Wikivoyage:Travellers' pub

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Weighing passengers[edit]

I see that Finnair is starting to weigh their passengers (and baggage). Does this seem invasive to you? Can "by the pound" fares be far behind?

See article from BBC. Mrkstvns (talk) 17:13, 22 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

They need the figures (and they are not the only ones doing this). Either estimates provided by authorities or their own. I suppose the figures differ between flights (and classes), so using real-world sample-based estimates is better than having to guess what carry-on luggage weights and whether the passengers differ from the population averages. The better the estimates, the less margins they need, which means more cargo or less fuel per flight, which probably is better for the climate.
If people get used to scales, then they could of course be used also for discrimination (whether you count by-pound fares as such or not), but I hope laws are strict enough to hinder that.
LPfi (talk) 18:08, 22 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]
It is not at all invasive. It is a voluntary anonymous survey of the weight of passengers with their carry on baggage. They need to do this to update the estimated weight of 100 passengers on a plane. Although there are other sources of people's weight, they don't include the clothes and bags that they take on the flight. This is not about people's weight, the average weight might have increased because more people are taking a full water bottle onto the plane.
There are a few flights in very small aircraft where all the passengers are routinely weighed, and this may to be used to decide seating positions. AlasdairW (talk) 19:19, 22 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, I encountered the small aircraft situation about 15 years ago on a small turboprop flying out of Bocas del Toro, Panama. Since the plane only seated about 10 passengers, presumably a couple chunky passengers sitting together could seriously affect the plane's balance. I wouldn't think that would matter with the large aircraft flown by an airline like Finnair. I have not heard of other large airlines weighing passengers... Mrkstvns (talk) 19:31, 22 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Here are reports of Air New Zealand doing this in 2023 and 2003. More controversially, Samoa Air was reported in 2013 to be introducing weight based fares. AlasdairW (talk) 20:47, 22 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I had a really uncomfortable 2-hour flight recently where my neighbor's bulk pushed into my middle seat, and I was aching for a while afterwards (his family for some reason booked seats away from him). This is literally the first time I have experienced this, and it was a shortish flight on a small aircraft, but I feel weighing in passengers and providing larger seats for those who need it is the way to go Andrewssi2 (talk) 21:32, 22 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]
That would make sense in an egalitarian society, but in the world of capitalism, the larger seats go to those willing to pay the most, not those whose girth requires it. Mrkstvns (talk) 21:46, 22 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]
But not every country is capitalist. SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 21:52, 22 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I don't care about the commercials so much. Already some airlines allow you to book an empty seat next to you. I recently flew Asiana long haul, and they have extra space seats in economy that you can pay a couple hundred dollar extra and don't allow anyone else to take them if empty - great value for me. Andrewssi2 (talk) 22:02, 22 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I don't find this invasive at all. In some cases, some plus-sized passengers might need larger seats given how tiny airplane economy seats can be (more than enough for me to put my feet up but not for most people). --SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 21:52, 22 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

ListingEditor impacted by latest deploy - fix in works[edit]

Just a heads up that the ListingEditor gadget broke with the latest deployment due to some changes with how headings are rendered (mw:Heading_HTML_changes).

I hope to have this working by the end of the day.

Sorry for the disruption to service! Jdlrobson (talk) 17:44, 23 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

This should be working now. Let me know here via a ping if you are experiencing issues. Also I'd like to advertise the beta version of the tool now has support for the mobile site if you are willing to try it out go to Special:Preferences and give it a test! Jdlrobson (talk) 16:58, 24 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]
(beta version on mobile phone) In Lakewood_(Colorado), for some reason it doesn't popup on the See+Do listings, but does on the "Get around" ones... -- andree 06:14, 25 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]
@Jdlrobson, in all the articles are missing the "[ add listing ]" link in the section titles. While it's present only the sub-section titles. Andyrom75 (talk) 08:20, 25 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Should be fixed now Jdlrobson (talk) 03:18, 26 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]
@Thanks, now it's fine. Andyrom75 (talk) 21:47, 26 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Another bug (at least for me, for others it may be a feature :) ) - if I add a listing with just wikidata, it adds lat=0|long=0... -- andree 13:01, 3 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Does this always happen, or only when the Wikidata entry doesn't have lat/long data? WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:34, 3 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
When I add just name and wikidata to the listing (and don't click 'sync')... -- andree 20:51, 3 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Itineraries or travel topics[edit]

There are articles that have an itinerary status template but are otherwise classified as travel topics:

Since they should not be classified as both, which article type should they be assigned? Should there be something on a project page about how to choose between these two classifications? JsfasdF252 (talk) 00:51, 24 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Those three are clear cases. Pirinexus is an itinerary article describing a cycling route, the two others are travel topic articles wrongly classified as itineraries (the destination lists are in typical travel topic style).
We do have outline itineraries that are meant to be itineraries but lack the itinerary essentials and could as well be developed into travel topics (if somebody finds a useful way to do that), and some travel topics, like the Nobel tourism article, could be tweaked to be an itinerary (in this case by adding Prepare, Get in and a thought-out itinerary through the point of interest – with no prejudice on whether such a change would be to the better).
I will correct the classification (the MediaWiki template) now.
LPfi (talk) 09:08, 26 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

FYI: Expedia to Eliminate 1,500 Jobs as Travel Growth Moderates[edit]

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-02-26/expedia-to-eliminate-1-500-jobs-as-travel-growth-moderatesJustin (koavf)TCM 03:01, 27 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Time zones[edit]

If a country has several time zones for different regions (like Canada, Russia or the United States of America), should we mention the time zone for different regions? Sbb1413 (he) (talkcontribs) 03:50, 27 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

