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Hi TGE, if I may abbreviate! Note, I had to remove some of the text from this article, as it came verbatim from previously published sources (Bloomberg is what flipped the trigger in this case). We can't use material like that unless it is explicitly released under a free license due to copyright concerns. If I'm mistaken and this was originally published under such a license, please let me know and I will correct it. Also, you should probably flesh out that article a bit. Even before the removal it was pretty bare-bones and looked more like a business directory entry than an encyclopedia article.
Feel free to ask me any questions about this, or anything. Thanks! CrowCaw 22:37, 22 April 2018 (UTC)
You'll just have to start anew. It was basically the directory information ("it is located at X and was listed on the National Register in Y") plus something derived from a dead link. Here's the photo and its minimal metadata:
[[File:Sarasota FL Chidsey Library01.jpg|thumb|Chidsey Library]] ((coord|27.3423|-82.5476|type:landmark_region:US-FL|display=title)) [[Category:Buildings and structures in Sarasota County, Florida]] [[Category:National Register of Historic Places in Sarasota County, Florida]]
Nyttend (talk) 12:07, 29 April 2018 (UTC)
Florida Southwestern and Barry University also have campuses that have a "Fort Myers" address but aren't in the city. Since the article is actually about the city proper, I reverted the FGCU add. Niteshift36 (talk) 16:40, 9 May 2018 (UTC)
On 10 May 2018, Did you know was updated with a fact from the article Bradenton Riverwalk, which you recently created, substantially expanded, or brought to good article status. The fact was ... that the Bradenton Riverwalk area was originally nicknamed "The Sand Pile"? The nomination discussion and review may be seen at Template:Did you know nominations/Bradenton Riverwalk. You are welcome to check how many page hits the article got while on the front page (here's how, ), and it may be added to the statistics page if the total is over 5,000. Finally, if you know of an interesting fact from another recently created article, then please feel free to suggest it on the Did you know talk page.
Gatoclass (talk) 12:01, 10 May 2018 (UTC)
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We have grown to 89 members.
This is the seventh issue of this newsletter. For previous issues, see our newsletter archive.
A warm welcome to our nearly one dozen new members...
Our new members include:
Be sure to say "hi" and welcome them to the team.
There were 1515 portals, but now we have 1475, because we speedy deleted a bunch of incompleted portals that had been sitting around for ages, that were empty shells or had very little content. Because they were speedied, they can be rebuilt from scratch without acquiring approval from WP:DRV.
This is what we have been gearing up for: upgrading the portals en masse, using AWB.
More than half of the Associated Wikimedia sections have been converted to no longer use a subpage. This chore will probably be completed over the next week or two. Many thanks to the WikiGnome Squad, who have added an Associated Wikimedia section to the many geography-related portals that lacked one. The rest of the subjects await. :)
The next maintenance drive will be on the intro sections. Notices have gone out to the WikiProjects for which one or more portals fall within their subject scope. Once enough time has elapsed for them to respond (1 week), AWB processing of intro sections will begin.
I'd like to take this opportunity to thank you all for your part in the RfC. I went back and reread much of it. I believe your enthusiasm played a major part in turning the tide on there. I'm proud of all of you.
Why reread that mess, you ask?
To harvest ideas, and to keep the problems that need to be fixed firmly in mind. But, also to keep in touch. See below...
I've contacted all of the other opposers of the RfC proposal to delete portals, to thank them for their support, and to assure them that their decision was not made in vain. I updated them on our activities, provided the link to the interviews about this project in the Signpost, pointed out our newsletter archive so they can keep up-to-date with what we are doing, and I invited them all to come and have a look-see at our operations (on our talk page).
It so happened that one of our members was a sockpuppet: JLJ001. According to the admin who blocked him, he was a particularly tricky long term abuser. This is a weird situation, since the user was quite helpful. He will be missed.
This has been somewhat disruptive, because admins are doing routine deletions of the pages (portals, templates, etc.) he created, and reversion of his edits (I don't know if they will be reverting all of them). Please bear with them, as they are only doing what is best in the long run.
The following pages have been deleted by the admins so far, that I know of:
((Wikimedia for portals|species=no|voy=no))
((#tag:categorytree|((PAGENAME))))
Automatic article alerts are now featured on the project page.
Some super out-of-date entries kept showing up on there, so posting it on the Project page was delayed. Thanks to Evad37 and AfroThundr for providing solutions on this one. Evad37 adjusted the workflow settings per Wikipedia:Article alerts/Subscribing#Choosing workflows, to make sure only the appropriate page types show up. AfroThundr removed the tags from the old entries that caused them to keep showing up in the article alerts.
Noyster pointed out that it would be nice to automate the updating of the portals section at the Community bulletin board.
Another major component of the portal system is the main list of portals, at Portal:Contents/Portals. How would we go about automating the updating of that?
Please post your ideas on the WikiProject's talk page. Thank you.
Keep in mind that we have already speedy deleted almost all of the nearly empty portals, which can be rebuilt without approval whenever it is convenient to do so. Other portals should be completed if at all possible rather than delete them through MfD (which requires approval from Deletion review to rebuild).
(Current deletion discussions are posted on our WikiProject page).
There's still more, but it will have to wait until next issue.
Until then, see ya around the project. — The Transhumanist 12:04, 31 May 2018 (UTC)
The WikiProject now has 92 participants, including 16 admins.
A warm welcome to the newest members of the team:
Be sure to say hi.
Pbsouthwood has just gotten through the grueling RfA process to become a Wikipedia administrator. Be sure to congratulate him.
