Talk:Main Page/Archives/2008

OS & browser statistics?

availability of statistics for the operating systems and browsers of Wikipedia visitors. We need such statistics at the Romanian Wikipedia, because we are planning to switch to certain new characters, previously unavailable in Unicode. We don't want to do this too early or too late. The new characters display as squares on some older OS & browser combinations, while they are the default on new OS's. We will use some other ways so as to upset the least number of visitors and editors, but it would be very helpful to get the best timing.

I know that data are recorded about editors' OS's and browsers (I can see that with checkuser), but I wonder if the same is done for visitors. Does anyone know where I can find or request such statistics? Thanks. — AdiJapan ☎ 12:35, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

Onko...

Onko täällä yhtään suomea puhuvaa käyttäjää?--Terveisin Wiki fani 14:41, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

Azerbaijani Wikipedia

Hi, In the Azerbaijani Wikipedia there are too many empty files that reach 7.000-8.000. Too many of these empty files just have empty templates and empty titles. These files can not be erased. So I eant someone which is from Meta to erase them. Thank you! [1] and [2] --Uannis 00:02, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

Hi, there are local sysops to do this. (I saw there are also 2 rfc: Requests for comments/Azeri Wikipedia empty page & Requests for comments/Admin AMD's abuse from Azeri wikipedia).

Thanks for Your understanding, --birdy geimfyglið _(:> )=| ∇ 00:06, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

My preference

In the language list on my preferences here at meta, yo-yoruba is missing and I can't reset it. Thanks Demmy 19:11, 9 February 2008 (UTC)

Its ok now thanks.Demmy 17:33, 17 February 2008 (UTC)

Request

We want to enlarge(13 is good) the font of gilaki wikipedia www.glk.wikipedia.org, and if this wiki font be Arial is better.

If anybody can do this, say that.--AminSanaei

nobody?--AminSanaei

Typo

In the Notifications for Feb 2, San Francisco is misspelled "San Fransisco". Thanks. --Cromwellt|talk|contribs 16:00, 25 February 2008 (UTC)

Hi, thanks for telling us! You can actually fix that template yourself (Template:Information thread), it's only semi-protected. I've made the main page semi-protected for now. We'll see if how the vandalism goes... :) Majorly (talk) 16:13, 25 February 2008 (UTC)

Help with parser functions

I'm trying to get this template to display the categories "Devils", "Characters", or "Humans" using the #switch parser function.

Right now, I have

{{#ifeq:{{{boss|}}}|yes|[[Category:Bosses]] {{#switch:{{{1|}}} |1=[[Category:Devil May Cry Bosses]] |2|3|4=[[Category:Devil May Cry {{{1|}}} Bosses]]}} {{#switch:{{{a|}}} |devil=[[Category:Devils]] |chardevil=[[Category:Characters]][[Category:Devils]] |charhuman=[[Category:Characters]][[Category:Humans]] }} |[[Category: Enemies]] {{#switch:{{{1|}}} |1=[[Category:Devil May Cry Enemies]] |2|3|4=[[Category:Devil May Cry {{{1|}}} Enemies]]}} }}

and the a,b,c part doesn't seem to not work at all.

Ideally, I want

{{enemy|1|boss=yes|chardevil}}

to display the categories Bosses, Devil May Cry Bosses, Characters, and Devils. Can anybody help me with this?128.211.166.87 20:59, 25 February 2008 (UTC)

Who messed with the sidebar?

The sidebar now links to two pages, Meta:Community Portal and Meta:Current events, which don't even exist except as redirects. The previous sidebar, which was specialized to Meta, also included a lot of helpful links which have now been removed. I say we revert this change.--Pharos 05:07, 7 March 2008 (UTC)

And someone did revert the change for awhile, but now it's been restored to the inferior (in my opinion) "generic" version. What's going on?--Pharos 03:25, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

Fixed. This is an old glitch that seems to happen on all MediaWiki wikis, but as far as I know nobody ever figured out why. It's probably a caching issue. Any administrator can fix it by editing MediaWiki:Sidebar. —{admin} Pathoschild 04:13:44, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

Flagged Revisions on the german Wikipedia

Pleae note, that the german Wikipedia has disabled flagged revisions on 11th May. The main page on meta says, that flagged revisions are still activated. Please change this.--84.187.176.94 14:23, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

Hello 84. Could you provide a link to a relevant discussion or announcement? It seems to be enabled on de:Special:Version. —{admin} Pathoschild 20:17:22, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

Pill informed me, that this had been temporary due to a problem [3], now they are enabled again, best regards, --birdy geimfyglið _(:> )=| ∇ 20:23, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

What exactly is Meta-Wiki?

