OLD NaNoWriMo faces FAQ

What happened to NaNo Faces (2019)?NaNo Faces doesn't work with the new nanowrimo site AND the NaNoWriMo wordcount API is not functioning. Because of this, people will have to manually enter their word count history day by day to get the community word count graphs on NaNo Faces to work.

Who created this tool?
NewMexicoKid, co-ML for the USA::Illinois::Naperville region of National Novel Writing Month.

How do I get a community word count graph?
While this tool is easier to use for those who are MLs or moderators of NaNoWriMo forums, it can be used by regular users. The only trick is that the forums (as of fall 2018) do not allow people to edit their posts after others have replied unless the original poster is a moderator of that forum (as MLs are for their regional forum). So if you make a post and then create a graph, you need to ensure that your post is 100% correct and complete if you won't be able to edit it after the fact. This is generally not a problem if you know the format of the HTML that will create the image you want to include in your post. That HTML typically is shown only after you've submitted your request; and you can't submit your request unless you know your thread URL.

To sign-up for NaNo Faces, fill out this form. I process the requests manually, so it may be a day or so before your page is created and linked.

What is NaNo Faces?
For those who are new to NaNo Faces, it is an evolution of my old regional thread wordcount graphing tool. The way it works is this: you register a forum thread with the tool and it provides you with a URL to an image and to a page. The image is a graph of all the wordcount progress of everyone who replies to the thread. The page is as described above. Because you don't know the thread URL until you create the forum thread, typically the tool is restricted to MLs who can edit threads in their regional forum. That being said, if you are careful and clever, you can guess what your NaNo Faces URL will be (it is based on the year and the short string you choose that is unique for that year) and do everything in one go *before* you register your thread with NaNo Faces, hoping that some other ML hasn't already grabbed your short string ;-)

What are the fields on the sign-up page?
faces id is just something that will be used to build the URL. It should be short with no spaces. Letters, numbers and underscores.

The descriptive name can be anything, but ideally regional graphs should follow the general nomenclature for regions. E.g.,USA::California::Elsewhere(but you can specialize the name after that part with additional strings if you like).

You can connect the intro thread and/or start a new thread specifically for Faces. I typically do both for my region--one to have better region stats and the second for people who like graphs. Any overlap in people is handled behind the scenes (update is handled only once per person each hour), so it doesn't burn a lot of CPU cycles.

With two threads in the region, each thread has its own graph. If two threads have some of the same participants, the graphs use the same data on the back end. So don't worry too much about having more than one graph per region.

What do I do with the HTML snippet on the graph tab of the generated page?
Contemplative Cat wrote: You have to use the source code button, which is the one with the two brackets < >. Click on that and the page will open to a bunch of gobblygook for those who don't code and html code for those who do. Put the code where ever you want it, click preview and if you like it, click submit and you're good to go.. ;-)

Won't this tool be broken when we move to the discourse-based forums in 2019?
Sadly, yes, though I have hopes of evolving the tool to work with discourse.