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Cross project ping

I mentioned you at meta:2015 Community Wishlist Survey#Simple math in tables (just in case you don't get email notifications from meta). Ryan Kaldari (WMF) (talk) 03:06, 17 November 2015 (UTC)

Just curious

About: replace otd link with oldid in Template:Article history. Forgive a naif for not knowing these. Juan Riley (talk) 01:45, 18 November 2015 (UTC)

@JuanRiley: I'm not surprised you didn't know these - I only just added them to the module. :) — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 01:47, 18 November 2015 (UTC)
Doh!? I am an old c (among various such 'real' languages) programmer. However...sending me to decipher some WP script to understand? Well then I am sorry I asked! But actually thanks tho for answering. I am sure it means something. 'Twere it not so much like work I might try to figure it out. :) Juan Riley (talk) 02:56, 18 November 2015 (UTC)
@JuanRiley: I didn't want you to look at the code itself, I just wanted to show you the date of the edit. :) — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 04:38, 18 November 2015 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

The Technical Barnstar
For making multiple "On this day" entries possible on Template:Article history in response to requests, and for apparently doing all sorts of other technical stuff that most of us couldn't dream of understanding Thanks! Loeba (talk) 12:57, 19 November 2015 (UTC)
Glad I could help. :) Thanks for the barnstar! — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 13:49, 19 November 2015 (UTC)

Thanks for support on Second-language acquisition

Thank you for your support of student editors on this page. Also thanks for fixing the talk page where they inserted their intended changes. I will encourage them to address other issues that might help it be ranked as B-Class rather than C-class. On my own review it seems that the biggest question will be whether it reasonably covers the topic area. Does a change in class status arise from consensus on the talk page? Marentette (talk) 23:09, 8 November 2015 (UTC)

@Marentette: So sorry for not replying to this sooner! I saw it last week but didn't have time to reply, and I had completely forgotten about it. The rating process is quite informal for the lower rankings. The ratings "stub", "start", "C", "B", and "A" are all dealt with by the relevant WikiProjects, which in this case is Wikipedia:WikiProject Linguistics. Usually these ratings are made by a WikiProject member who isn't involved with the writing of the article. To request someone to rate it, you would need to ask at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Linguistics. (I can't do it myself, as I wrote large portions of the article.) To be honest, I think it has been a B-class article for quite some time, but nobody got around to reviewing it yet. If you're looking for a more formal assessment, it might be a good idea to submit it for Good Article status, which is run centrally. If there are no big gaps in the content that should be covered, it should be able to get to Good Article status with a bit of copy-editing and checking of sources. Best — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 14:02, 22 November 2015 (UTC)

ArbCom elections are now open!

Hi,
You appear to be eligible to vote in the current Arbitration Committee election. The Arbitration Committee is the panel of editors responsible for conducting the Wikipedia arbitration process. It has the authority to enact binding solutions for disputes between editors, primarily related to serious behavioural issues that the community has been unable to resolve. This includes the ability to impose site bans, topic bans, editing restrictions, and other measures needed to maintain our editing environment. The arbitration policy describes the Committee's roles and responsibilities in greater detail. If you wish to participate, you are welcome to review the candidates' statements and submit your choices on the voting page. For the Election committee, MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 17:32, 23 November 2015 (UTC)

Hi. I have question: Do you happen to know what is the eligibility criteria?
Best regards,
Codename Lisa (talk) 18:56, 23 November 2015 (UTC)
Just off the top of my head, I don't think there is any, apart from having to have an account and having to identify with the WMF. All that matters is that you get elected. (Also, you are allowed to identify with the WMF after winning the election.) — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 22:02, 23 November 2015 (UTC)

ArbCom elections are now open!

Hi,
You appear to be eligible to vote in the current Arbitration Committee election. The Arbitration Committee is the panel of editors responsible for conducting the Wikipedia arbitration process. It has the authority to enact binding solutions for disputes between editors, primarily related to serious behavioural issues that the community has been unable to resolve. This includes the ability to impose site bans, topic bans, editing restrictions, and other measures needed to maintain our editing environment. The arbitration policy describes the Committee's roles and responsibilities in greater detail. If you wish to participate, you are welcome to review the candidates' statements and submit your choices on the voting page. For the Election committee, MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 16:46, 24 November 2015 (UTC)

Hello.

We might have a problem. Microsoft Visual Studio § Editions feature grid is entirely copyright violation. I only noticed after editing it a bit.

And by the way, how are you? Are you planning to leave Wikipedia?

Best regards,
Codename Lisa (talk) 04:22, 22 November 2015 (UTC)

Hi Codename Lisa. :) What's it a copyright violation of? Seeing as it's a table and not prose, it might not be infringing any copyrights, but I'd need to have a look at the original to know if we need to investigate any more. And no, I'm not thinking of leaving Wikipedia - my activity has been a bit lower than usual, but that's because I have real-life stuff going on that is taking up a lot of my time lately. Best — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 13:51, 22 November 2015 (UTC)
I knew I'd forget something when I am in a hurry. Yes, the table comes copied and pasted from an older version of its source, currently at: https://www.visualstudio.com/en-us/products/compare-visual-studio-2015-products-vs.aspx Even though some values (e.g. Yes, No or 3/4) are now different from its source, you can clearly see that labels, their exact placements and the table layout style comes from the source. Maybe it helps if you look at the version before I touched it: revision 691783350 The table seems to have come to being in revision 675560219.
I am not alien to real-life stuff myself; I had to request IP block exemption to edit over free ISP connections.
Best regards,
Codename Lisa (talk) 18:55, 22 November 2015 (UTC)
@Codename Lisa: It appears to be quite different from the current version of the source. I don't suppose you know of a cached copy of the old version anywhere? — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 02:38, 23 November 2015 (UTC)
That comment was very disconcerting. Here is a few screenshots that help you see what I am talking about.
These images are full-resolution. Feel free to zoom in.
Hopefully this comment clarifies what I mean and what you mean (broadly construed).
Best regards,
Codename Lisa (talk) 18:51, 23 November 2015 (UTC)
P.S. Let me know if still need to see an old cached copy. Best regards, Codename Lisa (talk) 01:25, 24 November 2015 (UTC)
This is going to have to wait a few hours, because the network I'm on currently blocks Google Drive. But I will look at it later on today. — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 02:01, 24 November 2015 (UTC)
@Codename Lisa: Ah yes, that is pretty clear. I doubt that it would be an actual legal problem (although IANAL, etc.), as it is mostly just a collection of facts, and probably satisfies fair use. However, there is enough grouping and ordering of the facts that there might be some claim to copyright there, so I think it fails Wikipedia's copyright policies. Given that it is a relatively weak violation I don't think we need to do any history deletion, but it would be a good idea to clean up the table to make sure there are no copyright problems. It would be best to just fix this by editing, but as a last resort we could remove the table. — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 15:59, 24 November 2015 (UTC)
Thanks. I'll see what I can do. (The general attitude, however, is that "if neither law nor admin would catch us, then violate it!")
You want to hear something funny, albeit off-topic? A user called FlippyFlink had been communicating with me, and he had been using my own style of messaging. I am sure you can easily spot his saying "hello" at the top of each message (which I have stopped doing) and his "Best regards," signature (which I still do). And then, there is his word choices. Oh, God! This thing has "sockpuppet investigation" written all over it. Hehe... How long has it been since people has stopped doing that? Even my stalker has.
Best regards,
Codename Lisa (talk) 18:50, 24 November 2015 (UTC)

Draftify and {{userspace draft}}

Might be missing something here, but shouldn't Draftify be untagging articles with {{userspace draft}} when it adds {{AFC submission}}, as I did with this edit? Thanks for your work. — Earwig talk 23:28, 24 November 2015 (UTC)

No, you're not missing anything. :) I'll put that on the to-do list. — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 23:29, 24 November 2015 (UTC)

I hear you

Hey, this is just a launch of inappropriate behavior from another editor. I came over to a friends house to help her write an article. Ever since PRehse tried to make it advertising alone so I went in and helped her change things to turn it. We deleted his code showing it to be an Advert. He went back and changed it to showing it an advert much like CAA https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creative_Artists_Agency

I put quotes etc and took it out again. PRehse seemed then got mad at me for taking out his "advert" code. Then he moved to delete it b/c of my edits to try to fix the advert wording.

Look, the lady's daughter was changed by the company. She feels strongly and will be devastated at losing all of this "hard work" on her part.

I'm just trying to help. Whatever you can do to help would be great. Along with her and the community I think the page will improve greatly but deletion of the page is just a malicious move on PRehse part for not getting his way.

I will have editors come and improve it but it needs to be taken off the deletion list.

Thanks buddy. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Comoncents85 (talk • contribs) 05:12, 26 November 2015 (UTC)

@Comoncents85: I doubt that PRehse's actions are a result of him "getting mad". It's simply that topics can't have a Wikipedia article if they aren't covered in published sources that have a reputation for fact-checking. For more about the policies involved, see this guide. If there aren't any reliable sources about Di-Cypher, then I'm afraid the page will be deleted - that's just how Wikipedia works. As for the advertising, that's a side issue. Pages containing promotional language can be cleaned up, but there's nothing that can be done for an article without any sources. — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 06:37, 26 November 2015 (UTC)
I understand, I'll add some more over the next couple of days. Just doing some research I see that the biggest issue is the name. Some people refer to it as d-cypher others as decipher - but I'll try to help her hash it all out. Thanks. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Comoncents85 (talk • contribs) 06:40, 26 November 2015 (UTC)
@Comoncents85: You need to make sure that the sources are from reputable publishers - think books and mainstream newspapers. Also, it doesn't matter what name the source uses to refer to Di-Cypher as long as we can be reasonably sure that it is about the same organisation as the other sources. You can also use sources in languages other than English, if any exist. — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 06:51, 26 November 2015 (UTC)

Request for Guidance

As an administrator, it would seem apparent that you have a greater breadth of knowledge in regards to dealing with other administrators; I'm hoping to appeal the topic ban that you assisted in laying out nearly three years ago, and I'd appreciate any sort of guidance you could give me in relation to going about that. I was given a pretty lengthy ban for that one extended argument that took place on the ARTPOP talk page (ergo, a period of six months had to elapse before I was able to appeal) and, now that the six month period expired over two years ago and I have proceeded in my editing career for nearly three years with the ban in place, I think it's high time I put forth case in order to get it lifted. If you have any suggestions or advice, I'd appreciate it. Reece Leonard (talk) 05:29, 26 November 2015 (UTC)

@Reece Leonard: Well, it seems you have already done the most important thing, which is to edit for a lengthy period of time without violating the ban. All you have to do now is to make an appeal at WP:AN. In your appeal, you should give a brief overview of why you were banned (with a link to the original ban discussion), you should explain how you can be useful while editing the content area in which you were banned, and you should explain how you will prevent the circumstances that led to your ban from happening again. If you do those three things (especially the last one), then I think your ban discussion will go smoothly. Note, however, that I haven't reviewed your edits when writing this reply - while writing a good appeal is important for a successful ban appeal, the most important thing is the actions that you have taken. That's what people will be looking at the most during the ban appeal discussion. Hope this helps. Best — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 07:00, 26 November 2015 (UTC)

G10 speedy deletion

Hello.

