Wikivoyage:Travellers' pub

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How do you feel about having a Discord server for for the English Wikivoyage community?

I am currently looking to create one for the small Hebrew Wikivoyage community. I think it works a lot better than the IRC servers, it is a lot more secure, it gives us a lot more options to collaborate, and it is a better and more up-to-date way of welcoming the new editors interested in joining the effort.

I can see that many other Wikimedia communities have opened Discord channels as well.

I am mostly hoping that it would be a good place to have more natural communication with the new people whom are curious about Wikivoyage, and would like to chat in real time with our more active members (and because it can be used on a mobile app, this probably means more people would participate in the chats when someone new joins, in comparison to the activity in the IRC servers).

How do you feel about this idea? ויקיג'אנקי (talk) 22:21, 16 February 2020 (UTC)

I am not opposed in theory but I am very pro-IRC and do not see the value in moving to another service. How is it that IRC servers are not working? How are they more secure? I'd be interested in any sources you used to make these claims. IRC is very much a "if it isn't broke, don't fix it" situation for me but I am happy to be corrected. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 03:18, 17 February 2020 (UTC)

Have you tried using Discord before? it is a much more up-to-date platform. Several things I like about discord so far (and i'm quite new to it still):

• It is much more secure - people cannot look up your IP address or figure out your real email. The Wikipedia Discord server seem to accept only people with verified emails, while other Wiki servers I've seen accept anyone - So I guess, we could also decide if we want it to only be available to verified people or if it should be available to anyone whom wants to join in right away.
• It works on both PCs and mobile devices, and the apps are very advanced - they are a sort of combination between a modern VoIP apps, IRC and internet forums. You can even have audio or video group conversations in it and people could send each other files directly if they want. I believe that it is also possible to configure it on your phone so that you would get a notification if there's any activity on the server while you are on the go.
• While IRC is very nostalgic for many of us (I grew up with it in the 90s too), my impression is that Discord seems to have gradually become a popular alternative to IRC among younger folks these days. So using it as the main communication platform might probably better appeal for younger people considering joining the efforts.
• While the user lists at the IRC channels only show users currently connected that are probably siting by a stationary PC, many times it seems to me that it is hard to get an immediate response in the IRC channels or even a late response. The situation seems to be less of an issue in Discord as the discord app on people's mobile makes it much more available to the members.
• Discord servers seem to be programmable... allowing addition of many various useful features.
• A discord server is similar to a forums platform - on the server we could create different channels for the main things our community is focused on ... for instance a channel for the main Expeditions, channels devoted for people focused on the site's maintenance, etc..
• As the participants in it might be more active than IRC because it is more available to people in mobile phones, it seems like the perfect landing page to send new people to.
• I understand that people don't have to install the app for it to work... if they want they could alternatively also use it through a web browser.
• I believe concentrated collaborations focused on improving specific things would be much more easier through it due to all the features I mentioned above. ויקיג'אנקי (talk) 09:34, 17 February 2020 (UTC)

I personally have never used IRC, but I have used Discord before, and to this day maintain some small servers, some of which are related to editing on private wikis. I cannot compare the two, but I can offer a bit of insight perhaps. To correct ויקיג'אנקי:

• The servers themselves aren't programmable. They are customisable to a large extend, but most of these customisations are done through the use of Discord bots, which are programmable and offer most of the extended usability of the servers. I don't have experience with programming and creating Discord bots though, so I can't really tell you what it'd take.
• Discord largely has a young userbase and would most likely be a way to get more interaction going with younger (potential) editors, as well as being not too difficult to get the hang of for veteran editors. It does require an account, which is about everything you need as a participant. The platform can be accessed through the browser, on mobile through the apps, as well as on desktop. If it is any insight, the reason I never bothered with the IRC to now, is because the thing as a whole seems very dated and impractical to me. It seemed to me as though it'd require a lot more effort from me to set up than it'd gain me.

Other than that, the above is pretty much accurate. Discord as a community tool offers lots of possibilities. Through the means of a custom bot, I reckon it wouldn't be too difficult to, for example, transfer ranks between a server and Wikivoyage (speaking of autopatroller, sys-op, moderator and so on). This might not be ideal since not every WikiVoyage Sys-op might want to be an Admin on the Discord server, but that's details that need to be worked out later. Either way, depending on their rank in the server, a user can see different channels. Moderation servers and logs, for example, are best not shown to the average user, and visible only to moderators and admins.

I have seen bots around on "product support servers" that let one create a ticket, which is essentially a private room. This could be a way to let users make their own projects/expeditions, and users could browse these in one way or another. Also not unimportant: Channels are distinguished between in voice channels and text channels, and they do pretty much what you'd expect. These can be organised through categories. To visualise, this image shows the structure of one of the wiki-specific Discord servers I run. It's not got a load of members, so it's nothing big, but the essential structure is there: The general category contains a closed channel which no-one but administrators can post in, and is pretty much a landing page; general and learn-to-wiki are channels intended to as they suggest. One is the general discussion, the other a channel for helping people get the hang of wikitext. The about category is mostly for feedback to us (administrators/sys-ops) in several kinds of ways, and the category mod talk is for sys-ops' documentation and discussion. Finally, there's several voice channels for different purposes.

Either way, the sky is the limit when it comes to customising a Discord server. I for one would be in favour of creating one for Wikivoyage and wouldn't mind lending a hand to its creation. If there's any questions I may be able to answer as a more long-time user of the platform, as well as the owner of several servers, please do send them my way!
-- Wauteurz (talk) 20:12, 17 February 2020 (UTC)

We have to meet people where they are. For text- and voice-based collaboration, Discord is it. IRC works for what it is, but people have to make a concerted effort to find it and use it. Powers ^(talk) 20:49, 17 February 2020 (UTC)

Why use private channels? Whats wrong with talking publicly on wikipages? Just curious. Ottawahitech (talk) 19:36, 25 March 2020 (UTC) (please ping me)

Nothing, and that's the normal thing to do. And as a matter of fact, I think most of us have ignored this thread. I had forgotten it existed. Ikan Kekek (talk) 21:26, 25 March 2020 (UTC)

I don't think that the goal is private communication. I think the problem is that communicating on wikitext pages is weird, compared to everything else people use for internet-based communication. Think about it: When was the last time you sent a message off-wiki in a system that let you change the other person's comments? And not just a copy of their comments, e.g., in a quotation, but the actual main record of their comments, so that if nobody else noticed and undid the unauthorized changes, someone could change your words to say that this was a grand idea and that you fully supported it?

Additionally, in the context of Hebrew, wikitext can be entirely non-intuitive, as some "punctuation" (such as the brackets we use to make links) can end up on the "wrong" side. There's a logical consistency to it (see http://rtl.wtf/ by one of my favorite MediaWiki devs, and especially the video of her StrangeLoop presentation, which is at http://ltr.wtf/lectures/strangeloop-2017-wait-thaw-supporting-right-left-can-expose-bad-ux-decisions/ ) but as the OP said, it's not a "natural" way to communicate. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:26, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

@ויקיג'אנקי: Can you tell us if Discord discussions public? Thanks in advance, Ottawahitech (talk) 21:15, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

Discord channels can have any privacy level the creator wants. They're at least as public as IRC channels. As for on-wiki communication, obviously most discussion should remain here. But a Discord server would be handy for real-time collaboration and assistance. Like if a newbie has a question about contributing, they could just ask on Discord instead of posting here in the Pub and waiting to see if any answers come in, which could be a day later or more. Powers ^(talk) 00:44, 28 March 2020 (UTC)

Thanks for replying. I don't use IRC, so I don't understand what you mean when you say at least as public as IRC. Ottawahitech (talk) 12:23, 29 March 2020 (UTC)

The point being that IRC is the current real-time chat platform used for Wikimedia collaboration. You can find more information here. Powers ^(talk) 19:05, 29 March 2020 (UTC)

IRC isn't used by non-devs much any longer. I have the impression that there are more people in the Telegram channel for just the Italian Wikipedia than on IRC for the whole movement. WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:53, 30 March 2020 (UTC)

I'm not surprised. Thus why Discord might be a better option. As stated above: meet people where they are. Powers ^(talk) 02:21, 1 April 2020 (UTC)

My biggest concern with a focus on Discord is the risk of sustainability of access to features and the freemium model Discord employs, ie data export requires paid level. In my opinion data export should be included in a free model. Mozilla recently moved their chat services from Slack to Matrix based communications which is open source and would provide more control for integration and improvement of user experience and tools - read more on that at https://wiki.mozilla.org/Matrix . The larger question is identifying how conversations are not being satisfied and looking what are possible solutions that meet the needs and values of the community. I'd suggest evaluating if infrastructure being selected supports open development and improvement by the community and most importantly access to leave with the data along with the privacy controls desired by the community.Wolfgang8741 (talk) 11:08, 7 April 2020 (UTC)

While of course, we all support the free software movement, and an open source option has many advantages, I think there's a strong advantage to using platforms that large numbers of people (both established Wikivoyagers and potential new Wikivoyagers) are already using. Powers ^(talk) 20:42, 8 April 2020 (UTC)

Coronavirus... Single collation page?

Should there be a single page collating all the disprate warnings and advice from various pages? (There was a single page for Zika...) ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 18:38, 26 February 2020 (UTC)

I look forward to the day when we could archive such a page, but I think that right now, it's a good idea. Ikan Kekek (talk) 19:55, 26 February 2020 (UTC)

Yes it will be a travel topic and breadcrumbed from Stay healthy. Once it's well developed, it should be prominently posted on the main page and if need be, social media. But it will have to be continually updated. The Zika virus article is a good starting point in terms of structure. Gizza ^(roam) 23:09, 26 February 2020 (UTC)

Agreed, such an article can be useful. Ypsilon (talk) 16:22, 27 February 2020 (UTC)

@Doc James:, Your thoughts? Asking so that someone with appropriate expertise can draft an appropriate article. ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 13:13, 27 February 2020 (UTC)

For what it's worth I'll link this here -https://www.gov.uk/guidance/travel-advice-novel-coronavirus being the advice from the UK. ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 18:35, 27 February 2020 (UTC)

As far as I know pings don't work when you edit the username without a new signature, so re-pinging User:Doc James. —Granger (talk · contribs) 00:45, 28 February 2020 (UTC)

Agree in my opinion a single page with all the various travel recommendations is better than multiple ones. Expecially with the recommendations changing so frequently. Travel Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 00:58, 28 February 2020 (UTC)

Thanks for your view, Is anyone (rapidly) drafting the relevant page? ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 11:02, 28 February 2020 (UTC)

Also - https://en.wikivoyage.org/wiki/Template:Warningbox/sandbox , Is there a recognized symbol that could be used to mark a health alert type warning box, as opposed to the default warning triangle? ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 11:01, 28 February 2020 (UTC)

