Wikiversity:Colloquium

Start your discussion here Please do not include wiki markup or links in section titles. Sign your posts with   ~~~~ Welcome Do you have questions, comments or suggestions about Wikiversity? That is what this page is for! Before asking a question, you can find some general information at: What is Wikiversity? Who are Wikiversity participants? Wikiversity Introduction MediaWiki software questions Wikiversity: Chat | Mailing list | Twitter For general questions, use Wikiversity:Help desk

Purge Cache - Colloquium Archives - RSS version

var wgArticlePath = "/wiki/$1"; var wgServer = "http://en.wikiversity.org"; var wgPageName = "Wikiversity:Colloquium"; var wgTitle = "Wikiversity Colloquium"; var wgContentLanguage = "en"; var x-feed-reverse = "true"; var x-blog-description = "You have questions, comments or suggestions about Wikiversity? That's what this page is for!";

RSS

"Imagination is more important than knowledge. For knowledge is limited, whereas imagination embraces the entire world, stimulating progress, giving birth to evolution." — Albert Einstein (discuss)

Your wiki will be in read-only soon

Read this message in another language • Please help translate to your language

The Wikimedia Foundation tests the switch between its first and secondary data centers. This will make sure that Wikipedia and the other Wikimedia wikis can stay online even after a disaster. To make sure everything is working, the Wikimedia Technology department needs to do a planned test. This test will show if they can reliably switch from one data centre to the other. It requires many teams to prepare for the test and to be available to fix any unexpected problems.

All traffic will switch on 26 April. The test will start at 14:00 UTC.

Unfortunately, because of some limitations in MediaWiki, all editing must stop while the switch is made. We apologize for this disruption, and we are working to minimize it in the future.

You will be able to read, but not edit, all wikis for a short period of time.

• You will not be able to edit for up to an hour on Wednesday 26 April 2023.
• If you try to edit or save during these times, you will see an error message. We hope that no edits will be lost during these minutes, but we can't guarantee it. If you see the error message, then please wait until everything is back to normal. Then you should be able to save your edit. But, we recommend that you make a copy of your changes first, just in case.

Other effects:

• Background jobs will be slower and some may be dropped. Red links might not be updated as quickly as normal. If you create an article that is already linked somewhere else, the link will stay red longer than usual. Some long-running scripts will have to be stopped.
• We expect the code deployments to happen as any other week. However, some case-by-case code freezes could punctually happen if the operation require them afterwards.
• GitLab will be unavailable for about 90 minutes.

This project may be postponed if necessary. You can read the schedule at wikitech.wikimedia.org. Any changes will be announced in the schedule. There will be more notifications about this. A banner will be displayed on all wikis 30 minutes before this operation happens. Please share this information with your community.

MediaWiki message delivery 00:41, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

dead-url in cite web template

Hello! In the template:cite web the parameter dead-url doesn't work. See Research in programming Wikidata/Anime#References. I need technical help :) --Andrew Krizhanovsky (discuss • contribs) 08:00, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

@AKA MBG: I would cheat and link through https://archive.org/. Then it won't be a dead url. -- Dave Braunschweig (discuss • contribs) 00:29, 22 April 2023 (UTC)

Seeking volunteers for the next step in the Universal Code of Conduct process

More languages • Please help translate to your language

Hello,

As follow-up to the message about the Universal Code of Conduct Enforcement Guidelines by Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees Vice Chair, Shani Evenstein Sigalov, I am reaching out about the next steps. I want to bring your attention to the next stage of the Universal Code of Conduct process, which is forming a building committee for the Universal Code of Conduct Coordinating Committee (U4C). I invite community members with experience and deep interest in community health and governance to nominate themselves to be part of the U4C building committee, which needs people who are:

• Community members in good standing
• Knowledgeable about movement community processes, such as, but not limited to, policy drafting, participatory decision making, and application of existing rules and policies on Wikimedia projects
• Aware and appreciative of the diversity of the movement, such as, but not limited to, languages spoken, identity, geography, and project type
• Committed to participate for the entire U4C Building Committee period from mid-May - December 2023
• Comfortable with engaging in difficult, but productive conversations
• Confidently able to communicate in English

The Building Committee shall consist of volunteer community members, affiliate board or staff, and Wikimedia Foundation staff.

The Universal Code of Conduct has been a process strengthened by the skills and knowledge of the community and I look forward to what the U4C Building Committee creates. If you are interested in joining the Building Committee, please either sign up on the Meta-Wiki page, or contact ucocprojectwikimedia.org by May 12, 2023. Read more on Meta-Wiki.

