Wikipedia talk:Talk page templates/Mini talk archive

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This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Contents 1 Stacking 2 What we need is a Meta-data tab 3 Well done! 4 They look like userboxes! 5 Change, don't duplicate 6 Got it 7 Side-by-side 8 Establishing consensus 9 Merging and stuff 10 The perfect example of what I had in mind... 11 An alternative 12 A real alternative 13 Good idea 14 Suggestion 15 Table of contents for talk page templates... 16 My thoughts 17 Implementation 18 Policy 19 Guideline 20 Using *gulp* metatemplates for standard WikiProject infobox text

Stacking

How would templates be stacked? Right now, they are one on top of another; if they remain that way, they'll take up the same amount of space. —Mets501 (talk) 17:59, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

I think the idea is that they will be stacked up down the right hand side of the page like userboxes which will allow the main content to come up the top (in a similar way to my userpage). Lcarsdata (Talk) 19:00, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

Looks fine to me pertaining they become floating element instead of taking the same number of screens it now does. Lincher 20:46, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

Yeah, that was the intention. When I have a spare hour instead of snatches on the computer I will create more smaller ones and make a babel box to demonstrate further. Dev920 (Tory?) 16:21, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

What we need is a Meta-data tab

What we really need is a meta-data tab for each article. All of these templates don't really even belong on the Talk page. Reducing the size of the templates is a good idea, but really only a band-aid, as it seems the number of templates assigned to each article is increasing at a rather persistant rate. Several articles I've seen recently have nearly two pages worth of talk page templates and I don't see the trend abating any time soon. Kaldari 01:02, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

It's probably a decent long-term solution, but its major drawback is that a separate tab would likely be significantly lower-traffic than the existing talk page. In many cases (e.g. WikiProject banners), the templates lose much of their usefulness if the average editor doesn't actually see them. Kirill Lokshin 02:14, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

Well done!

This looks like an excellent idea for a real problem. Of course, there are some important details to consider, but you have my support. -- Jitse Niesen (talk) 03:54, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

Thankyou. Any criticism would be welcome. Dev920 (Tory?) 16:21, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

Mine as well. An absolutely great idea. I was just thinking about how many boxes there were on talk pages, and considering that the debate to remove / limit them would be fierce given all the vested interests in them. This is a much better idea. Augustz 06:56, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

This is a wonderful proposal and I hope it is adopted as a solution to a real problem. Dekimasu 14:22, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

Thnakyou very much. Do you know how long a policy needs to be proposed before consensus can be fully and properly established? Dev920 (check out this proposal) 15:09, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

I addressed this question in a new section below. -- Jitse Niesen (talk) 05:54, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

This is a good proposal. BhaiSaab ^talk 18:52, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

Looks good to me. Highly needed, I redid the maths-rating tag so it took less space, but this is better. There was some discussion of the issue at Wikipedia talk:Version 1.0 Editorial Team/Assessment, where I've mentioned this page. --Salix alba (talk) 10:24, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

They look like userboxes!

Not saying that's a good or bad thing, but they do. Anyway, this is without doubt a good idea, as I am fed up with seeing talk pages with so many header templates the page itself gets pushed off the bottom of the screen – Gurch 11:40, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

I did intend them to be userbox sized actually, but the amount of text on a Failed GA template meant I couldn't do that. Others I would imagine could be userbox sized. I will try. Dev920 (Tory?) 16:21, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

I like this. Any reason we shouldn't just reduce the amount of text in the Failed GA template? 192.75.48.150 18:10, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

Because, stacked up, it would still take up an excessive amount of space. Also, it's not possible for some of the other templates, for example the FA template would look very strange if it simply read "Featured Article" without the width being reduced as well. Dev920 (Tory?) 18:30, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

Change, don't duplicate

I would support changing (reducing) the talk page templates, but not creating smaller duplicates, since using two different tls for the same thing tends to confuse people. >Radiant< 14:30, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

I would rather just downsize them all, but what I thought other people might like to do is only change the templates of pages who have obscene numbers of templates, like Islam. Dev920 (Tory?) 16:21, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

