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Bold edit and revert
Since Dec 2015, the TPG has talked about support/oppose comments by blocked socks. I believe the section needs work and here's why.
History
This section was originally added by
NE Ent (
talk ·
contribs) in this
Dec 5 2015 edit following
a discussion at the Administrator's noticeboard earlier that month.
NewsAndEventsGuy (
talk)
11:23, 27 May 2018 (UTC)
...an issue supported or opposed by different sucks...-- MelanieN ( talk) 21:49, 27 May 2018 (UTC)
Removing or striking through "support" or "oppose" comments of editors subsequently blocked as socks. Comments with no replies may simply be removed with an appropriate edit summary. Striking through with a short explanation immediately after the stricken text is done when other editors have replied to the comments. e.g.
Supportper nom. (Striking !vote by blocked sock.)
Removing or striking through comments made by blocked sock puppets of users editing in violation of a block or ban. Comments made by a sock with no replies may simply be removed with an appropriate edit summary. If comments are part of an active discussion, they should be struck instead of removed, along with a short explanation following the stricken text or at the bottom of the thread. There is not typically a need to strike comments in discussions that have been closed or archived.
Removing or striking through comments of editors subsequently blocked as socks. Comments with no replies may simply be removed with an appropriate edit summary. Striking through with a short explanation immediately after the stricken text is done when other editors have replied to the comments. e.g.
Supportper nom. (Striking !vote by blocked sock.)
NE Ent 00:56, 29 May 2018 (UTC)
Should this be mentioned in the section on emphasis? Doug Weller talk 12:23, 3 June 2018 (UTC)
I thought we'd resolved over a year go to help curtail WP:LISTGAPS problems and other "list manglement", by instructing people, when making replies, that (absent a good reason not to) the thing to do is to copy the list markup of what they're replying to and add their indent or bullet or number-sign after it. E.g., if you encounter this:
* '''Delete''' – NukeEmAll 16:01, 22 June 2018 (UTC) *: By why? – TheQuestioner 17:02, 22 June 2018 (UTC) *:: Because: *::# It's non-notable. *::# It's clearly promotional. – NukeEmAll 18:03, 22 June 2018 (UTC) *::#* I'm not sure I buy that. – TheQuestioner 19:04, 22 June 2018 (UTC)
And you want to reply to the last item, add your :
or *
after TheQuestioner's *::*
, thus:
*::#** NukeEmAll's rationale seems correct to me. – YourNameHere 20:05, 22 June 2018 (UTC)
If you want to reply to NukeEmAll's original post, use their *
followed by your bullet or indent:
*: Thanks for clarifying, NukeEmAll. I was leaning "Keep", but those are good reasons. – YourNameHere 20:05, 22 June 2018 (UTC)
There's probably an ideal and succinct way to put it, and having a sentence of advice on this (with or without an example) would be a great boon to accessibility, orderly talk pages, and more – people who create F'ed up lists in talk pages because they don't know better also do it in articles, where the accessibility and bad rendering issues are more important. It's amazing how many long-term editors still do not understand this basic principle. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼 16:55, 22 June 2018 (UTC)
I see no reason to have the unneeded word included in what we should concentrate on. In disputes, it is bound to cause confusion and endless discussion as to the meaning of the word "personality". I hope there is/can be consensus for removing it. -- SergeWoodzing ( talk) 14:00, 25 June 2018 (UTC)
Those of us (and only those of us?) who for years have tried very hard never (never) to address or mention another user on article talk pages have fully understood how much more delightful Wikipedia work is then, and how much more delightful it would be for all of us (all of us) if everybody did that. It can (can) be done, and it is really great. The magic that it brings, in concentrating only on article content (which I think article talk pages are all about), is almost unbelievable. -- SergeWoodzing ( talk) 16:07, 28 June 2018 (UTC)
When originally added, it read
With slight tweaks the current text reads
The original was added a long time ago in this edit with an edit summary saying it was supposed to be flip side of NPA. Both the original and the current link to WP:NPA in the bold part of the paragraph. Proposal - we could just repeat that link at the end, like this
NewsAndEventsGuy ( talk) 18:21, 28 June 2018 (UTC)
I am very pleased with the current wording, which I think says enough to anyone in doubt as to what goes. It's bound to be very helpful now in steering away from habitual personalization of so much of our article talk. --
SergeWoodzing (
talk)
15:53, 29 June 2018 (UTC)
With recent tweaks, it now (this version) links to both CIVILITY and ASSUME GOOD FAITH, and reads
NewsAndEventsGuy ( talk) 18:25, 2 July 2018 (UTC)
on contentlink to WP:Dispute resolution in particular? I'd much rather just say what we need to say, and follow with explicit links e.g.
I also dislike EGGs as Eeng said above. Proposed rewrite
Thoughts? (self struck)
NewsAndEventsGuy (
talk)
23:02, 2 July 2018 (UTC)
Is there any page where I can find all known rating publishers like AllMusic? I'm interested in these non-english publishers especially. Eurohunter ( talk) 21:04, 28 July 2018 (UTC)
@ Alsee: {{ Shortcut}} broke the list formatting because it contains line breaks. I've removed the line breaks from Module:Shortcut, so either type of list should be fine now (I think). Jc86035 ( talk) 17:47, 2 August 2018 (UTC)
Once or twice a month, plus/minus, I encounter a topic in an article's Talk page that is footnoted. The footnote is at the page bottom, though the section footnoted is mid-point in the article. I asked about this a couple of months ago and got the right fix on my specific request, inserting: {Reflist-talk} (with double braces -- one brace omitted for discussion's sake).
This is a minor yet regular Talk pages problem and might be worthy of added instructions or even a template adjustment. Probably this is more a problem for us mid-level editors, conscientious enough to cite our references, ignorant enough to not stick them in place. I'll strive to fix what I find from here out. But, if any of you highly capable Wikipedians can figure out where one might insert a fix regarding this... .
Thanks, GeeBee60 ( talk) 15:24, 7 August 2018 (UTC)
<references />
tag in the page, or at the bottom of the page if there is no <references />
tag after the point where the ref is used. Templates like {{
reflist}}
and {{
reflist-talk}}
contain a <references />
tag with some extra styling. So since the only issue is the absence of such a tag or template, there is really nothing that can be fixed. --
Redrose64 🌹 (
talk)
19:54, 7 August 2018 (UTC)
I read the article about the British military commander Alan Brooke with interest. Among many other things, I learned that he was an Ulsterman from Northern Ireland. I then went to the talk page to see if there was anything of interest there. I was startled to see this heading somewhat down the page: "Why does Alan Booke look so swarthy? Moreso looks a sub-Loirean Frenchman or a cryto-Jew."
That seems to me to be an extremely offensive remark, based solely on what appears to me to be racial or racist prejudice. I have just gone through the "talk page guidelines" and don't see anything that pertains specifically to something like this.
Am I being overly "politically correct" about this, or do others find it as offensive as I do? Further, I note that the person who created this section did it anonymously. What, if anything, can/should be done about it? Hayford Peirce ( talk) 23:54, 7 August 2018 (UTC)
Crypto-Jew... Crypto-currency... MORE THAN A COINCIDENCE??? FBDB E Eng 11:45, 9 August 2018 (UTC)
Personally, had I seen this post right away I would have moved it to user talk, and directed the OP to DR, HELPDESK, TEAHOUSE, and ANI. WIthout studying it, my gut says there's been an uptick in people complaining about specific disputes on this page, and it is not the right place to do that. I wish regular page watchers would help bar the gates or we'll be doing ANI like stuff everywhere eventually. NewsAndEventsGuy ( talk) 12:29, 15 August 2018 (UTC)
My idea.. not sure this will reach the policymakers/decisionmakers and actual hard-coders behind the wiki website properties.. Why not near the top of EVERY Talk (discussions) page, once someone enters into editing mode, display a red or yellow background rectangular banner at the top reminding commenters to add to the BOTTOM of the wiki text/code, and not to the top? My two cents. :) Vid2vid ( talk) 05:18, 4 September 2018 (UTC)
It might be a good idea to change the name of WP:TPG#Non-free images to WP:TPG#Non-free content or WP:TPG#Non-free files. While the majority of non-free files uploaded to Wikipedia is probably image files, there are audio files as well. This change would make it clear that this sub-section applies to all non-free content, not just image files. The relevant content would also need to be tweaked accordingly. -- Marchjuly ( talk) 02:38, 28 September 2018 (UTC)
It seems that a section link to a talk page discussion (be it user talk, article talk, project talk or whatever) gets broken once that discussion is archived. If so this is a fundamental flaw as it should be easy to refer back to a discussion if needed and such links in edit summaries can't be corrected. Is there any solution or workaround to this? A way to create a permalink perhaps? -- Jameboy ( talk) 10:17, 25 October 2018 (UTC)
No meta: Extended meta-discussions about editing belong on noticeboards, in Wikipedia-talk, or in User-talk namespaces, not in Article-talk namespace.
What are "meta discussions" and how do they apply to Talk Pages? Can anyone give any examples of what a "meta discussion" is, either actual or hypothetical. This term is totally meaningless to me. Tym Whittier ( talk) 19:52, 4 November 2018 (UTC)
Currently WP:INTERSPERSE goes to the § Layout section, just like WP:TOPPOST and WP:BOTTOMPOST. WP:INTERLEAVE goes to the § Editing others' comments section, which is a separate idea. It's not listed in the convenience-links box there. And "intersperse" and "interleave" are fair lay-language synonyms. Can someone work in a cross-linking of these two ideas? Or unify them? It's not obvious that interleaving a reponse to paragraph one of a three-paragraph parent post is editing that parent post vs just threading/layout games. DMacks ( talk) 08:08, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
In [ this] section, in the point fixing layout errors, am I allowed to replace <font> tag to <span> tag as part of removing obsolete HTML tag errors without informing the specific user? Adithyak1997 ( talk) 17:32, 18 November 2018 (UTC)
Hi – I posted a Talk page comment at Wikipedia talk:Ignore all rules regarding Wikipedia’s erroneous description of the features of AVG PC TuneUp (my employer’s product), because there are no available citations to reflect a recent product revamp that removed many of the features Wikipedia describes as current. I just saw that an editor (@ Verify References:) deleted my Talk page comment and attempted to answer my question. Was it appropriate for an editor to delete my Talk page comment? Can I restore it? Empey at Avast ( talk) 19:06, 1 March 2019 (UTC)
I just created a talk page but what I really wanted was to create an article... How may i change it ? Sagher Genesis ( talk) 10:38, 28 December 2018 (UTC)
Please see Talk:XXXX#Semi-protected edit request on 30 November 2018 and Talk:XXX#Well... for context. I propose to add the following to these guidelines at Wikipedia:Talk page guidelines#Editing others' comments:
{{
Empty edit request}}
on the User Talk page of a user who has posted an empty edit request.Shhhnotsoloud ( talk) 07:57, 15 January 2019 (UTC)
{{
subst:EP|xy}}
(it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format and provide a reliable source if appropriate) which is often correctly used on vague requests, but occasionally gets used on empty requests too. The only times that I've seen that message actually being replied to are when the original request wasn't empty. Using it on an empty request is simply a waste of time. -- Redrose64 🌹 ( talk) 19:53, 15 January 2019 (UTC)
{{
Empty edit request}}
(since I found out it exists last month - that might need to be pushed out a bit wider?), but my rule of thumb has been to place it for registered accounts on their first such request, or for IPs that have tried multiple requests. Based on that thumbrule, I think I've placed the template twice. ‑‑
ElHef (
Meep?)
