This page contains discussions that have been archived from Village pump (technical). Please do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to revive any of these discussions, either start a new thread or use the talk page associated with that topic.
During a period of low loads, the job queue might be zero. At Wikimedia, the job queue is, in practice, almost never zero. In off-peak hours, it might be a few hundreds to a thousand. During a busy day, it might be a few million, but it can quickly fluctuate by 10% or more.[1] The job queue length is reported at Special:Statistics.
Yesterday night I checked the job queue every ten seconds for two minutes, and it jumped from 9 to 24 and 243 thousand, back and forth. I repeated this with the same result (just different numbers) today. Would you have an explanation for that? It almost looks as though there are three job queues, and you get a random one. Debresser (talk) 21:49, 1 October 2009 (UTC)
Each time you fetch the page with the number of jobs in the queue, it is reported by one of the second-tier servers, which lag behind the master server. So when you see the number oscillate like that, it means your different requests are being handled by different servers, which are not in sync with the main server. So there is only one real job queue, but which secondary server answers your question is, essentially, random.
There is no direct way to query the master server about how long the job queue really is, but there isn't really a need to do so. On Wikipedia, we have system administrators who will fix things if the job queue gets too long. The Special:Statistics page is more useful for Mediawiki installations that do not have multiple second-level servers, in which case the number would be completely accurate. — Carl (CBM · talk) 01:06, 2 October 2009 (UTC)
This isn't quite right, but it's right where it's important – you should not worry about the job queue, we'll do that. — Werdna • talk09:05, 2 October 2009 (UTC)
Actually my answer was completely wrong, and I need to thank Domas for explaining it to me (although any errors here are entirely due to my own misunderstandings). I also looked at the code for Special:Statistics, which I should have done before.
It turns out that, for performance reasons, it is not practical to actually count the number of rows in the database table that holds the job queue. Therefore, the code for Mediawiki only estimates the number of rows. Because the estimate is written to be very fast but not very exact, it can vary wildly from moment to moment. The difficulty is that rows are constantly being added and removed from the job queue, so counting the rows that are "really" in the table is not as simple as it sounds. — Carl (CBM · talk) 13:16, 2 October 2009 (UTC)
I can tell you that the job queue is a subject that editors are interested in. Not worried about, but interested in. We see it as a measure of how well Wikipedia is coping with our edits. How healthy Wikipedia is at any given moment, so to speak. Apart from that, it gives us a sense of accomplishment. If I edit a widely used template, for example, I want to see the queue go up. I want to know whether my changes will be processed sooner, or later. And for all that I look to the job queue. I am not talking about myself alone, but about the community. Giving us such a false idea of the actual job queue, is disappointing. Can that be made to be more accurate? Frankly speaking, otherwise we should just not have it. Variances from 9 to 243 thousand are a mockery. Debresser (talk) 13:31, 2 October 2009 (UTC)
I've thought for a long time that we should just remove it, at least on Wikipedia. Make it do SELECT COUNT(*) so it's accurate for small sites, say, and then have an option to turn it off entirely for big sites. Even if it were accurate, it's useless to editors, and putting it on Special:Statistics misleads them into thinking they should care about it. —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 13:52, 2 October 2009 (UTC)
I agree it could be disabled, since (1) the number is not particularly accurate in the first place and (2) the system admins would tell everyone they should ignore it even if it were accurate. — Carl (CBM · talk) 13:59, 2 October 2009 (UTC)
FWIW, the reason you get a few different counts is because you're getting a few different counts. The count comes from InnoDB table statistics on whatever slave happens to run the query, and each slave calculates its own statistics. So it should be reasonably stable if you get the same slave, but two different slaves might have wildly different numbers (since it's a rough estimate). —Simetrical (talk • contribs) 13:55, 2 October 2009 (UTC)
I edited the interface so that it at least says "Estimated job queue length", so that new editors will be less likely to be mislead by the number. But disabling it seems like a better long-term solution. — Carl (CBM · talk) 14:00, 2 October 2009 (UTC)
In fact it has provided comfort when editing widely used templates to see the job queue deal with it, especially when WP seems to be going through one of it's medium term problems with resources. It may be an estimate but it is more concrete than WP:PERF. RichFarmbrough, 14:07, 2 October 2009 (UTC).
Removing information is generally a bad idea. But this is not information. Anything that can fluctuate within 5 seconds 2700% is not information! You call that a "detail"? Debresser (talk) 14:12, 2 October 2009 (UTC)
I updated the help page. I would suggest that it would be a possible solution to do a SQL COUNT periodically and store the result to be severed on special:statistics. I haven't the information to say whether this should be every 10 seconds, every minute or every second. If there are actually three or more separate queues then list them all, or the total. RichFarmbrough, 14:18, 2 October 2009 (UTC).
There are three different counts for the job queue. Each of them is consistent (doesn't fluctuate). Just now I had 3000, 348000 and 281000. Debresser (talk) 14:25, 2 October 2009 (UTC)
Move text up in collapsible template
I would like to have the three names evenly split on the collapsible header bar as they are now, but with the three words on the same line as the hide button.
Thanks for the suggestion Izno. The above is a very simplified example. The creator, nominator and editor count actually have names and information attached to them. I would like an editor to be able to see that creator, nominator and editor count information, but spaced evenly along the bar, even if the template is collapsed. Thanks. I have tried span tags, can't get it right, and div tags don't work.Ikip (talk) 21:00, 3 October 2009 (UTC)
StuffMoarStuff
Almost centered. The issue is that that the [close/open] takes up some space, so we have to set the width on the div to be less than article width less close width. This breaks down when we get to res's of about 600px, but that should be alright for our purposes, I suspect. --Izno (talk) 21:14, 3 October 2009 (UTC)
The link doesn't get on the best location, but that's probably a bug on the collapsible tables, which add it to the last cell instead of the first. Platonides (talk) 21:17, 3 October 2009 (UTC)
Something wrong happened; histories and contributions have changed, there's a unusable delete/undelete button in histories. JS doesn't seem to work. It's been difficult to edit since it happened. Certainly a configuration change caused this ? Has anyone information ? Cenarium (talk) 17:39, 7 October 2009 (UTC)
That path to wikibits.js got incorrectly set to /w/skins/common/wikibits.js somehow. Looks like it's fixed now. —GregU (talk) 17:47, 7 October 2009 (UTC)
I noticed the button & was wondering if that means selective deletion has been enabled... but it doesn't actually work right now. As far as problems go, I am having a lot of trouble saving changes. --ThaddeusB (talk) 17:50, 7 October 2009 (UTC)
Twice in less than five minutes, I made edits to (Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Log/2009 October 1) that ended up accidentally undoing the edit just prior to mine. I was unaware of this accident until I was notified about it on my talk page. Seeing that the situation had not yet been corrected, I attempted my own correction here, which resulted in another similar accident. In neither case was I given an automated edit conflict notification, and the edits just went through as if there was nothing wrong.
Was I given a free pass against edit conflicts by a bureaucrat or something like that, giving my edits priority over everyone else's when there's a conflict? Because if that's the case I'll willingly relinquish that "privilege" any time. -- Blanchardb-Me•MyEars•MyMouth- timed 16:59, 1 October 2009 (UTC)
There's no free pass. I'm not sure if that should've caused a conflict, or just gotten merged automatically. Either way, though, it seems like something went wrong in the merging somewhere. -Steve Sanbeg (talk) 21:57, 1 October 2009 (UTC)
I've seen this happen several times today, on several different pages; is it possible there's a problem with the edit conflict detector? --Floquenbeam (talk) 23:01, 1 October 2009 (UTC)
Yes, there are known issues with the edit conflict detector (at least, other people have reported the same problem). It seems to affect some editors more than others, either because of some nebulous browser issue or because of different editing patterns. I do not know if there is a bug filed about it. — Carl (CBM · talk) 00:57, 2 October 2009 (UTC)
Not enough of a pattern that I can find. It happened with this edit. Changes are shown to my edit that I didn't make, and that actual editor disappeared from the history. It's always possible that it's a cockpit error (me editing an old version or something), but I searched for that, and could not find one.—Kww(talk) 21:58, 4 October 2009 (UTC)
Spell checker!
I have no idea where to appropriately mention this, but this seems like the best place. It would be nice if the Wiki software could somehow incorporate a spell-checker in the "Edit summary" field as it does in the body field. I always try to be as detailed as possible in my summaries and feel quite retarded when I have to tab off the page to go to Google to check my spelling for a comment in the field (as I sometimes have to use "big" words with complicated spelling to get across my point in the limited characters). Anyway, maybe someone else here will get my point. Spell check = good. Especially in a field which can never be fixed or edited again once you see the stupid mistake you've made.
PS I just realized I wouldn't have to tab out to Google like I always do to check my spelling; I could just input it in the body field right above. Don't know why I didn't figure out that little simplicity before, but to each his own. But perhaps the suggestion is still worthwhile.
MediaWiki doesn't have any spell checking support. If your using Firefox you can activate the background spellchecker by right click on the edit summary field and selecting "Check spelling". — Dispenser17:38, 3 October 2009 (UTC)
If you're on a Mac, the red-underlining is a feature of the OS, and is available regardless of your browser. Dunno about Windows, since I use it as little as possible. EVula// talk // ☯ //16:47, 4 October 2009 (UTC)
Main page showing in modern skin
ALmost every second time I come to Wikipedia the main page is showing in the modern skin. I hav en't set it to show like this, and it often changes back to normal next time I visit the site. Why is this? What is wrong? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.251.147.241 (talk • contribs)
This has happened before. The reason is unclear. I suspect however, that it is because a logged in user has his session timeout between the time that he requests the page and the time that the page (in this case the Main page) is actually finished rendering. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 18:55, 4 October 2009 (UTC)
I am currently using the code {{:List of bla bla}} code to bring in the ifnormaiton from a sub page which was split out of the main article back to teh main one. however the code bring the entire page of the article into the mai article so meaning i can not make the indvidual articles serparate and ther eown articles. what i liek to know is there any way ot alter the code so it only brings in the table from the serperate article?--Andrewcrawford (talk - contrib) 12:44, 3 October 2009 (UTC)
You can create a template that contains only the table and then transclude it to both articles. E.g. you create Template:foos, containing only the table, and then place the code {{foos}} to both of them. Svick (talk) 12:56, 3 October 2009 (UTC)
OR: you can place <onlyinclude> before the table, and </onlyinclude> after it (that's if I've understood the question right).--Kotniski (talk) 13:00, 3 October 2009 (UTC)
The onlyinclude seems to work great although i wouldnt mind learnign how to make the template so that if a article is edited the information itn teh template would be alter as well--Andrewcrawford (talk - contrib) 13:10, 3 October 2009 (UTC)
In general, templates should not be used to simply show text split out into a subpage. It should either be put back into the main article or left in the subpage. — neuro14:18, 3 October 2009 (UTC)
Problem is the list was over 130kb before splitting but after splitting peopel complained because they had to look in other places for the informaiton this way the artilce is within size but suits everyones--Andrewcrawford (talk - contrib) 16:58, 3 October 2009 (UTC)
It's only "within size" in that it is easier to edit - the page itself is still just as big - or possibly a little bigger. There is currently no good solution to this:
Sub-pages are deprecated
Content in template space is frowned on (except navboxen)
Transcluding bits of one article into another using "onlyinclude" is not scalable, and is also obscure.
Replicating the text (as advised by some essay WP:ABUNDANT?) means either two sets of things to update or they drift apart.
Imnot suggestign editing a template just when i read the information above that how i udnerstood it, maybe the page explain about template need ot be updated to be simpler to understand esipcally for peopel liek myself with reaidng diffuculties--Andrewcrawford (talk - contrib) 18:12, 3 October 2009 (UTC)
I don't understand any of this technical stuff, but somehow the first onlyinclude above makes everything before it not appear on WP:VPA. Could someone fix this? Ntsimp (talk) 14:28, 5 October 2009 (UTC)
Fixed by changing < into <, but I don't understand why was it causing problems, because the onlyinclude was inside nowiki tag, so I think it should have been ok (but wasn't). Svick (talk) 14:40, 5 October 2009 (UTC)
incategory: search
Anyone know why
incategory:"Stub-Class Canadian communities articles"
Because the category is added by a template, rather than appearing directly in the wikitext? (Although someone else was claiming recently that the incategory function didn't work, and I'm not sure that that was the problem in that case.)--Kotniski (talk) 17:52, 3 October 2009 (UTC)
Nope to the first I set it explicitly on an ns0 page and that didn't work either (could have been lag) - even if it had very very likely that the software does not interrogate the pages themselves.
Time-lag would certainly seem a possibility - the search indexing routines certainly don't keep up with the database. (Quite why - for incategory - they don't just look at the category tables instead of indexing them separately is beyond me, but no doubt the devs have their reasons...) --Kotniski (talk) 10:23, 4 October 2009 (UTC)
We don't do it directly on the category table because on the database backend we use (mysql) this is extremely slow (on most others however it can be made fast with right kinds of indexes). This is why we use the search backend and this is why it only works for "proper" categories in the main article text (and not templates). --rainman (talk) 11:07, 4 October 2009 (UTC)
Doesn't the search backend support indexing metadata? Couldn't it index the list of categories for a page in addition to the wikitext for that page? (I mean, it obviously indexes the title of a page, even though that isn't part of the wikitext.)--Kotniski (talk) 11:19, 4 October 2009 (UTC)
Indexing metadata is easy enough, however, figuring out when it changes (e.g. template-added categories) and reindexing in an efficient way not so much.. --rainman (talk) 13:06, 4 October 2009 (UTC)
Doesn't that apply equally to indexing of text, though? (Sorry, I'm trying to educate myself here.) We know that the search indexer lags behind the database, which is a separate issue, but since you say indexing metadata is easy, why can't it just reindex the metadata at the same time as it reindexes the text? There would still be a lag, but it would at least catch the templated categories after the delay (as opposed to not at all).--Kotniski (talk) 13:23, 4 October 2009 (UTC)
There is a discussion about bibliography articles taking place here. Suggestions being made are of far wider significance than to the specific page in question, therefore any constructive contributions to the conversation would be greatly appreciated. Neelix (talk) 21:08, 5 October 2009 (UTC)
New changes bolded in watchlist.
I just wanted to ask about the feature by which new changes (ie. since the page was last visited) appear in bold text in the watchlist. This feature is in place on Commons for example, but not enwiki. My understanding is that it was disabled some time ago due to a glitch which has since been fixed. Are there any plans to re-enable the feature? DoktorMandrake16:10, 5 October 2009 (UTC)
That was, IIRC, the "email-me-when-pages-on-my-watchlist-change" option, which digitally melted the mail server when it was turned on on enwiki. The bold-new-changes feature is disabled on enwiki for the same reason: the performance load is unsustainable. Enwiki is several orders of magnitude more active than commons or most other WMF wikis. Happy‑melon19:57, 6 October 2009 (UTC)
Browser inconsistency
I've noticed that Chrome and Firefox consistently order my top tabs differently from each other- comparison shot here. I've searched and scraped through every line of my Monobook files (User:Kingoomieiii/monobook.js, User:Kingoomieiii/monobook.css) but I can't find anything that would cause this.
I actually much prefer the Chrome ordering, but Firefox is my baby ;_;
I think this is determined by the order in which your scripts load. It could be that gadgets enabled in Special:Preferences load first in Firefox, while scripts embedded in your Monobook load second. I'm not quite sure, though. Maybe you could try rearranging the scripts on your Monobook js page to see if it makes a difference, or even replacing some of your Preference-enabled Gadgets with their Monobook-enabled counterparts. TheEarwig(Talk | Contribs)21:54, 5 October 2009 (UTC)
This is a bug in the loadorder of Javascript in WebKit. Safari has the same issue. I filed the bugreport once, but it is not a top priority issue for them. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 11:33, 6 October 2009 (UTC)
The previous suggestion worked perfectly. Turned off gadgets, added to Monobook manually (in the right order)- works great. --KingÖomie13:48, 6 October 2009 (UTC)
Saving the links when GeoCities closes on October 26
I'm really interested in creating some tutorials on using Wikipedia. I haven't really fleshed out this idea yet, but I would probably combine screen recording with voice over, and produce short clips of a few minutes on different areas and aspects of editing. I'd start with the basics, of course, but I could move on to introducing things like adding inline citations, uploading images, DYK review, etc.
