User talk:xaosflux
A barnstar for you![edit]
| The Technical Barnstar | |
| Awarded for your role in getting the mass message sent out to eligible voters in the 2017 Arbitration Committee elections. Thanks for your help in keeping the community informed! |
A barnstar for you![edit]
| The Original Barnstar | |
| You can guess what this is for - thank you so much for all of your help, it was invaluable. Yunshui 雲水 08:57, 4 December 2017 (UTC) |
Thanks[edit]
| For your help at Village pump (technical) | |
| Thanks for your help & explanation at VP. Shearonink (talk) 16:32, 6 February 2018 (UTC) |
A barnstar for you![edit]
| The Technical Barnstar | |
| is hereby awarded to xaosflux for your diligent and honorable stewardship of the MassMessage system , the primary facility for keeping Wikipedians informed – Lionel(talk) 11:24, 8 April 2018 (UTC) |
Newsletter malfunction[edit]
Hi xaosflux, the July Ichthus sent out a duplicate. First I tested it here to a small test list (see User_talk:Lionelt/sandbox). It worked fine. I made a small edit to the newsletter, started the tool, previewed it, and then sent to the subscription. But it posted 2 copies to the distribution list. The log shows 2 send commands [1] both at the same timestamp but I'm certain that I only sent 1 newsletter. I don't know what happened. – Lionel(talk) 06:49, 3 July 2018 (UTC)
- @Lionelt: the only time I've seen that type of behavior is if the Special:MassMessage page was refreshed/reloaded while you were in the middle of it, or just error an accidentally hitting send, then back, then send (thinking you hit preview). Also, if you have multiple tabs with the same message in them. Keep an eye on it carefully next time you run it. — xaosflux Talk 11:26, 3 July 2018 (UTC)
Administrators' newsletter – July 2018[edit]
News and updates for administrators from the past month (June 2018).
Pbsouthwood • TheSandDoctor
Gogo Dodo
Andrevan • Doug • EVula • KaisaL • Tony Fox • WilyD
- An RfC about the deletion of drafts closed with a consensus to change the wording of WP:NMFD. Specifically, a draft that has been repeatedly resubmitted and declined at AfC without any substantial improvement may be deleted at MfD if consensus determines that it is unlikely to ever meet the requirements for mainspace and it otherwise meets one of the reasons for deletion outlined in the deletion policy.
- A request for comment closed with a consensus that the {{promising draft}} template cannot be used to indefinitely prevent a WP:G13 speedy deletion nomination.
- Starting on July 9, the WMF Security team, Trust & Safety, and the broader technical community will be seeking input on an upcoming change that will restrict editing of site-wide JavaScript and CSS to a new technical administrators user group. Bureaucrats and stewards will be able to grant this right per a community-defined process. The intention is to reduce the number of accounts who can edit frontend code to those who actually need to, which in turn lessens the risk of malicious code being added that compromises the security and privacy of everyone who accesses Wikipedia. For more information, please review the FAQ.
- Syntax highlighting has been graduated from a Beta feature on the English Wikipedia. To enable this feature, click the highlighter icon (
) in your editing toolbar (or under the hamburger menu in the 2017 wikitext editor). This feature can help prevent you from making mistakes when editing complex templates. - IP-based cookie blocks should be deployed to English Wikipedia in July (previously scheduled for June). This will cause the block of a logged-out user to be reloaded if they change IPs. This means in most cases, you may no longer need to do /64 range blocks on residential IPv6 addresses in order to effectively block the end user. It will also help combat abuse from IP hoppers in general. For the time being, it only affects users of the desktop interface.
- Currently around 20% of admins have enabled two-factor authentication, up from 17% a year ago. If you haven't already enabled it, please consider doing so. Regardless if you use 2FA, please practice appropriate account security by ensuring your password is secure and unique to Wikimedia.
You've got mail![edit]
Message added 23:25, 5 July 2018 (UTC). It may take a few minutes from the time the email is sent for it to show up in your inbox. You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{You've got mail}} or {{ygm}} template.
Home Lander (talk) 23:25, 5 July 2018 (UTC)
- @Home Lander: replied. — xaosflux Talk 23:46, 5 July 2018 (UTC)
- Ditto. Thanks. Home Lander (talk) 23:54, 5 July 2018 (UTC)
Yobot 59[edit]
I am in vacation. I'll resubmit when back home.Porbably by the end of this month. -- Magioladitis (talk) 15:22, 6 July 2018 (UTC)
- @Magioladitis: have a nice vacation, feel free to reopen that at any time in the future and we can schedule a new trial. — xaosflux Talk 15:24, 6 July 2018 (UTC)
Please comment on Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Biography[edit]
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Biography. Legobot (talk) 04:30, 8 July 2018 (UTC)
Happy Bureaucratship[edit]
Fluxbot is adding unclosed italics[edit]
On 8 July 2018, Fluxbot added unclosed italics to
Please make it stop doing this. —Anomalocaris (talk) 08:28, 9 July 2018 (UTC)
- @Anomalocaris: already stopped and fixed, was part of a small trial run. — xaosflux Talk 12:06, 9 July 2018 (UTC)
Tech News: 2018-28[edit]
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Recent changes
- WebM video files have smaller file size but still be of the same quality. Creating WebM files will take longer time. [2]
- The new filters for edit review tools and interface for watchlists will leave beta. This was supposed to already have happened but was delayed. For most wikis this will happen on 9 July. For the rest it will happen on 16 July. [3]
All wikis now use the Remex parsing library instead of Tidy. This could cause errors. You can help fix the errors. [4]
Problems
- When you rolled back an edit it could get both the
RollbackandUndotags. This has been fixed. [5] - Rollbacks from autopatrolled users were not marked as patrolled. This has been fixed. [6]
Changes later this week
- When you edit a link in the visual editor there will be two separate buttons to change which page the link goes to (target) or its text (label). [7][8]
- On the mobile version you can find a link to an editor's contributions from their user page. Now this will work even if they haven't created a user page. [9]
- When you edit a discussion on the mobile version you sometimes get your signature automatically added. This will now not happen if you have already added a signature manually. This is to avoid double signatures. [10]
- Structured discussions toolbars will have more style options. [11]
When you look at Wikimedia code in Gerrit there will be a new interface. It is on by default for new users. This is also true for developers. This is to make it easier to understand what is happening. [12]
The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 10 July. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 11 July. It will be on all wikis from 12 July (calendar).
Meetings
You can join the next meeting with the Editing team. During the meeting, you can tell developers which bugs you think are the most important. The meeting will be on 10 July at 18:30 (UTC). See how to join.
You can join the technical advice meeting on IRC. During the meeting, volunteer developers can ask for advice. The meeting will be on 11 July at 15:00 (UTC). See how to join.
Future changes
- Today all administrators can edit CSS and JavaScript for the entire wiki. There will be a new user group for editing CSS and JavaScript. Administrators will no longer automatically be able to do this. This is because it is a security risk when all administrator accounts can edit JavaScript even if they never plan to or do not know how it works. You can read more. [13]
- Page previews will be on by default for new accounts. [14]
Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.
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If you have feedback on how to make SuggestBot better, please let us know on SuggestBot's talk page. -- SuggestBot (talk) 11:54, 11 July 2018 (UTC)
Please comment on Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)[edit]
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Wikipedia:Village pump (policy). Legobot (talk) 04:28, 15 July 2018 (UTC)
Tech News: 2018-29[edit]
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Recent changes
- You can now use global preferences on Wikimedia wikis. You can set them on the global preferences page. [15]
- You can now see a new log of pages being created at Special:Log/create. It includes pages which are later deleted. It is now available on all Wikimedia wikis except Commons and Wikidata. [16]
- You can see how many pageviews a wiki had from specific countries. The Wikistats2 maps have now been updated. [17]
Changes later this week
- Your watchlist will show changes from the last seven days instead of three. If you have already set a length preference it will not change. [18]
The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from July 17. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from July 18. It will be on all wikis from July 19 (calendar).
Meetings
You can join the next meeting with the Editing team. During the meeting, you can tell developers which bugs you think are the most important. The meeting will be on July 17 at 18:30 (UTC). See how to join.
You can join the technical advice meeting on IRC. During the meeting, volunteer developers can ask for advice. The meeting will be on July 18 at 15:00 (UTC). See how to join.
Future changes
- Some articles have messages to readers about problems with the article. For example that it does not cite sources or might not be neutral. Readers do not see these messages on the mobile version. The developers now want to show them. You can read more and leave feedback.
- You can use
<inputbox>to create search boxes for specific pages. For example to search the archives of a community discussion page. Instead ofprefix:Page nameyou will see a text that explains which pages are being searched. You can read more and leave feedback.
Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.
