For the longest time, I’ve been using the Unused Templates
script, and it has come around time to discuss the problem with the majority of the script: UIBs. There have been many users who’ve been wanting to deal with templates in the Unused Templates by deleting them (as proof here
), and even the Unused Templates script mentions deleting them It mentions:
Remember to check for other links to the templates before deleting them.
Although there are still many abandoned templates still listed, the majority of this list is all UIBs! So here’s just my idea. I’m not saying I can complete them without additional help from others and some approval of a consensus around the site. We have pages devoted to using Templates - from article templates to coaching templates to award templates to you-name-it templates, there is no page (besides the category tree pages) given for our UIBs.
The page would act like some of the subpages of wikiHow:Templates
but would contain only our UIBs. I could pull each category’s lists using AWB or via a printout of the category, but I don’t have the necessary tools to create these pages and I know what’s been said in the past (that Staff doesn’t have access to get the complete list via their computers for use in the system). But I know I’ll need lots of help compiling these lists into workable pieces of art to present to others. (It would take more than one laptop keyboard to add them all, and several weeks to months to construct these pages. Even if I took one category a day, this would still be at least 30 days because there are 30-40 UIB categories existing…and I know some of these would take even more work down the line.)
While some of our UIB categories contain only a few UIBs (Less than 50-75), even our biggest one - User Person
- is at more than 400 and I don’t want to exceed or crash any systems or have users waiting exorbitant amounts of time for any of these subpages to be seen!
There’s gotta be something we can do to help our UIBs reach users besides just deleting them or mentioning them in conversation because even with some, most users feel like it’s too much to do to add them to their page and don’t want to open up and say that others could help them add them to their page. (I tried asking the community to see what they thought about these use statements but got no response.) Asking users about their UIB use
I think I make my point pretty clear…it’s a pleasure to work with UIBs, and I know not one of us would want to see our work deleted but when no one is using them, some of these need to be taken care of and I think this is something this site will be deserving of and be somewhat of a compromise for all.
Yes I definitely think some sort of page similar to wikiHow:Templates would be good for UIBs. AWB can generate a list of all the UIBs at the moment, from memory it’s around 2500, but don’t quote me on that.
UIBs are a great way to express oneself on wikiHow and I feel as though they’re kinda taking a backseat at the moment.
I’ve been giving some thought to creating these subpages. I created a WikiHow Function template to use less typing.
You input the curvy brackets for the template and the template name (given next) then a vertical bar character, and the complete title of the UIB, and once the page is created, it’ll make the complete section for it on the page. If the UIB requires more than just the name - and requires the user to fill in parameters, the user must manually import these sections into the form - and seeming ugly. If you were to use the User Sandbox UIB, you’d link {{Uibuse|User Sandbox}} and so forth for each template that needs to be added to the page. The template can be found at Template:Uibuse
.
This will minimize the amount of workload I’d have to do in typing out each indexed template to create each entry.
I recursed AWB for the top level of UIBs and outside of bad entries (subcats being included) and some buggy pages (here and there) and other issues causing the number to be higher than what it’s supposed to target as a UIB, the number came out to be about 1700 UIBs. However, I think we’re looking more like about 1600 (or thereabouts) actual UIBs.
What’s making this seem more terrible to me is that with some of these including parameters, using the template I set up to simplify typing onto the wikiHow:Templates subpages, it’s actually going to cause more work than normal, and I think I need to rethink my choices a little bit…but I have nothing saved offline for the code of the page or template for these items. I have bookmarks, but nothing is backed up. So I’m now tackling some of the projects I was supposed to get to in mid-November 2022.
If nobody has any more objections, I am looking at beginning this part of this project probably starting the first week of March.
However, it may start a bit slowly to ensure these pages are being written correctly the first time. If things go south, I’ll stop and rethink until a working fix can be found. However, this template has design elements that have proved work - both via other elements in the same namespace and after I used this workaround in the template temporarily housed on the main (unpublished) wikiHow:Templates subpage housing the structural page with the inuse template on it.
It’s after midnight my time on March 1st. I’ve created 3 subpages for 3 categories. Some of these entries should be coming off the Unused Templates pages soon. I won’t update this post as I create these subpages, but once I add the last subpage, I’ll add the updated wikiHow:Templates subpage concerning UIBs to the wikiHow:Templates top-level page. I’m working off a list of categories, and highlighting the ones which are completed, utilizing text-only versions of these category pages (as I used to do).
For these three, I created a master document in Notepad and am adding the entries and fixing them up for every category page I’m creating that day.
I’m over the 50% mark - but that’s not fully indicating just how much work some of these are expected to take towards the end. Many of the UIBs in User Person have multi-parameters that the Uibuse template can’t help me set - leading me into trouble that way. However, the others are a little less troublesome but with the amount and degree of other issues, it’s making it seem more terrible than it is, and here’s where it’s going to take me some time to really get things going in the right direction. Out of the 44 categories, I’ve started the subpages for 27 of them - so more than halfway there!
The subpage for the jump page for these UIBs can be found at wikiHow:Templates/UIBs
but be forewarned that it’s not done yet, and this will be updated as I complete them with an inuse on the page itself. You may view it, but keep in mind that if there’s a pipe character at the beginning and the line doesn’t turn into a link, there’s a good chance that the subpage hasn’t been created yet, or I’m in the midst of creating it or have forgotten to add it (and you will have to wait to the end to ensure everything is done), and you’ll need to contact me to get an approximate date of finalization of the page, because I have an idea of the order I’m planning to do these in, just give me time to do this.
I have better news now. I’m down to the last subpage to create - however it needs to be split into 3 subpages - due to its immense size (User Person) so that the split is so that (User A… to User J) is on page 1 (User M… to User T) is on page 2, and the remainder (User U… to User Z) is on page 3.
But there’s still some additional work that’s needed on some of the other fluency ones to conform to one standard format, taking this one step further to work towards the Mission
. However, it’s either I bring it up in the forums, or I’ll do my best to take care of it with information elsewhere and bring that information over piecemeal.
Ok. Unless I’ve missed one or two along the lines, I seem to have completed all 44 subpage categories - including the 3 pages for User Person - due to the overall size being just so big. I’ll continue to monitor our Unused Templates page for the next few days, and will continue to watch for other UIBs to fall in. We might need to address these changes on our Create a UIB page as well as a general watch with others as they see UIBs created and mention these changes in our forums - like this one - but in a different thread altogether.
These will be completed probably by the end of next week.
