Wikipedia talk:AutoWikiBrowser/Archive 31

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auto wiki browser

hi please add wikidata site to auto wiki browser — Preceding unsigned comment added by Amirh123 (talk • contribs) 12:10, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

You can already use Wikidata in AWB (there was that "Use site" option). But the important question is - WHAT do you want to do with AWB in Wikidata? --Edgars2007 (talk/contribs) 04:19, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

Only on non-mainspace pages. AWB is not currently equipped to handle Wikidata. I was not able to locate a task on Phab to handle it, but I think there are sufficient numbers of other tools for Wikidata that AWB probably is not necessary. --Izno (talk) 04:59, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

help with Regex Find & Replace

I'm relatively new at AWB and have used it successfully to replace one text string with another. But now I'm trying to do something more complicated and can't figure it out from the manual. I want to remove a deprecated parameter from an infobox. So I need to find "| param = any string" (with any number of blanks on either side of "param") and delete the line. Can someone give me the syntax for this? Thanks. MB 03:12, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

MB, a relatively simple solution is [\r\n]+[ ]*\|\s*parameter_name\s*=[^\r\n\|\{\}]*, but this comes heavily caveated. If this parameter exists (at the start of its own line) for other templates it will be deleted erroneously. Also, if the parameter value contains piped wikilinks, it will malform them by removing all text left of the pipe |. So just be extra careful, and as you encounter exceptions/constraints add them to the regex. The proper solution requires much string manipulation via the module (C# or VB.NET) or multiple complicated rules.   ~ Tom.Reding (talk ⋅dgaf)  03:48, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

The "Inside templates {{..}}" rule-option doesn't work well when nested templates exist, but should be used anyway to help minimize false positives in non-infobox templates. Not knowing the specifics of the infobox and parameter makes it more difficult to give detailed advice.   ~ Tom.Reding (talk ⋅dgaf)  05:21, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

OK, worked well. I was working from a list (category) of a particular infobox with unknown parameters - so I didn't have to worry about matching the parameter in other templates. There were many instances (5-10%) where I had make fixes due to piping but overall it saved a lot of time over doing it manually. MB 17:17, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

AWB on wiktionary

Hello. I just started use AWB on Azerbaijani Wiktionary. And can do some simple edits with AWB, but now I need very hard edits. For example there is code like that :

{{çevir|as|জন}}-{{az}}:{{çevir|as|su}}

And there is জন and su are variable. They change at each entry. I want change code like that :

# [[su]]

How I can do that? --Drabdullayev17 (talk) 19:05, 6 May 2018 (UTC)

Find and replace modification

Hello! I'm attempting to use AWB to replace ampersands with "and" (& --> and), but only for certain parts of the page, mainly the discography section. I was wondering if there is a special rule which that I can input which would allow me to skip the find and replace function for text which are inside apostrophes. Let's just say, "You & I" (featuring John Smith & Apple Bee)). I would like to avoid touching the ampersand for "You & I", but yet still replace the ampersand in the brackets. Thanks! aNode (discuss) 14:43, 2 June 2018 (UTC)

You'd need a negative lookbehind/lookahead, along the lines of (?<!")([^"]{0,10})&([^"]{0,10})(?!") (10 arbitrarily chosen since it's likely a song title won't be more than 10 chars long on either side, but I could be wrong), and replacing it with $1and$2. Primefac (talk) 14:51, 2 June 2018 (UTC)

Cheers mate, thanks for the tip! I'll give the rule a try. Edit: Holy, it worked! Thanks a ton for your help Prime! :) aNode (discuss) 14:54, 2 June 2018 (UTC)

how can i get all the pages of a category?

I am from ta.wiktionary. As we know that we can get the pages of a category by the make-list option. But it limits upto 25,000. If a category, exceeds that limit, how can get all the pages? Example, having broken linksAs a sysop, i want to clean-up. Thanks in advance.--Info-farmer (talk) 04:26, 10 June 2018 (UTC)

You could try a WP:DUMP scan. Or a WP:PETSCAN.Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 16:17, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

If a category has over 25,000 links, consider initiating a proposal to subdivide the category into a more reasonable subset. In some cases, categories may be subdivided by factors as basic as the first letters of pagenames. bd2412 T 23:53, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

When will the next AWB update be published

I was wondering when the next AWB update will be published. It looks like the last one was done a year ago and there are a lot of changes since then. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2601:5cc:100:697a:317e:2dd8:c191:8a0d (talk) 18:04, 28 January 2018‎ (UTC)

@Rjwilmsi and Magioladitis: I'm on a computer whcih can't get the nighly releases,a nd were wondering if a new stable (or at least unstable excecutable/snapshot) could be released. Thanks! :) (t) Josve05a (c) 23:06, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

I would need help from @Reedy: to do the release. I did leave him a couple of talk page messages but didn't get a response. Rjwilmsi 09:20, 12 June 2018 (UTC)

Yeah, I've been aware for a few months that we need to release an updated version. I'll see what I can do by the end of the week. Sorry! Reedy (talk) 15:23, 12 June 2018 (UTC)

@Josve05a: at the moment only Reedy can make a new release. -- Magioladitis (talk) 15:44, 12 June 2018 (UTC)

add wikitable or infobox

hello. how to add table or infobox to article by awb?thanksMonorodo (talk) 02:11, 13 June 2018 (UTC)

If you're adding an infobox, you'd use the "Append/Prepend text" option in the "More..." tab. Adding a table is a bit more complicated, since I assume you'd be wanting to put in a specific location, but it could reasonably be done by using a find/replace (assuming it was going to go in a specific location). However, if you're adding an identical table to say <5 pages, you might as well just add them manually, because it will take more time to set up the AWB rules and coding than it will to just copy/paste across those pages. Primefac (talk) 12:33, 13 June 2018 (UTC)

AWB skip/save

Is it possible to go through the "Make list" list, delete-and-skip those where no changes are made (per normal), but save-and-skip those where changes would be required, but don't actually make the changes? That is, if a change is required, save it in the list and continue onto the rest of the list? -- Alex^TW 06:18, 23 June 2018 (UTC)

This would be great, you can then let AWB make you the list overnight, and on the next run you know that you have to check every page. Now you sit there looking at it skip until there is a page to edit. —Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 06:23, 23 June 2018 (UTC)

Isn't this the pre-parse mode? From the top menu bar, Tools > Use pre-parse mode. -- John of Reading (talk) 06:34, 23 June 2018 (UTC)

So it is! (Though: Options > Use pre-parse mode). You learn something new every day. Thank you! -- Alex^TW 06:54, 23 June 2018 (UTC)

Proposed change to AWBRULES#3

Do not make controversial edits with it. Seek consensus for changes that could be controversial at the appropriate venue; village pump, WikiProject, etc. "Being bold" is not a justification for mass editing lacking demonstrable consensus. If challenged, the onus is on the AWB operator to demonstrate or achieve consensus for changes they wish to make on a large scale. Possibly-controversial changes to more than 500 pages must receive consensus either through a formal Request for Comment discussion or through the bot-approval process.

The "consensus" needed here is currently very vague. This is an attempt to clarify where a WP:LOCALCONSENSUS is sufficient, and where a wider discussion is necessary. power~enwiki (π, ν) 20:01, 3 July 2018 (UTC)

Procedural note: if and when a page-count threshold and wording have initial consensus, I will re-start this discussion as an RFC, possibly at a different forum, pinging all participants here. power~enwiki (π, ν) 20:03, 3 July 2018 (UTC)

Are you saying that all batches of 500+ AWB edits should be treated as if they were potentially controversial? That will add an unhelpful burden of administration to those using AWB for spelling and grammar fixes. -- John of Reading (talk) 20:47, 3 July 2018 (UTC)

If those don't need "consensus" now, I don't want this proposal to change it. I've added "possibly controversial" to the wording. I've also removed a separate threshold for "style" changes as more complexity than is beneficial. power~enwiki (π, ν) 20:55, 3 July 2018 (UTC)

"Possibly-controversial changes" are in the eye of the beholder. Instead of a numerical cap on pages affected, why not amend the guideline to state that (1) use of AWB to implement changes based on an MOS guideline requires RfC consensus, and (2) use of AWB to make personal preference changes is not acceptable. Pyxis Solitary 14:00, 4 July 2018 (UTC)

I oppose changing the current wording. It invites too much detail in what's a general idea. Making MOS changes with AWB is fine 99%+ of the time. No need to RFCize gnome work. Likewise, having arbitrary threshold for when to requires RFCs and BRFAs is pure WP:BURO. Don't make controversial edits with AWB. That's the rule. Simple, easy to understand, and use WP:COMMONSENSE. That's why we required experience to use AWB. If/When you run into a 'controversial' thing, someone will let you know. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 15:34, 4 July 2018 (UTC)

Rule no. 1 has a loophole

How is an AWB user expected to abide by WP:AWBRULES no. 1 when they can't preview before saving? See User talk:Bearcat#Superfluous reflist. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 16:55, 5 July 2018 (UTC)

You're presented with the diff. So you review the diff. AWB also allows previewing. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 16:58, 5 July 2018 (UTC)

Mediawiki problem not AWB. Mediawiki hides second occurrance of reflist. There is a CHECKWIKI task for it. One more proof that sometimes an edit may be valid even if it does not change the rendered output. -- Magioladitis (talk) 16:59, 5 July 2018 (UTC)

@Magioladitis: you're getting dangerously close to violating your ban again, if you haven't just done so. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 17:05, 5 July 2018 (UTC)

Headbomb Why? Explain me. There is CHECKWIKI error 78 which is listed as not cosmetic. I think Headbomb you are in confusion since the problem here is the second reflist not displayed due to Mediawiki rules. Mediawiki uses the same trick to display reflist when there are references and not reflist template. -- Magioladitis (talk) 17:10, 5 July 2018 (UTC)

• To answer the original question directly, Rule #1 doesn't mean you have to be perfect, it means if you screw something up you are responsible for dealing with the cleanup. In this particular instance, as well as in general, the response of "I didn't realize it was doing it" is good, with the follow-up being the removal of those sections from the affected pages (by the AWB operator). I can't even fault Bearcat for the edits - how they hell were they supposed to know that a transcluded section already had a {{reflist}} in it?

So yeah, drop a note asking what's going on, and if they don't respond in a calm and reasonable matter then we can start arguing about how terrible of people they are. Primefac (talk) 18:11, 5 July 2018 (UTC)

I consider this post mainly as bug report since I have seen several similar already in Phabricator. I explained above that fixing this is beyond AWB's administration. -- Magioladitis (talk) 08:07, 6 July 2018 (UTC)

Preview

The Preview of articles is really useful in showing what you are going to get before you save. But it does not show the categories, which would help if you keyed a category that is in red (does not exist). Could this be added? Hmains (talk) 16:59, 7 July 2018 (UTC)

AmE - BrE (and v.v.)

Is there a script/feature in AWB that would allow easy switching of spellings in an article between AmE - BrE, and vice versa? Thanks, Zingarese (talk) 20:30, 7 July 2018 (UTC)

In a word, no. In more words, such changes are extremely context-dependent and you've need to be very cautious about making mass changes of spellings in articles. Primefac (talk) 20:35, 7 July 2018 (UTC)

It is probably easy to do it by using F&R tables. -- Magioladitis (talk) 22:35, 7 July 2018 (UTC)

It is, but that's not technically a script/feature, you'd have to do it yourself. Primefac (talk) 23:00, 7 July 2018 (UTC)

True. -- Magioladitis (talk) 23:49, 7 July 2018 (UTC)

Typo in AutoWikiBrowser

Migrated to Phabricator: T199052. (t) Josve05a (c) 12:00, 8 July 2018 (UTC)

Tracked in Phabricator Task T199052 I just downloaded it today so it should be the latest version. When you go to Disambig and hover over the check mark to the left of '"Skip page were no disambiguation made" the text that displays says "Automatically skip pages if now disambiguation made" it should be "Automatically skip pages if no disambiguation made". —  BrandonALF   (talk) 23:49, 7 July 2018 (UTC)

Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser/CheckPage/VersionJSON

@Reedy: (and anyone else involved in AWB) Are Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser/CheckPage/VersionJSON and the accompanying module still used by something? {{3x|p}}ery (talk) 21:51, 26 June 2018 (UTC)

Given the lack of any reply, both pages have been nominated for deletion. {{3x|p}}ery (talk) 15:38, 9 July 2018 (UTC)

convert column of infobox to rows

I Have many of infobox like:

@@@en:Yuremamine@@@
{{chembox
| Verifiedfields = changed
| Watchedfields = changed
| verifiedrevid = 424841404
| ImageFile=Yuremamine.png
| ImageSize=200px
| IUPACName=
| OtherNames=Yuremamine
|Section1={{Chembox Identifiers}}
}}

many infobox

I Want use regex in notepad to convert each infobox to row infobox

@@@en:Yuremamine@@@{{chembox| Verifiedfields = changed| Watchedfields = changed| verifiedrevid = 424841404| ImageFile=Yuremamine.png| ImageSize=200px| IUPACName=| OtherNames=Yuremamine|Section1={{Chembox Identifiers}}}}

Monorodo (talk) 09:56, 8 July 2018 (UTC)

Did you try looking for carriage return and new line characters and replacing them with nothing?

search for: [\n\r]+

—Trappist the monk (talk) 12:27, 8 July 2018 (UTC)

Just as a note, Monorodo, convention on Wikipedia is that we have one parameter per line in an infobox - it makes it easier to see what is there and find errors. Primefac (talk) 14:08, 8 July 2018 (UTC)

in example above. I have many infobox::search for: [\n\r]+ produce only one row. I Want multiple row that contain at first @@@en: thanksMonorodo (talk) 06:06, 10 July 2018 (UTC)

Issues Connecting to Specific MediaWiki Installation - SSL Related?

I have successfully used AWB with multiple MediaWiki installations, including some that make use of HTTPS. I am currently trying to work with a new MediaWiki project using AWB but I am unable to connect to the server at all.

Upon launching the program, I receive an error stating "Error connecting to the wiki: Unable to read data from the transport connection: An existing connection was forcibly closed by the remote host." And upon attempting to Login, I receive an error stating "Network access error: The underlying connection was closed: An unexpected error occurred on a send."

The thing that seems strange to me is that I was able to access the wiki's API through a Postman GET request to the URI AWB appears to start with upon connecting to a new MediaWiki installation with no issues whatsoever:

/w/api.php?action=query&meta=siteinfo&siprop=general%7Cnamespaces%7Cnamespacealiases%7Cstatistics%7Cmagicwords&format=xml

So, as far as I can tell, there doesn't appear to be any issue with the server's configuration at all since it responds as expected to applications other than AWB.

Upon digging a little deeper into this issue running Wireshark to see the sent/received TCP packets generated by AWB, it appears that, upon attempting to connect to the server AWB sends a normal "Client Hello" packet and the server is immediately responding with a TCP Reset packet, ending the connection prematurely, rather than continuing the SSL handshake process. As mentioned before, since it appears that the server configuration seems perfectly functional for applications other than AWB, my only guess is that there must be some sort of issue with AWB's handling of the underlying TCP connection.

I'm kind of grasping at straws here and am open to any ideas or suggestions. While I'm unable to supply anyone with valid credentials with which to attempt a login, the wiki in question can be found at https://wiki.desert-nomad.com/

Thank you very much for your time! Squingynaut (talk) 08:03, 13 July 2018 (UTC)

List all pages at gl.wiki

Hi, I wanted to get the list of all the articles of gl.wiki to make typo edits. I have tryed to set the source "Special page" and click "Make list", then select "All pages", but that only gets 25.000 articles (gl.wiki has near 150.000). How can I get the complete list? Bye, --Elisardojm (talk) 19:18, 13 July 2018 (UTC)

@Elisardojm: for huge lists, you will want to use a dump. — xaosflux ^Talk 19:29, 13 July 2018 (UTC)

Xaosflux I don't know how use dumps, and I don't have enough space to save that file... Bye, --Elisardojm (talk) 19:47, 13 July 2018 (UTC)

@Elisardojm: on that page there is a "List of page titles in main namespace" that is only 1.3MB. If you don't know how to use a dump, now would be a good time to start learning, especially if you plan to edit over 100,000 pages. — xaosflux ^Talk 19:52, 13 July 2018 (UTC)

Thnaks Xaosflux, I have loaded a bit more than 200.000 pages, now I wanted to delete from list all redirects. How can I do that? Bye, --Elisardojm (talk) 21:27, 13 July 2018 (UTC)

Should we recommend quarry, or it's still too large list? IKhitron (talk) 21:41, 13 July 2018 (UTC)

A pre-parse with AWB would do the job, if slowly. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 21:43, 13 July 2018 (UTC)

IKhitron, how should I use quarry? I don't know that tool... Bye, --Elisardojm (talk) 12:10, 14 July 2018 (UTC)

Again, I do not know if it is powerful enough. Start with studying the MySQL plrogramming language for beginners. IKhitron (talk) 12:34, 14 July 2018 (UTC)

Ok, thank you to all! Bye, --Elisardojm (talk) 14:49, 14 July 2018 (UTC)

@Elisardojm: the same page of dumps has a file "Redirect list", I haven't checked it but if it is all the redirects you should be able to subtract them from the former list to be left with just article non-redirects. — xaosflux ^Talk 16:37, 14 July 2018 (UTC)

No, that file is an Mysql dump, it seems that is for create a table, but I don't know it's use because it's valors aren't redirections... I don't see other file that could contain that info. Bye, --Elisardojm (talk) 19:12, 14 July 2018 (UTC)

@Elisardojm: all glwiki articles excluding redirects --Edgars2007 (talk/contribs) 19:50, 14 July 2018 (UTC)

Oh, looks like it's too much for pastebin. Wait a minute, will create an archive. Available here. --Edgars2007 (talk/contribs) 19:53, 14 July 2018 (UTC)

Great Edgars2007! But, how can I make it in the future? Bye, Elisardojm (talk) 20:07, 14 July 2018 (UTC)

If it's not too often, you can ask me. --Edgars2007 (talk/contribs) 07:59, 15 July 2018 (UTC)

Thanks! Bye, Elisardojm (talk) 09:02, 15 July 2018 (UTC)

Hey, one last question. How can I get the list of all articles of gl.wiki, excluding redirections, that doesn't has the template {{Control de autoridades}}? Bye, Elisardojm (talk) 13:39, 15 July 2018 (UTC)

list --Edgars2007 (talk/contribs) 15:27, 15 July 2018 (UTC)

Great, thank you Edgars2007! Bye, Elisardojm (talk) 09:16, 16 July 2018 (UTC)

need module

hello. I need module to convert

{{chembox|Verifiedfields=changed|Watchedfield= changed|verifiedrevid=424841404|ImageFile=Yuremamine.png|ImageSize=200px|IUPACName=|OtherNames=Yuremamine|Section1{{ChemboxIdentifiers}}}}

to

{{chembox
| Verifiedfields = changed
| Watchedfields = changed
| verifiedrevid = 424841404
| ImageFile=Yuremamine.png
| ImageSize=200px
| IUPACName=
| OtherNames=Yuremamine
|Section1={{Chembox Identifiers}}
}}

Monorodo (talk) 22:20, 15 July 2018 (UTC)

Whitespace-only edits are usually considered 'insignificant edits.' Dat Guy^Talk_Contribs 01:05, 16 July 2018 (UTC)

Thanks. I need this module. Monorodo (talk) 13:05, 17 July 2018 (UTC)

Arrange the sections of article by awb

My articles messy like this. I want arrange all sections follow this:first

Biography section

Personal life section

Works and publications section

In finally section

Resources

How do that by module or regex. ThanksMonorodo

We have a manual of style that describes how an article should be arranged, most articles are in fact arranged in roughly this manner. How you choose to arrange a copy of a real article that you are duplicating with a different format on your user page for some reason is up to you, certainly not a matter that requires AWB. Beeblebrox (talk) 22:13, 20 July 2018 (UTC)

need for regex

in find and replacement of awb. what is the regex to find [[Dean Jones (actor)|Dean Jones]] I use \[\[Dean Jones (actor)\]\] .but it not work. Monorodo (talk) 18:21, 22 July 2018 (UTC)

@Monorodo: I'm barely competent with basic regex but I've found https://regexr.com/ very helpful. Try https://regexr.com/3sqks where it shows that \[\[Dean Jones \(actor\)\|Dean Jones\]\] works for example.  SchreiberBike | ⌨  18:32, 22 July 2018 (UTC)

The user making this and many other requests here is not on the list of authorized AWB users and has never made a single edit to an article. I am endeavoring on their talk page get to get them to clearly explain why they keep asking all these questions here without seemingly doing anything to contribute to the project. Beeblebrox (talk) 18:45, 22 July 2018 (UTC)

They've made requests along these lines going back to February 2018 here, and back to August 2017 at WP:VPT; also on several user talk pages. At one point I gathered several requests together because they were clearly interrelated, see Wikipedia:Village pump (technical)/Archive 165#regex. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 22:20, 22 July 2018 (UTC)

From what I gather from their reply on their talk page they are asking these questions with the intent of using AWB on another project. The only other project they are a little active on is fa.wp, and only about 30 some edits there, so that doesn’t really add up, but I’ve tried to explain to them that if you ask here you are going to get an answer based on how AWB is used on this project, as in the question above about how to re-arrange articles into a preferred structure. Nobody is going to do that here because articles don’t have uniform section titles here. What the point of this request is I don’t know, but it doesn’t seem to have anything to do with improving the English Wikiepdia. Beeblebrox (talk) 23:42, 22 July 2018 (UTC)

Full stops in queries

I've noticed a lot of articles where there are full stops and commas either without a following space or in some cases with a preceding space. But If I put something like ".There" in the Wiki Search box it ignores the fullstop and just searches on there. Any suggestions? ϢereSpielChequers 15:34, 7 August 2018 (UTC)

Use insource with slashes, for example insource:/\.There/ . You may not get complete results, but it should give you something to work from. Note, there do appear to be some things where it is correct. If a quote starts with a sentence in the middle of a paragraph, it may be correct inside the quote to start things with "...There are second sentences that..." Also, I don't think you need the backslash for a comma, so that would have insource:/,there/ Naraht (talk) 16:11, 7 August 2018 (UTC)

Thanks, yes I get there will be false positives. But enough worthwhile changes for it to be interesting for me. ϢereSpielChequers

Purging

Is there any way to use AWB to purge a list of articles? After a template is changed, it can take quite a while (a day?) before the articles change. Often this doesn't matter but if the information is time sensitive, it does. The specific situation is changing the electorates in place articles. After an electoral redistribution, the electorate may change and this change takes effect on the calling of the next election, so (assuming the old and new value are in a template already), you want to flick the switch and move from displaying the old value to the new one. This works fine apart from the lag in updating the articles and the act of calling the election draws people to ask "what electorate am I in" and so there is a lot of interest in the electorates from the point of the call. So you would like to force the purge over lots of articles as quickly as possible. Kerry (talk) 06:53, 10 August 2018 (UTC)

On the options tab uncheck everything, on the More.. tab uncheck everything, on the Disambig tab uncheck everything, on the Skip tab uncheck everything (set the Page > Doesn't exist radio button), on the Start tab uncheck everything and blank the summary. Under Tools > Make module, make sure that Enabled is unchecked. Create a list of pages that you want to null edit. Click start. When AWB presents the 'No changes' message in the main window, click save.

