thunderforce
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Posts posted by thunderforce
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On 3/21/2024 at 11:42 AM, Dacy said:
"Zero evidence" ignores the fact that there were differences between some of the directory entries and the wiki entries.
That's not evidence of malice. (On the face of it, it would be extraordinary if there weren't such differences; people make mistakes, passcodes change, base themes change.)
On 3/21/2024 at 11:42 AM, Dacy said:"Zero evidence" ignores the plea on the wiki to not change other people's base listings. I suppose the person who decided to put that into the wiki just did so on a whim?
Well, they certainly didn't do it shortly after reverting any kind of apparently malicious change; that's clear from the history; so I think the most reasonable explanation is that they did it preemptively - and probably not to prevent malicious editing, because why would a malicious editor pay any attention to a polite notice asking them not to do it?
On 3/21/2024 at 11:42 AM, Dacy said:I have said that I don't know for sure that there were malicious entry changes in the wiki
And I have said (speaking as someone who has now reviewed basically every edit on all five pages) that I have no evidence of any such, so unless you can find some, I suggest we proceed on the basis that it's never happened.
On 3/21/2024 at 11:42 AM, Dacy said:You refuse to accept that we've seen what we've seen.
That's simply not true. What I have been saying all along is that I have seen no evidence of malicious edits to base lists on the wiki. If you have seen evidence of malicious edits to the wiki, show it to me! The entire editing history is there. (But please remember the last time you did, it turned out a) it wasn't malicious and b) I'd already examined that specific example and shown that it was obviously not malicious in this very thread). If you haven't, then since I've said precisely nothing about what you've seen happen to the directory, I'm obviously not disputing anything you've seen.
Furthermore more and more of what you write seems to have no actual relationship to a disagreement over the content of the wiki. We agree that you will review any edits that have been made in the normal way, add them to your directory, and only then overwrite the wiki's table. We (presumably) agree that if someone _does_ make a malicious edit to the wiki, that procedure will overwrite it.
As far as I can see the only actual disagreement (in terms of what the page should actually have written on it) is whether the comment in the source should say "Bases are most easily updated ..." or "You may find it easier to ...".
Since the first of these statements is not actually known to be true for any given editor (and it seems very likely for at least some editors it is false), and since your apparent rationale for it is a problem that there is no evidence for and that the procedure we do agree on would fix, it seems obvious that we should prefer the second. Please at least try to address this question in any reply.
On 3/21/2024 at 11:42 AM, Dacy said:I guess you'll just have to live without comprehension
Generally it's best that you discuss the contents of pages, not the character of other editors.
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11 hours ago, Dacy said:
I said it was your choice.
I don't propose to remove them either, so I'm not sure what choice I'm making here.
At this point, as far as I can make out, your entire rationale for wanting changes to go through you is malicious editing, in spite of the fact that there is zero evidence that this ever happened. That doesn't make any sense to me.
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21 hours ago, Dacy said:
This was in response to your suggestion to viewers of the page as to how and where they should edit. Apparently, when you make a comment and leave it on the source page, that's okay, but if we did it, it's not.
You didn't do it. Perhaps you don't understand what is meant by a comment?
On my proposed version of the page,
<!-- If you are adding a base by editing the wiki, recommend adding it at the top to make it easier for the CRs to copy the information into their base directory. You may find it easier to follow the instructions in External Links to add your base to the CRs' directory. They will add it here shortly. -->appears when you edit the page. This is a comment. It isn't shown to people just viewing the page. That's the distinction here. You have never added a comment.
21 hours ago, Dacy said:Here's an example of an edit that BlackSpectre fixed: 19:36, 25 December 2022 BlackSpectre talk contribs m 4,096 bytes +527 Fixed a bunch of other broken links, passcodes, and text. Someone had copied the Costmic Transport passcode onto every copy link. That is just one example on the first history I checked.
