User talk:Fungbregas/Archive 9

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WikiCup 2015 March newsletter

That's it, the first round is done, sign-ups are closed and we're into round 2. 64 competitors made it into this round, and are now broken into eight groups of eight. The top two of each group will go through to round 3, and then the top scoring 16 "wildcards" across all groups. Round 1 saw some interesting work on some very important articles, with the round leader Freikorp (submissions) owing most of his 622 points scored to a Featured Article on the 2001 film Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within which qualified for a times-two multiplier. This is a higher score than in previous years, as Godot13 (submissions) had 500 points in 2014 at the end of round 1, and our very own judge, Sturmvogel_66 (submissions) led round 1 with 601 points in 2013.

In addition to Freikorp's work, some other important articles and pictures were improved during round one, here's a snapshot of a few of them:

Cwmhiraeth (submissions) took Bumblebee, a level-4 vital article, to Good Article;
AHeneen (submissions) worked-up the Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 article, also to Good Article status;
Rodw (submissions) developed an extremely timely article to Good Article, taking Magna Carta there some 800 years after it was first sealed;
And last but not least, Godot13 (submissions) (FP bonus points) worked up a number of Featured Pictures during round 1, including the 1948 one Deutsche Mark (pictured right), receiving the maximum bonus due to the number of Wikis that the related article appears in.

You may also wish to know that The Core Contest is running through the month of March. Head there for further details - they even have actual prizes!

If you are concerned that your nomination—whether it is at good article candidates, a featured process, or anywhere else—will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on Wikipedia:WikiCup/Reviews. Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. Figureskatingfan (talk · contribs · email), Miyagawa (talk · contribs · email) and Sturmvogel 66 (talk · contribs · email)

Thanks for your assistance! Miyagawa (talk) on behalf of Wikipedia:WikiCup.

(Opt-out Instructions) This message was send by Jim Carter through MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 04:54, 1 March 2015 (UTC)

The Signpost: 04 March 2015

From the editor: A sign of the times: the Signpost revamps its internal structure to make contributing easier

News and notes: Wikimedia Foundation and OTRS team both publish reports, indicate operating changes

Editorial: Conspiracy theories distract from real questions about grantmaking report

Traffic report: Attack of the movies

Arbitration report: Bradspeaks—impact, regrets, and advice; current cases hinge on sex, religion, and ... infoboxes

Interview: Meet a paid editor

In the media: Kanye West rebranded; Wikipedia in court; editors for hire

Featured content: Ploughing fields and trading horses with Rosa Bonheur

Technology report: Bugs, Repairs, and Internal Operational News

Blog: Black History Month edit-a-thons tackle Wikipedia’s multicultural gaps

The Signpost: 11 March 2015

Special report: An advance look at the WMF's fundraising survey

News and notes: WikiWomen's History Month—meetups, blog posts, and "Inspire" grant-making campaign

In the media: Gamergate; a Wiki hoax; Kanye West

In focus: WMF to NSA: "stop spying on Wikipedia users"

Traffic report: Wikipedia: handing knowledge to the world, one prank at a time

Featured content: Here they come, the couple plighted –

Op-ed: Why the Core Contest matters

The Signpost: 18 March 2015

From the editor: A salute to Pine

News and notes: SUL finalization imminent; executive office shake-ups at the Foundation

In the media: NYPD editing articles regarding allegations of police brutality and misconduct

Op-ed: Does the Wikimedia fundraising survey address community concerns?

Featured content: A woman who loved kings

Traffic report: It's not cricket

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 03:34, 21 March 2015 (UTC)

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The Signpost – Volume 11, Issue 12 – 25 March 2015

News and notes: Wikimedia Foundation adopts open-access research policy

Op-ed: How my father's railroad image collection now benefits the world: the value of digitization

Featured content: A carnival of animals, a river of dung, a wasteland of uncles, and some people with attitude

Special report: Wikimedia Commons Picture of the Year 2014

Traffic report: Oddly familiar

Recent research: Most important people; respiratory reliability; academic attitudes

Blog: The Wikipedia Library Team reflects on its new Visiting Scholars program

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 03:24, 27 March 2015 (UTC)

The Signpost, 1 April 2015

In focus: WMF's latest strategy document shows successes, vagueness, and the need for better data

In the media: Wiki-PR duo bulldoze a piñata store; Wifione arbitration case; French parliamentary plagiarism

Featured content: Stop Press. Marie Celeste Mystery Solved. Crew Found Hiding In Wardrobe.

Traffic report: All over the place

News and notes: New edits-by-mail option will "revolutionize" Wikipedia and its editor base

Special report: Pictures of the Year 2015

The Signpost: 01 April 2015

In focus: WMF's latest strategy document shows successes, vagueness, and the need for better data

In the media: Wiki-PR duo bulldoze a piñata store; Wifione arbitration case; French parliamentary plagiarism

Featured content: Stop Press. Marie Celeste Mystery Solved. Crew Found Hiding In Wardrobe.

Traffic report: All over the place

News and notes: New edits-by-mail option will "revolutionize" Wikipedia and its editor base

Special report: Pictures of the Year 2015

VisualEditor News #2—2015

Did you know?

With Citoid in VisualEditor, you click the 'book with bookmark' icon and paste in the URL for a reliable source:

Citoid looks up the source for you and returns the citation results. Click the green "Insert" button to accept its results and add them to the article:

After inserting the citation, you can change it. Select the reference, and click the "Edit" button in the context menu to make changes.

The user guide has more information about how to use VisualEditor.

Since the last newsletter, the Editing Team has fixed many bugs and worked on VisualEditor's performance, the Citoid reference service, and support for languages with complex input requirements. Status reports are posted on Mediawiki.org. The worklist for April through June is available in Phabricator.

The weekly task triage meetings continue to be open to volunteers, each Wednesday at 11:00 (noon) PDT (18:00 UTC). You do not need to attend the meeting to nominate a bug for consideration as a Q4 blocker. Instead, go to Phabricator and "associate" the Editing team's Q4 blocker project with the bug. Learn how to join the meetings and how to nominate bugs at mw:Talk:VisualEditor/Portal.

Recent improvements

VisualEditor is now substantially faster. In many cases, opening the page in VisualEditor is now faster than opening it in the wikitext editor. The new system has improved the code speed by 37% and network speed by almost 40%.

The Editing team is slowly adding auto-fill features for citations. This is currently available only at the French, Italian, and English Wikipedias. The Citoid service takes a URL or DOI for a reliable source, and returns a pre-filled, pre-formatted bibliographic citation. After creating it, you will be able to change or add information to the citation, in the same way that you edit any other pre-existing citation in VisualEditor. Support for ISBNs, PMIDs, and other identifiers is planned. Later, editors will be able to improve precision and reduce the need for manual corrections by contributing to the Citoid service's definitions for each website.

Citoid requires good TemplateData for your citation templates. If you would like to request this feature for your wiki, please post a request in the Citoid project on Phabricator. Include links to the TemplateData for the most important citation templates on your wiki.

The special character inserter has been improved, based upon feedback from active users. After this, VisualEditor was made available to all users of Wikipedias on the Phase 5 list on 30 March. This affected 53 mid-size and smaller Wikipedias, including Afrikaans, Azerbaijani, Breton, Kyrgyz, Macedonian, Mongolian, Tatar, and Welsh.

Work continues to support languages with complex requirements, such as Korean and Japanese. These languages use input method editors ("IMEs”). Recent improvements to cursoring, backspace, and delete behavior will simplify typing in VisualEditor for these users.

The design for the image selection process is now using a "masonry fit" model. Images in the search results are displayed at the same height but at variable widths, similar to bricks of different sizes in a masonry wall, or the "packed" mode in image galleries. This style helps you find the right image by making it easier to see more details in images.

You can now drag and drop categories to re-arrange their order of appearance on the page.

The pop-up window that appears when you click on a reference, image, link, or other element, is called the "context menu". It now displays additional useful information, such as the destination of the link or the image's filename. The team has also added an explicit "Edit" button in the context menu, which helps new editors open the tool to change the item.

Invisible templates are marked by a puzzle piece icon so they can be interacted with. Users also will be able to see and edit HTML anchors now in section headings.

Users of the TemplateData GUI editor can now set a string as an optional text for the 'deprecated' property in addition to boolean value, which lets you tell users of the template what they should do instead (T90734).

Looking ahead

The special character inserter in VisualEditor will soon use the same special character list as the wikitext editor. Admins at each wiki will also have the option of creating a custom section for frequently used characters at the top of the list. Instructions for customizing the list will be posted at mediawiki.org.

The team is discussing a test of VisualEditor with new users, to see whether they have met their goals of making VisualEditor suitable for those editors. The timing is unknown, but might be relatively soon.

Let's work together

Share your ideas and ask questions at mw:VisualEditor/Feedback.
Can you translate from English into any other language? Please check this list to see whether more interface translations are needed for your language. Contact us to get an account if you want to help!
The design research team wants to see how real editors work. Please sign up for their research program.
File requests for language-appropriate "Bold" and "Italic" icons for the character formatting menu in Phabricator.

Subscribe, unsubscribe or change the page where this newsletter is delivered at Meta. If you aren't reading this in your favorite language, then please help us with translations! Subscribe to the Translators mailing list or contact us directly, so that we can notify you when the next issue is ready. Thank you!

-Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk), 17:50, 3 April 2015 (UTC)

The Signpost: 08 April 2015

Op-ed: We are drowning in promotional artspam

News and notes: Advancement department to be created at the Foundation, milestone fixes

In the media: Wikipedia on 60 Minutes, Kickstarter, and in the classroom

Traffic report: Resurrection week

Featured content: Partisan arrangements, dodgy dollars, a mysterious union of strings, and a hole that became a monument

WikiProject report: WikiProject Christianity

Arbitration report: New Functionary appointments

Technology report: Bugs, Repairs, and Internal Operational News

The Signpost: 15 April 2015

News and notes: Erik Möller leaving Foundation; annual plan grants under community review

In the media: Saving Wikipedia; Internet regulation; Thoreau quote hoax

Blog: Single-User Login provides access to all wikis

Traffic report: Furious domination

Featured content: Au-delà de les Alpes, le chien lit de Sainte Bernard. Sous les pavés, les trimes d'argent! Mes enfants, suivez-moi!

The Signpost: 22 April 2015

Special report: Sony emails reveal corporate practices and undisclosed advocacy editing

In the media: UK political editing; hoaxes; net neutrality

News and notes: Call for candidates as the movement approaches the Wikimedia Board elections

In focus: 2015 Wikimedia Foundation election preparations underway

Featured content: Vanguard on guard

Traffic report: A harvest of couch potatoes

Gallery: The bitter end

The Signpost: 29 April 2015

Wikimania: Choice of small village for Wikimania 2016 ruffles feathers

News and notes: Wiki Loves Monuments evaluation sees diminishing returns and increasing cost

In the media: Scottish MEP blocked for edit warring; ranking articles by importance

Featured content: Another day, another dollar

Traffic report: Bruce, Nessie, and genocide

Recent research: Military history, cricket, and Australia targeted in Wikipedia articles' popularity vs. quality; how copyright damages economy

Technology report: VisualEditor and MediaWiki updates

WikiCup 2015 May newsletter

The second round one has all wrapped up, and round three has now begun! Congratulations to the 34 contestants who have made it through, but well done and thank you to all contestants who took part in our second round. Leading the way overall was Cas Liber (submissions) in Group B with a total of 777 points for a variety of contributions including Good Articles on Corona Borealis and Microscopium - both of which received the maximum bonus.

Special credit must be given to a number of high importance articles improved during the second round.

Coemgenus (submissions) was one of several users who worked on improving Ulysses S. Grant. Remember, you do not need to work on an article on your own - as long as each person has completed significant work on the article during 2015, multiple competitors can claim the same article.
Cwmhiraeth (submissions) took Dragonfly to Good Article for a 3x bonus - and if that wasn't enough, they also took Damselfly there as well for a 2x bonus.
LeftAire (submissions) worked up Alexander Hamilton to Good Article for the maximum bonus. Hamilton was one of the founding fathers of the United States and is a level 4 vital article.

The points varied across groups, with the lowest score required to gain automatic qualification was 68 in Group A - meanwhile the second place score in Group H was 404, which would have been high enough to win all but one of the other Groups! As well as the top two of each group automatically going through to the third round, a minimum score of 55 was required for a wildcard competitor to go through. We had a three-way tie at 55 points and all three have qualified for the next round, in the spirit of fairness. The third round ends on June 28, with the top two in each group progressing automatically while the remaining 16 highest scorers across all four groups go through as wildcards. Good luck to all competitors for the third round! Figureskatingfan (talk · contribs · email), Miyagawa (talk · contribs · email) and Sturmvogel 66 (talk · contribs · email) 16:32, 4 May 2015 (UTC)

The Signpost: 06 May 2015

News and notes: "Inspire" grant-making campaign concludes, grantees announced

Featured content: The amorous android and the horsebreeder; WikiCup round two concludes

In the media: Guggenheim image donation; Wiki campaign gets advertising award

Special report: FDC candidates respond to key issues

Traffic report: The grim ship reality

The Signpost: 13 May 2015

Foundation elections: Board candidates share their views with the Signpost

News and notes: Swedish Wikimedia chapter organizes simultaneous Wikidata contests

Traffic report: Round Two

In the media: Grant Shapps story continues

Op-ed: What made Wikipedia lose its reputation?

