Memory Alpha:Ten Forward/Archive 2006

Template:Tenforward

Article records

Are the articles that hit a certain number of viewing recorded somewhere? I just noticed that the Star Trek: Deep Space Nine article has been viewed more than twenty thousand times. Was the 10,000th article recorded? Excelsior 10:53, 4 Jul 2005 (UTC)

Individual page hits can be found here: Special:Popularpages. The 10,000th article wasn't recorded automatically, but a user posted it here a while ago. Apparently, this topic has been (re)moved. -- Cid Highwind 11:28, 4 Jul 2005 (UTC)

I was thinking more along the lines of a special page (a hall of fame if you will) that would show the articles that hit a certain number of hits. The DS9 page hitting 20,000 is excellent is it not? It should be recorded for posterity. Tough Little Ship 23:26, 4 Jul 2005 (UTC)

The 10,000th article topic was apparently deleted by an anonymous user without being archived, but I've recovered it and placed it in the archive. For the record, T'Pring was the 10,000th article. -- SmokeDetector47 // talk 01:26, 10 Jul 2005 (UTC)

I just noticed DS9 has just hit 30,000! Tough Little Ship 23:49, 16 Sep 2005 (UTC)

Contradictory info

There are many bits of info in star Trek which lack consistency. For example:

In Voyager it says that the Breen use biological based ships like Species 8472, but in DS9 it shows metal ships flying through space.
Damar and Weyoun argue over the climate of the Breen Homeworld, but in a previous episode Dukat states that there is a Cardassian embassy on Breen

These are just 2 examples. What should writers do about these Contradictions while wrtiting artciles?

For #1 i would ask you: is it entirely impossible that the breen have used two different types of ships in their history? -- Captain Mike K. Bartel^talk 06:39, 10 Jul 2005 (UTC)

If the information is indeed contradictory, both facts should be noted, accompanied by a small note stating the contradiction. No speculation. -- Cid Highwind 11:54, 22 Jul 2005 (UTC)

Do you think contradictory information should be noted under a specific heading such as Summary or Background Information for episodes? Is there a specific place for errors and inconsistencies? - GrilledCheese17 05:45, 30 Aug 2005 (UTC)

I just thought of another piece of contridicatry info. At one point it is stated that the Dominion is 2000 years old, yet at another it is stated that it is 10,000 years old. Tobyk777 01:49, 3 Sep 2005 (UTC)

Perhaps a simple footnote could be included. Then asterisks or superscript numbers can be added to the contradicted info, and then it can be explained in the stated asterisk or superscript number in the footnote. Enzo Aquarius 01:54, 3 Sep 2005 (UTC)

For example, with a reference to the Dominion, it could be phrased like this:

The Dominion was thousands of years old by the 24th century.

In Episode X, the Dominion was stated to be over two-thousand years of age, however Episode Y stated that it was of an age approaching 10,000 years.

Additionally, as I mentioned earlier, this type of format could be used:

First contact with the Klingons occured in 2151.*

Footnote (In title form of course, I just don't want to mess up the formatting of this area) *Though first contact was visually shown in "Broken Bow", it is mentioned in TNG that first contact with the Klingons occured Year

-- (Captain Mike K. Bartel^talk 02:01, 3 Sep 2005 (UTC))

Now, your idea is also great Mike, however it's not the most convenient in a large article (Unless it's done as a footnote at the end in italics of course and not in the middle of the article). Enzo Aquarius 02:12, 3 Sep 2005 (UTC)

I don't see why it would be inconvient. I think that this is a great way to sort it out. Tobyk777 06:09, 5 Sep 2005 (UTC)

It's a good solution. The tricky thing about contradictions that is often forgotten, is that characters can be lying or wrong. Jaf 13:11, 11 Sep 2005 (UTC)

Right, that's why there is the italic writing. ;-) --Memory 18:37, 26 Dec 2005 (UTC)

This is hanging around here for a long time, can we form this into a standard for MA:MoS? Maybe adapting the Wikipedia Footnotes? --Memory 18:37, 26 Dec 2005 (UTC)

I don't like the Wikipedia footnotes (and they seem to be controversial even on Wikipedia). Hasn't the i&i style be included in the MoS already? If not it should, of course. -- Cid Highwind 16:43, 11 Jan 2006 (UTC)

Links to Alpha or Beta Quadrant article

There are many location articles which state a location in either AQ or BQ as definite (see "What links here" for AQ and BQ) although this was never mentioned in canon. Often, this is just personal speculation. I suggest to check all these articles - if nothing definite about the location was said, we could instead link to an article (simply called Alpha or Beta Quadrant, for example) that basically states that the location is "somewhere in the neighborhood" and links to both Alpha Quadrant and Beta Quadrant. -- Cid Highwind 14:24, 5 Aug 2005 (UTC)

Any comments? -- Cid Highwind 11:17, 16 Nov 2005 (UTC)

Why use an article for this? Just add "Alpha or Beta Quadrant". --Memory 18:41, 26 Dec 2005 (UTC)

Because simply linking to the two possible locations would lack the explanation that could otherwise be included on the new page. An explanation that could eventually prevent the next-best contributor to simply change the ambiguous location links back to a single one because he thinks he knows where a specific planet is located. If it's just the name that is considered problematic, we could of course use a different one - what about Local space or something...? -- Cid Highwind 16:20, 11 Jan 2006 (UTC)

I think a straightforward "Alpha and Beta Quadrant" article might be enough to clear this up.. possibly a Category:Alpha and Beta Quadrant that would be a top level to sort things that were either from those identified one or the other. -- Captain M.K.B. 04:14, 23 March 2006 (UTC)

Navigation addition suggestion

I think it would be very useful to have additional links on the left-hand navigation area. Quick-links to specific series and their epsiode lists would be helpful, similar to the menu bar on Wikipedia's Trek pages but simplified.--StAkAr Karnak 23:27, 30 Nov 2005 (UTC)

Too many stubs

I just checked the Category:Memory Alpha stubs and was a little shocked to see that it lists about 800 pages marked as "stubs". This is more than 5% of our articles! If you have some minutes to spare, please check that list and see if you can enhance one or two of those articles to at least "incomplete article" status (then replace {{stub}} with {{pna-incomplete}}). I know I will try to make that part of my "daily work"... -- Cid Highwind 23:41, 7 Dec 2005 (UTC)