Dev920's suggestion makes total sense. On a page with only one or two talk templates, a smaller template might be ignored, while on pages like Talk:Islam, it's clear that the templates interfere with the page. If code can be added that detects the number of templates on the page, and shrink the templates if there are too many, that would probably be the best solution. I believe that something similar has been done for subject boxes like some I reviewed here, where they put themselves automatically into "Hide" mode if there are enough on the page. Nihiltres 03:19, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

Got it

OK, I've got it. To change all talk messageboxes to side boxes with no extra work just change the Common.css messagebox.standard-talk code to

.messagebox.standard-talk {
   border: 1px solid #c0c090;
   background-color: #f8eaba;
   float: right;
   border:1px solid #000;
   margin:1px;
   width:238px;
   font-size: 8pt;
   line-height: 10pt;
   clear: both;
}

You can try that in your personal css. It works perfectly. —Mets501 (talk) 14:55, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

A few templates will have to be adjusted though. I think we want {{talkheader}} at the top of the page and large, and {{todo}} at the top. {{bot}} should remain big at the top because it is used on bot user pages. And {{move}} should be big at the top too, since it is only temporary for 5 days. We also need to adjust {{FAOL}} as the picture is too wide and it juts out the side of the template. —Mets501 (talk) 15:04, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

I didn't understand that at all. Can you repeat in something simpler? Dev920 (Tory?) 16:21, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

Sure. All you have to do to make all the talk boxes smaller is add the code above to MediaWiki:Monobook.css and remove the old .messagebox.standard-talk code. This will automatically make all of the boxes smaller without adjusting each one individually. If you want to see this in action, you can go to your personal css (for you located at User:Dev920/monobook.css) and add that code to it. Only the few templates that should remain big at at the top (including {{todo}}, {{bot}}, {{move}}, and {{talkheader}}) need to be changed so that they are "immune" to this css change. Hopefully that's easier to understand. —Mets501 (talk) 16:26, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

Ok, I got it to work (thanks for that) but it really does look horribly messy now (not to mention it takes up a fair bit of space). I think if we're to reduce the template size, we need to reduce the amount of text as well. Dev920 (Tory?)

Yes, we need to reduce the amount of text. I think that we should first make them smaller, and then reduce the text, instead of having two copies of each template. —Mets501 (talk) 20:23, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

Ok, I've created some more templates and stuck them in a box (which took ages for technologically retarded me to work out). Your thoughts? Dev920 (Tory?) 20:54, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

You don't need to stick them in a box. They are perfect without the box. —Mets501 (talk) 01:11, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

Is there a way to make them stack up on the side without the box then?

If you have that code above in your css then they should automatically stick up on the side if they have class="messagebox standard-text attached to them. —Mets501 (talk) 11:02, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

I don't. I removed it because it looked really untidy. It takes up an excessive amount of space and on pages without a lot of discussion, will take up a fair amount of space in its own right. Dev920 (Tory?) 11:35, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

You're right, my suggestion's not going to work. —Mets501 (talk) 18:54, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

Side-by-side

Perhaps it would be advantageous to not stack the mini-templates, but to put them side-by-side. Perhaps that would actually take up less space:

Talk page templates/Mini talk archive is a former good article nominee. See below for reasons why it failed: once these have been dealt with, renominate.

See an archived peer review here.

This article is a current featured article candidate. Please, leave comments.

That former GA template, however, seems a bit oversized. I'm sure the point is conveyed, however. -- tariqabjotu 03:44, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

I know, but if you look, they now seem extremely untidy because of their differing heights. This would probably annoy some users. Dev920 (Tory?) 07:34, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

How about we standardise the heights? Have them all the same height as the GA one is (five lines of small text). That's not much higher than most of the existing talk templates, and actually less high than some of them. Having them the same height as before is OK because of course you now have three to a line, so you can fit three times as much info on one line, so overall the block of templates will only be one-third height – Gurch 20:09, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

I suppose that could work, yeah. So which is better? Dev920 (Tory?) 20:15, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

Keep in mind that a lot of these templates (particularly the ones used by the larger WikiProjects) have a show/hide block at the bottom. Any attempt to standardize heights should really take that into account. Kirill Lokshin 23:07, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