Best regards,

Xeno (WMF) 19:01, 26 April 2023 (UTC)

Licenses for files

Hi! According to wmf:Resolution:Licensing_policy all wikimedia projects must make sure that all files have a free license or meet the requirements of an Exemption Doctrine Policy (EDP).

The best way to do that is to add to all license templates either {{Free media}} to make files show up in Category:All free media or {{Non-free media}} to make files show up in Category:All non-free media. The license templates are protected so I can't add it.

According to Special:Statistics there are 37,785 files here but less than 200 are in the 2 categories above. So it would be great if it could be fixed.

I also noticed that there are licenses like {{Cc-by-nc-sa-3.0}}. Licenses with NonCommercial or NoDerivate are not valid free licenses so the files can only be kept if the file meet the requirements in the EDP (fair use).

Looking at Category:CC-BY-NC-SA-3.0 I would say that most of the files can't be used as fair use. However some of the files are there because they use {{Cc-by-sa-any-3.0}} so the problem can be fixed by removing the NC license.

Are there any users here that check files? If yes I would like to hear more so we do not check the same and do double work. --MGA73 (discuss • contribs) 19:08, 29 April 2023 (UTC)

@MGA73 Thank you for helping us clean up our file licenses. I agree that CC-BY-SA and CC-BY-NC-SA are incompatible. I checked the history and any resource that included the "any" template would have been released under CC-BY-SA, so I've redirected that template to CC-BY-SA.

Regarding Fair Use files, most of the files tagged that way were uploaded by students for course projects they were working on. Unfortunately, no one was checking file licensing at the time and the files were uploaded without any license. I believe we can legitimately assume that the user who created and uploaded the file was able to use their own creation for academic purposes under Fair Use guidelines. You are correct in recognizing that most of these files can't be used by anyone else as fair use, but this approach effectively allows the files to remain without reuse by others. If I'm missing something in applying this logic and you have a better solution, please let me know.

There is another large set of Fair Use files that have been recognized as not being legitimate fair use. So far, no one has had the time to go through and figure out which ones, if any, should remain. If you'd like to review some of those and provide an informed assessment, that would be very helpful.

To make sure I don't miss anything, can you list the templates you want tagged as Free media and Non-free media?

Thanks!

Dave Braunschweig (discuss • contribs) 03:39, 30 April 2023 (UTC)

@Dave Braunschweig Thank you for your reply. It is actually an interessting point you mention. On all other wikiprojects we judge fair use by the purpose of a large number of reusers. Here it is a question about what one or very few users (the student(s)). I wonder if you could argue that the files qualify for fair use as long as the projects are in progress and untill the course endend but perhaps 1 year after it no longer qualify as fair use? Anyway thats something that should be discussed more widely.

Based on your argument I think that the best solution is to add a fair use tag to the unlicensed files if they are used in a valid project. If they are unused (Special:UnusedFiles) they should be deleted unless we can safely classify them as free files and we think they are usable.

I noticed that there are other problems. For example File:Mok Storyboard Sheet.png it says "Public Domain" but the license added is {{GFDL}}.

Because of the large number of files (37k) it is not a good idéa just to check the files one by one. So I will work a little and try to make some lists and come up with a plan. So It may take a few days before you hear from me again.

Usually the best way if to have the users that are still active involved in the project and make them check their uploads. If they have a large number of files a bot could assist them.

If you or any other have some time then unused files could be a good place to start. Delete those that are non-free or have no license unless uploader is still active and can fix. Keep those with a free file that looks usable. --MGA73 (discuss • contribs) 09:04, 30 April 2023 (UTC)

I had a quick look at the discussion about the non-valid fair use. I'm not sure where to comment. At the top it says discussion should be archived. Anyway I fully agree with uploader that "No free use or Public Domain image known" but that is not the point. The point is

1. could a free image be created? For example what prevent uploader from creating a diagram of the earth? A map of Africa? A map of Hudson Bay?
2. are there no other way to explain the topic than to use a copyrighted photo of group therapy or "a girl from China with her tongue colored to match the Union Jack"?

