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Community Wishlist Survey 2016/Categories/WikiProjects

< Community Wishlist Survey 2016
WikiProjects
2 proposals, 114 contributors, 100 support votes



Suggestions for WikiProjects to join

  • Problem: WikiProjects are small and often newcomers do not know about them. I think one could improve WikiProject participation by increasing the users of WikiProjects by suggesting WikiProjects for users.
  • Who would benefit: WikiProjects and newcomers
  • Proposed solution: WikiProjects basically equal domains of interest - if there are still sufficiently large domains of interest without a WikiProject, it should probably be created by someone or some group (or at least requested to be created). So my suggestion is:
  • When new users register on the site, they getting some suggestions for WikiProjects to join. Those first suggestions would be very general, suggestions of things many people are interested in. My suggestion would be 5-10 WikiProjects like WP Football, WP Novels, WP Internet, WP Harry Potter, WP {country of the user}, WP Economics, WP Plants and WP Film to get them started by picking at least one. Many websites have something similar; Reddit suggests some subreddits and Twitter some people to follow. There should also be a non-intrusively visible option to efficiently search for a topic of interest (completion-suggestion for cleartext search, way to search via a category system [w:Category:WikiProjects by area], not just the names of the WikiProjects but boxes with the WikiProject icon [proper icons should become mandatory for WikiProjects], ...)
  • Once they're editing their edits can be analyzed - the most basic analysis would be to count the WikiProjects on the respective edited pages, so later suggestions could be personalized to the user. (Note: the algorithm can be improved by considering extra info such as which edits caused someone to thank the user for it and how much text was added, etc.) Furthermore, as the WikiProjects they've joined have related WikiProjects, these can be used for the suggestions as well.
  • Phabricator tickets:

Community discussion

  • This is a good area to explore. I'm thinking we could have something like "Related pages", currently in beta on the English Wikipedia. Perhaps call it "Related WikiProjects", and they would display on a page if the user had edited that page before. Stevie is the man! Talk • Work 15:41, 20 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • The problem that WikiProjects are small and often newcomers do not know about them is correct. To help it, there are a few options.
First, I tend to mark new drafts and new pages with WikiProject tags using a rater script. I have a preliminary modified version of it for personal use, which opens the rater automatically after a page finishes loading, and moves to a next random page after I click 'save'. I feel that such marking of new pages with wikiproject tags early in the run helps to connect new page authors with wikiprojects. There is not so many people making new pages compared with editing, but the new pages authors might be a good group to target and invite to Wikiprojects as by writing something they already showed that they care for Wikipedia and are ready to spend more effort and time on it. These new articles, added to wikiprojects but unrated or rated as a low class (i.e. stub), show in the to-do for a wikiproject. A wikiproject member goes to rate them, potentially also copyediting the article and interacting with its (possibly newcomer) author.
From here, second point: I see it useful to encourage human collaboration of these WikiProjects members with newcomers. When combined with a human interaction, invitation of newcomers to WikiProjects would be most effective.
On a related note, two things.
I expect that inviting people to WikiProjects, if automatic, must NOT be a talk page template.
I would like the wikiproject info to not be exposed on article page. Articles are only about content.
To expose talk pages more, as a random note, I may propose to show "Did you know? This article is a part of Wikiproject(s) X, Y, Z. See the talk page for details" banners at the top in a random small number of cases. Other ideas are welcome.
Fixuture, please let me know what you think of these points and comment.
--Gryllida 23:22, 22 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]
@Gryllida:

First, I tend to mark new drafts and new pages with WikiProject tags using a rater script. I have a preliminary modified version of it for personal use, which opens the rater automatically after a page finishes loading, and moves to a next random page after I click 'save'. I feel that such marking of new pages with wikiproject tags early in the run helps to connect new page authors with wikiprojects

Indeed that's probably effective in letting newcomers (and people in general) know about WikiProjects relevant to them. However not really on the scale on which that's happening now - it needs more people doing that. And for that to happen I think we should think about ways to get people tag drafts & new pages with their appropriate WikiProject banners. Furthermore I think it's long overdue to have the rater gadget built into the main site - it's way too useful for being a gadget (that hence almost nobody knows about), I truly can't imagine using (viewing and tagging) WikiProject banners without that gadget anymore.
That modified rater version of yours is really cool! Now even if this wasn't your intention you should make people know about it (starting with w:User:Kephir/gadgets/rater & w:Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Council) and use it - it's of almost no use if there's just one person using it. And it is (could be) really helpful here.
I just found one issue with it: it needs an arrow to switch to the next draft without any changes to the current one.
Also I think it's a problem that it always open up the rater window: there should be a special button to click (/mode) or page to visit to use that script instead of it being in effect all the time.
Btw. once the above 2 problems are fixed it could be linked at w:Wikipedia:Community portal#Todo already.

