Template talk:ArbComOpenTasks/Archive 1

Archive 1

Archive 2

Adding to template

Before it's recent protection, I tried to add a section to this template to address Requests that have gone stale (not met the 4-vote threshold to open or reject). This version can be seen here. Since this template is a tool for communicating status of arbitrations, this seems like a natural extension of the template. There, unfortunately, is no way in the Arbitration policy to handle stale requests, so using this tool to communicate that need seems natural and desirable. I suppose the exact presentation of this information is not important, but I think it's valuable to have it here. -- Netoholic @ 15:32, 2004 Oct 22 (UTC)

Today the page was unprotected. I implemented a more expanded version of the change described above. It was again reverted, and the page re-protected, by User:Raul654. Still no discussion on this or any other Talk page, and no attempt to gather the opinions of other users on merit of this improvement. -- Netoholic @ 04:36, 2004 Oct 25 (UTC)

Leave this protected permanently. The arbitrators are all sysops and can edit it as they need without all this hassle from people who have decided that they know exactly what the arbcom ought to be doing. —No-One Jones ^(m) 05:37, 25 Oct 2004 (UTC)

I'm inclined to agree. →Raul654 05:50, Oct 25, 2004 (UTC)

The tradeoff, of course, is that nobody else can help keep this up-to-date. Whether that is worth the effort of wrangling with attempts to reinstate a format that was abandoned months ago is your choice. —No-One Jones ^(m) 07:14, 25 Oct 2004 (UTC)

The previously "abandoned" version attempted to track changes as each vote changed - probably a bad way to go. But removing it also meant that long-standing requests are stagnant. Communication is never a bad thing. -- Netoholic @ 07:33, 2004 Oct 25 (UTC)

I think that this should not be protected; it is arcane (random vandals won't find it), obvious when someone changes it (so it won't be misleading), and, of course, easily revertable.

Also, Arbitrators are not de jure sysops, only de facto; what would we do were we to have a non-sysop member?

James F. (talk) 08:53, 25 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Format

I tried a new format for this, which was reverted my Mav. His comment was that he didn't want to have to type that every time, but I really think it be very easy. After all, you can just copy an old line, and then change the name of the sub-page on five links. The benefit is that each listing shows all the related pages. It will be helpful to see when a talk page is created and also make the "Whatlinkshere" function work much better. Consider reverting back, or at the very least try it for a few days. -- Netoholic @ 03:05, 2005 Jan 9 (UTC)

5 links would be needed instead of one or two. The way it is now is easier to maintain. --mav 04:26, 10 Jan 2005 (UTC)

/Workshop rather than /Evidence ?

Recently this template was edited to replace the /Evidence link with a /Workshop link [1].

However, this leaves no link to the /Evidence page from the RfAr page (and the Workshop page itself has no link to /Evidence either). -- Curps 15:08, 16 August 2005 (UTC)

I'm a little confused on the use of the /Workshop page.

• Is it for ArbCom use only or can any party edit it?
• Is it meant to replace the /Evidence page or supplement it?
• Should evidence be placed on both pages or just one?

I think the workshop is a good idea, I'd just like a little more info on how it should be used. Carbonite | Talk 15:17, 16 August 2005 (UTC)

We now have both Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/X and Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/X/Workshop. And both are just blank templates; neither one reproduces the user comments from Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration that were added during the voting to accept/reject process. Are we in the middle of a transition to a different way of handling the evidence-gathering phase? This needs to be cleared up. -- Curps 15:29, 16 August 2005 (UTC)

Style changes

I made some minor style changes to the template. I indented the text for each header, then had each header get progressively darker for each stage of a case going through ArbCom (maybe that should be reversed, heh, sounds negative). Hopefully the indented text is OK even if the color changes aren't (something about text hugging a margin that closely just drives me nuts). Anyways, enjoy. —Locke Cole 09:29, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

Recently closed - how recent?

How "recent" must a case be in order to be listed in the "recently closed" section? --TML1988 01:11, 30 December 2005 (UTC)

Took the very words. Is this working to a rough number of days (2-3?), a certain number of most recent cases (1-2?), or some combination thereof? Personally I'd suggest leaving more/them longer, given the timescale of many cases, which tends to make their subsequent disappearance somewhat sudden-seeming. Say a week, as a rule of thumb. Alai 21:15, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

I generally just remove one case from the list for every newly closed case. I'm sure other clerks do different things, however -- otherwise the number of cases there would be forever static. Johnleemk | Talk 21:49, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

It varies a lot. For nearly two weeks this month there were no case closes, so the most recent closed case on the list at that time was really rather old. Now we're closing cases about one a day and so I'm happy just to list the most recent two cases. There is a link to the full list of closed cases in the "Recently closed" header. --Tony Sidaway 23:20, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

Initials of editors?

Recently I went by the main WP:RfAr page and noticed that there had been a change made in this template recently, namely showing the initials of some editors involved in a case. What is that supposed to signify? Are these administrators or arbitrators that have commented on a case, or something like that? --Idont Havaname (Talk) 16:23, 30 January 2006 (UTC)

Those are to indicate whos clerking.--Tznkai 17:22, 30 January 2006 (UTC)

It would be nice if there was something to indicate this on the template itself instead of having users trying to figure it out the hard way. Zzyzx11 (Talk) 06:56, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

This template is too fat

Just a remark. On my 19" screen with full width this template takes way more than half of the width of the screen. I can imagine how it looks on smaller screens.

I would think for a template to show nicely left-justified it should not take more than 1/3 of screen with.

