User talk:Wmc824

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Hello, Wmc824, and welcome to Wikipedia! Thank you for your contributions. I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Here are some pages that you might find helpful:

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I hope you enjoy editing here and being a Wikipedian! Please sign your messages on discussion pages using four tildes (~~~~); this will automatically insert your username and the date. If you need help, check out Wikipedia:Questions, ask me on my talk page, or ask your question on this page and then place {{helpme}} before the question. Again, welcome! mikaul^talk 20:02, 31 December 2008 (UTC)

Changes to Twilight

Hi, I reverted your recent changes to the article. If you'd like to discuss removal of the lead image and other stuff, please leave a message on the talk page. Thanks! mikaul^talk 20:02, 31 December 2008 (UTC)

Tweaks to the Twilight image

Hi. I've just uploaded a modified version of your File:Types-of-twilight.png image, as File:Types-of-twilight-en.svg. Just thought I'd be courteous and let you know. The modifications are:

• I've "vectorized" it; see WP:SVG.
• I've enlarged the text, so it's easier to read on the page.
• I've exaggerated the angles representing evening and morning twilight, to better fit the larger text in.

-- Why Not A Duck 07:08, 14 January 2009 (UTC)

A vectorized image is preferable; shapes scale to larger sizes without pixelating. The thicker lines and larger text are easier to read at the size embedded in the article.

I notice that both arrowheads on an arc point in the same direction of rotation. Item #3 on Page 1 of this document http://homepages.cae.wisc.edu/~me231/online_notes/dimensoning/principals_dim.pdf suggests using "arrowheads touching the extension lines and pointing in opposite directions." The image at the bottom of Page 5 illustrates arrowheads on an arc.

Can the SVG program point arrowheads away from the centers of the arcs to the extension lines? If it can't put outward pointing arrows on each end, can it place an arrowhead on only one end? Then one might use concentric, equal-radius arcs in opposite directions with arrows at the leading ends of both arcs. Thanks for the improvement and the courtesy. - Wmc824 (talk) 08:08, 14 January 2009 (UTC)

Ok, I'm confused about the arrows. Here's how I meant them to look in the image: <======>. Is that right? As far as I can see, that's how they look. But it's possible that they show up differently for you, especially if I messed something up in the SVG. (It's possible; different programs for viewing SVG can give different results if I made a non-standard assumption.)

SVG can certainly handle doing it. Markers at either end or both; same marker or different markers at each end. I thought I had done that; if I haven't, let me know. One more advantage of SVG is it's comparatively easy to modify the image. Actually, I've been thinking of updating it once more anyway, to make the image show up larger on the image description page (currently it shows at the same size it appears in the article; it'd be nice if people who clicked on the image got a larger image). -- Why Not A Duck 22:07, 14 January 2009 (UTC)

Half the arrows show up differently in Opera 9.62 for some reason. My guess is that Opera is using the direction of the stroke when the arc is drawn to orient both arrowheads. I don't know whether that is standard behavior for an SVG engine. The arrowheads display as intended in Firefox 3.03. The vertical location of the text differs for some reason, too. There is less white space in Opera between the horizon line and the text both above and below the line. Here are screen shots from both browsers:

For now, I'll assume that the discrepancies are due to bugs in Opera. My apologies for the comment. Nice work on the image. It looks better and is more versatile than my raster image.

Thanks for making the background transparent, which allows my preferred background color to show through. Glaring white is way too prevalent on web pages; it is nice to have some relief. There wasn't a handy way to make the background of my PNG file transparent, so I caved to using the white background that is the default on Wikipedia and too many other sites.

I hadn't looked at an SVG file before. I don't understand the markup yet, but that it stores an image like this as a text file is intriguing. SVG files may preferable to DXF files in some CAD applications. - Wmc824 (talk) 03:30, 15 January 2009 (UTC)

Ah. Okay. Actually, in my SVG file there are two "arrowhead" designs. One pointing one way, and one pointing the other way, to compensate for the fact that Firefox, and WP's rendering software, both seem to orient the markers in the same direction of the curve. By the way, there's a test page showing how markers at the ends of lines are supposed to be oriented. I don't know why they don't use arrowheads in that test; the triangles they use look weird. As for the background: I originally planned on doing a white background (to make sure there's enough contrast for the black lines to show up) but somewhere there's a Wikipedia guideline that told me to make it transparent (which would've been the default anyway). Thanks for the comments. -- Why Not A Duck 19:12, 15 January 2009 (UTC)