For instance, New England, Mid-Atlantic, most of Florida, and the eastern sections of the Midwest and the South observe the Eastern Standard Time (EST), but I found no information regarding the zone in the respective regions. This is somewhat problematic for the Americans who travel from the west coast to the east coast and need to change their watches there. Sbb1413 (he) (talkcontribs) 03:55, 27 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Sure. It can be added to "Understand". Ikan Kekek (talk) 04:00, 27 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]
@Sbb1413: you can take a look at Broken Hill on how to cover timezones. Broken Hill is a town in the Australian state of New South Wales but is on the western end of the state away from most of the population, and instead has the same timezone as South Australia. Gizza (roam) 04:27, 27 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]
You may want to also mention "Daylight Savings Time", noting any localities that differ from neighboring regions (for example, Arizona). Mrkstvns (talk) 13:57, 27 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Should the time zone containing the capital be bolded or otherwise prominently marked, for countries and other political entities? JsfasdF252 (talk) 21:00, 28 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]
For the small minority of countries with multiple timezones, you mean? I don't think so. The capital city isn't necessarily the place that the traveler cares about. If you have a section like New South Wales#Time zone or a list, then you might mention that as part of the description of each time zone. "Some Region, which is where Capital City and the beaches are, uses UTC" is easier for the reader to understand than just "Some Region uses UTC". WhatamIdoing (talk) 03:38, 29 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I didn't create these templates, and the former has existed for a while (the latter was created recently by Roovinn), but I'm interested to hear the community's opinion if we opted to design these templates similar to how Commons designed them (see c:Template:Retired and c:Template:Semi-retired) instead of the simplistic Wikipedia style. --SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 08:54, 4 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Heads up that linking in this style in the header makes it difficult for some tools to link directly to it. the {{tl|Example}} style breaks some things versus the [[Template:Example]] style. (See an above thread where I did the same.) I changed it if you don't mind. —Justin (koavf)TCM 08:55, 4 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
No, I don't mind. Thanks for the fix, Koavf! --SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 09:02, 4 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
The three versions (the original blue, the current black and the Commons one) demonstrate that a retiring user cannot know what such a template will look like after they left. Thus the template should perhaps be regarded not as a message from the user, but as one from the community (in most cases based on a statement from the user, of course).
For a message from the community, it makes sense to use a (uniform) template. What kind of message do we want to convey with the design? I personally prefer the one on Commons, which looks much more friendly, especially as contrasted with the current black one, but it is unnecessarily wordy, as bans are few enough here that we don't need to explicitly address that issue. One point to keep in mind is that the template shouldn't offend anybody who got the template put on their user page by somebody else (after them having declared their retirement elsewhere) or who put the template there when it looked different.
LPfi (talk) 10:45, 4 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I'm with you on the bans, but I'm leaning in favour of mentioning the ban bit as "This is not indicative of breaking any Wikimedia policies." seems quite harmless and I presume most passer-by users have no idea how many bans a wiki issue (I, for one, frequently lurk Meta-Wiki and have zero clue how many are issued on a monthly basis). Otherwise I fully agree with you and think some of it should be mentioned in the documentation as a disclaimer for clarity. --SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 10:51, 4 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I prefer the look of the Commons versions.
Not a big issue, but maybe we should consider if "of their own volition" is always applicable. If an editor is semi-retired because they are in hospital or in prison, then it probably isn't of their own volition. Similarly if retired is added because another editor has heard of an editor's passing. Or are there alternatives to use in these circumstances? AlasdairW (talk) 23:50, 4 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Accounts of deceased Wikimedians are globally locked, for the record. SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 00:39, 5 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
The "retired" template is on just 13 pages. Four of them are blocked/glocked. That means that just over 30% of current users of this template were breaking policies, and should therefore not have a message indicating that they weren't. Eight of the 13 (just over 60%) made less than 50 edits total. The only account that I'd find that template even remotely useful for is @Saqib, who is active on other projects and therefore easily reached with a ping. In short: No practical need to have this template at all.
The "semi-retired" template is one one user's page. That person made an edit today.
If we see this template less as a means of self-expression (see meatball:Goodbye and w:en:WP:YDOW) and more as a practical thing (namely, those of us who are here need to know whether you're still around), I suggest that we get rid of the rarely used and mostly misleading templates, and instead install the m:User:SMcCandlish/userinfo.js and and m: MediaWiki:Gadget-markblocked.js gadgets, default on. Then we'll spot blocked users every time there's a link to their user pages, and the top of every user page/user talk page will have a note about how long it's been since that user's last edit. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:05, 5 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I cannot really see what the gadgets do, but I think having detailed info shown by default is a privacy issue, and it may have annoying effects on the project culture. Also, we might – just might – want to give some weight also to "global" status/activity, which it seems the gadgets don't care about. –LPfi (talk) 09:10, 5 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Global activity is apparently difficult to detect, though I agree that it would be good to have.
What the UserInfo script does is replace the line that says "From Wikivoyage." under your =User page title= with simple public information from Special:ListUsers and Special:Contributions. In my case, right now, it says "An autopatrolled, 9 years 9 months old, with 4,193 edits. Last edited 3 minutes ago. From Wikivoyage." I find that the "Last edited" line is the most useful, as it lets you know that I'm probably online (or that I haven't been around for years, or whatever). Other editors seem to think it's most useful for noticing that someone is a newbie (e.g., if it says "with 2 edits"). See File:Userinfo Screen Shot.png for a screenshot of what it looks like on a narrow screen.
The MarkBlocked script is useful in discussions and in page histories. It adds strikethrough to links (e.g., WhatamIdoing) and makes the link a lighter color so that you can see at a glance whether you're about to reply to someone who has been blocked locally. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:41, 5 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
If a bread at a bakery is stale, you don't stop making bread at all; instead, you work to fix the issue. A similar analogy here should also apply, instead of outright claiming that there isn't a practical need to have a template to have it all. The solution to this is to simply restrict its usage for users who are not banned, blocked or locked (with a policy explicitly allowing any user in good-standing to remove such a template if misused). Also, I agree with LPfi about the privacy issue. --SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 09:37, 5 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I would add to that list "users who have made very few edits". Several of our "retired" editors have made exactly two edits: to create their userpage and then to replace it with this template. They haven't "retired" from Wikivoyage; they were functionally never here in the first place. At which point there are so few uses of it that the template's contents could be placed directly on the (two? three?) users' individual pages, rather than putting it first in the Template: namespace and then transcluding it.
Try this: remove the template from all the user pages that are blocked/glocked, and from anyone who hasn't made, say, 50 edits. See how long the list is after that. Then ask: Do we need to use a tool designed to make it easy to repeat something across "many" pages ...when there aren't even "a few" pages to post it on? WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:32, 5 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Japanese Romanization[edit]

