Wikipedia talk:Talk pages

Non-introductory Material

Non-introductory Material that hasn't yet been usefully categorized

Some other Wikipedians disagree, believing that we should all feel free to write whatever we like on the topic of the page to which the talk page is appended.

removed the above. Who disagrees, other than the trolls? We're not a forum. -- Tarquin 13:27 Apr 19, 2003 (UTC)

Quite stinky, Tarquin. Tannin

On another matter completely now: Archiving. I always archive by using "Move this Page" to rename the talk page to (e.g.) Talk:Green cheese/archive1, then edit the new Talk:Green cheese (which has been auto-created by the "Move Page" function as a redirect to Talk:Green cheese/archive1) to remove the redirect and replace it with a plain link: Archived at Talk:Green cheese/archive1.

Is this:

• (a) Wrong? If so, why?
• (b) Just another way of doing the same thing, so who cares?
• (c) A better way of doing it, because it preserves the history for the archived page?

Tannin 13:39 Apr 19, 2003 (UTC)

I don't think it really matters much either way. My personal preference is to leave the original history intact by using cut-and-paste rather than 'move page'. That way the edit history shows the whole story in one place. But it doesn't worry me if I see it done the other way. -- sannse 13:46 Apr 19, 2003 (UTC)

I'm with sannse - I cut and paste (this leaves any links to a specific version of the page working), but it doesn't bother me if people do it another way. One great advantage of moving the page rather than cutting and pasting is that it can be done even when the page is over the 32Kb limit that causes a problem for some people (but that's not an advantage if you're not affected by the 32Kb limit, of course). --Camembert

Cool. In that case, I'll continue using the "Move Page" method. I could say that this is because I think it's easier to follow the history that way. But then there might be another explanation, involving a tiny bit less work and two magic little words which have been mentioned by significant others in my personal life from time to time - "bone" and "lazy". :) Tannin

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I'd like to suggest that, along with or instead of the -----, contributors also title discussion about separate topics. --Ellmist Thursday, January 30th, 02003

What's the best way to archive stuff? I like what I've done to Talk:Jesus Christ, but I know most people prefer archive in the manner of Talk:anti-Semitism. Using older versions seems somehow more elegant to me. (note cunning use of indents plus signature in this comment) Martin

The problem with using the page history is that it is potentially insecure. Right now, I can download all articles and talk pages by downloading the database dump of the CUR tables. Older revisions are stored in the OLD table, which is much, much larger and grows at a faster pace. If we use deletion for archiving, people who just download CUR cannot view the archive. Also, should we ever decide to clean the archive for space or performance reasons, the comments there are obviously lost. Plus, the older revisions are not currently searchable.

Now that we have convenient subpage support, moving the stuff to subpages seems like the more user-friendly solution. You can even create subpages for individual long threads, which would make them easier to look up. On the other hand, deletion is more like a real archive because there's no "risk" of discussions being resumed -- whether this is good or bad I don't know. I have used the deletion method myself, and it is a good question. You may want to bring it up on the mailing list; a policy on this would certainly be useful. --Eloquence 10:46 Jan 31, 2003 (UTC)

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From Wikipedia:Village pump:

Perhaps we should consider why we need seperate user and user talk pages? Martin

I would say they serve two rather different purposes. User: page usually for info about yourself, maybe some links or pictures you want to keep handy; User_talk: for discussion with other people, naturally. And aside from that, it seems like a natural extension of the regular pages having their own Talk: pages, like this one here. So I'm all for keeping them. And I'd still like to see a shortcut akin to "~~~~" that lets one link to one's User_talk: page instead. -- John Owens 21:15 May 4, 2003 (UTC)

Paragraph breaks in meta pages

Moved from Wikipedia:Village pump on Tuesday, July 8th, 02003.

My question is, should long posts to meta pages be split up into several paragraphs with blank space in between (as Nafnaf's, above; there doesn't seem to be a better example on hand) or separated by line breaks (as this one)? I find that paragraph breaks within posts are rather annoying, but some people don't seem to think so.
In the same vein, what's with the apparent custom of placing a horizontal line before every new post in talk: pages? -Smack 07:35 5 Jul 2003 (UTC)

Yes, if you want people to be able to read what you post, paragraph breaks are a very wise thing. As is breaking up unrelated discussions with a horizontal rule or heading. --Brion 07:38 5 Jul 2003 (UTC)

A good example has presented itself: Anthere's post below.

I was talking about breaking up related discussions with horizontal rules. -Smack 17:34 5 Jul 2003 (UTC)

End of moved discussion.

