Outpost 2 Documentation & Wiki

[Leviathan]

Hi all,

A few of us have been talking and would really like to restart the wiki and get documentation done for the Outpost 2 internals and SDK/API. There is some talk in other threads but I will start a new one for discussion on moving forward with it.

Current plans are to use Doxygen for creating a reference manual to the code and also having a website wiki that everyone can contribute to.

We will scale back what the original wiki was and not include unnecessary pages.

wiki.outpost2.net

[leeor_net]

Okay, so gist of this is that we're rebuilding the wiki using a much more recent version of a major wiki platform. We've settled on DokuWiki for several reasons that are beyond the scope of this thread but suffice it to say that it does exactly what we need it to do, it's amazing and you should go register right now!

https://wiki.outpost2.net/

We want to take what the original wiki wanted to be and actually make the new wiki be that; A definitive and comprehensive collection of articles and documentation for everything Outpost, Outpost 2 and Outpost Universe.

Main Category Listing

• Outpost 1
• Manual
• Strategies
• Whatever
• Outpost 2
• Manual
• Strategies
• Add Ons
• OP2 API Tutorials
• OPU Projects
  
  • Main Projects
  • Active Community Projects
  • Inactive Community Projects

This isn't a comprehensive list, it's just what I had off the top of my head so this is going to change as we move forward and further develop this project.

From these categories we'll be breaking things down into sub-categories and so on. Those of you familiar with MediaWiki's category system should take note that in DokuWiki, Namespaces provide the same functionality. In the context of this thread and our Wiki, Namespace and Category are interchangeable.

Sister Project
We've been talking about updating the documentation for the Outpost 2 SDK to use Doxygen syntax so we can automatically generate a static HTML 'manual' for it. This will be a useful reference for those who are already familiar with the API and are just looking for a quick reference without having to dig through the source code.

In addition to the manual, we want to provide tutorials and additional documentation about the how's and why's of things in the SDK much like many libraries (such as SFML, SDL, NAS2D and OGRE3D do) and that's where the Wiki comes in. This is where we go over the finer points and nuances of the SDK, how to use it effectively, tips, suggestions and caveats.

Goals
To provide a comprehensive guide to Outpost, Outpost 2, Outpost Universe, OPU's many projects (both active and inactive) and the OP2 SDK.

How You Can Help
Register for the Wiki and start writing!

Migrating from the old Wiki
A lot of the information on the original Wiki is good to go. You can help by migrating the information that's already there. The markup between the two Wiki's is a little different but even just copy/pasting the source from the old wiki to the new wiki will be helpful.

Outpost 2 SDK
If you're familiar with the Outpost 2 SDK and you want to help write the tutorials (I think there may even be a number of them in actual forum posts as well), go ahead and start writing!

[PatchouliConfort]

This is looking interesting ! I think I'll give some screenshots and provide the Wiki.

[leeor_net]

Woot! Would love some help. I got started yesterday on some basics.

[Leviathan]

Here are the links showing all the pages on the old and new wiki:

Old:http://www.outpost2.net/oldwiki/Special:Allpages
New: wiki.outpost2.net/sitemap

[leeor_net]

Hey guys, some of you have started writing some of the pages on the new wiki and they're all great starts! Thanks for the help guys!

I've unfortunately not been able to do as much as I'd like. Been kinda busy with real life stuff and developing OutpostHD.

But I haven't forgotten about the project.

We should consider some of what Sirbomber talked about in the following thread: https://forum.outpost2.net/index.php/topic,4141.0.html

Basically, we want to avoid having a lot of articles that aren't really worth having. That's kind of vague, I know, but any questions or suggestions should probably be brought up in this thread.

[dave_erald]

Anybody on top of this? I could probably donate some time, and on that note how difficult is it to migrate and create in the new wiki?

[leeor_net]

There isn't anybody 'in charge' so to speak. Or anybody really directing it.

We're using DokuWiki now so the markup is similar to MediaWiki but there are significant differences.

I don't know how much of the original wiki needs to be moved over. A lot of it can probably be dumped but there's also a lot of useful information as well.

As stated on IRC, I have a long weekend coming up so I'll probably have some time this weekend to do some work moving over some of the useful information.

[dave_erald]

Yeah man. Giver.

I have time to help is all I'm saying.

[leeor_net]

Turns out I spent most of my long weekend driving so I had no chance to do anything with the Wiki.

However, I've been looking over the original wiki and there's a LOT of great information if you sift through the fluff.

