Wikipedia talk:Babel

Right aligned Babel blocks

I took a look at the Babel template over at English, because I thought I remembered that the info blocks were right aligned. They use tables and the "float: right" attribute to force the blocks to the right.

Over at English they define Template:Babel-1 as:

 
{| style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; margin-bottom: 0.5em; width: 242px; border: #99B3FF solid 1px"
|-
| style="text-align: center" | '''[[Wikipedia:Babel]]'''
|-
| {{User {{{1}}}}}
|-
| style="text-align: center" | [[:Category:User languages|Search user languages]]
|}

Would it cause a lot of problems if we copied that definition over here?

What I did in the meantime was embed the use of Babel-3 inside a table with no border, like on my user page :

 
{| style="float: right;" 
|-
| {{Babel-3|en-3|de-1|zh-1}}
|}

Shenme 02:43, 1 Jun 2005 (UTC)

I support doing this. Michael 06:39, 26 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Big problem and question

Two major problems are bugging me with the Babel function here at SEWikipedia. The first is that the lovely categories you have listed so nicely on this page do not work correctly/don't show the actual users with those attributes, because in place of categorizing users as "User en", the way it works here (which I think is wrong) is to call them "Users by language - English." This does two things. First, it places all identified native-English-speaking users in a non-intuitive place, different from precedent (and this applies to all the other users/Babel categories, also, as the template works the same regardless of the content), and second, it means that the links on this page do not go to the categories which display all such identified users, since that goes to a different page altogether. This second means that even if there are fifty people who say they are native speakers of Swedish, you wouldn't know it from this page, because the link here (to "Category:User sv-N") is red, and the users (if there are any) are at "Category:Users by language - Swedish". Rather than change this list, I would highly recommend reconfiguring Babel so that it works the way it does in other Wikipedias. This also makes sense with the symbols in the boxes on the userpages (such as "en-2" for an intermediate English user).

Are we avoiding using the actual language ("Este usuario puede contribuir con un nivel intermedio de Español") because this is Simple English Wikipedia? I would still go for using the actual languages in the description, as the symbols (just like in the abbreviations for the different wikipedias) are generally self-explanatory. Oddly, the native-speakers' Babelbox still uses the language. --Cromwellt|talk 22:54, 17 February 2006 (UTC)

I can't even figure out how they work on EN: Template:·Users by language (en) finds something here on Simple, but on EN, en:Template:·Users by language (en) finds nothing, even tho' {{·Users by language (en)}} produces the same results on both Wikipedias. I wonder if the software versions are the same.

I do agree that the structure of things like Category:Users by language - Basic Swedish is VERY non-helpful, as it would be much better to have all 5 Swedish cats alph similarly; I guess Category:Users by language - Swedish (basic), Swedish (native), etc. Too bad the person that appears to have created much of this infrastructure hasn't been editting here for almost a year--maybe he could explain how they're useful this way.

As for the language, I would like to see, at a minimum, that the language name in English remain on the templates. I think the way EN does it is highly non-useful. And I disagree that codes like "sl" and "sk" have any intrinsic or immediately discernable distinction, let alone csb, als, nap, scn, wa, etc. (actually, the language seems to vary depending on who copied it over when, and who has modified it since: User:Stéphane Thibault. and to the other point, I don't think either 'is' nor 'íslensku' would necessarily be obviously, unambiguously Iceland, but I recognized the first letter in "Þessi" from some new Iceland-related articles I've editted in the past couple weeks.) Freshstart 05:49, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

You make some very good points, Freshstart. I think (I could be wrong, of course) the main difference is the name of the template. As above, over there they use "User en" for the template for native English speakers, whereas here we use "Users by language - Native English". Maybe you can still use the other form of template as an optional name for the regular one, but I'm sure that it isn't what they normally use. I think their version is better for a variety of reasons (most of them mentioned above), and our lovely page on Babelbox templates (this page) would actually be useful if we switched over instead of wasting space. The main reason I think that the English name of the language being on the template is extraneous is because anyone looking for an editor with that language ability would already know what symbol to look for, or would look on this page to find it, where the language is obvious. How about a compromise, then? We could change the "symbol" (the large letters) to the English version of the name (with appropriate number when necessary), while leaving the actual description in the given language. Then everyone can see what it is, whether they read the language or not. However, on the categories and names of templates, etc., I say we stick with the symbols, since I don't see any difficulty there, and that would fix our page here, not to mention being shorter and following precedent. --Cromwellt|talk 16:28, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

