Wikipedia:Village pump (technical)

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The technical section of the village pump is used to discuss technical issues about Wikipedia. Bug reports and feature requests should be made in Phabricator (see how to report a bug). Bugs with security implications should be reported differently (see how to report security bugs).

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How to stop web scraper sites?

I brought this up a few times last year, though nothing really materialized, but am hoping to raise this issue once again. I was just wondering if there is anything other than the spam blacklist or XLinkerBot to prevent citations to scraper sites from being used here? It seems that the area of recent deaths is where these are most prevalent, as there is just so much crap out there now that seems to scrape certain terms from Twitter (and probably Wikipedia) into cartoonishly amateur bot-generated "news articles" to generate clicks. Here are some previous discussions: 1 2; any further thoughts are greatly appreciated. Connormah (talk) 05:22, 20 April 2022 (UTC)

Lookup the dns names, find their owners, blast owners on twitter ? —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 08:40, 20 April 2022 (UTC)

Technically, not much can be done. The normal countermeasures such as captcha or passwords etc. obviously are not feasible. Refusing access based on IPs or other reverse DNS information is complex, resource-intensive and temporary. Non-technical solutions such as TheDJ suggested are probably the only readily available defense. 172.254.222.178 (talk) 11:56, 20 April 2022 (UTC)

@Connormah "... being used here? ..." can you clarify what you are asking? Do you want us to somehow refuse to allow certain people to read Wikipedia or do you want to prevent our editors from using references to these disreputable sources on Wikipedia? The former is quite at odds with our core mission. — xaosflux ^Talk 13:07, 20 April 2022 (UTC)

Xaosflux, sorry for being unclear, I meant the latter. I would say there there seems to be more and more of these types of sites popping up over the last few years, and while it is usually easy to find a RS suitable for use on Wikipedia, the sheer volume of these types of websites makes it very easy to fall for one. Connormah (talk) 14:46, 20 April 2022 (UTC)

@Connormah see the notes at MediaWiki_talk:Spam-blacklist. Besides SBL or XLBot, an abusefilter could possibly be used. All of these methods require someone or something to identify these sites though, I can't think of anything that will interrupt an edit, perform a machine-analysis of the contents of the link and make a reliable real-time determination if the remote page is disreputable. Possibly something like this could be integrated in to a near-time service such as mw:ORES. — xaosflux ^Talk 15:11, 20 April 2022 (UTC)

Xaosflux, perhaps a working solution might just be to compile a list and add them into the blacklist as identified by users here? Here is another recent one, in addition to the ones listed on the Deaths in 2021 page. Worst case, I've seen some premature obituaries based off Tweets and pages generated from Wikipedia vandalism from these types of sites in the past (thus creating a WP:CIRCULAR "source"), so I think it is a good idea to somehow create some way to prevent them from being linked. Connormah (talk) 23:03, 20 April 2022 (UTC)

At the minimum, we should get a listing of these sites and add them to the citations blacklists to ensure that editors can not use them as sources, thus creating WP:CIRCULAR references. Ktin (talk) 23:19, 20 April 2022 (UTC)

Is there an external blacklist anywhere we could use, like with proxy IPs etc.? Scraping data has legitimate uses – I've legitimately downloaded stuff that way for Wikipedia and elsewhere – but we need to stop citing sites which consist of unfiltered or invented drivel. Certes (talk) 23:35, 20 April 2022 (UTC)

With regard to the spam blacklist however, I suppose that these cites would technically not be spam, though one could maybe make an argument that they are as they presumably exist to exploit ad revenue by using certain clickbait-y terms that one might use in Google searches. Perhaps an edit filter would likely be best way, then? Connormah (talk) 22:19, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

Question

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T17439

Anyone know why the interlangage links disappear from the left side when you are editing a page? This is a pain; any way to avoid this behavior, or is there a PHAB for this already? Thanks in advance, UnitedStatesian (talk) 13:24, 22 April 2022 (UTC)

@UnitedStatesian: see phab:T17439 looks like this is by design (as the links could be changed based on what is edited); they do appear in preview mode - you can force preview mode to appear when you start editing by setting Show preview on first edit in Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-editing. — xaosflux ^Talk 14:48, 22 April 2022 (UTC)

I think now that all the IL links come from Wikidata, they can no longer be changed based on what is edited here in enwiki, and in fact much more likely to want, as I do, to use the links to jump over to wikidata from the editing screen to make necessary changes over there. Best, UnitedStatesian (talk) 15:47, 22 April 2022 (UTC)

@UnitedStatesian adding iw's in wikitext is absolutely still supported, and for many namespaces it is the only supported option. — xaosflux ^Talk 16:14, 22 April 2022 (UTC)

The mw:2017 wikitext editor displays the interwiki links for me. If you're using the 2010 WikiEditor in 2010 Vector, then you can still find "Wikidata item" in the "Tools" section (right above the big empty space where the interlanguage links used to be). Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 17:43, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

Mass update of incoming links after conversion to a disambiguation page

Is there an easy way to update all the links leading to a title after someone moved the article that had been at that title, and then created a disambiguation page under the original title? I'm looking at Puto, which used to be the article that has just been moved to Puto (food). There are 453 incoming links to what is now a disambiguation page. Largoplazo (talk) 11:09, 23 April 2022 (UTC)

@Largoplazo: Try DisamAssist, or the much faster yet less specific one AWB. NguoiDungKhongDinhDanh 11:27, 23 April 2022 (UTC)

Editors are considering reverting that move, though it seems likely to stick. There are often far fewer linmks than shown, because many are generated by a few templates such as navboxes; fixing each of those removes many articles from the list. DisamAssist covers templates but misses a few article links, notably in image captions and in parameters of templates such as {{sortname}}. Certes (talk) 13:41, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

Caching issue at DYK

This may, or may not, be a technical problem that just popped up for me yesterday. I'm providing a link here, to my DYK post. This has (so far) not happened for me anywhere else except DYK preps and queues. — Maile (talk) 18:06, 23 April 2022 (UTC)

DYYK#Anybody else having this issue? - preps and queues visuals

• Now that others have responded on DYK (click on thread above), there's some sort of caching issue going on with our Preps and Queues. With this happening to multiple editors, it is not simply a lone user issue. Individuals should not have to clear the cache just to see a page. And the fact that multiple editors at DYK are having this issue, indicates the problem lies elsewhere. — Maile (talk) 10:49, 24 April 2022 (UTC)

Do we have job queue/caching issues data somewhere for the period in question? The unhelpful page Help:Job queue does not contain any information where even the current length of the job queue can be found (it used to be visible in various Special: pages but apparently no longer is??). —Kusma (talk) 12:15, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

Yes, there has been an issue with the JobQueue for quite a while, see phab:T300914.--Snævar (talk) 12:42, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

Manual revert notifications

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T154637

Is there a reason why users are not notified of manual reverts? The revert is tagged with Manual revert and the reverted edit is tagged with Reverted so surely there's enough information here to send a notification? FozzieHey (talk) 19:31, 24 April 2022 (UTC)

I think it is because of historical reasons, because you used to be able to add/remove to the edit, manually revert and still have that tag. Anyway, there is a bug for this issue at phab:T154637.--Snævar (talk) 07:32, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

In many of our administrative processes, it is normal for edits to be reverted because the page returns to the same state regularly. For example, check the history of Template:Did you know/Queue/3 or Wikipedia:Administrator intervention against vandalism. I wouldn't want to be notified for such "reverts". (More generally, I am not sure the notification for reverts is a healthy thing anyway). —Kusma (talk) 10:34, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

We probably want to notify good-faith editors but not serial vandals. Distinguishing the two is left as an exercise for the reader. Certes (talk) 13:30, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

Contrariwise, notifying serious vandals (soon to be blocked) is fairly harmless, while giving good-faith editors constant and quick red alert messages may cause more annoyed revert warring than seeing the same edit half an hour later on your watchlist. —Kusma (talk) 21:58, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