One more point, while I'm not any kind of medical professional if there's just one or a few cases in a country and the number is hardly if at all changing, I don't think there's a reason for warningboxes or other warnings in articles. In that case I'd imagine the few people unlucky to have been infected are most likely in the hospital or otherwise quarantined. So, for example a warning like the one added to the Nigeria article isn't necessary - the country has exactly one case as of now. If the number of cases on the other hand is rapidly growing (ie. dozens of new cases in a day), it means the disease is loose and if you happen to be in that area there's a real risk you may catch it. --Ypsilon (talk) 14:02, 28 February 2020 (UTC)

I agree, Given the wording of the relevant section certain other diseases are more likely to be encountered.ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 14:21, 28 February 2020 (UTC)

I have plunged forward and started a coronavirus outbreak article. It only has the bare minimum for now so please add more information! The name may also need changing but I strongly suggest keeping "coronavirus" in the title instead of technical names for the virus or disease (nobody searches for SARS-COV-2, COVID-19 or nCov-2019). Gizza ^(roam) 04:59, 1 March 2020 (UTC)

This is an exceptionally useful article. A big thank you to those who put it together. I'm in SE Asia now and am watching the situation carefully as I am concerned about being stranded here (which would be very nice in many ways, but I have obligations at home). I am going to plunge forward and find a place for a link to it on the Main Page. Ground Zero (talk) 01:43, 3 March 2020 (UTC)

Social media nomination

I have nominated the 2019-2020 coronavirus outbreak article to be shared on our social media platforms. Please see the proposal at Wikivoyage:Social media/Nominations. Thanks. Gizza ^(roam) 00:23, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

Gizza - That social media nominations page is not very active. Luckily, I'm the sole administrator of Wikivoyage's Facebook page who also remains active on Wikivoyage itself. I will make sure and give the coronavirus article a mention when I can.

I think Wikivoyage has a Twitter account too, but I'm not sure if it's being actively updated. I'd volunteer if I were on Twitter, but I'm not. This is probably something we should look into addressing.

-- AndreCarrotflower (talk) 01:04, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

Done -- AndreCarrotflower (talk) 22:13, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

FTT

I would suggest to consider the change of the current FTT due to the worldwide emergency and the translation of that article in the other languages. Any Wikivoyage homepage should highlight this topic. --Andyrom75 (talk) 07:15, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

Yeah, and it's not as though the schedule can't be moved back, so that the current FTT gets a full month.--ThunderingTyphoons! (talk) 09:02, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

We're not going to change the FTT at this time. I do understand the awkwardness of the position we're in, as a travel wiki during a period of time where travel to many areas of the world is being discouraged or banned outright, but our mission remains that of serving those who do travel. In this situation, that means acknowledging there's a pandemic afoot and providing readers with up-to-date information and an accurate assessment of the risk of travelling - which we already do with the link on the Main Page to our 2019–2020 coronavirus outbreak article which IMO is pretty first-rate - but that also means acknowledging the reality that there are still flights in the air, including budget flights, and still passengers on them. If we were talking about a FTT (or a DotM, or an OtBP) that was specific to a country or area of the world that was particularly hard-hit or where particularly stringent travel restrictions applied, that might be different. But Flying on a budget is a very broad topic, and it's perfectly possible to do so to a country that's less affected by COVID-19, or domestically within the same country, or if all else fails, later after the pandemic is over - the information remains accurate in all those cases. -- AndreCarrotflower (talk) 16:07, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

We might change it actually, it depends on consensus. --ThunderingTyphoons! (talk) 16:16, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

ThunderingTyphoons! - Yes, but a little consideration, please, for those who do the work of devising the schedule and making banners, and who would have to scramble and take time away from other tasks to reconfigure that schedule and make new banners on the spur of the moment. I'm not saying let's do what certain world leaders are doing and pretend coronavirus is a hoax or is being overblown by the media, but I am saying that there are ways to handle this more seamlessly and with less disruption. If we decide to alter DotM to acknowledge the coronavirus, I would prefer that we put the entire thing on hiatus - DotM, OtBP, and FTT alike - and remove the carousel from the Main Page until the situation is sorted (perhaps we could replace it with a single non-rotating banner pointing to the 2019–2020 coronavirus outbreak article), and I would prefer that we wait to institute those changes until March 21st or some other day when we'd be changing out one of the features anyway. Because firstly, if what epidemiologists say is true about the spread of the disease, then the only effective difference between any destinations we might feature is whether it's a place that's currently being ravaged by coronavirus or one that in the very near future will be. So it's a fool's errand in the first place to try to pick and choose which articles are okay to feature and which should be pulled, especially given that we might have to reverse those decisions on short notice given how rapidly the situation on the ground is changing. Secondly, Flying on a budget is only FTT for ten more days, and as I said, it's a broad topic that's not linked to any particular geographic location and is thus less susceptible, relatively speaking, to said rapid changes on the ground than a destination article would be. And if it can be avoided, I'd prefer not to monkey around with pulling articles off the Main Page early and then figuring out how many days are left to make a whole month. -- AndreCarrotflower (talk) 17:57, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

I think we should change it. I am not very concerned with exactly how many days the existing FTT "should" get. Obviously, if any given maintainer doesn't have time to make the change, then that editor is not expected to do any of the work. But that should not preclude others from changing it. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:12, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

(edit conflict) To elaborate, we would be absolutely putting the traveller first by featuring the coronavirus on the carousel, as it is the number one issue in travel right now. "Travellers" are not just people who are travelling right now, or will be doing so imminently. Everyone who travels at some point in their lives is a traveller, and anyone who uses Wikivoyage to plan a trip or just do some research is a Wikivoyager.

Cynically, this may also help our readership figures, as it prominently displays the issue that everyone's talking about. The current static display above the featured event is a bit of a visual mess for Chrome and Firefox users (though perhaps one that can be fixed), and it involves scrolling down in order to see it. People who don't know it's there won't necessarily look.

By contrast, there is nothing "now" about Flying on a budget; it is so useful it could be featured any time for as long as the oil lasts. And it's not as though not featuring now involves deleting it from our servers, so travellers planning trips can still make use of it.

On Talk:Main page, I asked whether it would be possible to add a fourth item - coronavirus - to the carousel. I'll repeat that question here, as it's relevant, and is a way to feature the virus article more prominently without compromising our existing schedule, if people feel strongly about that.--ThunderingTyphoons! (talk) 18:18, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

(edit conflict) WhatamIdoing - You personally may not be "concerned with exactly how many days the existing FTT 'should' get", but consensus has held that having some featured articles on the Main Page longer than others is unfair to their authors, even under extreme circumstances (the linked talk page discussion asks what we would do if, hypothetically, a terrorist attack were to occur in a current DotM). There's absolutely no reason why we shouldn't accommodate that consensus into whatever we decide to do about DotM, and in a world where scientists say that up to 70% of the human population will ultimately be infected with the virus, there's also no reason why we should treat any particular article as a more sensitive subject than any other article. In fact, not only is flying on a budget "a broad topic that's not linked to any particular geographic location and is thus less susceptible, relatively speaking, to said rapid changes on the ground than a destination article would be", as I said above, but also not everyone who flies does so by choice. Many businesses are setting their employees up to work from home or telecommute, but (for the time being at least) there are also some that aren't, and business travel is still a thing that's happening. And Wikivoyage is at the service of business travellers too. We can live with the status quo for 10 more days, especially with an acknowledgement of COVID-19 already occupying a prominent place on the Main Page. -- AndreCarrotflower (talk) 18:27, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

In it:voy we have put in homepage the coronavirus article and it will remain there for at least three months. Travel is important but travel safely and healthy is more important. Just for chatting, w:Spanish flu was "just a flu"... --Andyrom75 (talk) 18:32, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

Oppose, even if it would be the 21st today. The coronavirus article definitely ought to be prominently displayed on the Main Page, and it would be hidden away in the featured articles carousel – it would only show one third of the time unless there's only one article in the carousel. A better place would be for example an additional narrow red box between the map and the carousel, or above the map. Or even a visible link (red text? a red box? a miniature warning box?) on the map itself. Also the epidemic will almost certainly be around for some time (ie. more than one month) and I don't think we should put the featured topics (or any other featured articles) on hold for an indefinite time unless those articles are about destinations heavily affected by the covid epidemic. --Ypsilon (talk) 18:37, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

(multiple edit conflicts) ThunderingTyphoons! - I'm torn between, on the one hand, wanting to do right by our authors and less disruption for the DotM maintainers on this site, and on the other hand, the feeling that it does look a bit tone-deaf for us to be promoting travel in any capacity under these circumstances. With that in mind, how about this for a compromise. We make a banner for the coronavirus article and add it to the carousel as a fourth item, as you suggested. Then, on March 21st, April 1st, and April 11th, we remove the current FTT, DotM, and OtBP (respectively) from the Main Page as we normally would but don't replace them with anything, until eventually the coronavirus article is the only one on the carousel. Depending on how long the epidemic lasts, any upcoming articles on the schedule to be featured can simply be moved a year into the future - same month - so there's no issue vis-a-vis Time to feature. -- AndreCarrotflower (talk) 18:39, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

People should really be limiting social contact quite a lot during this pandemic, but we have to face the possibility that it drags on for years. And while we probably should not promote leisure travel in any form right now, nor business travel as opposed to working from home, a big part of the appeal of travel sites during a time of enforced or voluntary restrictions on movement is vicarious. I will also say that I seriously doubt budget travel will be the same after the epidemic is over, as the airline industry is being ravaged by bankruptcies. Ikan Kekek (talk) 18:48, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

Excellent points, Ikan; I'll add my voice of support to them. Bumping the DotM, OtBP, and FTT probably doesn't make sense since we don't know how long this epidemic will last, and in any case it doesn't prevent people from travelling or from thinking about travelling. I do think we should add something more visible. (Quite honestly, I didn't even realize what was below the carousel, as my browser window isn't large enough to show it and I never linger on the main page.) A fourth item in the carousel would be good, or perhaps a small extra banner between the Welcome and the carousel. --Bigpeteb (talk) 18:57, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ I'm happy with exploring Andre's suggested compromise, and am equally happy with looking at Ypsilon's idea to put in a new, static box above the carousel. The idea that such important information shouldn't be animated has merit, as does the point that maintaining the normal featured articles may be inappropriate and increasingly pointless if more countries go into lockdown. --ThunderingTyphoons! (talk) 20:01, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

As things currently stand, it looks like opinions are trending very slightly in favor of continuing to run DotM/OtBP/FTT as normal (albeit perhaps with a coronavirus banner as a fourth feature for the duration of the pandemic), and I'm prepared to say we have a solid consensus against the immediate removal of Flying on a budget and/or any of our other current featured articles. So for now let's refocus the discussion on how best to address the coronavirus issue on the Main Page, and let's put off the issue of pulling feature articles off the carousel until no sooner than March 21st, unless there's some truly startling development in the news between now and then. Agreed? -- AndreCarrotflower (talk) 20:15, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

