MediaWiki talk:Common.js

I would prefer not to use the notiplus script at all. In fact, I would prefer to remove everything that is currently in MediaWiki:Common.js… It is either tools (AjaxRC, NotabilityMove) that users should be adding to their own personal JavaScript and that we shouldn't make everyone load and run, or things that affect only logged-in users and that we should not add to the site wide JavaScript either. A rule of thumb is that anything that does not make sense for anonymous readers who are not logged in should not be in MediaWiki:Common.js, MediaWiki:Wikia.js, or MediaWiki:ImportJS.

I don't think we need those JavaScript extensions at all. Some of them are poorly written JavaScript and have bugs; for example, AjaxRC resets expanded changes on Special:RecentChanges every time it updates the list, which as some might have found can be an annoyance not worth the auto-updating functionality. We already have blog posts and the forums to notify editors about things, and it is easy enough to determine who is an administrator or a content moderator that there's no need to put it in everyone's face. Even coloring links to user pages of administrators causes problems that it shouldn't on profile pages, categories, and maintenance reports.

What MediaWiki:Common.js and MediaWiki:Common.css are actually meant for is code that is necessary for our templates and articles to work properly for readers, for example styling the tickets and ROBUX templates, as well as infoboxes and navboxes. Customizations should not be in the site wide JavaScript and CSS, so if there is no objection in the coming days I would like to remove them and create a project page with instructions to enable personal JavaScript and add AjaxRC, NotabilityMove, and SignatureCheck to personal CSS and JavaScript pages. Users who want tools like AjaxRC and SignatureCheck will probably want them on all wikis, not just this one, so it makes more sense for them to add the tools to their global CSS and JavaScript pages which apply on all Wikia sites and not just the ROBLOX Wikia, and at the same time it won't make page loading slower for editors who do not want them or for readers who are not logged in. --Mark Otaris (talk) 02:59, October 18, 2016 (UTC)