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Archive 1

Todo vs to-do vs To do

All instances of "todo" need to be changed to "to do" or "to-do". — Chameleon Main/Talk/Images 09:36, 1 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Clarification: a hyphen is necessary when the expression is used as an adjective, e.g. "to-do list". Otherwise, it is simply spaced, e.g. "things to do". — Chameleon Main/Talk/Images 22:46, 2 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Does that include this template itself? Should it be Template:todo, Template:to-do, or Template:to do? Seems like if you want to standardize, it should be done all the way. -- Netoholic 02:35, 3 Aug 2004 (UTC)
While it doesn't really matter much, I prefer "todo" as the template name. It's one less keystroke, and we don't need to to be perfectly correct in what are essentially Wikicode macro names. — Matt 02:49, 3 Aug 2004 (UTC)
I've changed most of the instances to "to do" but I agree with leaving the template as {{todo}}, its similar to {{copyvio}} and other templates.. We can change ones called "to do list" to "to-do list" if thats correct, but i think "to-do" is used to mean a commontion or stir, and "to do" is always the correct phrase in this case. (at least, thats what I got out of dictionary.com, and the OED) —siroχo 06:35, Aug 3, 2004 (UTC)
The dictionaries aren't wrong, but what they aren't telling you is the general rule about two-word expressions used adjectivally before the noun. An inspection done on site is an on-site inspection. A family with two cars is a two-car family. A list of things to do is a to-do list. Get it? It's fine for the template to be wrong though, in the same way that it doesn't matter that copyvio is not correct English. — Chameleon Main/Talk/Images 08:31, 3 Aug 2004 (UTC)
K, got it. Anyways, lets leave the page that goes with each to-do list as "/to do", simply because each page has to be moved if we change it again, and "to do" by itself seems gramatically correct to leave it that way. —siroχo 09:30, Aug 3, 2004 (UTC)

Categories issues

I've noticed there are two categories: [[Category:To do of popular articles]] and [[Category:To-do of popular articles]]. They need to be merged. In fact, they should be pluralised: [[Category:To-do's of popular articles]] or [[Category:To-do lists of popular articles]]. — Chameleon Main/Talk/Images 11:01, 3 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Pcarbonn has been working on sorting articles by popularity and that category (Category:To do of popular articles and Category:To-do of popular articles) in general. If it can be made to work in a straightforward way it might be a very useful feature indeed. But yes, those categories should be merged.
However, keep in mind that every time we rename a category, we have to resave all the pages that are in that category (ie all the talk pages w/ todo lists) because the wiki software doesn't currently support "moving" of categories. —siroχo 14:00, Aug 3, 2004 (UTC)
Yes, I know. I recently moved Melée weapons to Mêlée weapons and it was a pain in the arse. I think it should be the responsibility of people who misname things in the first place. — Chameleon Main/Talk/Images 14:28, 3 Aug 2004 (UTC)


Article to-do priorities / parameter as sort key

For some reason, Wiki does not evaluate the parameter {{{1}}} in the sort key. It should evaluate to the priority given as a parameter in the call to this template, {{todo|7}} for example. A bug report has been entered to the wiki developer (bug n°: 1002735).

In the meantime, please do not change the category: I believe sufficient warnings are given to the reader that say that the category is not working. Pcarbonn 16:37, 3 Aug 2004 (UTC)

To be honest, I'm not a fan of using the template for this purpose. One category for all the "to do"'s, sure, but this priority mechanism seems more trouble than it's worth, even if it were working. It relies too much on people adding a parameter which is not yet standardized (A/B/C, 1/2/3) and may change in the future, making for rework. It's also not very easy for an average editor to know that the priority number is needed and what it means when they see it. Try using {{todo|priority=}} on the Talk pages, and in the template use {{{if defined:priority|[[Category:To do of popular articles|{{{priority}}}]] }}}, as described in Meta:Extended template syntax. -- Netoholic 18:41, 3 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Thanks for the feedback. The ideal would be to have a new variable that depends on the article, {{Popularity}}, which would give the popularity of the article: this way, the editors would not have to enter the parameter anymore. I have introduced a request for enhancement (n° 1000952) to that effect, and I've seen it has been set to high priority... Would that be the solution to your concerns ?
I agree that the parameter is far from ideal, and that it would eventually be superseded by the "Popularity" variable, if ever implemented. The idea to use the "if defined" construct is interesting. Is it currently available though ?
My concern is that the alphabetical listing in the category will quickly show its limitation once the list of articles with "To do's" becomes bigger, to the point where it becomes useless. Don't you share that concern ? Pcarbonn 22:03, 3 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Yes, an alphabetical listing in the category will likely become overwhelming in time. But so will your scheme... all "to do" pages will still be in the "popular articles" category if that's part of the template, just not necessarily sorted well. What is your goal with this? To get popular pages special editorial ttention, right? Well, first off, popular pages already have many active editors (because they are popular). If particular pages need special attention, there are already better ways of requesting work to be done, like Wikipedia:Pages needing attention, Wikipedia:Cleanup. {{Todo}} is a nice tool on its own, but your "to do" categories, no matter how they are sorted, will become bloated with too many pages to be practical. Right now, it looks like "if defined" is still just a proposal, but it may be useful if implemented, because the category won't have to be added to all "to do"'s, only those with the "priority=" set. -- Netoholic 23:25, 3 Aug 2004 (UTC)
You say "popular pages already have many active editors". You may have a point there. However, I have the feeling that much more edit attention goes to secondary pages than popular ones, ie. that popular ones deserve more attention than they currently have. Do you share this view ?
In line with that view, I do not believe that "Pages needing attention" and "Cleanup" are better ways to attract attention, because popular pages would be lost among the many more secondary pages, and thus would not get the attention they deserve.
You also have a point that the categories will become bloated, whatever the sort . It could be better to define sub-categories with pages of varying popularity: I'm pretty sure that the top priority category would not have so many pages to make it impractical, on the contrary. But in any case, this would require software update on Wiki. Pcarbonn 06:13, 6 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I have now found a way to make it work, by using sub-categories. This requires the use of 10 different templates : todo, todo1, todo2, ..., todo9. I have already created 2 of them. Because of the multiplicity of templates and the difficulty of moving articles from one category to another, we should finalize the category names before implementing it fully. Here is what I propose:

  • Articles with a to-do list, priority 1 (Top)
  • Articles with a to-do list, priority 2
  • ...
  • Articles with a to-do list, priority 9
  • Articles with a to-do list, priority not defined yet

Pcarbonn 15:23, 6 Aug 2004 (UTC)

My prediction... 90% of articles will end up in "priority 1". Its just human nature to want to put their article interests ahead of others. Who's going to clean up? Are there going to be arguments about whether an article is priority 4 or 5? Who is going to make sure all the todo templates are kept looking alike? Sorry, this priority scheme is getting silly. -- Netoholic 16:59, 6 Aug 2004 (UTC)
I think the original idea was that priority would be decided ONLY based on how many internal links linked to the article. It would be a rough estimate of how often people would stumble upon an article. But there is no automated way to do this yet. —siroχo 22:49, Aug 6, 2004 (UTC)
Actually, I'm ready to put the effort to maintain those templates and categories, and to enforce the rules about popularity. I hope that others will too. The To-do list idea was generated by the Wikipedia:WikiProject_Science : we needed a way to establish and communicate tasks to do on articles. My goal in this is to maintain a list of To do's for science, and to invite Wikipedians to contribute to the project in the best order of priority. I invite other projects to do the same. Nobody knows yet whether it will succeed, but Wikipedia is there to show that goodwill is available aplenty, and is stronger than bad will. And indeed, as you say, some may abuse the system and put their articles in priority 1. I expect this to be the minority though, and I don't think it should stop us. But who knows, without trying ? Pcarbonn 20:31, 8 Aug 2004 (UTC)
I understand that the argument above will not convince everyone. So let's try to find a way that does not disrupt the "normal operation" of the "To do" category, while still offering the priority thing as an option. I guess that the issue is "how much reference to the prioritized category" can we accept. Here is my proposal:
Pcarbonn 21:25, 8 Aug 2004 (UTC)

what is a Todo editorial To-do list ?

