Template talk:ArticleHistory

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January - February 2007

This template combines all the featured content-related templates into one, to reduce clutter on talk pages, and make it less confusing when an article has had multiple FACs, FARs or been demoted and repromoted etc. Good Article status, Articles for Deletion, Peer reviews and WikiProject reviews can also be included.

The parameter currentstatus controls what text appears at the top of the box, a set of parameters of the form |action1= |action1date=|action1link=|action1result=|action1oldid= produces a row in the history section at the bottom of the box. Action1 refers to the earliest event.

This template should not (and cannot) be used for nominating articles for processes such as featured article candidate or featured article review.


Contents

[edit] FFA/GA, but no FFAC/GA?

Am I correct to assume that a former featured article candidate, which is a good article, is best described as "FFAC"? I'm confused because there is a FFA/GA, but no FFAC/GA. --Merzul 13:45, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

Ok, learning to read does help... GA already says "Good article which is not a former featured article" :), so it's not as confusing; still maybe a little... --Merzul 13:51, 24 February 2007 (UTC)
FFA/GA is the only combination status. There are currently about 350 former featured articles. If such an article later becomes a GA, the FA folks wanted the former featured status still displayed. A former featured article candidate (FFAC), on the other hand is an article which did not pass at FAC - there are a couple thousand of such articles. If one is or later becomes a good article, it is a GA. Gimmetrow 14:35, 24 February 2007 (UTC)
Ok, but this means I really should learn to read :). I should denote it as "GA"; thanks! --Merzul 14:45, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

What about FAs which were formerly GAs? Can/should I use both GAN and FAC? --kingboyk 00:25, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Not entirely sure what you are asking. The idea of {{ArticleHistory}} is to list every completed review-like event, so it will easily have multiple GAN and FAC events listed, and perhaps others, like Talk:Pericles or Talk:Edwin Taylor Pollock (Note that the fac on the latter is outside ArticleHistory, as it is not yet a completed event). The currentstatus is the current state of the article, and GAs promoted to FA are simply FA. (They are unlisted from WP:GA.)
It was probably a dumb question, but I was actually asking the question you answered :) The relevant talk pages have been updated, and thanks again for your help. --kingboyk 17:53, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

The only combo currentstatus currently supported is FFA/GA, and as presently implemented, FFA/GA is a display option for GA. It makes the icons smaller to fit both the FFA and GA text. Compare Talk:Euro and Talk:Algorithm. Gimmetrow 00:48, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Excellent...

I tried it on Talk:God, and looking for the dates and picking appropriate old IDs was the only thing that took a very long time; but that's obviously not the fault of this template I think. There was just one detail I think needs fixing, when you flag an article as "FFAC" (which in this case was wrong); the text talks about the "Featured Article" history; but the history is called "Article Milestones". Anyway, this has to be the best template I've seen so far! :) --Merzul 15:06, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

I second that. It's a work of art! :) --kingboyk 17:54, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] A template to subst?

I was thinking, a subst-only template which takes the number of actions as a parameter and outputs a skeleton {{ArticleHistory}} would be really handy. --kingboyk 13:18, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

On second thoughts, I suppose the conditional code would end up being subst'd too, so this wouldn't work. I could perhaps create some skeleton templates such as AH2, AH3, AH4 and so on. Good idea or bad? --kingboyk 17:54, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
Do people really want to fill in this template by hand? Gimmetrow 18:02, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
That's how I've been doing it... I wasn't aware there is an alternative. --kingboyk 18:15, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
Well, a bot is converting featured articles over. Once the bot has been through an article, if it has missed anything (such as an old GA pass or fail that was deleted from the talk page), you add a few fields for it. Gimmetrow 18:31, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
That's how I've been doing it too, although I refuse to do oldids. Raul654 19:20, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
Then why not let the code do it? Gimmetrow 20:07, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

I've found lots of errors in templates done manually; best to wait for the bot to get to them. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 00:06, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] FA of the day

I really love how the template takes an article's front page date and prior to that date says "will be on the front page" and after that says "was on the front page". How about a small tweak so that if the date is today's date it says "*is* on the front page"? --kingboyk 22:01, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

OK. Gimmetrow 22:43, 9 March 2007 (UTC)
Thanks! And it was done just in time for me to see it at Talk:The KLF. Much appreciated! --kingboyk 22:51, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Former FTs

