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Wikipedia:Bots/Noticeboard/Archive 12

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KolbertBot block note

This is just an FYI since it was briefly mentioned at ANI, but I blocked User:KolbertBot today at Jon Kolbert's request via IRC because there was an issue with HTTP to HTTPS involving the New York Times, which was causing issues loading the external links. I have no idea what the bot policy is on unblocking as bot policy is not exactly an area of interest to me. So, I'm just posting here to note that I have no objection to any admin member of the BAG lifting the block in line with whatever the policy is if/when the time comes, and would actually much prefer that to doing it myself. TonyBallioni (talk) 03:02, 21 December 2017 (UTC)

If JK asked for a block, I don't see the issue of unblocking upon JK's request from any admin. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 03:14, 21 December 2017 (UTC)
Cool. I didn't know if there was a need for a BAG to comment, just thought it best to check here first. If that's the case, I can handle it (or someone else can if I'm not around). TonyBallioni (talk) 03:40, 21 December 2017 (UTC)

Inactive bots - December 2017

Per the bot policy activity requirements, the following bots will be deauthorized and deflagged in one week. These bots have not made an edit in 2 or more years, nor have their operator made an edit in 2 or more years.

bot_user_name oper_user_name oper_Last_edit bot_user_editcount bot_user_registration bot_Last_edit Notes
User:YpnBot User:Ypnypn 20151217 9805 20130611204919 20140305161942
User:MessengerBot~enwiki N/A N/A 4 20131119192607 20131119194253 Was migrated to User:MediaWiki message delivery
User:Wikinews Importer Bot User:Misza13 20150219 86016 20080103221728 20150617110050
User:NoomBot User:Noommos 20151021 131906 20110205163858 20130421172631
User:Project Messenger Bot User:Noommos 20151021 78 20110403163155 20110714195036
User:WolfBot User:Wolfgang42 20151125 3497 20121014025415 20131227014716

Should an operator wish to maintain their bot's status, please place "keep" and your signature in the notes column above for your bot. Deauthorized bots will need to file a new BRFA should they wish to become reactivated in the future. Thank you, — xaosflux Talk 00:00, 17 December 2017 (UTC)

Discuss
  •   Done All 6 accounts have be de-botted. — xaosflux Talk 12:33, 24 December 2017 (UTC)

Commons Deletion Notification Bot

I am developing a bot which notifies Wikipedia articles when images associated with them in Wikimedia Commons are

  1. nominated for deletion
  2. deleted
  3. Nominated not to be deleted

How can I detect that an image is deleted from commons after nomination? Is there any APIs available for that? Harideepan (talk) 13:07, 2 January 2018 (UTC)

@Harideepan: You should probably go talk to the Community Tech team, as they just had this topic place in their top ten wishes for 2017. See meta:Community Tech/Commons deletion notification bot. --Izno (talk) 14:13, 2 January 2018 (UTC)
Thank you for your response. I am new here. Harideepan (talk) 14:34, 2 January 2018 (UTC)

Bot causing multi colon escape lint error

There are now 8,218 lint errors of type Multi colon escape, and all but 7 of these are caused by WP 1.0 bot. This bug was reported at Wikipedia talk:Version 1.0 Editorial Team/Index#Bot adding double colons 9 October 2017. Perhaps some bot experts who don't typically wander in those parts can apply their skills to the problem. Please continue the discussion there, not here. —Anomalocaris (talk) 06:14, 28 November 2017 (UTC)

Didn't Nihlus already deal with all of these? Primefac (talk) 13:08, 28 November 2017 (UTC)
NilhusBOT 5 is a monthly task to fix the problems with the 1.0 bot until such time as the 1.0 bot is fixed. --Izno (talk) 14:16, 28 November 2017 (UTC)
Correct. I've been traveling lately, so I wasn't able to run it. I am running it now and will let you know when it is done. Nihlus 14:33, 28 November 2017 (UTC)
  • Please see User talk:Nihlus#1.0 log. The problem is that to fix this properly afterward will be more difficult, unless the 1.0 bot, or another task, is done to retroactively rewrite the log page (not only update new entries but correct old ones). —PaleoNeonate – 15:50, 28 November 2017 (UTC)
Basically, I don't have the time but would need to myself properly fix the log today. It's simpler to just revert and fix it properly when I can. —PaleoNeonate – 15:51, 28 November 2017 (UTC)
@PaleoNeonate: Why are you having this discussion in two separate places? I addressed the issue on my talk page. Nihlus 15:55, 28 November 2017 (UTC)

I thought that this may be a more appropriate place considering that it's about 1.0 bot and Nihlusbot, so will resume it here. Your answer did not address the problem. Do you understand that:

  • Before October 5, 2017, category links were fine, but then later were broken, resulting in the same kind of bogus double-colon links as for drafts (these were not mainspace links, but Category: space links)
  • It's possible that draft links were always broken, resulting in the same kind of broken double-colon links
  • Nihlusbot causes both broken category and draft space links to become mainspace links (not Draft: or Category: ones as it should)
  • As a result, the "fix" does not improve the situation, the links are still broken (mainspace red links instead of category and draft links).
  • If keeping these changes and wanting to fix them later, it's more difficult to detect what links were not supposed to be to main space. In any case, to fix it properly, a more fancy script is needed which checks the class of the page...

Thanks, —PaleoNeonate – 23:31, 28 November 2017 (UTC)

Do I understand? Yes, yes, this time it did due to a small extra bit in the code, disagree as stated already, this is something I am working on. Thanks! Nihlus 00:27, 29 November 2017 (UTC)
So, there are issues with almost every single namespace outside of articlespace, so WP 1.0 bot is making a lot of errors and should probably be prevented from continuing. However, until that time, I am limiting the corrections I am making to those that are explicitly assessed as Category/Template/Book/Draft/File-class. If they are classed incorrectly, then they will not get fixed. Nihlus 01:52, 29 November 2017 (UTC)
A few hours ago, there were just 6 Multi colon escape lint errors. Now we have 125, all but 4 caused by WP 1.0 bot. This may be known to those working on the problem. —Anomalocaris (talk) 06:02, 29 November 2017 (UTC)
@Nihlus: thanks for improving the situation. I see that Category links have been fixed (at least the ones I noticed). Unfortunately links to drafts remain to mainspace. —PaleoNeonate – 19:54, 29 November 2017 (UTC)
@PaleoNeonate: As stated above: I am limiting the corrections I am making to those that are explicitly assessed as Category/Template/Book/Draft/File-class. If they are classed incorrectly, then they will not get fixed. Nihlus 19:55, 29 November 2017 (UTC)
Yes I have read it, but unfortunately contest the value of such hackish edits in 1.0 logs. Perhaps at least don't just convert those to non-working mainspace links when the class is unavailable, marking them so they are known not to be in mainspace (those double-colon items never were in mainspace)? A marker, or even a non-linked title would be a good choice to keep the distinction... —PaleoNeonate – 20:48, 29 November 2017 (UTC)
Again, I repeat: I am limiting the corrections I am making to those that are explicitly assessed as Category/Template/Book/Draft/File-class. If they are classed incorrectly, then they will not get fixed. That means those are the only fixes I am making with the bot going forward as I have no intention of supervising each edit made to discern whether something is a draft/project page or not. Nihlus 20:56, 29 November 2017 (UTC)
I am limiting the corrections I am making to those that are explicitly assessed as Category/Template/Book/Draft/File-class. If they are classed incorrectly, then they will not get fixed. We appear to talk past eachother. That is not what technically happened. This diff (which you reverted) was made because links to mainspace were introduced for pages not in mainspace. If your script doesn't touch such links in the future when it cannot determine their class, that's an improvement. You say that you don't correct them, but so far they were still "fixed" (converted to erroneous mainspace links). The "loss of information" from my first complaint was about that those bogus links were previously unambiguously recognizable as non-mainspace (those that are now confusing, broken mainspace links when the class is not in the text). —PaleoNeonate – 05:27, 1 December 2017 (UTC)

CommonsDelinker and Filedelinkerbot

Filedelinkerbot was created to supplement CommonsDelinker, which was performing inadequately, with a lot of unaddressed bugs (including, off the top of my head, breaking templates and galleries) and limited maintenance. Is there any continued need for CommonsDelinker, that cannot be replaced by Filedelinkerbot? There are some issues which I'd like to raise, such as the removal of images from discussion archives (which should really be left as red links), and having single location to discuss such issues would really be preferable. --Paul_012 (talk) 03:46, 27 January 2018 (UTC)

Need someone with a mass rollback script now.

Would someone who has a mass rollback script handy please revert InternetArchiveBot's edits going all the way back to the timestamp in this diff? Kind of urgent. IABot destroyed roughly a thousand articles, due to some communication failure with Wikipedia.—CYBERPOWER (Chat) 22:29, 29 January 2018 (UTC)

  Done Nihlus 23:07, 29 January 2018 (UTC)
@Cyberpower678: When you say "destroyed", this means...? --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 23:38, 29 January 2018 (UTC)
It deleted chunks of articles or stuffed chunks of it into the references section, by making massive references out of them.—CYBERPOWER (Chat) 23:40, 29 January 2018 (UTC)
That does not seem to be the case with all articles it edited. eg this change was OK https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Seismic_vibrator&diff=prev&oldid=823022342 Graeme Bartlett (talk) 02:03, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
Most were bad, it was easier to just have that batch rolled back entirely. IABot will eventually pass over it again.—CYBERPOWER (Around) 02:19, 30 January 2018 (UTC)

Slow-burn bot wars

  Moved from WP:ANI#Slow-burn bot wars Primefac (talk) 15:44, 27 January 2018 (UTC)

Does anyone know why two bots edit war over which links to use for archived web refs? By way of example, the edit history of Diamonds Are Forever (novel) shows InternetArchiveBot and GreenC bot duking it out since September 2017. I've seen it on a couple of other articles too, but I can't be that bothered to dig them out. Although no real harm is done, it's mildly annoying when they keep cluttering up my watchlist. Cheers - SchroCat (talk) 14:17, 27 January 2018 (UTC)

That would have to be resolved by the bot owners, probably at Wikipedia:Bots/Noticeboard. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 14:35, 27 January 2018 (UTC)

I added a {{cbignore}} (respected by both bots) until we figure it out. Notify us on our talk page or WP:BO is easiest. -- GreenC 15:40, 27 January 2018 (UTC)

This appears to be an issue with GreenC bot. IABot is repairing the archive link and the URL fragment, and GreenC bot is removing it for some reason.—CYBERPOWER (Chat) 16:55, 27 January 2018 (UTC)
GreenC bot gets the URL from the WebCite API as data authority - this is what WebCite says the archive is saved under. -- GreenC 17:35, 27 January 2018 (UTC)
GreenC bot could use the |url= as data authority, but most of the time it is the other way around where the data in |url= is truncated and the data from WebCite is more complete. Example, example. So I went with WebCite as being more authoritative since that is how it's saved on their system. -- GreenC 17:47, 27 January 2018 (UTC)
That's not the problem though. It's removing the fragment from the URL. It shouldn't be doing that.—CYBERPOWER (Chat) 18:15, 27 January 2018 (UTC)
It's not removing the fragment. It's synchronizing the URL with how it was saved on WebCite. If the fragment is not there, it's because it was never there when captured at WebCite, or WebCite removed it during the capture. The data authority is WebCite. This turns out to be a good method as seen in the examples because often the URL in |url= field is missing information. -- GreenC 20:20, 27 January 2018 (UTC)
I'm sorry, but that makes no sense. Why would WebCite, or any archiving service, save the fragment into the captured URL? The fragment is merely a pointer for the browser to go to a specific page anchor. IABot doesn't capture the fragments when reading URLs, but carries them through to archive URLs when adding them.—CYBERPOWER (Chat) 20:27, 27 January 2018 (UTC)
Why is IABot carrying the fragment through into the archive URL? It's not used by the archive (except archive.is in certain cases where the '#' is a '%23'). -- GreenC 21:26, 27 January 2018 (UTC)
Do you understand what the fragment is for? It's nothing a server ever needs to worry about, so it's just stripped on their end. It is a browser pointer. If the original URL had a fragment, attaching the same fragment to the archive URL makes sense so the browser goes straight to the relevant section of the page as it did in the original URL.—CYBERPOWER (Chat) 21:39, 27 January 2018 (UTC)
Yeah I know what a fragment does (though was temporarily confused I forgot they worked at other services). But fragments don't work with WebCite URLs. We tack the "?url=.." on for RFC long-URL reasons but it is dropped when doing a replay (example). So there is no inherent reason to retain fragments at WebCite. However.. I can see the logic to keep them for some future purpose we can't guess at. And since it's already been done, by and large. So I will see about modifying GreenC bot to retain the fragment for WebCite (it already does for other services).
There is the other problem as noted: IABot -> GreenCbot - any idea what might have caused it? -- GreenC 22:17, 27 January 2018 (UTC)
Well even if it is dropped, which it should do, it still doesn't change the fact the page anchors exist. I'll give you an example of what I mean.—CYBERPOWER (Chat) 22:23, 27 January 2018 (UTC)
The fragment is not the part after the ?, that is the query string. The fragment is the part after the #. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 22:24, 27 January 2018 (UTC)
Yes I understand but it's different with WebCite URLs fragments don't work for reasons noted above. Try it: https://www.webcitation.org/5utpzxf0T?url=http://www.ymm.co.jp/p/detail.php?code=GTP01085336#song . Also on a different matter, what about this edit sequence? IABot -> GreenCbot -- GreenC 23:36, 27 January 2018 (UTC)
GreenC bot is now carrying through the fragment in-line with IABot per above. -- GreenC 00:47, 28 January 2018 (UTC)
Oh I see what you mean. The anchors don't actually work there, despite the fragment. In any event, IABot doesn't selectively remove them from WebCite URLs, as the fragment handling process happens during the archive adding process during the final stages of page analysis, when new strings are being generated to replace the old ones. I personally don't see the need to bloat the code to "fix" that, but then there's the question, what's causing the edit war?—CYBERPOWER (Chat) 00:52, 28 January 2018 (UTC)
GreenC bot is fixed so it won't strip the fragment there shouldn't be any more edit wars over it, but there are probably other edit wars over other things we don't know about. Not sure how to find edit wars. -- GreenC 04:31, 28 January 2018 (UTC)
Not sure how to find edit wars. Perhaps your bots could look at the previous edit to a page, and if it was made by its counterpart, log the edit somewhere for later analysis. It won't catch everything, and it might turn up false positives, but it's something. ​—DoRD (talk)​ 14:42, 28 January 2018 (UTC)
GreenC bot targets pages previous edited by IABot so there always overlap. -- GreenC 15:01, 28 January 2018 (UTC)
Maybe a pattern of the two previous edits being GreenC and IAbot? ​ Galobtter (pingó mió) 15:09, 28 January 2018 (UTC)
And/or the edit byte sizes being the same.. but it would take a program to trawl through 10s of thousands of articles and 100s of thousands of diffs it wouldn't be trivial to create. But a general bot-war detector would be useful to have for the community. -- GreenC 15:18, 28 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Many thanks to all. I never knew this board existed (thus the original opening at ANI), but thanks to all for sorting this out. Cheers - SchroCat (talk) 09:53, 28 January 2018 (UTC)
  • It looks like the bots disagree over something else too, according to this history and this. Is this the same sort of issue? Thanks - SchroCat (talk) 10:00, 3 February 2018 (UTC)
For Isabella Beeton it looks like the bot war will continue. @Cyberpower678: do you know why IABot made this edit? [1] - it removed the "url=" portion from the URL. -- GreenC 22:46, 3 February 2018 (UTC)
For Moonraker (novel), IABot is double-encoding the fragment ie. %3A -> %253A (%25 is the code for %). Although this is in the |url= it is garbage data. So I manually changed the |url= [2] removing the double encoding, re-ran IABot and it reports modifying the link, but no diff shows up. -- GreenC 23:11, 3 February 2018 (UTC)
Based on the above there is garbage data and this is causing the bots to disagree. I believe GreenC bot data is accurate - it gets it from the WebCite API and there is no way it is wrong because it is used to create the snapshot with. The data in the |url= field used by IABot is problematic. Ideally IABot would also use the WebCite API. However failing that I can see trying to fix both the |archiveurl= and |url= fields which might keep IABot from reverting. -- GreenC 23:20, 3 February 2018 (UTC)
Update: Made two changes to WaybackMedic that should help some. 1. when modifying the WebCite URL also modify the |url= to match. This will keep IABot from reverting in some cases but not all. 2. log changes and when the same change occurs in the same article, it will notify me of a possible bot war. No idea how many this will be. Worse case I'll just add a {{cbignore}}. -- GreenC 16:46, 4 February 2018 (UTC)

I started an RfC regarding IABot

Please see Wikipedia:Village_pump_(proposals)#Disable_messages_left_by_InternetArchiveBot if interested.—CYBERPOWER (Be my Valentine) 19:55, 11 February 2018 (UTC)

ARBCOM: Amendment request: Magioladitis 2

There's an amendment request for the Magioladitis 2 case. Feel free to comment or not.Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 15:58, 16 February 2018 (UTC)

The request was declined and the discussion is now closed. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 21:36, 20 February 2018 (UTC)

