Classic WoW Wiki talk:Namespace

I would like to take this a step further and suggest we create a few custom namespaces (will need admins to do this) to help store the game information. One such namespace would logically be "Items". This will allow for the creation of a page like Item:Ironfeather that contains no info on how the item is used in game and only the statistics for said item. For something as small is "Ironfeather" it might not seem like much till you think about the fact that we can include how much it sells to a vendor for as well as people can use the Special:Whatlinkshere to quickly find articles that talk about "Ironfeather".

I have thought about maybe having a "Quest" name space but I cannot think of why something like really would be anything other than something like Category:Quests with each quest walkthrough listed as an article maybe broken down into subcategories based on Faction (Horde, Alliance, or Both) and maybe then Class and Profession quests as well.

Another area however that would likely benefit greatly from it's own name space would the API section! They have it organized very nice and I'm really worried about even suggesting that it be moved to a new name space as the work it would generate would be huge! However just for the sheer size of the API area it would probably do well to act as a "sister" to WoWWiki maybe WoWDevWiki or something. The only problem with having the API area as seperat project is that it removed the ability to link to pages here on WoWWiki. Unless the admins want to set up Interwiki linking.
 * --BaldMonkey 15:55, 30 Sep 2005 (EDT)


 * Yes! API definitely needs its own namespace. How could it be that much more work? Hmm. I guess you'd have to change all the links to API:whatever . Maybe there's software that could find and replace. Does anyone know? - Schmidt (talk) 16:14, 30 Sep 2005 (EDT)


 * Added the &lt;nowiki&gt; for ya :-) and I think the problem would be cutting and pasting all the pages to the new namespace as from what I can tell there is way to move pages between namespaces. For that mater I can't even move a page for the sake of simply renaming like I have tried to do to help reduce some of the silly REDIRECTS that are being used.
 * Have the admins gone on vacation cause I only see two listed and to the best of my knowledge for alot of this sort of stuff we really need them to make some changes on the source files on the server.
 * --BaldMonkey 17:48, 30 Sep 2005 (EDT)


 * [LAISREN] Note that I already, experimentally, started adding Namespace prefixes for some articles; as an example, see http://www.wowwiki.com/Category:UI (e.g. UI:Guild List; UI:Raid List; UI:Spellbook...), but it never really caught on. There is some disagreement if it's better to use Namespaces (e.g. Guild:) or parenthetical tags (e.g.  (Guild))...
 * [LAISREN] Please see also my proposal for Article types at Article_type, as it bears directly on the overall consistent categorization strategy you're aiming for.
 * [LAISREN] The biggest problem at this point is the consistent, retroactive adoption of any categorization attempts we might want to make. It's far to easy to end up with inconsistent implementation, especially as the number of articles grows...
 * [LAISREN] Just some thoughts to mull over. - Laisren 21:14, 30 Sep 2005 (EDT)


 * Making a page and starting it with something like "UI:" does not make it a namespace. The article will still fall in tot he same realm as all the other articles it will just start with a "UI:".  The main reason to use a name space would be to set the information apart from the normal flow of articles.  In my request for an "Item" name space I would like to have this because that area has no need to be categorized.  In the namespace each entry would simply by Item: item name with the item name being typed in the way it is seen in game (for the purpose of capitalization.  This will give a referance for people to link to items from atricles with out having to link to Thott and Allakhzam all the time.  Something like the Faction and Zone area just doesn't really make sense with out more of an explination for why it should be a name space rather than a category listing of articles that related to that topid.


 * In the end it seems to me the largest issue here is that there was never any struture layed out for the categories and this has cause the problem of people placing items where ever they felt they should be. This sort of problem can be limited by a better front page design that makes available links to the root level Cagetgories for people to then start from.  So in the end there might be listed on the front page links like Category:Items Category:Zones Category:Bestiary Category:UI. Using the links there people can then drill down and look for related articles in that category.  The articles can be called what ever they want to so that if they coss over more than one category they can be simply be listed on more than one category.


 * What would hapen if someone Wanted to write and article about a mod that helps the lag in IronForge? If the named it "UI:IF_Mod" that sort of limits it to belonging in the UI category yet it might well be of use to poeple looking in the Zone subcategory of Category:Iron Forge since the article does relate to that as well.  And maybe that Mod works by causing all the people in the zone to look like murlocs and mybe they feel it should also be listed in the [:Category:Besitiery]] area.  Does that make sense about why pulling everything into a seperat name space doesn't work?


 * As for consistant Implementation that is why at the root of the categories I would suggest doing like I did with the Items page and creating a road map of how it all fits together. Will everyone that make an article know right where to put it?  Probly not but the people that are here and working on the site alot will be able to move things to the correct area.
 * --BaldMonkey 22:21, 30 Sep 2005 (EDT)

Namespace nomination

 * API : for all the API stuff
 * Faction : for all the Category:Faction:xxx and the like (under debate, no doubt)
 * Formula : (preferably not Formulas), for Category:Formulas and Game Mechanics and all its articles, conveniently all starting with Formulas:
 * Item : (again not Items) For holding the straight game info for the item not any articles.
 * Server : for all the servers (already they all start with Server:
 * Zone : for all the Category:Zone:xxx categories (under debate)


 * I'm not sure Zone should really be a namespace in and of its self. I will admit I've not looked at that the zone sections all that much yet but from what I've seen I don't even understand why they all start with "Zone:".  Seems like it should have been something like...
 * Category:Zones
 * Category:Kalimdor
 * Category:Duratar
 * Category:Mulgore
 * Category:Eastern Kingdoms
 * --BaldMonkey 21:18, 30 Sep 2005 (EDT)