User talk:Notdoppler/archive1

Hello and welcome to Corriepedia! All assistance is welcome!

You have made several changes recently where you have moved Jed Stone from being a regular cast member to being guest cast. Either myself or David_the_Wavid has moved him back again. Please note that the convention we have used in creating the 2000+ episodes to date on this site is that once a regular cast member, then ALWAYS a regular cast member - almost a badge of honour, if you like. Thus Sheila Crossley, appearing in just four episodes in 1974 and appearing for the first time since 1969 was credited as a regular cast member. Please could you stick to the same rule and ensure consistency. Thank you.--Jtomlin1uk 06:17, 26 August 2008 (UTC)

this page might also be of interest. David 08:37, 27 August 2008 (UTC)

Profile pages
Please could I ask you to take note of a few things on the profile pages that you're creating? I realise that they are being copied from Wikipedia - which is alright in itself - but we don't follow all of their conventions and need several adjustments to the text: 1) Please can you delete lines such as "XXX is a fictional character in the ITV soap Coronation Street". As this is a site purely about the programme such a definition is not required. In addition, links have been left in such as "fictional character" and while fine for Wikipedia, I cannot see us ever creating such a page here. Some delinking is required. 2) Dates should also be in the UK style of 2nd February, 3rd March etc, not February 2, March 3, etc and the first instance of this on a page of such a date should always be linked. 3) Tricky one this - beware where our links are different to wikipedia. We use "Rovers Return Inn" as a full link whereas Wikipedia uses just "Rovers Return". Such links need changing - watch out for ones on Wikipedia such as "Mike Baldwin (fictional character)" - we obviously just use "Mike Baldwin". 4) Please remember to add at least one category and a defaultsort. Appearance of a character in just a few episodes get a category such as "Category:2007 minor character" whereas others will be "Category:Coronation Street characters" - you'll have to use your judgement as to which is which! Sorry to go on - any questions, please ask! John--Jtomlin1uk 10:53, 28 August 2008 (UTC)


 * I'm also appreciative of your edits, these character pages have been long overdue. One thing you should be aware is that all the behind the scenes material in the character articles should be under its own section in the page, the rest being in-universe information, as if the character is real. The manual of style I linked to above gives more information about this. This isn't urgent, but if you're leaving it the way it is, it might be better if you would add one of the cleanup templates to the page. Thanks. David 11:49, 28 August 2008 (UTC)

Images
RE:your message.

For the old episodes, I usually get the images from the DVDs, except publicity images which can usually be found online. Newer episodes I usually screengrab from the ITV site - the latest episodes directly from the ITV catchup. The various video and picture galleries on the ITV site are also useful.

I've been going over the most recent few episode articles you've written for the site, I'm very grateful that somebody is else is choosing to tackle them as I've been doing them since the site started, they're mostly fine except for the cast lists, which occasionally omit someone. The episodes available on ITV catchup are a godsend not only for the images but the ending credits give us the cast list directly, at least for the single episodes - for double episodes there is only one cast list so other means need to be used to get two separate cast lists. Difficult sometimes!

David 14:32, 28 August 2008 (UTC)

Users
Hi, just alerting you to the existence of this page, the list of users, if you want to add yourself to the list.

Congratulations on bagging the 4000th article! David 19:05, 28 August 2008 (UTC)

Cast
I suppose there's no definite way, but my rule of thumb is an actor is in the regular cast if their character appears outside of a storyline. If they're a regular cast member, the storyline they leave in is different from the one they joined in. Quite hard to define actually, it's tempting to say just someone who lives in the street but some don't. Is there a specific example you've got in mind? David 19:41, 28 August 2008 (UTC)


 * There are a few ways to get a cast list. The most direct way is to watch the episodes online, that way you can pause to make a note of the actor names at the end credits. The cast list also goes up on IMDB, but it usually takes a while. Possibly TV magazines also give cast lists, but I don't buy any so I don't know for sure. David 10:42, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

Episode pages
Thanks for handling the new episode pages, I'll try and get those guest star names. David 16:22, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

Character infoboxes
Hi there, I've been taking a look at your articles, just a few things to note about them.

