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)		18	8	LaundryPizza03	2024-07-11 20:57	Legoktm	2024-06-24 01:34
2	Can we have an AIV feed a bot posts on IRC?		8	3	Legoktm	2024-06-21 18:24	Legoktm	2024-06-21 18:24
3	Bot to update match reports to cite template	BRFA filed	14	5	Yoblyblob	2024-06-20 21:21	Mdann52	2024-06-20 21:11
4	Bot to mass tag California State University sports seasons	Doing...	5	4	Frostly	2024-06-10 17:05	Headbomb	2024-06-09 17:28
5	Clear Category:Unlinked Wikidata redirects		9	6	Wikiwerner	2024-07-13 14:04	DreamRimmer	2024-04-21 03:28
6	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
7	Bot to change citations to list defined references	Not a good task for a bot.	3	2	Apoptheosis	2024-06-09 17:44	Headbomb	2024-06-09 16:56
8	Adding Facility IDs to AM/FM/LPFM station data	BRFA filed	11	3	Mdann52	2024-07-06 12:36	Mdann52	2024-07-06 12:36
9	Tagging women's basketball article talk pages with project tags	BRFA filed	15	4	Hmlarson	2024-07-18 17:13	Usernamekiran	2024-07-18 17:10
10	Friendly support for Draft categories – feedback request	Redundant	2	2	Mdann52	2024-07-11 19:47	Mdann52	2024-07-11 19:47
11	Adding links to previous TFDs		7	4	Qwerfjkl	2024-06-20 18:02	Qwerfjkl	2024-06-20 18:02
12	Bot that condenses identical references	Coding...	11	5	Polygnotus	2024-07-17 12:30	Headbomb	2024-06-18 00:34
13	Convert external links within {{Music ratings}} to refs		2	2	Mdann52	2024-06-23 10:11	Mdann52	2024-06-23 10:11
14	Stat.kg ---> Stat.gov.kg		2	2	DreamRimmer	2024-06-23 09:21	DreamRimmer	2024-06-23 09:21
15	Add constituency numbers to Indian assembly constituency boxes		3	2	C1MM	2024-06-25 03:59	Primefac	2024-06-25 00:27
16	Bot to remove template from articles it doesn't belong on?		2	2	Primefac	2024-07-24 20:15	Primefac	2024-07-24 20:15

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Automate submissions for Autopatrol right

Per this discussion at VPP, we'd like a bot to submit candidates to WP:RFP/A for the autopatrol right to help reduce the workload at WP:NPP. See also, this dicussion at VPP and this discussion at WT:DBR.

Svick has much of the work completed with his python script autopatrol_eligibles.py, which creates a list of potential users at Editors eligible for Autopatrol privilege on the 24th of each month. What is needed now is a bot to A) trim down the list using criteria below and B) submit the remaining users to WP:RFP/A.

Trimming list

Only users that would easily qualify should be submitted to WP:RFP/A, so users would be checked against these criteria and removed from the list. This may require several bots due to complexity.

• Remove users that are currently blocked — check Special:Blocklist/{{{username}}}
• Remove users that are retired — check for the strings {{retired}} or {{not here}} at user:{{{username}}} and user talk:{{{username}}}
• Remove users that have been denied in the last 60 days — check subdirectories of Wikipedia:Requests for permissions/Denied for the string "Autopatrolled" and {{{username}}} on the same line
• Remove users with copyright violation warnings in their talk page histories in the last 60 days — check for the string "Notifying user of possible copyvio" from CorenSearchBot at {{fullurl:User_talk:{{{username}}}|limit=500&action=history}}
• Remove users with unsourced BLP warnings in their talk page histories in the last 60 days — check for the string "Automated Message: Unreferenced BLPs" from DASHBot at {{fullurl:User_talk:{{{username}}}|limit=500&action=history}}
• Remove users that have deleted articles in the last 60 days — check Special:DeletedContributions/{{{username}}} — this would require a WP:ADMINBOT this part is optional so I'm striking it. - Hydroxonium (T•C•V) 12:50, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

This bot or bots will run once a month on the 25th after the new month's report is generated.

Submitting candidates

Once the list at Editors eligible for Autopatrol privilege has been trimmed down, a bot would submit the remaning users to Wikipedia:Requests for permissions/Autopatrolled with a note mentioning the number of article created and that it is a bot submission. Something like this {{subst:rfp|{{{username}}}|user has created # artciles. This is a bot submission}}. If the list is long, the bot may need to submitt a few users per day rather than all at once.

Is anybody willing to work on this? - Hydroxonium (T•C•V) 02:26, 29 April 2011 (UTC)

No responses in almost a week. Do you require a Adminbot for this or will a normal one suffice? Noom _talk ^stalk 18:47, 5 May 2011 (UTC)

This should in no case be an adminbot. Human review is still required to give the flag out, the bot is designed only to bring the eligible candidates to admin attention. Courcelles 09:32, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

I've been watching this request, I can write the (admin) bot, but it would have to be in my free time, so could take a while for me to get around to. The idea of having an admin bot is so that it can look at the users deleted contribs, not so it can automatically grant the right. I don't see it as being essential to check the deleted contribs however, and would prefer if someone else did the task (mostly because I don't really have the time to do it myself) - Kingpin¹³ (talk) 09:56, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

┌────────────────────┘
@Noom, a normal bot is fine. The adminbot part is optional, so I struck it.
@Courcelles, I've struck the adminbot part.
@Kingpin, thanks for archiving all those old permission requests. I struck the adminbot part, but if you want to work on it later, don't let me stop you.

