On 4/20/07, Brion Vibber brion@wikimedia.org wrote:
Also a quick formatting note -- the above will display kind of weird in the wiki, with the section headings as sublists under the bullet points...
It's probably better to use a layout that looks "natively" correct when editing the backing page.
I would suggest a format like
*Block reasons for IP addresses **vandalism|[[Wikipedia:Vandalism|Vandalizing]] pages **linkspam|[[Wikipedia:Spam|Spam]]ming external links *Block reasons for usernames ...
akin to MediaWiki:Sidebar. The first "parameter" should be the option visible to the sysop, the second should be the text to insert if that option is selected; definitely people will want to put links, and explanations as detailed as space allows, in the default reasons.
That's if you think groupings would be useful, anyway. They should certainly be optional, so something like
*vandalism|[[Wikipedia:Vandalism|Vandalizing]] pages *linkspam|[[Wikipedia:Spam|Spam]]ming external links
should display as expected. I.e., interpret second-level list items as items if any exist, and first-level as groups; or interpret first-level items as items if no second-level items exist. Alternatively, treat any first-level item followed by one or more second-level items as a group, and any first-level item not followed by any second-level items (at the end, or followed by a first-level item) as an item. Or just ditch the idea of groupings, maybe, unless there's demand for it. I don't see much use for it, really?
Rob's suggestions are good for defaults. Particular wikis will, of course, want to customize them ad nauseam, but that list is a sensible one of things that pretty much all wikis will disapprove of.