Help talk:Customizing Monaco

Monaco Side bar not showing up changes
What should I do, it's almost 24 hours now, is it normal?

Monobook emulation within Monaco
Has anyone successfully customized MediaWiki:Monaco.css to faithfully emulate the Monobook skin (as used at Wikipedia) and so apply that as the site default?

If so then please paste that CSS file content inside .. tags here.

I am not looking for the user preference for Monobook, I know about that! I am looking for a workaround to make the familiar wikipedia style Monobook the default skin for a site.

Najevi 18:30, 21 May 2008 (UTC)


 * You could try w:c:guildwars - I think there's is fairly close to monobook. Kirkburn (talk) 09:37, 18 June 2008 (UTC)


 * w:c:guildwars uses Monobook as a default skin. When viewed using user preference Monaco it looks like any other Monaco default skin. najevi 22:01, 18 June 2008 (UTC)


 * Aha, it's because I use http://guildwars.wikia.com/wiki/User:Kirkburn/monaco.css Kirkburn (talk) 18:53, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

Positioning and wrapping
Would you please consider allowing the user to specify the position in the list and the label strings corresponding to the 2 (or 3) user page related links. This will allow site admins and/or users to set those up so that the list appearance does not change noticeably as you move from one type of page to the other. najevi 05:36, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

At user pages email and contribution links appear. Consider dropping the word "this" from that rather lengthy label: "E-mail this user" becomes "E-mail user"

Reason: to avoid ugly line wrapping and/or column width changes within widget box. najevi 06:24, 17 June 2008 (UTC)


 * Regarding positioning, this had indeed come up - I'll add it to my list to poke people about. As for the "Email this user" link - what's your browser/OS? (I don't get it myself, but that doesn't mean we can't do something about it :) Kirkburn (talk) 09:36, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

Toolbox styling
There is a style modifier forcing bold font link labels and this appears to be coded very close to the HTML. Despite my efforts to force these labels to be arial, normal weight the link labels insist on appearing as bold font. Please remove that low level style and restore customizing capability to a user's or site's CSS.

najevi 04:29, 18 June 2008 (UTC)


 * I think you can use the following to change it:


 * 1) link_box a{ font-weight:normal; }
 * Hope that helps! Kirkburn (talk) 09:34, 18 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Thank you - that's exactly what I needed! najevi 21:36, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

Tips widget
Would it be possible to move the < > links to the very first line of the widget so that a user can leave the mouse in one place to click through each tip in the list? Currently the position of these links jumps around depending upon how many lines of text a tip requires. najevi 03:24, 17 June 2008 (UTC)


 * Sounds fair to me, passing it on so it can be looked at. Kirkburn (talk) 09:42, 18 June 2008 (UTC)


 * Thank you for that. It's much more useful this way. najevi 14:07, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

What this guide needs
I'll propably add more to this list as I come across stuff. Other that that, it's a very good guide. --Ose (talk) 10:46, 30 June 2008 (UTC)
 * How to change the font colors (external links, existant and inexistant internal pages, active and inactive).
 * How to change the background colors of all elements (for example the "latest activity" box).
 * Remove stuff that only applied to old monaco.

Main navigation menus expand even when I don't intend to hover over them
I've been using Monaco for almost a month now and whilst I have grown accustomed to many of it's features and idiosyncrasies there is one behavior that continues to trip me up whenever I am editing and previewing edits.

As I move my mouse from an article edit window to some other window (eg. some data file or some reference web page) I often glide my cursor over the main navigation menu area. Of course the expanding navigation menus appear usually immediately and other times with a short delay after the movement.

It was never my intent to hover at these navigation links. The Monobook skin has a wider dead zone and of course it does not have the expanding menu behavior that Monaco has so I never experienced this issue with the Monobook skin. Often when I am highlighting a line by dragging from right to left my mouse cursor overshoots far enough left to activate those expanding menus. This distraction interferes with my edit process.

