Talk:Changelog

From Automkv

Contents 1 Links 2 Post References 3 Entry Style 4 Danger Will Robinson! This document is getting too long!

Links

I don't know if I like the version numbers linking to the posts where the releases were mentioned, or not. thoughts? Jeradc 19:21, 20 March 2007 (IST)

I kinda like it, but then I was also wondering if buzzqw still made those old releases available? Maybe we should link to the release downloads instead of the Doom9 forums posts that talk about them. --Nx6 22:05, 20 March 2007 (IST)

Gah! I just realized there are two different ways of linking to posts on Doom9. I've been referencing the posts using a relative link (which uses the post number in the thread), and you've been using an absolute link (the one off the "LINK" text in the corner. I'm going to change mine to your style, as I think they would be less prone to be effected by UBB database issues. --Nx6 05:33, 21 March 2007 (IST)

I had no idea there was different way to link, I guess I learned something new for the day. Now I can go back to bed. Jeradc 15:11, 21 March 2007 (IST)

Post References

.39 - http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?p=889265#post889265 Jeradc 17:54, 20 March 2007 (IST)

I guessed the "added" or "changed" status for the entries on this release Jeradc 17:59, 20 March 2007 (IST)

.38 - http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?p=888861#post888861 Jeradc 17:54, 20 March 2007 (IST)

I guessed the "added" or "changed" status for the entries on this release Jeradc 17:59, 20 March 2007 (IST)

Entry Style

We don't want to use "added" or "changed" as that isn't normal changelog style. It would also be good to edit the entries for better grammar (no offense to buzzqw). --Nx6 22:08, 20 March 2007 (IST)

My 8 years of development are going to disagree with you on the "added", "changed" etc, plus, I like to see a differentiation in items so I can see what has been fixed (especially if I have something specific in mind), and what features have been added. Maybe there is a compromise we can come to? I do agree on the grammar though ;) Jeradc 22:30, 20 March 2007 (IST)

I guess it's just that the "Added" and "Fixed" in all caps is rather jarring, and all the changelogs I've read are written as plain statements. They should be edited so while imparting detail, they don't swamp the user in technical jargon. Hence in places where minor changes are made to increase performance, I'll rewrite the statement as "Performance tweaks to ______." and leave off the exact detail. Editing is also helping me spot some changelog posts where a change is listed more than once in list but phrased differently. I don't have a problem with "Added" and "Fixed" as long as they are the beginning of complete sentences. --Nx6 05:03, 21 March 2007 (IST)

Maybe we could do sections, similar to this: [1], that would give me my labels, and you your complete sentences, I think. :) Jeradc 15:10, 21 March 2007 (IST)

Sections aren't bad, that way we can differentiate between changes to AutoMKV itself and changes to packages that make up the back end of AutoMKV, and then we can just try to make the first word of the sentence "Fixed", "Added", "Removed", "Changed", etc. whenever possible (like I started doing on 0.45-0.49) but no all caps. If we just cut and paste the log posts buzzqw writes what we'll end up with is this: [2], which I'd like to avoid. So would they ultimately look like this?

• Core: Fixed bug where AVI container format would not mux if input was "gigli".
• GUI: Added checkbox for grayscale encoding to advanced settings.

or would you want to go as far as the specific component, like:

• X264: Added ability to scramble all ugly houses in the frame when encoding movie.

--Nx6 19:58, 21 March 2007 (IST)

Well, I wasn't thinking of breaking it down any farther then "Fixed", "Changed", "Added", maybe "Removed". I think it would be way too much work to do anything like "Core", "GUI", X264", etc. The section where you start each sentence with one of those key words (Fixed, Changed, etc) works for me, and might be (look) nicer then headings that will then only contain one item, in those cases where we have a very small changelog. (the example link you posted, and mine, is blocked here at work, I'll check it tonight)

Example of what I was attempting to suggest, based on the Azureus changelog:

Fixed:

• Now AutoMKV works
• quinticux quadpass is non-blocking
• xvid encoding at 640 bits no longer freezes

Added:

• New dvd ripper
• new icons

But, like I said a second ago, the sections you did for releases (.47, .48, .49) look good to me. So, I would be happy with that. Jeradc 23:04, 21 March 2007 (IST)

Let's go with that then. Now that we have all entries added in some form, we can begin the laborious process of rewriting most of them :). I notice when rewriting these as complete sentences, sometimes the terms (Fixed, Added, Changed) are changed to something different to better suit the actual change being described anyway.

I'd like to notate the releases that were full (all inclusive) installs vs. updates that were installed into older packages (which is how I was trying to set up the subsections when I first started) but I noticed on the end of the changelog you started with there were many of these, so your method of grouping all pointx-releases together worked better space-wise. The only problem I had with that is it implies a distinct version numbering system, where what actually happened was stuff like 0.75 was really an update (like it should have been called 0.74f) and the next full package was 0.76, how can we notate these in a small but noticable way? --Nx6 05:23, 22 March 2007 (IST)

Good question. I'm not sure I know a way to notate them off the top of my head. Generally the version numbering system tracks that (Major.minor.revision), but Buzzqw being the one man show that he is, has his own notation. I'll have to think about it, but if you have any ideas, let's run with it. The power of the wiki allows us to change it later :) Jeradc 06:19, 22 March 2007 (IST)

I wonder how hard it would be to insert a small graphic inline with the text, (like an 8x8 pixel picture). I was thinking of adding a small "package" type icon to those entries. But from what I remember of using images on Wikipedia, this is a real mouthful of code to add these. Does this wiki have any dingbat-type symbols we can insert easily in text blocks? --Nx6 04:41, 1 April 2007 (IDT)

Danger Will Robinson! This document is getting too long!

I was rewriting some entries and the Wiki is telling me this document should be under 32K as longer ones may not be editable in all browsers. Seeing as we aren't even to 1.0 yet, perhaps we should move the older changelog info to a separate document? I was thinking of breaking it at <0.60. This warning only comes up when editing the "full" page, editing by individual sections seems to be fine.