Help talk:Edit summary

Corrections

In the future, a way should be created to be able to correct any errors made after the edit summary is published; for example, here I accidentally typed "p" (on the keyboard it's present immediately after the "o") instead of the "o", consequently changing the meaning of the published sentence. JacktheBrown (talk) 19:39, 16 January 2025 (UTC)

@JacktheBrown: This was suggested a few months back - not on this page however, I think that it was at WP:VPT. It would be difficult to implement, for a variety of reasons. This would include the necessity of logging every change. Instead, see Help:Edit summary#Fixing. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 23:48, 16 January 2025 (UTC)

@Redrose64: it's a pity that this function is very difficult to implement. As a good WikiBee (therefore particularly precise and accurate), I would like to be able to correct some of my past edit summaries. JacktheBrown (talk) 10:37, 22 January 2025 (UTC)

Cầu Giấy Ward, not "district", why ?

• At the request of some users (I will not mention their names here, because they always claim that I am attacking them), I will explain why I changed from Cầu Giấy District to Cầu Giấy (without the suffix). I myself am very tired because of being mentally terrorized for many days (due to my bone pain, my personal work and many other users), but I will try to calmly explain so that my American friends can understand. Currently, the Vietnamese government has completed the final stage of abolishing district-level and upgrading commune-ward-level, so it is unrealistic to keep the information about Caugiay district as it was before April 19, 2025. I just tried to add this one paragraph for you to read and understand the problem, I just hope you don't undo any more edits, because if I try to sabotage it, I don't need to explain too many times:

On April 19, 2025, to meet the Policy to Arrange and Merge Administrative Units by the Government of Vietnam, the Hà Nội People's Committee quickly approved a Resolution on the plan of re-arranging commune+ward-level administrative units in the whole city.

According to the political document published for the press in the same day, Cầu Giấy Urban District was officially dissolved. Its entire area and demography have been divided into three new wards Cầu Giấy 1 (Cầu Giấy), Cầu Giấy 2 (Nghĩa Đô), and Cầu Giấy 3 (Yên Hòa). Therefore, Cầu Giấy Ward (phường Cầu Giấy) has been established based on the merging of :

• The entire ones of two former wards Dịch Vọng and Dịch Vọng Hậu.
• The small parts of five former wards Nghĩa Tân, Quan Hoa, Yên Hòa from Cầu Giấy District, and Mỹ Đình 1, Mỹ Đình 2 from Nam Từ Liêm.
  This new administrative unit basically has the meaning of preserving the cultural and historical values of before Giấy Hamlet and Hạ Yên Quyết Canton.

— Cầu Giấy

Anyway, if this request is made in the wrong place, I hope someone responsible will move it to a suitable place. I would be very grateful! It is very simple because I have very little experience with the organization of Wikipedia, what I care about is knowledge. In addition, this is an event that is happening in Vietnam, I am not making it up to deceive anyone. I just hope you read it! (JIlQIM (talk))

I have reposted this comment (except for the last "Anyway" paragraph) at Talk:Cầu Giấy district#Cầu Giấy Ward, not "district", why ? - Butwhatdoiknow (talk) 00:40, 2 May 2025 (UTC)

Still not possible to edit edit summaries?

Been a Wikipedia editor for almost two weeks now, and after reading this page, I learned that even to this day, it's still not possible to edit edit summaries. Why is this? Wouldn't it make sense for anyone to correct their own edit summaries if they believed they did a typo error or used the wrong brackets for linking words to special pages? For example, in this edit I made to the Earthworm article, where my edit summary says "Adjusted edit protection template; protected due to vandalism", I intended to use square brackets ([]) in order to link the word "vandalism" to the Wikipedia:Vandalism page, but I used brace brackets ({}) instead, so the link doesn't exist. How am I suppose to correct this? BriDash9000 (talk) 11:10, 21 May 2025 (UTC)

See Help:Edit summary#Edit summary properties and features ("Can't be changed after saving" bullet point) and Help:Edit summary#Fixing - Butwhatdoiknow (talk) 15:58, 22 June 2025 (UTC)

Butwhatdoiknow Yeah... not really helpful. BriDash9000 (talk) 16:15, 22 June 2025 (UTC)

BriDash9000 You asked "Why is this?" and "How am I suppose to correct this?" Did I misunderstood your questions? If so, that may be my fault, or it may be yours. In either case, please consider being more civil to folks who are trying to help you with a problem. - Butwhatdoiknow (talk) 21:36, 22 June 2025 (UTC)

@BriDash9000: This isn't going to happen, see for instance Help talk:Edit summary#Corrections above, and other threads in the archives. IIRC, on another page, WhatamIdoing (talk · contribs) recently replied to somebody else who made pretty much the same request. Basically: edit summaries are entries in an action log. If you allow a log entry to be edited, you need another log recording that edit. Ad infinitum. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 19:48, 22 June 2025 (UTC)

I've added a note at the top of this talk page. Maybe it will reduce the number of times people need to ask. WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:26, 22 June 2025 (UTC)

Thats a good idea, I support it. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 02:20, 7 July 2025 (UTC)

No means to add an edit summary in Skin Vector legacy 2010

I find there is no means to add an edit summary in the current desktop editor with Skin Vector legacy 2010. (Latest Ubuntu snap Firefox)

The edit dialog reports:

"Reminder: You have not provided an edit summary. Edit summaries help other users understand the intention of your edits. Please enter one before you click Publish changes again, or your edit will be saved without one."

But provides no help in how to do this.

It appears I have to switch to skin vector-2022.

Could this annoyance be fixed?

It used to be possible, but no longer, so maybe the edit summary mechanism disappeared in a regression. -~~ 84user (talk) 10:20, 13 October 2025 (UTC)

Policy on repeated breaches of H:FIES

Hi! I was wondering if there is a policy about how to deal with users who repeatedly breach the “all edits should be explained” policy. I haven't been able to find one but I admit I'm unfamiliar with the innards of wikipedia (templates, conventions, policies) and find it difficult to navigate the WP: namespace for information on them, so maybe I simply didn't know where to look.

Extra context: I recently had a technical edit reverted with a mere “invalid” summary, which I found very much unhelpful (invalid how? wrt content? if so I fail to understand why. wrt proper (conventional) use of the template? if so it would call for an edit rather than an undo and I believe it could be automated). Upon reading the user's talk page, I found that there had already been multiple requests from other editors for them to provide relevant summaries when editing pages and in particular when reverting edits. One editor provided a link to the aforementioned user's xtool statistics, according to which only 62% of their edits provide a summary, and that includes minimal, unhelpful summaries like the one I described. I find this all the more concerning as they have no less than 96,053 edits under their belt for an average of 34.6 edits/day. In contrast, they only seem to answer messages on their talk page about once a month and all requests for them to adhere to H:FIES have been left unanswered for about a year. I find such a lack of communication concerning and wonder if users with such behavior may be more trouble than anything.

P.S.: I'm expecting & hoping that this page is on some admins or otherwise experienced editors who may answer me. If someone would take the time to check the revision history pertaining to my technical edit and tell me what they believe I did wrong (or not), that would also be appreciated, considering it doesn't look like I can count on the user's cooperation to explain their undo. Arandomfolk (talk) 01:56, 29 November 2025 (UTC)

Regarding your P.S.: I am not an admin or a particularly "otherwise" experienced editor. I wonder whether the text in the first box at Category:Redirects to sections might hold the answer? - Butwhatdoiknow (talk) 03:38, 29 November 2025 (UTC)