Wikivoyage:Travellers' pub Voyage Tips and guide

Using some AI vibe coding and decent amount of reviews, I was able to put together a tool that we could use here. Basically it's a "Cart" for travel destinations. Myself, until now I used competitor page to put together travel itineraries - but this could very well replace it. Additionally, the tool could work as "To visit" list.

Notable features:

• any/most WV marker can be dragged into it, its wikidata and lat/long will be saved; drag'n'drop supported to reorder stuff
• the data is stored in mediawiki user-specific JS storage, so it should be available from all logged-in sessions
• export to JSON/GPX/mediawiki text, import from JSON; I was thinking the mediawiki text could be later used for people who want to create travel itineraries maybe
• map of the current trip
• after grabbing https://openrouteservice.org/ API key, one can ask it to calculate distances (by car or feet, probably others) between the POIs

I'd be happy if someone would give it a try -> you'll need to copy User:Andree.sk/common.js to your private common.js (or use redirect). -- andree 21:24, 28 January 2026 (UTC)Reply

This sounds amazing – I'll give it a try. //shb (t | c | m) 22:25, 28 January 2026 (UTC)Reply

After some quick use, I have to say it's great and can very much see this as a tool being published for all desktop users. A few minor things, though:

1. How is the "route" feature supposed to be used? I tried entering at least two cities in a few ways but I still keep getting the must enter at least 2 cities error.
2. Is it possible to interim save such a route in your userspace?
3. Will support for public transit integration be included? I don't imagine this to be easy (especially compiling multiple countries' and public transit operators' timetables together), and I don't know if it's doable with OSM data either.

Great job on this, btw! It's features like these we need to prevent this site from dying. //shb (t | c | m) 22:46, 28 January 2026 (UTC)Reply

1) seems to work for me, maybe you can export/share the JSON and I'll check what's wrong...

2) not yet, I'll check if it's possible to somehow export the paths in some reasonable format

3) in principle, we could configure it to use some open GTFS data on per-city (e.g. in Prague I know for fact that complete routes are available), probably depends on how free the access is. The question is if the users would use it. But if we would head towards making WV one-stop tourist guide with more whistles included....

I'll test the stuff a bit more and if it turns out useful, I think indeed I'd put it out there, to get some feedback... Thanks for giving it early try! -- andree 18:13, 30 January 2026 (UTC)Reply

I tried to make the tools as non-invasive as possible and made it public, to get more feedback. If you guys want to disable it, go into your preferences/Gadgets. If there's a consensus to remove it or not make it default enabled, we'll do it...... :) -- andree 21:02, 6 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

I suppose it is useful, but I also think it indeed is intrusive, so not suitable for being activated by default. As I type this, I don't know how to close or move it, and it keeps de-iconifying, obscuring the text I am writing (yes, I can scroll the page so that the input box isn't covered, but it is still annoying). –LPfi (talk) 21:31, 6 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

It shouldn't de-iconify on it's own, maybe some interaction with some browser extension, skin or Parsoid...? The only problem is, I'd say about 95% of people don't even know there are some gadgets in the settings. So if it's not on by default, almost noone will know it even exists. Especially the random visitors, for which I intended it the most (to keep them here) :-( -- andree 21:42, 6 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

Maybe then I'll add it to the icons at the top of of the article, instead of a floating icon, that's pretty tame, right? -- andree 21:55, 6 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

Of course, unless it's on by default, few will find it, but it needs testing by regulars. I'll do some testing later, until then I cannot say what should be done. The de-iconifying happend when I used the reply function, on typing. –LPfi (talk) 22:26, 6 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

@LPfi, I improved the behavior a bit, now it should be more low-key... Let me know if you are okay with it now, I'd again enable it, to get some more than zero feedback... :) -- andree 20:29, 12 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

Just an FYI that mw:Extension:ReadingLists is coming in the next few months which has persistent private storage of lists with a button that occupies the exact spaces you are adding your backpack icon. I think this feature could be ripe for repurposing/ customization in Wikivoyage as a "trip" feature (said as someone who has made lists in the past). You can play with it on test.wikipedia.org now as a beta feature. Jdlrobson (talk) 01:21, 16 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

Huh, thanks for the pointer... For a basic "to read" list it's okay, but the API is veeeery basic :-( I'll give it a try, but I'd say already now it's missing 90% of the functionality. If I only wanted a raw bookmark list, one can already put that in $User/Xyz... Especially I didn't want another "hidden storage" that can't be exported/exchanged with other people. Quite the opposite, I'd like it, if the data could be directly shared between users (think - a shared trip plan), but I think there's no such thing on mediawiki? -- andree 05:34, 16 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

the api supports multiple lists; storing any page (across projects - including Wikipedia articles). Unlike the localStorage used in your tool it is persistent and will follow the user across devices (e.g. if I am on my mobile phone it will be annoying when I go to my laptop and the lists I spent hours creating are not there)

The sharing functionality has been built by you already. Why could it not be built on top of the reading list feature rather than as a separate feature? In future where there is a bookmark button and a backpack button that both save lists, users are going to be very confused about why that the difference between them is.

If you download the Wikipedia official app youll see additional features that are not yet on web. The android app supports sharing lists with other users (albeit wikipedia not wikivoyage).

Essentially I have a concern here that shipping this feature to all users is going to give us headaches later on when we have to consolidate it with the native bookmarking tool that is currently being built by Wikimedia Foundation staff. Jdlrobson (talk) 17:46, 16 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

The gadget works on listing granularity, though... Esp. on WV, having article-based storage for this stuff is quite useless. For a trip to a bigger city, you could do is pick the favorite districts at best. There are also features like map and route calculation. Bt, it only uses localStorage for anonymous users (if it worked), but switches to mw.Api().saveOption("userjs-...") to have it persistent across devices.

I don't see a problem with WP official, we will see it if+when it gets here. I've been waiting such a thing for 5+ years now :-) I don't mind competition, if the reading lists thing is better/voted for, we can disable this one. I'll add there a flash "beta" sticker in the meantime :-) -- andree 18:20, 16 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

The problem with sharing lists of articles is that it's easy at the English Wikipedia to construct a list of articles that has inappropriate meaning – not just something like "Donald Trump, Fascism, Dementia", which might annoy some people, but things like "My, Teacher, Mary, Smith, Has, Sex, With, Students" or "Meeting, 123, Maple, Street, Chicago, Tuesday, Noon, Come, Alone". Private storage is a subpoena-generating risk (because account credentials can be shared, so it can turn into a private messaging system), public storage is a libel (and therefore oversighter) problem, and public sharing is a brand nightmare. This killed mw:Gather but not (apparently) the desire to create lists.

Having said all that, I don't think that these risks play out equally across all the wikis. It's a problem for the biggest wikis, but not here. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:58, 17 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

I just saw this icon and opened it up. I may have missed a post or two. Is there a place that elaborates on this new feature? —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 23:03, 15 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

#Trip_Planner_WIP/RFC. Never mind me. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 23:05, 15 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

Hi I also saw this and it's been interrupting some of my workflows on mobile so just turned it off. I am very concerned that logged out users cannot do the same.

Sorry to be a buzz kill, but I have some serious reservations about adding this to the experience for ALL logged out users based on the feedback from 3 users (User:SHB2000, User:LPfi and User:Andree.sk ) and I'd like to see some more discussion. I think this should be an opt-in gadget until that's happened.

As someone who has recently taken over the listing editor I am very concerned about long maintenance and the anonymous community becoming too dependent on another gadget they we might not be able to maintain so I'd like to understand more of the plan there...

I will share more thoughts later. Would those be better to put here or on another talk page? Jdlrobson (talk) 00:32, 16 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

Is there a way to make it show only to logged in users? //shb (t | c | m) 00:34, 16 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

yes. You can set rights option in addition to the default option to limit to logged in users with a certain right. I believe there is a right specific to all logged in users. Mw:Extension:Gadgets. I would have no objection to us doing that given gadgets tend to be a good place to cultivate new ideas (withiut the associated stress that comes with supporting a gadget for all users 😀). Jdlrobson (talk) 01:17, 16 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

We could also make it a desktop-only gadget. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:14, 27 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

I was contemplating the same - on desktop you would prepare your trip (fill the days with POIs) and have the gadget. On mobile, you'd open e.g. wv.org/wiki/MyTrip and it would show you the trip for today on a map (with much reduced interface). This would play nicely with the locator gadget too... OTOH, typically when I'm on a vacation, I don't take my desktop - yet I want to be able to adjust the plans... :) -- andree 19:34, 27 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

I think we can move discussion to MediaWiki talk:Gadget-TripPlanner now. Note gadgets dont support desktop vs mobile any more. You can choose not to display it by skin but that is not the same. We can however update the code to check things like browser viewport size.

Currently the gadget is enabled for all logged in users. Jdlrobson (talk) 00:12, 28 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Could you be more specific - which workflows does it break? Right now it really only adds that one icon... Does it interfere with some other gadgets or some browser? I'd like to make it ultimately available to everyone, if community doesn't disapprove it - but at the moment it doesn't show up for anonymous users (by accident :) I can't find how to enable it only for users, groups apparently can't be matched?). As for maintenance, given how easy it became to (vibe-)code things, I'm not too concerned... :-) -- andree 05:21, 16 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

My biggest concern is it creates a performance issues by introducing it a cumulative layout shift which would be highly damaging to Wikivoyage showing up in search result pages. However there are also security concerns.

Regarding vibe coding - I think it has great application for rapid prototyping but typically the resulting code quality and UX can be problematic. There are various problems in the code that could impact end users and playing with the tool I found quite a few bugs. If something is built with AI tooling I still expect a human to be able to understand it.

Where would be the best page to share these concerns? On the gadget talk page?

Regarding user rights I think autoconfirmed should be a the right group so perhaps editsemiprotected right would act as a good proxy? Jdlrobson (talk) 17:34, 16 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

It's a dynamically created gadget/on-click icon, does google/DDG/... index generated stuff already by programatically clicking all the stuff? Serious question, I'm no expert...

Obviously vibe-coding was a bit hyperbole, but for sure it was much less manual coding/inventing new stuff, than I'd expect... I tried to keep some security in mind, like not downloading stuff randomly and sanitizing inputs. We can for sure continue this on the gadget talk page! -- andree 18:25, 16 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

In some welcoming news, finally! (these were the guys who ran the public consultation for closing Wikinews) //shb (t | c | m) 23:54, 3 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

The SPTF is disbanded after running the public consultation for closing Wikinews. Well, I think Wikinews users still have to archive the content since the SPTF's decision doesn't get negated by being dissolved. Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs) 02:28, 4 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

Task forces are meant to be short-term groups. Of course it was disbanded when its work was done. And as Sbb says, that doesn't invalidate any of its findings or negate any of its recommendations.

BTW, it's always been the Board of Trustees for the Wikimedia Foundation, and not the SPTF, that will be deciding whether to archive Wikinews. There are about four board meetings a year, and they also pass resolutions outside of meetings. The most recent meeting was in December, so it's possible that the decision has already been taken, but from a general how-boards-work POV, I'd actually expect it to happen in the next meeting. They'll probably want to make that decision before they set the budget for the next year (which is traditionally their second meeting of the calendar year), because their decision might affect the budget (e.g., one-time expenses if they decided to support a fork to a new organization). WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:47, 4 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

A bit of a late reply, but I do think it's safe to say Wikinews is dead. Despite issues with the consultation process, I don't think there's anything saving it now (and like you I also expect the decision to come anytime in the next upcoming month or two). But I do really hope that Board takes feedback from this, were a similar task force in the future to be appointed (and definitely not with 2 sanctioned/self-sanctioned members and 1 very inactive user out of 6). //shb (t | c | m) 21:47, 6 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

The task force only had five non-Board members on it. One is a former WMF board trustee, one is a former steward, one practically is the French Wiktionary, and the other two I don't know well. One of those got into some trouble last year, but if it were possible for the WMF to magically know, in 2023, that an editor would be desysopped in 2025, then I think those powers could probably be put to better use than merely not appointing him to a temporary committee. (Victoria, who posted the list of appointed volunteers, is a community-selected WMF board trustee, having been a top vote-getter in 2021 and 2024. If you think that's a problem [I don't], then remember that the next time you hear someone saying that all WMF trustees should be elected by editors.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 06:14, 7 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

It's a problem, but not one that I think can actually be easily solved. //shb (t | c | m) 06:16, 7 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

Late to the conversation. I wouldn't give much too much thought about the composition of the task force members. The task force selects members themselves without an open election so it's basically a cabal/echo chamber. New vacancies were not advertised and simply appointed via a secret process. I have given a bigger breakdown on why the task force failed (and not just from Wikinews's perspective) in this comment. OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 14:04, 17 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

I wonder what makes you think that task force "failed". I suspect that they achieved the only thing they were really meant to do.