I have read your about page, yet I do not entirely understand what this project is intended to be. I would be very much appreciattive if more information could be sent to me.

I have been looking at all Wikimedia projects and often find that Wikipedia is the only one that anyone really uses. Personally, I think this unfortunate. Wikipedia was intended to be an encyclopedia, and now people are using it to place their news articles, which really belongs to Wikinews! More awareness needs to be made for the other Wikimedia Projects. I think that Wiki is an excellent technology that has barely reached its potential or intention.

I am not sure what to do about news articles or books being uploaded to Wikipedia. According to your about page, Meta-Wiki is not intended as a disposal ground for unwanted or inappropriate articles from other Wikis, though the idea of moving it here is not obvious nor practical to me. I will see what I can do to move the articles to Wikinews, Wikisource, or whatever project seems most appropriate depending on the content.

Agomulka 13:06, 22 May 2008 (UTC)

It's not to store a content. It's for coordinating projects' activity, a big Wikipedia: namespace for all Wikimedia projects — VasilievV ² 18:50, 22 May 2008 (UTC)

www.wikipedia/books/quote....org

May I ask how often those sites are updated ? Once a moth, once a year ? --Cradel 19:55, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

Expanción de Wikiquote

Buenas, En Wikiquote en español se ha iniciado un proyecto para expander a Wikiquote al idioma Aragones, el tema es que nadie sabe como iniciar un sist Wiki ¿Alguien nos podría ayudar?? salu2--Aldo Cazzulino 555 22:31, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

Hola, estás buscando Requests for new languages, ¿es así? allí se puede proponer wikis en otros idiomas. Saludos, --birdy geimfyglið _(:> )=| ∇ 22:44, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

Gracias po el enlace, es eso lo que estoy buscando, le problema es que de ingles no entiendo nada, ¿Podrías ayudarme a hacer la solicitud? gracias desde ahora y salu2--Aldo Cazzulino 555 00:34, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

Vale, pues, lo haces así: creas una subpágina llamada Requests for new languages/Wikiquote Aragones, allí pones:

==Aragones Wikiquote==
{{ls-header|open}}
{{New language proposal
 |language  = [[w:Aragonese language|Aragonese]] (''aragonés'', ISO 639-1: an, ISO 639-2/3: arg)
 |links     = [[incubator:Wq/an|development wiki project]]
 |external  = aquí pones enlaces externos que te parecen importantes para este idioma
}}

<Aquí pones tus argumentos en favor de este proyecto, ponlos en español, los puedo traducir para tí>

===Arguments in favour/a favor===
* 

===Arguments against/en contra===
*

===Other discussion/discusión===

Luego en Requests for new languages, puedes añadir esta página así:

{{subst:ls-newrow|Aragones Wikiquote}}

Para que lo acepten es necesario traducir el interfaz en betawiki:, puedes registrarte en betawiki:Special:Userlogin y dejar un mensaje en betawiki:Betawiki:Translators si quieres ayudar con las traducciones por allí.

Saludos, --birdy geimfyglið _(:> )=| ∇ 08:51, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

Una pregonta ¿cuanto dura una votación de este tipo? saludos--Aldo Cazzulino 555 19:51, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

Project propsals...

This is "outdated" and "historical"... but we still keep a link on the front page? --Emesee 20:07, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

For Sindhi

I want to start meta wiki in Sindhi anyone can help me?

--Mehran Mangrio 09:34, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

"...and the MediaWiki software on which it runs."

