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Political positions

Hi! I was wondering if a Political positions paragraph in an article about a politician is required to make it a good article. Mariah-Yulia (talk) 22:41, 18 September 2008 (UTC)

Not necessarily - see George H. W. Bush, George W. Bush, Gordon Brown. There will most likely have to be a section(s) that discuss the political positions of the politician, but it doesn't necessarily have to be in a "Political positions" section. Also, some articles that have one, like John Baird (Canadian politician) call it by a different name - though the trend seems to be to discuss political positions in the same section as they discuss the relevant term(s) of office. If you want an example for an article about a lesser-known politician (e.g. not a head of state or head of a legislative chamber) I'd recommend looking at an article like Berkley Bedell - a simpler article about a U.S. Congressman from Iowa, but still a WP:GA. Also, see the Good Article criteria here. --Philosopher Let us reason together. 00:33, 19 September 2008 (UTC)
Thank you for the tips and response! Mariah-Yulia (talk) 20:24, 19 September 2008 (UTC)
Glad I could help. --Philosopher Let us reason together. 00:49, 20 September 2008 (UTC)

Image restore

Um, did you notice the faulty screen shot box partially obscuring Ghandi's face? Also, I do not see how that image could even remotely be considered a Logo, which is what it was tagged as. MBisanz talk 01:59, 19 September 2008 (UTC)

No problem, I was just doing one of my uber-runs through the list of logos and kill any that aren't logos, feel free to do whatever you need to with that image. MBisanz talk 02:31, 19 September 2008 (UTC)

FYI on speedy of Hidding

You are correct that this article did not qualify for speedy deletion, but actually you can speedy delete an article that is at AfD if it does meet the criteria. It helps reduce the backlog at AfD. Beeblebrox (talk) 20:17, 19 September 2008 (UTC)

You're not supposed to list a speedy-able article at AfD, so I was assuming that the AfD nominator didn't believe it was speedy-able and implicitly objected to the speedy deletion. --Philosopher Let us reason together. 21:40, 19 September 2008 (UTC)

PROD of Impact Pro Wrestling (New Zealand)

Hi. Was there a seperate PROD template on this page or was it simply deleted because of the PROD on the "companion" IPW (Australia) page? Mattlore (talk) 10:45, 20 September 2008 (UTC)

There was a separate prod on this article. Sorry for the confusion. --Philosopher Let us reason together. 11:47, 20 September 2008 (UTC)

deletion of Emergency Medical Dispatcher

Not sure why this article was deleted, it isn't a fluff article by any means, Im not quite sure how deletions like this get by.....the article had a large amount of citation to it as well as a quick [1] google search would show that it meets WP:N and WP:V the google shows that the research is by NO means WP:NOT#OR the WP:Prod was offensive to say the least, and by no means was the orginal author notified which is stated in WP:GOODFAITH Medicellis (talk) 00:35, 6 October 2008 (UTC)

I didn't place the prod on the article, User:Blaxthos placed the prod - if you wish, you can bring your concerns about notification/good faith issues to him. As for how the deletion got by - it had a prod on it for five days without anyone removing it and thus became eligible for deletion - that's how we handle a lot of the "smaller" deletion issues around here b/c WP:Articles for deletion would get too crowded if we had to take everything there. After re-examining the content of the deleted article, I have decided to restore it - though it still may be deleted in the future via Articles for Deletion. --Philosopher Let us reason together. 06:24, 6 October 2008 (UTC)
thank you for the restore, I really do appreciate it! If I may ask for suggestions on improving the article to make it less likey to go through AfD....thanks again Medicellis (talk) 23:23, 8 October 2008 (UTC)
You seem to have the basics down with the article - the article could use some wikification, a copy edit, and (eventually) expansion - stuff to make it "look" more like a Wikipedia article. Perhaps a little more discussion of the notability of the EMD would be in order, but like I said, it appears you have the fundamentals down. If you want to continue expanding/improving the article, I recommend looking at the criteria for B-class articles and then eventually asking someone at WP:EMS or WP:MED to do a peer review on the article. --Philosopher Let us reason together. 07:00, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

christopher reed picture

Hi

I took the picture from this site

http://www.christopherreed2008.com/ —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.205.46.62 (talk) 17:41, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

