Wikipedia talk:Talk pages project

Try it out

If you want to try out the Reply tool (still early days), click on http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Utilisatrice:Whatamidoing_(WMF)/Brouillon?dtenable=1&uselang=en and leave a note in my sandbox. Ping me if you have questions or comments. Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 18:35, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

Now you can try it out here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Talk_pages_project?dtenable=1 Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 03:45, 1 June 2020 (UTC)

The edit you made above (Special:Diff/960099739) has thee different discussion tool tags - is there public documentation about the meaning of each? DannyS712 (talk) 09:13, 1 June 2020 (UTC)

User:DannyS712, I'm surprised you would even ask such a question. Of course it's not documented anywhere handy. (There's likely to be something in the code repository.) What do you want to know? (Please ping me.) Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 05:39, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

@Whatamidoing (WMF): For one thing, why is the plain discussiontools tag set to not be shown? DannyS712 (talk) 05:42, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

Mostly because I complained at them about cluttering up the RecentChanges feed. DiscussionTools includes Reply + NewDiscussion + maybe something else. I can imagine that anyone except Analytics is going to want to see those edits as a group. Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 23:22, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

Spammin the WAID. Timeless on a small screen is not as pretty as it should be. Izno (talk) 11:25, 1 June 2020 (UTC)

@Whatamidoing (WMF): Is there any way to integrate Notifications into this? Right now, the reply box starts by saying Reply to Whatamidoing (WMF) before I type anything, which (based on how other platforms work) seems to imply that Whatamidoing (WMF) will be tagged in the reply. I'm thinking of a "Notify Whatamidoing (WMF)" (or whatever the username is) checkbox next to the "Watch this page" one that would add {{Reply to|Whatamidoing (WMF)}} to the start of the reply. --Ahecht (TALK
PAGE) 17:19, 7 June 2020 (UTC)

Hello, User:Ahecht, they are still talking about that question, and your advice is welcome. The way I think of that question is: Do I want volunteer-me to be pinged every time someone comments after me in a discussion thread? (Work-me loves being pinged to everything, all the time. Volunteer-me is going to read all the comments at WT:MED every day whether I get pinged or not, so it's kind of a waste of effort.)

The next version will have an optional visual mode, with a quick search tool for usernames. I am pushing for them to turn the source mode (which is what we've got today) into something that looks plain but still has the keyboard shortcut for finding usernames. (Also for code formatting and link searching in general.) Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 05:37, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

I was thinking of a box that wouldn't be enabled by default, so it is presented as an option for each reply. --Ahecht (TALK
PAGE) 11:15, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

Maybe something like "Tick this box to ping User:Example"? (The actual ping could be added to the edit summary in that case, or inserted into the text of the comment.) I don't know whether that was already on User:JKlein (WMF)'s list of ideas, but if it wasn't, I bet it will be soon. :-D Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 23:24, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

Version 2.0 ready for testing

Try the fancier version here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Talk_pages_project?dtvisual=1

Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 20:33, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

Nothing showed up for me with visual (writing this with dtenable=1) DannyS712 (talk) 09:33, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

Yeah, it turns out that it doesn't work unless you already have the basic version enabled in your account. If you check my global.js, the first line is the magic one. Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 23:39, 22 June 2020 (UTC)

@Whatamidoing (WMF) Yeah, that did the trick DannyS712 (talk) 05:35, 23 June 2020 (UTC)

Mid-April status note

Quick update: This is available as an opt-in Beta Feature at the Arabic, Dutch, French, and Hungarian Wikipedias. I looked at every single diff during the first ~10 days (hundreds and hundreds of diffs), and while it generated a few questions (if you reply to a comment inside a table, does your reply belong inside it or outside it?), there were no significant problems. It seems to be working well overall. Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 19:49, 16 April 2020 (UTC)

Editing news 2020 #1 – Discussion tools

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This early version of the Reply tool automatically signs and indents comments.

The Editing team has been working on the talk pages project. The goal of the talk pages project is to help contributors communicate on wiki more easily. This project is the result of the Talk pages consultation 2019.

In a future update, the team plans to test a tool for easily linking to another user's name, a rich-text editing option, and other tools.

The team is building a new tool for replying to comments now. This early version can sign and indent comments automatically. Please test the new Reply tool.

• On 31 March 2020, the new reply tool was offered as a Beta Feature editors at four Wikipedias: Arabic, Dutch, French, and Hungarian. If your community also wants early access to the new tool, contact User:Whatamidoing (WMF).
• The team is planning some upcoming changes. Please review the proposed design and share your thoughts on the talk page. The team will test features such as:
  • an easy way to mention another editor ("pinging"),
  • a rich-text visual editing option, and
  • other features identified through user testing or recommended by editors.

To hear more about Editing Team updates, please add your name to the "Get involved" section of the project page. You can also watch these pages: the main project page, Updates, Replying, and User testing.

– PPelberg (WMF) (talk) & Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 19:50, 16 April 2020 (UTC)

Partner wiki update

We're supposed to get numbers soon on the Reply tool's use at the four partner wikis (French, Arabic, Hungarian, and Dutch). All I know at this point is that a couple hundred editors have used it, and that once they have it, most people keep using it (assuming they keep replying to comments on talk pages at all). Overall, people seem happy with it.