I think having individual bots for each task would make this whole thing a lot easier. I'd say the most important part is removing users from the list if they have copyvio notices and/or removing users that have been recently denied. I can do the other stuff manually, including submitting the users to WP:RFP/A. Thanks. - Hydroxonium (T•C•V) 12:50, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

If Kingpin would prefer, I've got some free time and can pick this task up. Noom _talk ^stalk 15:10, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

Absolutely, please don't let me stop you from writing it up. - Kingpin¹³ (talk) 15:20, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

That would be great, Noom. Thank you very much. - Hydroxonium (T•C•V) 18:14, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

Do you want the bot to overwrite the untrimmed list with the new one? Also, if the list exceeds 5 users, how does a rate of 1 user per hour for submission rate? Noom _talk ^stalk 20:41, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

Yes, please, write the new/trimmed list over the existing/untrimmed list. Submitting one user per hour sounds great. Thanks very much for your help with this. - Hydroxonium (T•C•V) 22:00, 6 May 2011 (UTC) struck this requiremet - Hydroxonium (T•C•V) 23:07, 14 May 2011 (UTC)

There seem to be some holes in the criteria listed above. What about false positives from bots (e.g., CorenSearchBot tagging a DAB page), or users who haven't been caught by a bot but have manual blp prod or copyvio warnings or speedy deletion warnings? VernoWhitney (talk) 22:12, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

Since these suggestions are just based on numbers, it's not 100% accurate. Administrators and other users are still free to give/nominate another user for autopatrol, these are just guesses at who may be a good candidate for autopatrolled. I could check for manual warnings on a users talk page along with the bot warning check, if wanted. Noom _talk ^stalk 22:55, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

@Verno, you are correct, there are a lot of holes in the process. We've been manually going through about 3,500 candidates based soley on number of articles created. Since these were not requests by users, it was decided that only super-good-users would be granted the right by the reviewing admins. This was to streamline the process and make it easier on the reviewing admins. So only about 40% of the users reviewed have been getting the right this way. We felt that granting the autopatrol right only to the very best users was the best and safest way to reduce the workload at WP:NPP. We are slowly starting to automate the process using what we've learned by doing it manually. We'll be tweaking the process as time goes on, so any suggestions are greatly appreciated.

@Noom, thanks very much for your help with this. Any type of automation will be a great help, so the bot doesn't have to do everything right away. Any task(s) the bot does will be very helpful. Thanks. - Hydroxonium (T•C•V) 07:18, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

BRFA filed - Thanks very much, Noom. I appreciate the help. - Hydroxonium (T•C•V) 15:14, 8 May 2011 (UTC)

I've struck the request to overwrite the existing file per MZMcBride's comment. Added this to the coversation so it gets archived with the discussion. - Hydroxonium (T•C•V) 23:07, 14 May 2011 (UTC)

Strong oppose: There are several points that give me pause. As part of my on-going concern with the situation at New Page Patrol I have an occasional stab at according autopatrolled rights. This bot is going to create flood of extra work for admins who will still need to do manual checks. Already, for example, one editor, makes large numbers of requests (in GF) for users, but without apparently making sufficient research, and a significant number have to be declined. This is not good for the morale of the editors who quite wrongly regard 'autopatrolled' as a promotion or an award for good service to Wikipedia.

Although the selection criteria for this botinclude all the checks that I personally make, I do not see any safeguards against users who mass create short stubs. Admins who check the applications daily for 'autopatrolled' will assume that the bot has done good work, and because of the sheer volume that will be produced by the bot, they may not carry out the manual checks that they should be doing. I am not entirely convinced that 'autopatrolled' actually makes much impact towards reducing the load on NPP. How many of the hundreds of daily new pages are created by accounts with autopatrolled rights, and how many of the ones that are patrolled are created by authors who are reasonable candidates for autoptrolled rights?

Rather than mass according autopatrolled rights, 'New Page Patroller' should be made a right, and accorded to editors who are sufficiently educated into getting it right.

However, if there is anything in these bot proposals that I have missed, I am quite open to criticisms of my concerns. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 00:42, 15 May 2011 (UTC)

Change all instances of "an historic" to "a historic"

It appears that Wikipedia has thousands upon thousands of articles that have the grammatically-incorrect phrase "an historic" instead of "a historic". It would take forever to change them all by hand and we need a bot for this task. "An historic" is simply incorrect because the "h" in "historic" is not silent, or if it is, it's only in minority dialects. Even A_and_an#Discrimination_between_a_and_an claims this is incorrect. Please make a bot to fix this! It should only be fixed in unquoted, non-title text, and only in article-space. Note that "an Historic" should still usually be changed because the indefinite article "an" is not part of a title. --Wykypydya (talk) 01:20, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

The article you linked to shows that both are acceptable: "Merriam-Webster's Dictionary of English Usage allows 'both a and an are used in writing a historic an historic'." – anna 01:41, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

The Oxford English Dictionary says that it should be "a historic" - with a very good explanation as to why. Also, if this is relatively simple as a find/replace task, my bot should be able to help out (I'm not sure if it can ignore titles - but should be able to). Perhaps we need a way of finding all pages with instances of "an historic"? My guess would be database report or something similar querying the DB? The Helpful One 01:45, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

This should be done, but by all means should not be done by a bot, for the same reasons typo-fixing bots are usually declined. This doesn't account for usage of "an historic" in quotations (and perhaps also debates about "a historic" vs. "an historic")! This should be done in AutoWikiBrowser rather than by a bot. — Preceding signed comment added by Cymru.lass (talk • contribs) 01:52, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

People have made arguments that "an" before a non-silent "h" or a weak "h" should be acceptable but it shouldn't be -- it looks and sounds ridiculous. I did a Google search and there are articles with these instances as far as the eye can see. Can a bot change only first-hand article text (that is not a quote or a title)? --Wykypydya (talk) 01:58, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

