Wikipedia:Village pump (technical)

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The technical section of the village pump is used to discuss technical issues about Wikipedia. Bug reports and feature requests should be made in Phabricator (see how to report a bug). Bugs with security implications should be reported differently (see how to report security bugs).

Newcomers to the technical village pump are encouraged to read these guidelines prior to posting here. If you want to report a JavaScript error, please follow this guideline. Questions about MediaWiki in general should be posted at the MediaWiki support desk. Discussions are automatically archived after remaining inactive for five days.

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"Pending changes" yet again

Following on from the discussion at Wikipedia:Village pump (technical)/Archive 188#Pending Changes again, it looks like I'm getting the "pending changes" error yet again, as can be seen from recent edits here. Why does this error keep coming back? Maestro2016 (talk)

Ultimately because the underlying bug hasn't been fixed yet, and while FlaggedRevs doesn't have an "owner" on the dev team it's unlikely to get fixed any time soon! ƒirefly ( t · c ) 19:01, 27 March 2021 (UTC)

Huh, I don't really know if edits using Twinkle count here, but apparently, my edits at Smilodon are automatically accepted now? Maybe this a sign that they're starting to fix the bug? Hopefully... JurassicClassic767 (talk | contribs) 17:48, 29 March 2021 (UTC)

Well, screw my last comment, it seems I still have the problem... JurassicClassic767 (talk | contribs) 16:26, 3 April 2021 (UTC)

I have the same issue from what I have been seeing, see Special:AdvancedReviewLog and there were many bot accepts of edits by autoconfirmed users that have not been auto accepted, and also I have been trying to accept edits by autoconfirmed users that have not been auto accepted. This issue is still present. User3749 (talk) 17:34, 4 April 2021 (UTC)

Image alt parameters

I've been adding image alt text occasionally and noticed that when I mouse-hover over an infobox image, the alt text is revealled as an overlay; when the image is in the article body no such annotation occurs. Recent examples of non-infobox articles are at History of the Jews in Hull and Matlock Bridge being building and bridge descriptions repectively. A recent example of infoboxed is at Bart Simpson which shows the text overlay on Bart's caricature-illustration.

Could someone please confirm if this (non-appearance) is the 'norm' and known, and preferably check with a screen-reader? For my own peace of mind. I'm using only IBM and almost-exclusively with Firefox 87.0. Thanks.--Rocknrollmancer (talk) 15:01, 27 March 2021 (UTC)

@Rocknrollmancer: We've recently lost our Grade A1 alt-text expert, so I'll try to answer. The alt text is present on the images at History of the Jews in Hull, Matlock Bridge and Bart Simpson, you can check this using your browser's "Inspect element" or "View source" features; it's the alt="..." attribute of the <img /> tag. In the case of Bart Simpson (but neither of the others), the alt text is copied to the title="..." attribute of the enclosing <a>...</a> element, and it is that title that some browsers are displaying as a tooltip.

The purpose of alt text is not to provide a tooltip (although some browsers do that) - it's to provide replacement text for use when images are not available, or, more fully, The image given by the src and srcset attributes, ... is the embedded content; the value of the alt attribute is the img element’s fallback content, and provides equivalent content for users and user agents who cannot process images or have image loading disabled. (see HTML 5.1 spec). So when the image can be displayed, the alt text need not be rendered; but if the image can't be displayed - such as if the upload.wikimedia.org server is flaky - you instead get a rectangle of the appropriate size, but instead of the image it contains text such as "Close up of natural stone arched bridge and tapered piers over river on a sunny day with blue sky". --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 17:04, 27 March 2021 (UTC)

@Rocknrollmancer, the infobox is using the module Module:InfoboxImage to display the image. If a title parameter is not passed to the module, the alt parameter is used as the title. – BrandonXLF (talk) 18:50, 27 March 2021 (UTC)

ThanQ Redrose64, BrandonXLF - I'm beginning to understand, I've been out for a few hours and realised when away from the keyboard that I'd not described adequately-enough the query. What I was needing to know was - for visually-impaired, is the alt text converted to a voice announcement? Or just the main caption? I know of a young lady who's lost her previous partial-sight totally about two years ago and is using Voice Over for iOS (?) on iphone, that's from memory as I'm unfamiliar with whatever that is (or if there's an equivalent on Android app or plug-in). Checking, she's taken it off her social media profile now, but the previous annotation stated not to send her images without a caption. That was the main gist of the enquiry, and I probably mis-stated when using the term screen reader. Hope that's clear-enough!--Rocknrollmancer (talk) 21:20, 27 March 2021 (UTC)

@Rocknrollmancer: Oh I see now. If someone is using a screen reader, the alt attribute of the image is always read, even if there's a caption. – BrandonXLF (talk) 22:12, 27 March 2021 (UTC)

Yes, this is why WP:ALT#Basics says The alt text is intended to be read out by screen readers just before the caption, so avoid having the same details in both. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 22:58, 27 March 2021 (UTC)

Good-O, pleased to have that clarified - it's been a long time since I looked; think it was when I tried to flush-right a TOC and it was reverted as potentially causing problems, but I couldn't quite remember on what device(s) were mentioned and how the hard/software may have developed since. Thanks for all your comments.--Rocknrollmancer (talk) 00:12, 28 March 2021 (UTC)

Indeed re alt text. VoiceOver is Apple's screen reader; for whatever it's worth Google TalkBack is the Android equivalent. It's not necessarily moving the table of contents to the right that causes problems for screen reader users like me; it's changing its position in the wiki-markup. Graham87 06:58, 28 March 2021 (UTC)

Thank you, Graham87, comments noted. I have only just seen your message from 28 March today, 2 April, when I wanted to submit another query, and the browser landed at this section from past browsing history. I have now seen the blank image field displayed momentarily with text, before the image appears.--Rocknrollmancer (talk) 18:48, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

Any technical reason why "Show previews without reloading the page" isn't the default setting for new accounts?

