explain xkcd - User contributions [en]

Talk:1594: Human Subjects

2015-10-24T23:29:21Z

199.27.128.112: Comments - further details and citation about fishing for patterns in data.

The responses in panels 1, 3, and 4 show that Megan is trying to downplay the issues despite better knowledge. This is probably done to surprise the reader of the dialogue for better dramatic effect. Sebastian --[[Special:Contributions/162.158.91.159|162.158.91.159]] 05:59, 23 October 2015 (UTC)

In the second panel, Megan makes a good point which Ponytail misses. If the control group had a high incidence of arson, while the experimental group did not (and assuming that proper protocols were followed in assigning subjects to groups), there is a possibility that the drug has the side-effect of suppressing the urge for arson [[User:Sysin|Sysin]] ([[User talk:Sysin|talk]]) 06:45, 23 October 2015 (UTC)
: Where is the point? "People where arrested for arson" - "Side effects" - "They where in the control group". That's not really a point for the side-effect of surpressing the urge for arson, is it? [[Special:Contributions/162.158.114.217|162.158.114.217]] 09:01, 23 October 2015 (UTC)
::If only people from the control group have been arrested, it is or could be. Sebastian --[[Special:Contributions/162.158.91.213|162.158.91.213]] 10:58, 23 October 2015 (UTC)
:::In this case both the control and the test group must be full of arsonists and the question is why did Ponytail let them lose to commit arson in the first place. May bye a double-blind test?[[User:Jkotek|Jkotek]] ([[User talk:Jkotek|talk]]) 13:29, 23 October 2015 (UTC)
:::Maybe both groups were arsonists and the thing helps prevent the person from getting arrested somehow. [[User:Mulan15262|Mulan15262]] ([[User talk:Mulan15262|talk]]) 14:50, 24 October 2015 (UTC)

:Another interpretation of the second panel is that Ponytail went fishing for patterns in the data, and happened to find the apparent cluster of arson arrests. There is no obvious reason why arson arrests would have any bearing on a drug trial. (Of course this depends on the drug, but the experiment in the last panel is about moisturizing cream; since no more specifics are given there is no reason to assume it is a psychologically active substance.) If you look at enough variables about a group of people (be they ever-so carefully randomly selected) you will probably find some "unusual" pattern - some way that they differ from the entire population.
:A classic example of this is the observation about Israeli fighter pilots having predominantly girl children. However, when one looks at subsequent births to Israeli pilots, they show the usual gender distribution. The only reason for looking at the gender distribution of children of Israeli fighter pilots was because somebody noticed this pattern in some data set. See "Science of the Discworld" by Terry Pratchett, Ian Stewart and Jack Cohen. [[Special:Contributions/199.27.128.112|199.27.128.112]] 23:29, 24 October 2015 (UTC)

did [[Danish]] cut her hair? --[[Special:Contributions/108.162.216.8|108.162.216.8]] 11:22, 23 October 2015 (UTC)

also, the title text could allude to the fact that sociopaths (or successful ones at least) tend to be really adept at getting other people to write off or engage in their behaviours. that is, the IRB, despite the apparent awfulness of the actions of the subjects, on meeting them thought they were pretty cool and people should lay off. --[[Special:Contributions/108.162.216.8|108.162.216.8]] 11:28, 23 October 2015 (UTC)

Are those "citation needed" of any use? There is already a link to Wikipedia for sociopathy. Also, the invoked reasons ("Is an arsonist defined as a sociopath?", "Is a masochist the same as a sociopath?", "Is there an agreed upon definition of 'truly sociopathic behaviour', and is this it?") are not sound to me. Sociopathy is defined as "antisocial behavior", so are arson and sadism. [[Special:Contributions/141.101.66.23|141.101.66.23]] 11:32, 23 October 2015 (UTC)

: I elected to simply remove references to sociopathy. I think the comic uses the phrase "awful" people, and I don't think it is necessary to instill the article with controversy by defining the people as sociopaths or any other term. Simply describing their traits and noting that it is unusual and why should be sufficient. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.216.31|108.162.216.31]] 14:01, 23 October 2015 (UTC)

I realize that this area is for discussing the subject of the comic, but of all the comic strips out there this is the last one I would ever expect to include the "word" ''snuck''. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.216.26|108.162.216.26]] 13:23, 23 October 2015 (UTC)
:This area is mainly for discussing the improvement of the article. Unlike Wikipedia, here we also can discuss the subject of the comic. I addressed your comment, because I never had heard the word (no scare quotes) ''snuck'', but immediatly knew it was an alternate past tense of ''sneak''. I added this: ''Snuck'' is a dialectal past tense of ''sneak''.[http://dictionary.reference.com/help/faq/language/g08.html]. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.221.17|108.162.221.17]] 13:37, 23 October 2015 (UTC)

::With respect, I don't think the word "snuck" is uncommon or in any way unique to this comic. I don't think there is any valid need to include a line defining a common verb. If people don't know what the word "snuck" is, dictionary websites are aplenty, but let's not turn this site into one of those ones where every word is a link to a definition. Unless it's jargon or technical or a proper noun that needs explanation, I don't think definitions or links are really needed. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.216.31|108.162.216.31]] 14:01, 23 October 2015 (UTC)
:: Why use a dictionary when Conan can do it for you? :-) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PmoHSczX8pU {{unsigned ip|108.162.238.84}}

This comic could be referencing the growing realization that that the subjects of almost all psychology studies are not representative of the world population at large and of the great variety of humans found in the world. The subjects in psychology experiments are usually psychology students or other undergraduate students. Thus the subjects of these experiments are WIERD (Western Educated Industrialized Rich Democratic), these subjects are not close to worldwide normal. See this [//www.scientificamerican.com/podcast/episode/psychology-studies-biased-toward-we-10-08-07/ Scientific American article] for more information. Thus this biases the results of psychology experiments in systematic ways, just as having a bunch of sociopaths as subjects would also systematically effect the results. --[[User:Benjamin|Benjamin]] ([[User talk:Benjamin|talk]]) 15:07, 23 October 2015 (UTC)

Might this comic be related to the increased effect of placebo in medical studies? The "awful people" explanation is one of the ones mentioned in the article: http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-34572482 [[Special:Contributions/141.101.79.49|141.101.79.49]]

:: Not really [[Special:Contributions/162.158.252.197|162.158.252.197]] 04:16, 24 October 2015 (UTC)

Does antisocial behavior really invalidate non-neuro/psychological drug trials? I don't think personality would change the progression and nature of other diseases. --[[Special:Contributions/199.27.128.137|199.27.128.137]] 09:29, 24 October 2015 (UTC)

== World Polio Day Comic ==

At the top of xkcd.com is a link to Bill Gate's blog http://www.gatesnotes.com/Health/XKCD-Marks-the-Spot which currently contains one of Mr. Munroe's strips. Is this an appropriate subject for this wiki? and if so how?--[[Special:Contributions/198.41.235.101|198.41.235.101]] 20:35, 24 October 2015 (UTC)

1594: Human Subjects

2015-10-24T23:10:25Z

199.27.128.112: Alternative explanation of panel 2 - ponytail went fishing for correlations

{{comic
| number = 1594
| date = October 23, 2015
| title = Human Subjects
| image = human_subjects.png
| titletext = After meeting with a few of the subjects, the IRB actually recommended that you stop stressing out so much about safety guidelines.
}}

==Explanation==
This strip plays on certain experiments involving {{w|Human subject research|human subjects}}. [[Ponytail]] is questioning the reliability of [[Megan]]'s experimental results, given that her human subjects appear to be extremely unusual and highly {{w|sociopathic}}.

