Template talk:Scholia

Template needs link to as-yet-unwritten article on Scholia

I've just seen this template added to an article on my watchlist, Sandra Knapp. The template doesn't say what "Scholia" is. Clicking on it leads to her page on the Scholia project, which doesn't include much explanation: clicking the "Scholia" link in the menu bar of that page leads to this which is not helpful for the reader who doesn't know what Wikidata is.

If this template is being rolled out to real encyclopedia articles, it needs to have a clickable link from the word "Scholia" to an article which explains what this is all about, for the benefit of readers - those real people out there beyond the ivory towers of Wikidata expertise. Please.

Perhaps just simply link the name to https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Wikidata:Scholia, or, better, write an article for Wikipedia - just as there is an article on Wikidata (which doesn't mention Scholia except as a source).

Pinging @Daniel Mietchen: as the editor who added it to that page, so presumably a Scholia enthusiast. PamD 08:04, 23 October 2019 (UTC)

Thanks for looking into this. I added the link to wikidata:Wikidata:Scholia for now. -- Daniel Mietchen (talk) 04:56, 24 October 2019 (UTC)

Thanks, @Daniel Mietchen: Certainly better than nothing, but not very reader-oriented, it's very much information for editors (people who know what Wikidata is, for a start). Someone still needs to write Scholia (Wikidata project) or some such title (and remember to update the hatnote at Scholia). PamD 11:41, 24 October 2019 (UTC)

Discussion elsewhere

• Wikipedia_talk:Draft_rewrite_of_Notability_(academics)#Scholia_to_support_this_idea

Blue Rasberry (talk) 15:52, 21 November 2019 (UTC)

Template Vandalised?

Now displays an image saying "69 sex"...58.152.251.171 (talk) 05:45, 28 April 2020 (UTC)

{{Ifnoteq then show}} used in this template had been vandalized. I've undone it. – Finnusertop (talk ⋅ contribs) 06:42, 28 April 2020 (UTC)

Doesn't seem useful on large topics

While this template may be useful perhaps for specific, focused articles on a relatively small or purely scientific subject, it seems (at least as it stands) to have little or no value on broad, general topics. Examples:

• Association football[1] gives only 5 articles since September 2016, the most recent one being an article in some regional Frenh newspaper. The third one is a manga series[2]. Actually finding out that this is a manga series isn't even straightforward, the list is indiscriminate and requires two further clicks per entry to find out what these even are. The fifth, "Ho perso Maradona: Storie di tifo e altre dipendenze " is an "independently published" book by an author without a single Wikipedia article anywhere. If I do a search for more specific articles, e.g. using "Uefa", results 2 to 10 are all Wikinews articles, which are a) already linked by the Wikinews template anyway, and b) again not reliable sources, not things we can use. What the actual purpose or benefit is from having this template on the football article is not clear.
• Bangladesh[3]: results are somewhat better than for football, i.e. they are at least at first glance all reliable sources. However, they are all very specific, not the kind of things one would use for a general article like Bangladesh, and at the same time mostly from one domain only, health and medicine. Searching for other topics which might be useful to add to the Bangladesh articles gives very disappointing results; a single result for "Tourism", nothing at all for "history", nothing for "sport", nothing on the "literature", one hit for "politics", ... Again, what the actual purpose or benefit is from having this template here is not clear.

The truly massive "Wikidata" labels which appear on Scholia look more like spam than anything else. The use of Qnumbers in our template here is an unnecessary distraction and offer nothing of value to readers or users of the template.

Is it allright if I remove the templates from such broad subjects, and perhaps add a note in the documentation that this template should be used for scientific subjects only? Fram (talk) 12:26, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

Seems a reasonable thing to do. Is it also actually possible to reduce the size of the Wikidata banner in the scholia link? I appreciate the value of advertising but agree with Fram that the current logo size overwhelms the page. -- Euryalus (talk) 15:17, 25 June 2020 (UTC)

I think it is reasonable to remove the Scholia template if Scholia does not present useful information. On the other hand, I suppose the link might provide some Wikicite people like me to extend the information in Wikidata. Now association football has 494 topic links [4]. For Bangladesh, the link could go to the country aspect instead [5]. — fnielsen (talk) 11:04, 30 June 2020 (UTC)

New URL for Scholia

Wikimedia Foundation has changed the canonical URL for Toolforge applications. Before Scholia's URL was https://tools.wmflabs.org/scholia, now it should be https://scholia.toolforge.org/. The template code makes use of ":toolforge:scholia" and it is unclear to me where this name is resolved. I am wondering whether anyone else would know? — fnielsen (talk) 10:56, 30 June 2020 (UTC)

@Fnielsen: you can keep using this syntax, see https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T247432 − Pintoch (talk) 11:43, 30 June 2020 (UTC)