Referring to the last checkbox in Preferences / Editing. To me, activating this option not only results in a shorter load time, but also has the added benefit of not resetting the scroll bar and cursor in the source editor. Since getting new editors to hit the preview button instead of accidentally making a mess and getting their Talk page templated by a well-meaning recent changes patroller is something we're somewhat struggling with, I feel that making this feature more convenient to use would have nothing but benefits. AngryHarpy‍^talk 09:35, 29 March 2021 (UTC)

No reason that I know of. Absolutely concur that this should be turned on by default. It also preserves the undo stack across previews so that Ctrl+Z undoes changes done before previewing. – SD0001 (talk) 10:06, 30 March 2021 (UTC)

If you enable it and preview a page which transcludes itself, typically a template with example calls in the documentation or in noinclude tags, then the transclusion uses the saved version instead of the previewed version. That is confusing and makes template development harder. For example, try previewing Template:X1 with this:

[[{{{1}}}]]<noinclude>
{{Documentation|content=
{{X1|Foo}}
}}
</noinclude>

The documentation should show Foo but it doesn't. Toggling the feature doesn't affect edits which have already started so enable it before starting the test. I don't know whether the feature has other bad quirks but this is enough for me to not use it. Many users rarely or never edit templates. PrimeHunter (talk) 12:15, 1 April 2021 (UTC)

PrimeHunter, I see, that's certainly not ideal. An argument could of course be made that this is a fairly fringe issue, especially for new users, but it would certainly cause confusion for some of them down the road. Since I'm admittedly extremely clueless about the backend of Wikipedia, I'm just going to ask outright: Is getting this quirk simply ironed out a realistic option here? AngryHarpy‍^talk 08:40, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

It's phab:T184466 from 2018: "Live preview doesn’t use new versions of templates embedded in themselves". I don't know how hard it is to fix but there appears to have been no work in three years. PrimeHunter (talk) 09:29, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

We could just disable live preview in template ns of course... Not that strange, as it also doesn't support the TemplateSandbox extension for instance... Then again, at some point, we should probably also fix this for the 2017 WE, which I assume has the same problem. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 13:52, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

Any article that uses cs1|2 templates ({{cite book}}, {{cite web}}, {{citation}}, etc) or uses {{sfn}} (and family) or {{harv}} (and family) templates transcludes itself. The cs1|2 templates transclude the articles that use them so that they can render publication, archive, and access in the form specified by the {{use dmy dates}} and {{use mdy dates}} templates. The {{sfn}} and {{harv}} families of templates tranclude the articles that use them so that they can do error detection (see Category:Harv and Sfn template errors). At present, that is about 4.7 million articles. There is a slow-boil move afoot to create some sort of automated mechanism to render all dates in an article according to an existing {{use xxx dates}} template.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 14:43, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

I don't know if it's because I use ol' stable Monobook, but enabling this feature doesn't create a live preview or do anything for that matter. - Floydian ^τ _¢ 16:36, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

@Floydian: it doesn't make a "live preview" as you type, but when you click "preview" it will soft refresh the preview area of the page without reloading the page. — xaosflux ^Talk 17:53, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

Tech News: 2021-13

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

• Some very old web browsers don’t work well with the Wikimedia wikis. Some old code for browsers that used to be supported is being removed. This could cause issues in those browsers. [1]
• IRC recent changes feeds have been moved to a new server. Make sure all tools automatically reconnect to irc.wikimedia.org and not to the name of any specific server. Users should also consider switching to the more modern EventStreams. [2]

Problems

• When you move a page that many editors have on their watchlist the history can be split. It might also not be possible to move it again for a while. This is because of a job queue problem. [3]
• Some translatable pages on Meta could not be edited. This was because of a bug in the translation tool. The new MediaWiki version was delayed because of problems like this. [4][5]

Changes later this week

• The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 30 March. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 31 March. It will be on all wikis from 1 April (calendar).

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

17:28, 29 March 2021 (UTC)

Also of note: magic links have been disabled. See T275951 and this March 2017 (English Wikipedia) RfC. – Jonesey95 (talk) 16:32, 1 April 2021 (UTC)

Option to change time from UTC to local timezone stops working

So whenever I reply to a comment anywhere, upon adding the comment all of the times in the signatures go back to the 24 hour format in UTC. Is this a known bug that is fixable or is it just a problem with me? Blaze The Wolf | Proud Furry and Wikipedia Editor (talk) 18:40, 30 March 2021 (UTC)

Do you mean in an edit box, or on the rendered page? --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 18:44, 30 March 2021 (UTC)

You mean while using mw:Extension:DiscussionTools, right? This is likely an issue with Comments in Local Time gadget – User talk:Gary/comments in local time.js#The script isn't compatible with page-updating user scripts. – SD0001 (talk) 18:50, 30 March 2021 (UTC)

Confirmed. I filed a patch for this issue at MediaWiki talk:Gadget-CommentsInLocalTime.js#For for incompatibility with DiscussionTools. – SD0001 (talk) 11:00, 1 April 2021 (UTC)

MediaWiki logo

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T268230

Why has the logo for MediaWiki (the one at the bottom right of Wikimedia projects) changed from a yellow sunflower to a red-pink flower? 54nd60x (talk) 09:48, 1 April 2021 (UTC)

@54nd60x: because it was changed, see mw:Project:Proposal for changing logo of MediaWiki, 2020. Majavah (talk!) 09:57, 1 April 2021 (UTC)

See also phab:T268230. — xaosflux ^Talk 10:54, 1 April 2021 (UTC)

Decimal-time block durations

Does the MediaWiki software enable the possibility of decimal-time block durations? Intrigued to know since I recall an admin trying to block a user for pi seconds some time ago. --Heymid (contribs) 11:52, 1 April 2021 (UTC)

@Heymid: no, you can specify a time or use GNU data input format. So you can't use irrational numbers but you can use less common intervals such as 'fortnight'. — xaosflux ^Talk 13:02, 1 April 2021 (UTC)

Can someone block me for 1.5 seconds? --Heymid (contribs) 15:16, 1 April 2021 (UTC)

@Heymid: no: (a) the parser for that only accepts numerical values in positive integers; (b) the blocking database only has precision to 1 second for datetime values. — xaosflux ^Talk 15:22, 1 April 2021 (UTC)

(c) any admin that did that would be hauled straight to arbcom for misuse of admin rights. Not by me though. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 23:18, 1 April 2021 (UTC)

