Cunnan:Old Village pump discussions (moved 2006)

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This page contains old discussions from the Village pump. If you need to talk about these issues again please do so there and not here.


Old topics

Vandalism

The Religion in the Rennaisance page has been vandalized by User:208.182.75.11 and User:66.4.125.11 repeatedly in the last couple of weeks. I've been reverting to articles in the history, but it's getting a little old. Is is possible to ban these IP addresses for any length of time? Also Cunnan:What is an article has been replaced with links to gambling sites, and I can't find a revision to revert to. --User:Paul Matisz Despite my poor prediction, these... individuals... have returned. As a result I have blocked them for a while, so people can better spend their time. If they return again it may be worthwhile considering a long term ban.--User 144 09:30, 26 Apr 2006 (EST)

Broken Links

I have been looking for broken links and have found a few please post any broken links here so they can be fixed. - Dren
Hinduism

  • Please define what you mean by a "broken link". If you are meaning wiki links in pages that link to pages that have not yet been created (e.g. Hindu, feudalism), then IMHO that is not a broken link, just a heavy suggestion by someone like me that someone who has more time and knowledge needs to write the page because we feel it would be appropriate to Cunnan. To me, a broken link is a link to an external url that consistantly doesn't work. Those are hard to find sometimes as the link may just not be working due to a server being down for a while. - Cian Gillebhrath 03:04, 18 Dec 2005 (CST)
  • I keep getting an intermittent "Database error" from Cunnan: TEXT=A database query syntax error has occurred. This may indicate a bug in the software. The last attempted database query was:(SQL query hidden) from within function "MediaWikiBagOStuff:_doquery". MySQL returned error "1062: Duplicate entry 'cunnan:messages:Sitenotice' for key 1 (localhost)". Has anyone else noticed this, or it just because I've switched to Linux? User:Paul Matisz 27 April 2006 -- 20:27 EST
    • I've seen that too. I'll look into it when I next update the wiki software (probably in a couple of weeks). It's unrelated to the browser/operating system you're using. - Tobin 12:41, 28 Apr 2006 (EST)

Request for Guidance

I hope one (or more) of the sys-admins can assist. Working through the Scottish kings, at some stage I will have to deal with the interregnum between Margaret and the English-imposed John Balliol. I do not want to list this as a specific period on the king-list, but it could so to be covered, with inter alia a list of the contenders. I can see that it can be linked to from Margaret and to John B, but what ought I to title it ?

  • Scotland - Interregnum
  • Scotland 1290-92
  • Scotland -- The Contenders

Suggestions, please. --Simoncursitor 02:27, 7 Jun 2005 (CDT)

I assume you are thinking of adding a table to the bottom of the page similar to the one on the pages for English Monarchs. The Scottish Interregnum sounds like a reasonable name for an article to me. Conrad Leviston 07:21, 7 Jun 2005 (CDT)
Thank you -- I have followed your titling suggestion. --Simoncursitor 03:08, 8 Jun 2005 (CDT)

Main Page alteration

I'd like to have a more interesting front page for Cunnan, which adds a bit of variety. To this end I have edited Cunnan:Main Page with an idea for a monthly edit. This does make the front page rather full, but it does have the advantage of directing readers to some of Cunnans better pages. Other categories that might be added are Historical figure of the month (mainly to highlight Simon's Scottish kings) and SCA group of the month. Feedback please. Conrad Leviston 05:41, 27 Jul 2005 (CDT)

  • I like it. Even larger changes might be a good idea. A "current projects" (e.g. the Form of Cury redaction) section might be a nice replacement for the "News & updates box". I'll try some of my ideas later today and will post the results. - Tobin 23:47, 7 Aug 2005 (CDT)
    • I have been a little presumptuous and added Cunnan:Projects to the main page under Community. This is very much a first draft, and will need a fair bit of improvement to become truly useful. In the medium term I would foresee specific project pages (e.g. Cunnan:12th Century life) where the ideas of any project can be thrashed out. At the moment though Cunnan is a little too small to necessitate this. Conrad Leviston 03:40, 10 Aug 2005 (CDT)
  • Can someone who knows how shrink the frame for the Ypotryll pic a bit. Otherwise, there is a lot of blank space left on the lefthand coloumn under the Page of the Month details. - Cian Gillebhrath 19:09, 1 Mar 2006 (CST)
    • I changed it to a thumb, which is suboptimal but probably looks better for the overall page layout.

