User:Phlip/Aprilween - Revision history

The Cheatbot: autoreplace: Homestar Runner (Flash cartoon) → Homestar Runner (body of work)

The Cheatbot — Fri, 30 Mar 2007 08:07:56 GMT

autoreplace: Homestar Runner (Flash cartoon) → Homestar Runner (body of work)

← Older revision		Revision as of 08:07, 30 March 2007
Line 173:		Line 173:
	Comments on the [[HRWiki:Main Page Talk Archive 11#WikkiTikkiTavi\|talk page]], comments on the [[Forum:7609\|forum]]… pretty even mix of people who really thought we'd changed back, people who got the joke and were playing along and people who were angry about the change (because yes, it's not quite as pretty as MonoBook, in that it doesn't have as much eye-candy… though I personally like minimalist things like this). [[User:JoeyDay\|JoeyDay]] came up with the idea, on the spur of the moment, to claim it was because of server load… which is half true, 'Tavi ''does'' have a lower server load than MediaWiki does. This wasn't really planned, but it worked rather well.		Comments on the [[HRWiki:Main Page Talk Archive 11#WikkiTikkiTavi\|talk page]], comments on the [[Forum:7609\|forum]]… pretty even mix of people who really thought we'd changed back, people who got the joke and were playing along and people who were angry about the change (because yes, it's not quite as pretty as MonoBook, in that it doesn't have as much eye-candy… though I personally like minimalist things like this). [[User:JoeyDay\|JoeyDay]] came up with the idea, on the spur of the moment, to claim it was because of server load… which is half true, 'Tavi ''does'' have a lower server load than MediaWiki does. This wasn't really planned, but it worked rather well.

-	There were even the few people (I won't name names, to protect the guilty) who decided it would be a good idea to prove how clever they were and spoil the fun for everyone by proving that we were still using MediaWiki. It isn't really all that hard if you know where to look – the source code is the usual MediaWiki format (not the 'Tavi format, which used <code>(())</code> for links instead of <code>[[]]</code>, for example), pages like [[Special:Search]] look a lot different to [http://old.hrwiki.org/index.php?action=find&find=stuff the old Search page], MediaWiki even has a [[Special:Version]] page. Perhaps the most telling is that 'Tavi didn't have Discussion pages. And then there's the more obscure, such as the version line at the bottom saying we were powered by WikkiTikkiTavi version [[Tooty-two\|0.2T]]. Of course, not everyone knew about these, but they aren't that hard to find if you know where to look, and it doesn't show how clever you are to point them out to people – it just makes you look like a jerk for gloating and spoiling people's fun. There were also the people who were angry that we'd even consider doing an April Fool's day trick. These were sometimes even the same people who were anxiously waiting to see what April Fool's content the actual [[Homestar Runner (~~Flash cartoon~~)\|Homestar Runner]] site would have. This confuses me… ''of course'' it was an April Fool's joke – if you were able to spot that it was MediaWiki, that fact should have been clear. Of course we weren't going to drop the pretence just because you'd figured it out, if everyone stopped doing an April Fool's joke just because ''someone'' figured it out, no-one would ever finish them. The plan was to keep it up until April 2, then revert everything back and explain it all. I find it strange that people would quit the wiki in a flaming troll-y fit, just because we pulled a one-day gag on you all. Are you going to stop going to homestarrunner.com because they turned everything upside down for one day? Or stop going to google because they have a fake [http://www.google.com/romance/ Romance Search] page?	+	There were even the few people (I won't name names, to protect the guilty) who decided it would be a good idea to prove how clever they were and spoil the fun for everyone by proving that we were still using MediaWiki. It isn't really all that hard if you know where to look – the source code is the usual MediaWiki format (not the 'Tavi format, which used <code>(())</code> for links instead of <code>[[]]</code>, for example), pages like [[Special:Search]] look a lot different to [http://old.hrwiki.org/index.php?action=find&find=stuff the old Search page], MediaWiki even has a [[Special:Version]] page. Perhaps the most telling is that 'Tavi didn't have Discussion pages. And then there's the more obscure, such as the version line at the bottom saying we were powered by WikkiTikkiTavi version [[Tooty-two\|0.2T]]. Of course, not everyone knew about these, but they aren't that hard to find if you know where to look, and it doesn't show how clever you are to point them out to people – it just makes you look like a jerk for gloating and spoiling people's fun. There were also the people who were angry that we'd even consider doing an April Fool's day trick. These were sometimes even the same people who were anxiously waiting to see what April Fool's content the actual [[Homestar Runner (body of work)\|Homestar Runner]] site would have. This confuses me… ''of course'' it was an April Fool's joke – if you were able to spot that it was MediaWiki, that fact should have been clear. Of course we weren't going to drop the pretence just because you'd figured it out, if everyone stopped doing an April Fool's joke just because ''someone'' figured it out, no-one would ever finish them. The plan was to keep it up until April 2, then revert everything back and explain it all. I find it strange that people would quit the wiki in a flaming troll-y fit, just because we pulled a one-day gag on you all. Are you going to stop going to homestarrunner.com because they turned everything upside down for one day? Or stop going to google because they have a fake [http://www.google.com/romance/ Romance Search] page?

	Um, OK, that turned into more of a rant than I had hoped…<br>		Um, OK, that turned into more of a rant than I had hoped…<br>

It's dot com: fixed per talk page

It's dot com — Fri, 23 Jun 2006 14:21:37 GMT

fixed per talk page

← Older revision		Revision as of 14:21, 23 June 2006
Line 4:		Line 4:
	==Definitions==		==Definitions==
	First, some technical terms, since many people got them confused:		First, some technical terms, since many people got them confused:
-	;MediaWiki:The wiki software we use. The wiki software we have used for quite a while. And the wiki software that we were using during the April Fool's day joke, ~~ragardless~~ of what we claimed while it was happening.	+	;MediaWiki:The wiki software we use. The wiki software we have used for quite a while. And the wiki software that we were using during the April Fool's day joke, regardless of what we claimed while it was happening.
	;MonoBook:The usual skin for the site. The one with the "article", "discussion", "edit", etc. links up the top, the toolboxes on the left… the default MediaWiki skin, and the only one that really works on our site.		;MonoBook:The usual skin for the site. The one with the "article", "discussion", "edit", etc. links up the top, the toolboxes on the left… the default MediaWiki skin, and the only one that really works on our site.
	;WikkiTikkiTavi:Another wiki software, that we used [[Old:HomestarRunnerWiki\|a while ago]] before we changed due to its not being very scalable to larger wikis. It was a very simplistic wiki, without many of the features that MediaWiki has.		;WikkiTikkiTavi:Another wiki software, that we used [[Old:HomestarRunnerWiki\|a while ago]] before we changed due to its not being very scalable to larger wikis. It was a very simplistic wiki, without many of the features that MediaWiki has.
	;TaviStyle:A MediaWiki skin that [[User:It's dot com\|It's dot com]] made, that looks very much like WikkiTikkiTavi. It was this that made the site look so much like 'Tavi during the day.		;TaviStyle:A MediaWiki skin that [[User:It's dot com\|It's dot com]] made, that looks very much like WikkiTikkiTavi. It was this that made the site look so much like 'Tavi during the day.
-	Unfortunately, if we simply installed TaviStyle on the wiki, it wouldn't have worked – everyone would have to go into their preferences to change it. We wanted it to be already changed for everyone. So we replaced the MonoBook skin with the TaviStyle skin. So even though it was called MonoBook in the preferences, it was actually TaviStyle. Also, the other skins in the preferences are no less part of MediaWiki than MonoBook is, they ~~are~~ merely do not work properly on our wiki.	+	Unfortunately, if we simply installed TaviStyle on the wiki, it wouldn't have worked – everyone would have to go into their preferences to change it. We wanted it to be already changed for everyone. So we replaced the MonoBook skin with the TaviStyle skin. So even though it was called MonoBook in the preferences, it was actually TaviStyle. Also, the other skins in the preferences are no less a part of MediaWiki than MonoBook is, they merely do not work properly on our wiki.

