Wikipedia:Village pump (technical)

 Policy Technical Proposals Idea lab WMF Miscellaneous 

• Table of contents
• First discussion
• End of page
• New post

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).

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.

« Archives, 196, 197, 198, 199, 200, 201, 202, 203, 204, 205, 206, 207, 208, 209, 210, 211, 212, 213, 214, 215, 216

Graph extension disabled per immediate effect

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T334940

Because of a security problem, the Graph extension has been disabled with immediate effect. More information will follow as it becomes available. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 09:03, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Okay, that obviates my coming here to report that {{page views}} is broken everywhere. I'll subscribe here, but if you report elsewhere, please add a link here, and a {{tracked}} template, as appropriate so I can monitor. Thanks, Mathglot (talk) 09:47, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

It's in phabricator as Phab:T334895, but the task is restricted. 192.76.8.66 (talk) 10:42, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Notes from T334940 — An update will go out later today, and in the meantime purging the pages cache should clear the raw wikitext — TheresNoTime (talk • they/them) 12:49, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

FYI An update will go out later today appears to mean "an announcement about the problem" and not a fix — TheresNoTime (talk • they/them) 13:13, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

An update has been posted on the wikitech-ambassadors mailing list, and it seems a MassMessage will go out tomorrow — TheresNoTime (talk • they/them) 23:41, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Problem with { { Graph:Chart } } ?

Article/section Ittoqqortoormiit#Population contains a { { Graph:Chart } } construct that does not display in the Chrome or Firefox browsers.

Notes: I don't know how to suppress WP formatting inside editing panes. A Web search and a reading of the WP manual of style did not reveal how to do this. I don't know how to submit WP bug reports, nor do I wish to know. David Spector (talk) 12:37, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

@David spector: The Graph extension has been temporarily disabled, see above. —Kusma (talk) 12:39, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Graphs disabled message

I have created {{Graphs disabled}} for use on significant documentation pages. It can just be blanked when graphs are working again but I suggest to not add it to numerous low profile pages when the problem is expected to be so brief. PrimeHunter (talk) 13:06, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Sounds good: a temporary problem that is being fixed; thank you. I hope all the uses are on "low profile pages". David Spector (talk) 13:16, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

I misread the intent of the template, but what I just did still feels like it works. See WT:WPAFC I'm not sure if this is a good solution as for those who are just browsing Wikipedia might not know what a template documentation page is and might be confused as to why the graph isn't showing. ― Blaze Wolf^Talk_{Blaze Wolf#6545} 13:27, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

It was intended for documentation pages about graphs. I have added an option |missing for places where a graph should have been displayed. That's a lot of places and I'm not sure how many temporary notices it's worth adding. It would be more practical if any use of <graph>...</graph> automatically displayed an interface message like MediaWiki:Graphs disabled. PrimeHunter (talk) 13:56, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

That would definitely help. And I realized that its intended for documentation pages after i Had already added it because I read it too quickly. ― Blaze Wolf^Talk_{Blaze Wolf#6545} 13:58, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

I for one oppose any need for a "Graphs disabled" message in mainspace; those in the know should just comment out graphs for the time being until this boondoggle gets fixed. (Hopefully this doesn't impugn on progress of inline SVG support.) – John M Wolfson (talk • contribs) 15:09, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

There is often associated content referring to the non-displayed graph. Commenting out the relevant parts may be non-trivial and it may not be uncommented quickly or at all when graphs return. The template can immediately be changed to display nothing when they return. If graphs were expected to be missing for a long time then a prettier but more work-demanding solution would be better but for a probably short term problem, I think it's good to have a simple option. PrimeHunter (talk) 15:24, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Graphs are a very important part for illustration on Wikipedia. From "Demographics" section of geographical locations to "Polling" & "Results" section of elections to articles on geological periods to articles on a specific genus. I'd suggest that MediaWiki:Sitenotice be called with the text "Due to some technical issues, most Graphs on Wikipedia are not visible. Inconvenience caused is regretted." I said, "most graphs" because some graphs also exist as svg/png on commons with should be visible, and readers should not have to face technical jargon like "extensions", etc. —CX Zoom[he/him] ^{(let's talk • {C•X})} 16:15, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

If consensus exists for a notice, something simple and non-obtrusive, to the effect of "Graphs are currently unavailable due to technical issues", no template boxes or red error text, or anything too flashy, would probably be best while this is sorted. It's already embarrassing enough that stuff like this happens in the current year, we shouldn't bring too much flash or attention to it while the devs work to fix it. – John M Wolfson (talk • contribs) 16:20, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Ahead of a proper communication that WMF is coming up with, I will say that it is now possible to display a custom message in place of the graphs, it is done by replacing MediaWiki:Graph-disabled content, empty by default, with a custom notice (such as an Ambox). There is also now a tracking category "Category:Pages with disabled graphs" showing the pages that used to contain graphs. The tracking category's name and description can be changed by editing MediaWiki:Graph-disabled-category and MediaWiki:Graph-disabled-category-desc interface messages. --Base (talk) 19:50, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

How about this? —CX Zoom[he/him] ^{(let's talk • {C•X})} 20:01, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

As source of inspiration, in Ukrainian Wikipedia we currently went with a standard Ambox icon and "There was supposed to be a graph or a diagram here, but its rendering is currently disabled for technical reasons. Please do not remove the code that is causing this message. Developers are already working on restoring the normal rendering of the graph or diagram." --Base (talk) 20:13, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

I find this one more precise and appropriate to be shown. Thanks for sharing. —CX Zoom[he/him] ^{(let's talk • {C•X})} 20:15, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

The missing graphs are probably confusing a lot of users so I have created MediaWiki:Graph-disabled with the suggested text. The text is still open for discussion but I wanted something out quickly. I guess there is no job queue to update affected pages so they have to be purged or edited to display it. See 4 Vesta#Physical characteristics for an example I purged. PrimeHunter (talk) 21:04, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

The ! in the red stop sign is quite alarming, while no action by reading user is required, not even by wikipedia editors.

Suggestion: use a 'information' sign, a white 'i' in a blue circle with the text:

"Sorry, we experience technical issues with this graph. It will reappear as soon as the developers have solved the problem." Uwappa (talk) 21:16, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

On 4 Vesta#Physical characteristics (screenshot of former display)

It looks a bit wonky for me because the notice has margins that squish it. It appears the notice has been propagated to all graphs on enwiki. SWinxy (talk) 21:21, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

I have toned it down to the default icon and no bold.[1] PrimeHunter (talk) 21:43, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Thank you. Suggested text finetuning:

"Graphs are temporarily unavailable due to technical issues."

The temporarily will indicate that a solution is on its way. Uwappa (talk) 21:55, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

I may not be editing for a couple of hours but other admins are free to make changes. PrimeHunter (talk) 22:01, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

I think this one would be better as "i" is for information pages. I actually like the unbolded text. And Uwappa's suggestion is good too. —CX Zoom[he/him] ^{(let's talk • {C•X})} 22:01, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

I don't think that image can be used since the file isn't protected. Galobtter (talk) 22:08, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

 Done seems reasonable. Galobtter (talk) 22:04, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

“The temporarily will indicate that a solution is on its way” lemme just do some expectation management here…. this extension is thoroughly unmaintained for over 6 years. I do not expect this to be quickly fixed. It should be noted that there were already discussions about potentially having to remove the entire extension even before the latest problem. I’m sure some ppl are looking into what is possible, but I’d be really surprised if this is fixed within a month. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 22:40, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

TheDJ, thanks for that. Expectation management is always helpful. If you have any insight into how fixing a problem like this is prioritized, that might help us at VPT understand whether we should work on implementing any workarounds in the meantime. As far as I can tell, this outage has affected at least 60,000 pages here at en.WP. – Jonesey95 (talk) 23:22, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

I agree that the notice feels squished. I had tried to apply the style parameter to width:100% so that empty space on either side can be eliminated but that overflowed the notice box on the right side which is not good. I guess someone has a better idea for it. —CX Zoom[he/him] ^{(let's talk • {C•X})} 22:05, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Okay, this one unsquishes it: {{notice|style=width:100%;margin:0;|text=Graphs are temporarily unavailable due to technical issues.}} —CX Zoom[he/him] ^{(let's talk • {C•X})} 22:07, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