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(re Rachel Corrie) Digital archaeologists of the future will find the "Talk" and "Discuss" pages infinitely more informative, passionate, interesting, and true to the times of their subject(s) than the soulless articles. In these pages we find the true depth of impact a personage like Rachel has on the world and history. 14 July 2003

In the spirit of WikiHate (the antithesis of WikiLove) embodied in the previous comment, I must respond: the assertion that 'digital archaeologists of the future will find the "Talk" and "Discuss" pages infinitely more informative, passionate, interesting, and true to the times of their subject(s) than the soulless articles' is ridiculous on its face, and is therefore the product of poor reasoning. To see this, simply imagine such an archaeologist's frustration if she could only access the "Talk" page and not the revision history of the article. Clearly, the "Talk" pages taken together with the article's complete history would be more interesting than either alone. But this is a side issue - the real reason why the above snide comment is irrelevant is simply that the target audience of Wikipedia isn't the digital archaeologists of the future but the websurfing fact-seekers of the here-and-now; and I'm willing to bet those fact-seekers find the 'soulless article' on Rachel Corrie a lot more valuable than the 41 kilobyte(!) record of the wrangling of various partisan Wikipedians. Please understand, I don't really care about Rachel Corrie one way or the other - but I think people who whine about the effort required in attempting to attain the NPOV ideal don't deserve a lot of WikiLove, and should either reassess NPOV or choose a different forum for their views. (Postscript: I do recognize the irony of being doctrinaire about NPOV.) Cyan 07:14 25 Jul 2003 (UTC)

Anon was just expressing an opinion - it is out of line to attack Anon for that. Anon simply has a high regard and interest in human interactions while you seemed to indicate that interaction is just a means to an end. Different people have differing ideas on what is important - big deal. In the future the article, its history and the talk page, its various archives and history will all be here. Everybody wins. WikiLove and Don't bite the newbies. --mav 07:23 25 Jul 2003 (UTC)

Chomp, chomp ;). First off, let me say that I knew my comments were a silly, trollish thing to post, but given that it was 11 days late, I didn't expect to provoke any controversy, or response, really: I was just blowing off steam into the archives, I thought. But in response to your post, it seemed to me that Anon's comments did not signify any actual interest in human interactions per se - rather they seemed to be a rhetorical device to emphasize his/her disgust with NPOV, caused by the fact that adherence to NPOV prevented partisans of Rachel Corrie from making the article a hagiography. You might wonder why I say "disgust"; it's because Anon wants someone with a stronger stomach to attempt a NPOV extension of the article, implying that if Anon were to try, it would turn Anon's own stomach. But perhaps my interpretation of Anon's comments is entirely wrong - it can be hard to read nuances in raw text. Regarding biting newbies: I didn't think an individual with enough knowledge of NPOV to profess disgust with it qualified as a newbie, hence CHOMP. Naughty, I know. Cyan 02:32 28 Jul 2003 (UTC)

Anon raises an interesting, if speculative idea. However, I'm a fan of soulless articles, myself :) Martin 11:50 25 Jul 2003 (UTC)

Inviolability of talk pages

(re Israel, originally) Ever since I started here the unalterability of talk pages have been kept holy. Should it not be kept that way? BL 05:38, 23 Aug 2003 (UTC)

Blatant trolling by a user who has been banned multiple times is not protected, in my view. This is clearly an anti-Israeli troll masquerading as an anti-Gentile bigot, and his comment actually has nothing to do with this article, so should be deleted. --Delirium 05:43, Aug 23, 2003 (UTC)

Genuine comments by genuine contributors are left on. Trolls' stuff never is. That comment was just a crude piss-take designed to provoke people, by a user who had repeatedly visited this and other pages to add bs. It was a phoney as a three dollar note. Trolls are only interested in provoking rows by whatever phoney means they can. So troll stuff is always removed. BTW the user in question is now blocked and all their edits have been rolled back. FearÉIREANN 05:52, 23 Aug 2003 (UTC)

Clearly, the best way to deal with trolls is to ignore them. No? BL 05:56, 23 Aug 2003 (UTC)

Not on a page as sensitive as here. All it takes is one person to see the comment they left, think it serious, make an anti-jewish comment in response, then others respond and you have a war again here. Rolling back their text is ignoring them. No debate, no communcation, just a blanket removal of all attempts to set off rows. In effect it is as if they don't exist. Most trolls on pages as sensitive as here get bored being ignored and deleted and after throwing a few tantrums give up and go away. Leave their text and you implicitly accept them, and that is something they crave, being part of the 'gang', even if for no other reason than to start fights. FearÉIREANN 06:24, 23 Aug 2003 (UTC)

Talk pages are for the purpose of improving the attached article. Comments which will not fulfill this purpose are off-topic, and may be moved, edited, or deleted, as we see fit. In my opinion, anyway. Martin

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From the article (Standards and conventions of writing and layout):

