This user is aware of the designation of the following topics as contentious topics: complementary and alternative medicine He should not be given alerts for those areas.

31 January 2024
News and notes: Wikipedian Osama Khalid celebrated his 30th birthday in jail Opinion: Until it happens to you Disinformation report: How paid editors squeeze you dry In the media: Katherine Maher new NPR CEO, go check Wikipedia, race in the race In focus: The long road of a featured article candidate, part 2 Recent research: Croatian takeover was enabled by "lack of bureaucratic openness and rules constraining [admins]" Comix: We've all got to start somewhere Traffic report: DJ, gonna burn this goddamn house right down
Single page Front page About Subscribe Suggestions Archives

Just another guy with a PC. See my Commons user page: commons:User:Timeshifter.
The Signpost, Tech News, The Bugle, and Centralized discussion are transcluded on this page: User:Timeshifter/Newsletters.

User talk here is not archived. Old talk is deleted. Users are allowed to remove anything from their talk pages. See WP:TALK and other wikipedia guidelines/policies. Like Wikipedia articles over time, people change, and there is little point in referring to past stale arguments and discussions.

To keep the discussion in one thread some comments added here are moved to the user talk page of the author. I reply there. I also watchlist that talk page for awhile in order to note when the user there replies. Harassing comments are also sometimes moved off this talk page. Sometimes the original author is offended by their own harassing comments, and my reply, on their user talk page. They then remove both from their talk page. I guess the light from their own verbal reflection offends them. One can find removed comments by using the history link on a talk page. Inappropriately-applied warning templates, etc.. are also removed from this talk page. Sometimes I remove stuff from my talk page for no particular reason, or for many varied reasons. Removal of comments from my talk page implies nothing. Don't take it personally. Unless I have requested otherwise, feel free to leave new messages on my talk page.

I had an image from Flickr from a photographer I just dealt with. He made the mistake of changing his copyright license to a Creative Commons one--but not one we accept. I took his word for it that he removed copyright in favor of Creative Commons, but since I'd just uploaded two of his photos with a correct one we accept, it was my oversight that he made a mistake and I didn't check it. The result of this was that the photo was not accepted in Commons for upload. Fine. But now I can't get the damned thing to upload it now that the license is correct! How RUDE. I've been uploading photos for years- more than any other editor I know of on the en.wikipedia. It is for this photo: [1]. How can I fix this? --Leahtwosaints (talk) 14:38, 16 August 2013 (UTC)Reply[reply]

You have GOT to be the coolest Wikisloth with super-powers that I ever met!! For a Sloth, you sure move at a quick pace!! :) Do you wear a "super cape", I wonder? That would really complete the whole outfit and mystique.. I keep trying to think of things I could maybe do for you since you are such a blessing and a help... Hmmm. Did you ever contact Roger Ebert before his untimely demise? Is there perhaps a photo of someone that I can search for on your behalf? Just say the words. I feel a great debt to you for your help over these years. --Leahtwosaints (talk) 12:00, 17 August 2013 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Could you believe the dark hearts won in deleting this entry? And now an article I started is also up for deletion by some nobody called LuckyLouie. --HafizHanif (talk) 21:24, 19 November 2014 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Timeshifter, would you be able to give your honest opinion regarding the deletion of Boyd's page? I think my suggestions at the discussion are fair and at least his memory as a scientist should be in wiki, regardless of the mention of any alien stuff. --HafizHanif (talk) 20:19, 21 November 2014 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Not sure if you or someone else is working on reintroducing this entry. I'm also not sure if you've come across this list of patents referencing Bushman's 1996 patent #5542247.

The sixth listed patent has two U.S. Airforce contracts; F49620-98-C-0038 and F49620-00-C-0005 with many independent source citations.

It is interesting how other deleted pages usually have a trail of information, but Boyd's has nothing. I didn't get to read what the final verdict was ( other than obvious deletion ). --HafizHanif (talk) 21:38, 30 November 2014 (UTC)Reply[reply]

I might have been buzzing through the disambig. page for the Van Morrison/Robbie Robertson song, "Caravan", seen here: Caravan (Van Morrison song) which they played during the filmed final concert "The Last Waltz" - if it's just my need for glasses please forgive me. Hopefully I'll have a computer soon. --Leahtwosaints (talk) 11:10, 22 April 2015 (UTC)Reply[reply]

What you saw was Flow.

