Help talk:Talk pages

Should "Talk page guidelines" and "Talk page" merge?

See discussion at the talk page for talk page guidelines. —DragonHawk (talk) 03:22, 16 January 2007 (UTC) for more info...

Policy status of this page?

What is the policy status of this project page? Is it a guideline? Just an essay? Simões (^talk/_contribs) 18:29, 24 January 2007 (UTC)

That's actually a good question. This project page (Wikipedia:Talk page) was Help:Talk page not long ago. It was moved to the project namespace recently. I don't know why (my not knowing why is not meant to imply there wasn't a good reason). Right now, it's kind of part-way between a help page and a guideline (which may be why it got moved out of Help). For these and other reasons, I think it might be a canidate for mering with Wikipedia:Talk page guidelines -- see discussion at the talk page for talk page guidelines for more on that. —DragonHawk (talk) 01:42, 25 January 2007 (UTC)

There are other information pages that aren't help pages - see, for example, Wikipedia:Embedded citations. -- John Broughton | ^(♫♫) 02:06, 26 January 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, keep 'em.

I think you should keep the codes. I found them very useful. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Norlid (talk • contribs) 15:35, 29 January 2007 (UTC).

Template for talk pages about talk

Hi all. I've noticed that a very few talk pages that themselves are about talk pages (this one, Wikipedia talk:Talk page guidelines, etc.) tend to attract misplaced discussions. I'm thinking it might be good for everyone if these talk pages featured a prominent notice to help send people to the right place. I've got a concept draft at User:DragonHawk/Temp4. I'm somewhat concerned with striking a good balance between being prominent and WP:BITE. Thoughts? —DragonHawk (talk) 17:34, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

Good idea. I strongly recommend removing the symbol of the hand. I also suggest removing the second to last sentence - I think that it's easy to read that as patronizing. -- John Broughton (☎☎) 05:04, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

permission

(Davidstw3 16:54, 31 January 2007 (UTC) = davidstw3 1/31/2007 10:52:03 AM (UTC))

I rec'd from publishers permission to re-use for Wikipedia purposes an essay I had written earlier.

Any comments or reflections on how this process can be assured of compliance with Wiki policies?

Thx

First, you should read WP:NOR; in short, Wikipedia isn't the place to put large chunks of your text. Second, you should read WP:RS; citing your published essay may or may not be appropriate, depending on what type of essay it is, where it was published, what your expertise is, and the Wikipedia article. Third, you should consider publishing it at a sister project - specifically, Wikisource. Fourth, if the essay is highly partisan, you should read WP:NPOV. And fifth, you should take further questions to a better page: Wikipedia:Help desk is a much better place than this page to discuss, for example, whether "repurposed" is the same as "copyright free", if you intend to use large chunks of text in an article, something that would normally be a copyright violation. -- John Broughton (☎☎) 05:01, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

Question

This page doesn't cover which talk page additions warrant the minor edit tag, and which do not. Granted, I suppose one can decide what is major and what is not, but it would be very helpful if we had some sort of definition for the record. Kennard2 01:17, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

• Would that be at Wikipedia:Minor edit? And since a minor edit can be on any type of page, I don't think Wikipedia:Talk page is the right place for such a definition. -- John Broughton (☎☎) 04:55, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

Where to place one's comments

On talk pages, it's not clear whether one should type new comments above or below existing talk.

I presume that most everyone reading this will find that remark strange, because you are already familiar with the conventions in this area. However, I believe this ambiguity may be an impediment to meaningful participation by a number of users. Though I have been using and contributing to Wikipedia for at least a couple of years, I have never until now contributed to a Talk page, despite a desire to do so, for fearing of interfering by stepping into conversations in the wrong place.

Similarly, only after completing this entry and pressing the "Save page" button will I find out whether this new section appears above or below the existing sections. What will I find: that Talk pages are like blogs, with newest content appearing (and expected) at the top, or like chat-room text, which read in forward order, much like transcripts of spoken conversation?

I'm surprised that FAQ and how-to pages for Talk don't address this. Clearly I'm not the only one who feels it necessary, because the head of this very talk page bears an instruction to "Put new text under old text." Still, I have yet to find out whether this new section I'm typing will appear above "Should 'Talk page guidelines' and 'Talk page' merge?" or below "Question: This page doesn't cover which talk page additions warrant..."

I think the Talk FAQ should make clearer what will result when one adds a new topic, and I think all Talk pages should bear a bit of instruction on where to insert one's remarks.

fuper 22:55, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

I've been wondering about that, too. The automatic "add to a page" button at the top, "+", appends at the end. I've been doing that, too, but recently saw someone claim that top-inserting is the "right" way, and am now looking for anything like a guideline. One thing to do with existing talk pages is just to check the direction the signature dates run in, and stick with that. Jutta 19:02, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

TPG 2.2 covers this to some extent, with "Start new topics at the bottom of the page". It does not explicitly address adding comments within an existing topic section, though. —DragonHawk (talk) 02:10, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

The indentation that is specified for follow-on comments makes it pretty clear, I think, that new comments within an existing section should go at the bottom. Otherwise you'd have:

        Third comment in section
    Second comment in section
First comment in section

Which I think would look exceedingly odd. In any case, it's not the norm here, and it's not the norm on any talk page I've ever seen. -- John Broughton (♫♫) 01:54, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

Philosophy of user talkpages

Recently, the user Qxz, who has theoretically left Wikipedia (recent edits suggest otherwise), was permitted to blank all comments on his/her talkpage, and the page was protected in this form. After I aked the admin responsible, the response I got was "respect", which makes perfect sense, but only within a certain philosophy, namely that talkpages are not a fundamentaly a public affair, but exist mainly for the benefit of the user in question. Conversely, if talkpages are meant for the general public, the page should instead have been locked in a form preserving all non-vandalism additions, with an explanatory note at the top.

So it appears that Wikipedia needs a philosophy of user talkpages to be expressed on this help page. What, if anything, should it be? $\sim$ Lenoxus " * " 01:21, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

Very generally, the only reason someone would want to use a user talk page would be to communicate with that user. This doesn't seem to be relevant anymore, and Qxz seems adamant about not returning, and if he does, he can always email the protecting admin. If you wish to start a discussion about him, perhaps WP:AN(I) would be the place.

However, I think that it would be appropriate to put Qxz's talk archives at the top of the page. A similar thing was done with Essjay, for example, except with a link to page history. Qxz {{db-author}}'d everything except for those archives, after all. Gracenotes^T § 02:28, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

Namespace

The name doesn't fit the namespace, this page has the structure of an article. Nikro 23:09, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

"Discussion" tab to access a "Talk" page

I'm used to it now, but it has always seemed to me to be rather unintuitive and unhelpful that the way to access a Talk page is via a tab labelled, not "Talk", but "Discussion". Can these tabs be renamed "Talk"? -- JackofOz 01:44, 25 May 2007 (UTC)

Forking an active discussion

I'm just curious if forking a talk page onto a separate sub-page is okay in the event an active discussion ends up getting too large? --Edward Sandstig 21:42, 25 May 2007 (UTC)

New topic

New topic