Please comment on Talk:Milwaukee Bucks[edit]
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Milwaukee Bucks. Legobot (talk) 04:30, 21 July 2018 (UTC)
Query[edit]
This appears to be well within the threshold of automated/semiautomatic editing for requiring a bot-request given the amount of articles. Was there one do you know? Is there a reason it wouldn't require one? Because adding a template that makes no visible change to the output of an article (It didn't on any of the ones on my watchlist or some of the others I checked) on that many articles without a discussion seems odd. Only in death does duty end (talk) 02:18, 22 July 2018 (UTC)
- @Only in death: I think a lot of that editors runs would be better under a bot account but I'm not ready to start that fight. — xaosflux Talk 13:05, 22 July 2018 (UTC)
- The reason I am querying it with yourself is to find out if this specific task should have had a bot-request, being a high-speed automated/semi-automated change to many articles, my reading of BOTPOL was that it should, but I am unsure. If its not, its annoying but not prohibited by policy. If it should be, its both annoying and prohibited by policy... Would it be better to ask at BAG? Only in death does duty end (talk) 14:12, 22 July 2018 (UTC)
- @Only in death: first, note this ... BAG only has purview over actual bots, editors that are violating editing guidelines in general are a community/administrator matter. If this editor wants to file a BRFA, we would be happy to review it. — xaosflux Talk 14:30, 22 July 2018 (UTC)
- So to find out if a task *should* have required a bot request, I need to ask the community/administrators, rather than BAG who actually vet bot requests? That seems... backwards? Only in death does duty end (talk) 15:20, 22 July 2018 (UTC)
- @Only in death: first, note this ... BAG only has purview over actual bots, editors that are violating editing guidelines in general are a community/administrator matter. If this editor wants to file a BRFA, we would be happy to review it. — xaosflux Talk 14:30, 22 July 2018 (UTC)
- The reason I am querying it with yourself is to find out if this specific task should have had a bot-request, being a high-speed automated/semi-automated change to many articles, my reading of BOTPOL was that it should, but I am unsure. If its not, its annoying but not prohibited by policy. If it should be, its both annoying and prohibited by policy... Would it be better to ask at BAG? Only in death does duty end (talk) 14:12, 22 July 2018 (UTC)
- ..."anyone can edit"... ; if the edits are bad: revert, if they are causing other problems (like flooding recent changes or watchlists due to speed and volume) first discuss with the editor. Someone adding a template to say 100 articles with AWB probably doesn't need a bot task, adding it to 10000+ probably does - in between is a grey area for sure and edits-per-interval are a major factor. How to proceed depends a lot on what you want the outcome to be. — xaosflux Talk 16:20, 22 July 2018 (UTC)
Tech News: 2018-30[edit]
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Recent changes
- When you log in to your account you can choose to keep being logged in. This checkbox now works better than before on the mobile version for users without JavaScript. [19]
- Wikis that use Citoid can automatically generate citations for Swedish news sites. This only works in the visual editor. This now works for Swedish public service radio. More will come. Others could use this to add news sites in other languages in the future. [20]
- Editors can do max 90 edits per minute. This is new since last month. This does not affect bots or administrators. [21]
Changes later this week
The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 24 July. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 25 July. It will be on all wikis from 26 July (calendar).
Meetings
You can join the technical advice meeting on IRC. During the meeting, volunteer developers can ask for advice. The meeting will be on 25 July at 15:00 (UTC). See how to join.
Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.
User:White Shadows/German U-boat bases in occupied France[edit]
Hi there. This sandbox article of mine was deleted while I was retired. I’ve since come back to editing and was curious if you could restore this for me?
Thanks!—White Shadows Let’s Talk 05:06, 25 July 2018 (UTC)
- @White Shadows: welcome back! I've restored your sandbox page, happy editing, — xaosflux Talk 11:19, 25 July 2018 (UTC)
Please comment on Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Television[edit]
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Television. Legobot (talk) 04:28, 28 July 2018 (UTC)
Email[edit]
It may take a few minutes from the time the email is sent for it to show up in your inbox. You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{You've got mail}} or {{ygm}} template.
Tech News: 2018-31[edit]
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Recent changes
- The design on Special:Log has changed. It will change again soon. Developers are working on fixing problems. [22]
Problems
- Deployment of 1.32.0-wmf.13 has been partially delayed. All deployments have been resumed and successfully done after bug fixes. [23][24]
- Deployment of 1.32.0-wmf.14 has been partially delayed. [25][26]
Changes later this week
The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 31 July. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 1 August. It will be on all wikis from 2 August (calendar).
Meetings
You can join the next meeting with the Editing team. During the meeting, you can tell developers which bugs you think are the most important. The meeting will be on 31 July at 18:30 (UTC). See how to join.
You can join the technical advice meeting on IRC. During the meeting, volunteer developers can ask for advice. The meeting will be on 1 August at 15:00 (UTC) as well as at 23:00 (UTC). See how to join.
Future changes
- After a community discussion, a new group for users will be created. "Interface administrators" will be the only users allowed to edit interface pages like MediaWiki:Common.css or MediaWiki:Common.js. This is done to avoid technical issues and improve security. That change will be effective by the end of August 2018.
Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.
Filters 925 and 926[edit]
Hi. Can you email (or copy to the testwiki) filters 925/926? Another spree got through today and I want to see if my ideas are any different from what's already being done. Suffusion of Yellow (talk) 21:46, 31 July 2018 (UTC)
- @Suffusion of Yellow: send me a diff you think these filters might be useful for first please. — xaosflux Talk 22:20, 31 July 2018 (UTC)
- Special:Diff/852805327 and everything else from the same IP. Suffusion of Yellow (talk) 22:28, 31 July 2018 (UTC)
- @Suffusion of Yellow: — xaosflux Talk 00:48, 1 August 2018 (UTC)Hello, Xaosflux. Please check your email; you've got mail!

It may take a few minutes from the time the email is sent for it to show up in your inbox. You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{You've got mail}} or {{ygm}} template.- Thanks. My own ideas would be a marginal improvement at best, but I may send something to MusikAnimal tomorrow if more gets through. Suffusion of Yellow (talk) 06:10, 1 August 2018 (UTC)
- @Suffusion of Yellow:
- Special:Diff/852805327 and everything else from the same IP. Suffusion of Yellow (talk) 22:28, 31 July 2018 (UTC)
The Signpost: 31 July 2018[edit]
- From the editor: If only if
- Opinion: Wrestling with Wikipedia reality
- Discussion report: Wikipedias take action against EU copyright proposal, plus new user right proposals
- Featured content: Wikipedia's best content in images and prose
- Arbitration report: Status quo processes retained in two disputes
- Traffic report: Soccer, football, call it what you like – that and summer movies leave room for little else
- Technology report: New bots, new prefs
- Recent research: Different Wikipedias use different images; editing contests more successful than edit-a-thons
- Humour: It's all the same
- Essay: Wikipedia does not need you
Please comment on Help talk:Citation Style 1[edit]
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Help talk:Citation Style 1. Legobot (talk) 04:30, 3 August 2018 (UTC)
Request for block[edit]
I just need to request you that please block user Mike V because that user is not editing as it is inactive. Mike V has not benn editing from December 2016 so that user needs to be blocked. Thank you. 171.79.23.108 (talk) 05:49, 4 August 2018 (UTC)
- We don't block users for "being inactive" but we do remove their advanced permissions as was already done for this user. — xaosflux Talk 14:06, 4 August 2018 (UTC)
Administrators' newsletter – August 2018[edit]
News and updates for administrators from the past month (July 2018).
- After a discussion at Meta, a new user group called "interface administrators" (formerly "technical administrator") has been created. Come the end of August, interface admins will be the only users able to edit site-wide JavaScript and CSS pages like MediaWiki:Common.js and MediaWiki:Common.css, or edit other user's personal JavaScript and CSS. The intention is to improve security and privacy by reducing the number of accounts which could be used to compromise the site or another user's account through malicious code. The new user group can be assigned and revoked by bureaucrats. Discussion is ongoing to establish details for implementing the group on the English Wikipedia.
- Following a request for comment, the WP:SISTER style guideline now states that in the mainspace, interwiki links to Wikinews should only be made as per the external links guideline. This generally means that within the body of an article, you should not link to Wikinews about a particular event that is only a part of the larger topic. Wikinews links in "external links" sections can be used where helpful, but not automatically if an equivalent article from a reliable news outlet could be linked in the same manner.
- The WMF Anti-Harassment Tools team is seeking input on the second set of wireframes for the Special:Block redesign that will introduce partial blocks. The new functionality will allow you to block a user from editing a specific set of pages, pages in a category, a namespace, and for specific actions such as moving pages and uploading files.
Tech News: 2018-32[edit]
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Recent changes
- Special:NewPages now has the OOUI look. [27]
Problems
- The MediaWiki version that was released two weeks ago was late to some Wikimedia wikis. This was because of bugs. It was on all wikis 30 July. [28][29]
Changes later this week
The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 7 August. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 8 August. It will be on all wikis from 9 August.
Meetings
You can join the next meeting with the Editing team. During the meeting, you can tell developers which bugs you think are the most important. The meeting will be on 7 August at 18:30 (UTC). See how to join.
You can join the technical advice meeting on IRC. During the meeting, volunteer developers can ask for advice. The meeting will be on 8 August at 15:00 (UTC). See how to join.
Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.
Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/Jbhunley/Bureaucrat chat[edit]
Hello fellow bureaucrats, in regards to a current RfA that has met its time, I would like your assistance in judging the community consensus presented in the discussion at Jbhunley's RfA. Your input would be most welcome at Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/Jbhunley/Bureaucrat chat. Best regards, MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 03:37, 7 August 2018 (UTC)
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Please comment on Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Dates and numbers[edit]
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Dates and numbers. Legobot (talk) 04:28, 10 August 2018 (UTC)
Chris brown[edit]
in the greatest artist of all time list Chris Brown should have 19 million units in the uk instead of 10 million i have source to support this claim chart data is also a music sale database also https://twitter.com/chartdata/status/982634107694919680 he also just got a new certification too https://twitter.com/chartdata/status/1028711464649904129 --User:Bhris breezy (talk) 09:59, 12 August 2018 (UTC
- Hello Bhris breezy To request an edit to the Chris Brown article go to: this link and click the request an edit button, it will leave a message for others to review. — xaosflux Talk 00:22, 13 August 2018 (UTC)
AWB[edit]
Hi. I hope you are well. Would please take a look at Wikipedia talk:AutoWikiBrowser#adding talkpage banner? Your help will be appreciated a lot. Thanks a lot in advance, —usernamekiran(talk) 22:13, 12 August 2018 (UTC)
- @Usernamekiran: I'm not sure what the best way to fix that is. — xaosflux Talk 00:23, 13 August 2018 (UTC)
- Thanks for looking into it :) —usernamekiran(talk) 00:48, 13 August 2018 (UTC)
Tech News: 2018-33[edit]
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Recent changes
CSS in templates can now be stored in a separate page on all wikis. This is called TemplateStyles. This is to make it easier to edit how templates look. [30]
Changes later this week
- There is no new MediaWiki version this week.
