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== Encouraging use of user talk pages ==

So, I've written [[User:FeRDNYC/User Talk Message|this message]], which I'm thinking of going around and (manually) placing on the User talk pages of everyone whose User: page is redirected to the main-article space, to point out that they won't receive talk-page message notifications unless they use their corresponding user talk page. 

(This covers two types of users:)
# Those with user talk pages like [[User talk:BlueStapler]], [[User talk:Hershey Almighty]], etc. that are redirected to [[Talk:BlueStapler]], [[Talk:Hershey Almighty]], etc. 
# Users like [[User:Hairplug4men]], [[User:EJ Rose]], etc. with redirected User pages, who have no redirect for their user talk page.

Basically it's about 50 people, I have a whole list. '''Most''' of them are probably not active users, but I'd plan to contact them all regardless. If they never see it, oh well. If they do, then great.

I just wanted to solicit feedback before I start.

With [[Special:ExpandTemplates]], you can see what the message would look like when it's placed on {{u|Djonni}}'s talk page (as an example). Click the following url: 

{{fullurl:Special:ExpandTemplates|wpInput=%7b%7bsafesubst:User:FeRDNYC/User+Talk+Message%7d%7d&wpContextTitle=User+talk:Djonni}}

You'll see the formatted message at the bottom of the page. -- [[User:FeRDNYC|FeRDNYC]] ([[User talk:FeRDNYC|talk]]) 01:51, 17 February 2019 (UTC)

::It seems some people keeps on redirect their user page to another page for some reasons, tried to leave messages but it don't seem to reach through. Well it's not really a serious issue but still happens. --[[User:WardPhoenix|WardPhoenix]] ([[User talk:WardPhoenix|talk]]) 16:03, 12 March 2019 (UTC)

::: Honestly, though, that's ''fine'' and if people want to do it then more power to 'em. (There are all sorts of reasons why someone might want to, including '''intending''' their user page to be editable by other people. That's the reason {{user|Djonni}} specifically gives on his [[User talk:Djonni|talk page]].) If people want to keep a "god" page in the article namespace, as long as it's properly categorized no harm done. It's ''only'' when the corresponding talk page isn't redirected '''back''' to User talk: space that there's a down side. But it works just fine to maintain a non-<code>User:Foo</code> userpage at <code>Foo</code>, with a <code>Talk:Foo</code> page that redirects to <code>User talk:foo</code>, and doing that means they won't miss notifications. -- [[User:FeRDNYC|FeRDNYC]] ([[User talk:FeRDNYC|talk]]) 20:49, 12 March 2019 (UTC)

:::: Sorry, the example-message URL above was "down" for a couple of weeks, as I'd repurposed the page in question to do canvassing for the JanuWiki post-mortem and forgot to set it back afterwards. Anyway, it's working again now. -- [[User:FeRDNYC|FeRDNYC]] ([[User talk:FeRDNYC|talk]]) 16:54, 13 March 2019 (UTC)

::::: I'm joining this conversation pretty late, and [[User:FeRDNYC|FeRDNYC]] hasn't been around the wiki since April... does anyone know if he went ahead with the plan? I think it's a very good idea, speaking from my own experience with an unredirected talk page! -- [[User:Djonni|Djonni]] ([[User talk:Djonni|talk]]) 09:03, 12 September 2019 (UTC)

I don't think he end up doing it, but I could be wrong.--[[User:WardPhoenix|WardPhoenix]] ([[User talk:WardPhoenix|talk]]) 13:29, 12 September 2019 (UTC)

:Yeah, alright. I found his draft at [[User:FeRDNYC/User Talk Message]]. I think it's a bit wordy personally, and gets a little lost in the weeds about the history of notifications on mediawiki sites, and needs a heavy edit. But I think his idea is really good and we should work up a better draft and go ahead with it.

:It's a shame he isn't around at the moment (I'll leave him a talkback regardless!) because he went to the trouble of compiling a list of the affected users and we don't have it! I'll have to do that myself. -- [[User:Djonni|Djonni]] ([[User talk:Djonni|talk]]) 15:07, 12 September 2019 (UTC)

== Theming or Other Event Brainstorms ==

{{u|FeRDNYC}} makes a really good point above that two big events a year would be amazing, but that there's also opportunities for smaller events. With the basis that JanuWiki should now be an annual event, perhaps this should be a list of other event or drive ideas (big and small) that we could do, to figure out how we could space things to still get necessary stuff done. -- [[User:SourceRunner|SourceRunner]] ([[User talk:SourceRunner|talk]]) 17:37, 23 March 2019 (UTC)

* '''JanuWiki 2020: Year of the WikiGnome/GodWikiStmas''' -- Big event. Next JanuWiki. Starts when? Ends January 31, 2020. Wrap-up ends February 29, 2020. Theming granularity? Process certainties?

