This answer is exactly correct. This is not up to the Foundation.

First, having a software displaying different behavior depending on the language/project is a bad idea. It makes things very complex and users travelling from one language to another are likely to find this disturbing.

So, any change in that respect must be reflected in all languages (I presume the cutoff at 15 or 45 could be negociable depending on communities, but the concept of having a cutoff should be global).

Such a global change of the software should not be initiated by the Foundation, but by editors. This is something needed by editors, not by Foundation. There is no argument for a top down decision here :-)

Discussing it on mailing lists first or on wikis is the way to go.

Anthere

effe iets anders wrote:

In my opinion, but of course i can not speak in any way for the foundation, this not an issue that is up to the foundation. The local community knows best what they need, and I guess that if they find a developer that wants to implement this, they can just ask him (her) to do it. I see no need to discuss it all over here :-) It would perhaps be something different if you prohibit editing for unregistered users etc maybe :)

Lodewijk

2007/2/18, Titoxd@Wikimedia titoxd.wikimedia@gmail.com:

...

No, it only requires some alterations of the site configuration file. Nothing major, actually. The main issue here is if it is acceptable to the Foundation.

Titoxd.

-----Original Message----- From: foundation-l-bounces@lists.wikimedia.org [mailto:foundation-l-bounces@lists.wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of Casey Brown Sent: Sunday, February 18, 2007 2:58 PM To: 'Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List' Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] Restriction on page moves inpt.wikipedia.orgThankyou

Hi Daniel, one question: Was this conclusion reached from a "straw poll" or discussion? Otherwise, it seems good, but it would probably involve a site-wide semi-protection against moves and upping the "new account cut-off" to 45-days.

-----Original Message----- From: foundation-l-bounces@lists.wikimedia.org [mailto:foundation-l-bounces@lists.wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of Daniel Nix Sent: Sunday, February 18, 2007 4:25 PM To: foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Subject: [Foundation-l] Restriction on page moves in pt.wikipedia.orgThankyou

Hi everybody,

In a recent poll on pt.wikipedia it was decided to restrict move pages to users with at least a 45-day-old registered account, the same minimum period to grant right to vote (but without the request of 100 valid editions).

I made a request on http://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/show_bug.cgi?id=9024 and it was suggested to consult the Foundation because the decision seems to be very restrictive.

Well, the community decision was:

First question (pro or con): *52 pro restriction *11 contro restriction

Second (time restriction): *15 votes - 5 days *8 votes - 15 days *38 votes - 45 days

So, I'd like to know what you think about it and what could be done after this decision.

Thank you, Dantadd http://pt.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usu%C3%A1rio_Discuss%C3%A3o:Dantadd

First, having a software displaying different behavior depending on the language/project is a bad idea. It makes things very complex and users travelling from one language to another are likely to find this disturbing.

That same logic could be used to say all languages should have the same system for RFA, AFD, etc. It was decided a long time ago that different languages would be allowed to decide their own policies. Policies which are enforced by the software are no different from any other policies.

Personally, I think 45 days is rather long, and I'm a little uncomfortable with it apparently being handled as a vote (although the results of the vote don't leave much room for interpretation, so it probably makes no difference), but if that's how pt want to do things, it's entirely up to them.

Well, this is a technical change to one site's configuration of a magnitude similar to adding an extra namespace to a wiki. More technically, it means modifying one wiki's LocalSettings.php file. I'm not entirely sure how changing $wgAutoConfirmAge on pt.wikipedia.org will affect en.wikipedia.org, for example. Technically, those settings are completely independent of one another, as they reside on separate files. The only way one wiki's technical requests affect everyone is when there is something *added* to MediaWiki, and those effects are due to a new setting added to MediaWiki's DefaultSettings.php file. As this isn't the case, since the functionality is already there (that's the reason there's a four-day page-move restriction in *all* Wikimedia wikis), changing it on one should not affect the other ones. I'm not sure if Anthere's worry is that a setting of 45 days in pt: will mean changing the setting to 45 days everywhere else, but if that is it, then there is no reason to worry. Looking at the code, there is absolutely no reason why the change would impact other wikis outside the Portuguese Wikipedia.

Titoxd.

-----Original Message----- From: foundation-l-bounces@lists.wikimedia.org [mailto:foundation-l-bounces@lists.wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of Anthere Sent: Monday, February 19, 2007 3:17 PM To: foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] Restriction on page movesinpt.wikipedia.orgThankyou

Thomas Dalton wrote:

...

First, having a software displaying different behavior depending on the language/project is a bad idea. It makes things very complex and users travelling from one language to another are likely to find this

disturbing.

That same logic could be used to say all languages should have the same system for RFA, AFD, etc. It was decided a long time ago that different languages would be allowed to decide their own policies. Policies which are enforced by the software are no different from any other policies.

No, it is not the same. Policies with social implications (such as RFA, AFD) may be developped independently by each community, without having any consequences on the choice made by other communities.

Policies with technical implications may imply that a decision made by one community, will be forced over the other communities. This is what happened for many many months, as all software evolutions were driven by the english community and forced over the other communities along the way. We are no more in these times. If a change of software is suggested, which could impact all communities, then there must be a general agreement that this is a good idea.

