Help talk:Notifications/Archive 8
Read notificationsI can't seem to see my cross-wiki notifications unless I have unread notifications on that wiki. So I wind up keeping unread notifications around to avoid losing the ability to refer to the notifications I have already read. I'd honestly rather turn off the distinction between read and unread notifications. Could you add a "Other wikis with read notifications" link or some such? HLHJ (talk) 01:08, 22 October 2018 (UTC) Re-reading this report, is seems less than clear. Example: I get lots of en-wiki notifications, but rarely anything from the nl-wiki. Someone notifies me from nl, and I read it but have no time to respond. A day later I go to my notifications list and cannot find any way to access that read nl-wiki notification. If I get a second nl-wiki notification, I can go to that, select "all" or "unread", and see my first nl-wiki notification, but I'd better remember to leave at least one of the messages flagged as unread if I don't want to lose access again. HLHJ (talk) 18:26, 22 October 2018 (UTC)
Triggering events: RevertsSection Alerts says, that a notification is generated: Edit reverts: When one of your edits is reverted, or "rolled back", by another user, but this isn't clear. Is the notification the result of clicking the "undo" (or "roll back") link? Is it a consequence of the prepopulated undo text which links the user's contributions and Talk page? If a user reverts a previous edit manually without clicking an undo link but imitates a typical Undo edit summary withe the Contributions and talk user links, is an alert generated? If a user clicks the undo link, but removes all wikilinks in the edit summary, is an alert generated? Mathglot (talk) 00:48, 29 December 2018 (UTC)
Notification in edit summaryMy reading of WP:Notifications#Alerts and the page it links to (mw:Mentions in edit summary) is that if User:A edits an article and includes "[[User:B]]" in the edit summary, then User:B will receive a notification, assuming they haven't disabled it in their preferences. The documentation states that a talk page notification needs to be signed, but no such requirement is mentioned for an edit summary. I experimented with diff which shows an unsigned edit to an article with a mention of a user in the edit summary. From the discussion here, that notification was not received. What's going on? Is there something in the documentation that I missed or is the documentation lacking a key point? Johnuniq (talk) 00:48, 26 January 2019 (UTC)
Why aren't alerts provided when posts are made to a user subpage?My question relates to this post of mine at the Teahouse where I normally answer other people's queries, rather than seek help myself. But today I am stuck. I am not receiving alerts when another user posts on the talk page of a sub-page of my own userpage (see User talk:Nick Moyes/Adoption/Clovermoss), and I find this very restricting. Is there a way to resolve this, or does this Phabricator ticket mean the issue is known about, but has been pushed into the long grass? How can I best get this issue picked up and addressed? And shouldn't this page make it clear that web-based alerts are only generated for edits made by others to one's main user page/talk page, and not to any sub-pages that may have been created? Nick Moyes (talk) 02:10, 17 February 2019 (UTC)
Requested move 26 May 2019
The result of the move request was: Moved, including subpages. Wikipedia:Notifications/Thanks is waiting for unprotection, and a move to Help:Thanks should be discussed further. (closed by non-admin page mover) Danski454 (talk) 21:17, 6 June 2019 (UTC) Wikipedia:Notifications → Help:Notifications – Per Wikipedia:Help namespace,
Pings not working as of 1 June 2019I checked it with {{U}} here, and using [[User]] here, neither of them seem to have given a ping to User:Winged Blades of Godric. Another user pinged me here, which wasn't received by me either. I wonder if anybody else has seen the issue? -- Kautilya3 (talk) 09:13, 1 June 2019 (UTC)
"View changes" link doesn't mark as readThe "View changes" link in a notification item, of which only one example is shown in our example image (File:Notifications-Flyout-Screenshot-08-10-2013-Cropped.png), lacks the Is there a good reason for this? I assume that it's meant to allow the user to copy a "clean" diff link not polluted by the Was this design choice already discussed somewhere? I've looked through the archives of this talk page but haven't really checked the corresponding places on m: or mw:. --SoledadKabocha (talk) 22:05, 7 July 2019 (UTC) Welcome to Wikipedia pop-upIt used to be that when an IP_address contributor edits an article / Talk page, a pop-up would occasionally (perhaps the first time Wikipedia saw that browser session or that IP_address?) appear saying: Welcome to Wikipedia Anyone can edit, and every improvement helps. Thank you for helping the world discover more! and to get rid of it the user would need to Go Back with their browser and navigate to the Edit form again. Very recently (in the last week, perhaps?) this pop-up obstructs the user every time they arrive at the edit form; navigating Back and Forward does not clear it. Plug-in developers and users alike have loathed pop-ups for over twenty years now so it's very surprising Wikipedia makes use of such an obnoxious mechanism for such a fruitless purpose. Somehow all my pop-up blockers are unable to protect the edit form page from this nuisance. After searching online how to block this pop-up, this page seemed like the best place to ask. 49.180.76.15 (talk) 10:10, 10 July 2019 (UTC)
DYK bugCould someone take a look at some concerns at DYK about the notification system? You can find it at Wikipedia talk:Did you know#Bug involving being pinged or pinging other editors when archiving nominations and I think it has to do with this edit. Wug·a·po·des 23:01, 17 August 2019 (UTC)
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This edit request has been answered. Set the |answered= or |ans= parameter to no to reactivate your request. |
Please consider giving the Help:Notifications page a disambiguation hatnote similar to one below.
or
96.244.220.178 (talk) 05:22, 29 November 2020 (UTC)
{{on hold}} - More information required I'm not seeing a connection between the word "notifications" or "notification" and the concept of "disambiguation." Can you clarify why a hatnote like this would be helpful enough to warrant using?- Speaking of "notifications" if you were logged in, I could use the "notification" system to leave you an alert. But since I {{ping}}'ing an IP address doesn't give the notification, I didn't bother. I mean, the @-sign will show up if I do, but that's not all that useful without the "notification" aspect.
