(In reply to comment #0)

The newsletter update states that Visual Editor is now functioning in the
content namespaces at MW, which includes the extension: and manual:
namespaces (and it does). That said, the default text for
"MediaWiki:Visualeditor-preference-enable" just states user and main at that
wiki.

It probably shouldn't default to saying only some namespaces and not changing when the wiki config adds it to other namespaces. Moving this bug to the VisualEditor product.

Simplest solution to this problem. :-)

Related URL: https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/70652 (Gerrit Change Ica186b9374ddaa0f2f6b2a84e5dff851011b68a4)

Change 70652 merged by jenkins-bot:
Make 'visualeditor-enable' pref hidden on wikis where VE is default

https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/70652

Now done.

(In reply to comment #2)

Simplest solution to this problem. :-)

an excellent case where "simplest" is very far from "correct" or "best".

in addition to being a bad solution, this change only affects enwiki, while the (original) bug is generic to all projects that install VE (and even non-projects, i.e., "3rd party" wikis).

as a side, together with this wrong and bad solution, James Forrester also changed the synopsis of the bug: from the original ("underlying text for Visual editor in preferences [editing] tab & variable names?"), to "Make VisualEditor a hidden preference", i.e., instead of outlining the problem, the bug synopsis now spells the "solution".
this is wrong on several levels: it creates the impression that the bug originator (billinghurst) asked to hide the preference, which he didn't, of course, and it hides the actual problem from someone reading this bug - only by digging in the history i was able to make sense of Comment #1, which looks now completely disjoint from the bug synopsis.

wrong or bad solutions to problems is something that can and does happen in every project. that's just life.
changing the synopsis the way it was changed is not something that can or should happen.

without digging too deeply, i'm going to revert the synopsis to the original one, and reopen - presuming the problem affects more then just enwiki, and also, with the hope that Bug 50929 (basically a request to undo this change) will be fixed soon.

peace.

(In reply to comment #6)

(In reply to comment #2)

Simplest solution to this problem. :-)

an excellent case where "simplest" is very far from "correct" or "best".

I disagree.

in addition to being a bad solution, this change only affects enwiki,

Not true.

while the (original) bug is generic to all projects that install VE (and
even non-projects, i.e., "3rd party" wikis).

The message is over-rideable, which is an entirely-adequate solution for most third parties. The initial request was, in my opinion, asking for a solution that didn't require a local over-ride, and met the intent of the team anyway (as part of removing VisualEditor as a local user preference, which was temporarily implemented for the opt-in alphas and is going away).

as a side, together with this wrong and bad solution, James Forrester also
changed the synopsis of the bug: from the original ("underlying text for
VisualEditor in preferences [editing] tab & variable names?"), to "Make
VisualEditor a hidden preference", i.e., instead of outlining the problem,
the bug synopsis now spells the "solution".

This is perfectly standard practice here.

this is wrong on several levels: it creates the impression that the bug
originator (billinghurst) asked to hide the preference, which he didn't, of
course,

Again, this is normal; comment 0 is the location to find what the originator wanted.

and it hides the actual problem from someone reading this bug - only
by digging in the history i was able to make sense of Comment #1, which looks
now completely disjoint from the bug synopsis.

I'm sorry that you were confused.

wrong or bad solutions to problems is something that can and does happen in
every project. that's just life.
changing the synopsis the way it was changed is not something that can or
should happen.

I strongly disagree.

without digging too deeply, i'm going to revert the synopsis to the original
one, and reopen -

Which I have reverted, and opened a new bug, bug 51411, for your concerns.

presuming the problem affects more then just enwiki

Your presumption is wrong. Note that the title you over-ride explicitly mentioned "Mediawikiwiki" (i.e., MediaWiki.org).

my intention was not to offend or attack, it was to draw attention that, to the best of my understanding, hiding the user option did not actually address the actual bug.

i think that bug 51411 you created is perfect, and once it's fixed/addressed, everything will be fine.

regarding the rewording of the synopsis: i am aware that it's common practice. actually, quite a few of the bugs i opened myself received this treatment.
in all the cases i can recall, the rewording was for the better.
my complain was not about the fact the synopsis was reworded, per se, but rather about the new description, which i do not think is a good one.

regarding my presumption: i am not sure if i understand your comment about this bug being specific to "mediawiki.org".
does this mean it's limited to wikimedia projects? if this is what you mean, i do not think you are correct.
this issue (the original one, that is) pertains to any wiki that uses the mediawiki software with visualeditor (new synopsis and your fix not withstanding).

peace.

(In reply to comment #8)

my intention was not to offend or attack, it was to draw attention that, to
the best of my understanding, hiding the user option did not actually address
the actual bug.

The 'actual' bug was, effectively, that "the temporary description of a temporary configuration option does not automatically expand based on a different configuration variable's setting".

However, the cause for complaint was "the temporary description of a temporary configuration option on MW.org is wrong and confusing", you are correct.

i think that bug 51411 you created is perfect, and once it's fixed/addressed,
everything will be fine.

It's exceedingly unlikely to be addressed, because (a) programmatic writing of human-readable descriptions is very delicate and not something we generally do, and (b) as we have said a great many times, this is about a configuration variable that exists purely for the duration of the alpha, to provide a way to "opt in". Availability of VE is a system-level configuration, not a user-level preference. By the time the software is actually marked for release by anyone outside WMF (when we remove the "here be dragons" labels), the underlying issue will be moot.

Then someone opened Bug 50929 - User preference to disable VisualEditor

The related change is https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/#/c/73565/

That effectively would reopen this bug 48666.

Change 73565 had a related patch set uploaded by Helder.wiki:
(bug 50929) Remove 'visualeditor-enable' from $wgHiddenPrefs

https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/73565

Change 73565 abandoned by Hashar:
(bug 50929) Remove 'visualeditor-enable' from $wgHiddenPrefs

Reason:
A preference to temporarily disable VisualEditor has been introduced in the VisualEditor extension itself : https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/#/c/75541/

This change is thus no more needed.

https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/73565