Wikimedia Forum/Archives/2011-01

Google results

When looking for "Wikipedia" on google.it, amongst the links showing up under the first one (the main one), there is a link to the YouPorn article. According to stats.grok it's not even a very popular page (2k visits per day - average, and I suppose this is mainly due to the visibility of the link). A donor on OTRS was very concerned about that. I had not noticed that before and I don't like that too: if we were to decide we'd probably put more useful links there, such as guidelines, help pages, 5 pillars, terms of use, disclaimers and so on. Any explanations for that or suggestions? User:Elitre

I do not have any explanation for that except that it could be due to the site popularity or search engine optimization matching of the searched text. However, I strongly concede to your opinion that it must be dealt with and altered immediately. --The Redmax! 01:51, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

Seems fixed now, btw. Links below first results are now Wikipedia - Wikipedia, Ricerca, L'enciclopedia, Persone, Scienze matematiche, fisiche e naturali, Tecnologia e scienze applicate, Sommario, Libera. No YouPorn in the first 100 results. --Nemo 18:42, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

How about an audio WIKI WATCH ?

You could simply say the word and the watch could reply with all the WIKI details. Because its I/O is only a mic and speaker there would be no bulk to carry around. I have no money but wanted to give back for your good intentions and help. If it works out well, give me a small cut of the profit and with the resources I could do a lot more good work. The preceding unsigned comment was added by 156.34.199.15 (talk • contribs) on 31 December 2010.

This sounds like advertising, so I'm not much inclined to accept this proposal. :| TelCoNaSpVe :| 20:02, 31 December 2010 (UTC)
There is no profit to be cut. This is a non-profit organization. ~ Ningauble 21:03, 31 December 2010 (UTC)

This ain't no business. It's a community service based on no profit no loss. The Redmax! 01:47, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

Scope of the meta-wiki

I have created the Free Society Conference and Nordic Summit article on this meta-wiki, but I am unsure if meta-wiki is suppose to contain such kind of information (that are relevant for chapters)[1]. Any thoughts? — Finn Årup Nielsen (fnielsen) 18:11, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

If they're relevant for chapters they're relevant here too. :-) --Nemo 18:38, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

IRC (!!!attention request!!!)

*MemoServ* send wmfgc IRC cloak request
-MemoServ- wmfgc's inbox is full

Please fix it...--Waihorace 06:50, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

Good afternoon,
I'm forwarding your request to the IRC group contacts members. --Dereckson 17:22, 3 January 2011 (UTC)
Sorry about that. It's cleared now. :) --FiliP ██ 19:43, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

WP 10

Will the central notice which is now on enwp post on all wikipedia or just en?--Waihorace 01:11, 8 January 2011 (UTC)

Good question! I'll ask in Dutch Wikipedia. Patio 09:40, 12 January 2011 (UTC)

Mobile versions of Wikimedia projects

Wikipedia has a mobile version (see the English one at http://en.m.wikipedia.org ).

But mobile pages do not yet exist for the following:

... and several other projects. Are there plans to begin mobile versions of them? WhisperToMe 18:15, 7 January 2011 (UTC)

I'm fairly certain I've seen at least one bug report for a site wishing to have a mobile interface. Have you tried searching bugzilla? Killiondude 00:05, 8 January 2011 (UTC)
Lemme check right now. If I find any bugzillas that are Wikimedia related but are not Wikipedia related, I'll post the links below. WhisperToMe 05:40, 8 January 2011 (UTC)
I haven't found anything using the search engine at http://www.bugzilla.org - I used "m.wiktionary.org" as a search term... and I used "Mobile" and "Wiktionary" as well... WhisperToMe 05:41, 8 January 2011 (UTC)
Bugzilla.org has no relation to Wikimedia. I searched "mobile" on bugzilla and found that #21867 was colored differently in my browser, previously clicked, so that's what I was mentioning above. Killiondude 02:48, 9 January 2011 (UTC)
The reason I searched with the term "Wikimedia" and similar words is that I believed that including those terms in the searches would help find pages on Bugzilla related to those sites. Anyhow I'm glad it's documented on Bugzilla. Hopefully people will create the mobile versions of the other sites... WhisperToMe 07:10, 10 January 2011 (UTC)
Bugzilla is a software system; MediaWiki is also. You searching bugzilla.org for Wikimedia content is akin to a Harry Potter fan searching for content related to harrypotter.wikia.com on MediaWiki.org. :-) Killiondude 08:25, 10 January 2011 (UTC)
Oh I get it now! The Wikimedia-related Bugzilla reports are actually on the wikimedia.org domain WhisperToMe 20:00, 12 January 2011 (UTC)

I disabled this banner because it looks awful. --MZMcBride 01:14, 12 January 2011 (UTC)

This page is not CentralNotice's log and is not something that the people who should've approved your action follow. Cbrown1023 talk 20:09, 13 January 2011 (UTC)

I've noticed that the "Donation" link in each Wikimedia project's sidebar links to this page. That's fine for Wikipedia, but unfortunately readers of non-WP projects are also directed there. The problem is that the page is very Wikipedia-centric, so readers landing there from other wikis may be confused why they are being asked to support Wikipedia and not the project they were on. This also gives the impression all non-WP projects are part of Wikipedia (not Wikimedia). I know most of our donations come from Wikipedia readers, but there is a fair amount of traffic coming from other wikis in the WMF world as well. Would it be possible to have non-WP projects link to a project-neutral page in the future? (There used to be one, but I can't find the link.) Tempodivalse [talk] 16:44, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