As a test/suggestion, I added a new line to the links on the "Recent changes" page, listing five stub articles similar to our wanted pages list. Please comment/discuss here, let's see if this is useful or should be reverted. -- Cid Highwind 10:28, 9 Dec 2005 (UTC)

I think it's useful, but perhaps the "more" should link to the Category: Memory Alpha stubs instead of Memory Alpha: Find or fix a stub so that people can see which articles are stubs? Just a thought...anyway, good idea! --Starchild 23:31, 10 Dec 2005 (UTC)

Of course, thanks. -- Cid Highwind 12:42, 11 Dec 2005 (UTC)

Database erasure prevention

I read in the Wikipedia article on Memory Alpha (here) that:

"Operations [at Memory Alpha] continued smoothly until March 23 [2004], when the site's database was accidentally erased during an upgrade of the MediaWiki software. The only backup available was six weeks out of date; nonetheless, the project moved forward undaunted."

Do we have proper measures in place to prevent this from happening again? --From Andoria with Love 02:20, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

Well back then, I gather, Memory Alpha was a separate site just using MediaWiki software. Currently, the site is operated by/with Wikia and Wikicities, and has the support of Wikimedia technicians, so the chances of erasure are extremely lower than they were a year and a half ago.--Tim Thomason 02:37, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

Whew! Okay, that's good to hear. Thanks. :) --From Andoria with Love 03:15, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

I started a similar discussion at our forum, but there was not much response to it. I found out that the database (only written content, not the pictures) is available for download via the link on my userpage (or here). I started to download the dumps four month ago, repeating it every month. At the moment I'm writing this, the 12/05 backup is downloading to my HD, for all language editions. I might be the only one who is doing this. As far as I know, the daily backups of wikicities are stored at the same serverfarm (Seattle?), on a backup server. So if the place is erased by a hurricane (or Klingons?), there will be left our backups only. --Memory 20:08, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

As a reseller for VERITAS/Symantec Backup Exec I would love to sell them some Backup Exec licenses ;-) --Funkdubious 21:21, 31 Dec 2005 (UTC)

Collaboration of the Week

I think a big problem with MA right now is that while we are all willing a make little changes, nobody really wants to do the major work on something like an episode summary, or major event (ie Earth-Romulan War, and Babel Crisis) I think a partial sollution would be to create a Collaboration of Week on the main page. It would be the main focus, and after a week is replace with another major page needing attention. Jaz 02:25, 7 Jan 2006 (UTC)

I think this idea was already brought forth within the past month or two with the name Refit of the Week. The idea had some support at first, but it eventually was dropped. I personally supported the idea and would still support it if the idea came up again. - Adm. Enzo Aquarius 02:28, 7 Jan 2006 (UTC)

I also supported the idea and was disappointed when it was deleted due to lack of interest. Like the duty roster and peer review ideas, it had a lot of steam at first but simmered down and came to a near-halt. The difference is that with the Refit of the Week you (obviously) have to change it weekly and thus need the entire community to back the idea because it can't sustain itself without constant attention. There are various arguments in favor of or in opposition to the idea, but ultimately I think that was why the RotW died.

However, in defense of current efforts, the duty roster is there for people who want to take on the somewhat tedious task of summaries and I think there are a lot of major events that have been featured. Also James T. Kirk has made a huge amount of progress these past few days, even if only because of one person. :) --Vedek Dukat ^{Talk | Duty Roster} 02:56, 7 Jan 2006 (UTC)

I just feel like we have these huge articles on tiny topics that are easy to right about (which isn't a problem), while things like Starfleet are left incomplete. We need to work on them as a collective, and we need to put it on the main page. I'd like it if we could reach some sort of consensus on this over the next few days, and hopefully, for the admin to add it to the main page. Jaz 05:42, 7 Jan 2006 (UTC)

Since there doesn't seem to be any opposition to this, I'd like to formally request that the admin add a collaboration or refit of the week to the main page, as well as a talk page to discuss future refits (I would but it is a protected page). Thanks a lot :) Jaz 06:20, 8 Jan 2006 (UTC)

Well, there's a whole discussion about the old&failed "Refit of the Week" in the Ten Forward Archive, including its Vfd consensus to delete the page. The "technical" question of simply recreating a page that had deletion consensus aside, I myself don't want to simply repeat an old mistake (let's make new ones...;) ), so perhaps we should find out first why that page failed and how/if we can avoid that the next time. -- Cid Highwind 12:06, 8 Jan 2006 (UTC)

In addition to the above, I just want to reiterate and explain some of my concerns with the old refit page.

Overlap with PNA lists and peer review:We have the various PNA messages (in this case especially pna-incomplete) and related lists to both mark articles and find them for further editing. We also have the peer review page to further enhance articles. I think that another page to find and enhance pages that need work will not miraculously solve all problems that the existing pages don't manage to solve. Starfleet, for example, is marked as incomplete since March 2005, but has no discussion regarding this status on its talk page. Instead of creating another discussion page, wait for that article to become selected, then wait again for others to participate, one could simply add to the article what he/she knows, then start a discussion on Talk:Starfleet to invite others to add known facts, and in a last step, create a peer review for it.
Complex voting procedure:The procedure described on the now deleted page was to nominate articles you think need work, then let others vote on articles they think should be made the "Refit of the Week", then choose the one with the most votes to become the new "Refit". Why does it have to be so complicated? I'm either interested&able to contribute to an article (in that case I could just do it instead of voting to do it later), or I'm not (in which case I probably won't even vote). Leaving that voting procedure aside, we'd either end up with a page where people add articles they think need work by someone else (that's exactly the function of pna-incomplete), or with a page where people promise to work on an article if others at least give hints about what to do (that's approximately the function of peer review).

