About
Webmaster
Background
I owe much of my interest in military and aviation history to video games. Games like Pearl Harbor: Zero Hour, Command & Conquer: Red Alert 2, and the Ace Combat series were very influential on me while I was growing up. The television show Dogfights on the History Channel also deserves a lot of credit. Even earlier, my first encounter with World War II came as a result of my interest in the RMS Titanic. The man who discovered the Titanic, Robert Ballard, also discovered the German battleship Bismarck. It was his book on the search and exploration of the wreck that I first learned about the war.[a]
In the interest of full disclosure, I would like to point out that I am not a pilot or a mechanic – I am a historian. Any knowledge I have of practical aeronautics and aircraft maintenance comes from spending time around, and asking questions of, others who are professional practitioners of those arts.
Philosophy
There are some portions of this website to which one or another person might object. To avoid any potential misunderstandings, I feel it may be informative to lay out some of my personal philosophies.
First, my goal is to be correct, not right. It does not matter to me, at the end of the day, whether or not I "win" an argument – simply that the most accurate description of the facts is achieved. So, if I push back against some point of an argument, it is only to more closely arrive at the truth of the matter.
Second, I subscribe to the maxim that "the world is not black and white". However, what often is forgotten is that there are two unwritten corollaries. First, the world is not fifty percent black and fifty percent white. Second, the world is not all the same shade of gray. In other words, there are no such things as absolutes.
Lastly, if you have any comments, suggestions or questions, please do not hesitate to reach out! I enjoy the feedback and there's always a good chance of learning something new!
Accounts
- Sporcle Profile
- Reddit Profile
- WIX Profile (Sign-in Required)
- Wikipedia Profile
- YouTube Channel
Website
Why does this website look like Wikipedia?
It is running MediaWiki, the same software that Wikipedia uses.
Can I edit this website?
No. Although it looks like a wiki, it is a personal website. Therefore, account creation and editing have been restricted.
Why use MediaWiki if you're not going to allow multiple users?
A few reasons:
- Adding references is easy
- It focuses on content over appearance
- It allows more direct control over formatting
- Revision history is built in
- It is a format I am very comfortable with
What tools were used to create this website?
A number of tools were useful. These include Wikipedia's export function and a corresponding import function on this website for transferring premade templates, a pair of BBCode to HTML and HTML to Wikitext converters for copying existing forum threads, and a similar Excel to Wikitext converter.[b][c]
References
Footnotes
- ↑ A quick aside, the hunt for the Bismarck is a terrible starting point for learning about the war. You will be very confused by the fact that outdated biplanes were responsible for crippling the ship.
- ↑ Other tools unrelated to the creation of this website, but that are still both quite useful and free include:
- Audacity – audio editor
- Bulk Rename Utility – mass file renaming software
- Free Online OCR – optical character recognition transcription website
- GIMP – raster graphics editor
- Hugin – panorama photo stitcher
- Inkscape – vector graphics editor
- IrfanView – image viewer, editor, organizer and converter
- QCAD – CAD software
- VLC Media Player – media player
- Zotero – citation management software
- ↑ Similar to the template import/export process, a set of instructions on how to update/enable extensions and install gadgets is below:
- Go to Special:ExtensionDistributor on MediaWiki.org
- Select extension and version
- Log in to cPanel file manager (via HostGator)
- Navigate to
public_html/w/extensionsfolder - Upload the file
- Move old version of extension to trash
- Extract the file
- Delete compressed file
- Delete old version
- Log in to cPanel file manager (via HostGator)
- Navigate to
public_html/w/folder - Edit
LocalSettings.php - Add
#Enable [ExtensionName] extension
wfLoadExtension( '[ExtensionName]' );
- to end of file
- Click "Save Changes"
How to Install Gadgets (RefToolbar, Syntax Highlighter)
- Navigate to MediaWiki:Common.js
- Edit page
- Add
//[Gadget Name]
mw.loader.load('//www.mediawiki.org/w/index.php?title+MediaWiki:Gadget-[Gadget Name].js&action+raw&ctype+text/javascript');With equals signs in place of the plusses
- to end of file
- Click "Save Changes"