I've noticed in recent months users have been changing all Japanese names and articles to use diacritics in spite of what is written in both Wikivoyage:Naming conventions and Wikivoyage:Romanization that state:

  • For article titles, use the name most commonly used in English for a place, regardless of local character sets.
  • Articles should use the city, region or country name most commonly used in English-speaking countries
  • If a place has a common English name, use it, but always provide the local script and correct romanization in parentheses.

Maybe users are confused because the overriding rules are written separately from the Japanese Romanization subheading, but a significant number of Japanese place names have been romanized and do not use the diacritics. I recently moved Zaō Onsen to Zao Onsen, because search results show that Zao Onsen is clearly the most common English name (Zaō Onsen retrieves only 19,000 results which include Zao Onsen in some of the results, while "Zao Onsen" retrieves 1,970,000 results of which none that I see contain the diacritics). It is very clear that the article should be title Zao Onsen with (蔵王温泉 Zaō Onsen) written in the lede however, I did not realize until after I moved it that it was moved TO the wrong name before that. A lot of place names have also been changed in spite of having established English romanizations. It seems users have forgotten, are ignoring, or are unaware of the overarching romanization rules and perhaps are unaware that the diacritics are still able to be written in parenthesis.

Is there a way to make this clearer? Or should I just send a message to users when I notice it happening? ChubbyWimbus (talk) 10:08, 4 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I would support making it very clear on Wikivoyage:Naming conventions with a subheading for "Japan" in a very similar fashion to Wikipedia. --SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 10:34, 4 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
A split of #Disambiguation is probably also overdue. --SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 10:37, 4 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Hey yo, since you're talking about me you could at least have @'d me in? Anyway, I wrote the Japanese romanization policy back in 2004, but these days I disagree with my old self and so does Wikipedia: I don't see any good reason not to use macrons for Japanese place names, particularly if we're simultaneously pretending Uluṟu-Kata Tjuṯa National Park is the most common form in Australia. Of course Tokyo, Osaka and other household names don't need macrons, but Zaō Onsen isn't exactly in the same league. I've formally proposed the change at Wikivoyage talk:Romanization.Jpatokal (talk) 01:57, 11 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
In either case, shouldn't Wikivoyage:Naming conventions continue to apply? Are these macrons most commonly used in English? -- Ikan Kekek (talk) 04:54, 11 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
They are almost never the most commonly used names in English for Japanese place names online OR within Japan. Given that the user proposing this does not consider over 99% non-diacritic usage to be enough to qualify as "common usage", it seems clear that the proposal is intended to eliminate the current Wikivoyage:Naming conventions and replace it with one that advocates for usage of diacritics OVER and INSTEAD OF whatever is commonly used. ChubbyWimbus (talk) 12:36, 11 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
At least my observation is that diacritics are generally not used in English when transliterating Japanese names, except in material specifically aimed at English speakers who are learning Japanese as a foreign language. It certainly would be helpful to indicate to English speakers which vowels are long and which vowels are short since that distinction is important in Japanese, and Japanese people will have no idea what you are talking about if you confuse long and short vowels. That said, Wikivoyage:Naming conventions says that the most common English name should be used, which is clearly without the diacritics. I think the solution would be to adopt the same policy that we do for our articles about Chinese cities. For say, Beijing, we have the page name without the tone marks, but in the lede we indicate what the correct pronunciation with the tone marks is (Běijīng). So for Japanese cities, we can just leave the page names without the diacritics, and indiciate in the lede correct pronunciation with diacritics to indicate the long vowels. So the page name would be "Tokyo" without the diacritics, but we indicate in the text of the lede that it is actually pronunced Tōkyō with the long vowels. The dog2 (talk) 15:25, 11 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I agree. Ikan Kekek (talk) 18:46, 11 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
You have described the status quo, that's exactly what we do today. Jpatokal (talk) 20:00, 11 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Incorrect. Our current policy is that macrons may never be used in Japanese article titles, period, and this overrides the general naming convention that names should be "with or without accents/diacritics".
I'm suggesting that we a) allow them, and b) start using them when Wikipedia has determined that the macroned version is the common name. (For example, w:Zaō Onsen.) Jpatokal (talk) 19:59, 11 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
See also: en:wikt:Wiktionary:Grease_pit/2024/March#FYI:_Major_romanization_change_coming_in_Japan and en:wikt:Wiktionary:Beer_parlour/2024/March#How_should_we_transliterate_(into_Japanese_script_or_other_scripts),_romanize,_and_lemmatize_Ryukyuan?. —Justin (koavf)TCM 20:28, 11 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
We should not outsource all decisions about what names are most commonly used in English to Wikipedia, especially if there are claims on Wikipedia that a Japanese place name with macrons is the most common spelling in English. Really? I don't think The dog2's suggestion requires a tweak to current Wikivoyage naming policy, since it would be used just in the beginnings of articles to show a transliteration of the Japanese characters, but if it does, I'd be happy to support that limited change. Ikan Kekek (talk) 20:36, 11 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Did you make some mistake and respond to me when you meant to respond to someone else? I didn't write anything about Wikipedia at all. —Justin (koavf)TCM 20:44, 11 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I'm replying in chronological order, so Jpatokal and others see my reply easily. You'd prefer for me to thread the response so that it's more easily lost in the middle. Ikan Kekek (talk) 20:50, 11 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I would prefer that you respond to messages with messages that respond to them. The way that you're doing it is unintelligible. That's why the : and :: syntax exists. If you respond ostensibly to Person A but in reality, it's written to Person B several paragraphs down, that is confusing. See also the [reply] links that are made so that you can directly reply to the relevant comment. —Justin (koavf)TCM 20:55, 11 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I'm responding to the overall thread. If you want to enforce subthreads, feel free to create a subheading and move stuff accordingly, and do that every time, because your preferences are not the common practice on this site. Ikan Kekek (talk) 20:57, 11 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Source? Please just use the [reply] link and don't respond to my comments with off-topic noise. You're making it much harder to follow the conversation. —Justin (koavf)TCM 20:59, 11 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
The [reply] links were apparently introduced to support the style of threaded discussions that's standard on Wikipedia, without regard to what is most used in the English Wikivoyage community. Here we usually add comments in chronological order, as Ikan Kekek said. It's a small cultural difference – different WMF projects are in some ways like different towns or countries. —Granger (talk · contribs) 22:09, 11 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
But if we are going to do that, it's infinitely more confusing to have the :- or *-based comments, as that implies that there is some kind of reason to responses. We should just have a flat series of comments (which itself would be ugly and unintelligible, but at least not actively misleading). —Justin (koavf)TCM 22:14, 11 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I don't find it more confusing, and both maintaining chronological order and providing a visual separation between successive comments, even when it meant looking like you were replying to a subsequent person, was the more common style at enwiki until the Reply tool became popular.
To cope with this, I've noticed a small increase in people deliberately naming the person/comment they're replying to, either with small quotations or by starting the comment with a user's name (e.g., "Ikan, I'm not sure about..." or "I agree with Ikan that...").
The other practice, which was used in the past and is still important now, is to assume that if the person's reply doesn't make sense as a reply to your own comment, then it's not a reply specifically to your own comment. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:45, 13 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I don't recall that being standard here or there. It's very distracting to not use the built-in ability to respond directly to someone else. —Justin (koavf)TCM 19:39, 13 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Other people find it very difficult to tell which comment came from which person, when there is no visual distinction, especially if there is no distractingly decorated sig in the earlier comment(s). WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:18, 14 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

