Talk pages consultation 2019/Current feedback

This page seeks to document in a precise manner the feedback, both past and current, about talk pages, Flow, and LiquidThreads. Ideally it will eventually contain what about each feature works, what doesn't work, what could be added, how widely each is used, and references. This page will not be used for communication, but rather for organizing points raised via other communication avenues.

What works

 * Finding specific discussions can be done with MediaWiki's search feature.
 * Watching changes and patrolling vandalism can be done with MediaWiki's features to watch article content
 * Compact view
 * Flexibility

Suggestions

 * Archive bots
 * Potential conflict: Korean Wikipedia for instance, prefers archiving to be done by hand


 * Archive prompt
 * Easy prompt to assist in archiving talk pages (eg duration, number of remaining posts, and desired archive box)


 * Avatars
 * Avatars and/or profile photos included in replies can make things less sterile.


 * Create topic
 * Make it clear how and where


 * Link permanence
 * Especially when archived, links to specific discussions break, forcing users to locate the archive and then perform CTRL+F in order to find their desired subject(s)
 * One solution might be when clicking on a link to a section that no longer exists, it no longer redirects to the page but to the search page which includes both the original page as well as the title of the subheading. Of course this would exclude links to articles in the main namespace.


 * Mentions
 * No way to know if you are mentioned in a conversation.
 * Using "@" can help and is intuitive especially when paired with autosuggest.
 * This could also make "where do I post a reply" a moot point


 * Quoting


 * Reply to comment
 * Made difficult for newcomers especially with repeated usage of ":".
 * There is no apparent "reply" feature, as is present on modern platforms.


 * Signatures automatic


 * Thread post notification
 * Make individual threads watchable, rather than the entire page.


 * Time stamps adaptive
 * Shorten the length of time stamps as time goes on to inhibit page bloat.
 * Perhaps dynamically: for instance, anything more than 3 hours old suppresses the minutes and seconds, anything more than two days old suppresses the time of day.


 * Upvoting
 * Or some obvious way to rank or otherwise note how useful (or not) comments and posts are
 * Pairing this with a "sort by votes" can help distill thread contents and make it a quicker read


 * Visual Editor option

What works

 * Structured-by-software discussion system which allows watching topics
 * Dedicated notifications when a reply is received or a topic is appreciated
 * Clear design for adding new topics and editing messages
 * Better integration and use on mobile
 * Mentioning (pinging), thanking, and replying to other users is easier

Suggestions

 * Compact view
 * More white space than original system. Leads to much more scrolling.


 * Edit others' comments
 * Users, barring admins etc., should not be able to edit other users' comments.


 * Filter open/closed topics


 * Flexibility
 * Allow for flexibility that is close to or on par with wikitext editing.


 * Internal search


 * Move topics
 * Ways to split, merge, move, or relocate topics or parts of topics.


 * Topic summary improvement


 * Vandalism
 * Counter-vandalism is more complicated. Needs to be improved.

What worked

 * A simplified post/reply workflow so new users can jump into the discussion.
 * Simple management of threads, including automation of archival, refactoring, and other tasks currently undertaken by bots and humans.
 * A flexible notification system, allowing users to keep abreast of developments in areas in which they are interested, ranging from entire discussion pages to discussion fragments.
 * Support for following discussion pages with RSS feeds.
 * Flexible post ordering, allowing users to keep track of which threads on a talk page are dead, and which threads are active.
 * An AJAX-based interface that allows users to quickly post and reply to other posts, without clumsy page loading.
 * Automatic signatures.