Editing User talk:Firestar233

{{crickets}}

but nobody came

== User and User Talk pages for IPs ==

There really is no point to creating these for IP users (such as myself, yes), as they are not a practical/viable a means to contact a specific anonymous contributor, nor a useful 'home-page' for them to use.

Now, '42' is maybe a bit keen to tidy up, and found that you seem to be active (or at least responded to a notification about the change to your Watched page, yes?), so rightfuly that should be reversed (the merits of tagging to delete other named users will depend upon the users themselves, there are occasional spam-only (or failed spam-only!) contributors that were given User-space pages by well-meaning others, who neither know nor care). But setting IP-specific pages to delete is entirely justified. If there are any significant contributions to these, they could probably be copied somewhere else first (pages of the most significant ''named'' contributor?), yet I generally doubt that'll be a realistic consideration, overall. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.163.111|172.70.163.111]] 12:23, 1 January 2025 (UTC)
: If the pages were blank, then I might agree. I'm mostly undecided on deleting the IP addresses' user and talk pages, but ''registered'' users probably shouldn't have their pages be deleted even if they are blank. [[User:Firestar233|guess who]] ([[User talk:Firestar233|if you desire conversing]] | [[Special:Contributions/Firestar233|what i have done]]) 21:31, 1 January 2025 (UTC)
:: Some people, upon getting "page creation privileges" have tended to go around and "un-redtext" people's user-space pages (or even just make them for random users they've seen sign up that day - not realising that a vast majority of the [[Special:Log/newusers|new users]] are typically just attempts at auto-spamming that get stalled).
:: It's all a lot easier if the user concerned (the who gains the pages) hasn't made any actual editing, or whose only edits are discredited. Even if you delete them and it ''wasn't'' a totally abandoned (and never-used) account, just hadn't got around to doing anything for several years, it can be recreated as soon as the puzzled owner finds out. (Some users, recently coming into "page creation capability" have tended to try to de-RedText random contributors to article Talk pagesl; or even give [[Special:Log/newusers|recent new users]] their userspace-pages, despite most of those clearly being abortively created only for spamming purposes.)
:: I think there's a degree of consideration to take when there is some content. But what use does the content of [[User talk:108.162.212.48|a page such as this]] have? That'd be a decision I'd happily leave to the administrator who eventually decideds to ''look at'' the "please delete this page" tag. They can look at the contributors, what they contribute, decided whether to: a) actually delete it (and, if there's reason to, they can always 'undelete' it, but meanwhile it cleans up the openly visible site), or b) remove the tag themselves.
:: I don't think it's your job to remove "please delete" tagging from pages that you randomly find like that. If you know the user concerned, maybe. If you ''are'' the user yourself, especially. But all you're doing is leaving it in a state where someone can be equally certain that they should be tagged-to-delete (with exactly the same reasoning) and re-apply it. Mass-hot(un)catting doesn't make me think that you've even looked at the users (contributors, if any, whoever created the page in the first place, but also the 'owner', if they've ever been involved).
:: No, maybe it wasn't right '42' to mark your particular page, but... look at the actual history of pages like [[User:Danken]]. Created (probably) in error, marked for deletion when that was realised... Then you reverse that for what reason? (Not for the sake of the content.) Good intentions, yes, vs. an equal well-intent. And, personally, I'd side with (some of!) the things you untagged being more tag-worthy than not. Leaving it up to the admin(s) to work out as and when they get around to it. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.74.118|162.158.74.118]] 22:41, 1 January 2025 (UTC)

==Whaaaaaaaaa==
:Omg you know warriors and undertale!? {{unsigned|Definitely Bill Cipher|15:04, 7 January 2025}}

