Wikisource:Scriptorium

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Announcements

Note

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New Wiki Project page

I have created a new Wiki Project page

• Wikisource:WikiProject Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition‎

It is a copy of WS:EB1911 text with modifications -- PBS (talk) 09:51, 5 April 2017 (UTC)

300,000 pages now validated

At 21:22 on 5 April, 2017 @AnotherAnonymous: set Page:Essays of Francis Bacon 1908 Scott.djvu/125 to validated, which was the 300,000th page to be validated. Interestingly, I made a similar announcement on 4 April, 2016 for the 250,000th page. Beeswaxcandle (talk) 07:40, 6 April 2017 (UTC)

Proposals

Book downloads with the Featured download template

I'm not sure if this has been discussed/noticed previously but the downloads using the Featured download template only provides the main page of the work. Since most texts are split over multiple sub-pages, this isn't very ideal and defeats the entire purpose of having the download links since no one can easily get the full work. I do know that the tool isn't perfect and the download can still be very badly transcribed but something is better than nothing. Will it be possible to tweak the template to also transcribe all sub-pages as well? Ciridae (talk) 19:35, 16 March 2017 (UTC)

@Ciridae: It should provide the whole work. When you are on the work, are you getting the same result from the [download] option in the left sidebar? Which format are you downloading? — billinghurst sDrewth 02:46, 17 March 2017 (UTC)

@Ciridae: Not to worry. I have found and fixed the problem. [/me mumbles and mutters again about these dotted templates]. — billinghurst sDrewth 03:07, 17 March 2017 (UTC)

 This section is considered resolved, for the purposes of archiving. If you disagree, replace this template with your comment. — billinghurst sDrewth 03:07, 17 March 2017 (UTC)

Use Web Fonts to improve {{cursive}}

I frequently use {{cursive}} for handwritten portions of a text (e.g. signatures), and occasionally for fully-handwritten texts such as letters. However, the default font on most browsers on Windows for cursive is Comic Sans, which looks nothing like any of the scripts used in any of the texts. Since we can use Web Fonts to provide a consistent view, I propose that we look for an easy to read, compatibly licensed script font that can be added to Web Fonts and used in {{cursive}} to improve the appearance of handwritten documents. —Beleg Tâl (talk) 21:24, 2 March 2017 (UTC)

@Beleg Tâl: We can use a combination of Web Fonts, in the template itself, and changes to MediaWiki:Common.css to fix this. Additionally, individually users can change their own CSS settings in MediaWiki and their browsers. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 21:45, 2 March 2017 (UTC)

Updating MediaWiki:Common.css would be preferable, but I don't know whether Web Fonts can be used that way, and I also don't know if a better font than Comic Sans can be reliably found on all users' systems. —Beleg Tâl (talk) 21:48, 2 March 2017 (UTC)

@Beleg Tâl: In case I wasn't clear, we can use all of those options. If we change the global CSS, the CSS in the template, add in Web Fonts, and individual users change their settings on-wiki and in-browser, then that will give a large likelihood that they won't see Comic Sans (unless they deliberately choose it). —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 22:03, 2 March 2017 (UTC)

We do have template:ULS though you will just have to find the right webfont that is within ULS. I have a list from ages ago, though nothing definitive. Have you looked through mw:Universal Language Selector or asked there? — billinghurst sDrewth 10:34, 14 March 2017 (UTC)

@Billinghurst: that is exactly what I'm suggesting. They don't have any cursive fonts, so we will first need to find a good one and have it added to Web Fonts (which is what ULS uses). —Beleg Tâl (talk) 11:56, 14 March 2017 (UTC)

Okay, what do we think of Petit Formal Script? It's a Google font, licensed under the SIL Open Font License, looks pretty good in a wall of text, and is pretty easy to read. —Beleg Tâl (talk) 20:28, 21 March 2017 (UTC)

Possibly. What about [1], or even [2], which looks much more like the Copperplate style penmanship I usually see. --EncycloPetey (talk) 20:36, 21 March 2017 (UTC)

I think Pinyon looks better per se, but it's not as easy to read as body text. Tangerine looks different than normal cursive that I'm used to but is very legible; it doesn't seem to do well at small sizes though. I still think Petit Formal is better for simple legibility, but I think either of those could be excellent alternatives. (It would be nice to see what they all look like side by side in our website's context though.) Here's a comparison of the three fonts in use on Wikisource. —Beleg Tâl (talk) 20:57, 21 March 2017 (UTC)

I agree that Pinyon is the closest of the three to standard copperplate in the minuscules. The swashes on the majuscles are quite spidery and would be difficult at smaller sizes. The numerals in Tangerine are inconsistent with the letters and the changing baseline for them is difficult. The very high ascenders on the minuscles really make this a display font rather than something to use for chunks of text. While the numerals in Petit Formal Script are boring, the font is still legible at smaller sizes (I can read it at 8 point) and the swashes on the majuscles aren't overbearing. If I had to choose one of the three for a general use font I would !vote for Petit Formal Script. If there was a way to restrict the usage of the cursive font to display headings only (minimum size 36 point), then Tangerine would be my preference. Beeswaxcandle (talk) 06:23, 22 March 2017 (UTC)

"Overbearing majuscules"? 60-pound minuscules? Fonts in the gym?!? We are looking at a font that has a point of difference, that then works in all the broadest available uses (sizing, numerals, kerning) though probably not something like extended character set (unless we see that we need equations and translations). If it is a point of difference, one would hope that we would look to restrict use to templates rather than direct use in main ns, so other (mis)uses could be identified and replaced as required. — billinghurst sDrewth 05:50, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

@Koavf: looking over this: it seems to me that there are two options: use inline CSS in the template, or use a class tag in the template and add an entry into Global CSS to style elements in that class. The end result of these is identical, however, and the discussion below on having dedicated separate CSS for templates makes it moot either way. —Beleg Tâl (talk) 17:10, 31 March 2017 (UTC)

Testing out the Timeless skin

Hi, I'm Isarra, a volunteer MediaWiki developer, and I've been working on a new responsive skin, Timeless, and I was wondering if you would be interested in having it deployed on your project to try it out.

It looks like this:

Some links:

• A labs project for general testing and editing
• A Beta Cluster clone of the Simple English Wikipedia, where Timeless is already deployed - you can create an account and in your preferences set your skin to Timeless and explore what it would be like on a real project
• A grant proposal regarding doing proper research into usage of and problems associated with the current skins, and from there doing further development of Timeless to make it properly address the needs of the various Wikimedia projects

Timeless is currently undergoing review and I have a grant proposal in the works to do further work on it (see just above; any feedback on that would also be appreciated), but the end goal here is to, if not develop Timeless itself into a viable skin for all Wikimedia projects, then determine what exactly would be required of such a skin so that one may eventually be created.

I'm reaching out to you in particular because Wikisource has use cases that are very likely to totally break Timeless (and most skins), and I would very much like to see how so that this may actually be properly addressed. If there are also problems you are currently having with the existing skins that we might be able to look into, that would also be something I'd be interested in, but either way the very nature of your project would make your feedback invaluable moving forward.

So the question is, do you want to take part in this? Would you be willing to help me test out Timeless? -— Isarra ༆ 03:50, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

@Isarra: (off the top of my head) I think that a little technical detail is required for the community to consider. Please correct or expand on the following 1) this is just the skin, there are no functionality changes; 2) Means of implementation, ie. an extra skin will be added to user preferences, that will be "off" by default, and users can turn "on" to trial; 3) What period of testing would you expect to take place? How would you seek feedback on the functionality and tests; 4) What specific things should be tested, eg. a) Extension:ProofreadPage is a major part of our config; b) what toolbar changes might we expect as these are adapted by users, c) sidebar changes expected would be ...? 5) If it is not working for a user, would it be as simple as changing back to the other skin. — billinghurst sDrewth 04:42, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

Addendum. Some of us (dinosaurs) still use monobook as vector didn't suit, so you will see monobook customisations still existing in Mediawiki: ns; and some of still use the old toolbar as it is easier to code adaptations, whereas the new toolbar is an extra level of complexity. — billinghurst sDrewth 04:49, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

Do you mean the old edit toolbar? Or the action links at the top of the page? -— Isarra ༆ 05:04, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

mediawiki.toolbar with additional mw-customeditbuttons, rather than the enhanced toolbar. — billinghurst sDrewth 05:25, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

Yes, yes, and I'm not entirely sure yet, but setting up a project page here for it would probably make the most sense, or whatever you're comfortable with - it'd be great if you could just file the bugs directly, but I get that that would probably be a bit much to ask. As for what specific things you should be testing, I don't know - that's why I want you to try it. I often find the best thing for testing a skin is just use it - see what happens, what's annoying, what needs to be changed.

ProofreadPage is actually why I wanted Wikisource involved - I fully expect it to not really work, and obviously we need it to. And I doubt it's the only thing unique to the project, either.

Sidebar... mostly it's the same - other languages and toolboxes get moved around depending on screen size, but the actual content is the same as other skins, whatever you put in MediaWiki:Sidebar. What all changes do wind up happening may also depend a lot on user feedback - if a toolbox location/split is bad, that will be addressed, things like that.

And yes, if you don't like it, you'll be able to just switch back to a different skin, same as you switched to it. And that's totally fine. -— Isarra ༆ 05:03, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

All those responses sound reassuring as users can dip in and out as going about their daily/weekly tasks.

Either setting up a subpage of Scriptorium, or a project page for feedback both sound fine (guided by others feedback, and it may be something that we should flag to the broader WS community about how we compile feedback @Zyephyrus, @Micru, @Ankry, @Yann, @Aubrey, @Tpt, @VIGNERON:). Many of us are basic phabricator: literate, so we could transfer confirmed issues if you have a phab project set up, and we can create a direct link on a page for reporting anyway (and encouraging more users to have that phab familiarity is beneficial). — billinghurst sDrewth 05:27, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

There is indeed a Timeless project on Phabricator: https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/project/board/1912/ Dereckson (talk) 15:21, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

Ah, that's excellent to hear. See. You know. Also, just as a general note, a lot of the specific work I intend to do does hinge a bit [[[meta:Grants:IdeaLab/Timeless|on the grant]], so if you have specific issues you want to raise there (either with things currently that you'd like to see improved upon, or concerns with Timeless itself), that would be incredibly useful, both for showing general interest and helping to shape the direction of my work. Thanks! -— Isarra ༆ 13:15, 28 March 2017 (UTC)

Proposing to close this as accepting the offer to participate in the evaluation. I am not seeing any dissension, though throwing a last ping to the community. — billinghurst sDrewth 13:54, 3 April 2017 (UTC)

Sounds good to me. Sam Wilson 22:45, 3 April 2017 (UTC)

Tracked in PhabricatorTask T162137

I would suggest that the feedback be tracked in a separate section in general discussion, rather than up here in proposals. — billinghurst sDrewth 12:51, 4 April 2017 (UTC)

nice refresh of skins. good for readers. wikisource specific issues may be the Display options layout, and the Sidebar Flat-list gadget. Slowking4 ‽ SvG's revenge 14:54, 4 April 2017 (UTC)

• @Isarra: We have a task in phabricator. Is the community needing to do anything further for you at this point of time? — billinghurst sDrewth 13:49, 26 April 2017 (UTC)

Nope, at this point we're mostly just waiting on some compatibility fixes (with other extensions, where the problem is in the extensions, not even the skin itself), I think. I should probably... make sure of that, though. But you guys are good, at least. -— Isarra ༆ 04:00, 27 April 2017 (UTC)

Layout with justified text

Can we have a new default layout available for all users, based on Layout 1 but with justified text? Or maybe modify Layout 1 to have justified text? The current display of Layout 1 (with text just left-aligned) doesn't look very good. Ciridae (talk) 07:09, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

The main objection against justified text seems to be unequal word-spacing; but the serrated right margin of left-aligned text looks more ugly, IMHO. I also work in Bengali Wikisource, where justified text is default, and it looks fine. Here we have justified text in page namespace and left-aligned text in main space by default. I can't fathom the rationale of this dichotomy, especially when print media uses justified text and we are here to recreate printed books in the digital medium. This site advocates against other print layout parameters, like paragraph indenting (being replaced by a blank line between paragraphs) and curly quotes (being absent in the keyboard), but I never found any proper reason against justified text; and there is no written rule against it here, so I use it manually in texts transcluded by me. But default would be better. Hrishikes (talk) 04:53, 1 April 2017 (UTC)

how do you feel about layout 2 or layout 3 or layout 4 or proposed layout. you realize the number scheme is arbitrary, and the last one you choose is default? would you like a user setting or a new layout? Slowking4 ‽ SvG's revenge 01:32, 5 April 2017 (UTC)

I was talking about Layout 1 (left-aligned, full text-area width) with justified text being the primary default, that the users would see, without exercising any layout option. This is the layout of printed books, so that people get exposure to it from childhood. Other layouts have less width; good for sidenotes, but when there are no sidenotes, so much blank space looks odd. Hrishikes (talk) 05:29, 5 April 2017 (UTC)

layouts only recently got fixed after being frozen for a decade Wikisource:Scriptorium/Archives/2014-01#Fixed_page_width. getting a summer of code person to change the "default" may take another decade. i think they view it like VE / wikicode as a setting that you can toggle, not as a default. but hey - go for it. Slowking4 ‽ SvG's revenge 12:13, 7 April 2017 (UTC)

I'd rather see us introduce a new layout or use a toggle, instead of altering the primary default layout for all works. There are too many things that might go wrong. --EncycloPetey (talk) 14:46, 7 April 2017 (UTC)

Bot approval requests

• See Wikisource:Bots for information about applying for a bot status
• See Wikisource:Bot requests if you require an existing bot to undertake a task

SpBot

• Bot name: SpBot (talk • contribs)
• Bot operator: Euku (talk • contribs) (home wiki: de.WP)
• Automatic or manually assisted: automatic
• Purpose of the bot: Archiving discussions with Template:Autoarchive resolved section
• Edit period(s): Nightly, about 1-6 edits/minute
• Programming language(s) (and API) used: Pywikibot (Python)
• Other projects that are already using this bot: 8 projects: de.wikipedia, de.wiktionary, de.wikisource, ja.wikipedia, ko.wikipedia, meta, wikidata and commons
• Additional information:

I was asked to run this bot for en.wikisource too. This bot is for archiving resolved discussions and working queues, that are tagged with {{Section resolved|1=~~~~}}. For example see the German "quality assurance": wikipedia:de:Wikipedia:Qualitätssicherung/20. Dezember 2016. For more details, please see Template:Autoarchive_resolved_section. My SUL bot account has more than 800.000 edits at all - most of them made in the German Wikipedia. This archiving task is running almost non-stop since 2007. --Euku (talk) 08:27, 21 December 2016 (UTC)

Thanks Euku. To confirm that I asked for this bot to be applied locally so that we can update our archiving practices. I have seen the bot work successfully at meta in managing important WMF-central page. Also to note that these are pages with header templates that were set by Pathoschild as he set here, and, importantly, it archives within sections so can be used by us at WS:PD, WS:CV and WS:AN. It will only be operating in areas where we set it, and that will be talk pages (... talk: and Wikisource:), all of which are non-content. — billinghurst sDrewth 09:30, 21 December 2016 (UTC)

This would be a useful bot to have running. --EncycloPetey (talk) 19:04, 21 December 2016 (UTC)

When should I start? --Euku (talk) 17:05, 4 January 2017 (UTC)

I started to run the bot daily/nightly at 3 am UTC. As it still has no bot flag, it will also notify users when it edits a user talk page. Please also note that for now there is no page that uses this bot. :-/ --Euku (talk) 19:42, 8 February 2017 (UTC)

Apologies Euku, I dropped the ball on activating the templates, though did add them inactively in places. I had set them in awaiting 'crat action earlier.
@Hesperian, @Mpaa, @Zhaladshar: Is there something that you are wishing to see at this stage? — billinghurst sDrewth 10:25, 9 February 2017 (UTC)

No, I'm pretty comfortable. I checked out how SpBot worked on Meta and it seems like it works great. I say we accumulate a couple actions from SpBot here to make sure it works fine on our wiki.—Zhaladshar ^(Talk) 14:39, 9 February 2017 (UTC)

I have set WS:CV, WS:PD and WS:AN to each archive, and seven days post application of {{section resolved}}. First two to archive at default level 2 (per discussions to not further sort sections into 'kept', 'deleted', 'other') and the latter at level 3, hence archiving within sections. I will presume that any micro configuration can occur via discussion at the respective talk pages. — billinghurst sDrewth 21:41, 9 February 2017 (UTC)

Can we perhaps do WS:RT as well? I tagged the resolved sections of that a few months back, so it should be good to go as well. --Mukkakukaku (talk) 01:37, 10 February 2017 (UTC)

Done at level 1 header. — billinghurst sDrewth 01:56, 10 February 2017 (UTC)

Looks like the config isn't quite right.... (Though honestly it would be useful if the bot told us what was wrong. Eg. what it was expecting that it couldn't find or whatever.) Mukkakukaku (talk) 04:38, 10 February 2017 (UTC)

Presumably it wants a full path, rather than a relative path (referring to examples). Not a major issue, I thought that it may be the case, just my habits. — billinghurst sDrewth 04:58, 10 February 2017 (UTC)

@Zhaladshar: and now? — billinghurst sDrewth 03:57, 12 March 2017 (UTC)

I think the edits have gone well. If there are no oppositions, I'll assign it the flag in a day.—Zhaladshar ^(Talk) 22:19, 12 March 2017 (UTC)

Bot flag's been added.—Zhaladshar ^(Talk) 01:44, 14 March 2017 (UTC)

 This section is considered resolved, for the purposes of archiving. If you disagree, replace this template with your comment. — billinghurst sDrewth 04:52, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

Task proposal for Wikisource-bot

I have prepared a script that can run on toollabs to replace the 'Google' page in djvu files (no pdf). The idea is as follows:

1. tag an Index page with a template (to be defined), e.g. something like {{blank_djvu_cover}}.
2. with the frequency we decide, the bot will modify and upload the corresponding djvu file, and blank the first Page:..../1 as 'Without text'
3. the file will be updated locally, if not shared on Commons, or on Commons directly.

If you agree with the approach, I can take care of the above and I can first run a few tests offline as soon as taggings are done, and later on make the tool tun on tool-labs.

An item that is up for deeper discussion could be if we want the bot also to delete (only) the first page instead blanking it, specifying it via template parameter. We could limit this option for Indexes w/o pages in Page: ns, or apply it to all Indexes. In the latter case, user who tags the Index must be aware that it is up to him to make sure that the action is consistent with Index status, effects on page numbering etc.

Comments welcome.— Mpaa (talk) 20:11, 5 March 2017 (UTC)

I rather like this idea, but I have two questions:

1. How often would this bot run this task? On demand, or would it be a scheduled daily/weekly/whatever thing?
2. I don't entirely understand the reason for point #3, keeping the modified file local. Other than the difficulty/overhead of getting bot permissions against Commons as well as enWS, why would we want to start double-hosting Commons works at enWS?

--Mukkakukaku (talk) 22:41, 12 March 2017 (UTC)

Oops apologies Mpaa, I missed this. I would like to see the test occur. I (still) do not favour deletion of the page to shorten the file, just replacement of image and text.

To Mukkakukaku. This is the proof of concept. Talking about scheduling can follow, gut feel is check daily. Whether to move a file to Commons is not solely the Google cover page, it still needs to fit within scope at Commons, have the templates completed, etc. Moving them is not overly complex with aCommonsHelper@toollabs, or a tool like ForTheCommonGood.

Operationally, I have one to test File:Love Insurance - Earl Biggers (1914).djvu which was deleted at Commons due to this issue. One think that we should consider is categorise as having been done. That will allow us to review more easily and a touchpoint on whether to move to Commons. — billinghurst sDrewth 00:10, 13 March 2017 (UTC)

Clarification on point #3. I meant that the tagging will be done on the Index page here on WS, while the file will be updated where it is actually located.— Mpaa (talk) 18:37, 13 March 2017 (UTC)

For now, you can tag using {{User:Mpaa/x}}. I created Category:Djvu files requiring clean up and Category:Djvu files processed by wikisource-bot to follow up.

For now only first page blanking is allowed.— Mpaa (talk) 21:15, 13 March 2017 (UTC)

Is this for files that we already host? The IA Upload tool has been updated recently to allow uploaders to strip the Google page out.