Thanks! --Philosopher Let us reason together. 21:06, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

Christopher Reed article

I responded on the article's talk page. A Stop at Willoughby (talk) 22:02, 11 October 2008 (UTC)

...And again. A Stop at Willoughby (talk) 15:32, 12 October 2008 (UTC)

Davenport, Iowa

Hey I am almost ready to nominate Davenport as a Featured Article. I was wondering if you could do a copy edit for me. It could use a read through with a fresh pair of eyes. Let me know! Thanks, CTJF83Talk 19:33, 14 October 2008 (UTC)

I'm going to be a little busy this evening and tomorrow - I'll try to evaluate it on/by Friday or Saturday, though. --Philosopher Let us reason together. 18:35, 15 October 2008 (UTC)
Ok, sounds good! I wanted to wait for at least another person or two (three if I'm lucky) to copy edit it, before I nomed it for FA. CTJF83Talk 18:46, 15 October 2008 (UTC)
Don't have many comments, as I haven't evaluated a town article before. But here goes:
General
  • Watch use and placement of commas. I fixed a few examples, there may be others.
History
  • Par 3 - Why mention the percentage of Germans? Were there significant number of other nationalities?

(outdent) Now there's a thought. If those sentences were moved, possibly also adding "The first settlers of Davenport were mostly Germans." from the history article, maybe that could work. I've made a change to the article to that effect. Thoughts? --Philosopher Let us reason together. 20:39, 23 October 2008 (UTC)

 Done CTJF83Talk 20:52, 23 October 2008 (UTC)

  • Par 4 - The sentence "Steamboaters saw nationwide railroads as a threat to their businesss" seems to be disconnected from the rest of the paragraph.
Geography
  • Par 3 - Need context for last sentence - is the article still talking about the '93 flood?
  • Perhaps add information about the '08 flood?

--Philosopher Let us reason together. 18:19, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

David Popescu

I don't have the knowledge to write an article about the Romanian one — but for what it's worth, it's entirely normal and valid to leave the existing topic disambiguated, even if the other article doesn't actually exist yet, if the other person is sufficiently notable that the existing one couldn't be considered the primary topic. For instance, there was already a redlink to "David Popescu" in Ministry of Interior and Administrative Reform (Romania), so if we left the Canadian one at the plain title that article would be linking to the wrong topic — but by virtue of that position, the Romanian one is sufficiently more notable than the Canadian one that it would be inappropriate to disambiguate that redlink but leave the Canadian one at the plain title. Bearcat (talk) 16:55, 17 October 2008 (UTC)

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No Problemo, Iam glad to help. It would faster if you have help so iam here :). --SkyWalker (talk) 05:10, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

We did it :D. Though i was slower due to slow net connection and plus defragmentation software has reduced cpu performances but it you need more help let me know. Iam glad to help. --SkyWalker (talk) 05:29, 19 October 2008 (UTC)
Thanks. --Philosopher Let us reason together. 05:29, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

Willie Basse

I'm just wondering why you removed the db tag and stated that notability had been asserted, with no references cited at all. If you could explain your reasoning, I'd appreciate it. Thanks! --Terrillja (talk) 06:38, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

