UESPWiki:Archive/CP Hidden Categories

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Hidden Categories

One feature that the MediaWiki added is "Hidden Categories".

I'm sure most people reading this will be familiar with the Category system that we use. It has its problems because of the organic way in which the site has grown, but basically it works well. With the later releases of MediaWiki, there is a __HIDDENCAT__ magic word that can be used to hide meta-information from users (unless they really want to see it). This page gives you the basic information, and this page from Wikipedia shows you how much the facility is used over there. The effect of adding this word to a category is that users only see it if they have ticked the "Show hidden categories" option in their preferences.

The key here is, in WP's words, "the categories that should appear here are the maintenance categories, that is, categories reflecting the present status of the encyclopedia article, rather than classifying the article subject." I propose that we use the same kind of template WP does to hide the same kind of categories for the same reasons. Every category in Needs Maintenance (and sub-cats) would get it, and project-related categories like the ones for the OBNPCRP would also have the magic word added. The effect would be to hide admin- and project-related information from the 95% of users who don't care about it.

My reason for suggesting this is that some pages have lots and lots of admin-related categories. This is mainly my fault for wanting the OBNPCRP to be as granular as possible, but even without that, there are stub pages also marked as incomplete and requiring verification. The profusion of categories hides - or at least - camouflages potentially useful information. If anybody is genuinely interested, they can always show the hidden categories by ticking a box in their preferences.

Does anybody have any objections or suggestions? rpeh •T•C•E• 21:38, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

Sounds like a great idea! ? Joram?Talk 22:21, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

I used to be neutral about this, but lately I've been convinced this will be a good idea. The OBNPCRP categories spring to mind as excellent examples on why it may be useful to hide the meta categories. The option that you can choose yourself whether you wish to see the hidden categories is what convinces me this won't be a bother for the editors actually needing those categories. --Timenn-<talk> 14:31, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

Sounds good to me. The category box (especially on NPC pages) is overwhelming and it is a great idea to hide them - with the option to make them visible if necessary. --Krusty 17:02, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

It's all been said, and it makes sense to me. Any editor interested enough in those types of categories can just tick the box in preferences. --GK^talk2me 19:13, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

Okay, for the moment I've added it (via new template {{Hiddencat}}) to the OBNPCRP categories so people can see how it works. For the rest, I'll wait a week from my original post. rpeh •T•C•E• 20:38, 23 January 2010 (UTC)

All done. There were rather more of those than I realised... rpeh •T•C•E• 13:02, 3 February 2010 (UTC)

Maybe it's just me, but the text is shoved up to the very top of the box (the hiddencat template). Anyone know why? --GK^talk2me 22:11, 23 January 2010 (UTC)

It was a Firefox issue. Chrome, Opera, and IE all vertically centered the text, Firefox didn't. Should be fixed now. ? Joram?Talk 23:48, 23 January 2010 (UTC)