-- Cid Highwind 15:09, 8 Jan 2006 (UTC)

I actually haven't read most of the comments on here yet, but as the person who created the refit page (it was under discussion, as can be seen on the archive page, and I took the liberty of creating the page when someone linked to it) and was a big proponent, I think it's best to let sleeping dogs lie and not be bold in (re-)creating anything similar. Weyoun 21:27, 8 Jan 2006 (UTC)

(Whoops, a misunderstanding) - Adm. Enzo Aquarius 22:57, 9 Jan 2006 (UTC)

Non-canon performers and staff

There is currently a discussion over at Vfd as to whether or not people who worked on non-canon Star Trek products should be given their own articles. The example here is Courtney Taylor, whose sole Trek credit is voice work in a Star Trek video game. My question is, should those performers and production personnel who only worked on non-canon items such as video games have their own articles? Personally, it seems rediculous to have articles for people who had nothing to do with the canon universe -- but then again, we do have articles for those who write the novels, which are considered non-canon. So what should be done about this: do we leave the Courtney Taylor article alone and thereby allow articles for video game personnel or do we delete it? That's all I have to say about that -- now have at it!!! :-P --From Andoria with Love 11:48, 7 Jan 2006 (UTC)

A difficult question. I think the authors of novels definitely have their place in MA, but so might the producers of non-canon works have. It is difficult to judge wether or not they have submitted enough work to receive an own article. I think of people like Larry Niven: ok not a good example, because TAS is canon, but he is normally involved in other projects than Trek, but provided material for the franchise. OTH I don't expect Warren Holland to have an article here, who was the publisher of Star Trek: Communicator (at least publisher of issue #142), either. -- Kobi - (Talk) 13:14, 7 Jan 2006 (UTC)

Moved from Vfd

Courtney Taylor: Actress whose only credit was a voice-over in a non-canon Star Trek video game. Having articles for those who worked in canon productions is one thing, but I don't think we need to start creating those who worked in non-canon items. At the very least, this should be merged with Star Trek: Starfleet Command III. --From Andoria with Love 01:29, 2 Jan 2006 (UTC)

Delete: I don't even think this info should even be included on the Starfleet Command III page. Memory Alpha is about everything related to canon Star Trek, not everything related to things related to canon Star Trek.--Tim Thomason 06:27, 2 Jan 2006 (UTC)
unsure -- should contributors to non-canon pursuits (writers and editors and illustrators and artists of comics, novels, toys and games) be given credit here? for voiceovers and some types of comic artists i'd at least say some sort of central table could be created (to see which contributors have been in every release, which have recurred or worked for different companies). i think this master list might be a better idea, if other archivists think giving courtney and her peers their own articles. -- Captain Mike K. Bartel^talk
Keep for now. We certainly need to open a dialogue on whether or not real-life people attached to non-canon yet sanctioned Trek projects deserve their own pages. -- SmokeDetector47^{| TALK} 03:01, 3 Jan 2006 (UTC)

Well, we do have pages for authors and illustrators of Trek books, so I don't know. I think we should just delete this, otherwise we may be giving the okay to create pages for others involved in non-canon merchandise (i.e. individual video game engineers and developers). I think that would be going a bit overboard. Just giving them credit on the game's article should be enough. --From Andoria with Love 04:39, 4 Jan 2006 (UTC)

Delete. Too many degrees of seperation. If she had worked on an episode of movie, keep it, but this seems so obscure. Jaz 08:52, 6 Jan 2006 (UTC)
- A discussion as to whether to keep or delete this article and others like it is currently being held over at Ten Forward. --From Andoria with Love 11:51, 7 Jan 2006 (UTC)

Scripts

Moved from Memory Alpha:Category suggestions.

Since I own the shooting scripts for Season One of Star Trek (plus "Kitumba" from Star Trek: Phase II), and since some of these contain scenes that were deleted/edited, I would be willing to put some time into noting these differences. I'm still shaky on my coding and so forth, and might need a good editor to go behind me to clean things up.

Damn, put this in the wrong place! Sorry. - Sir Rhosis 21:55, 8 Jan 2006 (UTC)

I think that's a great idea and would definitely support it, but I moved this here because I'm not sure where we'd put it exactly. We had an issue with "Memory Alpha LCARS" or something similar where a user was essentially posting unformatted scripts onto MA which in addition to being a copyvio had in the text something along the lines of "these are not for distribution". Basically, I think it's a great idea so long as we're not posting entire scripts and whatnot onto MA. --Broik 22:04, 8 Jan 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the help. No, I'd NEVER post full scripts, just small excerpts of deleted scenes which would fall under fair use in the body of a review (or so I think)--98% of the text would be critiques, opinions, etc. It would be easy to do, I'd simply copy and paste my own script critiques that I have done elsewhere, then wikify them. - Sir Rhosis 22:10, 8 Jan 2006 (UTC)

I'd be very interested in this and once a name is agreed upon this could go under other topics since it fits the bill with other pages listed there. Only one word of caution, make sure you keep the critiquing to an NPOV. :-) Trekkers are like Bajorans in terms of opinions, everyone has one and everyone is more than willing to share it (especially if you disagree). Weyoun 22:17, 8 Jan 2006 (UTC)

Good point. I agree, I would delete the personal opinions from my originals and present them as de facto changes/differences between what was written and what aired. People over at the TrekBBS have urged me to create my own site dealing with the scripts, but I'm still new to PCS, having used a simple webtv unit until this past year. - Sir Rhosis 22:21, 8 Jan 2006 (UTC)

As an encyclopedia, we generally don't do "critiques, opinions", but a description of deleted scenes or major last-minute changes sounds intriguing. I think this might be a good addition to the "Background information" section of the episode articles. Perhaps you can just add such information to one of the episode pages and we'll find the best way to keep that information there together? -- Cid Highwind 15:40, 9 Jan 2006 (UTC)

Sounds good, as long as no admins have a problem with it. If I hear no objections, I'll give one a shot in a few days and see how it goes over. - Sir Rhosis 23:13, 9 Jan 2006 (UTC)

Pentarus I, II, III, and IV

We currently have pages (albiet stubs) for Pentarus I, Pentarus II, Pentarus III, and Pentarus IV. I don't believe any have ever been mentioned, but they are all inferred from Pentarus V, which was. Do they need their own pages? Jaz 06:14, 16 Jan 2006 (UTC)

We typically don't link to (or create articles of) planets that haven't been mentioned directly but could be inferred. Of course, if there's a fifth planet in a system, planets 1-4 are a valid assumption - but if there's nothing to say about them, why have an article. Generally I'd say, unlink planets 1-4 and change them to redirects to the system page - hopefully without this becoming another case for someone to go around and create eleven redirects for every twelfth planet ever mentioned... But before doing so, check the scripts - some of those planets might actually have been mentioned. -- Cid Highwind 11:10, 16 Jan 2006 (UTC)

The remainder of the episode takes place on Lambda Paz, a moon of Pentarus III, and Pentarus II is mentioned as, along with Pentarus V, being one of two class M planets in the Pentarus system. So the articles on Pentarus I and Pentarus IV seem unnecessary, unless they appeared in the episode in some manner (background art/computer graphic/etc..) not revealed in the two seconds of text-only research i just performed.