If not allready done perhaps delete all the unused files first? But as I said I will try to make some lists. --MGA73 (discuss • contribs) 09:26, 30 April 2023 (UTC)

@MGA73: Unused Fair Use files were deleted. There may be more now if supporting pages have been deleted since then. Files clearly violating the Wikiversity:EDP (by location or for other reasons) were deleted. But no one has had time to look at every file and decide whether it is a violation. I do have a bot available to assist if you have suggestions on what it should look for. Thanks! -- Dave Braunschweig (discuss • contribs) 14:16, 30 April 2023 (UTC)

I've created Wikiversity:File Review and Wikiversity talk:File Review to continue this discussion. -- Dave Braunschweig (discuss • contribs) 14:43, 30 April 2023 (UTC)

Automatic citations based on ISBN are broken

Apologies if this message does not reach you in your favorite language. You can help translate it centrally at Meta. Thanks for your help.

We have recently become unable to access the WorldCat API which provided the ability to generate citations using ISBN numbers. The Wikimedia Foundation's Editing team is investigating several options to restore the functionality, but will need to disable ISBN citation generation for now.

This affects citations made with the VisualEditor Automatic tab, and the use of the citoid API in gadgets and user scripts, such as the autofill button on refToolbar. Please note that all the other automatic ways of generating citations, including via URL or DOI, are still available.

You can keep updated on the situation via Phabricator, or by reading the next issues of m:Tech News. If you know of any users or groups who rely heavily on this feature (for instance, someone who has an upcoming editathon), I'd appreciate it if you shared this update with them.

Elitre (WMF), on behalf of the Editing team.

MediaWiki message delivery (discuss • contribs) 19:45, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

Request for comment: Cleaning up draftspace

This wiki currently has over 650 content pages in the Draft namespace. Of those pages, over 90% have not been edited in the last 180 days, ~75% have been untouched for two years or more, and ~50% for over three years.

Technical details
A list of these articles can be obtained through the API using a request of the form: { "action": "query", "format": "json", "prop": "revisions", "generator": "allpages", "formatversion": "2", "rvprop": "timestamp|user|comment", "gapnamespace": "118", "gapfilterredir": "nonredirects", "gaplimit": "max" } API sandbox link

The Wikiversity:Drafts policy proposal suggests that these pages should be subject to deletion if they are left unedited for 180 days. (This was agreed to at Wikiversity talk:Drafts in 2019, but doesn't appear to have ever been implemented.)

Would other editors and administrators prefer that we do one or more of the following:

1. Implement automatic deletion of all draft articles older than 180 days?
2. Apply proposed deletion templates to all draft articles which haven't been edited in 90 days or more? (This would effectively "reset the timer" for those articles; if no one removes the templates, they would be deleted in mid-November, at least 9 months after they were last edited.)
3. Bring batches of currently expired draft articles to DR? (Many of the current draft articles fall into clearly defined groups, like a large group of IT articles created by User:Tech201805, so reviewing these batches would not be as burdensome as it might sound.)
4. Move expired draft articles to userspace? (I would prefer that we only do this selectively, if at all.)

Omphalographer (discuss • contribs) 21:30, 18 May 2023 (UTC)

I'd prefer to use Proposed Deletion. It doesn't require discussion, and anyone monitoring the resources can remove it if they want to keep the content. The last (and only) time I cleaned up Draft space, I tagged all articles untouched for more than 180 days with a Proposed Deletion with 60 days already expired (effectively giving them 30 days to object). I don't recall any complaints from that approach. I'm not sure anyone even noticed. -- Dave Braunschweig (discuss • contribs) 00:55, 19 May 2023 (UTC)

Fair enough, that works too. I've now tagged about 150 of the oldest drafts. Omphalographer (discuss • contribs) 20:25, 21 May 2023 (UTC)

I suggest everything in draft namespace either be moved to user-space (least preferable), left alone (and draft namespace linked to and promoted more), or moved to main namespace as stubs. I'm guessing they are effectively hidden in the draft namespace. Oh well. bless up. Michael Ten (discuss • contribs) 03:01, 29 May 2023 (UTC)

The intention of draft space is to allow editors time to develop articles; the articles I've been tagging have all been untouched for 3+ years, and in many cases the editors appear to have left the project. (In some cases, creating the draft was the user's only edit.) If any of the drafts I encountered were in a suitable state to promote to the main namespace, I would have moved them; alas, the vast majority of them have been unredeemable junk. (A couple of representative examples: Draft:Social Media and Education; Draft:Linktomaterial; Draft:Diamondase; Draft:Steel.)