KolbertBot

I have some minor concerns about KolbertBot (talk · contribs) editing outside of the scope set forth at Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/KolbertBot as it is editing other editor's comments that contain an http link on Template:Did you know nominations/ subpages ([3] [4] [5]). I personally don't feel the bot should be altering these without approval (as it was never approved for discussion type pages). This can mainly be attributed to the weird DYK nomination process, but I feel it should be discussed before the bot is allowed to continue. I asked Jon Kolbert to bring it up for discussion or to stop editing these pages but was essentially ignored and told "it's better for the readers", so I am bringing it up myself. Nihlus 19:34, 20 February 2018 (UTC)

I don't see anything in the BRFA that restricts KolbertBot from editing DYK nominations. It's specifically listed as allowed to edit in the mainspace and template space. I suppose you could argue that this wasn't the intention, but either way I can't find any attempt at discussing this with the bot op as outlined in WP:BOTISSUE, so I suggest that venue first.
That being said, I don't see the issue with making discussions URL point to the correct http/https protocols, nor is this something that would warrant putting KolbertBot on hold while this is being resolved, assuming consensus is against KolbertBot making those edits in the DYK space. The bot is breaking nothing, at best you have a very mild annoyance. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 21:33, 20 February 2018 (UTC)
It was discussed elsewhere, as I have already stated. Bots should not edit outside their purview and if others have concern then they should be addressed. I don't think the bot should be editing other people's comments, regardless, as it was not approved and not something detailed in its BRFA. If he wants to extend the scope of his bot's actions, then he should get it approved like the rest of us would normally do. I only brought it here because I was ignored in my direct request. Nihlus 22:15, 20 February 2018 (UTC)
The BRFA specifically says to change http->https in mainspace and template namespaces. Your examples are from the template namespace (primarily because nobody wants to fix this legacy process, these discussions aren't templates and don't really belong there at all, but it is an entrenched process). Now is this slightly out of the intent - sure I guess. And asking @Jon Kolbert: to update his code to skip pages starting with Template:Did you know nominations/ seems reasonable. Jon, can this be easily accommodated? — xaosflux Talk 22:33, 20 February 2018 (UTC)
Yes, and that was my only request. I understand what the template namespace is, but I doubt the oddly placed DYK nominations were considered to be "templates", and I don't believe they should be. There is a reason this bot is not running in the Talk or Project namespaces. Nihlus 22:36, 20 February 2018 (UTC)
Nihlus commented on IRC that they thought it wasn't appropriate for KolbertBot to be editing past DYK noms and it wasn't approved. I resoonded by saying it was approved by being in Template namespace, but not as the result of a BRFA specifically dedicated to editing them. Nihlus suggested I should opt to just skip them to which I disagreed, the reasoning being that anyone who refers to past DYKs would benefit by having HTTPS links. I suggested that if they were still opposed to it, to start a discussion so there's consensus to edit those pages or consensus to not edit those pages. I think it's beneficial because not only does it secure more links, some sites switch around their URL format and having those updates made by KolbertBot helps prevent linkrot. To be clear, I'm open to either option (whichever gets consensus), but I prefer continuing to modify the links. Skipping them would not be hard to implement. Jon Kolbert (talk) 23:13, 20 February 2018 (UTC)
@Jon Kolbert: thanks for the note, as these are de facto non-templates it would be best to skip them - if it is not a difficult code change for you. Those pages are unlikely to be seen by most "readers". — xaosflux Talk 23:16, 20 February 2018 (UTC)
@Xaosflux: If that's the desired behaviour, sure. I'll add an exception when I'm back on my desktop. Jon Kolbert (talk) 01:28, 21 February 2018 (UTC)
Thanks Jon Kolbert, if your task changes to be "all namespaces" or the like in the future these can be done again. (note: I have always hated those being in ns-10, screws up lots of things! — xaosflux Talk 02:18, 21 February 2018 (UTC)

Bots Newsletter, March 2018

Bots Newsletter, March 2018
 

Greetings!

Here is the 5th issue of the Bots Newsletter (formerly the BAG Newletter). You can subscribe/unsubscribe from future newsletters by adding/removing your name from this list.

Highlights for this newsletter include:

ARBCOM
BAG
BRFAs

We currently have 6 open bot requests at Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval, and could use your help processing!

Discussions

While there were no large-scale bot-related discussion in the past few months, you can check WP:BOTN and WT:BOTPOL (and their corresponding archives) for smaller issues that came up.

New things
Upcoming

Thank you! edited by: Headbomb 03:12, 3 March 2018 (UTC)

(You can subscribe or unsubscribe from future newsletters by adding or removing your name from this list.)

Somebody help me please

Hi everyone. I'm from another language of wiki and i'm trying to Boot Python. But i can't. can someone tell what i should to do ? --Bazom (talk) 16:22, 3 March 2018 (UTC)

https://stackoverflow.com/questions/4621255/how-do-i-run-a-python-program-in-the-command-prompt-in-windows-7 Google is such a wondrous tool.—CYBERPOWER (Chat) 18:53, 3 March 2018 (UTC)

Bots and the spam blacklist

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T36928

I've noticed that ClueBot III has sometimes triggered the spam blacklist (see Special:Log/spamblacklist/ClueBot III (must be logged in to view)), preventing it from archiving discussions. Is there a way to fix that? I left a message at User talk:ClueBot Commons but it was archived without a reply. — MRD2014 Talk 19:19, 18 March 2018 (UTC)

See phab:T36928 for more on this topic. — xaosflux Talk 19:26, 18 March 2018 (UTC)
@MRD2014: as for the bot behavior, best operation would be for the bot to confirm that their edit of adding text completes before making an edit to remove text. The write could fail for any sort of reason. — xaosflux Talk 13:02, 19 March 2018 (UTC)
At least API returns if the edit fails due to blacklist. But it doesn't say which link (last I checked). So what AAB does is strip all the user text and potential links. It's always tripping on Google's custom search links, since video games project uses a custom reliable source search. —  HELLKNOWZ   ▎TALK 13:20, 19 March 2018 (UTC)
It does tell you what matched the blacklist, e.g. 
{
    "edit": {
        "spamblacklist": "google.com/cse/",
        "result": "Failure"
    }
}
matching that custom search link against the rule \bgoogle\..{2,6}/(cse|amp)/. You can also test individual URLs against the blacklist using action=spamblacklist. Anomie⚔ 22:04, 19 March 2018 (UTC)
Ah, yes, now I remember something like that. —  HELLKNOWZ   ▎TALK 23:10, 19 March 2018 (UTC)

Archive links for "deadurl=no"

What is the consensus on adding archive links, en masse, to articles when unneeded, IOW "deadurl=no"? This adds an enormous amount of bloat, much of which will not be needed. -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 18:51, 28 March 2018 (UTC)

There's been a lot of discussion about this and the end result is "no consensus". I agree it's not a good idea, but other's think it is. -- GreenC 19:53, 28 March 2018 (UTC)
I thought the consensus was in favor of preventing link rot. User:InternetArchiveBot performs this task in order to mitigate link rot, if I am understanding the OP's question correctly. – Jonesey95 (talk) 19:58, 28 March 2018 (UTC)
Like I said, some people agree and others disagree. I'm not here to get into the reasons pro and con. IABot does not add an archive URL to every link on the page (dead or not) by default, is what the OP is saying. It only does if you click the special button in the IABot interface. And not everyone likes that. -- GreenC 20:07, 28 March 2018 (UTC)
The actions are by an editor who adds HUGE amounts of bloat by doing it for nearly 100% live links. Here's one example. Read my edit summary there, then look at their contribution history. I don't see any upside worth this. Adding 100 archive links to some day in the distant future save 5-10 of them? That doesn't make sense. A bot (or editor) should only do this when it's a "deadurl=yes". -- BullRangifer (talk) PingMe 20:17, 28 March 2018 (UTC)
Note the edit summary says "IABotManagementConsole 1.1" - the console has an option check-box to save every link, even when not dead. This is the feature that is controversial. -- GreenC 20:33, 28 March 2018 (UTC)

TohaomgBot

Where is the BRFA for TohaomgBot (talk · contribs) making edits like these? Who allowed it to be approved with huge gaps being created among the navboxes? --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 19:55, 3 April 2018 (UTC)

It looks like the original BRFA didn't have that. Time to block? Looks like xoasflux beat me to it. Primefac (talk) 19:58, 3 April 2018 (UTC)
@Redrose64: bot blocked for operating completely off task. Will message the operator. — xaosflux Talk 20:00, 3 April 2018 (UTC)
Notification left at operator's talk on meta:. — xaosflux Talk 20:05, 3 April 2018 (UTC)

CydeBot

@Cyde: Cydebot (talk · contribs) has been acting up lately, here's one of the many examples. Cards84664 (talk) 02:31, 11 April 2018 (UTC)

I'm wondering if it was this edit by BrownHairedGirl (talk · contribs), where an extra space (possibly two) was used - ; [[ Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2018 April 3]] instead of ;[[Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2018 April 3]]. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 07:48, 11 April 2018 (UTC)
Thanks for the ping, @Redrose64.
Damn. I'm pretty sure my extra space was the culprit. Sorry.
I should have spotted the leading space in the source, but having missed that I was reassured that it rendered OK.
Obviously I should have taken more care, and will keep a close eye on this one in future ... but it also seems to me that this is a case for a small tweak to the bot. --13:35, 11 April 2018 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by BrownHairedGirl (talk • contribs)

Deleted fair-use file

Closing, not a bot error. File restoration request completed. If you want sysops to do something new, please bring up a discussion at WP:AN. — xaosflux Talk 21:56, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

I am not entirely sure if this is the right place to report this incident because it is more related to people not noticing that a bot made a plausible (for a bot, of course) mistake, and not about a bot malfunction. As you can see in my talk page, B-bot nominated for deletion orphaned fair-use file File:The Lord Amulree in 1949.jpg on 4 March. The file became an orphan on 1 March and was eventually deleted on 12 March at 00:00.

I prefer not to say that I am semi-retired because I wish I could be as active as I were in the past, when I edited almost every day, but the truth is I log in very sporadically at this point. I logged in after it had been deleted (ironically, the same day, 18 hours after deletion) and found many (unseen by me, with the files already deleted) of the bot's notices on orphaned fair-use files which were up for deletion. I checked them all and they were all instances of my fair-use file having been replaced by a free file except for this one, the article of which is now without an image. I went to article history and eventually found out that it was all the doing of a sloppy IP edit (diff) which removed the file by pure accident. The person who fixed the mess did not notice that there was a broken file link and just deleted everything, while nobody noticed that the orphaned file did not have an actual replacement. When I found out, I pinged the creator of the bot, B, who never answered, asking for some action to be taken. I am very baffled by this situation and finally decided to take it here.--The Traditionalist (talk) 20:14, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

Hi @The Traditionalist: if I'm reading the above correct, the tagging bot did not make an error (that is the file actually was orphaned and it tagged it correctly)? - and the deleting admin did not make an error either? (i.e. that file actually was fair-use, and actually was orphaned at the time it was deleted). Can you be a bit more specific about what you would like done differently in the future? Is there anything you want done now (e.g. undelete that file - if so you can ask the deleting admin directly or at WP:REFUND if they are inactive). — xaosflux Talk 20:21, 24 April 2018 (UTC)
@Xaosflux: The deleting admin did make a mistake. They did not check whether the file had been replaced or had been removed by accident, the latter being the actual case. I wish for the file to be undeleted and I hope that future deleting admins will check article history when they find an orphaned fair-use portrait of a deceased person to be without a replacement.--The Traditionalist (talk) 20:37, 24 April 2018 (UTC)


This is clearly the wrong place to have placed this. My bad. I will go to WP:RFU. Have a nice day!--The Traditionalist (talk) 20:49, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

Was replying as this was closed (edit conflict), but just wanted to point out that the IP edits shouldn't be dismissed as good-faith "sloppy" edits, and this was no accident (look at each of this IPs edits in sequence). We're in a growing arms race. I see these sort of drive-by IP edits constantly, and it can be time-consuming to track them back to the last good edit after others only partially revert. Probably too much to expect either bots or admins to not miss these sometimes, but we try to do the best we can. What's really needed are more clueful Clue-Bots, but it takes some very skilled programmers to write them. – wbm1058 (talk) 22:18, 24 April 2018 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

How can I increase the API request limit?

I'm developing a bot that examines articles for signs of undisclosed paid editing. It's only gathering data, not making any edits. There are some API queries that I make where it would be useful to be able to return 5000 rather than 500 results at a time. Do I just apply for this like any other bot? I'm an admin and am using my rights for some queries. Ideally, I'd just have the bot flag added to this account, but I'm not sure if that's done. SmartSE (talk) 22:40, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

@Smartse: both sysops and bots have the same 'noratelimit' capability - so if you want this to run on a non-admin account you can apply for a bot flag. That being said, if you are pulling huge numbers of queries ensure you are using maxlag, running in series, and otherwise following all of the mw:API:Etiquette - you can use the standard BRFA process. If you are dealing with very very large results you may be better using a dump. — xaosflux Talk 22:53, 22 April 2018 (UTC)
@Xaosflux: both sysops and bots have the same 'noratelimit' capability Do you mean I can already request 5000? I think I tried before... but that may have been before I had OAuth working properly. Can you give me an idea of "huge numbers"? At the moment I'm maybe making a few per second at max. mw:API:Exturlusage is one where I need more returned. I have downloaded the dump of mw:Manual:Externallinks_table but it doesn't contain namespace information (despite having a column for it). If you know a better way to count how many links there are to specific domain then please let me know! SmartSE (talk) 23:13, 22 April 2018 (UTC)
@Smartse: From what I can tell, "highlimit" is already 500, normal users are 50 (from mw:API:Query). So if you want to move this to a bot and have it work at the same speed as your sysop account it will need a bot flag. "A few per second" (at 5000) per second is 900,000 results per min, thats a good way to get blocked by operations. — xaosflux Talk 23:26, 22 April 2018 (UTC)
Also the 'ratelimit' is about how often you can ask, not the size of the result (which is the limits I listed above). — xaosflux Talk 23:28, 22 April 2018 (UTC)
@Xaosflux: Sorry - busy few days. I'm afraid that I'm still confused... This query when run in my browser does return > 500 values but when I request it using python I only get 500 results... Answering my own question: mw:Special:OAuthConsumerRegistration/propose has a "high-volume editing" option which appears to control the API limit. Regarding request rates - I presumed that it was less work for the servers to return 1 request of 5000 than 10 of 500 - is that not the case? In reality, most of the results will return far less than 5000, so it'd never be reaching 900k/minute. I'll be sure to get some more feedback on what a polite level of requests is before unleashing anything in the wild. SmartSE (talk) 20:43, 25 April 2018 (UTC)
For /w/api.php?action=query&format=json&list=exturlusage&euquery=slashdot.org&eulimit=max, I get 5000 using my bot. Check for "limits": { "exturlusage": 5000 } in the response. I only get 500 on this account. — JJMC89 (T·C) 05:21, 23 April 2018 (UTC)
@JJMC89: Thanks that helped me work out what was going on! SmartSE (talk) 20:43, 25 April 2018 (UTC)
Given the application, I'm wondering if you shouldn't work from the page dumps (and specifically, the current page dumps rather than the full page dumps) instead of the live website. --Izno (talk) 21:57, 25 April 2018 (UTC)

MEATBOT discussion

There's a discussion at WT:AWB which could probably use some input from BAG/botops. Primefac (talk) 14:19, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

Attempts of bot login

I noticed Magioladitis (talk · contribs) reported a login attempt on User:Yobot. I've just had the same on User:Bibcode Bot. Please make sure your bot passwords are secure, as we may be dealing with something systematic. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 21:24, 3 May 2018 (UTC)

They seem to be proceeding ABC order through the list of editors (possibly recent). Regardless, more at WP:AN#Please help- who tried to break into my account? and WP:VPT#two-factor authorization. --Izno (talk) 00:29, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

API Logins being refused

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T193829

FYI, I've personally run in to this and have seen a few other reports. Thread at Wikipedia:Village_pump_(technical)#API_Logins_being_refused. Anyone having this issue right now? — xaosflux Talk 03:19, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

@Xaosflux: - SQLBot uses botpasswords, and ran fine last run: [6]. SQLQuery me! 04:19, 4 May 2018 (UTC)
When I regenerated my botpassword on one account it was able to logon again. — xaosflux Talk 04:27, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

Use of tags by bots

Hi all, I wanted to float a bot idea by those that watch this page. With the tagging system being more mature and open to use during edits what do we think about having bots use tags? I recent approved a trial for Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Community Tech bot 5 using tag bot trial by (see edits here) mostly because I wanted to see this feature get trialed and knew these operators could handle it. But the real question is: do we have support for bots using certain tags in general for all their edits? It may allow for some advanced filtering of RC/WL's. Note: there are some global (via phab) discussions about possibly using a "bot" or other type of tag for all bot edits, a local tag of anything else could always be done in addition. Thoughts? — xaosflux Talk 01:49, 23 May 2018 (UTC)

I'm not sure which bot exactly we'd want tags for. I might make it easier to setup a WP:HIDEBOT on a per-bot basis, but short of that, I can't really come up with a use that would be different from the existing bot flag.
I think it'd be best for tags to be something that's tool-related (AWB/Huggle/Twinkle/Dabsolver/etc...), I could see a use for that.Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 02:59, 23 May 2018 (UTC)
@Headbomb: the primary difference is that the 'bot' flag is part of the recent changes table, while tags stay in history. Any good use-cases there? I am supporting a phab task to use an 'imported' tag for imported versions but that is a more obvious case. Note, this specific task is running WITHOUT a bot flag, as hiding from watchlists would defeat its purpose. — xaosflux Talk 03:31, 23 May 2018 (UTC)
I suppose it doesn't hurt to have the information visible/stored somewhere, I just don't really see a point to it. OK, so an edit was made by a bot... but this was already knowable (from a human perspective) by the bot's account name. Only real use I could see is if someone decided to make a study of bot-edits, it might make their jobs easier. But even there, it'd be a huge pain to retrofit old bots / update existing bots to make use of it, so it'd be a very incomplete dataset. Maybe if the database was updated to retroactively tag every edit made from a bot account and automatically tag them in the future... and then someone could maybe come up with a gadget/CSS thing to hide bot edits from histories, although to what end, I don't really know.
Page creations by bots in various namespaces might be of interest over bot edits, but even there I can't come up with any real scenarios where knowing this is particularly useful. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 03:41, 23 May 2018 (UTC)

Inactive bots - May 2018

Per the bot policy activity requirements, the following bots will be deauthorized and deflagged in one week. These bots have not made an edit in 2 or more years, nor have their operator made an edit in 2 or more years.