• The WMF has been eliminating most of their talk pages (user pages and some major mainspace pages), so you're forced to use Flow if you want to contact them to discuss problems with their projects. A particular problem is that they switched over all official contacts points related to Flow itself! That is particular problem for discussing Flow bugs. (Writing about the bug *in* Flow triggers the problem!)
• You've only seen the tip of the iceberg. The list of problems with Flow is 142 feet long. Copy-paste is broken. A simple revert destroyed my original comment. Problems with templates. History is a disaster. The reply-threading turns modest-size discussions into unreadable spaghetti. You can't delete your own comments, much less someone else's. (You "hide" it, which leaves a link for it on the board.) IMO the biggest issue is that Flow does not store an accurate stable copy of what you write! Flow can randomly rewrite your formatting codes and nowikis etc. The way Flow works is kind of like translating your text into Russian, then translating it from Russian back to English when someone views or edits it. Sometimes those bugs can mangle your entire post into garbage during the rewrite. In fact Flow preforms that round-trip translation every time you try to preview what you wrote. So you preview, return to editing your wikitext, and Flow has REWRITTEN your wikitext! It's like editing on quicksand. There's no "truetext", everything Flow shows you is an illusion created on the fly.
• It seems the WMF still wants to eventually get Flow deployed, but the good news is that they've realized that there are serious objections here. They have been *trying* to improve their relations with the community ever since the superprotect incident, with limited success. Putting Flow on hold has been one of the successes. The current official policy is that no Flow pages will be deployed without local consensus requesting it. I think they are hoping the tiny wikis start accepting it, and that eventually all the 'obstructionist-change-averse editors' get dragged along into the wonderful future. BTW there's a doc page where "Admins" and the most "Experienced" editors are defined as the change-averse groups. Lols.
• There used to be 7 Flow pages on EnWiki. Activity has dropped to zero on every board where Flow gets deployed. One board was the Flow testing board: it died and was never fixed after an admin tried testing admin tools on it. I had a pair of abandoned boards deleted at MFD. I have another abandoned board at MFD with unanimous deletes so far. I have an open RFC at a dead wikiproject to roll back Flow - I *think* its passing but running an RFC inside Flow is a disaster. We can't move the discussion posts down to a separate discussion area, it's almost impossible to tell who is replying to who, and it is difficult to figure out which posts are !votes. Anyway, assuming it passes, that will leave us with two dead Flow pages. It's possible that EnWiki will be Flow-free in a month or two. I need to contact some of the other language Wikis with Flow to see if they want to move forward with Flow or start rolling it back. Alsee (talk) 17:28, 24 December 2015 (UTC)Reply[reply]

@Alsee: Thanks for all the info on Flow! I had to look up MFD. I see that it is Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion. Are there any wikis using LiquidThreads still? The WMF or the devs or whoever is in charge (I have no clue), take simple requests for improvement (such as watchlisting sections of talk pages) and then go crazy with complete rewrites of all the code. Same for the request for a WYSIWYG editor. I just wanted a simple WYSIWYG editor that did the simple stuff, and did it in article sections. But they went crazy and created this monster VE that edits the whole page, and tries to do everything the wikitext editor does and more. I just want VE lite for section editing. Bold, italic, links. --Timeshifter (talk) 13:01, 26 December 2015 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Hello, I’m Chris, a community liaison in the Discovery department at the Wikimedia Foundation. One of the projects we’re working on is to bring interactive maps to Wikipedia. If you are interested, I’d like to have an informal conversation with you about your work with WikiProject Maps, and the conventions you all have created. I'd like to learn more about your work and how that might influence the design of interactive maps.

Please let me know of some good times to chat via email and I can setup a meeting for us. I can be reached at ckoernerwikimedia.org.

If you’re not interested, that’s fine. I would appreciate any direction to other editors that have been involved and might be interested.

Have a good day, CKoerner (WMF) (talk) 20:46, 12 April 2016 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Hi, I don't know if there is a procedure to let people know when an editor quits to place a semi-retired placard on their talk page. In the case of Catfish Jim, one of my closest editing friends from the past, his talk page is looking like he's here, when it's just Admin and other bots that deposit info on timed intervals. To my knowledge, he hasn't been working since before I went into a coma three years ago. I think it's March 2012: [2]. I'll leave this to you as an Admin. I'm only doing little edits and am still not healed so, if you don't do something with this, I hope you'll pass it to someone who will. Thanks. --Leahtwosaints (talk) 13:09, 27 November 2016 (UTC)Reply[reply]

As a member of WikiProject Cannabis, you are invited to help organize the project's upcoming "420" collaboration, which is scheduled for April 2017. Yes, we're a few months away, but we're hoping to get the ball rolling by getting buy-in from experienced Wikipedia editors and seek help fleshing out some goals and ideas for a successful campaign. We also plan to conduct both on-wiki and offlline outreach so non-Wikipedias can also contribute. If you are interested in participating, please sign up and contribute to the ongoing discussions. All editors are welcome! ---Another Believer _(Talk) 16:55, 10 January 2017 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Hi Timeshifter, You said that you might not see my reply on Meta, so I'll talk to you here. :) I'm on the Community Tech team, and we're still working on the cross-wiki watchlist. As you saw, the cross-wiki watchlist was one of the top requests on the 2015 Community Wishlist Survey, and our team is responsible for working on it. It's still an active project for us. It's held up right now by some changes that we need to make to the database, altering the really huge and scary revision tables. We have to wait for permission and help from the database administrator to make those changes. That's a delay, which is a pain, but once we get that done, we'll keep making progress on the cross-wiki watchlist.

There's another five top wishes from last year's wishlist that we shipped last year, and we're currently working on a few top requests from this year's wishlist -- rewriting Xtools, and warning people after there have been unsuccessful login attempts. I'd be happy to tell you more about our team or the Community Wishlist, if you're interested. Let me know. -- DannyH (WMF) (talk) 23:42, 9 February 2017 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Hey, Timeshifter, I noticed your thread at VPT. The old toolbar that you posted a screenshot of:

...is the 2006 editing toolbar, and within the last week or so, it was retired by the WMF. I'm working on reintroducing it as a user-made script, if you want it back; if you want it, you can install it by adding the line (without <code></code> tags):

mw.loader.load("/w/index.php?title=User:Writ_Keeper/Scripts/legacyToolbar.js&action=raw&ctype=text/javascript");

...to your common.js page. I'm hoping to get it introduced as an official gadget soon, but in the meantime, that should restore most of the functionality you're used to, I think. HTH, Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 18:10, 15 November 2018 (UTC)Reply[reply]

