View source for Memory Alpha:Announcements

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Get the latest scoop about what's new at Memory Alpha! This page is used by the {{ma|administrators}} to post relevant announcements, so check back occasionally to get the news. For the latest press releases, check {{ma|Press Release|our press releases}}.

== April 2021 ==
5 April: In conjunction with Fandom, Memory Alpha offered a [[First Contact Day]] quiz -- with prizes!

== November 2020 ==
12 November: Nearly seventeen years to the day since its November 2003 inception, the English version of Memory Alpha reached its milestone 50,000th article with [[metal fabric]].

== June 2020 ==
3 June: Memory Alpha is uniting with {{el|https://www.reddit.com/r/startrek|Reddit's r/startrek}}, {{el|https://www.womenatwarp.com|Women at Warp}}, {{TrekCore}}, {{el|https://priorityonepodcast.com|Priority One}}, {{el|https://treknews.net|TrekNews.net}}, {{el|https://www.missionlogpodcast.com|Mission Log}}, {{el|https://larrynemecek.com/portal47|Trekland's Portal 47}}, and {{TrekMovie.com}} to ask ''Star Trek'' fans to support organizations fighting injustice. {{twitter|StarTrek/status/1267833393108127744|''Star Trek'' has always represented the hope of a better future for humankind}}. Please share this message with {{twitter|hashtag/TrekkiesTogether|&#35;TrekkiesTogether}}. {{TrekMovie.com|2020/06/03/star-trek-websites-and-podcasts-unite-ask-trekkies-to-support-organizations-fighting-injustice}}

== March 2016 ==
2 March: The English edition of Memory Alpha reached the milestone of 40,000 articles.

== October 2015 ==
Memory Alpha is updating the {{ma|Creative Commons License|CC-BY-NC license}} to {{ma|Creative Commons License/4.0|4.0}}; [[Forum:Memory Alpha licence update discussion|please see here for more info]].

== June 2013 ==
Please also take a moment to read about Memory Alpha's recent [[Forum:Visit to Wikia offices|visit to Wikia's offices in San Francisco]], and participate in the discussion about some upcoming changes, including a [[Forum:Video policy on MA?|proposed video policy]].

== October 2011 ==
Several updates from our host have changed the way you use and view Memory Alpha. Please visit the [[Forum:Wikia mandated changes|forum for more information]]. In response to this, it has been suggested we consider changing hosts. To participate in this discussion, please [[Forum:Should we change hosts?|see the forum]].

== March 2011 ==
'''Memory Alpha''' may be changing its look!

If you would like to take part in the discussion, [[Forum:Color change and gradients|please visit the forum]].

== October 2010 ==
'''Memory Alpha''' looking different today?

These changes are brought to us by our hosting company - for more information, please visit the [[Forum:Yet another skin change|forum discussion]].

== May 2009 ==
3 May: With the release of {{film|11}} imminent, the Memory Alpha community has agreed to lock the site to editing a period spanning the premiere date. For more information on this, please see [[Memory Alpha:Announcements/Star Trek release announcement|our announcement]].

== April 2009 ==
23 April: The English edition of Memory Alpha reached the milestone of 30,000 articles today.

== September 2008 ==
10 September: The Wikia tech team rolled out MediaWiki 1.13.1 to all of Wikia, including Memory Alpha. This is the latest stable release of the MediaWiki software which runs Wikia, and it contains a number of enhancements and bug fixes. You can read more about this upgrade {{bl|archivedate=20080912021248|http://www.wikia.com:80/wiki/MediaWiki_1.13|here}}. While we don't anticipate any major problems, some issues may appear. Please report any odd behavior on [[w:Forum:MediaWiki 1.13 upgrade|this forum page]].

== August 2008 ==
1 August: Memory Alpha has added a Bulgarian language edition to the ever-expanding international list at [[:bg:|MA/bg]].

== June 2008 ==
15 June: The way Memory Alpha looks is about to change. For more details, read our [[Memory Alpha:Announcements/July 2008 style change|announcement of the changes]].

== January 2008 ==
18 January: Memory Alpha expanded to an even dozen languages with the addition of the Japanese version, [[:ja:|MA/ja]].

== June 2007 ==
13 June: [[Memory Alpha:Press Release/25,000th article|Memory Alpha reaches 25,000 articles]].