I have recently nominated an article for speedy deletion per WP:A10, "Recently created article that duplicates an existing topic". Permanent link But the old article has changed ever since. (Permalink of duplicate revision, permalink of changes afterwards) I fear the attending admin might think I am crazy. Here is a diff that proves the creation has been a recent copy and paste action: [1]

Best regards,
Codename Lisa (talk) 00:39, 27 November 2015 (UTC)

Hi CL. :) I've redirected Microsoft Product Divisions to Microsoft product divisions for the time being, as they were duplicating each other. (This removes the speedy deletion tag at the same time - neither of the pages qualify for A10 speedy deletion, as both are plausible names for the subject.) It looks like Benjohnofbom is attempting to split Microsoft engineering groups to Microsoft product divisions, which might be a good move or not, depending on whether there is a consensus for it. Benjohnofbom has started a discussion about that at Talk:Microsoft engineering groups#Microsoft product divisions, so I would join in there and find a consensus, and then un-split the page if necessary. Best — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 02:09, 27 November 2015 (UTC)
Huh! I did not see that coming. It seems I bothered you for no good reason after all.
Thanks. And sorry.
Codename Lisa (talk) 03:42, 27 November 2015 (UTC)

Carlo Ancelotti

Renew PC? --George Ho (talk) 00:10, 30 November 2015 (UTC)

@George Ho: Do you have a reason for this request? We don't protect pages without a reason. — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 00:55, 30 November 2015 (UTC)
Some good edits and some bad edits this month. Bad edits were reverted; they were either vandalism or tests. --George Ho (talk) 01:11, 30 November 2015 (UTC)

Mexico Economy on Wikipedia

To whom it may concern. I happened to be reading about Mexico on Wikipedia and when I reached The Nation economy episode, the writer indicates being The nation in the Americas having a disparity of having the least number of rich people toward the largest poor population of poor people AFTER Chile....Wow!!! This observation is way off reality. Chile currently has a population less than 20 millions with a large, educated Middle Class ...Actually the best economy in South America...with decreasing level of population considered below poverty levels . Whoever wrote that misrepresentative article needs to evaluate, assess Chile, as it is now, Respectfully, A reader who has been educated in Chile Living now in the USA Regards. Chuck — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.167.103.237 (talk) 03:37, 30 November 2015‎ (UTC)

That does sound like a misrepresentation. Why not try and fix it? Wikipedia is the encyclopedia that anyone can edit, so you have the power to fix articles that need fixing. Have a look at Wikipedia:Introduction to learn more about contributing here. Best — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 05:32, 30 November 2015 (UTC)

YGM

Hello, Mr. Stradivarius. Please check your email – you've got mail!
It may take a few minutes from the time the email is sent for it to show up in your inbox. You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{You've got mail}} or {{YGM}} template. — BethNaught (talk) 20:01, 3 December 2015 (UTC)

Redr

Just noticed your self revert, and allow me to register an Oh, no! I tried to find where GeoffreyT2000 complained about it, but couldn't find anything. Is there something/anything I can do to help fix the problem?  Paine  19:18, 11 December 2015 (UTC)

@Paine Ellsworth: Yep - you can start a discussion to see if there's consensus for the change or not. The reason that I self-reverted is that it didn't appear that there was a consensus for the change due to the two objections I received. If a discussion among a wider selection of editors finds that there is actually a consensus for the edit, then there would be no problem with restoring it. Best — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 01:11, 12 December 2015 (UTC)
Okay, thank you for that! I'll put something together. I know that Jack McBarn's comment on your talk page was, Are you sure Special:Diff/684367972 was a good idea? IMO, {{redr}} is really meant for when there's more than one Rcat, and it seems cleaner without the blank line, and we know that Redr can be used for from one to seven rcats. Can you give me a hint as to what GeoffreyT2000 objected? Then maybe I can give a neutral opener to the discussion and perhaps neutralize their objection later in my rationale.  Paine  01:50, 12 December 2015 (UTC)
@Paine Ellsworth: Sure, it's here. Best — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 08:24, 12 December 2015 (UTC)
Thank you, again, Mr. S! That was back during a short period when I was not getting some notifications, and that was one of them. Happy holidays! Paine  22:33, 12 December 2015 (UTC)

Wikidata

Hi! Can I steal some of your time? I have a js related problem at Wikidata, and I know you're a helpful guy :) The problem in short. I have this script, that does a lot of cool things at Wikidata. Including automatic birth/death date adding (very boring task to be done manually).

It has some problems with some dates, specifically Latvian and Russian (most probably some more languages, that don't use normal Latin script). It recognises only year, but it should recognise full date. You can take a look at this page (after installing script) - section "Auto-detected birth/death dates:". The first one should be "1910. gada 2. septembrī" or something like that. It recognises "1980. gada 19. august", because augustā begins with august and in regex there isn't word ending match. The regex is right, tested it in external tester, so I assume there is some problem with month table. The code starts with wdUsefulprocessExtract : function ( t ) {, and ends (I suppose) with // try years only. It would be very good to resolve this, so that I and some colleagues can do better work :) Oh, and some comments about regex is also welcome, I assume, there is much more better ways to use OR without if ( m == null ) { --Edgars2007 (talk/contribs) 09:52, 10 December 2015 (UTC)

@Edgars2007: This is probably because \b in JavaScript has no idea about Unicode. For example, "décembre" is treated as three words: "d", "é", and "cembre". — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 11:42, 10 December 2015 (UTC)
(To be more accurate, "é" isn't considered a "word" character in JavaScript, as it is not in the set of [a-zA-Z0-9_].) — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 11:45, 10 December 2015 (UTC)
Sounds logical :) Could you suggest changes to the code? No, I'm not the author of script (and i'm not a programmer), I just adapted it for my use. --Edgars2007 (talk/contribs) 16:22, 10 December 2015 (UTC)
@Edgars2007: This should do the trick. You can just copy and paste the code back into your script, and it should work. Best — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 01:40, 11 December 2015 (UTC)
Works pretty fine, BIG thanks! But now there are some problems with brackets, more specifically - the closing ones. Here it's regognising only year, not the full date. When I tested with space and opening bracket (just out of curiosity), script recognised full year. Ideas (and code fix)? --Edgars2007 (talk/contribs) 09:35, 11 December 2015 (UTC)
Could you take a look, please? Was making most probably silly tests, to at least break the script, so that I would know where to look, but without success :) If you wanted to look at it some time later, then sorry for impatience. --Edgars2007 (talk/contribs) 11:33, 13 December 2015 (UTC)
@Edgars2007: I've made a fix for that bug here. Because I was detecting punctuation instead of using \b, the script was missing the case where the month was at the end of the string. I've added an explicit check for this now, so it should work again. The script will still miss the cases where the month is right at the start of the string, and where the month is the only thing in the string, but I doubt these are actually used in any articles. (If they are, let me know and I'll add the logic for them.) — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 12:51, 13 December 2015 (UTC)
Many thanks! Now will be a able to do much more work in less amount of time :) No, those case you mentioned (month is onlt part of string and the other case) shouldn't be used, at least in Latvian, which is my main language. Once more - thanks. I really appreciate it. --Edgars2007 (talk/contribs) 13:19, 13 December 2015 (UTC)

Did I do it correctly?

Regarding [2]. 78.26 (spin me / revolutions) 14:52, 16 December 2015 (UTC)

(talk page stalker) As far as I can tell, your RfA is correctly transcluded in as much as it appears on WP:RFA so people can see it (it must be because people are voting on it - 100% support so far :-D) but Cyberpower678's bots are currently down due to a labs outage (BethNaught's RfA stats are also out of date). When the bots come back up, you should appear in the stats box at the top of the page. Ritchie333 (talk) (cont) 15:43, 16 December 2015 (UTC)
I don't have any opportunity to kick my bots into action again. With that being said, they should revive on their own at around 0:00 UTC.—cyberpowerMerry Christmas:Unknown 15:46, 16 December 2015 (UTC)
The transclusion looks fine, yes. I believe I've already said it, but I'll say it again: good luck! — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 16:35, 16 December 2015 (UTC)

Season's Greetings!

Hello Mr. Stradivarius: Enjoy the holiday season and upcoming winter solstice, and thanks for your work to maintain, improve and expand Wikipedia. Cheers, North America1000 20:26, 20 December 2015 (UTC)

Use {{subst:Season's Greetings}} to send this message
Thank you! Merry Christmas to you too. :) — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 10:17, 21 December 2015 (UTC)

Happy holidays

Hi Strad. Thank you again for your nomination and advice. I feel I have temporarily used up all my fine words at the RfA so for now I will simply wish you very happy holidays. BethNaught (talk) 20:50, 20 December 2015 (UTC)

You're more than welcome. :) That was an impressive amount of support you got there, and a well-deserved WP:RFX100. Happy holidays! — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 10:21, 21 December 2015 (UTC)

Merry Christmas, Mr. Stradivarius

And may all your holidays be merry and bright . . . Thanks for all your help in 2015. Cheers. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 19:54, 21 December 2015 (UTC)

Thank you! Merry Christmas to you too. :) — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 23:14, 21 December 2015 (UTC)

Sincere appreciation

Thank you for your kind nomination. Thank you for your sage advice. Thank you for your continued support. You are a shining example of what makes this place work. 78.26 (spin me / revolutions) 23:42, 23 December 2015 (UTC)
Thank you for the kind words! Let me know if you have any questions about your new tools, and I'll be happy to help you out. :) — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 23:47, 23 December 2015 (UTC)

Season's greetings!

Hello Mr. Stradivarius: Enjoy the holiday season and winter solstice, and thanks for your work to maintain, improve and expand Wikipedia. Cheers, Esquivalience t 00:12, 24 December 2015 (UTC)

Spread the WikiLove; use {{subst:Season's Greetings}} to send this message
Thank you! Happy Holidays to you as well. :) — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 01:46, 24 December 2015 (UTC)

Merry Christmas

Wishing you a merry Christmas and a happy new year...

Codename Lisa (talk)

Thank you! Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to you too. :) — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 07:10, 26 December 2015 (UTC)

Miss Iraq Pageant

This is a new developing story. Request of undeletion submitted because significant new information has come to light since a deletion that would justify recreating the deleted page;

Please read the submission again on Miss Iraq page and consider the news articles and references before deleting. All articles and references are originating from 18th December 2015 to 30th December 2015 because Miss Iraq 2015 was held for the first time in 43 years on 19 December 2015.

Besides several international references provided below and on the submitted article, refer to the Iraq's Ministry of Culture website below:
http://crd.gov.iq/pgDetails.aspx?NID=1936

Other international articles: http://edition.cnn.com/2015/12/22/middleeast/miss-iraq-pageant/ http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/sep/28/miss-iraq-beauty-pageant-marred-by-death-threats http://www.nytimes.com/2015/12/23/world/middleeast/miss-iraq.html?_r=0 http://www.huffingtonpost.com/mycah-hazel/why-miss-iraq-2015-is-a-v_b_8851830.html http://www.msnbc.com/all-in/watch/the-pageant-moment-you-probably-missed-589787715794 http://time.com/4157202/miss-iraq-threats-2015/ http://www.elle.com/culture/news/a32822/miss-iraq-crowned/ http://www.cosmopolitan.com/style-beauty/a51219/miss-iraq-crowned/ http://www.state.gov/r/pa/prs/dpb/2015/12/250824.htm

Hbeaulandk (talk) 12:08, 30 December 2015 (UTC)

@Hbeaulandk: Sorry, but AfD discussions can't just be overturned because any editor says so - otherwise there wouldn't be much point in having the discussion in the first place. If you would like the decision to be overturned, you need to appeal to deletion review (after asking the user who closed Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Miss Iraq, Kharkiv07). Best — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 09:41, 31 December 2015 (UTC)

Happy New Year, Mr. Stradivarius!

