This is an archive of past discussions about MediaWiki:Watchlist-messages. 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.
@Pppery: I’ve disabled the {{edit protected}} using {{tl}} while we discuss the wording, expecting the “tl|” to be removed when consensus is reached. If this is inappropriate, feel free to remove the “tl|” while the discussion is ongoing. YBG (talk) 11:41, 16 November 2023 (UTC)
If this is not the right place to post this suggestion, please ping me to let me know where I should post it. Thanks! YBG (talk) 08:06, 15 November 2023 (UTC)
I've had a poke around and this was previously discussed in August 2017: "[...] after consulting with Matt, we decided there is no need to say 'not separately counting talk pages.'" It seems that's when the current wording was adopted. I'd agree that YBG's suggestion is an improvement on what's currently there. Schwede6601:25, 16 November 2023 (UTC)
I would prefer 'and' instead of 'plus', but yes, it's a better wording. Stephen — Preceding undated comment added 02:30, 16 November 2023 ((UTC)
@Schwede66 I don't think this really needs a full RFC. However it indeed does still seem to be "being discussed. @YBG drop a link to this at WP:VP/M, after a week someone can summarize whatever the consensus here is and reactivate the edit request. (Note: that could very well be "no consensus for change" with no ER needed). — xaosfluxTalk16:08, 16 November 2023 (UTC)
I think that eliminating "associated" would be just fine. Had I thought about it before my post above, I probably would not have included it. YBG (talk) 05:02, 24 November 2023 (UTC)
As a regular editor, I just want the page count and ignore the rest of the message as boilerplate already noted. I like having the number prominently placed close to the start rather that buried in a sentence. The current message is almost ideal for my needs; I might even change it to 1,234 pages are on your watchlist.... However, newer editors may have differing needs. Certes (talk) 12:40, 23 November 2023 (UTC)
Revised watchlist details options
Based on the feedback above, I am removing the unneeded word “associated” from (1)/(2)/(3) and adding a new option (5).
Most previous previous !votes for (1) and (3) stated ambivalence for “associated”; anyone who really wants that word included can !vote for (1a), (2a), or (3a).
It seems safe to assume that this leaves previous participants’ numeric !votes unchanged; they are invited to state, restate or change their numeric !vote, especially if this assumption is faulty:
@Certes,
@Novem Linguae,
@Pppery,
@Schwede66,
@Stephen,
@SWinxy, and
@Xaosflux.
These revised options include (1) my preference, (2) my original proposal without “associated”, (3) @Stephen’s alternative, (4) the status quo, and (5) @Certes’s alternative:
I don't think we need to do a second survey. I think we have a clear consensus from the above survey that we should do the old #1 minus the word "associated", which is Your watchlist has $1 pages (and their talk pages). Shall we go ahead and make that change? –Novem Linguae (talk) 18:04, 24 November 2023 (UTC)
I agree, a new survey in not necessary, but out of courtesy, I’d like to wait a couple of days before making a change. I don’t think there’s any rush. YBG (talk) 18:15, 24 November 2023 (UTC)
Proposal
Unless there is an objection in the next few days, I will make a protected edit request to change the wording to this:
Your [[Help:Watchlist|watchlist]] has '''$1''' {{PLURAL:$1|page|pages}} (and {{PLURAL:$1|its|their}} [[Help:Talk pages|talk {{PLURAL:$1|page|pages}}]]).