I was trying just margin:0 but that didn't work. Thanks!  Done Galobtter (talk) 22:09, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

It looks good in the image frame and outside one. {{annual readership}} has been replaced with a custom notice by RedRose. SWinxy (talk) 22:18, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

The red icon is too disruptive and flashy. Text alone will do the job of explaining technical problems without calling undue attention to behind-the-scenes work. The current {{Annual readership}} notice is perfect. – John M Wolfson (talk • contribs) 16:10, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Category:Pages with disabled graphs

There's a bunch of pages linked to Category:Pages with disabled graphs but that category has never existed and I don't know what to do with them. —Lights and freedom (talk ~ contribs) 19:40, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

The category has now been created with an explanation. PrimeHunter (talk) 20:54, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Clarification

What is this "security problem", what does security have to do with little graphs and charts and things in Wikimedia articles? I wish we heard at least a little bit more of an explanation. ɱ (talk) 00:11, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

@Ɱ Code with vulnerabilities can ostensibly be "hacked" to use to run malicious code in places it otherwise couldn't. For WP:BEANS reasons, its best to not elaborate :) CaptainEek ^{Edits Ho Cap'n!}⚓ 01:19, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

What malicious code could be put in a graph box? 'Click here for a spam site'? Is it worth pulling it rather than fixing it quietly, if there's nobody actively misusing this code? ɱ (talk) 02:26, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

I don't know the security problem but mw:Extension:Graph uses JavaScript which means it intentionally runs code in the user's browser. See JavaScript#Security for some general problems. Some people disable JavaScript completely in their browsers for security reasons. PrimeHunter (talk) 02:46, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Do graphs really need javascript? Can't graphs be just server side generated images? Is javascript only required just for mouseover effect? Will we avoid all javascript by deleting the mouseover effect? Uwappa (talk) 06:34, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Graphs used to be server-side generated images, but that was removed because that was also showing its age, and in worse ways. I like the rollovers myself, as it happens, which were not possible before; the loss of course is that graph content isn't served to users who turn their JavaScript off. Izno (talk) 06:54, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Moving away from graphs

TheDJ said it: this extension is thoroughly unmaintained for over 6 years. I do not expect this to be quickly fixed. Moving away from graphs is going to be tough, but not impossible. Some graphs are fully automated (e.g. {{annual readership}}) while others are partially automated (e.g. {{Television ratings graph}}). Would this be desired by the community? SWinxy (talk) 01:18, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

@SWinxy If by "this", you mean removing graphs altogether, no. Graphs are a fundamental aspect of conveying data, and this is an encyclopedia. Getting rid of coded in graphs would be a major headache, because they would need to be replaced by photos of graphs (photo-graphs :P), or other work arounds. CaptainEek ^{Edits Ho Cap'n!}⚓ 01:46, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Yes, coded graphs! Ditching graphs altogether would be a bit of a challenge... SWinxy (talk) 01:51, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Graphs are used on Wikisource to identify those works that are being read / accessed the most. The information helps drive our choices as to what publications we will put our efforts into next. We'd need a viable alternative before the extension is discontinued. --EncycloPetey (talk) 18:20, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

I think it's a bit premature to be worrying about removal/replacement. One of the suggestions on the public task is just to upgrade to a maintained version of the software package used and then do the remove/replaces necessary to fix the onwiki versions to the required standard. Izno (talk) 06:56, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

This. Don't jump the gun. This needs thorough analysis and then likely work. That can be between 3 days and 90 days or no further work at all. There really is no telling at this stage. Remember, everyone was working on their thing they are supposed to work on and now several people have been thrown into a big tumbling washing machines with work that is unscheduled and needs to happen next to other work they cannot let rest and delaying the rest, completely upending planning and scheduling. The only thing that might change anything at all, is expressing how much you appreciate and/or need graphs and how you use them. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 08:13, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

@TheDJ: well said, thank you — you should be a technical spokesperson or something..! — TheresNoTime (talk • they/them) 08:43, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Understood. I wanted to float the idea. SWinxy (talk) 16:55, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Hell no, we should be doing more inline code, with inline SVG support and whatnot, not less. In any event, I don't think anything will come of this in the long-term except hopefully more proactive maintenance. – John M Wolfson (talk • contribs) 16:13, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

+1 —CX Zoom[he/him] ^{(let's talk • {C•X})} 18:21, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Preventing future issues

Any plans by the WMF or volunteers to check all other official extensions for use of outdated libraries? Any plans to implement new processes to make sure libraries don't get out-of-date in the future? DFlhb (talk) 12:13, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

They (un-maintained extensions) are documented and supposed to be handled at phab:project/profile/3144/. WMF's CTO (Chief Technical Officer), miss Deckelmann, is supposed to handle that, but she has not done so yet. There is also a list over who handles which extension and service at mw:Developers/Maintainers. Any further questions should be answered by WMF.--Snævar (talk) 16:04, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Probably not in any systematic way. There doesn't appear to be enough software engineer time available to assign maintainers to all unmaintained software. Software gets created, then the software engineers / WMF teams move on to other projects. –Novem Linguae (talk) 19:37, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

There are some existing efforts here. libraryupgrader2.wmcloud.org is fairly prolific in updating outdated or vulnerable dependencies via gerrit change sets, see: https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/q/owner:tools.libraryupgrader%2540tools.wmflabs.org. But it has its limits and some changes must be manually reviewed. The Security Team also checks for outdated and vulnerable dependencies as part of any manual application security review request. And we are building out some SCA tooling for repos hosted at gitlab.wikimedia.org. These efforts could, of course, be expanded and accelerated. Though I would note that the way the Vega dependencies were "built" within the Graph extension was problematic, as they were not referenced within package.json and were therefore difficult to analyze, especially for an extension with no actual active maintainers. We're hoping to address this and several other issues in our current efforts to get the Graph extension reenabled on the projects. SBassett (WMF) (talk) 19:52, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Community Wishlist item for 5 years

FWIW, I'd like to remind that the Graph extension we are were using is very outdated and the community has been asking for 5 years to upgrade it to the latest build. In 2023, it was the #49 request in CWS: m:Community Wishlist Survey 2023/Multimedia and Commons/Update Vega to the latest build. I suspect that the security issue could've been resolved if it were upgraded. —CX Zoom[he/him] ^{(let's talk • {C•X})} 17:40, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Excellent link. This is yet another reason that I have given up on the CWS process. Regular editors, including myself, are not great at identifying which proposed improvements and projects are actually important for the continued operation of MediaWiki sites. Requests for shiny new features typically get a lot more support than boring stuff like "update the back-end software that drives a process that tens of thousands of pages depend on and for which there is no easy alternative". – Jonesey95 (talk) 18:48, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

It's outrageous how incompetent the WMF is. Everybody has known for years that the Graph extension was using outdated software and needed to be updated. This is critical software that is used in millions of pages. Nothing has been done for over 5 years! What were all the hundreds of paid developers doing in the meanwhile? Ita140188 (talk) 07:29, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

By that logic. Considering it is open source.... YOU also didn't do anything and thus you also are incompetent. There is too much code for the amount of developers, this is nothing new. Also it's not used by millions of pages. It's about 60 000 for en.wp, or just 16k articles. It's tiny compared to most extensions in use. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 08:30, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

Sorry for the million hyperbole written out of frustration, it is still a lot of pages that get a lot of views every day. This problem has been known for years and reported several times, it was just waiting to happen. If doing basic maintenance of the underlying Mediawiki software also should be the editor's responsibility, it makes me wonder why are we paying millions of dollars every year to WMF developers? What exactly are they doing? Ita140188 (talk) 09:52, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

There are literally feeds of the 30000 tickets opened and closed each year and all the change sets in gerrit where you can find that out. Running a top 10 website for a couple hundred wikis each with their own configuration requires a lot of work. Also, not everyone codes, there is testing, releasing, datacenter operations, the couple thousand of software projects made by users/editors, fundraising infrastructure for dozens of countries in the world, etc etc etc. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 10:50, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

Are they doing everything I want? Definitely not. Do they have the resources to do everything I want? Of course not. They have to set priorities, and disagreeing with your priorities is not evidence of incompetence.