I used google to find the script :) -- Captain Mike K. Bartel^talk 14:14, 16 Jan 2006 (UTC)

...hopefully without this becoming another case for someone to go around and create eleven redirects for every twelfth planet ever mentioned...

...And apparently, exactly this just happened with Pollux I, II and III. Does anyone have further sources for these? Otherwise, they should be handled as decribed above. -- Cid Highwind 22:54, 16 Jan 2006 (UTC)

Memory Alpha Wikimedia Commons

Is there a "Wikimedia Commons" repository on Memory Alpha as per Wikipedia.org? => http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Main_Page Instead of uploading the same image on other language page, you could save bandwith and storage space by this method. Im french and looking forward to this implementation of your server... My 2 cents. Conruyt 17:27, 16 Jan 2006 (UTC)

The issue was raised before, and I was (or at least would have been) a strong proponent, but the Wikicities people informed us it's currently not possible. If we were an independent organization like Wikimedia, I suppose we could (assuming someone knows how) configure something like this, but we're hosted on Wikicities (for free) and have to work within the limitations of what's possible there. --Vedek Dukat ^{Talk | Duty Roster} 17:52, 17 January 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the answer. So, we are going to upload "x number of" images. Multiply this number by "each languages hosted on this server" if people is looking forward having the same look & feel than the english pages. I find this ridiculous!. I'm sorry to say so. Conruyt 19:47, 17 January 2006 (UTC)

No need to apologize - I feel the same way, but unless you have a location where Memory Alpha could be hosted in such a way as to allow for a commons, I'm afraid things will stay the way they are. --Vedek Dukat ^{Talk | Duty Roster} 19:51, 17 January 2006 (UTC)

Please don't think things need to stay the way they are. Wikia is hoping to soon find funding for development related tasks like creating a new Commons for Memory Alpha, so what wasn't possible in the past, can certainly be considered for the future. I've added this to bug:221 so it doesn't get forgotten about. Angela (talk) 21:44, 17 January 2006 (UTC)

~~What about another feature for MA? => a "Printer Friendly" button/link on each page (with copyrights bottom lines of course)? Angela, thx to add a bug in bugzilla.~~ yup, seems that when I print, it is ok. Sorry. Conruyt 10:31, 18 January 2006 (UTC)

Great to know the high-and-mighty are still keeping an eye on us little people. :) Wikicities is great, and I really don't think we ever will move so long as the company is around. --Vedek Dukat ^{Talk | Duty Roster} 06:25, 22 January 2006 (UTC)

Layout committee / TOC design suggestion

I'm putting this here to make more people aware of the project I started: Memory Alpha:User projects/Layout committee, and especially to invite comments on the first topic discussed there, which is the design of article TOCs. Please visit and comment, if you're interested... -- Cid Highwind 20:01, 25 January 2006 (UTC)

More sounds!

I was wondering other people's opinion on this idea. Should we add sound effects to pages (e.g. a transporter sound effect on the transporter page), like the main title sound files we added on the star trek series pages? I was wondering because I already uploaded a phaser sound file and I wanted to know other people's opinion on this. --Galaxy001 03:12, 1 February 2006 (UTC)

I like the idea, but I'm also a little worried about it taking up to much space. Also, I wonder if people would really care all that much about sound effects. Theme music is intimately tied to the show, but sound effects, although recognizable, are not nearly as special to people.docdude316 20:25, 1 February 2006 (UTC)

I don't know MA's server situation and expenses, but the site is often sluggish on my end already, without the bells and whistles (ahem). I don't see much informational value in sound clips, and it might just attract junk traffic from collectors building their own libraries. In the future, if MA can afford the bandwidth without a hit on performance, it might be feasible. --Aurelius Kirk 20:56, 1 February 2006 (UTC)

Is there any way to ask the makers of MA? If they have user names, we could just add an idea to there discussion pages. Just an idea. I don't want to give them too much trouble. --Galaxy001 00:49, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

A lot of people turn the speakers off while browsing the internet because some pages spam around with sound effects, often far too loud. So I don't think we should start this here, it's too annoying in the mass. --Memory 23:12, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

I would be okay with this if its something you click on, but not automatic, that's really annoying. Jaz ^{talk | novels} 03:07, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

That is what I was thinking of. See the Phaser page and click on the sound effect link. --Galaxy001 22:32, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

Just to clarify: Memory Alpha is hosted by Wikia (Wikicities) and therefore technically does not have a server or bandwidth restriction as far as I know. That's not to say we should upload any file, but we don't have to worry about additional charges or something (it's free anyway).

Having sound files can be useful, and it has been done on some pages (Borg, Tribunal, The Wire are the only ones I remember seeing media links on). There's no way to make them automatic on MediaWiki so that's not even a consideration if anyone's worry about it. The only real catch is that the files have to be in OGG format. But adding a few sounds here and there could be nice and even prove helpful. --Vedek Dukat ^{Talk | Duty Roster} 00:05, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Categories with 200+ Entries

Would it be possible to allow categories to have more than the standard 200 on each page. It would be much easier to browse, and I don't think slowness is tha much of an issue any more, things seem to be loading much faster in the past month of so (perhaps related to our upgrade?). Jaz ^{talk | novels} 03:05, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

I have put a table of Content on those categories in the french-MA. (thanks Kobi for explaining how to do it :) - Philoust123 11:49, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

See here to copy it : fr:Catégorie:Personnel de Starfleet - Philoust123 13:50, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Is there a ship gallery?