Following the latest change, the template now links to an empty Todo page: why ? what is that page supposed to contain ? Shouldn't we just say "here is the editorial To-do list for this page ?" Pcarbonn 10:20, 6 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Ideally, that should read "Here is the PAGENAME editorial to-do list ? to update the list, click here". It currently only works properly in articles, but not in other namespaces. Take a look at Talk:Thermodynamics for a working example. -- Netoholic 13:12, 6 Aug 2004 (UTC)
OK Pcarbonn 15:23, 6 Aug 2004 (UTC)
A good idea. The technical problem is that if we use [[{{NAMESPACE}}:{{PAGENAME}}]] it'll use the talk namespace. There must be some way of automatically linking to an article from its talk page, though. —siroχo 22:54, Aug 6, 2004 (UTC)
It isn't necessary to link to the article from the template -- there's a standard View article navigational link on every talk page anyway. Subpages also have navigational links to their ancestors. --Eequor 08:20, 7 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Kneejerk reactions

It's strange that I'm called overzealous by User:Netoholic when sen edits change the entire appearance of the template. Some points about my edits, for clarification:

  • The table has one row. Using rowspan="2" is pointless.
    • Point taken. Obviously it didn't break anything, and looks like it was simply left over. -- Netoholic 10:18, 7 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • There is a useful {{edit}} template which produces an edit link for any given page.
    • Having one template depend on another is not a good direction. What if Template:Edit changes? -- Netoholic 10:18, 7 Aug 2004 (UTC)
      • Most likely, it would be quickly changed back. It's a useful template. --Eequor 16:59, 7 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • It's simpler to use align="right" as an attribute of a table cell than to use a <div>.
    • Only using one div to place the "edit this page" link on the right. -- Netoholic 10:18, 7 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • The term editorial tasks does not make much sense.
    • Seems OK to me. Any better ideas? -- Netoholic 10:18, 7 Aug 2004 (UTC)
      • Removing "editorial" is better. --Eequor 16:59, 7 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • High-priority does not make much sense either, as there is no reference point. Also this is a generic template; the users of the to-do list probably have their own priorities.
    • Again, suggest something better than "Here is the to-do list for xx". -- Netoholic 10:18, 7 Aug 2004 (UTC)
      • "This is the to-do list for xyz" is at least better than "high priority editorial tasks". --Eequor 16:59, 7 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • I changed the spacing a little because it looked better to me.
  • <font> is deprecated.
    • Replaced with <big><b>. The look is different, because of how BIG is styled in the main CSS, but not drastically. -- Netoholic 10:18, 7 Aug 2004 (UTC)
      • The template shouldn't place emphasis on the heading. The important part is the actual to-do list, and the template should not distract users. --Eequor 16:59, 7 Aug 2004 (UTC)
        • I think its important to bold the title here, so it feels more like the general wikipedia style. Section headings are bold, and so it makes sense to bold the title of this "section". People are not going to miss the grey box regardless. —siroχo 12:19, Aug 8, 2004 (UTC)
  • Placing the To-do link inside the table is more intuitive and doesn't interfere with the negative space to the left of the table.
    • disagree that its intuitive. The to-do link refers to the template itself, not the article. -- Netoholic 10:18, 7 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • The category should be at the bottom, as that is the standard location for categories. It's hard to find if it's in the middle of a table.
    • category placement can go anywhere. Its stripped out by wiki anyway. Its there to avoid weird extraneous blank lines. -- Netoholic 10:18, 7 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • There is no need to include a link to the parent page in the template; see above.
    • I think it ties the two together. -- Netoholic 10:18, 7 Aug 2004 (UTC)
      • They are tied together by the standard navigational links already. I agree that the name of the article should be included, but making a link to it is unnecessary. Also using {{PAGENAME}} only (instead of {{NAMESPACE}}:{{PAGENAME}} will not work for articles outside the main namespace. --Eequor 16:59, 7 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • cellspacing and cellpadding have the same effect as margin and padding in CSS, except they work when the table contains more than one cell.
    • Better that the style be applied to the table if we ever get above two cells. For now it looks fine. -- Netoholic 10:18, 7 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • Placing a border on a table allows multiple cells inside the border.
    • see above. -- Netoholic 10:18, 7 Aug 2004 (UTC)

It feels ridiculous to be arguing some of these. Please think about why changes may have been made before undoing them in a kneejerk reaction. --Eequor 09:26, 7 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Per my message on your talk page, it felt more like you were blind-siding the efforts here, since this is the first real discussion you've put into it. -- Netoholic 10:18, 7 Aug 2004 (UTC)
I felt that I wasn't making significant changes. -_-;; --Eequor 16:59, 7 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Real estate

There's plenty of "real estate" inside the border; there's very little text there currently. Negative space has value, just as positive space does, and placing a link under the image wastes that. Notice that most of the templates at Wikipedia:Template messages#Open_tasks are fairly generous with empty space near the same image. --Eequor 10:09, 7 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Recent edits by —siroχo

I made three edits just now to the template, and want to explain them

  1. I removed "editorial", it was redundant since the talk page is for editors to discuss, and it also just seemed like an extra word.
  2. I moved the "edit this list" link to the top, so its not hidden if there is a long list. We want the page to be relatively easy to edit, this also takes care of the real estate issue. (horizontal real estate does not matter on a page-wide template like this). Also, I don't think we should use the {{edit}} template, because one word is not clear enough to people who are new to todo lists and talk pages in general. And the parentheses and brackets look like HTML/wiki markup leftovers in a way, so we should just leave them off to keep it clean.
    The brackets are meant to allude to the standard [edit] links for article sections, so the link in the template appears consistent. --Eequor
  3. Make sure to keep {{{{NAMESPACE}}:{{PAGENAME}}/to_do}} on a newline (no spaces), or else the first asterisk does not register as a list item.

Also, i have a couple more notes,

  • keep the category inline with something else (anythign else that doesn't mess up the formatting) so extra blank lines aren't added.
  • Please keep the category as [[Category:Wikipedia pages with to-do lists|{{PAGENAME}}]] (ie keep the pagename in there) or else everything goes under "T" for talk.

Lastly, keep things neat here. Eequor and Netholic, you both have excellent ideas for this template we'll work all these issues out.

—siroχo 12:35, Aug 7, 2004 (UTC)

I don't know why I didn't think to put the edit link there at the top. I really like the way this looks now. -- Netoholic 13:57, 7 Aug 2004 (UTC)
I don't argue with the look, that's just fine. I'm just worried that todo lists may grow to be 10 or more items long, making the link less easily seen by new editors. At the top its one of the first things people will see. I did keep it right aligned as you had done, that fixes the awkwardness of the previous "click here" link. —siroχo 15:04, Aug 7, 2004 (UTC)

Usage

Netoholic, are you currently using this template for a to-do list on a different page? You haven't edited any "to do" subpages, that I can see. Why should your opinions set the precedent for people who will actually use the template? --Eequor 17:29, 7 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I find that comment rude and short-sighted. This template is very new, and is still a bit in flux (like the "priority" ranking). Its still very much a work in progress, but one I am interested in contributing to in anticipation of using it on some of the pages that interest me most. Please don't be so judgemental, it destracts from everyone's experience here. Comment on content, not on the contributor. -- Netoholic 03:13, 8 Aug 2004 (UTC)

In my opinion, not only has Netoholic made many useful edits to this site, but his usage of the template has no effect on whether or not his edits are valid. You've made several useful edits as well, and as the wikiproccess rolls, both you, Netoholic, and other who have worked on this page's ideas are coming together to create something better. Remember that wikipedia is larger than any user, and will last for a long time. There's no need to be impatient about anything, especially on a page so young as this. Eequor, I'd request that you take some time familiarizing yourself with wikiquette before pushing any issues you have with anyone, on this page. —siroχo 12:14, Aug 8, 2004 (UTC)

Note on wording

Pending tasks is an improvement over high-priority editorial tasks, but it's still somewhat of a misnomer. To-do lists in current use sometimes strike out supposedly resolved issues, in which case they are no longer "pending". --Eequor 21:45, 7 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Image alt text

People using a text-only browser, or a graphical browser with images disabled, lose nothing by not seeing the "Evolution-tasks.png" image. They also don't need to see browser-supplied text saying something like "there should be an image here but I can't display it" or "Evolution-tasks.png". Therefore, the image should be have empty alt text, but that's impossible, and the next best thing is to have a single space as the alt text. This is done with [[Image:Evolution-tasks.png| ]] (see Wikipedia:Alternative text for images).