Guilty as charged ... as a bad April fools' day prank that I regret now, even though it didn't have any major consequences. I tried a similar test with 2.71828 seconds on my account before then. Both of those non-integer-second blocks were displayed with durations like "1 January 1970" for a while. When I originally made them they were displayed with the correct number of seconds. Graham87 08:19, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

Oh, there was also this similar incident (see this village stocks entry). Graham87 08:25, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

Auto hyperlink for "RFC #" text format does not work

Hi, articles like Hypertext Transfer Protocol and URL in the Infobox section and in the "Base Standards" part have "RFC #" format text (e.g. RFC 3986) that previously have been auto hyperlinked, i.e. "RFC 3986" text automatically hyperlinked to https://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc3986 and it becomes RFC 3986 and this was done "automatically". But this capability is not working now (see HTTP article for example). I think this is a good and useful and correct capability and also in Deutsch language for example, this "text format" is still correctly auto hyperlinked to the "ieft site", but in English it does not work now. Please correct this bug. Thanks, Hooman Mallahzadeh (talk) 15:32, 1 April 2021 (UTC)

This March 2017 (English Wikipedia) RfC determined that these magic links should be replaced by the {{IETF RFC}} template. The functionality was finally disabled here at en.WP sometime in the last week or so. – Jonesey95 (talk) 16:11, 1 April 2021 (UTC)

@Jonesey95: Thanks, magic links in both articles converted to "IETF RFC" template. Grateful, Hooman Mallahzadeh (talk) 16:23, 1 April 2021 (UTC)

The developers decided that the magic links should be removed, per mw:Requests for comment/Future of magic links. English Wikipedia is ahead of other wikipedias here in removing them. It is just a matter of time when the Deutsch Wikipedia needs to do the same.--Snaevar (talk) 16:38, 1 April 2021 (UTC)

My scripts are not working correctly

A bunch of my installed gadgets aren't working for me since yesterday, but I see through edit summaries on my watchlist that they are still operational. I'm not able to use the User:GregU/dashes.js, User:Ohconfucius/script/EngvarB.js, or User:Ohconfucius/script/MOSNUM dates.js scripts, and possibly others. Twinkle is partially working for me, but it wouldn't allow me to welcome an IP earlier today. There's also a weird thing on my notifications, where instead of displaying the time since the ping, it shows {{PLURAL:$1|$1h}} for all of them. Any ideas of what is happening? I haven't done anything that would have changed anything. – Muboshgu (talk) 23:00, 1 April 2021 (UTC)

Have you contacted GregU (talk · contribs) and Ohconfucius (talk · contribs) on their talk pages? --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 23:21, 1 April 2021 (UTC)

Redrose64, I haven't, because this doesn't seem like a problem with their scripts per se, as I have seen other people using them today. – Muboshgu (talk) 23:24, 1 April 2021 (UTC)

Longer reply coming: This is common when one of your scripts breaks, usually due to a change in MediaWiki. Izno (talk) 23:29, 1 April 2021 (UTC)

Let's do some cleaning:

• Use the Twinkle gadget in preferences. Remove the line in User:Muboshgu/vector.js which imports it there.
• Remove everything in User:Muboshgu/monobook.js except for the last line. Move the last line to User:Muboshgu/common.js if you still want access to Lupin (I do not know if it works). Consider whether the options stored in monobook.js are still relevant to your WP:TWPREFS and add them there.
• Move every script in your vector.js into User:Muboshgu/common.js.
• Use the XFDcloser gadget in preferences. Remove the line in common.js which imports it there.
• Use the Prosesize gadget in preferences. Remove the line in common.js which imports it there.
• Switch User:Cameltrader/Advisor.js to User:Ebrahames/Advisor.js.
• Switch User:GregU/dashes.js to User:Ohconfucius/dashes.js.
• Remove one version of User:Ohconfucius/formatgeneral.js. You are loading 2.
• Remove one version of User:Ohconfucius/script/MOSNUM dates.js. You are loading 2.
• Remove Wikipedia:WikiProject_Deletion_sorting/delsort.js. It is empty.

Start with that. Izno (talk) 23:41, 1 April 2021 (UTC)

Will do... – Muboshgu (talk) 23:46, 1 April 2021 (UTC)

Izno, all done with those steps, it did not fix the problem but I was noticing how cluttered it was getting on those three subpages. – Muboshgu (talk) 23:55, 1 April 2021 (UTC)

@Muboshgu: in User:Muboshgu/common.js, turn off all the scripts, then make sure your gadget-powered things are working. Then turn then back on one at a time to try to find which one is causing you a problem -- then go follow up with that script's author. — xaosflux ^Talk 23:58, 1 April 2021 (UTC)

Okay, one more besides Xaos' comment: Remove the line for User:Kephir/gadgets/rater.js also, since Evad's version is maintained. Izno (talk) 00:10, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

With all of the scripts disabled, Twinkle is still not working right for me. And reenabling User:Evad37/rater.js back on (that script had been working for me before), it is now not working. :/ – Muboshgu (talk) 00:12, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

Nm that rater part, apparentlly the Evad rater shows up in a different spot then the Kephir gadget I'm used to. I'll just have to keep futzing around I guess. – Muboshgu (talk) 00:20, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

They're working on some pages, but not others. – Muboshgu (talk) 00:49, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

Resolved

for now. I reset all of my preferences back to default and spent a bunch of time toggling scripts and gadgets on and off. I've gotten everything I need working, and found some interesting tools I hadn't tried before. Thank you everyone for your help! – Muboshgu (talk) 03:32, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

@Izno and Xaosflux:. Thanks for troubleshooting the problem. FYI, I would confirm that there have been no changes to my scripts of late from my end, and what you have done to solve the problem seems to prove it. Best, -- Ohc ^¡digame! 16:33, 3 April 2021 (UTC)

Request: Please could someone create a template to show the number of files on Commons which use structured data (like a template on en.wiki)

Hi all

Please excuse the Commons request here (also posted here, I want a template which functions very similarly to a en.wiki one. I'm working on improving the documentation for Commons:Structured data and want to find a way to show the current use of it. One thing that would really help is to be able to write documentation that doesn't need to be updated manually. There is a template to show number of articles on English Wikipedia, would there be a way of having a template that showed the number results of:

• Total number of files with some kind of structured data (the important one I want)
• Total number of files with depicts statement (nice to have but not essential)

If anyone knows how to create this I would really appreciate it.