Barony Template Added

I so liked the idea of the Kingdom box template that I created a Barony one. See Barony of Dragonsspine for example of use although its pretty straight forward. Let me know if you'd like to see them for the other locality types (i.e. Canton, Shire, College, etc.) Feedback on it appreciated. Tobin & Co., you have a great wiki here, I love it!--Thorgrimr of Dragonsspine 09:04, 2 Aug 2005 (CDT)

Having been partially resopnsible for the Kingdom box (Tobin did most of the work) I quite like your adaptation. The one problem with both the Kingdom and Barony boxes is the way devices are depicted. Ideally the device will have a transparent background, but even then IE 5.5 and earlier won't display them properly. A white background is the usual wy images come to us and this creates a problem (for me at least) when the Knigdom box metal is yellow. I'm not sure that there is a real solution to this, but feel free to try your own ideas.
Good job though, and I don't see why the boxes shouldn't be used for other locality types. They are a useful way of representing vital statistcs, and look pretty too.
On a related note see Barony of Stormhold for the Lochac Barony navigational aid template. Something similar for other kingdoms may also be worth considering. Conrad Leviston 09:21, 2 Aug 2005 (CDT)

I added a Shire box as well for folks to use. The template looks the same, but you only add a Seneschal instead of two people. Also, I added an image to the Device article since it was in Requested Pictures. --Thorgrimr of Dragonsspine 11:49, 2 Aug 2005 (CDT)

Any way to modify it so it doesn't put up a quasi-error message if you don't have both a Baron and Baroness? Donovan Ravenhull 09:59, 9 Oct 2005 (CDT)

There is a way to modify the template to use a portion if it isn't empty, but I'm not sure if functions on 1.4 versions of the wiki software. Two new templates are needed, HideIfEmpty and IfEmptyDo. I'll add them and see if I can help out with this! Thorgrimr of Dragonsspine 19:37, 22 Feb 2006 (CST)

UPDATE--I got the hiding code to work. To use it in an article, you still need to have the variable name (i.e. baroness= |) and it will provide the label in the infobox, but you won't get the triple-bracketed stuff after it so it's much cleaner. To implement this functionality in your own templates, you must first enclose the transclusion info in a span or div tag with a call to the "HideIfEmpty" template (i.e. <span {{HideIfEmpty|{{{baroness}}}}}>{{{baroness}}}</span>). Just send me a note on my talk page if you have questions on this, I'm no expert, but I might be able to help!Thorgrimr of Dragonsspine 19:52, 22 Feb 2006 (CST)

Welcoming new users

For whatever reason, we seem to be picking up new users quite quickly at the moment. Old users, new users, admins and anyone else that feels like it can, and in my opinion should, welcome people to Cunnan and help them feel as though they are part of the community.

Of course, no one is obligated to do this.

Tobin 00:05, 8 Aug 2005 (CDT)

  • Does anyone know where all these new users are coming from? There certainly seems to be a lot of them. - Tobin 23:46, 10 Aug 2005 (CDT)
    • You could ask Del to check the referrer logs. Morgant 01:38, 11 Aug 2005 (CDT)
      • I might do that. I suspect that we may have been mentioned on one or more of the larger Kingdom mailing lists. - Tobin 02:54, 11 Aug 2005 (CDT)

Well, I came in from the Wikipedia site. Donovan Ravenhull 10:03, 9 Oct 2005 (CDT)

So did I. Seth Woodworth 10:01, 18 Dec 2005 (PST)

I don't remember where I first learned of Cunnan but I've been a lurker here off and on for a while. Recently I got a job transfer which allows me more time to spend on my hobbies(SCA and HTML) so I created an account here and have started making some edits and articles. Greylond 14:09, 22 Nov 2005 (CDT)