	==The story==		==The story==

It's dot com: +poll

It's dot com — Fri, 26 May 2006 16:17:32 GMT

+poll

← Older revision		Revision as of 16:17, 26 May 2006
Line 189:		Line 189:
	*[http://www.hrwiki.org/index.php?title=HRWiki:Aprilween_Main_Page&useskin=tavistyle The post-skin April Fool's Main Page (the one we actually used)]		*[http://www.hrwiki.org/index.php?title=HRWiki:Aprilween_Main_Page&useskin=tavistyle The post-skin April Fool's Main Page (the one we actually used)]
	*[[Forum:7609\|forum thread re: Aprilween]]		*[[Forum:7609\|forum thread re: Aprilween]]
		+	*[[Forum:7639\|forum poll re: Aprilween]]

It's dot com: fix

It's dot com — Thu, 06 Apr 2006 20:39:52 GMT

fix

← Older revision		Revision as of 20:39, 6 April 2006
Line 161:		Line 161:
	I knuckled down and made [http://www.hrwiki.org/index.php?title=HRWiki:Aprilween_Main_Page&oldid=299252 a page] that looked pretty much exactly like the [[Old:HomestarRunnerWiki\|old wiki mainpage]] (with a few CSS enhancements to get it to look right – make the red links, remove the "external link" icons and so on – these aren't visible in this archived version. Just trust me that it looked pretty much exactly like it). Then I wrote an ugly JavaScript hack (and I do mean ugly) that would hide all of the usual MediaWiki toolboxes and banners and such – basically it moved the page out of the content area and put it on the bottom, then just hid everything else. It worked, and it would mean that the Main Page would look like 'Tavi, and every other page would look like MediaWiki (so as soon as you clicked a link, you'd get the joke).		I knuckled down and made [http://www.hrwiki.org/index.php?title=HRWiki:Aprilween_Main_Page&oldid=299252 a page] that looked pretty much exactly like the [[Old:HomestarRunnerWiki\|old wiki mainpage]] (with a few CSS enhancements to get it to look right – make the red links, remove the "external link" icons and so on – these aren't visible in this archived version. Just trust me that it looked pretty much exactly like it). Then I wrote an ugly JavaScript hack (and I do mean ugly) that would hide all of the usual MediaWiki toolboxes and banners and such – basically it moved the page out of the content area and put it on the bottom, then just hid everything else. It worked, and it would mean that the Main Page would look like 'Tavi, and every other page would look like MediaWiki (so as soon as you clicked a link, you'd get the joke).

-	Then, [[User:It's dot com\|It's dot com]] got the idea of making another MediaWiki skin, based on the skin [http://www.hrwiki.org/index.php?title=Main_Page&useskin=nostalgia Nostalgia], that would look like 'Tavi. The idea had been thrown around a bit, but it was generally decided that it would be too much effort. Luckly for us, Dot com never uses "too much effort" and "coding stuff for the wiki" in the same ~~sentance~~. Seriously, that guy's amazing. He set it all up so that we wouldn't need to put the 'Tavi-like red links in the [http://www.hrwiki.org/index.php?title=HRWiki:Aprilween_Main_Page&useskin=tavistyle final Main Page], and we wouldn't need my ugly ugly JavaScript hack. Plus, if you went to any other page, it would still look like 'Tavi. Apart from the occasional suggestions, he did it pretty much by himself (and very quickly, too).	+	Then, [[User:It's dot com\|It's dot com]] got the idea of making another MediaWiki skin, based on the skin [http://www.hrwiki.org/index.php?title=Main_Page&useskin=nostalgia Nostalgia], that would look like 'Tavi. The idea had been thrown around a bit, but it was generally decided that it would be too much effort. Luckly for us, Dot com never uses "too much effort" and "coding stuff for the wiki" in the same sentence. Seriously, that guy's amazing. He set it all up so that we wouldn't need to put the 'Tavi-like red links in the [http://www.hrwiki.org/index.php?title=HRWiki:Aprilween_Main_Page&useskin=tavistyle final Main Page], and we wouldn't need my ugly ugly JavaScript hack. Plus, if you went to any other page, it would still look like 'Tavi. Apart from the occasional suggestions, he did it pretty much by himself (and very quickly, too).

	In the meantime, I worked on adding the "What's New" section to the Main Page. Simply including our current {{tl\|whatsnew}} template wasn't going to be any good – it didn't blend in well with the rest of the page. But we didn't want the users to think that we'd reverted to the old database too – we still had all of the current toons, including any April Fool's content that [[The Brothers Chaps]] made (which they [[April Fool's 2006\|did]]). So we needed a new banner. Using [[Wikipedia:The GIMP\|The GIMP]], I put together [http://www.hrwiki.org/images/whatsnew-ideas/ a whole bunch] of different ideas for the "What's New" banner, we eventually chose [http://www.hrwiki.org/images/whatsnew-banner.png Pom Pom].		In the meantime, I worked on adding the "What's New" section to the Main Page. Simply including our current {{tl\|whatsnew}} template wasn't going to be any good – it didn't blend in well with the rest of the page. But we didn't want the users to think that we'd reverted to the old database too – we still had all of the current toons, including any April Fool's content that [[The Brothers Chaps]] made (which they [[April Fool's 2006\|did]]). So we needed a new banner. Using [[Wikipedia:The GIMP\|The GIMP]], I put together [http://www.hrwiki.org/images/whatsnew-ideas/ a whole bunch] of different ideas for the "What's New" banner, we eventually chose [http://www.hrwiki.org/images/whatsnew-banner.png Pom Pom].

It's dot com: a few capital letters

It's dot com — Thu, 06 Apr 2006 20:33:39 GMT

a few capital letters

Phlip at 06:28, 4 April 2006

Phlip — Tue, 04 Apr 2006 06:28:19 GMT

← Older revision		Revision as of 06:28, 4 April 2006
Line 1:		Line 1:
		+	__FORCETOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
	''Don't bother to read this if you're not that interested… it's more than a little bit self-indulgent.''		''Don't bother to read this if you're not that interested… it's more than a little bit self-indulgent.''

