User blog:C.Syde65/Technical Update: 26 July, 2017

{|width="100%" {|style="background: white; border: 3px solid navy; -moz-border-radius: 10px; -webkit-border-radius: 10px; font-size:95%; width: 95%" align="center" This blog was originally going to be focused solely on announcing that Gadgets are now enabled on C.Syde's Wiki. But since I was very late in writing this blog, since I've been very busy with other things on this wiki, as well as other things on other wikis, I have decided to mention a couple of other things that are important to note.
 * colspan="2" align="center"| Technical Update: 26 June, 2017

Introducing Gadgets
The first thing I'd like to announce, which I've already mentioned is that Gadgets are now on this wiki. Even though they've been on this wiki for nearly a month, I feel that having a significant impact on this wiki, it's important to mention them for the benefits of the users that may or may not want to enable them.

Gadgets is an extension that allows users to pick JavaScript or CSS based "gadgets" that other community users provide. The scripts are available for users to enable or disable in their preferences under a tab labelled "Gadgets".

They're designed using JavaScript and/or CSS snippets located on pages in the MediaWiki namespace. Each gadget is added by adding a new entry to MediaWiki:Gadgets-definition, providing a name and description for the gadget, and a list of the JS and CSS snippets that it uses (see the Usage section below).

Gadgets use the same principle as [ MediaWiki:Wikia.js], [ MediaWiki:Common.css], etc. because they allow scripting or styling over the entire site. Since Gadgets function in this manner (the list that enables them as well as the actual JS and CSS pages), it requires being a wiki administrator to manage these, just like the site-wide JS or CSS.

This page shows a list of special gadgets you can enable for your account. These gadgets are mostly based on JavaScript, so JavaScript has to be enabled in your browser for them to work. Note that these gadgets will have no effect on this preferences page.

Also note that these special gadgets are not part of the Media Wiki software, and are usually developed and maintained by users on this wiki. Local administrators can edit the definitions and descriptions of available gadgets.

While it is not compulsory for users to enable any of the following gadgets on this wiki, it is strongly recommended to at least enable the Talk Button gadget, since there are certain pages which are not intended for discussions to take place in article comments.

Discussions
Very soon, discussions will be replacing threaded forums on C.Syde's Wiki for good. I thought that since those wikis that use threaded forums will eventually have discussions instead anyway, I felt that it would be better to request to have threaded forums migrated into discussions sooner rather than later.

Admittedly there will be some disadvantages, namely because discussions currently don't have a highlight feature, so users can't be notified about discussions that they aren't watching. Also wiki-text isn't supported by discussions, so that's another disadvantage.

And lastly, CSS is disabled for discussions, which is rather unfortunate because without CSS, discussions don't really blend with the rest of the wiki. This wiki relies heavily on CSS for it's design, so not having CSS for discussions will be another disadvantage.

But hopefully there will be ways on how to get around those disadvantages. And there are some advantages to using discussions, namely that they are mobile friendly, whereas threaded forums are anything but mobile friendly.

Non-Portable Info-boxes
A couple of weeks ago, I requested assistance from the Vanguard team, since I feel that we really do need some assistance with making our info-boxes portable. A lot of the info-boxes on this wiki are taken from the info-boxes on The Sims Wiki and are quite old.

It would be too much trouble for me to try and convert those info-boxes to make them portable, without losing the design detailing. At least my myself, hence why I requested assistance from the Vanguard team in the first place.

I'm pretty sure that's all I have to say that this very moment. So best of luck for your future here on C.Syde's Wiki, for those of you who enjoy reading and/or contributing to this wiki! :) ― C.Syde  ( talk  |  contribs ) 23:30, July 26, 2017 (UTC)