User talk:Mr.Z-man/Archive 10

Archive 5

←

Archive 8

Archive 9

Archive 10

Archive 11

Archive 12

→

Archive 15

Re: No edits

Hmm, that's odd; when I looked it had no edits whatsoever. –Juliancolton | ^Talk 00:57, 3 June 2009 (UTC)

Ah, I see. I guess I wasn't aware that the abuse filter could be tripped without an actual edit. Thanks. –Juliancolton | ^Talk 00:59, 3 June 2009 (UTC)

doc?

Hey Mr. Z, how you doing these days? Hey, I was just wondering, is there any documentation for User:Mr.Z-man/patrollinks.js? — Ched :  ?  02:55, 3 June 2009 (UTC)

User:Mr.Z-man/patrollinks. Mr.Z-man 03:09, 3 June 2009 (UTC)

server logs, pop pages script?

Hey, what language did you write your Popular Pages program in? And I know you use Midom's data, but can you give me a pointer to it?

I want to play with some more data on the Popular Pages for a project. I could start from scratch, but it's better not to reinvent the wheel, after all. tedder (talk) 03:17, 3 June 2009 (UTC)

I wrote it in Python. The source of the current bot is at [1]. The processPage() function does most of the work. There's another script that downloads the files, but I don't have a recent version on SVN as I'm in the process of rewriting both of them. I'm currently working on a new version of it but the basic idea will be the same.

The main issues with using the data directly is that it includes the data for every project and pages can be listed multiple times in various states of urlencoded-ness. If you aren't working with a lot of pages you may want to use the API on Henrik's site - [2] - even a day's worth of all the data is quite a lot. Mr.Z-man 03:40, 3 June 2009 (UTC)

Undeletion discussion / request: the concept of "Vacilando"

Hi, I see you have deleted http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vacilando, seemingly because it is a Spanish word, and because "Wikipedia is not a dictionary". I would like to counter that it is a concept and not a term, that it is recognized as an English loanword from Spanish, and that Wikipedia contains hundreds of thousands of word definitions (see e.g. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abeyance). Could we agree on undeleting this page, or is it necessary to start a deletion review. Thanks. --Tomas J. Fulopp (talk) 10:02, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

It was deleted after discussion at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Vacilando (2nd nomination), so yes, a deletion review would be required. Mr.Z-man 15:07, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

Page view statisitcs request

Could you have Mr.Z-bot create a "popular pages" list for WP:VG at Wikipedia:WikiProject Video games/Popular pages? Due to the scope of the project, it would also be much appreciated if you could maybe make it longer than 1,000 articles... maybe 3–5 pages (subpages of the main one) which list a thousand each? I'm not sure if you can really do that without a lot of recoding, but I thought I'd ask. Thanks! –Drilnoth (T • C • L) 16:10, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

I can't do subpages, but if the project has task-forces set up like WP:MILHIST (where all pages are categorized under the task force and the main project) I can do one for the project as a whole and one for each task force. Mr.Z-man 16:16, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

Right now I don't think that each task force has a category, but I'll look into setting one up. The standard list of 1,000 will be fine for now though; thanks! –Drilnoth (T • C • L) 16:51, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

WP:CHICAGO popular pages

I think you may have missed my request above. WP:CHICAGO would like a popular pages list.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:LOTM) 19:00, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

I saw it, but I won't be able to start working on it until the end of the month. Mr.Z-man 19:04, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

Popular pages Wikiproject-specific assessment cats

Another: Could the assessment-categories be made Wikiproject-specific? I noticed at Wikipedia:WikiProject Thelema/Popular pages that the cat links go to the root level categories instead. Just a thought :) -- Quiddity (talk) 18:40, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

It uses the normal {{B-Class}}, etc. templates. They support adding a category, but you have to give it the full category name with a named parameter – {{B-Class|category=Category:B-Class Thelema articles}} – which would increase the size of the wikitext by nearly 50%. If someone wants to modify the templates or create a new set of templates that just takes the part of the category name that's specific to the project – {{B-Class|Thelema}} – I might use it. Mr.Z-man 19:16, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

Understood (but beyond my current coding confidence). Thanks anyway. :) -- Quiddity (talk) 19:58, 6 June 2009 (UTC)

Thanks

For the Visual arts stats - great! Johnbod (talk) 17:32, 6 June 2009 (UTC)

Popular pages lists

Hello, would it be possible for you to generate a popular pages lis (similar to this one) for the Simpsons and ice hockey wikiprojects? In the case of the Simpsons one, there aren't 1000 articles, so maybe the limit could be 500. Thanks, Scorpion⁰⁴²² 21:48, 2 June 2009 (UTC)

WP:CHICAGO would also like this monthly service.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:LOTM) 05:53, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

 Doing... Adding all 3 to the list for June. Mr.Z-man 04:07, 8 June 2009 (UTC)

WP:Maryland popular pages

You seem to have created a monster. Can you add Wikipedia:WikiProject Maryland to your to do list? Geraldk (talk) 19:30, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

 Doing... Adding to the list for June. Mr.Z-man 04:05, 8 June 2009 (UTC)

MCB WikiProject

Hi Mr. Z-man,

Could you please turn on the Mr. Z-bot for the Molecular and Cellular Biology Wikiproject? Thanks! Proteins (talk) 17:32, 7 June 2009 (UTC)

The MCB request is the most pressing, but it would be great if you could also turn Mr. Z-bot on for the Mathematics, Physics and Chemistry WikiProjects. Thanks again, Proteins (talk) 21:17, 7 June 2009 (UTC)

 Doing.... They'll all be added to the list to start in June. Mr.Z-man 04:03, 8 June 2009 (UTC)

Thanks, that's great! I expect your "Popular pages" will help a lot in workshops introducing people to Wikipedia. Proteins (talk) 15:04, 8 June 2009 (UTC)

Data question

Hi. We've been having a discussion at the Classical Music project about the most popular pages, see here. Could you possibly join us to clarify where the data comes from? Thanks. --Kleinzach 03:42, 8 June 2009 (UTC)

stats

Hey Mr.Z-man. Hope you're well. I noticed you did a thing for stats for the LGBT project. Do you know if there is anything like that for any of the NASCAR or auto racing projects? ... oh .. and facepalm on the patrol links thing. I'll prolly not use it, I like to see what I'm marking first. Do you know of anything that will tell me and offer to mark as patrolled if I happen across an article without going through the NPP thing? Thanks, and have a good one. ;) — Ched :  ?  00:44, 6 June 2009 (UTC)

 Doing... Adding WP:NASCAR and WP:MOTOR to the list for June. Let me know if you want others. Mr.Z-man 04:05, 8 June 2009 (UTC)

GREAT! Thank you very much Mr. Z-man. I left a note at project pages for future reference. ;) — Ched :  ?  22:16, 8 June 2009 (UTC)

WP:FOOTBALL popular pages

Can you possibly add WikiProject Football to you popular pages list? Nanonic (talk) 22:07, 8 June 2009 (UTC)

Opera popular pages

Hi, thanks for the list. If you get the chance, could you comment on this [3]? Basically, the list may not be picking up on pages which have foreign accents in the titles, which is a drawback where opera is concerned. Cheers. --Folantin (talk) 11:18, 10 June 2009 (UTC)

Abuse filter bot coming back?

