Scsbot

This the talk page for a bot account.

To leave messages for the bot's maintainer, please do so at User talk:scs.

If you leave messages here, they will automatically stop the bot.

Source:Meteorite, Re.:Ref Desk.Misc.

This bot has malfunctioned and removed a source I was placing there. 65.163.112.225 06:16, 7 October 2007 (UTC)

Resolved; see User talk:Ummit#bot again. —Steve Summit (talk) 04:19, 14 October 2007 (UTC)

The bot had malfunctioned at Wikipedia:Reference desk/Science

The bot just asploded Wikipedia:Reference desk/Science. I've reverted the change and will be monitoring its next few edits and blocking if it continues to break pages. - CHAIRBOY (☎) 01:36, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for catching that. Either Wikipedia is horribly slow tonight, or some part of the network is, because the bot wasn't getting anywhere. I control-C'ed out of it, not realizing that it was evidently in the middle of submitting its changes to the Science desk. —Steve Summit (talk) 02:53, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

Looks like it flipped out on the Science desk again. :( Arakunem 02:07, 23 October 2007 (UTC)

Yeah. It's not the bot's fault per se, but rather, something that's gone ghastlily wrong with my Verizon DSL connection, which for the past couple of days has had such horrendous latency and bletcherously low bandwidth that I (and my bot) can hardly do anything. Sorry about this, folks. —Steve Summit (talk) 02:14, 23 October 2007 (UTC)

The bot's last edit was October 23, 2008. Should we manually add the desk headers for the time being? ~AH1^(TCU) 23:48, 25 October 2008 (UTC)

Language RD

Has the bot forgotten about WP:RD/L? It hasn't been archived in several days. —Angr 06:45, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

The bot is manually invoked (not fully automatic), and I was traveling last week, with limited 'net access. Archiving is mostly back to normal now. —Steve Summit (talk) 22:13, 14 August 2008 (UTC)

Hate to be a pain, but the Language desk is full again! —Angr 11:00, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

Oh! Thanks. I had no idea. (The bot's been issuing an error message for the past week or two, but I misinterpreted it and didn't realize what was actually going on.) Fixed now. —Steve Summit (talk) 00:37, 24 September 2008 (UTC)

Bot marked edits

Out of curiosity, why doesn't this bot mark its own edits as a "bot edit"? It is because it is not approved? Or maybe because it is only semi-automatic? Killiondude (talk) 06:00, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

Either I didn't know there was such a thing as a "bot edit", or I don't actually know how to set it. I should learn about that. (But since you asked, Scsbot is approved for the tasks it does.) —Steve Summit (talk)

If you look at your watchlist you have the option to hide minor edits, bot edits, etc. Bot edits are marked on watchlists with a b in front of the page name they edit. I don't know how to do set any of that stuff because I have never created/ran a bot but I just noticed that this bot doesn't do that. Although perhaps I'm going crazy and I just overlooked it. I think the only way to tell is to monitor my watchlist when your bot archives those pages. Killiondude (talk) 05:46, 8 January 2009 (UTC)

Clearly this bot should set that bit. I'll work on it. Now that you mention it, I'm surprised that, well, no one has ever mentioned it. Thanks. —Steve Summit (talk) 15:20, 8 January 2009 (UTC)

Either you changed something or I was wrong originally. The bot just archived the page and it showed up as a b on my watchlist. Sorry if it was my fault and I didn't see it correctly. Killiondude (talk) 01:03, 9 January 2009 (UTC)

Oh! Cool. Thanks. (No, I hadn't changed anything yet.) —Steve Summit (talk) 19:29, 9 January 2009 (UTC)

Gah! I'm such a loser. Sorry about that. I was mistaken. Killiondude (talk) 19:57, 9 January 2009 (UTC)

For future reference, marking an account as a bot is done by bureaucrats. The Wikipedia:Bureaucrats' noticeboard is probably the best place to ask if the bot is already approved (there may be another process I'm not familiar with, but someone there would point you in the right direction). --Tango (talk) 00:14, 14 January 2009 (UTC)

Thanks, but I do know this bot is approved! (The question was merely what mechanism caused bot edits to be flagged as such -- I wasn't sure whether it was because the user making the edit had the bot bit set, or something else.) —Steve Summit (talk) 01:44, 14 January 2009 (UTC)

Mathematics reference desk oddities

I'm not quite sure what's going on, but something strange is happening with the date section headers and archiving on the Wikipedia:Reference desk/Mathematics page. -- Tcncv (talk) 04:08, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