Are show/hide sections on template messages really necessary? They strike me as something of a gimmick. Perhaps the extra information they convey in the hidden section should be centralized somewhere and not included in the message at all? – Gurch 11:32, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

The alternative would be bunches of additional templates (which were rolled into the show/hide section to reduce clutter) present on the page; see, for example, {{WPMILHIST}} on something like Talk:Stephen Trigg. Kirill Lokshin 11:40, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

An additional complication (besides the different heights of the boxes) is that the browser windows have different width. The number of boxes that fit side-by-side (three, four, five) depends on the configuration. I'm assume this can be overcome with some technical wizardry. -- Jitse Niesen (talk) 07:17, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

I know, I have my bookmarks open right now and one of the boxes is falling off the edge of my screen so I can't read it. I don't think this idea is going to work. Dev920 (check out this proposal) 09:30, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

Establishing consensus

copied from #Well done!

Do you know how long a policy needs to be proposed before consensus can be fully and properly established? Dev920 (check out this proposal) 15:09, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

I'm not sure this proposal has been sufficiently worked out yet. At least, some instructions should be added. The integration with the archive box should be addressed. The design could perhaps used some more input, looking at the amount of work that went into Wikipedia:Template standardisation. For instance, I'm not sure that using Template:Userboxtop &c is a good idea. I don't quite like the faint blue box added around all the other boxes.

There is no fixed process for establishing consensus. It looks good at the moment, all comments are positive, but I think the community will only notice this proposal and react on it when you start using it. Therefore, I implemented it on Talk:Eigenvalue, eigenvector and eigenspace (before, after). By the way, it took me quite some time to make the small templates.

If the proposal is accepted, it will become a guideline and not policy, just like Wikipedia:Template standardisation. See Wikipedia:Policies and guidelines for the difference; it's not terribly important but if we start pushing for it we'd better do it right. -- Jitse Niesen (talk) 05:54, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

Yes, I absolutely agree with you about the userboxtop, but I'm not very good with code and tend to steal most of what I need from other pages (like tables, making two reference columns etc.), and I couldn't find anything that I could use besides the userbox. Is there anything?

I figured it would up being a guideline, but the whole "policy proposal" thing confused me. :) I know it takes a while to make the templates but on the bright side, you only need to do it once!

What integration with teh archive box did you mean? Dev920 (check out this proposal) 07:46, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

• For consensus, advertise this proposal at several pages (e.g. WP:VP and WP:RFC), see what people's objections are, and adjust the proposal to address those objections. Also, you could try modifying/reducing one of the existing talk page templates (please do not create forks as that will only muddle the issue) and see how people respond to that. >Radiant< 08:39, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

Oh yes, I've done that. I followed the steps to creating a new proposal, you know. :)

Merging and stuff

Ah, finally, a solution to the talk page template mess! I think this will easily get consensus. Afterwards I was thinking we should probably should merge this and WP:TS, to a page titled Wikipedia:Talk page templates. Both are short enough to share a page, and it would make sense from an organizational standpoint. Thoughts? Again, awesome job on this. -- Ned Scott 09:17, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

Yes, I agree with this idea. Only after the mini templates have been created though, and the guys at Template Standards don't object. Dev920 (check out this proposal) 09:21, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

The perfect example of what I had in mind...

...may now be found at Talk:Islam. See what it looked like before. There is also a half-example at George W.Bush, but I can't convert the Biography template because the code is obscenely complicated. Dev920 (check out this proposal) 13:06, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

I'm very concerned that this proposal seems to be going beyond changing the layout of the boxes—which would probably be uncontroversial, in most cases—to actually removing substantial portions of the template text in an attempt to get it to fit within the "userbox size". In my opinion, this is a frankly unacceptable way to proceed. The text in these templates is not there just to make them look bigger, but because it's actually useful and important; cutting out large chunks of it is not something to be done for such a petty reason as making all the boxes the same (extremely small!) size. Kirill Lokshin 14:15, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

