MediaWiki talk:Newarticletext/Archive 1

message: I've just changed the new article text—the text that appears when you edit a page that doesn't yet exist. It now reads:
:You are at a page that does not exist yet. To create an article on this topic, type in the box below (see the help page for more info). If you are here by mistake, just click your browser's back button. Your addition to the encyclopedia will be visible immediately, so if you just want to test how things work, please do that in the sandbox. 
:Please do not create an encyclopedia article about yourself, or an article whose main purpose is to promote a product or business. See What Wikipedia is not for more guidance. Articles in serious violation of Wikipedia's policies may be removed without notice.
I've also create a rough draft of a simpler guide to use instead of Wikipedia:What Wikipedia is not—one which concentrates on the most common reasons why things end up on VfD.  Dpbsmith 23:58, 4 Jun 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: New article text, and draft of guide (from the village pump)

message: I'd like to change the sentence "If you are new to Wikipedia, you may want to read more about how to write your first article." to "If you are new to Wikipedia, you may want to take a look at the tutorial before creating your first article." Also, if the community agrees to my proposed change to Template:Sandbox (see Template talk:Sandbox), and a page linked to from the Sandbox mentions the test wiki, I'd like to change "Please use the sandbox or the test wiki for experiments." to "Please use the Sandbox for experiments." I'd make these changes myself since they're relatively minor, but I'd like to ask the community before making any changes to an interface message.   – Jrdioko (Talk) 23:54, 5 Jul 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: It seems there were no objections, so I made the changes you suggested (more or less) and added a link to the test wiki in the sandbox template. Angela. 18:37, 8 Jul 2004 (UTC)
replies: text:  Thanks. I would like to ask about the capitalization of "sandbox." I don't know the exact rule, but it was my understanding that the lowercase word referred to a "sandbox" as explained in the sandbox article, but that when the word is made into a proper noun (such as our Wiki Sandbox), the word would be capitalized. I suppose there's also a possibility that the plural "sandboxes" in contexts such as "sandboxes on Wiki project" is lowercase and "the Test Sandbox on the Test Wikipedia," for example, is uppercase. I personally don't care what it is, but I think this should be standardized throughout the various pages that refer to the sandbox. I encountered this when trying to figure out what should be capitalized in Wikipedia:About the Sandbox (which now might need to be moved to Wikipedia:About the sandbox or Wikipedia:About The Sandbox *smiles*). I'm not sure where this should be discussed, but I thought I'd start here. Thanks!   – Jrdioko (Talk) 00:07, 14 Jul 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: I see no reason for capitalizing it. I don't think the Wikipedia sandbox is a proper noun. Sandbox is a generic term used on nearly every wiki to describe a testing area. And "our Wiki Sandbox" would be very wrong as the capitalized version of wiki is generally taken to mean the Portland Pattern Repository, not Wikipedia. :) Angela. 21:50, 14 Jul 2004 (UTC)
replies: text:  Good to know :). That brings up a whole different host of problems since I know I've seen "Wiki" in several places (such as "Wiki markup" on Wikipedia:How to edit a page). I see now that sandbox, when used as a general term, should be lowercase. However, it still seems to me that "the English Sandbox" should be capitalized since we are pointing out that sandbox as opposed to the others. Does this sound right? Also, since Wikipedia:About the Sandbox describes the English Sandbox rather than sandboxes in general, it seems like it too should be in uppercase. I've never been the best at figuring out what needs to be capitalized, though, so perhaps I'm not the best person to be thinking about this. Maybe I'll have to take a look at a grammar book.   – Jrdioko (Talk) 22:52, 14 Jul 2004 (UTC)
replies: text:  As the Main Page is capitalized but the Village pump isn't, it could go either way. I don't actually mind too much anyway. Angela. 00:37, 16 Jul 2004 (UTC)
replies: text:  Ok, and it's not a big deal, I just have a thing for standardization :).   – Jrdioko (Talk) 03:10, 16 Jul 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Proposed changes 

message: The newarticletext message does not make sense for a talk page.  I went to add comment on the scarity article that did not have a talk page.  So I got this message:
Wikipedia does not yet have a Talk page called Scarcity.
* To start the article, begin typing in the box below. When you're done, press the "Save page" button. Your changes will be visible immediately.
* Please do not create an article to promote yourself, a website, a product, or a business (see Wikipedia:Policy).
* If you are new to Wikipedia, please read the tutorial before creating your first article, and only use the sandbox for editing experiments.
* Search for Scarcity in Wikipedia
Problems with the message in the context of a talk page:
#It's not an article
#You shouldn't have to read the tutorial before making a comment on a talk page.
As the message stands in the context of a talk page, I think that a new visitor to the site would be seriously discouraged from making a comment on the talk page.  Reading a twelve page tutorial just to make a comment is seriously out of line.
I would recommend that the software should be improved to have different text for a new article and a new talk page.  For a stop gap measure, I would recommend that the new article text include a disclaimer that it refers to creating an article, and that it can be disregarded in the context of creating a new talk page.  Jrincayc 15:25, 25 Nov 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Doesn't make sense for talk page 

message: You've followed a link to a page that doesn't exist yet.
To create the page, start typing in the box below
(see the help page for more info).
If you are here by mistake, just click your browser's back button.
:Comments?
I would change the first sentence into "You are about to create a page that doesn't exist yet." This gives a clearer distinction with MediaWiki:Noarticletext for the view page as opposed to the edit page. Ditto for the other namespaces.--Patrick 14:41, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  newarticletext 

message: You've followed a link to a user page that doesn't exist yet.
To create the page, start typing in the box below
(see the help page for more info).
If you are here by mistake, just click your browser's back button.
:Comments?
::I reccomend saying something along the lines of "Wikipedia is not MySpace". Perhaps providing a link to BluWiki, so that people don't continually abuse Wikipedia as social networking and say "BUT IT'S THE ONLY WIKI!" ~ Flameviper 16:49, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  newuserpagetext 

message: You've followed a link to a image description page that doesn't exist yet.
To create the page, start typing in the box below
(see the help page for more info).
If you are here by mistake, just click your browser's back button.
:Comments?
"You are about to provide the description of an image. To do this, start typing in the box below
(see the help page for more info).
If you are here by mistake, just click your browser's back button."
"Create the page" is confusing, because if there is an image, it just adds an editable part.--Patrick 14:50, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  newimagepagetext 

message: You've followed a link to a talk page that doesn't exist yet.
To comment on the page , start typing in the box below
(see the help page for more info).
If you are here by mistake, just click your browser's back button.
:Comments?
::For user talk pages, the present text should be expanded thus:
:::Before creating this page, please [ verify] that the user account exists. Also, check to see whether any contributions have come from this account.
::Who agrees with me? --Slgrandson 17:29, 18 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  newtalktext 

message: I tried
 
 type=search
 default=
 
 but that gives
 type=search
 default=
 
Patrick 07:01, 13 July 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Inputbox

message: Can an admin just add a unique id to the div, like ? This would allow non-newbies to turn the display of this box off in their monobook.css file. Thanks, Func( t, c ) 06:21, 29 July 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes please!  That would be very helpful. JesseW 07:21, 29 July 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Done.--Patrick 11:30, 29 July 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Thank you. :) Func( t, c ) 23:36, 29 July 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Div ID 

message: Please note that this message can be disabled by adding the following to your monobook.css:
 #newarticletext { display: none; }
— Dan | Talk 23:41, 2 September 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  If you don't want to see this message at all...