Happy New Year!

Mr. Stradivarius,
Have a prosperous, productive and enjoyable New Year, and thanks for your contributions to Wikipedia. Liz Read! Talk! 21:39, 1 January 2016 (UTC)


Send New Year cheer by adding {{subst:Happy New Year fireworks}} to user talk pages.
Happy New Year, Liz! Hope you have a great 2016. :) — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 02:19, 2 January 2016 (UTC)

Admin help needed for updating Module:IPAc-en/phonemes

Hi Mr. Stradivarius

Over the last two months, we have reached consensus on Help talk:IPA for English about several changes:

The Module:IPAc-en/phonemes should be updated in order to reflect these changes. I have tested the changes on Module:IPAc-en/phonemes-testcases which is used by Template:IPAc-en/sandbox. I have taken care to conserve full backwards compatibility so any code that is being used now will continue producing a valid result. So basically, you can just copy Module:IPAc-en/phonemes-testcases over to Module:IPAc-en/phonemes.

For a more thorough overview of the changes and the consensus, please see User:J. 'mach' wust/sandbox#Template:IPAc-en/sandbox.

Thanks --mach 🙈🙉🙊 12:59, 16 January 2016 (UTC)

@J. 'mach' wust: Hi. :) Usually, pages like the ones you made have the suffix "/sandbox" - "/testcases" is usually reserved for pages like this one. I've moved your modules over to Module:IPAc-en/sandbox and similar accordingly. Code-wise, it all looks good. I'm worried that some of the examples are a bit verbose, though. For example, could /ʊ/ that can be reduced to /ə/ as in the 2nd 'u' in 'beautiful' be simplified to /ʊ/ 2nd 'u' in 'beautiful'? Also, the usual procedure for requesting edits to protected pages is by using an edit request on the talk page. That would be better than just asking me, as I might not always be around to check things, and it will give other users the chance to comment on your requested changes. Best — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 16:07, 16 January 2016 (UTC)
You are right that the title messages should not be too verbose. I had forgotten that some browsers only display a title message for a few seconds. I would still suggest a title that indicates the variability. For instance /ʊ/ or /ə/ 2nd 'u' in 'curriculum' – I had forgotten that the word curriculum is a better example word since a number of dictionaries use a transcription like /ˈbjuːtifl/ for the word beautiful Help:IPA conventions for English#Reduced vowels.
And thanks for fixing the test names – I was not sure what the usual test naming scheme was. I had roughly based my choices on Wikipedia:Template sandbox and test cases, even though I was aware that it was not entirely pertinent. --mach 🙈🙉🙊 16:25, 16 January 2016 (UTC)
D’oh – curriculum is already being used; beautiful it is, then. --mach 🙈🙉🙊 16:30, 16 January 2016 (UTC)
@J. 'mach' wust: Ok, I've updated the module. If there's anything else you want changing, it's probably best to make an edit request for it. Enjoy. :) — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 01:38, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

Dan Hagerty

Mr Stradivarius,I don't know if you are the person to contact or not. I recently found out a friend of mine had passed away.I looked him up on wikipedia and found a long biography of him half true, half of the man he portrayed. Don't know how important this is to wikipedia but just thought I would check. The person I am talking about is Dan hagerty from the movie gentle Ben. You can contact me — Preceding unsigned comment added by 50.151.110.236 (talk) 19:27, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

Hi there. If you don't want to get involved in editing Wikipedia yourself, probably your best bet is to email the volunteer response team. Best — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 21:45, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

Master of Regex, I call upon thee

Need your skills here. You're gonna have to label/note all of them and put very generic ones as low confidence. Thank you! --QEDK (T 📖 C) 20:08, 20 January 2016 (UTC)

Progress box

Hi, I'm asking your help because you last edited Template:Progress box (in May), stating convert to use Module:Progress box.

The progress box is no longer showing the counts for the monthly sub-cats of Category:Monthly clean up category (Categories for discussion) counter; see e.g. the page Jan 2016.

Hoping that you can fix this or pass it on to someone else who can. – Fayenatic London 13:53, 19 January 2016 (UTC)

Ah yes, I've been meaning to get round to fixing that. This has already come up at the template talk page, and I know basically why it's happening. I think the solution might have to involve going through and deleting a bunch of categories, but I'll have to think a bit more about that. Watch this space. — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 08:31, 20 January 2016 (UTC)
@Fayenatic london: This is now fixed, with the addition of the |count=subcats parameter. — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 11:33, 20 January 2016 (UTC)
Good work, thanks for fixing this so soon after my request! – Fayenatic London 22:06, 20 January 2016 (UTC)

Hatnote module

Hi, I reverted your edit at Module:Hatnote because when I looked at my sandbox (where I keep tables using Module:Sports table), they all displayed an error message that there was and error in Module:Main on line 51 where a function in Hatnote-module is called. Thought you should know the reason for my revert. Qed237 (talk) 23:37, 28 January 2016 (UTC)

No worries, and you were quite right to revert. The problem was that although the findNamespaceId wasn't being used in Module:Hatnote itself any more, it was still being used by Module:Main. Really Module:Main should be updated to not fail so horribly if that function isn't available, but for the moment I've just restored the function to Module:Hatnote. — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 23:39, 28 January 2016 (UTC)
Okay great, sounds good. And I have no errors at the moment, so it is all good. Have a nice day. Qed237 (talk) 23:47, 28 January 2016 (UTC)

Adminship

You might recall this discussion on my talk page. If you're still willing to nominate, I'm willing to be nominated. Besides DYK and anti-vandalism, I'm beginning to see that I could be of use to WikiProject Women where I've become more active. After we discussed this, I got another FA and two FLs to my credit. What do you think? Please be honest. — Maile (talk) 13:51, 19 January 2016 (UTC)

Hi there. :) Great to hear that you're thinking about running! I'm pretty busy in real life at the moment, so it might take a few days for me to get round to looking through your contributions again and (if all is well) writing a nomination statement. But I'll try to get it done some time this week. Best — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 08:27, 20 January 2016 (UTC)
Just so you are not surprised, ANI Battle of the Alamo in July was the worst since we last talked. End result is that the article was protected for 6 months. And this in October QPQs and slap-dash reviews triggered off some unpleasantness. Those are the two worst things I can think of about my experience in the last year. — Maile (talk) 13:30, 20 January 2016 (UTC)
@Mr. Stradivarius: So, may I assume that you have elected not to do this at this time? — Maile (talk) 23:53, 28 January 2016 (UTC)
@Maile66: No, I've just been preoccupied - sorry for keeping you waiting. I have some time today, so I'll do this later on. Best — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 01:37, 29 January 2016 (UTC)
An update: I ended up not actually having that much time yesterday, but I've now started looking at your edits, and I plan to finish some time either today or tomorrow. — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 09:04, 30 January 2016 (UTC)
@Maile66: Hi again. I've finished looking through your edits - sorry again for the inordinate amount of time that this has taken. I'm afraid that I haven't got very good news for you. Your anti-vandalism work looks good, and your content work has always been great, but I'm a bit worried by what I see in your deletion work. If you don't intend to focus on deletion as an admin it's fine to not have a huge amount of experience at AfD and in speedy deletion, but people will still be looking to see that you know the policies well so that they can trust you not to delete things that shouldn't be deleted. However, since our previous discussion I see a couple of your AfD comments that suggest that you didn't do a very thorough search for sources (see WP:BEFORE), and I see one "keep" vote where you don't list any reliable sources as evidence of notability (see WP:ITSNOTABLE). On the speedy deletion side of things, I see quite a few pages tagged with the wrong tag. For example, I see an article tagged as G11 that should have been A7, an article tagged as A3 that contained an infobox, and a few articles tagged as A11 that should really have been A7s, or perhaps should be PRODded or sent to AfD. The speedy deletion criteria are supposed to be interpreted narrowly, so people would probably pick up on these mistakes at an RfA. I'd like to see more work in these areas (doesn't have to be a huge amount) showing that you know what you are doing before I'd be comfortable with nominating you for RfA. The rest of your contributions look fine, however, and I don't think the two discussions you linked to above show anything objectionable. Let me know if you would like more specific examples of things to improve on, and I'd be happy to oblige (this could be via email if you like). And of course, let me know if you have any questions at all. Best — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 16:07, 31 January 2016 (UTC)
@Mr. Stradivarius: Thanks for you input. It gives me something to work on. — Maile (talk) 16:13, 31 January 2016 (UTC)

Thank you for supporting my RfA

Hawkeye7 RfA Appreciation award
Thank you for participating in and supporting my RfA. It was very much appreciated. Hawkeye7 (talk) 20:39, 1 February 2016 (UTC)

COI edit request

Hi there

I made a COI edit request on https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:George_Institute_for_Global_Health#Update_and_new_information on 4 January 2016. Looking at the page history you made changes to that page some time ago. Are you able to review my edit request? Sorry if this isn't the right process, new contributor!

Ktr183 (talk) 02:07, 5 February 2016 (UTC)

Template:Uw-draftmoved

Hi, can you please make the old location wikilink in Template:Uw-draftmoved not redirect? It's annoying to have both links go to the same page and it kinda defeats the purpose. Anarchyte (work | talk) 08:44, 10 February 2016 (UTC)

@Anarchyte: Hopefully this should do the trick. Let me know if that's not what you were looking for. Best — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 09:26, 10 February 2016 (UTC)
Thanks, that was exactly it! Anarchyte (work | talk) 09:29, 10 February 2016 (UTC)

Kayla Mueller

Most IP edits have been reverted. Extend PC? --George Ho (talk) 10:23, 10 February 2016 (UTC)

Redirect categorization

Hi Mr. Stradivarius! You've been interested in redirect categorization and the This is a redirect template in the past, so I wanted to let you know that there is a discussion at Template talk:This is a redirect#One parameter that might interest you.  Good faith! Paine  21:00, 17 February 2016 (UTC)

COI edit request: follow up

Hi there

Thanks so much for your feedback on my COI edit request to George Institute for Global Health on 5 Feb 2016. I've submitted a new revision in response to your points on the talk page, please let me know if you'd like to see anything else!

Ktr183 (talk) 10:48, 22 February 2016 (UTC)

Lua, Modules and my headache.

Hello, sorry for the unsolicited invasion of your talk-page, but you seem to be a recurring name on the module pages.

I'm sprucing up a smaller independent wiki and am playing around with the idea of having some random facts pulled onto the main page, to this end, I've been making a list of facts on a project page and using labelled section transclusion as a means to mark them individually. I believe the next step is to use a Module such as Module:Random to pull one (or a few of these) to the front page dynamically. The theory is sound in my mind, but I've never added a module to mediawiki before. I assume I'll need a Lua extension. Could you please recommend the best one to use? Are there any more dependencies to get Module:Random to work?

Thank you very much for your time!

