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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).

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Frequently asked questions (see also: Wikipedia:FAQ/Technical)

Click "[show]" next to each point to see more details.

If something looks wrong, purge the server's cache, then bypass your browser's cache.
This tends to solve most issues, including improper display of images, user-preferences not loading, and old versions of pages being shown.

No, we will not use JavaScript to set focus on the search box.
This would interfere with usability, accessibility, keyboard navigation and standard forms. See task 3864. There is an `accesskey` property on it (default to `accesskey="f"` in English). Logged-in users can enable the "Focus the cursor in the search bar on loading the Main Page" gadget in their preferences.

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« Archives, 193, 194, 195, 196, 197, 198, 199, 200, 201, 202, 203, 204, 205, 206, 207, 208, 209, 210, 211, 212, 213

Emergency server switch is NOT HERE

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T213864

Quick note, while everyone else is trying to sort out MassMessage problems: There's going to be a partial m:server switch tomorrow, because of hardware problems; it's just like all the previous ones, except affecting only some (most) wikis and with much less planning. It will NOT affect the English, German, French, or Russian Wikipedias (or several smaller places). Check the Phab link for the list of affected wikis.

On a side note, please ping me if you need my attention this week (or any time you think something's important, ever). Thanks, Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 19:59, 16 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

From the title, I thought we were blocking someone that had named themself Emergency server switch as WP:NOTHERE. Natureium (talk) 20:00, 16 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

<grin>

The task's been closed, so this is done. It sounds like editing was blocked on those wikis for less than four minutes. Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 17:52, 17 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

This isn't WP:ANI :) Galobtter (pingó mió) 17:53, 17 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Galobtter, so tempted to create the account named Emergency server switch just to say that it is here... Home Lander (talk) 20:35, 17 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry, was someone looking for me? Emergency Server Switch (talk) 21:23, 17 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Soooooooooooooock! Natureium (talk) 21:39, 17 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Template Data Table

Question... When adding TemplateData is there any way to edit it basically in a spreadsheet? It is so time consuming to use the data editor, constantly going back and forth between different params... --Zackmann (^{Talk to me}/_{What I been doing}) 19:26, 17 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Zackmann08: There's some other tools you can try listed at Wikipedia:TemplateData/Tutorial#Tools, or you can edit the wikitext directly (but you need to be careful to keep the JSON syntax valid, or the page will refuse to save) - Evad37 [talk] 00:53, 18 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Evad37: thanks!!! --Zackmann (^{Talk to me}/_{What I been doing}) 03:29, 18 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Floating 6

Can anyone fix the floating bold "6" here? https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=The_Beatles_(album)&oldid=878971860#Charts I can't seem to find where this is in the code. ―Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 03:55, 18 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Koavf:

Done --DannyS712 (talk) 04:12, 18 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks! ―Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 04:36, 18 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Staunton Mall

Can someone figure out why the map isn't working properly in the infobox for Staunton Mall? Ten Pound Hammer • ^{(What did I screw up now?)} 04:11, 18 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@TenPoundHammer: How should it appear/work? --DannyS712 (talk) 04:14, 18 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@DannyS712: It should show a map. I'm just seeing a blank space where it should be. Actually all such maps appear to be malfunctioning right now. Ten Pound Hammer • ^{(What did I screw up now?)} 04:17, 18 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@TenPoundHammer: I'm seeing a fully working map, and not just on that page. Maybe its a problem on your end? --DannyS712 (talk) 04:19, 18 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Seems to work for me as well. --Palosirkka (talk) 08:52, 19 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Idiosyncratic watchlist

I use my watchlist to keep an eye on articles I have written, particularly for detecting vandalism or unsuitable changes to articles. But the watchlist is inconsistent, and does not show me all the entries I would like it to. Today for instance I noticed (by resting the pointer on "diff") that Desert hare had been vandalised, but decided to look at another article on the watchlist before clicking through to Desert hare. By the time I got back to the watchlist, Desert hare was no longer listed there. By this time someone else had dealt with the vandalism, but the article should still have appeared on my watchlist, with a different time tag. Then there are pages like this one which I particularly want to watch, and where I can't rely on the watchlist alerting me to changes, which means that I often miss comments. Is there anything I can do to make the watchlist more suited to my requirements? Cwmhiraeth (talk) 10:10, 18 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Cwmhiraeth: in your watchlist do you have any filters enabled, for example - hide probably good edits? Depending on your configuration you may only see WL entries for the "latest" entry - and if you filter it out, it won't show. — xaosflux ^Talk 13:44, 18 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

At Preferences → Watchlist, make sure that "Expand watchlist to show all changes, not just the most recent" is turned on. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 17:49, 18 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you. We'll see how it goes now. Cwmhiraeth (talk) 18:35, 18 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Usage metrics of a script

Is there any particular way to answer questions like "How many people use my script right now ?" or "How many times is a script used per day ?".(especially if the script in question is a unconventional one like User:FR30799386/undo.js ?) << FR 12:20, 18 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

You could query for the ads it leaves in the edit summaries. It's miserably slow, though. Here's the 100 most recent. —Cryptic 14:30, 18 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Regarding the first, some writers of scripts advise the use of backlinks. For example, see User:Anomie/previewtemplatelastmod.js or User:Evad37/XFDcloser. The backlink is the wikilink that follows the ; // characters, and it allows usage to be checked using e.g. Special:WhatLinksHere/User:Anomie/previewtemplatelastmod.js or Special:WhatLinksHere/User:Evad37/XFDcloser after which you need to look for only page names that end in ".js" and ignore the others. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 17:56, 18 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

An insource search always works anyhow - this search in userspace finds that 20 people use the script. Galobtter (pingó mió) 18:00, 18 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

That answers my questions. Cryptic, I have forked your query so that I can run it on a later date, it answers my second question. I have added a backlink and the insource search does give me an idea of how many people are importing it right now. :) << FR 18:26, 18 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Edit conflicts on talk pages

Could edit conflicts on talk pages ever be reworked? My thought process for this is that after an editor (#1) has posted a comment, and while s/he is going back to edit it, fix typos, etc., another editor (#2) is already writing up their response. Editor #1 saves their fixes, Editor #2 goes to save their brand new reply, and is presented with an edit conflict. Going back to the question, could edit conflicts on talk pages be reworked so that the server could detect that Editor #2 didn't actually have any sort of conflict and just wanted to submit a new reply, and add the reply to where it was meant to go while ignoring Editor #2's changes? -- /Alex/₂₁ 13:18, 18 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Obligatory "structured discussions would solve this problem but en.WP refuses to use them". (Not without some decent reasons, mind you.) --Izno (talk) 13:55, 18 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Obligatory trout to the face for Izno for bringing up Flow... — xaosflux ^Talk 20:34, 18 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

