User talk:Catrope

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I speak English (near-native), Dutch (native) and German (limited) Feel free to ask your question in either of these three languages

I like the switch better....

Less templates. :-) Shane ^{(T - C - E)} 10:29, 23 May 2007 (CDT)

The new solution makes sure everyone can set autoborders, rather than just the people who can edit Template:Flag (which should really be protected). --Catrope^{(Talk to me or e-mail me)} 10:31, 23 May 2007 (CDT)

Maybe, but if we had a template check... every page would be looking for it and it become a "requested template" under Wanted Pages. We are trying to reduce that list.. not expand it. :-) Shane ^{(T - C - E)} 10:33, 23 May 2007 (CDT)

Template:Country alias is on top of Special:Wantedpages with 152 links, all resulting from pages using the {Cast,Crew,User} Data template while not specifying a nationality. Also, does it really matter? --Catrope^{(Talk to me or e-mail me)} 10:39, 23 May 2007 (CDT)

That will be fixed soon... :-D Shane ^{(T - C - E)} 10:40, 23 May 2007 (CDT)

Job queue is over 15k. I am running it right now. Shane ^{(T - C - E)} 10:51, 23 May 2007 (CDT)

I saw the fix. What exactly is the job queue and what does it mean that it's over 15K? Also, in which way will hundreds of pages checking for Template:Country flag autoborder US and find it nonexistent hurt the system? --Catrope^{(Talk to me or e-mail me)} 11:05, 23 May 2007 (CDT)

Fixed! YAY! :-D Shane ^{(T - C - E)} 11:57, 23 May 2007 (CDT)

Am I the only one that think flag borders look ugly? --Mercifull ^{(Talk/Contribs)} 12:16, 23 May 2007 (CDT)

I do not like them either... naybe not "white". Maybe another color.. Shane ^{(T - C - E)} 12:29, 23 May 2007 (CDT)

Hmm, whatever you did to Template:Border just now messed up the borders for  BEL again. --Catrope^{(Talk to me or e-mail me)} 12:51, 23 May 2007 (CDT)

Shane, could you elaborate more on why you prefer the #switch over the templates? AFAIK, doing an #ifexists on a page doesn't get it into Special:Wantedpages. --Catrope^{(Talk to me or e-mail me)} 12:34, 23 May 2007 (CDT)

How do i turn off flag borders for me then? I dont think they look right and dont fit well with the rest of the wiki design. --Mercifull ^{(Talk/Contribs)} 02:58, 25 May 2007 (CDT)

Instead of {{flag|BE}} (gives  BEL), use {{country flag|BE}} (gives  BEL). Shane somehow managed to mess up the BE border, but the  DE and  EST look fine to me. Meanwhile, I'll try to fix the BE border. Fixed. --Catrope^{(Talk to me or e-mail me)} 06:27, 25 May 2007 (CDT)

That wont stop borders from appearing all over the place tho will it? How do i remove the horrible border from the german flag on the front page? It looks ugly. --Mercifull ^{(Talk/Contribs)} 08:11, 25 May 2007 (CDT)

If your uglyness complaint was about the DE flag not lining up with the rest of the flags, that's fixed now. It's an ugly, temporary fix, though (I simply moved it down by 5px), but it's the best we've got going so far. AFAIK you're our CSS guru, so maybe if you take a look at Template:Border you'll come up with something better. You can use User:Catrope/Template:Border and User:Catrope/Testing Template for testing, if you want to. If you just find the borders ugly in themselves, you can always remove them using the procedure I outlined above. The flags for the Main Page are at Template:International inline. --Catrope^{(Talk to me or e-mail me)} 09:24, 25 May 2007 (CDT)

collapsible tables

Hi Catrope,

Thank you for the code. I ran into a few subtle bugs when I tried to fix the nesting of those table a couple of months ago. I'm about to go to Switzerland for a few days but I'll review and implement you fix when I get back. Cheers, Ruud Koot 13:13, 7 June 2007 (CDT)

