Wikibooks:Reading room/General

Welcome to the General reading room. On this page, Wikibookians are free to talk about the Wikibooks project in general. For proposals for improving Wikibooks, see the Proposals reading room.

Last days to vote on the Charter for the Universal Code of Conduct Coordinating Committee

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Hello all,

I am reaching out to you today to remind you that the voting period for the Universal Code of Conduct Coordinating Committee (U4C) charter will close on 2 February 2024. Community members may cast their vote and provide comments about the charter via SecurePoll. Those of you who voiced your opinions during the development of the UCoC Enforcement Guidelines will find this process familiar.

The current version of the U4C charter is on Meta-wiki with translations available.

Read the charter, go vote and share this note with others in your community. I can confidently say the U4C Building Committee looks forward to your participation.

On behalf of the UCoC Project team,

RamzyM (WMF) 16:59, 31 January 2024 (UTC)

@RamzyM (WMF): Just wondering if this is only an announcement or whether I can ask you questions Ottawahitech (discuss • contribs) 21:18, 27 February 2024 (UTC)

Report of the U4C Charter ratification and U4C Call for Candidates now available

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Hello all,

I am writing to you today with two important pieces of information. First, the report of the comments from the Universal Code of Conduct Coordinating Committee (U4C) Charter ratification is now available. Secondly, the call for candidates for the U4C is open now through April 1, 2024.

The Universal Code of Conduct Coordinating Committee (U4C) is a global group dedicated to providing an equitable and consistent implementation of the UCoC. Community members are invited to submit their applications for the U4C. For more information and the responsibilities of the U4C, please review the U4C Charter.

Per the charter, there are 16 seats on the U4C: eight community-at-large seats and eight regional seats to ensure the U4C represents the diversity of the movement.

Read more and submit your application on Meta-wiki.

On behalf of the UCoC project team,

RamzyM (WMF) 16:24, 5 March 2024 (UTC)

Hi @RamzyM (WMF). I am wondering if the staff at the Wikimedia foundation is paying any attention to discussions happening about the Universal Code of Conduct happening outside of Meta, such as https://foundation.wikimedia.org/wiki/Policy_talk:Universal_Code_of_Conduct?

I believe it is important to pay attention to discussions happening on individual wikis outside of META for at least two reasons:

1. Most active participants of these wikis do not pay any attention to discussions on META, but they are the ones who will be most affected by the enforcement of this "new" community-wide policy.
2. Also as I tried to explain to @Johan (WMF): Many of the people who have been blocked on META or globally locked altogether, are not vandals, spammers, or copyright infringers. Many are blocked without public open community discussion by one individual functionary, without any regard to the length of time or the contributions they have made.

I am sure that others are aware of the situation I am describing. So why am I the only person who says this openly? Ottawahitech (discuss • contribs) 18:24, 5 March 2024 (UTC)

Wikimedia Canada survey

Hi! Wikimedia Canada invites contributors living in Canada to take part in our 2024 Community Survey. The survey takes approximately five minutes to complete and closes on March 31, 2024. It is available in both French and English. To learn more, please visit the survey project page on Meta. --Chelsea Chiovelli (WMCA) (discuss • contribs) 00:10, 7 March 2024 (UTC)

@Chelsea Chiovelli (WMCA), Thanks for posting.

Can you tell us a little bit about this survey - what is the purpose of running it, for example. I folowed your link to META and it appears that one of the questions you ask there is whether one lives in Canada which seems to be a contradiction of what you say here. Ottawahitech (discuss • contribs) 14:56, 14 March 2024 (UTC)

Hi @Ottawahitech, thank you for your reply. Wikimedia Canada is running this survey to understand what contributors in Canada want/need to be able to contribute to Wiki projects so we can ensure our programs are helpful. Once the survey results are analyzed, we (WMCA staff) will be using the data to help us tailor our programming (existing programs or new ones) to suit the needs of contributors in Canada. For example, people may reply saying they want scholarships to attend WikiConferences. We do already offer scholarships but maybe people aren't hearing about it through our current communication channels so we can then plan alternative methods of communicating our scholarship announcements.

