Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/JJMC89 bot

The following discussion is an archived debate. Please do not modify it. To request review of this BRFA, please start a new section at WT:BRFA. The result of the discussion was

Withdrawn by operator.

JJMC89 bot

Operator: JJMC89 (talk · contribs · SUL · edit count · logs · page moves · block log · rights log · ANI search)

Time filed: 23:05, Friday, January 29, 2016 (UTC)

Automatic, Supervised, or Manual: Automatic

Programming language(s): AutoWikiBrowser

Source code available: AWB

Function overview: Replace {{Lc1| with {{Lc|cfd2=y| for all transclusions of {{Lc1}}.

Links to relevant discussions (where appropriate): WP:Bot requests#Request for bot to replace a string of code in applicable pages (permalink)

Edit period(s): One time run

Estimated number of pages affected: 3162

Exclusion compliant (Yes/No): No

Already has a bot flag (Yes/No): No

Function details: Replace {{Lc1| with {{Lc|cfd2=y| for all transclusions of {{Lc1}} to facilitate {{Lc1}} being merged into {{Lc}} as requested by Steel1943.

Discussion

Forgive me, but what does this really accomplish? Usually there's a WP:TFD before we merge templates. If {{lc1}} is already a convenience wrapper around {{lc}}/{{lx}}, why do we need to get rid of it? — Earwig ^talk 02:29, 1 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]

@Steel1943: As requester. Thanks. — Earwig ^talk 02:31, 1 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]

@The Earwig: Are you saying that this merge is controversial? This is my assumption, given that you brought up WP:TFD ... which is unnecessary to go through in uncontroversial cases. Steel1943 (talk) 07:45, 1 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]

And, to answer your question, the purpose is to centralize the templates so that there will not be a case where {{Lc}} would be updated when {{Lc1}} would need to be as well (unnecessary template fork). Compare this to the situation with {{About}}: A former template, now a redirect, {{Other uses-section}}, redirects to {{About}} since it's only difference from {{About}} was stating that the hatnote was placed in a "section" rather than a "page", not created via a "section=yes" parameter in {{About}}. To compare this to {{Lc}} and {{Lc1}}, the only differences are the formatting and the fact that the link to the "1=" page appears in {{Lc}} but not {{Lc1}}. Steel1943 (talk) 07:53, 1 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]

@Steel1943: Okay, but hold on for a moment. I'm taking a look at the transclusions of this template, and I note it's used almost entirely in CfD logs. The difference is just the monospacing (I admit I don't see the reason for that) and hiding the category name (which... I still don't see the reason for; {{cfd2}} already prepends the category name?). This all seems unnecessary. Couldn't we have {{cfd2}} use {{lc}} directly and remove the |cfd2= hack for {{lx}}? If you wanted, we could then replace {{lc1}} with {{lc}} in old transclusions and delete it, but it's not strictly necessary. I must be missing something. — Earwig ^talk 08:11, 1 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]

@The Earwig: About the formatting of the text ... you and I are on the same page there. I don't see the need for it either, but added it to the "cfd2=" parameter since it "was" there, so whoever implemented it originally in {{Lx1}} (now merged into {{Lx}}) may have seen a need for it. But yes, from what I saw, every transclusion of {{Lc1}} that exists was created by substitutions of {{Cfd2}} (thus why I named the parameter "cfd2".) However, the parameter could not just be removed wholesale since it does more than just creates the monobook formatting: As you stated, it also hides the link at the beginning to the "nominated" page. It seems that {{Lc1}} was set up this way since {{Cfd2}} already has a hard-coded link to the nominated page that is not part of {{Lc1}}, so making a link appear again would be redundant: Fixing this issue without using a parameter trigger in {{Lx}} as far as I can tell, would require manually removing the custom page link from all 3000+ pages since I don't think there is any possible "true/false" string that could catch and remove those links ("remove" since suppressing the cfd2 parameter in full would make the redundant page link appear.) Steel1943 (talk) 12:28, 1 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]

@Steel1943: I guess I was unclear. What I'm suggesting is this, followed by either leaving {{lc1}} as deprecated in old transclusions or substituting it with AWB/similar. Can't we do that? — Earwig ^talk 19:07, 1 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]

@The Earwig: I understood what you were saying. As I stated above, that fix doesn't resolve the previous usages of {{Cfd2}} since those pages will now have duplicate page links with that fix. (That "fix" you did will only resolve new substitutions of {{Cfd2}}.) My goal is to eventually redirect {{Lc1}} to {{Lc}}. The "fix" you just did works well for new substitutions of {{Cfd2}}, but does not address the substitutions that have already happened if the ultimate goal is to get rid of the cfd2 parameter from both {{Lx}} and {{Lc}}. (I would actually be okay if that parameter is completely removed: I created the parameter since my intent was to merge the templates, not change them.) Steel1943 (talk) 19:25, 1 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Someone mentioned a merge. Is there an actual WP:TFD around somewhere where this discussion took place? I don't feel comfortable approving this request, or even a trial, without some sort of clear consensus for this task. --slakr^\ talk / 04:53, 6 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]

And if it's uncontroversial (or believed to be), then the result at TFD should be obvious. --slakr^\ talk / 04:58, 6 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]

@Slakr: No thanks. The fact that anyone is mentioning that a TFD has to happen means that this is controversial. Unless "TFD" can stop being mentioned here, JJMC89 has my permission to withdraw this request. Steel1943 (talk) 06:10, 8 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]

@Steel1943: My main point is that this is a merge done by automation. Typically the vast majority of template merges should be listed on TFD as a matter of policy. There's obviously WP:IAR and WP:NOT#BURO, but the core issue here is that of automation: if so much as one person later says, "hey, I don't agree with that merge," there's no traditional recourse; someone has to then revert over 3,000 edits (and quite likely make a bot to do so). That's the main reason for the "Links to relevant discussions" portion of the BRFA. --slakr^\ talk / 06:08, 9 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]

@Slakr: Fair enough. Either way, I think I would like to withdraw this request as well. In all honestly, I'd rather get rid of the parameter all together if possible, so I'll probably be looking into other venues to see if that can be accomplished. Steel1943 (talk) 07:51, 9 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]

I humbly point to my suggestion from earlier. — Earwig ^talk 08:08, 9 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Earwig, as I sort of stated above, the only way that I can see your suggestion working (basically replacing {{Lc1}} with {{Lc}} without the cfd2 parameter) is if the community would not be bothered with every daily WP:CFD subpage that exists prior to the change having the name of the nominated page listed and linked twice. I would be okay with this, especially since then the {{Lc}} template could then be better utilized for other related CFD templates (such as {{Cfm2}}, {{Cfr2}}, etc) since they seem to currently not be built with any type of "Lc" template in them. With that being said, we should probably move this discussion elsewhere, possibly at Template talk:Cfd2 or Wikipedia talk:Categories for discussion since this discussion mainly pertains exclusively to {{Lc1}}'s usage in that template. Steel1943 (talk) 19:44, 9 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Withdrawn by operator. Please file a new bot request if a solution is agreed upon. — JJMC89 (T·C) 23:07, 13 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. To request review of this BRFA, please start a new section at WT:BRFA.