Main menu Mission name sorting

[snatcher]

5 hours ago, datiswous said:

Why not create a poll?

Sample sizes of polls I've seen here aren't large enough to draw any conclusions. What do we do with 5 votes for option one, 4 votes for option two, and 2 votes for option three? Making decisions based on such low numbers would be irresponsible. Besides, as far as I can tell poll results are available in real time and because of this results can be biased for different reasons.

Let's just put all elements on the table so that he who ultimately decides can take an educated decision.

[snatcher]

20 hours ago, wesp5 said:

For anybody who wants to test this in game, just install my latest patch to have a look!

I see what you did in there and how you fooled the game

I think you made a little mistake somewhere while packing the Patch, though:

[Skaruts]

23 hours ago, snatcher said:

Is anyone in here in favor of the current sorting (very first screenshot in this topic) over other options? Please speak up.

1. By going current, missions are kind of sorted and mission names are respected.
2. By going true alphabetical, missions are sorted and mission names are respected.
3. By going article last, missions are kind of sorted and mission names are not respected.

Please comment if you disagree or have something to add to my three points above.

If I were to decide I would personally find defending the second option the easiest: how would you like Windows to sort your files and folders?

The current sorting was always confusing to me. It was now on this thread that I finally understood what's going on there.

I tend to lean on option 2. I could live with option 3, but I prefer 2. I think it looks cleaner, too.

 

[wesp5]

20 hours ago, snatcher said:

I see what you did in there and how you fooled the game

I think you made a little mistake somewhere while packing the Patch, though:

Oops. I experimented with "< ", but noticed it doesn't look as good for the default missions which I want to have at the top. Fixed!

Edited October 7, 2023 by wesp5

[snatcher]

21 hours ago, wesp5 said:

Fixed!

Much better now, thanks!

[Fiver]

In a few lists, TDM missions are presented sorted (or sortable) alphabetically:
* In the mission downloader GUI
* On the web page: https://www.thedarkmod.com/missions/
* On the wiki: https://wiki.thedarkmod.com/index.php?title=Fan_Missions_for_The_Dark_Mod

The Chicago Manual of Style (CMOS) recommends placing initial articles (The, A, An) at the end of the full title: "A Tale of Two Cities" would appear as "Tale of Two Cities, A". Titles do not include subtitles unless they are essential for identification. If a subtitle is included, the initial article should be placed at the end of the full title, not before the subtitle. (https://style.mla.org/articles-and-alphabetization/)

I mentioned this in "0006339: Polishing menus: mission downloader" (https://bugs.thedarkmod.com/view.php?id=6339), but I suggest following CMOS in all cases where titles are an entry in a list.

[snatcher]

Very informative post, @Fiver.

Few months have passed and it probably is time to ask this again

On 10/5/2023 at 9:19 PM, snatcher said:

Is anyone in here in favor of the current sorting (very first screenshot in this topic) over other options? Please speak up.

1. By going current, missions are kind of sorted and mission names are respected.
2. By going true alphabetical, missions are sorted and mission names are respected.
3. By going article last, missions are kind of sorted and mission names are not respected.

Please comment if you disagree or have something to add to my three points above.

If I were to decide I would personally find defending the second option the easiest: how would you like Windows to sort your files and folders?

[STiFU]

CMOS all the way! It is in a way truly alphabetical, while allowing for efficient searching, and it is a world-wide standard way of sorting things.

[chakkman]

21 hours ago, Fiver said:

The Chicago Manual of Style (CMOS) recommends placing initial articles (The, A, An) at the end of the full title: "A Tale of Two Cities" would appear as "Tale of Two Cities, A". 

Sounds good to me.

[nbohr1more]

15 minutes ago, chakkman said:

Sounds good to me.

So we are gonna revert to 2.05 style:

https://bugs.thedarkmod.com/view.php?id=4499

?

Needs a vote I suppose.

 

[Amadeus]

Chicago Manual really is a solid choice for sorting stuff like this; that'd be my vote (although, I've always been more of an MLA man myself)

[STiFU]

25 minutes ago, nbohr1more said:

https://bugs.thedarkmod.com/view.php?id=4499

That bug report could be interpreted in two ways: One, the ingame-downloader-sorting needs changing, Two, all other lists needs changed sorting.

