Problem: At the moment, it is not possible to have feedback from a majority of people, because:
they are not following community discussions boards
go to a given page is an effort, and everyone can have very good reasons not to express how they feel about something
there is no way to collect their opinion in a given context
Some examples :
to leave feedback about a feature you have to be experienced. Users/readers have to understand the structure of the whole wiki to try to search for a page where they can leave some feedback (find it is not guaranteed).
help pages maintainers do their best to write Help pages (so as Editors on pages). But they don't know if those pages are useful for their audience, unless if someone understands there is a Talk tab and leave a message there (hint: it never happens).
...
Who would benefit: Anyone, because the cases are multiple:
People who don't know they can express their opinion about something or help improving it.
People improving stuff, to get direct input about something very specific, on a given context.
Help pages writers to create better pages and people looking for more information, to give feedback about the page they are reading and then benefit about that improvement.
Developers and users for an easier feedback about a given feature.
Editors who want to know if a part of the page they are working on is easy to understand.
...
Proposed solution:
Have a way for anyone to be surveyed about something specific. It can be to say if they have found what they were expecting, how they feel about a given feature...
It is just a yes/no question. This is the case for some on line documentation, like on Google help pages where you can say if you have found the page helpful. In the case there is a minority of no, a link should be added to point to a topic where people can explain what they were expecting.
More comments:
That task was first drafted as "have a way to know if people find what they are looking for on Help pages" but has been extended a but to have that yes/no solution as an unified practice
Some people may recall the Article feedback tool. That tool was very useful to collect feedback on help pages. That extension was not perfect, the wording used was prompting people to deliver unuseful feedback, and its focus was on articles. Removing comments curation would simplify the task a lot.
This would be super useful but also a lot of work. I imagine the controls would end up of similar complexity to CentralAuth, except that you'd also have to collect/display results. Not really a wishlist level thing IMO. --Tgr (talk) 07:36, 28 November 2017 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Tgr, it can also be simpler, with a script called by a template, to leave opinions and comments on a sub-page. Maybe like the Support button used on this page, but as an extension. Trizekfrom FR 10:00, 28 November 2017 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Salut Trizek, Ça fait un temps que je me dis qu'il faudrait un outil simple permettant d'obtenir du feedback des lecteurs. En effet, la plupart d'entre-eux ne connaissent pas la page de discussion des articles et ne savent pas comment y intervenir. Cependant, comme souligné dans les votes ci-bas, l'article feedback a été un retentissant échec à ce niveau. En quoi penses-tu que l'initiative que tu proposes aura un meilleur succès ? Simon Villeneuve 15:48, 29 November 2017 (UTC)
Salut Simon, je pense qu'un outil plus simple, avec un usage non-systématique et ponctuel aidera a collecter des retours plus pertinents. Également, comme noté plus bas, la manière dont les choses étaient formulées a amené à pas mal de retours inutiles. Bref, un système auquel on répond par oui/non sera a mon avis utile et gagnant. Trizekfrom FR 20:53, 30 November 2017 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Very good tool to have, indeed. Two comments-suggestions. •(1) As a user, I am always pleased to give my opinion, especially in a quick and easy manner. And therefore, I find a yes-no question proposition, a clever feature... as long as I am to reply "yes"; if it's a "no" for me, I feel frustrated if I can't explain my disproval or disagreement, since there are so many ways to not be "aligned" with a given solution (the one stated by the question) and only one to agree (welcome in our Ā-world (null-A)). This means I can't really participate to correction or improvment, and I feel this "no" like a useless "bark" ; simply adding the possibility to add a (discrete) link toward a discussion page or something equivalent, eventualy more user-friendly, in order to collect a few words of explanation, comment, growl, or of gratefulness, why not, would be fine ; a click toward a new window/dialog/ is not a puzzle when you are ready to type few words. •(2) As a potential user of the tool, making it a bit more universal, such as allowing for a quiz, a multiple choice question, would be really great, probably with not a great supplementary effort. Examples: completing the yes-no alternative by one or several (not semantically equivalent) choices such as "maybe", "no_opinion", "unconcerned", or a graduated answer such as "positively yes"-"yes"-"mostly agreing"-"balanced, undecided"-"mostly against"-"non"-"strongly no", or a "0 to 10" scale of agreement (but programing a slider is quite different than just a bunch of radio buttons, i guess). Whatever the answer, a level-0 tool, simple "yes-or-no" alternative, will be a great addition. --Eric.LEWIN (talk) 01:35, 30 November 2017 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Thanks Eric.LEWIN! Your to have a link to a talk page where you can expand what you think of the feature and explain your vote is definitely something to consider into the product definition. Have a dialog input may encounter the same problems the article feedback tool has, with usefulness comments. I also like your idea of having multiple choices, or a scale; that would be nice! Maybe for an iteration? Yes/No would be great as a first step that can go beyond. Thanks! Trizekfrom FR 20:53, 30 November 2017 (UTC)Reply[reply]
There are a few hurdles with this onde, even if it is quite nice. There are even research papers about it! First, there must be a cost with a system like this, otherwise it turns into a like-system. Then the users must be allowed to vote on a scale to express how they feel about the question. Because different people express their feelings differently the votes must be normalized somehow. Lastly the scales are for different dimensions, which might be overlapping or duplicated, so they must be folded into a lower dimension to make sense. This folding to a lower dimensional space is non-trivial. (Yes you can use PCA, but it will most likely create a mess.) — Jeblad 00:02, 11 December 2017 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Support Helpful for assistance pages. --Omnilaika02 (talk) 10:46, 28 November 2017 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Support, provided we don't revert to Article feedback (as MER-C, I felt Article feedback was just some kind of oversized "Like" button, all the more as Talk Pages and Good/Featured Articles procedures are much more effective to advance articles, at different stages of their development). But some easy feedback for new technical features, for instance, would probably be helpful. Still, I have some doubts about the exact scope as well as practical issues. --Azurfrog (talk) 11:49, 28 November 2017 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Support A good way to give new contributors an opportunity to express there needs, and thus stay at task in Wikipedia... Salix (talk) 13:33, 28 November 2017 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Support I think the success of such a tool lies in the semantics of its use, in the phrasing and the wording of the question and its answers, not in the tool by itself. --Eric.LEWIN (talk) 01:42, 30 November 2017 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Support Strainu (talk) 22:56, 27 November 2017 (UTC)
Oppose We've tried this with mw:Article feedback/Version 5; it turned into a glorified like button. No. MER-C (talk) 01:40, 28 November 2017 (UTC)