Is the abuse filter bot coming back? Wknight94 ^talk 14:30, 13 June 2009 (UTC)

Still waiting for final approval. Mr.Z-man 15:05, 13 June 2009 (UTC)

time stamp

every single time i sign my name with it it doesnt seem to have a link to my page it did but not anymore --The Movie Master 1 02:38, 19 June 2009 (UTC) 02:36, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

see above i have to highlight and link it my self User:The Movie Master 1

Make sure the "Raw signature" box in your preferences is not checked. Mr.Z-man 02:40, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

oh thanks a lot The Movie Master 1 (talk) 02:41, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

Request for three more popular pages

Hi Mr. Z-man,

It'd be very helpful for some upcoming Wikipedia workshops for scientists if there were "Popular pages" for three more WikiProjects:

• Wikipedia:WikiProject Microbiology
• Wikipedia:WikiProject Pharmacology
• Wikipedia:WikiProject Neuroscience

Could you ask Mr. Z-bot if he'd be willing to do those as well? It'd be a big help. Thanks! Proteins (talk) 18:58, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

Possible AIV false pos?

Since I cannnot view the details of the filter I am not sure what the problem was behind this. I am delisting from AIV until this is explained. Daniel Case (talk) 14:57, 21 June 2009 (UTC)

Yes, it looks like a false positive (for that filter, the user's contribs still seem a little suspicious) but I didn't write the filter. I would suggest bringing it up on Wikipedia talk:Abuse filter. Mr.Z-man 15:10, 21 June 2009 (UTC)

harmonising date formats

I agree largely with your arguments about harmonising date formats. OTOH, I believe that is desirable to keep the datebot proposal's scope narrow because a) it is judgemental matter and thus not suited to bots, and b)the precise scope will allow the proposal speedier passage at RfC. You might like to know that a script by Lightmouse can effectively do much of the harmonising task with respect to dmy and mdy dates (although date ranges remain problematic).

I see from your monobook page that you are fairly adept with scripts. Perhaps you might be interested in modifying the script by Lightmouse so that it treats yyyy--mm-dd dates too? Used in conjunction with dmy or mdy tagging, maybe a bot can be sent around at a later date to align date formats throughout? There has also been some limited discussion at Template_talk:Dmy. Ohconfucius (talk) 02:27, 25 June 2009 (UTC)

I haven't done much JavaScript work lately, and I'm fairly busy with other things to start a new task. I would suggest asking Animum or AzaToth. Mr.Z-man 16:55, 25 June 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for your suggestion. I only asked you this because you seemed to be extremely interested in this task and are spending quite a lot of time forcefully pushing the idea that the delinking bot should also align dates. It seemed like a task which would allow you to put your money where your mouth is. With your skills, you probably could have written all the code in the time you have taken to argue your case on WP:DATEBOT.

Why do you so vehemently oppose the date-linking bot? We are not in a commercial situation, and we are not in a hurry. Real-life time and cost considerations do not apply. There seems to be no reason why the two bots (a second bot to align dates) shouldn't exist independently. I have already started tagging articles {{dmy}} and {{mdy}}, so perhaps with your help, these formats may be maintained by such a bot in future. Ohconfucius (talk) 01:31, 26 June 2009 (UTC)

There's no reason why the 2 should be done separately. Both of those tasks would likely require hundreds of thousands of edits. Doing them separately would be a huge waste of resources. There's no hurry, therefore we take the time to make a more complete proposal. When working with bots that make large numbers of edits, the goal should be to be as efficient as possible. I don't disagree with the idea of a bot to delink dates, I just think that if we're going to do this, we should try to get it right the first time. Incremental updates, where each increment requires half a million edits, is a pretty terrible plan IMO. Mr.Z-man 02:24, 26 June 2009 (UTC)

I would agree wholeheartedly with your suggested approach if the community had adopted a unified date format across WP as I would have preferred, but it has not. I estimate the number of articles with predominantly dmy, mdy, or an ambiguous mix of date formats are fairly evenly split (in addition to a very large number of ISO dates in lists/tables and reference sections), and this is big enough to be problematic. Efficiency is good, but not our foremost concern. Most often, solving complex issues involves cutting down the problem into manageable chunks, and I think the narrow scope of the Datebot proposal does that quite well. Heterogeneous date formats, except for ambiguous date formats (eg 07/08/09), do not cause one's brain to stall while reading. Non-relevant links, however, are a detriment to the reading experience. That is why I feel they should be removed as a first priority.

I have analysed the edit patterns in a few articles, and believe that a very large number of edits - the vast majority - are trivial in nature ( I suggest you look at the articles of any of the more prominent athletes or musicians). By extension of your 'efficiency' logic, many small manual modifications should only occur with a more substantial contribution. That is how I like to work, but I don't always achieve it for a number of reasons; most WP editors don't work that way at all. Bots can only work that way if the rules are clear and unambiguous, but this problem is laced with too much subjectivity. Ohconfucius (talk) 04:27, 26 June 2009 (UTC)

Efficiency is not a goal with manual editing though. Of course logic that applies to a computer program won't necessarily extend well to humans. People generally don't know what they're going to do very far in advance of when they do it. The same is not true of a bot. A bot operator knows what the bot is going to (or should) do well in advance. Its also a matter of scale. It takes human users, and even most bots, years to make more than a hundred thousand edits, a bot to do date unlinking or date standardization would do it in a few weeks. As for "many small manual modifications should only occur with a more substantial contribution" - that is how bots are supposed to work. Bots that only make minor changes are usually denied. And to be clear, I'm not proposing that all dates be made the same format project-wide, just that each article is standardized to use whatever the dominant format in that article is. Mr.Z-man 06:15, 26 June 2009 (UTC)

Popular pages for WP:Croatia

Could you please add Wikipedia:WikiProject Croatia to projects for which this list is created?

BTW: since the list displays the quality assessment, it would be handy to see the importance assessment too. (Strictly speaking, hit count and quality are not related, while hit count and importance are.) GregorB (talk) 20:53, 25 June 2009 (UTC)

Request for mediation not accepted

A Request for Mediation to which you were are a party was not accepted and has been delisted. You can find more information on the case subpage, Wikipedia:Requests for mediation/Use of Sports Logos. For the Mediation Committee, Ryan Postlethwaite 02:26, 26 June 2009 (UTC)

This message delivered by MediationBot, an automated bot account operated by the Mediation Committee to perform case management.
If you have questions about this bot, please contact the Mediation Committee directly.

Metrication in the United States

A digusting comment has been placed on the Metrication in the United States talk page. Can you remove it?

There are two principal reasons why the United States of North America has been unable to change to a sensible measurement system that 200 / 203 countries use.

1. The financial cost of such a change would probably cripple a weakening economy.
2. The average American lacks the intellect necessary to be able to handle such a change.

ILuvAmerica (talk) 11:06, 27 June 2009 (UTC)

Looks like its already been removed. Mr.Z-man 15:05, 27 June 2009 (UTC)

Thanks!