Meetings
You can join the next meeting with the Editing team. During the meeting, you can tell developers which bugs you think are the most important. The meeting will be on 14 August at 18:30 (UTC). See how to join.
You can join the technical advice meeting on IRC. During the meeting, volunteer developers can ask for advice. The meeting will be on 15 August at 15:00 (UTC). See how to join.
Future changes
- The developers are planning more ways to block users. This could be blocking someone from just a page or a namespace. You can read more. You can leave feedback on the talk page. [31]
Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.
Recent reverts on WT:INTADMIN[edit]
Sorry about that, my finger slipped and hit the rollback button! Enterprisey (talk!) 02:25, 15 August 2018 (UTC)
Please comment on Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Taiwan[edit]
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Taiwan. Legobot (talk) 04:30, 17 August 2018 (UTC)
Bots Newsletter, August 2018[edit]
| Bots Newsletter, August 2018 | |
|---|---|
|
Greetings! Here is the 6th issue of the Bots Newsletter. You can subscribe/unsubscribe from future newsletters by adding/removing your name from this list. Highlights for this newsletter include:
As of writing, we have...
Also
These are some of the discussions that happened / are still happening since the last Bots Newsletter. Many are stale, but some are still active.
Thank you! edited by: Headbomb 15:04, 18 August 2018 (UTC) (You can subscribe or unsubscribe from future newsletters by adding or removing your name from this list.) | |
Tech News: 2018-34[edit]
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Changes later this week
The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 21 August. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 22 August. It will be on all wikis from 23 August (calendar).
Meetings
You can join the technical advice meeting on IRC. During the meeting, volunteer developers can ask for advice. The meeting will be on 22 August at 15:00 (UTC). See how to join.
Future changes
- The 2018 Community Wishlist Survey begins on 29 October. The survey decides what the Community Tech team will work on. You can post proposals from 29 October to 11 November. You can vote on proposals from 16 November to 30 November.
Legacy JavaScript global variables have been deprecated for seven years. They will soon be removed from all wikis. Gadgets and scripts that use them will stop working. You can test your community's gadgets on "group0" wikis. For example Test Wikipedia or mediawiki.org. The legacy JavaScript global variables are already disabled there. You can read the migration guide to fix old scripts. [32]
Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.
Edit filter idea...[edit]
Sometime back, I asked, and I believe you replied, at VPT or somewhere about the idea of an edit filter that would trip when "{{User:" or "{{User talk:" was added to pages, to stop accidental transclusions of user and user talk pages. It happened again at ANI, fixed here. Would this filter be difficult to create/enable? Home Lander (talk) 23:00, 20 August 2018 (UTC) is it only a problem in certain namespaces? The narrower the better (e.g. watching in (article) space is expensive). — xaosflux Talk 00:26, 21 August 2018 (UTC)
- Particularly the WP namespace, where it would get flagged at AN/ANI, RPP, the help desk, and similar. Home Lander (talk) 01:19, 21 August 2018 (UTC)
- @Home Lander: OK, I created a filter - it is in log only right now, feel free to keep an eye on edits hitting 928's log after now. — xaosflux Talk 02:34, 21 August 2018 (UTC)
- Yes I was just watching that (actually managed to trip it already). Home Lander (talk) 02:36, 21 August 2018 (UTC)
- @Home Lander: I had some overly greedy regex in there at first, it shouldn't be hitting on that stuff anymore. — xaosflux Talk 02:37, 21 August 2018 (UTC)
- Yeah I figured it was picking up anything even without the ":". Home Lander (talk) 02:38, 21 August 2018 (UTC)
- @Home Lander: OK, I created a filter - it is in log only right now, feel free to keep an eye on edits hitting 928's log after now. — xaosflux Talk 02:34, 21 August 2018 (UTC)
- Particularly the WP namespace, where it would get flagged at AN/ANI, RPP, the help desk, and similar. Home Lander (talk) 01:19, 21 August 2018 (UTC)
It seems to be working. Note that "namespace" is misspelled in the filter description.
Home Lander (talk) 02:41, 21 August 2018 (UTC)
- Thanks to Drmies for proving the purpose of this filter.
Home Lander (talk) 03:17, 21 August 2018 (UTC)
- Eh did it do something? I had to go and correct myself... Drmies (talk) 03:19, 21 August 2018 (UTC)
- @Drmies: It's just in testing at the moment. Home Lander (talk) 03:20, 21 August 2018 (UTC)
- Watching for FP's right now, then will give a "warn" on these actions. — xaosflux Talk 03:21, 21 August 2018 (UTC)
- Look, why don't y'all make a Nazi filter--that would be more useful to me. :) Drmies (talk) 03:22, 21 August 2018 (UTC)
- I know, we probably have a ton of those already, and I thank you for them. Sorry, that was dumb. Drmies (talk) 03:22, 21 August 2018 (UTC)
- Looks like there are at least 4 of them :D — xaosflux Talk 03:25, 21 August 2018 (UTC)
- Should we also check talk namespaces, except user talk? I imagine this happens a lot on mainspace talk pages, in particular — MusikAnimal talk 03:35, 21 August 2018 (UTC)
- Or frankly you might check user talk too. People do transclude parts of their userspace on their user page, but if all we're doing is showing a warning then this should be fine. Right? — MusikAnimal talk 03:39, 21 August 2018 (UTC)
- Looks like there are at least 4 of them :D — xaosflux Talk 03:25, 21 August 2018 (UTC)
- Watching for FP's right now, then will give a "warn" on these actions. — xaosflux Talk 03:21, 21 August 2018 (UTC)
- @Drmies: It's just in testing at the moment. Home Lander (talk) 03:20, 21 August 2018 (UTC)
- Eh did it do something? I had to go and correct myself... Drmies (talk) 03:19, 21 August 2018 (UTC)
- @MusikAnimal: maybe - seems like this happens mostly to the more "technical" editors that are in a hurry. @Home Lander: have you been seeing this elsewhere recently? — xaosflux Talk 03:41, 21 August 2018 (UTC)
- And I think there may be plenty of legit use cases, so would not want to set this to disallow. — xaosflux Talk 03:42, 21 August 2018 (UTC)
- It's not happening all the time, just one of those occasional things that when it does happen, no one seems to know how to fix it (typically a trip to ANI or VPT is the result). I agree that the talk namespace would probably be a good target for it. Home Lander (talk) 03:45, 21 August 2018 (UTC)
- And I think there may be plenty of legit use cases, so would not want to set this to disallow. — xaosflux Talk 03:42, 21 August 2018 (UTC)
IA nomination[edit]
Hello Xaosflux, I've nominated you for a temporary interface administrator access grant at Wikipedia_talk:Interface_administrators#Stop-gap_users_nominated. If you do not wish to have this foisted upon you, feel free to remove yourself from the listing. Thank you, — xaosflux Talk 02:49, 22 August 2018 (UTC)
Please comment on Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals)[edit]
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals). Legobot (talk) 04:30, 23 August 2018 (UTC)
Template help[edit]
Hello Xaosflux, I need some help with a custom user template User:FlightTime/Uw-Consensus. I have it loaded in my custom warning section of Twinkle and used Twinkle to post it on a page of my old account here User talk:Mlpearc Public. As you can see the template is posting two section headers, how can I remove the auto posting of == August 2018 == ? I have == Please seek consensus == hard coded in the template. If you have a moment your input would be appreciated, Thanx - FlightTime (open channel) 13:42, 26 August 2018 (UTC)
- @FlightTime: in general, Twinkle always make a "month" section to keep warning together so when you leave multiple messages, or multiple people leave message they can be grouped. Most twinkle message don't use section headers. I suggest you don't try to fight twinkle's process on this, but if you really want a section header use a lower level header like "===". — xaosflux Talk 14:45, 26 August 2018 (UTC)
- Thank you, no wonder I couldn't figure what was triggering the header, I thought it was the template, but its Twinkle thats posting the first header. Thanx for your time and your input. Cheers, - FlightTime (open channel) 14:51, 26 August 2018 (UTC)
Interface administrator[edit]
Hi Xaosflux, per Special:Diff/856641107, I have temporarily added the interface administrator user-right to your account. I'm sure the temporary part of that will change to permanent once we have a mechanism to agree it! WormTT(talk) 17:36, 26 August 2018 (UTC)
Tech News: 2018-35[edit]
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Recent changes
- You can now see moved paragraphs in diffs in the mobile view. It also works on all languages in the desktop view. [33]
- Bureaucrats on all Wikimedia wikis can now remove the interface admin user right. [34]
Problems
- Some diffs show lines in the wrong order. The developers are working on fixing it. [35]
Changes later this week
- The message you see when you thank a user will change. This is to make it easier to understand. [36]
- AWB will stop adding
using AWBin the edit summary. Instead it will add a tag that saysAWB. [37]
Some abuse filter variables have changed. They are now easier to understand for non-experts. The old variables will still work but filter editors are encouraged to replace them with the new ones. You can find the list of changed variables on mediawiki.org. They have a note which says Deprecated. Use ... instead. An example isarticle_textwhich is nowpage_title. [38]
Abuse filters can now use how old a page is. The variable is page_age. [39]
The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 28 August. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 29 August. It will be on all wikis from 30 August (calendar).
