Talk:Main Page

May I inquire as to what the point of this wiki is? Is it for articles about characters, places, etc. in Middle Earth? In that case, are we going by the books, the movies, or both?--walrussurlaw


 * It's for all of those. I don't know the best way of splitting information about the books and movies. Perhaps separate namespaces would help where information differs between the two? Angela 16:22, 12 Apr 2005 (EDT)

There's already a Tolkien Wiki at http://www.thetolkienwiki.org/ would it be very naughty to copy and paste articles from it? There doesn't seem to be much activity there? Jack 20:50, 11 Apr 2005 (EDT)


 * You can not copy anything from there without the prior permission of the person who wrote it. Their front page says:
 * All articles written here, remain property of their authors and must only be used on fair terms and with permission of the persons involved. 


 * Please don't copy anything from any site where the content is not GFDL. See the tolkien forums for details of other Tolkien sites which had to be taken down after copyright issues. Angela 16:22, 12 Apr 2005 (EDT)

Let's get creative
Hello, folks! Not much activity here, despite hundreds of registered members and over 400 views of the homepage.

I've created a couple of pages, and I hope the people who started this can help to tap the interest obviously out there in cyberspace.

As so little has happened, I may create a few more "guidance" pages.

Robin Patterson 02:58, 14 May 2005 (UTC) in Middle-earth


 * This surprised me also. LOTR is so popular(especially nowadays with the movies and all), its surprising we dont have much activity.  A suggestion that could help this wiki grow in numbers would be to advertise, even if its just telling your friends about it.  If everyone started spreading the word, im sure people would get interested.

WhiteRhino 04:45, 18 Sep 2005 (UTC)

Characters
I have created a characters page, so there are loads of empty links. Get writing everyone --Darth Mantus 16:07, 24 May 2005 (UTC)

logo
We need to create a good logo for this wikicity. I was thinking a picture of the 'One Ring' would be good. Any suggestions? --Darth Mantus 12:07, 25 May 2005 (UTC)


 * Here's one I created --GandalfTheBlack 17:31, 16 Jul 2005 (UTC) [[Image:Wiki tmp.png]]


 * That is several thousand percent better than what we have now. Robin Patterson 00:35, 17 Jul 2005 (UTC)


 * I've moved this to Image:Wiki.png so it can be the logo. I'm not very good at making images properly transparent though, so it still doesn't look great on a dark background.


 * Angela (talk) 09:25, 17 Jul 2005 (UTC)

Bootstrapping
I think it would be a good idea to bootstrap this wiki with some of the articles currently found in wikipedia. Some examples that would be useful:

you get the point. Wikipedia is GFDL so that shouldn't be a problem. unless of course you want to do everything from scatch here... 82.93.70.118 04:45, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)
 * Frodo Baggins
 * Sauron
 * Mordor
 * Middle-earth
 * hobbit
 * Gandalf
 * Gollum


 * Good idea indeed. I've taken a few phrases from Wikipedia and summarised paragraphs here and there, while leaving links to WP so that other contributors can easily find more facts. Have to be a bit careful about "attribution" - ask User:Angela. Robin Patterson 09:14, 30 Jun 2005 (UTC)


 * Later: now organised for proper copying procedures. Robin Patterson 22:29, 7 Sep 2005 (UTC)

Movie images missing on various pages
Hello. I've noticed there are quite a few images from the Peter Jackson movies which were uploaded and linked to, but appear to have been deleted (resulting in a missing image link). Is there some concern with copyrights for these images?


 * Hello, "Careax". I'm not aware of any that had images removed, but there may be some. Most of the "missing images" arise from my copying of pages from Wikipedia, where the images were specific to that Wikpedia and will have to be added to this site's image collection unless there's a clever different way to incorporate them. I'm not very competent with images. Robin Patterson 22:29, 7 Sep 2005 (UTC)

Another Tolkien Wiki
Hello folks, I don't want to sound like I'm advertising but, I just wanted to let you know I started a Tolkien wiki using mediawiki a while back over at TolkienGateway.net. Seems kind of pointless to have two mediawikis on the same topic, but more power to you if you guys want to stay here. Let the race to the most edits begin ;)


 * There are indeed a goodly number of sites devoted to the works of that scholarly gentleman, with at least three of them using MediaWiki. This one concentrates on LOTR. Good luck with yours. Robin Patterson 06:10, 12 Sep 2005 (UTC)

