Wikipedia:Bot requests

For the policy on bot requirements, see WP:BOTREQUIRE.

This is a page for requesting tasks to be done by bots per the bot policy. This is an appropriate place to put ideas for uncontroversial bot tasks, to get early feedback on ideas for bot tasks (controversial or not), and to seek bot operators for bot tasks. Consensus-building discussions requiring large community input (such as request for comments) should normally be held at WP:VPPROP or other relevant pages (such as a WikiProject's talk page).

You can check the "Commonly Requested Bots" box above to see if a suitable bot already exists for the task you have in mind. If you have a question about a particular bot, contact the bot operator directly via their talk page or the bot's talk page. If a bot is acting improperly, follow the guidance outlined in WP:BOTISSUE. For broader issues and general discussion about bots, see the bot noticeboard.

Before making a request, please see the list of frequently denied bots, either because they are too complicated to program, or do not have consensus from the Wikipedia community. If you are requesting that a template (such as a WikiProject banner) is added to all pages in a particular category, please be careful to check the category tree for any unwanted subcategories. It is best to give a complete list of categories that should be worked through individually, rather than one category to be analyzed recursively (see example difference).

Alternatives to bot requests

• WP:AWBREQ, for simple tasks that involve a handful of articles and/or only needs to be done once (e.g. adding a category to a few articles).
• WP:URLREQ, for tasks involving changing or updating URLs to prevent link rot (specialized bots deal with this).
• WP:SQLREQ, for tasks which might be solved with an SQL query (e.g. compiling a list of articles according to certain criteria).
• WP:TEMPREQ, to request a new template written in wiki code or Lua.
• WP:SCRIPTREQ, to request a new user script. Many useful scripts already exist, see Wikipedia:User scripts/List.
• WP:CITEBOTREQ, to request a new feature for WP:Citation bot, a user-initiated bot that fixes citations.

Note to bot operators: The {{BOTREQ}} template can be used to give common responses, and make it easier to keep track of the task's current status. If you complete a request, note that you did with {{BOTREQ|done}}, and archive the request after a few days (WP:1CA is useful here).

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Please add your bot requests to the bottom of this page.
Make a new request

#	Bot request	Status	💬	👥	🙋 Last editor	🕒 (UTC)	🤖 Last botop editor	🕒 (UTC)
1	Automatic NOGALLERY keyword for categories containing non-free files (again)		27	11	Anomie	2024-08-04 14:09	Anomie	2024-08-04 14:09
2	Fixing stub tag placement on new articles	Not a good task for a bot.	5	4	Tom.Reding	2024-07-16 08:10	Tom.Reding	2024-07-16 08:10
3	Adding Facility IDs to AM/FM/LPFM station data	Y Done	13	3	HouseBlaster	2024-07-25 12:42	Mdann52	2024-07-25 05:23
4	Tagging women's basketball article talk pages with project tags	Y Done	20	4	Usernamekiran	2024-09-05 16:55	Usernamekiran	2024-09-05 16:55
5	Bot that condenses identical references	Coding...	12	6	ActivelyDisinterested	2024-08-03 20:48	Headbomb	2024-06-18 00:34
6	Bot to remove template from articles it doesn't belong on?		3	3	Thryduulf	2024-08-03 10:22	Primefac	2024-07-24 20:15
7	One-off: Adding all module doc pages to Category:Module documentation pages		7	3	Andrybak	2024-09-01 00:34	Primefac	2024-07-25 12:22
8	Draft Categories		13	6	Bearcat	2024-08-09 04:24	DannyS712	2024-07-27 07:30
9	Remove new article comments		3	2	142.113.140.146	2024-07-28 22:33	Usernamekiran	2024-07-27 07:50
10	Removing Template:midsize from infobox parameters (violation of MOS:SMALLFONT)	Resolved	14	2	Qwerfjkl	2024-07-29 08:15	Qwerfjkl	2024-07-29 08:15
11	Change stadium to somerhing else in the template:Infobox Olympic games	Needs wider discussion.	8	5	Jonesey95	2024-07-29 14:57	Primefac	2024-07-29 13:48
12	Change hyphens to en-dashes		16	7	1ctinus	2024-08-03 15:05	Qwerfjkl	2024-07-31 09:09
13	Consensus: Aldo, Giovanni e Giacomo		17	5	Dicklyon	2024-08-14 14:43	Qwerfjkl	2024-08-02 20:23
14	Cyclones		3	2	OhHaiMark	2024-08-05 22:21	Mdann52	2024-08-05 16:07
15	Substing int message headings on filepages		8	4	Jonteemil	2024-08-07 23:13	Primefac	2024-08-07 14:02
16	Removing redundant FURs on file pages		4	2	Jonteemil	2024-08-12 20:26	Anomie	2024-08-09 14:15
17	Need help with a super widespread typo: Washington, D.C (also U.S.A)		32	10	Jonesey95	2024-08-26 16:55	Qwerfjkl	2024-08-21 15:08
18	Dutch IPA		4	3	IvanScrooge98	2024-08-25 14:11
19	AnandTech shuts down		9	6	GreenC	2024-09-01 18:39	Primefac	2024-09-01 17:28
20	Date formatting on 9/11 biography articles		5	2	Zeke, the Mad Horrorist	2024-09-01 16:27
21	Discussion alert bot		6	4	Headbomb	2024-09-08 12:29	Headbomb	2024-09-08 12:29
22	Regularly removing {{coords missing}} if coordinates are present	BRFA filed	11	2	Usernamekiran	2024-09-07 13:19	Usernamekiran	2024-09-07 13:19
23	Latex: move punctuation to go inside templates		3	2	Yodo9000	2024-09-07 18:59	Anomie	2024-09-07 03:38
24	Removing spurious nobot notice	Resolved	5	2	DreamRimmer	2024-09-11 04:26	DreamRimmer	2024-09-11 04:26
25	de-AMP bot	Resolved	4	3	Primefac	2024-09-09 16:01	Primefac	2024-09-09 16:01