"An historic" is an ENGVAR issue; many educated speakers use it. For them, "historic" is simply an exception to the rule to use 'a' before an aspirated 'h' (assuming they have an aspirated 'h' in the word). The usage of 'an historic' is still around 25% for the 'an' version (on google); it's not at all rare. We don't need to have bots going around second-guessing ENGVAR issues. — Carl (CBM · talk) 02:02, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

Also, this particular disagreement dates back to at least 1884 [1]. No chance we are going to settle it here. — Carl (CBM · talk) 02:04, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

• In reply to Wykypydya, bots can't detect whether or not text is quoted. But you can still fix this manually using AutoWikiBrowser, which will let you search for all instances of "an historic" in Wikipedia article space and fix them if they turn out not to be from quoted text.— Preceding signed comment added by Cymru.lass (talk • contribs) 02:09, 1 May 2011 (UTC)
  • Using AWB to go around changing lots of articles from one English variant to another would certainly violate WP:ENGVAR. — Carl (CBM · talk) 02:14, 1 May 2011 (UTC)
    • Okay, I see your point there. In my variation of English, the use of "an historic" is considered a grammatically incorrect. But since it is considered grammatically correct in other variations of English, it shouldn't be changed if it's grammatically correct in the variation of English the article's written in — Preceding signed comment added by Cymru.lass (talk • contribs) 07:06, 1 May 2011 (UTC)
      • Even in American English, the use of "an historic" is well established, although not the majority usage. The ratios on the corpus of contemporary American English [2] are close to the ratios we see on google. There's nothing grammatically incorrect about it in that dialect as a whole, unless you simply choose "correct" at whim. This is just another example where there is a natural variation in a language among educated speakers. — Carl (CBM · talk) 11:43, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

I do not think that this is not a job for a bot (or AWB). That there are "thousands upon thousands of articles" suggests that "An historic" is used by many editors, and so is a matter for consensus on the talk pages of the article involved. -- PBS (talk) 02:12, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

Australian English uses an historic, so the bot will need to leave alone all articles written so, or it will create a real nuisance Crusoe8181 (talk) 04:27, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

Citation needed. I'm a native speaker of Australian English and I don't believe that "an historic" is ever correct. - Richard Cavell (talk) 04:31, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

I fully support this task and this bot proposal. My only caveat is that it should have a blacklist of articles that will not be edited, specifically those that might deliberately use the incorrect form (articles about grammar, A and an, etc.) - Richard Cavell (talk) 04:31, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

• But how would the bot account for quotations and WP:ENGVAR? — Preceding signed comment added by Cymru.lass (talk • contribs) 07:06, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

• Spelling bots are not allowed due to false positives. —  HELLKNOWZ  ▎TALK 08:46, 1 May 2011 (UTC)
• Echo the above: definitely not a grammatical error. Even the BBC uses it. It's an WP:ENGVAR issue, and not one to be changed willy-nilly, let alone be addressed by a bot or AWB. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 09:03, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

• It has become clear from the remarks above having authoritative citations (as opposed to personal preference or opinion) that this is an WP:ENGVAR issue and seems inappropriate as the subject of a bot or a crusade. Don't we all have better things to do? hulmem (talk) 02:25, 2 May 2011 (UTC)

At the request of Richard Cavell (see above 04:31, 1 May), I've done some Googling. Like elsewhere usage in Australia is split. A Google search of Australian Government websites returns "About 196,000 results for "an historic" and About 235,000 results for "a historic". "an historic" usage [sic] in about 45% of pages. Here are two Australian examples from the web (on the first page of a Google search of the au domain) where the phrase "An historic" is used in the title:

• An Historic Opportunity, by NSWALC, March 29, 2011
• Lt Cdr Henry Stoker -- an Historic Journey by Dr Ian Chambers.
• In comparison A Google search of the UK government websites returns About 125,000 results for "An historic" and About 358,000 results for "a historic" ("an historic" is used in about 26% of pages).
• US government websites returns About 370,000 results for "an historic" and About 1,190,000 results "a historic" ("an historic" is used in about 24% of pages)

If anything "a historic" is over represented as a ratio on Wikiepdia About 7,960 results for "an historic" and About 34,800 results for "a historic" (an internal search of articles returns 5,070 for "An historic" and 22,424 for "A historic") so "an historic" is used in about 18% of article pages.-- PBS (talk) 09:04, 3 May 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for all the opinions everyone! Thanks to Cymru.lass for mentioning AutoWikiBrowser; I have gone to that page and added a request to be able to use it for this purpose. (See Wikipedia_talk:AutoWikiBrowser/CheckPage.) --Wykypydya (talk) 20:05, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

You cannot use AWB to go around violating WP:ENGVAR. That would be a violation of the AWB rules of use. — Carl (CBM · talk) 20:20, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

Wykypydya, you just demonstrated that 'an historic' is not grammatically incorrect, that it is used in Australia, the USA, as well as the UK. So on what grounds are you trying to eliminate the construction by automated means? --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 05:59, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

Concur with Ohconfucius. Surely there are more pressing issues than finding solutions to problems that don't exist. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 04:58, 15 May 2011 (UTC)

Category:Infobox person using deprecated parameters

In the frame of infobox person standardisation, WOSlinker added tracking categories to several infoboxes. Yobot started running to update/fix infobox parameters. This procedure enabled us to simplify the source code for several infoboxes and successfully merge some of them. Standardisation has the big benefit that everyone can add basic parameters to an infobox without having to consult the manual. This standardisation procedure has been discussed in Template_talk:Infobox_person/birth_death_params. Unfortunately, Yobot has been blocked since the task was considered by unapproved because Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Yobot 15 mentions only requests in this page. Would be OK to resume the task since I posted it here? -- Magioladitis (talk) 12:12, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