I do not wish to disable the expanding menus. So does anybody have any suggestions as to how I might customize my monaco.css to modify this undesirable behavior? eg.
 * 1) Can I increase the hover-over delay before the expanding navigation menus pop up? (It currently seems to be ~0.1s and I'd probably be happier with ~0.8s.)
 * 2) Can I reduce the size of the "hot spot" (?terminology?) to just the width of the menu text and not have it extend to the chevron at the far right of each row in this Main navigation menu? (That would give me a very generous dead zone between the LH edge of the edit window and the Main navigation hot spots.)
 * 3) Any other suggestions?

Thank you for considering my questions. najevi 13:02, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

To reduce the size of the hover-over area to the width of the menu text, you can use

#navigation a { display: inline; line-height: 24px; }	display: block; height: 24px; padding-top: 0; padding-bottom: 0; margin: 0; }       position: static; padding-left: .5em; right: auto; top: auto; }
 * 1) navigation a:hover {
 * 1) navigation a em {

Making the menus only appear after a timeout instead of appearing immediately would require some serious work with Javascript and it would be prone to break whenever the global skin code is changed. Drennan 12:37, 4 July 2008 (UTC)


 * Thanks. That fix is perfect for my wandering mouse cursor habit! najevi 23:35, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

Color of table headers
Hopefully I'm asking in the right place. I'm an archivist at Memory Alpha and I am having a problem with Monaco's customization. I have the colors all set to what I want, except for the tables. They all show up as if my CSS has no effect (see here). The best example I can find for the tables is here. I was wondering if someone could point me in the right direction. Thanks in advance. Willie LLAP 20:37, 9 July 2008 (UTC)


 * Those table headers have a non-transparent background image defined. If you want a solid colour, you should also add background-image: none to your CSS. Drennan 21:52, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

A rainbow of colors
Is there anyplace that lists the possible colors you can use to customize? I'm from the Irwin Allen wiki and I want to change the monaco to something thats customized. Can anybody help? Thanks — Mary ( talk ) 02:29, 7 August 2008 (UTC)

Have fun with this 216 web color code table (from VisiBone):

Should be possible to find some matching colors :-) --Avatar 06:58, 7 August 2008 (UTC)


 * Yes it should be possible to create at one or two matches. Thanks Avatar this is a big help! — Mary ( talk ) 16:25, 7 August 2008 (UTC)

Sidebar changes not taking effect
Hmmm... What did I do wrong/not do? http://avidflyer.wikia.com/wiki/MediaWiki:Monaco-sidebar Is there a delay that's not documented? --N757jh 22:51, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

Definitely a delay. Second question: sidebar code is **Category:History | History but line displayed in sidebar is "Page history". ? --N757jh 12:01, 23 September 2008 (UTC)


 * Yeah, there may be a delay on CSS, JS and sidebar changes. Also, you are seeing that because of MediaWiki:History - I'm not sure quite how to prevent it using corresponding MW pages though. Kirkburn (talk) 12:47, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

adding jquery into monaco
hi,

I've tried to install Jquery into to monaco.js. everything is running perfect but, the sidebar doesn't opens on hover. it seems to be incompatible with some monaco-native script. what can I do?--87.159.246.24 12:58, 26 November 2008 (UTC)

Sidebar colors?
How do I customize the colors of the sidebar? This page didn't offer much help... Followed by 100 zeroes (talk | contribs) 01:31, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

Some and only some custom skins are annoying
Some and only some custom skins are annoying. Asimov for example. But I don't want to disable "See custom wikis" preference. How can I get rid from some crappy skins? Please, answer me on my page, so I can get a message about. — Pigmeich (talk • вклад) 12:19, 4 February 2009 (UTC)


 * I'm not seeing a custom skin on either Asimov wiki. In any case, that preference is how you prevent seeing them - it's what it's for. Why do you need something else? Kirkburn (talk) 15:32, 4 February 2009 (UTC)