I'm trying to talk the team into offering it here, but I don't know if I'll succeed this round. They're going to want to run an A/B test at some point, though, and I'm encouraging them to think about the English Wikipedia as the fastest place to do that, just because of its size. The first step would just be getting it into Beta Features. Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 00:55, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

Editing news 2020 #4

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Reply tool

The number of comments posted with the Reply Tool from March through June 2020. People used the Reply Tool to post over 7,400 comments with the tool.

The Reply tool has been available as a Beta Feature at the Arabic, Dutch, French and Hungarian Wikipedias since 31 March 2020. The first analysis showed positive results.

• More than 300 editors used the Reply tool at these four Wikipedias. They posted more than 7,400 replies during the study period.
• Of the people who posted a comment with the Reply tool, about 70% of them used the tool multiple times. About 60% of them used it on multiple days.
• Comments from Wikipedia editors are positive. One said, أعتقد أن الأداة تقدم فائدة ملحوظة؛ فهي تختصر الوقت لتقديم رد بدلًا من التنقل بالفأرة إلى وصلة تعديل القسم أو الصفحة، التي تكون بعيدة عن التعليق الأخير في الغالب، ويصل المساهم لصندوق التعديل بسرعة باستخدام الأداة. ("I think the tool has a significant impact; it saves time to reply while the classic way is to move with a mouse to the Edit link to edit the section or the page which is generally far away from the comment. And the user reaches to the edit box so quickly to use the Reply tool.")[1]

The Editing team released the Reply tool as a Beta Feature at eight other Wikipedias in early August. Those Wikipedias are in the Chinese, Czech, Georgian, Serbian, Sorani Kurdish, Swedish, Catalan, and Korean languages. If you would like to use the Reply tool at your wiki, please tell User talk:Whatamidoing (WMF).

The Reply tool is still in active development. Per request from the Dutch Wikipedia and other editors, you will be able to customize the edit summary. (The default edit summary is "Reply".) A "ping" feature is available in the Reply tool's visual editing mode. This feature searches for usernames. Per request from the Arabic Wikipedia, each wiki will be able to set its own preferred symbol for pinging editors. Per request from editors at the Japanese and Hungarian Wikipedias, each wiki can define a preferred signature prefix in the page MediaWiki:Discussiontools-signature-prefix. For example, some languages omit spaces before signatures. Other communities want to add a dash or a non-breaking space.

New requirements for user signatures

• The new requirements for custom user signatures began on 6 July 2020. If you try to create a custom signature that does not meet the requirements, you will get an error message.
• Existing custom signatures that do not meet the new requirements will be unaffected temporarily. Eventually, all custom signatures will need to meet the new requirements. You can check your signature and see lists of active editors whose custom signatures need to be corrected. Volunteers have been contacting editors who need to change their custom signatures. If you need to change your custom signature, then please read the help page.

Next: New discussion tool

Next, the team will be working on a tool for quickly and easily starting a new discussion section to a talk page. To follow the development of this new tool, please put the New Discussion Tool project page on your watchlist.

Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 18:47, 31 August 2020 (UTC)

I'll add that deployments are currently blocked on a new API being deployed. So if anyone's interested in seeing this as a Beta Feature, it will be possible, but not immediately. Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 18:49, 31 August 2020 (UTC)

Editing news 2021 #1

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Reply tool

Completion rates for comments made with the Reply tool and full-page wikitext editing. Details and limitations are in this report.

The Reply tool is available at most other Wikipedias.

• The Reply tool has been deployed as an opt-out preference to all editors at the Arabic, Czech, and Hungarian Wikipedias.
• It is also available as a Beta Feature at almost all Wikipedias except for the English, Russian, and German-language Wikipedias. If it is not available at your wiki, you can request it by following these simple instructions.

Research notes:

• As of January 2021, more than 3,500 editors have used the Reply tool to post about 70,000 comments.
• There is preliminary data from the Arabic, Czech, and Hungarian Wikipedia on the Reply tool. Junior Contributors who use the Reply tool are more likely to publish the comments that they start writing than those who use full-page wikitext editing.[2]
• The Editing and Parsing teams have significantly reduced the number of edits that affect other parts of the page. About 0.3% of edits did this during the last month.[3] Some of the remaining changes are automatic corrections for Special:LintErrors.
• A large A/B test will start soon.[4] This is part of the process to offer the Reply tool to everyone. During this test, half of all editors at 24 Wikipedias (not including the English Wikipedia) will have the Reply tool automatically enabled, and half will not. Editors at those Wikipeedias can still turn it on or off for their own accounts in Special:Preferences.

New discussion tool

Screenshot of version 1.0 of the New Discussion Tool prototype.

The new tool for starting new discussions (new sections) will join the Discussion tools in Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-betafeatures at the end of January. You can try the tool for yourself.[5] You can leave feedback in this thread or on the talk page.

Next: Notifications

During Talk pages consultation 2019, editors said that it should be easier to know about new activity in conversations they are interested in. The Notifications project is just beginning. What would help you become aware of new comments? What's working with the current system? Which pages at your wiki should the team look at? Please post your advice at mw:Talk:Talk pages project/Notifications.

–Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 01:02, 23 January 2021 (UTC)

Experiences

@ProcrastinatingReader, Levivich, Barkeep49, Valereee, GeneralNotability, Pelagic, DannyS712, Ed6767, and SQL: @Blablubbs, Majavah, Awesome Aasim, The Earwig, L235, Thryduulf, Nthep, Silikonz, Berrely, and Ahecht: @CAPTAIN MEDUSA, Mr Ernie, Ltw2021, 1997kB, Sir Joseph, Joseywales1961, Amorymeltzer, 2d37, Mehmetcaputcu, and TheImaCow:

Hello, all. You have all used the Reply tool at least 5 times on this wiki, and I'd like to check in and see whether you have found any serious problems that you think should be addressed before it's made available more widely. I know the user script isn't working in Firefox right now (the fix is on the way, but the deployment train got derailed). Is anything else on your mind? Pages where it screws things up? Problems you're having? Anything? I'd like to talk to the devs about offering it as a proper Beta Feature here, but I'd like to make sure that you're all satisfied first.

You can use https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Talk_pages_project?dtenable=1 if you want to try it out on this page. Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 20:34, 8 February 2021 (UTC)

All fine for me, other than the minor things I mention at User_talk:ProcrastinatingReader#DiscussionTools. Still meaning to follow up on the most recent comment, but currently I'm not sure I agree on If someone doesn't get value from it, then why should they change the page's appearance (especially on a User_talk: page)?. Say Iridescent decided he doesn't get value from it and doesn't want to remove his box, that doesn't mean people commenting on his user talk page don't get value from it. Similarly, if the maintainers of Wikipedia talk:Good article nominations don't get value from it, that doesn't mean I (as an editor posting there, possibly just irregularly) doesn't get value from it. The people maintaining the page may not get value from it, but people posting on it might. So I still think that's a bug this extension should aim to fix. I'm not entirely sure why it's getting confused on the pages either; the wikitext is still normal, though I believe this extension works on the generated HTML. It might still be possible to account for it, though. ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 20:40, 8 February 2021 (UTC)

@ProcrastinatingReader: When I filed a task that would work around the box problem for TemplateStyles, the DT team let me know that that issue can be worked around by moving the div at issue out of the 'header template' and into the page itself. See phab:T271588#6733745. --Izno (talk) 01:32, 9 February 2021 (UTC)

Can't reply on customized talk pages (like my own talk page). Maybe that can be fixed? Also, clicking on "reply" inside of a template should make the reply outside of the template, not inside. Aasim (talk) 20:43, 8 February 2021 (UTC)

The problem is the box/background color. The Phabricator comment that @Izno linked is about this. Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 21:13, 9 February 2021 (UTC)

All good here. Thanks! Levivich ^harass/_hound 20:44, 8 February 2021 (UTC)

@Whatamidoing (WMF): I just stumbled upon an instance of it messing up a colon-to-colon reply (: should have been ::: in Special:Diff/1006327064), but it was on an arbcom workshop page so it might have been the unusual section formatting. Probably not worth holding up beta over. Levivich ^harass/_hound 08:12, 12 February 2021 (UTC)

@Levivich, you are correct. It's the fake ::"Comment by" sections that cause this. This is a special case of the question about whether, if my comment contains starts with : and ends with :*, should your reply begin with :: or :**? (It was one way, and people complained, so they switched it, and now people complain about that, too. There is no single correct answer that works for everyone and every discussion.) Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 20:32, 18 February 2021 (UTC)

I noticed it did it here, too, on a Signpost talk page (also unusual formatting). I guess it saw the ** at the beginning of the previous comment (which ended with :::), and so it did lvl3 ::: instead of lvl4 ::::.

The :/* system is, IMHO, a top example of wiki-insanity. I still can't believe we're not wrapping comments in XML tags to differentiate one comment from another and specify which comment is in reply to which previous comment. As I understand it, it's because some sizeable portion of the community wants the source code to be human-readable, which, to me, sounds insane. But I digress.

If you want my two cents, if a comment ends in :*, regardless of whether it started with : or :* or anything else, the next comment should begin with :** or :*:, with the third indent level indicating this is a new comment and not a continuation of the previous. But, you know, any sane system would simply not use indentation as a method of visually separating one comment from another, because indentation is used within comments, for lists and various other purposes. If we use indentation to separate comments, we will have problems like... this exact problem. Something tells me that someone said this 20 years ago and nobody listened.

Anyway I hope none of this holds up the rollout on enwiki because overall this tool is a big step forward, even if it doesn't magically solve all of our problems. Levivich ^harass/_hound 21:20, 18 February 2021 (UTC)

I'm not sure that association list formatting was possible on wiki twenty years ago. (Twenty years ago, talk pages hadn't even been invented yet.)