Legend
In the last hour
In the last day
In the last week
In the last month
More than one month
Manual settings
When exceptions occur, please check the setting first.

Add Navboxs

Add this templates, each one in its articles.

• Template:Municipalities in Alicante
• Template:Municipalities in Castellón
• Template:Municipalities in Valencia
• Template:Municipalities in Girona
• Template:Municipalities in Lleida
• Template:Municipalities in Tarragona
• Template:Municipalities in Ciudad Real
• Template:Municipalities in Cuenca
• Template:Municipalities in Las Palmas
• Template:Municipalities in Santa Cruz de Tenerife
• Template:Municipalities in La Rioja
• Template:Municipalities in Segovia

--Vivaelcelta {talk  · contributions} 07:30, 17 March 2014 (UTC)

Yes, I will get this sorted tomorrow. Rcsprinter₁₂₃ (converse) @ 23:55, 20 March 2014 (UTC)

I am striking through them as each one is completed. Rcsprinter₁₂₃ (talk) 19:03, 9 April 2014 (UTC)

Dispute resolution noticeboard

Over at Wikipedia:Dispute resolution noticeboard we have accrued an ad-hock combination of scripts and templates, assisted by EarwigBot and MiszaBot. In particular, we seem to be asking The Earwig for a lot. He has been very responsive and has been great about our constant stream of requests, but rather than dumping more and more on him I am wondering whether someone who is really good at automation has the time and inclination to do a proper job of re-engineering all of our DRN automation tools from top to bottom. If we manage to get a smooth-running system working, other noticeboards might be interested in using the same system. Is anyone interested in working on this?

(Previous request: Wikipedia:Bot requests/Archive 56#Dispute resolution noticeboard, User talk:Hasteur/Archive 8#DRNBot) --Guy Macon (talk) 17:33, 19 March 2014 (UTC)

I would second this request. Despite The Earwig's laudable efforts and full cooperation, the system for categorizing [the status of a DRN thread: open, in progress, stale etc.] and archiving threads still has glitches.-- — Keithbob • Talk • 16:30, 20 March 2014 (UTC)-- — Keithbob • Talk • 18:00, 23 March 2014 (UTC)

And often the bot 'forgets' to notify people on the user talk page that they have been listed as a party in a DRN case. If the DRN coordinator gives a warning or asks for clarification, or if a participant prematurely comments in the discussion section, the case is listed as OPEN when it clearly is not an open case.-- — Keithbob • Talk • 18:00, 23 March 2014 (UTC)

For whoever might be interested, by "do a proper job of re-engineering all of our DRN automation tools", I am talking about both a form or forms plus a bot, and someone who has the time to work with the DRN volunteers to get the details right. Here are a couple of examples of what I am talking about:

Let's say someone has a dispute about the content of First law of holes. We have a form for filing a case, but it allows the filer to enter "First law of holes" "Wikipedia talk:First law of holes", "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_rule_of_holes" "irst law of ho", etc. Only the first one gives us working pagelinks. The form shouldn't let the user enter something that isn't an article in mainspace. Likewise, right now you can file a case with nobody as a party to the dispute. The form shouldn't allow that.

