On the subject of Notifiers (and how to improve them)

So I've been thinking about notifiers a bit. They're incredibly important for helping editors understand what they may be doing wrong, even if a lot of editors tend to ignore them. And yet, there's a few issues with the notifier system, such as broken links, or the fact that we've apparently reached our limit for how many notifiers we can have. Nombretomado mentioned wanting to work on them to make them more efficient and stuff, so I figured, why not talk about them on their own thread, and figure out what we can fix?

Edit: Current notifiers are listed at Notifiers.

Edited by MacronNotes on Oct 2nd 2022 at 12:37:54 PM

First: for the love of god alphabetize them.

I keep expecting the ZCE notifier to be on the bottom of the list, but it's in the middle for some reason.

That's not much of an issue. If you press "Z" on the keyboard, you're taken straight to the ZCE option among the notifiers.

The biggest problem are the broken links.

I usually copy the notifier and send an adjusted PM the the troper with working links.

For the sake of reference, a list of the current notifiers, in order:

• natter

The edit you made on [page] looks like a conversation, not an example. We try to keep the articles more like articles than discussions. Please feel free to make that kind of entry on the discussion page.

• thanks!

[no text; this notifier is blank]

• mis-play

The [page] edit you made looks like it is incorrectly identifying the way the trope is played with. Please read the Playing with a Trope and Not A Subversion articles to make sure you're clear on which is which and what is what.

• murky example

The [page] edit you made either is too general for people to understand how it's a specific example, or is ambiguous as to whether it's an example. Please feel free to rewrite that entry to show how it matches the definition, or remove it if it is not an example. We try avoid examples that are "arguable", "not-quite", "borderline", and so forth on our trope pages.

• walkthrough mode

The [page] edit you made looks like a game walkthrough. We are about tropes, not about how to play a game. Please feel free to make that kind of entry on the discussion page for the article, in a Trivia tab, or in whichever of the forums is best.

• image changes

The [page] edit you made appears to have changed or added/deleted the page image, and I can't seem to find a thread in Image Pickin about it. In order to make sure that images demonstrate tropes as well as they can, we have a set of guidelines on How to Pick a Good Image. Posting an Image Pickin' discussion helps make sure that these images both meet our guidelines and demonstrate the trope as simply as possible.

• spoilers

The [page] edit you made looks like it violates our spoiler rules. Trope names (on work articles) and names of works (on trope articles) are never to be spoiler-tagged, nor should spoiler tags be used in folder names or in above-the-line descriptions.
Some articles have been designated "spoiler-free"; please do not add spoiler tags to them.

• word cruft

The [page] edit you made looks like it contains what we call word cruft.
We try avoid meaningless stuff like "How has X not been mentioned already?", "Just about", "Pretty Much", or "Not to mention".
Please try to keep your examples short and pithy.

• stub

The [page] article you made is a stub article; either it has too few examples of tropes or works or those present are misused or Zero Context Examples. The article will be processed here; feel free to improve on the page, but be warned that if the page isn't fixed it might be cut.

• ignored comment

The [page] edit you made disregards a commented-out warning. Comments are hidden in the source with a %% sign and are supposed to be respected when editing. Please feel free to discuss it on the page's discussion page or in an appropriate forum thread.

• bowdlerizer

The [page] edit you made removed or censored swear words in the article. If you meant to do this, please be aware that we allow adult language as long as it isn't excessive, and removing it without a good reason is against the rules. If you didn't, please check to see if you're running filtering or "web nanny" software. These programs will modify any article that you edit and leave a mess behind that has to be cleaned up, leading to removal of your editing privileges. Turn it off or put in an exception for tvtropes.org.

• grammar

The [page] edit you made contains problems with proper English grammar, spelling, capitalization, or punctuation. This wiki is pretty fussy about that sort of thing. We want to be casual in tone and professional in execution. Because casually good is what cool is all about.
A forum thread has been set up for people to get assistance with their writing.

• trivia

The [page] edit you made contains a link to a Trivia page. Trivia are interesting facts about how the work was created or about the work's subject, facts that are not actually in the work, but about it.
We keep the Trivia on a separate subpage.