I discussed this with another editor, and he pointed out that flash would probably work best for screen capture, and that it isn't supported on WP. Hurdle number 1. Assuming that I could use an alternative to flash that would be supported on WP, would the community accept video embedded on Help pages? If it couldn't be embedded, would it be ok to host the videos elsewhere and link to them from help pages? Instead of embedding help pages with videos specific to the content (which would be restricting for me), would it be viable to create a separate help page devoted to the videos? Would the community want to vet them first? How would it be established that they were appropriate?
Another aspect I am wondering about is privacy concerns. Would there be objections to screen shots that would, inevitably, show dozens of user names and some of their associated edits? Would I have to cover up the WP logo?
Has this idea been tried or suggested before and failed?
I hope that's not too many questions for one post! I'm really curious to know if this would work and am interested in hearing feedback. I really think that videos could help us retain editors who find WP initially bewildering. Plus, it would be fun to make them! Also posting to Village pump (proposals) Maedin\talk18:40, 2 October 2009 (UTC)
I did think of doing this ages ago, but never got around to it. I would suggest that videos would be a good idea on help pages, a lot of people seem to find the technical side of Wikipedia hard enough, and I can only imagine videos would soothe the situation. — neuro20:34, 2 October 2009 (UTC)
This seems like a really great idea. For videoing you can get free software from the 'net that videos a defined region of your screen. - Kingpin13 (talk) 17:31, 7 October 2009 (UTC)
MediaWiki software won't accept brackets in URLs. You can, however, use the ASCII percentage code, which for square brackets are %5B and %5D. Someguy1221 (talk) 06:53, 6 October 2009 (UTC)
I am having difficulty settng up a page do not know where to start. See Dr. Laureen Wishom. How do i get to education awards etc (example Jeffrey Gitomer's page) need help —Preceding unsigned comment added by Dr. Laureen Wishom (talk • contribs) 03:41, 7 October 2009 (UTC)
Also, you can download The Auto Wikipedia Browser which has a function to make lists. You can also ask someone to make a list for you, as it takes like 4 seconds. I don't think there is a limit when using AWB but I'm not sure. Tim1357 (talk) 23:18, 4 October 2009 (UTC)
I've suggested several times we should increase the default number of pages displayed to (say) 500, but got little reaction either way. Is there any reason not to do it? I can't believe there are performance issues - even with 500 entries a category page will be small compared with many of our most read articles.--Kotniski (talk) 08:33, 5 October 2009 (UTC)
Not sure if the others are yet back to sound order, but you're welcome to try. I thought something was better than nothing, so I implemented the global tool. —Anonymous DissidentTalk08:01, 7 October 2009 (UTC)
Aye, I would much rather have X's counter than global. And it seems to be working again now (although I think it was down when AD changed to the global). It basically has the same features as the old one, with a few changes. - Kingpin13 (talk) 13:18, 7 October 2009 (UTC)
I have been getting cryptic error messages from the Wikimedia Foundation when I try to make an edit. I use the back arrow and save again, sometimes several times, and finally get an edit conflict message - from my own edit. I suspect that what is happening is that something is detecting that it took too long for the edit information to be transmitted, and sometimes it uses it and still gives a failure notice and sometimes doesn't use it and gives a failure notice, which includes the words:
"Our servers are currently experiencing a technical problem. This is probably temporary and should be fixed soon. Please try again in a few minutes."
Now amazingly we went from maybe 80% on dialup in the world to about 80% on broadband in a very short period of time, and since I am still on dialup I am guessing that maybe the servers have been tweaked to expect broadband type of speed, or at least good dialup, as my dialup speed often drops to a few bytes per minute! Apteva (talk) 18:23, 7 October 2009 (UTC)
It sounds like you're encountering a fairly common server glitch. The problem is entirely with Wikipedia's servers: the only difference between dialup and broadband is that a broadband user will get the error message faster. --Carnildo (talk) 20:58, 7 October 2009 (UTC)
I am not sure what you mean exactly, but here is a common problem: Suppose you try save a new comment "bla bla bla ~~~~". Then you are waiting ages for the server to react. Experience shows that if you use the "back" button and press "save page" again you are likely to get a quick response. But if, in the meantime, the server's clock changes from "18:34" to "18:35", say, then the text you are trying to save the second time is not precisely the same as the first time, since ~~~~ is translated to something slightly different. Now if, as happens very often, you first edit was actually accepted and only the delivery of the resulting page was delayed, then you will now get an edit conflict with yourself for trying to replace "bla bla bla User Name 18:34, 30 February 0000 (UTC)" with "bla bla bla User Name 18:35, 30 February 0000 (UTC)".
This is just a symptom of long delays in the page delivery, or failure of our servers to deliver a page. Based on my own experience I guess that this occurs mostly if the server responsible for an individual edit request crashes (or freezes) after accepting the edit, but before delvering the page. If you try again, you get a different server. When there are technical problems the crashing or freezing of servers becomes more likely. HansAdler10:46, 8 October 2009 (UTC)
It's very strange. My user page is currently in this new category; if I null edit the page once or twice it goes away, then reappears if I null edit the page some more. :S PC78 (talk) 22:11, 7 October 2009 (UTC)
The root of the problem is that the CSS standard says that the top edge of any float cannot be above the top edge of any other float (in the same block formatting context) that occurs earlier in the HTML source; it makes no difference which side they are floated to. The fix in WP:BUNCH changes "several right-floated images" into "one right-floated block containing several images", so there is only the one expected top edge considered by the browser. Anomie⚔16:59, 8 October 2009 (UTC)
Unwatch tag at "My watchlist"
Along with having the [unwatch] tag at the article, it should have included in the My watchlist page, along side [rollback] tag:
Example:
(diff) (hist) . . Wikipedia:Good article nominations; 19:55 . . (+98) . . Mootros (talk | contribs) (→Law) [rollback][unwatch]
The benefits:
Of course, not all of us want rollback on the watchlist either, but alas... (but unwatch would be worse and I'm completely against adding it as standard) ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ (talk) 16:10, 8 October 2009 (UTC)
Hello, Xeno told me that this external revision history search tool is on history pages by default, but I cannot find it.
See User talk:Xeno#Searching for more info and screenshots. Our history pages appear vastly different... BlazerKnight (talk) 07:54, 4 October 2009 (UTC)
Those links are local customizations in the US English interface messages; if you select any other language you'll get the messages written for those languages. Unless the same message was also customized in that language you won't see the customization (whether it's French, Japanese, or British English). --brion (talk) 16:29, 5 October 2009 (UTC)
Yeah, I'd appreciate that. It'd help me out for some of the things I want to do. Including identifying one thing that may or may not be subtle vandalism. Xeno's given me a temporary workaround, but it'd be easier if it was right on the history page. --ThejadefalconSing your songThe bird's seeds15:35, 6 October 2009 (UTC)
We have 700 or so local interface changes for the English language. Applying those changes to gb english is not the problem. The problem is keeping the changes in sync with the other english original, and the "what about all the other languages" issue. Anyone have ideas ? —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 15:45, 6 October 2009 (UTC)
I think that, for now, it should be added to en-GB and we not really worry about the other languages since no one has complained about the missing 'revision history search' on those =) –xenotalk15:52, 6 October 2009 (UTC)
Seven hundred? Oy. As for the other languages, those are more of a problem since we'd need people to translate for a start. Isn't there a way to have changes made to the default Wikipedia automatically cross over into the English ones and minor changes be made then if needed? I state for the record that I have no idea what I'm talking about, but I'm hoping it makes sense. --ThejadefalconSing your songThe bird's seeds16:08, 6 October 2009 (UTC)
I've never quite understood why people use the British English option on Wikipedia. The differences are trivial and few, but you don't get any of the customized messages from the default English interface. Mr.Z-man16:39, 6 October 2009 (UTC)
Yes, I would never have known about the missing messages if not for stumbling upon that discussion on Xeno's talk page. I've switched to English for now. Maybe this should be added to requests for translation? BlazerKnight (talk) 19:59, 6 October 2009 (UTC)
Note: I have requested Translator rights at TranslateWiki.net - hopefully I should be able to resolve this issue, and then continue to ensure that other English features are available to British English users. DoktorMandrake17:13, 8 October 2009 (UTC)
translatewiki.net is not for customising messages, it is for translating the generic user interface of MediaWiki, its extensions and other products. If you think a MediaWiki message must be changed, because it is incomplete or plain wrong, feel free to note it on our translatewiki:Support page. Please be aware that the generic UI should not be technically details, but usable. Subtleties make software harder to use; feature richness - sometimes leading to long explanations - can also confuse the casual user, and are best left to the high traffic wikis themselves. Suggestions for improvement of MediaWiki can of course also be made in bugzilla:. Cheers! Siebrand (talk) 19:15, 8 October 2009 (UTC)
Maybe it could be that when you add an article to category, the counter increases, and when you remove it from the category, it decreases. But when you delete an article, the counter doesn't get updated. And because in the category you mentioned, articles are deleted regurarly, the count increases over time. This is just a guess, but it makes sense to me. In any case, this is certainly a bug and I filed T22977 (that is a duplicate of T18036). Svick (talk) 23:13, 3 October 2009 (UTC)
I believe there was a bug once as Svick describes but it shouldn't be happening anymore. One method that worked for me once, was to empty the category by editing the template and then repopulating it again. — Martin (MSGJ · talk) 13:14, 8 October 2009 (UTC)
Are the 600 pages you moved to a "temporary category" supposed to move back now that you've undone the change? Because they don't seem to have, so far. —David Eppstein (talk) 17:02, 8 October 2009 (UTC) Better now. —David Eppstein (talk) 00:43, 9 October 2009 (UTC)
For Baekje, it is {{Infobox Former Country}} and the field |stat_pop1=; for Tskhinvali it is {{Infobox Settlement}} and |population_total=. I'm not sure how to fix those templates so they don't try to eat the {{fact}} templates, other than removing the formatting. You can't fix the citation needed issue, because any references added to the field will get misformatted as well. ---— Gadget850 (Ed)talk10:17, 8 October 2009 (UTC)
A bug has been filed: T23054. A workaround for the templates is to have them take both a "pop" and "pop ref" parameter, so instead of {{Infobox Settlement|pop=1234{{fact}}}} it would be {{Infobox Settlement|pop=1234|pop ref={{fact}}}}. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Anomie (talk • contribs) 13:02, 8 October 2009 (UTC)
Odd article name... mainspace subpage?
Don't know where to mention this (nor what to do about it), but I just came across an article "South Asians/North Africans". As far as I know such a title is unacceptable in terms of the hierarchical layout of pages on Wikipedia, but I'm really not sure of the specific rules or what to do about it.... Help?
Numbering footnotes in edit window (LDR style citations )
I like the new WP:LDR option for citations. I'm looking into converting a large article, but I recently converted a smaller article, Tina Charles, to the format. After converting, I realized I could add <!1>, <!2> etc, in front of each footnote. Not a big deal, but if I want to edit footnote 4, it's easy to find.
The obvious downside is that the numbering is static. If I add new material and cite it, the footnotes automatically renumber, but not my "cheat sheet". My simple question - is there a way to accomplish this?
It isn't worth worrying about for a seven footnote article, but if I have an article such as Barack Obama, where I've started a conversion, it's highly likely that footnotes will be added or deleted. It occurs to me that it might be relatively straightforward to write a macro or a bot to automatically add or update the entries, but I thought I'd ask here in case there's a more elegant solution (plus, if the answer is a macro or bot, I need to find someone who can do that.)--SPhilbrickT21:52, 8 October 2009 (UTC)
One problem I see is that reused references will throw your numbering scheme off. I haven't been keeping the reference list in use order, instead I have been alphabetizing by reference name, making it easier to match the inline cite to the reference. You do have to watch for citation templates in vertical format (one entry per line) or if there is a break. ---— Gadget850 (Ed)talk22:09, 8 October 2009 (UTC)
I see what you are doing. The cite numbers are generated by Cite.php, which then uses MediaWiki messages to generate the HTML. A bot would have to be either hook into cite.php or it would have to examine the rendered HTML to grab the cite numbers. ---— Gadget850 (Ed)talk11:34, 9 October 2009 (UTC)
Compressing TOC to display upper-level headings only
Not really, this one must be placed in the source text, I meant something that is used on the receiving end only and does not interfere with any other user. NVO (talk) 09:35, 9 October 2009 (UTC)
Yes, you can use CSS to hide various levels. For example, the following would hide level 3 sections on all page:
.toclevel-2 { display: none; }
Note that there is an offset of 1 between the level of the section (=== is a level 3 section) and the number in the CSS.
If you only want to do this on certain pages, you can limit it one page at a time by using the class associated to the body element (for example, this page has class "page-Wikipedia_Village_pump_technical" on the body element). The body element also has a class corresponding to the namespace of the page.
You might be able to do some wildcard matching with more advanced CSS, if your browser supports it, but I have not tested that. — Carl (CBM · talk) 12:54, 9 October 2009 (UTC)
Missing image preview file
Is it just me (my browser - MSIE) or has something gone wrong with the preview of File:Cards.jpg. If I go there and click on Full resolution, then I get the big image, but I don't get a preview, here or on playing cards. -- SGBailey (talk) 10:07, 9 October 2009 (UTC)
We shouldn't be using progressive JPEGs anyhow - they're an obsolete rendering gimmick that actually increases the file size and the amount of work needed to render them. — Gavia immer (talk)15:16, 9 October 2009 (UTC)
That seems to be the default for Photoshop Elements for mac using "save as" – the other options are Baseline ("standard") and Baseline Optimised – any preferences? Oddly enough "save for web" has an unchecked checkbox for "Progressive" so that presumably avoids the problem. . . dave souza, talk15:29, 9 October 2009 (UTC)
Minor annoyance: weirdness with contribs
The contributions screen seems to have a hard time making a choice between:
I would like to ask why, when you first open Wikipedia or return to the home page, is the cursor not automatically placed within the search box? It would make searching easier. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Hufri01 (talk • contribs) 14:27, 8 October 2009 (UTC)
The current main page isn't designed as a search portal (unlike http://www.wikipedia.org/ which is, and which does have the search box focused by default). As noted, there is a gadget you can switch in in your options to get that behavior though. --brion (talk) 17:00, 8 October 2009 (UTC)
Just hit "alt-f" on Windows computers and "ctrl-f" on Macs to focus the cursor to the search box. It's quick and painless! Gary King (talk) 20:03, 9 October 2009 (UTC)
I like it. Took me a second to find the technical part, so I suppose that could be a little more prominent (as that part is of particular importance- 'your name may change on its own once you click Create'. --KingÖomie17:51, 8 October 2009 (UTC)
How prominent that needs to be depends on how the software handles it. Does it throw an error and give you a chance to choose something different, or just transform the chosen name into something acceptable? Rd232talk22:48, 8 October 2009 (UTC)
Well in answer to my question, invalid characters throw an error message (not a very helpful one), underscores are converted to spaces without confirmation, and a lowercase initial is automatically converted to uppercase. Anyway I've moved the technical restrictions message from the boxout (where it was in this version) to below "Choosing a Username", as an extra bullet. I'm not entirely sure this is better though - people are more likely to read it properly if there's only one bullet per heading. Rd232talk08:44, 9 October 2009 (UTC)
Hey, what's going on with tables? In every article I read table borders and cell lines have disappeared. Is it just me or are they being tweaked? Copana2002 (talk) 16:43, 7 October 2009 (UTC)
My cache is set to clear every time I exit FF so that can't be it. I also ran Ccleaner just to make sure. I thought it might be my FF add-ons, but I disabled them and I'm still getting broken tables. Copana2002 (talk) 15:03, 9 October 2009 (UTC)
If that happens only with tables without any formatting code (those with a first line like that: {|, maybe there isn't any problem. As I can recall, maybe some time ago these tables were rendered as if they would had a first line like that: {| border="1". -- Codicorumus« msg15:14, 10 October 2009 (UTC)
403 and 406 responses on various pages using my blackberry app.