BOT_user_name BOT_editcount BOT_user_registration BOT_last_edit Oper_username Oper_lastedit Notes
HBC Archive Indexerbot 165272 20061209003634 20120721005635 Krellis 20160118
HBC AIV helperbot3 140330 20070204005758 20120109193433 Krellis 20160118
OKBot 103883 20070604083415 20140401032952 OsamaK 20160402 account indef blocked
MerlLinkBot 17943 20090114235424 20140406114255 Merlissimo 20160124
KLBot2 96688 20110415001009 20130708121708 Kizar 20160411
The Anonybot 209 20130119073648 20130515040838 The Anonymouse 20160419

Should an operator wish to maintain their bot's status, please place "keep" and your signature in the notes column above for your bot. Deauthorized bots will need to file a new BRFA should they wish to become reactivated in the future. Thank you — xaosflux Talk 23:24, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

Discuss

Operator notifications were sent to user talk pages today. — xaosflux Talk 23:28, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

  Done bot flags removed and accounts marked as retired. Should these bots want to resume operations in the future a new BRFA will be needed. Thank you for your past bot-service! — xaosflux Talk 13:16, 26 May 2018 (UTC)
@Xaosflux: I haven't run my bot in a while, and I wouldn't mind it losing the flag temporarily and being marked (appropriately) as inactive. At the same time, I don't want to lose all my approved BRFAs. If I voluntarily give the flag up unrelated to these activity requirements, would I retain my approvals? ~ Rob13Talk 17:04, 26 May 2018 (UTC)
@BU Rob13: if it is foreseeable that you will ever resume a prior task there is no need to deflag so long as you are around - if your bot account was compromised or started running in error it is expected you would be able to participate in remediation. If you really want the flag removed we would certainly do it, but it isn't really helping anything. — xaosflux Talk 17:16, 26 May 2018 (UTC)
I guess it's more a security thing from my perspective, but if you don't see a need, no worries. ~ Rob13Talk 17:17, 26 May 2018 (UTC)
As to your other question, asking for your currently inactive bots flag to be removed would not expire out all of your prior authorizations, but should you then later become inactive for 2 years it would (and it would actually be much harder to track). This process is primarily built around marking out retired bots where the operator never specifically asked for retirement and just left the project instead. Feel free to block your bot account as well if you want to. — xaosflux Talk 17:19, 26 May 2018 (UTC)

Appearance of Template:Newbot

A few weeks ago, I tweaked {{Newbot}} to actually be readable and stand out from the bot op links found immediately below. Primefac reverted this just a while ago.

The old/current (since this was reverted) looks like this:

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

Time filed: 19:17, 26 May 2018 (UTC)

...

While the new/reverted version looks like this:

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

Time filed: 19:17, 26 May 2018 (UTC)

...

This isn't something I want to edit war over, but I strongly feel the bigger version is better, with the links about the same size as the header, creating a stronger association with the bot. The emphasis should be on the bot links, not the operator links. What does everyone else think? Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 19:17, 26 May 2018 (UTC)

Why not make it normal font size? e.g

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

Time filed: 19:17, 26 May 2018 (UTC)

...

Seems better to me - the 125% font size version is far too big, and the current version possibly too small Galobtter (pingó mió) 20:00, 26 May 2018 (UTC)
I prefer bigger, but I could live with the 100% version. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 20:02, 26 May 2018 (UTC)
The 125% version looks far too big to me. Personally I think the current version is fine, but the 100% version isn't horrible. Anomie⚔ 22:12, 26 May 2018 (UTC)
125% looks too big and it's questionable why we need custom formatting -- is someone somehow failing to find these? 100% is fine. Though I never had any issues with the original one. —  HELLKNOWZ   ▎TALK 22:20, 26 May 2018 (UTC)
Alright, since everyone seems fine with the 100% version, let's go there. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 22:23, 26 May 2018 (UTC)
  • Any of them are fine for me. — xaosflux Talk 23:14, 26 May 2018 (UTC)
  • 100 or smaller is fine by me. Primefac (talk) 23:19, 26 May 2018 (UTC)
  • First preference: normal size for running text; second pref: slightly smaller than that but within MOS:ACCESS#Text; No-no: bigger text, or text smaller than permitted by MOS:ACCESS#Text. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 08:11, 28 May 2018 (UTC)
  • Not a fan of the 125% version, any of the others are fine. ƒirefly ( t · c · who? ) 10:53, 28 May 2018 (UTC)
  • I, for one, have been confused by the multifarious tiny links. I think changing to 100% for the bot links and keeping the small status quo for the operator's is a good change. Thanks to Headbomb for starting this conversation with a bold edit. – Jonesey95 (talk) 01:47, 29 May 2018 (UTC)

Removal of bot permissions from User:HasteurBot

I'm retiring, permanantly after repeated abuses by editors and admins of "requests" that are being forced in as policy. I'm retiring because of out of order closes and patently wrong decisions. As such I request that HasteurBot be de-flagged as a bot. Hasteur (talk) 16:06, 3 June 2018 (UTC)

  Done should you return just file a new WP:BRFA if you would like to reactivate. — xaosflux Talk 16:34, 3 June 2018 (UTC)

Request suspension of KasparBot "deletion of persondata" message task until isuses resolved

Hi, three times now I've had User:KasparBot post messages on my talk page telling me that I have made an edit to add the {{persondata}} template, which is a deprecated template. However, all the edits are old ones from > 4 years ago when persondata was used, so for some reason or another the bot is incorrectly picking up those old edits. I posted twice on the bot operator's talk page, User:T.seppelt, both at least several months ago, yet got no response. Having had another such incorrect message today, and no response from bot operator, I request that the bot's task is suspended until it can be updated to ignore old edits. Thanks Rjwilmsi 08:11, 13 June 2018 (UTC)

Rjwilmsi, the reason you were notified (at least in this instance) was because the page was deleted in 2015 and restored earlier today. So before to day there was no {{persondata}} template, and today there was, so the bot went through the edits to find who added it. It's a weird glitch, but it's not any fault of the bot. Primefac (talk) 12:26, 13 June 2018 (UTC)
Thanks for explanation, though I find it unconvincing that it's a scenario that can't be handled - surely the bot should be checking the date/time of the edit? Rjwilmsi 12:54, 13 June 2018 (UTC)
Personally, I would rather the bot only notified people if the template was added recently (i.e. within the last month). Any further back than that there isn't much point in notifying. ƒirefly ( t · c · who? ) 13:04, 13 June 2018 (UTC)
  • Hello @Rjwilmsi:, in reviewing this I think this specific task should no longer be required, but it is extremely low volume - with only 20 edits all year that all seem related to deletion/rev deletion/long-spanning reversions. Will reach out to the bot operator to see about suspending this task - they are odd edge cases and in some instances legitimate, but not as useful as they once were. With primarily constructive tasks still running, blocking the bot (the only option we can really 'force' on it) doesn't seem like a good choice right now. — xaosflux Talk 13:10, 13 June 2018 (UTC)
    Operator user talk left; Operator email sent. — xaosflux Talk 13:13, 13 June 2018 (UTC)

User:Legobot stopped indexing my talk page

Legobot has stopped indexing my talk page. See the time stamp at User talk:Tyw7/Archive index --Tyw7  (🗣️ Talk to me • ✍️ Contributions) 21:18, 9 June 2018 (UTC)

Spam post. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 19:35, 10 June 2018 (UTC)
Is the bot even doing Task 15 aka taking over User:HBC Archive Indexerbot? I've searched Wikipedia and it seems it stopped indexing around 2016. --Tyw7  (🗣️ Talk to me • ✍️ Contributions) 19:52, 10 June 2018 (UTC)
@Tyw7: As I pointed out at User talk:Redrose64#Legobot index you have sent basically the same message to at least six different discussion pages, in clear contravention of WP:MULTI. For any bot problem, your first contact should be the bot's talk page; since your problem is with Legobot (talk · contribs) its talk page will be User talk:Legobot, where you have already posted. If no reply is forthcoming, the next place to leave a message is the talk page for the operator of the bot; the botop may be identified from the bot's user page; User:Legobot shows that the botop is Legoktm (talk · contribs), whose talk page is User talk:Legoktm. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 19:44, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

And I have already done that but received no reply. I think User:Legoktm might be busy, so so the next logical posting will be on this board which is for bot related issues. I posted on your talk page cause I thought you knew about the bot since you commented on other person asking question about Lego bot. And I thought perhaps you can help me out in case I have set up the bot incorrectly.

I posted on Herem page cause I mistakenly thought he was the joint owner for the bot and thought he could help out. I will wait until Legoktm replies to the thread left on the bot's help page and kindly redirect any further discussion to User_talk:Legobot#Bot_no_longer_indexing_my_talk_page--Tyw7  (🗣️ Talk to me • ✍️ Contributions) 20:39, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

Hi @Tyw7: Other then looking at the situation, there isn't much we can actually do here. If a bot is making bad edits and the operator is unresponsive we would certainly step in and do something about it. In your case, edits are not being made at all. A look at these pages suggests the task is still operational in general: 1, 2, 3; however a review of the last 30000 edits Legobot made in the user_talk namespace do not show any of this task activity for user_talk since June 2017, the very last edit being to User talk:Tommyang/Archives/2017. At this point it is solely up to Legoktm if they would like to address this. — xaosflux Talk 13:21, 12 June 2018 (UTC)
@Xaosflux: On a side note, do you know of some other bots doing the same or similiar task? --Tyw7  (🗣️ Talk to me • ✍️ Contributions) 15:35, 12 June 2018 (UTC)
Hi @Tyw7:, it doesn't look like anyone else is doing this from my searches, found an expired attempt in Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Demibot. You could ask someone to build this over at Wikipedia:Bot requests. — xaosflux Talk 19:42, 12 June 2018 (UTC)
Done. Wikipedia:Bot_requests#Indexing_talk_page. If any bot makers up to the task, much appreciated. --Tyw7  (🗣️ Talk to me • ✍️ Contributions) 20:08, 12 June 2018 (UTC)
@Tyw7: Just wanted to thank you for all your "leg work" on this issue. Cheers, - FlightTime (open channel) 15:44, 15 June 2018 (UTC)
@FlightTime: Weirdly enough it has indexed Talk:Anatolia according to User_talk:Legobot#Mask_problem_in_Indexerbot_config --Tyw7  (🗣️ Talk to me • ✍️ Contributions) 16:23, 15 June 2018 (UTC)

Help needed: Linter errors on other wikis

See this discussion if you're interested to help. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 23:21, 26 June 2018 (UTC)

Notice of removal of "bot" flag from RM bot

Per the WP:BOTFLAG activity requirements, bot accounts that have had no logged actions or edits for two years, where the listed operator has also had no logged actions or edits for two years, will be deauthorized. User:RM bot has not edited since 18 July 2012 and its operator HardBoiledEggs hasn't edited since 18 February 2012. This bot's task is now performed by RMCD bot. This is the required one-week notification that prior task approvals will be considered expired and bot flags will be removed. – wbm1058 (talk) 14:30, 2 July 2018 (UTC)

@Xaosflux: Bureaucrat help needed. Thanks, wbm1058 (talk) 02:14, 14 July 2018 (UTC)
  Done — xaosflux Talk 02:22, 14 July 2018 (UTC)

SSTbot adding level 5 vital articles

See [7] - is this really a good idea? I see one of the sons of Noah, Shem, was tagged today as a Level 5 vital article. Pinging User talk:Feminist. Doug Weller talk 15:49, 8 August 2018 (UTC)

@Doug Weller: can you elaborate on your concern? Was the page not actually a Wikipedia:Vital articles/Level/5 article? Do you think these just shouldn't be tagged? — xaosflux Talk 17:27, 8 August 2018 (UTC)
@Xaosflux: This may be the wrong board. Yes, I don't think one of the sons of Noah is really a vital article as it's not on the list. I can see how a bot can be tagging vital articles from a list, but that doesn't seem to be what's happening here. I will admit that if there are to be 50,000 level 5 articles which should be FA, this one doesn't seem to be top 50,000, but that's an issue for somewhere else, I'm not sure where. What I see here is a bot tagging articles not in the list. Doug Weller talk 17:42, 8 August 2018 (UTC)
@Doug Weller: Shem appears on Wikipedia:Vital_articles/Level/5/Philosophy_and_religion#Abrahamic_and_Judaic_mythology_(15_articles) - so it doesn't appear to be malfunctioning - if you think it is malfunctioning this is certainly the right venue to bring it up! If you disagree with the contents of the V5 list, Wikipedia talk:Vital articles/Level/5 may be better. — xaosflux Talk 17:46, 8 August 2018 (UTC)
@Xaosflux: you had me worried for a moment, I thought I might be going blind. I was looking at Wikipedia:Vital articles/Level/5 which doesn't include it. The title of the list you linked to seems misleading, as if you look closely it includes Level 4 articles, eg Noah and his 3 sons. Wikipedia:Vital articles/Level/5/People/Religious figures also includes a variety of levels. So if the bot is using these pages to tag all articles as Level 5, it shouldn't be doing that. Doug Weller talk 18:28, 8 August 2018 (UTC)
@Doug Weller: see WP:BOTISSUE. Your best bet, contact the bot operator. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 18:57, 8 August 2018 (UTC)
I think those non-5's are on that list just for reference, did you find any level-4's that were getting tagged as level-5? If so, certainly start by contacting the operator, if they are unresponsive or you are still in disagreement we can certainly revisit the task here. Best regards, — xaosflux Talk 20:19, 8 August 2018 (UTC)
I think the list is just silly. Considering Noah Level 4 but one of his sons Level 5 is certainly odd. ~ Rob13Talk 09:29, 17 August 2018 (UTC)
@BU Rob13: that list is by nature subjective, and it appears lower "levels" are more important - I don't think it's odd that someone would think that improving Noah would be more beneficial to our readers than improving Ham (son of Noah). In any case, I'm not seeing any bot-specific problems here are you? — xaosflux Talk 10:56, 17 August 2018 (UTC)
Oh, whoops! I thought the list went the other direction, with higher levels being more important. I'll shut up now. And no, I'm not seeing a bot-specific problem. I was just noting that, to the extent any problem exists, it is with the subjective list, not with the bot. ~ Rob13Talk 11:35, 17 August 2018 (UTC)

WP:AWB: New version is out

Just a heads up that a new version of AWB is out. The most important change (for me) is T159958. The "in template" lookup logic in the advanced find/replace has been tweaked to find something like {{cite journal}} in something like 

{{reflist|
*{{cite journal |... }}
}}

whereas before you couldn't reach it because it was nested in a {{reflist}}. Many thanks to @Reedy: for the new version. A (partial?) changelog is available at here. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 01:41, 18 August 2018 (UTC)

Bots Newsletter, August 2018

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:

ARBCOM
  • Nothing particular important happened. Those who care already know, those who don't know wouldn't care. The curious can dig ARBCOM archives themselves.
BAG
  • There were no changes in BAG membership since the last Bots Newsletter. Headbomb went from semi-active to active.
  • In the last 3 months, only 3 BAG members have closed requests - help is needed with the backlog.
BOTREQs and BRFAs

As of writing, we have...

Also

Discussions

These are some of the discussions that happened / are still happening since the last Bots Newsletter. Many are stale, but some are still active.

New things

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.)

Protection template bot?

