There is a discussion on WP:AN about this [1] which has incidentally spilled over onto my talk page. No I'm not canvassing or asking anybody to comment there, but I'd just like some personal feedback, so I can at least figure out whether I've gone completely nuts or if the concerns I've raised have some degree of merit.
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:AN#Talkpage_deletion_question
—C.W.
Your concerns are that you might click on a blue link to a talkpage with no discussion, right? I don't see a whole lot of merit to that, frankly, and I think sometimes MZMcbride likes to bump up his deletion stats and find a use for his scripts. I can't see any other good reason for deleting these pages - it doesn't save any space, they're stored anyway. I'd rather have a talkpage with some instructions and some format than nothing at all, through my unscientific belief that a new editor is more likely to add to a page that already exists than create one that doesn't.
Nathan
On Fri, Aug 1, 2008 at 10:36 PM, Charlotte Webb charlottethewebb@gmail.com wrote:
There is a discussion on WP:AN about this [1] which has incidentally spilled over onto my talk page. No I'm not canvassing or asking anybody to comment there, but I'd just like some personal feedback, so I can at least figure out whether I've gone completely nuts or if the concerns I've raised have some degree of merit.
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:AN#Talkpage_deletion_question
—C.W.
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Nathan wrote:
Your concerns are that you might click on a blue link to a talkpage with no discussion, right? I don't see a whole lot of merit to that, frankly, and I think sometimes MZMcbride likes to bump up his deletion stats and find a use for his scripts. I can't see any other good reason for deleting these pages
- it doesn't save any space, they're stored anyway. I'd rather have a
talkpage with some instructions and some format than nothing at all, through my unscientific belief that a new editor is more likely to add to a page that already exists than create one that doesn't.
It is indeed annoying to click on a blue link only to find that the only thing on that page is a totally pointless and condescending template. I would be much happier if there were a red link, or at least if the talk page contained only templates instead of meaningful discussion the link could remain red. Space is not a relevant factor for either side in this discussion. You have been around long enough that you should not need instructions about how to use a talk page. Talk pages have been around since the beginning of Wikipedia. There is no reason to believe that newbies have become stupider than ever, or that we need to talk down at them in the manner of this template.
Ec
On Fri, Aug 1, 2008 at 10:36 PM, Charlotte Webb wrote:
There is a discussion on WP:AN about this [1] which has incidentally spilled over onto my talk page. No I'm not canvassing or asking anybody to comment there, but I'd just like some personal feedback, so I can at least figure out whether I've gone completely nuts or if the concerns I've raised have some degree of merit.
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:AN#Talkpage_deletion_question
—C.W.
2008/8/2 Ray Saintonge saintonge@telus.net:
Nathan wrote:
Your concerns are that you might click on a blue link to a talkpage with no discussion, right? I don't see a whole lot of merit to that, frankly, and I think sometimes MZMcbride likes to bump up his deletion stats and find a use for his scripts. I can't see any other good reason for deleting these pages
- it doesn't save any space, they're stored anyway. I'd rather have a
talkpage with some instructions and some format than nothing at all, through my unscientific belief that a new editor is more likely to add to a page that already exists than create one that doesn't.
It is indeed annoying to click on a blue link only to find that the only thing on that page is a totally pointless and condescending template. I would be much happier if there were a red link, or at least if the talk page contained only templates instead of meaningful discussion the link could remain red. Space is not a relevant factor for either side in this discussion. You have been around long enough that you should not need instructions about how to use a talk page. Talk pages have been around since the beginning of Wikipedia. There is no reason to believe that newbies have become stupider than ever, or that we need to talk down at them in the manner of this template.
It was suggested a while back that a third colour could be used for talk pages with only templates. I don't think the discussion came to any meaningful conclusions, though.
On 8/2/08, Ray Saintonge saintonge@telus.net wrote:
I would be much happier if there were a red link, or at least if the talk page contained only templates instead of meaningful discussion the link could remain red.
I have requested a javascript tool to produce exactly this effect. Obviously I know how to change link colors and how to use regex\ to determine whether signed comments are present or whether there is no white-space outside of the {{curly brackets}}, but I'm having a little trouble with the ajax crap needed for fetching the contents of a page other than the one being viewed.
—C.W.
On Sun, Aug 3, 2008 at 4:41 PM, Charlotte Webb charlottethewebb@gmail.com wrote:
On 8/2/08, Ray Saintonge saintonge@telus.net wrote:
I would be much happier if there were a red link, or at least if the talk page contained only templates instead of meaningful discussion the link could remain red.
I have requested a javascript tool to produce exactly this effect. Obviously I know how to change link colors and how to use regex\ to determine whether signed comments are present or whether there is no white-space outside of the {{curly brackets}}, but I'm having a little trouble with the ajax crap needed for fetching the contents of a page other than the one being viewed.
I looked for an example page to test a script on, but couldn't find any. Pointers?
Magnus
On Mon, Aug 4, 2008 at 9:12 AM, Magnus Manske magnusmanske@googlemail.com wrote:
On Sun, Aug 3, 2008 at 4:41 PM, Charlotte Webb charlottethewebb@gmail.com wrote:
On 8/2/08, Ray Saintonge saintonge@telus.net wrote:
I would be much happier if there were a red link, or at least if the talk page contained only templates instead of meaningful discussion the link could remain red.
