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Create new custom namespaces (Report, WN) on cdo.wikipedia.org
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Description

Site: cdo.wikipedia.org

Request:
Please create two sets of custom namespaces for the Mindong Wikipedia (cdo.wikipedia.org). This is required to host migrated Wikinews content from the Wikimedia Incubator.

Context & Rationale:
Following the recent announcements regarding the closure of Wikinews projects, the main editors of both Mindong Wikinews and Wikipedia, along with the Mindong Wikinews administrators, all support migrating our Wikinews test project (currently under the Wn/cdo/ prefix on Incubator) to the Mindong Wikipedia. It will operate there as a dedicated sub-project.

Namespaces requested:

    • Namespace name: Report
    • Talk namespace name: Report_talk
    • Searchable by default: Yes
    • Subpages enabled: Yes
    • Purpose: To host the actual news articles and journalistic content. This will serve as the main content namespace for the Wikinews sub-project, which is why it should be searchable by default.
    • Namespace name: WN
    • Talk namespace name: WN_talk
    • Searchable by default: No
    • Subpages enabled: Yes
    • Purpose: To serve as the project namespace. It will host internal guidelines, policies, and administrative pages specifically related to the Wikinews sub-project, keeping them distinct from general Wikipedia policies.

Link to community talks:
Wikipedia:大𣗬下#專門設命名空間以容納新聞之提案

Event Timeline

I will cover this task, but do you only want the Report: namespace to be searchable?

I will cover this task, but do you only want the Report: namespace to be searchable?

Hi, thanks for picking up this task!

For the WN namespace, I would like its search configuration to simply match the standard Wikipedia (Project) namespace. Whatever the default search setting is for the Wikipedia namespace, please apply the exact same to WN.

I apologize if my initial description caused any confusion!

Change #1281901 had a related patch set uploaded (by Codename Noreste; author: Codename Noreste):

[operations/mediawiki-config@master] cdowiki: Create Wikinews-based namespaces

https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/1281901

codenamenoreste changed the task status from Open to In Progress.May 3 2026, 12:15 AM
codenamenoreste claimed this task.
codenamenoreste triaged this task as Medium priority.
codenamenoreste moved this task from Backlog to Working on on the Wikimedia-Site-requests board.

@Davidzdh, I created the patch days ago, feel free to review and notify me of any necessary changes. :-)

Hi @codenamenoreste,

Thanks for the patch! I would like to confirm whether the "searchable by default" configuration is included in this change. I noticed that the "Report" namespace doesn't seem to have a default search setting in the current diff.

Ideally, the "Report" namespace should be searchable by default, matching the behavior of the main (Article) namespace. Since the news project will continue to operate as an active sub-project on Mindong Wikipedia rather than being a static archive, we want its content to be easily discoverable. However, if the main namespace itself is not searchable by default, please follow that standard instead.

Please let me know if my technical understanding of the configuration (e.g., in InitialiseSettings.php) is incorrect. Thank you!

Before we deploy the change, isn’t there a concern about disregarding the original goals of the project?
The WMF Board of Trustees decided to close the Wikinews projects (T421796). Has this possibility been discussed anywhere outside the local community? I assume that moving the project into Wikipedia would be considered a major departure from the project’s intended scope...

migrating our Wikinews test project (currently under the Wn/cdo/ prefix on Incubator) to the Mindong Wikipedia

Wikipedia has a scope, and that scope is different from the Wikinews scope.
Would you agree?
(If the scopes were not different, then I'm not sure why Wikinews were separate projects from Wikipedia until a few weeks ago).

codenamenoreste changed the task status from In Progress to Stalled.Thu, May 21, 7:43 PM
Pppery changed the task status from Stalled to Open.Fri, May 22, 6:34 AM
Pppery subscribed.

We people in Phabricator shouldn't be second-guessing the local community here.

This is not the first Wikipedia to host its own wikinews either. See https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikinews#Languages_that_use_Wikipedia_to_serve_their_Wikinews

We people in Phabricator shouldn't be second-guessing the local community here.

This is not the first Wikipedia to host its own wikinews either. See https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikinews#Languages_that_use_Wikipedia_to_serve_their_Wikinews

We in Phabricator should be subordinate to the decisions of the Wikimedia Board of Trustees. Just as we moved all Wikinews sites to read-only per their decision, even if personally one of us thinks it was the wrong call, we similarly cannot allow a local community to circumvent their decisions.

I think the Board of Trustees should decide what to do here. If they intend to allow Wikipedia communities to host Wikinews within them, then the other Wikipedias listed in the link you provided could also create a proper Wikinews namespace, rather than tucking it under a Portal namespace or something similar. But if they are not willing to do that, we cannot officially support it in the form of a dedicated namespace.

Interpreting the Wikimedia Foundation's decision to close Wikinews projects as a blanket ban on Wikipedia hosting its own news sub-projects is an excessive over-interpretation.

We do not believe that the WMF needs to provide separate clarifications or decisions for every single over-interpretation that bubbles up. Nor do we believe that local communities should have their own decisions and initiatives stalled, waiting for "top-down" approval simply because of such over-interpretations. This fundamentally goes against the core Wiki spirit.

Unless the WMF explicitly states, "Hey, you cannot run your own news sub-project on Wikipedia," the local community's news sub-project should not be subjected to forced rectification or closure.

Furthermore, exactly as Pppery pointed out, many Wikipedias are already hosting their own Wikinews. We are not even breaking any precedent here.

Unless the WMF explicitly states, "Hey, you cannot run your own news sub-project on Wikipedia," the local community's news sub-project should not be subjected to forced rectification or closure.

https://wikimediafoundation.org/what-we-do/wikimedia-projects/#a1-reference does state that "Wikipedia is a free, collaborative encyclopedia". How is the "news subproject" related to building the encyclopedia? As Aklapper said, "If the scopes were not different, then I'm not sure why Wikinews were separate projects from Wikipedia until a few weeks ago."

(I should probably clarify that my comment above was an expression of my personal curiosity, and in no way any statement of some employer or such. And I wasn't aware that there are precedents - thanks for that additional info!)

I think @codenamenoreste should just schedule their patch for deployment in a window and see what happens. The only person who can make this political decision is ultimately the backport deployers or whoever they are accountable to.

I think @codenamenoreste should just schedule their patch for deployment in a window and see what happens. The only person who can make this political decision is ultimately the backport deployers or whoever they are accountable to.

I for one will not deploy a config change that appears to actively circumvent a BoT decision.

(I agree with Lucas. Additionally, @codenamenoreste did not appear to be around during the window)

I was busy during that time as said above.

Furthermore, exactly as Pppery pointed out, many Wikipedias are already hosting their own Wikinews. We are not even breaking any precedent here.

My two cents on this:

  • It’s an interesting question what the BoT decision means for those projects. Does “all Wikinews editions” (quote source) include only the separate wikis, or also those editions? (For all I know this question might have been answered somewhere – I haven’t followed this process that closely, to be honest.)
  • But also, there’s a significant difference between Wikipedias that, for one reason or another, hosted a Wikinews edition back when Wikinews was still an open project – and setting up new infrastructure for an internal Wikinews today. So IMHO this is not very useful precedent for this task.