The first paragraph on the Main Page implies that this wiki should be used for work related to the MediaWiki work. But I was under the impression that that was not the case at all. Isn't mediawiki.org where all MediaWiki-related work is being done (and has been for some time)? If so, can that text be removed, please? --MZMcBride 03:05, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

hmm removed along with its sub-section, I think that page needs to me "pimped" a bit..anyone has any ideas? ...--Cometstyles 03:48, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

Not to create more work but should it be removed from other languages as well? : - ) If so, I think the other pages are unprotected. I can probably take care of them. And which page needs to be "pimped"? --MZMcBride 05:33, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

I doubt I understand all the other languages and appropriately remove that section without making a hash out of it, I was talking about the Main Page, it has been like that since the time of dinosaurs..except for a couple of changes I made and some you did, maybe we need a Mainpage/Pimp and people can give in their ideas to what we can change how we can "update" it :) ..--Cometstyles 05:39, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

Ahh. Yeah, it is rather bland. : - ) --MZMcBride 05:51, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

I agree, it could do with an update. Majorly ^talk 12:42, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

so........any ideas? ...--Cometstyles 11:57, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

(unindent) What about removing the large obtrusive "Main Page" and "From Meta" text? And the pagetitle could be changed to something more exciting than "Main Page - Meta" .... As for the colors, the yellow box is bit faded and ugly. The box of sister projects at the bottom looks entirely out of place as it uses a different type of header and a different border color. Perhaps that should be addressed? And... why is the page fully protected? --MZMcBride 23:57, 19 August 2008 (UTC)

I've unprotected it. Perhaps you could work on a design in a sandbox somewhere? You seem to have some good ideas. Majorly ^talk 00:08, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

Removal of mention of Wikipedia from Main Page

Wikipedia is by far the most visible of all the Wikimedia projects. It's removal from Meta's lead seems a bit odd and I can't find discussion anywhere about it. Could it please be restored? --MZMcBride 23:54, 19 August 2008 (UTC)

Yes, in terms of visibility it's the highest, but for Meta all the projects are all "equal", IMO, so I would oppose giving one undue weight in the lead. —Giggy 08:41, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

I have removed it because I honestly think it is time for Wikimedia to focus all of it's efforts towards the decentralisation of Wikipedia as the "flag ship". These other projects have as much potential, and some of them have more. Change is needed if Wikimedia ever wants to be more than Wikipedia's shadow. This is not my call to make, however, and if the community wants to restore the reference, then that is up to them. —Anonymous Dissident^Talk 08:54, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

Uploading documents to doc man

Can someone please populate some knowledge on how to do so?

I would like to upload a template that links to a Microsoft Word Doc, so that it can be saved and printed. At the moment it opens as a Webpage... obviously I need some training! Any information would be great!

Lowered main page protection

Is there consensus for this to happen? It's a pretty radical move and I don't feel it should be sustained unless it is clear that this is okay with the community. It seems to me that common practice on most wikis is to give the main page as much guard as it can be given, and lowering it seems to be exposing it for the return of others being able to edit a page which frankly doesn't need to be edited much. —Anonymous Dissident^Talk 12:59, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

In addition, it only makes sense to lower the protections of all language main pages if we are going to do this. —Anonymous Dissident^Talk 13:09, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

It was never protected with consensus, so there really shouldn't need to be consensus to undo it. Someone requested it above, if you look. There has been two instances of vandalism in the past two years, while it was unprotected for months. MaxSem protected it with "It's time". "It's time" to unprotect I think. Our admins are pretty quick on RC patrol, so it's not that much of an issue. Majorly ^talk 13:19, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

Consensus isn't just pertinent to an action, it is pertinent to its sustenance. The page has been protected for years, and we lower the protection after one comment? I think we should wait for discussion before we take action. You may be right, but this is a big move, and I think community input is required before we solidify this change. —Anonymous Dissident^Talk 13:39, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, lowering the protection level is not a very good idea, IMO. Furthermore, I think discussion should have preceeded any action.  — Mike.lifeguard | ^@en.wb 19:06, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

I don't mind if it is semiprotected for editing or not, but why removing the move protection (an invitation)? Br., --birdy geimfyglið _(:> )=| ∇ 19:16, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