References don't have anything do do with assertions of notability. Perhaps I misunderstood your question? --Philosopher Let us reason together. 06:41, 19 October 2008 (UTC)
I had tagged with an A7 tag, since there were no references or any way to determine notability via WP:GNG. The GNG require 3rd party sources, so resources do have to do with notability, at least how I have interpreted GNG. Hopefully my reasoning makes sense. --Terrillja (talk) 06:48, 19 October 2008 (UTC)
Ah. Now it makes sense - and you would probably be right if you had PROD'd the article or taken it to WP:AfD. However, the A7 criteria doesn't ask if the subject is notable, but if it asserts that it is notable. --Philosopher Let us reason together. 06:51, 19 October 2008 (UTC)
I have showed his notability by adding reliable sources. Schuym1 (talk) 06:57, 19 October 2008 (UTC)
3 of the 4 are dead links, but I have removed my prod for now. He sounds notable, but I have certainly seen articles before where you would have thought the artist was a worldwide phenomenon from how they were written, but actually were unheard of. Anyways, I'm wp:agf --Terrillja (talk) 07:02, 19 October 2008 (UTC)
They do work. I viewed them a few minutes ago. See this search: http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=william+basse&aq=f&oq= Schuym1 (talk) 07:05, 19 October 2008 (UTC)
A stupid admin deleted the article for advertising! Schuym1 (talk) 07:07, 19 October 2008 (UTC)
Try clicking them, they threw 404 errors, so the filepath probably had to be altered to make them work. An admin speedied the article before I could try and fix any though. --Terrillja (talk) 07:09, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

(outdent)If you don't think the article should have been deleted for advertising, I suggest you talk to the deleting admin. --Philosopher Let us reason together. 07:40, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

I just glanced at the creator's username. If I would have noticed it, I wouldn't have even tryed to save the article. Schuym1 (talk) 09:30, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

TFD comment removal

Regarding this comment removal—I think those were good faith comments. Some may sound a little strange, but they all appear to have legitimate meaning. "contains nothing"—template has no text, just a category. "all of the text is plain black font"—template has only one link, the rest is unlinked text. "it's a license plate"—template is a image license tag. Pagrashtak 13:30, 21 October 2008 (UTC)

You may be right. Those phrases are just odd enough that I didn't get that meaning out of them. --Philosopher Let us reason together. 18:43, 23 October 2008 (UTC)

Friends?

If you think that Just Friends (TV series) is not nonsense, please add a couple of external links to prove me wrong. — RHaworth (Talk | contribs) 17:39, 23 October 2008 (UTC)

I refer you to WP:NONSENSE and note that the speedy tag used specifically said that hoaxes were not eligible for that speedy criterion. --Philosopher Let us reason together. 18:41, 23 October 2008 (UTC)

San Diego Freeway

Should this article stay merge with I-405. Since most contents on SD Frwy is I-405 stuff, control cities, and community serve, basic stuff we should try to avoid. We have too little to wirte of I-5, I know SD Frwy is both I-405 and I-5, is the FRWY I hail off of.--Freewayguy 22:04, 21 October 2008 (UTC)

I'm probably not the best guy to ask about that - I know zilch about the conventions for highway articles. Sorry. --Philosopher Let us reason together. 22:34, 23 October 2008 (UTC)

Redirects from banned users

Hi Sorry about the lack of edit summaries. I was in the middle of a wearing out my rollback key as you can see from my edit history. :) That said, I tagged the redirects for deletion since they were created by meatpuppets of a banned user, User:JarlaxleArtemis AKA User:Grawp. This user has created what may well be among the most long-term and organized group of vandals I've ever seen on a wiki, recruiting copycats via Encyclopedia Dramatica. In keeping with this site's rule of no edits from banned users regardless of whether or not they're useful, I tagged those redirects for speedy deletion. The latest MO as evidenced by the blocked socks whose edits I rolled back is to do a few legit edits before cutting loose with page move vandalism. Thanks. --PMDrive1061 (talk) 16:50, 24 October 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, I got to help cleanup some of the Grawp move vandalism too.  :( And I understand that sometimes you forget to use the edit summary button, it's certainly happened to me enough times - the only reason I mentioned it is because I'll often rely on the edit summaries to determine whether an article has been speedy-tagged, Prod'ed, etc. before. Keep up the good work, Philosopher Let us reason together. 05:52, 25 October 2008 (UTC)