I'm in favour of Ypsilon's proposal. The box between the map and the carousel would give an higher visibility to the article. PS I've noticed the current link in the homepage only after reading this discussion... --Andyrom75 (talk) 21:33, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

Coronavius (Covid-19) is now pandemic say WHO - (https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-51839944). I would not oppose pulling the DotM/OtBP/FTT, and NOT running an April 1st item this year. ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 21:33, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

I don't think that we should pull Flying on a budget, but making 2019–2020 coronavirus outbreak more prominent is good. Generally I think that readers read articles on the front page to consider something to do in a few months' time, not to leap in a taxi to the airport. If you are going to travel 500km in the next few months, you are probably at less risk of catching the virus spending 1 hour on a plane than 4 hours in a train or 8 hours in a bus. The virus is likely to be a major issue for the rest of the year. However we do need to be more ready to change featured articles in response to the news. Unfortunately DOTM work is mainly done by a very small number of editors which limits how easily we can make last minute changes. AlasdairW (talk) 00:10, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

Building on the final point that AlasdairW made, maybe we ought to take this opportunity to clarify for ourselves exactly what we hope to accomplish with DotM, which IMO has never been very well delineated. Are we promoting particular places to our readers as potential travel destinations, or are we highlighting well-written articles and rewarding editors' dedication by ensuring their work reaches a wider audience? I'd always assumed it was the latter, as the former doesn't jibe very well with our fair and balanced, not-for-profit ethos as a WMF family member. But if it's the former, then it follows that we should take a closer look at the ramifications of continuing to promote travel in the midst of coronavirus epidemic (and I mean travel as a concept - as I said before, it's almost pointless to speak in terms of which definitions are safer than others; any place that isn't affected now soon will be). -- AndreCarrotflower (talk) 00:21, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

An alternative would be to use the "Featured Events" space to highlight the article, with a picture of a virus or a COVID19 graphic. The FE space is intended to make the Main Page appear more timely, and to highlight events that travellers may be interested bin. COVID19 meets both of those criteria in spades. Also, events are bring cancelled or postponed, so we will have less to feature. As creator and curator of the FE space, I support putting Featured Events on hold until the pandemic is over. Ground Zero (talk) 01:06, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

I think this is the best idea yet, to be honest. -- AndreCarrotflower (talk) 01:14, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

Can the FE space be temporarily put higher on the Main page than the carousel, and can the text of the headline (presumably "2019–2020 coronavirus outbreak") be made bigger? Ikan Kekek (talk) 02:21, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

Some major events have been canceled, and some countries (at least in Europe) have banned gatherings of more than 500 or 1000 people, so I was already going to suggest to put the Featured events section on hold. I agree the Featured events section can be a good place to put the warning, for example with a similar design like Italian WV's Main Page as Andyrom suggested. --Ypsilon (talk) 06:09, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

I'd like to place it higher on the page, as I mentioned above. Ikan Kekek (talk) 07:11, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

Yes, continuing to feature it down in the 'scroll zone' is not good enough. Above the carousel, or in the carousel, I don't care, but it has to be visible at the point people arrive on the main page.--ThunderingTyphoons! (talk) 07:21, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

Above the carosel is the preferred choice. In alternative as the first page of the carosel (4 in total, but shifting the 3 existing ones). --Andyrom75 (talk) 09:29, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

I also support putting it above the carousel. First page of the carousel would also be okay, that's what they're doing at zh.wikivoyage. —Granger (talk · contribs) 09:46, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

There seems to be consensus to put more focus on this, so I've changed the Featured Event space as proposed as an interim step. I don't know if there is consensus to put it above the carousel (which I support), and I haven't the foggiest how to do it. Ground Zero (talk) 10:57, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

I have yet another idea. Wikimedia sometimes puts boxes on top of each article, in all wikis calling people to vote for stewards, photograph something and what have you. Could this be implemented on WV for the coronavirus epidemic? It would be visible on the top of all pages, not just the Main Page (of course we could have additional warnings on the Main Page). --Ypsilon (talk) 11:20, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

Site notice? ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 12:18, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

That would be a great idea, for sure.

Since there will shortly be an empty space where the virus is currently sitting, and events normally are, I wonder if we could temporarily fill it with a prompt for readers to explore our star articles? It may get them a bit of deserving attention from updaters, and is a nice way to show off our best works on the main page. It can be 'sold' as Wikivoyage looking back on some of the great places we've visited, and encouraging virtual visits via our travel guide in lieu of actual visits for the duration of the crisis. Just an idea I had this morning.--ThunderingTyphoons! (talk) 13:32, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

Yes, Site notice is apparently what it's called, we don't seem to have the template here. Central notice is metawiki's template that can be broadcasted to all wikis in all languages, though on the other hand Wikimedia informing readers on all wikis how to behave in the current situation (much of what's in our article is also useful for people just "traveling" between their home, workplace, school and local grocery store) isn't necessarily a bad idea... --Ypsilon (talk) 17:12, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

I think we could do it at MediaWiki:Sitenotice. If we do want to do that, let's workshop the text first, though. —Granger (talk · contribs) 17:25, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘As time goes by and more news continues to come out, I have found myself drifting more and more toward the opinion that maybe suspending DotM for a while would be a good idea after all (I mean, obviously, in addition to giving coronavirus coverage a more prominent place on the Main Page). I want to say that I'm very sympathetic to Ikan's comments about the vicarious pleasures of reading travel articles at a time when actual travel is increasingly impossible. That same perspective informed my opinions earlier on. But I think we need to balance that with a factor that I've not heard discussed much on this thread, which is that of optics. Regardless of what our rationale may be for continuing to have the featured-article banners on the main page, there's a distinct chance that our readers, our social media followers, or - less probably but potentially more consequentially - the press, who have recently been heaping praise on Wikipedia for their vigilance in keeping disinformation out of coronavirus-related articles, might misunderstand that rationale and assume our intent is to promote travel, and thus feel that we're acting recklessly and failing to take the coronavirus threat seriously. And I think that, especially for a smaller wiki like ours, we underestimate the importance of the goodwill of our readership or potential readership, and the damage that can be done if it's lost, at our peril.

Happily, if we pull the banners in the name of optics, there needn't be a sense of urgency to act immediately - we can still do as I suggested before, which is to wait until the 21st - and rather than waiting the many months or perhaps years that will elapse before the virus itself ceases to be a threat, the optics argument would probably enable us to quietly reinstate DotM once the news media finds a new obsession, which will almost certainly happen sooner due to issue fatigue among the public.

Just something to think about.

-- AndreCarrotflower (talk) 20:14, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

I would support that, but I think it really depends on how we present things. Suppose we put a notice on the page suggesting that people should follow the recommendations of health authorities to limit social contact and avoid inessential travel and then say "however, if you'd like to read about some destinations while you're staying home, here are three articles we're featuring for your reading pleasure this month"? Ikan Kekek (talk) 21:16, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

I don't think we need to suspend DOTM. As AlasdairW said, most readers aren't reading articles on the front page so they can jump into a taxi and set off immediately. I think readers see featured articles as recommendations for somewhere to consider planning a trip to or some interesting armchair travel. Adding a prominent link to our coronavirus article above the carousel (or as the first page of the carousel) would convey that we are taking our readers' safety seriously.

For comparison, I looked at the front pages of Lonely Planet, Trip Advisor, and Fodor's, and all three acknowledge the pandemic prominently but also continue to feature articles advertising destinations. Fodor's published an article called "We Won’t Stop Writing About Travel (Even in a Pandemic)" explaining their decision, somewhat similar to Ikan Kekek's suggestion. —Granger (talk · contribs) 00:20, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

Something else to think about—if we can get a relevant article into featurable shape on very short notice, we could run it as the next FTT and bump the French phrasebook to another month. A topic like Stay healthy, Infectious diseases, Hygiene and body care, Travel health kit, Returning home, or Travel insurance might be timely, for instance. (If we get an article in shape in time, I'd be happy to make banner images to take some of the work off of AndreCarrotflower.) I'm imagining doing this in addition to highlighting the coronavirus article in a more prominent place on the main page. —Granger (talk · contribs) 00:35, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

A mock-up

Here's a concrete suggestion for something we could put above the carousel. Of course the text can be modified or a different image can be substituted. What do others think?

2019–2020 coronavirus outbreak

Stay healthy

Should you cancel trips? How can you protect yourself if you're travelling? Read about how the COVID-19 pandemic is affecting travel.

—Granger (talk · contribs) 00:52, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

I support this banner. OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 03:20, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

Me too. Ikan Kekek (talk) 03:27, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

As a general rule, textboxes should be wide enough to accommodate article titles on one single line. I tweaked it accordingly. Yes, it has my full support. -- AndreCarrotflower (talk) 03:31, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

I'd support this, and put the Adelaide Festival back into the Featured Event space for now. It has not been cancelled. Ground Zero (talk) 04:20, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

Seeing support from multiple users and no opposition, I've implemented the change. Normally I would wait longer for a major change to the main page, but given the fast-paced nature of the situation I figure it's better not to delay unnecessarily. —Granger (talk · contribs) 05:24, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

It looks great! Thank you. Ground Zero (talk) 05:51, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

Yeah, it's awesome! Perfect. Ikan Kekek (talk) 05:57, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

Thanks Granger, looks good.--ThunderingTyphoons! (talk) 07:03, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

Great job! Thanks Granger! --Ypsilon (talk) 12:18, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

• I agree with this update of information. Having a prominent warning about a travel concern of such high importance is a sensible measure for a travel website.—The preceding comment was added by SelfieCity (talk • contribs)

Following up on the issue of suspending DotM

I want to start out by thanking Granger for bringing that Fodor's article to light. It was very much a relief to learn that other travel guides have been deliberating the same issues that we have, broadly speaking, and have decided that despite everything that's going on and the fear and trepidation it's stirred up, the reading public is still in a position to appreciate the difference between writing/talking about travel now and endorsing the idea of travelling now. I think that provides us with enough cover that I'd be okay with continuing as usual with DotM, despite my earlier fears. All the same, I think it might be a good idea to put out some sort of messaging explaining our reasoning for doing so. I think this is an especially important thing to do on social media, where DotM is highlighted in, if anything, a more active way than on the site itself. Here's a draft version of a post I intend to place on Wikivoyage's Facebook page in a day or so. Your feedback is welcome.

Hello readers.

In light of the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, we want to update you on the latest steps Wikivoyage is taking.

