Talk: Style guide

Italics

I think we need to add a part that says that Bedrock Edition and Legacy Console Edition should not italicized. While other versions need. Skylord wars (talk) 00:06, 2 February 2018 (UTC)

 Support--Madminecrafter12^{Talk • Contributions} 14:13, 24 February 2018 (UTC)

Well on the main page, most editions name are already italicized. Well, I still think "Legacy Console Edition" should be named as "Legacy Console Edition". See Talk:Legacy Console Edition#Italic words--Skylord wars (talk) 14:26, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

Move the page to Minecraft Wiki:Manual of Style?

Hello. I think this page to be moved to Minecraft Wiki:Manual of Style to match Wikipedia's title, instead of Minecraft Wiki:Style guide. A redirect can also be created from MCW:Style guide. --Philip57sundfors (talk) 12:00, 7 March 2018 (UTC)

 Oppose, style guide suits our wiki better. We're a small wiki with not as many people as the big wikipedia, where they need many regulations to deal with so many editors. Here, we just have a guide and that's formal enough IMO. We don't want to dictate and scare away our new editors haha. – Jack McKalling [ ] 13:27, 7 March 2018 (UTC)

 Oppose: Seems like a change just for the sake of changing it. Style guide is clear enough to state the purpose of this page. –KnightMiner · (t) 17:47, 7 March 2018 (UTC)

 Meh. The exact name isn't important here; both "style guide" and "manual of style" communicate the page's purpose just fine, so there's really no strong argument for changing from one to the other. Redirect the redlink and move on. 「ディノ奴千？！」^{? · ☎ Dinoguy1000} 23:09, 7 March 2018 (UTC)

 Done Redirect from redlink created. – Jack McKalling [ ] 23:21, 7 March 2018 (UTC)

 Slightly oppose. In my opinion either way works fine, but if the title is already Style Guide, I don't see any major benefit of moving it.-- Madminecrafter12^{T • C} 00:51, 8 March 2018 (UTC)

 Oppose “Manual” seems to sound too vast, like the UNIX man system including hundreds of pages. Plus it doesn’t look like a rational change; on both stances I agree with others. Also, “it is done on Wikipedia” can’t be a good argument by itself. — BabylonAS (talk | ru.Wiki Admin) 17:00, 28 March 2018 (UTC)

References

This wiki doesn't really have any rules regarding references; editors usually just add plaintext links. I find that this doesn't look that good and also doesn't give the reader much information on the page. I have created a few templates ({{Article}}, {{SnapshotLink}}, {{Link}}) that are loosely based off of Wikipedia's citing templates, but I seem to be mostly the only one using them (although {{Article}} is used on all recent snapshot pages). I just think there need to be some guidelines of linking references. Thoughts? – Nixinova 07:00, 21 April 2018 (UTC)

Suggestion: strongly recommend to use the most specific template possible with plaintext links as a last resort. --AttemptToCallNil (report bug, view backtrace) 08:00, 21 April 2018 (UTC)

New textures in images

When adding screenshots to an article, make sure the screenshots use vanilla textures and UI. Screenshots that use custom texturepacks, UI mods and other custom content are not allowed.

Does this apply to the new textures? – Nixinova 07:10, 21 April 2018 (UTC)

The rule does not apply when the purpose of the screenshot in question is to demonstrate said custom content. This seems to be mentioned immediately after the sentence you quoted: "This does not apply to articles covering mods."

Yes, when this rule was created, nobody could have thought content may be officially developed as an alternative to default data. Even if this case isn't an exact match (the new textures are intended to eventually replace the old ones, and are temporarily offered as a beta release), I think we should clarify this guideline a bit. --AttemptToCallNil (report bug, view backtrace) 07:57, 21 April 2018 (UTC)

“Weaknesses” sections

On some new pages such as Dolphin there are “Weaknesses” sections. I propose that these sections be disallowed, as tutorial information is generally excluded from normal pages. The Blobs 22:44, 10 May 2018 (UTC)

Definitely part of non-tutorial information in this case. It describes properties of the mob, it doesn't provide instructions as to what to do. In other words, Trolls are weak to fire, taking 25% more fire damage. is fine by itself, and should be in the article. However, if someone added So don't forget to include your fire mage in your party whenever you're going through troll territory! after the first sentence, that should be removed as "tutorial content". (Yes, these examples aren't Minecraft related at all, but the concept still applies.) --AttemptToCallNil (report bug, view backtrace) 22:57, 10 May 2018 (UTC)

Removal of the "American English" mention

Hi!

