Help talk:Talk pages/Archive 4

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Archive 2

Archive 3

Archive 4

Copyrights for the WIkipedia page I am building for my dad

Hello,

I have taken content from my father's website to build his Wikipedia page. I saw the note left by someone at Wikipedia that there was plagerism. After looking further, I found the solution. My father will be sending you an e-mail from an address associated with the website releasing the content to be on Wikipedia. This whole navigation process of the page building tool is complicated. Can you please acknowledge this note and tell me what to do next?

Thanks, PeterKpa-advisory (talk) 21:58, 10 January 2017 (UTC)

My username is Kpa-advisory

@Kpa-advisory: see Wikipedia:Donating copyrighted materials. But please note that even if there were no legal obstacles, such material is probably not suitable for Wikipedia for other reasons: you shouldn't source a page about a person form his website (WP:AUTOBIO). Also, this is the wrong forum for your query; this page is for disucssing how to improve the help page at: Help:Using talk pages – Finnusertop (talk ⋅ contribs) 04:11, 11 January 2017 (UTC)

Using VisualEditor on talk pages

As far as I know, it is not yet possible to edit Wikipedia talk pages without writing markup code. There was a project called WP:Flow that was supposed to make talk pages more user-friendly, but it was canceled last year. Will it someday be possible to edit talk pages using VisualEditor instead? Jarble (talk) 19:54, 30 May 2017 (UTC)

Indentation

I'd like to replace the indentation section with a shorter explanation. I think indentation is better explained at Wikipedia:indentation than it is here. Moreover, I believe a shorter explanation is much less intimidating to new editors (who are the primary target of this page). I propose an explanation similar to that of fr.wiki or Wikipedia: the missing manual. It would look like this:

Would anyone object? Atón (talk) 09:58, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

I see there are no objections so I've implemented the proposal. Atón (talk) 07:18, 20 March 2017 (UTC)

I've re-added the information about blank lines causing problems for accessibility. —Sangdeboeuf (talk) 04:09, 29 March 2017 (UTC)

I've corrected the typos (where you had put "intended" instead of "indented"). --David Biddulph (talk) 14:23, 11 April 2017 (UTC)

Mobile users

SmokeyJoe wrote Counting colons, when there are more than four or five, and remembering how many colons when the preceding post is more than three lines, is hard [1] in reply to my question as to why it is hard to get wp:string right when editing from a 'phone.

This may explain why they and many other users mis-string, with I think increasing regularity.

Do our guidelines need a tweak? This problem can be predicted to snowball with time, IMO. Andrewa (talk) 17:22, 30 June 2017 (UTC)

I think the WP:Flow scars are still to heal. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 01:40, 5 July 2017 (UTC)

re: Teahouse vs Talk

Can someone please clearly compare, & contrast Wikipedia:Talk_page pages with Wikipedia:Teahouse discussions of Wikipedia topics. The descriptions of both are complex, and perhaps confusing, as I have been rebuked for using the Talk tab to discuss & suggest changes to a topic, but without reference or links to any specific comparison & distinction between the appropriate use of each. The basis that I understand for using the Wikipedia:Teahouse is that some (?all) reviewers / maintainers, find it easier to scan recent additions to a single page rather than Talk throughout Wikipedia. If so, perhaps that explanation should be added/linked to both pages & the Talk page template.
Wikidity (talk) 19:25, 8 November 2016 (UTC)

I was blocked. I was not intentionally trying to break rules. Please restore me back. I am still learning.Ytteb1015 (talk) 21:30, 25 August 2017 (UTC)ytteb1015 Ytteb1015 (talk) 21:30, 25 August 2017 (UTC)

Requested move 3 September 2017

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: move. Will request implementation at WP:RM/TR (non-admin closure) TonyBallioni (talk) 19:29, 12 September 2017 (UTC)

---

Help:Using talk pages → Help:Talk pages – Unnecesarily specific title name. The article are about talk pages and how to use them. By being in the "Help" namespace, the verb-fication of the title is retundant. I can fix it myself in a few days if no-one objects.(should have read the rules) Gaioa (talk) 15:36, 3 September 2017 (UTC)

• Support per nom. Other help pages are just titled using the noun they describe. – Train2104 (t • c) 03:39, 7 September 2017 (UTC)
• Strong support. From Wikipedia:Help namespace: These pages contain information intended to help use Wikipedia or its software. Help use. The fact that it is in the Help namespace already suggests that it is about using something. — Mr. Guye (talk) (contribs)  19:24, 7 September 2017 (UTC)

