Wikinews:Water cooler/miscellaneous
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January 2024 |
Tech News: 2024-25
[edit]Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Recent changes
- People who attempt to add an external link in the visual editor will now receive immediate feedback if they attempt to link to a domain that a project has decided to block. Please see Edit check for more details. [1]
- The new Community Configuration extension is available on Test Wikipedia. This extension allows communities to customize specific features to meet their local needs. Currently only Growth features are configurable, but the extension will support other Community Configuration use cases in the future. [2][3]
- The dark mode beta feature is now available on category and help pages, as well as more special pages. There may be contrast issues. Please report bugs on the project talk page. [4]
Problems
Cloud Services tools were not available for 25 minutes last week. This was caused by a faulty hardware cable in the data center. [5]- Last week, styling updates were made to the Vector 2022 skin. This caused unforeseen issues with templates, hatnotes, and images. Changes to templates and hatnotes were reverted. Most issues with images were fixed. If you still see any, report them here. [6]
Changes later this week
The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 18 June. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 19 June. It will be on all wikis from 20 June (calendar). [7][8]- Starting June 18, the Reference Edit Check will be deployed to a new set of Wikipedias. This feature is intended to help newcomers and to assist edit-patrollers by inviting people who are adding new content to a Wikipedia article to add a citation when they do not do so themselves. During a test at 11 wikis, the number of citations added more than doubled when Reference Check was shown to people. Reference Check is community configurable. [9]
- Mailing lists will be unavailable for roughly two hours on Tuesday 10:00–12:00 UTC. This is to enable migration to a new server and upgrade its software. [10]
Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.
MediaWiki message delivery 23:48, 17 June 2024 (UTC)
What are these
[edit]Out of curiousity, what are the Developer Socks 1-3 created in September 2010 that have reviewer rights and have never been used for anything? Me Da Wikipedian (talk) 01:20, 19 June 2024 (UTC)
- They were for testing by MediaWiki devs. Cf. Test article for dev use. I'm not sure if they were ever used on a now-deleted page (such edits would be invisible to mere mortals like you and me). Heavy Water (talk) 01:55, 20 June 2024 (UTC)
- Admin? (@Cromium or @Bddpaux) @Heavy Water Me Da Wikipedian (talk) 10:08, 20 June 2024 (UTC)
Tech News: 2024-26
[edit]Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Recent changes
- Editors will notice that there have been some changes to the background color of text in the diff view, and the color of the byte-change numbers, last week. These changes are intended to make text more readable in both light mode and dark mode, and are part of a larger effort to increase accessibility. You can share your comments or questions on the project talkpage. [11]
- The text colors that are used for visited-links, hovered-links, and active-links, were also slightly changed last week to improve their accessibility in both light mode and dark mode. [12]
Problems
- You can copy permanent links to talk page comments by clicking on a comment's timestamp. This feature did not always work when the topic title was very long and the link was used as a wikitext link. This has been fixed. Thanks to Lofhi for submitting the bug. [13]
Changes later this week
- The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 25 June. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 26 June. It will be on all wikis from 27 June (calendar). [14][15]
- Starting 26 June, all talk pages messages' timestamps will become a link at English Wikipedia, making this feature available for you to use at all wikis. This link is a permanent link to the comment. It allows users to find the comment they were linked to, even if this comment has since been moved elsewhere. You can read more about this feature on Diff or on Mediawiki.org. [16]
Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.
MediaWiki message delivery 22:32, 24 June 2024 (UTC)
Voting to ratify the Wikimedia Movement Charter is now open – cast your vote
[edit]- You can find this message translated into additional languages on Meta-wiki. Please help translate to your language
Hello everyone,
The voting to ratify the Wikimedia Movement Charter is now open. The Wikimedia Movement Charter is a document to define roles and responsibilities for all the members and entities of the Wikimedia movement, including the creation of a new body – the Global Council – for movement governance.
The final version of the Wikimedia Movement Charter is available on Meta in different languages and attached here in PDF format for your reading.
Voting commenced on SecurePoll on June 25, 2024 at 00:01 UTC and will conclude on July 9, 2024 at 23:59 UTC. Please read more on the voter information and eligibility details.
After reading the Charter, please vote here and share this note further.
If you have any questions about the ratification vote, please contact the Charter Electoral Commission at cec@wikimedia.org.
On behalf of the CEC,
RamzyM (WMF) 10:51, 25 June 2024 (UTC)
Tech News: 2024-27
[edit]Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Recent changes
- Over the next three weeks, dark mode will become available for all users, both logged-in and logged-out, starting with the mobile web version. This fulfils one of the top-requested community wishes, and improves low-contrast reading and usage in low-light settings. As part of these changes, dark mode will also work on User-pages and Portals. There is more information in the latest Web team update. [17]
- Logged-in users can now set global preferences for the text-size and dark-mode, thanks to a combined effort across Foundation teams. This allows Wikimedians using multiple wikis to set up a consistent reading experience easily, for example by switching between light and dark mode only once for all wikis. [18]
- If you use a very old web browser some features might not work on the Wikimedia wikis. This affects Internet Explorer 11 and versions of Chrome, Firefox and Safari older than 2016. This change makes it possible to use new CSS features and to send less code to all readers. [19][20]
- Wikipedia Admins can customize local wiki configuration options easily using Community Configuration. Community Configuration was created to allow communities to customize how some features work, because each language wiki has unique needs. At the moment, admins can configure Growth features on their home wikis, in order to better recruit and retain new editors. More options will be provided in the coming months. [21]
- Editors interested in language issues that are related to Unicode standards, can now discuss those topics at a new conversation space in MediaWiki.org. The Wikimedia Foundation is now a member of the Unicode Consortium, and the coordination group can collaboratively review the issues discussed and, where appropriate, bring them to the attention of the Unicode Consortium.