* '''Guidelines and Guide Resources Drive'''
(Please expand)

* '''Easter Interlink Special''' -- Small event. EIS Eternal would be willing to sponsor a small wiki event during the Easter week or two weeks, with the object of adding links between pages on GodWiki (with reasonable reasons for doing so). One of the wiki strengths is the ability to create an ecosystem of lore, and the best way to explore that is following links between pages. So there could be the a specific event that GodWiki editors and content creators each chose a pair of pages to interlink, and write the lore between them that explains their relationships in the ecosystem and links the two. A report to the "Help Request" page when finished a pairing would make the pair's linker eligible for a reward of some sort after EIS checks that it has been done and does make sense.

* '''Trans-Lore-Ation''' -- Small event. A lot of Godville lore is in the forums and tucked away in little sections of personal chronicles. As players, we in common tend to "know" this lore to be true, but not have it on GodWiki. How about a small event where people scavenger-hunt their favorite descriptions of towns, taverns, monsters, and Godville myths from the older parts of forums and the crannies of guild and personal pages, then add excerpts and possible links to the applicable pages in GodWiki.

* '''Stub It Out''' -- Large event. Survey what articles with the "Stub" tag are still stubs, and remove tags where appropriate. Expand articles that are still stubs.

* '''"Wherefore ART Thou?"''' -- Large event(?). Adding art to the "picture needed" category articles. Some artists need a long time to plan, so this may need to be a slow or multi-phase event.
: Could be associated with the stub event maybe?


::: Sounds like there is some good ideas ready for the oven. I'd say that if you want to throw an event, just go for it. Create a page for it and allow us to help for the preparation.
:::Maybe we should make like a planner for upcomming events. By the way, talks about upcomming event may be more appropriate on the main talk

::: As for JanuWiki2020 (or GodWikiStmas maybe), I'd say we have the time to see it coming. Let's care of other event before.

::: --[[User:WardPhoenix|WardPhoenix]] ([[User talk:WardPhoenix|talk]]) 23:55, 25 March 2019 (UTC)

:::: As another idea for a possible event (I don't even know if it would be considered big or small), [[:Category:Pictures needed]] is up to 314 entries. That's 314 ''existing'' articles (primarily ones that use {{tlx|Monster}}, {{tlx|Artifact}}, or {{tlx|Equipment}}) which don't have an image to go with their subject. Trimming that list down a bit could also be a good way to get non-writers involved in creating wiki content. -- [[User:FeRDNYC|FeRDNYC]] ([[User talk:FeRDNYC|talk]]) 06:39, 26 March 2019 (UTC)

::::: Oh, yes, and [[:Category:Stubs]] is up to 552 articles that (in theory) need fleshing-out.

::::: I say "in theory" because some of them may not ''really'' be stubs, having been expanded since they were tagged that way. In the "Advanced options" at the bottom of the [[Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-rendering|appearance preferences]] is the option "Threshold for stub link formatting". It takes a length (in bytes) an article's source must be so it's not considered a stub. Links to all articles shorter than that threshold will be colored with a darker shade of red than the standard {{fake redlink|redlink}} coloring. 

::::: I currently have that preference set to 1000 bytes, and still some of the items in [[:Category:Stubs]] are colored blue. It's certainly ''possible'' for an article that's over 1000 bytes long to also be a stub, but it's also possible that there's already plenty of content there and the stub designation is outdated / overzealous. I'd say maybe 10-15% of the category's members show non-stub link coloring. -- [[User:FeRDNYC|FeRDNYC]] ([[User talk:FeRDNYC|talk]]) 07:00, 26 March 2019 (UTC)

:::::: These are great ideas for events, {{u|WardPhoenix}} and {{u|FeRDNYC}}. I've added them to the bullet point list above, and tried to evaluate them as large or small, based on your descriptions. Please feel free to expand or change what's in the bullet list.
:::::: {{u|WardPhoenix}}, good suggestion about the planner/calendar for events. Is something like that possible in GodWiki, {{u|FeRDNYC}}? --[[User:SourceRunner|SourceRunner]] ([[User talk:SourceRunner|talk]]) 15:21, 26 March 2019 (UTC)

::::::: {{tqb|I'd say that if you want to throw an event, just go for it. Create a page for it and allow us to help for the preparation.|WardPhoenix}}
::::::: I would agree with that, with one small adjustment: When you decide you ''definitely '''are''''' throwing an event, creating a page for it would be the first step in preparing for it, and can serve as the formal announcement of the upcoming event. 