We at Wikivoyage are passionate about travel. But we also recognize that the most important thing right now is, as much as possible, to slow the spread and mitigate the impact of the virus. And we understand that part of the reality of the fight against the virus is that for now, unnecessary travel is irresponsible and increasingly impossible. Over the past days, our community has been engaging in a discussion of how best to proceed with our mission of serving travellers in light of the current world situation.

On our Main Page, you'll find a link to our coverage of the 2019-2020 coronavirus pandemic. Again, please do everything you can to avoid travel during this pandemic, but if travel is unavoidable, our article is a comprehensive source of information on the pandemic as it pertains to travellers, including what to do to prevent infection and what to do if you do get infected. This information is being continuously updated as the situation progresses.

Also on our Main Page, you'll find links to our current Destination of the Month, Off the Beaten Path, and Featured Travel Topic articles. Our intention is to continue displaying these articles as normal, including promoting them on our Facebook page. Importantly, our intention is not to promote the idea of actually visiting any of these places now or in the immediate future. The primary purpose of our Featured Articles is, and always has been, to highlight the hard work of our dedicated team of travel writers by presenting our readers with the best-quality articles Wikivoyage has to offer. We are proud of the fact that our Featured Articles have served over the years as the inspiration for some truly fantastic travel adventures, and we hope that our readers are equally inspired by the articles we have in store for the coming months, but, once again, we implore you to please put off any unnecessary travel for the time being. These places will still be there waiting for you after the pandemic has passed - and given the grave impact that the pandemic is having on the travel industry, your custom will likely be more welcome than ever.

Another reason why we will continue to display our Featured Articles is because we also recognize that the stress of constant bombardment with news and information during this scary time, combined with the loneliness and isolation that comes with social distancing and lockdown, are having and will continue to have a real effect on people's mental health. We want you to stay up-to-date as the situation evolves, but we also understand the value of taking your mind off things from time to time. Even if right now you can't get away from it all to your favorite sun-soaked tropical isle in a literal sense, you can still "travel the world" virtually just by reading through our latest Featured Article, or any of our other articles.

Wikivoyage is the free, non-commercial, worldwide travel guide for everyone. That means you. And from the bottom of our hearts, we want to sincerely thank you for making us your most trusted source for travel information. We love travel, we know you love travel, and we intend to continue to be at your service for years and years to come. All things must pass, as they say; the coronavirus will too; and we all hope to be able to resume our normal lives and our normal travels as quickly as possible. But for now, please stay well, please stay informed with the recommendations of your local authorities and medical experts, and please take care of yourselves, your loved ones, and your neighbors.

(Pinging past participants in COVID-related discussions: ShakespeareFan00, Ikan Kekek, Gizza, Ypsilon, Ground Zero, Andyrom75, ThunderingTyphoons!, WhatamIdoing, Bigpeteb, AlasdairW, OhanaUnited, SelfieCity. Granger was already mentioned above.)

-- AndreCarrotflower (talk) 03:40, 18 March 2020 (UTC)

That's a really great draft! Thank you! I agree with it completely and would only tweak a few things. I'll make the edits now, and you can see if you like them - they're very minor. Ikan Kekek (talk) 05:01, 18 March 2020 (UTC)

It's very well written. No tweaks from me. Gizza ^(roam) 06:21, 18 March 2020 (UTC)

Excellent! Very passionate and accurate. Just one note. I'm not an English native speaker, but although the concept behind "your tourist dollars" is correct (and I agree with it), it sounds very venal, so I would suggest to reprhase it. Again congratulation. --Andyrom75 (talk) 07:22, 18 March 2020 (UTC)

Yep, good draft. I made a few changes in individual edits before this one. May I further suggest pinning the post once it's live, so it doesn't get lost by later ones?--ThunderingTyphoons! (talk) 07:57, 18 March 2020 (UTC)

Thanks, good, just a few days ago I would have not been sure about advising against local travel in the the areas with few known cases, but I think that time has passed. AlasdairW (talk) 08:23, 18 March 2020 (UTC)

That looks good to me. I would suggest adding a link to the message on the Main Page. Again, I will suggest the space occupied by Featured Events. The event that I added yesterday has been delayed until April 7, and will likely be delayed further or cancelled. The next event up is the Invictus Games. There's no information on their website now, but the way things are going, I think we can expect those to be rescheduled or cancelled. Ground Zero (talk) 09:47, 18 March 2020 (UTC)

ThunderingTyphoons!, thanks for rephase it, and sorry to use a not commonly used word :-D I admit that I've used the dictionary too, to translate the Italian word that I had in my mind to be accurate in message :-). Once agreed the text, I'll be more than glad to translate entirely in Italian. --Andyrom75 (talk) 12:25, 18 March 2020 (UTC)

Good idea and well written. —Granger (talk · contribs) 12:29, 18 March 2020 (UTC)

Thank you everyone. I just posted the notice a few minutes ago. -- AndreCarrotflower (talk) 15:35, 18 March 2020 (UTC)

A late comment, but the above text sounds good. --Ypsilon (talk) 18:08, 18 March 2020 (UTC)

It is here for those who are interested. Ground Zero (talk) 10:10, 19 March 2020 (UTC)

Excellent, thanks for writing this! I have no concerns with this, and I think this should be our standard policy, as it applies, to how we conduct Wikivoyage during the coronavirus outbreak and pandemic. --Comment by Selfie City (talk | contributions) 15:03, 22 March 2020 (UTC)

Covid warning boxes

Many of our Covid warning boxes on country pages warn about the outbreak in the country, and list details. I think that as things have changed from "avoid certain areas" to "go home while you still can" and "we're not letting foreigners in", we should focus the warning boxes to information about travel restrictions as that is what is most useful to travellers now. Ground Zero (talk) 09:47, 18 March 2020 (UTC)

That makes sense. Though I think we should still give key information about the situation within the country for travellers who are travelling for essential reasons or unable to get home. —Granger (talk · contribs) 12:37, 18 March 2020 (UTC)

I think what I want to avoid is trying to keep up with the news in these boxes: ### of cases, ## of deaths, it has now spread to Xyz province, etc. Ground Zero (talk) 08:52, 19 March 2020 (UTC)

Yes, we should concentrate on travel restrictions, though even keeping that info up-to-date will be difficult.

To what extent can we offload the problem, provide links instead of trying to have the info here? What links? WHO? WP? Our Coronavirus article?

Ideally every warning box in a country article would include a link to that country's source of authoritative info on restrictions, quarantines, etc. Pashley (talk) 09:20, 19 March 2020 (UTC)

I agree that at this stage it's not a good use of our time to update numbers of deaths and lists of provinces. Also agree it would be good for each warning box to link to that country's source of information. —Granger (talk · contribs) 13:26, 19 March 2020 (UTC)

Enhanced Password Reset now available on Wikivoyage

Note: I am posting this on English Wikivoyage, but I welcome this message being translated and shared on other wikis. Thank you!

Hello, everyone! The Community Tech team has released a new feature, which is called Enhanced Password Reset (EPR), to Wikivoyage and Wiktionary. With this feature, you can optionally select to require both username and email address to be submitted on Special:PasswordReset in order to generate password reset emails. This feature was developed by the Community Tech team, in response to the #3 wish in the 2019 Community Wishlist Survey. We decided to incrementally release the feature, so we released to Wikivoyage and Wiktionary first. The release to all other wikis will happen soon. In the meantime, we would love your feedback!

To enable the feature, go to the “Email options” section in “Preferences.” You can click on the checkbox that states, “Send password reset emails only when both email address and username are provided.” Once you click the checkbox and save, the preference is enabled. Please note that Password Reset Update is not a global preference by default. It is enabled per wiki. However, you can make it global in your global preferences. For more information on password resets and EPR, you can visit the Help:Reset_password page on MediaWiki. Thank you, and we look forward to checking out your feedback on the project talk page! --IFried (WMF) (talk) 00:21, 27 February 2020 (UTC)

User:Ikan Kekek, I think you may want to try this out. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:29, 27 February 2020 (UTC)

I guess I don't need it right now? Dunno. Thanks, WhatamIdoing. Ikan Kekek (talk) 22:42, 27 February 2020 (UTC)

I suppose its main use is to avoid others spamming your mailbox with reset messages. I think there is a maximal frequency on these, which makes them just a small annoyance even in the worst case (unless somebody is eavesdropping on your e-mail); the feature can be activated if you at some point feel fed up with such messages. --LPfi (talk) 17:32, 28 February 2020 (UTC)

"Huge" cities are not all that huge. Could we call them "big" instead?

At a certain point, some city articles need to be split up into districts, and at that point, we start calling them "huge". But most of these cities are far from huge. New York and Tokyo, for example, are indeed huge - you could easily devote a week or more to seeing everything in those cities. Seattle and Philadelphia, for example, are not - you can see all the main sights in one weekend, even if they are worth splitting into multiple district articles. So I wonder if we could use the term "big" instead: New York, Tokyo, Seattle, and Philadelphia are all indisputably big cities.

I don't know how much work is involved in making this terminology switch, so maybe it's not worth it.

Yumenotsuyoshi (talk) 20:32, 29 February 2020 (UTC)

Some of our "huge" cities (Buffalo, Wellington, and Edinburgh spring to mind) aren't even big, at least not in the same way that the ones you cite are big. Cities are mostly divided into districts because they're complex and have a lot to offer the traveller*, so if we're going to change the designation, I'd prefer something which spoke of complexity or tourism interest, rather than size. But I must also say that I wouldn't be hugely fussed if we didn't change from "huge city".

