Feed The Beast Wiki:Administrators' noticeboard

New editor retention
Here's something that people (by that i mean everyone) should work towards. This was something I was working on, which involved creating new policies, pushing the translation tools, visual editor/template data, the new notification system and most importantly the wikilove and thanks extensions which i believe have been since removed. Of course while I haven't observed/monitored the wiki closely, but you'll know if anything I say here is true or relevant. -- properly signed (Former Wiki Lead); July, 2016

Rationale
As with any volunteering work, inviting and retaining new volunteers is an issue. Since reestablishing the wiki as a public wiki, there has been no significant (perceivable) increases in the editorship among the general public. There has also been no significant structural change to the content or the administration of the wiki (although there seems to be a closed off effort to reorganize the categories on going? I advise you create a project page to invite general participation). I put this here because only the current admins have the power to instigate any meaningful change in the current state of the wiki. The wiki lead has been phased out (for the better), but the admin (and possibly the staff) needs to take up the responsibilities that were previously held by the lead. Currently the wiki isn't going anywhere, it's just chugging along since I left it, maybe fixing the shit I left behind.

Resources

 * Editor Trends Study
 * March 2011 Update
 * RFA by month
 * Attrition Pipeline

Assessment

 * Editor by tenure: Stagnant admin/staff count could represent two things: (1) failure to retain editorship (2) administrative failure (I'm leaning towards the latter). There should be a clear direction in which the admins are taking the wiki. I see none of that.
 * Accessibility: The existence of the visual editor significantly lowered the bar of starting to edit. But as crafting grids and infoboxes are central to many of the pages on the wiki, there remains a challenge for new users to understand how they work. The TemplateData extension was my intended solution to this but it has been removed. It is impractical to think that a visual editor without template data will solve the problem of the inaccessibility of wikitext on this specific wiki. The existence of excessive levels of user groups also gives the impression of a closed community. The PRO tag also works to give off the same impression (especially when 90% of the edits are made by pro users, though since it's a curse thing we really can't do anything about it).
 * New user editing experience: There is no longer any obstacle for any user to begin to contribute. However, retention still seems to be a problem. Special shoutout to Xbony2 for scaring off anon editors. In general there is a lack of compliments and a surplus of criticism (direct or indirect). templates remains an issue to new users, until a better system is in place, the burden is placed on the staff to add/include templates on new pages instead of asking a new user to understand the complicated tilesheet/oredict/crafting grid system that is in place.
 * Mobile audience: The generic mobile skin is present. However, templates and other page elements are not optimized for mobile. Crafting grids also don't seem to be working. Editing on mobile remains a miserable experience (this is however, to be expected).

Recommended Actions

 * Establish clear and simple wiki policies. Convey clearly to active and "tenured" editors the official stance (decided by consensus) towards new editors.
 * Identify possible obstacles that may cause disinterest in editing in the different stages of wiki participation up to adminship and bureaucrat requests. cf. attrition pipeline
 * "Openness begets participation". Encourage and mentor new users, express your appreciation to their contribution (the thanks ext is a good lightweight solution to this, wikilove would also be good). Assume good faith. Simplify the user hierarchy. If possible, hide the pro user tag (it looks ugly as fuck anyway).
 * Ease the use of templates. Test out the TemplateData extension (used on wikipedia, go check it out ). Write guides that are geared toward new users. Do not expect, however, the new users to read them. Make them accessible, but don't make them mandatory.
 * Encourage participation, let people know that anyone can edit the wiki. (I'm looking at whoever keeps adding IP to anon user pages) You won't get any new users if no one knows that the wiki is open to the public. Coordinate with the FTB team (forcefully, that's how i pissed them off. this is called the official ftb wiki after all) to inform players the existence of this resource.