		The Admin's Barnstar
		Thanks for your help in deleting the articles at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Anybot's algae articles! Much appreciated. –Juliancolton | Talk 01:34, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

Bot acting in a way that confuses me

Mr.Z-bot just reported Rex Dominator at AIV because he "Tripped filter 139 (details)." Not sure how this is a problem, since the user wasn't able to do anything of vandalism or otherwise problematic, because he was prevented from so doing by the filter. Is there a good reason why this would be reported? Not challenging you: I just don't know what this is, so I'd like to understand. Nyttend (talk) 04:07, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

The point is that he intended to vandalize. The fact that the edit wasn't actually successful shouldn't matter. If we have to wait for users to manage to bypass the filter before we blocked them, there wouldn't be much point to having it in the first place. Mr.Z-man 04:45, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

Popular pages for Wikipedia:WikiProject Zoroastrianism

A member of the above project has requested it have a popular pages page as well. Thank you again for a really wonderful innovation here. John Carter (talk) 00:52, 2 July 2009 (UTC)

Getting revision lists with wikitools

Hi Z-Man, you pointed me to frameworks for doing WP API calls a little while back at the village pump. I noticed that you maintain a python framework, wikitools, and I'd like to try it out. Unfortunately I am having a very difficult time navigating the source code to find the things that I am looking for. Specifically, is it possible to use your framework to get a list of revisions of a page? and if so how? Thank you, Sligocki (talk) 01:37, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

There's no function specifically for getting the page history. The framework is primarily an abstraction layer around the MediaWiki API with some objects for convenience. The README file explains how to do a simple query, this can be adapted for pretty much anything. To get the revision history for a page:

from wikitools import wiki
from wikitools import api
# create a Wiki object, by default it uses the English Wikipedia
project = wiki.Wiki() 
# define the params for the query, see the MediaWiki API docs for more details
params = {'action':'query', 'titles':'Main Page', 'prop':'revisions', 'rvlimit':'max'}
# create the request object
request = api.APIRequest(project, params)
# query the API
result = request.query()

and the result will look something like:

{u'query': 
    {u'pages': 
        {u'15580374': 
            {u'ns': 0,
             u'pageid': 15580374,
             u'revisions': [{u'comment': u'null edit to force purge',
                             u'parentid': 289122198,
                             u'revid': 298682365,
                             u'timestamp': u'2009-06-26T03:36:51Z',
                             u'user': u'Hersfold'},

                            {u'comment': u'transition complete',
                             u'parentid': 289122024,
                             u'revid': 289122198,
                             u'timestamp': u'2009-05-10T20:14:33Z',
                             u'user': u'Happy-melon'}],
             u'title': u'Main Page'}
        }
    },
 u'query-continue': {u'revisions': {u'rvstartid': 289122024}}}

but with a few thousand more revisions. So to get the most recent revision, result['query']['pages']['15580374']['revisions'][0]. The API is documented on mediawiki.org and at http://en.wikipedia.org/w/api.php. You may need to set "rvprop" depending on what information you need. Mr.Z-man 02:20, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

I see, there's no convenience class to help out. Well maybe I'll try to write one in the style of your framework. Thank you, Sligocki (talk) 18:38, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

I've been considering a Revision class to represent individual revisions, but haven't done it yet due to lack of time and no real use for it myself. Mr.Z-man 19:12, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

closeAFD.js

Hi Mr.Z-man. Firstly, can I say User:Mr.Z-man/closeAFD.js is proving to be a very useful script, but I just notified of an error caused by the script when I tried relisting an AfD. The edit is here, and I am using Google Chrome. Is this a known bug or error? Or did I just press the wrong button? \ Backslash Forwardslash / {talk} 07:26, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

I don't know what would cause that. Is that the only time you've tried to do a relist on Chrome, or have other worked properly? Mr.Z-man 19:12, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

Popular pages feature for WikiProject Cannabis

I love the popular pages feature, and was wondering if one could be created at some point for WikiProject Cannabis. Not sure if there are other steps that need to be taken to put in a request, but feel free to let me know if you need any additional information from me. Please, no rush, but it would be very much appreciated if you have time in the future to assist the project. Keep up the great work, and best wishes! --Another Believer _(Talk) 04:47, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

WikiProject Brazil needs the popular pages feature also. And I want to see the update of popular pages of WikiProject Michael Jackson. Regards; Felipe Menegaz 19:00, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

Abuse filter false positive

Hi - I've raised a query about a false-postive report that Mr.Z-bot reported to WP:AIV. Your input would be appreciated. —  Tivedshambo  (t/c) 10:35, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

Mr. Z-bot's schedule?

Hey, quick question: when does Mr. Z-bot update the Popular pages? Judging from his work for the past two months, I'm guessing that it's on the first Tuesday of each month, is that right? Sorry to bother you and thanks again, Proteins (talk) 19:02, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

Right now its approximately "whenever I get around to it" though that should change next month as I'm switching to a new script with better automation. I was going to do it last night (this morning UTC), but the Toolserver went down and it took a few hours for everything to come back up. Mr.Z-man 19:18, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

OK, thanks! I'm putting them to good use in our workshops, Proteins (talk) 19:41, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

Hey Z, I know that you've been busy, but if you could ask Mr.Z-bot to run soon, it would be a real help for our workshops. Thanks very much! :) Proteins (talk) 14:21, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

Thanks, Z, you're the best! Proteins (talk) 21:11, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Requests for comment/User page indexing

Please note Wikipedia:Requests for comment/User page indexing has been repurposed from the standard RFC format it was using into a strraw poll format. Please re-visit the RFC to ensure that your previous endorsement(s) are represented in the various proposals and endorse accordingly.

Notice delivery by xenobot 14:04, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

popular pages request

Hi, I'm requesting a popular pages page for WP Japan. Thanks!! --Torsodog^Talk 20:54, 9 July 2009 (UTC)

• Same here for wp:ELEM. The project is already running a manual version of it, but it is pretty tedious (User:Cryptic_C62/Elements). Thanks! Nergaal (talk) 04:39, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

WP:DERM

Thank you for all your work on wikipedia. With that being said, I wanted to know if it was possible to setup a popular pages page for a taskforce? If it is possible, would you help me create one for the dermatology task force? Regardless, thanks again! ---kilbad (talk) 14:29, 11 July 2009 (UTC)

pop pages

Heh, I wondered when you'd implement a requeust queue for the pop pages. Do you want or need any help "clerking" it or updating the config on toolserver? (my toolserver account has been requested, just waiting) tedder (talk) 01:42, 12 July 2009 (UTC)

The admin page I also made means that adding a requested project or updating the config is basically a 1-click process (I mainly did this to make it easier for me). Right now the volume is pretty reasonable, but thanks for the offer. Mr.Z-man 05:16, 12 July 2009 (UTC)

Sounds good- glad to hear it isn't a lot of work for you. Thanks, of course. tedder (talk) 05:19, 12 July 2009 (UTC)

WP:CHICAGO popular pages

Thanks for adding the project. As I understand it, a project can only view data from the date they are added to your script. Is that correct?--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:LOTM) 02:30, 12 July 2009 (UTC)

Basically. July 2009 is the first month that data will be retained indefinitely for, and it isn't retroactive for projects added later. So if a project is added now, data won't be collected for it until August. Mr.Z-man 05:08, 12 July 2009 (UTC)

Popular pages

I suggest that instead of overwriting the data, a new sub-page be created for each month, as is done for AfDs. SharkD (talk) 03:40, 12 July 2009 (UTC)

I may add that as a configuration option in the future. Mr.Z-man 05:37, 12 July 2009 (UTC)

Pop page bug

Wikiproject Physics' list for June 2009 says Nikola Tesla had 1.9 million hits, and average 145K views per day. This is clearly nonsense (and traffic stats gives ~9K per day., with a 210K views in the month

[4] / [5]

Similar bugs for Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer (61K hits/ 4.7K daily) when the traffic stat says ~20 daily, and 405 in the month. [6] /

I tried using the bug tracker page, but it kept saying the reporter field was missing and I couldn't find it.Headbomb {^ταλκ_{κοντριβς} – WP Physics} 04:18, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

The page on the Toolserver is the in-progress data for July 2009 - http://stats.grok.se/en/200907/Nikola_Tesla - he was on Google's main page for his birthday, so most of the hits are all from one day. Mr.Z-man 04:22, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

Nevermind, I mixed the months.Headbomb {^ταλκ_{κοντριβς} – WP Physics} 04:32, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

Your message

Quite frankly, I'm shocked at your response, but will take it's advice on board.

