Ella Orr Campbell has been nominated for Did You Know

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Courtesy note

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I mentioned you here. Tony (talk) 02:24, 4 July 2015 (UTC)Reply

This Month in GLAM: June 2015

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Headlines

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Books and Bytes - Issue 12

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  The Wikipedia Library

Books & Bytes
Issue 12, May-June 2015
by The Interior (talk · contribs), Ocaasi (talk · contribs), Sadads (talk · contribs), Nikkimaria (talk · contribs)

  • New donations - Taylor & Francis, Science, and three new French-language resources
  • Expansion into new languages, including French, Finnish, Turkish, and Farsi
  • Spotlight: New partners for the Visiting Scholar program
  • American Library Association Annual meeting in San Francisco

Read the full newsletter

The Interior 15:23, 16 July 2015 (UTC)Reply

Correction to Selfie Stick- help needed https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Selfie_stick

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I respectfully need your help in doing .... I have a conflict of interest with this edit as my father is the inventor of the Quik Pod. I posted a correction to the page because it is factually incorrect as it states the following, in fact my father's patent that was applied for in 2005 references mobile phone use. It launched in 2006 in the USA at photo retail stores including Ritz Camera, B&H photo and J&R photo and was widely reported in the media, references listed below.

It is erroneously reported that the first phone holding rod did not appear in the US until 2011. Quik Pod launched in the US market in 2006, it was designed for cell phones and point & shoot cameras.

Incorrect: Phone-holding rods have been available in the United States since at least 2011, with an iStabilizer-branded monopod going on sale in 2012.[10]

Correct: Phone-holding rods have been available in the United States since at least 2006, with a Quik Pod branded monopod going on sale in 2006.

References: http://www.popgadget.net/2006/12/quick_photos_wi.php (2006) http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/09/technology/09pogue-email.html?pagewanted=print&_r=0 (New York Times 2007) http://www.oprah.com/gift/Quik-Pod?editors_pick_id=34543 (Oprah 2008)

MissKidStuff (talk) 14:29, 29 July 2015 (UTC)Reply

Hi MissKidStuff, I've now worked in those three footnotes you've provided as well as used the NY Times one to explain a bit more about the notable design features. I also added in a google-trends reference to explain the origin of the word 'selfie-stick' as a catchall for the type of device. I hope that helps. Here's the diff of the edit: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Selfie_stick&type=revision&diff=673649965&oldid=673433652 Wittylama 15:51, 29 July 2015 (UTC)Reply

VisualEditor News #4—2015

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Read this in another languageLocal subscription listSubscribe to the multilingual edition

 
Did you know?

You can add quotations marks before and after a title or phrase with a single click.

Select the relevant text. Find the correct quotations marks in the special character inserter tool (marked as Ω in the toolbar).

 


Click the button. VisualEditor will add the quotation marks on either side of the text you selected.

 


You can read and help translate the user guide, which has more information about how to use VisualEditor.

Since the last newsletter, the Editing Team have been working on mobile phone support. They have fixed many bugs and improved language support. They post weekly status reports on mediawiki.org. Their workboard is available in Phabricator. Their current priorities are improving language support and functionality on mobile devices.

Wikimania

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The team attended Wikimania 2015 in Mexico City. There they participated in the Hackathon and met with individuals and groups of users. They also made several presentations about VisualEditor and the future of editing.

Following Wikimania, we announced winners for the VisualEditor 2015 Translathon. Our thanks and congratulations to users Halan-tul, Renessaince, जनक राज भट्ट (Janak Bhatta), Vahe Gharakhanyan, Warrakkk, and Eduardogobi.

For interface messages (translated at translatewiki.net), we saw the initiative affecting 42 languages. The average progress in translations across all languages was 56.5% before the translathon, and 78.2% after (+21.7%). In particular, Sakha improved from 12.2% to 94.2%; Brazilian Portuguese went from 50.6% to 100%; Taraškievica went from 44.9% to 85.3%; Doteli went from 1.3% to 41.2%. Also, while 1.7% of the messages were outdated across all languages before the translathon, the percentage dropped to 0.8% afterwards (-0.9%).