In the current watchlist-message, we say: Candidate statements can be seen here. I'm struggling a bit to come up with a more accessible alternative (the word here shouldn't be linked [1]). "Candidate statements have been prepared" sounds awkward. Anybody has a better idea? —Femke 🐦 (talk) 18:55, 2 December 2023 (UTC)
That works, thanks. When you vote there are more links to the mysterious here in the instructions, but no idea how to change that. —Femke 🐦 (talk) 14:44, 3 December 2023 (UTC)
I disagree with this blog post, at least specifically for Wikipedia UI. Our interface messages have a very egregious problem with linking random words in their body text, making it difficult to determine which of them is the proper link. A bolded "here" is typically the only thing that indicates where to click without making people read huge paragraphs of text. Maybe it's bad for SEO, but I don't think we really care about that, and we aren't formatting our pages as simple single-link call-to-actions, so most of the points here don't really apply imo. The accessibility concern it brings up uses screenshots (of what? it doesn't tell us what program) from Windows XP, and the other complaint (that seeing the word "click" causes people using phones to feel alienated) seems completely arbitrary. jp×g🗯️04:45, 14 December 2023 (UTC)
I feel like the main accessibility concern was for speech synthesis (screen readers), which I guess will let you select links to follow from a list, based on their text. In that context (i.e. none), the text piped into a link should carry some information about where it points. Folly Mox (talk) 05:30, 14 December 2023 (UTC)
Well, that's what I mean -- they say that in the blog post, but then their reason for it is screenshots from WinXP, which was released over 20 years ago. If someone who uses a screen reader says that this is the deal, then I will accept it's the deal, but I don't know how much I believe "some program in 2002 worked this way". I don't know who Granicus is but they don't seem to be very great at web accessibility; when I went to their front page it used 253 requests to load 8,510 kilobytes over the course of 17.89 seconds (for a couple screen heights of content), used parallax scroll (i.e. broke the default browser scrollbar behavior) for a "fun" effect, and featured its tagline in light gray text over a white gradient over a light gray background. jp×g🗯️05:59, 14 December 2023 (UTC)
Ah I understand, thanks for clarifying. That is a pretty good point. I imagine the software has advanced and is probably able to contextualise links better nowadays, and also say more ads at people. Folly Mox (talk) 06:48, 14 December 2023 (UTC)
This is indeed true for most websites. On Wikipedia specifically, we have a quite pervasive issue with this exact style being used ubiquitously for links to completely interface-irrelevant pages. For example, this actual MediaWiki message says:
Where does "watchlist" link? According to these guidelines, this is the style you're supposed to use for a link to the watchlist itself -- but instead it links to a completely different page that's a general explanation of the idea of a watchlist. The same is true for the text "talk pages" -- per this advice, this should be a link to a list of the talk pages on your watchlist, or something directly relevant to the task of checking it. But instead, it is a link to Help:Talk pages, an explanatory document telling you what a talk page is. This is useful... literally once, the first time you ever read it; every subsequent time someone check their watchlist, it's just a useless button and visual noise that distracts from the interface elements (i.e. "three of these links actually do something, the rest are WP:EASTEREGGs that exit whatever you were in the middle of doing and take you to a random help page). jp×g🗯️23:14, 15 December 2023 (UTC)
I grok the frustration with inconsistency. Although, I think those guidelines are also framed around "content", whereas in-line interface documentation has a somewhat different set of style guides/expectations, where specialized jargon-words often link to their definitions/documentation, and are especially intended for non-expert viewers of the UI. Hence I think it makes sense to link to Help:Watchlist, and arguably to Help:Talk_pages (so many readers and brand-new-editors are unaware of talkpages!).
Plus, we're just transcluding MediaWiki:Watchlist-messages into the MediaWiki:Watchlist-details part of the UI, hence this thread is mixing together "content" discussions (the original re-wording suggestion) with this "UI" discussion, which possibly adds more confusion!? (I.e. If you're proposing we unlink those keywords, perhaps start a new thread?). HTH! Quiddity (talk) 00:33, 18 December 2023 (UTC)
I think running this for 5 weeks might be too long. We normally run backlog drive watchlist messages for about a week, right? @Hey man im josh, if this only runs for a week, would you like it to start now or on January 1? –Novem Linguae (talk) 20:42, 22 December 2023 (UTC)
Cool. +1 from me then. While not everyone is an NPP reviewer, there are clear instructions for how to apply at WP:PERM/NPP at that link, so I think running this to a wide audience would be helpful. Will let someone more uninvolved make the final decision. –Novem Linguae (talk) 20:51, 22 December 2023 (UTC)
Not sure if this is allowed, but maybe there could be a message encouraging WikiCup participation? With four days until the start and 44 entrants, the participation feels a bit thin (in past years its usually been closer to 100, see e.g. 2022 with 97). Would something like that be alright? Not sure if they're any good, but two ideas of how they could look I came up with:
Sign up now for the 2024 WikiCup, Wikipedia's annual editing competition.
