Talk:Eurovision Song Contest 2024/Archive 5

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Talk page archive "minthreadsleft" parameter

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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Sorry for the meta-discussion here, but recently someone has been repeatedly changing this talk page's "minthreadsleft" parameter of the archive bot to 0, which would effectively mean this talk page would be wiped every couple of weeks and moved to the archives.

In my view, this is irregular and shouldn't happen, as the content of this talk page is useful for others to weigh in on and reference, and 14 days isn't a very long time. The bot's default value for this parameter is 5, and in recent years on the Eurovision pages the value has always been 4 (Talk:Eurovision Song Contest 2023, Talk:Eurovision Song Contest 2022, Talk:Eurovision Song Contest 2021, Talk:Eurovision Song Contest 2020, Talk:Eurovision Song Contest 2019) - not 0.

If you have an opinion on this, please could you weigh in so we can reach a consensus and have a settled value.

I'm about to change this value to the default value of 5 - It would be helpful if everyone refrain from changing this value until a consensus has been reached about it. BugGhost🪲👻 16:52, 7 June 2024 (UTC)

You have’t proposed anything other than not what I am proposing which is weird. Please propose something.

How many threads do you want left and why? How long do you want before a thread is archived and why?

These seem pretty obvious things to ask an OP to provide, and weird not to have been in the opening of the discussion.

This discussion feels like it’s only about what you don’t want (changes from me) and not what you do want. PicturePerfect666 (talk) 20:58, 9 June 2024 (UTC)

I very clearly proposed that your changes setting the parameter to 0 should be reverted, and the rest of the settings should remain unchanged. BugGhost🪲👻 22:48, 9 June 2024 (UTC)

That is not a proposal for something just a statement against something. What do you actually want? What do you want the minimum thread number set to? and how many day do you want the archiving days set to? PicturePerfect666 (talk) 01:01, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

What do you actually want? → I very clearly proposed that your changes setting the parameter to 0 should be reverted, and the rest of the settings should remain unchanged. This is getting tedious. You pretending that I am not suggesting something concrete makes no sense. And why is this comment the first reply? Why did you move it back up here out of chronological order, above Novem's, after SGV fixed the ordering? See WP:TPO.

I recommend you taking a breather from this and consider whether interacting here is helpful for the article, or whether it is just you refusing to drop the stick. BugGhost🪲👻 08:50, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

It’s a direct response to your claims. You are increasingly coming across as just anti anything suggested or done by me on this page. ‘Reverted’ to what? You haven’t proposed anything. It’s just ‘oppose what I do’. Other users have but getting a proposal from

you is like the search for hens teeth. You are very much the one who should evaluate what they are doing, why they started this discussion and why they are making wild claims about my motives further on in this thread. If anyone needs to drop the stick it’s you and the stick you are holding is ‘oppose Picture at all costs’. Seriously you are getting to the point of obsessed regarding my activities on this page. PicturePerfect666 (talk) 15:37, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

Pinging @PicturePerfect666 and @Super Goku V as they recently have made changes to the bot's config and may have opinions on this. BugGhost🪲👻 16:55, 7 June 2024 (UTC)

I'd say it's very uncommon to use minthreadsleft=0, and it hides the recent talk page history which I see as a disadvantage. I definitely recommend keeping it at 5. –Novem Linguae (talk) 20:21, 7 June 2024 (UTC)

I cannot see keeping any obviously finished discussions around is of any benefit to anyone. Also why not 15 or 500 threads to be kept then ‘nothing is hidden’ why 5? That’s an arbitrary figure to satisfy what?

Talk pages are not walls of evidence, shame, or glory. If a discussion has ended it should be archived not left stale like a piece of bread forgotten about.

Not archiving discussions that have finished is ridiculous and only goes to make things look old and forgotten about. Inferences that archiving is nefarious is madness and is made with

claims of ‘archiving being hiding’ as the OP has done which is patently complete and utter nonsense and shows no understanding what archiving is and like some kind of paranoia being projected. What an incredibly odd thing to get knickers in a twist over.

Archiving is not hiding.

What good does keeping stale old discussions hanging around?

Characterising archiving as hiding goes against the foundations of Wikipedia.