"Don't edit other people's words: Ever (except for obvious typing errors). Editing or deleting your own words is up to you. (but contrast this with suggestions on refactoring below - this could be considered a simplistic approach)"

So I was right, no? BL 17:20, 24 Aug 2003 (UTC)

I disagree with what the page says :) I've said so here, but not got round to refactoring the thing properly. Was enough work just merging this stuff into a single, self-contradictory, page. Martin 17:40, 24 Aug 2003 (UTC)

Stop it?

from user talk:SH

I have reinstated two deleted sections. Please don't change other people comments, it makes the discussion very hard to follow. -- Tim Starling 05:10, 28 Aug 2003 (UTC)

Reinstated my self-edit. Martin 12:07, 28 Aug 2003 (UTC)

Alex makes an error. Martin points out this error. Alex acknowledges the error, and writes some other stuff. Martin corrects Alex's error with strikethrough, and adds a editorial note. Martin removes his comment about the error ever existing in the first place. Alex's acknowledgement doesn't make any sense anymore, so he removes part of it. Martin's annotation doesn't make sense either, and Alex's "You are right Martin" is out of context. He may agree with the new tone of the paragraph, but in the meantime half the participants of the debate have read one version, and half have read another, so now each side has a different understanding of his precise position.

Can you two please stop it? Is it really so bad that Alex made a mistake that you have to attempt to remove all record of it ever happening, except for a few confusing references? -- Tim Starling 02:36, 29 Aug 2003 (UTC)

I was really just trying to be transparent. Since Martin removed the part of his comment that deals with the typo (which I also don't agree with, but I will let him put it back in as it is his comment, not mine and I think it is his responsibility). I just wanted to make it read better, without the strike out and with Martin's self censoring I really sounded like I was responding to something that wasn't in his post, so I thought the strike through action (which was not started by me) was at least a way someone could see that there was something I thought was irrelevant in the changed version.

My intention was to make this discussion clearer, not hide anything I said. I still stand by everything I said (and I did make a typo about the five authors, and Martin did correct it, so that is clear, no?). Maybe it would have been better if 172 didn't start censoring me. I do not think that is correct. I have the right to express my opinion and I do not think, as 172 incorrectly states that I am "harrassing" Saddam Hussein (if that is possible!); I am merely pointing out a historical fact, Saddam Hussein is a mass murderer who caused people to disappear, i.e. he banned them from Iraqi society using his wicked (not wikied) techniques. I don't think anyone disputes that; not even the user whose talk page this is, after all he has never responded to the substance of anyone's objections regarding his user name. Now, after thinking my joke over I really think adopting and keeping this name was done to inflame those editors who are sensitive to these kinds of issues. If SH really wanted to contribute he would not be sitting back and would respond beyond asserting that he "likes the user name Saddam Hussein" while posting the Saddam Hussein page on his user page! By do doing SH is stating that he wants to be equated with a public figure who caused the death of tens of thousands of innocent people. That is the maleficium here. Pointing this out does not harass anyone; it shows that those who are offended by this username have a reasonable basis for being so offended. — Alex756 03:17, 29 Aug 2003 (UTC)

What you and Martin did was mildly annoying (at least to me, obviously not to everyone). What 172 did was a major breach of ettiquette. I can only assume he misread your statement, but even so removing comments you don't agree with is absolutely unacceptable. The fact that you were merely pointing out a historical fact is beside the point. -- Tim Starling 04:18, 29 Aug 2003 (UTC)

If unclear text is posted, and then it is questioned, and clearer replacement text is provided, it is often best to delete the unclear version and the question. This does not remove any important information, but makes the page shorter, and improves the signal-to-noise ratio. Martin

I still have to respectfully disagree. I understand dialogue. I do it every day, and over the years I've grown accustomed to it. Refactored talk is an odd method of communication which confuses me every time I see it. -- Tim Starling

Blanking User talk pages

Moved from Wikipedia:Village pump on Saturday, September 13th, 02003.

What's the policy regarding individual users blanking their own pages? Are users allowed to arbitrarily blank their own talk pages at their own liking? --Jiang 17:33, 9 Sep 2003 (EDT)

Sure, why not? It's rude to blank the page instead of replying to other people's questions, of course, but there's nothing wrong with a clean talk page that leaves finished conversations to the history archives. --Brion 17:42, 9 Sep 2003 (EDT)

Request clarification on synchronization of citations

I'm confused by this instruction: "When discussing the name of the page, cite the current name: if the page is moved afterwards, the Talk page is usually also moved, so then it would not be clear what you were talking about and people may think e.g. that you are suggesting to change the new name, while you were referring to the old one."

If I cite the current name X and the page is move afterwards to Y, then won't my citation still point to X. Or does the movement process somehow automatically update all references in the Talk page?