- davidwr/(talk)/(contribs) 15:58, 29 November 2020 (UTC) First paragraph struck, see below. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs) 18:10, 29 November 2020 (UTC)
- @Davidwr: I think the IP editor is referring to the fact that the link WP:MENTION redirects here; which could be confused with WP:DABMENTION (or MOS:DABMENTION, which is the shortcut listed at the target section) and/or WP:Mention of wiki in articles - both of which also have the word "mention" in them. Seagull123 Φ 17:05, 29 November 2020 (UTC)
- (edit conflict) The request is about clearing up possible confusion between WP:MENTION and WP:DABMENTION. I am not opposed to this hatnote, but are these really confusable? WP:MENTION has a total of 10 clicks per month. – Thjarkur (talk) 17:07, 29 November 2020 (UTC)
- In light of the comments above, I'm ambivalent on this. I don't want to say "no" outright, but I don't want to say "of course, let me do that for you" without more discussion. While I recommend allowing at least a day for other comments, if another editor wants to make this change, I won't revert it. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs) 18:10, 29 November 2020 (UTC)
- @davidwr, Seagull123 , and Thjarkur:
- Sorry for the delayed response.
- Even if i don't get my hatnote, thank you for acknowledging and considering my request, and being polite about it. i've seen requests and suggestions (my own and others') ignored, and i've seen them rejected in rather hurtful ways.
- i was looking for WP:DABMENTION, but i thought the shortcut was WP:MENTION. That i found someplace i'd previously seen the link i wanted was more by luck than skill with a search box. The search box suggested wp:mention of wiki in articles, and i just figured, "why not?" (although i'm not sure if "wp:partial title matches" supports or opposes the idea).
- i don't know what pinging looks like for logged in users, but i got a line of bold text highlighted in yellow at the top of Wikipedia telling me i had a new message and linking to my talk page. User:Seagull123 probably had to go out of the way to send me that notification, though, so thanks for that. (i don't think i've tried pinging more than once or twice before, and pretty sure i did it wrong, but i imagine you get used to it so it's easy to do... if you're pinging a registered user.)
- 96.244.220.178 (talk) 06:51, 2 December 2020 (UTC)
It's been more than a week, so I'm going to make a judgment call and decline the request. People looking for the dab page will probably know to put "DAB" in their search. WP:Mention of wiki in articles basically never gets used. ◢ Ganbaruby! (Say hi!) 16:24, 11 December 2020 (UTC)
Alerts about failed attempts
Not sure if this is the right place, but yesterday and today, I have received over a hundred alerts about failed attempts to log in. At the beginning, when a dozen or so were showing, it concerned me, and I changed my password, but it seemed like this led to even more alerts. (Or maybe it didn't matter.) See screenshot here. Any idea what is going on, and what to do to address it? Erik (talk | contrib) (ping me) 15:24, 9 January 2021 (UTC)
- I have also been receiving these "multiple failed attempts" notifications, both yesterday and today. See the related discussions here: Wikipedia:Bureaucrats' noticeboard#Advice? Someone's trying to brute-force my account and Wikipedia:Village pump (technical)#Obvious attempts at bruteforcing my password not being prevented. Some1 (talk) 16:07, 9 January 2021 (UTC)
Ping from doppelganger account
A few times my username gets miscapitalised. Is it possible for me to create a doppelganger account for this and get any pings sent to it to come to my main account? AIRcorn (talk) 04:05, 12 January 2021 (UTC)
- (i) yes; (ii) no. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 15:08, 12 January 2021 (UTC)
- @Aircorn: The doppelganger could enable email for mentions at Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-echo. PrimeHunter (talk) 16:28, 12 January 2021 (UTC)
- I think it's less an issue of miscapitalization but of copying the wrong capitalization from your signature? In that case the easier thing to do is to make the capitalization of your signature same as the actual username. As Redrose64 said, you cannot forward notification to another account, so the alt account would not really do what you want here. – Ammarpad (talk) 06:34, 13 January 2021 (UTC)
- You could also use
text-transform:uppercase
in your signature: Aircorn (talk). It copy-pastes as Aircorn and says Aircon in the wikitext but doesn't help if users manually type AIRcorn. PrimeHunter (talk) 08:55, 13 January 2021 (UTC) - Even when there is no change of capitalisation between the true username and that displayed in the signature, some people will still get it wrong. I blame manual typing, rather than copy&paste: a number of times I've seen edits in my watchlist containing @RedRose64: which didn't notify me (of course) - I have never capitalised the second R; in fact I used two small R when I first registered, not realising that the first would be automatically capitalised. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 16:18, 13 January 2021 (UTC)
- Comment: There are a surprising number of editors (I don't mean you) whose displayed username differs considerably from their actual username. It can be quite the pain in the arse to trawl the actual wikicode in the editor to find out their actual user names. It would really help if policy dictated that what you see is what you get. Yes, Wikipedia would be a slightly less fun place, but it would make it much easier when you want to summarize a discussion for example, and want to courtesy-ping all major contributors. CapnZapp (talk) 10:55, 24 October 2021 (UTC)
- You could also use
- I think it's less an issue of miscapitalization but of copying the wrong capitalization from your signature? In that case the easier thing to do is to make the capitalization of your signature same as the actual username. As Redrose64 said, you cannot forward notification to another account, so the alt account would not really do what you want here. – Ammarpad (talk) 06:34, 13 January 2021 (UTC)
- @Aircorn: The doppelganger could enable email for mentions at Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-echo. PrimeHunter (talk) 16:28, 12 January 2021 (UTC)
- Thanks all. Since it is not possible I will just change my signature. Aircorn (talk) 22:26, 13 January 2021 (UTC)
find out if your attempt to ping somebody succeeded or failed?
I am not asking you here for the answer.
I am suggesting this Help page should ask and answer this rather basic question on the page itself (not here on Talk).
Even if the answer is "there's no way to know if you formatted your ping attempt correctly" with the explanation "privacy prevents you from being able to check whether a notification was sent; you can only view your own notifications".
