User talk:Quatermass

Hi. I'm not from Kaltura, but perhaps I can help to answer this. I'm from Wikia and we've been working with Kaltura to use this extension on some of our wikis. The main advantage over sites like YouTube is that Kaltura videos are editable, which means the whole community can work together and collaborate on creating content for this wiki. It's also open source software which is a big advantage over other video sites. If you're interested in trying it without going through Kaltura's partner program, Wikia would be be happy to offer you free hosting for this wiki and install the extension for you. Moving has some answers to commonly asked questions about moving a wiki to Wikia. Angela] 21:08, 18 March 2008 (CDT)

Hey there, looks like Wikia finally got started without us: http://aquarium.wikia.com/wiki/Aquarium_Wiki good for them, 1 article :)

Did you manage to get into ssh/telnet btw? --Brian 14:42, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

1! wow.

Sure did thanks. I did a xml dump, downloaded it and tried WikiTaxi on it. Waste of time, it removes the navigating section and so it's very hard to move through it. I guess the only way to do an offline version is set up apache, mysql, etc. and import everything there.

BTW, I'm giving a talk to the WLAS on Sunday on the AquariumWiki and later in the year in another Town in Scotland. (I've got a 3G broadband dongle for my laptop, so I can go online and do a demo.) If this keeps up, I'll need to get myself some cute groupies and I'll be in 7th heaven as I tour Scotland. ;-))

--Quatermass 20:53, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

Hey,

I'll add a _ref attribute to the template asap. --Brian 02:41, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

I got an unexpectedly hostile reaction here at Wikipedia when I responded in a friendly way to your posting there. I suppose it could just be a single idiosyncratic editor there, but I wonder whether I unintentionally stumbled upon some prior history between the two sites. Can you shed any light on it? I'm just trying to be helpful, here at the Aquarium Wiki as well as there. --Tryptofish 20:36, 16 January 2009 (UTC)

Hi Tryptofish, yes it did appear a little OTT. But I put that down to probably their previous experience and lack of reading emotional content as you said. I bet Wikipedia have to put up with a lot more spammers and 'good-willed' promoters than us. :-)

I put up the occasional wikipedia link to our site. But only when it appears to me that our site has more info on the subject. Wikipedia has a huge number of restrictions and rules on what its editors can or can't do. Hopefully we'll not get that many! The aquarium hobby is largely driven by word of mouth, old wife-tales and rumours so hard to cite sources. But we try to quote printed articles in magazines.

--Quatermass 18:20, 17 January 2009 (UTC)


 * Thanks so much for that answer. I also got a response from PsiPro, and I think I understand what's going on a lot better now. --Tryptofish 18:32, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

Hello, Quartermass. I am trying to add a topic to "Invertebrates (Freshwater)" but when I click Edit at the top of the page, it doesn't show me the other categories in there. I assume this content is all auto-generated.

Anyway, I would like to add "Marbled crayfish (Marmorkrebs)" to the FW inverts section. I have registered for the forum but while I'm waiting I thought I would ask you how to add a new topic to a page.

Thanks. Bulrush 15:42, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

Hi Bulrush, I take it you mean the category - Category:Invertebrates (Freshwater)?

To add your Marbles crayfish into this, you add the line " " to the bottom of the actual species profile - Procambarus marmorkrebs. But I see it's already in there.

If you meant the common name page - Marbled_crayfish, add the 2 lines " " and "  " to the bottom of the Marbled Crayfish page as this is where common names should be placed. :-)

P.s we don't have 'topics' so I've assumed you meant categories. :-)

--Quatermass 20:44, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

Sidebar Edit
Hi QM, regarding the species/common name edit on the sidebar, it looks a little jumbled, is it really necessary? You know me and things being on a straight line, in one line, tidy tidy, yay for OCD! --Cat 13:34, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

I guess we could either widen the bar, make the text smaller, abbreviate the words or simply have the common names in there? Each category should have a link to the other type in any case.

I think I prefer the latter. Your views?