In the second panel, she mentions that several people in one study had been arrested for {{w|arson}}. Megan begins to suggest that the arson is a {{w|side effect}} of whatever is being tested before she learns that the arsonists are in the {{w|Treatment and control groups|control group}} – that is, the group that is ''not'' subjected to whatever is being tested and is used as a comparison to see the differences in the people who are actually being tested. This result is "troubling", as the control group would not be expected to have such a high rate of incidence of arsonists. The implication is that her subjects are not representative of the general population, but appear to have been selected from some aberrant subpopulation, such as a prison or mental institution. Or she could have recruited them through an announcement that catered in some way to arsonists. An alternate explanation comes from comic [[790: Control]], in which [[Randall]] notes his hobby of sneaking into experiments and giving LSD to the control groups. Yet another explanation could be that ponytail went looking for some clusters of characteristics in the sample population, which had no connection to the study criteria, and happened upon the arson arrests - such clusters are expected if you look at enough different characteristics.

The third panel alludes to the {{w|prisoner's dilemma}}, in which two subjects must independently decide whether to "collaborate" with or "betray" the other subject based on different rewards for each choice (often framed as a different length of prison sentence, or a different amount of money). The rewards tier are selected so that the outcomes for each individual from best to worst are: betraying a collaborator, collaborating with a collaborator, betraying a betrayer, collaborating with a betrayer.
The thought experiment is considered interesting as it's uncertain what the most logical course of action, as choosing betrayal always improves one's situation, yet being in identical situations with no knowledge of each other, it's also logical for both prisoners to make the same choice and both collaborating is better than both betraying. Of course, it would not be expected that normal people would simply betray each other for no reason, without benefiting from it in any way.

The last panel references the {{w|Milgram experiment}}, in which subjects were instructed by experimenters to administer electric shocks to an unseen third party. The unseen third party was part of the experiment and pretended to be in agony. As shocks escalated they would beg for them to stop. The results suggest that people will continue to administer harm, despite the pleading of the victim, simply if told to do so by an authority figure, even when no incentive is provided to the subject to continue. In this case, however, the actual experiment did not involved electric shocks, and thus suggests that the subjects, of their own volition, brought equipment to produce electric shock and simply engaged in the activity unprompted.

In each of these cases, the subjects seem to have some "negative" psychological traits. While one or two people with such traits might not be unusual to be found in a randomly selected group, the fact that all three experiments contain multiple subjects with these traits (and seemingly the same traits in each study) is very unusual.

The title text refers to safety procedures normally required by {{w|institutional review board}}s, which are centralized groups within universities that ensure that experiments are ethical and safe. The inference is that for an IRB to recommend dispensing with safety procedures after meeting the subjects, the subjects must really, ''really'' deserve bad treatment. Or the members of the IRB are, like the human subjects, just sociopathically awful people. Or that Megan is selecting for these subjects, or causing these abnormalities, as a side effect of spending (probably significantly) more effort than is necessary to adhere to the procedures.

==Transcript==
:[Ponytail and Megan sit at a desk.]
:Ponytail: We're concerned that some of your results may be tainted by the fact that your human subjects are ''awful''.
:Megan: What do you mean?

:[Ponytail picks up a sheet of paper.]
:Ponytail: Several participants in your drug trial were arrested for arson.
:Megan: Side effects can be unpredictable.
:Ponytail: They were in the control group.

:[Zoom in on Ponytail.]
:Ponytail: In your prisoner's dilemma study, 80% of the participants chose to betray their partners '''''before''''' the experimenter had a chance to tell them about the reward.
:Megan (off-panel): Definitely troubling.

:[Ponytail shows Megan another sheet of paper.]
:Ponytail: In one experiment, your subjects repeatedly gave electric shocks to a stranger in another room.
:Megan: That's a famous psychological-
:Ponytail: This was a study of moisturizing creams!
:Megan: Yes, we're not sure how they snuck in all that equipment.

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics featuring Ponytail]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]
[[Category:Science]]

Talk:779: Anxiety

2014-05-02T05:29:17Z

199.27.128.112:

I don't think it's Black Hat saying the title text but someone else in line. However, I'm not sure so I'm hesitant to edit it.[[Special:Contributions/173.245.54.64|173.245.54.64]] 15:54, 6 March 2014 (UTC)

I think the point is not about offending the backscatter operator, but more about men not wanting others to view their genitals in the flaccid state. Many men have self-esteem issues about genital size, and would be eager to take a pill that would make them appear larger before exposing themselves in that way. [[Special:Contributions/199.27.128.112|199.27.128.112]] 05:29, 2 May 2014 (UTC)

Talk:745: Dyslexics

2014-05-02T03:27:59Z

199.27.128.112:

Can someone explain this sentence: "I kept doing 'doing 'doing it wrong' wrong' wrong."? Other than the 3 nested quotes, I don't get the point. [[User:Djbrasier|Djbrasier]] ([[User talk:Djbrasier|talk]]) 16:10, 3 January 2014 (UTC)

He's expanding the "it" in "doing it wrong." The joke of the comic itself is that the dyslexics are having difficulty making a mistake--they're doing "doing it wrong" wrong. In the title-text, Randall reveals he was having difficulty doing that wrong--he was doing "doing "doing it wrong" wrong" wrong. --[[User:Hatkirby|Hatkirby]] ([[User talk:Hatkirby|talk]]) 07:17, 4 January 2014 (UTC)

It's a nested statement. Perhaps made clearer with parenthesis. He's {doing [doing (doing it wrong) wrong] wrong}. In other words. He's incorrectly executing the incorrect execution of "doing it wrong" [[Special:Contributions/199.27.128.112|199.27.128.112]] 03:27, 2 May 2014 (UTC)

Talk:1350: Lorenz

2014-04-01T17:28:14Z

199.27.128.112:

I've had the story loop back to the first frame, so it wouldn't surprise me if this could go on infinitely if it had the available dialogue options.

