Happy New Year!
Christmas time is over (by the way, did y’all get what you wanted?), school’s started for me again and the exams are back as well. Woo! I seriously hope 2019 has more to offer.
In this issue, I’ll present the poll results from last month, and take a look at our goals for this year.
Remarkable Contributions
- Nicodami finished a 2018 Christmas Chaos Event article in a matter of hours after the holiday cheer was released!
- I’ve been working hard to finish the Fissure page with as much detail as possible.
- AvrooVulcan focused on numerous articles such as staff pages, and more. Looks like he’s had an editing spree! What could that be worth it, you ask? A shiny User of the Month tag sounds nice, right? ;)
Discussion, feedback and internal changes
Last month, we included a few polls in our newsletter to find out what you guys would like to see changed. We’ve taken all of your feedback into consideration!
To evaluate the results in detail, I’ll go through each question one by one.
Should we create an article for every single map?
With 3 neutral votes and someone opposing, I don’t believe this project should be our main focus this year. The Map Database which is currently in the process of being created should serve as a great way to look up details for all maps. Personally, I could definitely see map articles being added later if we have enough editors to keep them updated constantly.
Is mobile readability a relevant concern for you?
With 4 positive responses, it is clear that this is an aspect of the wiki we need to pay more attention to. It is true that some pages still contain huge tables or other features which make browsing through them uncomfortable. We will thus try to focus more on creating templates and updating old and unaesthetic content, which should hopefully improve the overall readability.
Would you like to see the newsletters continue?
100% of the votes supporting our monthly issues was a quite overwhelming response! I’m glad you guys are enjoying these, as they definitely take up a lot of of our time.
As you might have seen, I couldn’t deal with the previous weekly release of newsletters due to my time constraints; and even now, we have trouble with finalizing the articles on time. We could totally look into returning to our bi-weekly release plan if you would prefer that, but it doesn’t seem to be necessary at the moment.
Would you want the Mineplex Staff-Wiki Staff merge to happen?
I know that some of you are quite skeptical about this change, and worry about staff bias. I’ll make absolutely sure this won’t happen – as a bureaucrat, it is my duty to make sure our neutrality is unaffected by this change. I’ve been talking to LT regarding various ideas for almost a year now, and we’re definitely making progress! I’ll keep you all updated if everything goes well.
What of our current page expansion projects should we stick to?
Again, it is great to see that our efforts last year sparked your interest: laying the foundation for an even bigger and better Wiki has been my main goal in 2018. We’ve been able to start various projects which were never attempted before – creating pages for all kits, abilities, maps, staff members, and many more!
I’ll definitely stick to this project next year as we might be able to document every single detail of one minigame for the first time.
Are you happy with our current rules?
Everyone seems quite positive about keeping the same rules here. Unless it’s required, we probably won’t touch much the rules in the following weeks. If we were to change anything, we would probably start off by clarifying some aspects rather than adding new stuff.
Should we keep working on “random” games of the month or focus only on the available games?
Once again, a lot of you seem to appreciate the random games of the month! Considering it’s a good opportunity for us to bring back some light on old pages in order to get people to update them, we’ll surely continue with these!
Should we add more content for Bedrock Mineplex (formerly known as PE)?
It’s no big secret that ever since Bedrock was released, we’ve added close to no content for it whatsoever. This page is mainly focused on Java right now, and the majority of you – including me – doesn’t see this changing anytime soon.
I’m personally rarely playing Bedrock, so I’m constantly looking for other editors who could add some more detail to content for other platforms.
What I’m worrying about is that none of the Bedrock server’s history is documented. If we were to add Bedrock articles now, we would only be able to cite the present state of Bedrock, which makes it feel somewhat vague and inaccurate, unlike for Java where we have 6 years of balancing to look at.
Would you be interested in an expanded editing guide?
Well it looks like Nicodami and I have will have some work to do then! 100% of the votes would like to see us create a more detailed guide. We totally understand though, it is true than some of the aspects of the wiki (especially templates and wikicode) are a bit complicated at first sight. For now, you can always refer to our Manual of Style which serves as a basic introduction to our page. We’ve also released an FAQ on the Mineplex forums here.
I’ll definitely note this down as another important change we could work on this year.
Thanks for your participation in the polls! We might do them more often from now on, as there’s usually no direct feedback in the newsletter replies.
What else have we done in December?
I’ve added a base page name module, which serves as a function to make our life easier when creating templates. It can be used as a variable on any page to return the entire page name, excluding anything in parentheses.
The {{Map Infobox}} template is here! This was the last missing template for the minigame-related set of pages: Kits, Abilities and Maps. We’re technically good to create map pages now, the question if it is worth it still stands, though.
Another behind the scenes change I’ve worked on is a modification of our punishment system. Basically, it makes the staff life easier but also gives users more details on their block.
Upcoming Content
The same procedure as every year: I’ve created an outline of the History/2019 page. Maybe I can keep up with all updates this year. Remember, whenever you notice something missing, feel free to add it, or leave a notice so all readers are aware of it.
The Map Database is still in the works! We haven’t agreed on a final layout yet, so be sure to let us know what you think fits best by looking at some examples here. My personal favourite is probably the tables, as they are pretty handy, sortable by various parameters and easily modifyable in terms of design.
This month’s featured minigame is Type Wars. Being one of the classics, this article needs some love to stay consistent with all of our new templates. Perhaps you can take a few minutes to proofread it?
And that’s it for today! Thanks for reading, and as always; if you have any other suggestions for the newsletters or you just want to share your thoughts, make sure to leave a reply.
Thanks!
Newsletters | |
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2020 | Newsletter 20 • Newsletter 21 |
2019 | Newsletter 11 • Newsletter 12 • Newsletter 13 • Newsletter 14 • Newsletter 15 • Newsletter 16 • Newsletter 17 • Newsletter 18 • Newsletter 19 |
2018 | Newsletter 1 • Newsletter 2 • Newsletter 3 • Newsletter 4 • Newsletter 5 • Newsletter 6 • Newsletter 7 • Newsletter 8 • Newsletter 9 • Newsletter 10 |
2016 | Week 1 • Week 2 |