WML How-To FLow Chart

[Dixie]

Hey there people! I don't know if any of you know/enjoy the webcomic XKCD. I, for one, follow it regurlarly, even if I sometimes not get the jokes.

Some time ago, the guy made a pretty funny but still useful "comic" which I sent to my girlfriend and all other non-geek relatives. I thought it might be funny/useful to make a WML version of it, so I did! I figured it was a -bit- off-topic in WML Workshop, so I post it here. I'll trust the powers that be about wether or not it should be stickied somewhere over there

[Zerovirus]

Similes are like replies in offtopic in that I'm making one now.



I'm not sure the concept applies as well, but I think it's a nice approach to the idea. Perhaps I should try it?

[Ken_Oh]

Pretty funny.

I would have added something along the lines of "Are you just making up WML syntax, putting tags and keys inside of other tags when no document or example says you can put them there?" -----yes-----> "Don't do that."

I've been tempted to make a humor/help wiki page called "Don't just make up WML" to explain how to think when you're tempted to randomly put code together and expect it to read your mind.

[artisticdude]

Hehe. I enjoyed that. Flow charts are fun.

[Hulavuta]

Actually, I found it very helpful.

[governor]

Bottom left is a dead-end, it needs to redirect.

[Hulavuta]

It says "Give Up"

[boru]

Bottom left box can branch to two boxes: "Get help" and "Your post is buried in forum obscurity*"

"Get help" branches back to "Did it work?"

"Your post is buried in forum obscurity" could branch to "You get an even more wonderful idea!" and returns to the top.

(* [acronym=nota bene (note well)]nb[/acronym]: this is rare, but it happens sometimes)

[Dixie]

Bottom left box can branch to two boxes: "Get help" and "Your post is buried in forum obscurity*"

"Get help" branches back to "Did it work?"

"Your post is buried in forum obscurity" could branch to "You get an even more wonderful idea!" and returns to the top.

(* [acronym=nota bene (note well)]nb[/acronym]: this is rare, but it happens sometimes)

When it happens, it's because it's so technical that nobody's too sure they have anything to say to help (which is PRETTY rare, since there are some epic coders around and all), either that they are very unclear and precise (say, like this), hence why I wrote something along the line of "as precisely as possible".

If you guys wanna edit it to lengthen it, feel free to do so, but I ain't doing it I think it doesn't need those extra boxes, insisting too much would just kill the joke, imo.

[Anonymissimus]

An improvement:
Instead of "picking a random code", I suggest a "search-in-files" among all those mainline and working add-on content for e.g. occurances of a certain tag which is related to what you want to to.
It could actually be stickied or go to the wiki imo.

[governor]

It says "Give Up"

It says 'or give up'. ggkthxbye

[Zarel]

Also, pick a better font than Comic Sans. Ye gods.

And I think this belongs somewhere other than Off-Topic. It looks like it could be useful.

[Zerovirus]

Also, pick a better font than Comic Sans. Ye gods.

I knew there was something off about that font...

[Dixie]

Hey I usually don't pick Comic Sans :p (In fact, I don't think they exist on mac), this one was named something like "Chalkboard something". But I'll hand it to you: when I saw it on the forums, I too thought "God, this looks like Comic Sans" Maybe I should jsut redo it...?


BTW, here's how I personnally see the chart, answering a comment by Gambit on the wishing thread:

I tried to think about that from a newbie perspective, and it wasn't really that helpful to pretending-to-be-a-newbie-Gambit. (He got banned from the forums for spamming WML Workshop! He had so many questions and the flow chart just kept ending up there.)

In fact, and I think the funny part of the joke lies there, the flow chart is just plain common sense. It mostly says: "Don't say you don't understand when you've not tried. Work a bit by yourself, explore (you might even succeed more easily than you first thought), and in case you tried everything you can think of, there's still the 'ask help' option." IMO, it mostly goes in the same way as the eternal "Don't expect others to work on your ideas; put some work on it, and you might receive help if you need (and ask for) it". Nothing's free