14:40, 15 January 2019 (UTC)
This is a byte county test.contains just 27 bytes. Maybe we could all be helped if the software counted the bytes in the "meat" of these messages, and popped up a box if the content was under 30 bytes? That way, the only way intentional vandals could post would be to add junk, and users who actually meant to say something would be alerted that they goofed somehow. NewsAndEventsGuy ( talk) 15:12, 15 January 2019 (UTC)
Done Since there were no objections, I edited the guideline as I suggested, adding "if considered necessary" to respond to the comments above. Thanks for the feedback.
Shhhnotsoloud (
talk)
19:32, 22 January 2019 (UTC)
I made an edit ( Revision as of 12:01, 29 January 2019) that was reverted ( Revision as of 12:28, 29 January 2019 ) by user:NewsAndEventsGuy with the comment "Oppose as WP:CREEP and its redundant, see the part about removing prohibited material"
The change I made was to the paragraph that currently reads:
However it is precisely because of the bullet point "sockvote"
that the former needs to change because at the moment there is a possible conflict in interpretation.
The paragraph existed for five years before the bullet point was introduced and is and always was incorrect as sockpuppet comments have been struck out for far longer than that.
I also added an example of what "striking text" means as it is jargon without an explanation that could confuse new editors for whom this page is most useful. -- PBS ( talk) 15:00, 29 January 2019 (UTC)
Not sure if it's been discussed before, but I was wondering what the etiquette is for editors that unilaterally decide to archive conversations before the already configured bot has been able to archive the conversation. I'm noticing the behavior on some politics related articles, and while there's nothing (that I know of) in our policies that forbids or discourages the practice, I find the behavior potentially troublesome (because someone may decide to archive a topic they disagree with or find works against any bias they might be trying to push in the affected article).
Thoughts on perhaps adding a section that states manually archiving talk page sections less than a week after the last comment is discouraged behavior? — Locke Cole • t • c 08:41, 28 January 2019 (UTC)
Is there any reason to keep <s>...</s>
and <u>...</u>
for redacting? Using them, one loses the ability to style deleted and inserted text differently via CSS or script.
Paradoctor (
talk)
23:48, 2 March 2019 (UTC)
s
element represents contents that are no longer accurate or no longer relevant, the
u
element represents a span of text with an unarticulated, though explicitly rendered, non-textual annotation, such as labeling the text as being a proper name in Chinese text (a Chinese proper name mark), or labeling the text as being misspelt, which is barely relevant to indicating added text; thus, we should be using
<ins>...</ins>
instead of <u>...</u>
. For consistency, we should also use <del>...</del>
instead of <s>...</s>
, see
HTML 5.2 section 4.6. Apart from the fact that these have semantic meaning, they may also enclose block-type elements as a group: <del>
*'''Delete''' per nominator.
*:It is unencyclopedic, not notable, its last sentence fails [[WP:NPOV]]. And I had an argument with the page creator five years ago. --[[User:Example|Example]] ([[User talk:Example|talk]]) 01:00 3 March 2019 (UTC)
</del><ins>
*'''Keep''' We should not delete this page.
*:It is useful, I like it, and I have since met the page creator socially. --[[User:Example|Example]] ([[User talk:Example|talk]]) 02:00 3 March 2019 (UTC)
</ins>
<s>...</s>
and <u>...</u>
elements cannot do this, because they are inline elements. --
Redrose64 🌹 (
talk)
11:38, 3 March 2019 (UTC)Not sure whether this has been discussed before – I can't see anything about it here.
In certain situations, mostly leaving warning messages about vandalism or the like, it's common to use the month and year as a heading.
When this is done, should the heading be based on the date of the edit the message is about, or the date when the message is left? For instance, if today I discover that a user made a bad edit in January that has until now gone unresolved, should my message to that user be under the heading "January 2019" or "March 2019"?
This is even more likely to occur when an edit is done late on the last day of a month, in which case it must be quite frequent that no further activity occurs until the following month. And this is before you get into time zone complications.... — Smjg ( talk) 12:16, 9 March 2019 (UTC)
Housekeeping note... when this thread started there were four links in the LINKBOX. I have since deleted shortcut WP:SIGCLEARN, which was created in 2010 and had only 49 WhatLinksHereHits. NewsAndEventsGuy ( talk) 15:11, 16 March 2019 (UTC)
So this new shortcut I created to Wikipedia:Talk page guidelines#Editing others' comments has unexpectedly become the subject of controversy. User:JJMC89 first removes with the rationale that it is "unused", but obviously all shortcuts are unused when first introduced. Then User:Johnuniq removes as too many shortcuts create confusion. But that section already has four shortcuts, twice as many as any other on the page. Thinking five is one too many is completely arbitrary.
To quote Wikipedia:Shortcut:
Shortcuts are created for the convenience of editors. [...] Shortcuts are often used on talk pages in their abbreviated form, decreasing readability for the general reader. [...] To avoid these problems, a good practice when creating shortcuts is to choose common English words that are easily identifiable and memorable.
" WP:OTHERTALK" clearly fares better on these grounds than any of the other shortcuts that link to the same section. " WP:OWNTALK" is already a shortcut, so it is natural to have " WP:OTHERTALK" as well. If the issue is too many shortcuts, I suggest removing some of the others to make room for " WP:OTHERTALK". Three of the four shortcuts (" WP:TPO", " WP:TALKO" and " WP:TPOC") were all created by the same user, who has been indefinitely banned since 2015. Not only that but the meaning of those shortcuts is pretty opaque.
Citizen Canine ( talk) 10:12, 16 March 2019 (UTC)
"they generally should list only one or two common and easily remembered redirects". Following discussion at Wikipedia talk:Shortcut, that was relaxed to
"they generally should list only the most common and easily remembered redirects". Anyone reading that debate will conclude that the purpose of the change was not to give Citizen Canine the green light to wikilawyer about going from four to five shortcuts. There is no value in creating a fresh shortcut when we have four already. The new one will not meet the criterion of "most common and easily remembered" precisely because its unused. Of course a new shortcut is unused, but there's a world of difference between establishing a new shortcut when none already exist, and creating yet another one when we have more than enough already. -- RexxS ( talk) 13:37, 16 March 2019 (UTC)
There is no value in creating a fresh shortcut when we have four already.Yes there is. In terms of both quantity and quality, 1 memorable shortcut is preferable to 3 obscure ones. I'm in favour of WP:OTHERSWORDS, which is just as concise as WP:OTHERTALK and is clearer. Removing those current shortcuts will not make them cease to link to the section. Citizen Canine ( talk) 13:46, 16 March 2019 (UTC)
"there's a world of difference between establishing a new shortcut when none already exist, and creating yet another one when we have more than enough already"didn't you get? -- RexxS ( talk) 14:23, 16 March 2019 (UTC)
The point of these template boxes is not to list every single redirect for any given page (indeed, that's what Special:WhatLinksHere is for); instead, they generally should list only the most common and easily remembered redirects.WP:LINKBOXES A redirect that is unused (including WLH and edit summaries, outside of comments related to added it to this page) is not common; therefore, it should not be included. Yes, all new shortcuts will start out unused. If they come into common usage, then by all means consider adding them. Until then, don't. — JJMC89 ( T· C) 06:07, 17 March 2019 (UTC)
Proposal addressing all comments made thus far
(A) Keep in your mind the sharp distinction between the existence of a redirect shortcut and listing that shortcut in the LINKBOX
(B) LINKBOX guidance wants a short list. OK fine, let's have a short list.
(C) Of the existing four links
(D) proposal Keep the redirect pages for the other three, but with less than 1000 uses in their 10-year history there is little reason to clutter up the TPG LINKBOX with weird shortcuts that are neither intuitive nor easily remembered. Having purged that chaffe, there is ample room to add a new one that is both written in common English and is easily remembered.
NewsAndEventsGuy (
talk)
14:50, 16 March 2019 (UTC)
guidelines to editing other people's comments" (that is,
[[WP:TPO|guidelines to editing other people's comments]]
) haven't been too successful. Many editors care more about minimizing the number of characters they type than avoiding jargon. Not sure what premise you're agreeing with; I guess the conclusion you're disagreeing with is discouraging a lot of different shortcuts to be used.
isaacl (
talk)
18:12, 16 March 2019 (UTC)
[[WP:TPO]]
and hit "Publish changes". The software then translates this into [[Wikipedia:Talk page guidelines#Editing others' comments]]
, then stores the page.[[Wikipedia:Talk page guidelines#Editing others' comments]]
, and then translates it into [[WP:TPO]]
, then shows you the page / edit page.[[Wikipedia:Talk page guidelines#Editing others' comments]]
into [[WP:TPOC]]
, then shows you the page / edit page.[[WP:TPO]]
. It would be entirely possible to use something like §EOtC
(read "rules Editing Other's Comments") instead. Everyone can have their own preferred shortcuts, without having to worry about other's ideas what the perfect shortcut looks like.
Paradoctor (
talk)
13:32, 17 March 2019 (UTC)
:*:mytpo::[[Wikipedia:Talk page guidelines{#}Editing others' comments]]
References
EEng changed the guideline from using the word "content", which was the word used at least for a year, to other wording I object to [1]. I reverted, citing WP:EDIT, but the editor didn't care and reverted back. WP:EDIT states, "changes that would alter the substance of policy or guidelines should normally be announced on the appropriate talk page first. The change may be implemented if no objection is made to it or if discussion shows that there is consensus for the change." I believe that the change of wording changes the substance of the guideline because "content" is a more general word and "discussion" is a more specific word, therefore I object. The guideline should apply to all content and not just discussions or threads. Thinker78 ( talk) 05:57, 25 March 2019 (UTC)
How is this simpler? It's twenty characters longer, and contains three nested tag pairs rather than one template transclusion. -- Redrose64 🌹 ( talk) 20:22, 2 April 2019 (UTC)
I participated in an RfC at Talk:Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections, where I made this edit, which included a number of adjustments to the thread formatting. Ahrtoodeetoo objected and reverted these adjustments, and I posted the following on their talk page:
I do think I should be reformatting lists properly. I originally cited WP:INDENTMIX, but since that shortcut is only an archived discussion on a talk page, I searched for more reliable guidelines. WP:TPO states,
Cautiously editing or removing another editor's comments is sometimes allowed, but normally you should stop if there is any objection.It further explains,restrict the edits to formatting changes only and preserve the content as much as possible. Examples include fixing indentation levels [...]. The #Layout section below specifically calls out accessibility problems created by improper list practices, described in detail at MOS:LISTGAP. I don't believe I've broken any rules or guidelines in merely fixing the list structure, and I believe that doing so is positive and not harmful. — 烏Γ ( kaw) │ 19:46, 04 May 2019 (UTC)
Ahrtoodeetoo and I remain in disagreement, and they suggested I ask here. Is this practice a problem, and if so, why? — 烏Γ ( kaw) │ 05:09, 06 May 2019 (UTC)
Cautiously editing or removing another editor's comments is sometimes allowed, but normally you should stop if there is any objection.R2 ( bleep) 15:45, 6 May 2019 (UTC)
*<br/>::
*<br/>*:
"it's not clear that MOS/Accessibility embodies the right set of guidelines to actually achieve the goal of accessibility". So far your argument has rested on some vague hand-waving about the guidance at MOS:ACCESS not doing its job. So let's hear what pieces of guidance you feel are deficient. It may well have been a mistake to to place ACCESS within the MoS, but your opinion on that is clearly not shared by the majority, and it's no use whining about it. The situation is what it is, and your obstructionism on clearly delineating the scope of ACCESS results in editors regularly causing problems for anyone who has to use assistive technology, simply because they don't know any better.
cut your bullshit about "accusations" and (now) "obstructionism". You haven't got the street cred to call into question my good faith- At this point, I'm certainly questioning your good faith. — 烏Γ ( kaw) │ 04:09, 10 May 2019 (UTC)
@
EEng: Is there a concrete statement you can point to that asserts that MOS applies only to articles
? And, more importantly, is there a concrete suggestion you have for improving any of this? —
烏Γ (
kaw) │
00:19, 10 May 2019 (UTC)
Is there a concrete statement you can point to that asserts that MOS applies only to articles?– Sure, that would be MOS:MAIN's opening:
The Manual of Style (MoS or MOS) is the style manual for all English Wikipedia articles. This primary page is supported by further detail pages ... If any contradiction arises, this page always has precedence. The MoS presents Wikipedia's house style, to help editors write articles with consistent and precise language, layout, and formatting ... Style and formatting should be consistent within an article ... editors should not change an article from one of those styles to another ...
part of the English Wikipedia's Manual of Styleand discusses ...