Yes. If you actually read this thread you will find that those passcodes were added by BlackSpectre an hour before that. It wasn't malicious at all - it was just an error on their part which they rapidly corrected.
21 hours ago, Dacy said:And we've asserted this numerous times as the biggest part of the reason we redid this and want to maintain protections over editing, and you simply refuse to accept any of it, asserting time and time again, against any evidence, that there were no malicious edits on the wiki.
That's because there isn't actually any evidence. There's been one suggested case which turned out to be a simple error.
Furthermore, if someone was to make a malicious change, you'd detect it when you reviewed changes since the last directory upload, something you already said you intend to do.
21 hours ago, Dacy said:We have not said so, and in fact, if anyone wants to help make sure the content is accurate and up to date, we're happy to include them. But conversely, it should be obvious that every facet of our contribution to the wiki should not have to go through you.
You have in fact said that changes have to go through you; you've said that to make changes you should be contacted and
QuoteNote this table will be overwritten periodically by the CRs with a fresh copy from the directory.
A reasonable person reading that would conclude that changes added normally would be overwritten.
It's not the case that every facet of your contribution has to go through me - obviously not since your version of the page is _still up_.
21 hours ago, Dacy said:Bases are most easily updated in the base directory [link], to keep the identifying tags consistent and easily searchable. To update in this way, follow the link or contact CR @Dacy or CR @Easter Bunny to submit a base to the directory, or to update a base that has missing information.
How about "It may be easier to update bases in the base directory ..." ? It's not at all clear to me that it is "most easy" for a wiki editor to chase off somewhere else.
21 hours ago, Dacy said:the other option could be no lists on the wiki
I'm not sure that option is available. You can't unilaterally remove them.
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20 hours ago, Dacy said:
That is from the previous wiki
It's not, no - the Paragon Wiki didn't have it (or, as far as I can see, pages of this kind at all, so I'm a little confused about this). It was added to the Homecoming Wiki in January 2023.
(However, tl;dr - maybe skip to the end, I hope we can reach an agreement.)
20 hours ago, Dacy said:I don't oppose losing it, but it illustrates that this has been a problem, and I see no reason why it would not continue to be so. I will admit that I don't know if there were malicious wiki edits
It hasn't been a problem at all; as discussed above, there don't seem to have been any malicious wiki base list edits ever, even in the 2 years before that warning was added.
20 hours ago, Dacy said:I will admit to frustration here. Do you recognize at all that this is our area of expertise? That perhaps we have knowledge and experience you do not?
Obviously I appreciate you have a lot of information about bases, yes, but that is not the same as saying that you should declare that all changes to a page should go through you. Uninventive and SaphirantCross know far more about running City of Heroes on Linux than I do, but that doesn't mean they can do that with https://homecoming.wiki/w/index.php?title=City_of_Heroes_on_Linux.
20 hours ago, Dacy said:It's much easier to do a bulk copy paste than to individually edit the wiki, and we know it's correct.
That wouldn't change in the scenario I envisage. As far as I can see all that would change is that occasionally you'd have to copy a manual edit into your directory - very occasionally, perhaps once every 2 months.
20 hours ago, Dacy said:(And what happened to "I also in general don't think it's appropriate to have editing instructions on the page"?)
Er... a comment in the source doesn't appear to an ordinary user viewing the page. It's only visible to people editing it. That's an appropriate place to have editing instructions.
20 hours ago, Dacy said:I do not know if this is your intent, but it's felt like you don't want us to be here, you don't want us editing the wiki
I don't want you (or anyone) asserting external control over any page on the wiki. If you don't do that, I'm perfectly happy for you to edit it. To have this additional information effects a great improvement - I certainly don't object to _that_.