For files that have not yet been started, then I favour deletion of the page, because it restores the correct right/left pagination. If proofreading is underway, then blanking is possibly the better option due to the tangle of page moves required in the Page: namespace. Beeswaxcandle (talk) 06:27, 14 March 2017 (UTC)

If it hasn't been started and it is via ia-upload, just upload the file again and strip the lead page. — billinghurst sDrewth 10:38, 14 March 2017 (UTC)

If someone could tag some images, I could test a bit more.— Mpaa (talk) 20:36, 23 March 2017 (UTC)

@Mpaa: pretty hard to find local copies of Google files with header sheets. I can find numbers at Commons, but limiting searches to local uploads ... meh! We can trial some standard files and just revert them if you need targets OR we can look to do some runs at Commons. I favour the second, and happy to run the gauntlet if necessary. — billinghurst sDrewth 06:12, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

It is OK to work at commons. If you can find some, I can run a few as Mpaa. If it is OK, the we can take the next step as ws-bot. Need to create {{Mpaa/something}} or Template:Ws-bot/something} there. What about categorisation? Still needed at Commons?--Mpaa (talk) 21:04, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

@Mpaa:I don't see the need for categorisation afterwards, though there may be some value for before, especially if the bot stops working. I think that we will need an explanation page (could be on category page), and a template, maybe {{google front page}}. Hmm, does it work for pdf and djvu, or did we just do djvu? If the latter, we may wish to be more specific with template name to avoid confusion.

... a selection needing doing and most, if not all, will be at Commons.

Djvu only.— Mpaa (talk) 18:41, 29 March 2017 (UTC)

Building list at User:Wikisource-bot/Lead google page — billinghurst sDrewth 08:02, 25 April 2017 (UTC)

Proposing (really) inactive bot rights removals

The following bots are not operational and have not been so for over three years, and their users are not active at enWikisource. I propose that the bot rights be removed with the reason of no longer required/redundant/inactive. BrandeisBot (talk • contribs) Cswikisource-bot (talk • contribs) InductiveBot (talk • contribs) Mjbot (talk • contribs) Pathosbot (talk • contribs) SKbot (talk • contribs) Xenophon (bot) (talk • contribs) Thanks. — billinghurst sDrewth 02:06, 25 April 2017 (UTC)

•  Support proposal for all. --EncycloPetey (talk) 02:15, 25 April 2017 (UTC)

Repairs (and moves)

Designated for requests related to the repair of works (and scans of works) presented on Wikisource

Category:Christian authors

Move to Category:Christians per other categories in Category:Authors by religion and the fact that they are all authors--it's redundant to say. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 22:33, 1 January 2017 (UTC)

 Support, why not. —Beleg Tâl (talk) 22:50, 1 January 2017 (UTC)

 Support Sam Wilson 01:00, 2 January 2017 (UTC)

•  Oppose My understanding is that it is a category for our Author: ns pages only, so we run the risk that we will then start having all the biographies added to it. There is some evidence of that approach in some of the other categories. When one uses the categorisation tools, one does not see the parent categories so the name needs to be fully evident. If that means we fix the other categories, then we can do that. So that is my counter proposal. — billinghurst sDrewth 04:11, 2 January 2017 (UTC)

 Support. This would also bring them inline with other author categories such as nationality or time period. —Beleg Tâl (talk) 15:49, 4 January 2017 (UTC)

 Comment I would like to point out that the other religions do not have the word "authors" in them. For example, Category:Buddhists, Category:Hindus, Category:Druids, and so forth. We should be consistent, whatever we decide. --Mukkakukaku (talk) 15:00, 4 January 2017 (UTC)

We definitely need to make a decision and do something in this space. We are either categorising author pages in among the articles or we are not. I went to add A biographical dictionary of eminent Scotsmen/Ballantyne, John to Category:publishers and it is all author pp. — billinghurst sDrewth 13:07, 7 February 2017 (UTC)

I'm not sure articles within an encyclopaedia (or dictionary, as it may be) should be categorized. Like we have a Category:Cookbooks but we don't put individual recipes in there. --Mukkakukaku (talk) 02:23, 8 February 2017 (UTC)

I am not wishing to tag the individual article as "biographical article" nor "people from Scotland" which is the equivalent I believe that you suggest. This is a point of differentitation for each subpage. We have always allowed categorisation of subparts of works where the subpart differs from the parent. — billinghurst sDrewth 00:38, 13 March 2017 (UTC)

 Comment On further thought, I would like to perhaps raise the question -- what even is the purpose of these categories? Because statistically speaking, almost all of our 19th century English/American/Canadian/other European authors is going to be Christian, plus a large number of our encyclopedia articles in (for example) the DNB -- if we go that route. What does it matter the religion of the author? If the author writes religious works, cool -- put their works in a "Christian young adult fiction" category (or similar). But generally speaking religion is irrelevant to our purposes here, just like a categorization based on the fact that a person is blond, nearsighted, divorced, or male would be. --Mukkakukaku (talk) 02:29, 8 February 2017 (UTC)

If we address the nomenclature issue here that would be great as for many categories whether we differentiate between authors and articles. The issue of whether a category makes sense or not, is kept or not may be better in WS:PD, and presumably part of that is matching with other categories in other wikis. — billinghurst sDrewth 05:43, 8 February 2017 (UTC)

Proposing to close, and to specifically rename categories for authors, with the word authors. I will create any categories that require splitting. This will mean that author ns pages in authors pages, and all main ns works in those categories otherwise named. Please object now and propose alternatives. — billinghurst sDrewth 22:22, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

I have no objection, the only thing I've been thinking about in relation to this is that we could do what French Wikisource does, and assign the occupation & religion categories based on these authors have at Wikidata. The flow is: the author item has a religion statement, and the target item of that (e.g. 'christian') has a "topic's main category", which is the item that links to our Category:Christian authors. Hence, we can add that category autmatically. Whatdyareckon? I can make some unit tests for it all. Sam Wilson 00:58, 28 March 2017 (UTC)

I was more about fixing the category nomenclature/schema, for this set and there are others where the mix occurs. The means for the population into the future is neither here nor there for me, and the more that we can look to autopopulate through WD I see as an advantage, especially with our works. The biggest challenge is to think through the creation, and probably getting SPARQL output to guide us on category creation. I am the worst to do the curatorial! — billinghurst sDrewth 03:45, 28 March 2017 (UTC)

@Billinghurst: yes, good point! Go for it then, I say. I'll bring up the other stuff again later. Sam Wilson 03:59, 28 March 2017 (UTC)

Done though some may wish to play with the hierarchy. To note that some of the subcategories had articles populating, and they have been retained with the authors split out. In doing this, we now been able to better differentiate at WD where they had just been swept up in the larger generic labels. — billinghurst sDrewth 05:24, 1 April 2017 (UTC)

An Exposition of the Old and New Testament (1828) (Matthew Henry)

Work has been in progress for some time on this, initiated by User:Heyzeuss, though it has not got all that far. Having done some proofreading in Genesis, I decided to check and if possible validate some of the earliest pages done before I arrived so that there were not too many "yellow" pages awaiting "green" validation. I discovered that the end of the Memoir of Matthew Henry was missing from Wikisource and from the source scan at Archive.org . However I find at Hathi Trust that only two pages are missing and would like to add these from Hathi. Could someone put them in for me so I can proofread them? I'm fairly new to Wikisource so have no idea what is involved.

I did message Princeton about scans if the pages were present in the copy from which the Archive.org work was taken, before I discovered the California scan of an apparently identical printing at Hathi. If Princeton send theirs to me, they will still be relevant for getting inserted into the Archive.org edition. PeterR2 (talk) 22:28, 27 February 2017 (UTC)

Of course if it's going to cause lots of problems with references I could just type the missing material onto the bottom of Page:An Exposition of the Old and New Testament (1828) vol 1.djvu/35 with a hidden note as to what I've done and my source. It's hardly a major part of the book. PeterR2 (talk) 23:13, 27 February 2017 (UTC)

Princeton emailed me a monochrome scan of the two missing pages. They are having the two pages scanned and inserted into the record on Internet Archive. PeterR2 (talk) 00:23, 3 March 2017 (UTC)

The two missing pages have now been inserted in the Internet Archive document. How do we get the corresponding pages into Wikisource?PeterR2 (talk) 08:31, 8 April 2017 (UTC)

@PeterR2: I am trying to work out exactly what you are after. Let me see if I can tease it out c:File:An Exposition of the Old and New Testament (1828) vol 1.djvu has missing pages, and you have managed to get a new version upload to IA and it is exactly the same edition. Now you are asking how we repair the file at Commons, then update pages here. If that is correct, can you tell us which pages are missing, and where they are inserted Index:An Exposition of the Old and New Testament (1828) vol 1.djvu.

If it is exactly the same edition, then from the file at Commons you an overwrite the existing version; then we can ask @Mpaa: to get his bot to move the pages that need moving. — billinghurst sDrewth 09:17, 14 April 2017 (UTC)

@Billinghurst: Yes, there are two pages missing after Page:An Exposition of the Old and New Testament (1828) vol 1.djvu/35. Currently proofreading has been done all the way to Page:An_Exposition_of_the_Old_and_New_Testament_(1828)_vol_1.djvu/106 (I started at Page:An Exposition of the Old and New Testament (1828) vol 1.djvu/85 ) so as a newbie I'm a bit concerned as to what will happen if two pages get added in the middle of work that has already been done and linked, for instance at An Exposition of the Old and New Testament (1828)/Genesis, but it really needs to be done somehow for completeness. Princeton Theological Seminary (the source library for this item) arranged for the two missing pages to be inserted in the Internet Archive file which is linked from An Exposition of the Old and New Testament (1828) - see [3] - as you can see they have used a different scanning method for these two pages.PeterR2 (talk) 08:55, 15 April 2017 (UTC)

Done. I preferred to keep the djvu fmt, so the two pages have no text layer right now. It should be copied manually. I have not taken care of realigning Main ns.— Mpaa (talk) 18:37, 15 April 2017 (UTC)

@Billinghurst:@Mpaa: Thank you! That's great. I notice the Index:An Exposition of the Old and New Testament (1828) vol 1.djvu has lost its status colours. How do I get them back, please?PeterR2 (talk) 06:48, 19 April 2017 (UTC)

I see 1-77 and other odds and sods reflecting various states. What are you expecting to be different? — billinghurst sDrewth 07:19, 19 April 2017 (UTC)

Actually I Googled and found the answer in the Scriptorium archive in 2013 or 2003 or something and fixed it by refreshing the page by making a null edit.PeterR2 (talk) 07:23, 19 April 2017 (UTC)

Index:Acts of the Constituent Assembly of India 1949.djvu

Transcribed the contents list in good faith, but the source file was re-aligned.

Page text for what should be page 4, is currently on page 5 Page text for what should be page 5, is currently on page 7

Pages 6 and 8 should be reset to the OCR text. Thanks. ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 09:06, 9 March 2017 (UTC)

Looks to be resolved — billinghurst sDrewth 09:30, 14 April 2017 (UTC)

 This section is considered resolved, for the purposes of archiving. If you disagree, replace this template with your comment. — billinghurst sDrewth 09:30, 14 April 2017 (UTC)

commons:File:Don_Caesar_de_Bazan.djvu

I've erroneously included the google first page boilerplate. Could someone please excise that page for me? Thank you. LeadSongDog (talk) 21:02, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

@LeadSongDog, @Mpaa: we are currently building a tool to do that. — billinghurst sDrewth 00:13, 28 March 2017 (UTC)

@LeadSongDog, @Billinghurst: I've removed the cover page. And it looks rather likely that we could use the same system as the Indic language OCR (Google's Cloud Vision API) to determine whether a Google cover page exists or not. I've not yet done much testing, but it might be better than the currently manual selection of the cover page in IA Upload. Although, we wouldn't want it deleting the wrong thing! Sam Wilson 00:46, 28 March 2017 (UTC)

Thank you both. Just a thought, but don't these cover pages have some common features that could be simply tested for, such as the google url in the OCR'd text? That obviously should not be in any book we'd want to upload. Another option would be to give the human user a preview the first page before uploading the rest. LeadSongDog (talk) 15:49, 28 March 2017 (UTC)

@LeadSongDog: The ia-upload tool does give users a preview of the first page, and allows them to remove it. I thought you meant an easier system than that one. For an automated system, you're right it isn't too hard to at least attempt to determine if there's a Google logo, but we don't know how many false positives we'd get. Sam Wilson 00:35, 29 March 2017 (UTC)

Index:CAB_Accident_Report,_Pennsylvania_Central_Airlines_Flight_19.pdf

I discovered that the scan of page 49 in this project is incorrect, with a scan of page 57 on that page. The rest of the document seems OK outside of that.

The PDF seems to be inaccessible on the DOT database where the document was sourced from, although a different instance of the report is available from the 1st reference on the wikipedia page links to a different copy of the report with that page in tact, being page 56 of that particular PDF. I've done a quick cross-reference of that scan and the separate text layer in the DOT database where the projects original scan came from and it all aligns, suggesting the page in that PDF is the correct one.

I'm fairly new here, hopefully this is the right place to post to get this looked at and fixed up :)

Thanks Nickw25 (talk) 10:54, 8 April 2017 (UTC)

PING COMMUNITY Anyone have the tools (and patience) to take 56th page (page 49) from here and plugging that into file:CAB Accident Report, Pennsylvania Central Airlines Flight 19.pdf — billinghurst sDrewth 09:28, 14 April 2017 (UTC)

@Nickw25: Done -- Hrishikes (talk) 12:36, 14 April 2017 (UTC)

 This section is considered resolved, for the purposes of archiving. If you disagree, replace this template with your comment. — Mpaa (talk) 08:27, 17 April 2017 (UTC)

Index:Emanuel Swedenborg, Scientist and Mystic.djvu

Hello. Is anyone able to do a mass find and replace to replace the following ligatures with the proper text that I have missed whilst proofreading this work. They are the ligatures fi fi and fl fl. Thanks for any help.Jpez (talk) 16:09, 14 April 2017 (UTC)

Done.—? Mpaa (talk) 07:42, 16 April 2017 (UTC)

Thanks! Jpez (talk) 14:43, 16 April 2017 (UTC)

 This section is considered resolved, for the purposes of archiving. If you disagree, replace this template with your comment. — Mpaa (talk) 08:27, 17 April 2017 (UTC)

Other discussions

Open access articles in Wikisource

I'm from the NOA project of the German Technical Information Library. It hasn't started yet, but we are planning to harvest open access publications. Mainly we are dealing with figures, but we would also like to bring fulltexts to Wikisource. I've worked in Wikisource a few years ago and know how crucial quality is. We will only do as much we can sufficiently handle with our manpower and are not intending to overstretch any volunteers resources. The publications will only be from full digital journals, so no OCR is necessary.

I would like to hear your opinion, which prerequisites are still missing and what you generally think about such work.--TIB-NOA (talk) 15:09, 29 November 2016 (UTC)

@TIB-NOA: Let me know when you start migration--I'd like to help if I can. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 19:43, 30 November 2016 (UTC)

Just out of curiosity, is this potentially dealing with open access textbooks? If so, as someone who knows little if anything about them, would there be any sort of need to perhaps do "editions" of the text, if it gets revised often? John Carter (talk) 22:51, 30 November 2016 (UTC)

Thank you, I'm glad you pointed out that. Textbooks and reference works do contain excellent information and figures for many wiki places. And in general articles and books can be processed likewise. So, potentially yes! Editions may be needed whenever automatic processing isn't feasible. Tonitrus (talk) 10:05, 5 December 2016 (UTC)

@TIB-NOA, @Daniel Mietchen: I am presuming that you two have talk about the earlier work that Daniel did, and the discussion that we had at the time that Daniel and his colleagues uploaded a stack of works into the user namespace. In short, we will happily have the works, the important part is formatting (that DM explore) and getting the requisite wikidata in place for the articles. Bulk full digital is not something that the community cannot manage, BUT it is not something that we have well-addressed in the Wikidata age. I would think that we would be looking to get as much data as possible into WD, especially original source, and pulling it through rather than overly complicating matters here. We would probably want to talk to Wikidata about having a flag that clearly identifies digital sourced data, and one which we inhale rather than use our transcription ribbon. — billinghurst sDrewth 10:24, 5 December 2016 (UTC)

We are indeed doing something similar to Daniels Open Access Media Importer Bot. Probably Biblionik has already told him about us.

Yes, I told Daniel :) And a few other Wikipedians as well, see also my proposal at WikiCite 2016: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/WikiCite_2016/Proposals/WikiSource_and_Wikidata_as_a_hub_for_collaborative_annotation_and_reuse_of_Open_Access_literature Biblionik (talk) 17:21, 13 December 2016 (UTC)

@Billinghurst: With ribbon you are meaning a badge, like the stars for FA/GA?--TIB-NOA (talk) 18:57, 6 December 2016 (UTC)

@TIB-NOA: The primary conversation that we had with Daniel about the bot is at Wikisource:Scriptorium/Archives/2014-09#Automated import of openly licensed scholarly articles, there is probably other bits around; plus Daniel and I had a long chat at WM2014. It would be good if we can align the two components, to whatever extent, noting that that bot also uploaded images to Commons.

Wtih regard to ribbon, at the moment there is a direct relationship between the transcribed pages that are scan supported; an example is Shakespeare, William (DNB00) (up top). We migrate those ribbons to the badges at Wikidata. With your proposed additions, they will not have the ribbon as they aren't going through the (not proofread) ... (proofread) ... (validated) cycle, so we will need another means to identify a text to text relationship. I suggest that a new badge at WD could be that means, and have started a discussion at d:Wikidata talk:Wikisource. — billinghurst sDrewth 10:07, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

On my user talk page, there has been a little continuance of this discussion, though I want to bring it back to the community, and put forward some ideas that the community should discuss to progress this issue ...

Digital documents

Our community's approach to transcribing and transcluding works predominantly sprung up around reproducing old books, though we have had the occasional foray into modern documents. The system that has been set up has had a focus on a source to which we can verify an OCR/transcription which works well books/documents/... published on paper. It does not work well for digital documents, and we need a shared opinion and consensus to how we move forward with digital documents.

We need to

1. Explicitly accept that we can host digital-only documents and that these works do not need to be taken through the index/page verification process and then transcluded.
2. Sort out a marking system to identify digital documents akin though different our verifying ribbon
3. Look at our requirements for how these works are displayed as if they can be dropped into WS electronically, then the expectation should be that the metadata can be dropped into wikidata equally easily
4. Capture the consensus of the community into our help documentation

Can others identify other matters that should be discussed by the community in this regard? — billinghurst sDrewth 13:11, 14 December 2016 (UTC)

To these points I would like to add comment …

2. The badges system in WD is a ready place to mark a work as digital against the link to the document here and that information can be extracted back into our systems to display as digital-only. I have submitted phabricator:153186 to address this issue.
3. There is good scope to do an adaptation of {{header}} to something like {{header/digital}} (or something) that can completely extract data from Wikidata to populate the header without any intervention required locally. So if we are having a bot we would apply all fields via imported parameters, and its use in itself is a verification of known work from a known site with known, allowable copyright (all the provenance components)

— billinghurst sDrewth 13:11, 14 December 2016 (UTC)

Update This is in the process of being implemented in the Wikidata code, so I propose to start development here to allow for its usage, and look to other components discussed above. — billinghurst sDrewth 11:37, 30 December 2016 (UTC)

To the origins of the project: The Recitation-bot (talk • contribs) (run by Maximilianklein) has already imported ~200 documents from PubMed Central (PMC) and converted them to Wikitext in 2014-2016. They were not placed in the main namespace, but as subpages of Wikisource:WikiProject Open Access/Programmatic import from PubMed Central. Now my project is trying to do the same, but with much more documents and not only relying on PMC. Of course I will wait for your permission and until a badge at Wikidata is ready.

Examples, how my work could look like are Challenges and opportunities for digital history (Wikidata object) and Overview on CO2 valorization: challenge of molten carbonates. I think, that digital documents should get an extra namespace to distinguish them from PDF-based documents, e.g. Fulltext:Challenges and opportunities for digital history.--TIB-NOA (talk) 12:31, 16 December 2016 (UTC)

Update There is now a badge on Wikidata for "digital documents" ([4]).--TIB-NOA (talk) 10:35, 10 January 2017 (UTC)

I need to get back to this. Apologies for tardiness in its management. @Samwilson: Are you able to explain how Wikipedia utilises w:template:icon & w:module:icon as this is relevant for our next step to pull badge data from wikidata, and to have that display within {{header}}. — billinghurst sDrewth 01:59, 13 March 2017 (UTC)

There's nothing special in Module:Icon; that just constructs the image syntax. But I think we can do something with Module:Edition e.g. {{#invoke:Edition|badge|wikidata=Q28020002}} gives (and if no wikidata ID is passed, it'll use the ID of the page it's evoked from). Of course the icon and what it links to can be changed.

Is this the sort of thing you mean? I'm afraid I'm not fully up to date on what's going on with digital-born stuff. Sam Wilson 04:10, 19 March 2017 (UTC)

Index:Paper and Its Uses.djvu

I can't find anything on the author in Google, other than this work, which is making it hard to track down the dates. Also it seems this work is an update from a much earlier on by a different author who I've also been trying to trace with little success. ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 18:37, 23 January 2017 (UTC)

Suggest this might be his pedigree: Edward Arthur Dawe (house painter and paper-hanger; 1884-1970)?