This is probably a good idea in principle. I'm just worried about the case where Editor #2 posts information that would make Editor #1 change their reply, which would result in Editor #1 having to go back and make edits. For my part, in an upcoming reply-link change I'm going to display a little popup saying something like "An editor has made another comment here since you started writing [click here to reload]" if something like that is detected. Enterprisey (talk!) 21:54, 18 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Weird "Revert"

Could someone explain what happened Here? ^{[Username Needed]} 15:45, 18 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

An IP user used the "undo" button, presumably from the page history, to undo Nochorus's edit. The undo functionality, unlike rollback or Twinkle, can work on edits that aren't the most recent. Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 15:51, 18 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

HELP - Code for time variation

HELP - Need-To-Know, if possible, any Code to present the variation in the time duration of a day on the planet Saturn - variation to present => "+1m52s/-1m19s" - OR - "+112s/-79s" - in order that the final presentation looks like => https://cdn.iopscience.com/images/0004-637X/871/1/1/apjaaf798ieqn1.gif - from the following reference => < ref name="APJ-20190117">Mankovich, Christopher; et al. (17 January 2019). "Cassini Ring Seismology as a Probe of Saturn's Interior. I. Rigid Rotation". The Astrophysical Journal. 871 (1). Retrieved 18 January 2019. {{cite journal}}: Explicit use of et al. in: |author= (help)</ref> - Related material, so far, is the following => 10^h 33^m 38^s ( - from {{RA|10|33|38}} )
10 hours,33 minutes,38 seconds (+1m52s;-1m19s)^[1]^[2] - iac - TIA - and - Enjoy! :) Drbogdan (talk) 21:35, 18 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

References

^ Mankovich, Christopher; et al. (17 January 2019). "Cassini Ring Seismology as a Probe of Saturn's Interior. I. Rigid Rotation". The Astrophysical Journal. 871 (1). Retrieved 18 January 2019. {{cite journal}}: Explicit use of et al. in: |author= (help)
^ McCartney, Gretchen; Wendel, JoAnna (18 January 2019). "Scientists Finally Know What Time It Is on Saturn". NASA. Retrieved 18 January 2019.

{{val}} can use uncertainties like that but it cannot handle h/m/s units:

{{val|1234|+56|-78|sortable=off}} → 1234+56
−78

Special:ExpandTemplates shows the following output:

<span class="nowrap">1234<span style="margin-left:0.3em;"><span style="display:inline-block;margin-bottom:-0.3em;vertical-align:-0.4em;line-height:1.2em;font-size:85%;text-align:right;">+56<br />−78</span></span></span>

If desperate, you might try replacing the numbers in the output wikitext with what is needed for the h/m/s superscripts. Johnuniq (talk) 22:13, 18 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Johnuniq: Thank you *very much* for your reply - seems worth considering - and better than my own less worthy tries - Thanks again - it's *greatly* appreciated - Enjoy! :) Drbogdan (talk) 22:23, 18 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Johnuniq: BRIEF Followup: Yes - seems your suggested code:

<span class="nowrap">10<sup>h</sup>33<sup>m</sup>38<sup>s</sup><span style="margin-left:0.3em;"><span style="display:inline-block;margin-bottom:-0.3em;vertical-align:-0.4em;line-height:1.2em;font-size:85%;text-align:right;">+1<sup>m</sup>52<sup>s</sup><br />-1<sup>m</sup>19<sup>s</sup></span></span></span>

works very well, as follows => 10^h33^m38^s+1^m52^s
-1^m19^s

ALSO - the following code (per User:Kwamikagami from the Saturn article) =>{{RA|10|33|38}} {{+-|{{RA|0|1|52}}|{{RA|0|1|19s}}}} gives the following output => 10^h 33^m 38^s ^{+0^h 1^m 52^s}
_{−0^h 1^m 19s^s}

hope this helps in some way - iac - Enjoy! :) Drbogdan (talk) 15:11, 22 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I was trying to code it to leave out the "0^h ", but couldn't figure out how.

BTW, one of the nice things about the {{val}} and {{+-}} templates is that they use proper minus signs instead of hyphens, so we don't have to remember to do so and no-one needs to clean them up. — kwami (talk) 23:14, 22 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Well, that was an easy fix! Hrs now optional in the RA template. — kwami (talk) 23:38, 22 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Kwamikagami: Thank you for your help with this coding - yes - agreed - update seems to work very well - and is appreciated => <span class="nowrap">{{RA|10|33|38}} {{+-|{{RA||1|52}}|{{RA||1|19}}}} </span> gives the following output => 10^h 33^m 38^s ^{+ 1^m 52^s}
_{− 1^m 19^s} - Thanks again - and - Enjoy! :) Drbogdan (talk) 23:51, 22 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Tabular data not available

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T214179
Resolved

I'm investigating an error at California's 5th congressional district#2012. This is the wikitext and the error:

{{election box US auto|California|2012|United States Representative District 5|Mike Thompson link=Mike Thompson (California politician)}}
Lua error in Module:Election_box_US_auto at line 159:
Unable to find tabular data:
California Elections/2012/General/Candidates.tab.

The above calls Module:Election box US auto which executes the equivalent of:

tab_name = 'California Elections/2012/General/Candidates.tab'
tabular = mw.ext.data.get(tab_name)

The result in tabular is false instead of a table, and that gives the error above. The result should be the Lua equivalent of c:Data:California Elections/2012/General/Candidates.tab.

In a sandbox at Commons, previewing the following shows a table of valid data, as it should:

{{Data:California Elections/2012/General/Candidates.tab}}

I've done some sandbox testing that shows mw.ext.data.get('California Elections/2012/General/Candidates.tab') works at Commons but fails an enwiki. Any ideas? Johnuniq (talk) 02:09, 19 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Using what links here lead me to User:Legoktm/test (ping Legoktm). That is currently working but editing the page and previewing shows errors. There is a presumably temporary breakage that I suppose should be reported at phab somewhere. Johnuniq (talk) 02:26, 19 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

This is phab:T214179. — JJMC89 (T·C) 03:10, 19 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Magic, thanks. Basing articles on Wikidata and/or Commons tabular data has drawbacks. I wonder what appears in an enwiki watchlist if a Commons table is vandalized. Johnuniq (talk) 06:15, 19 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Transclusion links

What is the "hide transclusions" button supposed to do on the Special:WhatLinksHere page? I assumed it would hide links transcluded on to the target page through templates, but that's not working for me. SpinningSpark 12:08, 19 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

