Wikivoyage talk:Bug reports and feature requests

Streamlining bug reports

I'd really like to see our bug reports and feature requests streamlined a bit. I have a couple of thoughts:

1. I could install a bug-tracking system like Bugzilla (popular but bletcherous UI), Mantis (not so popular but nice UI), or others TBD. This would give the "right" kind of interface, but it would require an additional login step for users.
2. We could put one bug per page, and have Project:Bug reports just link to each page. This would organize them better, but leave things more flexible.
3. We could use a template for a bug report, to organize the bug pages.
4. Bug report pages could be sub-pages of Project:Bug reports, or even in their own namespace (like [[Bug:NumberOfArticles broken in pl:]].
5. We could use the Inputbox extension to make adding new bug reports and feature requests easier.

Comments? Ideas? Suggestions? --(WT-en) Evan 10:18, 27 April 2006 (EDT)

I'd suggest going whole hog and setting up Mantis, which is fairly nice and has all the prioritization/status etc filtering which is critical to sorting out the wheat from the chaff. (Scarab is also OK, but the query functionality and whole stupid 'module' thing never works the way you expect.) Wikipedia also uses Bugzilla, but as you say the interface is craptastic. (WT-en) Jpatokal 10:44, 27 April 2006 (EDT)

Weird interlanguage links

The links to the inaccessible pages reported on Project:Bug_reports#Inaccessible_pages are messing the interlanguage bar. I understand that those pages (at least those on the then pseudo-domain pt:) now lead directly to the actual pages on the language versions. Can we say the bug has been solved? (WT-en) Ricardo (Rmx) 22:48, 30 April 2006 (EDT)

I seem to be blocked from editing

Swept in from the pub

Hi all, Please someone check if I have been blocked from editing either intentionally or by accident. I have been unable to log on and have not been able to edit for a week. I have had no notification of a problem, and IB have not been forthcoming on why I get gateway timeouts for attempts to edit or connect to non-article pages. My service provider promised to check if they are the problem but have not come back to me. This is seriously frustrating and annoying, as I have a lot of updates waiting to upload. I dont even expect this message to go through, but it is all I can do. Cheers, User:Pbsouthwood

If you can't log on at all, it's not a block (nor is there one on your account). You'll have to define "unable to log on" more precisely -- do you get an error message of any kind? Or is it just a timeout, or no response, or what? (WT-en) LtPowers 10:13, 6 August 2011 (EDT)

My IP address was blocked once by IB, but I was unable to even browse the site when that happened - emailing tech at wikivoyage.org (several times) and giving them my IP address and a description of the problem eventually got it resolved. Also, be aware that site functionality for many users has currently degraded to the point where edits take numerous attempts - I'm finding I generally have to reload pages several times due to timeouts - so that may also be part of the problem. As LtPowers said, if you can provide any additional info it might make it easier to figure out the issue, and if you can't access the site then any of the admins here can probably act as an intermediary for you via email. -- (WT-en) Ryan • (talk) • 12:19, 6 August 2011 (EDT)

I am editing from a friend's house for this edit, and I had absolutely no problem at all, very quick connection and everything seems to work as expected. I don't know who his ISP is though as it is a local network service. Anyway to get to the questions: Not able to log on means if I click the Log on/create account tab I get a timeout. The only error message I get is 504 gateway timeout. and I get that for most non article pages, and all edit attempts in the last few days. I have not been able to get into shared at all recently, but the problems at En have been more gradual in buildup, which doesn't make sense to me at all. I have mailed the tech guy at IB (IBDick, I think he calls himself), but he has not so far managed to explain what the problem is or solve it. I have found out that the server refuses tracert requests as a policy, so that test didn't prove anything. I have been having the same trouble Ryan describes for months already. I have been unable to get onto anyone's talk page to leave a message or I would have done that already., and I don't have anyone's private email to bypass the problem. Its been a sort of "you cant get there from here" situation. I plan to try dial-up tomorrow if I get the time. that may also throw some light on the problem. Another friend accessed WT and could make edits using the same ISP that I use, so that doesn't look like the problem either, though the tech I spoke to at Telkomsa (my ISP) said he would get back to me after making some tests. me but did not. So it goes. If anyone wants to contact me by direct email, my address is on my user page. Cheers, • • • (WT-en) Peter (Southwood) ^Talk 12:51, 6 August 2011 (EDT)

I am also finding it is near impossible to load pages, preview or resolve an edit at this time, very frustrating. -- (WT-en) felix 12:09, 7 August 2011 (EDT)

I have made some small adjustments (set DNS to a more local branch) recommended by my ISP tech who thought they would solve the problem, but things have only improved marginally. I am now sometimes able to open an edit page. Perhaps 1 in 5 tries will open, and some of those will save, but still no success at all with shared. Cheers, • • • (WT-en) Peter (Southwood) ^Talk 11:42, 8 August 2011 (EDT)

You could try setting your DNS servers to 8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4 (Google's open DNS servers) ...

