Help talk:Notifications/Archive 8

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Archive 8

Read notifications

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T207932

I can't seem to see my cross-wiki notifications unless I have unread notifications on that wiki. So I wind up keeping unread notifications around to avoid losing the ability to refer to the notifications I have already read. I'd honestly rather turn off the distinction between read and unread notifications. Could you add a "Other wikis with read notifications" link or some such? HLHJ (talk) 01:08, 22 October 2018 (UTC)

Re-reading this report, is seems less than clear. Example: I get lots of en-wiki notifications, but rarely anything from the nl-wiki. Someone notifies me from nl, and I read it but have no time to respond. A day later I go to my notifications list and cannot find any way to access that read nl-wiki notification. If I get a second nl-wiki notification, I can go to that, select "all" or "unread", and see my first nl-wiki notification, but I'd better remember to leave at least one of the messages flagged as unread if I don't want to lose access again. HLHJ (talk) 18:26, 22 October 2018 (UTC)

If you know the wiki then you can go there and click the notifications icon to see read notifications originating from that wiki. If you are unsure of the wiki then the bottom of user contributions at en-wiki has an "accounts" link which gives links to other wikis where you have an account. PrimeHunter (talk) 22:16, 22 October 2018 (UTC)

Yes, I can do that. It's just a bit of a nuisance, especially for several wikis; I'd rather keep some unread notifications around. The menu is titled "Recent activity[:] Pages with unread notifications]], so it's not misleading, but I wish I could toggle it, or turn off marking messages as "read". I found this idiosyncrasy surprising, but it's more a feature request than a bug report. Thank you for the advice. HLHJ (talk) 02:03, 23 October 2018 (UTC)

HLHJ, if I understand correctly, you would like to have Special:Notifications to gather all cross-wiki notifications, no matter the wiki you are on, instead of visiting every wiki you're active on? If so that's a feature request, for a smart improvement. However, while no work is scheduled concerning Notifications, maybe you should push those changes as a Community Wishlist item. Trizek (WMF) (talk) 12:04, 23 October 2018 (UTC)

Trizek (WMF), I don't know anything about the internal workings of notifications, so that may quite possibly be what I want. I'm not sure what makes me "active" on a wiki (having unread notifications there?). A display that would allow read and unread notifications from all wikis to be amalgamated into one list rather than only being visible broken out by wikis-I-have-unread-notification-on would also work. Because I am active on a fair number of wikis, and keep unread notifications around, my "Recent Activity" list stretches well off the bottom of the screen. As I often deal with new notifications at the top of the page without scrolling down and clicking on and checking through eight or nine wikis, I've managed to miss seeing cross-wiki notifications for months, which is careless and unkind of me when someone is awaiting a reply. It's far too easy to do (also, checking right now, I can't see my English Wikitionary notifications at all; clicking on the menu item does nothing). I suspect I would be more active across wikis if this were easier. I'd be happy to help nominate a Wishlist item; please let me know of any other information you want. HLHJ (talk) 03:40, 25 October 2018 (UTC)

HLHJ, the description you have done is I think enough. I've tried to recap it in a Phabricator ticket, to track that request for improvement. Please edit it if needed.

Concerning the Community Wishlist, when the survey will start, you will just have to explain your problem there and link it to the Phabricator task. The community will vote on their favorite ideas, I hope you will have it selected!

Trizek (WMF) (talk) 09:14, 25 October 2018 (UTC)

Done! See Meta:Community Wishlist Survey 2019/Editing#Notifications should be able to display all cross-wiki notifications, whatever their status. Thank you, Trizek (WMF). Crit welcome. HLHJ (talk) 04:27, 30 October 2018 (UTC)

Triggering events: Reverts

Section Alerts says, that a notification is generated: Edit reverts: When one of your edits is reverted, or "rolled back", by another user, but this isn't clear. Is the notification the result of clicking the "undo" (or "roll back") link? Is it a consequence of the prepopulated undo text which links the user's contributions and Talk page? If a user reverts a previous edit manually without clicking an undo link but imitates a typical Undo edit summary withe the Contributions and talk user links, is an alert generated? If a user clicks the undo link, but removes all wikilinks in the edit summary, is an alert generated? Mathglot (talk) 00:48, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

I think it is just edits from using undo or rollback (undo and rollback tags). Manual reverts wouldn't trigger a notification. The edit summary doesn't have an impact. — JJMC89 (T·C) 00:47, 2 January 2019 (UTC)

Notification in edit summary

My reading of WP:Notifications#Alerts and the page it links to (mw:Mentions in edit summary) is that if User:A edits an article and includes "[[User:B]]" in the edit summary, then User:B will receive a notification, assuming they haven't disabled it in their preferences. The documentation states that a talk page notification needs to be signed, but no such requirement is mentioned for an edit summary. I experimented with diff which shows an unsigned edit to an article with a mention of a user in the edit summary. From the discussion here, that notification was not received. What's going on? Is there something in the documentation that I missed or is the documentation lacking a key point? Johnuniq (talk) 00:48, 26 January 2019 (UTC)

Thanks Uanfala for your edit at User:Uanfala/sandbox. The edit summary included a link to my user page and I received a notification despite there being no signature. As expected from the documentation, the notification reads "Uanfala mentioned you in an edit summary on User:Uanfala/sandbox ... 1: pinging User:Johnuniq". So notifications by edit summary work although the faint possibility that something disables them when editing an article remains. Johnuniq (talk) 02:40, 26 January 2019 (UTC)

@Johnuniq: Edit summary notifications are not triggered if the edit is a revert (undo or rollback) or is done by a bot. — JJMC89 (T·C) 02:58, 26 January 2019 (UTC)

Ah, so that's why! – Uanfala (talk) 02:59, 26 January 2019 (UTC)

Brilliant, of course. My test described above was exactly that: an undo. This edit at Morigi successfully notified me so notification by edit summary definitely works with the known exceptions that notifications can be disabled in your preferences, and specified accounts can be listed under "Muted users" in preferences to suppress notifications, and notifications do not work for an undo or rollback. I was hunting around earlier and found mention of a page which lists Sinebot as not generating notifications, but I can't see it now. Johnuniq (talk) 03:09, 26 January 2019 (UTC)

Hmm. Drmies (talk) 03:14, 26 January 2019 (UTC)

Yes, I got that notification and will notify in the edit summary of this edit. Johnuniq (talk) 03:53, 26 January 2019 (UTC)

Alright. We have to stop meeting like this. Drmies (talk) 03:56, 26 January 2019 (UTC)

I certainly received a notification for this unsigned talk page edit, so it was entirely down to the link in edit summary. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 13:26, 26 January 2019 (UTC)