User:Ingoolemo/Threads/06/02/27a

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< User:Ingoolemo | Threads | 06 | 02
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[edit] Aero-table

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Regarding the migration from tables and hand-written specs to the specs template:

  • I've been back and forth on this a hundred times but I think (at least until I change my mind again!) that template-generated specs are a Good Thing for the sake of consistency and ease of tweaking the layout later on. So, I'm interested in helping you migrate all of the aircraft articles to a unified format.
  • I can write and run an AWB task using regex to turn the table into a specs template or inline specs (it's just a bunch of find-and-replaces and it's only semi-automatic as it would still have to be cleaned up a little and moved to the appropriate location by hand but it beats copy-pasting 50 parameters across what may be a very lengthy article).
  • Aside from the vulnerability issue and template-within-template that was brought up with airtemp a while back (IMHO the template can be protected, as is done with things like qif), any technical reason why we should not use a template to generate specs? I'm thinking of server loads, page loading times, and so on.
  • I know mediawiki is able to do simple arithmetic but that particular function is not implemented in Wikipedia. Do you know where I could petition for that? It would be of huge benefit to do imperial-metric conversions and power/weight calculations on the fly within the template (it would also make the template code much simpler).
  • Thanks for all your help! - Emt147 Burninate! 02:15, 27 February 2006 (UTC)
Good luck with the AWB. Before you get started, I've designed a qif for armament, so that we can specify {{{guns}}}, {{{rockets}}}, {{{missiles}}}, {{{bombs}}}, and {{{other}}}. The code can be seen at Template talk:Airtemp. You may wish to review this proposal before beginning your work.
With regards to server load and other issues, this is an enlightening factoid: if we didn't use qif, we'd require 1024 times as many templates as we do now (for Stall speed, Vne, Vc, useful load, loaded weight, fixed/rotary wing, capacity field, armament field, and jet/prop/both/neither); even if we exclude some rarely used fields such as Vne, we would still require 128 separate templates.
I don't think the alleged vulnerability is such an issue at all. The only templates used in {{Airtemp}} are qif, and that's already protected. In my opinion, Airtemp is hardly so high-use that it needs to be protected.
Technical discussion can occur at the technical section of the village pump, or at Wikimedia's Bugzilla.
Cheers, Ingoolemo talk 04:39, 27 February 2006 (UTC)
Got it. I'm not so sure about subdividing the weapons category because the info available for many aicraft is "1,000 lb of payload which can consist of any combination of bombs, missiles, rockets, and small furry creatures." Having to parcel it into the separate categories may be creating too much work. - Emt147 Burninate! 04:50, 27 February 2006 (UTC)
In general, most Attack planes and bombers can be reduced to the basic categories. Exceptions to the scheme used should be relatively rare—they will mainly be seen among fighters—but can be taken care of relatively easily. Perhaps if we rename {{{other}}} to {{{notes}}}? That way, if an aircraft carries armament that doesn't fit into the normal category we can do something like
|missiles=2× [[AIM-9 Sidewinder]]
|notes=Occasionally armed with 70,000 [[gerbil]]s
Which would yield

Armament

Note that using the qif statement I did, if there are no other parametres present, the * '''Notes:''' {{{notes}}} will be reduced to * {{{notes}}}. So, if your hypothetical statement is the only one that we can make about the plane's armament, then we just type
|notes=1,000 lb of payload which can consist of any combination of bombs, missiles, rockets, and small furry creatures.
Which yields

Armament

  • 1,000 lb of payload which can consist of any combination of bombs, missiles, rockets, and small furry creatures.
One final question, however: what is the difference between a missile and a rocket? Are missiles a special kind of rocket? Ingoolemo talk 07:07, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

I'm worried it will create confusion. By convention, rockets are unguided, missiles are guided. - Emt147 Burninate! 07:15, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Guns/missiles/bombs/etc.

I'm still not quite sure about it, I think the output could be rather ambiguous.

Imagine, for B-52 for example:

Guns: 1x20 mm in the back Bombs: 70,000 lb including Mk.82, Mk.83, etc. Missiles: 6x Hound Dog cruise missiles

It makes it look like that's in addition to the 70,000 lb of bombs.

A better way would be:

Payload: 70,000 lbs including a combination of - Bombs: Mk.82, Mk.83, etc. - Missiles: Hound Dog

Or something of that sort. It's a big boolean test to perform in a template that will be used by thousands of pages too.

My request for enabling the <calc> extension to do on-the-fly math was nixed rather rudely. :\ - Emt147 Burninate! 06:58, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

As noted above a potential solution is
|guns=1× 20 mm in the back
|bombs=generally loaded with Mk.82 and Mk.83
|missiles=up to six Hound Dog cruise missiles
|notes=The B-52's payload does not generally exceed 70,000 lb.
This would yield

Armament

  • Guns: 1× 20 mm in the back
  • Missiles: up to six Hound Dog cruise missiles
  • Bombs: generally loaded with Mk.82 and Mk.83
  • Notes: The B-52's payload does not generally exceed 70,000 lb.
Ingoolemo talk 07:14, 27 February 2006 (UTC)
* The majority of military aircraft are capable of carrying a variety of weapon types (missiles, bombs, rockets, etc.). It's fine to split them into categories so long as it is clear they are constrained by a single maximum payload. Something like this:

Armament

  • Guns: 1× 20 mm in the back
  • Payload: Up to 20,000 lbs including
    • Missiles: up to six Hound Dog cruise missiles
    • Bombs: generally loaded with Mk.82 and Mk.83
- Emt147 Burninate! 07:19, 27 February 2006 (UTC)
Okay, I withdraw my proposal. Ingoolemo talk 17:45, 27 February 2006 (UTC)
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