The way it is now it ruins the table of contents in the main WP:ArbCom page, forcing even relatively short lines from it to break into two to three pieces like this:

2.6.3.4 
Suggestion
2.6.3.5 Update
2.6.3.6 Update Pt. 
2
2.6.4 Statement 
by User:Tony Sidaway
2.6.5 Statement by 
User:Leyasu

2.6.5.1 Gothic 
Music and Nu 
Metal (Banned By 
Admin Sceptre)
2.6.5.2 Second 
Ban By Sceptre
2.6.5.3 Gothic 
Metal
2.6.5.4 Heavy 
Metal Music
2.6.5.5 Admittance 
To Baiting Into 
Violating 1RR
2.6.5.6 Userpage 
Vandalism
2.6.5.7 
Threatening Admins
2.6.5.8 
Harrasment And 
Impersonation
2.6.5.9 
Personal Attacks And 
Wikilawyering On 
ArbCom

Comments? Oleg Alexandrov (talk) 16:11, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

I think it has more to do with your screen resolution than with your monitor size. At 1280*1024, I perceive no problem whatsoever. Also, this template is not included on WP:ARBCOM. Did you mean RfAr? Johnleemk | Talk 16:52, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

Yeah, I meant WP:RfArb, sorry. Now, this template has no limit in width I think, it expands as far as necessary to cover all lines in there without breaking them, is that right? Should its width be controlled though? Oleg Alexandrov (talk) 17:40, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

Sounds like a good idea. Perhaps a percentage would make sense (a pixel-specific width would make it too small for people like me). I'll see if I can come up with something. Johnleemk | Talk 18:04, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

Argh, ugly! Johnleemk | Talk 18:06, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

Yeah, either the TOC in WP:RfArb or this template look ugly, as they are forced to trade the same space. I agree with you, ugly TOC is easier to bear than the slimmed-down crammed ArbComOpenTasks template. Thanks for trying though. Oleg Alexandrov (talk) 18:59, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

Does the change I made look okay? (If it gets reverted, take a look at the history). —Locke Cole • t • c 21:36, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

Looks awesome to me, thanks! Oleg Alexandrov (talk) 21:53, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

Cool. =) Looks like it still has issues in IE 7 unfortunately. It looks like it's not respecting the white-space: nowrap in the table definition, but if you set nowrap on each individual table cell (except for the one I explicitly set to normal) it works fine. I bet it'd work if we had a CSS class for this (and take less code in the template). —Locke Cole • t • c 22:00, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

Alright, here's the solution for IE that saves having a ton of code in the template itself. The following code would need to be copied into MediaWiki:Common.css (putting it at the bottom should suffice):

.toccolours.arbcom,
.toccolours.arbcom TD {
  white-space: nowrap;
}

.toccolours.arbcom TD {
  vertical-align: top;
}

And this template would need to be updated to the code in User:Locke Cole/Template:ArbComOpenTasks.

If you'd like to see the effect yourself in IE/Firefox/whatever, simply copy the CSS code above into your userspace CSS override and look at User:Locke Cole/Template:ArbComOpenTasks (make sure to refresh/reload so your CSS file is updated). The only alternative I can think of to get this working with Internet Explorer is to put style="white-space: nowrap;" on every table cell defined.. and that gets ugly fast. Thoughts? —Locke Cole • t • c 23:54, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

I have been bold and added the "white-space:nowrap" directives and the template is now readable for me once again. My monitor is only a 15" LCD but I have to crank up the font-size to ridiculous levels to even get near to the effect that the original complainant describes. Maybe he could let us know what his settings are like to allow us to gauge whether this is likely to be a problem that other people will encounter? HTH HAND —Phil | Talk 12:04, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

The thing is, this is something that's edited (semi-)regularly so having all that code in there was something I was trying to avoid. =) Hence my suggestion of a CSS class that inherits from .toccolours. Then all we'd need is the single white-space: normal; to make the column with case names wrap as desired.

Also, you may want to modify Template:ArbComTaskEvidence (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs) which is what is used to add new cases to this template (it's subst'd into this template). —Locke Cole • t • c 13:05, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

In resonse to Phil Boswell, I have a 19" monitor with a 1024x768 resolution, full screen, that's when the TOC was showing mangled as described above. No big deal to some extent, as arbcom pages are not encyclopedic, so it is less important how they look, but still. :) Oleg Alexandrov (talk) 03:18, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

---

OK, I've now been reverted for removing an element that forced this template to be wider than it needed to be except in pathological conditions (that is, browser window widths of 800px and font sizes above 14pt, from a brief fiddling with settings. This is ridiculous. We can't hang-string ourselves into such an unsuitable situation merely because people go out of their way to have difficult set-ups. :-)

I propose, err, not having a forced-width item. Thoughts?

James F. (talk) 19:19, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

Not forcing the width implies that for long names either in {{ArbComOpenTasks}} or in the table of contents will mangle the table of contents as the two compete for the same space. But I seem to be the only one complaining, so I won't mind the template going back to unrestricted settings. But no, I am not going out of the way screwing my monitor so that things look bad. :) Oleg Alexandrov (talk) 20:00, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

FWIW, I preferred the fixed width version as well. Besides, without the fixed width, you may as well remove the white-space: nowrap styling since the browser will use the largest size it can get away with. —Locke Cole • t • c 20:13, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

Well... exactly. Having a fixed-width template is ugly as hell. Anyway, case names are meant to be short for ease of use (we've often called cases "... & others" or "... et al." for this reason), partially to make this template more useful and less ugly (but also to avoid our poor fingers being hammered down into stumps. :-)).

James F. (talk) 09:23, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

I have no opinion either way, as I'm not personally affected. I just reverted because we got consensus on the talk for the change. Now let's see if we'll get consensus to undo it. :p Johnleemk | Talk 20:15, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

Consensus is in the eye of the beholder. I read this and saw a lot of uninformed commentry about how CSS can (but really, really shouldn't) be used. :-)

James F. (talk) 09:23, 13 May 2006 (UTC)