Personally, I'd be happy if ALL 'free' images were supported by paperwork in OTRS as it would solve some other problems, but that's never going to happen. Sfan00 IMG (talk) 17:46, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

Popular pages for WikiProject Indian music

Hi Mr.Z-man! I'm a fan of your article hits pages. If it's not a bother, would you consider creating an article hits page for Wikipedia:WikiProject Indian music? Thank you. Hekerui (talk) 23:25, 27 June 2009 (UTC)

Hi again. How does one get to know whether a request was granted or denied? Hekerui (talk) 17:19, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

If the request isn't on the list here, you can look on the list of projects to see if it was approved. In the future, I'll probably add an email option for status updates. Mr.Z-man 17:46, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

Thank you. Hekerui (talk) 17:49, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

WP:VPR

No, you're right, it wasn't. That 'Bold text has been following me around since the advent of the new editing toolbar, but only when I'm using Google Chrome. I have a hypothesis: that it's inserted when I press enter (which will submit in Chrome but not Firefox). Anyhow, thanks for pointing that out, I was going to agree with you anyways :) . - Jarry1250 ^{[ humorous – discuss ]} 19:14, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

pop pages limited to wikiprojects?

Great tool... I roughly coordinate some activities at Portal:Gene Wiki. Although this effort is closely aligned with WP:MCB, it might still be interesting to see a pop pages report for the subset of pages covered by the Gene Wiki. The list of relevant articles can pretty easily be found here or here. Would it be possible to set up a monthly report focused on human genes? Cheers, AndrewGNF (talk) 18:07, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

At the moment, no. Right now the bot is designed around the assessment/importance category system used by Wikiprojects. Mr.Z-man 03:21, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Invitation to provide further input on desysop proposal

As someone who commented either for or against proposals here, I would like to invite you to comment further on the desysop process proposal and suggest amendments before I move the proposal into projectspace for wider scrutiny and a discussion on adoption. The other ideas proposed on the page were rejected, and if you are uninterested in commenting on the desysop proposal I understand of course. Thanks! → ROUX ₪ 04:28, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

User:Mr.Z-man/closeAFD.js

Would it be possible to add a configuration thing to this script to disable the non-admin closure flag? It keeps adding it on when I close AfD's in this account, which normally would be correct except for the fact I can delete things if I'm on my other account. :-) Hersfold non-admin^(t/a/c) 18:42, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

WikiBacon bot results

Hey Z, as you know, I've been developing a bot to show collaboration and initial edits between two Wikipedians (i.e., how did we first cross paths?). Here are some initial results involving you: User:TedderBot/Bacon_Results#Wikibacon: Mr.Z-man, Tedder. Please let me know what you think on my talk page: User talk:Tedder#WikiBacon results. tedder (talk) 02:41, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

Z-bot 7?

Is Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Mr.Z-bot 7 not running anymore? Wasn't it approved? Wknight94 ^talk 01:12, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Sorry, I made a few changes to how it got the data, but forgot the format for some of the data had changed slightly, it should be fixed now. Mr.Z-man 03:20, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Did it go down again? Seems a few were missed this morning: [7] Wknight94 ^talk 14:42, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

talkback / motorcycling

Not sure if you are watching, but can you watch Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Motorcycling and reply, especially about whether the importance fields need to exist or need to be populated? tedder (talk) 04:52, 26 July 2009 (UTC)

Hey

I asked you a challenging question on your OS candidacy. While I would prefer if you answer it, I understand if you are uncomfortable; if the latter is the case, please feel free to tell me to buzz off. I won't take offense. Best of luck with your candidacy. -- Samir 04:41, 29 July 2009 (UTC)

Aitias

As you participated in the first RFC, I am informing you there is a second RFC on Aitias currently open. Majorly talk 16:10, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

Chess project

I'm trying to add the chess project WP:CHESS to your tools, but I keep getting error messages that they don't exist. For project I've tried "WikiProject Chess" and "Chess-WikiProject" but it doesn't find either one. I tried "B-Class chess articles" category, and it doesn't find it either. What is the correct thing to enter? Bubba73 (talk), 02:38, 3 August 2009 (UTC)

Ah, sorry, the toolserver database is partially down, I didn't even realize it would affect that tool. I'll put a notice on the page, try again in a day or 2. Mr.Z-man 03:16, 3 August 2009 (UTC)

Thanks, I'll do that. I can use that page to enter the request. Bubba73 (talk), 03:21, 3 August 2009 (UTC)

I made the request through the page, thank you. Bubba73 (talk), 23:46, 5 August 2009 (UTC)

Re: Popular pages for WP Cannabis

Was just wondering if I needed to create the "popular pages" page for WP Cannabis in order for it to be updated. I see the project is on your approved list, but I have not seen the page created yet. I wasn't sure if the page would be created automatically, or if the project needed to start the page so that the bot could update it monthly. Thought I would ask. Thanks! --Another Believer _(Talk) 05:26, 5 August 2009 (UTC)

It'll be automatically created at the beginning of next month, when all the data for this month is processed. In the mean time, you can see the in-progress data here. Mr.Z-man 05:57, 5 August 2009 (UTC)

Thank you. --Another Believer _(Talk) 14:57, 5 August 2009 (UTC)

Proposal

I don't mean to be obnoxious, but I was wondering if you had the responses to the comments to the subpage proposal. I am not out canvassing, and I understand you are probably pretty busy right now. You generally seem to see to the heart of a matter, and if you still feel that you oppose the idea (even if only for certain pages) I would like to know. Thanks! ▫ JohnnyMrNinja 02:38, 6 August 2009 (UTC)

Cant see refTools

Hello, I cannot see the refTools box, even after enabling it in the Gadgets sections. I am using chrome, can you pls let me know if anything extra needs to be done. Regards, Leggette (talk) 12:22, 6 August 2009 (UTC) Also my edit toolbar is differnt than the one showed in the Help:Edit toolbar. Leggette (talk) 12:25, 6 August 2009 (UTC)

You're probably using the "enhanced" edit toolbar. You can turn it off in your preferences (the "Editing" section), or wait until the enhanced toolbar becomes stable enough for me to write a new version for it. Mr.Z-man 15:41, 6 August 2009 (UTC)

Thank you, its sorted now. Regards, Leggette (talk) 10:59, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

Popular pages for WikiProject Somerset

A month or so ago I requested a "popular pages" listing for WikiProject Somerset. It appears in the Popular pages project list but Wikipedia:WikiProject Somerset/Popular pages doesn't exist. Is there anything else I need to do?— Rod ^talk 20:56, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

The list will be created at the start of next month. In the meantime, the in-progress data can be viewed here. Mr.Z-man 21:26, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Scripts

Would you mind taking a glance at User:John254/mass rollback.js. It appears to only be adding the rollback all tab to my contributions. Thank you • S • C • A • R • C • E • 02:38, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

I can't see anything that would cause that. Note that the "rollback all" link will only appear on contribs pages that have at least one rollback link. Mr.Z-man 03:04, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Z-bot off?