::::::: I think {{u|Djonni}} worked up to [[JanuWiki 2019]] exactly the right way (whether intentionally or by pure luck): He put out feelers on the forums and in a proposal here at [[Talk:Main Page]], and used those discussions to solicit feedback and take the community's temperature on the idea. Then once he was sure there was sufficient interest that he could commit to definitely doing an event, he pulled the trigger on creating the event page, at which point he had someplace he could link to as a "more information" resource when he made the official announcement(s) about the upcoming event.

::::::: At any stage of planning, there's always the possibility that an event could end up getting cancelled for lack of involvement or interest. Things happen. But that risk can be minimized by getting at least a core team on board ''before'' putting a lot of work into constructing an event framework for a "maybe" or "possible" event. -- [[User:FeRDNYC|FeRDNYC]] ([[User talk:FeRDNYC|talk]]) 14:43, 27 March 2019 (UTC)

Moved this to the main page as it is more appropriate place and also easier to reach (yeah I'm lazy to reach for januwiki page every time on my phone). By the way I think the EIS event would be quite interesting, and as easter is coming i'd suggest we start thinking about it if you really want to kick it.
On a side note, I don't think a guideline event would be appropriate. Guidelines are supposed to be wrote by experimented and active users for beginners. That's more something we have to work on with experimented users I'd say. 
-- [[User:WardPhoenix|WardPhoenix]] ([[User talk:WardPhoenix|talk]]) 23:02, 26 March 2019 (UTC)

: That's a fair point, re: the Guidelines. I guess it depends how broadly you define "event". Certainly, you're right, guidelines-updates aren't the sort of free-for-all activity where we'd put out a call to the entire Godville user community for participation. Maybe "an effort", or "a sprint" (to employ some of my least-favorite software development jargon), ''among'' those experienced users.

: That being said...
:# A ''lot'' of what's lacking in the current Guidelines articles just comes down to formatting, copyediting, structure, and layout fixes — things that ''could'' be done by almost anyone, especially with guidance, as there's no real expertise needed. (However, as they '''also''' need major content updates, they're definitely not ''entirely'' fixable by casual editors alone. But they could be vastly improved.)
:# Because (as you say) the target audience for the Guidelines is inexperienced users, in my experience it's a huge mistake to write them '''without''' any input from users at or near that level. One of the things I learned in software development is that you never have the senior programmer, the one who wrote most of the code and knows every aspect of the software inside-and-out, write the instruction manual. If they try, 90% of the time it'll end up being unintelligible to the "average users" it's supposed to be written for. <p>(It's the same reason you NEVER sign up for a freshman-level "Intro to Whatever" class if it's taught by that department's most senior, most published, most brilliant researcher. Very few people whose knowledge of a topic is at that level will be capable of "dumbing things down" sufficiently that they can effectively teach it to students who have virtually no background in the subject. Everything will go right over their heads.)</p>

: The two trickiest problems in documentation don't have anything to do with knowledge or accuracy of information: The first is figuring out exactly where your target audience is at in terms of background knowledge and skill level, so that you know which things need to be explained, vs. what they probably already know so you don't waste their time repeating it. The other problem, then, is being ''able'' to explain things at that level, without leaving out any of the information they need because it's just implicitly assumed or seems "obvious" to someone with more experience. 

: ...But, all that being said I agree that Guidelines updates wouldn't make sense as an "event" in the JanuWiki mold, where we try to solicit come-one-come-all participation from as many users as possible. Heck, they may not be a very good fit for any sort of organized "group effort" at all — our best bet may be for someone to eventually just dive in and start making [[wikipedia:WP:BOLD|Bold]] changes to define an updated, improved structure for the content. Even if they only update a single Guideline article, once there's an example to work off of, other editors can pitch in to apply the same changes to the rest of the Guidelines. (That sort of example-based, follow-the-leader model is how ''most'' content-wide changes propagate here, really. Djonni created the {{tlx|hero or heroine}} template set, but he's responsible for only a handful of edits that applied those templates to article content.) -- [[User:FeRDNYC|FeRDNYC]] ([[User talk:FeRDNYC|talk]]) 14:43, 27 March 2019 (UTC)






== Subpages for main namespace ==

According to [[Mediawikiwiki:Help:Subpages|MW:Help:Subpages]], subpages are disabled for the main namespace. Should I submit a Feedback => Other asking for them to add the Main namespace to $wgNamespacesWithSubpages?