If you have a bot flag, use all of the above settings except on the More ... tab, check Enabled, select Prepend, choose 0 newlines. To the Append/prepend text box add {{subst:null}} (no other text). On the bots tab check Auto save. Start.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 11:39, 10 August 2018 (UTC)

AWB snapshot release

I've put a snapshot release of latest AWB SVN here https://sourceforge.net/projects/autowikibrowser/files/autowikibrowser/Snapshots/ which should help some users who want access to the latest version/fixes until the next formal release. Thanks Rjwilmsi 12:39, 11 August 2018 (UTC)

@Rjwilmsi: might want to cross-post this at WP:BOTN too. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 12:49, 11 August 2018 (UTC)

Login aborted

Resolved

Hello, I tried to login to AWB with my user account, but because I have a two-factor authentication, I am getting a "Login aborted" error. How do I fix it? — Ganeshk (talk) 03:01, 11 August 2018 (UTC)

@Ganeshk: You should use a bot password. Despite the name, they aren't just for bots. — JJMC89 (T·C) 04:33, 11 August 2018 (UTC)

@JJMC89: thank you. It is strange they have it setup on MediaWiki.org. I was thinking Meta would be a better place. — Ganeshk (talk) 15:25, 11 August 2018 (UTC)

@Ganeshk: You can access Special:BotPasswords on any wiki. — JJMC89 (T·C) 16:43, 11 August 2018 (UTC)

@JJMC89: that makes sense now.— Ganeshk (talk) 17:39, 11 August 2018 (UTC)

@JJMC89: That worked, thank you very much. — Ganeshk (talk) 04:30, 12 August 2018 (UTC)

adding talkpage banner

Hello,
For a while now, I have been adding talkpage banners using following module. But recently, I found out that if nowiki>{{</nowiki>WikiProject Banner Shell| parameter doesnt have |1= in it, then the module adds the banner above the shell, like it did in this edit: special:diff/851395517. Is there any way to avoid this from happening? Like, if there is {{WikiProject Banner Shell| present on the talkpage (without the |1= in it), then to add the |1= to make {{WikiProject Banner Shell|=1 and then insert the desired talkpage banner?

Any help will be appreciated a lot. Here is the module that i have been using:

 {
            Regex header = new Regex(@"\{\{{WikiProject Organized crime|{{WikiProject Organized Crime|{{WikiProject Fictional characters|{{Comicsproj|{{WikiProject Film|{{Film|{{WikiProject Video games|{{WikiProject Television|{{WPTV|{{WP Fictional|{{WikiProject Novels|{{WikiProject Anime|{{TelevisionWikiProject|{{WPFILM|{{WikiProject Songs|{{WP film|{{WPBooks", RegexOptions.IgnoreCase);
            Summary = "Added banner for [[WP:WikiProject Organized crime]]";
            Skip = (header.Match(ArticleText).Success || !Namespace.IsTalk(ArticleTitle));
            if (!Skip)
                ArticleText = "{{WikiProject Organized Crime}} \r" + ArticleText;
            return ArticleText;
        }

Regards, —usernamekiran(talk) 00:44, 22 July 2018 (UTC)

@Usernamekiran: I'm not exactly sure how modules in AWB work, but you could use this regex and if there's a match then replace the match in articletext but add the |1=, and continue adding the banner as usual. Dat Guy^Talk_Contribs 10:02, 23 July 2018 (UTC)

dummy comment so this wouldn't get archived. —usernamekiran(talk) 22:17, 12 August 2018 (UTC)

@Usernamekiran: I just used the Kingbotk plugin to tag a page correctly. It added a 1= when it was missing. You should try the generic option. — Ganeshk (talk) 22:42, 12 August 2018 (UTC)

@Ganeshk: thanks. working on it. —usernamekiran(talk) 22:56, 12 August 2018 (UTC)

@Ganeshk: Hi. I followed the manual, got everything done per it. But now, it is not even adding {{WikiProject Organized crime}}. Not sure what went wrong. —usernamekiran(talk) 23:45, 12 August 2018 (UTC)

@Usernamekiran: Will post the steps on your talk page. — Ganeshk (talk) 00:33, 13 August 2018 (UTC)

KM

Currently we have an AWB facility that handles KM but would it be possible to change it to {{convert|2716|km|mi|abbr=on}} ϢereSpielChequers 08:19, 15 August 2018 (UTC)

run awb on txt file

it is maybe run awb on txt file. i want to find and replace multiple values at once in txt file.thanks --Monorodo (talk) 12:12, 11 August 2018 (UTC)

@Monorodo: See WP:CSVLoader. — Ganeshk (talk) 15:28, 11 August 2018 (UTC)

@User talk:Ganeshk CSVLoader is an AutoWikiBrowser plug-in that allows creating and updating articles using CSV data files. I want replace multiple value at once only in txt file not in wikipea article and user page. --Monorodo (talk) 15:48, 11 August 2018 (UTC)

Ok, I have no idea. — Ganeshk (talk) 15:58, 11 August 2018 (UTC)

Feels like you are trolling here. — Ganeshk (talk) 17:40, 11 August 2018 (UTC)

@Ganeshk: Few people have any idea when Monorodo posts here, see the archives; Wikipedia talk:AutoWikiBrowser/Archive 31#need for regex in particular. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 20:32, 11 August 2018 (UTC)

Instead of AWB, try a text editor like NotePad++ that allows RegEx in its searches. - X201 (talk) 08:58, 15 August 2018 (UTC)

I DONT WANT ANNOY DEAR FRIENDS.

text editor like NotePad++ replace one value at once. I want replace 1000 difference item at once. i can replace multiple value with awb online. but i want do this in txt in my pc.--Monorodo (talk) 17:17, 15 August 2018 (UTC)

This is not a WT:AWB question at all, but more suited to WP:RD/C. However: instead of clicking Replace, click Replace All. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 07:51, 16 August 2018 (UTC)

Error connecting to wiki

When trying to connect to the wiki ( https:// wikizilla.org/wiki/ ) I get these errors when loading up AWB:

Error connecting to wiki

Authentication failed because the remote party has closed the transport stream.

Network access error

The underlying connection was closed: An unexpected error occurred on a send.

Inconsistently, an error may or may not happen when I set "Wikipedia" to Wikizilla but it doesn't update and still says "Wikipedia" on the bottom right. Clicking User: and trying to login at all displays the 2nd error. This started happening about 1-2 months ago and I don't remember what it was that I did then. It MAY potentially be related to the site switching to HTTPS (which happened months before that anyway) or PHP being switched around, or something. This may have absolutely nothing to do with that. I don't know. I am using Windows 10, AWB 5.9.0.0, .NET Framework 4.7.1 or later, Internet Explorer runs fine... help? 493Titanollante (talk) 17:34, 13 August 2018 (UTC)

This is almost certainly because AWB built on old .NET doesn't support TLS 1.1, or 1.2. Keep an eye on upcoming releases! Reedy (talk) 01:18, 17 August 2018 (UTC)

VERY IMPORTANT! AWB will be switching to requiring .NET 4.5

So... It's come to my attention that AWB only supports TLS 1.0, not TLS 1.2. This is causing problems for Wikia (see T202106), but is going to cause some problems for Wikimedia wikis [1] in the future. So we're going to get ahead of it. I'm guessing AWB usage is only contributing to the TLS 1.0 usage that WMF are using to decide how long to keep support around.

The only way we can do this is by switching to .NET 4.5 (from 3.5 which has some back compat with 2.5). Probably going to 4.5.2

To this extent, I'm gonna get the very overdue release out this weekend (sorry guys), and then another release soon after that bumps to using .NET 4.5! Reedy (talk) 01:23, 17 August 2018 (UTC)

Tagged edits! :D --Izno (talk) 01:36, 17 August 2018 (UTC)

I've deleted the old version of AWB (after saving my settings file) and downloaded the new version. When I run the software, it tells me I don't have the latest version (the stuff that I just downloaded from SourceForge isn't the latest version?) and that the updater (which is now version 2.2.0.0) needs to run. When it does run, it tells me that it doesn't have admin rights and thus has to abort. When I work within the program file area of my laptop, Windows generally asks me whether I'd like to assign admin rights for actions. When I do, everything is fine. AWB doesn't ask me; it just aborts. Any suggestions how to proceed? Schwede66 22:04, 18 August 2018 (UTC)

@Schwede66: you could try to right-click, run as administrator when you launch. — xaosflux ^Talk 23:18, 18 August 2018 (UTC)

That did the trick; thanks! Schwede66 23:40, 18 August 2018 (UTC)

@Reedy: Thanks for the above: it helped me, too. Would you have any guidance on where/how to update .NET, or what the system requirements are? Thanks. --Auntof6 (talk) 09:28, 19 August 2018 (UTC)

.NET is a Microsoft product. .NET 4.5 requires Windows Vista or later. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 10:03, 19 August 2018 (UTC)

AWB 4.6.2.0 - Is anyone still using it?

Anyone actually using it?

I can't imagine it's in much of a useable state now.. And things like TLS changes that are happening on many sites... It can't be that useful.

Reedy (talk) 17:12, 21 August 2018 (UTC)

Is it even possible to use an old version? I thought AWB was restricted to the most-recent version? Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 01:27, 22 August 2018 (UTC)

@Headbomb: it is configurable, see Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser/CheckPage#Enabled_versions. — xaosflux ^Talk 02:51, 22 August 2018 (UTC)

Yeah, it's for oooold wikis pre MW 1.13. Which dates back to August 2008, so it is literally 10 years old. People shouldn't be running that. I'm gonna disable it and see if anyone complains. In most cases, I can't see much reason anyone would want to use it Reedy (talk) 08:55, 22 August 2018 (UTC)

Error when making lists

Hi, ever since updating AWB to the latest version I've been having multiple issues. The latest one is me getting a "no results" error when I attempt to make a list in the Wiki search area. I've tried swapping the sources (Wiki search, categories) and disabling my antivirus which was causing the installation issues I had previously, but to no avail. I suspected that my firewall would be blocking network access to AWB, but the funny thing is that I can still log in as a user successful; I'm just not able to search up anything. Any ideas what's happening and how to solve this? aNode (discuss) 14:37, 24 August 2018 (UTC)

I too get nothing with "wiki search text". But if I pick the "wiki search text all NS" then it finds pages (but also useless one like talk and file: pages). I haven't tried anything else as I have just installed the latest version, so I don't expect bugs to be fixed so fast. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 10:16, 28 August 2018 (UTC)

Known issue that I fixed 9 days ago and will be in the next release. [2] Reedy (talk) 10:24, 28 August 2018 (UTC)

Interesting how one misplaced ampersand can mess up the code so much. Thanks for noticing the bug and fixing it! Is there any way we can patch it ourselves? aNode (discuss) 13:44, 28 August 2018 (UTC)

Not really, unless you're going to build from source (there's quite a bit of dependancies). Or we get a svn snapshot out. There's been a few other broken things due to the long time between the last few releases... And we need to do another release to bump the .NET version. So I'm guessing I'm gonna end up doing a 5.10.1.0 and a 6.0.0.0 almost simultaneously. Reedy (talk) 13:53, 28 August 2018 (UTC)

Any ETA on those? Hopefully not 20 months again... that was a real bummer. T111660 and T158577 would be particularly nice to have in the next release. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 18:34, 28 August 2018 (UTC)

quotation marks

• is changing to our MOS standard quotation marks ' and " (vertical, not slanted) from other characters not allowed with AWB as being insignificant or inconsequential edits if readers with certain computer screens cannot readily see the difference? Hmains (talk) 19:34, 1 September 2018 (UTC)

Hmains question above is in response to my comments on their talk page. I think this talk page here would have been the preferred spot to bring it up. Air.light (talk) 21:23, 1 September 2018 (UTC)

Excluding titles

How do I set AWB to exclude pages whose title contains (a) specific word(s) when performing bot-like edits? As of now, I could only find an option to set it to exclude pages containing (a) specific word(s). Thanks. Leaderboard (talk) 06:27, 9 September 2018 (UTC)

How are you generating your list? --Izno (talk) 16:34, 9 September 2018 (UTC)

I'm not sure I understand the question - you can exclude pages that contain specific words (I'm just going to drop the (s)s), but you don't know how to exclude pages that contain specific words?

Either way - once you've made your list, choose the "Filter" button at the bottom of the list, which will allow you to keep or exclude titles containing specific text. Primefac (talk) 02:20, 10 September 2018 (UTC)

@Primefac: I'm talking about the title of the page (eg: Python) rather than the page content itself. Leaderboard (talk) 06:48, 10 September 2018 (UTC)

Do what Primefac told you. Create a list. Click the filter button. Tick the Title tick box and enter the text that you want excluded. Click apply and articles with that CASE SENSITIVE word will be removed. - X201 (talk) 07:32, 10 September 2018 (UTC)

compatibility with Wikia

Does anyone know anything about AWB's current issues in relation to its compatibility with Wikia? I don't understand the technical aspects, but basically it hasn't worked for several weeks, and some folks who understand it better have been discussing it at wikiasite:community:Thread:1500005. I'd appreciate any insight one of the AWB devs could provide. Thanks very much. —scarecroe (talk) 23:08, 6 September 2018 (UTC)

This is phab:T202106. Reedy plans to release a new minor release with some critical-ish fix and then work on that task. He hasn't spoken to a timeline anywhere that I know of. --Izno (talk) 01:29, 7 September 2018 (UTC)

Thank you for the response and the continued support. I really appreciate it! —scarecroe (talk) 11:13, 7 September 2018 (UTC)

Is there a support contact for AWB? —scarecroe (talk) 12:36, 13 September 2018 (UTC)

Besides Reedy (who watches this page and volunteers on AWB) and isn't banned? No, not that I know of. You can watch the task directly on Phabricator if you wish to receive email on the topic, so that you do not need to check in. --Izno (talk) 13:30, 13 September 2018 (UTC)

I guess I'm looking to see how I can stay up-to-date on developments. I've been unable to use AWB on my wiki for about a month, and I'm trying to stay patient checking in on Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser/History every couple of days. —scarecroe (talk) 13:34, 13 September 2018 (UTC)

Since you have a Wikimedia account, you can log in to Phabricator and use the subscribe feature. You can take a minute or two in Phabricator to set it so that tasks you are subscribed to will send you email when updates occur. You should subscribe to phab:T202106 as well as the one I just made at phab:T204238--one is for the change, one is for the release. --Izno (talk) 13:48, 13 September 2018 (UTC)

Thanks, I'll keep an eye on those spaces. Much appreciated! —scarecroe (talk) 15:37, 13 September 2018 (UTC)

AWB 6.0.0.1/5.10.1.0

More releases today!

5.10.1.0 is just a bugfix release of 5.10.0.0, fixing search etc. I'll force that upgrade in a while.

6.0.0.1 requires .NET 4.5. If you can upgrade (making sure you have .NET 4.5 installed first), please do. I won't be forcing that upgrade for a while, but it will happen eventually when Wikimedia stops supporting TLS 1.0 (like Wikia did).

Reedy (talk) 14:18, 15 September 2018 (UTC)

Basically only people on XP probably can't upgrade to .NET 4.5 (Vista from SP2 is good for .NET 4.5)... If for some reason, you don't think you can install/upgrade to .NET 4.5, can you let me know and I'll work out what I'm going to do going forward. Trying to work out if it's useful for me to backport fixes to 5.10... Reedy (talk) 00:31, 17 September 2018 (UTC)

@Reedy: I can see 5.10.1.0 at sourceforge. Could you post a link for AWB 6? -- John of Reading (talk) 08:51, 17 September 2018 (UTC)

[3] - I've not marked it as the "active release" yet, because of a few extra hurdles etc to installing. But if you click through to the files, you'll see a 6001 Reedy (talk) 17:04, 17 September 2018 (UTC)

@Reedy: Thanks, I'm now using 6.0.0.1 -- John of Reading (talk) 17:46, 17 September 2018 (UTC)

(More) Are today's updates to Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser/CurrentVersion and Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser‎ correct? -- John of Reading (talk) 18:00, 17 September 2018 (UTC)

Yes and no... We don't have a way of easily showing multiple versions... Reedy (talk) 20:10, 20 September 2018 (UTC)

AWB in Linux

I would like to use AWB for my bot. But I am using linux. I tried to install wine with software centre and get-apt. But I couldn't install it because of some technical problems. Is there any alternate way for that.--PATH SLOPU ^(Talk) 09:07, 15 September 2018 (UTC)

Your Linux options are to install and configure Wine, AWB will work fine once correctly set up, or to sort out a Windows virtual machine. AWB under Mono can be coaxed into starting up and completing some edits with most functions working, but various not, so if you struggled with Wine then it would not be worth you looking at mono. Rjwilmsi 20:53, 20 September 2018 (UTC)

Actually, there is a chance for a third option, but it's not up to you. I can open a linux window connected to windows server on my work, something as inverted putty. I do not know if you can find one in your environment. IKhitron (talk) 21:58, 20 September 2018 (UTC)

@Rjwilmsi and IKhitron:Thank you for your help.--PATH SLOPU ^(Talk) 07:35, 21 September 2018 (UTC)

How to replace a word in a specific part of a template

Hi all, I asked this earlier this year already, but got no conclusive answer: I would like to replace letters in the Japanese part of this template: https://direngrey.wikia.com/wiki/Template%3ALyrics. More specifically the letters "ou" and "uu". If I try to replace them with the normal settings, all "ou" and "uu" are marked in the articles. There apparently is a way to do this via Find (\{\{lyrics\s*\|.*?\|[^\|}]*)ou => Replace with $1ō, but it didn't work. Now that the AWB is working again on FANDOM, I'd like to try again. What do I have to do? Seelentau (talk) 18:55, 23 September 2018 (UTC)

How to "Make list" of a user's page creations

I've been trying to work out a way of using "Make list" to select just those User Contributions that are page creations. For example, for my own pages I would want to select the pages that are shown on https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Contributions&offset=&limit=500&contribs=user&target=Hebrides&namespace=&tagfilter=&newOnly=1&start=&end=

I've tried various strategies in AWB, but without success. Before I start on obscure approaches like page scraping outside AWB using a regex, I thought I'd post the question here, as I'm sure there must be a simple way of using the built-in functionality in AWB, but it so far escapes me!

Some users create a lot of pages with the same pattern of errors (like linked dates, or a "Weblinks" section, or lowercase months, etc) and it would be good to be able to go through and correct such pages in AWB. Thanks in anticipation. — Hebrides (talk) 20:44, 4 October 2018 (UTC)

@Hebrides: You can use this tool to create the list and then populate it within AWB, xtools.wmflabs.org/pages/en.wikipedia.org/Hebrides. — Ganeshk (talk) 01:48, 6 October 2018 (UTC)

Thanks, Ganeshk, that xtool is really good and has download options too. In the meantime since posting this question, I've found a direct way in AWB that seems to work, after discovering the "Make list" option "HTML Scraper (advanced regex)", which I tried with the following options:

URL: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?limit=500&title=Special%3AContributions&contribs=user&target=Hebrides&namespace=&tagfilter=&newOnly=1&start=&end=

regex: (?<=title=)[^#<>\[\]\{\|}]+?(?=&oldid=)

It managed to populate AWB with my most recent 500 page creations, but it needs proper testing as my regex skills are rather rudimentary. I included it here in case anyone else finds it useful or wants to contribute a better regex :) What's more, because it scrapes pagenames from the "User contributions" page, it will probably work with other options on that page with a bit of tweaking of the regex.

Thanks again — Hebrides (talk) 10:19, 6 October 2018 (UTC)

Mass move article to new page (redirect)

I create some article by awb that names of article should be renamed or move to new redirct. How to redirct pages? --Aymara93 (talk) 05:22, 12 October 2018 (UTC)

I'm afraid that your request is not very specific, and also very hard to understand. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 13:57, 12 October 2018 (UTC)

There’s virtually no chance that this isn’t a sock of User:Monorodo who made a habit of asking similarly poorly worded questions and did not, in fact, have AWB access on this project. Beeblebrox (talk) 04:56, 13 October 2018 (UTC)

Plugins

Did anything change in AWB 6.0 with respect to plugins? The CSVLoader plugin that I developed does not load any more, any help would be greatly appreciated. @Reedy: @Rjwilmsi: @Magioladitis:. — Ganeshk (talk) 17:55, 20 October 2018 (UTC)

Please detail what you mean by "does not load any more"? Rjwilmsi 10:53, 21 October 2018 (UTC)

@Rjwilmsi: In the current version 5.0, when I copy the plugin DLL file into the AWB app root folder, it will automatically load the plugin and make it visible in the menu. Please see image to the right. It does not do it anymore in 6.0, does the Plugin need to be upgraded to the newer version of Visual Studio? The manual load option does not work either. Thanks. — Ganeshk (talk) 14:45, 21 October 2018 (UTC)

My guess would be that following our switch to require .NET 4.0, you may need to recompile the plugin targeting .NET 4.0. Do you get an error message when you try to load it? Rjwilmsi 07:31, 22 October 2018 (UTC)

I will work recompiling the DLL on .NET 4.0. No, I get no error/message/warning when I load the DLL. Thanks. — Ganeshk (talk) 14:53, 22 October 2018 (UTC)

@Ganeshk:, did you mean "now I get no error" and this is resolved, or is this still a problem, then? Tenbergen (talk) 02:23, 23 October 2018 (UTC)

@Tenbergen: no, not fixed yet. I was saying that nothing happens when I manually load. I will let you know once I have a fix. — Ganeshk (talk) 12:20, 23 October 2018 (UTC)

@Rjwilmsi: The recompile to .NET 4.5 has fixed the issue. Thanks for your help. — Ganeshk (talk) 18:01, 23 October 2018 (UTC)

Media mention

https://www.wm.edu/news/stories/2018/the-wikiman.php --kingboyk (talk) 20:36, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

Suddenly getting login failed error messages?

