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Enable Reference Previews on all wikis using the Popups extension, on Nov 21
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Description

We decided, that the feature is ready to leave beta feature mode.

Schedule:
Deactivate beta feature mode on all wikis on Nov. 21nd. Cleanup patches can be merged afterwards.

Acceptance criteria:

  • Disable BetaFeature mode
  • Keep the wgPopupsReferencePreviews feature switch until it's decided to remove it
  • Remove BetaFeature related config settings in mediawiki-config
  • User settings should be opt-out, so it's enabled by default
  • Make sure it's enabled by default for anon/IP masked temporary user*s

Note:

The feature depends on the Page-Previews extension being installed and enabled. Currently that's true only for all Wikipedia wikis and a handful exceptions. Currently the list is:

	'sewikimedia' => true, // T68374
	'wikipedia' => true,
	'enwikivoyage' => true, // T203981
	'hewikivoyage' => true, // T222017
	'zhwikivoyage' => true, // T230624
	'dewikivoyage' => true, // T264305

Follow ups:
T351708: Cleanup beta feature code in the ReferencePreviews and related
T256004: Decide if we keep the wgPopupsReferencePreviews feature switch

Related Objects

StatusSubtypeAssignedTask
OpenNone
Resolvedawight
ResolvedWMDE-Fisch
ResolvedWMDE-Fisch
Resolvedlilients_WMDE
ResolvedWMDE-Fisch
Resolvedlilients_WMDE
InvalidNone
ResolvedNone
ResolvedNone
ResolvedNone
ResolvedAndrew-WMDE
Resolvedlilients_WMDE
Resolvedlilients_WMDE
ResolvedAndrew-WMDE
DeclinedNone
DuplicateFeatureNone
ResolvedNone
ResolvedWMDE-Fisch
ResolvedBUG REPORTNone
ResolvedNone
ResolvedWMDE-Fisch
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OpenBUG REPORTNone
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Event Timeline

There are a very large number of changes, so older changes are hidden. Show Older Changes
WMDE-Fisch renamed this task from Enable RefPreviews on all wikis to Enable Reference Previews on all wikis.Sep 29 2023, 11:38 AM
WMDE-Fisch updated the task description. (Show Details)
WMDE-Fisch moved this task from Backlog to Doing on the WMDE-TechWish-Maintenance-2023 board.
WMDE-Fisch updated the task description. (Show Details)

Change 971882 had a related patch set uploaded (by WMDE-Fisch; author: WMDE-Fisch):

[operations/mediawiki-config@master] Enable Reference Previews on all wikis

https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/971882

Change 971897 had a related patch set uploaded (by WMDE-Fisch; author: WMDE-Fisch):

[mediawiki/extensions/Popups@master] Remove all BetaFeature code from ReferencePreviews

https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/971897

We should not forget to undo https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/493409, i.e. remove the feature from what is now wgBetaFeaturesAllowList.

Can you clarify: will it be enabled by default in wikis that already use ReferenceTooltips gadget by default? Because that seems like an unneeded overhead (assuming the preference feature doesn’t load conditionally, otherwise everything is probably fine).

Has this been tested on anything that's not a Wikipedia? And does "all wikis" mean "all wikis" or "all Wikipedias" in the announced "Enable Reference Previews on all wikis"?

I'm asking because I don't recall seeing this announced or as a beta feature on English Wikisource, and while it could potentially be extremely useful for that project's content the project does use Cite quite differently from your typical Wikipedia.

Can you clarify: will it be enabled by default in wikis that already use ReferenceTooltips gadget by default? Because that seems like an unneeded overhead (assuming the preference feature doesn’t load conditionally, otherwise everything is probably fine).

There's code that will disable Reference Previews when the user uses the ReferenceTooltips gadget. So there should not be the overhead of two previews. The behavior can be tested already by enabling the Reference Previews beta feature. If you experience any issues with that, please let us know.

Has this been tested on anything that's not a Wikipedia? And does "all wikis" mean "all wikis" or "all Wikipedias" in the announced "Enable Reference Previews on all wikis"?

I'm asking because I don't recall seeing this announced or as a beta feature on English Wikisource, and while it could potentially be extremely useful for that project's content the project does use Cite quite differently from your typical Wikipedia.

Hey, thanks for the questions. Yes, technically it's "Wikipedias". The feature currently depends on the Page-Previews extension installed. And that's only true for Wikipedia wikis and a handful of exceptions. I'll update this task accordingly to make that more clear.

WMDE-Fisch renamed this task from Enable Reference Previews on all wikis to Enable Reference Previews on all wikis using the Popups extension.Nov 14 2023, 9:15 AM
WMDE-Fisch updated the task description. (Show Details)

There's code that will disable Reference Previews when the user uses the ReferenceTooltips gadget. So there should not be the overhead of two previews. The behavior can be tested already by enabling the Reference Previews beta feature. If you experience any issues with that, please let us know.

I’m asking about the overhead of having a feature that does not get used load additional JS code, though.

Sure, that's one of the more important things we are responsible for as full-time developers. ☺️ Here is some of the code that does this: https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/diffusion/EPOP/browse/master/includes/PopupsContext.php$204

awight renamed this task from Enable Reference Previews on all wikis using the Popups extension to Enable Reference Previews on all wikis using the Popups extension, on Nov 22.Nov 16 2023, 8:07 AM
awight subscribed.