I am also current experiencing serious access issues. It is no longer just the problem of frequent mind numbing lags and time outs I have experienced for the last year or so.That problem comes and goes, at times making editing a considerable challenge, other times only requiring backing up and re-loading the page or page edit a few times. This is why I occasional show two sequential identical edits, or sometimes go-offline leaving an unresolved edit sequence. The current problem however appears quite different. I have not been able to load any Wikivoyage page for an extended time since my last edit at 10:07, 14 August 2011. I use Safari for mac and Firefox for mac and of course tried both browsers multiple times and flushed the caches. Just prior to uploading this note I did manage to successfully load WT recent changes and the WT main page, then it went back to the error message again. I can however consistently load pages using a different IP (by proxy). As I can log in from a different IP, using the same browser/s I assume the IP is being blocked, albeit now intermittently. The error messages are presented as follows. Just prior to posting this using a mirror proxy I started getting successful page loads again using my regular. The messages below are the error message displayed on failed attempts, the error message is the same in both browsers:

The requested URL could not be retrieved

While trying to retrieve the URL: http://en.wikivoyage.org/w/index.php?

The following error was encountered:

• Zero Sized Reply

Squid did not receive any data for this request.

Your cache administrator is root.

Generated Sun, 14 Aug 2011 17:32:44 GMT by wikivoyage.org (squid/2.6.STABLE6)

ERROR

The requested URL could not be retrieved

While trying to retrieve the URL: http://en.wikivoyage.org/wiki/Special:Recentchanges

The following error was encountered:

• Zero Sized Reply

Squid did not receive any data for this request.

Your cache administrator is root.

Generated Sun, 14 Aug 2011 21:04:20 GMT by wikivoyage.org (squid/2.6.STABLE6)

Except for the date stamp the message is the same each time.

I hope the IB people are currently paying some attention to this page. Although I have been experiencing erratic page loads, occasional timeouts and other frustrations up to a few hours ago they were in the normal range of lousy server response to which I am accustomed, this latest issue is however an entirely new phenomena. To me it looks like a classic data base overload problem and most likely the Squid response is arising from giving up waiting for Apache to respond after a set period of time, most likely due to DB structural problems, possibly the /temp folder or memory cache or a load balancing issue. I am really quite sick of having my time wasted by persistent re-loading requirements and time-outs when editing here. What I find odd though is that whilst experiencing this problem I could come in through a different IP and access the WT server at the time without any issues. I am assuming therefore that the problematic server I was accessing from my own IP was the issue and the other (proxy) IP I was using was accessing a different server (or an unaffected mirror server). This latest event is further underlining my suspicions that IB need to do some serious housekeeping, really how old is the gear these guys are using, have they purloined the stuff from a museum collection somewhere. Maybe others here have some ideas on this. To add some clarity to the matter I could not get in from an Indonesian IP but could get in from a Dutch IP. -- (WT-en) felix 18:36, 14 August 2011 (EDT)

I don't know if anyone from IB followed up with Peter after the emails that went out. In any rate, I left a message at our current IB liaison's talk page current IB liaison's talk page. --(WT-en) Peter ^Talk 00:05, 15 August 2011 (EDT)

Thanks Peter, I get "User account "IBobi" is not registered." when I go to that commons.wikimedia.org address. I manage to load this page OK today so maybe that particular server issue was transient. Hopefully though IB can see there are (ongoing) problems that really do need to be addressed. -- (WT-en) felix 04:40, 15 August 2011 (EDT)

I guess Peter meant to link IBobi's Shared talk page but linked to Commons instead, apperantly out of a mistake.