I have no problem with extending the length of time to 28 days for example. Stale, old, and clearly ended discussions should not hang around like stale bread; all forgotten and sad. PicturePerfect666 (talk) 22:02, 7 June 2024 (UTC)

I agree that 5 is an arbitrary number - but we have to find a compromise between 0 and infinity, so any number could be argued as arbitrary. I personally would say 15 or 20 would be a better choice as I feel like 4/5 doesn't show enough recent history, and archives are harder to navigate (because they hide conversation topics from view). For example, this discussion is a repeat of this one. A longer archive period would have removed duplication, because the older topic would not have been hidden. However, any value is better than 0.

I do not understand the steps you made to come to the conclusion that "characterising archiving as hiding goes against the foundations of Wikipedia", so I won't comment on that. I would say that I do not have "my knickers in a twist", nor am I "projecting paranoia", nor that what I am saying is "patently complete and utter nonsense and shows no understanding what archiving is" - I would appreciate it if you refrained from making these kinds of comments. We're just discussing a parameter on an archive bot.

I opened this section up because you made very clear in your edits and on my user talk page that you have strong opinions on this, even though your opinions are against the norms for archiving. I personally would have preferred not to have this discussion at all, as I assume most editors would see the benefit of having content remain on talk pages. This topic was opened because you changed the value to 0 on three separate occasions without ever discussing it on the talk page, and so I am trying to reach a consensus by including the rest of the editors here in a civilised straightforward way. BugGhost🪲👻 01:31, 8 June 2024 (UTC)

Everything I have said is an honest comment on the content you are laying out. It is absurd to leave discussions forever on a page going cold and stale after clearly being concluded. Additionally, the examples of discussions are simply a time frame issue, not an archiving issue. What is the time frame you are happy with? I have proposed 30 days and asked multiple times, but I have not got a response. PicturePerfect666 (talk) 02:12, 8 June 2024 (UTC)

From my POV, arguing this much because discussions are not archive is absolutely futile. Who gives a damn? Archive all the threads and the talk page looks empty and inactive, leave 5 threads on it and at least you can see the talk page has been active at some point. And even that is not really an argument. Just because it "looks empty" or "inactive" or whatever, the number is just arbitrary. But setting it to 0 is not a good idea to me. Yoyo360 (talk) 08:06, 8 June 2024 (UTC)

What number would you suggest to leave on a talk page and why? Also what time frame would you suggest? PicturePerfect666 (talk) 15:27, 8 June 2024 (UTC)

I don't have strong opinions either way, but it if a conversation has gone stale, it should probably be archived. An 'empty' talk page does not offend me if there is nothing fresh to discuss. Now that the contest has passed and activity has died down, it might make sense to adjust the age to archive from 14 days to maybe 30 or 60 days. With less watched pages, it can take some time for folks to find discussions and they may not in fact be stale yet. Grk1011 (talk) 12:36, 8 June 2024 (UTC)

I think 60 days for a thread to finish is reasonable.

yeah I think archive after 60 days regardless of number of threads left. Any longer and I don’t think a discussion is going to be that long. If the replies are once every 60 days then is it really being engaged with?

What do you think? PicturePerfect666 (talk) 20:23, 8 June 2024 (UTC)

Works for me. Grk1011 (talk) 18:42, 9 June 2024 (UTC)

I think there's 3 of us in this discussion that do not want minthreadsleft=0 as you are proposing here. –Novem Linguae (talk) 20:44, 9 June 2024 (UTC)

I am not seeing any cohesive proposals other than what I have proposed.

I am also not seeing any reasons given against what I have proposed.

Please propose something, going not what you have proposed only, is not helpful. Constructive participation is essential not just going ‘don’t want that’. If that’s not wanted what is wanted? PicturePerfect666 (talk) 20:49, 9 June 2024 (UTC)

I was going to leave this alone when it got changed back, but since I both got pinged and this has turned into a discussion, I will participate. Just going to quote Archive here regarding the main purpose for it: It is customary to periodically archive old discussions on a talk page when that page becomes too large. Bulky talk pages may be hard to navigate, contain obsolete discussion, or become a burden for users with slow Internet connections or computers. Notices are placed at the beginning of the talk page to inform all editors of an archive. (Emphasis mine)

Picture, five wasn't intended to be an arbitrary figure, just a rough number where there isn't too few or too many discussions. (Yoyo said it best that leaving a few threads makes it clearer that the talk page has been used.) Cluttered talk pages are not that helpful, like it was for a good chunk of last month when we had over two dozen discussions open at once. While not a serious proposal, even fifteen threads as mentioned would be too much clutter. Personally, I have a strong dislike for what I consider to be the chalkboard method of cleaning the talk page of all discussions, but some people prefer it so it is what it is. If it ends up at zero, then fine.

