Forum:Proposed replacement for the feature queue

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The feature queue has served us well for many years, but I believe the time has come to replace it with something else. There aren't enough articles being featured for it to really work anymore; the main page often has an empty section for "Today's Featured Article" or, worse, a DPL warning. I think the best option is to have static content done without DPL, so I've created a draft of a system that works this way. Outwardly this preserves the status quo except that the content no longer expires. My system also lacks the "Yesterday's Featured Article" section, as "yesterday" and "today" are never full at the same time and Wikipedia does not have "yesterday".

I've written a JavaScript gadget for this system, which makes the process much easier than the current manual one. (It can still be done manually and is about as easy.) You can read about what featuring articles is like in my system with and without the gadget here. You can try out the gadget by adding mw.loader.load("//uncyclopedia.ca/w/index.php?title=User:Llwy-ar-lawr/VFHcloser.js&action=raw&ctype=text/javascript"); to your common.js and clicking the buttons on User:Llwy-ar-lawr/TFA/example. If you sign with three tildes instead of four, you will also need to add threetildes = 1; (or put something else in place of "1", it doesn't matter what).

I realize there's a lot to think about right now, but it's important that the main page looks good because main pages are generally the most viewed on the site. If someone sees an empty section or "Warning: No results", they're likely to think the place is no good and not stick around. ❦ Llwy-ar-lawr • talk • contribs • 01:20 14 June 2019

Some of us think DPL warnings are hilarious! No, seriously, you know what you are doing and are working on something that is a real problem. However, "Yesterday's Featured Article" is a term overtaken by events, but "Previously Featured Article" might work and is a way to (1) give a feature continued play and (2) fill up space on the main page. Do please point to this page on the page where Carlb complained that stuff was broken. Spıke 🎙️01:41 14-Jun-19

I will go with this. Thanks Llwy. --RomArtus*Imperator ITRA (Orate) ® 14:08, 14 June 2019 (UTC)

Agreed, the main page needs to be high quality. This new plan looks great.

Note that "Featured today a long long time ago" used to blank out as well; it only worked off the first appearance date. Suggest that be changed to "Featured a long long time ago" and be scripted to work off a partial list of featured articles, with a random selection or even two linked to the main page. I can create the file to select from, perhaps 300 entries so as not slow down things. This would be in DYK style using option tags. I'd prefer that to be mostly articles from after the split but would include a bunch of older. This file will have to be maintained over the long term including rejiggering the list order (a typical randomizing scheme, e.g. for DidYouKnow, is not really random) as well as swapping out entries. DidYouKnow requires this (I feel); updating that only after 8-10 years was a bad thing; yearly would work. -- (talk) 19:09, 14 June 2019 (UTC)

Sure, that sounds fine. I assume the blankness is due to there not being any featured articles in the requested time slots. It does happen a fair amount, though.

I've added YFA, now "Previously Featured Article". (You can see what the whole thing looks like at User:Llwy-ar-lawr/main page, which may also be the site of further redesigns.) Wasn't hard to do, but I don't think taking up more space is needed or desirable, since it pushes down DYK. I'll also note that I cut the "recently featured" list down to three at a time. I was originally going to go with six because the current DPL list has a maximum of six, but it didn't work right for some reason, and I don't see the need given that in practice it never shows that many and Wikipedia only has three. I can try pushing it back up to six if wanted. ❦ Llwy-ar-lawr • talk • contribs • 01:07 15 June 2019

I think we should reduce the displayed length of PFA even more; it would be less important especially since, based on current years, TFA would already have been up for a couple of weeks and ideally, a fair number of visitors will have read it. So, because I want/like images on the main page, PFA doesn't need to be displayed longer than about the length needed to accomodate a portrait-type picture.

New thought: instead of FTaLLTA, just have a blurb saying "Older featured articles can be accessed via 'Featured content' on the sidebar". One less thing to break or maintain. -- (talk) 02:20, 15 June 2019 (UTC)

Would reducing it to the first paragraph do? I can adjust the script to do that. For other featured articles, there could just be a link to Uncyclopedia:Best of alongside "Archive – Vote for featured articles", like Wikipedia has. ❦ Llwy-ar-lawr • talk • contribs • 02:08 23 June 2019

I could live with just the first paragraph. The link with the other featured articles worksforme. -- (talk) 04:43, 23 June 2019 (UTC)

New system is in place with YFA cut to the first paragraph. "Archive" already links to the best-of page, so I didn't add another link. The featuring gadget is now available in your preferences -- last item on this list. If you sign with three tildes instead of four, add threetildes = 1; to your common.js. ❦ Llwy-ar-lawr • talk • contribs • 22:50 23 June 2019

All's right with the world now, at least with the main page. Thanks. -- (talk) 01:15, 24 June 2019 (UTC)