Thanks John Cummings (talk) 00:05, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

This is not possible in 'automatic' template form. You will need to create some sort of database query and update a template manually (or via bot, like is done for the template transclusion counts on enwiki). Izno (talk) 00:13, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

Thanks very much Izno, do you know where I can request something like this, I'm not a programmer. John Cummings (talk) 00:48, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

commons:Commons talk:Structured data is probably the right starting point. Izno (talk) 00:54, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

What non-trivial thing could cause 1 table row out of many to exist in the wikitext but not previews or after posting?

Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 18:47, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

@Sagittarian Milky Way: caching. Can you point to a specific currently occurring example? — xaosflux ^Talk 19:12, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

It was a missing < on a </ref> which was separated from a |- on the next line by only a line break which made everything disappear till the next proper |-. Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 19:33, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

The big red Cite error was a good clue. – Jonesey95 (talk) 21:17, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

Underscores in raw links

I have been seeing blue links with underscores, often. I do not understand why some are shown this way with underscores. The second example below is a by bot reverting a BLP addition. Both observed 2 April. What is the significance, if any? Under what circumstances would they (underscores) be appropriate. How would I achieve this, if I needed to? Thank you.--Rocknrollmancer (talk) 21:13, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

• Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Military_history#Coats_of_arms_in_infoboxes

• https://www.reddit.com/r/MotoUK/comments/mg3q89/a_disgusting_act_he_keeps_blocking_every_one/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=mweb

Underscores and spaces are interchangeable in wikilinks [[...]]. It's nearly always best to use spaces. Some tools use underscores for no good reason, maybe slightly easier coding or a programmer who didn't think about it. Underscores added by editors are probably copied from url's in most cases. Spaces are represented by underscores in url's. They are not interchangeable there. The only case where underscores is better in wikilinks is if the subject is written with underscores like static_cast and others in Category:Articles with underscores in the title. PrimeHunter (talk) 22:01, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

Hey Rocknrollmancer, underlines are purely optional. This commonly happens when copying/pasting from the browser bar instead of the visual text on the screen. I try to remove the underlines for visual reasons, but both are acceptable technically and lead to exact same page. When pasting a link outside of wikipedia, the underscores are important, so that your website knows it's one url and not multiple. Shushugah (talk) 22:06, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

Thank you - makes me feel inadequate if I don't understand. I have now been playing around and can see that:
https://en.wikipedia.orgwikiWikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Military_history#Coats_of_arms_in_infoboxes
is rendered as:
Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Military_history#Coats_of_arms_in_infoboxes
by omitting the first part and adding [[...]].
Many thanks. BTW, UTC doesn't allow for British Summer Time which is +1 hour, but I'm sure you know this and it's insurmountable.--Rocknrollmancer (talk) 22:56, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

UTC intentionally has no summer time and doesn't want to match British Summer Time. You can select "Europe/London" as your time zone at Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-rendering. PrimeHunter (talk) 23:07, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

ThanQ, it's already set that way: Server time:23:28, Local time:00:28 (now 33 minutes).--Rocknrollmancer (talk) 23:32, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

I had a similar conundrum with a clerk announcing at approx 11.30PM that evidence phase would close at midnight "in approx two hours". I had to query this as I'm used to ebay time as unequivocally 23:59:59, not with a +90/120 minutes tolerance. Stated to be flexibility for whomever was online after midnight. BTW, the 1 minute disparity when signing above was how my digital clock was manually set.--Rocknrollmancer (talk) 23:42, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

Spaces are never permitted in pure URLs - if desired, they must be encoded in some way, but the manner of encoding varies between websites. If the URL has a query string, most sites will use a plus sign + to represent a space in that part of a URL. Spaces before the query string are usually percent encoded, becoming %20. Wikipedia (and other sites using the MediaWiki software) allow the underscore as an alternative to %20, but not always as a valid replacement for the plus sign + in a query string. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 07:50, 3 April 2021 (UTC)

Creating Special:Diff links?

If I'm on a diff page, is there an easy way to generate a Special:Diff/xxxx wikilink to that page? As far as I can tell, you need to manually type "Special:Diff/" and then copy-paste the oid out of the browser url bar. That's enough of a pain that I don't usually bother, and just grab the whole url. Am I missing something obvious? -- RoySmith (talk) 14:16, 3 April 2021 (UTC)

{{subst:url to diff}} exists. * Pppery * _{it has begun...} 14:21, 3 April 2021 (UTC)

Pppery, Hmmm, interesting, but that looks like as much effort to use as the manual process I described. It also doesn't seem to work in an edit comment. -- RoySmith (talk) 16:16, 3 April 2021 (UTC)

Templates cannot be transcluded or substituted in edit summaries. Wikipedia:User scripts/List#Diffs shows CleanDiffURLs. PrimeHunter (talk) 16:42, 3 April 2021 (UTC)

Try User:Enterprisey/diff-permalink. – SD0001 (talk) 16:50, 3 April 2021 (UTC)

SD0001, Ah, cool. That's exactly what I was looking for. Thanks! -- RoySmith (talk) 22:44, 3 April 2021 (UTC)

Need a new template design for religious text's verses

Can someone please invent a reference template (that maybe includes the preview ability) that allows a Bible verse to pop up and be readable within the text of an article? If it could be designed to be used by plugging in any religious text, that would be awesome as well. It probably needs to go to one of the off-WP sites that enable reading, and I think that's been the hold-up with this. They are all about the same, so picking one is max-nix. Right now, I can't find a way to reference texts under discussion so our readers can easily see what's being talked about. I am not techno at all, and as a result, I have total faith in your ability to work this magic! :-) It's really needed and would add value to WP articles on religion. Thank you!Jenhawk777 (talk) 18:56, 3 April 2021 (UTC)

This is basically not possible in a template without hosting a copy of the Bible on Wikipedia somewhere. Which then gets into the reason we have one or two templates that give you a choice of Bible to read. Izno (talk) 19:06, 3 April 2021 (UTC)

Oof. The idea of the warring over which version of a religious text to use in these pop ups causes me to shudder.--Jorm (talk) 19:08, 3 April 2021 (UTC)

But Jorm dear, the current Bible verse template [[s:Bible (King James)/Psalms#Psalm 23|Psalms:23]] already allows the editor to choose which version of the Bible to reference. The current template is a link to those verses that are already available on wikipedia, just for that purpose, and it is already possible to link to the Revised Standard and a couple other versions as well. There's no reason to change any of that. My request isn't affected by that, and really, I think that's a non-issue. I've looked at several Bible sites and they all provide multiple versions of any verse you look for - automatically. You pick a version for what you are looking for, and voila, that's what pops up at the top of the page, but then there's also a list of the same verse in multiple other versions below it. Why can they do it and we can't? I have referencing envy.