I'm writing a commercial ( financial conflict disclosure) app that generally
functions as a browser but I'm getting a lot of 403 and 406 server responses
from wikipedia pages.Is there some well know reason this may occur? I could fake the user agent string but so far I haven't had any reason to do that. This became an issue as I was trying to make a note taking browser that makes it easy to copy text from browser pages and do some simple collation on the phone and then mail it to your default email account for later edit and past into a wiki page or talk page. I thought this would be a good way to research during dead time when you may only have access to a smartphone. Thanks Nerdseeksblonde (talk) 22:52, 8 October 2009 (UTC)
Are you using a default user agent string associated with your programming package? Wikipedia will 403 the default user agent in many programming packages on the grounds that software ought to use a uniquely identifiable user agent string for your particular program. Dragons flight (talk) 04:10, 9 October 2009 (UTC)
It would know because that's how HTTP requests work. It would care because a programmer who hasn't bothered to set a user agent is also likely to not have bothered with various other things to make it safe and correct. OrangeDog (talk • edits) 14:23, 10 October 2009 (UTC)
AFAIK we are copying the RIM browser requests. I'm not trying to launch nuclear missiles are download pay-for-porn, but certainly style sheets can be an issue. Nerdseeksblonde (talk) 16:09, 10 October 2009 (UTC)
I don't know if this'll make sense to anybody but me; but, I thought I'd bring it up here in-case anybody thinks there's value to the suggestion. As a regular user/editor (i.e., not an admin/sysop) I'm often working in areas and I see deleted articles where I want to see how long/significant the history has been and where it's gone. I don't know if it would be possible, but it might be nice if the software would allow "regular" users could see histories on deleted articles→just the "special" history page itself, without actually being able to link into any of the versions nor compare them. For various reasons, on a couple of occasions I've wanted to be able to (though not necessarily see the actual article), and I think maybe it should be considered. Comments from other editors (though I don't know if admins will be able to make an objective :P comment on this)? Peace and Passion☮("I'm listening....") 20:36, 10 October 2009 (UTC)
As an admin, I invite any non-admin to ask me, on my talk page, any question about the content of a deleted page. I'll answer whenever reasonable. As for the substance of this proposal: it's impractical now because sometimes revisions are deleted to hide usernames/edit summaries, but it might become more practical in the future should normal admins be granted the RevDelete tool (which would let them separately hide usernames/edit summaries). {{Nihiltres|talk|edits}} 22:09, 10 October 2009 (UTC) (iPod edit)
Null diffs are broken
Is this known ? All null diffs are broken, it seems to be recent, maybe due to the major update a few days ago, which changed appearance of various interface elements. Verified using another browser and logged-off. Cenarium (talk) 00:43, 12 October 2009 (UTC)
If by "broken" you mean "the two headings show up crammed into half the page width instead of using the whole width", see T23053. Anomie⚔02:13, 12 October 2009 (UTC)
Watchlist RSS feed ignores watchlist preferences
Hi. My watchlist preferences are set to show only the most recent change to each watched page, but a watchlist RSS feed shows all recent changes to watched pages. For example, if I'm watching the "pump" page, and that page has had 20 edits recently, my watchlist will correctly show only the one most recent edit, but my RSS feed list will show 20 entries for "pump". Is that a feature or a bug? Is there any way I can have the RSS feed obey my watchlist preference? Thanks. Rwxrwxrwx (talk) 09:33, 12 October 2009 (UTC)
OK, that fixed it, thanks. I had "allrev" in the URL; removing it fixed the problem. I had been using the URL I was given when subscribing to the feed, so I suppose (though I'm no expert) the problem now becomes "the automatically-generated URL does not reflect the user's preferences". Rwxrwxrwx (talk) 17:24, 12 October 2009 (UTC)
MediaWiki:Robots.txt says "... Disallow: /wiki/Wikipedia%3ARequests_for_adminship/". But searching on an expression in a current RFA pulled up that RFA on Google. Am I reading robots.txt wrong? Is there an accurate list somewhere of which pages are noindexed? - Dank (push to talk) 02:34, 13 October 2009 (UTC)
Robots.txt has a slash at the end of the line, so that means that pages beginning with /wiki/Wikipedia%3ARequests_for_adminship/ will not be indexed, but /wiki/Wikipedia%3ARequests_for_adminship, without the slash, will. That means that this RfA should probably disappear once it gets un-transcluded from the main RfA page. Perhaps, though, we should just get rid of the slash in the file. -- SoapTalk/Contributions02:37, 13 October 2009 (UTC)
Thanks guys. I'll bring this up at WT:RFA. All of the deletion discussion pages are in robots.txt, and I'd feel a little more comfortable if RFAs either are always noindexed or we encourage people to add {{noindex}} whenever there are sensitive deletion discussions; the issue came up in that RFA. - Dank (push to talk) 03:35, 13 October 2009 (UTC)
I had thought of this.. I created filter 254 . A searchintro, similar to editintros, could help to guide new users though, as it shows that some are confused after searching. Now that I think about it, a way to not show the create article link, url-encoded, e.g. &createarticlelink=0, that can be integrated in the inputbox, could be used in those cases. Cenarium (talk) 17:50, 13 October 2009 (UTC)
The quality of Wikipedia images has markedly decreased. I have been uploading images to the Wikicommons. When adding 'em to Wikipedia, I have noticed that the image quality (resolution) seems to be severely degraded -- something that has happened in the last week or two. Interestingly, it seems to be just on the English language version of WP; I concluded this after comparing images of a Mallory body and cirrhosis in the German and English version of WP. I presume this is to save bandwidth. Does anyone know whether this is temporary? Is it possible the image quality could at least be restored for registered users when they login? Nephron T|C18:33, 12 October 2009 (UTC)
The images appear identical to me. The thumbnails have been sent to different sizes on each language, but the images themselves are of identical quality. OrangeDog (talk • edits) 20:44, 12 October 2009 (UTC)
It is the thumbnails... but the thumbnails are de facto the images. How many people click on the thumbnails? The thumbnails are now severely degraded when compared to several weeks ago. If you click on the thumbnail - the file page (which displays a larger thumbnail) is also severely degraded. Compare en thumbnail with de thumbnail with original on the Wikicommons:
I see absolutely no difference between those images you have linked (excepting that the Obama image is supposed to be different). Try clearing your browser's cache and see what happens. OrangeDog (talk • edits) 23:04, 12 October 2009 (UTC)
I also see no difference. Maybe you could post screenshots, how those images look in your browser, so that we could see what's wrong. Svick (talk) 23:14, 12 October 2009 (UTC)
I don't see a difference now. I'm not sure what happened. I didn't have the impression it is related to the cache, as I could have sworn it was on a pair of computers I use. Hmmmm. If I do manage to reproduce it, I'll post another message and take some screenshots. Nephron T|C04:48, 14 October 2009 (UTC)
It sounds like you probably zoomed your browser in; this will scale the images up client-side which makes them either fuzzier or awfully pixelated, depending on your browser & video settings. Usually the zoom setting is saved per site, which is consistent with seeing different results at en.wikipedia.org and de.wikipedia.org... Try ctrl+0 (or ⌘+0 on a Mac) which will reset the zoom in most browsers. --brion (talk) 16:39, 14 October 2009 (UTC)
{{resolved}}
Hi, this was brought to ANI but it's probably better dealt with over here. The Template:DeLeonism has some strange things happening. When you go to click on the (v) (d) or (e) links at the bottom of the template, it tries to send you to a template with the addition of the word "terrorism" in the title. My knowledge of templates is very limited, but thought someone here might be able to help out the original user who posted it? Thanks! Frmatt (talk) 03:00, 18 October 2009 (UTC)
I had thought of this.. I created filter 254 . A searchintro, similar to editintros, could help to guide new users though, as it shows that some are confused after searching. Now that I think about it, a way to not show the create article link, url-encoded, e.g. &createarticlelink=0, that can be integrated in the inputbox, could be used in those cases. Cenarium (talk) 17:50, 13 October 2009 (UTC)
The quality of Wikipedia images has markedly decreased. I have been uploading images to the Wikicommons. When adding 'em to Wikipedia, I have noticed that the image quality (resolution) seems to be severely degraded -- something that has happened in the last week or two. Interestingly, it seems to be just on the English language version of WP; I concluded this after comparing images of a Mallory body and cirrhosis in the German and English version of WP. I presume this is to save bandwidth. Does anyone know whether this is temporary? Is it possible the image quality could at least be restored for registered users when they login? Nephron T|C18:33, 12 October 2009 (UTC)
The images appear identical to me. The thumbnails have been sent to different sizes on each language, but the images themselves are of identical quality. OrangeDog (talk • edits) 20:44, 12 October 2009 (UTC)
It is the thumbnails... but the thumbnails are de facto the images. How many people click on the thumbnails? The thumbnails are now severely degraded when compared to several weeks ago. If you click on the thumbnail - the file page (which displays a larger thumbnail) is also severely degraded. Compare en thumbnail with de thumbnail with original on the Wikicommons:
I see absolutely no difference between those images you have linked (excepting that the Obama image is supposed to be different). Try clearing your browser's cache and see what happens. OrangeDog (talk • edits) 23:04, 12 October 2009 (UTC)
I also see no difference. Maybe you could post screenshots, how those images look in your browser, so that we could see what's wrong. Svick (talk) 23:14, 12 October 2009 (UTC)
I don't see a difference now. I'm not sure what happened. I didn't have the impression it is related to the cache, as I could have sworn it was on a pair of computers I use. Hmmmm. If I do manage to reproduce it, I'll post another message and take some screenshots. Nephron T|C04:48, 14 October 2009 (UTC)
It sounds like you probably zoomed your browser in; this will scale the images up client-side which makes them either fuzzier or awfully pixelated, depending on your browser & video settings. Usually the zoom setting is saved per site, which is consistent with seeing different results at en.wikipedia.org and de.wikipedia.org... Try ctrl+0 (or ⌘+0 on a Mac) which will reset the zoom in most browsers. --brion (talk) 16:39, 14 October 2009 (UTC)
{{resolved}}
Hi, this was brought to ANI but it's probably better dealt with over here. The Template:DeLeonism has some strange things happening. When you go to click on the (v) (d) or (e) links at the bottom of the template, it tries to send you to a template with the addition of the word "terrorism" in the title. My knowledge of templates is very limited, but thought someone here might be able to help out the original user who posted it? Thanks! Frmatt (talk) 03:00, 18 October 2009 (UTC)
Searching among titles of deleted pages or deleted content
Isn't there a - amenable - way to search among titles of deleted pages, or deleted content ? Special:Undelete allows only to list pages starting with a given prefix. For example, it would have been useful for the subject of the previous thread, and I had other reasons to search those for maintenance. Cenarium (talk) 00:17, 12 October 2009 (UTC)
I'm afraid not at the moment unless there's a toolserver tool which can do it. (Offhand I'm not sure whether that info's available on TS though.) --brion (talk) 19:04, 14 October 2009 (UTC)
Why don't we have a touring members section as part of the infobox? In addition to members and former members, I think it would be good to have a Touring members section for band pages; it can help clear the air about who contributed in the studio, who was there for the tour. A band's live history is just as important for fans as their recording history is; I think this section could be beneficial for properly representing everyone who contributed to a band.
I've noticed some strange things that I have never been able to explain:
On February 20, 2005, my friend Mwl (talk·contribs) corrected some spelling on Cedric Diggory, but it seems to show him blanking the page. The next few edits all appear to be null edits. However, appeared to return to normal when Martinman11 (talk·contribs) added an image to the article. A comparison of the revision prior to the one made by Mwl and the edit by Martinman11 shows that the changes indicated in the edit summaries are indeed valid. There is nothing in the article's deletion log, and I don't think the oversight feature is supposed to blank pages.
As discussed in thread right above this one, the first oddity is caused by T22757. I don't know whether the second issue has anything to do with this bug or whether it is something unrelated. Svick (talk) 01:24, 15 October 2009 (UTC)
The second oddity was probably because the server clocks went out of sync. I've never encountered a diff like it before, where the times are relatively close together. I'm used to diffs like this one, which probably happened because a server clock was reset; you can see more examples of that problem at bug 2219 and my subpage about history oddities. Graham8707:24, 15 October 2009 (UTC)
Deleted pages without deletion logs
I'm resurrecting this thread. Here is an example of a page without a deletion log. I would like to improve that page to a level that would make suitable for Wikipedia, but I can't find the page, nor the deletion log.
I noticed today that the lines underneath the section headers in the Vector skin are overlapping some content for me ([10] is a snapshot from the article Halting problem). Does this happen for anyone else? My browser is Firefox 3.5.3 on Linux. — Carl (CBM · talk) 11:57, 15 October 2009 (UTC)
That was actually the correct rendering for what was there: the line under the header is simply the bottom border of the header element, and as a block element it is supposed to continue under the float. Our floated images have a background color set on their containing div to cover that up, but the floated table in that article did not do so (until someone changed it just now) so the line underneath showed through the transparent background. Anomie⚔12:25, 15 October 2009 (UTC)
(ec)I don't think this is a widespread problem, because tables aren't usually floated with their descriptions on Wikipedia (and I'm not sure this one should either). I fixed that article by setting white background color to the floated <div>. Svick (talk) 12:37, 15 October 2009 (UTC)
(with apologies to Radiohead) Can we do something about IP's having to type a CAPTCHA every time they add a WP:EL, especially if it's stuck in a ref template? I guess that could be complicated to parse, but couldn't the check be done every tenth time and still discourage spambots? I've typed so many now (since I ref the heck out of everything, usually with {{cite web}}) I've actually reached the end of the list and started back around again at the beginning. -- 209.6.238.201 (talk) 10:14, 15 October 2009 (UTC)
Gee... you'd never make it in the quality assurance department, buddy. I'm just letting you techheads know this eventually becomes a PITA for the casual/IP editor, and there should be a better way to separate the wheat from the chaff. (And yes, I know that Seigenthalerite cultists believe that every time someone signs up an "angle gets its wingdings", but have some respect for other faiths.) -- 209.6.238.201 (talk) 11:05, 15 October 2009 (UTC)
Gee, if I worked in a quality assurance department I'd be getting paid to be nice... as it is, I just wanted to point out an easy alternative to what you suggest, which raises a whole bunch of problems. If someone wants to get into those, fine, but I suspect the tradeoff between making things easier for spammers and for casual users may be right as it is. PS The EL CAPTCHA message currently doesn't point out that signing up for an account avoids that CAPTCHA. That may be deliberate, though. Rd232talk12:47, 15 October 2009 (UTC)
If we assume the edits of spambots are evenly distributed with all the other IP edits, checking on every tenth edit will have the effect of letting 90% of the currently-blocked spam through. The casual IP editor typically doesn't "ref the heck out of everything." Mr.Z-man16:05, 15 October 2009 (UTC)
If the spambots keep trying (which they certainly would if we put in such a system), the effect would be pretty much the same. Mr.Z-man18:01, 15 October 2009 (UTC)
Underlining with dots
I don't know whether this is a technical or a policy issue, so I have posted it on both Village Pumps.