I readded the move protection. I still don't see the need for protecting something that got vandalised twice in two years. We should only fully protect stuff if there's actually a real need. I don't see why it needs full protection, and it was never explained why it was fully protected in the first place. Majorly ^talk 20:10, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

I agree with Majorly. We should avoid pre-emptively protecting pages until a problem emerges as if there was only a very small problem in the first place then all you do is create a nuisance for genuine contributors who want to make valid changes but can't because they aren't an administrator. I think edit semi-protection and full move protection is perfectly adequate. Protection should really be a last resort when vandalism gets too high to be manageable and ends up distracting our contributors from other tasks, simply being vandalised once or twice is doesn't justify full protection. As Majorly says, we have plenty sharp users watching recent changes. Also, lets not get to a point where no one dares move without first getting consensus. The changes that Majorly made were reasonable to do so without first discussing them and he's clearly happy to discuss them once concerns have been raised, I don't think we should ask for any more. Adambro 22:37, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

• Bold, revert, discuss. I agree with Majorly's actions. Just make sure all the other language Main Pages have the same protection status. —Giggy 23:42, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

• Can we reprotect? Already vandalized. rootology (T) 01:53, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

No. We don't protect after one vandalism. Give it a chance, please... Majorly ^talk 02:29, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

• (+)Betawikiversity:Main page is protected in exactly the same way. We encourage all to contribute. --Hillgentleman 03:15, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

I totally disagree. The main page shouldn't be a playground for vandals. Never and nowhere. Regards, —DerHexer (Talk) 11:24, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

I'm afraid the occurrence of vandalism already makes my side here firmly decided. Leave the protection up. —Anonymous Dissident^Talk 13:36, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

I only unprotected it originally because someone asked why it was, and I didn't see a reason why (hardly any vandalism in the history). This person has yet to comment in this discussion, or make an edit to the page they were questioning about. Majorly ^talk 13:42, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

I'll fire him a message so he's aware. —Anonymous Dissident^Talk 13:45, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

And done. —Anonymous Dissident^Talk 13:56, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

The recent occurrence of vandalism doesn't justify increasing the protection. It occurred over two days after the protection was lowered, was reverted within 3 minutes, and the user blocked. This doesn't suggest to me a big problem that we are struggling to deal with which we need to resort to full protection to deal with, no doubt inconveniencing genuine users in the process. The level of protection also required for the account to have been created in advance, something which will put off many casual vandals. I would ask that the protection is maintained at the current level for a reasonable period of time so that the scale of the vandalism problem might be gauged and a proper assessment of the appropriate level made rather than reacting hastily to one malicious edit. Adambro 14:32, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

Okay, Adambro, fair enough, but I'd assert that the fact that vandalism was inserted only a day after the protection was lowered suggests that such vandalisms will be regular occurrences. 3 minutes might not be long, but this is our main page. It showcases Meta-wiki, and provides numerous first impressions for would-be contributors. The risk of that first impression being tainted by whatever a vandal might see fit to add is too great and not worth it, especially since the main page hardly needs to be edited anyway. Furthermore, in regards to your statement about inconveniencing non-admins: how about the inconvenience of constantly reverting vandalism to the highest profile page on the wiki? —Anonymous Dissident^Talk 14:42, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

What we are about is wiki and open editing. To fully protect pages that are not high-risk and are not high-visible is a bit silly in my opinion. Semi-protection seems more than sufficient. Will there be occasional vandalism? Probably. But there are tens of people watching at any given time. We use the same philosophy on other pages, pages that are seen far more often, like w:Britney Spears or w:George W. Bush. They get vandalized occasionally, but that isn't a reason to fully protect them indefinitely. And I would be willing to bet (though unfortunately I can't find stats) that those two pages are viewed more times per day than Meta's Main Page.