Is there a page with galleries of different ships? I looked but didn't find one so assuming I didn't miss it and it just doesn't exist I think this would be a great thing to have at least for the Federation and ideally for any major race with multiple ships. I am not as familiar with ship classes as some people so it can make searching for ships easier if they can see the ships. I don't want to fill the wiki with a bunch of nonsense images or articles but I think one image per ship class would be sufficient and useful. If anyone likes this idea I'd be more than happy to undertake the project (and would welcome assistance). Thoughts?--DannyBoy7783 19:18, 9 February 2006 (UTC)

Well, there's this page: [1], which lists all the ships in Starfleet. I'll have a look and see if there's something similar for the Klingon ships and Romulan ones. Zsingaya ^Talk 20:33, 9 February 2006 (UTC)
- Just checked, and there's a page for each major race: Federation starships, Klingon starships, Romulan starships, Ferengi starships, Vulcan starships, Cardassian starships, Borg starships. Zsingaya ^Talk 20:37, 9 February 2006 (UTC)
  - I just checked the Memory Alpha:Image use policy page, and from that page, I don't believe we can justify having lots of images of all the ships on one page. This is a quote from that page: "Remember that Memory Alpha is not an image gallery!" I hope this is helpful. Zsingaya ^Talk 20:44, 9 February 2006 (UTC)
    - I could be mistaken but I think what that means is that it isn't a place for people to host their own files. I know that Wookieepedia, for example, lets users upload "vanity images" for their user page. I think that is the intent of that quote, to prevent abuse of the free webspace available. Also, a ships of Star Trek gallery I think is very useful and a legitimate endeavor, rather than some frivolous collection of images. I think it is nice for people not familiar with class names to tell what a ship is without having to open the page. I use Firefox so it isn't a big deal to open a new tab but I think users of IE could find that a bit annoying. If no one else is interested that's fine but I thought I'd bring it up just in case.--DannyBoy7783 23:34, 9 February 2006 (UTC)
- There seems to be some sort of effort to create one section dedicated to all images of certain categories, such as Category:Memory Alpha images (individuals) and Category:Memory Alpha images (TNG novel covers) (see the complete list here). So perhaps a new category can be created for starships with a properly configured bot (or a real dedicated human). - Intricated 01:21, 10 February 2006 (UTC)

Cross references to episodes with a similar topic?

As we all know there are episodes that share a similar topic. Sometimes a connection between those is established by a common keyword (e.g. "pon farr"). On the other hand there are similarites that are rather loose (e.g. "death of a close friend" or "criticism of religion"). My idea is to include a new section in the episode articles just for this ("If you like this episode, you might also be interested in..."). I mean, that's what makes hypertext really interesting. What do you think? Lal 23:22, 21 February 2006 (UTC)

I think someone else suggested categorizing the episodes based on plot type and the idea was rejected. Perhaps you could come up with a list of categories you intend to use, as people would perhaps be more open to negotiation. Weyoun 23:21, 22 February 2006 (UTC)

Hm, I see your point. It sure is somewhat hard to categorize episodes by plot type if not impossible. Also I won't try to come up with categories because this will at best lead to in an endless discussion about the categories itself. On the other hand cross references are already being given here and there. So for instance VOY: Renaissance Man refers to VOY: The Raven and TNG: Brothers. This is fine, but my suggestion is to have such links in a separate section rather than in background information -- it really isn't "background information" at all, IMHO. Having a "You might also like this episodes" section would serve two purposes. First you could list more episodes withouth cluttering up the background information. Second a separate section would encourage others to come up with cross references and it would establish them as some kind of standard information. Lal 22:29, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

If you are talking about specific episode pages, you could always post "Related Episodes" (or "Related Topics") above or below "Links and References", I think I've seen that done before

An idea

I just made an Community Core values, that could be a policy

Honesty: To consistantly speak your opinion on talk pages.

Respect: To value other users, your userpage, and all that involves Star Trek.

Responsibility: To be accountable for your edits, other users, and the community of Memory-alpha.

Compassion: To show care and kindness for other users.

Courage: To get through difficult discussions with confidence and determanation

Justice: To consider the perspective or other users, and to be consistantly fair on talk pages using each end of the discussion.

I hope some of you agree with me. Whopper 04:42, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

I don't believe this is necessary. Besides the fact that all these "values" are covered in our rules, I find it somewhat childish -- no offense. Ottens 21:51, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

I appreciate the motivations, but I, too, do not believe this to be needed or desirable. Aholland 21:27, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

Main character surnames links

I was wondering if it would be better to move articles like Sisko to a disambiguation page and redirect it to Benjamin Sisko for example. It would make navigation much easier. -- Tacking Into the Wind 19:25, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

That sounds okay. What does everyone else think? -- Tough Little Ship 00:28, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

I'm not sure if its the greatest idea -- i'd rather encourage people to link to the correct article. I don't want to rain on your parade, so I'm willing to vote neutral and entertain a few other archivists to weigh in with their viewpoints.

BTW, if you want to move a page, use the "move" feature to move the page's entire history to a new location. Copying and pasting the entire contents of a page and copying them to a new page doesn't move the page history along with it. Plus, copying and pasting is disallowable in cases where it leaves two duplicates of the same page. -- Captain M.K. Bartel^talk 01:28, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

I, too, don't like this idea. Now, if someone links to Sisko, whether he wants to link to Benjamin, Jake or someone else from the family, he links to a special disambiguation page. An editor can use the "What links here" feature of that page and will find a list of links, most of which will need to be changed to something else. If we now go and make Sisko a redirect, this won't stop people from using the Sisko link if, in fact, they want to link to someone "not-Benjamin" - only that now, they don't use a link to a special page for exactly that purpose, but a link to a wrong article. -- Cid Highwind 11:11, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

Note: This has also been discussed here, where I had a different opinion but was convinced otherwise... ;) Maybe this discussion should be moved there. -- Cid Highwind 11:24, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

