Template talk:Sidebar planet

Sidebars
Some sidebars have just been introduced to many planet articles, sometimes (I think) reverting changes away from that style of sidebar months ago. I still believe that not every image of an article (planet or other) should be in a sidebar, and that the table construct of having "Caption:" in one cell and the actual caption in the neighbouring one looks ugly as hell.

This is a suggestion for a reduced standard template, and I'm going to change already existing planet sidebars to this one unless there's some big fuss about it. It makes use of up to two images (one orbital, one surface), and has both "class" and "affiliation" as optional parameters. A third one could be "location", although we'd know that one even less often than the first two.

FYI, the articles that got changed are: Remus, Talax, Andoria, Betazed, Vulcan (planet), Cardassia Prime, Trill (planet), Tellar Prime, Ferenginar, Cardassia Prime, Qo'noS, Romulus, Ocampa (planet). -- Cid Highwind 10:38, 25 June 2007 (UTC)


 * I was the one who changed those articles, thank you so much for making a standardized template, I tried but I really didn't know how to, and I hated a lot of things about that sidebar, like all the pics in there and "caption" on each picture, I just copied that one from I believe it was Bajor template because I couldnt find another one. I will start to implement the changes into other planets also.  Maybe you want to change Earth because I am not touching that one yet, :) 74.204.40.46 19:43, 26 June 2007 (UTC)

For what it's worth, I think that some of the newly added variables shouldn't be part of the sidebar. In other cases, like sidebar starship, we tried to limit ourselves to information that is available in "most" cases. That way, we'd have a sidebar that looks the same most of the time. We know the rotational period for about 3 of the fictional planets, I think, system and location might as well be merged (because we don't know either, most of the time), and the same goes for satellites.

Also, please make sure to not add information that is not really confirmed. I've already seen several sidebars where "Class:M" or "Location:Alpha Quadrant" has been added although that has never been stated. -- Cid Highwind 06:42, 27 June 2007 (UTC)


 * I just added info that was already found in the existing sidebars, I didn't want to take too much away from articles that other people put in there already. And FYI - just wanted you to know why i changed the example from Betazed to Bajor - just because everything in the sidebar could be listed in that one, unlike Betazed.  I figured I would add in there what I already found, but any misinformation that I added that is not canon was not intended, so if someone takes it out I will understand.  I agree, we don't need the rotational period in the sidebar, but it was in Bajor's sidebar and I didn't see it in the article.  Just trying to improve it is all.  I just think anything we take out of the articles we should make sure is in its proper place in the article.  A couple I wiped a lot of info was a lot of Sol planets, I didnt want to, but was reading Mars, and it said that all that scientific info is not canon.  Hope I helped improve it and you like my effort at least, sorry for any inconveniences. 74.204.40.46 05:56, 28 June 2007 (UTC) Ejfetters 05:58, 28 June 2007 (UTC) (forgot to sign in first, all other on this address are mine also.

Hey, it's not a problem that you changed it - that's why this is a wiki... :) If we come to an agreement regarding what fields should or should not be part of the template, we can just check the "What links here" and change the template calls accordingly. We already seem to be on the same side regarding the "Rotational period" field, so we could take that one out and move existing information to the individual article texts. It's probably used on Bajor and Theta 116 VIII (+"real" planets) only, anyway. -- Cid Highwind 09:02, 29 June 2007 (UTC)

Orbital Image Class: Satellites: Native Species: Location:(System, Quadrant) Surface Image
 * Glad to help work this out. Well, I don't like Rotational Period, so, strike that one out - I like this flow: Name (at top)
 * I think that this will sum up a brief informative of the planet, without getting too technical, or too informative about other things that should be in the article itself. Also, I know some of the info may not be canon, if you could help sort it out I'd appreciate it - I haven't seen all of Enterprise yet so I am not sure what it reveals :)  Ejfetters 06:42, 30 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Oh and forgot, should have affiliation also, placed after Native Species Ejfetters 06:44, 30 June 2007 (UTC)

Planet "status"?
I see that a new variable "status" has been added. If we really want to use that, we should think about terminology first. Is a planet that hasn't been destroyed yet really "active"? Sounds strange...

If anything, it might make sense to make this an optional parameter, and only use it if the planet actually has been destroyed. -- Cid Highwind 09:37, 25 May 2009 (UTC)


 * It is an optional parameter. I've made a tweak to the template documentation. -- sulfur 13:26, 25 May 2009 (UTC)