The reason he went for it was: "For some time I expect to be busy with subpage deletion for Wikipedia:WikiProject Portals as mentioned above. The amount of work is expected to keep me busy for some time. I am primarly a content creator and contributor to policy discussions, but would be willing to consider other admin work on request, providing that I feel that my involvement would be appropriate and not too far outside my comfort zone."
Evad37 has figured out a way to let the user flip through pictures without purging the page. Purging is awkward because there is an intermediary confirmation screen that you have to click on "yes". In the new picture slideshow section, all you have to do is click on the >
to go to the next picture or <
to instantly show the previous feature. The feature also shuffles the pictures when the page is initiated, so that they are shown in a different order each time the user visits the page (or purges it).
It is featured in Portal:Sacramento, California. Check it out to the right.
Keep in mind that the feature is a beta version. Please share your comments on how to refine this feature, at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Portals#Refining the Picture slideshow.
We now have a one-page portal design. It isn't fully automated, nor is it even fully semi-automated, as there are still some manually filled-in areas. But it no longer requires any subpages in portal space, and that is a huge improvement. For example, Portal:Sacramento, California utilizes the one-page design concept. While is employs heavy use of templates, it does not have any subpages of its own.
This is the most cooperative team I've ever seen. With a strong spirit of working together to get an important job done. Kudos to you.
There's more. A lot more. But it will have to wait until next issue, but you don't have to wait. See what's going on at the WikiProject's talk page. — The Transhumanist 02:13, 7 June 2018 (UTC)
1) Replace the intro box sections on portals with an upgrade. See details at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Portals/Tasks#AWB task: converting/upgrading intro sections.
2) Replace categories box sections on portals with an upgrade. See details at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Portals/Tasks#AWB task: Converting category sections.
Enjoy. — The Transhumanist 08:09, 13 June 2018 (UTC)
Here are some incremental tasks for you to consider. Do one, or many, as time allows. Every little bit helps...
We're getting close to having the main portals list up-to-date, but we aren't quite there yet. There are about 75 portals not yet listed there.
Therefore the first task, of course, is to add as many of these as you can. They can be found at Portal talk:Contents/Portals#These are not listed yet. Instructions are there.
The second task on this wish list is to convert one selected picture section to a picture slideshow section. The template to use for this is ((Random slideshow)). Here are some examples of portals with a picture slideshow section: Portal:Bangladesh, Portal:Sacramento, California, Portal:Algae, and Portal:Reference works.
Note that selected picture sections display pictures from subpages (one subpage per pic), and that each picture would need to be listed in the ((Random slideshow)) template.
Tip: Some portals have only a single picture covered in the selected picture section. Replacing their selected picture sections with a slideshow would be easiest. Eight or more pictures make a decent slide show. Search for pictures at Wikimedia Commons.
Have fun! Sincerely, — The Transhumanist 09:51, 13 June 2018 (UTC)
Hello. I was looking at Template:Manatee County, Florida and noticed you removed a number of locations from the template after the articles about them were deleted. I'm curious why you removed them entirely. Per WP:GEOLAND the places that were removed would generally be seen as notable as inhabited places even if their corresponding articles were deleted and (so long as they actually exist) removing them would make the template inaccurate and incomplete. Conceivably could they not be could be de-linked, red-linked (not ideal but an option), or otherwise addressed without making it appear the locales do not exist? Thanks, Mifter (talk) 03:30, 7 June 2018 (UTC)
Don't mind that box to the right. We'll be talking about that later, below.
With the portals upgrades?
No. :)
What is almost done is the updating of the main list of portals!
There are 23 portals left to be listed.
Kudos to the WikiGnome Squadron, for spearheading this.
Once it is fully updated, we need to keep it up to date. When you complete a portal, remember to add it to Portal:Contents/Portals.
Concerning portal upgrades, we are working on those section-by-section...
The Associated Wikimedia sections of the entire set of portals have been upgraded. These are now handled on each portal base page (bypassing the previously used corresponding subpages), using the ((Wikimedia for portals)) template rather than reiterated copied/pasted code.
So, to be more accurate on reporting upgrade progress, that's one section down (for the whole set of portals), with (about) nine sections to go. (Skipping curated portals, regarding custom content sections, of course).
Work is underway on converting Portals' introduction sections, and the categories sections.
If you would like to help, see Wikipedia:WikiProject Portals#Upgrade introduction sections and Wikipedia:WikiProject Portals#AWB task: Convert category sections
Work has also started with converting selected picture sections to picture slideshow sections. See Wikipedia:WikiProject Portals#Install picture slideshows.
Currently, there is no quality rating for portals: in the Portals WikiProject box on each portals' talk page, it just says "Portal". But times are a changin'. Quality assessment is on the way, and you can help. See the discussion.
Evad37 has figured out a way to apply the picture slideshow feature to displaying article excerpts (now you can check out the provided box above). :) This allows us to bypass page purging to see the next selection, and you can even click through them rather quickly. Currently, the wikicode for doing this for article excerpts is a bit eye-boggling, and so we are looking into simplifying it. A streamlined version may be just around the corner.
Note that this is a prototype, not ready for widespread use. Click on the box in between the lesser than and greater than signs, to see what I mean. It was meant for pictures, and so the thumbnail feature doesn't apply to article prose very well. I've presented it even though it isn't ready, to show the direction portal development is heading. See the discussion.
I'm amazed at how rapidly portals are evolving. And we're still within a single generation of portal technological evolution. Imagine what they might be in 2 or 3 more generations of developments. Pretty soon, portals will be able to shake your hand. :) — The Transhumanist 11:05, 16 June 2018 (UTC)
Hi.