Note that I do not say the suggestion is good or bad. I simply say "do not expect a top down decision".

ant

Personally, I think 45 days is rather long, and I'm a little uncomfortable with it apparently being handled as a vote (although the results of the vote don't leave much room for interpretation, so it probably makes no difference), but if that's how pt want to do things, it's entirely up to them.

_______________________________________________ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org http://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l

No, I said that if a technical change was required and would impact the entire community, then the entire community should agree.

ant

PS: from a personal point of view, I think one month and a half is a hell of a long time :-)

effe iets anders wrote:

I think anthere tried to explain that those changes have to be made on every wiki. Not technically, but regarding policy. If I read correct, the foundtaion wants that the technical side of every language project is about the same, to make it easy to switch from one project to another.

In that case, I would like to add that the move page functionality should be given to both users with a certain time of existance, but also to sysops. That is because of the stewards, reverting vandalism on small wiki's then. But that might be logical anyway. I think in that case two weeks makes more sense then one and a half month. That is imho just far too long. In one month a person is usually able to vote in votes, and is already sometimes part of the hardcore community. Two weeks might even be too long.

Lodewijk

2007/2/20, Titoxd@Wikimedia titoxd.wikimedia@gmail.com:

...

Well, this is a technical change to one site's configuration of a magnitude similar to adding an extra namespace to a wiki. More technically, it means modifying one wiki's LocalSettings.php file. I'm not entirely sure how changing $wgAutoConfirmAge on pt.wikipedia.org will affect en.wikipedia.org, for example. Technically, those settings are completely independent of one another, as they reside on separate files. The only way one wiki's technical requests affect everyone is when there is something *added* to MediaWiki, and those effects are due to a new setting added to MediaWiki's DefaultSettings.php file. As this isn't the case, since the functionality is already there (that's the reason there's a four-day page-move restriction in *all* Wikimedia wikis), changing it on one should not affect the other ones. I'm not sure if Anthere's worry is that a setting of 45 days in pt: will mean changing the setting to 45 days everywhere else, but if that is it, then there is no reason to worry. Looking at the code, there is absolutely no reason why the change would impact other wikis outside the Portuguese Wikipedia.

Titoxd.

-----Original Message----- From: foundation-l-bounces@lists.wikimedia.org [mailto:foundation-l-bounces@lists.wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of Anthere Sent: Monday, February 19, 2007 3:17 PM To: foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] Restriction on page movesinpt.wikipedia.orgThankyou

Thomas Dalton wrote:

...

...

First, having a software displaying different behavior depending on the language/project is a bad idea. It makes things very complex and users travelling from one language to another are likely to find this

disturbing.

...

That same logic could be used to say all languages should have the same system for RFA, AFD, etc. It was decided a long time ago that different languages would be allowed to decide their own policies. Policies which are enforced by the software are no different from any other policies.

No, it is not the same. Policies with social implications (such as RFA, AFD) may be developped independently by each community, without having any consequences on the choice made by other communities.

Policies with technical implications may imply that a decision made by one community, will be forced over the other communities. This is what happened for many many months, as all software evolutions were driven by the english community and forced over the other communities along the way. We are no more in these times. If a change of software is suggested, which could impact all communities, then there must be a general agreement that this is a good idea.

Note that I do not say the suggestion is good or bad. I simply say "do not expect a top down decision".

ant

...

Personally, I think 45 days is rather long, and I'm a little uncomfortable with it apparently being handled as a vote (although the results of the vote don't leave much room for interpretation, so it probably makes no difference), but if that's how pt want to do things, it's entirely up to them.

---

foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org http://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l

---

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On 20/02/07, effe iets anders effeietsanders@gmail.com wrote:

I think anthere tried to explain that those changes have to be made on every wiki. Not technically, but regarding policy. If I read correct, the foundtaion wants that the technical side of every language project is about the same, to make it easy to switch from one project to another.

From anthere's original post:

:::So, any change in that respect must be reflected in all languages (I :::presume the cutoff at 15 or 45 could be negociable depending on :::communities, but the concept of having a cutoff should be global).

I read that and came away with:

a) the basic way in which we give out permissions, 'a user of type X can do Y things', should be consistent across all projects; but

b) *but* the details of quite where any project draws the boundaries can vary

So "a normal user should be able to edit all pages", say, should be the same everywhere. "A normal user should be able to edit semi-protected pages and move pages, after some threshold, but not edit protected ones" should be the same everywhere.

But little details like what constitutes a "threshold", or the like, can vary - age of the account? age since first edit? number of edits? a combination? what's a viable number for either - five days/twenty edits? Likewise, the exact requirements for becoming an admin or deleting an article inevitably vary across projects, but the idea of "there will be a vague set of standards and consensus among those discussing it" is constant.

(As an aside, if we're talking uniform behaviour across wikis, now would be a good time to rediscuss the IP-page-creation policy on enwp...)

In that case, I would like to add that the move page functionality should be given to both users with a certain time of existance, but also to sysops. That is because of the stewards, reverting vandalism on small wiki's then.

Valid point. Any technical issues with this?