PROD of The Linkery

When did you PROD The Linkery? You never left a notification on my talk page, and I did not see the PROD in my watchlist. I request that you restore the article or we take the issue to DRV. --Beefyt (talk) 18:43, 24 October 2008 (UTC)

I didn't prod the article, I merely deleted it as an expired prod. The user who placed the {{prod}} tag on the article was User:Dr.frog. As far as restoring the article, I respectfully decline to do so unless you can explain how the subject of the article was notable. Meaning no offense, but I think the prod was correct in suggesting that the only assertion of notability was rather flimsy. --Philosopher Let us reason together. 06:01, 25 October 2008 (UTC)
Sorry, my mistake. The assertion of notability in this case is not based on the restaurants no-tipping policy, which is not argument for notability. Rather, the restaurant has received fairly substantial coverage in print media, most significantly in a New York Times magazine feature article. I believe this fact more than satisfies the inclusion criteria for standalone articles, according to WP:N. As for the {{prod}}, there were two things wrong with it. First, it should been an {{notability}}. According to WP:N, {{prod}} should be used when appropriate sources cannot be found to demonstrate the notability of its subject. This article was appropriately sourced to the New York Times magazine. Second, User:Dr.frog failed to place an alert on my talk page, so I was unable to respond to the {{prod}} in a timely manner. Now that the article is deleted, I don't even have access to any records that there was a {{prod}} in the first place, but I'll take your word for it. That said, please revert the article to its state before the {{prod}}, since it was completely unwarranted as the article was notable, as demonstrated. Thanks. --Beefyt (talk) 15:24, 25 October 2008 (UTC)

B.Wind wishes you peace!

User:B.Wind wishes you peace!

Spread peace and goodwill by adding {{subst:WikiPeace}} to other's talk pages with a friendly message.

Thank you for reminding me of my status as a member of the human race. After ultralong work hours and editing sessions, it is easy to forget it. Cheers... and Peace! B.Wind (talk) 02:16, 25 October 2008 (UTC)

You're welcome? I was just noting that you appeared to have made a mistake and not noticed the legitimate article buried behind the vandalism so you could avoid future mistakes, not trying to cause offense. --Philosopher Let us reason together. 06:04, 25 October 2008 (UTC)

I am guessing that it's a redlink because CfD now stands for Wikipedia:Categories for discussion, rather than "for deletion".

If it's an automatic tool, you may want to update it? - jc37 03:34, 25 October 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, sorry about that. I had just finished looking at AfD and TfD where the "D" really does stand for "deletion" so I didn't catch my mistake until a ways into the AWB run. The link should be Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2008 October 18#Category:Fictional centenarians. --Philosopher Let us reason together. 05:45, 25 October 2008 (UTC)

Chris Reed POV issue

Greetings. I undid your removal of material you thought might be in violation of POV rules. If you're going to remove POV material, I'd ask that you remove ALL the POV material. Leaving the paragraphs above the material you removed seems to indicate potential bias on your part. Thanks. --averagejoe (talk) 18:02, 25 October 2008 (UTC)

...and I redid the removal. BLP violations are not tolerated and will be removed; if you have neutral and reliably sourced information to add to the article, you may do so - otherwise it will be removed - other issues in the article notwithstanding. --Philosopher Let us reason together. 18:28, 25 October 2008 (UTC)

Bots Newsletter, August 2018

Bots Newsletter, August 2018

Greetings!

Here is the 6th issue of the Bots Newsletter. You can subscribe/unsubscribe from future newsletters by adding/removing your name from this list.

Highlights for this newsletter include:

ARBCOM
  • Nothing particular important happened. Those who care already know, those who don't know wouldn't care. The curious can dig ARBCOM archives themselves.
BAG
  • There were no changes in BAG membership since the last Bots Newsletter. Headbomb went from semi-active to active.
  • In the last 3 months, only 3 BAG members have closed requests - help is needed with the backlog.
BOTREQs and BRFAs

As of writing, we have...