But my actual complaint is that the current template isn't a pop up. A reader can't just hover and read the verse like in a preview function. That would be valuable - and would simply show the verse in whatever version the editor had chosen. It can be done Jorm, because it is being done elsewhere. We need that ability. It would better the encyclopedia by making it easier and more informative for our readers. Jenhawk777 (talk) 04:59, 4 April 2021 (UTC)

No one is really saying the idea is impossible, it is doable, but it is tricky. [[s:Bible (King James)/Psalms#Psalm 23|Psalms:23]] links to an different website, called Wikisource, hosted by the same company as Wikipedia and as such the link is internal (although we also have internal links to non-affiliated wikis, but that is beside the point). Fetching content from a different website basically is not possible. If you really want to be thorough then the exception is Wikidata, but they rejected hosting bible verses already, all other wikis cant get data from each other since mw:Manual:$wgEnableScaryTranscluding is off, and no it will not be turned on. Like has been said the only option is to have the verses locally and make the template work that way.--Snaevar (talk) 08:18, 5 April 2021 (UTC)

If the passage is relevant enough for someone to definitely want to read it, then simply quote it. If it is not quite that relevant, there are several methods of making Bible references of which {{Bibleverse}} is probably the best. – Finnusertop (talk ⋅ contribs) 09:08, 5 April 2021 (UTC)

Bummer. Jenhawk777 (talk) 21:37, 5 April 2021 (UTC)

Left aligning template contents

Not the most world-changing request, but I was wondering if a knowledgable editor would mind looking at Template:Peer review/Unanswered peer reviews sidebar and helping me make the text of the bullet-pointed list left aligned? I'm really scratching my head where to put the styling here. Thanks I hope! Tom (LT) (talk) 04:15, 4 April 2021 (UTC)

It oddly places the content in above so abovestyle = text-align:left; works. PrimeHunter (talk) 09:40, 4 April 2021 (UTC)

Much appreciated. --Tom (LT) (talk) 22:45, 4 April 2021 (UTC)

Want to try out the latest greatest tool?

Registration is now open for a scientific study to test the efficacy of my new anti-promo tool. If you are interested in participating and you meet the inclusion criteria, please leave a message on my talk page. Inclusion criteria and other information about the study may be found on my talk page. Sam at Megaputer (talk) 04:26, 4 April 2021 (UTC)

Penton, Tunica County, Mississippi

I wonder if someone could help me change the name of this place back to "Peyton". On March 5, 2020, an IP changed the name. I'm not sure if changing it back will make something go wonky. Thanks for your help! Magnolia677 (talk) 21:52, 4 April 2021 (UTC)

@Magnolia677: IPs cannot rename pages. The only IP edits dating from March 2020 are these two, which are simple text changes and should easily be revertable by any user. No special rights are required. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 22:36, 4 April 2021 (UTC)

@Redrose64: Sorry, I should have given more detail. Last year an IP went through the text of the article and changed all the "Peytons" to "Pentons". Then today User:Maxbmogs actually changed the name of the article to Penton. I changed all the text back to Peyton today, but the name of the article still needs to be changed back. Thanks! Magnolia677 (talk) 22:42, 4 April 2021 (UTC)

In which case, either yourself or Maxbmogs should be able to WP:MOVE the page back to where it came from. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 22:51, 4 April 2021 (UTC)

@Redrose64: Worked like a charm. Thanks! Magnolia677 (talk) 22:56, 4 April 2021 (UTC)

Hide/Show links of collapsible table

Hi, the links which hide and show a collapsible table are commonly "[Hide]" and "[Show]". Can the links have other names? "Collapse" and "Expand" for example. Is there a way to have the collapse link in two places; at the top of the table and at the bottom? Thanks, PeterEasthope (talk) 23:07, 4 April 2021 (UTC)

Collapse links cannot be placed at the bottom of a table. You cannot customize on per-page what the toggle displays, that can only be done in Javascript (it might be possible for you to personalize for yourself if you work hard enough, but I do not guarantee that it would look pretty). Collapse and expand are actually the default, but for historical reasons we preferred hide/show. Izno (talk) 01:49, 5 April 2021 (UTC)

OK, thanks Izno, ... PeterEasthope (talk) 03:28, 5 April 2021 (UTC)

Proposal for finding longstanding bad articles

Thomas Ranch is about to be deleted, having existed in Wikipedia for over fifteen years without a single inline reference, and without ever having an external link to an independent source. Grub Smith, though a bit longer, has been in a similar state for an equally long time. I happened to come across these two not while searching for suspect articles but while doing general cleanup around the given name Thomas and the surname Smith. How many more articles are out there in this condition? I propose that the best way to find out, if technically feasible, would be to generate a list of articles that have never had an inline ref tag over the course of their existence, sorted by age, and push through them from the oldest on forward. If someone has the Wiki-fu to generate such a list, please have at it. BD2412 T 00:20, 5 April 2021 (UTC)

Never over the course of their existence is probably a tall order, but WP:RAQ is probably a better first stop. Izno (talk) 01:51, 5 April 2021 (UTC)

Yes, a tall order, but great efforts yield great rewards. Thanks for the pointer. BD2412 T 02:41, 5 April 2021 (UTC)