Netoholic says that that didn't work for him, but it worked fine for me. The [[Image:Evolution-tasks.png|Tasks]] that Netoholic used means that people using text-only browsers will see the text "Tasks To-do list" in the left hand column of the table. I don't like that, and would prefer to see just "To-do list". So, I would like to go back to alt="(space)", as I used in this edit. —AlanBarrett 09:25, 8 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I'm fine with that. When I checked, it displayed only <img... title=" "...> but no alt=" ". I'm fine with " " as long as it works. -- Netoholic 15:18, 8 Aug 2004 (UTC)
I get <a href="..." class="image" title=" "><img src="..." alt=" " /></a>, with the alt text being repeated both in the title attribute of the a tag, and in the alt attribute of the img tag. This seems acceptable to me, though I wish it were possible to put different text in the two places. I'll change the alt text back to " " now. —AlanBarrett 20:55, 8 Aug 2004 (UTC)
See also Alt text. Andy Mabbett 13:13, 23 November 2005 (UTC)

Template for non-article namespace

I believe that the easiest way to do that is to create a {Wtodo} template, separate from the existing one. Pcarbonn 05:16, 11 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I think someone did that, check out Template:WikipediaTodo —siroχo 07:32, Aug 11, 2004 (UTC)

I think this will work, but I wanted to discuss it first. Add a parameter to the template that gives the parent namespace name including a trailing colon, like this:

in "Template:todo": To-do list for [[{{{1}}}{{PAGENAME}}]]
at the top of the talk page for an article in the main namespace: {{todo}}
at the top the talk page for an article in the Template namespace: {{todo|Template:}}

—AlanBarrett 13:27, 11 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Just use "{{NAMESPACE}}:{{PAGENAME}}" which produces - "Template talk:To do/Archive 1" -- Netoholic 13:52, 11 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Ah, I see the problem now. I like your idea. For normal articles, the parameter would be optional. To simplify though, you can include the trailing colon in the template itself.
  • in "Template:todo": To-do list for [[{{{1}}}:{{PAGENAME}}]]
  • at the top of the talk page for an article in the main namespace: {{todo}}
  • at the top the talk page for an article in the Wikipedia namespace: {{todo|Wikipedia}}
I've updated the Template:Todo to include this. -- Netoholic 14:13, 11 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Please revert the last changes ASAP: the template does not work correctly for normal articles anymore !! e.g. for Train station or Voltron: the link to the main article is broken. Pcarbonn 15:03, 11 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Yep, this is because every place {{Todo}} is used, a parameter pointing to the parent namespace would have to be defined. This is a great idea, but damn hard to make it work right! -- Netoholic 16:05, 11 Aug 2004 (UTC)

New "namespace friendly version" causing edit links: Check out some of the articles that use {{todo}} for example Talk:Baseball. The link back to the article is a red edit link. This happened after {{{1}}} was added in. I really hope we can fix this, but i'm not sure how. Maybe we could delay this feature until the {{{if defined:''parameter''|''text''}}} syntax is introduced into mediawiki (see meta:extended template syntax)

(btw, be careful when you check for this, many articles with todos are using some other sorts of templates now ({{todo1}}, etc.) I'm not completely sure where that came from, but i'll check it out later, time for bed. —siroχo 15:05, Aug 11, 2004 (UTC)

I have created the todo1 templates in order to create the To do, by priority category, as previously discussed in other threads. Pcarbonn 16:10, 11 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • Apparently, when template parameter 1 is undefined, {{{1}}} does not expand to an empty string; the inner {{1}} expands to the expansion of {{Template:1}}, and the outer {} remains unchanged. See m:Help:Template#Parameters. —AlanBarrett 16:00, 11 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I suspect that the easiest way to fix this would be to request the developers to add a new {{{NAMESPACE_NO_TALK}}} magic variable, or similar. —AlanBarrett 16:00, 11 Aug 2004 (UTC)

  • I found a way to fix the template and make it work in all namespaces at the same way; see the section down here. --Ggonnell 15:04, 13 Mar 2005 (UTC)

<big> vs <h3>

The reason I chose to change to <h3> was because it looks more like the standard wiki heading typefaces. What's the problem with accessibility? —siroχo 07:36, Aug 11, 2004 (UTC)

H headings are used to describe a hierarchy or outline, and are meant to be nested H1>H2>H3. Text browsers, screen readers, and other alternate browsers would render that incorrectly or it may cause confusion, , especially because it's inside a table. The proper heading would be H2, but I doubt that would look good visually. I've updated it so that the cell is a TH (header), which I think is the most appropiate format. Visually, it's very a very subtle difference. -- Netoholic 12:34, 11 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Gotcha. —siroχo 15:05, Aug 11, 2004 (UTC)

Ever-expanding category

The to do category will become too large. So a suggested solution, have the link (inserted when a to do list is created), link to [[Category:<Article's category>/To do]]. So most or all categories would have a subcategory called "to do", with links to the articles in the parent category which have to dos. If this suggestion is somewhat unclear, I can make another attempt to explain it. Zoney 15:22, 11 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Unfortunately, there isn't really any way to automatically extract the categories an article belongs to. There also doesn't seem to be any way to find the proper (non-talk) namespace that a talk page belongs to, and so no way to refer to the parent article. --Eequor 15:57, 11 Aug 2004 (UTC)
I believe I understand. You would enter a parameter in the template, e.g. {{todo|Science}}, and then use this parameter to insert the todo page in the [[Categor:Science/To do]] category. They have been many attempts to use parameters to the template, but all have failed. So I wish you good luck ! Pcarbonn 16:06, 11 Aug 2004 (UTC)
A way around this would be to multiply the number of templates, and use {{todoScience}} for example. This is the approach that was taken for the "To do, by priority" category (see {{todo1}} template). However, this solution is not ideal if we have 100+ templates. Pcarbonn 16:06, 11 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Please note there are currently only 34 real articles in Category:Wikipedia pages with to-do lists. It's unclear whether the number of to-do lists will increase significantly; as things are now, dividing the to-do lists by category would probably result in to-do categories with one article each.
My concern is mainly due to the fact that if use of the category does expand - it's easier to apply a scheme now rather than later... Zoney 16:56, 11 Aug 2004 (UTC)
The current to-do category is probably little-used. I doubt anyone would browse the list to find a to-do list with a need they could fill. It's likely that editors will refer to the flat lists at Wikipedia:Pages needing attention, Wikipedia:Cleanup, or Wikipedia:Requests for expansion instead. --Eequor 16:27, 11 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Another solution would be to add categories to the /todo page (the one that only contains the list of tasks), and not in the template. For example, the Atom/todo page could be added to the Science, Requested images, ... and any category the editor wants. So the article would appear in the appropriate lists. When all the tasks are done, simply remove the category entiesy from the /todo page. This gives a lot of flexibility, and is quite intuitive. Pcarbonn 17:08, 11 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Actually, I have tested that, and it works. So I have updated the procedures in Wikipedia:To-do list accordingly. Please check. Pcarbonn 20:35, 11 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Todo for page

We should have a Template:TodoForPage so that you could include a todo for an article to your userpage with something like {{TodoForPage|World War II}} I can't get it to work, and perhaps it is not possible. [[User:Sverdrup|❝Sverdrup❞]] 21:11, 11 Aug 2004 (UTC)

You're active on CotW, so you've probably already seen this by now: Wikipedia:Collaboration of the week/To do is an example of what you were trying to do. :-) • Benc • 19:24, 2 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Namespace friendly version

I've finally created a version that in all my tests (that I did in it.wiki) works perfectly in every namespace. To do this I designed a template that functions almost as a variable, similarly to NAMESPACE, but it gives always the name of the "article" namespace (e.g. "Wikipedia" for "Wikipedia Talk"; empty value for "Talk"; etc.). I hope it's not a problem to rely on a secondary template. Note that when you look the template page the link in the title in the Template:Todo does not appear as link as the link in this case now refers to the page itself Template:Todo and not anymore to Todo This modification eliminates the need of a dinstinct Template:WikipediaTodo - see for example Wikipedia_talk:Chemistry.--Ggonnell 19:54, 10 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Nice workaround, thanks - I took the liberty to adopt the idea for the German Wiki. However, I also wanted to assure, that there can only be a single todo-list for each article, located at the discussion page. If you create a TODO-template in the article section and one in the discussion section, you get two different todo-lists. 
{{{{TALKSPACE}}:{{PAGENAME}}/to_do}}
results in something like 
{{{{TALKSPACE}}:Todo/to_do}}
instead of importing the to_do-List...
Now here is the problem, that this templates are not real vaiables, i.e. nesting does not work. Any ideas how to acchieve this? --TheFilz 22:46, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)

bugzilla:531#c6

Background

I noticed that the background of the template recently changed color (or added color, I'm not sure of exactly what kind of change was made). It used to be grayish and basically blended into the background; now, it's tangerine. Would it be possible to change the color back, or to change it to something more neutral (like a darker shade of gray) so that it doesn't stick out so much? I don't mean to sound like a whiner, but I really liked it as it was. I'd make the change myself, but I feel like it effects enough users that I should make the request here rather than taking it upon myself to change it. Essjay (talk) 13:22, Jun 12, 2005 (UTC)

Watch instead of Add to Watchlist

Any objections against changing the text in the template from "Add to watchlist" to "Watch"? It would give us more horizontal space for the headline (which incurs a line break in all but the shortest articles) and it is also consistent with the verb used on the article tab itself. Arbor 13:52, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Actually, let me expand that request to include the Edit link as well. Let's just call it "Edit". Arbor 13:57, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC)
I say do it. Makeup, murder, and template text: Less is more. Essjay · talk 14:19, Jun 13, 2005 (UTC)
Done it, boldly. Let's see if there is any big reaction to it. By tomorrow, I will edit the Todo How-to to make the instructions conform with the new link texts. (Done, hope I found them all) Arbor 15:59, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC)
If you're still watching here, and chance you can wikify the link to the "Todo How-to"? I've been unable to find it under any permutation, and with such common words, search is wores than useless. --Kgf0 23:03, 13 October 2005 (UTC)

Why all this categories?