20 hours ago, Dacy said:I propose a compromise. As I said already, EB is out as far as editing the wiki goes, and I am willing to promise that I will monitor for changes/input to the wiki directory that is apart from entries to our directory. Is there a way to make that easier and get notifications from changes to a particular section of the wiki? That would certainly mean I could immediately take whatever action is needed. We will remove the warning about losing anything entered because of the downloads that will be done; however, we also will not encourage people to edit on the wiki by telling them where to place a new base entry.
You can add pages to your "watchlist" (and I expect any page you edit is added by default) by clicking the star at the top right, next to View history. In Preferences you can set "Email me when a page or a file on my watchlist is changed". However, part of what I'm saying is I hope even that's not necessary. If you're checking the history immediately before a bulk upload, it's extremely easy then and there to see what (if anything) has been changed (with the "Compare Selected Revisions" button).
To be honest, my aim in writing "If you are adding a base by editing the wiki, recommend adding it at the top to make it easier for the CRs to copy the information into their base directory" was not to _encourage_ making manual edits, but to make sure if they were made, they all ended up in the same place to make it easier to copy the information. Hence I have no great attachment to that wording. How about "Rather than adding a base to this list, you may find it easier to follow the instructions in External Links to add your base to the CRs' directory. They will add it here shortly" ?
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On 3/14/2024 at 11:28 PM, Dacy said:
And WE are asking people to NOT add bases on the wiki, but direct additions to us.
I appreciate we want different things. That is why we are having a discussion where we can explain _why_ we want what we want and where other interested editors can weigh in. One of us might change their mind - just as although my preferred option was to remove all ERP bases, hence the edit removing one as "clearly inappropriate" and me being a bit embarrassed about letting it slip in to begin with, when Draeth Darkstar chimed in supporting what you proposed, I said we might as well go with that.[1] Failing that we might agree to abide by a third party's decision (eg, AboveTheChemist) or see what higher authority says.
However, I'm not clear why you are so opposed to it. It's the work of a moment to check the revision history, something you intend to do anyway - and since (for example) seven bases were added to the Everlasting list (by far the biggest) in 2023, I really don't see that capturing information from manual edits is going to cause you any particular problems.
From my point of view I don't think it is appropriate for any editor to assert external control over any page. Suppose I think (and it's likely) that I am the largest contributor (post-2019) to the Player's Guide to the Cities. Perhaps I would find it more convenient to edit it on my computer and have people send me updates. However, I would not even consider putting a a note on it saying people should send me updates and that I might overwrite any changes they make.
I also in general don't think it's appropriate to have editing instructions on the page, rather than as comments on the source. The former is shown to users who just want to use the page. The editing instructions should be seen only by editors. (Indeed, the existing text saying "Please do not remove or recategorize other people's base postings" should probably be moved.)
I've edited https://homecoming.wiki/wiki/User:Thunderforce/Reunion_Bases so the comment in the source now says: "If you are adding a base by editing the wiki, recommend adding it at the top to make it easier for the CRs to copy the information into their base directory. You may find it easier to follow the instructions in External Links to add your base to the CRs' directory. They will add it here shortly." I think that's a reasonable way to make that option visible to editors, but without any suggestion that editing the page in the normal way is forbidden.
10 hours ago, AboveTheChemist said:But I also appreciate the issues that you've had to deal with in terms of keeping the base info updated, consolidated, and free from malicious influence
However, given the discussion above, I'm not aware of any malicious base edits on the Wiki, so I don't think continuing to permit ordinary editing opens the door to that particular issue.
[1] I appreciate there has been a "no ERP bases" rule declared so this is moot, but it's an example of the kind of way one might hope this discussion works.
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On 3/12/2024 at 11:58 PM, thunderforce said:
As I understand it CR Dacy and EB propose to keep a separate document of ERP bases, and for the wiki to list them but instead of a base code appearing on the Wiki, a link to said document would appear.