Within the last 24 hours, seemingly random underlining with dots has appeared all over Wikipedia. (Is there a name for it?) In my opinion it destroys the readability of Wikipedia articles. It makes words and phrases jump off the page. As far as I can tell, it serves no useful purpose at all, but if people really like the extra linking function there's got to be a less annoying way to mark the links. Can we revert back to yesterday on this thing? HowardMorland (talk) 17:00, 15 October 2009 (UTC)
Never mind. It seemed to go away on its own. It wasn't there the next time I logged on. Then it was again; then it wasn't. When it was happening, it would offer links to other things on the web with similar names, including Wikipedia articles. Maybe it was just my computer. I was using the Firefox browser. HowardMorland (talk) 18:04, 15 October 2009 (UTC)
Now that we have a bunch of editors who are using vector, and, I assume there are also those of us who have grown accustomed to monobook and won't be changing, what about some kind of way to direct a user to Special:Mypage/(myskin).js or .css ? It would make it a lot easier to explain to newer and less technically-inclined users how to install stuff into their .js and .css pages. –xenotalk18:11, 8 October 2009 (UTC)
I agree, but I don't think anyone else heard. Maybe file a bug (except nobody finds those... *sigh*) 09:27, 12 October 2009 (UTC)
Much of the stuff that goes on these pages is skin-dependent, so you would end up with just one more place to add (and to forget) code. Cacycle (talk) 13:15, 13 October 2009 (UTC)
The devs are unlikely to implement a parser function that would change its value based on skin, as that would break the caching system. A saner system would be a special page i.e. "Special:MySkinPage" or some such, and in the meantime an admin can use CSS display code across the sitewide skin code pages to create a template for everyone. {{Nihiltres|talk|edits}} 15:52, 13 October 2009 (UTC) (iPod edit)
It might be a bit more straight forward to use a site JavaScript enhanced template in the meantime. Should somebody propose the Special:MySkinPage" idea? Cacycle (talk) 21:49, 13 October 2009 (UTC)
Here is a short script that dynamically replaces Special:MySkin.js links with Special:MyPage/skin.js links (with "skin" being the current skin of the user): User:Cacycle/myskinify.js (install using "importScript('User:Cacycle/myskinify.js');"). It does the same to .css links. It works under all skins and with the current versions of Firefox, Chrome, Opera, and IE. The execution time should be negligible and I do not think it would interact with any existing script or gadget. I propose to add this (or something similar) to the common.js. Cacycle (talk) 04:06, 15 October 2009 (UTC)
Whenever you look at an edit by another user you get a line number as part of the display of the actual edit at the top of the page. It would be nice to be able to use this information to go down the page so you can find and see the actual view of the article. --THE FOUNDERS INTENT PRAISE17:16, 15 October 2009 (UTC)
Those line 24 numbers only apply to a fixed-width version of the page. 25 The rendered display has a dynamic width that accomidates various browser sizes, 26 so you'd end up with numbers that either didn't match up with 27 the diff version, or something like the numbering in this post. 28 --KingÖomie17:51, 15 October 2009 (UTC)
Actually, those are (more or less) paragraph numbers. Most of the time, it would be fairly easy to link from the diff to the point in the article, but the exceptions are what makes it difficult. Every time you hit "enter" the software sees a new paragraph, so something like an infobox would be seen as 20+ paragraphs, none of which actually show up in the final article. --Carnildo (talk) 20:40, 15 October 2009 (UTC)
Named parameters in #expr
Do named parameters not work with #expr? For instance, take the code {{#expr:{{{year}}}+1}}. If year was 1000, it should return 1001. It works if you do not use a named parameter like this: {{#expr:{{{1}}}+1}}. Unfortunately, I have to use a named parameter as I'm trying to convert an existing template to a new format.—NMajdan•talk19:45, 15 October 2009 (UTC)
Ok, don't know what I was doing, but yeah, it is working. But, another question. How can I do this (which really is what I was originally going for): {{#expr:{{{1|year}}}+1}}? My ultimate goal is to do away with the year parameter, but for legacy purposes it needs to stay for now. So, I need it to default to the named-parameter if a non-named parameter is not used. My testing is here and here.—NMajdan•talk20:20, 15 October 2009 (UTC)
When counting the number of hits to a page that has been renamed/moved, should I count the stats for the old page *and* the new page? Or, does a redirect automatically increment the number of hits to both pages? Take for example Wikipedia:WikiProject Koei Warriors Games which was renamed/moved in February. The old link had more hits in April than the new link, which seems weird to me, since visitors to the old page should automatically be redirected to the new page. SharkD (talk) 00:40, 16 October 2009 (UTC)
Redirects are counted separately to non-redirect pages. So to find the number of hits to a page that has been moved, add the number of hits for the new page title to the number of hits for the old page title. Graham8708:00, 16 October 2009 (UTC)
Yes, after a person edits a page, they get taken to the page they were editing directly (i.e. without the redirect). Graham8705:26, 17 October 2009 (UTC)
Why so many changes to the sidebar?
Every now and then, the sidebar gets changed, with contents added, removed or changed. Some people could think this doesn't bother anyone, but there are people like me who have defined many things in the personal monobook.css page, and every time something gets changed, everything is screwed up.
I'm getting really annoyed of this. I'd feel much better if this changes were kept to a bare minimum, or at least if these changes were well documented. Sorry if I sound rude, I don't want to, I just would thank if someone gives me some answer, or helps me find how can I track the changes and properly maintain, with little effort, my css. - Keta (talk) 11:40, 16 October 2009 (UTC)
I hadn't noticed, though you could watchlist MediaWiki:Sidebar, which generates the sidebar. I believe the toolbox pane and stuff below that are generated purely by the software; I don't know a way to monitor them. • Anakin(talk)06:27, 17 October 2009 (UTC)
Searching for characters
I can no longer search for individual characters. I tried typing in "|", assuming it would redirect me to the actual article (vertical bar), but instead I got a page saying that no results were found. Huh?? Surely "|" is used somewhere on Wikipedia... what's the deal? --Cryptic C62 · Talk00:37, 17 October 2009 (UTC)
Dear all, I am from Bengali Wikipedia. One small thinks I want to know, how do you create the Tab name of Main Page as "Main Page". If you go to main page of this wiki you can see top first tab called "Main Page". I also send a bug T22987. But they still now give me not any resolution.- Jayanta Nath(Talk|Contrb)10:03, 17 October 2009 (UTC)
I'm a bit puzzled by a bug report for my bot, where a "collapsible box" mechanism fails. I've set up a test page to that end, on which you can see the problem. Basically, I try to transclude a page into a collapsible box. However, the box - which on other occassions has always worked fine - collapses only the first lines of the transcluded page. What's going wrong here? It might be related to {{PR/header}}, but I have no clue what the exact reason is. Any ideas? --B. Wolterding (talk) 16:44, 18 October 2009 (UTC)
Seems to be fixed with this edit. The problem is that {{PR/header}} is transcluded as "::{{PR/header|...}}". With the newline in the template, the raw HTML ends up as something like "<dl><dd><div>...PR/header...</dd></dl></div>"; either the browser or MediaWiki's tidy interprets that tag soup such that the div at the end of the PR/header template closes the NavContent div. Anomie⚔17:44, 18 October 2009 (UTC)
You don't, without being an admin and editing the site-wide CSS files in the MediaWiki namespace (if you find a way to, please report it to security@wikimedia.org). You can do inline styles on a div wrapped around your whole user page, but rules specifying external urls (e.g. images) are automatically filtered out (again, if you find a way around that please report it to security@wikimedia.org). Anomie⚔16:46, 18 October 2009 (UTC)
You can create an absolute positioned div with your own background and use z-index for instance. Inline CSS is still very powerful, if you are a proficient CSS writer. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 11:06, 19 October 2009 (UTC)
I've just noticed that many (all?) pages in Wikipedia: namespace are move-protected, even if there's nothing in the protection log. Is this now the default for this namespace? Has it changed recently, or have I only just noticed it?--Kotniski (talk) 14:04, 19 October 2009 (UTC)
Sorry, I was mistaken, the pages I was looking at turn out to have log entries. But there seems to be a problem with the protection log link on the page that appears when you try to move a page for which you don't have permission (Special:MovePage/xxxx).--Kotniski (talk) 14:50, 19 October 2009 (UTC)
On 2009 Philadelphia Phillies season, this error message is displayed about 50 times: "Error: If you specify |archivedate=, you must also specify |archiveurl=." The thing is, they all already have that parameter. What should I do to fix this? I posted this at Template talk:Cite web, and another editor has also independently posted there, but I'm not sure how many people read that talk page. Coemgenus15:26, 19 October 2009 (UTC)
And should all be cleared up again. Sorry for the trouble, I thought I had the change prepared as well as I could. I got database errors during the change, and expected that if I changed /core last, there would be no visible artifacts during the transition (except on pages that already showed an error). My mistake. Amalthea15:34, 19 October 2009 (UTC)
edit notice for special:emailuser
Is it possible to add edit notices to special pages?
We could add this to the list of notes on MediaWiki:Emailpagetext, but I doubt people will read that. We could make it blink using a CSS selector for ".page-Special_EmailUser_User_Arbitration_Committee"
Well, I've been thinking about proposing user:Example/Emailnotice subpage for custom per-user messages on Special:EmailUser. It should be possible, the mechanism is the same as I explained here. — AlexSm03:50, 15 October 2009 (UTC)
Usually $1 is programmed to be replaced with the target, but I don't think anyone has suggested or tried doing it. Anyway, you can replace the subject using &wpSubject= in the url too. — Dispenser17:34, 19 October 2009 (UTC)
Is there a way to stop people from editing other people's email notices? (I think there is an edit filter or something which stops people editing other user's userspace edit notices?) — Martin (MSGJ · talk) 18:36, 19 October 2009 (UTC)
Template Problem- embedding an image in a tempate- and also coord tag
If anyone has time to pop over to TMtr template example I could do with a little advice, The template {{TMtr}} is set up to generate a for a 11 parameter item, a complicated formatted rendering, as two rows in a table. It works and can be used. While working on the documentation, I attempted to input instances with each parameter on a separate line- this broke the template. I have shown it working and not working in the example. The point is that I don't understand what is causing the problem- and how one must cure it. The cure would achieve stability and provide an interesting line to include in H:T. Its not urgent but if anyone has a moment.... --ClemRutter (talk) 17:22, 18 October 2009 (UTC)
You should probably create a subpage for the documentation; otherwise it would be too easy to accidentally break the template itself when trying to edit the documentations, plus having the doc and template on the same page creates a lot of unnecessary code. Intelligentsiumreview17:30, 18 October 2009 (UTC)
You are inserting table syntax (| on a newline == new table cell) into a table. The parser is just getting confused and doesn't remember which | means what. If you'd rewrite the entire TMR template in pure html tables, instead of in wikitables, I think you'd be fine. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 11:02, 19 October 2009 (UTC)
That is certainly worth a try this evening. You reckon there is no way to clarify this in wiki code- I feel less stupid now I know its not just me. --ClemRutter (talk) 12:39, 19 October 2009 (UTC)
If the problem is where TheDJ thinks it is, then you can do it in wikicode, but I'm not sure it would "clarify" things. You have to substitute | with {{!}} inside a template call wherever it is meant as table-| and not template-|, but it can make the code quite unreadable. Svick (talk) 13:54, 19 October 2009 (UTC)
I have re-coded in HTML and that has got rid of the error effecting the start of the coordinates expansion- but not the problem of the [[Image:file.jpg|200px|thumb]] when Image:file.jpg is contained in un-named parameter {{{6}}}}. Changing this to a named parameter solves the rendering problem- as the named parameter trims the attached lf/cr, while the unnamed parameter leaves it in place. What I need is a wiki function that does the equivalent of a <?php echo trim($a) ?>. Looking at the MW Help Template gave me the idea that all that was needed was a helper function that converted a un-named parameter to a named parameter- {{StripWhitespace|x = {{{6|}}}}} has already been witten. It solved all the problems. Thanks guys for all the input- we can all sleep soundly tonight. --ClemRutter (talk) 22:19, 19 October 2009 (UTC)
Google Chrome
I'm using Chrome and everything I to go edit somthing, the first 10 functions are displayed (those icons above the "Subject/headline" box). I have to refresh the page, when this happens, to get the rest of the functions, such as insert table. This is got to be fixed. Maybe a bugzilla report will fix.174.3.111.148 (talk) 21:06, 18 October 2009 (UTC)
Let me tell you something. I once had Google Chrome, and I loved it. It was everything I had always wanted. When I started editing Wikipedia, I noticed that I couldn't use a lot of the features that I wanted to. Then I switched to firefox. Once I started using it, I loved it. I even removed Google Chrome from my laptop. If you want my advice, switch to Firefox. By the way, you might want to create a Wikipedia account. I am glad I could help you. Btilm 23:13, 18 October 2009 (UTC)
This: [[{{{name}}}|]. Won't work, I'm afraid, the pipe trick actually expands such a wikilink when saving it, not when displaying it. My writing of [[Foo (disambiguation)|]] here is expanded to Foo while saving, check the source text. For limited usage, you might be interested in {{Title disambig text}} though. Amalthea23:56, 19 October 2009 (UTC)
Is there some kind of escape character I can put in front of the pipes so that the template forms a valid address on Archive.org? LeilaniLad (talk) 17:43, 20 October 2009 (UTC)
Every time I upload an image, it shows that I uploaded it twice in quick succession under file history. I also get the stupid "uploading file" box that never goes past 0% and doesn't let me click anything else, although the image still gets uploaded. I'm guessing these problems are related somehow. I thought it might have to do with the Beta, but it happens with or without the Beta active. I also tried with and without the new "mwEmbed support" gadget and the Firefogg Firefox extension, but it still happens. Any ideas would be appreciated. Thanks, MrKIA11 (talk) 20:36, 19 October 2009 (UTC)
The issue is that formatdate wraps its output in a span, which breaks wikilinking: <span class="mw-formatted-date" title="2024-11-10">2024-11-10</span>. For the specific use case here, why not just do [[Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion#{{CURRENTYEAR}}-{{CURRENTMONTH}}-{{CURRENTDAY2}}|MfD]] → MfD? Anomie⚔12:28, 20 October 2009 (UTC)
Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion uses autoformatted dates in section headings (maybe that is a bad idea) so [[Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion#{{CURRENTYEAR}}-{{CURRENTMONTH}}-{{CURRENTDAY2}}|MfD]] only gives the right section link for users with no date preference or the right preference. PrimeHunter (talk) 13:43, 20 October 2009 (UTC)
(edit conflict)Because if a user has a date preference set, then #{{CURRENTYEAR}}-{{CURRENTMONTH}}-{{CURRENTDAY2}} doesn't exist. I always thought formatting headings based on preference was dumb, but the people over there disagreed. MrKIA11 (talk) 13:45, 20 October 2009 (UTC)
Hi, friends! I recently printed the article Spontaneous CSF Leak using the built in print option located on the left panel. However, when printed I got a few errors. Namely, the images displayed code and the references all had this little EDIT next to them. I wonder if this is a known issue and can anyone else reproduce it? Thanks! Basket of Puppies19:42, 20 October 2009 (UTC)
The edit links are now removed from printing. When the printable version makes the text run into images, then this is most likely a problem of the browser that you are using to print. P.S. there is not even a need to use "printable version", you can just choose print from the menu and you will get the printable version automatically. The "printable version" link is basically only there for older Internet Explorer versions. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 20:01, 20 October 2009 (UTC)
– The header is required for a number of reasons. If you want to use Wikipedia, don't tamper with the data your browser sends. Icewedge (talk) 01:44, 19 October 2009 (UTC)
The problem (webserver saying "Please provide a User-Agent header" instead of serving the page)
happens only with some URLs (example: [11]).