Meetings
You can join the next meeting with the Editing team. During the meeting, you can tell developers which bugs you think are the most important. The meeting will be on 28 August at 18:30 (UTC). See how to join.
You can join the technical advice meeting on IRC. During the meeting, volunteer developers can ask for advice. The meeting will be on 29 August at 15:00 (UTC). See how to join.
Future changes
- Because of a data centre test you will be able to read but not edit the wikis for up to an hour on 12 September and 10 October. This will start at 14:00 (UTC). You might lose edits if you try to save during this time. The time when you can't edit might be shorter than an hour. You can read more about this.
Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.
Number of Redirects[edit]
Are redirects included in {{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}? —Eli355 (talk | contribs) 16:49, 28 August 2018 (UTC)
- (talk page watcher) eli355, No. One can see here for the number of redirects and pages per namespace Galobtter (pingó mió) 17:16, 28 August 2018 (UTC)
- @Eli355: see also mw:Manual:Article_count, to be counted it has to not be a redirect, and also contain at least one wikilink. — xaosflux Talk 17:18, 28 August 2018 (UTC)
The Signpost: 30 August 2018[edit]
- From the editor: Today's young adults don't know a world without Wikipedia
- News and notes: Flying high; low practice from Wikipedia 'cleansing' agency; where do our donations go? RfA sees a new trend
- In the media: Quicksilver AI writes articles
- Discussion report: Drafting an interface administrator policy
- Featured content: Featured content selected by the community
- Special report: Wikimania 2018
- Traffic report: Aretha dies – getting just 2,000 short of 5 million hits
- Technology report: Technical enhancements and a request to prioritize upcoming work
- Recent research: Wehrmacht on Wikipedia, neural networks writing biographies
- Humour: Signpost editor censors herself
- From the archives: Playing with Wikipedia words
Please comment on Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style[edit]
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style. Legobot (talk) 04:31, 30 August 2018 (UTC)
Courtesy message[edit]
It may take a few minutes from the time the email is sent for it to show up in your inbox. You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{You've got mail}} or {{ygm}} template.
Curiosity[edit]
I just happened to glance at Special:Statistics and noticed that there is a user category for Copyright violation bots which red links to WP:Copyviobot. Do you know if this is something new? -- Dolotta (talk) 18:31, 1 September 2018 (UTC)
- @Dolotta: looks like this is part of phab:T199359 - it's not "live" yet, and I don't know much about it either (yet!). — xaosflux Talk 18:43, 1 September 2018 (UTC)
Administrators' newsletter – September 2018[edit]
News and updates for administrators from the past month (August 2018).
None
Asterion • Crisco 1492 • KF • Kudpung • Liz • Randykitty • Spartaz
Optimist on the run → Voice of Clam
Interface administrator changes
Amorymeltzer • Mr. Stradivarius • MusikAnimal • MSGJ • TheDJ • Xaosflux
- Following a "stop-gap" discussion, six users have temporarily been made interface administrators while discussion is ongoing for a more permanent process for assigning the permission. Interface administrators are now the only editors allowed to edit sitewide CSS and JavaScript pages, as well as CSS/JS pages in another user's userspace. Previously, all administrators had this ability. The right can be granted and revoked by bureaucrats.
- Because of a data centre test you will be able to read but not edit the wikis for up to an hour on 12 September and 10 October. This will start at 14:00 (UTC). You might lose edits if you try to save during this time. The time when you can't edit might be shorter than an hour.
- Some abuse filter variables have changed. They are now easier to understand for non-experts. The old variables will still work but filter editors are encouraged to replace them with the new ones. You can find the list of changed variables on mediawiki.org. They have a note which says
Deprecated. Use ... instead. An example isarticle_textwhich is nowpage_title. - Abuse filters can now use how old a page is. The variable is
page_age.
- The Arbitration Committee has resolved to perform a round of Checkuser and Oversight appointments. The usernames of all applicants will be shared with the Functionaries team, and they will be requested to assist in the vetting process. The deadline to submit an application is 23:59 UTC, 12 September, and the candidates that move forward will be published on-wiki for community comments on 18 September.
Tech News: 2018-36[edit]
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Recent changes
- There is a new user right for users who can edit CSS and JavaScript for the entire wiki. Before this all admins could edit CSS and JavaScript. This was a security risk. This group is called interface administrators. Administrators can delete user CSS and JavaScript pages. [40][41]
- There will be an A/B test on the Wikipedia mobile website. It starts this week. It tests how we show templates that show information about an article. The test will last two weeks. [42][43]
- You can now use different CSS rules for different skins when you edit templates. This is because of TemplateStyles. [44]
wp10in ORES is now calledarticlequality. [45]- When you get a new message on your talk page you get a yellow message in the toolbar. The preference to show or not show this has been removed. [46]
Problems
- UploadWizard had problems with campaigns. Users could not upload files. This has now been fixed. [47]
- You can get a notification when a link is made to a page you created. This has not worked since June. It was fixed last week. [48]
Changes later this week
The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 4 September. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 5 September. It will be on all wikis from 6 September (calendar).
Meetings
You can join the technical advice meeting on IRC. During the meeting, volunteer developers can ask for advice. The meeting will be on 5 September at 15:00 (UTC). See how to join.
Future changes
- The Wikimedia Foundation Readers department will work on advanced mobile editing. You can read more about this and other things they plan to work on over the next year. You can also see the presentation.
- The RelatedSites extension will be removed from Wikivoyage.
Unused projects on the Wikimedia Cloud virtual private server will be removed. This will happen in October. Projects can be marked if they are being used. [49]
Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.
[edit]
Is adding a Navbox templates to the bottom of a page a minor edit? —Eli355 (talk | contribs) 19:35, 3 September 2018 (UTC)
- @Eli355: according to the guidance at Help:Minor edit, adding new content-containing material should not be considered "minor" in general. — xaosflux Talk 20:11, 3 September 2018 (UTC)
Articles you might like to edit, from SuggestBot[edit]
Note: All columns in this table are sortable, allowing you to rearrange the table so the articles most interesting to you are shown at the top. All images have mouse-over popups with more information. For more information about the columns and categories, please consult the documentation and please get in touch on SuggestBot's talk page with any questions you might have.
SuggestBot picks articles in a number of ways based on other articles you've edited, including straight text similarity, following wikilinks, and matching your editing patterns against those of other Wikipedians. It tries to recommend only articles that other Wikipedians have marked as needing work. We appreciate that you have signed up to receive suggestions regularly; your contributions make Wikipedia better — thanks for helping!
If you have feedback on how to make SuggestBot better, please let us know on SuggestBot's talk page. -- SuggestBot (talk) 11:47, 5 September 2018 (UTC)
Requests for permissions[edit]
You reorganised {{Requests for permissions}} into Common & Uncommon a while back. Unless you have some strange criteria in mind I think Event Coordinator & Extended Confirmed need to be switched, as everyone (eventually) gets Extended Confirmed while needs to be applied for & a reason given. I'll go ahead & make the change but feel free to revert if I've got something wrong. Regards, Cabayi (talk) 16:23, 5 September 2018 (UTC)
- @Cabayi: no big deal for me. It is unusual for editors to "request" extended confirmed, specifically because it is automatically assigned. I moved EVC up to encourage people to use it over the older "account creator" since it is now better suited for event management. — xaosflux Talk 16:58, 5 September 2018 (UTC)
Please comment on Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Dates and numbers[edit]
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Dates and numbers. Legobot (talk) 04:29, 6 September 2018 (UTC)
Moving the revision search along[edit]
Apologies that this has gotten bogged down in the details. Don’t know if you saw I’m ok w your ‘Change search ’. And I’m actually ok with ‘Revision search’ if the top box was labeled ‘Search for revision by tag’. Given that all seem to agree on cutting down the verbiage (3 words to 2) in the external tool labels and no one has objected to the reordering, how can we best move ahead from here? Also I have a minor related suggestion if you have the bandwidth for that. Humanengr (talk) 19:23, 6 September 2018 (UTC)
- @Humanengr: hi, I haven't really been following up on this - if a consensus has been reached on the talk page, just reactivate the edit-request by changing "answered=yes" to "answered=no" and one of the patrolling admins will pick it up. Best regards, — xaosflux Talk 21:31, 6 September 2018 (UTC)
Oops![edit]
Hello Xaosflux!
It's been a while since I've been around these parts; I apologize for missing your message. It seems I've been marked as inactive in regard to several tools/permissions (rightfully so). I do intend to be more active in the near future—I've been missing Wikipedia! I noticed you removed my account creator right due to inactivity for over a year; out of curiosity, does inactivity only count edits and not log actions? The reason I ask is because I last worked at ACC on 29 April 2018.