No-one objected to that, so we'll go with it.
https://homecoming.wiki/wiki/User:Thunderforce/Reunion_Bases is an example of how I think my remaining concern should be addressed. The external links have moved to the bottom of the document, and there's no claim that the data will just be overwritten (because I think the CR should be, and I hope will be, checking for on-wiki changes before a fresh upload). I've added a comment asking people adding bases on-wiki to add them at the top of the list to make that easier.
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More generally the edits seem to suggest that the Google document is the sole source and that changes on the wiki may simply be overwritten. What follows is a set of suggestions and/or questions about what the wiki's policy should be.
I think it would be best if people could continue to add their bases to the wiki, and more generally that the wiki's editors can decide amongst themselves what appears on the wiki.
I would expect that someone doing a bulk upload would first review the history of the page (this would not be an onerous task, it is rare that these pages are edited and might be rarer now) and deal with any changes, presumably adding them to the Google document.
(If someone wants their base to appear only in the wiki, we should make provision for that, but I think we can cross that bridge in the unlikely event we come to it).
Re ERP bases, it's not clear what our policy should be. We could do anything from "list them all, we are unofficial" to "we should not knowingly mention any base where players are likely to hear or see violations of the Code of Conduct". As I understand it CR Dacy and EB propose to keep a separate document of ERP bases, and for the wiki to list them but instead of a base code appearing on the Wiki, a link to said document would appear.
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I've just had time to review the base lists as they are now.
Mostly things seem to be working well. However, I notice the following oddities, all on Everlasting.
One base had a still-working invite code, but now is "DM owner for invite". As far as I know this is because the owner has asked for that change. While we could say that the old code is in wiki history and if the owner wants it removed from the wiki they should change it, this seems harmless.
One base was removed. The invite code works, but you come in stuck in the scenery. I see no problem with removing it.
SUCCESS-29174 was removed. It still works. The base refers to the creator's struggle with addiction.
One base has been added which is obviously vore-themed.
A base I removed (after, I regret, three years) because it was "ERP-focused" has been re-added. However, it now seems to be a fairly ordinary nightclub base.
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I (a rogue) was just trying to help someone on Reunion (two bluesiders, leader was a hero) stuck on this. They had me join a team and started the mission from Ouro. They saw the spawns as friendly, but I saw them as hostile and could attack them. I think the unusual thing is that a hero could select the mission from Ouro at all but those are the additional details I know.
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I've just found https://homecoming.wiki/w/index.php?title=Everlasting_Base_List&oldid=289794
As such I owe @Easter Bunnyand @Dacyan apology; this was a bulk upload (and furthermore one with some very inappropriate content which I have now removed). I am sorry.
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18 minutes ago, BlackSpectre said:
In all honesty I have no idea about specifics. It’s been almost a year. But all my edits are stored in the wiki for all to see. I might have been thinking about other pages from other shards as well. Meh.
That's the only base list you have ever edited. I think it must be that - it's about a year ago and the only edit you've made to the base list that corrects a bunch of passcodes (and you write "someone had copied the Costmic Transport passcode onto every copy link"). In that case I have some good news and some bad news:
Good: the spurious passcodes were only up for about an hour (on Christmas Day) so it's unlikely they had much impact on users.
Also good: the edit adding the spurious passcodes was almost certainly not malicious, but a case of editor error. Because...
maybe not so good - the editor in question was you and obviously you weren't malicious.
I don't know what can have happened but (for example) maybe you added the command but, before you realised you'd made a mistake, there was some kind of RL interruption that meant you came back an hour later and forgot exactly what you were doing.
17 minutes ago, Dacy said:the sheet info is well controlled, the wiki is not
Given the above, I'm not actually aware of any malicious edits to the wiki base lists. I review most edits (I didn't catch this because the bogus passcodes were only up for an hour) so I'd like to think I would know if that happened with any significant frequency.
I think it's best to have the sort of check AtC discusses just as a belt-and-braces thing, not least to be sure conversion works as expected. Also anyone doing a replacement of the entire table after changes to the sheet needs to be somewhat careful that someone hasn't added their base to the wiki and not to the sheet since the last upload was done.