This is going to be a hell of a thing. Good luck... [[User:H|H]] ([[User talk:H|talk]]) 15:39, 1 April 2014 (UTC)
:I think this is one of those times when the custom field might come in handy. Duplicating Randall's code seems like it might be difficult, and it might just be easier to link to the original page. Probably. '''[[User:Davidy22|{{Color|#707|David}}y²²]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 15:47, 1 April 2014 (UTC)

There's always new story lines, even when you think you've read them all, new ones appear to replace them. I don't think it'll ever be possible to record them all. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.212.192|108.162.212.192]] 15:55, 1 April 2014 (UTC)

When I go to XKCD, all I see is the comic from Monday... weird. --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 16:45, 1 April 2014 (UTC)

Currently there appears to be a bug. Instead of the evolving, crowd-sourced comic, I just see an off-center copy of the previous comic, 1349: Shouldn't Be Hard. [http://i.imgur.com/pw2OfOL.png Screenshot here].
UPDATE: it appears to be a bug in the XSRF-blocking code. Chrome console shows me the error "XMLHttpRequest cannot load http://c1.xkcd.com/graph/1/. The 'Access-Control-Allow-Origin' header has a value 'http://xkcd.com' that is not equal to the supplied origin. Origin 'http://www.xkcd.com' is therefore not allowed access."
FURTHER UPDATE: you can work around this bug by going to http://xkcd.com instead of http://www.xkcd.com!
It also doesn't work if you have HTTPS Everywhere enabled.
[[Special:Contributions/108.162.216.38|108.162.216.38]] 16:46, 1 April 2014 (UTC)

This comic introduced(?) a font of its own of Randalls comic type. I don't know if it has been sitting there for long, but I just noticed it: http://xkcd.com/fonts/xkcd-Regular.eot -- phiarc [[Special:Contributions/108.162.219.12|108.162.219.12]] 17:20, 1 April 2014 (UTC)

User talk:Jeff

2013-11-04T21:21:55Z

199.27.128.112: /* Email contact */

{{notice|This is the talk page of Jeff, the creator of Explain XKCD. If you have a comment about the wiki, please use the [[Explain XKCD:Community portal]]. Use this page only for personal messages to Jeff, of for requests that require server access.}} 

== ParserFunctions ==

Hi Jeff,

Just thought I'd run this up the flagpole... any thought about installing the ParserFunctions extension? I think this site could benefit from a few templates that would aid in indexing/categorizing the entries as content is migrated, and ParserFunctions would make some really impressive things possible... but installing any extension or not would be up to you.

Also, do you have any feelings about us users creating templates in the Template namespace, which we could use to maintain the content? Just wanted to get your thumbs-up before/if I did something like that. Just want to play nice. Love the site, and the new wiki format.

- PT [[User:IronyChef|IronyChef]] ([[User talk:IronyChef|talk]]) 03:05, 1 August 2012 (EDT)
:ParserFunctions are awesome, yup! --''[[User:Philosopher|Philosopher]]'' [[User talk:Philosopher|Let us reason together.]] 06:56, 1 August 2012 (EDT)
::{{done}} Yes to both. I have enabled ParserFunctions and Templates sound like a great idea. IronyChef, please send me an email at the address on the blog and I'll make you an admin if necessary to edit templates. --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 08:03, 1 August 2012 (EDT)

== Extension:Variable ==
Just wondering what you thought about adding the [http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Extension:Variables Variables extension]. I'm toying with revising {{tl|LATESTCOMIC}} to not be so expensive (both in terms of template expansion, and ongoing maintenance.) I could do that now, but the wiki would have to re-expand and re-evaluate the same expression about six times, being slightly counter-productive. -- [[User:IronyChef|IronyChef]] ([[User talk:IronyChef|talk]]) 14:54, 25 August 2012 (UTC)
:: any thoughts ... up, down, sideways? Thanks! -- [[User:IronyChef|IronyChef]] ([[User talk:IronyChef|talk]]) 15:34, 1 September 2012 (UTC)
::: I'm up for it... Let me get it installed on the wiki side when I get a chance. --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 23:13, 3 September 2012 (UTC)

== Bugging you again.... ==

Could you take a look at [//www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?limit=10000&tagfilter=&title=Special%3AContributions&contribs=user&target=Philosopher&namespace=8&year=&month=-1] and tell me if I'm thinking in about the same way as you are here? Also, I've brought up [[MediaWiki:Tagline]] and [[Explain XKCD:Community portal]], as it'd be cool to have a tagline. --''[[User:Philosopher|Philosopher]]'' [[User talk:Philosopher|Let us reason together.]] 10:46, 1 August 2012 (EDT)
:With you 100% on the File Delete reasons. Thanks. I agree also about having a tagline. What do you think it should be? --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 11:13, 1 August 2012 (EDT)
::Nothing's coming to mind right now. Perhaps someone else will think of something. --''[[User:Philosopher|Philosopher]]'' [[User talk:Philosopher|Let us reason together.]] 17:54, 2 August 2012 (EDT)
Discussion continued at [[Explain XKCD:Community portal/Proposals#Tagline]].

== Automatic Import ==
Moved to [[Explain XKCD:Community portal/Proposals#Automatic Import]]. (Header left to avoid breaking links.) --''[[User:Philosopher|Philosopher]]'' [[User talk:Philosopher|Let us reason together.]] 00:30, 4 August 2012 (EDT)

== Please watch [[Explain XKCD:Community portal/Administrators' noticeboard]] ==

I'd like to ask that the admins consider adding [[Explain XKCD:Community portal/Administrators' noticeboard]] to their [[wikipedia:Help:Watching pages|watchlists]]. On a similar note, I've just started a discussion there about spammers. -''[[User:Philosopher|Philosopher]]'' [[User talk:Philosopher|Let us reason together.]] 02:02, 4 August 2012 (EDT)

== Images from Wikimedia Commons and SVG ==
Please set <code>$wgUseInstantCommons = true;</code> in the wiki's LocalSettings.php, so we can use images from Wikimedia Commons without having to reupload them here.
Also, I'd be neat if you could [[mw:Manual:Image Administration#SVG|enable svg images]]. Thanks! --[[User:Waldir|Waldir]] ([[User talk:Waldir|talk]]) 04:20, 4 August 2012 (EDT)
: {{done}}, Instant Commons is on. Will need a little more work to get SVG images to work. What renderer to do you suggest I use? --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 12:05, 6 August 2012 (UTC)
:: That'll depend on what you have available in your server. They say there that ImageMagick seems to be an acceptable choice, but rsvg seems to be the best one if the dependencies can be sorted out. --[[User:Waldir|Waldir]] ([[User talk:Waldir|talk]]) 13:20, 6 August 2012 (UTC)

== Search suggestions ==

Hi,

could you please set $wgEnableMWSuggest [http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Manual:$wgEnableMWSuggest] to true? This enables search suggestions for the search field, and often this helps you to skip the search results. --[[User:SlashMe|SlashMe]] ([[User talk:SlashMe|talk]]) 09:10, 4 August 2012 (EDT)
:{{done}} OK, this is has been added to the LocalSettings. --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 12:06, 6 August 2012 (UTC)

== Time zone ==

Please set the wiki to UTC (<tt>$wgLocaltimezone = "UTC";</tt> in LocalSettings.php), as it's the most neutral option for our international community. In any case, each user can choose their time zone in their preferences.
:{{done}} Ok, set. --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 12:07, 6 August 2012 (UTC)

== Short urls, site logo, lowercase xkcd ==

Hi,
I'm not sure if you tried it but http://shorturls.redwerks.org is a great (and simple :D) tool to implement clean urls with mediawiki. That would make urls much nicer around here.

