About ULS:

There was a strong rebellion in ml.projects (ml.wikipedia, ml.wikisource, ml.wiktionary etc) while ULS was deployed. And later developers responded chaotically and ULS was removed from ml.wikiprojects and put us in stone age without any typing tool. Users expressed even stronger rebellion at that time about the removal of a feature (typing tool) which they were utilized atleast since 2007. After two weeks someone with a better vision reinstated ULS.

Current move exactly placed wikis in a similar state. There is no typing tool available by default. But unlike previous time, now users are generally happy and appear thankful eventhough we cannot agree unilateral actions. Infact we got only three queries about the removal, this time. In first glance that is a happy situation, but if we look deeper, problem is evident. Most familiar users switched themselves to some other typing tool (IBus, Keymagic etc), now they are happy because of easy loading. But this is totally against our "anyone can edit" tagline. Currently editing is limited to regular users.

Personally I think ULS is a bad Idea, it combines different requirements unnecessarily. Worst thing about ULS is that, it is not even possible to remove individual features completely. I personally (and many others) doesn't understand why we need to load webfonts for typing. Not everybody has ideal networks. There are low bandwidths, usage limits, old softwares etc affecting normal users.

No EasyTimeLine is available for Malayalam, We cannot apply <math> to any equations in Malayalam, we are not fortunate enough to write a sentence in comments because it usually gets clipped because of mediawiki size limits, we need to convert text in our SVGs to path for correct rendering (which limits any advantages of SVGs), exporting any mediawiki page to PDF never worked etc are some real bugs we are suffering. ULS only reinvented the wheel (ULS replaced old perfect Narayam in our wikis) and made it square. Now it is taken back to garage for repairing and letting the vehicle to run.

IMHO adding features must be supportive to users. ULS and IME made regular users less active because of accessibility and usability problems, probably including atleast two admins.

Just sharing what we learned and observed. :ml:user:Praveenp

On 1/27/14, Guillaume Paumier gpaumier@wikimedia.org wrote:

Hi,

The latest tech newsletter is now available at https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/Tech/News/2014/05 . Below is the English version.

You can help write the next newsletter: whenever you see information about Wikimedia technology that you think should be distributed more broadly, you can add it to the next newsletter at https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Tech/News/Next .

More information on how to contribute is available at https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Tech/News#contribute . You can also contact me directly.

As always, feedback (on- or off-list) is appreciated and encouraged.

---

Latest *tech news https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/Tech/News* from the Wikimedia technical community. Please inform other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translationshttps://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/Tech/News/2014/05are available.

*Recent software changes*

• Pages from Wikimedia sites now load faster in your browser thanks to

"module storage", a way for your browser to save data like JavaScript and CSS on your computer to avoid downloading them again. See videohttps://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ori_Livneh,_Site_performance_update,_January_2014.webm.

[1]http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikitech-l/2014-January/074140.html

• The code used to show videos has changed. You should be able to play

the video on the page, with the play button on top of the video. If you see the play button on the right of the video, or if clicking on the video leads you to the original file, please file a bughttps://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/enter_bug.cgi?product=MediaWiki%20extensions&component=TimedMediaHandleror tell User:Bawolff https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/User_talk:Bawolff. [2]https://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/55550

• The Special:ActiveUsers page will be removed because it's too

slow. [3]https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/107988

• The latest version of MediaWiki

(1.23wmf11https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/MediaWiki_1.23/wmf11) was added to test wikis and MediaWiki.org on January 16. It will be added to non-Wikipedia wikis on January 28, and all Wikipedia wikis on January 30 (calendar https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/MediaWiki_1.23/Roadmap).

*Problems*

• On January 21, Universal Language

Selectorhttps://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/Extension:UniversalLanguageSelectorwas turned off on all Wikimedia sites because it makes pages load slowlyhttps://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/Universal_Language_Selector/Announcement_Jan2014. If you want to use web fonts, or write in scripts that aren't on your keyboard, you need to add it as an option in your preferenceshttps://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-personal. It will be turned back on when the issues are resolved. [4]https://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/56433

• For about 20 minutes on the same day, there were problems with

CSShttps://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/en:Cascading_Style_Sheetsand JavaScript https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/en:JavaScript due to high server load.

*Future software changes*

• You can give comments

https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Talk:Winterabout the new version of " Winter http://unicorn.wmflabs.org/winter/", a proposal to have a fixed toolbar at the top of wiki pages. [5]http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/design/2014-January/001411.html

*Tech news https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/Tech/News prepared by tech ambassadors https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/Tech/Ambassadors and posted by MediaWiki message delivery https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/User:MediaWiki_message_delivery • Contribute https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/Tech/News#contribute • Translate https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/Tech/News/2014/05 • Get help https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Tech • Give feedback https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Tech/News • Subscribe or unsubscribe https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Global_message_delivery/Targets/Tech_ambassadors.*

-- Guillaume Paumier Technical Communications Manager — Wikimedia Foundation