Template talk:Spoken Wikipedia

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Template:Spoken Wikipedia is permanently protected from editing, as it is a heavily used or visible template.

Substantial changes should be proposed here, and made by administrators if the proposal is uncontroversial, or has been discussed and is supported by consensus. Use {{editprotected}} to attract the attention of an administrator in such cases.
Any contributor may edit the template's documentation to add usage notes, categories or interwiki links.

[edit] Date

Wouldn't it be nice to record the date the recording was made, so that users can actually tell how up-to-date it is?

Not just the date, record the exact revision it was taken. Also a link to the comparison between that revision and the current revision (i.e. the equivalent of clicking the (cur) link adjacent to that revision on the history page) might be useful. Thryduulf 09:11, 17 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Unfortunately, you can only link to old revisions or the (ever-moving) current revision - there's no permanent address for the revision that is currently visible. A null edit serves as a workaround. --Andrew 09:17, Apr 17, 2005 (UTC)

hmm, true at present, although I understand the developers are working on this. Another work around is to view the newest non-current revision and then click the link to view the newer edit. I think this generates a permanent url that basically says link to the version that is one newer than the one with the id given. Thryduulf 12:34, 17 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I don't think so: Doing that on this page gives you the URL http://...Template_talk:Spoken_Wikipedia&redirect=no, whereas a permanent revision URL is of the form http://...Template_talk:Spoken_Wikipedia&oldid=12429402. Maybe as a temporary measure, until there is a fix in the code, the template should contain a timestamp of when it was created? Or else just have the poster first add the template and then find the revision URL of the previous version. — Asbestos | Talk 10:02, 18 Apr 2005 (UTC)

For what it's worth, what I've done is edit the article in question, to add the link to the spoken version of the article... Then gone back to get the link for the version of the article before I added that link - and made that the version referred to on the Image: page for the audio file. - MykReeve T·C 18:32, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I've copied this discussion to Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Spoken Wikipedia, where other project participants may see it. Demi ^T/_C 21:13, 2005 Apr 18 (UTC)

Almost without exception, I find a small error or a patch of rough wording in the articles I'm recording. Maybe I should record better articles, but I just make my edits (many of which are not even really audible--punctuation or typo fixes, for example-- and use THAT version. It's basically the null editing workaround..but editing something. Ckamaeleon ((T)) 20:50, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

P.S.-- Until somebody raises a really strong objection, I will continue to modify my GFDL disclaimer to read

"This sound file, recorded {recording date}, and all text in the article, are licenced under the Gnu Free Documentation licence, available at ...." {emphasis not spoken}

My logic is that by including the date in the disclaimer, the listener will always have it, even if the date of the file changes (as it might through copying or transferring between machines. I would secretly like this to become Project-wide policy, but I'm not really going to push for it. Ckamaeleon ((T)) 07:01, 26 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Category name

"Wikipedia Spoken Wikipedia" just sounds odd for a category name. How about "Articles in Spoken Wikipedia", which doesn't leave any room for confusion. --brian0918 ™ 19:43, 18 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Are there any plans to start spoken.wikipedia.org, or en.spoken... or spoken.en...? How about Category:Wikipedia spoken articles, which collectively names what's in the category? —Michael Z. 2005-04-18 20:05 Z
- You can change the category name if you want, but be advised that you have to make edits to all the articles currently in the original category before they'll display in the new category. --brian0918 ™ 20:13, 18 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Whatever the name, it needs to be generic and not have the word 'Wikipedia' in it since reusers of Wikipedia content are not named Wikipedia. Also - no link to the Wikipedia namespace is allowable since many reusers delete those pages (and if they didn't, it would confuse their readers). An external link to the help page is tolerable, however. --mav 16:47, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)

This is no more self-referential than any of the other navigational or meta templates described in no self-references. A mirror that doesn't want the project namespace can remove or edit this template when they're removing or editing the others. Providing a URL removes a mirror's ability to add their own audio help or serve their own copies of spoken articles. The thrust of the self-reference policy is to make sure article text makes sense and is portable--it isn't intended to quash notes like those from the Wikiquote or Commons "more material" templates (which do not use external links). Demi ^T/_C 18:23, 2005 Apr 22 (UTC)

Your argument falls on this point; if a third party user wants to have their own list of spoken articles, then they would simply change their version of this template. Most won't and many of those will not have any pages in the wikipedia namespace. An external link works for everybody. --mav 20:25, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)

And if a user wants to use our list of spoken articles (despite the fact they are not affiliated with the foundation), then they can certainly add their link. I don't see the problem. Would one use the same reasoning to make all the "help Wikipedia" links in the hundreds of stub templates external? I don't think you've addressed why those are correct but this one is not. I appreciate the discussion, by the way. Demi ^T/_C 21:02, 2005 Apr 22 (UTC)

The problem is that many reusers delete the Wikipedia namespace pages or otherwise don't have them. Thus any internal link to that namespace would be broken for them. Things like stub pages are fundamentally difference because those type of messages are not designed to be permanent parts of the article. --mav 21:43, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)