If so, you might need to use a longer password on your (bot) account. Log in using your account on a normal web browser, and see if you're asked to change your password. Reedy (talk) 10:53, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

Ten characters is the new minimum. Schwede66 08:25, 17 December 2018 (UTC)

Replacing lines based on text at start

I'm looking to replace some links and navigation templates to accommodate some impending category moves (see e.g. this or this). Is there a way in AWB to do a find & replace where it finds a line starting with a certain text string (e.g. "{{Cat topic year|" or ":[[:Category:") and replaces the entire line with new text? Cheers, Number 57 18:32, 17 December 2018 (UTC)

@Number 57: You can use a regex that ends with .+ and

• starts with ^ with the MultiLine option, e.g. ^\{\{Cat topic year\|.+ → {{navseasoncats}}, ^:+\[\[:Category:.+ → {{navseasoncats}} or
• starts with (^|\n) without the MultiLine option, e.g. (^|\n)\{\{Cat topic year\|.+ → $1{{navseasoncats}}, (^|\n):+\[\[:Category:.+ → $1{{navseasoncats}}

In either case, you'll probably want to use the IgnoreCase option. — JJMC89 (T·C) 05:28, 18 December 2018 (UTC)

@JJMC89: Excellent, many thanks! Number 57 13:15, 18 December 2018 (UTC)

VS version?

What version of Visual Studio was used to compile the latest AWB version? I am trying to compile plugins on VS 2017, but they don't load correctly. — Ganeshk (talk) 00:42, 18 December 2018 (UTC)

@Reedy: @Rjwilmsi: @Magioladitis: — Ganeshk (talk) 17:50, 19 December 2018 (UTC)

VS Community 2017. What do you mean they don't load correctly? There's been some security changes in newer .NET, which mean they get "blocked" by windows. See T208787 for more info. Reedy (talk) 13:56, 20 December 2018 (UTC)

@Reedy: I suggest you try compiling a existing plugin or create a simple one and try to load the library. AWB does not load the menu item at all and does not return any errors. I have been troubleshooting this for a month now with no clue as to what's happening. Your fabricator link does not help either. — Ganeshk (talk) 16:34, 23 December 2018 (UTC)

@Reedy: How do I check event logs/error logs in AWB? — Ganeshk (talk) 16:43, 23 December 2018 (UTC)

I did, that's how I know it was an issue, added some basic handling in AWB, and filed a task to follow up from it further. Look at [4] and "unblock" the library Reedy (talk) 17:07, 23 December 2018 (UTC)

@Reedy: The unblock fixed the issue. Thanks for the workaround. — Ganeshk (talk) 03:54, 24 December 2018 (UTC)

AND operator across multiple lines

Heya, I'm trying to tell AWB to skip pages that are missing two words on different lines (but it cannot skip them if they only have one). I've determined that I can use lookaheads to do this:

(?=.*word1)(?=.*word2)(?=.*word3)

I'm using .* to account for content that might be in between them, because they're probably not going to be next to each other. The problem here is that .* doesn't seem to include newlines. Is there another meta-character that can be used to get literally every single character, including newlines? Or just a way to integrate newlines into the expression separately? Thanks. —Atvelonis (talk) 18:15, 26 December 2018 (UTC)

Atvelonis, quickest & dirtiest way would be to use [\d\D]* instead of .*. Any combination of lowercase & corresponding uppercase character classes (the uppercase being the inverse of their lowercase counterpart) effectively search for all characters.   ~ Tom.Reding (talk ⋅dgaf)  18:24, 26 December 2018 (UTC)

That seems to work. Thank you for the quick fix! —Atvelonis (talk) 18:47, 26 December 2018 (UTC)

Version 6?

I was running AWB version 5.10.1.0, but saw that WP:AWB states there's been a stable version 6 since September. I tried running Help > Check for updates, but it didn't find any updates. I went to https://sourceforge.net/projects/autowikibrowser/files/autowikibrowser/ and noticed the green button says the latest update is 5.10, but was able to click on the AutoWikiBrowser6001 folder to find version 6 and install it. Could you please make it easier for users to find and install the new version? Thanks! GoingBatty (talk) 17:54, 24 December 2018 (UTC)

It's on my TODO list. I didn't want to push people to version 6 that didn't actually need it until it was further tested. Not many functional changes in it, but the underlying .NET changes could've broken many things. Reedy (talk) 18:58, 26 December 2018 (UTC)

After installing version 6, I ran Help > Check for updates, and it found an update. After installing it, I see I'm back at version 5.10.1.0. Shouldn't the updater only install newer versions? Thanks! GoingBatty (talk) 17:56, 24 December 2018 (UTC)

Probably. Updater was very naively implemented, and I've done some work to overhaul quite a lot of it (including being able to do optional updates and stuff). Need to release an update of that before I push v6 into the limelight. Reedy (talk) 18:58, 26 December 2018 (UTC)

Can awb work from a list of urls

• Hello. Can awb work from a text file containing a list of urls, such as https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Maiden_Castle,_Dorset&oldid=300874924? Lingzhi2 (talk) 11:46, 1 January 2019 (UTC)

Lingzhi2, I don't know if there is such an option, what stops you from removing the beginning and the end of the url to leave the article name alone? I would use notepad++ and regex replacement. If you have article names in txt file you have option to load this file.Uziel302 (talk) 13:18, 5 January 2019 (UTC)

Uziel302, let me explain the goal. I want to acquire the html files of previous versions of all FA articles. Specifically, I want the version that existed at the exact moment it was promoted to FA, so I can glean prose size stats from them via Python... Years ago (years and years ago, actually) I used to use AWB a lot and I found that it left html versions of pages in browser cache... I don't know whether it still works like that... So as the first step to my goal, I thought I could run AWB over all the FA talk pages, get those talk pages in my browser's cache, run Python over them while they are on my laptop, and get oldids from the "article milestones". Forex, the number "300874924" in the URL above gets you the FA-promoted version of Maiden Castle, Dorsett. [Somewhat surprisingly, the "title=Maiden_Castle,_Dorset" in the URL is unnecessary. So forex if you change the oldid in the URL above to "361087775" you get the FA-promoted version of Cottingley Fairies]. So once I had all those oldids, I could use Python again to make a list of URLs with different oldids. Then I could load that list into AWB (again) and get the OLD versions of the actual FA articles into my browser's cache (or so I hope). Then I could look atthose in various ways... BUT... I tired running AWB over talk pages today, first without making changes, then trying to make an immaterial changes (substituting "e" for "e", case sensitive), but nothing I did had any effect at all.... Do you have ideas? Thanks! Lingzhi2 (talk) 14:15, 5 January 2019 (UTC)

Lingzhi2, you can use source/text file to load a list of URL on that format, but I don't know how it should load it to your cache, isn't there other ways to scrape the links? I use HTTrack to scrape HTML from the web to my computer.Uziel302 (talk) 14:25, 5 January 2019 (UTC)

HTTracker looks like a version of web whacker. I suppose I could point it at the FA page and have it get all the links on that page, but then I would have to figure out a way to change those links to Talk page links... not sure it would do that. AWB OTOH could just run from Category:Wikipedia featured articles and convert to talk pages... Lingzhi2 (talk) 14:36, 5 January 2019 (UTC)

"Software disabled"

Screenshot of the application displaying the error message

I'm trying to use AWB with the Civilization Wiki, which I have done many times in the past. Today, AWB wouldn't start the process when I clicked "Start". Upon closer inspection it says "Software disabled" at the lower left corner. When I try to login, it displays an error message that asks to check that the Internet is working and the Wiki is online (both true). Indeed, after the login apparently fails, AWB still easily creates a list of articles in a category. I've tried updating, restarting and logging in and out, but nothing seems to work. Any ideas what might be the problem? I've also uploaded a screenshot of the error (included next to this message). —ZeroOne (talk / @) 21:52, 8 January 2019 (UTC)

Hi @ZeroOne: I was able to login just fine to Civilization wikia. Are you using the latest AWB version, 6.0.0.1? — Ganeshk (talk) 00:42, 9 January 2019 (UTC)

You can find the new version here, https://sourceforge.net/projects/autowikibrowser/files/autowikibrowser/AutoWikiBrowser6001/ — Ganeshk (talk) 00:54, 9 January 2019 (UTC)

Oh, no, I was running 5.10.1.0! The auto-updated couldn't find the newest version! :( I installed it manually and ran the auto-updater -- and it downgraded the application back to version 5. But after reinstalling the new version it works like a charm again, thank you! —ZeroOne (talk / @) 22:18, 9 January 2019 (UTC)

Welcome, glad to hear. The auto-updater issue was discussed recently, Wikipedia_talk:AutoWikiBrowser/Archive_31#Version_6?. — Ganeshk (talk) 22:53, 9 January 2019 (UTC)

failed

I have done thousands of edits using AWB, but not in recent years. Now I have time to pick up my old habbit, but when I login I receive the message "Login failed X Aborted". I use in preferences the language nl. Is my AWB account blocked? I am using 5.10.1.0. on Wikipedia.nl, where I am listed as AWB-user. I login with a verification code and just succesfully changed my regular password. Japiot (talk) 21:57, 21 January 2019 (UTC)

Do you use WP:2FA? If yes, see Wikipedia:Using_AWB_with_2FA. — Ganeshk (talk) 22:05, 21 January 2019 (UTC)

Thanks, I got it and it is okay now. Japiot (talk) 23:19, 21 January 2019 (UTC)

List showing only html codes

I recently got the permission for making edits with AWB. I tried to generate pages from the Make List dialog bog in which my input for Source is Category and Category is Script errors. When I clicked the Make List button, it generated a list of pages all of which are showing only html codes. How can it be converted to real names?Adithyak1997 (talk) 05:09, 25 January 2019 (UTC)

@Adithyak1997: Since no one else has replied yet, I'll have a go. I've not seen the "Make list" function do this. Using the bottom left part of the main AWB window, I've set the "Source" to Category, the "Category" to Pages with script errors, and clicked the "Make list" button. That gives me a list of 500+ page names starting with Draft:Episode has No Name (Superhero Landing). I'm not seeing any HTML codes in the list. Are those the steps you are taking? What do you see as the first entry in your list? -- John of Reading (talk) 08:35, 26 January 2019 (UTC)

Thanks for replying. The problem was that the name of category was incomplete.Adithyak1997 (talk) 18:55, 26 January 2019 (UTC)

RfC of potential interest

An RfC is underway that interested "watchers of this page" wound enhance by participating, I hope that many will! The discussion is located at Wikipedia talk:Twinkle#RfC regarding "Ambox generated" maintenance tags that recommend the inclusion of additional sources. Thank you.--John Cline (talk) 06:25, 29 January 2019 (UTC)

Help

Hello. I want to replace a text. I know how to do that. The problem is that I want to add new text to two lines. For example,

==First edition==

I want to replace it with

==Second edition==
Third opinion

How can I do that? Xaris333 (talk) 21:38, 14 February 2019 (UTC)

@Xaris333: Use \n in the "replace" string to insert a newline. -- John of Reading (talk) 07:30, 15 February 2019 (UTC)

"New message" message

I use AWB with another account ~ User:Kahtar ~ which i never log into other than through AWB; someone recently posted a message on that account's talk page, and subsequently i got a "You have a new message" box when doing anything in AWB. The only way i could get rid of it was to log out of LindsayH, into Kahtar and visit the talk page, then back out of Kahtar and back into Lindsay; not an issue really, just a bit cumbersome. Am i missing something? Is there an easier way to dismiss that message box so i can continue working in AWB if another message is ever posted on Kahtar's talk? Happy days, Lindsay^Hello 10:03, 16 February 2019 (UTC)

Nope, that's how you've got to do it if you allow talk page posts on the AWB account's talk page. You can/should redirect that talk page to your main account instead. --Izno (talk) 13:36, 16 February 2019 (UTC)

Oh, it is redirected, but someone still got on it and edited it. I hadn't thought before, i could probably ask to have it protected, so it'd have to go to the main. Thanks for that. Happy days, Lindsay^Hello 15:23, 16 February 2019 (UTC)

The other way to deal with it is to log into your alternate account via a different web browser. Saves you from having to log out from your default browser. Schwede66 19:12, 16 February 2019 (UTC)

Or if your browser has Private/InPrivate/Incognito mode, just open a new window like that and log in. — xaosflux ^Talk 21:30, 16 February 2019 (UTC)

Just as a note re: protection - it's pretty unlikely you'd get approval for that especially since it's an AWB account. Short of blocking someone, the best way to get someone to stop using AWB (at the very least to indicate they've seen the message) is to leave them a talk page notice. Protecting the talk page would remove that check, meaning only admins would be able to stop the user and the user in question could potentially do a lot of damage until one could be found. Primefac (talk) 15:14, 17 February 2019 (UTC)

Stub tagging

I believe AWB will automatically add or remove STUB tags, but I can't find any documentation on the criteria. Is it based on the number of bytes, and if so, what is the threshold (and what counts, e.g. text, not infoboxes)? MB 15:14, 19 February 2019 (UTC)

@MB: There's some documentation at Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser/General fixes#Mainspace tagger. -- John of Reading (talk) 16:48, 19 February 2019 (UTC)

That's what I was looking for, Thanks. MB 17:14, 19 February 2019 (UTC)

Wikivoyage Orphan tag

How do I get the Orphan tag to be place on English Wikivoyage pages when I run AWB? Do not want any of the other Wikipedia tags though. --Traveler100 (talk) 13:49, 2 March 2019 (UTC)

Check and replace template parameter uses

Hello. Is it possible to search specific parameter usages of a given infobox template, using AWB? Thanks in advance! Rehman 04:10, 5 March 2019 (UTC)

@Rehman: Yes. One way would be to use a skip rule. For example, if you wanted to find the instances of {{Infobox software}} where |discontinued=yes, you could create a list with source "What transcludes page" is "Template:Infobox software", and then add a rule in the "Doesn't contain" field with the Regex box checked that says:

{{\s*Infobox software[^}]+\|\s*discontinued\s*=\s*yes

Select Options > Use pre-parse mode, uncheck everything on the Options tab, click Start, and let it run. When it's done, you'll have your list. GoingBatty (talk) 23:37, 5 March 2019 (UTC)

@Rehman: you might want to see if the labs tool Template Parameters already has what you want.   ~ Tom.Reding (talk ⋅dgaf)  00:11, 6 March 2019 (UTC)

Thank you for the quick replies, GoingBatty and Tom.Reding. I will check both. Regards, Rehman 02:44, 6 March 2019 (UTC)

You could also use the In Template rule in advanced find/replace. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 03:01, 6 March 2019 (UTC)

Ubuntu and wine

Please can some kind editor hand-hold me very patiently through the process of making AWB work under wine? I'm a seasoned JWB and Linux user with a little Wine experience. I've read many pages of how-tos and FAQs on Wikipedia and elsewhere, and spent several days trying, but can only get as far as AutoWikiBrowser has encountered a problem and needs to close. I'm using Ubuntu 16.04 and Wine 1.6.2 with dotnet20 added via winetricks. I think that where I may be going wrong is at WINEARCH=win32 winecfg as recommended in Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser/Mono_and_Wine#Setting_up_the_Wine_environment. This puts up a tabbed dialog box but I can't find any clue about which of the myriad options there I need to change. Thanks, Certes (talk) 22:54, 7 March 2019 (UTC)

Find and replace

Hi. How do I remove an entire line using Find and Replace? I don't want to just blank the line, but to delete the whole line (thus shifting the below line up) if it contains a particular parameter name within an infobox template. Rehman 13:56, 16 March 2019 (UTC)

Does including \n? at the start (or end) of the search expression work? The ? should allow you to continue removing the right bits from lines such as {{SomeTemplate|unwanted_parameter=Foo}} or |wanted_parameter=Bar|unwanted_parameter=Foo. Certes (talk) 14:11, 16 March 2019 (UTC)

Thank you, Certes! Looked everywhere and couldn't find this. Rehman 14:47, 16 March 2019 (UTC)

Certes, unfortunately it doesn't work. It seems to be adding a blank line when replacing. I couldn't find the way to delete the entire line in here as well, unless I am not looking at the right place... Rehman 15:36, 16 March 2019 (UTC)

Your last example has successfully got rid of one of the line feeds. What regex are you searching for, and what are you replacing it by? Is the \n within a (match) that gets put back in the replacement text? I'm still trying to get AWB to start, so I'm not an expert on its particular flavour of regex. Certes (talk) 15:42, 16 March 2019 (UTC)

Please excuse me for sounding silly, I am no expert in regex. Basically, I want to delete the entire lines that contain image_size, location_map_caption, location_map_size, ps_annual_gen_year, or relief. I used the "Find and Replace" option, and simply added \n in the replace with column... Rehman 16:01, 16 March 2019 (UTC)

Please provide the exact regex you are using. --Izno (talk) 16:36, 16 March 2019 (UTC)

It sounds as if you are putting \n in the text that gets inserted. \n needs to be removed so, instead of putting \n in the "replace with" column, add it to the text such as image_size that you are removing. I can't see the AWB screen but I would guess that it goes into the previous column. Certes (talk) 16:41, 16 March 2019 (UTC)

Certes, Unfortunately that doesn't seems too work either. :( Are you able to help write the full code if say, I want to remove the entire line if it contains ps_annual_gen_year? Rehman 02:05, 17 March 2019 (UTC)

@Rehman: I think the first step is for you to post the full search and replacement expressions you are using, e.g. change "\| *image_size.*" to "", together with any flags (e.g. "m" for multi-line). Then someone may be able to improve them. Certes (talk) 12:19, 17 March 2019 (UTC)

Certes, right now I'm not using any expressions. I'm simply adding | ps_annual_gen_year = in the first column, and \n? in the next. :( Rehman 12:41, 17 March 2019 (UTC)

We really need someone who can see an AWB screen to help out here, but it sounds as if the "first column" may be the text to be removed and the "next" the text to be inserted in its place. You want to remove \n rather than inserting it, so it needs to go in the first column rather than the next. So setting the first column to \n| ps_annual_gen_year = and leaving the next blank may work. You may need spaces between \n and | if your article has spaces at the start of its lines. If that doesn't work then let me know: this may mean that \n is only available in regular expressions, which are a bit more complicated. Certes (talk) 12:58, 17 March 2019 (UTC)

Certes, almost there. The matching content are deleted, but anything after it isn't. Hence it is bunched and pulled to the previous parameter... I want it do delete the entire line, if the matching text is present. Rehman 13:27, 17 March 2019 (UTC)

AWB is treating the first column as simple text but your text varies. There will be some way to have AWB handle this: perhaps you have a tickbox marked something like "regular expression" or "regex". Once you've selected that, it should almost work. We need to do a couple more things. Firstly, | has a special meaning; to match the actual character we need to "escape" it by adding a \ before it. Secondly, we need to match the rest of the line, which we can do with .* (. means "any one character"; * means "as many of them as possible"). You can also match any number of spaces by putting * after a space, and make the line feed optional by putting ? after it, so \n? *\| *image_size.* in the first column should do the job. The second column is still blank. Don't forget to tick the regular expression box. Certes (talk) 13:48, 17 March 2019 (UTC)

Works perfectly Certes. You saved a lot of my time. Thank you! Rehman 13:58, 17 March 2019 (UTC)

Wikivoyage Orphan tag

How do I get the Orphan tag to be place on English Wikivoyage pages when I run AWB? Do not want any of the other Wikipedia tags though. --Traveler100 (talk) 13:49, 2 March 2019 (UTC)

Translate

Hi, can I translate AWB to Czech language? I translate Wikipedia mobile apps and MediaWiki. --Patriccck (talk) 15:24, 5 April 2019 (UTC)

New script allows correcting typos in one click

AWB is a great tool for typos, but it requires special access and a desktop app. And it takes some time setting up each query/replacement.

I created User:Uziel302/typos.js to enable correcting obvious typos in one click.

After adding importScript('User:Uziel302/typos.js'); to User:NAME/common.js you will have "Replace" button on User:Uziel302/Typos.

You can see an example of how it works on this video.

Would appreciate any help correcting the lists of typos my program finds in Wikipedia.