Now, if you're in a position to fund the development you want, I'm sure that they would pay attention. Even then they would have the final say on what to do when. -- Shmuel (Seymour J.) Metz Username:Chatul (talk) 11:06, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

Graph extension disabled

Yesterday the Wikimedia Foundation noted that in the interests of the security of our users, the Graph extension was disabled. This means that pages that were formerly displaying graphs will now display a small blank area. To help readers understand this situation, communities can now define a brief message that can be displayed to readers in place of each graph until this is resolved. That message can be defined on each wiki at MediaWiki:Graph-disabled. Wikimedia Foundation staff are looking at options available and expected timelines. For updates, follow the public Phabricator task for this issue: T334940

--MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 17:36, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Update on graphs: https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T334940#8798354

Over the last few days engineers have been exploring an approach that will add Vega 5 support for the Graph Extension. The goal is restore as much graph rendering as possible in the shortest timeframe. This aim to address the vulnerabilities found but most importantly to restore as much of the extensions previous state. We will also be updating the D3.js library from version 3.5.17 -> 7.8.4. The Vega 1 and Vega 2 libraries will be removed from the graph extension.

In terms of expectations:

• Initially the graph extension with Vega5 may only be supported on modern browsers (approximately 2017 or newer). This is due to some issues with ES5 builds and MediaWiki in the most recent versions of Vega. It’s hoped this can be resolved with a build step to restore functionality to MediaWiki's full supported browser stack.
• A compatibility layer that maps Vega 2 community graphs to Vega aims to allow current Vega 2 syntax to work with Vega 5, but our expectation is that some <graph> syntax might need to be updated in some places.
• We are building in some more sustainable error handling code. They will load and display an error thumbnail if the graph cannot be displayed. The purpose of this is to allow us to turn some graphs on and get a better sense of which graphs need to be prioritized. When graphs fail to render they will also send an error to our client logs so we can track them and later fix them.

Security will be reviewing the updated Vega 5 and D3.js libraries and the threat model associated with this approach, and release of the update is gated on a successful security review. We want to be as confident as possible that the approach is secure and correct.

We are assembling a small group of engineers from across a number of teams to see how much additional progress we can make on Graph between now and May 5, and will be working iteratively on our approach. We will continue to share updates along the way here on Phabricator. If we hit major blockers (e.g., security or library complexities we can't quickly resolve in the order of days or a couple weeks), we will be sure to share this information whilst we establish next steps. Our hope is that we can avoid difficult tradeoffs where we would need to keep Graph disabled for a long time, but we also need to acknowledge that this is a distinct possibility.

Seddon (WMF) (talk) 14:59, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

@Seddon (WMF), maybe you missed it, but ES6 is now the minimum required version of JavaScript, plus one or two functions from ES2017ish timeframe that @TheDJ has mentioned elsewhere (Promise.finally I think was one). So not sure why ES5 is mentioned above as the source of an issue? Izno (talk) 16:19, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

@Izno The short answer is that Vega provides either a full or what they term an ES5 build. They don't do intermediate builds. Seddon (WMF) (talk) 17:40, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

lol Izno (talk) 22:25, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

April 28th update on graphs: https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T334940#8813922

The short version

• The team has laid a bunch of groundwork to add vega5 support to the graph extension and improve the extensions security overall.
• Vega5 has been enabled on the beta.cluster for testing.
• We hope the start testing on production next Tuesday on test.wikipedia.org
• Vega5 breaks a lot of graphs. The team is trying to mitigate this, but communities will need to begin migrating from vega2 to vega5.

The long version

Over the last week we have:

• added Vega5 support
• dropped support for Vega1 and Vega2
• improved the error handling messaging within the graph extension
• add logging for graph errors
• ongoing work to improve url sanitisation
• added foreign-resources infrastructure for extensions
• started work on attempting to build a rudimentary vega2->vega5 translation layer to mitigate the disruption a move to vega5 may cause
• added some support for this migration for use to update raw graph definitions (not built via lua) via the GraphSandbox
• fixed an issue with graph overflow on mobile

The graph extension has been re-enabled on the beta cluster to aid engineers in being able to test in a more production like environment rather than relying on local development environment's. We had hoped that we would be able to re-enable the graph extension with vega5 at least on test.wikipedia.org however over the past week there have been a number of challenges. Recent builds of Vega meant it did not cleanly support ES6 browsers. This was also causing problems for our infrastructure. A recent patch to vega fixed this but also saw a big update to d3.js dependencies that vega relies on.

Whilst we could have used the last deployment window to backport a bunch of work to production wiki's, the scale of what needed backporting was beyond what is reasonable for the nature of backport windows. In addition to that, we were increasingly getting close to the golden rule of don't deploy on a friday. As such the team working on this took the decision that the majority of this week's work would go out on the deployment train next week and we will look to begin further testing on test.wikipedia.org next Tuesday.

In terms of expectation management:

• The graph extension is being upgraded from vega2->vega5 which means that the graph definitions that had been previously used on wiki either in a raw form or constructed via lua modules are not compatible. This means that none of the existing graph definitions would be in any way interoperable.
• Our engineers are attempting to build a rudimentary translation layer that may provide some small degree of backward compatibility but this cannot be relied upon and it is vital that communities look to migrate graph and templates from vega2->vega5.
• The english beta wikipedia serves as a good testing location and has the most recent version of vega5 and Module:Graph from enwiki/dewiki
• This guide] provides the most comprehensive detail on migration from Vega 2.

Seddon (WMF) (talk) 17:21, 28 April 2023 (UTC)

When will this be fixed?

It's getting kind of annoying that graphs have been disabled for this long. Is there an approximate time frame for when they will be working again? A day, a week, a month, a year, ever? Thiscouldbeauser (talk) 13:44, 23 April 2023 (UTC)

My hope is we can maybe restore some functionality in the next week or so. Seddon (WMF) (talk) 16:03, 23 April 2023 (UTC)

Cool, thanks! Thiscouldbeauser (talk) 11:58, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

Any updated forecast coming? Seddon (WMF) Tomastvivlaren (talk) 08:28, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

mediawiki.org is now running Graphs again. I think they are still working on some of the remote source usage and improvements to the automatic v2 to v5 transforms. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 09:35, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

@Tomastvivlaren Per Phab:T334940#8848174 it's been realised that the extension would need to completely re-written because vega is not designed to handle untrusted user input. 192.76.8.84 (talk) 18:38, 13 May 2023 (UTC)

The hyperlink of Page view in Page information corrupts

Hi, about one month ago, there was a hyperlink for the value of "Page views in the past 30 days" in the "Page information" of each article that, after clicking on it, a diagram appeared for "Page view per day". But this hyperlink does not exist now.

For example, for the article "Telegram (software)", the associated Page information is Information for "Telegram (software)". In this page and in the section named "Basic information", the last item in the table is "Page views in the past 30 days", and its value is "271,603" today. This item, about one month ago, had a hyperlink that after clicking shows a "Page view per day" diagram for 1 month ago, but now this hyperlink does not exist.

So please do something to bring back this helpful hyperlink. Thanks, Hooman Mallahzadeh (talk) 10:51, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

@Hooman Mallahzadeh: The Graph extension - used in templates like Template:Annual readership - was disabled nine days ago. This was announced above, and also at Template talk:Annual readership#Currently disabled. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 11:21, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

Still, the hyperlink could still be there. Explain the unavailability of the graph on the linked page. As soon as the graph problem is solved, the graph will reappear. Uwappa (talk) 12:11, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

So far as I can tell, the link was not removed by English Wikipedia, but at a much more fundamental level - the MediaWiki software itself. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 12:35, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

Yes, the link was made and removed outside the English Wikipedia. It was also removed in other wikis. It's at https://en.wikipedia.beta.wmflabs.org/wiki/Example?action=info, but they have the Graph extension enabled at https://en.wikipedia.beta.wmflabs.org/wiki/Special:Version#mw-version-ext-parserhook-Graph. Considering graphs were disabled for security reasons, view them there at your own risk. If you have the default language "en - English" at Special:Preferences then you can click "Pageviews" in the page history or "Page view statistics" at the bottom of page information. It links another feature https://pageviews.wmcloud.org. You can also install User:PrimeHunter/Pageviews.js to get the link directly on pages regardless of your interface language. PrimeHunter (talk) 14:00, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

Short term solution for those private wikis affected please ?

