View source for FlightGear wiki:Village pump

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Welcome to the '''Village Pump'''. This page is used to discuss the technical issues, operations and guidelines of the [[FlightGear wiki]].

Please <span class="plainlinks">[{{fullurl:{{FULLPAGENAME}}|action=edit&section=new}} add new topics]</span> to the '''bottom''' of this page.

Old discussions should be moved to a [[FlightGear wiki:Village pump/Archive YEAR]]. These discussions can then be moved to a relevant talk page if appropriate.

__TOC__

== Dark mode? ==

Hi, when will the dark mode (like wikipedia) be added?
[[User:Fgf5|Fgf5]] ([[User talk:Fgf5|talk]]) 18:37, 22 April 2026 (UTC)

: Hi,
: Updating our MediaWiki version is actually planned for coming weekend. That will give you dark mode, among other improvements ;-)
: [[User:Gijs|Gijs]] ([[User talk:Gijs|talk]]) 19:30, 21 April 2026 (UTC)

== MediaWiki updated to 1.39.6 ==

We have updated MediaWiki to its latest LTS version 1.39.6 today. Although we've tested the update, chances are that we've missed certain scenarios or features. Please report any issues that you may encounter.

[[User:Gijs|Gijs]] ([[User talk:Gijs|talk]]) 09:31, 30 January 2024 (UTC)

== Embedded YouTube videos broken ==

It seems that the [[mw:Extension:EmbedVideo|EmbedVideo extension]] was removed at some point. Consequently, pages such as [[Howto:Creating FlightGear Promo Videos]] are broken. At present, the best replacements seems to be [[mw:Extension:EmbedVideo_(fork)|a fork]] and [[mw:Extension:YouTube|Extension:YouTube]].

—'''''[[User:Red Leader|<span style="color:red">Red Leader</span>]]''''' ([[User talk:Red Leader|talk]], [[Special:Contributions/Red Leader|contribs]]) 19:21, 30 January 2024 (UTC)

: Hi,
: Thanks for the report. It was introduced by today's update, but should be fixed now.
: [[User:Gijs|Gijs]] ([[User talk:Gijs|talk]]) 21:21, 30 January 2024 (UTC)

:: Confirmed, thanks. And I’d completely forgotten about {{[[Template:Wikipedia|wikipedia]]}}. 😅
:: '''''[[User:Red Leader|<span style="color:red">Red Leader</span>]]''''' ([[User talk:Red Leader|talk]], [[Special:Contributions/Red Leader|contribs]]) 21:57, 30 January 2024 (UTC)

== Forum registration problem ==

Hello,
I would like to register on the forum, but I tried several times without success. I sent an email to the administrator some time ago, but it seems to have been lost. I don't know what to do, is there somebody here who could help? Please tell me if you need additional information.
Thanks very much in advance. [[User:Kestrel|Kestrel]] ([[User talk:Kestrel|talk]]) 13:14, 25 March 2024 (UTC)

: Hi,
: That's unfortunate! You can find my email address at https://forum.flightgear.org/contact.php Please try again if you've done that before, I'll actively monitor the address for any incoming messages, and let me know if you don't get a reply.
: [[User:Gijs|Gijs]] ([[User talk:Gijs|talk]]) 15:01, 25 March 2024 (UTC) (forum admin)

== Sidebar link for "Build server" is broken ==

Hello, 

Just wanted to bring to someones attention that the URL for "Build server" currently 404s. Not sure if this resource still exists or if its URL has changed.

Cheers!
-Joshua

: Hi Joshua,
: The URL is still correct, but the build server is temporarily down due to a server failure. It's being worked on, so should be back up "soon".
: [[User:Gijs|Gijs]] ([[User talk:Gijs|talk]]) 12:29, 3 September 2024 (UTC)

== FlightGear Wikipedia article image needs correctly sourced Flightgear wiki screenshot ==
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FlightGear

The image used for the Flightgear Wikipedia article appears to have been deleted, because it was sourced from the following Flightgear-wiki screenshot page:

[[:File:Bo 105 over Sint Marteen.png]]

which referred to an imgur link instead of the following thread, which gives a CC license based on a google search of the file name:

https://forum.flightgear.org/viewtopic.php?f=88&t=32163&start=0

Discussion on Wikipedia:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Files_for_discussion/2024_December_7#File:FlightGear_Flight_Sim_Bo_105_over_Sint_Marteen.png

> ''Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the file's talk page or in a [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Deletion_review deletion review]).''