Yup, I am aware that bots do manual reverts in some areas, it is touched on in the phab task by disabling the tag or notification for edits with the bot flag. Although, there are still a few other edge cases mentioned in the task as well. Thanks for your comments everyone. FozzieHey (talk) 15:34, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

Problem with page moves

Hey, folks,

I'm not sure what is up but I've noticed lately that when I'm moving an article, even if I have Move talk page box checked off, the Talk page isn't moved along with the article. Most recently, an editor noticed and tagged the Talk page to be moved separately. I'd say that this has happened 6 or 7 times over the past week but I can't figure when it happens or why it happens. It's not every time, I'd say it happens about 25% of the time that I move a page with a talk page. Any ideas what might be going on? Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 03:19, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

In one of the last move log entries before your message here, both the article KJR-FM and its talk page required admin assistance to move them due to edits that were in the way. If you move an article but the talk page move is blocked like this, the talk page does not get moved along with the article automatically (and there's an easy-to-miss message near the end of the "move succeeded" page saying that the talk page move failed). Graham87 08:29, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

I love that post. Here we have Graham87, who totally relies on screen-reader software, telling the sighted people that a message is easy-to-miss. I often wonder how much low-relevance yada yada that Graham has to put up with before hearing the things that really matter. I admit that I tune out of background noise and may miss things I should be hearing. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 20:43, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

I think I've said something like this before, but if it weren't for the ability to cut off a screen reader's speech at any time, Wikipedia (and the web/computing in general) would be almost unusable for screen reader users. Graham87 01:26, 26 April 2022 (UTC)

Progress bar on mobile media player is practically unusable

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T306779

Screenshot: https://i.imgur.com/YLukQaw.png

I assume it's already known, but I can't find anything on phab:. Is there any plan to improve it? --fireattack (talk) 04:19, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

Thank you, I'll make a ticket out of this. This is now phab:T306779. Please remember that until recently, you couldn't use video at all on iOS with the mobile site. ;) —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 08:22, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

XFDcloser, again

Whatever affected XFDCloser on the RFD pages has now affected an AFD page. I'd post on the XFDCloser talk page but when I did that before, there wasn't a solution proposed. On the RFD pages, XFDcloser would close the discussions but not delete the page under discussion or remove deletion tags if the page was kept.

I can tell you that the problem is not on the entire log page, it is right after Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Log/2022 April 21#Women in the Montana government is listed. On the log page, the AFDs listed above this discussion are fine but at this discussion, and the ones below, you can see "XFDcloser loading..." indicating that XFDcloser isn't working when trying to close these discussions. Could there be a coding problem on the log page that is tripping up XFDcloser? Your help would be appreciated. Email to Evad37 hasn't produced any results thus far so I'm coming to the Village Pump (technical) to cast a wider net for help. Thank you. Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 04:28, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

I don't know what happened (?) but something got fixed on this log page. Although it is still a problem on RfD pages like Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2022 April 25. I can't see anything in the page history that shows what happened, it's a bit of a mystery. Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 05:36, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

I don't know if it's related or not, but there was an unclosed small tag in Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Gonzalo Lira (2nd nomination), which was the nomination above the one where the issue started. I noticed that and fixed the error between your two posts, but that may not have been what fixed it. Hog Farm _Talk 05:47, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

Status of Cologne Blue skin

After going through MW:Skin:Cologne Blue, I checked if or not it is installed on en-wiki at Special:Version. To my surprise, it is indeed installed here. The thing is that it doesn't appear at all at Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-rendering where all other skins are mentioned. How does a user set it, should they want to? And if it's "deprecated", do the cologneblue.js and .css no longer work at all? (I was working at Template:User toolbox, when I encountered links to cologneblue .js/.css which perhaps are no longer required.) Thanks! —CX Zoom[he/him] ^{(let's talk • C • L)} 10:47, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

Its deprecated, in that you can no longer select it indeed, but it is already your skin, it is still available to you. This has been the case for a while now. See meta:Tech/News/2019/33 —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 11:21, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

So the only way to access it if you don't have it in your prefs already is to add ?useskin=cologneblue to the URL? —Kusma (talk) 13:18, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

Not exactly. When you add ?useskin=cologneblue between Special:Preferences & #mw-prefsection-rendering, it unhides the option to set cologneblue as the default, but this arrangement effectively hides it from most of us and future new editors. —CX Zoom[he/him] ^{(let's talk • C • L)} 13:38, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

Wow, that's a neat trick! Also works for Modern, a skin that I am more tempted to play with again than CologneBlue. —Kusma (talk) 15:58, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

See also mw:Wikimedia Product/Component responsibility#Skins, which describes both of those skins as "actively deprecated". Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 17:50, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

See also Wikipedia:Village pump (technical)/Archive 191#modern skin on Commons and Wikipedia talk:Skin#'Modern' not selectable any longer. Basically:

• Go to Preferences, forcing view in Cologne Blue
• Select "Cologne Blue"
• Click on Save
• That's it, until they finally remove the skin.

In short: don't rely on it. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 21:05, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

ProtectedTitles

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T65318

While working with Special:ProtectedTitles I saw that there are not a lot of things you can do at that page.

Do you think it would be beneficial to add the following options:

1. Allow ordering by level of protection and/or ending date of protection;
2. Show links beside entries for changing protection level ("similar" to what we get in Special:BrokenRedirects);
3. Maybe show the protection summary provided on each entry somewhere (maybe when hovering over them?)

All what I said above would be helpful in my admin work at SqWiki but I was wondering how would other admins here feel about those. - Klein Muçi (talk) 11:16, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

#1 may be expensive (ORDER BY outputs on huge outputs can be) - you can already filter results by namespace and level, perhaps a single additional filter of 'indefinite protections only' (like on Special:ProtectedPages) would work? — xaosflux ^Talk 13:49, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

#2 is a "meh" for me, you can do this client-side several ways already, it is already available in things like navpopups's on-hover menu — xaosflux ^Talk 13:45, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

#3 above is phab:T65318. — xaosflux ^Talk 13:44, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

I know nothing of query limits. If ordering is expensive, I believe enhancing ProtectedTitles to have the same interface as ProtectedPages would probably be enough. That idea is also entertained in the task you mentioned.

As for the change protection link, navpop is what I'm currently using for that as well. I just think that special pages themselves in general should have links that serve their main functions instead of acting just as lists. - Klein Muçi (talk) 16:03, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

I wonder what you actually need. Would a filter work (e.g., show full protection only, indef only, expiration date in the next week)? Maybe if you can tell us more about how you would use that information, we could come up with some options that aren't potentially expensive and would do what you need. Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 17:52, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

@Whatamidoing (WMF), given that indefinite protection is the default one, a lot of our admins use only that for their title protections no matter what the case. Currently I'm the only active admin for many months now. There are many cases where the protection shouldn't be indefinite, the most typical of which are the cases where the title is good on its own but it has been protected nonetheless because its content was being abused, for example "Albania's economy", with content such as: AAAAAAAAAAAhahahaha

So basically I'm reviewing the whole entries which are protected indefinitely and it felt a bit frustrating that I couldn't do much from that special page beside sorting by namespace and type of protection. - Klein Muçi (talk) 01:42, 26 April 2022 (UTC)

Reviewing is going to be slow this way. Would it help prevent this problem if the default was changed? I suspect that it's just a config change. Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 19:38, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

Hmm... Maybe that would be a good idea. - Klein Muçi (talk) 02:10, 29 April 2022 (UTC)

Printing an article

Hello: I've been trying to print the page entitled ANZAC Day but absolutely no luck. No problems printing other pages though. Please advise. Thanks. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Dianahooper (talk • contribs) 14:34, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

Printing layout is normally handled by the browser, the preview worked for me - outputting 37 pages. This article is somewhat large, are you using a desktop to create the print view? — xaosflux ^Talk 15:48, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

How do I make the cell on the left yellow?

Hi all

I'm working on some reasearch into volunteers needs in working with partner organisations and I'm writing up the results in a series of colour coded tables. Does anyone know how I could turn the cell on the left yellow as well? Also any way to set the cell borders to 0 so there is no white spaces between the cells?