Oh! Let's continue this conversation on my talk page. —Steve Summit (talk) 02:25, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

Corruption in WP:RD/S

Further to my earlier message about corruptions to WP:RD/S at User talk:Ummit#Scsbot issue: parsing snafu, today's corruption [1]. Given that it's now doing multiple corruptions (and with no obviously unusual or hard to parse markup implicated) I think it's best that the bot stop until you get around to beating it back into shape. I'll leave notes on the talk pages of those project pages affected so they know to do stuff manually in the interim. -- Finlay McWalter • Talk 00:36, 7 September 2009 (UTC)

Another one just now. -- BenRG (talk) 00:39, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

And it deleted the same text yesterday. Line length limit? -- BenRG (talk) 00:43, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

See response here. —Steve Summit (talk) 02:21, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

Bot malfunction.

The bot seems to have broken the misc desk includes here.

I'd fix it, but I can't quite tell what's been done wrong. APL (talk) 02:04, 26 November 2009 (UTC)

It looks fine now. The bot reported no errors. Perhaps you caught it right in the middle of its run, when it had deleted the content from the main page and linked to the archive page, but not created the archive page yet. —Steve Summit (talk) 02:57, 27 November 2009 (UTC)

Reference desk

Bot forgot to add new date headers on 6th /7th june -see Wikipedia_talk:Reference_desk#Date_headers_going_AWOL.

Thanks.87.102.17.246 (talk) 22:39, 7 June 2010 (UTC)

OK; see replies elsewhere. —Steve Summit (talk) 00:57, 8 June 2010 (UTC)

Problem with headers

Hi, Scsbot added headers in wrong order in this edit[2].—Emil J. 10:32, 14 June 2010 (UTC)

Known glitch, thanks. —Steve Summit (talk) 01:30, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

But not yet fixed - diff -- John of Reading (talk) 07:23, 20 December 2010 (UTC)

Now fixed, finally. —Steve Summit (talk) 02:44, 6 September 2012 (UTC)

Wikipedia_talk:Help_desk#Archive

Just mention, Wikipedia_talk:Help_desk#Archive  Chzz  ►  01:05, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

Peculiar addition of date headers

See this edit. —teb728 t c 00:57, 18 December 2011 (UTC)

Yeah, it's a known bug. —Steve Summit (talk) 02:19, 18 December 2011 (UTC)

Looks like it happened again: [3] RudolfRed (talk) 00:24, 19 February 2012 (UTC)

This bug is finally fixed. —Steve Summit (talk) 02:44, 6 September 2012 (UTC)

Minor error in adding multiple sections

See this edit: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?diff=next&oldid=469217047 – sections are added in wrong order. --CiaPan (talk) 09:23, 3 January 2012 (UTC)

This bug is finally fixed. —Steve Summit (talk) 02:44, 6 September 2012 (UTC)

Help desk date headings not being added

Hiya. Scsbot has not added date headings to Wikipedia:Help desk for a couple of days. Did we do something to piss it off? ^(humour) fredgandt 01:29, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

No, just sort of a "perfect storm" of logistical glitches. (Blame it on the SOPA blackout, if you like.) —Steve Summit (talk) 02:13, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

With pleasure!  fredgandt 02:14, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

Heading mixup at the math Ref Desk

This change: [4]. Maybe as no new questions were asked for two days, or as it took a two day holiday (or both), but to insert headings after questions added on those days, and out of order, was very odd.--JohnBlackburne^words_deeds 03:31, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

This bug is finally fixed. —Steve Summit (talk) 02:44, 6 September 2012 (UTC)

Date header missed?

At the help desk, the bot seems to have missed to add the date header for February 22 and thus I added it manually (I accidentally added it in the wrong spot initially). Are there any problems with the bot? Toshio Yamaguchi (talk) 15:13, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

The bot is not 100% reliable at adding date headers, and for various reasons the backup pass that might have caught the omission didn't run last night. Thanks for noticing and fixing it yourself. —Steve Summit (talk) 15:22, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

Purpose

What is the purpose of the bot? What does it do? Could you put that on the bot's page? Allen (talk)

Yes, there is information here and here. —Steve Summit (talk) 03:45, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

Out of order dates again

Bot owner might want to take a look at this edit. SpinningSpark 00:21, 23 June 2012 (UTC)

And again. —Bkell (talk) 00:27, 6 September 2012 (UTC)

This bug is finally fixed. —Steve Summit (talk) 02:44, 6 September 2012 (UTC)

Wrong month links descriptions in Archives

The monthly archives' links on the last daily page of May seem mismatched. See Language RD Archive of May, 31 – it contains this code:

    | [[Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/April 2013|May]] 
    | [[Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/May 2013|May]] 
    | [[Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/June 2013|Jul]]

(slightly reordered for better readability). Note the visible contents does not correspond to actual links destinations.