I do not think there is a bot that automatically adds a protection template to pages once an admin protects them. I'm used to adding the protection template myself, to the point that some admins left messages on my talk page concerning the matter. But from what it looks like, there at least used to be a bot that did it, but I'm not sure if it's working. This is why I'm bringing this up on this noticeboard and not the bot request page. Funplussmart (talk) 10:52, 8 August 2018 (UTC)

Continued at Wikipedia:Bot_requests#Automatically_add_protection_templates_to_protected_pages Ronhjones  (Talk) 18:02, 18 August 2018 (UTC)

Discussion concerning WP:BOTFLAG/WP:RC

Main page: Wikipedia:Village pump (technical) § Bot edits not hidden in RecentChanges

In particular, there might be a need to update WP:CREATEBOT with additional guidance. I know very little here, so I'll let others update the guide if that's needed. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 02:11, 6 August 2018 (UTC)

@Headbomb: in a nutshell, some terminology is easy to confuse. The "bot group" gives an account access to the "bot permission". Having the "bot permission" lets an account use the "bot flag". The bot flag is what marks an edit as a "bot edit". When editing via the web interface the "bot flag" is assumed unless suppressed on edit, when editing via the api interface the "bot flag" must be asserted with each edit that wants to be marked as a bot edit. In general most bot tasks will use a bot flag, except for ones where it is desirable to be seen on things like watchlists (for example BAGBOT updating the bots list). When a brand new bot is being trialed, we can't check if this is being used since it won't have access - for new tasks we can check the edits to see. — xaosflux Talk 02:19, 6 August 2018 (UTC)
@Xaosflux: Yeah, but what I mean is don't tell me, let's tell bot ops in general, somewhere. Probably as a section of WP:CREATEBOT#How does a Wikipedia bot work?, but anywhere that makes sense would also work. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 02:23, 6 August 2018 (UTC)
@Headbomb: didn't mean to be needlessly "telling you" , mostly this was for general use just was in reply to you. It is something we can be sure BAG is talking about, perhaps add it to the BRFA list (will you be asserting the BOT FLAG?" as a new question? — xaosflux Talk 02:25, 6 August 2018 (UTC)
That's an idea. I'm assuming AWB/Pywikipedia takes care of that automatically already? Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 02:28, 6 August 2018 (UTC)
By default pywikibot flags edits made by users with the bot right as bot edits. Users can also specify whether or not edits should be flagged as bot edits. — JJMC89 (T·C) 03:00, 6 August 2018 (UTC)
Just a note for future docs: if using Special:BotPasswords be sure to have "High-volume editing" selected to enable "bot" grants. — xaosflux Talk 04:53, 6 August 2018 (UTC)
That also applies to OAuth. — JJMC89 (T·C) 04:57, 6 August 2018 (UTC)
I added a small section at Wikipedia:Creating_a_bot#Bot_Flag Ronhjones  (Talk) 18:13, 18 August 2018 (UTC)

Out of curiosity... (to all bot operators)

How many of you use BotPasswords, and how many of you use OAuth, and why?—CYBERPOWER (Chat) 21:05, 8 August 2018 (UTC)

  • I use OAuth because of the security aspect.—CYBERPOWER (Chat) 21:05, 8 August 2018 (UTC)
I just have sessions open for a long time on Toolforge. If I ever need to log in again, I suspect I would use BotPasswords due to convenience. However, if Pywikibot supported OAuth with minimal effort required (and I haven't checked), I would use that instead. Enterprisey (talk!) 21:07, 8 August 2018 (UTC)
No idea what I use, whatever AWB/pywikipedia defaults are I guess, and because they're the default shit and seem to work. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 21:41, 8 August 2018 (UTC)
It does – mw:Manual:Pywikibot/OAuth. — JJMC89 (T·C) 02:34, 9 August 2018 (UTC)
  • BotPasswords, I primarily use AWB that doesn't support OAuth - but also because of the huge pile of phab:T103587. BotPasswords just easily work, and I like the control over using web authentication - OAuth is just too much trouble for single-use consumers. — xaosflux Talk 22:50, 8 August 2018 (UTC)
    I've never had issues specifically related to owner-only consumers. Granted I've discovered a few bugs with OAuth, they're usually critical ones that got fixed promptly. InternetArchiveBot runs on OAuth.—CYBERPOWER (Chat) 23:00, 8 August 2018 (UTC)
    @Cyberpower678: one of the biggest benefits of BP of OA I see is that it is self-service, you want to use it - just go do it, no fussing around with have to go over to meta and fill out applications, having to republish if you want to modify a grant, etc. — xaosflux Talk 14:07, 9 August 2018 (UTC)
    User:Xaosflux. I think phab:T103587 is for things like web tools where end-users are represented by the tool for making edits to Wikipedia (similar to the Internet Archive Bot web tool). For bots, there is only 1 user, owner-only consumer, which is significantly more simple. The credential registration is automatically approved (within seconds) there's no backlog or waiting for approval because if the account has a bot-flag it is considered good enough for auto approval. It's basically self-service, filling out the application takes a minute or less. -- GreenC 14:23, 9 August 2018 (UTC)
  • BotPasswords because AWB. I think both are valid and would not favor one over the other in the approvals process, if that's a relevant component of your question. ~ Rob13Talk 23:35, 8 August 2018 (UTC)
  • A shell command-line OAuth method for saving pages is wikiget, it's fast, not language-dependent and installs as a single file. Oauth setup instructions -- to save a page: ./wikiget -E <page name> -S <edit summary> -P <text file> -- GreenC 23:45, 8 August 2018 (UTC)
  • I use OAuth for pywikibot (most of my bot work) because it is more secure and BotPasswords for AWB since OAuth isn't supported. — JJMC89 (T·C) 02:34, 9 August 2018 (UTC)
    I'm surprised AWB doesn't support it. That's a little sad actually, given the dedicated devs that develop it.—CYBERPOWER (Chat) 13:43, 9 August 2018 (UTC)
    • AWB hasn't had an update in well over a year (@Reedy: here for a reminder an AWB update would be a godsend). It's holding back a lot of things. No idea if OAuth support would add anything to AWB though. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 14:43, 9 August 2018 (UTC)
Passwords are insecure, quite simply. There's a reason the world is moving to OAuth. If AWB doesn't move to OAuth, and there is a serious security incident, I wonder how the WMF sysadmins would respond given their job to protect the Wikimedia servers and infrastructure. -- GreenC 15:36, 9 August 2018 (UTC)
Russia getting into User:MinusBot just fills me with dread. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 15:39, 9 August 2018 (UTC)
BOFH too -- GreenC 15:45, 9 August 2018 (UTC)
I have no idea what my bot's real passwords are. :p—CYBERPOWER (Chat) 18:25, 9 August 2018 (UTC)
I make my bot solve a captcha for each edit! — xaosflux Talk 00:25, 13 August 2018 (UTC)
I've put a snapshot release of latest AWB SVN here https://sourceforge.net/projects/autowikibrowser/files/autowikibrowser/Snapshots/ which should help some users (@Headbomb: etc.) until the next formal release. Rjwilmsi 07:54, 11 August 2018 (UTC)
  • Botpasswords on custom php classes. SQLQuery me! 02:38, 9 August 2018 (UTC)
  • BotPasswords because I'm too lazy to integrate OAuth and do I really need it? —  HELLKNOWZ   ▎TALK 11:06, 11 August 2018 (UTC)
    @Hellknowz: Yes! Yes, you do! Why? Because I said so, and I am the bot law. ;-)—CYBERPOWER (Chat) 23:27, 12 August 2018 (UTC)
    May be later... —  HELLKNOWZ   ▎TALK 00:31, 13 August 2018 (UTC)

So, for AWB to be able to use OAuth... We'd really need OAuth2 in MediaWiki. Which we don't have. See phab:T125337. This is due to distribution of secret keys. Or else, it's having everyone register their own OAuth app... I'm also intrigued why you think AWB would be the cause of a "serious security incident". Reedy (talk) 22:29, 16 August 2018 (UTC)

PyWikiBot doesn't require users to register their own OAuth app, but they use OAuth fairly invisibly, how do they do it? -- GreenC 00:22, 17 August 2018 (UTC)
Yes it does. Legoktm (talk) 01:25, 17 August 2018 (UTC)
Ahh then it's defaulting to bot password thought it used OAuth -- GreenC 02:02, 17 August 2018 (UTC)
I think PWB's (pywikibot.Site().login()) tries whatever you put in the config file. If you did not generate an OAuth token, surely it cannot try that? TigraanClick here to contact me 07:54, 20 August 2018 (UTC)
Ever since I created an OAuth function for awk I have not needed PWB or AWB, I don't know why I thought PWB used OAuth other than a vague memory of seeing OAuth in the source and assuming it was being used in the same way other tools can make edits on behalf of editors using OAuth. -- GreenC 13:19, 20 August 2018 (UTC)
  • 2FA on the main bot account (since it's an admin bot), and then use bot password for normal use. Ronhjones  (Talk) 18:06, 18 August 2018 (UTC)
  • OAuth via PWB for me, because the manual said bot passwords are a Bad Thing and as a sheepish rookie botop I followed it. TigraanClick here to contact me 07:54, 20 August 2018 (UTC)

Help talk:Citation Style 1#New parameter that does nothing bot-deny

Please comment at the above link if this something that you could make a use of. Going to ping @Smith609, Ocaasi (WMF), Ocaasi, Jonesey95, AManWithNoPlan, CristianCantoro, Nemo bis, Pintoch, Tom29739, and Magioladitis: on this. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 16:46, 21 August 2018 (UTC)

Server test reminder

Hey, a reminder: the there will be a server test over the next few weeks, see m:Tech/Server switch 2018 for more info. On , September 12, it will not be possible to edit the wikis for a short period of time (same goes for October 10). /Johan (WMF) (talk) 12:11, 10 September 2018 (UTC)

New bot-like access group

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T193782

A new "bot-like" user group as appeared, "Copyright violation bots", possibly related to phab:T199359. Thank you to Dolotta for calling this out. @MMiller (WMF): do you have information about what is going on with this initiative and how it will impact editors here? — xaosflux Talk 18:45, 1 September 2018 (UTC)

Ping also to ערן as these tasks have your bot account's name all over them. — xaosflux Talk 18:50, 1 September 2018 (UTC)
Per Special:ListGroupRights, they have the ability to "Tag pages in the Special:NewPagesFeed as likely copyright violations, through the pagetriage-tagcopyvio API (pagetriage-copyvio)". Looks like the group was created in phab:T202041; for use in User:EranBot. Per phab:T201073 "After the attached patch is merged and deployed, there will be a new user group on English Wikipedia called "Copyright violation bots". A bureaucrat on enwiki can then put EranBot in that group." It seems like the purpose is to allow copyright violations detected by EranBot that fill up CopyPatrol to also mark pages as copyright violations on the NPP feed? Galobtter (pingó mió) 18:55, 1 September 2018 (UTC)
Anything like this will certainly need a new BRFA, I seem to recall there was a notable false positive "copyright violation detection" problem with this bot (for example when copying public domain text). — xaosflux Talk 19:01, 1 September 2018 (UTC)
Xaosflux: Thank you for opening this discussion. I haven't yet coded the reporting/using the API from the bot side, and haven't yet asked for this right, but I shall do it soon.
The bot is already running on all changes in enwiki and suspected edits are reported to a database, and users go over them using Copypatrol developed by Community Tech team. Growth team is working on improving Special:NewPagesFeed and are looking for a way to integrate copyvio system into it, and the above tasks can provide some more details.
Would you like me to open a new BRFA under Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/EranBot/2? Eran (talk) 20:32, 1 September 2018 (UTC)
If you are still in beta testing, etc - you don't have to do anything here (yet) - not until such time as you want to start testing edits or actions on (as opposed to against) the English Wikipedia. — xaosflux Talk 20:36, 1 September 2018 (UTC)
Ping to @Roan Kattouw (WMF): for any input. Added phab:T193782 tracking to above. — xaosflux Talk 19:55, 4 September 2018 (UTC)
Hi everyone, my apologies for not having announced this ahead of time. I thought adding an obscure new user group that isn't being used yet to the already quite long list of user groups would be unlikely to be noticed by anyone, but it took less than 48 hours. That'll teach me to never underestimate Wikipedians :)
As others already inferred, the idea behind this group is to put EranBot in it, so that it can tell our software which new pages and drafts it thinks are possible copyvios. I wanted to clarify that this "possible copyvio" flag will only appear on Special:NewPagesFeed and nowhere else. It will say Possible issues: Copyvio and link to CopyPatrol for a more detailed report on why it thinks it might be copyvio; see also this screenshot. CopyPatrol and EranBot are existing tools that already score and list potential copyvios, and we're trying to make it easier to use them for new page patrolling and draft review.
The copyvio feature will be available for testing on test.wikipedia.org soon (stay tuned for an announcement from MMiller (WMF)), and is not enabled on English Wikipedia yet (meaning that even if EranBot is put in this group and starts flagging things, those flags won't be displayed). The reason we need a group is that we need a way to trust only EranBot and not other users to pass us this copyvio information, and we figured the groups+rights system was the least bad way to do that. --Roan Kattouw (WMF) (talk) 22:22, 4 September 2018 (UTC)
@Roan Kattouw (WMF): who is the "we" on this? Will the communities control who we trust to make these inputs? Also please see my note on phab:T199359 or above regarding "unoriginal" vs "copyright infringing" and how this is being determined. — xaosflux Talk 01:59, 5 September 2018 (UTC)
@MMiller (WMF): perhaps you can address? Primary concern: Is this going to label editors contributions as "copyright violations" in situations where they are not actually in violation of a copyright? Where is the actual checking and validation of the terms of use of the copyright of the source material occurring? If this is actually only checking for "text this third party has seen elsewhere" without actually validating the copyright status we shouldn't be casting aspersions of a legal violation. If it is only checking for non-originality suspects, we should only call them out as such. — xaosflux Talk 14:40, 5 September 2018 (UTC)
@Xaosflux: thanks for the question. The work we're doing here is essentially to post the results from the CopyPatrol tool alongside pages in the New Pages Feed. This project has been a collaboration with the NPP and AfC reviewing communities, and our product team has posted as much information as we could about how and why we're building the way we are. CopyPatrol scans all substantial edits (over 500 bytes) by using iThenticate's API (via EranBot), which is a third-party API used by institutions to check original writing for plagiarism. It checks text against its database of websites, academic journals, and books, and says what percent of the text is found in another source. This is not a definitive declaration of copyright violation, because of many potential exceptions. For instance, the text that it finds in multiple locations may in fact be public domain, or it may be a Wikipedia mirror site, or simply a long block quote. Therefore, users of CopyPatrol know that when something is flagged in that interface, it only means there is a potential violation, and that the human editor should investigate further before determining whether there is a violation. Similarly, what we'll do with the New Pages Feed is say "Potential issues: Copyvio", because it is only a potential issue, brought up by proxy through a plagiarism detection service. In conversations with the reviewing communities, it looks like the standard practice there is that any machine-generated flag about copyvio means that a human should investigate to make the decision, which is a practice they use with another popular tool, Earwig's Copyvio Detector. Does this help? -- MMiller (WMF) (talk) 19:01, 5 September 2018 (UTC)
@MMiller (WMF): Can the "label/tag" be changed to something like "Potential issue: Copied text", "Potential issue: Reused Content", etc? We obviously take copyright very seriously as it is a core project tenet and I don't think we should blindly through around the phrase "copyright violation". Note, I'm only referring to the label, not the process; to focus on the substance of the content, not the motive of the editor. — xaosflux Talk 20:46, 5 September 2018 (UTC)
BTW: The bot does more than just "non original" - it detects wikipedia mirrors (the source indicate it is mirror of wikipedia), creative commons content (the source indicate it is CC license) as well as citations (the added content contains link to the source). Eran (talk) 21:16, 5 September 2018 (UTC)
@ערן: that is sort of my point, if someone adds such text their addition may not actually be a "Copyright Violation". I don't disagree that it may warrant extra recent changes patrol attention, and tagging sounds useful. — xaosflux Talk 21:25, 5 September 2018 (UTC)
Just wanted to chime in to agree with Xaosflux here. I'm far from the most prolific user of Copypatrol, but I spend some time there. There are a number of things that aren't violations, and the false positives are usually either a vandal repeating "hi hi hi hi" or some other text, or something public domain or appropriately licensed. The latter content is frequently one of roughly three specific editors who won't show up in new pages since they're all autopatrolled, but certainly not always. I'd likewise be more comfortable with either of Xaosflux' suggested options. ~ Amory (u • t • c) 01:07, 6 September 2018 (UTC)

Xaosflux, I would like to start testing it on enwiki and get Eranbot into copyviobot group - any report that go to CopyPatrol will also goes to PageTriage via API of enwiki. AFAIK (Roan Kattouw (WMF), MMiller (WMF) correct me if I'm wrong) currently it will not displayed to users and later (once enabled in the PageTriage extension) there will be small hint with link to copypatrol for further infromation (example[8]). As for the text of the hint, I think there are good arguments here why the hint text should be cartefully considered (shouldn't be casting aspersions of a legal violation) - it can discussed later how to name it (copycheck? copypatrol?). Thanks, Eran (talk) 10:32, 15 September 2018 (UTC)

@ערן: please file a WP:BRFA to have your new task reviewed. It looks like some testing may have been done on testwiki, if so please include information from those tests in the BRFA. I'm glad you are open to the labeling update (note the name of the "access group" doesn't matter, we can rename that locally) and both of your above suggestions sound fine to me. I certainly expect this will catch actual "copyright violations" in addition to other copied text - but we can leave the blaming up to humans :D — xaosflux Talk 14:47, 15 September 2018 (UTC)
Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/EranBot/2. Eran (talk) 16:08, 15 September 2018 (UTC)
(Roan Kattouw (WMF), MMiller (WMF) - it looks like in the new group creation local community access wasn't included (e.g. "Allow bureaucrats to add/remove users from this group"), this should be done for enwiki, testwiki, test2wiki - do you need us to create the phab configuration request for this? — xaosflux Talk 14:51, 15 September 2018 (UTC)
Thanks Xaosflux and ערן. I think Roan Kattouw (WMF) can answer about the technical parts on Monday. With respect to the naming and wording, your point is taken, and I will think about this some more and discuss with the community. We're actually going to be deploying the first part of this overall project to production on Monday, and most of my attention is on that (not involving a bot). So I will revisit the naming over the next couple weeks. -- MMiller (WMF) (talk) 21:39, 15 September 2018 (UTC)

copyviobot access

I've created a VPP section to expand 'crat access to include management of the new botgroup, copyvio bot. Please see Wikipedia:Village_pump_(policy)#bureaucrat_access_to_manage_copyviobot_group for details. Thank you, — xaosflux Talk 02:12, 11 October 2018 (UTC)

User:ProteinBoxBot

I have blocked User:ProteinBoxBot indefinitely, since their page creations contained too many problems. A discussion about unblocking it, or changing the rules it operates under, or revoking permission for this bot, may be warranted. User talk:ProteinBoxBot#Blocked again, too many problems (and some previous sections on the bot talk page) have more information. Fram (talk) 08:25, 24 October 2018 (UTC)

Thanks for the note Fram - pings to bot ops: @Andrew Su: and @Julialturner:. — xaosflux Talk 11:54, 24 October 2018 (UTC)

User:BsherrAWBBOT

I would like to reapprove my bot, User:BsherrAWBBOT, for the originally approved tasks, template orphaning and replacement. It had been unapproved only for inactivity. Thanks. --Bsherr (talk) 21:51, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

@BsherrAWBBOT: you will need a new BRFA, use Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/BsherrAWBBOT 2. — xaosflux Talk 22:25, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

Lint error repairs..