- One new wiki has been created: a Wikipedia in Mandailing (
w:btm:) [22]
Problems
- Editors can once again click on links within the visual editor's citation-preview, thanks to a bug fix by the Editing Team. [23]
Future changes
- Please help us to improve Tech News by taking this short survey. The goal is to better meet the needs of the various types of people who read Tech News. The survey will be open for 2 weeks. The survey is covered by this privacy statement. Some translations are available.
Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.
MediaWiki message delivery 23:59, 1 July 2024 (UTC)
There are many news articles on calls for Biden drop out of race, but this coverage seems very biased
[edit]As far as I can tell both Biden and Trump were severely demented in the debate. But Trump for some reason is not catching any fire and I think he should. He answers in short sentences and gives nothing concrete or specific. Anyway, my question is: is it NPOV to make a coverage on demands for Biden to step down? — Pooldoje (talk) 13:02, 4 July 2024 (UTC)
- An en.wn reporter is not required to repeat another reporter's or news agency's biases. In fact it isn't allowed per WN:NPOV. You can, however, find two or more articles that discuss both men's performance and synthesize them into one article, thus presenting both sides in a neutral point of view:
Neutral point of view means that an article should fairly represent all sides in a news story, and not make an article state, imply, or insinuate that any one side is correct. (Of course, there are limits to which points of view are worth mentioning, and this can be an area of conflict.)
– WN:NPOV
- I also see no reason why it would be biased for you to cover requests for Biden to step down, as long as you adhere to WN:NPOV. We also have a guideline titled Wikinews:Neutrality that can be helpful.
- Michael.C.Wright (Talk/Published) 13:50, 4 July 2024 (UTC)
Voting to ratify the Wikimedia Movement Charter is ending soon
[edit]- You can find this message translated into additional languages on Meta-wiki. Please help translate to your language
Hello everyone,
This is a kind reminder that the voting period to ratify the Wikimedia Movement Charter will be closed on July 9, 2024, at 23:59 UTC.
If you have not voted yet, please vote on SecurePoll.
On behalf of the Charter Electoral Commission,
RamzyM (WMF) 03:45, 8 July 2024 (UTC)
Tech News: 2024-28
[edit]Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Recent changes
- At the Wikimedia Foundation a new task force was formed to replace the disabled Graph with more secure, easy to use, and extensible Chart. You can subscribe to the newsletter to get notified about new project updates and other news about Chart.
- The CampaignEvents extension is now available on Meta-wiki, Igbo Wikipedia, and Swahili Wikipedia, and can be requested on your wiki. This extension helps in managing and making events more visible, giving Event organizers the ability to use tools like the Event registration tool. To learn more about the deployment status and how to request this extension for your wiki, visit the CampaignEvents page on Meta-wiki.
- Editors using the iOS Wikipedia app who have more than 50 edits can now use the Add an Image feature. This feature presents opportunities for small but useful contributions to Wikipedia.
- Thank you to all of the authors who have contributed to MediaWiki Core. As a result of these contributions, the percentage of authors contributing more than 5 patches has increased by 25% since last year, which helps ensure the sustainability of the platform for the Wikimedia projects.
Problems
- A problem with the color of the talkpage tabs always showing as blue, even for non-existent pages which should have been red, affecting the Vector 2022 skin, has been fixed.
Future changes
- The Trust and Safety Product team wants to introduce temporary accounts with as little disruption to tools and workflows as possible. Volunteer developers, including gadget and user-script maintainers, are kindly asked to update the code of their tools and features to handle temporary accounts. The team has created documentation explaining how to do the update. Learn more.
Tech News survey
- Please help us to improve Tech News by taking this short survey. The goal is to better meet the needs of the various types of people who read Tech News. The survey will be open for 1 more week. The survey is covered by this privacy statement. Some translations are available.
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MediaWiki message delivery 21:31, 8 July 2024 (UTC)
U4C Special Election - Call for Candidates
[edit]- You can find this message translated into additional languages on Meta-wiki. Please help translate to your language
Hello all,
A special election has been called to fill additional vacancies on the U4C. The call for candidates phase is open from now through July 19, 2024.
The Universal Code of Conduct Coordinating Committee (U4C) is a global group dedicated to providing an equitable and consistent implementation of the UCoC. Community members are invited to submit their applications in the special election for the U4C. For more information and the responsibilities of the U4C, please review the U4C Charter.
In this special election, according to chapter 2 of the U4C charter, there are 9 seats available on the U4C: four community-at-large seats and five regional seats to ensure the U4C represents the diversity of the movement. No more than two members of the U4C can be elected from the same home wiki. Therefore, candidates must not have English Wikipedia, German Wikipedia, or Italian Wikipedia as their home wiki.
Read more and submit your application on Meta-wiki.
In cooperation with the U4C,