FYI: Is it safe to travel to Mexico, Jamaica, and the Bahamas in 2024?[edit]

https://boingboing.net/2024/03/04/is-it-safe-to-travel-to-mexico-jamaica-and-the-bahamas-in-2024.html

In a real tragedy for the scale of a blog post, they link the wrong article. Here is the correct one. —Justin (koavf)TCM 23:50, 4 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

FYI: 11 Remote Destinations That Are Definitely Worth the Effort to Visit[edit]

https://www.outsideonline.com/adventure-travel/destinations/most-remote-places-on-earth/Justin (koavf)TCM 23:50, 4 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Good article, but I find it a bit US-centric. --SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 21:06, 11 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Agreed: I thought it was weirdly US-centric and I'm an American. —Justin (koavf)TCM 21:09, 11 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
What really surprised me was the lack of any Russian destinations. --SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 21:11, 11 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
That is one of the least surprising things I can imagine, particularly writing to an American audience (which Outside is, to the extent that it is an American publication). I could not in good conscience recommend anyone go there. It's no North Korea or active war zone, but there's a remote-yet-much-too-hi prospect that you'll be arrested for holding a blank piece of paper in public or something and then be a pawn in State Department negotiations for 19 months until an international terrorist is released in a prisoner swap. :/ —Justin (koavf)TCM 21:17, 11 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Parts of Russia are definitely active war zones, in the sense that they've been attacked by drones and apparently by Ukrainian Special Forces, so things get targeted or torched every so often. Ikan Kekek (talk) 22:24, 11 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah, that too and certainly the "parts" of "Russia" that are actually stolen land of Ukraine. —Justin (koavf)TCM 22:27, 11 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

FYI: I flew to Japan with my baby. Here's what I learned about traveling with young kids[edit]

https://www.npr.org/2024/03/05/1196978785/traveling-with-babies-and-toddlers-tips-tricksJustin (koavf)TCM 14:59, 5 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

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

You can find this message translated into additional languages on Meta-wiki. Please help translate to your language

Hello all,

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

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

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

Read more and submit your application on Meta-wiki.

On behalf of the UCoC project team,

RamzyM (WMF) 16:25, 5 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Template?[edit]

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

I'm not sure what you're experiencing. Is this when you're editing or reading? What pages do you see this on? What do you mean by "topic"? WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:04, 6 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
When reading. I see it on every page on the site: Cities, regions, countries, parks, travel topics, etc.
Gray box with links to all the sections.
Pagebanner
[+] Understand
[+] Get in
[+] Get around
.... Mrkstvns (talk) 21:17, 6 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I think it's a bug, see T359446 on Phabricator. -- Alexander (talk) 21:29, 6 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I can see it now. That box is the "Table of Contents". WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:37, 7 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
@Andyrom75: Do you think you could possibly reinsert that temporary fix you made sometime back? --SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 12:44, 7 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
@SHB2000, I've temporary patched Template:Pagebanner. Please, ping me as a reminder when the bug has been solved. Andyrom75 (talk) 15:34, 7 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you, Andyrom! SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 20:25, 7 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
@Andyrom75, the bug report says the patch was riding this week's deployment train, so it should be fixed now. (You'll need to double-check that it actually did get fixed; all I can confirm is that the deployment train has been here.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:50, 13 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
@WhatamIdoing, thanks for the ping. The server-side changes has been been reverted, so I've done the same with my temporary patch.
Now it seems that the previous behavior has been restored. Andyrom75 (talk) 22:36, 13 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you for your vigilance, Andyrom! --SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 09:40, 14 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Wikimedia Canada survey[edit]

