User talk:Thelonesoldier

Well what did you expect to find, whats missing, if you know something that isn't here then you should write it as thats the point of a wiki. If you want something ask, don't complain. --Angry Beaver 19:06, 16 Feb 2007 (PST)

Fair comment, but thats some work to overhual, any particular entities in mind that should undergo the process first? I think its something that should be done so starting a slow rollout of the improvement would be the way to go. --Angry Beaver 20:51, 16 Feb 2007 (PST)

What's missing in ambient_generic? It's almost exactly the same usage as in HL1 - in fact, it's probably even easier with the addition of a sound browser in Hammer. Geez, simmer down a few notches and use some common sense. Oh, and welcome. --Campaignjunkie ^(talk) 12:07, 17 Feb 2007 (PST)

In his defense theres a lot of useful info that could be included, like what is lfo, when valve says spinup... what do they mean? Instead of forcing everyone to experiment and research including more of the information like that might be usefull. --Angry Beaver 12:09, 17 Feb 2007 (PST)

I disagree; that stuff really isn't useful. ;) Also, no one's forcing anyone. If the information isn't there, then it isn't there. You can fill it in yourself or move on. You're not supposed to blame this entire wiki community for its inability to cater to your specific problems, because that's called "whining." --Campaignjunkie ^(talk) 12:17, 17 Feb 2007 (PST)

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I think you've really missed the point here, and would do well to calm down. The Wiki is the product of the people that contribute to it. People the same as you, who take a few minutes or hours out of their day to add to what's here, for no reason other than that it will help out people the same as you. There is no one here who magically knows the answers to the questions you have, and who is withholding information. There is no standard that the Wiki has to attain. It's entirely a glass-half-full proposition. What's here helps you out (for example, try finding info about the flags for ambient_generic in Hammer). What's not, well you're no worse off than you were before. If you want to know about stuff but can't find it, there are ways and means of asking. Insulting the people who spend their free time making your life easier (even if it isn't easy enough for you) isn't really going to help anyone. --Giles 04:01, 18 Feb 2007 (PST)

In the past, my experience with the help desk has been that it's incredibly slow and not worth bothering with. And people like Campaignjunkie who have years of mapping experience definitely know information they aren't bothering to add because it "isn't helpful" (which is totally absurd). Articles like the ambient_generic article are absolutely worthless and might as well be deleted. All the information is copied verbatim from Hammer, which means the only people who would ever need that information already have it in an easier-to-access-location. It does hurt me because I waste my time trying to find information on the wiki and just find completely worthless summaries like "<integer> Spin up time (0-100)" which doesn't mean anything to anybody. I'm upset that VALVe is too lazy to provide documentation, and that even though way back when we had Worldcraft, it came with excellent documentation, but VALVe continually replaced the documentation sites with less useful, less navigable ones until we finally reached the Wiki, which is frustrating to navigate and usually fails to provide any useful information in the end result. And then when I come and try to suggest changes people start complaining about how adding useful information would be bad - that's "too much information"! So perhaps you can see why I'm frustrated. Thelonesoldier 11:58, 18 Feb 2007 (PST)

^ Ditto. By the way, all those LFO and spinup controls are from HL1 - and only now are you so upset about not knowing what they do? --Campaignjunkie ^(talk) 16:09, 18 Feb 2007 (PST)

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If you are having trouble getting a link to turn blue, rather than red, it's because you have got the capitalisation wrong. It needs to match what the page was originally created with. Annoying bug, I know.

While you are running around adding lots of basic info to the entity pages, bear in mind that the Wiki needs to serve two types of people - those who want reference, and those who want beginner materials - and that the needs of those two may compete. More detail can help a beginner but hinder someone looking for reference.

Also, "Maybe the more skilled community is afraid of competition from the upstarts"? For real? Well I guess your name is accurate. I really don't understand where you are getting these perceptions of laziness or elitism from, though. I hope that after you've spent a while here you mellow a bit. In the meantime, your enthusiasm and efforts are appreciated, I'm sure. --Giles 14:58, 19 Feb 2007 (PST)

I thought I had the capitalization correct. I think I tried it different ways. And yes, it does need to serve two types of people, not just the people who already know the information and so feel it unecessary to put it on the pages. I can't imagine anyone who knows the stuff would come here looking for reference, especially since there isn't anything they can't get from Hammer much more easily. And yeah, "for real". When people are telling me not to add information because it's "not useful" and "too much information", I fail to see how that makes sense except to prevent this information from being readily available to beginners. For example, I personally know Campaignjunkie, and I recall that he always caters to those around his skill level and tries his best to not give any help to those he thinks are worse than himself. Nothing besides laziness or elitism could realistically explain how little real information is available in most of the articles I've looked at. Thelonesoldier 15:07, 19 Feb 2007 (PST)

"I can't imagine anyone who knows the stuff would come here looking for reference, especially since there isn't anything they can't get from Hammer much more easily"? Then you are simply mistaken in the scope of your imagination. A novice learns differently from a more experienced user. You are also outright wrong - I've saved myself dozens of hours through stuff that's on the Wiki but not in Hammer (which is why I pop in now and then to see if I can't give a little back).