An edit summary mention produces a separate ping so I got two pings for [3]. PrimeHunter (talk) 08:48, 2 July 2019 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Oops, sorry. :) -- Timeshifter (talk) 09:22, 2 July 2019 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Hi! I am a student editing the page Incarceration of Women in the United States. I saw that you are a main contributor to the Incarceration in the United States article, so I was wondering if you might look over my article and give me any suggestions on what more I could work on? I have mostly focused my attention on the healthcare section, but I'm hoping to submit the entire thing for good article status, so I'd appreciate any feedback you have. Please feel free to post on my talk page! Thanks, Nicolekoonce (talk) 19:19, 13 November 2019 (UTC)Reply[reply]

hi. I just happened upon one of your own userboxes. i would like to try to help out. particularly with issues of editor responses, admin conduct. could you please let me know where I can help out? if you reply here, please ping me. thanks!! --Sm8900 (talk) 16:07, 16 January 2020 (UTC)Reply[reply]

I have created Template:COVID-19 pandemic death rates/doc with instructions for updating Template:COVID-19 pandemic death rates. Please advise if you notice any errors.

I have included the VBA code of a Word macro to automate the later stages of the update. This should work just as well for Template:COVID-19 pandemic death rates by country. I tried to create a macro to automate the whole process, but either the program or my computer does not like large macros. Dudley Miles (talk) 13:33, 5 September 2020 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Dudley Miles. Thanks. Looks good. I adjusted and clarified a few things. Check history for explanations. I don't have MS Word. So I can't help there. I use freeware LibreOffice. Of that free office suite I only use Calc. And I am a beginner with it. --Timeshifter (talk) 17:02, 5 September 2020 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Thanks for your help. The explanation in the doc is much clearer after your changes. Dudley Miles (talk) 17:06, 5 September 2020 (UTC)Reply[reply]

First I noticed that you undid the revision at Template:COVID-19 pandemic death rates by country/styles.css however it doesn't seem you have implemented the changes from User:Timeshifter/Sandbox119 there yet so the table is now no longer scrolling with sticky headers. Are you still planning to re-add those features? If yes is there a reason you're waiting to implement them?

Secondly, are you looking to create a table stylesheet that can be used to implement any of these features more generally, it seems to me this might be a good idea going forward if you are aware of any feature requests that have or are likely to recur.

Apologies if this has been asked and answered elsewhere I don't really have time to read through any of those discussions in full at the moment; thanks for your help. (please ping on reply)

𝒬𝔔 00:12, 7 September 2020 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Update: OK I just noticed the link to Template:COVID-19 pandemic death rates on the help talk page; I presume then that this supersedes Template:COVID-19 pandemic death rates by country? If so it should probably be redirected to the new table. Second question still stands; although as I mentioned earlier it will have to be a bit before I can start on it, thanks. (please ping on reply)

𝒬𝔔 00:44, 7 September 2020 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Quantocius_Quantotius. This has been moving very fast. There are now 3 table templates and 2 style sheets.

2 of the table templates are tables that are on this article page:

• COVID-19 pandemic by country and territory‎

Those 2 tables use the same style sheet:

• Template:COVID-19 pandemic data/styles.css

The CSS style sheet you were working on is this one:

• Template:COVID-19 pandemic death rates by country/styles.css

It is now only used for this table template:

• Template:COVID-19 pandemic death rates by country

That table template is in this article:

• COVID-19 pandemic death rates by country

That table is not supposed to be a scrollable table.

I just updated some of the history here:

User:Timeshifter/Sandbox119

--Timeshifter (talk) 01:10, 7 September 2020 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Thanks for clearing that up. Well if things are moving fast I probably won't be much help. I may drop in briefly every now and then for the next 2-3 weeks but substantive projects will have to wait until towards the end of the month at least. So I'm about to log-out in a few minutes but if you hit me with a ping I'll see it sooner or later.

𝒬𝔔 01:11, 7 September 2020 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Quantocius_Quantotius. I am assuming that the non-scrollable table template does not need the changes you made to it. Since those changes assumed it was a scrollable table. So I will revert your changes. Feel free to add back whatever you think is useful for a non-scrollable table. I haven't been working on that article and its template. Feel free to edit its CSS style sheet now that you know it is for a non-scrollable table.

I have been concentrating on the scrollable tables. Feel free to work on the CSS for those scrollable tables. I am a newb at CSS. I wish there was a collapse button to collapse the scrollable tables back to scrollbox size after they have been fully expanded by the "show all" button. --Timeshifter (talk) 01:27, 7 September 2020 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Belatedly  Done please see Template:COVID-19 pandemic data. Let me know if there are any issues or if there are any other templates you would like this feature added to.

Sorry for the delay, had a lot more IRL stuff to attend to than I anticipated. If I do get a bit of extra time I was planning on setting up a workspace on testWP so we can try to work on some additional css features of general applicability, but I do ask for your patience. I'm already a bit overcommitted to stuff here considering the volunteer time I have available.

𝒬𝔔 16:16, 25 October 2020 (UTC)Reply[reply]

(unindent). Thanks Quantocius Quantotius! There is a problem though. The collapse button only works on the template page. I just noticed this concerning "Show all" too. It works fine on the template pages. But when the 3 templates are together on COVID-19 pandemic by country and territory the buttons only work on the top template. So I guess the classes below are not specific enough. I copied the wikitext below from your recent addition to Template:COVID-19 pandemic data.