The person who uploaded it, or someone from the wiki, should ideally fix the FlightGear wiki page, and do a deletion review for the Wikipedia file. The file may have been used in multiple pages since screenshots are uncommon on Wikipedia due to proprietary apps. Feel free to remove this comment once it's taken care of. Good luck

== Issues with three templates ==

Hi,

The [[Template:Fgmeta_commit|fgmeta commit]] template appears to be broken. It used to work in the first ''Note'' [[Scripted_Compilation_on_Linux_Debian/Ubuntu#For_the_curious:_the_SSH_way|here]] (see the URL).

Also, I tried to use [[Template:Repo_link#Site:_Generic]] to create a link to the [https://gitlab.kitware.com/cmake/cmake.git CMake repo], but didn't manage: IIRC, the link text was empty.

Finally, [[Template:Fgmeta_source]] doesn't seem to to what the doc. says for ''simplepath'': with
<pre><nowiki>{{fgmeta source
| path = download_and_compile.sh
| simplepath = 1
}}</nowiki></pre>

the link text starts with a slash, so I used
<pre><nowiki>{{fgmeta source
| path = download_and_compile.sh
| text = download_and_compile.sh
}}</nowiki></pre>
which is of course more redundant.

Thanks for considering! :-)

[[User:Rominet|Rominet]] ([[User talk:Rominet|talk]])


: Good catch.  I need to look into that one.  I may not have coded the commit part of GitLab into the master {{tl|repo_link}} template.

: [[User:Bugman|Bugman]] ([[User talk:Bugman|talk]]) 15:41, 13 March 2025 (UTC)

:: All fixed.  It was quite simple - the {{tl|fgmeta_source}} template was missing the <code>proj</code> parameter.  I've also fixed {{tl|fgmeta_clone}}.

:: [[User:Bugman|Bugman]] ([[User talk:Bugman|talk]]) 15:53, 13 March 2025 (UTC)

::: Thanks for the reply and fixes, Bugman! (And sorry for the delay, I didn't see any notification...) I see the first item is indeed addressed. Regarding the second item, well, I see no place where I'd really want to use this now on the d&c page, so didn't test it. As for the third one, I still get <code>/download_and_compile.sh</code> in the Preview when I try the above {{tl|fgmeta_source}} snippet with <code>simplepath = 1</code>.

::: I looked at {{tl|fgmeta_clone}} too; it looks nice but seems to default to the <code>git://</code> protocol. Would it be possible to make it default to using <code>https://</code>? Thanks again. :-)
 
::: [[User:Rominet|Rominet]] ([[User talk:Rominet|talk]])

:::: Not a problem.  For the <code>simplepath</code> parameter, that is the designed behaviour in the {{tl|repo link}} template.  In most cases our repositories have complex directory structures and the desired output is the absolute file path, removing the protocol and URL parts of the path.  Do you wish to simply have the file name there?  No one had asked for that before, so I never added an option for that.  In the case of the source repositories, you often want to remove the first part of the absolute path so that for example in SimGear, {{simgear source|path=simgear/scene/util/QuadTreeBuilder.hxx|simplepath=1}} (<nowiki>{{simgear source|path=simgear/scene/util/QuadTreeBuilder.hxx|simplepath=1}}</nowiki>) would be shown as {{simgear source|path=simgear/scene/util/QuadTreeBuilder.hxx|text=scene/util/QuadTreeBuilder.hxx}} (<nowiki>{{simgear source|path=simgear/scene/util/QuadTreeBuilder.hxx|text=scene/util/QuadTreeBuilder.hxx}}</nowiki>.  This is not scriptable in MediaWiki so I left it all for the text parameter.

:::: For the protocol, I have now added the <code>protocol</code> parameter.  E.g. <nowiki>{{fgmeta clone | protocol = https}}</nowiki>.  That will give <code>{{fgmeta clone | protocol = https}}</code> (as of today generated as <code><nowiki>git clone https://gitlab.com/flightgear/fgmeta.git</nowiki></code>).

:::: [[User:Bugman|Bugman]] ([[User talk:Bugman|talk]]) 08:51, 24 March 2025 (UTC)

::::: Thanks Bugman, I've updated the [[Scripted_Compilation_on_Linux_Debian/Ubuntu|download_and_compile.sh page]] to use <code><nowiki>{{fgmeta clone | protocol = https}}</nowiki></code> as you proposed; it works great. For the link to download_and_compile.sh, I can continue to use <code><nowiki>{{fgmeta source | path = download_and_compile.sh | text = download_and_compile.sh}}</nowiki></code>, no problem.

::::: As far as I'm concerned, everything is resolved here, so this thread/section can be deleted if someone wants to “clean up”.