Featured content: Four first-time featured article writers lead the way

The Signpost: 20 May 2015

From the editor: Your voice is needed: strategic voting in the WMF election

In focus: The awful truth about Wikimedia's article counts

Traffic report: Inner Core

News and notes: A dark side of comedy: the Wikipedia volunteers cleaning up behind John Oliver's fowl jokes

Featured content: Puppets, fungi, and waterfalls

In the media: Jimmy Wales accepts Dan David Prize

WikiProject report: Cell-ebrating Molecular Biology

Arbitration report: Editor conduct the subject of multiple cases

The Signpost: 27 May 2015

News and notes: WMF releases quarterly reports, annual plans

In the media: Scrubbing Parliamentary biographies; Wikipedia's invisible history

Discussion report: A relic from the past that needs to be updated

Featured content: When music was confined to a ribbon of rust

Recent research: Drug articles accurate and largely complete; women "slightly overrepresented"; talking like an admin

Traffic report: Summer, summer, summertime

Technology report: MediaWiki blows up printers

VisualEditor News #3—2015

Did you know?

When you click on a link to an article, you now see more information:

The link tool has been re-designed:

There are separate tabs for linking to internal and external pages.

The user guide has more information about how to use VisualEditor.

Since the last newsletter, the Editing Team has created new interfaces for the link and citation tools, as well as fixing many bugs and changing some elements of the design. Some of these bugs affected users of VisualEditor on mobile devices. Status reports are posted on Mediawiki.org. The worklist for April through June is available in Phabricator.

A test of VisualEditor's effect on new editors at the English Wikipedia has just completed the first phase. During this test, half of newly registered editors had VisualEditor automatically enabled, and half did not. The main goal of the study is to learn which group was more likely to save an edit and to make productive, unreverted edits. Initial results will be posted at Meta later this month.

Recent improvements

Auto-fill features for citations are available at a few Wikipedias through the citoid service. Citoid takes a URL or DOI for a reliable source, and returns a pre-filled, pre-formatted bibliographic citation. If Citoid is enabled on your wiki, then the design of the citation workflow changed during May. All citations are now created inside a single tool. Inside that tool, choose the tab you want (⧼citoid-citeFromIDDialog-mode-auto⧽, ⧼citoid-citeFromIDDialog-mode-manual⧽, or ⧼citoid-citeFromIDDialog-mode-reuse⧽). The cite button is now labeled with the word "⧼visualeditor-toolbar-cite-label⧽" rather than a book icon, and the autofill citation dialog now has a more meaningful label, "⧼Citoid-citeFromIDDialog-lookup-button⧽", for the submit button.

The link tool has been redesigned based on feedback from Wikipedia editors and user testing. It now has two separate sections: one for links to articles and one for external links. When you select a link, its pop-up context menu shows the name of the linked page, a thumbnail image from the linked page, Wikidata's description, and/or appropriate icons for disambiguation pages, redirect pages and empty pages. Search results have been reduced to the first five pages. Several bugs were fixed, including a dark highlight that appeared over the first match in the link inspector (T98085).

The special character inserter in VisualEditor now uses the same special character list as the wikitext editor. Admins at each wiki can also create a custom section for frequently used characters at the top of the list. Please read the instructions for customizing the list at mediawiki.org. Also, there is now a tooltip to describing each character in the special character inserter (T70425).

Several improvements have been made to templates. When you search for a template to insert, the list of results now contains descriptions of the templates. The parameter list inside the template dialog now remains open after inserting a parameter from the list, so that users don’t need to click on "⧼visualeditor-dialog-transclusion-add-param⧽" each time they want to add another parameter (T95696). The team added a new property for TemplateData, "Example", for template parameters. This optional, translatable property will show up when there is text describing how to use that parameter (T53049).

The design of the main toolbar and several other elements have changed slightly, to be consistent with the MediaWiki theme. In the Vector skin, individual items in the menu are separated visually by pale gray bars. Buttons and menus on the toolbar can now contain both an icon and a text label, rather than just one or the other. This new design feature is being used for the cite button on wikis where the Citoid service is enabled.

The team has released a long-desired improvement to the handling of non-existent images. If a non-existent image is linked in an article, then it is now visible in VisualEditor and can be selected, edited, replaced, or removed.

Let's work together

Share your ideas and ask questions at mw:VisualEditor/Feedback.
The weekly task triage meetings continue to be open to volunteers, each Wednesday at 12:00 (noon) PDT (19:00 UTC). Learn how to join the meetings and how to nominate bugs at mw:Talk:VisualEditor/Portal. You do not need to attend the meeting to nominate a bug for consideration as a Q4 blocker. Instead, go to Phabricator and "associate" the Editing team's Q4 blocker project with the bug.
If your Wikivoyage, Wikibooks, Wikiversity, or other community wants to have VisualEditor made available by default to contributors, then please contact James Forrester.
If you would like to request the Citoid automatic reference feature for your wiki, please post a request in the Citoid project on Phabricator. Include links to the TemplateData for the most important citation templates on your wiki.

Subscribe, unsubscribe or change the page where this newsletter is delivered at Meta. If you aren't reading this in your favorite language, then please help us with translations! Subscribe to the Translators mailing list or contact us directly, so that we can notify you when the next issue is ready. Thank you! Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 17:31, 6 June 2015 (UTC)

The Signpost: 03 June 2015

News and notes: Three new community-elected trustees announced, incumbents out

Blog: How Wikipedia covered Caitlyn Jenner’s transition

Discussion report: The deprecation of Persondata; RfA – A broken process; Complaints from users on Swedish Wikipedia

Featured content: It's not over till the fat man sings

Technology report: Things are getting SPDYier

Special report: Towards "Health Information for All": Medical content on Wikipedia received 6.5 billion page views in 2013

In the media: Anonymous Australian editing targets football player, shooting victim

Traffic report: A rather ordinary week

The Signpost: 10 June 2015

News and notes: Chapter financial trends analyzed, news in brief

Traffic report: Two households, both alike in dignity

In the media: Arbitration case attracts media coverage; Wikipedia in Israel

Featured content: Just the bear facts, ma'am

Technology report: Wikimedia sites are going HTTPS only

Blog: Making Wikipedia’s medical articles accessible in Chinese

The Signpost: 17 June 2015

In the media: Wikipedia wins Asturias Prize; printing out Wikipedia; HTTPS switch

Arbitration report: An election has consequences

In focus: Three weeks to save freedom of panorama in Europe

Op-ed: Making a difference in Wikipedia, one GA at a time

Technology report: HTTPS-only rollout completed; proposal to enable VisualEditor for new accounts

Interview: A veteran’s Wikipedia edits help him understand the brutality behind Yugoslavia’s wars

News and notes: Labs outage kills tools, self; news in brief

Featured content: Great Dane hits 150

Discussion report: A quick way of becoming an admin

WikiProject report: Western Australia speaks – we are back

Orphaned non-free image File:Southern District RSC logo.png

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Thanks for uploading File:Southern District RSC logo.png. The image description page currently specifies that the image is non-free and may only be used on Wikipedia under a claim of fair use. However, the image is currently not used in any articles on Wikipedia. If the image was previously in an article, please go to the article and see why it was removed. You may add it back if you think that that will be useful. However, please note that images for which a replacement could be created are not acceptable for use on Wikipedia (see our policy for non-free media).

Note that any non-free images not used in any articles will be deleted after seven days, as described in the criteria for speedy deletion. Thank you. --B-bot (talk) 17:43, 25 June 2015 (UTC)

The Signpost: 24 June 2015

From the editor: The Signpost tagging initiative

Op-ed: Content Translation beta is coming to the English Wikipedia

Special report: Small impact of the large Google Translation Project on Telugu Wikipedia

Featured content: One eye when begun, two when it's done

Recent research: How Wikipedia built governance capability; readability of plastic surgery articles

Technology report: 2015 MediaWiki architecture focus and Multimedia roadmap announced

News and notes: Board of Trustees propose bylaw amendments

In the media: Turkish Wikipedia censorship; "Can Wikipedia survive?"; PR editing

Blog: 7,473 volumes at 700 pages each: meet Print Wikipedia

Arbitration report: Politics by other means: The American politics 2 arbitration

Orphaned non-free image File:Yung Long FC 2013.png

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Thanks for uploading File:Yung Long FC 2013.png. The image description page currently specifies that the image is non-free and may only be used on Wikipedia under a claim of fair use. However, the image is currently not used in any articles on Wikipedia. If the image was previously in an article, please go to the article and see why it was removed. You may add it back if you think that that will be useful. However, please note that images for which a replacement could be created are not acceptable for use on Wikipedia (see our policy for non-free media).

Note that any non-free images not used in any articles will be deleted after seven days, as described in the criteria for speedy deletion. Thank you. --B-bot (talk) 17:41, 26 June 2015 (UTC)

The Signpost: 01 July 2015

News and notes: Training the Trainers; VP of Engineering leaves WMF

In the media: EU freedom of panorama; Nehru outrage; BBC apology

WikiProject report: Able to make a stand

Featured content: Viva V.E.R.D.I.

Traffic report: We're Baaaaack

Technology report: Technical updates and improvements

Blog: These Texans are on a quest to improve Wikipedia’s coverage of their state’s revolution

The Signpost: 08 July 2015

Editorial: So you want to get your message out. Where do you turn?

News and notes: Wikimedia Foundation annual plan released, news in brief

In the media: Wikimania warning; Wikipedia "mystery" easily solved

Traffic report: The Empire lobs back

Featured content: Pyrénées, Playmates, parliament and a prison...

Technology report: Tech news in brief

Reference errors on 15 July

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The Signpost: 15 July 2015

Op-ed: On paid editing and advocacy: when the Bright Line fails to shine, and what we can do about it

Traffic report: Belles of the ball

WikiProject report: What happens when a country is no longer a country?

In the media: Shapps requests WMUK data; professor's plagiarism demotion

Blog: Wikimedia Foundation releases third transparency report

News and notes: The Wikimedia Conference and Wikimania

Featured content: When angels and daemons interrupt the vicious and intemperate

Technology report: Tech news in brief

Disambiguation link notification for July 20

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The Signpost: 22 July 2015

From the editor: Change the world

News and notes: Wikimanía 2016; Lightbreather ArbCom case

Wikimanía report: Wikimanía 2015 report, part 1, the plenaries

In the media: Novelists annotate Wikipedia; Wales promotes TPO; Working for free

Traffic report: The Nerds, They Are A-Changin'

WikiProject report: Some more politics

Featured content: The sleep of reason produces monsters

Gallery: "One small step..."

Technology report: Tech news in brief

The Signpost: 29 July 2015

News and notes: BARC de-adminship proposal; Wikimania recordings debate

Op-ed: My life as an autistic Wikipedian

Recent research: Wikipedia and collective intelligence; how Wikipedia is tweeted

In the media: Is Wikipedia a battleground in the culture wars?

Featured content: Even mammoths get the Blues

Traffic report: Namaste again, Reddit

The Signpost: 05 August 2015

Editorial: Wikipedia better equipped to deal with systemic bias than traditional publishers

Op-ed: Je ne suis pas Google

News and notes: VisualEditor, endowment, science, and news in brief

WikiProject report: Meet the boilerplate makers

In the media: Probe into Nehru edits launched; dangers of the right to be forgotten

Traffic report: Mrityorma amritam gamaya...

Featured content: Maya, Michigan, Medici, Médée, and Moul n'ga

Blog: Get help editing Wikipedia with the new “Co-op” mentorship program

VisualEditor News #4—2015

Read this in another language • Local subscription list • Subscribe to the multilingual edition

Did you know?

You can add quotations marks before and after a title or phrase with a single click.

Select the relevant text. Find the correct quotations marks in the special character inserter tool (marked as Ω in the toolbar).

Click the button. VisualEditor will add the quotation marks on either side of the text you selected.

You can read and help translate the user guide, which has more information about how to use VisualEditor.

Since the last newsletter, the Editing Team have been working on mobile phone support. They have fixed many bugs and improved language support. They post weekly status reports on mediawiki.org. Their workboard is available in Phabricator. Their current priorities are improving language support and functionality on mobile devices.

Wikimania

The team attended Wikimania 2015 in Mexico City. There they participated in the Hackathon and met with individuals and groups of users. They also made several presentations about VisualEditor and the future of editing.

Following Wikimania, we announced winners for the VisualEditor 2015 Translathon. Our thanks and congratulations to users Halan-tul, Renessaince, जनक राज भट्ट (Janak Bhatta), Vahe Gharakhanyan, Warrakkk, and Eduardogobi.

For interface messages (translated at translatewiki.net), we saw the initiative affecting 42 languages. The average progress in translations across all languages was 56.5% before the translathon, and 78.2% after (+21.7%). In particular, Sakha improved from 12.2% to 94.2%; Brazilian Portuguese went from 50.6% to 100%; Taraškievica went from 44.9% to 85.3%; Doteli went from 1.3% to 41.2%. Also, while 1.7% of the messages were outdated across all languages before the translathon, the percentage dropped to 0.8% afterwards (-0.9%).

For documentation messages (on mediawiki.org), we saw the initiative affecting 24 languages. The average progress in translations across all languages was 26.6% before translathon, and 46.9% after (+20.3%). There were particularly notable achievements for three languages. Armenian improved from 1% to 99%; Swedish, from 21% to 99%, and Brazilian Portuguese, from 34% to 83%. Outdated translations across all languages were reduced from 8.4% before translathon to 4.8% afterwards (-3.6%).

We published some graphs showing the effect of the event on the Translathon page. Thank you to the translators for participating and the translatewiki.net staff for facilitating this initiative.

Recent improvements

Auto-fill features for citations can be enabled on each Wikipedia. The tool uses the citoid service to convert a URL or DOI into a pre-filled, pre-formatted bibliographic citation. You can see an animated GIF of the quick, simple process at mediawiki.org. So far, about a dozen Wikipedias have enabled the auto-citation tool. To enable it for your wiki, follow the instructions at mediawiki.org.

Your wiki can customize the first section of the special character inserter in VisualEditor. Please follow the instructions at mediawiki.org to put the characters you want at the top.

In other changes, if you need to fill in a CAPTCHA and get it wrong, then you can click to get a new one to complete. VisualEditor can now display and edit Vega-based graphs. If you use the Monobook skin, VisualEditor's appearance is now more consistent with other software.