The survey does include a question about whether or not one lives in Canada. We are sharing the survey on public forums (like this one) where anyone can see it but the focus of this particular survey is contributors in Canada. So, we added this question to ensure the responses we collect are from contributors in Canada. Could you clarify for me where you find the contradiction? I want to make sure the way we've been communicating about the survey is as clear as possible. Chelsea Chiovelli (WMCA) (discuss • contribs) 17:48, 14 March 2024 (UTC)

@Chelsea Chiovelli (WMCA): Great hearing back from you! It is not every day I get an answer to posts announcing WMF initiatives.

I have always wondered how the wikimedia movement arrived at the decision to have wikis separated by language and not by country. I find that many Canadian topics are poorly covered in the ENWP, FRWP, Simple,and ENWQ (not sure about FRWQ), and are more likely to face deletion. I don't know enough about other wmf-projects to form an opinion. I agree that a common language is a good way to group topics and volunteers, but I find that small countries, such as Canada, New Zealand, etc, do not get the same kind of coverage.

Take for example, w:Nortel and one of its CEOs, w:John Roth. Nortel had humble beginning in Montreal, Quebec in 1895 as a Canadian company but became an w:International corporation after many name changes and ups and downs. In the early 2000s, under John Roth it was so big that it "accounted for more than a third of the total valuation of all companies listed on the w:Toronto Stock Exchange". However, by 2009 "Nortel filed for w:bankruptcy protection in Canada and the United States", and a hundred thousand employees lost their coveted jobs. In a few years Nortel and John Roth went from being the darlings of Canada to a big void. A similar story unfolded at w:JDSU and its CEO does not even have a page on ENWP.

Unfortunately, the sum of all human knowledge (or is it the sum of all American and British knowledge:-) does not explain how this came about, even though the events took place after 2001 when enwp was already in existence. In the chaos a wikipedia project w:wp:wikiproject Nortel was deleted (wikiprojects are rarely deleted at enwp), and the article about John Roth "the most successful businessman in modern Canadian history" is in shambles (not even a date or place of birth or education info) and is rated LOW importance on wikiproject Canada. The wikidata item about Roth. is not much better.

Just wondering if this sort of thing is of concern to Wikimedia Canada? Thanks in advance, Ottawahitech (discuss • contribs) 18:53, 16 March 2024 (UTC)

Hi Ottawahitech,

I may take a few days to reply but I'm always happy to answer questions! Also, just to clarify, the survey I announced here is from Wikimedia Canada, not WMF. Wikimedia Canada is an affiliate chapter but we are independent of the Foundation :)

Regarding the coverage of Canadian topics on Wikipedia, absolutely we want to see more Canadian topics on the sister projects. However, our mandate is more so to support editors, institutions, WikiProjects, events, etc that seek to increase the amount/quality of content on Canadian topics across the sister projects rather than determine what specific Canadian articles/content should be included or their priority. If you're interested in topics like the ones you mentioned in your example, I would encourage you to post on the Wikipedia WikiProject: Canada discussion board or the Wikipedia Village Pump to see if there are others who may share your interests. Alternatively, if you ever want to organize a wiki-related event to boost the coverage of Canadian topics, leave a message on my talk page and we can chat more.

P.S. Thanks for the ping about Wikimania scholarships. I'll take a look! Chelsea Chiovelli (WMCA) (discuss • contribs) 22:47, 18 March 2024 (UTC)

@Chelsea Chiovelli (WMCA)

Re: "I'm always happy to answer questions! Also, just to clarify, the survey I announced here is from Wikimedia Canada, not WMF. Wikimedia Canada is an affiliate chapter but we are independent of the Foundation :)"'

I wonder if you would take the time to explain to the ignorants around here (I am talking about me) what the difference is between WMF and WMDE and WMCA. I am asking because I saw a notice on Wikdata "online event Wikidata Leveling Up Days" advertised by someone who uses (WMDE) in their userID. I am assuming they are employees/contractors of Wikimedia Deutschland and not the WMF? Is the WMF the ultimate employer of employees of the different chapters?

