Hey everyone! Here is a little update on some of the things that are going on around Fandom:

Features being tested

• The Thanks extension is currently being tested by a number of wikis. The staff at Fandom are still observing how it performs; once this process is concluded, the goal is for it to become an opt-in feature (meaning, wikis will be able to toggle it on or off as they wish). You can check more info on the feature in Help:Thanks.

• Some wikis are also continuing to test "notifications for reported posts", which should help with moderation efforts - it allows moderators to be properly notified of posts that have been reported and still need to be dealt with. Many of the shortcomings the feature had have been worked on, and more improvements are still to come.

Other updates

• For logged out visitors, the global nav bar color will be changing from yellow to the logged in colors (dark purple for dark mode, white for light mode). This should hopefully be a little more pleasing on the eyes for logged out visitors!

• Quick Answers, an experimental information tool that uses AI, began to be tested recently; however, the rollout was a bit disastrous due to inaccurate content being shown on pages, and it ended up having to be removed. Fandom will be looking to address those types of issues as experiments continue. (For more information on this, check out the most recent technical update.)

• A team of Fandom staff has started looking into improving page load times across wikis (with updates such as lazy loading pictures or improving video performance).

Fandom Stars

Just a friendly reminder that Fandom is still on the lookout for users that want to join the "Fandom Stars" program. For those who don't know what it is, you can find the general details in https://www.fandom.com/fandom-stars/

Being a Fandom Star means you can have more direct access to Fandom Staff through a Discord channel in Fandom's official server, as well as the opportunity to give more direct feedback. Stars can sometimes also get offline opportunities in case something comes up in your vicinity (e.g. last year, some Stars attended San Diego Comic Con and were able to perform some interviews).

Anyone that is around wikis a lot is more than welcome to apply. You need a certain experience/time on the Fandom platform, but other than that, applications are open - links to it can be found in the info page.

Hello! Thought I'd take the opportunity to summarize various updates on things that have been happening at Fandom this month, as well as some news on what's coming soon.

Extension: Thanks

• The Thanks extension is being tested by various wikis right now. It is an extension that allows users to "thank" others for their contributions (via a link in Recent Changes, page histories, etc.) The user receiving the "thanks" then gets a notification about it.

• This was the most requested feature in Fandom's extension nomination process. It's now slowly being rolled into more wikis as an experiment to find out whether it's successful in incentivizing more editors to keep contributing.

• Any wikis interested in being part of the testing can request for the extension to be enabled (I can enable it on admin request). More information about the extension itself can be found in Mediawiki.org.

Other wiki-related news

• Besides the Thanks extension, Fandom is conducting more experiments to find what has a positive impact on things like editor retention and user registration (e.g.: adding edit icons next to section headers for logged-out users on desktop)

• For more details on these and other technical updates, feel free to also check the Technical Update blog posts (from May 5 and May 19).

Fandom's projects

• This May, we've been celebrating Asian American Pacific Islander Month. You're welcome to check the introductory blog post, as well as an interview with Gene Luen Yang (creator of TV series American Born Chinese) and staff member Jieyang's favorite games featuring AAPI protagonists.

• There are various community programs editors can join if they wish - feel free to check the Community Programs Hub if you'd like to know more details.

If anyone has questions or comments on any of this, feel free to either leave them here, or you can message me anywhere really.

https://gta.fandom.com/wiki/Special:Community

As announced on the Bulletin Board, we now have the ability to custom style the mobile experience here at GTA Wiki.

Our aim is to get the content on a mobile device looking and working as close as possible to the Desktop experience, within reason.

Not everything that we have built for Desktop will translate well to the Mobile experience, so please bear with us while we work through the process of enabling the features (both visual and functional) that we think will work.

If you encounter issues on mobile, please bring it to the attention of a staff member or use the wiki Discord #todo-ucx-mobilecss channel.

Hey y'all, BolbiiS here with some Discussions tips! We've noticed a lot of posts that, while not necessarily against the rules, may make the experience of Discussions more of a hassle and bloated. So here's some tips before you post!

1) Check The Wiki First!

The GTA Wiki is, first and foremost, a Wiki! This is an organized base of information about all things Grand Theft Auto, and 9 times out of 10, the answer to your question is only one search away! If you're looking for support, try searching for pages relating to your support question first. If you can't find anything, then feel free to ask!

2) Use Titles With Purpose!

This one actually is a rule! We have noticed quite a few posts use titles that don't really "get to the point" and do not make clear what the post is about. Have a support question? Put the question in the title! Have a spicy GTA opinion? Put it in the title! Titles like "hi" or "I have a question" or "I need help" only serve as bloat in a post. Staff may also be more likely to consider your post spam if your title is not concise.

3) Use Discussion Categories!

This point is mainly targeted at those who post support questions in the General Discussion category. Please note of the drop down box on the second screen when writing a Post. There, you can change the Post's category! Have a question about where to find something? Use Game Help & Support! Have some sweet photos of your car and outfit? Use Photos & Art! Using these categories also help our Discussions board feel less chaotic and bloated. For those who like to ask about opinions or post their game ideas, there may be a possibility of expanded categories in the future. Either way, make sure to check that drop down box before you post!

Thanks for reading this list of tips! If you have any questions or concerns, reply below.

Hello everyone! I’m going to share in this thread some general updates of what’s been happening at Fandom (as of October 2022). This was a month filled with more technical updates, and a very exciting change to mobile theming which was introduced last week.

