Template talk:Outdent

Gap in the line
This might affect just some browsers, but the line has a gap at some indentation levels in Firefox. —⁠andrybak (talk) 09:28, 26 June 2019 (UTC)
 * What version? I'm not seeing any on version 67.0.1 on Firefox on Windows 10. – Brandon XLF   (t@lk)  12:26, 26 June 2019 (UTC)
 * I checked on Windows as well, and it seems that this is an issue very similar to the issue I encountered with Template:Routemap, and it has to do with the width of fonts used by the browser. —⁠andrybak (talk) 13:03, 26 June 2019 (UTC)
 * I'll have to double check the fonts used on Ubuntu later. —⁠andrybak (talk) 14:36, 26 June 2019 (UTC)
 * I collapsed the table just for size/placement. I don't see any issues; running FF beta. Primefac (talk) 23:54, 26 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Turns out, that outdent has a gap when DejaVu Sans is the default "sans-serif" font used by the browser. Switching setting "Preferences > Language and Appearance > Advanced... > Sans-Serif" to Liberation Sans fixed the issue for me in Firefox. I've updated the table. Is it worth spending time to try to fix the template for default fonts on non-Windows machines? —⁠andrybak (talk) 00:07, 27 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Probably not. How big of a gap was it, anyway? Primefac (talk) 00:11, 27 June 2019 (UTC)
 * The line is rendered by a number of dashes box drawing characters. To fix the biggest gap I saw, I had to add two dashes horizontal box drawing characters (not in wikitext, just in HTML through Firefox's Inspector tool). —⁠andrybak (talk) 07:29, 27 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Wow, that's... big. Surprised no one ever noticed it. Primefac (talk) 12:47, 27 June 2019 (UTC)

Template-protected edit request on 16 November 2019
Replace Module:Outdent with Module:Outdent/sandbox. This replaces the use of box drawing with borders, offering support for all fonts and support for older versions of IE. Borders also render more sharp. The use of borders also makes the template non-selectable when copying text from the page, which is preferable because indents are copied from the page when you copy the text on the page. This change also makes the module significantly smaller. See Template:Outdent/testcases for comparison. – Brandon XLF   (t@lk)  08:19, 16 November 2019 (UTC)
 * The sandbox lines are a different width than the existing ones - was this intentional, and how much will it impact the visual aspect of any existing uses? Primefac (talk) 12:52, 16 November 2019 (UTC)
 * Also, the test cases in the section "Strings of : and then a * supplied for parameter" do not match each other. The sandbox appears to render incorrectly. – Jonesey95 (talk) 15:18, 16 November 2019 (UTC)
 * Fixed. If you mean by thickness, that can be changed, currently it's 1px, but it can also be 2px. If you mean by the length of the lines, I think the sandbox is a little better in terms of the length of the lines, but they are a little off, so I added some code to move them 1px to the right, and now the pixels seems to line up exactly on my computer at least.


 * 1px with "AAA" gray value:


 * Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua.
 * 
 * Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua.


 * 2px with "AAA" gray value:


 * Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua.
 * 
 * Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua.


 * 2px with "BDBDBD" gray value:


 * Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua.
 * 
 * Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua.


 * 0.2em with "BDBDBD" gray value:


 * Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua.
 * 
 * Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua.


 * Current with "AAA" gray value:


 * Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua.
 * Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua.
 * Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua.


 * Sandbox (added by Jonesey95 to BrandonXLF's original examples):


 * Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua.
 * Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua.
 * Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua.


 * – Brandon XLF   (t@lk)  17:23, 16 November 2019 (UTC)
 * I see zero reason to change the thickness. Primefac (talk) 23:32, 16 November 2019 (UTC)
 * I changed most of the "1px" styling to "2px" in the sandbox, and now the sandbox lines look thicker than the current template. It would be nice to make it look the same. – Jonesey95 (talk) 15:12, 17 November 2019 (UTC)
 * , I don't think that's possible because most browsers round decimals. – Brandon XLF   (t@lk)  22:46, 17 November 2019 (UTC)
 * Also, I'm pretty sure the original was 1px; in the above example the 1px variant looked like the current template/module. Primefac (talk) 01:52, 18 November 2019 (UTC)
 * OK, I have tweaked the gray value in the sandbox to see if I could match the gray of the current module, at least on my screen. For me, making the gray lighter makes the line look a little thinner, so close to the current module that I suspect nobody will notice. I took the liberty of adding the sandbox example to BrandonXLF's examples above, and modifying the "1px" example to show 1px regardless of changes to the sandbox. What does it look like to both of you? – Jonesey95 (talk) 04:54, 18 November 2019 (UTC)
 * Looks better, I know in comparison it's easy to see the differences but 2px was just too thick by itself. Primefac (talk) 11:03, 18 November 2019 (UTC)
 * I made the horizontal border 1px thick and a little darker, and I think it looks really similar to the current version. Let me know if it looks better than having it all 2px. – Brandon XLF   (t@lk)  17:11, 18 November 2019 (UTC)
 * On my screen, the "2px with BDBDBD" version looks closest to the current template. The most recent 1px change to the sandbox makes the horizontal line look considerably thinner than the current template. If your goal is to upgrade the functionality of the template without having people notice a change (and subsequently complain, because change is hard), I think the "2px with BDBDBD" version is your best bet. – Jonesey95 (talk) 21:14, 18 November 2019 (UTC)
 * , the 2px still looks way too large on my screen, I think it has something to do with the browser font size. When I set my browser font size to "large", they look very similar. I changed the sandbox so it uses em instead of px, meaning it should change between screen sizes. It now looks much better on my screen, let me know if it looks like the 2px version on your screen. – Brandon XLF  (talk) 22:15, 18 November 2019 (UTC)
 * 0.1em looks like 1px on my screen. I pasted a 0.2em example above. For me, that looks like the current template. – Jonesey95 (talk) 00:26, 19 November 2019 (UTC)
 * On my screen, 2px is too large and 1px fairly thin. The thing that comes somewhat close to the slightly blurred text-version is this admittedly silly version with a box-shadow:   I don't think I would have noticed a change to 1px, so it's probably fine.  – Thjarkur (talk) 01:26, 19 November 2019 (UTC)