Thanks very much

Funding and staff	Needs of interviewees	Support requested
	Funding Office and staff Infrastructure	Fundraising support Recruitment There is a desire to grow in the work with content partnerships. The main request here is how to increase the financial possibilities. Marketing material can be developed from best practices and case studies. A common portfolio that can be shared is desirable.
	Quotes	Quotes
	"The main need is more resources through funding. There is a desire to grow and expand in the field of content partnership." "Tech resources are needed to be able to do more uploads. More developers and setting a good workflow. Not planning for training institutions to do uploads themselves, but keeping the option in mind." "More funding. Would like to offer resources to small partners who cannot fund that themselves. Both meeting rooms, food and drinks. Would also like to be able to offer (paying for) web space, servers and tech support." "a. Office space b. Staff c. Operational cost." "Need to have long term planning in order to work with government institutions as they have a yearly budget that needs to be set the year before. Hard to plan that long ahead when only volunteers are working for the UG." "We also lack the internet. That’s our largest handicap, internet access. It’s expensive – and of poor quality."	"Financial support in the form of rapid grants or annual grants. Both from WMF or from gov organizations. Could also be in-kind support in form of broadband connections or help with transportation or a place to be." "Construction of a whole program which aims to result in a project collaboration. For example, an employment as a Wikimedian in Residence for six or twelve months."

John Cummings (talk) 16:27, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

Is the above what your wanted (with a lighter yellow)? —  Jts1882 | talk  16:46, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

See Special:Permalink/1084627870 to see what the table looked like when Jts first edited it. NguoiDungKhongDinhDanh 16:53, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

(edit conflict) @John Cummings: To change color of a cell, use style="background-color: color;"; to make cell borders effectively collapsed, use style="border-collapse: collapse;". Also, don't use <big>...</big> and <center>...</center>; they are deprecated and browsers may drop support for them anytime. TLDR: Just copy-and-paste, your table works as intended now. Here's the diff. NguoiDungKhongDinhDanh 16:51, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

Hi NguoiDungKhongDinhDanh thanks so much for this, works perfectly. John Cummings (talk) 17:51, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

Note not showing up when replying to COI edit request

Hello! I recently responded to a COI edit request on Talk:Omaha Steaks using the "Note" option and not closing it. However, for whatever reason, my response isn't showing up. I can't see anything that would be causing it to not show up. ― Blaze Wolf^Talk_{Blaze Wolf#6545} 17:15, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

@Blaze Wolf I see your response, it is inside the collapsed section titled "New draft for review". — xaosflux ^Talk 18:10, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

@Xaosflux: Oh. Why did it get put there? Going into the source editor doesn't show it located there. ― Blaze Wolf^Talk_{Blaze Wolf#6545} 18:10, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

The section editor and likely the "COI Request Tool" you are using are geting confused because someone wrapped div's (those collapsed sections) around l2 headings. Maybe take those out. — xaosflux ^Talk 18:14, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

@Xaosflux: Could you possibly do that for me? I'd rather not attempt to do that and mess something up. ― Blaze Wolf^Talk_{Blaze Wolf#6545} 18:15, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

Suggest moving all of the suggested rewrite to a sandbox or draft page to streamline that. — xaosflux ^Talk 18:16, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

@Blaze Wolf ^-- I can't from where I am right now, but may revisit when I'm at another computer. — xaosflux ^Talk 18:17, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

@Xaosflux: Alright sounds good. I'll let the requester know that it would be better to do that. ― Blaze Wolf^Talk_{Blaze Wolf#6545} 18:19, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

Why isn't the formatting of my user page displaying correctly on en.wiki (from meta)?

Hi all

I have a unified user page across all Wikimedia wikis (not sure of the correct name for this). Unfortunately I'm getting a lot of issues with the formatting (missing fonts, wrong size text etc) which I've put quite a lot of effort into, since I work a lot with the UN and other professional organisations who read my page I'd really like to fix this.

• Formatting working properly on Meta: User:John_Cummings
• Fonts missing and wrong size on Wikipedia: User:John Cummings

Any suggestions? If this is a simple formatting error on my part please just change the meta page to whatever works. Or is it a bug?

Thanks very much

John Cummings (talk) 19:29, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

Where exactly do the fonts have wrong size? Ruslik_Zero 19:58, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

You appear to have several unclosed HTML tags. Give me a few minutes to remind meta that I am actually logged in. Izno (talk) 20:12, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

Should be fixed now. Izno (talk) 20:40, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

Side bar

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T306910

problem TOC

Is there an opption to not have the new contents side bar as this is causing mass sandwich effect for me....so bad many articles are non readable.--Moxy- 22:06, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

You are using Vector 2022 currently. If you wish to return to previous Vector, see Special:Preferences under the Appearance tab. Izno (talk) 22:42, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

That said, I've just now been given a dose of it offwiki and it's, uh, not pretty. Izno (talk) 22:48, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

Yes Vector 2022...its the skin we tell people that use desktop view on mobile devices to use////because it normally allows you to pick full screen ...as in no "Main menu" but now we have TOC there taking up even more room then the Main meun did. Moxy- 23:23, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

I don't think anyone should be suggesting Vector 2022 for mobile use at this time. Timeless, Minerva, and Monobook with the responsive option on are all more appropriate. Izno (talk) 23:45, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

Non allow full screen. To be honest its odd we dont have full screen option on all skins...no need for "main menu" all the time....plus its the way for editing in desktop view on mobile devices.-- Moxy- 00:30, 26 April 2022 (UTC)

And neither does Vector 2022. I do know it is trivial to get full screen in Timeless. Izno (talk) 01:22, 26 April 2022 (UTC)

What?/ full page view Moxy- 03:42, 26 April 2022 (UTC)

The linked Phabricator ticket, won't help with this particular issue (currently we hide the table of contents at low resolutions if you resize your browser, but this is viewport not window size). It likely needs a modification to the meta[name="viewport"] tag to set an initial-scale that zooms out to keep it consistent with the current legacy Vector experience.

Neither Vector's are responsive, so the phone is trying to compensate.

I'll have a think about this and get back to you later in the week with a more appropriate ticket. Jdlrobson (talk) 03:51, 26 April 2022 (UTC)

The static TOC in the sidebar is an accessibility issue - specifically, it fails MOS:COLOUR (second bullet) Links should clearly be identifiable as a link to our readers. - because the subsection names are shown in black, despite being links. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 21:08, 26 April 2022 (UTC)

This will be fixed with T306562. – Jonesey95 (talk) 14:42, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

Tech News: 2022-17

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

• On many wikis (group 1), the software to play videos and audio files on pages has now changed. The old player has been removed. Some audio players will become wider after this change. The new player has been a beta feature for over four years. [1][2]

Changes later this week

• The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 26 April. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 27 April. It will be on all wikis from 28 April (calendar).
• Some wikis will be in read-only for a few minutes because of a switch of their main database. It will be performed on 26 April at 07:00 UTC (targeted wikis).
• Some very old browsers and operating systems are no longer supported. Some things on the wikis might look weird or not work in very old browsers like Internet Explorer 9 or 10, Android 4, or Firefox 38 or older. [3]

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

22:53, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

Vector-2022 Widening Gadget

Hi all, if you have ideas about an opt-in gadget to widen the viewport in vector-2022, feedback is welcome at MediaWiki_talk:Vector-2022.css#widener_gadget?. — xaosflux ^Talk 14:46, 26 April 2022 (UTC)

@Xaosflux: Would the CSS in the collapsed bit would sort of show what it would look like if it were implemented? ― Blaze Wolf^Talk_{Blaze Wolf#6545} 15:26, 26 April 2022 (UTC)

Need to be able to hide TOC like the Main Menu ....for more info see Wikipedia:Village pump (technical)#‎Side bar. Causing readability issues for those who use this on mobile view for full screenMoxy- 19:37, 26 April 2022 (UTC)