On another note, I've got the very same message Felix explained above yesterday night, around midnight GMT, and gave up but now I seem to be accessing and editing seamlessly. The details on the problem and how to get around it are far too technical for me, though. – (WT-en) Vidimian 06:59, 15 August 2011 (EDT)

For what it's worth, I'm seeing the same behavior intermittently. I emailed tech at wikivoyage dot org with a screenshot last night, but I'm not optimistic about a response. At this point I would lay odds that the database is in need of standard TLC, but who knows if that will ever happen. -- (WT-en) Ryan • (talk) • 10:36, 15 August 2011 (EDT)

Hi -- I pinged Dick on this just to be on the safe side. Hopefully he'll be able to take a look at this over the next few days. In the future, you can contact me via my posted email address, or Dick/Tech as you see fit.--(WT-en) IBobi 16:16, 15 August 2011 (EDT)

Hi (WT-en) IBobi, from my perspective today things seem to be back to their old cluncky ways again with no more squid ink blackouts. Thanks for your note above. -- (WT-en) felix 06:58, 16 August 2011 (EDT)

I was now able to log in again, but have been experiencing the same problems over the past few days, including earlier this evening. It seems the troubles come and go, sometimes not allowing me to do anything (including logging in or seeing recent changes, which gives me the same "Zero Sized Reply"), at other times I can see recent pages but still not log in or edit. In any case, it's working now but was still broken a few hours ago so I'm not sure it's fixed. (WT-en) Justme 19:06, 17 August 2011 (EDT)

Back to extended periods of failed page loads, failed edit uploads or zero server responses, happening again yesterday thru early this morning, working OK at this moment. -- (WT-en) felix 12:28, 18 August 2011 (EDT)

So I understand this, the error that led to this thread has been resolved and we are "back to the usual site sluggishness"? If this is a bug that needs to be addressed, please report it here: http://shared.wikivoyage.org/wiki/Top_bugs --(WT-en) IBobi 14:01, 23 August 2011 (EDT)

Sometimes page request times are good however for a lot of the time timeouts and slow page loads are a very disappointing aspect of editing on this site. Edits are occasionally lost in the muddle of it or alternatively require lots of back paging to retrieve, this is also frustrating as loading those pages is difficult as well. I often find the site unusable for hours at a time and on many occasions these problems have persisted for days or even weeks. Maybe there are conflicts with my ISPs caches, maybe it is a dysfunctional mirror server. It seems we do not all suffer from the same problem at the same time. Just incase it should be of interest I do check using a different computer and I have alternative browsers installed. I use only up to date OS and browser versions. Thanks for taking and interest iBobi. -- cheers (WT-en) felix 18:09, 23 August 2011 (EDT)

Hey felix, looks like rather than your being blocked, this is a symptom of an overall site issue that we will be working to resolve as we upgrade Mediawiki and address existing tech requests and bugs. Hang in there, because the site is going to be in better shape over the next couple of months.--(WT-en) IBobi 19:24, 23 August 2011 (EDT)

I have not suggested that I am being blocked, it appears to be bad server behaviour or related issues, good to hear that there is something being done to address the problems.-- cheers (WT-en) felix 20:00, 24 August 2011 (EDT)

Preferences Reseting?

Swept in from the pub

Last week my user preferences for recent changes and date format reset. Today the same thing happened again, and my editor preferences also changed. Has anyone else seen anything similar? If my account has been hacked that seems like an odd thing for someone to change, so I think it's more likely that something is amiss with the Wikivoyage servers. -- (WT-en) wrh2 12:20, 5 October 2011 (EDT)

Exactly the same happened to me, twice.--(WT-en) burmesedays 20:25, 5 October 2011 (EDT)

Thanks, good to know I don't have to worry about whether my account was hacked. My snarkier side would say something about reporting this as a bug on shared: if I thought there was better than a one-in-fifty chance of anything being done, but luckily that side of my personality is kept in check. -- (WT-en) wrh2 22:12, 5 October 2011 (EDT)

If you make the report and put in as many details of exact behavior as your can (include your browser type & version), I'll raise it with Tech. Please ping me on my page or via email at paul.obrien at internetbrands dot com when you've done this, okay?--(WT-en) IBobi 15:21, 6 October 2011 (EDT)

While your efforts have definitely resulted in more responsiveness, there are still a ton of high priority open bugs, including the longstanding performance problems. Given that reality, reporting an issue with user preferences that is impossible to reproduce reliably is probably not a good use of either of our available resources right now. -- (WT-en) wrh2 15:40, 6 October 2011 (EDT)

