UESPWiki:Community Portal/Archive 10

This is an archive of past UESPWiki:Community Portal discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page, except for maintenance such as updating links.

RSS/Atom Feeds

Is anyone on the site seriously using these? The server-status page reports 7 attempts at accessing RSS or Atom feeds, all of which have been frozen for 4 days now, tying up the server and slowing down the site. This is not the first time it's happened, and we have to get Daveh to restart the server every time. So what I'm asking is whether it's really at all beneficial to the site to have these active at all? If nobody's really using them, I think we should consider simply disabling them to prevent them from bogging down the site repeatedly. --TheRealLurlock ^Talk 16:04, 2 December 2007 (EST)

At the moment these feeds represent a clear DoS possibility to anybody who wants to harm the site and I'd agree they should be taken off if at all possible. To be honest, even if a few users are using them legitimately the danger to the site is great enough that they should go anyway. Hopefully their removal will help the site to stay up longer between reboots. --Rpeh^{•T•C•E•} 16:56, 2 December 2007 (EST)

Except that RSS/Atom feeds aren't the source of the problem, and they're not the only way to get a frozen connection. Anyone who tries to view the diff on a problematic edit, no matter what way they try to do it, will get a frozen connection. I've had it happen to me, and I've seen it happen to almost every other patroller on the site. So if the real concern is eliminating a possible avenue for a DoS attack, I don't think that turning off RSS/Atom feeds really makes the site more secure.

Furthermore, at least some of the editors right now who are having an extremely hard time accessing the site have frozen connections. Lurlock for example has an edit from yesterday that is still connected to the server. There are a couple of "read"-status connections in the server logs that have been frozen for a couple of days and I'd be willing to bet that one of those is rpeh (no IP addresses are provided at the "read"-status stage, so it's not possible to verify it unfortunately). Those connections would be frozen right now whether or not RSS/Atom feeds were enabled; the server would still need to be restarted to fix those frozen connections. So although the RSS/Atom feeds are contributing to general performance problems, they are not the reason why some people are having particularly acute problems accessing the site.

If we want to really make the site more reliable and more secure, we need to find the bug in the wiki code that freezes connections. I know in a general sense what triggers it in the common cases: viewing a diff of a large edit to a large page. The fact that apache isn't able to automatically terminate these connections says that they're being locked up in an unusual state. But any more serious debugging would really require being logged in to the server: being able to view the status of the frozen processes, view the server logs, being able to add some debugging messages to narrow down where in the code it's happening, being able to trigger the bug repeatedly and then restart the server. It's possible that going that process might also identify some underlying problem that also explains the other frozen connections that crop up from time to time, but that's purely speculation. --Nephele^Talk 18:48, 2 December 2007 (EST)

You're right of course, but my concern is that the feeds will always cause the issue if a problematic edit exists; without the feed it requires somebody to view the precise difference. At the moment, 7/10 of the blocked connections are caused by the feed pages, which would seem to suggest that even though they aren't the source of the problem, they're the main expression of it. If there's no easy way to turn them off then Nephele's right - it makes more sense to fix the underlying problem. But if there's a switch somewhere, I'd seriously consider using it. --Rpeh^{•T•C•E•} 02:49, 3 December 2007 (EST)

Bacon

You know in Oblivion Bacon the Boar in Dunbarrow Cove, well since he's essential and always in Dunbarrow Cove, you should you know, create a page for him, I think. Thank You!!

--68.194.37.234 18:03, 4 December 2007 (EST)

some wikipedia oblivion articles up for deletion ... transwiki candidates?