I can reproduce the error (here). The preceding comment begins with ** and the switches to :::, which is always wrong. I'm not sure what it should reply with, but I'm convinced that ::: is wrong. The Reply tool places the box to show where the 'indentation' will appear, and it is obvious that it's going to be in the wrong place. Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 04:31, 22 February 2021 (UTC)

A reply to ** should be **: or ***, I believe. Enterprisey (talk!) 08:34, 24 February 2021 (UTC)

I have a few stray thoughts. An option to ping in source mode is my most desired feature, since I primarily edit in source mode, and is the main thing missing compared to Enterprisey's reply-link. There is also no clear way to leave a comment that is not indented without starting a new section; this is commonly needed when leaving a general comment or when outdenting explicitly with {{od}}/{{od2}}. Lastly, editors can be inconsistent about whether they indent with : or *, but DiscussionTools enforces :. I don't like this inconsistency, but has it been conclusively decided to only support : going forward? This aside, I've been very happy with it. I don't think these are blocking issues and would love to see it more widely available. — The Earwig ⟨talk⟩ 20:54, 8 February 2021 (UTC)

The option to ping the editor you're replying to would be super helpful. I don't like / use visual mode either. SQL^{Query me!} 23:01, 8 February 2021 (UTC)

@The Earwig, the "correct" thing to do with ** vs *: has not been conclusively decided. It originally used **, but then a few people said that it was the wrong thing, so they changed it, and now other people say that it was better the other way around. You can see some comments at phab:T263902. I think that no matter what the default is, some people will think it's the wrong thing. (I originally thought I was firmly in the ** camp, but it turns out that I sometimes want it one way and other times the other way.) Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 21:19, 9 February 2021 (UTC)

Until phab:T264520 is fixed the interface is fairly annoying since I need to switch back and force from visual (for pings) and source (for everything else I type) - it was closed as a duplicate of phab:T251633, but the latter task does not cover everything in the former. DannyS712 (talk) 20:56, 8 February 2021 (UTC)

@DannyS712, as a workaround, if you type the template syntax (elsewhere, e.g., in the URL bar of your web browser), and then paste it into the visual mode, the template works:  Done! Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 21:21, 9 February 2021 (UTC)

@Whatamidoing (WMF): yeah, its easier to just switch the mode to source editing at that point DannyS712 (talk) 21:58, 9 February 2021 (UTC)

I agree with Earwig and Danny that the ability to ping in Visual only is the biggest hiccup. I also have encountered the issues PR highlights which isn't a dealbreaker for me but might be for a more novice user. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 21:05, 8 February 2021 (UTC)

I have used it solely with Firefox, I don't use visual editor. I have encountered very few problems, occasionally hangs and I abandon, ping and answer manually, doesn't happen too often so I think it is fine for my (limited) needs. JW 1961 Talk 21:18, 8 February 2021 (UTC)

The only problem I've had with its use is that once I encountered a bug where left and right arrows would switch between Visual and Source mode, rather than move the cursor. It was a comment that required careful wording, so I was going backwards and forwards quite a lot, sometimes with ctrl and sometimes with shift also, but despite testing it a few times since I've not been able to reproduce the issue (so haven't reported it).
Sometimes, It results in WP:LISTGAP issues but I've not looked into this in any detail so don't know if it's tool error or user error.
Finally, for feature requests:

• integration with popups would be useful (in the source editing preview at least)
• If three tildes are typed then it should append just the timestamp (rather than the whole signature) Thryduulf (talk) 22:29, 8 February 2021 (UTC)

Ah, yeah, I can break the arrow keys if I shift-tab to the visual/source selector and use an arrow key while editing. — The Earwig ⟨talk⟩ 23:38, 8 February 2021 (UTC)

@The Earwig and @Thryduulf: What's your web browser and OS? We should get a bug filed for that. Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 21:23, 9 February 2021 (UTC)

@Whatamidoing (WMF): Reproduced in latest Chrome and Firefox on macOS. — The Earwig ⟨talk⟩ 21:27, 9 February 2021 (UTC)

Firefox on Xubuntu, I'm currently on version 85 but it might have been 84 when I experienced it. Thryduulf (talk) 23:04, 9 February 2021 (UTC)

This is now phab:T274423. Please feel free to edit. Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 19:55, 10 February 2021 (UTC)

My major complaint is still that the text box starts with the default text "Reply to Whatamidoing (WMF)", which seems to imply that {{Reply to}} is going to be used to ping the named editor. In source mode, there's nothing that can be done but re-type the name manually, and while the Visual tab does have a way to mention a username, when I click on that button, the user I am replying to (in this case, Whatamidoing (WMF)) doesn't even show up in the list of suggestions! My recommendation would be that in source mode, there be a checkbox that says "Notify Whatamidoing (WMF)" (or whatever the username is that appeared in the default text), and that in Visual mode, the username in the default text is shown at the top of the list when the mention user button is clicked. --Ahecht (TALK
PAGE) 22:55, 8 February 2021 (UTC)

Works for me. I would like an option for ping though Sir Joseph ^(talk) 23:18, 8 February 2021 (UTC)

@Sir Joseph, the ping feature is available in the visual mode. There's a plan to offer it in the source mode, but I haven't seen any movement on that. Maybe "someday" rather than "soon"? Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 21:24, 9 February 2021 (UTC)

I'm enjoying the tool, though I will say I only use Source mode and never Visual (the preview is good enough). I'll echo everything everyone else has said, and also emphasize the WP:LISTGAP problem that Thryduulf brings up: the tool handles bulleted comments (created using *) quite poorly. There are some discussions where every comment is expected to be a bullet point, and reply tools are useless either for offering an opinion or for responding to others' comments. On the whole, I'm very impressed by the tool and grateful that this is something you've been working on. I appreciate that the way you're going about development is iterations of careful testing rather than setting it to be on by default from the get-go. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 23:28, 8 February 2021 (UTC)

Oh, and yes, an option to ping the person I'm replying to by default would be very helpful. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 23:29, 8 February 2021 (UTC)

@L235 and @Ahecht: Do you really want everyone to ping you, every time they reply after your comment?

