Hi folks,
I am happy to report that we deployed an updated version of Article feedback v5 on the
German Wikipedia yesterday, at long last. :)
This new version includes these new features:
• Better feedback filters
• Simpler moderation tools for editors
• Separate reader moderation tools
• Discuss on talk page / contact post author
The release went well and the tools are now being tested by German community members. You
can see these new features in action on this central feedback page for the German
Wikipedia, where feedback from about 13,000 articles is being collected:
https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spezial:Artikelr%C3%BCckmeldungen_v5
If you would like to test the new features on the German Wikipedia, please restrict your
posts and moderations to this minor test page:
http://de.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Spezial:Artikelr%C3%BCckmeldungen…
If you prefer to test in English on our prototype site, visit this testing page on
MediaWiki:
http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Article_feedback/Version_5/Testing
We've updated our help pages on MediaWiki to describe all the new features that are
being deployed:
http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Article_feedback/Version_5/Help/Editors
Next, we are planning to deploy Article feedback to French Wikipedia next Tuesday, March
26 (starting with just a few articles, then going up to 42,000 articles a few weeks
later). We will also be releasing this new tool on the English Wikipedia next Tuesday
(that release is being delayed so we can complete the feedback data conversion -- as well
as disable the 'feedback from watched pages' feature, which is causing database
cache issues). Note that AFT will only be enabled on an opt-in basis on the English
Wikipedia, as requested by the community in last month's RfC; but many editors have
already started to re-enable AFT5 for articles they are watching, and we hope the tool
will continue to help them and others improve Wikipedia based on reader feedback in coming
months.
To track this multi-site release, visit this Etherpad page, which is being updated every
day and includes a list of known issues:
http://etherpad.wikimedia.org/AFT5-release
This will be our final release for AFT this fiscal year. Our current plan is to complete
these three deployments, then monitor activity on the English, French and German
Wikipedias in the next couple months and wait for their communities to vote on a wider
release. If these pilots are successful, we will consider supporting a few more
deployments this summer, for projects that have reached consensus for a wide release of
the tool (so far, we've received a variety of requests from the Chinese, Hungarian,
Kannada and other Wikipedias, as well as Commons). A more detailed roadmap for this
product is outlined on this 2013 release plan:
http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Article_feedback/Version_5/Release_Plan_2013
I would like to take this opportunity to give a big round of applause to lead developer
Matthias Mullie for this major milestone, as well as thank Benny, Kaldari, Luke, S Page,
Aaron and Asher for carefully reviewing all his new code -- and Chris, Oliver and others
for helping test it. Special thanks as well to our partners at the German Wikipedia: Denis
Barthel, Sebastian Peisker and Raimond Spekking, who have worked beyond the call of duty
to make this release possible -- as well as to Benoit Evellin, who is spearheading the
French deployment. Last but not least, we are very grateful to all other colleagues who
contributed to this final phase: Dario, Philippe, Roan, Howie, Terry and Erik, to name but
a few. It's a true pleasure to be working with you all!
I will send another update after we deploy the new features on the French and English
Wikipedias.
Onward!
Fabrice
_______________________________
Fabrice Florin, Product Manager
Wikimedia Foundation
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Fabrice_Florin_(WMF)
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