I'm not saying don't add information to the Wiki, I'm saying be careful about where you put it. There's little point putting in a mini-tutorial about brush-entities are the start of every entity page that deals with a brush-entity, for instance, because once you've read it and understood it, it just gets in the way. There are pages for beginners, which can always benefit from being more fleshed out. But there's no point, for example, bemoaning that func_detail "could still be explained better" on the entity page, when there are three articles linked at the bottom that do the job. --Giles 15:28, 19 Feb 2007 (PST)

Fuck this. I add information and you guys edit it back out. Sorry for trying to help. Goddamn assholes. Thelonesoldier 15:59, 19 Feb 2007 (PST)

I'm not sure why you address that to me, since I purposefully avoided editing what you wrote (knowing that would be your reaction). Welcome to how all Wikis work. Different people have different ideas about what should be done. Progress beyond disagreement is either made the bad way, through brute force (be here more often, edit more pages than other people), or the good way, by calm discussion and rational debate. Adding information doesn't necessarily make things better. The structure of information is just as important. Do feel free to drop back anytime. --Giles 16:13, 19 Feb 2007 (PST)

See, on most wikis, adding information is encouraged. On most wikis, articles link to relevant concepts. On most wikis, articles are not written assuming the reader already knows everything about everything and would only be irritated with actual useful information instead of worthless copy and paste definitions. Thelonesoldier 16:37, 19 Feb 2007 (PST)

Most wikis also aren't based around tutorials, and therefore must introduce the reader to all the subjects it covers. This wiki however, is based on tutorials. A beginner starts with the beginner's information, and once that's been conquered, moves up to higher skilled tutorials. It's pointless to constantly re-explain EVERYTHING to the user, since if they do start with the basics, then it will teach them all they need to know for the more advanced stuff.

Say you were reading a book on how to drive a car. In the first chapter, it explains, in detail, how to start the car. In the later chapters, would you expect it to give another full tutorial on starting the car, or would you expect it to just say "start the car." ?

This is the reason your edits are being removed. The information has been covered in the beginner's tutorials and thus does not need to be reiterated again in every article. --Daedalus 17:58, 19 Feb 2007 (PST)

Driving a car is much easier than mapping. You don't need a detailed explanation of how to start a car or make it go forward or stop it. You hear it once and you know it. You can learn how to drive a car in five minutes. It takes more practice to become skilled at it, but that's a separate issue. Just because the regulars have been mapping for years and can remember every little detail doesn't mean you aren't going to get newcomers who don't know a lot of information and perhaps have forgotten things while going through all the basics. And not everyone approaches learning in the same way. Just because some people are content to carefully read through each beginner article and carefully memorize all the information doesn't mean you won't get others who prefer to learn things as they need them in a more hands-on manner. For someone like me, who knows all the basics, it's a lot nicer to be able to go to a specific entity or concept and learn just that one thing, and be able to either research or extrapolate how to do other things. If I want to know how to set up a trigger for a Source map, I'd like that information to be in the trigger article, not scattered across six different beginner articles and tucked in amongst other information I don't need. Not everyone reads, or needs to read, the whole manual from the beginning. Some people would rather check the index and go to page sixty-five to learn how to install the spark plugs, without knowing or needing to learn how the entire electrical system works. Thelonesoldier 23:42, 19 Feb 2007 (PST)

Maybe you've noticed by now, with all your adding to the articles, that before long, one will know what a brush entity is, especially if they read the beginning tutorials. If somebody doesn't want to start with the basics, and therefore doesn't know what sometime basic means, they can look it up, or deal with it. There is no need to go through every entity and add the basics that people should have already read.

I only started mapping about 4 months ago, yet I know what a brush entity and a point entity is, because I bothered to read the beginner's material. If you're just starting to map, why start with the intermediate material if you haven't looked at the beginner's material?

If you really love repeating yourself, go ahead and keep adding the same old information to the articles. But as you can see, it's both tedious and (to myself) unnecessary, because it's been explained before. --Daedalus 01:56, 20 Feb 2007 (PST)

Paranoia

End it, theres no conspircay against thoose new to editing so just drop the paranoid dellusions --Angry Beaver 15:34, 19 Feb 2007 (PST)