Why does the template todo has all these priority categories (from 1 to 9). I can hardly think how could one user decide if the article is at priority 3 or 4. It's a useless waist of time. I suggest we remove them all and keep a small number of categories (low and high priority only). CG 20:40, 9 February 2006 (UTC)

Dotted border

Get rid of this annoying dashed border and replace it with a solid one.

This was taken from the to-do list on top of this page. But why? Are dots all that awfull? I don't think so. jοτομικρόν | talk 19:20, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

To do lists in Category talk pages

This template does not work right when used on category talk pages. For an example see Category talk:Anime. Instead of having a link to Category:Anime, it is categorizing the talk page in the category. Either this gets fixed (which I would not dare attempt myself), or the templates have to be Subst'ed (I don't know if this is an option), or they have to be removed from category talk pages. Any ideas? -- Samuel Wantman 11:33, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

The offending code is
<big> [[Wikipedia:To-do list|To-do list]] for [[{{ARTICLESPACE}}:{{PAGENAME}}]]:</big>
Articlespace:Pagename parses into Category:Anime which is why it was doing that. I have subst'd the template onto Category:Anime for now since it will be merged into Template:WikiProject Anime and manga/to do as soon as I have completed a few more of the requests in that to do list. --Squilibob 12:29, 28 March 2006 (UTC)
Thanks for your help with this. It looks like Subst'ing is an option, though fixing the code so this doesn't happen might be better. I'm going to add a note that this doesn't work with categories, and that a better place to post this is a project page instead of a category talk page. Few people look at category talk pages. -- Samuel Wantman 20:59, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

Restyled version

I've decided to make a new todo template since I think this one looks a little big and clumsy. The new one is smaller and doesn't use the black dotted line. You can find it at Template:Todo2. —Michiel Sikma, 20:17, 8 April 2006 (UTC)


New version (parameters)

I've made a new version of this Todo template that uses parameters. It allows one to set a width, height, the location of the edit links (top, bottom) and the float value (left, right, none). Of course, it's possible to not set any parameters, in which case it will show up like a normal todo template. Maybe you would like to take a look at it. It's located at Template:Todo3. Maybe I can add some of the parameters that you have tried to add to this template; what functionality did you try to add? —Michiel Sikma, 12:51, 16 April 2006 (UTC)

Is there a version which takes the location of the todo page as a parameter?

I'd like to collect together multiple to-do lists on a WikiProject page. This would require a version of the template that doesn't use the default /todo location. Is there such a beast? With the new conditional code feature, I could easily add the option to this one (warning about making changes and testing them in a sandbox first is duly noted). --kingboyk 09:49, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

I made one. See Template:Todo-Named. --kingboyk 10:07, 21 June 2006 (UTC)

Different image?

Nuvola apps knotes.png

I know its not public domain, but it is GPL, so should we use Image:Nuvola apps knotes.png in place of Notes.svg? See it in action to the left.--Draicone (talk) 06:46, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

My latest update

Cleaned up all localurl to fullurl and shortened the code a lot, I have also added a preload to Template:Tasks/Preload if no /to_do exist. Have also fixed the bug with having todo on cat pages. →AzaToth 23:35, 15 September 2006 (UTC)

Bug report

Resolved

AFAICT —Ms2ger (talk) 13:20, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

Appears to have a bug that supresses (or breaks?) the TOC on a Talk page. See Talk:1956 Hungarian Revolution.--Paul 18:33, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

Explicity adding a __TOC__ to a page using Template:Todo is a workaround for this problem.--Paul 16:58, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

Purge

Why has the purge link the nonstandard title "refresh"? This caused me to insert, unnecessarily, a standalone {{purge}} link. I think I hear somebody whisper "it's more refined" but I don't think anybody seriously thinks clicking a purge link will cause a bulimic teenager to stick a finger down her throat. John Reid ° 23:30, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

Different appearances

Resolved

{{todo}} and {{todo priority}} look different. Shouldn't we be striving for consistency? Maybe we should use parser functions or something on one and make the other a redirect. --WikiSlasher 02:18, 18 December 2006 (UTC)

Long since done. "Resolved"ing topic. — SMcCandlish [talk] [contrib] ツ 10:24, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

Is there a reason why the template does not contain a link to the "To do" subpage itself? — Sebastian 20:25, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

To what end? It already shows the page, and if you want to edit it, it has an edit link (and watch, etc.) Why non-edit link to what it is already showing you? — SMcCandlish [talk] [contrib] ツ 10:22, 22 February 2007 (UTC)
Thanks, there's indeed no need. Not sure anymore why I asked; maybe the "edit" link was disabled back then or I overlooked it. — Sebastian 20:32, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

Proposed merge/redirect from template:todo nocat

I propose someone with the template know-how merge and redirect {{todo nocat}} here. Basically it's just a fork of this template as it existed at the end of February last year, sans the categories. Copying the new code over to update it would be a PITR. So I suggest that we have a new "categories" parameter to replace having a separate template just to turn off the cats, where someone who wants no todo cats on his/her user page can specify "categories=no" to turn off the cat. Anyone concur? Flyingtoaster1337 04:49, 26 January 2007 (UTC)

I do. — SMcCandlish [talk] [contrib] ツ 10:21, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

Bug report

The list and target parameters are incompatible. Since these are very new, if you fix target to require the full filename, this problem goes away before hardly anyone's implemented the existing version. — SMcCandlish [talk] [contrib] ツ 10:27, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

PS: That is to say, because list exists, the shortening guesswork that target does will often be wrong, because the filename won't actually be what is expected. — SMcCandlish [talk] [contrib] ツ 10:28, 22 February 2007 (UTC)
Knock, knock. Anyone home? This appears to still be unresolved. — SMcCandlish [talk] [contrib] ツ 20:50, 18 March 2007 (UTC)
NB: It appears to me that the code in {{Todo-Named}} will solve this issue. — SMcCandlish [talk] [contrib] ツ 20:53, 18 March 2007 (UTC)
If' the code I wrote in Todo-Named was used here, why is it not mentioned in the history and why is aforementioned template deleted? I'm happy to work here for free but not so happy when I don't get credit for my work... --kingboyk 20:42, 1 December 2007 (UTC)

Todo-Named deprecated?

The instructions for this page say to see the variant template {{Todo-Named}}. The instructions for that template say it's deprecated in favor of {{todo}} with a target= parameter. Can we fix whichever one of these is not current? -- Antaeus Feldspar 19:45, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

Todo-Named needs to be merged into this one; it's code can fix the problem reported above. — SMcCandlish [talk] [contrib] ツ 20:53, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

Wh'appen?

Can someone(s) (namely AzaToth and Jrockley) summarize what is going on here? Seems like an awful lot of code changes, and of too geeky a nature for me to figure out at 11:30-something my time (thought it may make immediate sense after coffee tomorrow morning. The fact that I've been futzing around with PHP instead of WM parser functions for most of the day may have something to do with my possible denseness right now.— SMcCandlish [talk] [contrib] ツ 05:27, 21 March 2007 (UTC)

Jrockley moved the priority text down to the lower right corner, and I thought, why not, but fixed it so it looked better for small windows. I also then indented some code. →AzaToth 12:51, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

Why does the target parameter work this way???