Not sure who to address this to but there are some wikipedia articles up for deletion. Some may duplicate content on this wiki already but others (eg, Septim bloodline) do not. If anyone has dealt with transwikis before, or if there is a recommended, least-painful, process, FYI:

28 November (AfD, CfD, TfD):

• Creatures of Morrowind at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Creatures of Morrowind (2007-11-28 –)
• Creatures of Oblivion at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Creatures of Oblivion (2007-11-28 –)
• Creatures of Cyrodiil at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Creatures of Cyrodiil (2007-11-28 –)
• Artifacts of The Elder Scrolls at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Artifacts of The Elder Scrolls (2007-11-28 –)
• Septim bloodline at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Septim bloodline (2007-11-28 –)
• Organizations of The Elder Scrolls at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Organizations of The Elder Scrolls (2007-11-28 –)
• High Rock at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/High Rock (2007-11-28 –)
• Cuhlecain at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Cuhlecain (2007-11-28 –)
• Oblivion (dimension) at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Oblivion (dimension) (2007-11-28 –)
• Valenwood at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Valenwood (2007-11-28 –)

-DarkElf 21:40, 5 December 2007 (EST)

Unfortunately, due to legal concerns, we are unable to accept content taken from Wikipedia. It has to do with a difference between their licensing and ours, and the fact that it would be impossible for us to get permission from all of the original authors to publish the page under our license. (It's rather complex, actually.) Anyhow, I'm pretty sure most of this content does exist in some form or another. (See Lore:Septim Dynasty for your example.) I feel for these articles, really, I do. It's always disheartening when the Wikipedia elite decide to trash a lot of people's efforts in an effort to "clean up", but we've been through this before, and it unfortunately is not possible for us to take these articles without complicated legal entanglements. If you would like to rewrite some of them in your own words, by all means do so. But I'm afraid you won't find much support for a verbatim copy of these articles to UESP. --TheRealLurlock ^Talk 22:52, 5 December 2007 (EST)

Actually, the GFDL (Wikipedia's license) and the Creative Commons license (UESPWiki's) are shortly going to become compatible, so it might be worth pulling them off for a transwiki at some later point. Personally I don't think that Wikipedia is the right place for these things - I go to Wikipedia looking for things that exist in the real world, and I go to the UESP looking for things that exist in Tamriel. Better publicity in the main Wikipedia articles on Morrowind, Oblivion etc. of the UESP wouldn't go astray though. Alphax 22:56, 8 December 2007 (EST)

That's really interesting, Alphax. Where'd you hear that?--Ratwar 23:27, 8 December 2007 (EST)

There are at least some UESP "external links" in those articles. Better publicity might be achieved by a wikipedia article on UESP itself, since there isn't one now. That would at least be a "real-world"-relevant wikipedia topic. Of course, someone somewhere would raise the topic of notabilty, though I'm sure I've seen less notable things on there. -DarkElf 03:26, 10 December 2007 (EST)

Pictures Such as Bacon and Reasonable Pages

Well, you guys said you were going to have a picture for Bacon but all you really have is just pictures for NPC's, not Animals and other creatures, and plus you should also give Bacon, and Hjalti and all the other Pets that are in the game 24/7 such as Porkchop (well I mean picture for him, but he's only there before the Champion Match) and Frost Artronach Familiars please!! Thank You!!

--68.194.37.234 18:54, 7 December 2007 (EST)

You have to understand - this is hardly a priority for us. We all have other projects we're engaged in, and getting a picture of Bacon (who looks exactly the same as every other Boar in the game anyhow) is not really at the top of anyone's list. If it's really that important to you, I suggest you try getting a screenshot yourself. See Help:Images for tips on how to get a good image and post it onto the site. If you don't feel like doing it, somebody else will probably get to it eventually, but I can't promise anything. --TheRealLurlock ^Talk 19:37, 7 December 2007 (EST)

Good idea, thanks, now where can I find a good camera? Hmmmm....

--68.194.37.234 19:43, 7 December 2007 (EST)

Unfortunately, if you're dealing with a console version instead of the PC (which I assume you are if you're talking about a camera), you probably won't be able to do much. Photographing your TV never really looks very good, even with a high-end camera. You'll probably just have to wait for somebody else to get to it, then. Or use the standard Boar picture for the time being. (Like I said, they all look the same, so nobody will really notice if it's not actually Bacon.) --TheRealLurlock ^Talk 19:47, 7 December 2007 (EST)

Cyrodiilic or Cyrodilic

I'm not sure if this is the right place, but if you refer to a character/object that comes from Cyrodiil, do you refer to it with the spelling 'Cyrodiilic' or do you leave out an 'i' and spell it 'Cyrodilic'? I noticed that in Morrowind it is spelt 'Cyrodiilic' but in Oblivion it is spelt 'Cyrodilic'. Which one is correct to use?--Willyhead 08:18, 9 December 2007 (EST)

The Spelling guide says that 'Cyrodilic' is preferred but 'Cyrodiilic' is acceptable. --Rpeh^{•T•C•E•} 08:47, 9 December 2007 (EST)

Morrowind:Roleplaying...?