When did this change? It looks absolutely horrible on my widescreen monitor, most pages barely utilize more than like 10% of the total page width, and look almost as if CSS styles failed spectacularly! I'd like to know how to revert it ASAP! KPu3uC B Poccuu (talk) 13:01, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

In Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-rendering, you can change Skin (I use "Vector legacy (2010)"), then click Save at the bottom. Certes (talk) 14:09, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

This worked at one point:

.mw-page-container {
min-width: none; max-width: 1300px; padding: 0;
}
.mw-workspace-container {
max-width: 1400px;
}
.mw-content-container {
max-width: 1400px;
}

I don't know if it works any longer. (You change the "1300px" and "1400px" to whatever numbers work for you.) Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 19:44, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

@KPu3uC B Poccuu (and FYI to @Whatamidoing (WMF)) there is an experimental gadget you can load from preferences (all the way down in "testing and development") called "wide-vector-2022", you can try that to reclaim your screen from all that whitespace. — xaosflux ^Talk 20:00, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

Watchlist notifications still appear after being dismissed

I don't know if this is intentional, but I seem to keep getting the same notifications appear on my watchlist after dismissing the notification ... multiple times. For example, at the present time, there is a notification that there is an WP:RFA in progress and a notification for the most recent issue of the Signpost. However, after I dismiss these notifications, they stay dismissed until I log out and log back in ... then they reappear. If I recall, after a notification is dismissed, it stays dismissed, even after logging out and logging in. Is this not/no longer the case? Steel1943 (talk) 19:01, 26 April 2022 (UTC)

@Steel1943 the dismissing part is dependent on a client-side cookie (more technically a local storage object). So for example if you are using a private browsing session, it won't be maintained. — xaosflux ^Talk 19:10, 26 April 2022 (UTC)

How to write multiple OR in templates?

Hi, I want to create a template like this {{#ifeq: {{{letter}}} | A OR B OR C | true | false }}. If you didn't understand, I will provide a specific example. Thanks! ⇒ AramTalk 21:01, 26 April 2022 (UTC)

@Aram,
{{ifor| test1 = {{{letter}}} | val1 = A | test2 = {{{letter}}} | val2 = B | test3 = {{{letter}}} | val3 = C | then = true | else = false}} ― Qwerfjkltalk 21:10, 26 April 2022 (UTC)

Or a casual {{#switch:}}. --Izno (talk) 21:11, 26 April 2022 (UTC)

Really amazing and helpful! Thank you both! ⇒ AramTalk 21:28, 26 April 2022 (UTC)

mw:Help:Extension:ParserFunctions##switch is certainly the best method if this is your real situation.

{{#switch:{{{letter}}}|A|B|C=true|false}}. That's all. PrimeHunter (talk) 22:14, 26 April 2022 (UTC)

Anyone else experiencing "reply" adding nowiki to pings? or inability to preview

It's a pain. As is the occasional default to Visual with the inability to preview. Doug Weller talk 11:07, 27 April 2022 (UTC)

If you use the {{Ping}} template in Visual it will nowiki it. Use the button instead. I personally haven't experienced it defaulting to visual or refusing to preview. --Ahecht (TALK
PAGE) 15:39, 27 April 2022 (UTC)

Thanks. I'll keep an eye on it more carefully to see if it goes to visual again. Doug Weller talk 15:44, 27 April 2022 (UTC)

In Visual mode, as you type {{ you should see a "Wikitext markup detected" notification at the top-right, warning you that you're using the visual editor. Note also you can ping in both visual and wikitext mode by typing @. — MusikAnimal ^talk 16:49, 27 April 2022 (UTC)

I didn’t know that, thanks. Doug Weller talk 17:35, 27 April 2022 (UTC)

@Ahecht: it works fine for me - I just used the ping template on you here. — xaosflux ^Talk 15:58, 27 April 2022 (UTC)

OK, think I was able to replicate the workflow that causes this. (a) Use reply tool (b) use the Visual Editor Mode (c) Use wikitext like a template (d) Ignore the toast that wikitext isn't supported in this mode. — xaosflux ^Talk 09:55, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

Probably. I presume "toast" means text? Doug Weller talk 09:57, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

Sorry, jargony. "Toast" is something that pops up :) If you try to put markup in replytool visual mode, you should get a pop-up notification warning you about it. — xaosflux ^Talk 12:55, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

Lol! Of course! Doug Weller talk 13:39, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

The ability to use templates in the visual mode depends on some background work. The software would need to be able to wrap a complex comment in some kind of code to indicate that this whole thing belonged in the "list" (the single item beginning with the ::::). Otherwise, if someone adds, say, an infobox, they'll get a mess. Right now, you'd get something like this:

::::{{infobox

::::| name=Alice

::::| country=here

::::}}

::::I have a question about this infobox.

But you want something like this:

::::<<<{{infobox

| name=Alice

| country=here

}}

I have a question about this infobox.>>>

(which would display as an infobox, not as a bunch of broken wikitext). Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 20:03, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

Edge case actions with page titles

Hello! Is there any way we can do the following actions:

1. Change a page's title while creating it? (Example: I noticed I had a typo in my new page's title but the content is correct.)
2. Search for a page's title while being in https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?search=.... (the page you get the search results when not jumping immediately to a page after searching for its title in the search box) and if it exists, immediately jump to it, not have it load up as a title there first and then have to click on it to open it. - Klein Muçi (talk) 11:11, 27 April 2022 (UTC)

1. There is no Wikipedia feature but it can be done in seconds with a Windows browser. Use Ctrl+A in the edit area to mark everything and Ctrl+C to copy it to the clipboard. Manually change the page name in the url and insert the copy with Ctrl+V
2. Search pages also have the normal search field. You would have to use that as far as I know. PrimeHunter (talk) 11:34, 27 April 2022 (UTC)

   @PrimeHunter, thank you for your answers! In regard to 1, changing the title in the URL is better than what I do, that is, creating a new page from scratch after copy-pasting the content. As for 2, that's what I'm referring to, the search field. If you search something there while being in the search page and the title you're searching for comes as a suggestion in it there is no way to just straight up to that page like when normally using the search field in, let's say, the main page, is there? (If my explanation is still not good enough, I can provide a specific example.) - Klein Muçi (talk) 11:51, 27 April 2022 (UTC)

   The page name can be clicked with right mouse and then open[ed] in new tab just like any other links. NguoiDungKhongDinhDanh 12:05, 27 April 2022 (UTC)

   @NguoiDungKhongDinhDanh, eh. I was hoping to not do that but instead have it behave the same as when you normally search something in the search box, that is immediately "jump", open the wanted title in the same tab. Looks like there is no way to do that. Thank you anyway! :) - Klein Muçi (talk) 12:11, 27 April 2022 (UTC)

   My browser's right-click menu lets me search for text I have highlighted, opening a new tab. It only offers my default search engine, but that could be set to Wikipedia. A third-party "Search with Wikipedia" add-on for Firefox adds Wikipedia search to the right-click menu; other browsers may have similar extensions. Certes (talk) 13:35, 27 April 2022 (UTC)

   I mean that Special:Search has two search fields, the normal search field on every page (the position depends on your skin) and the bigger field on search pages. As far as I know, only the normal search field has a feature to go directly to a page. Only the bigger field is prefilled with your previous search so it's inconvenient to use the normal field. PrimeHunter (talk) 12:08, 27 April 2022 (UTC)

   @PrimeHunter, oh... Funnily enough I hadn't been aware that there were 2 search fields which behaved differently. Any idea why does the "bigger field" behave like it does? What benefits are supposed to be had from that behavior, assuming that is intended? My first instinct is to ask "why can't we make both fields behave the same" but I'm assuming that change is deliberate. - Klein Muçi (talk) 12:14, 27 April 2022 (UTC)

   Many users don't know how to avoid the Go feature in the normal search field when they want to. The search page helps. PrimeHunter (talk) 18:18, 27 April 2022 (UTC)

   Interesting... To my everyday usage it feels like an extra step which only makes my usage feel more clunkier but I can see the need for it now. Thank you! - Klein Muçi (talk) 01:10, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

   MonoBook has separate "Go" and "Search" buttons. Vector's normal search box defaults to "Go", and the search box on Special:Search defaults to "Search". Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 20:05, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

Navigation popups - coder needed

Is anyone able and wiling to add a feature or two to the Navigation popups gadget, please?