I support this task. Having consistent field names is a definite benefit to WP. Once you are done with this one, you should look into the whole coordinates (latd, lat_d, lat_deg, lat_degrees, ...) soup. However, it looks like you will be busy for some time. Thanks! Plastikspork _―Œ^(talk) 00:12, 5 May 2011 (UTC)

Seem fine to me - assuming that (as per my View in the discussion) no edits are made to replace deprecated parameters alone (without some substantive edit combined). Rd232 ^talk 02:46, 5 May 2011 (UTC)

My understanding is that Magioladitis indeed seeks the go-head to for a bot run comprising standalone edits serving this purpose alone. He's already been told that it's okay to combine them with visible changes, but he regards this as insufficient.

To be clear, I take no position on the matter other than stressing that this would constitute a special exception to the normal rules and therefore requires explicit consensus within the community. —David Levy 03:20, 5 May 2011 (UTC)

Oh, well, I would oppose that, and I don't see any basis from the infobox discussion for community support for it. What's the rush? As I said there, standardise the parameters in the templates and documentation, leaving old parameters functioning but deprecated, and then use AWB and bots (combining with other edits) to slowly standardise parameter use. Rd232 ^talk 03:34, 5 May 2011 (UTC)

I tried this approach with other stuff and the result is that the job was tripled for various reasons. For example editors not checking the manual but copying infoboxes from other pages (This is result of parameters not being easy to remember). One more thing is that I would like to avoid adding code in AWB that will be removed in some months or even worse remain there for years and then nobody will remember why is there. Hardcoding this stuff should be avoided. Another solution will be to add the extra code only to the bot but I am afraid we will end up to something like SmackBot's code which it does a lot of stuff (probably everything) but it turned to be very difficult to maintain or modify. If we just do it straightforward we will finish in a few days. I have general fixes turned on anyway so most probably other stuff will be done on the same time. So far, there were only problems with double runs because I haven't loaded the whole list of deprecated parameters or because some infoboxes had wrong parameters (for example infobox supports "birth_date" and "birthdate" and someone added "born") which maybe an editor's mistake or the result of a renaming between infoboxes with not compatible parameters. -- Magioladitis (talk) 07:16, 5 May 2011 (UTC)

Hm, OK. Can you estimate how many edits will be required, and how many of those might be "just the infobox" edits? There's also the issue that if we go down this road, we surely need to fully complete infobox standardisation first, to ensure that all parameters that might need changing get changed in one "big bang". OK, we don't need to standardise all infoboxes, but at least those for each type (eg people, places, other broad categories within which the standardisation is going to be done). Rd232 ^talk 20:30, 5 May 2011 (UTC)

Also, a possible compromise would be to limit bot activity (in terms of infobox-only edits) to new articles, where an infobox might be copied wrongly, and the article won't be on many watchlists yet and anyway will be undergoing editing. Rd232 ^talk 20:36, 5 May 2011 (UTC)

OK. I think I can perform a dry run (i.e. without saving) and get this information. I wasn't planning to do all infoboxes! Only the those for persons and there aren't that many. I also didn't want to touch those for footballers since we still don't have a stable consensus. -- Magioladitis (talk) 20:50, 5 May 2011 (UTC)

So far the discussion seemed to be about birth/death dates.Surely there's other things that need standardising too (even leaving aside footballers, if they're tricky for some reason). Rd232 ^talk 20:56, 5 May 2011 (UTC)

I did a partial dry run on Category:Infobox person using deprecated parameters. Out of the 1,600 first pages, 1,200 need some kind of general fix (I had skip if only whitespace, only casing changed turned on). This is a good proportion. -- Magioladitis (talk) 09:43, 8 May 2011 (UTC)

OK. That's still about 9k edits (for 35k pages in that category) for just the infobox update. I guess I can live with that. I'd prefer knowing that future standardisation won't require more such edits, but I'm guesstimating that the number of edits which could be saved by waiting for a "big bang" approach wouldn't be all that high. So, might as well get it done. Rd232 ^talk 13:14, 8 May 2011 (UTC)

We are already changed the code in lot of the infoboxes to transclude Infobox person, this means we won't to make changes on them anymore. WOSlinker and me already worked on updating most of the infoboxes semi-automatically anyway. -- Magioladitis (talk) 13:44, 8 May 2011 (UTC)

OK, good (and thanks to both of you for all your work on this). I'm not entirely sure though that such transclusion ensures the parameters are already standardised as far as possible - does it? Rd232 ^talk 14:47, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

• Support. This is very helpful and needful. Thank you. Barong 10:51, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

On footballer infoboxes

User:Petan-Bot started some days ago to clean-up footballer infoboxes. This clean=up doesn't include the parameters we are discussing here. We could ask the owner to expand their work. The only problem I sense is that some people working on footballers had some disagrement on the "playername" to "name" change. We should first ask which parameters could be fixed in this case. Merging "cityofbirth" and "countryofbirth" to "birth_place" (same for "death_place") seems a good task for the particular infoboxes. -- Magioladitis (talk) 06:39, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

At Template talk:Infobox person/birth death params, it was only two people discussing this. They also weren't keen on merging city/countryofbirth into one field. We really need more input from others on these issues. -- WOSlinker (talk) 07:11, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

It's no problem for me to extend task of bot to do also this if people wouldn't complain that this task isn't welcome, but bot would probably have to walk through all the completed ones since it almost finished the task. Petrb (talk) 14:52, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

Can you please leave a message to template's talk page warning for the changes? -- Magioladitis (talk) 17:49, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

Template:Talk header

This request is a more limited follow-up to this one several months ago. The usage instructions for Template:Talk header indicate:

In accordance with Wikipedia:Talk page layout, this template should not be added to otherwise empty talk pages.

