Wikipedia talk:Featured pictures

Original scans vs digital recreations

It might be helpful to have some people who know something about images and restoration work at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Islam-related articles#Proposal: clarify "user-generated" in MOS:CALLIGRAPHY, which appears to be a proposal to ban vectorizing line art, if that line art contains certain words. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:00, 8 February 2025 (UTC)

HTML tables for layout -> CSS

See this draft I made. Sapphaline (talk) 10:22, 6 September 2025 (UTC)

Consider the CSS already at Wikipedia:Featured articles/styles.css as a model. We should avoid marking divs up with display: table(-x) in this day and age if they have little to do with tables (some screen readers are opinionated about display modes).

Avoid IDs if possible, they can be hard to override.

Avoid overriding default styles and then overriding your override (max-width 719px). (A prior iteration of this rule might have been "design for mobile first" since most of the web's defaults are responsive by default.) Izno (talk) 16:19, 6 September 2025 (UTC)

some screen readers are opinionated about display modes - for example?

Avoid IDs if possible, they can be hard to override. - sure

Avoid overriding default styles and then overriding your override - sure Sapphaline (talk) 16:51, 6 September 2025 (UTC)

Well, it used to be the case that assigning display: block to tables very much broke tables for accessibility agents (deleted their accessibility properties). (This has been fixed in at least some of them.) I'm fairly certain I've heard of some others doing the reverse, where assigning display: table gives items table accessibility properties, when that's not what you want in the slightest.

But even if there aren't such cases, using either display flex or display grid is much more pleasant and allows for smaller HTML with more display options than you could ever get with display: table. Izno (talk) 22:07, 6 September 2025 (UTC)

Please check the flexbox version out. Sapphaline (talk) 08:41, 7 September 2025 (UTC)

Why not use base variables for colors? Like var(--background-color-progressive-subtle); for the blue background, so that it is dynamic and changes in dark mode. waddie96 ★ (talk) 17:56, 8 September 2025 (UTC)

It is best when making changes for one reason not to conflate others which might have social ramifications. This blue has been this blue for a long time and will be a question of consensus if it should change. Izno (talk) 18:17, 8 September 2025 (UTC)

But I think it's a great idea to use a flexbox or gridbox layout waddie96 ★ (talk) 17:57, 8 September 2025 (UTC)

Seems fine. The other thing I would change is to use naming more like FA/styles.css i.e. wp- leading the lot (to go along with the page name). This helps distinguish the class names from Template:Fp having some potential conflicting CSS used on this page. (That might not happen, but easier to name things now than later have a query about why things look weird, and it's good rules for others later who want to emulate the support.)

A few other minor things to consider:

1. The earlier sheet doesn't use CSS gap for the whitespace but probably should/could.
2. Should probably add dark mode support directly with colors rather than throwing a "override all colors" at it, which you can steal direct from the earlier sheet.
3. Should probably move the breakpoint down in both sheets. 720 is there from when the Minerva breakpoint was 720, but they moved that down to 640.

Izno (talk) 18:24, 8 September 2025 (UTC)

use naming more like FA/styles.css - sure.

The earlier sheet doesn't use CSS gap for the whitespace but probably should/could - gap is a new property and doesn't work with browsers like Pale Moon or SeaMonkey.

Should probably add dark mode support - well, there's already skin-nightmode-reset-color class specified on all block elements.

Should probably move the breakpoint down in both sheets - sure. Sapphaline (talk) 07:40, 9 September 2025 (UTC)

Pale Moon or SeaMonkey. That's on them. We don't optimize for the literally 0.1% (on desktop; if we include mobile the number goes down significantly) of people using a browser which isn't one of the big 4 or 5, especially when the worst that happens is that it has no gap between cells.

well, there's already skin-nightmode-reset-color class specified on all block elements. That's dark mode support in the way that caring only about contrast between background and foreground is dark mode support, which doesn't really exude the theme of the affected page(s). Izno (talk) 16:49, 9 September 2025 (UTC)

We don't optimize for the literally 0.1% (on desktop; if we include mobile the number goes down significantly) of people using a browser which isn't one of the big 4 or 5 - yet margin: just works. I don't see any good reason to change it to gap:, especially when the latter is less supported than the first.

which doesn't really exude the theme of the affected page(s) - I've added dark mode support into the stylesheet. Sapphaline (talk) 17:52, 9 September 2025 (UTC)

Shrug, my point remains. We don't optimize for that small of a group. Margin is at best awkward. Users of those browsers know they're going to get a worse experience in general because they're using forks from a half decade or more in the past. That's their problem. Izno (talk) 21:09, 9 September 2025 (UTC)

I concur with Izno waddie96 ★ (talk) 08:47, 10 September 2025 (UTC)

I agree with Izno, Wikipedia:Featured articles/styles.css is a good base. waddie96 ★ (talk) 17:57, 8 September 2025 (UTC)

Automated tool for new images?

By the way, how do people add new images on this page? Is it done through some sort of an automated tool? Because if it is, I think its author should require alt= text to be specified. Sapphaline (talk) 08:05, 9 September 2025 (UTC)

Looks like it's mostly @Armbrust, so they should answer this one. Izno (talk) 21:12, 9 September 2025 (UTC)

January 15, 2026 25th anniversary of WP

I've been seeing if people are planning any special observances for the 25th anniversary of WP. I started here and then discussion moved to here. I imagine WP:DYK, WP:TFA, WP:TFP (and maybe WP:TFL) might want to try to plan something. There are 3 months to figure things out. Feel free to comment there or have your own discussion.-TonyTheTiger (T / C / WP:FOUR / WP:CHICAGO / WP:WAWARD) 05:11, 9 October 2025 (UTC)