Format for Kingdom Pages

Looking at the history file some of you may have noticed I have been fiddling about with the [[Kingdom of �thelmearc]] page. Because there was a decent amount of information up there already I wanted to try and create a format that could be used on the other kingdom pages. Could other regular users take a look at the page and reformat as they think appropriate or leave comments here (is trying to standardise kingdom pages a good thing?) Conrad Leviston 08:20, 8 Aug 2005 (CDT)

  • IMHO I think trying to stardardize category-related pages is a good idea albiet a lot of work unless commuincated well. I think if the Kingdom pages, for example, all have the same look and feel, it is then easier to find the info you want because its in roughly the same place as the last kingdom page you were at. I'm also wondering if anyone has a problem with the amount of graphics I'm contributing to Cunan? --Thorgrimr of Dragonsspine 09:04, 8 Aug 2005 (CDT)

I quite like more graphics, I think many users, like me, just haven't bothered learning those commands yet. I guess if the ammount of graphics is likely to significantly slow page loading for little explainatory benefit, that would be a problem, but i think we are nowhere near that point yet.
I do have one late comment on the kingdom box - perhaps where rulers are given some way of indicating when this information is out of date could be added, since they change at least every 6 months, and updates may be overlooked, and even if they aren't I might be uncertain if that is so. For example a "reigning until" field. This is less of a problem with other groups, since barons/esses and senechals tend to last for a couple of years on average. Tiff 10:49, 8 Aug 2005 (CDT)

Yes, it looks useful, but If i was a casual user of cunnan, but used to webpages, I'd be used to (other) webpages being out of date, and would still doubt the updatedness of such a page. Besides I think it's not a bad piece of information to have - I'm always interested if a set of royalty is newly invested or late in their reign anyway.Tiff 11:16, 9 Aug 2005 (CDT)

New regional point of view tag

With the influx of new people (Hi, everyone!), we're going to have more problems with regional points of view - articles that are only applicable to some of the kingdoms. Those of us from Lochac are as guilty as the rest - what wacky archery rules we have! I've been presumptuous, and added a new template and category to help us deal with the load. It's easy to use- all you have to do is put the following text
{{rpov}}
in an article, and it will automatically mark it for review here. - Morgant 01:14, 12 Aug 2005 (CDT)

Muslim / Moslem / Islam

I have unified the references (or the links at least) by making all the Moslems into Muslims. Is it now worth making Muslim a re-direct to Islam (since, as I understand it, Muslim is a religious specificator rather than a national or racial one), and commissioning an expert to write the Islam article ? --Simoncursitor 05:29, 15 Sep 2005 (CDT)

  • Well Christianity is a redirect to Christian, so I can see Muslim and Moslem both being a redirect to Islam. For start, the Islam article just needs dates for when it started, what are the major branches, where was it a major religion and where and when did it expand. This should link to the Moors, the Crusades, the Spanish Wars and famous Muslims like Sal al'Adin (sic). And later, someone can start a persona bit. And Muslim/Moslem/Islamic are proper adjectives (like Chinese, Soviet). Muslim/Moslem can also be used as nouns (like "an Australian" but not "the English"). - Cian Gillebhrath 19:03, 15 Sep 2005 (CDT)

Midrealm wiki

I see that there is a new midrealm wiki (Midrealm wiki). Any ideas on how we best share information with them and avoid duplication of effort? Conrad Leviston 20:27, 5 Oct 2005 (CDT)

  • How about asking them to redirect their wiki to this one? The only real problem I could see would be the fact that Cunnan seems to default to UK/Australian spelling (duh, see the URL ending in .au?), but that's easy enough to fix with a simple redirect from the US spelling to UK/Aus (ie, redirect "authorize" to "authorise," something I do as I find the need to ;-) ). This wiki has more information, it's in the Midrealm's best interest to try and not duplicate Cunnan's efforts :) Thomas 20:33, 5 Oct 2005 (CDT)
  • I'll update the Cunnan:Interwiki stuff to include their wiki when I have time. It does seem a bit silly to double up on articles like period and authenticity. On a note that is only barely related we seem to have passed 1,200,000 article views some time ago (see the statistics).- Tobin 22:19, 5 Oct 2005 (CDT)
  • But also remember that they are trying to be Middle-centric ... (cf. Midrealm entry for Presence). Our pages for general terms would not always include specific regional interpretations or regional ways/rules of playing that aspect of the Game. - Cian Gillebhrath

