Module talk:Find sources: Difference between revisions

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{{Hatnote|This talk page is intended for discussion of template content and links. For discussions relating to technical aspects of the Find sources template, see '''[[Template talk:Find sources]]'''}}

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== Number of transclusions of Template:Find Francegeneral sources ==

Reminder to self (or any interested party) that we have {{tl|Find France sources}} as a working template that should be converted to the Module config. More eyes to look it over again and refine the search urls if possible would be nice (I just tweaked one param on Qwant that improved results a lot), and then convert it over. [[User:Mathglot|Mathglot]] ([[User talk:Mathglot|talk]]) 04:49, 28 November 2022 (UTC)

[[Template:Find general sources]] has "869860 transclusion(s) found" as of 06:36, 30 November 2023 (UTC), as I just checked https://templatecount.toolforge.org/index.php?lang=en&namespace=10&name=Find_general_sources#bottom .

== -wikipedia ==

(Appreciate it if another user can reply below and confirm this.)

This has been previously brought up in [[Module talk:Find sources/Archive 1#Some google searches using this module have "-wikipedia" at the end|2019]] and [[Module talk:Find sources/Archive 1#Change "-wikipedia" to "-site:wikipedia.org"|2021]], and I'd like to bring it up again and see about pushing it to the finish line. The Find Sources module adds "-wikipedia" to the search strings by default. Personally, I'm just tired of removing that every time I use the template links. Adding "-wikipedia" to a search term may have once been a good idea, but in 2022, it's no longer a good idea, because these days, the word "Wikipedia" appears in many, many reliable sources, and "-wikipedia" would exclude any page that has the word "wikipedia" on it (indeed, many reliable sources now cite Wikipedia, even if they do so with caution, and almost every Google Book page for a book by a notable author has a knowledge panel with the word "Wikipedia", example below). If we want to exclude ''this website'' from search results, the correct string would be "-site:wikipedia.org". So, I'd like to propose removing "-wikipedia" or changing "-wikipedia" to "-site:wikipedia.org", which would exclude results from this website without excluding every other website that has the word "wikipedia" on it.

This is written here because [[Template talk:Find general sources]] redirects here. [[User:RZuo|RZuo]] ([[User talk:RZuo|talk]]) 06:36, 30 November 2023 (UTC)

For example:

*Searching Google Scholar for {{code|wikipedia}} [https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C22&q=wikipedia&btnG=] brings 2.5 million results. That's how many pages are excluded by adding {{code|-wikipedia}} to a Google Scholar search string.

*Searching Google Scholar for {{code|"quantum mechanics"}} [https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C22&q=%22quantum+mechanics%22&btnG=] yields as the top result a 2012 book published by Springer called ''[https://www.google.com/books/edition/Principles_of_Quantum_Mechanics/sDvrBwAAQBAJ?hl=en&gbpv=0 Principles of Quantum Mechanics]''. That's working as it should. BUT...

*Searching Google Scholar for {{code|"quantum mechanics" -wikipedia}} [https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C22&q=%22quantum+mechanics%22+-wikipedia&btnG=] yields as the top result a book from 1998 called ''[https://www.google.com/books/edition/Quantum_Mechanics/ppf9DwAAQBAJ?hl=en&gbpv=0 Quantum Mechanics]''. The 2012 book ''Principles of Quantum Mechanics'' is pushed down to the third page of search results [https://scholar.google.com/scholar?start=20&q=%22quantum+mechanics%22+-wikipedia&hl=en&as_sdt=0,22].

*Why? I think because the Google Books page for the 2012 book has the word "Wikipedia" on it -- it's the author knowledge panel that Google pulls from us -- but the Google Books page for the 1998 book doesn't have that Wikipedia knowledge panel on it and thus doesn't have the word "Wikipedia".

:Quoting from what appears right now on the template page, this is "'''roughly 1% of all pages'''" on English Wikipedia. [[User:RZuo|RZuo]] ([[User talk:RZuo|talk]]) 06:42, 30 November 2023 (UTC)

In sum, adding "-wikipedia" de-emphasizes the newest and thus most relevant results, so we should remove that string or replace it. It kind of defeats the purpose of having these Find Sources links in the templates in the first place.