Specifically (and in order of my reference, FWIW) those described at:

• Wikipedia talk:Tools/Navigation popups/Archive 10#Wikidata ID
• Wikipedia talk:Tools/Navigation popups/Archive 11#Patrolling
• Wikipedia talk:Tools/Navigation popups/Archive 9#Template sandboxes and testcases

-- Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 12:13, 27 April 2022 (UTC)

You may check or file this at https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/tag/navigation-popups-gadget/ instead where feature requests for that gadget are handled. Malyacko (talk) 20:36, 27 April 2022 (UTC)

I have been told elsewhere (and some time ago) "This tool is not under active development ... If you want a feature, you will have to find someone willing to program it.". The Patrolling request has been on Phabricator since June 2019, with no substantive responses, other than support. The Wikidata request has been there since January 2020, with zero responses. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 20:19, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

Time spent on Mediawiki projects

Is there a way to see how much time you spend surfing/working on Mediawiki projects? I'm curious. - Klein Muçi (talk) 15:56, 27 April 2022 (UTC)

It would need to be client-side, logs of 'reading' pages is not available publicly for privacy reasons. — xaosflux ^Talk 16:02, 27 April 2022 (UTC)

@Klein Muçi This may not be exactly what you're looking for, but xtools' edit count report includes a timecard that shows what time of day and day of week your edits tend to occur on. ~ ONUnicorn^{(Talk|Contribs)}problem solving 17:41, 27 April 2022 (UTC)

Some tasks involve offline work, such as researching in books or analysing database dumps, and there's no way to record that. Most edits I can do in seconds but a few take days to prepare and that's not recorded anywhere. Certes (talk) 17:47, 27 April 2022 (UTC)

Thank you to everyone who commented! The timecard was indeed interesting in regard to my question. I was just curious to know how many hours a day I spend at "Wikipedia" averagely. The only reason I didn't say "Wikipedia" is because, beside changing back and forth between at least 3 different languages of Wikipedias, I also switch back and forth between different projects such as WikiQuote, Meta and MediaWiki. My ideal outcome would also take into consideration the time spent at the Phabricator, the Wikimedia Code Review and SWViewer (or even other offline work as user Certes mentions) but knowing such a thing could be hard to achieved (if not impossible, considering the offline element) I was mostly hoping for a "client-side tracking script" that could track the activity in the aforementioned MediaWiki projects but it looks like such a thing isn't really a thing so...

Thank you anyway! :) - Klein Muçi (talk) 00:52, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

Lighten up

I've noticed some experienced contributors are averse to the use of tables in articles. They claim tables are "too heavy" or "too distracting". This seems very strange to me. I think tables are very useful and they should be used whenever they work better than plain text. But I have to admit the tables in Wikipedia are visually heavier set than I would prefer. This may have something to do with the aversion some contributors feel. In his books, Edward Tufte advises using only the minimum amount of "data ink". As I interpret it, the absolute minimum of data ink in a table would be something like a very thin border of very light gray and no background color at all. But in Wikipedia, the tables are much much darker than this. Would it be possible to lighten up the default color of all tables in Wikipedia? I believe this could be achieved by adjusting two values in the CSS code that governs all tables. What would be the correct procedure for this? --Inehmo (talk) 19:40, 27 April 2022 (UTC)

@Inehmo: Tables should be used for tabular data, not for anything that subjectively "works better". Feel free to provide specific examples including full links. Thanks, --Malyacko (talk) 20:34, 27 April 2022 (UTC)

I created a few examples of what I had in mind. Here: https://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/K%C3%A4ytt%C3%A4j%C3%A4:Inehmo/Hiekkalaatikko – Inehmo (talk) 22:53, 27 April 2022 (UTC)

The standard wikitable class is deliberately "light" with minimal background colors. Additional colors are added most often by fans of the particular page topic. (Sports is the worst issue in this regard.) There's only so much we can do about it; right now our minimum limit is basically at the point of WP:ACCESS color contrast requirements which we enforce by a template system. Izno (talk) 21:07, 27 April 2022 (UTC)

Accessibility is certainly a compelling reason. But a lighter background color would increase the contrast with text and thereby improve the situation. – Inehmo (talk) 05:07, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

Maybe I can be considered one of those editors. Even though not dealing that much with articles per se, after nearly 9 years of contributing around I'm still averse of tables in Wikipedia. Their overall usage feels very, very clunky technically vise and the visual aspect is generally unappealing and/or bland. In my decade of contributions I've only been forced to work "intensively" with tables only twice. One time I had to translate the contents of a table and it took me literal days to be able to preserve the original table structure without messing it while translating. The other time was this, a task which I couldn't accomplish even after asking multiple users for help. - Klein Muçi (talk) 01:06, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

I agree with you about tables being challenging to edit and modify in wikitext view. I don't use the beta Visual Editor, but I understand that it makes table editing a lot easier. – Jonesey95 (talk) 04:03, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

Yes, that is the more fundamental issue. I have some experience with many kinds of tables all around the web and I fully agree: tables are quite impossible in wikitext format. Their current implementation requires a thorough rethinking. Luckily, the Visual Editor is very capable. It is a great relief, if not a complete solution to the problem. – Inehmo (talk) 05:27, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

I hope I won't forget this topic until the new community wishlist happens. - Klein Muçi (talk) 13:06, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

Hey @Klein Muçi, you can make a note in Community Wishlist Survey/Sandbox :) SGrabarczuk (WMF) (talk) 20:14, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

@SGrabarczuk (WMF), thank you! Just did. - Klein Muçi (talk) 02:06, 29 April 2022 (UTC)

In the world of Featured/Good content, tables are a must, it seems, an indication of superior quality, I guess. Glad to see there are others who are table-adverse. They are irksome to read when long lines are stuffed into boxes with lots of line wraps - it seems tidy, except for those who consume the information. Bulleted lists are often better as you have the space and freedom to build out without being confined to tidy little boxes for the sake of signaling a quality production. -- GreenC 05:36, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

Removing messagebox and standard-talk

Hello all, I intend to remove the messagebox and standard-talk classes from Common.css Soon as a part of moving to TemplateStyles (see MediaWiki talk:Common.css/to do#description). This is because these classes already have well-known replacements (primarily {{ombox}} and {{tmbox}} and "hand-coded" tables/divs).

I am leaving this note here (atypically) because while I have done my best to remove the vast majority of uses that are "public facing" and not archived discussions/unused WikiProjects (see MediaWiki talk:Common.css/to do#messagebox; between this account and my repeat-edits account I'm in the 10k edits range mostly un-substing old AFD messages), I am essentially unable/unwilling to do anything about the 120 thousand uses on user and user talk pages. These uses are mostly WikiProject invitations and barnstars (as best I can, I've fixed the templates that generate the classes).

I do not think making changes to those pages makes sense. It is bot scale to preserve the width, centering, and background of these tables, which is not ultimately deleterious to the page content. However, I would anticipate many editors looking at their user pages and being sad.

I have previously written a transition guide for people who want to restore NavFrame-similar styles to their user pages (which had a similar issue), which I can do here as well if desired. It is fairly trivial in this case for individual editors to adjust their uses of these classes. I am not currently certain where that guide would live.