14 June: As you may have noticed, we are currently experiencing difficulties with our [[Special:Wantedpages|wanted pages list]]. Due to an error created by the staff at MediaWiki which is affecting the [[Template:Episode|EpLink template]], the server is creating red links where there shouldn't be any; thus, there are hundreds of unwanted links ending with the "episode" qualifier. These are not actually pages which need to be created, they are simply produced due to the error. Unfortunately, correcting this error is not a top priority for the good folks over at MediaWiki, so the links will have to remain until we find a way to override them. In the meantime, please do not create pages for those links.

Also, there is an error with {{h|DynamicPageList}} function (see the lists at the top of [[Special:RecentChanges|the recent changes]]) by a recent update. This is currently being looked into so, unlike the above error, this error should be cleared up momentarily, so please have patience.

* '''Update:''' this problem has been resolved.

== March 2007 ==
30 March: Another new language version of Memory Alpha has been created - [[:zh:|MA/zh]] (Chinese).

== February 2007 ==
20 February: A new language version of Memory Alpha has been created - [[:pt:|MA/pt]] (Portuguese).

== January 2007 ==
17 January: Two new language versions of Memory Alpha have been created - [[:cs:|MA/cs]] (Czech) and [[:ru:|MA/ru]] (Russian).

== December 2006 ==
1 December: A new language version of Memory Alpha has been created - [[:sr:|MA/sr]] (Serbian).

2 December: The image issues mentioned below appears to have been resolved. It is now safe to upload new images over old ones.

8 December: Due to an issue with Wikia servers, all JPEG images on Memory Alpha are currently unavailable.

* '''Update''': The problem has now been resolved for most users. However, Opera users may still experience difficulties seeing images.

== October 2006 ==
4-5 October: Memory Alpha has been having some weird issues with its images as of late. On the 4th, the images disappeared entirely. This goes for the ones on the foreign language versions, as well. They were ultimately restored by Jason of Wikia. Now, however, as of the 5th, there seems to be some sort of retrieval error with some of the images; instead of bringing up the newest version of an image, an older revision appears. To make things less confusing (and to prevent the possibility of botching things up even further), we ask that '''nobody''' revert or upload over any current images until this whole issue is resolved.

19-21 October: There are still some issues with images at Memory Alpha following a recent database move. Images uploaded to replace previous images with the same file name may not appear correctly (the previous image may still appear, albeit distorted). Uploading new versions of current images should be kept to a minimum, although doing so is not at all required. One possible way of fixing this error upon uploading a new image is to A.) revert back to the previous image, B.) load your revised image '''without''' reverting or deleting previous images, and then C.) reverting back to your revision. Note that it may take a few minutes for the changes to take effect, so please have patience.

27 October: Image issues seem to have been resolved, but at present we are experiencing some difficulties with JavaScript. As the site notice states, it's causing the site to automatically refresh every few seconds. [[User:OuroborosCobra|OuroborosCobra]] has alerted Wikia of the problem and they are looking into it; in the meantime, it may be best to disable the JavaScript if your browser is affected; so far, Mozilla Firefox definitely is, while Internet Explorer is not. No idea about Opera or others, though. Will keep you posted on further updates.

* '''UPDATE 1''': Correction, the image issue is still not resolved. Sigh...
* '''UPDATE 2''': The JavaScript issue should be resolved for the most part. For the record, the problem was caused by [[User:bp|Bp]]'s script changes, so hate messages can be sent his way. On the other hand, Bp also fixed the problem, with help from [[User:Splarka|Splarka]], so you should also send him some love. After the hate, of course. ;) That said, if you experience any JavaScript problems, please contact Bp ''politely'' at [[User talk:Bp/interactive tree script|this page here]].

== July 2006 ==
July 4: Wikia recently ran into some snags with its testing of a newer version of MediaWiki 1.7, which has resulted in some broken templates on Memory Alpha and other Wikis. These templates should now be fixed, but if you see table tags showing up as text it will be due to cached versions of the page. You can add "?action=purge" to the url to reload the page.

* Update: There will be some broken templates now and again while Wikia test new upgrades for the MediaWiki software, so please have patience. Our apologies for any inconvenience.
* Update: Everything should be fixed now, although you may still need to add "?action=purge" to the url to load a page with broken templates. Also, if you find any templates still broken, simply prefix # in that template's code. For example: <nowiki>{{ifexpr:({{{3}}} > {{#ifexpr:({{{3}}}</nowiki>

== June 2006 ==
Just to let you know, there is likely to be a short database lock today to allow for a MediaWiki upgrade. It is scheduled for around 19:00 (UTC) today ({{el|1=https://www.timeanddate.com/worldclock/fixedtime.html?month=6&day=8&year=2006&hour=19&min=0&sec=0&p1=0|2=world clock}}). The whole process should take less than an hour - all subject to the whole thing going smoothly of course!