These new articles, added to wikiprojects but unrated or rated as a low class (i.e. stub), show in the to-do for a wikiproject. A wikiproject member goes to rate them, potentially also copyediting the article and interacting with its (possibly newcomer) author.

That's also what I had in mind with the "Help with a draft"-tasktype at my full suggestion/s (ctrl+f for "Help with a draft" on that page). Getting people to rate new articles & drafts is the other side of the coin of course.

I expect that inviting people to WikiProjects, if automatic, must NOT be a talk page template.

Agree on that! It should be a modern solution and not some hidden, clutterish, 1990s-style talk-page entry or anything alike. I was referring to how the invites should look with "not just the names of the WikiProjects but boxes with the WikiProject icon [proper icons should become mandatory for WikiProjects]" above. These tiles (or boxes) should be displayed at the landing page of a user after logging in.

To expose talk pages more, as a random note, I may propose to show "Did you know? This article is a part of Wikiproject(s) X, Y, Z. See the talk page for details" banners at the top in a random small number of cases.

Good idea. Maybe these could also show for all articles in a defined timespan - there could be a WikiProject day/week in which the WikiProjects of articles are visibly listed on the article page even for logged out users for instance.
--Fixuture (talk) 15:06, 26 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • By thinking about it, I do not like the idea because it is a machine which gives advice, and not a real person who gives it. I prefer an opposite proposal : Improve WikiProject participation by suggesting users for WikiProjects. Thus, users in a WikiProjects could identify more easily the contributors potentially interested in a project, and write a personalised message to attract them. --Consulnico (talk) 17:54, 28 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]
    • @Consulnico: While I don't oppose the thrust of Fixuture's proposal, about a year ago, I and others were aiming for something along your lines here. If those active in WikiProjects could get a better handle on the degree of editing by particular editors in their subject area, they would better be able to decide who to invite to their WikiProjects using their existing invitation templates/approaches. Stevie is the man! Talk • Work 18:18, 28 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]
    • @Consulnico: Why would that be a problem? WikiProjects finding users that might be interested in their project is the current (non-working) approach. That's not how it works for most websites and it's not working here. After all those "personalized messages" are just some templates which are posted (in the same way every time; and not as formal invite but a bitty talk page entry) on a user's talk page which is really 2000s-style and not suited for newcomers. But in spite of all of that it could still be done in addition to the suggested suggestions. --Fixuture (talk) 20:27, 2 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Voting – Suggestions for WikiProjects to join

  1.   Support--Wesalius (talk) 08:21, 28 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  2.   Support There is some initial work on this via WikiProjectX in the WikiProject Directory, but the list of "engaged editors" and the tools to actually engage them, are not available yet-- could use a good layer of interactivity promotion (like the ability to identify who is a new editor to an area, or who is a new editor more generally). Sadads (talk) 15:06, 28 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  3.   Support the general thrust of this, especially if it includes the inverse proposition noted by Consulnico, Sadads and myself. We shouldn't just tell users about WikiProjects, but also tell WikiProjects about potential members. Stevie is the man! Talk • Work 18:22, 28 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  4.   Support Csisc (talk) 11:07, 2 December 2016 (UTC).[reply]
  5.   Support the wub "?!" 13:29, 4 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  6.   Oppose People should get as little unwanted soliciting as possible, and there's already a lot of that across WMF sites Studmult (talk) 08:03, 5 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  7.   Support Did not get a chance to read the details, but yes I agree, most editors know little about which wikiprojects are there for them to join. Ottawahitech (talk) 20:53, 5 December 2016 (UTC)please ping me[reply]
  8.   Support Icebob99 (talk) 19:04, 6 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  9.   Support JJBers (talk) 22:05, 6 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  10.   Support I'm part of a small WikiProject that might fail if we don't get more members. This would strongly impact us! UNSC Luke 1021 (talk) 16:09, 7 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  11.   Support--Moxy (talk) 20:36, 7 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  12.   Support This would be a great benefit to our wikiproject that has slipped into semi-activity. Deaddebate (talk) 22:17, 7 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  13.   Support TheDragonhunter (talk) 03:43, 8 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  14.   Support a great way to integrate new editors. --LT910001 (talk) 05:59, 8 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  15.   Support Can't hurt :) --Piotrus (talk) 13:15, 8 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  16.   Support sounds good to me EvMsmile (talk) 15:13, 9 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  17.   Support Miniapolis 21:02, 9 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  18.   Support - Bcharles (talk) 15:23, 10 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  19.   Support --TanvirH (talk) 20:37, 10 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  20.   Support -- I really think the under-utilization of WikiProjects weakens Wikipedia overall, I'd love to seem them made more active communities for discussion of improving coverage. Goonsquad LCpl Mulvaney (talk) 03:59, 11 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  21.   Support Giorgos ab1234 (talk) 13:09, 11 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  22.   Support Having more diversely populated wikiprojects might also help turn the tide of some many of them turning into WP:OWN cliques comprising a little faction of tagteamers.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼  18:29, 11 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  23.   Support--David1010 (talk) 20:53, 11 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  24.   Support FoCuSandLeArN (talk) 22:59, 11 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  25.   Support Quiddity (talk) 09:50, 12 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  26.   Support Casliber (talk) 11:32, 12 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  27.   Support - DPdH (talk) 12:10, 12 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  28.   Support--Mikheil Talk 21:34, 12 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]