Currently when you use todo normally, it creates a link to the main page in its header "To-do list for foo". But when i specify my target, it instead requires me to add "Talk:" to foo so that it will properly name the to-do list subpage. The problem is that now the title reads and links to the talk page of the article as in "To-do list for Talk:Foo". You can try just ommitting "Talk:" but then the edit button creates a subpage in the mainspace. Why not change this to only have people write "target=Foo" and the template can add the "Talk:" part for the edit link? i'm using awb right now to sift through all articles using this template, and so far very few utilize target... so i don't think it would be too much to change. -ΖαππερΝαππερ BabelAlexandria 22:58, 15 April 2007 (UTC)

:ok, i went ahead and made the change... i'm going to run awb to fix all current uses, and anyone is invited to visit this page to see a list of pages i still need to check in case i need to stop before i'm done. Or if you want to see if a ceratain page needs to be still updated. -ΖαππερΝαππερ BabelAlexandria 23:33, 15 April 2007 (UTC)

nevermind... i was having problems getting to put the "talk:" in the right spot. maybe someone who knows it a little better could implement this change... it looks like it used to be properly implented in the deprecated Todo-named. i'm wondering why that template was deemed depreacted when this template doesn't really do it the same way... -ΖαππερΝαππερ BabelAlexandria 03:07, 16 April 2007 (UTC)

There are pages outside talkspace that transclude this template. Do you just want to get rid of the "Talk:" in the header and for it to link to the article instead? I'll try using an {{#if:}} on {{ns:1}}. –Pomte 03:12, 16 April 2007 (UTC)
When would you need to specify the target parameter? –Pomte 03:16, 16 April 2007 (UTC)

I'm not sure from reading the above if this has been implemented yet. It's a little odd for it to say "To-do list for Talk:foo:", since the to-do list isn't actually for the talk page, but the article itself. --Brandon Dilbeck 21:14, 5 June 2007 (UTC)

I don't think there's any way to do this without requiring a new parameter to specify the article name. –Pomte 21:37, 5 June 2007 (UTC)
There's a way to get just the page name without the namespace; I think it's {{SUBPAGENAME}} but I don't recall precisely; see M:ParserFunctions for deets on such variables. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 00:38, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
That magic word works for the current page. But when the target parameter is used, it's usually specifying some other page, so it doesn't help in this situation. –Pomte 06:55, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
Oh, right. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 18:03, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Priority

Is there any way that priority can be automatically assigned, perhaps by a bot? It's rather a nuisance to go to the article then 'what links here' every time, so if it could be done automatically it would be a great help. Richard001 00:44, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

How do I add a "watch" button?

This template has a "watch" button. I want to add a watch button to the box which is used in these two places:

When can I best learn the syntax of adding things such as "watch" buttons. I've tried picking apart the template:todo code but with no success. Thanks. Gronky 14:42, 15 June 2007 (UTC)

Like diff linking, you can copy the link directly by right-clicking on watch and "Copy shortcut" or whatever:
http://wiki.riteme.site/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:WikiProject_Free_Software&action=watch
But this is messy, so use fullurl. The following gives the same link as above:
{{fullurl:Wikipedia:WikiProject Free Software|action=watch}}
Now make it a normal external link:
[{{fullurl:Wikipedia:WikiProject Free Software|action=watch}} watch]
which gives watch
If you don't like the icon, use CSS:
<span class="plainlinks">[{{fullurl:Wikipedia:WikiProject Free Software|action=watch}} watch]</span>
which gives watch
–Pomte 19:20, 15 June 2007 (UTC)
Thanks. This explanation enabled me to figure it out. My todo boxes now have watch buttons: WP:WPFS#Free_software_articles_TODO. Gronky 03:38, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

View

Would it be possible to add view to the edit, history, etc.? JohnnyMrNinja 04:29, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

No print for the contents in the second cell in the first row

Is it possible to wrap the links in the second cell of the first row in a span tag with the class of noprint? The cell should still print, but the contents may not need to print. I did a print preview of a page with this on it, and the contents were horribly skewed due to the fact that those links are expanded to show the full urls. A noprint on the contents would make printing this box a little neater, IMO. LA @ 19:02, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

Priority

What exactly does the priority parameter do or mean? The examples with the priority parameter look exactly the same as the examples without the priority parameter. Also, is priority=1 high or low? Thanks—G716 <T·C> 04:02, 23 August 2008 (UTC)

Updates

{{editprotected}} I have prepared a new version at {{Todo/sandbox}}. It contains the following changes:

  • uses the (t)mbox-* classes;
  • has some classes for skinning by users;
  • adds a |collapsed= parameter, as requested above;
  • adds parameters to customize the looks (so other todo templates can just use this template): |image=, |above=, |below=, |inner=, |smallfor= & |category= (I'll document them as soon as they are implemented);
  • adapts automatically to the namespace;
  • borrows a bit of the look from {{WPBS}};
  • uses relative instead of absolute font sizes;
  • abbreviates the editlinks width |small=yes;
  • doesn't expand them when printing
  • doesn't link to the deleted category To do, by priority.

It can be seen in action on some pages already. If there are no comments, I'll request the edit. Thanks. —Ms2ger (talk) 13:20, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

Please replace the page with the contents of {{To do/Archive 1/sandbox}}. Thanks. —Ms2ger (talk) 11:02, 16 November 2008 (UTC)
Done. Nice work. Cheers. --MZMcBride (talk) 20:07, 28 November 2008 (UTC)
Thanks! —Ms2ger (talk) 18:37, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

Non-subpage to do template

Resolved

Should we have a similar template that doesn't create a subpage? Creating a subpage is slightly awkward when the list becomes empty, and edits to the list are missed by those only watching the talk page. It also requires an extra edit to add the to-do list to the talk page, which is mildly annoying. A template that is just a part of the talk page but displays more like a to-do list and less like ordinary text might be an alternative or just better than ordinary to-do lists. Richard001 (talk) 23:42, 20 November 2008 (UTC)

This is already implemented in the sandbox, we just have to wait until an admin edits it in. —Ms2ger (talk) 08:38, 22 November 2008 (UTC)
And now merged into the main template. —Ms2ger (talk) 18:41, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

Hidden-by-default option needed

Resolved

This needs an option like many navboxes have, to appear in the page hidden ("rolled up") by default; this would make it more useful on talk pages, where it would be about the size of a WikiProject banner until willfully expanded. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 07:33, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

I've made revisions here User:Ludwigs2/:test per Wikipedia:Requested_templates#Template:Todo that does what's requested. it changes the look of the template slightly, however. if it looks ok to you, I'll ask to have it editprotected in. --Ludwigs2 04:54, 29 October 2008 (UTC)
I've written up another version at {{Todo/sandbox}} (that takes up some less space and uses the recently agreed on (t)mbox-* classes for TPTs). To compare, please see the testcases. —Ms2ger (talk) 12:30, 29 October 2008 (UTC)
nice! --Ludwigs2 17:17, 29 October 2008 (UTC)
And done too. —Ms2ger (talk) 18:54, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

Categories

All the pages that use the template are put into Category:Wikipedia pages with to-do lists. Just wondering if there should be another category, Category:To do, unused, for example, for pages where the template has been used but the ToDo list hasn't been created. 

{{#if:{{{inner|}}}||{{#ifexist:{{#rel2abs:{{{list|./to do}}}|{{{target|}}}}}||[[Category:To do, unused]]}}}}

(assuming I've got all the {} correct) -- WOSlinker (talk) 00:15, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

{{editprotected}}

Could the code below be added just before the 

</includeonly>

in the template.

It will add another category as described above. 

{{#if:{{{inner|}}}||{{#ifexist:{{#rel2abs:{{{list|./to do}}}|{{{target|}}}}}||[[Category:To do, unused]]}}}}

thanks -- WOSlinker (talk) 23:32, 9 January 2009 (UTC)

 Done Ruslik (talk) 11:18, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

The russian interwiki

Add the russian interwiki (ru:Шаблон:to_do) in that page, please. Gleb-ax (talk) 14:03, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

Interwiki links should be added to Template:Todo/doc page, which is not protected. Ruslik (talk) 11:19, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

Collapse Option with "Shown" Default

I suggest that the code 

{{#ifeq:{{{collapsed|}}}|yes|collapsible collapsed}}

be replaced with 

{{#if:{{{collapsed|}}}|collapsible}} {{#ifeq:{{{collapsed|}}}|yes|collapsed}}

to give editors the option of creating a list that may be collapsed by the reader but is not collapsed by default. With this modification, the collapse parameter works as follows:

  • {{todo}} gives a normal todo list that is not collapsible,
  • {{todo|collapsed=yes}} gives a collapsible list that is collapsed when rendered,
  • {{todo|collapsed=no}} gives a collapsible list that is not collapsed when rendered.