I truly doubt that assignation. Did you read the small print of the title? Public servant with office at HMSO at the age of 25 who progresses to be a house painter and wallpaper. Doubtful. — billinghurst sDrewth 04:49, 24 January 2017 (UTC)

Edward Arthur Dawe (1875–1963), occupation shown as clerk with knowledge in printing @HMSO (1911 England census). Born Exeter, died Wallington.probate. Father was a photographer. — billinghurst sDrewth 05:01, 24 January 2017 (UTC)

Author:Edward A. Dawe created, What license to use? (And I note based on the dates the scans might need to be localised from Commons.) ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 12:02, 24 January 2017 (UTC)

Why you never ever indent your comments? It's not that difficult.— Mpaa (talk) 19:39, 24 January 2017 (UTC)

@ShakespeareFan00: file moved here, and deleted at Commons. Please update local file. — billinghurst sDrewth 21:45, 24 January 2017 (UTC)

You shouldn’t use initials for an author page. If you aren’t sure of the middle name, just leave the initial out and note on the author’s page.Zoeannl (talk) 00:07, 16 March 2017 (UTC)

A Woman of the Century

user:Zoeannl i belatedly found this work A Woman of the Century after uploading duplicate scan Index:A woman of the century.djvu after Index:Woman of the Century.djvu. the new scan looks cleaner, but thoughts ? delete new scan ? copy over OCR to old ? Slowking4 ‽ RAN's revenge 05:00, 28 January 2017 (UTC)

It would take a lot of effort, but it would be worth looking through every page before making a decision, in order to make sure that the scan is complete and of quality throughout. I have occasionally found "better" scans at IA or Google, only to later discover missing pages, duplicate pages, pages blurred beyond hope of reading, etc. --EncycloPetey (talk) 05:16, 28 January 2017 (UTC)

Cleaning up that work is not going to be that problematic, most of it was bot applied, so we can work out which is preferable, move the requisite pages in whichever direction, and then clean up. — billinghurst sDrewth 09:59, 28 January 2017 (UTC)

Addendum. The reason that the pages are bot applied is that often one wishes to work on a specific biography from the complete work, so this makes finding them easier. For some biographical works even adding a search on the index page for the Page: ns is advantageous. — billinghurst sDrewth 10:01, 28 January 2017 (UTC)

ok, i will start in with index (found at separate prospectus) and then start in on new scan. we can bot copy over if decided later. Slowking4 ‽ RAN's revenge 20:47, 28 January 2017 (UTC)

Okay, we can leave it with you. Do we prod you in later in Feb. so it is not forgotten? I would hate for work to get done on one of the variations and get lost/confused/wasted. — billinghurst sDrewth 22:45, 29 January 2017 (UTC)

Hi, I missed this. Where are we at? I have no real preference re scans, I just would rather not see proofreading go to waste. I am hoping to use as this book as a beginners project but still working on a Proofreaders guide atm. Zoeannl (talk) 00:04, 16 March 2017 (UTC)

Zoeannl - i have started transcribing your scan and inserting images from my scan. about 1/4 the way proofread. Slowking4 ‽ SvG's revenge 01:37, 5 April 2017 (UTC)

Proposal: Add Wikidata to Special:Import sources

Tracked in PhabricatorTask T160403Resolved

The following discussion is closed and will soon be archived:

consensus to add wikidata to approved list for import — billinghurst sDrewth 11:01, 14 March 2017 (UTC)

As with the recent discussion for imports from mediawiki and update to mul.wikisource, I would like the community to support the addition of Wikidata (d:) as a source for Special:Import. The primary reason for this is to allow administrators to directly update our modules for use of Wikidata. An example is that Module:Wikidata has been announced at d:Wikidata:Project chat as having been updated, and our only means to currently do that is a cut and paste. Cut and paste is less desirable, it adds new editors and doesn't clearly align with other versions which import will better do. Thanks. — billinghurst sDrewth 12:20, 11 February 2017 (UTC)

 Support —Beleg Tâl (talk) 03:17, 12 February 2017 (UTC)

 Support Seems like a no-brainer to me. --Xover (talk) 14:18, 14 February 2017 (UTC)

 Support Sam Wilson 21:20, 14 February 2017 (UTC)

 Support obviously sensible, thanks sDrewth. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 21:49, 14 February 2017 (UTC)

Now available for admins. — billinghurst sDrewth 13:51, 15 March 2017 (UTC)

 This section is considered resolved, for the purposes of archiving. If you disagree, replace this template with your comment. — billinghurst sDrewth 14:27, 16 April 2017 (UTC)

I need some feedback about Index:History of Greece Vol I.djvu

Since I’m not really acustomed with en.wikisource I would like some feedback and opinions about the following matters:

1. Am I handling well the refs that span 2 pages? I copy the rest of the reference to the previus page (e.g. Page:History of Greece Vol I.djvu/59)
2. When a new paragraph is need within a ref, I insert a newline followed by a {{nop}}. Is this the manner I should handle it? (e.g. Page:History of Greece Vol I.djvu/60)
3. Am I supposed to link every instance of an Author that has a page in en.wikisource, and every instance of a work cited or once per page, or just once (only the first time)?
4. Since this work cites greek classical texts in their original language, should I link the ref to el.wikisource, when the original is available? (E.g. [[Author:Plutarch|Plutarch]], [[Lives (Dryden translation)/Solon|Solon]], [[:el:Βίοι Παράλληλοι/Σόλων|c. 12]] i.e. Plutarch, Solon, c. 12)
5. should I use the <poem> tag in cases like in the second ref of Page:History of Greece Vol I.djvu/59, or is the <br /> tag preferable?

Thank you in advance! —Ah3kal (talk) 08:10, 26 February 2017 (UTC)

@Ah3kal: some comment in reply

1. Help:References ... we look to leave them in situ as there is a means to identify and join continuing refs. Weird or bug-eyed formatting solutions would drive us to amalgamate, ie. when there is a table split across two pages (my bane yesterday)
2. I would usually put in a <p> or a <br/> to make up for the collapsing component. Whatever works, it isn't critical.
3. I normally link once per chapter, and again for a link going into an endnote. We are more likely to underlink than overlink.
4. Bit of a toughie, if you know that the work exists at the wiki, and is the author's direct work, then sure. Often with those ancient works we end up with a disambig page, and that can contain a link to the works. That is usually what I do, but that is personal. As it is rarer for a work to exist in native language it is not something that we have discussed from memory.
5. We don't prescribe between <poem> and <br/>, personal choice to get the desired result, community did not reach a consensus and in the end it makes little difference. — billinghurst sDrewth 10:35, 26 February 2017 (UTC)

Thank you very much billinghurst. I feel a bit dumb that I didn’t notice Help:References. As for greek texts, given that el.wikisource is my homewiki, I can resolve the links to the actual texts (when no exact edition is mentioned). —Ah3kal (talk) 14:21, 26 February 2017 (UTC)

2. A {{dhr}} {double hard return) between paragraphs works too. Zoeannl (talk) 23:50, 15 March 2017 (UTC)

Enough!

I have had it, what seems like it's the logical approach isn't. Short Titles Act 1896/First Schedule/Pre Union

The last attempt to do what was thought to be reasonably standard generated a spurios table end marker |} and I am not prepared to spend yet more endless hours going round and round in circles, because I can't cope with what appear to me to be phase of the moon issues with precisely where wiki markup/LST interact in certain ways.

This has probably already been explained many times previously, so I am not going to get into yet another argument. I am considering marking ALL my efforts on this work for speedy deletion, so that someone that is actually competent with where depending on the phase of the moon specfic syntax has to go has a clean start unencumbered by previous attempts at half baked 'fixes'.

I appreciate that this may seem like you seeing me in the middle of a burnout, but having put a lot of effort into trying to get something working, I am really frustrated when making what should be a simple simplification or change brings down the entire edifice.

This isn't the only work affected. I may be considering asking for deletion of other efforts that use overly complex templates as well. ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 18:17, 1 March 2017 (UTC)

@ShakespeareFan00: If it's any consolation, I feel your frustration and I really value all you add to WMF projects. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 21:00, 1 March 2017 (UTC)

Decided to take a break, and put my brain under a cold tap... The relevant fix was found... Sometimes it's better to stand well back from exploding contributors (sigh).ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 21:27, 1 March 2017 (UTC)

If you see a spurious |} it will either be due to there being two, so one is seen as raw text, or that it isn't seen as starting on a new line. — billinghurst sDrewth 01:51, 2 March 2017 (UTC)

and I usually find that it is not lunar phases when it happens to me, but the input at keyboard end. I can usually work it out when I have the code in front of me, though when you have to go through complex code in templates, it is a nightmare. Use Wikisource:Sandbox and simplify and test in parts. While sometimes it is quirks of references, or tags, it is usually me. Identify the signs and remember first principles. — billinghurst sDrewth 01:57, 2 March 2017 (UTC)

Well perhaps you can explain in simple terms why the technique used here Page:Chronological_Table_and_Index_of_the_Statutes.djvu/29 when implemented in like fashion here Page:Public General Statutes 1896.djvu/34 generates 2 different outcomes? We've had the same discussion about precisely how Mediawiki handles {{nop}}, table synatx at least twice previously, with no conclusive long-term fix to the issue being forthcoming. Why is it such a chore to have what should be near identical techniques work consistently when the SAME technique is applied in different content? (Sigh.) ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 15:32, 2 March 2017 (UTC)

No, I will not. You got yourself into that trouble with non-standard, overly complex templates. Expecting people to bale you out on a regular basis is not reasonable. There will be a coding error or difference there somewhere, you just haven't found it. Your total attention to detail is often not there, whether it be proofreading or templates. I simply do not have the time nor the patience to dig through crud like this.

We don't get into this sort of pickle as we don't go for overly complex, error-prone templates, we keep it simpler. — billinghurst sDrewth 22:44, 2 March 2017 (UTC)

Harsh, but fair.. and as it's unreasonable to expect anyone else to care deletion of anything using the overly complex templates (up to annd including my entire 8 years worth of effort) may be the simplest option. Having reached the limits of my own confidence, patience and expertise, it's perhaps time to just stop contributing altogether? I don't hold anyone else responsible for this at present, but will consider further disscusion pointless. It's a shame that I seem to have wasted my efforts, trying to make this project better, and that you've had to witness a rather public meltdown. As I was saying the other day, I blew it :(

ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 02:16, 3 March 2017 (UTC)

The current "fix" seems to be do with some very precise positioning of line-feed/carriage returns and in forcing additional nops on every template call, which seems like overkill to me. If someone is willing to loose their sanity reducing the templates concerned to the absolute minimum needed to get them working, I'd appreciate the attempt.ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 15:46, 2 March 2017 (UTC)

Second concern (as indicated previously), even when {{nop}} is implemented on the pages (and for each row of the table) an assembled page like - Short Titles Act 1896/First Schedule/6 Ann still apparently needs a convoluted template like {{table-page}}. That it works at all is a miracle. (sigh)ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 16:09, 2 March 2017 (UTC)

At the very least it would be nice to have documented somewhere (not by reading the source code directly), how LST/mediawiki/table is 'wrapping' what it thinks it's rendering, so that the quirks of it all can be better understood.

ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 16:14, 2 March 2017 (UTC)

And also today when I decided to when I decided to work on this Index:Chronological Table and Index of the Statutes.djvu, by reformatting the index using TOCstyle, yet more issues (albiet my own fault due to the precise paramaters calling that template needs.) when trying to input all the relevant formatting. When something is too complex for normal users to use without additional tools (like enhanced editors and so on), a fundamental rethink of certain assumptions are needed on the part of the entire community. Sadly I don't see solutions like Visual Editor being ready for Wikisource use any time before the next ice age...

ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 20:47, 2 March 2017 (UTC)

I do think there is a lot of template bloat when it comes to tables. I prefer to stick with the default syntax, {{ts}}, and a few basic special cases ({{multicol}} and {{TOC begin}} and related). I find it is generally a waste of time to try to get a giant uber-complex template to work in all cases. —Beleg Tâl (talk) 21:04, 2 March 2017 (UTC)

while i in general like the look and feel of the customization that we can do, after a certain point i have to weigh the effort versus effect. if it truly is enough for you now, then maybe it is a good time to reassess or reconsider the choices that led you here. and then adjust them a little so that your productivity / mental health is greater, even if you had to make an aesthetic compromise. if you want to establish a MOS about certain cases, set it up in user space, and we can brainstorm and have a SOP going forward. Slowking4 ‽ SvG's revenge 23:23, 3 March 2017 (UTC)

 This section is considered resolved, for the purposes of archiving. If you disagree, replace this template with your comment. — billinghurst sDrewth 14:28, 16 April 2017 (UTC)

Edit window limitations

Do we have a new vertical size limit on the edit window? Today, I can't extend the window to the same size as the neighboring DjVu page image, which I was able to do as recently as yesterday. Today, I drag the size down, and hit a sticking point beyond which it will not extend. --EncycloPetey (talk) 04:05, 9 March 2017 (UTC)

Firefox 51.0.1 allows me to expand the edit box to the same height as the image, which is not unexpected in a table or div. — billinghurst sDrewth 05:54, 9 March 2017 (UTC)

My Firefox 51.0.1 allowed me to do so yesterday (and in all times past), but not today. Now, my edit window is limited to a height which is decidedly shorter than the image. --EncycloPetey (talk) 05:57, 9 March 2017 (UTC)

Have you been using Visual Editor, or have you upgraded to Firefox 52.0 ?

ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 19:56, 9 March 2017 (UTC)

Neither. --EncycloPetey (talk) 02:43, 10 March 2017 (UTC)

I have checked in Chrome (56.0.2924.87) and Firefox (51.0.1), the edit window can be dragged to bigger size vertically than the scanned page. So the problem may be local. Hrishikes (talk) 03:11, 10 March 2017 (UTC)

I've been having this problem on two different computers, running different OS (Windows / MacOS) but with Firefox. Lately the situation has changed slightly. I still get a maximum size at which point I can't increase the size of the edit window, however it's no longer always shorter than the accompanying image. Previously, the sticking point was always relative to the size of the image at about the same place (~90% of the image size). But now the sticking point seems to be at a fixed size irrespective of the size of the image. So now, my edit window can sometimes go larger (but only so far), and sometimes only short, depending on the djvu file I'm working with. --EncycloPetey (talk) 17:42, 16 March 2017 (UTC)

I wonder if it's related to this recently reported problem, which was ultimately blamed on a long-forgotten user script. Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 16:54, 18 March 2017 (UTC)

If so, it's a different tweak than it is here. I have no such code in my common.css to cause that problem. Also, my issue is a maximum size when I change it, not an externally forced window height that needs to be adjusted. --EncycloPetey (talk) 17:20, 18 March 2017 (UTC)

Search failure

Although Poems of Nature (1895) was listed as a "New text" in January 2017, and appears first on the list at Wikisource:Works/2017, a search in the WS namespace does not turn up this link. Has this problem been noted before? --EncycloPetey (talk) 18:39, 12 March 2017 (UTC)

I'm guessing this is a caching or job queue issue. It's now showing after I gave it the relevant pages a barrage of purges and null edits. BethNaught (talk) 20:38, 12 March 2017 (UTC)

I wonder how many of our pages are failing to show up in searches for this reason. --EncycloPetey (talk) 17:37, 16 March 2017 (UTC)

Tech News: 2017-11

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Changes this week

• You will be able to show references from <references /> tags in more than one column on your wiki. This is the list of footnotes for the sources in the article. How many columns you see will depend on how big your screen is. On some wikis, some templates already do this. Templates that use <references /> tags will need to be updated, and then later the change can happen for all reference lists. mw:Editing/Projects/Columns_for_references[5]
• The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 14 March. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 15 March. It will be on all wikis from 16 March (calendar).

Meetings

• You can join the next meeting with the VisualEditor team. During the meeting, you can tell developers which bugs you think are the most important. The meeting will be on 14 March at 19:00 (UTC). See how to join.

Future changes

• Some old web browsers will not be able to use JavaScript on Wikimedia wikis in the future. If you have an old web browser on your computer you can upgrade to a newer version. [6]
• CSS in templates will be stored in a separate page in the future. [7][8]

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

15:25, 13 March 2017 (UTC)

Action items

• The above components about CSS are very pertinent to us. We should be looking to get our heads around what is happening, especially as 1) much of what we apply inline is styling, rather than structural, 2) we style tables! I need to do some more reading and thinking. Others more expert please feel welcome to throw in your opinions. To me it will over us the change to overhaul what we do.

  Good news, with the planned change we can start to utilise nth-child type css, and other CSS3, formatting at a template level, rather than just globally (per common.css). What that will mean is that where we can finally style a column of a work rather than have to format every cell in the column (yippee). We will have some work to do to set up something like template:table style and its subsidiary. We will also want to look at what we consider good template styles, and what we consider problematic. [We probably should review what bloat we have created and should put centrally anyway,eg. making some of our static formatting templates just be classes and move the formatting centrally. And yes, I should create a separate section :-/ ] — billinghurst sDrewth 02:52, 15 March 2017 (UTC)

• With regard to references. I don't believe that we would have many, if any, uses of references presented in columns. If we do, we should be looking to identify these and determine where we want to take these. — billinghurst sDrewth 23:46, 13 March 2017 (UTC)

Tracked in PhabricatorTask T33597

We don't use references in columns, but we do use {{reflist}} and {{smallrefs}} an awful lot. Will this change affect those templates? --Mukkakukaku (talk) 04:13, 14 March 2017 (UTC)

both templates have coding for columns and that will need to be updated, (or maybe we just remove it?) — billinghurst sDrewth 11:04, 14 March 2017 (UTC)

Added the phabricator tracking. It seems that there will be an ON group of wikis and an OFF group, though the process for which is not stated. I have asked the question. We will need to work that option into our templates. It will probably mean that we will need to move the style components of templates into Mediawiki:common.css though I will leave that to those who play that space better than I. — billinghurst sDrewth 11:17, 14 March 2017 (UTC)

Opt-in. So we can update at our leisure. — billinghurst sDrewth 14:16, 14 March 2017 (UTC)

There's definitely no rush.

For now, you can turn this feature on for any individual page (requires >10 refs to see a change). If you ever want that to change (in which case, you could turn it off on any individual page), then please file a task in Phabricator, or talk to me. My goal is for the default setting at your wiki to be the best setting for your wiki – not the best setting for some hypothetical average wiki. Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 21:38, 14 March 2017 (UTC)

Decoupling CSS from dynamic templates?

How are templates that style dynamically, like {{Numbered div}} intended to be done correctly, if CSS is being "decoupled"? ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 15:11, 15 March 2017 (UTC)

The above said, some aspects of what numbered div does could ideally be implemented with CSS counters in any event.ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 15:44, 15 March 2017 (UTC)

That is the discussion that we have to have. Basically the change is going to be equivalent to html where we can have <style> sections or separate style sheets. It is a big change and we are going to have to work out what we want to do. We may choose to not do anything at this point of time as most of our templates are pretty set. You especially need to settle! Running amok changing templates and adding further complexity and tangentially to what the community decides would not be ideal. — billinghurst sDrewth 13:47, 16 March 2017 (UTC)

If the existing inline styles will still work, then there's no need to change anything (which was the impression I got from the TemplateStyles documentation). However, if there is a general consensues that "decoupling" style and content, is a good thing, then it should be seen as a chance to massively overhaul many templates.

For example, currently we have {{p}},{{tf}},{{ts}} that essentially all do the same thing, albeit for different HTML elements. Would it not be a more sensible approach to have one central style/parse to handle the short codes, rather than 2 or more, and to have the short codes/expansion stored separately from the parse portion of the template? That way to add new codes, it wouldn't need to necessary to modify the parse template (which could be protected.) and instead there could be a page which was used as a lookup table for the style codes.

I am also of the view that are some templates (mine included) DO need to be massively overhauled. ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 14:16, 16 March 2017 (UTC)

Upcoming changes

There are a lot of small changes happening in the next couple of weeks, and I wanted to give you all a quick heads-up about them. Please share this information with other people/languages/projects that will be interested:

• There's a change to how columns in reference lists are handled, at the request of the German Wikipedia. This change will improve accessibility by automatically formatting long lists of <ref>s into columns, based on each reader's screen width. (It has no effect when the references list contains fewer than 10 refs.)
  • What you need to do: Nothing visible is happening now. If your project uses the normal <references /> tag (or doesn't really use refs at all), then file a Phabricator task or just tell me, and I'll get your wiki on the list for the next config change. If your project uses a "reflist" template to create columns, then please consider deprecating it, or update the template to work with the new feature.
  • I have a few worries about this for the Wikisources. I don't know how the different Wikisources are formatting columns of footnotes in sources. I also don't whether you'll decide, in the case of a narrow printed source being reproduced on a wide computer screen, that it's better to to maintain the narrow columns of the original (which could mean many narrow columns vs two narrow columns in the original) or the number of columns in the original (which could mean two wide columns rather than many narrow ones). So I'd particularly like to hear from each of the Wikisources about whether this should be enabled on each one. If this feature is really going to break things, then we probably shouldn't enable it here.
• The label on the "Save changes" button will change on most projects tomorrow (Wednesday) to say "Publish page". This has been discussed for years, is supported by user research, and is meant to be clearer for new contributors. (Most of us who have been editing for years don't even look at the button any more, and we all already know that all of our changes can be seen by anyone on the internet, so this doesn't really affect us.)
  • If you have questions or encounter problems (e.g., a bad translation, problems fixing the documentation, etc.), then please tell me as soon as possible.
  • When we split "Save page" into "Save page" and "Save changes" last August, a couple of communities wondered whether a local label would be possible. (For example, someone at the English Wikipedia asked if different namespaces could have different labels [answer: not technically possible], and the Chinese Wikipedia has some extra language on their "Save page" button; I think it's about the importance of previewing.) Whether the Legal team can agree to a change may depend upon the language/country involved, so please ask me first if you have any questions.
• As part of the ongoing, years-long user-interface standardization project, the color and shape of the "Save changes" (or now "Publish page"), "Show preview" and "Show changes" buttons on some desktop wikitext editors will change. The buttons will be bigger and easier to find, and the "Save" button will be bright blue. (phab:T111088) Unfortunately, it is not technically possible to completely override this change and restore the appearance of the old buttons for either your account or an entire site.
• Do you all remember last April, when nobody could edit for about 30 minutes twice, because of some work that Technical Ops was doing on the servers? The same kind of planned maintenance is happening again. It's currently scheduled for Wednesday, April 19th and Wednesday, May 3rd. The time of day is unknown, but it will probably afternoon in Europe and morning in North America. This will be announced repeatedly, but please mark your calendars now.

