I'm currently transferring this: http://www.vogonswiki.com/index.php/List_of_g … roprietary_APIs
It's gonna take a while 😜

F2bnp wrote:

I'm currently transferring this: http://www.vogonswiki.com/index.php/List_of_g … roprietary_APIs
It's gonna take a while 😜

I see what you are trying to accomplish, but is it not just better with a link in this case to the post? I'm not very interested in updating both the thread and the wiki in the future. At the moment I control all the links either on my dropbox or bitly account.

elianda wrote:

I have some objections to the current article layout. […]
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I have some objections to the current article layout.

f.e. if you take the Yamaha article, there is a paragraph for each card. If you consider adding example initialization setups and maybe even example wavetable recordings one page would grow rapidly.
I see also some lack of exact writing, f.e. for the SW60XG is written "Not a fully-featured soundcard."
What does this mean? Do you really want to introduce a feature distinction?
I guess it would more correct to mention that there is no codec for digital out.

There is also the page Useful DOS utilities, which does not only present Utilities but also drivers and TSRs.
Especially for the TSRs and drivers there should be at least a small description why they are better and which additional features they have as well as limitations (f.e. requires 386, or f.e. for UMBPCI requires supported chipset + floppy access won't work anymore)

I only just started the article, and was going to add more information. And I called it 'utilities' because I thought that would cover just about all programs.

For the Yamaha, 3dfx and similar articles I think stuffing everything into one page is not a bad idea, you can always make separate articles when the paragraphs get too long. Or else you would start out with hundreds of almost-empty pages, and it would be hard to keep everything organized and in the same style.

swaaye wrote:

Guys I would rather not see this be some duplicate Wikipedia. I think we should instead go for sharing practical experiences with hardware and games.

Wikipedia won't even accept information of that sort because they refer to it as original research. Well we are supposedly the experts at using this old junk so I say that's what we should do with our Wiki. That's what gets lost in the forum after all.

How about both? Documenting all old hardware in wikipedia-style, then adding personal experiences and links to how-tos from there? Having all relevant information in one place would seem more convenient. I think some wikipedia-style 'Comparison of ...' lists with different types of hardware would be useful as well.

SquallStrife wrote:

This ^^^^^

The Sierra driver hacking stuff comes to mind. The OPL3->DB60XG Chorus/Reverb mod too.

Stuff that's stored on these forum pages, that you can't find anywhere else.

Yes, I was going to write a tutorial on the OPL3 effects mod, I have to get working on that again. I'm not satisfied with my current setup yet, but I guess I could post what I've got and change it when I improve it.

Just started another article:
http://www.vogonswiki.com/index.php/DOS_memory_management

I'd like some feedback about my articles in the hardware section though. I'm still changing things here and there but having some feedback (particularly about stuff I've forgotten to include!) would be nice!

Just to clarify what I meant with the 'dates'...

Was more along the lines that when explaining about say socket5 mobos, one could mention they appeared late 1994 and mostly ended spring/summer 1995. And so on for other items....
(or even just putting "(fall 1994-spring 1995)" behind the title/headline/item name)

Not necessarily exact dates. Just enough to place it somewhere on the timeline.

Yes, it might duplicate wikipedia to some minor extent, but it would be more convenient, I think.
And those hardware articles will be duplicating (some of) the wikipedia info anyway, albeit in a condensed form(as per now anyway).

Oh well, I probably shouldn't get too vocal here, not having written a single article myself - no offence intended! 😅 😊

bestemor wrote:

Just to clarify what I meant with the 'dates'... […]
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Just to clarify what I meant with the 'dates'...

Was more along the lines that when explaining about say socket5 mobos, one could mention they appeared late 1994 and mostly ended spring/summer 1995. And so on for other items....
(or even just putting "(fall 1994-spring 1995)" behind the title/headline/item name)

Not necessarily exact dates. Just enough to place it somewhere on the timeline.

Yes, it might duplicate wikipedia to some minor extent, but it would be more convenient, I think.
And those hardware articles will be duplicating (some of) the wikipedia info anyway, albeit in a condensed form(as per now anyway).

Oh well, I probably shouldn't get too vocal here, not having written a single article myself - no offence intended! 😅 😊

None taken 😀

Btw, I wrote all my articles myself from top of my head. I only googled once or twice to look up some numbers. And all the pictures I added were also self-made.

I'm not sure about adding dates as (and this might sound strange to you) I don't see this being relevant. One could always have a look at the print on the pcb and check it's exact week of manufacture there 😉

But feel free to add the dates to the articles if you'd like 😁

Aaand we got our first spammer on the wiki too. He/it posted an entire page about water skiing or something. I deleted the content of his page and external links in his profile, but don't know how to delete whole pages.

Hi Guys,

I've enabled a setting so that you now must confirm your email address before you can edit any pages.

This might help a bit with the spam....

mwdmeyer wrote:

Hi Guys,

I've enabled a setting so that you now must confirm your email address before you can edit any pages.

This might help a bit with the spam....

Cheers on the quick response! 😁

Enigma, thanks a lot for editing Socket 7 Builds section, I do make silly mistakes visible to any but my own eyes 😁

Maybe some native english speakers could fix the worst language errors? 😀

I don't see weird non-native english as that much of a problem. But yeah if it's totally incomprehensible I might go in and fix things. 😀

Since I have seen no one doing it, to all users commenting: please sign your posts with four tildes at the end, like so: ~~~~

More spam bots. I guess individual approval of new users is the way to go for this wiki...

That might be easier than using CAPTCHAs like Wikipedia and hopefully can't be circumvented easily.

Hi Guys,

I've enabled a simple math question on sign up. If this doesn't work that I will probably switch to manual approval.

mwdmeyer wrote:

Hi Guys,

I've enabled a simple math question on sign up. If this doesn't work that I will probably switch to manual approval.

They are known to get around that. You should change to logical questions. Like: Which brand is Pentium from?

A human from Vogons will not have any problems, but a bot will have more trouble than with a simple math question.

I know that in the Wiki also experience with old hardware should be presented. Still I would like to see often a better description for which specific cases this experience is true. Currently a lot of facts are presented as general rules which is mostly not true. Some paragraphs might be as well from marketing journals instead of personal experience reports. Please take a bit more care and specifically limit facts to the corresponding hardware config or operating system.

Just to give an example, currently for the mainboards the general recommendation is to use the fastest CPU possible. I don't think this is helpful for readers as it should be more diversified e.g. by looking at different fictious user profiles.
Just to give an opposing example: When using socket 7 for DOS, plugging a P233MMX is a bad idea when playing games with iMuse sound system as it will not work anymore, while on a P166MMX it does.

vetz wrote:

mwdmeyer wrote:

Hi Guys,

I've enabled a simple math question on sign up. If this doesn't work that I will probably switch to manual approval.

They are known to get around that. You should change to logical questions. Like: Which brand is Pentium from?

A human from Vogons will not have any problems, but a bot will have more trouble than with a simple math question.

Or just switch to manual approval, it's not like theres hundreds of Vogoners going to apply within the next week or so 😜

Just post that you applied and what name you registered with on the wiki (I just used Tetrium). Should be nearly impossible to get a spam-account in that way 😁