<div class="covid-show-table" style="font-size:80%;font-weight:500;">[[#covid19-container|[show all]]]</div><div class="covid-collapse-table" style="font-size:80%;font-weight:500;float: right;">[[#top|[collapse]]]</div>

I added the collapse part of the above wikitext to:

• Template:COVID-19 pandemic death rates
• Template:Monthly cumulative COVID-19 death totals by country‎

It works great on the template pages. But in the article with the 3 templates clicking any of the "show all" buttons in any table other than the top one does nothing. So the collapse buttons do not show up on the lower tables. Since they don't expand.

I created a sandbox just for you where you can experiment:

• User:Timeshifter/Sandbox126

--Timeshifter (talk) 23:31, 25 October 2020 (UTC)Reply[reply]

I asked for help here:

Wikipedia talk:TemplateStyles

In the section currently titled: "Need help with multiple templated tables on the same page using the same styles.css"

--Timeshifter (talk) 06:58, 27 October 2020 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Just noting for the benefit of page watchers that I have given a more detailed explanation over at VPT.

𝒬𝔔 23:03, 28 October 2020 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Note: See further discussion here: Template talk:Monthly cumulative COVID-19 death totals by country.

Hey, sorry you didn't like the changes to your user boxes. I was confronted with some particularly anally retentive editors when I first started editing, and they advised me that the rules and guidelines applied to all of Wikipedia, not just the articles. So, I guess that is what gave me the impression I should make the changes, but I'm just as happy to leave them the way you had them since you didn't like the changes because I'm not currently retaining my anus. LOL.😀 Huggums537 (talk) 02:22, 11 February 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]

The use of HTML in wikitext is in fact HTML.

1. Please stop edit warring over this. This is non-negotiable.
2. John is in the right on this point. You must provide compliant HTML for WP:Accessibility.

Thanks. --Izno (talk) 20:09, 15 June 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Izno. I believe you are mistaken. Mediawiki software converts everything it sees into what it puts on the page. The browser sees none of what is in the wikitext until Mediawiki converts it to HTML, CSS, JavaScript, etc..

<ul> in the wikitext in the case of side-by-side tables and/or images contributes nothing to accessibility.

Side-by-side tables and/or images look exactly the same with or without <ul> in the wikitext.

We can take this to Wikipedia:Village pump (technical) if necessary for more info.

Screenreaders do not see wikitext. They only see what the Mediawiki software converts it too.

And side-by-side tables and/or images look exactly the same to the browser and screenreaders with or without <ul> in the wikitext.

Your solution of using a gallery for images is fine too. --Timeshifter (talk) 20:39, 15 June 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]

I am not mistaken. HTML text in wikitext passes straight through the parser as HTML (both Parser.php and Parsoid) in all cases (with some HTML causing additional changes to how the parser deals with the contained text; <pre> is a notable example). That is why we have an allowed list of HTML and CSS directly in the parser as part of Sanitizer.php: we do not want bad-faith actors to use HTML elements in malevolent ways.

Subsequently, to provide valid HTML per the HTML standard, <li> must be placed inside either <ol> or <ul>, whether in an actual HTML document or a MediaWiki wikitext document. Perhaps you did not understand the point that John was making.

(N.b. I am not speaking to wikitext as wikitext just to be clear e.g. * at the beginning of a line.)

Invalid HTML is usually, almost always, inaccessible HTML. Izno (talk) 20:51, 15 June 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]

If I may butt in: if y'all are talking about this edit vs. this one, then I can definitely see a difference, in both the HTML output and the rendered output of the page. Timeshifter's edit is missing the surrounding <ul></ul> in the browser HTML, and in the rendered output (at least in my browser), the images are placed closer to the left margin. So it seems that John and Izno are correct. Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 21:04, 15 June 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Writ Keeper. See my reply to Izno. Also, John like Izno was talking about inaccessibility problems, not the left margin. John and I discussed this elsewhere. And he did not show any inaccessibility problems. He just suspected there might be some. --Timeshifter (talk) 21:25, 15 June 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]

The edit in question indeed. Izno (talk) 21:33, 15 June 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Izno. As you said everything has to go through the parser, sanitizer, etc.. And in some cases the HTML is not allowed to be used. Some deprecated HTML for example. Some works. Some doesn't.

In the case of side-by-side tables I am not seeing any inaccessibility problem. See:

User:Timeshifter/Sandbox153

In this case <ul> serves no purpose except to mess up the left margin. Someone complained about this elsewhere. Removing <ul> fixes that problem, and it is more efficient code. Less to remember.

It allows tables to fit in narrower screens too. Since there is no left margin. Narrow your browser window on the sandbox page to see. The horizontal scrollbar shows up sooner on the lower set of side-by-side tables that have <ul>

What inaccessibility problem are you seeing? I see none when doing without <ul> in this sandbox case.

--Timeshifter (talk) 21:19, 15 June 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Yeah, no. Bold text that indicates an argument on how your device provides you content isn't how accessibility works. "I like less code" also isn't how we make decisions where accessibility is relevant. Much less conformant HTML. If you personally cannot remember that list item elements must be inside o/ul elements, then you specifically should not revert an editor correcting that issue; if you want to fix any particular display that you do not like, you need to ask how to do that, not revert. In this case, if you want to "fix" the left margin, the way to fix that is to set margin-left: 0 on the list item elements. Izno (talk) 21:33, 15 June 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Izno. If you google style=display:inline-table you will see it used in many different ways. Many different ways without <ul>. I already knew about margin-left:0

I also already knew how to fix the problem without it. So I fixed it. You have yet to show me why my fix is incorrect. As in how it is inaccessible. --Timeshifter (talk) 21:44, 15 June 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]

You are barking up a totally weird tree if you think my concern has anything remotely to do with CSS display. I am strictly concerned about outputting both valid and accessible HTML, for which you must include ol/ul elements.