Odd request, but would a bot flag be needed for a contributor making a lot of manual edits, via Special:LintErrors (and links therefrom) using the standard interface, due to volumes involved? ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 13:36, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

If the error is pretty common but low-volume, I've used either my personal account or my AWB without bot flag. When you have an identifiable pattern for 1k+ pages, that's bot-reasonable (and I've used my bot account for those). --Izno (talk) 13:51, 5 November 2018 (UTC)
As always, it depends on what "a lot" means. I have been doing batches of one hundred to a few hundred semi-automated edits per day to resolve Linter errors, and I have had no complaints that I can remember. A few reverts, probably, but a minuscule percentage. I make sure to use a helpful edit summary like "Fix Linter errors". That experience tells me that a few hundred edits per day doesn't get you into WP:MEATBOT territory, but a few thousand a day might do so.
People also tend to get a little bit more unhappy about edits to User and User talk pages, so I tend to stick to Template and mainspace pages. YMMV. – Jonesey95 (talk) 17:22, 5 November 2018 (UTC)
If doing any to User talk root pages, a bot should be used with the bot and minor flag (such as to make use of the 'nominornewtalk' capability) - any other edit will trigger the "you have new messages" prompt - which is understandably annoying to others. — xaosflux Talk 17:57, 5 November 2018 (UTC)
I lack the ability to reapair a number of issues on talk pages, notably signatures, but the advice above is good . Thanks ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 08:04, 7 November 2018 (UTC)

RFC: Should BAG members have an activity requirement?

Please comment at the RFC. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 17:47, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

Bots that haven't edited in a very long time

Moved from Wikipedia talk:Bot Approvals Group#Bots that haven't edited in a very long time. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 13:37, 15 November 2018 (UTC)

I've noticed that there are quite a few flagged bots that haven't edited in a very long (2 years or more) time.

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  76. Italic title bot (talk · contribs) Last edit: 20130125044857
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  78. SPPatrolBot (talk · contribs) Last edit: 20130105041814
  79. Thehelpfulbot (talk · contribs) Last edit: 20121226221153
  80. Image-req-proj-bot (talk · contribs) Last edit: 20121224200006
  81. Legobot II (talk · contribs) Last edit: 20121211000244
  82. VIAFbot (talk · contribs) Last edit: 20121122214656
  83. Lucia Bot (talk · contribs) Last edit: 20121116225341
  84. Ryan Vesey Bot (talk · contribs) Last edit: 20120928012455
  85. DpmukBOT (talk · contribs) Last edit: 20120921000053
  86. SeveroBot (talk · contribs) Last edit: 20120904093820
  87. Chem-awb (talk · contribs) Last edit: 20120831173308
  88. Chris G Bot (talk · contribs) Last edit: 20120730064602
  89. CeraBot (talk · contribs) Last edit: 20120707224430
  90. Robert SkyBot (talk · contribs) Last edit: 20120705214646
  91. BOTarate (talk · contribs) Last edit: 20120623075402
  92. SprinterBot (talk · contribs) Last edit: 20120616153901
  93. CanisRufus (talk · contribs) Last edit: 20120615164646
  94. Arbitrarily0Bot (talk · contribs) Last edit: 20120610233220
  95. RockfangBot (talk · contribs) Last edit: 20120607054508
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  99. SteveBot (talk · contribs) Last edit: 20120406023638
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  102. People-n-photo-bot (talk · contribs) Last edit: 20120312190725
  103. SatyrBot (talk · contribs) Last edit: 20120217172502
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  107. Snowbot (talk · contribs) Last edit: 20120206225608
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  109. CrazynasBot (talk · contribs) Last edit: 20111203113335
  110. Petan-Bot (talk · contribs) Last edit: 20111201081751
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  123. SDPatrolBot II (talk · contribs) Last edit: 20110331204956
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Should we consider de-flagging these? SQLQuery me! 04:52, 15 November 2018 (UTC)

We have a consensus to do so, yes. We first have to send notifications. -- Magioladitis (talk) 09:22, 15 November 2018 (UTC)

  • @SQL: we usually run a clean up about twice a year, but per the Wikipedia:Bot_policy#Activity_requirements we only remove where both the bot and the operator have been inactive for 2 years. I'm all for re-reviewing the inactivity requirement. We certainly can ask if any of the operators would like to 'retire' their bot voluntarily as well. — xaosflux Talk 12:17, 15 November 2018 (UTC)
    • At minimum, those bots should be marked as inactive. Save for nullbots, if those are around. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 13:40, 15 November 2018 (UTC)

Checking for bot activity

Other than contributions and logs, how can we tell if a bot is running or not? The bot in question is Joe's Null Bot (talk · contribs · logs) which is designed to always have empty contribs and logs. I suspect that it is stopped: see Template talk:Db-meta#Template:Db-c1. Are there other null bots available which could run through everything in Category:Empty categories awaiting deletion, in accordance with task 5 for that bot? --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 11:58, 9 November 2018 (UTC)

Have you tried User talk:Joe Decker? — xaosflux Talk 13:37, 9 November 2018 (UTC)
I and others have noticed this bot not running too. I pinged on Monday but no response.   ~ Tom.Reding (talk ⋅dgaf)  13:48, 9 November 2018 (UTC)
I could possibly do a run through - is the "problem" you are trying to fix right now that there are pages showing in categories that should not be? (what is a current category with an issue, and what is an example article you want purged to fix it?) — xaosflux Talk 14:17, 9 November 2018 (UTC)
The information should be at Template talk:Db-meta#Template:Db-c1, which I linked at the start. In brief: when you add a {{db-c1}} to an empty category page, the cat is immediately placed in Category:Empty categories awaiting deletion. Seven days after the last edit to the empty cat page, a WP:NULLEDIT will remove the empty cat from Category:Empty categories awaiting deletion and add it to Category:Candidates for speedy deletion and Category:Candidates for speedy deletion as empty categories. It is that null edit that is not occurring. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 14:55, 9 November 2018 (UTC)
Redrose64, We should add something into the guidelines where null bots give some sort of visible indication of life, such as updating the last run timestamp of a page. —CYBERPOWER (Chat) 14:59, 9 November 2018 (UTC)
  • I'm running a pass through the ~350 cats and sub cats right now. — xaosflux Talk 15:01, 9 November 2018 (UTC)
    @Redrose64: my run completed, but it doesn't look like it "did" anything? If you update one of the categories manually is it working? — xaosflux Talk 15:13, 9 November 2018 (UTC)
    I don't know. Without going into every single page in Category:Empty categories awaiting deletion and doing a null edit myself to see if its categorisation changes, I don't know what shouldn't be in that category. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 15:31, 9 November 2018 (UTC)
    OK, so I did a null edit on every page - any chance that nothing is wrong and that NullBot is actually working fine? — xaosflux Talk 15:32, 9 November 2018 (UTC)
    If Joe's Null Bot had been working fine, the five redlinked categories mentioned at Template talk:Db-meta#Template:Db-c1 would not have been under discussion (and there would have been no reason for that thread to have been started in the first place); they would have been moved to Category:Candidates for speedy deletion as empty categories some days ago and promptly deleted. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 15:49, 9 November 2018 (UTC)
    @Redrose64: it looks like those were all taken care of before you asked for work here - are there currently any issues that you need addressed? As far as the initial question here your only option is to ask the operator. Keep in mind no operator is ever required to operate their bot, and having a bot not run is always fine. If you think the issue the bot is trying to address is serious enough, the community wishlist survey is still open and you could open a request to have it addressed by the development team at meta:Community_Wishlist_Survey_2019. — xaosflux Talk 18:23, 9 November 2018 (UTC)
    They were taken care of by me coming across miscategorised categories, and making manual null edits to them. If you look at the deletion logs for the last four categories that I named, Fastily (talk · contribs) deleted them at 11:26 today - that is, after I made this post at 10:38 today, which was in turn after I null-edited those four cat pages some five to ten minutes earlier than that post. I can't prove that last phrase, because null edits are not logged.
    Yes there are still issues: since Joe's Null Bot is apparently down, we need something else to trawl Category:Empty categories awaiting deletion periodically, and null edit every subcategory in it. It should not run constantly: once per day will do, although once every two to three days will not cause undue problems. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 20:04, 9 November 2018 (UTC)
    OK feel free to post over at WP:BOTREQUEST for someone else to make a bot if Joe Decker doesn't reply. Seems like this is a very low impact job (both in terms of impact to readers and for bot processing). — xaosflux Talk 21:23, 9 November 2018 (UTC)
Hi folks, sorry that I've been slow to respond -- a combination of life issues, temporary medical issues, and a change of residence. I think I have the previous bot tasks running now, and I will take a look again tomorrow to check in and see if there are additional problems. Thanks for your patience. --joe deckertalk 05:37, 14 November 2018 (UTC)

IP running a bot?

Malfunction, was resolved. — xaosflux Talk 03:51, 21 November 2018 (UTC)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

I'm not sure what the appropriate place for this is, but I came across an IP rapidly (8 in one minute) adding wikiproject notices with an edit summary identifying it as a bot (ex: "Added {{WikiProject Protected areas}}, rated as B-class (BOT))") and I'm pretty sure this is against the bot policy. And it's weird and I don't know if they are using multiple IPs or really what's going on at all. Basically I know nothing at all about bots. Natureium (talk) 00:18, 21 November 2018 (UTC)

@Natureium: for the most part that would not be allowed and the address could be blocked, however I only see that IP making 4 edits (Redacted) and then stopping. Are there more edits I'm missing here? It could have been some minor test or a bot that lost its logon token temporarily. — xaosflux Talk 00:30, 21 November 2018 (UTC)
There were definitely at least 8 edits. I'm pretty certain I'm not losing my mind just yet. Natureium (talk) 00:31, 21 November 2018 (UTC)
And now that IP has only 1 edit... SmartSE (talk) 00:36, 21 November 2018 (UTC)
Make that 0 (to me at least!) SmartSE (talk) 00:38, 21 November 2018 (UTC)
🤔Natureium (talk) 00:43, 21 November 2018 (UTC)
Ummmm.. I'll contact WP:OS to see if they are involved. — xaosflux Talk 00:52, 21 November 2018 (UTC)
It's a bot in the process of being approved, logging out seems to be a technical error. -- Mentifisto 01:03, 21 November 2018 (UTC)
@Mentifisto: thank you for the swift reply - case closed. If you could pass on to the requester: they should be using the mw:API:Assert option to prevent logged-out use of a bot. — xaosflux Talk 01:06, 21 November 2018 (UTC)
@Natureium: thank you for letting us know, everything appears in order now. Happy editing, — xaosflux Talk 01:08, 21 November 2018 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Possible bot editing from German IP

Nothing else to do here. A clear path was laid out if the IP editor would like to continue: register an account, register a bot, obtain community consensus, and file a BRFA. — xaosflux Talk 00:13, 1 December 2018 (UTC)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

I was referred here from WP:ANI#Special:Contributions/77.179.137.192. Midday yesterday, I noticed the German IP 77.179.137.192 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · http · block user · block log) making a large number of edits. They do not appear problematic by themselves, but as SQL noted, there were 574 edits over 111 minutes, remarkably consistent, and stopped immediately upon me querying the user to ask if they were using a bot. I just checked the range contributions but I'm not seeing any other similar recent activity on first glance. Not sure if this is something new or if it may go back further. Home Lander (talk) 16:39, 27 November 2018 (UTC)

Looks like a duck to me. ProgrammingGeek talktome 16:42, 27 November 2018 (UTC)
Looks like it has stopped, else I'd be all for blocking pending more information. If it starts back up they can come talk about their bot needs. — xaosflux Talk 16:53, 27 November 2018 (UTC)
Xaosflux, That's about what I was thinking as well (and why I didn't block while they were at AN). SQLQuery me! 17:49, 27 November 2018 (UTC)

@SQL, Xaosflux, and Home Lander: I just blocked 89.12.34.218 for making the same edits. Over 500 of them in ~two hours, nonstop. ~ Amory (u • t • c) 00:48, 28 November 2018 (UTC)

Amorymeltzer, Good catch, thanks! SQLQuery me! 00:50, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
I've also now blocked the following for doing the same thin; each after the previous was blocked:
~ Amory (u • t • c) 01:17, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
I enabled a filter from MusikAnimal, meant for this very same thing a week or so ago. Seems to be working. ~ Amory (u • t • c) 01:38, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
Blocked
As well. SQLQuery me! 01:41, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
Also 89.12.56.4 (talk · contribs · WHOIS), 89.12.49.85 (talk · contribs · WHOIS), and 77.13.40.125 (talk · contribs · WHOIS). Rate limit turned off. ~ Amory (u • t • c) 01:43, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
  • This is a pretty ridiculous disruption - what would be the operators motivation here? — xaosflux Talk 01:48, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
    Xaosflux, I have no idea. I don't think it's an authorized bot operating logged out by mistake - it hops IP's rapidly once blocked. SQLQuery me! 01:50, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
    Lets see if 888 shuts it down. — xaosflux Talk 01:52, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
    Xaosflux, So far, it seems to have, yes. SQLQuery me! 01:53, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
    No earthly idea. Nothing from the talk page or a recent TfD give any hint. ~ Amory (u • t • c) 01:55, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
    I take that back, it seems intentional (per User_talk:Jonesey95#Infobox_settlement) to be removing redirect usage. See also Template talk:Infobox settlement/Other templates up for TfD. ~ Amory (u • t • c) 01:59, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
    Well if they want to make 7000 cosmetic edits they will need to do it in a way that won't flood recent changes. — xaosflux Talk 02:06, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
    Can you enlighten the reader how? And what rule classifies them as "cosmetic"? 89.14.125.70 (talk) 02:11, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
    Wikipedia:Bot_policy#Cosmetic_changes, and the how would be to: register/log in to an operator account, register a bot account, gain consensus for your change, and gain bot approval at WP:BRFA. — xaosflux Talk 02:14, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
    No, you are a liar. 89.14.125.70 (talk) 02:15, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
    I think you'll find wantonly calling people liars when they clearly are not isn't going to further your cause. SQLQuery me! 02:19, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
    Do you think you are the right person to talk about lies? Probably you are an expert in that? [9] 77.180.168.93 (talk) 02:26, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
    Per the bot policy, register an account, and follow the instructions at BRFA in order to get your bot approved and flagged as a bot. Expect questions and opposition related to block evasion and repeatedly violating the bot policy, however. SQLQuery me! 02:17, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
    Bot policy does not apply, since there was no bot involved and I don't know how to write one. 77.180.168.93 (talk) 02:26, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
    I think it's safe to say at this point that this person is clearly not here to contribute in any productive manner. Home Lander (talk) 02:32, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
    User:Home Lander, it is not safe, you are now guilty of PA. 77.180.168.93 (talk) 02:37, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
    Oh yes, I'm guilty of PA while you've referred to others as liars and idiots. Get lost, troll. Home Lander (talk) 02:39, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
    My actions have nothing to do with you being guilty of PA or not. 77.179.109.190 (talk) 02:44, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
I was working with Amorymeltzer to set the edit filter up on IRC. Yes, it was set up to stop an unauthorized bot editing at high speed. I'll repeat my question from Jonesey95's talkpage. "So, you normally edit at 5+ edits per min for hours on end, stopping and hopping IP's immediately as soon as you get a talkpage message, or run into a block?". This is very clearly a logged out bot. SQLQuery me! 02:33, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
Hope you had a nice time on IRC. But changing IPs is not anything that indicates a bot. I too can repeat content from Jonesey95's talk: You are an idiot. 77.180.168.93 (talk) 02:36, 28 November 2018 (UTC)

Redirects hang around since June 2009

The redirects hang around since June 2009 and they are known to cause trouble, citing:

I've actually had a real issue where a module function had to search the article text to get the infobox in order to get some piece of data from it (this is a simplification of the scenario and there was no other way), however instead of it being simple, I had to pass the function a list of all possible redirects that could be used so it could match them as well. While I'm sure my scenario is an edge-case, it is still a valid scenario and more-so, keeping redirects on the opposite, does have no reason to be kept other than "I like it" and people claiming "disturbance" as if one edit will do that. --Gonnym (talk) 16:58, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

89.14.125.70 (talk) 02:16, 28 November 2018 (UTC)