Hi. Wanted to let you know that Mr.Z-bot missed a blatant sock edit here. Maybe it was turned off at the time? Wknight94 ^talk 11:58, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

The Toolserver was down at the time. Mr.Z-man 04:49, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

Vandal?

Re: [8] This edit does not seem to meet the criteria for posting at Wikipedia:Administrator intervention against vandalism.

• Your report must follow these three points:
• 1. The edits of the user you are reporting must be considered vandalism.
• 2. The user must be given sufficient recent warnings to stop.
• 3. Unregistered users must be active now, and the warnings must be recent.

The editor had not been warned, nor had they been given sufficient warning, nor was the type of vandalism clear. Last I checked tripping your filter 166 was not grounds for blocking without warning. [9] Jeepday (talk) 00:11, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

If this is a clear sock of a banned user, as the report indicates, then warnings would be silly. If it is not a clear sock of a banned user, then the abuse filter needs to be modified so its author should be contacted. This talk page is for the bot that simply reported what some other users have told it to report. Wknight94 ^talk 00:17, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

By the way, there have been two arbitration cases regarding edits like this. WP:ARBMAC2#Tighten the abuse filter in particular advises that edits like this be fully prevented. Wknight94 ^talk 00:23, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

If it is a sock then it should be reported at Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations. The report provides insufficient information to block a user based on one edit, with no warnings. If all posts by User:Mr.Z-bot are subject to block without question when posted to Wikipedia:Administrator intervention against vandalism then then we need to add a fourth criteria that says that. Jeepday (talk) 00:45, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

If you don't think a filter should have its hits reported to AIV, you (or any admin) can remove it from the "immediate" list on User:Mr.Z-bot/filters.js. As far as I can tell, the only appropriate place on SPI for such a report would be Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/SPI/Subpage - Bot reported cases, but given that it seems to be almost totally ignored (some reports are more than 3 months old and it only seems to be visited by admins once every other week or so), that doesn't seem like a very useful place to report likely socks that are currently active. Mr.Z-man 00:53, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

@Jeepday, the WP:ARBMAC2 blocks are easy for those familiar with it. If you aren't familiar, you are not obligated to act on the report. Leave it for someone who is. The bot report was good and the IP that triggered the filter was very blockable (at the time - probably no point now). If the instructions at AIV indicate otherwise, they need to be fixed. Wknight94 ^talk 01:26, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

Posted to Wikipedia_talk:Administrator_intervention_against_vandalism#User:Mr.Z-bot for discussion. Keep in mind that the goal of Wikipedia:Administrator intervention against vandalism is not to block user but to stop vandalism. In this case, had the bot posted "sufficient recent warnings to stop" prior to posting for block. There would have been no block, as there was only one edit. I also wonder why if the bot is so sure that the action is vandalism and the user needs to be blocked it does not undo or rollback the edit. Jeepday (talk) 22:17, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

There seems to be a serious misunderstanding here of how the bot and the abuse filter works. The bot does not do any analysis of the edit itself. The bot monitors the log of abuse filter hits. If a hit matches any of the filters listed in the "immediate" list on User:Mr.Z-bot/filters.js, it reports it to AIV. For filters in the "vandalism" list, it reports the user if they they trip 10 filters in a 5 minute period. The user who trips the filter receives a warning automatically when they trip most filters, typically some variant of MediaWiki:Abusefilter-disallowed or MediaWiki:Abusefilter-warning. For most of the filters on the "immediate" list, there's nothing for the bot to revert, as the edit was disallowed by the filter. This report was not because of this edit, it was because of this attempted edit.

Additionally, I have not written nor reviewed most of the abuse filters on the list that it reports for. Most were suggested by users when the bot first started running, a few others were added by admins later. I trust that admins can make sensible decisions about what should and shouldn't be on the lists. Mr.Z-man 22:39, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for the explanation, I had thought the filter 166 was your work, I did not realize it was Foundation work. I have read Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Mr.Z-bot 7 and have a better understanding of what is going on. So reevaluating my concerns in light of new knowledge, I think there is room for improvement. Posting to AIV is a recommendation to block, the admin who will (or may not) block the suspected vandal should review the edit history and interactions (edit war?) and then make a judgment call on the best action, then warn, block or discuss. I am not sure how many admins are fluent in the details of these filters, so posting without sufficient info is counter productive. Details of filters are not visible You may not view details of this filter, because it is hidden from public view. Some rational for the filter and the recommended action to block, should be provided, maybe add a high level description of the filters criteria? Jeepday (talk) 10:12, 29 August 2009 (UTC)

On a related but separate topic, Why did the IP not get one of the filter warnings? I would also use a special warning for immediate posts, if a warning is given something like, "Your attempted edit (date/time stamp, and link) makes this account subject to immediate block", that would server as final warning (thus meeting the sufficient warning clause, and helping to clarify clear vandalism). Jeepday (talk) 10:12, 29 August 2009 (UTC)

The abuse filter documentation answers a lot of these questions. First, there is a user group right to see the details of private filters. That user group right can be assigned by administrators. You are an administrator so you can simply grant yourself that right, and then you can see private filters. Next, the filter functionality has a built-in mechanism for warning people. But why would you bother warning an obvious sock of a particular known banned individual? That individual has been warned and warned and indefinitely blocked and had a whole variety of IPs blocked and re-blocked... further warnings now would be silly. Wknight94 ^talk 10:54, 29 August 2009 (UTC)

I did not figure out how to grant myself the right to see private filters, but as I was looking at Wikipedia:Edit_filter, I found MediaWiki:Abusefilter-blocked. As I understand it the filter can be set to auto block and add this tag. Wouldn't it be simpler to just set the filter to block, instead of adding it to a list of report immediately, then having a bot report it, so a person will block it? Jeepday (talk) 11:39, 29 August 2009 (UTC)

Try this page for setting your rights. The filter tool developer (User:werdna) included functionality for the filter tool to block, but that functionality was not enabled on English Wikipedia. This bot is the closest we can get to automatically blocking based on filters. Wknight94 ^talk 11:48, 29 August 2009 (UTC)

I believe the main reason is (besides that the blocking feature isn't enabled) that there's still a chance of the filter having a false positive, so it helps to have a human review before blocking. Also, the warning messages aren't added to the user's talk page, they're shown in the interface when the user tries to save their edit. Mr.Z-man 15:09, 29 August 2009 (UTC)

Maybe we could summarize this on WP:GAIV as suggested here? Jeepday (talk) 10:55, 30 August 2009 (UTC)

Pop pages

I recently signed up WP:DERM for popular pages, and wanted to know how long it will take for Wikipedia:WikiProject Medicine/Dermatology task force/Popular pages to be created? ---kilbad (talk) 02:11, 30 August 2009 (UTC)

Shortly after the start of September. Note that you can see the in-progress stats for August here. Mr.Z-man 03:24, 30 August 2009 (UTC)

Question about research

I wanted to ask a question about some research I want to do. I want to search approximately 20 different terms in google and find out where the Wikipedia page for each term ranks compared to other online resources. Specifically, I would be looking at terms for dermatologic conditions. So, for example, with the following search [10] on my results screen Wikipedia is the first entry, followed by medscape. Can I use google trends/"Google Insights for Search" to accomplish this? Or is there some other way I can compare google results? ---kilbad (talk) 21:07, 30 August 2009 (UTC)

I've never done any research using Google like that before, so I don't think I'd be much help. User:Dragons flight does a fair bit of Wikipedia-related research, you might consider asking him, or possibly on one of the reference desks. Mr.Z-man 21:44, 30 August 2009 (UTC)

Daft question?