Also, if you could, please take a look at [[Explain XKCD:Community portal/Proposals#Naming conventions]], where your assistance is needed for some server changes. --[[User:Waldir|Waldir]] ([[User talk:Waldir|talk]]) 15:31, 6 August 2012 (UTC)

:Hi again :) just to remind you about the short urls thing. I think it would be great if we could have wiki links in the form "explainxkcd.com/wiki/link_title". It might be necessary to move the wiki into a different folder name than "wiki", but that's just a matter of renaming the folder and changing <code>$wgScriptPath</code> in LocalSettings.php accordingly. The link above makes things really straighforward, it should really only take you a few minutes to set everything up.
:Another cool thing that could be done is set up a server redirect so that links in the form of explainxkcd.com/number would point to the comics in the wiki instead of returning a 404 error (for instance, http://explainxkcd.com/123 would point to http://explainxkcd.com/wiki/123). That way, we could replicate xkcd's own url system for comics and people could simply type explainxkcd.com/123 and get the explanation for the corresponding comic. This redirect can probably be set up in the hosting company's web interface, but in case it can't, let me know if you need any help. --[[User:Waldir|Waldir]] ([[User talk:Waldir|talk]]) 22:03, 11 August 2012 (UTC)
::Hi Waldir - I'll work on the short URL thing. I want that to work for sure. With regards to the redirect, I have been working on it for a while and I have a few .htaccess files and etc that don't work. I'll be grateful for the help on it. Please send me an email if you know how to get it done. This would also allow anyone from xkcd.com/435 to just add explain and go to the comic explanation. Very helpful. Been working on it unsuccessfully for a while. --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 01:41, 12 August 2012 (UTC)
:::Ugh, it must be my hosting because I did all of the shorturls correctly it just sent it to a 404 page for the site over and over again. The url seemed to be the right one, but didn't send it to the right location. It should NOT be this difficult. --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 02:25, 12 August 2012 (UTC)

== wgCapitalLinks ==

Hi Jeff! When you have a few spare minutes, please add the following to LocalSettings.php:
$wgCapitalLinks = false;
This allows page titles not to be automatically capitalized by the software, which is important for filenames and for some comic titles such as [[s/keyboard/leopard/]]. Cheers, [[User:Waldir|Waldir]] ([[User talk:Waldir|talk]]) 21:34, 11 August 2012 (UTC)
:{{done}} --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 01:37, 12 August 2012 (UTC)
::...and this broke our templates (and maybe [[Special:RecentChanges]]?). See [[explain xkcd:Community portal/Admin requests]]. Can't we just style the page titles so they appear as though they aren't capitalized when they really are? (As done at [[wikipedia:Xkcd]], using the DISPLAYTITLE magic word (called through [[wikipedia:Template:DISPLAYTITLE]]).) --''[[User:Philosopher|Philosopher]]'' [[User talk:Philosopher|Let us reason together.]] 04:42, 12 August 2012 (UTC)
:::Looks like transition pains would be inevitable. I think everything is sorted out for now. See the Admin requests thread for details. As for using DISPLAYTITLE, I understand the rationale, but this is xkcd and attention to capitalization is necessary in several pages, and I believe we'd rather use a complete solution (so that pages actually have the correct title) rather than hacking what is shown to viewers. In any case, we shouldn't have many problems in the future because of this; People will only capitalize the first letter of a title when it's actually necessary; otherwise, lazyness/convenience makes us all use lowercase everywhere (besides, redirects can be used just in case, such as {{tl|yesno}} → {{tl|YesNo}}. --[[User:Waldir|Waldir]] ([[User talk:Waldir|talk]]) 09:06, 12 August 2012 (UTC)

== External Images ==

Has there actually been a decision on external images? Or is it just to be decided later?  [[User:Grep|grep]][[User_talk:Grep|talk]] 
: No decision yet. What do you think? --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 21:16, 28 August 2012 (UTC)
::Well, the whitelisting seems an OK idea. This would help you save space on the servers that you are hosting on, so that's a plus. I say go for whitelisting.  [[User:Grep|grep]][[User_talk:Grep|talk]]  Mostly I am wondering because I created a PHP script that creates an image to display the results of a poll (like on the Moving the Wiki topic in Proposals). For my situation any method of something external being placed on this site will work.
::'''I just''' got an idea... what if there was a group of moderators that check external images and approve them. The more approvals a person gets, the more "reliable" they are considered to be... ?  [[User:Grep|grep]][[User_talk:Grep|talk]] 

== Short Link Problem Fix? ==

Is <code>mod_rewrite</code> installed and enabled? 
[https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Manual:Short_URL/Apache MW ShortURL] 
Are all of the config files (including the wiki one) set up?

 [[User:Grep|grep]][[User_talk:Grep|talk]] 

== New admin please? ==

This is a bit forthright of me, but nothing appears to be being done about it. Would you read this [[explain xkcd:Community portal/Proposals#Spampage Rampage]] and comment on it? Thanks, [[User:Lcarsos|lcarsos]] and the community 17:47, 13 November 2012 (UTC)

== Small change ==

Hi Jeff! Long time no see. Look, could you add
:<code>$wgGroupPermissions['autoconfirmed']['autopatrol'] = true;</code>
to LocalSettings.php? That will allow edits by [[mw:auto-confirmed|auto-confirmed]] users not to be marked with a red exclamation mark in recent changes so we can more quickly spot edits that might need reviewing. --[[User:Waldir|Waldir]] ([[User talk:Waldir|talk]]) 02:16, 22 November 2012 (UTC)

:Btw while you're at it, please also add
::<code>$wgAllowUserJs = true;</code>
::<code>$wgAllowUserCss = true;</code>
:So users can make their own scripts and styles to enhance the wiki (I need that, for instance, to test stuff without affecting anyone else, before integrating them on site-wide javascript/css pages) --[[User:Waldir|Waldir]] ([[User talk:Waldir|talk]]) 16:52, 22 November 2012 (UTC)

{{done}} and {{done}} --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 19:55, 25 November 2012 (UTC)

:Thanks! --[[User:Waldir|Waldir]] ([[User talk:Waldir|talk]]) 19:57, 25 November 2012 (UTC)

:: Sorry, I forgot a small detail: it is necessary to set up the following so that "auto-confirmed" doesn't mean "any registered user":
:: <code>$wgAutoConfirmAge = 60*60*24*3 // accounts become auto-confirmed after 3 days</code>
:: <code>$wgAutoConfirmCount = 10 // ...and 10 edits</code>
:: Cheers, [[User:Waldir|Waldir]] ([[User talk:Waldir|talk]]) 21:32, 25 November 2012 (UTC)

::: {{done}} --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 21:49, 25 November 2012 (UTC)