How will all the [[Wikiquote: and [[Wikisource: and [[Commons: links remain intact for third parties? --brian0918 ™ 22:30, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Those are not internal links. --mav 23:03, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)

What about Wikipedia:Spoken articles? --Dante Alighieri | Talk 18:33, Apr 22, 2005 (UTC)

Right--that's where the link now points, after my edit. The previous version had it as an external link (an embedded URL pointing to the same page). Demi ^T/_C 18:36, 2005 Apr 22 (UTC)
Yeah, I agree with Demi. mav is wrong. ;P --Dante Alighieri | Talk 18:37, Apr 22, 2005 (UTC)

Self-references are tolerable within templates like this because reusers can rework them with little difficulty. — Matt Crypto 18:50, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Expecting them to edit hundreds of templates is not reasonable. --mav 20:26, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)

That isn't the point--please read Wikipedia:no self-references: self-referencing within a pointer template like this one is specifically allowed. This is no more or less a nuisance for a mirror than any of the other navigational templates currently in articles, that make reference to discussion or processes outside of articles. In addition, making this an external link makes all those mirrors link back to our list of spoken articles (served by wikimedia) when they should be linking to theirs; or, if they do not want to serve the spoken versions, they can eliminate the template completely, which is presumably what they do for the many templates listed at Wikipedia:no self-references. Demi ^T/_C 20:41, 2005 Apr 22 (UTC)

"Limited use of self-references are sometimes found in the Template namespace and the Category namespace, such as with disambiguation and stub notices. Expanding this to other areas is not encouraged due to the need of third party users to either delete those templates or modify them to remove the Wikipedia references." This is a clear expansion into that area. A mutually-acceptable compromise is needed. Using categories can do this. A {{{SubCat}}} variable can be used to generate sub categories for Category:Spoken articles. The Wikipedia page that lists these would be linked from the TFA template for FAs and maybe from the talk pages of articles with spoken versions. --mav 21:39, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)

How do you think they get all the articles from here onto their site? They don't do it manaully, they have bots do it for them. It would take a bot all of 3 seconds to switch all the links from [[Wikipedia: to [[Thirdpartypedia: --brian0918 ™ 20:31, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Why should they have to do that in the first place? A way around this is to just use categories. --mav 21:39, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Because? Why should we bend over backwards to make things trivially easier for a bot when it makes sense for human users to do it a different way? --Dante Alighieri | Talk 21:59, Apr 22, 2005 (UTC)

Most third party users do not use bots. In cases where they do they often use them badly, such as finding each instance of 'Wikipedia' and replacing it with their site's name. --mav 23:02, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)

If third parties use bots badly then that, in all fairness, is their problem, and not ours. — Matt Crypto 23:10, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)

The main point is that they most often don't use them at all. Our content should be as easy to use as possible. Having numerous self refs does not help that. --mav 23:20, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)

What about stub templates? There's billions of those, and they're all "self-referencing" according to your definition. You care so much about this one but not a bit about those. --brian0918 ™ 22:02, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Those are not supposed to be permanent parts of an article. What's more a future version of MediaWiki could automatically sort any article with a stub tag out of a database dump that third parties could use. So the stub templates are not a good analogy, the various WikiProject templates and featured article templates are. None of those are allowed in articles. --mav 22:53, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Why would we want to keep stubs out of databse dumps? The reusers should be able to decide whether or not they want them. And if they don't want the Wikipedia namespace link, they edit or blank the stub template. If they don't want it here, they edit or blank this template. --SPUI (talk) 23:35, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Mav has been at this before, cut-and-pasting templates like {{expand list}} to the talk pages where they made no sense. I'd advise ignoring him. --SPUI (talk) 22:12, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I've been here shaping policy long, long before you started and will be here long, long after you are gone. And don't think for a minute that you have 'won' that argument you mentioned - the only reason I stopped pushing was because I had a fund drive to run. Sorry, but your single pet template was not as important as making sure we have enough servers. Ignore me? --mav 23:18, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Hah, your elitism is rather amusing. Amusing enough that it probably hurts your argument. --SPUI (talk) 23:35, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Sorry, going to have to echo that. That was insufferably rude of you mav. Burgundavia 23:56, Apr 22, 2005 (UTC)