What is the difference between this and this, and why are the stats not the same? PC78 (talk) 00:32, 4 September 2009 (UTC)

The toolserver tool is for this month, the one on the wiki page is last month's data. Mr.Z-man 00:43, 4 September 2009 (UTC)

Now I'm really confused. The one on the wiki page shows data from 1-31 August, right? What does the toolserver page show then, given that we're only three days into September? PC78 (talk) 01:07, 4 September 2009 (UTC)

The data from the first 3 days of September; the data it uses is published hourly. Mr.Z-man 01:08, 4 September 2009 (UTC)

Ah, OK. :) Are these things two seperate entities then? As in, if you subscribe to one you don't get the other? PC78 (talk) 01:12, 4 September 2009 (UTC)

No, they're connected, the wiki page is only updated after the end of each month, while the toolserver tool gets (usually) hourly updates. Mr.Z-man 01:17, 4 September 2009 (UTC)

OK. There doesn't appear to be a corresponding wiki page for this list. Is that because the toolserver hasn't gathered enough data yet, or am I just looking in the wrong place? PC78 (talk) 01:23, 4 September 2009 (UTC)

Yes. The toolserver tool will be available before the wiki page. Mr.Z-man 01:29, 4 September 2009 (UTC)

Thanks, that was most helpful. :) PC78 (talk) 01:31, 4 September 2009 (UTC)

WikiProject chess

I signed WikiProject Chess up for Popular Pages, but it isn't working correctly. It isn't giving the kind of information that it is supposed to. Can you check to see if there is a problem? Thank you. Bubba73 (talk), 15:00, 3 September 2009 (UTC)

The bot hasn't created the page yet. Data collection for a project starts the month after signup and the page is created at the very beginning of the month following that (with the previous month's full data). Since the chess project was added last month, data collection started this month - you can see the results here. Mr.Z-man 16:03, 3 September 2009 (UTC)

Thanks. Is this Wikipedia:WikiProject Chess/Popular pages the page that will be created? It already exists - will that cause a problem? Bubba73 (talk), 16:18, 3 September 2009 (UTC)

The bot should just overwrite the existing page. Mr.Z-man 17:05, 4 September 2009 (UTC)

Thanks, it hasn't done so yet. Will it do it at the first of the next month? Bubba73 (talk), 17:38, 4 September 2009 (UTC)

Also, are all page views counted for "popular page" stats, even if they get there from a redirect? Bubba73 (talk), 16:50, 4 September 2009 (UTC)

Yes. Mr.Z-man 17:05, 4 September 2009 (UTC)

Good! Bubba73 (talk), 17:38, 4 September 2009 (UTC)

AIV

Hi there not one to prod to much into the mechanics of bots, but i think your bot made a mistake reporting a user who went back to sign his name after another bot originally signed his message. It seems he tripped one of the filters so there may need to be a bit of tweaking with that, happy editing, heres the text as appeared on AIV

Peter on Blocks (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · edit filter log · block user · block log) - Tripped filter 10 (Unusual change in title length) (details). Mr.Z-bot (talk) 01:21, 7 September 2009 (UTC)

Ottawa4ever (talk) 01:41, 7 September 2009 (UTC)

At any rate this was removed from aiv. Ottawa4ever (talk) 01:55, 7 September 2009 (UTC)

Actually, the report was for this attempted pagemove. It was a false positive, but not what you described. I do hope people are actually using the "details" link provided when reviewing the reports... Mr.Z-man 02:26, 7 September 2009 (UTC)

David Tombe

David Tombe and I are both parties to Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case#Speed of light. You indefinitely blocked Tombe at 23:27, 25 August 2008, for block evasion and sockpuppetry (another admin took pity and unblocked him). Where can I find the evidence and findings that led to this block? He was more recently topic banned, and an IP popped up out of nowhere (no prior edits on Wikipedia) to defend Tombe and attack the admin. In a discussion that ensued, I discovered that other IPs have popped up out of nowhere to support Tombe in other disputes. I would like to get to the bottom of this. Thank you. —Finell (Talk) 17:43, 7 September 2009 (UTC) (To preserve the continuity of the conversation, I will watch for your reply here on your Talk page.)

I asked for a checkuser to be done after an IP posted a comment to my talk page about the Tombe block. The check was probably not done at RFCU (either ANI somewhere or privately via IRC/email). You'd probably need to ask a checkuser for more details. According to [11], Thatcher did the actual check. Looking at [12], the accounts used were User:86.141.250.177, User:Tim Carrington West, and User:D Tombe. Mr.Z-man 18:12, 7 September 2009 (UTC)

Thanks. I wonder what the record is for consecutive unsuccessful unblock requests. After Tombe was unblocked later, he resumed his pattern of disruptive editing. You may wish to make a statement in the arbitration. —Finell (Talk) 22:04, 7 September 2009 (UTC)

green links

Thank you for joining the discussion about the orange and green links proposal. I have started a more modest proposal which may be a first step towards my older proposal. Any comments would be greatly appreciated there. GeometryGirl (talk) 14:28, 8 September 2009 (UTC)

Popular pages for WikiProject Sri Lanka

Hello Mr.Z-man, Can I request popular pages for WikiProject Sri Lanka here? Regards--Chanaka L (talk) 03:17, 9 September 2009 (UTC)

closeAFD: relist is flaky

The "relist" button of closeAFD is flaky. It doesn't work some/much/most of the time. As an example, I am looking at this dusty AFD, clicked "relist", clicked "submit". It says the following near the top of the page:

# Got Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Seithigal
# Getting 

Yeah, it hangs at "getting". Any ideas? Is there any way to add some debugging hooks in my monobook.js? tedder (talk) 06:57, 10 September 2009 (UTC)

No ideas, there haven't been any changes to the code in a while. Mr.Z-man 22:19, 10 September 2009 (UTC)

Can you try relisting this AFD and this AFD and see what you get? tedder (talk) 06:56, 11 September 2009 (UTC)

WP:RELIST change

I would appreciate if you would discuss your change on the talk page. Two other users supported the change, not just me. Stifle (talk) 08:00, 11 September 2009 (UTC)

That's not entirely correct. The part I removed was not part of the original proposal, but was suggested by Ron Ritzman after one person had already commented. If you're referring to 81.111.114.131, its not entirely clear that he supports the "must provide an explanatory comment" part. Technically you didn't explicitly agree either, it was just implied when you added it to the guideline. Mr.Z-man 16:48, 11 September 2009 (UTC)

Pop Pages feature- watchlist

Probably not the right place for it, but this is really cool: how many people are watching a given page. It'd be cool to implement that with Pop Pages- another way to sort the list. tedder (talk) 20:55, 10 September 2009 (UTC)