Article structure ...structure of articles ... Article lead ... Article lead ... Article lead ... elsewhere in the article ... Article lead ... Article lead ... articles should ... articles should ... articles with ... In articles, do not ... colors in articles ... in Wikipedia articles ... Articles (and other pages) that use color ... If an article ... top of the article ... threaded discussion on talk pages ... especially in article content ... appropriate for an article ... links to other articles ... consistent appearance between articles ... articles should use ... avoided in article text ... not used in article text ... in the article's main body ... articles should be accessible ...
A small clarification: WP:INDENTMIX originally linked here, but it was recently updated to point to the same place as MOS:LISTGAP. (I also completely forgot that I was the one who created WP:INDENTMIX.) — 烏Γ ( kaw) │ 00:32, 08 May 2019 (UTC)
I removed contents from an article that I didn't find it relevant for the article. Another editor simply dumped the contents removed the contents removed from prose into its talk page. example.
In this example, an editor simply dumped a list of references for others to consult for others to expand with but not a discussion of references. What do the guidelines and community consensus say on the use of talk page as a dump ground for previous contents or raw references rather than for discussion purposes? Graywalls ( talk) 15:58, 28 March 2019 (UTC)
{{
refideas}}
AngusWOOF (
bark •
sniff)
16:15, 28 March 2019 (UTC)
It was posted at article talk on March 9, twenty days ago, with text "For future reference". It is mainly PRIMARY source reearch on the building's history, instead of the club itself. It looks off topic to me, and after 20 days without the discussion even beginning it appears to me to be abandoned. So with the appearance of being offtopic and abandoned I moved it from article talk to user talk in this two-edit DIFF. If Another Believer disagrees, then by all means EDIT THE ARTICLE (be bold) and then DISCUSS in a meaningful way if it gets reverted (see WP:BRD. Alternatively, just start discussing in a meaningful way right now. Either way article talk should not be used as a parking place for abandoned drafts. NewsAndEventsGuy ( talk) 17:20, 28 March 2019 (UTC)
Extremely abuse of power. Stop him. He is tampering things he doesn’t understand.
If he doesn’t understand the material, make him stop. He doesn’t have permission to delete something he doesn’t understand. Completely unfair. Wrong wrong wrong. Stealthsilent ( talk) 23:26, 15 May 2019 (UTC)
Had a recent case where a logged-in editor removed an unresponded-to section on my Talk page created by a banned sock. Removing comments by a sock is permitted by the penultimate bullet at WP:TPO. On the other hand, it's my talk page, and I would think that at a minimum, a ping would be required, and a strikeout-plus-explanation would be better than stealth removal. Just wondering if OWNTALK or TPO needs to say anything about this or not. It just feels wrong to do this, but I can't pinpoint why. Perhaps there's another policy I'm missing. Mathglot ( talk) 09:09, 5 June 2019 (UTC)
Is it correct to tell an editor not to put a draft article on their user talk page? I couldn't find anything specific.
And if it's not against the rules, then I guess I shouldn't have moved the draft to a sandbox, but I think that was acceptable given that an article draft on the page would just confuse people who are trying to use the talk page for what is intended.— Vchimpanzee • talk • contributions • 19:45, 13 August 2019 (UTC)
I've been having a conversation with In ictu oculi and SmokeyJoe at User talk:Andrewa#Pointy bullets about whether edits such as this one should be bulleted.
I don't think they should be. The reason for doing so seems to be to draw attention to the post, to make it stand out. That would be better done explicitly by bold text or several other techniques IMO, if it's really the intent. Of course bolding is unattractive because it looks pushy, like shouting. The bullet point is really just as pushy, but in a more subtle way.
Plus, according to MOS:INDENTMIX, once we go to bullets we shouldn't go back.
The two users I've pinged above aren't by any means the only ones doing this, just the two I've invited to the conversation on my talk page. It seems to be spreading. And as nobody wants their comments to be less visible, I guess in time everyone will be forced to adopt the practice too, and the use of the colon : for indenting will virtually cease, and bullets will become the standard. That may not be a bad thing, technically the colon is a list markup too, but I think it needs discussion.
Comments? Andrewa ( talk) 04:42, 12 September 2019 (UTC)
*
to ::
. This instructs the parser to close the first-level bulleted list, start a first-level unbulleted list (it's more complicated than that, but for this description it will suffice), and then start a nested second-level unbulleted list. This leads to extra announcements by screen readers to indicate the end of the bulleted list and the start of two unbulleted lists. The appropriate markup to use instead is *:
, as shown in the second example, which keeps the first-level bulleted list and starts a nested second-level unbulleted list. The visual appearance of these two is the same, but with a lot less extraneous announcements for the recommended approach.::*
from the post that I was replying to, and added one symbol. I used a colon because I dislike using bullets in discussions except in special cases - such as at the start of the line where I state the aforementiobed rule. --
Redrose64 🌹 (
talk)
22:41, 12 September 2019 (UTC)So, why do you do it? What does it achieve?, so I thought you were asking me, not asking me why someone else used a bulleted item in a specific instance. I don't know why the editor chose to use a bulleted item; maybe the editor finds it easier to read. But... more relevant to your argument is whether or not other readers are actually perceiving a bulleted item as having greater prominence, regardless of the writer's intent. isaacl ( talk) 00:21, 16 September 2019 (UTC)
Here is another very recent example of a bullet that seems to have no valid function. Comments? Andrewa ( talk) 10:42, 18 September 2019 (UTC)
There's some discussion above about whether bolding is helpful. To me it is on occasions, and I think that's what our guidelines say too.
I use it for two purposes, and think both are in keeping with current guidelines. Excessive bolding is shouting, but the occasional bolded word is fine.
One is as a leading summary, notably in RM and similar surveys to indicate Support, Oppose, Comment, closing comment, Relisting comment... there may be others but those are my normal ones in RMs. And similarly in informal discussion I sometimes preface my reply by Agree and bold that word. I think this helps others (including but not only an RM closer) to assess the flow and direction of the discussion or survey.
The other is to indicate raised voice in mid-sentence. This can subtly but significantly change the meaning of the sentence, and on occasions makes it more intelligible IMO. Or to reiterate: Excessive bolding is shouting, but the occasional bolded word is fine. To me that bolding helps to make the meaning clear, by making it quite clear that Excessive bolding is the only sort I mean. Interested in other comments.
I offer this as an example of both. Andrewa ( talk) 01:36, 16 September 2019 (UTC)
- WP:REDACT and WP:REDACTED redirect to Wikipedia:Talk page guidelines#Editing own comments - perhaps this should be changed to WP:RETRACT and WP:RETRACTED to prevent confusion with Redaction, an Admin's ability to redact edits, that is, hide and delete page revisions ( Wikipedia:Revision deletion#Criteria for redaction) - Epinoia ( talk) 00:16, 27 September 2019 (UTC)
Can someone point out where to add a new issue? At the end, at the top, or below the most similar issue, maybe at a higher indent level? (Apologies if it's already there and I couldn't find it) Uhw ( talk) 20:55, 1 November 2019 (UTC)
I just suggested this guideline might be an appropriate place for a guidence being suggested at WP:VPR#Discussions about articles on Noticeboards should leave a note on the relevant talk page. Dmcq ( talk) 17:46, 21 November 2019 (UTC)
Right now these guidelines claim, in the section Wikipedia:Talk page guidelines#Behavior that is unacceptable, that a personal attack is "saying something negative about another person". That is of course utter nonsense. Not all personal attacks take the form of saying something negative about a person (threatening them or doxxing them are examples listed in this very guideline), and by and far not everything negative said about someone is a personal attack. AddWitty NameHere 03:36, 19 November 2019 (UTC)
"it is possible to point out inappropriate behavior of editors by stating facts and citing guidelines instead of making negative comments"is demonstrably untrue. "Stating facts" often involves saying something negative, sometimes unavoidably. -- RexxS ( talk) 19:17, 5 January 2020 (UTC)
What does "rule of thumb" mean?
Specifically, does it mean a) that we can point to WP:TALKCOND to ask editors with user talk pages in far excess of (currently) 75K to trim/archive their pages? or does it mean b) that we can't do that
If b) then what is the purpose of having a "rule of thumb"? As opposed to having a well-defined policy or guideline on one hand, or having no numerical target at all on the other?
If a) then why not have the number specified be the actual target? (Much like, say, the limit of words in a tv episode, where if a summary is even 401 words it means at least some editors will put up a cleanup template) My question is: why say 75K if we allow twice as much? Why not then have the guideline say 150K? Why have a "rule of thumb" if that only means editors can disagree how much is too much? Three times as much? (225K) Five? (375K) At this point, maybe it's better to drop any numeric target at all; meaning that even if my user talk page is 1M or 10M the community won't enforce trimming? (Editors might ask me to trim it but nothing happens if I won't)
Remember, this wording "rule of thumb" has remained unchanged for years and years. It is also very non-standard in our guidelines, so I think it's about time to question the usefulness of having a numeric target that still doesn't work like all our other numeric targets.
Note: Unlike the previous talk page section, this one is not about the actual number (whether it should be 75 bytes, 75K or 75M). You can discuss this
here.
Your input is welcome. CapnZapp ( talk) 11:23, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
be sanctioned with blocks until they complythen
there is no point in even writing a suggestion. E Eng 22:37, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
The English phrase rule of thumb refers to a principle with broad application that is not intended to be strictly accurate or reliable for every situation. It refers to an easily learned and easily applied procedure or standard, based on practical experience rather than theory. This usage of the phrase can be traced back to the seventeenth century and has been associated with various trades where quantities were measured by comparison to the width or length of a thumb.As to why we have a rule of thumb and not a specified number, see the fifth pillar ("no firm rules"). Levivich ( talk) 16:54, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
Notice that today's FA – Zoo TV Tour – is 138K. The other day we had The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari at 127K. The pages are just about a single topic and their talk pages should likewise be limited to discussion of that topic. A user talk page, however, may cover any number of topics because users can and do edit numerous different subjects. My own talk page is about 400K and that's because it covers divers topics, from article number 5 million to article 6 million and a fair few in between. I chip away at it from time to time but it's a laborious process because there is no standard mechanism. Having had to develop my own filing system, I'm now inclined to keep my own counsel on how to proceed. As editors are likely to be the most active readers of their own talk pages, they need no prompting from others nor an arbitrary guideline. Andrew🐉( talk) 22:07, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
Sorry if this has already come up, the discussion itself is too long to be sure I've read it carefully, but DGG can you just tag the threads you want to retain with a do not archive template, then set the page to automatically archive anything older than 30 days? Apologies if this is butting in unhelpfully. --valereee ( talk) 14:29, 6 March 2020 (UTC)
{{
DNAU|730d}}
shortcut is used inside the post. The instructions at
Template:Do not archive until/doc give more detail. --
RexxS (
talk)
18:30, 6 March 2020 (UTC)
It's been a couple of days with no new discussion. My conservative summary is that there is a clear opposition to having a binding guideline, leaving it up to each user. In other words, that a significant part of the community is okay with user talk pages of any length.