---

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

Tricky aspects of indenting

@Mandruss: Numbering editors in the order in which they are displayed on the page (diff) avoids the issue of what should happen when another editor wants to reply to the second comment. I don't particularly care what the guideline says because it is pretty irrelevant for how things are done—I have tried to explain indenting to a few good editors who simply don't get it and never will. However, the example should tackle the tricky issue. If I were making the tricky comment, I would insert it as shown in the example if the comments were fairly brief and it wasn't a highly active page like ANI. If those conditions did not apply, I would probably add my new reply at the bottom with some reference to the comment I was replying to. These considerations are probably a bit advanced for the guideline, but an example with everything numbered in ascending order makes it appear that the comments were added in that order, despite the timestamps which currently show Editor 3 as being after Editor 4 which is a bit strange. Johnuniq (talk) 02:38, 18 October 2017 (UTC)

See your point, self-reverted. ―Mandruss ☎ 02:40, 18 October 2017 (UTC)

Talkpage Clarification

We got this largest talk page in here. I been trying using talkpage helps to classifications some talk page options to ensure a solution in this section. Been trying get some veteran Wikipedia editors to review a solution to finalized a talk page section. — Preceding unsigned comment added by BusriderSF2015 (talk • contribs) 23:22, 16 February 2018 (UTC)

"Indentation" section is inadequate

The "Indentation" section is inadequate because it does not explain how to create a response that contains more than one paragraph. Apparently leaving a blank line is verboten, but the help page does not say what to do instead. Jc3s5h (talk) 19:47, 3 July 2018 (UTC)

why IP banning me on zh.wikipedia ?

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

I must report abuse of 'editorial' power by this admin User:Mys_721tx on zh.wikipedia.org. It is most uncalled for to IP ban me for translating MAJOR 'lack' in Chinese language site. I am a profession en-> zh translator, former editor on poetry magazine as well.

IF you have a bit of time plus a slight curiosity, do look into my talk page there and see how incomprehensible the situation is, that admin thinks by translating his grandma's laundry list, I must meet certain 'standards' to use wikipedia resources now? I'd appreciate as much help as I can get, since I can't make contact with _any_ sane translators on my team during the time of 'ban'. This admin's personal 'dislike' of my output there is a grave loss to US all.

Regards

LairdUnlimited 03:58, 9 September 2018 (UTC)Allthingsgo zh:User_talk:Allthingsgo — Preceding unsigned comment added by Allthingsgo (talk • contribs)

Block reason

破壞：屡次加入粗劣翻译

Damage: Repeatedly adding poor translation (according to GTranslate)

and you could ask that admin over here Mys 721tx using English, I suppose.

But... complaining over here is really strange. Each Wiki is separate.

And I can't be sure, but I think your user talk page access is still enabled over there. People can talk to you through your user talk page?

But... I would tend to take things at surface value. You need to find a way to work within their requirements. Perhaps they could pair you up with a mentor at zh wikipedia? Shenme (talk) 04:32, 9 September 2018 (UTC)

Within the span of a day, he has produced 12 articles while failing to follow the manual of style or to make sure the translation actually mean the same of the original text. The translations have about the same quality as that of Google Translate. This is on top of other ten or so poorly translated articles he created that almost no effort was made to improve those. Such behavior is unconstructive and need to stop. -Mys_721tx (talk) 05:01, 9 September 2018 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Hacked account?

{{helpme}} The Findhorn Foundation is my first edit. I did not to previous edits, that is, Rand corporation or Lowla Branz. Therefore, I think someone has hacked my account. I will change my password. Is there anything else I should do? Snicholls (talk) 07:56, 25 January 2019 (UTC)

@Snicholls: Those edits at Special:Contributions/Snicholls are 12 years old. Maybe you just forgot them. There is nothing else you should do. PrimeHunter (talk) 11:29, 25 January 2019 (UTC)

Also, as you were advised when you posted the above, this is not the page for posting questions about using Wikipedia ... see WP:QUESTIONS for help about using or editing Wikipedia. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 12:03, 25 January 2019 (UTC)

2019 talk pages consultation

This Wikipedia:Talk_pages_consultation_2019 may be of interest to followers of this page. II | (t - c) 05:37, 27 February 2019 (UTC)

how a talk page can be blocked?