Yes and no. A number of those bugs will hopefully resolve when the Mediawiki upgrade is done, which is currently being specced out. If the preference resets are something we can resolve in the meantime, it's probably worth reporting. If we cannot reproduce the error, it is of course less likely we can address it.--(WT-en) IBobi 18:11, 7 October 2011 (EDT)

I can image "speccing out" would take two or three days or even a week, but 3 months and no end in sight? It's getting pretty ridiculous. What is wrong with your tech people? (WT-en) texugo 00:30, 8 October 2011 (EDT)

Chances are they've never worked with MediaWiki before. (WT-en) LtPowers 09:42, 8 October 2011 (EDT)

My preferences decided to reset themselves again today.~~

Really sick of having to reset my preferences every time I login. Since when does "speccing out" a project, involve breaking what is already running? Wikivoyage sucks at the moment. --(WT-en) Inas 17:06, 9 November 2011 (EST)

Search broken?

Swept in from the pub

The last couple of days, I've noticed that the search isn't working properly. If you search for a page (clicking Search, rather than Go), you get a message that says

There was a problem with the wiki search. This is probably temporary; try again in a few moments, or you can search the wiki through an external search service:

followed by a Google search box. It happens even if you search for a page we definitely have, like New York City. It seems to be happening only here on en: as far as I can tell, and I have no idea how long it's been going on. Anyone else noticed this? (WT-en) texugo 01:48, 6 October 2011 (EDT)

Yeah, I remember seeing that even on Wikipedia years ago. Looks like our search engine is down. Time for a bug report. (WT-en) LtPowers 09:57, 6 October 2011 (EDT)

Working for me. Anyone still having problems?--(WT-en) IBobi 15:15, 6 October 2011 (EDT)

Typing "New York" in the search box and clicking the "search" button takes me to the error page (WT-en) texugo mentions. -- (WT-en) wrh2 15:43, 6 October 2011 (EDT)

Still broken for me too. (WT-en) IBobi, are you clicking the "Search" button? The "Go" button works fine (if we have the page), but the Search button doesn't. (WT-en) texugo 23:27, 6 October 2011 (EDT)

I see it. I'll get tech on it & keep you updated. Thanks guys.--(WT-en) IBobi 17:37, 7 October 2011 (EDT)

Should be okay now. Let me know if you see this again.--(WT-en) IBobi 17:46, 7 October 2011 (EDT)

No change as far as I can tell. Every search takes me to the error page with the google search box. (WT-en) texugo 00:27, 8 October 2011 (EDT)

This worked for me shortly after IBobi posted his message, but it is broken again now. -- (WT-en) wrh2 01:02, 8 October 2011 (EDT)

Looking back into this to 1. Fix it, and 2. Figure out why it keeps breaking.--(WT-en) IBobi 14:22, 10 October 2011 (EDT)

Back up now, and being monitored to determine what the longterm issue is with stability.--(WT-en) IBobi 14:41, 10 October 2011 (EDT)

Special:Import

Swept in from the pub

Special:Import gives me "No transwiki import sources have been defined and direct history uploads are disabled." How do we change this? I want to upload important policy and policy talk pages from wts that I saved. --Peter ^Talk 22:45, 21 November 2012 (UTC)

I think that you have to ask at bugzilla:. --Stefan2 (talk) 22:48, 21 November 2012 (UTC)

Yes that's right, if you create a bug in the "Site requests" component, or just follow this link, you should be able to add the wikis that you wish to import from. Which wikis did you have in mind? Thehelpfulone 20:25, 22 November 2012 (UTC)

Have done this here [1]. --Peter ^Talk 16:55, 26 November 2012 (UTC)

Cached "Maintenance reports"

Swept in from the pub

Several of the Maintenance reports on Special:SpecialPages are showing older cached data. Has the updating of the reports been turned off or are they being updated on a schedule? I apologize if I missed a discussion on this. - Xltel (talk) 16:27, 24 November 2012 (UTC)

<-- --

Swept in from the pub

Template:IsPartOf appears to have a problem. The template is invisible if you look at the page in the usual way in a web browser, but if you use the PDF option ("Print/export: Download as PDF" from the left menu), then the template displays at "<-- --". Something isn't working properly. Does anyone know what the error is? --Stefan2 (talk) 02:42, 26 November 2012 (UTC)

HTML comment which wasn't closed properly in the template itself? {{isIn}} was correct, but isPartOf and Dans (fr:) both had the error. K7L (talk) 03:38, 27 November 2012 (UTC)

Make bug reports where?