Future changes

The team will be changing the appearance of selected links inside VisualEditor. The purpose is to make it easy to see whether your cursor is inside or outside the link. When you select a link, the link label (the words shown on the page) will be enclosed in a faint box. If you place your cursor inside the box, then your changes to the link label will be part of the link. If you place your cursor outside the box, then it will not. This will make it easy to know when new characters will be added to the link and when they will not.

On the English Wikipedia, 10% of newly created accounts are now offered both the visual and the wikitext editors. A recent controlled trial showed no significant difference in survival or productivity for new users in the short term. New users with access to VisualEditor were very slightly less likely to produce results that needed reverting. You can learn more about this by watching a video of the July 2015 Wikimedia Research Showcase. The proportion of new accounts with access to both editing environments will be gradually increased over time. Eventually all new users have the choice between the two editing environments.

Let's work together

Share your ideas and ask questions at Wikipedia:VisualEditor/Feedback.
Can you read and type in Korean or Japanese? Language engineer David Chan needs people who know which tools people use to type in some languages. If you speak Japanese or Korean, you can help him test support for these languages. Please see the instructions at mw:VisualEditor/IME Testing#What to test if you can help.
If your wiki would like VisualEditor enabled on another namespace, you can file a request in Phabricator. Please include a link to a community discussion about the requested change.
Please file requests for language-appropriate "Bold" and "Italic" icons for the styling menu in Phabricator.
The design research team wants to see how real editors work. Please sign up for their research program.
The weekly task triage meetings continue to be open to volunteers, usually on Tuesdays at 12:00 (noon) PDT (19:00 UTC). Learn how to join the meetings and how to nominate bugs at mw:VisualEditor/Weekly triage meetings. You do not need to attend the meeting to nominate a bug for consideration as a Q1 blocker, though. Instead, go to Phabricator and "associate" the main VisualEditor project with the bug.

If you aren't reading this in your favorite language, then please help us with translations! Subscribe to the Translators mailing list or contact Elitre directly, so that she can notify you when the next issue is ready. Thank you! Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 00:01, 8 August 2015 (UTC)

The Signpost: 12 August 2015

News and notes: Superprotect, one year later; a contentious RfA

In the media: Paid editing; traffic drop; Nicki Minaj

Forum: Community voices on paid editing

Wikimanía report: Wikimanía 2015, part 2, a community event

Traffic report: Fighting from top to bottom

Featured content: Fused lizards, giant mice, and Scottish demons

Technology report: Tech news in brief

Blog: The Hunt for Tirpitz

The Signpost: 19 August 2015

Op-ed: WP:THREATENING2MEN: The English Wikipedia's misogynist infopolitics and the hegemony of the asshole consensus

In the media: Politically controversial science; "Wikipedia hates women"

Featured content: Dead parrots, live frogs, a symbolic kiss and what do we get? Enrique Iglesias!

Travelogue: Seeing is believing

Traffic report: Straight Outta Connecticut

Technology report: Tech news in brief

Blog: How Wikipedia responds to breaking news

The Signpost: 26 August 2015

In focus: An increase in active Wikipedia editors

In the media: Russia temporarily blocks Wikipedia

Op-ed: Wikimania—can volunteers organize conferences?

News and notes: Re-imagining grants

Featured content: Out to stud, please call later

Arbitration report: Reinforcing Arbitration

Recent research: OpenSym 2015 report

WikiCup 2015 September newsletter

The finals for the 2015 Wikicup has now begun! Congrats to the 8 contestants who have survived to the finals, and well done and thanks to everyone who took part in rounds 3 and 4.

In round 3, we had a three-way tie for qualification among the wildcard contestants, so we had 34 competitors. The leader was by far Casliber (submissions) in Group B, who earned 1496 points. Although 913 of these points were bonus points, he submitted 15 articles in the DYK category. Second place overall was Coemgenus (submissions) at 864 points, who although submitted just 2 FAs for 400 points, earned double that amount for those articles in bonus points. Everyone who moved forward to Round 4 earned at least 100 points.

The scores required to move onto the semifinals were impressive; the lowest scorer to move onto the finals was 407, making this year's Wikicup as competitive as it's always been. Our finalists, ordered by round 4 score, are:

Cas Liber (submissions), who is competing in his sixth consecutive Wikicup final, again finished the round in first place, with an impressive 1666 points in Pool B. Casliber writes about the natural sciences, including ornithology, botany and astronomy. A large bulk of his points this round were bonus points.
Godot13 (submissions) (FP bonus points), second place both in Pool B and overall, earned the bulk of his points with FPs, mostly depicting currency.
Cwmhiraeth (submissions), first in Pool A, came in third. His specialty is natural science articles; in Round 4, he mostly submitted articles about insects and botany. Five out of the six of the GAs he submitted were level-4 vital articles.
Harrias (submissions), second in Pool A, took fourth overall. He tends to focus on articles about cricket and military history, specifically the 1640s First English Civil War.
West Virginian (submissions), from Pool A, was our highest-scoring wildcard. West Virginia tends to focus on articles about the history of (what for it!) the U.S. state of West Virginia.
Rodw (submissions), from Pool A, likes to work on articles about British geography and places. Most of his points this round were earned from two impressive accomplishments: a GT about Scheduled monuments in Somerset and a FT about English Heritage properties in Somerset.
Rationalobserver (submissions), from Pool B, came in seventh overall. RO earned the majority of her points from GARs and PRs, many of which were earned in the final hours of the round.
Calvin999 (submissions), also from Pool B, who was competing with RO for the final two spots in the final hours, takes the race for most GARs and PRs—48.

The intense competition between RO and Calvin999 will continue into the finals. They're both eligible for the Newcomers Trophy, given for the first time in the Wikicup; whoever makes the most points will win it.

Good luck to the finalists; the judges are sure that the competition will be fierce!

Figureskatingfan (talk · contribs), Miyagawa (talk · contribs) and Sturmvogel 66 (talk · contribs) 11:48, 2 September 2015 (UTC)

The Signpost: 02 September 2015

Special report: Massive paid editing network unearthed on the English Wikipedia

News and notes: Flow placed on ice

Discussion report: WMF's sudden reversal on Wiki Loves Monuments

Featured content: Brawny

In the media: Orangemoody sockpuppet case sparks widespread coverage

Traffic report: You didn't miss much

Technology report: Tech news in brief

The Signpost: 09 September 2015

Gallery: Being Welsh

Featured content: Killed by flying debris

Op-ed: DYK, or proudly displaying incorrect information on the Main Page with alarming regularity

News and notes: The Swedish Wikipedia's controversial two-millionth article

Traffic report: Mass media production traffic

Technology report: Tech news in brief

In the media: Calling all scientists!; More Wikipedia editors in the Netherlands than all of Africa combined

The Signpost: 16 September 2015

Editorial: No access is no answer to closed access

News and notes: Byrd and notifications leave, but page views stay; was a terror suspect editing Wikipedia?

In the media: Is there life on Mars?

Featured content: Why did the emu cross the road?

Traffic report: Another week

Technology report: Tech news in brief

The Signpost: 23 September 2015

In the media: PETA makes "monkey selfie" a three-way copyright battle; Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy

Op-ed: Can we please stop bashing Wikipedia?

Featured content: Inside Duke Humfrey's Library

WikiProject report: Dancing to the beat of a... wikiproject?

Traffic report: ¡Viva la Revolución! Kinda.

Technology report: Tech news in brief

The Signpost: 30 September 2015

News and notes: Wikimedia Foundation fundraising report, Montreal to host 2017 Wikimania

In the media: Irish legislative editing; coffee quarrel; more sports vandalism

Op-ed: Wikipedia needs more administrators

Recent research: Wiktionary special; newbies, conflict and tolerance; Is Wikipedia's search function inferior?

Tech news: Tech news in brief

VisualEditor update

This note is only delivered to English Wikipedia subscribers of the visual editor's newsletter.

The location of the visual editor's preference has been changed from the "Beta" tab to the "Editing" section of your preferences on this wiki. The setting now says Temporarily disable the visual editor while it is in beta. This aligns en.wiki with almost all the other WMF wikis; it doesn’t mean the visual editor is complete, or that it is no longer “in beta phase” though.

This action has not changed anything else for editors: it still honours editors’ previous choices about having it on or off; logged-out users continue to only have access to wikitext; the “Edit” tab is still after the “Edit source” one. You can learn more at the visual editor’s talk page.

We don’t expect this to cause any glitches, but in case your account no longer has the settings that you want, please accept our apologies and correct it in the Editing tab of Special:Preferences. Thank you for your attention, Elitre (WMF) -16:32, 7 October 2015 (UTC)

The Signpost: 07 October 2015

Op-ed: Walled gardens of corruption

Traffic report: Reality is for losers

Featured content: This Week's Featured Content

Gallery: Winners of Wiki Loves Monuments 2015 in Pakistan

Arbitration report: Warning: Contains GMOs

Technology report: Tech news in brief

In the media: Jailed Saudi blogger wins award; PR editing and Wiki-embarassment; Pakistan's third-richest person?

The Signpost: 14 October 2015

Op-ed: WikiConference USA 2015: built on good faith

WikiConference report: US gathering sees speeches from Andrew Lih, AfroCrowd, and the Archivist of the United States

Editorial: Why the news media needs a Wikipedian in residence

News and notes: 2015–2016 Q1 fundraising update sparks mailing list debate

Traffic report: Screens, Sport, Reddit, and Death

Featured content: A fistful of dollars

Technology report: Tech news in brief

Blog: Third Wikimedia Spain conference takes place in Madrid

The Signpost: 21 October 2015

Editorial: Women and Wikipedia: the world is watching

News and notes: Wikimedia lawsuit against NSA dismissed; Affiliates mailing list launched

In the media: "Wikipedia's hostility to women"

Special report: One year of GamerGate, or how I learned to stop worrying and love bare rule-level consensus

Featured content: A more balanced week

Op-ed: Wikipedia is significantly amplifying the impact of Open Access publications

Arbitration report: Four ArbCom cases ongoing

Traffic report: Hiding under the covers of the Internet

Technology report: Tech news in brief

VisualEditor News #5—2015

Read this in another language • Subscription list for this multilingual newsletter

Did you know?

You can use the visual editor on smartphones and tablets.

Click the pencil icon to open the editor for a page. Inside that, use the gear menu in the upper right corner to "Switch to visual editing".

The editing button will remember which editing environment you used last time, and give you the same one next time. The desktop site will be switching to a system similar to this one in the coming months.

You can read and help translate the user guide, which has more information about how to use the visual editor.

Since the last newsletter, the VisualEditor Team has fixed many bugs, added new features, and made some small design changes. They post weekly status reports on mediawiki.org. Their workboard is available in Phabricator. Their current priorities are improving support for languages like Japanese and Arabic, making it easier to edit on mobile devices, and providing rich-media tools for formulæ, charts, galleries and uploading.

Recent improvements

Educational features: The first time you use the visual editor, it now draws your attention to the Link and ⧼visualeditor-toolbar-cite-label⧽ tools. When you click on the tools, it explains why you should use them. (T108620) Alongside this, the welcome message for new users has been simplified to make editing more welcoming. (T112354) More in-software educational features are planned.

Links: It is now easier to understand when you are adding text to a link and when you are typing plain text next to it. (T74108, T91285) The editor now fully supports ISBN, PMID or RFC numbers. (T109498, T110347, T63558) These "magic links" use a custom link editing tool.

Uploads: Registered editors can now upload images and other media to Commons while editing. Click the new tab in the "Insert Images and media" tool. You will be guided through the process without having to leave your edit. At the end, the image will be inserted. This tool is limited to one file at a time, owned by the user, and licensed under Commons's standard license. For more complex situations, the tool links to more advanced upload tools. You can also drag the image into the editor. This will be available in the wikitext editor later.

Mobile: Previously, the visual editor was available on the mobile Wikipedia site only on tablets. Now, editors can use the visual editor on any size of device. (T85630) Edit conflicts were previously broken on the mobile website. Edit conflicts can now be resolved in both wikitext and visual editors. (T111894) Sometimes templates and similar items could not be deleted on the mobile website. Selecting them caused the on-screen keyboard to hide with some browsers. Now there is a new "Delete" button, so that these things can be removed if the keyboard hides. (T62110) You can also edit table cells in mobile now.

Rich editing tools: You can now add and edit sheet music in the visual editor. (T112925) There are separate tabs for advanced options, such as MIDI and Ogg audio files. (T114227 and T113354) When editing formulæ and other blocks, errors are shown as you edit. It is also possible to edit some types of graphs; adding new ones, and support for new types, will be coming.

On the English Wikipedia, the visual editor is now automatically available to anyone who creates an account. The preference switch was moved to the normal location, under Special:Preferences.

Future changes

You will soon be able to switch from the wikitext to the visual editor after you start editing. (T49779) Previously, you could only switch from the visual editor to the wikitext editor. Bi-directional switching will make possible a single edit tab. (T102398) This project will combine the "Edit" and "Edit source" tabs into a single "Edit" tab, similar to the system already used on the mobile website. The "Edit" tab will open whichever editing environment you used last time.

Let's work together

Share your ideas and ask questions at mw:VisualEditor/Feedback. This feedback page uses Flow for discussions.
Can you read and type in Korean or Japanese? Language engineer David Chan needs people who know which tools people use to type in some languages. If you speak Japanese or Korean, you can help him test support for these languages. Please see the instructions at mw:VisualEditor/IME Testing#What to test if you can help, and report it on Phabricator (Korean - Japanese) or on Wikipedia (Korean - Japanese).
Local admins can set up the Citoid automatic reference feature for your wiki. If you need help, then please post a request in the Citoid project on Phabricator. Include links to the TemplateData for the most important citation templates on your wiki.
The weekly task triage meetings are open to volunteers. Learn how to join the meetings and how to nominate bugs at mw:VisualEditor/Weekly triage meetings. You do not need to attend the meeting to nominate a bug for consideration, though. Instead, go to Phabricator and "associate" the main VisualEditor project with the bug.