*Or if we get meta, cities are divided into districts because a lot of work has been done on them, meaning there's too much content for one article.--ThunderingTyphoons! (talk) 21:11, 29 February 2020 (UTC)

Also, welcome to Wikivoyage :-) ThunderingTyphoons! (talk) 21:16, 29 February 2020 (UTC)

"Big city" is already what we call a city article with the full template. ("Small cities" don't have every section, like Stay Healthy.) "Small", "Big", and "Huge" mostly refer to the size of the article(s), not the populations of the cities themselves. Powers ^(talk) 01:07, 1 March 2020 (UTC)

I think we should separate the properties of the city itself from how we treat them. There are huge, complex cities we haven't destrictified and there are quite simple modestly sized cities that we have districtified. What we call the templates need not be visible to the reader, at least not until they start editing. The "huge" wording has bothered me for quite some time. Can't we just say "[City} is described in several district articles ..." or (more to my taste) "This is an overview of [city]. For specific sights, restaurants, and accommodation, see the district articles." --LPfi (talk) 15:00, 2 March 2020 (UTC)

This sounds good to me. Yumenotsuyoshi (talk) 00:37, 3 March 2020 (UTC)

I have always assumed that there was a subtle hint in there: if the city isn't "huge", then you shouldn't be splitting it into so many districts. I sort of doubt that if I were going to an unfamiliar mid-sized US city that I'd be happiest needing to read through six or eight district articles to find a hotel or a restaurant. And if the city is smaller (say, less than 50,000 or 100,000 population), then I might wonder about the quality of the listings, because even a fairly tourist-focused city isn't likely to have 50+ restaurants that we would recommend (and it wouldn't be helpful to me to have such a long list anyway). WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:46, 2 March 2020 (UTC)

Objectively, Richmond, Virginia is by no means a huge city, while Karachi is. Are you suggesting that purely because of these respective cities' populations, we should be districting Karachi and not Richmond? Before you answer, you should look at a couple of threads in Talk:Karachi/Archive 2013 that concluded otherwise. There are two requirements for "huge city" templates that divide cities into districts for the purposes of Wikivoyage: (1) There must be so many listings that putting all of them into one article makes it quite long and cumbersome, or at least less readable than using district articles; (2) The points of interest must be distributed around town, such that they aren't overwhelmingly in a single area that can't be practically divided up (which is the reason Karachi isn't districted). If we're getting hung up on terminology, we could debate changing the name of the "huge city" template, but to what? "Districted city"? What would actually be less confusing? Ikan Kekek (talk) 19:29, 2 March 2020 (UTC)

I am not suggesting that Karachi needs any districts. I am, however, suggesting that Richmond probably doesn't need seven districts, especially since most of them are underdeveloped, and one is non-existent. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:28, 3 March 2020 (UTC)

I've suggested before that Richmond's districts should probably be merged back into the city article. Unfortunately, no one who knows the city has weighed in, so the discussion has stalled. See Talk:Richmond. —Granger (talk · contribs) 00:31, 4 March 2020 (UTC)

The name of the template is unimportant, but the text the template provides is not. The "X is a huge city" phrase is misleading, especially when people may think that cities without that phrase aren't. I gave two suggestions for changing it. --LPfi (talk) 20:31, 2 March 2020 (UTC)

I don't really care if the text that's viewable outside of edit mode says "This city article is at guide/usable/whatever status". That's OK with me, and I hope if we decide on that, it'll be simple to change the output of these templates to say that. Ikan Kekek (talk) 20:35, 2 March 2020 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ Yes to the reader, all of them can just be called "cities". Some cities have districts and some don't. Similarly, we don't differentiate bottom-level regions with regions that are divided further although the article structure changes slightly. Internally we need to continue to classify cities with districts and those without separately. Gizza ^(roam) 00:49, 3 March 2020 (UTC)

Good comparison. I agree. Ikan Kekek (talk) 01:18, 3 March 2020 (UTC)

Same. Support. --ThunderingTyphoons! (talk) 06:28, 3 March 2020 (UTC)

Kill Bill tourism

Does a lady dressed in all yellow cutting down the Crazy 88 (were there really 88 of them or did they just call themselves that because it sounded cool?) with a Hattori Hanzo sword ring a bell? In that case, read on!

We've featured a couple of Fiction tourism articles as FTT; Breaking Bad Tour and Seinfeld Tour (and now The Wire Tour is nominated). How about one from a movie next? I figured of my favorite movies could make a nice itinerary and started writing Kill Bill tourism a while back with the help of some web pages specializing in movie locations, as well as our guides for destinations, local transport websites, Google Maps etc. I think the article starts looking quite nice already, but feel free to add to it. --Ypsilon (talk) 19:50, 3 March 2020 (UTC)

FlyBe

(Swept in from Grahamsands Talk page)

Good morning, Graham. Thanks for your updates regarding FlyBe. I think the information you're adding would stand out better in a cautionbox, rather than as straight prose. What do you think? --ThunderingTyphoons! (talk) 08:48, 5 March 2020 (UTC)

I considered that, but thought the added value of doing so would only stand for a day or two while everyone caught up with the news. I was thinking more of the longer term impact on viability of airports and indeed of whole destinations such as Newquay, Northern Ireland and Jersey. I'll complete the present update in the next ten min then we can take stock. Grahamsands (talk) 08:53, 5 March 2020 (UTC)

It will be of value for longer than a day or two, because people will have tickets booked and will still want to get where they're going, and at some point it will become clear which routes are going to be replaced and which are axed. I understand there are other sources of information, but we do aim to be a self-contained travel guide. If necessary, we could put the box in a template, and deploy it across however many articles (so you edit the template page, and it changes automatically across the site,) if the idea of keeping so many articles updated over an indeterminate period of time is daunting.ThunderingTyphoons! (talk) 10:24, 5 March 2020 (UTC)

It's tempting to try to be the first with travel news, but the way Nationalrail enquiries crashed last night suggests that most travellers are ahead of us. I didn't think the extra prominence of a cautionbox added much, but don't object to one. But what doesn't work is standard warning content for all Flybe destinations, for the very reason you raise. For some it's a hammer blow (Newquay, Belfast). For some it's a damned nuisance but you can workaround (Southampton). For some it's a major concern (Blue Islands still fly to Jersey, but can they keep going?) For some it's indirect (Flights to Scilly and by Loganair to the Scottish islands are by separate carriers, but what about the onward air connection). So that's what I've sought to portray. It's difficult to see other operators taking these routes in the next few months as everyone is retrenching over coronavirus. Grahamsands (talk) 10:50, 5 March 2020 (UTC)

It seems at least a few dozen articles still recommend FlyBe for getting to destinations. Someone will need to go through and remove the airline from each of them. I can try to do that when I have time, or one of you can if you have the chance. —Granger (talk · contribs) 11:28, 5 March 2020 (UTC)

Let's move these discussions to the pub, I don't own the topic . . .

continuing from that, we'll find more examples as the days go by. For instance the warning has just gone on the city pages, not on the surrounding regions - Newquay and Exeter are handy portals for Devon and Cornwall, or were. But what travellers would find most useful right now are other ways to Get In. My impression is that rail links are reasonably well-described for the affected destinations, but bus routes for many are kinda vague. Grahamsands (talk) 13:45, 5 March 2020 (UTC)

US suspends US- Europe travel..

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-51846923 —The preceding comment was added by ShakespeareFan00 (talk • contribs)

For thirty days. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 01:40, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

Finnish taxis

An IP user has been adding taxi information, mainly on two taxi apps, to a lot of Finnish city articles. I have no idea whether the IPv6 address is stable, so not relying on direct communication (I will put a link to here from the IP user talk).

I am not sure how to handle this. It is clear that the info should be added to Finland#By taxi instead of all these pages, if the companies are relevant country wide – but I have no idea of whether they are of any use outside some areas. The crucial question is whether some actual taxi driver in the vicinity can be reached with those apps, and I suppose you need local info to know. The company can claim coverage even if only a tiny percentage of drivers, usually having to drive a long distance to get to you, are connected.

The general problem has existed since the taxi reform: taxis and call centres are no more locally bound, and any company can claim as large an area of coverage as they want. I am not a frequent customer, so have little data from the ground.

--LPfi (talk) 11:02, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

Perhaps the user registered: Vkem has made similar edits. Copying my talk page message. --LPfi (talk) 11:09, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

Commons contest

Please consider voting in the c:Commons:Picture of the Year/2019. WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:39, 18 March 2020 (UTC)

If you've never done this before: If you're reading this page, you're almost certainly eligible. It's in Phase 1, which means that you only need to click on the button to vote for all the pictures that you like. It could be a few or it could be a hundred.

If you don't want to look at all of them, then you might like looking through c:Commons:Picture of the Year/2019/R1/Gallery/Panoramic views (some of which might be useful as banners here), or for a more random mix of subjects, go to c:Commons:Picture of the Year/2019/R1/Gallery and choose the list for your favorite month. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:49, 19 March 2020 (UTC)

Crosswiki help

For Paris/7th_arrondissement, under the (Bir-Hakeim 6 or École Militaire 8 , Champ de Mars-Tour Eiffel C ), ☏ +33 , there is the symbols 6,8,C, however, when we moved over to zh, see here, we need to manually insert. We had imported rint, station and etc templates. May I know what else we are lacking? Thanks.--Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 16:49, 19 March 2020 (UTC)

Withdrawn. Sorted out already.--Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 08:58, 20 March 2020 (UTC)

Restored COTM

Starting in January 2020, our COTM had been abandoned. I have now restored it with the March collaboration. For those of us who do COTM projects, let's work on reducing the number of poorly formatted links on Wikivoyage. --Comment by Selfie City (talk | contributions) 17:24, 19 March 2020 (UTC)

Volte face time for me. Having said at Talk:COTM that collaboration of the month doesn't do anything for me, making sure all links are frontlinks is of interest to me, so I'll be joining in.--ThunderingTyphoons! (talk) 18:25, 19 March 2020 (UTC)

One question I have is that COTM says "1262 ... articles" — where can we find the information necessary to change this number? If no-one knows, we might as well remove that statistics, since the collaborated effort is reducing the number and therefore making it inaccurate. --Comment by Selfie City (talk | contributions) 12:53, 20 March 2020 (UTC)

I guess we can follow the link and see how many results there are. Currently 1192. —Granger (talk · contribs) 13:12, 20 March 2020 (UTC)

Thanks. I have used that method to find out how much each has decreased since the numbers were added by Traveler100. It's coming along quite well. --Comment by Selfie City (talk | contributions) 14:24, 20 March 2020 (UTC)

I believe Travel Man may have used categories for some of his lists as well (for future months' collabs). --ThunderingTyphoons! (talk) 15:48, 20 March 2020 (UTC)

Sorry, by categories you mean? --Comment by Selfie City (talk | contributions) 16:49, 20 March 2020 (UTC)

@SelfieCity: Special: Categories. So T100 might, for instance use Category: Pages with broken file links to know which pages have links which need fixing, and how many. Make sense? ThunderingTyphoons! (talk) 18:23, 20 March 2020 (UTC)

Yeah, that makes sense. Thanks. --Comment by Selfie City (talk | contributions) 18:41, 20 March 2020 (UTC)

If you want to see a list of categories at the bottom each page, Go to the Appearances tab in Preferences, and select "Show hidden categories". This can be useful for checking that your edit has fixed the issue. AlasdairW (talk) 22:45, 20 March 2020 (UTC)

Long-term effects of coronavirus

This is to open a conversation about the long term impact of coronavirus on travel and upon WV. There is already a specific page with its own discussion threads, but that focuses on immediate advice and there are limits to which it can look long-term. But as the pandemic affects all aspects of travel then it affects the entire content of WV. And as it threatens the survival of all travel-related business then it threatens the existence of WV.

Are we in accord about the gravity and extent of the situation? This is a novel virus that is spreading rapidly, roughly doubling every week in every country with the crucial exception of China, where it has halted. It causes severe illness in 15%, critical illness in 5% and death in 2%. In response there have been unprecedented restrictions on travel and on personal liberty, even denying travel and activity that would previously be seen as essential. This situation seems likely to go on for several months, and it could be many, many months.