EmRick

[edit]

USA

I'm a bit of a noob here, so please forgive me if this is the wrong forum for this.

I've written a very good article on the the 60s psychedelic/progressive rock group "The United States of America". I can't seem to get it posted because of the band's name. I have *no* idea what to do about this - changing the title would make it less searchable, but all the permutations of USA are taken by the Article on the USA (country).

Please advise.

misterwarwick@yahoo.com

Replied at User talk:Hwarwick. Angela. 02:12, 18 Jun 2004 (UTC)

A way to get a list of all the "pages" you have created?

Is there a way to get a list of all the "pages" you have created (which does not include edits), without searching through and picking out all of them your personal contributions page? Secfan 15:03, 12 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Using a forum instead of a talk page

discussion from the village pump

I recently came across a dispute between rlandmann and greyengine5 and tried to go see what it was about. I searched several talk pages about the topic. And finally found that the discussion of the Wikiproject is being carried off-Wikipedia on a bulletin board. [1] I find this disturbing. Do we have any policy about this? Rmhermen 04:52, Aug 18, 2004 (UTC)

To view the actual forum, rather than just one topic, see [2]

You can read some of the discussion leading up to this development here. In short, a number of the more active participants in WikiProject Aircraft feel Wikipedia talk pages not conducive to long and detailed discussions.

As for it being "disturbing", I'll just repeat a comment I made before the trial started -"there's nothing more "sinister" about wikipedians using an external forum to discuss aspects of a project than if we were exchanging private email, or chatting via IRC or any other IM network (or meeting in person over a cup of coffee). In fact, a web forum ensures a transparency and accountability that none of those other modes of communication do."

Finally, from the beginning, this has been described as a "trial". If there are objections from the broader community (on the basis of policy or otherwise), then we'd like to know about them. Anyone with doubts as to why some of us have felt a need for a different way of talking about the project is free to try and make sense of the dog's breakfast that is the archived talk pages of WikiProject Aircraft. --Rlandmann 05:25, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)

IRC and IM provide something which Wikipedia does not - realtime communication. When decisions are made over IRC or IM, the log files are usually posted on the talk pages to allow others to catch up and voice objections. Talk pages are Wikipedia's non-realtime discussion feature. If you don't want to use them, you should have good reasons not to. By using an external forum, you lose 1) watchlist notification of discussions on a particular article, 2) discussions showing up in RC, 3) clear track record of all discussions associated with a particular page, 4) refactoring, 5) licensing of discussions as being part of the Wikimedia text corpus, 6) ability to post under your name without re-registration, 7) wiki-markup in comments (including image markup). ...

Not everyone who works on articles which are part of a WikiProject's scope is a member of a WikiProject or interested in becoming one. Hence, many people who will edit these articles will be confused as to what is going on and why certain decisions are made. Transparency of the decision-making process is key on Wikipedia.

But the biggest problem is the risk of the discussions being lost. Conversations on talk pages are automatically backed up together with the rest of the DB and will exist as long as Wikipedia itself exists. What happens to the forum you set up if you lose interest, or if the server harddisk crashes?

Talk pages certainly take a while to get used to, and there is room for improvement in terms of usability. However, when properly handled, they are superior to a forum. That's because you can take a discussion that went over 30 pages and summarize it down to three essential paragraphs. You can use all the functionality of the wiki in your posts. You can create any type of poll with any voting system you want. When someone comments on a page in your watchlist, you will be notified. You can allow other people to edit and improve your comments (as I do).

For all the reasons above, I strongly recommend not to use an external forum. Not being actively involved in the pages of this WikiProject, I will leave it at that. But if a single person who is actively involved does not want to participate in this forum, that should be reason enough to close it down.--Eloquence*

Related discussion on Wikipedia talk:Village pump as to whether the village pump should be moved to a forum. Angela. 11:31, Aug 18, 2004 (UTC)

I am concerned about not only the lack of record of discussion but the lack of advertisment of its existence or of the poll being taken. But announcing polls is always a weak point. I think we need to use Wikipedia:Community_Portal and Wikipedia:Current surveys more. Rmhermen 14:11, Aug 18, 2004 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you're talking about. It's clearly displayed at the top of Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Aircraft.

As for it being 'disturbing' - how so? It's open for everyone to read. Registration is not required. It's a functional system for viewing posts, rather than a cobbled-together mishmash like the wikipedia talk pages. IRC and IM have no tangible or permanent logs, while this forum cannot be edited or deleted at someone's whim. If a similar system was integrated into the mediawiki, would you call it disturbing then?

