Template talk:EW charity

Is this template a good idea?

(Post intended to be provocative)
Reading the discussion here it appears that the template keeps breaking because the page it points to keeps changing. "the Charity Commission website has been rearranged again so that our URLs don't work any more" ... "the last two times" ... "The answer provided seems extraordinarily cumbersome" ... "their reply isn't helpful. The extra parameters" ... "just linking to the search form ... It means an extra click for the reader".

Changes to the Web page pointed to means that articles using the template break now and again. So, is providing a template worth the hassle? If anything a bookmarklet generating a link which can be edited manually (like WebRef for general, mainly news, links) might be better. Personally I replaced a reference to {{EW charity}} by navigating quickly to the page by doing a Web search for charity commission 1107313, then go to the page and use WebRef to generate a link which I then have to edit.

The real advantage of a template, of course, is that if the URL of the site is changed, the template can be modified to track it, but direct references will deadlink. Best wishes, Pol098 (talk) 14:54, 30 December 2021 (UTC)

YES! Keen to keep it as I find it very useful, even with one extra click on the CC site. Those who have expertise may be able to offer a fix again to the wiki code. --Mervyn (talk) 09:16, 31 December 2021 (UTC)

I did fix it and tested it against multiple use cases and it didn't break. However my "fix" was reverted. Ho hum. Regardless of that, it's still a very useful template. 10mmsocket (talk) 10:58, 31 December 2021 (UTC)

• I created this template, years ago, at a point where there was a simple mapping from charity number to Charity Commission record. And yes, the first twice that they redesigned the site the helpful Mr Dunn provided clues which enabled the template to be amended so that by updating the template we could update the many many pages which used it to link to the Charity Comission records. Sadly this seems not to be possible since 2020 (and I've asked on the gov.uk contact page a couple of times with no useful response) ... but if @10mmsocket: could find a fix which works for all, or even the large majority, of charities, that would be brilliant. @The wub: You reverted the change - could you perhaps liaise with @10mmsocket: to show which examples still don't work with their fix, with a view to maybe cracking the problem again? I think the Charity Commission data is a very useful External Link for any UK charity, as it provides a large amount of up-to-date info about the organisation, so it would be brilliant if the template could be thoroughly mended, yet again. PamD 17:21, 31 December 2021 (UTC)

• On the other hand, looking now again at the Charleston Trust example above, there is obviously no relationship between the charity number "1107313" and the url: https://register-of-charities.charitycommission.gov.uk/charity-search/-/charity-details/4012805 , so a direct link to the charity details seems unlikely. What a pain. But if the template reliably links to the "search page" with a list of exactly one result (which should happen, as the charity number is unique), that is still a help for our readers. Should we perhaps add a comment "Click on charity name for full details", or is that obvious to most of our readers? PamD 17:35, 31 December 2021 (UTC)

  WIll take a look but very happy to admit I was wrong! 10mmsocket (talk) 18:13, 31 December 2021 (UTC)

• @Pol098: At present, the template leads the reader to a page where they need one more click to get to the information they need. Your hard-coded link leads the reader directly to the information they need, saving a click. BUT, next time the Charity Commission revise their database (it happens!), we will be able to fix the templated links by tweaking the template, while the reader coming across your hard-coded link may or may not get anywhere useful. That's the trade-off. I reckon the template is still worthwhile. PamD 17:45, 31 December 2021 (UTC)

Thanks for responses. Glad I asked the provocative question as it's developed interesting responses, though the conclusion is yes, the template is a good idea. I hadn't realised that the page tended to get changed in ways which break a direct link; obviously a single template which has to be tweaked is better than lots of misbehaving links. Happy New year to all. Pol098 (talk) 19:47, 31 December 2021 (UTC)

I concur that the template is still useful, even if it requires one more click. Hopefully we might be able to fix direct linking in future, or at least keep up with any future changes to the Charity Commission website, and the template does still provide a consistent style and associated metadata for citations.

For what it's worth I checked the top 10 usages on what links here at time of writing, and 5 had a URL containing the charity number, but 5 had a different number. So direct linking is probably out of the question for now. Even Wikimedia UK's page doesn't match the charity number! the wub "?!" 17:26, 2 January 2022 (UTC)

Acknowledge in documentation that it's a moving target?

I edited the documentation that the template currently points to the search page; my edit was reverted, correctly, because the situation is more complex. I suggest that the template documentation should be modified when necessary to briefly explain the current situation for editors (and update the explanation as the database and template evolve). From the reversion of my edit I infer that I myself don't understand the situation well enough to do any more. The only "normal" situation requiring no explanation is when the template links to the charity's actual page.

When I edited a page and found that the template linked to the search page rather than the charity, the first thing I did was think "bug!", look at the documentation, and glance through Talk. The only mention of landing on the search page was in a discussion, which I missed on a quick scan. Accordingly, I edited the template out of the mainspace article (inserted direct link) and made comments in Talk here. If there had been a brief mention of the issue on the Talk page I would not have needed to do any of that. Best wishes, Pol098 (talk) 12:13, 1 January 2022 (UTC)

@Pol098 I don't see that your edit to the documentation was reverted? It's still there for me, and looks like a good addition. I probably should have made it more clear at the time of editing the template in Oct 2020, but was hoping it would only be a temporary edit as we might get a resolution from PamD raising it on the Charity Commission blog comments [1]. That never happened unfortunately. the wub "?!" 17:27, 2 January 2022 (UTC)

Thanks, yes, it's stil there, I obviously made a mistake when I thought I was checking it. Linking to the search page is also stated a few lines below my addition; I obviously missed that when checking documentation before using the template. It could be tidied up to have a single mention, and perhaps more prominent (bold?) and more correct (+"sometimes"). But I'll leave this for people who know the score. Best wishes, Pol098 (talk) 17:41, 2 January 2022 (UTC)

Update to linking directly to charity page

It appears you can link to a charity directly again: https://register-of-charities.charitycommission.gov.uk/charity-details/?regId=CHARITY_NUMBER&subId=0, worth updating the template? --Dr-Mx (talk) 03:00, 17 March 2022 (UTC)

I tried a dozen random English and Welsh charities, including examples mentioned on this talk page and its archive, and every one worked fine. I suggest we give it a go. 10mmsocket (talk) 07:34, 17 March 2022 (UTC)

I boldly changed the template and gave it a good test against multiple charity articles. It seems to be working OK. I have updated the /doc to reflect the new direct link. --10mmsocket (talk) 08:06, 17 March 2022 (UTC)

Sorry for the delayed reply, I tested a few links myself and all looked good to me. Very glad to see this fixed, thanks Dr-Mx and 10mmsocket! the wub "?!" 19:33, 24 March 2022 (UTC)