It only hides pages where the whole page itself is transcluded. It's only useful on templates and other pages used for transclusion. User:PrimeHunter/Source links.js may help with what you want. It's a frequently requested feature. Wikipedia:Village pump (technical)/Archive 155#What Links Here vs.Templates has links to other requests here and at Phabricator. PrimeHunter (talk) 12:36, 19 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@PrimeHunter: that's great. The only thing that that isn't doing for me is finding links that come in via a redirect. It's not even finding the redirect page. But it's a great help, so often what links here is swamped by navbox entries making it useless. SpinningSpark 15:10, 19 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Proposed gadget: Shortdesc helper

I recently revised my user script User:Galobtter/Shortdesc helper to fix some minor issues and use OOUI, and I'm proposing that it become a gadget. It apparently is/will be possible to conveniently edit short descriptions on the mobile app and it would seem good to have a gadget for doing so on desktop; shortdesc helper has been installed and used by a reasonable number of people and I haven't received much reports of bugs or issues with it. Galobtter (pingó mió) 13:39, 19 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Support as a useful step in involving more editors in this task. – But have you or will you fix the defect whereby input of {{Short description|none}} doesn't register and the helper script continues to display "Missing" or (in the case of a list article) "Wikimedia list article"?: Bhunacat10 (talk), 20:17, 21 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

{{short description|none}} doesn't actually change the short description displayed on mobile (which would still pull from wikidata) - the relevant page property is not made empty - so the wikidata description should still be displayed but I'll see if I can put an indicator somewhere and disable the "missing". Galobtter (pingó mió) 08:28, 22 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Support Useful script, works as intended barring a small bug which I have raised with the maintainer. << FR ^(mobileUndo) 03:53, 24 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Why does advanced search make searching namespaces harder rather than easier?

On the search tab of preferences:

"Don’t show the Advanced Search interface.
Advanced Search adds a form to the Special:Search page. This allows you to perform specialized searches, even if you don't know any search syntax. It also changes the way namespaces can be selected.

Yeah, Advanced Search makes it more difficult to search templates for example. -- Timeshifter (talk) 14:22, 19 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Give an example why it's harder.

Earlier to search by namespace you needed to press enter in search box, click advanced search and then finally select namespace. Now it's shortened by 1 step. I don't like that it places cursor always in search, making browsing longer results by keyboard annoying (when you visit one result and then go back again to results page). --MarMi wiki (talk) 23:45, 19 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

See Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-gadgets. Check the box for "Open search results in a new tab or window when holding down the Ctrl key". It is not perfect, but it nearly always works. -- Timeshifter (talk) 10:34, 20 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry, but that doesn't solve my problem.

What I meant by "cursor always in search" (I'm assuming the option was for that): search for something that gives couple of pages of result (increase number of results [or change screen resolution to smaller vertical size] per page if you can see all page), go one/two pages down by pressing Page Down, select one of the links, when page loads go back to search results (Alt+cursor left) (you should return to the same screen position on the results list), press up/down/Page Down key - cursor (focus) is in the search box, so you end up at the top of the page. --MarMi wiki (talk) 21:29, 20 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

MarMi wiki. I see what you are saying. My idea gets around it though by not loading a new page on top of the search results list. So your place in the list (via page down) is exactly where you left it. You use ctrl-click on each search result. Each one opens in a new tab. -- Timeshifter (talk) 18:25, 22 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I guess that will work (equal number of steps needed). But I'm used to open results in one tab. --MarMi wiki (talk) 19:31, 22 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Example: Click on the search form icon to get to the search page. Click on "add namespaces". Uncheck "article". Scroll down to template. Check "template". Enter search terms. Click "search." That is more steps than before.

And worse, it is not as intuitive. The old search had all the namespace checkboxes in a very compact square. No need to scroll.

And now if you hit the wrong scroll button you lose the namespaces list. -- Timeshifter (talk) 10:34, 20 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Personally, I agree with you that the old list of checkboxes was more usable than the current dropdown list widget. You'd have to ask the people responsible for the redesign to know why they think this is better; you might file a task in the Phabricator project for the advanced search to ask them more directly, or figure out who the right people are and ping them. Anomie ⚔ 15:28, 20 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Specifically, the old array of check boxes was also easier to access: just move the cursor to the box. With this scrolling arrangement (and why do people think scrolling is so neat it should be unnecessarily added?) you have to scan a list going by in quasi-random order. ♦ J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 20:03, 24 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the link. That link should be on the advanced search form, so people can see what has already been requested. I see you are a developer. Could you write up a task? I don't have much luck in writing tasks that get a favorable response. :) -- Timeshifter (talk) 16:21, 20 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Not something I'd do in my professional capacity, and in my personal capacity I don't really have time. Sorry. Anomie ⚔ 01:20, 21 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Special:Search links to Help:Searching on "Help" in the English Wikipedia. If we want a link to phab:tag/advanced-search/ then it should be on the help page and not the search form itself. Advanced search is enabled by default but few readers will be interested in the phab page. PrimeHunter (talk) 10:15, 21 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

PrimeHunter. One developer told me this recently about the link "Tell us what you think about the filtering tools" on the English Wikipedia and Commons watchlist page:

We don't plan to remove that link. We still need it to have a way to be aware of bugs. If someone wants to suggest a change or an improvement, we will look at it but it may be implemented later. Have a like like that is done on more and more tools because of the reason you mention: people won't come to Phabricator or elsewhere because they aren't aware of it.

So maybe there could be a similar link on the advanced search page. Rather than bury it on the help page. -- Timeshifter (talk) 18:12, 22 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Timeshifter: Do you know that you can type in the name of the namespace (after clicking Add namespaces that space turns into search box with autocompletion)? --MarMi wiki (talk) 21:33, 20 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

MarMi wiki. No, I did not know that. Thanks. It is kind of buggy though. A space entered in after typing in "template" causes the list to shrink down to just the checkbox for template talk. And I if I type in 2 namespaces in that form, with a space between them, I get nothing. I sometimes want to search in multiple namespaces quickly. The old set of checkboxes in a compact space was so easy, fast, and intuitive. -- Timeshifter (talk) 18:12, 22 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

If you know names of namespaces then two letters should be enough to find them - ex. Talk and Template: ta -> click on Talk (or choose by cursor down+enter), te -> click on Template. It's quick too (if you don't need to select more than ~4). But expanding list (like for Advanced parameters) of all namespaces would be nice too.