Episode navigation templates

moved to Memory Alpha talk:Navigational templates

Links to Amazon

Template:Sidebar episode releases

A user has been adding links directly to Amazon.com from articles on this site so people can purchase DVDs of Trek episodes. (See, for example, TOS: "Elaan of Troyius") Is this in keeping with Memory Alpha policy? Aholland 11:40, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

I'd rather see those "ASIN" links on the articles of the actual media instead of on each episode article - and in that regard, I don't know if we really need a section "DVD Media information" at all - but with the new template, an ASIN link from the media article itself shouldn't be a problem, I think. -- Cid Highwind 11:48, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

The problem is, no episodes link to which DVDs that episode was on. If I clicked on "The Devil in the Dark" and there was no reference link at all, how would I be able to find the two DVD collections its has been released on (or for that matter, the two VHS releases?). The novels pages have a "reference" field where the ISBN can be linked -- maybe each episode should link to whichever DVD article(s) are relevant, and place the purchasing information there. And should we start VHS articles for each individual tape? Either way, i think that episodes do need a media information link. -- Captain M.K. Bartel File:Tng capt.png 14:46, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

That's true, but I still think that there shouldn't be a direct off-site link to "some" releases but not others. Having a list of all releases of any specific episode on the episode article still seems like the best alternative to me - perhaps in the form of another standardized sidebar template in the background section of any episode article; otherwise as a new section, but one not specifically restricted to DVD releases.

In that case, this list should contain links to media articles here on MA, which then can contain ISBNs, ASINs or whatever - this doesn't necessarily mean that we have to create separate articles for each VHS tape, though. Perhaps an article TNG VHS Collection (or whatever the "official" name might be) which contains a table listing all individual tapes with contained episodes and ISBN/ASIN number?

If we start listing those numbers on the episode article directly, we'd just end up with an unmaintainable mess of duplicate information... -- Cid Highwind 15:24, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

I support creating a list of VHS ISBNs/ASINs and linking it to each episode article -- a unified storehouse of the ordering info, rather than disseminating it to individual pages. This would also be valuable to unify the info should we ever decide to abort/alter the ASIN template/system to direct to another site -- only a few pages would need to be changed rather than all 700+ eps/movies...

Each episode has only been released on video one or two times, and i don't think new releases are forthcoming, so this wouldn't be a huge problem to maintain either -- Captain M.K. Bartel File:Tng capt.png 15:43, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

We should still have one article per "product" (so to speak), and not just one huge list for all VHS releases of one series. One "product", in this case, would be the whole range of 2-episodes-per-VHS releases for each of the series. Other "products" could be specific releases - I remember seeing something like a "Q Box" or "Borg Box" with all Q/Borg episodes on VHS, for example. These different products shouldn't be listed on one page, but get their individual articles.

As a suggestion, I created a sidebar template that I added to the top of this section... -- Cid Highwind 16:01, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

merged discussion

Nice form -- i was was in a "show preview" of some episodes to see if i could accomplish something similar (great minds, and all that...)

For TOS episodes, AFAIK, they were released in the following formats:

Columbia House VHS (2 to 4 episodes per tape)
Paramount VHS (1 episode to a tape)
Paramount series DVDs (2 episodes per set?)
Paramount season DVDs : TOS Season 1 DVD, etc..
Paramount "fan collectives" : part of a multi series collection

So all the VHS releases would be linked to as TOS VHS? (rd to Star Trek: The Original Series (VHS)...)

and then we'd probably need a link to unwritten articles about the earlier DVD releases for the individual break downs (TOS DVD, rd to Star Trek: The Original Series (DVD) ?) -- Captain M.K. Bartel File:Tng capt.png 15:59, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

I'm a little unsure how to name each article if we are breaking them down that far -- for example "Tomorrow is Yesterday" should link to TOS Season 1 DVD and Star Trek: Fan Collective - Time Travel, but what should we name the DVD article and VHS articles. It was released along with Devil in the Dark on one 2-episode tape by Columbia House, then released by itself on a single tape be Paramount, and also on a DVD with another episode from the first TOS DVD release. Is that three new articles we should make?

Out of curiousity, does MA get a percentage when Amazon makes a sale through us? I know many other sites use this? It may be an avenue to explore to cover any costs that may arrise. Jaz ^{talk | novels} 06:07, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

Name change

I'm sure the creators of this database worked hard to find the right name for this project. However, Memory Alpha just isn't very memorable to me. Wikipedia, or Wookieepedia (the Star Wars version), just rolls off of the tongue.

May I suggest the name Trekkiepedia? I'm aware of the conotation that "Trekkie" has to some people, but the name just seems more catchy.

"Memory Alpha" is named in honor of that great research libary seen in TOS: "The Lights of Zetar". See Memory Alpha for more. I rather like the name, myself! Aholland 19:05, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

I like Trekkiepedia over Memory Alpha, but I doubt people would want to change it after so long. --Vedek Dukat ^{Talk | Duty Roster} 21:19, 13 April 2006 (UTC)

God, no. "Trekkiepedia" just sounds fanboyish and generic IMO, whereas "Memory Alpha" sounds more like a serious brand name (as far as that's possible for a Trek fan site ;) ). Besides, from a marketing standpoint, changing a name that is as well-known as Memory Alpha has become would be ridiculous. -- Cid Highwind 13:30, 14 April 2006 (UTC)

Portals

What does everyone think about "portals" - should we start to create these for Memory Alpha?

To explain things, Wikipedia uses portals to further arrange its content. They got rid of a lengthy "Encyclopedia" table on the main page completely, and instead created a portal page for every major topic ("Arts", "Science", etc.) - only those (eight) portals are linked on the main page prominently, which frees up much space and allows visitors to dive into one of the topics easily.

Further portals can be created for "minor topics" and are listed on a project page. All portal pages are identified by having a "Portal:" prefix and typically act as "main pages" for their topic - no content, but links to related categories, subportals, individual articles and so on...

