User:VoABot II/Help

How VoABot II works

VoABot II is a bot that monitors changes and automatically reverts spam/banned users' rejected edits, and certain vandalism that occurs in streaks. It does not check talk or other certain namespaces. Note that talk page support may be added in the future. Administrators can modify the bot's settings via editing the admin panel.

VoABot II monitors pages from two locations: Recent changes, and its Watchlist.

Pages the bot monitors:

The bot's watchlist

Pages that are specifically watched by VoABot II are monitored for consensus-rejected edits added by banned users including spam links. This is only used when the user is able to evade simply blocks, such as using a revolving IP address. Additionally, edits by logged out IP ranges can also be reverted automatically; this is only used to stop logged-out users that vandalize a page, yet use a shared IP address with other editors that share the IP address.

Pages watched by VoABot II are listed here at WP:PP.

Recent changes

VoABot II also watches Recent changes and checks the edit changes by shared IP users and proxies. It checks for more general, less page-specific, edits as when it monitors its watchlist. It may also sometimes be programmed to check all edits by any IP address to pages that have certain words in their title, like elephant.

Changes are watched with a fairly high speed, so edits can be reverted within less than a minute. With the non-admin rollback function, edits can often be reverted within five seconds when there is low traffic.

New user contributions

The contributions log here is also be monitored by VoABot II to watch edits by recently created accounts.

Move log

The move log here is also be monitored by VoABot II to watch for page moves to inappropriate names by new users.

Related changes

The Related changes page for a certain page can also be monitored by VoABot II to watch categories.

Reverting edits

When VoABot II rolls back an edit by a user, it finds the last version by a different user, and sets the page to that version. If that is not possible, it will not do anything. If a different user is the last editor, it will not do anything.

It will sometimes just revert one edit back if it is just removing a poor quality link.

Note: When IPs are reverted, the bot will try to avoid reverting back to an IP within that /16 CIDR range.

Revert reasons

Note: Sysop edits will never be reverted. Talk pages are not watched.

One of the following bolded statements will appear after any revert by VoABot II within brackets in the edit summary:

Possible vandalism - The edit was identified as adding vandalism to the page.

Possible comment vandalism - The edit had vandalism or email addresses, Facebook, or MySpace links in the summary.

Possible test edits - The edit involved edits made to test images/layout/formatting. Please use the "preview" button instead.

Dubious information - The edit was identified as adding addresses, phone numbers, MySpace, Facebook, Geocities, YouTube, FreeWebs or other such pages. Note that older users will be allowed to add these.

Restricted changes - Either A) the edit was identified as being consensus rejected edits of a banned user or B) the edit was identified as changing too much text at once for a shared IP/very new user on a page that banned users tend to attack. Additionally, it could simply refer to "page blanking" of any page while the bot is on RC patrol.

Limited IP range - Either the edit was made by a logged-out user of an IP range blacklisted from the bot's watchlist or this could be the result of temporary limitations temporarily placed on shared IPs. Any good edits caught in the crossfire can be reviewed and restored.

Open ports - The edit was made from a web hosting service or such.

Suspicious edits - It is sometimes necessary to set heavy restrictions on edits by new users to pages in the bot's watchlists or possibly to revert all such edits. Additionally, this could be the result of limitations temporarily placed on new users editing pages in the watchlist. Any good edits caught in the crossfire can be reviewed and restored.

Link spam - The edit involved adding unwanted and unneeded links or an unusually large number of links.

Mistakes?

It is possible for any bot to eventually make a mistake somewhere; if you feel that this bot has reverted in error, please leave a message here. If you feel that the error is urgent (such as the bot reverting back to a vandalized version), then you can revert it again until it stops; by default, VoABot II will not revert a user more than three times.

If there is a pressing reason, then contact Voice of All on his talk page. If the bot seems to be very out of control, then you can request for an administrator to block it temporarily until things are sorted out.