We’ve all had travel plans thwarted, but what about updating of content? It feels like content on long-distance transport and amenity listings should mostly freeze; we don’t know what’s closed temporarily, when it might re-open, or what’s lost for good. There may be local transport and natural attractions and themes still worth working on. I’m not proposing any “policy” here, just a general commonsense approach.

The last calamity on this scale was 9 / 11, and its repercussions are still echoing. The travel industry was devastated but was then resurgent, with all sorts of new opportunities which we’ve been enjoying. WV can reach a good long-term position if it survives the slump, but no travel means no travel writing. Contributors find other interests, some may not return (beyond the normal turnover) and no newcomers join; then come the revival the content needs major overhaul but there are few hands to do it. Whatever we perceive as a weakness in WV right now (eg poor coverage of many areas of the world, and poor upkeep in other languages) will be exacerbated. Grahamsands (talk) 10:28, 24 March 2020 (UTC)

I think the most active editors just need to keep doing what we're doing. Unlike travel websites that operate for profit, as far as I understand our situation in the Wikimedia community, we don't need to make a profit every quarter. Therefore, if our web traffic declines for a time but then recovers after the virus passes, we can return to normal. We might actually find ourselves in a better position than commercial travel websites that are probably losing money right now due to the coronavirus. --Comment by Selfie City (talk | contributions) 11:46, 24 March 2020 (UTC)

Grahamsands, in uncertain situations like this, it's a natural human instinct to crave hard answers about how everything will turn out in the end. But the "long term impact of coronavirus on travel and upon WV" is unknowable at this time, and thus there's no "conversation" about it to be had. Engaging in speculation is unhelpful, and trying to then establish policy (or "a general commonsense approach", or whatever term you want to couch it in) based on that speculation is even more unhelpful. And when the thinking behind that speculation is based on the absolute worst-case-scenario extreme of the range of possible outcomes, the idea becomes worse still. (For instance, I personally think it's very unlikely that lockdowns will "go on for several months, and it could be many, many months". World leaders, or at least certain right-wing elements of the U.S. government, are starting to suggest it will soon be time to get back to work to avert economic collapse, but it's actually much larger than just the economy: isolating en masse for long periods of time is not something that human beings have ever been asked to do before in all of history, including during pandemics, nor is it at all clear that such long-term isolation is within the capabilities of our species in a psychological/sociological sense, regardless of the epidemiological consequences. I say this not to engage in speculation after having denounced it, but as an example of how wide the range of possible outcomes is and that no, we are in no way "in accord about the gravity and extent of the situation".)

If you feel it's important for you personally to stop writing for Wikivoyage at this time, or to restrict your writing to certain subject matter only, then you personally are perfectly free to do so. But, I repeat, attempting to use pie-in-the-sky speculation as a basis for best practices for the whole community to follow is just as much a nonstarter here as it proved to be on Talk:2019–2020 coronavirus pandemic, and quite frankly, I really don't want to hear any more about this.

-- AndreCarrotflower (talk) 15:34, 24 March 2020 (UTC)

Of course anyone interested in discussing the long-term effects is free to do so, but those of us who don't find it very useful at this stage, like me and AndreCarrotflower, may focus on other things instead. Personally, I agree that it is too early to say what the impacts will be. Our time on Wikivoyage right now is probably best spent (a) updating practical information related to the crisis and (b) doing various maintenance and updates that we haven't gotten around to (like the cotm).

Regarding editing practices for the time being: I agree with the general sense that updates to things like national parks may be more useful than updates to things like long-distance transport. I don't think we should enforce this as a rule, though—anyone can make updates to whatever they think is useful. I agree that, at this stage, we shouldn't remove listings based on temporary closures until we know that they're closed for good. —Granger (talk · contribs) 16:21, 24 March 2020 (UTC)

Agree with Granger and Andre.

One thing about confinement, it is within our capacity as humans to isolate for extended periods of time due to pandemic - we can take our lead from the inhabitants of Eyam, a village in the English Peak District, who upon discovering they had bubonic plague in their midsts in 1666, quarantined themselves from the outside world and maintained it for 14 months until the infection passed, even though dozens of people succommed. Surrounding communities supported them by bringing food to the village gates and leaving it. While the story didn't end particularly well given the nonexistent medical care, we can all take inspiration from their altruism and resolve. If they could do it, with no hope of survival beyond praying, and with nothing to do but wait, then we can do this, for as long as it takes.--ThunderingTyphoons! (talk) 17:29, 24 March 2020 (UTC)

By the way, although I didn't mention this opinion in my earlier comment in this discussion, I agree with the others that this kind of analysis and adjustment to speculation is unnecessary. Also, TT, thanks for the history! I never knew about that event before! --Comment by Selfie City (talk | contributions) 17:48, 24 March 2020 (UTC)

All I'll say is, we'd better isolate for months, because the consequences of not doing so could be hundreds of millions of deaths throughout the world. Otherwise, I agree with Granger's views on things to edit. I actually haven't changed my editing routine - I still patrol, fixing grammar and syntax and reverting touting. Ikan Kekek (talk) 18:38, 24 March 2020 (UTC)

And returning to the topic at hand, this is what I said at Talk:2019–2020 coronavirus pandemic: "if you want to talk about help to plan travel, that's fine and should be discussed somewhere, but not in a thread covering a pandemic." So you started a thread talking about "the long term impact of coronavirus on travel" - a thread covering a pandemic. How about not speculating about the long-term effects of a pandemic on travel, at a time when we're still in relatively early stages of a deadly pandemic that potentially billions of people could be sickened by? I'd suggest showing a little sensitivity and waiting until it's under control before having this discussion. Ikan Kekek (talk) 18:57, 24 March 2020 (UTC)

We are fortunate that we live in an internet era. In previous pandemics, like the Black Death, Spanish Flu and countless others, quarantine would have been a lot more boring. At least we can video call people. We can see and hear them. Just not touch and get close. Easier for some (but obviously not all) industries to work from home in modern times too so the economy while severely damaged won't drop to zero. The death rate when hospitals are overwhelmed (in Wuhan and Lombardy) is 10%. Let's all do our part in slowing this down. Some historians believe that Shakespeare wrote King Lear while in quarantine so this can still be a very productive time in our lives. Gizza ^(roam) 21:12, 24 March 2020 (UTC)

The biggest change to our articles will be the huge number of listings that will have closed when this is over. Many shops, restaurants, bars and hotels will disappear. Airlines and cruise ships too. Heck, maybe even other transport services. And even more sadly, the managers, workers, and regular customers of various listings will die. In my opinion, if I were to add new content, it would be on things that are guaranteed to stick around in a couple of years. Things like national parks and nature and very old historical monuments, statues and archeological sites that aren't run on a commercial basis. Also we can start a virtual tourism travel topic. Gizza ^(roam) 21:23, 24 March 2020 (UTC)

I agree. Some international ferry lines have already thrown in the towel, those without freight and cargo as their main income. Travel focus will shift from long distance travels to local and regional travels, to those who can afford it. Not that far away, but out of suburbia for a little comfort. 94.191.147.196 21:38, 24 March 2020 (UTC)

We've deleted all virtual tourism from this site before - remote cams, etc. I agree that we should focus on those now, as this is the time for people to travel vicariously from their own homes. As for creativity, well, I've already written two new tunes since the plague came to New York. Ikan Kekek (talk) 21:41, 24 March 2020 (UTC)

In the past week or two several other travel sites have published lists of virtual tours, live cams, streamed performances, and so on from tourist attractions that are closed due to the pandemic. We could do the same. We can create a dedicated article with a list of "travel at home" options, which we could archive, like we do with past sporting events, after the crisis has ended. —Granger (talk · contribs) 21:49, 24 March 2020 (UTC)

Or we could not archive but embrace them, as travel sites are always partly about vicarious, virtual travel. Ikan Kekek (talk) 22:21, 24 March 2020 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘As someone who is stuck in a foreign country far away from the rest of my family, I will say that having the internet is certainly making isolation much easier to cope with. Because of the internet, I am able to give my family regular updates on my situation. I can imagine how much harder it would have been for my grandfather during World War II when he was separated from his father due to the war (and his mother died young, so he was effectively an orphan for the duration of the war). There is already resistance to the shutdowns from within the U.S. Many people see it as an infringement of basic human rights and the first step in the path down to dictatorship. One common argument I have heard is that you should isolate yourself if you are scared, but the government has no right to limit people's movement as that is an infringement of personal freedom. So it is certainly conceivable that the lockdowns will end soon when people eventually become irate and start defying them en masse to march on government offices.

Regarding the long-term effects, I think it's premature to say that the travel industry will never recover. If there's something I learnt from studying history, it is that for as long as civilisation has existed, societies have gone through cycles of boom and bust. We've already been through multiple pandemics and multiple stock market crashes as a human race, and somehow, the world economy seems to always bounce back, so while things seem bleak now, I'm inclined to think we are currently just in the "bust" phase of the cycle, and a "boom" will come again at some point. The dog2 (talk) 01:14, 25 March 2020 (UTC)

In terms of what we can do, I think that in two or three months, we'll have a better idea of what's closed permanently, and we can go through our favorite articles and remove closed listings. This will be easier to do for relatively ephemeral attractions: closed restaurants are probably permanent losses, but a purpose-built building (such as a hotel) is likely to be re-opened as a very similar hotel later, even if it's under a new name and with different staff. WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:53, 25 March 2020 (UTC)

I don't think speculation about ultimately unknowable outcomes should govern anything we do at Wikivoyage, but as long as we seem to want to speculate idly regardless, I'll take a swing. I don't think the premature end of the lockdowns will necessarily involve "irate" citizens "march[ing] on government offices", as The dog2 said. I simply think it will involve more and more people disregarding the warnings to leave their homes and congregate in groups, especially as the weather gets nicer, and perhaps businesses like restaurants reopening illicitly because it's either that or financial ruin for their owners. And in making the decision of whether to double down on enforcement or throw in the towel, our political leaders will calculate that defying the will of the people, as foolhardy as it may be, is not good for their future electoral prospects. I've heard it argued that people who currently aren't taking the disease seriously will be scared into compliance once deaths from the virus become widespread enough that everyone knows someone who's succumbed, but I fear the opposite is true: that as death tolls mount, a certain nihilism will pervade, and the general sentiment will be, as the old saying goes, "eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we die". I think ultimately, the trajectory of this pandemic won't be substantially different from past ones: a quicker return to normal than we currently predict, but a much higher price to pay in lives lost than we currently hope for. And believe me, I hope I'm wrong about all of this. -- AndreCarrotflower (talk) 16:18, 25 March 2020 (UTC)