 * I want something ideal: that my preferences for skins are unique for every wikia, so I can let the admins choose the skin, but also can to go not along with them and change certain skins: I don't like white-on-black styles, while others are OK.
 * However, I thought there's a way to avoid only certain non-default skins. If it doesn't implemented yet, that's normal — I don't contribute to Asimov's wiki still, while other's project wiki styles' going along with me. — Pigmeich (talk • вклад) 07:06, 5 February 2009 (UTC)


 * Hmm, it's an interesting idea. I'll note it down, see if we have an opportunity to do something like that at some point. Kirkburn (talk) 19:03, 5 February 2009 (UTC)


 * Doesn't it make just as much sense to use your own Special:MyPage/monaco.css and just override the changes? That way you can see sapphire or whatever you want.  ~Joey~    ^Talk^  08:32, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

It wont work!
i keep doing the colour thing but nothing happens! --2+2 10:52, 20 February 2009 (UTC)


 * Can you provide more detail? Kirkburn (talk) 23:31, 5 March 2009 (UTC)


 * It won't work for me either! I'd like to customize the color scheme of my new wiki using the simpler method of changing colors 1 and 2, and I do exactly what the guide says, but nothing happens! Que es? Limequat 13:47, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

Monaco-sidebar not updating magic words
If you look at my sidebar on the FunOrb Wiki, at w:c:FunOrb:User:Timeroot/Monaco-sidebar, and try it out, you will notice something strange: the Magic Words hardly ever update. While the clock doesn't really matter much (it only update onces every hour, :P), for the alternate skinned links this is horrible! For example, I want to see one page in another skin. I click the link, and it works fine. I spend the next two days browsing the wiki, but it might not even update in the entirety of that time! So, if I use that link for another page, it will take back to the page I visited two days previously. I added the part about ", and you are currently at !" to test my theory that Magic Words simply don't update very often in the siderbar, and it proved true. That particular piece of text hardly ever updates. I of course cannot bring this issue to MediaWiki, as Monaco isn't a normal skin, but I was wondering if Wikia could prehaps fix this? I find that the alternate skin code has high potential, but not the way that Monaco-sidebar works right now! Timeroot|undefinedTalk • Contribs • Edit count 00:18, 3 March 2009 (UTC)


 * The sidebar is cached so as to prevent the servers getting overloaded, so they will not update immediately. I don't think there's a lot that can be done about this at the moment, but over time it should hopefully get faster as we improve our software and hardware. Kirkburn (talk)

A question
How do you change the color of links? Screennameless -  "Goodnight, everybody!"  21:37, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

Sidebar color
Is there a way to change the background color of the sidebar? Thanks. eskimospy 23:05, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

 .widget { background-color: ColorHere; border-color: ColorHere; }


 * That did it for me. Screennameless  -  "Goodnight, everybody!"  23:58, 18 March 2009 (UTC)


 * Thank you so much! eskimospy 17:07, 19 March 2009 (UTC)

Custom Monaco theme not working
In the Pokemon Crater Wiki I copied the example monaco theme given on this page in section 'Customize the Colors'- Custom color customization, and went to admin options in my preferences to select custom. It worked. Then I changed the colours as you can see on this page- MediaWiki:Monaco.css. The theme didnt change automatically so I went back to admin options selected Sapphire, saved it and then again selected Custom and saved it. but the new colours I specified in the Monaco.css page do not show. Insteed, the old example theme from the section I mentioned erlier appears. Why is this happening and how can I correct it?Deshkap 2006 17:02, 3 April 2009 (UTC)


 * Sorted at the wiki :) Kirkburn (talk) 11:41, 7 April 2009 (UTC)

Problems updating/refreshing custom CSS
I have been working on generating a Custom CSS layout for my new Night Court Wiki ... and I'm having problems with the CSS refreshing properly almost every time I save and reload.

Sometimes it works fine, but most of the time, when I refresh it, it reloads with a broken early version of the layout. It then takes several attempts of various means of refreshing before it displays properly.

Is there a known issue with Custom Monaco CSS layouts not wanting to update properly?