I guess this kind of script can be used for additional AWB tasks, you don't need a desktop app with special access in order to make certain edits across Wikipedia. If there task is scalable enough, we can write a script with web interface for it. Uziel302 (talk) 17:28, 27 April 2019 (UTC)

help in Commons

I have been given permission to use AWB in Commons, but I am baffled on how to get started. What do I have to key/enter/where in order to get into AWB commons and see an AWB screen? Thanks Hmains (talk) 00:00, 28 April 2019 (UTC)

Options > Preferences > Site Kerry (talk) 09:54, 28 April 2019 (UTC)

Issues logging in

Every time I try to log in an error popup appears saying 'Aborted'...I've just enabled 2FA, is this linked? GiantSnowman 16:49, 8 May 2019 (UTC)

Please check FAQ above for bot passwords. — Ganeshk (talk) 16:52, 8 May 2019 (UTC)

Lovely, thanks! GiantSnowman 17:59, 8 May 2019 (UTC)

Using Wiki search (text) to find a phrase

I must be doing something stupid, but I just can't see it. According to the manual, I can use Wiki search (text) to find a phrase by enclosing it in double quotes. But when I use it to look for any phrase, it returns no hits. Even something that should have lots of hits like "United States" returns an empty list. Is this feature supposed to work, and if so how? --Gronk Oz (talk) 15:42, 6 May 2019 (UTC)

I've had trouble with that lately and have meant to ask about it here. If I use "Wiki search (text)" as the source, nothing comes up, but if I use "Wiki search (text) (all NS)" everything in mainspace will come up, but so will everything else from userspace, filespace, etc. It's easy to then clear out what I don't want, but it shouldn't be necessary to take that extra step. So, that's a fix, but I'd like to know why "Wiki search (text)" no longer works. Thanks, SchreiberBike | ⌨  17:34, 6 May 2019 (UTC)

I don't know why, but "Wiki search (text)" is working for me. I've just tested a "United States" search using versions 5.10.1.0 and 6.0.0.1 -- John of Reading (talk) 17:40, 6 May 2019 (UTC)

It didn't work for me and I was using Version 5.10.0.0. I just did the update (Help → Check for updates) to Version 5.10.1.0 and it works again. I should have checked that first. Solved for me at least. SchreiberBike | ⌨  17:58, 6 May 2019 (UTC)

Thanks for the suggestion, @SchreiberBike: that works fine for me. I can search for "Wiki search (text) (all NS)", then tick the List option to "remove non-main space" and it seems to give me the right results. --Gronk Oz (talk) 02:30, 9 May 2019 (UTC)

Option in Settings to change Background color?

Bumping thread for 90 days. JoeHebda (talk) 20:10, 23 February 2019 (UTC)

Greetings, For Wikipedia edits, I recently changed background color to "Linen" to tone-down the bright white background. Wondering how to do same with AWB? Regards, JoeHebda (talk) 20:05, 23 February 2019 (UTC)

@JoeHebda: I made a Night-mode style.css for AWB. It isn't colorblind friendly, but you can easily customize it by looking through the code comments. Directions are at the top. Enjoy!   ~ Tom.Reding (talk ⋅dgaf)  21:01, 23 February 2019 (UTC)

@Tom.Reding: - I did the "style.css" copy-and-paste as directed into my laptop AWB root folder and it had no effect. Tested with various colors & still not working. Wondering if "settings.xml" or something else needed to activate? JoeHebda (talk) 15:08, 16 March 2019 (UTC)

@JoeHebda: "style.css" is correct. I don't recall having to do anything else (and I would've put it in the directions otherwise). Is it possible you have 2 installation locations?   ~ Tom.Reding (talk ⋅dgaf)  16:06, 16 March 2019 (UTC)

@Tom.Reding: - Here's what I did so far: Deleted all AWB 6.1 (Windows) & cleanup appdata/roaming. Re-downloaded V6001, Re-installed, Re-posted that style.css file. Started AWB for first time & still defaulting to white background. Wondering if any of those plugins needed? Otherwise it's not urgent, so I can stay with AWB the way it is. Regards, JoeHebda (talk) 18:42, 16 March 2019 (UTC)

Captcha required?

I'm working on adding short descriptions using AWB and it got stuck. I'm going pretty fast because there's very little I need to check before saving. I keep getting this pop up that says "Captcha required, is the user account autoconfirmed etc?" when I try to save, and then AWB stops and won't save the page. I just made this account today but had it manually extended confirmed because this is my alternate account. What's going on? AspeningAWB (talk) 21:34, 25 May 2019 (UTC)

@Aspening: Your alt account has been granted the "confirmed" user right. Did that resolve the issue? -- John of Reading (talk) 06:45, 26 May 2019 (UTC)

@John of Reading: Yes, it did. Aspening (talk) 11:36, 26 May 2019 (UTC)

Orphan tags

Per Wikipedia:Village pump (idea lab)/Archive 29#Idea - bot to tag orphans, and the previous consensus in the Template:Orphan/doc that orphaned articles are usually "insufficiently critical to merit notifying general readers", adding this tag does not seem to be a valuable use of editors' time (either the time of the editor who is adding the template or the time of the multiple editors who review that edit). Its addition should therefore be permitted but gently discouraged.

I know AWB can't really be set to prohibit bad edits, and AWB certainly should continue to address some formatting with this template (like {{multiple issues}}), but would someone please remove the GENFIXES option to spam orphan tags? I'd really appreciate it. WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:00, 27 May 2019 (UTC)

Is Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser/User talk templates deprecated?

In over three years, nothing has been added, and many have been deleted. Category:Wikipedia templates to be automatically substituted exists, does (or shouldn't) AWB use that? There's a large difference in numbers between the two, I would presume largely due to redirects. ~ Amory (u • t • c) 23:57, 27 May 2019 (UTC)

Use on Fandom/Wikia

I haven't checked into this issue in a while. Was there ever an update that would allow AWB to work again with wikis hosted by Fandom/Wikia? I thought it was reported that the switch to HTTPS was keeping it from working, but Wikipedia's using it now as well, so that wouldn't be the source of the problem. —RRabbit42 (talk) 17:24, 27 May 2019 (UTC)

You need to get the latest 5.x release--that's been out for a year or so now. --Izno (talk) 17:59, 27 May 2019 (UTC)

I will have to try manually updating it or uninstall/reinstall it. After a few years of having the program force updates and no longer allowing an old version to run, seeing it say no updates were available beyond 5.10.1.0, it seemed like maybe it wasn't being updated any longer.

A quick note. The main page for AWB on SourceForge still points to the 5.10.1.0 download. I had go through the Files link to retrieve 6.0.0.1. —RRabbit42 (talk) 18:52, 1 June 2019 (UTC)

Is there a way to save the raw text from every page of a list

• hello. Can I make AWB run through a list of pages and save the text/wikitext of every page to my computer? Maybe in browser cache, or elsewhere?  ♦ Lingzhi2 (talk) 09:14, 19 June 2019 (UTC)

Check out AWB plugins page. — Ganeshk (talk) 11:54, 21 June 2019 (UTC)

Forgive me, does that mean there is one', or there might be one? And if the former, what's it called? Thank you for your patience. ♦ Lingzhi2 (talk) 13:46, 21 June 2019 (UTC)

Finding categorised redirects (wikiHow)

Hi - I use the AWB to edit wikiHow. Is there a way to make a list of redirect pages that have been categorised? I have very little experience with the AWB so maybe there's some kind of obvious solution that I'm not seeing. Thankk you in advance TheZoodles (talk) 18:23, 24 June 2019 (UTC)

• Anyway, you can use quarry. IKhitron (talk) 09:41, 25 June 2019 (UTC)

Double error correction

I notice that sometimes one error will be corrected (like changing it‘s to it's - a typo fix to the correct type of apostrophe), but it really should be its with no apostrophe. Is there any way to rerun AWB on the "new" version before saving to catch these kinds of things? MB 01:24, 26 June 2019 (UTC)

@MB: Yes - right click in the edit box at the bottom right, and select "Reparse" from the pop-up menu. -- John of Reading (talk) 05:49, 26 June 2019 (UTC)

That's odd: most of the corrections such as it's thing → its thing contain the apostrophe parade [´ˈ׳᾿‘’′Ꞌꞌ`;']. Changing the order of the typo fixes by moving the punctuation section earlier might help. Certes (talk) 08:56, 26 June 2019 (UTC)

@Certes: From WP:AWB/T, "Do not expect rules to be applied in the order they appear" -- John of Reading (talk) 11:25, 26 June 2019 (UTC)

I can't make minor edits?

I see that there is a rule saying, "Do not make insignificant or inconsequential edits." Well, this is a problem because a big reason for using AWB or JWB is to fix typos, etc. Does this rule mean that if the only change I'm about to make to an article is a typo fix, then I should just skip? The rule does not make sense to me. Can anyone explain to me if I'm incorrectly interpreting this? Thank you. William2001^(talk) 02:55, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

That usually means to not make edits which have no effect on the appearance of the page. Fixing errors is not "insignificant or inconsequential". SchreiberBike | ⌨  03:50, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

That makes more sense. Thank you. William2001^(talk) 05:30, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

I'd go even further. Many of my JWB edits fix wikilinks which led to the wrong page; this has no effect on the appearance of the page unless a mouse happens to be hovering over the link. I consider that a legitimate use of the tool. Certes (talk) 08:52, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

How to avoid section name in edit summary?

Hello. In here, it is written that "If auto-changes happen in only one section there is an option to show this section in the edit summary. This option can be suppressed by the appropriate button." I checked many tabs and options in AWB, but couldn't suppress this auto-generated edit summary. Where can I find an option to do so? Thanks in advance. Ahmad^Talk 15:08, 3 July 2019 (UTC)

@Ahmad252: Its on the main menu across the top of the program, Options > Do not use section edit summaries -- John of Reading (talk) 15:22, 3 July 2019 (UTC)

Thanks! Ahmad^Talk 15:23, 3 July 2019 (UTC)

List all files

How can AWB list all files (or unused files, etc), so that I can then categorise them, hopefully quite automatic by using filters? Is this possible?

I tried the Special page option (-> All Files), but this lists the pages, not the file itself (File:xxx). I've tried some HTML scraping as well, but probably can't get the regex correct. Pangaearocks (talk) 22:54, 4 July 2019 (UTC)

Interesting. Looks like I found a way after all. In many of these special pages it's not possible to choose a namespace, but for All pages it was. Hey presto, and I managed to get all files. Hopefully it's now possible to categorise some of these thousands of files... (Maybe this will be useful to somebody else who stumbles in here too) Pangaearocks (talk) 23:08, 4 July 2019 (UTC)

Regex help

Hi there, is there any easy way to have AWB look for formatting like this:

[[List of Bollywood films of 1968|1968]]

--but strip the wikilink, leaving:

1968

--without having to set up rules for every possible year? Is there a Regex formula that could help here? I'm not very technically gifted, but I can paste just fine. Thanks, Cyphoidbomb (talk) 15:35, 14 July 2019 (UTC)

like this?

search: \[\[List of Bollywood films of (\d{4})\|\d{4}\]\] replace: $1

or, to match only when the two year values are the same:

search: \[\[List of Bollywood films of (\d{4})\|\1\]\] replace: $1

caveat: for clarity, ignores the possibility of extraneous leading and trailing white space (\s*)

—Trappist the monk (talk) 15:50, 14 July 2019 (UTC)

@Trappist the monk: Thanks for that! The latter one seems to be working nicely. Regards, Cyphoidbomb (talk) 20:46, 14 July 2019 (UTC)

Is the Kingbotk plugin still supported?

Magioladitis and Sam rewrote the Kingbotk plugin in C# (sorry I couldn't help at the time, I'd taken on a time consuming new job). The last I heard the plugin was shipping with AWB. I'm just wondering if the plugin is obsolete or still supported.

If the latter, could I redirect the talk page to an AWB talk page (which one) or maybe move both the description page and talk page over and leave redirects behind?

If the former (obsolete/pining for the fjords), I guess we'll put a banner at the top of the talk page and call it a day :)

Thanks! --kingboyk (talk) 23:58, 15 July 2019 (UTC)

List of low frequency typos you can load on AWB

Hi guys, I know this project focuses on high frequency typos, but there is some high frequency origin of typos that can be addressed as well. The most common origin I found is switching between adjacent chars, removing, duplicating and replacing chars. Levenshtein distance 1 in formal language. I took all common words, made on them all possible variations and removes the legitimate words from the output. I then searched those 200K variations across Wikipedia dumps. What I found helped me create a list of less frequent replacements and a list of the articles where they are found. You can load those lists from Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser/Settings/Autocorrect and the talk page and start fixing thousands of obvious typos across Wikipedia, few seconds per fix. I hope you will find this list useful. Any feedback is much appreciated! Uziel302 (talk) 14:05, 21 July 2019 (UTC)

It would be nice if this were something that could be incorporated into AWB's default changes. I'd love to help make these improvements, but I also don't want to lose track of the custom find/replace rules I've created for myself. Or am I totally misunderstanding how to implement this? I'm not a very technically skilled AWB user. Cyphoidbomb (talk) 20:14, 28 July 2019 (UTC)

Regex help

Hi all, could someone please help me set up a Regex for the following? In Indian film articles I often see this structure:

The film stars [[Mohanlal]] and [[Mammootty]] in the lead roles.

The film stars [[Mohanlal]] and [[Mammootty]] in lead roles.

The film stars [[Mohanlal]] and [[Mammootty]] in pivotal roles.

starring [[Mohanlal]] and [[Mammootty]] in lead roles / in the lead roles / in pivotal roles

Generally speaking, if someone is the star of a film, it can be assumed that they have lead or pivotal roles. So I'd like the rule(s) to look for that sort of sentence structure, and then trim the back end of it to:

The film stars [[Mohanlal and [[Mammootty]].

Es posible? Also, sometimes that sentence structure terminates in a comma, because the sentence continues, like:

The film stars [[Mohanlal and [[Mammootty]], with direction by [[Martin Scorcese]].

So if there's a way for it to fix everything up to the period or comma or whatever, that would be ideal. And I always look at the changes I make, so I'm pretty good about spotting errors. Much appreciated!

@Cyphoidbomb: You could try changing a pattern such as ([Ss]tar(s|ring|red)( +\S+){1,5}) in *(the)? *(lead|leading|pivotal) *roles? to $1 with regex and g flags set. Certes (talk) 22:04, 28 July 2019 (UTC)

I will give that a shot, thank you Certes! Cyphoidbomb (talk) 22:32, 28 July 2019 (UTC)

@Certes: It doesn't seem to be working, but I'm sure it's something I've done or am not doing. I'm using the Normal settings of find and replace, I've pasted the entire long string ([Ss]tar(s|ring|red)( +\S+){1,5}) in *(the)? *(lead|leading|pivotal) *roles? into the Find field, and $1 in the replace field. I've ticked the RegEx box. What is the "g flag"? Cyphoidbomb (talk) 22:45, 28 July 2019 (UTC)

OK, it did find and replace this instance, but it didn't find the text in this edit or this edit

stars [[Ratheesh]], [[Saritha]], [[T. G. Ravi]], [[Madhuri (Tamil actress)|Madhuri]], [[Kuthiravattam Pappu]] and [[Disco Shanti]] in the lead roles.

stars [[Mammootty]], [[Jalaja]], [[Viji]] and [[Menaka (actress)|Menaka]] in the lead roles.

I manually made those changes. Thanks for your help, Cyphoidbomb (talk) 22:51, 28 July 2019 (UTC)

@Cyphoidbomb: I set an arbitrary maximum of five words between "stars" (or similar) and "in the lead role" (or similar). Changing the 5 to a larger number will find more cases but may produce more false positives. "g" should repeat the change wherever the pattern occurs rather than just for the first occurrence. In JWB, the box where you can type "g" is called "Regular expression flags". I don't know the exact text of the corresponding label in AWB, as it won't run on my PC. Certes (talk) 00:00, 29 July 2019 (UTC)

Orphan tagging

I see that orphan tagging is done through the auto tagger. It says in the documentation that "orphan tagging can be limited to articles with 0 incoming links (excluding redirects) from the Tools Menu." I'm lost; which tools menu where? I have a tools menu in AWB but cannot see how or where to influence orphan tagging. Schwede66 23:24, 7 August 2019 (UTC)

@Schwede66: I've corrected the documentation - it's part of the Options menu not the Tools menu. -- John of Reading (talk) 06:18, 8 August 2019 (UTC)

Release notes - What's new in each version

Are there Release Notes for AWB - something that gives a summary of what's new in each version? Eg, what would I gain by using v6 instead of v5.10? Mitch Ames (talk) 03:56, 10 August 2019 (UTC)

In the banner above, Changelog. --Izno (talk) 04:11, 10 August 2019 (UTC)

Thanks. Mitch Ames (talk) 04:14, 10 August 2019 (UTC)

Cannot connect to a custom wiki

Hi I can not connect to the http://wiki.tockdom.com/wiki/Main_Page wiki. I use the following options in the site part of the preferences.

Project: custom
http or https: http://
URL: wiki.tockdom.com/w/

It always shows this error:

An error occured while connecting to the server or loading project information from it. Please make sure that your internet connection works and such combination of project/language exist. Enter the URL in the format "en.wikipedia.org/w/" (Including path where index.php and api.php reside). Error description: Unerwartete XML-Deklaration. Die XML-Deklaration muss der erste Knoten im Dokument sein. Davor sind keine Leerzeichen zulässig. Zeile 2, Position 3.

I tried multiple settings without luck. I even used older versions of the autowikibrowser to test if it works. The current version which I use is 6.0.0.1
Can somebody please help me? Thanks!
9Larry98 (talk) 22:54, 13 August 2019 (UTC)

@9Larry98: it looks like you are running MediaWiki version 1.23 which is very old and unsupported. Can you upgrade your wiki to the current release track 1.31.3 or 1.33? — xaosflux ^Talk 02:52, 14 August 2019 (UTC)

Updates?

The Changelog seems to show that the current version is as of September 2018. The problem of AWB not recognising {{geodis}} as identifying dab pages, thus encouraging careless editors like BigDwiki (see above) to label them incorrectly as stubs and orphans, was identified and apparently "fixed" ages ago (it'll be there in Phabricator somewhere) but is still waiting to be deployed in the next update. Any news on when this will happen?

It doesn't change the fact that an AWB user is responsible for all their own edits so ought not to be making incorrect edits even when AWB suggests them. PamD 09:46, 16 August 2019 (UTC)

Orphan tagging is another problem. I got pulled up for this myself the other day and it turns out you can set this to be MOS-compliant but the documentation had to be updated to tell you how. Very annoying when the default settings aren’t right. Schwede66 16:15, 16 August 2019 (UTC)

Removal of rights for User:BigDwiki

With reference to his talkpage, I am requesting for removal of AWB rights for BigDwiki. Refusal to stop AWB activities for not abiding by all Wikipedia guidelines, policies and common practices and insignificant or inconsequential edits and also wrong tagging of pages.--Xaiver0510 (talk) 08:28, 16 August 2019 (UTC)

That's not true. Once there was consensus from several editors, I stopped using the tool and changed a BUNCH of settings and went back to using it in a very limited capacity. In fact, there are quite a few users thanking me for my AWB edits. The tool in it's default configuration seems to lead users to make changes that the tool suggests to be made, although the are minor and seemingly against policy. I'm not sure why the tool would out-of-the-box seem to violate policy, but I've got it configured now in such a way that I believe it's compliant.BigDwiki (talk) 08:32, 16 August 2019 (UTC)

With reference to Alleh, that is within your last 10 edits, there is still no change [5].--Xaiver0510 (talk) 08:33, 16 August 2019 (UTC)

@BigDwiki: I really suggest that rather than seeing AWB as a tool that can be configured so it is compliant, that you look at each edit you make with AWB and decide for yourself if that edit is compliant. AWB often suggests things that I don't understand. I don't allow changes I don't understand because if asked, I couldn't explain why I made that change. Also, please be aware of the WP:AWBRULES. These are not "some policy or another". These are at the top of the page about AutoWikiBrowser. Many people take a negative view of AWB and your edits have contributed to that negative view. Please show respect for Wikipedia by being careful. Thank you. SchreiberBike | ⌨  19:43, 16 August 2019 (UTC)

Surprising stats

The first few lines of the stats table, sorted by number of saves, are:

Site	Unique Users	Sessions	Saves
vi.wikipedia.org	86	46,278	1,713,706,847
lietuvai.lt	6	26,562	1,103,162,901
en.wikipedia.org	2,569	247,111	172,362,443
commons.wikimedia.org	435	24,610	168,284,945

viwiki edits are responsible for 45% of the global total, with only 86 unique users. That's 10x the enwiki saves with 1/30th the users and 1/5th the sessions. Is there something interesting that AWB is being (or has been) used for on viwiki? Lietuvai.lt stats are also interesting. I'm not implying there's anything nefarious going on – just curious. —[AlanM1(talk)]— 22:33, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

They may allow cosmetic edits or be using AWB for bot edits rather than a custom-coded bot. --Izno (talk) 12:05, 23 August 2019 (UTC)

Help needed

I downloaded AWB today after being away from it for so long. However it's not letting me load it as its saying that mscorjit.dll file is missing or corrupt. How do i fix this? Do i need to download something--Mjs1991 (talk) 00:46, 18 August 2019 (UTC)

User:Mjs1991 I've not seen that error before but let's hazard a guess that it has something to do with the fact that the latest version of AWB needs v4.5 of the .NET Framework. If you have an up to date installation of a recent version of Windows this ought to be installed (and if not, you really should install 4.5.2 or newer as 4.5.0 is no longer supported by Microsoft). If you've not been able to resolve this can you reply with what version of Windows you have and which version(s) of .NET are installed? --kingboyk (talk) 17:47, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

Password

Hi, When I clicked 'Start' to run AutoWikiBrowser, and a window pop up and asking me to login. I dont remember the password and pls advise how to proceed from here. thanks in advance. CASSIOPEIA^(talk) 12:05, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

@CASSIOPEIA: It's asking for your Wikipedia account password, not an AWB-specific password. If you've lost your Wikipedia password then you should be able to reset it via email; Help:Reset password. -- John of Reading (talk) 13:05, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

@CASSIOPEIA: I notice you are in oath-testers, so you may have 2FA enabled. In which case, you are likely using a "BotPassword" for AWB. You can reset that at Special:BotPasswords, see Wikipedia:Using AWB with 2FA for more help on that topic. — xaosflux ^Talk 14:48, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

@Xaosflux and John of Reading: Hi guys, thanks for the help. Will try ge the AWB bot set up this weekend. Cheers. CASSIOPEIA^(talk) 01:53, 28 August 2019 (UTC)

Oddness

{{citation needed|date={{subst:CURRENTMONTHNAME}} {{subst:CURRENTYEAR}}}} correctly substitues the month and year but {{deprecated inline|certain=yes|date={{subst:CURRENTMONTHNAME}} {{subst:CURRENTYEAR}}}} does not. Any idea why? Example: [6] Guy (Help!) 06:40, 25 August 2019 (UTC)

@JzG: Substitution doesn't work at all inside <ref>...</ref> tags; see Help:Substitution#Limitation. -- John of Reading (talk) 07:24, 25 August 2019 (UTC)

Thanks. Guy (Help!) 07:52, 25 August 2019 (UTC)

@Guy:, You can force the substitution by substituting the <ref>...</ref> tags too: {{subst:#tag:ref|{{deprecated inline|certain=yes|date={{subst:CURRENTMONTHNAME}}{{subst:CURRENTYEAR}}}}}}. – Ammarpad (talk) 11:03, 29 August 2019 (UTC)

Got it, thanks. Guy (Help!) 15:17, 29 August 2019 (UTC)

Section heading capitalization

In [this edit], the section heading "Personal Life" was changed to "Personal life", but the prior heading "Other Activities" was left in start case. Why? MB 15:53, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

User:MB we provide a limited number of fixes in that area. We, perhaps, could expand it at some point. -- Magioladitis (talk) 17:00, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

OK, I suspected that but wanted to be sure there wasn't another reason. I'll try to manually fix other headers if I notice them. MB 17:06, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

Cite parameters

As you may know there have modest but been wide-reaching changes to the dead-url cite parameters.

