DJBWiki talk:Guidelines

Articles are NOT to exceed 32kbs in size

Just for clarification for myself... I can understand that rule if the article can obviously be shortened (i.e. superfluous "fluff" can be taken out of character histories), but what about informative articles that are simply long? For example, take the recently completed CSP Planets articles: Judecca (38 kb), Caina (50 kb), and Antenora (38 kb). They are informative, they are concise... but they are long. Will this be strictly enforced or will there be exceptions? The definition of a "guideline" is somewhat obscure. -- RevengeX Palpatine 16:39, 1 February 2008 (MST)

After talking with Jac I don't understand the reason for the limit. The standard wiki code adds the 32kb+ warning because of compatibility with older browsers, which isn't really a problem for anyone. As far as server size goes - the Warbanners on the DB site are bigger than 32kbs so I doubt text-filled articles are that big of a problem. I can understand wanting to limit the excess - as this was started because of Ylith's double character article - but is there a real reason for the limit that isn't explained away by what I've said? --Shadow Taldrya 17:02, 1 February 2008 (MST)

Valid points both - but, if we aren't going to worry about size - what about length? There are some articles out there that are just way to frickin long and need cut down. There is no reason a member should write about every single little thing that happens to them. That's what the stories are for. Example: Wookiepedia doesn't write each individual detail that happened in a book, but put in the synopsis or just whats need to know.

If we drop the size limit, by which your logical thoughts show we should, should we keep a length cap? --Tron 17:45, 1 February 2008 (MST)

What is the length cap? I know Kaine was all about enforcing a bunch of rules, but I wasn't much into listening at the time :P I think it's less a matter of length (some people have very in-depth histories) and more the actual content. History = good, character info = good, random crap that doesn't actually matter or can be used in a fictional sense = bad... that sorta thing :P --Shadow Taldrya 17:54, 1 February 2008 (MST)

At this time there is no length cap. I agree about good info staying and random stupid crap leaving. Should we have a length cap though? --Tron 17:56, 1 February 2008 (MST)

If an article can be sectioned into smaller articles - like Ylith has agreed to do, then I don't think you'd need an actual length cap. Wiki pages are easy enough to navigate so you can find the information you need (ie: Character personality or physical description) and really, being too long doesn't hurt anyone. Fewer people may read the entire article, but it's still nice to have accomplished the task of fleshing out your character that much. Even if it's just for you yourself to enjoy. I know that's why I made my article - I doubt most of us read other peoples histories for fun. Just my take on it. If it's about the wiki staff having to actually monitor what's being written then yeah, maybe you guys would be more concerned about overall length. --Shadow Taldrya 18:11, 1 February 2008 (MST)

I don't think any hard limits need to be set...I do think some articles however are longer than perhaps they should be. Some people write stories than an actual article, making it longer than needed. I think in the end we should just concern ourselves with the overall quality of the articles, rather than how long they are. --Halcyon 18:16, 1 February 2008 (MST)

I agree that limits aren't needed. If an article has stuff that can be taken out, then that can be made note of case by case --Aabs 16:13, 2 February 2008 (MST)

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