::Also, quoting from [[Module_talk:Find_sources/Archive_1#Wikipedia_Library_text]], "'''this is an 800k-transclusion template'''" in September 2021. [[User:RZuo|RZuo]] ([[User talk:RZuo|talk]]) 06:58, 30 November 2023 (UTC)

== Edit request 1612 MarchJanuary 20232024 ==

I'm not sure if anyone is watching this page, but thoughts? What's the process for establishing consensus and making a change to a protected module? Thanks, [[User:Levivich|Levivich]] ([[User talk:Levivich|talk]]) 16:51, 7 December 2022 (UTC)

: We should keep the exclusion term, but modify it to add the <code>site:</code> search param. The idea behind adding <code>-wikipedia</code> as an exclusion search term is a good one, but per your objections, it wasn't executed properly. The term should be: <code>-site:wikipedia.org</code>. If done that way, it will no longer exclude books or other documents with the word ''wikipedia'' on it.

: Your comment and reasoning are valid, even if your example was not. ''Principles'' appears on the third page anyway, even if the query is formatted properly (e.g., [https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=%22quantum+mechanics%22+-site%3Awikipedia%2Eorg like this]). Further, in the original version of the query, the fact that ''Principles'' appears on the third page is good evidence that the book does *not* have the word ''wikipedia'' in it anywhere (that's the whole point of the exclusion term, to exclude such results; that this isn't always the case gets into the fine points of the search ranking algorithm, but that's getting way beyond scope here and doesn't change the argument). The fact that it's still on the third page anyway, means that Google's ranking algorithm is ranking other results higher, and has nothing to do with documents that do, or do not, have the term ''wikipedia'' in them.

: However, keeping the exclusion term is still a good idea, and your basic argument is still correct, so the exclusion term in the module should be modified accordingly to add the <code>site:</code> search param. [[User:Mathglot|Mathglot]] ([[User talk:Mathglot|talk]]) 08:41, 10 December 2022 (UTC)

::Thanks, but what is the purpose of adding {{code|-site:wikipedia.org}} to a Google Scholar or Google News search string, since neither site indexes Wikipedia.org? (Remove the minus sign and I get [https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C22&q=%22quantum+mechanics%22+site%3Awikipedia.org&btnG= no results].) It makes sense to add the exclusion for Google Web tho. [[User:Levivich|Levivich]] ([[User talk:Levivich|talk]]) 14:27, 10 December 2022 (UTC)

{{edit template-protected|Module:Find sources/linkstemplates/Find general sources|answered=yes}}

== Template-protected edit request on 12 December 2022 ==

A discussion at [[Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals)]] resulted in consensus supporting the proposal to "remove all individual news outlets" from [[Module:Find sources/templates/Find general sources]] (closure: [[Special:Diff/1195065906]]). This means removal of the following lines:

{{Moved from|Module talk:Find sources/links|[[User:Pppery|* Pppery *]] [[User talk:Pppery|<sub style="color:#800000">it has begun...</sub>]] 02:38, 13 December 2022 (UTC)}}

<pre>

{{edit template-protected|Module:Find sources/links|answered=yes}}

{

Please change "WP Library" to "TWL" as it is the more common term (see [[Wikipedia:The Wikipedia Library|reference page]]). Thanks! [[User:EpicPupper|🐶&nbsp;EpicPupper]] ^{(he/him &#124; [[User talk:EpicPupper|talk]])} 21:28, 12 December 2022 (UTC)

code = 'new york times',

display = "''NYT''",

tooltip = 'The New York Times',

},

{

code = 'ap',

display = 'AP',

tooltip = 'Associated Press',

},

</pre> [[User:Adumbrativus|Adumbrativus]] ([[User talk:Adumbrativus|talk]]) 05:26, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

:{{done}}<!-- Template:ETp --> by Sdkb in [[Special:Diff/1195169672]] [[User:SWinxy|SWinxy]] ([[User talk:SWinxy|talk]]) 22:16, 12 January 2024 (UTC)