(This latter part is just my best guess, not objective truth. But. How about I don't need to piece together the puzzle, and instead have the Help page tell us all what really gives? :)
Regards, CapnZapp (talk) 10:51, 24 October 2021 (UTC)
- @CapnZapp: At Preferences → Notifications, enable both "Failed mentions" and "Successful mentions". For some reason, these only work for mentions in wikitext, not in edit summaries. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 20:47, 24 October 2021 (UTC)
- Thank you. However, I was thinking about instances where you try to reach a "correct" user, but fail to create the proper wiki coding. For instance, allow me to fail to reach you Redrose64 in my next edit. CapnZapp (talk) 12:12, 25 October 2021 (UTC)
- Here I am discussing with User:Redrose64 but will intentionally fail to sign my post. Cheers CapnZapp
- Unless I'm mistaken there is no way to get a heads-up about this. More to the point: the help page does not discuss it either way. Cheers from a properly signing CapnZapp (talk) 12:15, 25 October 2021 (UTC)
- Thank you. However, I was thinking about instances where you try to reach a "correct" user, but fail to create the proper wiki coding. For instance, allow me to fail to reach you Redrose64 in my next edit. CapnZapp (talk) 12:12, 25 October 2021 (UTC)
Notified without mention
This edit by Mathglot (talk · contribs) notified me with:
but should not have done, because the edit summary contains no links other than the section name. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 17:28, 8 November 2021 (UTC)
- @Redrose64:, actually you were mentioned in the summary: mouse over the punct at the end of the sentence, or see here. It's a bit of a stealth ping that I use on occasion when I forget to notify someone previously in the body of the page, or I need to repair an incorrect notification, and follow up with an unobtrusive ping in the edit summary without encumbering the rendered page history forever with the name of an editor who might not want it having such prominence there. Sharp eyes to even notice this, though! Mathglot (talk) 18:12, 8 November 2021 (UTC) updated to fix a word; by Mathglot (talk) 20:00, 8 November 2021 (UTC)
- OK, Thank you --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 19:18, 8 November 2021 (UTC)
- No problem; happy editing! Mathglot (talk) 20:04, 8 November 2021 (UTC)
- This is genius. –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 19:34, 2 December 2021 (UTC)
- OK, Thank you --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 19:18, 8 November 2021 (UTC)
A useful notification
If the system of notifications is still being improved, please consider this suggestion: recently an editor, acting in good faith and unbeknownst to me, prematurely moved a draft from my user space to article space.[5] It would have been useful if a notification had been sent to me and I think it would be prudent in all cases where a user moves a user subpage from another's user space if the user hosting the subpage was notified. Thank you.--John Cline (talk) 05:40, 2 December 2021 (UTC)
- @John Cline: I've filed phab:T296955 to contain this idea and link to related requests. The Notifications extension is not currently being actively worked on by a specific team at the Foundation, but adding a new notification-type can hypothetically be done by any volunteer-developer (AFAIK). Hope that helps. Quiddity (WMF) (talk) 17:58, 2 December 2021 (UTC)
- It helps greatly, that you've given of your time to answer, and endorse this as potentially worthwhile. Best regards and be well.--John Cline (talk) 21:29, 2 December 2021 (UTC)
Semi protected edit request
This edit request has been answered. Set the |answered= or |ans= parameter to no to reactivate your request. |
In Help:Notifications#Toolbar icons:
The first badge (red, "alerts") contains most more important notification types: new messages on your talk page, mentions, etc.
172.112.210.32 (talk) 04:10, 5 December 2021 (UTC)
- Done Thank you, - FlightTime (open channel) 04:14, 5 December 2021 (UTC)
Notifications for links to pages you didn't create
Is there a way to receive a notification when someone links to a page you didn't create? There are a couple I didn't create but contributed significantly on and it would be nice to be notified. DiscantX 00:15, 23 December 2021 (UTC)
- Seconding that. It would be really good if there were a way to set your preferences on a page-by-page basis. I've created a large number of disambiguation pages and I find it annoying to get notified each time someone is foolish enough to link to one or another of them. – Uanfala (talk) 00:35, 23 December 2021 (UTC)
- @Uanfala Opt-out is possible to do already! Two possible methods: (1) click the "..." link within the notification itself, which will then show a button for "Mute link notifications for 'pagename'", (2) type in the names of pages in the box at the bottom of Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-echo. Hope that helps! Quiddity (WMF) (talk) 20:17, 23 December 2021 (UTC)
- Whoa, so obvious and I have missed it! Thanks! – Uanfala (talk) 22:16, 23 December 2021 (UTC)
- @Uanfala Opt-out is possible to do already! Two possible methods: (1) click the "..." link within the notification itself, which will then show a button for "Mute link notifications for 'pagename'", (2) type in the names of pages in the box at the bottom of Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-echo. Hope that helps! Quiddity (WMF) (talk) 20:17, 23 December 2021 (UTC)
- @DiscantX That is not currently possible. There's a feature-request for it at phab:T66090 (I've added mention of this new thread). Quiddity (WMF) (talk) 20:13, 23 December 2021 (UTC)
- @Quiddity (WMF) Thanks for the response and for adding the mention. Cheers, DiscantX 05:12, 25 December 2021 (UTC)
Section on syntax of ping to be added?
I am a casual editor on WM (and often focus on other things heavily for extended periods). So I know about ping, but would need a place to look to refresh about exact syntax of use (like in a refference manual). I looked in the article and into FAQ (not reading through, but skimming and with page search of browser), and failed to find an example of ping usage.