No problem. Have fun in Switzerland. --Catrope^{(Talk to me or e-mail me)} 13:15, 7 June 2007 (CDT)

Welcome to the Order of the Sponge

Catrope, you've easily demonstrated your abilities and skills, so I've granted you page-move ability to use as necessary. --Spencerian 08:14, 8 June 2007 (CDT)

Thanks. --Catrope^{(Talk to me or e-mail me)} 16:26, 10 June 2007 (CDT)

Troyan userpage

I've added a new "essay" to my user page. If you want to archive the previous version of my user page, go right ahead. -- Troyian 03:05, 10 June 2007 (CDT)

Done. --Catrope^{(Talk to me or e-mail me)} 16:26, 10 June 2007 (CDT)

Indexing...

I am getting a bot that going to do all the archiving. I am getting the source code for it now. :D Shane ^{(T - C - E)} 14:16, 11 June 2007 (CDT)

Oh, that'd be nice. I liked doing it nonetheless. BTW, I think I've archived pretty much everything by now, the largest non-archived page being User talk:Peter Farago ;) --Catrope^{(Talk to me or e-mail me)} 14:18, 11 June 2007 (CDT)

Also, you might wanna know the MediaWiki folks are working on a better API so bots won't have to dig through HTML responses any more. It's not finished yet, but when it is, it'll make a bot programmer's life a lot easier. I'm intending to write a bot that uses the new API (after I've helped finishing the API itself, of course), and your ArchiveBot just gave me an idea for another feature ;) --Catrope^{(Talk to me or e-mail me)} 14:41, 11 June 2007 (CDT)

Template:Archive-message

The bot, when it created an archive message add a template to the top of the page, right now I wanted to remove the fields so it's just plain. They will be added back once I can figure out why (also) it's not working correctly and how to code Phyton. :) Shane ^{(T - C - E)} 21:34, 14 June 2007 (CDT)

When start and end aren't specified, they don't break anything, do they? Then why not leave them in. --Catrope^{(Talk to me or e-mail me)} 05:43, 15 June 2007 (CDT)

I see they're back, thanks for that. --Catrope^{(Talk to me or e-mail me)} 16:00, 16 June 2007 (CDT)

Bots and MediaWiki API

I saw your comments regarding edit tokens at MW:API and thought you may be interested in the SimpleForms extension which already has the ability to update and create articles from the HTTP request parameters. It doesn't implement edit tokens yet, but does allow you to lock it down so that requests are only allowed from the localhost which means your server-side scripts can update articles and is much easier to implement than a bot. If you prefer bots we have some Perl code for accessing wikis at http://www.organicdesign.co.nz/wiki.pl and there are libs like PyWikiBot. See also Wikipedia:Creating a bot. --Nad 21:28, 23 June 2007 (CDT)

We're breaking edit tokens and the like in the API right now. I already have a working action=rollback implementation supporting edit tokens, and am currently working on action=delete. Editing pages through the API shouldn't be far away. --Catrope^{(Talk to me or e-mail me)} 13:18, 24 June 2007 (CDT)

Cool, I'll update SimpleForms to work with the API when it's ready. Thanks ;-) --Nad 14:49, 24 June 2007 (CDT)

I'll remember to drop you a note when it is. --Catrope^{(Talk to me or e-mail me)} 14:57, 24 June 2007 (CDT)

Creation of new episode pages

Why don't you just copy a previous episode page and change all the relevant stuff (which is just a few numbers and names), instead of using the default template? That's far easier. I was already done with everything when you submitted the page. --Serenity 15:23, 26 June 2007 (CDT)

Sorry. Feel free to overwrite me. --Catrope^{(Talk to me or e-mail me)} 15:25, 26 June 2007 (CDT)

No problem. It's not that you did it. Edit conflicts happen, even if they suck. But you just added the framework without any content. Never mind. --Serenity 15:28, 26 June 2007 (CDT)

I just went autopilot and did {{subst:Episode Guide}}. Didn't think about your suggestion, which is cleverer. --Catrope^{(Talk to me or e-mail me)} 15:35, 26 June 2007 (CDT)

Virgon link

I linked to the Twelve Colonies article because Virgon is a TOS/RDM disambiguation. I see your argument, but for that you should use Virgon (RDM).