:And they never go smoothly :) it's now likely to be around 06:00 UTC tomorrow ({{el|1=https://www.timeanddate.com/worldclock/fixedtime.html?month=6&day=9&year=2006&hour=6&min=0&sec=0&p1=0|2=world clock}})

== May 2006 ==
May 22: The upgrade for MediaWiki 1.6 was not initiated. Instead, Memory Alpha is currently running on {{mw|MediaWiki 1.7}} alpha.

== April 2006 ==
April 3: '''Planned downtime''' &ndash; Memory Alpha will be upgraded to {{mw|MediaWiki 1.6}} later today. The exact time has yet to be specified.

:April 4: The planned upgrade has been delayed due to technical difficulties. The upgrade is still slated to go up sometime within the next day.
::April 5: Status of upgrade unknown. Stand by.
:::April 10: The upgrade has taken longer than expected due to a few bugs. These issues are currently being taken care of and MA should be upgraded soon.

== January 2006 ==
January 17: Memory Alpha has now been upgraded to {{bl|archivedate=20060221233809|http://www.wikicities.com:80/wiki/MediaWiki_1.5|MediaWiki 1.5}}. Please report problems at [http://wikicities.com/wiki/Talk:MediaWiki_1.5 Wikicities].

== December 2005 ==
December 15: We're expecting two new servers to arrive in the next few days, and Jason is planning to push them into service as soon as possible. They are likely to arrive Friday 16 December or Monday 19 December. These new servers will be replacing our current database server and file server. So, getting them in place will mean some (hopefully minimal) downtime for the site, around 06:00 UTC.

:December 20: A new file server and new database server will be put it into service today. There will be a few hours of read-only time from 04:00 UTC Wednesday, December 21. Updates will be posted to {{bl|archivedate=20060101114022|http://openfacts.berlios.de:80/index-en.phtml?title{{=}}Wikicities_Status|openfacts.berlios.de}}.
::December 21: Upgrade complete, please [[Wikicities:Report a problem|report any problems]].

== November 12, 2005 ==
'''Planned downtime''': Memory-Alpha will be upgraded to {{mw|MediaWiki 1.5}} on Saturday November 12 at 4am (UTC). Updates will be made at {{bl|archivedate=20060101114022|http://openfacts.berlios.de:80/index-en.phtml?title{{=}}Wikicities_Status|berlios}}.

:The upgrade has failed. See {{bl|archivedate=20051125203704|http://www.wikicities.com:80/wiki/MediaWiki_1.5|MediaWiki upgrade news}}.

== October 22, 2005 ==
Memory Alpha has been named {{bl|archivedate=20051213220741|http://www.scifi.com:80/sfw/issue442/index.html|Science Fiction Weekly}}'s (the Sci-Fi Channel's newsletter) {{bl|archivedate=20051013084129|http://www.scifi.com:80/sfw/issue442/site.html|Site of the Week}}!

== September 4, 2005 ==
Memory Alpha has been awarded the {{eas|misc/eae-award.htm|September 2005 '''Ex Astris Excellentia''' award}} by {{eas}}. Thank you, Bernd!

== June 15, 2005 ==
Memory Alpha will be read-only for a period between 06:00 and 08:00 ({{el|https://www.worldtimeserver.com/current_time_in_UTC.aspx|UTC}}) on June 15 for the setting up of database replication.

== June 7, 2005 ==
'''Scheduled downtime''': Tomorrow (7 June) at 7am UTC (3am Eastern Standard Time, 9am Central Europe), all of [[Wikicities:Wikia|Wikia]]'s servers are moving to a new colocation facility across the street. Memory Alpha will be completely unavailable during this. We are moving at the request of our colo facility, which is putting us into their new fancy facility, since they are planning on shutting down the old one. Our IP numbers and the machines themselves will be unchanged, so you should not notice any difference once the site is back up. The move should take no more than a few hours, but please check the {{bl|archivedate=20060101114022|http://openfacts.berlios.de:80/index-en.phtml?title{{=}}Wikicities_Status|offsite status page}} or the [irc://irc.freenode.net/wikicities #wikicities] [[Wikicities:IRC|IRC]] on freenode for updates. A complete set of backups of all databases, images, and configuration files will be made before the move occurs. We're sorry for any inconvenience caused by this.