Phlip: updated (and totally overwrote whoever edit conflicted me)

Phlip — Tue, 04 Apr 2006 06:26:02 GMT

updated (and totally overwrote whoever edit conflicted me)

← Older revision		Revision as of 06:26, 4 April 2006
Line 1:		Line 1:
	''Don't bother to read this if you're not that interested… it's more than a little bit self-indulgent.''		''Don't bother to read this if you're not that interested… it's more than a little bit self-indulgent.''

-	~~----~~	+	==Definitions==
-		+
	First, some technical terms, since many people got them confused:		First, some technical terms, since many people got them confused:
	;MediaWiki:The wiki software we use. The wiki software we have used for quite a while. And the wiki software that we were using during the April Fool's day joke, ragardless of what we claimed while it was happening.		;MediaWiki:The wiki software we use. The wiki software we have used for quite a while. And the wiki software that we were using during the April Fool's day joke, ragardless of what we claimed while it was happening.
Line 10:		Line 9:
	Unfortunately, if we simply installed Tavistyle on the wiki, it wouldn't have worked – everyone would have to go into their preferences to change it. We wanted it to be already changed for everyone. So we replaced the Monobook skin with the Tavistyle skin. So even though it was called Monobook in the preferences, it was actually Tavistyle. Also, the other skins in the preferences are no less part of MediaWiki than Monobook is, they are merely do not work properly on our wiki.		Unfortunately, if we simply installed Tavistyle on the wiki, it wouldn't have worked – everyone would have to go into their preferences to change it. We wanted it to be already changed for everyone. So we replaced the Monobook skin with the Tavistyle skin. So even though it was called Monobook in the preferences, it was actually Tavistyle. Also, the other skins in the preferences are no less part of MediaWiki than Monobook is, they are merely do not work properly on our wiki.

-	~~----~~	+	==The story==
-		+
	Ok, so anyways, one day (March 28, to be precise), I drop into the IRC channel to see people talking about April Fool's Day. Here's how it all went down:		Ok, so anyways, one day (March 28, to be precise), I drop into the IRC channel to see people talking about April Fool's Day. Here's how it all went down:

Line 160:		Line 158:
	So as you can see, the WikkiTikkiTavi idea, and hence most of the the blame, was mine.		So as you can see, the WikkiTikkiTavi idea, and hence most of the the blame, was mine.

-	I knuckled down and made [[HRWiki:~~Aprilween Main Page\|~~a page]] that looked pretty much exactly like the [[Old:HomestarRunnerWiki\|old wiki mainpage]] (with a few CSS enhancements to get it to look right – make the red links, remove the "external link" icons and so on – these aren't visible in this archived version. Just trust me that it looked pretty much exactly like it). Then I wrote an ugly JavaScript hack (and I do mean ugly) that would hide all of the usual MediaWiki toolboxes and banners and such – basically it moved the page out of the content area and put it on the bottom, then just hid everything else. It worked, and it would mean that the Main Page would look like 'Tavi, and every other page would look like MediaWiki (so as soon as you clicked a link, you'd get the joke).	+	I knuckled down and made [http://www.hrwiki.org/index.php?title=HRWiki:Aprilween_Main_Page&oldid=299252 a page] that looked pretty much exactly like the [[Old:HomestarRunnerWiki\|old wiki mainpage]] (with a few CSS enhancements to get it to look right – make the red links, remove the "external link" icons and so on – these aren't visible in this archived version. Just trust me that it looked pretty much exactly like it). Then I wrote an ugly JavaScript hack (and I do mean ugly) that would hide all of the usual MediaWiki toolboxes and banners and such – basically it moved the page out of the content area and put it on the bottom, then just hid everything else. It worked, and it would mean that the Main Page would look like 'Tavi, and every other page would look like MediaWiki (so as soon as you clicked a link, you'd get the joke).

-	Then, [[User:It's dot com\|It's dot com]] got the idea of making another MediaWiki skin, based on the skin [http://www.hrwiki.org/index.php?title=Main_Page&useskin=nostalgia Nostalgia], that would look like 'Tavi. The idea had been thrown around a bit, but it was generally decided that it would be too much effort. Luckly for us, Dot com never uses "too much effort" and "coding stuff for the wiki" in the same sentance. Seriously, that guy's amazing. He set it all up so that we wouldn't need to put the 'Tavi-like red links in the [http://www.hrwiki.org/index.php?title=~~Main_Page~~&~~oldid~~=~~298221~~ final Main Page], and we wouldn't need my ugly ugly JavaScript hack. Plus, if you went to any other page, it would still look like 'Tavi. Apart from the occasional suggestions, he did it pretty much by himself (and very quickly, too).	+	Then, [[User:It's dot com\|It's dot com]] got the idea of making another MediaWiki skin, based on the skin [http://www.hrwiki.org/index.php?title=Main_Page&useskin=nostalgia Nostalgia], that would look like 'Tavi. The idea had been thrown around a bit, but it was generally decided that it would be too much effort. Luckly for us, Dot com never uses "too much effort" and "coding stuff for the wiki" in the same sentance. Seriously, that guy's amazing. He set it all up so that we wouldn't need to put the 'Tavi-like red links in the [http://www.hrwiki.org/index.php?title=HRWiki:Aprilween_Main_Page&useskin=tavistyle final Main Page], and we wouldn't need my ugly ugly JavaScript hack. Plus, if you went to any other page, it would still look like 'Tavi. Apart from the occasional suggestions, he did it pretty much by himself (and very quickly, too).

	In the meantime, I worked on adding the "What's New" section to the Main Page. Simply including our current {{tl\|whatsnew}} template wasn't going to be any good – it didn't blend in well with the rest of the page. But we didn't want the users to think that we'd reverted to the old database too – we still had all of the current toons, including any April Fool's content that [[The Brothers Chaps]] made (which they [[April Fool's 2006\|did]]). So we needed a new banner. Using [[Wikipedia:The GIMP\|The GIMP]], I put together [http://www.hrwiki.org/images/whatsnew-ideas/ a whole bunch] of different ideas for the "What's New" banner, we eventually chose [http://www.hrwiki.org/images/whatsnew-banner.png Pom Pom].		In the meantime, I worked on adding the "What's New" section to the Main Page. Simply including our current {{tl\|whatsnew}} template wasn't going to be any good – it didn't blend in well with the rest of the page. But we didn't want the users to think that we'd reverted to the old database too – we still had all of the current toons, including any April Fool's content that [[The Brothers Chaps]] made (which they [[April Fool's 2006\|did]]). So we needed a new banner. Using [[Wikipedia:The GIMP\|The GIMP]], I put together [http://www.hrwiki.org/images/whatsnew-ideas/ a whole bunch] of different ideas for the "What's New" banner, we eventually chose [http://www.hrwiki.org/images/whatsnew-banner.png Pom Pom].
Line 184:		Line 182:

	See you around, {{User:Phlip/sig}}		See you around, {{User:Phlip/sig}}
		+
		+	==External Links==
		+	*[[Old:HomestarRunnerWiki\|The old WikkiTikkiTavi Main Page]]
		+	*[http://www.hrwiki.org/index.php?title=HRWiki:Aprilween_Main_Page&oldid=299252 The pre-skin April Fool's Main Page]
		+	*[http://www.hrwiki.org/index.php?title=HRWiki:Aprilween_Main_Page&useskin=tavistyle The post-skin April Fool's Main Page (the one we actually used)]
		+	*[[Forum:7609\|forum thread re: Aprilween]]

Lapper: relink

Lapper — Tue, 04 Apr 2006 06:20:09 GMT

relink

← Older revision		Revision as of 06:20, 4 April 2006
Line 160:		Line 160:
	So as you can see, the WikkiTikkiTavi idea, and hence most of the the blame, was mine.		So as you can see, the WikkiTikkiTavi idea, and hence most of the the blame, was mine.