That's everything on my mind at the moment, but I may have forgotten something. If you have questions (about this or any other WMF work), then please {{ping}} me, and I'll see what I can find out for you. Thanks, Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 19:01, 13 March 2017 (UTC)

The time for the server switch project has been confirmed. All of the wikis will be in read-only mode for 20 to 30 minutes on two days soon:

• Wednesday, 19 April 2017, starting at 14:00 UTC
• Wednesday, 3 May 2017 (two weeks later), starting at 14:00 UTC

If you are a MediaWiki hacker, then please note that the normal deployment schedule has been canceled during both of those weeks.

There is more information at m:Tech/Server switch 2017, including a link to the official schedule. Please leave a message on my user talk page or "ping" me if you have any questions. Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 22:05, 29 March 2017 (UTC)

Proofreading

U.S. Government Printing Office Style Manual 2008 is nearly completely proofread. I have found an earlier copy to fix the last Problematic pages. The proofreading has been done by ShakespeareFan00 and I over the last year, and is frankly a bit erratic. We’ve both been trying different approaches as we’ve worked through it. I think it now really needs a thorough editorial eye passed over it as it is validated.

My intention is to use this text and Cowie's Printer's Pocket-Book and Manual as proofreading reference books/exemplars/training material so I want them to be reflective of WS standards, especially demonstrating that there are different approaches to "solving" proofreading "dilemmas". I would really appreciate erudite discussion referencing these books. I think we could use Page discussion to detail the finer points and then link them to Help pages.

Any takers for a thorough review?

Cheers, Zoeannl (talk) 01:28, 16 March 2017 (UTC)

@Zoeannl: can you describe the different approaches in style? Maybe we can get a bot to go through and either check or adjust some of the differences. — billinghurst sDrewth 13:40, 16 March 2017 (UTC)

@Billinghurst: You have clearly not even looked at this transcription before sounding off. It is a demonstration piece of the limits of typography and as such a robotic solution can only be detrimental at best. 101.174.28.34 23:12, 16 March 2017 (UTC)

Absolutely I didn't check it on the limited moments that I had, which is why I asked for an expanding on the comments so that people can better understand prior to venturing to the work. Start with open questions to better have the issues defined, so we don't all have to work it out. Mention some of the possible solutions, so the thinking is shared with a common approach. Running a bot through is always possible at this stage if there are style differences. — billinghurst sDrewth 02:23, 17 March 2017 (UTC)

Specifically, I have issues with font size mark-up both in terms of consistency between proofreaders and as faithfully representing the text which specifies things like "7 point" in places (as a printing standard).

Generally … SF came up with a template specifically for the project which is pretty cool and worth discussion. The book covers a lot of stuff like non-English fonts, symbols, tables, poetry etc so as I am proposing would provide a great exemplar for what we should/could/would do for proofreading and formatting.

Cheers, Zoeannl (talk) 07:32, 18 March 2017 (UTC)

Wiki 4 Coop

Hello everyone,

I come to you to invite to re-read the submission of a new partnership project between the Wikimedia movement and the Belgian NGOs. The project is titled Wiki 4 Coop and I invite you to discover its submission page on Meta-Wiki. Do not hesitate to endorse the project if you like it and even correct my English if you have a little time. A beautiful end of day for all of you, Lionel Scheepmans (talk) 12:06, 17 March 2017 (UTC)

We invite you to join the movement strategy conversation (now through April 15)

This message, "We invite you to join the movement strategy conversation (now through April 15)", was sent through multiple channels by Gregory Varnum on 15 and 16 of March 2017 to village pumps, affiliate talk pages, movement mailing lists, and MassMessage groups. A similar message was sent by Nicole Ebber to organized groups and their mailing lists on 15 of March 2017. This version of the message is available for translation and documentation purposes

Dear Wikimedians/Wikipedians:

Today we are starting a broad discussion to define Wikimedia's future role in the world and develop a collaborative strategy to fulfill that role. You are warmly invited to join the conversation.

There are many ways to participate, by joining an existing conversation or starting your own:

Track A (organized groups): Discussions with your affiliate, committee or other organized group (these are groups that support the Wikimedia movement).

Track B (individual contributors): On Meta or your local language or project wiki.

This is the first of three conversations, and it will run between now and April 15. The purpose of cycle 1 is to discuss the future of the movement and generate major themes around potential directions. What do we want to build or achieve together over the next 15 years?

We welcome you, as we create this conversation together, and look forward to broad and diverse participation from all parts of our movement.

• Find out more about the movement strategy process
• Learn more about volunteering to be a Discussion Coordinator

Sincerely,

Nicole Ebber (Track A Lead), Jaime Anstee (Track B Lead), & the engagement support teams

05:09, 18 March 2017 (UTC)

I have started a discussion relevant to Wikisource to which I encourage people to add comments, especially regarding the value and impact behind integration of Wikisource with Wikidata, Wikipedia, and Libraries. --EncycloPetey (talk) 16:52, 18 March 2017 (UTC)

@EncycloPetey: Thanks for that.

I've also created a local page for this at Wikisource:Wikimedia Strategy 2017, if anyone would prefer to participate here instead of on Metawiki. Please let your fellow editors know, in the optimum locations for you. Looking forward to your input! :) Quiddity (WMF) (talk) 01:04, 22 March 2017 (UTC)

commons poty banner

i see we are getting a commons banner here. [9] anybody comment or consent to this? Slowking4 ‽ SvG's revenge 14:07, 18 March 2017 (UTC)

We are? I never see banners here. Gadgets win! — billinghurst sDrewth 14:58, 18 March 2017 (UTC)

Yeah, that just popped up for me on the Community Portal. Can't say I like the idea that people visiting a page like that are greeted by a huge banner that directs them to another project. --EncycloPetey (talk) 16:49, 18 March 2017 (UTC)

there is a global turn-off "following code to your common.css page: #siteNotice {display: none;} " [10] cheers. Slowking4 ‽ SvG's revenge 00:44, 19 March 2017 (UTC)

Changes in Preferences Editing settings & other issues

The textarea window row size setting from Preferences/Editing settings was removed with one of the recent wmf software updates.

Also noticed that {{rule}} and table borders etc., are not rendered and this causes some confusion when previewing. Had anyone else noticed these issues? — Ineuw talk 20:42, 18 March 2017 (UTC)

The rendering of {{rule}} is platform specific. When I view pages from home, rules and table borders render just fine. When I view pages at work, rules and table borders render only sometimes, but often not. This is true whether I preview an edit or simply view a page. I use Firefox at both locations, but have issues at work because it runs Windows. --EncycloPetey (talk) 21:28, 18 March 2017 (UTC)

Thanks, I will check this issue in Linux. However, the lines do show up eventually on the same platform (Windows 7 & Firefox) and this was never an issue before. — Ineuw talk 04:28, 19 March 2017 (UTC)

On Pearl Buck

How come I cannot find Pearl Buck as an author? Billingsmell 21:56, 18 March 2017 (UTC)

Primarily because nobody has created an author page for her yet. Based on her Wikipedia page, all her writings were in the 1930s or later, which means they are all (probably) copyright. If there are no public domain works by her, there is no point in creating an author page for her anyway, and any author page would probably be deleted. —Beleg Tâl (talk) 22:07, 18 March 2017 (UTC)

But she is very famous and a page has to be devoted to her.Billingsmell 22:14, 18 March 2017 (UTC)

Famous has nothing to do with it. Most Wikisource projects (English or otherwise) only create Author pages if there are works written by that person that are in the public domain. If a person has not written anything, or all their works are under copyright, we do not create an Author page for them. the purpose in having an Author page is to provide a list of what we have on Wikisource, not simply for the sake of having a page. --EncycloPetey (talk) 22:30, 18 March 2017 (UTC)

That is it. I also searched for "Karen Blixen" but I could not see her name here. I had book written by her and I wish to edit her page if it exists.Billingsmell 22:35, 18 March 2017 (UTC)

I can only find three of her works published before 1923, and those were published in Danish. Have you tried Danish Wikisource? --EncycloPetey (talk) 23:15, 18 March 2017 (UTC)

i suspect we have some orphans that may not have been renewed, but it is too hard. you could build the author and bibliography, (or grab from wikidata) and then start with the hathi trust search of the pdfs. [11]; and copyright search [12] Slowking4 ‽ SvG's revenge 00:51, 19 March 2017 (UTC)

New Page that I created

Please start contributing to the page I just created: https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Authors_whose_work_are_part_of_their_or_someone_else%27s_epitaphs Thanks. Billingsmell 22:55, 18 March 2017 (UTC)

That's not the sort of thing Wikisource does. We don't create new works or articles, but re-publish works that have already been published, and create indexes/categories/catalogs so that people can find those works on our site. --EncycloPetey (talk) 00:24, 20 March 2017 (UTC)

Re-reading previously proof-read..

I've decided to take another look at some stuff I proofread earlier this year, and in previous years. I am not finding many big errors, but I am finding a lot of tiny single character or format errors, on pages I was sure I'd checked at least twice previously. So if I am somewhat quieter for a while or I seem to be making a LOT of minor edits don't be surprised, The aim is to try and push the page quality as far as I reasonably can before it gets validated (And that reminds me, I should probably check some of those as well). ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 23:01, 18 March 2017 (UTC)

Your proofreading is passable. Even on Project Gutenberg things get missed after 6 rounds of proofreaders have been through. Which is why WS has an advantage as we can continue to improve once "published". PG’s process for fixing mistakes is arduous. Because of this Distributed Proofreaders, where the books are processed, has a very vigorous training program that I would really recommend for everyone here at WS. It doesn’t take long to get through their first stage (P1) and they have projects and feedback specifically for beginners. It is 95% relevant to what we do here, and even the differences help train the eye. They have tutorials and quizzes too. I notice they have 300+ active users in the last 24 hours, about the same as WS in the last month … They do know what they are doing re proofreading. I think it’s a real shame that their end product is IMHO so inferior to WS. Cheers, Zoeannl (talk) 01:13, 19 March 2017 (UTC)

@ShakespeareFan00: I recommend you to install typoscan.js by AuFCL. It highlights a of typos. — Ineuw talk 04:35, 19 March 2017 (UTC)

@ShakespeareFan00: have a look at Page:The Holy Bible (YLT).djvu/55, and read through it a bit. This is how you've been proofreading this whole work. It's a page I randomly picked which I remember working with you for a bit, and I remember your proofreading there was as if you just speedily went through it. Also check some of the pages I've validated and compare history from your proofreading. I thought of bringing it up to you many times, but I don't like putting down someone who after all is just trying to help, but in the end is it help? or would it have been better if no help was provided at all, since in this circumstance my validating was as if I was proofreading and in the end the true validation is lost, since I'm sure I've left many mistakes behind myself. So I must say your proofreading is unacceptable in this work. As I said I wouldn't have mentioned this at all (probably should of though) but it seems you're looking for critique and and your work here Index:The Holy Bible (YLT).djvu speaks for itself. Sorry. Jpez (talk) 05:11, 19 March 2017 (UTC)

@Jpez: Added to my re-read list. If you find others LMK.ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 09:36, 19 March 2017 (UTC)

Cassell 3? Although there you're not the only one missing lots of stuff. I agree with Jpez about how difficult it can be to raise issues needing to be raised. BethNaught (talk) 11:05, 19 March 2017 (UTC)

Thanks, Any objections to a complete re-read of all volumes of this completed so far?ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 11:26, 19 March 2017 (UTC)

Why would anyone object to anyone rechecking their own work? BethNaught (talk) 11:42, 19 March 2017 (UTC)

@Ineuw: , I may already have typoscan.js installed, I am not going to rely on automated tools to spot "errors" though. ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 09:36, 19 March 2017 (UTC)

I'm glad you're taking steps to recheck your work, but I would recommend you follow Zoeannl's advice re PG training. I haven't done it but it looks helpful; your rechecks are still missing quite a bit, see my randomly sampled page [13] vs. [14]. BethNaught (talk) 11:05, 19 March 2017 (UTC)

I can't promise 100% ever. This is EVEN with the typo script, the spell-checker in Firefox, and page preview. Was there a plan to add further text-check' tools, to look for mismatched brackets, quotes and s/e template mismatches? ( Kind of like a Wikisource specfic set of checkwiki hurestics.)ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 11:26, 19 March 2017 (UTC)

I never asked for 100%, and I would never claim that I never make errors. Nevertheless you clearly have a blind spot for punctuation, which spell-checkers won't help with. Try using the MS Word (or equivalent) spell checker as that also checks grammar. But really when so many of your works have problems, you should consider that there may be a fundamental problem with your proofreading, which may need to be fixed with e.g. the PG training. BethNaught (talk) 11:42, 19 March 2017 (UTC)

Quite. I will also note at one point, I was marking pages I'd effectively only cleaned up from OCR as "Not-proofread" until someone queried why I was creating a backlog, and why I was apparently asking for 2 proofreads as well as the validation step. If scan errors and typos are being missied in sufficient number (on the initial entry and) re-checking as well, it clearly needs at least 3 (independent) people. I'm thusly also not happy that it's possible to mark as proofread directly on new page-creation, as barring someone that's done a LOT of proof-reading previously, it's unlikely all the errors will be removed on a first-pass. ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 12:13, 19 March 2017 (UTC)

Also:

1. If anyone finds anything they want "re-read" drop a note on my talk page. I won't be starting 'new-projects' (other than stuff I already have watchlisted) until June.
2. I will be marking 'new-pages' as 'Not-Proofread' (given my concerns)
3. I obviously have no objections to other contributors correcting scan errors that have been overlooked/missed (Letting me know so the entire work can be "re-read" would be appreciated.)
4. The spell-check dictionary in most software doesn't like archaic spellings or long-s. Would there be any interest in people slightly more able than me developing an 'archaic' list for older word forms? ( and yes I'm well aware that until a certain date English spelling was NOT uniform.)

ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 12:33, 19 March 2017 (UTC)

Is there any kind of agreement in the community as to an acceptable error rate, or to what level the formatting should to be accurate, in order to mark a page as proofread? I always understood it to be "as perfect as possible", but accepting that an error every couple of pages, more if pages are very long or complicatedly laid out, will happen. I often feel when checking or validating others' work (not just SF00, and not naming other names) that others have different standards. BethNaught (talk) 11:42, 19 March 2017 (UTC)

Let's just say that finding 2-3 typos per PAGE on a recheck is probably too high. The speed at which proofreading/validation occurs has also been a concern raised. (There was at one time a suggestion that to validate needed two people to independently flag an unchanged page (i.e no changes) as such, but the outcome of the disscussion was that it wasn't feasible in the software.)ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 12:13, 19 March 2017 (UTC)

Might I suggest a method for processing a page, which would include proofing, validating, revalidating as many times as you like? There was someone many years ago at Distributed Proofreaders who was having some difficulty in catching OCR misinterpretations, publisher typos and punctuation mishaps despite the use of Wordcheck. It was suggested to the user that the method of using Ctrl+right arrow key might help. I too was having the same issue. Originally I was just moving my mouse over the text but when I checked my diffs I found I was missing too much and it was obvious stuff. Then I started using the Ctrl+right arrow key method and things started to improve. Although that may sound time consuming, it really isn't once you get used to it. I like to "read" as I proof (or maybe in this case, "proof" as I read) as I am doing both. Somewhere in my past, I recall a statement that "the eye follows movement". Do you ever find yourself watching the movement in the background of a TV interview instead of the non-moving person in the front? Not to say that this is the best method (I'm sure I still miss the occasional thing) but something you could try. Humbug26 (talk) 18:00, 19 March 2017 (UTC)

I've found myself using that technique, especially with some old texts that needed special formatting inserting, I still can't do non-latin text (sigh) .ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 18:43, 19 March 2017 (UTC)

• BethNaught, I am glad to see your mention of Cassell’s and to that I would state that if you see a mistake anywhere please fix it. That is "as perfect as possible" - helping one another create a better Wikisource and not only on one’s personal projects. The situation you are seeing on Cassell’s v.3 came about as a speed reader (guess who) went through that volume and because of the swift marking of "proofread" I came behind and missed many mistakes while I did get as many as possible while trying to keep up (my mistake) with the speed reader who often makes many mistakes although I have seen that same person edit with perfection. I don’t know why he speed reads but he has been notified by several people and sometimes he has stated he was going to take a "break" but that break doesn’t last very long. My idea includes to going over all of the 9 Cassell volumes once fully done and especially vol.3 My basic job, as agreed upon at the outset among 4 of us, was to insert all images in proofread text plus look over the text. Your comment, "Is there any kind of agreement in the community as to an acceptable error rate, or to what level the formatting should to be accurate, in order to mark a page as proofread? - is an excellent point in my opinion. Speed reading causes more harm than good in my experiences. I have followed and have seen many pages marked "proofread" yet filled with mistakes. Speed dominates that person but he is not a bad person. Also, some do not format pages. When looking into the edit mode one easily sees those. Best, —Maury (talk) 19:27, 19 March 2017 (UTC)

@ShakespeareFan00: Where did you get the idea that it's automated? All it does is highlights possible errors, then it's up to the user to check the context. For example. ii, li, Av and St, are possible errors depending on their context. The Regex for the errors were ones suggested by other users who found them in the scans. — Ineuw talk 21:47, 19 March 2017 (UTC)

Is there a page to suggest new patterns to look for? ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 21:59, 19 March 2017 (UTC)

In old-school printing you got this Page:U.S. Government Printing Office Style Manual 2008.djvu/21 when checking proof's. Is there a way to do something like that in UI/digital terms for Wikisource pages? (i.e noting errors with a carret in the text, and the actual errors down the side.). I am also thinking in terms of VE stuff... ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 22:11, 19 March 2017 (UTC)

On the topic of punctuation: the Wikisource:WikisourceMono font can help with making it easier to see differences between commas, dashes, colons etc. Sam Wilson 23:15, 19 March 2017 (UTC)

pagelist for two page scans

I have a book scanned as two page spreads. How do I configure the pagelist tag to number it correctly in such a situation? Is there any workaround? --Prateek Pattanaik (talk) 07:22, 19 March 2017 (UTC)

You'd probably have to do it manually: 1=1 2=3 3=5 4=7 etc. —Beleg Tâl (talk) 12:11, 19 March 2017 (UTC)

That is how I have managed it in the past. — billinghurst sDrewth 00:16, 20 March 2017 (UTC)

WIkisource Tutorial ?

In a previous thread it was mentioned that there was a tutorial/quiz on the Distributed Proofreaders website. Given that it was possible to implement the "Wikipedia Experience" tutorial on English Wikipedia, would it be possible to implement a "Wikisource Tutorial" based on the DP example? (noting that some of the formatting is done slightly differently on English Wikisource).

I couldn't come up with a name other than tutorial, unless someone knows what an apprentice scribe or typesetter was called way-back. ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 16:46, 19 March 2017 (UTC)

/* By Request */

ShakespeareFan00 has told me on my talk page that there was some sort of editing conflict. So, I repeat what I previously wrote without the highlight and this is copy/pasted from that highlight.