For documentation messages (on mediawiki.org), we saw the initiative affecting 24 languages. The average progress in translations across all languages was 26.6% before translathon, and 46.9% after (+20.3%).  There were particularly notable achievements for three languages. Armenian improved from 1% to 99%; Swedish, from 21% to 99%, and Brazilian Portuguese, from 34% to 83%. Outdated translations across all languages were reduced from 8.4% before translathon to 4.8% afterwards (-3.6%).

We published some graphs showing the effect of the event on the Translathon page.   Thank you to the translators for participating and the translatewiki.net staff for facilitating this initiative.

Recent improvements

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Auto-fill features for citations can be enabled on each Wikipedia. The tool uses the citoid service to convert a URL or DOI into a pre-filled, pre-formatted bibliographic citation. You can see an animated GIF of the quick, simple process at mediawiki.org. So far, about a dozen Wikipedias have enabled the auto-citation tool. To enable it for your wiki, follow the instructions at mediawiki.org.

Your wiki can customize the first section of the special character inserter in VisualEditor. Please follow the instructions at mediawiki.org to put the characters you want at the top. 

In other changes, if you need to fill in a CAPTCHA and get it wrong, then you can click to get a new one to complete. VisualEditor can now display and edit Vega-based graphs. If you use the Monobook skin, VisualEditor's appearance is now more consistent with other software.  

Future changes

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The team will be changing the appearance of selected links inside VisualEditor. The purpose is to make it easy to see whether your cursor is inside or outside the link. When you select a link, the link label (the words shown on the page) will be enclosed in a faint box. If you place your cursor inside the box, then your changes to the link label will be part of the link. If you place your cursor outside the box, then it will not. This will make it easy to know when new characters will be added to the link and when they will not.

On the English Wikipedia, 10% of newly created accounts are now offered both the visual and the wikitext editors. A recent controlled trial showed no significant difference in survival or productivity for new users in the short term. New users with access to VisualEditor were very slightly less likely to produce results that needed reverting. You can learn more about this by watching a video of the July 2015 Wikimedia Research Showcase. The proportion of new accounts with access to both editing environments will be gradually increased over time. Eventually all new users have the choice between the two editing environments.

Let's work together

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  • Share your ideas and ask questions at Wikipedia:VisualEditor/Feedback.
  • Can you read and type in Korean or Japanese? Language engineer David Chan needs people who know which tools people use to type in some languages. If you speak Japanese or Korean, you can help him test support for these languages. Please see the instructions at mw:VisualEditor/IME Testing#What to test if you can help.
  • If your wiki would like VisualEditor enabled on another namespace, you can file a request in Phabricator. Please include a link to a community discussion about the requested change.
  • Please file requests for language-appropriate "Bold" and "Italic" icons for the styling menu in Phabricator.
  • The design research team wants to see how real editors work. Please sign up for their research program.
  • The weekly task triage meetings continue to be open to volunteers, usually on Tuesdays at 12:00 (noon) PDT (19:00 UTC). Learn how to join the meetings and how to nominate bugs at mw:VisualEditor/Weekly triage meetings. You do not need to attend the meeting to nominate a bug for consideration as a Q1 blocker, though. Instead, go to Phabricator and "associate" the main VisualEditor project with the bug.

If you aren't reading this in your favorite language, then please help us with translations! Subscribe to the Translators mailing list or contact Elitre directly, so that she can notify you when the next issue is ready. Thank you! Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 00:01, 8 August 2015 (UTC)Reply

WestConnex

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While I admit I was frustrated when you moved all my Cumberland Plan content out of the WestConnex article, your suggestion that I start a new page set off a bit of a chain reaction, resulting in County of Cumberland planning scheme, Sydney Region Outline Plan and Sydney Into Its Third Century. So thanks for that. Interested to get your thoughts on the articles some time if you have a moment. Mqst north (talk) 13:54, 9 August 2015 (UTC)Reply