-	I knuckled down and made [[~~User~~:~~Phlip/~~Aprilween Main Page\|a page]] that looked pretty much exactly like the [[Old:HomestarRunnerWiki\|old wiki mainpage]] (with a few CSS enhancements to get it to look right – make the red links, remove the "external link" icons and so on – these aren't visible in this archived version. Just trust me that it looked pretty much exactly like it). Then I wrote an ugly JavaScript hack (and I do mean ugly) that would hide all of the usual MediaWiki toolboxes and banners and such – basically it moved the page out of the content area and put it on the bottom, then just hid everything else. It worked, and it would mean that the Main Page would look like 'Tavi, and every other page would look like MediaWiki (so as soon as you clicked a link, you'd get the joke).	+	I knuckled down and made [[HRWiki:Aprilween Main Page\|a page]] that looked pretty much exactly like the [[Old:HomestarRunnerWiki\|old wiki mainpage]] (with a few CSS enhancements to get it to look right – make the red links, remove the "external link" icons and so on – these aren't visible in this archived version. Just trust me that it looked pretty much exactly like it). Then I wrote an ugly JavaScript hack (and I do mean ugly) that would hide all of the usual MediaWiki toolboxes and banners and such – basically it moved the page out of the content area and put it on the bottom, then just hid everything else. It worked, and it would mean that the Main Page would look like 'Tavi, and every other page would look like MediaWiki (so as soon as you clicked a link, you'd get the joke).

	Then, [[User:It's dot com\|It's dot com]] got the idea of making another MediaWiki skin, based on the skin [http://www.hrwiki.org/index.php?title=Main_Page&useskin=nostalgia Nostalgia], that would look like 'Tavi. The idea had been thrown around a bit, but it was generally decided that it would be too much effort. Luckly for us, Dot com never uses "too much effort" and "coding stuff for the wiki" in the same sentance. Seriously, that guy's amazing. He set it all up so that we wouldn't need to put the 'Tavi-like red links in the [http://www.hrwiki.org/index.php?title=Main_Page&oldid=298221 final Main Page], and we wouldn't need my ugly ugly JavaScript hack. Plus, if you went to any other page, it would still look like 'Tavi. Apart from the occasional suggestions, he did it pretty much by himself (and very quickly, too).		Then, [[User:It's dot com\|It's dot com]] got the idea of making another MediaWiki skin, based on the skin [http://www.hrwiki.org/index.php?title=Main_Page&useskin=nostalgia Nostalgia], that would look like 'Tavi. The idea had been thrown around a bit, but it was generally decided that it would be too much effort. Luckly for us, Dot com never uses "too much effort" and "coding stuff for the wiki" in the same sentance. Seriously, that guy's amazing. He set it all up so that we wouldn't need to put the 'Tavi-like red links in the [http://www.hrwiki.org/index.php?title=Main_Page&oldid=298221 final Main Page], and we wouldn't need my ugly ugly JavaScript hack. Plus, if you went to any other page, it would still look like 'Tavi. Apart from the occasional suggestions, he did it pretty much by himself (and very quickly, too).

Phlip: archive'd

Phlip — Mon, 03 Apr 2006 01:52:39 GMT

archive'd

← Older revision		Revision as of 01:52, 3 April 2006
Line 172:		Line 172:
	The effect was almost immediate.		The effect was almost immediate.

-	Comments on the [[~~Talk~~:Main Page#WikkiTikkiTavi\|talk page]], comments on the [[Forum:7609\|forum]]… pretty even mix of people who really thought we'd changed back, people who got the joke and were playing along and people who were angry about the change (because yes, it's not quite as pretty as Monobook, in that it doesn't have as much eye-candy… though I personally like minimalist things like this). [[User:JoeyDay\|JoeyDay]] came up with the idea, on the spur of the moment, to claim it was because of server load… which is half true, 'Tavi ''does'' have a lower server load than MediaWiki does. This wasn't really planned, but it worked rather well.	+	Comments on the [[HRWiki:Main Page Talk Archive 11#WikkiTikkiTavi\|talk page]], comments on the [[Forum:7609\|forum]]… pretty even mix of people who really thought we'd changed back, people who got the joke and were playing along and people who were angry about the change (because yes, it's not quite as pretty as Monobook, in that it doesn't have as much eye-candy… though I personally like minimalist things like this). [[User:JoeyDay\|JoeyDay]] came up with the idea, on the spur of the moment, to claim it was because of server load… which is half true, 'Tavi ''does'' have a lower server load than MediaWiki does. This wasn't really planned, but it worked rather well.

	There were even the few people (I won't name names, to protect the guilty) who decided it would be a good idea to prove how clever they were and spoil the fun for everyone by proving that we were still using MediaWiki. It isn't really all that hard if you know where to look – the source code is the usual MediaWiki format (not the 'Tavi format, which used <code>(())</code> for links instead of <code>[[]]</code>, for example), pages like [[Special:Search]] look a lot different to [http://old.hrwiki.org/index.php?action=find&find=stuff the old Search page], MediaWiki even has a [[Special:Version]] page. Perhaps the most telling is that 'Tavi didn't have Discussion pages. And then there's the more obscure, such as the version line at the bottom saying we were powered by WikkiTikkiTavi version [[Tooty-two\|0.2T]]. Of course, not everyone knew about these, but they aren't that hard to find if you know where to look, and it doesn't show how clever you are to point them out to people – it just makes you look like a jerk for gloating and spoiling people's fun. There were also the people who were angry that we'd even consider doing an April Fool's day trick. These were sometimes even the same people who were anxiously waiting to see what April Fool's content the actual [[Homestar Runner (Flash cartoon)\|Homestar Runner]] site would have. This confuses me… ''of course'' it was an April Fool's joke – if you were able to spot that it was MediaWiki, that fact should have been clear. Of course we weren't going to drop the pretence just because you'd figured it out, if everyone stopped doing an April Fool's joke just because ''someone'' figured it out, no-one would ever finish them. The plan was to keep it up until April 2, then revert everything back and explain it all. I find it strange that people would quit the wiki in a flaming troll-y fit, just because we pulled a one-day gag on you all. Are you going to stop going to homestarrunner.com because they turned everything upside down for one day? Or stop going to google because they have a fake [http://www.google.com/romance/ Romance Search] page?		There were even the few people (I won't name names, to protect the guilty) who decided it would be a good idea to prove how clever they were and spoil the fun for everyone by proving that we were still using MediaWiki. It isn't really all that hard if you know where to look – the source code is the usual MediaWiki format (not the 'Tavi format, which used <code>(())</code> for links instead of <code>[[]]</code>, for example), pages like [[Special:Search]] look a lot different to [http://old.hrwiki.org/index.php?action=find&find=stuff the old Search page], MediaWiki even has a [[Special:Version]] page. Perhaps the most telling is that 'Tavi didn't have Discussion pages. And then there's the more obscure, such as the version line at the bottom saying we were powered by WikkiTikkiTavi version [[Tooty-two\|0.2T]]. Of course, not everyone knew about these, but they aren't that hard to find if you know where to look, and it doesn't show how clever you are to point them out to people – it just makes you look like a jerk for gloating and spoiling people's fun. There were also the people who were angry that we'd even consider doing an April Fool's day trick. These were sometimes even the same people who were anxiously waiting to see what April Fool's content the actual [[Homestar Runner (Flash cartoon)\|Homestar Runner]] site would have. This confuses me… ''of course'' it was an April Fool's joke – if you were able to spot that it was MediaWiki, that fact should have been clear. Of course we weren't going to drop the pretence just because you'd figured it out, if everyone stopped doing an April Fool's joke just because ''someone'' figured it out, no-one would ever finish them. The plan was to keep it up until April 2, then revert everything back and explain it all. I find it strange that people would quit the wiki in a flaming troll-y fit, just because we pulled a one-day gag on you all. Are you going to stop going to homestarrunner.com because they turned everything upside down for one day? Or stop going to google because they have a fake [http://www.google.com/romance/ Romance Search] page?