• BD2412, I seem to remember that the database replicas only include metadata, not the actual page contents. To get the contents, you need to go through the API (which is much slower). Somebody needs to check me on that. Just as a proof-of-concept, I wrote a trivial little python script that iterates over all pages in mainspace and searches for '<ref>' anywhere in the text. It's processing about 10 pages/second. We've got about 6 million articles (from WP:STATS, which I assume is talking about mainspace when it says, "6,281,819 articles"). So, we could scan every mainspace article in about a week. One could envision doing that. I'm guessing the number of revisions is 2 orders of magnitude higher, so searching every revision of every article would likely be prohibitive. First guess, a couple of years. I'm not sure what value it would add anyway. -- RoySmith (talk) 02:49, 5 April 2021 (UTC)

  We could cut that down significantly by first removing from the search every article that has a ref tag right now (which should be a substantial majority), and of those that remain, only searching articles created before, say, 2007. The value would just be clearing out old garbage. BD2412 T 03:00, 5 April 2021 (UTC)

An database scan should work. I tried searching for an ref tag on a lot smaller wiki than enwiki and it seems to work. Queries would not work, because they are not logged in an sql table.--Snaevar (talk) 08:00, 5 April 2021 (UTC)

Snaevar, What query did you perform? Can you link to a Quarry page? -- RoySmith (talk) 14:02, 5 April 2021 (UTC)

They're likely talking about database dumps. Quarry won't work as you say – it doesn't have page texts. Pinging HaeB who I think can comment on the feasibility of processing the dumps for this task. – SD0001 (talk) 16:55, 5 April 2021 (UTC)

I did an database scan using AWB, on an small wiki and I simply searched the main namespace for pages who do not have "<ref>". That kind of search is done offline. The dump file contained all pages with the most current version only (pages-meta-current in the filename). The dump file was downloaded from dumps.wikimedia.org.--Snaevar (talk) 19:33, 5 April 2021 (UTC)

As noted in the WP:RAQ discussion, inquiries can further be narrowed to articles categorized in the Category:Companies category tree, or articles categorized in Category:Living people. That's where these sorts of problems appear most likely to arise. BD2412 T 15:15, 5 April 2021 (UTC)

@BD2412: why not begin with something like Category:Articles lacking sources from December 2006? For companies specifically use something like Cleanup listing for WikiProject Business (currently does not exist for WikiProject Companies but you can request one). – Finnusertop (talk ⋅ contribs) 16:17, 5 April 2021 (UTC)

Neither of the articles noted above were so tagged, perhaps because they have external links (even though these link to sites unusable as sources). I am looking for things that have really slipped through the cracks. BD2412 T 16:20, 5 April 2021 (UTC)

Sure, BD2412, but if some type of action is needed on articles with these specific problems, it would make sense to start with the ones that have already been identified. But I get your point. I sometimes run across low-traffic articles with obvious problems that have slipped through the cracks as well and tag them. – Finnusertop (talk ⋅ contribs) 16:24, 5 April 2021 (UTC)

Pending changes update: "Approved" revisions incorrectly enabled on enwiki

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T278904

In page histories, manually accepted revisions are now displayed with a #d5fdf4 background instead of the #eaf3ff background used for automatically accepted revisions. The text "accepted by Username" has been replaced by "approved by Username", a change which I have overriden at MediaWiki:Revreview-hist-quality-user to match our protection policy's wording. If we find a little consensus to do so, an interface administrator can also override the new color. That said, I personally don't mind seeing the distinction between automatically and manually accepted changes. Note: Twinkle's rollback manually accepts the resulting revision, resulting in brightly highlighted vandalism reverts. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:43, 5 April 2021 (UTC)

No, wait, this is a bug. phab:T279276. MediaWiki:Revreview-hist-basic-user vs. MediaWiki:Revreview-hist-quality-user. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 00:51, 5 April 2021 (UTC)

Now phab:T278904. — xaosflux ^Talk 14:13, 5 April 2021 (UTC)

Tech News: 2021-14

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

• Editors can collapse part of an article so you have to click on it to see it. When you click a link to a section inside collapsed content it will now expand to show the section. The browser will scroll down to the section. Previously such links didn't work unless you manually expanded the content first. [6]

Changes later this week

• The citoid API will use for example 2010-12-XX instead of 2010-12 for dates with a month but no days. This is because 2010-12 could be confused with 2010–2012 instead of December 2010. This is called level 1 instead of level 0 in the Extended Date/Time Format. [7]
• The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 6 April. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 7 April. It will be on all wikis from 8 April (calendar).

Future changes

• PAWS can now connect to the new Wiki Replicas. Cross-database JOINS will no longer work from 28 April. There is a new way to connect to the databases. Until 28 April both ways to connect to the databases will work. If you think this affects you and you need help you can post on Phabricator or on Wikitech.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

19:38, 5 April 2021 (UTC)

Fool-proofing WP:Sandbox notice

Is there anyway of fool-proofing the notice so it won’t ever get deleted again? Perhaps make it smaller? More hidden comments? Move it to the page’s edit notice? --Heymid (contribs) 22:18, 5 April 2021 (UTC)

Cyberbot I has a task that cleans the sandbox periodically, like this. I didn't dig in to its BRFA or logic to see why it sometimes takes a few hours between edits. cyberpower678 might be able to shed some light. – Jonesey95 (talk) 22:57, 5 April 2021 (UTC)

I know this. I haven't been living under a rock. So there’s no way of forcing the template to be there outside of putting it in the page’s wikitext along with everything else? A problem is that some users add the nobots template which disables bot editing of the page. And it’s not like the bot immediately restores the message once removed. --Heymid (contribs) 19:47, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

Who to give kudos for preview cards?

I noticed that someone finally added preview cards for enwiki articles, showing the first image in tweets, on slack, etc. I thought that was declined by the tech team. I'd like to give a hearty thank you to whomever coded that. Anyone know how to find out? mw:Extension:TwitterCards is still listed as "experimental" and is not shown as installed on any Wikipedia. 2601:647:4D00:2C40:6130:2EC6:6215:83F0 (talk) 23:44, 5 April 2021 (UTC)

You'll want the work on/around phab:T157145. Izno (talk) 00:00, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

List of articles that need improvement

I've come across a cluster of Wiki articles that are loaded with unsourced statements. What is the best way to get them on a list of articles that need improvement that everyone can see? I've been adding the Ref Improve template to the top of such articles. Does that automatically put it on some "articles needing improvement" list?