There is now one topic that has lost FT status (and a second on the way), so this template should probably get a FTRC action. We can probably keep it simple and only tag the main article as a former FT like we do with failed FT nominations. On second thought, we might as well tag all members of a former FT. The "ftmain=" paramater would not have to get involved in any way, it would just be a matter of adding a new action. It would be confusing if someone knew that a page used to be part of a FT bus saw no evidence of it. --Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 21:54, 12 March 2007 (UTC)

This is a good idea, and will be added eventually. Gimmetrow 04:14, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
Change to Final Fantasy featured topics populated the error category. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:33, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Current status

Current status doesn't recognize A class articles, if anyone feels compelled to add that. Thanks, Doctor Sunshine talk 19:49, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

A-class is attributed on a project-by-project basis, whereas theotehr are community sel;ected. That's why A-class is not a recognized status.Circeus 19:55, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Cscr-featuredtopic.png

Image:Cscr-featuredtopic.png was listed at Category:Images which should be in SVG format. I converted to SVG; the new version is Image:Cscr-featuredtopic.svg (imaginative filename). This image is used in this template, but I've been scared off by the dire warning to would-be editors. I'm guessing that I would do as I do everywhere else, and replace the occurrence of Cscr-featuredtopic.png with Cscr-featuredtopic.svg in the source, but don't want to have to spend an afternoon fixing collateral damage if that isn't the case. Can someone confirm/deny/edit this for me? Cheers, Stannered 14:47, 20 March 2007 (UTC)

Switching images is fine. I think the concern is breaking the numerous nested parserfunctions. Gimmetrow 15:18, 20 March 2007 (UTC)
Fab - done! Stannered 15:22, 20 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] OldID documentation

I think the template docs would benefit from some instruction on how to fill in the "oldid" line. Here's what I suggest:

The "oldid" is a several-digit number which refers to the exact version of the page at the time of that particular action. This version can then be viewed when a user clicks on the date in the list of milestones.

There are multiple ways to obtain an oldid. For example, while looking at a page's history, it should be possible to hover the mouse over the date of a particular change, and then the URL will appear at the bottom of the window in the browser's status bar:

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Main_Page&oldid=89723590

In the above example, the final number, 89723590 is what should be used in the oldid field.

This number can also be obtained by stepping through the diffs in an article's history, and looking for the oldid in the URL line.

When dealing with a large number of possible changes, researching each oldid can become tedious. In this case, it can be helpful to use a javascript tool made by Dr pda. To use it:

  • Add {{subst:js|User:Dr pda/articlehistory.js}} to your monobook.js page.
  • Refresh your browser cache
  • In your browser toolbox along the lefthand side of the page, you should now see an additional link entitled "Article History"
  • Clicking on the link while you are at an article's talkpage, will search the talkpage history for notable events related to the article, and then display a list of these dates and the associated edit summaries
  • Next to each summary is the word (oldid) Clicking on it will provide the associated article oldid for that timestamp.
  • For further documentation, see: User:Dr pda/articlehistory.js.

How's that look? Or would it be better to make an oldid section somewhere else, like WP:DIFF, and then link there? --Elonka 02:47, 21 March 2007 (UTC)

Looks like a very useful suggestion, although I am not so much an expert in these things.... :-) Walter Ching 06:46, 22 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Possible change needed

Today's main page FA's talkpage (Talk:Fourth International) is listed in both Category:Wikipedia featured articles and Category:Wikipedia featured article candidates (contested). I suspect that this is because there are details of a past unsuccessful FA nomination in its {{ArticleHistory}}. If I'm right, can the template be changed so that it does not add articles to that category once there has been a subsequent successful FA candidacy listed in it? WjBscribe 03:41, 22 March 2007 (UTC)

This behaviour would have happened with the older templates, if a featured and facfailed were on the same page. What is the contested category used for? Could it be eliminated entirely? Gimmetrow 12:20, 22 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Proposal for Template

May I propose this?

  1. To rename Date to Version. This seems to convey exactly what is in the column.
  2. Add a column or something separated by slash in the same Version column to put down the Talk Page at that time of that Version. I thought of this when Elonka made a useful edit at an article history template, showing the Talk Page at the moment when the GA template was put by someone. This would give the reader an insight into the discussions at that time of that particular version.
  3. Add a place when it was linked to High Traffic Site.