For that matter, what makes you think there were any "new vacancies"? Unlike the US Supreme Court, task forces don't have a set, limited size. If the group is working closely with someone, then it makes sense to make them be part of the group. The second most senior person for the WMF's entire technical division could not be easily replaced by any volunteer contributor, so your realistic choices are "appoint him", "keep it a secret", or "have an election just for show, with all the other candidates disqualified because they can't do what he can (e.g., assign WMF staff to study technical migration plans)". Which would you choose under those circumstances? WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:34, 17 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

I'll keep my reply here short since I have written extensively in the linked comment on Meta. The objective of the sister project was immense. It was, for the first time, allowing non-trustees to determine whether to open new sister project(s). At the same time, it's going to determine, for the very first time*, whether a project be closed. You absolutely need to ensure that the task force selection process is representative of the community and not selected through backdoor channels or knowing the right people because the result and impact is immense. The failure of the task force in both objectives further fracture the Wikinews community and set the adoption of new sister project process back by at least 2-3 years while proposals have been waiting for 7 years (and we're complaining about drop in human traffic because of AI while ignoring new ideas and projects that could counter the drop). Not to mention that the conduct by some of the selected task force members were less then stellar to say the least.

* The September 11 memorial wiki was the first (and I believe the only time) a WMF non-language wiki be closed. But it's not at the same level and prominence as Wikinews. OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 14:17, 19 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

• I don't think the objective was immense. I suspect that the actual, if unwritten, objective was to figure out whether Wikinews should be closed. The founder of Wikinews thought it was a failed experiment some 15 years ago. People have been talking about closing it for approximately forever. If you'd said to me five years ago, and especially at any point after Pi zero died, "Huh, the Board is setting up a committee to look at opening and closing non-Wikipedias", my first thought would have been "I bet they'll be looking at finally getting rid of Wikinews". This shouldn't be a surprise to anyone who has been paying attention to Wikinews.
• The SPTF made recommendations to a Board committee. They did not make decisions. There have always been non-trustees making recommendations. It's now up to the committee to vote on whether to take this recommendation, or a different one, to the Board for a vote. (There are also 131 other closed wikis.)
• I don't agree that all stakeholders have to be at the table when the question is whether to fire one of the stakeholders for under-performance. I bet you wouldn't expect that for a real-world job, either.

WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:32, 19 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Heya, long time no write here. Just some points:

I was an advisor in the SPTF, not a full member, only BoT members had voting rights in the SPTF. In the limited meetings I attended, decisions were already made, so my contributions were minimal, mainly promoting community consultations about their decisions, which proved ineffective since SPTF decisions were pre-determined.

Upon my sanction, I was immediately removed, missing subsequent meetings. While I agree that sanctioned individuals shouldn't be part of such bodies, at the time I still had community trust and always focused on small communities.

Btw, there was a proposal for a Sister Projects Committee (SPC); I suggest promoting initiatives like this, because WMF should not have task forces that override community wishes.

Cya~ Galahad (sasageyo!)^(esvoy) 03:47, 25 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

I think the WMF should override some community wishes, because some of them are bad. Five or ten years ago, the WMF had to override a community decision to block all "out" gay editors on sight. Before that, they had to explain to another community that it wasn't okay for them to punish women for editing articles about sex, even if their culture thought that was immodest behavior. Each community must meet the minimum standards, even if it "wishes" to do otherwise. WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:50, 26 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

After 13 years, many Wikivoyage listings are still in plain text, rather than templates. This means they can't have coordinates, they're often badly formatted because they don't use our templates (Eat, Drink, Sleep, See, etc.), and they don't have a lastedit parameter so the date of information is unclear allowing them to become out of date. I try to fix these manually, but in some cases (Amandola) the task is just too daunting. I bet that half of the businesses listed there are defunct. without templates

I think we used to have a bot that did just this. Could we create a new one? Listings would still need to be checked, but this could save a lot of time and make our listings more time-relevant, the biggest critique of our website from outside of Wikivoyage. --Comment by Selfie City (talk) (contributions) 14:52, 4 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

That sounds like a great idea, but I would ask that the bot not fill in the lastedit field, but leave it blank. We would not want a bunch of listings imported from Wikitravel to be automatically converted to templates indicating that the listing was last updated on 4 Feb 2026 (for example). I have been trying to apply templates to new listings without templates that have been added to a couple of England articles (by an experienced editor). It's a job and a half. Ground Zero (talk) 22:06, 4 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

I agree. I should've clarified that I mean the lastedit parameter should be created empty, so that editors can make edits and fill it in. --Comment by Selfie City (talk) (contributions) 22:59, 4 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

Do you have some representative list of such pages? A bot is not a problem to make, but to make it reliable and not do breaking edits is something different... -- andree 22:06, 4 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

• Amandola
• Gilbertsville
• Ilhéus
• Neuss

--Comment by Selfie City (talk) (contributions) 23:02, 4 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

Listings are often but not automatically a good way to convey info, so unleashing a bot will generate text that only a bot will ever want to read (and perhaps that day is dawning). As the experienced editor that GZ just had a little poke at, I'm bound to observe that the System Architects of WV have endowed us with half a dozen different formats for presenting info. It is not for us mere mortals to know their sublime intent, but I suggest we should continue to make use of them all. Grahamsands (talk) 22:54, 5 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

Lists of untemplated restaurants, bars and hotels look like the stuff that was imported from Wikitravel in 2007. When I use Wikivoyage for travelling, I ignore undated entries because they are usually outdated cruft. I think Wikivoyage should be doing better than that in 2026. Ground Zero (talk) 02:49, 6 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

Agreed. They also just look pure messy (esp markers) and my mind often just glosses right by. //shb (t | c | m) 03:16, 6 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

I understand, but I think that for the sake of creating a bot, we shouldn't let ourselves be sidetracked by that concern. We have articles and business listings from 2007 that actually are unchanged. That's the main problem my proposal is attempting to fix. --Comment by Selfie City (talk) (contributions) 13:55, 6 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

Oh ftr I support – listings should be the norm sitewide. //shb (t | c | m) 21:42, 6 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

I think in some cases, it's fine to list POIs as markers or simply in bold — I've noticed you do this in articles, and personally I don't have a problem with that. My concern is more with articles pulled from WikiTravel which use their old format. These are the "dinosaur" articles rather than the newer drafts. --Comment by Selfie City (talk) (contributions) 22:57, 5 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

I'm not overly concerned by it. Yellowknife's See section is a mix of bulleted items, templates and nested templates. And that doesn't bother me. OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 14:10, 6 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

The only bulleted items in Yellowknife#See are the Aurora Borealis, and the Great Slave Lake. If someone did assign coordinates to the aurora, they would be wrong. As the lake covers an area larger than Wales, coordinates would not be useful. Ground Zero (talk) 14:25, 6 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

There's also "buy" in Yellowknife which is a mixture of bulleted items and templates. OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 15:05, 6 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

All of the stores listed in Buy are templated. The bulleted items are things that you might consider buying, like Caribou-skin mittens, so they would not have a template with coordinates, date, address, telephone. It would be a problem for a bot, but the concern I am raising is about businesses that are listed without dates. Ground Zero (talk) 17:19, 6 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

I'm imagining a bot that is applied on a case by case basis, not sitewide. I don't think it would need to be used on decent articles like Yellowknife, where minor fixes if needed could be made by a human. --Comment by Selfie City (talk) (contributions) 13:36, 9 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

Non-decent articles probably need more than bot-tidying. A human should make the major fixes. Of course, if they want a tool to do some of the work automatically, I don't object, but listifying should not be the only thing done. Most restaurant and hotel listings not edited since 2013 should probably be removed rather than listingified, unless they can be at least tentatively verified. –LPfi (talk) 14:00, 9 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

I agree, but listifying is a tool that would make the human updates (checking businesses' status, etc.) quicker. --Comment by Selfie City (talk) (contributions) 16:08, 9 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

Just run that by me again. The problem is that we have far more outdated entries than editorial input to update them. Many are not time-stamped: you and I would know that these are especially likely to be outdated but the casual reader is left guessing. The proposed solution is to deploy a bot that would fix none of them but create far more, as it would listify entries that are fairly recent and those that are not time-sensitive, such as landmarks. That's the idea, right? Grahamsands (talk) 19:43, 10 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

We have two separate issues here. One is listings that are not dated. That's a problem, but it needs to be fixed with user input.

I'm talking about entries that were imported from WikiTravel and aren't even in a listing template. Should we just leave them as timeless messes? At least if they're in the template, they can be updated more easily... --Comment by Selfie City (talk) (contributions) 20:52, 10 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

Indeed – there is nothing saying that a bot has to fill in the lastedit field. //shb (t | c | m) 23:08, 10 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

Any such bot IMO should skip the |lastedit= field, and it could even add a |bot=yes field. Since unknown parameters are usually ignored, that shouldn't even require any changes to the templates. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:27, 11 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

I am not sure that unknown parameters are ignored in listing fields as I have recently seen errors being flagged up for twitter and facebook fields which I think were a brief experiment.

I do think that converting suitable text to listings by a human controlled bot is a good idea. Having a listing with its "edit" link at the end encourages users to make minor updates. I was disappointed to see that a bot recently converted a few inline listings to markers, for example on Benešov, but this was only on a very few pages. AlasdairW (talk) 21:33, 11 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

See listing template discussion -- andree 16:54, 12 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

Good idea regarding the bot parameter – I think the default listing template you see at the source header would need to be changed; I'm not sure how this can be done, but I'm sure there is a way. //shb (t | c | m) 21:46, 11 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

I believe the warning for unknown parameters is shown only for those who have enabled such warnings, i.e. people who in this case indeed should see it (and remove the parameter if the listing is OK). If the template were edited, what would you like it to do when that parameter is set? Perhaps have it show a warning :-)

–LPfi (talk) 09:36, 12 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

Oh I see what you mean. //shb (t | c | m) 09:57, 12 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

I think that converting a templated listing for a restaurant to ordinary text is a bad idea. In addition to removing the date stamp that tells the reader how current the information is, it removes the coordinates, and in this case the phone number. Ground Zero (talk) 12:03, 23 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Agreed; it also makes the article in general look a lot less organized and tidy, and is against current site consensus anyway. //shb (t | c | m) 12:16, 23 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

You can check out the gadget by enabling it in your settings - it adds 'current position' marker into dynamic maps around here. Feedback welcome :-) -- andree 20:16, 15 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

@Andree.sk: Having properly tested out this gadget now, this is an amazing little gadget. I'd support making this mainstream and default for everyone. //shb (t | c | m) 12:09, 8 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Given the lack of objections, should this be made a mainstream default gadget? //shb (t | c | m) 09:20, 23 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

I made it so. If someone is against, speak now or stay silent forever... :)

The poimap2.php thing also has this feature actually, but I think it's not used too much anymore? I'll try to get some statistics from somewhere... -- andree 18:51, 27 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Hello! There will be a Wikimedia Café meetup on 7 March 2026 at 15:00 UTC, focusing on the Wikimedia Commons mobile app. Featured guests will be software developers User:Misaochan and User:RitikaPahwa4444, and Wiki Project Med chair User:Doc James. Please see the Café page for more information, including how to attend. ↠Pine (✉) 07:32, 22 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

Nice to see Commons is finally getting a mobile app. //shb (t | c | m) 06:31, 23 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

I have had a quick look at a list over 50 grant applications in meta:Grants:Regions/Sub-Saharan Africa. I only looked at the details of a small selection of the applications in the "Rapid Funds - Fiscal Year (FY) 2025-26 (SSA)" - "Under Review" in the box at he bottom of the page. I found two that planned to edit Wikivoyage:

• meta:Grants:Programs/Wikimedia Community Fund/Rapid Fund/Promoting Tourism and Travel Information in Northeast Nigeria through Wikimedia (ID: 23747298)
• meta:Grants:Programs/Wikimedia Community Fund/Rapid Fund/Open Heritage:Documenting Northern Nigerian Cultures, Festivals, and Emirates on Wikimedia (ID: 23741619)

You can comment on the applications on the linked grant discussion pages. Has the discussion of the new policy on Wikivoyage:Welcome, event organizers concluded? - it may be appropriate to mention this policy in grant application discussion. AlasdairW (talk) 22:27, 26 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

Do we know which user is behind the two grants? Unfortunately the edit histories of both applications were done by a bot. //shb (t | c | m) 23:07, 26 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

See the answer to question: "8. Describe your team.", nearly halfway down the page. AlasdairW (talk) 23:15, 26 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

I see – pinging @Ishaku Ajeje, Mlamido, Gwanki, Mahuta, Mr. Snatch, A Sulaiman Z: – can you all confirm you are aware of this discussion?