Since there is also a significant part of the community that feels this is not made clear by the current phrasing (including me), I believe the best course of action to progress the issue is to make a BOLD edit to attempt to rectify this. Feel free to give your input on the impending edit.
CapnZapp (
talk) 10:37, 17 March 2020 (UTC) Done
CapnZapp (
talk)
10:45, 17 March 2020 (UTC)
On the subject of how large one's user talk page can get, as far as I know, this page is the only policy or guideline page to discuss it. The current phrasing is As a rule of thumb, archive closed discussions when a talk page exceeds 75 KB or has multiple resolved or stale discussions.
WP:TALKCOND
I searched the archives. Unless I'm mistaken, this question has not been discussed since 2012: Wikipedia_talk:Talk_page_guidelines/Archive_9#The_guideline_is_outdated_and_should_be_changed_completely.
Q. Should we increase the limit† on talk page size from 75K?
†) Yes, I'm aware it's a rule of thumb and not a hard limit.
The benefit of of an increase would be to ease enforcement. It is incredibly hard in cases where a user has a much too large talk page to argue "you need to trim it to 75K". "75K??" they say, "that's nothing!".
You might think "but how about letting the editor off the hook if they reduce it to 100K or 200K..." but that just suggests the number is out of date. I mean, if we have a guideline or rule of thumb, what it specifies is really the only reasonable target. What's the point of bothering users to follow our guideline, and then not having the guideline as the target? (And if you want to argue "but don't bother the user then", you're really arguing for the limit to be increased or removed altogether).
Mostly to focus our discussions, how about I offer a specific change suggestion.
Proposal: Change the following sentence
from
to
Cheers, CapnZapp ( talk) 17:11, 22 February 2020 (UTC)
I'm happy to rephrase the start of the discussion, User:EEng. Even better, feel free to start a new talk section where you raise the issue in your own words, and I'll close this one. Let us not derail into discussing decorum. CapnZapp ( talk) 08:25, 24 February 2020 (UTC)
As most of the guidance on article size at WP:SIZESPLIT seems to be applicable to talk pages as well, increasing the recommended size limit before archiving clearly runs counter to most of the considerations we already endorse. Consequently, I think it would be better to change this guidance to:
Optionally, we could re-use the ranges suggested on SIZESPLIT to present more nuanced guidance here. -- RexxS ( talk) 17:43, 24 February 2020 (UTC)
RexxS
DGG
"SIZESPLIT is for articles and is motivated by almost completely different reasons"– that's patently untrue. SIZESPLIT gives five considerations:
"motivated by almost completely different reasons"? That really is well off the mark.
"most of the rationale behind SIZESPLIT revolves around a human reader's limited capacity for long articles"is clearly false, as most of the rationale behind SIZESPLIT revolves around other factors, and I've demonstrated that by quoting the five considerations given in SIZESPLIT. Why not address the actual guidance there, rather than making up your objections to it? -- RexxS ( talk) 00:03, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
"questionable claims"only in your opinion. SIZESPLIT has project-wide consensus, and there is no indication that the five factors there apply any less to talk pages than to articles. You find evidence that those factors affecting articles don't affect talk pages and then your opinion might be worth listening to.
SIZESPLIT has project-wide consensus– That's odd, because right at the top it says it
has not been thoroughly vetted by the community.The handwringing about truncation and so on was added in 2011 with no discussion at all. Even, generously, assuming that that was in fact a realistic issue at that time, I renew my call for evidence that it remains an issue ten years later. E Eng 17:49, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
Note: At this time, I extended an invitation to the Village Pump for more input. Cheers
CapnZapp (
talk)
09:58, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
"it is simply a rule of thumb, not something that should be enforced on anyone"I consider that a separate second issue. When we have agreed on a number (or not to have a number etc) I plan on asking what a "rule of thumb" means (in a separate talk page section), unless someone beats me to it of course. Let's just not discuss it here intermixed with my original question above, please. Cheers CapnZapp ( talk) 10:20, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
Server resources expended with each page load or cache purge– Are you joking? Am I just dreaming that it's 2020? Is it really still 1999? E Eng 18:19, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
server limits or more accurately, software limitsbeing a relevant consideration for a possible page-size limit; you talked about
Server resources expended with each page load or cache purge, which is quite different and none of our business whatsoever as editors (with the narrow exception of template editors) – see WP:PERFORMANCE. E Eng 23:21, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
Alternative proposal: How about we remove all specific thresholds for user talk page length per WP:CREEP. We should be worrying about article content, not policing other people's talk pages. The penalty for having a talk page that is long enough to be cumbersome is that, in the natural course of events, people who comment there will complain about it. That should be sufficient; we don't need rules and bright lines and penalties for noncompliance. — David Eppstein ( talk) 19:45, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
If we disregard the comments that basically amount to "let's not have this discussion" without providing any substantial arguments as to why not, it seems there is no consensus (on agreeing on a particular number). The larger discussion is in the section below, so I'm holding off further comment here in the meanwhile. CapnZapp ( talk) 11:20, 3 March 2020 (UTC)
It's been a couple of days with no further discussion. Please see #Rule of thumb below. CapnZapp ( talk) 10:34, 17 March 2020 (UTC)
Note that with recent changes, the language used As a rule of thumb, archive closed discussions when a talk page exceeds 75 KB or...
no longer applies to user talk pages, only article talk pages. I suggest further discussion is taken to a new talk page section for clarity.
CapnZapp (
talk)
07:47, 25 March 2020 (UTC)
This is a comment, not a request for change:
Currently (see above for previous discussion) our guideline offers the following:
"Large talk pages are difficult to read and load slowly over slow connections. As a rule of thumb, archive closed discussions when a talk page exceeds 75 KB or has multiple resolved or stale discussions – see Help:Archiving a talk page."
I do think the guideline offered is obsolete. If a talk page is very active, it has (automatic) archival set up already. If it isn't, the number and age of inactive discussions/sections have a much larger impact than checking the size against some number. And we really should recommend automated archival: manual archiving needs to be repeated, can easily be set up in a manner not compatible with later auto-archival and is generally more trouble than it's worth imho.
If an (article) talk page feels "too large", an editor might ask for and set up automated archival, but I don't think that happens already at 75 KB. And even if it feels "too large", if it isn't growing, it's usually such a low-impact problem that most editors simply leave it be anyway. Our guideline would probably be better off if it reflected this common sense. CapnZapp ( talk) 08:00, 25 March 2020 (UTC)
This is a comment, not a request for change:
Currently (see above for previous discussion) our guideline offers the following:
"The length of user talk pages, and the need for archiving, is left up to each editor's own discretion."
I personally don't see how this gels with the much more important "User talk pages must serve their primary purpose, which is to make communication and collaboration among editors easier."
I realize this particular guideline isn't strictly required to make these users clean up their act, and I realize the overall impact on Wikipedia is minimal ("just don't visit"), so I guess leaving it be is okay.
However, that depends on
WP:USERTALKBLOG being an appropriate venue for resolving conspicuous cases, since that's the only place we link to. Since this isn't a "dispute" between two editors, but rather reporting one editor to the greater community, if community discussion at Miscellany for deletion
is not a proper venue, we might consider tweaking our language here to not send concerned editors astray.
CapnZapp (
talk)
08:12, 25 March 2020 (UTC)
I think this guideline is problematic. What if someone starts a section headed "Mangoes", a discussion develops, and then an editor says, "'Mangoes' looks weird; I'm going to change the heading to 'Political timing'". Now, maybe the discussion has drifted off to a point where "Political timing" makes sense as a heading. However, when the section was originally started, "Mangoes" made sense, and "Political timing" made no sense at all. The original posting then becomes incomprehensible. Why did Wacko Jacko make a posting about "Political timing" and then ramble on about mangoes? Effectively, people who have gone off topic are rewarded and are able to colonise the discussion. It would be better for people who have gone off on a tangent to start their own discussion with a new heading, rather than taking over Wacko Jacko's section. Simply because other people want to discuss political timing, does not mean that mangoes are unimportant.-- Jack Upland ( talk) 09:09, 5 January 2020 (UTC)
Could someone summarize if this discussion actually led to any change? Thx CapnZapp ( talk) 15:38, 21 March 2020 (UTC)
Your feedback is requested at Talk:Great Chinese Famine#Proposed rollback to April 14 in connection with dispute resolution and proper use of Talk pages. Thank you. Mathglot ( talk) 19:45, 24 April 2020 (UTC)
This page contains our guidance on collapsing off-topic talk page discussion, part of which currently reads These templates should not be used by involved parties to end a discussion over the objections of other editors.
I propose that it be changed to These templates should not be added or removed by involved parties to end or restore prominence to a discussion over the objections of other editors.
The rationale is that it is best to have uninvolved editors judging whether or not a discussion is off-topic, and that this should apply both ways. Just as an editor who doesn't like a thread isn't allowed to curtail it by collapsing it over others' objections, an editor who insists on perpetuating a discussion everyone else agrees is off-topic should not be allowed to keep it prominent by un-collapsing it. I think this largely reflects current de-facto practice. Note that this guideline does allow editors to continue commenting in a collapsed thread if they want, and this proposal will not change that.
Sdkb (
talk)
22:43, 11 March 2020 (UTC)
Well, since you made a bold edit, and User:EEng reverted you, and you brought up the issue her on talk, the next step is for him to explain his reasons why. If he doesn't, and no-one else objects, feel free to simply reinstate your changes. It's too early for the support/oppose game. CapnZapp ( talk) 08:28, 12 March 2020 (UTC)
Your idea of what is off topic may differ from what others think is off topic, so be sure to err on the side of caution– the question often becomes clear only with continued discussion. E Eng 13:52, 12 March 2020 (UTC)
These templates should not be used to end a discussion over the objections of other editors? Or
"Don't edit war over collapsing or hiding comments"? Specifying a default rule, e.g., "In case of a dispute over hiding comments that you can't resolve through discussion, it's usually better to err on the side of leaving comments visible", might help. But it might be unnecessary, too. WhatamIdoing ( talk) 20:12, 29 April 2020 (UTC)
These templates should not be used to end or restore prominence to a discussion over the objections of other editors.Would that address your concerns? {{u| Sdkb}} talk 21:15, 30 April 2020 (UTC)
@ WhatamIdoing: It would be through removing that template. (and I'm happy to ping or not ping, just lmk your preference) {{u| Sdkb}} talk 01:09, 1 May 2020 (UTC)
These templates should not be added or removed by involved parties to end or restore prominence to a discussion over the objections of other editors.And the idea isn't that it's never okay to uncollapse comments (I agree with you that in borderline cases, uncollapsing should be the default), but rather that the community should be able to clerk itself when needed. That's the "over the objections of other editors" at the end. {{u| Sdkb}} talk 01:56, 1 May 2020 (UTC)
"Don't edit war". Do we need to re-state the normal rule in this context? WhatamIdoing ( talk) 22:31, 2 May 2020 (UTC)
![]() | This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
Archive 10 | Archive 11 | Archive 12 | Archive 13 | Archive 14 | Archive 15 | Archive 16 |
Bold edit and revert
Since Dec 2015, the TPG has talked about support/oppose comments by blocked socks. I believe the section needs work and here's why.