BethNaught, I am glad to see your mention of Cassell’s and to that I would state that if you see a mistake anywhere please fix it. That is "as perfect as possible" - helping one another create a better Wikisource and not only on one’s personal projects. The situation you are seeing on Cassell’s v.3 came about as a speed reader (guess who) went through that volume and because of the swift marking of "proofread" I came behind and missed many mistakes while I did get as many as possible while trying to keep up (my mistake) with the speed reader who often makes many mistakes although I have seen that same person edit with perfection. I don’t know why he speed reads but he has been notified by several people and sometimes he has stated he was going to take a "break" but that break doesn’t last very long. My idea includes to going over all of the 9 Cassell volumes once fully done and especially vol.3 My basic job, as agreed upon at the outset among 4 of us, was to insert all images in proofread text plus look over the text. Your comment, "Is there any kind of agreement in the community as to an acceptable error rate, or to what level the formatting should to be accurate, in order to mark a page as proofread? - is an excellent point in my opinion. Speed reading causes more harm than good in my experiences. I have followed and have seen many pages marked "proofread" yet filled with mistakes. Speed dominates that person but he is not a bad person. Also, some do not format pages. When looking into the edit mode one easily sees those. Best, —Maury (talk) 19:27, 19 March 2017 (UTC)

Further, BethNaught has shown me a page he corrected where five people did not catch all words in proofreadig for which I thanked him and thank him again. Best regards, —Maury (talk) 21:02, 19 March 2017 (UTC)

Collaboration products newsletter: 2017-03

Latest news from the Wikimedia Collaboration team, about Notifications, Flow and Edit Review Improvements. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you.

What's new?

We have focused all our efforts on the New filters for edit review. You will discover these filters on your wiki soon (see below).

Edit Review Improvements [More information • Help pages]

Recent changes

• The documentation concerning the new filters for recent changes has been written and marked for translation.

Future changes

• We will release the ⧼eri-rcfilters-beta-label⧽ beta option on Portuguese and Polish Wikipedias March 28. This beta option adds powerful filtering and other tools as well as an improved filtering interface to the Recent Changes page (and Recent Changes Linked). To try out these new tools on these two wikis, go to the Beta tab of the Preferences page (after the 28th) and select ⧼eri-rcfilters-beta-label⧽.
• In the weeks following the initial release to Polish and Portuguese Wikipedias, the New Filters for Edit Review beta will go out to the following list of Wikipedias in waves (schedule to be done):
  • Persian, Dutch, Russian, Turkish, Czech Wikipedias and Wikidata. [15]
  • English Wikipedia. [16]
  • All other wikis. [17]

Flow [More information • Help pages]

Recent changes

• <math> <hiero> <score> <syntax> <source> <ref> shortcuts are now working on Flow visual editing mode. Type a shortcut in the visual editing mode will open the control panel for the chosen option. [18]
  • Concerning <ref>, footnotes will be automatically included at the end of the message, unless if they are displayed elsewhere in the message by the appropriate template.
• Flow has been removed from Metawiki. [19]

Future changes

• The way you switch between wikitext and the visual editors in the desktop view has changed. It will be a drop-down menu. This is the same as in the mobile view. [20]

Collaboration team's newsletter prepared by the Collaboration team and posted by bot • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

17:02, 20 March 2017 (UTC)

Tech News: 2017-12

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

• The Save page button now says Publish page or Publish changes on the Wikimedia wikis except for Wikipedias and Wikinewses. This change will come to Wikipedias later. The point is to make it more clear that the edit will change the page immediately. Publish page is when you save a new page and Publish changes when you edit an existing page. [21]
• DMOZ no longer works. Templates that use DMOZ can be redirected to archive.org or another mirror. DMOZ has been removed from the RelatedSites extension on Wikivoyage. [22]
• You can see monthly page views when you click on Page information in the sidebar. Developers can also get monthly page views through the API. [23]
• The Linter extension is now on smaller Wikimedia wikis. It helps editors find some wikitext errors so they can be fixed. It will come to other Wikimedia wikis later. The extension will be able to find more errors later. [24]
• The MediaWiki-Vagrant portable development environment has been updated to use Debian Jessie. This means local development and testing will be more like on the majority of Wikimedia production servers. [25]

Problems

• On 15 March some interwiki links to other languages were not correctly sorted. This has been fixed. If you still see pages where the interwiki links are not sorted as they should be, they should be fixed automatically with time or you can edit the page and save it without changing anything. If this doesn't work, please report it. [26]

Changes this week

• When you edit with the visual editor, you will be able to switch the direction you write in from right-to-left to left-to-right as you are editing. This is especially important for editors who edit in languages that write from right to left. You can do this with a tool in the editing menu. You can also use the keyboard shortcut Ctrl+Shift+X on PCs or Cmd+Shift+X on Macs. [27]
• The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 21 March. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 22 March. It will be on all wikis from 23 March (calendar).

Meetings

• You can join the next meeting with the VisualEditor team. During the meeting, you can tell developers which bugs you think are the most important. The meeting will be on 21 March at 19:00 (UTC). See how to join.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

22:03, 20 March 2017 (UTC)

publish may work for wikisource communities, but i can imagine the community pushback on wikipedias. maybe an opt out? or change for VE and not wikitext? Slowking4 ‽ SvG's revenge 22:24, 21 March 2017 (UTC)

Typo words.

Hi,

Can I ask that if you find a word that looks like a scan/typing error to list it and the Page it appears in here User:ShakespeareFan00/Typo words, so I can use a regexp to find and fix them? Thanks. ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 12:39, 21 March 2017 (UTC)

It is all a bit tentative but may I suggest you liase with either da capo or da boss regarding outline of potential solution (or equivalent as I am no longer active)? Might be relevant. (ex-AuFCL) 03:11, 23 March 2017 (UTC)

Portal:War poetry cleanup

Before I have at it, I'm seeking permission to clean up the "Individual poems" section of Portal:War poetry > World War One poetry. To list all WW1 poems available at Wikisource would be "too much." Therefore, if a poem currently listed is contained within one of the Collections listed, I would remove it from the list. Otherwise, an incomplete listing such as we currently have seems pointless to me. Any suggestions would be appreciated. Just thought I'd tidy things up in light of the 100th anniversary of American involvement in the War. Thanks, Londonjackbooks (talk) 21:32, 22 March 2017 (UTC)

user:AdamBMorgan? thoughts? a subpage for loose would be a compromise. Slowking4 ‽ SvG's revenge 02:42, 23 March 2017 (UTC)

I believe AdamBMorgan is gone for a time, unfortunately. They would have been my go-to person... I will go ahead with some adjustments, and will keep in mind the words of Florence Earle Coates, to "Take not away what thou canst not restore!" Input is still welcomed! Thanks, Londonjackbooks (talk) 00:04, 24 March 2017 (UTC)

Template:...

This template states "The existence of this template has not been discussed, and the consequences have not been examined, usage is not recommended." Let's discuss and examine so that we can use, modify, or remove the template :)

The benefit I see to the current template usage (spaced dots) is simply that it spaces the dots nicely. In particular, it works well in cases where there are four dots, i.e. an ellipsis and an extra period; it then spaces them out nicely, like this. . . .

The downside is, of course, that an actual ellipsis may be preferred typography in all cases. In that case, I would support modifying {{...}} to simply place an ellipsis, and it could be used for ease of typing. —Beleg Tâl (talk) 14:00, 23 March 2017 (UTC)

I strongly and violently oppose the proposal to disfigure thousands of pages with artificially compressed ellipses. This is about more than typography and ease of editing, but also about context, rhythm, and communication. An ellipsis used simply to indicate omitted text can be compressed, certainly, but the spacing of dots in dialogue is often intended to communicate pauses of varying lengths. In this instance, the typography communicated through intervening spaces is used to indicate a longer or shorter duration of pause. Eliminating this feature from Wikisource mars the original text. The spacing of periods are also used in reconstruction of documents to indicate a lacuna in the surviving copy. The spacing and number of the dots indicates the size of the lacuna. A similar effect occurs in poetry, where the spacing and number of dots are used to visually align or space sections of text. So, claiming that the only benefit is that the template merely "spaces the dots nicely", is an empty argument that fails to account for all the various reasons that printers have used for the spacing or dots in text. --EncycloPetey (talk) 14:27, 23 March 2017 (UTC)

{{...}} doesn't currently support variable spacing and number of dots, so I think that's a little beyond the scope of the discussion, though we could of course modify the template to support some of that functionality. It's my understanding that the template is currently only used as a more aesthetic alternative where a regular ellipsis would still be appropriate. Do you have any examples to the contrary? or examples of situations where {{...}} would be appropriate, but &hellip; would not? —Beleg Tâl (talk) 15:11, 23 March 2017 (UTC)

And, of course, on researching into even my own usage of this template, I find I am completely wrong . . . . . my apologies. So: what would you say to the use of the template in cases where a regular ellipsis is appropriate? —Beleg Tâl (talk) 15:16, 23 March 2017 (UTC)

Per our Style Guide, we prefer regular ellipsis of omission as a character by default, but even the Style Guide allows that there are situations where another option is permitted. I have given examples of situations which I believe can warrant doing things differently. But when there is no need to use this template, then it should not be used. My editing style is that I prefer not to use a template at all unless either (a) a template is necessary to produce the desired result, (b) a template makes the coding much easier than without it, or (c) the template makes the document easier to adjust later should the need arise. Others may feel differently. --EncycloPetey (talk) 20:07, 23 March 2017 (UTC)

Index:The Bab Ballads.djvu

is currently the featured text. However I have found a large number of pages with errors: of the 88 I have cursorily checked so far, 32 have had at least one error, often more. That's 36%. If anyone else would help me clean up the rest I'd be grateful. (See related changes to see which ranges I have checked.) Thank you, BethNaught (talk) 15:56, 23 March 2017 (UTC)

Never mind. A hundred total edits and I've skimmed it all myself. BethNaught (talk) 20:25, 23 March 2017 (UTC)

The Subjection of Women by J. S. Mill

We currently have an unsourced, non-scan-backed copy of this work. However I have almost finished proofreading this scan. Given the current copy is unsourced, could I overwrite it, or should I create a versions page?

There was a similar situation re. Pollyanna, where overwriting happened. This case is different in that there is no source, but in Billinghurst's words, "Until we have a firm statement and guidance in the deletion policy, I will seek the community's opinion where I come across these examples." BethNaught (talk) 19:30, 26 March 2017 (UTC)

How certain are you that it is/isn't the same version? That's generally the deciding question. If there's no indication of what version they are, a direct comparison of text is necessary. —Beleg Tâl (talk) 21:17, 26 March 2017 (UTC)

Yeah, we are looking for edition differences, often it will be British vs. American, in the editing. Does Special:ComparePages help? Which edition have you transcribed? — billinghurst sDrewth 21:58, 26 March 2017 (UTC)

It's London, 1869, which makes it first edition or a reprint thereof AFAICT. The IA metadata claims the scan is the author's presentation copy, although I don't know how much I believe that. The side-by-side comparison is here: our current mainspace text, as opposed to the scan, appears to: a) have many scannos, b) correct a couple of typos in the scanned text, c) consistently change -ize spellings to -ise. Would that indicate an American edition for the period in question? I can't easily see any place where major revision has happened, although I might have missed something due to paragraphing errors. (Thanks for the tip about ComparePages, I didn't know about that.) BethNaught (talk) 22:28, 26 March 2017 (UTC)

Thanks for the comparison. Looking at the comparison my opinion is to kill the old work, whether it is a different version or not as it would seem to be a significantly inferior quality transcription, and without the ability to check the transcription against the source, I propose that the scanned-backed text take its place. @BethNaught: lovely work as always! — billinghurst sDrewth 00:13, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

OK then, if nobody objects I'll do the replacement probably tomorrow. Thanks for the input. BethNaught (talk) 17:56, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

Done BethNaught (talk) 18:40, 28 March 2017 (UTC)

Change 'plain sister' to follow edition linkages

Hi all, I'd like to suggest a new feature for the {{plain sister}} template: Module talk:Plain sister#Follow_edition_links Sam Wilson 00:07, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

@Samwilson: I think that we are going to need a higher-level explanation, rather than a technical explanation. At the minute plain sister has numbers of sister link components, through manual linking to the (parent) literary works at the sisters, and automated to the edition data at wikidata through the sister link at WD. What is the expected outcome that you would expect to see in the header at an edition page here? — billinghurst sDrewth 00:19, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

@Billinghurst: Sorry! Yes, good point. :) The problem I'm trying to solve is situations like the following and also similar situations where there are multiple editions of the same work spread over different Wikisources.

Take for example w:The Swiss Family Robinson:

• Work: The Swiss Family Robinson — d:Q665715
  • Edition: The Swiss Family Robinson (Kingston) — d:Q19100459
  • Edition: The Swiss Family Robinson - 1851 — d:Q19100453

In the current system, the two editions both require wikipedia = The Swiss Family Robinson to be added to their header template, because their Wikidata items do not link to Wikipedia (because only the 'work' item is allowed to do that). In fact, in this example, the second edition doesn't have that, and so its sister links don't currently list Wikipedia at all.

The fix is to use the fact that all editions have a 'edition or translation of' statement that links to the work item: we follow that link, and from there can get the Wikipedia sitelink. This results in e.g. {{plain sister/sandbox|wikidata=Q19100453}} resulting in:

• sister projects: Wikipedia article, Commons category, Wikidata item.

(The wikidata paramter is included here because we're on the Scriptorium and not on the edition's Wikisource page; in actual usage it'd just be {{plain sister}}).

Sam Wilson 01:03, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

I'm not sure we can do that automagically. Yes, every edition will have an 'edition or translation of' statement, but not every edition will have a single value for that property. For instance, Swanwick's translation of Aeschylus' Agamemnon is a translation of Aeschylus' play, but there are four editions of Swanwick's translation. So Swanwick's translation will have a "work" item (without Wikipedia article), which will list the four edition data items, and Aeschylus' play Agamemnon will also have a "work" item with Swanwick's translations listed, and the individual editions of Swanwick will have both "work" items listed, since Wikidata does not distinguish between "edition of" and "translation of". Here's the catch: there is no article about the play Agamemnon on the English Wikipedia: it is included as a section within the larger article about the Oresteia trilogy.

If this case seems complicated, I can suggest ones that will be even worse once Wikidata catches up with its own data structure. --EncycloPetey (talk) 01:49, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

@EncycloPetey: Certainly, I'm sure there are many cases where things will be weird (I think this is called the Bonnie and Clyde problem?), but for those we can always override locally, as we're currently doing. I'm just talking about the situations in which a sitelink does exist on the work item, so we needn't repeat it here.

We could perhaps in the future look at doing more traversals, such as following 'part of' (P361) relationships (which is perhaps what would get us to Oresteia from Swanwick's translation?) But not doing that needn't stop us handling the simpler cases.

Sam Wilson 02:21, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

•  Comment I will think about this when my brain has some thinking and play time. Now to confuse matters this approach only works well for fiction works, or the rare mega non-fiction works like EB1911 that have articles, but generally not so well for other types of works. All because the relationship between WS and WP and our laissez faire approach.

  Our other, and larger, use case we face is for biographical/encyclopaedic entries. We (perhaps a little naughtily) label as biographical/encyclopaedic articles and not editions at Wikidata, and these need to link back to "main subject", eg. Byron, George Gordon to w:Lord Byron. (If we had a complete biographical work, would we expect it to link back to the article about the book, or the article about the person?) — billinghurst sDrewth 03:56, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

• • All of those can be reasonably easily handled, I think: we'd just define a set of properties that should be followed when looking for a sitelink (and one hasn't been found yet). We could even do it on the next step as well, and get the main subject (or 'part of' or other property) of a work if that work doesn't have a sitelink.

    I don't agree that this only works for fiction works though; it works for anything that has a 'edition or translation of' property. In fact, that's all it works for! :-) I'm trying to keep it simple; we can grow the idea later, if desired.

    One complexity even with this simple case is when there are multiple values for 'edition or translation of'—but we could just list them all. Sam Wilson 04:10, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

You missed the keyword "well" as in works well with. Meaning that the vast majority of our works that have enWP articles and have editions here are primarily fiction works, ie. fiction works tend to get notability in the numbers game rather than non-fiction, so non-fiction books are less likely to have wikipedia articles. Where we have a periodicial article, the periodicial may be listed, however that tends not to cascade down to the article level. — billinghurst sDrewth 05:08, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

@Samwilson: There is another type of situation, where Wikipedia may not have an article on the specific edition or work here, but it has an article on the specific subject. Other than biographies, this is also true about mythological stories (e.g. 1) and fairy tales (e.g. 2). If the story is famous, it will be a part of many collections, in slightly different languages, rendered by different authors. Wikipedia will have a general article on the story in such cases; these need to be linked locally, because linking through Wikidata may not be possible. Hrishikes (talk) 04:13, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

@Hrishikes: good point. Would these be linked with 'main subject'? Actually, it doesn't really matter what the property is, as long as there is some connection to Wikipedia we can just follow it (we have to just define what we consider reasonable linking properties). We'd have to give each chapter in your example its own Wikidata item, but that's a pattern that seems likely to be followed for other things such as journal articles etc. so should be fine. Do you think the base idea here is okay though? That we start by just following 'edition of' properties, where they exist? Sam Wilson 04:20, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

@Samwilson: As I said, one such story will be part of many collections, some of which will be present here. For example, 1 has an image here. So Wikidata will need linking to several chapters of different works. Do you think this kind of thing is feasible? (One Wikipedia article vs. different chapters of different books in multiple language wikisources.) This will come handy for most famous stories of mythological/fairy tale genre. Hrishikes (talk) 04:28, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

@Hrishikes: I think that SW is saying above, 1) let us have a proof of concept, 2) it will have capacity to be expandable as the community considers use cases and sets rules for it to happen. Maybe like a cascading #ifexist hierarchy of links 1st "edition of" < 2nd "main subject" < 3rd ??? — billinghurst sDrewth 05:01, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

@Hrishikes, @Billinghurst: yes, that's about the sum of it! :) And the hierarchy of links is a great way to think about it. My goal with the current proposed change is just to start the journey in a small way, and to get a bit of clarity in our minds (and codes) about this work/edition distinction at Wikidata. (I think it's a pretty fundamental part of the future of bibliographic data on Wikidata, and by extension Wikisource.) I think it'll mean we link more works to their sister project pages, with no extra effort on our part. I'm not seeing any objection (to this specific change); is that right? Sam Wilson 03:13, 31 March 2017 (UTC)

I'm still unclear as to what will happen when an "Edition" is an "edition" of two different data items (e.g. edition of one item and translation of another). --EncycloPetey (talk) 03:36, 31 March 2017 (UTC)

@EncycloPetey: at the moment we do many enWS works to one enWP article, and I would think that the same would continue. As I envisage SW's plan it is to allow direct linking to the corresponding article at enWP by following the WD item and intervening item nodes back through particular Q codes. So this ultimately means we are resolving the enWS to enWP linking automatically. The only time I see we have an issue is if there are two different articles at enWP to which we may link, and nothing springs to mind for me.

While I am saying that I see that the plan as proposed is great for works of fiction (and irrespective of agreeing/disagreeing) SW is saying that his methodology is extensible, and we can work on a plan to look at linking further. This will allows us to map what links can be direct, and the varying paths. This is a first step on this track, there are plenty of further improvements to take for all the xxWSes.

Of course the next story is how do we link from enWP back to enWS, especially if there are multiple items at our end, however, we should separate that as a discussion (to keep this discussion on track). — billinghurst sDrewth 04:26, 31 March 2017 (UTC)

@Billinghurst: Please re-read my question. Your response does not address the issue I raised. It addresses a different issue. --EncycloPetey (talk) 04:38, 31 March 2017 (UTC)

@EncycloPetey: If there is no wikipedia article for which to link it, then we have manual overrides. If there are multiple choices then that is what the cascading criteria does. I had believed that component had been addressed. I think that the discussion on edge cases always need good mapping and problem solving, and getting into that level of detail in a conceptual argument is making for complex discussion in a general forum. I believe that is what is said above about starting the mapping, and this is a starting place. If you are asking me how I saw conceptually we would differentiate between linking to an article of an edition of a work, or link to the literary work itself, my personal opinion would be the lowest factor. How does that work in SW's plan? No idea yet, it will be fun working through such criteria and hopefully no eyeballs will be gouged during that debate. We are so going to need electronic whiteboards!!! — billinghurst sDrewth 06:18, 31 March 2017 (UTC)

@Billinghurst: Again, you have responded, but have not answered the question: "what will happen when an "Edition" is an "edition" of two different data items?" --EncycloPetey (talk) 14:10, 31 March 2017 (UTC)

@EncycloPetey: good point, sorry I do remember now thinking about that but not doing anything! I think we'd want to display all edition site links, but perhaps 'sister links' has too specific a meaning, and what we really want is to display useful interproject links as we've been discussing above. But I shall investigate what happens at Wikidata some more. Sam Wilson 05:19, 31 March 2017 (UTC)

I've attempted to lay out an example of something being an edition of multiple works at d:Wikidata_talk:WikiProject_Books#multi-work.2Fcomposite_editions. Would love some other examples too. Sam Wilson 07:13, 31 March 2017 (UTC)

@Samwilson: See my Euripides / Shelley query there. Wikidata makes no distinction between "edition of" and "translation of", and this is the cause of many problems. --EncycloPetey (talk) 14:13, 31 March 2017 (UTC)

Tech News: 2017-13

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

• When you edit with the visual editor, you can see a visual diff as well as a wikitext diff when you review your changes. [28]

Problems

• Special:AllPages was disabled for two days due to some performance issues. It is back, but the filter for redirects is gone as the cause of the performance problem. It still needs to be fixed. [29][30]

Changes this week

• New filters for Recent changes will be released on Portuguese and Polish Wikipedias and MediaWikiwiki on March 28. Other wikis will get it progressively. The new filters include filtering, highlighting and, on certain wikis, user intent prediction.
• The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from March 28. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from March 29. It will be on all wikis from March 30 (calendar).