The current sorting does not even resolve the issue as the sorting is still different from the missions web page.

[Fiver]

On 1/22/2024 at 9:50 PM, Amadeus said:

I've always been more of an MLA man myself

I am less familiar with the MLA Handbook, so I don't know what (if anything) it says about how to account for definite and indefinite articles when sorting lists based on titles. I can't find anything about it online. Let's hope they don't come after us if they find out and disagree.

Edit: According to the link I provided in my previous post, "MLA style follows the The Chicago Manual of Style", so there is no conflict between them.

Edited February 10 by Fiver
update

[Fiver]

4 hours ago, STiFU said:

That bug report could be interpreted in two ways: One, the ingame-downloader-sorting needs changing, Two, all other lists needs changed sorting.

Yes, the description is somewhat unclear. When it says "The in-game downloader might show something different than the main menu.", I don't perceive that as a problem. Sorting a list by titles (articles last) is one thing; presenting the full title (with article first) is another. And they serve two different purposes:
* When presenting the title in a list along with other titles by other authors, I would want to put more emphasis on functionality, usability and the overall presentation of the list as a whole. It is in everybody's interest that the list is functional and neat.
* When presenting the title by itself, I would want to put more emphasis on the author's wishes.

 

4 hours ago, STiFU said:

The current sorting does not even resolve the issue as the sorting is still different from the missions web page.

I think the web page and the list on the wiki should follow CMOS too, for the same reasons.

By the way: the web page (https://www.thedarkmod.com/missions/) has a column "Type" which has values "S" or "C" but it does not explain the difference. Does anyone know?

[Fiver]

I suggest following CMOS in this case. That sorting style would also be easy to implement on the web page, on the wiki, and anywhere else too.

One detail may remain, though: How do we list a title like "The Lieutenant 1: In Plain Sight"?
* "Lieutenant 1, The: In Plain Sight", or
* "Lieutenant 1: In Plain Sight, The"

I'm pretty sure the first alternative is better because it connects the title to the word it modifies.

[Goldwell]

Seeing this made me wish we also had a little search box in the top right corner. That would make finding missions a lot easier.

[Amadeus]

Yeah, with +160 missions and growing, it might be time to consider a search bar

[STiFU]

5 hours ago, Fiver said:

By the way: the web page (https://www.thedarkmod.com/missions/) has a column "Type" which has values "S" or "C" but it does not explain the difference. Does anyone know?

It stands for campaign or single mission.

[snatcher]

16 hours ago, nbohr1more said:

Needs a vote I suppose.

We can wait a few months and ask again but so far nobody here seems to be in favor of the current sorting so going for any of the alternatives sounds like an improvement for all. I don't care which one wins, whatever @AluminumHaste says

[nbohr1more]

I think it should be a menu option, or else someone will open a new bug report in a few months asking that we switch back again.

[datiswous]

Personally I'm strongly against using:

Wind in the Willows, The

That look just sucks and makes no sense to me. It's i.m.h.o. not true alphabetic sorting.

Also, I would think that in the above example someone could think that Willows is the most important and so it should be:

Willows, The Wind in the

 

I prefer:

The Wind in the Willows

That is the whole title and the The at the start is just as important as any other word in it. Otherwise why would the author put it there? You should assume it's important.

 

I think it should at least be possible that I can change the way this shows by edditting Gui files (or by a cvar). If that is possible I'll will do that (just as I made the install_splash.tga show without transperancy applied). I think currently that isn't possible.

 

Edited January 23 by datiswous

[wesp5]

52 minutes ago, datiswous said:

The Wind in the Willows

That is the whole title and the The at the start is just as important as any other word in it. Otherwise why would the author put it there? You should assume it's important.

I agree, which is the reason why I made mission sorting in my patch like this, which is also how missions are sorted elsewhere in the web.

[datiswous]

7 minutes ago, wesp5 said:

I agree, which is the reason why I made mission sorting in my patch like this, which is also how missions are sorted elsewhere in the web.

Hmm, I might need this patch some day..

[Rio_Walker]

Kinda wish we could sort it by author/plot. As well as order of completion (which one I did last, which one I did first), and order in which they should be completed ("Sequel to [mission] play that one first and come back here")