I think that there should be a Morrowind:Roleplaying page just like there is an Oblivion:Roleplaying page. Any thoughts or reasons why there isn't one already? I wouldn't otherwise ask for permission to create a page, it just seemed odd to me that there wasn't one when I looked. --HMSVictory 11:49, 22 December 2007 (EST)

It probably hasn't been created because most regular editors think that the Oblivion Roleplaying article is one of the least helpful and most problematic pages on the site. See for example all of the discussions at Curing Stupidity or a similar question that came up a while ago on my talk page. Articles such as Roleplaying are not encyclopedic in nature and the point of the wiki is to provide encyclopedia-style information on the Elder Scrolls games.

That said, however... no, you do not need to ask for permission before creating a page. And we try to be tolerant of the variety of different ideas about what type of content people would find to be useful on the site and therefore do not delete information that some readers might find useful. But don't expect an enthusiastic response if you proceed with the idea. --Nephele^Talk 12:17, 22 December 2007 (EST)

Well, the Oblivion Roleplaying page seems to be very popular, so think I will set up the page and take it from there. Don't worry, I will make sure it's taken down if people start objecting! -HMSVictory 12:20, 22 December 2007 (EST)

I really hate the Roleplaying pages. People should be smart enough to be able to have fun in their own games without needing advice from other people. Plus, Oblivion: Roleplaying works because the editors who edit on there are likely only editing there. Frankly, its just a waste of space that is only tolerated because as soon as it gets deleted, someone would just make another thing somewhat like it. There are more important things to do with Morrowind than make a role playing page. Get to work on that instead and then after Morrowind is "perfect" you can add a roleplaying page. --Timmeh ^Talk 12:43, 22 December 2007 (EST)

In the immortal words of Frankie Howerd, "Nay, nay and thrice nay!" The Oblivion Roleplaying page has probably the worst signal to noise ratio of any page on the site. In other words, for every half-decent suggestion there are a dozen stupid ones and the page acts as a magnet for bad spelling, poor grammar and just plain badly-written posts.

If you were to take a vote of the patrollers and admins that have to clean up the page you'd probably get a majority in favour of deleting the Roleplaying section totally. Certainly the various discussions that have taken place on IRC have failed to produce anybody willing to defend it! The only reason there hasn't been an on-site discussion about deleting the whole lot is that we all recognise the amount of work that people have put into it. That said, however, I can't see anybody regarding the creation of an equivalent page for MW with anything other than blank horror.

Lastly, is there even any need for such a page? Most of the ideas will work in both games and don't need a Morrowind-specific page and the ones that don't... well tough. Let's keep the site as the encyclopedia it's meant to be. —Rpeh^{•T•C•E•} 12:44, 22 December 2007 (EST)

Well, your points are very valid. But personally I have found the Oblivion Roleplaying pages to be quite inspiring. They are very good to look over when one has run out of official quests or has reached 100% completion. The pages are very badly edited, but I am sure that there is a way to control this. And besides, compare this to Willyhead's "Creating an Awesome Character" and "Guide to Destroying the Imperial City" and it seems very reasonable. --HMSVictory 13:17, 22 December 2007 (EST)

My big problem with this is that there are so many neglected pages in the wiki that should be more helpful. I've been the only one working on Daggerfall for some time now, which is understandable with the lack of editors who have Daggerfall, but Tamriel:Factions is still a mess and that is something that anyone can help out with. The Morrowind main quest is also not as helpful as it should be, but you are suggesting that we make a Role Playing page that (if it helps anyone) helps the people who have completed the Main Quest and are bored. I say we fix those issues before we get into "how to make the game more fun". --Timmeh ^Talk 13:30, 22 December 2007 (EST)