Swept in from the pub

Prices aren't showing up in "do" templated listings but when I tried to report this at Wikivoyage:Bug reports I get a soft re-direct to a non-existent page. -- Alice^✉ 06:18, 9 December 2012 (UTC)

If it's a software issue, that would be at http://bugzilla.wikimedia.org. --Rschen7754 06:27, 9 December 2012 (UTC)

It's "price" not "prices"; the extension is not at fault this time. If the bug reports page doesn't mention Bugzilla, perhaps it should be changed to match the "report a bug" in the sitenotice? K7L (talk) 07:31, 9 December 2012 (UTC)

Too late - what a ninny I am, I've just reported it as Bug 42891! -- Alice^✉ 07:43, 9 December 2012 (UTC)

Destinations of the month icon glitch

Swept in from the pub

Hi. I picked the Paris article at random, and on Ubuntu Firefox 17 and Chromium-browser both show a red Prev... link near the top right next to its coordinates.

The div "dotm_icon" has a div inside it which links to the missing icon :

 <a title="File:Favicon yellow-black.svg" class="new" href="/w/index.php?title=Special:Upload&wpDestFile=Favicon yellow-black.svg">
    Previous destination of the month</a>

This image exists at http://en.wikivoyage-old.org/wiki/File:Favicon yellow-black.svg with a {{move}} tag to move it to Commons. Maybe that yellow 'v' checkmark icon won't be meaningful as the wikivoyage icon evolves. -- Skierpage (talk) 21:14, 10 December 2012 (UTC)

Yeah, I missed the #DotM and OtBP icons section -- Skierpage (talk) 21:22, 10 December 2012 (UTC)

Recent changes not displaying new edits

Swept in from the pub

This may be a time-sensitive issue that will be fixed by the time some of you read this, but right now (5:40AM UTC, 11 Dec) recent edits aren't displaying at Special:Recent changes, my watchlist, my contributions, or on the "View History" page of pages I've just edited (although the changes have been made and are displayed in the page). The last edit displayed in recent edits is (My time is set to U.S. EST...UTC-5...so it was made at 4:27AM UTC 11 Dec):

• (Upload log); 23:27 . . This, that and the other (Talk | contribs) uploaded "File:Azadi1.jpg" ‎(Transferred from wts.wikivoyage-old.org: see original upload log above)

There's also a line in the "Recent changes options" box right below "Show/hide minor edits | Show/hide bots..." that reads "Show new changes starting from 00:32, 11 December 2012" (Again, time is UTC-5) which can be clicked, although no changes are displayed (but the options, sidebar, etc load) when clicked.

Over on my watchlist, the following line is displayed below the "Mark all pages visited" button: Below are the last 250 changes in the last 168 hours, as of 11 December 2012, 00:42. (5:42AM UTC, 11 Dec). While the most recent edit displayed was made at 23:00 10 Dec (4:00 UTC, 11 Dec), despite the fact that I have just edited a couple pages and the page is set to display my edits in the watchlist. What's going on? AHeneen (talk) 05:56, 11 December 2012 (UTC)

The database servers are currently experiencing abnormally high lag, and are in the process of catching up right now.--Jasper Deng (talk) 05:58, 11 December 2012 (UTC)

New Roadmap?

Much to my delight, almost all of our outstanding feature requests (and bugs, naturally) were solved simply by migrating to WMF servers! Life is just so sunny over here. This means, though, that we need to reboot our thinking about how to move forward. I'm proposing that we do that at Wikivoyage:Roadmap. I have a lot of ideas, although they will probably have to wait until things calm down a bit here. --Peter ^Talk 06:41, 16 January 2013 (UTC)

New tools

Swept from the Pub

Wondering if we should add a few new tools for editors? I suggest these two anyway.

WikEd

WikEd color codes mediawiki markup depending on what it is. Users can add it on Wikipedia under "preferences". Should we add it here?

Support

• I find it makes it a lot easier to edit. Travel Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 06:12, 15 January 2013 (UTC)
• Seems sensible. Some Wikipedians and others on the sister projects find editing without WikEd painful; may as well make them comfortable. —Tom Morris (talk) 16:30, 15 January 2013 (UTC)

Oppose

Comments

We don't really have a ton of MediaWiki markup, not to the level of Wikipedia at least. I'm not sure how useful it would be, but it wouldn't do much harm either. LtPowers (talk) 13:16, 15 January 2013 (UTC)

Done - I've enabled this gadget. –sumone10154^(talk) 21:11, 15 January 2013 (UTC)

Twinkle

Twinkle is a tool that one can use to welcome new users. It may not be as good as doing each personally but does make it much faster which may be important for all the new editors joining.