We've got our work cut out for us.

[dave_erald]

Okay, I started on this, made some mistakes, got it corrected. I am going to use what I can from the old wiki, just shorten some of the explanations, cleanup others and compile it a little neater and cleaner than what was there.

So far I started on the OP2 Online Manual section with a link to a new page for Units (buildings and vehicles)

I originally started something different, than looked at the old wiki, realized what I was doing was dumb and started over. So if you see in the recent changes something deleted, that was something I made.

Now that I have got my first mistake out of the way I could use some tips or pointers, or if its garbage delete it and I'll move on.

Thoughts? Suggestions?

[dave_erald]

Alright.

With a little help from Leeor I got the Unit Reference page for Buildings and Structures completed as part of the OP2 Online Manual.

I figure i'm missing at least one or two things, probably adjust sizes here and there. And I am going to add a small subsection to the spaceport on that page under the spaceport for components and pricing that are manufactured by the spaceport rather than making a whole page for just that, or should I?

- NOTE - If anyone could get me the passkey to be able to delete a media file or two, there was at least one incidence where the file name made for a bad transition onto the wiki. Be much abliged. (there is a double copy of the plymouth dirt structure, the first i uploaded as plymouth_d.i.r.t.png and yes that was dumb the next was just plymouth_dirt.png much simpler.

If anyone has any suggestions on where in depth descriptions of each building should go I'm all ears. Just trying not to clutter up pages or add unneccessary items.

David R.V.

EDIT - yes, I forgot the Forum structure. I'll remedy that when I get home.

Edit.Edit Forum added.

[Hooman]

I just took a quick look at the page for structures. The images are nice.

I noticed a few oddities:
- the different sized images for the light towers
- the tube going to the MHD Generator
- mines for only one colony, and unsurveyed

Another thought I had, was the two colonies sometimes have corresponding structures, but with a slightly different name. Should these somehow be lined up? I was thinking of the Forum/Rec Center, and the Advanced Residence/Reinforced Residence. I realize of course there may be different resource requirements, and this also breaks the alphabetical ordering. Of course it might make more sense to arrange things based on use, and perhaps just have an alphabetical index available.

I'm surprised how well the images are lined up. I thought I remember reading you were doing this by hand using in-game screenshots. That's quite a few images to do manually. Perhaps we could discuss an automated way to generate images? I just dug up the old VB project for viewing game graphics and added it to SVN. Maybe we can make a tool to automatically extract images you need.

[dave_erald]

Yes absolutely, if there was a simpler way to extract images I am all for it.

I was mentioning to Leeor or someone, I just used the snipping tool in Windows, it creates a png file that loads easily into the wiki, but as they are all in game pics I have to manually grid select the box size of the image when using that snipping tool, and once it is uploaded I just code the adjacent images to the same size. So both advanced labs are wrote in as {{eden_advanced_lab.png?150x150}} {{plymouth_advanced_lab.png?150x150}} the 150x150 just rescales the image to fit as a 150x150 pixel image.

 - I don't completely like it as each image has that damn Active/idle light in the corner.

 - Anyways, if someone could get me a image extracter and also the in wiki pass to be able to delete media once I have better images I can clean up that page and any corresponding pages I make. Also, having an extracter that could be adapted to pull images from the original Outpost might be helpful as well, and I could get all structure images without the damn indicator light

 - And I was just about to say both colonies use the same mines but I am very much wrong there. I'll fix that. As far as surveyed or unsurveyed that could be in a another part of the tutorials defining mine output per bar. I guess I just wanted structure images for now.

 - Also, Eden doesn't have a forum, right? I think... And as far as the extra residences go I am going to look into side by siding those two to reduce on used vertical space. Maybe...

WIKI LINK-OPUniverse Wiki


UPDATE - Online manual start page done
 - Tutorials page done
 - Buildings and structures page done
 - Vehicles page done
 - Tech tree pages added and done
 - Rules pages done
 - Interface guide added
 - Spaceport and starship components added
 - Detailed unit descriptions page added and done ( 2015-11-29 )

ITEMS that need adjusting/correcting still
 - MHD generator pic
 - Adjust light tower sizes (get new images)
 - Mines for both colonies DONE
 - Pics for Weapons and Weapon Turrets
 - Need to add Starship Components - Started
 - The attack chassis section of the wiki is unreadable on mobile. Going to need help with that. DONE
 - Maybe add a page for Detailed Unit Descriptions? DONE and Completed

[dave_erald]

As soon as someone gets around to reading this...