PerkinsTaylor (talk) 23:21, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

tweak: {{#if:{{{collapsed|}}}|collapsible {{#ifeq:{{{collapsed|}}}|yes|collapsed}}}}}
my question would be, though, what do we want to be the default state: collapsible or not collapsible? --Ludwigs2 00:35, 1 March 2009 (UTC)
What about {{#ifeq:{{{collapsed|}}}|yes|collapsible collapsed|{{#ifeq:{{{collapsible|}}}|yes|collapsible}}}}? I'd prefer not overloading the collapsed parameter. —Ms2ger (talk) 10:17, 1 March 2009 (UTC)
either way. --Ludwigs2 11:25, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

Template issue

{{editprotect}} I've tried installing the {{todo}} template on Talk:List of Shugo Chara!! Doki— episodes‎ only to have the template spill its guts. I believe this is caused by the !! in the page's title and I cannot find a way to fix this issue other then to recode the template using HTML instead of WikiTable markup. --Farix (Talk) 18:09, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

I've updated the sandbox with a version that shouldn't cause problem as well as fix a couple of minor issues as well. --Farix (Talk) 01:07, 17 April 2009 (UTC)
 Done. Please let me know if anything unexpected happens. — Martin (MSGJ · talk) 12:36, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

Below and priority parameters broken

{{editprotected}} I've fixed a problem with |below= and |1= (see testcases) in the sandbox. Please sync. TIA. —Ms2ger (talk) 14:30, 1 May 2009 (UTC)

 Done Nice work. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 00:29, 2 May 2009 (UTC)
Thank you —Ms2ger (talk) 10:05, 2 May 2009 (UTC)

For some reason, neither of the classes plainlinksneverexpand and plainlinks2 are creating plainlinks on the editlinks at the top of the box. — Martin (MSGJ · talk) 21:27, 13 May 2009 (UTC)

Fixed. plainlinksneverexpand had been deprecated. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 22:18, 13 May 2009 (UTC)

template causes page to be included in Category:Wikipedia how-to

See User:Bfalexander for an example. That page begins with {{Post-it small}} and is categorized Wikipedia how-to. Nowiki the Post-it template and the category goes away. 69.106.253.194 (talk) 22:28, 31 May 2009 (UTC)

Fixed; the problem was with {{post-it small}}, not {{todo}}. Someone put categories for the template outside a noinclude section. —TKD [talk][c] 22:34, 31 May 2009 (UTC)
Thanks. I listed Todo as the problem as, to my less experienced eye, Post-it was a redirect.tooold (talk) 03:52, 1 June 2009 (UTC)
btw - "How-to" has a similar problem. Not sure if anyone is watching it; any chance you can fix that as well? Thanks 69.106.253.194 (talk) 07:22, 1 June 2009 (UTC)
I fixed it and responded on that template's talk page. Until I read your message there, it wasn't clear to me that there was a "similar problem". In {{how-to}}'s case, the problem was not that categories for the template itself were being applied to all pages that included it, but rather that we don't want user test pages or transclusions to be categorized in Category:Wikipedia how-to. —TKD [talk][c] 08:11, 1 June 2009 (UTC)

help

Is it possible to insert a "to do" list that does not say "to do" at the top? (because it's not for the purpose of a "to do" list, -- I just want to transclude content from another page)

Second, is it possible to have two of these boxes appear next to each other on the same row? The box on the left will show some wikitext, and the box on the right will show what that wikitext looks like when saved; so that someone can just copy the wikitext from the left if he likes what he sees on the right.

Thanks Agradman talk/contribs 05:53, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

Template Justification

This may not be the right place to ask... but I created this template for use on this task force page. I cannot get the template to center itself on the page - it stays left. When I add what I think is the right alignment code, it jumbles up the column on the target page. Extending the template's width to that of the target page's would be acceptable as well - I have been unsuccessful. Thanks. Andyo2000 (talk) 16:26, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

Removal of td template

{{editprotected}} Could the copy in the sandbox be copied over to live. The change is so that the {{td}} template is no longer used by this template as the code is now used directly. Thanks. -- WOSlinker (talk) 15:11, 1 August 2009 (UTC)

 Done —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 13:59, 4 August 2009 (UTC)

Class

{{editprotected}} Please sync with the sandbox. It uses a class (with the styling defined in MediaWiki:Common.css) rather than an inline style, which makes it easier to restyle it. TIA. —Ms2ger (talk) 18:49, 4 August 2009 (UTC)

 Done —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 23:57, 4 August 2009 (UTC)

headers

{{editprotected}} Please look at Talk:Heath v. Alabama and let me know why the "Goal" in the {{todo}} is not properly rendered. Thanks. 72.83.102.154 (talk) 18:36, 30 October 2009 (UTC)

My edits to the sandbox fix this. Could it please be synchronized? —Ms2ger (talk) 20:39, 30 October 2009 (UTC)
 Done —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 15:08, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

Preload

When /to_do list does not exist the template shows this preload: Template:Tasks/Preload. In Category:Wikipedia pages with to-do lists, unused you will find several examples. In my opinion it is confusing, wastes precious space within the talk page header and moreover it is not necessary. Proposal: an empty list (example) or a message like "The list is empty, click edit to add an item" are more appropriate. -- Basilicofresco (msg) 08:52, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

I updated Template:Todo/sandbox: when /to_do does not exist it shows the message "To-do list is empty: remove {{todo}} tag or click on edit add a item.", do you like it? -- Basilicofresco (msg) 09:09, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

Looks fine to me. I've also change the categorisation so that userpages are not added to Category:Wikipedia pages with to-do lists, unused. -- WOSlinker (talk) 13:56, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

{{editprotected}} Could the changes above which are in the sandbox be applied to live. Thanks. -- WOSlinker (talk) 13:58, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

 Done. Thanks, PeterSymonds (talk) 14:07, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

template seems to break on transcluded subpage

Resolved

Currently the template seems to break when being used on transcluded subpages. As an example I've left the pages User:Cat-five User:Cat-five/header (all my header info, transcluded into User:Cat-five), and User:Cat-five/header/to_do (the tasks subpage) as is.

To reproduce. If you go to User:Cat-five it will show that there are no tasks however if you go to User:Cat-five/header it will properly show the one item in the list. I've tried telling it specifically use the page but it appears to want a new list for each different transcluded version which is possible but which could cause any number of issues and is kludgy at best. Cat-five - talk 23:37, 4 June 2010 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure that this is because Todo uses the #rel2abs parser function, which locates the todo list relative to the calling page. when you call User:Cat-five/header directly, it works fine because rel2abs looks or the list page relative to /header. however, when you call the header from the main page, rel2abs looks for the list relative to your user page, and can't find it at User:Cat-five/todo. the way to resolve this, I think, is to use an absolute path - easiest would probably be |inner={{User:Cat-five/header/to_do}} though |list=User:Cat-five/header/to_do might work as well. --Ludwigs2 01:55, 5 June 2010 (UTC)
Thanks for the help. Just a few technical notes if anyone is interested, using inner as the parameter seems to cause all sorts of formatting glitches on both the header page and the main userpage. [3] is a good example if anyone's interested. setting the list parameter seems to work perfectly but I haven't admittedly tried very hard to find ways to break it. Cat-five - talk 17:48, 5 June 2010 (UTC)

Rephrase

{{edit protected}} Change the phrase "To-do list is empty: remove {{todo}} tag or click on edit add a item." to "To-do list is empty: remove {{todo}} tag or click on edit to add an item." --Bensin (talk) 10:46, 10 January 2011 (UTC)

 Fixed — Martin (MSGJ · talk) 17:33, 10 January 2011 (UTC)

Add the option to choose the color of the To-do list

Hey guys, I had to transclude and subst To-do template into a subpage of mine, what about adding a parameter color where it goes in the style section. style="border-collapse:separate; background:{{{colour}}};"

Thanks in advance. Eduemoni↑talk↓ 20:54, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

You can just use the following: |style=background:LightGoldenRodYellow; -- WOSlinker (talk) 21:13, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

Edit request 23Jan12

One minor update in sandbox to fix name of template. Thanks, --Funandtrvl (talk) 21:08, 23 January 2012 (UTC)

 Done. — Edokter (talk) — 22:32, 23 January 2012 (UTC)

Add

You should add the catalan interwiki, it's ca:Plantilla:Per fer. It would be useful.--KRLS (talk) 17:40, 6 July 2012 (UTC)

Can be added in onTemplate:To do/doc in the includeonly section at the end of the page. -- WOSlinker (talk) 20:56, 6 July 2012 (UTC)

Using this on another wiki?