== Proposed removal on 'Find video game sources' template: ==

:Just as a passing comment: TWL is a lot unclearer for me as someone who knows nothing about ''The Wikipedia Library''. TWL is just another [[Three-letter acronym|TLA]] on wikipedia ([[Wikipedia:Shortcut table/uppercase|of many]]) whereas at least you can gather that WP Library stands for Wikipedia Librabry even if you have a passing knowledge of Wikipedia. [[User:Terasail|<span style="color:#088; font-weight:800;">Terasail</span>]][[User talk:Terasail|^{<span style="color:#000;">'''[✉️]'''</span>}]] 22:27, 12 December 2022 (UTC)

:: Why not spell it out in full as "Wikipedia Library" or "The Wikipedia Library"? [[User:Pppery|* Pppery *]] [[User talk:Pppery|<sub style="color:#800000">it has begun...</sub>]] 02:38, 13 December 2022 (UTC)

:Going ahead with this, because the tooltip for when a mouse hovers gives away "The Wikipedia Library", and "TWL" is more consistent with the other source-link initialisms. '''''[[User:Paine Ellsworth|<span style="font-size:92%;color:darkblue;font-family:Segoe Script">P.I.&nbsp;Ellsworth</span>]]'''''&thinsp;,&nbsp;[[Editor|<span style="color:black">ed.</span>]]&nbsp;[[User talk:Paine Ellsworth|^{put'r&nbsp;there}]]&nbsp;<small>17:44, 17 December 2022 (UTC)</small>

Remove both [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Search?search=%22Find+video+game+sources%22&prefix=Wikipedia%3AWikiProject+Video+games%2FReference+library&fulltext=Search+reference+library&fulltext=Search VG/RL] and [https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?search=%22Find+video+game+sources%22+prefix%3AWikipedia+talk%3AWikiProject+Video+games&title=Special:Search&profile=default&fulltext=1 WPVG/Talk] (both don't seem to link anywhere) on [[Template:Find video game sources]] (these are the last two links) [[User:Superb Owl|Superb Owl]] ([[User talk:Superb Owl|talk]]) 18:16, 24 June 2024 (UTC)

== Template-protected edit request on 6 January 2023 ==

: Unclear what you change you are requesting. Please clarify. [[User:Mathglot|Mathglot]] ([[User talk:Mathglot|talk]]) 09:27, 25 June 2024 (UTC)

== Trim "list of" from argument? ==

{{protected edit|answered=yes}}

Add to [[:Category:Articles for deletion templates]] as it is used at [[Template:Afd2]]. –[[User:LaundryPizza03|<b style="color:#77b">Laundry</b><b style="color:#fb0">Pizza</b><b style="color:#b00">03</b>]] ([[User talk:LaundryPizza03|<span style="color:#0d0">d</span>]][[Special:Contribs/LaundryPizza03|<span style="color:#0bf">c̄</span>]]) 06:39, 6 January 2023 (UTC)

: You need to specify what template you want the category added to. Presuming you mean [[Template:Find general sources]] (the target of [[Template:Find sources AfD]]), I'm not convinced it belongs in that category since its used for far more than AfD discussions. [[User:Pppery|* Pppery *]] [[User talk:Pppery|<sub style="color:#800000">it has begun...</sub>]] 17:35, 6 January 2023 (UTC)

Can the logic here convert "List of foo" as a parameter to become a search for "foo"? e.g. "List of fictional rutabagas" becomes "fictional rutabagas" for search purposes? This would help correctly identify relevant sources in AfDs, and those who actually meant to search for "List of foo" can add the prefix back if desired. My experience is that "list of foo" consistently fails to produce any relevant sources, while "foo" will produce more sources, with some arguably relevant to the discussion. [[User:Jclemens|Jclemens]] ([[User talk:Jclemens|talk]]) 05:59, 20 August 2024 (UTC)

== Edit request 16 March 2023 ==

== Chatbots as valid sources or identifiers of them ==

{{edit template-protected|answered=yes}}

'''Description of suggested change:''' Change the link for the "WP refs" link to the one used in [[WP:RSSE]]. Much more accurate than the current one (which as an example, the current one, when searching "Euro Truck Simulator 2", has a top result for "download.com" to "download" the game, as opposed to the RSSE one which has the top result of the game's page on Metacritic) ― [[User:Blaze Wolf|<b style="background:#0d1125;color:#51aeff;padding:1q;border-radius:5q;">Blaze&nbsp;Wolf</b>]][[User talk:Blaze Wolf|^Talk]]<sub title="Discord Username" style="margin-left:-22q;">Blaze&nbsp;Wolf#6545</sub> 01:09, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