--Quatermass 15:04, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

I also prefer having big text on the category page essentially saying "Click here to browse by common names" --Brian 15:31, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

I think I do prefer it the old way also, saves less scrolling down through the nav bar. A little pretty box in say the Fish - Freshwater page saying "click here for the common names" would be fine I think. --Cat 16:44, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

Have you noticed that if you go to the Forum, that the aqW nav bar is still showing the old one...Odd that.

--Quatermass 20:26, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

main page
somfink funny's happened to the main page, the edit bit has got all bumped over to the right hand side, not sure how to fix! --Cat 21:03, 20 March 2009 (UTC)

It's the large size of the fish image I think.

I guess the template for that particular image needs to be smaller.

--Quatermass 00:05, 21 March 2009 (UTC)

OK, I've corrected the problem by clearing the style. --Quatermass 08:50, 21 March 2009 (UTC)

copyright
The images I got online of the rocks did not have any copyright logo. I edited the images to where they are mine, because they are not recognizable from the originals. If the images were copyrighted, it would have said it on the images. By the way, why was my lyretail molly article deleted? The images were of my mollies.

--Vlad 15:37, 20 April 2009 (UTC)

OK, you seem not to fully understand copyright. Mind you who does :-))

Just because an image is online and has no copyright mentioned around it doesn't mean it has no copyright. All images have copyright by right of law. There is no need to state it (though many people do). Therefore if you find an image online it is not for the taking unless it states otherwise. I suggest you go back to the site where you got the images and ask permission to use the images for the aqW, many are very happy to allow its use. If you can't do this then we'll have to delete them. Sorry but it's breaking the law and a person could sue our site for stealing.

(Also you can't simply edit someone else's copyrighted photo and pass it off as your own. That is also breaking the law.)

Regarding the 'lyretail molly article'. I see this was edited by yourself and Catxx. I took a look and I guess it was converted to a redirect because of several reasons. Maybe because the lyretail molly article was incorrectly titled? We use species names as titles not common names.

The species name you had was spelt slightly wrong. It was Mollienesia velifera, this in any case is an old obsolete name. It's correct modern accepted name is Poecilia velifera and we have a species page for this already. :-) See Taxomy site for details

So I can see why Catxx did this. Your image - Molley.JPG is still on the site, I see it is on the Poecilia velifera page.

I hope this helps explains why I think Catxx edited your page? If not let's discuss this on the forum? --Quatermass 09:51, 21 April 2009 (UTC)

Oh, Ok. : ) -Vlad

Hey,

I noticed you added the old aqua rank link. I never added it because I didn't feel that the number of visitors justified their big ugly button :) We could always add the links to another page like The_Aquarium_wiki:Promotion between you cat and me we could get the site top ranked if we vote every day, the top site only has 80 votes in from 24 days so we would get fairly close.

--Brian 14:24, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

You are absolutely right. Worth a go. Though perhaps place the link in the forum and ask people to vote? That way it's up to individuals how they vote. ;-)

I did remove the link btw. It wouldn't appear on the panel for some reason. Probably a cache issue at my end.

--Quatermass 21:27, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

Hi QM! I was reading your information about BioSpira and noticed there were no warnings listed. The store I worked for a number of yrs ago was one of the first to test BioSpira when it first came out on the market. What we found caused us to stop selling it to just anyone, and that is a warning the general public should know about. BioSpira houses a large amount of bacteria in their packets, intended to cycle a tank instantly when the fish are added. The packaging does not warn that you need to be sure to get the right amount of fish & fish waste to feed so much bacteria all at once. The consequences of not adding enough fish is bacteria die off, a huge ammonia spike that can take up to a week or more to come down on its own, (caused by the dead/dying bacteria) and alot of dead fish. There is no easy way to clean such a thing up and most people ended up losing entire aquariums full of animals and having to start over from the beginning without the BioSpira. Nowhere on the packaging does it state how much fish waste it takes to feed the amount of bacteria in the BioSpira package, which makes it a shot in the dark. For a new fish keeper, this usually means alot of money spent and a lot of dead animals. (BioSpira is expensive in the USA)

At the store we backed off of the sale of BioSpira for new tank set ups and jump starting them as it was advertised to be used for, and instead we began using it for those customers who went elsewhere and grossly overstocked their tanks, leaving them in trouble with massive amounts of ammonia in new tanks. For that purpose the BioSpira worked very well.