For a new user (or such as me) either a section of a referrence to help article on ping template could be welcome, if it doesn't exist yet; if it exists it might need to be made more "findable". If I encounter this info now, I'll add, if not, help of others would be welcome. --Marjan Tomki SI (talk) 11:47, 29 January 2022 (UTC)
- To find the info I needed I had to trace through a request for deletion of ping template discussion in archives, and through Help:Fixing failed pings, which was not very direct path. It seems {{ping}} template is a shortcut for {{reply to}} template, and this link to it's documentation includes syntax. I propose this (or better) link to be included in the article. --Marjan Tomki SI (talk) 13:02, 29 January 2022 (UTC)
- Additional info is, that what to me comes as "syntax" in doc on link above is in section Template:Reply to/doc#Usage. --Marjan Tomki SI (talk) 13:29, 29 January 2022 (UTC)
- @Marjan Tomki SI: That's normal for Wikipedia template documentation - we are an encyclopedia for everybody, not just computer programmers. So we use everyday language, not geekspeak. Indeed, if you create a documentation page for a template that doesn't already have one, it's pre-filled from Template:Documentation/preload which explicitly includes the heading "Usage". --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 23:15, 29 January 2022 (UTC)
- @Redrose64: Thanks for comment, but the problem was that I followed a sizable link sequence from search for ping (which defaulted to search in WP articles, with more than one chunk of 500 interesting, but not relevant at that moment, hits) to Help:Notifications.
- I modified search to look into WP help only, and got 3 hits, of which one was "Help:Notifications (redirect from Ping)" here, where I found (and still find) no Usage section.
- That's why I tried to search for alternative terms, of which one was syntax (which came from my early linguistics training around Latin, not programmese, a couple of decades before first of programming languages - and even more before several formal language(s) of mathematics, and even more before the idea about general and interdisciplinary theory of languages - entered my language set).
- It might be usefull to add a Usage section to Help:Notifications, with at least link to Template:Reply to, where I did find usefull (for the problem of the time) Usage section.
- I might be bold, but I chose not to act boldly when I am aware I am not competent yet about consequences and conventions, so I first propose here on this talk page
- what was the problem and
- what change might help aleviate it,
- and expect somebody already had a better solution I can be notified about ;-). --Marjan Tomki SI (talk) 17:56, 8 February 2022 (UTC)
- The template is named
{{reply to}}
and unfortunately{{ping}}
is a redirect to it. I say "unfortunately" because one thing that the template doesn't do is to perform a ping. The term "ping" became a buzzword some time ago, used by people who either misunderstood its real meaning, or didn't know that it had one. What the{{reply to}}
template does is to create a link to a Wikipedian's user page, preceded by an at-sign and followed by a colon, all wrapped in a<span class="template-ping">...</span>
. That's all - and don't be misled by that span element, it does nothing; so all that there really is a fancied-up link. - For a "mention"-type notification to be sent to a user, either of two things must be done:
- you make a post in which three things must all occur in the same edit: (i) one or more new lines of text are added to the page, any one of which must (ii) contain a link to the user page of the person to be notified, and (iii) end in your own signature as generated by signing with four tildes. I've done that with this edit, and here is the link that will trigger the notification.
- you place a link to the user page of the person to be notified in an edit summary
- The common factor is the link to the intended recipient's user page. No templates are necessary in either case, although they are often used for the first. Indeed, the
{{reply to}}
template was created after the notifications feature went live in 2013. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 20:26, 8 February 2022 (UTC)- @Redrose64:Thanks for nice and concise info about template.
- @ping: this word, and connected contexts where it is used, are a lot broader; and ping (and synonims) have different meanings in each, and area of that is heavily interdisciplinary (let's leave that aside for now). Internet ping you assumed relevant in this case was named after naval sonar ping (as I suppose you knew), which was etymologicaly onomatopoetic.
- But here IMO pager ping meaning was used (also onomatopoetic, now mostly but not completly,replaced by SMS on portable - inlcuding pre-"smart" - phones). It's primary function was to just attract attention to something. If I were calling attention to a piece of discussion to several (including not yet involved) people, not only the person I was possibly replying to only, linguistic asociation to replying to everyone would be wrong, because you can't reply to somebody that hadn't already communicated with you. Even when one has, you might initiate a new discussion, possibly on new topic, and that is really not a reply also. That's probably why ping buzzword is used so often, and in those meanings, IMO, correctly.
- The problem I am addressing here is of possibly modifying contents of Help in such a way that info on {{reply to}} (usage - how to do it, not only when it is applicaple or how it works) can be found easily and intuitively for next novice searchers.
- Now I also found all relevant info in WP:MENTION; which redirects to correct part of this help article, but seems less than useful (for a novice; IMO adding examples of use would help, or link to Template:Reply to/doc#Usage where expamples exist; and for reasons of search problems mentioned above with word Usage somewhere nearby). In my cse, I had to make several unsuccesfull tries first (e.g. {{ping|talk:User}} and {{ping|[[talk:User]]}} didn't work for reasons that became obvious after testing, but were not after reading relevant section of help initially).
- That section also wasn't found easily. When this help article was shown in search (see above), I also had to read Help:Notifications article through focused to find relevant section WP:MENTION; when only skimming it I missed mentions of ping and reply to templates completly, and while doing focused reading this article of course I had to dismiss from focus of my mind what I did when I encountered "minor" problem of how to correctly use ping/reply to. Also, for a regular editor {{template}} symbols and their meaning are obvious, for a novice are not (and link to explanation of that might be usefull).
- Does already exist something like referrence manual for such things? Or something on that in FAQ? And either in a way that search would find and show exact topic in article (not whole help article only like here, but Mention section in particular)? If this is not the place to discuss that, where to address it? Some project about help? --Marjan Tomki SI (talk) 06:56, 11 February 2022 (UTC)
- @Redrose64:Thanks for nice and concise info about template.