Please let me know what you think. Izno (talk) 21:33, 27 April 2022 (UTC)

It sounds to me like a reasonable idea. The old pages will still have its content preserved, which is the important thing in my opinion. as best I can, I've fixed the templates that generate the classes) is good to hear. Rlink2 (talk) 21:41, 27 April 2022 (UTC)

I've made up MediaWiki talk:Common.css/messagebox in case anyone wants to look at it and/or provide feedback. Izno (talk) 23:24, 29 April 2022 (UTC)

Red links in talk pages

I have just closed an RM at Talk:Ukrainian anti-Soviet armed resistance and noticed the links to its own article page are red, like in "moved to Ukrainian anti-Soviet armed resistance". The source seems to show just a regular link. Any idea what could be the issue? Vpab15 (talk) 22:41, 27 April 2022 (UTC)

A WP:PURGE seemed to have fixed it. Suffusion of Yellow (talk) 22:55, 27 April 2022 (UTC)

Great, thanks a lot! Vpab15 (talk) 23:06, 27 April 2022 (UTC)

No cursor in the reply tool

Hi, I don't know if it's quite yet Thursday on the wiki, but I don't have a cursor in the reply tool. It's behaving perfectly normal, I just can't visibly see it. I've purged my cache, and tried a bunch of pages, but it's not there. The only code I've messed with in the past day was to DISABLE two scripts on my globaljs, so i doubt that affected me. Happy Editing--IAmChaos 04:01, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

 Works for me @IAmChaos: are you in visual editor mode or wikitext mode? If you start typing does it appear (i.e. is it just against the left border)? — xaosflux ^Talk 09:53, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

Hi, I am in source mode, and no it is still invisible when typing. I can tell where it is, because I can still type and move it with arrow keys and type between old text, it just doesnt visually appear. It's only in the reply tool, works in regular editing and in the quickedit box (I dont remember if quickedit is a script or gadget or what). Happy Editing--IAmChaos 09:57, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

This is a reply tool in visual mode. I mean to me it looks the same as source mode (without a preview), and there is still no cursor. Happy Editing--IAmChaos 09:59, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

@IAmChaos could you try using a different web browser to see if it is a browser-specific problem? — xaosflux ^Talk 10:27, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

Hey, So it's working on my alt on Chrome (there is a cursor). My main is on unmodified Safari 15.3. Unfortunately with a dead phone, I can't try my main on Chrome, my apologies. IAmChaos(alt acct - please ping my main) 10:31, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

Back on my main, I Did this to my commonjs, and it's still invisible after another cache clear. Happy Editing--IAmChaos 10:35, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

To rule out scripts, you could try to load this page in safe mode. Are you saying right now you only see this problem in Safari? — xaosflux ^Talk 12:52, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

In safemode now (Safari), and yes it is only safari that I see this issue. (including safemode) Happy Editing--IAmChaos 12:56, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

Can you reproduce this in the visual editor? Try https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Whatamidoing_(WMF)/sandbox?veaction=edit for the visual editor. Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 20:15, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

If IP Template

Resolved

 – GIGO. — xaosflux ^Talk 12:51, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

Transcluding the template if IP shows the result "You are not logged in" even though I am logged in.

Some specifications:

• I use Chrome 100.0.4896.127 stable on Windows 10 21H2. Using a Chromebook running on version 100 didn't change anything. Changing to Firefox, whether on Windows or on a virtual machine, didn't change anything.
• I use MVPS HOSTS for my hosts file to block advertising domains. Again, using a Chromebook or Firefox in a virtual machine, whose hosts files don't have anything, didn't work.
• I use uBlock Origin 1.42.4 to block any missing trackers. Disabling uBlock didn't change anything.

• Wikipedia and Wikimedia are both whitelisted. All traffic from the Wikimedia Foundation is whitelisted.

• I use Vector 2022 as my skin. Changing to Vector 2010 didn't affect anything.
• I'm a rollbacker and pending changes reviewer on enwiki. Other users on enwiki who have more permissions saw the template correctly.

• I don't have an additional account on Wikimedia per policy.
• I don't have two-factor authentication available in my account because I haven't sent a request at Meta.

• I have Hotcat, Lupin, ProveIt, Twinkle, wide-vector-2022, and WikEd. Disabling all of them did not work.
• The Chinese version of the template works.

Hopefully someone can help me with this.

— B. L. I. R. 04:35, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

@BeywheelzLetItRip: It uses code in MediaWiki:Group-user.css. What do you see here: You are not logged in. I see nothing. User:BeywheelzLetItRip/common.css should have CSS but it has wikitext. Maybe it contains something that messes up your other CSS loading. Try blanking it. If you want to transclude wikitext on your user page then I strongly recommend you don't place it in a CSS page. PrimeHunter (talk) 08:59, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

And if you do want to use that "css transclusion hack" don't do it on that page, use something like User:Username/fakecsspage.css — xaosflux ^Talk 10:26, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

I moved wikitext to a new stylesheet here and removed everything from the common.css file. It works now. — B. L. I. R. 10:56, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

Wikitext in a .css page is still very confusing and may cause trouble but at least it's not processed as CSS in your new fake css page. xaosflux wasn't suggesting to actually use a new .css page but merely saying it wouldn't be as bad as using common.css. PrimeHunter (talk) 11:35, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

Understandable, the protection policy for user pages does not say what the implications will be for users who are using transcluded CSS files on their user pages. It's only when a user attempts to create and/or edit a stylesheet that a warning appears. — B. L. I. R. 12:30, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

Agree, it's not "recommended" - it just won't also break other things. Base userpages are already semi-protected by an edit filter as well. — xaosflux ^Talk 12:51, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

Got it, thanks a lot for the help and for clearing the confusion up! I'll do my best not to break functionality via CSS. — B. L. I. R. 15:34, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

Is there a Javascript date library we can load?

I was using jQuery UI's date picker to format date strings, but it appears that this has been deprecated now, as I saw the message This page is using the deprecated ResourceLoader module "jquery.ui". Please use OOUI instead. in my Javascript console, but I couldn't find any date-related objects in OOUI. I know I can do it myself but I find it annoying to have to reinvent the wheel. Thanks in advance. —howcheng {chat} 04:39, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

There are mw.widgets.DateInputWidget and mw.widgets.datetime.DateTimeInputWidget. Nardog (talk) 04:45, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

Thanks, but I wasn't looking for UI widgets. DateTimeFormatter looked a little more promising but I can't quite figure out how to use it. I just went and did it the vanilla JS way. —howcheng {chat} 05:09, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

Moment is shipped with core so you can use it from ResourceLoader. Nardog (talk) 05:24, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

MediaWiki is allready moving away from Moment, see phab:T146798. Previous uses where replaced with Date.toLocaleString or an formatted date from the API. Anyway, just so you know, MediaWiki is eventually also going to go away from OOUI in several years time, to Vue.js, codex is the name of the WMF implementation of it.--Snævar (talk) 05:42, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

(Yay, someone saw the deprecation notice and did something about it!) Izno (talk) 05:29, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

@Izno: It was pretty lucky. I noticed my script stopped working due to changes in the API so I had to fix it, and while debugging I saw the console logs. —howcheng {chat} 07:37, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

Watchlist, email notifications

If you have email notifications for pages on your watchlist enabled then you receive emails that start The Wikipedia page PAGENAME has been changed on 19 April 2022 by ... I'm dealing with a VTRS enquiry where someone wishes to suggest a change to the wording, but I don't know where to point them to initiate such a discussion. Is the notification content hosted here or on mediawiki? Nthep (talk) 10:38, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

@Nthep I think that is from one of these messages. We are unlikely to localize these without good reason though. If there is something that would make it better for everyone that uses any mediawiki installation, they can file a request at phab. — xaosflux ^Talk 12:49, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

@Xaosflux it's MediaWiki:Enotif body intro changed, the correspondent considers "was changed on" to be more grammatically correct than "has been changed on". Depending on how soon after the event you see the notification (e.g. next day) then they may have a point. Nthep (talk) 13:26, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

@Nthep ok, so since that is a semantic change, it should be done upstream (if it is warranted) - so they should file a phab feature request. They will need to register an account (here on Wikipedia is fine) then attach it to phabricator, then use this form. It may or not be accepted by the developers, but if so we will get the new verbiage here, and it will be available for translation on every project. I don't think we should localize this for only users with English as their primary language, and only on the English Wikipedia (then you would get different messages from other projects you also edit on). They certainly could start a discussion here and try to form a consensus for a local override if they really wanted to. — xaosflux ^Talk 13:42, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