Picture of Frodo on front page
Hi, my name is Terry Foote, and I help out on Wikicities with a few things, among them is copyright issues with images. I had to take down the image of Frodo on the front page because it didn't have a photo attribution or copyright tag. Please go to this[|this link] to chose the most appropriate tag. Also, please be sure to do this for all other images on your Wiki. Feel free to contact me on my talk page with any questions, or send me an email at terry@wikia.com. Thanks! Terry Foote 20:22, 8 Nov 2005 (UTC)
 * Are you an admin Terry?--Darth Mantus 13:01, 12 Nov 2005 (UTC)

New pages
Can we have something on the main page so that we can see what new pages have been created (I know there is a recent changes pages but it would be good to have it on the main page as well, like Wookiepedia )--Darth Mantus 16:58, 22 Dec 2005 (UTC)


 * You find it by clicking on "special pages" to the left and then "new pages" Gimli 05:45, 14 Jan 2006 (UTC)

Featured article/picture
Should we have a featured picture/article for the main page like they do on wikipedia and some other wikicities? Maybe there could be voting for featured article status? Gimli 04:25, 10 February 2006 (UTC)
 * Good Idea--Darth Mantus 13:14, 12 February 2006 (UTC)

Format and Tags
Over at Wookieepedia, they have tags to help "Wookieefy" articles, basically make them "in universe". Looking at some articles, such as Thingol, have what appears to be text taken from another wiki: "Elu Thingol is the King of Doriath and High King of the Sindar, a fictional character of Middle-earth, created by J. R. R. Tolkien. " Over at Wookiepedia, they put info like this in a "Background" or "Behind the Scenes" section, and that is where it talks about influences, character development by authors, etc. Should there be something like that for these articles? And should there be tags that can be added to articles, saying "this needs more work"? I've seen the "stub" tag, but are there others? Duke Starhopper 00:43, 28 February 2006 (UTC)


 * There is the tag to add to articles from wikipedia. perhaps you could create other tags you wanted?  The "fictional character of Middle-earth" bit should be removed from articles Gimli 02:02, 28 February 2006 (UTC)


 * That's what I figured. I've been doing my best to fix those I have been seeing.  Duke Starhopper 17:34, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

Tense
I am working under the assumption that we are using the Past Tense, since Tolkien's works take place in ages before our own. Am I correct in this assumption? Duke Starhopper 01:21, 28 February 2006 (UTC)


 * Yes is there a problem?--Darth Mantus 18:58, 1 March 2006 (UTC)


 * No, just making sure, I came across a present tense article and fixed it, just wanted to make sure I was doing the right thing... Duke Starhopper 00:46, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

redesign
I have redesigned the main page based on wookiepedia's, hope its ok. I also thought we should start having some community things like Featured pictures, Featured article, Collaboration of the Month, Articles for Deletion and a DidYouKnow template for the main page. The featured article/pic and collaboration will be democratically chosen, I just thought I should get the ball rolling and start off by choosing a couple Gimli 23:37, 5 March 2006 (UTC)
 * I like the idea, but I think the pictures being stacked like that take up a lot more room than if they were side-by-side. Also, the Featured Article should have a link to said article, so you can click it from there.  Duke Starhopper 22:41, 8 March 2006 (UTC)
 * Ok Ive fixed the featured article. Perhaps you would like to change Template: Featured pictures to how you want them orgainised? There is also a thing they do on wikipedia portals to have the page marked with 27 so that you can have 31 pictures automatically rotate each month which might be an idea. Gimli 08:13, 9 March 2006 (UTC)
 * Ive now organised the featured articles the way they do at some wikiportals so they rotate each day, if youre wondering what the new templates such as Template:F/8 etc is. Some might still need some editing and adding thumbnail images to Gimli 14:30, 10 March 2006 (UTC)
 * I have no idea how to design layouts. I can try to learn, but mainly I'm an editor (language, not design :) )  I was thinking something like a 2 x 2, or 3 x 2, so they're mainly side by side, rather than a vertical row of many.  Duke Starhopper 22:56, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

Deletion
How do you bring up a deletion vote for an article? I don't know that much about Wikipolicy. Duke Starhopper 22:57, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

Redirect
How do you make one "article" redirect to another (is in a search)? For example, make Grima redirect to Grima Wormtongue. Duke Starhopper 23:28, 22 March 2006 (UTC)