Forum:Wikianswers Widget

I found out quite by accident that we now have a WikiAnswers widget on our sidebar that all anons see by default. Judging from the questions generated on WikiAnswers, most readers use this like a search box - which means I need to divert my time form my wiki to answer the questions by directing the readers back to our own wiki. Most of the time, the "search terms" are even spelled correctly, and the only benefit this has for us is to pinpoint where we need to add redirects to make up for MediaWiki's shortcomings in recognizing different capitalizations of an article title.

At worst, Wikia is stealing our readers; at best, it makes needless work for us. Why? To recreate a list of Special:Mostvisitedpages in a variety of spellings on another wiki that links back to us? -- ◄mendel► 18:16, 10 June 2009 (UTC)

WikiAnswers
I apologize for any inconvenience caused by the rephrasing option in our wiki (WikiAnswers). I do want you to understand that any user can rephrase a question, and then answer it. The admin can do their best to help in this situation, but at the same time cannot guarantee that all your users will be redirected back to you due to the other users rephrasing questions, or changing "improving" the answers. I don't know yet if the staff will have a correct solution to this.

I will definitely consult with Angela immediately about the best way to solve this situation. I apologize again for any inconvenience this may have caused you, I do my job as an admin as I was trained. Will comply with any changes as they become available.

UPDATE: A definite re-direct can not be guaranteed either, unless the question is protected. I am not sure what makes a question qualify for the "protect" feature. Again Angela is perhaps the best to answer this. --Molokaicreeper 19:15, 10 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Molokaicreeper refers to this issue. -- ◄mendel► 20:54, 10 June 2009 (UTC)


 * Questions asked in the answer box open in a new window, so there's no chance of the project "stealing readers". If someone asks a question that isn't phrased as a question, that will be reworded into a question to make the answers project more useful and to help people that are searching for an answer to that question in google. If you don't want a particular question to display in the widget on a wiki, simply remove the category "your wiki name" from the question. Angela (talk) 21:59, 10 June 2009 (UTC)
 * You don't get it. These questions were never meant as questions. You are making WikiAnswers into a collection of questions that nobody intended to ask, and deceive our readers into thinking they have used our wiki search. This is madness. -- ◄mendel► 23:19, 10 June 2009 (UTC)
 * The Wikianswers widget on GuildWiki is place so close to the wiki search box that people accidentally ask questions when searching for a wiki page. &mdash; [[Image:BalisticSig.png]] 23:59, 10 June 2009 (UTC)
 * I didn't notice the widget until now since I was using Monobook. Yes, most users are asking questions specific to the wiki the question has been ask on. And no, I won't waste my time at WikiAnswers to answer those questions. Also, I'm sure the users asking the question are expecting a magic answer to pop up in seconds. --Michaeldsuarez (Talk) (Deeds) 00:32, 11 June 2009 (UTC)
 * PS: Why is everyone searching in the form of a question? We don't have semantic search engines. The searching tools here don't understand what "who", "what", "when", "where", "how", and "why" mean. --Michaeldsuarez (Talk) (Deeds) 00:32, 11 June 2009 (UTC)
 * That's how we recognize that these users think of this as a search box: they're mostly NOT using the widget for questions. Have a look:
 * [[File:Search_guildwiki.png]]
 * [[File:Wikianswers.png]]
 * They're separated by a lot of space, if you scroll the page just a bit you won't see the search box, but the widget. And actually it is more noticeable than our search box. Would you think that it leads you offsite before you've used it? At least the corner ads that were used previously didn't mislead like that. -- ◄mendel► 01:53, 11 June 2009 (UTC)
 * They're separated by a lot of space, if you scroll the page just a bit you won't see the search box, but the widget. And actually it is more noticeable than our search box. Would you think that it leads you offsite before you've used it? At least the corner ads that were used previously didn't mislead like that. -- ◄mendel► 01:53, 11 June 2009 (UTC)

I agree that the widget is causing a great deal of confusion. The widget should at least make it more obvious that it is not actually part of the wiki it is shown on, because even I got confused for a second when I logged out and saw this great big widget with questions related to the wiki topic being shown on them. I probably wouldn't agree with removing the widget entirely, but I'd definitely like the widget's actual purpose to be made far more conspicuous. Wjxhuang, the 888th Avatar  {Talk} 14:27, 11 June 2009 (UTC) It seems Wikia changed the widget design to set it apart better. This is a step in the right direction. -- ◄mendel► 22:49, 11 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Weird, i still see the gey area at top of it and the search box at bottom (on Central). — TulipVorlax 00:46, 12 June 2009 (UTC)
 * I think if a wiki uses CSS to customize the look of its widgets, the Wikianswers widget could look like a "local" widget, and it would require special rules to make it look properly branded again. This might be the reason why ours looks like the screenshot I posted first. -- ◄mendel► 08:58, 12 June 2009 (UTC)


 * Actually, this is how i see it, Wikia-wide, even after reload of CSS :
 * http://img81.imageshack.us/img81/7131/12062009052137.jpg
 * I know GuildWiki's one is altered to fit the custom skin, that was not what i was asking about. — TulipVorlax 09:24, 12 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Judging by the picture it looks like the English widget is showing for you. For the widget to work well, you need to choose your language (in this case is French).  My widget in Spanish is working great.  If this is not the problem then rest assured if you let Angela or Zuirdj know, they can fix it.--Molokaicreeper 10:36, 12 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Are you talking about the global prefs setting ? If so, it always was french, since the creation of the account (more than 2 years ago). Look in next section to see why some strings are still in english. — TulipVorlax 14:20, 12 June 2009 (UTC)

New : support of other languages than english
People are complaining above about that widget been use as a search box but on my part, if i would have complained about something earlier, would have said that on a french wiki (or for a french user) the widget was only sending us the english Wikianswers.

But this is not the case anymore. So it's great now. Thanks. — TulipVorlax 11:11, 11 June 2009 (UTC)


 * Except for links in the grey header that are still for the english wiki. — TulipVorlax 11:13, 11 June 2009 (UTC)


 * These can be translated. See w:c:answers:MediaWiki:Answers widget anon note, w:c:answers:MediaWiki:Answers widget admin note, and w:c:answers:MediaWiki:Answers widget user note. If you send me the translations, I can add them to w:c:messaging. Angela (talk) 13:34, 11 June 2009 (UTC)

 Wikianswers recherche de nouveaux administrateurs. Voir les détails.  (Bold italic part in the link; i'm not sure of what to put.)
 * I'm not sure that MediaWiki:Answers widget admin note should be translated since it ask for admins for the english wiki. Or, if we translate it, maybe the link should not change ?
 * Anyway, here all three of them :
 * MediaWiki:Answers widget admin note :
 * MediaWiki:Answers widget anon note :


 * MediaWiki:Answers widget admin note :


 * — TulipVorlax 01:35, 12 June 2009 (UTC)