I would also object to non-project members coming along and changing project banners to make them look like userboxes, especially on a proposal that has not yet been accepted by the wikicommunity. Like Kirill said, there is valuable information in many project banners, and as you see yourself with WPBIO, some project banners are quite complex. Someone outside a specific wikiproject might not be familiar with all of the discussion and consensus that was reached to develop the project banners as they are now and is more likely to remove parameters and text that has been found as vital by the wikiproject. Yes, many talk pages have an overabundance of banners, and some of them could easily be reduced in size, but I think project banner size and wording should be left to individual wikiprojects. Slambo (Speak) 15:56, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

That's a good idea, Wikiprojects should certainly be able to develop their own banners. But as at the moment, we're only producing templates as examples rather than definitive copies, I don't think we need to worry about that until the guideline achieves consensus, when we can leave messages on all the projects, don't you think? Dev920 (check out this proposal) 16:47, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

Actually I think quite a few of these boxes could do with a good copy edit. Take Template:WPBiography. In the first line we have

This article is within the scope of WikiProject Biography. For more information, visit the project page.

Both links point to the same page. I'd say the second sentance could easily be removed with no impact. Indeed having two identical links slightly decreases usability as the reader needs to hover over both links to see where they point. In the second line we see the same

This article has been rated as GA-Class on the Project's quality scale. FAQ

Again two links to the same page and a third to a different page with basically the same info.

On {{maths rating}} I've taken a minimalistic aproach

This article is within the scope of WikiProject Mathematics. Mathematics grading: GA-Class, High-Importance

Basically everything the reader needs to know with minimal text. --Salix alba (talk) 16:38, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

It's suitable, perhaps, for somebody who is already familiar with the grading system; but quite cryptic, in my opinion, for people seeing the template the first time. It's true that we don't need two links to the same page, for example; but the second one (which goes to a particular section) is pretty useful for people trying to look things up, particularly on a long page. Kirill Lokshin 17:03, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

But the large templates don't list the quality scale, either. Dev920 (check out this proposal) 17:17, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

But they give a direct link to where it's located, rather than leaving the reader to find it themselves. Kirill Lokshin 17:55, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

That's why I linked "quality" to the rating scale on my userboxes; I assume it just didn't occur to salix to do it with his. Dev920 (check out this proposal) 19:33, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

I agree with this. I mean, I haven't been removing vital text for the sake of size, which is why FailedGA is much larger than the others. But it's always seemed to me that a project that prides itself on its summary style tends to become rather verbiose outside of articles. I mean, to take Islam for example, have I removed anything that was extremely useful to an editor? Because of the amount of vital writing on the todo box, I left it full size. Dev920 (check out this proposal) 16:47, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

Umm, the {{facfailed}} template has lost the (very important, and quite difficult to find otherwise) link to the archives where nominations were kept before the subpage system was put into place. Kirill Lokshin 17:03, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

...which only applies to failed articles before October 2004. Which is not many. Do you not think that most articles by then will have changed so much that the page in useless to improve an article? Look at Papal tiara, for example, it's gone to FAC, and straight out the other side. When the template was first made, I should imagine it would have extremely helpful. How helpful is it now? Dev920 (check out this proposal) 17:17, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

Most archived things are quite useless for future improvements, actually, but we tend to keep them around because they're useful as records of what has been done with the article in their own right. I don't think it's a good idea to remove links to even very old archives, for the same reason that we don't remove links to three-year-old deletion nominations, and so forth. Kirill Lokshin 17:55, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

I would agree that a link to the archive needs to be kept around, but does it need to be on every single failed FAC box? Isn't there a betetr page we could put it on, like WP:FAC or something? Dev920 (check out this proposal) 19:33, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

I think the shrunken templates are a better idea, and the ones that don't seem to fit in the smaller scale/are complaining of having text cut should be bold and re-edit the new versions. Down the right side seems MUCH better than across the top, by the way. Didn't someone suggest this already about six months ago? Search engine is down right now, but Google says maybe the talk page of Wikipedia:Template_standardisation#Talk_page_templates would be a good place to post about this idea (and probably Wikipedia talk:Template messages, too). -- nae'blis 19:52, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

