User:KeybladeSpyMaster/Guide to Talk Bubbles

Step 1: The Template Page
The first step is to decide where to host your talk bubble. One requirement to a talk bubble template's location is that it has to be in the Template:-space. In other words, the page has to have the prefix "Template:" in it. It should also have something to do with your username; you can't host your talk template in "Template:jkdi", even if you can remember that as the location of your talk bubble template. As an example, my talk bubble template is hosted at "Template:KeybladeSpyMaster". However, you can choose an acronym of your username, such as (using me as an example) "Template:KSM".

Step 2: What's You will need
Consider my own talk bubble:

There are a ton of things that can be customized. You should keep these in mind as you build your talk bubble. Some of the basics are as follows (the names uses the template parameters that will need to fill out):
 * image: Pretty self explanatory. The image you want to be your talk bubble's avatar.
 * imagesize: Also self-explanatory. It's the size of your avatar in pixels. It's an optional parameter, mostly in case your image is too big or too small.
 * color: The top color (the navy blue, in this case).
 * color2: The bottom color (the lighter blue, in this case).
 * textcolor: The text color for the top part of the talk bubble (It's silver, in this case).
 * textcolor2: The text color for the bottom part of the talk bubble (it's black, in this case).
 * line: The color of the dividing line (It's red, in this case. This is also optional).
 * name: Your Username. This is required to be your actual username, as in most cases, it automatically will link to your userpage.
 * sig: Some quote that you might like. This may be from the Kingdom Hearts series, it could be totally made up. This is also optional.
 * time: Here, you should put the  parameter. However, you can put in another quote, if you like.
 * text: Here, you should put the  parameter. However, if you're advanced (or want to be), you can put other things. In my case, I put two Diamond Dust Keychains surrounding the text parameter.

In some cases, you don't have to fill out all these things (the text color items, for example, are black by default, so if you want it to stay black, you don't have to fill it out.

Step 3: The Code - Making the first Talk Bubble
For the actual templates, I recommend you use either of these two: Template:TalkTextTest2 or User:Xiggie/TalkTemplate2. The difference? The former makes it easy to link images currently on the wiki for your avatar, while the latter allows for using images hosted elsewhere for your avatar.

Now, simply copy the code above into your template, and fill it out with the information you were supposed to gather from Step 2. Here's how mine looks like (It's been simplified a tad).

Which creates:

There's a couple of things left to make it perfect. At the beginning of your template, you will have to add this exactly:

It now looks like this:

Congratulations! You have made your fist talk bubble! To use it, simply type

where " " is the name of the template (from Step 1). To print the timestamp without your username for the time parameter, type five tildes instead of four.

Step 4: The Code - Additional Talk Bubbles
Suppose you want more than one talk bubble. I suggest you check out TNE's Emotion guide for more of what you might want to consider when making additional talk bubbles; however, I'll give you the basic code for making more than one. Right after the first set of closing brackets, you simply add followed by the rest of the code for your second talk bubble, and then close again with another set of brackets. At the very end, where the very last set of closing brackets appear, be sure there is one set of two closing brackets for each talk bubble you make. Your code now looks like this:
 * {{#if:{{{text2|}}}|{{TalkTextTest2

{{#if:{{{text|}}}|{{TalkTextTest2 }}|{{#if:{{{text2|}}}|{{TalkTextTest2 }} }}}}
 * image=Sprite_Sora_N_Wisdom.png
 * imagesize=80px
 * color=#06305B
 * color2=#0066FF
 * textcolor=#BFBFBF
 * textcolor2=#000000
 * line=#CC0000
 * fonttype=Segoe UI
 * name=KeybladeSpyMaster
 * sig=I do it for my family, my home, my friends! I do it for her!
 * time=Welcome to Spy Force One. - {{{time}}}
 * text= {{{text}}}
 * image=Sprite_Sora_N_Valor.png
 * imagesize=80px
 * color=#06305B
 * color2=#BFBFBF
 * textcolor=#BFBFBF
 * textcolor2=#000000
 * line=#CC0000
 * fonttype=Segoe UI
 * name=KeybladeSpyMaster
 * sig=Light!
 * time=Mission Complete. - {{{time}}}
 * text= {{{text2}}}

Notice that in the second bubble, the parameter is now " ". When you want to use the second bubble, instead of, you'll have to use  , like this: {{KeybladeSpyMaster|time=|text2=< >}}

Congratulations! You now have two talk bubbles! Repeat this step for as many talk bubbles as you want! If you simply want the talk bubbles, you can stop here. In the next step, we'll go into how the code works, so you can get a handle of how wiki markup works, and how to use it elsewhere. Once you get the hang of it, it's amazing what kinds of crazy things you can do!

Step 5: The Code - Dissecting the Code
I believe that it's better when users try to not only get what they want, but understand how it works; in this case, we'll be going into what the additional code does.

The first part is a simple  tag. This tag makes it so that everything between the two tags (the closing tag looks like this: ) only appears when you use the template, and not on the template page.

Next is the if statement. If-statements work like this:

It basically says that if you use " " (usually appears as ), in this case,, then the first case   appears. In the talk bubbles, to use parameter, we type.

In the talk bubbles, we added the actual code for the talk bubbles in the area for Case A, which is activated, as I mentioned earlier, when we type.

In Case B, we type the next  statement and repeat the process. Because instead of closing the if-statement, we added another one in Case B, we have the longer line of closing brackets at the very end, to close every if-statement we opened.

That's it for now! If you have additional questions or concerns, to be sure to ask me or anyone else on the wiki!