It makes wikipedia stand out as annoying for users who don't normally send the header.
I hope this behavior serves a purpose (like, keeping out a bot operated by someone who is smart
enough to operate a bot but not smart enough to forge the header).
92.225.64.14 (talk) 13:35, 17 October 2009 (UTC)
I can access that url you give with just the host: header - are you sure it's wikipedia? You probably can't edit without a user agent. --h2g2bob (talk) 23:57, 20 October 2009 (UTC)
Search function won't search
On several occasions in the past week, all I intended to do was search for something. The article more than likely did not exist, but I wanted to know where the information was.
All Wikipedia would do was tell me there was no such article and give me a red link to create the article. At some point, I was able to find the text I searched for, so the search function should have given me at least the one result and probably more; whether the text was a title of something notable enough for an article is debatable.Vchimpanzee· talk·contributions·18:26, 21 October 2009 (UTC)
There are probably more like that - see Help:Special page, which lists all of them and indicates which are inactive (or rather were inactive last time anyone checked). I suspect this is something the devs would have to sort out, by taking the inactive special pages out of the system somehow (try asking at WP:VPT).--Kotniski (talk) 09:32, 21 October 2009 (UTC)
Problem With Watching Talk Page
When I go to My preferences > User Profile > E-mail Options, I can't see an option as "Notify me by e-mail when my talk page is changed" while I remember very well that the option used to exist though I never used it but I would like to use it now. Also I can't see "Notify me when the page I watch are changed" while Wikipedia:Preferences states that such option exists. The said two options exist in Wikinews and Commons. Help me out in the earliest, thank you, Srinivas10:42, 22 October 2009 (UTC)
I eliminated the sidebar and expanded the main content area to full screen by adding hidePane to my user javascript page. no links were lost. they just got moved to drop down boxes at the top of the page. this is perfect except that I would really like for the links to stay in place while I scroll. How would I do that? Also I'm wondering if you think it would even be possible to create a drop down menu at the top of the page with the table of contents as its content? Lemmiwinks2 (talk) 17:01, 22 October 2009 (UTC)
Convert UserChrome.css modification to a Wikipedia skin?
I have a Wikipedia skin for the Firefox addon Stylish, and I was wondering if there was any way to have it appear as a skin in the WP preferences dialog. It seems to only work when I press "show preview" while editing, and it only works on that page. Is there any way to convert is into a personal WP skin without modifying any of the original skins? I'm rather new to WP, and (more than) a little confused. Any help would be greatly appreciated.
-Hmmwhatsthisdo (talk) 01:23, 22 October 2009 (UTC)
You're adding it to the wrong page. When you use Stylish, you're not actually applying a different skin, you're just adding CSS on top of another skin (MediaWiki skins are built in PHP). The solution is to add the CSS to the skin page of the skin that is getting overlaid, which is most likely your Monobook page. CSS pages only apply automatically if they correspond to the (MediaWiki-level) skin you're using: I have both a monobook.css and a vector.css page, for example, and only vector.css applies right now as I'm using the Vector skin. {{Nihiltres|talk|edits}} 13:51, 22 October 2009 (UTC)
But wouldn't that overwrite the original Monobook? or will it create a new skin entirely, based off of monobook? what I'd like to have happen is to have my skin show up as a separate radio button (rather than as the Monobook skin) in my appearance options.
"Overwrite" no. Monobook.css is like any wiki page- you can revert changes to it. Right now, yours is probably empty- after adding the Stylish code, you can revert back to original Monobook by either blanking the page or commenting out the code. Right now there is no way for a user to add a "custom" skin that would appear as a selectable option in the preferences. --King Öomie22:44, 22 October 2009 (UTC)
Template:Mediawikiredundant
I've just created Template:MediaWiki redundant to help identify which mediawiki interface messages are not in use (including those which merely include something else). It could perhaps add a templated category or something as well. I'd like it to distinguish messages which are entirely redundant and messages which include something else, but my brain isn't working enough to do it. Thoughts? Rd232talk17:55, 22 October 2009 (UTC)
It may be possible, as there are scripts which customize rollback. However, per Wikipedia:MINOR, vandalism reverts are supposed to be marked as minor, and rollback is only to be used for reverting clear vandalism. So, I would say there isn't a good reason to not check them as minor? Or is this just a "I wonder if it could be done" question? Thanks. Plastikspork―Œ(talk)00:53, 23 October 2009 (UTC)
No idea. There's a good 100 variables you didn't cover, starting with A) what version of Firefox, B) Clean install or modded, C) what browser were you using previously? --King Öomie14:16, 23 October 2009 (UTC)
I just discovered that, apparently, the IBdB doesn't allow external linking to pages within their website. I clicked on the ibdb link on Lend Me a Tenor, which took me to the ibdb main page, so I changed the link to another page within the ibdb website, and that link, too, only takes the reader to the ibdb main page. Is there anything that can be done to fix this, or should we have some sort of policy about linking to ibdb? 99.166.95.142 (talk) 17:39, 22 October 2009 (UTC)
There was a trailing slash on the link? I changed it, and it appears to now work for me, but it could be my browser configuration (or caching issues)? Plastikspork―Œ(talk)18:33, 22 October 2009 (UTC)
This issue can be seen in Internet Explorer, but not in Firefox. The problem is in the {{listen}} template. I asked on its talk page if anybody knows how to fix this. Svick (talk) 00:25, 23 October 2009 (UTC)
I started using the Vector skin and I'd like the actions that are now in the drop-down menu (i.e. Watch, Purge, Twinkle stuff) to show as tabs as the rest of them (e.g. Edit, View history). How can I change my user JS or CSS to do this? Svick (talk) 12:41, 21 October 2009 (UTC)
I have a function in my vector.js that should do that for individual functions… crude work from a JavaScript newbie, but it works in Safari at least. (I ought to double-check that the code doesn't need any tweaking to match the current structure of Vector, too… there might be an unnecessary chunk of code in there.) I'd extend it to a full dropdown-menu-eliminator for you, but I'm a bit too busy at the moment. Take a look at User:Nihiltres/vector.js and you might get a few ideas on how to make it work for you… or perhaps someone will come along and polish my work into a usable form for you. Look for the moveActionOutOfMenu() function. {{Nihiltres|talk|edits}} 14:48, 21 October 2009 (UTC)
Thanks. After looking at your code, I wrote User:Svick/DropDownToTabs.js and it seems to work fine, except for Twinkle's action links. Twinkle adds them using addOnloadHook and I move them the same way, and my code apparently executes before Twinkle's. How can I fix this? Svick (talk) 17:08, 21 October 2009 (UTC)
The problem I had was, of course, caused by a stupid error in my code. The code works for me now in Firefox and anybody is welcome to use it. Svick (talk) 20:03, 23 October 2009 (UTC)
Ok so the subject isn't clear, so let me use an example rather than trying to explain it
If I put a space before a line, it does a code or quotation box. Unfortunately the text never wraps and will cause a horizontal scroll bar if it isn't manually broken.
So whats the purpose of it not wrapping if it messes up page layout? I know I can use colon, but that dashed outline makes the space indent very useful for quotations... Except for the nowrap part. The feature seems redundant if its only for short codes (Why not use the same markup for showing longer codes?) and it messes up the fixed widths whenever it is used for a code that is longer than the page is wide (Which if it does this, most people will avoid using it once the code breaks the page width). - ʄɭoʏɗiaɲτ¢19:07, 23 October 2009 (UTC)
Actually, part of its purpose is to never automatically break. It's to be used specifically for code snippets as they appear, which is rendered useless if the browser window adds a line break for readability. Although it's irritating when someone accidentally prefaces a talkpage comment with a space and just leaves it unfixed for six months. --King Öomie20:09, 23 October 2009 (UTC)
Is there a variation/a template that I can use to make the box, but have it wrap (for quotations and what not)? (beat me to it Gadget) Or from a vice-versa perspective, can we make a template for code snippets and use the indent space for quotations (probably not at this point I assume)? - ʄɭoʏɗiaɲτ¢20:40, 23 October 2009 (UTC)
You can enclose it in <pre style="width:80%; white-space: pre-wrap;">...</pre>:
If I put a space before a line, it does a code or quotation box. Unfortunately the text never wraps and will cause a horizontal scroll bar if it isn't manually broken.
Can't even see the registration form with a 1440x900 screen resolution. ;-)
Hello. When one is not logged in, and want to create an account, he sees MediaWiki:Fancycaptcha-createaccount. This message is so large, that the newbie may not notice there is a registration form under it. Come on, can't we summarize it a bit ? Is every word neccesary ? Should we move that message under the registration form ? Thanks for your attention. :-) Dodoïste (talk) 21:12, 19 October 2009 (UTC)
I agree that it should probably be trimmed/re-arranged. However, if we put it under the form, people are less likely to read it (we also have a bunch of other stuff down there already). Ideally, we would be able to put the text in the form itself, so the username information could come directly before the username input, the password info before the password input, etc. But the software doesn't currently support that. Mr.Z-man22:01, 19 October 2009 (UTC)
The only important and useful information in this message is: "Unable to see the image? An administrator can create an account for you". The rest could be deleted, and it woulnd't create any problems doing so, because:
The user don't want to read it and will try to skip it anyway. It's boring, and it's getting in his way.
Worse, too much information or rules may discourage the user to create an account: "Oh gosh, do I really need to read everything before creating an account?" If one of you is familiar with usability testing, he'll understand how users can feel like.
The user is lost : he can't see the usual registration form, and is disappointed. Where should he go to fill in those three fields? The user will probably scroll down, but it's too late: the user has been disturbed.
Comment: the current version is (mostly) my redesign, which I posted here and got only one person commenting on. Suddenly everyone gives a damn?! Anyway the previous version was like this. I was focussed on making that clearer. And now, in response to the point that the form isn't visible, I've added "scroll down..." near the top. PS It had occurred to me that it would be much better, usability-wise, to integrate the instructions with the form, which is the very usual way to do these things! But I don't think we can do that without requesting a software change. Which we can do, of course... Rd232talk20:35, 20 October 2009 (UTC)
Sorry, I'm not very active on en.wiki, I didn't see your previous message. Anyway, I do agree with you: you made it clearer.
But now I'm talking about something else: is every information on that message neccessary? Couldn't we delete a few ? Dodoïste (talk) 20:52, 20 October 2009 (UTC)
Well the second bullet under Username could be punted to the "Username policy" boxout (I had it there originally, but it was said to not be visible enough). We could also do away with that bullet altogether if (a) the error message in those situations with forbidden symbols were clearer, and (b) the auto-conversion were flagged when it's done (don't think it is currently). In addition, the Email Address part pretty much duplicates the note in the form. We should really be able to merge those. How do we edit the email address message in the form itself? Rd232talk21:07, 20 October 2009 (UTC)
Reflection:Dodoïste makes a fair point and Rd232 is doing a good job as usual. But I think there's a contradiction at the heart of Wikipedia's user account policy that should be part of any new account signup/registration process:
Edits by anonymous users (IP addresses) are in general tolerated or even approved ("they catch our typos"). Because IP addresses may be shared by multiple individuals, edits are not usually tracked for long periods and in any case criticisms of edits are expressed in muted terms. An anonymous user is at liberty to edit from multiple IP addresses without any censure.
Edits by registered users are closely monitored and can be analysed in such detail that the user's interests and background can be inferred. It is easy to stalk the user, and criticism can be expressed directly and vigorously on the user's talk page or elsewhere. Once a user has started editing from a registered account, that user is implicitly forbidden from making any edits from a different registered account or from any IP address.
No, a registered user who wants to stop using a username can go back to using just an IP address, or can just drop their username and create a new one at any time. In general, nobody would even know. — Carl (CBM · talk) 02:12, 21 October 2009 (UTC)
You can retire an account in some circumstances, but policy says you can't use more than one account to contribute to the same page or discussion, and you mustn't repeatedly switch accounts. It seems to me that the registration process should explain the rules about creating a new account when you already have one. I'm thinking about a recent SPI where a user had created nine accounts that edited the same group of pages, apparently unaware of these rules. - Pointillist (talk) 15:37, 21 October 2009 (UTC)
If anything needs explaining, it's the increase in (average) respect shown to a registered account edit vs an anonymous edit (excluding obvious vandalism). Not pointing this out may be a WP:BEANS issue though... Rd232talk09:02, 21 October 2009 (UTC)
That's all we need. Possibly we could re-add a box like is there currently, but it needs to be to the right of the form, rather than on top. We may need a software change (e.g. another system message) in order to do that. --Aude (talk) 22:52, 21 October 2009 (UTC)
Yay, that's exactly what I meant! I'm happy to be understood! :-) I support your proposal.
Those are useful links. Also, I know that developers are working to refactor the user login and account creation code in MediaWiki. When that's implemented, it should be possible to build in some immediate feedback with Ajax. For example, as someone enters a username, we can do a check to see if (1) the username is available, (2) if it's on our username blacklist (see MediaWiki:Titleblacklist), (3) if they enter an e-mail address as their username, provide feedback to say that's not advisable or not allowed. We could also provide feedback on strength of the password (e.g. weak -> strong). --Aude (talk) 23:34, 21 October 2009 (UTC)
Aude, in the absence of a "wizard" step-by-step form with instructions at each stage, I'd be happier with a message more like this:
Registering a free account takes only a few seconds and provides a number of benefits.
You'll need to choose a nickname that satisfies our username policy and does not accidentally reveal your real-life identity.
In general, if you have already edited Wikipedia using another account, you should not create a new account (here's why).
If you've forgotten the password for your existing account, click here for advice.
If you simply want to change your username, request it here.
It's a good idea to provide an email address that can be used to send you a temporary password if you ever forget your real one. Other editors won't see your email address, and you can prevent them from sending emails to you if you wish (here's how).
To help protect against automated account creation, please enter the words that appear below in the box, without any spaces (more info). If you can't see the words in the box, ask an administrator to create the account on your behalf.
This is still fairly compact but covers the principal pain points. The change to "provides a number of benefits" aligns the text with the Username policy page and avoids over-selling the advantages of registration. What do you think? - Pointillist (talk) 00:43, 22 October 2009 (UTC)
Regarding the username, mentioning and linking to the username policy is reasonable. The part about using one's real name duplicates the text below the form (with red, bold text drawing attention to it).
The bit about changing account names is also provided below the form. The forgot password information is good, though perhaps could go below the form, making there be two bullet points (where it says "Already have an account?")
Also, I would eliminate the e-mail item, since there already is a place in the form (below the e-mail address box) for this.
Looking at the German Wikipedia signup form, they've essentially got below the CAPTCHA/form what we have above it. We've focussed heavily on privacy issues below the form (which we have far more detail on). And they don't mention characters forbidden in usernames, and username policy is two lines. They do mention (which we don't) a 30-character limit on names, and a ban on ALL CAPS. I think there are drawbacks to putting all the info below the CAPTCHA/form, unless we can keep it really short - i.e. it won't get read. I think there are drawbacks too to ditching all the details we have, but Email Address can go, especially if someone can figure out how to edit the "email" message within the form. I've moved the tech details to the boxout, and commented out the Email Address bit, and merged the username/password headers. Maybe more radical changes should wait for the technical enhancements mentioned? Rd232talk11:28, 22 October 2009 (UTC)
Perhaps we should change our attitude to registration. Instead of trying to get users to register as soon as possible—which apparently tempts us to exaggerate the "many benefits" of registering and to minimise messages about possible downsides—we might make it into a deliberate "rite-of-passage" for editors: the moment when an individual declares his/her commitment to the community and its policies (e.g. the prohibition against editing with multiple accounts).