Also

Discussions

These are some of the discussions that happened / are still happening since the last Bots Newsletter. Many are stale, but some are still active.

New things

Thank you! edited by: Headbomb 15:04, 18 August 2018 (UTC)

(You can subscribe or unsubscribe from future newsletters by adding or removing your name from this list.)

Tech News: 2018-34

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Changes later this week

  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 21 August. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 22 August. It will be on all wikis from 23 August (calendar).

Meetings

  • Recurrent item Advanced item You can join the technical advice meeting on IRC. During the meeting, volunteer developers can ask for advice. The meeting will be on 22 August at 15:00 (UTC). See how to join.

Future changes

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

16:46, 20 August 2018 (UTC)

Please comment on Talk:Timeline of Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections

The feedback request service is asking for participation in this request for comment on Talk:Timeline of Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections. Legobot (talk) 04:26, 25 August 2018 (UTC)

Tech News: 2018-35

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

  • You can now see moved paragraphs in diffs in the mobile view. It also works on all languages in the desktop view. [4]
  • Bureaucrats on all Wikimedia wikis can now remove the interface admin user right. [5]

Problems

  • Some diffs show lines in the wrong order. The developers are working on fixing it. [6]

Changes later this week

  • The message you see when you thank a user will change. This is to make it easier to understand. [7]
  • AWB will stop adding using AWB in the edit summary. Instead it will add a tag that says AWB. [8]
  • Advanced item Some abuse filter variables have changed. They are now easier to understand for non-experts. The old variables will still work but filter editors are encouraged to replace them with the new ones. You can find the list of changed variables on mediawiki.org. They have a note which says Deprecated. Use ... instead. An example is article_text which is now page_title. [9]
  • Advanced item Abuse filters can now use how old a page is. The variable is page_age. [10]
  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 28 August. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 29 August. It will be on all wikis from 30 August (calendar).

Meetings

  • Recurrent item You can join the next meeting with the Editing team. During the meeting, you can tell developers which bugs you think are the most important. The meeting will be on 28 August at 18:30 (UTC). See how to join.
  • Recurrent item Advanced item You can join the technical advice meeting on IRC. During the meeting, volunteer developers can ask for advice. The meeting will be on 29 August at 15:00 (UTC). See how to join.

Future changes

  • Because of a data centre test you will be able to read but not edit the wikis for up to an hour on 12 September and 10 October. This will start at 14:00 (UTC). You might lose edits if you try to save during this time. The time when you can't edit might be shorter than an hour. You can read more about this.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

16:16, 27 August 2018 (UTC)

The Signpost: 30 August 2018

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 02:04, 30 August 2018 (UTC)

WikiProject X Newsletter • Issue 12

Newsletter • August 2018

This month: WikiProject X: The resumption

Work has resumed on WikiProject X and CollaborationKit, backed by a successfully funded Project Grant. For more information on the current status and planned work, please see this month's issue of the newsletter!

-— Isarra ༆ 22:24, 30 August 2018 (UTC)

WikiCup 2018 September newsletter

The fourth round of the 2018 WikiCup has now come to an end. The eight users who made it to the final round had to score a minimum of 422 points to qualify, with the top score in the round being 4869 points. The leaders in round 4 were:

  • South Carolina Courcelles scored a magnificent 4869 points, with 92 good articles on Olympics-related themes. Courcelles' bonus points alone exceeded the total score of any of the other contestants!
  • Hel, Poland Kees08 was second with 1155 points, including a high-scoring featured article for Neil Armstrong, two good topics and some Olympics-related good articles.
  • Scotland Cas Liber, with 1066 points, was in third place this round, with two featured articles and a good article, all on natural history topics.
  • Other contestants who qualified for the final round were Marshall Islands Nova Crystallis, Republic of Texas Iazyges, Cascadia (independence movement) SounderBruce, Wales Kosack and United States Ceranthor.