Will look into it. Mr.Z-man 04:53, 19 September 2009 (UTC)

"Location" in cite news

Please could the "location" field be added to refTool for news citations. This is normal practice outside the USA. The problem is that nearly all US newspapers include the name of the city of publication in their title, e.g. The New York Times. Outside the USA this is largely not the case, so one needs to distinguish between e.g. The Daily Telegraph (Sydney) and The Daily Telegraph (London). People need to be encouraged to include the city of publication in all cases where it is not obvious. Thank you! - Alarics (talk) 17:19, 17 September 2009 (UTC)

I'm currently working on a replacement for that script that will use the new toolbar and be more easy to customize. At the moment, and in the foreseeable future, the current script is basically unmaintained. But if I get some free time, I'll look into adding the field (I think that's one of the few things that's actually not difficult to do with the old code). Mr.Z-man 04:58, 19 September 2009 (UTC)

Proposed abuse filter additions

I think it would be useful to add filters 148, 149 and 189 to the immediate list as these filters detect when users are spamming COI pages and are almost always spam username violations. Or would it be possible to report them to UAA? Triplestop x3 02:18, 18 September 2009 (UTC)

The "immediate" list should really only be used for things that deserve an immediate indef block. I'm not convinced we should be treating new users who create a COI page the same way we treat hardened vandals. 189 could possibly be added if it gets some more review to make sure there aren't any false positives. Typically the filters on the immediate list are already set to disallow the edit, or at least give a warning; 189 is only set to tag at the moment and gets a very high number of hits (nearly 70 in the past 5 hours). Note that 189 is already on the "vandalism" list though. Mr.Z-man 05:15, 19 September 2009 (UTC)

Es posible?

MZM said you're the man on this. Would it be possible to craft a userright that lets an editor delete pages, see deletedhistory, and see all deletions on any page that they have personally deleted, but not see any other deleted material? (Watching) - Dank (push to talk) 19:02, 18 September 2009 (UTC)

It would not be possible to do so by simply making a new group with a set of rights. It would require new software features. Triplestop x3 22:01, 18 September 2009 (UTC)

Agreed. - Dank (push to talk) 22:47, 18 September 2009 (UTC)

Would it be possible? Yes.

Would it be easy? Probably not.

What's the use case for it? Mr.Z-man 05:18, 19 September 2009 (UTC)

When I take all the recent arguments from the discussion at WT:RFA (and I think there's consensus not to go forward with it) about an "admin-lite" RFA, there was no significant objection and lots of support for the idea of unbundling one or more admin buttons. (I'm still working on a rough draft of which statements seemed to get support and no opposition, I'll be happy to post it here if you like so we can work on it together.) We didn't get far with unbundling, but for me, there's a stopper with unbundling, say, only "editprotected", to take a popular choice. Getting that button would then be seen as a step along the road to RFA, and tagger would divert time to doing the things that would justify getting that button ... taking time away from more critical tasks, such as deletion tagging. The only way I can think of to avoid that downside is to unbundle the delete button if we unbundle anything else.

The problem is that User:MGodwin has said, and many agree, that letting non-admins see deleted pages would be a disaster; he'd be willing to go to the Board over it. So if you put my objection and his objection together, the only option left if you want to unbundle is some kind of vetting and coaching leading to handing out a delete button, and of course it would be desirable (though not necessary for the trial run, and not absolutely necessary) for the guy/gal who just deleted a page to be able to check previous deleted versions and see the pages they deleted in case they or others have questions. - Dank (push to talk) 09:24, 19 September 2009 (UTC)

Striking. SoWhy is very negative on this, and he has some points, but I still want to find something to unbundle that would actually help admins out and give people some kind of first step that seems attainable. Another potentially dumb idea I just thought of is at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Requests_for_adminship#Wrapping_up.2C_moving_on. - Dank (push to talk) 15:13, 19 September 2009 (UTC)

WikiProject Poland

How can we get the listing of our 500 most popular pages? [13] We are discussing this here. Thanks for your assistance, --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 16:40, 19 September 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for helpful comment

Thanks for your helpful comment on Wikipedia:Village pump (technical) #HTML type attribute missing. As an ordinary editor I appreciate insight from the technical and meta side. Eubulides (talk) 05:34, 21 September 2009 (UTC)

Comment about your slap dash approvals of bots ignoring community input

[14] --69.225.3.119 (talk) 01:18, 24 September 2009 (UTC)

I posted this asking User:Hesperian to get involved about the BAG drive-by approval process that may see your poorly thought-out bot, with unmonitored data, without community consensus, be approved for a trial run.

I will be asking other members of the community if there is any point in BAG if all you do is a drive-by approval. If you're not reading the discussion, but merely going in and approving everything, there's no point in requesting approval from BAG. --69.225.3.119 (talk) 01:39, 24 September 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/SmackBot XX

Was it approved with my remark for extra spaces or not? I got confused. -- Magioladitis (talk) 08:34, 24 September 2009 (UTC)

I left that up to Rich Farmbrough to decide. I didn't think it was such a critical issue that it should block approval. Mr.Z-man 12:10, 24 September 2009 (UTC)

Wikitools

I'm an "exotic" bot owner (I mainly use my rought python scripts do to strange works into it.source; I only used a couple of pywikipedia scripts, mainly page.get() and page.put()...), I just discovered a new world made of API, json, and wikitools. I'd been impressed by the lightness of wikitools, but I can't understand if there's a community of users; really I presume that wikitools users are not so many.

I'll explore for sure the software: but how can I get help and/or examples to learn more? Thanks. --Alex_brollo Talk|Contrib 22:56, 24 September 2009 (UTC)

There really isn't a community like there is for pywikipedia (though that's probably the only bot framework that is developed by more than a couple people). I know of a couple other people here that use it, and there's at least a few non-Wikimedia users who've asked questions or provided patches. If you have questions, you can ask here, or email me. If you use IRC, I'm on a lot in most of the main Wiki(p|m)edia channels, you might be able to find another user in the #wikipedia-BAG channel. Mr.Z-man 02:14, 28 September 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia:WikiProject Comics/Popular pages

Did I do something wrong? It appears the bot didn't create the above page in its recent run. Hiding T 09:36, 1 October 2009 (UTC)

• Ah, is the data being assembled from 1st October, but we won't get a report until a full months data has been assembled in November? Hiding T 09:58, 1 October 2009 (UTC)
  • Yes, that is correct. Mr.Z-man 19:33, 1 October 2009 (UTC)
    • Ta. Hiding T 13:08, 2 October 2009 (UTC)

Joe Hollywood

Can you please unprotect http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joe_Hollywood . I have sources and references to create this article on him. Thanks so much. (Johnnyk1225 (talk) 02:59, 1 October 2009 (UTC))