Portal:Tamil civilization could sure use a picture slideshow. See instructions at Wikipedia:WikiProject Portals#Install picture slideshows.
Please add as many pictures as you have time for. Even adding a single picture helps.
Thank you. Cheers, — The Transhumanist 00:07, 18 June 2018 (UTC)
We've grown to 94 participants.
A warm welcome to dcljr and Kpgjhpjm.
We are in the process of developing a rating system specifically for portals, as the quality assessment scheme for articles does not apply to portals. It is coming along nicely. Your input would be very helpful. See the discussion at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Portals/General#Proposed new quality class assessments.
One of our participants got involved with this WikiProject through interest in how the new generation of portals would be handled in WP's MOS (Manual of Style). It didn't take long before he got sucked in deeper. This has given him an opportunity to look around, and so, he has made an assessment of this WikiProject's operations:
I'm quite frankly really impressed and inspired by what's happening here. If you'd asked me a year ago if I thought portals should just be scrapped as a failed, dragged-out experiment, I would have said "yes". This planning and the progress toward making it all practical is exemplary of the wiki spirit, in particular of a happy service-to-readers puppy properly wagging its technological and editorial tail instead of the other way around, and without "drama". It's also one of the few examples I've seen in a long time of a new wikiproject actually doing something useful and fomenting constructive activity (instead of acting as a barrier to participation, and a canvassing/ownership farm for PoV pushers). Kudos all around. — SMcCandlish
Congratulations, everyone. Keep up the great work.
We've run into a glitch with slideshows: they don't work on mobile devices.
Initially, we will need to explore options that allow portals to have slideshows without adversely affecting mobile viewers. See Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Portals/Design#Mobile view support.
Eventually, we may need another way to do slideshows. If we do go this route, and I don't see why we wouldn't, then (user configurable) automatic slideshows also become a possibility.
Once implemented, this will allow editors to create and edit cascading style sheets for use with templates. This will expand what we can do with portals. For more detail, see mw:Extension:TemplateStyles and Wikipedia:TemplateStyles.
We've run into an obstacle using Lua-based selective transclusion: Lua is incapable (on Wikipedia) of reading in article names from categories. Because of this, we'll need to seek other approaches for fully automating the Selected article section. We are exploring sources other than categories, and other technologies besides Lua.
Speaking of using other sources, the template ((Transclude list item excerpt)) collects list items from a specified page, or from a section of that page, and transcludes the lead from a randomly selected link from that list. Courtesy of Certes. So, if you use this in a portal, and if the template specifies a page or section serviced by JL-Bot, you've now got yourself an automatically updated section in the portal. JL-Bot provides links to featured content and good articles, by subject.
What is "fully automated"? When you create a portal using a creation template, and the portal works thereafter without editor intervention, the portal is fully automated. That is, the portal is supported by features that fetch new content. If you have to add new article names every so often for it to display new content, then it is only semi-automated.
Currently, the Selected article section is semi-automated, because it requires that an editor supplies the names of the various articles for which excerpts are (automatically) displayed. For examples, look at the wikisource code of Portal:Reptiles, Portal:Ancient Tamil civilization, and Portal:Reference works.
So far, 3 sections are fully automatable: the introduction section, the categories section, and the Associated Wikimedia section.
Henry.
Or some other name.
Eventually, the portal department will be a software program. And we won't have to do anything (unless we want to). Not even tell it what portals to create (unless we want to). It will just do it all (plus whatever else we want it to do). And we will of course give it good manners, and a name.
But, that is a few years off.
Until then, building portals is still (partially) up to us. — The Transhumanist 13:34, 30 June 2018 (UTC)
We now have 97 participants.
Be sure to welcome our newest members, BrantleyIzMe, Coffeeandcrumbs, and Nolan Perry, with warm regards.
Work is proceeding apace. We have 2 major thrusts right now: converting the intro sections of portals, and building the components of the one-page automated model...
We need everybody, except those building software components, to work on converting intros. If you have AWB, definitely use that. If not, then work on them manually. Even one a day, or as often as you can muster, will help a lot. There are only about 1,000 of them left to go, so if everyone chips in, it will go pretty quickly. Remember, there are 97 of us!
The intros for most of the portals starting with A through F have already been converted to use the ((Transclude lead excerpt)) template.
The standard wikicode for the automated intro that we want to put into place looks like this:
((/box-header|Introduction|noedit=yes|))
((Transclude lead excerpt | ((PAGENAME)) | paragraphs=1-2 | files=1))
((Box-footer|[[((PAGENAME))|Read more...]]))
That works for most portals, but not all. For some portals it requires some tweaking, and for others, we may have to use a different or more customized approach. Remember to visually inspect each portal you work on and make sure that it works before moving on to the next one.
Be sure to skip user-maintained portals. They are listed at Wikipedia:WikiProject_Portals#Specific_portal_maintainers.
I've started an AWB tips page, for those of you feeling a bit overwhelmed by that power user tool. Feel free to add to it and/or improve it.
We have some very talented Lua programmers, who are pushing the limits of what we can do in gathering data from Wikipedia's various namespaces and presenting it in portals. Due to their efforts, Lua is powering the selective transclusion core of our emerging automated portal design, in the form of selected article sections that rotate content, and slideshows.