- The template is named
- @Marjan Tomki SI: That's normal for Wikipedia template documentation - we are an encyclopedia for everybody, not just computer programmers. So we use everyday language, not geekspeak. Indeed, if you create a documentation page for a template that doesn't already have one, it's pre-filled from Template:Documentation/preload which explicitly includes the heading "Usage". --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 23:15, 29 January 2022 (UTC)
- Additional info is, that what to me comes as "syntax" in doc on link above is in section Template:Reply to/doc#Usage. --Marjan Tomki SI (talk) 13:29, 29 January 2022 (UTC)
signature-ping bug
if all the links in your signature are lowercase (e.g. [[user:theleekycauldron|theleekycauldron]] ([[user talk:theleekycauldron|talk]] • [[special:contributions/theleekycauldron|contribs]]) (she/[[singular they|they]])
), the ping won't work, which is kinda annoying because i'd rather the links in the source of my signature all be lowercase. theleekycauldron (talk • contribs) (she/they) 21:07, 19 May 2022 (UTC)
Notification methods
According to the introduction/lede a user can be mentioned to their user page by making an edit with a link to their user page in 7 ways. It doesn't explain how their effects differ depending on which is used. Mcljlm (talk) 23:48, 19 November 2022 (UTC)
- @Mcljlm: They all have the same effect and they all work by making a link to the user page. Six of them just use a template to make the link. Many other templates can be used but those are some of the most common. PrimeHunter (talk) 23:58, 19 November 2022 (UTC)
- @PrimeHunter: Since they all have the same effect why are there so many rather than just one? Mcljlm (talk) 11:03, 20 November 2022 (UTC)
- Three of them display differently. By same effect I mean they make the same notification. The other three are redirects with shorter names. PrimeHunter (talk) 11:32, 20 November 2022 (UTC)
- Notifications are not generated by templates. They are generated by making a new, signed, post that contains a link (a normal wikilink and not an external link) to somebody else's user page, for example this link User:Mcljlm will trigger a notification to you. How that link is made is irrelevant, and we have had templates that make user links for years before the notifications feature was introduced. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 11:36, 20 November 2022 (UTC)
- @PrimeHunter: Since they all have the same effect why are there so many rather than just one? Mcljlm (talk) 11:03, 20 November 2022 (UTC)
Unregistered users
There should be mention of whether/how unregistered users are notified. A link to WP:THEYCANTHEARYOU in the "see also" section perhaps? Or maybe even a new section? Throast {{ping}} me! (talk | contribs) 21:17, 19 February 2023 (UTC)
- @Throast: They're not notified. The second paragraph (beginning
Notifications are displayed to the right of the username ...
) shows that the notifications are shown for logged-in users. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 23:53, 19 February 2023 (UTC)- Redrose64, well, that's not true, they do receive talk page notifications ("Peach bar of doom"). To me, this seems important to note. Throast {{ping}} me! (talk | contribs) 23:58, 19 February 2023 (UTC)
- Those don't go through the WP:ECHO system though. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 00:17, 20 February 2023 (UTC)
- Redrose64, I see. Still, I think a link to the "Peach bar of doom" in the "see also" section along with a short note or a sentence under Help:Notifications#Messages on your talk page, which already addresses the "orange bar of doom" for registered users, wouldn't hurt. Intuitively, I assume this is the first page users would come to to get more info on this, and currently, the issue is basically completely unaddressed. I've been registered for almost 10 years and had to ask at the Teahouse because I couldn't find any useful information. Throast {{ping}} me! (talk | contribs) 00:40, 20 February 2023 (UTC)
- Those don't go through the WP:ECHO system though. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 00:17, 20 February 2023 (UTC)
- Redrose64, well, that's not true, they do receive talk page notifications ("Peach bar of doom"). To me, this seems important to note. Throast {{ping}} me! (talk | contribs) 23:58, 19 February 2023 (UTC)
Templates triggering notification
Recently in an AN/I thread that didn't directly link the subject of discussion, I dropped a {{userlinks}} template in as a courtesy for anyone who wanted a one-click to that users' pages/specials/logs. The originator of the thread thought I was trying to ping that user and it got me wondering so I dug a little into this a bit. There's a ton of templates out there that link to users, so Is the template list on this page exhaustive? In other words, this help article posits using [[User:Example]], {{u|Example}}, {{User|Example}}, {{user link|Example}}, {{ping|Example}}, {{Yo|Example}}, or {{reply to|Example}}
as templates that deliver notifications to the linked users, are these the only templates? If not, is there an exhaustive list somewhere? GabberFlasted (talk) 18:31, 18 April 2023 (UTC)
- This is a common misconception. There are no templates that generate notifications. Notifications are triggered by a new post that includes a link to somebody else's user page and your signature, and all three must occur in the same edit. The link to somebody else's user page might be template-generated, and the
{{userlinks}}
template does precisely that, as evidenced by this:{{userlinks|GabberFlasted}}
yields GabberFlasted (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) which will trigger a notification because it makes a link to your page, it's in a new post, and I signed it. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 20:10, 18 April 2023 (UTC)- Ahh so it is. Thank you very much for your time and thank you for clearing this up. That's very good to know moving forward. GabberFlasted (talk) 11:07, 19 April 2023 (UTC)
Delete specific notifications from notification log
Hello,
I have a problem where I am unable to delete certain notifications from my notification list, even after checking them. The specific notification was just someone being unnecessarily rude, but it’s become an eyesore every time I check my Wikipedia notifications. Is it possible to delete this (specifically on mobile)? Thank you.
NOTE: Please forgive me if this is outlined somewhere already and I missed it, I am relatively new to Wikipedia and still learning the ins and outs of it.
Dantus21 (talk) 01:45, 8 July 2023 (UTC)
- Hello @Dantus21
- I'm sorry you had such a bad experience.
- Thank you for reporting it.
- At the moment, the only way to make a given notification disappearing is to get more notifications. These new notifications will "push" the unpleasant one to the "All notifications" menu. Only the last 25 notifications are visible on mobile.
- I know it is not the solution you expected, and I'm truly sorry that I can't provide a better solution. Your report of this need is now documented, and it will help us to improve the experience for everyone.
- Trizek_(WMF) (talk) 15:11, 11 July 2023 (UTC)
- Thank you so much!!!! It’s unfortunate that there’s no option to delete notifications yet, but I greatly appreciate your efforts to have this fixed. As for the rude message itself, thankfully it has been buried as I have started a requested move and rfc with many replies, so I am good for now. I must say again though, thank you so much for your kindness! You embody the spirit of what Wikipedia should be! Dantus21 (talk) 00:21, 12 July 2023 (UTC)
- Thank you for your kind words. Trizek_(WMF) (talk) 13:00, 12 July 2023 (UTC)
- Thank you so much!!!! It’s unfortunate that there’s no option to delete notifications yet, but I greatly appreciate your efforts to have this fixed. As for the rude message itself, thankfully it has been buried as I have started a requested move and rfc with many replies, so I am good for now. I must say again though, thank you so much for your kindness! You embody the spirit of what Wikipedia should be! Dantus21 (talk) 00:21, 12 July 2023 (UTC)
It's the icon that looks like a _ _ _ _ _ !