: Do you have the list of domains searched by the RSSE google custom search? The existing one lists 496 sites, and the list is open to view to anyone. I don't think we should change it to any list that isn't transparent about what is being searched. If it's already there, maybe I didn't see it; can you point me to it? [[User:Mathglot|Mathglot]] ([[User talk:Mathglot|talk]]) 10:28, 18 March 2023 (UTC)

::I don't believe the existing one is actively maintained. Is there an issue with one that isn't transparent about what's being searched? It says its limited to those published by "well-known reliable sources", but I"ve asked on the talk page about what sources are specifically used. ― [[User:Blaze Wolf|<b style="background:#0d1125;color:#51aeff;padding:1q;border-radius:5q;">Blaze&nbsp;Wolf</b>]][[User talk:Blaze Wolf|^Talk]]<sub title="Discord Username" style="margin-left:-22q;">Blaze&nbsp;Wolf#6545</sub> 13:53, 20 March 2023 (UTC)

:[[File:Red information icon with gradient background.svg|20px|link=|alt=]] '''Not done for now:''' please establish a [[Wikipedia:Consensus|consensus]] for this alteration '''[[Wikipedia:Edit requests|before]]''' using the {{Tlx|Edit template-protected}} template.<!-- Template:ETp --> Barkeep has answered there. Consider further whether that's the set of pages you'd like to search. [[User:Izno|Izno]] ([[User talk:Izno|talk]]) 18:48, 11 April 2023 (UTC)

{{u|Awesome Aasim}}, Can you please elaborate on your intentions with [[Special:Diff/1251335553|this sandbox edit]] ? I believe that it would be a perversion of this module and the associated template to admit any notion of AI bots into the module configuration either as 1) a reliable source, or as 2) a good way to find reliable sources (their hallucinations are legion). Hence, I would be against porting your changes to the module or to the template without consensus achieved at an Rfc on this page advertised at the main venues where AI bots are being discussed, as well as at [[WP:VPR]]. Thanks, [[User:Mathglot|Mathglot]] ([[User talk:Mathglot|talk]]) 04:51, 16 October 2024 (UTC)

== Template-protected edit request on 12 May 2023 ==

:I kind of agree as well. However, Google and Bing also index unreliable sources. I was initially going to put in a query "find reliable sources for $1" but then decided against it for some reason. [[User:Awesome Aasim|Awesome]] [[User_talk:Awesome Aasim|Aasim]] 14:00, 16 October 2024 (UTC)

{{edit template-protected|Template:Find sources mainspace|answered=yes}}

:: That is, of course, true. However, I have never seen Google or Bing invent a very convincing-looking source out of whole <s>cloth</s> bits, creating authors who do not exist, or very complex and scholarly-looking titles that look real but do not exist (but are quite similar to pieces of other titles that do exist), and so on. If the task assigned were to add sources to an article that do not exist but would rarely get challenged, AI bots are definitely the way to go. It's quite possible vandals or lazy or clueless editors are doing this already, and it is a problem that will have to be addressed at some point. [[User:Mathglot|Mathglot]] ([[User talk:Mathglot|talk]]) 15:34, 16 October 2024 (UTC)

add google with brave search and sci hub [[User:Baratiiman|Baratiiman]] ([[User talk:Baratiiman|talk]]) 08:15, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

:::When a chatbot is powered by a search engine, it is less likely to make stuff up; but that doesn't mean it doesn't pull from unreliable sources. I have tried Copilot before (not necessarily for Wikipedia tasks, but for personal tasks like clarifying math concepts) and it has not really failed me. On the other hand, ChatGPT has occasionally made stuff up, especially when it does not query from the web. [[User:Awesome Aasim|Awesome]] [[User_talk:Awesome Aasim|Aasim]] 15:45, 16 October 2024 (UTC)

:[[File:Red information icon with gradient background.svg|20px|link=|alt=]] '''Not done:'''<!-- Template:ETp --> 1. We will not be linking to Sci Hub. 2. We already have one Google search. I don't see a reason to use a second. [[User:Izno|Izno]] ([[User talk:Izno|talk]]) 22:19, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