What are the sources you have? Mr.Z-man 19:37, 1 October 2009 (UTC)

refToolbar.js

Hey, hey! I've upgraded your script to include the ACAI toolbar support. Here's the code responsible for that:

  if (mwCustomEditButtons && (document.getElementById('toolbar') || document.getElementById('wikiEditor-ui-toolbar'))/* && wikEdAutoUpdateUrl == null*/) {
    if (document.getElementById('toolbar')) {
      button = document.createElement('a');
      button.href = "javascript:easyCiteMain()";
      button.title = "Wstaw szablon cytowania";
      buttonimage = document.createElement('img');
      buttonimage.src = "http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/bf/Button_easy_cite_pl.png";
      buttonimage.alt = "Wstaw szablon przypisu";
      button.appendChild(buttonimage);
      document.getElementById('toolbar').appendChild(button);
    } else {
      buttonimage = document.createElement('img');
      buttonimage.src = "http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/9/9a/Curly_Brackets.svg/22px-Curly_Brackets.svg.png";
      buttonimage.alt = "Wstaw szablon cytowania";
      buttonimage.title = "Wstaw szablon cytowania";
      buttonimage.classname = "tool tool-button";
      buttonimage.style.width = "22px";
      buttonimage.style.height = "17px";
      buttonimage.onclick = easyCiteMain;
      document.getElementById('wikiEditor-ui-toolbar').childNodes[2].childNodes[0].childNodes[4].appendChild(buttonimage);
    }

I hope you can adapt it to the English refToolbar. :) Hołek ҉ 20:07, 1 October 2009 (UTC)

I'm currently working on a full rewrite of it, using the new toolbar's "native" functions for modifying it, it'll also be easier to translate and modify the forms. Its about 95% done, there's just a couple things I've been putting off, as well as (AFAICT) a bug in the toolbar that needs to be fixed. Mr.Z-man 22:09, 1 October 2009 (UTC)

And where is it be available right now? :D Maybe I could help in some spare time. :) Hołek ҉ 22:39, 1 October 2009 (UTC)

bot report at ani

Your bot reported User:Terrentia Rew to AIV. At the time the account was reported, there were no edits, no deleted edits, and the abuse filter said I wasn't allowed to see the details of why it was tripped. So, I guess I'm asking if you have any ideas on how one would evaluate such a report, or should we just ignore it? Beeblebrox (talk) 20:23, 2 October 2009 (UTC)

• Never mind, another helpful user has just pointed out to me that I can simply give myself the right to view the filter. Beeblebrox (talk) 20:46, 2 October 2009 (UTC)

Ping

If you are on-wiki now and available to oversight an edit, please let me know, either here or on my talk page.  Frank  |  talk  00:55, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

I'm around, but emailing the list is typically faster. (If its sensitive, email would be better than a reply here) Mr.Z-man 01:05, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

Thanks.  Frank  |  talk  01:25, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

Talkback

Hello, Mr.Z-man. You have new messages at Thesevenseas's talk page.
You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.

  Set Sail For The Seven Seas  308° 12' 30" NET   20:32, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

Popular page for WikiProject Hong Kong

The information on the Assessment and Importance does not seems to match the ones showing in the talk pages. I'm wondering if it's an issue caused by the tags we use on the talk page? Some pages uses {{WikiProject Hong Kong}} and some pages uses the shortcut tag {{WPHK}}. Tavatar (talk) 17:39, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

The importance and assessment ratings are the rating at the start of the month the data is for (actually a few days before), so any changes made after that won't be reflected in the old data. You can see the difference by comparing September to October - Jet Li didn't have an importance rating at the start of September, but it was rated "Mid" by the start of October. If you know of any discrepancies that this doesn't seem to explain, let me know. Mr.Z-man 19:53, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

I see, thanks for clearing that information up. :D Tavatar (talk) 18:47, 11 October 2009 (UTC)

People shouldn't refactor others' comments

This includes subject headers. My comments and those of others are part of that discussion, some absolutely directly apropos. You and others don't get to remove them as if they don't count. If you wish to re-align the comments, then provide appropriate links as the discussions will likely be archived separately and some things won't make sense (see hammersoft's talk page for specifics). — BQZip01 — ^talk 17:07, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

No comments were "removed" from anywhere, they were only barely related to the original discussion and a distraction from the real issues, hence why they were separated. Saying that you were just reverting vandalism was just outright deception, given that you've already reverted the same edit by other users several times now. I really fail to see why you can't discuss this one issue at a time and instead choose to make (or in this case, hijack) every discussion about this into some giant referendum about every possible related topic, which inevitably result in a huge discussion with no resolution. Its almost as if you'd rather just continue debating than get anywhere near a solution. Mr.Z-man 17:19, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

"they were only barely related to the original discussion" I beg to differ: Wikipedia:Village_pump_(policy)#University_Standards. The largest part of the area I started deals exactly with the issue Hammersoft wants to discuss. It was vandalism in that it was a "...change of content made in a deliberate attempt to compromise the integrity of Wikipedia." This is a clear attempt by someone to sockpuppet their own beliefs. — BQZip01 — ^talk 17:53, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

So why have you not reported myself, Hammersoft, and Camelbinky for vandalism and "compromising the integrity of Wikipedia"? Though I would suggest you read that a little more sensibly before doing so. Moving a section on a discussion page has no effect whatsoever on the "integrity of Wikipedia" - which refers to the quality of articles. Mr.Z-man 17:57, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

Because yours are honest attempts to improve the talk page (regardless of how I view them). The IPs edits are not. — BQZip01 — ^talk 18:08, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

• The IP's were identical to what a registered user did. --Hammersoft (talk) 18:14, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

• Which is why they were disruptive. The IPs motive makes the difference. — BQZip01 — ^talk 18:16, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

• An IP editing isn't automatically disruptive. Assuming motives in the absence of any proof IS. --Hammersoft (talk) 18:20, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

This person is quite obviously someone sockpuppeting (don't tell me this wasn't someone trying to game the system). By definition, it was, at a bare minimum, disruptive editing: its semantics. — BQZip01 — ^talk 18:28, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

Mr.Z-man, re: your 17:19 comments above: Precisely. Thank you for voicing it. --Hammersoft (talk) 18:14, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

Or its someone with a dynamic IP who can't control when they get assigned a new IP. Both IPs are owned by Sprint PCS, a wireless carrier. Perhaps they get assigned a new IP every time they connect, or a different IP for different locations. I'm amazed that you've managed to determine their intentions based on only 2 edits, despite no hint of their motives behind their edits outside of their edit summaries. You mentioned their motives above. What are they (the motives) and (ignoring the fact that they edited from 2 different IPs, since you have no way of knowing why) how did you determine this? Mr.Z-man 20:10, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

I agree that it could certainly be a dynamic IP, but the point is that this IP is an established editor (take a look at the edit summaries) and is using IP anonymity to bypass WP:3rr or avoid scrutiny; both are WP:SOCK violations. — BQZip01 — ^talk 16:36, 13 October 2009 (UTC)

Again, you're making assumptions based on little evidence. You're assuming that they're an established user who has logged out simply by the fact that they're familiar with Wikipedia. They're only making about 1 revert per day, so they're nowhere close to 3RR. Anyway, either make a real report somewhere, either at SPI for the IP or at ANI for my disruption or please drop the issue. Mr.Z-man 17:28, 13 October 2009 (UTC)

• Disclaimer: I'm not even sure what the above is about, but I thought I should point out:

Section headers: Because threads are shared by multiple users, the original title becomes communal property. To avoid disputes it is best to discuss changes with the editor who started the thread, if possible, but it is generally acceptable to change section headers when a better header is appropriate. This is under the purview of threads themselves being shared property rather than a single editor's comments.

Typically if I change a section header, I will leave a note "was: (XXX)" as well as an {{anchor}} for good measure. –xeno^talk 18:21, 12 October 2009 (UTC)