I have requested a javascript tool to produce exactly this effect. Obviously I know how to change link colors and how to use regex\ to determine whether signed comments are present or whether there is no white-space outside of the {{curly brackets}}, but I'm having a little trouble with the ajax crap needed for fetching the contents of a page other than the one being viewed.
I looked for an example page to test a script on, but couldn't find any. Pointers?
No matter, found one. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Magnus_Manske/templates_only_talk.js
Will display a talk link for main namespace as "new" if the talk page only contains templates.
Magnus
On Mon, Aug 4, 2008 at 5:50 AM, Magnus Manske magnusmanske@googlemail.com wrote:
No matter, found one. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Magnus_Manske/templates_only_talk.js
Will display a talk link for main namespace as "new" if the talk page only contains templates.
I believe this will fail if the client's connection is slow enough since you don't handle onreadystatechange, but instead jump right into handling the response (which may not be available that soon).
On Mon, Aug 4, 2008 at 1:14 PM, Chris Howie cdhowie@gmail.com wrote:
On Mon, Aug 4, 2008 at 5:50 AM, Magnus Manske magnusmanske@googlemail.com wrote:
No matter, found one. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Magnus_Manske/templates_only_talk.js
Will display a talk link for main namespace as "new" if the talk page only contains templates.
I believe this will fail if the client's connection is slow enough since you don't handle onreadystatechange, but instead jump right into handling the response (which may not be available that soon).
The request is done synchronously, so the send() will wait until the respone is availavle.
Magnus
On Mon, Aug 4, 2008 at 9:44 AM, Magnus Manske magnusmanske@googlemail.com wrote:
On Mon, Aug 4, 2008 at 1:14 PM, Chris Howie cdhowie@gmail.com wrote:
I believe this will fail if the client's connection is slow enough since you don't handle onreadystatechange, but instead jump right into handling the response (which may not be available that soon).
The request is done synchronously, so the send() will wait until the respone is availavle.
Interesting, I wasn't aware that it had a synchronous mode. At any rate I would still recommend using asynchronous mode since large talk pages could cause a several-second delay. (In most of the browsers I have tested on the UI locks while JavaScript is running due to JS's (lack of a) threading model.)
On Mon, Aug 4, 2008 at 3:14 PM, Chris Howie cdhowie@gmail.com wrote:
On Mon, Aug 4, 2008 at 9:44 AM, Magnus Manske magnusmanske@googlemail.com wrote:
On Mon, Aug 4, 2008 at 1:14 PM, Chris Howie cdhowie@gmail.com wrote:
I believe this will fail if the client's connection is slow enough since you don't handle onreadystatechange, but instead jump right into handling the response (which may not be available that soon).
The request is done synchronously, so the send() will wait until the respone is availavle.
Interesting, I wasn't aware that it had a synchronous mode. At any rate I would still recommend using asynchronous mode since large talk pages could cause a several-second delay. (In most of the browsers I have tested on the UI locks while JavaScript is running due to JS's (lack of a) threading model.)
OK, OK, done ;-)
I also fxed an issue with broken JavaScript multiline regexp.
Magnus
Charlotte Webb wrote:
There is a discussion on WP:AN about this [1] which has incidentally spilled over onto my talk page. No I'm not canvassing or asking anybody to comment there, but I'd just like some personal feedback, so I can at least figure out whether I've gone completely nuts or if the concerns I've raised have some degree of merit.
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:AN#Talkpage_deletion_question
Sorry, it's rejected. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Avoid_using_WikiProject_talk_page_tem...
2008/8/2 SPUI drspui@gmail.com:
Charlotte Webb wrote:
There is a discussion on WP:AN about this [1] which has incidentally spilled over onto my talk page. No I'm not canvassing or asking anybody to comment there, but I'd just like some personal feedback, so I can at least figure out whether I've gone completely nuts or if the concerns I've raised have some degree of merit.
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:AN#Talkpage_deletion_question
Sorry, it's rejected. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Avoid_using_WikiProject_talk_page_tem...
The current objection seems to be only ones with {{talkheader}}, which is indeed pretty useless - the link is objecting to project templates, which is subtly different.
Project banners *are* meaningful - they do serve a useful logistical function, in that they're infrastructure that can let us keep tabs on article quality (and suchlike metadata) without interfering with the article itself. Without them, we'd be hard pressed to come up with this wealth of data:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Version_1.0_Editorial_Team/Index
These "rich metadata" templates cover some 70% of our articles, and mean that over 55% of the encyclopedia has some kind of explicit quality assessment. I'd say this is more than worth the occasional annoyance of "oh, no discussion after all".
On 8/2/08, SPUI drspui@gmail.com wrote:
Sorry, it's rejected. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Avoid_using_WikiProject_talk_page_tem...
Ah, so I'm not the only crazy one. I will have to bookmark this page.
Obviously the locus of this particular discussion was the {{talkheader}} template. I do have similar issues with the myriad of wiki-project templates, but I am willing to concede that the quality/assessment/whatever data might be genuinely useful to other users. I have something similar on my own talk page but it was entirely a drunken joke and completely unrelated to the current debate.
On the other hand, with the advent of hidden categories, many of these features could be migrated to article space, much like the Persondata template (using some CSS to make it invisible by default but viewable by those interested).
If the contents of the talkheader template are terribly important it should be part of an appropriate mediawiki interface page rather than something people manually and indiscriminately add to talk pages when they have nothing better to do.
—C.W.