Alex J Fox(Talk)(Contribs) 18:45, 22 February 2016 (UTC)

@AlexJFox: No problem - you can message me any time you like. To use Module:Random you will need to install Scribunto, which is the Wikimedia Foundation's official Lua extension. The current version of Module:Random also depends on Module:Yesno, Module:List and Module:TableTools, so you will need to copy those over to your wiki as well.

Note, however, that you can simulate random numbers in pure template code if you don't want to install any extensions. For a quasi-random number from 1 to 10 you could use something like {{#expr: ({{NUMBEROFEDITS:R}} mod 10) + 1}} (output: 10). If your wiki doesn't get many edits then you could do the same thing with the current time in Unix time: {{#expr: ({{#time:U}} mod 10) + 1}} (output: 9). Using Module:Random will give you better randomness and means that you don't have to keep track of how many items you want to rotate through. (To rotate through 11 items in the template code above you need mod 11, and to rotate through 12 items you need mod 12, etc.) Using pure template code will probably be a lot easier to get working, though.

Also, whichever of these you use, you may need to purge your main page for the changes to show up, depending on how you have your caching set up. Let me know if there's anything else you need to know, and I'll be happy to help. Best — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 03:20, 23 February 2016 (UTC)

I can't tell you how happy I am to see that this is possible with template code! There will be an initial 'surge' of edits as we move all of the relevant content from an old wiki version/server to the new one, but after that edits will be sporadic, so in time I shall probably move to using the module anyway, but for testing purposes the template code is great! Also, I don't anticipate heavy traffic at all on this wiki so the main page probably won't need to cache at all, I think I'll be able to figure out how to set that up, but thank you so SO much for the help! Alex J Fox(Talk)(Contribs) 03:23, 24 February 2016 (UTC)

COI edit request followup

Hi there

Sorry to invade your Talk page again but thanks so much for your feedback on my COI edit request to George Institute for Global Health on 5 Feb 2016. I submitted a new revision on 22 Feb in response to your points, please let me know if you'd like to see anything else!

Ktr183 (talk) 07:02, 3 March 2016 (UTC)

Santiago (Philippine city)

So many IP edits have not been accepted. Upgrade to semi or renew pending changes? --George Ho (talk) 05:53, 6 March 2016 (UTC)

@George Ho: None of the edits have really been vandalism, BLP violations or copyright violations. I don't think that the page is eligible for pending changes protection now per the wording of WP:PCPP. Also, asking me here seems a little like trying to get the result you want, rather than an impartial one (although I'm aware I was the one who originally protected the page). I think it would be better to make a request at WP:RFPP. — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 01:52, 7 March 2016 (UTC)
Shall I next time post a request at an administrator's page or RFPP? --George Ho (talk) 03:08, 7 March 2016 (UTC)
I think RFPP would be a better bet, but there's nothing wrong with using WP:AN for cases that might need debate, etc. Best — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 04:42, 7 March 2016 (UTC)
Oh, I meant a user talk page. George Ho (talk) 07:05, 7 March 2016 (UTC)

Regarding this

[3] - in what way can less than 7 hours be regarded as a "reasonable time" given that Wikipedia is edited by editors who live in all locations of the globe? A minimum period of 24 hours is surely essential. Please unblank the request, ideally for a 24 hour period, so that I can read it and the reasons for its rejection. Tiptoethrutheminefield (talk) 00:36, 7 March 2016 (UTC)

@Tiptoethrutheminefield: It's not about 7 hours being a "reasonable time" or not. It's about the case being used as evidence in an arbitration case, which goes against the priveleged nature of mediation. Besides, I just pushed the button - the person who made the decision is actually User:TransporterMan, the mediation committee chair. — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 00:49, 7 March 2016 (UTC)
But it is about what constitutes a "reasonable time". I would like to read the blanked request, the text that was left here [4] implies that a "reasonable time" should have been available for this to have be done, and I do not think a time period of less than 7 hours was reasonable. Are you saying you can't unpush the button, won't unpush the button, want more of a reason to unpush the button, or that I should ask TransporterMan? Tiptoethrutheminefield (talk) 00:57, 7 March 2016 (UTC)
@Tiptoethrutheminefield: As far as I know, the reason to delete the page has nothing to do with how long the request was open for. I can technically unpush the button, yes, but I don't have the authority to do so. It would take a decision by the mediation committee as a whole to undo this action. If you want to take it up with someone, you should ask TransporterMan or email the committee's (private) mailing list via User:Mediation Committee. — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 01:38, 7 March 2016 (UTC)
Tiptoethrutheminefield, those closing notices are automatically generated and only have a single form, unfortunately. As Mr. Stradivarius has said, the case was closed due to it bleeding over into the ARBCOM case and to preserve the privilege of mediation. Specifically, my closing statement was, "Complete reject. Since allegations about what is happening here have now inappropriately bled over into the ARBCOM case, this case is being rejected so as to preserve the privileged nature of mediation. This case may, if needed, be refiled once the ARBCOM case is complete. For the Mediation Committee, TransporterMan (TALK) 17:42, 5 March 2016 (UTC)" If the case were still up, that's all that there would be to see. For the Mediation Committee, TransporterMan (TALK) 16:57, 7 March 2016 (UTC) (Chairperson)
Thanks, I understand and accept that explanation. Though it's a flaw that the standard notice refers to things that are not applicable for all the functions the notice is used for. Tiptoethrutheminefield (talk) 20:12, 7 March 2016 (UTC)

COI edit request followup 2

Hi there

Thanks for your feedback to my request on George Institute for Global Health and I'm so sorry for those issues. Obviously I'm still learning what is acceptable and what isn't, but I definitely want to and will comply with all the rules. I've stripped the proposed text right back to basics, please let me know what else I should do.

Ktr183 (talk) 06:02, 11 March 2016 (UTC)

Newbie Template Editor - am I doing this right?

Hi. I don't want to load the question too much, so simply: Am I doing this right? Please. fredgandt 01:45, 15 March 2016 (UTC)

@Fred Gandt: Stefan2 usually knows what he is doing with template code, so I went ahead and made him a template editor as well. He really should have been one quite a while ago, in my opinion. As for the edit request itself, there's nothing wrong with disagreeing with people about how a template edit should be implemented. If you can't come to an agreement on the template talk page, then consider asking other editors, perhaps on WP:VPT. Myself, I tend to side with Stefan2 - templates should be easy to use for users, even if the resulting template code gets a little complicated. (That's just my opinion, not official advice, by the way.) If you really want to have clear, well-indented code that also does everything that Stefan2's version does, you can always convert it to Lua. :) — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 05:30, 15 March 2016 (UTC)
Thank you. I appreciate the feedback. I'm a better safe than sorry kinda guy, and just want to be safe. fredgandt 12:54, 15 March 2016 (UTC)
User:Fred Gandt: Well, if a page is protected, then there is always a reason for the protection, so it's appropriate to carefully check any edit requests before fulfilling them. Nothing wrong with that. --Stefan2 (talk) 13:23, 15 March 2016 (UTC)
Mhmm :-) And we're getting there. I'd say the first batch (not including mergers and redirects etc) is ready to roll. fredgandt
I'll not be doing much Lua work until I've familiarised myself with it a bit more, and then it'll be on less contentious templates to settle in. fredgandt 03:38, 16 March 2016 (UTC)

Explanation of revert on the ROBLOX article

I reverted it because you are suppose to name the file specifically, "ROBLOX studio 2016" is way to general


Thanks,

Pastorma (talk) 01:20, 18 March 2016 (UTC)

@Pastorma: You have the wrong user. It was User:Codename Lisa who made the edit that you reverted. — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 02:48, 18 March 2016 (UTC)

Template:WikiProject_India/sandbox

At Template:WikiProject_India/sandbox I've added WikiProject Telangana earlier, but couldn't add WikiProject Visakhapatnam.--Vin09 (talk) 06:30, 17 March 2016 (UTC)

@Vin09: What do you mean you've added WikiProject Telangana? You've never edited Template:WikiProject India/sandbox before. Did you add it to another page? — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 06:36, 17 March 2016 (UTC)
Yes, I've added. Don't know if it was the same page.--Vin09 (talk) 06:39, 17 March 2016 (UTC)
@Vin09: Well, you need to put the template code for WikiProject Telangana and WikiProject Visakhapatnam into Template:WikiProject_India/sandbox, or get somebody to do it for you. Do you want me to do it, or would you like to try yourself? — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 08:53, 17 March 2016 (UTC)
@Mr. Stradivarius: Could you do it?--Vin09 (talk) 11:05, 17 March 2016 (UTC)
@Vin09: I've been looking into this, and I see you haven't asked WikiProject India about adding the WikiProject to the template yet. I've asked here for you. Let's leave that discussion open for a week and see what the consensus is. (Because it might affect WikiProject India's work, we need to ask the project members before just adding WikiProject Visakhapatnam to the template.) Best — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 08:26, 18 March 2016 (UTC)

Lua console testing - invoke and frame

Hi. I'm confused by the docs at mw:Extension:Scribunto/Lua_reference_manual#frame:newChild which indicates that it's possible to test what would normally be #invoked within the console. Can you help me understand please? The current mess I'm learning on is at Module:User:Fred_Gandt/sandbox - if you could add the required code to make p.params(frame) work as if it were invoked when called from the console, that'd really help. I realise I can change the code to not use frame, but that starts getting way off point for testing, especially when I get around to trying more complex things. fredgandt 01:02, 21 March 2016 (UTC)

@Fred Gandt: You have two options here. The first is to fake the structure of the frame object by doing this:
=p.params{args={"pre"}}
This will work for code that just uses the args table, but will fail if the code tries to use any of the frame object methods like preprocess, etc. Your other option is to use frame:newChild to make a proper frame object, and then pass that into your function. That would work something like this:
local cf = mw.getCurrentFrame()
local frame = cf:newChild{args={"pre"}}
=p.params(frame)
You need to press enter before the last line for that to work properly. Or you could use mw.log if you want to copy and paste it all at once:
local cf = mw.getCurrentFrame()
local frame = cf:newChild{args={"pre"}}
mw.log(p.params(frame))
Or just do it all on one line:
=p.params(mw.getCurrentFrame():newChild{args={"pre"}})
By the way, zero in Lua is a truthy value, so things like if #args then x end won't work as expected. E.g. this comes out as "foo":
if 0 then
    mw.log('foo')
else
    mw.log('bar')
end
One last protip: use mw.logObject all the time, because it's awesome. Hope this helps. :) — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 02:13, 21 March 2016 (UTC)
That helps a lot Mr. Stradivarius, thank you. I had it all arse about face (as we say in Blighty).
"zero in Lua is a truthy value" <-- that however doesn't help at all! >.<
I'm sure to get a lot wrong for a while.
I really appreciate you taking the time to help me; I'm sure you have better things to do. Hopefully, I'll get good at it and be useful. fredgandt 02:29, 21 March 2016 (UTC)

Frank Sinatra, Jr.