In my opinion, stubs don't make a lot of sense on Wikiversity. They make sense in an encyclopedia or a dictionary, where the purpose and general content of a page is implied by its title. Educational resources, by contrast, require more up-front planning and direction from editors, to the extent that a vaguely described stub may be more of an obstacle than it is helpful. Omphalographer (discuss • contribs) 05:25, 29 May 2023 (UTC)

"the vast majority of them have been unredeemable junk." https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/one_man%27s_trash_is_another_man%27s_treasure Michael Ten (discuss • contribs) 06:02, 29 May 2023 (UTC)

Sometimes true but are there any examples of drafts with many views? If any drafts have many views it could be an indication that it is more treasure than trash. Moving it to user name space would probably mean even fewer will notice it. --MGA73 (discuss • contribs) 17:27, 30 May 2023 (UTC)

Draft space is excluded from search, both in Special:Search and in robots.txt, so pages in that namespace are - for better or worse - basically undiscoverable by visitors. It looks as though Wikiversity:Statistics hasn't been updated for a bit, but none of the archives from 2022 show any substantial, sustained interest in any specific draft pages. Omphalographer (discuss • contribs) 17:40, 30 May 2023 (UTC)

January 2023 through April 2023 statistics updated. -- Dave Braunschweig (discuss • contribs) 21:33, 30 May 2023 (UTC)

No surprises there. The only draftspace articles which show up at all in this year's stats are the ones which were being actively edited that month - and my suspicion is that most of those hits are from the author working on the page, not other viewers reading it. Omphalographer (discuss • contribs) 22:11, 30 May 2023 (UTC)

Selection of the U4C Building Committee

The next stage in the Universal Code of Conduct process is establishing a Building Committee to create the charter for the Universal Code of Conduct Coordinating Committee (U4C). The Building Committee has been selected. Read about the members and the work ahead on Meta-wiki.

-- UCoC Project Team, 04:21, 27 May 2023 (UTC)

The name of an article on Hedonism

I created article "Hedonism (Polansky)" and it was moved to Hedonism/Polansky. I feel unhappy with the new name. What troubles me, I think, is that it gives the impression that there is a larger work or project "Hedonism" and there is a part of it called "Polansky". Whereas my idea was that I published an article on hedonism called "Hedonism", and since I felt I should not occupy the "Hedonism" headword for my work, I used "(Polansky)" for disambiguation.

The following changes come to mine:

• Name it "Hedonism (Polansky)" again, where the brackets are inspired by Wikipedia article name convention.
• Name it "Hedonism - Polansky" if preferred.
• Name it "Hedonism by Polansky" if preferred.
• Name it "One man's look at hedonism": thus, use ever so slightly original title to make sure the title "Hedonism" is not occupied.

What do you think? Any other proposals? --Dan Polansky (discuss • contribs) 11:35, 2 June 2023 (UTC)

@Dan Polansky Hedonism/Polansky is the accepted approach. We don't name main space resources after users except as subpages. And since "One man's look at hedonism" is still a resource on hedonism, that, too, would be moved to where the page is now. If you'd prefer to rename it, you are welcome to do so, but the location is correct as currently published.

I suppose your other option would be to work with the WikiJournal of Humanities to have it accepted and published there.

Dave Braunschweig (discuss • contribs) 13:33, 2 June 2023 (UTC)

Thank you. So let me see: would "One man's look at hedonism" be placed to "Hedonism/One man's look at hedonism"? If so, why would one use subpaging when there is categorization for the purpose? I looked around a bit to see what the practice is, and I found e.g. "C language in plain view" not placed at "C language/C language in plain view", and there is "The necessities in Microprocessor Based System Design", not "System Design/The necessities in Microprocessor Based System Design" or the like. The thing is, "Hedonism/One man's look at hedonism" looks kind of clumsy. As clumsy as it looks, it is perhaps better than "Hedonism/Polansky" for the reasons stated: it looks as if there is chapter called "Polansky" or something.

As for WikiJournal of Humanities, that seems too much of a challenge to me; that would require addressing issuess found in a review and committing time and attention to address the issues.

Since you seem rather opposed to "Hedonism (Polansky)", would "One man's look at hedonism" be acceptable even if dispreferred? Or would at least "Hedonism/One man's look at hedonism" be acceptable even if dispreferred? --Dan Polansky (discuss • contribs) 14:26, 2 June 2023 (UTC)

C language in plain view and The necessities in Microprocessor Based System Design are both complete, real-world courses taught by a prolific Wikiversity user with 43,000 edits. That's probably not the best comparison for this resource. If you're planning to develop a real-world course on hedonism, please move the page to Draft: space so you can begin your development work.

We don't have any main space pages named after users. If you happen to find one, please let us know and it will be addressed immediately. As indicated above, "If you'd prefer to rename it, you are welcome to do so, but the location is correct as currently published."

Dave Braunschweig (discuss • contribs) 23:05, 2 June 2023 (UTC)