:::: Thanks, again. Also, since the wiki didn't break, I take it that you noticed the missing semicolons which I stupidly forgot to include at the end of the lines, and added them. Sorry for the slip-up. --[[User:Waldir|Waldir]] ([[User talk:Waldir|talk]]) 17:31, 26 November 2012 (UTC)
::::: No worries, I know that much at least! :) --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 17:36, 26 November 2012 (UTC)

Did you by any chance write "auto patrol" instead of "autopatrol"? [[Special:ListGroupRights]] suggests so, and if that's the case, that explains why the changes don't seem to have had the effects I expected from them (edits by auto-patrolled users still marked with the red exclamation mark in Special:RecentChanges). Could you check that the line reads exactly <code>$wgGroupPermissions['autoconfirmed']['autopatrol'] = true;</code>? --[[User:Waldir|Waldir]] ([[User talk:Waldir|talk]]) 17:54, 26 November 2012 (UTC)
: That's what I thought I put even though autocorrect wanted to change it. Can't look now, will have a look when I get home. ---[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 17:55, 26 November 2012 (UTC)
:: Any news? No pressure, I'm just curious :) --[[User:Waldir|Waldir]] ([[User talk:Waldir|talk]]) 15:34, 30 November 2012 (UTC)
::: Bah - I keep forgetting when I get home. I'll try to get it done this weekend. --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 17:35, 30 November 2012 (UTC)
:::: Much delayed, but {{done}} --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 02:50, 4 December 2012 (UTC)
::::: Thanks, Jeff. I'll let you know if there's any further issues, but I believe everything should be working now. --[[User:Waldir|Waldir]] ([[User talk:Waldir|talk]]) 03:34, 4 December 2012 (UTC)

== Links to category pages ==

I couldn't help but notice the number of your edits to your page. You can link to category pages by putting a colon in front of "Category". <code><nowiki>[[:Category:Pages to delete]]</nowiki></code> produces [[:Category:Pages to delete]]. It also doesn't add the category to that page, it just links to it. Cheers, [[User:Lcarsos|lcarsos]]_a ([[User talk:Lcarsos|talk]]) 17:30, 30 November 2012 (UTC)
: Oh geez. You saw that? That's a little embarrassing with not knowing what to do, I kept trying to figure out how to put the link there. Thanks for the help! I couldn't find that information anywhere. --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 17:31, 30 November 2012 (UTC)

::When I had to learn about that trick the edits on that page looked fairly similar. I eventually found the right page [http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Help:Links] (ctrl+f "category", it's buried) and managed it. I have the Recent Changes page set to auto-refresh every minute. I see a few things. [[User:Lcarsos|lcarsos]]_a ([[User talk:Lcarsos|talk]]) 17:43, 30 November 2012 (UTC)

== Your opinion? ==

Please comment [[explain xkcd:Community portal/Technical#We need more maintainers|here]]. Cheers, [[User:Waldir|Waldir]] ([[User talk:Waldir|talk]]) 17:21, 5 December 2012 (UTC)
:Update: we've been offered help by [[mediawiki:User:Dantman|an experienced MediaWiki developer]], I think we can finally solve the server-side issues now! Please take a look at the thread linked above. [[User:Waldir|Waldir]] ([[User talk:Waldir|talk]]) 20:07, 23 March 2013 (UTC)

== I am really dumb ==

and this morning, while creating a user name, I goofed it and wrote .mau, (with a trailing comma) instead of .mau. (with a trailing dot, which is my trademark). I know that a bureaucrat on MediaWiki can change a username which had few edits (my own edits are three including this one): could you do this, or at least delete this username so that I may recreate it without leaving a dead one? TIA, [[User:.mau,|.mau,]] ([[User talk:.mau,|talk]]) 15:09, 16 January 2013 (UTC)
:You can actually change your signature to .mau. if you want, to mask that for now. Just make a page called User:.mau,/sig and craft your signature to your liking, then go to my preferences at the top and set your sig to <nowiki>{{SUBST:User:.mau,/sig}}</nowiki>. If you want an example, [[User:Lcarsos/sig]] is a near-vanilla and quite clean example of a custom sig, while [[User:Omega/sig]] and my sig, [[User:Davidy22/sig]] are slightly more tricked-out options. Wikipedia's guidelines to signature crafting are {{w|Wikipedia:Signatures#Customizing_your_signature|here.}} '''[[User:Davidy22|Davidy22]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 15:53, 16 January 2013 (UTC)
::ok, thanks! [[User:.mau,|.mau.]] ([[User talk:.mau,|talk]]) 09:55, 17 January 2013 (UTC)
:::Aw, that's it? No bling or anything? Meeehhh. '''[[User:Davidy22|Davidy22]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 13:16, 17 January 2013 (UTC)
:(to Jeff) I believe user renaming is not possible in vanilla mediawiki. An extension is required: [[mw:Extension:Renameuser]] --[[User:Waldir|Waldir]] ([[User talk:Waldir|talk]]) 18:21, 17 January 2013 (UTC)
::I find a bit disturbing to have a "wrong" username, especially because I may not remember it somewhen (yes, the word does not exist, but I like its sound); but I don't need any flashy signature, so I just changed the traling comma to a dot. --[[User:.mau,|.mau.]] ([[User talk:.mau,|talk]]) 14:09, 18 January 2013 (UTC)

==/wiki/==
Now that the site apparently redirects to the wiki, could the entire wiki URL just be explainxkcd.com, without the trailing wiki? It's mostly for cleanliness, but also to throw off the spambots for a while. Those accursed spam happy bots. '''[[User:Davidy22|Davidy22]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 04:29, 4 February 2013 (UTC)
: Sounds good, I'm working on that part next. It is next on my "to-do" list complete some URL work like that. --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 18:05, 4 February 2013 (UTC)
::''nag''. Also, the spam is becoming an issue. A pretty big issue. Time to switch captchas? '''[[User:Davidy22|Davidy22]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 13:04, 18 February 2013 (UTC)
::: OK - sounds good to me, any ones you recommend? --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 13:33, 18 February 2013 (UTC)
:::: I don't remember which captcha the wiki uses, but I know securimage and recaptcha are two very competent options. Alternately, you could use [http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Extension:ConfirmEdit ConfirmEdit] to screen anon edits. Much of the spam seems to be automated, so questycaptcha should screen out most of the chaff. Just simple questions, like "What webcomic does this site explain" or "Who created XKCD" should be sufficient to screw up our current spammers. Also, rm /wiki/ plx. '''[[User:Davidy22|Davidy22]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 13:41, 18 February 2013 (UTC)
:::::Confirm edit is in and Recaptcha is out. Let's try that. --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 14:11, 18 February 2013 (UTC)
::::::The questions appear to be case-sensitive. To avoid frustration, could you add a notice to every question saying that the answers have to be in all lower/upper case? I got "What's the name of this wiki" wrong a bunch of times, and I think it's due to capitalization. '''[[User:Davidy22|Davidy22]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 14:30, 18 February 2013 (UTC)
:::::::Ok - cool. I changed it to $wgSitename instead of just writing it out. --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 14:32, 18 February 2013 (UTC)
::::::::If we get no spam tomorrow, I will hold a party in your talk page. Oh, and /wiki/. '''[[User:Davidy22|Davidy22]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 14:38, 18 February 2013 (UTC)
:::::::::I'll just hijack this thread and ask: Isn't it time Davidy22 got admin tools? It's long overdue. And please promote Lcarsos‏‎ to bureaucrat, so he can make new admins if needed. And seconded: <code>/wiki/</code> ! --[[User:Waldir|Waldir]] ([[User talk:Waldir|talk]]) 02:39, 19 February 2013 (UTC)
::::::::::Could you also put confirmEdit in general page creation for anonymous users? There's still a couple of spam pages being made that don't actually advertise anything. There hasn't been an account creation in a long time, so I think we've killed off the spam accounts. The rate of spam has definitely dropped significantly ever since we switched to confirmEdit. '''[[User:Davidy22|Davidy22]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 05:42, 20 February 2013 (UTC)
::::::::::We've just had a surge of pure griefer spam. Anons who don't insert any links, they're just throwing spam at us out of malice. Could you make anonymous users have to pass through confrimEdit to create pages? Thanks. On a side note, what's the ratio in terms of file size between current explanation pages to logs and diffs? '''[[User:Davidy22|Davidy²²]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 01:53, 22 February 2013 (UTC)
:::::::::::Wow those suck. Wiping out whole pages with anon edits. I can't change the settings from here, but I'll do it when I get home. Also, I'm not sure what you mean by filesize? --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 15:51, 22 February 2013 (UTC)
::::::::::::Eh, how much space do explanations and images take up on your hard drive when compared to the space that log files and diffs take up? '''[[User:Davidy22|Davidy²²]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 16:01, 22 February 2013 (UTC)