Support

Oppose

Comments

• Twinkle does a lot more than welcome new users; if you set it up right, it will warn editors, nominate pages for deletion, provide a form of rollback, etc. --Rschen7754 06:16, 15 January 2013 (UTC)
• Per Erik Moeller on the list setting this up may be a little more complicated than I hoped. It looks like we will need someone who is good with IT to get it up and running. Travel Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 06:19, 15 January 2013 (UTC)
  • By the way, if you want a simplified version of Twinkle installed for you personally, you can copy the code from m:User:Rschen7754/global.js - also there is a script that crosses out links to blocked editors, and a Wikidata script (this one only works on Wikipedia, unfortunately). --Rschen7754 08:11, 15 January 2013 (UTC)
• We don't really have the infrastructure in place to make full use of Twinkle, and I would strongly oppose using it to "welcome" new users. LtPowers (talk) 13:16, 15 January 2013 (UTC)

Editor features: Search/replace, etc.

Swept in from the pub

When I use the classic (non-visual) editor in Wikipedia, my screen shows a lot of features, including fields for searching and replacing, which I don't see in the Wikivoyage editor. In both WP and WV, I have checked the "Enable enhanced editing toolbar" and "Enable wizards for links, formatting, tables, citations, and the search and replace function" boxes in Preferences|Edit, but that seems to have no effect on whether I see Search/Replace fields in my editor window (in WP or WV). How can I get Search/Replace in the Wikivoyage editor? Peter Chastain (talk) 22:18, 16 January 2016 (UTC)

Template?

Swept in from the pub

Tracked in Phabricator ^(?)
Task T359446

What's up with the templates inserting a completely useless contents block on the left side of every topic? In some cases it produces astoundingly ugly and unusable page layouts (especially for countries and regions). Did somebody do this on purpose? Mrkstvns (talk) 19:15, 6 March 2024 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you're experiencing. Is this when you're editing or reading? What pages do you see this on? What do you mean by "topic"? WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:04, 6 March 2024 (UTC)

When reading. I see it on every page on the site: Cities, regions, countries, parks, travel topics, etc.

Gray box with links to all the sections.

Pagebanner

[+] Understand

[+] Get in

[+] Get around

.... Mrkstvns (talk) 21:17, 6 March 2024 (UTC)

I think it's a bug, see T359446 on Phabricator. -- Alexander (talk) 21:29, 6 March 2024 (UTC)

I can see it now. That box is the "Table of Contents". WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:37, 7 March 2024 (UTC)

@Andyrom75: Do you think you could possibly reinsert that temporary fix you made sometime back? --SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 12:44, 7 March 2024 (UTC)

@SHB2000, I've temporary patched Template:Pagebanner. Please, ping me as a reminder when the bug has been solved. Andyrom75 (talk) 15:34, 7 March 2024 (UTC)

Thank you, Andyrom! SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 20:25, 7 March 2024 (UTC)

@Andyrom75, the bug report says the patch was riding this week's deployment train, so it should be fixed now. (You'll need to double-check that it actually did get fixed; all I can confirm is that the deployment train has been here.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:50, 13 March 2024 (UTC)

@WhatamIdoing, thanks for the ping. The server-side changes has been been reverted, so I've done the same with my temporary patch.

Now it seems that the previous behavior has been restored. Andyrom75 (talk) 22:36, 13 March 2024 (UTC)

Thank you for your vigilance, Andyrom! --SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 09:40, 14 March 2024 (UTC)

Where did the table of contents go?

Swept in from the pub

I'm using Vector 2022 skin. I vaguely recalled clicking on the hide button which made the table of contents on the left-hand side disappear. But I can't re-enable it. I already tried "Preferences" -> "Misc" tab and the options in "Table of contents". I do notice that in MediaWiki, there is a button beside the page title to re-enable the "Contents" section but that doesn't seem to be an option here. And oddly enough, talk pages show the table of contents. OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 04:28, 9 March 2024 (UTC)

Could this be related to #Template? above? —Granger (talk · contribs) 04:55, 9 March 2024 (UTC)

@Andyrom75:? SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 06:02, 9 March 2024 (UTC)

@SHB2000, @Mx. Granger, @OhanaUnited, I confirm that this is related to the temporary patch I've applied on #Template?.