Regarding accessibility, it's not about you. It is specifically in regard to screen readers. Izno (talk) 21:50, 15 June 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Izno. In my first reply to you, I mentioned screenreaders. You have yet to show me a problem with accessibility. There are many cases in wikitext that don't use the same full HTML that one would use as a webmaster. Long ago I did my share of basic web pages on Tripod, Angelfire, Geocities, etc.. So I know the difference. --Timeshifter (talk) 22:00, 15 June 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Indeed, What inaccessibility problem are you seeing? is precisely the wrong question when it comes to screen readers. Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 21:55, 15 June 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Some people use screenreaders even though they have perfect eyesight. Some developers for example. But I take your point, and I ask everybody: What accessibility problems are you claiming? If you don't have a screenreader how can you claim anything unless someone with a screenreader tells you something? Send them to User:Timeshifter/Sandbox153. Ask them if their screenreader detects any difference other than the left margin. --Timeshifter (talk) 22:06, 15 June 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Okay, first of all, it is not the responsibility of people who need accessibility aids to analyze a page for accessibility issues; it is our responsibility as editors (and as coders) to anticipate and address all such issues proactively. Second of all, look at this: [4]: specifically errors 11 and 12 (further errors suppressed). li tags are invalid HTML when used the way they are. (Granted, there are a ton of other errors, too, but that doesn't mean it's okay for us to throw a bunch more onto the pile; an analogy to WP:OTHERSTUFF comes to mind.) As Izno points out, screen readers parse the HTML structure of a page to present it to their users, and any invalid HTML can cause problems for screen readers; thus, it is incumbent on us as editors to avoid invalid HTML wherever possible, because being proactive about avoiding accessibility issues is our responsibility as editors. We should not wait until a person who depends on a screen reader to complain; if they complain, we have already failed. I don't think "I like the margin padding better" is reasonable as an excuse to use invalid HTML, especially when the same effect can be accomplished with valid HTML, and "I think the HTML looks better" is certainly not a reasonable excuse. Do better. Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 22:30, 15 June 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]

I think you are making my case. There are 597 errors on that page. And additional warnings. HTML always has this problem. That is why we have transitional HTML versions, and so on. There will never be perfection.

Until we get someone with a screenreader to check out the sandbox (User:Timeshifter/Sandbox153), we are talking in circles. Mediawiki would be paralyzed if it held up everything until every single change in the mediawiki code was run by someone with a screenreader. And I have heard from someone with a screenreader who pointed out that a Mediawiki problem he experienced was annoying, but that the alternative was worse because it only helped him, but made things seriously worse for far more people. So everything is a balance. I find it annoying that you, John, and Izno are all going on strictly your suspicions, but without any evidence of a problem. I don't think there will be a problem. Screenreaders have no problem with basic tables with a single row of headers. As long as they have captions. That is what we have at User:Timeshifter/Sandbox153. See if you can round up someone with a screenreader. I will too. --Timeshifter (talk) 23:00, 15 June 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Okay, so this conversation is indeed going around in circles, but I think it's for different reasons than the ones you're thinking. You started out by saying there was no difference in the page between your version and JohnFromPinckney's version: Side-by-side tables and/or images look exactly the same with or without <ul> in the wikitext. That is demonstrably false, though; there is both a visible difference and a difference in the HTML output. When this was pointed out to you, you said In this case <ul> serves no purpose except to mess up the left margin. Someone complained about this elsewhere. Removing <ul> fixes that problem. So, now, you're saying that you see the difference (in the left margin), and are remivng UL tags deliberately to fix that. But you see how that does not correspond with what you said forty minutes earlier and ten lines above, right? You're moving the goalposts. Now, you're demanding that a person who uses a screen reader come in and prove to you that there's an accessibility issue. But it should not take a blind person with a screenreader to tell you that you're messing up the page to convince you to stop inserting invalid HTML into a page. If there are hundreds of HTML problems with a page, we don't fix it by adding ten more. And honestly, the rules of how HTML works should be the baseline for any conversation about HTML in Wikipedia, even before we get into any questions about accessibility. The burden of proof is on you to justify why you're breaking the rules of HTML, and "I don't like the margin (which can be fixed with valid HTML)" and "it's nine bytes less code" does not cut it. Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 00:42, 16 June 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]

(unindent). I have been clear all along that other than the left margin, the visible output is the same. Both versions are side by side tables that wrap. Someone else on the Help:Table talk page complained about the left margin. They did not like all the clutter of using <ul style="margin-left:0px;"> to get rid of the left margin. I experimented and noticed that getting rid of <ul> altogether got rid of the left margin. This allowed side by side tables to work in narrower screens with simpler wikitext. It is all on the talk page. You keep thinking that HTML in wikitext has to follow all the rules of HTML elsewhere. According to this w3schools page <p> without </p> is malformed HTML. But Help:HTML in wikitext says: "Note that the closing tag </p> is not strictly necessary for MediaWiki installations that output HTML 5 (such as Wikipedia)." There are many other examples of allowed HTML use in wikitext that does not follow the HTML rules elsewhere.--Timeshifter (talk) 02:00, 16 June 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]

