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What to do with non-issue message boxes e.g. ombox that are currently not styled and behave inconsistently
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Description

The ombox template is used on project, help, user and talk pages.
Examples can be found here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:WhatLinksHere/Template:Ombox

Some examples:

Screen Shot 2018-08-27 at 1.43.07 PM.png (129×828 px, 30 KB)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipediholic
Screen Shot 2018-08-27 at 1.44.08 PM.png (269×1 px, 85 KB)

On mobile these appear like so without modification:

Screen Shot 2018-08-27 at 1.49.07 PM.png (435×505 px, 67 KB)

Screen Shot 2018-08-27 at 1.49.36 PM.png (440×529 px, 54 KB)

Steps to Reproduce

Visit a page in Minerva using ombox template:
e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:WhatLinksHere/Template:Ombox

Expected Results

  • The issue is displayed in the new page issues treatment

Actual Results

  • The issue is displayed as part of the article content and not considered a page issue as it is not a page issue.

However, this is inconsistent with treatment of other message boxes outside the main namespace e.g. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:2000

The underlying template has plainlinks ombox ombox-style CSS classes but correctly none of these are recognized by the page issue parser. From the template documentation:

This is the {{Ombox}} ([O]ther pages [m]essage [box]) metatemplate.

It is used to build message box templates for pages of the types User, Wikipedia, MediaWiki, Template, Help, Portal and any new future namespaces; i.e. for page types not covered by {{Ambox}}, {{Tmbox}}, {{Imbox}} or {{Cmbox}}. Thus, it should not be used for boxes for articles, talk pages, image pages or category pages.

The ombox or ombox-style CSS classes should be added to the parser. [see developer notes]

Environments Observed

Browser Version

  • Chromium v68.0.3440.106

OS Version

  • Ubuntu v18.04 64b

Device Model

  • Desktop

Device Language

  • English

Developer notes

The ombox is not a page issue. It is a box of information about the page similar to cmbox, fmbox and tmbox (category, file and talk)

Treatment of these boxes rather than being consistent with page issues, should in fact be consistent with treatment of the tmbox for which we continue to use the old treatment
e.g.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:2000

Screen Shot 2018-08-27 at 1.46.05 PM.png (109×190 px, 7 KB)

However, there are many templates that use the Template:Ambox for things other than issues. Examples include Template:Fbox, Template:Sbox, Template:Tmbox, Template:Imbox. We will probably want to review all those usages in conjunction with the ombox.

Event Timeline

Restricted Application changed the subtype of this task from "Deadline" to "Task". · View Herald TranscriptAug 27 2018, 6:53 PM
Restricted Application added a subscriber: Aklapper. · View Herald Transcript
Jdlrobson renamed this task from [Bug] Ombox issues are not identified in new page issues treatment to What to do with non-issue message boxes e.g. ombox that are currently not styled and behave inconsistently.Aug 27 2018, 8:52 PM
Jdlrobson edited projects, added Web-Team-Backlog (Design); removed Web-Team-Backlog.
Jdlrobson updated the task description. (Show Details)
Jdlrobson added subscribers: ovasileva, Jdlrobson.

Given these templates are used in non-main namespaces and page issues for this project are limited to the main namespace, I don't think this is super urgent or should be tagged Page-Issue-Warnings - but I'll leave that up to @ovasileva
Seems like a conversation/design direction is needed here.

ovasileva lowered the priority of this task from Medium to Low.Aug 28 2018, 11:09 AM

I agree that it's lower priority given that these templates aren't used in the main namespace. I'm happy to work on some designs when we feel the time is appropriate.

Questions I'd like to answer (possibly via CHEAP A/B tests):

  • If something renders in search empty state, will users interact with it?
  • Are they more likely to interact if there is a photo / link / button?
  • What kind of recommendations are useful in this context?

Technical Questions:

  • Is it even possible for us to do this quickly in a production setting? If so, what would that look like?
  • How do we do this without involving other teams e.g. needing to update Codex? needing things from event platform team?
  • What kind of level of data is useful for making decisions?