Template talk:AuEduNewbie

No documentation
This template hasn't been provided with any sort of a documentation or otherwise explanation as to how it's intended to be used. Is it supposed to be used in the user namespace, the draft namespace, the talk namespace, or somewhere else? Is it sort of a userbox like banner, students can added to their user pages? I cam across the template being used at Talk:Music television and it seemed really out of place so I removed it.I asked an admin who's pretty knowledgeable about templates about templates to take a look at User talk:Primefac and he made some changes to the syntax. The part of the template stating "This page is a work in progress and I am approaching my subject in good faith." seems to imply it was intended for article talk pages or maybe even draft talk pages, but it would probably be better to have discussed it a little more before just creating it. The coloring, size, etc. of the template is not really consistent with that used for most article talk page templates and it's not clear how the template should fit into the WP:TALKLEAD. There are similar templates for WikiED projects like Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment which seem to serve the same purpose; so, it's not entirely clear why this one was needed. Its different coloring and size might unintentionally give it undue prominence on an article talk page, which could lead to some misunderstandings.Anyway, it would help to know how this template is intended to be used and who is supposed to be using it. -- Marchjuly (talk) 22:53, 6 November 2020 (UTC)
 * The creator,, is semi-retired, but yes, Bidgee, if you're around, it'd be helpful to have better documentation. There's also no need for this to be Australia-specific. If we decide to keep it and not just merge it into a similar template, there should be parameters that allow specifying the link that goes to Australia. If you don't hear back, I'd suggest sending this to WP:TfD. &#123;{u&#124;  Sdkb  }&#125;  talk 00:54, 10 November 2020 (UTC)
 * It was never meant to be placed on the talk page of any article, it was intended to be placed on the User page and/or talk page of the student. I'm no longer employed in teaching the subject (thanks to COVID), you'll need to talk with on the template's future. Bidgee (talk) 02:09, 10 November 2020 (UTC)
 * . is correct. He created it for our students to put on their talk pages primarily but some of them at times put it on their user pages instead. We absolutely don't want students to put it on any article talk page so I'm very sorry about the one you've found on Talk:Music television . I've not seen this happen before but realise that the wording “This page is a work in progress and I am approaching my subject in good faith” might cause users to think it should go on an article talk page. The reason it is needed is that we use the WikiED Dashboard and when students didn't write on their user pages as asked, Administrators over there didn't know who to contact if they needed something addressed urgently. Bidgee's template is designed to include the tutors' Wiki usernames so WikiED-ers would contact them direct. It's been very. useful if used correctly because it helps me too when I'm going through up to 1000 (last year) assignments to know whose tutorial group students are in.


 * I'd like to be able to keep using it if you'd be willing to let Bidgee (if you are able to Bidgee) remove "“This page is a work in progress and I am approaching my subject in good faith.” and change the last line to read “I am approaching my subject in good faith. If you have any concerns or questions, my tutor’s name is Example (talk · contribs). Thanks!” Please let us know if this is possible and if there's anything else we should do. Next year we will be giving students marks for completing required work on their User pages and talk pages so that the templates don't end up in the wrong place. Thank you. everyone for your feedback and help with this and with our students' pages - esp thanks to for posting considerate and constructive messages to our students  and Fransplace (talk) 07:04, 10 November 2020 (UTC)
 * I don't think anyone needs to apologize. If even a basic documentation is added which helps students understand how the template is to be used, then perhaps there will be less chance of it being added to any article talk pages. My main concern about student's adding this to article talk pages is that it might lead to misunderstandings among editors where the student who adds the template mistakenly assumes it's sort of a "free pass" where they can edit the article as they please without worrying about WP:CONSENSUS or other Wikipedia policies and guidelines and where other editors who see the template might misinterpret it as the student trying to claim WP:OWN over the article. Students, in particular, might be working under a different set of constraints related to their studies that other editors are not privy to or bound to; so, they may try to make lots of changes to existing articles and be a little too WP:BOLD at times simply because they might not have the time to be WP:CAUTIOUS, which might lead to their changes being reverted or revised by others. This might frustrate and discourage some students, especially after they've added a "I'm a student; please don't BITE me" template to the article's talk page. Anyway, as long as the students understand what the template means and how it should be used, then things should be fine and problems should be minimized. -- Marchjuly (talk) 08:09, 11 November 2020 (UTC)
 * I have made the change that requested. I have also added a note to the documentation as to what the template is for and also added that it is not to be added to article or article talk page spaces. Bidgee (talk) 01:33, 12 November 2020 (UTC)
 * Thanks again and ! I'll add more detailed information - including the policies (CONSENSUS, OWN, and CAUTIOUS) for students next year when we work on adding the template to their user pages. Fransplace (talk) 06:12, 12 November 2020 (UTC)

Requesting code review
The template puts the big ugly warning label up even on user talk pages as seen as on the User talk: page.

