Community Wishlist Survey 2019/Watchlists/Watchlist item expiration

Random proposal ►◄ Watchlists The survey has concluded. Here are the results!

Watchlist item expiration

Problem: My watchlist combines a few pages which I want to watch permanently with thousands of entries which I only wanted to monitor for a few days after a one-off edit. The two types are mixed together with no distinction. Removing pages which were of temporary interest is tedious and error-prone.
Who would benefit: Editors who want to monitor revisions to a page in the near future, without it cluttering up the watchlist permanently. This especially benefits "gnomes" who make minor changes to many pages.
Proposed solution: Introduce an optional expiry date on watchlist entries. Remove expired entries from watchlists before displaying them. Make the default expiry date "forever", so the change only affects editors who opt in.
More comments: The edit dialogue could have a "watch for a day/week/month" option. Allow editors to make this their default on an opt-in basis.
Phabricator tickets: T124752, T100508, T8964
Proposer: Certes (talk) 13:59, 7 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Discussion

This is a variation on the Watchlist Expiry idea, which has been much discussed and debated over the years. See T124752 T100508 T8964. It was a 2016 project of the German wishlist team, and it looks like they made progress in terms of adding required fields to the back-end Watchlist data table. But I'm not sure what the progress was after that, or why the process stalled if it did. I'm pinging Birgit Müller (WMDE) and Lea Voget (WMDE), who should be able to fill us in on where this effort stands and what the level of difficulty going forward would be. —JMatazzoni (WMF) (talk) 19:00, 7 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
- So we did take the biggest hurdles, which was refactoring all the necessary code and adding the required fields to the database table. What is left to do is implementing the actual feature. This should not be hard in itself, the complexity comes more from making this work with other ideas for the watchlist (although I am not sure if there are currently any other plans). Currently,no work on this wish is scheduled. The reason why we stopped our work was that it took over a year for the database fields to be added, and we had thus many more things on our TODO-list when they were finally there. --Lea Voget (WMDE) (talk) 12:36, 9 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  - not all required fields have been added to the table - a field for the expiry date is still missing. -- DKinzler (WMF) (talk) 21:48, 29 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
When working on this problem for the 2013 German wishlist, an alternative was proposed: we could allow watchlist entries to be listed by the date they were added, and give users a way to remove old entries by selecting them from the filtered view. There is a recent RFC that proposes a similar feature, see phab:T209773. -- DKinzler (WMF) (talk) 21:48, 29 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Voting