== May 6, 2005 ==
A [[:sv:|Swedish edition]] of Memory Alpha is now available at memory-alpha.org/sv.

== March 14, 2005 ==
'''Scheduled downtime''' for one or two hours on March 14 from 04:00 ({{w|Coordinated Universal Time|UTC}}) due to an upgrade of {{w|MySQL}} and {{w|MediaWiki}}.

== February 22, 2005 ==
We apologize for the outage yesterday. Due to a power failure at the colocation facility where Wikimedia and Wikia's servers are located, Memory Alpha and all Wikimedia and Wikia sites were down (see {{el|https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/foundation-l/2005-February/015701.html|related post from the Wikipedia-I mailing list}}). The servers needed to be rebooted, and databases resynchronized. All should have been done by now, but apparently de:Memory Alpha remains down. Hopefully, this will resolve itself within the next few hours, as the system is restored.

== February 9, 2005 ==
Memory Alpha is in the process of moving to a new hosting service. This will involve a major change to our current operating procedure. For the full details, see the {{ma|Announcements/February 2005 server move|announcement about the server move}}.

== February 2, 2005 ==
As most of you have probably heard by now, {{s|ENT}} has been canceled. {{st.com|bl=1|archivedate=20050204053233|startrek/view/news/article/9469.html}} Memory Alpha wishes the cast and crew of ''Star Trek'' all the best, and thanks them for their efforts and enthusiasm. We're confident that ''Star Trek'' will remain alive, and will someday return, in whatever form.

== January 2, 2005 ==
Happy New Year! Memory Alpha is currently slowly implementing [[Special:Categories|Categories]], to make searching for and finding articles a lot easier. Join the ongoing discussion at [[Memory Alpha:Category tree]] to help!

== December 8, 2004 ==
With the holidays coming up, I have some good news! We have reached our '''€100''' mark! Again, thanks to all donors. With people like you, Memory Alpha can stay alive!

== October 31, 2004 ==
Happy Halloween, everybody. I'd like to take a moment to thank everyone who has donated to Memory Alpha. We've almost reached our target of 100 euros! Memory Alpha recently moved to a new server to cope with the traffic, and your donations are being used to pay for our hosting. All this proves that Memory Alpha is a thriving community, thanks to your continuing support.

== September 1, 2004 ==
Memory Alpha is currently in the process of upgrading to MediaWiki 1.3, and changing its default skin to Monobook. This means that certain aspects of the site may not render correctly, or may appear strange. The software and appearance is still being worked on, so such problems should be temporary. Please report all bugs and/or rendering errors to <obsolete css link removed>. A full description of the changes and features can be found at [[Memory Alpha:MediaWiki]].

== June 20, 2004 ==
Briefly: Memory Alpha has updated its {{ma|Creative Commons License}} to match the new version 2.0 of the "by-nc" license, just released by Creative Commons. There are no effective changes with regard to the operations of Memory Alpha or the licensing of its content; the license update is merely intended to re-word and make clearer certain aspects of the conditions of the license. We're just posting the notice here so everyone is aware of the change.

== May 14, 2004 ==
Memory Alpha's expansion continues! Today, with the help of [[User:Eloquence|Erik]] and [[User:Florian K|Florian]], we've established a new [[:de:|German language edition]] of Memory Alpha! If you speak or write German, please drop by and lend a hand!

== April 12, 2004 ==
Memory Alpha has completed its move to its new server. We are now situated at www.memory-alpha.org. Please update your bookmarks. The database is once again open for editing, with some minor upgrades to the MediaWiki software, and any bugs should be reported to [[User:MinutiaeMan|Dan Carlson]].

We're pleased to announce the opening of the first multilingual edition of Memory Alpha! The [[:nl:|Dutch edition]] is now open and functional, although it has practically no pages at the moment. If you speak Dutch, please drop in and lend a hand!

== March 31, 2004 ==
Harry and I are currently planning to move Memory Alpha to its own hosting account and domain name. We've agreed that the existing arrangement is simply not sufficient for the long term as Memory Alpha grows. The switch will probably happen in a couple of weeks. However, it's going to be a bit of a strain for the two of us to pay for this new hosting account, so we've set up a {{ma|donations|donation page}} should any members have some extra funds they can spare us. It would be greatly appreciated!