== Promote Davidy22 ==

:''Breaking this discussion out from where it was, because it merits its own section. [[User:Lcarsos|lcarsos]]_a ([[User talk:Lcarsos|talk]])''
I'll just hijack this thread and ask: Isn't it time Davidy22 got admin tools? It's long overdue. And please promote lcarsos‏‎ to bureaucrat, so he can make new admins if needed. And seconded: <code>/wiki/</code> ! --[[User:Waldir|Waldir]] ([[User talk:Waldir|talk]]) 02:39, 19 February 2013 (UTC)

:'''Heartily Agree''' on promoting Davidy22, he's almost always more on top of spam patrol than I am these days (burn-out for the lose). I'm not sure I can speak for my own promotion without sounding self-serving and power-hungry. However, in my few spare moments this semester I am looking closely at getting a bot up and running to automate the clean up of spam (mostly because manual spam patrol is the most soul-sucking and disheartening activity I've ever done), so it would be nice to be able to get a bot account promoted to bot status without misrepresenting it as my account. [[User:Lcarsos|lcarsos]]_a ([[User talk:Lcarsos|talk]]) 18:13, 19 February 2013 (UTC)
:: Davidy22 is up to admin (honestly, I thought he was already one, so no issue there on my end.) and lcarsos has been updated to bureaucrat because we should have more redundancy there. Also, create a bot account and let me know what it is and i'll give it bot rights. --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 18:36, 19 February 2013 (UTC)
:: Or now, you can do it! :) --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 18:41, 19 February 2013 (UTC)
:::WOO, power! '''[[User:Davidy22|Davidy22]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 05:42, 20 February 2013 (UTC)

== Small ConfirmEdit change ==

Can you change the line:
<pre>$wgCaptchaTriggers['create'] = false;</pre>
to true? I think this would solve most of our bot vandalism/griefing problems. [[User:Lcarsos|lcarsos]]_a ([[User talk:Lcarsos|talk]]) 21:19, 22 February 2013 (UTC)
:: {{done}} I changed 'edit' to true as well since we've seen a bunch when editing user's talk pages. We will see if I have to move that back to false. --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 16:16, 23 February 2013 (UTC)

== DeleteOldRevisions ==

There's a script built into mediawiki called DeleteOldRevisions.php that seems to have deprecated the deletehistory plugin. A link to the [http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Manual:DeleteOldRevisions.php manual page.] A hard drive upgrade would be apt for the future though. '''[[User:Davidy22|{{Color|purple|David}}y²²]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 00:15, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
: I'm looking into it. I'm not sure how the wiki got back up and running without me running the update. I'll try the [http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Extension:DeleteHistory] and see if that can help in the meantime. The expanded HD might be a no-go, but I'll see on that too. --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 01:27, 20 March 2013 (UTC)

==Server Hardware==
The website is getting really slow and throwing internal errors all over the place, and it looks like both the main page and the page for the newest comic [[1190: Time]] are climbing rapidly in views. If one ambiguous comic is hitting us like a DDoS, we're going to get it in the shorts if Randall ever actually acknowledges our existence directly, or some other geeky media outlet posts a link to us. Is there a donate button anywhere? '''[[User:Davidy22|{{Color|purple|David}}y²²]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 05:18, 25 March 2013 (UTC)
: We certainly can get a Donate button. We may need to migrate the server to get it upgraded. This is one of those big days, I guess. --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 12:39, 25 March 2013 (UTC)
:: How about a Kickstarter or Indiegogo campaign? --[[User:Waldir|Waldir]] ([[User talk:Waldir|talk]]) 12:37, 26 March 2013 (UTC)
:::Kickstarter and Indiegogo are one-time things. No good for this. I recommend modifying the donate button so that there is a PayPal "Subscribe" button near it so people can also do small monthly subscriptions. I recommend a dropdown with $1, $2, $5, $10, $20 options.
:::Does 1&1 give you stats like how much bandwidth (or rather how much data) you are using. That could have an effect on where is best to get the new hosting; Rackspace Cloud, Linode, AWS, or even a real server with access to other network options like paying for actual Mbps bandwidth with unlimited data.
:::When you get a server I'd like to properly set it up with varnish, nginx, apc (or Zend_Optimizer+ considering it's going to be part of php 5.5), memcached, and perhaps php-fpm instead of mod_php. Varnish will allow anonymous pages to be cached hopefully reducing the load issues. And nginx should serve out static things better than Apache. [[User:Dantman|Dantman]] ([[User talk:Dantman|talk]]) 05:23, 27 March 2013 (UTC)
:::: Regarding the Paypal button, besides the subscribe option, I would recommend removing the credit card logos, as they make it too wide for the sidebar and not fit the design well. Besides, I personally think they give it kind of a corporate feel; instead, a simple "donate" button, while still recognizable as paypal's, feels simpler and more "personal", for lack of a better word.
:::: Also, I think you should place it above the AdSense block, since that makes it more visible, and prioritizes a form of supporting the site that people have direct, active control over, rather than the passive, choice-less (modulo AdBlock) AdSense.
:::: And also capitalize "donate" in the section title, to match the other titles ("Navigation", "Toolbox", etc.)
:::: Since we're at it: maybe more donation options would make sense: [//flattr.com Flattr], [//gittip.com Gittip], [//tiptheweb.org/ TipTheWeb], and possibly [//bitcoin.org/ Bitcoins].
:::: Finally, is it possible to make the AdSense background transparent, or at least the same as the site background of #F3F3F3? --[[User:Waldir|Waldir]] ([[User talk:Waldir|talk]]) 14:15, 27 March 2013 (UTC)
:::::Is it possible to add the ad and donate buttons without including a section title? Minimizing unused space is gooood. Also, I noticed that you installed the deletehistory plugin, but it's trying to use another version of PHP that's installed on the server. deleteoldrevisions.php in the maintenance folder oughta work fine, though it'd probably be apt to run it over the weekend when we're not expecting absurd floods of visitors like we are now. We may need it too, after we've filled up the hard drive again with archives of Time.'''[[User:Davidy22|{{Color|purple|David}}y²²]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 14:39, 27 March 2013 (UTC)
:::::: Yes, it is possible for me to edit, I will have to go into the settings for each since I used extensions for them. I hate the credit card things too. Will take a look at all options tonight.
:::::: The Deletehistory plugin doesn't work, sadly because of the PHP version. Hopefully, when we migrate, it will be on a newer version and that will work. Hopefully, we will have more disk space too... --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]])
::::: Hey Jeff. Could you change the width of the paypal donate button so that it matches the google ads and the bitcoin donate button? Maybe using a custom button rather than the paypal-provided one?
::::: Also, any news regarding the possibility of changing the background of the google ads? --[[User:Waldir|Waldir]] ([[User talk:Waldir|talk]]) 17:21, 8 April 2013 (UTC)
:::::: It did not work out with Google ads for a reason they will not disclose to me, but I'll work on the buttons and the banner ad. --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 16:11, 9 April 2013 (UTC)