::::: ''Other subject:'' the only remaining thing is that I didn't receive any notification, neither for your replies here nor for the January changes by [[User:Jebba|Jebba]] to the [[Scripted_Compilation_on_Linux_Debian/Ubuntu|download_and_compile.sh page]] that is on my watchlist. I used to receive email notifications for these things years ago, haven't changed my preferences regarding this and don't see any setting that would explain why I don't receive these notifications anymore. Maybe email sending by the wiki software is not quite well configured according to current standards (SPF, DKIM, DMARC)?

::::: [[User:Rominet|Rominet]] ([[User talk:Rominet|talk]])

== Improve the 'simgear clone', 'flightgear clone' and 'fgdata clone' templates ==

Hi,

In order to improve [[Fedora_Packages_and_Compiling]], it would be nice to have the <code><nowiki>{{simgear clone}}</nowiki></code>, <code><nowiki>{{flightgear clone}}</nowiki></code> and <code><nowiki>{{fgdata clone}}</nowiki></code> templates on par with <code><nowiki>{{fgmeta clone}}</nowiki></code> (support for the <code>protocol</code> parameter, etc.). I tried

 <nowiki>{{simgear clone | protocol = https | opt = --single-branch --branch release/2024.1 | post = simgear}}</nowiki>

but it doesn't seem to work, as the preview shows this:

 <nowiki>git clone --single-branch --branch release/2024.1 git://gitlab.com simgear</nowiki>

(ditto with <code>flightear clone</code> and <code>fgdata clone</code>). Thanks in advance :-)

[[User:Rominet|Rominet]] ([[User talk:Rominet|talk]])

: I needed a while to work out the best strategy for these changes.  I've now gone through all of the {{tl|repo link}} cloning subtemplates listed on {{tl|repo link/doc related}} and added the <code>project</code> parameter to the templates and the optional <code>protocol</code> parameter.  These changes were required as the <code>gl</code> section of the {{tl|repo_link}} template is constructed differently to the <code>sf</code> section.  I've also updated the git cloning documentation {{tl|repo link/doc git clone}}.  I hope this covers everything you need.

: [[User:Bugman|Bugman]] ([[User talk:Bugman|talk]]) 07:48, 1 April 2025 (UTC)

:: Thanks a lot, Bugman, this works great! Your changes allowed me to perform [https://wiki.flightgear.org/w/index.php?title=Fedora_Packages_and_Compiling&type=revision&diff=141687&oldid=141513 this edit] in [[Fedora_Packages_and_Compiling]]. The only remaining <code>git clone</code> command written in full on that page is for FG's fork of OpenSceneGraph at GitLab. I understand that choosing a proper name for an applicable <code><nowiki>{{... clone}}</nowiki></code> template probably requires some careful thinking... ;-)

:: [[User:Rominet|Rominet]] ([[User talk:Rominet|talk]])

== Default text in Template:Repo link ==

Hi,

The default ''text'' in {{tl|Repo link}} gives somewhat pleasant link texts such as
 flightgear/flightgear/src/Scripting/NasalSys.cxx
when the ''site'' is <code>sourceforge</code>, however the result looks like a bug for other sites (though I understand this may be as intended). To be clear, the URLs are correct but the default link texts look weird because they start with the unqualified site name rather than the fully-qualified domain name. For instance,
 {{obr}}fgmeta source{{cbr}}
yields [https://gitlab.com/flightgear/fgmeta gitlab/flightgear/fgmeta/next] rather than [https://gitlab.com/flightgear/fgmeta gitlab.com/flightgear/fgmeta/next]. I suggest to replace <code>gitlab</code> with <code>gitlab.com</code> in the default text (where the HTML comment says “Site advertising”) and do the same for <code>github</code>.

Note: the Gitorious web site doesn't exist anymore, maybe that should be removed from the template?

Thanks for considering; I can do the replacement if you wish.

[[User:Rominet|Rominet]] ([[User talk:Rominet|talk]]) 10:38, 12 November 2025 (UTC)

: Sounds sensible, so please go ahead!
: Regarding Gitorious, it may be nice to link to an archived version of the repos, such as https://archive.softwareheritage.org/browse/origin/directory/?origin_url=https://gitorious.org/flightgear/fgdata.git&visit_type=git Altough this only makes sense for repos or branches that are not part of our current GitLab...
: [[User:Gijs|Gijs]] ([[User talk:Gijs|talk]]) 13:58, 12 November 2025 (UTC)

:: [https://wiki.flightgear.org/w/index.php?title=Template:Repo_link&action=history Done], thanks Gijs!
::

:: One should be careful using this, though, because the resulting link ''texts'' may be non-existing URLs (after prepending the protocol) despite looking like valid ones, as shown by the first example in [[User:Rominet/Sandbox#FGMeta-Python repo templates]]!