I would like to suggest to remove the following line: "Pages on the wiki should use American English unless the in-game name is British English. For instance, “colour” should be “color”, and “centre” should be “center”. " And probably replace it with something way more appropriate, like the text of the help wiki: gphelp:Gamepedia_Help_Wiki:Tutorial/Keep_in_mind#National_varieties_of_English. I really think however that it should be clear that the in-game terms of en_US are the one to use on the Wiki, as they are the official language of the game.

Every user should feel free to write the way they learned to, and there is no good reason why to require users to use rules from a particular place or country in the world. We should also avoid to "correct" something good in another region, simply for the sake of correcting.

Of course, consistency is something important, and we should perhaps state that we should spell words (like "center"/"centre") the same way everywhere in a same article. (wp:Manual_of_Style#National_varieties_of_English is a good reference on that matter).

JSBM (talk) 01:50, 27 June 2018 (UTC)

The in game name part should not be removed as you really need to follow the in game name. The strange thing is, although Minecraft (game) uses American English as their default, Minecraft.net uses British English instead. I  Agree with removing the line saying that the wiki should be using American English. skylord_wars (talk) 02:07, 27 June 2018 (UTC)

I'm sorry, but to me it makes the most sense to use something consistent throughout the wiki, and American English makes more sense because it's what the game uses. I weakly think that the statement is okay the way it is. However, I do think that it's not really useful to make an edit if it's just to change British English to American English. It kind of just clogs up page histories and recent changes, with little benefit. Honestly, I personally am not really picky on the exact variety of English used - all users can almost always read and understand the other variet(y)(ies) so it doesn't really matter that much imo. I am definitely open to other ideas, and depending on what other responses this gets, I may change my mind about this as well. If we do remove the line, though, which I don't hold any strong objections to, that we should specify when what variety should be used, or if it matters at all.-- Madminecrafter12^{Talk to me} 02:12, 27 June 2018 (UTC)

You can see wikipedia:MOS:ENGVAR as an example. Article names of in game things should use in game name, which is by default American English. Though the contents of the article may contain some bits of other English variants. Tutorial pages should instead be not be restricted. Plus, the English wiki is made up of many English-speaking people, but not all of them are American. Redirects can be made if there are different names. That is why I support the statement to remove that line. We should also add a line redirecting to Gamepedia's Manual of Style. skylord_wars (talk) 02:31, 27 June 2018 (UTC)

 Neutral. Either a potential for potato chip wars or seemingly arbitrary, yet strictly enforced common standard. --AttemptToCallNil (report bug, view backtrace) 13:02, 27 June 2018 (UTC)

 Oppose. As opposed to Wikipedia, the Minecraft Wiki has no region-specific articles, so we can't decide on what variety of English to use based on the Article contents. If we remove that guideline, that would mean that the wiki no longer follows a uniform variety of English. I don't see any profit in that, at all. All it would do is causing confusion. As American English is Minecraft's default language, it only makes sense to have this wiki written in American English. | violine1101^(Talk) 17:11, 6 July 2018 (UTC)

 Oppose: Consistency in writing style is the goal, and so yes, some single standard has to be adopted. – Sealbudsman talk | contribs 21:48, 6 July 2018 (UTC)

 Oppose with same arguments as mentioned above. Although I'd personally prefer British English as a language, the wiki makes the most sense in American English, and it needs to be specifically one or the other. We're working together with too many people already to allow for such useless conflicts as minor spelling disagreements. Which is what would arrise if we removed that line. There are more important things in life (and here on the wiki) than personal preferences in spelling. – Jack McKalling [ ] 09:33, 10 July 2018 (UTC)

Bedrock Edition: is it an official name?

While listed here on the Mojang website as a specifier, few other official sources use this term; in particular, this page doesn't. Editions based on the Bedrock code platform are now simply marketed as Minecraft.

A slow edit war is ongoing where instances of Bedrock Edition in articles are italicized and deitalicized. Even the style guide itself had one undiscussed edit which was reverted.

I think we need to determine whether "Bedrock Edition" is to be considered an official name, and consequently, whether it should be capitalized in articles. --AttemptToCallNil (report bug, view backtrace) 11:14, 2 September 2018 (UTC)

 Support for keeping Bedrock Edition as the official name. The different editions for different all run on the Bedrock engine and are all commonly known as Bedrock Edition as a consequence. As Bedrock is the official name for that engine, it makes sense to simply have all those versions (or editions, so you like) known as Bedrock Edition officially.