...Okay, I'm not sure how this isn't clear yet, but none of us are concerned about what the HTML looks like in the wikitext (i.e. in the edit box, when you're editing the page). Of course that doesn't have to be valid HTML, because it hasn't gone through the Mediawiki parser to become true HTML yet. What we're all talking about is the output HTML of the rendered page (i.e. what you see if you view the page like a reader would and right-click to view source). The edits you're making are causing errors in the output HTML, *not* the wikitext. As I explained on VPT, the example you give eith the <p> tag is not a relevant comparison. The reason the page says that the closing p tag is optional is because, when the wikitext containing an unclosed p tag goes through the Mediawiki parser, the parser will automatically close the p tag for you. So, while there is an unclosed p tag in the wikitext, there is no unclosed p tag in the output HTML, because the parser fixes it for you. But the parser does not fix orphaned li tags in the same way, so using li tags without an enclosing ul tag will lead to invalid HTML in the output HTML, not just the wikitext. You can see this in action here: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/api.php?action=parse&page=User:Writ_Keeper/sandbox . Notice how, although there is an unclosed p tag in the wikitext, the p tag is properly closed, and thus valid HTML, in the HTML code that the parser outputs. They're not the same thing. Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 02:20, 16 June 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]

There is lots of other stuff that ends up in the output HTML that is not perfect HTML. Deprecated HTML, etc.. Others in the VPT thread have pointed out various examples. As I have said several times, if it doesn't effect anything then it doesn't matter. You have yet to show that this lack of <ul> here effects anything in a negative way. --Timeshifter (talk) 02:30, 16 June 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Both JAWS and NVDA detect the version with ul as containing HTML lists but do not detect the HTML lists in the version without ul. Please do not use the latter version. Also, screen readers don't normally detect margins. Graham87 02:42, 16 June 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Thanks Graham. I am confused though since technically there are no lists at all in either section. There are just 2 side by side tables in each of the 2 sections.

But no problem. We no longer need that method that uses the list HTML of li and ul.

isaacl found a simpler solution that only uses divs. It is elegant, legal, and simpler. I pasted it in as a third section on that sandbox page:

User:Timeshifter/Sandbox153

--Timeshifter (talk) 02:56, 16 June 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Sounds good re divs. Technically there are lists in the section that contains ul ... that is exactly what the ul tag does; it creates an unordered list. Whether it's *semantically* appropriate is another thing entirely ... but a list should be marked up properly in any case. Graham87 03:02, 16 June 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]

(unindent). Graham. So your screen readers read the divs option OK at sandbox 153? Or below? I pasted it below so that others reading this thread can check it out too.

Everybody: Narrow your browser screen to see the tables wrap (one drop below the other). Works in mobile view too. --Timeshifter (talk) 03:19, 16 June 2021 (UTC) --Timeshifter (talk) 03:19, 16 June 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Yes, it works fine. Graham87 03:33, 16 June 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Hi! Sorry if I'm bothering you. I am new to Wikipedia and wanted to contribute to the site. I noticed that the external links at the bottom of the table help page contains webpages that allows you to make tables only from inputting data directly into the website. I was wondering if it was Ok for me to add a link to a webpage that makes tables that allows user to upload excel files and convert it to the wiki format and vice versa. Thanks! --Rangusangus (talk) 17:12, 1 July 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Rangusangus. What is the link? I will have a look at it. It might also be posted here:

• Commons:Chart and graph resources: Chart and graph resources at Commons
• Commons:Convert tables and charts to wiki code or image files: includes information on converting table markup.

--Timeshifter (talk) 21:33, 1 July 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]

@Timeshifter: Sorry to keep you waiting! I found the website here: http://www.excel2wiki.com/ Looks like it was originally excel2wiki.net but was changed to the current one Rangusangus (talk) 03:15, 4 July 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Rangusangus. See: Help:Table#Converting spreadsheets and database tables to wikitable format

It links to the:

Copy & Paste Excel-to-Wiki converter.

--Timeshifter (talk) 06:09, 4 July 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]

@Timeshifter: The Copy & Paste Excel-to-Wiki converter. and the other one at Help:Table#Converting spreadsheets and database tables to wikitable format are different as they only supports ctrl + c/v to paste the table and the the other (www.excel2wiki.com) supports uploading excel files directly on the website. --Rangusangus (talk) 08:57, 4 July 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Rangusangus. Have you used this converter? Does it work?

Also, I noticed that the page loads very slowly. And it doesn't scroll vertically. My taskbar covers up the last line of the page:

"For any problems, contact me at nguye586@purdue.edu"

I can only see it if I lower my font size.

--Timeshifter (talk) 18:41, 4 July 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]

@Timeshifter: I have used this converter before and can confirm that it works. Personally, I find it more convenient than the other converters, especially for larger tables as it requires a file upload than copy pasting. It also has options for single quote and double quote tables.

I managed to contact them and they said the scroll button should be fixed now.

For the loading problems, I don't have a problem on my end so it might be a geographical issue where the webpage is hosted.

--Rangusangus (talk) 14:13, 6 July 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]

It takes forever to load. Now it is cut off at the top.

I looked at the HTML page source.

I suggest you contact them, and tell them that maybe they should remove the style sheet and class="centered". Also remove the script at the bottom.

