Preference settings to modify crosswiki search results
Problem: Since 2017, crosswiki search results have been implemented. However, the results have been also centralized, especially for various communities. The crosswiki search results at enwiki have been limited per community consensus. For example, crosswiki snippets of Wikimedia Commons are suppressed from enwiki search results (phab:T163463), but the results from Commons in enwiki can be found only while using "File:" namespace. Wiktionary (phab:T163463) and Wikivoyage results in enwiki have been restricted as well to exact title matches. Currently, AFAIK only enwiki has a gadget to disable/enable the snippets all together. I don't know which other projects have the similar gadgets; a user script can be found at enwiki's Signpost article, but I don't know whether other projects are aware of such user script.
Who would benefit: Registered users who would like to decide for themselves which snippet(s) they want to either see or disable. (Either registration is required, or users must sign-in for that benefit.)
Proposed solution: Add settings for crosswiki search results preferably in the "Search" tab of User preferences. They would also decide which results from any sister project to display. They can also decide whether to disable or enable the snippets. They can also reorder the snippets from top to bottom (i.e. highest to lowest priority).
More comments: I proposed this back in 2017, but that was under the older "top 10" format. Maybe the TechCom can give this into consideration as part of the backlog. Furthermore, as I wrote in a Phabricator task, default settings for English Wikipedia should reflect wishes of the enwiki community (phab:T163463, phab:T171803, phab:T185250).
Phabricator tickets: phab:T266726 (tagged as Low-priority)
Oppose I suppose I don't use the search engine often enough or broadly enough to think this a big deal, as I hadn't even noticed the search protocol change, but if the issue is that the scope of results has gotten out of hand, maybe it's better if things just went back to the way they were before. Tyrekecorrea (talk) 18:39, 9 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@Tyrekecorrea: This proposal also allows you to disable the snippets all together, the same way that enwiki's gadget does. If this proposal fails to impress and attract TechCom, then you can use enwiki's gadget to disable them. George Ho (talk) 20:02, 9 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Weak support Why not? MarioSuperstar77 (talk) 20:18, 8 December 2020 (UTC)
Support --Ciao • Bestoernesto • ✉ 01:06, 9 December 2020 (UTC)
Oppose I suppose I don't use the search engine often enough or broadly enough to think this a big deal, as I hadn't even noticed the search protocol change, but if the issue is that the scope of results has gotten out of hand, maybe it's better if things just went back to the way they were before. Tyrekecorrea (talk) 18:39, 9 December 2020 (UTC)