I'll echo again. Maybe "I'd advise ignoring him" was provocative, but bragging about one's superior importance is very unseemly. Can we just forget the personal comments, and focus on arguments? — Matt Crypto 23:57, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I've created Template:Spoken articles as a less self-referential version of this template. All that will be needed will be to add a SubCat= to each template reference. The category list will then sort things as needed. --mav 23:18, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Thanks, Mav! I think this works nicely, with a wrinkle: Instead of subcategories, let's just keep them in the same category. We'll get around to moving what's at [[Wikipedia:Spoken articles]] to [[Category:Spoken articles]] which will solve the problem I had with the layout of the articles on the Category: page. Demi ^T/_C 01:03, 2005 Apr 23 (UTC)
I think we still need the subcategories, otherwise the page is going to become huge quickly. The main category will have have a list of direct links to all the files (now at Wikipedia:Spoken articles), bypassing the subcategories. --brian0918 ™ 01:32, 23 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Wait, let's see if I get this straight. If we put Wikipedia:WikiProject Spoken Wikipedia in the main namespace, it will be deleted. If we keep it where it is, we can't link to it properly. But if we simply move all that text to the category, it's OK? That somehow seems broken to me; there's no reason for a category if we have the list. --SPUI (talk) 03:09, 23 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Nevertheless, that appears to be agreeable--the list of articles wasn't a "project page" anyway, and brian and I did a crapload of work setting it up that way, specifically to address some of these self-referential concerns. In any case, I've done the simplest implementation of this idea--subcategories may be desirable in the future, but changing the template name and/or arguments means too many edits to do now. The version of the template now in place should be agreeable to everyone, I think. Demi ^T/_C 03:16, 2005 Apr 23 (UTC)

[edit] Location of css code

I think it would probabaly be best to keep the "top: " code in MediaWiki:Monobook.css as the usual code for when the sitenotice isn't around, and just have some temporary code to update the positioning in the template. Updating Monobook.css is a hastle, and the file doesn't refresh for most users until they restart their browsers (or longer depending on their cache settings) so we should avoid ever having to update Monobook.css, and instead where temporary fixes are needed, do them in style= in the templates. Joe D (t) 30 June 2005 13:35 (UTC)

Additionally, it's currently positioning it in the wrong place, so I'll ask for the top: to be reset in Monobook.css. Joe D (t) 30 June 2005 13:37 (UTC)

As of half an hour ago or so, I made some changes to monobook.css relating to this at the request of Chameleon. Do a Ctrl+refresh and see if it's changed for the better. - Mark 30 June 2005 13:39 (UTC)

The latest fix should be permanent. The spoken notice is no longer positioned in the way it way before. Sitenotices should no longer be a problem. All CSS can now be dealt with by the stylesheet. — Chameleon 30 June 2005 14:04 (UTC)

Oh dear, there is a problem. The bit of code that fixed the problem unfortunately causes another problem. It makes horizontal lines go through certain infoboxes in IE, so it has been removed. We need to work around this problem. — Chameleon 2 July 2005 09:44 (UTC)

The "top:" element doesn't work predictably with Internet Exploder -- see bugzilla 2634. — Catherine\^talk 7 July 2005 06:15 (UTC)

I hardwired a top: into the template as a temporary fix, Firefox showed it in a different place to IE and Opera though so I gave up. Joe D (t) 7 July 2005 11:46 (UTC)

Maybe "margin-top:"? — Catherine\^talk 7 July 2005 16:45 (UTC)

[edit] Tables

I would like to change the template to work with tables instead of the div. This would correct the floating nature.

ex: Spoken_Wikipedia#Templates for articles
ex: Paradox

I have the needed skills and experience with HTML to accomplish this.--Kim Nevelsteen 10:36, 23 August 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Location

Where this template should be placed? Top or bottom of articles? I prefer to be located in the bottom of the article, but please specify this detail because there's a little disorder in article that have this template. CG 17:37, 18 September 2005 (UTC)

Raul654 just declared that it is to be placed in the External links section. And usually, what he says, goes. ~MDD 46 96 01:22, 17 January 2006 (UTC)

On Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Spoken Wikipedia I believe there is concensus that this is not the case. Joe D (t) 02:02, 17 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Shouldn't this link to the particular revision that the speaker used...

...and not the Wikipedia articles on that date? Those articles have little to no impact on the spoken version. - Kookykman (talk • contribs)

The date is Wikified, I think, because then it can be altered according to a user's date preferences. Linking to the spoken version might be good but is more complicated (involves figuring out its revision ID or something along those lines). --Fastfission 03:55, 2 December 2005 (UTC)
We already have a talk page template that contains more details and links to the old revision and a diff, this template should be kept simple, IMO. Joe D (t) 23:50, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] lower top code a bit

To me, having it right below the my contributions and my watchlist links, etc. is a tad messy and lowering to say, where the fundraiser notice is right now (and wouldn't disrupt anything) is a better solution. I seek consensus for any objections, first, if not, I'll be bold and just do it. -- Natalinasmpf 03:01, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

That's where it's supposed to be, somebody messed up the code in MediaWiki:Monobook.css and nobody's fixed it yet. See Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Spoken_Wikipedia/Archive_2#Link_at_top_of_article.3F Joe D (t) 03:07, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

Well, now the sitenotice is occupying where it supposedly should be, so I suppose it is now out of the question. -- Natalinasmpf 02:52, 23 December 2005 (UTC)

I'm commenting it out, as it doesn't appear to be working right now; it's colliding with my user toolbox as well. æle ✆ 21:17, 24 December 2005 (UTC)

I highly prefer the placement in the first heading, like they do on [[1]]. Of course, this is problematic... what are we going to do? ~MDD 46 96 21:15, 15 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Spacing