An alternative

Have a look at Template:Skiptotoctalk for an alternative way to avoid template clutter. This allows the full templates (often quite useful) to remain, but making it easy to skip past them if you don't want to read them. It's already in use at over 50 talk pages. See Talk:Bill Clinton and Talk:The Lord of the Rings for examples of it in use. I would strongly support use of this template over any attempt to make the talk page templates smaller. Carcharoth 23:24, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

I know, there was one on Islam. But frankly, if the vast size of reams of talkpage templates is long enough to warrant a tag to skip them wwithout even reading them, does this not prove that something needs to change? If the templates are smaller, at least more people will read them, rather than skipping straight past. Dev920 (check out this proposal) 23:43, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

I think they are both good, but I still hope this project is successful. The templates may be useful, but they should be just as useful if they are smaller. I am going to add Skiptotoctalk to a few pages right now and wait to see new developments here. Dekimasu 12:14, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Regarding "I know" - it seems strange that it hasn't been mentioned here before. Because it hasn't been discussed here, it looks like both methods are operating without being aware of the other (a fairly common situation on Wikipedia). Regarding "does this not prove that something needs to change", what this proves is that the talk pages are being overloaded. If people are not reading them, that requires a change of culture. Talk about them, point out to people why they are useful. Eventually, more people will take notice of them. At the end of the day though, some people want to read and add discussion about how to write the article, while others want to look up the tags (or do both). The 'skip to toc' tag is for the former. The latter have the template tags there at the top to look through anyway. Trying to satisfy both types of users of the talk pages is laudable, but misguided. Either create a separate page for the "template tags" (even a subpage), or use the 'skip to toc' tag. Having said that, I had a look at Islam, and the smaller template tags do look nice. I just think that sometimes the larger tags are needed, and are useful, and I would oppose the "removal of text to make them smaller for the sake of making them smaller" approach that seems to have been happening above. Carcharoth 13:08, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

A real alternative

I hijacked a bit of code that already exists, and I think with a little work, it can do an ideal job. I don't understand CSS at all (guessed everything I did), so pardon my sloppy job, but check the code out: User:Nihiltres/Sandbox2. I have no idea how someone made the code for a nice little "hide" button in the first place, but it's very convenient as an alternative to either cramped userbox-sized messages or Template:Skiptotoctalk, at least in my opinion. It's all that we really need, and it'll display unless someone hits the hide button, meaning that people see nice, wide, templates until they either choose to either scroll past or hide the whole thing. As I say, I don't know CSS, so the solution I think is ideal may need a rewrite - not that I can! :) Any comments? Nihiltres 01:26, 23 October 2006 (UTC)

One thing I have suddenly realized after thinking about other things for a while is that if there is another one of this style of box on the same page (even if the other box is at the bottom of said page), the box will autohide. Since it would be desirable for the metadata box to initially show regardless of the presence of other boxes of the same style, the code for the box would have to be changed slightly to work that way. Nihiltres 05:00, 23 October 2006 (UTC)

I can see this as a quick fix, but I would prefer smaller boxes. -- Ned Scott 05:07, 23 October 2006 (UTC)

The issue I have with this, as with the previous hiding idea, is that people scrolling down will never even look at the templates. If they are small and neat but tucked away to the side, people can look whilst scrolling down but with the minimum of inconvenience. Dev920 (check out this proposal) 15:20, 30 October 2006 (UTC)

Fair enough. Since this hasn't seen much use, I'm now subst'ing the transcluded page here for posterity and {{db-userreq}}'ing that page. Nihiltres 17:57, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

Good idea

I was notified of this by Dev920. Great proposal! --Striver 15:55, 30 October 2006 (UTC)

Suggestion

A small suggestion. I looked at Talk:Islam. It uses a new set of templates that are under a sub-page named "small". Instead, you could pass a "size" parameter to all templates and resize the template if it is set to "small". For example, {{V0.5|size="small"}}. This way we can use the smaller box at cluttered talk pages and the larger one in most pages that have little content. And still maintain a single version of template. -- Ganeshk (talk) 16:03, 30 October 2006 (UTC)