If you can't read this in your favorite language, then please help us with translations! Subscribe to the Translators mailing list or contact us directly, so that we can notify you when the next issue is ready. Thank you!

— Whatamidoing (WMF) 04:16, 30 October 2015 (UTC)

The Signpost: 28 October 2015

From the editor: The Signpost's reorganization plan—we need your help

News and notes: English Wikipedia reaches five million articles

In the media: The world's Wikipedia gaps; Google and Wikipedia accused of tying Ben Carson to NAMBLA

Op-ed: It’s time to stop the bullying

Arbitration report: A second attempt at Arbitration enforcement

Traffic report: Canada, the most popular nation on Earth

Recent research: Student attitudes towards Wikipedia; Jesus, Napoleon and Obama top "Wikipedia social network"; featured article editing patterns in 12 languages

Featured content: Birds, turtles, and other things

Technology report: Tech news in brief

Community letter: Five million articles

The Signpost: 04 November 2015

Op-ed: You are invited to participate in the Community Wishlist Survey

News and notes: Wikimedia Foundation finances; Superprotect is gone

In the media: Ahmadiyya Jabrayilov: propaganda myth or history?

Traffic report: Death, the Dead, and Spectres are abroad

Featured content: Christianity, music, and cricket

Gallery: Princess of Asturias Awards 2015 ceremony

Technology report: Tech news in brief

WikiCup 2015: The results

WikiCup 2015 is now in the books! Congrats to our finalists and winners, and to everyone who took part in this year's competition.

This year's results were an exact replica of last year's competition. For the second year in a row, the 2015 WikiCup champion is Godot13 (submissions) (FP bonus points). All of his points were earned for an impressive 253 featured pictures and their associated bonus points (5060 and 1695, respectively). His entries constituted scans of currency from all over the world and scans of medallions awarded to participants of the U.S. Space program. Cwmhiraeth (submissions) came in second place; she earned by far the most bonus points (4082), for 4 featured articles, 15 good articles, and 147 DYKs, mostly about in her field of expertise, natural science. Cas Liber (submissions), a finalist every year since 2010, came in third, with 2379 points.

Our newcomer award, presented to the best-performing new competitor in the WikiCup, goes to Rationalobserver (submissions). Everyone should be very proud of the work they accomplished. We will announce our other award winners soon.

A full list of our award winners are:

Godot13 (submissions) (FP bonus points) wins the prize for first place and the FP prize for 330 featured pictures in the final round.
Cwmhiraeth (submissions) wins the prize for second place and the DYK prize for 160 did you knows in the final round (310 in all rounds).
Cas Liber (submissions) wins the prize for third place and the FA prize for 26 featured articles in all rounds.
West Virginian (submissions) wins the prize for fourth place
Calvin999 (submissions) wins a final 8 prize.
Rationalobserver (submissions) wins a final 8 prize.
Harrias (submissions) wins a final 8 prize and the FL prize for 11 featured lists.
Rodw (submissions) wins the most prizes: a final 8 prize, the GA prize for 41 good articles, and the topic prize for a 13-article good topic and an 8-article featured topic, both in round 3.
ThaddeusB (submissions) wins the news prize for the most news articles in round 3.

We warmly invite all of you to sign up for next year's competition. Discussions and polls concerning potential rules changes are also open, and all are welcome to participate. The WikiCup judges will be back in touch over the coming months, and we hope to see you all in the 2016 competition. Until then, it only remains to once again congratulate our worthy winners, and thank all participants for their involvement! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send.

Figureskatingfan (talk · contribs · logs), Miyagawa (talk · contribs · logs) and Sturmvogel 66 (talk · contribs · logs) 18:39, 8 November 2015 (UTC)

The Signpost: 11 November 2015

Op-ed: As one thousand of us requested, Superprotect has been removed

Arbitration report: Elections, redirections, and a resignation from the Committee

Discussion report: Compromise of two administrator accounts prompts security review

Featured content: Texas, film, and cycling

In the media: Sanger on Wikipedia; Silver on Vox; lawyers on monkeys

Traffic report: Doodles of popularity

Gallery: Paris

The Signpost: 18 November 2015

Special report: ArbCom election—candidates’ opinions analysed

In the media: Icelandic milestone; apolitical editing

Discussion report: BASC disbanded; other developments in the discussion world

Arbitration report: Ban Appeals Subcommittee goes up in smoke; 21 candidates running

Featured content: Fantasia on a Theme by Jimbo Wales

Traffic report: Darkness and light

ArbCom elections are now open!

Hi,
You appear to be eligible to vote in the current Arbitration Committee election. The Arbitration Committee is the panel of editors responsible for conducting the Wikipedia arbitration process. It has the authority to enact binding solutions for disputes between editors, primarily related to serious behavioural issues that the community has been unable to resolve. This includes the ability to impose site bans, topic bans, editing restrictions, and other measures needed to maintain our editing environment. The arbitration policy describes the Committee's roles and responsibilities in greater detail. If you wish to participate, you are welcome to review the candidates' statements and submit your choices on the voting page. For the Election committee, MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 16:47, 24 November 2015 (UTC)

The Signpost: 25 November 2015

Op-ed: Wikidata: the new Rosetta Stone

News and notes: Fundraising update; FDC recommendations

In the media: Erasmus Prize awarded to Wikipedia; trouble on the Russian Wikipedia

Recent research: Do Wikipedia citations mirror scholarly impact?; co-star networks in silent films

Featured content: Caves and stuff

Traffic report: J'en ai ras le bol

Arbitration report: Third Palestine-Israel case closes; Voting begins

Technology report: Tech news in brief

Blog: Wikimedia Foundation, Wikimedia Deutschland urge Reiss Engelhorn Museum to reconsider suit over public domain works of art

The Signpost: 02 December 2015

Op-ed: Whither Wikidata?

News and notes: Online harassment consultation; High voter turnout at ArbCom elections

In the media: Is Wikidata as transparent as it seems?; Wikimedia Fund-raising drive launches

Traffic report: Jonesing for episodes

Featured content: This Week's Featured Content

Technology report: Tech news in brief

The Signpost: 09 December 2015

News and notes: ArbCom election results announced

Op-ed: Wikidata: Knowledge from different points of view

In the media: Political editing in the context of the US presidential primaries

Gallery: Wiki Loves Monuments 2015 winners

Traffic report: So do you laugh, or does it cry?

Featured content: Sports, ships, arts... and some other things

Technology report: Tech news in brief

The Signpost: 16 December 2015

In focus: Drone photography: New possibilities and new challenges

In the media: Wales in China; #Edit2015

Arbitration report: GMO case decided

Featured content: An unusually slow week

WikiProject report: Women in Red—using teamwork and partnerships to elevate online and offline collaborations

Traffic report: A feast of Spam

Gallery: WikiConference USA 2015: images, slide decks, and videos

WikiCup 2016 is just around the corner...

Hello everyone, and we would like to wish you all a happy holiday season. As you will probably already know, the 2016 WikiCup begins in the new year; there is still time to sign up. There are some changes we'd like to announce before the competition begins.

After two years of serving as WikiCup judge, User:Miyagawa has stepped down as judge. He deserves great thanks and recognition for his dedication and hard work, and for providing necessary transition for a new group of judges in last year's Cup. Joining Christine (User:Figureskatingfan) and Jason (User:Sturmvogel 66) is Andrew (User:Godot13), a very successful WikiCup competitor and expert in Featured Pictures; he won the two previous competitions. This is a strong judging team, and we anticipate lots of enjoyment and good work coming from our 2016 competitors.

We would also like to announce one change in how this year's WikiCup will be run. In the spirit of sportsmanship, Godot13 and Cwmhiraeth have chosen to limit their participation. See here for the announcement and a complete explanation of why. They and the judges feel that it will make for a more exciting, enjoyable, and productive competition.

The discussions/polls concerning the next competition's rules will be closed soon, and rules changes will be made clear on Wikipedia:WikiCup/Scoring and talk pages. The judges are committed to not repeating the confusion that occurred last year and to ensuring that the new rules are both fair and in the best interests of the competition, which is, first and foremost, about improving Wikipedia.

If you have any questions or concerns, the judges can be reached on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, on their talk pages, or by email. We hope you will all join us in trying to make the 2015 WikiCup the most productive and enjoyable yet. You are receiving this message because you are listed on Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. Sturmvogel 66 (talk), Figureskatingfan (talk), and Godot13 (talk).--MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 06:46, 22 December 2015 (UTC)

VisualEditor News #6—2015

Read this in another language • Subscription list

Did you know?

A new, simpler system for editing will offer a single Edit button. Once the page has opened, you can switch back and forth between visual and wikitext editing.

If you prefer having separate edit buttons, then you can set that option in your preferences, either in a pop-up dialog the next time you open the visual editor, or by going to Special:Preferences and choosing the setting that you want:

The current plan is for the default setting to have the Edit button open the editing environment you used most recently.

You can read and help translate the user guide, which has more information about how to use the visual editor.

Since the last newsletter, the VisualEditor Team has fixed many bugs and expanded the mathematics formula tool. Their workboard is available in Phabricator. Their current priorities are improving support for languages such as Japanese and Arabic, and providing rich-media tools for formulæ, charts, galleries and uploading.

Recent improvements

You can switch from the wikitext editor to the visual editor after you start editing.

The LaTeX mathematics formula editor has been significantly expanded. (T118616) You can see the formula as you change the LaTeX code. You can click buttons to insert the correct LaTeX code for many symbols.

Future changes

The single edit tab project will combine the "Edit" and "Edit source" tabs into a single "Edit" tab, like the system already used on the mobile website. (T102398) Initially, the "Edit" tab will open whichever editing environment you used last time. Your last editing choice will be stored as a cookie for logged-out users and as an account preference for logged-in editors. Logged-in editors will be able to set a default editor in the Editing tab of Special:Preferences in the drop-down menu about "Editing mode:".

The visual editor will be offered to all editors at the following Wikipedias in early 2016: Amharic, Buginese, Min Dong, Cree, Manx, Hakka, Armenian, Georgian, Pontic, Serbo-Croatian, Tigrinya, Mingrelian, Zhuang, and Min Nan. (T116523) Please post your comments and the language(s) that you tested at the feedback thread on mediawiki.org. The developers would like to know how well it works. Please tell them what kind of computer, web browser, and keyboard you are using.

In 2016, the feedback pages for the visual editor on many Wikipedias will be redirected to mediawiki.org. (T92661)

Testing opportunities

Please try the new system for the single edit tab on test2.wikipedia.org. You can edit while logged out to see how it works for logged-out editors, or you can create a separate account to be able to set your account's preferences. Please share your thoughts about the single edit tab system at the feedback topic on mediawiki.org or sign up for formal user research (type "single edit tab" in the question about other areas you're interested in). The new system has not been finalized, and your feedback can affect the outcome. The team particularly wants your thoughts about the options in Special:Preferences. The current choices in Special:Preferences are:
- Remember my last editor,
- Always give me the visual editor if possible,
- Always give me the source editor, and
- Show me both editor tabs. (This is the current state for people using the visual editor. None of these options will be visible if you have disabled the visual editor in your preferences at that wiki.)
Can you read and type in Korean or Japanese? Language engineer David Chan needs people who know which tools people use to type in some languages. If you speak Japanese or Korean, you can help him test support for these languages. Please see the instructions at mw:VisualEditor/IME Testing#What to test if you can help, and report it on Phabricator (Korean - Japanese) or on Wikipedia (Korean - Japanese).

If you aren't reading this in your favorite language, then please help us with translations! Subscribe to the Translators mailing list or contact us directly, so that we can notify you when the next issue is ready. Thank you!

Whatamidoing (WMF), 00:54, 24 December 2015 (UTC)

The Signpost: 30 December 2015

News and notes: WMF Board dismisses community-elected trustee

Arbitration report: Second Arbitration Enforcement case concludes as another case is suspended

Featured content: The post-Christmas edition

Traffic report: The Force we expected

Year in review: The top ten Wikipedia stories of 2015

In the media: Wikipedia plagued by a "Basket of Deception"

Gallery: It's that time of year again

The Signpost: 06 January 2016

News and notes: The WMF's age of discontent

In the media: Impenetrable science; Jimmy Wales back in the UAE

Arbitration report: Catflap08 and Hijiri88 case been decided

Featured content: Featured menagerie

Recent research: Teaching Wikipedia, Does advertising the gender gap help or hurt Wikipedia?

WikiProject report: Try-ing to become informed - WikiProject Rugby League

Technology report: Tech news in brief

WikiCup 2016: Game On!

We are about to enter the second week of the 2016 WikiCup. The most recent player to sign up brings the current total to 101 contestants. Signups close on 5 February. If you’re interested, you can join this year's WikiCup here.

We are aware that in some areas the scoring bot’s numbers are a little bit off (i.e., overly generous) and are working to have that corrected as soon as possible.--MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 18:04, 7 January 2016 (UTC)

WikiCup 2016: Game On!

We are about to enter the second week of the 2016 WikiCup. The most recent player to sign up brings the current total to 101 contestants. Signups close on 5 February. If you’re interested, you can join this year's WikiCup here.