Sorry --HMSVictory 13:33, 22 December 2007 (EST)

Full Stops/Periods/Stops

Discussion moved here from my talk page for general discussion. --Nephele^Talk 12:40, 22 December 2007 (EST)

Nephele, I have noticced on the Recent Changes that you are deleting full stops on images descriptions (The majority placed there by Playjex). Why is this? Grammar rules condone that all short phrases (Save isolated one-word sentences or titles) should have stops to accompany them? Is this a particular rule on the UESPWiki or something similar? --HMSVictory 12:05, 22 December 2007 (EST)

The grammar rules that I checked all said that periods/full stops are not appropriate in places such as headers and figure captions. Note that figure captions are not the same as short phrases that may appear within a paragraph, where a period is necessary to separate the phrase from a subsequent sentence. I checked a dozen sites yesterday where the rules all stated that periods should not be used at the end of figure captions. Most relevant probably is Wikipedia where it states "Most captions are not real sentences, but extended noun phrases ("The Conservatory during Macquarie Night Lights, a summer festival"—noun phrase, no final period"—compared with ""The Conservatory was spotlit during Macquarie Night Lights, a summer festival."—real sentence with final period)."

Furthermore, existing practice on the site shows that 99% of our existing figure captions do not have any periods at the end of the captions. Similarly, 99% of the headers on the site do not have any periods. I'm not particularly enthusiastic about a project that seems to consist of going through and changing what's currently accepted on the site when there is no grammatical requirement to make the change. --Nephele^Talk 12:28, 22 December 2007 (EST)

I've decided to move this discussion to the community portal so that the community members can contribute their opinions and, if necessary, we can make a general decision about what is preferred for UESPWiki: should figure captions on the site that consist of phrases (not full sentences) have periods at the end or not? --Nephele^Talk 12:40, 22 December 2007 (EST)

We certainly don't need a period at the end of every phrase caption on the site. The rules say it isn't appropriate, it looks funny, and it seems like an unnecessarily large undertaking to go through and make all these tiny changes for no particular reason. In my opinion, it's all time best spent working on something else. --Eshe^talk12:56, 22 December 2007 (EST)

Well, I do agree with you concerning sentence fragments, but many image descriptions are longer and comprise actual sentences. It is however, fruitless to try and eliminate all the stops that are currently in place as it is a common reaction to place one whenever a conceptual scripture has been finished. In this case, a short phrase or fragment. While it may be pointless trying to add them everywhere, that conclusions implies that it is also pointless to take them all away. --HMSVictory 13:12, 22 December 2007 (EST)

Just for clarification: I have not started any campaign to remove all periods from the site's figure captions. The only such changes I've made have been to cleanup Recent Change edits that had just added periods and needed to be patrolled. I had assumed that was obvious, but since your comments seem to be directly solely at my choice to undo the recent changes rather than at the choice to make the edits in the first place, perhaps it's not so obvious. --Nephele^Talk 13:28, 22 December 2007 (EST)

Sorry --HMSVictory 13:34, 22 December 2007 (EST)

Agreed. I WILL discontinue to put periods on all short phrases. I apologise that I have obstructed the grammar "rules" per se. Thank you for all of your opinions. Take care, and Happy Holidays to all! --Playjex 09:59, 23 December 2007

That's A Good Question!

It does happen - we get good questions on the talk pages. I know all the site regulars try to answer as many as they can but all too often things disappear off the Recent Changes page without a good answer. So Template:Good Question; a template we can slap on a talk page to indicate that a particular question is ripe for further investigation. The reason I'm bringing it up here is that a) It's 2am right now so my colours probably make sane people sick, and b) it would involve a subtle change to the way we've handled talk pages. Obviously when a question is answered, the template needs to come off but that involves editing another user's talk page post - something that has been discouraged so far. Also, there ought to be a discussion about what constitutes a proper answer - is this going to create excess work for patrollers? This came to mind because of my suggestion on UESPWiki:Patrollers so I'd especially welcome feedback from our cadre of RecentChanges patrollers but everyone should feel free to comment. Oh - and remind me that I need to add the categories if it does go live. —Rpeh^{•T•C•E•} 21:09, 30 December 2007 (EST)