While I'm at it, I'm going to be completely honest: I don't get good feelings about the first. Two of the organisers listed there, Special:CA/Hajara ya'u and Special:CA/Nnamadee, do not even have local accounts on enwikivoyage (i.e. they never even visited Wikivoyage whilst logged in). That alone should be a bit concerning, but I am happy to be proved otherwise (and I hope it ends up being that way). //shb (t | c | m) 03:20, 27 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

@SHB2000@Ikan Kekek Thank you very much for contacting us regarding the proposal.

Typically, we form a team with members from different specializations who work collaboratively on such projects. We assure you that we will fully comply with all Wikivoyage policies and guidelines throughout the process.

Thank you again for your consideration. Mr. Snatch (talk) 08:45, 27 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

Thank you for posting, and please stay in touch with us so we can be available to help with planning in any way that could be useful. Ikan Kekek (talk) 09:06, 27 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

@Ikan Kekek, AlasdairW, SHB2000 Thank you very much for reaching out to us about this proposal, [1], I am very pleased with your response. As you rightly noted, some individuals have not yet opened accounts on Wikivoyage. For this reason, we aim to intensify our efforts to encourage people from Northeast Nigeria to begin contributing actively to Wikivoyage. This will be achieved by helping them appreciate the value of their cultural heritage and traditions, and by reassuring them that their contributions will gain global recognition when shared not only on Wikivoyage but also on Wikipedia as a whole. We assure you of our full commitment to strictly following all relevant guidelines. [2] Ishaku Ajeje (talk) 09:31, 27 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

Thanks very much! I'm posting to those talk pages. Ikan Kekek (talk) 23:19, 26 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

Hello AlasdairW, Thank you for for pointing out the inclusion of Wikivoyage in our project.

In our proposal Open Heritage: Documenting Northern Nigerian Cultures, Festivals, and Emirates, we included Wikivoyage because the organizers already have practical experience creating and improving Wikivoyage articles. The project is focused on documenting Northern Nigerian emirates, festivals, and cultural heritage, and some of these topics are directly relevant to travel and cultural tourism. Because of this, it makes sense to improve related travel information where appropriate.

We are aware of the ongoing discussion about the new policy for event organizers on Wikivoyage. We will review the guidance on Wikivoyage:Welcome, event organizers and make sure our project activities align with the expected standards for training and content contributions. Our team will ensure that our contributions follow Wikivoyage policies and best practices.

We are not connected to the other proposal mentioned. Our team will focus on implementing our own project activities, while ensuring that any contributions to Wikivoyage follow the Wikivoyage guidelines and scope. We also welcome any suggestions from the community that can help improve the quality of our contributions.

Thank you

Gwanki (talk) 06:00, 27 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

Awesome, @Gwanki, glad to hear you're aware – hopefully all goes well for you with the grant. :) //shb (t | c | m) 06:35, 27 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

Indeed, good luck with the grant application, and thanks for working with us! My feeling is that for Wikivoyage, the most important things in regard to festivals are what, when and where. From what I've seen, what is the most commonly covered of the three, but when and exactly where may be omitted, and visitors need that information for planning and to attend. What we don't want is either just a list of festival names without other information or lots of detail about the what with no practical information about when or where to go. Ikan Kekek (talk) 07:26, 27 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

I am pleased to see that the grant applicants have engaged with us, and I hope that the applications are successful. AlasdairW (talk) 11:13, 27 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

Unfortunately, these two grant applications were not funded. AlasdairW (talk) 23:22, 27 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

@AlasdairW Yes, we didn’t anticipate this outcome, but considering the high number of proposed projects, we fully understand the limitations involved. Mr. Snatch (talk) 08:32, 28 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

I'm really sorry to hear that. I hope you guys can reapply soon. Let us know if we might be able to help you in any way. Ikan Kekek (talk) 22:44, 28 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

@Ikan Kekek Thank you so much for your kind message. We truly appreciate your support and encouragement. We will definitely consider reapplying soon, and we’ll reach out if we need any assistance. Mr. Snatch (talk) 23:04, 14 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

There are two other grant applications that mention Wikivoyage, but these are proposing less edits, and may not have much impact:

• meta:Grants:Programs/Wikimedia Community Fund/Rapid Fund/Wikipédia & Génocide des Tutsis (ID: 23653583) This Rwanda based application proposes to edit 10 pages on Wikivoyage, but as the application is mainly written in French, they may not contribute here.
• meta:Grants:Programs/Wikimedia Community Fund/Rapid Fund/Advance Wikipedia Awareness and Training at Abdu Gusau Polytechnic and Historical Documentation of Gusau, Zamfara States. Follow up to our Previous Initiative. (ID: 23526700) is based in Nigeria and proposes to edit 30 pages on Wikivoyage, but the main activity is adding photos to Commons. As it is planned for 2026-01-01 - 2026-03-31, it is unlikely to get a grant in time.

As before there are comment links in the applications. AlasdairW (talk) 11:24, 27 February 2026 (UTC)Reply

There are a lot of locations people might visit and photograph because they are known from popular culture. Are these a possible travel topic?

An ex once sent me a photo of herself "Standing on the corner of Bleecker and MacDougal", a location in Greenwich Village mentioned by w:Fred Neil in a song. There are many photos of the corner of Haight & Ashbury, center of the hippie neighborhood in 60s San Francisco. Winslow (Arizona) has a statue based on an Eagles tune. Probably there are a bunch more I do not know of.

People also often take selfies in front of various famous structures, anything from the Washington Monument to the Taj Mahal. I don't think those locations belong in this topic, doubt it would be worth trying to list them anywhere.

Other opinions? Volunteers? Pashley (talk) 04:15, 4 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

In my own personal opinion, I find this photo to be spectacular, and classical at the same time. I remember this, during my middle school years. ~2026-69216-3 (talk) 21:26, 5 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Looks like a few moments ago, an attack (I'd rather name it "shooting in your own feet" :-) ) happened and wiki's are in degraded mode. No user javascript ATM. More info... -- andree 18:33, 5 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Many wikis were in read-only mode (see phab:T419143). Glad at least the damage has been reverted. It was a genuine mistake, though; shit happens I guess. Must say though that trying to edit m:SRG without scripts feels...painful. //shb (t | c | m) 21:05, 5 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

The WMF has released a statement about this at m:Wikimedia Foundation/Product and Technology/Product Safety and Integrity/March 2026 User Script Incident. User .css/.js scripts are back, too. //shb (t | c | m) 00:23, 6 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

That statement lacked a lot of details. And of course, one should not be doing testing on prod server. OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 18:29, 6 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

And running random code with staff privilege on internet connected machines as part of a security review sounds odd in itself, to say the least. I assume they cannot tell too much detail, at that might reveal vulnerabilities, if not in the system itself, at least in how privileges are handled by WMF staff. I still hope that they disclose as much as possible when such vulnerabilities have been handled. The vulnerabilities should be examined as a matter of urgency and dealt with as soon as practicable, but if a culture change is needed, the changes may need time to settle. However, the incident should not be forgotten until such a report is published. This is not a private company where such incidents can be seen as business secrets. –LPfi (talk) 20:35, 6 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

What I don't understand with all of this is why they needed to load a userscript onto the site js to test it for malicious code. //shb (t | c | m) 22:38, 6 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

My understanding is that the malicious code copied itself to the site js, as it was run with sufficient privileges. Otherwise it had just infected the user's (common.)js. –LPfi (talk) 07:50, 10 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Could be, yeah (the edits are oversighted and I have no idea what bit of the .js code infected which). //shb (t | c | m) 08:40, 10 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

There're test wikis for this reason. At the very least, even after loading this malicious userscript, the vulnerability would only be nuking pages on the test wiki and not on an actual wiki. OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 06:44, 8 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

(cc @Andyrom75, Jdlrobson:) Is it just me, or has the reply tool been down for everyone else as well? I'm using Chrome on MacOS. //shb (t | c | m) 10:57, 12 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

SHB2000, same here, but only on en:voy. In it:voy currently it works. --Andyrom75 (talk) 11:12, 12 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Oh good I'm glad it's not just me going crazy. :P (also have no issues on Meta, at least when viewing m:SRG and m:RFH) //shb (t | c | m) 11:13, 12 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

It's working now. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:19, 12 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Hi everyone! We are Federica (User:Chicafratta) and Alessio (User:Aionna), two Italian researchers working on the WikiM.A.R.C.A. project. The name is an acronym for Marche, Artigianato, Ricerca, Cultura e Accoglienza (Marche, Craftsmanship, Research, Culture and Hospitality). It is a broader project coordinated by the University of Macerata in collaboration with Confartigianato Macerata - Fermo - Ascoli Piceno (a trade union association that represents, protects and develops over 8,000 small businesses and artisans in the area) and funded by ANCoS APS. This project aims at improving online content about the Marche region on Wikimedia platforms such as Wikipedia and Wikivoyage. The project focuses on researching and documenting local culture, traditions, itineraries and products, with the goal of creating reliable and useful information for both residents and travellers.

We are mainly working on the Italian version of Wikivoyage, where we are creating itineraries based on traditional food and wine or local craftsmanship. These articles will later be translated into English.

Thank for your welcome and we are open to any help or suggestions! Chicafratta (talk) 16:20, 12 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Thank you very much. It sounds like a great project! I would suggest looking at existing itineraries in Category:Star articles and Category:Guide articles. Some existing travel topics on wine regions and craftsmanship could also be worth looking at; I know Colorado's Wine Country was a featured Off the beaten path article some years ago and Mexican artesanias is a guide-level article. I also recommend reading or at least looking through the key points in the core policy and guideline pages linked in Wikivoyage:Welcome, event organizers: Wikivoyage:What is an article?, Wikivoyage:Don't tout, Wikivoyage:Copyleft, Wikivoyage:Welcome, Wikipedians and Wikivoyage:Goals and non-goals, and familiarizing yourselves with Wikivoyage:Listings templates if you have not already done so.

Please ask us any questions that come to your minds when you read those pages. I believe there are at least a couple of differences in policy and guidelines between it.wikivoyage and en.wikivoyage.

I very much look forward to reading your contributions!

All the best,

Ikan Kekek (talk) 19:50, 12 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Looking forward to this, too. :) //shb (t | c | m) 20:47, 12 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Hi everyone! @Aionna and I’d like to share a quick update on our work: we have completed and published the article “Vernaccia Nera wine route”. We have followed the instructions on this page Wikivoyage:Itinerary article template. If you have time to take a look, we would really appreciate any feedback.

We also have a question: is it possible to display the itinerary route on the map, as we did in the Italian version Percorso della Vernaccia Nera? If so, could you please explain how to do it?

Thank you very much! :) Chicafratta (talk) 11:53, 18 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Thank you for creating this. I have made a couple of small technical additions. I set the article as Outline, but it does look very close to being Usable. It would be helpful to have a little more on getting to Serrapetrona, as I see from it:Serrapetrona that there are buses to get there. It would be even better if you could also create Serrapetrona. AlasdairW (talk) 22:00, 18 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

I've made a few copyedits (all very minor), but otherwise a really solid start, Chicafratta – great work so far. :) //shb (t | c | m) 04:50, 19 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Thanks for your help. We will make the changes you have suggested. As for the article on Serrapetrona, we are currently working on it: Serrapetrona (it is just the Sandbox). We will update you once it is finished.

) Chicafratta (talk) 18:09, 19 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Hiǃ We have just published the article on Serrapetrona, If you want to take a look and give us any feedback. Thank youǃǃ Chicafratta (talk) 12:57, 24 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Hi, @Chicafratta, I just glanced at your edit to the Marche page. What stands out is the use of "perfect" and "ideal". Those are on en.wikivoyage's list of words to avoid. You might also benefit from looking at WV:Welcome, tourism professionals, because while it's good to put great destinations in a good light, we should do so by giving specific information, not by using the kinds of promotional words and phrases travel agencies or tourism bureaux use. Ikan Kekek (talk) 13:09, 24 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

I only found out about Special:EditChecks today, and I must say I'm pretty pleased with the PasteCheck.js script (which warns users for copypasted text). However, underneath it, I notice there's a ToneCheck.js script, which, based on the description, is based on a BERT model, linking to m:NPOV, which is not a policy on Wikivoyage. Is there a way to configure this such that it reflects Wikivoyage:Be fair instead of NPOV? (cc @Andyrom75, Jdlrobson:) //shb (t | c | m) 11:52, 14 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

That's the Editing team's work, so you want to ping @Quiddity (WMF) and @PPelberg (WMF). Because the writing style is intentionally different, we might not want it here.

Several of the usual EditChecks are irrelevant, including addReference (we want the opposite: warn people if they add any), convertReference (we have no citation templates), externalLink (these are wanted), and probably yearLink (as irrelevant, because there are no articles for any years, and therefore no possibility of linking to the wrong one). WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:32, 14 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Thanks, both. It looks like the ToneCheck issue is partially covered at phab:T419812 (ToneCheck is only active at 3 pilot-wikipedia projects currently, and only intended for Wikipedias for now), and I'll file some related bug-reports next week about improving the overall clarity/accuracy of that new Special page for non-Wikipedias. Quiddity (WMF) (talk) 19:31, 14 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

+1, @Quiddity (WMF): thank you for making us aware of this issue, @SHB2000 + @WhatamIdoing. You should notice this fixed before this week is over.