I've been wondering about a system that pings you if a newbie replies to you, but not if an experienced editor does. Or maybe it should be the other way around: Every time we reply to a newbie, they get auto-pinged (because how else will they notice the reply?), but the rest of us are left to our watchlists. Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 21:26, 9 February 2021 (UTC)

Do you really want everyone to ping you, every time they reply after your comment? IMO: yes, otherwise I need to add everything to my watchlist or remember to check back, and even then it's harder to notice replies to my comment in particular. When I reply to someone, more often than not, I want them to see it. (Edit: though doing this through the edit summary instead of {{reply}} would be fine.) — The Earwig ⟨talk⟩ 21:32, 9 February 2021 (UTC)

I want it by default – oftentimes I may turn it off, but less than half the time. For example, here, I wouldn't ping you because I know you're going to see this at some point and it's not urgent. Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 21:49, 9 February 2021 (UTC)

I wouldn't mind being pinged every time. It should be optional, but I agree with KevinL that it should be the default. I have enough pages on my watchlist that I don't usually see a reply unless I'm pinged. --Ahecht (TALK
PAGE) 03:11, 10 February 2021 (UTC)

The problem is that the preference should be settable on the receiver's side, not the sender's. You don't mind being pinged every time, so you should be able to set a preference saying you want to be pinged every time. I don't want to be pinged if I'm already involved in a conversation and thus following it. I'm not sure how this can be managed, though. isaacl (talk) 22:13, 16 February 2021 (UTC)

I mean, the current mechanism (writing in wikitext) is that the writer's preference is generally followed – I almost pinged you just now until I realized you probably wouldn't want one! Best, KevinL (aka L235 · t · c) 03:18, 17 February 2021 (UTC)

If you mean I can disable receiving all notifications, yes, but I don't want to do that. I appreciate you're thinking more of what would reduce clicks when you're replying. I'm thinking of Whatamidoing's question regarding if someone really wants to be pinged every time. Some people like The Earwig may, and others like me just want to be notified once, on first mention, if I'm not already participating. isaacl (talk) 23:19, 18 February 2021 (UTC)

+1. The indenting and pinging are the only issues I see with the tool. Enterprisey's reply-link automatically adapts to the indenting style that's already in use in a discussion, which is probably the best way to go about it – maybe you could steal some code there? Blablubbs|talk 13:43, 10 February 2021 (UTC)

Jumping in here with some indenting/LISTGAP bug numbers, in case anyone wants to join the "phun" on Phabricator: phab:T252708 is the one that is about handling multi-level comments, which includes all the problems on the ArbCom case pages. (If you're the first person to reply in the fake sections, then it thinks that the lines about "Comments by parties" are part of your comment.)

If you want to be able to change the indentation level (e.g., to correct its incorrect guess about the ArbCom case pages), see phab:T265750. If you want to be able to set the reply style (e.g., for voting at RFA), then see phab:T263902.

If you have a favorite approach, feel free to post your recommendations here or at mw:Talk:Talk pages project. Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 22:39, 25 February 2021 (UTC)

I've been using the tool on Firefox 86 without any problems (likely as I've been loading the extension in my global.js). I personally like writing replies in source mode, as I often add a lot of links, templates, etc, but noticed that, unlike visual mode, which has the nice ping option and other formatting tools, source mode lacks it. Also a few very minor things, such as it not being able to reply on custom talk pages, indenting confusingly with bullet points, and lacking a small "outdent" feature, incase discussions get too long. However, overall, quite a nice tool! — Yours, Berrely • ^Talk∕_Contribs 08:07, 9 February 2021 (UTC)

I've enjoyed using the tool. Perhaps there would be a way to bold or italicize text directly in the tool, if you don't know the apostraphe markups off the top of your head. Mr Ernie (talk) 12:30, 10 February 2021 (UTC)

There is in the Visual mode - just click the B icon for bold or the I icon for italic (the Ctrl+B and Ctrl+I shortcuts also work). I don't know whether it would be possible to add the edit toolbar (or a version of it) to the source editor. Thryduulf (talk) 13:55, 10 February 2021 (UTC)

Adding a toolbar is both possible and planned. I'm not sure how soon it might happen. There are also discussions about whether the toolbar should have more/other items in it. I keep telling @PPelberg (WMF) that it would be more useful to have a special character inserter than the Bold and Italic buttons, but he keeps telling me that they're useful to other people. The main problem is that the toolbar needs to stay small, because if you're on a narrow screen, and replying to a heavily indented comment, then you might only have a narrow space for the whole box. If any of you have ideas about what should be in the toolbar, then I'm sure he'd be interested. Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 19:42, 10 February 2021 (UTC)