To go beyond Lua's limits, to take full advantage of Mediawiki's API, we are in the midst of adding another programming language to the resources we shall be making use of: JavaScript. The ways that JavaScript can help us edit portals to boost the power of our Lua solutions, are being explored, which will likely make the two languages synergistic if not symbiotic. Research is under way on how we can use JavaScript to make some of the portal semi-automated features fully automatically self-updating, in ways that Lua cannot. Like gathering random members from a category and inserting them into a portal's templates as parameters. Once the parameters are in place, Lua does the rest.
If you would like to get involved with design efforts, or just keep up on them, see Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Portals/Design.
Well, not at the present time, because building portals is quite time consuming. The good news is that we are working on a design that will be fully automated, or as close to that as we can get. And the new design is being implemented in the portal department's main portal creation template. This means, that not only will portals update themselves, their creation will be highly automated as well. That's the nature of templates. You put them in place, and they just... work.
What I'm getting at here, is that it would be better to wait to build lots of new portals until after the new design is completed. Because with it, instead of taking hours to create a new portal, it will likely take minutes.
That does not mean we should be idle in the meantime. The main reason most of us are here is because it became apparent that portals were largely unmaintained and had grown out-of-date. This had become so apparent that a proposal was made to delete all the portals and the portal namespace to boot. That makes our main objective in the short term to improve all the existing portals so that the community will want to keep them—forever.
Building lots of new portals comes later. Let's fix up the ones we have first. ;)
And on that note, I bid you adieu. Until next newsletter, see ya 'round the WikiProject. — The Transhumanist 12:33, 10 July 2018 (UTC)
We have 97 participants.
Automation makes things go faster, even portal creation. One of the components Certes made was ((Transclude list item excerpt)). I became curious about its possible applications.
So I worked out a portal design using it, the initial prototypes being Portal:Kyoto (without a "Selected pictures" section), and Portal:Dubai (with a "Selected pictures" section). Then I used Portal:Dubai as the basis for further portals of this type...
Why?
To see, and to show, what may become feasible via automation.
It now looks highly feasible that we could get portal construction time down to a few minutes, or maybe even down to a few seconds.
The singularity is just around the corner. :)
When using the ((Random slideshow)) template to display pictures, be sure to use the plural tense in the section title: "Selected pictures". That's because slideshows don't show up on many mobile devices. Instead the whole set of pictures is shown, hence the section title "Selected pictures", as it fits both situations.
In case you are curious, here is a list of the portals so far that have a slideshow:
|
|
|
The intros for most of the portals up through the letter "O" have been converted, using this wikicode:
((/box-header|Introduction|noedit=yes|))
((Transclude lead excerpt | ((PAGENAME)) | paragraphs=1-2 | files=1))
((Box-footer|[[((PAGENAME))|Read more...]]))
Where the pagename didn't match the article title for the subject, the title was typed in.
Most of the portals that do not contain ((/intro))
or ((((FULLPGENAME))/Intro))
have not yet been processed.
About a thousand portals use the method of selective transclusion for the intro section. That's about two-thirds. That means we have one-third of the way to go on the intro section conversions.
So much has been happening with portals that I can't keep up with it. (That's good). Which means, more in the upcoming issue. Until then, see ya 'round the project. Sincerely, — The Transhumanist 08:47, 15 July 2018 (UTC)
I got overwhelmed IRL (in real life) during the production of issue #12. So, here is a catch-up issue, to help bring you (and me) up to speed on what is happening with portals...
By the way, we still have 97 participants. (Tell all your friends about this WikiProject, and have them join!)
One cool feature of some of the geographical portals is a panoramic picture at the top of the intro section.
Check these out:
The Portals WikiGnome squadron is busy adding panoramas to geographical portals that don't yet have one. Feel free to join in on the fun. See task details at Wikipedia:WikiProject Portals#Add a panorama or skyline to a geographic portal.
Caveat: avoid super-huge pics, as they can cause portal scripts to time-out. Please try to keep picture size down below 2 megabytes. Thank you.
Speaking of pictures...
We now have two slideshow templates. You may be familiar with ((Random slideshow)), in which the editor types in (or copies/pastes) a list of pictures he or she wants it to display.
Well, now we have another template, courtesy of Evad37, which accepts one or more page names instead, and displays a random image off of the listed pages. So instead of listing dozens of files by hand, you can include a title or three to be scanned automatically. It even lets you specify particular sections.
The new slideshow template is ((Transclude files as random slideshow)).
Here's a sample, that grabs images from a single page:
Speaking of new templates, here's another one!
Also from Evad37, we have a new component for starting section boxes, that is color configurable, and that bypasses the need for box-header subpages altogether. It is ((Box-header colour)).
For color support, see Web colors.
For the discussion in which this was inspired, see Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Portals/Tasks#Colour combinations for accessibility.
(In case you didn't notice, the slideshow box above uses this new template).
BTW, don't forget to close your box with ((Box-footer)).
The answer to this question is quite involved, and would fill this page to overflowing. Therefore, this subject, including a complete update on where we are at and where we are going with portal design, is covered at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Portals/Design.
An AWB pass to convert intros on the portals has been completed. The pass couldn't convert them all (due to various formatting configurations, etc.).
All but about 170 portals now have introductions selectively transcluded on the base page. Not counting manually maintained portals, that leaves about 70 portals that either need their intros converted, or they need an intro.
Next, we'll be converting the categories sections!
The course of action we have been taking goes something like this, with all steps being pursued simultaeneously...
1) Design a one-page automated portal model
2) Convert existing portals to that design (except those being manually maintained)
3) Remove subpages no longer needed
4) Develop further tools to empower editors working on portals
Later, when the tools are up to the task, filling in the gaps in coverage (with new portals) will also become practical.
Probably not.
