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Template-protected edit request on 6 January 2026

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Some article’s talk pages have one reference idea, so it should say The following reference(s) may be useful when improving this article in the future: ~2026-11754-9 (talk) 19:00, 6 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]

 Completed. P.I. Ellsworth , ed. – welcome! – 04:50, 8 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]

Option for yellow background color, or side tabs, of collapsed banner

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See Talk:Killing of Renee Good#Article currently has nothing on the relevant DHS and ICE deadly force and safety policies and its subsection: Talk:Killing of Renee Good#Template:Refideas. Name of subsection may change. From that discussion, and adapted:

This is the first time I have heard of this template: Template:Refideas. Or seen it. It is at the end of a wall of banners at the top of this talk page. Which I routinely ignore since I thought I had seen everything before. I doubt many people regularly scroll through that wall and notice it for the first time. It is not on a lot of talk pages, relatively speaking. Or if they do know of the template, I doubt many people regularly look through every wall of banners on every talk page to see if it has popped up.

I know it can be collapsed. I think that would be a good idea, and then put it above all the other banners since it is the only continually useful banner there. But for people to notice it, the background color of the collapsed banner, or part of it, needs to be yellow. It needs to be a parameter of the template, not the div I scratched together below. It only has example links. It works in light and dark mode.

At the linked talk page this banner says: "Reference ideas for Killing of Renee Good".

Just the collapsed banner itself needs to be yellow, without the side extensions. My div could work for now though. I put it at the top in this version of the talk page.

A parameter for a yellow background color of the collapsed banner would help people notice it. No matter where it is placed in the talk page banner stack. It needs to work in light and dark mode of course. Which may require !important or something else. I am not an expert at this stuff. --Timeshifter (talk) 15:09, 12 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]

The banner uses standard colours which were agreed upon some time before I started (May 2009). This is for consistency; at one time each talk page banner had its own colour scheme, often wildly different. The colours are now defined by Module:Message box/tmbox.css. A year or two ago, there was a discussion on the talk page of a different banner requesting a change to the colour scheme there. It was rejected. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 14:02, 13 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
@Redrose64: Thanks for the info. Which banner are you referring to? I want to read the discussion.
Maybe there should be an exception to the rule in this case. Due to the timeliness of this banner. So I need to see why the other banner request was rejected.
Just putting this banner at the top without a color change may not get it noticed.
Maybe the banner itself can be the same color, but have a parameter that adds the yellow side tabs. I may have accidentally come up with the best solution. It was not my intent to add the yellow side tabs. I was just experimenting with div colors.
Someone with a lot more experience than me needs to remove the red text from the show/hide banner, and its contents. I added that just to make it readable in light and dark mode. The original banner code is fine. But combining all the code is beyond my skill.
Someone with skills should be able to create a parameter to add just the yellow side tabs.
Better yet would be to make the yellow side tabs the default. So that people are more likely to notice the suggested reference links no matter where the banner is placed (anywhere in the stack of banners).
A note could be added inside at the top of the text saying that this banner should be added to the top of the banner stack.
In dark mode the banner is the same color (or close) as the other banners. So it is only the yellow side tabs that make certain that people notice it. That is assuming we get rid of the red text. --Timeshifter (talk) 15:02, 13 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
As I said elsewhere, it follows similar formatting style to Template:Tmbox. CNC (talk) 15:17, 13 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Have you read this thread? You are repeating info that has already been said. --Timeshifter (talk) 17:22, 13 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
For your questions, it wasn't just one banner, but all of them. Each banner had their own style. If you want to read the discussions, then see WP:TS which was created in 2007. --Super Goku V (talk) 05:59, 14 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]

New point. WP:TALKORDER does not say this banner has to be near the bottom of the talk banners. It says: "The order in which they are most often presented is listed below. This is not a prescriptive list". People who edit the article may not notice the edit notice in the edit window, or are too busy editing to follow the link. And many people come to the talk page before doing any editing. So how are they to know of the suggested references? And people who happen to see the edit notice, and not follow it right away, may look for it on the talk page, but not know what they are looking for, or where to look for it. It sounds like it is sending you to a talk topic section. --Timeshifter (talk) 17:41, 13 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]