Right now, if someone has an old notice from a previous DRN case on their talk page, the bot doesn't notify them. The bot also won't let a volunteer make a comment without being listed as the volunteer who takes the case.

In other words, what we need is a new filing form and a new bot, both optimized for this task. I would also very much like it to be adaptable so that we can offer a version to WP:3RRNB or WP:AIAV. If we are smart about this, we can convince other editors to use the tool and thus automate multiple noticeboards and other dispute resolution venues.

I realize that this is quite ambitious compared to your average bot request, but the benefits would be huge. --Guy Macon (talk) 17:03, 20 March 2014 (UTC)

Sigh.[1][2][3][4][5][6][7] --Guy Macon (talk) 07:54, 22 March 2014 (UTC)

Grumble.[8] --Guy Macon (talk) 01:20, 23 March 2014 (UTC)

(Sound of Crickets...) --Guy Macon (talk) 02:32, 24 March 2014 (UTC)

Hi, I'm alive. — Earwig ^talk 04:24, 24 March 2014 (UTC)

Good to hear from you. First, let me once again emphasize that the combination of Earwigbot and the script at Wikipedia:Dispute resolution noticeboard/request have been extremely helpful and that your work is very much appreciated. I have heard the same sentiment from other DRN volunteers. That being said, if you look at the thread above you will see some legitimate areas where we can do better, especially in the script that allows malformed requests to be posted. So, am I correct in my belief that asking you to do a proper job of re-engineering all of our DRN automation tools from top to bottom would be dumping more and more on you? On the one hand, I don't want to offend by asking elsewhere, but on the other hand I don't want to offend by asking too much of you. --Guy Macon (talk) 04:59, 24 March 2014 (UTC)

Redoing DRN from scratch isn't something I'm comfortable with, particularly since it's not a project I'm personally involved in, and writing code for projects I'm not personally involved in is how we got into this mess in the first place. The bit about malformed request titles is pretty far removed from EarwigBot's area of functionality (unless you want the bot to fix bad titles, but that's going to run into other problems), so I'd rather not handle it myself. You have identified two specific areas that I think I can look into, which are the missing notifications and the ability for a volunteer to make edits without "opening" a case. I find the latter to be a bit nitpicky given DRN's informal nature, but who am I to talk? If you'd like, we could stop the bot from changing cases from 'new' to 'open' and require volunteers do it, but I don't know if this would be very helpful. As for the former, I'd rather the bot accidentally not notify someone rather than cause someone to be notified twice, which is why it's fairly conservative. It's always been my understanding that the filer is expected to leave notifications, and the bot only acts as a safeguard in case they forget. In order to improve it, we would need a more foolproof way of determining whether someone has been notified, and I've been unable to come up with a good system for that which also takes into account custom notifications that don't use the substituted template – unless, as noted previously, we're okay with double-notifications (and that prospect makes me very uncomfortable). Any other issues the bot has are either things I'm unaware of, or are a result of mutual misunderstanding regarding how the bot works (like the confusion over the meaning of 'needassist' a couple months ago). — Earwig ^talk 06:57, 24 March 2014 (UTC)

So, is anyone here willing to volunteer to do a proper job of re-engineering all of our DRN automation tools from top to bottom? --Guy Macon (talk) 16:51, 27 March 2014‎ (UTC)

Earwig has given a pretty substantial response about why he doesn't think re-doing DRN from scratch is a good use of (his) time. It would be helpful of why you think a "re-engineering from top to bottom" is necessary so prospective bot ops know the challenges and expectations before taking up the task; right now there's just an open-ended request, of which the scope is still unclear. Legoktm (talk) 18:04, 27 March 2014 (UTC)

Ok, let me try to summarize:

• DRN is a busy place and there are multiple cases in various stages of development at any given time. We have very few active volunteers and we are constantly on the verge of a backlog. DRN is also (in my opinion) a crucial gear in the WP machine (along with other DR forums) as conflict is the inevitable side effect of the WP collaboration model. A complex forum with a high workload and few volunteers means we need to be efficiently supported by automation. While we are very grateful for the automation afforded us thus far, the current automation has several problems and deficiencies and counteracting these deficiencies via manual examination and manipulation is time consuming and unproductive. For this reason, we need an appropriate technical person to review the entire automation set up at DRN and make fixes, revisions and upgrades. Earwig has been most helpful, but outlining isolated concerns via discussion and consensus on the DRN talk page has been slow and ineffective. A band aid approach to this problem is not working. What we need is someone who will work with DRN volunteers such as Guy Macon and myself, in a focused way, to a) review all current automation procedures and forms, b) ID and fix current problems and deficiencies, c) add additional features to further automate the DRN process.
• This is by no means an exhaustive list. But my summary of the current problems would be:
  • Case summary chart-- Automated status changes are sometimes inaccurate and/or misleading.
    • IN PROGRESS triggers prematurely
    • CLOSED Embedded instructions to volunteers regarding manually changing the status to CLOSED should be clarified
    • Each status' markup 'code' should match the actual displayed status ie markup of NEEDASSIST yields a status of NEEDS ATTENTION and OPEN yields IN PROGRES
    • NEEDS ATTENTION and STALE were also triggering prematurely but this may have been remedied as I think Earwig removed "the logic that checks for cases being a certain number of days old...... [to] get rid of the bot's tendency to modify case statuses against volunteers' wishes"
  • Case notifications-- User talk page notices are inconsistent.
  • Filing form -- Needs improvement and expansion. It does not require a URL to prior discussion and allows editors to open a case without crucial information. It needs to be expanded to include a place for administrative comments so the case status is not prematurely changed to OPEN.

-- — Keithbob • Talk • 16:56, 28 March 2014 (UTC)

• A follow up note........ It seems that despite possible recent changes ot the status settings, they are still cumbersome and misleading. There are too many types of status and they are confusing. For example right now (3:50 UTC) the summary chart lists cases as: New, Stale, In Progress, Need Assist. While the individual cases themselves have their status listed as: New Discussion, Dispute Inactive, Discussion In Progress, Needs Attention. Furthermore: the two cases labeled as Needs Assist/Needs Attention are ongoing cases in progress and are mislabeled. Likewise one cases listed as In Progress has yet to be opened by a moderator. -- — Keithbob • Talk • 03:59, 31 March 2014 (UTC)
• Another glitch is that the Filed By: User XYZ section of the case overwrites the closing summary when its closed, making that portion of the summary unreadable. Please help us.-- — Keithbob • Talk • 19:57, 3 April 2014 (UTC)
• There is also this needed change to the form, which has already been discussed and has consensus on the DRN talk page here.-- — Keithbob • Talk • 03:18, 6 April 2014 (UTC)

It is annoying that I still have to do things like this. Before I fixed it, the links in the "Location of dispute" section didn't go where we want them to go. Is anyone here willing to help us? --Guy Macon (talk) 18:11, 3 April 2014 (UTC)

Remove {{Please check ISBN}} from |isbn= in CS1 citations

 Hasteur (talk) 00:36, 10 April 2014 (UTC)

At some point, a helpful bot or human editor inserted the {{Please check ISBN}} template within the |isbn= parameter in citations in a thousand or so (somewhere between hundreds and two thousand) articles. This addition may have been a helpful maintenance tag at one time, but now it interferes with displaying and fixing ISBNs in citations, as documented on the template's documentation page.

Can someone please use a bot or AWB or other means to run through Category:Pages with ISBN errors and remove all instances of {{Please check ISBN}} from the |isbn= parameter in citations? This will make it easier for human editors to clean up the articles in the category. There are about 6,600 articles in the category.

As a side note, it is likely that many of the articles edited by the bot will remain in Category:Pages with ISBN errors, since CS1 citations contain code that checks |isbn= for valid values.