To Anonymous Dissident: if the current Main Page is supposed to be a showcase for Wikimedia, the projects are in terrible, terrible shape. The current Main Page (and Meta in general) is currently embarrassingly out of date, as are a good deal of the links placed on it. (For example, the introduction talked about MediaWiki documentation, when mediawiki.org has been (and is) the primary place for that for years. A prominent link about Transfer of authority seems to be entirely inaccurate.) We should be doing as much as humanly possible to encourage editing and improving of the content of the Main Page and elsewhere; full protection stands in direct opposition to that. --MZMcBride 20:32, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

Please feel free to update areas that need updating. Thanks. Majorly ^talk 21:03, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

I'd prefer slightly out of date to pure vandalism. The news thread is still in good shape, and is regularly updated. Links can be easily updated, but after that, is it really worth it to have the protection down? Maybe we should stop the idle banter and try and get a gauge on what the general view here is. I think I partially agree with MZMcBride's points about the Main Page's outdatedness, but I still think the risk of having a semi-protected main page just for the sake of updating links and keeping the page up to date, a task that'd take 30 minutes and that's it. So, yeah. I think hearing definitive opinions from people and then unprotecting or leaving it would be good. Straw poll, perchance? —Anonymous Dissident^Talk

No offense, Al, but it's kind of silly. Is there any Main Page on a major WMF project that isn't locked down? Lets lock it. :) rootology (T) 16:34, 23 August 2008 (UTC)

Yes, there is. Let's not lock it, unless the vandalism is recurring. Majorly ^talk 17:24, 23 August 2008 (UTC)

I agree with MZMcBride: A main page which is out-of-date is not very useful. Dynamicism is the essence of wiki. Hillgentleman 10:40, 25 August 2008 (UTC)

Then why not propose some updates? I must stress that a slightly out-of-date main page is better than one calloused with vandalism. —Anonymous Dissident^Talk 11:20, 25 August 2008 (UTC)

New logo in the address bar

The old logo still appears as the icon in the browser's address bar. --Amir E. Aharoni 00:18, 9 September 2008 (UTC)

I think this must be set by a sysadmin. I could be wrong though.  — Mike.lifeguard | ^talk 01:32, 9 September 2008 (UTC)

Appears to be correct now. --Amir E. Aharoni 12:53, 14 September 2008 (UTC)

Favicons cache differently from other aspects of websites; it could have been a browser issue. Moot point, though, since all's fine and dandy... EVula // talk // ☯ // 05:51, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

No, it hadn't been set at the time - JeLuF has done this recently.  — Mike.lifeguard | ^talk 13:43, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

enlarging the font of gileki wikipedia

hi, i am Amin Sanaei, gileki wikipedia adminstorator. in gileki wikipedia, font of pages is very small and people can not read it!. if anbody can change it, please do that. the larges of font of farsi wikipedia is good for our gileki wikipedia. i try to do that but can not do that!.AminSanaei 10:34, 19 September 2008 (UTC)

Protection of all language Main Pages

If we're going to leave this one protected, it only makes sense they are all locked. At any rate, we need to find consensus on the matter of the protection of the Main Page(s). Thoughts? —Anonymous Dissident^Talk 14:35, 26 September 2008 (UTC)

I agree that all the Main Page variants should be similarly protected. EVula // talk // ☯ // 15:46, 26 September 2008 (UTC)

I would be "okay" with semi-protection, but not full protection (otherwise, how are they going to get translated?). Cbrown1023 talk 20:29, 26 September 2008 (UTC)

When are the other language pages ever edited, let alone vandalised? Majorly ^talk 20:33, 26 September 2008 (UTC)

We are a set of wikis. Wiki is our "thing." See also: Meta-Wiki. Please stop inhibiting open editing. --MZMcBride 01:05, 27 September 2008 (UTC)

I'm not inhibiting anything. That would be if I just protected all of them without asking. I am hoping to form discussion on the matter. —Anonymous Dissident^Talk 01:37, 27 September 2008 (UTC)

He's not... the Main Page is hopefully the first thing that you see, he just doesn't want that thing to be vandalism that the end-user doesn't know how to fix. Cbrown1023 talk 01:45, 27 September 2008 (UTC)