I may also note that the Minecraft.net help page is for individual versions on different platforms, as it would be rather difficult to write an article which addresses all platforms running Bedrock Edition (what applies for an Android device usually does not go for a Windows device and vice versa; same goes for the consoles). —DarkShadowTNT (t ♦ c) 11:38, 2 September 2018 (UTC)

@Marioprotvi and Giorgosarv18: Both of you: please stop reverting each other's edits that change Bedrock Edition to italicized or not, until there is a consensus here. You are welcome to comment here, but if the edit war continues, page protection or even short user blocks may be necessary.-- Madminecrafter12^{Talk to me} 14:26, 2 September 2018 (UTC)

As I recall from this discussion, the official name was either just "Minecraft" or "Minecraft (Bedrock)". For the sake of consistency its been called Bedrock Edition on the wiki, but that is not as official as Java Edition or Console Edition. Basically, in most cases they want to drop the "Bedrock" and call it just Minecraft, but for our cases we need the clarification. Since we now have a Mojang link calling it "Bedrock Edition", I say it seems pretty official when referring to all of Bedrock as a whole. –KnightMiner · (t) 20:06, 2 September 2018 (UTC)

Yes, I  Support considering "Bedrock Edition" as an official name. It is not wrong to call each Minecraft edition on those individual platforms, instances of "Bedrock Edition". We're comparing full-product titles with software titles here, which not always correlate, due to a product sometimes containing embedded software, hence the confusion. I would definitely consider Bedrock (in the form of a game engine), as embeded software here. And as such, it carries the name of "Bedrock Edition" as a product name separate from the minecraft game (e.g. "Minecraft for Windows 10") that it is exposing. The reason for that is that Bedrock itself, is unquestionably a product of its own, has its own title, and in that way has nothing to do with the games released for the different platforms that use its codebase. Just like how all Samsung smartphones use "Android" operating system, and that "Android" itself is a name that has nothing to do with Samsung. The only difference being that Bedrock was developed by the same company that released the games.

And all this talk about official names and what not, questioning what should be formatted in italics or not, has everything to do with Bedrock being a "Major works of art and artifice", as wikipedia seems to call it. Although not listed there, a game engine meets all the described criteria to be a "major works", and in a different wording, is essentially a product on its own, regardless of it not having been publicly used as a standalone one. It has its own development space, name, version system and codebase, all completely independent from the publicly released products that carry the name "Minecraft" or "Minecraft (Bedrock Edition)". So it should (or could, I don't care about the result of this discussion), be identified as an official title that needs italics. Because this formatting has nothing to do with whether Mojang has officially announced or released Bedrock as a separate product, or whether them using the name is considered "official" or not. – Jack McKalling [ ] 12:56, 3 September 2018 (UTC)

For reference, "software other than games" (game engines are not games) is listed in wikipedia:MOS:TITLES#Neither, where such titles are stated as not to be italicized or put in quotes. --AttemptToCallNil (report bug, view backtrace) 13:54, 3 September 2018 (UTC)

But although correct that a game engine is not a game, it absolutely is game software. So it is arguable whether game engines should be defined by that category, and one could very well argue that it should even be renamed to "Software other than game software". It's not really "proof" that game engine names should not be italicized. – Jack McKalling [ ] 14:08, 3 September 2018 (UTC)

That's not what it says. The proposed change makes quite little sense; it looks like it's done to fit a viewpoint on a very specific question; also, this is definitely not de facto practiced on en.wikipedia. --AttemptToCallNil (report bug, view backtrace) 14:23, 3 September 2018 (UTC)

In this blog post, mojang specifically says "Bedrock Version", so it should be italic. (possible change Bedrock Edition to Bedrock Version) FVbico (talk) 15:46, 5 September 2018 (UTC)

I don't really see advantages to have the official names in italics. With that in mind, I suggest to remove the entire Italics section, instead. JSBM (talk) 15:56, 5 September 2018 (UTC)

 Support: There is absolutely no point in italiczing official titles, the Style Guide doesn’t even specify why they should be italiczed. --Giorgosarv18 (^talk/_contribs) 19:46, 5 September 2018 (UTC)

Sorry, but I have to  Disagree. Bedrock Edition is the name we use "officially" within the wiki, but that's irrelevant to the question. As we learned in English class in grade school, the correct usage of italics (for the relevant purposes) is governed by the rules of English composition. Specifically, a term is written in italics when it names a "complete body of work" such as a book, periodical, or software product. There is no body of work named Bedrock Edition — that's just an abstract idea we invented to aggregate the various Bedrock versions — so italicizing it is misleading and incorrect. I can see how editors might have thought the italics have something to do with "officialness", but there's no rule, or even custom, for expressing such a status in prose. – Auldrick (talk · contribs) 17:54, 27 September 2018 (UTC)