By the way, you can scroll the namespace list by using mouse scroll wheel, it's more convenient. Too bad you cant do that from keyboard by PgDn/PgUp. --MarMi wiki (talk) 19:31, 22 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

TemplateData not working for Template:Infobox video game

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T213953
Resolved

I tried to add {{Infobox video game}} using the VisualEditor but it displays neither the description nor the fields (tried two different browsers and accounts). As far as I can tell, Template:Infobox video game/doc which contains the TemplateData for this template has not been changed recently and when I try to edit the TemplateData there, all fields appear. I tried to append the whole TD block to the sandbox version and use that version but while I can edit the TD, it also won't appear when trying to add the template with the VE. Can someone help? Regards So Why 14:46, 19 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

It doesn't work for me either. Assuming it's working correctly, it doesn't refreshed template yet (Help:TemplateData#Limitations_and_questions), and you can't null-edit the template because it's protected. --MarMi wiki (talk) 23:55, 19 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Possibly related to phab:T213953, since null-editing the template didn't fix it. - Evad37 [talk] 07:54, 20 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@SoWhy: The bug has been resolved, so it should be working now - Evad37 [talk] 05:38, 22 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, works again. Thanks for the ping! Regards So Why 08:10, 22 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Logged in here, when I go to other sites I'm logged out

It happened at Wikisource a few days ago, just now at Wikimedia. Doug Weller talk 19:56, 19 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I think that can happen if you have some software that causes your browser to accept cookies from some sites but not others. Johnuniq (talk) 21:17, 19 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Doug Weller: By Wikimedia, do you mean commons:, meta:, foundation: or another site? Wikimedia is the name of the organisation that hosts all of these Wikis - several hundred altogether. Most of these are part of the single unified login (SUL) system, but some (such as foundation) are not.

When you visit one of the non-SUL Wikis, you won't be logged in unless you log in there as a separate operation. There's nothing we can do to change that except file a phab: ticket.

When you visit one of the SUL Wikis and you are not shown as logged in, try a WP:BYPASS and see if that fixes it. If not, there is a possibility that you have a corrupt cookie. To fix this, go to a site where you are definitely logged in; then deliberately log out; then log in again. Logging out will invalidate all cookies that bear your login name; logging in will create a fresh cookie. When visiting other sites for the first time after logging in again, this fresh cookie may still need the bypass technique. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 21:41, 19 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Redrose64: sorry, meta, to be exact meta:Stewards/Elections_2019. Wikisource a few days ago, meta today. It doesn't help that I use my iPad and my PC at times during the day so I can't recall which I was using at Wikisource, definitely my iPad earlier today. Thanks Doug Weller talk 22:02, 19 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Improving the ease of listening to audio (especially MIDI files)

(Sorry if this is misplaced. I figure this is mostly technical.) The most common method of including audio (at least in articles on music theory) seems to be Template:Audio. See Interval (music) (and many of the pages linked from it) for examples in the wild. Here's an example of the template's output: Alabama (play^ⓘ). When I click "play" (in Chrome), it navigates to a new page that plays the sound file. I think it would be nicer if clicking it played the file without navigating to a new page, but it's not a terrible experience.

However, if I use the Audio template with a MIDI file, it is pretty terrible. Example: Play^ⓘ. In Chrome and Firefox, this opens a prompt to download the .mid file to my machine. From there, I can use some program to play it (if I'm lucky enough to have the appropriate software and plugins).

There does exist another template, Template:Listen which creates a widget that lets me play the audio without leaving the page. It doesn't work with MIDI files, but Template:Synthlisten is a variant that does.

I'd like to discuss a few potential improvements to the current state.

1. Modify {{Audio}} to act as an inline player

i.e. make it a miniature version of {{Listen}}. Ideally one that transparently works with MIDI in addition to ogg/flac/wav. I could imagine the appearance remaining basically the same, but with the 'Play' link acting as a button (which would perhaps change into a "Pause" button while the audio is playing).

This seems like the nicest solution to me. But I also realize it's a big feature request with significant implications. This has been discussed a few times. These proposals never seemed to catch much momentum, but nor were they dismissed as impossible:

2. Replace instances of {{Audio}} with {{Listen}}/{{Synthlisten}}, where appropriate.

There are some details that make this tricky.

If you look, for example, at Interval (music), you'll see that most instances of {{Audio}} occur in image captions. There is no obvious way to insert a {{Listen}} widget inside an image caption, or generally to combine {{Listen}} and an image into one figure. You can see a variety of methods I've experimented with at User:Dindon~enwiki/Listen_Plus_Image_Experiments. None of the approaches give flawless results. Tables seem to give the best layout, but it feels like a hack? Would be interested to get feedback on these approaches, or any others I may have missed.

(Specifically for cases where the image is of some unannotated sheet music, Score may also be a good replacement, although the translation would require some effort and expertise.)

Another issue is the existence of places where size considerations preclude the possibility of replacing {{Audio}} with {{Synthlisten}}, for example the table in Interval_(music)#Main_intervals. Unlike {{Listen}}, {{Synthlisten}} has a progress slider which makes it unavoidably very wide (see the first example at User:Dindon~enwiki/Listen_Plus_Image_Experiments where the widget overflows the box meant to contain the image caption). It would be helpful to at least have an optional parameter to supress the slider, matching {{Listen}}.

3. Document conventions regarding when to use {{Audio}} vs. {{Listen}}

Perhaps at Help:Creation_and_usage_of_media_files#Audio and on the respective template doc pages.

My impression is that {{Audio}} is appropriate when inlining some audio in the main text, or in very space-constrained contexts (e.g. the caption labelled "Augmented and diminished intervals on C" here, which contains links to 14 audio files). I can't think of any other scenarios where I wouldn't prefer {{Listen}}, but I may be missing something.

I found the following quote at Template_talk:Audio/Archive_1#The_other_audio_template which supports this interpretation:

I think it goes without saying that the listen template is better for everything except inlined text (for which it was never desinged) - it's cleaner, better looking, and more intuitive.

Dindon~enwiki (talk) 02:15, 20 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Regards MIDI files, I think it would be a good idea for MediaWiki to automatically make an Ogg preview. (It takes about 6.15 seconds to do this to

using ffmpeg on my machine.) We already do something similar for SVG files, and those are even rendered correctly in most browsers. Eman 235/talk 03:25, 20 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

That's more or less what {{Synthlisten}} already does, using mw:Extension:Score. We would be able to incorporate the feature into {{Audio}} if we could obtain the URL to the generated ogg without creating a player, but I don't know if the extension currently allows it. Nardog (talk) 10:14, 21 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

ProveIt issue

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T214273

I have not been able to use ProveIt at all for the last 12 hours or so. This is because while it usually allows me to, for instance, add new references by entering text into the appropriate fields in the ProveIt sidebar, recently this has become impossible, because clicking on the "Add" tab on the top (which normally creates a new blank citation to fill in) now does nothing at all. Another odd problem is that when I click on the "list" tab on a page that does have fully formatted references, it lists the references, but when I then click on one of the references themselves, it always has "no template" selected in the "main template" menu, and there are never any other options to select, regardless of which citation template is actually being used. I have never seen this happen in >5 years of using ProveIt and I hope it can be fixed soon. IntoThinAir (talk) 15:19, 20 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