There is a c. 600,000 edit bot run on-going to fix these.

If you are doing any AWB work it is possible to assist in this, by adding a few simple rules to the normal search and replace.

It is probably also possible to do something with the template plugin, but that is since my time so I can't comment on it.

The rules would be something like:

\|\s*dead[-]*url\s*=\s*(yes|y|true) *(\n|\||}})	                        |url-status = dead$2
\|\s*dead[-]*url\s*= *(\n|\||}})	                                $1
\|\s*dead[-]*url\s*=\s*(no|n|false) *(\n|\||}})	                        |url-status = live$2
\|\s*dead[-]*url\s*=\s*(unfit|usurped|bot:\s*unknown) *(\n|\||}})	|url-status = $1$2
bot:\s*unknown	                                                        bot: unknown

These are by no means bomb-proof, but I suspect they will be pretty robust.

All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 20:08, 12 September 2019 (UTC).

logging to a named file on a local drive

is that possible with a c++ module?

If a page is skipped for any reason, for example, is it possible for the c++ module to automatically log that event to a file on my local drive much like it logs that information to the appropriate section of the Logs tab.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 00:02, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

This would be very nice & useful, especially if it includes the skip edit summary.   ~ Tom.Reding (talk ⋅dgaf)  13:39, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

Double-clicking in Wine?

I'm running under Wine, and when I double-click in the diff window to undo a potential edit, something is intercepting it and it just highlights the word where I double-clicked. Seems like a similar issue to this. Are other people experiencing this? Any fix or workaround suggestions?—Chowbok ☠ 03:02, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

Where to download from?

I stupidly allowed my hard drive to be "cleaned" when having some hardware maintenance done, and now AWB won't launch properly. I'd like to try a fresh install: can someone remind me where to get a new copy from? Thanks. --Auntof6 (talk) 05:55, 22 September 2019 (UTC)

@Auntof6: The latest version, 6.1.0.1, downloads from https://sourceforge.net/projects/autowikibrowser/files/autowikibrowser/AutoWikiBrowser6101/AutoWikiBrowser6101.zip/download -- John of Reading (talk) 07:02, 22 September 2019 (UTC)

@John of Reading: Thanks! --Auntof6 (talk) 07:34, 22 September 2019 (UTC)

6.1.0.x update

Kinda sad the T159958 regression is still there, and that T111660 and T158577 haven't made the cut in the new version. I thought that some of these would have been tackled at Wikimania and related hackatons. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 06:16, 18 September 2019 (UTC)

Sorry. Unfortunately lack of time to actually work on them (though, based on the list, maybe only one of them I'd probably be able to fix easily enough myself). This release was more in response to the specifically broken stuff (even though it's well overdue), rather than as an attempt to get new features et al out. Reedy (talk) 06:26, 18 September 2019 (UTC)

I updated to this version to get round the problem with login but now I get 2 instances of the programme running whenever I start the programme. Keith D (talk) 17:39, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

Unfortunately, we barely had time to work with AWB this year during Hackathon. We need to find a way to keep maintaining AWB. I have some ideas that I will discuss with Reedy. -- Magioladitis (talk) 11:26, 22 September 2019 (UTC)

Startup & login failures

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T233070

As of about 15 hours ago, I started getting this error message on AWB startup, using 2 separate machines from 2 different locations where I had internet access, both running Windows 7 64-bit:

An error occured [sic] while connecting to the server or loading project information from it. Please make sure that your internet connection works and such combination of project/language exist. Enter the URL in the format "en.wikipedia.org/w/" (including path where index.php and api.php reside).
Error description: StartIndex cannot be less than zero.
Parameter name: startIndex

Then another error when trying to login with 2 accounts (this & my bot account, both are valid on WP:AWB/CP):

Check page failed to load.

Check your Internet is working and that the Wiki is online.

I suspect that the 2nd error is a result of the 1st, since there appears to be some configuration error that can't find the English wiki. Can anyone identify/fix the problem?   ~ Tom.Reding (talk ⋅dgaf)  13:20, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

This is probably WP:VPT#AutoWikiBrowser fails to connect. --Izno (talk) 13:39, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

@Tom.Reding: @Izno: This is because https://noc.wikimedia.org/conf/InitialiseSettings.php.txt changed yesterday. I understand the file is going to be replaced, but it hasn't happened yet. If you have access to source, in WikiFunctions!SiteInfo.cs!LoadCategoryCollation(), replace that filename with VariantSettings.php.txt. Or I think you can get away with stubbing out the function completely. David Brooks (talk) 14:06, 17 September 2019 (UTC) ETA: Oh, sorry for the duplication - I see this is mentioned in the phab task linked to in the VPT comment. David Brooks (talk) 14:19, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

6.1.0.0 has been released... Reedy (talk) 18:31, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

@Reedy: I've upgraded to 6.1.0.0 and got this "Check page failed to load" message. -- John of Reading (talk) 18:41, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

Reedy, John of Reading so at this point upgrading to 6.1.0.0 doesn't take care of the issue?Naraht (talk) 19:43, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

Same here - after upgrading to v6.1.0.0, I don't receive the 1st error above at startup, but I still receive the 2nd error when trying to login with any account.   ~ Tom.Reding (talk ⋅dgaf)  19:48, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

Yes, it fixes the issue reported. The issue now is a different one, due to some WIP code I didn't finish. Reedy (talk) 20:08, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

Try [7] Reedy (talk) 20:42, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

@Reedy: success with v6.1.0.1!   ~ Tom.Reding (talk ⋅dgaf)  20:47, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

@Reedy: And thank you for cutting out the download of a 140KB file! David Brooks (talk) 22:01, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

Reedy, many many thanks for the prompt fix. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 22:53, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

Glad to see this fixed. --Jarekt (talk) 12:17, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

error with launching older versions - startIndex can't be less than zero

error message

I just got this error on 5.10.0.1 and 6.0.0.1. Fortunately 6.1.0.1 works but it took me time to find it out. All worked fine this morning... Uziel302 (talk) 18:14, 22 September 2019 (UTC)

Are you using 5.10.1.0?

Just wondering if anyone is still using the 5.10 versions...? I'm trying to work out whether it's worth the effort of backporting some of the changes to the 6.X branch to 5.10, for those who for whatever reason can't use .NET 4.5... Reedy (talk) 23:12, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

• AWB updater on version 6.0.0.1 "updates" AWB to 5.10.1 version, so I thought 6.0.0.1 is some sort of beta. MBH (talk) 02:55, 18 September 2019 (UTC)
  • It kinda is, but based on the lack of bug reports for anything specifically relating to the changes made in this from 5.10 to 6.0, I'm probably going to bump some of the version numbers around and encourage people to upgrade. Do you still experience the same behaviour with the updater that was both separately released and included in 6.1.0.0 and 6.1.0.1? Reedy (talk) 06:25, 18 September 2019 (UTC)
    • No, 6.1.0.0 updater updates to 6.1.0.1. MBH (talk) 07:11, 19 September 2019 (UTC)
• I may be mistaken, but I seem to recall that the link on the main page led to a 5.10.x package as of yesterday morning. In any case, isn't there a runtime version block now, making the answer to your first question necessarily "no"? That said, surely a more apt question is: does anyone not have .net fx 4.5 installed? David Brooks (talk) 12:55, 18 September 2019 (UTC)

Oh, I probably am mistaken, It's 6.0.x that is blocked, not 5.10.x. Apologies. David Brooks (talk) 13:23, 18 September 2019 (UTC)

Thank you so much for the tip that .NET 4.5 is compatible with AWB! I've been trying for a couple of years to get AWB working with Ubuntu 16.04 and Wine, using .NET 2.0 (suggested in the FAQ above) or 3.5 (from WP:AWB#Running on Linux or Mac) but never got it to start. I'd tried 4.0 and 4.5, which didn't install, but this discussion provided the clue that I needed to persevere by upgrading wine and winetricks manually and making a few other tweaks. Thanks again for all your hard work. Certes (talk) 16:36, 18 September 2019 (UTC)

It's been around for a year, see the changelog ;). More seriously, it might be useful to get that documented and potentially reproducible. Reedy (talk) 16:43, 18 September 2019 (UTC)

I've written a few notes at User:Certes/AWB on Ubuntu. I've been down a lot of dead ends, which I didn't document fully, so I'd be interested to see whether anyone else succeeds with that approach. Once it's reproducible, it could go somewhere more visible. I've asked for help in a few places and got no response, and I remember seeing an AWB statistics summary showing all but six out of thousands of edits being from Windows, so I may be the only editor attempting to use AWB on Linux. Certes (talk) 17:09, 18 September 2019 (UTC)

Stats are possibly broken. I've not given them any love in years.. You're definitely not the first to try. See Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser/Mono_and_Wine for more Reedy (talk) 20:17, 18 September 2019 (UTC)

I use AWB under Linux all the time. AWB has required at least .NET 3.5 for a few years now. I currently use .NET 4.5 under Wine. The Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser/Mono_and_Wine page does cover it all, and it includes what I use (opensuse) though other editors have split the page into distro-specific sections, which I'm not sure helps, but I didn't want to edit against them. Rjwilmsi 09:02, 3 October 2019 (UTC)

Thanks for the confirmation. Everything worked for me once I realised that I had to add a repository manually and get a recent version of Wine. Certes (talk) 09:27, 3 October 2019 (UTC)

I'm still using 5.10.1.0. Is there any demonstrable advantage to using version 6? WP:AWB/H tells me that it has:

• TLS 1.1/1.2 - which I don't yet need on English Wikipedia.
• Fixup WikiSearchListProvider - what does that mean in practical/user terms. What incorrect behaviour, visible to the user, does it fix?
• Overhaul message system to be displayed to users - what does that actually mean? Exactly what will appear different to the user?
• Allow users to select which optional update to update to - not an issue if don't update. And in any case I would always manually select which version to download and update to.

Mitch Ames (talk) 13:16, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

@Mitch Ames: Aren't you seeing the StartIndex error dialog where this discussion started? David Brooks (talk) 18:21, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

With v5 I do see the "StartIndex cannot be less than zero" error, but given the context of this section ("... anyone is still using the 5.10 versions...? ... whether it's worth the effort of backporting some of the changes to the 6.X branch to 5.10") my question was intended as "Is there any demonstrable advantage to using version 6 (with English Wikipedia) - other than the fix to the recent login problem, which Reedy is suggesting including in v5?" In particular, see the bullet points in my post of 13:16, 19 September 2019 (UTC). Mitch Ames (talk) 09:50, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

FWIW, the code is open source. The change logs are public. The bugs fixed in phabricator are public. It's not necessarily upto the developers to distill this to a changelog. Other people are able to help do that too (as has happened before). It is a wiki, anyone can edit it. Reedy (talk) 14:14, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

Also, you might not need TLS 1.1/1.2 support, but doesn't mean you can't benefit from it. There are also numerous changes in the .NET framework that I have no idea on the positive affects this may have on AWB. Reedy (talk) 14:16, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

You said that you were "probably going to ... encourage people to upgrade". A summary of changes that is meaningful to the average editor would probably help. Can you provide a specific link to the list of bugs fixed and/or functional changes in AWB v6? (The commit log is not helpful to non-programmers.) Mitch Ames (talk) 01:23, 21 September 2019 (UTC)

• is there any version of AWB that currently works? If so, where is it? Hmains (talk) 19:12, 21 September 2019 (UTC)

@Hmains: 6.1.0.1 is working for me. It comes from https://sourceforge.net/projects/autowikibrowser/files/autowikibrowser/AutoWikiBrowser6101/AutoWikiBrowser6101.zip/download -- John of Reading (talk) 19:27, 21 September 2019 (UTC)

@John of Reading: Now I don't receive the "StartIndex cannot be less than zero" error but I am back to receiving a popup box saying "Login failed [white x in red circle] Aborted", which has been going on for several weeks now. Hmains (talk) 19:40, 21 September 2019 (UTC)

@Hmains: This thread suggests your password might be too short. Otherwise, I've no idea. -- John of Reading (talk) 20:15, 21 September 2019 (UTC)

@John of Reading: I have no trouble with my password in Commons and EN:WP. Are the rules different now for AWB? Where are the rules? Thanks Hmains (talk) 20:19, 21 September 2019 (UTC)

@John of Reading: My password is currently 8 lower case alpaha and then 4 numbers--12 long Hmains (talk) 20:23, 21 September 2019 (UTC).

@Hmains: Sorry, I'm already out of my depth here. Better to ping @Reedy for advice. -- John of Reading (talk) 20:26, 21 September 2019 (UTC)

@John of Reading: I reset my password and now all is ok; thanks for everything Hmains (talk) 20:29, 21 September 2019 (UTC)

• I am still using 5.10.1.0 and have been getting the error "An error occurred while connecting to the server or loading project information..." for a couple of days now. I tried to upgrade via AWB updater, which was not successful, since it failed when updating the Updater itself. I have not yet tried to manually download 6.*, because I think I have learnt that some developers do not consider 6.* to be mature yet. The current bug is the first time I learnt there is a 6.* at all. So I am somewhat confused about versioning, which version to use (or as Hmains stated "Is there any version of AWB that currently works?"), and how to get along the current error messages. --Bildungsbürger (talk) 10:07, 22 September 2019 (UTC)

Just wondering if anyone is still using the 5.10 versions...? — Does the usage data that AWB collects "to help the developers track use" (Preferences, Privacy) tell the developers what version is being used? If not, perhaps is should. 60.231.59.151 (talk) 22:53, 24 September 2019 (UTC)

According to Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser/History, AWB v6 supports TLS 1.1, 1.2 and requires .NET 4.5. However according to .NET Framework version history#.NET Framework 4.6 and its source, TLS 1.1, 1.2 wasn't added until .NET 4.6. Why the discrepancy between the AWB and .NET release notes? Mitch Ames (talk) 13:22, 2 October 2019 (UTC)

Replace [[X|X]] with [[X]]

Heyo, I've used AWB to fix contractions in my wiki (like [[X|X's]] to [[X]]'s), but unfortunately, there are some leftover links in the form of [[X|X]]'s. How can I use AWB to fix those? It does so automatically when I apply general fixes, but not when the change to [[X|X]]'s has already been made (I think). I tried some RegEx functions, but none worked.
And how can I make AWB ignore "External Links" when applying general fixes? Or would it be possible to not use general fixes to change [[X|X]] to [[X]]? Seelentau (talk) 15:20, 5 October 2019 (UTC)

Does this do what you want?

find \[\[([^\|\]]+)\|\1\]\]

replace [[$1]]

—Trappist the monk (talk) 15:25, 5 October 2019 (UTC)

I think it does, thank you! Also, I tried to load this module of general fixes to avoid the change of "External Links" to "External links", but I have no idea if what I did is correct... what would I have to do in the module so that it doesn't make that change? Seelentau (talk) 15:41, 5 October 2019 (UTC)

I don't know. I never, ever use general fixes because I do not want to be responsible for the actions of code written by others. I would suggest that since the last apparently substantive edits to that module page were made in February 2017, whatever is there is very likely way out of date and therefore obsolete.

And, External Links should be changed to External links (sentence case) per MOS:HEADINGS.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 16:01, 5 October 2019 (UTC)

Yup, managed to do it without the custom stuff. And I don't mean this wiki, I meant the One Piece wiki over at wikia fandom. Seelentau (talk) 20:42, 5 October 2019 (UTC)

Can't find csc.exe

Trying to compile a simple AWB module on a machine which I have never previously used for that purpose.

AWB itself runs fine, and has done lots of edits for me.

However, attempts to "make module" generate this error: "Compiler executable file csc.exe cannot be found."

So I downloaded installed .NET Framework 4.8 Developer pack, and restarted my machine. Same problem. Here's the full error report:

**description**: 
**workaround**: 
--------------------------
<table><tr><th>Exception:</th><td>`InvalidOperationException`</td></tr>
<tr><th>Message:</th><td>`Compiler executable file csc.exe cannot be found.`</td></tr>
<tr><th>Call stack:</th><td><pre>   at System.CodeDom.Compiler.RedistVersionInfo.GetCompilerPath(IDictionary`2 provOptions, String compilerExecutable)
   at Microsoft.CSharp.CSharpCodeGenerator.FromFileBatch(CompilerParameters options, String[] fileNames)
   at Microsoft.CSharp.CSharpCodeGenerator.FromSourceBatch(CompilerParameters options, String[] sources)
   at Microsoft.CSharp.CSharpCodeGenerator.System.CodeDom.Compiler.ICodeCompiler.CompileAssemblyFromSourceBatch(CompilerParameters options, String[] sources)
   at System.CodeDom.Compiler.CodeDomProvider.CompileAssemblyFromSource(CompilerParameters options, String[] sources)
   at WikiFunctions.CustomModules.CustomModuleCompiler.Compile(String sourceCode, CompilerParameters parameters)
   at AutoWikiBrowser.CustomModule.MakeModule()</pre></td></tr>
</table>
**OS**: Microsoft Windows NT 6.2.9200.0
**version**: AutoWikiBrowser (6.1.0.1), WikiFunctions (6.1.0.1), revision 12353 (2019-09-17 21:16:42)
**net**: 4.0.30319.42000
**duplicate**: 
**site**: https://en.wikipedia.org

But I have mutiple copies of csc.exe :

C:\Users\Me>dir /s %WINDIR%\CSC.EXE
 Volume in drive C has no label.
 Volume Serial Number is 2CFB-CF52

 Directory of C:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v4.0.30319

08/10/2019  15:48         2,140,808 csc.exe
               1 File(s)      2,140,808 bytes

 Directory of C:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework64\v4.0.30319

08/10/2019  15:48         2,758,280 csc.exe
               1 File(s)      2,758,280 bytes

 Directory of C:\WINDOWS\WinSxS\amd64_netfx4-csc_exe_b03f5f7f11d50a3a_4.0.15713.0_none_75029b843b5b1af7

15/09/2018  08:29         2,739,280 csc.exe
               1 File(s)      2,739,280 bytes

 Directory of C:\WINDOWS\WinSxS\amd64_netfx4-csc_exe_b03f5f7f11d50a3a_4.0.15744.161_none_6bb831a0de84fd37

08/10/2019  15:48         2,758,280 csc.exe
               1 File(s)      2,758,280 bytes

 Directory of C:\WINDOWS\WinSxS\x86_netfx4-csc_exe_b03f5f7f11d50a3a_4.0.15713.0_none_bcafd25b4fd743fd

15/09/2018  08:29         2,170,960 csc.exe
               1 File(s)      2,170,960 bytes

 Directory of C:\WINDOWS\WinSxS\x86_netfx4-csc_exe_b03f5f7f11d50a3a_4.0.15744.161_none_b3656877f301263d

08/10/2019  15:48         2,140,808 csc.exe
               1 File(s)      2,140,808 bytes

     Total Files Listed:
               6 File(s)     14,708,416 bytes

How do I help AWB find one of these copies of csc.exe? --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 15:25, 8 October 2019 (UTC)

Greetings @BrownHairedGirl: - Only a wild guess, but maybe copy one of those csc.exe into AWB directory? Which one - I have no idea... Good luck, JoeHebda (talk) 19:14, 8 October 2019 (UTC)

Category for AWB missing articles that show on WP

Greetings, Wondering why Category:Unknown-importance Saints articles on Wikipedia has articles starting with letter "A" vs. AWB starts with letter "J" for same category? I did turn off all AWB filter, and did WP-purge. Regards, JoeHebda (talk) 16:07, 16 October 2019 (UTC)

@JoeHebda: AWB sorts by page name only, "Saint Arbogast", not by the category sort key, "Arbogast". I imagine the AWB list started at J because some helpful editor has worked through letters A to I recently; thanks to your efforts the AWB list now starts at P. -- John of Reading (talk) 16:47, 16 October 2019 (UTC)

@John of Reading: - Thanks. I had forgotten about that difference. Cheers! JoeHebda (talk) 18:18, 16 October 2019 (UTC)

Way to ignore external links without ignoring internal ones?