I've just seen this edit by JohnFromPinckney. I'm not sure what they were attempting (maybe inserting a template?) but most of their comment got <nowiki>-ed. Thryduulf (talk) 02:23, 15 February 2021 (UTC)

I am quite used to typing my contributions (such as they are) directly into the Talk page, and I've tripped over a few specialties when trying to use the Reply tool instead. What Thryduulf mentions isn't the only time this has happened to me, and I have a theory about how it occurred: I copy-pasted some text from elsewhere which had a wikilink in it. The tool silently accepts my text, showing me a nice, functional bluelink (precluding the necessity of me using the "Link" button), but when I publish my entry, there's a whole bunch of <nowiki> tagging in my comment, usually disabling the tqq template into which I pasted the text. (My pasted wikilinks are live, but the rest of the comment's code is, er, broken.) I then have to go and manually clean my comment anyway. — JohnFromPinckney (talk) 15:48, 15 February 2021 (UTC)

@JohnFromPinckney, you were using the visual mode, where templates are disabled. Did you type the {{tqq| part manually? Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 18:23, 15 February 2021 (UTC)

Yes. I hadn't realized there's a way to actually enter wikicode. Thanks for the hint. — JohnFromPinckney (talk) 14:33, 16 February 2021 (UTC)

You're welcome. And thank you for posting this, because the devs are working on refining a bit of 'warning' code as a direct result. It's at phab:T274923. I think we missed the cutoff for this week's deployment train, so it may take another ~10 days before it has a visible effect here, but it should be on its way. Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 21:27, 16 February 2021 (UTC)

Found a bug I think. I click "New section" somewhere and fill it out, decide not to submit and go to another article. Suddenly, the new section dialog pops up (without me clicking anything) at the bottom of the page with my unsaved content from another article's talk pre-filled out. ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 11:29, 16 February 2021 (UTC)

I've experienced this too (although I don't remember whether it was a new section or a reply), you have to explicitly cancel your comment. Thryduulf (talk) 12:20, 16 February 2021 (UTC)

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T274949

I can reproduce it (only) in the "New Discussion" tool. I've filed a bug report. I don't think that the wikitext mode recovers unsaved changes, so I assume this only happens in the visual mode right now. Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 21:39, 16 February 2021 (UTC)

• Hey, WAID, I've got a new complaint: using the tool on EEng's talk page gave me a timeout error ("Error contacting the Parsoid/RESTBase server (HTTP 504)") and I think also made the lights flicker in the San Fran office. It went through on another attempt, but just to be safe, when the beta is rolled out, User talk:EEng should probably be deleted and salted :-D Levivich ^harass/_hound 20:32, 19 February 2021 (UTC)

  I'll have you deleted and salted, and served on bagels with a little shmeer. This gives another justification for keeping my talk page as it is: stress test for new tools. If it can digest my talk, it can handle anything. EEng 22:42, 19 February 2021 (UTC)

  That error is not this tool specifically; it's the backend. However, @Levivich, I'm sorry to disappoint you, but your guess about the cause is probably wrong. When the page is too large, you'll get HTTP 413 instead. I triggered it on @DGG's talk page earlier this month. Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 04:21, 22 February 2021 (UTC)

  Oh, I see. I guess I'll go post some more warning templates and DS notices on EEng's talk page; we'll see how quick we can get that 504 down to a 413. Levivich ^harass/_hound 08:31, 24 February 2021 (UTC)

• Cursor in Source mode: Well, it's invisible. I see a nice blinky vertical bar in Visual mode, but in Source mode I just have to know where I last typed or clicked. There's nothing to see. Using (*gulp*) Firefox 52.9.0 on (*sorry!*) Vista. — JohnFromPinckney (talk) 02:17, 23 February 2021 (UTC)

  Thanks for the note, @JohnFromPinckney. You win a bug number: phab:T275814. If you see this behavior in any other tool, please add that to the Phab ticket (your Wikipedia account works there via OAuth) or post here and ask me to add it for you. Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 22:43, 25 February 2021 (UTC)

• I tapped [Reply] on WAID's top post here, and the box popped in between Thryduulf's comment and the {tracked} template. It's not Reply Tool's fault if the list formatting has gone wonky partway through a long discussion, but it's one of the most common reasons that I have to cancel out and do a section edit. I’d like some way to add a top-level or first-level comment at the bottom of a discussion, regardless of what has gone before. That's not a blocker to turning it on as an opt-in, but it would be a nice-to-have feature. (Compare Structured Discussions, which has two affordances for replying at the bottom, both of which unfortunately do the same thing. One should indent and the other should not-indent.) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Pelagic (talk • contribs) 20:24, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

  @Pelagic, the team has been talking about this. If you imagine replying to a comment that starts with ::::::::::::, the key points seem to be: send me back to zero, send me back to one :, and let me adjust by just one (which would help with the slightly wonky discussions). Does that sound about right to you? Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 16:44, 1 March 2021 (UTC)