Bug, I do get that 14 days is short, but the talk page has just recently shrunken down from being over 100k in size, which is why I only doubled the archiving date from what it was before. With seven days, we still had a number of stale discussions that took time to auto-archive.

I don't mind 30 or 60 days if we want to jump to that now as it does seem that things have started to settle. If we do that, then we should consider setting minthreadsleft to 0-3, though again I would prefer at least one thread left. --Super Goku V (talk) 04:54, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

I am happy to go for one discussion left and 30 days archive time. Later that can be increased to 60 days when things really slow down. It can then be lowered to zero threads if there is minimal to no discussion taking place down the line. PicturePerfect666 (talk) 05:09, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

I think we should immediately go back to the last stable version until this discussion is concluded. Here's a revision from a month ago that appears to be a stable version. Click "Edit Source" to see the archive settings. Reverting to the status quo ante / last stable version is the normal practice, per WP:SQA and WP:BRD. It is up to whoever is proposing the "new" thing (minthreadsleft=0 in this case) to demonstrate that there is enough support for it, and so far there are enough objections that I am not seeing that support. –Novem Linguae (talk) 05:29, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

Good grief ‘the last stable version’?

The revision from a month ago belies the activity on the page and is in no way ‘the last stable version’

No such ‘last stable version’ can exist due to the nature of this talk page with the article subject taking place and naturally either side of that being much quieter.

Also there is no ‘new’ here; changing archiving based on activity is standard practice.

This all feels completely bonkers that this is even a serious issue.

The final line takes the biscuit of “enough objections that I am not seeing that support” and sums up this as just no! no! no! PicturePerfect666 did it so I’m just going to object.

Actual proposals from me twice have been suggested and one user has no issues with the current 0/60 proposal. I have also made another proposal based on SuperGokuV’s input of 1/30.

Please actually suggest something other than going round and round repeatedly playing games of must oppose everything from PicturePerffect666 which is exactly how the ‘no to zero’ comments are starting to be tiresomely obvious as their underlying intent. Yeah it will be denied but none of the ‘no to zero’ users have (at time of writing) made any serious proposals in this discussion on how many threads to leave and how many days before archiving. PicturePerfect666 (talk) 05:50, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

Seeing as you discuss "underlying intent", lets examine your actions here: The reason why the last stable version happened so long ago is because a few weeks ago you changed the value to zero because you wanted to remove a discussion topic from the talk page by abusing the archive settings - the edit summary literally says "Changed archiving period as this needs to move on.", after you repeatedly attempted to remove a talk section. You knowingly changed the value in order to obscure talk page discussions that you did not like, and now you are doing it again by trying to obscure your RFC's that are at the top of the page (the ones that indicate your opinions are overwhelmingly disagreed with). It is painfully obvious what you are doing to anyone who's been active on this page for more than a week, and pretending that you're doing it for any other reason is ridiculous. This is embarrassing and time wasting. You have never once cared about the archive settings at any other point other than times where reducing minthreadsleft would mean something you disagreed with would be removed from the talk page. That is not the purpose of the archive bot and you should be well aware of that. BugGhost🪲👻 09:20, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

If the RfC's get archive before they get properly closed, then I can restore them from the archive, but why would they be archived? Template:Donotarchiveuntil is properly set for both as far as I see. --Super Goku V (talk) 10:15, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

Thanks for the clarification on this - my point is not that the change to the archiver settings will remove the RFC's before they are officially closed, it's that I believe PP666's motivation to change the archiver settings is so that the fewest amount of people will see them in order to save face - the proposed changes aren't to aid the article or the discussion around it. BugGhost🪲👻 10:47, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

I have read diatribes in my life but by goodness this is worse than sewage the amount of crap in it. all the comments on my motivation show you are simply out to ‘stop me’ grow up will you. I suggest you withdraw each and every word you make claiming you know my motivations and that you somehow know I’m here in bad faith. You have no idea how archiving works. Why would an active discussion get archived for fuck sake. Seriously the above proves it’s just stop me not build anything constructive. PicturePerfect666 (talk) 15:13, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

