Talk:Tech/News/2023/14

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Hey @SD0001, thanks for adding a submission!

Unfortunately, I don't think the entry in its current state is quite suitable for Tech News, primarily because it's not immediately clear how it's Wikimedia specific, plus it is English-only (which we try to avoid). I will remove it for now, but I'll add my thoughts below on ways to potentially bring it back in the future.

(There are also the more subjective aspects, such as that: we don't typically link to non-Wikimedia sites from within Tech News, and some readers might have concerns with highlighting a plain GitHub documentation page at all (given GitHub's ownership by Microsoft, and all the related complexities of commercial organizations and closed-source platforms).)

However, I do see that the 2nd link in your entry, is going to a page that you prepared there, which gives some additional wiki-specific details. I think that could be worth highlighting more broadly. If you think this is something of widespread interest to all semi-technical editors, then I'd suggest creating a page/guide on mw: with the core details, and more/clearer links to wiki-related examples. That way it can be marked for translation, and contributed to by others, and found via searches, and thus have a better chance of reaching and helping the wider movement audience over the long-term. Perhaps as a subpage/section of mw:Manual:Creating a bot? Or integrated with Small wiki toolkits/Starter kit/Bots and Tools? At that stage, I think it would be a good Tech News entry.

I'd also be curious if anything similar could be done in our own instance of mw:Gitlab, so that people can contribute/collaborate/learn/copy without needing to make a GitHub account. (However, I'm not deeply familiar with that, nor am I a developer; this is just me thinking-out-loud!)

I hope these notes are helpful! Quiddity (WMF) (talk) 19:26, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

@Quiddity (WMF)

immediately clear how it's Wikimedia specific

It's a tool to assist developing userscripts on Wikimedia wikis...

plus it is English-only

The news item can be easily translated here in Tech News and users can use automated translation services to translate the documentation if they want to figure out how to use it.

we don't typically link to non-Wikimedia sites from within Tech News

This literally benefits Wikimedians. It's an optional tool they can use. It's a link to website on the open internet. There's no problem with this.

and some readers might have concerns with highlighting a plain GitHub documentation page at all (given GitHub's ownership by Microsoft, and all the related complexities of commercial organizations and closed-source platforms).)

If people have problems with GitHub then they don't have to click on the link. Many developers do use and appreciate GitHub as a service so for most people it is not an issue and should not be an issue putting it on Tech News. Lectrician1 (talk) 16:17, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

As the second half of my comment says, I do think it is worth including in some form, but I suggest documenting it on-wiki, and linking there instead, for many long-term benefits (plus avoiding the concerns I mentioned in the first half, which you've commented on). I hope that helps. Quiddity (WMF) (talk) 22:11, 28 March 2023 (UTC)