Could you please tell us in simple to-do list what we can do to restore graph capabilities on our private wikis? (I assume it is not just on wikipedia as I have rendering problem on standard graph code on my private wiki. Shall we go back to a version earlier of Media Wiki as a short term solution for non-sensitive wikis?).

In my case (perhaps a large group of people), security is not an immediate issue as it is not a much developed private wiki and does not interest hackers, and I would appreciate solutions such as enabling previous functionality for some weeks, if there's the option, until the long term solution is ready.

To make it simpler, how can the following code be run in short term on private wikis? (it is showing as blank white now, when you try to edit in visual editor it shows a "rendering error" message)

Code listing

{ "$schema": "https://vega.github.io/schema/vega/v5.json", "description": "A basic pie chart example.", "width": 200, "height": 200, "autosize": "none", "signals": [ { "name": "startAngle", "value": 0, "bind": {"input": "range", "min": 0, "max": 6.29, "step": 0.01} }, { "name": "endAngle", "value": 6.29, "bind": {"input": "range", "min": 0, "max": 6.29, "step": 0.01} }, { "name": "padAngle", "value": 0, "bind": {"input": "range", "min": 0, "max": 0.1} }, { "name": "innerRadius", "value": 0, "bind": {"input": "range", "min": 0, "max": 90, "step": 1} }, { "name": "cornerRadius", "value": 0, "bind": {"input": "range", "min": 0, "max": 10, "step": 0.5} }, { "name": "sort", "value": false, "bind": {"input": "checkbox"} } ], "data": [ { "name": "table", "values": [ {"id": 1, "field": 4}, {"id": 2, "field": 6}, {"id": 3, "field": 10}, {"id": 4, "field": 3}, {"id": 5, "field": 7}, {"id": 6, "field": 8} ], "transform": [ { "type": "pie", "field": "field", "startAngle": {"signal": "startAngle"}, "endAngle": {"signal": "endAngle"}, "sort": {"signal": "sort"} } ] } ], "scales": [ { "name": "color", "type": "ordinal", "domain": {"data": "table", "field": "id"}, "range": {"scheme": "category20"} } ], "marks": [ { "type": "arc", "from": {"data": "table"}, "encode": { "enter": { "fill": {"scale": "color", "field": "id"}, "x": {"signal": "width / 2"}, "y": {"signal": "height / 2"} }, "update": { "startAngle": {"field": "startAngle"}, "endAngle": {"field": "endAngle"}, "padAngle": {"signal": "padAngle"}, "innerRadius": {"signal": "innerRadius"}, "outerRadius": {"signal": "width / 2"}, "cornerRadius": {"signal": "cornerRadius"} } } } ] }

— Preceding unsigned comment added by 31.14.151.6 (talk) 10:39, 1 May 2023 (UTC)

Nothing has changed about the extension, other than it having been disabled. Well.. unless you are running the unreleased master branch. In that case, the solution seems pretty obvious to me... —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 11:05, 1 May 2023 (UTC)

The solution is not obvious to me, could you elaborate? How can we enable the graph extension? Any code? Shall we install an old version of Media Wiki (a month or two old)? 31.14.151.6 (talk) 11:16, 1 May 2023 (UTC)

The issue is not that a new version of MediaWiki broke Graph. The issue is that Graph has (and has had) major security flaws. Snowmanonahoe (talk) 11:22, 1 May 2023 (UTC)

I know the Graph has issues, I mean how has it been disabled on my private wiki and how can I enable it for myself? 31.14.151.6 (talk) 11:27, 1 May 2023 (UTC)

I am using Media Wiki 1.38.4, which means it is a version before the announced issue of Graph around mid April, so how can Graph be disabled on my private wiki? Does Media Wiki read some privileges and rights from a centralized server when it is run? 31.14.151.6 (talk) 11:26, 1 May 2023 (UTC)

It doesn't. Your issue has nothing to do with this security problem. From what I can see from above, you are using Vega 5, but Graph only used to support Vega 1 and Vega 2 up to last week. More importantly; this is not a support forum for 3rd party MediaWiki installation. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 12:18, 1 May 2023 (UTC)

(The appropriate forum would be mw:Support.) Izno (talk) 17:09, 1 May 2023 (UTC)

Add 'convenient-discussions' tag

Hello! Can you please add a tag for ConvenientDiscussions so that edits are marked not in the description, but in a normal way?
Example: commons:MediaWiki:Tag-convenient-discussions, commons:MediaWiki:Tag-convenient-discussions-description. Iniquity (talk) 21:26, 4 May 2023 (UTC)

I support we add these MW messages so that a tag can be used by CD. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 08:44, 5 May 2023 (UTC)

Can you point to a diff that has this in the way you do not like for reference? — xaosflux ^Talk 18:54, 5 May 2023 (UTC)

This one, for example :) Iniquity (talk) 20:21, 5 May 2023 (UTC)

I can create a tag if JWBTH is willing to change the script to use it. Galobtter (talk) 20:54, 5 May 2023 (UTC)

Sure, I'll update the script once the tag is created. (The configuation, to be precise.) JWBTH (talk) 22:18, 5 May 2023 (UTC)

@Galobtter, can you help? :) Iniquity (talk) 11:48, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

@Iniquity@JWBTH,  Done, see Special:Tags. Galobtter (talk) 01:04, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

Thanks a lot! :) Iniquity (talk) 06:23, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

No objections to initiating a tag for this, the description should call out that it is a 'userscript' like most of our other similar ones do. — xaosflux ^Talk 22:04, 5 May 2023 (UTC)

Left-image after multiple right-images in preceding section

This is a generlization of a weird layout noted in Teahouse. When there are multiple right-hand images or floated items (infobox/navbox), they stack on the right side. If this is followed by a left-hand image, it vertically aligns with the last of the left-hand stack.

That seems like a reasonable effect: if I wanted the left-hand image to be higher, such as aligned with an earlier image in the right-hand stack, I would have placed it earlier in the wiki-source.

The problem is when the right-hand image-stack dangles down from an earlier section of an article. In that case, the left-hand image in the later section is pushed down by the right-hand stack. That is contrary to the purpose of using left/right to avoid images from getting pushed too far down due to stacking. It gives weird effects and is difficult to diagnose, let alone resolve easily:

foo

bar

bar bar bar bar bar

Before you say "well, stop stacking in the previous section", I'll point out that this is the standard situation in any article with more than one infobox/navbox in the lede. Is there any way to have I guess the opposite of {{clear}}? Or a template to put multiple infoboxes in a single container? DMacks (talk) 09:34, 6 May 2023 (UTC)

Is this a software "feature" (perhaps in the underlying CSS) to reduce sandwiching? The issue is reported here at the Teahouse. Esowteric + Talk + Breadcrumbs 09:42, 6 May 2023 (UTC)

{{Stack}} handles this. I have used it in the article reported at the Teahouse.[2] PrimeHunter (talk) 12:22, 6 May 2023 (UTC)

Thanks! DMacks (talk) 18:55, 6 May 2023 (UTC)

It is not a feature, just a reality of dealing with floating items that must clear themselves. Izno (talk) 16:18, 6 May 2023 (UTC)

This might be the only time in the history of ever that tk can do something better than other gui toolkits. DMacks (talk) 18:55, 6 May 2023 (UTC)

Why do I feel like this is something that is the result of any recent MW update, because this probably did not happen before. I clearly remember using |left in images to fix pushed images, and use {{clear}} when I need a content to begin after both left and right-aligned items are shown, instead of the current behavior which I independently discovered just now, see #Left-aligning image with lots of content on right section below. Thanks! —CX Zoom[he/him] ^{(let's talk • {C•X})} 16:31, 7 May 2023 (UTC)

Also, this behaviour is different from {{clear}} in the sense that the content after "clear" begins when all above content is finshed. In the case above, and the one I noted below, the top-alignment of left image and that of the last right image is at the same level, as if {{clear}} is being automatically applied just after the second-last right-aligned element, except that it affects only aligned items and not text content. —CX Zoom[he/him] ^{(let's talk • {C•X})} 16:37, 7 May 2023 (UTC)

@CX Zoom I don't know why you feel that way, but floating images have behaved this way almost since web browsers were invented. You can find one of many explanations at WP:MFOP.