In spite of this, there are about 3,000 pages (according to Catscan) which contain no content other than {{Talk header}} or one of its redirects. So, could a bot delete all talk-namespace pages (except user talk pages) which contain no content other than {{Talk header}} and have only one revision in the page history (the second criterion ensures that potentially useful page history is not deleted)? Thank you, -- Black Falcon ^(talk) 23:55, 5 May 2011 (UTC)

What about using the list of such pages to simultaneously tag the articles for wikiprojects whilst removing talkheader? If the page is empty but for talkheader, it clearly lacks project tags. (That would be an AWB task, not bot.) Rd232 ^talk 02:00, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

That would, without a doubt, be a better approach, but is there an automated or semi-automated way of determining which WikiProject tag(s) to add to a particular page (I have been doing this type of replacement manually in those cases where the WikiProject is readily identifiable, but it is not always immediately clear)? -- Black Falcon ^(talk) 03:15, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

I would think experienced editors like us would usually be able to figure out one or more relevant projects manually, with the entire project list (link not to hand but not hard to find) kept handy for reference. And if not, in some cases, well then just strip talkheader and don't worry about it. A lot slower process though than just stripping talkheader... PS in terms of automation, Category:Living people -> WPBIO springs to mind; beyond that, you'd have to start constructing a complex tree of category-> wikiproject (and that gets tricky with unexpected subcategories that don't really belong, as I found out once via Xenobot tagging I had to partially undo). That's possibly a worthwhile thing itself, to improve wikiproject tagging, but an undertaking so massive it may not be feasible. Rd232 ^talk 04:08, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

If anyone's feeling particularly delete happy, I've got a list of empty talk pages only edited by a human once (remember they're empty). — Dispenser 05:15, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

I feel! -- Magioladitis (talk) 07:06, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

No, I'm not happy. That generate blue links that should be red ones. I often look on talkpages and am disappointed because there is/was no discussion - only projects and sometimes only a talkheader... mabdul 20:45, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

project-banner-only talk pages are now so common that your disappointment must be limited, surely. I do recall being annoyed by this sometimes when it was less common, but that ship has sailed... Rd232 ^talk 01:50, 8 May 2011 (UTC)

Comment: I tell you what, doing some examples from the list, it strikes me that you could vastly reduce the count by deleting talk pages (with just talk-header on) of redirects. (I don't think there's any particular reason to keep such pages in terms of maintaining page history or something - is there?) The rest would then be a much more manageable proposition to tackle manually. Rd232 ^talk 02:00, 8 May 2011 (UTC)

I think this is potentially contentious (sorry) - plus, I can't see a point to it. Just because a guideline says do't add it to blank pages, does not mean that, if it has been added, it should be taken away.

Redirects can have useful talks.

And even talks with only the one revision and no history could be there for a reason.

Example - I know I've made some, occasionally, for a new user who is struggling to get the idea of talk pages - if their newly-minted-new-article talk is non-existent, it's that little bit more complicated for them to figure out - so, I might create a talk with just the header, after instructing the new user, and hope they'd post to it - maybe in a week, maybe in a month, who knows.

Similar, if I'm trying to defuse an edit was - I just want to say "Please discuss it [[Talk:Whatever|on the talk page]] - and I don't want to mess around and complicate things with a red link.

So unless there are some good reasons to delete them (which I've not heard), I recommend just leaving 'em alone.  Chzz  ►  15:03, 14 May 2011 (UTC)

Template:Infobox election

To implement a new parameter for Template:Infobox election, I would like a bot to search pages using the infobox for the text "# seats _ needed for a majority". Then remove the line break, and the sentence, and add the parameter majority_seats with the number, (example). Thanks, 117Avenue (talk) 05:17, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

If I were to type "The number of seats which were necessary for the majority was 132581", would the bot have to catch that? --43?9enter ^★_☭ 06:21, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

I believe that all the cases were added by the same guy, so they should all be in the same format. 117Avenue (talk) 12:51, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

I think I can use replace.py to find every page that transcludes Template:Infobox election, search for
\d seats needed for a majority, and replace that with |majority_seats = \d

Someone who is professional at bots, does that work? --43?9enter ^★_☭ 01:31, 8 May 2011 (UTC)

Requesting help from someone who's good with bots Actually if I used replace.py to find "seats were needed for a majority", removed that, and pinned "|majority_seats =" 4 spaces before that, would that work? --43?9enter ^★_☭ 02:15, 8 May 2011 (UTC)

Help! --Σ _☭^★ 00:16, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

Assuming replace.py is just a search/replace script, and all cases of majority seats are written the same, then it should work. Noom _talk ^stalk 02:08, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

Or I could replace the <br> with a |majority_seats = and simultaneously replace "seats were needed for a majority" with "". Would that work too? --Σ _☭^★ 01:20, 17 May 2011 (UTC)

I'm just going to do this manually with find+replace... --Σ _☭^★ 06:41, 18 May 2011 (UTC)

Template:Music

Perhaps (where appropriate), a bot could get music symbols to use {{music}} all the time? This would really help with the great list of articles with "Eb" and other stuff. (The list is longer than you might think...!) Lanthanum-138 (talk) 11:39, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

Can you give a list of the pages? I don't quite understand the task required - you want a bot to find/replace uses of some symbols with the music template instead? The Helpful One 21:51, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

I'm not sure about what pages they are, but generally here's the accidentals should be corrected in such articles:

• G# --> G♯
• Eb --> E♭
• n2, nat2 --> ♮2
• Fx --> F
• Bbb --> B
• Ad --> A
• Ft --> F
• Edb --> E
• C#t --> C

The characters that are not replaced by the template will differ according to the situation, naturally! I propose this because "Eb", "G#" are incorrect and are only used when the correct characters "E♭", "G♯" are missing, which is not the case here. Nevertheless #, b, n, x, bb misrepresentations are more common than d, t, db, #t. Lanthanum-138 (talk) 09:39, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

Do note that A#, C#, and F# are also programming languages, where changing '#' to '♯' would not follow normal usage. Db, Cd, Gd, and At are also chemical elements (and "At" is a very common English word, too). This replacement would probably have to be manually assisted so a human could ensure that the changes make sense in context. Anomie⚔ 10:40, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

Ah, missed those. Unfortunately there seem to be a lot of these annoying things...perhaps get a bot to automatically convert those that cannot mean anything else (e.g. Fdb, G#t), and make a list of those that might mean something else for humans to look through?? Lanthanum-138 (talk) 13:28, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

Or perhaps only convert #, b, n, x, bb, because those are the most common errors (the others really practically never arise). That would probably dramatically cut down false positives (and maybe give a list of articles which the bot shouldn't correct). Lanthanum-138 (talk) 13:31, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

Why not creating a list by searching these terms and looking if they are in any music cat (and otherwise ignore them)? mabdul 13:56, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

Great idea! First search the terms, check for music cats, then change if appropriate! (An override may be needed for "At".) Lanthanum-138 (talk) 07:33, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

Feedback navigation links

Regarding Wikipedia:Requests for feedback/navigation, which is transcluded on WP:FEED,

Could someone possibly make a bot which automatically adds links each month, as I did manually here?

If you need more info, give me a shout. Cheers!  Chzz  ►  14:10, 13 February 2011 (UTC)

Reposted, because this was archived with no response.  Chzz  ►  19:54, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

Would this be done monthly or daily? LegoK^ontribsT^alkM 02:18, 1 March 2011 (UTC)

I think monthly would be fine; the redlinks do no harm. Maybe add the next month just a couple of days before end-of-month.  Chzz  ►  03:42, 1 March 2011 (UTC)

Femto Bot has a task like this. I could expand it a little. Rich Farmbrough, 20:52, 2 March 2011 (UTC).

Er, yes, please. Or whoever. I'm sorry; not sure if you need input from me at this stage, but...of course - my intention in posting here was asking if anyone could do it - because, I try to remember but sometimes forget. So, yes of course; if someone can arrange this - please do. Chzz  ►  06:45, 10 March 2011 (UTC)

BUMP Chzz  ►  06:22, 14 March 2011 (UTC) Rescued from the archive again  Chzz  ►  06:37, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

My bot can do it Petrb (talk) 07:50, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

Has any progress been made on this? ^Avic_ennasis @ 05:02, 2 Nisan 5771 / 6 April 2011 (UTC)

Next month; bot wouldn't reinsert april again Petrb (talk) 06:10, 7 April 2011 (UTC)

OK. I've restored this from the archive (again), so we can see if it happens. Petrb, will it happen a few days before end-of-month, or bang on midnight, or what? Cheers,  Chzz  ►  22:51, 25 April 2011 (UTC)

When it's best? day before? Petrb (talk) 17:16, 27 April 2011 (UTC)

Erp, sorry, didn't see this for a couple of days. Yes - today would be ideal, I think. And in general...well, a few days (3?) before the end of the month would do no harm, and possibly give a chance to spot/fix a problem. Thanks again,  Chzz  ►  12:06, 30 April 2011 (UTC)

Great, it happened [3].

One small problem though - May has 31 days, not 30.  Chzz  ►  02:56, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

Restored from archive for the third time [4], because it still needs sorting out, as noted above. Future timestamping to end of month, to prevent archiving until it's seen to be working.  Chzz  ►  06:10, 9 May 2011 (UTC) fake timestamp; this message left on 9 May (de-faked timestamp)

Trial has passed so now I am waiting for BAG, I hope that issue was fixed although it's not easy to prove it. Petrb (talk) 17:10, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

I've marked it approved, there's a couple of issues, but a month should provide enough time to make sure everything is fine, and as I mentioned on the request page they won't cause any major harm (see here and here for details). - Kingpin¹³ (talk) 17:34, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

ibid

I'm removing ibid and other deprecated methods of citing sources atm. Is there a possibility (a bot or maybe a database scan?) to get the links/data when these ibids have been added? It takes rather a long period to find and replace these ibids. The most tiome consuming factor is to find in which edit these ibids were added. Replacing them correctly is not a big task, but there should any possibility to find them. Can create a bot or whatever such a database scan and give me the revisions in a list? mabdul 11:57, 10 May 2011 (UTC)

I can make a database scan and then tag these pages with {{Ibid}} using my bot. Probably in some hours. -- Magioladitis (talk) 12:02, 10 May 2011 (UTC)

There are already nearly 2400 pages tagged. That is not the problem. I need the dates WHEN they were added. Isn't there any possibility to scan the database of the history of the tagged articles? mabdul 12:16, 10 May 2011 (UTC)

I presume you're aware of the WikiBlame tool? Not sure how feasible it is to automate that approach. Rd232 ^talk 13:45, 10 May 2011 (UTC)

Oh, no. I'm not aware of the existing of such a cool tool... I have to "bookmark this on my user page. Is it possible to automate now? mabdul 15:50, 10 May 2011 (UTC)

Un-cache arXiv links

Simple (I think) request: change links like

http://arxiv.org/PS_cache/arxiv/pdf/1002/1002.0442v1.pdf

to

http://arxiv.org/abs/1002.0442/

where the replacements are something like

s|(?:www\.)arxiv.org/PS[-_]cache/arxiv/pdf/\d{4}/(\d{4}\.\d{4})(?:v\d+)?\.pdf|arxiv.org/abs/$1/|gi

s|(?:www\.)arxiv.org/([-a-z]+)/pdf/\d{4}/(\d{7})\.pdf|arxiv.org/abs/$1/$2/|gi

This way people can read the archive rather than download a file, and if they want to download the whole paper they can choose the format they prefer rather than that preferred by the person leaving the link.