Fascinating work Mqst north! I'd wanted to have the Cumberland plan in WP for a long time, but never got around to it. Sorry for removing all the content from WestConnex, but it really was a bit overwhelming for that article. Rather, the Cumberland plan deserves to be mentioned (and linked to) from all the different articles about Sydney's infrastructure. To be honest, I've seen a few editors appear over the years who have a focus on 'fixing' articles about government projects who are clearly working directly either for the agency (e.g. RTA/RMS) or the political party currently in government. They try to whitewash the sections about criticism of public-private-partnerships, or changing the tone of the article about the current govt's latest public transport plan to being 'done' rather than 'proposed' etc. etc. So, my alarm bells went off when I saw a new username greatly reworking the WestConnex article. I don't have time/connectivity at the moment to fully investigate the new articles you've created, but I'll watchlist them and keep an eye out. As a general suggestion, I'd recommend looking at the other sydney-transport articles and see how these new articles could be linked in to them. More inbound links to new articles mean that more people discover them, and therefore more editors are likely to help improve and integrate them to the wider encyclopedia. All the best, Wittylama 17:55, 9 August 2015 (UTC)Reply

This Month in GLAM: July 2015

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Headlines

To assist with preparing the newsletter, please visit the newsroom. Past editions may be viewed here.

@Wittylama: I was wondering if you could take a look at Commons:User talk:Jed#The Feast of the Rejoicing of the Law at the Synagogue in Leghorn, Italy - Google Art Project. The Synagogue was not in Leghorn but in Livorno. Thank you for your time. Lotje (talk) 16:39, 1 September 2015 (UTC)Reply

Thanks for thinking of me Lotje. I've now responded over on that page. Wittylama 11:42, 2 September 2015 (UTC)Reply

This Month in GLAM: August 2015

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Headlines


  • UK report: QRpedia AWOL; RSC holds another edit-a-thon
  • Special story: New toolkit on Photo Events documents best practices, strategies and more
  • Open Access report: Wikipedia as an amplyfier; horse face recognition, rhythm perception, fossil rodent teeth
  • Wikidata report: Wikidata this month
  • Calendar: September's GLAM events



To assist with preparing the newsletter, please visit the newsroom. Past editions may be viewed here.

Wikidata weekly summary #175

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Help us improve wikimeets by filling in the UK Wikimeet survey!

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Hello! I'm running a survey to identify the best way to notify Wikimedians about upcoming UK wikimeets (informal, in-person social meetings of Wikimedians), and to see if we can improve UK wikimeets to make them accessible and attractive to more editors and readers. All questions are optional, and it will take about 10 minutes to complete. Please fill it in at:

https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/JJMNVVD

Thanks! Mike Peel (talk) 18:13, 20 September 2015 (UTC)Reply

Art280

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Hi Wittylama. When we talked about this project in the flight to Mexico, you mentioned you wanted articles about those works of arts in every possible Wikipedia version, and that Europeana will provide a brief description and hi-res images. From the informations I have, the images from Romania will be licensed CC-BY-NC-ND, and we will not be the only country in that situation. While we could just ignore it, based on c:Commons:When_to_use_the_PD-Art_tag, I don't think this would be a good move for the relations with the national partners. What do you think the best course of action would be? Thanks, Strainu (talk) 15:53, 22 September 2015 (UTC)Reply

Wikidata weekly summary #176

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Your involvement in Wiki Loves Open Data

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Hi Wittylama,

I noticed that Europeana is involved in the Wiki Loves Open Data initiative. Hence, I would like to draw your attention to the StrepHit IEG proposal: one of its goals is to invite Open Data organizations to donate their data through a standard procedure (cf. task T10.4 and this section).

Could you please have a look at the proposal? It would be ideal if you could endorse and/or join it via the blue buttons.

Looking forward to hearing back from you.

Cheers,

--Hjfocs (talk) 09:48, 23 September 2015 (UTC)Reply

Wikidata weekly summary #177

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Books and Bytes - Issue 13

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  The Wikipedia Library

Books & Bytes
Issue 13, August-September 2015
by The Interior (talk · contribs), Ocaasi (talk · contribs), Sadads (talk · contribs), Nikkimaria (talk · contribs)

  • New donations - EBSCO, IMF, more newspaper archives, and Arabic resources
  • Expansion into new languages, including Viet and Catalan
  • Spotlight: Elsevier partnership garners controversy, dialogue
  • Conferences: PKP, IFLA, upcoming events

Read the full newsletter

The Interior via MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 16:30, 1 October 2015 (UTC)Reply

Wikidata weekly summary #178

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VisualEditor update

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This note is only delivered to English Wikipedia subscribers of the visual editor's newsletter.