I've made a sandbox that fixes this problem.

The new behavior is:


 * User, User talk:
 * Article talk, non-talk namespaces:
 * Other talk namespaces:

In all namespaces, it is followed by the existing code:

I am requesting a review of this version to see 1) if there are any bugs and 2) if this is the behavior we want.

Possible behavior changes to discuss: davidwr/ (talk)/(contribs)  20:08, 14 November 2020 (UTC)
 * In what namespaces should the big ugly error message appear? Should that be ALL that is shown, or should the rest of the template be shown as well?
 * In what namespaces should  appear?  Should it appear above or below the main template?  Should it be in a different font or style?
 * In what namespaces should  appear?  Should it appear above or below the main template?  Should it be in a different font or style?
 * This was the cause. Bidgee (talk) 20:47, 14 November 2020 (UTC)
 * OK, that puts us back at a stable starting place. In light of the large discussion above, do we want the template to have any namespace-sensitive output?  davidwr/  (talk)/(contribs)  20:56, 14 November 2020 (UTC)
 * This (modified the message after the test) will hopefully address that issue! Tested and working on talk spaces other than User talk pages. Bidgee (talk) 01:35, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
 * Good to finally get that sorted. I'm going to sandbox some wordsmithing so it looks better in namespaces other than article talk spaces.  davidwr/  (talk)/(contribs)  01:54, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
 * Spoke too soon, the current version doesn't work in User: space. The version I put in the sandbox (diff) does work, at least in the namespaces I tested: Article, Article talk, User, User talk, Template, and Template Talk (I just previewed to test, I did not save).  davidwr/  (talk)/(contribs)  02:20, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
 * Annoying that it doesn't work on User: pages but I think it was because of |other = in talkspace detect includes everything. Removed it and added in main other so it will still show on the Article space (main space). Bidgee (talk) 05:35, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
 * Have added the changes that you tested above. Bidgee (talk) 05:42, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
 * Glad to be of help. davidwr/  (talk)/(contribs)  15:50, 15 November 2020 (UTC)
 * Thanks again for your help. Bidgee (talk) 04:40, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
 * Happy to be of service. Also, I'm "keeping up practice" in the area of template editing.  Should there be a need for people with the "template editor" user-right, I want to be ready to say "not only have I done this in the past, but I'm keeping my skills up to date."  There currently doesn't seem to be a need (low backlog), which is one of the reasons I haven't asked for that chore/privilege yet (a "demonstrated need" is one of the criteria, plus, I'd rather not carry around "keys" I don't actually need). davidwr/  (talk)/(contribs)  15:06, 16 November 2020 (UTC)

Invalid params
In the interest of being scientific I set up tracking categories for if user or Example, and out of ~1800 uses, ~380 were invalid, making it ~80% correct use (as opposed to 80% incorrect). That's definitely a much more manageable number of pages to fix. Primefac (talk) 14:53, 30 May 2021 (UTC)


 * I assumed it was 80% incorrect because when I searched using hastemplate out of the first 20 or so around 80% were incorrect, which I guess was not a representative sample. I still feel it would be a better idea to fix almost all of them automatically by defaulting to rname when user equals example, but fixing it manually with a tracking category will work as well, it will just take more time/effort. Zoozaz1 talk  15:13, 30 May 2021 (UTC)
 * That's not an unreasonable position to hold, to be honest, but here's why I feel it's always better to fix mistaken uses than "excuse" them with extra bodges in the code:
 * Right now, we have (in pseudocode) . If we go with your idea, we need to code it as , but only if   is a certain set of values. So we go from a single wikilink with a single if empty call to something that involves at least three #if, #ifeq, or #switch statements. Additionally, we need to repeat this check for both the (talk) and (contribs) links.
 * Basically, it's not impossible to do, but it's not good coding practice and is a royal pain to debug. It's better to throw in some tracking categories, maybe clean up and/or improve the /doc to make it more obvious which parameters are used in which circumstances, and educate new users rather than assuming they're going to mess it up. Primefac (talk) 15:39, 30 May 2021 (UTC)
 * In a general sense I agree with you, but in this case it's also a pain to have to fix the 380 invalid users. Would fixing that be something you can do with AWB? Zoozaz1 talk  16:02, 30 May 2021 (UTC)
 * Should be a straight-forward fix. Primefac (talk) 16:38, 30 May 2021 (UTC)