Please see WP:Administrators' noticeboard/Edit warring#User:2605:E000:364F:4000:C4A8:F108:65C2:367F reported by User:Winterysteppe (Result: Semi). You semiprotected for two days. Since there is a BLP issue, would you consider a longer period? Such as three months? Whether Frank Sinatra, Jr. had a second son ought not to be sourced to a unfamiliar web site that shows the scan of a page from a court decision. We don't like to use raw court papers, except to expand or corroborate something already known from a regular source. If my recollection of the policy is correct then the IPv6's last edit has the correct version of the article. There was a 2012 interview of Sinatra Jr. in the Guardian where he denies having a second son. Thanks, EdJohnston (talk) 04:22, 23 March 2016 (UTC)

@EdJohnston: You're quite right, and I've extended the protection to 3 months. I did notice the dubiousness of the source earlier, but I was most concerned with stopping the edit war - at 14 reverts in just over an hour, it didn't look like they were going to stop any time soon. :) — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 04:52, 23 March 2016 (UTC)

Regarding the Page - Jackky Bhagnani

Hi,

I notice that the page has been locked till 6th April 2016. The changes done by me included change of the profile picture and removal of slanderous content which made fun of the person concerned.

Though I see multiple changes there after done by others, I want to request the page to be reinstated to the changes I did. Thanks for reading and considering the request.

Regards. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Superfan32389 (talk • contribs) 05:26, 23 March 2016 (UTC)

@Superfan32389: Hi, and welcome to Wikipedia. :) Unfortunately, we can't use the photo that you uploaded, as it isn't available under a free licence. Wikimedia Commons only accepts free content, and Wikipedia will only accept non-free images under strict criteria, which doesn't include portrait photos of living people. As for the content you removed, I agree that it does seem overly negative, and at the least it could do with redrafting. Try making a proposal on Talk:Jackky Bhagnani as to what you think the section should say instead of the current text. You can use the {{edit semi-protected}} template to attract the attention of other editors. Best — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 05:37, 23 March 2016 (UTC)

IP block

Hi I commenced the not inconsiderable task of joining your community today with a view to editing, and before I have even gained confidence and launched an inaugural edit, I understand I am blocked. 

This user is currently blocked. The latest block log entry is provided below for reference:

00:26, 26 April 2015 Mr. Stradivarius (talk | contribs) blocked 195.147.0.0/18 (talk) with an expiration time of 1 year (anon. only) (Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Sardanaphalus)

Please advise if this is an issue with the IP address or another User ghosting. I would be grateful if you could remove the block so that I might practice and eventually publish. I have as you can see created the account. I look forward to your response. Superangulon210 (talk) 17:22, 21 March 2016 (UTC)

@Superangulon210: It looks like you just had bad luck. Your IP address was included in a range that I blocked because it was being used disruptively by another user a while back - it isn't anything to do with you. You shouldn't have any problems editing if you are logged into your account, but if you do, feel free to ask for help, either here, by email or on IRC. Creating an account is a good first step anyway, as other editors have a way of recognising you, and this will likely work in your favour in discussions etc. As for the block, I'd rather not lift it just yet - I'll wait for the full year to expire and then see if the disruption reoccurs. Best — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 23:26, 21 March 2016 (UTC)
I had the same problem many years ago with a different account (declared (properly?)). I've learned since that Wikipedians are well aware of the fact that IPs do not maketh the editor, and all are judged by the content of their contributions and not by the numbers in their user names  fredgandt 05:47, 23 March 2016 (UTC)

Thanks for Lua help

Thanks for your help with Lua back in November. I've finally gotten around to creating the module I had in mind. Feel free to check it out:

The slightly edited Template:Infobox zodiac/sandbox invokes Module:Zodiac date. Results can be seen at my sandbox.

I have a discrepancy when I try to invoke it from the special sandbox invocation page. If it strikes your interest, you could weigh in on my question. Jc3s5h (talk) 19:44, 23 March 2016 (UTC)

It looks like you've already received some good help at Wikipedia talk:Lua, but feel free to ask me if you have any other questions. I actively watch that talk page, though, so it might be easiest just to post them over there. Best — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 12:13, 24 March 2016 (UTC)

Japanese

Hello! I can't remember whether I told you that the latest set of updates for Japanese language support in the visual editor finally landed. The devs seem to believe that it's all working now, and that the visual editor could safely be offered as an option to all editors there. That won't happen during (at least) the next few weeks because of other things that are distracting me, but if you have any feedback, and in particular if you become aware of any problems or unnatural-feeling behaviors with the IME, please {{ping}} me. Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 18:12, 21 March 2016 (UTC)

Ok, I'll have another play around with it later on. :) — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 23:32, 21 March 2016 (UTC)
Thanks. Let me know how it goes. Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 17:10, 25 March 2016 (UTC)

Module:Protection banner/banner

Do you remember what Module:Protection banner/banner was for? Is there any reason to keep it around? Jackmcbarn (talk) 17:47, 26 March 2016 (UTC)

@Jackmcbarn: I can't remember why I started writing it, no. There's no reason to keep it around that I can think of, so I'll zap it. — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 06:15, 27 March 2016 (UTC)

Another request for your assistance with learning Lua

Hi again. I will lead with a request that if you would prefer I stop turning to you for help in this respect, please state so freely, I will understand.

That said: I wonder if you could take a look at the two Modules I've pushed into service ( Editing advice and NUMBEROF ), and give basic feedback on my apparent grasp of Lua or my lack thereof?

Specifically
is it stupid code?
are there better ways to get those things done?
how's the syntax and comments?
how's the documentation?

Any other feedback welcome. fredgandt 21:30, 27 March 2016 (UTC)

@Fred Gandt: Hi there. :) No, the code isn't stupid, at all. There were a few things I noticed, though, so in no particular order:
  • In Template:Editing advice you pass through parameters like {{{1}}}, {{{2}}}, etc., but if you used frame:getParent().args in Module:Editing advice instead of frame.args then you could avoid passing through any parameters in Template:Editing advice, and just use ipairs in the module to iterate through the numerical arguments.
  • If you do the above, you can't assume that all the arguments that you get will either be "about", "section", or integers - if someone used {{subst:editing advice|bananas=5}} then you would have a bananas parameter to deal with - so your current loop of for key, value in pairs(frame.args) do ... end would stop working. You could fix this by checking explicitly for args.about, then args.section, and then using ipairs for the page arguments. It's also generally better practice to specify things like this explicitly, as it helps prevent bugs from unexpected values caused by future refactorings. And it would also be more efficient, as instead of checking for keys of "about" and "section" on every iteration of your loop, you can just check them once before the loop starts.
  • Also, using frame:getParent().args rather than passing the arguments through manually is a lot faster, as it makes the template page much simpler for PHP to parse.
  • I find it's usually clearer to do preprocessing of the arguments first (like trimming whitespace and changing pure whitespace arguments to nil), and then to just pass an args table around, rather than passing the frame object to a lot of different functions. This keeps the code cleaner, I think, and it helps to avoid bugs later on in processing where you assume that arguments have been trimmed but actually they haven't. I usually use Module:Arguments for this, as it uses metatables to do awesome things like automatically trim arguments, but still only fetch them from the frame object if they are actually accessed.
  • In Module:NUMBEROF, you should be aware that attempting to parse wikitext is difficult and error-prone. (If you've never seen it before, take a look at the source code of MediaWiki's Parser.php.) For example, {{foo|== Some heading ==}} won't necessarily produce a section heading, and neither will <!-- == Another heading == --> or <nowiki>== Another heading ==</nowiki> (even assuming that you add line breaks before the first equals signs). Simple parsing attempts might be good enough for most uses, but you should be aware that they won't be perfect.
  • A small gripe about naming - I highly encourage you to use more descriptive names for your functions than "middle" and "get". :) I usually aim for people to be able to tell what the function does without having to look at any comments. (Although you should also write comments, of course.) Also, instead of "haystack" in haystack = mw.title.new(page), I would use "title" or "page" - the haystack is the actual page text, not the title object.
  • I would also avoid all-caps names like NUMBEROF, as they are easy to confuse with native parser functions like CURRENTDATE, etc. Templates and parser functions behave subtly differently, so it's probably best to differentiate them.
That's all I've got for now, but feel free to ask me if there's anything else you want to know. Best — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 00:53, 28 March 2016 (UTC)
Thank you :-) That's a lot to absorb, so I'll take it slow after sleeping after bashing my head against a regex that's going to actually work one day.
Right off the bat - frame:getParent().args is very handy to know about. Definitely a more direct approach; and stuff like Module:Arguments (I'm a big fan of not reinventing the wheel) will be handy.
I have looked at (and edited) a local MW installation and thus have read the parser, which was awesome fun -_-
Yes, I wouldn't expect my code to handle edge cases, but there aren't many (in my experience) because of the style guides etc.
I was actively trying to emulate magic words with the titling of NUMBEROF*, but if that's considered tasteless, I won't whine if it gets moved. Bearing in mind there's the established {{NUMBEROF}} which I found when looking for categories, mine's possibly extra confusing. A move should probably be followed by a deletion of the origin, so do you want to handle that?
I'll get to work attempting to improve them, armed with your helpful and greatly appreciated feedback - tomorrow.
Really, I am (oh internet, how you squish heartfeltitude) extremely grateful that you'd take the time and effort to compose such a helpful response to my query. I consider those who go out of their way to help others to be amongst the best of us (all). fredgandt 01:38, 28 March 2016 (UTC)
@Mr. Stradivarius/Archive 24: - I began implementing your suggested fixes to Module:Editing advice, but am not sure how to use frame in local functions without passing it around as an argument. I almost copied it to a local (global in JS) var, but wasn't sure if that would really be the right thing to do. What is? fredgandt 21:16, 29 March 2016 (UTC)
@Fred Gandt: Passing it around as an argument or having it as a global variable are both viable solutions. Personally, though, I tend to use mw.getCurrentFrame in situations like that. Using mw.getCurrentFrame doesn't even add that much overhead, as it's cached within the Scribunto extension code. — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 23:49, 29 March 2016 (UTC)
Perfect! Thank you. While we're on the subject of that documentation - it kinda sucks. One long page listing everything(?) is not easily navigable, searchable or cross-referenceable. I already decided to do something about it when I am more familiar with the language, but wonder what you (as an expert) thinks? fredgandt 06:32, 30 March 2016 (UTC)
@Fred Gandt: I brought that up on the talk page back in December 2014, but nothing came of it. There is also another section about the documentation further down. Perhaps more discussion would result in something, however. Also, I remember seeing a suggestion somewhere (but I can't remember where) to move the documentation into the actual extension code, so that the documentation could work like the MediaWiki JavaScript documentation does. I think this may be the best way forward, but it would require development effort, which is (I assume) why it hasn't happened yet. — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 08:26, 30 March 2016 (UTC)
That's swish! Not seen it before, or sure how ideal it is (probably takes some getting used to). Not being at all familiar with that method of documentation, I have no idea how much work would be involved, but where editing MW pages is concerned, it's pretty much a doddle, and only dependent on some relative agreement (implied consensus rocks). I'd start with subdividing the main sections into separate pages, then subdividing again where sensible. Mostly, it's the lack of functional examples that renders the learning curve steep. Definitely a thing to do, and a conversation to have over there. It's good to know the seed was already sewn. fredgandt 10:17, 30 March 2016 (UTC)

Passing the buck

Hi again. Sorry to bother you with this, but hopefully you'll understand my reasoning.

{{Multiple issues}} had an edit request which I responded to. Due to a disagreeable exchange, I have stepped away from the discussion as I feel my presence will only antagonise the requester.

{{Multiple issues 2}} was created to sidestep the discussion and "substantially duplicates" {{Multiple issues}} on "only one page" so I tagged it for speedy deletion with {{Db-t3}}.