== Everything's good ==

Except for the (currently) occasional server error, I have no problems.

I've turned on HotCat and Popups, imported wikEdDiff and my HideTopContribs, all of which make me fairly efficient at watching changes.

A minor request would be the Redirect toolbar button.

[[User:Markhurd|Mark Hurd]] ([[User talk:Markhurd|talk]]) 17:13, 19 April 2013 (UTC)

:When you turn off enwiki's "Enable enhanced editing toolbar" all of the toolbar buttons explainxkcd has are in the same order (it skips Math) and the very next one is Redirect #R. It seems to be defined at http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=MediaWiki:Common.js/edit.js&action=edit
:I've tried adding just Redirect #R myself [[User:Markhurd/common.js|here]], but something's going wrong. (And I should be sleeping!)
::Seeing as it is only one button I wanted, I simplified the code down to calling addButton directly and it is now working fine. [[User:Markhurd|Mark Hurd]] ([[User talk:Markhurd|talk]]) 13:07, 20 April 2013 (UTC)

:Re being an Admin: Yes, please, as long as you note this would be my first actual Admin bit. (I'm a Bureaucrat on another MW wiki so I could give myself Admin rights whenever I wanted.) [[User:Markhurd|Mark Hurd]] ([[User talk:Markhurd|talk]]) 19:39, 19 April 2013 (UTC)

== Sidebar ads ==

Hi, we're having a discussion about the sidebar ads on [[Talk:Main Page#sidebar ads?]]. --[[User:St.nerol|St.nerol]] ([[User talk:St.nerol|talk]]) 08:42, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

== Economic transparency ==

Hi! I made a request on economic transparency on the proposals page. –[[User:St.nerol|St.nerol]] ([[User talk:St.nerol|talk]]) 22:05, 27 May 2013 (UTC)

==Thumbnails are not working==
I'm relatively new here but I think each picture should get it's proper thumbnail when the original is to large to embed. Mediawiki is using some applications in the background maybe not available here. But there are some workarounds. And since "onlinehome.us" is well secured I still do even not know what OS is running in the background. But whatever the OS is, it should be solvable.--[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 18:13, 8 June 2013 (UTC)

== Last missing page ==

Hi, I'm hoping you don't mind about my adds to Natalie Dee. I was working on that at the same time.
BTW: Can I help you on that thumbnail issue? I really would be happy if it could fixed here.--[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 21:42, 18 June 2013 (UTC)
:: No problem on the Natalee Dee comic, I was just working on it because it was the last one, edit away. What's the thumbnail issue? --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 21:43, 18 June 2013 (UTC)
:::Thanks for your reply. I am still talking about this: [http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Manual:Errors_and_symptoms#Image_Thumbnails_not_working_and.2For_appearing Image_Thumbnails_not_working]. I am sure there is a need to fix the [http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/LocalSettings.php LocalSettings.php]. Maybe some paths are wrong or it's just using wrong image tools. I can help on any OS except Apple computers.--[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 22:07, 18 June 2013 (UTC)

== Congratulations! ==

You just created the last unexplained comic of ''xkcd''! [[User:Greyson|Greyson]] ([[User talk:Greyson|talk]]) 23:38, 18 June 2013 (UTC)
: Thanks Greyson! --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 03:04, 19 June 2013 (UTC)

==Math==
A lot of comics have formulae in them. Could you set $wgUseTeX = true in LocalSettings.php? That lets us use latex in pages. It'd be useful for comics like yesterday's. '''[[User:Davidy22|{{Color|#707|David}}y²²]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 09:12, 11 July 2013 (UTC)
:Yeah, this would be nice. But you have to install an extension, LaTex must be available, then compile something, and at least adjusting the LocalSettings.php config file. We also sill do not have all image features here. But I can help, Windows or Linux.--[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 13:55, 11 July 2013 (UTC)
:: I'll look into it. Let me know if you find an extension that will do the trick. Send me some links to anything that would help and I can get them set up. --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 14:44, 11 July 2013 (UTC)
:::Go here [http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Extension:Math Extension:Math] and read the installation instructions first, it's not easy. For Fedora (Linux) there is a package called "mediawiki-math.x86_64" available. I will test this at my own computer.--[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 15:57, 11 July 2013 (UTC)
::::It's the hell, but I got a first crappy version at my local installation. I have had to install ''latex'' and ''ocaml'' packages and now its working, but it still renders many lines before the <nowiki><math></nowiki> tag, So it's still not usable for this site.--[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 14:35, 13 July 2013 (UTC)
===Seeing injected banner ads?===
I'm seeing banner ads (viewing on my iPad) that cover the actual banner of the site and never scroll out of view. It's as if they've been infected by a downstream server (ISP?). Anybody else? I'm in Wisconsin using TDS. Jeff M.
: That's terrible, I've got to fix that. bah. --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 18:36, 2 August 2013 (UTC)
:: Is there a place I can email some screenshots? Jeff M.{{unsigned ip|69.130.242.120}}