MZMcBride, if you don't like the fact admins have a protect button, initiate a discussion to get page protection removed. Some pages must be protected. What would you say if someone suggested the main page of English Wikipedia was unprotected? Would you automatically agree "because it's a wiki"? Just because it's a wiki does not mean every single page needs to be open to every vandal who happens to pass by. I don't know about you, but I want our welcome mat free of profanity. We tried having the main page unprotected recently, and it failed rather spectacularly. I don't agree with this proposal really because the other language pages aren't nearly as high profile, but your reasoning that "this is a wiki" is extremely poor. We have a protection button for a reason. Majorly ^talk 12:02, 27 September 2008 (UTC)

I think that's up to each wiki community to decide. We don't really need to be micromanaging them like this. Kylu 01:07, 27 September 2008 (UTC)

No, no, no. I mean all language-variants of the Meta main page. —Anonymous Dissident^Talk 01:36, 27 September 2008 (UTC)

Yes, we are only talking about the Meta-Wiki home pages. Cbrown1023 talk 01:45, 27 September 2008 (UTC)

oic. das ist mehr klar, danke. Kylu 16:09, 27 September 2008 (UTC)

They should be protected, just like, and for the same reason as the English version, in my opinion. - Rjd0060 01:52, 27 September 2008 (UTC)

I'm going to go ahead and do it. It makes sense, and there is a general agreement that if one should be protected, they all should be. There haven't been any comments in days, so I think it'd be best just to do it. —Anonymous Dissident^Talk 13:06, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

On second thoughts, I'm going to make a note on Babel to just make sure. —Anonymous Dissident^Talk 13:08, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

The portuguese version was semi-protect, and before was full protect, because a user make wrong editions there (after, I explain about this with him). So, I agree with a full protection. Alex Pereira ^falaê 13:18, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

I vote for semi-protection only. The pages are rarely translated anyway, not to mention vandalized. Protecting them would mean that the only way to ever have them fully translated is if every language had a native speaker admin at Meta, and that one of the native speaking admins at Meta would actually be interested in translating. Diego pmc 20:16, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Well, we have a fair consensus here. I'm going to protect them. —Anonymous Dissident^Talk 03:38, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

Support full or semi, whichever is the consensus. ++Lar: t/c 22:17, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

I don't think that these Main Page variants should be fully protected. At worst, they should be semi-protected instead, though I would rather prefer if they were not protected at all, unless there was recent or persistent vandalism that justified it. Did you check the history of these pages? What are your observations? Korg 19:22, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

Indeed. And isn't full protection a strong impediment toward updated translations for these languages? --MZMcBride 00:22, 21 December 2008 (UTC)

Redesign

For your consideration: User:MZMcBride/Main Page. --MZMcBride 08:44, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

Argh, not another en-Wikipedia clone. Their redesign was nice, but I don't want every wiki to look the same. :) —{admin} Pathoschild 14:27:24, 04 October 2008 (UTC)

What about just redesigning the top box for the moment? That is, putting the "Welcome to Meta-Wiki..." piece inside of a box and getting rid of the yellow box. --MZMcBride 16:04, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

Nobody cares? :-( --MZMcBride 17:57, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

I care, but you already know I don't like your redesign much :\  — Mike.lifeguard | ^@en.wb 00:44, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

I don't mind the top box, but I don't want the yellow box to go. —Anonymous Dissident^Talk 08:54, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

Why's that? The yellow box is rather glaring (to me, at least). --MZMcBride 23:40, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

Updating the main page

There have been concerns expressed that the main page is not up-to-date enough. So I'd like to propose that people use this section to request the needed updates to the page. Please, anything that needs fixing or improving, name it and hopefully we'll have a better main page at the end. —Anonymous Dissident^Talk 12:11, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

We have an entire wiki devoted to the Foundation and its activities, yet it has an entire box devoted to it. That seems rather silly and out of place. --MZMcBride 23:40, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

Also, it would be nice to set MediaWiki:Pagetitle-view-mainpage to something nice like "Meta, a Wikimedia Project co-ordination wiki" instead of "Main Page - Meta". Commons and the English Wikipedia both do this. It's a nice touch. :-) --MZMcBride 07:13, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

Done & I like it.  — Mike.lifeguard | ^@en.wb 15:12, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

/me pokes AnonDiss. --MZMcBride 04:05, 15 October 2008 (UTC)

"Meta, the Wikimedia projects coordination wiki" might be better.--Pharos 15:01, 18 October 2008 (UTC)