Picture, I just got done checking the history. The settings that Novem linked to were like that at the end of last year and at the end of every month up until the event. In fact, that was the settings that were initially set up last May. --Super Goku V (talk) 10:34, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

There is no way of easily knowing that from the link the provided through a phone. Thank you for the clarification. As you pointed out earlier though there were an unwieldy number of discussion threads last month, making the navigation of the page difficult. Which is what archiving is for. PicturePerfect666 (talk) 15:14, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

Y'all, this really isn't something to argue over. In fact it is so insignificant that it's annoying. It has absolutely nothing to do with 'building an encyclopedia'. As Bugghost pointed out, the default value is 5. Just do it and move on. Let's also just agree on 30 days as "stale". Grk1011 (talk) 12:56, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

100% agree on all points. BugGhost🪲👻 13:14, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

I really have to concur with Grk1011 here. It's low key ridiculous that there's been this much discussion over how to archive this talk page! Yes archiving is a useful tool to keep the talk page from remaining on topic, but it's really not that important to determine how the talk page is archived, how many threads are left, how often it is archived, for people to get this hung up over it and for this discussion to drag on for so long! 5 threads remaining and 30 days to begin archiving seems perfectly fine to me. Sims2aholic8 (talk) 14:35, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

minthreadsleft=5 and algo=old(30d) is also fine by me. Good compromise. –Novem Linguae (talk) 19:57, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

This discussion is moot the parameters are deprecated. PicturePerfect666 (talk) 20:19, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

minthreadsleft is deprecated in Template:Archives, not User:MiszaBot/config. The difference is important. See here for a more detailed explanation. –Novem Linguae (talk) 20:31, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

This is officially now Wikipedias most banal discussion. PicturePerfect666 (talk) 01:15, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

I love you I love you, actual proposals.

I’ve suggested 0/60 - which works for {{|Grk1011}} and I’ve suggested 1/30 moving later to 0/60.

I can’t see the point of discussions which are stale and concluded being left on a talk page. I see no logic for 5. I have made other suggestions. I don’t see why 5 threads should be the default or why any threads at all should be left on a talk page when clearly concluded. PicturePerfect666 (talk) 15:38, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

Is minthreadsleft deprecated?

• The idea behind leaving a minimum number of threads on the page is so that editors don't start new discussions on issues that were already recently discussed, but review the discussions that already occurred instead. I believe 5 used to be the default, but actually a recent change to the template deprecated the |minthreadsleft= parameter, and the parameters for archiving age. Supposedly it only produces text in the box now, while the archiving bot determines the minimum threads and archiving age automatically, regardless of the settings. So actually it doesn't matter what we set them to. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 16:17, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

  Are you sure? I don't see anything about minthreadsleft being deprecated over at User:MiszaBot/config. If I am missing it, feel free to quote it or link to a diff. –Novem Linguae (talk) 19:47, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

  Ah, I think I see what you mean. minthreadsleft default is 5. That's different than deprecation but I see what you mean. Anyway, even if the default is 5, this recent edit also removed the algo parameter, which lowers it to its default of 24 hours, which is very fast. So I disagree with that edit. –Novem Linguae (talk) 19:55, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

  (edit conflict) No, I'm not sure at all, but also I'm looking at the docs for {{Archives}}. MiszaBot is deprecated: it hasn't run in thirteen years and its maintainer left the project in 2015. The successor process uses the same code for backwards compatibility, or it did, maybe that also changed, and/or maybe the bot has been offline long enough that nobody is thinking to update its docs page any more. I was looking in the docs for {{Archives}} for the defaults for the parameters, and it says in the table there that |minthreadsleft= is deprecated (along with several others), but doesn't explain further. I went to the talk page for the template and there are a series of discussions there from about March of this year about automating several of the parameters, but I don't know if code actually changed, and wouldn't really know what I was looking at anyway. I tested omitting the parameters on my own talk page and it does render the table as the discussions suggest it would be, but I didn't leave it up long enough to actually test the archiving. @Mathglot: it looks like you made the changes to the documentation, maybe you can advise? Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 20:06, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

  Thanks for that info. Even though MiszaBot is no longer running, the config template User:MiszaBot/config is used by all the contemporary archive bots, including Lowercase sigmabot III and ClueBot III. You can read up more on that at Help:Archiving a talk page#Example with sequentially numbered archives. I definitely do not think that template is deprecated.