This has been reported at phab:T214273 - Evad37 [talk] 03:50, 21 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

RSU Afc Button

Hi. Has the Random submission button for AFC go away? If it did where can I find another one? It's the one by Flooded with them Hundreds. --Thegooduser Life Begins With a Smile :) 🍁 21:53, 20 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Thegooduser, FWTH retired and requested that all their userspace pages be deleted. Special:RandomInCategory/Pending AfC submissions should do what you want though. --AntiCompositeNumber (talk) 22:09, 20 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@AntiCompositeNumber: Given that you're not the only one who uses that script, I'm going to see if I can refund it into my userspace. --DannyS712 (talk) 22:10, 20 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry, meant to ping @Thegooduser: --DannyS712 (talk) 22:10, 20 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I'll ~~restore the page~~ ask that it be restored. Primefac (talk) 22:21, 20 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Primefac: I already did - I'm asking for all of his scripts. Also, you restored the documentation page, but not the actual script itself... --DannyS712 (talk) 22:26, 20 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

(edit conflict)There was only one revision and it was simple, so I've just copied it here:

$.when( mw.loader.using('mediawiki.util'), $.ready ).then( function() {
    mw.util.addPortletLink( 'p-views', '/wiki/Special:RandomInCategory/Pending_AfC_submissions', 'RSu', '', 'Go to random draft submission', 'l');
})

~ Amory (u • t • c) 22:30, 20 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Amorymeltzer: Thanks. I've also requested that the scripts they wrote be resuscitated. Would you be willing to help? See Wikipedia:Interface administrators' noticeboard#Undeletion of FWTH's user scripts. Thanks, --DannyS712 (talk) 22:32, 20 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Done. ~ Amory (u • t • c) 22:48, 20 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks! Thegooduser Life Begins With a Smile :) 🍁 02:29, 21 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Syntax highlighting and spell checker in Firefox

I noticed that enabling syntax highlighting in (text) edit disables the spell checker in Firefox. Can it be fixed? --MarMi wiki (talk) 00:58, 21 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

There are several syntax highlighters. I guess you refer to the one on a highlighter marker button

, to the left of "Advanced" in some toolbars. It disables spell-checking in Firefox to avoid other problems. See phab:T177509. "Syntax highlighter" at Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-gadgets works with spell checking. PrimeHunter (talk) 09:58, 21 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, I will try that version now. It looks like it's less graphical. --MarMi wiki (talk) 21:22, 21 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

New-article edit-notice substitutes plus-characters instead of spaces

This is a flawed usecase:

Click on redlink foo baz bar
Click on "search" link in bulletpoint "You can also search for an existing article to which you can redirect this title"
Click on redlink in "You may create the page "Foo+baz+bar", but consider checking the search results below to see whether the topic is already covered"
Create and save the page
Oh no! The page name is not "Foo baz bar", it's "Foo+baz+bar"

This has happened to me twice lately. Whatever template is generating the "search" link in step #2 needs to be fixed. jnestorius^(talk) 16:18, 21 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

It seems like {{urlencode: ... }} is redundant in MediaWiki:Newarticletext. I don't know why {{#titleparts: ... }} is necessary either. Nardog (talk) 16:31, 21 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Fixed, also removed titleparts. Galobtter (pingó mió) 16:36, 21 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Ping Dinoguy1000 as the person who added that. Galobtter (pingó mió) 16:38, 21 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

When I added this code (keeping in mind that I was not the one who originally implemented the search link as an external link), it was necessary to properly handle titles with some special characters - {{PAGENAME}} by itself performs some encoding that broke titles with certain characters; #titleparts unencodes those characters, but broke for certain other titles; and urlencode allowed those other titles to work correctly. However, based on some limited testing I just did, it appears none of these gymnastics are necessary any more. IIRC I never even thought to try using an internal link for the search link at the time either. I suspect the search links in Template:No article text could also be simplified based on this, if anyone wants to investigate further. 「ディノ奴千？！」^{☎ Dinoguy1000} 19:37, 21 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Blocking

Hi all, a general question: When a user is blocked indefinitely, does the system disallow them to create a new account using the same email address? Like, is the email address added to a blacklist or something? Seems like it would be easier to curtail sockpuppetry if the users had to keep signing up for new email accounts. If all they have to do is jump to a new IP and use the same email address that would be a lame flaw in our system. What are the other ways people can create accounts? I know that there's some way for an existing account to create other accounts--when a user is blocked, do we automatically block those other accounts? Wouldn't that be helpful as well in curtailing sockpuppetry? I don't typically go into the user creation logs unless I have a reason to. Thanks and sorry if my questions are weird, I'm just trying to think of better ways to reign in socking. Cyphoidbomb (talk) 18:03, 21 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

As far as I know, the autoblock doesn’t look at email addresses. There’s a simple reason for that: an email address is not required to create an account. --AntiCompositeNumber (talk) 18:24, 21 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Tech News: 2019-04

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

Tech News

Some people did not get last week's issue of Tech News. This was because of a problem with MassMessage. If you did not get last week's issue, you can read it on Meta. [1]

Recent changes

The content translation tool can now use version 2 as the default version for users who turned on the beta feature. For example it adds the tracking category Pages with unreviewed translations to translations that might have used machine translations without fixing the problems. This is so others can find them. You can find this category in Special:TrackingCategories on Wikipedias.
https://mediawiki2latex-large.wmflabs.org can now convert collects of up to 800 pages to PDF, EPUB or ODT. Previously this was 200 pages.

Problems

When a template was edited with the visual editor, it would sometimes put all information on one line. This makes it difficult to read for editors who use the wikitext editor. It also makes it more difficult to see what happened in a diff. This problem affected edits made between 8 and 17 January and is now fixed. [2]
MassMessage is used to post a message to many pages. It has not been working reliably. Some messages have not been posted to everyone. [3][4]
Because of a database problem that had to be fixed immediately you could not edit most wikis for a couple of minutes on 17 January (UTC). This has now been fixed. [5]

Changes later this week

You will be able to use template styles in the Module namespace. [6]
The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 22 January. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 23 January. It will be on all wikis from 24 January (calendar).

Meetings

You can join the technical advice meeting on IRC. During the meeting, volunteer developers can ask for advice. The meeting will be on 23 January at 16:00 (UTC). See how to join.