Phlip: explanation

Phlip — Sun, 02 Apr 2006 05:01:53 GMT

explanation

New page

''Don't bother to read this if you're not that interested… it's more than a little bit self-indulgent.''

----

First, some technical terms, since many people got them confused:
;MediaWiki:The wiki software we use. The wiki software we have used for quite a while. And the wiki software that we were using during the April Fool's day joke, ragardless of what we claimed while it was happening.
;Monobook:The usual skin for the site. The one with the "article", "discussion", "edit", etc. links up the top, the toolboxes on the left… the default MediaWiki skin, and the only one that really works on our site.
;WikkiTikkiTavi:Another wiki software, that we used [[Old:HomestarRunnerWiki|a while ago]] before we changed due to its not being very scalable to larger wikis. It was a very simplistic wiki, without many of the features that MediaWiki has.
;Tavistyle:A MediaWiki skin that [[User:It's dot com|It's dot com]] made, that looks very much like WikkiTikkiTavi. It was this that made the site look so much like 'Tavi during the day.
Unfortunately, if we simply installed Tavistyle on the wiki, it wouldn't have worked – everyone would have to go into their preferences to change it. We wanted it to be already changed for everyone. So we replaced the Monobook skin with the Tavistyle skin. So even though it was called Monobook in the preferences, it was actually Tavistyle. Also, the other skins in the preferences are no less part of MediaWiki than Monobook is, they are merely do not work properly on our wiki.

----

Ok, so anyways, one day (March 28, to be precise), I drop into the IRC channel to see people talking about April Fool's Day. Here's how it all went down:

{| style="border: none; font-family: monospace;border-collapse: collapse"
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<Dot_com>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | so, April 1 is between now and next Monday
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<Dot_com>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | are we gonna get an AF toon *and* sbemail150?
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<FireBird`>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | Yay! April Fools Day sigs!
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<Phlip>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | I'm thinking they'll do something clever and combine them into one
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<Dot_com>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | JoeyDay|school: are we celebrating the holiday as a wiki in any way?
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<Dot_com>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | or is that too unprofessional?
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<JoeyDay|school>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | Dot_com: We should put up something saying we've been bought out by Yahoo!
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<JoeyDay|school>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | Isn't Yahoo! snatching up lots of things lately?
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<Phlip>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | JoeyDay|school: how about some "unobtrusive" advertisments
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<Phlip>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | yeah, I stole the idea from KoL, but it was funny
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<JoeyDay|school>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | We should invert the color scheme.
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<JoeyDay|school>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | fuschia on green or something.
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<Dot_com>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | we could point to a different Main Page
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<Phlip>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | "This diff was brought to you by Toyota. Oh, what a feeling."
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<JoeyDay|school>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | We could say we've got inside knowledge of HR.com going under.
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<JoeyDay|school>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | Matt called me and said they're shutting down in a week.
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<Dot_com>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | JoeyDay|school: we don't want to do anything that generates even *one* email to them
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<JoeyDay|school>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | Hm, that's a good point.
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<HSRusername>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | yeah, too extreme methinks
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<FireBird`>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | I like being bought by Yahoo!
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''*''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | '''Tom39Away''' Doesn't like anykind of April 1st foolery.
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<JoeyDay|school>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | We should do up the whole scheme BBS style in fixed width font, like 1981.
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<FireBird`>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | HRWiki Premium.
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<Dot_com>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | heh
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<FireBird`>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | If H*R didn't already take it, that would be fun to do.
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<Phlip>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | maybe we should restyle the main page to look like the old wikitikitavi main page?
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<FireBird`>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | That would be fun.
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<JoeyDay|school>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | phlip: That would be cool.
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<HSRusername>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | make the "Successfully logged in" screen say you're blocked
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<JoeyDay|school>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | Or just bring the old Tavi wiki back.
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<JoeyDay|school>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | HSRusername: That would generate a lot of email.
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<Dot_com>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | I like the Tavi idea
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<Phlip>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | like revert it back to http://www.hrwiki.org/index.php?title=Main_Page&oldid=3255 or something
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<JoeyDay|school>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | HSRusername: But it would be funny.
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<HSRusername>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | maybe, unless they just tried to go to another page and realized they weren't
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<HSRusername>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | or a note on the bottom
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<JoeyDay|school>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | We could change a bunch of the system messages to crazy things.
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<Phlip>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | you mean like tbird did that one time?
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<HSRusername>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | heh
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<JoeyDay|school>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | Phlip: Heh, yeah.
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<Dot_com>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | I don't think we should change more than the front page
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<Tom39Away>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | Or we could do nothing.
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<Dot_com>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | Tom39Away: :P
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<Phlip>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | change [[MediaWiki:And]] to "or" :P
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<JoeyDay|school>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | We could put a bunch of kitten pictures up and say we're switching the whole thing to the Kitten Wiki.
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<Dot_com>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | ha ha ha
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<Tom39Away>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | Or we could do nothing.
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<Phlip>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | but yeah, we want to do something that'll be easy to do *quickly* and quick to revert when we're done though
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<FireBird`>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | "The Homestar Runner Wiki is no longer hosted here. This has now become The Kitten Wiki".
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''---''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | '''Dot_com''' is now known as '''Everybody'''
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<Phlip>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | changing vast number of pages isn't gonna do that
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''*''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | '''Everybody''' knows Tom39Away doesn't want to do anything
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''---''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | '''Everybody''' is now known as '''Dot_com'''
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''*''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | '''Tom39Away''' slaps Dot_com around with a large trout
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<JoeyDay|school>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | Is the username "Everybody" taken on the wiki?
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<JoeyDay|school>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | That's a perfect name.
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<JoeyDay|school>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | Everybody! Everybody!
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<FireBird`>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | Hey, Everybody!
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<FireBird`>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | Heh.
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<FireBird`>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | I bet it is taken.
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<JoeyDay|school>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | La dee doh dee doh!
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<Dot_com>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | http://www.hrwiki.org/index.php/User:Everybody%21
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<JoeyDay|school>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | It doesn't appear to be taken.
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<JoeyDay|school>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | Oh, with the exclamation point...
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<JoeyDay|school>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | Yep, that guy's got the perfect username.
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<Dot_com>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | Here's why I think the Tavi idea is tops: (1) it's simple; only involves one page edit, (2) it's funny, and a lot if not most people would get the joke, and (3) it still says Homestar Runner Wiki at the top
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''*''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | '''Phlip''' is working on making it look as much like 'Tavi as possible
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<Phlip>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | it'll involve two edits - one to the main page and one to monobook.js, but that's not too bad
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<Phlip>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | it's probably overboard anyways
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<Dot_com>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | can we do it without changing the monobook?
|-
| style="text-align:right;padding-right:0.5em;border-right:1px solid #666" valign="top" | '''<Phlip>''' || style="text-align:left;padding-left:0.5em" | basically hiding all the mediawiki stuff and then recreating it all in the wiki text
|}

