Talk:Appearences Section

I designed this page as a prototype for an idea I had on how character pages should be done. Instead of all the titles showing up throughout the text, I placed them in their own section below. I believe this makes for a neater and more organized page. I'm open to suggestions, comments and criticism of course, but I like it and if we get a general consensus on this, I can start converting everyone. So what do you think? The original page is unchanged for comparison to the Maggie the cat (prototype) page. Thanks. --Matt 08:42, 27 December 2007 (CST)

Interesting idea. The history section in this article is neater, but now we cannot tell where the information in a particular section came from. If I wanted to know when Talon revealed his feelings for Maggie, this page doesn't actually have that information. And if we are not putting citations in the body text, where do we link to specific responses at Ask Greg (if and when it is appropriate to do so)?

I do like the Appearances section. It would be nice and useful to have all appearances listed in one place (although episode titles should not be italicized). But in my opinion, by removing the episode citations from the body text, we've lost more than we've gained.

We could... just thinking now... we could use the new section as a sort of References section as they have at Wikipedia. That is, we include small links ¹ throughout the body text, which users can click on to be directed down the page to the references section, and the number indicates the appropriate episode.

This is a simplification of the system used at Wikipedia, because MediaWiki reference tags don't seem to work on GargWiki (I've tried before). If we wanted, for example, to be able to link back up the page to the citations, then we'd need to make it more complicated, perhaps by using templates.

In fact, this is the system described here at Wikipedia, which was the first footnote system they used and which has been obsolete for a very long time. More recent, but equally obsolete methods can be found here and here.

This might be more trouble than it's worth. -- Supermorff 11:16, 27 December 2007 (CST)

I totally understand your point about in which episode stuff happens, but in my mind, the history sections are such a jumbled narrative anyway (with C-i-T info to boot) that often the episode notation after a paragraph doesn't really reflect what was in that episode anyway, which means it was false information. For instance, in the current Maggie the Cat page, we have a mention in the first paragraph about her coming to New York to be an actor and all that. The first episode reference we see is Metamorphosis, but this information was not revealed in that episode. So, to me adding an appearences section is more informative, if not more factual. Not to mention it reveals more information than the original format shows such as which episodes she appeared in, but did not have lines and which episodes mentioned her. Another example is that last paragraph. It is only a couple sentences, but it mentions things that occur over several episodes (or issues in this case). If we were to cite all those stories after that paragraph nobody would know what happened in what story either. If we could figure out a working footnote system, I suppose that'd work, but it might be better for those footnotes to take you directly to the episode page itself rather than further down the page you are on. Or so it makes sense in my mind. --Matt 11:32, 27 December 2007 (CST)

Yeah... yeah, that could work. Instead of scrapping the citations throughout the body text, we just change the format. So instead of ("Metamorphosis") we have ¹ or something similar to that. We can include these smaller citations in more appropriate places, even more often. And we can keep the Appearances section as you've done here.

I don't think it's a problem that the first citation after the first paragraph is for "Metamorphosis" - CIT information, by definition, is not referenced in any episode anyway. All the other, canon info from the first paragraph is from "Metamorphosis". It would be nice to have a Ask Greg citation for that CIT info. -- Supermorff 11:42, 27 December 2007 (CST)

Yes, I like this idea A LOT. With that system we'd have either yellow footnote numbers linking to episodes or blue footnote numbers linking to Ask Greg stuff. I could go ahead and start putting the footnotes in Maggie the cat (prototype). This would make a big project even bigger, but I think it is well worth it in the end. --Matt 11:45, 27 December 2007 (CST)

We could go a step further, and create templates so that we don't have to type out the whole <sup... whatever each time. We could include it all at Template:Ep or something, so all you'd have to do is {{ep|Metamorphosis|1}}, for example. It would be simpler if they weren't numbered (and we used an asterisk * or something), but we could do it either way. -- Supermorff 11:53, 27 December 2007 (CST)

I'd appreciate some simplicity like that a lot before starting on this project (assuming at least a few more people like the idea). I don't know much about Wiki-coding though, so I'll leave this in your hands or someone else's. In the meantime, I added the episodic footnotes to the prototype page. --Matt 12:00, 27 December 2007 (CST)

Hmmm.... this looks incredibly complicated. If we switch to this system, I for one will never use it because it is far to sophisticated for me to code when I write pages. Also, as noted, the page itself no longer says which information comes from what source. Not every computer or browser can mouse-over links to tell their destination. As for putting references on paragraphs of mixed information... firstly, I don't think it is necessary to give references for every single piece of information, since it can be assumed that our sources are limited to the show, the comic, and Greg Weisman for all in-Gargverse information. Are we going to cite every single piece of real-world information as well? Secondly, when I do cite in mixed paragraphs, I put the citations directly after the sentence they relate to, within the period. Whereas paragraphs that are wholly from one episode, I cite at the end of the paragraph. I think our current citing system works fine. If we change characters, we would have to change every single page on the wiki. And then we have this code all over the place that only wiki-markup experts can use.