History
This section was originally added by
NE Ent (
talk ·
contribs) in this
Dec 5 2015 edit following
a discussion at the Administrator's noticeboard earlier that month.
NewsAndEventsGuy (
talk)
11:23, 27 May 2018 (UTC)
...an issue supported or opposed by different sucks...-- MelanieN ( talk) 21:49, 27 May 2018 (UTC)
Removing or striking through "support" or "oppose" comments of editors subsequently blocked as socks. Comments with no replies may simply be removed with an appropriate edit summary. Striking through with a short explanation immediately after the stricken text is done when other editors have replied to the comments. e.g.
Supportper nom. (Striking !vote by blocked sock.)
Removing or striking through comments made by blocked sock puppets of users editing in violation of a block or ban. Comments made by a sock with no replies may simply be removed with an appropriate edit summary. If comments are part of an active discussion, they should be struck instead of removed, along with a short explanation following the stricken text or at the bottom of the thread. There is not typically a need to strike comments in discussions that have been closed or archived.
Removing or striking through comments of editors subsequently blocked as socks. Comments with no replies may simply be removed with an appropriate edit summary. Striking through with a short explanation immediately after the stricken text is done when other editors have replied to the comments. e.g.
Supportper nom. (Striking !vote by blocked sock.)
NE Ent 00:56, 29 May 2018 (UTC)
Should this be mentioned in the section on emphasis? Doug Weller talk 12:23, 3 June 2018 (UTC)
I thought we'd resolved over a year go to help curtail WP:LISTGAPS problems and other "list manglement", by instructing people, when making replies, that (absent a good reason not to) the thing to do is to copy the list markup of what they're replying to and add their indent or bullet or number-sign after it. E.g., if you encounter this:
* '''Delete''' – NukeEmAll 16:01, 22 June 2018 (UTC) *: By why? – TheQuestioner 17:02, 22 June 2018 (UTC) *:: Because: *::# It's non-notable. *::# It's clearly promotional. – NukeEmAll 18:03, 22 June 2018 (UTC) *::#* I'm not sure I buy that. – TheQuestioner 19:04, 22 June 2018 (UTC)
And you want to reply to the last item, add your :
or *
after TheQuestioner's *::*
, thus:
*::#** NukeEmAll's rationale seems correct to me. – YourNameHere 20:05, 22 June 2018 (UTC)
If you want to reply to NukeEmAll's original post, use their *
followed by your bullet or indent:
*: Thanks for clarifying, NukeEmAll. I was leaning "Keep", but those are good reasons. – YourNameHere 20:05, 22 June 2018 (UTC)
There's probably an ideal and succinct way to put it, and having a sentence of advice on this (with or without an example) would be a great boon to accessibility, orderly talk pages, and more – people who create F'ed up lists in talk pages because they don't know better also do it in articles, where the accessibility and bad rendering issues are more important. It's amazing how many long-term editors still do not understand this basic principle. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼 16:55, 22 June 2018 (UTC)
I see no reason to have the unneeded word included in what we should concentrate on. In disputes, it is bound to cause confusion and endless discussion as to the meaning of the word "personality". I hope there is/can be consensus for removing it. -- SergeWoodzing ( talk) 14:00, 25 June 2018 (UTC)
Those of us (and only those of us?) who for years have tried very hard never (never) to address or mention another user on article talk pages have fully understood how much more delightful Wikipedia work is then, and how much more delightful it would be for all of us (all of us) if everybody did that. It can (can) be done, and it is really great. The magic that it brings, in concentrating only on article content (which I think article talk pages are all about), is almost unbelievable. -- SergeWoodzing ( talk) 16:07, 28 June 2018 (UTC)
When originally added, it read
With slight tweaks the current text reads
The original was added a long time ago in this edit with an edit summary saying it was supposed to be flip side of NPA. Both the original and the current link to WP:NPA in the bold part of the paragraph. Proposal - we could just repeat that link at the end, like this
NewsAndEventsGuy ( talk) 18:21, 28 June 2018 (UTC)
I am very pleased with the current wording, which I think says enough to anyone in doubt as to what goes. It's bound to be very helpful now in steering away from habitual personalization of so much of our article talk. --
SergeWoodzing (
talk)
15:53, 29 June 2018 (UTC)
With recent tweaks, it now (this version) links to both CIVILITY and ASSUME GOOD FAITH, and reads
NewsAndEventsGuy ( talk) 18:25, 2 July 2018 (UTC)
on contentlink to WP:Dispute resolution in particular? I'd much rather just say what we need to say, and follow with explicit links e.g.
I also dislike EGGs as Eeng said above. Proposed rewrite
Thoughts? (self struck)
NewsAndEventsGuy (
talk)
23:02, 2 July 2018 (UTC)
Is there any page where I can find all known rating publishers like AllMusic? I'm interested in these non-english publishers especially. Eurohunter ( talk) 21:04, 28 July 2018 (UTC)
@ Alsee: {{ Shortcut}} broke the list formatting because it contains line breaks. I've removed the line breaks from Module:Shortcut, so either type of list should be fine now (I think). Jc86035 ( talk) 17:47, 2 August 2018 (UTC)
Once or twice a month, plus/minus, I encounter a topic in an article's Talk page that is footnoted. The footnote is at the page bottom, though the section footnoted is mid-point in the article. I asked about this a couple of months ago and got the right fix on my specific request, inserting: {Reflist-talk} (with double braces -- one brace omitted for discussion's sake).
This is a minor yet regular Talk pages problem and might be worthy of added instructions or even a template adjustment. Probably this is more a problem for us mid-level editors, conscientious enough to cite our references, ignorant enough to not stick them in place. I'll strive to fix what I find from here out. But, if any of you highly capable Wikipedians can figure out where one might insert a fix regarding this... .
Thanks, GeeBee60 ( talk) 15:24, 7 August 2018 (UTC)
<references />
tag in the page, or at the bottom of the page if there is no <references />
tag after the point where the ref is used. Templates like {{
reflist}}
and {{
reflist-talk}}
contain a <references />
tag with some extra styling. So since the only issue is the absence of such a tag or template, there is really nothing that can be fixed. --
Redrose64 🌹 (
talk)
19:54, 7 August 2018 (UTC)
I read the article about the British military commander Alan Brooke with interest. Among many other things, I learned that he was an Ulsterman from Northern Ireland. I then went to the talk page to see if there was anything of interest there. I was startled to see this heading somewhat down the page: "Why does Alan Booke look so swarthy? Moreso looks a sub-Loirean Frenchman or a cryto-Jew."
That seems to me to be an extremely offensive remark, based solely on what appears to me to be racial or racist prejudice. I have just gone through the "talk page guidelines" and don't see anything that pertains specifically to something like this.
Am I being overly "politically correct" about this, or do others find it as offensive as I do? Further, I note that the person who created this section did it anonymously. What, if anything, can/should be done about it? Hayford Peirce ( talk) 23:54, 7 August 2018 (UTC)
Crypto-Jew... Crypto-currency... MORE THAN A COINCIDENCE??? FBDB E Eng 11:45, 9 August 2018 (UTC)
Personally, had I seen this post right away I would have moved it to user talk, and directed the OP to DR, HELPDESK, TEAHOUSE, and ANI. WIthout studying it, my gut says there's been an uptick in people complaining about specific disputes on this page, and it is not the right place to do that. I wish regular page watchers would help bar the gates or we'll be doing ANI like stuff everywhere eventually. NewsAndEventsGuy ( talk) 12:29, 15 August 2018 (UTC)
My idea.. not sure this will reach the policymakers/decisionmakers and actual hard-coders behind the wiki website properties.. Why not near the top of EVERY Talk (discussions) page, once someone enters into editing mode, display a red or yellow background rectangular banner at the top reminding commenters to add to the BOTTOM of the wiki text/code, and not to the top? My two cents. :) Vid2vid ( talk) 05:18, 4 September 2018 (UTC)
It might be a good idea to change the name of WP:TPG#Non-free images to WP:TPG#Non-free content or WP:TPG#Non-free files. While the majority of non-free files uploaded to Wikipedia is probably image files, there are audio files as well. This change would make it clear that this sub-section applies to all non-free content, not just image files. The relevant content would also need to be tweaked accordingly. -- Marchjuly ( talk) 02:38, 28 September 2018 (UTC)
It seems that a section link to a talk page discussion (be it user talk, article talk, project talk or whatever) gets broken once that discussion is archived. If so this is a fundamental flaw as it should be easy to refer back to a discussion if needed and such links in edit summaries can't be corrected. Is there any solution or workaround to this? A way to create a permalink perhaps? -- Jameboy ( talk) 10:17, 25 October 2018 (UTC)
No meta: Extended meta-discussions about editing belong on noticeboards, in Wikipedia-talk, or in User-talk namespaces, not in Article-talk namespace.
What are "meta discussions" and how do they apply to Talk Pages? Can anyone give any examples of what a "meta discussion" is, either actual or hypothetical. This term is totally meaningless to me. Tym Whittier ( talk) 19:52, 4 November 2018 (UTC)
Currently WP:INTERSPERSE goes to the § Layout section, just like WP:TOPPOST and WP:BOTTOMPOST. WP:INTERLEAVE goes to the § Editing others' comments section, which is a separate idea. It's not listed in the convenience-links box there. And "intersperse" and "interleave" are fair lay-language synonyms. Can someone work in a cross-linking of these two ideas? Or unify them? It's not obvious that interleaving a reponse to paragraph one of a three-paragraph parent post is editing that parent post vs just threading/layout games. DMacks ( talk) 08:08, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
In [ this] section, in the point fixing layout errors, am I allowed to replace <font> tag to <span> tag as part of removing obsolete HTML tag errors without informing the specific user? Adithyak1997 ( talk) 17:32, 18 November 2018 (UTC)
Hi – I posted a Talk page comment at Wikipedia talk:Ignore all rules regarding Wikipedia’s erroneous description of the features of AVG PC TuneUp (my employer’s product), because there are no available citations to reflect a recent product revamp that removed many of the features Wikipedia describes as current. I just saw that an editor (@ Verify References:) deleted my Talk page comment and attempted to answer my question. Was it appropriate for an editor to delete my Talk page comment? Can I restore it? Empey at Avast ( talk) 19:06, 1 March 2019 (UTC)
I just created a talk page but what I really wanted was to create an article... How may i change it ? Sagher Genesis ( talk) 10:38, 28 December 2018 (UTC)
Please see Talk:XXXX#Semi-protected edit request on 30 November 2018 and Talk:XXX#Well... for context. I propose to add the following to these guidelines at Wikipedia:Talk page guidelines#Editing others' comments:
{{
Empty edit request}}
on the User Talk page of a user who has posted an empty edit request.Shhhnotsoloud ( talk) 07:57, 15 January 2019 (UTC)
{{
subst:EP|xy}}
(it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format and provide a reliable source if appropriate) which is often correctly used on vague requests, but occasionally gets used on empty requests too. The only times that I've seen that message actually being replied to are when the original request wasn't empty. Using it on an empty request is simply a waste of time. -- Redrose64 🌹 ( talk) 19:53, 15 January 2019 (UTC)
{{
Empty edit request}}
(since I found out it exists last month - that might need to be pushed out a bit wider?), but my rule of thumb has been to place it for registered accounts on their first such request, or for IPs that have tried multiple requests. Based on that thumbrule, I think I've placed the template twice. ‑‑
ElHef (
Meep?)