If they're actually on a subpage, that's two versions of the template to maintain. It might be possible to have an actual parameter that would fiddle with the styling of the template, though; the best way to do this would be to create a CSS class that could be standard for small templates. Kirill Lokshin 16:29, 30 October 2006 (UTC)

Kirill, I agree. A CSS class for small templates is needed. I was working on the converting India template. It was pain to do the same with a table. What is the procedure to request one? Please advise. -- Ganeshk (talk) 19:17, 31 October 2006 (UTC)

Ask on MediaWiki talk:Common.css. The class should basically copy over the formatting of the normal messagebox.standard-talk, but force the width down and add a float. Kirill Lokshin 19:27, 31 October 2006 (UTC)

I created a sample in my sandbox to show how this will work. -- Ganeshk (talk) 17:51, 30 October 2006 (UTC)

{{User:Ganeshk/sandbox/peerreview}}

will produce:

A request has been made for this article to be peer reviewed to receive a broader perspective on how it may be improved. Please make any edits you see fit to improve the quality of this article.

{{User:Ganeshk/sandbox/peerreview|small=yes}}

will produce:

That's an excellent idea. Thank you. -- Jitse Niesen (talk) 01:04, 31 October 2006 (UTC)

I don't understand any of what you just wrote, but if it results in reduced size templates with reduced text, I'm for it. Dev920 (check out this proposal) 19:50, 31 October 2006 (UTC)

I'm also a non-coder (for CSS, at least), but I have a suggestion: make the templates automatically resize themselves if they detect more than X (3-4) templates of their type on the page. I know that something similar has been done for a different element; the key would just be implementing it again and resolving the placement of all of the newly small templates. Nihiltres 03:07, 5 November 2006 (UTC)

As far as I know, something like that couldn't be done without advanced javascript, and there is no global js. —Mets501 (talk) 03:45, 5 November 2006 (UTC)

Table of contents for talk page templates...

What annoys me most about talk pages with lots of templates, is that you can't see at a glance what the templates are. In that sense, I would support a resizing and repositioning (but not a rewriting) of the templates, or maybe a list (like the table of contents) of the templates with a "hide" button to hide that bit of the page and bring up the talk page bit of the talk page. Carcharoth 16:56, 30 October 2006 (UTC)

If you're going to have a list of templates, what, really, is the need for the templates themselves at all? Dev920 (check out this proposal) 19:58, 30 October 2006 (UTC)

My thoughts

I support this, on the condition that certain templates remain large, in particular {{talkheader}}, {{FAC}}, {{GAC}}, and any other templates that are temporary. Things like {{FA}} and {{GA}} should definitely be small, though. -- Cielomobile ^{talk / contribs} 04:05, 1 November 2006 (UTC)

Good point, I agree. -- Ned Scott 06:15, 1 November 2006 (UTC)

I agree as well. Keep some large, and make some small. Now it's just a case of surveying the different talk page templates in use and deciding which should be which. Is there a category somewhere? A subcategory of Category:Wikipedia templates surely? Yes. See Category:Talk header templates and the relevant subcategory of Category:Article talk header templates. Carcharoth 11:30, 1 November 2006 (UTC)

I'd think the priority here would be a template that's about a current event with the article, such as a review in-progress (such as FAC) or some other time-sensitive relation. -- Ned Scott 11:35, 1 November 2006 (UTC)

I wanted to say that I agree with the above points, some of these are perectly fine being big, as such we should rush to reduce the size of all of them. Also I think this proposal in general is a great idea --T-rex 20:23, 3 November 2006 (UTC)

These mini-templates look fantastic. However, the {{talkheader}} page in particular appears to be quite pointless - the information included, should be on ALL talk pages as part of the mediawiki software. -- Chuq 02:04, 4 November 2006 (UTC)

I think talk header could use a trim of some kind, and also be only used on talk pages where there is an issue of some kind. For example, a sudden burst of really new editors coming to the talk page, etc. Not that I feel strongly about it. -- Ned Scott 02:39, 4 November 2006 (UTC)

Implementation

I think it has now been generally agreed that the size and text of templates should be reduced to the size of a standard userbox, with the exception of a "template that's about a current event with the article, such as a review in-progress (such as FAC) or some other time-sensitive relation", though this may need further discussion.