Major characters have the 'main character' infobox. Recurring characters have the 'individual' infobox. One-time only characters don't have an infobox, as usually there won't be enough content on the page to justify it.

The Nick Neeson article merge is fine, but you might want to consider simplfying the appearances list by having more than one column, like in this page. David 18:37, 10 September 2008 (UTC)

RE:Alert and suggestions
I'll check those recent episode articles tomorrow, circumstances permitting. I hope to write the October 2007 articles on Monday, recently I've been writing the articles on the original characters and it's taken up a lot of my time. I'm trying to get a lot done before I go back to uni, not much time left! David 21:23, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

New episodes
Thanks for taking the new episodes off my hands! I haven't checked your recent ones, but they seem okay. The main thing that must be absolutely correct is the cast list, as it takes the longest to correct if its wrong. It's mainly a convenience though, as you might have guessed there's no way to see the earlier episodes unless they've been commercially released (or unless you work for Granada TV, I guess) so there's precious little information obtainable from them.

Will I keep the 'list of appearances' pages updated? I'm happy to do so, it doesn't take long. David 09:56, 17 September 2008 (UTC)


 * 2007 episodes - I use the official synopsis obtainable from various sites (I use digital spy), images from ITV site and cast lists from IMDB. TV.com is also useful, but contains only sketchy information. David 14:46, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the warning. This will be my first experience of dealing with a disruptive user, I'm quite excited.

About the images from the ITV site, you can find them using the search function at the top right of their site, just type in the date of the episode - ITV don't seem to take them down, they're just difficult to find. The pictures from the scene-by-scene sections are fine, but I prefer the higher-resolution pics from the 'pictures of the week' sections.

For IMDB, you just have to know you've got the right date. David 20:41, 19 September 2008 (UTC)

RE: Impressive!
Ahhh, thanks a bunch for changing that for me! :) Chiidatbe 17:50, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

Character articles
Thanks for your comment about the Elsie Tanner article! For character articles I usually start off with what's on Wikipedia (which in most cases is not very much) and the corrie.net character page, which is usually just a set of dry facts, then plunder through the episode synopses from the years they were in it for details of the storylines they had. Once I've got all the information, I structure most of it into the biography section, write a personality section if its someone who was in it for a while and put all remaining facts into other sections, plus any behind the scenes information I've learned.

The trouble with Wikipedia, especially for characters like Ken and Deirdre, who've been in it for a while, they're heavy on recent events, some of which are trivial in the character's overall history compared with major events from their early years in the programme which barely get mentioned. Still, they go into a lot of detail for the newer characters - probably a little too much detail, at least for the biography section.

About the Coronation Street history page, well to be honest it's quite daunting and I might take it a bit at a time. I've not even properly written the main page on the show.

A few questions I've been wondering, is it just recent Corrie you've seen? Do you own any of the Network DVD boxsets (1960s, 1970s, 1980s)? David 12:03, 24 September 2008 (UTC)


 * They're DVD screengrabs. David 12:57, 24 September 2008 (UTC)

Peter
Hello there. You either created a page today called just "Peter" or redirected it to the page for Peter Barlow. Please be VERY careful doing things like this in future as single names have a habit of being used on more than one occasion in the programme and a redirect should not be used if it can be helped. In this instance such a redirect has caused a link to be made for a character called Peter (with no surname) played by Jon Finch in 1967. I've delinked the relevant entries now. Thank you.--Jtomlin1uk 20:51, 24 September 2008 (UTC)

New episodes
I'm afraid noting characters down as they appear on-screen is what I did, I couldn't think of anything other way to get it done. David 18:52, 25 September 2008 (UTC)