== Full cache kills this page ==

Hi, it seems this page was not reachable for 15 hours again. The cache here has to be cleared sometimes, but since I can do it with my account I will create a script running once per day. 15 hours outage are bad, I try to avoid this in the future. --[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 15:50, 3 October 2013 (UTC)
:Which page was dead? --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 16:11, 3 October 2013 (UTC)
::The entire site was dead. Look here: [[Special:RecentChanges|Special:RecentChanges]]. My last post was at 23:44 yesterday, no actions here after my reset at 14:54 today. The site was dead. I'm not a hacker, but I'm a programmer and I used this base of knowledge to fix this problem. If you do need more details, please send me an email. --[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 18:25, 3 October 2013 (UTC)
::: Agreed. Tried to visit yesterday PM, but a lot of pages were spilling guts: user pages, category pages, no comic explanations (as far as I could tell with my limited browsing.) A chron-job script to keep that at bay would be good medicine, assuming it didn't have other side effects. [[User:IronyChef|IronyChef]] ([[User talk:IronyChef|talk]]) 03:19, 4 October 2013 (UTC)
I will set up a cron job running once per day. Maybe this entry at the config file [https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Manual:LocalSettings.php LocalSettings.php] would be the better solution:
$wgMainCacheType = CACHE_NONE;
I'm using the MidnightCommander (Linux) for editing this file.--[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 12:11, 4 October 2013 (UTC)
:::: Cache_None is already set in the LocalSettings. I believe this is usually a database error that we are getting. It usually resolves itself as I'm not able to resolve it myself. I believe that we are getting hit with a brute force attack at our database during those times because the database is totally unreachable. I'm working on moving to a new host where the database will be better protected. --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 12:16, 4 October 2013 (UTC)
:::::Cache_None or CACHE_NONE? This should be case sensitive. Nevertheless I did purge the cache and the site was instantly available again (after approx. 15 hours). Also Davidy22 explained that he did clear the cache to bring the site back. The error messages are misleading and not showing the real problem.--[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 12:43, 4 October 2013 (UTC)
:::::: Yes, CACHE_NONE, sorry, I was typing fast. I've ran my clear cache script a few times when I've had that same problem and haven't seen results, so I'm glad we at least have something that's working. --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 15:18, 4 October 2013 (UTC)
:::::::You are doing a great job, I feel I just have to say thanks! When the next outage does happen I will activate a small script, but for now I just try to avoid unnecessary traffic to this server.--[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 16:15, 4 October 2013 (UTC)
:::::::: Thanks Dgbrt! --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 18:07, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

== New host ==

Great job, but please check this link: <code>/wiki/</code>. I can browse the entire folder and more. It seems that "htaccess" should be renamed to ".htaccess".--[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 08:32, 30 October 2013 (UTC)
: Oh geez. That's bad. Thanks! --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 12:02, 30 October 2013 (UTC)
:: Should be good now. --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 16:45, 30 October 2013 (UTC)

I found an other serious issue belonging to DNS entries:
Name: explainxkcd.com
Address: 108.162.198.131
Name: explainxkcd.com
Address: 108.162.199.131
This works fine because 108.162.'''198'''.131 is correct. But most DNS servers showing up with this result:
Name: explainxkcd.com
Address: 108.162.199.131
Name: explainxkcd.com
Address: 108.162.198.131
This just leads to the old server at 108.162.'''199'''.131. Check Google DNS server 8.8.8.8 with nslookup, the wrong IP is shown first.
--[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 19:34, 30 October 2013 (UTC)
: Weird... I'll research. --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 19:35, 30 October 2013 (UTC)
::Yes, it's weird. After I discovered this I did enter an entry for this at my local "/etc/hosts" file. But it seems most people can not access the new site.--[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 20:20, 30 October 2013 (UTC)
::One more: The logo on the left top is broken. ''style="background-image: url(/wiki/skins/common/images/explainxkcd.png)'' does not exist.--[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 20:53, 30 October 2013 (UTC)
::: Yea, what happened to that logo... it was there this morning. --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 20:56, 30 October 2013 (UTC)
::::Oh, after a computer crash I'm back. Right now even the editor is broken here. I don't know if I can send this message. --[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 21:22, 30 October 2013 (UTC)
:::::Ok, it does work, but all images for short cuts on top of the editor are also broken now. --[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 21:26, 30 October 2013 (UTC)
:::::: The editor works fine for me, I'll research the images. --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 21:27, 30 October 2013 (UTC)
:::::::It seems all links like "/wiki/skins/common/images/button_bold.png" are gone. Additionally I'm getting an JavaScript error "TypeError: document.getElementById(...) is null". http://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/skins/common/images/button_bold.png redirects me to http://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page. Maybe you still get some content, maybe cache, from 108.162.199.131? Or is the real site now on that IP? Remember, I have had to restart my computer; most of my cache is gone and I'm just seeing the real page.--[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 21:48, 30 October 2013 (UTC)
:::::::: I fixed the images. I did that stupidly through the htaccess page. I've got to figure a better solution for what I'm trying to do to solve another problem. --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 21:58, 30 October 2013 (UTC)
:::::::::Looks great right now. So that DNS glitch seems to be the most worse problem right now.--[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 22:08, 30 October 2013 (UTC)
:::::::::: I think DNS is still propagating with the updates from yesterday. Not every one has the correct information yet... those two DNS IPs are the load balancers, I believe. --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 22:09, 30 October 2013 (UTC)
:::::::::::Strange "load balancers", but it's working now on both IPs. Many thanks again for your hard work, you must have invested many hours on this migration. Let's see tomorrow if other users will be able to find this site again.--[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 22:30, 30 October 2013 (UTC)

== Please remove subaddressing from my account email [[user:tbc]] ==

Hi Jeff,

I requested a password reset, but I forgot that my account still has an old email registered: timc+explainxkcd@divide.net. My ISP, pcisys.net née divide.net, disabled subaddressing during an email upgrade earlier this year. If you will update that email to remove the plus sign so my account email is timc@divide.net, I will be able to reset my password. I was logged in from my iPad to write on the [[explain_xkcd:Community_portal/Admin_requests#Please_remove_subaddressing_from_my_account_email_user:tbc|community portal]] page, but since I needed my password, which I have forgotten, to change it, I got stuck. – ''[[User:Tbc|tbc]] ([[User talk:Tbc|talk]]) 30 Oct 2013''
: You should be good to go now. --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 16:07, 31 October 2013 (UTC)

== Email contact ==

Hi Jeff,

I understand you are the admin of this site. I need to contact you privately about a security hole in your server configuration. Is explain@ an appropriate place to reach you? (jeff@?) [[Special:Contributions/199.27.128.112|199.27.128.112]] 19:46, 4 November 2013 (UTC)
: You can send me an email at the "E-mail this user" link on the left under "Toolbox". --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 20:05, 4 November 2013 (UTC)
:: I don't see it... is it available to non-registered users? [[Special:Contributions/199.27.128.112|199.27.128.112]] 20:45, 4 November 2013 (UTC)
::: Crap, probably not. jeff.roman AT gmail --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]]) 20:53, 4 November 2013 (UTC)
:::: Email sent. You can delete this thread if you want. [[Special:Contributions/199.27.128.112|199.27.128.112]] 21:21, 4 November 2013 (UTC)

User talk:Jeff

2013-11-04T20:45:41Z

199.27.128.112: /* Email contact */

User talk:Jeff

2013-11-04T19:46:02Z

199.27.128.112: contact request