@Whatamidoing-WMF: can you share a bit more about what you are/may be wanting to do with the regular wikitext editor that the New Discussion Tool makes difficult/not possible?

...we are trying to get a sense for the differences you see between the two experiences.

I can imagine gadgets not available in the NDT (inserting standard messages, arbitrary templates, other blocks of code, reformatting etc.). Since gadgets are maintained (or not) by the community, there’s no guarantee they will ever be made compatible with the NDT; even if they could, sometimes they’re only for senior users, who are fine with the full-page editing, so it’s not worth the work making them compatible (at least not in the short term).

In T278466#7069138, @Tacsipacsi wrote:

I can imagine gadgets not available in the NDT (inserting standard messages, arbitrary templates, other blocks of code, reformatting etc.). Since gadgets are maintained (or not) by the community, there’s no guarantee they will ever be made compatible with the NDT; even if they could, sometimes they’re only for senior users, who are fine with the full-page editing, so it’s not worth the work making them compatible (at least not in the short term).

Gadgets, yes...okay. This context is helpful, @Tacsipacsi.

In T278466#7135773, @ppelberg removed a parent task: T271964: [Release ticket] Make New Discussion Tool available as opt-out feature at partner wikis.

Not being able to use features the user is used to and having to use non-trivial workarounds doesn’t sound like something ready to be made opt-out for me. While it’s totally okay for opt-in deployment, I strongly believe it should be a blocker for making NDT opt-out.

In T278466#7136023, @Tacsipacsi wrote:

In T278466#7135773, @ppelberg removed a parent task: T271964: [Release ticket] Make New Discussion Tool available as opt-out feature at partner wikis.

Not being able to use features the user is used to and having to use non-trivial workarounds doesn’t sound like something ready to be made opt-out for me.

@Tacsipacsi, we've been thinking that people who value access to gadgets not yet adapted for the New Discussion Tool would decide to turn off the feature, in favor of using the existing experience that does support said gadgets.

Are there aspects about the thinking above that cause you to be concerned?

I think there are many senior editors (including me) who love DiscussionTools, but they might need the not-yet-adapted (or sometimes not even adaptable) tools every now and then. I wouldn’t want to turn DT off just because of these relatively rare cases.

In T278466#7163842, @Tacsipacsi wrote:

I think there are many senior editors (including me) who love DiscussionTools, but they might need the not-yet-adapted (or sometimes not even adaptable) tools every now and then. I wouldn’t want to turn DT off just because of these relatively rare cases.

Understood. Okay. As an initial approach, we're going to implement a way for people to disable DT off on a page-by-page basis and we're going to implement this before the New Discussion Tool is offered as an opt-out feature at any wiki.

This work will happen in T285578.

Suggestions from the merged-in ticket:

In T274783#6830767, @Patriccck wrote:

I have got a suggestion how to solve the problem. When the New discussion tool is enabled, everyone can select what way is the best for concrete purpose. For some purposes is the best new way, for other purposes is the better old way. I think it can be an additional setting in Special:Preferences, which will be automatically turned on for advanced users. See file down.

In T274783#6831817, @Tacsipacsi wrote:

If there are two tabs (I have no opinion on whether it’s needed), I think VisualEditor’s approach is more consistent (and probably easier to implement):

Reading what you are saying @Tacsipacsi I wonder if this is the kind of content that would normally go in a "settings" tab. This way you'd be able to essentially select what mode you would prefer.

@iamjessklein You mean Special:Preferences? That already works—you can disable the New Discussion Tool, which has the same effect as setting the full-page editor preferred. This ticket is about allowing to choose on a case-by-case basis—if I generally like DiscussionTools, but know that for a particular edit I need something that’s not available in DT, let me make a one-time decision about using the full-page editor, without touching Special:Preferences.