User:BethNaught/Draft Flow RfC
Background
Flow is a software project which has been under development by the Wikimedia Foundation since the latter half of 2013. Its stated aim is "to build a modern discussion and collaboration system for all Wikimedia projects"
. It follows a previous such project, LiquidThreads, which was ultimately abandoned due to severe problems. Flow replaces talk pages implemented in wiki markup, in the same software model as content pages, with a more forum-like system with discrete posts, a default input box which eschews wikitext (although a wikitext mode can be enabled) and notification system integration.
Flow was initially conceived to be, in the long run, a mandatory replacement for wikitext talk pages across Wikimedia wikis. It caused significant controversy on the English Wikipedia, particularly in mid-2014, when concerns were amplified in the context of the MediaViewer/Superprotect conflict. Concerns centered on loss of functionality, introduction of software regressions, and changes to Wikipedia ethos. Those in support of Flow said that Wikipedia should have a more technically-intuitive talk system and suggested that overall the changes would be an improvement to the software.
In September 2015, active development on Flow paused. It was put in maintenance mode (no work on major new features) while the relevant software team moved their focus to cross-wiki notifications and other Echo improvements, aimed to complete by April 2016. After that, they plan to move on to a "Workflows" project. Workflows is intended to semi-automate community workflows such as handling Articles for Deletion. The exact design of Workflows has yet to be determined, but the WMF has indicated an intent that it will only work on discussion pages that have been converted to Flow. However Flow is currently a discussion-only feature.
Flow has seen some adoption on smaller wikis. However, it is moribund on the English Wikipedia, only ever enabled on a very small number of pages. Activity on every Flow page declined to essentially zero. The majority of Flow pages have received consensus to delete. Consensus was reached to end the Flow trial at WikiProject Breakfast and return it to a talk page. That RFC was run inside Flow, with participants on both sides noting the difficulty of following the discussion to determine the outcome. The only remaining Flow pages are WikiProject Hampshire and the Flow testing page. Flow is highly unlikely to be adopted in full any time soon, due to missing features, significant opposition to some existing aspects, the fact that the WMF has relented on its plan to mandate Flow's use, as well as a backlog of approximately one thousand open bugs or other tasks.[1] There has not yet been a major RfC where the community has had the opportunity to come to a clear conclusion.
Proposal
Flow is to be uninstalled from English Wikipedia, with existing Flow pages being converted back to wikitext. Flow is not to be reinstalled without consensus in favour at a future RfC.
Discussion
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The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it. |
Support
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