14:40, 15 January 2019 (UTC)
This is a byte county test.contains just 27 bytes. Maybe we could all be helped if the software counted the bytes in the "meat" of these messages, and popped up a box if the content was under 30 bytes? That way, the only way intentional vandals could post would be to add junk, and users who actually meant to say something would be alerted that they goofed somehow. NewsAndEventsGuy ( talk) 15:12, 15 January 2019 (UTC)
Done Since there were no objections, I edited the guideline as I suggested, adding "if considered necessary" to respond to the comments above. Thanks for the feedback.
Shhhnotsoloud (
talk)
19:32, 22 January 2019 (UTC)
I made an edit ( Revision as of 12:01, 29 January 2019) that was reverted ( Revision as of 12:28, 29 January 2019 ) by user:NewsAndEventsGuy with the comment "Oppose as WP:CREEP and its redundant, see the part about removing prohibited material"
The change I made was to the paragraph that currently reads:
However it is precisely because of the bullet point "sockvote"
that the former needs to change because at the moment there is a possible conflict in interpretation.
The paragraph existed for five years before the bullet point was introduced and is and always was incorrect as sockpuppet comments have been struck out for far longer than that.
I also added an example of what "striking text" means as it is jargon without an explanation that could confuse new editors for whom this page is most useful. -- PBS ( talk) 15:00, 29 January 2019 (UTC)
Not sure if it's been discussed before, but I was wondering what the etiquette is for editors that unilaterally decide to archive conversations before the already configured bot has been able to archive the conversation. I'm noticing the behavior on some politics related articles, and while there's nothing (that I know of) in our policies that forbids or discourages the practice, I find the behavior potentially troublesome (because someone may decide to archive a topic they disagree with or find works against any bias they might be trying to push in the affected article).
Thoughts on perhaps adding a section that states manually archiving talk page sections less than a week after the last comment is discouraged behavior? — Locke Cole • t • c 08:41, 28 January 2019 (UTC)
Is there any reason to keep <s>...</s>
and <u>...</u>
for redacting? Using them, one loses the ability to style deleted and inserted text differently via CSS or script.
Paradoctor (
talk)
23:48, 2 March 2019 (UTC)
s
element represents contents that are no longer accurate or no longer relevant, the
u
element represents a span of text with an unarticulated, though explicitly rendered, non-textual annotation, such as labeling the text as being a proper name in Chinese text (a Chinese proper name mark), or labeling the text as being misspelt, which is barely relevant to indicating added text; thus, we should be using
<ins>...</ins>
instead of <u>...</u>
. For consistency, we should also use <del>...</del>
instead of <s>...</s>
, see
HTML 5.2 section 4.6. Apart from the fact that these have semantic meaning, they may also enclose block-type elements as a group: <del>
*'''Delete''' per nominator.
*:It is unencyclopedic, not notable, its last sentence fails [[WP:NPOV]]. And I had an argument with the page creator five years ago. --[[User:Example|Example]] ([[User talk:Example|talk]]) 01:00 3 March 2019 (UTC)
</del><ins>
*'''Keep''' We should not delete this page.
*:It is useful, I like it, and I have since met the page creator socially. --[[User:Example|Example]] ([[User talk:Example|talk]]) 02:00 3 March 2019 (UTC)
</ins>
<s>...</s>
and <u>...</u>
elements cannot do this, because they are inline elements. --
Redrose64 🌹 (
talk)
11:38, 3 March 2019 (UTC)Not sure whether this has been discussed before – I can't see anything about it here.
In certain situations, mostly leaving warning messages about vandalism or the like, it's common to use the month and year as a heading.
When this is done, should the heading be based on the date of the edit the message is about, or the date when the message is left? For instance, if today I discover that a user made a bad edit in January that has until now gone unresolved, should my message to that user be under the heading "January 2019" or "March 2019"?
This is even more likely to occur when an edit is done late on the last day of a month, in which case it must be quite frequent that no further activity occurs until the following month. And this is before you get into time zone complications.... — Smjg ( talk) 12:16, 9 March 2019 (UTC)
Housekeeping note... when this thread started there were four links in the LINKBOX. I have since deleted shortcut WP:SIGCLEARN, which was created in 2010 and had only 49 WhatLinksHereHits. NewsAndEventsGuy ( talk) 15:11, 16 March 2019 (UTC)
So this new shortcut I created to Wikipedia:Talk page guidelines#Editing others' comments has unexpectedly become the subject of controversy. User:JJMC89 first removes with the rationale that it is "unused", but obviously all shortcuts are unused when first introduced. Then User:Johnuniq removes as too many shortcuts create confusion. But that section already has four shortcuts, twice as many as any other on the page. Thinking five is one too many is completely arbitrary.
To quote Wikipedia:Shortcut:
Shortcuts are created for the convenience of editors. [...] Shortcuts are often used on talk pages in their abbreviated form, decreasing readability for the general reader. [...] To avoid these problems, a good practice when creating shortcuts is to choose common English words that are easily identifiable and memorable.
" WP:OTHERTALK" clearly fares better on these grounds than any of the other shortcuts that link to the same section. " WP:OWNTALK" is already a shortcut, so it is natural to have " WP:OTHERTALK" as well. If the issue is too many shortcuts, I suggest removing some of the others to make room for " WP:OTHERTALK". Three of the four shortcuts (" WP:TPO", " WP:TALKO" and " WP:TPOC") were all created by the same user, who has been indefinitely banned since 2015. Not only that but the meaning of those shortcuts is pretty opaque.
Citizen Canine ( talk) 10:12, 16 March 2019 (UTC)
"they generally should list only one or two common and easily remembered redirects". Following discussion at Wikipedia talk:Shortcut, that was relaxed to
"they generally should list only the most common and easily remembered redirects". Anyone reading that debate will conclude that the purpose of the change was not to give Citizen Canine the green light to wikilawyer about going from four to five shortcuts. There is no value in creating a fresh shortcut when we have four already. The new one will not meet the criterion of "most common and easily remembered" precisely because its unused. Of course a new shortcut is unused, but there's a world of difference between establishing a new shortcut when none already exist, and creating yet another one when we have more than enough already. -- RexxS ( talk) 13:37, 16 March 2019 (UTC)
There is no value in creating a fresh shortcut when we have four already.Yes there is. In terms of both quantity and quality, 1 memorable shortcut is preferable to 3 obscure ones. I'm in favour of WP:OTHERSWORDS, which is just as concise as WP:OTHERTALK and is clearer. Removing those current shortcuts will not make them cease to link to the section. Citizen Canine ( talk) 13:46, 16 March 2019 (UTC)
"there's a world of difference between establishing a new shortcut when none already exist, and creating yet another one when we have more than enough already"didn't you get? -- RexxS ( talk) 14:23, 16 March 2019 (UTC)
The point of these template boxes is not to list every single redirect for any given page (indeed, that's what Special:WhatLinksHere is for); instead, they generally should list only the most common and easily remembered redirects.WP:LINKBOXES A redirect that is unused (including WLH and edit summaries, outside of comments related to added it to this page) is not common; therefore, it should not be included. Yes, all new shortcuts will start out unused. If they come into common usage, then by all means consider adding them. Until then, don't. — JJMC89 ( T· C) 06:07, 17 March 2019 (UTC)
Proposal addressing all comments made thus far
(A) Keep in your mind the sharp distinction between the existence of a redirect shortcut and listing that shortcut in the LINKBOX
(B) LINKBOX guidance wants a short list. OK fine, let's have a short list.
(C) Of the existing four links
(D) proposal Keep the redirect pages for the other three, but with less than 1000 uses in their 10-year history there is little reason to clutter up the TPG LINKBOX with weird shortcuts that are neither intuitive nor easily remembered. Having purged that chaffe, there is ample room to add a new one that is both written in common English and is easily remembered.
NewsAndEventsGuy (
talk)
14:50, 16 March 2019 (UTC)
guidelines to editing other people's comments" (that is,
[[WP:TPO|guidelines to editing other people's comments]]
) haven't been too successful. Many editors care more about minimizing the number of characters they type than avoiding jargon. Not sure what premise you're agreeing with; I guess the conclusion you're disagreeing with is discouraging a lot of different shortcuts to be used.
isaacl (
talk)
18:12, 16 March 2019 (UTC)
[[WP:TPO]]
and hit "Publish changes". The software then translates this into [[Wikipedia:Talk page guidelines#Editing others' comments]]
, then stores the page.[[Wikipedia:Talk page guidelines#Editing others' comments]]
, and then translates it into [[WP:TPO]]
, then shows you the page / edit page.[[Wikipedia:Talk page guidelines#Editing others' comments]]
into [[WP:TPOC]]
, then shows you the page / edit page.[[WP:TPO]]
. It would be entirely possible to use something like §EOtC
(read "rules Editing Other's Comments") instead. Everyone can have their own preferred shortcuts, without having to worry about other's ideas what the perfect shortcut looks like.
Paradoctor (
talk)
13:32, 17 March 2019 (UTC)
:*:mytpo::[[Wikipedia:Talk page guidelines{#}Editing others' comments]]
References
EEng changed the guideline from using the word "content", which was the word used at least for a year, to other wording I object to [1]. I reverted, citing WP:EDIT, but the editor didn't care and reverted back. WP:EDIT states, "changes that would alter the substance of policy or guidelines should normally be announced on the appropriate talk page first. The change may be implemented if no objection is made to it or if discussion shows that there is consensus for the change." I believe that the change of wording changes the substance of the guideline because "content" is a more general word and "discussion" is a more specific word, therefore I object. The guideline should apply to all content and not just discussions or threads. Thinker78 ( talk) 05:57, 25 March 2019 (UTC)
How is this simpler? It's twenty characters longer, and contains three nested tag pairs rather than one template transclusion. -- Redrose64 🌹 ( talk) 20:22, 2 April 2019 (UTC)
I participated in an RfC at Talk:Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections, where I made this edit, which included a number of adjustments to the thread formatting. Ahrtoodeetoo objected and reverted these adjustments, and I posted the following on their talk page:
I do think I should be reformatting lists properly. I originally cited WP:INDENTMIX, but since that shortcut is only an archived discussion on a talk page, I searched for more reliable guidelines. WP:TPO states,
Cautiously editing or removing another editor's comments is sometimes allowed, but normally you should stop if there is any objection.It further explains,restrict the edits to formatting changes only and preserve the content as much as possible. Examples include fixing indentation levels [...]. The #Layout section below specifically calls out accessibility problems created by improper list practices, described in detail at MOS:LISTGAP. I don't believe I've broken any rules or guidelines in merely fixing the list structure, and I believe that doing so is positive and not harmful. — 烏Γ ( kaw) │ 19:46, 04 May 2019 (UTC)
Ahrtoodeetoo and I remain in disagreement, and they suggested I ask here. Is this practice a problem, and if so, why? — 烏Γ ( kaw) │ 05:09, 06 May 2019 (UTC)
Cautiously editing or removing another editor's comments is sometimes allowed, but normally you should stop if there is any objection.R2 ( bleep) 15:45, 6 May 2019 (UTC)
*<br/>::
*<br/>*:
"it's not clear that MOS/Accessibility embodies the right set of guidelines to actually achieve the goal of accessibility". So far your argument has rested on some vague hand-waving about the guidance at MOS:ACCESS not doing its job. So let's hear what pieces of guidance you feel are deficient. It may well have been a mistake to to place ACCESS within the MoS, but your opinion on that is clearly not shared by the majority, and it's no use whining about it. The situation is what it is, and your obstructionism on clearly delineating the scope of ACCESS results in editors regularly causing problems for anyone who has to use assistive technology, simply because they don't know any better.
cut your bullshit about "accusations" and (now) "obstructionism". You haven't got the street cred to call into question my good faith- At this point, I'm certainly questioning your good faith. — 烏Γ ( kaw) │ 04:09, 10 May 2019 (UTC)
@
EEng: Is there a concrete statement you can point to that asserts that MOS applies only to articles
? And, more importantly, is there a concrete suggestion you have for improving any of this? —
烏Γ (
kaw) │
00:19, 10 May 2019 (UTC)
Is there a concrete statement you can point to that asserts that MOS applies only to articles?– Sure, that would be MOS:MAIN's opening:
The Manual of Style (MoS or MOS) is the style manual for all English Wikipedia articles. This primary page is supported by further detail pages ... If any contradiction arises, this page always has precedence. The MoS presents Wikipedia's house style, to help editors write articles with consistent and precise language, layout, and formatting ... Style and formatting should be consistent within an article ... editors should not change an article from one of those styles to another ...
part of the English Wikipedia's Manual of Styleand discusses ...