Generally though, I think we try to link directly to correct sites and not use redirect links even if they are easier. You did with Galactica vs Galactica (RDM) for example. --Serenity 05:59, 2 July 2007 (CDT)

The point here is that we can be fairly sure that Galactica (RDM) will always end up linking to the right page, no matter what crazy stunts we decide to pull. Galactica may not redirect there forever. Same with The Twelve Colonies (RDM)#Virgon vs. Virgon (RDM): the latter is guaranteed to be right and stay right, whereas the former is not. --Catrope^{(Talk to me or e-mail me)} 06:01, 2 July 2007 (CDT)

White-on-white edit count

I already told Shane about this, he must have forgotten. Its not a CSS error its a bug in the actual extension taking the wrong attributes. If you see him before I do just give him a gentle reminder. --Mercifull ^{(Talk/Contribs)} 11:01, 3 July 2007 (CDT)

The Mop beckons you

I created a Request for adminship for you :) --Serenity 12:26, 18 July 2007 (CDT)

Template test page

Couldn't this be deleted: User:Catrope/Testing Template? Or at least cleared. --Serenity 08:34, 20 July 2007 (CDT)

Well spotted. I cleared it, but kept it around for when I need it again. --Catrope^{(Talk to me or e-mail me)} 07:45, 23 July 2007 (CDT)

Quotes

Hi! Glad you're back. I noticed that on your edits today, regarding quotes, you've been changing many one-line quotes so that a rank and the name of the character appear first. However, that does not match these standards. According to that, for one-line quotes, the quote appears first, followed by a hard line break and then the rank & name followed by the episode. -- Veepz 18:19, 30 July 2007 (CDT)

Thanks for pointing that out, I never knew that. I just used the 'long' format for all quotes. --Catrope^{(Talk to me or e-mail me)} 02:53, 31 July 2007 (CDT)

Well, the rules are a bit overcomplicated for such a trivial thing as quotes. I'm sure there were reasons for making them as they are, but they aren't very obvious. --Serenity 05:08, 31 July 2007 (CDT)

I don't mind complicated rules, as long as I know them :P --Catrope^{(Talk to me or e-mail me)} 15:28, 31 July 2007 (CDT)

Well said :-) -- Veepz 15:35, 31 July 2007 (CDT)

Yeah, the 'Tomorrow' thing... Don't know how that got in there, my frak up. Thanks for clearing it. -- Veepz 03:05, 4 August 2007 (CDT)

Welcome to the Order of the Mop

You are now empowered with administrator privileges. That means you get to mop on a more formal basis! You know the ropes, but be sure to dive through the various policies to (re)familiarize yourself as needed. Congratulations! --Spencerian 14:02, 1 August 2007 (CDT)

Congrats, Catrope! :-) -- Veepz 14:45, 1 August 2007 (CDT)

Thanks both. I'd also like to thank everyone who supported my RFA, I hope not to disappoint you and make a good mop. --Catrope^{(Talk to me or e-mail me)} 14:47, 1 August 2007 (CDT)

Congrats :) Shane ^{(T - C - E)} 14:51, 1 August 2007 (CDT)

Congrats! :-) -- Joe Beaudoin ^{So say we all - Donate - Sanctuary Wiki — New} 16:07, 1 August 2007 (CDT)

And your also an admin on Wiki Frakr as well. -- Joe Beaudoin ^{So say we all - Donate - Sanctuary Wiki — New} 16:35, 1 August 2007 (CDT)

Thanks. The frakr: interwiki binding currently points to en.frakr.com, which should be wiki.frakr.com. I can't figure out how to change this through Special:Interwiki, or is that a bureaucrat's privilege? --Catrope^{(Talk to me or e-mail me)} 16:38, 1 August 2007 (CDT)