The creator has removed the tag, and I have reasons to believe my attention in any regard will not be well received, so I'm passing the buck. Tag! You're it! Sorry, but you're my Yoda (lucky you). fredgandt 23:17, 1 April 2016 (UTC)

@Fred Gandt: Well, the sledgehammer solution would be to nominate {{multiple issues 2}} at WP:TFD - that isn't allowed to be reverted. The non-sledgehammer solution would be to resolve the dispute, after which the {{multiple issues 2}} issue is likely to solve itself. Given the technical nature of the dispute, I'd stick {{rfc|tech}} on there and ask at WP:VPT for people to have a look. Having a few more technically-knowledgeable people chime in should help steer this towards a stronger consensus. Myself, I have to go out now, but I might have a look when I get back. — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 03:22, 2 April 2016 (UTC)
@Mr. Stradivarius: - The RfC is a good idea and done. Unfortunately the disagreement extended into the article space and resulted in an unresolved request (by me) for administrative intervention, so I strongly doubt that my input would be welcome, and thus would likely be counter-productive. The actual edit request discussion is pretty much circular, and having already suggested an unaccepted compromise, I can't see an agreeable way forward. Anything else I can think to say just sounds like bitching, so that's that. Thanks for the RfC suggestion, it might bring at least part of the dispute to a close. fredgandt 10:20, 2 April 2016 (UTC)

Help with random numbers

Hi again!

Thanks once more for your previous help with expressing a random number without lua.

I just wanted to run one more thing by you, when I use the mod function with something like {{#expr: ({{#time:U}} mod 10) that any occurrence of the same function on the page will always return the same result. Is there anyway I could use this for example, 3 times on the same page and get 3 different results each time yet still keep the number between 1 and 10 (for example). Would this require the lua functionality?

Thank you once again! Alex J Fox(Talk)(Contribs) 16:19, 17 April 2016 (UTC)

@AlexJFox: All the sources of pseudo-randomness in standard MediaWiki are cached per page, so this isn't possible to do without cheating a little. What you need is a template that takes a "seed" parameter and gives you a pseudo-random number based on the current time and current number of edits, etc., and on the number you provided. If you don't provide a seed, then you will get the same number for every template invocation, but if you provide a unique seed for each template invocation, you should get a different quasi-random number for all of them. We have Template:Random number that does exactly that, so you could try importing it. However, it would give you a number from 0-9, not 1-10, so you would have to use an #expr parser function to add one to the result every time, which probably isn't what you want. So, I altered it in my sandbox to fix that (and to stop it from depending on Template:Mod). Let me know if that helps. Best — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 03:53, 18 April 2016 (UTC)

Scribunto: An Introduction

Hello, I am reading the wikibook Scribunto An Introduction. It is a great resource. Thank you for your contributions to this book. I noticed that many of the chapters listed on the outline are not added yet. https://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Scribunto:_An_Introduction Do you have any more information about this book, and when these chapters might be added? I am using this book as a resource for learning how to use Lua to create queries in my wiki. Thank you. Wikipersistence (talk) 21:30, 20 April 2016 (UTC)

@Wikipersistence: Thank you for the kind words! Unfortunately there is no particular timetable for adding the other chapters. It may happen when I have more time, but I can't give any guarantees. For the moment I recommend Programming in Lua, which I found very useful while learning the language. You just have to watch out because there are a few differences between standard Lua and Lua in Scribunto (for example, Scribunto has no print function). You can read the version for Lua 5.0 online for free. Scribunto uses Lua 5.1, but it only differs from Lua 5.0 in a few details (e.g. the length operator, #). And if you have any questions about Lua or Scribunto, a good place to ask is at Wikipedia talk:Lua, which is watched by a lot of the Lua coders on Wikipedia, and some other Wikimedia wikis as well. — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 23:14, 20 April 2016 (UTC)

Thanks very much for the reply, and especially for directing me to the Wikipedia talk:Lua page. That page has a lot of very helpful information, I'll go through it again, and I will certainly ask a question there. I appreciate the help! Wikipersistence (talk) 04:57, 22 April 2016 (UTC)

Module:Message box help

Hey Mr. Stradivarius. I don't know if you saw my ping at Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals)#Implementing Help:Maintenance template removal, but you seem to be the key person to talk to for any change to this module. The discussion has been going for two weeks with 27 participants other than me and unanimous support. To implement, it seems we need a new parameter in the module to pass the intended link through to various maintenance templates that use ambox (or possibly other article message templates). It should appear after all other content in the templates, after a line break (more detail at the pump discussion). Can you help? If not, can you recommend who I might talk to? Thanks!--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 13:48, 24 April 2016 (UTC)

@Fuhghettaboutit: I did see that, but I have been pretty busy for the last few weeks and haven't had much time for Wikipedia. Thankfully, I'm now a lot less constrained time-wise, and I should be able to help out more. I've added some preliminary code to the module sandbox. This code adds a |removalnotice= parameter which allows you to output the template removal notice by using |removalnotice=yes. You can check out the results in my sandbox. Actually, ambox has an |info= parameter which could have been used to add the text in the right position (very helpfully left undocumented by me and previous {{ambox}} editors, mea culpa). However, seeing as this is going to be a standard message for all banner templates, I thought it would be best to add the actual wording to the module so that people don't have to type it out every time. I also considered turning it on by default and requiring |removalnotice=no to turn it off, but I rejected that idea after looking at all the other templates that transclude {{ambox}} - there are a lot that this notice would make no sense with. Let me know if the example in my sandbox looks good, and if everything is ok I'll add the code to the module proper. Best — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 13:34, 25 April 2016 (UTC)
Much obliged! Looks good (as usual) and sorry to impose. Definitely better to have it opt-in. Even if it wouldn't carry through to templates where it wouldn't belong, a few people at the discussion indicated that we should limit its placement at first, maybe to just the templates I gave specific advice about at the help page—so making it a default (at least at first) would not dovetail with that. I'm having trouble imagining a basis for objection but I will honor that, only adding it to some, for say a month, and if there's no complaints/issues, then add it more broadly (maybe even seeking some secondary consensus first before making it really widespread)

Two thing: Can we add in the prefixed bullet that's always been part of the proposal, maybe with {{*}}? The other is that it does not appear from the sandbox that the message is being added to the Multiple issues template (an important location for it to work, since many maintenance templates are only seen through it). Thanks again!--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 15:37, 25 April 2016 (UTC)

@Fuhghettaboutit: Ok, I've added the bullet. The message not displaying in {{multiple issues}} is on purpose: if it displayed there, then you would get multiple duplicate messages (one for each maintenance template). On the other hand, if you hide them, and then add a message to {{multiple issues}} itself, then you can avoid the duplication. — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 23:34, 25 April 2016 (UTC)
Ah, I get it – the sandbox use of multiple issues was you testing to make sure it wouldn't have that duplication problem. Yes, ready to go, thanks. If you can add it to the module that would be great.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 01:00, 26 April 2016 (UTC)
@Fuhghettaboutit: Ok, it is now live, so you can start adding |removalnotice=yes to templates that use ambox. — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 02:33, 26 April 2016 (UTC)
Fantastic. I'm going to start adding it in now. Thanks.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 11:29, 26 April 2016 (UTC)
Can you help some more? It's not working with multiple issues. Did I add it to the wrong part of the template? Also, a few users are complaining that there's too much whitespace and I agree with them that it would be good it it could be snugged up as much as possible with the content preceding it and any whitespace after it closed up, if possible.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 03:16, 27 April 2016 (UTC)
@Fuhghettaboutit: Multiple issues uses the more free-form |text= parameter rather than |fix=, |date=, etc., and at the moment the message only appears for messages that use the latter style of parameters. It would be possible make the message appear after {{text}} parameters as well, but I'm not sure how much sense that would make. If {{multiple issues}} is the only template that needs it, it might be best just to add it manually as part of the |text= parameter in that template. Also, multiple issues already uses bullet points for the various maintenance templates it contains, so using a bullet for the message as well might be confusing - adding the message manually would allow you to style it differently from the other messages. And come to think of it, the message text might need tweaking too, as it would be referring to multiple templates. As for the whitespace, putting the message inline after the date is probably the most reliable way of saving the space. It might be possible to keep the message on a separate line and bunch it up against the preceding line, but you probably wouldn't save all that much space, and you would have to test it carefully to make sure it doesn't make the text overlap on any of the major browsers. I've made an example of how it might be inlined in my sandbox. — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 04:58, 27 April 2016 (UTC)
Okay. Thanks again. I don't think anyone will object to placing it after the date and that will take care the criticism, so please do so. While it would be a understandable it would be a bit of a kludge if not tailored for multiple issues, so I'll add it in using the text parameter, with changes for the context.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 05:12, 27 April 2016 (UTC)
The inline version is now live. :) — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 06:56, 27 April 2016 (UTC)
Huzzah!--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 12:50, 27 April 2016 (UTC)

Categories for protected pages

Thanks again for your prompt help at CFD. I have nominated the additional categories at WP:CFDS; you're of course very welcome to check these.

I spotted some further potential housekeeping issues.

The contents of Category:Protected redirects must be getting the category from a different module related to template:This is a redirect. Should this also be renamed to "Wikipedia fully-protected redirects"? Also, {{redr|protected}} is putting e.g. Halo Waypoint into Category:Wikipedia indefinitely move-protected pages and Category:Wikipedia protected pages as well as Category:Protected redirects; would the last one not be sufficient?

Template:Wiktionary redirect is also putting pages into Category:Protected soft redirects. Is that now automatic, not needing a parameter to be typed, for pages which are in fact protected?

Where Wiktionary and normal redirects appear in Category:Wikipedia protected pages because they have an additional protection template, e.g. Innit which has {{pp-protected|small=yes}}{{wiktionary redirect}}, is it OK to manually remove the protection template as unnecessary? – Fayenatic London 12:20, 30 April 2016 (UTC)

@Fayenatic london: Hrm, let's take those in order:
Hope this helps. :) — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 13:27, 30 April 2016 (UTC)
Thanks. On the last point, another editor requested at Talk:Subpar the protection template as well as Wiktionary redirect, because the latter does not cause the protection icon to be displayed. Please can the icon be automated when the protected redirects category appears? – Fayenatic London 11:24, 2 May 2016 (UTC)
Also, Help:About has {{Redr|merge|to project|rcon}} and currently ends up in seven categories including Category:Wikipedia move-protected project pages, Category:Wikipedia semi-protected project pages, Category:Protected redirects and Category:Semi-protected redirects. This seems excessive, esp. as Category:Protected redirects says it is for fully-protected redirects, so no page should be in that as well as Semi-. – Fayenatic London 21:35, 2 May 2016 (UTC)

Page Recreation

Hello Mr. Stradivarius!

I hope this message finds you well. I am contacting you today because you are the deletion admin on a wiki page that i attempted to submit in 2014 for the Director/Prod Giovanni Zelko,GiovanniZelko, and I would like to request that the page be recreated. After reviewing the forum discussing its deletion as well as the progress of Zelko's career since the page's deletion-which i believe has progressed well and now merits the page, I would like to ask you how to proceed in successfully getting this page back up (im not familiar with the procedure and find the guidelines a bit confusing)?