1px seems to be the favourite. Let me know when the sandbox is ready to be synchronised. &mdash; Martin (MSGJ · talk) 19:24, 23 November 2019 (UTC)
 * The sandbox is currently using 1px and is ready to be synchronized. Also,


 * test_line_width
 * Set to any string to test the line creating and reduction functions in the module.
 * Not recommended
 * will need to be removed from Template:Outdent/doc since the parameter is no longer around since it is now no use for it and it was only used for testing. – Brandon XLF  (talk) 19:47, 23 November 2019 (UTC)
 * ✅. Please make any changes required to the documentation yourself &mdash; Martin (MSGJ · talk) 11:33, 25 November 2019 (UTC)
 * ✅. Please make any changes required to the documentation yourself &mdash; Martin (MSGJ · talk) 11:33, 25 November 2019 (UTC)

does this template technically create new lists when used?
Is this template accessibility-compliant with MOS:LISTGAP? —  Fourthords  &#124; =Λ= &#124; 19:34, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

No text after Outdent
Hi all, I raised a query (April 22 2020) about my user talk archives at the help desk. The swift answer was that Outdent, without any following text, seems to break the Archives box. Any thoughts? >: MinorProphet (talk) 14:24, 22 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Even if you put a bunch of text after the outdent, the links are still not clickable. I can see the links sometimes if I pass my mouse over the text, but they disappear. I suppose it's possible that the box that outdent creates overlaps the archives box somehow. Someone could copy this page into Special:ExpandTemplates to look at the code. Add Lorem ipsum after the outdent to see that the links are still not clickable. – Jonesey95 (talk) 15:20, 22 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Not much to see, really. First is the archive box, second is the outdent:


 * The archive box is showing plainlinks to the archives, and the outdent is wrapped up in spans. There doesn't seem to be any crossover between them. Primefac (talk) 15:38, 22 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Update: seems to be only on their page; I did pretty much the same thing on my talk and I didn't see any odd behaviour. Primefac (talk) 15:41, 22 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Update 2: I took the code from Special:PermaLink/952501648 (on my own talk) and put it through the ExpandTemplate, properly showed all of the text and links despite the expanded code being identical. Primefac (talk) 15:47, 22 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Update 2.5: I took the code from the original permalink (from their talk), copied to my page, for Special:PermaLink/952502609; it looks like the top row of archives isn't showing, but the second+ lines are showing as normal. I guess that means there's something in the outdent spans that's overlapping the archive box, but only for one row of text... Primefac (talk) 15:47, 22 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Thank you all for your expert interest so far. Like, "I can see the links sometimes if I pass my mouse over the text, but they disappear." I should confess that I am using Firefox 47.0.1 on XP Pro SP3, and my antiquated system may be unable to cope. >: MinorProphet (talk) 16:04, 22 April 2020 (UTC)
 * I get the same results as in Update 2.5. MinorProphet (talk) 16:10, 22 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Seems like the first was causing the issue. Switching to  seems to have worked. Primefac (talk) 17:53, 22 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Brilliant. Thank you everyone for your timely and expert assistance. MinorProphet (talk) 21:11, 22 April 2020 (UTC)

Template-protected edit request on 15 May 2020
Please apply Special:Diff/952521877/956790018 to the module to allow negative numbers to be passed as first positional parameter to the template. New test cases: —⁠andrybak (talk) 10:07, 15 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Yes check.svg Done Primefac (talk) 14:05, 15 May 2020 (UTC)

Use color from style guide
Please use the color from the style guide,, instead of. So, replace all occurences of  with. Jack who built the house (talk) 22:39, 18 September 2021 (UTC)
 * ✅ Primefac (talk) 23:45, 18 September 2021 (UTC)

Any other template to separate comments from unrelated replies?
Recently I came across a discussion where an outdented comment appeared to have a reply to it, but it was to the original comment and was completely unrelated. Here's the use case that I saw (comments coloured to signify relevance to one another):

Primary content.
 * Comment.