Could someone tell me what the Notice badge icon is actually intended to represent?
I'm giving a presentation on Wikipedia shortly, and realise I don't know how to describe its shape. (I can't find anything in the talk archives, and I've always regarded it as an OKI321 dot matrix printer ribbon, or a VHS video tape, but I doubt either is correct.)
Any thoughts (before I make a complete fool of myself) might be rather welcome! Nick Moyes (talk) 10:51, 13 August 2023 (UTC)
- A stylized image of an inbox, I think. The icon may have progressed from something like to to that as designers moved from skeuomorphism to flat design. Anomie⚔ 11:46, 13 August 2023 (UTC)
- Aah! That does make sense as to its origins. Thank you.
- I'll just have to refer to it as "that little, square intray-shaped thingy" Nick Moyes (talk) 08:43, 14 August 2023 (UTC)
- It's a TV set. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 21:58, 14 August 2023 (UTC)
Eternal new message notice
The "You have a new message (last change)." notice refuses to go away, no matter what I try, e.g. forcing reload on the Talk page multiple times. --2001:1C06:19CA:D600:96F5:4FF9:C05A:7509 (talk) 16:20, 26 August 2023 (UTC)
- Finally gone now; took about 24 or so hours for it to disappear. (Because my IP changed...) --2001:1C06:19CA:D600:9D50:8AC6:F15B:DCE9 (talk) 05:22, 27 August 2023 (UTC)
- This has been reported to the developers at phab:T345031. -- John of Reading (talk) 16:53, 27 August 2023 (UTC)
Admin notifications
Is there an expectation that admins should have notifications enabled / respond to them? Is there a policy about this? Schwede66 09:21, 4 September 2023 (UTC)
- @Schwede66 the relevant policy is WP:ADMINACCT. The relevant part reads
Administrators are expected to respond promptly and civilly to queries about their Wikipedia-related conduct and administrative actions, especially during community discussions on noticeboards or during Arbitration Committee proceedings. Administrators should justify their actions when requested.
Notifications are not mentioned in the policy but email is,While best practices are for administrators to have email enabled, they are not required to enable or reply to email.
Various places require editors (not just administrators) to be made aware when they are the subject of a discussion, and it is always taken that a message on their talkpage fulfils this requirement but a ping does not necessarily do so. Accordingly I would say the spirit is that administrators are not required to have notifications enabled. Thryduulf (talk) 19:56, 10 October 2023 (UTC)- There is no rule that admins have to react to pings, but I would still expect any active admin to either have notifications enabled or to watch and follow closely all noticeboards and talk pages where they could reasonable expect pings. There are enough situations where we are not discussing an admin's actions, but would still like their advice (say, we'd like to hear from the admin who unblocked Editor A last year in a later discussion about sanctions for A). At the least, admins who turn off pings should clearly state this on their user page to avoid/explain pings going missing. —Kusma (talk) 21:04, 10 October 2023 (UTC)
- Thanks, Thryduulf. Schwede66 21:54, 10 October 2023 (UTC)
HELP
MY NOTIFICATIONS BELL HAS A ONE ON IT BUT WHEN I CLICK ON IT NOTHING NEW SHOWS UP. THE ONLY THINGS SHOWING UP ARE PAST MESSAGES! Justyouraveragelechuga talk 17:25, 3 January 2023 (UTC)
- Justyouraveragelechuga: YOU PROBABLY GOT A NOTIFICATION ON ANOTHER WIKI. THERE IS NO NEED FOR THIS CAPITALIZATION. CLYDE TALK TO ME/STUFF DONE (please mention me on reply) 23:21, 5 May 2023 (UTC)
- ClydeFranklin: I am seeing the same thing as Justyouraveragelechuga (thanks for your reply). How would I find whatever other wiki might have triggered the notification, and how would I interact with it to remove the "1"? Also, I don't recall making another account elsewhere. Was one created automatically? If so, why? Was there perhaps a "create accounts in all these wikis" box I might have checked or left checked?
- Also, as best I can see, both my "Your alerts" bell and my "Your notices" in-tray appear to link to the same URL, Special:Notifications. I wonder if that's normal? If so, then what is the difference between both icon-links, and why do we have both? (It's not a ¿Por qué no los dos? in-joke, or is it?) I do note that they don't both have the "1", so apparently their subscripted counter state can differ. Curiouser and curiouser. ReadOnlyAccount (talk) 04:43, 15 October 2023 (UTC)
- @ReadOnlyAccount: Whilst the ultimate link is to Special:Notifications, clicking the icon (not the link) triggers some Javascript that filters what Special:Notifications returns. The two icons apply fifferent filters, so should return different results. Try both. One (or both) of them may have an entry in the list showing text like "More alerts from 2 other wikis
Wikidata and Simple English Wikipedia
View 2 alerts". If you click on the "View 2 alerts" it will expand to provide further entries. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 08:14, 15 October 2023 (UTC)- @Redrose64: I do not see different results between clicking on the in-tray or bell. I also do not see anything like "More alerts from other wikis". I have found a setting "Cross-wiki notifications – Show notifications from other wikis" in Preferences, and disabling that makes the "1" disappear. Re-ticking it brings back the "1". I do use the vector (NOT 2022) layout, which is essentially the reason I made this account. I may have modified some Global Preferences during or shortly after account creation, but I am unable to find anything that looks like it might have triggered this behaviour – which increasingly looks like a CSS bug. Am I in the right place asking for help with that? Should this be reported elsewhere? Justyouraveragelechuga's testimony suggests this is not just me, and that the issue is possibly reproducible in certain conditions, but I don't know the precise steps that would be required for others to reproduce the misbehaviour. I suppose one of the steps might be, you'd have to trigger an unread message from another wiki, but I don't know how to do that. Perhaps one way to try and reproduce might be to make a new account and then do what I did, which so far hasn't been very much. I see Justyouraveragelechuga has 598 edits as of this writing, so that's not a new account, meaning the bug is possibly not simply linked to that. Is there some other common factor? It can't be too common, or else this thread would be overrun by hundreds of users screaming about the same thing. ReadOnlyAccount (talk) 09:51, 15 October 2023 (UTC)
- I'll mention you at meta:, which should bump the counter on the bell icon. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 10:15, 15 October 2023 (UTC)
- Huh. Son of a gun. It did. It now says "2". So what does that mean, and where do I go from here? ReadOnlyAccount (talk) 12:05, 15 October 2023 (UTC)
- @ReadOnlyAccount: Your account is automatically created at Wikimedia wikis if you view any page while logged in. Special:CentralAuth/ReadOnlyAccount shows your accounts. If you visit each wiki then maybe you can see a notification when you hit the right wiki. Maybe it's the welcome message at fr:Discussion utilisateur:ReadOnlyAccount. I don't know why you don't see "More alerts from other wikis" here. It works for me. PrimeHunter (talk) 20:21, 15 October 2023 (UTC)
- Thank you for the information. Can the Special:CentralAuth/ReadOnlyAccount page be found and navigated to in some way that does not rely on users already knowing that URL or being told it and bookmarking it? Is that URL (or each user's version of it) linked and listed somewhere, so people can actually find and reach it on their own? Is it at all discoverable?