So as you can see, the WikkiTikkiTavi idea, and hence most of the the blame, was mine.

I knuckled down and made [[User:Phlip/Aprilween Main Page|a page]] that looked pretty much exactly like the [[Old:HomestarRunnerWiki|old wiki mainpage]] (with a few CSS enhancements to get it to look right – make the red links, remove the "external link" icons and so on – these aren't visible in this archived version. Just trust me that it looked pretty much exactly like it). Then I wrote an ugly JavaScript hack (and I do mean ugly) that would hide all of the usual MediaWiki toolboxes and banners and such – basically it moved the page out of the content area and put it on the bottom, then just hid everything else. It worked, and it would mean that the Main Page would look like 'Tavi, and every other page would look like MediaWiki (so as soon as you clicked a link, you'd get the joke).

Then, [[User:It's dot com|It's dot com]] got the idea of making another MediaWiki skin, based on the skin [http://www.hrwiki.org/index.php?title=Main_Page&useskin=nostalgia Nostalgia], that would look like 'Tavi. The idea had been thrown around a bit, but it was generally decided that it would be too much effort. Luckly for us, Dot com never uses "too much effort" and "coding stuff for the wiki" in the same sentance. Seriously, that guy's amazing. He set it all up so that we wouldn't need to put the 'Tavi-like red links in the [http://www.hrwiki.org/index.php?title=Main_Page&oldid=298221 final Main Page], and we wouldn't need my ugly ugly JavaScript hack. Plus, if you went to any other page, it would still look like 'Tavi. Apart from the occasional suggestions, he did it pretty much by himself (and very quickly, too).

In the meantime, I worked on adding the "What's New" section to the Main Page. Simply including our current {{tl|whatsnew}} template wasn't going to be any good – it didn't blend in well with the rest of the page. But we didn't want the users to think that we'd reverted to the old database too – we still had all of the current toons, including any April Fool's content that [[The Brothers Chaps]] made (which they [[April Fool's 2006|did]]). So we needed a new banner. Using [[Wikipedia:The GIMP|The GIMP]], I put together [http://www.hrwiki.org/images/whatsnew-ideas/ a whole bunch] of different ideas for the "What's New" banner, we eventually chose [http://www.hrwiki.org/images/whatsnew-banner.png Pom Pom].

So then we decided we needed to test the skin. For real, on the real wiki, not on the small test wiki we'd set up to build it on. So we waited until the dead of the night, when there were no edits going on, and we pushed out the skin to the live server. It only took us 11 minutes to check everything that needed to be checked, and then put the usual Monobook skin back. It was ridiculous, and not even funny. We thought we'd gotten away with it, when tragedy struck! We'd been caught! [[User:YK|YK]] put a message on [[Talk:Main Page]], saying he'd spotted the new skin, and wanted to know if it was vandalism, hackery or an early April Fool's joke. To keep the surprise, we had to delete his edits from the page… we talked to him though, and he was cool with it. He even [http://www.hrwiki.org/index.php?title=Talk:Main_Page&diff=298275&oldid=298270 joined in the fun] later, which was good.

And that's about it really… We were done then, except for the odd tweak here and there – sacrificing authenticity in the name of usability (adding a lot of links to the red panels, where there was one in MediaWiki but not in 'Tavi). Even after only the couple of days that we had the skin working, we quickly got accustomed to it, navigating around just as quick as in Monobook (to all the people who thought it was unusable: it's only because it was new. After a few days you would have found it usable too, though of course it was only around for one day). We just sat back in nervous excitement, watching the little countdown timer I wrote, waiting for it to hit T−0:00:00. Then, we set up the [http://www.hrwiki.org/index.php?title=MediaWiki:Sitenotice&direction=prev&oldid=298188 Site notice], locked the database (for show – we didn't need to) and rolled out the skin.

The effect was almost immediate.

Comments on the [[Talk:Main Page#WikkiTikkiTavi|talk page]], comments on the [[Forum:7609|forum]]… pretty even mix of people who really thought we'd changed back, people who got the joke and were playing along and people who were angry about the change (because yes, it's not quite as pretty as Monobook, in that it doesn't have as much eye-candy… though I personally like minimalist things like this). [[User:JoeyDay|JoeyDay]] came up with the idea, on the spur of the moment, to claim it was because of server load… which is half true, 'Tavi ''does'' have a lower server load than MediaWiki does. This wasn't really planned, but it worked rather well.

There were even the few people (I won't name names, to protect the guilty) who decided it would be a good idea to prove how clever they were and spoil the fun for everyone by proving that we were still using MediaWiki. It isn't really all that hard if you know where to look – the source code is the usual MediaWiki format (not the 'Tavi format, which used <code>(())</code> for links instead of <code>[[]]</code>, for example), pages like [[Special:Search]] look a lot different to [http://old.hrwiki.org/index.php?action=find&find=stuff the old Search page], MediaWiki even has a [[Special:Version]] page. Perhaps the most telling is that 'Tavi didn't have Discussion pages. And then there's the more obscure, such as the version line at the bottom saying we were powered by WikkiTikkiTavi version [[Tooty-two|0.2T]]. Of course, not everyone knew about these, but they aren't that hard to find if you know where to look, and it doesn't show how clever you are to point them out to people – it just makes you look like a jerk for gloating and spoiling people's fun. There were also the people who were angry that we'd even consider doing an April Fool's day trick. These were sometimes even the same people who were anxiously waiting to see what April Fool's content the actual [[Homestar Runner (Flash cartoon)|Homestar Runner]] site would have. This confuses me… ''of course'' it was an April Fool's joke – if you were able to spot that it was MediaWiki, that fact should have been clear. Of course we weren't going to drop the pretence just because you'd figured it out, if everyone stopped doing an April Fool's joke just because ''someone'' figured it out, no-one would ever finish them. The plan was to keep it up until April 2, then revert everything back and explain it all. I find it strange that people would quit the wiki in a flaming troll-y fit, just because we pulled a one-day gag on you all. Are you going to stop going to homestarrunner.com because they turned everything upside down for one day? Or stop going to google because they have a fake [http://www.google.com/romance/ Romance Search] page?