As far as user:Rmhermen's concerns, I've not seen him as an active participant of the project either on the talk pages or off. The forum will remain online indefinitely, as the server has daily backups and the forum will remain there whether i retain my interest in wikipedia or not. Having seen the absurdly high level of bickering, infighting, resistance to change, and pointless discussion which goes on, that interest is in fact already beginning to wane. -eric 19:21, Aug 18, 2004 (UTC)

I second what rlandmann and Ericg have said above, that forum is permanent enough, and what's more it provides a far better medium for discussion and opinion-gauging votes, especially on policy issues, than an ordinary Wikipedia talk page. In addition, it's clearly listed at the very top of the WikiProject:Aircraft talk page, so it's not as if it's hard to find or secret. This is not like an ICQ session at all, it's totally open and transparent. Anybody can view it and contribute to it. Impi 08:58, 20 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I have no problems with users discussing things off-Wikipedia. But I have a MAJOR problem when they come back with a policy change based on discussion that occurred, for example, on IRC. That's unacceptable. RickK 22:39, Aug 18, 2004 (UTC)

Talk Squared pages

Has anyone talked at all about the inclusion of Talk^2 (pronounced talk squared) pages?? This means a page that is for discussing a talk page just like a talk page is for discussing an ordinary page. 66.32.255.74 16:43, 25 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Wouldn't a better name be "metatalk" pages? 172.170.82.247 16:44, 24 Oct 2004 (UTC)

I think this would cause real confusion - where would it end?

What is logical about the phrase "metatalk"?? 66.32.243.1 22:58, 26 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Metatalk: talk about talk. Anyway, metatalk would be nothing but confusion in my mind: you'd have this post here in this section and we'd be replying in a Re: Talk Squared pages section in a metatalk page. --Ihope127 15:02, 29 August 2005 (UTC)

Emergency Can we ask explanation of Edits using Talk pages

I asked some body to explain his edits on talk pages but he is not telling me. (He is an admin :S) Do I have right to ask an admin reasons for his edit using talk pages?

Please answer soon bcoz he may revert all changes and lock the page bcoz he is an admin. So please help me by replying soon.

Zain 23:32, 21 Dec 2004 (UTC)

There's almost never a problem with asksing, but there's not necessarily an obligation to reply. --Jerzy(t) 00:10, 2004 Dec 22 (UTC)

Problem was not that he didn't reply. Problem was that he replied by saying He won't explain! Now I have taken a break from edit and Talk And requested for mediation. If you can help me in it. I'll really appreciate it.

Zain 07:04, 22 Dec 2004 (UTC)

It's better to have append comments instead of edit the talk page

Can we do the talk page like comments in forum but linked to the wiki page? I feel it's better.

Indenting policy

The current text about indenting says:

The first contributor is all the way to the left, the next person starts with one colon (:), the next person starts with two colons. Then, when the first contributor responds, they start at the left margin again, and the second and third persons continue to mark themselves with one and two colons respectively. In that way, who is saying what is clear.

That might be a good idea but no one ever does it. Is there any point to keeping this suggestion? I suggest replacing it with:

The first contributor is all the way to the left, the next person starts with one colon (:), the next person starts with two colons. If your comment has more than one paragraph, or if it includes a bulleted or numbered list, you must precede each paragraph or list entry with the appropriate number of colons to keep it properly aligned.

JamesMLane 06:58, 22 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Arabic scribble.

Why is there some arabic scribble at the bottom of the page? It seems someone tried to link to the Arabic version of this article, but failed somewhat. Can anyone fix that? Oscar Evans 11:28, 29 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Comment indenting

• Use indenting to keep the conversation straight: The first contributor is all the way to the left, the next person starts with one colon (:), the next person starts with two colons. Then, when the first contributor responds, they start at the left margin again, and the second and third persons continue to mark themselves with one and two colons respectively. In that way, who is saying what is clear.

This isn't the most effective method of clarifying communication flow. Generally, Wikipedians use colons to indent for responses while starting new discussion points on an uncolonized line. The above guideline doesn't reflect this, which produces bad results. The guideline should suggest a method to increase the clarity of communication rather than the clarity of "who is saying what". Instead of the last line, the following should be: "In that way, who is saying what to whom is clear."

Example:

/* ==Subject heading== */
UserA starts topic. [0:01]

UserB replies. [0:02]

UserA replies to UserB. [0:03]

UserB replies to UserA's reply. [0:04]

UserC replies to UserB's reply. [0:07]

UserC replies to UserA's first reply to UserB. [0:08]

UserA expands on topic. [0:05]

UserB replies. [0:06]

UserC replies. [0:09]

I suggest we model the guideline after the logic of the typical threaded message board. Adraeus 16:00, 18 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Talk templates necessary?