Reply to above.
 * Reply to primary content.

Is there some way to demarcate where an outdented thread ends via a template or similar? — Tenryuu 🐲 ( 💬 • 📝 ) 21:32, 13 January 2023 (UTC)
 * Re-threading per is probably your best bet here. Primefac (talk) 10:41, 16 January 2023 (UTC)
 * Thanks, it seems that's my best bet. — Tenryuu 🐲 ( 💬 • 📝 ) 14:21, 16 January 2023 (UTC)

Bug in reply when outdenting from user with a custom signature
When I outdented following a comment from a user with a custom signature, the reply for the entire discussion reset to the bottom of my outdented comment. See here for example. After this edit, if you clicked the "reply" button at the top of the discussion, it went to the bottom of my outdented comment instead of the bottom of the entire discussion. The void century (talk) 20:47, 5 February 2023 (UTC)
 * This looks like a bug with the new Discussion Tools, which produces the "reply" link at the end of each editor's contribution to a talk page. AFAIK, it automatically inserts colons sufficient to indent a new contribution one more than the previous one. There is at least one feature request,, to allow editors to adjust the colon depth of the new addition. – Jonesey95 (talk) 23:41, 5 February 2023 (UTC)
 * It was still doing it after I moved the colons into the outdent, so not sure if that's the entire issue. The void century (talk) 20:11, 8 February 2023 (UTC)

Reply question
Root User
 * Nested discussion User1

blarblar blar User2 some other reply to "nested discussion" User3

How do I indicate that User3 replied to "Nested discussion" instead of "Root"? Aaron Liu (talk) 23:27, 30 April 2023 (UTC)
 * Well, User3 probably should have used a : to indent one level, but otherwise I would use an @User2 (either via ping or just written out) to indicate that the reply is to User2 and not to Root User. Primefac (talk) 12:26, 2 May 2023 (UTC)

A tiny flaw in the logic of the examples '3.x'
An example according to your logic:
 * A. Before 'A' are 3 ":"s.

B

An example according to my logic:
 * C. Before 'C' are 3 ":"s.
 * D old. Normally 'D' would be indented by one step more than 'C'. So, before 'D' would be 4 ":"s. So this 'D' at the start of the line is the place where 'D' would be by normal indentation. And so: this is the place, where the right end of the sign should start.

D new. This is the new place of 'D', after outdentation.

So the right end of all the outdentation signs in the examples '3.x' should begin one step further to the right.

This would also require to change the rule from: "Use the number of colons from the former contribution!", to "Use the number of colons as you would normally use for your contribution!".

{Re. my punctuation: I know: this final dot is non-standard; I only do this in talks.}

Ping welcome, Steue (talk) 23:32, 1 August 2023 (UTC)


 * , I am genuinely not sure what you're suggesting here. If one person is replying twice (as you have done in your "D" example) and wants to outdent their comment halfway through discussion, then they are more than welcome to, but technically speaking four indents is still correct since the "old" D is indented with 4 colons. Primefac (talk) 08:29, 2 August 2023 (UTC)


 * @Primefac
 * Thank you for the ping.
 * You seem to agree with my opinion about the number/amount of colons which should be used in the template.
 * However there seems to be a misunderstanding:
 * In my example all the contributions (A to D) are thought to be from different contributors.
 * What I'm critisizing is that in the examples in the documentation the out-dent signs are too short by one unit, i.e. one colon.
 * If 'D' would have used 4 colons for his in-dentation, i.e. if he would not out-dent, then he should use 4 colons ( not 3 ) as the parameter for the length of this out-dent sign.
 * What I'm critisizing is that in the examples in the documentation the out-dent signs are too short by one unit, i.e. one colon.
 * If 'D' would have used 4 colons for his in-dentation, i.e. if he would not out-dent, then he should use 4 colons ( not 3 ) as the parameter for the length of this out-dent sign.


 * Ping welcome, Steue (talk) 09:04, 26 August 2023 (UTC)
 * The examples of use mirror how the template is used; to be honest I don't think I've ever seen an outdent done in the manner in which you are describing. Primefac (talk) 14:39, 26 August 2023 (UTC)

Outdenting a group of contributions?
Some contributors just indent and indent, one after the other, until there is less than a word in the column.

In such cases the readers have to scroll almost permanently.

When I, as a reading user, come across such a case, is there a way to outdent a whole group of contributions with just one template?

Ping welcome, Steue (talk) 00:37, 2 August 2023 (UTC)
 * No. Primefac (talk) 08:23, 2 August 2023 (UTC)