only a question, for protect every Talk page from vandalism or else — Preceding unsigned comment added by Kalininos (talk • contribs) 16:05, 15 March 2019 (UTC)

@Kalininos: This is covered by the protection policy. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 21:33, 15 March 2019 (UTC)

Endemol Shine Group - Merge suggestion.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Endemol_Shine_Group

Hi Guys,

On the Endemol Shine Group wikipedia page, I have suggested that Endemol being merged into the Endemol Shine Group page as Endemol merged into Endemol Shine Group. It makes sense to have the history of the company incorporated rather than having two separate pages I think, because people might get confused about the company. I thought about this when I was searching for who makes the TV show Black Mirror? But I was unsure whether it was Endemol or Endemol Shine Group. Oli — Preceding unsigned comment added by Ojmarson (talk • contribs) 15:06, 1 April 2019 (UTC)

Talk pages consultation 2019 – phase 2

The Wikimedia Foundation has invited the various Wikimedia communities, including the English Wikipedia, to participate in a consultation on improving communication methods within the Wikimedia projects.

Phase 2 of the consultation has now begun; as such, a request for comment has been created at Wikipedia:Talk pages consultation 2019/Phase 2. All users are invited to express their views. Individual WikiProjects, user groups and other communities may also consider creating their own requests for comment; instructions are at mw:Talk pages consultation 2019/Participant group sign-up. (To keep discussion in one place, please don't reply to this comment.) Jc86035 (talk) 17:14, 20 May 2019 (UTC)

"Meta" question, re Transparency, Privacy, and "Watch"'ing Talk Pages

Hey hey good People of Earth :) Hey how's it going? This chat topic that I'm going to broach is meta (ie. it's talk about Talk!) So I figured it probably belongs on a Wikipedia official page about (what are) Talk pages, **on the very Talk section** of that said page... That being said, I know Wikipedia is all about complete transparency, and history of edits, and contributions for all of its users, registered users, but isn't it a little strange that somebody can Watch (or set to watch) anyone else's User:Talk page? I forgot that I had a Friend's set to Watch for future replies to my own conversations, and so I'm continually seeing what people write on his page over time. So... along those lines, is there a setting or feature where you can see a list of who's watching which pages, Wikipedia-wide? Or at least for ones own Talk page, is a user able to see a list of Wiki users who are watching it? I think that would be an interesting feature, suggestion, software enhancement! - What are your thoughts? Vid2vid (talk) 00:13, 19 May 2019 (UTC)

No, it is not possible to know who is watching a page. That is because watchlists are considered to be private. If you view a particular page and click "Page information" in the tools on the left you can see the number of people watching a page, except that the exact number is not shown if it is below 30. That is all that is available. Johnuniq (talk) 01:32, 19 May 2019 (UTC)

Hi there, @Johnuniq:! Thanks, very interesting. 1- I heard that there is indeed a way to prevent others from "Watching" ones "Talk" page, but have yet to find the setting. Oh hey, 2- along the lines of page counters, I think remote-linking to a free web counter image is blocked across all of Wikipedia/Wikimedia, phooey, right? Lastly: 3- I hope part of your username is the Unix cmd uniq :) That's awesome if so! Vid2vid (talk) 23:19, 21 May 2019 (UTC)

@Vid2vid: No, it is not possible to stop someone from watching your talk page. There are some mute settings in Special:Preferences which will stop notifications from named users. In order for an image to be seen here, it has to be uploaded. Yes, uniq is part of my history and user name. Johnuniq (talk) 23:27, 21 May 2019 (UTC)

An example of a talk page

I've created an example of a talk page with inline explanations in my sandbox. It combines several elements in the same place, which are explained in more detail with individual examples on the help page itself. Would it make sense to add such an example to a subpage of Help:Talk pages? —⁠andrybak (talk) 09:36, 26 June 2019 (UTC)

 Done: see subpage Help:Talk pages/Example and Special:Diff/904683932. —⁠andrybak (talk) 20:10, 3 July 2019 (UTC)

Post Rejection on Mobile Site

There is currently no error message when a new discussion post is rejected on the mobile site. I was talking about something shown in a YouTube video and added a link to the video, but it was rejected since it was the shortened youtu.be version. There was no indication that it was rejected, so it wasn’t until I went to check back later that I realized the post was rejected and I had to type it over from scratch. LoyalSage (talk) 14:17, 25 September 2020 (UTC)