• crosswick

Please remember that the [page] edit you made needs to be added on both the trope and the work article. Check out Crosswicking for an explanation of how to do this and why it's important.

• indexing

The [page] article you made isn't currently on an index. Wiki articles should always be indexed, which is done by adding the article to a suitable index page as a bullet point. If you need help with indexing, consult How Indexing Works for instructions, or this forum thread for advice.

• YMMV

The [page] edit you made contains a link to a "Your Mileage May Vary" page. These pages are too subjective to be called a trope, so we keep them on a separate subpage. Just click the YMMV tab on a work's page to list them.

• indentation

Hi there. Your [page] edit has some indentation issues. Please have a look at the Example Indentation article to see how we'd like to keep things organized.

• zero context

Your [page] edit needs a little more detail. Looks like you made what we call a "zero context example" or ZCE. We try not to just plop down a trope name with no explanation of how the trope is used in the work. Take a look at the Zero-Context Example article for clues on how to do it up right.

• rudeness

The [page] edit you made was unnecessarily rude or was accompanied by a rude comment. We like to keep the wiki a pleasant place to visit, and we'd prefer that our editors behave in a respectful manner to each other. If you disagree with something someone wrote, the Discussion page and/or private messages should be used to work the issue out.

• sinkhole

The [page] edit you made inserted a hidden link to another page which isn't relevant or appropriate on this page. We call them Sinkholes and they distract and confuse the reader. We particularly don't like those which misuse tropes or turn a sentence completely blue. Please feel free to take such links out if you encounter them.

• namespace

The [page] article you made is in the wrong namespace. Please consult Namespace about the proper place to create an article in. If you need help moving it, post in this forum thread.

• this troper

The [page] edit you made contains first-person language, either by using "me", "I", or other personal pronouns, or the deprecated "This Troper" phrasing. Wiki articles aren't about you, they are about the topic. Please keep this in mind while editing.

• not recent

The [page] edit you made improperly uses "recent" or other time-relative language. Examples should be time-neutral because they could be read years from now. Please refer to our Examples Are Not Recent policy for more information.

• work title

The [page] edit you made isn't linking to the work page properly. Work names in trope examples should be links (written in CamelCase or between {{ and }} for single-word links), in italics (created by surrounding the link text with '' and '' (two single apostrophes), except for short stories, where they should be between " and " (one double quote)) and with a namespace before the link (like Namespace/WorkTitle). If you have trouble, just consult the Text-Formatting Rules or Ask The Tropers.

• deleting YMMV

The [[article]] edit you made looks like you are deleting someone's opinion. The YMMV items are going to have opinions which might differ from yours. That is kind of the point. Please only remove things from YMMV that are factually incorrect. We'll be sure to leave your opinions up. Please extend that courtesy to others.

• Note this notifier doesn't link to the page in question — it actually says [[article]]

• edit reason

Greetings. I notice that the edit you made on [[article]] is missing an edit reason. When making large edits such as removing examples or rewriting large sections of the page, it is usually a good idea to provide an explanation. Other tropers may otherwise not have an idea of why you are doing this. Thanks for helping us keep the wiki cool.

• Likewise, this one actually says [[article]]

• speculation

The edit you made on [page] appears to speculate about the events of the work. We trope events that explicitly happen within the work; theory-crafting or theorizing about Ambiguous Situations has no place on the main wiki and should be saved for Wild Mass Guessing. (If you are troping an unreleased work, please check out our Speculative Troping and Upcoming Work policies.)

• complaining

The [page] edit you made looks like complaining and/or has a negative tone. While we understand being passionate about the things you like (or hate), please keep your opinions separate from your examples, and your tone as neutral as possible.

• general example

The [page] edit you made looks like what we call a "general example". As a rule, examples should be about specific works and moments, not the company or medium as a whole. Please see How to Write an Example for more information.

I'd actually like for them to be in alphabetical order, too. Right now they're in the order of when they were added, which just gets confusing, and it's easy to have trouble finding something. (Though that's also partially because the list is near impossible to read on Night Vision...but I digress)

However, fixing the links is a more pressing issue for sure.