I'd like to see something like this here as well, at least to get rid of some of the content of our crowded main page. Any opinions? -- Cid Highwind 10:55, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

I also thought of making use of them (when revising the MA/de frontpage). Further topics could be actors and for each series ... let's not restrict these to in-POV only. However I have no -- Kobi - (Talk) 11:53, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

I thought about the following five "main" portals to be placed on the main page:

People
Society and Culture
Around the Universe
Science and Technology
Star Trek

The first four are taken directly from section headers of the existing "Encyclopedia" listing, while "Star Trek" would be a combination of the sections "Episodes and Movies", "Other Media" and "Trek and Culture", basically combining everything that is about Star Trek from a production or franchise POV. Of course, these suggestions could still be refined.

Further subportals, once those few main portals are up and running, could for example be "Starships" (about everything related to starships), "Klingon" (about the Klingon species, its culture etc.), "Star Trek:The Next Generation" (a portal for everything related to that series), ... -- Cid Highwind 19:46, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

Space Marines

Does Starfleet employ any kind of special operations away teams?

The Earth Starfleet (predecessor to the more familiar Federation Starfleet) was known to work in concert with a human military organization which had teams called MACOs, essentially career soldiers trained to be deployed on Earth and aboard Earth space vessels.

While the Federation Starfleet itself was never mentioned to have any soldiering jobs outside of its normal security forces, numerous officers over the years have been shown wearing special combat uniforms (in "Nor the Battle to the Strong" and "The Siege of AR-558"), a combat division specialty colored uniform (in Star Trek V) as well as being referred to by military ranks (like Colonel West in Star Trek VI).

This might not answer the topic, as they never said clearly whether they were "marines" or not, but there certainly are soldiers in the 23rd and 24th century Starfleets. -- Captain M.K.B. 05:37, 30 March 2006 (UTC)

Previous / Next

I'd like to be able to switch through pages about planets, species and such by hitting previous or next. Similar to the way years are done. It seems like it would be better then going back to a list somewhere all the time. Is this possible? Jaf 14:04, 31 March 2006 (UTC)

Non-canon names as redirects

A large problem we have in browsing is the large amount of unnamed characters. Many of these characters have been given non-canon names over the years. While I do not want to move them to those pages, I think it would be a good idea to make some of the more popular pages into re-directs in order to make searching and browsing easier. Jaz ^{talk | novels}File:United Federation of Planets logo.png 03:26, 1 April 2006 (UTC)

That seems a logical proposal. We shouldn't prevent people from getting information just because they don't know the "proper" name of something. I'm not that familiar with redirects, but if I understand it right it would seem to be a fairly transparent thing to readers and get them where they need to be. Aholland 04:42, 1 April 2006 (UTC)

Redirects provide a completely transparent browsing experience unless the reader bothers to click on the link in the small grey line after they use the redirect that says:

(Redirected from non-canon title here)

Example: Enterprise-D. I like the idea, but I'm not sure if such redirects would violate current MA canon policy. Someone more knowledgeable than I care to chime in? - Intricated 04:55, 1 April 2006 (UTC)

For what it is worth, my opinion is that this type of link would not violate the canon policy. The policy deals with the sources of information that can be used in the body of or as a basis for naming an article. This redirect suggestion is more of an administrative approach to guiding readers from a "non-canon" identification to a "canon" one. As such it seems to support canon data entirely. There would be a problem if there was information beyond the redirect in an article with a non-canon identification, but I think a redirect is both clever and a way to help people who only know the non-canon name for something or someone. Aholland 17:37, 1 April 2006 (UTC)

I'm going to go ahead and start making the redirects. Jaz ^{talk | novels}File:United Federation of Planets logo.png 20:35, 1 April 2006 (UTC)

Having non-canon names redirect to the appropriate page does not violate canon policy, or at least it has never been questioned before. The only concern I have is that a link to a specific sub-heading within a page, i.e. to the "unnamed" character whose name you have typed into the box, is not possible. It then becomes confusing because you may not know to look for "Burly Klingon" instead of whatever name the non-canon source gave. I suppose there's no getting around that though. --Vedek Dukat ^{Talk | Duty Roster} 20:50, 1 April 2006 (UTC)

Is there a way to make redirects link to subheadings? I know you can do it with normal linking by using the #, example: Unnamed humanoids (24th century)#Tailheads. I also know this does not work in redirects from previous attempts, but perhaps there is an equivalent? Jaf 21:03, 1 April 2006 (UTC)Jaf

No, it's not, which is what the Vedek was saying. Anchors (having a # followed by the heading) are not possible on MediaWiki redirects due to technical issues. But I don't see a problem with these redirects, which avoid confusion and also keep new people from creating the pages. --Broik 21:50, 1 April 2006 (UTC)

Any non-canon names made into redirects as a result of this suggestion could be listed at Memory Alpha:List of non-canon redirects please. -- Captain M.K.B. 04:39, 7 April 2006 (UTC)

New deletion template

In an effort to ease new users into our views on canon, i suggest that if anyone creates an obviously deletable non-canon article (like Reginald Barclay (mirror) or USS Stargazer (NCC-2893-A)), that we add this template ({{deletionapocrypha}} to give them the heads up that article titles are canon-only: Template:Deletionapocrypha -- Captain M.K.B. 04:34, 7 April 2006 (UTC)

Built-in gallery feature

I'd like someone to contact me about the built-in gallery feature that I've heard of and seen on here. I don't know anything about it, and it might be an interesting way to update the actor's picture tables. Thanks. Zsingaya File:Maco-corporal.png 08:56, 13 April 2006 (UTC)

The gallery feature is easy to use. Simply use the HTML-like tags <gallery> & </gallery> to create one and between the tags, add a simple list of image filenames without further wiki formatting - it's possible to add formatted image descriptions, of course. This will create the following (see the code for more info):

As you can see, there are four images per row, perfectly aligned, with possibility to add text and no complicated table markup. The design of this gallery could still be changed, for example by removing the grey borders completely, just having an "outer" border for the gallery as a whole etc. -- Cid Highwind 10:09, 13 April 2006 (UTC)

Is there a way to limit the gallery to 3 images per row, or resize the thumbnails? On a screen below 1024 resolution, that table wouldn't look right. --Vedek Dukat ^{Talk | Duty Roster} 12:42, 14 April 2006 (UTC)