- I will note that automatic account creation elsewhere because I sign up here does not follow the principle of least surprise even if that's maybe mentioned in some red-tapey terms and conditions somewhere for legal CYA. This also sounds like a pretty CATCH-22ish quandary: I don't know what triggered the notification, and I cannot click through and see the notification. I could browse to random non-enwp wikis to see if it's maybe visible there, but you're effectively, implicitly saying visiting random wikis might trigger more unsolicited account creation with MORE notifications(!). If that's not usability hell or at least UI Design by Kafka™, then I don't know what is. No offence. I especially don't mean to have a go at helpful you, and I don't know whether or where else this oughta be reported, but I do know that this seems crazy to me. LSD-driven development, anyone?
- Like I mentioned above, I do of course realise that the "More alerts from other wikis" thing seems to work for most people, and that the bug only affects a subset of users. But I also know I'm not alone, because I'm not the original reporter – rather, when I came here to report this, I did find Justyouraveragelechuga had just done that. ReadOnlyAccount (talk) 13:46, 16 October 2023 (UTC)
- @ReadOnlyAccount: The English Wikipedia is one of the Wikimedia projects run by the Wikimedia Foundation. The projects have separate logs but a unified login system. I was here before that system and it's a great improvement. Before, you had to manually create an account everywhere of interest, e.g. another Wikipedia language, and choose a username and password. Your normal username might already be taken there. Passwords could be different at each project. "Contributions" (may be in a user icon menu at the top right depending on your preferences) goes to a page with links to your Special:CentralAuth page, both near the top on "global accounts" and at the bottom on "accounts". Going to other Wikimedia projects to look for a notification is definitely not how it's intended to work but was merely a suggestion when the intended method apparently fails for you for some reason. Maybe it would work in another browser. At least you only have 6 accounts. Special:CentralAuth/PrimeHunter shows 376. I thankfully never had to go through them to look for something. Special:CentralAuth/ReadOnlyAccount only shows accounts which have already been created so you will not create additional accounts or trigger more notifications by going there. At Special:SiteMatrix you could create around 1000 local accounts by clicking links. PrimeHunter (talk) 20:40, 16 October 2023 (UTC)
- Oh, so, wait, if I understand correctly, then I can not only safely go to Special:CentralAuth/ReadOnlyAccount but also can safely click on any of the links under "List of local accounts" w/o triggering more notifications? That's... not quite as kafkaesque. Still at best a workaround to buggy behaviour, but not really a CATCH-22 like I thought.
- Thanks for explaining how to find my Global account information page. Once you know where to click, Contributions – global accounts is just two degrees of Kevin Bacon.
- I still don't know exactly what the common factor is that I have in common with Justyouraveragelechuga and that causes people like us to not see the "More alerts from other wikis" thing (or a difference between the in-tray and the bell). I have also encountered more Notifications bugginess, but reporting that would probably require uploading some screenshots somewhere. Would it be appropriate to upload screenshots to Wikipedia purely for bug reporting? Not saying that I will get around to it, but I might.