== March 28, 2004 ==
If you try to upload an image and receive an internal error message saying "could not rename file", please contact [[User:MinutiaeMan|Dan Carlson]]. It's likely that someone uploaded an image of the same file name during the "lost weeks"; that means that the file itself is intact in our upload directory, but the database thinks there's nothing there. I will need to know the exact file path of the image that you tried to upload (it's given in the error message, for instance ''"/hsphere/local/home...."'').

== March 26, 2004 ==
After first backing up the wiki to ensure there wasn't a repeat of this week's unpleasantness, we have finally managed to upgrade the MediaWiki software to the most current version. There are some new features available, try experimenting with them! Updated help pages for features such as the new image syntax will be coming soon.

Please also note that our URL has changed slightly &ndash; instead of being located in the /mediawiki/ directory, the pages are now located in the /en/ directory. I've set up a .htaccess redirect, however, so no one should encounter any problems. The /wiki/ shortcut URL should still work, regardless. Please contact me if you have any questions!

== March 24, 2004 ==
In an extraordinarily unfortunate accident, Memory Alpha's database was wiped yesterday during an upgrade of the system to MediaWiki version 1.2. This occurred due to an unforeseen error in the database upgrade script. As a result, Memory Alpha has been forced to revert to the last backup &ndash; which was made on February 6. All updates after that date have been lost, as have any new user registrations after that date. We sincerely apologize for the inconvenience.

== March 8, 2004 ==
We apologize for the continuing access problems with Memory Alpha (and the other sites on the st-minutiae account). This is due to a problem with the host server, and unfortunately is beyond our (or rather Dan's) control. This may or may not reoccur in the near future. If it does, please watch the SCN for information. For the full detail, please see this page at STM.

== February 13, 2004 ==
For anyone who noticed the brief locking of the database, this was because of a potentially major error that was being returned at random points while submitting a new or edited article. At first, it looked like we were going to have to roll back our site to the previous version of MediaWiki. Fortunately, that wasn't the case, thanks to some very useful and timely assistance from the MediaWiki contributors' mailing list. If you encounter any further database errors, please report them so we can look into them.

== February 10, 2004 ==
Apologies for the brief outage accompanied by weirder-than-usual error messages; the wiki software was being upgraded to MediaWiki v1.1.0. This version includes several security and bug fixes, as well as a couple of other interesting features that should make things interesting -- like automatic messages built into the wiki system. If you find a bug, as usual, please report it after checking the bug reports link (also found on the quickbar).

== February 1, 2004 ==
We apologize for the two-day-long server outage that completely crippled Memory Alpha (as well as the other sites hosted in the same account). According to our host, the server suffered a hard drive failure and had to be restored from backup. In the mean time, FTP access was unavailable so a manual restoration from my hard disk was impossible as well. Hopefully, this will be the last problem with the server for a ''long'' time to come.

== January 17, 2004 ==
You may have already noticed the new links on the quickbar. Two of these are there for convenience, to pages that already exist: this announcements page, and the Memory Alpha forum at the Subspace Comms Network.

The third link is to a brand-new feature for Memory Alpha &ndash; a ''Trek'' websites directory. An open directory designed specifically for ''Trek'' sites should nicely complement our open encyclopedia. Go check it out, and add your own site to the list!

== January 16, 2004 ==
The database problems have finally been solved. After the server software upgrade yesterday, our host experienced further difficulties which were restricting the number of requests allowed to flow into the databases &ndash; this had the annoying effect of creating unpredictable and intermittent access to Memory Alpha pages. As of this morning, everything appears to have been solved.

Also, Harry and I have made the decision to change the Memory Alpha copyright policy to adopt a new license, a {{ma|Creative Commons License}}. This was done primarily to make it easier for us to display images and other copyrighted media on the site under fair use rules. If you have any questions or complaints, please post them on [[Memory Alpha talk:Copyrights]].

== January 15, 2004 ==
Our apologies for the unannounced downtime that was experienced this morning &ndash; our host was performing an upgrade of the MySQL server software. Everything should be up and running normally now, however!

== December 29, 2003 ==
Our big brother {{w||Wikipedia}} is in trouble! Read this {{bl|archivedate=20031229173036|http://www.wikimedia.org:80/letter.html|letter}} to see how you can help!

== December 23, 2003 ==
Some cool news: Memory Alpha was mentioned today in {{el|https://trektoday.com/news/231203_01.shtml|TrekToday's news bullets}}. The word is spreading!

== November 26, 2003 ==
The first announcement. Move along, nothing to see here... -- [[User:MinutiaeMan|Dan Carlson]]

[[Category:Memory Alpha maintenance]]
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