Having a similar template has crossed my mind a few times. It would make it much easier for non-patrollers to find questions that they might want to investigate and/or answer, would make it easier to find questions asked by patrollers/admins, and would make it easier to dig up questions that are more than a couple of days old. As for editing other editors' posts, I think it's well within the bounds of what is acceptable. It's not altering the meaning of the original post in any way, just making it easier at first to find the post (because I'm sure patrollers will need to add most of the tags, rather than leaving it up to the question-asker) and then afterwards signalling that the question has been answered.

I'd be in favour of implementing such a template. If we want to just move forward and see what happens, that works for me. Or if we want to plan ahead a bit more, a couple of issues that I'd expect we'll need to handle (in addition to rpeh's question about what constitutes an "answer") are:

• What types of questions need the tag? And who decides whether or not a question warrants a tag? For example, if an editor asks "Is Umbra the best sword ever?" (sorry I can't make myself add the inevitable typos and grammar flaws!) and includes the "good question" tag, would it be OK to remove the tag?
• Do tags stay on forever? Should there be a time limit after which questions expire and tags get deleted? Or should the category be sorted so that the most recent questions are at the top of the list (which would require tweaking the template somehow to record the date...)? The concern is how to make it possible for newer entries to stand out so that people who check the category periodically don't get overwhelmed by the questions that they've already scanned (and presumably decided they can't answer).

--Nephele^Talk 01:26, 31 December 2007 (EST)

I think it's a wonderful idea! I don't think we would have too much trouble with newbies adding the tag to inappropriate questions, so long as the tag isn't widely "advertised." Similarly to the {{huh}} tag, it would mostly be added by patrollers checking out a recent change and seeing that it needed more research/input to be considered resolved.

I'm all for just moving forward and implementing it... that's probably the best way to find out what else we need to figure out.

I would say that, yes, the tag should be removed from questions inappropriate for it. I'd also think that the tag should stay as long as the issue is unresolved. I guess it would make sense for the category to be sorted so that the tagged pages that have had the most recent edits would be on top. --GuildKnight^Talk2me 19:23, 31 December 2007 (EST)

I'd hope we can instill an aura of "bad taste" into flagging one's own questions, but if not then patrollers can soon remove inappropriate tags. Nephele's point about appropriate question should hopefully be addressed in the same way - patrollers will get into the swing of separating the good questions from the chaff. Perhaps also, instead of "question that needs to be answered", the template should say something like "topic that needs research", to indicate that we're looking for valuable information rather than personal opinion. As for the tags themselves, I'd incline towards keeping them on forever but adding the date. Perhaps a Wikipedia-like system of using a parameter may work? So we'd have {{Good Question|date=January 2008}}, for instance. That would use sub-categories rather than sorting but the idea is the same. Lastly, I'd like to start using the idea as soon as possible but I'd prefer we get things like this ironed out as much as we can first. —Rpeh^{•T•C•E•} 21:14, 31 December 2007 (EST)

I think it is a fairly good idea. However, I think most important questions should be moved to the Community Portal when it involves changing site policy. The tag should be used mostly on important questions about certain games or minor changes to the site. --Timmeh ^Talk 20:16, 1 January 2008 (EST)

Sure - this would be for questions relating to the game rather than the site. —Rpeh^{•T•C•E•} 08:36, 2 January 2008 (EST)

Yes, I have returned, sorry for all the fuss before. I believe that this concept has been brought up with good reason, but, as of now, it would create too much hassle. There are already enough templates to be used here and, while this is both functional and helpful, could break the site down into mindless micromanagement that results in little. I beleive that the best course of action here is probably to set up regulations to simplify the use of this template and/or designate a particular patroller to moniter the activity surrounding these templates. We should also distinguish between question types such as Lore, Gameplay, Glitches, Easter Eggs, Technical issues etc. Maybe a varying parameter could be included? --HMSVictory 11:42, 3 January 2008 (EST)