Vandalism
Hi there! Yeah, I saw his "message" and couldn't be bothered changing it - some people are amazingly tiresome.--Jtomlin1uk 19:20, 26 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Your disambiguation pages though are excellent. Really good for mopping up mis-directs.--Jtomlin1uk 19:41, 26 September 2008 (UTC)

Images
One source of images is the CSVU site. (Just Google the term CSVU - once on there click on "Visual Updates" on the grey bar on the left and you'll see images for Canada, Australia and New Zealand for episodes showing there about now but shown up to a couple of years back in the UK. The pages are refreshed every week and older pages ARE deleted so it might be worth saving a load now.--Jtomlin1uk 15:46, 29 September 2008 (UTC)

New episode articles
Don't worry about it, I'm happy to resume the new episode articles. They're a right pain, aren't they? Way too time consuming for their own good. David 16:14, 6 October 2008 (UTC)


 * I haven't forgotten them, I prefer to do a whole week's worth of episodes at the same time, so I can concentrate on other articles on other days. David 19:09, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

Compliments
Thanks for the message and complments to you to for the enthusiam you've showed since joining the site! JohnJtomlin1uk 19:17, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

characters template
Yes! I've been wanting to create templates like these for a while but to be honest I don't know how (I was fairly new to wiki editing when I started Corriepedia). Will they be separated though or will they all appear on character pages? Like on the Annie Walker page will the template for original characters only be on it, or will the rest of them which don't apply to her, because it is fairly bulky otherwise.

Not so sure about the 'deaths' and 'longest running characters' bits, are you taking these from the 'list of....' pages? I don't think they're necessary for templates. Rovers staff definitely though, but I think on that the characters should be listed owner first (Steve), then landlady (Liz), then bar staff. I also think the original/current characters should be grouped together by family, so individual names are easier to find.

But otherwise, thanks for making it! David 21:37, 11 October 2008 (UTC)


 * Hi, unless there are any objections I'm going to separate the template. David 09:07, 12 October 2008 (UTC)

Help needed
Thanks for the message. Somewhat ironically one the reasons that I've slowed down a little is that there is more info for 1989 and a couple of the other years than available previously. Bit parts are listed on the "Corrie" site for 1989 to circa 1995 and I'm carefully reading each synopsis to make sure that I'm getting the right info and noting bit part appearances that might not always be clear e.g. Christine Carter in the cafe scenes. Another reason for the temporary slowdown is that I reached about 1989 in my researches with back issues of TV Times so have had to make several trips recently to the British Library to stock up on info, hence my comparitive lack of updates yesterday. I'd rather you carried on working backwards from 2007 as you do get in a rhythm when putting episode updates on and I wouldn't want to spoil that.--Jtomlin1uk 17:54, 12 October 2008 (UTC)

Character status
I'd say they're both regulars, they both appear quite often now. David 09:45, 21 October 2008 (UTC)

Episodes
That's fine. I've worked out that we should complete the episodes about Feb/Mar next year isn't bad going for some 7000 episodes!--Jtomlin1uk 16:41, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

Brian Tilsley
Good article! It's always good to see a article appear which is needed so much, this one linking to over 400 pages!--Jtomlin1uk 14:00, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

Character pages
I'm not really sure what you mean, I just gather the information then write them. A lot of material is too short for the biography section so I put it into other sections. It all seems to come together in the end, but recently I've been working on smaller articles, it's much easier! David 17:33, 4 November 2008 (UTC)


 * Try http://www.tv.com/ David 17:40, 4 November 2008 (UTC)


 * No, it just has episode entries. Search for Coronation Street to find the show then list the episodes - this brings up a list of all episodes + synopses. Then use the search function for 'Elsie' to highlight all the mentions of Elsie, then manually search through them for the important bits. It can take a while, especially for someone who was in the street for a while, but that's how I do most articles. David 18:04, 4 November 2008 (UTC)


 * Nope, finding Corrie images online is a bit of a struggle, best just to ask me and I'll get an image from the DVDs. David 18:32, 4 November 2008 (UTC)