See phab:T420124 for more details. PPelberg (WMF) (talk) 23:10, 16 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Thank you, Peter! Is there a timeline available for when such tools will be rolled out to non-Wikipedia projects? //shb (t | c | m) 23:59, 16 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

phab:T420124 is tagged for 1.46.0-wmf.20, which is scheduled for wikitech:Deployments#Wednesday, March 18. WhatamIdoing (talk) 03:35, 17 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Just to be clear, tomorrow's the date when the list will stop showing all the things that aren't being used here. Actually getting more of them to be useful here will take much longer. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:15, 18 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Ah, right, I see. Thanks for the insight, though. //shb (t | c | m) 04:05, 18 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

My partner and I are currently in Berlin on 6-month freelancers' visas. We're early in our time here but already have a lot to share about the process of applying for the visas, what you need to do to follow up when you have moved to wherever you're staying, and various differences between the U.S. and Germany. (For example, over-the-counter medications tend to be more expensive here and dispensed in much smaller quantities, and some supplements are more difficult to find; however, groceries are cheaper and produce and meat in supermarkets is generally excellent.) We have articles about studying abroad in different countries and retiring abroad. Should I start an article about living and working in Germany as an American? Ikan Kekek (talk) 15:57, 16 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Is a general article for non-EU people (not just for Americans) possible?

It would be nice to have articles like that for many countries. For example, I learned a few years ago that if you are living and working in Italy, you have to register your lease. This isn't to prove your residency so much as a way for them to prevent the landlord from "forgetting" to report your rent on their income taxes. (It also makes you eligible for various rental protection laws.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:21, 16 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Yes, it's possible, though the work I do will necessarily be from an American's perspective and experience. You have to register your place of residence here, too. That's the first official thing to do after you arrive at your rented apartment, receive a form from your landlord and fill out a form you bring to your appointment. Ikan Kekek (talk) 17:35, 16 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

I'm not clear whether I have permission to start this article or not. Ikan Kekek (talk) 10:36, 18 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

I'd say go for it (something like Living on a temporary work visa in Germany, whatever you think works) – what you write might be oriented towards someone migrating from the US, but I suspect over time as the article gets more edits, that will fade out. //shb (t | c | m) 10:41, 18 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Or Working in Germany. I think most of the content will apply also to somebody who gets permanent residency, and much of it also to EU citizens who don't need visas. Anybody should understand that it is directed to people from abroad. We have several Working in… articles already. Working in the United States seems to concentrate on directly work (or employment contract) related issues. In Working in Finland I have included a range of practical issues, such as housing and children, offloading to it practical matters many people who stay a longer time may need to consider. –LPfi (talk) 11:43, 18 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

I think many American-specific issues may be interesting for people from other countries too; somebody from a non-Western country who knows the USA even superficially may expect things to be the same in Germany. And for me, I suppose I will learn quite some about the USA from what is different in an EU country (although that's of course a side point). –LPfi (talk) 11:48, 18 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Ok, I'll start a draft in my userspace some time within the next 3 weeks or so, probably sooner. I would start by mentioning something about the fact that there are different types of work visas, my experience of the process of applying for one type of visa from my home country, what I've heard about how much harder it is for nationals of developing countries to get such visas, the things you need to do when you are in Germany with your work visa in order to be able to work, bill for your services and earn money, and some side points about similarities and differences between life in the U.S. and Germany such as more strongly enforced and relatively more uniform quiet hours, especially as relates to quiet days - Sunday and holidays - over-the-counter medications being more expensive and available in much smaller quantities per box and dry cleaning being more expensive and slower but produce being high-quality and often cheaper. OK, that was a run-on sentence that should have semicolons, but I'm not going to edit it on my phone. :-) Ikan Kekek (talk) 12:16, 18 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

What are the criteria for choosing one or the other? I'd consider listings the default & would certainly use them whenever creating a list, & markers only when mentioning a place in running text.

I cannot think of a case where I'd want to have:

• {{marker | name= ...

However, others obviously feel differently. For example Himalayas#Destinations has multiple lists done with markers. Pashley (talk) 10:29, 18 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

I tend to use markers to list cities and other destinations, as well as adding coordinates for places mentioned in running texts. Otherwise, I use listings. However, I do think we should use listings for cities and other destinations as well, and reserve markers for places mentioned in running texts. Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs) 11:04, 18 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

@Ground Zero: I see you converting listings to markers in Western Sahara. Why? Pashley (talk) 12:45, 31 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Regarding these edits, it is our standard formatting to use markers for cities and other destinations in region articles, and to use listing templates for See, Do, etc. listings. Why would this article be different? A city doesn't need address, phone, price, hours information, unlike a museum or restaurant. Ground Zero (talk) 12:55, 31 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Thank you. That does make sense. Pashley (talk) 13:17, 31 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

I went looking for a policy on this, and I couldn't find one. This is just one of those unwritten conventions. that trip people up. I think it would be a good idea to formalize this. Thoughts? Ground Zero (talk) 20:05, 31 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Hello, this message is to notify that Faster than Thunder has been nominated for a global ban at m:Requests for comment/Global ban for Faster than Thunder. You are receiving this notification as required per the global ban policy as they have made at least 1 edit on this wiki. Thanks, //shb (t | c | m) 01:49, 22 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

@Asamboi: Also not sure if anyone has alerted you on FtT's latest misdeeds with off-wiki harassment, but some of it does involve you (happy to send evidence by email if you want) //shb (t | c | m) 04:43, 22 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Thanks for the heads-up. I was blissfully unaware, but I would appreciate it if you could email me the details. Asamboi (talk) 06:38, 22 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

I've recently had occasion to look at some intercontinental air fares & am seeing some painfully large numbers.

Is this due to the war in the Middle East causing rising fuel prices? Is it something we should write about? Where? Pashley (talk) 05:02, 24 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

I've been noticing this too (planning to fly out in August doing some early preparations). I'd very much put it on the Middle East war and fuel shortages caused by it. Maybe a box on flying? //shb (t | c | m) 05:45, 24 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Airfares go up and down, but this doesn't belong in a warning box. Ground Zero (talk) 11:58, 24 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Perhaps a caution box? It certainly seems worth mentioning since it affects many travellers, though discussing blame would be out of scope. Pashley (talk) 12:16, 24 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Correct, though of course we know who to blame... Ikan Kekek (talk) 13:03, 24 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Indeed... (not that it should be conveyed into mainspace, but you know what I mean). //shb (t | c | m) 01:45, 25 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

I added a caution box at Planning your flight. Pashley (talk) 06:31, 26 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Using some AI/vibecoding, I tried to redesign travel topics into something a bit more modern and minimalist (and something a bit based on abstractwiki's Main Page), with a bit of a hoverover effect. No templates were changed, but the boxes are now based on {{topicbox2}} instead of {{topicbox}} (since I didn't want to unilaterally change the look of the template).

The result is at User:SHB2000/travel topics; if there are no objections, I'll adjust the travel topics page accordingly. Works on both Vector 2010 and 2022. //shb (t | c | m) 01:44, 25 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Done, given the lack of objections. //shb (t | c | m) 23:57, 26 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Hey everyone!  

We at Wikimedia Small Projects are excited to suggest bringing the Wikivoyage communities together once more for a event—you know, just in time for the 2026 World Cup! We’re calling it the "Wikivoyage World Cup 2026," and we’d love for you to be part of it.

Here are some of our hopes for the event:  

• To bring all our active Wikivoyage communities together—especially those speaking Spanish, English (yes, I know this is the right community), and French, since they’re connected to the host countries.  

• To team up with local chapters like Wikimedia Mexico, Wikimedia Canada, and the affiliates in the United States.  

• To improve existing articles and create new ones about Canada, Mexico, and the United States.  

• To have a centralnotice to keep everyone in the loop.

We’re thinking of holding the event from June 11 to August 20, so it’s a good idea to start getting things ready now. I know this has come up before, and I’d really love for you to join us in coordinating the event and reaching out to affiliates and/or volunteers who might be interested.

Regards, Lord Ravager (talk) 03:03, 25 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Like last time, I'm happy to judge/evaluate the articles submitted as part of this contest once again. //shb (t | c | m) 05:36, 25 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

I support this initiative. I would say that it should be open to all Wikivoyage languages since many dominant national football teams don't use English, French or Spanish (looking at you, Portugal, Brazil and Germany). OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 15:58, 15 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

@Lord Ravager Can you let us know when this is set up? OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 15:54, 19 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

I don't exactly think it's controversial to say that the blue box on the Main Page has served its due time. For one, having a blue background reeks of very late-2000s/early 2010s era interface, which gives this site a very dated look, and very much not in line with broader more modern website trends which have been heading towards a more minimalist design. As seen in my screenshot on the left (from Safari on an iPhone, iOS 26.4), the indenting on the blue boxes on Vector 2022 (which is what all logged out users will see) tips over to the left ever so slightly, which is a really bad look for the Main Page.

I've tried to redesign the look based on w:abstract:'s design. On mobile, it eliminates the issue of the indents, and looks a lot more cleaner in my opinion based on a demo I've made at User:SHB2000/revamped main. Works well on both vector 2010 and vector 2022, optimised for both light and dark mode (using the help of Gemini). If there are no objections, I'll go ahead and change the design of the page.

//shb (t | c | m) 06:34, 26 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

That looks good. I have looked at it both logged in and logged out on a desktop. I don't think blue text on a pale blue background is a good idea, except for making the text less prominent (equivalent of fine print). AlasdairW (talk) 10:50, 26 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Support text on coloured background is more difficult to read for those with visual impairments. We should strive for accessibility.

Ground Zero (talk) 11:06, 26 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Support — It really looks good compared to the existing text on coloured background. Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs) 13:00, 26 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Support: looks great! Bluecoordinationfine (talk) 15:27, 26 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Support: Thank you for improving this! Should the WV:PF link in the "Get involved" heading be preserved? Gerode (talk) 16:01, 26 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Good catch – done. //shb (t | c | m) 00:36, 27 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Support always nice to see new design elements, can't wait to see how it looks on desktop. --Ypsilon (talk) 17:56, 26 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Support - I already insisted on getting an upgrade to Main Page elements when I picked up mending Vector 2022, but never got to {{Bottomboxes}}. I'm glad you've picked this up! I do think a little touch of colour is lacking though. I wonder, would it work if the border for Discover were Wikivoyage blue  #006699  and Get Involved were Wikivoyage green  #339966 ? ― Wauteurz (talk) 20:59, 26 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

@Wauteurz, Ypsilon: Special:PermaLink/5238380 would be how it'll look with the Wikivoyage colours. On one hand, I do like that it reflects the Wikivoyage theme, but on the other hand I'm conflicted because the box colours feel a tiny bit distracting (especially on dark mode). //shb (t | c | m) 22:41, 26 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Actually, ignore the permalink above, here's a screenshot of how it looks for me. //shb (t | c | m) 22:45, 26 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Support. I would want to take a closer look at the newly proposed code but am very much in favor of removing the blue background! I don't think it is accessible in current form? Jdlrobson (talk) 19:25, 27 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Support for a change. ~2026-69216-3 (talk) 08:50, 28 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Given the overwhelming clear consensus to implement this, Done. Part 2 of the revamps (to the sister project section) can be expected sometime in April. //shb (t | c | m) 02:03, 29 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Looks good! I didn't hate the blue box, but this looks much better. I'd support part 2 also. --Comment by Selfie City (talk) (contributions) 02:47, 5 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

Why is social media not a reliable source in general, and to begin with? What happens if you use them in articles? ~2026-18962-24 (talk) 17:19, 26 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Use them how? Give an example of what you're thinking of. Ikan Kekek (talk) 18:02, 26 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

@~2026-18962-24 @Ikan Kekek Is reliable source even a term on this project? Purplebackpack89 21:05, 26 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

it isn't lol. //shb (t | c | m) 23:55, 26 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

We do link to social media pages (like Facebook) when a small business (cafe etc) uses that as its only online presence. Such a page that appears to be created by the business, is only a little less reliable than a regular webpage for the business. The important thing is to check that the information makes sense, and that there is other evidence of the business existing.

AlasdairW (talk) 00:06, 27 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Oh for sure – but usually only FB (I think there was consensus against Instagram links sometime back). But "reliable source" isn't a term we use here. //shb (t | c | m) 00:11, 27 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Hi Lately I've been seeing more and more restaurants and other places that offer Whatsapp as a contact system, in addition to mail or telephone.