Who knows what our programmers and editors have dreamed up while I was writing this.
See ya again soon, — The Transhumanist 11:09, 18 July 2018 (UTC)
I have mixed feelings about this naming, not just the WP article, but various business and government entities. The creek is of course the oldest entity, and it's spelled Fishhawk. When Newland communities started developing and plastered the name on neighborhoods and streets, they named everything "FishHawk". After the development became home to about 15-20k people, it became a CDP, and however it happened, it was misspelled "Fish Hawk". But as you point out, the article is technically about the CDP, and it's a more "official" name, even though it's really "wrong". Probably few people really care, most people tend to feel that a blank is the same thing as nothing. Anyway, thanks for your help!Jacona (talk) 16:52, 19 July 2018 (UTC)
Please don't add block templates to users - the blocking admin/checkuser likely opted not to add the template. The template you used is also only used on the talk page, not the user page. Thank you! - TNT 💖 14:36, 23 July 2018 (UTC)
Development of design continues, full speed ahead...
Can you say "paradigm shift"?
Now, in addition to picture slideshows, we have slideshows that can display excerpts. Portals are not just for topic tasting anymore. Now they can be made useful for surveying Wikipedia's coverage of entire subjects. This gives a deeper meaning to their name. Hmmm. "Portals"... Doorways to knowledge.
Portal:Lithuania was redesigned using excerpt slideshows. Check it out.
For those of you who cannot wait to test out these new toys...
We have not one, but three excerpt slideshow components to pick from:
((Transclude excerpts as random slideshow))
((Transclude list item excerpts as random slideshow))
((Transclude linked excerpts as random slideshow))
((Portal image banner)) displays a panoramic picture the width of the page, and adjusts its size, so it stays that way even if the user changes page view size. And it accepts multiple file names, so that the picture displayed randomizes between them each time the page is visited/purged.
Give resizing the page a try:
Before:
After:
Notice how the box bottoms line up. That readjusts even if you click the slideshow buttons.
The template used for this is ((Flex columns)).
By the way, when you include more than one box in a column, any left over whitespace in that column is divided between them.
You may have noticed the new ((Box-header colour)) template used above. It lets you pick the color locally (right on the same page). Before, this was handled on a subpage somewhere.
Now that we have lots of toys to play with for making cool portals...
Don't forget, that the majority of views of Wikipedia these days are from mobile devices. We need to make certain that portals display well on those. So, remember to check your work on portals in mobile view mode...
To see a portal in mobile view mode, insert a ".m" into a portal's url, after "en", like this:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portal:Reptile
If you discover problems in a portal you can't fix, report them on Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Portals/Design.
Have fun. — The Transhumanist 01:00, 27 July 2018 (UTC)
Now that we have lots of toys to play with, it's play time!
Here are some fun activities to use our new toys on...
Would you like to travel around the world? Well, this may be the next best thing...
Here's another fun toy to play with: ((Portal image banner))
To see what it looks like, check out the panoramas at the tops of the following portals:
The task: There are many geography portals that lack panoramas. Please add some. Please keep the file size down below 2 megabytes, and keep in mind that you may find quality banners at commons: at less than 200K (.2 megabytes). Good search terms to include with the place name are "banner", "cityscape", "skyline", "panorama", "landscape", etc.
Related task: There are also lots of geography portals that have panoramas used as gaudy banners (with print or icons splattered across them) or that display them in some random location on the page. In many cases, those pages would be improved by displaying the panorama as a clean picture at the top of the intro section, like on the examples above. This works best with banner-like panoramas. Please fix such pages when you come across them, if you believe it would improve the look of the page.
Taller images might be better suited displayed further down the page, or in the "Selected images" section.
Note that ((Portal image banner)) supports multiple images, and displays one at random upon the first visit, and each time the page is purged.
That is, image slideshows!
Over 200 have been installed so far. Just 1200 to go. (Be sure not to install them on portals with active maintainers, unless they want you to).
The title "Selected images" reflects the fact that not all images on Wikipedia are pictures, and encompasses maps, graphs, diagrams, sketches, paintings, pictures, and so on.
The toys we have to work with for this are:
((Random slideshow))
and
((Transclude files as random slideshow))
The task: Using one of the above templates directly on a portal's base page, replace static "Selected picture" sections, with a section like one of these:
The one on the left uses ((Random slideshow)) (which accepts file names), and the one on the right uses ((Transclude files as random slideshow)) (which accepts source pages from which the filenames are gathered).
The above section formatting is used on many of the pages you will come across, but not all. In those cases, use whatever section formatting matches the rest of the page.
Note that you may come across "Selected picture" sections done with ((Random portal component)) templates. That template call is the entire section. Replace it with a section that matches the other sections on the page, and put the new slideshow inside that.
For example, in Portal:California, this code:
((Random portal component|max=21|seed=27|header=Selected picture|subpage=Selected picture))
was replaced with this code:
((/box-header|Selected images|noedit=yes))
((Transclude files as random slideshow
| ((PAGENAME))
| Culture of ((PAGENAME))
))
((Box-footer))
And the new section blended right in with the formatting of the rest of the page. Note the use of the ((PAGENAME))
magic word. Plain article titles also work. Don't feel limited to one or two page names. But be sure to test each slideshow before installing the next one. (Or if you prefer, in batches - just don't leave them hanging). Report technical problems at the Portal design talk page.
These sections, where unmaintained, have gone stale. That's because 1) the excerpts are static, having been manually copied and pasted, and 2) because they lack automatic addition of new entries.
