Topic on Project:Village Pump

Whatamidoing (WMF) (talkcontribs)

Hi everyone,

I'm not sure that this is the right place to ask, but I figure that someone here will know: I have an idea that I'd like to run past you all. One of the things that I do (and need to do more of soon) is make screenshots for help documentation. Especially for VisualEditor, there's a lot of this, and all of it needs to be produced in a couple dozen languages. The contents of the screenshots therefore varies a lot between languages, and also through the history of the page, as different people used different pages at different times.

What I'd like is a fake "article" or page that:

  • contains only public domain images and CC-0 text,
  • uses most of the core wikitext markup (bold, italics, sections, images, references, lists, tables, etc.), and
  • could be translated into any language.

Do we have something like this already? Does anyone foresee any problems or have any advice if I create one?

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SamanthaNguyen (talkcontribs)

This would create an accessibility issue because it's not actual text, but text within graphics. Screen readers can't read these, so this method isn't suggested :( Also, help pages are bound to be edited, so if you want to provide up-to-date information you'd have take another screenshot for every revision (or every 5 revisions per say?) These files would be bigger too than just actual characters (letters, symbols, numbers) which are a byte each, so performance is another issue.

It is an interesting idea, but I'm not sure what advantages this could have.

Whatamidoing (WMF) (talkcontribs)

I think you've misunderstood. I don't want screenshots of the help pages; I want screenshots in the help pages. "Type the data in the blank field labeled 'TYPE HERE'" is easier for most people to understand if those instructions are next to a picture of a blank field labeled 'TYPE HERE' (and maybe with circles and arrows and half of a word typed there).

Most of my screenshots need to show Wikipedia-style articles, which means that I'm always creating different bits of articles just to make a screenshot (like this one). I was thinking that if I made a whole article, that nobody would have to keep creating bits and pieces.

Jdforrester (talkcontribs)

We already have software that automatically takes screenshots in multiple languages. The problem is not having content.

John Broughton (talkcontribs)

I think a fake article is a good idea. And if it was on astronomy (mentioned elsewhere), you could look at NASA topics, such as https://www.nasa.gov/topics/journeytomars/index.html or https://www.nasa.gov/topics/solarsystem/index.html .

Still, I wonder if you're overthinking this. If the article is about a fake topic, where all the words are your own, then you don't have to worry about copyright issues. I'm not suggesting you spend a lot of time creating content - rather, that you modify an existing topic. And images from the Commons shouldn't raise any copyright issues.

So, specifics - I suggest using a Simple English article, not an article from the main English Wikipedia, as your base, because the translation should be easier. And, looking at the most recent "very good articles" - https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Very_good_articles - one jumps out (to me) as most useful: https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hurricane_Vince_(2005) . That's because the images for an article on hurricanes can all be from NOAA, and thus public domain. (There are actually three articles about hurricanes, of the ten listed; you could also use https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tropical_Depression_Ten_(2005) for some wording.)

Or, to return to your original idea, consider https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andromeda_galaxy - you can name your own galaxy, rather than your own hurricane.

Whatamidoing (WMF) (talkcontribs)

I've started this at Help:Sample page and used it for a series of new screenshots that I added to Help:VisualEditor/User guide. I'm still sorting out what content will be convenient, but so far I think this is going to be a practical solution to my screenshot problems. Also, when I'm a little further along, I think it will need a re-write with Simple English in mind, as John suggested.

I think I'm going to need to import at least simple versions of a couple of popular template styles, so that I can show template uses in a page. Maybe a simple infobox and a common citation template would be sufficient.

Whatamidoing (WMF) (talkcontribs)

Also some type of template that is normally subst:ed. The VisualEditor documentation shows a barnstar, which is not ideal for that context. (VisualEditor is usually disabled on discussion pages.)

John Broughton (talkcontribs)

I'm not convinced that template substitution is worth including; it is vanishingly rare in articlespace. But if you're determined, you might use <nowiki>{{No more links}}</nowiki>, as mentioned at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Substitution#Article_namespace .

Whatamidoing (WMF) (talkcontribs)

I've added an old (non-Lua) copy of {{Cite journal}} for this project. I figured that, of the common types, it was the least likely to be (mis)used in other pages on mediawiki.org. I'm still thinking about an infobox. {{infobox person}} might work, since it's common, but there should be no use for that template in the mainspace. If someone has other ideas, then feel free to let me know.

Whatamidoing (WMF) (talkcontribs)

Update: I think it's nearly done. I still need to add a non-citation template (probably an infobox) and maybe some computer code. If someone wants to make a "Hello, World" section with his or her favorite (and not too complicated, please) computer code, then that would be great.

Whatamidoing (WMF) (talkcontribs)

It's just amazing how many fiddly little features VisualEditor supports these days. I need a template that doesn't display on the page. Something like Template:Use British English would work fine, except that it doesn't exist at mw.org. Is there anything here? I could always import it if that were necessary, but I'm hoping to find something that's already here/useful for other purposes.

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