We are aware that in some areas the scoring bot’s numbers are a little bit off (i.e., overly generous) and are working to have that corrected as soon as possible.--MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 18:08, 7 January 2016 (UTC)

The Signpost: 13 January 2016

In the media: War and peace; WMF board changes; Arabic and Hebrew Wikipedias

Community view: Battle for the soul of the WMF

Editorial: We need a culture of verification

In focus: The Crisis at New Montgomery Street

Op-ed: Transparency

Traffic report: Pattern recognition: Third annual Traffic Report

Special report: Wikipedia community celebrates Public Domain Day 2016

News and notes: Community objections to new Board trustee

Blog: Inside the game of sports vandalism on Wikipedia

Featured content: This Week's Featured Content

Arbitration report: Interview: outgoing and incumbent arbitrators 2016

Technology report: Tech news in brief

The Signpost: 20 January 2016

News and notes: Vote of no confidence; WMF trustee speaks out

Op-ed: Not a pretty picture: Thoughts on the "monkey selfie" debacle

In the media: 15th anniversary news round-up

Traffic report: Danse Macabre

Featured content: This week's featured content

Blog: Fifteen years ago, Wikipedia was a very different place

The Signpost: 27 January 2016

Op-ed: Lila Tretikov: the WMF needs your input in developing our strategy

News and notes: Geshuri steps down from the Board

In the media: Media coverage of the Arnnon Geshuri no-confidence vote

Recent research: Bursty edits; how politics beat religion but then lost to sports; notability as a glass ceiling

Traffic report: Death and taxes

Featured content: This week's featured content

The Signpost: 03 February 2016

From the editors: Help wanted

Special report: Board chair and new trustee speak with the Signpost

In focus: The Knight Foundation grant: a timeline and an email to the board

Op-ed: So, what’s a knowledge engine anyway?

News and notes: Harassment survey 2015; Luis Villa to leave WMF; knowledge engine background

Arbitration report: Catching up on arbitration

Traffic report: Bowled

Featured content: This week's featured content

The Signpost: 10 February 2016

Special report: New internal documents raise questions about the origins of the Knowledge Engine

In focus: An in-depth look at the special report's newly revealed documents

News and notes: Another WMF departure

In the media: Jeb Bush swings at Wikipedia and connects

Featured content: This week's featured content

Traffic report: A river of revilement

Blog: Wikimedia Foundation removes The Diary of Anne Frank due to copyright law requirements

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 05:29, 15 February 2016 (UTC)

The Signpost: 17 February 2016

Special report: Search and destroy: the Knowledge Engine and the undoing of Lila Tretikov

Op-ed: Shit I cannot believe we had to fucking write this month

Featured content: This week's featured content

Traffic report: Super Bowling

Technology report: Tech news in brief

Blog: Antonin Scalia and the editor tracking his legacy

The Signpost: 24 February 2016

Special report: WMF in limbo as decision on Tretikov nears

Op-ed: Backward the Foundation

Traffic report: Of Dead Pools and Dead Judges

Blog: Wiki Loves Africa brings the continent’s fashion to the world

Arbitration report: Arbitration motion regarding CheckUser & Oversight inactivity

Featured content: This week's featured content

Technology report: Tech news in brief

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 05:05, 25 February 2016 (UTC)

VisualEditor News #1—2016

Read this in another language • Subscription list for this multilingual newsletter

Did you know?

Among experienced editors, the visual editor's table editing is one of the most popular features.

If you select the top of a column or the end of a row, you can quickly insert and remove columns and rows.

Now, you can also rearrange columns and rows. Click "Move before" or "Move after" to swap the column or row with its neighbor.

You can read and help translate the user guide, which has more information about how to use the visual editor.

Since the last newsletter, the VisualEditor Team has fixed many bugs. Their workboard is available in Phabricator. Their current priorities are improving support for Japanese, Korean, Arabic, Indic, and Han scripts, and improving the single edit tab interface.

Recent changes

You can switch from the wikitext editor to the visual editor after you start editing. This function is available to nearly all editors at most wikis except the Wiktionaries and Wikisources.

Many local feedback pages for the visual editor have been redirected to mw:VisualEditor/Feedback.

You can now re-arrange columns and rows in tables, as well as copying a row, column or any other selection of cells and pasting it in a new location.

The formula editor has two options: you can choose "Quick edit" to see and change only the LaTeX code, or "Edit" to use the full tool. The full tool offers immediate preview and an extensive list of symbols.

Future changes

The single edit tab project will combine the "Edit" and "Edit source" tabs into a single "Edit" tab. This is similar to the system already used on the mobile website. (T102398) Initially, the "Edit" tab will open whichever editing environment you used last time. Your last editing choice will be stored as an account preference for logged-in editors, and as a cookie for logged-out users. Logged-in editors will have these options in the Editing tab of Special:Preferences:

Remember my last editor,
Always give me the visual editor if possible,
Always give me the source editor, and
Show me both editor tabs. (This is the state for people using the visual editor now.)

The visual editor uses the same search engine as Special:Search to find links and files. This search will get better at detecting typos and spelling mistakes soon. These improvements to search will appear in the visual editor as well.

The visual editor will be offered to all editors at most "Phase 6" Wikipedias during the next few months. The developers would like to know how well the visual editor works in your language. They particularly want to know whether typing in your language feels natural in the visual editor. Please post your comments and the language(s) that you tested at the feedback thread on mediawiki.org. This will affect the following languages: Japanese, Korean, Urdu, Persian, Arabic, Tamil, Marathi, Malayalam, Hindi, Bengali, Assamese, Thai, Aramaic and others.

Let's work together

Please try out the newest version of the single edit tab on test2.wikipedia.org. You may need to restore the default preferences (at the bottom of test2wiki:Special:Preferences) to see the initial prompt for options. Were you able to find a preference setting that will work for your own editing? Did you see the large preferences dialog box when you started editing an article there?
Can you read and type in Korean, Arabic, Japanese, Indic, or Han scripts? Language engineer David Chan needs help from people who often type in these languages. Please see the instructions at mw:VisualEditor/IME Testing#What to test if you can help. Report your results on wiki (Korean – Japanese – all languages).
Learn how to improve the "automagical" citoid referencing system in the visual editor, by creating Zotero translators for popular sources in your language! Join the Tech Talk about "Automated citations in Wikipedia: Citoid and the technology behind it" with Sebastian Karcher on 29 February 2016.

If you aren't reading this in your favorite language, then please help us with translations! Subscribe to the Translators mailing list or contact us directly, so that we can notify you when the next issue is ready. Thanks!

– Whatamidoing (WMF) 17:46, 25 February 2016 (UTC)

WikiCup 2015 March newsletter

That's it, the first round is done, sign-ups are closed and we're into round 2. Forty-seven competitors move into this round (a bit shy of the expected 64), and we are roughly broken into eight groups of six. The top two of each group will go through to round 3, and then the top scoring 16 "wildcards" across all groups.

Twenty-two Good Articles were submitted, including three by Cyclonebiskit (submissions), and two each by MPJ-DK (submissions), Hurricanehink (submissions), 12george1 (submissions), and Cas Liber (submissions). Twenty-one Featured Pictures were claimed, including 17 by Adam Cuerden (submissions) (the Round 1 high scorer). Thirty-one contestants saw their DYKs appear on the main page, with a commanding lead (28) by Cwmhiraeth (submissions). Twenty-nine participants conducted GA reviews with J Milburn (submissions) completing nine.

If you are concerned that your nomination will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on Wikipedia:WikiCup/Reviews. Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. Thanks to everyone for participating, and good luck to those moving into round 2. Sturmvogel 66 (talk · contribs · email), Figureskatingfan (talk · contribs · email), and Godot13 (talk · contribs · email) --MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 02:39, 1 March 2016 (UTC)

WikiCup 2016 March newsletter (update)

Along with getting the year wrong in the newsletter that went out earlier this week, we did not mention (as the bot did not report) that Cas Liber (submissions) claimed the first Featured Article Persoonia terminalis of the 2016 Wikicup. Sturmvogel 66 (talk · contribs · email), Figureskatingfan (talk · contribs · email), and Godot13 (talk · contribs · email).--MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 16:05, 2 March 2016 (UTC)

The Signpost: 02 March 2016

News and notes: Tretikov resigns, WMF in transition

Featured content: This week's featured content

Traffic report: Brawling

Recent research: Wikipedia and paid labour; Swedish gender gap; how verifiable is "verifiable"?

Blog: Wikimedia Foundation details requests to alter or remove content in new transparency report

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 01:01, 8 March 2016 (UTC)

The Signpost: 09 March 2016

News and notes: Katherine Maher named interim head of WMF; Wales email re-sparks Heilman controversy; draft WMF strategy posted

In the media: Wikipedian is break-out star of International Women's Day; dinosaur art; Wikipedia's new iOS app and its fight for market share

Op-ed: A modest proposal for Wikimedia’s future

Featured content: Five articles, four lists, a topic, and five images were promoted this week.

Technology report: Wikimedia wikis will temporarily go into read-only mode on several occasions in the coming weeks

WikiCup report: First round of the WikiCup finishes

Blog: The new alchemy: turning online harassment into Wikipedia articles on women scientists

Systemic bias: Revenge of "I can’t believe we didn’t have an article on ..."

Traffic report: All business like show business

The Signpost: 16 March 2016

News and notes: Wikipedia Zero: Orange mobile partnership in Africa ends; the evolution of privacy loss in Wikipedia

In the media: Wales at SXSW; lawsuit over Wikipedia PR editing

Op-ed: Hard work needed to address Wikimedia’s leadership challenges

Discussion report: Is an interim WMF executive director inherently notable?

Featured content: This week's featured content

Technology report: Watchlists, watchlists, watchlists!

Traffic report: Donald Trump, the 45th President of the United States

Wikipedia Weekly: Podcast #119: The Foundation and the departure of Lila Tretikov

Blog: It “revolutionized the way German-speaking people inform themselves about the world”: Fifteen years of the German Wikipedia

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 21:13, 19 March 2016 (UTC)

The Signpost: 23 March 2016

Interview: Exclusive: interview with interim ED Katherine Maher

News and notes: Lila Tretikov a Young Global Leader; Wikipediocracy blog post sparks indefinite blocks

In the media: Angolan file sharers cause trouble for Wikipedia Zero; the 3D printer edit war; a culture based on change and turmoil

Traffic report: Be weary on the Ides of March

Editorial: "God damn it, you've got to be kind."

Featured content: Watch out! A slave trader, a live mascot and a crested serpent awaits!

Arbitration report: Palestine-Israel article 3 case amended

Wikipedia Weekly: Podcast #120: Status of Wikimania 2016

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 03:25, 27 March 2016 (UTC)

The Signpost: 1 April 2016

News and notes: Trump/Wales 2016

In the media: Saskatoon police delete Wikipedia content about police brutality

WikiProject report: Why should the Devil have all the good music? An interview with WikiProject Christian music

Traffic report: Donald v Daredevil

Featured content: A slow, slow week

Technology report: Browse Wikipedia in safety? Use Telnet!

Recent research: "Employing Wikipedia for good not evil" in education; using eyetracking to find out how readers read articles

Wikipedia Weekly: Podcast #121: How April Fools went down

Blog: Growing hashtags: Expanding outreach on Wikipedia

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 20:12, 1 April 2016 (UTC)

Do you want one Edit tab, or two? It's your choice

How to switch between editing environments

Click the [[ ]] to switch to the wikitext editor.

Click the pencil icon to switch to the visual editor.

The editing interface will be changed soon. When that happens, editors who currently see two editing tabs – "Edit" and "Edit source" – will start seeing one edit tab instead. The single edit tab has been popular at other Wikipedias. When this is deployed here, you may be offered the opportunity to choose your preferred appearance and behavior the next time you click the Edit button. You will also be able to change your settings in the Editing section of Special:Preferences.

You can choose one or two edit tabs. If you chose one edit tab, then you can switch between the two editing environments by clicking the buttons in the toolbar (shown in the screenshots). See Help:VisualEditor/User guide#Switching between the visual and wikitext editors for more information and screenshots.

There is more information about this interface change at mw:VisualEditor/Single edit tab. If you have questions, suggestions, or problems to report, then please leave a note at Wikipedia:VisualEditor/Feedback.

Whatamidoing (WMF) 19:22, 11 April 2016 (UTC)

The Signpost: 14 April 2016

Op-ed: Should prison inmates be permitted to edit Wikipedia?

News and notes: Denny Vrandečić resigns from Wikimedia Foundation board

In the media: Wikimedia Sweden loses copyright case; Tex Watson; AI assistants; David Jolly biography

Featured content: This week's featured content

Traffic report: A welcome return to pop culture and death

Arbitration report: The first case of 2016—Wikicology

Gallery: A history lesson

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 00:46, 14 April 2016 (UTC)

The Signpost: 24 April 2016

News and notes: Lunar project; steering group formed to search for next executive director

Op-ed: Knowledge Engine and the Wales–Heilman emails

Special report: Update on EranBot, our new copyright violation detection bot

Traffic report: Two for the price of one

Featured content: The double-sized edition

Arbitration report: Amendments made to the Race and intelligence case

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 22:42, 24 April 2016 (UTC)

The Signpost: 2 May 2016

News and notes: Wikimedia Switzerland's board and paid-editing firm; passing of Ed Dravecky

In the media: Wikipedia Zero piracy in Bangladesh; bureaucracy; chilling effects; too few cooks; translation gaps

Traffic report: Purple

Featured content: The best ... from the past two weeks

Arbitration report: Two editors unbanned; Wikicology case enters workshop phase; Gamaliel restricted from Gamergate at his own request

Recent research: The eight roles of Wikipedians; do edit histories expose social relations among editors?

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 03:09, 2 May 2016 (UTC)

WikiCup 2016 May newsletter

Round 2 is over and 35 competitors have moved on to Round 3.

Round 2 saw three FAs (two by Cas Liber (submissions) and one by Montanabw (submissions)), four Featured Lists (with three by Calvin999 (submissions)), and 53 Good Articles (six by Worm That Turned (submissions) and five each by Hurricanehink (submissions), Cwmhiraeth (submissions), and MPJ-DK (submissions)). Eleven Featured Pictures were promoted (six by Adam Cuerden (submissions) and five by Godot13 (submissions)). One Featured Portal, Featured Topic and Good Topic were also promoted. The DYK base point total was 1,135. Cwmhiraeth (submissions) scored 265 base points, while The C of E (submissions) and MPJ-DK (submissions) each scored 150 base points. Eleven ITN were promoted and 131 Good Article Reviews were conducted with MPJ-DK (submissions) completing a staggering 61 reviews. Two contestants, Cwmhiraeth (submissions) and Cas Liber (submissions), broke the 700 point mark for Round 2.