I hope you're well! MJ94 (talk) 00:53, 9 September 2018 (UTC)
- @MJ94: I've restored your ACC flag, I do so many of these I don't think I even remembered sending you that message! Drop a note at WP:PERM/AWB if you still have use for AWB (just say you removed for 'inactivity' but are now back to avoid a long discussion and to get that bot off your back). To answer your question, your "logged actions" should count towards activity - but many of the reports/bots/etc that look for inactivity usually only check edits since they are much more common. Thanks for taking this in stride, please note nothing was meant as a judgement against you. If you need anything else, please let me know. — xaosflux Talk 01:03, 9 September 2018 (UTC)
2FA tester group[edit]
Can you please add me to the 2FA tester group? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Lucent (talk • contribs) 17:59, 10 September 2018 (UTC)
- @Lucent: you have to request this on meta at this page: meta:Steward_requests/Global_permissions#Requests_for_other_global_permissions. — xaosflux Talk 18:08, 10 September 2018 (UTC)
Tech News: 2018-37[edit]
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Recent changes
- When you added or edited a template with the visual editor the input boxes were very big. This has been fixed. The input boxes will now be smaller until you click on them. Then they will change size to fit the text. [50]
Problems
- Some diffs showed lines in the wrong order. This was fixed last week. [51]
- Marking a cross-wiki notification as read didn't work every time. The other wiki was not updated. This has now been fixed. [52]
<maplink>did not work for a few days. This was because of a bug. This has now been fixed. [53]{{subst:REVISIONUSER}}is used by some templates. For a period edits saved with{{subst:REVISIONUSER}}would save the previous user's name and not your username. This is now fixed. Edits made before the bug was fixed will still be wrong and need to be corrected. [54]- When you move a page the title still shows the old page name. The developers are working on fixing this. [55]
Changes later this week
- Because of a data centre test you will be able to read but not edit the wikis for up to an hour on 12 September and 10 October. This will start at 14:00 (UTC). You might lose edits if you try to save during this time. The time when you can't edit might be shorter than an hour. You can read more about this.
- Because of the data centre test there will be no new version of MediaWiki this week. Changes for this week will come next week instead.
Meetings
You can join the next meeting with the Editing team. During the meeting, you can tell developers which bugs you think are the most important. The meeting will be on 11 Septmber at 18:30 (UTC). See how to join.
You can join the technical advice meeting on IRC. During the meeting, volunteer developers can ask for advice. The meeting will be on 12 September at 15:00 (UTC). See how to join.
Future changes
- The developers work on making the wikis work better on mobile phones. There is a list of common problems when making content easier to read in the mobile view. You can add things to the page and ask others to help.
Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.
Do the div id's and other tags look ok?[edit]
If so, I'll proceed as you indicated on Histlegend talk. Thx for your help and guidance. Humanengr (talk) 18:54, 12 September 2018 (UTC)
- Can't check right now, just work on the sandbox and leave a note, several people are looking at it. — xaosflux Talk 19:00, 12 September 2018 (UTC)
Please comment on Wikipedia talk:Shortcut[edit]
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Wikipedia talk:Shortcut. Legobot (talk) 04:28, 13 September 2018 (UTC)
To make the Histlegend discussion threads more intelligible[edit]
For ease of reading, I should have split the proposals.
At this point, maybe I should go ahead and do some paragraph-level strikethroughs on some of both your and my comments in the two current sections; create a new section, etc., so folks can track it all better. Ok? Apologies for the confusion. Humanengr (talk) 18:09, 14 September 2018 (UTC)
- As long as it is very clear what you want the final result to look like, that should be fine. — xaosflux Talk 18:38, 14 September 2018 (UTC)
page history[edit]
Hi. I hope you are well.
Could you please take a look at User talk:Path slopu#Speedy deletion nomination of Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser/Script? I thought Path slopu created AutoWikiBrowser/Script as a test, so I moved it to his userspace. But after he commented on his talkpage, I realised the page might have existed once as it is mentioned/linked on WP:JWB page. Would you please take a look at the history of Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser/Script, and tell if it existed before? I think i did something wrong by suppressing the redirect.
—usernamekiran(talk) 19:47, 14 September 2018 (UTC)
- pinging GAB —usernamekiran(talk) 19:51, 14 September 2018 (UTC)
- @Usernamekiran: I think it is OK, from a quick look Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser/Script doesn't need to actually exist to use the script once you install it. — xaosflux Talk 19:59, 14 September 2018 (UTC)
- Thanks. But did it exist before? —usernamekiran(talk) 20:03, 14 September 2018 (UTC)
- @Usernamekiran: The earliest I saw was (diff) 2018-07-31T13:42:19 . . Path slopu (talk | contribs | block) (95 bytes) (←Created page with '{{subst:iusc|User:Joeytje50/JWB.js/load.js}}'). — xaosflux Talk 22:22, 14 September 2018 (UTC)
- Thanks. But did it exist before? —usernamekiran(talk) 20:03, 14 September 2018 (UTC)
Bot Ahechtbot[edit]
I see you approved Task 3 for User:Ahechtbot. This bot is making edits that are in violation of the bot policy. Why was it approved? Pinging bot owner @Ahecht: as well. This bot made an edit to move the bold ''' tags outside of a font tag. That's cosmetic at best. The change isn't visible to the reader.--v/r - TP 00:54, 15 September 2018 (UTC)
- Nevermind. I see that the WMF has implemented some dumb parser that breaks with old wiki syntax.--v/r - TP 00:57, 15 September 2018 (UTC)
- @TParis: thanks for bringing up the concern, but yes it's part of the Special:LintErrors cleanup due to that parser change, on some pages the fixes may be less noticeable, on some they break formatting for the whole page - its a major pain! This is running with both 'bot' and 'minor' to try to minimize any disruption to watchlists, etc. For the most part, once these are done they shouldn't be repeated. Best regards, — xaosflux Talk 04:03, 15 September 2018 (UTC)
- I'd also note that WP:COSMETICBOT does not consider fixing "invalid HTML such as unclosed tags, even if it does not affect browsers' display" to be a cosmetic change. --Ahecht (TALK
PAGE) 05:21, 15 September 2018 (UTC)
Sandbox[edit]
One of my sanboxes I am not using anymore, User:Eli355/Orders of magnitude (mass flow rate), so would like it to be deleted. —Eli355 (talk | contribs) 00:14, 17 September 2018 (UTC)
Tech News: 2018-38[edit]
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Recent changes
- The Wikimedia Commons mobile app has a new version. Images uploaded using Nearby are now automatically added to the associated Wikidata item. You can browse other images on Commons. You can see your achievements and your upload statistics. It has also fixed some bugs. [56]
MediaWiki web requests now have a time limit of 60 seconds for GET requests and 200 seconds for POST requests. [57]
Problems
- You could not see the menu on the notifications page on the mobile version. This has now been fixed. [58]
Changes later this week
- Special:AncientPages can hide disambiguation pages. [59]
The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 18 September. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 19 September. It will be on all wikis from 20 September (calendar).
Meetings
You can join the technical advice meeting on IRC. During the meeting, volunteer developers can ask for advice. The meeting will be on 19 September at 15:00 (UTC). See how to join.
Future changes
- The developers are testing new mobile web navigation. You can use it and give feedback.
Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.
Please comment on Template talk:Iobdb name[edit]
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Template talk:Iobdb name. Legobot (talk) 04:29, 19 September 2018 (UTC)
Tech News: 2018-39[edit]
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Changes later this week
- The preferences form will change to use the standard look. If you see any problems please report them on Phabricator. [60]
The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 25 September. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 26 September. It will be on all wikis from 27 September (calendar).
Meetings
You can join the technical advice meeting on IRC. During the meeting, volunteer developers can ask for advice. The meeting will be on 26 September at 15:00 (UTC). See how to join.
Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.
Please comment on Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Video games[edit]
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Video games. Legobot (talk) 04:29, 26 September 2018 (UTC)
Edit summaries for visual editing[edit]
Is it possible to write edit summaries for visual edits? —Eli355 (
talk
contribs
) 16:19, 26 September 2018 (UTC)
Old geezer needs help again[edit]
Howdy Xaosflux. You were so helpful last month in getting my password restored, I thought maybe you could likewise help me with a new difficulty. I haven't uploaded images to WP in years, but yesterday I created a new stub article about a forgotten celebrity and came across a great image to go with it. To my horror, though, the metadata on the file page displays my real name - not sure how that happened, as I certainly didn't type it in. Can you or somebody quickly delete this image page? It's File:Frances_Robinson-Duff_ad_1922.jpg Textorus (talk) 17:27, 27 September 2018 (UTC)
- @Textorus: this is done. If you don't mind random websites you could try verexif.com to strip the EXIF data fields before reuploading. — xaosflux Talk 18:07, 27 September 2018 (UTC)
- Thank you so much! And thanks for the verexif link too - I have bookmarked it and will try it sometime. Right now, I'm feeling a little gun-shy. I've been a very competent end-user of computers and the internet since 1977 - but in the last year or so it all seems to be turning into a hot digital mess I can't get my head around.Textorus (talk) 20:29, 27 September 2018 (UTC)
- This is for you:
| The Special Barnstar | ||
| To Xaosflux for help and kindness to an old wikigeezer. Textorus (talk) 20:29, 27 September 2018 (UTC) |
The Signpost: 1 October 2018[edit]
- From the editor: Is this the new normal?
- News and notes: European copyright law moves forward
- In the media: Knowledge under fire
- Discussion report: Interface Admin policy proposal, part 2
- Arbitration report: A quiet month for Arbcom
- Technology report: Paying attention to your mobile
- Gallery: A pat on the back
- Recent research: How talk page use has changed since 2005; censorship shocks lead to centralization; is vandalism caused by workplace boredom?
