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Wikipedia: Sandbox

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Wikipedia: Sandbox

#1

Post by zaptrem »

I was learning about Wikipedia recently and thought it was interesting there was a global, public page specifically for writing random stuff to learn how to use their editor. I assumed there would be something like this on a per-user, invisible to the public level, but not a global level like this page.

Wikipedia: Sandbox
en.wikipedia.org

Re: Wikipedia: Sandbox

#3

Post by tonymet »

There are both, every user has their own sandbox. But this one is there to encourage first time visitors and the uninitiated to make changes , so they know that anyone can contribute uninhibited.

Re: Wikipedia: Sandbox

#4

Post by kemayo »

tonymet wrote: post #3

There are both, every user has their own sandbox. But this one is there to encourage first time visitors and the uninitiated to make changes , so they know that anyone can contribute uninhibited.

Though, just to be clear, the per-user ones are also public. They're just a convention where if you make a subpage of your user page and call it "Sandbox", nobody is going to complain about the encyclopedic value of your edits.

Re: Wikipedia: Sandbox

#5

Post by tonymet »

kemayo wrote: post #4
tonymet wrote: post #3

There are both, every user has their own sandbox. But this one is there to encourage first time visitors and the uninitiated to make changes , so they know that anyone can contribute uninhibited.

Though, just to be clear, the per-user ones are also public. They're just a convention where if you make a subpage of your user page and call it "Sandbox", nobody is going to complain about the encyclopedic value of your edits.

True , though I just discovered category scans still hit your user sandbox. Kind of silly

Re: Wikipedia: Sandbox

#6

Post by firasd »

It's interesting to think about how complex the wikipedia text is compared to something like github flavored markdown or even standard html tables (although I guess it eventually renders into standard html so it's not more complex than the latter when all other html elements are considered in addition to )

For example the swatch internet time infobox is dynamically updated

{{short description|Alternate time system by watch maker Swatch}} {{Infobox | image = [[File:Swatch beat Logo.svg|200px|alt=Logo of Swatch Internet Time]] | caption = Logo of Swatch Internet Time | title = Time{{efn|at page generation }} {{purge|(update to view correct time)}} | label1 = 24-hour time (UTC) | data1 = {{nowrap|{{#time:H:i:s}}}} | label2 = 24-hour time (CET) | data2 = {{Time|CET|dst=no|df-cust=H:i:s|hide-refresh=yes}} | label3 = .beat time (BMT) | data3 = {{nowrap|@{{#expr: floor( {{#expr:{{#expr:{{#expr:{{#time:H|now + 1 hour}}3600}}+{{#expr:{{#time:i}}60}}+{{#time:s}}}}/86.4}} )}}}} }}

Re: Wikipedia: Sandbox

#7

Post by stogot »

firasd wrote: post #6

It's interesting to think about how complex the wikipedia text is compared to something like github flavored markdown or even standard html tables (although I guess it eventually renders into standard html so it's not more complex than the latter when all other html elements are considered in addition to ) For example the swatch internet time infobox is dynamically updated {{short description|Alternate time system by…

I’ve spent countless hours at employers fixing Xwiki syntax errors mixed with HTML. The parsing engine must be complex

Re: Wikipedia: Sandbox

#8

Post by bawolff »

kemayo wrote: post #4
tonymet wrote: post #3

There are both, every user has their own sandbox. But this one is there to encourage first time visitors and the uninitiated to make changes , so they know that anyone can contribute uninhibited.

Though, just to be clear, the per-user ones are also public. They're just a convention where if you make a subpage of your user page and call it "Sandbox", nobody is going to complain about the encyclopedic value of your edits.

If you really want something private, there is https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:ExpandTemplates (or of course just hit preview and dont save)

Re: Wikipedia: Sandbox

#9

Post by bawolff »

firasd wrote: post #6

It's interesting to think about how complex the wikipedia text is compared to something like github flavored markdown or even standard html tables (although I guess it eventually renders into standard html so it's not more complex than the latter when all other html elements are considered in addition to ) For example the swatch internet time infobox is dynamically updated {{short description|Alternate time system by…

I always found it ironic that the table syntax is designed to resemble ascii-art type tables, and then literally nobody writes it in a way that looks like an ascii art table.

Re: Wikipedia: Sandbox

#10

Post by susam »

I just went back to check whether I have a sandbox on Wikipedia. Turns out I do: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Susam_Pal/sandbox

I am not a regular contributor to Wikipedia but the little time I have spent contributing there has exposed me to its very elaborate culture, with barnstars being one artefact of that culture, alongside policy acronyms everyone seems to know by heart, WikiProjects organised around every imaginable topic, userboxes that are little badges that say something about you, etc.

By the way, I added a few userboxes for the Logo programming language, in case there are any Wikipedians out here who happen to love Logo: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:User_logo

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