Move templates to bottom

Here Category:Tor (anonymity network) we have 2 large infoboxen templates that cover the actual content of the category. Can we move those to the bottom or rather should they just be removed? --Palosirkka (talk) 13:35, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

What do you mean they "cover the actual content of the category"? On the desktop site the navboxes are collapsed, and even if they're not because you're on the mobile site or have turned JavaScript off or for some other reason, you can just scroll down, can't you? Nardog (talk) 13:43, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

@Palosirkka those should be "collapsed" if they are not, make sure you have javascript enabled. As for your question though, it is not currently possible to put templates below the category listing. If this was an article or project page, we could - but the category page type doesn't support that format. — xaosflux ^Talk 13:44, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

I recommend removing these navboxes from the category page. It is quite uncommon to have them there, and their contents should duplicate the articles listed on the category page if the navboxes and categories are designed and assigned well. – Jonesey95 (talk) 13:59, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

Thank you all. I forget things look different with JavaScript (which I disable for security and privacy). I'll go ahead and remove them per Jonesey95. --Palosirkka (talk) 14:22, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

Is there any way to make language tag markup less breakable?

I've been mulling over this for a while now, but I haven't the technical knowledge to know what could be done. I add a lot of language tags to Wikipedia – think {{lang}}, {{transliteration}} and the like – and the problem is that I'll go through an article, I'll mark up all non-English text with the correct template, and then editors adding new content, even content that features words marked up throughout, commonly just slap some italic markup either side and call it a day.

I know that consistency of edits is a problem, and that obviously some templates are going to be missed here and there. But these are articles with a lot of foreign-language text, articles where terminology is unavoidable and where that terminology is unavoidably not English. I've tried to inform editors here and there about language tagging, but that's no guarantee that they'll remember, and having to keep very large articles on my watchlist in the event that one or two language tags need adding in the future has resulted in my watchlist ballooning to 568 articles. And the articles I'm focusing on are pretty much only Japanese arts and culture articles.

I don't think this can be avoided by just informing enough editors about language tagging. There's too many articles, and I'm wondering if there's something technical that could be done about this. At the end of the day, it's consistent markup vital to accessibility that can be easily broken by unwitting editors. I figured I'd ask here, if nothing else.--Ineffablebookkeeper (talk) ({{ping}} me!) 17:53, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

"Is there a way to get people to do things they don't know they should do?" can unfortunately not be answered positively, especially since the addition of italics can be for non-language related reasons (ship, species, and work names prominently). We could theoretically ban the use of '' and ensure there are sufficient templates to cover the use cases for italics, but I don't anticipate that being favored by the general populace. We could add an edit notice for every page of interest, but that extends into the thousands or hundreds of thousands of pages where an English-foreign term is used.

Really the only thing you can do is tell people when you see it. Part of the note can be "if you see someone do it like you used to, let them know to change what they're doing too". Izno (talk) 19:31, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

Watchlist problems, some revisions that I go thru come back as unread, and other related matters

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T218511

I have the watchlist set to show every revision of each article on my list displayed in bold, compared to the last time I checked the watchlist. I will go thru each revision (diff) in one article, clicking "next edit" till I get to the most recent revision of the article. I will then return to the watchlist and refresh to see all revisions from the article I visited as read (non-bold). Sometime later, though, I will notice on another refresh that some of the most recent revisions of the same article will be marked unread again. There's also times when I will only check some of the revisions of an article, and then check the watchlist to see that all of the revisions are marked read, when I didn't go thru all of them. What is going on?

I just cleared all cookies to all Wikipedia sites a few minutes ago, and the problem is still happening (for those of you suggesting that I clear cookies). MPFitz1968 (talk) 19:11, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

This is a recurring problem. It is tracked in T218511. I haven't noticed it for a while, but it just started happening again to me about two days ago. – Jonesey95 (talk) 19:25, 28 April 2022 (UTC)

How to get/copy raw html content?

Hi, I want to copy a specific part of a RAW Html content, but I don't know how to do it. For example, I want to get <pre>...</pre> content in this link and then use it in a Mediawiki namespace page. Thanks! ⇒ AramTalk 00:07, 29 April 2022 (UTC)

@Aram don't think that is very feasible (maybe with some Lua) - what is the end result you are trying to accomplish, perhaps there is another way to go about it. — xaosflux ^Talk 11:50, 29 April 2022 (UTC)

Special:ExpandTemplates may be helpful to strip template content. Otherwise look at the page source, on Firefox it is more tools > view source. --Jules (Mrjulesd) 13:05, 29 April 2022 (UTC)

@Xaosflux and @Mrjulesd I want to add a drop-down list to Special:Upload (on ckbwiki) to add non-free templates (i. e. Template:Non-free use rationale album cover) just like Licensing drop-down list. And I wrote some codes (see below), but I don't know how to get those template codes.

var albumCoverValue = "Album Cover template";

var templateTypeLabel = '<td class="mw-label"><label for="templateType">Template type:</label></td>';
var selectTag = '<select name="templateType" id="templateTypeSelector" onchange="changeOption(this)">' +
    '<option value="">Choose</option>' +
    '<option value="' + albumCoverValue + '">Album Cover</option>' +
    '<option value="poster-value">Poster</option>' +
    '</select>';

var selectTagWrapper = '<td class="mw-input">' + selectTag + '</td>';

$('.mw-htmlform-field-HTMLTextAreaField').after('<tr class="mw-htmlform-field-Non-free-use-rationale-templates">' +
    templateTypeLabel + selectTagWrapper + '</tr>');

function changeOption(selected) {
    var x = selected.options[selected.selectedIndex].value;
    document.getElementById("wpUploadDescription").value = x;
}

Try above in console. We should do something to get template codes for albumCoverValue variable. ⇒ AramTalk 18:28, 29 April 2022 (UTC)

@Aram: Try using a JSON page? NguoiDungKhongDinhDanh 19:09, 29 April 2022 (UTC)

@NguoiDungKhongDinhDanh I've never worked with JSON. Do you have any idea? ⇒ AramTalk 19:46, 29 April 2022 (UTC)

@Aram: You apparently know JS, so I think I can safely assume that you also know what JSON is. Create a JSON page (by changing content model or using a title that ends with .json) with all template codes, then use some JS code to query that page's content. NguoiDungKhongDinhDanh 19:53, 29 April 2022 (UTC)

I suggest you just add as a section within your existing form; they can be seen here: MediaWiki:Licenses; attempting to insert additional input boxes there will likely become problematic with different skins and with different releases. I sent you a note on ckbwiki where I might be able to look further. — xaosflux ^Talk 19:54, 29 April 2022 (UTC)

@NguoiDungKhongDinhDanh I have basic information about it, but I haven't worked on it. Of course, I have created Wikipedia JSON pages, but those were just a copy-paste from other projects (without my skills). So far, I have no idea how to get information from it, but now you've given me some ideas about how it works, and I thank you for that. I need to read some information about it so I can work with it. Thank you!

@Xaosflux I'm not technically that good. But I don't know how the MediaWiki:Licenses page can add those templates contents to the box. If we do so, it may be confused because it merges with the license section. Anyway, I'll wait for your notes. ⇒ AramTalk 20:32, 29 April 2022 (UTC)

@Aram: When you edit MediaWiki:Licenses the bulleted items work like this:

*$TemplatePageName|$Label

So for example on w:ckb:MediaWiki:Licenses there is a line:

*cc-by-3.0|Creative Commons Attribution 3.0

This uses the template at w:ckb:داڕێژە:Cc-by-3.0

So create any templates you want, apply appropriate protection to them, then edit that Licenses page to add them. Is that what you are looking for? — xaosflux ^Talk 20:50, 29 April 2022 (UTC)

@Xaosflux No, I'm not talking about the licensees, but about the usage of Template:Non-free use rationale. On ckbwiki, only the ckb:Template:ھۆکاری بەکارھێنانی نائازاد provided (see ckb:میدیاویکی:Onlyifuploading.js#L-20). There are more templates (see Category:Non-free use rationale templates). I mean how to add those templates usage codes to the box instead of the ckb:Template:ھۆکاری بەکارھێنانی نائازاد? Am I clear? ⇒ AramTalk 21:21, 29 April 2022 (UTC)

Think I'm missing your goal a little bit. Your Special:Upload already includes lots of non-free templated options, you can remove ones that you don't want be editing the Licenses page as well. — xaosflux ^Talk 21:43, 29 April 2022 (UTC)

Make working with templates easier: More improvements coming soon.