Um, OK, that turned into more of a rant than I had hoped…<br>
Incidentally, all that ranting is ''not'' aimed at people who didn't figure out it was a joke – I have ''nothing'' against them, there's nothing wrong with not knowing about the features that would tell you it was really MediaWiki, you don't need to know about them to use the wiki, and use it well. It's directed at the people who ''knew it was a joke'', and decided to act immature anyway.

Incidentally, this is pretty much why I love MediaWiki and why we'll probably never change – it would be downright ''impossible'' to tweak 'Tavi so that it looked like Monobook. But it was almost ''easy'' to tweak MediaWiki so that it looked like 'Tavi.

Anyway, that's the story of the first April Fool's event on HRWiki. I hope you enjoyed it as much as we did. Come on, you know you did. Take a deep breath. Put a smile on your face.

See you around, {{User:Phlip/sig}}

← Older revision		Revision as of 20:33, 6 April 2006
Line 5:		Line 5:
	First, some technical terms, since many people got them confused:		First, some technical terms, since many people got them confused:
	;MediaWiki:The wiki software we use. The wiki software we have used for quite a while. And the wiki software that we were using during the April Fool's day joke, ragardless of what we claimed while it was happening.		;MediaWiki:The wiki software we use. The wiki software we have used for quite a while. And the wiki software that we were using during the April Fool's day joke, ragardless of what we claimed while it was happening.
-	;~~Monobook~~:The usual skin for the site. The one with the "article", "discussion", "edit", etc. links up the top, the toolboxes on the left… the default MediaWiki skin, and the only one that really works on our site.	+	;MonoBook:The usual skin for the site. The one with the "article", "discussion", "edit", etc. links up the top, the toolboxes on the left… the default MediaWiki skin, and the only one that really works on our site.
	;WikkiTikkiTavi:Another wiki software, that we used [[Old:HomestarRunnerWiki\|a while ago]] before we changed due to its not being very scalable to larger wikis. It was a very simplistic wiki, without many of the features that MediaWiki has.		;WikkiTikkiTavi:Another wiki software, that we used [[Old:HomestarRunnerWiki\|a while ago]] before we changed due to its not being very scalable to larger wikis. It was a very simplistic wiki, without many of the features that MediaWiki has.
-	;~~Tavistyle~~:A MediaWiki skin that [[User:It's dot com\|It's dot com]] made, that looks very much like WikkiTikkiTavi. It was this that made the site look so much like 'Tavi during the day.	+	;TaviStyle:A MediaWiki skin that [[User:It's dot com\|It's dot com]] made, that looks very much like WikkiTikkiTavi. It was this that made the site look so much like 'Tavi during the day.
-	Unfortunately, if we simply installed ~~Tavistyle~~ on the wiki, it wouldn't have worked – everyone would have to go into their preferences to change it. We wanted it to be already changed for everyone. So we replaced the ~~Monobook~~ skin with the ~~Tavistyle~~ skin. So even though it was called ~~Monobook~~ in the preferences, it was actually ~~Tavistyle~~. Also, the other skins in the preferences are no less part of MediaWiki than ~~Monobook~~ is, they are merely do not work properly on our wiki.	+	Unfortunately, if we simply installed TaviStyle on the wiki, it wouldn't have worked – everyone would have to go into their preferences to change it. We wanted it to be already changed for everyone. So we replaced the MonoBook skin with the TaviStyle skin. So even though it was called MonoBook in the preferences, it was actually TaviStyle. Also, the other skins in the preferences are no less part of MediaWiki than MonoBook is, they are merely do not work properly on our wiki.

	==The story==		==The story==
Line 165:		Line 165:
	In the meantime, I worked on adding the "What's New" section to the Main Page. Simply including our current {{tl\|whatsnew}} template wasn't going to be any good – it didn't blend in well with the rest of the page. But we didn't want the users to think that we'd reverted to the old database too – we still had all of the current toons, including any April Fool's content that [[The Brothers Chaps]] made (which they [[April Fool's 2006\|did]]). So we needed a new banner. Using [[Wikipedia:The GIMP\|The GIMP]], I put together [http://www.hrwiki.org/images/whatsnew-ideas/ a whole bunch] of different ideas for the "What's New" banner, we eventually chose [http://www.hrwiki.org/images/whatsnew-banner.png Pom Pom].		In the meantime, I worked on adding the "What's New" section to the Main Page. Simply including our current {{tl\|whatsnew}} template wasn't going to be any good – it didn't blend in well with the rest of the page. But we didn't want the users to think that we'd reverted to the old database too – we still had all of the current toons, including any April Fool's content that [[The Brothers Chaps]] made (which they [[April Fool's 2006\|did]]). So we needed a new banner. Using [[Wikipedia:The GIMP\|The GIMP]], I put together [http://www.hrwiki.org/images/whatsnew-ideas/ a whole bunch] of different ideas for the "What's New" banner, we eventually chose [http://www.hrwiki.org/images/whatsnew-banner.png Pom Pom].

-	So then we decided we needed to test the skin. For real, on the real wiki, not on the small test wiki we'd set up to build it on. So we waited until the dead of the night, when there were no edits going on, and we pushed out the skin to the live server. It only took us 11 minutes to check everything that needed to be checked, and then put the usual ~~Monobook~~ skin back. It was ridiculous, and not even funny. We thought we'd gotten away with it, when tragedy struck! We'd been caught! [[User:YK\|YK]] put a message on [[Talk:Main Page]], saying he'd spotted the new skin, and wanted to know if it was vandalism, hackery or an early April Fool's joke. To keep the surprise, we had to delete his edits from the page… we talked to him though, and he was cool with it. He even [http://www.hrwiki.org/index.php?title=Talk:Main_Page&diff=298275&oldid=298270 joined in the fun] later, which was good.	+	So then we decided we needed to test the skin. For real, on the real wiki, not on the small test wiki we'd set up to build it on. So we waited until the dead of the night, when there were no edits going on, and we pushed out the skin to the live server. It only took us 11 minutes to check everything that needed to be checked, and then put the usual MonoBook skin back. It was ridiculous, and not even funny. We thought we'd gotten away with it, when tragedy struck! We'd been caught! [[User:YK\|YK]] put a message on [[Talk:Main Page]], saying he'd spotted the new skin, and wanted to know if it was vandalism, hackery or an early April Fool's joke. To keep the surprise, we had to delete his edits from the page… we talked to him though, and he was cool with it. He even [http://www.hrwiki.org/index.php?title=Talk:Main_Page&diff=298275&oldid=298270 joined in the fun] later, which was good.