We will all, at some point, get the coronavirus. One may show no symptoms, one might show light symptoms or one might show severe symptoms. Only thing that really matters is, that we and the surrounding community do not get the virus in large numbers — at the same time. It could be as simple as that. But of course it wont be that simple. Keep distance, sanitise, stay home. 94.191.156.102 18:20, 25 March 2020 (UTC)

Even if you do get it, it is better to get it later (say 3-4 months from now) than earlier (right now). A vaccine won't be available by then but we will have a much better idea of which medicines used experimentally right now are effective in reducing the severity and likelihood of dying from it. Gizza ^(roam) 02:28, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

You'll also have a better chance of receiving life-saving supportive care if you don't get it until after the waves of critical patients who are and will soon be overwhelming ICUs in hard-hit areas. Ikan Kekek (talk) 02:37, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

It feels better that we're having these conversations than not doing so, eg on editing priorities - I'm going to occupy myself with some of the parks. Another aspect that can be tackled is poor page structure, eg if the districtification is a mess. Those pages can be remedied without update to the listings, making them easier to overhaul whenever normality returns. Grahamsands (talk) 17:50, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

Exactly. Best to avoid the "eeny, meeny, miny, moe"-period. 94.191.141.64 18:14, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

Well, in these times of cancellations and suspensions, perhaps the next step will be to move the Easter holidays to Pentecost? 94.191.141.64 21:39, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

Responsible houses of worship have closed their doors. Mainstream Christians don't believe Jesus wanted more people to get sick and die - that kind of goes against the accounts of his ministry in the Gospels. Ikan Kekek (talk) 22:45, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

We stated on Facebook that we will continue running as normal. Just because we feature Easter doesn't mean we're telling people to go to church. --Comment by Selfie City (talk | contributions) 23:42, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

Lent was never that easy. Perhaps it should be prolonged for another 40 days? I have already got very much accustomed. 94.191.141.64 23:50, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

I think the IP user is being facetious. At any rate, we've got a solid consensus in favor of the status quo here, so I see no need to further prolong this discussion. -- AndreCarrotflower (talk) 00:26, 27 March 2020 (UTC)

No harm in a little light humor. These times are very depressing, so sometimes a slight bit of ironic humor might help us carry on, but it's admittedly a delicate thing online, and that's why I was initially opposed to the April Fools' Day joke article being done again this year. Ikan Kekek (talk) 05:08, 27 March 2020 (UTC)

And there was me thinking that eeny, meeny, miny, moe (etc) were the moons of Jupiter. But I've updated the explainer on Eyam, since it's likely to be much quoted in days ahead. Grahamsands (talk) 21:11, 28 March 2020 (UTC)

Where does mapshape come from?

On dynamic maps, when a mapshape is present, how is it generated. Many of the English counties' mapshapes are completely wrong, omitting parts of the counties, and it would be nice to get them fixed.--ThunderingTyphoons! (talk) 21:20, 25 March 2020 (UTC)

My understanding is that sometimes it comes from OpenStreetMap, sometimes from Commons, and sometimes from code in the page itself. OpenStreetMap data occasionally develops substantial errors, which usually seem to go away in a few days or weeks. Others may know more than I do. —Granger (talk · contribs) 22:58, 25 March 2020 (UTC)

I think it's from Openstreetmap via Wikidata. Not sure if adding code to articles is possible nowadays, or if code added here is overridden by anything from WD. --Ypsilon (talk) 07:05, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

Depends - in {{mapshape}}, you can either use wikidata ID (in which case it will be from OSM), or specify the commons GeoJSON. Usually, if OSM data are completely wrong, there's either a kartographer error (AFAIK it doesn't like e.g. incorrectly closed shapes - they render normally on OSM, but incorrectly on wikipedia), or some wikidata tagging problem (missing wikidata for some areas), or e.g. local OSM editors have different opinion on what a country is than WV (e.g. Japan regions also extend to sea, which some local editors don't like; Taiwan has it differently). -- andree.sk(talk) 10:19, 31 March 2020 (UTC)

Thanks for the answers, all. The ones I'm referring to - e.g. Hampshire, Dorset, East Sussex, Lincolnshire - just have {{mapshape}} in the article, so the shape obviously comes from one of the external sources, WD OSM etc. Any way of knowing which?

Andree has got it right, I think, with "local OSM editors have different opinion on what a country is than WV", as the mapshapes seem to show the administrative counties, which is not what we use on Wikivoyage (we use the ceremonial counties).

I looked on Wikidata's entry for Lincolnshire, and noticed they had the wrong OSM relation ID, associating with the administrative county rather than the ceremonial county. I changed it to the right one about two hours ago, hoping that this would change the mapshape on WV's Lincolnshire article, though so far nothing has changed. Even taking into account that changes to Wikidata can sometimes take a while to filter through to WV, this is taking its sweet time, if indeed anything is going to happen.--ThunderingTyphoons! (talk) 13:45, 31 March 2020 (UTC)

If it just has {{mapshape}}, then it's finding the Wikidata item associated with that WV article (you can see this yourself in the sidebar with the "Wikidata item" link under "Tools"). From there, I'm uncertain whether it finds that WD item's OSM relation, or whether it looks for an OSM relation tagged with that WD item.

The relationships work in both directions to some degree, and I'm not sure changing it only on WD is sufficient. The administrative boundary on OSM has the tag wikidata=Q23090, so that may take precedence somewhat. Given the awkwardly-placed note in Q23090's description, I think what ought to be done is edit OSM relation 78312 to have wikidata=Q21269047, and edit OSM relation 1916530 to have wikidata=Q23090. Having made similar edits for rail lines, I think within a couple of days that change will get pulled into the Wikidata entries by some automated process, which will then make things show up as desired here. --Bigpeteb (talk) 17:02, 31 March 2020 (UTC)

Indeed, for the stuff to work, it has to be mainly in OSM database - I think whatever is OSM relation is written in WD isn't really taken into account. Once you update the OSM relation (to refer to the "correct wikidata"), it takes about a day or two to show up on WV... -- andree.sk(talk) 19:18, 31 March 2020 (UTC)

So I updated the OSM relation field on Wikidata yesterday before posting my previous comment, but haven't yet changed anything on OSM itself. I just made an account on OSM, and can't work out how to edit the Wikidata field there. There must be a way, but I can't find it. Will post on the help forum over there.--ThunderingTyphoons! (talk) 16:28, 1 April 2020 (UTC)

Posted.--ThunderingTyphoons! (talk) 16:51, 1 April 2020 (UTC)

ThunderingTyphoons!: Another option, albeit labor-intensive and time-consuming, is to dispense with Mapshape entirely and enter coordinates manually using Template:Mapmask. See any of the new-school Buffalo district articles in my userspace, e.g. User:AndreCarrotflower/Allentown, for an example (click to the "Edit" screen and scroll all the way down). -- AndreCarrotflower (talk) 16:54, 1 April 2020 (UTC)

Tis a nice idea, and certainly one I'd consider, but would have to be a last resort. We in Europe don't have the luxury of straight borders, so inputting all the coordinates to make a polygon complex enough to be an accurate representation of even one county will take forever. I had briefly thought that OSM might already have a list of the coordinates, but they use something called "nodes" instead. Bugger.--ThunderingTyphoons! (talk) 17:03, 1 April 2020 (UTC)

• Or one can directly code using <maplink> or <mapframe>: This method is a bit more complicated or specialized to accomplish. Use this type of coding perhpas if all else fails. I took coordinates from mapshape mentioned above as an example. (also added a hidden marker) and used group and show parameters.. 1. Allentown with mapmask Polygon 2. Allentown as filled Polygon 3. Allentown as LineString Coding would provide basis for crating a map file in Commons. Note: Simpler and easier with existing Templates and to best use them as much as possible. -- Matroc (talk) 03:23, 2 April 2020 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ Whatever benefits OSM brings to the world, "easy editing" is not one of them. Unlike the loosely-structured text we work with in wikis, geographical data is much more structured; editing it first requires you to understand the structure (which for OSM also means understanding its massive, complex, and sometimes problematic set of tags) and also learning how to use the editors, which is also not very easy. Although the OSM forums are the right place to ask (well, one of the places, if perhaps not the best one), I'll try to explain it here as it may be helpful for other WV editors.

The manual way of selecting things and editing is the one you probably think of first. You navigate around on the map looking for what you want to edit.

1. Zoom to an area where you can see the things you want to edit. Given the two relations I wanted to edit (78312 and 1916530) I went to this bit of coastline where I can pick them out separately.
2. Click the "Edit" button to open the in-browser "iD" editor. From here, you can do it the manual way or the easy way.
3. Given where I started, I got a message that I need to zoom in. Zoom in slowly towards that coastline until the message disappears and it loads shapes.
4. Click one of the lines (in OSM terms, a "way") to select it. Click on the line, not the yellow highlighting (which would select the "beach" area rather than the line). It will select that line (way) and display all its attributes in the edit pane on the left.
5. In the edit pane on the left, scroll down. There's a section for "All relations" which lists the "relations" that this line (way) is part of. Unfortunately, they're only given by type and name, not ID. I clicked the line in the southeast quadrant, so it has three that may be relevant based on their names:
   • Administrative Boundary - Lincolnshire
   • Boundary - Lincolnshire
   • Boundary - Lincolnshire
6. For this example, let's take the from bottom to top. (It ends up being educational that way.) Click the last one, "Boundary - Lincolnshire", to select it.
7. We need to figure out if this is the relation we were looking for. In the status bar at the bottom of the edit pane on the left, there's a "View on openstreetmap.org" link. Hover over that (or Ctrl-click it to open in a new window/tab), and we can see from the URL that it's relation 8483972. Oops, that's not one we wanted. And at the top of the edit pane, we can see this boundary is of type "traditional"; that's not the one we were looking for. Let's try again.
8. Click that same line (way) to select it again. Go to the "All relations" list.
9. This time, pick a different relation. Moving up the list from the bottom, let's try the second from bottom, which is also labeled "Boundary - Lincolnshire".
10. This one has type "ceremonial", and hovering over the "View on openstreetmap.org" link we can see its ID is 1916530; that's one of the ones what we wanted.
11. Looking under the "All fields" section near the top, it doesn't have a Wikidata field, so let's add one. At the bottom of that section, there's an "Add field" box. Start typing "wiki", and you'll get "Wikidata" as one of the possible fields. Click it.
12. In the Wikidata field, type "Lincolnshire". Unfortunately, there are quite a few to choose from! You need to match up the correct Wikidata ID, or you could simply paste that ID into the box instead (Q23090). In either case, click the correct "Lincolnshire" from the list (even if there's only one) to select it. That will fill in some read-only fields so you can verify it's linked to the correct Wikidata ID.
13. Now you can save your edit, or you can edit the other county and save both of them in one edit. Let's do that, slightly differently this time.
14. Click the line (way) to select it again. This time we'll pick the remaining "Administrative Boundary - Lincolnshire" relation near the top of the list. As before, check that this is the relation we want (relation 78312, and its type is "administrative").
15. This time, scroll down to the "All tags" section in the middle of the edit pane. Instead of using the friendly editor, we'll just edit the tag manually.
16. This has 8 tags, and wikidata is one of them. For some tags, you might have to know what format the value needs to be in, which is documented on the OSM wiki, but fortunately Key:wikidata is an easy one: it should just be the Wikidata ID, nothing more.
    • If it didn't have the tag we need, we could easily add it. Click the "+" button to add a tag. Type "wikidata" in the left column; it will autofill. Then paste the Wikidata ID we want (Q21269047) in the right column.
    • Since it does have a tag, we just need to change the value. Edit the value for the wikidata tag in the right column and paste the Wikidata ID we want (Q21269047).
17. In either case, you can check your work by scrolling back up to the "All fields" section and see if the correct data in the Wikidata section has appeared. (Not all tags get represented this way, but many common ones do.)
18. Finally, save your edits. In the far top right, there's a "Save" button. It should show "2", indicating that you've made 2 edits (or edits to 2 items, whatever). Click it, write a change summary, and save.