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

20:33, 21 January 2019 (UTC)

Recent changes to articles

How to incluide changes in categories which are localisted in the main category? Eurohunter (talk) 21:09, 21 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

User name can start with an asterisk

I used a template on User talk:*ptrs4all* which didn't work as intended. I suppose it's not too serious, but it looks strange and there could be other problems. — Vchimpanzee • talk • contributions • 22:36, 21 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

It's an example of the known issue at Help:Template#Problems and workarounds. I have fixed Wikipedia:Teahouse/Teahouse talkback by inserting nowiki before the username.[7] Many other templates still fail on usernames starting with an asterisk. {{Encodefirst}} can also be used in fixes. PrimeHunter (talk) 23:11, 21 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

One that definitely works as expected (by taking the star as-is and not as the first item of a bulleted list) is {{user}}, which I used successfully in this edit. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 11:37, 22 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

How many user names, globally, start with an asterisk? How many of those are active? Maybe its worth raising a ticket to prevent the creation of new accounts using an asterisk at the start of the name; and also maybe forcing a rename of existing accounts? Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 12:14, 22 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

There are quite a few of them - several thousand from this decade alone - but I don't know how many are active (list). —DoRD (talk) 12:44, 22 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

New usernames starting with an asterisk could be prevented in Wikimedia wikis in meta:Title blacklist. I once made a similar suggestion for equals sign but it was declined at meta:Talk:Title blacklist/Archives/2015#Equals sign. PrimeHunter (talk) 14:27, 22 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

PorkchopGMX

Hi, on my watchlist I saw this, "(Deletion log); 01:16 PorkchopGMX (talk | contribs) deleted redirect User:PorkchopGMX/Wait until the user edits by overwriting ‎(G6: Deleted to make way for move)" But how is this possible, PorkchopGMX is not an admin. Thegooduser Life Begins With a Smile :) 🍁 01:21, 22 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I’m pretty sure that it happens automatically when you move a page. In this case, i moved the page to an existing redirect that was in turn created from moving the same page before. The redirect was automatically deleted, so that the new version could be in place of it. PorkchopGMX (talk with me - what i've done) 01:25, 22 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Ah. Thanks. Thegooduser Life Begins With a Smile :) 🍁 01:27, 22 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

This is Wikipedia:Moving a page#Moving over a redirect. Non-admins can only do it when the only edit in the page history is a redirect to the source of the move. PrimeHunter (talk) 01:41, 22 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, that is correct. It's only in the last two years or so (since 1 December 2016 I think) that these deletions have been logged, but they have been occurring silently for many more years. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 11:46, 22 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Searches for certain numbers return nonsense results

I was searching for an obscure computer model number ("3838") and noticed that the results included several seemingly spurious hits on celebrities, such as Victor Garber:

Victor Garber

BNE: XX4827335 BNF: cb14555225q (data) GND: 1061811514 ISNI: 0000 0001 1477 3838 LCCN: n85322430 MusicBrainz: 0e8d3431-e40c-4ddc-93c0-db67a0cd16a5 SNAC: w6h99bnn

I tried a couple of other four-digit numbers, which picked up similar results ("4242" and Gemma Arterton, as another example).

There's no such text visible in the article source, so it appears that article metadata that is normally hidden is getting erroneously(?) indexed by the search engine. (Or is this considered a feature?)--NapoliRoma (talk) 16:31, 22 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

That text is from the {{authority control}} template; it appears at the bottom of the Victor Garber page, under the navbox. The numbers themselves come from Wikidata, so they wouldn't be in the source on enwiki. Whether that's a bug or a feature is left as an exercise to the reader; Help:Authority control says that it's a way of associating a unique identifier to articles on Wikipedia, and that number is part of Garber's International Standard Name Identifier, so it might be intentional for such ids to be used in search criteria. Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 16:39, 22 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

It's hidden in the mobile version. You should see it in the desktop version. By default, the rendered desktop page is searched. {{authority control}} is an English Wikipedia template which outputs text in the rendered page just like navboxes and various other templates. Prefix the search with insource: if you only want hits in the source text: insource:3838. In this and many other examples it gives more results, e.g. when 3838 is part of a url with link text. 3838 insource:3838 finds pages where it's both in the source and rendered page. PrimeHunter (talk) 18:32, 22 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@NapoliRoma: To narrow search results, add word computer to the search: 3838 computer. --MarMi wiki (talk) 19:56, 23 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Misspelled namespace in the search interface ("Educaton")

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T214456
Resolved

I'd fix it but I wouldn't know where to find the source text. Upon a search, choose Add namespaces... and you'll find in the dropdown list "Educaton Program talk".--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 04:39, 23 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Fuhghettaboutit: we need a developer to fix that one, I've opened phab:T214456. — xaosflux ^Talk 04:59, 23 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Just FYI...Education_Extension_scheduled_shutdown, Wikimedia outreach ...-...Wikipedia:Education noticeboard/Archive 18#NOTICE:_EducationProgram extension is being deprecated....--Moxy (talk) 05:04, 23 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Fixed — xaosflux ^Talk 12:13, 23 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks all!--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 13:02, 23 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Amazing template switch

Many articles were in Category:Pages with script errors and I fixed a recent edit at {{College}} that was responsible. That is a very interesting template and in the spirit of sharing, I offer these puzzles (the first prize for a correct explanation of these outputs is a free post at User talk:Jimbo Wales and the second prize is two free posts):

{{College|Adams State}} → Adams State
{{College|==A==}} → Error: Template:College requires a value
{{College|1===A==}} → ==A==
{{College|:}} → Error: Template:College requires a value
{{College|}} → Error: Template:College requires a value
{{College|Alabama State}} → Alabama State

It is amazing how well that template works given the enormous switch. If I have to pose a question, I suppose it would be to ask if all the colons and the pipes before most of them should be removed. Johnuniq (talk) 10:06, 23 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

That is certainly an unusual template. The only parts which are transcluded (between includeonly tags) is

{{#switch:{{{1|}}}||:| = | #default = {{{1}}} }}

but it is obviously using the other code somehow ... — Martin (MSGJ · talk) 10:22, 23 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

All code except <noinclude>...</noinclude> is transcluded. That means nearly all code is trancluded on that page. It uses some unusual code to render nicely on the template page so it becomes easier to edit. Most examples by Johnuniq are side effects of this unusual code. For example, colons are used to give indentation on the template page but causes a colon in the call to produce a match the first time for Adams State. PrimeHunter (talk) 10:45, 23 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Wow, I didn't understand that reason for the colons. Very innovative use of wikitext. Johnuniq (talk) 02:53, 24 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I'll take a crack at it. The parser (mostly) ignores the newlines in the switch statement, so, reorganizing it into one line of:

| match [|match [|match ...]] = result

for each possible result, the parser sees:

{{#switch:{{{1|}}}
 | ==A== | Adams State College | Adams State | : = [[Adams State University|Adams State]]
 | Adamson University | AdU | Adamson | : = [[Adamson University|Adamson]]
 | United ... | AFA | : = [[United States Air Force Academy|Air Force]]
 | | University of Alabama | Alabama | : = [[University of Alabama|Alabama]]
 ...
 | Youngstown ... | : = [[Youngstown State University|Youngstown State]] 
 | : | = | #default = {{{1}}}
}}

The first call correctly matches Adams.
I think the second call, with parm 1 set to ==A==, ends up passing an empty value because of the leading =. See #5 for why this yields Alabama.
In the third call, a value of 1===A== passes ==A== as parm 1, which matches the first case of the first result, yielding Adams State.
The fourth call, with param 1 set to :, matches the fourth case of the first result (the : between the | and the =, again yielding Adams.
The fifth call, with param 1 set to nothing, matches the first case of the third result (the in the | |), yielding Alabama. This is because, in the template code, the result above it (Air Force) is the first one to have a trailing | after it. It seems these trailing pipes should be removed to avoid matching an empty param so it can be trapped as an error.