The location of the visual editor's preference has been changed from the "Beta" tab to the "Editing" section of your preferences on this wiki. The setting now says Temporarily disable the visual editor while it is in beta. This aligns en.wiki with almost all the other WMF wikis; it doesn’t mean the visual editor is complete, or that it is no longer “in beta phase” though.

This action has not changed anything else for editors: it still honours editors’ previous choices about having it on or off; logged-out users continue to only have access to wikitext; the “Edit” tab is still after the “Edit source” one. You can learn more at the visual editor’s talk page.

We don’t expect this to cause any glitches, but in case your account no longer has the settings that you want, please accept our apologies and correct it in the Editing tab of Special:Preferences. Thank you for your attention, Elitre (WMF) -16:32, 7 October 2015 (UTC)Reply

This Month in GLAM: September 2015

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Headlines

To assist with preparing the newsletter, please visit the newsroom. Past editions may be viewed here.

Wikidata weekly summary #179

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Wikidata weekly summary #180

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Wikidata weekly summary #181

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WikiProject X Newsletter • Issue 5

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Newsletter • October 2015

Hello there! Happy to be writing this newsletter once more. This month:

We did it!

In July, we launched five pilot WikiProjects: WikiProjects Cannabis, Evolutionary Biology, Ghana, Hampshire, and Women's Health. We also use the new design, named "WPX UI," on WikiProject Women in Technology, Women in Red, WikiProject Occupational Safety and Health. We are currently looking for projects for the next round of testing. If you are interested, please sign up on the Pilots page.

Shortly after our launch we presented at Wikimania 2015. Our slides are on Wikimedia Commons.

Then after all that work, we went through the process of figuring out whether we accomplished our goal. We reached out to participants on the redesigned WikiProjects, and we asked them to complete a survey. (If you filled out your survey—thank you!) While there are still some issues with the WikiProject tools and the new design, there appears to be general satisfaction (at least among those who responded). The results of the survey and more are documented in our grant report filed with the Wikimedia Foundation.

The work continues!

There is more work that needs to be done, so we have applied for a renewal of our grant. Comments on the proposal are welcome. We would like to improve what we have already started on the English Wikipedia and to also expand to Wikimedia Commons and Wikidata. Why those? Because they are multilingual projects and because there needs to be better coordination across Wikimedia projects. More details are available in the renewal proposal.

How can the Wikimedia Foundation support WikiProjects?

The Wikimedia Developer Summit will be held in San Francisco in January 2016. The recently established Community Tech team at the Wikimedia Foundation is interested in investigating what technical support they can provide for WikiProjects, i.e., support beyond just templates and bots. I have plenty of opinions myself, but I want to hear what you think. The session is being planned on Phabricator, the Wikimedia bug tracker. If you are not familiar with Phabricator, you can log in with your Wikipedia username and password through the "Login or Register: MediaWiki" button on the login page. Your feedback can help make editing Wikipedia a better experience.


Until next time,

Harej (talk) 09:03, 26 October 2015 (UTC)Reply

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Hi. Thank you for your recent edits. Wikipedia appreciates your help. We noticed though that when you edited Millennium celebrations, you added links pointing to the disambiguation pages Doomsday and Maori. Such links are almost always unintended, since a disambiguation page is merely a list of "Did you mean..." article titles. Read the FAQ • Join us at the DPL WikiProject.

It's OK to remove this message. Also, to stop receiving these messages, follow these opt-out instructions. Thanks, DPL bot (talk) 11:34, 27 October 2015 (UTC)Reply

VisualEditor News #5—2015

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Read this in another languageSubscription list for this multilingual newsletter

 
Did you know?
You can use the visual editor on smartphones and tablets.

 

Click the pencil icon to open the editor for a page. Inside that, use the gear menu in the upper right corner to "Switch to visual editing".

The editing button will remember which editing environment you used last time, and give you the same one next time. The desktop site will be switching to a system similar to this one in the coming months.

You can read and help translate the user guide, which has more information about how to use the visual editor.

Since the last newsletter, the VisualEditor Team has fixed many bugs, added new features, and made some small design changes. They post weekly status reports on mediawiki.org. Their workboard is available in Phabricator. Their current priorities are improving support for languages like Japanese and Arabic, making it easier to edit on mobile devices, and providing rich-media tools for formulæ, charts, galleries and uploading.