Can you please add a warning to your article about BioSpira? It would save many lives and a lot of money. Thanks!

Sorry who are you? You forgot to add your signature to your posting. Interesting point you've raised. Regarding the BioSpira, Didn't the packet give dosage advise on it? Of course it's no longer on sale as Marineland labs got bought out by Tetra and it is now known as SafeStart. --Quatermass 08:07, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

QM - VC is my wiki site that Brian helped me set up and hosts here: http://www.vinyl-creep.net my other geek passion haha! --Cat 12:10, 14 September 2009 (UTC)

Google ads
Hey,

Google finally got around to paying me. If you would like me to order some of the business cards for you e-mail me the layout and your address and I'll send them along. Same for you Cat.

--Brian 13:33, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

Glad to hear your getting some money at last! I've got several hundred B. Cards at present. So thanks for the offer, but I'll pass this time. If Cat wants some, drop me an email and I'll send some to her. --Quatermass 15:23, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

I'm not sure I'd really use B.Cards, I'm a bit useless and all the fishy people I know I talk to on a regular basis anyway. Invest the money in any other necessary website expenses ^__^ --Cat 15:54, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

SVG Images
Quarter master,

I'm trying to SVG images to render correctly on my wiki but am having problems. Looks like you have been able to do it. Can you offer any suggestions? In particular, I'm trying to get images for template:ambox to work and some state flags.

Thanks

Kevin

Wikia
Also, from the first entry on this talk page it looks like wikia made an unsolicited offer take over your content. Was there anything special you did to prevent them from doing this? If you don't want to post a response to that here you can kevinpforrest live. Any tips on how to prevent that would be appreciated.

from what I've read, wikia sounds kind of evil! Not sure who uses content from wikia...I certainly don't!

Kevin

Just say no
I said no? --Quatermass 21:00, 15 January 2010 (UTC)

Venturi
Not sure what you were thinking, but that article should be euthanized. Huw Powell 00:02, 17 February 2011 (EST)
 * Its by no means complete, but why remove it? --Brian 08:12, 17 February 2011 (EST)

Yes, why remove it? --Quatermass 12:50, 17 February 2011 (EST)
 * There are no venturis in the aquarium hobby or trade? Do you know what a venturi even is? The article might suggest not. I was going to try to fix the really bad writing on that article, but to do so I would also have to change most of it and re-title it.  An airlift tube driven by bubble is not a venturi. OK, a venturi is a narrowed part of a tube through which a fluid (gas or liquid) is flowing.  In the narrow part, since the fluid has to move faster, pressure is reduced.  This is how carburetors work - in the venturi is where the fuel jet is inserted, the lowered pressure draws the fuel in... Airlift tubes do not use this effect. Huw Powell 22:06, 17 February 2011 (EST)

Sorry who mentioned bubbles? It is a open ended tube. The narrow gap causes free air to be drawn in. Have you seen a Python water changing device? --Quatermass 12:38, 18 February 2011 (EST)
 * I mentioned the bubble with respect to protein skimmers. See . And yes airlift tube use the fact that air rises to pull water up with them, power heads use venturis to pull air into the waterflow. --Brian 13:42, 18 February 2011 (EST)
 * I have seen the Python, yes. Seems crazy to add cold, chlorinated water to the tank directly and hope the chemicals added will make it ok.  But that's another topic.  After I do water changes, I refill my buckets to let them at least get up to room temp. for the next change.  Bubbles?  Air drawn into filter output would seem to be "bubbles".  Maybe we are misunderstanding each other.  Request: Read the article.  Fix the grammar, then maybe I can follow what it says? Huw Powell 23:09, 18 February 2011 (EST)