On this basis, the essential "terms" of the commitment would have to be presented to the user before they click the form's submit button, e.g. as a summary in simple language above the form, with links to detailed explanations as appropriate. Once the user has registered a similar summary should be posted to their talk page as part of a welcome message. What do you think? - Pointillist (talk) 23:09, 22 October 2009 (UTC)
P.S. Dodoïste's example of the ebay registration form is worth examining. The ebay user agreement (here) is 8614 words (52776 characters) long, and under a paragraph saying "We expect you to read all of the linked documents carefully" links to eighteen additional pages, including strict rules on identities. So it is a much more overtly legal document than anything we are considering here.
Ebay's user agreement is the perfect example of a text that users will never read. It's a fail. I only wanted to show a few explanations and a design improvement. Ebay itself is quite unusable.
Aude, I do support a refactor the user login and account creation code in MediaWiki. Please try the yahoo account creation from, which many usability experts point out as a reference. Try to mess up with it, and see how it reacts. You might like to try picnik's website as well: click on "register" up right. Have fun! :-)
Aude, I can't help much with the coding. But I would be glad to help the developers to design a new form. I could help them to make a user-friendly form. How should I contact them? Yours, Dodoïste (talk) 01:21, 23 October 2009 (UTC)
Well done, it's much clearer than before. And that icon shows the right way, and is very attractive. I want to request an account too! :-) Dodoïste (talk) 11:12, 23 October 2009 (UTC)
Thanks for removing the e-mail text. Other things duplicated include the part about offensive usernames, as well as the part about promotional usernames and including domain names or e-mails in usernames. (in the bullet point, and in the box). For the part about non-permitted characters, I have started making some code changes to check for those. I'm making it so that you get a specific error message (once the form is submitted) if you attempt to include them. I think an error message would be enough. I think there are more ways to make the form more compact (as suggested previously), but let's consider things piece by piece and see what can be done. --Aude (talk) 01:19, 25 October 2009 (UTC)
Well, decent error handling would obviate the need to talk about those technical issues up front - that would be nice. The duplication about usernames is probably necessary, though - the bit on the left being the summary and the boxout being the detail. It's also the main issue users won't be aware of, so it bears making it prominent enough. Proper integration with the form might make that achievable without duplication, but that's longer term. Rd232talk15:40, 25 October 2009 (UTC)
technical problem entry for "Contact Us"
I suggest that the "Contact Us" page list a subpage for technical markup problems, to call attention to pages where an amateur editor has either caused a problem or can't figure out how to fix it. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.18.239.210 (talk) 12:40, 20 October 2009 (UTC)
Took a look, and saw the existing "technical problem" entry went to a "bug report" page, without clearly identifying that it was talking about software issues. Added a line "Request help with a technical issue with the wikimarkup of a Wikipedia page." linking to the Help Desk. Rd232talk15:47, 25 October 2009 (UTC)
Diff colors bad for colorblind people
Thought it might be a good idea to flag up a message posted on the reference desk that the bold red text in diffs is difficult for a user to read because he's colorblind. I'm not colorblind, so I can't really say what's neeed, but perhaps it could be different colors? Diffs do have red text on a green background, which is a common type of colorblindness. --h2g2bob (talk) 23:48, 20 October 2009 (UTC)
Looking at diffs through http://colorfilter.wickline.org/, I did not see any major issues. Some of the text was a bit harder to read, but I'd attribute to me not looking through the filter daily (rather than the colors). Perhaps we should create a colorblind gadget? I know for certain games they provide a setting for color blindness. — Dispenser02:48, 21 October 2009 (UTC)
Perhaps we can use highlighting in our diffs, like they do on other wikipedias. Sample Or at least change the background colors to something other than green. -- Ynot?13:54, 21 October 2009 (UTC)
The French example seems to be a great improvement. Much more legible, and more consistent with the normal means for highlighting text. Ian Spackman (talk)
Another method, one that would probably get approval more easily than a sitewide change, would be for someone to write some javascript that would allow a user to view diffs in a different format (either the French format or some new one). That way, a colorblind user (or anyone else, for that matter) could log in to view diffs in this more personalized manner. Someguy1221 (talk) 09:26, 25 October 2009 (UTC)
Are there any string manipulation parser functions? I'm specifically looking for a way to add an error check to User:Kww/singlechart so that if someone uses {{singlechart|Bulgaria|3|url=whatever}}, I can verify that the url does not contain charly1300 or apcchart, or, conversely, verify that it does contain bamp-bg.org.—Kww(talk) 12:55, 23 October 2009 (UTC)
Yes, the devs seem to have some inexplicable resistance to including these string functions. The code exists, everyone wants it, the devs just don't want to let us have it. I think it was last discussed at T21298. The excuse is performance issues (which I can't actually believe - if the server's got enough oomph to format dates and do math, then it can manage to detect one string inside another or measure how long it is); but anyway the workarounds we have to use (the string manipulation templates lined to above) are even more inefficient. All rather bizarre... --Kotniski (talk) 13:25, 23 October 2009 (UTC)
You linked to the bug discussion which explains why it's not bizarre. Pulling out one of the more relevant comments: "...The Lua extension requires installation of a PHP extension and/or the ability to use exec(). If it were enabled on Wikimedia, all templates would use it pretty soon, and anyone on shared hosting without either of these rights would be unable to use large chunks of Wikimedia content. PHP extension installation requires root access, and exec() is unsafe on shared hosts that have all PHP executed by a single user (using mod_php, FastCGI, etc.)." Keeping MediaWiki widely installable remains a significant objective. The bug discussion suggests we might one day get string functions based on the abuse filter structure, but who knows when (or if). Rd232talk13:56, 23 October 2009 (UTC)
Yeah but you don't have to do it with any fancy extensions. All right, I don't have the specialized technical knowledge to actually know for sure, but I really can't believe that doing simple string manipulation is any more difficult or resource-consuming than doing math or date formatting (even padleft and padright are more complex than saying what the length of a string is). Maybe that wasn't the most appropriate bug discussion to link to, but I had a very weird conversation with a dev at one point where he really did just seem to be saying "we don't want to let people have this because it's not something they ought to want". (And the devs haven't worked out how to do alphabetical order yet either... grr...) --Kotniski (talk) 14:08, 23 October 2009 (UTC)
The problem is that giving just string functions is that its, at best, a temporary fix. Wikipedia was able to get by just fine without parser functions until people developed some templates to do "if" statements, and then people started using them in tons of templates, so we got parser functions. Now people are using parser functions to build string functions. If we enable string functions, its almost a given that someone will start using them to make something even more complex. Ideally we could embed a real programming language instead of slowly turning wikitext into an ugly and inefficient one, but that has the problems that Rd232 mentioned. Mr.Z-man16:44, 23 October 2009 (UTC)
Not sure what you're saying here. You're sounding a bit like the dev I talked to - apparently saying that we shouldn't have something that users will find useful because then they might start asking for even more useful things. Or that there's a more satisfactory solution which unfortunately has the drawback that it can't be used, so because of that we can't implement the slightly less satisfactory one that can.--Kotniski (talk) 17:00, 23 October 2009 (UTC)
I'm saying that we should consider more than just what people want right this very second. We should consider the long-term implications of slowly turning wikitext into an inefficient and difficult to use programming language. Mr.Z-man17:12, 23 October 2009 (UTC)
Well yes, that's what it already is. But explicit string functions would make it a bit more efficient and easier to use, so again, I don't see the argument, unless it's "let's keep things worse than they need be so that we have a stronger argument sometime in the future when we want to replace them with something else." (And given that the devs are running close to a decade to solve alphabetical order, I don't expect a workable replacement for wikitext parser functions to be produced any time soon.) --Kotniski (talk) 18:04, 23 October 2009 (UTC)
Easier to use for who? The handful of users who write complex templates? The majority of users will never use such things. As for efficiency, if it the current hacks were creating a real problem, it would be installed (or the current hacks would be disabled), otherwise, don't worry about performance. As for alphabetical ordering (I presume you mean in things like categories), this is mostly a database issue, not a MediaWiki one. There's little that the MediaWiki developers could do about that. Mr.Z-man22:45, 23 October 2009 (UTC)
Nonsense, of course they could solve this problem (at bugzilla they say that various solutions exist, it's just a matter of deciding which one to use). But because devs don't seem to care about what users want, no-one's doing anything about it. Your first comment is misguided as well; maybe only a few users will write complex templates, but many more will use them, and the sites that run off the software will improve for everyone as a result. Neither of these are huge issues (though it might be thought that alphabetical ordering is a pretty fundamental thing to get right when you're writing works of reference), but it's frustrating to see so much effort being put into this project by editors (and devs of course - I'm not complaining about any individuals) while continually seeing easy potential improvements held up due to - I'm not sure what to call it, systemic incompetence maybe - at developer level.--Kotniski (talk) 10:06, 24 October 2009 (UTC)
Yes, ignore all of the new features and bugfixes that are added all the time and point to 2 that aren't as an evidence that the developers are incompetent and "don't seem to care about what users want." There's one easy "solution" to string functions, but its at best a temporary fix. There really aren't any "easy" solutions to proper unicode collation. Mr.Z-man16:53, 24 October 2009 (UTC)
All right, no point carrying on sniping at each other here, but I retain my impression that the system by which the devs operate (collectively, as a part of the system, not as individuals) is causing serious bottlenecks in this project. The main problem seems to be lack of proper channels of dialogue and unresponsiveness to users' actual needs. (And collation is trivially easy, even I know how to do it. And temporary fixes are better than no fix at all.) --Kotniski (talk) 17:45, 24 October 2009 (UTC)
Date calculations
As I continue on my quest to automate some of the record chart tables, I've come across an unpleasant problem. There are a few of the major chart sources that use relative time for the URLS: last week is week 1, the week before last is week 2, etc. That means that every reference people place has to be updated every week, and any reference my chart macro creates will have the same problem. Alternatively, I could calculate how many weeks ago a date was, and adjust the URL automagically. Does anyone know of any templates that do date math that I could use as a starting point?—Kww(talk) 23:47, 23 October 2009 (UTC)
I agree that changing the URL every week is rather bad practice. If they really don't have any way of creating a permanent URL and aren't willing to do so, I would suggest using something like WebCite. Mr.Z-man01:44, 24 October 2009 (UTC)
I suspect that they do it on purpose. Many of them take steps to prevent direct linking to interior pages, as opposed to coming in through the top. It's one of the reasons that keeping record charts accurately cited is such a pain. Using WebCite defeats my primary purpose, which is to make properly citing a chart easy so that novices can accurately do it. For most, tell me the country, artist name, and song title, I can generate an accurate URL to verify the information against. For a few, I need the date. My ultimate goal is to get the charts converted to using templates in a standard form, so that a bot can then be produced to read the templates and automatically verify them as a background task. Chart vandalism is a nasty problem, and I've gotten tired of manual verification and reversion. Looks like DATEDIFF2 will provide the core of what I need, with a little bit of divide by 7 logic and checking for Wednesday crossings (for Japan) and Sunday crossings (for the UK). This is easy compared to Billboard. I'm actually thinking of building an intermediate website that implements the Billboard API in another server just to give a usable URL format that doesn't require a magic and unpredictable number to identify the artist.—Kww(talk) 03:24, 24 October 2009 (UTC)
AFAIK there is an absolute-date syntax for Billboard charts (e.g. Oct 10, 2009), and as it still permits archiving that is a good route to automate if you can. This raises the wider question of whether Wikipedia should contain manually-synchronized copies of data tables from other sources, given that this offers all sorts of opportunities for sneaky vandalism (there used to be an editor who delighted in tampering with cities' climate tables, for example). Pointillist (talk) 18:43, 24 October 2009 (UTC)
Note that your link only provides the top 10 positions. The remaining 90 are there, just harder to get at. My first proposal at chart data was to simply eliminate it, for much the same reason as you've proposed. I gave up on that. Then, I spent over a year and around 15,000 edits trying to take care of the problem manually. I'm in the process of giving up on that. Now, I'm aiming for a standard format. If I can get the data to be entered via a standard set of templates and sourced to a standard set of sources, a bot can be written that verifies the data offline. At least that way, sneaky vandalism will get automatically corrected.—Kww(talk) 12:31, 25 October 2009 (UTC)
Warning when adding links from a known unreliable source
Can a warning be added to inform the user that the link is not verifiable when the user try to references unreliable source, for example, when the url contains wikipedia.org, baike.baidu.com or blogspot.com?--Skyfiler (talk) 23:18, 24 October 2009 (UTC)
add a {{subst:Adw|ARTICLE NAME}} for anything that is listed for AfD, CSD, or blanked;
add an entry to the list of AfDs (in the Languages section of that page), or an equivalent
As is, manual tracking only does this very poorly, and as a result, articles are deleted or blanked without adequate notice to the WikiProject contributors, which is quite frustrating.
Similarly, it would be nice if we could automatically tag as {{WP conlang}} anything that is listed in certain WP:CL-governed categories, like Category:Constructed languages and Category:International auxiliary languages, since everything in those categories is necessarily of interest to the WP, and users may not know of the WP and how to correctly tag new pages for inclusion in it.
I think this functionality would be of significant utility to all WikiProjects, and could be done in a completely project-agnostic way (e.g. perhaps tied to {{WPBannerMeta}}).
Anybody else notice that some old page versions are still gone? The 2005 Peer Review version of Technetium, for example, is blank. See [12] Related SignPost entry here. Anything been done about this yet? --mav (talk) 04:06, 26 October 2009 (UTC)
Actually since all of these issues require identification for fixing, it's rather important you mention all these cases in that specific bugreport I think... —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 12:08, 26 October 2009 (UTC)
Yikes, there are heaps of them! I know of cases of this problem at piano for example, and many other articles that I can't remember at the moment. Bug 19990, which was another problem relating to corrupted history that I reported, was almost resolved without me having to mention the hundreds of pages where it occurred. I would've thought the devs would use database queries to find all (or almost all) the edits to fix in bug 20757, and not have to rely on editors finding them by accident. Graham8706:26, 27 October 2009 (UTC)
searching for ELs to a domain
I know I've seen people do this in the past, but I can't seem to locate it right now. Let's say I wanted to do a search in wikipedia for pages that have links to a certain domain (today my concern is geocities.com). How would I do that? --Bachrach44 (talk) 16:47, 26 October 2009 (UTC)
Hi - I'm an arbcom clerk and I need a variant of the Template:Discussion_top template. (I have no idea how to write templates and would break something if I tried).
Basically my problem is that in Arbcom cases there are often HUGE discussions that need to be closed off. They are also often adjacent, so when you are scrolling down it is hard to tell where one stops and the next begins because the discussion template gives them the same background colour. I have been switching between ((discussion top)) and ((archive top}} in order to get some colour differences, but the wording of these two templates differs and it's a bad look.
Desired template changes:
Wording changed from "The following discussion is archived..." to "The following ArbCom discussion is archived..."
A colour parameter (color=1, color=2 etc) to allow the background colour to be changed. Three colours would be plenty. Should default to the current colour (#f5f3ef).
A name of Template:Arbdiscuss would be ideal.
Being clueless, I'm not sure how this ties in with the ((discussion bottom)) tag.
Oh, I've spelt "color" "colour". I can change it, if you'd like (or I can explain how to change it, if you've already protected it). Basically, though, it is {{Arbdiscuss|colour=<desired colour>}}. For example, if I fill <desired colour> with, say, ivory, it would produce:
The following arbitration-related discussion is archived. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipisicing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur. Excepteur sint occaecat cupidatat non proident, sunt in culpa qui officia deserunt mollit anim id est laborum.
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
Preventing search engines from indexing certain commercial encyclopedia pages
Would it be possible to establish a list of encyclopedia pages, mostly about businesses and products, that are invisible to Google and similar search engines?