Need feedback on Draft/improvements that can be made

Any improvements you recommend? Draft:Rima_Nakabayashi 52-whalien (talk) 08:10, 9 December 2020 (UTC)

@52-whalien: this is the talk page for discussing improvements to the page Help:Talk pages. See WP:QUESTIONS for help about using or editing Wikipedia. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 09:09, 9 December 2020 (UTC)

Replying to multiple comments at once

WP:THREAD says clearly how to reply to a single comment but gives no advice for replying to multiple comments at once. Suppose two people reply to a comment and one wants to reply to both replies at once, with a remark that inherently addresses both. Could WP:THREAD include guidance as to how one should do that? —2d37 (talk) 09:49, 9 January 2021 (UTC)

@2d37: This has been discussed at WT:TPG, see for example Wikipedia talk:Talk page guidelines/Archive 12#RfC: Should the guideline discourage interleaving? #2. You can use {{replyto}} to show who you are replying to (as I did at the start of this post), and {{tq}} (as in a remark that inherently addresses both) to make it clear which question, sentence or phrase you are posting about. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 13:18, 9 January 2021 (UTC)

Discrepancy with MOS:INDENTGAP

Help:Talk pages#Indentation says Comments are indented using one or more initial colons (:), each colon representing one level of indentation. However, MOS:INDENTGAP says However, this markup alone is missing the required <dt> (term) element of a description list, to which the <dd> (description/definition) pertains. As can be seen by inspecting the code sent to the browser, this results in broken HTML (i.e. it fails validation). The result is that assistive technology, such as screen readers, will announce a description list that does not exist, which is confusing for any visitor unused to Wikipedia's broken markup. This is not ideal for accessibility, semantics, or reuse, but is currently commonly used, despite the problems it causes for users of screen readers.

The <dl>...</dl> issue is addressed in Phabricator ticket T6521, but shoildn't the two prescriptions be brought into alignment pending a resolution? Shmuel (Seymour J.) Metz Username:Chatul (talk) 15:03, 20 January 2021 (UTC)

References

Clarification on pages of cited materials

Thanks for your clarification on pages of cited materials appearing in the body of the article. I was surprised when I saw them. I thought they were due to some mistakes made by me.Greatman012 (talk) 14:42, 11 March 2021 (UTC)

Should Talk sections be in inverse chronological order instead of chronological order ?

Currently, the convention is to have the comments in a Talk section from first in time to last. That is clearly best. Another convention, though, is to have the sections themselves, the topics, also in chronological order. Should this be changed to reverse chronological order?

I can't see a good argument for chronological order, except maybe in the Archives, but people mainly get to the Archives by Search anyway, not be browsing.

The argument for reverse chronological order is that most of the action is in the newest Section, and putting it first means less scrolling to start a new Section, to read one, or to edit one.

Should the convention be changed? This would involve changing the Help page here to tell people to add Sections at the Top, not the Bottom, and changing the software so that if the software does it automatically, it goes to top and not bottom. editeur24 (talk) 21:09, 6 September 2021 (UTC)

Such a change also implies changing almost all of the talk pages already in existence, plus their archive pages.

Chronological order makes sense because people write and read from the top down. We already have enough trouble getting people to thread properly within a discussion; I don't think it would help to have the pages going in two directions at once. And generally, the older discussions at the top are the ones that should be looked at first, whether for people familiar with the article and its talk, or for editors making a first-time visit. The older discussions get archived or closed first, so should be looked at first. Top-down chronology allows users to get an idea of the page's history; going backwards (reverse-chronologically) would make that harder. — JohnFromPinckney (talk / edits) 09:53, 7 September 2021 (UTC)

@JohnFromPinckney:What I've seen most commonly are Talk pages where the first few sections are from 2005, 2010, 2012, etc., and then maybe there is one from 2019 at the bottom. For such Talk pages, nobody wants to read the older entries first, though you might want to search for whether your topic had been covered already. Within-Section, it's important to have the entries chronologically; between section, one wants to see the latest first, I think. editeur24 (talk) 19:24, 7 September 2021 (UTC)