Hello! I've been doing some work where I use AWB to automatically italicize the names of game review sites where they're used. However, a lot of times they link to the article on them in prose and I want to be able to edit that. But, I can't just allow external links because then AWB tries to add italics in the middle of URLs. Is there any way to set it to ignore external links but not internal ones? TheAwesomeHwyh 05:02, 17 October 2019 (UTC)

@TheAwesomeHwyh: Are you using regular expressions for your find and replace rules? If so, try tacking (?<!https?://[^ \|\{\}\[\]\<\>]*) to the end of the "find" string. If a rule would have found a match inside a URL, this stops the rule firing by checking for the http: or https:. There may be a better way, of course. -- John of Reading (talk) 06:43, 17 October 2019 (UTC)

@John of Reading: I use the "normal settings" thingy for my rules. Is that the same thing? TheAwesomeHwyh 17:08, 17 October 2019 (UTC)

@TheAwesomeHwyh: Within the "normal settings" is a grid with columns "Find", "Replace with" and so on. Do you work with rules that have the "Regex" column ticked? -- John of Reading (talk) 17:26, 17 October 2019 (UTC)

@John of Reading: Here, let me upload a image of what my rules look like. One second... TheAwesomeHwyh 17:30, 17 October 2019 (UTC)

@John of Reading: Here you go. TheAwesomeHwyh 17:32, 17 October 2019 (UTC)

TheAwesomeHwyh 17:32, 17 October 2019 (UTC)

Looks like its not ticked. Let me do that. TheAwesomeHwyh 17:33, 17 October 2019 (UTC)

Done. Now, where do I put your code? TheAwesomeHwyh 17:35, 17 October 2019 (UTC)

Thank you so much, I figured it out now! I have one more question though: how do I also make it ignore ref names? It is trying to correct those now. TheAwesomeHwyh 17:54, 17 October 2019 (UTC)

Be very careful with this. A lot of those game review sites are named in cs1|2 citation templates. Brute-force global replacement of |website=Game Informer with |website=''Game Informer'' (also any of the |website= aliases) or |publisher=Game Informer with |publisher=''Game Informer'' will cause cs1|2 markup errors. Do not do that.

Just because I was curious, this insource search for Game Informer used anywhere in {{cite web}} finds about a thousand pages. You might guess that there are quite a lot of pages that could be damaged by incautious use of awb to make the replacements you want to make.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 18:05, 17 October 2019 (UTC)

Yep I know, that's why I want to know how to make it avoid citations. TheAwesomeHwyh 18:25, 17 October 2019 (UTC)

Just pinging @John of Reading: since I'm not sure if you saw my question- how would one also prevent it from replacing text in references? TheAwesomeHwyh 19:29, 17 October 2019 (UTC)

@TheAwesomeHwyh: I don't have that ready to hand, sorry.

Has anyone else solved that one? -- John of Reading (talk) 19:59, 17 October 2019 (UTC)

I have found that it is a lot easier to find what I don't want to find than it is to not-find what I don't want to find. Regex doesn't do logical-not very easily. So, what I do quite often is find and then hide what I don't want to find.

Suppose that I don't want to find the text Game Informer in |publisher=. I might write a find and replace that looks like this:

find: (\|\s*publisher\s*=\s*)[Gg]ame\s+[Ii]nformer(\s*[\|\}])

replace: $1__g4m3_1nf0rm3r__$2

This 'hides' all of the |publisher=Game Informer by replacing the text I want to find with |publisher=__g4m3_1nf0rm3r__; text that I'm not looking to find.

Repeat for all of the various |website= aliases and whatever other parameters might have the name (|title= for example). Then repeat the above for all of the review site names (new secret word for each review site name).

Once everything that you don't want to find is hidden, do the find and replace that adds the italic wikimarkup. When that is done, unhide:

find: __g4m3_1nf0rm3r__

replace: Game Informer

repeating for each of the secret words and associated review site names.

This is a simplified example. en.wiki editors will have added inappropriate wikimarkup and extraneous text and whatever to |publisher= and |website= (and aliases; and markup is not always balanced) so be aware of that. Also consider doing this in a c# module; much easier to do it that way (I think).

—Trappist the monk (talk) 22:42, 17 October 2019 (UTC)

Thank you so much! TheAwesomeHwyh 22:47, 17 October 2019 (UTC)

Sorry to pester you- but I've run into another error. Now it tries to replace ref names and the names of game sites in the game review template that shows all the review scores. Is there any way around that? TheAwesomeHwyh 23:49, 17 October 2019 (UTC)

Forgot to ping: @Trappist the monk:. TheAwesomeHwyh 23:50, 17 October 2019 (UTC)

Er, it tries to italicize them. TheAwesomeHwyh 23:53, 17 October 2019 (UTC)

@Trappist the monk: Hmm. I've been trying at this for a while now and I don't quite understand. I tried doing (\|\s*publisher\s*=\s*)(\|\s*name\s*=\s*)[Gg]ame[Zz]one(\s*[\|\}]) but it just ignores the ref names. What did I do wrong? TheAwesomeHwyh 01:45, 18 October 2019 (UTC)

That regex doesn't work as you intend it to work because it is looking for |publisher= followed by |name= followed by GameZone. It is unlikely that you will ever find that string.

find: (<ref\s*name\s*=\s*"?)[Gg]ame[Zz]one("?)

replace: $1__G4M320n3__$2

—Trappist the monk (talk) 11:55, 18 October 2019 (UTC)

@TheAwesomeHwyh: (?!(?-i:(?s:(?:(?!<ref).)*)</ref)) should prevent matches inside ref tags. "Scan ahead looking for </ref, but while scanning ahead, make sure you don't go past <ref" -- John of Reading (talk) 03:29, 18 October 2019 (UTC)

@John of Reading: Thanks! I'll just manually skip the review template, then. TheAwesomeHwyh 03:35, 18 October 2019 (UTC)

@John of Reading: Wait, it's not actually working. Should I be placing this before Trappist's workaround or after? TheAwesomeHwyh 03:42, 18 October 2019 (UTC)

@TheAwesomeHwyh: This should be tacked on to the end of the "Find" string, with "Regex" ticked. Once it's working properly, this would be instead of Trappist's workaround. What page are you trying it out on? -- John of Reading (talk) 03:49, 18 October 2019 (UTC)

@John of Reading: My French Coach and My Spanish Coach. Is there a way I could export my rules to some sort of text file so that I could copy it here? TheAwesomeHwyh 03:52, 18 October 2019 (UTC)

Oh wait. Looks like I was tacking this on the end... one second. TheAwesomeHwyh 03:53, 18 October 2019 (UTC)

I mean the beginning, one second. TheAwesomeHwyh 03:53, 18 October 2019 (UTC)

@John of Reading: This seems to be only working on the first appearance of a ref name, but it just ignores whenever it happens again. I'm trying currently to have it skip Eurogamer ref's but It's only skipping the first appearance. TheAwesomeHwyh 03:55, 18 October 2019 (UTC)

@TheAwesomeHwyh: Ah, I see. Try tacking on (?<!\<\s*ref\s+name\s*=\s*(?:"|'|)[\w\s\:\-\.\/]{0,99}) as well, which should prevent matches inside <ref name=sommething/>. I'm going back to bed now; I'm in the UK. -- John of Reading (talk) 04:05, 18 October 2019 (UTC)

@John of Reading: Thanks! Just to clarify, do I need both or just the latter? TheAwesomeHwyh 04:06, 18 October 2019 (UTC)

@John of Reading: Nevermind, looks like I need both. Thanks! TheAwesomeHwyh 04:08, 18 October 2019 (UTC)

Skip changing apostrophes

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T231012

I'm new to AWB and have found that most of the suggested edits are changing apostrophes from ’ to '. Is there a way to skip this particular change as I'm looking to use AWB more for fixing typos and tagging pages. Bellowhead678 (talk) 13:48, 25 October 2019 (UTC)

@Bellowhead678: yes eventually: see WT:AWB/T#Move "'s" rule to WP:GENFIXES?, which is unfortunately still "Open, Needs Triage" status and assigned to no one.   ~ Tom.Reding (talk ⋅dgaf)  14:08, 25 October 2019 (UTC)

Skip Disambiguation Pages

There seems to be an issue with AWB not skipping disambig pages. I have tried to write a regex script to skip pages that contain "geodis" and "may refer to", but disambiguation pages are still being caught in my list and they are increasingly difficult to the determine that they are disambig without seeing the entire page which isn't necessarily visible. I am receiving complaints from several editors because of AWB adding the STUB tag to these pages and my not knowing that they are disambig. Is there an AWB fix for this? -BigDwiki ^talk 23:55, 30 October 2019 (UTC)

See https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T212601. This has allegedly been fixed in AWB but AWB continues to suggest incorrectly adding stub and orphan templates to pages with "geodis" or "railway station disambiguation" templates, and the above editor continues to accept these incorrect suggestions. It is not AWB which adds these tags, as stated above, but a human editor. PamD 00:32, 31 October 2019 (UTC)

We can all agree that AWB is suggesting the edits and me (a human) saves them. -BigDwiki ^talk 00:34, 31 October 2019 (UTC)

I possibly have a solution. I have simply added the word "disambiguation" to the skip page "contains" field and it seems to be skipping properly. I was trying to write a complex regex script but this seems to work. Will continue testing.-BigDwiki ^talk 19:09, 31 October 2019 (UTC)

Bot

An administrator left a message on my talk page telling me to get approval as a bot (I’ve been making tons of non-controversial JWB edits for HTTPS in the past few days). However, I’m not a bot, and don’t have the technical knowledge to make one, so I’m not sure what to do. Do I need to stop these edits? In my understanding, all users approved as bots are supposed to be not human... DemonDays64 | Tell me if I'm doing something wrong :P 20:21, 15 November 2019 (UTC)

No, you cannot keep making thousands of edits changing "http" to "https" from an unflagged account. This should be from an approved bot-flagged account. –xeno^talk 20:35, 15 November 2019 (UTC)

Category removal

I'm running AWB on Robertson Street United Reformed Church doing general cleanup and it is removing the article from Category:Churches in Hastings. I have no idea why it is doing this. MB 21:03, 30 November 2019 (UTC)

@MB: That category declaration is listed twice; AWB is only removing the duplicate. -- John of Reading (talk) 21:26, 30 November 2019 (UTC)

Thanks, I thought that what it was but the diff listing confused me because it cuts-off the second occurrence. I should have been able to figure that out anyway. MB 21:44, 30 November 2019 (UTC)

article 5566

Using nothing (not even 'Apply General fixes'), links to 5566 (the boy band) get unlinked by AWB v 6.1.0.1 to the number 5566. Such links can be found in the articles C-pop and Taiwanese Wave. This unlinking is wrong; it would be nice to get it fixed or get the article name changed. Thanks Hmains (talk) 01:51, 30 November 2019 (UTC)

@Hmains: I'm also using 6.1.0.1 but don't see this happening. Do you have a find+replace rule or custom module that might be trying to implement MOS:UNLINKYEARS? -- John of Reading (talk) 09:00, 30 November 2019 (UTC)

No, I have nothing at all turned on. Just straight AWB. Hmains (talk) 17:07, 30 November 2019 (UTC)

I could not reproduce this behavior either, even with all of AWB 6.1.0.1's stock features turned on.   ~ Tom.Reding (talk ⋅dgaf)  17:37, 30 November 2019 (UTC)

I also tried. I ran AWB on Mandopop which has a link to the page. No change.Naraht (talk) 20:25, 30 November 2019 (UTC)

Wild idea: I am using IE. What are you using? Hmains (talk) 03:38, 1 December 2019 (UTC)

Further idea: since articles, with names of 4 digits, are (except for a few exceptions like this one) year articles, perhaps the better overall direction would be to rename 5566. Hmains (talk) 17:22, 1 December 2019 (UTC)

Recognizing local file descriptions

Does AWB have any functionality for narrowing a large list of pages in the File: namespace to just the ones that have a local (en.wiki) description, or conversely the ones that are just showing through from Commons? Thanks, -- Black Falcon ^(talk) 05:41, 2 December 2019 (UTC)

@Black Falcon: At the bottom of the "Skip" tab there are options to skip if the page "exists" or "doesn't exist". A quick check shows that if there's no local file page, it "doesn't exist" as far as AWB is concerned. Those options combined with "Options > Use pre-parse mode" will allow you to narrow the list. -- John of Reading (talk) 08:28, 2 December 2019 (UTC)

Thank you! -- Black Falcon ^(talk) 23:23, 15 December 2019 (UTC)

Ref question

In this edit, AWB found two identical refs and added "ref name=" to both which causes the of consolidation the two refs into one in the compiled text. But it didn't remove the duplication in the source as I did manually in this edit.

I tried running AWB again after the first change, but it still didn't completely merge the two refs. I know I have seen AWB remove redundant refs at other times, so I'm not sure why not this time? It seems inconsistent. MB 05:09, 27 December 2019 (UTC)

@MB: I think it's because the references are sitting inside a template, {{columns-list}}. Very occasionally, AWB used to cause reference errors when it merged two references inside a template, because it didn't know that the template was going to ignore one of the parameters:

| old_parameter_actually_ignored_now = 123<ref name=somename>Someref</ref>
| other_parameter_still_in_use = 456<ref name=somename/>

It now plays safe and leaves both copies intact, without trying to guess what the template is going to do. -- John of Reading (talk) 06:25, 27 December 2019 (UTC)

OK, seems reasonable. Today, I found a case where it did this again. The first occurrence was within an infobox and the second was in the body of the article but not within any template. This would have been safe to fully combine, assuming it did it the right way (leaving the full ref in the second occurrence as I did here manually). MB 06:00, 29 December 2019 (UTC)

AVG

AVG (antivirus software) on my system has put AWB in quarantine, because it thinks it is a virus. Any comments? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Snowmanradio (talk • contribs) 21:15, 3 January 2020 (UTC)

Templates before categories?

I made this edit, which puts the stub template after the categories. Which setting do I adjust to avoid that? --Palnatoke (talk) 20:59, 10 January 2020 (UTC)

@Palnatoke: I think this will need a change to AWB itself; see phab:T100743 and phab:T144133 where the code had to be changed for two other languages. -- John of Reading (talk) 21:55, 10 January 2020 (UTC)

Thanks. I created phab:T242473. --Palnatoke (talk) 22:20, 10 January 2020 (UTC)

Using regex and AWB to fix pages at Category:Pages using deprecated image syntax

I would like to help clear out the huge backlog at Category:Pages using deprecated image syntax using AWB. However, I don't know what regular expressions to use. I have been told on my talk page that I would need lots of regular expressions to catch all the issues and fix them. I know that AWB's general fixes won't fix deprecated image syntax but it would be helpful if it did. Pkbwcgs (talk) 15:21, 31 December 2019 (UTC)

I clean up a lot of these manually. I'm not sure if this is a job for AWB because it is not always that straightforward. Sometimes there are multiple images. In these cases, I usually move one outside the infobox. Sometimes, they both can stay in the infobox (e.g. one as image= and one as logo=). Another issue is the caption. Sometimes, it goes into caption=, sometimes another field (e.g. image_caption=). Then there are cases where there is already a caption specified and you need to determine if that is a caption that matches the image or one from a prior deleted image. Or sometimes both captions match the image so you need to decide which is best (if they are not identical). Another thing to watch for is image_size (or equivalent) is sometimes set to something like 1000px, but it has no affect when the image is using the [[File:]] syntax. This needs be updated (and it can have several different names). Just my thoughts. MB 16:12, 31 December 2019 (UTC)

I would think that AWB could at least do some of that work in a semi-automated way with regexes. Each user would write his or her own regexes to help make the changes. Of course, AWB users would need to look at the diff screen on AWB to be prepared to do some of the work manually on every page and to check the changes regex have made. If you understand regexes, then to make a start, you could look for parts of the syntax that can be easily changed by regex and, if that works ok, then write more regexes to make more regex enhancements. I would say that regexes can be unpredictable unless you are familiar with them. Snowman (talk) 21:12, 3 January 2020 (UTC)

To echo Snowman, if you understand regex then you can do it yourself, but, be prepared for it being a long-winded process at the start, because it's amazing how many different ways humans find to write and achieve the same thing. I did this a while back on video game articles and my advice would be, rather than try to write one amazing bit of regex that does everything, build a library of commands to tackle each specific format. Don't try to clear the list in one pass, be happy to skip articles until you spot that a different pattern is common and add that to your library and start again. - X201 (talk) 15:26, 6 January 2020 (UTC)

@X201: I don't understand regex at all so I don't even know how to make a command to fix the problem with regex. Pkbwcgs (talk) 19:24, 13 January 2020 (UTC)

Tasks affecting 89,000 pages are usually more suited to a bot than AWB (where someone would have to press Save 89,000 times). However, it sounds as if many cases do require human input. Might it be possible to identify simple cases which can be fixed in bulk by a bot? Others can help with the regex syntax. If we're lucky, that could leave just a few hundred awkward cases to be fixed with AWB or manually. If we're not, the job would be partially done, which seems better than not done. Certes (talk) 19:40, 13 January 2020 (UTC)

@Certes: That is a good idea. However, there needs to be some sort of regex to fix the simple cases "in bulk by a bot". Pkbwcgs (talk) 19:45, 13 January 2020 (UTC)

Fixing all cases without breaking anything might require extensive and intricate changes to widely used protected templates. For example, the first case I looked at, BMT Fourth Avenue Line, uses {{Infobox rail line}} with |image={{rint|nycs|D|size=50px}}..., which (line 1164 of {{Rail-interchange}} tells us) resolves to |image=[[File:NYCS-bull-trans-D.svg.... That looks like the sort of thing we can only fix in templates, and other callers of Rint might need the square brackets. Certes (talk) 21:16, 13 January 2020 (UTC)

@Certes: I think that the square brackets from Template:Rail-interchange that are causing the deprecated image syntax issue need to be removed. I can easily do this; however, the biggest worry is that this could break a lot of formatting. There are 26,701 transclusions for the template. However, at the same time, transclusions of Template:Rail-interchange could be causing a lot of articles to be added Category:Pages using deprecated image syntax because of the double bracket formatting around images in the template. Pkbwcgs (talk) 21:25, 13 January 2020 (UTC)

Compiler executable file csc.exe cannot be found.

I've just moved from Windows 7 to a clean installation of Windows 10, and installed MS Visual Studio Community 2019. AWB will now not open my settings file since it includes a C# module which will not compile. The settings file worked perfectly well before the change. The error message is "Compiler executable file csc.exe cannot be found." The full error message is:

Exception:`InvalidOperationException`
Message:`Compiler executable file csc.exe cannot be found.`
Call stack:   at System.CodeDom.Compiler.RedistVersionInfo.GetCompilerPath(IDictionary`2 provOptions, String compilerExecutable)
  at Microsoft.CSharp.CSharpCodeGenerator.FromFileBatch(CompilerParameters options, String[] fileNames)
  at Microsoft.CSharp.CSharpCodeGenerator.FromSourceBatch(CompilerParameters options, String[] sources)
  at Microsoft.CSharp.CSharpCodeGenerator.System.CodeDom.Compiler.ICodeCompiler.CompileAssemblyFromSourceBatch(CompilerParameters options, String[] sources)
  at System.CodeDom.Compiler.CodeDomProvider.CompileAssemblyFromSource(CompilerParameters options, String[] sources)
  at WikiFunctions.CustomModules.CustomModuleCompiler.Compile(String sourceCode, CompilerParameters parameters)
  at AutoWikiBrowser.CustomModule.MakeModule()
**OS**: Microsoft Windows NT 6.2.9200.0
**version**: AutoWikiBrowser (6.1.0.1), WikiFunctions (6.1.0.1), revision 12353 (2019-09-17 21:16:42)
**net**: 4.0.30319.42000

A search of my C:\ drive shows six files called csc.exe of which the newest is at C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Visual Studio\2019\Community\MSBuild\Current\Bin\Roslyn

I'd appreciate any help with solving this please. Best regards — Hebrides (talk) 23:32, 18 January 2020 (UTC)

Settings file saved in a previous version will probably refer to .NET 2.0 for custom modules. Newer AWB releases are .NET 4.0 now, a clean Win 10 installation likely won't have .NET 2.0. So if you make a backup of the settings XML file, go in and remove the custom module settings, open it with AWB then go into the custom module settings and paste it in again that should enable it with the correct .NET version. Rjwilmsi 20:45, 19 January 2020 (UTC)

Thanks – you're right, it was a .NET version problem. I went ahead and edited the settings file, removed the code and changed <Module><Enabled>true</Enabled> to <Module><Enabled>false</Enabled>. Restarting AWB and loading the settings resulted in Windows 10 notifying me, "An app on your PC needs the following Windows feature: .NET Framework 3.5 (includes .NET 2.0 and 3.0)" so I clicked "Download and install this feature". When I restarted AWB and opened the original settings file with the code in, everything worked again. Thank you for your help. — Hebrides (talk) 23:29, 19 January 2020 (UTC)

Creating talk pages

Is AWB can be used to create talk pages with some templates in it? I want to complete project tiger categorization with my bot. --Hindust@ni^{क्या करें? बातें!} 16:25, 21 January 2020 (UTC)

@हिंदुस्थान वासी: Yes. At the bottom of the "skip" tab, make sure you haven't selected "Skip if page doesn't exist", and then use "Append/prepend text" on the "More..." tab to tell AWB what text you want on each page. -- John of Reading (talk) 16:54, 21 January 2020 (UTC)

How to turn an article into a redirect

I'm merging permastubs of Russian rural localities and I need to know the quickest shortcut for turning an article into a redirect. ミラP 15:41, 23 January 2020 (UTC)

AWB not following MOS:ORDER

I've repeatedly seen AWB moving hatnotes to above short descriptions which is against MOS:ORDER. Could this be fixed? Recent diff here, but I've seen it several times before from several different users. ‑‑Trialpears (talk) 08:08, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

@Trialpears: This was reported at Wikipedia talk:AutoWikiBrowser/Bugs#MOS:ORDER in November, but AWB users are still waiting for the developers to release a software version containing the fix. For now, all AWB users have to manually undo the incorrect changes before saving each edit. Not all AWB users will be aware of this. -- John of Reading (talk) 09:06, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

So this may take a year or more to get the genfixes changed? If that's the case is it possible to change some of the other regex lists used by AWB such as the typo fixing list to get a quick and hacky solution? ‑‑Trialpears (talk) 10:05, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

I'm not aware of any workaround. -- John of Reading (talk) 10:23, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

I suppose we could change (.*)({{Short description(something*)}}) to $2$1. However, that would implement MOS:ORDER even where AWB didn't break it, and I'm not sure everyone wants that. (If the description follows after a navigation hatnote such as For something else, see elsewhere., I boldly leave the description attached to the article it describes rather than the ambiguous title above.) Certes (talk) 10:35, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

More than 25000 pages

I presume I'd need a bot account to get more than 25000 pages, or am I blind to the option to increase it (or at least grab the next 25000)? Jerod Lycett (talk) 03:10, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

AWB on mediawiki 1.23?