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

14:46, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

Disambiguation: merge these?

//unarchiving 2017-3-29 to continue discussion//

Thoughts on whether these are the same or different in terms of disambiguation

• Dialogue
• A Dialogue

I know that we have merged certain variations of "(The|A)? Word ..." see Cry, or another including plurals Fan

Our page Help:Disambiguation doesn't cover such, and it is probably a time we can work through that guidance. — billinghurst sDrewth 04:01, 2 January 2017 (UTC)

 Support. I see no reason not to merge these pages. —Beleg Tâl (talk) 14:36, 2 January 2017 (UTC)

 Support. There are so few items, I can see no reason to separate them into two lists. --EncycloPetey (talk) 14:41, 29 March 2017 (UTC)

While on the matter

Something like A Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature/Butler, Samuel which is a pretty old page.

Do we really wish to disambiguate to that level? (especially as it can be captured on a table of contents). Would something like that belong at a collective "Butler, Samuel" or "Samuel Butler"? Noting that we could be building a for our backs as with that approach as we start to build biographical works are we just making lots of names to add, for example the number of John Smiths in the Alumni Oxonienses will be non-trivial. — billinghurst sDrewth 06:19, 2 January 2017 (UTC)

Noting that we already determined that works about author's belong on Author pages rather than being separately listed in main namespace (disambiguations/versions). Also noting that we have talked about persons in Portal: nsamepsace. Though that will never cover all circumstances, thoguh they will generally all be subpages of a work. — billinghurst sDrewth 10:35, 2 January 2017 (UTC)

If I may, can someone point to the conversation where this has been "already determined" so I can think through this? Also, what was the primary concern within that conversation with regard to creating redirects/versions pages for titles with people's names? Thanks, Londonjackbooks (talk) 12:14, 2 January 2017 (UTC)

I do not think that disambiguation at this level is useful at all. I would just use the work's TOC for disambiguation, or if they are entries in an anthology, I would use a top-level disambig page between those entries and any other pages with the same title. —Beleg Tâl (talk) 14:36, 2 January 2017 (UTC)

Edmund Clarence Stedman is an author. "Edmund Clarence Stedman" is also the title of a poem by Florence Earle Coates with two versions hosted here. A letter from Stedman to Coates—(also hosted here)—references and wikilinks to the poem (see text "sonnet"). It is my opinion that it would be (and was) quite useful to have a versions page entitled "Edmund Clarence Stedman" to link to from the letter as opposed to redirecting to an anchor at Stedman's author page. Also note "Robert Browning", which in my opinion is also useful. Perhaps make "Edmund Clarence Stedman (Coates)" a versions page? as is Robert Browning (Coates). Londonjackbooks (talk) 17:29, 2 January 2017 (UTC)

Edmund Clarence Stedman should be a versions page listing versions of the poem called "Edmund Clarence Stedman" by Coates. If another different work called "Edmund Clarence Stedman" is added (or if there is a reasonable argument to be made that the letter is entitled "Edmund Clarence Stedman") then Edmund Clarence Stedman should be a disambig page linking to the new work and also to Edmund Clarence Stedman (Coates) which would become the new versions page for Coates' poem.

In either case: Edmund Clarence Stedman can link to Author:Edmund Clarence Stedman, either in the notes or related_author fields, or (if appropriate) in a "See also" section below. The letter of course should link to the poem's version page. By no means should Edmund Clarence Stedman point to an anchor in Author space. —Beleg Tâl (talk) 15:11, 3 January 2017 (UTC)

@Billinghurst: did you think these were separate works? These are clearly versions of a single work; your comment "community position is that these works are added on the target author's pages rather than separately disambiguated" suggests that you misunderstood the nature of this work, as it is my understanding that community position is precisely the opposite. —Beleg Tâl (talk) 15:15, 3 January 2017 (UTC)

Outcomes

This slipped through to archives without an example and a confirmation of what the results of the discussion would be

I have created

• Samuel Butler as a disambiguation page and link from there to
  • "Samuel Butler ..." (main namespace articles)
  • "Butler, Samuel ..." (main namespace articles)
  • "(parent)/Butler, Samuel..." (main namespace articles)
  • "Author:Samuel Butler..." (author namespace pages)

so is that what contributors are expectations?

I have also created a redirect from the existing A Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature/Butler, Samuel though wonder whether we should more delete that as it isn't going to be a needed page, and would be hard to find to edit anyway.

With a question. Would contributors expect or find it useful to see {{similar}} at the tops of all these biographical subpages linking pack to the disambiguation page? — billinghurst sDrewth 05:29, 29 March 2017 (UTC)

I personally think that disambig pages are not appropriate for encyclopedia articles just as they are not appropriate for chapter headings. However I think that this opinion does not necessarily reflect that of the community. If such disambiguation is acceptable, then my only objection is that the articles are not called "Samuel Butler" but are instead called "Butler, Samuel", therefore Butler, Samuel should be the disambig page and Samuel Butler should only exist if works called "Samuel Butler" are added in future. —Beleg Tâl (talk) 21:56, 29 March 2017 (UTC)

Straw poll: How and where to have lengthy, potentially complex discussions?

It has been a while since this question has been asked, and the community personnel, and somewhat our approaches, have changed in that period since last asked. So I am asking this question to the current community, as the current community needs to have this forum best suit its needs.

Where does the community expect lengthy and potentially lengthy discussions to occur?

1. Here in Scriptorium? or
2. As requests for comment in a subpage to Scriptorium, and then linked from here? or even temporarily transcluded here? or
3. On the talk page to the subject matter with an announcement here of the discussion? Probably with a concluding statements here to the announcement.

Each has its strengths and weaknesses for visibility, participation, and discoverability.

I ask as in more recent times the active discussion on numbers of issues has waned, without any indication of the passive participation, ie. people read and will contribute if they feel strongly one way or the other.

• If it is noise to this page, then we would shift it.
• If it is a burden to this page, then we would shift it.

Both of these cases would mean a choice of to where for the discussions.

• If it is stopping some people from using this page from asking questions, then we can just rejig our communications and again redirect many to the "Help" subpage
• If the open discussion is neither noise for too many, nor a burden, nor scaring off users, then we can continue as is.

— billinghurst sDrewth 23:01, 29 March 2017 (UTC)

I think the Scriptorium is the best place for it. Moving large discussions to a different page will just lower the amount of eyes on them, and there are few enough eyes as it is. —Beleg Tâl (talk) 13:04, 31 March 2017 (UTC)

seems to be working fine for me. and only one archive to search. but then i have seen way too much forum shopping and micro-voting elsewhere, so i am biased. Slowking4 ‽ SvG's revenge 23:11, 31 March 2017 (UTC)

I think here in Scriptorium is best. I dislike looking through a maze with links ("over here over there")—Maury (talk) 00:57, 2 April 2017 (UTC)

I think the Scriptorium is best, even though I forget sometimes, and post things elsewhere; maybe we can make it a bit more clear somewhere e.g. "all discussion is welcome in the Scriptorium, rather than on individual talk pages". Although, the other thing I'd say is that mw:Flow would be good to have here. It's hard to follow many different discussions sometimes. On a related note, I'd like to see just one discussion page per work (probably on it's mainspace top-level page, and the others redirecting to that one). Sam Wilson 03:14, 2 April 2017 (UTC)

Author's names

Do we have a policy for how to name Author pages when the author changes name? The most common would be when a woman author marries, but I have come across a man who changed his name by adoption. I understand WP now lists articles about women by their maiden name … I am looking at Author:Emily Gosse whose WP article is w:Emily Bowes. Cheers, Zoeannl (talk) 04:33, 1 April 2017 (UTC)

Wikisource:Naming conventions We have generally taken through to the last name (married) and use redirects for the variations. It is an inexact science. — billinghurst sDrewth 07:00, 1 April 2017 (UTC)

Yankee in Canada (1866) Thoreau

Surely there is no need to disambiguate this title. Suggest moving to A Yankee in Canada or A Yankee in Canada, with Anti-Slavery and Reform Papers. BethNaught (talk) 07:07, 1 April 2017 (UTC)

I would agree with you. I will defer to someone with greater knowledge which is preferable. — billinghurst sDrewth 08:38, 1 April 2017 (UTC)

It will need to be disambiguated, because this volume exists in several copies, including copies in two multi-volume collections of Thoreau's writings that people have begun transcribing here. --EncycloPetey (talk) 16:26, 1 April 2017 (UTC)

Thank you for clarifying. BethNaught (talk) 16:31, 1 April 2017 (UTC)

Am I correct to understand this is a specific edition of a specific anthology which nearly shares the name with one of its constituent parts unless we rename it to A Yankee in Canada, with Anti-Slavery and Reform Papers, and that the specific anthology arrangement with its title may have multiple editions? Including as part of a yet larger anthology? Or is it just the constituent parts are included in a larger anthology? Excursions (1863) Thoreau may have the same issue also.

To what degree do we preemptively disambiguate things? I can see that it is a problem to move texts if there are external web links to internal chapters or what have you. On the other hand it sounds very difficult to do 'right', certainly a great deal of our main namespace isn't there. Prosody (talk) 17:29, 9 April 2017 (UTC)

The edition in question is a specific edition of a collection of papers, originally published individually, the "Yankee in Canada" then collected and published, then this edition published as a book with additional papers, which subsequently was published at least three more times as the same collected volume in a larger collected set.

Yes, preëmptive disambiguation is a Good Thing, and yes, it is often difficult to get right without doing research. I've spent the better part of the past two days doing research on published editions of Seneca's tragedies (and other works with the same titles) just to be sure I'm disambiguating them correctly. I did similar research for the tragedies and comedies from ancient Greece. These works were a bit more challenging because the titles are short (usually naming a single character or group), and were often recycled or re-interpreted by later Roman and French dramatists, so the titles pop up over and over. "A Yankee in Canada" is less likely to have additional writers using the same title, but for a popular writer like Thoreau, there will almost certainly be multiple editions of his works. --EncycloPetey (talk) 23:12, 9 April 2017 (UTC)

Linguistic Report 1961

appear to be a Somali government typescript.[31] would people be amenable to uploading here, since commons is talking about crown copyright? Slowking4 ‽ SvG's revenge 00:42, 2 April 2017 (UTC)

The reference is to [32], and I see no reason not to at least let that run its course.--Prosfilaes (talk) 07:07, 2 April 2017 (UTC)

There seems to be agreement that it is okay to upload it to Commons.--Prosfilaes (talk) 08:11, 3 April 2017 (UTC)

Template:Dotted summary row

I was investigating to see if I could use {{Dotted summary row}}, or at least the underlying CSS classes, on a page. I think the related {{Dotted summary row no image}} is too heavyweight (the nested tables didn't work). The template is being used in a few places, but it looks like the corresponding CSS classes are not part of MediaWiki.css (if they ever were), and so the intended display is not happening. The Italian Wikisource has them (s:it:MediaWiki:Common.css). Seems like either the template should be removed, or the CSS classes added. Did they exist at one point? Carl Lindberg (talk) 00:46, 3 April 2017 (UTC)

Geez, how many dotted row templates do we have? I think we can add them to the common CSS, but is it possible to merge this template into {{Dotted TOC row}} or something instead? —Beleg Tâl (talk) 12:08, 3 April 2017 (UTC)

I would think that we would be better to await the new implementation of styles in templates. We should be looking to avoid burgeoning common.css with occasional formatting. Every component added to common.js, and common.css adds load time. — billinghurst sDrewth 12:23, 3 April 2017 (UTC)

I think {{Dotted summary row no image}} takes the same approach as {{Dotted TOC line}}, but the TOC template is not quite as flexible. I think both assume a basic two-column table (though the TOC template has parameters for TOC-specific situations which is not my case), and any deviation (like I had) meant they were unusable. The same might be true of the Dotted summary row template, which is a completely different approach to the problem, but the CSS classes defined in it would be much more flexible as other templates could be defined which use them for other situations. If CSS is going to be allowed in templates though, then great -- that may be enough. A possible problem though is the style uses a "url()" component, to a very specific Commons image, which is stripped out by MediaWiki's security sanitizer if you try to use it inline. If the template CSS style feature will also strip that out, then we also can't use it, and it would have to go into common.css . The no-image approach may also be made more flexible... the code is dense enough I didn't want to spend time figuring out if it was possible. Carl Lindberg (talk) 15:21, 3 April 2017 (UTC)

Tech News: 2017-14

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

• The Save page button now says Publish page or Publish changes on most Wikipedias. The point is to make it more clear that the edit will change the page immediately. Publish page is when you save a new page and Publish changes when you edit an existing page. [33]
• The tracking category Category:Pages with template loops is now added when a template loop is found. A template loop is for example when a template tries to use a second template that uses the first template. [34]
• English Wikipedia now has cookie blocks. It will come to more wikis in the future. This is an extension to the autoblock system so when a user is blocked, the next time they visit the wiki a cookie will be set. This means that even if the user switches accounts and to a new IP address the cookie will block them again. [35]

Problems

• Wikidata descriptions, aliases and labels that used some characters could not be saved. This has now been fixed. [36]

Changes this week

• The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 4 April. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 5 April. It will be on all wikis from 6 April (calendar).

Meetings

• You can join the next meeting with the VisualEditor team. During the meeting, you can tell developers which bugs you think are the most important. The meeting will be on 4 April at 19:00 (UTC). See how to join.
• You can join the next office hour with the Wikidata team. The meeting will be on 5 April at 16:00 (UTC). See how to join.

Future changes

• New filters for Recent changes will come to Wikidata and Persian, Dutch, Russian, Turkish, Czech and Hebrew Wikipedia on 11 April. The new filters include filtering, highlighting and user intent prediction. User intent prediction means the filter tries to help editors determine if the edit was made in good faith or not. Other wikis will get it later. [37]

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

17:53, 3 April 2017 (UTC)

Start of the 2017 Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees elections

Please accept our apologies for cross-posting this message. This message is available for translation on Meta-Wiki.

On behalf of the Wikimedia Foundation Elections Committee, I am pleased to announce that self-nominations are being accepted for the 2017 Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees Elections.

The Board of Trustees (Board) is the decision-making body that is ultimately responsible for the long-term sustainability of the Wikimedia Foundation, so we value wide input into its selection. More information about this role can be found on Meta-Wiki. Please read the letter from the Board of Trustees calling for candidates.

The candidacy submission phase will last from April 7 (00:00 UTC) to April 20 (23:59 UTC).

We will also be accepting questions to ask the candidates from April 7 to April 20. You can submit your questions on Meta-Wiki.

Once the questions submission period has ended on April 20, the Elections Committee will then collate the questions for the candidates to respond to beginning on April 21.

The goal of this process is to fill the three community-selected seats on the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees. The election results will be used by the Board itself to select its new members.

The full schedule for the Board elections is as follows. All dates are inclusive, that is, from the beginning of the first day (UTC) to the end of the last.

• April 7 (00:00 UTC) – April 20 (23:59 UTC) – Board nominations
• April 7 – April 20 – Board candidates questions submission period
• April 21 – April 30 – Board candidates answer questions
• May 1 – May 14 – Board voting period
• May 15–19 – Board vote checking
• May 20 – Board result announcement goal

In addition to the Board elections, we will also soon be holding elections for the following roles:

• Funds Dissemination Committee (FDC)
  • There are five positions being filled. More information about this election will be available on Meta-Wiki.

• Funds Dissemination Committee Ombudsperson (Ombuds)
  • One position is being filled. More information about this election will be available on Meta-Wiki.

Please note that this year the Board of Trustees elections will be held before the FDC and Ombuds elections. Candidates who are not elected to the Board are explicitly permitted and encouraged to submit themselves as candidates to the FDC or Ombuds positions after the results of the Board elections are announced.

More information on this year's elections can be found on Meta-Wiki. Any questions related to the election can be posted on the election talk page on Meta-Wiki, or sent to the election committee's mailing list, board-electionswikimedia.org.

On behalf of the Election Committee,
Katie Chan, Chair, Wikimedia Foundation Elections Committee
Joe Sutherland, Community Advocate, Wikimedia Foundation

Posted by MediaWiki message delivery on behalf of the Wikimedia Foundation Elections Committee, 03:37, 7 April 2017 (UTC) • Please help translate to your language • Get help

The last week of the 1st cycle of Wikimedia strategy conversation

Hi, I'm Szymon, a MetaWiki Strategy Coordinator. 3 weeks ago, we invited you to join a broad discussion about Wikimedia's future role in the world. The discussion is divided into 3 cycles, and the first one ends on April, 15. So far, Wikimedians have been discussing mainly about technological improvements, multilingual support, friendly environment, cooperation with other organizations and networks.

• If you'd like to get detailed information about the discussed topics, have a look at → that page.
• If you'd like to join the discussions, please comment → on the talk page of that page or on Meta-Wiki.
• If you have any questions that weren't answered there, feel free to ask me.

I'm pinging a few recently active admins. I hope you'll help me with passing along the news, maybe even join the discussion. @Beeswaxcandle, @EncycloPetey, @Ineuw, @Beleg Tâl, @Charles Matthews:.

Looking forward to your input. Thank you in advance! SGrabarczuk (WMF) (talk) 00:38, 8 April 2017 (UTC)

I have found the question "What role do we want to play in the world in 2030?" too remote. I can see the prospects for integration between Wikimedia sites over the next, say, five years very interesting. Charles Matthews (talk) 04:18, 8 April 2017 (UTC)

this is a prompt for the brainstorming which is more fun, than the five year implementation plan and resource loading. but yeah, if you are action-oriented, it is all a little woolly headed. and some folks say "execution beats strategy every day". Slowking4 ‽ SvG's revenge 13:53, 9 April 2017 (UTC)

Well, I added my overall take to Wikisource talk:Wikimedia Strategy 2017. Charles Matthews (talk) 10:33, 12 April 2017 (UTC)

that’s good. now is the time to get your feedback in while they are listening. they have been responsive to our wish lists. Slowking4 ‽ SvG's revenge 14:26, 14 April 2017 (UTC)

Searchability of Indexes not-proofread

According to Category:Index Not-Proofread, we currently have about 6500 Indexes needing to be proofread. How might someone who comes along wanting to proofread a work on gardening, for example, access a list of Indexes available needing to be proofread on that particular subject? Londonjackbooks (talk) 14:06, 9 April 2017 (UTC)

OCR text is not searchable. But if the word gardening is present in the index name or any created page of that index, that would be searchable, e.g. Index:Australian enquiry book of household and general information.djvu, Index:Gardening for Ladies and Companion to the Flower-Garden.djvu, Index:Boots and Saddles.djvu. All such works would not be on gardening; may only contain a passing reference to the topic; this will need to be manually checked. Hrishikes (talk) 14:22, 9 April 2017 (UTC)

Would it be possible to add top-level categories to Indexes, such as can be found at Library of Congress Classification? Or would this be opening up a can of worms? Londonjackbooks (talk) 14:33, 9 April 2017 (UTC)

Some sort of categorisation is desirable, as given in Portal:Index. But it would be a huge work. Hrishikes (talk) 14:46, 9 April 2017 (UTC)

if you had an OCLC number, you could import the categories from library of congress. (although they have problems as well). Slowking4 ‽ SvG's revenge 17:08, 9 April 2017 (UTC)

•  Comment categorising index pages is going to be a lot of work for temporary benefit. [Noting that wee are pretty garbage at categorising main namespace works for presentation and they have long term benefit for readers (which are our bulk).] How about we look to define specifically you would be looking to achieve (what output might you be expecting?), ie. from index ns: works, looking to show works that are not proofread by an author? by a keyword? by a year of publication? We have numerous means to isolate and to identify Index: ns, so it is the innovation of getting something prepared, and then getting potential editors to find what we have prepared. Do we even know the numbers around potential transcribers, or how to interest them in the next steps? — billinghurst sDrewth 04:46, 10 April 2017 (UTC)

Actually, for finding a suitable work to proofread, index categorisation is not essential. An editor would not give a lot of time and labour for any random work. He/she will first find out the name of a suitable work by launching a general search in Google etc., or proceed from a pre-acquired knowledge. Then the editor will see whether it is available here, and if available, whether proofread or otherwise. If not available, then the editor can add it here. This is the general procedure by which I work, and it is likely that, other editors also choose the work first and then find it here or add it and start proofreading. Index category is helpful and desirable, but not essential. Hrishikes (talk) 05:43, 10 April 2017 (UTC)

Forgive my unstructured thought process... Wikipedia's Citation Hunt tool came to mind, and prompted my question. I too, generally speaking, search for works with "pre-acquired knowledge", but I presume it is not the same for all. The end I am looking at is to chip away at the 6500 works needing to be proofread. I could work on making sure that project links are available on author pages for those works; that would take care of one aspect...