Note: I hope you and others here do not mind my hijacking of this thread to ask some questions that are only indirectly related to wikibooks? As someone who views themselves as a member of The Wikimedia movement I can't think of a better place to discuss this (?): Ottawahitech (discuss • contribs) 19:38, 5 April 2024 (UTC)

Yes of course! The structure of the organizational side of the movement can be very confusing so it's a fair question. Wikimedia Canada (WMCA) and Wikimedia Deutschland (WMDE) are both affiliate chapters of the Wikimedia Foundation (WMF) meaning they are independent non-profit organizations that represent the Wikimedia movement on a regional scale, usually specific to a single country. As an an affiliate chapter we (WMCA) have a name that links us to the movement (Wikimedia Canada) and we are able to use Wikimedia trademarks for our work, to fundraise, or for publicity. Affiliate chapters are also able to apply for funding from WMF. However, we are independent of the WMF in the sense that we are not governed, owned or operated by the Wikimedia Foundation. ie) the Foundation doesn't really affect our day-to-day operations or hiring. So yes, any time you see a user with WMCA or WMDE or WMUK, etc in their user name, they are most likely an employee, contractor, or volunteer for that affiliate chapter (like me!). Employees of the Foundation will have WMF in their user name.

There are also other types of Wikimedia movement affiliates, including user-groups, thematic organizations, and hubs. To my knowledge, hubs are a newer addition (or will be a new addition if the new Movement Charter is ratified later this year) to the Wikimedia movement affiliates model and there are two types: Regional and thematic. Regional hubs support volunteer communities across multiple regions, like the Central and Eastern European hub (CEE hub) or the Eastern, Southeast and the Pacific regional cooperation (ESEAP Hub), while thematic hubs support volunteer communities that focus on specific themes, like language.

Does that help clarify things for you? There is an FAQ page for Wikimedia movement affiliates as well, in case there are things you're still curious about. Have a good weekend :) Chelsea Chiovelli (WMCA) (discuss • contribs) 22:22, 5 April 2024 (UTC)

@Just happened to see that the subject of wikimedia scholarships to attend WikiConferences is actively being discussed on w:User_talk:Jimbo_Wales#Wikimania_scholarships. Ottawahitech (discuss • contribs) 16:46, 17 March 2024 (UTC)

@Chelsea Chiovelli (WMCA), thank you for promising a more elaborate response later. I, and I hope others, are keenly interested in hearing the perspective of someone who is involved in a Wikimedia-affiliate.

Re: "our mandate is more so to support editors, institutions, WikiProjects, events, etc that seek to increase the amount/quality of content"

• Do you believe that in order to support "editors" (I call them users/contributors), the individuals running the affiliates have to have at least a basic understanding of the issues that such contributors face? Many / most(?) contributors do not participate in real life events (such a wikiMania), or even local events organized by their own wikimedia affiliate. Most participate online only in one wmf-project, such as the English Wikipedia (enwp).

In my experience, you are more likely to encounter multi-wiki-contributors on the smaller wikis, such as this one (the English Wikibooks). I have not been here Long enough (I just started participating here more actively in the last few weeks) to figure out if regular (non-admin) contributors also participate in other wmf-wikis. Maybe someone else can provide their perspective? I myself have been around wikiland since 2007, the first 10 years or so, almost exclusively on enwp where I was rather active until I was indefinitely blocked. I then moved on to Simple where I was indef blocked in 2020, and META where I was infinitely blocked also in 2020. Since then I have participated actively in some of the smaller wikis managing, barely, to stay out of trouble.