If you are concerned that your nomination will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on Wikipedia:WikiCup/Reviews. Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. Thanks to everyone for participating, and good luck to those moving into round 2. Sturmvogel 66 (talk · contribs · email), Figureskatingfan (talk · contribs · email), and Godot13 (talk · contribs · email) -- MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 03:00, 5 May 2016 (UTC)

The Signpost: 17 May 2016

News and notes: Affiliates' nomination of WMF trustees announced; FDC's straight talking to WMF

Op-ed: Swiss chapter in turmoil

In the media: Wikimedia's Dario Taraborelli quoted on Google's Knowledge Graph in The Washington Post

Featured content: Two weeks for the prize of one

Traffic report: Oh behave, Beyhive / Underdogs

Arbitration report: "Wikicology" ends in site ban; evidence and workshop phases concluded for "Gamaliel and others"

Wikicup: That's it for WikiCup Round 2!

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 02:33, 17 May 2016 (UTC)

The Signpost: 28 May 2016

News and notes: Upcoming Wikimedia conferences in the US and India; May Metrics and Activities Meeting

Special report: Compensation paid to Sue Gardner increased by almost 50 percent after she stepped down as executive director

In the media: The perils of Wikipedia's monopoly; Wikipedians' fragility; Street Sharks hoax

Featured content: Eight articles, three lists and five pictures

Op-ed: Journey of a Wikipedian

Arbitration report: Gamaliel resigns from the arbitration committee

Recent research: English as Wikipedia's Lingua Franca; deletion rationales; schizophrenia controversies

Traffic report: Splitting (musical) airs / Slow Ride

Blog: Freely licensed magic at Eurovision

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 21:13, 28 May 2016 (UTC)

The Signpost: 05 June 2016

News and notes: WMF cuts budget for 2016-17 as scope tightens

In the media: Jimmy Wales on net neutrality—"It's complicated"—and his $100m fundraising challenge

Featured content: Overwhelmed ... by pictures

Traffic report: Pop goes the culture, again.

Arbitration report: ArbCom case "Gamaliel and others" concludes

WikiProject report: WikiProject Video Games

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 20:13, 5 June 2016 (UTC)

The Signpost: 15 June 2016

News and notes: Clarifications on status and compensation of outgoing executive directors Sue Gardner and Lila Tretikov

Special report: Wikiversity Journal—A new user group

Featured content: From the crème de la crème

In the media: Biography disputes; Craig Newmark donation; PR editing

Op-ed: Commons Picture of the Year; Wikidata licensing

Traffic report: Another one with sports; Knockout, brief candle

Blog: Why I proofread poetry at Wikisource

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 21:58, 15 June 2016 (UTC)

Editing News #2—2016

Editing News #2—2016 Read this in another language • Subscription list for this multilingual newsletter

Did you know?

It's quick and easy to insert a references list.

Place the cursor where you want to display the references list (usually at the bottom of the page). Open the "Insert" menu and click the "References list" icon (three books).

If you are using several groups of references, which is relatively rare, you will have the opportunity to specify the group. If you do that, then only the references that belong to the specified group will be displayed in this list of references.

Finally, click "Insert" in the dialog to insert the References list. This list will change as you add more footnotes to the page.

You can read and help translate the user guide, which has more information about how to use the visual editor.

Since the last newsletter, the VisualEditor team has fixed many bugs. Their workboard is available in Phabricator. Their current priorities are improving support for Arabic and Indic scripts, and adapting the visual editor to the needs of the Wikivoyages and Wikisources.

Recent changes

The visual editor is now available to all users at most Wikivoyages. It was also enabled for all contributors at the French Wikinews.

The single edit tab feature combines the "Edit" and "Edit source" tabs into a single "Edit" tab. It has been deployed to several Wikipedias, including Hungarian, Polish, English and Japanese Wikipedias, as well as to all Wikivoyages. At these wikis, you can change your settings for this feature in the "Editing" tab of Special:Preferences. The team is now reviewing the feedback and considering ways to improve the design before rolling it out to more people.

Future changes

The "Save page" button will say "Publish page". This will affect both the visual and wikitext editing systems. More information is available on Meta.

The visual editor will be offered to all editors at the remaining "Phase 6" Wikipedias during the next few months. The developers want to know whether typing in your language feels natural in the visual editor. Please post your comments and the language(s) that you tested at the feedback thread on mediawiki.org. This will affect several languages, including: Arabic, Hindi, Thai, Tamil, Marathi, Malayalam, Urdu, Persian, Bengali, Assamese, Aramaic and others.

The team is working with the volunteer developers who power Wikisource to provide the visual editor there, for opt-in testing right now and eventually for all users. (T138966)

The team is working on a modern wikitext editor. It will look like the visual editor, and be able to use the citoid service and other modern tools. This new editing system may become available as a Beta Feature on desktop devices around September 2016. You can read about this project in a general status update on the Wikimedia mailing list.

Let's work together

Do you teach new editors how to use the visual editor? Did you help set up the Citoid automatic reference feature for your wiki? Have you written or imported TemplateData for your most important citation templates? Would you be willing to help new editors and small communities with the visual editor? Please sign up for the new VisualEditor Community Taskforce.
Learn how to improve the "automagical" citoid referencing system in the visual editor, by creating Zotero translators for popular sources in your language! Watch the Tech Talk by Sebastian Karcher for more information.

If you aren't reading this in your preferred language, then please help us with translations! Subscribe to the Translators mailing list or contact us directly, so that we can notify you when the next issue is ready. Thank you!

Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk), 21:09, 30 June 2016 (UTC)

The Signpost: 04 July 2016

News and notes: Board unanimously appoints Katherine Maher as new WMF executive director; Wikimedia lawsuits in France and Germany

Op-ed: Two policies in conflict?

In the media: Terrorism database cites Wikipedia as a source

Featured content: Triple fun of featured content

Traffic report: Goalposts; Oy vexit

Blog: Jimmy Wales names Emily Temple-Wood and Rosie Stephenson-Goodknight as Wikipedians of the Year

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 18:47, 4 July 2016 (UTC)

The Signpost: 21 July 2016

News and notes: Board faces diversity and skill-base issues in new FDC appointments

Discussion report: Busy month for discussions

In the media: Women in science editathon gets national press; Wikipedia "shockingly biased"

Featured content: A wide variety from the best

Traffic report: Sports and esports

Arbitration report: Script writers appointed for clerks

Recent research: Using deep learning to predict article quality

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 13:19, 21 July 2016 (UTC)

The Signpost: 04 August 2016

Editorial: Wikipedia policy suppresses sharing of information

News and notes: Foundation presents results of harassment research, plans for automated identification; Wikiconference submissions open

In the media: Paid editing service announced; Commercial exploitation of free images; Wikipedia as a crystal ball; Librarians to counter systemic bias

Obituary: Kevin Gorman, who took on Wikipedia's gender gap and undisclosed paid advocacy, dies at 24

Traffic report: Summer of Pokémon, Trump, and Hillary

Featured content: Women and Hawaii

Recent research: Easier navigation via better wikilinks

Blog: All-new notifications page helps Wikimedians focus on what matters most

Technology report: User script report (January to July 2016, part 1)

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 23:33, 4 August 2016 (UTC)

The Tireless Contributor Barnstar

		The Tireless Contributor Barnstar
		For your extensive work on articles regarding world snooker and football in Hong Kong, I think this is well deserved and well overdue. Davykamanzi → talk • contribs • alter ego 19:11, 8 August 2016 (UTC)

The Signpost: 18 August 2016

News and notes: Focus on India—WikiConference produces new apps; state government adopts free licenses

Special report: Engaging diverse communities to profile women of Antarctica

In the media: The ugly, the bad, the playful, and the promising

Featured content: Simply the best ... from the last two weeks

Traffic report: Olympic views

Technology report: User script report (January–July 2016, part 2)

Arbitration report: The Michael Hardy case

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 16:40, 18 August 2016 (UTC)

The Signpost: 06 September 2016

News and notes: AffCom still grappling with WMF Board's criteria for new chapters

Special report: Olympics readership depended on language

In the media: Librarians, Wikipedians, and a library of Wikipedia coverage

WikiProject report: Watching Wikipedia

Featured content: Entertainment, sport, and something else in-between

Traffic report: From Phelps to Bolt to Reddit

Technology report: Wikimedia mobile sites now don't load images if the user doesn't see them

Recent research: Ethics of machine-created articles and fighting vandalism

Blog: Upload of free photos from Swiss library underway

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 21:44, 6 September 2016 (UTC)

Orphaned non-free image File:HKSFC new.png

⚠

Thanks for uploading File:HKSFC new.png. The image description page currently specifies that the image is non-free and may only be used on Wikipedia under a claim of fair use. However, the image is currently not used in any articles on Wikipedia. If the image was previously in an article, please go to the article and see why it was removed. You may add it back if you think that that will be useful. However, please note that images for which a replacement could be created are not acceptable for use on Wikipedia (see our policy for non-free media).

Note that any non-free images not used in any articles will be deleted after seven days, as described in the criteria for speedy deletion. Thank you. --B-bot (talk) 02:34, 25 September 2016 (UTC)

The Signpost: 29 September 2016

News and notes: Wikipedia Education Program case study published; and a longtime Wikimedian has made his final edit

In the media: Wikipedia in the news

Featured content: Three weeks in the land of featured content

Arbitration report: Arbcom looking for new checkusers and oversight appointees while another case opens

Traffic report: From Gene Wilder to JonBenét

Technology report: Category sorting and template parameters

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 04:21, 29 September 2016 (UTC)

Invitation to the African Destubathon

Hi. You may be interested in participating in the African Destubathon which starts on October 15. Africa currently has over 37,000 stubs and badly needs a quality improvement editathon/contest to flesh out basic stubs. There are proposed substantial prizes to give to editors who do the most articles, and planned smaller prizes for doing to most destubs for each of the 53 African countries, so should be enjoyable! So it would be a good chance to win something for improving stubs on African sportspeople, including footballers, athletes, Olympians and Paralympians etc, particularly female ones, but also male. Even if contests aren't your thing we would be grateful if you could consider destubbing a few African articles during the drive to help the cause and help reduce the massive 37,000 + stub count, of which many are rated high importance (think Regions of countries etc). If you're interested in competing or just loosely contributing a few expanded articles on African Paralympians, Olympians and committees etc, please add your name to the Contestants/participants section. Diversity of work from a lot of people will make this that bit more special. Thanks. --MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 21:14, 6 October 2016 (UTC)

Editing News #3—2016

Read this in another language • Subscription list for this multilingual newsletter • Subscribe or unsubscribe on the English Wikipedia

Did you know?

Did you know that you can easily re-arrange columns and rows in the visual editor?

Select a cell in the column or row that you want to move. Click the arrow at the start of that row or column to open the dropdown menu (shown). Choose either "Move before" or "Move after" to move the column, or "Move above" or "Move below" to move the row.

You can read and help translate the user guide, which has more information about how to use the visual editor.

Since the last newsletter, the VisualEditor Team has mainly worked on a new wikitext editor. They have also released some small features and the new map editing tool. Their workboard is available in Phabricator. You can find links to the list of work finished each week at mw:VisualEditor/Weekly triage meetings. Their current priorities are fixing bugs, releasing the 2017 wikitext editor as a beta feature, and improving language support.

Recent changes

You can now set text as small or big.[1]
Invisible templates have been shown as a puzzle icon. Now, the name of the invisible template is displayed next to the puzzle icon.[2] A similar feature will display the first part of hidden HTML comments.[3]
Categories are displayed at the bottom of each page. If you click on the categories, the dialog for editing categories will open.[4]
At many wikis, you can now add maps to pages. Go to the Insert menu and choose the "Maps" item. The Discovery department are adding more features to this area, like geoshapes. You can read more on MediaWiki.org.[5]
The "Save" button now says "Save page" when you create a page, and "Save changes" when you change an existing page.[6] In the future, the "Save page" button will say "Publish page". This will affect both the visual and wikitext editing systems. More information is available on Meta.
Image galleries now use a visual mode for editing. You can see thumbnails of the images, add new files, remove unwanted images, rearrange the images by dragging and dropping, and add captions for each image. Use the "Options" tab to set the gallery's display mode, image sizes, and add a title for the gallery.[7]

Future changes

The visual editor will be offered to all editors at the remaining 10 "Phase 6" Wikipedias during the next month. The developers want to know whether typing in your language feels natural in the visual editor. Please post your comments and the language(s) that you tested at the feedback thread on mediawiki.org. This will affect several languages, including Thai, Burmese and Aramaic.

The team is working on a modern wikitext editor. The 2017 wikitext editor will look like the visual editor and be able to use the citoid service and other modern tools. This new editing system may become available as a Beta Feature on desktop devices in October 2016. You can read about this project in a general status update on the Wikimedia mailing list.

Let's work together

Do you teach new editors how to use the visual editor? Did you help set up the Citoid automatic reference feature for your wiki? Have you written or imported TemplateData for your most important citation templates? Would you be willing to help new editors and small communities with the visual editor? Please sign up for the new VisualEditor Community Taskforce.