The last case in the code doesn't need the : match, since that would have happened up in the first case. I think the = case should be trapped as an error (along with ).

—[AlanM1(talk)]— 13:22, 23 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

This template is a hairball, and I always dread seeing edit requests for it. I think we can make it better. The best thing would probably be some sort of Lua module with a data file, but pending that, I have created Template:College/testcases and Template:College/sandbox. The sandbox needs a lot more work, and many more testcases and error checks are needed. – Jonesey95 (talk) 14:58, 23 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I left a comment on the talk page about how I really don't see a need for the template at all. All it's doing is linking things, and we have a long history of deleting those kinds of templates at TFD. --Izno (talk) 15:45, 23 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

It was nominated and kept at Wikipedia:Templates for discussion/Log/2018 October 30#Template:College after your talk page comment. PrimeHunter (talk) 18:25, 23 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Yeah, and I commented in the TFD too. Sigh. --Izno (talk) 19:25, 23 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Sandbox changes to Template:College

I have created and modified the sandbox. Here are the test cases from above, plus one more:

{{College/sandbox|Adams State}} → Adams State
{{College/sandbox|==A==}} → Error: Template:College requires a value
{{College/sandbox|1===A==}} → ==A==
{{College/sandbox|:}} → Error: Template:College requires a value
{{College/sandbox|}} → Error: Template:College requires a value
{{College/sandbox|Alabama State}} → Alabama State
{{College/sandbox|Foo State}} → Foo State

In the sandbox version, Category:Pages using Template:College with unsupported name is added to pages with a blank value or a value that is not supported by the template. Values not supported by the template are rendered as submitted to the template (e.g. Foo State). You can see more examples at Template:College/testcases. Feedback is welcome. We should probably move this discussion to Template talk:College. – Jonesey95 (talk) 19:44, 23 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

"established_date" not working in "Infobox settlement" template

Hi there. I'm not sure why this edit didn't work. I tried it myself as a preview and the established date didn't appear in the infobox. Thanks! Magnolia677 (talk) 22:46, 23 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

fixed --Lam-ang (talk) 23:14, 23 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Diff between the original edit and the fix. established_date is only shown if established_title is present. There is no default value. The documentation of {{Infobox settlement}} should probably say this. It's mentioned at Template talk:Infobox settlement#No defaults? PrimeHunter (talk) 00:29, 24 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Ah. Thanks! Magnolia677 (talk) 10:14, 24 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Infobox medical condition (new)

Example: infobox of Brain tumor. "Specialty Lua error: bad argument #1 to 'find' (string expected, got nil).", but specialty is well specified here. This error is now apparently affecting all pages that use {{subst:Infobox medical condition (new)}}, no matter if "specialty" is specified in wikidata. Materialscientist (talk) 00:38, 24 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I'm also seeing it on pages with {{Infobox video game}}. Seems to be a relation. What's going on? funplussmart (talk) 00:49, 24 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

The problem has disappeared. Materialscientist (talk) 01:57, 24 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

That was vandalism at Module:Complex date reported at WP:AN. Johnuniq (talk) 02:49, 24 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

API: Interacting with JSON pages

Help request: When using the api to retrieve the content of a page, it usually returns in the form of a long string with escape characters, etc. For pages that are in the JSON content format already (eg Wikipedia:Geonotice/list.json) is there any way to have the api return the content as json? --DannyS712 (talk) 03:11, 24 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

DannyS712, In PHP at least, this works:

<?php
$api = unserialize( file_get_contents( "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/api.php?action=query&prop=revisions&rvlimit=1&rvprop=content&format=php&titles=Wikipedia:Geonotice/list.json" ) );
$json = $api['query']['pages'][58816915]['revisions'][0]['*'];
print_r( json_decode( $json, TRUE ) );
?>

It returns:

Results SQL ^{Query me!} 03:27, 24 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not sure what language you're using, but serializing at least gives me the page content without decoding everything. SQL ^{Query me!} 03:27, 24 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@SQL: I've been using javascript. I'd rather try to avoid learning a new language just to figure this out, but thanks for the help. If noone else can help, I might just have to learn PHP --DannyS712 (talk) 03:31, 24 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

You could also get the raw page content using ?action=raw, and parse that into JSON. E.g. with Javascript/jQuery:

$.get('https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Geonotice/list.json&action=raw')
.then(function(response) { return JSON.parse(response); })
.then(function(result) { console.log(result); });

- Evad37 [talk] 03:35, 24 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Evad37, Heh, forgot about that - that works perfectly as well! SQL ^{Query me!} 03:39, 24 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Evad37: Thanks. JSON.parse was the answer I needed. But, I thought I read somewhere that index.php is being depreciated? --DannyS712 (talk) 03:44, 24 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Evad37: Thank you so much. The JSON.parse was what I needed. See User:DannyS712 test/get JSON.js for a proof-of-concept script that logs the selected page's json content. --DannyS712 (talk) 04:07, 24 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

"Prompt me when entering a blank edit summary" does not recognize HotCat generated summaries

The title says it all. If I use HotCat to add multiple categories, I will get a warning that no edit summary has been entered despite HotCat filling in a summary. I have to manually edit that summary (by adding a space usually) for the check to no longer flag the comment. Before I fill a bug report, I'd like to make sure it's not just me, so can someone else reproduce this? Regards So Why 09:04, 24 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I reproduced it. You may wish to read phab:T10912 too, which is related. –Ammarpad (talk) 12:58, 24 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Lowercase sigmabot help

Due to an username change, I needed to reconfigure Lowercase sigmabot III's settings. However, in process of doing so, sigmabot forgot that I had archive 2 back when Miszabot was archiving it and archived some of 2018 Signposts to archive 1. Is there any help to prevent this from happening again? FMecha (to talk|to see log) 12:34, 24 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Fixed with counter = 2.[8] PrimeHunter (talk) 12:48, 24 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@FMecha: Lowercase sigmabot didn't "forget" - you told it to go back to the first archive, when in this edit you removed |counter=2 and replaced it with |counter=1. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 19:22, 24 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Could someone who knows about UTRS please reply to request at User talk:War Operation Plan Response?