Thank you very much. I look forward to your response. Folasade.aremu (talk) 08:11, 17 April 2016 (UTC)

Hi there. This page was deleted at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Giovanni Zelko because the subject didn't pass the notability guidelines for biographies at that time. To recreate it, we need to have some proof that the subject passes the guidelines now. Have a look at the simplified guidelines to see what we generally look for here. Best — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 04:03, 18 April 2016 (UTC)
Hi Mr. Stradivarius,
Thank you for your response. After reviewing the notability guidelines that you directed me to,and perusing the web for proof, I feel that Zelko is now up to par. I learned that a feature film, which he wrote, directed, and produced added to its international festival wins, and in August of 2015, had an American theatrical release, which gained him and the film a lot of press coverage. The most prominent of these articles, like the Washington Times and Huffington Post write ups can be found on Zelko's website, http://www.giovannizelko.com/press.html. It appears that Zelko's status has grown a lot since his film's theatrical release as demonstrated by the numerous radio show and magazine interviews that he's done within the last seven months or so. There's alot more of him on google. Should i dig these up and send them to you?
Thank you for your time,
Sincerely Folasade.aremu (talk) 01:38, 3 May 2016 (UTC)
I've had a look at the articles linked at that website, and I've also had a quick search on Google for material about Zelko, and everything that I can find that mentions him is actually about the film The Algerian and just mentions him in passing. This usually isn't enough to satisfy the "significant coverage" clause of the general notability guideline, but it would be enough to have an article about the film. Why don't you write the film's article first? I doubt that The Algerian would be deleted due to a lack of notability, but a page on Zelko himself would be on shakier ground, I feel. Best — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 01:43, 4 May 2016 (UTC)

Your thoughts

Hi. Could I have your opinion, from a programmer's point of view, of Module:Infobox/dates please? It is designed to take a date inside {{start date}} or {{end date}} and repackage it, omitting the year if it's repeated. I.e. 

{{#invoke:Infobox/dates|dates|{{Start date|2016|04|21}}|{{End date|2016|04|28}}}}

gives April 21 (2016-04-21) –
April 28, 2016 (2016-04-28) — Martin (MSGJ · talk) 08:44, 6 May 2016 (UTC)

In case it is of interest, I have been slowly working on Module:Date for a while, although I have ignored it in recent weeks. I'm not sure that a general-purpose date module will be of much use, but I've been wanting to play with it for a while. It can parse text to extract a date and do date arithmetic, and has some other tricks. Johnuniq (talk) 10:57, 6 May 2016 (UTC)
@MSGJ and Johnuniq: Sorry for the late reply. I think that Module:Infobox/dates should probably be reworked to accept a wider range of input, not just the output created by Template:Start date and Template:End date. To avoid code redundancy, this implies that Module:Infobox/dates, Template:Start date and Template:End date should all get their date-formatting and microformat-creation code from a shared library. Module:Date is the natural choice for the date-formatting, and perhaps it could be expanded to cover date microformats as well - or perhaps that would be better in a separate module, I'm not sure yet. I can see a lot of use in general for a date module, by the way. For a start we need to convert Template:Age and friends to Lua so that they have better (and centralised) error checking code, and we would need a good date arithmetic module for that. The date-parsing functions would have also been very useful when I was writing Module:Dts. I'm sure there are many other use cases as well. — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 14:21, 12 May 2016 (UTC)
Agreed. I created Module:Age in March 2013 (time flies!) to fix a particlar problem with one of the age templates per a request somewhere. Later, I saw mention of other minor problems/inconsistencies with some other age templates, and that is when I started work on Module:Date. My plan is to finish it real soon now, then change Module:Age to use it, then look at replacing some of the other age templates. I hope to keep Module:Date as a clean date handler, with all the template handling in Module:Age. I don't know anything about Module:Dts or "microformat-creation", although presumably the latter is a fairly straight forward presentation of a formatted date. Some tricky bits on my to do list include handling ambiguous dates—currently Module:Date requires a date to be valid, but a couple of the age templates can work without a component (perhaps you can omit the year? I'd have to remind myself). Currently I'm sidetracked with some Wikidata tweaks for Module:Convert/sandbox. Johnuniq (talk) 01:06, 13 May 2016 (UTC)
@Johnuniq: There are some more details of how the microformats on Wikipedia work at Wikipedia:WikiProject Microformats. I've never tried to use them as an information source myself, but generating them is a matter of putting a formatted date inside <span>...</span> tags with special class attributes. Template:Start date uses <span class="bday dtstart published updated">YYYY-MM-DD</span>, if I'm reading all of those padlefts correctly. — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 06:25, 13 May 2016 (UTC)
OK, thanks. In the past I've just copied the output shown by Special:ExpandTemplates but I could do some reading about microformats when the time comes. Johnuniq (talk) 07:45, 13 May 2016 (UTC)

Page deletion

Hi, my page was deleted and I want to get it back, is there a way? Since I was new, I did not know that I had to give authentic references. Can you help? Parwaaz hasan (talk) 15:16, 16 May 2016 (UTC)

@Parwaaz hasan: I moved your page to Draft:Hazrat Shah Sufi Khwaja Abul Hassan Chishti. When it's ready you can submit it using the button at the top of that page. Please be aware that you need to use references and to write from a neutral point of view (unfortunately, phrases like "almighty Allah" aren't generally allowed in Wikipedia articles). Best — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 01:40, 17 May 2016 (UTC)

LuaSQL

Has the implementation of LuaSQL on enwiki been discussed at all, or have we an already implemented DB (like) application? Accessible and manipulable data storage of Modules... Fred Gandt · talk · contribs 00:43, 15 May 2016 (UTC)

@Fred Gandt: No, not that I'm aware of. All we have at the moment are mw.loadData and mw.wikibase, and I don't remember any discussion of implementing SQL-like functionality in Lua. It's possible to do database-like things with mw.loadData, for example Module:Signpost and its submodules, but there are limits - 2MB per page and 50MB memory usage per invoke. Surprisingly, the 10-second execution limit hasn't been a problem in Module:Signpost, even though the quasi-database is constructed from scratch every time a page using it is parsed. I guess Lua is just quick at linking tables together. Other things needing database access are usually implemented as tools on Tool Labs or as MediaWiki extensions. If we were to have LuaSQL or something like it, we would need thorough security and performance reviews, as I imagine that it would be pretty easy to make mistakes which could damage the site. This sounds like something to ask about on the wikitech-l mailing list, although I'm guessing it won't happen unless there is a significant need for something like this. — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 01:58, 15 May 2016 (UTC)
Security and efficiency wise, each module having access to only its own limited DB would simplify things. I've been trying to figure a way to implement something with mw.loadData tables and came up with something that resembles what the signpost module's doing. I'm wondering if the ability for tables to hold references to themselves may be a way to kludge a lookup from any column. I see setmetatable() in use in the signpost module; I saw that in the docs, but - well we've discussed the docs before. At this time, I am too clueless about Lua to be making any suggestions for things to be implemented, so will just go with my kludge idea, and if you don't mind, ask for a code review when (or if) it's working?
Have a good day Mr. S. I'm done for now. Neverland awaits. Fred Gandt · talk · contribs 02:39, 15 May 2016 (UTC)
@Fred Gandt: You might want to try Programming in Lua for an explanation of metatables. This is one area where Scribunto doesn't differ from standard Lua, so you can use the standard docs. (There is one minor exception - in Scribunto, getmetatable only works on tables, but I've never seen a situation where this distinction is important.) The thing that you will see metatables used most for is to have some function run when you access a table key. This works because the __index function in the metatable will be run whenever the key for that table is nil. For example:
local my_table = {}
local my_metatable = {}
setmetatable(my_table, my_metatable) -- my_metatable is now the metatable for my_table
mw.log(my_table.foo) -- nil
mw.log(my_table.bar) -- nil
my_metatable.__index = function(t, key) -- this function is run when my_table[key] is accessed and would otherwise give a result of nil
    return 7
end
mw.log(my_table.foo) -- 7
mw.log(my_table.bar) -- 7
my_table.foo = 42 
mw.log(my_table.foo) -- 42
mw.log(my_table.bar) -- 7
Often the setup of the metatable will be inlined, like this:
local my_table = setmetatable({}, {
    __index = function (t, key)
        return 7
    end
})
mw.log(my_table.foo) -- 7
Feel free to ask if you have more questions. :) — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 03:25, 15 May 2016 (UTC)
Thank you again. I'll be referring to your help if I ever tackle the docs; code examples rock! Fred Gandt · talk · contribs 16:01, 15 May 2016 (UTC)

Hi again. I wonder if you would mind taking a look at Module:User:Fred Gandt/sandbox which is being demonstrated at User:Fred Gandt/sandbox/article and will hopefully assist in modernising Wikipedia:Motto of the day per discussion at Wikipedia talk:Motto of the day#Proposal: automate Motto of the day?

It's got all the functionality I aimed to get, but am pretty certain the code will be painfully naive; there's bound to be better ways to do everything I've done.

Your feedback would be greatly appreciated (when and/or if you have the time), and in the long run will benefit the development of the MOTD.

You may be interested enough to develop a metamodule from the idea of this pseudo-DB? I'm way too early on in the learning process to consider trying that yet. Fred Gandt · talk · contribs 06:56, 18 May 2016 (UTC)

Hi. :) The first thing I am wondering is why you have structured the data on separate pages, rather than putting it all together. As it is, it would be easy to attach the wrong date to a motto by editing one data module without knowing that you have to edit the other ones as well. (And Murphy's law dictates that someone will inevitably do this.) I would put the data all on the same page, and use standard YYYY-MM-DD dates to make things simpler:
return {
	{
		wikitext = [=[Foo [[Foo]] Foo]=],
		date = '2015-01-01',
	},
	{
		wikitext = [=[Bar [[Bar]] Blacksheep]=],
		date = '2015-01-03'
	},
	-- ...
}
You can always use Module:Delink to turn the wikitext into non-markup text if that is desired, and you can always use business logic to do things like matching mottos for a specific day of the month, etc. And this way, the data will be easy to manage for the MOTD project, something for which I'm sure they would be grateful.