Same error on May, 31 on Maths and Computing, did not check other desks.--CiaPan (talk) 05:45, 5 June 2013 (UTC)

Oh, dear. I see what you mean.

Now I don't remember whether that text is generated explicitly by the bot, or implicitly by one of several archive header templates. I'll look into it.

(And, moving this thread to my talk page, since discussion here stops the bot.) —Steve Summit (talk) 13:45, 5 June 2013 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Reference desk/Computing

For some strange reason, Scsbot has archived January 12th's discussions even they were still active.[5] It did not touch January 9th, 10th or the 11th. There's been no activity in the 9th's discussions since the 9th but it left it on the page. Not sure what's going on here, but I reverted the bot. I am cross-posting this on the Reference Desk talk page and the Scsbot talk page. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 11:48, 15 January 2014 (UTC)

Adding date too early at Wikipedia:Help Desk

Was wondering why the bot had just added the heading for 29 May already- it usually does it just after midnight UTC, so is 12 hours early. I'm reverting it. Diff is [6]. Joseph2302 (talk) 10:49, 28 May 2015 (UTC)

Help desk August 7 heading

The August 7 heading hadn't been added at the Help desk, so I did that. --83.255.46.175 (talk) 09:52, 7 August 2015 (UTC)

Help desk August 8 heading

The August 8 heading hadn't been added at the Help desk, so I did that. --83.255.46.175 (talk) 07:08, 8 August 2015 (UTC)

correction

https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Reference_desk/Archives/Computing/January_2016&diff=prev&oldid=757856120

your bot needs fixing and the archives as well.209.53.193.86 (talk) 03:44, 2 January 2017 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you mean; that boilerplate wording has been standard for years.

(Editing the archives is lightly discouraged, but not prohibited.) —Steve Summit (talk) 03:51, 2 January 2017 (UTC)

Greedy bot moved two days from RefDesk into one archive page

When archiving June 2 from Wikipedia:Reference desk/Computing the bot grabbed one June 1 thread, too:

Special:Diff/845320055

and pasted everything together into a single archive page:

Special:PermanentLink/845320063

Fixed already:

removed the thread from archive June 2 Special:Diff/845352687

and created June 1: Special:PermanentLink/845352683.

CiaPan (talk) 06:53, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

Ohh, wrong page. I'm very sorry I forgot to switch to the operator's talk page and stopped the bot. :( --CiaPan (talk) 06:55, 11 June 2018 (UTC)

Are you sleeping?

You didn't add a fresh date heading to WP:PNT for October 7! Largoplazo (talk) 16:34, 7 October 2018 (UTC)

Thanks for the reminder. (Musta been tired last night; forgot to run the bot at all.) —Steve Summit (talk) 20:12, 7 October 2018 (UTC)

Can this bot remove empty date headers from the refdesks (as what User:MarnetteD does)

. Flooded with them hundreds 07:39, 27 December 2018 (UTC)

A bot - I can't remember which - does remove them eventually. I get them a little earlier when I remember.Nothing wrong with that as far as I can tell. MarnetteD|Talk 07:47, 27 December 2018 (UTC)

That's great. Flooded with them hundreds 08:00, 27 December 2018 (UTC)

See also this thread. —Steve Summit (talk) 23:27, 27 December 2018 (UTC)

Archive working in Wikipedia:Reference desk/Mathematics?

It looks like Wikipedia:Reference desk/Mathematics is overdue for archiving old threads. I'm not sure what the criteria are so maybe I'm wrong, but perhaps there's a problem and I thought you ought to know. --RDBury (talk) 03:40, 8 May 2019 (UTC)

@RDBury: Possibly it's because there are some relatively fresh answers (on 29 and 30 April) in the oldest thread Special:PermaLink/896093038#Wedge_product (started on 26 April)...? --CiaPan (talk) 08:51, 8 May 2019 (UTC)

@RDBury:, @CiaPan: Archiving has been sporadic for the past two weeks because I've been traveling. But I'm back, and everything is catching up now. —Steve Summit (talk) 01:10, 9 May 2019 (UTC)

Ok, I didn't know it required a human to kick things off. Looks like Math is caught up now so thanks. --RDBury (talk) 10:31, 9 May 2019 (UTC)

Discussion Removed but Archive not created

(credit to Ibn Battuta for bringing up this issue at the Help Desk.) Is this a bug?