In Safari the text is double-spaced. Is this intentional? It seems unneccesary to me and makes the box twice as big as it needs to be. --Fastfission 23:43, 1 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Icon at the top right

Steinsky, good idea about where to link the icon to; I wasn't entirely happy with what I'd chosen, but couldn't think of something better. Now we have the problem of deciding what to link the icon to in the various "Spoken Wikipedia-n" templates, though. I haven't put the icon in there yet. I was thinking of making one boilerplate template to include the icon and most of the text (the bit that's the same for each Spoken Wikipedia template), so that changes could easily be made all at once to the main Spoken Wikipedia templates (which would just include the boilerplate one). I'm not sure what to do now. Any more of your good ideas? T J McKenzie 01:59, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

Ok, I decided to go with the boilerplate idea, and for now the icon links to the "External links" section of the article for "Spoken Wikipedia-n", since that's where the template should appear, according to the current instructions. Is this a good place to link it to? If not, then it's easy to change, by editing Template:Spoken Wikipedia boilerplate. If it is a good place, should we link Template:Spoken Wikipedia there, too, for consistency? T J McKenzie 04:35, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

Raul, why did you remove the icon? Perhaps you were unaware that I recently put it there (without any words, which used to accompany it) in response to a request from someone who I strongly suspect is a user of spoken articles, rather than a contributor. Perhaps you were unaware of the apparent consensus here, here, and here, that (if possible) there should be something at the top of a spoken article to let people know about it, even if there were a number of ideas about exactly how it should work. Perhaps you think the icon is too intrusive. Does anyone have any ideas about how to less intrusively indicate at the top of a page the existence of a spoken version? T J McKenzie 01:28, 23 February 2006 (UTC)

It's metadata, it's intrusive, and its presence here encourages the others to do the same (and, just for the record, I was even more adamant at opposing its use in the featured articles for which I am the director). We should *not* be screwing with the standard layout of articles in order to advertise wikiprojects or other wikipedia-related processes. Raul654 01:33, 23 February 2006 (UTC)

In this particular instance I think removing the icon was fine. In my browser, after it had been lowered so it wouldn't interfere with the anon-only notice, the heading's line went right through it. ~MDD 46 96 04:11, 23 February 2006 (UTC)

Yes, it was quite close to the line (just below it) in my browser (Firefox 1.0.7) when I was logged in, and a fair way above it when I wasn't.

For the record, MDD, do you still support the idea of having some sort of indication about spoken articles close enough to the top that you don't need to scroll down to see it? You seemed to support it a month ago, when you suggested putting the icon at the beginning of the article, but I note you've always been keen that it should only be there if it doesn't interfere with other things on the page.

And Raul, do you oppose having any such indicator, or would you allow it if it satisfied certain restrictions? T J McKenzie 04:40, 23 February 2006 (UTC)

MDD, how does it look now? In that position, as far as I can tell, it doesn't get run through by the line in Firefox 1.0.7, Konqueror 3.4.3, or IE 6.0. Of course, ideally, an admin would shift the Anonnotice to the left just slightly so that the icon could go back where it was, just to the left of of the featured article star (see here).

Raul, I'm not sure I understand your objection to the icon based on it being metadata. I followed the link you provided, and indeed, I find that an acceptable use of self-reference in an article is "to advertise sister projects and other versions of itself". What is a spoken version of an article if not another version of the article? Besides, all of the self-reference is contained in the {{Spoken Wikipedia}} template. It's there whether it's shown at the top or not. If a mirror can show the icon at the top at all, the icon link will break only if the link in the box at the bottom also breaks. The issue is where the self-reference can be and what it can look like.

How is the icon at the top right intrusive? As far as I remember, I didn't even notice the featured article star until I read about its existence somewhere. Having a little icon at the top right is hardly intrusive "advertising". Its main purpose would be to inform people who already know about the project that a particular article has been covered by the project.

I think your strongest point is that it might encourage other WikiProjects to try to do the same. I already wondered about that myself, and there are a lot of other WikiProjects. I discovered this when I had a look at the entire List of WikiProjects, reading at least the name of each project. I tried to imagine why any of the others could possibly want an icon at the top right. An icon at the top should serve the purpose of letting readers know something they might want to know before they read the article.

Most of the projects are about a particular subject, and were therefore easy to dismiss. You know whether or not an article is about a Philippine writer once you've read the first paragraph. You don't need an icon to tell you that. It's also notable that some of these projects have quite significant "advertising" at the top. For example, WikiProject Numismatics maintains one enormous infobox, which you can see at Quarter (U.S. coin).

Some quality-related projects might mount a better case for an icon. For example, WikiProject General Audience might want to certify certain pages, to indicate that they are suitable for a non-academic audience. However, this really would require the addition of metadata, and it's of disputable benefit to a reader to know an article is accessible to a general audience if it lacks quality in other ways (e.g. accuracy). If they really insisted on having an icon, then it could occupy the space where the featured article star goes, since a featured article must be well written and not go into unnecessary detail, so the "general audience" certificate would be redundant and could be removed when the featured article star is able to replace it. This would avoid an overflow of icons.