If you're curious, this behavior is prescribed by the CSS1 spec (and unchanged in later specs):

5. A floating element's top may not be higher than the top of any earlier floating or block-level element.

https://www.w3.org/TR/CSS1/#floating-elements

I think the rule exists to allow text to be laid out on the page in a single pass. Otherwise, a left-floated image could push down the right-floated images that are placed before it, which in turn could push down the left-floated images further, which could push down the right-floated ones again, and so on. Matma Rex talk 19:46, 7 May 2023 (UTC)

Ahh, that makes sense. —CX Zoom[he/him] ^{(let's talk • {C•X})} 19:37, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

Excel to Wiki converter

Hello Technical supporters I used to use this excel to wiki converter up to 20 days ago when it stopped working, who can repair it? or guide me to an easy similar converter? [3]. Abu aamir (talk) 15:53, 7 May 2023 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Village pump (technical)/Archive 204 § Excel to Wikipedia tables for a discussion of options, including using copy and paste within the Visual Editor, and a link to a page that points to different tools. isaacl (talk) 16:10, 7 May 2023 (UTC)

See Help:Table#Tables and the visual editor (VE). The sections that follow provide much help. There are a couple converters linked too. Copying and pasting to and from tables to the Visual Editor, LibreOffice Calc, web pages, etc. is covered too. --Timeshifter (talk) 20:46, 7 May 2023 (UTC)

@Abu aamir I maintain that tool and was not aware that it wasn't working. I am trying to debug it now. --Ahecht (TALK
PAGE) 22:06, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

@Abu aamir I restarted the webserver and it is now working. Not sure what caused it to fail before. --Ahecht (TALK
PAGE) 22:10, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

• @Ahecht thanks for your effort, it is very good tool.--Abu aamir (talk) 06:55, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

Adding preview images to articles?

Does there exist an established way to add a preview image to an article? By preview image, I mean an image that shows up in search results/suggestions on mobile Wikipedia, or when you link to a Wikipedia article from a social platform (i.e. Twitter, Discord, etc).

Usually, the first image of the article is used automatically, but sometimes this is a bad default. For example, when you link to Carolina–Duke rivalry, the preview image is the Duke logo, which is not ideal. We have File:Duke v Carolina logos.svg which would make for a much better preview image; however, I don't know the best way to make it become the preview image. I suppose I could put something like <div style="display:none">[[:File:Duke v Carolina logos.svg]]</div> at the top of the article, but that seems a bit janky and I was wondering if there's a template or something. Cheers, IagoQnsi (talk) 23:05, 7 May 2023 (UTC)

@IagoQnsi: The image in search results/suggestions must be displayed in the lead and selected by mw:Extension:PageImages#Image choice. I don't know whether Twitter and Discord use the page image. PrimeHunter (talk) 23:52, 7 May 2023 (UTC)

@IagoQnsi You can exclude images from being the page image by adding the "notpageimage" class, e.g. [[File:Example.png|class=notpageimage]]. --Ahecht (TALK
PAGE) 21:55, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

Categories for protected pages

Please can someone advise how to update e.g. Category:Fully protected redirects to Category:Wikipedia fully protected redirects, following a valid request at WP:CFDS? This is part of a set now listed at WP:CFDWM#Other, but the old category still contains members that do not depend on {{R fully protected}}. – Fayenatic London 11:11, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

By looking through the remaining redirects and finding out where the category comes from? Spot checking a few, I see several that are directly categorized, and I also see that other redirect protection level templates like {{R semi-protected}} can apply the category if the article is fully move-protected. You might start with those. Anomie⚔ 11:42, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

This search finds three templates. When you think the template cases are done, remove "NO BOTS" from WP:CFDWM#Other and see if the bot does the rest. It has admin rights. PrimeHunter (talk) 12:05, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

Thank you, those templates seem to cover all cases. I had thought the categories were being populated by some hidden cascade system.

The bot won't work where it can't find a category to replace. It is either a matter of waiting or doing dummy edits to force the template updates to propagate. – Fayenatic London 15:12, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

Ah, yes I see, there were some residual pages coded directly as members of Category:Fully protected redirects, so I fed them to the bot. I missed a trick there – I could have asked someone to replace the category code with {{R fully protected}}, and have now requested help with this at Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser/Tasks#Replace_category_with_template. – Fayenatic London 19:14, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

How to put link in parameter

I'm making a template (Template:User friends) and I want to be able to put a link in the text in the "name of friend" parameter, but I can't figure out how. Any ideas?

Sincerely, --AugustusAudax (talk|contribs) P.S: Aliens exist 14:11, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

Something like this: This user is [[real life]] friends with [[User:{{{1}}}]]? —  Jts1882 | talk  14:21, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

Or [[User:{{{1}}}|{{{1}}}]] to not display "User:". PrimeHunter (talk) 14:28, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

Thanks! Sincerely, --AugustusAudax (talk|contribs) P.S: Aliens exist 15:33, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

Linking a subsection without underscores

As copy-pasting an article's subsection for wikilinking transforms spaces into redundant underscores, is there a way to wikilink without manually removing underscores in every instance (particularly to simplify syntax and to limit character count)? E.g. [[Wikipedia#Policies and laws|Wikipedia's policies and laws]] instead of [[Wikipedia#Policies_and_laws|Wikipedia's policies and laws]]. Brandmeister^talk 21:05, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

{{slink}} exists. Izno (talk) 21:18, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

User:Nardog/CopySectLink might help you. Nthep (talk) 21:27, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

If you use the reply tool or the new topic tool in visual mode (you can turn them on at Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-editing-discussion), you can just copy-paste the full link like "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia#Policies_and_laws" and it will be automatically prettified to become an internal link like "Wikipedia#Policies and laws". Matma Rex talk 23:08, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

Thanks, set the CopySectLink tool. Brandmeister^talk 09:16, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

Tech News: 2023-19

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

• When you close an image that is displayed via MediaViewer, it will now return to the wiki page instead of going back in your browser history. This feature request was voted #65 in the 2023 Community Wishlist Survey. [4]
• The SyntaxHighlight extension now supports wikitext as a selected language. Old alternatives that were used to highlight wikitext, such as html5, moin, and html+handlebars, can now be replaced. [5]
• Preloading text to new pages/sections now supports preloading from localized MediaWiki interface messages. Here is an example at the Czech Wikipedia that uses preload=MediaWiki:July. [6]

Problems

• Graph Extension update: Foundation developers have completed upgrading the visualization software to Vega5. Existing community graphs based on Vega2 are no longer compatible. Communities need to update local graphs and templates, and shared lua modules like de:Modul:Graph. The Vega Porting guide provides the most comprehensive detail on migration from Vega2 and here is an example migration. Vega5 has currently just been enabled on mediawiki.org to provide a test environment for communities. [7]

Changes later this week

• The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 9 May. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 10 May. It will be on all wikis from 11 May (calendar).
• Until now, all new OAuth apps went through manual review. Starting this week, apps using identification-only or basic authorizations will not require review. [8]

Future changes

• During the next year, MediaWiki will stop using IP addresses to identify logged-out users, and will start automatically assigning unique temporary usernames. Read more at IP Editing: Privacy Enhancement and Abuse Mitigation/Updates. You can join the discussion about the format of the temporary usernames. [9]
• There will be an A/B test on 10 Wikipedias where the Vector 2022 skin is the default skin. Half of logged-in desktop users will see an interface where the different parts of the page are more clearly separated. You can read more. [10][11]
• jquery.tipsy will be removed from the MediaWiki core. This will affect some user scripts. Many lines with .tipsy( can be commented out. OO.ui.PopupWidget can be used to keep things working like they are now. You can read more and read about how to find broken scripts. [12]

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

MediaWiki message delivery 00:34, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

The tipsy removal looks to impact these 35ish scripts. Izno (talk) 01:04, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

For scripts that use jQuery UI (which is most of the above), it's more sensible and easier to migrate to jquery.ui.toolip – which is what Twinkle did 3 years ago. Tipsy is a jQuery plugin after all. – SD0001 (talk) 06:09, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

Pedantic correction: Half of logged-in desktop users who are using Vector 2022 will see an interface... I haven't yet found anything to explain why (if it's indeed the case, as implied) logged-out desktop users will see no change. — JohnFromPinckney (talk / edits) 07:39, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