Support Redalert2fan (talk) 19:12, 16 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support SEMMENDINGER (talk) 19:31, 16 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support James Martindale (talk) 19:46, 16 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Like the proposer I want to be able to watch a page for a short time after editing it WikiGnomishly, or indefinitely if it's a topic of interest. PamD (talk) 23:23, 16 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Tom Ja (talk) 23:53, 16 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Gehenna1510 (talk) 00:25, 17 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support — Insertcleverphrasehere ^{(or here)} 00:26, 17 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support MrX (talk) 01:45, 17 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Rs chen 7754 02:31, 17 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Natureium (talk) 02:58, 17 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Hiàn (talk) 04:08, 17 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support JTP ^{(talk • contribs)} 04:53, 17 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Domdeparis (talk) 07:33, 17 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Xiplus (talk) 08:00, 17 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Jtajt (talk) 08:09, 17 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support –Ammarpad (talk) 09:07, 17 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Tractopelle-jaune (talk) 09:47, 17 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support --Tylwyth Eldar (talk) 10:15, 17 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support as proposer Certes (talk) 10:23, 17 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Elekhh (talk) 10:39, 17 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support ديفيد عادل وهبة خليل 2 (talk) 10:45, 17 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Kpgjhpjm (talk) 13:52, 17 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Sakretsu (talk) 14:58, 17 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support — Sounds like a sound proposal. SshibumXZ (talk) 16:48, 17 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Dcheney (talk) 16:58, 17 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Cabayi (talk) 17:15, 17 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Amir (talk) 19:19, 17 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support JAn Dudík (talk) 20:31, 17 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Yamaha5 (talk) 20:35, 17 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Nk (talk) 20:35, 17 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Mmitchell10 (talk) 20:35, 17 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Mehdi^Talk 20:37, 17 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Fatemi ♪ 20:41, 17 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support —Thanks for the fish! ^{talk•contribs} 20:49, 17 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support — pythoncoder (talk | contribs) 21:14, 17 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Would be very useful. Tom (LT) (talk) 23:21, 17 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Mz7 (talk) 00:21, 18 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Sunfyre (talk) 02:44, 18 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support — Bilorv (talk) 03:06, 18 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support This could be combined with a proposal below to "mute" certain pages for a short length of timeAHeneen (talk) 05:49, 18 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Poya-P (talk) 06:19, 18 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Abductive (talk) 09:59, 18 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Very good idea. Jules78120 (talk) 10:22, 18 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support فرهنگ2016 (talk) 10:41, 18 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support NMaia (talk) 10:51, 18 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Wikimostafa (talk) 11:13, 18 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support An excellent proposal. (Worth noting that Twinkle/Huggle/STiki would need a mod to take advantage of this feature) Girth Summit (talk) 12:11, 18 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Liuxinyu970226 (talk) 12:45, 18 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Timeshifter (talk) 12:56, 18 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support XXBlackburnXx (talk) 14:56, 18 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Bruce1ee (talk) 15:01, 18 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Pagliaccious (talk) 16:38, 18 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support — Draceane ^talk_contrib. 17:17, 18 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Dvorapa (talk) 19:17, 18 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support JackPotte (talk) 22:21, 18 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support -- Whats new?^(talk) 22:46, 18 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Stryn (talk) 22:59, 18 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Trizek ^{from FR} 09:58, 19 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support ·addshore· ^{talk to me!} 10:13, 19 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Geraki ^T_L 13:56, 19 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Courcelles 15:02, 19 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
SupportONUnicorn (talk) 15:56, 19 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support I am a gnome, and I would appreciate this. StringRay (talk) 22:21, 19 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support very strongly. Iridescent (talk) 10:13, 20 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support CAPTAIN RAJU^(T) 22:55, 20 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Tisfoon (talk) 06:09, 21 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Onel5969 ^{TT me} 10:44, 21 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support BMK (talk) 11:07, 21 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Vexations (talk) 11:22, 21 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Novak Watchmen (talk) 14:54, 21 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Conny (talk) 15:02, 21 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support BugWarp (talk) 17:37, 21 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Sometimes can be useful. Gce (talk) 18:33, 21 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Nihlus 22:46, 21 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Yes, work should definitely be completed on this. Alsee (talk) 05:34, 22 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Vulp here 17:23, 22 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Encycloon (talk) 18:57, 22 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Flo Beck (talk) 20:08, 22 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support FiliP ██ 20:32, 22 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support SalmanZ (talk) 21:16, 22 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support AnuJuno (talk) 06:54, 23 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support MisterSynergy (talk) 10:04, 23 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Hmxhmx 10:44, 24 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Quiddity (talk) 18:37, 24 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Barkeep49 (talk) 19:23, 24 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Fettlemap (talk) 21:23, 24 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Matěj Suchánek (talk) 11:11, 25 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Helder 13:36, 25 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support IKhitron (talk) 19:47, 25 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support WikiGnome approved :) — AfroThundr ^{(u · t · c)} 02:57, 26 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support PMG (talk) 11:41, 26 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support -- Amanda (aka DQ) 22:57, 26 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support, though there's some design question on "do we want to warn/indicate to users that their temporary watched item will expire soon?" that might be worth answering. --Izno (talk) 00:38, 27 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Abeona (talk) 12:05, 27 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support YFdyh000 (talk) 19:58, 27 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Mahir256 (talk) 21:42, 27 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Calvinballing (talk) 15:06, 28 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Uanfala (talk) 00:19, 29 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Daniel Case (talk) 03:33, 29 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Yes please. Even a simple flag in watchlist (like 'long-term' or 'short-term') with different options to purge 'short-term' should work. In the current setup I watch only pages I am interested in in long-term — NickK (talk) 16:37, 29 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Watching reactions after edit is good argument. Take considerations from Izno's comment. Wargo (talk) 16:43, 29 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Duży Bartek (talk) 19:25, 29 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support --OrsolyaVirág (talk) 14:25, 30 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Support Schniggendiller (talk) 15:53, 30 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]