An extra parameter to sub-categorize questions is a nice idea - I'm not sure how well it's going to work in practice though. A question might fall into more than one category or there might be doubt as to which it should be in. Plus I don't want to give patrollers too much work to do and having to have them look up the categories before adding the template is a bit much. On the other hand it would mean people can check out the types of question that particularly interest them. I'd say the at first we try it without a type but that if a lot of questions get marked we look at adding it. —Rpeh^{•T•C•E•} 12:43, 3 January 2008 (EST)

After careless careful thought, I come to the conclusion that it might be a good idea to have a time limit for these "good questions". Maybe after 15 days or a week or some period of time that seems ample enough to do research and talk about a topic. After then it should be permitted to delete these tags (unless deleted by the user whose talk page it has been posted on, then anytime is good). Also, would these be restricted just to user-talk pages or all talk pages? I'd prefer both. --Timmeh ^Talk 18:15, 3 January 2008 (EST)

Often the "good questions" take far more than a couple of weeks to answer. I'd anticipate that easy-to-answer good questions will rarely get tagged, since often the patroller will be able to pull up the construction set and answer the question right away. But questions that require in-game testing, for example, can take a while before someone has the opportunity and patience to do the necessary followup (for example, what are the equations governing NPC skills and attributes, based on Morrowind talk:The point of NPC classes). So if there is a time limit, it would need to be longer than just one or two weeks. Personally, I prefer rpeh's suggestion of having month-by-month subcategories. So if you want to just see what new questions have arisen, you can just look at the current month; if you want to see everything that's available, you look at the full category.

I also agree with rpeh that sub-categories based on question type is likely to be tricky. It actually seems to me like that would promote the type of "mindless micromanagement" that HMSVictory wants to avoid. The page on which the question appears will by itself provide people with most of the type information: if it's on a Tamriel talk page, then it's likely to lore-related; if it's on an Oblivion quest's talk page, then it's likely to be gameplay related.

As for where the tags would be used, I'd recommend that they primarily be used on article talk pages, in part because that will make it much easier for question-answerers to identify the question topic. I'd even encourage "good questions" that are asked in other locations to first be moved to the appropriate article talk page. If the question is relevant to a specific article, then it's probably where the question belongs in the first place (even if it was first asked at UESPWiki:Reference Desk or on an editor's talk page).

That's also probably influenced by my feeling that the "good question" category should focus on article content. This should help to address some of the issues as to what questions warrant being identified as a good question. In other words, a "good question" has to be one that, once answered, will allow the associated article to be improved. If a question is one whose answer will never get incorporated into a UESP article, then it shouldn't be tagged. Also, questions that aren't relevant to a specific article (e.g., a community portal-type questions) wouldn't qualify. The top of the category page could easily point readers to a handful of other discussion pages that can be expected to always contain recent discussion of more general topics. --Nephele^Talk 00:10, 4 January 2008 (EST)

Categorizing articles wouldn't perse mean that only one category will apply to a question. If a question falls between two categories, just add it to both. But as there is already a good categorization for articles (NPCs, Quests, Overviews, Places etc.) there is hardly any need to add a seperate layer of categorization. However, it would be a good idea to use the page trail (which is practically present on every article) as guideline where a question belongs to. This would leave patrollers only to checking the main article to see what trail is present.

I think there should be no time-to-live for questions, mainly because of the reason Nephele just provided. If the questions are categorized by month some moderating is required to keep it clean. Some questions may become irrelevant or be solved by other means. This will leave the question what to do when two questions are very similar. I think adding a header to the questions for links to similar questions is the best solution. Merging such questions would mean that someone has to meddle in other people's comments, and only selecting (the best) one of the questions for "good question" tagging will require difficult judgement calls. --Timenn < talk > 08:20, 4 January 2008 (EST)

I think much of the problem would come from the definition of a "Good Question." What one user believes is a fantastic query maybe another user's idea of complete rubbish. This could cause problems, especially if people start hunting for questions which they then tag just for the sake of it, or to make other editors work for nothing. This *could* cause vandalism, although that assumption is probably unlikely to be realised. Also, instead of just posting a note on an article's talk page, users may tag their own questions to try and get them noticed. If a guideline was introduced to clarify what a good question is, then maybe this idea would shine a little brighter. --HMSVictory 12:13, 4 January 2008 (EST)

