On Sun, 16 Jan 2005 15:19:03 -0800 (PST), jjcogliati-wp@yahoo.com jjcogliati-wp@yahoo.com wrote:
This is a request for comments on both the patch and the feature that are in Bug 626: Different new page text for each namespace (enhancement) at: http://bugzilla.wikipedia.org/show_bug.cgi?id=626
I haven't looked at the exact operation of your patch, but as stated in bugzilla I support the idea of allowing these messages to be configured independently. The only disadvantage I can see is that the more messages there are, the more there is to translate, and the harder it is for site administrators to keep track of customisation (the more you *can* customise, the longer it takes to do so).
The only way to avoid that problem is to have some kind of "transparent" messages, or just a switch, so that the old one-size-fits-all message can be used by those who don't want to think about the different namespaces. But as far as I'm aware, you can do transclusions within MediaWiki messages (am I right?), so anyone wanting to *merge* the messages can just use {{MediaWiki:newarticletext}} for those they don't want to define.
This even gives the option of picking and choosing, so really obvious distinctions, like starting a new *discussion* versus new *content*, or *describing* a category versus *creating* an article, can be made even if others aren't. [But maybe I *am* wrong about inclusions in MediaWiki: messages...]
I know I'm in danger of restating my case once too often here, but I thought this would be a reasonable context to work through some of the possible concerns.