Or it could be:
Sign up now for the 2024 WikiCup. Improve content and try to be the upcoming year's Wikipedia champion!
@Novem Linguae: Yes, users can sign up after it starts (and up to one month after, in fact - though I think its better for one to sign up before it starts as then one can maximize the time they have to score points) - one week would be fine. BeanieFan11 (talk) 00:47, 28 December 2023 (UTC)
{{Display/watchlist
|until= February 2, 2024
|cookie=nnn
|text= [[m:Special:MyLanguage/Universal Code of Conduct/Coordinating Committee/Charter/Voter information|'''Voting''']] on the ratification of the [[m:Special:MyLanguage/Universal Code of Conduct/Coordinating Committee/Charter|Universal Code of Conduct Coordinating Committee (U4C) charter]] is open until 2 February 2024.
}}
Thanks, seems reasonable - will leave open for a few days to see if there is any feedback (unless another admin wants to come along and just do it). — xaosfluxTalk12:00, 22 January 2024 (UTC)
Steward Elections and Confirmations are currently taking place on Meta. A summary of the candidates and process is available at our Village Pump.
I'm not certain this is appropriate, in particular the inclusion of the link to the Village Pump page - I believe such a link is useful, as it reduces the effort required for editors to understand what is happening and to participate, and I have attempted to make the summary there neutral, but at the same time it is abnormal to include such a link. BilledMammal (talk) 16:02, 10 February 2024 (UTC)
The shorter the better for watchlist messages. Suggest removing ; participating ensures the English Wikipedia is represented in this important process. –Novem Linguae (talk) 17:06, 10 February 2024 (UTC)
I wanted to include some sort of call to action, to encourage editors to step out of our small sphere, but I trust your experience; removed. BilledMammal (talk) 17:07, 10 February 2024 (UTC)
I believe this is already being advertised on a site notice (I have seen it several times). I'm not sure it needs further exposure? — Martin (MSGJ · talk) 21:28, 11 February 2024 (UTC)
Thank you; I think it would still be best to have a watchlist notification, as I believe that it gets more engagement from active editors. BilledMammal (talk) 23:07, 12 February 2024 (UTC)
Yes, there is a central notice, depending on your settings it may or may not appear periodically. I'm in the confirmation, so recuse on posting this myself. I'd be wary about linking to a fork of results etc here, that may go stale. — xaosfluxTalk23:31, 11 February 2024 (UTC)
I plan to keep the summary up to date - and if I fail to do so, I don't think it would be much effort to remove it from the notification? BilledMammal (talk) 23:07, 12 February 2024 (UTC)
2024 requests for adminship review
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I think there has already been a watchlist message for this event, which ran for a week. We probably shouldn't bombard people with these messages. — Martin (MSGJ · talk) 10:01, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
Hi all! Would love to give The Core Contest a shout out to draw in more folks. Thinking a week long notice, beginning whenever possible (we like to draw in people early so they have time to prepare). I imagine the text we used last year would suffice:
Editors are invited to sign up for The Core Contest, an initiative running from April 15 to May 31, which aims to improve vital and other core articles on Wikipedia.
This edit request has been answered. Set the |answered= or |ans= parameter to no to reactivate your request.