If we are going to suggest that guilds use subpages instead of not subpages, shouldn’t they be enabled...? I only noticed this now as I was dealing with HM’s main namespace pages and didn’t see the breadcrumb links. — [[User:Emptysora|Emptysora]] ([[User talk:Emptysora|talk]]) 21:43, 18 December 2019 (UTC)

: That seems like a good thing to submit, though it may not be accepted. Since there are already subpages being used in practice in Main, the primary advantages would be:

:* Better breadcrumb navigation (or, breadcrumb navigation in Main at all)
:* Correct subpage moves if required

:The only subpages I know of in Main are Guild (off the top of my head, ref. the [https://wiki.godvillegame.com/index.php?search=Harvest%20Moon&title=Special%3ASearch&fulltext=1 HM subpages,] [[Russia/statistics]], [https://wiki.godvillegame.com/index.php?search=The%20Forsakens%20Lament&title=Special%3ASearch&fulltext=1 TFL subpages]) and some user pages in the main namespace (including my own [[Djonni/Shared sandbox]]... We'll see if the Devs feel it's worth enabling for those cases. With the changes to user templates that are being discussed and worked on, subpages with infobox templates may become more common for guilds. -- [[User:Djonni|Djonni]] ([[User talk:Djonni|talk]]) 13:27, 19 December 2019 (UTC)

:: Submitted~! — [[User:Emptysora|Emptysora]] ([[User talk:Emptysora|talk]]) 15:52, 19 December 2019 (UTC)

== A Godwiki survey? ==

One of the thing I had planned at one point of [[SummerWiki 2019]] was a poll to vote for best article. The idea was to make maybe people that didn't participate aware of the articles and make them read those and further if possibly. After all, people lile to vote [[anonymouse]], so I though a poll would have been an idea to present the godwiki. 

Soooo, I was wondering if doing an anonymous survey for the Godwiki could lure people there and maybe tell us why people aren't using it that much (or atleast not contributing much). There is thousands of actives gods and wey less active right here. 
And maybe with those answers we could improve the godwiki to lure more people in.

I have never done such a survey so well, if you thought it's a good idea, let's work on it together once more! -- [[User:WardPhoenix|WardPhoenix]] ([[User talk:WardPhoenix|talk]]) 22:58, 19 December 2019 (UTC)

'''Random samples of questions'''

* How often do you use the Godwiki.
* If you don't use the Godwiki tell us why 
** Too hard to use
** Don't see why I should use it
** etc.

* If you use Godwiki, do you contribute often to it?
* If you don't contribute to it tell us why.
** Too complicated
** Not confident in english
** Don't care
** etc.

*Are you aware of events that happened and could happens on the Godwiki?

* What do you like on the Godwiki 
* What don't you like on the Godwiki 

* What you would like to see on Godwiki?

* What do you think could be improved on the Godwiki?

* Were you aware there are volunteers ready to help you with Godwiki articles?

* Were you aware that you could create your personnal page on the Godwiki ?

:: Are you suggesting like a Google Forms or SurveyMonkey survey be posted as an alert on the main page? Since most of my motivation for editing is to make editing as painless as possible for other people, I’m actually completely on-board with with idea.

:: If we do do a survey, I would suggest making the aggregate results public (eg: announcing it on the main page).

:: We could also not do this as a one-time thing, but a recurring thing at set intervals.

:: I would suggest that instead of the conditional question for not contributing, we ask the question and then provide a set of “How much do you agree with the following statements” questions after it. Eg: “The editing guidelines are easy to understand.” (And others... I just can’t think of any)

:: I’d ask a conditional question “Have you recently posted a request for help on Help:Requests?” And if so, do another “how much agree” set. Like: “I feel that my request was satisfactorily resolved.” (Etc) optionally asking the name of the volunteer/for more info they want to provide.

:: Lastly I’d suggest on the last page we add an optional field asking for god name (should they want to provide it), and an option to perhaps request that we contact them...? Similarly, an “any additional comments” field.

:: I know I say all of this, but, the simpler the form, the better. Likewise, the less text and shorter the form, the better. I don’t expect us to do all of what I just wrote, I’m just throwing it out there. — [[User:Emptysora|Emptysora]] ([[User talk:Emptysora|talk]]) 00:33, 20 December 2019 (UTC)

::: I'm definitely on-board for this, with a few hesitations.