The easier way goes like this:

1. Instead of moving around on the map, just put yourself anywhere and click the "Edit" button.
2. Using the search box on the left pane, paste the ID of the thing you want to edit, such as 78312.
3. It turns out there's a node, a way, and a relation all with the ID 78312. They're not related to each other; IDs are not unique between the different types of objects, so you have to know which you want. We want to edit relation 78312, so click it.
4. After a couple seconds, it will finish loading and you'll see it highlighted in the map.
5. Follow other instructions from above to add or edit the Wikidata field/tag.
6. You can click the X at the top of the edit pane to unselect that item, which will bring you back to the search box.
7. Search for the other relation, edit as above, and finally save.

Whew. It's not as complicated as it sounds once you're familiar with it, but it definitely takes some learning. I'm obviously trying to dumb it down to be as explicit as possible, but it's clearly more like editing Wikidata than WV, and harder still because you have to think and operate more (geo)graphically. --Bigpeteb (talk) 19:05, 1 April 2020 (UTC)

Wow, @Bigpeteb: thank you for the detailed explanations! I will attempt to read and understand them tomorrow, when I'm fresh (and supposed to be working, but mehhh.) Regards, ThunderingTyphoons! (talk) 20:49, 1 April 2020 (UTC)

Using your detailed guidance and the advice I got on the forum, I have today been able to correct all of the OSM-WD relations that affect English county articles here. Now we play the waiting game to see if, when the various systems update, my changes affect what we can see on WV. --ThunderingTyphoons! (talk) 21:57, 2 April 2020 (UTC)

Help with banner

I'm new here, so sorry if this is the wrong place. The {{pagebanner}} is giving me some trouble. Could someone look at Eastport (Maine) and help me get the banner looking less bad? Wugapodes (talk) 20:27, 3 April 2020 (UTC)

See Wikivoyage:Banner Expedition#How do I help?. Per the standards described on that page, banners need to be at least 1800 pixels wide, and a 7:1 ratio (2100 x 300 pixels or larger is preferred). The image you're trying to use isn't wide enough, but even if it were, it needs to be manually cropped to the part you want and then uploaded as a separate file. --Bigpeteb (talk) 21:19, 3 April 2020 (UTC)

The current pagebanner looks okay. The problem I see is that it is somewhat blurry on the left side. This may require a new image; there is a tool called Croptool which you can use to get a 7:1 banner ratio from photos on Commons, which can then be used as Wikivoyage banners. If you want more information about that, see Category:Banner missing from Wikidata. --Comment by Selfie City (talk | contributions) 23:33, 3 April 2020 (UTC)

Thank you both! Those were helpful links. There aren't a ton of pictures of Eastport, and I'm too far away to take any myself. I'll look through my albums and ask some friends if they have any they'd be willing to upload to commons. Wugapodes (talk) 01:36, 4 April 2020 (UTC)

User:Wugapodes, I found the banner process to be more complicated than I wanted to bother with, so I list my suggestions at Wikivoyage:Banner expedition/Banner suggestions, and other editors very kindly finish the process. This is a friendly place with lots of helpful people. WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:27, 5 April 2020 (UTC)

wikivoyage monthly statistics

I don't know if this has been discussed here before: The WMF provides all kinds of statistics for all of the wmf-projects. Here is March's 100 top viewed pages report: https://stats.wikimedia.org/#/en.wikivoyage.org/reading/top-viewed-articles/normal%7Ctable%7Clast-month%7C~total%7Cmonthly

Enjoy, Ottawahitech (talk) 05:15, 7 April 2020 (UTC)

It seems like the traffic is dominated by visitor following links from elsewhere. Why is a user talk page in the top 20? Good that our list of calling codes is useful, but is that the main thing we have to offer? Farther down the list country and city articles dominate, but the top 20 makes me not exactly trust the list as anything but statistics. Does somebody else have explanations or an analysis? --LPfi (talk) 07:07, 7 April 2020 (UTC)

Well done to 13th place runner-up Llanfairpwllgwyngyll; your time has come.

There are plenty of destination articles in the top 20, just perhaps not the ones you'd expect.--ThunderingTyphoons! (talk) 08:55, 7 April 2020 (UTC)

I have noticed Llanfairpwllgwyngyll high on monthly statistic before. I think this could be due to how we choose to abbreviate the name, as I have just searched for "Llanfairpwllgwyngyll" on Google and our page came second. We are further down the page on a search for "llanfair pg", which I think is a more common abbreviation. It is very odd that the user page which hasn't been edited for 2 years appears anywhere on the list, which does make me suspect some of the hit counting. AlasdairW (talk) 19:33, 7 April 2020 (UTC)

I think it's probably accurate, and I think it demonstrates how odd internet traffic can be. Our goal should be, among others, to improve web traffic to the most important destinations. --Comment by Selfie City (talk | contributions) 19:50, 7 April 2020 (UTC)

Almost all of the hits to the user talk page are desktop hits; very few are mobile hits. Such an extreme disparity is reason to suspect that something odd is going on (for example, an automated script generating lots of page views, intentionally or due to a bug). —Granger (talk · contribs) 22:38, 7 April 2020 (UTC)

Interesting. Maybe something is really wrong with these statistics. I’m commenting on mobile right now. --Comment by Selfie City (talk | contributions) 10:40, 8 April 2020 (UTC)

Missing Wikipedia icon

{{Listing}} is designed to show wikipedia icon/link (if existing) when wikidata field is filled, but I've noticed a weird behavior on Legazpi: listing #1 (by plane) works corretly, but listing #3 (by train), don't. Any idea on why it happens and how it can be fixed? --Andyrom75 (talk) 09:39, 7 April 2020 (UTC)

I’m not sure what caused the issue, but I’ve added the “Wikipedia” parameter that links to the desired article. Let me know if I’ve made a mistake. --Comment by Selfie City (talk | contributions) 10:39, 7 April 2020 (UTC)

There is an ongoing problem, see phabricator. I don't understand exactly what is going on, but it seems some table (cache?) was lost causing all kinds of weirdness. --LPfi (talk) 10:53, 7 April 2020 (UTC)

Well, that’s unfortunate, but at least there is a workaround. --Comment by Selfie City (talk | contributions) 13:45, 7 April 2020 (UTC)

LPfi, I'm not skilled enough to understand if this is the problem, but since they are working on it, it should be closed soon and we can check again later.

SelfieCity, technically it's not a mistake what you have done, but I would revert your change in order to check immediately if the issue will persist when the ticket will be closed on phabricator. If persist we have to focus on how to solve the problem. --Andyrom75 (talk) 14:30, 7 April 2020 (UTC)

Okay, I understand. --Comment by Selfie City (talk | contributions) 16:51, 7 April 2020 (UTC)

Although that bug is still open, the issue has disappeared. Luckly it was just temporary bug. --Andyrom75 (talk) 16:53, 8 April 2020 (UTC)

Yes. They seem to be handling the aftermath on the servers, and there may still be issues left in some caches. --LPfi (talk) 17:15, 8 April 2020 (UTC)

Editing news 2020 #1 – Discussion tools

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This early version of the Reply tool automatically signs and indents comments.

The Editing team has been working on the talk pages project. The goal of the talk pages project is to help contributors communicate on wiki more easily. This project is the result of the Talk pages consultation 2019.

In a future update, the team plans to test a tool for easily linking to another user's name, a rich-text editing option, and other tools.

The team is building a new tool for replying to comments now. This early version can sign and indent comments automatically. Please test the new Reply tool.

• On 31 March 2020, the new reply tool was offered as a Beta Feature editors at four Wikipedias: Arabic, Dutch, French, and Hungarian. If your community also wants early access to the new tool, contact User:Whatamidoing (WMF).
• The team is planning some upcoming changes. Please review the proposed design and share your thoughts on the talk page. The team will test features such as:
  • an easy way to mention another editor ("pinging"),
  • a rich-text visual editing option, and
  • other features identified through user testing or recommended by editors.

To hear more about Editing Team updates, please add your name to the "Get involved" section of the project page. You can also watch these pages: the main project page, Updates, Replying, and User testing.

– PPelberg (WMF) (talk) & Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk)

19:28, 8 April 2020 (UTC)

This seems like a good idea. Would others agree to our requesting the this tool early? --Comment by Selfie City (talk | contributions) 19:47, 8 April 2020 (UTC)

Since I'm here anyway, I'll say that in the last week, work-me has reviewed a couple hundred edits made with this tool. I've found a few oddball things (like an unexpected extra blank line), and editors at those four wikis have given the team a list of suggestions, but there were no page corruptions or serious errors. I'm satisfied with the tool myself and hope to be able to use it everywhere soon (although I want about 90% of the suggestions implemented, too). On this wiki, it's possible that we'd see more whitespace changes (we call them "dirty diffs") than these first four wikis did, so I want to be clear that "requesting the tool" means asking for an opportunity to test it. The Editing team will not just turn it on automatically for everyone at this stage. WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:52, 9 April 2020 (UTC)

Would that request be on an individual basis, or would it take place on a larger scale? --Comment by Selfie City (talk | contributions) 13:05, 9 April 2020 (UTC)

Right now, the devs have blocked it entirely on ~99% of wikis, including this one. Ideally, the team would see a consensus to request that this wiki have access. Once the wiki has access, it's all individual choice from there. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:28, 9 April 2020 (UTC)

I support requesting access for this wiki so that we can test the tool. —Granger (talk · contribs) 16:49, 9 April 2020 (UTC)

Me too. Support. It's also nice to have an answer to the question of what you've been doing.--ThunderingTyphoons! (talk) 17:33, 9 April 2020 (UTC)