Hi! Wikimedia Canada invites contributors living in Canada to take part in our 2024 Community Survey. The survey takes approximately five minutes to complete and closes on March 31, 2024. It is available in both French and English. To learn more, please visit the survey project page on Meta. Chelsea Chiovelli (WMCA) (talk) 00:21, 7 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

April 1st..[edit]

Any thoughts? ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 17:28, 7 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I had an idea already the last year, but have yet to finalize it... Do we do this 'in secret'? :-D -- andree 09:14, 8 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
In the past, it's been done as collabrative draft in userspace. What's the idea? ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 09:18, 8 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Basically something like https://www.reddit.com/r/place (or also w:en:The_Million_Dollar_Homepage), but with world map, and editors could claim some land (and in return must do some edits there, to keep it! :) ). -- andree 08:10, 10 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
r/place but without the bots, shall we put it? --SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 08:20, 10 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Last year we decided to do something different and rickroll our readers. I want to do something similarly unconventional this time but I'm not sure what. --SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 09:44, 8 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I had a suggestion, which might be a bit interesting, which was 'travel' into one's gender expression, But wasn't sure how that might work within a typical WikiVoyage type article, whilst remaning respectful to genuinely Transgender readers. ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 11:24, 8 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
That sounds extremely difficult, especially since what feels respectful varies from culture to culture. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:55, 8 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I agree with WhatamIdoing. --SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 19:52, 8 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Wikivoyage talk:Joke articles would be the place to discuss this. Ground Zero (talk) 11:39, 8 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I've kicked off a discussion there. My suggestion: places with unusual names, for example a Morón & Mörön double bill. Jpatokal (talk) 23:01, 13 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
With 3 days left, should we proceed with Jpatokal's suggestion. --SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 10:28, 28 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
He himself is busy, so somebody else should do this, or create an article on some other theme. I'll be away too, so won't do it. –LPfi (talk) 16:55, 28 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Where did the table of contents go?[edit]

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

Could this be related to #Template? above? —Granger (talk · contribs) 04:55, 9 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
@Andyrom75:? SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 06:02, 9 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
@SHB2000, @Mx. Granger, @OhanaUnited, I confirm that this is related to the temporary patch I've applied on #Template?.
Once the bug T359446 will be solved, the patch could be removed and the normal behavior will be restored.
Sorry for the temporary inconvenience. Andyrom75 (talk) 07:34, 9 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah, it's understandable. Hopefully the bug should be fixed sooner than later. --SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 09:12, 9 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for confirming. —The preceding comment was added by OhanaUnited (talkcontribs)
@OhanaUnited, please check if now the "Table of contents" can be shown. --Andyrom75 (talk) 22:39, 13 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Yes it reappeared. Thanks. OhanaUnitedTalk page 05:54, 14 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Suggested task[edit]

If somebody would like to edit, here's a suggestion:


The brand Thalys does not exist anymore. It has merged with Eurostar. So everything that was Thalys before belongs now to Eurostar.


So search "Thalys" via the Wikivoyage search box and replace/merge everything regarding that brand name to/with Eurostar. 80.187.75.63 18:57, 9 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

OP, please plunge forward as you see fit! --SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 08:20, 10 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
It looks like 57 articles still mention this name. I updated one but left the old name in ("Eurostar (formerly Thalys)") in case it might be useful to readers who were looking for the old name. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:01, 13 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Ukraine's Cultural Diplomacy Month 2024[edit]

Hello all.

Check this out: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Ukraine%27s_Cultural_Diplomacy_Month_2024

Think this might be of interest to many of you. It definitely is of interest to me. Roovinn (talk) 06:26, 10 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Sadly it seems to target Wikipedia only. OhanaUnitedTalk page 02:04, 11 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Informative status[edit]