Then it will be a normal plain web page that fits to the screen.--Timeshifter (talk) 18:15, 6 July 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]

@Timeshifter: Can you take a look at the website now? They said the problem should have been fixed. Loading times are still normal for me. --Rangusangus (talk) 04:43, 7 July 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]

It no longer is messed up. But it takes 20 seconds to load. Please ask them to remove as much external styling and scripting as possible. Try using inline styling instead. It is just a simple web page, and shouldn't take 20 seconds to load. --Timeshifter (talk) 05:46, 7 July 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]

@Timeshifter: They said there were a minimal amount of external styling and scripting and there was nothing too fancy.

I tried to test the website on 2 speed checking website and the average load time was 0.5 seconds. https://imgur.com/a/ilrc8Ub

Can you try to access the website using this link instead? https://www.excel2wiki.com/

If the issue still persists, could you check the speed of the website using online speed checker tools to see if its a website issue or a local issue.

On my end the website is working fine. I will forward an email to them again if its still not working on your end.

--Rangusangus (talk) 09:39, 7 July 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Rangusangus. It is the same 20 seconds in Firefox. Edge is fast. Half a second.

This is out of my league. Maybe ask for help at toolforge.com

That is the domain for this other excel2wiki tool:

https://excel2wiki.toolforge.org

toolforge.com redirects to here:

https://wikitech.wikimedia.org/wiki/Portal:Toolforge

Maybe host the tool there. Or get some help from there.

--Timeshifter (talk) 11:49, 7 July 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Hello :) I am writing my MA dissertation on Wikipedia Wars and the Israel-Palestine conflict, and I noticed that you have contributed to those pages. My dissertation will look at the process of collaborative knowledge production on the Israel-Palestine conflict, and the effect it has on bias in the articles. This will involve understanding the profiles and motivations of editors, contention/controversy and dispute resolution in the talk pages, and bias in the final article.

For more information, you can check out my meta-wiki research page or my user page, where I will be posting my findings when I am done.

I would greatly appreciate if you could take 5 minutes to fill out this quick survey before 8 August 2021.

Participation in this survey is entirely voluntary and anonymous. There are no foreseeable risks nor benefits to you associated with this project.

Thanks so much,

Sarah Sanbar

Sarabnas ^{I'm researching Wikipedia} _Questions? 11:01, 30 July 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Howdy Timeshifter,

I really appreciate the hard work you've out in to US drug overdose death rates and totals over time. It's a great article. One thing I would like to comment about: some passages are a bit informal.

For example: "Around 100,300 died in the 12 month period ending April 30, 2021.[4] That's 275 a day."

Would you agree that this declarative "That's 275 a day" seems a bit informal? Would it bother you if I changed the lead to something like "Around 100,300 people died in the 12 month period ending April 30, 2021, at a rate of 275 deaths per day.[4]"? I don't want to ask you to do anything because I know you're such a busy contributor.

Regardless, Happy New Year! -- Hunan201p (talk) 22:30, 26 December 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Hunan201p. Thanks. Either way sounds fine by me. Feel free to change it. Let's keep further article related discussion on the article talk page. --Timeshifter (talk) 00:20, 27 December 2021 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Hi, Timeshifter, the template you created Template:2021 monthly cumulative COVID-19 death totals by country, is no longer being used anywhere on any article or somewhere related to COVID-19. Before I nominate it for deletion, there are two other 2021 templates that you also created, Template:2021 first half. Monthly cumulative COVID-19 death totals by country and Template:2021 2nd half. Monthly cumulative COVID-19 death totals by country. Did the first and second half templates replace the template in question and is no longer needed? Or does it still have some benefit in remaining? --WikiCleanerMan (talk) 23:15, 2 March 2022 (UTC)Reply[reply]

WikiCleanerMan. I just changed its name to User:Timeshifter/Sandbox176. It is referenced in some important technical discussions concerning scrollable tables with sticky headers. Both row and column sticky headers. Narrow your browser window to see what I mean.

So I moved it to user space to avoid problems. --Timeshifter (talk) 01:19, 3 March 2022 (UTC)Reply[reply]

		COVID-19 Barnstar
		Awarded for efforts in expanding and verifying articles related to COVID-19. Awarded by Cdjp1 (talk) 8 March 2022 (UTC)

		The Original Barnstar
		Awarded for being the top contributor to an article related to COVID-19. Awarded by Cdjp1 (talk) 8 March 2022 (UTC)

Cdjp1. Thanks for the barnstars! --Timeshifter (talk) 03:43, 9 March 2022 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Hey, Timeshifter. I'd like to wish you a wonderful First Edit Day on behalf of the Wikipedia Birthday Committee! Have a great day! Chris Troutman (talk) 18:46, 7 October 2022 (UTC)Reply[reply]

I am hoping I am doing this correctly. I saw your comments on Raw Story and agree with them.I am sorry but I do not have an account and hope this is the correct place to respond. I will also answer you on the other page.

Can you PLEASE --- whenever you have time take a look at Palmer Report? There has been a Wikipedia attack from some republican editors. They are a political site -- a good one and I am a fan.

For months (years) scores of people have been pleading with the editors there to take the "hyper partisan, fake news website" out of the header. It is not accurate. It was put there by the same person who muddied up Raw story -- a republican. I along with dozens -- literally dozens of people protested. We felt it was an attack, a vicious one. The response was always send some reliable sources to counter it.

Only nobody ever used the term "hyper-partisan, fake news website" in the first place. I spent four hours trying to find a source and asked several times. There are some obscure republican sources. They never used, to the best of my knowledge any of those terms.