Recent improvements

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Educational features: The first time you use the visual editor, it now draws your attention to the Link and ⧼visualeditor-toolbar-cite-label⧽ tools. When you click on the tools, it explains why you should use them. (T108620) Alongside this, the welcome message for new users has been simplified to make editing more welcoming. (T112354) More in-software educational features are planned.

Links:  It is now easier to understand when you are adding text to a link and when you are typing plain text next to it. (T74108T91285) The editor now fully supports ISBN, PMID or RFC numbers. (T109498, T110347, T63558)  These "magic links" use a custom link editing tool.

Uploads:  Registered editors can now upload images and other media to Commons while editing. Click the new tab in the "Insert Images and media" tool. You will be guided through the process without having to leave your edit. At the end, the image will be inserted. This tool is limited to one file at a time, owned by the user, and licensed under Commons's standard license. For more complex situations, the tool links to more advanced upload tools. You can also drag the image into the editor. This will be available in the wikitext editor later.

Mobile:  Previously, the visual editor was available on the mobile Wikipedia site only on tablets. Now, editors can use the visual editor on any size of device. (T85630)  Edit conflicts were previously broken on the mobile website. Edit conflicts can now be resolved in both wikitext and visual editors. (T111894) Sometimes templates and similar items could not be deleted on the mobile website. Selecting them caused the on-screen keyboard to hide with some browsers. Now there is a new "Delete" button, so that these things can be removed if the keyboard hides. (T62110) You can also edit table cells in mobile now.

Rich editing tools:  You can now add and edit sheet music in the visual editor. (T112925)  There are separate tabs for advanced options, such as MIDI and Ogg audio files. (T114227 and T113354)  When editing formulæ and other blocks, errors are shown as you edit. It is also possible to edit some types of graphs; adding new ones, and support for new types, will be coming.

On the English Wikipedia, the visual editor is now automatically available to anyone who creates an account. The preference switch was moved to the normal location, under Special:Preferences.

Future changes

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You will soon be able to switch from the wikitext to the visual editor after you start editing. (T49779) Previously, you could only switch from the visual editor to the wikitext editor. Bi-directional switching will make possible a single edit tab. (T102398) This project will combine the "Edit" and "Edit source" tabs into a single "Edit" tab, similar to the system already used on the mobile website. The "Edit" tab will open whichever editing environment you used last time.

Let's work together

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If you can't read this in your favorite language, then please help us with translations! Subscribe to the Translators mailing list or contact us directly, so that we can notify you when the next issue is ready. Thank you!

Whatamidoing (WMF) 04:16, 30 October 2015 (UTC)Reply

Wikidata weekly summary #182

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Wikidata weekly summary #183

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This Month in GLAM: October 2015

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Headlines

To assist with preparing the newsletter, please visit the newsroom. Past editions may be viewed here.

Wikidata weekly summary #184

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Wikidata weekly summary #185

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Wikidata weekly summary #114

Mail

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Hello, Wittylama. Please check your email; you've got mail!
It may take a few minutes from the time the email is sent for it to show up in your inbox. You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{You've got mail}} or {{ygm}} template.Gereon K. (talk) 19:38, 24 November 2015 (UTC)Reply

Personal acquaintances: invitation

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Hello Wittylama, On the German-language Wikipedia the community has introduced a system for several years in what users conform that they have met other users in real life. This system was created to create more trust between users and thus creating a better and nicer place to work on the wiki. On the German-language Wikipedia it is a huge success and I translated a large part of this tool in English so that also users from other Wikipedias can use it. It only makes sense to sign up into the system if you have met at least three other users in person. You can sign up for the tool, after three other users confirm they have met you, you can confirm other users yourself. About this system, more information can be found at Wikipedia:Personal acquaintances. In the green section are the instructions. On Wikipedia:Personal acquaintances/Participants will grow a list of participants who are active in the English speaking parts of the world. It would be great if would you sign up! :-) Greetings - Romaine (talk) 14:45, 29 November 2015 (UTC)Reply

PS: On the German-language Wikipedia, everything is translated into English, but you need perhaps to set your preferences on English to show it in this language. Romaine (talk) 14:45, 29 November 2015 (UTC)Reply