The note above from WMF staff says Due to privacy and technical restrictions, we are only able to run this test with logged-in users. I looked through half a dozen phab tickets and found mention of the "logged in only" restriction, but no explanation about why it was put in place. This A/B test appears to be the reason for the new ".vector-feature-zebra-design-disabled" CSS class that has been stuck to all sorts of other classes like gum to the bottom of a shoe, interfering with custom CSS. If you are one of the lucky 50% to see the Zebra design during the A/B test, or if you figure out how to script your way into the test, you will get a ".vector-feature-zebra-design-enable" CSS class instead, AFAICT. – Jonesey95 (talk) 13:57, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

Probably caution around that even a cookie that just assigns the user to the A or B bucket might be seen as a "tracking" cookie under various laws, and lack of any other good way to do the bucketing. Anomie⚔ 12:07, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

I've heard (in the context of a different A/B test) that getting IP editors assigned correctly and durably is difficult. The legal considerations are apparently not insurmountable. Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 04:53, 13 May 2023 (UTC)

Could we not surmount them by showing A to editors with odd IP addresses and B to even IPs, without storing any information on either server or browser? (Checking a more significant bit would provide more resilience against IP hoppers, e.g. check the 7 in 123.45.67.89 or 2003:45:67:89:A:B:C:D.) Certes (talk) 10:52, 13 May 2023 (UTC)

Well, heck. I didn't actually look on this same page; I just followed the links provided in the News item. (And it's probably there on the mw pages, too, and I just didn't see it.) Thanks for the tip, Jonesey. — JohnFromPinckney (talk / edits) 13:21, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

WP:PEIS preventive measures

I recently came across a WP:PEIS in ATP 1000, that I was able to resolve by replacing flag with flagg|cxxlo. ATP 1000 and WTA 1000 have each 30+ transcluded sections with a list of singles and doubles tennis winners per season (1990–present). At what point will the page size limit be exceeded and how does one prevent it?

I experimented in my sandbox and replaced #if:1 with P1|1=, and flag(icon) with flagg|cxxlo, but that didn't resolve the issue. By replacing flag(icon) with flagg in the source sections pages before transclusion ([13], [14], [15]) I was able to reduce the page size limit after transclusion but only to a degree.

Is there a way to further reduce the page size template expansion being exceeded and where can I calculate how much template data in kB has been expanded? Qwerty284651 (talk) 15:54, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

You can delete the {{P1|1= wrapper entirely; the only result will be a little bit of excess whitespace, and the PEIS will be about half. See Wikipedia:Template limits#How can you find out? to find out how much room you have left. * Pppery * _{it has begun...} 16:24, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

You can avoid the whitespace by removing the newlines before and after the section transclusion. PrimeHunter (talk) 17:41, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

I realized what's the problem. It's the 54 (6 players x 9 events) flagicons that are section transcluded. Replacing them with flagg|cxxlo reduces the PEIS by 28kB (from 44.000 bytes [16] --> 16.000 bytes [17] (that is 520 bytes per flagicon) in all 35 articles (1990-present) will drastically reduce the current PEIS of ATP 1000, which sits just below the page size limit [18]. Removing whitespace is barely noticeable. Removal of the {{P1|1= wrapper significantly reduces PEIS at the cost of excess whitespace. Qwerty284651 (talk) 23:44, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

Given both sister articles ATP– and WTA 1000 expand yearly, that PEIS will be reached eventually. I will defer from removing P1 until PEIS limit is reached again (in 10+ years). After P1 removed the articles are still over PEIS, then we are left with 2 choices: split article (usually because of rebranding) or substitute 2–5 transcluded sections as a last ditch effort at the cost of longer page loading time (server workload)... Qwerty284651 (talk) 23:59, 9 May 2023 (UTC)

Final result: with all 35 articles flagicons replaced with flagg|cxxlo (size reduced by a 1/3) [19]. Qwerty284651 (talk) 00:42, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

And I went and removed the flag icons representing countries, since it is against wikipedia MOS and Tennis Project consensus to use them for locations anyway. Only for player sports nationality. Fyunck(click) (talk) 03:50, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

@Fyunck(click), thank you for that. Duly noted for next time: Flag icons only sport athletes nationality. Qwerty284651 (talk) 07:15, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

Box Office Mojo competitors' templates

More templates needed...e.g.: Chasing Amy : Box Office Mojo: Template:Mojo title - [20]

• The Numbers (website): https://www.the-numbers.com/movie/Chasing-Amy
• Lumiere (database): https://lumiere.obs.coe.int/movie/4223

.... 0mtwb9gd5wx (talk) 01:44, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

Automatic citations based on ISBN are broken

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T336298

Hey all. It's been a while. This is an FYI as I'm aware that when things break, this is among the first places that many Wikimedians would check, hoping to find relevant information.

We have recently learned that we're currently unable to access the WorldCat API, which provided the ability to add citations using ISBN numbers. This affects citations made with the VisualEditor Automatic tab, and the use of the citoid API in gadgets and user scripts, such as the autofill button on refToolbar. The Editing team is investigating options.

I would like to gather a bit more information before sending out a Mass Message to other wikis; in the meantime, interested folks can keep tabs on the situation via Phabricator, or by reading the next issues of Tech News. If you know of any users or groups who rely heavily on this feature (for instance, someone who has an upcoming editathon), I'd appreciate it if you shared this update with them.

On behalf of the Editing team, Elitre (WMF) (talk) 08:24, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

Thanks for the notification. I have suggested to inform users at Wikipedia talk:RefToolbar#ISBN autofill broken. PrimeHunter (talk) 14:32, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

Banner link error

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T336353

When attempting to access link from the reference desk, regarding a "community survey", the following error occurred:

Erreur interne du serveur

CDbConnection failed to open the DB connection.

Une erreur interne est apparue lorsque le serveur web traitait votre requete. Veuillez contacter the webmaster pour signaler ce problème.

Merci.

Link = https://questionnaires.marsouin.org/index.php/978939 --136.56.52.157 (talk) 09:03, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

I get a different error, I get

Internal Server Error / The server encountered an internal error or misconfiguration and was unable to complete your request. / Please contact the server administrator at postmaster@questionnaires.marsouin.org to inform them of the time this error occurred, and the actions you performed just before this error. / More information about this error may be available in the server error log.

Stuartyeates (talk) 09:22, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

I have filed phab:T336353. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 09:23, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

Hello,

thanks for the feedback

there is a problem with OVH. We are on it

I've asked to unplug the banner (and to replug it once solved)

Sorry! Jullienn (talk) 09:29, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

I have disabled the banner until the survey can be fixed. Peter Coombe (WMF) (talk) 09:30, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

Thank you! Jullienn (talk) 09:34, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

quick question @Pcoombe (WMF) : also in the French/Spanish / Turc language versions? Jullienn (talk) 09:35, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

Yes, they are all part of the same CentralNotice "campaign" so are all disabled. Peter Coombe (WMF) (talk) 09:41, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

@Pcoombe (WMF): a duplicate discussion at WP:Village pump (miscellaneous)#Marsouin survey error. So is VPT the right forum for any future banner issues as well? Jay 💬 10:51, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

No, see meta:CentralNotice/Report_an_issue —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 11:02, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

Volunteer me happened to see this VPT discussion on his watchlist so that is how I became aware of it. But generally the quickest way to get CentralNotice admin attention is as described at m:CentralNotice/Report an issue. Peter Coombe (WMF) (talk) 11:17, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

The survey links are working again. The banner is planned to go back up on English Wikipedia (at a reduced traffic level) at 12 UTC i.e. in approximately 40 minutes. Peter Coombe (WMF) (talk) 11:22, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

The banner is back, and from the questionnaire server's side, everything is working fine this time. Sorry for the inconveniences! Jullienn (talk) 12:29, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

• Got this banner failing again. Please note, this is not managed by the English Wikipedia, I've reported it at meta:User_talk:Pcoombe_(WMF)#More_banner_problems, as this is being managed by WMF. — xaosflux ^Talk 13:07, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

  Yes we've had a problem of capacity in our servers (we also thought that less people would be interested in answering...)