  @Whatamidoing (WMF): I was thinking of a "reply at end of discussion" feature/affordance, but yes "adjust indentation" is a more general solution. Then you could reply anywhere (vertically) in the conversation flow and tweak the indentation to where you want it. I imagine it would feel quite natural to achieve "reply-to-thread" by hitting "reply-to-last-comment" followed by "outdent to zero (or one)". It would also save scrolling up a long discussion to find the OP with its Reply link. [Left, right, and zero (or one) would suffice – once you’re at zero (or one) then it’s just one more tap/click to get to one (or zero).] I hope that makes sense. Is there a decent chance that adjusting indent will be on the to-do list and not in the too-hard basket? Pelagic ( messages ) – (22:08 Tue 02, AEDT) 11:08, 2 March 2021 (UTC)

  We have a decent chance. I haven't heard them talking about it in the last couple of weeks, so it's not likely to happen soon. When they've talked about it in the past, none of the devs have ever mentioned concerns about difficulty. My impression is that the coding is easy, and the only potentially difficult part is the design (where exactly do you stick the button, and how many options do you offer?). Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 20:09, 2 March 2021 (UTC)

  The main task is phab:T265750. I'll mention you there, so you'll be subscribed to it. Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 20:14, 2 March 2021 (UTC)

• Probably the thing I find most annoying is that when using the source editor normally, pressing tab takes you from the main text input box to the edit summary box, but when using the reply tool (in source mode at least) tab takes you to the first highlitable thing in the preview (usually a link or your signature). This means my normal workflow of finishing my commnet, pressing tab and then end and starting to type my edit summary takes me to a random point on the page. I have no idea whether it is technically possible to set the edit summary box as the target of the first tab after the editing box, but if it is doing so (or being able to set a preference to do so) would be really useful for me. Thryduulf (talk) 21:44, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

  This is a timely comment, because they've been talking about fixing some tab orders in the New Discussion tool. I'll pass it along. Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 16:45, 1 March 2021 (UTC)

New sections

Since we don't have the Beta Feature turned on here yet, most of you are using this via a user script, which means you've been using the mw:Talk pages project/New discussion tool to start new sections. Almost all of the comments above are about replying, rather than starting new discussions. The designer asked me earlier this week if anyone had comments on the New Discussion tool, and I had to tell her that I'd heard very little about it. So now I'm asking: What do you think?

For myself, I like having it show the new section at the end of the page. I hope that will help newcomers figure out our bottom-posting system. What do you think? Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 22:44, 25 February 2021 (UTC)

I didn't know new sections was a thing with the tool? I don't see a link on this page and don't recall seeing one elsewhere. Thryduulf (talk) 23:10, 25 February 2021 (UTC)

@Thryduulf, I think this will work:

1. Click on https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia_talk:Talk_pages_project&dtenable=1
2. At the top of this page, click the 'New section' tab (next to the history tab).

If it works, then it'll scroll to the end of this page and give you a space to start a new discussion.

You can play in my sandbox if you want: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Whatamidoing_(WMF)/sandbox?dtenable=1 Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 17:13, 26 February 2021 (UTC)

Ah right, the new section link is at the top of the page. I was looking for a link at the bottom, sorry. I haven't used it much but I don't recall any issues when I have. Thryduulf (talk) 17:42, 26 February 2021 (UTC)

I think there will be demand for a bottom-of-page link after this is turned on and more people are typing their replies directly at the bottom of the page. Currently, you scroll to the top, hit [ New Section / + ] which then scrolls you back to the bottom. French Wikipedia has "Ajouter un sujet" in the bottom right. Are there plans to include something as part of DT, or should we consider emulating the French example? — Pelagic ( messages ) – (06:58 Mon 01, AEDT) 19:58, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

@Pelagic making it easier for people to identify where/how to add a new topic to a talk page and access the link/button for doing so, regardless of where they are on the page, is something we have plans to work on.

In fact, in December, you shared an example of how Meta works to deliver easier access to the new topic link (thank you). If you come across any other projects that implement like what you described, we'd value hearing. PPelberg (WMF) (talk) 04:16, 1 March 2021 (UTC)

Hi Peter, glad to hear that’s still in your plans. Much as I would love to have a French-style link now (with or without New Discussion tool, but especially with), it'd be wasted effort trying to get w:en to add one sitewide if it's going to be made obsolete by something that's on the DT roadmap.

What’s your thinking about release timing? If you get to the point where New Discussion tool is ready for wider use, but the best approach to invoke it from other places on the page is still under design/discussion, would you consider a simple link/button at page bottom as an interim measure or first iteration? (I do prefer the location of the French link over the Meta one.)

Also, a general question for anyone reading who knows about modding MediaWiki: where would I look if I wanted to emulate the French link via my personal js?

— Pelagic ( messages ) – (06:53 Thu 04, AEDT) 19:53, 3 March 2021 (UTC)

@Pelagic, look in w:fr:MediaWiki:Common.js and search down the page until you find the section called "Ajout d'un lien « ajouter une section » en bas de page" (currently lines 516 to 530). I think if you copy that over to User:Pelagic/common.js or m:User:Pelagic/global.js, then it will work for you. Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 21:19, 3 March 2021 (UTC)

@Pelagic, responses to the points you raised below...

What’s your thinking about release timing?