Question: How does one separate (list) categories using this search engine? For example, for Project:Wikisource, I type in "Political science" in Categories, and a result appears. But if I type in "Index Not-Proofread, Political science" or "Index Not-Proofread; Political science", no results show. How can multiple cats be listed to generate results? Londonjackbooks (talk) 11:53, 10 April 2017 (UTC)

@Londonjackbooks: For Petscan: write one category, click enter, write another category. If you want the work to be present in both categories, choose "Subset". If you want works of either category, choose "Union". Hrishikes (talk) 12:13, 10 April 2017 (UTC)

Great. Thanks. Londonjackbooks (talk) 12:30, 10 April 2017 (UTC)

@Londonjackbooks: We are going to need a little bit of curation, it comes down to how much, and where. A number of ways to proceed. 1) have a wikiproject where you can load and list works; 2) utilise the keyword feature of Special:IndexPages to present a subset of works; 3) other pre-prepared searches that present a set of works, be it through petscan, or an internally constructed set of criteria; 4) We look to better populate our works at Wikidata, and run searches and categorisation from there to point at our works here. It is my belief that the best way to get people to find works, especially theme-based is a well-constructed WikipProject especially as that is something that we can advertise/promote/push. The DNB project worked as it was coordinated and promoted. Our use of PotM has clearly been one of our most successful, again coordinated and promoted.

And an aside about good petscan searches, note that you can use the interwiki of petscan: with your search number. Check my little list on my user page. — billinghurst sDrewth 13:35, 10 April 2017 (UTC)

@Billinghurst: Would you be averse to my adding top-level categories—derived from the list at Library of Congress Classification—to Index pages? Would it even be possible to add a parameter (if that's the right word) to the Index template where a user can select a Category from a drop-down list of top-level LC subjects (there are 'only' 20)? That way, when an Index is created, Users can opt to add Category info as they do other template parameters (and this way, Categories entered would be uniform and case-correct).

I have created a sandbox with a table that links to Petscan searches for specific categories based on LC Classification. "Political Science" is the only subject/category that generates a result at the moment. As far as a WikiProject is concerned, it could consist in part of such a table linking to works by category as used in my sandbox. Please let me know if any of this is desirable. I am not averse to adding [single, top-level] Categories to 6500 Indexes if the community is not against my doing so. Of course, others may have better insight into the realistic aspect of doing so. My insight into/knowledge about such things is often limited. Londonjackbooks (talk) 16:01, 10 April 2017 (UTC)

If we wanted to categorize Index pages, we could modify MediaWiki:Proofreadpage index template to automatically include categories based on their 'main subject' (P921) and 'genre' (P136) properties on Wikidata (or any others that are desired). For example, Gardening for Ladies and Companion to the Flower-Garden (d:Q29354298) has subject 'gardening' and this could be turned into Category:Works about about gardening that require proofreading or similar. These categories would then of course need to be added to parent categories, which would be a bit of a pain if not done by bot. Sam Wilson 03:47, 12 April 2017 (UTC)

Instead of using categories (serves completed works better), can we not use the portal system, especially as this solution has been hiding in plain sight on the main page? If there are no objections, I could pick away at adding the "To Be Proofread" and the "To Be Validated" works to applicable portals, using the {{small scan link}} (Transcription project) to indicate which are available to be worked on. @Londonjackbooks: For your example The American Democrat: does Portal:Political theory work? Humbug26 (talk) 17:53, 12 April 2017 (UTC)

@Humbug26: Would your idea not take more manual maintenance and oversight? If I understand correctly, one would manually add (from the existing 6500) a to-be-proofread work to a list at a Portal; once said work is proofread, it would need to be manually taken off the to-be-proofread list at the Portal. When what I was proposing, once said work is fully proofread, the work would automatically be removed from to-be-proofread PetScan search results, as that category would automatically disappear once the work is promoted to to-be-validated (i.e., less manual work/oversight). As for the Political theory portal recommendation, my thinking only went so far as to the use of categories (and I thought to keep those categories top-level), so unless some other system is adopted than one similar to what I have proposed, I don't have an answer for you at this moment. Londonjackbooks (talk) 18:42, 12 April 2017 (UTC)

Tech News: 2017-15

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

• Tidy is going to be replaced with an HTML5 parsing algorithm. Bad HTML in wikitext would cause problems on a number of wikis. There is now a ParserMigration extension on all wikis that you can use to help clean this up. You can read more about how you can use it. [38]

Changes this week

• Some older web browsers will not be able to use JavaScript on Wikimedia wikis from this week. If you have an old web browser on your computer you can upgrade to a newer version. [39]
• New filters for Recent changes will come to Wikidata and Persian, Russian, Turkish and French Wikipedia on 11 April. The schedule has been changed to fix the user intent prediction filters for some wikis. User intent prediction means the filter tries to make it easier for editors to determine if the edit was made in good faith or not. Other wikis will get it later. [40]
• The list of special characters in the wikitext editor and the visual editor will now have a group of Canadian Aboriginal characters. [41]
• The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 11 April. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 12 April. It will be on all wikis from 13 April (calendar).

Meetings

• You can join the next meeting with the VisualEditor team. During the meeting, you can tell developers which bugs you think are the most important. The meeting will be on 11 April at 19:00 (UTC). See how to join.

Future changes

• Because of a data centre test you will be able to read but not edit the wikis for 20 to 30 minutes on 19 April and 3 May. This will start at 14:00 (UTC). You might lose edits if you try to save during this time. You can read more about this.
• RevisionSlider will change how you move between revisions. This will be available on the test wiki from 11 April. It will come to other wikis later if users like the change. You can test it and give feedback.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

18:34, 10 April 2017 (UTC)

Additional snippets

• Consultation about new wikistats started (http://stats.wikimedia.org is been phased out). This is the prototype: https://analytics-prototype.wmflabs.org/#/ you can leave feedback here:

mw:Wikistats 2.0 Design Project/RequestforFeedback/Round2

• Preparing to deploy sister wiki search results display - posted notice at multiple wiki's village pumps (phabricator:T162064#3161941)

Read-only mode for 20 to 30 minutes on 19 April and 3 May

Read this message in another language • Please help translate to your language

The Wikimedia Foundation will be testing its secondary data center in Dallas. This will make sure that Wikipedia and the other Wikimedia wikis can stay online even after a disaster. To make sure everything is working, the Wikimedia Technology department needs to conduct a planned test. This test will show whether they can reliably switch from one data center to the other. It requires many teams to prepare for the test and to be available to fix any unexpected problems.

They will switch all traffic to the secondary data center on Wednesday, 19 April 2017. On Wednesday, 3 May 2017, they will switch back to the primary data center.

Unfortunately, because of some limitations in MediaWiki, all editing must stop during those two switches. We apologize for this disruption, and we are working to minimize it in the future.

You will be able to read, but not edit, all wikis for a short period of time.

• You will not be able to edit for approximately 20 to 30 minutes on Wednesday, 19 April and Wednesday, 3 May. The test will start at 14:00 UTC (15:00 BST, 16:00 CEST, 10:00 EDT, 07:00 PDT, 23:00 JST, and in New Zealand at 02:00 NZST on Thursday 20 April and Thursday 4 May).
• If you try to edit or save during these times, you will see an error message. We hope that no edits will be lost during these minutes, but we can't guarantee it. If you see the error message, then please wait until everything is back to normal. Then you should be able to save your edit. But, we recommend that you make a copy of your changes first, just in case.

Other effects:

• Background jobs will be slower and some may be dropped. Red links might not be updated as quickly as normal. If you create an article that is already linked somewhere else, the link will stay red longer than usual. Some long-running scripts will have to be stopped.
• There will be code freezes for the weeks of 17 April 2017 and 1 May 2017. Non-essential code deployments will not happen.

This project may be postponed if necessary. You can read the schedule at wikitech.wikimedia.org. Any changes will be announced in the schedule. There will be more notifications about this. Please share this information with your community. /User:Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk)

MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 17:34, 11 April 2017 (UTC)

Tertiary source citation warning not relevant

Wikisource, like all wikis using CiteThisPage, displays a warning at the top of each citation page:

IMPORTANT NOTE: Most educators and professionals do not consider it appropriate to use tertiary sources such as encyclopedias as a sole source for any information—citing an encyclopedia as an important reference in footnotes or bibliographies may result in censure or a failing grade. Wikipedia articles should be used for background information, as a reference for correct terminology and search terms, and as a starting point for further research.

(eg. https://en.wikisource.org/w/index.php?title=Special:CiteThisPage&page=Executive_Order_13377&id=2024305)

This warning is not relevant for Wikisource, which provides primary sources, not tertiary sources. The warning should be removed. This was previously filed at https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T162599 and then referred here.

Sondra.kinsey (talk) 22:44, 12 April 2017 (UTC)

Actually Wikisource contains primary, secondary, and tertiary sources. Where did you see this notice on our site? --EncycloPetey (talk) 23:03, 12 April 2017 (UTC)

yeah where do i go to turn the notices off, also the "You are editing in the main namespace. This page should include a "header" template." warning. they are a useless speedbump. Slowking4 ‽ SvG's revenge 02:31, 13 April 2017 (UTC)

•  Comment the file is MediaWiki:Citethispage-content and after some comment was made in a phabricator ticket this week, I did give it a tweak. People may also wish to look at editable components for CiteThisPage. — billinghurst sDrewth 11:44, 13 April 2017 (UTC)

task T162599 - you know i do present this issue at libraries, but "may result in censure or a failing grade" - really? it’s all rather patronizing. you also have: "Please remember to check your manual of style, standards guide or instructor's guidelines for the exact syntax to suit your needs. For more detailed advice, see Citing Wikipedia." that seems to me to be to be enough (if we had a citing wikisource page). can we get a consensus to edit the page? i nominate deleting the "important warning" and adding all the tl;dr to the citing wikisource page, which interested people can read.Slowking4 ‽ SvG's revenge 01:55, 15 April 2017 (UTC)

I think that most useful way to progress is to put specific text forward for the community to agree upon. — billinghurst sDrewth 02:48, 15 April 2017 (UTC)

@Charles Matthews: With your Wikidata:WikiProject Source MetaData-hat on. I would love to see whether cite this page could look to have a means to use Wikidata, or could use WD, AND if that is a yes, that we could also look to have a means to identify where data is missing at WD from the citation here. At the moment one has to go to WD and run manual checks to know whether information has been transferred. — billinghurst sDrewth 06:09, 21 April 2017 (UTC)

Ideally I would love to see a template at somewhere like enWP that someone can just do an arbitrary call to a WD item, and a use like {{cite book|arbitrary=Qnnnnnn}} fully populates a template. — billinghurst sDrewth 06:37, 21 April 2017 (UTC)

I've put the issue to some folk who will know more than I do. Charles Matthews (talk) 06:52, 21 April 2017 (UTC)

Five Black Lives

I've been trying to find a scan of Five Black Lives: the autobiographies of Venture Smith, James Mars, William Grimes, the Rev. G. W. Offley, James L. Smith (1855), which includes the second edition of Life of William Grimes, the Runaway Slave, the first narrative of an American ex-slave.

However, I cannot find it at Hathi Trust or the Internet Archive, and the Google Books copy [42] seems to think it's still under copyright (!) so BUB won't touch it.

Can someone find a copy? Or does someone have contact with the person who runs the Book Uploader Bot? This work can't possibly still be under copyright. --EncycloPetey (talk) 16:34, 15 April 2017 (UTC)

Are you sure about the copyright date? I see Google's pub date states 1855, but info from a Worldcat search (scroll toward end of results page) details that of the five narratives, four of them are dated after 1855: Wm. Grimes' narrative is dated 1855, but the other narratives are dated (chronologically) 1860, 1864, 1881 & 1897. I tried addall.com used book search for 1855 copies, as well as ebay... but no luck. Londonjackbooks (talk) 17:01, 15 April 2017 (UTC)

I know for certain only the date for the William Grimes autobiography edition. That date is given at the UNC library copy of the first edition. With a match at google.books, I assume that date is correct, but do not know the publication history and can't say for the other included works or for the collection.

If we can find any copy of William Grimes' autobiography, that would be a forward step. We are sorely lacking at Wikisource when it comes to 19th-century works by African-American authors. --EncycloPetey (talk) 17:09, 15 April 2017 (UTC)

I'll keep looking for Grimes' autobiography... I found more confirmation that it is unlikely that Five Black Lives -- as a collection -- was published in 1855. It is listed as a 1st edition being published by Wesleyan University Press, [1971] in several search results. Londonjackbooks (talk) 17:12, 15 April 2017 (UTC)

Individual narratives

1. Venture Smith @ Hathi trust
2. James Mars @ Hathi trust
3. G. W. Offley @ Hathi trust
4. James L. Smith @ IA

Londonjackbooks (talk) 17:31, 15 April 2017 (UTC)

The story of w:Charles Ball is present here, however: Index:Fifty Years in Chains, or the Life of an American Slave.djvu. The story of Grimes is available for online reading: http://docsouth.unc.edu/neh/grimes25/grimes25.html Hrishikes (talk) 19:48, 15 April 2017 (UTC)

the compilation appears to be copyright 1971 [43] ; OCLC 2680663 - we could organize a project to start the originals, would make a good effort for black history month. Slowking4 ‽ SvG's revenge 23:14, 15 April 2017 (UTC)

That's a good idea, but collecting African-American biographies might be a bigger collaboration than we could accomplish in a single month. It might even make for a suitable community collaboration to follow on sometime after Thoreau. I envision Thoreau continuing as our Community Collaboration until the end of July (when we celebrate his 200th birthday), then following with a shorter collaboration for someone from England (I have a person in mind). But then starting around December, or early next year, we then could collect African-American biographies. It would be great timing too, since this February will be the 200th birthday of Frederick Douglass. --EncycloPetey (talk) 01:36, 16 April 2017 (UTC)

Wikimania 2017 in Montréal

Wikimania 2017

This year, Wikimania is happening in Montréal! You want to give us a hand? We need YOU as a volunteer!

Contact Antoine2711 at abeaubien@wikimedia.ca.

Come make a difference with a great team of passionate Wiki people. —unsigned comment by Antoine2711 (talk) 22:24, 15 April 2017‎.

95 years ago was 1921

It's approaching 2019 and the release of new, 1923, works into the public domain. We should prepare a collection of 1923 works to be released on 1/1/2019; I plan to find an early copy of The Murder on the Links that we can work from, and I'm currently working on the Renewal Registrations for 1950 to be able to get a good list of some of the major stuff that's going to be freshly out of copyright in English. But I was thinking about leading into that, with an emphasis on 1921 works this year and 1922 works next year. Any interest in this idea?--Prosfilaes (talk) 08:51, 16 April 2017 (UTC)

{{nop}} , it's overloaded use and possible replacement.

This isn't (yet) an issue, but future versions of the parser could potentially "tidy" blank tag pairs out of generated output entirely, thus possibly including the "tidying" out of the implied paragraph break generated.

{{nop}} is also used in three different instances:-

1. is the original intended use, at the end of a page to force a paragaph break
2. in ref tags to force a paragraph break.
3. is at the head of a continued table (to provide a place holder for the pagenumber script, as I understood it.) and to ensure the relevant table element is read correctly.

Whilst the first 2 uses are the same, the third isn't and is a workaround for certain (current) limitations in the parser/Proofread page, ( which have been discussed at least twice here before.)

I've started https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T163073 on my own initiative, given that I felt there should be specific magic tags for overriding the default paragraph handling (like there are tags to indicate NOINDEX or page specfic TOC), in the parser, rather than it relying on a local template.

Feedback would be appreciated, as "community" support helps decide what gets fixed. ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 22:39, 16 April 2017 (UTC)

The use in ref tags is an incorrect use. This should be done with paragraph tags.

With respect to the other usages, has a future problem actually been flagged or are you trying to be preëmptive of something that may never happen? Beeswaxcandle (talk) 23:51, 16 April 2017 (UTC)

A lone <p> will generate "malformed" HTML, according to the Linter Extension's checks (having had to fix over 100 or so pages utilising this quirk, I'm not happy about using it elsewhere., and is courtesy in . and doing <p></p> per what's supposed to be done doesn't yet render nicely in references IIRC.

I wasn't aware of the other usages being flagged as a problem as such, but given that the parser is being re-developed anyway, resolving what is a LONG standing limitation (necessitating a local template for something that SHOULD be in the core parser) was felt to be entirely reasonable.

In relation to the usage at a head of a table, this caused some pages to be listed as "fostered content" by the LinterExtension (the first instance of this being one I raised a phab ticket about as I initially thought it was a false positive.) as the lead {{nop}} is seen by the relevant checker as NOT being inside a table row or table element, and thus will get moved to the parent element before the table, automatically. This was another quirk behaviour which I understood wasn't necessarily guaranteed to behave the same in the new parser. (I've also had several rows with the parser getting it to handle complex tables( with split header/content/footer) correctly and consistently using the {{nop}} route.) Having a magic tag with a CONSISTENT, COHRENT and "documented" behaviour in all contexts, would be far far better than regularly playing 'guess the random interaction relying on Mediwiki behaviour you are supposed to know by mind-reading..' that has been used till now. ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 00:26, 17 April 2017 (UTC)

Unfortunately you do go off half-cocked. In all cases "nop" is used as a placeholder, for a variety of elements of wiki syntax. Your continued panicked run-arounds and ill-judged comments at phabricator are not helpful.

Don't let Linter drive behavioural editing. The use of a single "p" marker is as old as the hills, and while the modern syntax likes closure, simply don't fuss it. So you don't have to fix anything like that, and you can be happy or not that is solely your choice. If you are not happy doing it, then don't. When you don't know what you are talking about, sometimes you should learn to say nothing. — billinghurst sDrewth 06:03, 17 April 2017 (UTC)

I'm sorry you feel that way, but based on personal experience of trying to get things working on more than one work, I'm increasingly fed up as I said, of playing "hunt the quirk" (which probably shows in the Phabricator tickets).

Time to take another time out. ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 11:02, 17 April 2017 (UTC)

in all the parser fun, maybe we should take council from user:Tim Starling - "We'll soon be getting rid of Tidy on WMF websites in favour of a pure PHP solution called RemexHtml that I recently wrote. It should eventually become the default for new MediaWiki installations as well. It accepts either form and will initially output "<br />" for compatibility with parser tests." [44] - Slowking4 ‽ SvG's revenge 14:20, 17 April 2017 (UTC)

Save/Publish page

The boilerplate at the foot of the edit window begins

By clicking the “Save page” button,...

But there is no “Save page” button. The button being referred to is labeled “Publish page”. Either the boilerplate or the button text should be changed.

The equivalency is obvious to me and probably to most editors, but most ≠ all. I am a (1) highly educated (2) native speaker of American English (3) with 12 years of Wikipedia experience, (4) a career largely spent in the software industry, and (5) a doctorate in linguistics. It may not be so obvious to, e.g., a non-native speaker, or an educated native speaker new to Wikimedia who wonders what the difference is between saving a page and publishing it.

Please {{Ping}} me to discuss. --Thnidu (talk) 05:31, 17 April 2017 (UTC)

@Thnidu: Thanks for the note. The change from "save page" to "publish page" is a change that has taken place in the last month. It is contained in the message MediaWiki:Wikimedia-copyrightwarning and we are using the default for all wikis. @Whatamidoing (WMF): the global message needs to be updated, and maybe it needs to be done in many languages. Can we poke that at you for resolution? — billinghurst sDrewth 06:10, 17 April 2017 (UTC)

Whatamidoing (WMF): Noting that this footer used to be Philippe's text, so it may be something to wave past Mdennis (WMF). — billinghurst sDrewth 07:21, 17 April 2017 (UTC)

@Billinghurst: Whee! Thanks for the quick and helpful answer. :-) --Thnidu (talk) 06:17, 17 April 2017 (UTC)

Noting to community the only overt place that needed change is Mediawiki:Newarticletext which I have just updated. We should be looking through our pages in the Help: namespace for where we may have the "save page" text. — billinghurst sDrewth 06:19, 17 April 2017 (UTC)

I wasn't making a new page. I was editing Bright's Anglo-Saxon Reader/Anglo-Saxon Versification, a couple of typo fixes. (Don't worry, I compared with the scan of the original. Typos like "teh".) What I noted would exist on all edit pages. --Thnidu (talk) 07:14, 17 April 2017 (UTC)

Tech News: 2017-16

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

• You can add ?safemode=1 to the end of the URL on Wikimedia wikis to disable your personal CSS and JavaScript. Example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Literature?safemode=1. This means you can test if a problem is because of your user scripts or gadgets without uninstalling them. [45]
• You can now see a list of all autoblocks on Special:AutoblockList. [46]
• The Wikiversity and Wikinews logos are now shown directly from the configuration and not from [[File:Wiki.png]]. If you want to change logo or have an anniversary logo, see how to request a configuration change. This is how it already works for other projects. They can request logo changes the same way. [47]

Problems

• Because of a data centre test you will be able to read but not edit the wikis for 20 to 30 minutes on 19 April. This will start at 14:00 (UTC). You might lose edits if you try to save during this time. You can read more about this. This will also happen on 3 May.