Notable Persons

I am wondering, since I am new to here, but what are the guidelines about articles about specific people? While I don't see any reason that we would need one for every Baron/Knight/et al in the Known World, but there are a few individuals who's efforts and actions helped form the SCA. Donovan Ravenhull 06:20, 10 Oct 2005 (CDT)

As of yet there are no guidelines. In fact a few of the older pages are for SCA individuals who are not noteworthy at all. If you thnik they're worth mentioning that's probably a good start. Conrad Leviston 08:24, 10 Oct 2005 (CDT)
Personally, I would leave it to a few. First Crowns, a few super-dukes, the Queen-Soveriegns, notable artisans. We would have to be careful though. Donovan Ravenhull 17:43, 10 Oct 2005 (CDT)
I've posted three articles on notable SCAdians lately -- Fionnadh Averylle O'Connor of Maidenhead, Finnvarr de Taahe, and Thorbjorn Osis Brandsson as examples of what a Notable Persons article should probably be -- where they are (or were) active, a list of their titles, awards and honours, mentions in notable SCA documents, rough date of death (if applicable), etc. I think the main thing to do is avoid "ego pieces" and it should be fine. User:Paul Matisz 22:00 EST, 17 April 2006

Server move, heads up

The server that this wiki is hosted on will be moving at some point in the next few months. What is basically happening is that I have two new servers in my usual data center (Paddington, NSW, Australia), which will replace this server (Dallas, TX, USA) and the old http://www.sca.org.au/ server (Paddington). The two new servers have quite a bit more grunt and will be more reliable (dual CPUs, 2.5GB RAM, SCSI RAID arrays) than either of the current ones (single CPU, 512K / 1GB, IDE drives).

The www.sca.org.au server has already moved onto one of the new machines.

The second machine is being used for a major client project at the moment but will become available in a few months' time, probably around xmas/new year. When it becomes available both cunnan and www.sca.org.au will move on to it, along with a few of my other client sites.

There will probably be a bit of disruption going on when that does happen -- Fedora Core 3 (or maybe 4 or 5) new kernel, newer version of PHP, newer version of MySQL, etc. So far there appears to have been a few problems converting international/multi-byte characters between the older and newer systems so that's something to look out for. There will also probably be at least a few hours of downtime.

More information closer to the date.

Del 21:13, 22 Oct 2005 (CDT)

Well what's happening is this: I have a new server in the USA, which Cunnan will be moving to in the next 48 hours. Hopefully this should alleviate some of the load / MySQL problems that have been occurring of late. I can't give you an exact time when this will happen, but it will be soon -- there are a list of sites to be moved, one at a time, and Cunnan is on that list somewhere. When it happens there will be about an hour of down time. Del 15:11, 14 Jun 2006 (EST)
Another update. The server move will happen approx 4pm on Saturday 17th June, AEST. Cunnan will be down for about 30 minutes while that happens. Del 20:20, 16 Jun 2006 (EST)
All done. Let me know if you notice any problems related to the move. Del 16:18, 17 Jun 2006 (EST)
Also the time zone of the new server is set to Australian Eastern Standard Time (Australia/NSW). So the admins may want to fiddle with the clock settings for displaying and recording edits, etc. Del 16:24, 17 Jun 2006 (EST)

New admins

We keep saying this every time, but we should figure out some guidelines for adding new admins. Say, at least 100 edits and 1 month's activity. There are a couple of people we should look at adding to our admin list, but they haven't been around very long. User:Thomas and User:Paul Matisz have both been doing good work, and are in timezones that would be useful to help stem the spamfloods that are coming in. What do other admins think? Conrad Leviston 17:58, 7 Nov 2005 (CST)