- The Special:SiteMatrix thing looks wild. What does it mean if links are struck out or red, respectively? Is that explained anywhere? ReadOnlyAccount (talk) 15:07, 17 October 2023 (UTC)
- @ReadOnlyAccount: See Wikipedia:Bug reports and feature requests. Phabricator has its own system to attach a file to a bug report. What is your browser? Does it have JavaScript enabled? Have you tried another browser? Red at Special:SiteMatrix means non-existing, i.e. that project doesn't have a wiki in that language. Strikethrough means closed. There may still be visible pages but the wiki cannot be edited and you cannot log in or create an account. See more at mw:Extension:SiteMatrix. PrimeHunter (talk) 19:20, 17 October 2023 (UTC)
- @ReadOnlyAccount: The English Wikipedia is one of the Wikimedia projects run by the Wikimedia Foundation. The projects have separate logs but a unified login system. I was here before that system and it's a great improvement. Before, you had to manually create an account everywhere of interest, e.g. another Wikipedia language, and choose a username and password. Your normal username might already be taken there. Passwords could be different at each project. "Contributions" (may be in a user icon menu at the top right depending on your preferences) goes to a page with links to your Special:CentralAuth page, both near the top on "global accounts" and at the bottom on "accounts". Going to other Wikimedia projects to look for a notification is definitely not how it's intended to work but was merely a suggestion when the intended method apparently fails for you for some reason. Maybe it would work in another browser. At least you only have 6 accounts. Special:CentralAuth/PrimeHunter shows 376. I thankfully never had to go through them to look for something. Special:CentralAuth/ReadOnlyAccount only shows accounts which have already been created so you will not create additional accounts or trigger more notifications by going there. At Special:SiteMatrix you could create around 1000 local accounts by clicking links. PrimeHunter (talk) 20:40, 16 October 2023 (UTC)
- @ReadOnlyAccount: Your account is automatically created at Wikimedia wikis if you view any page while logged in. Special:CentralAuth/ReadOnlyAccount shows your accounts. If you visit each wiki then maybe you can see a notification when you hit the right wiki. Maybe it's the welcome message at fr:Discussion utilisateur:ReadOnlyAccount. I don't know why you don't see "More alerts from other wikis" here. It works for me. PrimeHunter (talk) 20:21, 15 October 2023 (UTC)
- Huh. Son of a gun. It did. It now says "2". So what does that mean, and where do I go from here? ReadOnlyAccount (talk) 12:05, 15 October 2023 (UTC)
- I'll mention you at meta:, which should bump the counter on the bell icon. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 10:15, 15 October 2023 (UTC)
- @Redrose64: I do not see different results between clicking on the in-tray or bell. I also do not see anything like "More alerts from other wikis". I have found a setting "Cross-wiki notifications – Show notifications from other wikis" in Preferences, and disabling that makes the "1" disappear. Re-ticking it brings back the "1". I do use the vector (NOT 2022) layout, which is essentially the reason I made this account. I may have modified some Global Preferences during or shortly after account creation, but I am unable to find anything that looks like it might have triggered this behaviour – which increasingly looks like a CSS bug. Am I in the right place asking for help with that? Should this be reported elsewhere? Justyouraveragelechuga's testimony suggests this is not just me, and that the issue is possibly reproducible in certain conditions, but I don't know the precise steps that would be required for others to reproduce the misbehaviour. I suppose one of the steps might be, you'd have to trigger an unread message from another wiki, but I don't know how to do that. Perhaps one way to try and reproduce might be to make a new account and then do what I did, which so far hasn't been very much. I see Justyouraveragelechuga has 598 edits as of this writing, so that's not a new account, meaning the bug is possibly not simply linked to that. Is there some other common factor? It can't be too common, or else this thread would be overrun by hundreds of users screaming about the same thing. ReadOnlyAccount (talk) 09:51, 15 October 2023 (UTC)
- @ReadOnlyAccount: Whilst the ultimate link is to Special:Notifications, clicking the icon (not the link) triggers some Javascript that filters what Special:Notifications returns. The two icons apply fifferent filters, so should return different results. Try both. One (or both) of them may have an entry in the list showing text like "More alerts from 2 other wikis
- ClydeFranklin: I am seeing the same thing as Justyouraveragelechuga (thanks for your reply). How would I find whatever other wiki might have triggered the notification, and how would I interact with it to remove the "1"? Also, I don't recall making another account elsewhere. Was one created automatically? If so, why? Was there perhaps a "create accounts in all these wikis" box I might have checked or left checked?
Alerts
I haven't gotten any red bell alerts in about 24 hours, even though I saw someone undoing my edits, and I also believe someone tried to ping me but I did not get an Alert for that either. I checked my preferences and it doesn't look like anything changed there. Could someone ping me to see if I get an Alert? Also, any idea what could be going wrong? BOZ (talk) 15:03, 23 April 2024 (UTC)
- Hmm, I just got a ping now, so maybe that was only temporary. BOZ (talk) 15:23, 23 April 2024 (UTC)
Edit request
In the source, please change:
(writing <nowiki>[[User:Example]], {{u|Example}}, {{User|Example}}, {{user link|Example}}, {{ping|Example}}, {{Yo|Example}}, or {{reply to|Example}}</nowiki>)
to:
(writing <nowiki>[[User:Example]]</nowiki>, {{tlxi|u|Example}}, {{tlxi|User|Example}}, {{tlxi|user link|Example}}, {{tlxi|ping|Example}}, {{tlxi|Yo|Example}}, or {{tlxi|reply to|Example}})
so that the template names would be links in the rendered page. Thanks. 2A0D:6FC2:6A90:4D00:0:0:0:5F9 (talk) 20:22, 29 May 2024 (UTC)
- Done. (I was looking for something else, but it was an easy enough edit, especially the way you presented it.) ^_^ —DocWatson42 (talk) 03:04, 15 June 2024 (UTC)
Is there a way to display more notifications than fifty (or to search them)?
Greetings and felicitations. I'm looking for a (probably) pre-2017 notification. Is there a way to display more notifications than fifty at a time, or to search old notifications? I have a decent idea of what I am looking for, but not one for searching this page's archives (I browsed this page, and pages 7 and 8 of the archives, but as yet to no avail). —DocWatson42 (talk) 03:17, 15 June 2024 (UTC)
- @DocWatson42 Unfortunately not. It's still 50 at a time, since your & I's last discussion about it at phab:T203632. And whilst there's interest in building a search (phab:T132804) it hasn't been done yet (and I suspect would be relatively high-effort?).
- Tangentially, I'm reminded of "Zawinski's Law of Software Envelopment, also known as Zawinski's Law, states: Every program attempts to expand until it can read mail. Those programs which cannot so expand are replaced by ones which can." -- Which doesn't help you, but does hint at the explanation about why complex features like this don't exist in every tool!
- I hope that helps a bit, if only to save you time digging through talkpage archives here. Quiddity (WMF) (talk) 00:06, 18 June 2024 (UTC)
- Thank you, and I'm sorry that I forgot that I've brought it before—I'm glad you remembered. :-) —DocWatson42 (talk) 02:47, 18 June 2024 (UTC)
- Late followup: Just FYI, I didn't remember either! I outsource my memory to computers, hence my love for wikis! I only remembered after I searched for any existing related tasks, and found our old discussion there. :-) Quiddity (WMF) (talk) 00:22, 21 June 2024 (UTC)
- Thank you, and I'm sorry that I forgot that I've brought it before—I'm glad you remembered. :-) —DocWatson42 (talk) 02:47, 18 June 2024 (UTC)
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