Is there a way to get AWB with the old mediawiki 1.23 working? I'm not the owner of the wiki and it is not planned to update to a new version in the next weeks. Or is there a alternative which works similar to AWB? --9Larry98 (talk) 14:11, 16 February 2020 (UTC)

You can download an older release of AWB with support for older mediawiki versions from sourceforge. Rjwilmsi 17:59, 16 February 2020 (UTC)

Moving sections

Is there a way with AWB to move a section header and its corresponding content below another section? With or without regular expressions. —Atvelonis (talk) 18:38, 22 February 2020 (UTC)

Refs

I am marking up self-published sources. Where a SPS is in a named reference, the markup is <ref name="sps">{{cite blah blah}}</ref>{{self-published inline}}.

There may be references in the page, in the form <ref name="sps" />. I cannot think of a way to get AWB to pick up invocations of a named reference and tag them, because you can't as far as I am aware use the result of a regex term as a parameter in a subsequent search, even using sub-rules in Advanced. Am I right? Guy (help!) 21:09, 27 February 2020 (UTC)

If you have c# skills, a custom module will allow you to do what it is that I think you want to do because you can assign a capture (of the <ref>...</ref> name attribute) to a variable to be reused in later searches.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 21:48, 27 February 2020 (UTC)

Twitter is a SPS. Should we tag them all as well? -- Ohc ^¡digame! 09:19, 28 February 2020 (UTC)

Certainly not systematically and mindlessly. WP:RSCONTEXT matters a lot here. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 13:34, 28 February 2020 (UTC)

DEFAULTSORT

The change in sort order some years back made case irrelevant. However our content can be reused by other wikis, and the old way of doing it will preserve sort order for these users, without damaging our categorisation. I noticed a recent AWB edit lowering the case of a DEFAULTSORT. Can you confirm whether this is a General Fix or not? All the best: Rich Farmbrough (the apparently calm and reasonable) 19:01, 8 March 2020 (UTC).

Bots tab

Hello everyone, Why i can't use Bots tab? I mean... I'm a sysop at ckbwiki and used AWB (913 edits until now), but today i noticed Bots tab dismissed for me! Can someone tell me what happened? Thanks! ⇒ AramTalk 20:33, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

@Aram: The "bots" tab only shows up when you use an account that is listed as a bot in the CheckPage. Look for the word "enabledbots" in the ckb CheckPage and try listing yourself there, using the enwiki CheckPage as a guide. -- John of Reading (talk) 20:46, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

@John of Reading: Oh! That is scared me for a while. I added myself to enable bots tab in the bot section now and the bots tab appeared again! But what about ckb:ویکیپیدیا:AutoWikiBrowser/CheckPageJSON page? ⇒ AramTalk 21:11, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

@Aram: Hmm, I've never noticed that one before. From Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser/History it seems that a future version of AWB will look for the user names there. -- John of Reading (talk) 21:17, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

@John of Reading: Thank you very much! you helped me a lot! Warm regards! ⇒ AramTalk 21:29, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

Error messages not showing clearly in previews

Twice today I've had my errors fixed for me by Mikeblas - to whom my thanks - errors I've missed because my AWB preview has not shown the error messages clearly. I've been scrolling through the AWB preview looking for the usual bold red error messages, but in fact they are only shown in standard size text in black. Is it possible to do something to AWB or to my configuration to fix this?

To demonstrate, paste <ref name=x>foo</ref><ref name=x>bar</ref>{{reflist}} into the AWB edit window and ask for a preview. Don't save, of course. -- John of Reading (talk) 19:04, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

Wow! I don't use AWB, but that sounds like a pretty serious problem. Are other preview errors inhibited? -- Mikeblas (talk) 01:15, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

Some errors show in red; Module:Check for unknown parameters puts out an explicit style="color:red". The difference is that Template:Broken ref only puts out <span class="brokenref">, relying on that class definition being loaded. -- John of Reading (talk) 07:07, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

Wikitable issue

Hello, just wanted to report a small issue with recent AWB edits. As seen here and here, these edits are removing a line break before a wikitable, which evidently breaks things. In the latter example, that's all the edit did.

Possibly-helpful discussion of this can be seen on my talk page here as well as on JzG's.

This is not really my area of expertise, but I'll be glad to help with further info if I can. I've been poking around to find wikitable errors, and if I find more, I'll collect them (please let me know if I ought to add them here). Thanks, Jessicapierce (talk) 14:44, 15 March 2020 (UTC)

AWB executes but doesn't create screen.

For the last week or so AWB (6.1.0.1, I believe) simply hasn't created the screen. A entry for AWB exists in the program icons at the bottom of the page runs, but there is nothing visible. Is it possible that it has come up but is shifted so far off screen that it appears not to come up? (and yes, I have rebooted)Naraht (talk) 18:25, 2 April 2020 (UTC)

Have you tried uninstalling and reinstalling it? That should force everything back to defaults. I have noticed that the current release is a lot buggier than usual, with plugins not working and the updater unable to update. ‑ Iridescent 18:49, 2 April 2020 (UTC)

Request to remove bdi tags when removing Special:Booksources links

It appears that AWB is configured to remove Special:BookSources links that are caused by a long-standing Visual Editor bug, which is a welcome feature. Can the code be tweaked to remove the extraneous <bdi>...</bdi> tags that are also sometimes added by this Visual Editor bug? A bot will then (usually) be able to replace the magic links with the {{ISBN}} template, which requires some logic that is not necessary to integrate into AWB. Thanks. – Jonesey95 (talk) 00:44, 8 April 2020 (UTC)

OK, rev 12407. Will be in next AWB release. Rjwilmsi 11:21, 8 April 2020 (UTC)

Thanks. – Jonesey95 (talk) 13:25, 8 April 2020 (UTC)

Checking Draft space

Hi, Is there a simple way to deploy AWB for typos across draftspace specifically? I have tried searching for "AFC submission" in all namespaces and then filtering that down to draft space, but there are lots of other drafts in draftspace. ϢereSpielChequers 18:30, 16 April 2020 (UTC)

From the "Source" dropdown select "Special page", select "All pages" from the drop-down and change the namespace to "Draft". If the query is so big it crashes, you may need to select "All pages by prefix" and do A, B, C etc separately. Bear in mind that (in my experience) doing automated cleanup to drafts is a good way to annoy a lot of people very quickly, since by their nature they tend to contain snippets and fragments rather than finished product. ‑ Iridescent 18:37, 16 April 2020 (UTC)

Thanks that works. My experience of my last thousand or so edits in draftspace is that I almost never get reverted or criticised. In fact I have got a few thanks, often from complete newbies. But then I do skip past those AWB suggested edits that are only changing the dash or apostrophe, and I only delete or suggest others delete about 1% of the drafts I do anything to. ϢereSpielChequers 11:09, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

Only making one change when Regular expression is checked

Hi, I'm using the Javescript browser version (on mac), and AWB was working just fine for me for find and replace a regular expression but now if the regular expression box is checked, it will only change the first instance of that term, no matter what is in the Replace: field. It works fine for specific non-regex strings but not any more for regexes. It's the same in both Chrome and Firefox so I'm not sure why it stopped working right. Thanks, Reywas92^Talk 07:22, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

You will need to request help at WP:JWB. The only thing AWB shares with JWB is some part of the name and the WP:AutoWikiBrowser/CheckPage. --Izno (talk) 18:37, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

@Reywas92: Do you have g in your regex flags? Certes (talk) 19:23, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

Certes, I have always left the flags box blank. Reywas92^Talk 19:28, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

You'll need g to make the change multiple times. As far as I know, JWB has always worked that way with regex (but not with simple text replacement). Certes (talk) 19:35, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

Thanks, that does it! I wonder why it was worked before without it then. Reywas92^Talk 20:13, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

Failure to update page - no errors thrown

I've been trying to work with AutoWikiBrowser to make a very simple change across multiple pages, adding "North" to the name of a template on the pages, so new template accessed would be "North Savadkuh County", thus replacing the county template. I've tried find-replace which showed the proper change in preview but did not make the change, and I've tried manual editing in the edit window. I am using a bot login and have enabled the "edit existing pages" permission. I used AWB some years ago when doing some major category changes and it worked fine for me back then. I've added a few pictures detailing the steps below:

• 
  Manually designated one page target, unchecked find-replace, clicked start and got "no changes" note as expected.
• 
  Manually revised text in Edit Box and clicked Diff to show preview of diff
• 
  clicked Save
• 
  After Saving - "no changes" and the Edit Box does not show the manually entered change.

Thoughts on this before I go to Phabricator? --User:Ceyockey (talk to me) 17:33, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

@Ceyockey: I just tried it via search and replace in AWB and it worked fine. No idea why it wouldn't in your case. Feel free to revert my edit so that your example is still available. SchreiberBike | ⌨  20:35, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

@SchreiberBike: Thanks for checking; I've more that I need to do (a few dozen) so I'll leave the one you did in place. In reading above ... Is there another AWB version? I downloaded the 64-bit for Windows (I'm on Windows 10 Pro), but is there a Java version that I could try? --User:Ceyockey (talk to me) 20:50, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

@Ceyockey: The JavaScript (not Java) version may be useful: WP:JWB. It has most but not all AWB features. Certes (talk) 21:44, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

@Certes: Thanks, I'm giving it a try. --User:Ceyockey (talk to me) 22:05, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

...yep, that worked! --User:Ceyockey (talk to me) 22:09, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

Inserting blank lines

AWB inserts spurious blank lines into long tables and lists. For example, attempting a trivial change to Russell 1000 Index works but also adds a few extra lines in apparently random places. Other pages with long tables or lists, or even many short ones, behave similarly. Double clicking on the relevant line of the diff doesn't undo the change, and single clicking doesn't take me to the relevant line, so finding the spurious line in a huge table is impractical. (In practice I copy-paste the edit window to an editor which shows line numbers, remove the lines and copy-paste it back to AWB, but that often takes longer than doing the intended change manually.) Does anyone else see the problem, or is it just me? I'm using Wine on Ubuntu, which may be relevant. I've tried turning automatic changes and typo fixing off, and I have only one simple search and replace which can't add blank lines. Certes (talk) 16:30, 20 April 2020 (UTC)

New checking feature?

I wasn't sure where to go, so I've cross-posted this at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Check Wikipedia.

I made a request at WP:BOTR the other day, and the discussion proceeded as follows:

I think I made this kind of request several years ago, but I can't find it in the archives.

Occasionally people add text like [citation needed] or (reference needed) to articles, and these articles don't end up in maintenance categories because they're plain text instead of templates. Could someone write a bot that would go around making edits like this, or could an existing maintenance-bot operator add this task? I'm guessing that it would be rather simple — give it a list of phrases, tell it to look for them inside parentheses and brackets, and let it loose. Of course, this isn't a one-time problem, so if this is a good idea, it ought to be made an ongoing task. Nyttend backup (talk) 16:35, 20 April 2020 (UTC)

It's probably best to do this with AWB or another semi-auto tool, as there are some legitimate uses of "[citation needed]" in pages (on this page, citation needed, and links to citation needed for example). [8] is a good search term for the first one, then can regex search-and-replace \[?\[citation needed\]\]? with {{subst:cn}}. --AntiCompositeNumber (talk) 15:49, 22 April 2020 (UTC)

@Nyttend backup:  Doing... via AWB. GoingBatty (talk) 12:58, 23 April 2020 (UTC)

@Nyttend backup:  Done - except for those inside comments. GoingBatty (talk) 16:53, 23 April 2020 (UTC)

Another one that could be picked-up is (dead link) or [dead link]. Keith D (talk) 14:29, 23 April 2020 (UTC)

Hi, thanks for the help! I know there are some general maintenance tasks that AWB operators tend to look for. How do I ask that this kind of fix be added to their task list? Nyttend backup (talk) 19:13, 23 April 2020 (UTC)

@Nyttend backup: Seems like a good question for Wikipedia talk:AutoWikiBrowser or Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Check Wikipedia. GoingBatty (talk) 22:38, 23 April 2020 (UTC)

@Keith D:  Doing... but many can be deleted if there's already an archive-url or the link can be fixed. GoingBatty (talk) 01:40, 24 April 2020 (UTC)

Is it possible to amend AWB to include fixes like changing [citation needed] to {{citation needed}} on the routine that people use to remove curly quotes and make other general fixes? Thank you. Nyttend backup (talk) 18:06, 24 April 2020 (UTC)

Running into a limit making a list

I have been doing an AWB request on a very large category, but can only load the first 25k pages in the category to a list. This appears to be a hardcoded limit in the AWB program. Is there a way to start the list after a certain point in the category, to increase the limit on the number of pages I can load in AWB, or to download the contents of a category to make a list myself? Thanks for any help. VanIsaac_WS^cont 07:37, 27 April 2020 (UTC)

The 25k limit is not an AWB limit but a MediaWiki API limit. There is an API without limits but you need to have an admin or bot account to use it. Rjwilmsi 11:25, 27 April 2020 (UTC)

Pretty sure I ran into that 25,000 limit with bots, but I'll double check to be sure. Would be really nice to not have to deal with that. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 16:01, 27 April 2020 (UTC)

IIRC bots will only bypass it if you also have the NoLimits plugin enabled. As of a couple of weeks ago NL was failing to load (for me at any rate) even when I tried to force it in the plugin manager. ‑ Iridescent 16:03, 27 April 2020 (UTC)

How do you enable/load those plugins? Is is just a tick box in a plugins menu? Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 16:14, 27 April 2020 (UTC)

If you move the plugin into the same folder as AWB. it should (emphasis on "should") install when you restart the software, otherwise you can manually activate them from the "plugins" option on the menu. As I say, when I tried activating NoLimits on the current version of AWB a couple of weeks ago it wouldn't activate by either method, but I don't know if that's an issue with the current software or with my machine. ‑ Iridescent 16:17, 27 April 2020 (UTC)

I tried using the plugin a couple of times in the past 6 or 8 months without success though in years past I have used it. One sort of crude work-around is to use use wiki search with incategory and prefix keywords and just work through the alphabet; it ain't elegant but it works.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 16:23, 27 April 2020 (UTC)

@Rjwilmsi: That's not correct. It's an AWB limit. The MW API lets you load 500 pages (5000 for bots/sysops) in one request. But by making multiple requests, any number of pages can be loaded, even more than 25000. SD0001 (talk) 16:41, 27 April 2020 (UTC)

I guess my question is whether there's some sort of workaround to load a category beginning at a some point (I need less than 6000 pages alphabetically from the end of a category). VanIsaac_WS^cont 16:54, 27 April 2020 (UTC)

Use the wiki search as I suggested?

—Trappist the monk (talk) 16:56, 27 April 2020 (UTC)

Ahh, I just saw you talking about the plugin not working and didn't see the suggestion at the end. I think I've figured out how to tweak the Wiki search, although that is a criminally under-documented feature. VanIsaac_WS^cont 17:36, 27 April 2020 (UTC)

Doesn't work with bots AFIACT. Trappists's hack sort of works, but runs into a 5000 limit per prefix letter. And probably doesn't straightforwardly works with special characeters. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 19:08, 29 April 2020 (UTC)

• Fortunately, a bot owner found my issue and graciously got everything I needed. The working through alphabetically with Wiki-search works for the vast majority, but you have to be very careful in how you structure your calls to hit all the alphabetical permutations. Also, it doesn't return any results outside the 26 letters of the English alphabet unless you already know to hit those. I would certainly recommend to anyone facing this AWB limit in future to use WP:Bot requests to get your data dumped to a file - I got my results on a test page in my personal userspace. VanIsaac_WS^cont 19:19, 29 April 2020 (UTC)

Viewed archives for WP:ORDER-related discussions

But did not find something related to what I was looking for. Am curious if the regex code that handles header and footer elements is available. The header elements are:

1. Short description
2. Hatnotes
3. Deletion / protection tags (CSD, PROD, AFD, PP notices)
4. Maintenance / dispute tags
5. English variety and date style
6. Infoboxes
7. Foreign character warning boxes
8. Images
9. Navigational boxes (header navboxes)

And the footer elements are:

1. Succession boxes and geography boxes
2. Other navigation templates (footer navboxes) (navbars above )
3. Authority control templates (taxonbar above Authority control)
4. Geographical coordinates (if not in Infobox) or
5. {{Featured list}}, {{Featured article}} and {{Good article}} (where appropriate for article status)
6. Defaultsort
7. Categories
8. Stub templates

So, to simplify my request for information, is the code that handles how the stub templates are placed available? If those templates are not in their cozy spot at the very bottom, two newlines below the categories, AWB moves them there by default, and that is what I'm wanting to be able to search for. Dawnseeker2000 00:58, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

Orphan tags

Can someone please check the settings as some prolific editors are adding orphan tags to a number of articles that have one or more valid incoming links, regards Atlantic306 (talk) 02:38, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

I think I've noticed this too, but can't quote any links. I suspect that the article used to be an orphan and is recorded as such in an outdated list or database. Certes (talk) 11:09, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

@Atlantic306 and Certes: Isn't this the setting Preferences > Restrict orphan tag addition to linkless pages? I believe that should be ticked when working at the English Wikipedia. Perhaps it's worth asking one of or two of these editors whether they have that ticked. -- John of Reading (talk) 12:28, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

I hadn't discovered that option, and will tick it now. That option was already ticked, presumably by default. Thanks. Certes (talk) 12:44, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

Is this happening right now? I think I saw a note somewhere about a week ago saying "Oops, orphan tagging in AWB (or another auto-editor like WPCleaner) was configured wrong. I have fixed it." But I don't remember where. And searching for something like that is hopeless. – Jonesey95 (talk) 13:55, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

I've only seen it happen very occasionally, and certainly not in the last week. Certes (talk) 14:30, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

• Thanks for the help. There was a autowikibrowser editor yesterday wrongly adding it to tens of articles at high speed, have left him a message about the code. Could the code be fixed permanently by default to that setting on the English wiki to avoid this? regards Atlantic306 (talk) 20:15, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

Atlantic306 et al.: I've been suspicious when I occasionally see AWB do it, and usually remove it manually if I don't want to verify it. What is the option supposed to do exactly (checked and un-checked)? The manual says Forces auto-tagger to add orphan tags only to pages with no incoming links ... but I thought that was the definition of an WP:ORPHAN. Where is the option (I don't see it in any of the tabs on the Options→Preferences dialog)? Thanks. —[AlanM1 (talk)]— 00:28, 20 May 2020 (UTC)

@AlanM1: The option is a separate menu item, about half way down the options menu. The definition of "orphan" has changed over the years; see, for example this 2009 post. Without looking at the source code I couldn't tell you exactly what the option does. I rarely allow AWB to add this tag, given the kilobytes of discussion about the tag's usefulness -- John of Reading (talk) 06:10, 20 May 2020 (UTC)

@John of Reading: Thanks. Found it. It was checked. FWIW, I investigated the last two cases where I added it and found both were "correct" in my understanding at the time they were added. My edit to 2008 AO112 resulted in it being linked by WP:Wikiproject Orphanage from Mount Lemmon Survey 9 days later. I tagged 2018 VP1 on 2020-04-03, apparently correctly, since all of Special:WhatLinksHere/2018 VP1 are only because of transclusion of the {{2020 in space}} navbox (even though I've selected "hide transclusions"), except List of asteroid close approaches to Earth in 2020, from which it was linked on 2020-05-10 (5 weeks later) (though it was de-tagged by Mccapra on 2020-04-12 as "not an orphan", I'm guessing because some consider inclusion in a navbox as disqualifying?). I just linked it from List of asteroid close approaches to Earth in 2018, too. —[AlanM1 (talk)]— 14:42, 20 May 2020 (UTC)

Hi I refer to this report which is generated every three days to identify articles tagged as orphans that aren't. My edits are manual and I don't use AWB. The bot certainly counts incoming links contained in navboxes, and I've always understood those to be relevant to the task of de-orphaning. Have I got that horribly wrong? The bot has been running this report since 9 August 2019 and several thousand articles will have been deorphaned since then on the basis that they have navbox links, so if we have a problem, we have a big one. Mccapra (talk) 15:22, 20 May 2020 (UTC)

Pinging DannyS712, the bot's operator. —[AlanM1 (talk)]— 22:33, 20 May 2020 (UTC)

The current guidance at Wikipedia:Orphan says that links from navboxes do count; an article linked from other articles via a navbox is not an orphan. -- John of Reading (talk) 03:31, 21 May 2020 (UTC)

Well that’s a relief! I can’t think of why navbox links would be excluded, really. Mccapra (talk) 05:28, 21 May 2020 (UTC)

OK. In the 2018 VP1 case above, I see that 2018 VP1 was not in the navbox as of when AWB thought it was an orphan, so it looks like it was correct at the time. Perhaps other cases that have been thought to be mis-tags are similar? I'll watch more closely in the future. —[AlanM1 (talk)]— 02:40, 22 May 2020 (UTC)

Highlight colours for edits

Hi, is there an option somewhere that lets me make the blue and yellow change highlight bits more obvious? Maybe it is my eyesight and a small screen, but I'm finding the faint blue and yellow very hard to spot. ϢereSpielChequers 16:52, 22 May 2020 (UTC)

Yes, see Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser/style.css Rjwilmsi 19:37, 22 May 2020 (UTC)

Old/multingual wikisource

How to use AWB on http://wikisource.org , the old/multilingual/incubator wikisource? There is no language prefix and apparently it's not possible not to select a language nor to use the custom mode (error 403). If there is no solution, here is an idea : use mul as language prefix (which is done in some other cases).