If you aren't reading this in your preferred language, then please help us with translations! Subscribe to the Translators mailing list or contact us directly, so that we can notify you when the next issue is ready. Thank you! Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 18:18, 14 October 2016 (UTC)

The Signpost: 14 October 2016

News and notes: Fundraising, flora and fauna

Discussion report: Cultivating leadership: Wikimedia Foundation seeks input

In the media: A news columnist on the frustrations of tweaking his Wikipedia bio

Technology report: Upcoming tech projects for 2017

Featured content: Variety is the spice of life

Traffic report: Debates and escapes

Recent research: A 2011 study resurfaces in a media report

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 19:29, 14 October 2016 (UTC)

WikiCup 2016 November newsletter: Final results

The final round of the 2016 WikiCup is over. Congratulations to the 2016 WikiCup top three finalists:

First Place - Cas Liber (submissions)
Second Place - MPJ-DK (submissions)
Third Place - Adam Cuerden (submissions)

In addition to recognizing the achievements of the top finishers and everyone who worked hard to make it to the final round, we also want to recognize those participants who were most productive in each of the WikiCup scoring categories:

Featured Article – Cas Liber (actually a three-way tie with themselves for two FAs in each of R2, R3, and R5).
Good Article – MPJ-DK had 14 GAs promoted in R3.
Featured List – Calvin999 (submissions) produced 2 FLs in R2
Featured Pictures – Adam Cuerden restored 18 images to FP status in R4.
Featured Portal – SSTflyer (submissions) produced the only FPO of the Cup in R2.
Featured Topic – Cyclonebiskit (submissions) and Calvin were each responsible for one FT in R3 and R2, respectively.
Good Topic – MPJ-DK created a GT with 9 GAs in R5.
Did You Know – MPJ-DK put 53 DYKs on the main page in R4.
In The News – Dharmadhyaksha (submissions) and Muboshgu (submissions), each with 5 ITN, both in R4.
Good Article Review – MPJ-DK completed 61 GARs in R2.

Over the course of the 2016 WikiCup the following content was added to Wikipedia (only reporting on fixed value categories): 17 Featured Articles, 183 Good Articles, 8 Featured Lists, 87 Featured Pictures, 40 In The News, and 321 Good Article Reviews. Thank you to all the competitors for your hard work and what you have done to improve Wikipedia.--MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 01:52, 2 November 2016 (UTC)

We will open up a discussion for comments on process and scoring in a few days. The 2017 WikiCup is just around the corner! Many thanks from all the judges. If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. Sturmvogel 66 (talk · contribs · email), Figureskatingfan (talk · contribs · email), and Godot13 (talk · contribs · email)

WikiProject Good Articles's 2016-2017 GA Cup

WikiProject Good Articles's 2016-2017 GA Cup

Greetings, all!

We would like to announce the start of the 4th GA Cup, a competition that seeks to encourage the reviewing of Good article nominations! Thus far, there have been three GA Cups, which were successful in reaching our goals of significantly reducing the traditionally long queue at GAN, so we're doing it again. Currently, there are over 400 nominations listed. We hope that we can again make an impact this time.

The 4th GA Cup will begin on November 1, 2016. Four rounds are currently scheduled (which will bring the competition to a close on February 28, 2017), but this may change based on participant numbers. We may take a break in December for the holidays, depending on the results of a poll of our participants taken shortly after the competition begins. The sign-up and submissions process will remain the same, as will the scoring.

Sign-ups for the upcoming competition are currently open and will close on November 14, 2016. Everyone is welcome to join; new and old editors, so sign-up now!

If you have any questions, take a look at the FAQ page and/or contact one of the judges.

Cheers from 3family6, Figureskatingfan, Jaguar, MrWooHoo, and Zwerg Nase. We apologize for the delay in sending out this message until after the competition has started. Thank you to Krishna Chaitanya Velaga for aiding in getting this message out.

To subscribe or unsubscribe to future GA Cup newsletters, please add or remove your name to our mailing list. If you are a participant, you will be on the mailing list no matter what as this is the easiest way to communicate between all participants.

--MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 01:40, 3 November 2016 (UTC)

The Signpost: 4 November 2016

News and notes: Finally, a new CTO; trustee joins Quora; copyright upgrade impending

In the media: Washington Post continues in-depth Wikipedia coverage

Wikicup: WikiCup winners

Discussion report: What's on your tech wishlist for the coming year?

Technology report: New guideline for technical collaboration; citation templates now flag open access content

Featured content: Cream of the crop

Traffic report: Un-presidential politics

Arbitration report: Recapping October's activities

Recent research: Why women edit less, and where they are overrepresented; article importance and quality; predicting elections from Wikipedia

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 17:51, 4 November 2016 (UTC)

ArbCom Elections 2016: Voting now open!

Hello, Fabregas0414. Voting in the 2016 Arbitration Committee elections is open from Monday, 00:00, 21 November through Sunday, 23:59, 4 December to all unblocked users who have registered an account before Wednesday, 00:00, 28 October 2016 and have made at least 150 mainspace edits before Sunday, 00:00, 1 November 2016.

The Arbitration Committee is the panel of editors responsible for conducting the Wikipedia arbitration process. It has the authority to impose binding solutions to disputes between editors, primarily for serious conduct disputes the community has been unable to resolve. This includes the authority to impose site bans, topic bans, editing restrictions, and other measures needed to maintain our editing environment. The arbitration policy describes the Committee's roles and responsibilities in greater detail.

If you wish to participate in the 2016 election, please review the candidates' statements and submit your choices on the voting page. MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 22:08, 21 November 2016 (UTC)

The Signpost: 4 November 2016

News and notes: Arbitration Committee elections commence

In the media: Roundup of news related to U.S. presidential election and more

Blog: The top fifteen winning photos from Wiki Loves Earth

Gallery: Around the world with Wiki Loves Monuments 2016

Featured content: Featured mix

Special report: Taking stock of the Good Article backlog

Op-ed: Fundraising data should be more transparent

Traffic report: President-elect Trump

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 09:06, 26 November 2016 (UTC)

WikiCup December newsletter: WikiCup 2017

On 1 January 2017, WikiCup 2017 (the 10th Annual WikiCup) will begin. This year we are trying something a little different – monetary prizes.

For the WC2017 the prizes will be as follows (amounts are based in US$ and will be awarded in the form of an online Amazon gift certificate):

First place – $200
Second & Third place – $50 each
Category prizes – $25 per category (which will be limited to FA, FL, FP, GA, and DYK for 2017). Winning a category prize does not require making it to the final round.

Note: Monetary prizes are a one-year experiment for 2017 and may or may not be continued in the future. In order to be eligible to receive any of the prizes above, the competing Wikipedia account must have a valid/active email address.

After two years as a WikiCup judge, Figureskatingfan is stepping down. We thank her for her contributions as a WikiCup judge. We are pleased to announce that our newest judge is two-time WikiCup champion Cwmhiraeth.

The judges for the 2017 WikiCup are Godot13 (talk · contribs · email), Cwmhiraeth (talk · contribs), and Sturmvogel 66 (talk · contribs · email).

Signups are open now and will remain open until 5 February 2017. You can sign up here.

If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send.MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 20:02, 14 December 2016 (UTC)

The Signpost: 22 December 2016

Year in review: Looking back on 2016

News and notes: Strategic planning update; English ArbCom election results

Special report: German ArbCom implodes

In focus: Active user page filter prevents vandalism and harassment

Op-ed: Operation successful, patient dead: Outreach workshops in Namibia

In the media: In brief: Coverage of gender gap initiatives, banner fundraising, and more

Featured content: The Christmas edition

Technology report: Labs improvements impact 2016 Tool Labs survey results

Traffic report: Post-election traffic blues

Blog: Wiki Loves Monuments contest winners announced

Recent research: One study and several abstracts

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 03:04, 22 December 2016 (UTC)

The Signpost: 17 January 2017

From the editor: Next steps for the Signpost

News and notes: Surge in RFA promotions—a sign of lasting change?

Interview: What is it like to edit Wikipedia when you're blind?

In the media: Year-end roundups, Wikipedia's 16th birthday, and more

Featured content: One year ends, and another begins

Arbitration report: Concluding 2016 and covering 2017's first two cases

Traffic report: Out with the old, in with the new

Technology report: Tech present, past, and future

Recent research: Female Wikipedians aren't more likely to edit women biographies; Black Lives Matter in Wikipedia

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 10:39, 17 January 2017 (UTC)

The Signpost: 6 February 2017

Arbitration report: WMF Legal and ArbCom weigh in on tension between disclosure requirements and user privacy

Special report: Wolves nip at Wikipedia's heels: A perspective on the cost of paid editing

News and notes: Official WMF rebuke to Trump policy; WMF secures restricted funds

In focus: WMF strategy consultant brings background in crisis reputation management; Team behind popular WMF software put "on pause"

WikiProject report: For the birds!

Op-ed: How to make editing workshops useful, even if participants don't stick around

In the media: Presidential politics, periodic table, and our periodic roundup of updates

Technology report: Better PDFs, backup plans, and birthday wishes

Traffic report: Cool It Now

Featured content: Three weeks dominated by articles

Forum: Productive collaboration around coordinated protest marches; Media and political personalities comment on Wikipedia at its 16th birthday celebration

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 10:46, 6 February 2017 (UTC)

The Signpost: 27 February 2017

From the editors: Results from our poll on subscription and delivery, and a new RSS feed

Recent research: Special issue: Wikipedia in education

Technology report: Responsive content on desktop; Offline content in Android app

In the media: The Daily Mail does not run Wikipedia

Gallery: A Met montage

Special report: Peer review – a history and call for reviewers

Op-ed: Wikipedia has cancer

Featured content: The dominance of articles continues

Traffic report: Love, football, and politics

Blog: WikiIndaba 2017: A continent gathers to chart a path forward

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 01:20, 28 February 2017 (UTC)

March 2017 WikiCup newsletter

And so ends the first round of the competition, with 4 points required to qualify for round 2. It would have been 5 points, but when a late entrant was permitted to join the contest in February, a promise was made that his inclusion would not result in the exclusion of any other competitor. To achieve this, the six entrants that had the lowest positive score of 4 points have been added to the 64 people who otherwise would have qualified. As a result, some of the groups have nine contestants rather than eight. Our top four scorers in round 1 were:

Cas Liber, last year's winner, led the field with two featured articles on birds and a total score of 674.
Iry-Hor, a WikiCup newcomer, came next with a featured article, a good article and a tally of 282 bonus points for a score of 517. All these points came from the article Nyuserre Ini, an Ancient Egyptian pharaoh,
1989, another WikiCup newcomer, was in joint third place at 240. 1989 has claimed points for two featured lists and one good article relating to anime and comedy series, all of which were awarded bonus points.
Peacemaker67 shared third place with five good articles and thirteen good article reviews, mostly on naval vessels. He is also new to the competition.

The largest number of DYKs have been submitted by Vivvt and The C of E, who each claimed for seven, and MBlaze Lightning achieved eight articles at ITN. Carbrera and Peacemaker67 each claimed for five GAs and Krishna Chaitanya Velaga was well out in front for GARs, having reviewed 32. No featured pictures, featured topics or good topics yet, but we have achieved three featured articles and a splendid total of fifty good articles.

So, on to the second round. Remember that any content promoted after the end of round 1 but before the start of round 2 can be claimed in round 2. Invitations for collaborative writing efforts or any other discussion of potentially interesting work is always welcome on the WikiCup talk page. Remember, if two or more WikiCup competitors have done significant work on an article, all can claim points equally.

If you are concerned that your nomination—whether it is a good article candidate, a featured process, or anything else—will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on Wikipedia:WikiCup/Reviews. If you want to help out with the WikiCup, please do your bit to help keep down the review backlogs! Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. Godot13, Sturmvogel 66 and Cwmhiraeth 13:52, 1 March 2017 (UTC)

Editing News #1—2017

Read this in another language • Subscription list for this multilingual newsletter

Did you know?

Did you know that you can review your changes visually?

When you are finished editing the page, type your edit summary and then choose "Review your changes".

In visual mode, you will see additions, removals, new links, and formatting highlighted. Other changes, such as changing the size of an image, are described in notes on the side.

Click the toggle button to switch between visual and wikitext diffs.

The wikitext diff is the same diff tool that is used in the wikitext editors and in the page history.

You can read and help translate the user guide, which has more information about how to use the visual editor.

Since the last newsletter, the VisualEditor Team has spent most of their time supporting the 2017 wikitext editor mode which is available inside the visual editor as a Beta Feature, and adding the new visual diff tool. Their workboard is available in Phabricator. You can find links to the work finished each week at mw:VisualEditor/Weekly triage meetings. Their current priorities are fixing bugs, supporting the 2017 wikitext editor as a beta feature, and improving the visual diff tool.

Recent changes

A new wikitext editing mode is available as a Beta Feature on desktop devices. The 2017 wikitext editor has the same toolbar as the visual editor and can use the citoid service and other modern tools. Go to Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-betafeatures to enable the ⧼Visualeditor-preference-newwikitexteditor-label⧽.