I anticipate us focusing on making it easier for people to identify where/how to add a new topic to a talk page this summer. Reason being: we will first focus on: 1) getting topic subscriptions in y'alls hands and then, 2) introducing a series of small visual enhancements to make it easier for people to identify and understand new activity on a talk page. Note: while the scope of these "visual enhancements" is still coming togther, you can find some information on the project page and in phabricator here (T249579).

If you get to the point where New Discussion tool is ready for wider use, but the best approach to invoke it from other places on the page is still under design/discussion, would you consider a simple link/button at page bottom as an interim measure or first iteration?

I think what you are proposing here could be a wise first step...good thought! Although, I need to stop short of committing to any definitive plan in order to make sure: A) we (read: all of us) have the space to learn new things about the tool as we use it more and B) JKlein (WMF) (design lead) has room to think more about this issue of discoverability.

Please let me know if anything above prompts new thoughts/questions or leaves anything you were wondering about unanswered. PPelberg (WMF) (talk) 04:11, 12 March 2021 (UTC)

It's great, I've had no problems with it, and I like it a lot more than starting new sections in VE. (Particularly having the new section edit window be at the bottom of the page instead of on its own page.) Levivich ^harass/_hound 23:19, 25 February 2021 (UTC)

I've been using it, and I like it. SQL^{Query me!} 17:19, 26 February 2021 (UTC)

If, for some reason, I want to override it and use the old-style new-section experience (just for a single edit, not as a permanent preference), is there a way to do that? ... answering myself here: open in new tab achieves that. (Why would I want to? Maybe I’m typing something that would benefit from CharInsert, syntax highlighting, ref tool, etc. Not common on a talk page, but possible.) — Pelagic ( messages ) – (06:33 Mon 01, AEDT) 19:33, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

I'd say that would be quite useful when drafting something intended for the main article, which is not an uncommon use of talk pages. Thryduulf (talk) 21:39, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

@Pelagic, I can't say that this quirk is intended or guaranteed to stay around, but at the moment, it appears that if you click the "New section" button while you're on the "View history" page, then you get the old wikitext editor. Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 02:04, 11 March 2021 (UTC)

If you click the link to start a new section on a talk page on a wiki that (a) you have not edited before and (b) has a welcome message for new contributors then clicking "start editing" on that message takes you briefly to the old new section interface and then to the top of the page you were going to leave a comment on with the new tool loaded at the bottom. At least I think that is what happened to me at the Outreach wiki. I've tried testing with my alt account (Awkward42) and not managed to reproduce it (on outreach, dk.wikipedia, hr.wikipedia and en.Wikiversity), but it's not an easy thing to test given that I don't know how to force seeing the welcome message more than once on any given wiki. Thryduulf (talk) 16:25, 11 March 2021 (UTC)

Doing this

Hello, all:

My overall impression from this page and from WP:VPT is that nobody has any significant concerns about the Beta Feature being offered. Unless I hear otherwise, I'll ask the devs to please put enwiki on the list for whenever they're making a config change. This could be as early as next week, but I can't promise a particular date.

The Beta Feature will (definitely) be default-off, opt-in only. It might include the New Discussion feature as well as the Reply tool; if not, then it'll get added later. (This depends on how long we have to wait.) Either way, the user scripts should continue to work.

There's work on a toolbar for the wikitext source mode (pinging and searching for links, because who's wants to type out Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World by hand when you could just type travels into and have the search box do the rest?). However, my current impression is that won't be ready very soon. In that case, you can expect that to be added later, too. Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 20:58, 4 March 2021 (UTC)

@Whatamidoing (WMF): Thank you for your work on this. I'm looking forward to seeing it activated for enwiki. SQL^{Query me!} 21:54, 4 March 2021 (UTC)

Feedback request: pinging and other tools in source mode

In the "Experiences" conversation above, and others before [i], many of y'all requested that easier ways for pinging and linking be added to the Reply Tool's source mode.

We have a prototype ready that introduces this functionality and we would value you trying out the prototype and sharing what you think about it by commenting in this thread. I'm going to post a couple of feedback prompts in the comment that follows this one.

Before posting that, a couple of things to note:

• You can try the prototype by clicking this link on a desktop computer: https://patchdemo.wmflabs.org/wikis/12cdbb1f7baf0b71e7dc733aff3da949/w/index.php/Talk:Main_Page
• The link above will take you to a test wiki that is NOT connected to any other wiki and its contents will eventually be deleted. So please, experiment freely.

---

i. See the "Tool ideas" section of phab:257391's task description for links to previous conversations. PPelberg (WMF) (talk) 04:33, 12 March 2021 (UTC)

Prototype feedback prompts

• What did you find unexpected about how the prototype looks and functions?
• What do you appreciate about the prototype?
• What do you wish was different about the prototype?

Also, I'm going to ping some of the people who requested easier ways for pinging and linking be added to the Reply Tool's source mode with the assumption that they would be interested in trying the prototype: @Ahecht, @Berrely, @Barkeep49, @The Earwig, @DannyS712, @KevinL, @Pelagic, and @SQL. PPelberg (WMF) (talk) 04:37, 12 March 2021 (UTC)