Thread:Sannse/@comment-201159-20121216183415

Hello, I'm contacting you because people on a FFXIclopedia forum page recommended I contact an administrator.

I posted on the FFXIclopedia forums a thread titled "FFXI Monsters, Parties, Skills, etc" located at http://forums.ffxiclopedia.org/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=28559. Please note the idea does not deal completely with the FFXclopedia wikia. In fact, the proposed change to the wikia doesn't start until message #4, which reads (in part):

"Posting this additional message to insure one of my thoughts / points doesn't get lost. While my initial and continuing goal is still the skill up application, IMHO, the WIKI needs a page, table, or whatever would be appropriate as a way to combine all the monster data and allow users to locate monsters based upon criteria.

Is this possible and if so what would be the appropriate way to accomplish this in our wonderful WIKI? Also would it be possible for an application to access the information? I guess that raises a new question: Can an application access the WIKI to look up information and if so, how?"

PLEASE NOTE: I realize a single page could exist of all the monsters, but it doesn't solve the issues raised in the thread. An example is consistency. Presently the same monster and item are found in multiple locations (different pages, categories, etc) and sometimes the information is in conflict. Some examples: Category can list a monster with a "?" for level, but the actual page lists say 78-80. The same is true for items, a monster page might say it drops the item, but not the item page itself. As a wikia (I thought) was to emulate an encyclopedia, one would hope for consistency. I also realize the design when there is cross referencing becomes a problem (e.g. the author doesn't know every place to update).

My hope / thought is a central location (database) exists where the information could reside and then pages could reference this information, instead of containing the information directly. While I view this as the difference between procedural and object oriented programming, it is only what crossed my mind when I realized what could help the wikia -- and maybe other wikia - with consistency issues.

Another item / issues from the thread is having an application obtain information (e.g. monster level) from the wikia to use. The thread goes into more details on how I want to use the information, but I can see where there could be a host of valid uses.

Sincerely yours,

I. B. Halliwell of Ragnarok (formerly Caitsith) 