- The new wiki should be complete enough that with in the week whom ever is in charge of the wiki (probably Leeor, best guess) could change the link at the top of the OPU home page over to the new Wiki page.

- Yes of course who ever is in charge of the site or wiki or whatever (who ever is the oldest) can decide when to swap it over.

- Thanks Leeor and Hooman for the help. I have a list of items that I have done that need polishing, and I will update those when possible.

- Somebody else may need to fill in all aspects for the Original Outpost game. Never played it and don't know my way around it... like at all.

David R.V.

[Hooman]

The OP2Graphics project may already do what you want. It should let you get images of buildings without the idle/disabled/active light. The attached zip file contains an executable file as well as the Visual Basic source code.

Feel free to suggest improvements for the project to make what you're doing easier.

[leeor_net]

There is apparently still some contention amongst some of the moderators so I don't know if they will necessarily link to the wiki hosted on the outpostuniverse.org domain but maybe they would consider moving wiki.outpost2.net to oldwiki.outpost2.net and importing the DokuWiki setup we've been working into wiki.outpost2.net. I'm happy with whatever. We should also be able to use the DokuWiki install as the main page as BlackBox once suggested a few years ago. It's well suited to that task I think.

Anyway, nice work with the Outpost 2 section! Fleshes that whole bit out.

I'll probably do the Outpost 1 work myself as it's kind of my game and I've been obsessed with it since 1994 (holy shit, for 21 flipping years).

[dave_erald]

Contention amongst moderators eh? Well that's good...

Can I ask what over or would that be 'stirring the pot' so to speak? Oh well, as long as my work (it's work I guess, hell with it, that's what i'm calling it) on the new wiki wasn't for waste then it don't matter to me what the argument is I suppose.

[Vagabond]

I would like to work on transferring the Novellas to the Doku Wiki. I have a Doku Wiki account as username Vagabond if someone doesn't mind giving me write permissions. I've worked with Creole and Markdown syntax before, so it shouldn't be too difficult for me to work Doku syntax.

[Hooman]

Leviathan, are you the only one who can set write permission?

[leeor_net]

Nope, I'm also an admin on the Wiki. I had to update some permissions to control spam so I'll go ahead and get write permissions updated here in a few minutes. Next time you log on you should be able to create and edit new articles.

Can I ask what over or would that be 'stirring the pot' so to speak?

It's old news and really kind of irrelevant today so I'll just leave it in the past. Suffice it to say if we wanted to integrate the dokuwiki with the current Outpost2.net domain we'd need to actually move the installation to the Outpost2.net servers. It's definitely doable but I think only after the outpost2.net servers have been upgraded to prevent more outages in the future like we've been experiencing.

EDIT:

Permissions have been updated.

[dave_erald]

Yeah that's fine, no need to aggravate people.

Oh, and Hooman will notice that I went ahead and changed all my dates over to the ISO style... didn't want his head to explode.

[Hooman]

Yeah! And there was much rejoicing. Finally, I will be able to read dates without confusion. No more will I find myself hoping all date stamps are past the 12th of the month, just to be sure I was reading them correctly.

Rest of the world, take note!


Also, good to know there isn't a one person bottleneck for setting up new accounts.

[Vagabond]

I've started work on the wiki and have been uploading chapters. You can see the main page here: http://wiki.outpost2.net/doku.php?id=outpost_2:storyline.

I followed Dave's example on the footnote links to maintain consistency. I'm trying to place all the pages in useful namespaces to keep organization proper. Only 3 more chapters for Plymouth remain. I'll have to play through Eden to get some of their chapters out of the game unless someone knows how to easily extract them.

I cannot figure out how to center a line of text in the Doku Wiki syntax. J. Steven York likes to use centered # # # in the novellas. I have tried using the html tag center (deprecated in HTML 4) and the text-align css property without success. If someone has some insight on this, it would be appreciated.

I'm trying to stay faithful to the text by copying over the italics part of the text and other formatting, but I may miss a couple since I'm skimming the text.

[dave_erald]

Nice. Vagabond got the novellas in, and thanks for following what I've already done, whether it's right or not I don't know.

On that subject I'm not entirely sure I got the namespaces concept right or not. If I don't then let me know and I'll fix it.

As far as the paragraph breaks go by using # # # I haven't seen anything in syntax or plugins that would work. Other than a one line table or column, or using a aligned image might work.

Good stuff man.

Dave