I started a new discussion on another page, very minor really, and I'm not sure what the protocol is here - I've noticed that some pages do have templates indicating the existence of a discussion, although those tend to be where there is major controversy as to how it's written, POV issues, etc. In my case, I'm thinking it's not necessary due to the nature of the question, but I'm not sure if it's "polite" not to. Yes, I'm a newbie. :) Thanks. 67.101.113.10 06 May 2005

Can we get a better example?

Can we write a better example of a talk page in the article? This one is just plain lame Borisblue 2 July 2005 14:04 (UTC)

Signature?

Can someone add a section to this page explaining how to click to add your signature to the end of a "Talk" post. Someone explained this to me but I can't find such a button anywhere. Thanks, --Badagnani

It's the second button fom the right in the group of buttons above the edit pane. lick it and it automatically inserts the following wherever the cursor is: -- 207.200.116.74 18:30, 24 July 2005 (UTC)

Thank you for your help. That's the thing--this was already explained to me, but I still cannot find any such button. The button on the right is labeled "unwatch" and the second from the right is "move." Above that, the link furthest to the right is "log out" and the second from the right is "my contributions." Is this button invisible or is my computer somehow blocking me from seeing it? For now I am using four tildes. Badagnani 18:44, 24 July 2005 (UTC)

Can someone please explain exactly where the signature button is located? It does not show up on my screen. I was told it is the second from the right above the edit window, but which are the buttons located to the left and right of it? Is there any possible reason it wouldn't show up on my screen (or that of any computer I have used to look at the Wikipedia site)? Badagnani 08:21, 6 August 2005 (UTC)

The signature button is in the edit window, second-most from the right. It looks like this. I prefer the em dash '—' as opposed to the double hyphen -- (shudder), but I am appalled that the four tildes '~~~~' is not mentioned anywhere in the Talk help page. I am going to add it. — Mproud 08:15, 14 August 2005 (UTC) Sure enough, I missed the link for signatures. There is no way in hell anyone is going to see that. I think we should roll the signature into this page (or if many people are opposed to that idea, then at least make the link more noticeable and maybe mention it again after the article goes on how to post comments. — Mproud 08:20, 14 August 2005 (UTC)

Holy moly...I see the signature button now but would never have seen noticed in my life if you hadn't given me that graphic file of what to look for. It's so tiny and "design-looking." I've been using this website for months and never even noticed it! The lack of clear description on the "help" pages didn't help, but if there had been a page that showed each of those buttons and what they do, I might have known what/where it was and how to use it. Actually, the more I look at these buttons the more I think they look like decoration. Like the one with a trumpet on it--does that play music? It looks pretty, but it's hard to identify with its use. thanks again. Badagnani 09:14, 14 August 2005 (UTC)

You're absolutely right. The icons aren't as noticeable as they could be. They're awfully small (especially as display sizes get ever larger). and many of the icons look confusing. You're right — there isn't even a line that says "toolbar" or anything. My guess is these buttons were/are optional, but signatures seem fundamental enough where it should be a little easier to figure out.

I don't really dig the text box that provides the captions for the buttons either — I'd much rather prefer a written line below each button. Also. those buttons have that distracting color-fading background that just makes it harder to see. — Mproud 09:23, 14 August 2005 (UTC)

I don't see any of the icons or text mentioned here. What any reader sees depends on the skin selected, the browser being used, and any extensions to the browser. JamesMLane 16:30, 14 August 2005 (UTC)

This was created using the 'Start a new discussion feature', as an example

This was created using the 'Start a new discussion feature', as an example of it.

What is "This" referring to? Badagnani 18:34, 24 July 2005 (UTC)

This section of course. What else could it possibly refer to?

Thought it might be referring to the previous question. I haven't been able to find a "Start a new discussion feature." Badagnani 18:47, 24 July 2005 (UTC)

Post a comment

In the article, they mention a "post a comment" feature when adding on a comment or a new thread. I couldn't find this. Are they referring to the "Start a new discussion" freature (the little plus sign next to the "edit this page" feature)? If someone was to comment/respond to a thread or discussion, would that person use the "edit this page" feature or is there something else that person is "supposed" to click on?

• If you want to comment on a previous thread, go to that area and to the right you'll see a link saying "edit." Click on that and add your comment, with 4 tildes following to identify yourself (signature). Alternatively click the "edit this page" button up top. The plus sign is just used for making a new thread. Does that answer your question? Badagnani 08:04, 6 August 2005 (UTC)

• To answer your question more fully, I think you are right that the "post a comment" and "start a new discussion" are indeed the same feature (the plus sign button). It really isn't clear and it should be made so. Unfortunately, questions on this page aren't always answered clearly and fully. Can someone more knowledgeable please help with this, and if the explanation pages need clarification, fix them? Badagnani 08:16, 6 August 2005 (UTC)

Clean up and rework this page?