Do we really need the "Thanks" notifier? Can't people just make their own thank-you PMs if they want? Is it really that important to have a specific notifier for this, when we're so pressed for spots? (Off the top of my head, two notifier suggestions- Trope Slashing and ROCEJ- had to be tabled because we're at max notifier capacity.)

Another issue I personally have is that there's a lot of times when a troper is making more than one error in the same edit, and I'm unsure how to notify them about it. Pick one of the issues and send them the one notifier, possibly modified to also say "hey, work on this as well"? Create my own notifier? Send more than one notifier? Perhaps a catch-all "formatting errors" notifier would help in these cases...

Fixed the deleting YMMV and edit reasons notifiers so they actually pull the article name, for one. I have some more thoughts on notifiers as a whole, but I had this on the backburner and need to put them together.

For a really long time, I've wanted to have a notifier for "misuse"; for new examples that simply don't fit the trope.

The murky example is kinda close, but it doesn't really get to the heart of the problem.

I believe the misuse notifier should include a link to Is this an example? thread in case the troper who added the example doesn't agree with the assessment that it's misuse and that the example doesn't fit the trope definition.

Is the "image changes" one necessary? Changes/deletions that are problematic get reported to Image Pickin', and those that are fine are left alone. IP is encouraged but not mandatory and the language suggests ALL image changes must go through IP when that's not the case. If instead an image was added/removed through IP and someone changed it, that calls for the "ignored comment" notifier.

I've always considered the existence of that message to be a form of overbureaucratization. If the image is bad, revert it, otherwise let it lie. And make a (new) IP thread or a request for staff input at Ask The Tropers if it gets edit warry.

Also, the YMMV and Trivia notifiers can easily be merged into a catch-all "wrong part of the wiki" notifier. There's no reason to separate the namespaces.

I've sent the "image changes" notifier when reverting an image change, but it won't hurt my feelings to lose it. I also agree with regarding merging those two notifiers into one.

Here's my attempt at a catch-all "wrong page" notifier:

"Hi there! It seems that on [[page]], you've added a link to something that can't be on a main work page. Examples like this come with an icon that tells you where they belong, so they're pretty easy to spot. If it's YMMV or Trivia, please move the example to the proper subpage, or cut the link. If it's Flame Bait, delete the link/example altogether. If the trope occurs in-universe, please make sure to note this in the example. Thank you!"

It's a little long, but it covers the bases.

Edited by WarJay77 on Jan 23rd 2020 at 2:55:03 PM

That's pretty good. For the Flame Bait bit, I'd say "delete ("it" or "the example") altogether".

Yeah, that sounds a bit better. Tweaked.

Caveat: Trivia items may be linked and potholed within trope examples when relevant, but not listed as tropes themselves. When the wiki update added the trivia icon to such links I pointed out that What Goes Where on the Wiki allows for this, and Fighteer acknowledged it, but it never got fixed (unsurprisingly).

Okay, lemme try again:

"Hi there, it looks like you posted a link on [[page]] that doesn't belong there. Items like this come with icons to tell you where they belong; YMMV links and examples should only be on YMMV pages; Trivia examples go on Trivia pages; and Flame Bait examples are not to be linked anywhere. If these tropes occur in-universe, make sure to note it in the example. For more information, see What Goes Where on the Wiki. Thanks!"

Edited by WarJay77 on Jan 23rd 2020 at 11:16:14 AM

That looks good, and you managed to make it a bit more concise, too. Typo: "you a posted link"

Should it be "You've posted a link?"

No, I just meant that the "a" got swapped around; it should be "you posted a link" not "you a posted link".

^ Oh, I missed that in both posts.

That's good.

Perhaps replace "If these tropes occur in-universe" with "If any of these occur In-Universe" to make it clear that Flame Bait can be listed in such cases as well?

In addition, I say that YMMV should be linked to YMMV.Home Page the first time, Trivia should be linked to Trivia the first time, and Flame Bait be made a Wiki Word.

Just a note: links to wiki pages from notifiers are broken. It's a known bug as far as I know.

Some links are broken, but I don't think it's inherent. Could be wrong.

I think they all are. Same with discussion pages (those attached to articles).