  Anyhow, the capacities are upgraded and the questionnaire is back, but the banner will be delayed a bit for the English Wikipedia's survey (probably begining of June).

  Of course you can answer and feedback any question before!

  Thank you all for your understanding! Jullienn (talk) 09:26, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

Losing login

A week ago I initiated Wikipedia:Help desk/Archives/2023 May 3#Losing login. A few minutes ago, for the first time in a week, I experienced the same problem. Is this a known problem?--Bbb23 (talk) 15:31, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

I don't know if it's known in the Phab ticket sense, but along with the other responses that you got in the last thread, I have that issue from time to time as well. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 15:44, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

I'm not getting what you're getting, but related: in 2023 I've been strangely getting logged out a lot from my devices. Unlikely to be actually related though. SWinxy (talk) 07:01, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

This might be phab:T326281 or one of the related issues. Browsers have lately become more strict about accessing cookies for privacy and security reasons, which breaks logins, especially crosswiki. Check if you have any tracking protection/privacy extensions enabled; they might be breaking the logins. Galobtter (talk) 08:41, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

@Galobtter: I use the latest version of Firefox and no such extensions; indeed, I have only two, which I've had for a long time, AdBlock Plus, which I have disabled for Wikipedia, and a machine translator called TWP.--Bbb23 (talk) 13:42, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

I also use Firefox. I would just make sure tracking protection isn't turned on. If it isn't, then I think it has to fixed in the ticket and I'm not sure if there's more that you can do to fix it. Galobtter (talk) 23:08, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

AFAICT, you can't turn tracking protection off. It can be set to Standard, Strict, or Custom. Unlike the first two, within the last you can set different options. What do you recommend, and do you recommend it only to "fix" the Wikipedia problem or because you think it's a good idea otherwise?--Bbb23 (talk) 23:35, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

You can turn off "enhanced tracking protection" for one particular website - see here. I have it set to standard and disabled it on Wikipedia and the only login issues I have is not being automatically logged into e.g. wikidata or wikinews since they are on different domains. Galobtter (talk) 23:44, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

Ah, I added the exception but left my setting for everywhere else at Custom. I used https://en.wikipedia.org as the website. I'll let you know if I have the problem again. Thanks for your help.--Bbb23 (talk) 23:50, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

Certain pages forced in V22

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T336504

Hello! So just recently, on the community Discord, User:Skarmory discovered that some pages are forced to use vector 2022 regardless of the preferences. One of them is the SPI page for an LTA, the other was User:JPxG/sandbox, however that one appears to be normal again. ― Blaze Wolf^Talk_{Blaze Wolf#6545} 12:18, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

Can't reproduce it. Could it possibly be the same problem as #Losing login above rather than just the skin preference being lost? Are you still logged in when it's Vector 2022? Nardog (talk) 12:23, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

@Nardog: Yep I'm still logged in when it happens. The SPI page is Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Architect 134 ― Blaze Wolf^Talk_{Blaze Wolf#6545} 12:26, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

Oh, that one is in Vector 2022 for me too. Nardog (talk) 12:30, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

That's also in V22 for me, and I'm still logged in. Adding ?useskin=vector fixes it. I didn't try purge or null edit, as I don't want to "fix" a useful example of the bug. Certes (talk) 15:43, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

For clarification: JPxG's sandbox was originally found by User:JPxG, I went to it and it was in vector 2022, closed out of it, went back and it was in vector 2010. Skarmory (talk • contribs) 12:27, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

On both Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Architect 134 and User:JPxG/sandbox, a null edit seems to make it follow my preference (legacy Vector) and purging (via gadget or action=purge) seems to bring back Vector 2022. Nardog (talk) 12:47, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

That's quite interesting. ― Blaze Wolf^Talk_{Blaze Wolf#6545} 12:54, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

Purging changes JPxG's sandbox to V22 for me. ― Blaze Wolf^Talk_{Blaze Wolf#6545} 12:55, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

I wonder what the two pages have in common. They both have __NOINDEX__ and are loading the style module mediawiki.special but I don't know if these are relevant. Nardog (talk) 13:15, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

I have had a few pages load in Vector2022 instead of Monobook today. Usually aggressive reloading fixes this, but it is quite annoying. —Kusma (talk) 13:03, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

One such page for me is Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Pasqua Rosée/archive1. On two different devices, using Chrome, the page came up first in the Vector2022 skin, and after reloading was correctly presented in Monobook. —Kusma (talk) 13:19, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

After editing and saving the page, it was first presented in V22 and only returned to Monobook after reloading. —Kusma (talk) 13:20, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

Can confirm the page loads in V22 on my device. ― Blaze Wolf^Talk_{Blaze Wolf#6545} 13:26, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

Requires a purge to load in V22 for me. Skarmory (talk • contribs) 13:30, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Coccinellidae/archive1 is one for me. Hog Farm _Talk 13:41, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

One thing that appears to be consistent across all of these pages is that they're subpages. ― Blaze Wolf^Talk_{Blaze Wolf#6545} 13:44, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

I have filed a phab ticket (T336504). Skarmory (talk • contribs) 14:16, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

Things have been narrowed down there to "Using Special:Prefixindex can force the default skin". The train is currently rolled back to group1 wikis and we'll hold it there until a fix lands. BBearnes (WMF) (talk) 18:01, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

Sounds good! Glad we could get it figured out. ― Blaze Wolf^Talk_{Blaze Wolf#6545} 18:13, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

The issue at https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T336504 should be fixed. I am going to update all wikis to the new MediaWiki version. If you still notice the issue after the wikis got updated, please reopen the task and I should notice :) Hashar (talk) 09:02, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

Glad my sandbox could be a part of history :) jp×g 18:30, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

I had posted about this same issue at Wikipedia talk:Vector 2022#New glitch and Jonesey95 mentioned this Village pump:technical thread.

Just chiming in that this glitch happened to me too - not sure which pages it happened to me on. I went and looked at my Preferences and yes I did have Vector 2010 - the Legacy, the Original - checked. And then when I went back to the page the glitch had appeared on the glitch had disappeared.

Not sure but I think(?) it might have been my main User Page, which does have that NOINDEX code on it... Shearonink (talk) 21:09, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

Miscategorisation from transclusion

At Category:Lists of counties of the United States by state, I can see Wikipedia:Featured content/Lists as one of the pages in category. When I opened this page, the category was not shown, because the page has random components and selects a random featured article, I saw something related to Navy, and the page had categories of this article shown. I believe this is not ideal, is there a long-term solution to fix this miscategorisation? Thanks! —CX Zoom[he/him] ^{(let's talk • {C•X})} 21:16, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Featured content/Lists expects the source of the featured list to be marked with <onlyinclude>...</onlyinclude> to control which parts to transclude. See e.g. List of ice hockey teams in Alberta for a page which has it. List of counties in Arizona, List of counties in Kentucky and List of counties in Maine don't have it. PrimeHunter (talk) 22:41, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

I dug a little deeper. Many of the lists are missing onlyinclude but I don't think they should actually have it. Wikipedia:Featured content/Lists was transcluded in Wikipedia:Featured content until 2013 [21] after discussion at Wikipedia talk:Featured content/Archive 3#Dire need of cleanup. Special:WhatLinksHere/Wikipedia:Featured content/Lists shows nothing indicating the page is used for anything now. There is no point struggling to add and maintain onlyinclude code in 143 lists if the system isn't used. I suggest to deactivate the transclusion of the lists in Wikipedia:Featured content/Lists unless somebody can give a good reason to keep it. Maybe the whole page should just be deleted. PrimeHunter (talk) 00:38, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

"You have switched your layout to full width"

Yes. I know. I did it on purpose. It's not a mistake that I need to be educated about.

Is there a way to turn this popup off? Or are people who prefer full-width doomed to be nagged about it every time we use the encyclopedia until we admit that we're wrong?

The nag popup seems to reappear every. single. time I open a new browser window. Closing it only hides it for the duration of a single session. At best. To be clear, I'm not changing the setting it back and forth, or doing anything weird. I set that setting months ago, and I left it that way.

Is there a "hide forever" button or setting that I've missed? Is this a glitch that I should be reporting to someone? I'm assuming it's not supposed to be this way, because it seems like very bad ux design mistake to have a popup tooltip that won't ever go away.