They're doing great work, and more admins is good. Tiff 20:50, 7 Nov 2005 (CST)

  • The one thing that time does give new Cunnan users is an idea of what is the "norm" in entries (e.g. humour vs serious, brief vs in-depth, local vs. general) and what admins do in Cunnan. That is one reason to wait a couple of months even if they have been entering lots of good entries. - Cian Gillebhrath
    • I'll echo User:Cian, I'd say a couple of months of activity (or a ton of edits/additions!) makes sense before making someone an admin. That being said, I'd be happy to help stem spamfloods whenever possible -- is there a sub-admin position that'd allow for that? Either way, I'm flattered at being told that I'm doing good work, and will be happy to help out :) Thomas 08:41, 8 Nov 2005 (CST)
  • Thomas - note that there are also rankings above admin. We're just worried that you might be finding the inabilty to rollback pages, or move them, chafing. Especially user:Paul Matisz, who I think has been around a little longer.
    • Might I second a move for User:Paul Matisz to be made an admin? He has been here a long time, doing much to add to the Wiki and (certainly recently) removing vandalism.--User 144 09:46, 26 Apr 2006 (EST)
  • It sure would be great to spread the time zones a little - we seem to have more sucess keeping locals, and i don't think my semi nocturnalism counts.
  • On the other hand a month or more sounds normal for deciding on admins - so we know they are going to stick around.
  • While we are adding admins - I just noticed user User:AuntieNic is not an admin, and I'm sure she'd find it usefull to be able to delete accidental pages and change recepie names more easily.

Tiff 10:39, 8 Nov 2005 (CST)

OK, How about User 144? He's been around a couple of months, been contributing fairly heavily and has been cleaning up after vandals. Conrad Leviston 05:23, 16 Mar 2006 (CST)

  • I support that. [evil grin] Can we make it a condition that they own up who they are? He/she should know now that we won't bite.... much. - Cian Gillebhrath 16:36, 16 Mar 2006 (CST)
  • I'd support that too. Any objections? - Tobin 17:52, 21 Mar 2006 (CST)

It has now been a week, and seeing that there are only yes votes here, User 144 is now an admin. Conrad Leviston 18:42, 23 Mar 2006 (CST)

  • Thank you all. I shall try not to let it go to my head. 8) --User 144 01:00, 24 Mar 2006 (CST)

Paul Matisz

  • As previous reservations no longer hold (ie. he is still active after many months), and we have had User144 second him just recently, I am going to act unilaterally and raise Paul Matisz's status. I am pretty sure nobody here will object. Conrad Leviston 00:19, 3 May 2006 (EST)

Thanks, guys. Just one question... if I can block users, does that include blocking myself? Just out of idle curiosity -- I'm one of those people who accidentally paints himself into corners sometimes... I once fired a nailgun through my own boot (missed the toes) and I've also sewn a torn shirt to my pants and the couch (simultaneously). User:Paul Matisz 05 April 2006 - 15:19 EST

  • To block a user go to Recent changes. Next to each user is the block option. If you click on it you will be asked if you are sure. As the block option also appears next to your own name it is theoretically possible to block yourself. I've never tried though.

New Kingdom

  • As many of you know, on 11/5 AS XXXX, a new kingdom was created, Gleann Abhann. However, the "SCA Kingdom" box (within the curly brackets) doesn't reflect it. How does one edit the box to make that work out? Thomas 18:02, 14 Nov 2005 (CST)
  • Should now be fixed - Cian Gillebhrath

Use of information from Wikipedia

An editor has just added a lot of information into Norman and Saxon. From the acknowledgement at the top of their edits and the categories and links given on the resulting pages, I believe that the entire of the content was lifted from the relevant Wikipedia pages. While I believe the citation is exactly as Wikipedia would want and the information is relevant to Cunnan, my memory and experience tells me that this is not quite the way Cunnan's pages are normally done. My reasons are:

  • Cunnan is not intended to include encylopaedic pages, which these edits were.
  • I do not like cutting and pasting large amounts of information from other sites
  • Cunnan's primary aim is to provide snippets of information on things that are useful to a re-enacter (primarly SCAdians). These two pages should IMHO say what Saxons and Normans are, link to associated pages about their kings and regions, and then describe how a relevant personna might live.