I saw that myself and fixed it. LOL :-) As for the privs for the interwiki, it's just Shane and I who have those privs for now. Actually, they're not part of the bureaucrat rights level, but have their own rights level. -- Joe Beaudoin ^{So say we all - Donate - Sanctuary Wiki — New} 16:42, 1 August 2007 (CDT)

I doubt I would ever give those out because it allows database access. Shane ^{(T - C - E)} 03:16, 2 August 2007 (CDT)

Congrats Catrope! JubalHarshaw 21:15, 1 August 2007 (CDT)

Template Doc

If you are going to output the tmeplate on the template page it self, you gotta add a check to make sure it doesn't add to the categories if it has any. Otherwise they go in the category of items where it should not be. --Shane ^{(T - C - E)} 12:18, 3 August 2007 (CDT)

Right, didn't think of that. Thanks for the heads-up. --Catrope^{(Talk to me or e-mail me)} 12:22, 3 August 2007 (CDT)

Welcome back!

Welcome back! How was the vacation? -- Joe Beaudoin ^{So say we all - Donate - Sanctuary Wiki — New} 17:16, 15 August 2007 (CDT)

I've had fun, thanks. I won't be taking another one for about a year, so my activity should be back to normal shortly. --Catrope^{(Talk to me or e-mail me)} 06:19, 16 August 2007 (CDT)

Mile time

Yep. It didn't take me 5 hours. (That's actually pretty close to my marathon time, if I recall correctly). Thanks. --Steelviper 14:29, 16 August 2007 (CDT)

To verify, I checked your avg. speed, which is 4.8 m/s, which is 17.3 km/h, which is 10.8 mph, which looks like running speed (I had about the same avg. speed when running a quarter mile, so you're obviously the better runner ;)). --Catrope^{(Talk to me or e-mail me)} 14:53, 16 August 2007 (CDT)

The first 800 was faster than the second, I'm pretty sure. I'd probably get a better time with more even splits. I wasn't really training for the mile, though. I had been doing ~20 miles per week at around 9 minutes per mile for endurance/fitness. I guess the mile just seemed like a sprint by comparison. My miles per week has dropped off considerably since the baby, though, so that PR may stand for a while.

I ran 1/4 mile in high school, usually hovering around 60+ seconds (which is to say, I almost never placed high enough for points). I guess in hindsight I should have been doing 800/mile, but the 1/4 miles definitely "build character". Especially those last 100 yards. Ugh. --Steelviper 15:23, 16 August 2007 (CDT)

1/4 mile in 60-odd seconds? I envy you :P I did it three times and ran 80-odd every time, with pretty good splits each time (and one inverse split :O). But then I'm not much of a sprinter or a runner, I much prefer biking (never biked more than 21 miles in one go though, but I intend to change that). --Catrope^{(Talk to me or e-mail me)} 15:52, 16 August 2007 (CDT)

Cycling is cool. I'm definitely a runner with a bike, though, and not a cyclist. When I see a hill on foot, I grin and drive harder into it. When I see a hill on bike, I despair (and change gears). I know it's mental, but I'm not sure whether I'll put in enough bike time to overcome that.

I was doing a duathlon last summer and smoked a guy in a cycling team kit in the opening run... only to watch him lap me a couple of times before the bike course was complete. But that's... ok. --Steelviper 17:31, 16 August 2007 (CDT)

I'm not really much of a hill biker (there are hardly any hills where I live), but more the type that drives 13 or 14 (depending on wind conditions) mph for an hour and a half straight (never tried longer, also got school to think about :P). I think hills would kill me, though, as they force you to change your speed every 10 minutes, which I probably wouldn't handle very well. The one hill that I do find on my way (a viaduct crossing the highway) I bite through in the same gear as much as possible, but I doubt I could do that with multiple, real, hills. --Catrope^{(Talk to me or e-mail me)} 05:52, 17 August 2007 (CDT)

Re-imagined Series definition: all-purpose vulgarism; Colonial version of "fuck" (see: frak)