Article structure ...structure of articles ... Article lead ... Article lead ... Article lead ... elsewhere in the article ... Article lead ... Article lead ... articles should ... articles should ... articles with ... In articles, do not ... colors in articles ... in Wikipedia articles ... Articles (and other pages) that use color ... If an article ... top of the article ... threaded discussion on talk pages ... especially in article content ... appropriate for an article ... links to other articles ... consistent appearance between articles ... articles should use ... avoided in article text ... not used in article text ... in the article's main body ... articles should be accessible ...
A small clarification: WP:INDENTMIX originally linked here, but it was recently updated to point to the same place as MOS:LISTGAP. (I also completely forgot that I was the one who created WP:INDENTMIX.) — 烏Γ ( kaw) │ 00:32, 08 May 2019 (UTC)
I removed contents from an article that I didn't find it relevant for the article. Another editor simply dumped the contents removed the contents removed from prose into its talk page. example.
In this example, an editor simply dumped a list of references for others to consult for others to expand with but not a discussion of references. What do the guidelines and community consensus say on the use of talk page as a dump ground for previous contents or raw references rather than for discussion purposes? Graywalls ( talk) 15:58, 28 March 2019 (UTC)
{{
refideas}}
AngusWOOF (
bark •
sniff)
16:15, 28 March 2019 (UTC)
It was posted at article talk on March 9, twenty days ago, with text "For future reference". It is mainly PRIMARY source reearch on the building's history, instead of the club itself. It looks off topic to me, and after 20 days without the discussion even beginning it appears to me to be abandoned. So with the appearance of being offtopic and abandoned I moved it from article talk to user talk in this two-edit DIFF. If Another Believer disagrees, then by all means EDIT THE ARTICLE (be bold) and then DISCUSS in a meaningful way if it gets reverted (see WP:BRD. Alternatively, just start discussing in a meaningful way right now. Either way article talk should not be used as a parking place for abandoned drafts. NewsAndEventsGuy ( talk) 17:20, 28 March 2019 (UTC)
Extremely abuse of power. Stop him. He is tampering things he doesn’t understand.
If he doesn’t understand the material, make him stop. He doesn’t have permission to delete something he doesn’t understand. Completely unfair. Wrong wrong wrong. Stealthsilent ( talk) 23:26, 15 May 2019 (UTC)
Had a recent case where a logged-in editor removed an unresponded-to section on my Talk page created by a banned sock. Removing comments by a sock is permitted by the penultimate bullet at WP:TPO. On the other hand, it's my talk page, and I would think that at a minimum, a ping would be required, and a strikeout-plus-explanation would be better than stealth removal. Just wondering if OWNTALK or TPO needs to say anything about this or not. It just feels wrong to do this, but I can't pinpoint why. Perhaps there's another policy I'm missing. Mathglot ( talk) 09:09, 5 June 2019 (UTC)
Is it correct to tell an editor not to put a draft article on their user talk page? I couldn't find anything specific.
And if it's not against the rules, then I guess I shouldn't have moved the draft to a sandbox, but I think that was acceptable given that an article draft on the page would just confuse people who are trying to use the talk page for what is intended.— Vchimpanzee • talk • contributions • 19:45, 13 August 2019 (UTC)
I've been having a conversation with In ictu oculi and SmokeyJoe at User talk:Andrewa#Pointy bullets about whether edits such as this one should be bulleted.
I don't think they should be. The reason for doing so seems to be to draw attention to the post, to make it stand out. That would be better done explicitly by bold text or several other techniques IMO, if it's really the intent. Of course bolding is unattractive because it looks pushy, like shouting. The bullet point is really just as pushy, but in a more subtle way.
Plus, according to MOS:INDENTMIX, once we go to bullets we shouldn't go back.
The two users I've pinged above aren't by any means the only ones doing this, just the two I've invited to the conversation on my talk page. It seems to be spreading. And as nobody wants their comments to be less visible, I guess in time everyone will be forced to adopt the practice too, and the use of the colon : for indenting will virtually cease, and bullets will become the standard. That may not be a bad thing, technically the colon is a list markup too, but I think it needs discussion.
Comments? Andrewa ( talk) 04:42, 12 September 2019 (UTC)
*
to ::
. This instructs the parser to close the first-level bulleted list, start a first-level unbulleted list (it's more complicated than that, but for this description it will suffice), and then start a nested second-level unbulleted list. This leads to extra announcements by screen readers to indicate the end of the bulleted list and the start of two unbulleted lists. The appropriate markup to use instead is *:
, as shown in the second example, which keeps the first-level bulleted list and starts a nested second-level unbulleted list. The visual appearance of these two is the same, but with a lot less extraneous announcements for the recommended approach.::*
from the post that I was replying to, and added one symbol. I used a colon because I dislike using bullets in discussions except in special cases - such as at the start of the line where I state the aforementiobed rule. --
Redrose64 🌹 (
talk)
22:41, 12 September 2019 (UTC)So, why do you do it? What does it achieve?, so I thought you were asking me, not asking me why someone else used a bulleted item in a specific instance. I don't know why the editor chose to use a bulleted item; maybe the editor finds it easier to read. But... more relevant to your argument is whether or not other readers are actually perceiving a bulleted item as having greater prominence, regardless of the writer's intent. isaacl ( talk) 00:21, 16 September 2019 (UTC)
Here is another very recent example of a bullet that seems to have no valid function. Comments? Andrewa ( talk) 10:42, 18 September 2019 (UTC)
There's some discussion above about whether bolding is helpful. To me it is on occasions, and I think that's what our guidelines say too.
I use it for two purposes, and think both are in keeping with current guidelines. Excessive bolding is shouting, but the occasional bolded word is fine.
One is as a leading summary, notably in RM and similar surveys to indicate Support, Oppose, Comment, closing comment, Relisting comment... there may be others but those are my normal ones in RMs. And similarly in informal discussion I sometimes preface my reply by Agree and bold that word. I think this helps others (including but not only an RM closer) to assess the flow and direction of the discussion or survey.
The other is to indicate raised voice in mid-sentence. This can subtly but significantly change the meaning of the sentence, and on occasions makes it more intelligible IMO. Or to reiterate: Excessive bolding is shouting, but the occasional bolded word is fine. To me that bolding helps to make the meaning clear, by making it quite clear that Excessive bolding is the only sort I mean. Interested in other comments.
I offer this as an example of both. Andrewa ( talk) 01:36, 16 September 2019 (UTC)
- WP:REDACT and WP:REDACTED redirect to Wikipedia:Talk page guidelines#Editing own comments - perhaps this should be changed to WP:RETRACT and WP:RETRACTED to prevent confusion with Redaction, an Admin's ability to redact edits, that is, hide and delete page revisions ( Wikipedia:Revision deletion#Criteria for redaction) - Epinoia ( talk) 00:16, 27 September 2019 (UTC)
Can someone point out where to add a new issue? At the end, at the top, or below the most similar issue, maybe at a higher indent level? (Apologies if it's already there and I couldn't find it) Uhw ( talk) 20:55, 1 November 2019 (UTC)
I just suggested this guideline might be an appropriate place for a guidence being suggested at WP:VPR#Discussions about articles on Noticeboards should leave a note on the relevant talk page. Dmcq ( talk) 17:46, 21 November 2019 (UTC)
Right now these guidelines claim, in the section Wikipedia:Talk page guidelines#Behavior that is unacceptable, that a personal attack is "saying something negative about another person". That is of course utter nonsense. Not all personal attacks take the form of saying something negative about a person (threatening them or doxxing them are examples listed in this very guideline), and by and far not everything negative said about someone is a personal attack. AddWitty NameHere 03:36, 19 November 2019 (UTC)
"it is possible to point out inappropriate behavior of editors by stating facts and citing guidelines instead of making negative comments"is demonstrably untrue. "Stating facts" often involves saying something negative, sometimes unavoidably. -- RexxS ( talk) 19:17, 5 January 2020 (UTC)
What does "rule of thumb" mean?
Specifically, does it mean a) that we can point to WP:TALKCOND to ask editors with user talk pages in far excess of (currently) 75K to trim/archive their pages? or does it mean b) that we can't do that
If b) then what is the purpose of having a "rule of thumb"? As opposed to having a well-defined policy or guideline on one hand, or having no numerical target at all on the other?
If a) then why not have the number specified be the actual target? (Much like, say, the limit of words in a tv episode, where if a summary is even 401 words it means at least some editors will put up a cleanup template) My question is: why say 75K if we allow twice as much? Why not then have the guideline say 150K? Why have a "rule of thumb" if that only means editors can disagree how much is too much? Three times as much? (225K) Five? (375K) At this point, maybe it's better to drop any numeric target at all; meaning that even if my user talk page is 1M or 10M the community won't enforce trimming? (Editors might ask me to trim it but nothing happens if I won't)
Remember, this wording "rule of thumb" has remained unchanged for years and years. It is also very non-standard in our guidelines, so I think it's about time to question the usefulness of having a numeric target that still doesn't work like all our other numeric targets.
Note: Unlike the previous talk page section, this one is not about the actual number (whether it should be 75 bytes, 75K or 75M). You can discuss this
here.
Your input is welcome. CapnZapp ( talk) 11:23, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
be sanctioned with blocks until they complythen
there is no point in even writing a suggestion. E Eng 22:37, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
The English phrase rule of thumb refers to a principle with broad application that is not intended to be strictly accurate or reliable for every situation. It refers to an easily learned and easily applied procedure or standard, based on practical experience rather than theory. This usage of the phrase can be traced back to the seventeenth century and has been associated with various trades where quantities were measured by comparison to the width or length of a thumb.As to why we have a rule of thumb and not a specified number, see the fifth pillar ("no firm rules"). Levivich ( talk) 16:54, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
Notice that today's FA – Zoo TV Tour – is 138K. The other day we had The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari at 127K. The pages are just about a single topic and their talk pages should likewise be limited to discussion of that topic. A user talk page, however, may cover any number of topics because users can and do edit numerous different subjects. My own talk page is about 400K and that's because it covers divers topics, from article number 5 million to article 6 million and a fair few in between. I chip away at it from time to time but it's a laborious process because there is no standard mechanism. Having had to develop my own filing system, I'm now inclined to keep my own counsel on how to proceed. As editors are likely to be the most active readers of their own talk pages, they need no prompting from others nor an arbitrary guideline. Andrew🐉( talk) 22:07, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
Sorry if this has already come up, the discussion itself is too long to be sure I've read it carefully, but DGG can you just tag the threads you want to retain with a do not archive template, then set the page to automatically archive anything older than 30 days? Apologies if this is butting in unhelpfully. --valereee ( talk) 14:29, 6 March 2020 (UTC)
{{
DNAU|730d}}
shortcut is used inside the post. The instructions at
Template:Do not archive until/doc give more detail. --
RexxS (
talk)
18:30, 6 March 2020 (UTC)
It's been a couple of days with no new discussion. My conservative summary is that there is a clear opposition to having a binding guideline, leaving it up to each user. In other words, that a significant part of the community is okay with user talk pages of any length.