Wikidata weekly summary #186

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Wikidata weekly summary #187

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Books and Bytes - Issue 14

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  The Wikipedia Library

Books & Bytes
Issue 14, October-November 2015
by The Interior (talk · contribs), Ocaasi (talk · contribs), Sadads (talk · contribs), Nikkimaria (talk · contribs)

  • New donations - Gale, Brill, plus Finnish and Farsi resources
  • Open Access Week recap, and DOIs, Wikipedia, and scholarly citations
  • Spotlight: 1Lib1Ref - a citation drive for librarians

Read the full newsletter

The Interior, via MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 19:12, 10 December 2015 (UTC)Reply

This Month in GLAM: November 2015

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Headlines

To assist with preparing the newsletter, please visit the newsroom. Past editions may be viewed here.

Wikidata weekly summary #188

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Wikidata weekly summary #189

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Wikidata weekly summary #186

Best wishes for the holidays...

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  Season's Greetings
Wishing you and yours a Happy Holiday Season, and all best wishes for the New Year! Adoration of the Shepherds (Poussin) is my Wiki-Christmas card to all for this year. Johnbod (talk) 10:26, 22 December 2015 (UTC)Reply

VisualEditor News #6—2015

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Read this in another languageSubscription list

 
Did you know?

A new, simpler system for editing will offer a single Edit button. Once the page has opened, you can switch back and forth between visual and wikitext editing.

 
If you prefer having separate edit buttons, then you can set that option in your preferences, either in a pop-up dialog the next time you open the visual editor, or by going to Special:Preferences and choosing the setting that you want:
 

The current plan is for the default setting to have the Edit button open the editing environment you used most recently.

You can read and help translate the user guide, which has more information about how to use the visual editor.

Since the last newsletter, the VisualEditor Team has fixed many bugs and expanded the mathematics formula tool. Their workboard is available in Phabricator. Their current priorities are improving support for languages such as Japanese and Arabic, and providing rich-media tools for formulæ, charts, galleries and uploading.

Recent improvements

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You can switch from the wikitext editor to the visual editor after you start editing.

The LaTeX mathematics formula editor has been significantly expanded. (T118616) You can see the formula as you change the LaTeX code. You can click buttons to insert the correct LaTeX code for many symbols.

Future changes

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The single edit tab project will combine the "Edit" and "Edit source" tabs into a single "Edit" tab, like the system already used on the mobile website. (T102398) Initially, the "Edit" tab will open whichever editing environment you used last time. Your last editing choice will be stored as a cookie for logged-out users and as an account preference for logged-in editors. Logged-in editors will be able to set a default editor in the Editing tab of Special:Preferences in the drop-down menu about "Editing mode:".

The visual editor will be offered to all editors at the following Wikipedias in early 2016: Amharic, Buginese, Min Dong, Cree, Manx, Hakka, Armenian, Georgian, Pontic, Serbo-Croatian, Tigrinya, Mingrelian, Zhuang, and Min Nan. (T116523) Please post your comments and the language(s) that you tested at the feedback thread on mediawiki.org. The developers would like to know how well it works. Please tell them what kind of computer, web browser, and keyboard you are using.

In 2016, the feedback pages for the visual editor on many Wikipedias will be redirected to mediawiki.org. (T92661)

Testing opportunities

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  • Please try the new system for the single edit tab on test2.wikipedia.org. You can edit while logged out to see how it works for logged-out editors, or you can create a separate account to be able to set your account's preferences. Please share your thoughts about the single edit tab system at the feedback topic on mediawiki.org or sign up for formal user research (type "single edit tab" in the question about other areas you're interested in). The new system has not been finalized, and your feedback can affect the outcome. The team particularly wants your thoughts about the options in Special:Preferences. The current choices in Special:Preferences are:
    • Remember my last editor,
    • Always give me the visual editor if possible, 
    • Always give me the source editor, and 
    • Show me both editor tabs.  (This is the current state for people using the visual editor. None of these options will be visible if you have disabled the visual editor in your preferences at that wiki.)
  • Can you read and type in Korean or Japanese? Language engineer David Chan needs people who know which tools people use to type in some languages. If you speak Japanese or Korean, you can help him test support for these languages. Please see the instructions at mw:VisualEditor/IME Testing#What to test if you can help, and report it on Phabricator (Korean - Japanese) or on Wikipedia (Korean - Japanese).