Preventing the existence of these article pages from influencing search engine results would allow such pages to continue to exist, while denying them the advertising benefits of search engine manipulation that come from having a Wikipedia page. Having this capability might allow these issues to be resolved without having to resort to deletion process, which seems to be a flawed instrument when it comes to these issues. - Smerdis of Tlön (talk) 14:00, 27 October 2009 (UTC)
I believe they do. On the other hand, I'm not asking about indexing of AfD discussions; rather, the underlying articles. Will simply adding that tag to the pages in question do the trick? And if so, should I start? - Smerdis of Tlön (talk) 14:12, 27 October 2009 (UTC)
The template {{noindex}} has no effect in mainspace (see the template for details). Also, policywise, if it did work, use in this way would be highly controversial. As to addressing the problem, this seems an issue of notability, which should perhaps be addressed at WP:COMPANY, which currently doesn't discuss awards. For me, the notability value of many industry awards is rather low. Rd232talk14:25, 27 October 2009 (UTC)
If the companies meet the inclusion criteria, they should be indexed. If you disagree with the result of an AFD, there's an appa process for that. –xenotalk15:31, 27 October 2009 (UTC)
External links in Wikipedia have the rel=nofollow parameter, so these articles shouldn't raise search engine rank of the companies' websites, if that's what you are concerned about. Svick (talk) 19:43, 27 October 2009 (UTC)
Technically, my concern is that having a Wikipedia page is itself an advertising coup and likely to put a business with a Wikipedia page at the top of the list of search engine results on related subjects. It's usually trivial to follow the link from the Wikipedia page to a company's own site. Ideally, we could have pages on commercial products and businesses on businesses that pass notability guidelines, but without making the Wikipedia pages on them appear in web searches, so that Wikipedia would not be quite as attractive as an advertising venue. - Smerdis of Tlön (talk) 19:55, 27 October 2009 (UTC)
I see your point, but it really defeats the object of Wikipedia. The only solution is to re-examine the specific notability criteria for this area (WP:COMPANY), an area which is so much more vulnerable to spam than others (and the core notion of notability doesn't take account of that). Also, possibly, re-examine how those criteria are applied at AFD, where (some might controversially argue) a certain inclusionist tendency doesn't seem to care about the spam issue; any article on a minimally notable company is improvable to a neutral standard in theory, ergo keep - even though in practice this often doesn't happen, providing what I call a spamicle (cf Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment/new_users#Promotional articles...). Rd232talk21:55, 27 October 2009 (UTC)
There should not be promotional pages on Wikipedia. If there is a page in the article namespace that functions as unworthy advertising for a company or product (that is, not just presenting an encyclopedic coverage that describes a successful and ethical company), then that page needs to be rewritten or deleted, not merely hidden. Happy‑melon22:13, 27 October 2009 (UTC)
Some variant of this (for spam, BLPs, questionably notable subjects, etc.) is almost a perennial proposal. My response to all of them is: If we don't want the general public to be able to easily find a particular article, we should not have that article. Mr.Z-man23:50, 27 October 2009 (UTC)
Accidentally disabled mobile Wikipedia on iPod Touch
I think there's no special character returning all articles for performance reasons, so I've been looking for a minimal number of searches returning all of them - or almost all of them, at the time of the latest search index. Assuming any article should contain at least one word in English alphabet, we can do this with 'wildcards' in 26 searches, a* and so on. Can this be done in less than that ? Cenarium (talk) 20:45, 27 October 2009 (UTC)
They would probably all contain at least one period... ? And if that doesn't work, surely they would all possess at least one vowel =) –xenotalk20:47, 27 October 2009 (UTC)
I'd like them returned through the search interface because of some new search features that could be introduced, such as sorting by date and size; which are already noted in search results. So that you can for example easily see which articles haven't been edited in ages, or of small size, without needing to make a database report and such. Cenarium (talk) 21:23, 27 October 2009 (UTC)
Is it able to use a parameter in template, so as it would be once showed as being used in <pre></pre> and next time normally?
I need to enter ex. <font color="red">Example</font> as value of a parameter and receive the next result, it would be very useful for showing template function in documentation:
That's an interesting question but I don't think it possible because there is no way to expand a parameter without decoding the HTML. The only possibility I think is to use something like what I've got in my sandbox and separate the line into three, i.e.
It seems to me, that the solutions presented aren't usable in my case: I need it for creating a survey of template function and would like to get rid of the necessity of entering the same parameter two times, once in <pre></pre>, next without it. For the result required, see [15]. --Petrus Adamus (talk) 14:44, 27 October 2009 (UTC)
Dispenser gave you the solution, maybe I can explain it more: within the template, You can use {{#tag:nowiki|{{{1}}}}} when You want to show the code and simply {{{1}}} for showing the result of the same code. -- Codicorumus« msg19:50, 27 October 2009 (UTC)
Thank you. Nevertheless, it goes ex. for ''text'' but not if you use a template as the parameter, ex. {{#tag:nowiki|{{date|2006-05-04}}}}. --Petrus Adamus (talk) 23:29, 27 October 2009 (UTC)
mobile.wikipedia.org: If you search for "wp:rd/e" then instead of going to the Entertainment Refdesk, as you do on en, instead it comes up with some sort of search results page of articles that supposedly contain that string. Comet Tuttle (talk) 04:34, 28 October 2009 (UTC)
Spider crawling
I'd like to run a webcrawler over Wikipedia. Are there any guidelines I should be following, or issues to be aware of, lest I knock out a server? OrangeDog (τ • ε) 13:13, 28 October 2009 (UTC)
I appreciate that you are probably experiencing many symptoms here and won't report any more 404s today if I can find a workaround.
Thanks
Error when pressing preview
I'm getting this message when I click on preview:
ERROR
The requested URL could not be retrieved
While trying to retrieve the URL: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User:Floydian/sandbox/tests&action=submit
The following error was encountered:
* Unable to forward this request at this time.
This request could not be forwarded to the origin server or to any parent caches. The most likely cause for this error is that:
* The cache administrator does not allow this cache to make direct connections to origin servers, and
* All configured parent caches are currently unreachable.
Your cache administrator is nobody.
Generated Wed, 28 Oct 2009 17:42:36 GMT by sq43.wikimedia.org (squid/2.7.STABLE6)
And submit:
Not Found
The requested object does not exist on this server. The link you followed is either outdated, inaccurate, or the server has been instructed not to let you have it. Please inform the site administrator of the referring page.
Funny, it's happening to me randomly, especially when clicking direct links from my watchlist that involve subpages in the Wikipedia project namespace. I thought I was simply going crazy, glad I'm not alone! user:J aka justen (talk) 17:54, 28 October 2009 (UTC)
Dablink
I saw an article with a hatnote that included {{Dablink}}. However, the edit screen included the entire text of the message, even brackets. It seems the template should provide a means to just enter the two names--the one that redirects to that article, and the one someone might be looking for.
To copy an article in a sandbox generates some problems if catogories is not deleted. I got a three day lock because of this. Maybe it can be fixed or a note given in sandbox usage. Wdl1961 (talk) 22:31, 28 October 2009 (UTC)
I just went to edit Riversleigh Platypus and was served an edit box with right-to-left text! I reverted to an earlier version where the text is left-to-right, but there are still versions in the article history where the edit box is served as RTL. e.g. [16] Note that this is not a case of some idiot reversing the text; the text is correct but somehow MediaWiki has been tricked into serving it up in right-to-left layout. The cause appears to be this diff, in which a vandal changes the {{inline}} template to {{enilni}}, i.e. "inline" backwards, a template that does not exist and apparently never has. However it is not at all clear to me how such an edit could cause MediaWiki to screw up so badly, and I have been unable to induce RTL text in my sandbox using this technique. Maybe the problem occurred in the back end, and this was just the first edit after it happened. Does anyone know what is going on here? Hesperian01:26, 29 October 2009 (UTC)
The linked diff [17] added non-displayed unicode characters specifying right-to-left text. Your browser obeys them as would many other programs. Some languages are read right to left and such codes are sometimes needed but they may have been deliberate vandalism in this case. See also {{Rtl-para}}. PrimeHunter (talk) 01:54, 29 October 2009 (UTC)
How do I remove the white guy (or gal or blob) avatar from next to my user name? I prefer the default skin, browsed through others without finding better.
Is there a code to remove the avatar? Or change the avatar? Are there other avatars? Are there custom skins? Or ways to customize this one? --IP69.226.103.13 (talk) 07:23, 26 October 2009 (UTC)
I didn't notice it until I tried Beta then switched back-Beta has a different one, a little more orange, maybe less offensive (not really). Sorry about that, Xeno. Try the monobook fix listed in the first link PrimeHunter posted, also the second link contains instructions for switching to a different image, and I think I'll go for a more representative of me one some time in the future. If you try that and it works, let me know. --IP69.226.103.13 (talk) 19:50, 26 October 2009 (UTC)
You're welcome. The little guy doesn't bother me as much as I thought it did, now that it's gone; but I do want to add my own image in the future. If you try that fix also, please let me know. --IP69.226.103.13 (talk) 19:12, 29 October 2009 (UTC)
A new way to look at Wikipedia
Is there anything about this on Wikipedia?
I was looking at a Washington Post article and saw a link I could click on, though I don't generally do that. It had a little book beside it, which was new. When I decided to see what that would do, before I had even clicked a pop-up appeared with the Wikipedia article about the person mentioned.Vchimpanzee· talk·contributions·19:51, 28 October 2009 (UTC)
The use of pictures if appropriate sources are cited
I would love to contribute a picture of Vannevar Bush's "Memex" drawing in his biography, but I don't know if it's ok to just take a picture from Google and cite it. I tried looking for a picture of the Memex drawing in free picture archives, especially if their description was one of "scanned pictures from old books", but I still couldn't find it. Can't I just cite my sources from Google? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Lauranic (talk • contribs) 23:36, 28 October 2009 (UTC)
Well it depends. First of all, the Memex is a concept from As We May Think, published July 1945. The illustrations of the Memex however, are probably all from the September 10, 1945 issue of Life magazine. This illustration is likely created by and copyrighted by LIFE magazine and thus not suited for Wikipedia. Since other persons should be able to draw unrestricted versions of this theoretical machine based text in the original article, the image probably cannot be used under our Fair Use policy either. I'm not aware of any versions that you can include in Wikipedia at this time. As far as I was able to find out, the idea wasn't patented at that time either (those patents often have drawings, and there is no copyright on patents, so that would have been ideal).
Instead of the current combination of recursive templates and primitive parser functions, would it be feasible to allow a secure subset of Perl to execute in templates? This should be faster to execute and easier to use than the current system.
I chose Perl as it is designed for text manipulation, has a flexible and concise syntax, and insecure keywords and variables can be easily filtered. OrangeDog (τ • ε) 13:41, 21 October 2009 (UTC)
This sort of thing has been discussed before on the wikitech-l mailing list in at least June and July 2009, although I don't think Perl was one of the contenders (Lua, Javascript, Python, and PHP were mentioned, as well as something based on the AbuseFilter language). IIRC, the general results of the discussion were that any serious candidate would have to be sufficiently resource-friendly, "readable", very secure, and available in a pure-PHP implementation so sites on cheap hosting without the ability to add extensions or exec other programs can still copy Wikipedia's templates (the last is the real killer). Bonus points if the language is particularly easy to learn or should already be known by a significant fraction of the community. Anomie⚔16:35, 21 October 2009 (UTC)
OrangeDog, there's been a bug for ages to enable StringFunctions, a set of ParserFunctions, essentially, that allow for easy string manipulation. The code is already implemented on the English Wikipedia, even, but it's disabled in the configuration. Vote for bug 6455, open a new bug, pester the devs, etc. and I'll support it, not least because the hacks we have are really, really ugly. {{Nihiltres|talk|edits}} 19:48, 21 October 2009 (UTC)
Hmm, looks like it'll never happen. I don't agree with the "cater for sites that don't install extensions" argument. Surely we shouldn't be using cite.php then? OrangeDog (τ • ε) 00:44, 22 October 2009 (UTC)
The issue isn't that sites can't install MediaWiki extensions, its that they can't compile PHP extensions (written in C), or shell out to some other program. The problem with StringFunctions is that, like ParserFunctions, it would probably just be a temporary fix. It would be fine until people start using it to make even more complex hacks, then we're back where we started. The issues we have now are the same as when ParserFunctions was developed and installed to replace templates like {{qif}}Mr.Z-man01:35, 22 October 2009 (UTC)
Precompile a Perl/Lua interpreter (source available in C) into PHP extensions for multiple platforms and ship as MediaWiki extension? OrangeDog (τ • ε) 08:13, 22 October 2009 (UTC)
Not all users can include modules into their PHP configuration--back to the shared host argument. Either they can't edit php.ini or dl() has been disabled. dl() has also been deprecated, meaning including the module would require php.ini access or ability to compile it into PHP. Neither are possible on shared hosts, usually. ^demon[omg plz]13:48, 22 October 2009 (UTC)
Can you explain again why that is different to other MediaWiki/PHP extensions that are commonly used (e.g. cite.php)? OrangeDog (τ • ε) 14:27, 22 October 2009 (UTC)
Installing an extension for Mediawiki involves adding a line to your LocalSettings to enable it (this is the case with ParserFunctions, Cite, etc), and possibly to configure it. Adding extensions to PHP require a lot more access, and we can't assume 3rd party installations of Mediawiki have that access. ^demon[omg plz]16:19, 22 October 2009 (UTC)
The original idea can be implemented as a MediaWiki extension, it's just a ton of work. Were we able to use exec or PHP extensions it would be far less work. Anomie⚔11:32, 23 October 2009 (UTC)
So it's really a case of "can't be bothered". I wish people would admit that instead of making accessibility excuses. OrangeDog (τ • ε) 12:11, 24 October 2009 (UTC)
If by "accessibility" you mean the fact that a pure-PHP version must be available: No, the "accessibility" is the direct cause of it being so much work. Consider as an analogy the difference between just referencing a book and first having to make a perfectly localized translation so people who can't read the book's original language can read it. Anomie⚔14:58, 24 October 2009 (UTC)
What I mean is, the reason it won't be done is purely because no-one can be bothered, rather than it is intrinsically wrong or impossible to do it. Any arguments based on ability to install extensions are completely invalid - I have my own MediaWiki installation, but I can't install cite.php because my host won't allow me to change configurations, yet we're allowed to use it here. OrangeDog (τ • ε) 15:12, 25 October 2009 (UTC)
Yes, it would be a lot of work to create a sandboxed version of a programming language that's sufficiently secure, efficient, and doesn't lose any of the current functionality (especially parser functions like "ifexist" and "pagesincategory" that need to get information from the database), even if you don't include a pure-PHP version. However, if you can't even edit your own wiki configuration, and your host refuses to do so, I would suggest switching to a better host. Even crappy free webhosting on shared servers that don't allow shell access still allow you to install extensions like Cite and edit your configuration. Mr.Z-man00:02, 26 October 2009 (UTC)
It's not that "nobody can be bothered." It's that it's a very difficult problem to solve properly--half assed solutions won't cut it. I would love to work on this project, I think it'd be a lot of fun and would really benefit Mediawiki in the long run. I also would love to have the free time to work on this. The vast majority of developers are volunteers, and the paid development staff's time is usually devoted to more mission-critical things, site operations trumping all. So unless A) Somebody steps forward and is willing to devote the proper time to do this or B) The WMF decides this is mission-critical and allocates paid staff time to it, it remains a pipe dream. ^demon[omg plz]23:05, 29 October 2009 (UTC)