-	And that's about it really… We were done then, except for the odd tweak here and there – sacrificing authenticity in the name of usability (adding a lot of links to the red panels, where there was one in MediaWiki but not in 'Tavi). Even after only the couple of days that we had the skin working, we quickly got accustomed to it, navigating around just as quick as in ~~Monobook~~ (to all the people who thought it was unusable: it's only because it was new. After a few days you would have found it usable too, though of course it was only around for one day). We just sat back in nervous excitement, watching the little countdown timer I wrote, waiting for it to hit T−0:00:00. Then, we set up the [http://www.hrwiki.org/index.php?title=MediaWiki:Sitenotice&direction=prev&oldid=298188 Site notice], locked the database (for show – we didn't need to) and rolled out the skin.	+	And that's about it really… We were done then, except for the odd tweak here and there – sacrificing authenticity in the name of usability (adding a lot of links to the red panels, where there was one in MediaWiki but not in 'Tavi). Even after only the couple of days that we had the skin working, we quickly got accustomed to it, navigating around just as quick as in MonoBook (to all the people who thought it was unusable: it's only because it was new. After a few days you would have found it usable too, though of course it was only around for one day). We just sat back in nervous excitement, watching the little countdown timer I wrote, waiting for it to hit T−0:00:00. Then, we set up the [http://www.hrwiki.org/index.php?title=MediaWiki:Sitenotice&direction=prev&oldid=298188 Site notice], locked the database (for show – we didn't need to) and rolled out the skin.

	The effect was almost immediate.		The effect was almost immediate.

-	Comments on the [[HRWiki:Main Page Talk Archive 11#WikkiTikkiTavi\|talk page]], comments on the [[Forum:7609\|forum]]… pretty even mix of people who really thought we'd changed back, people who got the joke and were playing along and people who were angry about the change (because yes, it's not quite as pretty as ~~Monobook~~, in that it doesn't have as much eye-candy… though I personally like minimalist things like this). [[User:JoeyDay\|JoeyDay]] came up with the idea, on the spur of the moment, to claim it was because of server load… which is half true, 'Tavi ''does'' have a lower server load than MediaWiki does. This wasn't really planned, but it worked rather well.	+	Comments on the [[HRWiki:Main Page Talk Archive 11#WikkiTikkiTavi\|talk page]], comments on the [[Forum:7609\|forum]]… pretty even mix of people who really thought we'd changed back, people who got the joke and were playing along and people who were angry about the change (because yes, it's not quite as pretty as MonoBook, in that it doesn't have as much eye-candy… though I personally like minimalist things like this). [[User:JoeyDay\|JoeyDay]] came up with the idea, on the spur of the moment, to claim it was because of server load… which is half true, 'Tavi ''does'' have a lower server load than MediaWiki does. This wasn't really planned, but it worked rather well.

	There were even the few people (I won't name names, to protect the guilty) who decided it would be a good idea to prove how clever they were and spoil the fun for everyone by proving that we were still using MediaWiki. It isn't really all that hard if you know where to look – the source code is the usual MediaWiki format (not the 'Tavi format, which used <code>(())</code> for links instead of <code>[[]]</code>, for example), pages like [[Special:Search]] look a lot different to [http://old.hrwiki.org/index.php?action=find&find=stuff the old Search page], MediaWiki even has a [[Special:Version]] page. Perhaps the most telling is that 'Tavi didn't have Discussion pages. And then there's the more obscure, such as the version line at the bottom saying we were powered by WikkiTikkiTavi version [[Tooty-two\|0.2T]]. Of course, not everyone knew about these, but they aren't that hard to find if you know where to look, and it doesn't show how clever you are to point them out to people – it just makes you look like a jerk for gloating and spoiling people's fun. There were also the people who were angry that we'd even consider doing an April Fool's day trick. These were sometimes even the same people who were anxiously waiting to see what April Fool's content the actual [[Homestar Runner (Flash cartoon)\|Homestar Runner]] site would have. This confuses me… ''of course'' it was an April Fool's joke – if you were able to spot that it was MediaWiki, that fact should have been clear. Of course we weren't going to drop the pretence just because you'd figured it out, if everyone stopped doing an April Fool's joke just because ''someone'' figured it out, no-one would ever finish them. The plan was to keep it up until April 2, then revert everything back and explain it all. I find it strange that people would quit the wiki in a flaming troll-y fit, just because we pulled a one-day gag on you all. Are you going to stop going to homestarrunner.com because they turned everything upside down for one day? Or stop going to google because they have a fake [http://www.google.com/romance/ Romance Search] page?		There were even the few people (I won't name names, to protect the guilty) who decided it would be a good idea to prove how clever they were and spoil the fun for everyone by proving that we were still using MediaWiki. It isn't really all that hard if you know where to look – the source code is the usual MediaWiki format (not the 'Tavi format, which used <code>(())</code> for links instead of <code>[[]]</code>, for example), pages like [[Special:Search]] look a lot different to [http://old.hrwiki.org/index.php?action=find&find=stuff the old Search page], MediaWiki even has a [[Special:Version]] page. Perhaps the most telling is that 'Tavi didn't have Discussion pages. And then there's the more obscure, such as the version line at the bottom saying we were powered by WikkiTikkiTavi version [[Tooty-two\|0.2T]]. Of course, not everyone knew about these, but they aren't that hard to find if you know where to look, and it doesn't show how clever you are to point them out to people – it just makes you look like a jerk for gloating and spoiling people's fun. There were also the people who were angry that we'd even consider doing an April Fool's day trick. These were sometimes even the same people who were anxiously waiting to see what April Fool's content the actual [[Homestar Runner (Flash cartoon)\|Homestar Runner]] site would have. This confuses me… ''of course'' it was an April Fool's joke – if you were able to spot that it was MediaWiki, that fact should have been clear. Of course we weren't going to drop the pretence just because you'd figured it out, if everyone stopped doing an April Fool's joke just because ''someone'' figured it out, no-one would ever finish them. The plan was to keep it up until April 2, then revert everything back and explain it all. I find it strange that people would quit the wiki in a flaming troll-y fit, just because we pulled a one-day gag on you all. Are you going to stop going to homestarrunner.com because they turned everything upside down for one day? Or stop going to google because they have a fake [http://www.google.com/romance/ Romance Search] page?
Line 178:		Line 178:
	Incidentally, all that ranting is ''not'' aimed at people who didn't figure out it was a joke – I have ''nothing'' against them, there's nothing wrong with not knowing about the features that would tell you it was really MediaWiki, you don't need to know about them to use the wiki, and use it well. It's directed at the people who ''knew it was a joke'', and decided to act immature anyway.		Incidentally, all that ranting is ''not'' aimed at people who didn't figure out it was a joke – I have ''nothing'' against them, there's nothing wrong with not knowing about the features that would tell you it was really MediaWiki, you don't need to know about them to use the wiki, and use it well. It's directed at the people who ''knew it was a joke'', and decided to act immature anyway.

-	Incidentally, this is pretty much why I love MediaWiki and why we'll probably never change – it would be downright ''impossible'' to tweak 'Tavi so that it looked like ~~Monobook~~. But it was almost ''easy'' to tweak MediaWiki so that it looked like 'Tavi.	+	Incidentally, this is pretty much why I love MediaWiki and why we'll probably never change – it would be downright ''impossible'' to tweak 'Tavi so that it looked like MonoBook. But it was almost ''easy'' to tweak MediaWiki so that it looked like 'Tavi.

	Anyway, that's the story of the first April Fool's event on HRWiki. I hope you enjoyed it as much as we did. Come on, you know you did. Take a deep breath. Put a smile on your face.		Anyway, that's the story of the first April Fool's event on HRWiki. I hope you enjoyed it as much as we did. Come on, you know you did. Take a deep breath. Put a smile on your face.