It seems that there are somewhat over 2000 of these links, so I think a robot would be (1) faster and (2) less error-prone than a human.

CRGreathouse (t | c) 00:10, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

BTW, there's already a few bots/people (like Rjwilmsi, Citation bot, and myself) and doing conversion from bare links such as http://arxiv.org/PS_cache/arxiv/pdf/1002/1002.0442v1.pdf to something like arXiv:1002.0442 or Pierre Dusari (2010). "Estimates of Some Functions Over Primes without R.H.". arXiv:1002.0442 [math.NT].. However there's no bot which focuses solely on arXiv links, and some of these bots are on hold, so it might be time for a dedicated bot for the arXiv links. I'll do some number-crunching once the newest database dump is available. Headbomb {talk / contribs / physics / books} 00:24, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

Thanks. This is why I go to the experts rather than try to hack something together myself -- I never know what's already in progress and what's already been discussed. Yes, {{arXiv}} would be preferable but I think converting bare links to bare links would still be better than the current situation. Good luck with citations; formats differ significantly enough that I'd be impressed if you managed more than 80% proper conversion. (I'd love to be impressed. :p)

CRGreathouse (t | c) 02:57, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

Within citation templates there are about 500 journal cites with an arxiv URL, which would be better converted to |arxiv=. However, only about 25 of those seem to be the cached links you describe. I've not got data on bare links. Rjwilmsi 17:18, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

Yes, I figure that someone willing and able to use citation templates is probably able to use the correct arXiv URI. But there are many cached barelinks throughout Wikipedia -- I found the one I used as an example in an article I watch and I thought I should try to fix the underlying issue rather than just one link in one article. CRGreathouse (t | c) 23:35, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

Absolutely, I agree. I was just providing info on the data I have. I've quite often seen a citation template followed by the arxiv link for it as a bare link, so there are probably three scenarios to handle. I'll do the ones in citation templates in the next few days. Rjwilmsi 06:48, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

Moving out links to external links away from Infobox adult biography

In the past we formed a consensus to move links to IMDB away from infobox for Infobox TV series, Infobox episode, Infobox film, etc. There is still one infobox that has external links to its code. This is Template:Infobox adult biography.

I posted a message in March in Template_talk:Infobox_adult_biography#Links_to_external_links and there are no disagreements for moving on and moving |iafd=, |egafd=, |bgafd=, |imdb=, |afdb= away from the infobox to the external links section.

A bot has done that in the past for the other infoboxes. Can someone please do it? -- Magioladitis (talk) 08:11, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

I'll have a look. Anomie⚔ 10:40, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

After you move them to the external links section, remove them from the infobox too please. -- Magioladitis (talk) 10:44, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

Of course. Did you intentionally omit |eurobabeindex= and |homepage=? Also, I see {{iafd name}} and {{afdb name}} and {{IMDb name}}; are there templates for any of these other sites? Anomie⚔ 23:51, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

I just forgot them. |eurobabeindex= and |homepage= must be moved too. I don't think the others have any template but if we have many of them we could create one. -- Magioladitis (talk) 19:13, 14 May 2011 (UTC)

|homepage= should probably stay alothogh may want to rename to |website= to match other infoboxes. -- WOSlinker (talk) 20:28, 14 May 2011 (UTC)

Agree. You are right. Most of the infoboxes have an entry for official websites. -- Magioladitis (talk) 20:37, 14 May 2011 (UTC)

OTOH, when this same task was done for Template:Infobox Film and Template:Infobox Television film the |website= was removed. But Template:Infobox television did keep it. I don't care much either way. Anomie⚔ 22:13, 14 May 2011 (UTC)

Let's go ahead and keep it for now, since {{Infobox person}} has it, and conversion to that infobox is probably the eventual fate of this infobox (per the discussion on the talk page). Thanks! Plastikspork _―Œ^(talk) 22:27, 14 May 2011 (UTC)

We can also remove |gender=. All other infoboxes don't use it as obvious or not important to be in the infobox. -- Magioladitis (talk) 01:43, 15 May 2011 (UTC)

You'll have to hold a consensus discussion for that, before I could have the bot do it. I note that at the moment the parameter is just used for linking and for the infobox title color, it isn't displayed anywhere. Anomie⚔ 14:24, 15 May 2011 (UTC)

OK. Let's do the rest. I left a message to the template talk's page. -- Magioladitis (talk) 14:48, 15 May 2011 (UTC)

Per discussion in the template's talk page we have consensus to remove "measurements" and "measureispenis". -- Magioladitis (talk) 15:55, 16 May 2011 (UTC)

The bot was already done by the time you posted this. See User:AnomieBOT/TemplateReplacer16 log/2 for a list of articles that might need human attention. Anomie⚔ 00:50, 18 May 2011 (UTC)

file names

I have another new request and / or a question: Is there any automatic possibility to tag images for file move if they have only numbers in (this would cause some falsepositives) maybe with an prefix? mabdul 21:40, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