It's not the only wiki for coordinating Wikimedia projects though :)  — Mike.lifeguard | ^@en.wb 17:52, 18 October 2008 (UTC)

'SQL queries' link should maybe take you straight to https://wiki.toolserver.org/view/Query_service -- Harry Wood 11:45, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

Done  — Mike.lifeguard | ^@en.wb 16:58, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

Lelouch Lamperouge

This is just a minor edit I am requesting to make. I just changed the birthday of the character Lelouch Lamperouge from the anime Code Geass to January 6, 1999 instead of December 5, 1999. I just thought it would make more sense to match the character's birthday with his personality as well as with the person who plays his voice. But unfortunately the page is protected and i am not able to make an edit. My request is for the page to be unprotected or edited by an administator of you would be so kind. (Karen ,29 October 2008).

Hello Karen. If you're referring to "Lelouch Lamperouge" on Wikipedia, try discussing on its talk page; this is a different website. —Pathoschild 16:22:25, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Can anyone tell me about Bean Media? I found them mentioned on Wikipedia but the entry was removed?

We have been hassled by a rep and they won't take no for an anwer I wondered if anyone else has had any dealings with them? Holdenhj 01:48, 12 November 2008 (UTC)

Sorry, that is not what meta.wikimedia is about. You should perhaps try a google search.  — Mike.lifeguard | ^@en.wb 02:30, 12 November 2008 (UTC)

Updating the main page (2)

I'm starting a new thread because the old one seems to have died a bit. I think smaller steps are a better approach than trying to eat the entire elephant in one bite. :-) So I'd like to propose putting the top text in a box and eliminating the yellow box altogether. This would also remove some links that really don't need such prominent positioning.

Current version

Welcome to Meta-Wiki, a website devoted to the coordination and documentation of the Wikimedia Foundation's projects and their related affairs. Other venues for discussing the Foundation and these projects include the Wikimedia mailing lists (particularly foundation-l) and the Wikimedia chapters.

Content pages on Meta: 151,040

Projects Complete list · New Requests Mission and Vision Board of Trustees Wikimedia Foundation Translation Requests · Press releases

Proposed version

Welcome to Meta-Wiki, a website devoted to the coordination and documentation of the Wikimedia Foundation's projects and their related affairs. Other venues for discussing the Foundation and these projects include the Wikimedia mailing lists (particularly foundation-l) and the Wikimedia chapters. Content pages on Meta: 151,040 Projects (complete list) · Mission · Vision Board of Trustees · Wikimedia Foundation

Thoughts? --MZMcBride 04:01, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

I really like it. Perhaps we could also work on the box that contains the language main pages. —Anonymous Dissident^Talk 05:37, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

Yes, the one thing that was pointed out to me is that it removes the Translation links, which are apparently an important part of Meta. I was thinking of perhaps creating a separate box and putting all of the translation-related work there? As for this top box, perhaps the background is too dark? I'm still undecided. :-) --MZMcBride 06:28, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

Translation is very important and requires a prominent link. Majorly ^talk 16:31, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

What about splitting the pink box ("Meta in many languages") and making the bottom half have all of the translation links? Like the bottom half would be "Help support your language" or something. How many are translation-related links are there? Meta:Babylon, Translation requests, and Translation seem to be the big three. Are there others? --MZMcBride 20:50, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

User:Cbrown1023 may know the answer. Majorly ^talk 20:52, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

Looks good - anything to get rid of that yellow box. - Rjd0060 16:29, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

Better code:

Content pages
on Meta:
151,040

Welcome to Meta-Wiki, a website devoted to the coordination and documentation of the Wikimedia Foundation's projects and their related affairs. Other venues for discussing the Foundation and these projects include the Wikimedia mailing lists (particularly foundation-l) and the Wikimedia chapters.

