Esp261

User talk:etesp
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PWD

I'd like to use Pure Wiki Deletion on my wiki (well, the 1.19 upgrade of it), but the person trying to install it says it's throwing SQL errors on that version. Is there any chance you could look into updating it to support 1.19? PDW seems like a much more appropriate system of deletion for a wiki, much more open, and with very few exceptions (legal things, spambot pages) letting users view deleted pages is not a problem at all.

Yeah, PWD needs a few changes in order to make it work on v1.19. But I think it always did have other problems anyway, such as redlinks to those blanked pages showing up as a bright cherry red rather than the appropriate shade of red/maroon depending on whether the page had been clicked; and in some contexts, such as special pages, links to blanked pages showing up as the usual blue.

I kinda lost interest in fixing it after the enwiki community rejecting using it there, and I wasn't able to find anyone to help me with Inclupedia (it's such a big project that I would've wanted a co-founder to assist me with it). There are a number of possible alternatives. One is to give everyone the power to view deleted articles, and then revisiondelete what you really want to remove from the public eye.

Sorry that your time was wasted trying to get it to work. I've edited the Extension:PureWikiDeletion page to note that it's been downgraded to "unstable" status, and noted the alternative configuration here. Leucosticte (talk) 15:32, 2 October 2012 (UTC)

That's unfortunate, despite the minor issues like lack of cache invalidation on blank and showing up as blue on special pages it seemed like a pretty good solution. The link coloring even seemed more like a feature to me, it's handy to know whether there is some available history on a link or whether there really is nothing you can access there. Even if Wikipedia is not currently keen on it, having this setup available for other wikis seems very positive. Would you be able to at least point us at the parts of code which need updating?

And as for Inclupedia, yea. I've read huge amounts of wikipedia policy and debates in preparation for setting up my wiki, and.. the way deletion imposes massive risks of wasted effort and limits the scope of WP is by far the largest thing which has prevented me from getting involved. I'm not in a position to help much with that kind of project, but I do hope that either WP's restrictiveness (especially on web/game content, weee classic forms of media not finding much notable, despite huge numbers using them, wanting information on them, and being willing to write it) is reduced or something like that comes along.--Esp261 (talk) 16:13, 2 October 2012 (UTC)

It's been a long time since I played around with PWD, but right off the bat I notice that on line 36-38 of PureWikiDeletion.hooks.php, $redirect is no longer part of Manual:Hooks/ArticleSaveComplete, so that functionality needs to be removed from PWD. That variable was used to bring the user to an "Action complete" screen after blanking a page, so that he wouldn't think that PWD wasn't working. Tim Starling said to add another hook to the core to implement that functionality.

Wikipedia culture has gotten worse as time has gone by, largely as a result of Sanger's Law creating a vicious cycle. The wikidragons have mostly been slain (the ArbCom, with its secretive deliberations on kicking people off, made that task a lot easier) and it's sort of an echo chamber at this point of people talking about how great the project and its rules are, and how it's too bad that some people aren't able to come around to a right way of thinking and adapt themselves to the community's requirements. I don't see any way around it but to start fresh with a new wiki, but it needs to be sufficiently integrated with Wikipedia in order to have much success; that was the idea behind Inclupedia.

Unfortunately, it is hard to get people interested in the technical side of wikis. Almost everyone seems to think it's an insurmountable challenge. It's not easy by any means, but obviously everyone who's now involved as a developer started out knowing nothing about MediaWiki; however, pulling together, they were able to build quite some quite powerful software. Leucosticte (talk) 17:42, 2 October 2012 (UTC)

Alright, I'll pass that information on to Arceus who's working on our extensions. Interesting links, I agree with most of your assessment of the situation. Unfortunate how it'd be so difficult to effectively fork wikipedia (something I have thought about a great deal. Your proposed setup seems about as good as it'd get.), or persuade it to be something bigger. Still, the dream of a much larger collection of collectively edited user generated useful content is being built in many places at once across the web. Maybe one day it'll be unified. And yea, the technical setup is so key, and only a tiny percentage of users who want to help are involved with it.--Esp261 (talk) 21:43, 2 October 2012 (UTC)

Esp261, did you consider the option mentioned here? Leucosticte (talk) 15:35, 20 March 2014 (UTC)

We ended up doing something a bit like that, giving all users the ability to see and search deleted pages, but not spreading deletion power as widely. It works, but is not as attractive as a more open system. Unfortunately, the way deletion is set up now it seems likely to be.. uncomfortable for normal users to use, very much designed as an experienced user/staff tool. Also, it's nice to have a separate more severe deletion for some things (spam primarily, some forms of clearup, ability to get copyvios or personal information out of public view). I'm no longer active in that project, but that'll be a consideration it for my next wiki.--etesp (talk) 00:14, 25 April 2014 (UTC)