Stupid question, and if anyone can point me to a good tutorial on how to do this, it would be great ... I work on a private wiki, as a side hobbyist sort of thing, and we're trying to use/import this template over there. I'm not, however, anywhere near a media wiki genius. We are using MediaWiki: 1.6.5, PHP: 5.2.17 (cgi), and MySQL: 5.0.95-community. Any pointers for a better place to ask the question would be appreciated.--Vidkun (talk) 15:13, 22 August 2012 (UTC)

I'll leave this question up, although I found my solution - http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Help:Templates#Copying_from_one_wiki_to_another --Vidkun (talk) 15:29, 22 August 2012 (UTC)
This Template also requires you to set $wgUseTidy = true; in your LocalSettings.php configuration. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.123.216.226 (talk) 22:24, 27 January 2013 (UTC)

Incorrectly Prefixes Include Page with Template Namespace but Edit Link is Correct

Resolved

AFAICT —Ms2ger (talk) 13:20, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

The edit link takes you to PAGE/to do, but the box tries to include Template:PAGE/to do. So when you use the edit link to fill in the box, it doesn't. - Keith D. Tyler 17:17, 28 June 2007 (UTC)

I seem to have the same problem as Keith D. Tyler with the template code I borrowed for use in my own wiki site. I haven't look for this problem on a wikipedia article - sorry. Simply using {{todo}} sometime gives a to-do list that has something like "Top-do list for Translations talk:Translation Guidelines:" as the title. In addition, the contents of the list has a link to "Template:Translations talk:Translation Guidelines/to do". However, the edit link still links to the correct page "Translations talk:Translation Guidelines/to do" which contains my Tasks. --Nathanhaigh 09:16, 7 November 2007 (UTC)

Not fixed for me. I see the exact issue described above. Any idea why the edit page and include pages go to different URLs? 74.123.216.226 (talk) 23:11, 27 January 2013 (UTC)

{{todo}} list outside of talk namespace

The template docs state that

Normally, the "/to do" subpage should only be created under the article's Talk page, unless it is a notice board or project page.

I just had a bit of an argument about this with User:Lova Falk, who created Personality psychology/to do, which seems to be in the wrong namespace. It's a redirect that I tried to CSD, but another editor removed the tag. Are to do lists in main space ok? QVVERTYVS (hm?) 19:51, 28 December 2013 (UTC)

As I told QVVERTYVS, I did not create that page, the template did... And the to-do list is also on Talk:Personality psychology... Lova Falk talk 19:56, 28 December 2013 (UTC)

Height

It would be nice if we could set the height, so that the text becomes scrollable once it becomes so large. Stevie is the man! Talk • Work 16:56, 27 July 2014 (UTC)

@Stevietheman: added to the sandbox as |height=3em. Frietjes (talk) 16:13, 28 July 2014 (UTC)
Thanks for the quick turnaround! I apologize for my lack of precision, but I intended to say max-height. I suppose this has more sensitivity to browser support, but I believe all recent versions of major browsers deal with it fine. Stevie is the man! Talk • Work 16:22, 28 July 2014 (UTC)
makes sense, added here. if there are no problems, I will add it to the main template. Frietjes (talk) 16:32, 28 July 2014 (UTC)
Thanks again. I just tested it in my user space, and it appears to work perfectly. Stevie is the man! Talk • Work 16:40, 28 July 2014 (UTC)
By the way, I recommend calling the param maxheight and saying it won't work on IE8 -- that's the only (kind of) recent version of a browser I know has a bug that prevents this from working. Stevie is the man! Talk • Work 16:44, 28 July 2014 (UTC)

Problem with lists in the inner argument

There is a problem with having lists in the inner argument. If one writes 

{{To do
|inner=
* List element 1
* List element 2
}}

the result becomes (the to do template has been substituted in this example)

which is incorrect behavior. However, if one instead encloses the inner argument in an HTML <span>: 

{{To do
|inner=<span>
* List element 1
* List element 2
</span>
}}

the result instead becomes (the to do template has been substituted in this example)

which is the correct behavior. The same incorrect behavior exists for numbered lists in the inner argument and has the same remedy. —Kri (talk) 09:01, 7 June 2012 (UTC)

To see the status of this issue, here is the same example again, but this time it has not been substituted:
—Kri (talk) 15:47, 7 July 2012 (UTC)
  • I've actually dealt with this problem quite a bit on another wiki. There are three possible solutions.
1. Change the following code:
    #if: {{{inner|}}} | | {{
      #ifexist: {{#rel2abs:{{{list|./to do}}}|{{{target|}}}}} | | {{#switch:{{NAMESPACE}}
  • To this code simply moving the placement of the linefeed in the template:
    #if: {{{inner|}}} | |
      {{#ifexist: {{#rel2abs:{{{list|./to do}}}|{{{target|}}}}} | | {{#switch:{{NAMESPACE}}
2. Change the same code :
    #if: {{{inner|}}} | | {{
      #ifexist: {{#rel2abs:{{{list|./to do}}}|{{{target|}}}}} | | {{#switch:{{NAMESPACE}}
  • To include a line break inside the template:
    #if: {{{inner|}}} | | <br />{{
      #ifexist: {{#rel2abs:{{{list|./to do}}}|{{{target|}}}}} | | {{#switch:{{NAMESPACE}}
3. Change a larger chunk of code :
<includeonly>{{
  #ifeq: {{{nocats}}} | yes | | {{{category|[[Category:Wikipedia pages with to-do lists|{{PAGENAME}}]]}}}{{
    #if: {{{inner|}}} | | {{
      #ifexist: {{#rel2abs:{{{list|./to do}}}|{{{target|}}}}} | | {{#switch:{{NAMESPACE}}
       |{{ns:2}}
       |{{ns:3}}=
       |#default=[[Category:Wikipedia pages with to-do lists, unused]]
       }}
    }}
  }}
}}</includeonly>
  • To include a span wrapper inside the template:
<includeonly>{{
  #ifeq: {{{nocats}}} | yes | | {{{category|[[Category:Wikipedia pages with to-do lists|{{PAGENAME}}]]}}}{{
    #if: {{{inner|}}} | | <span>{{
      #ifexist: {{#rel2abs:{{{list|./to do}}}|{{{target|}}}}} | | {{#switch:{{NAMESPACE}}
       |{{ns:2}}
       |{{ns:3}}=
       |#default=[[Category:Wikipedia pages with to-do lists, unused]]
       }}
    }}</span>
  }}
}}</includeonly>

Template-protected edit request on 10 December 2014

Please update this template using the changes in the sandbox to make the template code easier to read and be HTML5 compliant. Thank you. — {{U|Technical 13}} (e • t • c) 19:39, 10 December 2014 (UTC)

 Done. ☠ Jaguar ☠ 19:16, 14 December 2014 (UTC)

Blank to-do list

If the to-do list is empty, then should the template just not display or should it say something like "There are no active tasks for this page"? At the moment it displays an empty box which looks a bit silly — Martin (MSGJ · talk) 12:49, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

either option would work for me. would be easy to add 'display:none' to the outer table. Frietjes (talk) 17:05, 22 October 2015 (UTC)
That would make it impossible to add tasks, as the edit link will disappear. -- [[User:Edokter]] {{talk}} 17:31, 22 October 2015 (UTC)
okay, then "There are no active tasks for this page" Frietjes (talk) 17:44, 22 October 2015 (UTC)
So. When the To-do list is empty on an article talk page...but the to-do sub-page still exists, what is the proper procedure? Can I just delete the template from the main talk? Does "There are no active tasks for this page" exist as a result-parameter? (See Talk:Assassination of Abraham Lincoln/to do and Talk:Assassination of Abraham Lincoln. Thanks, Shearonink (talk) 06:33, 27 January 2017 (UTC)
Shearonink, now added to template:tasks. Frietjes (talk) 16:10, 27 January 2017 (UTC)

For parameter not operative when "small=yes" set

I've tried to set the for parameter but it doesn't work at all when the to do list is set to be small. Stevie is the man! Talk • Work 16:18, 21 August 2016 (UTC)

Could you provide some more details? Where do you use it? On Wikipedia and which one? What output do you get, can you show a screenshot? --Escalator~enwikibooks (talk) 11:01, 22 August 2016 (UTC)
Check out the first todo list on the page WP:Loutasks. Stevie is the man! Talk • Work 11:55, 22 August 2016 (UTC)

This issue still exists, so can anyone please look at it? Like I said above, it's the first todo list on WP:Loutasks.