There may be some parameters to control that feature, although Angela wasn't aware of any when I just asked here. The only size given in the stylesheet is a width of 150px per cell - x4, +some pixels for borders and margins, gives a width of about 625px for the whole thing. I could try to tweak those sizes a little, but... Do we really want to do that? We're living in 2006, isn't a resolution of 1024 standard now (or even below standard)? If we're optimizing for a resolution of 800x600, you have to keep in mind that individual images would be tiny to barely visible for someone running a resolution of 1280 or 1600... -- Cid Highwind 13:23, 14 April 2006 (UTC)

Other MA versions

(de) German version

Statistics : 5500 articles since May 2004

Nothing for the moment

(eo) Esperanto edition

Statistics : 5 articles since September 2005
I don't mean to hurt the feelings of whoever initiated it, but I really don't believe we should have an Esperanto edition. As I stated somewhere above, many non-native English speakers prefer reading MA in English over their own language, and I just can't see any benefit in adding another layer of complexity to the project when we have two editions (Swedish, Polish) which are already in a state of disrepair. Wouldn't we be better off without the Esperanto one? --Vedek Dukat ^{Talk | Duty Roster} 21:17, 13 April 2006 (UTC)

There seem to be (little but) activity on it actually. As long as people are interested in, I don't see any problem with it - Philoust123 10:42, 14 April 2006 (UTC)

I created a very, very basic page on the Esperanto wiki, but I was experimenting with the language while reading a tutorial. I agree entirely with the Vedek's assessment. If I was going to learn a language for the sake of Memory Alpha, it would be Spanish, which I learned in high school. Weyoun 19:07, 14 April 2006 (UTC)

(es) Spanish version

Statistics : 5300 articles since ?
In case you missed its casual introduction into the MA family, we now have a Spanish edition, and I'd like to make a few notes on it in case this causes confusion:

What is now MA/es was originally "Trekkipedia" (a better name for MA, IMHO, but that's another issue) which is why formatting may be different from what you're used to. For example, most articles don't begin with a bolded declaration of the topic, and citations are much less frequent at present. This will change as time goes on, so feel free to adjust things accordingly.
You will probably have to re-register, as the user base (at present) is not pooled with that of Wikia and by extension Memory Alpha.
Performers and production staff formerly had articles using last name, first name; if you come across any of these articles, please move them to first name last name format.
Titles are something I need to discuss with the admin, because Star Trek is known as "Viaje a las estrellas" in Spanish and I'm not sure how much translating will be done in that respect.

Any other questions, feel free to contact me or the admin on there. Thanks! --Vedek Dukat ^{Talk | Duty Roster} 07:22, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

I don't speak a single word of spanish, so I'm just putting this here - was the former "Trekkiepedia" published under a compatible Creative Commons License, so that the content could be reused, or how do they work around that? -- Cid Highwind 07:37, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

I don't speak spanish either, though it is sometimes rather simple to guess what one article means in english (or German). In order to get the interwikis set up: Vedek can you please set interwikis there, where the spanish page title is not the same as the english one? -- Kobi - [[{{ns:3}}:Kobi|(''{{ns:1}}'')]] 12:52, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

Licensing: Umm, it didn't -have- a license, so I think they're just adopting MA's CC license. It was formerly hosted on a server in Argentina, so I have no idea what that means in "legalese", but es:Ocupación de Bajor is a translation-in-progress of one of our absolute best articles.

Interwiki: Sure, I'll make sure the links stay up to date, although it gets to be a bigger and bigger pain as we open more and more editions of Memory Alpha. But that's a good thing, so I don't mind. ;) --Vedek Dukat ^{Talk | Duty Roster} 22:12, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

Hi, my name is Omar, from Argentina, and one of the creators of the original "Trekkipedia". I not fluent in English, but I sure what the "Trekkipedia" was 100% compatible with the CC Licence. LL&P --ElAuriano 16:55, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

(fr) French version

Statistics : 1100 articles since November 2005

Nothing for the moment (hoping it will stay so :) - Philoust123 10:38, 14 April 2006 (UTC)

(nl) Dutch version

Statistics : 3600 articles since November 2003

Nothing for the moment

(pl) Polish version

Statistics : 6 articles since ? 2005
How can we contact any of the admins? (They left no email address and Wikia doesn't have one either). [...] -- Kobi - [[{{ns:3}}:Kobi|(''{{ns:1}}'')]] 12:58, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

(sv) Swedish version

Statistics : 1200 articles since November 2003
Since there are no replies about my concerns on Memory Alpha talk:Start a new edition in another language I have to post this more public it seems: What will happen to the Esperanto, Polish, and Swedish versions? How can we contact any of the admins? (They left no email address and Wikia doesn't have one either). Currently MA/sv is a spam fest for vandals and no admin around. -- Kobi - [[{{ns:3}}:Kobi|(''{{ns:1}}'')]] 12:58, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

I don't understand why we even have an Esperanto edition... Enough people (several German-speaking members and at least one who speaks Swedish, to my knowledge) prefer the English edition over their own languages, so I can't understand why anyone would want to read it. I could be wrong though.

The Swedish edition at least has content, so the only thing I can think of is to have some English-language admin keep an eye on it until someone else comes along and picks up the project. --Vedek Dukat ^{Talk | Duty Roster} 22:18, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

I check them from time to time as well. Perhaps sysop rights should be granted to all English admin for the other MAs. That way they could block obvious spammers and vandals, even if they dont speak the language (page blanking and spam looks the same in every language). Jaz ^talkFile:United Federation of Planets logo.png 04:13, 13 April 2006 (UTC)

I don't think every english admin should have the sysop rights, but rather 1 or 2 who check these wikis every 2-3 days, because many of them won't care about these wikis and there's no need for 20 admin on each versions (people who have questions don't know who to contact in that case). Furthermore, the other languages admin should inform about their presence (saying for example they watch the recent changes "once each week every saturday"...) and absence (holiday, administration stop...). I think a special page should be created for this like "Memory Alpha:other MA versions discussions" (rather than the Ten Forward) to discuss these specific problems. Concerning MA-fr, I watch the changes generally every days (at least every 2 days), I also granted Kobi the admin rights. If I haven't any disponibilities for a while, I will inform you, don't worry :). - Philoust123 12:50, 13 April 2006 (UTC)