See above. This user claims UTRS does not work for them and produces an error. Regards So Why 13:51, 24 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@SoWhy: UTRS issues can be reported to: utrs-admins

googlegroups.com (I'm not somewhere I can email them right now). — xaosflux ^Talk 14:05, 24 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, I'll tell them! Regards So Why 15:02, 24 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Doesn't work for me either (I was just caugnt up in unblock collateral) ^{[Username Needed]} 15:21, 24 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

flaggedrevs-color-1 in watchlist page history?

For a short while (possibly just one page load?), every entry in my watchlist had a pale blue background. Disabling:

.flaggedrevs-color-1 {
    background-color: #eaf3ff;
}

in the Chrome DOM explorer turned it off. I'm no longer seeing that when I look at my watchlist again. Was there some change that was quickly rolled back, or just a random transient failure of some CSS file to load? -- RoySmith (talk) 18:45, 24 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

PS, I'm sorry, not the watchlist. Page history, but only for a specific page: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Kip_McKean&action=history I'm still seeing it. -- RoySmith (talk) 18:48, 24 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@RoySmith: The page Kip McKean is under pending changes. In its history, all edits that have been accepted are given a pale blue background; if there were any that were awaiting review, they would have a brownish-yellow background like this. To see more examples, have a look at the page history of any article listed here. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 19:29, 24 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Searching contributions by date appears to have a glitch

I was searching someone's contributions for something they posted in 2017. So using the usual method, I did this

Went to their contributions
Clicked on the "From Date" box
Clicked on the up arrow twice, to get to the year. I was presented with years from 2000 to 2015. This is an error, the years should end with the current year.
Tried clicking on the right arrow to get the next years, only to be presented with 2020 to 2035
In other words, the years 2016 to 2019 are missing from the selection box. (The same thing happens with "To Date").

Obviously this isn't a massive issue for most people, because you can just type the dates in. It would be an issue for someone who (for example) uses a mouse and speech software, however. Black Kite (talk) 19:33, 24 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Note: it happens to all the windows. Clicking back one gives me 1980 to 1995 (i.e. 1996 to 1999 are missing).

Edit: it's a browser issue. In Edge and Chrome,it works fine. In Firefox 64.0.2, which is what I'm on, it looks like the window is too small to fit all 20 dates in. Black Kite (talk) 19:37, 24 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

GNIS is broken

GNIS is broken, breaking {{cite gnis}} and equivalents as well as the search function. It was working on Monday. Just FYI, probably temporary, but something to watch. ―Mandruss ☎ 21:26, 24 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Why am I seeing everything right justified here?

Suddenly all the pages I view here on the English Wikipedia are right justified - articles, talk pages, contributions, watch list (makes the watch list look quite strange). Pages at the French and German Wikipedias are appearing normally, as are those at Wikidata and Commons. Has something happened here? I haven't make any recent changes to my preferences. StarryGrandma (talk) 04:00, 25 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@StarryGrandma: if you look at this page in safemode is it still wrongly justified? — xaosflux ^Talk 04:05, 25 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

In safemode it is back to normal. StarryGrandma (talk) 04:23, 25 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

How about in force English mode? — xaosflux ^Talk 04:25, 25 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Still right-justified in "force English". StarryGrandma (talk) 04:32, 25 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@StarryGrandma: try blanking out your User:StarryGrandma/common.js and User:StarryGrandma/common.css files. Also are you using a desktop or mobile? What skin are you using? — xaosflux ^Talk 04:48, 25 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for looking into this Xaosflux. Blanked them, logged out, rebooted computer, and still seeing this all right-justified. I'm using the Vector skin in desktop mode with browser Firefox 64.0.2 (64-bit). I still have my Twinkle and AfC menus active even with css and js pages blank. But many people have those and I seem to be the only one with this problem. StarryGrandma (talk) 05:12, 25 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Xaosflux, somehow "justify paragraphs" was set in my user preferences, I didn't even know there was such a thing. Perhaps I clicked it earlier by accident and it has only just started affecting watchlists. Thanks for all your help. StarryGrandma (talk) 05:29, 25 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

StarryGrandma, I know why because the same thing happened to me a few days ago. There was a bug in OOUI that let your mouse clicks pass through the save button in your preferences and toggle the checkboxes behind it. You were probably trying to click "Save", and it didn't work because you had toggled the checkbox next to "Justify paragraphs" with that click. This bug has been reported to the developers and they're currently fixing it. Enterprisey (talk!) 06:43, 25 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

[APJ-20190117-1] Mankovich, Christopher; et al. (17 January 2019). "Cassini Ring Seismology as a Probe of Saturn's Interior. I. Rigid Rotation". The Astrophysical Journal. 871 (1). Retrieved 18 January 2019. {{cite journal}}: Explicit use of et al. in: |author= (help)

[NASA-20190118-2] McCartney, Gretchen; Wendel, JoAnna (18 January 2019). "Scientists Finally Know What Time It Is on Saturn". NASA. Retrieved 18 January 2019.

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 ::Thanks for looking into this {{u|Xaosflux}}. Blanked them, logged out, rebooted computer, and still seeing this all right-justified. I'm using the Vector skin in desktop mode with browser Firefox 64.0.2 (64-bit). I still have my Twinkle and AfC menus active even with css and js pages blank. But many people have those and I seem to be the only one with this problem. [[User:StarryGrandma|StarryGrandma]] ([[User talk:StarryGrandma|talk]]) 05:12, 25 January 2019 (UTC)
 ::{{u|Xaosflux}}, somehow "justify paragraphs" was set in my user preferences, I didn't even know there was such a thing. Perhaps I clicked it earlier by accident and it has only just started affecting watchlists. Thanks for all your help. [[User:StarryGrandma|StarryGrandma]] ([[User talk:StarryGrandma|talk]]) 05:29, 25 January 2019 (UTC)
+:::{{u|StarryGrandma}}, I know why because the same thing happened to me a few days ago. There was a bug in OOUI that let your mouse clicks pass through the save button in your preferences and toggle the checkboxes behind it. You were probably trying to click "Save", and it didn't work because you had toggled the checkbox next to "Justify paragraphs" with that click. This bug has been reported to the developers and they're currently fixing it. [[User:Enterprisey|Enterprisey]]&nbsp;([[User talk:Enterprisey|talk!]]) 06:43, 25 January 2019 (UTC)