I appreciate your observations about the advantage of reverse chron order, but I don't see that it's a significant one. For those of us who arrive at a discussion through watchlist notifications, whenever someone either added a section with the "New Section" tab and whenever someone edited an existing section with the "Edit Section" link, we reach a section directly from the link in the edit summary. The table of contents at the top of the page also gives quick access to the bottom—as does (on a PC, at least), Ctrl-End. So the advantage would be incremental, and wouldn't stack up against the challenge of retrofitting every talk page already in existence. Such retrofitting would be obligatory because, IMO, suddenly shifting practice without rearranging existing sections would make reading existing talk pages a nightmare. Finally, how would we possibly acquaint the entire Wikipedia community with the change simultaneously and have any realistic expectation of consistency in following it? Largoplazo (talk) 11:24, 7 September 2021 (UTC)

@Largoplazo: Good point about arriving from a link--- in such cases, order doesn't matter. And you're right that the Table of Contents helps. But retrofitting wouldn't be obligatory. What would be wrong with just changing new pages? Existing pages would continue to be in inconvenient, chronological, order, but eventually they'd all be archived and it wouldn't matter. If people don't currently want to read sections in chronological order, as I suggest, then they wouldn't care about what the order is below the fold anyway. editeur24 (talk) 19:24, 7 September 2021 (UTC)

@Editeur24: If old talk pages were left as-is, how would anybody, coming to a talk page, know without inspecting the date of the first contribution to each section whether the newest entries are at the top or the bottom? With existing pages, do you imagine no user would be confused on which end to add a new section to (assuming they don't use or don't even know about the "New Section" tab)? Or that they'd even know which pages were in existence at the time of the switchover and which had been created since then? Largoplazo (talk) 21:49, 7 September 2021 (UTC)

It's kind of like suggesting at this late date that it would be better for such-and-such reasons if traffic in one's country were to drive on the other side, and resolving to put the change into effect, but only on new roads (ten years later, who, encountering a new road, will know whether it's a before-road or an after-road?), and with a likelihood that all the details of the new rules will reach no more than 2% of the driving population. Largoplazo (talk) 21:57, 7 September 2021 (UTC)

@Editeur24: You're about twenty years too late: decisions like this should be made when a project is still young and in an ebullient state of flux, with people posting here, there and everywhere; the object would be to bring chaos into order. We now have order: any apparent chaos is due to the natural unfamiliarity that all newbies have, and is easily rectified. You write about "changing the software": but the software isn't merely the MediaWiki "New section" feature - there are a large number of bots and scripts, all maintained by different people, which add message at the bottom of discussion pages. We would need a coordinated effort to get all these people to amend their software, and put the amendments live simultaneously with a huge task to alter the existing order of all discussion pages and their archives. In short: this isn't going to happen. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 15:21, 7 September 2021 (UTC)

@Redrose64: You're right that I'm 20 years too late, but better late than never. From Python 2 to Python 3 the command "print var2" was changed to "print(var2)" and the world survived. As I said to Largoplazo above, I think this could be done incrementally. It could even be half-done without changing the software at all, just by changing the convention. The current order is no better than random, so making some of the pages inverse chronological would be a definite improvement, I think. editeur24 (talk) 19:24, 7 September 2021 (UTC)

It could even be half-done without changing the software at all, just by changing the convention. You seem to be saying we should change they way we're all supposed to do it, but not change the software that works based on the supposed convention. That can't be right. And your The current order is no better than random, so making some of the pages... leads me to conclude your proposal isn't really serious at all. — JohnFromPinckney (talk / edits) 19:37, 7 September 2021 (UTC)

Yes--- this is a situation where half-changing is better than not changing at all. That is because the current order is indeed no better than random. When sections jump around between totally unrelated topics, order doesn't matter, except that it would be convenient to have the newest on top. editeur24 (talk) 20:11, 8 September 2021 (UTC)

You can't unilaterally ask many thousands users to change an ingrained habit. You need to get their agreement, and it needs to be an overwhelming consensus of the whole Wikipedia community - and for this page with its 54 page watchers who visited recent edits, a notice here, perhaps followed by a poll, simply isn't enough. Even if you can get all of those page watchers who have not yet commented to support you, that's still only 51 people, which is a tiny proportion of the community. Then consider the hundreds of WMF wikis that are not English Wikipedia - such as Commons, Wikidata, Meta, the various Wikipedias that are not in English (French, German, Spanish etc.) of which there are more than 200, together with a number of Wiktionaries, Wikibookses, Wikinewses, Wikiquotes, Wikisources, Wikiversities, Wikivoyages all of which are also multilingual - it's a big list. As far as I am aware, they all follow the convention of adding new topics at the bottom, so you either need to persuade all of those to switch over, or demonstrate why it's a good idea for English Wikipedia to go it alone and be different from all the others. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 19:54, 7 September 2021 (UTC)