 * Most of the images have come from screengrabs so far. I usually hunt around for publicity shots but there aren't many. The Elsie Tanner one isn't a screengrab, I found that online, whereas the Dennis Tanner one is, it's from a 1965 episode. David 18:41, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Images
There's no need to update the images on character pages to keep up with Wikipedia. I think it's best to stick with one that best represents the character, whereas Wikipedia pushes more for something as up-to-date as possible. David 14:27, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

2007 episodes
We're working to get all episodes by the time the 7000th episode is broadcast, see Forum:7000th_episode. David 11:26, 6 November 2008 (UTC)


 * If you want I could tackle 2006. David 11:30, 6 November 2008 (UTC)


 * Go for it then, but I don't think you can depend on getting images or cast lists for every episode, you should at least be able to get a synopsis though and that's the main thing. David 11:36, 6 November 2008 (UTC)


 * It took longer than it looks, I prepared most of them beforehand then copied and pasted. In total it took around five hours. David 12:07, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

No, they're official synopses and I've seen them used in other websites. Plus I usually tinker with them a bit anyway to make for better reading.

There are ways of cross-cutting, especially with cast lists. I copy and paste them all directly from IMDB to Microsoft Word. IMDB cast lists are formatted differently than here on Wikia (they look like eg. "William Roache   ...    Ken Barlow" and we want it like "Ken Barlow - William Roache") so I use find and replace for each person's name and it will fix the whole month's cast lists in about 15 minutes rather than the hours it would take to do it manually. Hope that makes sense. David 12:39, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

Wilf Morton
Okay. David 12:47, 6 November 2008 (UTC)


 * She was recurring I think, she wasn't in it very often and didn't live in the street. David 18:39, 6 November 2008 (UTC)


 * I liken her to Dave Smith and Archie Shuttleworth. Sporadic appearances, no storylines of their own but are occasionally involved in other character's storylines, don't live in the street, no proper exit. David 19:15, 6 November 2008 (UTC)


 * There's no clear indication, which makes it harder. I didn't really watch the show last year so didn't see Doreen. David 19:24, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

I've started a forum topic on this here. David 19:29, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

Liz McDonald
I know, I've started crediting her as Liz McDonald too, I was hoping it would be an Elsie Tanner situation (where she continued to be credited as 'Tanner' even after marrying Alan Howard for several months) and her surname being Tomlin was actually referenced in the show, but I guess we should admit defeat and change the article name to McDonald. David 21:14, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

RE: struggling
Don't worry about it, this isn't a job and you're not obligated to contribute. GCSEs are more important. David 18:47, 17 November 2008 (UTC)

Welcome back
Hi, it's good to see you back during the holidays.

One thing to note though, I've been leaving the new episodes for a few weeks as it's not yet clear if the recent double length episodes have one production code each or two, as it will affect the episode numbers. I should know which it is for sure soon, but until then it's best to leave the new episodes as they might be wrong. David 22:24, 19 December 2008 (UTC)


 * Some count as one, and some count as two. The only way to know for sure is to see the production code. David 22:47, 19 December 2008 (UTC)


 * This site gives the production codes. The most recent episodes of Coronation Street to be added are from late November. David 22:52, 19 December 2008 (UTC)


 * That was Episode 6855. David 23:11, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

Don't worry about it. David 16:23, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

Welcome back again Notdoppler! How are you? Thanks for making these regular/guest cast changes. David 10:03, August 1, 2011 (UTC)
 * Yeah, Len was introduced as a full-time member of the Windasses and Mary arrived with no fanfare - funny how things change. David 10:25, August 1, 2011 (UTC)
 * Xin yes, Faye yes but I would hold off on Frank as if spoilers are anything to go by he won't be around for much longer. David 11:03, August 1, 2011 (UTC)
 * 
 * Yes, I will do that. David 12:03, August 1, 2011 (UTC)
 * I would say regular now. David 15:14, August 1, 2011 (UTC)