:::: Imho, this page is not the place for Wikipedia editors to debate whether chatbots are more or less likely to hallucinate under this or that circumstance, and, pardon me, but anecdotal evidence about failure to fail in casual use by non-experts is close to worthless. Please use the AI discussion venues for that. Here we should debate whether a find sources module should use the results of AI, however triggered, and imho the answer to that is a slam-dunk 'no'. I will shut up now, and hopefully others will chime in. [[User:Mathglot|Mathglot]] ([[User talk:Mathglot|talk]]) 16:26, 16 October 2024 (UTC)

::but google and bing dont work in my country only brave [[User:Baratiiman|Baratiiman]] ([[User talk:Baratiiman|talk]]) 17:07, 13 May 2023 (UTC)

{{Moved::::: from|ModuleAgreed talk:Findentirely with Mathglot here. sources/links|[[User:Pppery|* Pppery *]] [[User talk:Pppery|<sub style="color:#800000">it has begun...</sub>]] 0216:3853, 1316 DecemberOctober 20222024 (UTC)}}

:Google's top-level "AI overview" results are rarely totally accurate, but they do give the source links, which in aggregate ends up being significantly ''more reliable'' for us than their raw top search results, which, often being shit like quora or low-quality zines, do not provide sources at all.

:I don't know if linking to another engine prompting something like ChatGPT would get better AI-enhanced results than Google or Bing in that respect, since they are putting a good deal of effort into making it give back real online-accessible sources. That seems to align with our goal here.

:Of course the other question is whether it's more enticing for the novice editor to have a shiny link saying "ChatGPT" or whatever latest AI tool is out there, instead of just clicking "Google", even if the result is the same. Also, calling exclusively the Google AI overview results does not appear possible right now as it's still considered an experimental feature, and it doesn't appear to be available in private browsing either. But that's my thought going forward. [[User:SamuelRiv|SamuelRiv]] ([[User talk:SamuelRiv|talk]]) 17:52, 16 October 2024 (UTC)

<small>'''Listed at:''' [[Wikipedia:Village pump (miscellaneous)]]. [[User:Mathglot|Mathglot]] ([[User talk:Mathglot|talk]]) 16:35, 16 October 2024 (UTC)</small>

:I think that even if chatbots were 100% accurate in their output, we would still want to avoid using them for use-cases like this because of how heavily these technologies rely on Wikipedia itself as an information source. We need to stay upstream of LLMs to avoid circular referencing. _signed,[[User:Rosguill|'''''Rosguill''''']] ^{[[User talk:Rosguill|''talk'']]} 16:47, 16 October 2024 (UTC)

::I wonder if with the right prompt engineering we can get these chatbots to actually spit out reliable sources. We can maybe base our entire prompt based on something like [[WP:RSPS]]. Although it probably would overfill the query parameter. [[User:Awesome Aasim|Awesome]] [[User_talk:Awesome Aasim|Aasim]] 17:25, 16 October 2024 (UTC)

::: Are you proposing to engineer a solution that operates without human intervention? Because if you are successful, you should quit your day job and launch the next AI start-up, or become CTO of one of the existing ones. [[User:Mathglot|Mathglot]] ([[User talk:Mathglot|talk]]) 17:30, 16 October 2024 (UTC)

::::No, a person will still need to click on and then review what is provided, and provide follow up queries. The queries I pass into the ?q=... parameter may be a good start, but I don't think they are a good end. But us Wikipedians should know this; just as the first page of Google/Bing search results can at times be littered with stuff like [[WP:DAILYFAIL]] and [[WP:NEWSMAX]], depending on the query and depending on previous searches.

::::I have largely toyed with ChatGPT and found it is not always good. Web-based LLMs like Copilot and Gemini are a bit better, although I remember they had a bumpy start, sometimes pulling nonsense from places like Reddit and Facebook.

::::I do not agree that we should just copy and paste the exact output of an LLM. I only think AI is good to assist humans, but practically can never replace humans. [[User:Awesome Aasim|Awesome]] [[User_talk:Awesome Aasim|Aasim]] 17:38, 16 October 2024 (UTC)

:I think that including AI-oriented links is likely to cause more problems than it solves. [[User:WhatamIdoing|WhatamIdoing]] ([[User talk:WhatamIdoing|talk]]) 19:41, 17 October 2024 (UTC)