One more project I thought a lot about was Project Echo. They seem to have quite a good case for advertising near the top of an article that there are versions in other languages. It would be handy for readers of other languages to know before they struggled through the English one (if they don't have sufficient knowledge of English) that there is a version available in their mother tongue, or another language they have a better grasp of. The thing is, as it should be, this information is already available near the top of an article! With my screen resolution set to 1024x768 (which is what it normally is), I can see at least the top of the "In other languages" box to the left of an article without scrolling down.

I suppose what I'm saying is that if any project has a case for having an icon at the top, the Spoken Wikipedia one does. Now, if the chance is still too great that there'll be an outbreak of icons, then perhaps we could put our information discreetly somewhere else near the top, so that people who want to know which articles have a spoken version can find out easily, without hunting for "External links". Putting it somewhere else might require the addition of another template to every spoken article, though, which you may claim would weaken the portability to mirrors. Do you (or does anyone else) have any other ideas about how readers can be easily informed about which articles have spoken versions?

I look forward to hearing your thoughts. T J McKenzie 03:35, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

I posted a screenshot at http://greendaemon.com/icon.jpg. Things always looks a bit different on my machine because I run it at 125dpi instead of the default 96dpi. My position on this issue is that it would be convenient to have something small at the top of an article, but that at present there's really no good way to do this. I don't like CSS hacks (they are too fussy/inconsistent), or anything instrusive. My main concern is that the infobox is placed somewhere consistent, so that users can expect to find audio recordings in the same place all the time. Something at the top would be nice, but it's not a priority and I don't think it should come at the expense of Wikipedia's overall consistency, or a clean layout. ~MDD 46 96 21:55, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

I only noticed this today, and I'm going to disagree about Raul on this one too like we did on the Featured article/list/etc star: I think this potentially a good idea. It is no more "meta data" than the original template was, or interwiki or catgeory links are.

If this goes ahead, we need to think carefully how it is going to work so we don't end up with hundreds of the dinky things all clashing with each other. Has anyone researched how visually impaired readers use Wikipedia? Does this help? Or does it make things harder for text-to-speech software?

I wonder if there is not a better way of doing this, technically speaking: the interwiki links appear in a special place - could this sort of thing be hard-wired in the same way? -- ALoan (Talk) 17:15, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

I have wondered about how screen readers will deal with it. I suspect that when you press TAB to go through all the hyperlinks, and it gets to that one, it will read the hover-text (which is "This is a spoken article. Click here for more information."). Unfortunately, pressing TAB to go through the links means you have to go a long way to get there, since the order is apparently determined by the order of the code, so the link appears to come during the box, which tends to be quite close to the bottom. Pressing SHIFT-TAB to go backwards through the links doesn't help much either, since you have to go past all the links at the bottom of the page and in the column at the left, first.

As for what order it reads it when you're just reading the page, not pressing TAB to go through the links, I don't know. I don't know if it would read the hover-text at all in that situation. If not, then one thing I've considered is that we could put "Listen" in very tiny writing just above or below the icon. I think if the text appears near the top of the screen, it will be one of the first things to be read, regardless of where it comes in the code. However, I don't know how a screen-reader would handle the column down the left; it might depend on precisely which screen-reader you were using.

I have a vision-impaired relative, so next time I get the chance, I'll test out various things with her screen-reader.

Just for the record, I'm not adamant that it should specifically be an icon in the top-right corner that signifies a spoken article, but there ought to be something near the top to indicate it, preferably something that will be easily spotted both by sighted people who are looking for it, and by screen-readers. T J McKenzie 07:05, 26 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Linking

When I place the cursor over the small speaker icon in Opera 8.51, the title says "Click here for more information". Clicking the image, however, takes me to the image description page with no more information. Could this be fixed? (Editing templates looks gibberish to me...) –Mysid 10:15, 1 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Nominated for deletion

I have nominated this template (specifically, the icon at the top-right of the template) for deletion. Raul654 22:35, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Icon at the top-right, pt 2

Per comments on the TFD (and apparently misunderstanding as to what was actually being proposed for deletion - my nomination only extended to the icon itself), I've withdrawn the TFD for continued discussion here. In particular, I am proposing to remove the icon at the top right. Raul654 17:07, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

I'm strongly in favour of keeping the icon. —Nightst a llion (?) 06:03, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

I personally would like to have it at the end of the introduction, but up in the corner is fine. Its preferable because its convenient for the reader. Falphin 13:23, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

Hi Raul, I may be coming into this a little late, but can you clarify what you object to in that icon? (disclaimer: I'm part of the Spoken Wikipedia project) With a little more information, maybe we can get to a better way to achieve the same thing. -- Laura S | talk to me 17:24, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

For one thing, it's redundant with the actual box. For another, it is broken in non-monobook skins. Raul654 17:29, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

I presume you'd also like to remove the icon indicating an article is an FA? Personally, I think both are quite nice to have, and I'd even go so far as to say the sound icon is more useful than the FA one if the formatting problem is from having them both on the page. Moulder 18:27, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

I think what he's saying is that since there's already a box at the bottom of the page indicating that there's a spoken version, having another notice of that fact at the top of the page is a little redundant. (Correct me if I'm wrong.)

