is that it is generally not allowed to edit another person's fanon pages except to make minor and uncontroversial changes). This is also why K6ka reacted to you experimenting on fanon pages; we treat fanon pages as "owned" by the person that created it, so we never use them for experimenting on. -- LostInRiverview talk · blog · contribs 01:41, August 15, 2019 (UTC)