• This Sequence: bot removed discussions from June 7 -> did not create achieve -> Created Wikipedia talk:Reference desk/Archives/Science/2019 June 7 -> created links to archives (which are not working) at Wikipedia:Reference_desk/Archives/Science/June 2019.
• Bot's contributions. These series of change start at 1:41 15 June 2019. OkayKenG (talk) 10:29, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

@OkayKenji and Ibn Battuta: Definitely a bug. Now fixed. Thanks for pointing this out. —Steve Summit (talk) 10:50, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

Hasty archiving

Here a thread on the WP:RD/MATHS was archived less than seven hours after a new comment was added. Isn't that a bit too soon?  --Lambiam 07:03, 27 March 2020 (UTC)

For better or worse, the archiving policy at the Reference Desks is and has always been that threads are archived a fixed number of days after they're started. The algorithm doesn't consider recent activity. —Steve Summit (talk) 12:00, 27 March 2020 (UTC)

Archiving a thread based on a fixed number of days from its creation doesn't make sense to me. I have seen multiple conversations that go on for quite a while, suddenly been archived in the middle of some activity. Threads should be archived about 2 weeks after the last contribution to it, not 2 weeks after the first contribution. And, yes, I realize that this is harder to do. Dhrm77 (talk) 15:06, 6 October 2023 (UTC)

@Dhrm77: Please start a discussion at Wikipedia Talk:Reference Desk. I'm just a lowly bot operator. (And this is that bot's talk page, not mine!) —scs (talk) 15:56, 6 October 2023 (UTC)

Suggestion: remove empty dates

Could the bot be modified to remove date headers for dates with no questions? E.g.: here Otherwise, those darn humans will do it, e.g. here. 107.15.157.44 (talk) 06:24, 6 June 2020 (UTC)

Short answer: No, but there's another bot that's supposed to. See here. I don't know anything about that other bot. I wonder if it's stopped working? —Steve Summit (talk) 11:30, 6 June 2020 (UTC)

It is unclear whether that unspecified bot was approved and/or implemented. 107.15.157.44 (talk) 18:59, 6 June 2020 (UTC)

The bot stopped working when it's operator died * Pppery * _{it has begun...} 04:37, 13 November 2020 (UTC)

Archival of not solved questions in the help desk

@Scs Your bot archives the help desk. That's good, but that's not good: it also archives not solved questions (for example, my question "Closing the Media Viewer is impossible?"). Please edit source codes to say like "don't archive not solved questions!" to the bot. RuzDD (talk) 02:58, 30 January 2024 (UTC)

RuzDD, there is a related discussion at Wikipedia talk:Help desk#Proposal to change archiving at Help Desk to stale + <interval>, so I suggest to post there. Normal archiving needs to continue until something else is agreed. TSventon (talk) 03:08, 30 January 2024 (UTC)

@TSventon Looks like no one denies that proposal so the bot can be changed? Also, can i revert archiving of just my topic (it's obvious that discussion is ongoing)? RuzDD (talk) 03:14, 30 January 2024 (UTC)

RuzDD, I would not object to that. Presumably it could go under today's date so it doesn't get archived again for a few days, with a note of what you have done. TSventon (talk) 03:23, 30 January 2024 (UTC)

@RuzDD: Yes, any discussion about changing the archiving policy needs to take place on the Help Desk talk page, not here.

(Note, however, that making decisions based on whether a given discussion is "solved" or not is not something the current bot is ever going to be able to do. If we move in that direction, it will have to be with a different bot.)

—scs (talk) 12:05, 30 January 2024 (UTC)

Bot adding wrong date header

@Scs: The Scsbot recently added a new date header to the language reference desk. In doing so, it added the header February 13. Today is only February 12. JIP | Talk 01:29, 12 February 2024 (UTC)

@JIP: Thanks. I'm rehosting the bot tonight, and there was some version skew in an underlying date/time computation utility, but I think that's fixed now. —scs (talk) 04:57, 12 February 2024 (UTC)