- Humour: Signpost Crossword Puzzle
- Essay: Expressing thanks
Edit protected request[edit]
Thank you for granting my edit request, Xaosflux! I would have thanked you on that talk page; however, I thought it best to return the page to a redirect since it is used on many pages that way. Thanks again! Paine Ellsworth put'r there 15:34, 1 October 2018 (UTC)
- Noticed on the same day I thanked you, you also notified Jackmcbarn of the consequences of inactivity. Don't suppose you have heard anything about ol' Jack, have you? Paine Ellsworth put'r there 18:41, 1 November 2018 (UTC)
- @Paine Ellsworth: nope, Jack appears to have left the project, he is of course welcome back and upon return can just ask for this admin access back (if it's not too long away). — xaosflux Talk 18:45, 1 November 2018 (UTC)
- Jack is one of the editors who has helped me for years, esp. with modules and templates. Looking over his contributions, I don't see anything to indicate why he would leave the project. If you concur, do you know of any way we can find out anything about his situation? Paine Ellsworth put'r there 19:43, 1 November 2018 (UTC)
- @Paine Ellsworth: feel free to use Email to try to contact him. — xaosflux Talk 19:48, 1 November 2018 (UTC)
- Well, no response from him yet. Paine
- @Paine Ellsworth: feel free to use Email to try to contact him. — xaosflux Talk 19:48, 1 November 2018 (UTC)
- Jack is one of the editors who has helped me for years, esp. with modules and templates. Looking over his contributions, I don't see anything to indicate why he would leave the project. If you concur, do you know of any way we can find out anything about his situation? Paine Ellsworth put'r there 19:43, 1 November 2018 (UTC)
- @Paine Ellsworth: nope, Jack appears to have left the project, he is of course welcome back and upon return can just ask for this admin access back (if it's not too long away). — xaosflux Talk 18:45, 1 November 2018 (UTC)
Tech News: 2018-40[edit]
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Recent changes
- Ordinary pages can no longer be loaded as javascript. You could do this using
?action=raw&ctype=text/javascriptin the URL. Only fully protected pages in the MediaWiki: namespace or user javascript subpages can be loaded as javascript now. This is for better security. [61][62]
Problems
- New and updated translations from translatewiki.net will not reach the wikis for a while. You can still translate messages on translatewiki.net. The Wikimedia wikis will be updated with the new translations later. This is because of work on the translation system. [63][64]
Changes later this week
The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 2 October. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 3 October. It will be on all wikis from 4 October (calendar).
Meetings
You can join the technical advice meeting on IRC. During the meeting, volunteer developers can ask for advice. The meeting will be on 3 October at 15:00 (UTC). See how to join.- You can join the meeting with the Wikimedia Foundation Search Platform team. The meeting will be on 3 October at 15:00 UTC. See how to join if you want to know how the search function works or have questions.
Future changes
- Because of a data centre test you will be able to read but not edit the wikis for up to an hour on 10 October. This will start at 14:00 (UTC). You might lose edits if you try to save during this time. The time when you can't edit might be shorter than an hour. You can read more about this.
Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.
Please comment on Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Infoboxes[edit]
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Infoboxes. Legobot (talk) 04:30, 2 October 2018 (UTC)
Special:Redirect/logid/92487000[edit]
I'm guessing you didn't mean to assign MMS here, so I've removed it. If I was wrong, please feel free to revert. Best, Kevin (aka L235 · t · c) 21:15, 2 October 2018 (UTC)
Articles you might like to edit, from SuggestBot[edit]
Note: All columns in this table are sortable, allowing you to rearrange the table so the articles most interesting to you are shown at the top. All images have mouse-over popups with more information. For more information about the columns and categories, please consult the documentation and please get in touch on SuggestBot's talk page with any questions you might have.
SuggestBot picks articles in a number of ways based on other articles you've edited, including straight text similarity, following wikilinks, and matching your editing patterns against those of other Wikipedians. It tries to recommend only articles that other Wikipedians have marked as needing work. We appreciate that you have signed up to receive suggestions regularly; your contributions make Wikipedia better — thanks for helping!
If you have feedback on how to make SuggestBot better, please let us know on SuggestBot's talk page. -- SuggestBot (talk) 11:42, 3 October 2018 (UTC)
Administrators' newsletter – October 2018[edit]
News and updates for administrators from the past month (September 2018).
Justlettersandnumbers • L235
Bgwhite • HorsePunchKid • J Greb • KillerChihuahua • Rami R • Winhunter
Interface administrator changes
Cyberpower678 • Deryck Chan • Oshwah • Pharos • Ragesoss • Ritchie333
Guerillero • NativeForeigner • Snowolf • Xeno
- Following a request for comment, the process for appointing interface administrators has been established. Currently only existing admins can request these rights, while a new RfC has begun on whether it should be available to non-admins.
- There is an open request for comment on Meta regarding the creation a new user group for global edit filter management.
- Partial blocks should be available for testing in October on the Test Wikipedia and the Beta-Cluster. This new feature allows admins to block users from editing specific pages and in the near-future, namespaces and uploading files. You can expect more updates and an invitation to help with testing once it is available.
- The Foundations' Anti-Harassment Tools team is currently looking for input on how to measure the effectiveness of blocks. This is in particular related to how they will measure the success of the aforementioned partial blocks.
- Because of a data centre test, you will be able to read but not edit the Wikimedia projects for up to an hour on 10 October. This will start at 14:00 (UTC). You might lose edits if you try to save during this time.
- The Arbitration Committee has, by motion, amended the procedure on functionary inactivity.
- The community consultation for 2018 CheckUser and Oversight appointments has concluded. Appointments will be made by October 11.
- Following a request for comment, the size of the Arbitration Committee will be decreased to 13 arbitrators, starting in 2019. Additionally, the minimum support percentage required to be appointed to a two-year term on ArbCom has been increased to 60%. ArbCom candidates who receive between 50% and 60% support will be appointed to one-year terms instead.
- Nominations for the 2018 Arbitration Committee Electoral Commission are being accepted until 12 October. These are the editors who help run the ArbCom election smoothly. If you are interested in volunteering for this role, please consider nominating yourself.
File protection[edit]
Greetings,
I wanted to note that normally sensitive files such as File:Wiktionary-logo-v2.svg and File:Octagon-warning.svg are only upload protected. Edits to the file page do nothing to the file itself and the maintenance burden in form of edit requests is not negligible. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 13:18, 6 October 2018 (UTC)
- I removed the 'edit' protection on those, thanks for the note. — xaosflux Talk 19:21, 6 October 2018 (UTC)
Filter 930[edit]
Hey, you probably aren't online as I'm posting this, but do you think you could set filter 930 to disallow as you said you would? Thanks. SemiHypercube ✎ 16:27, 8 October 2018 (UTC)
Tech News: 2018-41[edit]
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Recent changes
- The Education Program extension was removed from all Wikimedia projects. You can use the Programs and Events Dashboard or the Fountain instead. [65]
Problems
- There was a problem when you copied and pasted from a table with the visual editor. It could add
hrefwhere it shouldn't be. This has now been fixed. [66]
Changes later this week
- Because of a data centre test you will be able to read but not edit the wikis for up to an hour on 10 October. This will start at 14:00 (UTC). You might lose edits if you try to save during this time. The time when you can't edit might be shorter than an hour. You can read more about this.
- Because of the data centre test there will be no new version of MediaWiki this week. Changes for this week will come next week instead.
Meetings
You can join the technical advice meeting on IRC. During the meeting, volunteer developers can ask for advice. The meeting will be on 10 October at 15:00 (UTC). See how to join.
Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.
Please comment on Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (use English)[edit]
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (use English). Legobot (talk) 04:33, 9 October 2018 (UTC)
Precious anniversary[edit]
| Four years! |
|---|
--Gerda Arendt (talk) 06:24, 10 October 2018 (UTC)
Can you take a look at Histlegend?[edit]
I think everything has been addressed per here. Can you check that so we can reset the edit request? Thx for your help. Humanengr (talk) 23:03, 12 October 2018 (UTC)
00000000 listed at Redirects for discussion[edit]
An editor has asked for a discussion to address the redirect 00000000. Since you had some involvement with the 00000000 redirect, you might want to participate in the redirect discussion if you have not already done so. {{3x|p}}ery (talk) 03:43, 15 October 2018 (UTC)
Tech News: 2018-42[edit]
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Problems
- Some pages, edits and users disappeared for a short while after the server switch. Missing content and users was fixed within a day. Some preferences and other things might take a few more days to fix. [67]
- Wikis are updated with new and updated translations from translatewiki.net again. This will happen once a week. The developers are working on fixing the problem so we can have translation updates more often again. [68]
Changes later this week
- When you create an abuse filter that prevents edits you can now write a specific error message for it. Before this all abuse filters that prevented edits had the same error message. [69]
The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 16 October. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 17 October. It will be on all wikis from 18 October (calendar).
Meetings
- There will be no more meetings with the Editing team. This is because not enough Wikimedians were interested. To tell developers which bugs you think are the most important you can use Phabricator as normal. [70]
You can join the technical advice meeting on IRC. During the meeting, volunteer developers can ask for advice. The meeting will be on 17 October at 15:00 (UTC). See how to join.
Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.
13 years of editing[edit]
Please comment on Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (broadcasting)[edit]
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (broadcasting). Legobot (talk) 04:27, 16 October 2018 (UTC)
Delete a mailing list page[edit]
Hi Xaos, please delete this page that you've created long back Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Indian military history task force/Mailing list. It is confusing to have a separate mailing list apart from the members page, so we'll use the latter. Thank You, KCVelaga (talk) 16:10, 21 October 2018 (UTC)
- Template:KCVelaga
Done — xaosflux Talk 16:21, 21 October 2018 (UTC)
Please comment on Wikipedia talk:Article titles[edit]
The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Wikipedia talk:Article titles. Legobot (talk) 04:31, 22 October 2018 (UTC)
Tech News: 2018-43[edit]
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Changes later this week
The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 23 October. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 24 October. It will be on all wikis from 25 October (calendar).
Meetings
You can join the technical advice meeting on IRC. During the meeting, volunteer developers can ask for advice. The meeting will be on 24 October at 15:00 (UTC). See how to join.
Future changes
- The Community Wishlist Survey begins on 29 October. The survey decides what the Community Tech team will work on. You can post proposals from 29 October to 11 November. You can vote on proposals from 16 November to 30 November.
Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.