Here's what to look for: {{to do|list=Wikipedia:WikiProject Louisville/to do|for=WikiProject Louisville (Tasks at a Glance)|small=yes|maxheight=300px}}

If you remove "|small=yes", the for parameter works. Stevie is the man! Talk • Work 11:47, 28 April 2017 (UTC)

for= parameter

Hello. I unsuccessfully tried to as a test use for= to transclude the todo-list of another page/project. The test is in my sandbox here. I tried with various case, with underlines, with links... Perhaps this is not supposed to work, or is broken? Thanks, —░]PaleoNeonate█ ⏎ ?ERROR░ 11:29, 28 April 2017 (UTC)

@PaleoNeonate: you will have to set the list parameter, like in my example in the previous thread -- that is what transcludes the todo list. for relates to how you title it. Stevie is the man! Talk • Work 11:52, 28 April 2017 (UTC)
Thanks, I have just discovered this from the above-example, and successfully made my test work. Super! —░]PaleoNeonate█ ⏎ ?ERROR░ 11:55, 28 April 2017 (UTC)

nocats defaults to "yes"?

@Train2104:

Since Special:Diff/789301802 assumably, no categorization occurs into Category:Wikipedia pages with to-do lists unless |nocats=no is explicitly given.

The documentation makes me want to believe it was intended to add categorization by default, with opt-out using |nocats=yes. Oddly enough, /testcases page has the category in it.

Can this be changed (back) to adding categorization by default, with opt-out mechanism? 2001:2003:54FA:D2:0:0:0:1 (talk) 09:57, 13 July 2017 (UTC); edited 10:03, 13 July 2017 (UTC)

It seems like /testcases had a cached page with the category in it. I purged the page and now the categorization is gone there too. 2001:2003:54FA:D2:0:0:0:1 (talk) 10:07, 13 July 2017 (UTC); edited 10:15, 13 July 2017 (UTC)

To clarify the issue: This template has 7724 transclusions from pages, but only 148 pages are in the category. I checked few of those 148 pages and they all seem to be from Template:Tasks or manually inserted. 2001:2003:54FA:D2:0:0:0:1 (talk) 10:18, 13 July 2017 (UTC)

Template source not showing correctly

Just a minor issue: when you try to import this template onto another wiki, some tr and td tags are in the source (caused by $wgUseTidy) instead of the wiki markup. The template won´t work in such way, as tr/td tags are forbidden by default. [4] I would say a note about this issue somewhere on doc page would be helpful for other users. 

{| class="{{Talk other|demospace={{{demospace|}}}|tmbox tmbox-notice|ombox ombox-notice}} {{#ifeq:{{{small|}}}|yes|mbox-small}} {{#ifeq:{{{collapsed|}}}|yes|collapsible collapsed}} t-todo" style="border-collapse: separate; border-spacing: 4px; {{{style|}}}"
<tr><th class="mbox-text" style="text-align: left; padding: 1px;">{{
  #if: {{{inner|}}}
[...]
  #ifeq: {{#ifeq:{{{smallfor|}}}|yes|no|{{{small|}}}}}|yes||&#32;for {{{for|[[:{{{target|{{SUBJECTPAGENAME}}}}}]]}}}
}}:</th><td class="mbox-empty-cell"></td></tr>{{
  #if: {{{above|}}} | <tr class="todo-abovebelow"><td colspan="2">{{{above}}}</td></tr>
}}
|-
The above note was added in 2015 by User:Escalatr. Now in 2018 I'm seeing the same issue but this seems to apply to all templates loaded from this site. At first I though I had to HTML-encode everything, so all the <tr tags needed to be &lt;tr. But then the template pushed raw HTML into content. It occurred to me that the template code wasn't being parsed. And that's because for my new installation I had not activated a parser. So with it built-in to WM v1.30.0, the following in LocalSettings fixed it all up:
wfLoadExtension( 'ParserFunctions' );
Summary: You need to load the ParserFunctions extension to use Templates. Why isn't this documented? Or am I missing something? --GravaT (talk) 22:27, 26 March 2018 (UTC)

Proposal: don't default to preloading with {{tasks}}

Unless the parameter nopreload is explicitly set to yes, then a newly created todo list is preloaded with a blank {{tasks}} template. As a first-time todo user, I was confused about how to proceed from here. A few issues that contributed to my confusion/dissatisfaction:

  • The template docs for {{to do}} don't mention {{tasks}} (other than a link provided under "See also" at the bottom without explanation). All the examples shown at {{to do}} use 'vanilla' formatting, rather than {{tasks}}.
  • I found the meaning of the many parameters for {{tasks}} (requests, assess, category, citations, fac, far, flc, fsc, gan, gar...) were not self-explanatory. The preloaded template didn't include any placeholder values or html comments hinting at how to use the parameters. The documentation at the {{tasks}} page is also not great.
  • I was trying to create a todo list for an article, as described at the WP:TODO information page. But I eventually came to the understanding that most of the fields of {{tasks}} are intended for WikiProjects, not individual pages. e.g. the requests field, which is supposed to relate to article requests.

Here's a comment from another editor in 2016 who shared my frustration.

I've reviewed a random sample of pages in Category:Wikipedia pages with to-do lists. Of articles that use to-do lists (not counting articles that are in this category because of a WikiProject banner that transcludes the project todo list), it seems like the majority do not use {{tasks}}. (Talk:Aloha shirt is one of the few examples I could find that did, and it's interesting to note that editor misunderstood the "requests" field, using it to mention a request for new photos).

I'd like to propose no longer defaulting this preload behaviour on. I imagine that most users of this template are applying it to talk pages for mainspace articles, not WikiProjects. And as I've outlined above, I think {{tasks}} preloading is more confusing than helpful for articles.

Various implementation options include:

  1. only preload if nopreload is explicitly set to no
  2. deprecate nopreload and add a preload with opposite semantics which defaults to no
  3. get rid of preloading behaviour altogether

I would be fine with any of these options. Colin M (talk) 21:20, 26 March 2019 (UTC)

Proposed changes to {{refideas}}

There is a proposal to change the behavior of {{refideas}} to make the content collapsible. Interested editors are invited to give feedback on the talk page. Wugapodes [thɑk] [ˈkan.ˌʧɹɪbz] 17:58, 7 June 2019 (UTC)

Removal instructions

The documentation should specify HOW to remove this, or editors will simply remove the template (and leave the subpage). CapnZapp (talk) 14:29, 7 July 2020 (UTC)

Date of last update

A lot of uses of this template have fallen out of date. I think it would be useful to add a date of last update default parameter, kinda like what I put at the list for WP:VIT. Thoughts? {{u|Sdkb}} talk 00:07, 27 May 2020 (UTC)

Wait, I realized that using <small>(Last updated {{REVISIONDAY}} {{REVISIONMONTHNAME}} {{REVISIONYEAR}})</small> gives the revision date for the talk page, not the to do list page, when transcluded. Is there another technical solution to this? {{u|Sdkb}} talk 10:24, 16 August 2020 (UTC)
I have added the LMD to the sandbox version -- see the testcases and let me know what you think. — GhostInTheMachine talk to me 17:21, 16 August 2020 (UTC)
GhostInTheMachine, following up for the technical pump, looks like there are no objections, so we're good to implement. {{u|Sdkb}} talk 22:38, 8 September 2020 (UTC)
I am too lowly to make the change myself. — GhostInTheMachine talk to me 09:04, 9 September 2020 (UTC)
First, the normal way to submit an edit request is to attempt to edit the template and follow the instructions. That obviates the need to post to VPT in search of "grown-ups".
Second, in my browser, the collapsed small version wraps the word "To-do", putting "To-" on one line and "do:" on the next line. That is awkward. I think you might have to move the date to the first line of the body (or is a two-line header possible in a collapsed setup?). – Jonesey95 (talk) 15:56, 9 September 2020 (UTC)
I put in a line break before the updated date, and I was sure it wouldn't work with collapsing, but it appears to work fine. What do you think? – Jonesey95 (talk) 15:59, 9 September 2020 (UTC)
I think that I would keep it in one line for large and do the wrap only for a small box. — GhostInTheMachine talk to me 19:53, 9 September 2020 (UTC)
I like that. Take a look at the collapsed cases at Template:To do/testcases now. – Jonesey95 (talk) 21:56, 9 September 2020 (UTC)
Would you like to edit the sandbox to experiment with the changes that you envision? You did a good job with the first batch, and you probably know what you want better than I do. – Jonesey95 (talk) 01:07, 10 September 2020 (UTC)
  • I don't think this needs to be on by default. To-do lists tend to not be time-bound and it won't matter for most cases whether the list has been edited recently or years ago as long as the items are still relevant. I am no longer watching this pageping if you'd like a response czar 22:48, 30 September 2020 (UTC)
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