Cdlt, VIGNERON * ^discut. 14:33, 1 August 2017 (UTC)

User:VIGNERON. Yah you can do it by just choise the Project "custom" and select "http://" then simply give url "wikisource.org/w/".-- Jay ❯❯❯ Talk 07:15, 12 November 2017 (UTC)

@Jayprakash12345: you could try and tell me if it really works? As I said before, I've got a HTTP 403 error for some reason :/ Cdlt, VIGNERON * ^discut. 17:27, 19 December 2017 (UTC)

User:VIGNERON, Sorry Please use "https://" instead of "http://". And Login is working fine for me. [9] [10]-- Jay ❯❯❯ Talk 17:38, 19 December 2017 (UTC)

Oh, so obvious I missed it, thank you a lot! Cdlt, VIGNERON * ^discut. 19:40, 19 December 2017 (UTC)

AWB and templates

So I'm building up an AWB module for infobox genfixes, and among some of the more useful tidbits of code I came across RemoveExcessTemplatePipes(string templatecall). The only issue is that, unlike RemoveTemplateParameter(string articletext, string templatename, string parameter), which includes the articletext, the pipes function doesn't have that in there. I am having a bit of a brain fart, and can't figure out what to put in place of the ??? in

 ??? = WikiFunctions.Tools.RemoveExcessTemplatePipes(<insert template name here>);

Based on the return for that tool it will only return the new template code, and I feel like the only way to replace the "old" template with the "new" template would be some sort of Replace. I guess I just want to check that a) my thinking is along the right lines, and b) I have the right replace - would it just be ArticleText = ArticleText.Replace(oldTemplateCode, newTemplateCode)? Primefac (talk) 17:30, 22 May 2020 (UTC)

Something like ArticleText = Tools.NestedTemplateRegex("infobox foo").Replace(ArticleText, m => Tools.RemoveExcessTemplatePipes(m.Value)); should do it. Rjwilmsi 19:33, 22 May 2020 (UTC)

Awesome, that works. Thanks!

Next dumb question. I'm coding up the dictionary of all params, using Dictionary<string, string> allParams = Tools.GetTemplateParameterValues("infobox film");, but nothing's happening. I output an allParams.Count as a dummy check and it shows 0 (though I can manually .Add key/value pairs and the count updates appropriately). Am I missing something really obvious? Primefac (talk) 02:52, 23 May 2020 (UTC)

Tools.GetTemplateParameterValues requires a "templatecall" i.e. instance of the template e.g. {{infobox film|abc=123|def=234}} not a template name. Rjwilmsi 06:25, 23 May 2020 (UTC)

That'll teach me to code after midnight... didn't even notice the difference in inputs. Thank you again. Primefac (talk) 19:14, 23 May 2020 (UTC)

And here I was, hoping that T159958 was about to get a resolution... Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 19:16, 23 May 2020 (UTC)

Apparently "rev 12148" had the fix, but something got lost along the way. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 19:20, 23 May 2020 (UTC)

Consolidation of identical references

I use AWB less lately and noticed today that it was not consolidating identical references by using refname as it was before. Did I mung a setting or was that changed? --LilHelpa (talk) 21:19, 6 June 2020 (UTC)

LilHelpa, it's probably something on your end because the consolidation works fine for me and I'm on the latest version. Ionmars10 (talk) 23:15, 6 June 2020 (UTC)

@LilHelpa: I believe in only consolidates on articles which have consolidated references. Do you have an example of somewhere where you expected AWB to consolidate, but doesn't? Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 23:28, 6 June 2020 (UTC)

Yes, on Kondraty Ryleyev. --LilHelpa (talk) 23:32, 6 June 2020 (UTC)

Yup, that's what it was. As soon as I consolidated 1 reference, it consolidated the others. I took the opportunity to spitshine the reference section and convert things to {{sfn}} templates, which made things a lot more readable. Will also simplify adding the pages to the Plokhy refs. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 00:25, 7 June 2020 (UTC)

Thanks! --LilHelpa (talk) 10:24, 7 June 2020 (UTC)

Structured data

Quick query - can AWB be used to add structured data to files on Commons? — O Still Small Voice of Clam 05:05, 21 June 2020 (UTC)

No. See also phab:T138754. --Izno (talk) 13:21, 21 June 2020 (UTC)

Underlinking

There have been some concerns expressed by an editor that AWB's auto-tagging is improperly adding {{underlinked}} to stub templates (samples here and here). Should the size of the article factor in to when the template should be added, and/or is there a way to avoid it being added to these articles? Is the tag being appropriately added? Primefac (talk) 15:41, 21 June 2020 (UTC)

Nomination for deletion of Template:BLP unsourced

Template:BLP unsourced has been nominated for deletion. You are invited to comment on the discussion at the template's entry on the Templates for discussion page. Deletion would require changes to this part of the general fixes. John of Reading (talk) 06:07, 22 June 2020 (UTC)

Request for minor changes for ukwiki

I created T254109 on Phabricator, can someone please have a look? --Ата ^(talk) 13:23, 23 June 2020 (UTC)

A user made several thousands automated edits--can someone help me go thru them to fix errors?

User:BrownHairedGirl has been adding "Category:Foo| " at the bottom of thousands of articles but it has resulted in several errors (e.g. Peanuts and Category:Peanuts, People from Ibiza/Category:People from Ibiza, Planters/Category:Planters, Piranhas/Category:Piranhas). This user seems unwilling or unable to talk about how to fix this issue, so can someone please help me sort thru the thousands of relevant pages in Special:Contributions/BrownHairedGirl? ―Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 12:18, 28 June 2020 (UTC)

Utter nonsense. I am perfectly willing to discuss the issue of the few anomalies that arise. Unfortunately, Justin is taking an aggressive approach in which he is engaged in personalised fault-finding rather than problem-solving ... and in pursuit of this has even reverted[11] a disambiguation I did.[12]

I am entirely willing to review and fix any issue sfrom my edits, as I have always done. However, I am not willing to waste time with an editor whose clear intention is simply to find opportunities to snipe. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 12:28, 28 June 2020 (UTC)

Connection error

I have moved the below from the bugs page per discussion above.

I've been unable to log into AWB today at all; when I try, I get the error message that "Check page failed to load. Check your Internet is working and that the Wiki is online." However, both of those things are obviously true, given that I'm able to reach Wikipedia to post this comment now. I also thought that maybe it was because I was running an older version of AWB that might have been discontinued, so I updated to the newest stable release, but I'm still getting the same error. Can anybody tell me how to fix it? Bearcat (talk) 18:36, 16 September 2019 (UTC)

Exact same problem and attempt to fix it as above, here. Emptywords (talk) 21:33, 16 September 2019 (UTC)

Also having this problem on fandom.com (formerly wikia.com) following several months of stability. —scarecroe (talk) 23:31, 16 September 2019 (UTC)

I also have this problem today. — YoungForever^(talk) 01:09, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

Same here, i haven't changed anything. --DHC DarkShadow (talk) 02:11, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

Same. bd2412 T 00:55, 18 September 2019 (UTC)

Version 6.1.0.0 seems to fix it. —scarecroe (talk) 11:35, 18 September 2019 (UTC)

6.1.0.1 works :) Emptywords (talk) 16:35, 18 September 2019 (UTC)

6.1.0.1 seems to function well for Wikia (FANDOM.com). Bunai (talk) 23:14, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

Upgrading to 6.1.0.1 still hasn't fixed this problem for me; I still get an error msessage, and the only thing that's changed is that it's more detailed. Now it says "An error occurred while connecting to the project server or loading information from it. Please make sure that your internet connection works and such combination of project/language exist. Enter the URL in the format "en.wikipedia.org/w" (including path where index.php and api.php reside. Error description: StartIndex cannot be less than zero. Parameter name: startIndex." Bearcat (talk) 15:29, 23 September 2019 (UTC)

I'm getting the same problem with the current version. The download pages for versions 6.1.0.0 and 6.1.0.1 won't even load. Linguist111^{my talk page} 19:25, 23 September 2019 (UTC)

@Linguist111 and Bearcat: Did this ever resolve for you? --Izno (talk) 17:38, 5 July 2020 (UTC)

A batch of custom module errors (and one genfix issue)

I have copied the below from /Bugs per the discussion above.

Been running a bot task and have been informed of a few issues.

1. Special:Diff/958826610. The bot replaces ' with plain apostrophes, breaking mark-up
2. GetTemplateParameterValues (in Tools) is too rigid. A valid param/value pair such as |budget=$50–60 million<ref name="AFI film|59175">{{AFI film|59175}}</ref> gets split along the pipe in the ref name, as seen here and a half-dozen other places (the diffs provided by isaidnoway).
3. AppendParameterToTemplate (in Tools) has some weird code, specifically line 2431 (return WikiRegexes.TemplateEnd.Replace(templateCall, separatorBefore + @"|" + separatorAfter + parameter + equalsFormat + newValue + @"$1}}");). It's causing any parameter value that has a "$1" in it to be removed; see any of these fixes that I had to make. Forgot this was already fixed, see below

Those are the major ones I've located based on this bot run, and I'm not sure how "vital" these changes are, but I thought I would mention them, since #1 at the very least is a genfix that could be affecting other users. Happy to post my module code if you think it's something on my end. Primefac (talk) 13:47, 26 May 2020 (UTC)

For what it's worth, bug 1 is caused by the "Unicodify whole page" option, not by the general fixes. -- John of Reading (talk) 14:15, 26 May 2020 (UTC)

Fair enough, I suppose I should have said "are part of the Automatic changes" since I generally consider them all to be the same. Primefac (talk) 14:36, 26 May 2020 (UTC)

1 is resolved by T235849 Exclude &apos from Unicodify. 2 you are expected to use HideText within a custom module if you expect these sorts of things to be handled for you (the custom modules page hasn an example). 3, OK, taking A Walk in the Sun (1945 film) as an example, what parameter and value were you appending to infobox film so I can replicate? Rjwilmsi 18:39, 26 May 2020 (UTC)

For #3, I forgot that was the "old" module code, basically I was taking each parameter, removing it, and then re-adding it to the template in order to fix what I thought was a bug with the RemoveExcessTemplatePipes code; I suspect I messed something up in translation but I re-built the module to get around the problem.

For #2, I assume you're referring to this section? This seems like it would remove the template itself; in other words, I'm not really sure where I'd put it (the cleanup code is pasted below). Primefac (talk) 19:15, 26 May 2020 (UTC)

"genfixes" code

public static string infoboxCleanup(string templatecall) { /// Initialize container, pull out named params from template string newTemplate = "{{" + Tools.GetTemplateName(templatecall); Dictionary<string, string> allParams = Tools.GetTemplateParameterValues(templatecall); /// Find longest parameter (for setting spaces before equals) int longestParam = 0; int paramLen; foreach(KeyValuePair<string, string> kvp in allParams) { paramLen = kvp.Key.Length; if (paramLen > longestParam) longestParam = paramLen; } /// Put each param/value pair into the template string separatorBefore = "\r\n", separatorAfter = " ", equalsFormat = " = "; foreach(KeyValuePair<string, string> kvp in allParams) { string numSpaces = new String(' ', longestParam - kvp.Key.Length); newTemplate += separatorBefore + @"|" + separatorAfter + kvp.Key + numSpaces + equalsFormat + kvp.Value; } newTemplate += separatorBefore + "}}"; ///Check to ensure all old params match new params Dictionary<string, string> allNewParams = Tools.GetTemplateParameterValues(newTemplate); foreach(KeyValuePair<string, string> kvp in allNewParams) { if (allNewParams[kvp.Key] != allParams[kvp.Key]) return templatecall; } return newTemplate; }

@Rjwilmsi: Did you see the followup from Primefac? --Izno (talk) 18:07, 5 July 2020 (UTC)

Is development active?

I see lots of bug reports and many great suggestions on Phabricator, yet there hasn't been an update to AWB since last September. Is development still active? Is I realize this sounds like a newbie question, but I've looked through these wiki pages and am still uncertain if programming work is ongoing.

Also, there's five years of bug discussion at Wikipedia talk:AutoWikiBrowser/Bugs. It hasn't been archived since the Phabricator migration, apparently. Could most of that be archived? The archive naming paradigm might have to change since bugs are [supposed to be] reported on Phabricator. – voidxor 22:36, 25 June 2020 (UTC)

I have manually archived the current Bugs talk page to Wikipedia talk:AutoWikiBrowser/Bugs/Archive 31, choosing only the 42 sections that I could verify to have been resolved or moved to phabricator. There may be a couple more sections that could be resolved; if someone knowledgeable could review the remaining 14 sections and mark them appropriately, they could also be archived. – Jonesey95 (talk) 00:32, 26 June 2020 (UTC)

I think it would make more sense just to move all the rest to tasks in Phabricator regardless. Then Reedy can close the ones that are no longer relevant and we can redirect the Bugs page here. --Izno (talk) 17:02, 1 July 2020 (UTC)

One of the 14 sections left (the last on the page) is one i started; i tried to open a Phabricator request but was utterly overwhelmed by the apparent complexity of doing so. If my question isn't going to be answered, fine, i understand, i didn't use the correct procedure so i'm easily open to it be archived, but whoever might look at these questions or bugs needs to understand that the required way of reporting/requesting is not user-friendly. And i consider myself relatively savvy. Not such happy days, Lindsay^Hello 19:00, 1 July 2020 (UTC)

@LindsayH: While admittedly I haven't created a new bug report yet (all the bugs I've encountered have open tasks in Phabricator), the bugs page has a big "File a new bug report" link near the top that prepopulates a new-task page. Fill out a title and description and click the "Create New Task" button. It doesn't seem any more complicated than creating a new section on the Wikipedia talk page.

Also, Izno proposed migrating the remaining talk-page discussion to Phabricator (where it arguably belongs), not leaving it unanswered. – voidxor 22:37, 3 July 2020 (UTC)

@LindsayH: Hey, you definitely did the right thing! I think what would be more useful going forward is for all questions/it's brokens/feature requests to end up here, and if we can't resolve it here among these page watchers, to put it on Phabricator. Since we aren't sure the last handful of bugs on the other page are Good To Go, then we need to make sure the question ends up in a place where a developer can check. (And, maybe some illumination to those tasks by being on this page instead would help make sure you get an answer.) If you don't understand Phabricator, that's okay, though if you're having difficulties, I'm happy to help figure it out. --Izno (talk) 22:45, 3 July 2020 (UTC)

@Izno: I fully support your proposal to eliminate merge the bugs page and redirect it here into this page. We want as many bug reports going directly to Phabricator as possible, with this talk page as a fall back for anybody having Phabricator troubles. As of now, editors must click through the bugs page in order to be directed to Phabricator. Having seen what it accumulated since the Phabricator migration (before Jonesey95 recently archived it), I'm concerned that many users were simply not following the Phabricator instructions at the top, rather than trying and running into trouble. Also, we want folks to search existing bug reports before posting. – voidxor 18:59, 4 July 2020 (UTC)

Ditto on the feature-requests page. And we'd merge and not eliminate. – voidxor 19:22, 4 July 2020 (UTC)

Merged /Bugs. Please feel free to boldly tidy or tweak. --Izno (talk) 18:36, 5 July 2020 (UTC)

And now /Feature requests. --Izno (talk) 19:53, 5 July 2020 (UTC)

Regex Replace With value

Hey all, quick question: I have a regex formula that I want to use in AWB's Find & Replace. I pasted the regex into the Find field, but I'm not clear what to enter in the Replace With field.

My mission: I want AWB to look through a specific list of articles for infobox parameter and content "location = [[Tamil Nadu]]", and then just delete that without leaving any white space behind. Any ideas? Currently, if I leave the Replace With field blank, I get a gap in the text, like:

| language = Hindi

 

| country = India

Thanks, Cyphoidbomb (talk) 22:18, 5 July 2020 (UTC)

I only know a bit of regex, but I think if you append a "\n" to your search text, that will also remove the carriage return at the end of the line. That does require marking the search as regex and you may have to change "location = [[Tamil Nadu]]" to "location \= \[\[Tamil Nadu\]\]". Hope that helps. If not I'm sure someone will correct me. SchreiberBike | ⌨  22:35, 5 July 2020 (UTC)

P.S. I've found https://regexr.com/ very helpful in figuring out regex. SchreiberBike | ⌨  22:37, 5 July 2020 (UTC)

I guess there are two questions that I have for you. The first is if you want to remove the parameter only if Tamil Nadu is linked. The second is if you want to remove the entire line or just the value of |location=. The answer given above is good, but depending on the answer to these questions it might change the code a little bit. Primefac (talk) 23:04, 5 July 2020 (UTC) (please do not ping on reply)

Hey there, Primefac, I'd want to delete the parameter, whether linked or not. Short story, I'm cleaning up after an editor who created a ton of problems at Indian TV articles, and he always misused this parameter. And actually, while we're on the same subject, I could really use another regex that converts "|country = [[Tamil Nadu]]" (linked or not, caps or not) to "|country = India". (unlinked) There might be spaces involved as well before the "=" and I think I'd want to keep them, to help the equals-signs line up a little more closely to the parameters around it. You know how lots of people like everything to line up nicely in the infobox formatting? SchreiberBike I appreciated your feedback as well, thank you. Cyphoidbomb (talk) 23:12, 5 July 2020 (UTC)

Okay, so two regex replacements:

• Replace \|\s*location\s*=\s*(\[\[)?Tamil Nadu(]])?\s*?\n? with nothing (regex on, caps match off)
• Replace (\|\s*country\s*=\s*)(?:\[\[)?Tamil Nadu(?:]])?(\s*?\n)? with $1India$2 (regex on, caps match off)

That should take care of 99% of the cases, plus any where the param isn't the only thing on a line. Primefac (talk) 23:46, 5 July 2020 (UTC) P.S. For quick-and-dirty regex tests, I use Rubular

Ooh, these look solid, based on my test run! Thank you so much! And to address the test site suggestions, I did try in earnest to learn regex, but it was way too much for my brain and I could never get it right, not even the easy-level tests. I don't mean to be a burden, but I do appreciate the brainwork you regex capable folk are willing to donate to people such as myself. Thank you. Cyphoidbomb (talk) 03:38, 6 July 2020 (UTC)

Always happy to help, keeps me fresh :-) Primefac (talk) 20:37, 6 July 2020 (UTC)

AWB on Linux

Now that .NET is open-source, has anyone attempted to build AWB on Linux, or ideally produced a standalone application that will run without .NET Core?

I've been using AWB on Linux (Ubuntu 16.04) with Wine, but reverted to JWB after finding a bug. (I consider it a showstopper, as I don't want to mess pages up randomly without noticing.) I'm aware of Mono but haven't used it as I understand it to be less stable than .NET with Wine. There are several threads on the subject in this page's archive, but .NET has since become more widely available and easier to use. Certes (talk) 10:43, 9 July 2020 (UTC)

You can build AWB on Linux with MonoDevelop - build isn't the problem, run is. When AWB is run under Mono there are key features that don't work (preview, diff) - I could use it by changing AWB to write the diff HTML to a local file that I could then view in a browser to check edits, but that's not much of an everyday solution. While .NET Core is open source the .NET Forms aren't (System.Windows.Forms), that's the main issue. I'm aware you've raised a bug but as I can't reproduce it with my Wine setup I can't do anything about it - you have a later version of wine, so assuming you have the same winetricks installed (riched20 etc. as per Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser/Mono and Wine‎) then it would suggest a regression in wine. In which case, depending on your willingness to pursue the issue, a wineHQ bug needs to be raised, or you can try installing an older version of wine (no such issues on wine 4.19 for me) / create a VM of Ubuntu with older wine. Rjwilmsi 11:34, 9 July 2020 (UTC)

Thank you! Adding riched20 seems to have fixed it. I'd overlooked that section. I've successfully previewed null edits to 100 articles (some of which would have broken before) and, if I have no further problems, I'll mark the bug as fixed with info for other editors with a similar problem. It also fixes a few other problems. For example, "Find" now finds text: no more copying and pasting the article into a text editor every time I want to search! Certes (talk) 12:36, 9 July 2020 (UTC)

For the benefit of anyone finding this later, I also added a few other tricks, which improved the user experience from barely usable to slick. Full command: winetricks riched20 corefonts gdiplus ie6. Certes (talk) 13:07, 9 July 2020 (UTC)

(308) Permanent redirect error

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T257689

Hello folks, I was loading pages under "Check Wiki error (number)", but when I try to make a list it's showing "The remote server returned an error: (308) Permanent Redirect" so is there any fix? Thank you, GSS ^💬 13:20, 7 July 2020 (UTC)

Try it again. It was probably related to this: Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Check Wikipedia#Domain name change - tools.wmflabs.org/checkwiki => checkwiki.toolforge.org. Dawnseeker2000 15:02, 7 July 2020 (UTC)

@Dawnseeker2000: still showing the same error. It was working perfectly fine this afternoon (IST) but then suddenly stopped responding. GSS ^💬 15:37, 7 July 2020 (UTC)

Alright, give them some time. Looks like there's some loose ends to tie up following the domain name change. Dawnseeker2000 18:54, 7 July 2020 (UTC)

AWB can no longer load list of pages using Checkwiki error number

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T257689

Hi everyone. I just want to make sure if this a bug in AWB or if it is a problem with WP:CHECKWIKI server.

• Problem: AWB can no longer load list of pages using Checkwiki error number (probably because the Checkwiki URL was recently changed from https://tools.wmflabs.org/checkwiki to https://checkwiki.toolforge.org/)
• How to reproduce: In "Make list" try to load list of pages using Checkwiki error number (Example: Error 16 for arwiki)
• AWB gives "Network access error" with the message "The remote server returned an error: (308) Permanent Redirect."
• Version: Latest stable (AWB 6.1.0.1) SVN 12353
• .Net version: 4.0
• OS: Windows 10
• Note: This feature (loading list of pages using Checkwiki error number) was working well up until a few days ago.
• I believe that after fixing this bug, a new version of AWB should be released. (The current stable version is more than 9 months old anyway.) Thank you. --Meno25 (talk) 16:57, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

@Meno25: This is, indeed, a problem due to the URL migration; I've created phab:T257689 tracking it. Naypta ☺ | ✉ talk page | 17:10, 10 July 2020 (UTC)