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1 hour ago, BlackSpectre said:
In my view, this is the real problem. I saw this on the Excelsior page, and since I pretty much live on Excelsior, I edited the page, reorganized it, and fixed all of the malicious code. There were several where someone had replaced the base access code with a different base access code... presumably to get more traffic compared to other bases listed.
Is what you're referring to fixing here the removal of COSMICTRANSPORT-6608 done in edit https://homecoming.wiki/w/index.php?title=Excelsior_Base_List&type=revision&diff=309771&oldid=309770 ?
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14 hours ago, Dacy said:
thunderforce, there should be no bases on the wiki that are not on our docs. Easter Bunny already collected and added all the bases we could find. We don't yet have all the updating done, as we are hoping the owners will do that, but the codes and bases and owners, if listed anywhere, should be listed in our document. And all of the codes have been checked.
On reflection it seems like this would work fine. It's not like the wiki base lists get edited so frequently that it will be hard to check for recent edits before doing a fresh upload from the document. I sha'n't do what I proposed above, since I think you're right that it's unnecessary.
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On 2/9/2024 at 5:31 PM, AboveTheChemist said:
I took the liberty of grabbing the base code data for Reunion from the Google doc and turning it into a wiki table on the Reunion talk page. You can check it out here: https://homecoming.wiki/wiki/Talk:Reunion_Base_List
I propose to do a bit of scripting (not really necessary for Reunion's half-dozen bases) to compare it with the wiki list and see which bases are missing, then (if any) to check if they are defunct. If there are any non-defunct bases not in the spreadsheet (and I propose to create one for that test case) I think they might, if the spreadsheet upload process otherwise works, be at the bottom of the table on the wiki so they don't constantly get stomped by spreadsheet uploads.
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Thank you, and I'm sorry that I'm so consistently abrasive. Let's not speak of it again.
I appreciate you only want to improve things (and I see Dacy is already cleaning out old info about base editing, which is excellent). I think Above The Chemist is suggesting a reasonable way to upload your information (but I think we have to be a bit careful that this doesn't remove functioning bases that happen not to be in your spreadsheet). I can see there's something faintly absurd about you maintaining a list of 600-odd bases while the Wiki jealously guards its list of a few dozen.
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You cannot, no, control access to a page. Any editor can edit any page; other editors can watch that page; some editors (like me) try to review recent changes and I like to think that by and large a decent job is done to correct the very occasional cases of vandalism or spam, and to copy edit additions.
In view of EB's cracks about me ("Congrats! A valiant armchair victory. You have bravely corrected us. We tremble at your feet.") I don't really want to engage further today,
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9 minutes ago, Dacy said:
Because nowhere does it say "Edit if the wiki editors agree" and HOW do we get the "wiki editors" to agree?? Nothing is very clear here. I have no idea who these editors are, how to contact them, or what information they need beyond "this is incorrect and we want to fix it with carefully researched data with controlled input access for veracity". Can we edit, or not? If not, it would be helpful to have something of this process for submission for approval listed somewhere.
This club which you have joined is one place to seek agreement. Wiki talk pages are another. The "editors" are anyone who can edit the wiki, and you are welcome to be one; you can just sign up. I don't speak for everyone, but I am reasonably sure it would be fine to edit the list of bases on the wiki to make it more accurate. I am less sure it would be fine to delete it, and I personally would oppose such an idea.
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3 minutes ago, Easter Bunny said:
Congrats! A valiant armchair victory. You have bravely corrected us. We tremble at your feet.
I don't speak for everyone, but I think it would be more useful if you didn't employ this sort of rhetorical nonsense.
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There is no "committee"; the wiki is run by consensus of its editors.
14 minutes ago, Dacy said:When told something isn't right, your proposed solution is "just get rid of it"?