I see a that "informative status" has been created as an article category at Wikivoyage:Article status. A discussion took place Wikivoyage talk:Article status#Creating a new status for something in between usable and guide? which seemed to find support for the idea two years ago, but Wikivoyage:Informative articles still refers to the concept as "experimental". I personally support the proposal, but we do need to decide whether we should implement this concept more broadly or withdraw it. If we do approve it, many articles would need to be recategorized over time. --Comment by Selfie City (talk) (contributions) 19:01, 12 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I like the idea of a status in between usable and guide, but I think the criteria for making an article "informative" should be better described. It would be nice if it were at least a little bit more demanding than simply a usable article with at least 3-4 listings. Crikey! All of my "usable" articles meet that low threshold. I think that in order to be considered "informative" there should be a well-written lede and a good "Understand" section that explains what's special about a place (maybe with Infoboxes for cultural traditions, etc.) Just a thought... Mrkstvns (talk) 20:01, 12 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
As the proposer, I think it's time to withdraw it. It's a great idea in theory but the logistical challenges of implementing this on a mass-scale has become near-impossible. --SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 20:30, 12 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
There is no need to have all eligible articles updated to the new status. That can be done as article status is otherwise checked, given that the status is widely known. The problem is in defining the criteria. In trying to do that, I saw quite some oddness in the present criteria. Can we adjust the criteria at all, making some usable articles revert to outline and some guides to usable (or informative)? If we can, we can do the same with a new status. However, the discussion stalled, it seems with not too much interest from the community. –LPfi (talk) 11:56, 13 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Which is partially why I'm on the side of abolishing this status. Without much community input (I presume the numbers post-COVID will remain like this for a while), it's hard to make bold changes like an entirely new status. --SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 12:01, 13 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I don't know if I'm being a bit too pessimistic or if I'm biased as the one who initially proposed it. --SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 12:05, 13 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I think if we create a new status, it will be adopted over time. However, we would need to form a new consensus on the qualifications of this article status, IMO. --Comment by Selfie City (talk) (contributions) 14:12, 13 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Well, we have and it's existed for over two years, but very little has been done on it for cases where the criteria is evident. SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 09:41, 14 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I don't think we get much value from increasing the number of possible ratings. The fewer categories we have, the less time we'll spend on bureaucracy. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:03, 13 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I guess it's less so the bureaucracy and more so just the time spent to make the status mainstream. --SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 20:46, 13 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I just don't think there's such a drastic difference between usable, information and guide for town and small village pages. Take Kuujjuarapik that I created last month while I travelled there. I added practically everything there is about the town. Right now I'm already hung up on whether changing it from usable to guide (because the only thing missing for guide is "go next" one-liners). If we introduce informative and I added the "go next" one-liners, I honestly don't know whether my article is considered to be informative or guide. And I think many editors will also be confused by this somewhat blurred distinction between the two. OhanaUnitedTalk page 06:24, 14 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Wikivoyage talk:Park article status has some discussion on the issues. If people are interested in getting this forward, I think it is worth skimming through (at least for those working with parks). One should do some analysis about what differs between a just barely usable and a good usable article (of some category), and what holds articles from becoming guide, as I suggest on that talk page. We could make a comment on forgetting about informative in the case of small towns ("just make them guide instead"); for real cities I think there is a huge difference between barely usable and near guide. –LPfi (talk) 07:10, 14 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
The status I aim for on any page where I do substantial work is PDG. That means it's Pretty Damn Good, and is a near complete self-sufficient guide to the place. But I almost never upstage beyond "usable" precisely because I don't want the quagmire of definitions and hair-splitting. Another day gone, another town PDG, and tomorrow onto the next. Grahamsands (talk) 22:01, 14 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees 2024 Selection[edit]

You can find this message translated into additional languages on Meta-wiki.

Dear all,

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

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

Here are the key planned dates:

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

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

Election Volunteers

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

Best regards,

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

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

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

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

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

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

MPossoupe_(WMF)19:57, 12 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

If anyone is curious what I think would be helpful in Board members, I've put a list of questions at m: User:WhatamIdoing/Board candidates. It always amazes me that some editors believe that fixing thousands of typos on Wikipedia would make a person qualified to set a multi-million dollar budget and lead 600 employees. IMO we need volunteers who understand financial statements and have some general idea of employment law. If you've got some business-related experience and are willing to put in a few hundred unpaid hours for the next three years, please consider volunteering. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:31, 13 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Harrassment[edit]

Apologies to bring this unpleasantness here, however user SHB2000 has a vendetta against me and is harassing me on my talk page (protected for time being). I will be clear - I want no further contact with them, and I would ask the other Admins to counsel them on their behavior. Obviously, I won't contribute to this thread further because I really want no more to do with them Thanks. Andrewssi2 (talk) 10:34, 14 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

To the community, please comment on Wikivoyage:User rights nominations#User:Andrewssi2 (removal) for their abuse of admin privileges and UCoC violations. --SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 10:45, 14 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
And TIL that leaving talk page messages about misuse of rollback was "harassment". --SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 10:46, 14 March 2024 (UTC) [comment hidden by LPfi at 11:25, 14 March 2024, comment unhidden on 11:30, 14 March 2024][reply]
Let's keep the discussion on the nomination page. –LPfi (talk) 11:25, 14 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
@LPfi: Why did you hide my comment? At least you could have given me a courtesy notice on my talk page. I will unhide it as there are no policy-based grounds for hiding that comment. --SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 11:29, 14 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I didn't think about a courtesy notice having been appropriate. I assume most regulars watch this page and the threads on it they find interesting. I thought making the hiding obvious was enough. Sorry for misinterpreting best practices.
My reason to hide the comment in the first place was that it was making an accusation, which could prompt a response and a thread partly doubling the one linked above. Referrals to discussions elsewhere should generally (and especially if the topic is sensitive or heated) be made as neutrally as possible.
LPfi (talk) 11:57, 14 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you for explaining it through (censoring isn't the best practice for that, though). --SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 12:00, 14 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I'm really disturbed to hear about this. Both of you have been valued admins. I will comment on the linked thread. Ikan Kekek (talk) 17:34, 14 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
As a side note: could someone else possibly not mind editing Andrewssi's comment from "SMB2000" to "SHB2000" – I understand that this was a typo made in good faith but "SMB" is a very inappropriate text slur. --SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 20:30, 14 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Well I hope this doesn't preclude everyone from calling you SMB2000. Brycehughes (talk) 02:08, 17 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Global ban proposal for Slowking4[edit]

Hello. This is to notify the community that there is an ongoing global ban proposal for User:Slowking4 who has been active on this wiki. You are invited to participate at m:Requests for comment/Global ban for Slowking4 (2). Thank you. Seawolf35 (talk) 19:45, 14 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

They have made just one edit here, are indefinitely blocked on five projects and a hasty look shows they might have deserved it. –LPfi (talk) 20:47, 14 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah, this ban might be a negative for Wikisource but it is probably for the better for the wider WMF world. SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 06:13, 15 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Your wiki will be in read-only soon[edit]

Trizek (WMF), 00:00, 15 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@Trizek (WMF), is this hoped to be one minute or so? Or is this expected to be longer than the previous ones even if everything goes perfectly? WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:47, 16 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
We can't know in advance. This time, some scripts took longer than expected to execute, and the read-only happen a donen of minutes after 14:00 UTC. It lasted 3 minutes though. Trizek (WMF) (talk) 16:31, 21 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Accessibility of map pins / tube map references[edit]

Hey there, I've been slowly preparing Wikivoyage for night mode. On the most part it's looking pretty good for that, but I'm noticing that we have many problematic accessibility issues in the standard version of the site. I'm using https://chromewebstore.google.com/detail/wcag-color-contrast-check/plnahcmalebffmaghcpcmpaciebdhgdf to get an overview of the issue in our pages.