Closing Remarks
As the current active editorship is low, this seems like a lot of work. But it is crucial for a wiki to have editors to be able to survive. There will be that one day when you decide to retire from editing, who's going to take your place then? Inviting participation and retaining users should always remain a top priority for any wiki. Of course this wiki will die if modded minecraft ceases to exist (ftb is already ded to me). 𝜘

Comments
You may leave your comments here. I am leaving it as is and will not be providing any more comments. The staff and admin should come to a consensus of the situation at hand and any actions to take among themselves, however, anyone is free to participate in the conversation.

Lang fix
Make the code and pageSuffix methods of Module:Language public. -Xbony2 (talk) 21:09, 13 May 2016 (UTC)
 * Module:Utility_functions already has a public version of pageSuffix, although you have to trim the first character off if you're not using it as a link.  Chocohead Nag • Edits • Staff 21:15, 13 May 2016 (UTC)
 * I mostly want code; I just threw in pageSuffix because, why not? -Xbony2 (talk) 21:19, 13 May 2016 (UTC)
 * You should be able to get code from pageSuffix and just trim off the /. --  Satanic Santa F T B Wiki Admin 16:13, 18 May 2016 (UTC)
 * That's ugly and redundant code. -Xbony2 (talk) 10:29, 23 May 2016 (UTC)
 * is not that ugly in the grand scheme of things, especially as you'd only likely have to call it once.  Chocohead Nag • Edits • Staff 16:40, 23 May 2016 (UTC)

Group updates
-Xbony2 (talk) 21:20, 27 May 2016 (UTC) -Xbony2 (talk) 11:03, 3 June 2016 (UTC)
 * , taking off staff and probably banhammer.
 * , taking off staff.
 * , adding editor.
 * , adding editor.
 * Veto. That person has only been editing the wiki for a couple days. --  Satanic Santa 🎅F T B Wiki Admin 04:04, 4 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Editor should be given out whenever you think someone's edits are good enough that they don't need to be manually patrolled. 🐇 R e t e p 9 9 8 🐇🐰 Bunny Overlord 🐰 05:22, 4 June 2016 (UTC)
 * "Promoted based on staff choosing; any staff can nominate a user for editor rights if they are trustworthy and if they create documentation past a few pages. Requires no formal vote." - My renewed and unfinished group proposal. -Xbony2 (talk) 11:48, 4 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Peter: I agree. But we also shouldn't give it out to people who only have 30 contributions. I don't think that's enough to determine that they will almost always have edits that don't need to be looked at too much by staff.
 * Xbony: I don't know why your future proposal is really relevant in our decision making right now, where your proposal hasn't even been proposed. --  Satanic Santa 🎅F T B Wiki Admin 17:17, 6 June 2016 (UTC)
 * That portion of my proposal is my interpretation of how it works currently. Apparently I'm wrong, but then again there isn't an established group system here (hence why I'm making my proposal- so we can have a system to cover all cases, and so each staff member that joins joins the same way). -Xbony2 (talk) 18:10, 6 June 2016 (UTC)

(the more active editathoners) -Xbony2 (talk) 11:32, 21 June 2016 (UTC)
 * , adding editor.
 * , adding editor.
 * , adding editor.
 * done --  Satanic Santa 🎅F T B Wiki Admin 17:11, 21 June 2016 (UTC)