  • Problem: Until April of this year, Mr.Z-bot would automatically post a list of the top 500 (the default, configurable up to 1000) most popular pages for each WikiProject on English Wikipedia to a subpage of those projects (report example, configuration interface). In April, his bot stopped working and since the bot's operator Mr.Z-man has basically retired, it seems unlikely that he will revive it. Besides being totally broken, the other shortcomings of the bot are that it only counts desktop pageviews and it only runs on English Wikipedia. It would be great to have it count all pageviews (including mobile) and expand the bot to run on other wikis that use WikiProjects, like the French and Italian Wikipedias.
  • Who would benefit: WikiProject participants (It helps them know which articles are important to improve.)
  • Proposed solution: Since Mr.Z-bot's code is pretty old and a lot of the pageview technology has changed over the last few years, it would probably be best to rewrite the Popular Pages code from scratch and build a new bot for it (with the code hosted on GitHub).
  • More comments: It could probably utilize the new pageviews API to get its data, which should make it a lot simpler than the old version. And it could hopefully use PageAssessments to get the WikiProject associations.

Community discussion

Work is almost done. We have a new tool here that will calculate monthly pageviews for projects with less than 25,000 articles. It takes a couple of steps for larger projects. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 03:56, 3 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
I use your pageviews tool all the time, I have tried massviews a few times, and I admire your work. However, here's why Mr.Z-man's Popular Pages is not easily surpassed:
  1. Popular pages incorporated article assessment information (specifically class and importance)
  2. Popular pages followed the "make the common case run fast" design principle. He picked a fixed reporting period (monthly) that 99.9% of users were happy with. This meant that he could generate reports once monthly in batch fashion and people could thereafter browse them more or less instantaneously. Your tools seem to have been designed to maximize flexibility (which is a noble goal, there's no doubt), but at the cost of having to wait several minutes for massviews in particular to generate something on the fly.
  3. Popular pages followed the en:KISS principle--there was no need to copy-n-paste URLs or puzzle over the meaning of "use subject page instead of talk page"
-- DanielPenfield (talk) 08:07, 8 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]