Correcting links to redirected article

The article about the company/products Louis Vuitton has been moved to Louis Vuitton (brand). The vast majority of mainspace articles linking to the original namespace (except Louis Vuitton itself) now need to be changed to the new namespace (piped), because mentions refer to the company/product and not the man. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 14:35, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

Hi, I was looking to do this fully automated but then a user mentioned to me that people might have linked to the article for the man, not the brand - do you know which pages link to the man (or if they link to a different article name) so that it can be done automated? Otherwise I can AWB the 790 pages in all namespaces or 512 in article namespaces semi-automatically to fix it. The Helpful One 21:37, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

So far, I have just scanned the pages linked to the original namespace. For those that refer to the man, I have already put a colon inside the square brackets of these, so tasks set to unlink the traditionally formed direct link ought not to be affected. However, your comment has led me to a second thought: if Louis Vuitton the brand is the more common usage, perhaps it should stay in the original namespace, or the original could become a dab page, and the biography should be moved to Louis Vuitton (1821–1892) instead? --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 01:19, 15 May 2011 (UTC)

I think this is a pretty clearcut case of the WP:COMMONNAME being the brand and not the biography, so the brand should be at Louis Vuitton and the biography at Louis Vuitton (designer) or Louis Vuitton (entrepreneur). It's better to have a word disambiguation which people might be able to guess, than a jumble of dates that they need a biography of LV to know.... In fact there's a good case for the two articles just being merged, it's a common approach for articles on eponymous fashion brands and there's lots of duplication between the two.Le Deluge (talk) 11:34, 17 May 2011 (UTC)

Someone clearly thought the biography did not belong... My article creation was a response to a person who deleted the biography from the brand article. Maybe I should have reverted instead of creating a new article. What to do now? --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 14:18, 17 May 2011 (UTC)

Deferred Given that it's a major and debatable change to one of our most-read articles, I would have reverted the edit and set up a discussion on the talk page about splitting and potential names for the daughter articles. Particularly since the edit you refer to is that editor's one and only edit. However, we are where we are. I'd suggest this is no longer a matter for a bot request, it needs to be taken to Talk:Louis Vuitton and sorted out there. I've already started a discussion there and invited comment from WP:FASHION, I'm no expert on the subject but my gut feel is that the biography should be reunited with the brand. Le Deluge (talk) 16:18, 17 May 2011 (UTC)

Jamesbreadth

May we please have a bot that detects the insertion of the phrase "Jamesbreadth" into an article, and then reports the editor who inserted the phrase to WP:AIV. Various socks of banned Swamilive (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) are in the habit of inserting this phrase into articles. Mjroots (talk) 15:27, 14 May 2011 (UTC)

Just to follow up on this...it would be a waste of time to ban the phrase Jamesbreadth. I'll simply create another hybrid word and start using it. And repeat. The Garrison Stans (talk) 15:44, 14 May 2011 (UTC)

In any case, you're looking for the WP:Edit filter combined with User:Mr.Z-bot#Task_6 - Kingpin¹³ (talk) 16:17, 14 May 2011 (UTC)

Interwiki warnfile

Please update an interwiki warnfile for is.wiki, or build a new one if it does not exist.Snaevar (talk) 00:43, 15 May 2011 (UTC)

Walibi Holland

Walibi World changed their name to Walibi Holland and I see that there are many pages which show the old name. If someone with AWB access could change this, it'll be great (I can do this too, but I do not have AWB access). Thanks in advance, TBloemink (talk) 11:46, 15 May 2011 (UTC)

Pending the processing of the backlog at Wikipedia talk:AutoWikiBrowser/CheckPage, I expect to receive AWB access, and should be able to perform the name changes at that time. Chester Markel (talk) 05:31, 18 May 2011 (UTC)

User:FlBot replacement

Can we get someone to take over User:FlBot's tasks updating the Wikipedia:Community portal/Opentask page? It seems the owner has retired. -- œ^™ 16:47, 15 May 2011 (UTC)

I can hit this up with a lot smaller operable code too. Should be able to get something running before the end of this week. -- DQ (t) (e) 18:44, 16 May 2011 (UTC)

You da man ;) Thanks. -- œ^™ 23:07, 17 May 2011 (UTC)

Removal of redundant parameters from {{ThisDateInRecentYears}} on date articles

{{ThisDateInRecentYears}} has been revamped. It no longer needs parameters on date articles. I have removed them by hand for 1, 2 & 3 January. Would someone please get a bot to go the rest of the way to 31 December? JIMp _talk·cont 00:32, 17 May 2011 (UTC)

Attempting to try right now. --Σ _☭^★ 01:10, 17 May 2011 (UTC)

Done. Results --Σ _☭^★ 01:12, 17 May 2011 (UTC)

Removal of the pipes can be done if I put |something instead of just something. --Σ _☭^★ 01:14, 17 May 2011 (UTC)

Requesting BAG person help! New result, should I make a BRFA? --Σ _☭^★ 03:59, 18 May 2011 (UTC)

Yes, it looks like your bot could be approved if you create a BRFA. Chester Markel (talk) 05:28, 18 May 2011 (UTC)

Never mind... --Σ _☭^★ 05:51, 18 May 2011 (UTC)

SImple statistics about pages deleted at XfD

There is a proposal and the start of discussion at Wikipedia talk:Criteria for speedy deletion#Verifying G4 for a simple list of statistics (size, number of links, number of categories, number of images) about articles deleted at AfD (and possibly other XfDs) to be posted on the talk page of the relevant discussion by a bot. In order to progress this discussion it would be helpful for someone with knowledge of the capabilities and practicalities of bots to share their knowledge there. Thryduulf (talk) 06:37, 17 May 2011 (UTC)