The IP editor has drawn our attention to a post by Gonnym. It was made in a discussion at User talk:Pigsonthewing#Infobox settlement - redirects. User:Pigsonthewing, User:Gonnym and User:Jonesey95 gave opinions in that thread. If Infobox Settlement should truly redirect to Infobox settlement to avoid all kinds of problems, it's likely that a more regular way of doing those edits can be found. EdJohnston (talk) 02:58, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
"If Infobox Settlement should truly redirect to Infobox settlement to avoid all kinds of problems" - it does redirect. And new redirects have been added after June 2009. The clean-up helped to find sources for the addition of new redirects. 77.179.109.190 (talk) 03:01, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
Looks like my post was inexact. The statement by User:Gonnym implies that going through the encylopedia and replacing 'Infobox Settlement' (currently a redirect to the lower case form) with 'Infobox settlement' would avoid some difficulties in writing the module code. I have no relevant knowledge but maybe someone else knows why this should be so. If it's true, then invoking a module with the wrong case could be a general problem. EdJohnston (talk) 03:06, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
I can understand their sentiment, but mass-replacing replacing 10,000 redirects without any consensus is surely less effective than including that one massively used redirect in the whatever module. It's not for me to determine when/where the cutoff is, but if the comparison is between adding more complexity to a regex or making thousands and thousands of edits that change nothing to a reader, the choice is easy. ~ Amory (u • t • c) 03:09, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
In case anyone is wondering, I am collateral damage here, if anything. I made three (non-cosmetic) edits, I believe, at this person's request, assuming good faith. I will stay out of it from here. – Jonesey95 (talk) 05:33, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
@Gonnym: there have been mentions of a module, but it has not been named. Which module is the one where you "had to pass the function a list of all possible redirects that could be used"? --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 10:15, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
A module I'm currently working on, Module:Television episode disambiguation description, which I had to extract a short description template inside Template:Infobox television episode (and its redirects) which I did in order to extract the short description data. In order to do so, I had to search for the template name in the article text. If you look at the list at line #7 you'll see I pass it a list of template names. There are more redirects, but the ones with very few uses, I replaced and don't check, and the ones with a lot of uses I'm checking. Luckily, this infobox only has 8 redirects, unlike Infobox settlement which has 64. --Gonnym (talk) 10:21, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
OK. Have you asked a known Lua expert - such as RexxS (talk · contribs) - if there is already a function that will do this? --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 11:16, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
I was assisted by Trappist the monk (talk · contribs), specifically also with this solution to this problem. If RexxS knows for a better solution, I'll gladly hear it. --Gonnym (talk) 11:53, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
As I was pinged, I took a look at the code and there's no way round supplying a list of the templates to make it work, so your algorithm is fine. You could simply make into lower case both the template names and the content that you're searching, in order to reduce the number of template names. Since your algorithm returns the start position in the content, you could then use that on the unmodified version of the content to extract the short description without losing the information about its case. Speaking of which, I don't think it's a good idea to transform the first letter of the short description into lower case. That causes issues if the short description begins with a proper noun. Whenever we have the option of sentence case or fragment case for text, I'd always choose sentence case for automated generation, as it avoids the proper noun problem, and the worst we can end up with is "EBay" (and that's their own fault as far as I'm concerned). Cheers --RexxS (talk) 15:24, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
If I understood you correctly, Module:Extract short description (the module I pass my list to) does that and handles both upper and lowercase (for first character only), but that doesn't deal with other types of redirects. As for the lower-case, in this specific short description, there is no way for a proper noun to be the first word. It is always either "A", "An" or number. --Gonnym (talk) 15:41, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
Apologies for not making myself clearer. Just dealing with the capitalisation of the first letter is a bit of a waste when you could dispense with capitalisation issues entirely when searching. That would allow a list containing e.g. "Infobox television episode" to also match "Infobox Television Episode", "infobox television episode", and all variants in-between. I do understand that in this specific case, a proper noun won't be supplied, but as modules can get copied and adapted by others, I always find it wise not to make assumptions about what input they may receive, YMMV. Cheers --RexxS (talk) 22:21, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
Well as far as this current situation with Infobox [sS]ettlement is concerned, it would seem there's no actual reason to replace these redirects, is that correct? ~ Amory (u • t • c) 12:00, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
Are you asking me if my code has any issue with this current situation or asking me if I agree with your conclusion or not even asking me? Not sure from your question. But I'll answer anyways in case it was meant to me. The module I am working on is not related to infobox settlement and to this issue. I do however hold firm my belief that dead code, including template redirects (not article redirects), are an evil that should be eradicated with fire as it serves absolutely no function, and in-fact does have negative effects, including, but not limited to, my scenario; promotes bad naming conventions (if editors think that a redirect style is correct usage); and causes unnecessary burden when doing other routine fixes. Not long ago I've put a request to tag pages in a category with a project banner. Some of the pages had the project banner but with a redirect version, so the end result had some articles with 2 banners which I then had to manually remove. Unlike article redirects which have good (and bad) uses, template redirects have only negative ones. --Gonnym (talk) 12:12, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
Unlike article redirects which have good (and bad) uses, template redirects have only negative ones. I hope this is just harmless exaggeration. I just used {{tq}} to quote you; that template redirect name is a heck of a lot easier to type and to remember than {{Talk quote inline}}. Short redirect names are definitely a Good Use or template redirects. That said, I have no problem when AnomieBOT or AWB general-fix editors replace template redirects with full template names in the process of making other substantive edits. – Jonesey95 (talk) 15:17, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
That is an exaggeration, as your example is very useful and I use it myself, but that brings it back to my 2nd issue, where other editors think "tq" is a correct primary name and we have Template:Lx which says nothing to anyone who didn't create it. --Gonnym (talk) 15:45, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
I was indeed asking about this specific case. Your unrelated module was used as justification by the IP editor(s) for the thousands of edits, so I was just confirming that regardless of your module, there was no need for the IP editor to violate policy like this. Nothing to do with you. ~ Amory (u • t • c) 15:49, 28 November 2018 (UTC)

Newbies accusing IP of being a bot

Any evidence for bot editing? No. 5+ edits per minute is no evidence. 77.179.109.190 (talk) 02:44, 28 November 2018 (UTC)

"Newbies", that's absolutely hilarious. I've been around for 11 years, 9 months, and have been a member of the Bot Approvals Group for over 10 years. I have explained my case in numerous places. you just keep making personal attacks. SQLQuery me! 03:05, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
User:SQL, hilarious is that you think - do you? - being around for 11 years, 9 months, and hav[ing] been a member of the Bot Approvals Group for over 10 years moves you out of "Newbie". Re "I have explained my case in numerous places." - you have no case, all you provided to "substantiate" your claim is nonsense. There is no PA in classifying you "newbie". Some people never learn and die as newbie. 77.13.0.105 (talk) 22:59, 30 November 2018 (UTC)
If you check WP:Sockpuppet investigations/Tobias Conradi you may notice some IP socks with addresses in the 77.179.* range. EdJohnston (talk) 03:21, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
EdJohnston, all of those IPs are German as well, and details there state he's known to be German. Interesting. Home Lander (talk) 03:32, 28 November 2018 (UTC)

This definitely desires further investigation, and if it is deemed apparent that this is block evasion from the above SPI, then this falls under WP:BANREVERT and I believe should be mass-reverted until consensus determines otherwise. Home Lander (talk) 03:52, 28 November 2018 (UTC)

Holy shit. This has been ongoing for 12 years. As nicely as possible, could this user get a hobby? ProgrammingGeek talktome 04:30, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
I don't think mass-reverting edits that were purely cosmetic to begin with is needed. The link I gave above to Template talk:Infobox settlement/Other templates up for TfD suggests an old recently-revived effort that hardly seems necessary. ~ Amory (u • t • c) 12:02, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
Amorymeltzer, good enough. Also, a mass-rollback would flood recent changes, which is one of the original core issues here. Home Lander (talk) 14:32, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
Per WP:COSMETICBOT: "Keep in mind that reverting a cosmetic edit is also a cosmetic edit. If the changes made in a cosmetic edit would otherwise be acceptable as part of a substantive edit, there is no reason to revert them." Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 14:48, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
  Comment: The usage of "newbies" is incorrect in this situation. --@Boothsift 02:43, 30 November 2018 (UTC)
User:Boothsift - why? 77.13.0.105 (talk) 22:53, 30 November 2018 (UTC)

About the unneeded section headers

I couldn't resist making a new section, haha, sorry.

Xaosflux or SQL or any admin/'crat hanging around: could BOTN benefit from temp semi-protection? I assume the IPs are going to keep rever-warring and adding superfluous section headers, and further activity should be at SPI? ProgrammingGeek talktome 04:36, 28 November 2018 (UTC)

Reply to ProgrammingGeek

Don't you like headers ProgrammingGeek? :D Seems to have settled down some, if it persists then short term should be fine, we rarely have BOTN participation from those without accounts. — xaosflux Talk 04:39, 28 November 2018 (UTC)

Closing down

Hi everyone, think there has been a lot of off (bot) topic information here. Here is what I'm seeing are some points and follow ups:

  • High-speed cosmetic editing was occurring by someone purposefully hopping IP's to continue editing after being blocked
    • This editing was of a cosmetic nature and appear to at least be semi-automated
    • This editing was causing excess flooding of recent changes and watchlists
      • This was disruptive, and administrative actions to stop the disruption have been applied
      • This editing may be acceptable if run by a bot flagged account with community consensus for the task
        • Determining if there is consensus for this task should be performed at a more appropriate venue such as WP:TFD
    • Mass-reversions are not appropriate as the edits individually are not problematic
  • Sock-puppet accusations and investigations may be followed up at WP:SPI

Is there anything else we need to address here at WP:BOTN? — xaosflux Talk 15:54, 28 November 2018 (UTC)

Xaosflux, think you've summed it up well. Thanks for putting a "lid" on it (and under another section header  ). Home Lander (talk) 16:09, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
Looks good. Thank you, Xaosflux, for dealing with this issue. ProgrammingGeek talktome 16:23, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
Thoughts on keeping the filter on or turning it off? Having not heard from the IP yet today I'm inclined to leave it on until there's an acknowledgement of these items. ~ Amory (u • t • c) 16:26, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
Amorymeltzer, unless there's false positives, see no negatives in leaving it on; I suspect if it's shut off the IP will just go back to it. Home Lander (talk) 16:35, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
Leave on, appears the anonymous user intends to continue to make disruptive edits, can re-visit if FP's (e.g. make an added_line && removed_lines etc). — xaosflux Talk 16:37, 28 November 2018 (UTC)
Possibly related. (Talk page request, apparently to continue these edits.) – Jonesey95 (talk) 21:21, 30 November 2018 (UTC)

Newbies not knowing how to edit fast are claiming edits were done by bot or semi-automated

The edits were not automated and did not use a bot. It was simply done by using a web browser. 77.13.0.105 (talk) 22:52, 30 November 2018 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Bot Malfunction Tonight

Hello all.

I've been trialling my bot tonight (per here), and there have been some issues.

First, the bot edited while logged out (as in the thread above). I didn't put the call to the method to begin editing in the callback from the login, which I should have done and since rectified. Thanks to Xaosflux for the suggestion to use the assert functionality. Additional thank yous to the oversight team who suppressed the edits quickly.

Secondly, the bot edited far too rapidly. The bot framework I used (this one) states it limits edits to three concurrently so as to not overload the API. This isn't what happened and I'm looking into throttling the edits in future.

Finally, the bot did not detect when the template was already placed, putting multiple templates in pages. I've done a rollback on all of the bot's edits, which according to the policy is allowed as long as I leave a message at the relevant talk page, which should be here.

Thank you for your patience as I work out the issues in my first bot.

Kindest regards

ProgrammingGeek talktome 03:47, 21 November 2018 (UTC)

Discussion: Citation bot removal of publisher and location in cite journal

I have begun an RFC at Help talk:CS1 regarding Citation bot's activity for cite journal publisher and location. Please provide input. --Izno (talk) 16:03, 27 November 2018 (UTC)

New BAG nomination

I have put in my name for consideration of the Bot Approvals Group. Those interested in discussing the matter are invited to do so here. Thank you for your input. Primefac (talk) 00:42, 4 December 2018 (UTC)

Mass rollback tool discussion

A discussion at the administrator's noticeboard is taking place regarding the use of the "mass rollback" script hosted at User:Writ Keeper/Scripts/massRollback.js. Questions include whether there has been any prior discussion or approval of this tool, and at what point WP:BOTP begins to apply. The specific case under discussion involves 416 edits at once. Please consider joining the discussion there. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 00:32, 5 December 2018 (UTC)

BAG assistance requested

I would say that Help talk:Citation Style 1#RFC on publisher and location in cite journal has completed at this time.

I would like to request a BAG member to summarize and close the discussion as it is primarily about a particular bot's function. --Izno (talk) 22:06, 28 December 2018 (UTC)

@Izno: this isn't really BAG remit, ultimately it is a guideline that applies to any editor, including human editors. However, if the community standard changes, any bots doing this task should also be asked to change - and if they don't they can be dealt with here. — xaosflux Talk 22:32, 28 December 2018 (UTC)
I agreed that this isn't in BAG's mandate, although it certainly doesn't preclude a BAG member from closing things in his personal / admin / crat / whatever capacity. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 22:37, 28 December 2018 (UTC)
Oh certainly, any editor can close RfC's. If it is overdue you can list it at WP:AN/RFC as well. — xaosflux Talk 22:38, 28 December 2018 (UTC)
Huh, I might have misjudged BAG on this point. The RFC asks a question about a specific bot's specific function (i.e. whether it has approval to continue in that function), which I was fairly certain is in BAG's remit. --Izno (talk) 22:44, 28 December 2018 (UTC)
@Izno: I don't see that that Help talk: discussion includes the bot's operator at all, were they invited to the discussion? In general, edits made by bots are the responsibility of their operator, and those edits should conform to community standards. Points 2 and 3 are much more salient, and anyone can close the RfC related to those. Once decided the bot operator will need to make changes or stop operations if their edits no longer have consensus. I'll send notice to Smith609 as you are discussing their bot. Hopefully this isn't another case like WP 1.0 bot above, where the operator is unresponsive/unknown (in which case the bot should be blocked outright). — xaosflux Talk 22:58, 28 December 2018 (UTC)
Additional pings to @Kaldari and AManWithNoPlan: who are listed as additional contacts on the bot talk page. — xaosflux Talk 23:03, 28 December 2018 (UTC)
@Xaosflux: The current maintainer of the bot is still Smith who is reachable, but the majority of the patches recently submitted are by AManWithNoPlan, who indeed commented in the RFC. An invitation was provided on User talk:Citation bot. --Izno (talk) 23:04, 28 December 2018 (UTC)
I am largely not opinionated; I mostly write code for fun. I generally only get involved when people make statements about the bot's history that are untrue (such as people mistakenly not realizing that the function in question was not new). AManWithNoPlan (talk) 23:07, 28 December 2018 (UTC)
@AManWithNoPlan: thanks for the feedback. @Izno: from what I see so far, the bot operators appear to be open to changing to meet what ever the consensus for citation standards end up being. Keep in mind that while this is naming this one bot, this appears to mostly be a general editing/citing standard that should apply to everyone (and by extension any current or future bots). — xaosflux Talk 23:12, 28 December 2018 (UTC)
I do have one opinion. That is that people should create pages for journals and wiki link that to differentiate hard to find publications; instead of relying on publisher= and such. AManWithNoPlan (talk) 23:47, 28 December 2018 (UTC)

Double redirects?

Just curious: Are there any examples of bot(s) fixing double redirects in the "Wikipedia:" namespace in the previous 24 hours? Just wondering as I just fixed a few from page moved that happened almost a day ago. Steel1943 (talk) 17:29, 28 December 2018 (UTC)

@Steel1943: just going off of edit summaries, looks like there haven't been any in a couple of days, see quarry:query/32343. — xaosflux Talk 17:57, 28 December 2018 (UTC)
@Xaosflux: Thanks for the prompt response. That’s quite alarming, and I’m not sure who to contact (such as any specific bot operator) to find out what’s going on with that. Steel1943 (talk) 17:59, 28 December 2018 (UTC)
@Steel1943: well for EmausBot we can ask @Emaus:. — xaosflux Talk 18:01, 28 December 2018 (UTC)
Thanks! Yeah, it would have helped if I looked at the query to see the most recent bot who performed such edits before I commented. 😅 Either way, I also left Emaus a comment on their talk page on the Russian Wikipedia (as per their user page) referring to this discussion. Steel1943 (talk) 18:07, 28 December 2018 (UTC)
  • Hello! Currently my bot works on double redirects in 2 modes:
    1. New moves. Bot regularly checks moves in the following namespaces: 0, 1, 10, 11, 14, 15 and ignores others since these cases are the most proper.
    2. Special page. Here bot handles all pages without exception. And this special page usually updates once per 3 days.
  • In first mode bot ignores ns 4 because of high risk of vandalism (in my opinion), but I can remove this filter and process every namespace if you concern it is not. By the way all ns 4 double redirects appears on the special page and bot finally processes them. --Emaus (talk) 01:19, 31 December 2018 (UTC)
    Thank you for the update Emaus! @Steel1943: these appear to be getting worked on still, see last example at: Wikipedia:WikiProject_Video_games/Warcraft/to_do. Don't think there is much else left needed here? — xaosflux Talk 17:08, 31 December 2018 (UTC)

Reporting article assessment "WP 1.0 bot" misbehaving

Back into August and now again since October 8th, and October 25 the bot is having "quality log" issues.

First part, creating assessment tables runs correctly.