They can be upgraded with:
or
((Transclude list item excerpt))
or
All three of these will provide excerpts that won't go stale. The latter two can provide excerpt collections that won't go stale, by providing new entries over time. The key is to select source pages or source sections that are frequently updated, such as root article sections, mainstream lists, or navigation templates.
When the above tasks are completed for the entire collection of portals (except the ones with specific maintainers), we'll be more than half-way done with the portal system upgrade.
Keep up the great work. — The Transhumanist 19:18, 30 July 2018 (UTC)
Discussions are underway on the design of a portal tool (user script) that will hopefully have features for modifying portals at the click of a menu item, to make editing them easier. It might do things like change the color for you, add to a selection, add a new section, move a section, and so on.
If you'd like to be involved and suggest features for the tool, please join us at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Portals/Design#What would you want a portal tool to be able to do?.
As new portal components are built by our Lua gurus, those components are being used to upgrade portals. Each component automates a section of a portal in a particular way.
The sections that are mostly upgraded so far are the Intro, and the Associated Wikimedia section.
The sections currently undergoing upgrade are: Selected image, Categories, and the Intro.
The Intro? Isn't that done already?
Yes, and no.
The upgrade of the excerpt in intros is mostly complete (there are about 70 non-standard portals that still need it).
Now we are doing another upgrade of intros in the form of adding a panoramic picture at the top of the intro, on portals for which such a picture is available on Commons:. Dozens of panoramas have been added so far, and they are really starting to affect the look of portals — the portals that have them look really good.
Regions are the most likely subjects to have panoramas, but a surprising number of other subjects have banner-shaped pictures too. Some examples of non-geographic portals that they have been added to are:
Speaking of pictures, several hundred Selected image sections have been upgraded to include image slideshows.
The push for automation continues, with new components under continuous testing in the field. As problems are spotted, they are reported to our programmers, who have done a fantastic job of keeping up with bug reports and fixing the relevant Lua modules fast. I am highly impressed.
Construction time on new portals is now down to as little as a minute or less. Though not in general. If you are lucky enough to spot portals that fit the profile of the new tools (their strengths), then a portal can be complete almost as soon as it is created, with the added time it takes to find and add a panorama. Source page titles are not generally standardized, and so it source pages in many cases must be entered manually. Where source page titles follow a standard naming convention, portal creation for those subjects goes quickly.
So, we still have some hurdles, but the outlook on portals is very good. New features, and many improvements to features are on the horizon. I'll be sure to report them when they become available.
What will the portal of the future look like? That is up to you!
See you on the project's talk pages.
Sincerely, — The Transhumanist 21:10, 15 August 2018 (UTC)
This issue is about portal creation...
Myself and others have been testing and experimenting with the new components in upgrading existing portals and in building new portals. They have now been applied in hundreds of portals.
The templates are ready for general use for portal creation.
They are still a bit buggy, but the only way we are going to work the rest of the bugs out is by using them and reporting the bugs as we come across them.
I look forward to seeing what new portals you create!
Be sure to report bugs at WT:WPPORTD.
The main portal creation template is ((box portal skeleton)).
After starting a portal using ((box portal skeleton))...
Check out the Did you know? section on Portal:Determinism. — The Transhumanist 02:24, 22 August 2018 (UTC)
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Note that any non-free images not used in any articles will be deleted after seven days, as described in section F5 of the criteria for speedy deletion. Thank you. --B-bot (talk) 17:30, 24 August 2018 (UTC)
I noticed over at the Portals WikiProject that you have or use AWB (or JWB).
There are some tasks that have turned up that are perfect for AWB.
We have many new portals, and they need:
The new portals can be found on Category:Single-page portals along with some revamped ones. You'll need to use the skip feature of AWB.
If you have any questions, please ((ping)) me, and ask them below. — The Transhumanist 01:59, 30 August 2018 (UTC)
This month: WikiProject X: The resumption
Work has resumed on WikiProject X and CollaborationKit, backed by a successfully funded Project Grant. For more information on the current status and planned work, please see this month's issue of the newsletter!
-— Isarra ༆ 22:24, 30 August 2018 (UTC)
As you know, portals are now supported by a number of new templates, which are in turn supported by some new Lua modules.
Those templates and modules are being put to the test, in the new portals that have been created since this WikiProject rebooted, plus a number of existing portals that have been revamped.
The new portals, and revamped ones, can be found at Category:Single-page portals.
Please browse the new portals at your leisure, and report any and all problems that you spot. Post bug and other portal problem reports at WT:WPPORTD. Please report bugs, quirks, awkward aspects, or anything weird or off that you notice. Compliments and suggestions are also welcome. :)
When you report a bug, please indicate the portal's name, the section that the problem appeared in, and the name of the article appearing (first) in the section with the problem. Most problems will likely be encountered in the Selected general articles" section, due to quirks in a displayed article's wikicode that the lua modules don't handle yet. Your help in spotting those is of utmost value. Thank you.
For portals that have been converted to the single-page design, we are not deleting their subpages at this time, because we are working on ways to harvest the data from those pages. For example, the Selected picture subpages include filenames and captions that would be valuable for the image slideshows. Please don't delete portal subpages, for now. They'll be slated for d-batch speedy deletion after harvesting. Thank you.
We are currently testing a feature added to ((Transclude files as random slideshow)) that allows it to accept both sourcepages and filenames. Courtesy of Evad37. This will pave the way for harvesting files and their captions from portal subpages, for use in image slideshows.