Changes this week

• There is no new Mediawiki version this week. This is because of the data centre test.

Meetings

• You can join the next meeting with the VisualEditor team. During the meeting, you can tell developers which bugs you think are the most important. The meeting will be on 18 April at 19:00 (UTC). See how to join.

Future changes

• stats.wikimedia.org will be replaced. You can see the new prototype. You can leave feedback on this change.
• Page Previews will be turned on for logged-out users on a large number of wikis in May. It could be postponed and happen later. Page Previews shows readers a short part of a linked article when they rest their mouse pointer on the link. This is to help them understand what it is about without leaving the article they are reading. Page Previews used to be called Hovercards. Users who have tested the feature can give feedback. [48]
• From next week, user scripts using very old deprecated wikibits functions will show errors. These functions have not worked since 2013. You should fix or disable broken scripts. You can see examples of how to upgrade scripts. [49][50]

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

19:32, 17 April 2017 (UTC)

Notes

• @Ineuw, @ShakespeareFan00: please note the above comment about safemode as you both seem to have the most issues due to custom javascript. Now we just need to find a good place to poke that information for when we forget that syntax. — billinghurst sDrewth 00:04, 18 April 2017 (UTC)

Collaboration products newsletter: 2017-04

Latest news from the Wikimedia Collaboration team, about Notifications, Flow and Edit Review Improvements. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you.

What's new?

The fourth fiscal quarter began the first of this month, and Collaboration Team has begun work on our new quarterly goals. In the coming months, we'll be working to release the New Filters for Edit Review beta on all wikis and then to improve the beta as much as possible based on user feedback. On that score, we're planning a round of user interviews on the new tools in May to get detailed information about usability and usefulness. If you've tried the new features and have thoughts, please share them with us in any language.

Our other focus right now is to look at what changes will be needed to spread the new filtering interface to other review pages, especially Watchlist. We're also exploring how to incorporate the tools we didn't include in the new interface in this round, like the Tag Filters, time-frame selector and Namespace filter.

Edit Review Improvements [More information • Help pages]

Recent changes

• New Filters for Edit review are now available on Polish, Portuguese, Persian, Russian and Turkish Wikipedias as a Beta feature. French Wikipedia and Mediawikiwiki have the filters as a Beta feature too, but without the quality and intent filters. [51]
• Special:RecentChangesLinked now displays a message when no results are found for a given combination of filters. [52]

Problems

• Polish Wikipedia is experiencing an issue with predictions (quality and intent filters using ORES). The different predictions are in conflict. An edit can be considered as "good" and "bad" at the same time, and the filter levels are somewhat redundant. We have formulated a plan to address this and are working on a fix, which is deployed progressively on Polish Wikipedia. [53]
• The issue on Polish Wikipedia is shared by a few other wikis: Dutch, Czech and Hebrew, and Wikidata. The deployment for those wikis has been postponed to Tuesday, May 9. Wikis without this predictions problem have been deployed or will be deployed with no change on the schedule. [54]
• Interestingly, the "problem" with those wikis is that they perform better than we anticipated. Once the fix is in place, the tools will work with particular simplicity on these wikis.

Future changes

• English Wikipedia and all wikis without ORES prediction services will get the New Filters for Edit review on Monday, April 24. [55]
• All remaining wikis will get the New Filters for Edit review on Tuesday, May 9. [56]
• Wikidata edits will be added as a type of change on New Filters for Edit review. [57]

Notifications [More information • Help pages]

• Notifications badges were overlapping other tabs on Internet Explorer 11 and Firefox 3.6, using MonoBook skin. This is now fixed. [58]

Flow [More information • Help pages]

• Flow is now available as a Beta feature on French Wikiversity. [59]
• All Flow documentation is now available on one page gathering all information, to help users to search for an information.
• Flow's AbuseFilter integration now allows blocking a particular user from participating on a talk page, or any topic within it. [60]

Collaboration team's newsletter prepared by the Collaboration team and posted by bot • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

13:04, 18 April 2017 (UTC)

Author pages, wikidata and family name

Hi to all who do work in Wikidata, especially in the creation and editing of author pages over there. I have been looking at the population of "family name" (Property:P734) data as that would be a really useful field for us to utilise here (it equates to our use of lastname in the Author template.)

By my searches, the data looks to be

• No family name: 17356 15020 petscan:889104 (slow query)
• With family name: 4196 6553 petscan:889108 (slow query)

and I think that I added about 1000 yesterday with the use of tools.

I would like to ask that anyone adding author data over there to please consider the addition of P734 data, and even creating items for surnames if they are not within the system there. I will look to create the simple WS guide to author addition at WD to assist this process.

My reason for wanting this populated is that when done, we can look to the bot creation of compilation lists, so we can autogenerate lists like Wikisource:Authors-A rather than the porous manual lists we have now. "Given name" and "family name" data populated to WD is required for this to be successful.

Thoughts? Questions? — billinghurst sDrewth 04:44, 20 April 2017 (UTC)

is there a way to mix and match against worldcat or viaf ? Slowking4 ‽ SvG's revenge 20:00, 21 April 2017 (UTC)

How would this work for people like John Emerich Edward Dalberg-Acton, 1st Baron Acton, surname "Dalberg-Acton" but listed in most indices at "Ac"? Or people whose last names are not generally used for indexing, like the house names of royal families, or the former names of monks and popes? The edge-cases are the places where an automatic solution is likeliest to fail. —Beleg Tâl (talk) 20:59, 21 April 2017 (UTC)

@Beleg Tâl: In principle, it's not hard to have a default value and then add in a field for alphabetical_sort_override=. In 99% of cases, it would be fairly straight-forward to sort someone by surname and in a relatively small number of cases, it would be necessary to manually check and redefine it. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 21:17, 21 April 2017 (UTC)

In that case we would need the "alphabetical_sort_override" key to be in Wikidata too, I imagine, so that the indexer-bot can access it. —Beleg Tâl (talk) 21:59, 21 April 2017 (UTC)

Noting that Wikidata has hyphenated family names, and I am sure that we can involved in that conversation there about how we wish to utilise data pulls. Noting also that there is still prefered and normal scope. It shouldn't be a blocker to us populating data, it is a fine-tuning matter. — billinghurst sDrewth 00:44, 22 April 2017 (UTC)

And noting we already have defaultsort in {{author}} and then it would how we could utilise. — billinghurst sDrewth 00:46, 22 April 2017 (UTC)

RFC: Author template firstname/lastname and the "Such and such of Placename"

Separate though related note. By my review of data for one name people eg. "John of Wendover", we still have varied use, all in firstname, all in lastname, split to both fields.

It is my belief that we should have an accepted practice and be giving specific guidance for such names. I believe that it all belongs in the firstname parameter, with the lastname parameter left empty. My reason being that when presented it should present as a string, it should default sort as that string, and based on firstname.

I know that is a provocative and bold statement, and I would like to hear other opinions about how we can organise the data, strengths and weaknesses of the approaches, so ultimately we can start to tidy up the existing data, and look to monitor the input. Thanks. — billinghurst sDrewth 04:50, 20 April 2017 (UTC)

I agree that it ought to be all in firstname with lastname blank, especially if that still sorts correctly. However, I don't see any reason for it to matter, so long as it sorts correctly. The primary difficulty in standardizing is the significant number of people for whom it isn't clear whether it should be counted as a surname or not, since the line is blurry in many cases. —Beleg Tâl (talk) 12:07, 20 April 2017 (UTC)

Yes it sorts properly, where lastname is missing it sorts on firstname. It displays properly. Richard of Wendover should appear at R lists, not O or W. We are clarifying to uses which way to push them, to firstname, not lastname. We are not removing the choice of what is a surname or not; and we will never get 100% purity, though I would like something better than our current 50% (based on users changing one or the other). — billinghurst sDrewth 15:31, 20 April 2017 (UTC)

Can the publisher be the Library of Congress?

This book Index:Notes of the Mexican war 1846-47-48.djvu doesn't list the publisher but the inside page linings are from the Library of Congress. Could they be the publishers? — Ineuw talk 07:18, 20 April 2017 (UTC)

I don't think they are; it's the same lining as books I know to be published by the Library of Congress, but the scan is from the LoC, and I think it more likely they just using their paper where they were rebinding it.--Prosfilaes (talk) 07:34, 20 April 2017 (UTC)

no - the metadata is frequently wrong at Internet Archive. the LOC catalog link is here https://lccn.loc.gov/02015450 or (OCLC) 2652213 this is a book by J. Jacob. Oswandel, published Philadelphia : [s.n.], 1885. i would blank publisher and add the correct metadata. worldcat works also. LOC does publish materials for their use, such as the Catalog of Copyright Entries, but it is very unlikely, more likely self-published or unknown, especially for war memoir. Slowking4 ‽ SvG's revenge 19:56, 21 April 2017 (UTC)

Notice: training event on afternoon of Monday 24th April 2017

Sorry for the short notice, but I will be running a training workshop from 2pm-5pm British Summer Time (GMT +1) at the University of Cardiff, which will involve up to twenty new accounts dropping in and proofreading one page of a text that I've prepared. I will review their edits afterwards and clean up any mess. Thanks, MartinPoulter (talk) 22:08, 23 April 2017 (UTC)

@MartinPoulter: thanks for the heads-up. I see that you have enWP account creator rights, so that is good. Good luck with what you are doing, and we would appreciate any feedback that the newbies have that could assist others; and thanks! — billinghurst sDrewth 23:44, 23 April 2017 (UTC)

Tech News: 2017-17

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

• New filters for recent changes are now available as a beta feature on most wikis. You can turn it on in your preferences. Remaining wikis will have the new filters on 9 May. [61]
• When administrators, bureaucrats and stewards make a user a member of a user group they can now set an expiry date. A user group is for example "administrators" or "bots". This means that they can give someone user rights for a limited time. This is similar to how blocks and page protections can be limited in time. Special:UserRights will have new options for this. You can read more about user groups. [62]

Problems

• Since the data centre test last week the content translation tool has been disabled. This is because of a database problem. It will be back as soon as the problem has been solved. [63]

Changes this week

• The GuidedTour extension will be enabled on all wikis. This is a tool to explain to new users how to edit. [64]
• Wiktionary will handle interlanguage links in a new way. The Cognate extension will automatically link pages with the same title between Wiktionaries. For this to work all old interlanguage links have to be removed. You can read more about this. [65]
• The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 25 April. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 26 April. It will be on all wikis from 27 April (calendar).

Meetings

• You can join the next meeting with the VisualEditor team. During the meeting, you can tell developers which bugs you think are the most important. The meeting will be on 25 April at 19:00 (UTC). See how to join.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

16:40, 24 April 2017 (UTC)

Local notes

With regards to the ability to do temporary rights any administrator who is assigning themselves the bot user rights should look to make these temporary rights, and I think that the community should have that as a base position.

To note that if you wish to give yourself rights for a couple of hours with that finishing on the same day, that you can just add the UTC time hh:mm (and it does take YYYY-MM-DD hh:mm as other time if you ever want to be specific). Such temporary rights log as being temporary, and the rights do expire, that the expiry does not show afterwards; and the rights addition in still displays Special:UserRights with a tick at least for a while (purging no difference), though with the expired time. — billinghurst sDrewth 05:57, 25 April 2017 (UTC)

Works/editions and authority control parameters

I am seeing in Category:Pages using authority control with parameters the use of items that are book-related, rather than edition specific, eg. OCLC, and VIAF. I am not certain that this is particularly kosher, and seeking opinion on whether they should be removed or not. Do people see that they actually add value? — billinghurst sDrewth 14:56, 25 April 2017 (UTC)

I'm divided on the issue. On the one hand, we want edition-specific information. But all too often, I can't find any edition specific links at VIAF or even LoC for the editions I'm seeking. And the LoC will sometimes have copy specific links rather than edition-specific ones, which is of no value to us at all since their copies seldom have scans available. --EncycloPetey (talk) 15:01, 25 April 2017 (UTC)

It means that we are needing to manage that data locally, as we should not be pushing that book-level data into Wikidata for our editions. It also means that we are tracking its addition locally, which seems pointless if it is just indicative data, rather than something of value. — billinghurst sDrewth 16:23, 25 April 2017 (UTC)

We can't keep misguided bot operators from transferring data inappropriately. Even when all the data is correct, I've seen bot operators or well-meaning editors mis-add the data to items, then argue and get all huffy when I try to explain how it's supposed to be done. If Wikidata were able to do their end consistently, and if we had a way to pull information and links from work-level items on Wikidata, whenever appropriate, then I think it would cease to be an issue. Unfortunately, Wikidata is a mess when it comes to distinguishing works and editions, or in tracking languages of works, and bots and new editors keep muddying the water.

Also, VIAF is in flux, with many works having multiple ID values, and I can almost never find edition information in VIAF. So, you have to know how to navigate "up" Wikidata in Wikidata in order to find book information. Further, we have no tools for "crawling" up the links in Wikidata from an edition to a work, and even if we had that, there is still no distinction at Wikidata between edition (in the same language) and translation. Until Wikidata can handle these and related issues, I don't see the problem that you've raised going away. --EncycloPetey (talk) 20:26, 25 April 2017 (UTC)

we are going to have to lead the way about structuring bibliographic metadata. could you write up a problem statement; and proposed paths forward, and missing process bits. how would we curate the worldcat or OCLC to incorporate edition information? if we wait for wikidata and VIAF, we will get a "solution" we will not like. if we raise the issues at wikidata, maybe we can get some buy-in. Slowking4 ‽ SvG's revenge 03:29, 26 April 2017 (UTC)

Interestingly just today I found an OCLC link that stated an edition, so maybe there is a lack of consistency and the mess is just universal. Rather than hit my head against the wall, maybe we just brute force the data, and take our whipping later. We just manage with less than perfect data and fix it all into the future. — billinghurst sDrewth 04:39, 26 April 2017 (UTC)

What is the 'blue-sky' desire for {{authority control}}? Is it that it displays a 'work' ID if there isn't an 'edition' one? Because that isn't too hard to do. I mean, not too hard to set up the linkage to use Wikidata data… the adding of the IDs to the right item on WD is another matter, but at least on our side things would stay clean. I don't really see the point in adding work-IDs to editions here (where there's no edition ID to be had); it'd be just as much work to add them at Wikidata, and doing so would have wider-ranging benefit. (Although, I agree that there's a world of bibliographic mess out there and that we're probably not going to end up with perfection!) Sam Wilson 06:40, 26 April 2017 (UTC)

Sam, I do like the thought of cascading the the authorities. If data not on the edition, then choose the work. The neat thing about that is that here it is a coded response to the data selection, not encoded data here. The only thing that we need to do is to confirm that we want each authority that we display to cascade from work to edition; then fix the data. — billinghurst sDrewth 23:48, 26 April 2017 (UTC)

@Billinghurst: Yeah, it shouldn't been too hard to add to Module:Authority control. I'll start writing some tests for the existing functionality. Would we want it to display any differently when it shows a work-level ID? Alternatively, we could show two sections in the authority control area, with the 2nd being for the work (might make it clearer?). Sam Wilson 01:15, 27 April 2017 (UTC)

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I wouldn't particularly wouldn't want to overly change/fork the module itself as ours does (did?) match enWPs. If we could wrap it that if the edition link fails to produce data that we then call the work (but I am not the coder so you tell us). Bit of push and pull whether we identify it separately, or pull the same field. If my first answer effects the approach, then maybe it is just simpler to align in showing separately. — billinghurst sDrewth 05:12, 27 April 2017 (UTC)

Yes, good point. Let's add it to the nascent Module:Edition, and it doesn't even need to do the complicated thing of knowing about all the different IDs; we can just ask Wikidata what an edition (and then its work) has. I'll get a sandbox and tests set up and we can experiment. Sound like a plan? We've got a ticket phab:T159104 for this sort of thing at the Hackathon in Vienna too; I'll work on this there as well. Sam Wilson 07:20, 27 April 2017 (UTC)

the problem is - most book metadata does not differentiate between editions. they glom all the editions together in one item. this means that there is the prospect of cleaning up all the metadata on the internet. we are going to have to make it easier to "check the edition before upload", but will have no help from anywhere else. it is not the first time that wikimedia is leading by example on metadata. Slowking4 ‽ SvG's revenge 14:21, 26 April 2017 (UTC)

Indeed. I think that summarizes the situation well. And while we can lead the way, each individual can tackle only a small portion of the problem. I have been trying to get the situation in hand for Greek drama, and have started expanding to some other Greek poets and Roman drama, but it is a mountain to deal with, especially since the task involves knowing the structure and quirks of several databases (GND, BnF), in addition to the issues on Wikidata and the various Wikisources. Never mind that doing this right universally also means working in several languages.

But even doing all that, I will have only cleaned up the situation for about 43 plays and a single set of 50 poems by a single author when I have finally done the group of works that I have selected to clean up. We really need an easier way to manage the creation, correlation, and correction of the data involved, and that's the gist of my proposal for Wikimedia strategy. If anyone here would like to add comments to that thread at Meta, expounding on some aspect of this issue, it would help clarify the situation and promote the discussion for all concerned. This is a big issue with many facets. --EncycloPetey (talk) 20:53, 26 April 2017 (UTC)

Requesting the deletion of a file on Wikisource

Please could someone delete File:Taking of Upton Bridge.jpg? I accidentally uploaded it on to Wikisource years ago. There is a version of the same file on Commons. -- PBS (talk) 16:15, 25 April 2017 (UTC)

Done. For future reference, feel welcome to use {{sdelete}} and say it is transwikied. As it is unused we can speedy it. — billinghurst sDrewth 16:19, 25 April 2017 (UTC)

Watchlist issues anyone?

For me for the past twelve hours, I am having display issues for my Watchlist. I get a blank screen (enWS only) and no error messages in my console. Can someone please confirm that their watchlist is working here at enWS, and especially confirm if they are using firefox. [my attempts to solve the issue will have to wait a while] Thanks. — billinghurst sDrewth 23:53, 26 April 2017 (UTC)

I do get the note

The character encoding of the HTML document was not declared. The document will render with garbled text in some browser configurations if the document contains characters from outside the US-ASCII range. The character encoding of the page must be declared in the document or in the transfer protocol.

and I don't believe that I have made any changes to anything in that time. — billinghurst sDrewth 23:57, 26 April 2017 (UTC)

Not to fuss, I have got it working by cleaning out the list through Special:EditWatchlist/raw. I will add it back later to find out what has changed. It was a category, not sure which, that will definitely have to wait. — billinghurst sDrewth 00:09, 27 April 2017 (UTC)

I have identified that having Category:Speedy deletion requests in my watchlist breaks the display of Special:Watchlist. Can anyone please confirm whether it is a more universal problem, or just for me. To note that you have to set OFF in your watchlist preferences

Hide categorization of pages

— billinghurst sDrewth 13:11, 27 April 2017 (UTC)

I tried just now; added the cat to my watchlist and turned off "hide cats", but I still do not have this issue in Firefox or Vivaldi/Chromium. However, I noticed a few people having watchlist trouble at w:Wikipedia:Village pump (technical) so I suspect there's something bigger at play. —Beleg Tâl (talk) 23:57, 27 April 2017 (UTC)

The strategy discussion. The Cycle 2 will start on May 5

The first cycle of the Wikimedia movement strategy process recently concluded. During that period, we were discussing the main directions for the Wikimedia movement over the next 15 years. There are more than 1500 summary statements collected from the various communities, but unfortunately, just several from your local discussion. The strategy facilitators and many volunteers have summarized the discussions of the previous month. A quantitative analysis of the statements will be posted on Meta for translation this week, alongside the report from the Berlin conference.

The second cycle will begin soon. It's set to begin on May 5 and run until May 31. During that period, you will be invited to dive into the main topics that emerged in the first cycle, discuss what they mean, which ones are the most important and why, and what their practical implications are. This work will be informed and complemented by research involving new voices that haven’t traditionally been included in strategy discussions, like readers, partners, and experts. Together, we will begin to make sense of all this information and organize it into a meaningful guiding document, which we will all collectively refine during the third and last cycle in June−July.

We want to help your community to be more engaged with the discussions in the next cycle. Now, we are looking for volunteers who could

• tell us where to announce the start of the Cycle 2, and how to do that, so we could be sure the majority of your community is informed and has a chance to feel committed, and
• facilitate the Cycle 2 discussions here, on Wikisource.

We are looking forward to your feedback!

Base (WMF) and SGrabarczuk (WMF) (talk) 16:18, 27 April 2017 (UTC)

Index:Bibliografia Pratese, compilata per un da Prato.djvu

Non-english work?ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 10:41, 28 April 2017 (UTC)

I decided to be bold and just delete it, because the creator of the Index page within minutes created the page at it:Index:Bibliografia Pratese, compilata per un da Prato.djvu and has started proofing it there, so apparently they created it here by accident.--Prosfilaes (talk) 12:43, 28 April 2017 (UTC)