Wikiquote[edit]
Like it should be!--Risto hot sir (talk) 20:30, 23 October 2018 (UTC)
Baffled by edit filter trigger[edit]
I reported a false positive that disallowed my edit of 18 October and see that there's still no response. In no way did my edit match the filter description "Multiple Obscenities", and I can't find a public filter matching the filter description. In the interest of "assume good faith", should I post to the article's talk page the edit I was attempting and explain what happened? Or might that trigger the same edit filter again?
If it helps to resolve whatever's at issue, I've pasted below the original text and the text edit I was attempting, which at least to my eyes is an improvement:
Original Text[edit]
- In 1984, British journalist and political commentator Polly Toynbee visited Ikeda at the invitation of the SGI. According to Peter Popham, writing about Tokyo architecture and culture, Ikeda "was hoping to tighten the public connection between himself and Polly Toynbee's famous grandfather, Arnold Toynbee, the prophet of the rise of the East."[163] Polly Toynbeee wrote that she had never met "anyone who exudes such an aura of absolute power as Mr. Ikeda" and others she had talked to “felt they had been drawn into endorsing [Ikeda]."[164][165] In The Guardian in May 1984, she wrote that she wished that her grandfather had not endorsed Choose Life: A Dialogue, his dialogue with Ikeda.[165]
Edited Text (Triggered Edit Filter)[edit]
(Italics = Struck out text from the Original Text Section , Bold = text added to improve the Original Text section above) :In 1984, British journalist and political commentator [[Polly Toynbee]] visited Ikeda '''in Japan''' at ''the'' '''his''' invitation ''of the SGI'' '''conveyed by Dick Causton, SGI leader of the UK'''. According to Peter Popham, writing about Tokyo architecture and culture, ''Ikeda "was hoping to tighten the public connection between himself and Polly Toynbee's famous grandfather, Arnold Toynbee, the prophet of the rise of the East."<ref>Peter Popham, ''Tokyo: The City at the End of the World'' (Tokyo: Kodansha International, 1985; ISBN 4-7700-1226-8), p. 64.</ref>'' Polly ''Toynbeee'' '''Toynbee once''' wrote that she had never met "anyone who exudes such an aura of absolute power as Mr. Ikeda" ''and others she had talked to “felt they had been drawn into endorsing [Ikeda]."'' '''to describe an unsettling opulence with which she was received by him.'''<ref>''Toynbee, "Soka Gakkai and the Toynbee 'Endorsement'"; quoted in Popham, ''Tokyo'', '' '''{{cite book |last=Popham |first=Peter |date=1985 |title=Tokyo: The City at the End of the World |location=Tokyo |publisher=Kodansha International |page=65 |isbn=4-7700-1226-8}}'''</ref>''<ref name="grandfather">{{cite news |title=The Value of a Grandfather Figure |work=The Guardian |author=Polly Toynbee |date=19 May 1984}}</ref>'' In The Guardian in May 1984, she wrote that '''others she had talked to about Ikeda "felt they had been drawn into endorsing him" and that''' she wished ''that'' her grandfather had not '''similarly''' endorsed Choose Life: A Dialogue, his dialogue with Ikeda.''<ref name="grandfather"/>'' '''<ref>{{cite news |title=The value of a grandfather figure |work=The Guardian |author=Polly Toynbee |date=19 May 1984}}</ref> In his response letter to ''The Guardian'', Dick Causton described her reflections as honest and understandable, given the "culture shock" of being hosted as a distinguished guest by Ikeda in a Japanese cultural setting and the "religious shock" of encountering Buddhists as ordinary people, all during a hectic 10-day schedule of interviews with prominent figures arranged by Soka Gakkai at her request.<ref>{{cite news| title=The double shock of Japanese culture |author=Dick Causton |work=The Guardian |date=28 May 1984}}</ref>'''
Tacktician (talk) 16:06, 25 October 2018 (UTC)
- Hi @Tacktician:, I just left a note at the FP board. This is certainly a false positive but one that will be challenging to fix programmatically. That filter is somewhat complicated and private, but I suspect it hit on your addition of the phrase "dick" 3 three times. This is a false positive as it is a proper name as well as a common vandal term. That specific filter only looks at 'articles', so you can leave an edit request on the associated talk page (use the {{edit semi-protected}} template) and someone will process it for you. — xaosflux Talk 17:04, 25 October 2018 (UTC)
- Thanks for your help. Just to follow up, the protection level on the Daisaku Ikeda page remains intact. I got the edit through by changing "Dick Causton" to "Richard Causton". Conveyed the same to DBigXrayᗙ , who responded to my request for edit on the Daisaku Ikeda Talk page.Tacktician (talk) 17:49, 9 November 2018 (UTC)
- Tacktician, thank you for the WP:Ping. Yes, I can now understand why you were unable to edit the said page. User:Xaosflux May I know how the "edit request" template will help Tacktician, because AFAIK even if I make the edit on behalf of him, it will still hit the edit filter. (Please note, I am not fully aware of how edit filters work, so please be kind if you find my question, silly
). --DBigXrayᗙ 18:16, 9 November 2018 (UTC)
- @DBigXray: Special:AbuseFilter/380 only applies to 'newer' editors. — xaosflux Talk 18:19, 9 November 2018 (UTC)
- I see, thank you for the clarification. Tacktician I will make this edit on your behalf now. --DBigXrayᗙ 18:23, 9 November 2018 (UTC)
- @DBigXray: Special:AbuseFilter/380 only applies to 'newer' editors. — xaosflux Talk 18:19, 9 November 2018 (UTC)
- Tacktician, thank you for the WP:Ping. Yes, I can now understand why you were unable to edit the said page. User:Xaosflux May I know how the "edit request" template will help Tacktician, because AFAIK even if I make the edit on behalf of him, it will still hit the edit filter. (Please note, I am not fully aware of how edit filters work, so please be kind if you find my question, silly
- Thanks for your help. Just to follow up, the protection level on the Daisaku Ikeda page remains intact. I got the edit through by changing "Dick Causton" to "Richard Causton". Conveyed the same to DBigXrayᗙ , who responded to my request for edit on the Daisaku Ikeda Talk page.Tacktician (talk) 17:49, 9 November 2018 (UTC)
Confirmed user reversal[edit]
Hi,
I am currently working on a proposed sister project called VideoWiki where we allow to collaboratively edit a video file for Wikipedia.
You can verify about Videowiki at:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wiki_Video
Kindly request you to mark me confirmed as this account is connected to Wikipedia's OAuth and VideoWiki's features will be disrupted.
--Videowiki123 (talk) 17:14, 25 October 2018 (UTC)
- @Videowiki123: the 'confirmed' flag is normally a temporary flag for very new accounts and gets replaced by the 'autoconfirmed' flag which is now on your account. You should be able to see you have this access now in Special:UserRights/Videowiki123. Are you having any current issues? — xaosflux Talk 17:18, 25 October 2018 (UTC)
Yes, I am getting an error saying "user is blocked from editing". Did not face this error before. So pretty sure this is because of removal of this username from "confirmed" list. However, IF you could switch this user back to "confirmed" temporarily, then I can try to see if this error still persists. That way, we can be 100 percent sure about whether the removal of "confirmed" user has caused this error. --Videowiki123 (talk) 17:50, 25 October 2018 (UTC)
- @Videowiki123: I added that flag (you may confirm at Special:UserRights/Videowiki123) - if you keep getting this error, some screen shots may help us figure out how to fix it for you and other that could have the same issue. — xaosflux Talk 18:16, 25 October 2018 (UTC)
The reason for the unexpected error message is due to a block of this user-account by a user (Vituzzu). This block has disabled the OAuth associated with this account, resulting in VideoWiki not working. Could you please "unblock" this user account? Is there a permanent way where this user account cannot get blocked by other users? This is important because VideoWiki will stop working if some user ends up blocking this user account in the future again. Please find the Commons link which shows the screenshot of the error message for your verification. The description in the Commons link provides more context. https://commons.m.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Videowiki_OAuth_API_error.png --Videowiki123 (talk) 07:03, 26 October 2018 (UTC)
- This may be an autoblock on meta or commons, you will need to follow up with Vituzzu. — xaosflux Talk 11:48, 26 October 2018 (UTC)
- @VideoWiki123: and any account may be blocked, if your edits don't follow community policies blocking could be used. — xaosflux Talk 11:49, 26 October 2018 (UTC)
NPP: new copyvio bot[edit]
Ni. Thanks for the heads up, indeed I wasn't aware of it. I expect Insertcleverphrasehere will mention it in his next NPP newsletter. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 19:16, 25 October 2018 (UTC)
ZackBot 12[edit]
Howdy. I'm sure you have plenty on your plate, but would be wonderful if you could take a look at Wikipedia:Bots/Requests_for_approval/ZackBot_12 when you have time. :-) --Zackmann (Talk to me/What I been doing) 17:18, 27 October 2018 (UTC)
The Signpost: 28 October 2018[edit]
- From the editors: The Signpost is still afloat, just barely
- News and notes: WMF gets a million bucks
- In the media: Bans, celebs, and bias
- Discussion report: Mediation Committee and proposed deletion reform
- Traffic report: Unsurprisingly, sport leads the field – or the ring
- Technology report: Bots galore!
- Special report: NPP needs you
- Special report 2: Now Wikidata is six
- In focus: Alexa
- Gallery: Out of this world!