:: So, to avoid people getting trapped by this, maybe the default link text should start with something like <code>[GitLab]/...</code> rather than the <code>gitlab.com/...</code> I just put (to make it clear that such link texts are not supposed to be “Internet addresses”).
:: [[User:Rominet|Rominet]] ([[User talk:Rominet|talk]]) 16:20, 12 November 2025 (UTC)

::: This is now implemented. For instance, <code>{{obr}}fgmeta-python source {{!}} path = pyproject.toml {{!}} tag  = 1.0.0b1 {{cbr}}</code> results in {{fgmeta-python source | path = pyproject.toml | tag  = 1.0.0b1 }}. This also holds for GitHub and GitoriousIsNowClosed. SourceForge has no such prefix for now (it initially didn't, and editing its part of {{tl|Repo link}} requires a bit more temerity than what I have at the moment :-)).
::: [[User:Rominet|Rominet]] ([[User talk:Rominet|talk]]) 09:15, 14 November 2025 (UTC)

: That's a good idea.  Note for Gitorious - I added this because there are a number of historical documents/pages that refer to developments that occurred on Gitorious which were not migrated to SourceForge.  I originally made the Gitorious links work by pointing to the archive by the Internet Archive (see [[Gitorious]]).  However that archive has been offline for a few years now.  The Internet Archive are storing all the data so it may return one day.

: [[User:Bugman|Bugman]] ([[User talk:Bugman|talk]]) 22:06, 13 November 2025 (UTC)

== Beware of shortened Git commit IDs ==

While fixing broken links due to the {{tl|foo commit}} templates not specifying <code>proj=flightgear</code> (this was implicit with <code>site=sf</code> but isn't with <code>site=gl</code>), I found that URLs at GitLab don't accept the same shortened Git commit IDs as those at SourceForge:
 https://sourceforge.net/p/flightgear/fgdata/ci/807062 - OK
 https://gitlab.com/flightgear/fgdata/-/commit/807062  - NOK
 https://gitlab.com/flightgear/fgdata/-/commit/807062d - OK
 https://gitlab.com/flightgear/fgdata/-/commit/807062d0b6f858885547f27325e829c2bf42a12b - OK

As a consequence, there are probably a lot of broken links in the wiki due to shortened commit IDs. Better always use the long ones...

{{Note|Commit ID 807062 in FGData is not ambiguous at the time of this writing.}}
[[User:Rominet|Rominet]] ([[User talk:Rominet|talk]]) 15:45, 3 December 2025 (UTC)

: I have modified {{tl|Simgear_commit}}, {{tl|Flightgear_commit}}, {{tl|Fgdata_commit}}, etc. (12 templates!) to show a commit ID truncated to 7 characters in the automatically generated link text, so there is no excuse for not using the full commit IDs anymore when using these templates (see the result [[Howto:Building_FlightGear_without_HiDPI_support#Commits|here]] for instance). Thanks to [[User:Gijs|Gijs]] for installing [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Module:Ustring Module:Ustring] which made this possible!

: Note that manually provided ''text'' arguments are not truncated.
: {{tip|In case you feel like replacing shortened commit IDs with full ones in {{tl|foo commit}} template calls, the full commit IDs can be found like so:
 cd /path/to/repository
 git rev-parse ''shortened-id1'' ''shortened-id2'' ...
}}

: [[User:Rominet|Rominet]] ([[User talk:Rominet|talk]]) 18:05, 25 December 2025 (UTC)

== Nasal unit test assertion documentation ==
I just started an article about [[Nasal unit tests]] but could need some help improving the section about the tests.

The only documentation I find is the {{flightgear source|path=src/Scripting/NasalUnitTesting.cxx|text=C++ source code}} and the existing test files (<code>test_*.nut</code>) in {{fgdata source|path=Nasal|text=fgdata/Nasal}} (side note: it took me several days to figure out where the <code>nasal-test</code> FGCommand was implemented).

—[[User:Johan G|Johan G]] ([[User_talk:Johan_G|Talk]] | [[Special:Contributions/Johan_G|contribs]]) 12:36, 14 March 2026 (UTC)

: In order to find the <code>nasal-test</code> FGCommand, a simple approach is to run, in the three main repositories, <code>git grep -Fe nasal-test</code> (or, more accurately but slower: <code>git grep -Ee '\bnasal-test\b'</code>). This shows a few lines including
 globals->get_commands()->addCommand("nasal-test", &command_executeNasalTest);
: which indicates that the command is implemented by {{flightgear source | path=src/Scripting/NasalUnitTesting.cxx | line=148 | text=command_executeNasalTest()}}, which can be found using either IDE-like features (LSP server, etc.) or the same <code>git grep</code> technique. :-)

: [[User:Rominet|Rominet]] ([[User talk:Rominet|talk]]) 13:40, 21 April 2026 (UTC)