A new visual diff tool is available in VisualEditor's visual mode. You can toggle between wikitext and visual diffs. More features will be added to this later. In the future, this tool may be integrated into other MediaWiki components. [8]

The team have added multi-column support for lists of footnotes. The <references /> block can automatically display long lists of references in columns on wide screens. This makes footnotes easier to read. You can request multi-column support for your wiki. [9]

Other changes:

You can now use your web browser's function to switch typing direction in the new wikitext mode. This is particularly helpful for RTL language users like Urdu or Hebrew who have to write JavaScript or CSS. You can use Command+Shift+X or Control+Shift+X to trigger this. [10]
The way to switch between the visual editing mode and the wikitext editing mode is now consistent. There is a drop-down menu that shows the two options. This is now the same in desktop and mobile web editing, and inside things that embed editing, such as Flow. [11]
The Categories item has been moved to the top of the Page options menu (from clicking on the icon) for quicker access. [12] There is also now a "Templates used on this page" feature there. [13]
You can now create <chem> tags (sometimes used as <ce>) for chemical formulas inside the visual editor. [14]
Tables can be set as collapsed or un-collapsed. [15]
The Special character menu now includes characters for Canadian Aboriginal Syllabics and angle quotation marks (‹› and ⟨⟩) . The team thanks the volunteer developer, Tpt. [16]
A bug caused some section edit conflicts to blank the rest of the page. This has been fixed. The team are sorry for the disruption. [17]
There is a new keyboard shortcut for citations: Control+Shift+K on a PC, or Command+Shift+K on a Mac. It is based on the keyboard shortcut for making links, which is Control+K on a PC or Command+K on a Mac. [18]

Future changes

The VisualEditor team is working with the Community Tech team on a syntax highlighting tool. It will highlight matching pairs of <ref> tags and other types of wikitext syntax. You will be able to turn it on and off. It will first become available in VisualEditor's built-in wikitext mode, maybe late in 2017. [19]
The kind of button used to Show preview, Show changes, and finish an edit will change in all WMF-supported wikitext editors. The new buttons will use OOjs UI. The buttons will be larger, brighter, and easier to read. The labels will remain the same. You can test the new button by editing a page and adding &ooui=1 to the end of the URL, like this: https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Project:Sandbox?action=edit&ooui=1 The old appearance will no longer be possible, even with local CSS changes. [20]
The outdated 2006 wikitext editor will be removed later this year. It is used by approximately 0.03% of active editors. See a list of editing tools on mediawiki.org if you are uncertain which one you use. [21]

If you aren't reading this in your preferred language, then please help us with translations! Subscribe to the Translators mailing list or contact us directly, so that we can notify you when the next issue is ready. Thank you! User:Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 19:18, 9 May 2017 (UTC)

The Signpost: 9 June 2017

From the editors: Signpost status: On reserve power, help wanted!

News and notes: Global Elections

Arbitration report: Cases closed in the Pacific and with Magioladitis

Op-ed: Wikipedia's lead sentence problem

Featured content: Three months in the land of the featured

In the media: Did Wikipedia just assume Garfield's gender?

Recent research: Wikipedia bot wars capture the imagination of the popular press

Technology report: Tech news catch-up

Traffic report: Film on Top: Sampling the weekly top 10

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 02:18, 9 June 2017 (UTC)

The Signpost: 23 June 2017

News and notes: Departments reorganized at Wikimedia Foundation, and a month without new RfAs (so far)

In the media: Kalanick's nipples; Episode #138 of Drama on the Hill

Op-ed: Facto Post: a fresh take

Featured content: Will there ever be a break? The slew of featured content continues

Traffic report: Wonder Woman beats Batman, The Mummy, Darth Vader and the Earth

Recent research: Utopian bubbles: Can Wikipedians create value outside of the capitalist system?

Technology report: Improved search, and WMF data scientist tells all

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 07:32, 23 June 2017 (UTC)

Template:Fb rbr t pos Hong Kong13

Why you create such template? It is a overkill because already exist Template:Fb rbr t pos; indeed with the option p=3 and r=12 they are the same:

{{Fb rbr pos header |nr=22}}
{{Fb rbr t pos|p=3|r=12   |t=Biu Chun Rangers|1|2|3|4|5|6|7|8|9|10|11|12}}<
{{Fb rbr t pos Hong Kong13|t=Biu Chun Rangers|1|2|3|4|5|6|7|8|9|10|11|12}}
|}

— Preceding unsigned comment added by Stigni (talk • contribs) 12:12, 24 May 2013 (UTC)

WikiCup 2017 July newsletter

The third round of the competition has finished in a flurry of last minute activity, with 288 points being required to qualify for round 4. It was a hotly competitive round with all but four of the contestants exceeding the 106 points that was necessary to proceed to round 4 last year. Coemgenus and Freikorp tied on 288, and both have been allowed to proceed, so round 4 now has one pool of eight competitors and one of nine.

Round 3 saw the achievement of a 26-topic Featured topic by MPJ-DK as well as 5 featured lists and 13 featured articles. PanagiotisZois and SounderBruce achieved their first ever featured articles. Carbrera led the GA score with 10, Tachs achieved 17 DYKs and MBlaze Lightning 10 In the news items. There were 167 DYKs, 93 GARs and 82 GAs overall, this last figure being higher than the number of GAs in round 2, when twice as many people were taking part. Even though contestants performed more GARs than they achieved GAs, there was still some frustration at the length of time taken to get articles reviewed.

As we start round 4, we say goodbye to the fifteen or so competitors who didn't quite make it; thank you for the useful contributions you have made to the Cup and Wikipedia. Remember that any content promoted after the end of round 3 but before the start of round 4 can be claimed in round 4. Remember too that you must claim your points within 10 days of "earning" them (some people have fallen foul of this rule and the points have been removed).

If you are concerned that your nomination, whether it be for a good article, a featured process, or anything else, will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on Wikipedia:WikiCup/Reviews. It would be helpful if this list could be cleared of any items no longer relevant. If you want to help out with the WikiCup, please do your bit to keep down the review backlogs! Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. Godot13, Sturmvogel 66 and Cwmhiraeth 05:38, 30 June 2017 (UTC)

The Signpost: 15 July 2017

News and notes: French chapter woes, new affiliates and more WMF team changes

Featured content: Spectacular animals, Pine Trees screens, and more

In the media: Concern about access and fairness, Foundation expenditures, and relationship to real-world politics and commerce

Recent research: The chilling effect of surveillance on Wikipedia readers

Op-ed: Why Task Forces are Dying in 2017

Gallery: A mix of patterns

Humour: The Infobox Game

Traffic report: Film, television and Internet phenomena reign with some room left over for America's birthday

Technology report: New features in development; more breaking changes for scripts

Wikicup: 2017 WikiCup round 3 wrap-up

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 01:49, 15 July 2017 (UTC)

The Signpost: 5 August 2017

News and notes: Non-English special edition! 99% no news about English-based wiki communities!

Recent research: Wikipedia can increase local tourism by +9%; predicting article quality with deep learning; recent behavior predicts quality

WikiProject report: Comic relief

In the media: Wikipedia used to judge death penalty, arms smuggling, Indonesian governance, and HOTTEST celebrity

Traffic report: Swedish countess tops the list

Blog: Canadian Supreme Court rules against Google in favor of worldwide court orders

Special report: Sharing Wikipedia offline medical information in the Dominican Republic

Featured content: Everywhere in the lead

Technology report: Introducing TechCom

Humour: WWASOHs and ETCSSs

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 00:22, 5 August 2017 (UTC)

WikiCup 2017 September newsletter

Round 4 of the WikiCup has ended and we move forward into the final round. In round 4, a total of 12 FAs, 3 FLs, 44 GAs, 3 FLs, 79 DYKs, 1 ITN and 42 GARs was achieved, with no FPs or FTs this time. Congratulations to Peacemaker67 on the Royal Yugoslav Navy Good Topic of 36 items, and the 12 featured articles achieved by Cas Liber (5), Vanamonde93 (3), Peacemaker67 (2), Adityavagarwal (1) and 12george1 (1). With a FA scoring 200 points, and bonus points available on top of this, FAs are likely to feature heavily in the final round. Meanwhile Yellow Evan, a typhoon specialist, was contributing 12 DYKs and 10 GAs, while Adityavagarwal and Freikorp topped the GAR list with 8 reviews each. As we enter the final round, we are down to eight contestants, and we would like to thank those of you who have been eliminated for the useful contributions you have made to the Cup and Wikipedia. The lowest score needed to reach round 5 was 305, and I think we can expect a highly competitive final round.

Remember that any content promoted after the end of round 4 but before the start of round 5 can be claimed in round 5. Remember too that you must claim your points within 10 days of "earning" them. If you are concerned that your nomination will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on Wikipedia:WikiCup/Reviews Needed. It would be helpful if this list could be cleared of any items no longer relevant. If you want to help out with the WikiCup, please do your bit to reduce the review backlogs! Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck, and let the best man (or woman) win! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. Godot13, Sturmvogel 66 and Cwmhiraeth 06:26, 1 September 2017 (UTC)

The Signpost: 6 September 2017

From the editors: What happened at Wikimania?

News and notes: Basselpedia; WMF Board of Trustees appointments

Featured content: Warfighters and their tools or trees and butterflies

Traffic report: A fortnight of conflicts

Special report: Biomedical content, and some thoughts on its future

Recent research: Discussion summarization; Twitter bots tracking government edits; extracting trivia from Wikipedia

In the media: Google's Ideological Echo Chamber; What makes someone successful?

WikiProject report: WikiProject YouTube

Technology report: Latest tech news

Wikicup: 2017 WikiCup round 4 wrap-up

Humour: Bots

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 03:45, 6 September 2017 (UTC)

The Signpost: 25 September 2017

News and notes: Chapter updates; ACTRIAL

In the media: Monkey settlement; Wikipedia used to give AI context clues

Humour: Chickenz

Recent research: Wikipedia articles vs. concepts; Wikipedia usage in Europe

Technology report: Flow restarted; Wikidata connection notifications

Gallery: Chicken mania

Special report: Two steps forward, one step backward: The Sustainability Initiative

Traffic report: Fights and frights

Featured content: Flying high

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 01:20, 25 September 2017 (UTC)

The Signpost: 23 October 2017

News and notes: Money! WMF fundraising, Wikimedia strategy, WMF new office!

Featured content: Don, Marcel, Emily, Jessica and other notables

Humour: Guys named Ralph

In focus: Offline Wikipedia developed at OFF.NETWORK Content Hackathon

Blog: The future of offline access to Wikipedia: The Kiwix example

In the media: Facebook and poetry

Special report: Working with GLAMs in the UK

Traffic report: Death, disaster, and entertainment

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 02:37, 23 October 2017 (UTC)

WikiCup 2017 November newsletter: Final results

The final round of the 2017 WikiCup is over. Congratulations to the 2017 WikiCup top three finalists:

First Place - Adityavagarwal (submissions)
Second Place - Vanamonde (submissions)
Third Place - Cas Liber (submissions)

In addition to recognizing the achievements of the top finishers and everyone who worked hard to make it to the final round, we also want to recognize those participants who were most productive in each of the WikiCup scoring categories:

Featured Article – Cas Liber (actually a two-way tie with themselves for an astonishing five FAs in R2 and R4).
Good Article – Adityavagarwal had 14 GAs promoted in R5.
Featured List – Bloom6132 (submissions) and 1989 (submissions) both produced 2 FLs in R2
Featured Pictures – SounderBruce (submissions) improved an image to FP status in R5, the only FP this year.
Featured Topic – MPJ-DK (submissions) has the only FT of the Cup in R3.
Good Topic – Four different editors created a GT in R2, R3 and R4.
Did You Know – Adityavagarwal had 22 DYKs on the main page in R5.
In The News – MBlaze Lightning (submissions) had 14 ITN on the main page in R2.
Good Article Review – Krishna Chaitanya Velaga (submissions) completed 31 GARs in R1.

Over the course of the 2017 WikiCup the following content was added or improved on Wikipedia: 51 Featured Articles, 292 Good Articles, 18 Featured Lists, 1 Featured Picture, 1 Featured Topics, 4 Good Topics, around 400 Did You Knows, 75 In The News, and 442 Good Article Reviews. Thank you to all the competitors for your hard work and what you have done to improve Wikipedia.

Regarding the prize vouchers - @Adityavagarwal, Vanamonde93, Casliber, Bloom6132, 1989, and SounderBruce: please send Godot13 (talk · contribs · email) an email from the email address to which you would like your Amazon voucher sent. Please include your preference of global Amazon marketplace as well. We hope to have the electronic gift cards processed and sent within a week.

We will open up a discussion for comments on process and scoring in a few days. The 2018 WikiCup is just around the corner! Many thanks from all the judges. If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. Sturmvogel 66 (talk · contribs · email), Cwmhiraeth (talk · contribs · email), and Godot13 (talk · contribs · email) MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 11:41, 2 November 2017 (UTC)

WikiCup 2018

So the 2017 WikiCup has come to an end. Congratulations to the winner, to the other finalists and to all those who took part. 177 contestants signed up, more than usual, but not all of them submitted entries in the first round. Were editors attracted by the cash prizes offered for the first time this year, or were these irrelevant? Do the rules and scoring need changing for the 2018 WikiCup? If you have a view on these or other matters, why not join in the WikiCup discussion about next year's contest? Sturmvogel 66 (talk · contribs · email), Godot13 (talk · contribs · email) and Cwmhiraeth (talk · contribs · email). MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 13:59, 17 November 2017 (UTC)

The Signpost: 24 November 2017

News and notes: Cons, cons, cons

Arbitration report: Administrator desysoped; How to deal with crosswiki issues; Mister Wiki case likely

Technology report: Searching and surveying

Interview: A featured article centurion

WikiProject report: Recommendations for WikiProjects

In the media: Open knowledge platform as a media institution

Traffic report: Strange and inappropriate

Featured content: We will remember them

Recent research: Who wrote this? New dataset on the provenance of Wikipedia text

Humour: Good faith (but still incomprehensible)

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 02:40, 24 November 2017 (UTC)

ArbCom 2017 election voter message

Hello, Dexterfung. Voting in the 2017 Arbitration Committee elections is now open until 23.59 on Sunday, 10 December. All users who registered an account before Saturday, 28 October 2017, made at least 150 mainspace edits before Wednesday, 1 November 2017 and are not currently blocked are eligible to vote. Users with alternate accounts may only vote once.

The Arbitration Committee is the panel of editors responsible for conducting the Wikipedia arbitration process. It has the authority to impose binding solutions to disputes between editors, primarily for serious conduct disputes the community has been unable to resolve. This includes the authority to impose site bans, topic bans, editing restrictions, and other measures needed to maintain our editing environment. The arbitration policy describes the Committee's roles and responsibilities in greater detail.

If you wish to participate in the 2017 election, please review the candidates and submit your choices on the voting page. MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 18:42, 3 December 2017 (UTC)