== Sandbox ==

Hey, what are you cooking up in your sandbox? The wikitext/code on your user page looks pretty interesting. '''[[User:42.book.addict|<span style="font-family:Cormorant Garamond;font-size:9pt;color:#A9C6CA">42.book.addict</span>]]<sup>[[User talk:42.book.addict|<span style="font-family:Cormorant Garamond;font-size:6pt;color:#516874">Talk to me!</span>]]</sup>''' 21:45, 9 January 2025 (UTC)
:I'm also wondering about this! --[[User:FaviFake|FaviFake]] ([[User talk:FaviFake|talk]]) 15:17, 20 February 2025 (UTC)
: I was trying to fight with wikitext to allow me to calculate the precise contribution score. Plainly using the contribution score extension's functions in an expression returned an error saying there was a delete character in the input, which i think was because the cscore functions evaluated after the expression and had the delete character as the default string. I tried offloading it to a template, which was my sandbox, but that didn't work so I just gave up and just updated it manually on my user page [[User:Firestar233|guess who]] ([[User talk:Firestar233|if you desire conversing]] | [[Special:Contributions/Firestar233|what i have done]]) 20:50, 20 February 2025 (UTC)

== Interested to know ==

What was the rationale behind {{diff|365435|switching wiki-italics with HTML-italics}}. I presume some context in which it was embedded, but it's not obvious where, and I'm genuinely curious. (Noting that i(talic)-tags are officially a style-only tag, with the equivalent em(phasis)-tags are now prefered where it's a semantic purpose, though identical under most circumstances and probably not worth changing.) [[Special:Contributions/172.70.160.216|172.70.160.216]] 13:40, 13 February 2025 (UTC)
:For some reason the wikitext italics didn't italicize the second page(if it was given), but the html italics italicized the second page link. [[User:Firestar233|guess who]] ([[User talk:Firestar233|if you desire conversing]] | [[Special:Contributions/Firestar233|what i have done]]) 06:53, 14 February 2025 (UTC)

...additionally, I have for a while been pondering adding (optional) <nowiki>[[Category:Comics sharing name|<category sorting key>]]</nowiki> to the {{template|distinguish}} template. Invoke by <nowiki>{{distinguish|9654: Similar Names|Similar Name 8765}}</nowiki>, on top the (hypothetical) "8765:Similar Name" page and <nowiki>{{distinguish|8765: Similar Name|Similar Name 9654}}</nowiki> on its counterpart, auto-populating [[:Category:Comics sharing name]] without having to seperately remember to add. (When it's a number-vs-title coincidence, "|[[2: Petit Trees (sketch)|2 Petit Trees]]" vs "|[[2614: 2|2 #2614]]", perhaps.

I've yet to work out what might happen to the category if this was done for (e.g.) [[2411: 1/10,000th Scale World]], [[2412: 1/100,000th Scale World]] and [[2417: 1/1,000th Scale World]], if adding a {{template|distinguish}} for both 'others' on all three (one could retain the current 'manual' category of <nowiki>[[Category:Comics sharing name|1/10]]</nowiki> and stick to the current only-the-target parameters at the top).

Thoughts? [[Special:Contributions/172.71.178.78|172.71.178.78]] 14:18, 13 February 2025 (UTC)
:Not the intended recipient but love the idea! --[[User:FaviFake|FaviFake]] ([[User talk:FaviFake|talk]]) 17:36, 13 February 2025 (UTC)
:i made it add the category when the common parameter is given (even if empty, where it doesn't add the sorting key). [[User:Firestar233|guess who]] ([[User talk:Firestar233|if you desire conversing]] | [[Special:Contributions/Firestar233|what i have done]]) 23:33, 14 February 2025 (UTC)

== can you elaborate on "if you have something to add, add it to the main explanation"? ==

That was my first edit.  You didnt delete it, but commented it out. I thought I had seen alternate explanations in other articles.  Are you just asking me to remove the "===Alternative Explanation===" header?


[[Special:Contributions/172.69.23.94|172.69.23.94]] 14:49, 18 February 2025 (UTC)
(Note:I have no idea why its asking for 4 tildes)
: There generally aren't "alternative explanation" sections in the other pages (If there are, i don't remember seeing any under a new section). From what I've seen, different takes are typically worked into the main section instead of a separate section at the bad i.e. just before where the table is now. I just commented it out because i was tired and didn't feel like incorporating it myself (i'm pretty bad at it), and deleting it would just require future editors to look at the history to see what was removed. It was essentially just me putting the workload on other people.
:Though, looking back at it now, it seems like what you wrote kind of missed the point of the comic, as it is pretty clearly referring to the website wirecutter instead of the wirecutter tool.
:the <nowiki>~~~~</nowiki> is what inserts your signature in the talk pages, so that the comments will be attributed to you. [[User:Firestar233|guess who]] ([[User talk:Firestar233|if you desire conversing]] | [[Special:Contributions/Firestar233|what i have done]]) 06:31, 20 February 2025 (UTC)