Interwiki fixation
There's a bunch of interwikis that need to be converted to HTTPS and shit. Go through each one, check if it is HTTPS, or redirects to another website, and fix it. And Gamepedias should start with the prefix //, not https:// or http://. This is the kind of thing I'd fix myself, but you know, I'm not an admin. -Xbony2 (talk) 12:46, 26 June 2016 (UTC)
 * It's a wonder why we have so many obscure wikis on the list to start with.  Chocohead Nag • Edits • Staff 12:48, 26 June 2016 (UTC)
 * That's just how it is per default. See -Xbony2 (talk) 12:54, 26 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Just because it's default doesn't mean keeping all of them is necessary.  Chocohead Nag • Edits • Staff 12:56, 26 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Didn't say it was. -Xbony2 (talk) 14:15, 26 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Can you just stop complaining about not being admin? It's really annoying. --  Satanic Santa 🎅F T B Wiki Admin 19:46, 26 June 2016 (UTC)
 * I'm sorry. It's just that I feel like sometimes I do everything around here. I devote hundreds of hours, pretty much every single day, to wiki writing and fixing shit. This is my passion. But yet, this wiki is ruled by two admins who just "do enough editing on the wiki to maintain PRO", and who don't seem to do anything unless I literally force them to. I'm sorry for being snarky, I'm sorry for being for a bitch, I really am, but I'm just tired. -Xbony2 (talk) 23:45, 26 June 2016 (UTC)
 * You know, this wouldn't be the first time you haven't responded to a request over the course of a week. -Xbony2 (talk) 15:42, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
 * It's also hardly a huge priority, for months we've coped with it (especially considering the only 2 we really use is the MC Wiki and normal Wikipedia), an extra week isn't a big deal what so ever.  Chocohead Nag • Edits • Staff 19:50, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
 * And gamepedia/wikipedia are already fixed anyway. 🐇 R e t e p 9 9 8 🐇🐰 Bunny Overlord 🐰 20:00, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
 * There I fixed the fucking https shit --  Satanic Santa 🎅F T B Wiki Admin 20:09, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
 * thank you
 * It's not that it is a huge priority, it's just that it's something that takes very little time to do but yet takes a lot of time to get around to doing. -Xbony2 (talk) 21:02, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
 * If it's so quick, then you could've done it and put it in a table so they'd only need to copy and paste the links over.  Chocohead Nag • Edits • Staff 21:04, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
 * @Retep, that's not unsigned. It's just part a badly indented comment. (bony)
 * The lesson here is to always indent your comments correctly. 🐇 R e t e p 9 9 8 🐇🐰 Bunny Overlord 🐰 21:25, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
 * You're one to talk. You just broke a comment in half. -Xbony2 (talk) 21:38, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
 * @Choco, I probably should of, if it would of helped that much. -Xbony2 (talk) 21:21, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
 * For what it's worth, I'll never vote for you to be admin since you insist on saying "could of" instead of "could have". 🐇 R e t e p 9 9 8 🐇🐰 Bunny Overlord 🐰 21:25, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
 * For what it's worth, I think you became admin not because you were experienced or worked hard for it, but because there just weren't any other admins around at the time. Santa could of ;) been fine as the only admin, but alas. -Xbony2 (talk) 21:38, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
 * Peter was admin before me, and was also made admin at a time where there were 3+ other admins. --  Satanic Santa 🎅F T B Wiki Admin 21:42, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
 * To be more specific, it was the role of Bureaucrat which I assumed by bureaucratic fiat. Admin I got a full month before santa and was given to me by jinbobo, who was wiki lead at the time. Staff I was given by jadedcat, who was wiki lead at the time, when I first joined so very very long ago. 🐇 R e t e p 9 9 8 🐇🐰 Bunny Overlord 🐰 21:47, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
 * And I'm pretty sure Tadpole (now known as Nerixel) was admin at that time too --  Satanic Santa 🎅F T B Wiki Admin 21:49, 2 July 2016 (UTC)
 * Yep. See Feed The Beast Wiki:Administration.
 * If I re-apply for admin, which I don't even know if I'll ever do, I won't be surprised if ya'll don't vote for me. Not because I'm not experienced (I've written thousands of pages), not because I'm not hardworking (I contribute almost every single day, and I've spent hundreds of hours contributing), not because the tools aren't of any use to me (a rather large amount of the administrative action taken recently (I could say a majority, but I'm not keeping score) has been at my request), but because I bitch-out when it takes a week for administrators to do a ten minute task. -Xbony2 (talk) 22:19, 2 July 2016 (UTC)

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-- santa wanted me to sign, so there you go.
 * Uh, I appreciate it, but I think that doesn't count as a signature. -Xbony2 (talk) 10:38, 3 July 2016 (UTC)