They also locked the page when people tried to change it and called it vandalism. But everyone I saw came in good faith. The Palmer Report is not fake news and is very much like Raw Story. I had a source -- Brian Williams from MSNBC did a segment several tears ago and used information from their site. I was told that was not interesting enough to put on the site and then they ignored me and all the others. You an easily see this through old Talk pages because there are over a dozen complaints.

I hope you are not upset that I posted such a long post but I think what is happening makes Wiki look very bad and I liked what you said on the raw story site. I do not want to name the person less it be thought of as a verbal attack but you can see all this quite easily. Please if you can do anything, please research this and please look seriously at the "hyperpartisan, fake news" entry. Because that is not neutral.

Thank you,

1. 1. 1. 1. Norah

2600:6C65:7E7F:B93E:AD3C:1976:2DA8:EAB2 (talk) 00:33, 7 February 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Hi Norah. I don't have the time, health, and energy nowadays for much Wikipedia activity. You will get a lot farther if you log in with a user name. You are still anonymous. You can create an account with just a user name and password. Email address is optional, and is not public. Useful for password resets. It can be a secondary throwaway email address. Gmail can be set to forward to another email address. Even another Gmail address. --Timeshifter (talk) 00:59, 7 February 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Thank you. I am sorry about your health issues. I will not bore you with a long reply but I have tried in the past as have others and nothing worked. Was delighted to see how several of you fixed Raw Story who I also like. But I am completely unaware of how to edit on Wiki and also have some (minor) health issues. But thanks! At least you care and that counts for a lot. I hope your health situation improves and thank you so much for answering.

#### Norah 2600:6C65:7E7F:B93E:AD3C:1976:2DA8:EAB2 (talk) 04:16, 7 February 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Read this in another language • Subscription list for this newsletter

This newsletter includes two key updates about the Editing team's work:

1. The Editing team will finish adding new features to the Talk pages project and deploy it.
2. They are beginning a new project, Edit check.

Talk pages project

The Editing team is nearly finished with this first phase of the Talk pages project. Nearly all new features are available now in the Beta Feature for Discussion tools.

It will show information about how active a discussion is, such as the date of the most recent comment. There will soon be a new "Add topic" button. You will be able to turn them off at Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-editing-discussion. Please tell them what you think.

An A/B test for Discussion tools on the mobile site has finished. Editors were more successful with Discussion tools. The Editing team is enabling these features for all editors on the mobile site.

New Project: Edit Check

The Editing team is beginning a project to help new editors of Wikipedia. It will help people identify some problems before they click "Publish changes". The first tool will encourage people to add references when they add new content. Please watch that page for more information. You can join a conference call on 3 March 2023 to learn more.

–Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 18:19, 22 February 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Hello! Was looking into some of the history of and proposals for a global watchlist, and saw quite a few comments on it by you in the past. Is there a current solution or commonly accepted tooling for this purpose? Thanks! Top5a (talk) 06:49, 27 May 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Top5a. I don't know. I haven't been keeping up with it. --Timeshifter (talk) 08:03, 27 May 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]

OK! Thank you for the rapid reply! Cheers -- Top5a (talk) 08:05, 27 May 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]

I realize we have been butting heads (in good faith!) a bunch recently. But I wanted to stop by and just say I appreciate the work you do maintaining tables across the website, ensuring text-citation integrity, and helping others understand how to maintain the encyclopedia. Thank you, and happy new year! Enjoy this stroopwafel – I saw "stroopwafel" in the WikiLove menu and needed to see what one is. They look delicious, but I can't say I've heard of one before, much less tried one :) Best, HouseBlastertalk 02:56, 3 January 2024 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Thanks! --Timeshifter (talk) 03:10, 3 January 2024 (UTC)Reply[reply]

News and updates for administrators from the past month (January 2024).

Administrator changes

• Red-tailed hawk
• Robertsky

• Ameliorate!
• Ancheta Wis
• Anthony Bradbury (deceased)
• Cobi
• Ev
• Moondyne
• Worm That Turned

Bureaucrat changes

Worm That Turned

CheckUser changes

Wugapodes

Interface administrator changes

• Enterprisey
• Izno

Guideline and policy news

• An RfC about increasing the inactivity requirement for Interface administrators is open for feedback.

Technical news

• Pages that use the JSON contentmodel will now use tabs instead of spaces for auto-indentation. This will significantly reduce the page size. (T326065)

Arbitration

• Following a motion, the Arbitration Committee adopted a new enforcement restriction on January 4, 2024, wherein the Committee may apply the 'Reliable source consensus-required restriction' to specified topic areas.
• Community feedback is requested for a draft to replace the "Information for administrators processing requests" section at WP:AE.

Miscellaneous

• Voting in the 2024 Steward elections will begin on 06 February 2024, 14:00 (UTC) and end on 27 February 2024, 14:00 (UTC). The confirmation process of current stewards is being held in parallel. You can automatically check your eligibility to vote.
• A vote to ratify the charter for the Universal Code of Conduct Coordinating Committee (U4C) is open till 2 February 2024, 23:59:59 (UTC) via Secure Poll. All eligible voters within the Wikimedia community have the opportunity to either support or oppose the adoption of the U4C Charter and share their reasons. The details of the voting process and voter eligibility can be found here.
• Community Tech has made some preliminary decisions about the future of the Community Wishlist Survey. In summary, they aim to develop a new, continuous intake system for community technical requests that improves prioritization, resource allocation, and communication regarding wishes. Read more
• The Unreferenced articles backlog drive is happening in February 2024 to reduce the backlog of articles tagged with ((Unreferenced)). You can help reduce the backlog by adding citations to these articles. Sign up to participate!