  1. Problem 1 - Listing numbers
    In our use of colors for maps - for example the map pins we use e.g. the Do, See etc.. templates we generate boxes with the pin number inside them. In the London article for example "Watch Tennis at Wimbledon" as a gray box with white text. This does not pass WCAG AA ( https://webaim.org/resources/contrastchecker/) so means that text is unreadable to certain users.
  2. Problem 2 - the pins. For the pins themselves, I am not sure of the constraints at play here, but again the colors and backgrounds are not always accessible.
  3. I'm also seeing some accessibility issues in templates like  VIC  where the white text on blue is not accessible to some readers. In this case we can probably switch from white text to black text, or alter the background colors slightly (where possible).

Proposed solutions:

  • I'd like to suggest that we move away from text on backgrounds for this sort of thing. For example instead we could move the color alongside the text it represents like in this example:

https://en.m.wikivoyage.org/w/index.php?title=London&diff=4847875&oldid=4847186&title=London&diffonly=1. Could we do something similar to this work for the See, Do etc.. templates?

  • I think we should provide some better guidelines to editors - particularly in the template namespace. Do we have any existing pages that guide editors around how they use colors on this site?


Thanks in advance for your input and ideas!

Jdlrobson (talk) 22:52, 17 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I can only really comment anything meaningful to your third point, being a major contributor to RINT myself. Editing labels like  VIC  would be highly problematic, as RINT's purpose is to reflect the labelling as it appears in place. The Victoria line simply uses that blue and that white. Switching the colours to anything else would make it more difficult for a reader to recognise the branding when visiting. Besides, a lot of these colours have passed design boards galore - TfL's lines are one of those. A single Chrome plugin flagging it as an accessibility issue is not something I would value over representing reality accurately. There no doubt are some labels that pose genuine accessibility issues, but they are best resolved in a case-by-case scenario.
That said, I did change {{RbE}}, the template responsible for generating the RINT labels, to use red instead of light grey whenever a colour is not defined, as red is the most common line colour. That should resolve the biggest accessibility issue with RINT that can be fixed en-masse.
Wauteurz (talk) 21:33, 18 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah, while it is tempting to change the colours from an accessibility standpoint, changing the colour defeats the entire purpose of the template. --SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 09:59, 20 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

This page might need an update. Are any of the social media accounts still active? (none of the 6 users in charge of maintaining WV's FB and X/Twitter accounts are active anymore) --SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 09:58, 20 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Looking at it, May 30, 2021 for FB and some date around 3 years ago for X/Twitter (need an account to open the page). Should the English Wikivoyage permanently abandon its social media accounts? --SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 10:31, 20 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Keep — Since many people in the world are interconnected with social media (including me, of course), I think the social media accounts of Wikivoyage should be kept as they are obvious platforms to promote our project. We should also venture into the Threads app to promote our project to the Insta users. Sbb1413 (he) (talkcontribs) 17:31, 23 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I agree in principle, but those accounts are literally abandoned and there's no way for any of us to take over both the FB and X/Twitter accounts since almost all of users maintaining those accounts have left. --SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 09:00, 27 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
If we can't take over those accounts, then it is better permanently abandoning those accounts in favor of new ones. Sbb1413 (he) (talkcontribs) 09:45, 27 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Are the people who maintained them not contactable? I assume they have other things going on in their lives, but they may be reading their email, and somebody may even have their phone numbers. If so, they should be able to hand over rights to the accounts. Leaving abandoned accounts behind and creating new ones gives a bad image. If we have to create new ones, we need to create some mechanism for the situation not to be repeated (and put a note and link on the old ones, if possible). –LPfi (talk) 10:36, 27 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Hmm, I suppose LtPowers might be contactable given they've made sporadic edits both here and on Wikipedia, but all of the others haven't made edits in years (except Andre, who left due to abuse of admin tools on Commons). --SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 10:56, 27 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Those two both have their email enabled. If their email addresses are stable non-throw-away ones, them not editing doesn't affect being able to reach them. Some in the community may also have personal contacts to them. Similarly with the others. –LPfi (talk) 12:49, 27 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, for heaven's sake, I'm still pingable and emailable. Andrew did such a good job with the Facebook postings that I fell out of the habit, and no one notified me when he stopped doing them. Plus I didn't (and don't) really have the time to keep up with it. I will say that I don't know that we ever got much engagement on Facebook (can't speak to the other social media), but I'm happy to add other people as admins if anyone wants to step forward. Powers (talk) 13:47, 27 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I would suggest that at minimum, we post Destination of the Month, Off the Beaten Path and Featured Travel Topic each month. They seem like low hanging fruits, high quality entries and give us something to post about on a regular basis without looking too spammy or bot-like. OhanaUnitedTalk page 19:18, 27 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I don't disagree, but someone has to write the blurbs. It gets to be a lot for one person. Powers (talk) 19:48, 27 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Just use the lead section of those articles as blurbs. No need to reinvent the wheel. OhanaUnitedTalk page 04:16, 28 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Or use the blurbs that will go on the main page. --SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 04:24, 28 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Early access to the night mode (mobile web, logged-in)[edit]

Hi everyone, as announced in November, the Web team at the Wikimedia Foundation is working on night mode. A very early version of this feature is now available on a small set of wikis. Because there are active technical editors in your community, we have decided to roll it out here. But don't worry, the new feature is not disruptive! (See the "known limitations" section below.) It's important for us to work together with you before we release this feature to a wider audience. Our goals for the early rollout are to:

  • Show what we've built very early. The earlier you are involved, the more your voices will be reflected in the final version
  • Get your help with flagging bugs, issues, and requests
  • Work with technical editors to adjust various templates and gadgets to the night mode

Go to the project page and the FAQ page to see more information about the basics of this project.