The question we face now then is, how to implement it? Do we use my original idea, of creating smaller templates and uploading them to the original template space with /small attached, or the idea above, which seems quite clever but I don't understand in the slightest? Discuss. :) Dev920 (check out this proposal) 10:32, 4 November 2006 (UTC)

Well, the idea above is much more reasonable, since it (a) won't require maintaining two copies of each template and (b) will allow anyone who wants to see the templates full-size to do so by overriding the CSS class in question. Kirill Lokshin 17:23, 4 November 2006 (UTC)

Kirill, I have asked for a new CSS class at MediaWiki_talk:Common.css per your suggestion. That would make life lot easier. -- Ganeshk (talk) 18:01, 4 November 2006 (UTC)

Cool. Any idea how long taht will take? Dev920 (check out this proposal) 18:34, 4 November 2006 (UTC)

Dev, I have no idea. This is my first CSS proposal. -- Ganeshk (talk) 18:42, 4 November 2006 (UTC)

• Please don't fork the templates, that will only confuse people. Editing the existing templates, or using CSS to make them smaller, is a better way to do it. >Radiant< 23:40, 5 November 2006 (UTC)

It should be pretty easy to work with the existing templates so they both have a "full" and "small" mode. Even if some templates should be almost always small, it would help at least transition to have the two options in one template. I'll gladly help out where I can. -- Ned Scott 05:28, 6 November 2006 (UTC)

I don't really mind. I created the proposal to resolve a problem, I don't care how it is implemented. :D Dev920 (check out this proposal) 08:25, 6 November 2006 (UTC)

The new CSS class has been added to Common.css. See [1] for how to add the optional small parameter. -- Ganeshk (talk) 19:54, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

But that template is no smaller at all! Dev920 (check out this proposal) 20:28, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

K, I see it on Islam. Can't say I'm happy with how it looks now, but at least it's smaller. Dev920 (check out this proposal) 20:36, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

How did you want it too look? Isn't that basically identical to your original example? —Mets501 (talk) 20:47, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

Oh, I see, Ganeshk had changed it. Maybe you were having the same ugly rendering problem that I was having, I've reverted it now. —Mets501 (talk) 20:49, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

I moved the Archives to the bottom. That was the change. I wanted you to check if the current version renders okay. -- Ganeshk (talk) 21:37, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

I guess the tan colour was nice, and I envisaged the templates being smaller in width. I guess I can live with this though. Dev920 (check out this proposal) 21:41, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

Mets, How do we get the TOC move up and remove the space? I see a lot of blank space between the To do and TOC. Does anyone else see this? I use IE (1024x768). -- Ganeshk (talk) 21:44, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

I fixed it now. Please check Talk:Islam. Is it rendering okay for everyone? -- Ganeshk (talk) 21:47, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

No. I see normal-sized templates, with the TOC squashed into a column a few centimetres wide to the left of the templates. Looks awful! Hope someone can fix it. Carcharoth 00:11, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

Did you clear your cache? The CSS won't update until you do. Kirill Lokshin 00:15, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

Doh! Looks fine now. :-) Carcharoth 00:47, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

Incidentally, for those people adding this to templates: it's not necessary to create two copies of the entire text; if the text is the same between the large and small versions, it's sufficient to replace the normal class definition with {{#ifeq:{{{small|}}}|yes|class="messagebox small-talk"|class="messagebox standard-talk"}}. Kirill Lokshin 22:36, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

I fixed the templates I created per your suggestion. Additionally, the image needs to be changed too. Image size should be replaced with {{#ifeq:{{{small|}}}|yes|30px|50px}}. -- Ganeshk (talk) 23:04, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

Or just set it to 45px, which works well for both. ;-) Kirill Lokshin 23:17, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

Ooh, I'm happy. So, just to clarify, what code do I need to use? Dev920 (check out this proposal) 23:26, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

You can copy the code from Template:Peerreview. -- Ganeshk (talk) 23:42, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