Looking over this page again, I think it's deserving of a clean up and quite a bit of reworking. Comments are like the number one thing I didn't know how to do even years after I actively browsed and edited the Wikipedia!

I'll look at this again and maybe start a subpage to discuss ways to rework this page. What do you all think? Is this overzealous? Is the current page not that bad to begin with? — Mproud 08:25, 14 August 2005 (UTC)

New Personnel

I'm new to the Wikipedia Encyclopedia, How do I access my Talk Page ?

If you have an account, it will appear on your top right corner as "my talk". If you don't have an account, register! Borisblue 13:33, 22 October 2005 (UTC)

I guess you can get it here as well:66.112.107.8 (talk · contribs)

Problems Creating Talk pages

I made an edit to his main article Karol Szymanowski, and I'm wanting to explain my reasons on the talk page. There's nothing on the talk page yet, so my entry would be the first. As always, I've done the right thing and added my material and saved it, but I keep on being sent to a wacky non-Wikipedia page and the edit goes nowhere. What's the problem? JackofOz 03:31, 22 October 2005 (UTC)

Worked for me. Try again now that I've created the page.-gadfium 05:33, 22 October 2005 (UTC)

Thanks for that, I've now made my edits. But now exactly the same problem's occurring when I try to create a Talk Page for List of longest-serving members of the Australian House of Representatives. I get a webpage called iQuicksearch.com. Is this something peculiar to my system, or are others having the same problem? JackofOz 13:29, 23 October 2005 (UTC)

You caught yourself an infection with malware. Try http://www.spywareinfo.com/articles/hijacked/ as a start. Femto 14:39, 23 October 2005 (UTC)

Thanks for that. JackofOz 23:48, 23 October 2005 (UTC)

University of Ottawa

heres one of them that states it is the north america's premier university

http://www.schoolfinder.com/schools/profile.asp?ProfileType=University&SchoolCode=uotta08&URL=schoolindex

Toko School

I can't begin to express how great it feels to see a title go from a useless dump site for nonsense into a useable, even great, article. Good stuff, man! - Lucky 6.9 06:07, 31 October 2005 (UTC)

New message annoucement

Does anyone know of a way to "trigger" you have a new message annoucements on pages other than my user talk page? (It doesn't have to be pretty ;-) —Jwanders 01:38, 7 November 2005 (UTC)

don't indent??

• Use coherent formatting
  • Don't indent text.

Huh?? Obviously we're supposed to indent. Can someone clarify what this is trying to say? — Omegatron 01:27, 22 November 2005 (UTC)

I've deleted it, along with another instruction that doesn't seem to apply. Melchoir 19:52, 4 December 2005 (UTC)

After talking with its author, I've restored and clarified the instruction in question. Melchoir 09:03, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

Question: Edit Summary on Talk Pages

What is the rule for an edit summary on a talk page, for example, when responding to another users comment? I could not find any information regarding that on this article. I realized that when adding a "new discussion" to a talk page no edit summary is required, however, I am asking about editing a section on a talk page, and adding my response. Thanks. --Austin Matthews 20:01, 1 December 2005 (UTC)

Deleting vandal/linkspammer comments

I would like to remove comments left on my talk page a couple weeks ago by 166.165.243.38, in particular the external link.

This user (also known as 166.165.245.16, 166.165.254.216, 166.165.254.6, 166.165.245.49, 166.165.243.85, 166.165.252.25, and 166.165.246.180) repeatedly added the video link to the September 11, 2001 attacks article and it was reverted each time, by many different editors. I'm merely keeping the article on my watchlist, so it doesn't get overwhelmed with conspiracies and try to keep it accurate and WP:NPOV (otherwise, it would reflect poorly on Wikipedia).

While I'm fairly sure that it's okay to at least remove the link from my talk page, I want to run it by others first. Thanks. --Aude 01:30, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

Posting format

I have been finding issues with the use of indentation to separate posts. One problem is that we also use indentation for block quotes, and so it becomes hard to read to tell if something is a block quote or a different post. (This can be partially overcome by using double-indents for block quotes in talk pages, and only single indents for separating posts.) If the block quote is of heavily formatted text, it becomes even more difficult to separate postings from block quotes.

Another issue occurs when people display examples of proposed tables, especially if they're centered. Again, the separation between posts is difficult, if not impossible to find.

Another issue with indentation is that it encourages fisking, where somebody will interleave their posts within another author's post. It then becomes difficult to tell whether something like this is two posts by two different authors, or multiple posts:

Hello, world!

Hello, whoever you are.

This is the cannonical output for one's first program in a given language.

I think you mean "canonical".

It was started by Kernighan and Ritchie in C.

Who uses C anymore?

-- RandomPoster 00:00, 1 January 1970 (UTC)

So I'd like to propose an alternate posting format: instead of using indentation to separate posts, use a marker to separate the posts instead.

