In T298390#7592305, @Tgr wrote:

Some of the pages are not and should not be in the template namespace - e.g. the cswiki list includes Modul:Infobox. Did the actual configuration also break, or just the validation process?

I didn't check behavior of the actual code that handles the variable. Rest of the config definitely works (we'd notice quickly if it stopped, I think).

I'm not sure Modul:Infobox needs to be included (it's loaded by Template:Infobox, which in turn is called by the majority of infobox templates). If we want to support non-templates listed in this variable, https://github.com/wikimedia/mediawiki-extensions-GrowthExperiments/blob/master/includes/Specials/SpecialEditGrowthConfig.php#L370 (and few following lines) should get removed.

I can think of three options:

1. limit GEInfoboxTemplates to pages in the Template namespace
2. add functionality to HTMLTitleTextField to specify a default namespace while allowing other namespaces
3. require full page names in GEInfoboxTemplates

The reason module support was added is that we want to keep the template lists in the low hundreds, wikis can easily have more infobox templates than that, many of them are generated via Lua, and there is no guarantee they use a wrapper template like Template:Infobox on cswiki which could be used instead of the module for search. (I ran into problems on arwiki I think when using only templates, although it is entirely possible that I made some mistake.) So I think option 1 is risky.

Option 2 looks like confusing UX because how do you differentiate pages in the default namespace from pages in the main namespace? (Which is not something we'd run into, but if the functionality is added to core, it should be considered.)

So yeah, I think just update the on-wiki config and remove namespace special casing from the code.

...but then, it seems rather confusing to have various fields called SomethingTemplates but some of them need to be prefixed and some not. Ugh.

I think we should go with option 3, as it matches what I decided to do with the other fields that normally use templates (namely templates for template-based newcomer tasks).

In T298390#7685932, @Urbanecm_WMF wrote:

I think we should go with option 3, as it matches what I decided to do with the other fields that normally use templates (namely templates for template-based newcomer tasks).

That seems reasonable to me.

Change 769465 had a related patch set uploaded (by Urbanecm; author: Urbanecm):

[mediawiki/extensions/GrowthExperiments@master] SpecialEditGrowthConfig: Do not require GEInfoboxTemplates to be templates

https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/769465

Patch is +2'ed, so moving back to in progress for us to update on-wiki config after this change is in group2 with the next train. Then we could also have a patch to remove the default NS_TEMPLATE namespace in TemplateCollectionFeature.

Change 769465 merged by jenkins-bot:

[mediawiki/extensions/GrowthExperiments@master] SpecialEditGrowthConfig: Do not require GEInfoboxTemplates to be templates

https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/769465

Change 770131 had a related patch set uploaded (by Urbanecm; author: Urbanecm):

[mediawiki/extensions/GrowthExperiments@master] TemplateCollectionFeature: Do not default to NS_TEMPLATE

https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/770131

In T298390#7770760, @kostajh wrote:

Patch is +2'ed, so moving back to in progress for us to update on-wiki config after this change is in group2 with the next train. Then we could also have a patch to remove the default NS_TEMPLATE namespace in TemplateCollectionFeature.

Set a reminder for this Thursday to have a look at that.

In T298390#7771949, @Urbanecm_WMF wrote:

In T298390#7770760, @kostajh wrote:

Patch is +2'ed, so moving back to in progress for us to update on-wiki config after this change is in group2 with the next train. Then we could also have a patch to remove the default NS_TEMPLATE namespace in TemplateCollectionFeature.

Set a reminder for this Thursday to have a look at that.

Train's not on group2 yet (in fact, it's only at group0 due to blockers). Postponing reminder to have a look next week.

https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/c/770131 is now ready for review.

Change 770131 merged by jenkins-bot:

[mediawiki/extensions/GrowthExperiments@master] TemplateCollectionFeature: Do not default to NS_TEMPLATE

https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/770131

In T298390#7785154, @Urbanecm_WMF wrote:

In T298390#7771949, @Urbanecm_WMF wrote:

In T298390#7770760, @kostajh wrote:

Patch is +2'ed, so moving back to in progress for us to update on-wiki config after this change is in group2 with the next train. Then we could also have a patch to remove the default NS_TEMPLATE namespace in TemplateCollectionFeature.

Set a reminder for this Thursday to have a look at that.

Train's not on group2 yet (in fact, it's only at group0 due to blockers). Postponing reminder to have a look next week.

@Urbanecm_WMF - are you still planning to take a look? I checked testwiki wmf.5 (all patches have been deployed) and all seem to be working as expected.