We are discussing whether the timing makes sense in light of the Thansgiving holiday and the train hold: https://lists.wikimedia.org/hyperkitty/list/wikitech-l@lists.wikimedia.org/thread/FJ7EAWKEUN55FRJMFKXXMHNYNN65GS3M/

I think the lack of the train is not a problem: if problems arise on a Wednesday, that week’s train has already departed anyway, so next week is not different in that regard. (Actually, the lack of the train may be a good thing: if there was a train, the enabling would happen in a heterogeneous environment – Wikivoyages with the new version, Wikipediæ with the old one.) However, if something goes wrong, and nobody is in office to commit and deploy an emergency rollback, that could be a problem. So while no-train doesn’t seem to be a problem, you should probably not deploy on the day before Thanksgiving. A day earlier (Tuesday, Nov 21) should be safe.

WMDE-Fisch renamed this task from Enable Reference Previews on all wikis using the Popups extension, on Nov 22 to Enable Reference Previews on all wikis using the Popups extension, on Nov 21.Nov 20 2023, 10:56 AM
WMDE-Fisch reassigned this task from WMDE-Fisch to awight.
WMDE-Fisch moved this task from Watching / Epic to Doing on the WMDE-TechWish-Maintenance-2023 board.
WMDE-Fisch updated the task description. (Show Details)
WMDE-Fisch subscribed.

I think the lack of the train is not a problem: if problems arise on a Wednesday, that week’s train has already departed anyway, so next week is not different in that regard. (Actually, the lack of the train may be a good thing: if there was a train, the enabling would happen in a heterogeneous environment – Wikivoyages with the new version, Wikipediæ with the old one.) However, if something goes wrong, and nobody is in office to commit and deploy an emergency rollback, that could be a problem. So while no-train doesn’t seem to be a problem, you should probably not deploy on the day before Thanksgiving. A day earlier (Tuesday, Nov 21) should be safe.

Thanks for the nudge. We re-scheduled and aim to deploy on the 21st now.

Change 971882 merged by jenkins-bot:

[operations/mediawiki-config@master] Enable Reference Previews on all wikis

https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/971882

Mentioned in SAL (#wikimedia-operations) [2023-11-21T08:09:37Z] <awight@deploy2002> Started scap: Backport for [[gerrit:971882|Enable Reference Previews on all wikis (T282999)]]

Mentioned in SAL (#wikimedia-operations) [2023-11-21T08:11:02Z] <awight@deploy2002> awight and wmde-fisch: Backport for [[gerrit:971882|Enable Reference Previews on all wikis (T282999)]] synced to the testservers (https://wikitech.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mwdebug)

Mentioned in SAL (#wikimedia-operations) [2023-11-21T08:24:39Z] <awight@deploy2002> Finished scap: Backport for [[gerrit:971882|Enable Reference Previews on all wikis (T282999)]] (duration: 15m 02s)

Mentioned in SAL (#wikimedia-operations) [2023-11-21T08:27:08Z] <awight@deploy2002> Started scap: Backport for [[gerrit:971882|Enable Reference Previews on all wikis (T282999)]]

Mentioned in SAL (#wikimedia-operations) [2023-11-21T08:28:27Z] <awight@deploy2002> wmde-fisch and awight: Backport for [[gerrit:971882|Enable Reference Previews on all wikis (T282999)]] synced to the testservers (https://wikitech.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mwdebug)

Mentioned in SAL (#wikimedia-operations) [2023-11-21T12:27:06Z] <awight@deploy2002> Started scap: Backport for [[gerrit:971882|Enable Reference Previews on all wikis (T282999)]]

Mentioned in SAL (#wikimedia-operations) [2023-11-21T12:28:30Z] <awight@deploy2002> wmde-fisch and awight: Backport for [[gerrit:971882|Enable Reference Previews on all wikis (T282999)]] synced to the testservers (https://wikitech.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mwdebug)

Nice! Is there a User-notice planned? I imagine some projects (e.g. English Wikipedia) may want to consider whether they change the "default" option the reference previews gadget for anonymous users.

Nice! Is there a User-notice planned? I imagine some projects (e.g. English Wikipedia) may want to consider whether they change the "default" option the reference previews gadget for anonymous users.

Yes, there are plans to get in touch with the wikis that have a default on the relevant gadgets. Would be a great success to get rid of some of these :-)

Change 971897 merged by jenkins-bot:

[mediawiki/extensions/Popups@master] Remove all BetaFeature code from ReferencePreviews

https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/971897

Change 980901 had a related patch set uploaded (by Jdlrobson; author: Jdlrobson):

[operations/mediawiki-config@master] References previews is no longer a beta feature

https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/980901

I posted another patch for some code I stumbled upon while introducing a new beta feature.

Nice! Is there a User-notice planned? I imagine some projects (e.g. English Wikipedia) may want to consider whether they change the "default" option the reference previews gadget for anonymous users.

Yes, there are plans to get in touch with the wikis that have a default on the relevant gadgets. Would be a great success to get rid of some of these :-)

Is there a task to track this or should I add User-notice to this task? If you create a new task, could you subscribe me? (I'm monitoring this ticket as that communication impacts work I'm doing in the repo )

I posted another patch for some code I stumbled upon while introducing a new beta feature.

Thank, we got that covered and are planing to merge it during the current sprint. :-)
See https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/c/operations/mediawiki-config/+/976650

Yes, there are plans to get in touch with the wikis that have a default on the relevant gadgets. Would be a great success to get rid of some of these :-)

Is there a task to track this or should I add User-notice to this task? If you create a new task, could you subscribe me? (I'm monitoring this ticket as that communication impacts work I'm doing in the repo )

No not yet. We'll keep you updated when there's movement. :-) - Thanks for taking care!

Change 980901 abandoned by Jdlrobson:

[operations/mediawiki-config@master] References previews is no longer a beta feature

Reason:

https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/c/operations/mediawiki-config/+/976650

https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/980901