A sample article that shows what this template does to citations is Theleis I Den Theleis. Thanks in advance. – Jonesey95 (talk) 04:53, 28 March 2014 (UTC)

You just need to move the {{Please check ISBN}} to be outside the {{cite book}} but still be inside the <ref>...</ref>, like this. --Redrose64 (talk) 08:40, 28 March 2014 (UTC)

You could do that, but since the CS1 module code checks the ISBN, I don't think the "please check" template is needed at all. The template is still useful in locations where the ISBN is used outside of CS1 citations. – Jonesey95 (talk)

Here's a regex (tested successfully via AutoEd) that you can use, if you are a willing AWB user or bot operator:

(\|\s*isbn\s*=\s*[\d-X]+\s*)\{\{Please check ISBN\|reason\=[a-z\d\s\.\(\)]+\}\}

Do the find in case-insensitive mode, and replace with $1 – Jonesey95 (talk) 04:01, 3 April 2014 (UTC)

Jonesey95 Do you have a discussion link showing support for this? Hasteur (talk) 12:51, 9 April 2014 (UTC)

No, I do not. The "please check" templates are old, dating from a time before the citation ISBNs were automatically checked for validity. As you can see in the link above, they do not even render correctly within the new citation module. – Jonesey95 (talk) 13:00, 9 April 2014 (UTC)

Addendum: Hasteur, there was discussion at Category talk:Articles with invalid ISBNs#Placement of this template? and there is a bold warning at {{Please check ISBN}} that explains why this template should not be in |isbn= in citations. – Jonesey95 (talk) 23:40, 9 April 2014 (UTC)

In point of fact, they didn't render correctly in the pre-Lua cite templates either. Most were placed by Rich Farmbrough (talk · contribs) or one of his bots - Rich had the intention of going through Category:Articles with invalid ISBNs and fixing them all up, and did in fact make some progress (if you look at his user talk page from around May/June 2012 you'll see several discussions); but with one thing and another, he has been unable to complete the cleanup. See also Category talk:Articles with invalid ISBNs#Placement of this template? --Redrose64 (talk) 18:56, 9 April 2014 (UTC)

The problem then was that the cite tempalte had been re-written to "ISBN" to the article ISBN on every single instance, contrary to the wiki-magic that links ISBN 0-14-044-170-0 automatically to the special:booksources page, and contrary to WP:OVERLINK. However the best solution is to fix up the ISBN numbers, there are only a few thousand. Unfortunately I am prevented form being much help, last time we did this we were very successful as a team, and really got stuck in on the last, very hard to source ISBNs. All the best, Rich Farmbrough, 19:30, 9 April 2014 (UTC).

@Jonesey95, Redrose64, and Rich Fambrough: I ask for the Consensus discussion as a CYA of being a bot operator. So that I understand, we are to look for the {{Please check ISBN}} template inside a {{cite book}} block and move it outside the cite book, but still have it be inside the reference section. If this is correct, I'll start tinkering with my AWB rules to work on this. Hasteur (talk) 00:36, 10 April 2014 (UTC)

See this diff for a one off example that I personally double checked. Hasteur (talk) 00:53, 10 April 2014 (UTC)

Can someone fix Cydebot?

Cydebot (talk · contribs) keeps replacing my template {{DVD}} with a licensing template, but it is claiming Wikipedia:Non-free content/templates which has been marked historical since 2012, and has been unused since 2008. There's no reason for this to still be actively replacing templates, since everything will have been fixed years ago. Further, {{DVD}} isn't even listed as a template needing replacement on that page. -- 70.24.250.235 (talk) 04:33, 31 March 2014 (UTC)

I would recommend contacting the owner Palmtree5551 (talk) 20:22, 7 April 2014 (UTC)

I did that, he failed to respond. His archivebot already archived it. -- 70.24.250.235 (talk) 04:53, 9 April 2014 (UTC)

Can you show us where Cydebot is misbehaving via a diff? Hasteur (talk) 12:54, 9 April 2014 (UTC)

This happens everywhere diff where the template was placed. -- 70.24.250.235 (talk) 03:38, 10 April 2014 (UTC)

Another example diff: diff Palmtree5551 (talk) 03:57, 10 April 2014 (UTC)

Update iupac.org GoldBook links

They changed their online Gold Book, breaking all our direct links. Easy regexp/replacement mapping to update them...see for example this manually done edit. Better a bot than 161 articles manually. DMacks (talk) 01:58, 3 April 2014 (UTC)

This can easily be done with AWB, so I'll go ahead and change it in the next few days. Kevin Rutherford (talk) 04:12, 5 April 2014 (UTC)

Almost 250 edits later, everything has been replaced, as there were a lot more on pages that weren't showing up on that link page. Kevin Rutherford (talk) 02:26, 8 April 2014 (UTC)

Awesome--thanks! Any idea/pattern for what made so many omitted from special:linksearch? DMacks (talk) 06:38, 8 April 2014 (UTC)