This was before my time, but there was some discussion around this icon a few months ago. From the discussion, it looks like there was a general consensus to put the box itself in External links, but people still wanted a way to indicate the availability of a spoken version near the top of an article. The reasoning was that the spoken version doesn't do much good if you've already read the whole article by the time you know it exists.

Originally, the box was positioned near the top of the page, but was moved down after Raul654 pointed out that it should go in External links. This is when the small corner icon was proposed; in fact at least one listener requested it. I'm not necessarily defending the icon itself (the redundancy doesn't bother me but the incorrect linkage does), but rather the notion that we need to be able to indicate, at or near the top of an article, that a spoken version is available. -- Laura S | talk to me 20:28, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

Additionally to Laura's summary, there has been a link at the top of the page at various times since almost the very start of the project. Joe D (t) 22:11, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

My vote is to keep the link. With regards to the two objections Raul listed above:

I don't think it is redundant, the two links serve different purposes, and as others have pointed out before, a link after you've read the article isn't that useful.
This can be fixed with a CSS class, which I have been meaning to make for a while. Last I checked the Featured Article template also needed this, and perhaps the code can be shared so only the distance from the right needs to be hard wired into the template. This fix will also mean the template won't show up on any mirrors or exports (unless they also take the monobook.css file).

Additionally IIRC an earlier objection was that WikiProjects and other such self-references should be keept to a minimum in the main namespace. I very much agree with that (and sometimes get quite irate about big orange collaboration templates and the like being slapped on the top of articles) but this template is not an editorial template, self-reference or intrusive, and is more akin to the language links than to an editorial or wikiproject template. Joe D (t) 22:11, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

I'm also strongly in favour of keeping the icon, on principle.

As background, I also observed events surrounding the moving of the original Spoken template (before the icon was added) from the top of articles to the bottom, in the External Links section. At the time I had no particular objection to this; putting it at the top did sometimes cause ugly article formatting when it conflicted with taxoboxes and other things. However, this action was taken without significant discussion with participants in the Spoken project; it was presented as a fait accompli and the discussion, by necessity, held afterwards.

Over time, I've noticed a small number of editors who seem to take strong exception to just about anything relating to Spoken Wikipedia in articles. The common argument seems to be that the Spoken items make the article or page look ugly. They might call this common sense, but I see it as aesthetic judgement, and it's different for everybody.

It's good, however, to see discussion happening this time, even if the TFD process was done very hastily. -- Macropode 03:18, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

I'm also in favor of keeping the icon at the top. I think the other "pro" contributors have made a very good case for it. I'd like to reinforce the idea that the entire box was at the top and that a single icon (which is a bit smaller than I'd personally like) was an acceptable compromise for most parties, balancing a nice, uncluttered look at the top with the need to alert readers to the spoken version's existence. I also wantot underscore how the box and icon seem redundant, but really they are different:

The Icon says "hey! Look! You can listen to this article!"
The box says "But you should know that this recording was made on X date, so it may not recent (or it may be VERY recent). By the way, here's the text of the version we recorded. You know, so you can follow along. Oh, and here's some more info on the recording, such as the performer's name, sex and general accent, if you like. If you're having trouble with listening to the audio, here are some resources for that, and finally, if you want to know more about what otehr kinds of recordings we have available, you can find those here."

That's a lot of info for such a tiny box--and the only part of it that is redundant is the link to the media itself. Ckamaeleon ((T)) 21:12, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

Here's my thing. Some information belongs at the bottom of an article. Related links (now that you've read the article, you might like these), sister projects (very similar), references (traditionally goes at the end). Some information really belongs at the top. Current events (before you read this, keep in mind it may be changing rapidly) and disambigs (in case you were looking for something else by the same name, try here before wasting your time with this article) come to mind as good examples. I think we are mostly agreed that the existence of a spoken version belongs near the top as well (before or while you read this, you might prefer listening to the article instead or in conjunction).

I can understand not wanting to change the "standard" layout for articles. What if we put a note below the title, but before the article, similar to the disambig notices? I wouldn't even use a big box like current events. It doesn't even need a picture (although it's pretty); just a little statement like "a spoken version of this article exists", with a link to the file or the template box. (Would need a workaround for multipart articles; the template box links to all parts but the icon currently does not accommodate that.)

This would be even more effective than the icon, which is so tiny that I honestly didn't know it was a speaker. Also, the icon links to the speaker image itself, not the sound file or the template box, so it's not entirely useful. And it would do away with all the formatting/layout/css issues, since it would just be one line of italicized text preceding the article. Would this work? -- Laura S | talk to me 21:37, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

My thoughts:

Yeah, I don't like how the icon links to the speaker image file. At one point (I thought) it would take you down to the box. I wonder why this changed?
A short notice would be acceptable to me, since it provides the appropriate info at the right point in the article, like you said. I would still prefer a graphic/icon in the vein of the featured article star, but only for aesthetic reasons. What does everyone else say?