Hello. The last set of improvements from WMDE’s Templates project will be deployed to English Wikipedia soon:

Play media

Fundamental changes in the template dialog (example from a left-to-right wiki).

1) You’ll receive a fundamentally improved template dialog in VisualEditor and New Wikitext mode. This will make it easier to understand what is expected from a template, how to navigate the template dialog, and how to add parameters. These improvements have been active on a few wikis for some months already. The little video here summarizes the changes that were made. If you like to learn more, please visit our project page.

2) It will become easier to find and insert templates with an improved search and added warnings (in the TemplateWizard & in the template dialog of VisualEditor and New Wikitext mode).

3) In syntax highlighting (CodeMirror extension), a colorblind-friendly color scheme will be added. You’ll be able to activate it with a user setting.

The planned deployment for 1) and 2) on English Wikipedia is May 17. 3) is planned for May 10. These were the last three out of seven projects in the Templates focus area. Apart from these bigger projects, the Technical Wishes team improved a few other user-facing issues and fixed some bugs related to working with templates. You can learn more about it here.

Feedback on all the projects is much appreciated on their respective talk pages. – Thanks a lot on behalf of WMDE’s Technical Wishes team, Johanna Strodt (WMDE) (talk) 10:47, 29 April 2022 (UTC)

I'm confused. I thought this was already planned to be released previously? ― Blaze Wolf^Talk_{Blaze Wolf#6545} 13:28, 29 April 2022 (UTC)

Yes some of this was previously announced, but then delayed in the week that it was supposed to go live. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 19:17, 29 April 2022 (UTC)

Ah alright. Thanks for the clarification. ― Blaze Wolf^Talk_{Blaze Wolf#6545} 19:22, 29 April 2022 (UTC)

Changing the position of {{DISPLAYTITLE}} creates an ugly gap, how to avoid it?

In this edit I tried to bring the template further up in the article as per MOS:LAYOUT, but as a user pointed out (and you can see it in the diff link preview), it creates an ugly gap between the title and the main content of the article. Why does this happen? 0xDEADBEEF (T C) 15:56, 29 April 2022 (UTC)

{{DISPLAYTITLE}} and {{Short description}} both creates no visible wikitext, so their lines are treated as blank ones. Try placing them on the same line? NguoiDungKhongDinhDanh 16:16, 29 April 2022 (UTC)

^ should work. Izno (talk) 19:38, 29 April 2022 (UTC)

There is a problem with the coding. {{DISPLAYTITLE}} creates an extra blank row while {{Short description}} doesn't. If we place {{DISPLAYTITLE}} under {{Short description}} as per WP:LAYOUT, this blank row will appear. If we delete {{Short description}} or place {{Short description}} under {{DISPLAYTITLE}}, the extra blank row will disappear. The only way to comply with the template order stated in WP:LAYOUT while avoiding that extra blank row is placing both {{Short description}} and {{DISPLAYTITLE}} on the same line, but it makes the codes look messy, I don't like it. 2001:8003:9008:1301:1516:F3EF:6434:339B (talk) 04:23, 30 April 2022 (UTC)

ENGVAR in newcomer copyedit task

Hi all, I don't know where this query fits best, so I'm asking it here. Are newcomers who are guided by the Newcomers task feature, told about MOS:ENGVAR before giving them the task of copy-editing? So far, I've found quite a few Newcomer copyeditors switch British English to American one and vice-versa. If they aren't told about it already, can it be added to the guide somehow? (Noting that I know nothing about how this thing works) Thanks! —CX Zoom[he/him] ^{(let's talk • {C•X})} 19:28, 29 April 2022 (UTC)

Does not seem to be mentioned anywhere. The relevant guidance, reproduced here, is:

• MediaWiki:growthexperiments-help-panel-suggestededits-quick-start-tips

  Copyediting is about making a small fix to the way an article is written, such as spelling, grammar, or the clarity of the text. Copyedits help articles to be more professional and trustworthy.

• MediaWiki:growthexperiments-help-panel-suggestededits-tips-vector-visualeditor-copyedit-example-value

  Reaching Mercury from Earthh poses significant technical challenges.

• MediaWiki:growthexperiments-help-panel-suggestededits-tips-vector-visualeditor-copyedit-main-calm

  To make a difference, you only need to make one or two small corrections. You do not need to work on the entire article. You also don't need to have any special knowledge about the topic.

• MediaWiki:growthexperiments-help-panel-suggestededits-tips-vector-visualeditor-copyedit-main-rules1

  You can fix spelling and grammar errors. This might include sentences that are too long, repeated words, or incorrect punctuation.

• MediaWiki:growthexperiments-help-panel-suggestededits-tips-vector-visualeditor-copyedit-example-rules1

  Mars has has two small moons.

• MediaWiki:growthexperiments-help-panel-suggestededits-tips-vector-visualeditor-copyedit-main-rules2

  You can also rewrite sentences so that they do not contain opinions. Wikipedia content should be neutral, clear, and encyclopedic. However, be careful not to change the facts in the sentence.

• MediaWiki:growthexperiments-help-panel-suggestededits-tips-vector-visualeditor-copyedit-example-rules2

  Jupiter is the largest, and most interesting, planet in the Solar System.

• MediaWiki:growthexperiments-help-panel-suggestededits-tips-vector-visualeditor-copyedit-text-rules2

  This sentence contains an opinion that should be removed.

• MediaWiki:growthexperiments-help-panel-suggestededits-tips-vector-visualeditor-copyedit-main-step1

  Once you see a correction you want to make, click "Edit" to get started. Then go ahead and fix issues by deleting and typing as needed.

• MediaWiki:growthexperiments-help-panel-suggestededits-tips-vector-visualeditor-copyedit-main-publish

  Either find more changes to make, or go ahead and click "Publish changes" to publish your edit!

* Pppery * _{it has begun...} 19:52, 29 April 2022 (UTC)

So we should add "Do not change American to British spellings or vice versa" to main-rules1 ? —Kusma (talk) 07:57, 30 April 2022 (UTC)

User talk page warning to flag up likely THEYCANTHEARYOU problem

While waiting (!) for the mobile user notification problem (WP:THEYCANTHEARYOU) to be one day maybe (!!) fixed, would it be a) possible and b) good idea to implement in the meantime a warning which automatically appears on the top of the user talk page of a user who is likely to be not getting notifications (ie. edits only or or mostly on an affected mobile device, and does not edit their talk page)?

I realise this would do nothing to help such users receive the said notifications, but it would at least make it easier for the rest of us to identify this as a possible explanation for their lack of response to warnings etc., helping to AGF and not raise blood pressures unduly. I've seen many user talk pages where the attempts at communicating with the user get increasingly desperate, until someone points out this as the likely reason. I just thought maybe that could be done automatically by way of some clever code.

Thoughts? -- DoubleGrazing (talk) 07:25, 30 April 2022 (UTC)

I don't see how "automatically" can be done. I would prefer to just disallow editing from any remaining THEYCANTHEARYOU system, ideally combined with pointers to our many working systems instead of a broken one. (This post was written on my phone using a browser and the Monobook skin, which is both easier to use and more powerful than any of the crippled "mobile solutions"). —Kusma (talk) 08:26, 30 April 2022 (UTC)