Second part, is "stuck" creating multiple logs since October 25th. Tonight 8 days of logs with 7 days are repeats, for most but not all WPs. Details at Wikipedia talk:Version 1.0 Editorial Team/Index.

Interested users are (audiodude—Kelson—Walkerma). Regards, JoeHebda (talk) 03:16, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

  • Notified currently listed operator at w:fr:User talk:Kelson. I'm also a bit concerned as to who is in currently taking responsibility for this bot, it appears to have changed operators many times and even its own User and User talk pages do not agree on this matter. — xaosflux Talk 04:26, 2 November 2018 (UTC)
  • @JoeHebda: other than engage the operators and call them to task, the only other tool we have are blocking or deauthorizing a bot, as far as the possibility of blocking: I don't see an "urgent" issue as it is not editing reader-facing material (i.e. articles, certain templates). As far as the errors you are reporting, is this bot making any useful edits along with what you are calling out as problems? — xaosflux Talk 04:30, 2 November 2018 (UTC)
@Xaosflux: - Yes the bot is daily updating Wikiproject assessment tables - that function is working correctly & is visible to all interested WP updaters/maintainers. The second part of creating daily logs is not functioning correctly. Two issues, first with each passing day since Oct. 25, most WPs are being loaded up with repeat logs (last night 7 days worth); secondly the bot stops processing logs at "B" in the alphabet & never updates "C" to "Z" named WPs. These WPs have no logs updated since October 8th. Hope this clarifies.
Work is started on revamping WP 1.0 bot so ultimately it will be replaced. Because the timeline is uncertain, I'm reporting here to hopefully find someone to fix the bot. JoeHebda (talk) 14:24, 2 November 2018 (UTC)
@JoeHebda: thanks for the note, and we can certainly keep following up on this. To recap: you think the bot should keep working, but get rid of the problem - and the current problem isn't sever enough to block the bot and stop the things that are working until it is fixed - correct? — xaosflux Talk 15:18, 2 November 2018 (UTC)
@Xaosflux: - Yes, the bot is still running daily. From "back in the day" I was hired on to cleanup database mess created from aborted (2 days live) project. Had to learn IBMs PL/I programming in a couple days. And disk storage was precious & expensive in those times. My concern is all those daily (repeat) log files & how they can be removed? So far there have been zero complaints from WPs ("C" to "Z") not getting the daily logs. JoeHebda (talk) 15:31, 2 November 2018 (UTC)
@JoeHebda: the rate and size these are being editing isn't anything to worry about performance wise. From looking at the edits I'm not sure if they are useful to anyone but they don't seem to be "wrong"? I'm assuming you are referring to edits such as these? — xaosflux Talk 15:35, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

@Xaosflux: - Yes, those edits & there are 1000's of them. I was using them all the time along with Wikipedia:WikiProject Catholicism/Assessment & WP Saints, WP Military history, WP Biography; to check articles being updated. The logs are useful tracking tool & I miss them. JoeHebda (talk) 15:42, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

@JoeHebda: sorry, I'm a bit lost :D Can you show an example of a few edits this bot made that you don't think should have been made according to its current approval (e.g. a malfunction)? — xaosflux [[User tTalk 16:35, 2 November 2018 (UTC)
@Xaosflux: Many malfunction examples at Wikipedia talk:Version 1.0 Editorial Team/Index. JoeHebda (talk) 20:59, 2 November 2018 (UTC)
Xaosflux, as JoeHebda implies the bot does not make mistakes, it just does not complete its 2nd task. So any project log that I have an interest in never get made. They are beyond the letter B. These logs are incredibly useful to see project assessment changes and reasses such articles as necessary but without, it's very difficult to assess article that don't appear elsewhere as a convenient list. I really miss them. ww2censor (talk) 21:44, 2 November 2018 (UTC)
OK @Ww2censor and JoeHebda: the 'problem' is that the bot is not making an edit that you would like it to? If so only the operator can deal with that - I am still certainly concerned for whomever the operator of this bot is to be properly identified! — xaosflux Talk 23:05, 2 November 2018 (UTC)
Answering @Xaosflux and Ww2censor: WP 1.0 bot has two problems
1. Not creating logs for WPs with names "C" through "Z".
2. When creating logs for WPs "A" and "B" (stalls out during Bs & goes back to assessment tables) it keeps repeat creating logs since Oct. 25. For example, last night Logs for Oct. 25,26,27,28,29,30,31-repeats and Nov.1-new; for every one of those A-B wikiprojects. Following this pattern, tonight's repeated logs will be Oct. 25 to 31 & Nov.1, and Nov.2-new logs. JoeHebda (talk) 23:24, 2 November 2018 (UTC)
Thanks for update - still pending an operator to show up to this conversation. — xaosflux Talk 23:25, 2 November 2018 (UTC)
If it helps, Kelson seems to be the only person trying to keep this running per [10] and while elsewhere Hedonil nor Theopolisme may still be associated with the bot neither are active users here as I mentioned [Wikipedia talk:Versio 1.0 Editorial Team/Index#Is_tools.wmflabs_down?|this post] about 6 weeks ago. Audiodude is now also listed as a maintainer. ww2censor (talk) 22:12, 3 November 2018 (UTC)
Has anyone tried emailing Kelson (or contacting him through other channels)? He doesn't seem to be currently active on frwiki, where the talk page message was posted. --Paul_012 (talk) 03:59, 4 November 2018 (UTC)
I've tried leaving a message to get the attention of the operators - asking that the bots usertalk be updated. SQLQuery me! 06:45, 4 November 2018 (UTC)
Update for (Xaosflux—Ww2censor—audiodude—Kelson—Walkerma) From Nov. 3 WP 1.0 bot processing I updated at Wikipedia talk:Version 1.0 Editorial Team/Index#November 3, 2018 - WP 1.0 bot processing to report two bot issues. A possible "Missing template for WP Bihar" and "Date timestamps, corruption". JoeHebda (talk) 15:08, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

I have blocked the bot. Looking at e.g. Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial Team/Biblical Criticism articles by quality log, today, over the course of 28 edits, it duplicated the already present contents of that page, with logs for 2009 to 2012, and nothing newer. This is utterly useless and confusing. At Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial Team/Beyoncé Knowles articles by quality log it is working the 2014 log, making today more than 200 edits to that page in a row, with the end result that it reordered 14 entries, and changed http to https[11]... Here it made more than 100 edits to change absolutely nothing. As always, feel free to unblock without contacting me once these issues have been solved. Fram (talk) 14:48, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

@Fram: - Thankyou. At Wikipedia talk:Version 1.0 Editorial Team/Index I posted summary of Nov. 4 processing and agree 100-percent with need to block bot. Difficulty is finding the Expert with knowledge and tech skillset to fix. Myself being retired (after 44 yrs with computers), I have the time, but zero ability to fix. I've only been on Wikipedia since 2014 mostly doing article tags & assessments. I can toss out questions is about all I can do. Regards, JoeHebda (talk) 15:23, 5 November 2018 (UTC)
Now that this account is blocked, it should not be unblocked without clearly identifying which human(s) is in control of it. — xaosflux Talk 17:58, 5 November 2018 (UTC)
Xaosflux, I support the block. The malfunction in of itself wasn't of a nature that caused major disruption to justify blocking, but the fact that the operator of the bot is not clear is enough to justify a block in addition to the malfunction. —CYBERPOWER (Chat) 18:14, 5 November 2018 (UTC)
Sorry, I accidently sent above to Archive & I don't know how to "unarchive" so I copy-and-paste back here. JoeHebda (talk) 14:43, 16 November 2018 (UTC)
You could have gone to your contributions, clicked the "diff" links for this page and the archive, and then used the "undo" link provided in each one. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 22:50, 16 November 2018 (UTC)

Unblock for 1 hour?

Can I request that the Bot 1.0 be unblocked for 1 hour so I can update WP:MILHIST/Biographies and WP:MILHIST – Please? Adamdaley (talk) 03:08, 16 November 2018 (UTC)

@Adamdaley: - Since the bot was blocked at Wikipedia:Bots/Noticeboard, I will copy-and-paste your question there. I myself don't know how to block or unblock. Wish there was a button for those two functions.
Also be aware that when you request assessment with emwp10 it updates the assessment tables only & no quality logs. JoeHebda (talk) 14:37, 16 November 2018 (UTC)
@Adamdaley: please ask the operator of this bot to request unblocking, one of the reasons it is blocked is because it is unclear who is taking responsibility for its actions. @JoeHebda: while some bots have "enable/disable" buttons, this one is blocked and will require a administrator to unblock. — xaosflux Talk 14:54, 16 November 2018 (UTC)
While the bot is blocked there is an alternate process to help WP people. It is posted below. JoeHebda (talk) 16:42, 23 November 2018 (UTC)

Alternate process

While WP 1.0 bot is blocked, there is a way to get current article counts (assessment wikitable) for your WikiProjects. Follow the two-step process below.

  1. Generate new project data - At Update project data page, choose your Wikiproject & click the Go button. Depending on how busy enwp10 tool is there may be considerable wait time. After completion, run step two.
  2. Display project table - At Project summary tables page, choose your Wikiproject and click the Make table button.
  • Both of these processes can be bookmarked on your laptop. Credit to Adamdaley (talk) for this helpful contribution. JoeHebda (talk) 02:31, 20 November 2018 (UTC)
  • Not only bookmarked on a laptop, but also a desktop. Anyone doing this must remember to call each of the bookmarks differently to avoid confusion. Adamdaley (talk) 22:03, 20 November 2018 (UTC)

November 27, 2018 - update

Greetings, Today I added a plain to-do list at here for "WP1.0bot". Regards, JoeHebda (talk) 15:07, 27 November 2018 (UTC)

December 8, 2018 - update

Thanks to a workaround from @Gonzo fan2007: here the WP1.0bot is now successfully processing Assessment Tables only, without the quality logs. First run was Dec. 6 & last night Dec. 7 was also good. JoeHebda (talk) 16:43, 8 December 2018 (UTC)

JoeHebda, Gonzo fan2007 - Did we ever definitely answer the question "Who is in control of this account?"? I believe that this was one of the conditions we wanted to see met before unblocking (mentioned specifically above by both Xaosflux, and Cyberpower678).
When I asked, all I got was "the bot is run by the few of us left on the WP:1 project".
I would be happy to unprotect the bot's user/talk pages so that they can be updated. SQLQuery me! 19:20, 19 December 2018 (UTC)
SQL, it was my understanding that Audiodude, Kelson, and Walkerma were in charge of the account based on this comment. I have unprotected the user talk page of the bot, fyi. « Gonzo fan2007 (talk) @ 19:48, 19 December 2018 (UTC)
Gonzo fan2007, Could be. I think what we're looking for is "X, Y, and Z have access to this account.". That comment lists an indeterminate number ("the few of us"), a main person that maintains it (I presume this means that they have access to the account), someone whom is writing code for it (does this mean that they have access to the account too?), and is posted by a third person that you mention, whom doesn't specify if or if not they have access to the account in that comment.
Now that the talkpage is unprotected, one of the operators simply providing a clear update to "It is a bot is operated by Theopolisme and Wolfgang42" on User_talk:WP_1.0_bot would suffice. SQLQuery me! 20:04, 19 December 2018 (UTC)
@Gonzo fan2007 and SQL: agree - edits made by bots are still the responsibility of the editor(s) that are in control of the bot account - they need to be clearly identified and responsive to queries about their edits. — xaosflux Talk 20:23, 19 December 2018 (UTC)
SQL, Xaosflux: you are correct. My unblock of the bot account was based on the understanding that the account was accessible and under control by the users I referenced above. If this is not the case, obviously please feel free to reblock. « Gonzo fan2007 (talk) @ 20:53, 19 December 2018 (UTC)
SQL, Not as far as I can tell. I am not aware of anyone coming forward here. —CYBERPOWER (Merry Christmas) 03:50, 20 December 2018 (UTC)
  • @Kelson: are you the person in control of (and taking ownership of edits made by) @WP 1.0 bot: ? — xaosflux Talk 20:26, 19 December 2018 (UTC)
    • SQL, Xaosflux. and Cyberpower678: I have reblocked the account on the grounds that ownership of the account is clearly ambiguous at this point, and that is not something we want to perpetuate with a bot acocunt. Audiodude, Kelson, and Walkerma, if either or all of you have access to the bot account, please indicate it by performing a manual edit while logged in to the bot account on its talk page. « Gonzo fan2007 (talk) @ 15:00, 20 December 2018 (UTC)
@Xaosflux: @Gonzo fan2007: Yes I do, I have made a blank edit here. Please unblock the bot. Kelson (talk) 17:01, 31 December 2018 (UTC)
@Kelson: thank you! I've unblocked this account, please be sure to follow up on the questions and issues about malfunctions that have been raised above. — xaosflux Talk 17:05, 31 December 2018 (UTC)

WP 1.0 bot not running daily updates

Greetings for January 2, 2019 - Noticed bot is not processing daily Assessment table updates (and possibly Quality logs). Any ETA of when it will be re-started? JoeHebda (talk) 14:52, 2 January 2019 (UTC)

For questions about edits NOT being made, please follow up directly with the operator, Kelson. — xaosflux Talk 15:09, 2 January 2019 (UTC)

Notification of BAG nomination

I am just writing this to inform WP:Bots/Noticeboard that I have requested to join the Bot Approvals Group (BAG). I invite your thoughts on the nomination subpage, which is located here. Thank you for your time. --TheSandDoctor Talk 05:42, 14 January 2019 (UTC)

Possible unregistered bot?

Could someone check out the contributions of 2600:1700:7E31:5710:E52A:C47D:7520:DA36 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)? I know it's stopped but I don't know the procedure for dealing with constructive unregistered bots. [Username Needed] 13:01, 15 January 2019 (UTC)

I'm just seeing an IP that has made lots of small gnomey edits in quick (but not super quick) succession. Nothing to indicate it is a bot. SmartSE (talk) 13:20, 15 January 2019 (UTC)

Archive URLs

In a nutshell: Do not make mass modifications to URLs without accounting for archive URLs which are complicated and require more than a search-replace

Since about 2015, the number of archive URLs on Enwiki has gone from about 600,000 to 3 million. This is the commendable work of IABot, and the numbers increase daily. The problem arises that user scripts, bots and tools that make modifications to URLs but are often not accounting for archive URLs.

Examples why search and replace does not work. :

  1. The website http://example.com/... has moved domain to http://example.co.uk/... so a bot or script changes all occurrences in a search-replace. This causes http://web.archive.org/web/20180901010101/http://example.com/... -> http://web.archive.org/web/20180901010101/http://example.co.uk/... but this archive URL does not exist creating a dead archive URL.
  2. However even if the archive URL is skipped with regex, using the same example: {{cite web |url=http://example.com/... |archiveurl=http://web.archive.org/web/20180901010101/http://example.com/... }} Arguably the correct action in this case is to replace the |url= with http://example.co.uk/... and delete the |archiveurl= (and any |archivedate= and |deadurl=) because the new link is working, and the old |archiveurl= is no longer an archive of the |url=. Search and replace does not work.
  3. Even if #2 is not done and the original |archiveurl= is kept, the |deadurl=yes would be converted to |deadurl=no as the |url= is no longer dead.
  4. If there is a {{dead link}} template next to the link, that template would be deleted as the link is no longer dead.
  5. In addition to CS1|2, there are similar issues with {{webarchive}} and bare URLs.
  6. There are similar issues with the 20+ other archive providers listed at WP:WEBARCHIVES. It is not isolated to Wayback which is only about 80% of the archives.

My bot WP:WAYBACKMEDIC is able to fully automate URL changes while accounting for archives. It's not a simple bot so I don't expect anyone else to custom build something like it though hope others will. For now, I'm trying to intercept URL change requests at BOTREQ, and to remind bot makers at BRFA.