Ckamaeleon ((T)) 06:51, 26 May 2006 (UTC)

I don't know whether this would be considered less offensive than the icon by the users who oppose it, but in any case, if this proposal is made policy, all "metadata" relevant to this argument will likely be removed from article main pages, including anything at the top, and the Spoken infobox/link at the bottom. There would be no indication on an article's main page that a spoken version of it exists. -- Macropode 07:11, 26 May 2006 (UTC)

Interestingly, when I load Short-beaked Echidna, the speaker icon links to the audio file, not the speaker image. I don't have time to figure this one out at the moment. -- Macropode 09:23, 26 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Linking to uploads

I love the fact this now links to uploads: a request that I was about to make myself! I have changed the name of the title that appears when you hover over the sound icon to make this less confusing. There is a flaw in cases where there are multiple part recordings. Could the appropriate templates be edited so that all parts appear at the top, possibly in the format

^2·3

My editing skills are clearly not up to scratch but I had intended to have the "2" and "3" next to the icon! (In retrospect though, finding a way to put the numbers below might not be such a bad idea, since there is room underneath for them). Any thoughts? TheGrappler 00:44, 2 June 2006 (UTC)

In trials, I found and fixed two problems: my title for the link was too long to be displayed, so needed trimming, and the numbers were too big, solved by using a small font. If you want to see a trial version: this shows how it looks with 3 parts plus FA star and this shows how it looks without FA star; this shows how it looks with just 2 parts (ugly!); this shows it with 4 (is there some way to recenter this? Would that interfere with any other notices?), 4 plus FA star (as before); and finally in the two part case, here's an alternative which repeats link 1 to make it look more balanced (much nicer!).

In the two part or three part cases there doesn't seem to be any new disadvantage (unless it causes different issues in someone else's browser?), so I would strongly recommend switching over to them. For more than 3 parts, linking 4 or more parts seems problematic so it may be better to link only the first three. Any thoughts? TheGrappler 01:16, 2 June 2006 (UTC) (Sidenote: the only articles that actually have 4 or more parts are Hindi and Hinduism, both of which are liable to have their articles altered in the near future. TheGrappler 02:04, 2 June 2006 (UTC))

[edit] Wrong position of the icon

Image:Spoken wrongposition2.JPG

Image:Spoken wrongposition1.JPG

Perhaps this issue has been talk about extensively already - then I offer my apologies. I'm just to lazy to read all the discussion here.

The icon is set in such a position that it is superimposed on the Mediawiki:Anonnotice message. This should be remedied somehow. --Dejan P. 15:33, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

This issue has been talked about pretty extensively, but I don't think any agreement was ever really reached. It doesn't seem like people care all that deeply what the precise position of that icon is. Personally, if it's blocking other items, I say we move it. The problem is, where do we move it to? All other positions seem to have similar problems My own solution was to get rid of the icon altogether, and replace it with an italicized bit of text that simply says "A spoken version of this article is available", similar to disambig text. Perhaps I should put that to a poll or something. -- Laura S | talk to me 16:42, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

Perhaps the anonnotice could be adjusted so that it automatically moves a bit to the left if the article contains the Spoken wikipedia template? But this has probably been discussed already. --Eleassar ^{my talk} 20:37, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

My guess is that, while elegant, that solution would be too complicated to get implemented. Also, the anon notice is probably considered a "staple" of Wikipedia and it might be difficult to convince anyone outside Spoken Wikipedia to mess with it. -- Laura S | talk to me 01:03, 17 June 2006 (UTC)

All that needs to happen is for a few more spaces to be added to the end of the notice - its functionality does not have to be affected at all. TheGrappler 16:05, 23 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] An idea...

Can we add a place in the tag to permanently link to the version of the article in which the recording was done? --HappyCamper 04:14, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

Excellent idea! TheGrappler 15:09, 23 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Upload links for multiple parts

At present, the spoken icon links to an upload for the first part of the spoken article. I think this is unacceptable in the case of articles with multiple spoken parts: further parts can't be uploaded from the header icon, and because it doesn't link down to the main box there's no easy way of downloading the other parts. There's also no warning that when you listen to the file downloaded from the speaker icon, it will cut out mid-article - I have found that very annoying on at least one occasion! Here is a proposal for improving this system while still generally using the speaker icon at the top to download the audio file.

[edit] Only one part

No changes needed.

[edit] Two parts

^1·2

Summary of differences: change title for icon, give links for downloading both parts. See how it looks here.

[edit] Three parts

^2·3

Summary of differences: change title for icon, give links for downloading both parts. See how it looks here

[edit] Four or more parts

Only a handful of spoken articles have four or more parts. I suggest in this case it is better to revert to making the icon a link to #External links with a title something like "This is a spoken article. Click here for more information".