I have no idea, but this edit makes a good point that not all of the links are dead, so would you be willing to check out why this might be occurring, as I might have to rollback all of my edits. Kevin Rutherford (talk) 14:09, 8 April 2014 (UTC)

IUPAC hosts lots of content, including Gold Book. They didn't "change their domain-name from www to goldbook" (or at least it wouldn't make sense for them to do that and I didn't investigate or expect to see that change). Instead (or at least what I was flagging) was just the move of the /goldbook/ content to that subdomain (my special:linksearch was for "www.iupac.org/goldbook" not the whole "www.iupac.org"). DMacks (talk) 14:21, 8 April 2014 (UTC)

Well, after much panicking, I think I fixed everything, so all should be good now. Kevin Rutherford (talk) 03:06, 9 April 2014 (UTC)

Still broken (or re-broken, or some-adjective/adverb-broken). This still has the /goldbook/ in the pathname. The game is "the content of a directory on the main site became the toplevel content on a different site", so as I said before: They didn't "change their domain-name from www to goldbook". DMacks (talk) 04:40, 9 April 2014 (UTC)

Pages like that were from instances that shows up on the list, and I have reverted it for now as I am about to travel for a few days and want to be safe rather than sorry. Kevin Rutherford (talk) 13:55, 9 April 2014 (UTC)

Adding Glottolog codes to language infoboxes

Hi! I've been asked to write a new task for my bot at User talk:PotatoBot#PotatoBot for Glottolog codes?. Before I start coding, I'd like to ask if there is any bot around that can already do this (i.e. adding parameters to language infoboxes based on a list in wiki format) without [much] additional coding work. Thanks, ἀνυπόδητος (talk) 11:25, 4 April 2014 (UTC)

Broken Links: JCPC and Supreme Court of the United Kingdom

Resolved

The Judicial Committee of the Privy Council and the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom have changed their website (ref) and old links are now broken. Requested changes:

• www.jcpc.gov.uk/* → www.jcpc.uk/*
• www.supremecourt.gov.uk/* → www.supremecourt.uk/*

--Txuspe (talk) 09:00, 5 April 2014 (UTC)

I'll tackle this in the next few days, unless there is an urgent need to change the links right now. Kevin Rutherford (talk) 05:05, 6 April 2014 (UTC)

They've been broken for three months so a few more days will be great. Thank you! --Txuspe (talk) 09:14, 6 April 2014 (UTC)

Done! Kevin Rutherford (talk) 03:52, 8 April 2014 (UTC)

Great! Thanks very much Kevin! --Txuspe (talk) 11:29, 8 April 2014 (UTC)

MTA (New York City) dead links

There are a lot of dead links on MTA (New York City)-related pages because MTA recently moved all its pages to new URLs as of March 6, 2014. The links have been dead since that date.

For example, the URL http://www.mta.info/nyct/facts/ridership/ridership_sub_annual.htm was moved to http://web.mta.info/nyct/facts/ridership/ridership_sub_annual.htm.

The URLs all have to be changed from the format http://www.mta.info/... to http://web.mta.info/...

At least 500 pages make use of the old http://www.mta.info/... URLs. I have already notified three WikiProjects (WP:TRAINS, WP:NYC, WP:NYCPT) about this. --Epicgenius (talk) 19:49, 7 April 2014 (UTC)

To anyone who wants to do this with AWB, there are 1,260 links on the site to the dead external links. Kevin Rutherford (talk) 04:18, 8 April 2014 (UTC)

Just a note, to anyone doing this, that http://new.mta.info/... URLs should not be changed, as these are not dead links. Epicgenius (talk) 17:34, 8 April 2014 (UTC)

@Epicgenius: Do you have links to the consensus discussion? Hasteur (talk) 13:03, 9 April 2014 (UTC)

@Hasteur: Which consensus discussion? I only found that the links were dead. Mjroots pointed me here on WT:TWP. Epicgenius (talk) 13:31, 9 April 2014 (UTC)

This isn't a controversial request. An editor could do the task manually, but it's something far better suited to a bot. I've fixed the link to the WP talk page where this was first brought up. Mjroots (talk) 19:51, 9 April 2014 (UTC)

Clean up with retention of data

Hello over at Wikiproject Video games, we need to clean up our articles and remove a hell of a lot of redundant data.

