Wikibooks:Reading room/Proposals/2014/September

Echo and watchlist
Special:Notifications & Special:Watchlist substantially overlap in functionality, except the former also contains extra (some non-public) events and doesn't provide with passive usage options (means to turn off web-nagging or email-nagging and to just keep visiting the page whenever I'm free), while the latter doesn't provide with options of active web-nagging notifications (but already provides email interface). Partly, in my personal view, the Echo/Notifications project was driven by low usability of watchlist; comes to mind. It's also perhaps worth noting that Echo users aren't exposed to Special:Notifications unless thy have JavaScript disabled — in which case it's their only means of reading the notifications.

I'd like to get this done: Thoughts on both, please? --Gryllida 02:19, 9 September 2014 (UTC)
 * 1) Merge these two pages into one.
 * 2) To remedy large inflow of information, introduce multiple levels of importance of the web-nagging notifications (red for mentions, orange for thanks, blue for new watchlist items, etc and configurable in your settings).
 * Nice idea, although you're more likely to generate interest discussing this on Meta or MediaWiki where these issues are generally pushed around... QuiteUnusual (discuss • contribs) 07:25, 9 September 2014 (UTC)


 * Merging the two into one could make both more complex and thus less useful. I rather like both the way they are, as I perceive them as serving different purposes &mdash; notifications for a small number of personal items, watchlist for a bigger picture of mostly-less-personal items.


 * Which said, I still don't understand what Echo is; I've tried to find information about it, but half the time, pages say it's the same as notifications, while the other half, they talk about it as something different but evidently assume everyone already knows what. --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 10:13, 9 September 2014 (UTC)
 * Echo and Notifications are indeed the same thing (see Echo (Notifications) QuiteUnusual (discuss • contribs) 11:29, 9 September 2014 (UTC)