SVGs in Safari
Hello all,
I cannot for the life of me get safari to view ANY on wikipedia properly. They show up as enormous files that can't be scrolled or zoomed so that you can only see a tiny portion, usually the extreme upper left corner. I'm using the latest safari, but my OS is Mac 10.4.11 on a late powerbook G4. I tried the SVG help page, but that's more for creators and I was directed here. Firefox works OK, with scrolling enabled, but it's a pain to switch browsers for a single purpose. Safari has supposedly supported SVGs for a while, but I'm not sure of the extent of that support. Any help would be appreciated. Thanks. 209.133.78.35 (talk) 23:55, 27 October 2009 (UTC)
SVGs should work fine in Safari, especially the latest one. It will be difficult to diagnose the problem for you unless you provide us with more information; I suggest you post a screenshot at ImageShack so we can see how it looks for you. Gary King (talk) 00:45, 28 October 2009 (UTC)
MediaWiki renders SVGs as PNGs in articles, due to lack of SVG support in some browsers... I don't know if that's useful or not here, but I thought I'd mention it. –Drilnoth (T • C • L) 01:51, 28 October 2009 (UTC)
Hi guys, thanks for the quick replies. I'll give you all the info I can think of. I'm on Mac OS X 10.4.11 using a Powerbook G4 17" 1.67, Safari Version 4.0.3 (4531.9). Intelligentsium, I could see that file fine. Couldn't register with ImageShack but if you take a look at this file: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:NJT_railmap.svg I can give you a good idea of what my screen cap looks like. It's all white with just the very end of the yellow line and the dot for Port Jervis in the left upper center area. No scroll bars of any kind or any other controls. I suspect it might be a PowerPC thing. Thanks again for all your help, at least I now know it's not a wide-spread Safari problem. (forgot to sign in last time) Armandtanzarian (talk) 03:21, 28 October 2009 (UTC)
In that case, it's most likely a bug in Safari's SVG handling. The comments above where people said it worked fine for them were likely because they did not realize you were viewing the SVG itself and not the PNG MediaWiki uses for embedding in pages (due to poor browser support for embedded SVGs). Anomie⚔16:52, 29 October 2009 (UTC)
When you have a jpg file bigger than your browser window, Safari will fit this image to your browser window and provide you with zoom and scroll controls. When you have an SVG file that is bigger than your browser window howver, you do not get zoom to fit, no zoom controls and not scroll bars, usually presenting you a huge view of the top left corner of an SVG. There is no way around this atm. it is a known limitation of Safari. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 19:59, 29 October 2009 (UTC)
Tested on same browser and OS, hardware irrelevant: use Shift+Command+drag to move the image. No "hand" cursor appears, but it behaves as if you have "move content" focus. Sswonk (talk) 20:29, 29 October 2009 (UTC)
Also, use Shift+- (hyphen) Command+- (hyphen) to zoom out one level of zoom only, further use of Shift+- just toggles try it to see what happens, zooms out somewhat but then toggles. Sswonk (talk) 20:33, 29 October 2009 (UTC)
Thank you DJ and Sswonk for the info and research. The dragging tip works, but alas zoom not at all. Still, you've given me peace of mind. Can't believe this is considered SVG "support" in Safari. I'll use Firefox for now. Thank again. 71.119.255.238 (talk) 04:39, 30 October 2009 (UTC)
Glad to help. Besides Firefox, you can retry using the View menu in Safari to zoom in and out. The key combination Command+hyphen should have worked to zoom out at least one level. You might also try Opera, now at version 10.01, which has good SVG support. See also http://dev.opera.com/articles/svg/. Sswonk (talk) 04:59, 30 October 2009 (UTC)
Yes the view menu in safari works for zooming out once or twice and then ceases to work. Does not toggle. Oddly, Command+- does not work. In Firefox both the View menu and Command+- work. Go figure. 71.119.255.238 (talk) 06:03, 30 October 2009 (UTC)
Number of edits
Hey, all. This is a really low-priority question, so I won't be upset if it never gets answered. I am just wondering- why is the number of edits under "my preferences" and not under "my contributions"? Just a bit confused. Thanks! Basket of Puppies01:56, 30 October 2009 (UTC)
Because anyone can see your "my contributions" page, but only you can see your "my preferences" page. Some people don't want their edit count to be particularly public. Hesperian02:20, 30 October 2009 (UTC)
I don't think that's it. Edit counts are particularly public. Popups, for example, if you turn it on, reveals them simply by hovering over someone's name, as do a myriad of external tools. This one is linked from the very bottom of contributions pages. Maybe one reason Special:Contributions doesn't show the edit count is that it doesn't necessarily show all one's edits anyway, since some are at the admin-only Special:DeletedContributions. Or perhaps just nobody ever thought/bothered to add it. • Anakin(talk)03:33, 30 October 2009 (UTC)
I followed this link from a forum that censors certain words. It goes to a "page does not exist" message, as expected, but the formatting of that message is badly mangled. --Carnildo (talk) 09:49, 29 October 2009 (UTC)
There seems to be a bug somewhere (maybe it has a bug number at Bugzilla) that causes {{PAGENAME}} or {{FULLPAGENAME}} to insert a line break before if the page name starts with an asterisk. This causes templates and included messages to break.--Kotniski (talk) 11:08, 29 October 2009 (UTC)
Sometimes they do, especially if someone attaches a patch and the right dev actually sees it. In this case, we have a bit of an issue since the bug in T14974 was directly caused by the fix for T2529, so someone has to work out just what to do to fix this without re-breaking 529 (or get dev approval to re-break 529). Anomie⚔16:50, 29 October 2009 (UTC)
Well bug 529 was about tables within tables, and someone "fixed" it in a way that quite needlessly broke other stuff. No-one was ever asking for a newline before asterisks and stuff. So just remove the asterisk from the regular expression, and hey presto, both bugs are fixed!! (Now just wait another five years before anyone actually does it...) --Kotniski (talk) 17:09, 30 October 2009 (UTC)
See T2529 (comment #12). I think no one realized it would break other stuff, at least not in enough time to easily revert it. Now the problem with re-breaking 529 is that it will make stuff stop working that has worked for almost 5 years now. And at this point it's more than just templates in tables, someone might now be depending on some template with content like "* blah blah blah" to start a bulleted list even in a construct like "foo: {{bar}}". Anomie⚔19:54, 30 October 2009 (UTC)
It is working for me in the same browser. Are you using the right shortcut? Alt + ⇧ Shift? That's the default, but there are some access key-related settings in about:config you should check. Try while logged out too, to avoid the influence of any gadgets or other options. • Anakin(talk)16:50, 30 October 2009 (UTC)
The Idea is to not break up the talk page (logging, edit-history and for other process reasons), but to simply have the ability to create new sub sections within a section, withought having to scroll the section to the bottom. I certainly agree, having an empty MediaWiki "non-talk" page isn't a good idea. I've tried combining "&action=edit§ion=1" and "&action=edit§ion=new", obviosly that didn't work out..lol. Just asking if perhaps there is a tweak to do this, withought having to transclude.--Hu12 (talk) 19:12, 30 October 2009 (UTC)
Captcha
As an anonymous IP, I've grown used to hitting a captcha requirement when reverting vandalism, fixing sources, etc. But why did I get a captcha for this edit, when there were no external links added? 99.166.95.142 (talk) 18:21, 30 October 2009 (UTC)
In fact, you added external links with that edit. The template {{blpsources}} adds links to Google, so you can easily look up sources for that article. That may be why you were asked to enter the captcha. Svick (talk) 19:15, 30 October 2009 (UTC)
Special:PrefixIndex displays the first 200 article titles (beginning with ! and ") before letting the user type in a prefix. The few editors who commented agree that this behaviour is rarely useful and should be removed, especially as the first few titles happen to contain profanities. Anakin believes that it would require a software change and has submitted bugzilla:21143. It was suggested that we advertise the issue here to attract comments from a wider audience. Certes (talk) 19:47, 30 October 2009 (UTC)
Since it does a contextual search(ie bases the search not on just the word but also the context of the word) it must create a query out of elements of the page, or simply send the page name itself to google. Google will certainly either know which page, or have all the information needed to figure it out. I imagine this information is covered by their privacy policy. Chillum00:26, 27 October 2009 (UTC)
In the end there is no way to use a search database hosted by Google without sending Google the information they need to process your searches. Of course there is no requirement to use Google, you can use the native Mediawiki search. — Carl (CBM · talk) 11:44, 27 October 2009 (UTC)
I asked devs for just one link to WP:Searching (otherwise what's the point of having that page?) but no, even one link is considered too complicated for visitors. Well, on my home wiki I had to insert absolutely positioned "help icon" into both Searchmenu-new and Searchmenu-exists. — AlexSm15:44, 30 October 2009 (UTC)
Yep, I've asked for that several times. Did you actually get an answer from someone? Can you link me to it if you did? I can't believe the devs really think that such a link shouldn't be there.--Kotniski (talk) 16:50, 30 October 2009 (UTC)
Oh right, rainman seems to be the search guy;) (as witnessed above). I've dropped him a talk page notice so hopefully we'll get this sorted out soon.--Kotniski (talk) 17:00, 30 October 2009 (UTC)
Incidentally I find it surprising that we seem to find it helpful to show the "Search in namespaces:" box, which is of little relevance to the average reader, by default - and not even collapsed somehow. I'd have thought the one word summaries above that (Content / Multimedia / etc) would be enough. IMO I'd rather hide that complexity and provide a few more help links (eg for creating articles, or asking questions), if it can be done in a clear, non-confusing and unobtrusive way. Rd232talk17:42, 30 October 2009 (UTC)
"Search in namespaces:" in shown only if you have non-standard search settings, so it is not shown to the average reader. As for the messages, there are those two messages mentioned by AlexSm to which general instructions and help text can be added to. We want to keep the area *before* the search box clean and without any unnecessary links. I find it quite unnatural for a new user to first read all those "consider reading X or consider clicking Y" before they even see the search box. Remember that typical viewer of special:search is an anonymous user that either mistyped something, or was looking for something with different wording. If he wants to learn how to search, he is more likely to click "Help" in the left-hand side menu. I remember that previously people frequently used to edit wikipedia:searching asking why there is no article on X, or how to create article on Y, just because in their head searching is synonymous with finding. So, I don't support the change of layout, and I think the current layout is just enough. --rainman (talk) 18:36, 30 October 2009 (UTC)
OK, I'm not sure I agree with you about user psychology, but anyway, thanks to you and Alex for pointing out that we can edit those two messages - that should do the trick. (I'm still not sure why the central documentation page for search is on en.wp though.)--Kotniski (talk) 18:48, 30 October 2009 (UTC)
I'd have expected it on the MediaWiki site. (I know no-one looks there, but then on each WP you have either a soft redirect to the relevant page, or a localized - and perhaps less technical - summary.) Not too important, but since I happen to know about the MediaWiki site, I actually did spend time looking there.--Kotniski (talk) 19:02, 30 October 2009 (UTC)
Whilst we're on this: if nothing at all matches the search query, MediaWiki:Search-nonefound is shown in addition to MediaWiki:Searchmenu-new. But the latter message refers to "checking the search results below". Perhaps Search-nonefound should be shown instead of Searchmenu-new, with the "create page" option added there. Rd232talk12:39, 31 October 2009 (UTC)
Why is the image wrapped in two divs? (And why the alpha filter? Wikipedia already apply those to PNGs.) Anyway, the problem stems from the absolute positioning. The image is on top of the link, so it become unclickable. Maybe it helps better to let us see what you are trying to do. — Edokter • Talk • 01:28, 31 October 2009 (UTC)
It's wrapped around two divs so I can define a location for just the image, not the text. I've included the alpha so you could see that there is text behind the image, although it's not necessary. z-index doesn't seem to work here, is it impossible to put all the text ontop of the image and have a location for the image? -- penubag (talk) 01:46, 31 October 2009 (UTC)
I had no trouble clicking the link; you must have a widescreen. ;) The z-index is working fine, but a z-index of 1 goes on top of the zero z-index of the (automatically generated) P element filling the table cell. Interestingly, Firefox 3.5 here for some reason puts a background on the P so giving the div a z-index of -1 doesn't work right either. But this seems to work fine:
Wow! Thanks Anomie! You added a Z-index to the text which is fine, but why is it that when I gave the image a z-index of -1 the image disappeared? That's what led me to think z-index wouldn't work here. -- penubag (talk) 04:12, 31 October 2009 (UTC)
I'm still wondering what it is going to be used for. In IE, the image breaks out of the bottom of the table. Absolute positioning is evil anyway... — Edokter • Talk • 12:59, 31 October 2009 (UTC)
Search box dropdown
{{Resolved}}
The Wikipdia searchbox shows a dropdown of all pages over all namespaces that start with the input. On another wiki where I am admin, there is no such dropdown. How can I add that?
I have written several dozen simple navigational templates which are part of Wikipedia articles. I would like to do something a "bit" more complicated.
I would like to develop a new template that would accept two arguments:
fn (x,y), both integers
1. A constant would be subtracted from the value y. y-c = a. all whole integers
2. Using "a" as an offset, a value "b" would be selected from a table t where hardcoded values have been pre-placed. This value would be a decimal figure.
3. This value b would be multiplied by x to obtain the "answer," the function value. x (and the final value) could be a fairly large number.
The template might look like this to a potential user: {{templatename|x|y}}
I have tried looking at examples of templates and have been dismayed that "convert" (for example) is defined at the highest level by dozens of multiple braces culminating internally with an asterisk. Quite meaningful, I am sure, to the person/people who wrote it, but not a good instructional example IMO.
I would like to add an additional toolbox to the monobook skin. I already know how to add entries to an existing box with the addPortletLink function in Javascript, that's not what I'm asking. What I want is an extra box or to split the existing box, can this be done? Thanks, SpinningSpark15:09, 31 October 2009 (UTC)
I had assumed you would modify the code to your needs, rather than simply pasting it in. Aside from the problem where some spaces get "lost" when copy-pasting, the code there serves a different purpose. Unfortunately, I am not well-versed in JavaScript [The code is written in CSS, not Javascript], so I probably cannot help you. Intelligentsium18:48, 31 October 2009 (UTC)
Well the first problem is to get it to work "as-is" before attempting to modify it. But no, it's not really what I wanted. What that code appears to do (if I could get it to work) is convert one portlet (the personal toolbar) into a different form (as a sidebox). What I want to do is keep all the existing portlets and either create a completely new one or split an existing one into two distinct menus. SpinningSpark19:50, 31 October 2009 (UTC)
User:Svick/userToolbox.js should do what you want. You can either import or copy it to your user JavaScript. It creates new empty toolbox below all others. You can then add links to it by addPortletLink as to other toolboxes with the first parameter 'p-usertoolbox'. Svick (talk) 20:21, 31 October 2009 (UTC)
I've written something similar to this before: User:Anakin101/addPortlet.js. Works in Monobook, Modern, Vector, at least, maybe others. It requires two parameters, an id for the new portlet box, and its title. Example:
addPortlet('p-tb2', 'More Links');
and you can populate with it links with addPortletLink. The optional "before" parameter of that function is the id of another one of the portlet boxes it will be placed relative to, such as (in Monobook) 'p-navigation', 'p-search', 'p-interaction', 'p-tb', 'p-lang', etc. By default the box contains a <ul> (bulleted-list) suitable for use with addPortletLink, but as it returns the pBody element you can override to contain something different (similar to the search box). E.g. (crazy example):
var p = addPortlet('p-goog', 'Google', 'p-search'); p.innerHTML = '<iframe src="http://www.google.com/m" width=140px/>';
This image was moved to commons, but the POV-Ray source-code that existed on its description page was lost in transit. Is there any chance someone can restore it? SharkD (talk) 15:56, 31 October 2009 (UTC)
Fixed — Martin (MSGJ · talk) 16:13, 8 October 2009 (UTC)
Added — Martin (MSGJ · talk) 16:17, 19 October 2009 (UTC)
Resolved
shows the right way, and is very attractive. I want to request an account too! :-) Dodoïste (talk) 11:12, 23 October 2009 (UTC)
Done
![[10]](http://toolserver.org/~cbm/20091015a.png){kind=link}
/Image:User.gif:_unintended_bias%3F){kind=link}