---

Projects (complete list) • Mission • VisionBoard of Trustees • Wikimedia Foundation

At least for this part, however the entire page should be recoded.
— Danny B. 01:10, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

I'm strongly against a splitting box: it should be on the top. Native English speakers should remind that non-native ones may have more difficulties to browse the English page and much clearer and higher readability is required. The link to translation page should be visible and clear in my opinion. --Aphaia 15:14, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

All right. What about something like this:

Content pages
on Meta:
151,040

Welcome to Meta-Wiki, a website devoted to the coordination and documentation of the Wikimedia Foundation's projects and their related affairs. Other venues for discussing the Foundation and these projects include the Wikimedia mailing lists (particularly foundation-l) and the Wikimedia chapters.

---

Projects (complete list) • Mission • Vision • Translation • RequestsBoard of Trustees • Wikimedia Foundation

Are all of the links in the bottom row needed? What about the "complete list" link? Or the "Board of Trustees" link? Personally, I think the "Board of Trustee" link can probably be removed as it's prominently listed at Wikimedia:Home. And then we could move the "mission" and "values" links next to the "Wikimedia Foundation" link? Thoughts? --MZMcBride 21:13, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

Couple thoughts on the latest proposal: The "Requests" link should be made clear that it is for translation requests. I'd suggest Changing those last two links to "Translation (Requests)". Also, I don't see why the Board of Trustees link is needed on this page. The link to the WMF wiki is prominent and when that is clicked, people will be able to easily find a link to the BoT's page. Other than that - I've updated part of it on all proposals to reflect the current main page where this minor change was made. - Rjd0060 21:26, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

What is absolutely unnecessary and worthless there and occupies one of the most prominent positions, is the "Content pages on Meta: 151,040" waste. Strongly suggest to remove it. Now, if it will be removed, it can be replaced by Wikimedia logo with link to foundation's site. Then the bottom part with links can be centered and contain a bit more links. I'll provide the demo soon, got to interrupt this now...
— Danny B. 23:32, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

Combining both of Rjd's and Danny's suggestions:

Welcome to Meta-Wiki, a website devoted to the coordination and documentation of the Wikimedia Foundation's projects and their related affairs. Other venues for discussing the Foundation and these projects include the Wikimedia mailing lists (particularly foundation-l) and the Wikimedia chapters.

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Projects (complete list) · Mission · Vision · Translation (requests)

Thoughts? --MZMcBride 03:49, 14 December 2008 (UTC)

Looks good to me. I'd make the logo a bit bigger, but that really isn't important. - Rjd0060 04:00, 14 December 2008 (UTC)

better. :-) Cbrown1023 talk 14:48, 14 December 2008 (UTC)

Tweaked again:

Welcome to Meta-Wiki, a website devoted to the coordination and documentation of the Wikimedia Foundation's projects and their related affairs. Other venues for discussing the Foundation and these projects include the Wikimedia mailing lists (particularly foundation-l) and the Wikimedia chapters.

---

Projects (complete list) • Mission • Vision • Translation (requests)

— Danny B. 21:52, 14 December 2008 (UTC)

This is getting a bit silly..what next after one of this gets approved, another section on how the middle part of the page should look like?..I was hoping that someone could come with a "full" out-take on how the main page should look like in their user subpages and we can compare and discuss that rather that just the header..--Cometstyles 01:41, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

That's simply not fair. I did propose a complete redesign above and people only complained. :X --MZMcBride 04:04, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

Well I wanted a main page with pictures of little cute bunnies and kittens and covered in glitter, but they said no :( ..come up with a design which includes everything important and IRC :p ...--Cometstyles 04:38, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

I've boldly updated the Main Page. Thoughts? --MZMcBride 06:19, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

Wikimedia Foundation section

Is any part of that box necessary on Meta's main page? It seems like a holdover from the time when Meta was used instead of the Foundation wiki. Thoughts on removing the entire box? --MZMcBride 06:19, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

I removed a whole section dealing with mediawiki a long time ago and to answer your question, i think it should stay but updated a bit and we must remove both the "Core issues and collaboration" and "Community and communication" and combine them as one and maybe call it "collaboration and the community" or something similar..its just taking space and is a bit-outdated, and as part of a major over-haul, I was thinking about changing the "Main Page" title to something more clearer and more on the goals of the project, maybe something like "Portal' or " like the english wikipedia, have no title :) ...--Cometstyles 10:31, 15 December 2008 (UTC)