I have tried to recruit in the usual spots but the reach has turned out to be too limited, so I would like to request a watchlist message. Here is the message I propose:
Personally I think this is of too limited an interest to our global audience for a watchlist notice. Stephen05:06, 17 April 2024 (UTC)
Well, that increases the chances I will have to cancel the event. I'll give it a few days to see if anyone signs up but it's looking doubtful. I should have realized the editors are too depleted on this site to make a go. Stefen Towers among the rest!Gab • Gruntwerk05:19, 17 April 2024 (UTC)
Blaming committed long-timers for the utter ongoing depletion of editors at the Wikipedia doesn't exactly have the best look. Would you rather nobody does the work? I think that can be arranged. Heh. Stefen Towers among the rest!Gab • Gruntwerk03:40, 18 April 2024 (UTC)
I wasn't blaming you for anything, just pointing out that no other editor seems interested in editing your pages. Stephen06:44, 18 April 2024 (UTC)
Also, frankly, that you don't seem to know the high international regard for the underlying event really should have meant you let somebody else answer. Belittling the very well known Kentucky Derby is very odd. Stefen Towers among the rest!Gab • Gruntwerk03:45, 18 April 2024 (UTC)
The underlying daily pageviews for the Kentucky Derby Festival is 15 as you can see here. We use watchlist notices for events of global reach. Something with 15 daily views falls way outside that scope, I'm afraid. Sorry, Stefen. Schwede6604:23, 18 April 2024 (UTC)
The Kentucky Derby lacks global relevance and a backlog drive organised around the subject would hold no interest for most editors. – Teratix₵05:41, 18 April 2024 (UTC)
Whew. The decision is the decision but that statement is like saying Muhammad Ali and KFC lack global relevance. All three are widely known around the globe. I'm flummoxed. You know this is THE KENTUCKY DERBY, right? Part of the Triple Crown of Horse Racing? World renowned. Egad. Stefen Towers among the rest!Gab • Gruntwerk05:47, 18 April 2024 (UTC)
Honestly, I wouldn't support watchlist notices for backlog drives around Ali or KFC, either – again, not the sort of thing many editors would participate in. – Teratix₵05:58, 18 April 2024 (UTC)
NPP May backlog drive
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I'd like to request that the following notice be added to watchlists until April 30, 23:59 UTC:
Sign up now for the May 2024 New Pages Patrol backlog drive. Review articles and earn barnstars!
Done for one week. I'm an NPP coordinator so I'm a little biased, but there's no objections in this talk page section, and in the past these have always been approved. –Novem Linguae (talk) 02:19, 26 April 2024 (UTC)
U4C election vote
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{{Display/watchlist
|until=May 9, 2024
|cookie=nnn
|text= Voting period for the [[m:Special:MyLanguage/Universal Code of Conduct/Coordinating Committee/Election/2024|Universal Code of Conduct Coordinating Committee (U4C)]] is open through <u>9 May 2024</u>. Read the information for voters on the [[m:Special:MyLanguage/Universal Code of Conduct/Coordinating Committee/Election/2024#Voting|voting page on Meta-wiki]] and '''[[m:Special:SecurePoll/vote/396|cast your vote here]]'''.
}}
Done for one week. I removed the underline and condensed the text a bit. Hopefully these changes are OK. Let me know if you'd like it modified. –Novem Linguae (talk) 02:26, 26 April 2024 (UTC)
This has not been acted on. It is similar to messages that have been posted before, for our bi-monthly drives. Is there something more I need to do to get it posted? The GOCE May drive is well underway. Dhtwiki (talk) 08:07, 3 May 2024 (UTC)
Done - @Dhtwiki: not really, we were just a bit backlogged. I suppose the only thing you could have done is format the entire message in your ask to make it even easier to load in, see example in the edit request above. — xaosfluxTalk10:39, 3 May 2024 (UTC)
WikiProject Women in Green - June 2024 Good Article Editathon
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I'd like to request that this notice be added to the watchlist. Keeping the notice up until June 3 or 4 would be excellent -- our event starts on June 1st, so we're hoping to attract new participants up into the first week of the month. (@Grnrchst, just pinging you here to let you know I've made the request!)
Sign up here for WikiProject Women in Green's "Going Back in Time" Good Article (GA) editathon, running through June 2024. Learn new GA skills, help improve articles about women and women's works, and earn a special barnstar!
If someone plans to bump the cookie number (or however it works) when the current RFA gets to the voting stage, causing the watchlist notice for this RFA to reappear for those who dismissed it, I'd like to request that it be discussed before it's just unilaterally done. I don't agree with it. Whether it's discussed now - before we're sure it will be needed - or when a request is made, I don't care too much about. Floquenbeam (talk) 18:12, 26 May 2024 (UTC)
Want to improve Wikipedia's reliability? Compete in WikiProject Reliability's unsourced statements drive starting on June 1st and replace {{citation needed}} tags with references!