Once the bug T359446 will be solved, the patch could be removed and the normal behavior will be restored.

Sorry for the temporary inconvenience. Andyrom75 (talk) 07:34, 9 March 2024 (UTC)

Yeah, it's understandable. Hopefully the bug should be fixed sooner than later. --SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 09:12, 9 March 2024 (UTC)

Thanks for confirming. —The preceding comment was added by OhanaUnited (talk • contribs)

@OhanaUnited, please check if now the "Table of contents" can be shown. --Andyrom75 (talk) 22:39, 13 March 2024 (UTC)

Yes it reappeared. Thanks. OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 05:54, 14 March 2024 (UTC)

Can't save edits on listings

Swept in from the pub

I was shown the following message repeatedly: "Error: An unknown error has been encountered while attempting to save the listing, please try again: spamblacklist". I guess it's a case of false positive by an automatic filter. Delist me please.--Hnishy63 (talk) 00:54, 26 April 2024 (UTC)

Ah, now it's okay. Can't figure out how it works.--Hnishy63 (talk) 01:23, 26 April 2024 (UTC)

Content translation

Swept in from the pub

Hey All We are looking at the possibility of launching Content Translation to work between languages of WikiVoyage. What this would mean is that one could use this tool to translate WikiVoyage articles between EN and DE or DE to EN or another other language pairs for that matter. There is the possibility to have this work supported by an initial machine translation layer but the requirement for humans to make a certain amount of improvements. Thoughts or concerns? Travel Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 08:22, 10 August 2024 (UTC)

I wouldn't support allowing machine-translated listings or sections to be put verbatim on any language version of Wikivoyage. I just think that's a very bad practice. As machine translation improves, maybe someday it will be OK, but the authors have to be credited and it's really better for a thinking person to not only translate but also make decisions about whether edits are needed. Ikan Kekek (talk) 08:59, 10 August 2024 (UTC)

I would strongly support it. Even on voy/de our community is very active but still too small. Even me, I often start with an en:import. I think have a tool like that could lower the barrier to start new articles, especially in an less active Wikivoyage language version. It would be not limited to de, even Polish Wikivoyager could use German articles to have it translated and start. -- DerFussi 10:40, 10 August 2024 (UTC)

Yah allowing machine translation without improvement is definitely not something I would support either. Thankfully the tool doesn’t permit this. Travel Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 15:28, 10 August 2024 (UTC)

I've used it for Wikipedia articles, and I think it's helpful. The percentage of necessary revision to a machine translation is configurable per language pair, as some machine translations are better than others. You might want 5% changed, on average, for Spanish to English, but 15% for German to English.

In my experience, it's easiest to translate into a language you know very well. People who write well in English don't dump bad translations into the mainspace just because The Computer™ said that was good grammar. Problems with this can usually be resolved with a short partial block to force a discussion. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:57, 10 August 2024 (UTC)

For the record, a similar request has been made at m:Community Wishlist/Wishes/ContentTranslation work for Wikivoyage/en (original request is in Spanish). --SHB2000 (t | c | m) 10:59, 10 August 2024 (UTC)

It's not obvious what this adds, because even with existing tools, translation of most languages is speedy and not a bottleneck to editing. What takes time is engaging brain to produce coherent content. For instance, the North African desert does not have such good skiing as google-translated W/WV-DE would have you believe - Piste in this context means a dirt track. Grahamsands (talk) 20:42, 10 August 2024 (UTC)

At htwiki, I'm cleaning up machine translations that were apparently accomplished through this method:

• Open French Wikipedia article.
• Copy raw wikitext into Google Translate.
• Paste unedited Google Translate results, including mangled wikitext codes, non-existent parameter names, and translated file names, into the Haitian Creole Wikipedia.

The ContentTranslation tool doesn't screw up the wikitext. WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:46, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

@Grahamsands: Nobody said that using the ContentTranslation tool even with machine translation meant you stopped doing copyedits. --SHB2000 (t | c | m) 05:33, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

What I'm afraid of is the translation tool allowing a workflow where the brain is disengaged. The 15% (or whatever) limit avoids this for most users, but some may come up with strategies to get enough changes without improving anything.