The bulk of the work is being done by a handful of editors. But we can't do it all. We need help with spotting bugs, refining the search parameters in new/revamped portals (in the "Did you know..." and "In the news" sections), adding images to slideshows for a broader selection (they default to showing the images on the root article page but are capable of showing so much more), adding panoramic pictures at the top of the intro section of region portals (cities, counties, states, provinces, countries, continents, and other regions), to name but a few task types.
It is rewarding to be a part of the growing portal phenomenon. And you get to see its expansion and refinement up close.
Feel free to join in on the fun. ;)
Thank you, — The Transhumanist 06:58, 4 September 2018 (UTC)
Hey...
If you have AWB laying around, please dust it off and crank it up! ;)
We have a growing backlog!
There are now 539 portals. Of those, 51 are of the new design.
Many of the new portals are orphaned or near orphaned, and need links pointing to them:
To make a list of corresponding templates, you can use AWB's make list feature to make a list of the pages in Category:Single-page portals. Then you copy that list to a sandbox, and replace \nPortal:
with ]]\n* [[Template:
, using WP:wikEd. That will give you a list of templates to work on. Then you set skip in AWB to skip the ones that already have the portal link.
To make a list of corresponding root articles, make a list of portal links, and then remove "Portal:" from the links.
To make a list of category links to process, make sure you use a leading colon (:) in the category links, like this: [[:Category:Blue Öyster Cult]]
.
All new and revamped portals can be found at Category:Single-page portals.
Thank you. — The Transhumanist 20:45, 17 September 2018 (UTC)
Don't blink. You might miss something.
As of a few days ago, portals had doubled in about a month and a half.
Also, there were 98 incompleted portals in Category:Portals under construction. Now there are just 43.
The goals, plans, and task sections have all been updated.
Many new portals are still orphans, and need links pointing to them:
All new and revamped portals can be found at Category:Single-page portals.
This is the main list of portals.
Nearly 2,000 of the new portals need to be listed here.
They can be found at Portal talk:Contents/Portals#These are not listed yet. Instructions are included there.
Portals now have a new rating system of their own designed specifically to support portal evaluation! We were trying to use the standard assessment system for articles, but that doesn't fit portals very well.
Many thanks to Evad37, Waggers, AfroThundr3007730, SMcCandlish, Tom, BrendonTheWizard, and Pbsouthwood for their work and input on this.
The new system can be found at the top of all portal talk pages, in the WikiProject portals box. Those with "???" ratings need to be assessed, which makes up most of the older portals.
Most of the new portals were started out with an initial "Low" level of importance when their talk pages were created. Those deserving higher importance should be promoted as you come across them.
The starting point for new portals included minimal parameters and content, in the form of default values in the template(s) used for their creation.
So, for the search strings in the "Did you know..." and "In the news" sections, this was the magic word ((PAGENAME))
, which represents the portal's name. Unfortunately, the resulting term is alway capitalized, which limits its effectiveness as a search string for anything but proper nouns. Results for those two sections can be improved, by replacing the "PAGENAME" magic word with multiple search strings, and search strings that begin with lower case letters. There is no inherent limit as to how many search parameters may be included. Lua search notation is used. The more general the subject, the more subtopic search terms you may want to include. For example, on Portal:Avengers (comics), ((PAGENAME))
turned up nothing. But, when more parameters were added, as in the wikicode below...
((Transclude selected recent additions | ((PAGENAME)) | Iron Man | Spiderman | Antman | Hawkeye | The Hulk | Incredible Hulk | David Banner | Captain America | Scarlet Witch | Black Widow | Tony Stark | Nick Fury | Age of Ultron | Infinity War | months=36 | header=((Box-header colour|Did you know... ))|max=6))
... that returned several results in the portal's DYK section.
Be sure you make the improvements to both the DYK section and the "In the news" section, as they both require the search strings.
The default starting selection for the image slideshow in most new portals is whatever images happen to be in the corresponding root article (via the PAGENAME magic word). You can improve image slideshows by adding more sourcepages and filenames as parameters in the "Selected images" section of portals.
See Template:Transclude files as random slideshow/doc for instructions.
Portals used to take about 6 hours or more to create. Now, for subjects that have particular navigation support, we've got that down to about one minute each, with even more content displayed than ever. True, that means the new portals pick you, rather than the other way around. Creating a specific portal that doesn't happen to have the requisite navigation support is still pretty time consuming. But, we are working on extending our reach beyond the low-hanging fruit.
And efforts are ongoing to keep shaving time off of the creation process. Eventually, we may get it down to seconds each.
In addition to improving automation, we're always looking for new features and improvements that we can add to portals, and there is plenty of potential to expand on the standard design so that new portals are even better right out of the starting gate. Additional designs are also possible.
On the horizon, there are many more portals waiting to be created. And we can expect to see at least a few more section types emerge. I never expected slideshows, for example, especially not for excerpts. Who knows where innovation will take us next?
Keep up the great work everyone.
Sincerely, — The Transhumanist 07:10, 23 September 2018 (UTC)
84.78.21.1 (talk) 17:54, 8 November 2018 (UTC)
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Portals have passed the 4,000 mark.
Here's a list of portals created since the last issue
List of new portals
|
---|
|
Please inspect these portals, report problems or suggest improvements at WT:WPPORTD, or develop them further (see below). Thank you.
There is still lots to do...
There are many subject gaps that need to be filled. This can be done by creating new portals, or by adding Selected article sections to existing portals. To create a new portal, simply place ((subst:Basic portal start page))
on an empty portal page, and click "Preview". If the portal is complete, click "Save". After you try it, come share your experience and excitement at WT:WPPORTD.