Finally today I found a Climbing guide which only offers Whatsapp or Telegram as contact for customers. Not address or Telephone. Additionally they offer email or web. ( and looks like a real business !)

Is there any policy about messaging applications to be included in the listings?? Any chance to add a new field (or fields) in the listings to include Messaging??

I'm afraid times are changing. I never filled the FAX or Tollfree fields. Also many times I find 2 telephone numbers, the fixed line and the mobile, and I always doubt which one include in the listing. Also many times the business says you can use the mobile for messaging. Mmorell (talk) 17:58, 27 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Honestly, yep... whatsapp/signal/instagram/... would be much more important these days for most businesses than fax/phone, at least outside Germany :) I seriously doubt more than 1% of our visitors book hotels by phone... Perhaps we can improve the templates a bit there... -- andree 18:42, 27 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

I saw a travel magazine recently that recommended contacting hotels by phone before booking (e.g., to make sure the hotel existed). WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:22, 27 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

This makes sense to me. I've also had this no-phone-number situation with Line and WeChat in some regions. Gerode (talk) 20:22, 27 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Whatsapp, Telegram, Facebook and Instagram are proprietary platforms, in contrast to universal communication protocols such as e-mail, the World Wide Web, and telefax. Wikimedia projects have been wary of endorsing proprietary platforms; but they can be considered for individual services which offer no other contact information. /Yvwv (talk) 14:08, 28 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

I agree with the fact that are private services. But reality is that in Spain whatsapp is almost universal. Event government has whatsapp lines for servicing people. And a policy explaining when and how to use those comunication systems may be useful for colaborators. On the example I mentioned at the begining I write the whatsapp contact in the content section of the listing, but I don't know if it's right or not. If there is no guidance every one will use his own way and thats not good for standarizing data. Mmorell (talk) 07:16, 30 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Hello! There will be a Wikimedia Café meetup on Saturday, 11 April 2026 at 14:00 UTC (timestamp conversion tool), focusing on the the 2026-2027 Wikimedia Foundation Annual Plan. The featured guests will be Kelsi Stine-Rowe (senior manager, Movement Communications, Wikimedia Foundation), and Sam Walton (senior product manager, Moderator Tools, Wikimedia Foundation). In addition to this Café session, several additional meetings regarding the Annual Plan are listed on the Collaboration page, and you may participate on the talk page. This Café meetup will be approximately two hours long. Attendees may choose to attend only for a part. Please see the Café page for more information, including how to register.

↠Pine (✉) 05:37, 29 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

If you're thinking about attending: That's 10:00AM Saturday in New York, 7:00AM Saturday in California, 10:00PM Saturday in Perth, and 2:00AM Sunday in Auckland. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:17, 29 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/02/16/arts/louvre-museum-ticket-scam-arrests.html —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 07:47, 29 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

https://www.travelandleisure.com/2026-road-trip-of-the-year-usa-rvshare-11893389 —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 08:24, 29 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

A user named Darrrrmilk keeps removing the "Places of worship" section of Bangalore/West Central. Initially they say that they "disagree with making a section for places of warship [sic]" without providing a reason. So, I reverted the removal. However, they removed it again, saying, "But these aren't necessarily "places to visit" it is religion-exclusive". The relevant policy WV:POW says,

Some cities and rural areas have so many places of worship, such as churches, synagogues, mosques and temples, that it is impractical to list them all. Reasons to list a religious site could be that it

• has guided tours
• gives service in a foreign or minority language
• has historical or architectural importance
• is the city's only, largest or oldest place of worship for a religion or
• any other distinction which makes it interesting for a visitor, other than religious services that are typical of the area.

There is of course more leeway in articles with fewer listings in general, or where a certain type of place of worship has "rarity value", but don't give a 'See' listing to the fiftieth church in a quiet bedroom suburb when it looks as cookie-cutter as the one next door. [...] On the other hand, houses of worship that travellers may find useful in a religious or spiritual sense can be listed in the 'Cope' section of a city article. This would be especially useful if there's one main mosque in the city in question, or if there is only one church representing a certain Christian denomination in the area. The listing should make clear that it is a place of worship, not of tourism. And remember, if you're a member of the clergy or congregation of a church you're adding a listing for, the rules of Don't tout still apply.

I have preserved the removed section at User:Sbb1413/BLR, and started this discussion to avoid edit warring on this. Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs) 18:08, 29 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Of course, I value the local knowledge of the user, as I'm a mere outsider who has never visited Bengaluru (the name I prefer off-wiki) but want to live there. However, I find many of the well-known places of worship in BLR to be useful for secular travellers, including the ones deleted by the user. Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs) 18:12, 29 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

I happen to like walking around old church buildings and graveyards, so of course I think religious-related sites are valid tourist sites.

The first listing that was removed is a historical church and the description says it "attracts people of all faiths", so these are not exclusive to a single religion. However, I think that sites that are exclusive to a single religion should be acceptable (though probably in the ==Cope== section). For example, if you're an Arabic speaker traveling in the US, even if you are personally 100% secular atheist in terms of religious orientation, the local mosque is your best bet at finding another Arabic speaker should you ever need one. They can also be good sources of information for any religion-specific needs, like finding a halal or kosher restaurant. WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:16, 29 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Any house of worship that meets the criteria listed above can and should be listed Purplebackpack89 21:07, 29 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Because I got pinged here is my answer:

While some of the attractions listed such as the Hudson Memorial Church say that it attracts people of all faith but the vast majority of the temples do not, they do seem more of a place to actually "worship" or "pray" than just a historical attraction to visit. I may be wrong so if I am please feel free to correct me. Darrrrmilk (talk) 21:13, 29 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Put the section back. Some of these are worthwhile for the architecture or history, hence of interest to at least some visitors.

This site is not just for tourists, though, so it is also worth listing places where visitors might want to attend services -- a Christian church with services in a European language, a mosque with Urdu, etc. In these cases, the language should be mentioned. Pashley (talk) 22:09, 29 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Agree with Pashley here. //shb (t | c | m) 22:45, 29 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

I know that this wiki is not just for tourists, I am just saying that a section for "worships" should not belong in a guide especially under the "see" section because like I already mentioned, it is more "religion-exclusive" Darrrrmilk (talk) 02:46, 30 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

If it's listed under ==See==, that means that someone thought these were appropriate attractions for non-religious reasons (e.g., architecture or history or art).

Separately, a travel guide should also include information about actual religious content for religious travelers. Religious travelers should be treated the same as other groups of travelers who have predictable needs or interests. We should have content for families, for LGBTQ travelers, for low-income travelers, for disabled travelers, for short-term travelers, for long-term travelers, for holidaymakers, for emergency travelers – and on exactly the same basis, for religious travelers. It doesn't matter if religion is the purpose of the trip (e.g., Hajj, Camino de Santiago, Rome), if it is particularly important to the person (e.g., someone who attends religious services every day and prefers to keep doing that while out of town), or if it is a place to connect with others (e.g., a long-term traveler trying to find other people from their home culture). We should have some content for everyone. I assume that most people don't attend religious services while traveling, but we shouldn't discriminate against the minority that does. WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:35, 30 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

How is removing it discriminating them exactly? Darrrrmilk (talk) 22:18, 30 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

By removing advice relevant to them. However, the listings in the section are only six, which doesn't seem excessive, and the descriptions seem to be written from the perspective of tourists, not worshippers. I don't see the section as problematic. –LPfi (talk) 09:31, 31 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Yes, I wrote the description from the perspective of tourists, as I expect a tourist in BLR would visit them, just like I visited the churches and temples in Chennai and Visakhapatnam as a tourist. Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs) 09:47, 31 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

I'm not a Hindu, Muslim or Sikh, but visiting Hindu temples, mosques and the Golden Temple on his trip to India with his parents were wonderful, mind-opening experiences for 12-year-old Ikan Kekek. We absolutely should be promoting great places of worship in India and every other country! Ikan Kekek (talk) 05:43, 5 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

Please see Wikivoyage talk:Administrators#Inactive_administrators as of 2026-03, thanks. Codename Noreste (talk) 02:45, 30 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Despite being an active Wikivoyager for several years, I wonder whether the seven continents (and also Other destinations) could be simply breadcrumbed further into Destinations, thus rendering the latter a top-level article à la Itineraries, Phrasebooks and Travel topics. This could fix problems with the country-level articles that can't perfectly belong to any continent, like Saint Helena, Ascension and Tristan da Cunha and maybe the British Indian Ocean Territory (although it would get breadcrumbed into Mauritius eventually as things stand). Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs) 07:50, 30 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

On a side note, this could render Other destinations redundant, as it currently acts as a "wastebucket" for extra regions that don't neatly fall into any of the seven continents. Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs) 07:54, 30 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

That would probably be a good thing because this page makes no sense to me. WikiSeto (talk) 11:28, 31 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

I don't like the idea. It makes most breadcrumb trails longer without any real benefit I can see. Pashley (talk) 10:32, 30 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

I was thinking that Destinations > Asia > ... > Chennai could enable some people to move back to the Destinations article instead of searching for "Destinations" explicitly. Yes, searching is common, but there's a reason for breadcrumbs to exist. Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs) 03:48, 31 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

I agree with Pashley. Ikan Kekek (talk) 06:03, 31 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

I thought the Destinations article would aid travellers to navigate various destinations, and adding it to the beginning of the breadcrumbs could help them even more. Like they could revert to Destinations if they have gone way down the hierarchy, like Asia > South Asia > India > Southern India > Karnataka > Cauvery Basin > Mysore (district) > Mysore. Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs) 06:24, 31 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

The neatly-categorize-everything side of my brain likes this proposal, but I agree that an overloaded breadcrumb is a bad user experience, and it's not clear to me how a perfectly clean hierarchy serves users of the site. Is there a way to suppress "Destinations" in breadcrumbs with more than a couple items, and is that worth the trouble?

The Destinations page looks largely redundant with the Main page. I'm not sure if I prefer making it a robust landing page or a more auxiliary corner for the (increasingly glitchy) article map. I'm hesitant to direct more traffic to it (versus the Main page) in its current state (though I think that is fixable with the same kind of attention SHB2000 is giving to other landing pages). Gerode (talk) 16:47, 31 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

@WikiSeto, Pashley, Ikan Kekek, Gerode: While the seven continents may or may not get breadcrumbed into Destinations, they can be categorized to Category:Destinations without any breadcrumb trail (i.e. with [[Category:Destinations]] instead of {{isPartOf|Destinations}}), which makes the category tree neat without compromising the breadcrumb trail. Also, the Other destinations article is redundant to Destinations as the "other destiations" can be listed with the main ones like in User:Sbb1413/Destinations. Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs) 07:34, 6 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

I'm not yet sure on the Category:Destinations plan. It "feels" neat, but it's still not clear to me what problem is solves or what functionality it adds.

I support your plan to merge Other Destinations, I don't see how that page is useful for anything other than bookkeeping. In User:Gerode/Destinations, I took your mockup and added more grouping to keep the continents first and foremost, and reduced to two columns to be better on mobile. Gerode (talk) 16:09, 6 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

I'm warming up to Category:Destinations, as a way to get rid of the Other Destinations page: if there's no Other Destinations page then its subpages' breadcrumbs need to point somewhere else, and the Destinations page is a much better target. Gerode (talk) 16:35, 6 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

Hi everyone, I've nominated Sbb1413 for adminship – please weigh in at Wikivoyage:User rights nominations#Sbb1413 (sysop). Thanks, //shb (t | c | m) 08:32, 30 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

As per the latest announcement on the Board of Trustees noticeboard, Wikinews will be set to read-only from May 4, 2026. Given that it's unlikely there will be any new news articles from now, I've removed the link accordingly on Template:WikivoyageSister. //shb (t | c | m) 00:37, 31 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Thanks. I've done the same where I can and made relevant phab: tasks. I still have the vain hope that we can come back some day: if Wikivoyage can be adopted, Wikinews could be re-adopted. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 06:22, 31 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

There are several proposals to fork it to a new site; at least two groups appear to have plausible proposals, and everyone wants to get the rights to the trademarks (which the WMF has previously refused, but at some level, everything's negotiable). WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:47, 31 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

I don't think we should link non-Wikimedia projects on {{WikivoyageSister}}, though. //shb (t | c | m) 04:15, 1 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

I agree. WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:20, 1 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

I'm shocked to see this. Why can't we let enough users, to contribute to Wikinews, despite being in a normal state? In my own opinion, Wikinews should be kept active and editable. This project was launched in November 8, 2004, crazy that it lasted for about 22 years! Are there any WMF projects closed down also in the past, besides Wikinews anyway? Further beyond, I believe that a lot of users, are active on Wikipedia, Wiktionary, and here in Wikivoyage, rather than the Wikinews as of 2026. To have a feeling, I'm definitely going to miss this project, after it got set permanently to read-only mode. Unfortunately, there are not going to have as many articles or stories reviewed, since I heard from the WMF that this site only had about 2-3 reviewers a month. ~2026-69216-3 (talk) 03:44, 2 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

The only other one is m:Sep11Wiki. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 04:52, 2 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

More than 100 wikis have been shut down/made read-only over the years. However, AFAIK this is the first time that an entire multilingual content project has been shut down. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:05, 2 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

It is. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 01:32, 3 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

@WhatamIdoing Exactly, the first one for entire multilingual content project to shut down. But do you know another the reason on why did Wikinews shut down? We all read this announcement from the the Board of Trustees noticeboard, and I seen these responses that they consider migrating to Miraheze. Although there were some feedback, I believe that there should be more users contributing to Wikinews, since there are not much them active on this project. ~2026-69216-3 (talk) 21:48, 3 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

This is the reason that Wikinews shut down: The Wikinews project was a failure.