Right sorry, I didn't check Module:Message box/tmbox.css as I'm not a coder, so didn't expect to understand that reference. I can now see what it was obviously referring to. I don't want to argue about talk order here, only to say it's not considered high-importance so don't be surprised if someone else moves it down as a force of habit (based on where it usually lives). It would also be better discussed at Wikipedia talk:Talk page layout rather than here. CNC (talk) 17:46, 13 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
We can start here since we are more knowledgeable about this template. Then to Wikipedia talk:Talk page layout.
I noticed someone added this after the Refideas template right after I moved it to the top:
{{bots|deny=AWB}}<!-- to prevent reordering in line with [[WP:TPL]] -->
WP:TPL is Wikipedia:Talk page layout. AWB is AutoWikiBrowser, which can reorder banners.
I wonder if that AWB denial can be built in to the Refideas template to keep it from being moved around. If not, then that is another reason to add yellow side tabs so the suggested references are more likely to be noticed if the Refideas banner is buried near the bottom of the banners.
Banner fatigue is real, and many people will not like an open noncollapsed banner anywhere in the banner pile. I think it should be closed by default. That is more reason to use something like the yellow tabs. --Timeshifter (talk) 18:00, 13 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
What is your argument, that reference lists are more important than contentious topic restrictions and BLP policy? As like most I would disagree that. AWB explains why it get's moved then. CNC (talk) 18:19, 13 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
People are used to seeing those banners. But suggested references need to dealt with soon. And people need to know where to add those suggested references. This is another reason to use the yellow side tabs, or something, so people easily know where to add those suggested references. And also because it is obvious the banner could end up anywhere in the banner pile. --Timeshifter (talk) 18:25, 13 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]

Comments. At Talk:Killing of Renee Good. Well, it is back down at the bottom of the banner stack where it will probably be missed by most people. Oh well, I tried. If people want this banner to be more noticed and used, then it needs to be made more noticeable so more people can use it. It's not rocket science. It's basic web GUI stuff. Because Wikipedia operates largely by the herd instinct, it will usually end up at the bottom of the talk banner pile. It needs to be flagged with the yellow sidebars, or something.

I think most people go the talk page via the watchlist. That means one arrives at the top of the talk page, and goes either to the table of contents (via the side link in Vector 2022), or scrolls down if new to the talk page. Or if patient enough to scroll. But I doubt many people notice the references banner when scrolling since most of us have banner fatigue, and already have seen the banners before. And the references banner only shows up occasionally on talk pages. So it is easy to miss since there is nothing distinctive or noticeable about it. Easy to scroll by it, and miss it. --Timeshifter (talk) 11:57, 15 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]

See the box that begins "The following ...".

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See the box that begins "The following ...".

The above is from the edit notice one sees upon opening the edit window in an article using this template.

The edit notice sends you to the talk page. On my talk page the references banner is covered up by a dropdown title (in Vector 2022).

On many talk pages the suggested references list will be in a closed box. "The following" is seen only when the box is open.

It might be better to have the edit notice tell people to search for "Reference ideas for ...". That is in the title of the open or closed box. --Timeshifter (talk) 18:52, 15 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]

Always provide a link when describing or reporting an issue. When I go to Talk:Ambiguity, I see a box that begins "The following ...", and I do not see "Reference ideas for ...". – Jonesey95 (talk) 20:21, 15 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Oops. I assumed that what I was seeing when I manually opened the closed box on a talk page was what I would see when the box was open by default. See here:
Talk:Killing of Renee Good
I removed the edit request.
Here is the open and closed banner:
--Timeshifter (talk) 22:39, 15 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Maybe, like many/most(?) collapsed sections, both the open and closed templates should have the same top-line text: "The following reference(s) may be useful when improving this article in the future:". The collapsed template could add something like "(click [show] for details)". – Jonesey95 (talk) 23:11, 15 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
@Jonesey95: Those sound like good ideas. --Timeshifter (talk) 20:29, 16 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]

Edit request for implementing ideas of Jonesey95:

--Timeshifter (talk) 13:53, 18 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]

 Done. The new header text is a bit awkward. Reasonable edits that still keep the start as "The following ..." are welcome. – Jonesey95 (talk) 14:27, 18 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks Jonesey95. I give you blanket permission to make it better. :) --Timeshifter (talk) 16:27, 18 January 2026 (UTC)[reply]

Edit request 1 February 2026

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Description of suggested change: Add |alt=icon to the icon, because linked images need alt text – per MOS:ALT.