Known limitations of the initial release

  • Currently, night mode is only available on mobile, for logged-in users who have opted into advanced mode, as an opt-in feature.
  • Gadgets may initially not work well with night mode and may have to be updated.
  • Our first goal is making night mode work on articles. Special pages, talk pages, and other namespaces have not been updated to work in night mode yet. We have temporarily disabled night mode on these pages.

What we would like you to do (the broad community)

Consider linking to the Recommendations for night mode compatibility on Wikimedia wikis on pages explaining how to format templates and similar pages. Soon, this page will be marked for translation. We would like to emphasize that the recommendations may evolve. For this reason, we are not suggesting to create your local wiki copies of recommendations. At some point, the copy could become different from the original version.

What we would like you to do (template editors, interface admins, technical editors)

When most bugs are solved, we'll be able to make the night mode available for readers on both desktop and mobile. To make this happen, we need to work together with you on reporting and solving the problems.

  1. To turn it on, use the mobile website (for example, this is what the main page looks like on mobile) and go to the settings part of your menu and opt into advanced mode, if you haven't already.  Then, set the color to night. (Later, we will be allowing the device preferences to set night mode automatically).  
  2. Next, go to different articles and look for issues:

Thank you. We're looking forward to your opinions and comments! SGrabarczuk (WMF) (talk) 18:24, 20 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@SGrabarczuk (WMF), I'm having a problem with https://night-mode-checker.wmcloud.org/enwikivoyage-mobile-light/ When I click one of the names to uncollapse the list of errors, it uncollapses it, and then opens the page on top of the list. Should that be opening the article in a new tab? WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:38, 22 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Hey @WhatamIdoing! Are you asking if the page could be opened in a new tab instead of the same tab? SGrabarczuk (WMF) (talk) 11:33, 22 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
That's one way to solve my problem. WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:56, 22 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I see. Well, I was asking because I wasn't sure I understood what the problem was. Could you rephrase the question? SGrabarczuk (WMF) (talk) 23:46, 22 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
As a contributor who would like to resolve problems, I want to look at the list of errors on a page. However, when I go to https://night-mode-checker.wmcloud.org/enwikivoyage-mobile-light/, the list of errors is collapsed. When I click on (for example) "Main_Page - Total Errors: 12", the Cloud Services tool is immediately overwritten by the Main Page. I don't want to see the Main Page itself in this tab; I want to see the list of errors. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:48, 23 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
it's just a bad UI :). You can expand by clicking outside of the links or right click and open in new tab.
The list of errors is not too useful out of context to be honest. I would recommend using the browser extension on the pages with a high amount of errors.
Szymon - you can talk to Kim about improving the UI while I am out!
I think it would be useful to finish up my video too. Jdlrobson (talk) 10:32, 25 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Is there a way to turn on dark mode on desktop? Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-rendering doesn't have anything for me. --SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 06:05, 22 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Hello @SHB2000, great question. It's too early to enable it on desktop. We'll roll it out on more wikis on mobile, and then on desktop, as a beta feature. You may read more about this in our FAQ. There's a table there with all the details. SGrabarczuk (WMF) (talk) 11:36, 22 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
That's all good. I do like the look of it on mobile, though. --SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 11:40, 22 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
If people can opt in on mobile and let me know via my talk page if you see any articles that look broken I will be happy to get those fixed. The top 100 most read are looking good so hopefully this will be on desktop soon. Jdlrobson (talk) 16:03, 23 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
@Jdlrobson: I notice Template:Infobox is broken, not displaying content, e.g. see the one under United States of America#Holidays. Was it this edit? Brycehughes (talk) 15:40, 24 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Seems it was. I rolled it back but now the HTML table styling is off. Brycehughes (talk) 15:55, 24 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── At the German Wikivoyage, we are using the solution of the English Wikipedia for desktop computers. It is working well (now only for logged-in readers). --RolandUnger (talk) 16:51, 24 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Article suggestion[edit]

If anyone is up to the task of writing it, I think a Canada without a car article will be a good one to have, along the lines of the United States without a car and Australia without a car. I've never lived in Canada, but based on my visits there. Canada is also a very car dependent country. And it seems that Canada's famed national parks are very hard to explore without a car. If anyone knows if any of them can be explored without a car, that information will certainly be useful. The dog2 (talk) 15:15, 25 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

This looks like a viable topic. Perhaps some of these webpages would inspire someone to create it:
WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:31, 25 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Re alternative transport. Brycehughes (talk) 18:11, 25 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah, from experience the Vancouver metro area is easy to get around without a car, but I needed to rely on one of my mum's friends in rural BC. A guide like this would be very helpful for many travellers. --SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 08:59, 27 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Because of overcrowding at the parking lots, Banff National Park has shuttle buses to get people around, but other parks are difficult to access. Park Bus has sporadic trips from Toronto to ten parks in summer. Rouge Park is a national park in Toronto, accessible by city bus. Ground Zero (talk) 11:47, 27 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]