Success would have looked like:

• Many writers
• Many new articles
• Prompt reviews
• Many readers

What they had was:

• Few writers
• Few new articles
• Slow and unfinished reviews
• Few readers

These are wonderful people. They worked very hard. But unfortunately, it did not succeed. Not everything we try is successful. WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:13, 3 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

@Koavf @WhatamIdoing Thank you. Having few writers, news articles, and readers, is very shocking to me, since how much news stories and articles, can be accessible throughout the Internet under Google Search Engine, such as CNN, BBC, NBC News, The New York Times, Daily Mail, Voyage, Vox, Wired, NPR, SFGate, ESPN, USA Today, Wall Street Journal, New York Post, Huffpost, Daily News, and Forbes, which are read by millions of people. I don't understand the lower view count for Wikinews articles, despite being a free project since 2004. I guess that this project was a failure, and need to migrate to Miraheze. ~2026-69216-3 (talk) 03:07, 5 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

Hi all.

The sister project Wikinews was scheduled to close in May. For context, each new page on that wiki is a news report and a few days after the event, unlike Wikipedia, it gets read-only and no longer editable. There were user engagement issues because it was hard to get new pages approved when there are only 2 or 3 reviewers active and news is not approved if it is over a week old , and also users lack awareness who else is from their own continent, do not make meaningful connections.

Main complaint from WMF is "Wikipedia does such a great job at news writing anyway" though I personally do not agree with it, their page format is not a news report as it stays editable forever and one page actually is an encyclopedic history page and not about one event. plus Wikinews allows photo essays about super local events which Wikipedia does not. I think they are all valuable additions to meet the content freedom and knowledge freedom mission of the Wikimedia movement.

Link: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Foundation_Board_noticeboard#Board_of_Trustees_Approves_Closure_of_Wikinews

And I am wondering if it would be suitable to make a News: namespace here and, unlike what Wikinews did, try to aggressively make visual maps of where the events are, as well as where the users are from (they add a point on a map and there is a map of all events, and another map with all users). Now with the Kartographer feature this may be visually appealing and doable from programming point of view.

Maybe that helps users to connect better and also then Wikinews does not have to move to external site like miraheze. For wikivoyage this could mean a bit more traffic and maybe more users expanding the pages about travel destinations.

Main software difference is usage of FlaggedRevs in that namespace and the volunteer peer reviewers would need to apply for access to be allowed to approve or decline page revisions.

this was not yet discussed within Wikinews itself and I am just wondering what you think.

Hoping this is helpful and you can support or give some ideas.

Many thanks. Gryllida (talk) 09:17, 31 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

I'm not sure WV is the best place for generic news. Sure, most of the time news is about some place on the Earth, but likely there aren't enough people here (interested) to do any significant reviews? Thus probably quite a bit of politics stuff (which we seem to actively avoid around here) would flow in...

Maybe if we agreed that it's only news about local events (festivals, happenings, temporary exhibitions) and not "random events" (protests, wars, natural disasters...)? -- andree 09:46, 31 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

That might makes sense if local events like festivals, happenings and temporary exhibitions are covered here, and we already cover international ones like Olympic Games, FIFA World Cup, World's Fair, etc. Protests, wars and disasters may be covered, but they should be restricted to official advisories, which directly affect travel. Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs) 09:55, 31 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

I agree that posting news here is a big stretch, but for what it's worth, about a half-dozen Wikipedias host their own local version of Wikinews. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 11:13, 31 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Last I heard, the WMF will not install FlaggedRevisions on any more wikis, so if that's a requirement, then this idea is doomed. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:46, 31 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

@Gryllida Goodbye, Wikinews! We will miss you. ~2026-69216-3 (talk) 03:45, 2 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

https://www.architecturaldigest.com/gallery/the-most-beautiful-places-in-the-world —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 02:29, 31 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Interesting list, thanks. It's a little funny that they call the aurora borealis an "astrological light show", though. Ikan Kekek (talk) 06:02, 31 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Read this article, looks fascinating to me. ~2026-69216-3 (talk) 05:18, 4 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

I'm seeing a weird type of vandalism on the pagebanner for Yucatec Maya phrasebook. The page displays with a red "For Sale" band on the right side, yet I don't see anything in the page source that would do that and I don't see that band in the jpg file that's on commons, so I'm scratching my head wondering how the heck somebody did that (and how can I fix it)? Any of y'all seen something like this before? Mrkstvns (talk) 20:48, 31 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

This is deliberate by User:Andree.sk as a humor article. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 21:43, 31 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Okay, thanks! I guess I wasn't thinking about March Fools Day pranks. Cheers, Mrkstvns (talk) 22:46, 31 March 2026 (UTC)Reply

Too bad there's only one WV for the whole world! -- andree 04:31, 1 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

It links to World Sale. WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:21, 1 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

I have to say I think this might be my favorite Apr 1 prank we've done so far. It's different, unconventional and nothing like what we've seen on this site (and we did get a few global/enwiki users join in on the World Sale too). //shb (t | c | m) 22:12, 2 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

Yep, that is clearly April fools by the way. ~2026-69216-3 (talk) 01:25, 3 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

Hello everyone,

This is a notice regarding an ongoing data migration on Wikidata that may affect your election-related templates and Lua modules (such as Module:Itemgroup/list).

The Change:
Currently, many templates pull electoral maps from Wikidata using the property P1846, combined with the qualifier P180: Q19571328.

We are migrating this data (across roughly 4,000 items) to a newly created, dedicated property: P14226.

What You Need To Do:
To ensure your templates and infoboxes do not break or lose their maps, please update your local code to fetch data from P14226 instead of the old P1846 + P180 structure. A list of pages was generated using Wikimedia Global Search.

Deadline:
We are temporarily retaining the old data on P1846 to allow for a smooth transition. However, to complete the data cleanup on Wikidata, the old P1846 statements will be removed after May 1, 2026. Please update your modules and templates before this date to prevent any disruption to your wiki's election articles.

Let us know if you have any questions or need assistance with the query logic. Thank you for your help! ZI Jony using MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 17:11, 3 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

@Andyrom75: Are you able to help us out with this? Not entirely sure what needs to be done here. //shb (t | c | m) 22:49, 3 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

@SHB2000, there were two pages affected by the above problem.

One was a sandbox that I've just deleted.

The other one is Template:RegionTasks but the only thing I've fixed was a redirect in Template:Catscancall to speed up the output.

@ZI Jony, I suppose that in Template:RegionTasks, there is one or more link to a query that should use P14226. Since I'm not familiar with this template nor with PetScan, can you tell me which is/are the one(s) to patch?

Thanks, Andyrom75 (talk) 07:24, 4 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

I just created Cavinti, but after several edits my routebox still won't show up even after I copy templates from other articles. Borgenland (talk) 06:19, 4 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

@Borgenland, fixed. Andyrom75 (talk) 07:26, 4 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

Hi all, at Listing Browser you can find an experimental tool that we could put somewhere. It's something like the 'nearby articles' that we already have, but this one also does fuzzy search (the string doesn't have to exactly match) and shows listings (plus articles) on the map. Right now it all works 'locally' within the browser, and the listing data is ~1 month old and needs manual update. If we'd agree to have this, maybe we can move it to wiki toolforge (same as poimap2), to have it somehow automatically working, but I have 0 experience with that ATM. I use it for mainly two things in the past months:

• If I want to put an listing somewhere, but need to first find the related article (e.g. "eiffel", "Trevi, Roma" or "Most, Prague")
• To populate quickly the Trip Planner. You can drag'n'drop the POIs from the Listing Browser search results to it...

Comments welcome... If it's unwanted, I'll just keep it to myself locally, no problem :) -- andree 06:56, 5 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

@Andree.sk: having just tested this out (with a few POIs from Vienna and Uluru), this is amazing – this is the kind of thing that I think even logged out users can benefit from (as in, have a bot periodically update the listings, have the tool in some kind of projectspace page, and link it on the main page). //shb (t | c | m) 07:07, 5 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

Wow! This should be featured prominently! Gerode (talk) 15:41, 5 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

Yup, that has the ability to be useful, when searching for destinations, or places to visit for travel. ~2026-69216-3 (talk) 21:44, 5 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

I'm trying to remove the group= from markers on the Appalachian Trail article, and instead add coordinates to the mapframes so they show up. I'm not blanking the page, but I am removing a lot of "text". Is this a universal rule? Blamegroovy (talk) 21:32, 6 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

I would urge caution in removing the "group=" parameter from the markers in Appalachian Trail. The marker numbering doesn't work when there are more than 99 of the same marker, so the groups may have been added to address this. I suggest that you outline the changes that you want to make on Talk:Appalachian Trail, perhaps with a small example, so that editors familiar with that article can comment. Then after a few days, make the changes in small steps, so that you don't trigger the filter which detects a large amount of text being removed. AlasdairW (talk) 22:09, 6 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

It's close, but there don't seem to be 99 of the same marker. They're linked to the map frame with group=, but that seems to have broken at some point. I can apply the changes stepwise? It's always possible to revert them afterwards! Blamegroovy (talk) 22:23, 6 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

I'd like to try to do that. If I have to create redirects, which is better?

1. Redirecting to the county seat if it has an article (esp. one that covers its environs), or
2. Redirecting to a regional article that covers multiple counties.

Purplebackpack89 01:22, 7 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

That depends on where the relevant content is, if anywhere. I think there are some counties that probably aren't worth mentioning, but there's no harm in creating such redirects, providing that the relevant counties are and should be mentioned in the target articles. It's an absolutely huge job, so are you sure it's the best use of your time? Ikan Kekek (talk) 01:54, 7 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

perhaps it's something I'll do a little bit over time Purplebackpack89 02:37, 7 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

In some parts of the US, counties are important for travelers. When I was working on Iowa#Regions a few years ago, I decided to list the names of the counties in each region. This IMO has two benefits:

• I could figure out which region to stick things in
• The traveler can figure out which part of the state the severe weather warning was talking about (because for the most part, the radio reports give the names of the counties, not the names of the individual towns).

I sometimes wonder if the rural parts of that state would be better of treating each county as the bottom-level destination, rather than the towns. Southwest Iowa, for example, is Council Bluffs and "everything else". We don't have an article for any town in Adams County, but if we wanted to write about that rural area, it would probably make more sense to write about the whole county in one go than to have separate pages for little places like Carbon, Iowa (population: 36) or even Corning (Iowa) (population: 1500).

If we didn't want to treat a county as a rural district, then I think redirecting the county names to the regions (Adams County (Iowa) → Southwest Iowa) would be a good idea. I think that would be appropriate for all of the "flyover states". I'm not certain that it would work as well on the East Coast; someone else will have more information about that. WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:51, 7 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

I think standard way to do this is indeed using the small city template? Probably 'get around' section may not make sense. I did it like that e.g. for Greater Košice. Indeed region article listing 10 tiny cities with 1 listing each (if even) is not too traveller friendly IMO. -- andree 07:57, 7 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

The rural area article template was created (a few years ago?) for cases where the article isn't primarily about a town. It should suite regions (counties or non-administrative regions) where there are multiple towns, each one not article-worthy on its own, or where the interesting things are outside of towns. Redirects for county names should do no harm, but are probably redundant in the cases where the county is named after the main city. –LPfi (talk) 11:38, 7 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

There are "cow counties" in Texas with populations in the hundreds that cover large areas. How useful would it be to redirect them anywhere? Ikan Kekek (talk) 17:14, 8 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

You could redirect Loving County (Texas) to one of the Big Bend Country regions (I can't easily tell from the page which one it falls into). I think it would be harmless, but I don't know if it would be particularly important to anyone. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:44, 8 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ Big Bend Country is divided into Permian Basin and Trans-Pecos subregions (3 articles and 13 articles, respectively). Now it is being divided into counties. What will happen to the existing subregion articles? Is this a parallel regionalization? Is there any need for separate county articles?