- Recent research: Wikimedia Commons worth $28.9 billion
- Humour: Talk page humour
- Opinion: Strickland incident
- From the archives: The Gardner Interview
Relisted AFD discussions[edit]
If I vote in an AFD discussion, can I vote again after it gets relisted? —Eli355 (talk • contribs) 21:21, 28 October 2018 (UTC)
- Hi @Eli355:, AfD's are not votes, you are welcome to continue discussing it after relisting. — xaosflux Talk 21:26, 28 October 2018 (UTC)
- What do you mean by "AfD's are not votes"? —Eli355 (talk • contribs) 21:36, 28 October 2018 (UTC)
- @Eli355: see Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion#Contributing_to_AfD_discussions, when XfD's are closed and acted upon a numerical count of the participants is not a primary factor in the decision. — xaosflux Talk 22:52, 28 October 2018 (UTC)
- Suppose I vote in an AFD discussion. After that, the discussion relisted. Can I vote for a second time after the relisting? —Eli355 (talk • contribs) 23:42, 28 October 2018 (UTC)
- @Eli355: AfD's are discussions. You are welcome to continue to add to the discussion while it is open (or reopened), you may make 1 comment on it, you may make 10 comments on it. — xaosflux Talk 00:56, 29 October 2018 (UTC)
- @Eli355: AfD is a venue where it is discussed if an article should be kept or deleted. You can comment, and present your arguments numerous times in the said discussion. You should see some previous AfDs for example. At the top of my head, you can see it in Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Hyperbolic asteroid. —usernamekiran(talk) 07:02, 29 October 2018 (UTC)
- @Eli355: see Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion#Contributing_to_AfD_discussions, when XfD's are closed and acted upon a numerical count of the participants is not a primary factor in the decision. — xaosflux Talk 22:52, 28 October 2018 (UTC)
- What do you mean by "AfD's are not votes"? —Eli355 (talk • contribs) 21:36, 28 October 2018 (UTC)
Boo![edit]
Hello Xaosflux:
Thanks for all of your contributions to improve Wikipedia, and have a happy and enjoyable Halloween!
– —usernamekiran(talk) 07:02, 29 October 2018 (UTC)
Interface Edit Requests - Bot Table[edit]
Hello Xaosflux, as an interface administrator I wanted to let you know that there are two pages you should consider watch-listing: Wikipedia:Interface administrators' noticeboard and User:AnomieBOT/IPERTable. The later is a bot-generated table of all outstanding interface edit requests that you may be able to handle. Thank you for your continuing support of Wikipedia! MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 14:40, 29 October 2018 (UTC)
- Maybe an idea in future to mention who the message is from. I had to check the logs to see that it was from you! Cheers — Martin (MSGJ · talk) 14:55, 29 October 2018 (UTC)
Tech News: 2018-44[edit]
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Recent changes
- You can post proposals for the Community Wishlist Survey. The survey decides what the Community Tech team will work on. You can post proposals until 11 November. You can vote on proposals from 16 November to 30 November.
The wikis now have a content security policy report. This means that you might get a warning in your javascript console when you load external resources in your user scripts. For security reasons it is recommended that you don't do this. It might not be possible to load external resources in your scripts in the future. [71]
Problems
- Your watchlist can show which changes you have already seen. This did not work for a few days. It has been fixed. [72]
Changes later this week
The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 30 October. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 31 October. It will be on all wikis from 1 November (calendar).- The 2006 wikitext editor is no longer available. It will be removed from Special:Preferences. It has not been the standard editor for a long time. It was replaced by the 2010 wikitext editor. [73][74]
Meetings
You can join the technical advice meeting on IRC. During the meeting, volunteer developers can ask for advice. The meeting will be on 31 October at 15:00 (UTC). See how to join.
Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.
Articles you might like to edit, from SuggestBot[edit]
Note: All columns in this table are sortable, allowing you to rearrange the table so the articles most interesting to you are shown at the top. All images have mouse-over popups with more information. For more information about the columns and categories, please consult the documentation and please get in touch on SuggestBot's talk page with any questions you might have.
SuggestBot picks articles in a number of ways based on other articles you've edited, including straight text similarity, following wikilinks, and matching your editing patterns against those of other Wikipedians. It tries to recommend only articles that other Wikipedians have marked as needing work. We appreciate that you have signed up to receive suggestions regularly; your contributions make Wikipedia better — thanks for helping!
If you have feedback on how to make SuggestBot better, please let us know on SuggestBot's talk page. -- SuggestBot (talk) 12:31, 31 October 2018 (UTC)
Administrators' newsletter – November 2018[edit]
News and updates for administrators from the past month (October 2018).
- A request for comment determined that non-administrators will not be able to request interface admin access.
- A request for comment is in progress to determine whether the Mediation Committee should be closed and marked as historical.
- A village pump discussion has been ongoing about whether the proposed deletion policy (PROD) should be clarified or amended.
- A request for comment is in progress to determine whether pending changes protection should be applied automatically to today's featured article (TFA) in order to mitigate a recent trend of severe image vandalism.
- Partial blocks is now available for testing on the Test Wikipedia. The new functionality allows you to block users from editing specific pages. Bugs may exist and can be reported on the local talk page or on Meta. A discussion regarding deployment to English Wikipedia will be started by community liaisons sometime in the near future.
- A user script is now available to quickly review unblock requests.
- The 2019 Community Wishlist Survey is now accepting new proposals until November 11, 2018. The results of this survey will determine what software the Wikimedia Foundation's Community Tech team will work on next year. Voting on the proposals will take place from November 16 to November 30, 2018. Specifically, there is a proposal category for admins and stewards that may be of interest.
- Eligible editors will be invited to nominate themselves as candidates in the 2018 Arbitration Committee Elections starting on November 4 until November 13. Voting will begin on November 19 and last until December 2.
- The Arbitration Committee's email address has changed to arbcom-en
wikimedia.org. Other email lists, such as functionaries-en and clerks-l, remain unchanged.
Tech News: 2018-45[edit]
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Recent changes
- You can now use TemplateWizard to edit templates. This works only with the 2010 wikitext editor and not in the visual editor or the 2017 wikitext editor. If you click on
you can enter the information in a pop-up. You can turn on TemplateWizard in your beta feature preferences. [75]
Changes later this week
- You can choose to see edit conflicts in a two-column view. This is a beta feature. You can find it in your preferences. The interface for the two-column edit conflict will change. You can read more.
- When you edit with the visual editor you can use the "Automatic" citation tab. This helps you generate citations. You will now be able to write plain text citations or the title of a journal article or a book in this tab. This will search the Crossref and WorldCat databases and add the top result. [76]
The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 6 November. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 7 November. It will be on all wikis from 8 November (calendar).
Meetings
You can join the technical advice meeting on IRC. During the meeting, volunteer developers can ask for advice. The meeting will be on 7 November at 16:00 (UTC). See how to join.
Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.
Thanks[edit]
Hi Xaosflux. Thanks for your help, I'll put in the request there soon. CatonMA2 (talk) 18:26, 7 November 2018 (UTC)
User:PrimeBOT[edit]
Could I ask you, as an administrator that is active with the WP:BRFA process, to please take a look at User:PrimeBOT? There are some major issues with their latest run and it concerns me that they are referencing a WP:BRFA from February that seems not to relate to the current task at hand. The script is severely broken and is dumping pages into error categories by the thousands. --Zackmann (Talk to me/What I been doing) 07:25, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
- @Zackmann08: if you have already tried to contact the operator and are still in disagreement with the bot edits, please open a section at WP:BOTN for review. — xaosflux Talk 13:35, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
ARBCOM[edit]
Have you considered running? It's thankless task, but one which I think you'd excel at - TNT 💖 16:50, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
- ...although that does rather come across as "it's a thankless task and so you'll excel at it" :) ——SerialNumber54129 16:53, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
- @There'sNoTime: thanks for the nod of confidence, but I don't have the time to commit to that committee in the upcoming year. — xaosflux Talk 17:20, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
- I was hoping he would go for different elections instead... --Rschen7754 17:55, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
- Thanks @Rschen7754:, but I won't be able to take on any more heavy commitment items until at least next summer. — xaosflux Talk 19:47, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
Tech News: 2018-46[edit]
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Recent changes
- Some old mobile browsers can use the watchlist again. This has not worked for a while. These browsers are called grade C browsers. This helps for example Windows Phone 8.1 with Internet Explorer and Lumia 535 with Windows 10. [77]
Problems
- You can choose to see edit conflicts in a two-column view. This is a beta feature. You can find it in your preferences. Users who use this view saw the edit conflict resolution page when they wanted to see a preview. This has been fixed. [78][79][80]
Changes later this week
The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 13 November. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 14 November. It will be on all wikis from 15 November (calendar).
Meetings
You can join the technical advice meeting on IRC. During the meeting, volunteer developers can ask for advice. The meeting will be on 14 November at 15:00 (UTC). See how to join.
Future changes
- You can use the content translation tool to translate articles. The developers are working on a new version. One of the changes will be a maintenance category. Articles where users add a lot of text from machine translation without changing it will be in that category. This is so the community can review it. The users will also have been warned before they publish the article that it has a lot of unchanged text from machine translations. [81]
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Good Guess![edit]
Looks like you are right SQLQuery me! 19:06, 13 November 2018 (UTC)
A barnstar for you![edit]
| The Admin's Barnstar | |
| Thanks for fixing all those fully-protected double redirects relating to MedCom for me! SemiHypercube ✎ 02:29, 15 November 2018 (UTC) |
Request de. Wiki Jiny Lan[edit]
Hallo Xaosflux, thank you for your suggestion. You wrote: ″...would you like us to import it to your personal sandbox for you to work on first?″ If I understood you right, did you ask me, if you could import to my personal sandbox. Yes of course. This would be very helpful for me. Please let me know, if I misunderstood you and I have to do the import by myself. Thanks a lot and kind regards from GermanyGauthier W. de Reymaker (talk) 21:39, 15 November 2018 (UTC)
YGM[edit]
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