  1.   Support This is sorely missed. Throw some resources at this. It may not even take long to fix. Stevie is the man! Talk • Work 03:16, 28 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  2.   Support--Shizhao (talk) 03:19, 28 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  3.   Support--Wesalius (talk) 08:21, 28 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  4.   Support --Micru (talk) 16:10, 28 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  5.   Support very strongly! Badly missed. Johnbod (talk) 04:33, 29 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  6.   Support I'd love to use a more current list of popular pages to encourage professors to assign Wikipedia editing tasks to their students. Rachel Helps (BYU) (talk) 17:55, 1 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  7.   Support as the editor who opened the Phabricator ticket (my thoughts there) czar 01:06, 2 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  8.   Support I like every kind of stats :) 4nn1l2 (talk) 13:51, 2 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  9.   Support -- AdrianGamer (talk) 06:04, 4 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  10.   Support --Rschen7754 04:45, 5 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  11.   Support --Mark Schierbecker (talk) 07:12, 5 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  12.   Support Richard Nevell (WMUK) (talk) 10:59, 6 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  13.   Support if it is already implemented it should be easy to provide, otherwise it is sorely missing. Ottawahitech (talk) 12:44, 6 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  14.   Support This tool is a basic feature which greatly increases the usefulness of WikiProjects. It has been unstable or restricted in use for years. Blue Rasberry (talk) 18:32, 6 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  15.   Support Icebob99 (talk) 19:04, 6 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  16.   Support Seems like a good idea, JJBers (talk) 22:03, 6 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  17.   Support --Cobblet (talk) 04:56, 7 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  18.   Support Would love to see them back up and running again. John Carter (talk) 17:59, 7 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  19.   Support --Anastan (talk) 18:05, 7 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  20.   Support As per the others above, this has been/was a valuable tool. It was very useful to WikiProject Opera and we miss the updates. Voceditenore (talk) 18:13, 7 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  21.   Support Informatics like this one are very helpful to Wikipedia projects. TeriEmbrey (talk) 18:22, 7 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  22.   Support Yes, please. A very useful tool to gather information about popular pages and their current status on project level. GermanJoe (talk) 18:27, 7 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  23.   Support useful to find popular but underdeveloped articles of a project. Agathoclea (talk) 18:30, 7 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  24.   Support – I seriously want to know what webcomic-related pages are of high importance when it comes to pageviews, and am curious about developments in other fields as well. ~Mable (chat) 18:31, 7 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  25.   Support Imzadi 1979 → 18:46, 7 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  26.   Support Yes, this is helpful information. --RL0919 (talk) 19:07, 7 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  27.   Support I say any tool that helps us get the most proverbial bang for our contribution is welcome. InformationvsInjustice (talk) 20:35, 7 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  28.   Support--Moxy (talk) 20:37, 7 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  29.   Support --Epipelagic (talk) 20:52, 7 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  30.   Support Badly missed Plantdrew (talk) 20:57, 7 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  31.   Support--McortNGHH (talk) 20:59, 7 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  32.   Support Sounds useful. --Chickadee46 (talk) 22:28, 7 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  33.   Support missed. Keith D (talk) 22:49, 7 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  34.   Strong support so much so that I even put a userbox on my user page professing how useful it is 2.5 years ago... Oncenawhile (talk) 23:11, 7 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  35.   Support Yes please. Cloudz679 (talk) 00:34, 8 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  36.   Support Yes, please! Allen (talk) 00:57, 8 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  37.   Support Yes, I miss this informative service/feature. Reywas92 (talk) 02:04, 8 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  38.   Support This was useful when it was working; there were always a few popular articles that caught me by surprise. TheCatalyst31 (talk) 02:59, 8 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  39.   Support Double sharp (talk) 04:19, 8 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  40.   Support Much missed tool that was very useful for projects and portals. Espresso Addict (talk) 05:12, 8 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  41.   Support Dani el Case (talk) 05:32, 8 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  42.   Support Sounds very useful. Felsic2 (talk) 05:44, 8 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  43.   Support exceedingly useful --LT910001 (talk) 05:58, 8 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  44.   Support – This has been very useful for the WikiProject Opera in targetting articles for improvements (and for removing mis-applied project banners). -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 06:14, 8 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  45.   Support plus design challenge: 1) Enable annual reports and 2) allow a higher maximum number of pages to include in the report (e.g., 10000 rather than 1000) and a higher default number of pages to include in the report (e.g., 1000 rather than 500). -- DanielPenfield (talk) 08:07, 8 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  46.   Support Useful data. X24Delta (talk) 08:22, 8 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  47.   Support Very much needed. Ciridae (talk) 09:26, 8 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  48.   Support Yes, please! --Piotrus (talk) 13:15, 8 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  49.   Support A vital service, sorely needed.--Smerus (talk) 14:30, 8 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  50.   Support Very useful JoJan (talk) 15:25, 8 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  51.   Support Whats new? (talk) 22:48, 8 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  52.   Support — Gestrid (talk) 00:58, 9 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  53.   Support – I missed this useful service when it stopped working for WikiProject Devon back in April. DanielPenfield's three bullet points in Community discussion above neatly explain why the way that it worked was so useful. Smalljim (talk) 11:14, 9 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  54.   Support Very useful!! EvMsmile (talk) 15:11, 9 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  55.   Support Jokulhlaup (talk) 15:13, 9 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  56.   Support Kalbbes (talk) 22:04, 9 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  57.   Support OrsolyaVirág (talk) 11:58, 10 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  58.   Support --Jklamo (talk) 13:04, 10 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  59.   Support Kvng (talk) 13:25, 10 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  60.   Support This should be added to the Database reports or Special reports generated by the software. Reguyla (talk) 18:43, 10 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  61.   Support --TanvirH (talk) 20:37, 10 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  62.   Support --NaBUru38 (talk)
  63.   Support --Biochemistry&Love (talk) 02:40, 11 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  64.   Support --Goonsquad LCpl Mulvaney (talk) 04:05, 11 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  65.   Support This was definitely useful; would like to see it back, and more functional (e.g. distinguish between articles and their talk pages, etc.)
  66.   Support Knope7 (talk) 04:46, 12 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  67.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼  18:27, 11 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  68.   Support SounderBruce 04:57, 12 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  69.   Support Quiddity (talk) 09:50, 12 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  70.   Support Casliber (talk) 11:31, 12 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  71.   Support - DPdH (talk) 12:09, 12 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  72. Conditional   Support Only if this tool will be multlilingual and available to all wikis — NickK (talk) 23:32, 12 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
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