Wikivoyage:Region article template says: "Before you plunge forward creating a region, keep in mind that we only add a new level of regions when there are too many cities or too much content in the existing breakdown. The regional hierarchy at Wikivoyage doesn't always follow the official breakdown—and frequently is much "flatter" than the official breakdown." Ground Zero (talk) 11:09, 9 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

Yes. There is a difference between creating articles and creating redirects. I don't see a big problem in redirecting a cow county into the region covering it. Somebody going there as a veterinarian probably has better sources than us, but somebody going to an oil job in Loving (it seems cows aren't the only industry), might have some use of Midland, which Permian Basin (the redirect target) tells is where to fly. "Loving" doesn't seem to collide with any important destination, so the redirect does no harm. There could be a list of counties in the region article if there aren't too many of them, to ensure readers that the article indeed is a valid redirect target, but I wouldn't give 64-people counties bullets unless they are article-worthy – an agritourism listing doesn't need an Other destination bullet for the county or itself unless it is truly extraordinary. –LPfi (talk) 14:05, 9 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

My position is that if counties aren't mentioned in the target article, a redirect from them is probably unjustified, and that some counties don't merit a mention. Ikan Kekek (talk) 14:32, 9 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

@Ikan Kekek What if a county itself isn't mentioned, but a city or other destination within the county IS? Purplebackpack89 16:01, 9 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

That doesn't change anything for me. Ikan Kekek (talk) 17:41, 9 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

While there is a discussion about this underway, I don't understand why Purplebackpack is still creating county articles with almost no information in them. Big Bend Country is already split into two regions, neither of which is too large. Why is it being split into five county articles in parallel to the existing regional breakdown? There isn't a need for it. It violates the policy set out in Wikivoyage:Region article template. Ground Zero (talk) 02:14, 10 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

I would not create a separate article for Loving County. But I would mention it somewhere, because tornado warnings are routinely announced by county, and not by each little town separately. WhatamIdoing (talk) 03:38, 10 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

This sums up mostly my thoughts. The county breakdowns may not fit exactly within Wikivoyage's region articles, but mentioning them, alongside with important county information (particularly for emergencies, like tornadoes as you mention), is definitely worthy of inclusion. (and also why I'm not opposed to such redirects) //shb (t | c | m) 03:45, 10 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

If somebody can be expected to visit the county and the area is handled in a region article, then it is good to let the traveller find that region article. They may not know to which of our lower-level regions their destination belongs. While we don't want a long bullet list of 64-people counties, an easy-to-skip paragraph at the end of the region's Regions, Cities, Other destinations or Get around section shouldn't make too much harm, unless it gets very long (and don't burry other information there). Then the county is mentioned and can have the appropriate redirect. This, of course, is for places that the traveller could expect to find by a search (such as tornado warning localities). Such a list is also helpful when trying to find the right article for a POI in a place we don't really cover. –LPfi (talk) 10:00, 10 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

@Ground Zero: The only article articles (i.e. not redirects) I created were Brewster County (Texas) and Presidio County (Texas), both of which have multiple destinations. Purplebackpack89 21:05, 10 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

@User: Purplebackpack89 these destinations are already listed in the existing subregions of Big Bend Country. Why are we creating a parallel subdivision of that region? Subdivision of a region should be discussed on the region's talk page first. I have proposed to redirect these two subregions to the existing subregion. Please join the discussion at Talk:Presidio County (Texas). Ground Zero (talk) 21:36, 10 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

I see now that the other county articles you created were redirects to articles that don't mention the counties. I was wrong in writing that were were "still creating county articles with almost no information in them", and I apologize to you for my mistake. Ground Zero (talk) 21:43, 10 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

• Another thing that is worth noting: regions are ambiguous; people disagree on the name and boundaries of them. Counties are not: every acre of land in the lower 48 is in exactly one of them. Purplebackpack89 21:46, 10 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

  If the regions are ambiguous, we should edit the pages to make them clear. I believe that most sub-state regions (for US) on Wikivoyage are based on county/parish borders anyway. (Louisiana doesn't have "counties"; they have "parishes", which are approximately the same thing but out of the Napoleonic legal tradition.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:14, 11 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

I have added in the definition of Trans-Pecos that has been in use since 1887 from the corresponding Wikipedia article. Ground Zero (talk) 00:50, 11 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

@WhatamIdoing If you're "editing to make them clearer", what you really may be doing is "picking a winner" of how regions are defined. Some counties are in a region by one source and out of it by another. Sources may place the same county in two different regions. Etc. etc. Purplebackpack89 01:04, 11 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

I am editing the subregion articles that have existed since 2008 to make them clearer. There is no consensus yet to change the subregions. Changing regions or subregions is done through discussion. I have changed many regions, including Normandy, Brittany, Cornwall, Bourgogne-Franche-Comté, Grand Est, and Devon, and you can read the discussions that I initiated before changing them on each of their talk pages. Ground Zero (talk) 01:15, 11 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

Purplebackpack, I don't know if you've had time to read the rules, but "the regional hierarchy at Wikivoyage doesn't always follow the official breakdown". What matters on Wikivoyage is where we – not external "sources" – have agreed to draw the line. The reader wins if they find all the information about a rural(ish) county in exactly one (1) place. The reader loses if we scatter the information across multiple pages because "Well, Alice's book says that this county is on the southern edge of the North region, and Bob's book says it's on the northern edge of the South region, and the state tourism board puts it in the Central region, and we wouldn't want to 'take sides'." This is the side we're taking: Make a decision about which one (1) region the county (or fraction of it) is in, and stick everything about that county in the same place. WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:28, 11 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

IRL procrastination, a random shower thought for better user retention, and 100 or so Gemini prompts (i.e. AI/vibecoding): the results of that led me to create Wikivoyage:Travel Tracker. It's a personal tool that any logged in user can use to track which countries they've visited. No scripts that need to be installed, just go to Special:MyPage/Visited and check it out for yourself.

Why? Part of what got me hooked into Jetpunk was exactly their country tracker. Many people use online sites to track their travels nowadays. The idea is so that casual users – users that occasionally edit Wikivoyage but only ever so often, perhaps choose to use this travel tracker, then are immediately incentivised to update their travel maps after visiting somewhere new, hopefully also updating some actual articles in the process.

The tool still has many teething issues, some that will take time to fix, but it's usable for the most part. Alongside Andree's trip planner, I hope this too can be added to the topbar. I'm also planning on perhaps creating a similar tool for US/Indian/Mexican/Brazilian states, depending on how things go. Any feedback/fixes appreciated and welcome. :)

//shb (t | c | m) 11:43, 9 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

This works well for me at first glance! (I found one glitch, "Bosnia and Herzegovina" isn't shading for me.) It would be fun to have a way to note regions and cities as well, then I'd probably use it as a "Places I've visited"/"Articles I've worked on" section on my User Page. Gerode (talk) 16:28, 9 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

The glitch is unfortunately a long-standing property of kartographer - it here are too many regions, it may not display all of them. Also, sometimes the OSM data import breaks. E.g. Thailand shape is quite broken currently, too. -- andree 19:07, 9 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

Yeah for the first I've found usually just a hard cache solves that issue. OSM data import breaks yeah I have no idea how to fix that (similar issue with Singapore too). //shb (t | c | m) 22:47, 9 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

Created phab:T422902 for the Thailand/Singapore issue – seems to be a pretty widespread problem across WMF projects so I def think it's worth this getting looked into by more technical people than us. //shb (t | c | m) 03:59, 10 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

Also have given the tracker a little bit of a revamp in terms of style + few finishing touches (like a numerical counter). //shb (t | c | m) 05:05, 10 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

For some reason Q38 (Italy) was added twice for me, using purely the editor. Otherwise, nice work :-) -- andree 19:05, 9 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

Ah, I see the issue (Estonia mistakenly had the Wikidata item of Italy) – fixed! :) //shb (t | c | m) 22:51, 9 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

It's a fun tool. To make it more interesting, you could also provide an option to break it down by region (state, province, etc.) for the top ten countries by population or area. Gizza ^(roam) 03:23, 10 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

I've added this tool to the topbar – should work in both vector 2010 and vector 2022, but not skins older than that. //shb (t | c | m) 08:51, 12 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

Wow, that feature works, on Temporary Accounts too. ~2026-69216-3 (talk) 12:36, 12 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

Since temporary accounts only lasts for 90 days from initial creation, @~2026-69216-3 you may want to create an account soon because your current temporary account will expire by the end of this month. As for the tool itself, I noticed that your shaded countries don't show up on my end. On the broader picture, I propose that we limit this tool to registered accounts. Otherwise we will potentially have tonnes of abandoned Temporary Account map pages that people can't access after 3 months. OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 04:45, 13 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

I'd go further and say that I don't think temporary accounts should be able to create userspace pages at all for the same reason you mention. Maybe I'll start a separate discussion for that sometime later. But yeah @~2026-69216-3 in your case, would recommend doing that (and then perhaps moving your map to your userspace under a registered account). //shb (t | c | m) 06:17, 13 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

If they can't create a User: space page, then they'll have a harder time telling us some things that we want to know (ordinary user page content, like languages spoken), and they won't be able to create a sandbox for testing, which could lead to making more mistakes in the mainspace.

Also, at the moment, this is not a big problem. Almost none are being created, and only 14 exist in total.

When we reach the point of having, say, 100 or 500 or some other large number of such pages, I think we could have a generous deletion policy for User: pages, but I don't think we need a wholesale ban. By "generous", I mean that if it's more than, say, a year old and just test edits (or actually problematic in some way), then any admin should feel free to delete it. I do not mean that an admin marks their calendar to search and delete all User: pages because it just annoys the admin's sense of tidiness that those contributors were allowed to create pages in the User: space. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:41, 13 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

Hmm that's true, you do have a point especially because "Draft:" isn't a namespace here. I'll try to think of how else we could solve that issue. //shb (t | c | m) 21:52, 13 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

That is okay to me. ~2026-69216-3 (talk) 00:40, 14 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

Still any particular reason why you haven't just created an account btw? //shb (t | c | m) 00:42, 14 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

For me, I have a preference. I would rather edit as temporary user, other than creating the registered or named account. I do not plan to stick around as much in the future. ~2026-69216-3 (talk) 20:32, 14 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

I didn't propose to restrict Temporary Accounts from creating any "User:" pages. I am only proposing restriction on TAs creating the "/visited" pages because they can't stick around past 90 days. From a technical standpoint, is there a way to display a message only to TAs that "hey, you can use this tool locally but if you want to truly save it or show it to friends, you need to register an account"? OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 15:06, 14 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

I went to see if I could embed this on my main User page. Could you add an easy way to suppress the checkboxes, maybe by a flag on the VisitedMap template? Not only would that make this map embeddable, it would make it harder for me to check boxes on other people's pages! Gerode (talk) 21:14, 12 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

@Gerode: You should be able to now embed this on your userpage (just by transcluding {{User:Gerode/Visited}}). Suppressing the checkboxes I've got planned, probably using the abuse filter (since there are some cases where I think it's okay and I'd rather a warn system over a complete disallow). //shb (t | c | m) 23:36, 12 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

Is there a limit to how many countries the tracker can show? On my map, a bunch of random countries (the UK, France, Spain, Philippines, Laos) are not showing up even though they're selected. Asamboi (talk) 03:12, 13 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

Usually it's a cache issue – Special:Purge should do the trick (they appear for me on your map). //shb (t | c | m) 03:39, 13 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

I would recommend adding a "refresh" button which functions like it's a purge, with a line telling user to click on the refresh button if the map doesn't update or have countries missing. We can't expect new users to know a special page. OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 13:49, 15 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

I like this idea (have always thought about it). It also pairs well with the world editing challenge. But at first save Australia and New Zealand weren't shaded until I refresh the page. OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 04:35, 13 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

Echoing other comments, this is a nice little gadget, I tried it out the other day. An idea for how to develop it further would be an additional layer for countries the user would like to visit (maybe in green or red?). In addition to Singapore which was mentioned above, also the main part of Morocco does not want to show up. --Ypsilon (talk) 16:26, 13 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

So far I've fixed Thailand and HK on OSM. Singapore should be easy to fix, and I'll have to look into what's causing the issue for Serbia and Morocco. //shb (t | c | m) 21:51, 13 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

SG now also fixed. //shb (t | c | m) 02:05, 14 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

Uganda is not shown. --RolandUnger (talk) 05:39, 14 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

It seems to show for me – you might need to clear your cache or give it a refresh. //shb (t | c | m) 05:45, 14 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

Serbia's mapping to Kosovo. Let's not start the next world war shall we? :) OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 17:20, 14 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

I tried to fix it last night – ig a waiting game to see how long it'll take for this change to be mirrored here. :P //shb (t | c | m) 04:13, 15 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

And Morocco. //shb (t | c | m) 12:32, 15 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

@OhanaUnited: Both Serbia and Morocco now fixed. //shb (t | c | m) 02:43, 16 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

mexico, belize, panama, costa rica, Brazil, Argentina, Tunisia, Spain, Portugal (and probably a few more I have missed are not working for me). Is there a limit to how many you can add? Jdlrobson (talk) 03:10, 18 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

@SHB2000 @Andree.sk I debugged this some more and I am seeing a call to https://maps.wikimedia.org/geoshape?getgeojson for every single country in the map. So for 195 countries, the browser tries to open 195 concurrent or sequential connections.