I quite agree. If Wikipedia were a monarchy, the next step would be to convince the monarchy; under current governance, I'm not sure how I'd go about it. Posting here is just a first step---this seemed the most appropriate place. I hope to be read by one of the people who goes to Wikipedia conventions, tries to get consensus, writes software for it, etc., and have them pick up on the idea. Maybe I'll be one of those people someday. editeur24 (talk) 20:11, 8 September 2021 (UTC)

Multi-line bulleted comments

Some types of discussions use top-level bulleted lists, e.g. requested moves. How should I post a top-level comment with multiple lines? Should I use : for subsequent lines, or *? If I want to include indented bullet points in my top-level comment, where should my signature go — at the end of the last bullet point, on a new unindented line, or somewhere else? Rublov (talk) 16:51, 31 December 2021 (UTC)

@Rublov: See Wikipedia:Colons and asterisks#Best practices 3. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 21:33, 31 December 2021 (UTC)

Reply Tool: a new opt-out feature arriving soon

I have inserted this new section about the new Reply Tool at Help:Talk pages.

This will be an opt-out feature which all desktop users will soon be seeing, following its successful trial in beta. Its rollout on English Wikipedia was initially intended for 7th February 2022. However, after discussions at WP:VPP, that rollout has been held back a short while so that as many users as possible are made aware of this feature, and for brief explanatory notes to be provided on Help pages and for users of other help fora to be made aware. Nick Moyes (talk) 22:29, 8 February 2022 (UTC)

"Start a discussion about" template

I'm not sure if this is the right place to discuss this, but I see that blank talk pages are now defaulting to a message that says "Start a discussion about" (e.g. Talk:Guillaume Hoorickx). Where was that decided? It seems problematic, in that talk pages discussions should be about the article rather than the subject. This is clarified in the subsequent message, but it still seems misleading to new editors. StAnselm (talk) 18:40, 2 August 2022 (UTC)

It's part of a new MediaWiki feature enabled by default with "Enable quick topic adding" at Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-editing. The message you quote is MediaWiki:Discussiontools-emptystate-title. We have costumized it but only to omit it when the subject page doesn't exist. We still use the default wording which was chosen somewhere outside the English Wikipedia. mw:Talk pages project/Feature summary has a feedback link to mw:Talk pages project/Replying if you want to request a global change. We can change it locally in MediaWiki:Discussiontools-emptystate-title. PrimeHunter (talk) 21:07, 2 August 2022 (UTC)

OK, thank you. StAnselm (talk) 21:21, 2 August 2022 (UTC)

Was "Talk" previously "Discussion"?

Were the Talk pages once called Discussion pages? If so, why was the name changed? John Link (talk) 23:28, 8 May 2020 (UTC)

@John Link: The name of the "Talk" tab was changed in 2012 after this discussion. But the "Talk:" prefix, as in "Talk:Main Page" is much older than that, and was never "Discussion:" -- John of Reading (talk) 05:18, 9 May 2020 (UTC)

Thank you, John of Reading. I would have voiced my opposition to the change, which I consider a dumbing down of the language, similar to "talkback" replacing "question-and-answer session" or "discussion" for what sometimes happens after a performance. John Link (talk) 05:55, 9 May 2020 (UTC)

"Talk" has two advantages over "Discussion" from standard rules of good writing: 1. It has less syllables, 2. It is Anglo-Saxon rather than Latin. editeur24 (talk) 21:55, 6 September 2021 (UTC)

Language doesn't "Dumb down", it merely changes over time. And its *always* done this. But for reference, "talk" stems from middle english "talken" stemming back to at least the 1200s. As a general rule language strives towards efficiency (Like most cognitive processes, its just searching for the minima of its valley), talk has one syllable, is universally understood, and theres really no downside to preferencing it. Simple, concise and efficient, and in this case, long since decided. Duckmonster (talk) 02:08, 7 August 2022 (UTC)

Misleading

I don't know it is the right place to ask but someone accused me of having two accounts although I only have one account. How can I explain to him/her about this situation? RenRen070193 (talk) 03:26, 29 August 2022 (UTC)

You could ask for opinions at WP:Teahouse. However, Wikipedia is part of the internet and there will always be people who make accusations. Some of them are plausible although possibly inaccurate, while other accusations are baseless. Don't worry about it. People who focus on improving the encyclopedia while engaging with other editors in discussion when needed do not have a problem. Johnuniq (talk) 04:00, 29 August 2022 (UTC)

Thanks for your pieces of advice Johnuniq RenRen070193 (talk) 15:16, 30 August 2022 (UTC)

Does the "Reply Tool" actually reply to the indicated user?