  I think the minthreadsleft parameter is deprecated for Template:Archives, which is just the archive box that links to the archive pages. That box now auto-detects the minthreadsleft parameter. Ironically, it probably auto detects the minthreadsleft parameter by reading the minthreadsleft parameter in User:MiszaBot/config, where it is not deprecated.

  So I think the important distinction here is that there are two templates: one template that tells the archive bots how fast to archive (User:MiszaBot/config), and one template that puts archive links on a page (Template:Archives). And minthreadsleft is not deprecated in the former, and is deprecated in the latter. Hopefully that makes sense. –Novem Linguae (talk) 20:28, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

  I was writing this up, but got interrupted and Novem Linguae got there first, so this is just a quick message agreeing with him. It's perhaps also worth pointing out that

  • the Miszabot config, including minthreadsleft, is still in active use by Lowercase sigmabot III for automated page archiving; and
  • formerly, the user of {{Archives}} had to use up to four parameters (including param |minthreadsleft=) to generate the bot notice appearing below the list of archives which specifies archive frequency and so on, but the template was enhanced recently to generate the bot notice automatically from the archiving bot config on the page, rendering the four archive bot notice params, including |minthreadsleft=, obsolete.

  So to answer the title question: minthreadsleft is deprecated in template {{Archives}}, and not deprecated in the Miszabot/config (and in some other places outside the scope of this discussion). By coding the Miszabot/config with values you prefer, it will cause the page to be archived according to the values you gave. If, in addition, you code {{Archives}} on the page, it will generate a list of archives in a box, with a bot notice appearing automatically showing the config values you coded, unless you suppress the notice with |nobot=yes. Hope this helps clarify things. Mathglot (talk) 23:30, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

  @Novem Linguae: You mentioned ClueBot III, but that ignores {{User:MiszaBot/config}} - instead, it uses {{User:ClueBot III/ArchiveThis}}. AFAIK only one bot recognises {{User:MiszaBot/config}}, and that is lowercase sigmabot III. It took over some of MiszaBot's tasks several years ago, but was deliberately coded to read {{User:MiszaBot/config}} in order to avoid the need to amend thousands of talk pages. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 10:40, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

  Ah you're right. For some reason I thought both bots used the same config template, but it looks like each has its own. Thank you for the info. –Novem Linguae (talk) 10:43, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

numbers in parameters

Above, four of us have agreed to minthreadsleft=5 and algo=old(30d). That looks like a consensus to me, so I have implemented it. If I am not reverted, we should be all set. I recommend against manually archiving this, ironically for the same reasons that we are also opposed to minthreadsleft=0, which is transparency and ease of access to recent talk page discussions. Thank you to everyone who participated in the discussion. –Novem Linguae (talk) 05:47, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

This is not a representative statement.

This is not counting !votes as this is not a democracy

there have been a number of proposals some have not been commented on some have been agreed with

The claimed version you have is not as far as I can see a proposal more just an opppose everything and go to some default.

I'm not going to fall for the phoney ‘well I counted this many agreeing with me’ rubbish.

If you think that version you seem to have fallen in love with (of some bizarre default, which doesn’t exist by the way), is so great why is it that what the numbers should be set to. Nothing of substance on that has been provided. Whereas a number of others have said with substance (not just me before you go down that path) on other proposals.

I have begged for actual proposals and none of ‘cannot be zero’ brigade which i include you in have made a positive contribution proposal here. It is all not this or this, nothing about what you actually want and why.

Please provide an actual proposal and why, not just ‘not zero’. PicturePerfect666 (talk) 18:16, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

(edit conflict) @PicturePerfect666: your behaviour here is becoming disruptive; your ongoing battleground behaviour and thinly-veiled personal attacks will no longer be tolerated. If you would like to participate in working towards agreement on what the archiving parameters should be, feel free to participate but you must follow the civility policy and cease the insults. If you continue to make unilateral changes and stomp your foot and demand that things be your way and call everyone names who disagrees with you, you will be asked to leave. Please do not change the archiving parameters again. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 18:35, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

Make that five who agree. At this point, consensus is more than clear, WP:SATISFY applies, and there is no further need to respond ad infinitum to one who sees it differently. Time for all of us to let this thread go; I see nothing to be gained by prolonging it. Mathglot (talk) 19:12, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.