Thinking some more about this, do we actually need to store the date in the first place? If MOTD want to go fully automatic as they are saying, surely the date it was previously approved for is irrelevant now? I know that there are special mottos for things like Halloween and Christmas, but you could associate those mottos with their event by putting them in submodules or subtables, or by using a tagging system - the date isn't really necessary. — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 11:35, 18 May 2016 (UTC)

Thanks for taking a look;
The idea is simply (in theory) to create a DB like structure that allows weak SQL like queries against it. Where a typical key > value structure exists, we can only call for a value from a known and importantly unique value, and not even easily do it backwards. A DB allows the data to be mined by column and we need only be concerned with the row indexes of returns to get the data from any other column in those rows.
So with at the very least 1300 current mottos, each created for a specific day, we might want to know which were MOTD on all the April 1sts, or pull up all from the previous month, or do deep searches for similar mottos, or (not implemented yet) arbitrarily group mottos by theme e.g. "humorous" etc.
I've moved all the data to one table of tables, but with a simple key > value layout, all the data mining gets either intensive or impossible.
I'll implement the use of Module:Delink [too] along the way.
I see no reason to throw the baby out with the bathwater, and scrap the date data whilst creating any automation. We can have our cake and eat it!
I'm also looking ahead to semi-automating parts of a rebooted submission system for new mottos, and listing of those we already have. I'm going to carry on down this path, and if the value of the effort becomes more apparent, hopefully the actual code will be improved by someone with more technical skills in Lua (which I'm fast learning to loathe). Fred Gandt · talk · contribs 22:20, 18 May 2016 (UTC)
@Fred Gandt: Yes, I understand what you're trying to do with your database-like table structure - this is similar to what I did in the Signpost module. I meant that you can organise the data together by motto but still output it in the database-like format. (I've implemented something along the lines of what I mean in this edit.) — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 05:36, 20 May 2016 (UTC)
Perfect! I'm guessing that Module:Delink can be woven into the return function too, although I've been sidetracked by a proposed chess game slideshow which I'm building an alternative suggestion for (before the bulky current one goes too far).
I was half way to figuring out a similar structure in my head, but didn't think to (didn't know we could) build a return function; I thought I'd have to fiddle with the loops.
The original multi sheet format was based on my wrongly assuming Lua would let me find things in arrays without iterating over them, but since that turned out to be impossible (as far as I know), I realised after your prompting that since I have to loop through everything repeatedly anyway, it really didn't make much difference how it was structured - so make the structure human read/writeable.
You've nailed it! Quelle surprise. I'll implement Delink and arbitrary grouping next, after finishing a demo of this chess thing (a fraction of the code and arguably more wikicentric). Fred Gandt · talk · contribs 06:34, 20 May 2016 (UTC)
@Fred Gandt: Yep, you can do anything you like in the module, as long as the table you return has the structure mandated by mw.loadData. In the Signpost module, for example, the data is at pages like Module:Signpost/index/2016, Module:Signpost/index/2015, etc., and the database-making code is at Module:Signpost/index. (This is the page that actually gets loaded with mw.loadData.) — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 06:59, 20 May 2016 (UTC)
Good to know, and again, thank you for your guidance. My enthusiasm for being awake faded to grey a while ago, so will study this more closely either tomorrow or over the weak-end [sic] depending on how long it takes to clean up the chess thing I made. Ping ya later! ;-) Fred Gandt · talk · contribs 08:27, 20 May 2016 (UTC)
I've added Delink to your reworking (which is awesome) of the DB, and stripped all the text fields, and was somewhat surprised that it worked! :-)
I have a feeling that getArgs should be used in the main module, but it doesn't behave when testing in the debug console (I blame Lua, not my lack of understanding of it ;-) Fred Gandt · talk · contribs 12:41, 21 May 2016 (UTC)
@Fred Gandt: One thing about Module:Delink is that it's quite processor-intensive. If you try and delink all 1000+ mottos every page parse, you'll probably find yourself going over the 10-second execution limit. A better approach might be to store wikitext only in the DB and then to de-link the results when necessary. If you have to have de-linked text in the DB, you could try it first with Module:Delink and see how long it takes, and if it definitely doesn't work you might have to go with your first idea of storing both the wikitext and the de-linked text in the DB manually. — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 14:41, 21 May 2016 (UTC)
Hrm >.<
So my original thought for delink was to use it on-the-fly for text searches by delinking the iterated markup when |text= is called. i.e. {{#invoke:Sandbox/Fred Gandt/sandbox|get|request=date|text=Bar Bar Blacksheep}} which gives us Script error: The function "get" does not exist., instead of iterating text.
Would that be better!? Surely not. Well, I suppose actually, it would then only delink what is needed, and only when needed - so yeah, I'll do that.
This reminds me of the first coding language I learned - Linden Scripting Language which has a limited memory (and many other limits) and access to things called notecards which it can read but not write to, which also have limits. The net result is scripts that use scripts to call scripts which use loads of notecards to store all the data... It's horrible. Fred Gandt · talk · contribs 15:28, 21 May 2016 (UTC)
Well, there are always limits of one sort or another when you're dealing with computers. :) One way you could work around this is to write a bot to add de-linked text to any entry which doesn't have it. Or a gadget for people to add mottos which adds both the linked and de-linked text. — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 11:18, 22 May 2016 (UTC)
I already had a gadget in mind for adding entries after proposal > review > acceptance.
I'll try the on-the-fly way before discounting it as a possibility.
Aside: Want to look at the chess demo viewer I just made? There's only an HTML file code to copy/paste for local (Chrome and Firefox) use so far (the wikifying is next). It's pretty cool for a quick project. No idea if it'll ever be used :-) Fred Gandt · talk · contribs 12:56, 22 May 2016 (UTC)

Hello there my friend. Long time. You once helped me arrange items in my toolbox on the left. I'm wondering if you could help me add a commons uploads link so I can easily see what a user has uploaded. I often have such a need with spammers. Many thanks for any help you can offer. Best, Anna Frodesiak (talk) 20:24, 19 May 2016 (UTC)

That shouldn't be too hard at all - I'll do it when I next get a moment. Best — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 05:38, 20 May 2016 (UTC)
Wonderful! Thank you kindly. :) Anna Frodesiak (talk) 05:45, 20 May 2016 (UTC)
@Anna Frodesiak: Turns out I had some time now - the script is ready at User:Mr. Stradivarius/gadgets/CommonsUploads.js. Any preference for where in the toolbox you would like the link to display? — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 06:14, 20 May 2016 (UTC)
Oh, that's great. So fast! I have no idea where it should go. Please see here and place it if you would. I'm scared of such pages. :) Anna Frodesiak (talk) 06:32, 20 May 2016 (UTC)
@Anna Frodesiak: No, the script itself can stay in my userspace, that's no problem. (This script is a general one that anyone can use, but the script that I put in your userspace last time was specific to the way you've set your profile up.) I meant where in the menu you would like the link to appear. Would you like it to appear under "What links here", under "User contributions", under "Logs", or under something else? — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 06:54, 20 May 2016 (UTC)
Oh I see. Please, in the box called "tools" below "Block user" if you know where that is. :) Anna Frodesiak (talk) 06:56, 20 May 2016 (UTC)
@Anna Frodesiak: Ok, done. Well, technically it's above "Email this user" rather than below "Block user", but that's pretty much the same thing. — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 07:06, 20 May 2016 (UTC)
Hmm, I don't see it. I have: {{spamublock}}, What links here, Related changes, User contributions, Deleted contributions, Logs, Block user, Email this user, User rights management, Upload file, Special pages, Page information, Expand citations...
Anna Frodesiak (talk) 07:19, 20 May 2016 (UTC)
@Anna Frodesiak: I see the problem - you didn't add the script to your common.js, and I didn't think to do it myself. Until this edit, that is. — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 10:00, 20 May 2016 (UTC)
Perfect! Thank you so much. I've needed this for ages and this will come in so handy. I've already used it once like ten seconds after I saw it. Thank you!! :) Anna Frodesiak (talk) 14:19, 20 May 2016 (UTC)

What was your total time investment on this one? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 20:42, 21 May 2016 (UTC)

I dunno, maybe about 20 minutes? It was pretty much just copying and pasting code I'd written before. — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 10:38, 22 May 2016 (UTC)
Ah, so nice. It will probably save me an hour a year. And your SUPG has already saved me many, many, many hours. I am very grateful. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 18:21, 22 May 2016 (UTC)

MRV discuss

Hi, please could you stop changing the date format in MRV discuss instances. You're causing rogue dates to appear below the template, as shown here: {{MRVdiscuss|date=21 May 2016}}. I'm not sure why, but until it is fixed, the format has to be YYYY MMM DD. Thanks  — Amakuru (talk) 11:56, 26 May 2016 (UTC)

PS - it formatted OK on this page, but look at User:Amakuru/Sandbox for an example. This is happening to every talk page where you're updating the date format. Thanks  — Amakuru (talk) 11:57, 26 May 2016 (UTC)
@Amakuru: Sorry, this should be a temporary thing. Hang on a second while I fix the template. — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 12:00, 26 May 2016 (UTC)
@Amakuru: This should be fixed now. If you see any pages with rogue dates still, a purge should get rid of it. Sorry for the inconvenience. — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 12:04, 26 May 2016 (UTC)
Ah OK, thanks for the update then!  — Amakuru (talk) 12:12, 26 May 2016 (UTC)

Dispute

Strad, I doubt that you'll want to get involved in this, as busy as you are, but see the two edits by user Yzyzyz1979 (I'm not linking so as not to ping these folks) and the reverts for incomprehensibility by David Gerard. The posting editor has unsuccessfully tried to make a DR request and clues suggest that he speaks Japanese. Just in case you might be interested, no reply to me needed. Best regards, TransporterMan (TALK) 20:06, 24 May 2016 (UTC)

@TransporterMan: Judging from their user page, they're a Chinese speaker, so I won't be much help in the linguistic department I'm afraid. Best — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 22:40, 24 May 2016 (UTC)
Damn. That's where clues will get you. Thanks for looking. BTW, I'm on holiday in Poland right now and we were staying at a hotel a few days ago where the only English-language station was NHK World showing news and Japanese travelogues and culture shows. Quite a cultural whiplash for this ol' Texas boy. Do zobaczenia, TransporterMan (TALK) 20:27, 26 May 2016 (UTC)

Template:Install user script

Hi, can you expand on why you lowered the protection on that template editors? They do not have the power to edit user JS/CSS, and therefore shouldn't be able to edit the template either IMO... Legoktm (talk) 07:16, 27 May 2016 (UTC)

@Legoktm: That was because of this. If you want to raise the protection level again I don't have any objections, though, so go ahead. Best — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 08:12, 27 May 2016 (UTC)

Suppression of redirects

At User:Mr. Stradivarius/gadgets/Draftify, you said that only administrators can suppress redirects. This is actually false, as bots, global rollbackers, and now page movers can suppress redirects too. Can you please update your "Draftify" gadget page to account for this? This means that the "Leave a redirect behind" box is allowed to be unchecked by bots, global rollbackers, and page movers too. 24.205.16.208 (talk) 22:58, 27 May 2016 (UTC)

Thanks for pointing this out - I'll have a look at it later on. — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 23:02, 27 May 2016 (UTC)
Ok, this is now fixed. The script now checks the API for the current user's rights, so it's now future-proof if more user groups ever get the block or suppressredirect rights. — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 04:29, 28 May 2016 (UTC)

mediawiki editrequest

If you have the chance, would you please review the edit request at: MediaWiki talk:Scribunto-doc-page-show? Thank you, — xaosflux Talk 17:45, 1 June 2016 (UTC)

Modules calling templates

Usually from what I've seen, templates that would be very intricate are backed by Lua modules, usually ones at an identical protection level, or higher. Is there a precedence for modules to make calls to templates, and more specifically, templates at a lower protection level? Or is it bad practice?

I was thinking that {{No article text}} might be a good candidate for Luafication, except that it makes calls to other templates. I'm still pondering a refactor at the moment to fix the 3 cases I suggested on its talk page. Thanks — Andy W. (talk · ctb) 16:54, 3 June 2016 (UTC)

@Andy M. Wang: It's usually best practice to also convert all called templates when converting a module, but there are plenty of places where modules call templates. The only hard and fast rule is that parsing a module (including all called templates) can't take more than 10 seconds, otherwise you get an error. As for Template:No article text, I think the best improvement may be to split it into two templates, one formatting template for the basic layout, and one logic template that generates the text using parser functions. The logic template would call the formatting template to generate the final output. You could do the same thing in Lua, but I'm not sure how necessary it is, really. — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 01:31, 5 June 2016 (UTC)
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