Since there is also a significant part of the community that feels this is not made clear by the current phrasing (including me), I believe the best course of action to progress the issue is to make a BOLD edit to attempt to rectify this. Feel free to give your input on the impending edit.
CapnZapp (
talk) 10:37, 17 March 2020 (UTC) Done
CapnZapp (
talk)
10:45, 17 March 2020 (UTC)
On the subject of how large one's user talk page can get, as far as I know, this page is the only policy or guideline page to discuss it. The current phrasing is As a rule of thumb, archive closed discussions when a talk page exceeds 75 KB or has multiple resolved or stale discussions.
WP:TALKCOND
I searched the archives. Unless I'm mistaken, this question has not been discussed since 2012: Wikipedia_talk:Talk_page_guidelines/Archive_9#The_guideline_is_outdated_and_should_be_changed_completely.
Q. Should we increase the limit† on talk page size from 75K?
†) Yes, I'm aware it's a rule of thumb and not a hard limit.
The benefit of of an increase would be to ease enforcement. It is incredibly hard in cases where a user has a much too large talk page to argue "you need to trim it to 75K". "75K??" they say, "that's nothing!".
You might think "but how about letting the editor off the hook if they reduce it to 100K or 200K..." but that just suggests the number is out of date. I mean, if we have a guideline or rule of thumb, what it specifies is really the only reasonable target. What's the point of bothering users to follow our guideline, and then not having the guideline as the target? (And if you want to argue "but don't bother the user then", you're really arguing for the limit to be increased or removed altogether).
Mostly to focus our discussions, how about I offer a specific change suggestion.
Proposal: Change the following sentence
from
to
Cheers, CapnZapp ( talk) 17:11, 22 February 2020 (UTC)
I'm happy to rephrase the start of the discussion, User:EEng. Even better, feel free to start a new talk section where you raise the issue in your own words, and I'll close this one. Let us not derail into discussing decorum. CapnZapp ( talk) 08:25, 24 February 2020 (UTC)
As most of the guidance on article size at WP:SIZESPLIT seems to be applicable to talk pages as well, increasing the recommended size limit before archiving clearly runs counter to most of the considerations we already endorse. Consequently, I think it would be better to change this guidance to:
Optionally, we could re-use the ranges suggested on SIZESPLIT to present more nuanced guidance here. -- RexxS ( talk) 17:43, 24 February 2020 (UTC)
RexxS
DGG
"SIZESPLIT is for articles and is motivated by almost completely different reasons"– that's patently untrue. SIZESPLIT gives five considerations:
"motivated by almost completely different reasons"? That really is well off the mark.
"most of the rationale behind SIZESPLIT revolves around a human reader's limited capacity for long articles"is clearly false, as most of the rationale behind SIZESPLIT revolves around other factors, and I've demonstrated that by quoting the five considerations given in SIZESPLIT. Why not address the actual guidance there, rather than making up your objections to it? -- RexxS ( talk) 00:03, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
"questionable claims"only in your opinion. SIZESPLIT has project-wide consensus, and there is no indication that the five factors there apply any less to talk pages than to articles. You find evidence that those factors affecting articles don't affect talk pages and then your opinion might be worth listening to.
SIZESPLIT has project-wide consensus– That's odd, because right at the top it says it
has not been thoroughly vetted by the community.The handwringing about truncation and so on was added in 2011 with no discussion at all. Even, generously, assuming that that was in fact a realistic issue at that time, I renew my call for evidence that it remains an issue ten years later. E Eng 17:49, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
Note: At this time, I extended an invitation to the Village Pump for more input. Cheers
CapnZapp (
talk)
09:58, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
"it is simply a rule of thumb, not something that should be enforced on anyone"I consider that a separate second issue. When we have agreed on a number (or not to have a number etc) I plan on asking what a "rule of thumb" means (in a separate talk page section), unless someone beats me to it of course. Let's just not discuss it here intermixed with my original question above, please. Cheers CapnZapp ( talk) 10:20, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
Server resources expended with each page load or cache purge– Are you joking? Am I just dreaming that it's 2020? Is it really still 1999? E Eng 18:19, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
server limits or more accurately, software limitsbeing a relevant consideration for a possible page-size limit; you talked about
Server resources expended with each page load or cache purge, which is quite different and none of our business whatsoever as editors (with the narrow exception of template editors) – see WP:PERFORMANCE. E Eng 23:21, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
Alternative proposal: How about we remove all specific thresholds for user talk page length per WP:CREEP. We should be worrying about article content, not policing other people's talk pages. The penalty for having a talk page that is long enough to be cumbersome is that, in the natural course of events, people who comment there will complain about it. That should be sufficient; we don't need rules and bright lines and penalties for noncompliance. — David Eppstein ( talk) 19:45, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
If we disregard the comments that basically amount to "let's not have this discussion" without providing any substantial arguments as to why not, it seems there is no consensus (on agreeing on a particular number). The larger discussion is in the section below, so I'm holding off further comment here in the meanwhile. CapnZapp ( talk) 11:20, 3 March 2020 (UTC)
It's been a couple of days with no further discussion. Please see #Rule of thumb below. CapnZapp ( talk) 10:34, 17 March 2020 (UTC)
Note that with recent changes, the language used As a rule of thumb, archive closed discussions when a talk page exceeds 75 KB or...
no longer applies to user talk pages, only article talk pages. I suggest further discussion is taken to a new talk page section for clarity.
CapnZapp (
talk)
07:47, 25 March 2020 (UTC)
This is a comment, not a request for change:
Currently (see above for previous discussion) our guideline offers the following:
"Large talk pages are difficult to read and load slowly over slow connections. As a rule of thumb, archive closed discussions when a talk page exceeds 75 KB or has multiple resolved or stale discussions – see Help:Archiving a talk page."
I do think the guideline offered is obsolete. If a talk page is very active, it has (automatic) archival set up already. If it isn't, the number and age of inactive discussions/sections have a much larger impact than checking the size against some number. And we really should recommend automated archival: manual archiving needs to be repeated, can easily be set up in a manner not compatible with later auto-archival and is generally more trouble than it's worth imho.
If an (article) talk page feels "too large", an editor might ask for and set up automated archival, but I don't think that happens already at 75 KB. And even if it feels "too large", if it isn't growing, it's usually such a low-impact problem that most editors simply leave it be anyway. Our guideline would probably be better off if it reflected this common sense. CapnZapp ( talk) 08:00, 25 March 2020 (UTC)
This is a comment, not a request for change:
Currently (see above for previous discussion) our guideline offers the following:
"The length of user talk pages, and the need for archiving, is left up to each editor's own discretion."
I personally don't see how this gels with the much more important "User talk pages must serve their primary purpose, which is to make communication and collaboration among editors easier."
I realize this particular guideline isn't strictly required to make these users clean up their act, and I realize the overall impact on Wikipedia is minimal ("just don't visit"), so I guess leaving it be is okay.
However, that depends on
WP:USERTALKBLOG being an appropriate venue for resolving conspicuous cases, since that's the only place we link to. Since this isn't a "dispute" between two editors, but rather reporting one editor to the greater community, if community discussion at Miscellany for deletion
is not a proper venue, we might consider tweaking our language here to not send concerned editors astray.
CapnZapp (
talk)
08:12, 25 March 2020 (UTC)
I think this guideline is problematic. What if someone starts a section headed "Mangoes", a discussion develops, and then an editor says, "'Mangoes' looks weird; I'm going to change the heading to 'Political timing'". Now, maybe the discussion has drifted off to a point where "Political timing" makes sense as a heading. However, when the section was originally started, "Mangoes" made sense, and "Political timing" made no sense at all. The original posting then becomes incomprehensible. Why did Wacko Jacko make a posting about "Political timing" and then ramble on about mangoes? Effectively, people who have gone off topic are rewarded and are able to colonise the discussion. It would be better for people who have gone off on a tangent to start their own discussion with a new heading, rather than taking over Wacko Jacko's section. Simply because other people want to discuss political timing, does not mean that mangoes are unimportant.-- Jack Upland ( talk) 09:09, 5 January 2020 (UTC)
Could someone summarize if this discussion actually led to any change? Thx CapnZapp ( talk) 15:38, 21 March 2020 (UTC)
Your feedback is requested at Talk:Great Chinese Famine#Proposed rollback to April 14 in connection with dispute resolution and proper use of Talk pages. Thank you. Mathglot ( talk) 19:45, 24 April 2020 (UTC)
This page contains our guidance on collapsing off-topic talk page discussion, part of which currently reads These templates should not be used by involved parties to end a discussion over the objections of other editors.
I propose that it be changed to These templates should not be added or removed by involved parties to end or restore prominence to a discussion over the objections of other editors.
The rationale is that it is best to have uninvolved editors judging whether or not a discussion is off-topic, and that this should apply both ways. Just as an editor who doesn't like a thread isn't allowed to curtail it by collapsing it over others' objections, an editor who insists on perpetuating a discussion everyone else agrees is off-topic should not be allowed to keep it prominent by un-collapsing it. I think this largely reflects current de-facto practice. Note that this guideline does allow editors to continue commenting in a collapsed thread if they want, and this proposal will not change that.
Sdkb (
talk)
22:43, 11 March 2020 (UTC)
Well, since you made a bold edit, and User:EEng reverted you, and you brought up the issue her on talk, the next step is for him to explain his reasons why. If he doesn't, and no-one else objects, feel free to simply reinstate your changes. It's too early for the support/oppose game. CapnZapp ( talk) 08:28, 12 March 2020 (UTC)
Your idea of what is off topic may differ from what others think is off topic, so be sure to err on the side of caution– the question often becomes clear only with continued discussion. E Eng 13:52, 12 March 2020 (UTC)
These templates should not be used to end a discussion over the objections of other editors? Or
"Don't edit war over collapsing or hiding comments"? Specifying a default rule, e.g., "In case of a dispute over hiding comments that you can't resolve through discussion, it's usually better to err on the side of leaving comments visible", might help. But it might be unnecessary, too. WhatamIdoing ( talk) 20:12, 29 April 2020 (UTC)
These templates should not be used to end or restore prominence to a discussion over the objections of other editors.Would that address your concerns? {{u| Sdkb}} talk 21:15, 30 April 2020 (UTC)
@ WhatamIdoing: It would be through removing that template. (and I'm happy to ping or not ping, just lmk your preference) {{u| Sdkb}} talk 01:09, 1 May 2020 (UTC)
These templates should not be added or removed by involved parties to end or restore prominence to a discussion over the objections of other editors.And the idea isn't that it's never okay to uncollapse comments (I agree with you that in borderline cases, uncollapsing should be the default), but rather that the community should be able to clerk itself when needed. That's the "over the objections of other editors" at the end. {{u| Sdkb}} talk 01:56, 1 May 2020 (UTC)
"Don't edit war". Do we need to re-state the normal rule in this context? WhatamIdoing ( talk) 22:31, 2 May 2020 (UTC)