Should this be in policy ("Archives should be accounted for when modifying URLs")? Should we have a Wikipedia:Bots/URL subpage for requests; or a project for URL change requests? Should a project be on enwiki, or at meta to notify other language wikis globally? Feedback or thoughts, thanks. -- GreenC 01:14, 30 December 2018 (UTC)

I don't really understand your problem with #2. I have seen no documentation anywhere to indicate that the archived page must reflect the URL of any currently living page. And there are some cases where it cannot or will not, such as a domain-specific archive URL (e.g. The NYT). Our objective is the content at the live URL. --Izno (talk) 17:59, 30 December 2018 (UTC)
Initially I responded why I believe #2 is a best practice, but am refactoring because in the end it's up to you what to do. The point of this OP is that mass URL changes require more than a search-replace it needs a special-purpose bot. The hope here is to raise awareness of the issues so that in the future whenever URL changes come up, there is recognition of what is required, or at least taken into account. -- GreenC 22:35, 30 December 2018 (UTC)
I may start to sound like a broken record, but in general: what do we expect human editors to do in these situations? From the samples above, it certainly makes sense that human editors should not be introducing broken links (like in example 1) - so bots should not either. The guidance on this should be a general citation/archive guidance more than just a bot-guidance though. — xaosflux Talk 00:44, 31 December 2018 (UTC)
As for "old" archiveurl's - I'm not very up to speed on this, is it meant as only "an archive of the url that is in archive=" or "here is another archive where this reliable source can be found"? — xaosflux Talk 00:48, 31 December 2018 (UTC)
@Xaosflux: sorry, I missed your reply. Agreed, good idea to document the best practice and I hope to do that. I'm having trouble following your second question, but the "old" |archiveurl= just means whatever the archive URL was before it got modified by the search/replace script. Does it make sense why that is a problem? I can step through it if you want. -- GreenC 00:33, 21 January 2019 (UTC)

Cyberbot

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T213475

Seems like several tasks are broken now:

  1. Sometimes, bot blank WP:CHUS (pinging @1997kB and K6ka:)
  2. Bot did pointless edit warring edits in CratStats task, RfX Reporter and RfXTallyBot (pinging @DeltaQuad, Amalthea, and Xeno:)
  3. Bot only archive less than 5 days RFPP request in WP:RFPPA (now only 19 January and 20 January)
  4. Disable fiction seems broken
Though @Cyberpower678: promised to fix the first and the second, but still broken Hhkohh (talk) 23:20, 20 January 2019 (UTC)
As the bot is now ignoring the stop pages I will be blocking the bot. It's clearly broken and needs intervention before editing again. -- Amanda (aka DQ) 00:24, 21 January 2019 (UTC)
DeltaQuad, I honestly have no idea what is going with the bot, other than it started after the server migration happened in Labs. I haven't gotten an answer about it though. —CYBERPOWER (Around) 02:43, 21 January 2019 (UTC)
Fair, that's why the block was issued though. -- Amanda (aka DQ) 03:55, 21 January 2019 (UTC)
Hhkohh, I've got a massive failure log, I'm downloading it now. —CYBERPOWER (Around) 02:47, 21 January 2019 (UTC)
Well I just took a look at the logs, and it's caused by a lot of 503 responses from the MW API. Massive amounts actually. I have 20 GB of data for just the last 7 days. Pinging Anomie. What could be causing this. Here's a snippet of my log:
Extended content

Date/Time: Thu, 27 Dec 2018 01:02:27 +0000 Method: GET URL: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/api.php Parameters: Array ( 

   [action] => query
   [prop] => info
   [inprop] => protection|talkid|watched|watchers|notificationtimestamp|subjectid|url|readable|preload|displaytitle
   [titles] => Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/JJMC89
   [redirects] => 
   [format] => php
   [servedby] => 
   [requestid] => 667437408

)

Raw Data: <!DOCTYPE html> <html lang=en> <meta charset=utf-8> <title>Wikimedia Error</title> <style>

  • { margin: 0; padding: 0; }

body { background: #fff; font: 15px/1.6 sans-serif; color: #333; } .content { margin: 7% auto 0; padding: 2em 1em 1em; max-width: 640px; } .footer { clear: both; margin-top: 14%; border-top: 1px solid #e5e5e5; background: #f9f9f9; padding: 2em 0; font-size: 0.8em; text-align: center; } img { float: left; margin: 0 2em 2em 0; } a img { border: 0; } h1 { margin-top: 1em; font-size: 1.2em; } .content-text { overflow: hidden; overflow-wrap: break-word; word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-hyphens: auto; -moz-hyphens: auto; -ms-hyphens: auto; hyphens: auto; } p { margin: 0.7em 0 1em 0; } a { color: #0645AD; text-decoration: none; } a:hover { text-decoration: underline; } code { font-family: sans-serif; } .text-muted { color: #777; } </style>

<a href="https://www.wikimedia.org"><img src="https://www.wikimedia.org/static/images/wmf-logo.png" srcset="https://www.wikimedia.org/static/images/wmf-logo-2x.png 2x" alt="Wikimedia" width="135" height="101"> </a> Error

Our servers are currently under maintenance or experiencing a technical problem. Please <a href="" title="Reload this page" onclick="window.location.reload(false); return false">try again</a> in a few minutes.

See the error message at the bottom of this page for more information.

If you report this error to the Wikimedia System Administrators, please include the details below.

Request from 172.16.2.21 via cp1089 frontend, Varnish XID 760768760
Upstream caches: cp1089 int
Error: 429, Too Many Requests at Thu, 27 Dec 2018 01:02:27 GMT

</html>

UNSERIALIZATION FAILED

@Anomie: I know it says too many requests, but I don't see how that could be. Surely Cyberbot couldn't possibly be hitting the max limit on apihighlimits.—CYBERPOWER (Around) 03:12, 21 January 2019 (UTC)
It often does not do its job at RfPP properly but now we have nothing there at all, so no archiving is going on. I suppose I'm going to have to manually archive until the bot gets fixed. Enigmamsg 06:12, 21 January 2019 (UTC)
I am glad to help archive and hope Cyberpower678 can fix it Hhkohh (talk) 09:10, 21 January 2019 (UTC)
Hhkohh, The numerous failures is because the API is throwing 503s at more than half of the requests it makes. From what I can tell, unless a process has gone rogue, Cyberbot shouldn’t be anywhere near the API rate limit. —CYBERPOWER (Around) 12:16, 21 January 2019 (UTC)
This is an error returned by Varnish, it has nothing to do with the API rate limit. According to https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/source/operations-puppet/browse/production/modules/varnish/templates/text-frontend.inc.vcl.erb$262 , Varnish is not supposed to return 429 for Wikimedia networks including Labs IP addresses. I guess that wikimedia_nets variable needs to be updated with the new IP addresses used by Labs. Nemo 14:45, 21 January 2019 (UTC)
Nemo bis, Well, this certainly confirms that this is not a fault on the bot's end. Any chance we can get this updated, soonish? Labs recently migrated servers, and since then Cyberbot has been really weird in the way it behaves on Wikipedia. I assumed something changed, but never had an opportunity to look into it. —CYBERPOWER (Chat) 16:13, 21 January 2019 (UTC)
No idea how quick a fix might come. It should be a trivial configuration change but I see that on a related ticket there is some debate about it (and of course sysadmins would prefer if every client did what it's told by error 429). Varnish seemingly ignores the requests which come with a login cookie, so you could also try that way. Nemo 16:25, 21 January 2019 (UTC)
Nemo bis, except for that the bot is actually getting a 503 HTTP code and I’m not going to create code to parse human readable HTML where another error code is nested. —CYBERPOWER (Chat) 16:50, 21 January 2019 (UTC)
@Nemo bis and Cyberpower678: Looks like phab:T213475 in that case. Anomie⚔ 22:21, 21 January 2019 (UTC)

Discussion Notice

There is a discussion that may be of interest at Wikipedia_talk:Username_policy#UAA_Bot_Work. RhinosF1(chat)(status)(contribs) 17:51, 8 February 2019 (UTC)

Template:Category redirect

What bot(s) currently maintain(s) category redirects? I'd like to chat with the operator(s), but I have no idea whom to address. Nyttend (talk) 00:11, 12 February 2019 (UTC)

@Nyttend: See User:RussBot and Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/RussBot --DannyS712 (talk) 00:14, 12 February 2019 (UTC)
Hi, DannyS712, and thank you. Note now left on R'n'B's talk page. Nyttend (talk) 00:32, 12 February 2019 (UTC)

Cyberbot II

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T213475
Cyberbot II (talk · contribs)

Please stop this one too.

The last edit in this list happened after notification about the same issue at User_talk:Cyberpower678#Cyberbot_II ~ ToBeFree (talk) 15:57, 22 January 2019 (UTC)

I am curious why the run page is disable but bot is still running the disabled task? Hhkohh (talk) 16:06, 22 January 2019 (UTC)
Blocked, @Cyberpower678: please review critical article blanking bug, and why the run page is being ignored - if you have changed this to use a new functionality please update your documentation. — xaosflux Talk 16:11, 22 January 2019 (UTC)
Xaosflux, See one section up. Cyberbot is suffering from a MW web service issue which is causing critical malfunctions. It can only be fixed once the above issue is fixed. —CYBERPOWER (Chat) 21:05, 22 January 2019 (UTC)
Thank you, any admin (including you) should feel free to unblock if you think the issue is resolved and you are ready to perform a supervised restart. — xaosflux Talk 21:09, 22 January 2019 (UTC)
Xaosflux, Of course, and thank you. I will be leaving the bot blocked for a while until I hear from the sysadmins. Cyberbot runs on ancient code, and I am working to rewrite it to use newer, more error handling code. It's still a ways off though. —CYBERPOWER (Chat) 21:16, 22 January 2019 (UTC)
Xaosflux, with the bot stable again, can you unblock meta and commons? —CYBERPOWER (Be my Valentine) 12:46, 13 February 2019 (UTC)
@Cyberpower678: Cyberbot II wasn't blocked at meta, but Cyberbot I was - I've unblocked that one. I'm not a commons: admin though. — xaosflux Talk 12:59, 13 February 2019 (UTC)
Xaosflux, just a typo. ping yourself? Hhkohh (talk) 13:42, 13 February 2019 (UTC)
Haha fixed thanks, — xaosflux Talk 13:54, 13 February 2019 (UTC)
Xaosflux, thanks. Isn't Fastily a commons admin? —CYBERPOWER (Be my Valentine) 14:27, 13 February 2019 (UTC)
Nevermind. But -revi is one. —CYBERPOWER (Be my Valentine) 14:30, 13 February 2019 (UTC)
(edit conflict) @Cyberpower678: nope, try commons:User:Taivo who blocked it, and is recently active. — xaosflux Talk 14:31, 13 February 2019 (UTC)
And Cyberbot I too
After more than ten years with no nifty Template:Adminstats to create a pretty display of my admin actions, and having no sense of anything missing, I happened upon it somewhere a few months ago and followed instructions to place it on one of my user pages. Now the Cyberbots get cut off at the pass and no more updates!
I'm disappointed in myself for feeling tempted to be a crybaby about it. Thanks for all the great work, Cyberpower, if they never fix the thing that's breaking it we'll still owe you a lot. – Athaenara ✉ 05:41, 2 February 2019 (UTC)
Athaenara, It'll be back. MW Varnish just needs updating, but that's something only the sysadmins can do. —CYBERPOWER (Chat) 21:24, 2 February 2019 (UTC)
It's back!! – Athaenara ✉ 08:54, 13 February 2019 (UTC)

Could someone usurp KadaneBot?

  Moved from WP:VP/T

Hi all, Kadane very helpfully created KadaneBot for us over at Wikipedia Peer Review - it sends out automated reminders based on topic areas of interest for unanswered peer reviews. Unfortunately, Kadane's been inactive almost since creation (September 2018), and hasn't responded to my request [12]. Would anyone be so kind as to usurp this bot so we can continue to use it? --Tom (LT) (talk) 09:00, 21 February 2019 (UTC)

@Tom (LT): there isn't really an 'usurp' process for bots. Anyone is welcome to build a clone of this bot, and request to run it. You can ask someone to at WP:BOTREQ. — xaosflux Talk 12:46, 21 February 2019 (UTC)
Thanks, will do.--Tom (LT) (talk) 07:30, 22 February 2019 (UTC)
  Moved to WP:BOTREQ

Notice

Per a request at WP:ANRFC, I have closed Help talk:Citation Style 1#RFC on publisher and location in cite journal, which concerns the actions of Citation bot, which is operated by Smith609. Just wanted to put a note here. --DannyS712 (talk) 19:52, 22 February 2019 (UTC)

HBC AIV helperbot5 malfunctioning

Since 00:15 UTC on February 25th, the bot mentioned above has ceased removing resolved reports from WP:AIV. Doing this function manually is very tedious, so it would be appreciated if the issue could be resolved as soon as possible. Thanks, Kirbanzo (userpage - talk - contribs) 02:15, 25 February 2019 (UTC)

@Kirbanzo: please contact the operator at User talk:JamesR. Since the bot is NOT editing, they are the only person that can do anything about it. — xaosflux Talk 02:18, 25 February 2019 (UTC)
Alright, did so. Thanks for letting me know of this. Kirbanzo (userpage - talk - contribs) 02:21, 25 February 2019 (UTC)
  Fixed — JamesR (talk) 03:00, 25 February 2019 (UTC)

BotPasswords

I was experimenting with the use of Special:BotPasswords for the Bots. I generated one, and the Bot was ab;le to use it to login okay, but when the Bot went to update a page, I got assertbotfailed: Assertion that the user has the "bot" right failed. Can anyone point me to how to resolve this? Did I generate the BotPassword incorrectly? Hawkeye7 (discuss) 20:04, 27 February 2019 (UTC)

mw:API:Assert I presume ~ Amory (u • t • c) 20:06, 27 February 2019 (UTC)
Yes, but the MilHistBot does have the bot account right. It is only when using a BotPassword that it fails. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 21:41, 27 February 2019 (UTC)
Did you check the checkbox for the "High-volume editing" grant? Anomie⚔ 00:21, 28 February 2019 (UTC)
That's what I needed! I hadn't checked that box because I wasn't doing anything high-volume related. It works now. Thank you for your help. Much appreciated. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 01:16, 28 February 2019 (UTC)
"High-volume editing" includes the bot right, which is what assert=bot checks for. Anomie⚔ 01:38, 28 February 2019 (UTC)
@Anomie: I notice we don't have an entry for 'assertion' (or whatever that's called') in WP:BOTDICT. Mind writing one? Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 01:47, 28 February 2019 (UTC)
Ok. Special:Diff/885444191 Anomie⚔ 01:57, 28 February 2019 (UTC)

Adminbots requests page

Does anyone actually make use of Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Adminbots? These are normally cross posted at WP:AN and other venues, and there are very few watchers. Think it can be deprecated.... — xaosflux Talk 22:03, 28 February 2019 (UTC)

It doesn't look like it. The page info says there are 45 watchers, 17 who've looked at it recently. I'm one of them and don't really care much. Anomie⚔ 00:46, 1 March 2019 (UTC)
I'd be fine getting rid of it / marking as historical, as long as we keep the AN notices. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 00:52, 1 March 2019 (UTC)
Same. They're not very common so it hardly seems productive. ~ Amory (u • t • c) 01:59, 1 March 2019 (UTC)
So long as we continue notifying AN, I'd be fine with marking it historical. SQLQuery me! 02:34, 1 March 2019 (UTC)

Nomination for substitution of Template:BOTREQ

 Template:BOTREQ has been nominated for substitution. You are invited to comment on the discussion at the template's entry on the Templates for discussion page. {{3x|p}}ery (talk) 03:38, 5 March 2019 (UTC)

 – {{3x|p}}ery (talk) 00:41, 6 March 2019 (UTC)

Double-redirect tagging (2019)

Hi. I'd like to revive this discussion from 2017. I still think that double-redirect-fixing bots should tag pages they fix with {{R avoided double redirect}}. This would help detect errors in cases of:

  1. Controversial mergers/redirections
    1. Article A is controversially merged/redirected to article B.
    2. The bot re-targets redirect C (which initially pointed to A) to article B.
    3. The merger/redirection is reverted, and article A is restored.
    4. Redirect C is left pointing to B instead of A, where it should.
  2. Redirect vandalism
    1. Article A is redirected to article B by a vandal.
    2. The bot re-targets redirect C (which initially pointed to A) to article B.
    3. The vandal is reverted.
    4. Redirect C is left pointing to B instead of A, where it should.
  3. Bad page moves
    1. Article A is redirected to article B by a vandal or misinformed editor.
    2. The bot re-targets redirect C (which initially pointed to A) to article B.
    3. The page move is reverted, and B is re-targeted to more appropriate target D.
    4. The bot re-targets redirect C to D instead of A, where it should.
  4. Complicated move-splits
    1. Editor 1 expands article A, and moves article A to article B in order to reflect the new scope.
    2. The bot re-targets redirect C (which initially pointed to A) to article B.
    3. Editor 2 disagrees with the expansion, reverts the move, and splits the new content into article B instead.
    4. Redirect C is left pointing to B instead of A, where it should.

I think I've seen examples all four cases, but mostly I've had to fix cases of (1), e.g. here, here, and here.

In the previous discussion, Headbomb opposed the proposal due to the huge amount of unnecessary tags that would be generated by non-controversial, routine page moves, which form the large majority of the bots' edits. So I'm thinking that maybe this could be limited to double redirects to redirects which are not tagged with {{R from move}}. This would limit usefulness to the issues caused by situations (1) and (2), but since the other cases seem much rarer, this is probably an okay compromise. Pinging bot operators Emaus, R'n'B, Xqt and Avicennasis.

Note: I've also identified another case, e.g. here, but I don't see a way to address this other than raising editor awareness:

  1. Disambiguation moves
    1. Article A, which has an ambiguous title, is moved to the more specific title article B, and re-targets redirect A to overview article D.
    2. The bot re-targets redirect C (which initially pointed to A) to overview article D, instead of B, where it should.

--Paul_012 (talk) 09:29, 9 March 2019 (UTC)

Long and Winding Road to Parsoid

 
"The Long And Winding Road To Making Parsoid The Default MediaWiki Parser"

At the end of this presentation about mw:Parsoid, someone asked whether editing tools and bots should be using Parsoid. Subbu's answer is conditional ("depends upon what you're trying to do"), but it's something that some of you might want to look into. Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 21:20, 12 March 2019 (UTC)

Vandalism detection

At least one bot detects likely vandalism and reverts it. Sorry, I forget its name or their names; but it does (they do) excellent work; I certainly don't want to complain about imperfections.

Just a few minutes ago I reverted this vandalism from July 2018. It didn't involve any racism, Islamophobia, homophobia, etc etc; yet it's obvious to my (human) eyes that it's vandalism (or drunken stupidity, or similar). Vandalism-detection-bot operators might like to examine why it wasn't automatically detected. More.coffy (talk) 02:40, 21 February 2019 (UTC)

@Cobi: Ping, might be interested. 2405:204:130C:AF29:1FA9:A68F:D271:8028 (talk) 20:14, 13 March 2019 (UTC)
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