[edit] Alternative suggestion for two or three parts

Do the same as for four parts (so no little number icons). In other words, if there is only one spoken file, the icon should be used to download that file, if the spoken article is in several parts, then the icon links down to the main spokenbox.

Does this seem all sensible? If we are to keep the icon as a link to file uploads, I think these suggestions will make it much easier to use. An alternative is to switch back to using the header icon to link down to the main spokenbox in the external links section for all spoken articles. I don't think that the current situation of only being able to download part one in multi-part spoken article is sustainable. TheGrappler 17:57, 23 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Icon is on top of the line

I've just seen a Spoken Wikipedia article for the first time. The small icon at the top of the page sits right over the line that is underneath the heading. Is this because it was positioned during a period when there was a notice at the top, and that position is fixed?

Template:Coor title d seems to put the content in the correct place, just beneath the line. Using a position like this would also avoid any Wikipedia notices (which was discussed above). JRawle (Talk) 17:04, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

Fixed. The template uses the same positioning code as the featured article template. Joe D (t) 22:44, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] An optional parameter for an immediate link to the recorded version

I'd find it really useful it there were an optional parameter for an immediate link to the recorded version, because it may take quite a long time to find the given revision of the article in the page history. For example, just look at the article Dinosaur and try to find the given revision (30 December 2005) in the page history. It may take as much as twenty or even more minutes to find it since it's some two or three thousand revisions back and as time goes by, it'll be even more...

Do you think an optional parameter like that could be inserted into the template? If a link is present, the template could have it, and if it's not given, the template would look like it looks now. (For example, the above link could be inserted into this field.) Adam78 17:03, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

For recently uploaded recordings, click on "info" in the article's spoken information box, which will take you to the audio image page. Here you'll find a link to the corresponding article version, if the template field has been filled in correctly. This field was only added to the template a few weeks ago, so not many recorded articles will have it yet. -- Macropode 09:15, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

Thank you! Adam78 07:47, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

I'm strongly in favour of modifying this template so it has a direct link to the article version in question. Sure, the method you've described is fine for established Wikipedians who know what they're looking for, but for someone who's stumbled across a spoken article page, has downloaded the recording, and wants to follow along while reading, the system of getting to that correct version is needlessly complicated.

I've observed someone view a spoken article page, and click on the date in this template expecting to be taken to the correct article version, but instead get taken to a normal date page. Does anyone really think that someone clicking the date on this template wants to be taken to an article about the date itself? If we want to make spoken articles more accessible to people, we need to start by making them simple to access and use.

Let me know what you think. H4cksaw (talk) 11:26, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

I think this edit would have to be done to Template:Spoken Wikipedia boilerplate? --gwc 02:43, 12 April 2007 (UTC)

Yes, that's right. -Panser Born- (talk) 12:23, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] play in browser tool

I was wondering if this template could include in the main box a small "play in browser (beta)" link to the WikiMediaPlayer (ie, from {{Listen}})? The tool is really useful for improving accessibility, such as in the case of readers that can't play Vorbis audio or don't want to download a 10MB+ file. I was also wondering if there was some way to set this link to open in a new window (I've never seen it done)? Thanks! --gwc 02:41, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

I thought the same thing a while back but removed my comment because the WikiMedia Player didn't work when I went back to it.

I think that if it works (as is appears to now), it'd be a great thing. The content of {{Spoken Wikipedia}} could be

<div id="section_SpokenWikipedia" class="infobox sisterproject noprint"> <div style="text-align: center">'''[[:Media:{{{1}}}|Listen to this article]] · [[:Image:{{{1}}}|(info)]] · [http://tools.wikimedia.de/~gmaxwell/jorbis/JOrbisPlayer.php?path={{urlencode:{{{1}}}}}&wiki=en play in browser]'''</div> {{Spoken Wikipedia boilerplate|{{{2}}}|{{{1}}} }}

which gives you this. If you like this idea, change the template or slap an {{editprotected}} on this page. WODUP 22:58, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

Ooh, thanks for coding it! Hey, I was thinking, if it makes it prettier, <span class="plainlinks"> will suppress the external link icon. --gwc 02:51, 12 April 2007 (UTC)

Done. I've also plainlinksed the entire template; the 'play in browser' link is the only one affected at present. --ais523 11:25, 12 April 2007 (U T C)

[edit] Interwiki

Please add

 [[es:Plantilla:Wikipedia grabada peq]]

 [[ia:Patrono:Audio]]

 [[la:Formula:Spoken Wikipedia boilerplate]]

Thank you. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 190.10.0.120 (talk) 11:45, 11 May 2007 (UTC).

Done. Note that this template uses a /doc page, so you could have added the links yourself without admin help. --ais523 14:40, 11 May 2007 (U T C)

[edit] Overprints other items

This template often overprints other items on the page. It makes assumptions on how wide the user's screen is. Jidanni 00:44, 25 August 2007 (UTC)