Blocking on Wikimedia

Dear users. I'm Theklan, sysop on basque wikipedia and devote wikipedian since 2006. I'm really ashamed about the decision to hold Wikimania on Haifa, Israel, where many araba country wikipedians and many other left-side activists can't enter. This is a real shame. I'm trying to express my concerns about this on Wikimania 2011 Desk, but I've been blocked because my political point of view is not accepted by the admins of that place. This is a double shame. I ask to unblock me now or I'll try to get an official boycott position from many other wikipedians and even some Wikipedia sections. -Theklan 18:19, 12 January 2011 (UTC)

Well, it seems that the place of wikimania 2011 can't be changed anymore. Maybe a boycott is the only thing that you can do now. Hope no more wikimanias in such places. --DS-fax 15:49, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

When and how to use central notice

Having a central notice should be a rare exception, not the standard. The vector skin was developed to have a clean, uncluttered page. But since November there has been not a single day without a central notice. That's way too much.

The fundraiser was mandatory, the "thank you" too. As well as the anniversary.

But the scholarship for Haifa was nonsense: how many people could possibly be affected by that? 100? 200? All of them deeply engaged in their projects. Hardly an issue worth bothering every (logged in) user. And the steward candidates are even worse. We are talking about maybe twenty-five people, and every one of them is already hanging out in our IRC channels all day. No one can be a steward unless he or she is well connected in the movement for ages, way beyond individual projects. And of course I know how to block the notice, but I am not the issue. The issue is cluttering the page and bothering people with stuff outside of their interest.

This is about information management: If we use central notice for stuff, our people are not interested in, we diminish the value our users see in this tool. Then we can't reach them anymore if it is really important. Please let us restrict the central notice to issues that affect all the community or a public of maybe 100.000 people or more. Never ever bother everyone with stuff, that is of interest only to a few of those who are already deeply involved.

Now pull the call for steward candidates please and don't use central notice at all until the election begins. --h-stt !? 20:37, 17 January 2011 (UTC)

I agree with you. Fundraising and anniversary may be inportant, but they should not take up so much place. Centralnotice for Wikimania is totally unnessesary. We can develop some other methods to deliver these messages to the communities. --DS-fax 15:45, 19 January 2011 (UTC)
So please, Meta-Admins: disable the current central notice and be much more strict in setting new ones. TIA --h-stt !? 14:09, 21 January 2011 (UTC)

What the difference between policies which apply to all Wikimedia projects and founding principles?

Both the two claim to be mandatory and refinable. ––虞海 (Yú Hǎi) 17:49, 21 January 2011 (UTC)

I think the "founding principles" are set in stone and can never be changed. Policies can change if there is a discussion. Not sure though... Seb az86556 18:39, 21 January 2011 (UTC)
The founding principles are historic. The five principles are here. They are sound principles, and I don't think there would be reason to change them. Core policies on local Wikimedia projects are likely to be based on those founding principles, though there will be other policies and guidelines which will emerge as appropriate, and which may not be connected to the founding principles. SilkTork 23:35, 21 January 2011 (UTC)
But the five principles claimed to be “refinable”. See founding principles. ––虞海 (Yú Hǎi) 10:56, 22 January 2011 (UTC)
For perspective on policies applying to all Wikimedia projects, you might start at Policies. The "five principles" of the above link are explicitly specific to Wikipedia; they "apply to all Wikimedia projects" only in the same sense that, everywhere in the world, the capital of Ohio is Columbus. (I actually had to look that up. :-) --Pi zero 14:44, 23 January 2011 (UTC)
The five principles is why wikimedia came into being. --DS-fax 09:37, 24 January 2011 (UTC)

Historical data/research

Hello,

I'm a sysop/bureaucrat on w:mr. We're trying to trace our roots (of w:mr) using historical data and other stats. When I joined the party (sometime in 2005), I was told that w:mr was started on May 1, 2003. I have been trying to substantiate that date, but can not go back beyond Jan 21, 2005, based on the "oldest articles" list.

Is there another way I can find out when w:mr was commissioned, launched and when the first edit happened?

Thanks much.

Abhay Natu My talk page on w:mr

The oldest page i found in the Web Archive is that one from 22 December, 2003. Maybe that helps. Béria Lima msg 18:02, 25 January 2011 (UTC)
I found this. Maximillion Pegasus 19:41, 25 January 2011 (UTC)
But http://mr.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?rcid=1 suggests that perhaps some older edits have been lost, doesn't it? --Nemo 08:52, 28 January 2011 (UTC)
Thank you for your help.
w:mr:सदस्य चर्चा:अभय नातू
The first 5 edits of Chinese Wikipedia are also lost. --DS-fax 09:24, 28 January 2011 (UTC)

Need help

  1. http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Category:Wikipedia_templates&action=history
  2. http://be.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Катэгорыя:Вікіпедыя:Шаблоны&action=history
  3. In other wikis - the same.--Амба 01:32, 27 January 2011 (UTC)
Hi Амба,
What you want to know about this category?
Talking about templates:
What is the status of the possibility of using HTML5 in WikiMedia Foundation sites? Template HTML5 --Patio 09:50, 27 January 2011 (UTC)
whew --DS-fax 09:25, 28 January 2011 (UTC)