::: Getting surveys right is ''hard''. Phrasing questions well requires a ''lot'' of thought, so let's not rush. I think we need to keep a few things in mind:
:::* Any question that requires typing will cause some people to just stop doing the survey in immediately.
:::* We don't have permission to collect personal information, and shouldn't ask for it. No god name fields at all, no personal information at all, neither the respondent's nor others' (e.g., editors who helped them)
:::* Information from the community belongs to the community. ''All'' answers should be anonymous, anonymized if necessary, and then the data made available to everyone, once we check through to ensure there is no personal or inappropriate information included (all text that is kept would have to comply with the game rules, not mention any individuals or guilds, etc. Any response that wasn't suitable to be made public would need to be discarded)

::: There's probably others but I'm still working on my first coffee.

::: A cautious thumbs up from this guy. -- [[User:Djonni|Djonni]] ([[User talk:Djonni|talk]]) 06:39, 20 December 2019 (UTC)

{{outdent|::::}} I’m going to start going to you, {{u|Djonni}}, when I have questions about privacy practices... heh.

But yes, everything you said is very valid. Maybe at most, on the final screen (very end) an additional comments field that’s entirely optional.

Surveys certainly are hard, my first reaction to a survey from a company I’m not entirely on board with (virtually everything aside from Mozilla/MDN surveys) is, “Ugh. No thank you,” if I am in a good mood, and, “Yeah, no. I don’t need more people tracking me and my opinions,” otherwise. The longer the survey, the more likely I am to abandon it too.

I mean, I’m not attached to the idea of collecting god/volunteer names anyway. That’s probably just useless information at best and asking for trouble at worst. I’m not even attached to having text fields. The “how much do you agree” kind of things are more than enough for the vast majority of the things we might be looking for. Using them results in less text the user has to read too, which should, if even just a little, raise the odds of someone completing the survey. The most successful surveys are short and sweet. Eg: “would you recommend us to a friend?” (Y/N), “why?” (Text), end of form. — [[User:Emptysora|Emptysora]] ([[User talk:Emptysora|talk]]) 07:38, 20 December 2019 (UTC)

: [https://fr.surveymonkey.com/r/8HZCN7W A draft of what could be done as a survey]. Updated the link for the draft, try to answer it so I can see how the results appears and give feedback about it if you don't mind! --[[User:WardPhoenix|WardPhoenix]] ([[User talk:WardPhoenix|talk]]) 14:45, 25 December 2019 (UTC)

:: Some informations from what I can see at the moments: there is possibility to keep the survey anonymous easily (just a parameter to check) and there is detailled results for each questions even, written ones. --[[User:WardPhoenix|WardPhoenix]] ([[User talk:WardPhoenix|talk]]) 14:20, 26 December 2019 (UTC)

== Pages marked for deletion tend to redirect here ==

I don't think this is a good practice. See [https://wiki.godvillegame.com/index.php?title=Special%3AWhatLinksHere&hidetrans=1&hidelinks=1&target=Main+Page&namespace= this page] for a list of redirects to the main page. --[[User:Uni34|Uni34]] ([[User talk:Uni34|talk]]) 08:14, 21 December 2019 (UTC)

: Yup, I completely agree. The main page redirects came first in most cases, and were then marked for deletion. I argued for the redirects to simply be replaced with {{tlc|Delete}}, as I felt then and still do that those redirects are very disorientating for people especially for people who don't understand how wikis work. But this conversation happened a while ago, (I can't find it now) and folks didn't seem to agree with me, so I started adding {{tl|Delete}} to those redirects as I came across them, leaving the redirects in place.

: But, since someone else has brought it up again... I completely agree, redirecting hundreds of random unneeded pages to the Main Page instead of marking then for deletion with a clear reason was, I think, always a bad idea! I'd love to get rid of aaallllll those redirects if those here now agree that it's a good idea. -- [[User:Djonni|Djonni]] ([[User talk:Djonni|talk]]) 08:33, 21 December 2019 (UTC)

:: 👍-- [[User:WardPhoenix|WardPhoenix]] ([[User talk:WardPhoenix|talk]]) 01:53, 29 December 2019 (UTC)

== Note about creating a special kind of article ==

See [https://godvillegame.com/forums/redirect_to_post/2?post=1289223 this post]. The idea is interesting , but we should considerate if we need to create one article regrouping all of those advices or having those advices in every concerned articles (dungeon/sail/etc)
: Both, it will be a pain to keep updated, but that way new people coming in will know their needs are being considered and met. In every page, so that everyone is integrated within the community. --[[User:Sand Devil|Sand Devil]] ([[User talk:Sand Devil|talk]]) 21:00, 24 January 2020 (UTC)