Wait! Don't just use {{#ifeq:{{{small|}}}|yes|class="messagebox small-talk"|class="messagebox standard-talk"}}. Some of the unnecessary text in the template was removed as well, it wasn't just the box size that was changed! —Mets501 (talk) 00:24, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

Unnecessary text should be removed in both box sizes, large or small. I feel it should do no harm leaving the text as it is. -- Ganeshk (talk) 00:28, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

This way it is lot easier to implement. I just finished it on India template and used it on Talk:Bangalore. The other way will be a total rewrite of template. -- Ganeshk (talk) 00:47, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

The results are fantastic. Take a look at Talk:Leonardo da Vinci. It had 10 boxes. -- Ganeshk (talk) 02:04, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

Awesome :D -- Ned Scott 08:35, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

Yes, that is beautiful. I think this has highlighted the amount of superfluous text on templates though. Dev920 (check out this proposal) 08:37, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

I must be missing something, or the proposed solution doesn't work on all browsing environments (right now I'm using Firefox 1.5, KDE 4, Ubuntu 6.06) because the only real change I see on both talk pages mentioned is that the boxes now have a white background instead of an orange background. I do not see a significant change in size. Slambo (Speak) 12:10, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

Have you cleared your cache? ;-) Kirill Lokshin 13:42, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

Since I hadn't looked at that page before, I don't think that's the problem. However, it looks correct on my SuSE 10.0 box (also running Firefox 1.5, but on KDE 3.4.2). I'll try it again when I get back to the Ubuntu box. Now to work on modifying {{TrainsWikiProject}} to include the new parameter too... Slambo (Speak) 13:59, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

It's not the page caching that's the issue, but the sitewide CSS being cached. You need to force it to be reloaded for the new class to render properly. Kirill Lokshin 14:02, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

Thanks, now it looks right on both boxen. I'm going through and shortening the text on TWP as well for the small format, but with Trainfest this weekend (the largest annual model train show in the Midwest; I'm exhibiting my own models there again this year), I won't have as much time to work on it until Monday. There's an example of using the small format showing the text that I did reduce on Talk:TGV. Now that we've got this formally integrated into the main talk page templates page, should we also include a short list there of live examples using the small format (Talk:Islam, Talk:Leonardo da Vinci and Talk:TGV)? Slambo (Speak) 13:36, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

{{TrainsWikiProject}} now has the small parameter implemented as well. Slambo (Speak) 19:37, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

Policy

As this policy has begun to be implemented, it is clearly no longer a proposed policy. What do I do now, remove the tag, or what? Dev920 (check out this proposal) 08:37, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

The page needs to be updated (add the implementation with the small parameter, so that people know how to use it; mention that temporary boxes like FAC and talkheader should not be shrunk; probably more). Since there is a consensus, we can then replace Template:Proposed by Template:Guideline (not Template:Policy). -- Jitse Niesen (talk) 09:11, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

Guideline

I've edited the main page to look like a guideline. I think the text does need to be reduced - so much of it just seems so unneccessary. Dev920 (Please vote here) 10:17, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

Using *gulp* metatemplates for standard WikiProject infobox text

Every WP infobox has a rating and quality scale. With this "small" option, the rating texts should be reduced. Is this a good place for a metatemplate? e.g.

{{quality text |class=A |project=WikiProject Trains}} 

This article has been rated as A-Class on the quality scale

{{quality text |class=A |project=WikiProject Trains |small=yes}} 

Quality: A-Class

This would move a switch statement from the main template to this subtemplate, such that you could just pass along {{{class}}} and {{{small}}} unaltered. e.g.

{{quality text |class={{{class}}} |project=WikiProject Trains |small={{{small}}} }}

The downside is this would affect a lot of complicated templates, but it cleans up a lot of ugly code and helps standardize things across WikiProject templates. – flamurai (t) 01:18, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

It's something that might be useful for basic cases, but, in some more complicated templates, there's non-standard options in the code that a combined metatemplate wouldn't be able to deal with. Having this would also make customization more difficult, since it would require unwrapping the nesting first (which is probably beyond many editors' comfort level as far as parserFunctions are concerned. Kirill Lokshin 02:32, 10 November 2006 (UTC)