Each new portal is just a starting point. Each portal of the new design can be further developed by:
Besides the new portals, there are still about 1200 portals of the old design that need to be converted to the new design.
Many portals need to be de-orphaned, by placing links to them (in the See also section of the corresponding root articles, at the bottom of the corresponding navigation footer templates, and on the corresponding category pages).
Many of the new portals still need to be listed at Portal:Contents/Portals.
Bugs keep popping up in portals. These need to be tracked down and reported at WT:WPPORTD.
Tools are needed to make developing and maintaining portals quicker and easier.
Dreaming up new features and capabilities. Innovation needs to continue, to design the portal of tomorrow, and the portal development-maintenance-system of the future. Automation!
So, if you find yourself with a little (or a lot) of free time, pick an area (or more) above and...
...dive in! — The Transhumanist 07:05, 25 October 2018 (UTC)
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There are now 4,180 portals.
Will we break 5,000 by the end of the year?
I know we can. But, that is up to you!
( New portals are created with ((subst:Basic portal start page))
or
((subst:bpsp))
)
Hello everyone! Enjoy the holiday season and winter solstice (if it's occurring in your area of the world), and thanks for your work in maintaining, improving, and expanding portals. Cheers, — The Transhumanist 06:51, 26 November 2018 (UTC)
The following portals have been created since the last issue:
Keep 'em coming!
By the way, the above list was generated using this Petscan query. It can be easily modified by changing the date. The data page (under the Output tab) also has options for receiving the data in CSV or tabbed format, which some operating systems automatically load into a spreadsheet program for ease of use, such as copying and pasting the desired column (like page names).
We'll keep it short this issue.
Expect a flood next time. Or the one after that.
Cheerio, — The Transhumanist 08:06, 26 November 2018 (UTC)
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This month: A general update.
The current status of the project is as follows:
Until next time,
-— Isarra ༆ 22:44, 20 December 2018 (UTC)
Before, we could only cut off the bottom of pics.
User:FR30799386 has pulled it off, and made the upgrade to ((Portal image banner))...
So, this:
Becomes this:
Here's the code for the above banner:
((Portal image banner|File:American Falls from Canadian side in winter.jpg | [[Niagara falls]], from the Canadian side |maxheight=175px |overflow=Hidden|croptop=10))
To see it employed in a portal, check out Portal:Niagara Falls.
We were racing against time to create 5,000 portals by the end of the year (just for the heck of it).
We made it. We've passed the 5,000 portals mark, with time to spare!
And the 5,000th portal is Portal:Major League Baseball, by Happypillsjr.
Congratulations!
The 10,000th portal mark. But...
...there is plenty else to do in addition to building new portals:
And whatever else you can dream up.
But most of all, have a...
The Grid, thank you for your contributions to the Portals Project, and have a prosperous, productive and enjoyable New Year.
Sincerely, — The Transhumanist 12:38, 30 December 2018 (UTC)
Well, here's the first issue of the new year. Enjoy...
A hearty welcome to new arrivals to the portals department:
DannyS712 has created a user script prototype, User:DannyS712/Cat links, that can pull members from a category, a functionality we've been after since the project's revamp last Spring. Now, it's a matter of applying this technique to scripts that will place the items where needed, such as with a section starter script and/or portal builder script.
There have been some discussions at Wikipedia talk:Portal guidelines.
DreamyJazz is working on a bot to place links to portals on root articles, category pages, and navigation footer templates.
Portal bugs are getting dealt with soon after they are reported.
Lots of wikignome activity (using Hotcat, etc.).
Keep up the good work. — The Transhumanist 09:35, 20 January 2019 (UTC)
For a visually intensive portal, see Portal:Hummingbirds.
If you find any other portals that stand out, please send me the links so I can include them in the next issue. Thank you.
There are about 1100 portals left in the old style, with subpages and static excerpts. As those are very labor intensive to maintain (because their maintenance is manual), all those except the ones with active maintainers (about 100) are slated for upgrade = approximately 1000. We started with 1500, and so over a quarter of them have been processed so far. That's good, but at this rate, conversion will take another 3 years. So, some automation (AWB?) is in order. We just need to keep at it, and push down on the gas pedal a bit harder.
You can find the old-style portals with an insource search of "box portal skeleton".
Speaking of upgrades...
The following portals are listed in the header at the top of Wikipedia's Main Page, and get far more traffic than all other portals:
Of those, all but one have been revamped to an automated self-updating single-page design.
The remaining one, Portal:Mathematics has manual maintainers, and has been partially upgraded.
As these are our flagship fleet, they need to be kept in top-notch condition.
Check 'em out, and improve them if you can.
And be sure they are on your watchlist.
Keep 'em coming!
As you know, thousands of the new portals are orphans, that is, having no links to them from article space. For all practical purposes, that means they are not part of the encyclopedia yet, and readers will be unlikely to find them.
What is needed are links to these portals from the See also sections of the corresponding root articles.
Dreamy Jazz to the rescue...
Dreamy Jazz has created a bot to place the corresponding category link to the end of each portal (if it is missing), and place a link to each portal in the See also section of the corresponding root articles.
That bot, named User:Dreamy Jazz Bot, is currently in its trial period performing the above described edits!
To take a look at the edits it has made so far, see Special:Contributions/Dreamy_Jazz_Bot.
It shouldn't be long before the bot is processing the entire set of new portals.
Good news indeed.
Way to go, Dreamy Jazz!
That's all I have to report this time around.
No doubt there will be more to tell soon.
Until then, — The Transhumanist 13:16, 28 January 2019 (UTC)