During round four, 6 featured articles and 164 good articles were promoted by WikiCup contestants, 13 articles were included in good topics and 143 good article reviews were performed. There were also 10 "in the news" contributions on the main page and 53 "did you knows". Congratulations to all who participated! It was a generally high-scoring and productive round and I think we can expect a highly competitive finish to the competition.

Remember that any content promoted after the end of round 4 but before the start of round 5 can be claimed in round 5. Remember too that you must claim your points within 10 days of "earning" them. If you are concerned that your nomination will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on Wikipedia:WikiCup/Reviews. It would be helpful if this list could be cleared of any items no longer relevant. If you want to help out with the WikiCup, please do your bit to keep down the review backlogs! Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck, and let the best editor win! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. Godot13, Sturmvogel 66, Vanamonde and Cwmhiraeth. MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 18:31, 1 September 2018 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – September 2018

News and updates for administrators from the past month (August 2018).

Administrator changes

added None
removed Asterion • Crisco 1492 • KF • Kudpung • Liz • Randykitty • Spartaz
renamed Optimist on the run → Voice of Clam

Interface administrator changes

added Amorymeltzer • Mr. Stradivarius • MusikAnimal • MSGJ • TheDJ • Xaosflux

Guideline and policy news

  • Following a "stop-gap" discussion, six users have temporarily been made interface administrators while discussion is ongoing for a more permanent process for assigning the permission. Interface administrators are now the only editors allowed to edit sitewide CSS and JavaScript pages, as well as CSS/JS pages in another user's userspace. Previously, all administrators had this ability. The right can be granted and revoked by bureaucrats.

Technical news

  • Because of a data centre test you will be able to read but not edit the wikis for up to an hour on 12 September and 10 October. This will start at 14:00 (UTC). You might lose edits if you try to save during this time. The time when you can't edit might be shorter than an hour.
  • Some abuse filter variables have changed. They are now easier to understand for non-experts. The old variables will still work but filter editors are encouraged to replace them with the new ones. You can find the list of changed variables on mediawiki.org. They have a note which says Deprecated. Use ... instead. An example is article_text which is now page_title.
  • Abuse filters can now use how old a page is. The variable is page_age.

Arbitration

  • The Arbitration Committee has resolved to perform a round of Checkuser and Oversight appointments. The usernames of all applicants will be shared with the Functionaries team, and they will be requested to assist in the vetting process. The deadline to submit an application is 23:59 UTC, 12 September, and the candidates that move forward will be published on-wiki for community comments on 18 September.
Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 23:23, 2 September 2018 (UTC)

Tech News: 2018-36

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

  • There is a new user right for users who can edit CSS and JavaScript for the entire wiki. Before this all admins could edit CSS and JavaScript. This was a security risk. This group is called interface administrators. Administrators can delete user CSS and JavaScript pages. [11][12]
  • There will be an A/B test on the Wikipedia mobile website. It starts this week. It tests how we show templates that show information about an article. The test will last two weeks. [13][14]
  • You can now use different CSS rules for different skins when you edit templates. This is because of TemplateStyles. [15]
  • wp10 in ORES is now called articlequality. [16]
  • When you get a new message on your talk page you get a yellow message in the toolbar. The preference to show or not show this has been removed. [17]

Problems

  • UploadWizard had problems with campaigns. Users could not upload files. This has now been fixed. [18]
  • You can get a notification when a link is made to a page you created. This has not worked since June. It was fixed last week. [19]

Changes later this week

  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 4 September. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 5 September. It will be on all wikis from 6 September (calendar).