If you, or anyone else here, are interested in the experience of other members of the movement who have been shunned by this community check out this current Global Ban META-RFC. Ottawahitech (discuss • contribs) 19:57, 20 March 2024 (UTC) Updated: Ottawahitech (discuss • contribs) 00:30, 8 April 2024 (UTC)

Hi Ottawahitech,

Apologies for the delayed response. I see where you're coming from. The survey I announced in my initial post is a way for WMCA to ensure our basic understanding of the needs of contibutors in Canada is up to date. Every contributor will engage with local events differently, if at all, and that's okay. If you are based in Canada and you feel there is a way WMCA can support your activities as a contributor aside from local events, I invite you to take the survey if you haven't already. It is open until March 31, 2024. Chelsea Chiovelli (WMCA) (discuss • contribs) 22:41, 26 March 2024 (UTC)

Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees 2024 Selection

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More languages • Please help translate to your language

Dear all,

This year, the term of 4 (four) Community- and Affiliate-selected Trustees on the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees will come to an end [1]. The Board invites the whole movement to participate in this year’s selection process and vote to fill those seats.

The Elections Committee will oversee this process with support from Foundation staff [2]. The Board Governance Committee created a Board Selection Working Group from Trustees who cannot be candidates in the 2024 community- and affiliate-selected trustee selection process composed of Dariusz Jemielniak, Nataliia Tymkiv, Esra'a Al Shafei, Kathy Collins, and Shani Evenstein Sigalov [3]. The group is tasked with providing Board oversight for the 2024 trustee selection process, and for keeping the Board informed. More details on the roles of the Elections Committee, Board, and staff are here [4].

Here are the key planned dates:

• May 2024: Call for candidates and call for questions
• June 2024: Affiliates vote to shortlist 12 candidates (no shortlisting if 15 or less candidates apply) [5]
• June-August 2024: Campaign period
• End of August / beginning of September 2024: Two-week community voting period
• October–November 2024: Background check of selected candidates
• Board's Meeting in December 2024: New trustees seated

Learn more about the 2024 selection process - including the detailed timeline, the candidacy process, the campaign rules, and the voter eligibility criteria - on this Meta-wiki page, and make your plan.

Election Volunteers

Another way to be involved with the 2024 selection process is to be an Election Volunteer. Election Volunteers are a bridge between the Elections Committee and their respective community. They help ensure their community is represented and mobilize them to vote. Learn more about the program and how to join on this Meta-wiki page.

Best regards,

Dariusz Jemielniak (Governance Committee Chair, Board Selection Working Group)

[1] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/Wikimedia_Foundation_elections/2021/Results#Elected

[2] https://foundation.wikimedia.org/wiki/Committee:Elections_Committee_Charter

[3] https://foundation.wikimedia.org/wiki/Minutes:2023-08-15#Governance_Committee

[4] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Foundation_elections_committee/Roles

[5] Even though the ideal number is 12 candidates for 4 open seats, the shortlisting process will be triggered if there are more than 15 candidates because the 1-3 candidates that are removed might feel ostracized and it would be a lot of work for affiliates to carry out the shortlisting process to only eliminate 1-3 candidates from the candidate list.

MPossoupe_(WMF)19:56, 12 March 2024 (UTC)

"recipes as out of scope [on ENWP], but there are some very good ones on Wikibooks"

I found this quote (and others about wikibooks) in the ENWP SignPost. It appears that at least a few wikipedians are aware of some of the good work done here.

Some other comments:

• "I think cooking would in theory be covered by WikiBooks"
• "why don't we encourage people to write how to on Wikibooks, and then link them from the Wikipedia page?"