There is no guarantee that those using the tool have a good enough command of English to avoid problems, neither with grammar, nor with facts. We can have a discussion with established users, and block them if need be, but we might have short-term accounts do problematic translations. I simply do not trust unknown users to behave sensibly with such tools.

On the other hand, I don't have experience with using the tool for Wikivoyage articles, it might work well with the typically less complicated text here (and it might have improved since I tried it at sv-wp). What's the experience of new users using the tool at Wikipedias? –LPfi (talk) 09:20, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

If I'm not mistaken some wikis require extendedconfirmed permission to use the Content Translation tool – in our case, we could make that autopatroller and sysop. This would make it clear that the tool is primarily for trusted users and using it is a privilege. --SHB2000 (t | c | m) 10:07, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

That would probably solve the main issues. –LPfi (talk) 11:17, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

Worries like "some may come up with strategies to get enough changes without improving anything" are not grounded in facts. It's pure speculation. It's obvious that you "simply do not trust unknown users", but we could equally say that "There is no guarantee that those using" the existing system can write in English well, and newbies screw up all day long, at all wikis, everywhere. It's part of the learning curve.

I think the situation breaks down like this:

• Old system: Newbies make mistakes, newbies mangle formatting, newbies use machine translation without any minimum requirements or even reminders to check the results. Sometimes we have to clean up the mess, or delete the page, or block them.
• Proposed system: Newbies will make mistakes, but they'll be less likely to mangle formatting. Newbies will use machine translation, but there will be minimum requirements and reminders to check the results. Still, sometimes – though probably less often – we will have to clean up the mess, or delete the page, or block them.

Which of these two systems do you want? Remember that the one in which nobody uses machine translation, nobody writes in their second (or third) language, and only people who are fully competent in both technical and language terms get to contribute isn't what we have now, and it won't be what we have then, either. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:48, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

Might be that you are right, but I don't think it is a far-fetched a-priori thought that a tool for machine translation increases the usage of machine translation. –LPfi (talk) 17:30, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

I know that machine translation is a valuable tool in hands that know how to use it. In those cases, the result shouldn't be easily distinguishable from skilful manual translation. We also have users that use machine translation to produce low-quality text and even rubbish. I don't think it is common enough to be a problem. I don't know whether this tool will increase such usage to a point where it is a problem. Personally, I have tried the tool a few times at Wikipedia and found it hard to use as intended (e.g. changing the paragraph structure wasn't supported). It might work better for Wikivoyage. –LPfi (talk) 17:38, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

One of the classic stories about poor translation is that in the early days of machine translation, somebody entered the text "The spirit was willing but the flesh weak" into an English to Russian translator. The resulting Russian was translated back to English and dave "The vodka was good but the meat was bad". This is an extreme example, but I often use the Google English to Afrikaans translator, mainly to get the correct vocabulary. I invariably have to change something. I therefore counsel that machine translators should be used with care. Martinvl (talk) 19:58, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

At the very least when it's trialled, it should only be for autopatrollers and sysops, LPfi's concerns are pretty much why many wikis require EC (typically 30 days + 500 edits on many Wikipedias) to use this tool. --SHB2000 (t | c | m) 21:58, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

For sure and those limits can be set at WikiVoyage aswell. We could also set it up for functioning from EN WV to other languages of WV if EN does not wish to have it functional to here. But before I assign this work to a programmer will need consensus from at least a few communities. Travel Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 05:21, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

I'd probably want to restrict it to autopatrollers, at least at first. Anyone who wants to use the tool can request autopatroller status and be granted it at the discretion of an admin. The documentation on the tool should state that clearly. Ikan Kekek (talk) 07:46, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

CX can also be turned on without machine translation (obvious problem, seen at other wikis: people just copy/paste paragraphs into Google Translate without any requirement for revision), so that we get only the formatting and attribution benefits, without the translation benefits (e.g., they'll link to the disambiguation page Auburn instead of automatically connecting to Auburn (Alabama)).

I understand that it's also possible to choose specific language pairs for translation (e.g., from Spanish to English, but not from German to English). WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:05, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

We could allow autoconfirmed users to do that (formatting and attribution benefits, without the translation benefits). Ikan Kekek (talk) 15:49, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

@SHB2000, does your "many wikis" mean "the English Wikipedia only"? WhatamIdoing (talk) 14:55, 12 August 2024 (UTC)