I was struggling to remember who that was for a moment! I would never categorise his character as a regular, AIUI every actor signs a contract, even if its only to appear in one episode. He was only in a handful of episodes anyway. David 20:09, August 1, 2011 (UTC)

Casts
Echo David's welcome back! Could I ask a favour? If you find a fault in a regular cast where they were missed out totally of the listing of an episode, could you alert me to this? It could be, as in the case of Gary Windass, that their "Full list of appearances" page also needs amendment in addition to the episode page itself. Thanks very much. John.--Jtomlin1uk 17:16, August 3, 2011 (UTC)

List of appearances

 * Two things, make sure the nunbers in each column are divisable by four or the nearest number to 4 (e.g. 57 appearances go in three columns of 15 and one of 12 (if there are less than 8 appearances or so in a given year, I don't bother dividing) but the main problem I spotted last night was in the table header - it started off as {| width="50%" whereas it should have been {| width="100%" - in other words, the table has a width of 100% of the page. Thanks for doing some of these - they can be quite dull to do!!--Jtomlin1uk 10:59, August 10, 2011 (UTC)

Dr Carter
Okay. David 11:43, August 11, 2011 (UTC)

Characters
Notdoppler, the new character template is at Template:Character, we abandoned the Main/Minor character ones a year or two back. David 11:50, August 11, 2011 (UTC)
 * No problem. I've been very busy lately which is why I haven't contributed much myself but have some free time coming up soon! David 11:56, August 11, 2011 (UTC)

Pipelinks
Hi there, Just a quick message to let you know that there's no need to add pipelinks in relation to (for example) Xin Chiang to Xin Proctor. If you click on the link Xin Chiang the page automatically redirects to Xin Proctor anyway, as it was created before she and Graeme got married, and then moved thereafter and any reference to the character pre-marriage should be made as her maiden name. Same with Kylie Turner/Platt. Hope this helps. Regards.Karen2310 18:27, August 12, 2011 (UTC)

Character images
Sorry for the delay in replying - away at the moment. Usual method is play the episode on your pc (either from disc or youtube) and then press print screen on the relevant chosen shot. Paste into Microsoft paint and save as a jpeg. Then open in microsoft photo editor and crop the image to the desired size and upload to the site.--Jtomlin1uk 10:58, August 13, 2011 (UTC)

Dave Dutton
You may wish to revise this page - if you click on "What Links Here" at the base of the page, you'll see that he's played a lot more than four characters!--Jtomlin1uk 12:52, August 18, 2011 (UTC)
 * Corrienet has more than that but some I haven't traced - I suspect some of them are uncredited walk-ons. The actor has his own webpage here that you may wish to use to investigate further and to link to: http://www.nyt.co.uk/davedutton.htm. --Jtomlin1uk 13:05, August 18, 2011 (UTC)
 * Perhaps, but I would go with what was credited on-screen rather than other sources.--Jtomlin1uk 13:28, August 18, 2011 (UTC)

IMDB
Just a cautionary note about relying on IMDB for the primary source for your information.... For example, the character played by Tony Pritchard - Episode 7562 (24th March 2011) was definitely credited as "Business Man" and not "Businessman" - regards. Karen2310 21:21, August 25, 2011 (UTC)
 * Okay. Notdoppler 21:25, August 25, 2011 (UTC)

Re: Transmitted episodes
I've recently acquired these episodes and have them all on DVD's.Karen2310 09:40, August 27, 2011 (UTC)
 * They don't have a name - I got all the episodes from a friend and burned them to DVD's myself, it's just part of my own collection.Karen2310 09:45, August 27, 2011 (UTC)

Notdoppler, I've been wondering, did you get a chance to take part in our 50th anniversary survey last year? David 00:48, September 1, 2011 (UTC)
 * Well here are the results if you want to see. It was great fun to do! David 00:52, September 1, 2011 (UTC)