Thus, instead of:

Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah

Yak, yak, yak, yak, yak, yak, yak, yak

Yada, yada, yada, yada, yada, yada, yada, yada

Spoon! Spoon! Spoon! Spoon! Spoon! Spoon! Spoon! Spoon!

or

Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah

Yak, yak, yak, yak, yak, yak, yak, yak

Yada, yada, yada, yada, yada, yada, yada, yada

Spoon! Spoon! Spoon! Spoon! Spoon! Spoon! Spoon! Spoon!

we'd use:

Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah

————

Yak, yak, yak, yak, yak, yak, yak, yak

————

Yada, yada, yada, yada, yada, yada, yada, yada

————

Spoon! Spoon! Spoon! Spoon! Spoon! Spoon! Spoon! Spoon!

Does this seem like a good idea? If not, why not?

— DLJessup (talk) 21:03, 23 December 2005 (UTC)

I'm not sure what your suggestion will do to help. The use of headings generally separates new posts, with all the indented posts as responses. How far indented the subsequent responding posts are tells me who's responding to who. With what you're suggesting, how do we tell if "Yada yada yada" is responding to "yak yak yak" or "blah blah blah"? Maybe in the edit summary, we should specify "response to DLJessup" or whoever we're responding to. --Aude 04:15, 28 December 2005 (UTC)

Here's the thing: I've rarely encountered situations in which true "tree indentation" was used in the talk pages. At best, I see people consistently indenting with each person responding to the previous poster, until the indentation gets about six levels deep, then it resets back to 0 indentation. Tree indentation only works when all the posters understand and use tree indentation.

Not using tree indentation is not just a problem for newbies, either. When I first started working on Wikipedia, this page included the following text:

• Use indenting to keep the conversation straight

  The first contributor is all the way to the left, the next person starts with one colon (:), the next person starts with two colons. Then, when the first contributor responds, they start at the left margin again, and the second and third persons continue to mark themselves with one and two colons respectively. In that way, who is saying what is clear.

As far as your question of "How do we tell if 'Yada yada yada' is responding to 'yak yak yak' or 'blah blah blah'?" I've found that 9 times out of 10, I'm responding to the last message in a thread. When I'm not responding to the last message in a thread, I simply quote who and what I'm responding to. Heck, if you're reading this message, you'll see that I need to quote part of your message even though you're the most recent poster.

Tree indentation doesn't handle the situation in which somebody responds to two different previous posts in the same message (which I've seen as well); you're forced back to mentioning who you're responding to in your post and/or quoting from their messages.

Let me give you some examples where I think marker separation might be useful:

• Template talk:USParty. (In addition to the obvious cases in which possible revisions to the template are previewed, check out the fourth post in "What minor parties to include?" where the indentation gets screwed up when the message includes a numbered list.)
• Talk:U.S. presidential election (Note how, at the top, before the first topic header, horizontal rules are used to separate posts and how there's a heavy use of tables there.)

— DLJessup (talk) 08:36, 28 December 2005 (UTC)

?

This talk page to e frank is not a very good one i liked the new main page one --Madcowpoo 17:17, 2 January 2006 (UTC)

WP:TP#Etiquette is in conflict with WP:BAN#Enforcement

I was wondering if we could avoid future problems by adding the following to the etiquette section...

Edits on user talk pages made by sockpuppets or meatpuppets of banned users should be followed with a comment stating that they have been banned along with proof unless the user has stated that they do not mind allowing other users to revert third party comments at will.

karmafist 21:16, 23 January 2006 (UTC)

merge it with a nonexsistant aricle?

well, why merge it with an article that doesnt exsist? (sorry if the first "s" in "exsist" isnt there, I'm not that good at speling.) if you look at the banner at the top that says " It has been suggested that this article or section be merged with Help:Talk page. the "help:talk page" is a red link! why merge with something that isnt there?

Apparently it wants to add the Wikipedia: prefix to it. TimBentley 04:28, 30 January 2006 (UTC)

This can be fixed by replacing {{merge|Help:Talk page}} with {{subst:merge|Help:Talk page}}, save, and then remove the wrong prefix. I suppose the merge template isn't changed very often, so it would be all right to subst: it. --Eddi (Talk) 13:20, 30 January 2006 (UTC)

Editing the No talk page template.

People are emailing HelpDesk-l because they don't understand the message that comes up when they're the first to edit a talk page: "Wikipedia does not have a Talk page called foo. Please search for foo in Wikipedia before creating the page, to check for alternate spellings. To start the page, type in the box below." Will someone who knows where this template is, please remove the 2nd quoted sentence. -- Jeandré, 2006-02-10t10:52z, 2006-04-24t12:19z