I haven't rollbacked the pages yet becuse I would like to hear what others think and/or linked to the page that actually has the policy on these matters. - Cian Gillebhrath 03:21, 18 Dec 2005 (CST)

I only just noticed this here, so excuse my late reply. I tend to flip-flop on this issue. I used to be of the opinion that there is no point in reinventing the wheel, which is why I imported the Albigensian Crusade page. I am now of the opinion that bringing stuff over is not necessarily a good thing, but am not willing to stop others from doing it. I would personally be inclined to leave the pages as they are until such time as somebody wants to write a more relevant page. Conrad Leviston 00:30, 3 May 2006 (EST)

Question about Languages

First off, I'm new, so this may already be answered. Well, I was just wondering if the pages about specific languages, (for example Greek or Old English) should have information on the languages themselves, rather than just background and examples. IE, a list of pertinent vocabulary, or a short grammar? The articles would be, in my opinion, more informative.Ridan 17:44, 12 Jan 2006 (CST)

  • Most of the pages on languages were written by me as stubs. I was mainly using my own linguistic knowledge and David Crystal's "An Enclyclopedic Dictionary of Language and Languages". Details on the languages in depth is for external pages IMHO. The key things that I think that SCAdians and other recreationists would like to know about languages are:
    • Where were they spoken?
    • When were they spoken?
    • What alphabet did they use?
    • What other languages do they relate to?
    • Major manuscripts written in the language.
    • How they played a major role in the history of a region, e.g. Anglo-Saxon Chronicles, Church Latin

- Cian Gillebhrath 23:37, 12 Jan 2006 (CST)

  • Actually I'd be interested in some basic info on how the language was spoken, were anyone skilled enough to write such. But it definately needs the background data Cian lists too. (what use writing about ancient Livonian, if no-one knows where Livonia is) I can see the following reenactor uses:
    • basic prononciation (eg how do I pronounce that name, how does the pronounciation differ from it's modern decendants/modern english)
    • basic phrases (how can I say something groovy in persona. Things like counting, time words, etc seem cool too)
    • reading simple words from a manuscript (eg labels above a persons head in a picture, headings of a section)
    • interesting concepts unique to the language translated (eg battlecries, drinking shout words, proverbs, things that give insight into the people, etc)
    • basic grammar and vocab can probably be explained using the above as examples
    • we don't need to re-invent the wheel - where other guides exist (especially online ones), it is appropriate to give a brief summary (and info a non-academic might need to know) and a link.
  • The above is just a discussion of my thoughts on what i see as useful - we welcome all kinds of info.
  • My discussion has been based on the assumption that when you say eg. greek, you are talking about a form of the language used pre 1600. For modern greek my discussion would be limited to how it relates to ancient forms, and phrases to help you translate modern academic papers or webpages.

Tiff 08:41, 13 Jan 2006 (CST)

  • I'm talking about any language relevant to the SCA. The articles would need to have the background information, but I think the additional material Tiff hath specified would make the articles more informative. Ridan 19:09, 15 Jan 2006 (CST)