Thanks. ApLundell (talk) 23:15, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

Try this first: go to Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-rendering and uncheck "Enable limited width mode", then Save. That does the trick for me. – Jonesey95 (talk) 23:26, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

It's already unchecked. ApLundell (talk) 23:44, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

I have it on limited width and I keep getting popups too randomly, so I don't think it is a full width thing. If you have some privacy/anti-tracking extensions or settings enabled, that might be causing issues since it looks a cookie is set to see if you have the acknowledged the setting (but for logged-in users it should definitely store that with your account too). There's definitely some bugginess there. Galobtter (talk) 23:57, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

Yes, I've noticed that this is a fairly persistent popup that I have had to close multiple times also. @Jon (WMF)? Izno (talk) 23:59, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

Ah, ok. I guess it's not just me then. (Not sure if that's good news or bad!)

I am blocking "Cross-site cookies". Maybe that's at fault? I thought that was a pretty standard thing to block these days.

I'm also running an ad-blocker, but checking the logs, the only thing it blocks on Wikipedia is something from "intake-analytics.wikimedia.org", which doesn't seem like a likely culprit. ApLundell (talk) 00:14, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

Yeah, that's definitely pretty standard now. This definitely is super annoying; I left a comment at phab:T335307; there's no reason why the same user should get this popup more than once. Galobtter (talk) 02:56, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

I'm curious what browser you are using - I'm wondering if this is because I use Firefox. Galobtter (talk) 03:04, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

In the meantime people can add

.vector-settings {display: none;}

to their common.css which gets rid of the popup and the toggle. Galobtter (talk) 05:21, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

Yes, up-to-date Firefox over here. Also rocking uBlock origin, but it is only catching intake-analytics, as above. Izno (talk) 05:58, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

Looking at the code, it seems the popup should not appear as long as the cookie enwikilimited-width-aware is set. It may be somehow blocked or expiring too soon. Nardog (talk) 05:25, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

Twitter may delete 30-days-inactive accounts: archiving needed

Twitter just changed its rules to say that accounts that aren't logged into for 30 days are liable to be deleted. I've seen claims that some accounts have already been deleted.

We have a tremendous number of Twitter links in references - 57,959 articles have twitter.com links as I write this. Could someone please point an Internet Archive bot at them?

(It's possible that Twitter will backtrack on this rule. But we should archive this stuff anyway - Twitter is already a much more fragile and unreliable platform than it was in October 2022.) - David Gerard (talk) 08:40, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

I quickly put together a bot request to add archive-url/archive-date to instances of {{cite tweet}} where the URL has been archived but not added to the template. That'll at least address some of these issues.. — TheresNoTime (talk • they/them) 12:47, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

WP:URLREQ would have been the right spot to stop around. Anyway, your search does not account for cite tweet, as it happens. Izno (talk) 15:39, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

ah thank you! I'll note it there too. Yeah, there's those as well - David Gerard (talk) 19:13, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

It seems like Musk also tweeted that the accounts would be "archived" though I have no idea what that will actually mean for the URLs that are in use currently. --Dennis C. Abrams (talk) 18:04, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

I would not trust that any particular thing is going to happen at Twitter other than stuff continuing to break down, sometimes horrifyingly - David Gerard (talk) 19:11, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

Reply tool not functioning

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T332235

Reply tool not working on WP:ITN/C

On WP:ITN/C, the [ reply ] tool has run into a bit of a kerfuffle (for me at least). Whenever I enter ITN/C, I immediately get moved down to a specific comment where it attempts to load an unfinished reply (I know this because before this occurred, it was loading replies that I had already made) to a comment I've already had replied to. The big issue is that the reply never loads, which is an issue considering that for whatever reason, you can't write multiple replies at once. I'm using Google Chrome. This has occurred before and it seemed to be solved via clearing the cache, but that's not working now. Interestingly enough, on Chrome, it attempts to do the same thing when logged out, but then subsequently dismisses the reply. Meanwhile, on Microsoft Edge, it doesn't load the reply at all logged-in or logged-out, meaning that it's likely a browser issue of some sort. - Knightoftheswords281 (Talk · Contribs) 12:52, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

Thanks for the bug report, this seems to be the same issue as this task: T332235 and I hope we'll find the time to investigate it soon. Matma Rex talk 19:40, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

Twinkle

Hello good time;

I request you to make Twinkle applicable on the phone as well, because users do not always have access to computers and laptops. Anyone you edit on Wikipedia has access to a mobile phone and can use Twinkle's features. With respect mojtaba ^Discuss 13:55, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

User:Plantaest/TwinkleMobile. You can alternatively switch to the desktop site on your phone. Nardog (talk) 14:09, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

@Nardog

Hello, yes, I am aware of this issue and its capabilities, but if we go on a direct road, it is better than an indirect route. mojtaba ^Discuss 15:20, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

The appropriate place to request this is WT:TW, where I would guess the maintainers would say "it's in the plans, and here's the alternative for now". Izno (talk) 15:42, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

Odd page thing happened just now - all articles, all browsers, no difference

Don't know what you call this, but when you bring up any page, at the top there is usually identifying information as to how many users have linked the page, who created it, when, etc. That just totally disappeared, leaving behind a teeny little dot that keeps moving from left to right. Browsers Firefox, Chrome, MS Edge, etc. — Maile (talk) 14:52, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

Never mind. Whatever it was, just corrected itself. — Maile (talk) 14:56, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

Newspapers.com

It seems like there were recent changes at Newspapers.com which makes it a bit more annoying to cite. It used to be that when you pasted a URL from a clipping into the News citation RefToolbar and clicked the magnifying glass to autofill the rest of the template, it would autofill into the "work" field the name of the newspaper from which the clipping was taken. Now, however, it's autofilling "Newspapers.com" into the "work" field. It creates an extra step when citing articles from Newspapers.com. Is there anything Wikipedia can do on its end to remedy that or would that have to be done on Newspapers.com's end? Or is there a third alternative that I'm not seeing. Dennis C. Abrams (talk) 18:02, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

We've had a couple threads about this at the talk page of WP:Women in Red, most recently here. Apparently, according to a Phab thread, the issue is currently being dealt with by the Library team. Curbon7 (talk) 18:05, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

Thank you. I would not have thought to look there. Dennis C. Abrams (talk) 18:07, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

Media player is wrongly displayed in gallery view

In Railways in Melbourne article I found a gallery box become a straight line, and the media player is placed out of box, is there any way to fix? -- Great Brightstar (talk) 07:32, 13 May 2023 (UTC)

The gallery is at Railways in Melbourne#Passenger information. It works for videos but File:PRIDE II Talking Box Next Trains Announcement at Ginifer.ogg is a sound file. Galleries are for images. The MediaWiki documentation is at mw:Help:Images#Rendering a gallery of images and doesn't mention sound files. I'm not surprised it renders poorly. I doubt there is a good fix other than just placing it outside the gallery. PrimeHunter (talk) 10:09, 13 May 2023 (UTC)

The technical reason is that this gallery has specified widths here. That means the gallery allows the content to autosize the height. But audio doesnt have 'intrinsic' height that is resizable and thus ends ups with size 0.. If you don't specify sizing the gallery works (just looks poorly because all squares are uneven). I'me sure that some improvements can be made if time was invested into it, but yes, primarily audio files are just not designed to be put into galleries. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 10:29, 13 May 2023 (UTC)

Strange behaviour right-clicking wikilink with #section while previewing

If I create a wikilink containing a #section (that actually already exists), of course it works fine in read mode. However, if I go into the source editor, click on preview, and right-click to open the link in a new browser tab (to check the link syntax is right), it brings up full page source edit mode (URL: ...title=Wikipedia:Page&action=submit#section). Other links do not. Maybe there's a conflict with edit submission?

Is this a feature or an issue (which may require no action)?

Thanks, Esowteric + Talk + Breadcrumbs 17:08, 13 May 2023 (UTC)

This is just how browsers work. Izno (talk) 17:19, 13 May 2023 (UTC)

Thanks. It's strange, though, that it doesn't bring the page up in read mode and jump to the anchor, but instead submits a page request and brings it up in the source code editor. But then little surprises me these days. (I'm using Vector Legacy 2010, btw). Esowteric + Talk + Breadcrumbs 17:29, 13 May 2023 (UTC)