Mobile Theming

This is probably the biggest news to share really - starting last week, Mobile Theming is now available for all wikis! Basically, Mobile Theming makes it so that the wiki’s main colors (background color, accent color, etc.) can be visible on mobile as well.

GTA Wiki was already part of the early testing, so it has had mobile theming for a while and you should be able to see it when visiting from mobile (thank you so much for joining the test and making it possible for the feature to be released!) But if anyone here is interested in learning more about the feature or how we’re looking at contrast, you’re welcome to check the following:

• Creating Web Accessible Content on Fandom

• Everything You Need to Know About Mobile Theming

• Help Page - ThemeDesigner (with brand new info!)

Fandom is also aware of a number of bugs relating to ThemeDesigner - it’s a big change, so naturally, there are things to iron out still - but a few of them have been fixed since last Wednesday’s release (those are detailed in this special technical update post).

Technical Updates

Aside from the work done on Mobile Theming, there are various other technical updates and bugs Fandom is currently aware of - these have been detailed in the updates shared on October 7 and October 21.

Some notable updates:

• The ability to partially block users - including blocking users just from posting on Discussions, which has been a long-term request - is now available.

• Admins can now set Discussions category names with a character limit of up to 64 characters (before, it used to be 20).

• Custom icons for map markers in Interactive Maps are live!

• LinkSuggest dropdown showing an empty link suggestions box when scrolling down the editor - issue now resolved!

• Reference cite errors now appear in the 2017 editor preview.

Discussions AbuseFilter

I mentioned this in the update I made for the previous month already, but just wanted to add that the Discussions AbuseFilter feature is now available to communities beyond the initial, little group that had them, and any wiki can request for it to be enabled.

If you’re a wiki administrator and would like it to be enabled, feel free to let me know, and I can have it enabled. If you’re a community user, you may want to discuss this with the admin(s) - in which case, they can contact me to request it :)

For more information:

• Introducing Discussions AbuseFilter

Other Events / Initiatives

Other than wiki-related news, there have also been some other events and posts going on, which I’d like to share as well - we’ve celebrated Las Voces of the Hispanic Community, had an update on National Bullying Prevention Month, and are just now looking at Halloween in Hocus Focus 2: The Wiki-ing Hour!

I think that’s all I have for now. Stay tuned for further updates from Fandom, and feel free to reach out to me if you have questions on anything ;)

Hello everyone! I’m ReverieCode - for those of you that don’t know me, I was assigned to this wiki as a Wiki Representative from Fandom not too long ago, to provide support and a way of direct communication between the wiki and Fandom staff.

I wanted to share some key updates of what’s going on around Fandom, as there have been a lot of things “in the oven”, but usually not everybody knows about it all. So I'm here with my first “update post” with a TL;DR of relevant things that happened this month.

Mobile theming

Mobile theming is starting to be introduced for wikis - this applies some of the wiki’s desktop customization (fonts, colors and background images) into the mobile version, improving the visual experience considerably.

Other than just having those elements, it’s also going to be possible for admins to preview a wiki’s mobile theme via the ThemeDesigner, and for users to switch between light/dark mode via mobile here - two things that are in the process of being included into mobile theming.

For now, this is only live on 15 wikis for testing and feedback - one of them happens to be the GTA Wiki, so you may have noticed the theme on mobile as well. A lot more is on the way for mobile specifically, so, stay tuned!

• Relevant links: original announcement and technical updates post

Discussions AbuseFilter

Along with mobile theming, the Discussions AbuseFilter has also been created and is in a similar state of being enabled in a select number of wikis before it becomes available for any wikis wishing to use it. This is the Discussions counterpart to the “AbuseFilter” feature wikis already had for content pages - a tool that can help with certain aspects of moderation if needed.

• Relevant links: original announcement and technical updates post

Technical updates

Fandom is now back to posting biweekly updates with listing some of the major issues that have been fixed, and some that are currently being checked. There were two posts this month, and some of the issues fixed in September include:

• Interactive Maps - If two users were editing a map at the same time, the second edit was overriding the first without providing an error message that changes have already been made (like regular Edit Conflict warnings).

• Interactive Maps - Custom map markers no longer disappear and are always visible.

• VisualEditor and the mobile editor were failing to load when an infobox was present on a page.

• When a mod or admin views who reported a post, the username(s) of the reporter(s) is now clickable and leads to their Discussions profile.

To see more bug fixes and some currently known issues, you can visit the two technical update posts: for September 9 and September 23.

Another big piece of news is that Interactive Maps should now be available for editing by all editors, having received a series of modifications that should enhance and improve the feature.

• More details: Everything You Need to Know About the Interactive Maps Update

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That's pretty much what I have for now - more staff blog posts can be found at Community Central. If anyone has any questions or comments to make about anything included above, that's what I'm here for - so ask away! :)

Hey y'all, I'm BolbiiS, Staff member here on the GTA Wiki. We hope you have been enjoying conversating with your fellow Grand Theft Auto fans on our Discussions board!

This is just a quick post to give notice that we're actively working on organizing Discussions to fit the community's needs, and to pardon our dust as we do some fine-tuning. In the meantime, check out our revamped Discussion Guidelines! We ask that you read and understand the rules in place so we can keep this a nice place to both have meaningful discussion and to help your fellow users receive help and assistance for both Wiki editing and gaming. Thanks!