(jbo110 02:39, 21 April 2009 (UTC))


 * Yes, the CSS is cached, which means edits may take a few minutes to take effect. Kirkburn (talk) 14:46, 21 April 2009 (UTC)


 * That makes sense. It's been working much better today, however. Thanks for the help.

One more question, though: What is the CSS value for the div that contains the popout menus on the navigation menu? I would like to apply some styles specific to those boxes, but can't find the proper code with which to do so. I could use "menu-item##" (with the number for each line), but that gets tedious as I'd have to code the stylesheet manually each time I change the menu. But if someone can provide the name of the div that contains the second-level menus, it would be much appreciated. (jbo110 05:52, 22 April 2009 (UTC))


 * I'm having the same kind of trouble over on Carmageddon Wiki. I'm trying to alter the top bar so it looks more like the one on Djinni Wiki. If I alter the code using Firebug it looks like I want it to, but if I update the code in MediaWiki:Monaco.css, I refresh several time (whil holding shift in Firefox to ignore the cache) and nothing changes! I've made several changes in the last hour or so, but none of them show up - I tried swapping the Wiki Gaming logo for one that's a different colour to check, and yes it doesn't change! :( JaffaCakeLover 15:36, 23 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Checked again an hour ago, and now it's changed - seriously, it takes over 24 hours to update the .css file?! JaffaCakeLover 17:24, 25 April 2009 (UTC)


 * This is something we're working on. Kirkburn (talk) 15:21, 27 April 2009 (UTC)


 * Got something similar here, uploaded a new Wiki.png and it's not replacing the old one...--SirRandomage 22:26, 29 June 2009 (UTC)


 * On my wiki I made a bunch of things have rounded edges, so the pop-up menus inherited this, but it made them look kinda ugly so I adjusted them by using the "#navigation .sub-menu" selector. I think that's what your looking for. You can see what i did at my [Monaco.css page, at the top. --[[User:Deo Favente|Deo Favente]] 22:24, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

"Community"/"Latest activity" sections
Is there a way to customize or remove the Community section of the sidebar?

I find it makes the page look cluttered, and makes it difficult to create a good colour scheme. I would love to customize elements of this section or remove it altogether.-- Miraene (talk) 14:15, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


 * Other than the normal CSS customization available, not yet - but we're looking at reworking that box. Kirkburn (talk) 18:23, 1 June 2009 (UTC)

#popular# and MediaWiki:Most popular articles
I like the idea of using this Monaco-sidebar magic word to promote articles - such as the Manual_of_style and Templates while a brand new wiki is just getting started.

The trouble is none of the links listed at MediaWiki:Most popular articles get displayed.

See vsk.wikia.com for an example. Please advise if a different list syntax is required.


 * Perhaps this is related to Customizing_Monaco

najevi 04:43, 14 June 2009 (UTC)


 * A good question - I am not sure of the issue here. I will ask. Kirkburn (talk) 15:14, 17 June 2009 (UTC)


 * I've done a little digging, and it appears the format needed is that seen on http://www.wikia.com/wiki/MediaWiki:Most_popular_articles - I've added a note to the article. Kirkburn (talk) 16:10, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

Main navigation links do not display in the order specified at MediaWiki:Monaco-sidebar
I can successfully use MediaWiki:Monaco-sidebar to add various links to the main navigation bar and the order in which I list those links in MediaWiki:Monaco-sidebar is also reflected in the main navigation bar. However, for any list of links specified with double asterisks (i.e. second level of the cascading menu hierarchy) the order displayed in the cascading menu is not the same as the order specified in MediaWiki:Monaco-sidebar.

For a specific example see vsk.wikia.com and note the hierarchy created for the ISAF RRS category link.