Hope this is ok! :-) Walter Ching 06:45, 22 March 2007 (UTC)

Who would be adding the talk page version info to the template? High traffic seems a little outside the scope of this template, which is meant for review-related events. Gimmetrow 12:42, 22 March 2007 (UTC)
Ok, agreed as to high traffic issue. :-) As for talk page info, I suppose the same Wikipedians who were interested to fill up the other info will do it? As to Date to Version, this is my number one proposal. Hope this latter is ok? Thanks, Gimmetrow! Walter Ching 06:10, 23 March 2007 (UTC)
I'm not following; currently, we have date and version, which is useful. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:48, 23 March 2007 (UTC)
When no oldid is provided, there is no linked version, just a date. Gimmetrow 16:27, 23 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] oldid error

Could you someone please take a look at Talk:Mackinac Island. The oldids I put in this template on that page show 'Error: invalid time'. I've rechecked the oldid values at least three times. Dr. Cash 23:32, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

Fixed (twice). SandyGeorgia (Talk) 01:16, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Good article reviews

Hey, I've come across a small thing that should be addressed: there should be a "listed" option for the Good Article Review parameter, since articles that failed their nomination can be reviewed and promoted. Teemu08 14:12, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Breaks Special:Recentchangeslinked

I'm not sure how many other projects use these special pages, but for pages that have begun using this template, change lists such as Special:Recentchangeslinked/Wikipedia:WikiProject_Board_and_table_games no longer show changes to those articles. This breaks a useful feature of WikiProject banners, which is that they can be used to quickly obtain a list of changes related to a WikiProject. Is there a solution for this? —ptk✰fgs 06:48, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

I fail to see how this template could affect that. Raul654 07:39, 27 March 2007 (UTC)
Oh my, I've come to the wrong talk page. Sorry about that! —ptk✰fgs 08:18, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] DRV

Can someone set up DRV syntax? Lexicon (talk) 23:54, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

Like what? Examples? Gimmetrow 00:17, 29 March 2007 (UTC)
I dunno, it doesn't matter what it looks like--the same as AFD, I guess. It simply cannot list DRV as it now stands. Lexicon (talk) 15:19, 5 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] 2nd Featured Topic

I'm not sure whether or not this would be too complicated, but I was thinking that we should have the option of allowing people to enter a second Featured topic. There have already been two articles which were members of more than one FT, and another is two more are in nomination. I was thinking that the first FT could use the existing code, and a second one could be added with ft2name= and ft2main=. For example, for the currently nominated FF8 article, it could be:
|FTname=Final Fantasy titles
|FTmain=no
|FT2name=Final Fantasy VIII
|FT2main=yes.
--Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 01:01, 30 March 2007 (UTC)

If no one gets back to me before some articles get a second FT, I guess I'll try to add the parameter to the template myself based on the existing code for the FT parameters. I think I understand this well enough to edit, but if I end up screwing up the template, I'll revert. --Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 16:59, 2 April 2007 (UTC)
Over my head; post a note to Gimmetrow (talk • contribs). SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:09, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

There really should be a better long-term way to handle FTs. Is it possible that an article could be the main article on two FTs? Gimmetrow 17:20, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

I think that this template handles FTs very well, and adding optional ft2name and ft2main parameters should be good enough to fix this problem. In almost all cases, an article in two FTs will be the main article in one topic and a member article in the other. I think there could, however, be a few cases where an article could be the main one of two topics. Off the top of my head, for example, a singer-turned-actor could have a "movies staring John Doe" topic and an "albums by John Doe" topic which would both use the "John Doe" article as their main one. --Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 18:03, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Help fix my code

I've almost got FT2 right, but I had to add an ft2link= paramiter because the original ftname= parameter assumes the link of the =ftc action link. Right now I have:

[[{{#ifeq: {{{ft2link|}}}||{{{ft2link}}}|}}|identified]]

and I want it to link to whatever the ft2link= paramiter is, but it is just giving me the word "identified". What am I doing wrong? --Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 04:20, 5 April 2007 (UTC)

Easiest would be to combine this with the the regular FT text, and if a second FT parameter exists, it gives both topics it's part of as one text. There isn't really a need for these links since they are part of the milestones. Gimmetrow 04:26, 5 April 2007 (UTC)
In fact, the way it is currently coded appears to have a bug, if an article is part of one FT then is nominated as part of another which fails, the failed FTC seems to be linked. This can't happen with current FAs and FLs because the latest FAC or FLC must have been a success or the article wouldn't be FA/FL. Gimmetrow 04:32, 5 April 2007 (UTC)
The easiest way to fix that would be to make an ftlink= parameter in addition to the ft2link= parameter. So, how can I fix my #ifeq line to say "put whatever is indicated in the ftlink parameter here"? --Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 04:38, 5 April 2007 (UTC)
Solved it. I should have been using #if rather than #ifeq. --Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 04:49, 5 April 2007 (UTC)
There really is no point having the links in the displayed text - they are going to be listed below. How's the combined version? Gimmetrow 04:54, 5 April 2007 (UTC)
This seems to look good now. Thanks for your help. --Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 04:55, 5 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] How many articles use this template?