== Fixing the {{tl|notice}} and {{tl|notice2}} templates ==

Hey Firestar233! Since you seem to like templates, I wanted to let you know that the {{tl|notice}} and {{tl|notice2}} templates (and thus also the {{tl|incomplete}} and {{tl|incomplete transcript}} templates, which use {{tl|notice}}) sometimes break when a link is used. I'm not sure what causes them to break (for example, [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=15:_Just_Alerting_You&oldid=366502 here it breaks], but [[ibm_hc_2|here it works]], even though the latter has more links), but I thought you might be interested in this. --[[User:FaviFake|FaviFake]] ([[User talk:FaviFake|talk]]) 09:22, 23 February 2025 (UTC)
:It's not an error with those templates, or at least not one that can be solved ''by'' those templates.
:The presence of the "=" character n the link URLs gets interpreted by the template-parser as making a variable that is called <everything in that paramater to the left of the (first) equals sign> contain paramater data that is <everything to the right of it>. And, in doing so, it no longer recognises that 'N'th parameter as <parameter N> and containing <the whole lot>, but leaves it blank and thus (as is errorchecked by the template) cause for the complaint.
:In short, if you try to use an equals-character, it'll disrupt things from your expectations.
:The answer, though, is probably quite simple. Replace any (and all!) instances of "=" with {{template|{{=}}}}, that means that it doesn't trip up the backend wikimedia handling/whatever it is.
: So, instead of...
:*"...|something like foo=bar|..." looking like a <nowiki>{{{something like foo}}}</nowiki> uselessly containing "bar"...
: We have...
:*"...|something like foo<nowiki>{{=}}</nowiki>bar|..." properly giving an appropriate '<N>'th parameter <nowiki>{{{<N>}}}</nowiki> containing "something like foo=bar"...
:I also ''really'' personally dislike the kind of URLs that have 'highlight text' additions. If you could have used the link without any of the ":~:text=" part, and onward, you'd have been Ok. And I wouldn't have been wondering if you were yet another one of those cases where the person posting the URL doesn't even bother to check that they're using the least complicated and perhaps non-browser-specific version of a URL. ;) [[Special:Contributions/162.158.33.215|162.158.33.215]] 20:16, 23 February 2025 (UTC)
:: That does seem to be the issue, with unescaped equal signs. [[User:Firestar233|guess who]] ([[User talk:Firestar233|if you desire conversing]] | [[Special:Contributions/Firestar233|what i have done]]) 04:41, 24 February 2025 (UTC)

:: Thanks! This makes sense.
 And I wouldn't have been wondering if you were yet another one of those cases where the person posting the URL doesn't even bother to check that they're using the least complicated and perhaps non-browser-specific version of a URL. ;)
::Well, the reason I went out of my way to select the text, right click, and click "Copy link to highlight" is because without it, the user would be directed to the full page of 10-20 comics instead of the specific comic in question. If you notice, I've done this for every "original caption" and "original title" link for the early comics, like [[1]], [[3]], [[10]], etc.
::I'm not sure if it's compatible with all browsers, but even if it's not and doesn't worsen the UX of a non–compatible browser–user, then i believe we should keep using these "longer links". --[[User:FaviFake|FaviFake]] ([[User talk:FaviFake|talk]]) 16:28, 24 February 2025 (UTC)

== Identity Theft ==

Wasn't me who added that tag, but I've a feeling that it was a reference to the potential (corporate?) identity theft that the theft of TinyURL would allow. (Yeah, a marginal reference, at best, but just to give you my casual thoughts on the matter. Certainly I'm not going to unrevert it back.) [[Special:Contributions/172.68.205.92|172.68.205.92]] 20:55, 24 February 2025 (UTC)

(Added to that, that Phones category in Rapid Test Results probably references the "Good Cell Signal". Again, I would say too tenuous to matter.) [[Special:Contributions/172.68.205.92|172.68.205.92]] 21:10, 24 February 2025 (UTC)