I like the Appearances section, however. That is a good idea. -- Vaevictis Asmadi 12:10, 27 December 2007 (CST)

Yeah, I understand your nervousness about the citing. Honestly, if the majority decide it is a mess or isn't neccesary, I'd be happy to leave it out. And I second your motion that it isn't entirely neccesary to cite all this canon stuff anyway. But I'll let majority rule there. Another question comes up when we address lead characters like Goliath and Elisa. Are we going to create huge lists of episodes in their Appearences sections or just say something like "All except..."? It is an issue I hadn't thought through yet. --Matt 12:17, 27 December 2007 (CST)

Vote On New Format

I'll set it to a vote and when I get a general sense of which way the consensus goes I'll start making changes. The way I see it there are three choices:

• 1. Leave the pages as they are with episode citations throughout the History as in: Maggie the Cat.

• 2. Take the citations out completely and add the Appearences section to each page as in: Maggie the Cat (prototype2).

• 3. Take the episode citations out and replace them with numbered footnotes linking to the correct episode AND create an Appearences section as in Maggie the cat (prototype).

I'm voting for Number 2 at this point. I don't feel citations are neccesary in the history at all and it makes things kinda difficult. I like the simplicity of just a Appearences section. -- Matt 17:20, 27 December 2007 (CST)

I'm reasonably happy with the status quo (option 1) at the moment, but if we are changing it I would prefer option 3 over option 2. Option 2 lacks information that both others contain. -- Supermorff 13:05, 28 December 2007 (CST)

Yeah, but lots of pages don't cite at all, like Princess Katharine. There is no consistency and some pages have some citing, but not adequately. -- Matt 13:12, 28 December 2007 (CST)

Give me five minutes, and the Princess Katharine page will be cited all through (present system). -- Supermorff 13:14, 28 December 2007 (CST)

How long was that? -- Supermorff 13:18, 28 December 2007 (CST)

LOL, my point was not that it couldn't be cited or couldn't be cited quickly, my point is that for years it has not been cited at all and it never seemed to matter. However, if you think it is important that we cite, I think we may as well do it with cite numbers (option 3). I think the Appearences section is well liked so I think unless I get a lot of objections, it's gonna come down to option 2 or 3. Option 2 is easier, but option 3 is more informative. Vaevictis raised a possible concern, however. Will some computers have problems with the cite number system? And is there an easier way to make the citing code to create a page like option 3? -- Matt 13:46, 28 December 2007 (CST)

I like option 3, but that might be more work than it's worth for some editors. I would advise against option 2 because then the reader has no idea what the sources are for which statements. Speaking of which, it'd be nice if the people who put in CIT stuff would at least put a link to Ask Greg saying where it comes from. Sometimes I wonder if some of the CIT stuff isn't just bogus...

As for referencing stuff, I think it's easier if we just use <ref>Source</ref>, makes numbering easier too.--Moeen 13:51, 28 December 2007 (CST)

If Option 3 is what we end up voting (and it looks like we are all gonna compromise with it), then yes it'll make editing a bit more work, but that is alright. It's about the final result, right? -- Matt 13:53, 28 December 2007 (CST)

Sure, though I think there's a way to make Option 3 a little easier, which is use <ref>Source</ref> instead of modified superscripts. Then in the appearances, just add {{reflist}}. The wiki will automatically number them and list them. You may even want to just want to call the "Appearances" section a "References" section.--Moeen 16:30, 28 December 2007 (CST)

I tried that. It isn't working... You can go ahead and modify Maggie the cat (prototype) to show me what you mean if you'd like. Maybe I don't understand or did it wrong... But honestly, I'm leaning towards my new idea now (see below). --Matt 16:38, 28 December 2007 (CST)

New Idea

Alright, i've been looking over other Wikis, notably the Star Trek Wiki and I think I have an idea that is a good compromise. It is pretty simple, we keep each entry as it is with the titles cited throughout the history but also add an Appearences section. Thats it. This is very easy to do because one only needs to add the new section and the history and citing can be left as it is. It won't cause any problems with some computers not being able to use the numbered citing correctly or not. And it'll provide information about what happened where but the Appearences section will look nice for stylistic reasons (IMHO) and will add a little more information (notice several episodes are listed in Appearences that are not in the history citations). I think that resolves everyone's concerns about this new system, we get our cake and eat it too. Sound good? -- Matt 14:54, 28 December 2007 (CST)

Down here

1. Like this!

Hey, I'm cool with it. -- Greg Bishansky