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I suggest that we have a watchlist announcement about the ongoing Wikimedia Foundation election. This affects all WMF projects, and is of direct interest to the Wikipedia community.
I propose something along the lines of...
"The Wikimedia Foundation Board election process is ongoing. There are four open seats on the Board of Trustees, and twelve candidates running in the election. Until June 12th, you may ask questions to the candidates here. You can use this tool to verify if you are eligible to participate in the election."
At this stage, unless I'm missing something, the only thing really available is the last couple days of the month-long "submit questions" phase - so we're sort of too late here. There may be some more CentralNotices on this going around as well; suggest we wait until voting is open to put a WLN up here. For right now, feel free to put a reminder at WP:VPWMF for the end of the current phase. This isn't a "hard no" if some other admin wants to do this, I just don't think it is the best use of this space. — xaosfluxTalk19:24, 7 June 2024 (UTC)
I wouldn't mind adding this. It's important to get enwiki involved in this process. But I think it should be shorter and have 0-1 bolded links instead of 4. Suggested rewrite:
They’re only proposed questions that may be asked though. Not exactly asking questions to the candidates. Stephen12:52, 8 June 2024 (UTC)
{{Display/watchlist
|until= 12 June 2024
|cookie=xxx
|text=The [[meta:Wikimedia Foundation elections/2024|Wikimedia Foundation Board election]] process is ongoing. There are four open seats on the [[meta:Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees|Board of Trustees]], and twelve [[meta:Wikimedia Foundation elections/2024/Candidates|candidates]] running in the election. Until June 12, you may '''[[meta:Wikimedia Foundation elections/2024/Questions for candidates|ask questions to the candidates]]'''.
}}
Not done I'm going to somewhat-involved close this, because would end up expiring in about 5 hours from now even if it were done. @Pecopteris: if there is another major phase coming feel free to represent (possibly for whatever the August 2024 Panel Interview is going to be). Any admin that wants to do it anyway, feel free. — xaosfluxTalk19:00, 11 June 2024 (UTC)
Developing Countries WikiContest
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I'd appreciate if the following could be displayed for a week or so, ending on July 1.
WMF Board of Trustees elections start tomorrow I think (Sept 3). Once the SecurePoll link is published, we should probably do a watchlist notice for it, lasting one week.
WP Women in Green - October Good Article (GA) Edit-a-thon
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I'd like to request that this notice be added to the watchlist -- leaving it up for one week would be perfect.
Sign up here for WikiProject Women in Green's "Around the World in 31 Days" Good Article (GA) edit-a-thon, running through October 2024. Learn new GA skills, help improve articles about women and women's works, and earn a special barnstar!
This edit request has been answered. Set the |answered= or |ans= parameter to no to reactivate your request.
Requesting a watchlist notice to run for the next seven days:
The October Good Article Nominations backlog drive aims to completely eliminate the backlog of nominations from nominees who don't yet have 10 or more Good Articles. Sign up now to help us make it happen!
If there's any concerns about the wording, quantity of messages, duration, etc. please let us know soon so we can make adjustments. Thanks! –Novem Linguae (talk) 01:32, 7 October 2024 (UTC)
Surely the until parameter in {{Display/watchlist}} needs to be one day later, as these deadlines include the end date. For example, the nominations notice is already gone from my watchlist, although the period only ends at midnight UTC. -- Maddy from Celeste (WAVEDASH)12:43, 14 October 2024 (UTC)
Can we extend this until December 16th - that's the next court date, and the point at which we will likely see whether WMF has effectively protected these users PII, or if it has unambiguously disclosed it. (If I'm misunderstanding something, then please correct me). The open letter is still collecting signatures. Tazerdadog (talk) 18:23, 30 November 2024 (UTC)
Yep, it has, but I think this message is not in the same vein as most other watch-list messages. Lets give it until 16th December and if we don't have decisive action (which, knowing Indian courts is unlikely), we probably won't be beating the horse. Sohom (talk) 21:37, 30 November 2024 (UTC)
I have self-reverted my commit since there doesn't seem to be a immediate consensus to extend it. Other thought are welcomed. Sohom (talk) 23:04, 30 November 2024 (UTC)