In some cases, the entire article is unsourced. Some contain line after line of equations in math-major notation, with no supporting footnotes. The average reader has no way to ascertain whether that "stuff" is supported by experts in the field, generally accepted, or some anonymous Wikipedia editor's original work. I've been trying to find reliable sources, but it's difficult because that requires access to specialized textbooks that aren't readily available online or in my local library. The articles I'm talking about concern finance. For example:

• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fixed_income_analysis
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yield_to_maturity
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bond_duration

Thanks, BuzzWeiser196 (talk) 10:54, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

@BuzzWeiser196: {{Refimprove|date=April 2021}} adds the hidden categories Category:Articles needing additional references from April 2021 and Category:All articles needing additional references. The latter has 400,000 articles. You can enable "Show hidden categories" at Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-rendering. I recommend that for editors. PrimeHunter (talk) 11:08, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

Thank you. BuzzWeiser196 (talk) 11:12, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

Editing a talk page blanks the entire discussion

I just added a comment at the last thread Talk:macOS High Sierra, and the edit window blanked all the existing text. Consequently, this diff has removed a bunch of comments (when I didn't want it to!) and ended up with a reply to the wrong thread. I know talk page communication is difficult, but if I'm struggling, what hope have new users got? Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 14:58, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

Same issue here, I was only able to get to edit here by doing it in mw:safemode. It doesn't appear to affect me while logged out (I popped into an incognito window and appeared to be able to edit fine). ‑‑ElHef (Meep?) 15:20, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

If I comment out all of my extensions in Special:MyPage/common.js, it starts working. I'll go back and uncomment each one in turn, and let you know which is the culprit. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 15:22, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

That's probably not what's going on with mine; my common.js is blank (has been for years). ‑‑ElHef (Meep?) 15:29, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

Well, if I comment out importScript('User:Gary/comments in local time.js');, the problem goes away. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 15:30, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

• @Ritchie333: I reverted changes in that personal userscript that were requested in MediaWiki_talk:Gadget-CommentsInLocalTime.js#Fix_for_incompatibility_with_DiscussionTools. That personal userscript seems to be in need of rewrite to modernize it for gadget use as well. — xaosflux ^Talk 15:35, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

  I don't use that gadget but whatever changed seems to have fixed it for me. ‑‑ElHef (Meep?) 15:37, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

  @ElHef: that gadget is just a reference back to the personal userscript mentioned above. — xaosflux ^Talk 15:39, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

  Yeah, I just realized what that was referring to and I do have that enabled in prefs. Thanks for the quick fix. ‑‑ElHef (Meep?) 15:42, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

• I have the same problem as Ritchie above. I tried to add this comment in the previous section, but was unable to do so. RolandR (talk) 15:05, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

  @RolandR: try again (see above). — xaosflux ^Talk 15:38, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

Help refining a search

Apologies if this is the wrong place, but I don't know where else to ask
I regularly search for links in articles to User pages, as these are contrary to MOS:DRAFTNOLINK and are often vandalism - usually linking to unacceptable content - or people mistakenly signing their additions to articles
To find these I search for insource:User insource:/\[\[ *User *:/ sorted by edit date - as here
Today, User:polbot has auto-created 150-160 articles, each of which includes User:polbot and this; along with User:GreenC bot/Job 18 and User:Kvng/RTH are cluttering up the search results, making it difficult to find the links to "real" users pages. However, I don't know enough about the coding to omit those three "users" from the search results - can anyone help me out ? Thanks - Arjayay (talk) 15:14, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

@Arjayay This search works. Not sure why you had wikipedia namespace selected in there which was causing a timeout. – SD0001 (talk) 15:19, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

Thanks SD0001 - that's really helpful, and very prompt - I was trying to put the omissions at the end - Thanks again - Arjayay (talk) 15:24, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

@Arjayay: This omits pages with a user link inside comment tags. PrimeHunter (talk) 16:04, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

Wow PrimeHunter thanks a lot. I started off with 3250 search results this morning, SD0001 reduced that to 750, and you've got it down to 40 - My only regret is not asking sooner - thanks again to both of you - Arjayay (talk) 17:19, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

We also have Wikipedia:Database reports/Articles containing links to the user space but it's not live and it includes links made by templates, e.g. {{Proposed deletion/dated|...|nom = username}}, so it's less useful. It would be better if our search feature had a linksfrom: option (requested in phab:T253642). PrimeHunter (talk) 17:51, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

Transcluding mainspace pages

I've discovered that some pages like Doctor Who (film) are being transcluded in other mainspace pages. I'm not sure I agree with this practice. This is a job that I think should be done only with templates. Most editors, especially if you're using VisualEditor, probably don't realize that editing the table at Doctor Who (film)#Production effects over 340 other articles. With that in mind, I have semi-protected the page indefinitely as high-risk, which is something that happens automatically in the templatespace.

What's even worse I think is using parser functions like #section and #section-h. This kind of selective transclusion offers useful functionality but it is fragile. #section requires special markup on the target page, and #section-h will break all transclusions if an editor changes or removes the target section heading.

Is there any technical reason not to use templates for these use-cases? If not, should we propose a policy/guideline to disallow mainspace transclusion? The practice seems to be widespread (~3,500 articles have a transclusion count of 5 or more). It would take a lot of work to convert everything to use templates, but we could at least deprecate and/or formally discourage this practice.

Thoughts? — MusikAnimal ^talk 15:57, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

• Seems to easily overlap with scenarios brought about with Template:Excerpt. — xaosflux ^Talk 16:02, 6 April 2021 (UTC)
• I have for quite some time considered making a bot to deal with transcluded sections changing names, but haven't got around to it. I think it's actually quite a good idea to tranclude sections to perhaps a handful other pages but when the count gets to the double digits it should probably be a template. I think in any case MusikBot probably should be enabled in mainspace, just in case. --Trialpears (talk) 16:24, 6 April 2021 (UTC)
• The people wanted section transclusion and we gave it to them. This is what happens. I agree with Trial that while we support it, MB should probably operate in the mainspace. There should probably be a report for "large number of main space transclusions". --Izno (talk) 18:27, 6 April 2021 (UTC)
• This is follow-up to Template talk:Infobox Doctor Who episode#Deriving an episode/serial number, and it's not a section of Doctor Who (film) that is transcluded but the whole article, which is pushed through {{Template parameter value}} in order to extract a single figure from the infobox. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 18:47, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

  Well, that seems dumb. :) Izno (talk) 18:50, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

  Looks to be @TedEdwards: back in Oct 2018. — xaosflux ^Talk 18:55, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

  Exactly, and if you follow the first link that I provided in my last post, you'll see that I already mentioned that. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 18:57, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

New plan for RADAR rollout

Since no one wants to be a lab rat, we are changing course for the rollout of my new tool. Registration is no longer be required for use.