If you aren't reading this in your favorite language, then please help us with translations! Subscribe to the Translators mailing list or contact us directly, so that we can notify you when the next issue is ready. Thank you!

Whatamidoing (WMF), 00:54, 24 December 2015 (UTC)Reply

Wikidata weekly summary #190

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Wikidata weekly summary #186

2017 Star Trek

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Hello, I forgot to do it earlier but i wanted to thank you for creating the 2017 star trek thing. You beat me to it. But still cheers to watching Star Trek!!

The Winter of Steppes (talk) 19:38, 5 January 2016 (UTC)Reply

Thanks The Winter of Steppes :-) I like to try and catch topics that I know WILL be notable in the future but for which there is limited information at the moment. As a big-time ST fan, I was hugely excited to read the news of the new show. All I can hope for now is they don't go and create some generic space-based explosion-fest, losing the soul of ST in the process... Wittylama 21:46, 5 January 2016 (UTC)Reply
High five wittylama I like ST so much, i swear to God, it was the first tv show i was serious in watching. I basically "grew up" on watching re-runs. I also was excited toooo!~!~ Hopefully it won't go the way of JJ Abrams!.... That was decently good, but took a part of my soul:) The Winter of Steppes (talk) 21:57, 5 January 2016 (UTC)Reply

Wikidata weekly summary #191

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This Month in GLAM: December 2015

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Headlines

To assist with preparing the newsletter, please visit the newsroom. Past editions may be viewed here.

Help decide the future of Wikimania

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The Wikimedia Foundation is currently running a consultation on the value and planning process of Wikimania, and is open until 18 January 2016. The goals are to (1) build a shared understanding of the value of Wikimania to help guide conference planning and evaluation, and (2) gather broad community input on what new form(s) Wikimania could take (starting in 2018).

After reviewing the consultation, we'd like to hear your feedback on on this survey.

In addition, feel free to share any personal experiences you have had at at a Wikimedia movement conference, including Wikimania. We plan to compile and share back outcomes from this consultation in February.

With thanks,

I JethroBT (WMF) (talk), from Community Resources 21:32, 13 January 2016 (UTC)Reply

Alan RIckman

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Sorry to bother you, I hope you don't mind that I have placed your citation, in the Alan Rickman Talk page which confirms Alan's death, in a new section which includes credible sources, if there is an issue please let me know and I will revert my edit, regards.Twobells (talk) 13:12, 14 January 2016 (UTC)Reply

Wikidata weekly summary #192

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WikiProject X Newsletter • Issue 6

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Newsletter • January 2016

Hello there! Happy to be writing this newsletter once more. This month:

What comes next

Some good news: the Wikimedia Foundation has renewed WikiProject X. This means we can continue focusing on making WikiProjects better.

During our first round of work, we created a prototype WikiProject based on two ideas: (1) WikiProjects should clearly present things for people to do, and (2) The content of WikiProjects should be automated as much as possible. We launched pilots, and for the most part it works. But this approach will not work for the long term. While it makes certain aspects of running a WikiProject easier, it makes the maintenance aspects harder.

We are working on a major overhaul that will address these issues. New features will include:

  • Creating WikiProjects by simply filling out a form, choosing which reports you want to generate for your project. This will work with existing bots in addition to the Reports Bot reports. (Of course, you can also have sections curated by humans.)
  • One-click button to join a WikiProject, with optional notifications.
  • Be able to define your WikiProject's scope within the WikiProject itself by listing relevant pages and categories, eliminating the need to tag every talk page with a banner. (You will still be allowed to do that, of course. It just won't be required.)

The end goal is a collaboration tool that can be used by WikiProjects but also by any edit-a-thon or group of people that want to coordinate on improving articles. Though implemented as an extension, the underlying content will be wikitext, meaning that you can continue to use categories, templates, and other features as you normally would.

This will take a lot of work, and we are just getting started. What would you like to see? I invite you to discuss on our talk page.


Until next time,

Harej (talk) 02:53, 20 January 2016 (UTC)Reply