Template violates WP:ELTEMP

@Daniel Mietchen: This template is in violation of WP:ELTEMP: "Do not create large, graphical templates for non-WMF websites, even if these websites are also wikis. All templates except those for WMF 'sister' projects should produce a normal, single-line, text-based external link without any favicons, bold-faced text, custom bullets, or other unusual formatting." The {{side box}} template can only be used for external links to sister projects. While your Scholia tool is obviously quite useful and interesting, there are many other tools that are also useful and interesting, and we do not give preferential treatment to any of them. I hope that makes sense. Please reformat this template to comply with WP:ELTEMP. Thank you! Kaldari (talk) 15:49, 8 December 2020 (UTC)

No response to this request. Count me in as another who wishes the template to meet WP:ELTEMP. In the case of biographies, is there not a way to put the Scholia link into the already existing Authority Control template? Esculenta (talk) 12:25, 11 January 2021 (UTC)

It doesn't directly provide authority control though, since the profiles are all indexed by Wikidata IDs. It would make more sense to produce an inline link like {{Google Scholar id}} etc. – Joe (talk) 13:05, 11 January 2021 (UTC)

@Joe Roe, Kaldari, and Esculenta: I am part of the Scholia team, and I acknowledge that the template needs reformatting or further action.

The situation is that this template is in violation of WP:ELTEMP as stated. One way to come to compliance with the rule would be to reformat this template to appear as a bullet-item of the external links section of articles, rather than as a side box in the same place as it currently is.

A challenge is that this template is used 2165 times, and I presume most of those placements have been by wiki community members rather than from any central order or encouragement from the Scholia team. Our team did place hundreds of these templates as a pilot but that does not account for the more broad present usage.

I think I would like to organize more discussion about where and how to place this. Here are some options:

• It stays in the external links section somehow
  • it stays as it is
  • it becomes an external link
  • it remains a side box, but it gets rebranded to indicate that its content is from Wikidata (thus becoming compliant with the sister project requirement)
  • it becomes part of the authority control template, where it joins the list of scholarly profiling services
• it goes to article talk pages in templates like {{Find medical sources}} or {{Reliable sources for medical articles}}
• it could be part of Wikipedia article bibliography sections, as it is wiki-based bibliography generation
• others may have other ideas.

Depending on the course of action it may be necessary to make multiple edits to 2165 articles. I think a next best step would be to organize community discussion for usage guidance. In January 2022 we will have a new report out on the state of Scholia, and I suggest that further discussion wait until this information is available for discussion.

Blue Rasberry (talk) 15:19, 22 November 2021 (UTC)

@Bluerasberry: It's been over a year and this template is still in violation of WP:ELTEMP. With all due respect, I don't think any further discussion is necessary to solve the immediate problem. Just convert this template from a sidebox into a regular bulleted external link. After that is done, further discussions can be had about how this template can be evolved or repurposed for the future. Thanks! Kaldari (talk) 08:14, 23 February 2022 (UTC)

@Kaldari: Okay, I recognize that I am the person responsible for this because I develop Scholia, and that I should do something. I hesitate because I lack the technical skills to enact changes, and I am not sure where to go for help. Here is what I think needs to be done:

1. Create a list of articles where {{Scholia}} is used, about 2500
2. Delete all instances of {{Scholia}}
3. Create a new template, "template:Scholia bullet link", which generates a bullet with link to Scholia in the "external links" section of an article
4. Add "template:Scholia bullet link" into that list of 2500 articles

So far as I understand, Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser can do the template deletion and addition, but I am not skilled in using it. Before I explore further, Kaldari, is the above what you had in mind? Also, do you have advice for me to technically enact this? Bluerasberry (talk) 15:21, 24 February 2022 (UTC)

Why a new template? Can't we just edit this one to display as inline text then use AWB to insert a * before each use (and fix its placement if necessary)? – Joe (talk) 16:16, 24 February 2022 (UTC)

@Joe Roe: Can things really be so simple as that one step process with one edit per article to correct? I am unfamiliar with the ease of automation, and whether AWB can do the removal and addition in one edit. Do you know enough about it for that to seem reasonable to you?

I do not talk regularly with anyone about AWB, and have not thought about where and how I could ask questions. I am also unsure about how long it would take me to learn to do things. I feel uncertainty about what to recommend and would appreciate any advice you have. Bluerasberry (talk) 17:34, 25 February 2022 (UTC)

I don't mind doing it, if you're okay with that method? – Joe (talk) 12:01, 26 February 2022 (UTC)

@Joe Roe: 🙏 Thank you if you would, I would greatly appreciate this favor and outcome. It is a big help for me. Change it as described from the box to the bullet. 😀 Bluerasberry (talk) 15:26, 28 February 2022 (UTC)