Template talk:incomplete

I like the idea of this template. But I'm wondering if we can make it more vertically compact by shrinking the characters a bit. I think it takes up a bit more space than it needs to. Also, this way, we could use the general format of the bar for other header notices. TheHYPO (talk) 14:31, 21 August 2012 (UTC)

Originally, the characters were sized at 45px, but with the broken image scaling they showed up as broken images. While somewhat apropos for the template, it wasn't what was intended. So I took out the 45px scaling, and they were too large. Given the choice between broken images or large images, I decided to leave them large. Once the image scaling issue is solved, I'm all for shrinking them back to 45px. Blaisepascal (talk) 14:38, 21 August 2012 (UTC)

I've just created {{ambox}} akin to wikipedia's template:Ambox for header messasges on pages. Not sure if we'll really need many of them but I thought why not standardize. I do like that your box is a bit more narrow and compact, but I thought uniformity might win out over a single pretty template.

To that end, I updated this template but put it in a beta location for the time being because, as you say, scaled images are broken. {{Incomplete/beta1}} is what I propose to replace this with once scaling is fixed. Feel free to discuss here whether you like it or not. We could ultimately setup a "type" field for ambox rather than manually putting in a color like they do at wiki (red for big issues, and colour coded down depending on the type of issue) TheHYPO (talk) 14:47, 21 August 2012 (UTC)

I didn't create this template, merely edited it. It was created by Omega, I believe. Blaisepascal (talk) 14:50, 21 August 2012 (UTC)

As I've stated in explain xkcd:Community portal/Proposals#Notice templates, I changed the template to use the {{notice}} template that is already being used in several places, and I'll delete {{ambox}} as it's redundant. Note that the styling of {{notice}} can always be changed. --Waldir (talk)

Recently there have been a lot of people preemptively removing incomplete tags. I think it would be a good idea to add a note to this template along the lines of "do not remove this too early". RamenChef (talk) 16:20, 13 March 2017 (UTC)

I've done this manually a few times in the past. But my BOT will add this in the future.--Dgbrt (talk) 22:59, 13 March 2017 (UTC)

Can someone add the “Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon” part to the template instead of having people manually put that in the reason field? Aaron Liu (talk) 19:23, 22 December 2023 (UTC)

Right now (or, at least, until the recent "Incompleteness wars" with precipitous removals and fervant re-adding), the relevent BOT tended to include all that and it would stick around (to entertain new visitors, if nothing else) until significantly after its creation. But at least after the next comic arrived, usually, whilst the article was most likely to still be subject to 'improvement' outside of landing on one by the Random button or leapfrogging by reference from an actual later one.

Which is not to say that the template couldn't be edited to supply such default text if not given an override (for those whose intent in using it does not require that). But it would need some careful thinking, checking the pages that are currently extant users of it (because I happen to think that certainly the last week's worth of comics are fair game to continue to display the incompleteness tagging unless proven to be explained to within an inch of its metaphorical life, though clearly others don't; and at least for the next week or so changing the transcluded text could make for silly stuff like doubling up that request or changing the actual latest intention of one).

...anyway, I can't edit it myself. And I perhaps also tend to prefer the status quo (both in usage(/removal) and application), but these are my suggestions for how to procede if so... 162.158.74.119 21:49, 22 December 2023 (UTC)

I don't know why, but the {{incomplete}} tag occasionally shows up in a very narrow format. With // for line-break, the current one starts "This explanation is // incomplete:" and continues with similar short lines for the rest. (Or continued. As I flicked back and forth between tabs to get all the line-breaks, it refreshed all on its own and is now full-width again.) It's not the first time I've seen this happen, but it recurred (initially) across several manual refreshes of this comic so I just thought I'd say something (then it vanished again, as I tried to ...typical). This morning, I've been getting a few more "Technical difficulties" and "503" style bad site responses than the usual background rate (and once I got the page entirely without CSS-induced styling, as if the .htm loaded but the .css got hit by temporary connection difficulties) but there was no other obvious 'lack of loading' issues in this instance. Looks like a more highly specific width-percentage or side-padding requirements being mistransmitted/misinterpretted somewhere between server and browser ends of the process. 172.68.229.94 06:44, 13 May 2025 (UTC)

Are you saying the incomplete tag is extremely narrow even on wide enough screens? I've never had problems with it. --FaviFake (talk) 14:48, 13 May 2025 (UTC)

Intermitently it is extremely narrow (I don't actually think width-of-screen plays any part, except perhaps from what nominal width it gets further narrowed). I do very occasionally become subject to the entire .css not loading at all (definitely the fault of my connection, its most obvious effect is that all text is Times New Roman-y/serifed, rather than whatever Sans Serif it normally uses), but it seems rather strange that I far more commonly get ...something happening... such that all a page looks like it's perfectly normal and fully stylesheeted except that the Incomplete box is a specific rather narrower version, a third or less of the usual width. And no other things 'default/fall-back formatted', even the text within is normally styled (Sans, and correct size) rather than fallback styled (Timesy).

Honestly, I'm not even sure what mechanism can cause this, even a dodgy connection at my end. I had originally planned to say the above on the latest comic's Talk page (hence "several refreshes of this comic", above, which I should have changed), but I thought I should move it away from there as it wasn't something that only had started happening on that one. But it was happening a lot, survived several hard refreshes and only when I tried to write the above (before I cut it out of Talk:<comic> and pasted it here into the Template talk) did it suddenly correct itself as I switched tabs (Chrome, which tends to reload pages without ever being asked, as well, but that's just one of its many problems, which I won't both to list all here).

It was more an "I'm not the only one with this, am I?" note, rather than any idea that it's a definite global issue to be immediately solved. Clearly you don't recognise this. 172.70.86.157 15:56, 13 May 2025 (UTC)

Sure but you haven't answered my question. Are you saying the incomplete tag is extremely narrow even on wide enough screens? What happens when you reload the page? Which pages does it happen on? --FaviFake (talk) 16:15, 13 May 2025 (UTC)

All anticipated in last response.

1. "Intermitently it is extremely narrow (I don't actually think width-of-screen plays any part, [...]"
2. "[...] survived several hard refreshes [...] it suddenly correct[ed] itself [...]"
3. "[...] it wasn't something that only had started happening on [the latest comic]" [emphasis added]

And from initial report:

1. "[it] occasionally shows up in a very narrow format."
2. "it recurred (initially) across several manual refreshes"
3. "not the first time I've seen this happen"

Minimised answer ok? Happily calling it a "random glitch", if it's only me being glitched. 172.69.224.184 17:46, 13 May 2025 (UTC)

Minimised answer very ok!! I must have missed these among the sea of text and parentheses. I'm not even sure why I was asking them so I'll stop. From your description, it seems this has never happened to me. --FaviFake (talk) 19:41, 13 May 2025 (UTC)