Main Page
The Stratics Community Wiki
The Stratics Community Wiki is the next evolution in data collection here at Stratics. Historically data was collected, collated, and published by a group of highly dedicated individuals passionate about various MMORPGs that Stratics provided coverage of. This system while excellent wasn't perfect, as dedicated as they were, the individuals publishing data were limited to the time they had available to collect and organize information and community collaboration wasn't fluid or easily achievable.
Contents
Purpose of the Stratics Community Wiki
The Stratics Community Wiki is being built with several objectives in mind, among which are accessibility of data, ease of use, organization, thoroughness, and speed in updating data.
Accessibility, Ease of Use, and Organization of Data
The primary purpose of the Stratics Community Wiki is to make collected information about MMORPGs open and accessible for anyone to contribute to, update, or make use of within the scope of the creative commons license associated with the wiki. Any registered valid member of Stratics in good standing, has access to edit and update the content of the community wiki, removing many of the limitations which were present in the older system. By opening up the wiki to anyone we harness the power of a passionate community.
Mediawiki was chosen as a platform due to it's long term support, it has become the standard by which all other wiki platforms are measured and power sites such as Wikipedia. Due to it's popular status the simple markup language used for formatting mediawiki pages has become standardized, and excellent documentation exists allowing anyone to easily learn, opening the door for community contributions.
Mediawiki automatically supports categorization, allowing pages to be associated quickly and easily. This allows similar topics to be quickly grouped and navigated for ease of use. Augmenting this is categorization Mediawiki supports the use of Namespaces, allowing us to use one wiki to support multiple titles while keeping the data from cross linking.
The Stratics Community Wiki can be navigated through the links found on the sidebar, and through the extensive cross categorization links found throughout the Wiki.
Links Legend
Links found on Wiki pages are color coded. Below is an easy reference to each color.
Bright Blue Links are for un-visited Links to existing pages.
Dark Blue Links are for existing pages which you have visited in the past.
Red Links on pages represent links to pages that are referenced but have not yet been created. Clicking these links will take you automatically to a editor where you can create the page yourself!
Namespaces
Namespaces are use to allow the Stratics Community WIki to reuse a page name in a different context. This is necessitated in order to allow the Stratics Community Wiki to support multiple titles in the future. Ultima Online information therefore on creation must have the page title prefixed by UO:. For example if a user was to create a page for the Ultima Online create "a Skeleton" they would title the page UO:Skeleton, this would allow for the pages SO:Skeleton or SOTA:Skeleton to be created for Shards Online or Shroud of the Avatar respectively.
Currently available Prefixes and their Namespaces are:
- UO: for Ultima Online
- SO: for Legends of Aria formerly known as Shards Online
- SOTA: for Shroud of the Avatar
Remembering these prefixes is extremely useful when searching for information for a specific game, as when doing an advanced search you can select only to search within a specific namespace there by filtering out any undesirable results.
In Organizations found on multiple Titles
In the event a Guild or other In Game organization is present in multiple titles, they my create a single page in any applicable namespace and contact a Staff Member of Stratics to request page redirects in additional namespaces. An example of this would be PaxLair present in both Ultima Online and Shroud of the Avatar. After creating the page UO:PaxLair, they may request a page redirect from SOTA:PaxLair or vice versa and then only need to maintain one page for both titles.
Namespaces for additional titles can be created upon request. If you would like to have a namespace added please contact [email protected] .
History of the Stratics Community Wiki
The Stratics Community Wiki at launch is the result of over a years worth of research, development, and testing. The majority of this time was spent researching suitable technology that would allow Stratics to convert and maintain information in a manner that embraced the concepts of community involvement and interaction, while placing the least amount of demands in terms of knowledge and accessibility on potential contributors.
A Better Way
Shortly after Ron Bron purchase Stratics in 2014, the hunt was on for a more effective method for organizing and distributing data and the decision was made to go with a Wiki Format. The First attempt at this was through a Xenforo plugin which allow for the creation of a Wiki directly in the Xenforo Software that powered the Stratics Community Forums. While this system was functional in testing, and proved to be a better solution than the existing system, it left data at the mercy of Xenforo database which in the event of a catastrophic failure, or abandonment of the plugin by it's creators, would result in the potential loss of information. Other concerns were largely centered around the BBCode/Mediawiki hybrid markup language used to create pages, which at times was confusing and difficult for novice writers to adapt too.
After the community funded purchase of Stratics by the Leadership team in December of 2015, and the emergence of new technology becoming available the existing Wiki project was scrapped and a new Wiki using a bridged version of Mediawiki began it's planning phase. The benefits quickly became apparent, as now data would be stored on a separate database adding a layer of protection, and if in the future Xenforo was to become depreciated and unsuitable for Stratics continuing needs the Wiki could be ran as a standalone installation.
Implementation and Testing
After several months of planning Mediawiki was installed and bridged to the forums and alpha testing began by the Leadership team and current staff members. During this time the search for a manager for the new Wiki began and on his hiring he began designing templates and importing new data not previously available on Stratics to the new Wiki in preparation for a closed beta test phase.
In September 2016 closed Beta Testing began, on the opening of closed beta the Wiki consisted of over 10000 pages of information that had previously been unavailable on Stratics.