• Click here to use the tool. (link will begin working shortly)
• Click here for instructional videos.

Be sure to save the links so you don't lose them. Sam at Megaputer (talk) 16:32, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

So what exactly is this tool? EGGIDICAE🥚 18:50, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

The tool does several things, but the main feature I am proud of it that it detects promotional articles. Or at least it will, once our IT guy get the link working (haha). So I've run a customized sentiment analysis on all articles about companies and schools to derive a promo score, which we can use to rank them from most to least promotional. I've also pulled in all of the promo tags, and monthly page views. Then the idea is that we apply various sorts and filters to discover various types of damaged articled. To give some examples, we can filter down to untagged articles and sort by promo score. The articles at the top of the list are promotional articles without tags, so we tag them. Or we can filter to articles that have POV tags, and then sort by monthly views. If we care about reducing damaged hits, this gives us a priority que for articles in need of cleanup. Sam at Megaputer (talk) 18:59, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

I don't understand why we need a tool hosted off Wiki which presumably will have access to private data for user accounts when we have perfectly good filters that already do this. EGGIDICAE🥚 19:05, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

Well, we can't sort by promo score. And I'm not sure what you mean by access to private data for user accounts. Once the link is working, no account setup will be required. Sam at Megaputer (talk) 19:09, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

Yes, we can. In the same way that ORES and filters already do. EGGIDICAE🥚 19:12, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

I'm not sure that ORES does exactly that. Could you show me what you mean? For example, could you get me a link to all articles on companies that have a notability tag, sorted from most to least promotional? Sam at Megaputer (talk) 19:20, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

MW:ORES. Can you please explain how exactly your tool works, what type of information it would "see" from using it? EGGIDICAE🥚 19:28, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

I make this video series to explain how it works from a user's prospective. If this can be achieved with ORES, It's certainly not obvious how to do it from that documentation. I am planning on opening up the tool for inspection after it has been out for two weeks and we have collected some data on efficacy. Sam at Megaputer (talk) 19:40, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

You still haven't explained what if anything it sees from a data standpoint, which is more important since you're asking people to test it out and promoting it all over the site without any meaningful discussion with the actual community. EGGIDICAE🥚 19:42, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

Are you asking me to explain how it creates the ranking? Sam at Megaputer (talk) 19:47, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

To be honest, this sounds to me like straight-up spam promoting your company's tool, and I'm half-minded to remove the spam you posted - the optics of this are very concerning for me. If it's genuinely not intended to be promotion and is intended to purely for the interests of furthering the project, why not open-source it and host it on wikitech:Toolforge? That way, concerns about leaking the private data of users of this tool can be mitigated through the requirement to follow Toolforge's terms of use as well. While I'm definitely interested in the anti-spam fight, just the way this seems to have been pushed from your end definitely feels like (to me, at least) a bait-and-switch, though I do assume that's not your intention.

You also mention you're collecting usage data from this, but I fail to see where you've disclosed your privacy policy detailing exactly what data you will be collecting and storing, and for how long. ​stwalkerster (talk)

Oh, that data collection. The data I am collecting is just an analysis of how these Wikipedia articles change over time. We aren't collecting any user data. And this tool was built with a proprietary software framework, so it can't be open-sourced. But it might be possible to create an open-source knock off if it is popular, and I would even be willing to help with that. I'm not sure what you mean by "bait and switch". Sam at Megaputer (talk) 19:56, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

The fact that you do not understand what I am asking about with regard to data is a problem. How do we know what data it is collecting from someone using the tool? How do we know this isn't just scraping IPs? What privacy assurances are there? EGGIDICAE🥚 19:59, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

It's the same as when you visit any website. If I had built this tool to scrape IPs, I would be doing that in a very inefficient way. You are probably wanting to know what Megaputer is trying to get out of this. That is a perfectly reasonable question. My company let me work on this because they are hoping to make the news. As for myself, I am a Wikipedian who wants to help along the project. Sam at Megaputer (talk) 20:02, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

No, I honestly don't care. I want to know what user data this tool is gathering from USERS ACCESSING IT considering you've promoted it all over the place. This isn't a goodness of your heart creation, you even said as much. My company let me work on this because they are hoping to make the news. EGGIDICAE🥚 20:07, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

Bot Partially Non-functioning

I think that I have a specific issue and a general issue to report. The specific issue is that a bot, User:MDanielsBot, has stopped doing one of its tasks. The task is Task 6, which is to clerk the Dispute Resolution Noticeboard by maintaining a table that summarizes the status of disputes. It has stopped maintaining that table. The bot seems to be doing Task 4 properly, which is to dispose of stale reports at the vandalism noticeboard. The instructions say that if the bot is malfunctioning, administrators can press a button to block it, or non-admins can report it at WP:ANI. Presumably a report at WP:ANI will result in the bot being blocked. Any bot should be blocked if it is doing something wrong. In this case the bot isn't doing anything wrong. It isn't doing something right that it should do. The general issue is what should be done if a bot stops doing one of its tasks, and the bot maintainer is on a long wikibreak. It appears that User:Mdaniels5757 has posted a notice saying that they will be back in a few months. In the meantime, their bot is doing its most important task, and isn't doing another task.

What should be done with this bot?

What should be done with bots that are partly non-functioning and do not have a current bot administrator? Robert McClenon (talk) 18:16, 6 April 2021 (UTC)

This is a typical problem with bots. There's nothing that can be done about it. Try emailing Mdaniels; if he sees it, and has time, he might fix it. If not, WP:BOTREQ to find someone else to create a similar bot (presumably this may help make it quicker for someone to do so). ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 18:20, 6 April 2021 (UTC)