Er, no - Easter Bunny removed all base information from the wiki (ie, getting rid of it). I reverted it and said that should only be done if the wiki editors agreed.
14 minutes ago, Dacy said:EB made an account. Put up a page fixing multiple errors.
I'm afraid that is not true. They removed all base information from the wiki. They did not create a new page.
Anyone can see https://homecoming.wiki/wiki/Special:RecentChanges and https://homecoming.wiki/wiki/Special:Contributions/The_Easter_Bunny and see that, other than https://homecoming.wiki/wiki/User:The_Easter_Bunny they have not "put up a page".
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I'm not sure it's that old - it is the newest wiki for Homecoming - but if it's not that important to you I suggest you might usefully delete your contributions to this thread (in the club for discussing improvements to the wiki) and leave the club which you seem to have joined for the specific purpose of commenting on this subject.
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51 minutes ago, Aalya said:
Hey there! I think what @Easter Bunnyis referring to is the Everlasting Yellow Pages. As far as anyone can tell, no specific person or group is maintaining it.
That's unfortunate, but I don't see any reason to suppose the Wiki "was/is fed from a separate Google Doc that has become pretty severely corrupted and compromised by player misuse", although it is helpful that you have identified the supposed document.
36 minutes ago, Aalya said:Thank you for all that you have done so far with this wiki. I can tell that you have put a lot of time and effort into it. I quickly skimmed through and some major errors immediately jumped out at me with just a cursory glance:
Well, I certainly haven't, and more generally we are standing on the shoulders of the Paragon Wiki from live. I encourage you to register an account and fix these errors.
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43 minutes ago, Easter Bunny said:
There are literal hundreds of bases that our on both versions. In the " _unofficial_ HC wiki" I have personal bases I made that i did not submit to the wiki. I submitted them on the Google Doc. CR Dacy has bases on the wiki that she did not input there. AalyaSenai has bases on the wiki she did not input. Mitsiyan. BBBadger. I could absolutely go on, but that seems unnecessary.
That speaks to me that there was an upload from the Google Doc to the wiki.I don't see why. It seems more likely that individual wiki editors have added entries for bases they happened to find useful. In particular, as already mentioned, there is nothing in the edit history on the wiki to suggest a bulk upload. I can find edits that add two or three bases at most.
QuoteBut my concern is for the community, It is not helpful for anyone to have two diverse locations to input bases. I am seeking to condense them into one clear source
Then feel free to persuade the wiki editors that all base information should be kept off the wiki.
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I wonder also if you could elaborate on how "the information listed on the HC Wiki" (by which I think you mean the _unofficial_ HC wiki) "was/is fed from a separate Google Doc that has become pretty severely corrupted and compromised by player misuse"? I try to stay reasonably aware of recent edits and as far as I remember people mostly just add bases, not "corrupt and compromise" listings.
Having reviewed the edit history on https://homecoming.wiki/w/index.php?title=Excelsior_Base_List&action=history I can see little reason to believe there's been a bulk upload of any kind, although I could be wrong.
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I'm not sure what you mean by a "scare".
Any page on the wiki is maintained by the contributors to the wiki. You are at liberty to correct the information on the wiki and I encourage you to do it. Personally I would suggest not allowing Google to snoop on information about bases (or anything), but you do you; if you want to add a link to the Google document and other wiki contributors don't object, be my guest.
I would prefer that information on the wiki is maintained by contributors to the wiki by mutual consensus.
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XP reducers from START (P2W) Vendor
in Suggestions & Feedback
Posted
I'm posting this here after a conversation with Conviction on Discord. It would be helpful to me, and I hope it would not be too much work, for the START/P2W Vendor to offer XP reductions in the same way she offers XP boosters (but without attendant bonus influence). This would let people on shards with long-term bonus XP like Reunion play the game at a more normal pace, or more generally let people who want to collect all the arcs (etc) level more slowly without the slightly awkward feeling of turning off XP altogether.