The quality of question is going to be something that patrollers will need to look at. Nephele has already given a good answer but it bears summarising: A "Good Question" is one that will benefit the site by being answered. If we eventually go ahead with this, the documentation page could have some examples on it that patrollers and others could use as a guide. If we find that a user is consistently abusing the template by posting on everything they ever ask, it can be dealt with like any other behavioral problem on the site - unofficial warnings, official warnings and then banning. —Rpeh^{•T•C•E•} 13:05, 4 January 2008 (EST)

After due deliberation, I have decided at how I believe this should be taken forward. A trial period, as mentioned before, would be an excellent way of testing how competent the idea is. If this is to go ahead, however, it should be made clear to all editors that this is available, so as to provide more accurate results from a wider range of participants. If we end up with a flood of "Good Questions," then maybe we should re-calibrate the process. If we are presented with sparsely placed and well-balanced judgments, then it is clear that this concept should be introduced fully. Personally, I have encountered interesting questions on talk pages asked months ago without reply, so I am certainly not against this proposal. --HMSVictory 07:04, 5 January 2008 (EST)

As I understand it, the {{Good Question}} template idea is to create a meta-editing tool, intended primarily for use by patrollers and admins to ensure that important points a) get noticed by experienced contributors, and b) prompt the "hmmm" reaction from casual visitors. It would implicitly be bad taste to flag one's own questions this way; but of course people will do this. There are also problems of persistence and usefulness over time. I do understand and embrace the basic concept, and agree that reasonable usage patterns should evolve through practice. However, this situation suggests to me that we are looking for a kind of editorial tool that doesn't currently exist. (This situation also applies to Wikipedia.) We don't have an easy way for patrollers, admins, and "serious" contributors (whatever that means) to flag content for special attention, other than the category system and normal talk page use. It's as if we want a new kind of talk page that is strictly for meta-editing – for flagging content, suggesting changes, etc. Failing that approach (which is obviously a non-starter), the right kind of template(s) could be helpful. They would need to be branded with a different set of usage guidelines – e.g. suggesting that insertion/deletion/modification of the template be permissible within talk page contents, but presumably only by some approved class of patrollers/admins. This is obviously an elitist non-Wiki concept, but if we're talking about guidelines rather than strict rules, or something based on the number of edits a given user has made, it could pass muster as a community consensus. Hmmm. Not sure if my point is coming through here. The template sounds like a good idea; but does this discussion suggest that there is a set of similar meta-editing tasks, performed by patrollers and admins, that might be better supported through tools that are orthogonal to the normal article editing and category mechanisms? I have no proposal other than to go ahead with the suggested template, but if there is a *right* solution it will have implications on every Wiki. Spinality 02:14, 6 January 2008 (EST)

Okay, since everybody seems to be saying "Good idea" to at least some extent, I've gone ahead and created the template. We now have the Good Question template and a couple new categories, plus the first marked question. Let's see how this works and tweak as required. —Rpeh^{•T•C•E•} 03:46, 6 January 2008 (EST)

One last thought - should the templates come off once the question is answered or instead, accept a second parameter that would change the appearance and add the page to a sub-category so we can keep track of which questions were answered? Or is that over-complicating things? –Rpeh^{•T•C•E•} 14:03, 8 January 2008 (EST)

At first thought, that does seem to be kind of overly complicated. I would think that the template would be removed when it is no longer one of the "questions needing answers." --GuildKnight^Talk2me 17:50, 8 January 2008 (EST)

I'm inclined to agree with GuildKnight. Keeping the templates around seems overly complicated, perhaps in part because I don't immediately see the benefit of keeping track of answered questions. For example, other "good" questions that could be answered right away (without ever getting tagged) aren't being tagged or kept track of. --Nephele^Talk 00:30, 9 January 2008 (EST)

Yeah I thought so. Always worth asking the question though! –Rpeh^{•T•C•E•} 01:49, 9 January 2008 (EST)

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