Please see Wikipedia talk:Talk pages project#Does the "Reply Tool" actually reply to the indicated user???. CapnZapp (talk) 12:58, 9 September 2022 (UTC)

Issue

I am having issues trying to reply to talk pages. I won't let me type a message. I have to use the edit article button instead.Cwater1 (talk) 00:56, 20 October 2022 (UTC)

Hi, can you also use the edit (article) section? Chongkian (talk) 01:29, 7 December 2022 (UTC)

Notification on user talk

Hi, quick question: if I post to someone’s talk page, but then immediately revert that post, does the user still get a notification? — HTGS (talk) 05:10, 1 February 2023 (UTC)

Yes yes. They get two notifications! Johnuniq (talk) 06:19, 1 February 2023 (UTC)

Notifications, once sent, cannot be rescinded. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 19:42, 1 February 2023 (UTC)

Is the instruction video on this page out of date?

I feel like there are a few things said in this video that do not apply anymore. MisterN1C022 (talk) 22:22, 6 October 2023 (UTC)

Huh, it's less out-of-date than I expected, with it being 12 years old! (For future reference, in case someone changes the page: it's this video, and transcript here for those who prefer it.) Some of the instructions it gives became a bit obsolete last year as a result of the talk pages project: there are now more convenient ways to reply and to notify people. Some of the advice on the page itself is also out of date, e.g. Help:Talk pages#Indentation. It's not wrong though: you can still do things in these ways, but we probably shouldn't promote them to new users. Matma Rex talk 23:30, 6 October 2023 (UTC)

ok! thanks! MisterN1C022 (talk) 19:39, 9 October 2023 (UTC)

Question

When exactly was the Talk page added to Wikipedia? I couldn't find the answer on the article. Iamnotflour (talk) 02:00, 2 November 2023 (UTC)

@Iamnotflour: I don't know, but the associated "magic word" {{TALKPAGENAME}} was added to the software in version 1.7, which dates from 2006. Pinging Graham87 (talk · contribs), who specialises in Wikipedia's history. -- John of Reading (talk) 08:00, 2 November 2023 (UTC)

@Iamnotflour and John of Reading: Modern talk pages (and namespaces) were introduced in January 2002 with the Phase II software (see Wikipedia:PHP script new features). Before then, talk pages were in the main namespace with "/Talk" on the end (see George W. Bush/Talk] on the Nostalgia Wikipedia for an example). I'm sure I read somewhere that Larry Sanger said he invented the concept of separating article and talk page content, but I can't find a good source about that now. Graham87 (talk) 11:44, 2 November 2023 (UTC)

Thanks. I wasn't sure is anything predated the Talk namespace, because the earliest talk posts I can really find are from late 2006, meaning there would be a 5-year gap between the creation of Wikipedia and the Talk page being established. Iamnotflour (talk) 13:04, 2 November 2023 (UTC)

Nowadays, archiving is performed (usually by a bot) by cutting individual threads from the main talk page and pasting them to an archive subpage, so the history of the main talk page goes right back to when it was created. But some years ago, it was the practice (and still is for some user talk pages) to rename the talk page to an archive subpage, and then convert the resulting redirect into a new edition of the main talk page - in these cases the history of the main talk page only goes back to the page move. As an example, consider an article that is likely to have existed from very early on - Talk:New York City has a history going back to January 2008; you need to look at the history of its archives to go back earlier. It seems that its very earliest history is now at /Archive 10. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 21:42, 2 November 2023 (UTC)

Starting a new thread

WP:TPNEW says to start a new topic by clicking on the "New section" link. Experiment suggests the following occur with various skins.

• Vector : New section
• Vector-2022  : Add topic
• Minerva Neue : Add topic
• Timeless : New topic
• MonoBook : +
• IP editors (not logged in) : Add topic

Is the above correct? Can something simple be done so WP:TPNEW gives less puzzling advice? Johnuniq (talk) 01:53, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

The same problem was actually discussed recently at Wikipedia:Village pump (technical)/Archive 209#"New section" vs "Add topic", but it was archived without anyone doing anything about it. Matma Rex talk 11:00, 11 December 2023 (UTC)