What do others think? Do we want to have more eyes on us? Ottawahitech (discuss • contribs) 19:47, 11 April 2024 (UTC)

Certainly. In practice, the way that Wikibooks works is like our daughter project Wikiversity, which is that in principle, editors can collaborate together on things, but in practice, books and learning modules are passion projects (or platforms for crankery, depending) that are written by one person. Having actual collaboration here on more work would be a good thing. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 23:19, 11 April 2024 (UTC)

re:"Having actual collaboration here on more work would be a good thing"

I agree. I just discovered Category:WikiProjects which was originally intended for the purpose of coordinating content building by topic, I think. Has anyone been here long enough to shed light on what went wrong and what went right with the idea of creating wikiprojects on wikibooks? Ottawahitech (discuss • contribs) 18:53, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

Very hi overhead to write a book versus an encyclopedia article. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 23:24, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

WB Notability

I want to write a book named "Infraction of Vienna Convention: The Israeli bombing of the Iranian embassy". Does it fulfill notability criteria of Wikibooks? Doostdar (discuss • contribs) 21:11, 16 April 2024 (UTC)

I'm not sure it's in-scope. From the title alone, it sounds more like a thinkpiece or article rather than an educational/instructional book. What's your proposed outline and chapter breakdown? —Kittycataclysm (discuss • contribs) 23:02, 16 April 2024 (UTC)

I wouldn't even consider adding such a book here unless you also intend to discuss the other side of the argument. Wikibooks is not the place for one-sided politics.--Xania ^talk 05:01, 18 April 2024 (UTC)

It would fall foul of original research rather than notability, plus the title indicates it is not intended to be a textbook. A book that was about various infractions of the Vienna Conventions over the last 50 years might be in scope, a one pager on one incident wouldn't be. MarcGarver (discuss • contribs) 12:29, 18 April 2024 (UTC)

In 2017, when I asked here about notability, a user said that notability policy is specific to Wikipedia and in Wikibooks we have our own Inclusion Criteria. In 2018, the answer to me was that different Wikibooks in different languages have different inclusion criteria adding that neutrality and original research parameters should be considered. Now you give me different opinions: you say that a thinkpievce or article doesn't fit WB but we have already a book here like Professionalism which surveys cases and ideas in professional ethics. The parameter of let's call it "instructionability" is hard to define when it comes to books like Computational Creativity. Doostdar (discuss • contribs) 18:33, 19 April 2024 (UTC)

Officially, our policy is that "non-fictional books that aren't instructional aren't allowed on Wikibooks", but you're right that the "instructibility" criterion can be somewhat of a grey area. For whatever it's worth, I'm honestly not convinced that Professionalism falls within our scope, and I'm not sure that Computational Creativity is great either, especially since it's poorly developed. One relevant aspect could be temporality—very recent global events alone strike me as more suitable for Wikinews, while an in-depth book about the topic over time seems more suitable here. Either way, I would love to know what your proposed book outline would be and how you believe it to be instructional—that will help us assess it properly. Cheers! —Kittycataclysm (discuss • contribs) 20:56, 19 April 2024 (UTC)

"Infraction of Vienna Convention: The Israeli bombing of the Iranian embassy" is not suitable for "Wikinews" because it aims to analyze deeply past and current diplomatic status of the world and Israel in the region. "Israeli–Palestinian conflict" started about a century ago and continues today as "Israeli invasion of the Gaza Strip (2023–present)". As you see it has a long history and fulfills "temporality" parameter. As well as, it is not a "fictional" book but evidently "real". It also fulfills "instructibility" on humanity area and diplomatic affairs. Doostdar (discuss • contribs) 07:38, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

Scientific writing guide (student thesis edition)

Dear Community,

I'm only slowly grasping the scope of Wikibooks, Wikiversity & Co., and have a question (quite a few actually, but keeping it to one for now):

Would Wikibooks be a good place to compile a "How To" guide for scientific writing, to be used and expanded by Bachelor and Master students and supervisors alike?

I have long thought about how to best construct such a project to have it accessible, and I now think Wikibooks might be the place. Does something similar exist already?