I understand your reasoning. I was also not referring to officialness but indeed to that complete body of work you're talking about. I just don't agree with you that Bedrock is not a complete body of work (or "major work of art" as I like to call it). Just because we can't download a "Bedrock Edition" does not mean it isn't a full software product. – Jack McKalling [ ] 18:40, 27 September 2018 (UTC)

Actually, it does mean that. "Bedrock Edition" doesn't refer to any particular software product, it refers to a collection of them, each of which is titled Minecraft with an X Edition subtitle. But an aggregation can also be considered a body of work (e.g. under copyright law), so your argument is still valid. My objection is that this collection either has no name or is named Minecraft; it isn't named "Bedrock Edition". I would also like to note that when we were searching for a term of art for this collection, Mojang asked us not to use "Bedrock Edition" for fear that people would think it was a product and be frustrated when they couldn't find it for sale. We chose to use it anyway because we couldn't think of a better alternative, and it was specifically mentioned that Mojang's concern could be satisfied by not italicizing it. I don't think we should thwart that goal for the sake of a consistent reference style, especially one that's misleading. We should instead be emphasizing to our readers that Bedrock Edition is not an actual edition, it's a version. (My earlier attempts to promote this idea were widely rejected, and it won't surprise me if my present argument is as well.) – Auldrick (talk · contribs) 20:54, 27 September 2018 (UTC)

Ok you've convinced me, I revoke my previous opinion, and I'd like to think of one such alternative to work around those concerns before I formulate a new one. – Jack McKalling [ ] 20:58, 27 September 2018 (UTC)

New proposal

A new idea I just had for working around the italicizing problem, is by changing the name of Bedrock Edition to just "Bedrock editions". No italics, but plural. Lowercase "editions" because it isn't one product. Forget it's an engine, as we need to refer to specifically the collection of multiple platform adaptations of the game. Anywhere we're referring to Bedrock in an article, rephrase it to refer to the collection of editions rather than a single product, and remember that for instance "Education Edition" is an one of the "Bedrock editions". Modify templates like {{only}} and {{exclusive}} to use this naming (in their display) while still using "bedrock" as a key (in the parameters). Never refer to "Bedrock Edition" anywhere at all, but delete that name and refer to the collection of editions that use this game engine instead of referring to the engine (name) itself. Rename Bedrock Edition to the new name and keep redirect. Update Bedrock edition. Did I miss anything? What you guys think? – Jack McKalling [ ] 22:57, 27 September 2018 (UTC)

Is the same approach applicable to the term "Legacy Console Edition"? --AttemptToCallNil (report bug, view backtrace) 04:11, 28 September 2018 (UTC)

Good idea, "Legacy Console editions" sounds good to me. – Jack McKalling [ ] 07:26, 28 September 2018 (UTC)

Do we need to capitalize "Console"? (e: or "Legacy"?) --AttemptToCallNil (report bug, view backtrace) 08:29, 28 September 2018 (UTC)

I think it would be "legacy console editions," all lowercase. – Sealbudsman talk | contribs 18:50, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

I'd love to see us use "(the) Bedrock editions", and to link only [[Bedrock]] (i.e. not [[Bedrock edition]]s) to emphasize even more that it's not a single edition. However, it's been done this way so long that I think Bedrock Edition already has a firmly entrenched meaning in the public mind, and we should be cautious about how far we deviate from how the public conceives it (even though it was the wiki, more than anything else, that planted the seed). I don't claim to have the answer to that, I'm just suggesting that we should consider it as a factor. – Auldrick (talk · contribs) 15:04, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

Well, eventually people get used to change. Most people don't call poppies "roses" anymore for instance. – Jack McKalling [ ] 15:08, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

I believe that even if it goes against the public grain to a degree, it is still proper that the wiki be a force that corrects misconceptions in whatever way. – Sealbudsman talk | contribs 18:50, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

I think you have the right idea. Perhaps even the article should be called Bedrock editions, which would more reflect its multiple nature. – Sealbudsman talk | contribs 18:50, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

I  Support this proposal; as you said, it's not 1 version, but several, it's not an edition but a codebase, so bedrock editions makes much more sense.

Also seeing the lack of activity, I feel like this idea could be started, but I'd wait until other admins agree with me here. FVbico (talk) 14:40, 7 March 2019 (UTC)