This architecture doesn't scale with our traffic and is currently triggering 429 requests which is likely why many of the countries are not showing for people. This also increases the risk that this feature could interfere with tools and other features on that site that may in future get rate limited.

Can we look to get this fixed sometime next week, given this risk here? I suggest we use a single request with a pipe-separated or comma-separated list of Q-ids if that's possible or at minimum batch the queries with setTimeout and caching using mw.storage for subsequent requests. Jdlrobson (talk) 19:35, 19 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

If it's possible to fix this, that would be appreciated (I'm not entirely sure how to make it such – I'm also a bit preoccupied this week and life irl has been quite hazy, but I'll give it a shot). //shb (t | c | m) 22:08, 19 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

While updating a listing in Stuttgart, Germany, I visited the city's official website. It is available in German and several other languages, but upon selecting the English version, a notification appeared stating that the content is automatically translated by DeepL. In such cases, what is the preferred approach? Should I link to the original German version of the website, or is it better to provide the English URL, even if it relies on machine translation?ShuaiXuesheng (talk) 16:53, 10 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

I assume the translation link is easily found on the page, in which case I'd link the original. I wonder, now that AI translations are offered everywhere (including in Firefox, where it took some time for me to find how to disable it), what added value do direct such links from city pages offer? They might check that the translations are sensible, but more likely, at least for less common languages, they just rely on the tool. Perhaps the translation is even offered by the content management system and they just didn't disable it. –LPfi (talk) 21:50, 10 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

I think we should still link official pages in English when possible, but in these kinds of cases, I would tend to support linking the German-language page. Ikan Kekek (talk) 21:59, 10 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

From my experience, municipalities seem to do everything they can to cut costs. I often see job postings looking for someone to manage the entire media presence of a city with 500,000 people on a part-time basis of just 15 to 20 hours a week. It’s frankly unrealistic. And they are trying to cut corners in the exact same way when it comes to automated translations. Personally, I believe that if DeepL or similar tools are used, we should always link back to the original source language.ShuaiXuesheng (talk) 10:28, 11 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

I agree. The landing page of the municipality is the least like to change. The addresses of other language versions may change from time to time and make the link obsolete. Ground Zero (talk) 11:37, 11 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

Hello everyone, would you please take a look at the edit history of Suburbs?

Here is the link: [3]

To me, I feel like this article needs some improvements. Also, the edits made by single purpose accounts, appears to be weird as well, as these edits made, have been reverted multiple times already. Methinks, that if anyone here is interested on adding new information to this page, truthfully. ~2026-69216-3 (talk) 02:54, 12 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

Methinks you left something out of that sentence. :-) But seriously, there are existing discussion threads on the Talk:Suburbs page that anyone including you can participate in. Ikan Kekek (talk) 06:23, 12 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

@Ikan Kekek Yes, but did you check the edit history too on Suburbs? ~2026-69216-3 (talk) 21:13, 13 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

I've been aware of that article since its inception. What point do you want to make? Ikan Kekek (talk) 21:39, 13 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

Replicable bug: if you create a new listing, and add something to the `wikidata` element, it gets dropped when you save. Is there an open bug for this? Or can somebody point me at the source code? Asamboi (talk) 03:15, 13 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

probably a question for @Andyrom75 or @Jdlrobson at Wikivoyage:Listing_editor -- andree 07:14, 13 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

@Asamboi, I'm not sure I got your point. In Plovdiv I've created a new listing as a test with Wikidata field duly filled. It worked (then I removed it). Could you please check it and let me know what I misunderstood? Thanks, Andyrom75 (talk) 12:55, 13 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

I notice an obsolete "Main Page" proposal in mainspace: Main Page/Main Page New Mobile. I think it's intended to be a "mobile-friendly" version of our Main Page, and was designed at the time when smartphones were too small. Since it's totally redundant to our existing mobile-optimized Main Page, I suggest it to be moved out of mainspace as a "historical" page. However, I don't rule out the possibility of its components be incorporated into our existing mobile version. Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs) 18:06, 13 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

It's clearly a sandbox, I'll move it under the main page in a while (jointly with what links there). Andyrom75 (talk) 07:34, 14 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

Done. --Andyrom75 (talk) 07:42, 14 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

I see there are there Main Page sandboxes: Main Page/Sandbox, Main Page/sandbox2, and Main Page/sandbox3. However, I think it's too many, and I suggest to keep only one (Main Page/Sandbox). Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs) 18:10, 13 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

Occasionally it may be useful to have more than one sandbox if alternatives are being offered for discussion. It looks like boxes 2 and 3 were used for discussions in Template talk:Bottomboxes and Wikivoyage talk:Travellers' pub, so I don't see any great need to clear them away. AlasdairW (talk) 20:48, 13 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

I agree with Alasdair. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:28, 14 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

https://guide.world/ —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 19:31, 14 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

Odd that it mentions Wikipedia but not Wikivoyage… HyperAnd (talk) 20:48, 14 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

It links to guides by one author 21 times, and another gets 7 links. I wouldn't regard it as a neutral list, and it may deliberately avoid listing worldwide guides - the major commercial guides also don't get a mention. AlasdairW (talk) 22:42, 14 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/2026/05/best-free-restaurant-bread-america/686582/ —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 19:39, 14 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

If space tourism is on the cusp of being a real thing, then it can't be long until hotels in space become a thing too. Here's an article that gives it some thought: https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-to-build-a-space-hotel/ Mrkstvns (talk) 18:29, 15 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

If space hotels ever become a thing, they would get listed in the "Sleep" section of our space article. It should note which spacecraft serve a given hotel. Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs) 04:06, 16 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

Plus continued vigilance against the pranksters who’ll try to populate space with non-existent pizzerias, as they do with desolate regions on Earth. Weary travellers who’ve been disappointed 2 or 3 times may lose confidence in WV info and fail to locate the genuine pizzerias out there. Grahamsands (talk) 12:02, 17 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

One way to tackle this creep of space pizzerias is to note which spacecraft serves the pizzeria if it's separate from a hotel. If no spacecraft serves it, it would get removed. Sbb1413 (he) (talk • contribs) 12:13, 17 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

There seems to be an influx of new Nigeria articles. Is this related to any known event, or another event in violation of the event organizer policy? //shb (t | c | m) 12:52, 17 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

It looks like 21 new articles were posted. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:40, 17 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

@User:Bigcee007, @User:Viva33, @Ngozi scholar Okafor, @User:Celetex, @User:Senator Choko, @User:OGA Goody, @User:Adakaibe (and please read WV:Naming conventions#Disambiguation, which is not done in the same style on this site as on Wikipedia), @User:Akwugo, @User:Chikwas, @User:IfyClassique, @User:Bigkotech, @User:Nneka Ibeanu, @User:Ennydavids: Can you all tell us what is going on and link the organizing page for us? Who trained you in how to edit on Wikivoyage? Thanks. Ikan Kekek (talk) 23:39, 17 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

...and @Goodymeraj: who posted a block appeal on behalf of someone else on my talk page. //shb (t | c | m) 05:42, 18 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

Good morning sir. I posted the appeal. We are currently on a project of visibilizing some Nigerian communities on Wikivoyage. The users you mentioned and tagged above are part of the exercise. Bigcee007 is one of them. That's why I'm appealing on his behalf. Thank you so much Goodymeraj (talk) 05:52, 18 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

@Goodymeraj, please answer the questions we've asked you. Also, importantly, have you read Wikivoyage:Welcome, event organizers? If not, read it right away! Ikan Kekek (talk) 05:54, 18 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

Please which other questions did you ask that I've not answered. And yes, I read the Wikivoyage:Welcome, event organizers Goodymeraj (talk) 05:58, 18 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

And when did you inform us about this event prior to it happening and solicit our advice and collaboration? Read and answer the questions in this thread. I see no reason to repost them. They are in the first and third posts in this thread. Ikan Kekek (talk) 06:53, 18 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

@Goodymeraj:...so it was you behind this expedition? What do you mean you've read the event organizers policy, but then failed to do every single step listed on that page? //shb (t | c | m) 12:33, 18 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

We have to decide what to do about this; by all appearances, it's exactly what the event organizers policy is supposed to prevent, and everyone involved is so far evading all our questions. Should we be asking right now whether all of the edits should be reverted and all the participants should be blocked, or is the more salient question whether the organizer should be banned? Our policy is either in force or it's a dead letter, so it's important for us to figure out the best course of action and take it. Ikan Kekek (talk) 15:31, 18 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

Can everyone please calm down a bit? I can see why Ikan asks the questions above, but I definitely do not think we should answer yes to either of them. Both the organiser & the participants appear to be acting in good faith, so heavy-handed measures should be avoided if possible.

A lot of our coverage of Africa is quite weak & we definitely want contributions from new users with local knowledge. Yes, the inevitable new user blunders are irritating, but nothing that cannot be dealt with. Pashley (talk) 16:11, 18 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

It's the eternal paradox of the new editors: Newbies are 'expensive', but the community will die without them.

As we discussed months ago at Wikivoyage talk:Welcome, event organizers#A draft of a substitute for the text on this page I'm not convinced that banning organizers is the right choice, especially on a "first offense", when we can't know whether they read the page before the event.

I do think these articles need improving. Picking one at random, Igbo-Ukwu is a site of archaeological significance. The population is around 75,000, so it's the kind of place we probably ought to have an article on. It would be nice to have information added to this article (e.g., hotels, restaurants, several festivals), but I'm not sad that we have five sentences instead of zero. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:15, 18 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

People acting in good faith would answer our questions. The silence in reply to them is deafening. We need answers ASAP. Ikan Kekek (talk) 21:02, 18 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

@Ikan Kekek: I'd personally ban the organizer for both failing to adhere to the event organizer policy, and also blatantly lying about having read the page. Maybe I'd give a 24–48-hour grace period (from the time of your message), because any longer and that just increases the workload for everyone else trying to clean their mess. //shb (t | c | m) 21:21, 18 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

And also for playing dumb ("Please which other questions did you ask that I've not answered") and refusing to answer any of the questions at the top of the thread. Ikan Kekek (talk) 21:28, 18 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

Would it be appropriate to make sign language phrasebooks? Such languages are actually in use, especially in places that have concentrated deaf communities, unlike say, Latin. HyperAnd (talk) 21:10, 17 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

Absolutely! How would you do it? Ikan Kekek (talk) 23:40, 17 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

Now that's the tricky part. Most of the notation used to write sign languages aren't very readable to an average traveller. We could simply just use video, but video isn't very editable for a wiki, so it should be supplemented with written notation if possible. The most promising notation I see are Wiktionary's notation and w:SignWriting. Wiktionary's notation doesn't use hard-to-understand symbols, but it's non-visual. SignWriting is very visual, but we need to enable a gadget to render it because most devices can't handle 2D arrangement of text. The gadget is mw:Extension:SignWriting MediaWiki Plugin, but unfortunately it's largely unmaintained. Here's the gadget implemented on ASL Wikipedia in the incubator if you want to see how it looks (though it doesn't render on the mobile skin). HyperAnd (talk) 00:37, 18 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

My feeling is, if it can be useful to travelers, do it. I think video and pictures are most useful. I couldn't make head or tails of the ASL symbols, but is it important for travelers to know them? Ikan Kekek (talk) 03:59, 18 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

My take: for most travelers, probs not – but I can see these phrasebooks being useful in the odd situation and I don't see an issue with sign language phrasebooks if someone is willing to create them and make such phrasebook useful. //shb (t | c | m) 08:05, 18 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

Well, many deaf and hard of hearing people read and edit websites, and there are various different sign languages, so I think sign language "phrasebooks" would be very useful to that segment of our readership and also people with keen hearing who want to communicate with them. The difficulty, if anything, is that these would be primarily video or picture phrasebooks, but the concept is the same and the need is clear. Ikan Kekek (talk) 08:18, 18 April 2026 (UTC)Reply

I think sign language phrasebooks would be welcome, but I do see practical difficulties. I understand that there are several English based sign languages: American Sign Language, British Sign Language, New Zealand Sign Language etc which may be difficult for sign users. The phrasebook would need to be illustrated with photos (or drawings) unless we change Wikivoyage:Image policy to allow short videos in this exceptional case. I don't think wiki editing of a video is an issue if videos are kept short (less than 10 seconds) so editing is done by uploading a replacement, as with photos. AlasdairW (talk) 21:07, 19 April 2026 (UTC)Reply