(If we extend the circle of questions a bit, I'd love to get in contact with an experienced user who has an overview about where to Wikiversity, Wikibooks and Co individually shine, since for me some lines are still blury, and I don't want to disrupt established workflows that I am unaware of.)

Thanks alot and best regards, TimBorgNetzWerk (discuss • contribs) 09:59, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

I think a guide to how to write properly would be a real asset and perfectly in line with the mission here and I do not know of any existing content like that. If you are having trouble structuring it like a book, but instead have some essays, some exercises, maybe some interactive material where someone could post writing and others could edit it, etc., that's more of a Wikiversity thing. Wikiversity spun out of Wikibooks as a place to host material that is general learning modules of some kind but not strictly like a book or guide that is a more-or-less static work (and can be printed or used otherwise used offline). —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 11:40, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

Thank you Koavf, greatly appreciated, also & especially the additional insights. I think for this case, a book would really be the best basis. How & where would I best start? a) in my User:TimBorgNetzWerk/sandbox, or b) follow Using_Wikibooks/Starting_A_New_Wikibook -> Help:Pages#Creating -> start writing there?

Best and thanks, TimBorgNetzWerk (discuss • contribs) 12:10, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

I would recommend using your sandbox to start some outlines, drafts, etc. Without having looked at your global edits, it seems like you're a new user and I'm overjoyed at that, but starting out diving into writing a textbook is the deep end. :/ Also, I will state that unlike, e.g. Wikipedia, where most everything is kinda/sorta edited by everyone, in reality (but not in theory or principle), books here tend to be personal passion projects and if Person A wants to write a book, it's likely that he will do 90%+ of the heavy lifting. There are just too few editors here and the topics end up being too niche. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 12:15, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

Alright, Sandbox it is. I've already outlined a LaTeX template, so I'll be building on top of that. Since I'm currently a PhD student and aim to walk down the academia lane for the forseable future, being the "sole editor" is not much of a hurdle - I'll have to formulate each and every advice once already, and together with the students we should eventually have more and more structured knowledge about the do's and dont's. We've also founded an NPO ([1]) for those kinds of projects, so we can coordinate the resources to what little topics we can cover and where to join if one might be interested.

Right now we're more at the mid-point of an ongoing 2-year project, worst case I'd have build it from the ground on an isolated MediaWiki instance, but now that I grasp Wikibooks & Wikiversity better and better, I think building this resource here will be much more productive.

All in all (I've noticed I started every sentence with "so", so... changed that.) thanks for the starting points, will read up and get working asap. Also, for a lack of a thumbs-up-feature, assume every message I don't reply to as "read with thumbs up" :D TimBorgNetzWerk (discuss • contribs) 12:28, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

Hey, if you can finish a thesis (congrats!), then you have the discipline and project management skills to write a book here. And if you can actually end up getting academics to write clearly, you'll be doing God's work. I'm not necessarily a bullesye on who is an ideal contributor, but please let me know if

Ican help you. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 12:31, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

I agree that this is within scope as a guide and that it could be very helpful! I also second the suggestion that you start building and workshopping in your sandbox. Reach out if you need any help! Cheers —Kittycataclysm (discuss • contribs) 12:19, 18 April 2024 (UTC)

Is Wikibooks multilingual?

Wikibooks is a project which its different versions share the least number of interwikis specially for subpages of the books. In this situation the qusetion is if Wikibooks is considered as multilingual website? Doostdar (discuss • contribs) 20:46, 23 April 2024 (UTC)

This is the case solely because Wikibooks is in general a very small and obscure project. There is no reason why in principle books and subpages shouldn't exist in multiple languages. Note also that there is no Wikibooks equivalent to the multilingual Wikisource which is the only Wikimedia Foundation wiki that has works that are themselves multilingual (or also, I guess Commons). —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 00:17, 24 April 2024 (UTC)