Since the project started, a number of template fields have been added and removed from the main article template. We now have 15 defunct fields that still appear in the code for some article pages, and we're now in the position where all of this old data is getting in the way and making things confusing for new users (They copy over template code from existing articles only to find that some template fields aren't working after they have populated them with data.)

Initially we were just going to delete the data, but Wikidata say they want it, so that negates any semi-automatic editing as its outside the capability of AWB; and the volume of edits makes any manual effort a non-starter.

In order to aid all users (especially new ones) in editing the infobox code, and at the same time preserve data, we want to move the populated defunct fields from the template on existing article pages, to a new hidden template at the bottom of the article, so that the data in those fields can be harvested later by the squirrels at WikiData. Any field that is blank can just be binned.

As we have over 11,000 articles that need this process carried out on them, a bot really is the only way of doing this.

We have a tracking category that lists every article that needs editing.

The discussions around this job are the following:

Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Video_games/Archive_104#We.27re_editing_42.25_of_all_WP:VG_articles

Template_talk:Infobox_video_game#Tracking_category

I've also put the details in a table to make things easier to read.

Job Description

Item Comment Template Infobox Video game Brief outline: Remove defunct fields from template markup and copy any populated fields to hidden template at bottom of article for later collection by Wikidata Defunct Fields: picture format, aspect ratio, input, license, resolution, ratings, requirements, version, preceded by, followed by, latest release version, latest release date, latest preview version, latest preview date, website Category Category:Infobox video game with deprecated parameters Number of Articles: 11,766 Other info. Most of the formatting is standard, but the requirements field can have a number of different user devised layouts.

Its not going to be easy as some of the fields contain user's own unique - and sometimes differing - formatting styles, but we know you'll find a way to cope with it. Hope you can help. - X201 (talk) 08:12, 8 April 2014 (UTC)

@X201: What's the name of the stealth template we're going to be adding to the bottom of the pages to hold all the deprecated parameters/values? Hasteur (talk) 13:05, 9 April 2014 (UTC)

@Hasteur: Anything the bot creator thinks is appropriate. How about something along the lines of InfoboxVGArchive ? - X201 (talk) 13:10, 9 April 2014 (UTC)

I would strongly suggest {{Video game data}} to align with {{Persondata}} (without being agglutinative). All the best, Rich Farmbrough, 19:23, 9 April 2014 (UTC).

Surely Wikidata is capable of extracting data from the version before the bot run? All the best, Rich Farmbrough, 19:23, 9 April 2014 (UTC).

Repair of 600+ interwiki links broken by removal of a link prefix

From the very origin of the interwiki linking system, the prefix "wiki:" was available for making links to the WikiWikiWeb. However, in the intervening years there became less and less reason to link from here to that website, and people began to increasingly confuse it with the "Wikipedia:" namespace. So, given that the WikiWikiWeb also has the prefixes "c2:" and "WikiWikiWeb:", in January of this year it was switched off. (See the discussion at Meta.) This broke just short of 1100 links across all projects. About 700 of those are on this wiki, and I'd like to request a bot run to fix them. Thankfully, as page names on the WikiWikiWeb follow a predictable format (CamelCase), it was trivial to separate them out from the links that appear to have been intended to actually be "Wikipedia:" links. I've put both lists in this paste. The format is one page ID and link destination per line, tab-separated. Some pages have more than one link that needs to be fixed and thus appear multiple times. I also stripped out a lot of obvious mistaken article links from the latter list, plus any occurring on IP users' talk pages, because there's really not much point updating those. The final total of links that need fixing is 635.

If there's any other information I need to provide please let me know. Thank you. — Scott • talk 17:38, 8 April 2014 (UTC)

Um... If I recall correctly we should not ever be mucking around with talk page archives. In addition I see other pages (such as Arbitration proceedings) that are also in the "Don't ever touch" category. Please check again. Hasteur (talk) 15:07, 9 April 2014 (UTC)

You've got it back to front. Those pages have already been "mucked around with", because a change at the system level has caused linkrot. Links are content and linkrot is content damage. By the way, talk archives are not Holy Writ that can never be touched. — Scott • talk 17:19, 9 April 2014 (UTC)

Yes there are many reasons archives can be changed, and this is certainly a valid one. The general reason for slapping a big "do not change" template on them is to prevent people from trying to continue a discussion, a trap not just for rookies. All the best, Rich Farmbrough, 19:21, 9 April 2014 (UTC).