Sounds fine to me. Freshstart 03:39, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

I made all the changes (took me hours), except deletion of some old templates (since only admins can delete) and the font size of the symbol being adjusted for the length of the word (haven't gotten to it yet). Also changed this page to reflect changes, including adding a warning/notice near the top. Placed a notice on all talk pages of users which currently use Babel boxes so that they can fix their Babel boxes appropriately. I hope these changes are okay with everyone. If not, feel free to comment here or on my talk page. Happy editing! --Cromwellt|talk 04:13, 29 April 2006 (UTC)

Oh, and I also did not change the text of the boxes to the language (i.e. the Swedish Babel box in Swedish), though those can be easily brought in from English Wikipedia. --Cromwellt|talk 04:16, 29 April 2006 (UTC)

"We could change the "symbol" (the large letters) to the English version of the name" doesn't sound fine to me. We should follow the meta: standard and changing that to the language name degrades the templates. -- aflm (talk) 21:31, 29 April 2006 (UTC)

In my opinion, if we're going to have the English version of the name, we can't use the Babel userboxes because it just doesn't look right. I think it'd be fine to have different userboxes with the English name instead of the code, but not for use with the existing ones. Also, the codes transcend any one language, so there's no need to simplify. --Keitei 19:26, 7 May 2006 (UTC)

Glad to see some other voices have joined the discussion. As you can see from the discussion above, I am basically neutral as regards the symbols (language codes). As long as people come here (Babel), the symbols are explained, but if people go to the cats or to a user's page, it may not be obvious to what language(s) it refers. That was the reasoning behind putting it in place of the symbol.

If we do keep this format, we should lessen the fontsize of at least the long language names. Also, I feel we should definitely use the actual languages in the descriptions. While meta templates are useful as a model, each Wikipedia and other project must make its own decisions on these things. --Cromwellt|talk 21:13, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

Now that we've got Freshstart's input, I think we have consensus. This means five things, I would say:

1. We should use the codes again, but link them to the language pages
2. We should close the survey, since the issue is resolved, I think
3. We should remove the "don't change Babel templates" banner from the new changes page
4. We can start editing Babel templates again (changing the templates as we've decided would be a good idea)
5. We should make a note on the Babel page that tells those who create new templates how we've decided to do it

Comments, etc., are of course welcome. --Cromwellt|talk|contris 04:08, 28 May 2006 (UTC)

Should we change the language codes of the templates to the language names?

Read the above discussion and tell us what you think about this. Please add a number sign (#) before your signature.

Oppose

1. We should follow meta: standards. - aflm (talk) 19:19, 7 May 2006 (UTC)
2. I tried: hungarian is too long. We can add comment, like this:Category:User_hu --Rodrigo 18:58, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

We can link the language code to its article. See template:user zh. -- aflm (talk) 17:57, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

Neutral

1. As long as this is the only new change, I don't mind either way. --Cromwellt|talk 21:13, 8 May 2006 (UTC)
2. Having the codes linked to the language names resolves my concerns. Freshstart 18:59, 27 May 2006 (UTC)
3. Per Freshstart. So long as it is linked, there shouldn't be a problem. Celestianpower 09:13, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

Comments

I have already noted that some names are too long. I mentioned above that I have not yet lessened the fontsize for those. I think that is the best solution, assuming we keep the names instead of symbols. But yes, linking the code to the language article would work fine, I think, and would remove any doubt. If Freshstart likes that idea, I think we should go with it, since he was the one who suggested not having the symbols. --Cromwellt|talk 04:35, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

Additional languages

Could we have following languages added: Thai, Lao, Tagalog, Kiswahili and Amharic? Thanks.Tdfdc (talk) 19:13, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Some of these have templates, they're just not on this page. What levels would you need of each of these? By the way, I have linked each language in your post. If you leave them linked, it will be easier for me to find what I need to create any needed templates. --Auntof6 (talk) 22:50, 12 January 2014 (UTC)