Discussion on Local Group pages

Moved from User:MasterWill's discussion page and edited for formatting

-Cian Gillebhrath 16:53, 20 Mar 2006 (CST)
  • I thought that by creating Arrowsreach centric wiki pages on Cunnan that cross references into other pages on Cunnan I would be able to encourage more of our members to use and contribute to Cunnan as a whole. For example, I am amazed that Mistress Margie has not been introduced to Cunnan as she would be an avid user if she could get over her initial fear for the complex and arcane computer arts. Cunnan is also incredably handy and useful, and I can see such "group centric" use increasing as more and more people find out about it, at that point we should create a seperate category for Lochac group pages rather than splitting it off into a seperate wiki.
-MasterWill 00:26, 21 Mar 2006 (CST)
  • This is adresses to everyone in general:
Is it possible to have a subwiki? What I'm thinking is a change in page colour, indicating that certain content related to a limited group, and a small automated disclaimer, that not all the info on such pages will be totally intellegible to people outside the group. The Krae Glas hall hire directory (happy to make it the melbourne hall hire directory if we got entries) seems one such thing to me, and st monicas occasionally has such things (eg festival planning), although it is easier with our smaller group to get people to read emails, than visit a wiki.
Maybe technically, I'm talking a second wiki, but one open to all lochac groups, that uses the same software as cunnan, and meshes seamlessly with it? It is one of the constant conflicts we have, and I too would like to have somewhere I don't feel worried about havign the two concepts of useage warring against each other.
-Tiff
  • This is sort of why I wrote to you Will. Cunnan has pages that supposedly define its purpose (i.e. Cunnan:What isn't Cunnan?, Cunnan:What is Cunnan?) but I suspect they were written a while ago by the St Monicans who set Cunnan up. However, the "rules" have been pretty well followed so far. The regular editors have been trying hard to delocalise the content of the entries, and not limit them to solely SCA details. The one exception has been the KraeGlas hall hire directory, but since that was written by Monicans and their locals, it is easy to ignore.
IIRC it was previously decided that Cunnan's pages weren't going to be substitute webpages for branches, nor was Cunnan going to be a repository for documents like newsletters, manuals etc. The servers have shifted from St Mon's to Del's machines.
While I think its great that you are encouraging Arrowreachians to use and contribute to Cunnan (especially Margie.... we need stuff on period theatre added), I am just worried that the recent edits will set a precedent that contradicts the existing norms. Tiff's idea is good. Having a distinctly separate area for SCA (and other groups) to have their own pages with their own styles would be better, but I fear that it will hard to manage as the server may not have the resources, and it will be harder for us to moderate. A separate wiki for Lochac groups might be the best way to go on that.
- Cian Gillebhrath 17:03, 21 Mar 2006 (CST)
  • Having a second "area" within one wiki would be tricky the software we're using really isn't setup to handle that. What might be an option is to have a second wiki, a Lochac wiki, setup. Someone would need to ask Del, it's his server. A couple of changes to the interwiki link scheme and we'd have [[Lochac:some page]] and [[Cunnan:some page]] working to "pass" users between the two.
I'm not volunteering to approach Del about this but I'd support and help anyone who did.
- Tobin 17:39, 21 Mar 2006 (CST)
  • Before I started contributing to the Cunnan I went looking for Cunnan:Policies and guidelines on content, and I came to conclusion that what I intended to add was acceptable. Now that you have pointed out the other policy pages (i.e. Cunnan:What isn't Cunnan?, Cunnan:What is Cunnan?) I have found quite a lot of pages that seem to break the Cunnan:What isn't Cunnan? rules, for example, the Holy Roman Emperor and Guard pages have very little to do with re-enactment and read more like an encyclopaedia entries. The Cunnan:FAQ states that the local intrest pages have not been deleted because they don't conflict with what anyone else wants to write. There is a need for local pages, and dividing the wiki seems like such a waste of time and ends up reducing it's overall value. So to clear this up, we could create a page template that has a different background colour for local pages.
-MasterWill 17:57, 21 Mar 2006 (CST)
  • The point in the FAQ about articles that only concern a small group was more for regional/local point of view type things not for event planning, etc. If we allow one instance of this then we have to be prepared for all groups involved in the SCA to start using the site as a place to jot down notes for running events and organising who's doing the cooking on a particular day at a particular camp. Cleaning up after the events are over would be a real pain, and I don't think that a record of what a household had for lunch at last years Rowany is the sort of thing we want to have to keep track of. I'm also not sure Del would be keen on us hosting these kinds of things for groups that have nothing to do with Lochac.
I don't think that dividing the wiki would reduce it's overall value. I think it would help better define what the wiki is for and the interwiki linking I mentioned is an easy and clear way to get users moving between the two sites. If we were really keen we could abuse the wiki software's ability to have links related pages in other "languages" to make the relationship even stronger.
Altering the site's CSS to have a different background is easy but getting the software to use it is a problem. I understand the code but I refuse to make changes like that since they make upgrading a real pain. You could do it by placing the content of the entire page within a table with a coloured background but that'll break when you start adding right aligned images, etc.
If people really insist on using Cunnan in this way then I'll suggest they move the pages out of the article namespace and into [[Cunnan: page name ]].
- Tobin 18:27, 21 Mar 2006 (CST)
  • I'm afraid the arrangements of the policies pages are just a classic victim of this being a wiki -- disorganisation. If someone has time, they might get them structured better and put meaningful links on other pages.
As for the encyclopaedic nature of some pages, I suspect what is meant is that editors shouldn't include everything that is ever known on a page about a subject. Just keypoints that explain what the topic is on about and items that may be relevant to it. Some editors like to write a lot (cf. User:Anton). I as a moderator chicken out of editting those pages, partially because of the individual style in which they are written (hard to edit! easier to rewrite which takes time!). But I do personally feel that some pages say too much for Cunnan.
As for Guard, IMHO it does contain entries for senses of the word that doesn't really add to anything you would find in a dictionary. But since the author is so good at writing pages, I left it alone in the hope that he/she would expand those entries further at a later date with more medieval-centric data. I also mean to add links to pages for certain guards e.g. NVG, Mead Guard.
But a page that is mainly a list of links really needs to justify why it doesn't deserve to be chopped down. The list of Other re-enactment sites is a classic (but messy) example. The key thing that saves it (for now) is that all the links are for one topic.
- Cian Gillebhrath 20:50, 21 Mar 2006 (CST)
I believe that the page of links was just lifted from the Wikipedia, anyway. I think that some of the major links are valid and should remain. A better idea would be to keep the links to those that the authors know directly, thus being able to then give a relevant entry for that link as has been done with the NVG.