Diff:

−
[[File:Nuvola apps package editors.png|50px]]
+
[[File:Nuvola apps package editors.

{{Lemondoge|Talk|Contributions}} 15:46, 1 February 2026 (UTC)[reply]

 Done. ~ Jenson (SilverLocust 💬) 19:42, 1 February 2026 (UTC)[reply]

Statistics and observations on template use

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I wrote a quick script to help better understand how this template is being used on English Wikipedia by randomly sampling just over 1% of the pages that use this template, with the results below. It did seem like video games and pop culture were more likely to use this template, and the data seems to bear that out. Happy to re-reun this with other parameters or modify the script to find more insights. Code for this can be found on github here:

- Fuzheado | Talk 12:21, 23 March 2026 (UTC)[reply] 

Total articles analyzed: 380
Total reference entries: 1,395
Average refs per article: 3.7
Template errors found: 54

--- Reference Type Distribution ---
  url                   :   724 ( 51.9%)
  archive               :   362 ( 25.9%)
  citation_template    :   218 ( 15.6%)
  news_organization   :    25 (  1.8%)
  other                :    20 (  1.4%)
  book                 :    14 (  1.0%)
  social_media         :    13 (  0.9%)
  wiki_article         :    13 (  0.9%)
  academic_journal     :     5 (  0.4%)
  government           :     1 (  0.1%)

--- Top 20 Domains (from URLs) ---
  punknews.org               :    47   (music/punk rock news)
  allmusic.com              :    28   (music reviews)
  thegazette.news           :    20   (newspaper)
  articles.mcall.com        :    18   (Allentown Morning Call)
  altpress.com               :    16   (alternative press)
  mmegi.bw                  :    14   (Botswana newspaper)
  mtv.com                   :    11   (music/entertainment)
  books.google.co.uk        :    10   (Google Books UK)
  polygon.com               :     9   (gaming)
  sundaystandard.info       :     9   (Botswana newspaper)
  ign.com                   :     8   (gaming)
  sportskeeda.com           :     8   (sports)
  exclaim.ca                :     7   (Canadian music)
  timeextension.com        :     7   (retro gaming)
  laut.de                   :     7   (German music)
  ftbl.com.au               :     7   (Australian football)
  snl24.com                 :     7   (news)
  newspapers.com            :     6   (newspaper archives)
  gamespot.com              :     6   (gaming)
  kotaku.com                :     6   (gaming)

--- Top 20 Article Topics ---
  Culture.Media.Media*            :    81
  Culture.Media.Music              :    66
  Culture.Internet_culture         :    54
  Culture.Media.Video_Games        :    44
  Culture.Sports                   :    19
  Culture.Biography.Biography*     :    18
  Culture.Literature               :    13
  STEM.STEM*                       :     9
  Geography.Regions.Americas.North_America:     8
  Culture.Visual_arts.Comics_and_Anime         :     7
  Culture.Visual_arts.Visual_arts*             :     5
  Geography.Regions.Europe.Europe*              :     5
  Geography.Regions.Asia.East_Asia              :     5
  Geography.Regions.Asia.Southeast_Asia          :     4
  Geography.Regions.Oceania                      :     4
  History_and_Society.Politics_and_government     :     3
  Culture.Media.Television                       :     3
  STEM.Biology                                   :     3
  Geography.Regions.Asia.West_Asia               :     2
  Culture.Philosophy_and_religion                :     2

Fuzheado | Talk 12:21, 23 March 2026 (UTC)[reply]

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