How many articles use this template? I make it somewhere around 2500. So how many should be using it? Anyone have any stats for number of FAs, FFACs, GAa, and so on? Can such stats be generated from the template itself (using what links here)? Carcharoth 15:45, 5 April 2007 (UTC)

Gimmetrow (mostly) and I have carefully worked through all FA article lists that should have it, and all links to old FA templates. All FAs and FFAs currently have it (you can see the tally of the number of each at WP:FA and WP:FFA). All WP:FACs that weren't promoted (failed) since January have it. All WP:FARs since about January have it. Many FACs that failed during 2006 or prior don't yet have it; what prevents us from adding those is simple; most of the old GAs don't have complete templates on their pages, and searching for and adding back in the oldids will be a pain. Some GAs have it, but that has been sporadic—Gimmetrow will have a better answer—but since GA is such a random process anyway, it's hard to get it fully implemented there. As far as I know, the template is implemented about as fully as we can accomplish for the FA process; holdups are at GA. Not sure what you really want to know; give me a better idea and I can better answer. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:54, 5 April 2007 (UTC)
I suppose what I really wanted to know was how "completely implemented" the template was. And your answer pretty much answered that question. Can't a similar code be used to search for when the "GA" template was added to the talk page, and then suggest an oldid update? Carcharoth 16:17, 5 April 2007 (UTC)
Dr pda's script is rendered useless on GAs because *SO* many reviewers don't use edit summaries when passing GA and/or don't add the oldid. Once, I decided to start working on this, and it was taking me up to ten minutes to find each oldid on GA. I don't think it's worth it. Now, if someone wants to encourage THEM to go through the entire list of GAs, and make sure the talk page has an oldid on the GA template, we might have a whole 'nother story. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:20, 5 April 2007 (UTC)
Just checked the data by checking What Links Here on {{Facfailed}}; there are currently about 1,250 old facfailed that don't have the ArticleHistory template. If you start looking at them, you'll get a sampling of how many have missing pieces (either peer review or GA oldid, for example). SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:28, 5 April 2007 (UTC)
The bot also has some code to try to find the GA oldid if not present. In addition to the problem Sandy mentions, some talk pages are archived by moving, splitting the edit history. Also sometimes the GA template has a date rather than an oldid. (This is actually better for ArticleHistory, even though it's wrong in the GA template...) Gimmetrow 16:29, 5 April 2007 (UTC)
Which reminds me ... GAC instructions say to add oldid on GA passing, but date on GA failing. Inconsistent, confusing. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:36, 5 April 2007 (UTC)
On the other hand, 'only' 2050 GAs. I had a look, and some really do look quite nice (of course, looks aren't everything). It would be nice to get them all covered by this. I might even demote some of the less 'nice-looking' GAs. After reading them, of course. Carcharoth 16:50, 5 April 2007 (UTC)
To accomplish implementation on all GAs, you'd need to get a drive at the GA Project for editors to 1) upload Dr pda (talk • contribs)'s article history script, 2) go through all 2000 GAs and check for oldid to add back to the GA template (and peer reviews and facfaileds while they're in there), 3) make sure templates for all other pieces indicated in Dr pda's script are accurately listed on the talk page with no dead links (that includes old archived facfaileds and peer reviews), and 4) put a worklist of talk pages here that are GimmeBot-ready so that Gimmetrow can run through them and convert all the templates to articlehistory. (We've found it's not optimal for editors to be manually installing articlehistory themselves, as there are usually errors—better to let Gimmetrow run GimmeBot.) It's a lot of work; that's what Gimme and I did on all the FAs. Of course, while you're in a talk page, might as well group the articlehistory templates together, and add the banners, too :-) (Isn't it nice of me to volunteer Gimmetrow's time—if someone takes this on and starts the list on the work page, I can help review the article pages for readiness :-) SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:00, 5 April 2007 (UTC)
OK. I've started a thread over there here. If you could, please clarify what I've said, especially what you mean by "GimmeBot-ready". Carcharoth 22:12, 5 April 2007 (UTC)
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