BTW Sorry about the guard entry. Cian was in many ways right but I also think that Cunnan should be a resources that reenactors/SCAdians can access that includes topics that directly related to them. In addition, a page needs to start somewhere. --User 144 00:18, 22 Mar 2006 (CST)

As someone probably guilty of too long and too general entries, may I say that my intention is always to consider two things -- if I was looking for this, what would I want to know, and expect to be told, without needing to go somewhere else; and, if a recreationist has troubled to come here, what right have I to dangle half the information in front of himr, and then tell himr to go somewhere else for the rest. Hence the Scottish Kings, which no-one is likely to want to impersonate, but people may want to associate with (in, I am a (distant) member of ***'s Court; or, my family is a by-blow of King ***'s). Also my practical expereince of fighting, outdoor caming, running revels, or administrating a Kingdom is zero. Simoncursitor 05:40, 24 Mar 2006 (CST)

Jerusalem's Kings

====FOLLOWS: Discussion on Local Group pages====
Having gone as far as I currently can on Kings of Scotland, and bearing in mind how central, to both the Christian medieval and also to the Islamic, the Kingdom of Jerusalem is, I was thinking of doing an index page and brief biographical notes on the Kings/Queens of Jerusalem, with particular reference to the intermarriages by which they were linked to other European royal families.
However, if people feel that this is too detailed a topic, and too irrelevant to "real" re-enactment, I will stop before I've started.
Posted to look for comments -- Simoncursitor 00:20, 20 Apr 2006 (EST)
I'd be fascinated by such an article, personally. But then I have a Norman pre-2nd Crusade persona. I've always felt the SCA should be about more than just hitting sweaty men with sticks, but about really learning and experiencing history. User:Paul Matisz 25 April 2006 -- 13:02 EST

Metal Weapons Groups/Reenactment Revision

I've made the changes now but I haven't deleted the other re-enactment sites page yet. As the page was lifted from the Wikipedia, I think it better deleted as it doesn't have much significance, unless we are going to fill in all the missing pages. --User 144 18:13, 20 May 2006 (EST)

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