Please advise how I can correct this. najevi 13:00, 16 June 2009 (UTC)


 * This would be due to the magic word used for the category heading - it's creating the submenu itself at the moment. You need to link to the category more normally, e.g. . Kirkburn (talk) 15:12, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

Thank you. This tip was right on the money! najevi 15:30, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

Kyo Kara Maoh
I dont know if I should put this here, but, I just created a template (for the first time) on the mainpage of my wiki, Kyo Kara Maoh, and the icon over the sidebar goes behind the bar. Help! I dont know what to do.--Kylecharmed 23:44, 5 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Please send a link to your wiki, and the description of the problem to Community support by using Special:Contact (or community@wikia.com) --Uberfuzzy 09:44, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

I Need CSS Help Please
I'm the new administrator of the Air Rivals Wiki, and I've modified the skin a little bit, but I can't figure out how to get the font colour of the "more..." and the "edit this menu" items in the menus to change to my yellow (#E48A00). I may also decrease the size of the "more..." item but I can handle that once I figure out the right selector. Can anyone give me some pointers?


 * These two take the following classes:


 * 1) navigation .Monaco-sidebar_edit
 * 2) navigation .Monaco-sidebar_more
 * Hope that helps you override them! Kirkburn (talk) 17:16, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

How Long
Hi, sorry if this is the wrong place to post this but how long on average does the changes to the wikia page take? I'm talking about when you change the colours of the General Wiki itself. Does anyone know? -- Chimpso Manager of Strasky and Hutch Game Wiki 00:03, 16 August 2009 (UTC)


 * You should be able to see the changed design for your personal monaco.css when you use a specific keyboard combination. It varies between browsers. I've taken the below from the text that appears above all css pages.
 * Note: After saving, you have to bypass your browser's cache to see the changes.
 * Internet Explorer: hold down the Ctrl key and click the Refresh or Reload button, or press Ctrl+F5.
 * Firefox: hold down the Shift key while clicking Reload; alternatively press Ctrl+F5 or Ctrl-Shift-R.
 * Opera users have to clear their caches through Tools→Preferences
 * Konqueror and Safari users can just click the Reload button.
 * Chrome: press Ctrl+F5 or Shift+F5
 * That should clear your cache and force your browser to make the new colours appear. Wjxhuang,  the 888th Avatar  {Talk} 04:27, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

I did that too! It still didn't work. -- Chimpso Manager of Strasky and Hutch Game Wiki 05:40, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

Don't worry! I got it now, I had to preview the changes and THEN clear thet cache. Now I just need to ask, how do I permenetly save these changes? -- Chimpso Manager of Strasky and Hutch Game Wiki 05:49, 16 August 2009 (UTC)


 * As long as you have saved it then you should be good to go. If there aren't any cache issues, everyone should see it a little after you save.  ~Joey~    ^Talk^  08:22, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

Coloring of links
Hello, I'm making a custom skin for a wiki, and I want to have custom colors on the links. While I have found out how to change to color of usual links and visited links, I can't figure out how to change the color of red links or external links. Any help here would be much appreciated. M ata N ui  18:52, November 17, 2009 (UTC) a.external { color:foo; } a.new { color:foo !important; }
 * Should do the trick. Joey (talk) 02:19, November 18, 2009 (UTC)
 * Thanks! M ata N ui  18:22, November 18, 2009 (UTC)

Double Skins
In addition to the question above, I wonder if it's possible to have two different-themed custom skins, between which the user could choose. Again, any help here would be much appreciated. M ata N ui  18:52, November 17, 2009 (UTC)
 * They'd have to switch the skin via editing their Special:MyPage/monaco.css and (most preferably) import a CSS list (aka from a page on the wiki.) There isn't anything current for switching Monaco custom skins at the moment. Joey (talk) 02:21, November 18, 2009 (UTC)
 * OK. Thanks. M ata N <font color="#0cacff">ui  18:22, November 18, 2009 (UTC)

Better way to customise
I find all this information just to change the colors on an Wiki to be very complicated. Could we maybe just have something like drop-down menus and buttons? Superjustinbros. 23:18, November 17, 2009 (UTC)
 * Yup. We are working on re-drafting this page, and breaking it up into subpages. --Uberfuzzy 22:42, November 20, 2009 (UTC)