Meetings

Future changes

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

16:47, 3 September 2018 (UTC)

Tech News: 2018-37

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

  • When you added or edited a template with the visual editor the input boxes were very big. This has been fixed. The input boxes will now be smaller until you click on them. Then they will change size to fit the text. [21]

Problems

  • Some diffs showed lines in the wrong order. This was fixed last week. [22]
  • Marking a cross-wiki notification as read didn't work every time. The other wiki was not updated. This has now been fixed. [23]
  • <maplink> did not work for a few days. This was because of a bug. This has now been fixed. [24]
  • {{subst:REVISIONUSER}} is used by some templates. For a period edits saved with {{subst:REVISIONUSER}} would save the previous user's name and not your username. This is now fixed. Edits made before the bug was fixed will still be wrong and need to be corrected. [25]
  • When you move a page the title still shows the old page name. The developers are working on fixing this. [26]

Changes later this week

  • Because of a data centre test you will be able to read but not edit the wikis for up to an hour on 12 September and 10 October. This will start at 14:00 (UTC). You might lose edits if you try to save during this time. The time when you can't edit might be shorter than an hour. You can read more about this.
  • Because of the data centre test there will be no new version of MediaWiki this week. Changes for this week will come next week instead.

Meetings

  • Recurrent item You can join the next meeting with the Editing team. During the meeting, you can tell developers which bugs you think are the most important. The meeting will be on 11 Septmber at 18:30 (UTC). See how to join.
  • Recurrent item Advanced item You can join the technical advice meeting on IRC. During the meeting, volunteer developers can ask for advice. The meeting will be on 12 September at 15:00 (UTC). See how to join.

Future changes

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

22:35, 10 September 2018 (UTC)

Tech News: 2018-38

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

  • The Wikimedia Commons mobile app has a new version. Images uploaded using Nearby are now automatically added to the associated Wikidata item. You can browse other images on Commons. You can see your achievements and your upload statistics. It has also fixed some bugs. [27]
  • Advanced item MediaWiki web requests now have a time limit of 60 seconds for GET requests and 200 seconds for POST requests. [28]

Problems

  • You could not see the menu on the notifications page on the mobile version. This has now been fixed. [29]

Changes later this week

  • Special:AncientPages can hide disambiguation pages. [30]
  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 18 September. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 19 September. It will be on all wikis from 20 September (calendar).

Meetings

Future changes

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21:58, 17 September 2018 (UTC)

Tech News: 2018-39

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Changes later this week

  • The preferences form will change to use the standard look. If you see any problems please report them on Phabricator. [31]
  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 25 September. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 26 September. It will be on all wikis from 27 September (calendar).

Meetings

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15:22, 24 September 2018 (UTC)

The Signpost: 1 October 2018

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 00:45, 1 October 2018 (UTC)

Tech News: 2018-40

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

  • Ordinary pages can no longer be loaded as javascript. You could do this using ?action=raw&ctype=text/javascript in the URL. Only fully protected pages in the MediaWiki: namespace or user javascript subpages can be loaded as javascript now. This is for better security. [32][33]

Problems

  • New and updated translations from translatewiki.net will not reach the wikis for a while. You can still translate messages on translatewiki.net. The Wikimedia wikis will be updated with the new translations later. This is because of work on the translation system. [34][35]

Changes later this week

  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 2 October. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 3 October. It will be on all wikis from 4 October (calendar).

Meetings

  • Recurrent item Advanced item You can join the technical advice meeting on IRC. During the meeting, volunteer developers can ask for advice. The meeting will be on 3 October at 15:00 (UTC). See how to join.
  • You can join the meeting with the Wikimedia Foundation Search Platform team. The meeting will be on 3 October at 15:00 UTC. See how to join if you want to know how the search function works or have questions.

Future changes

  • Because of a data centre test you will be able to read but not edit the wikis for up to an hour on 10 October. This will start at 14:00 (UTC). You might lose edits if you try to save during this time. The time when you can't edit might be shorter than an hour. You can read more about this.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

17:34, 1 October 2018 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – October 2018

News and updates for administrators from the past month (September 2018).

Administrator changes

added Justlettersandnumbers • L235
removed Bgwhite • HorsePunchKid • J Greb • KillerChihuahua • Rami R • Winhunter

Interface administrator changes

added Cyberpower678 • Deryck Chan • Oshwah • Pharos • Ragesoss • Ritchie333

Oversight changes

removed Guerillero • NativeForeigner • Snowolf • Xeno

Guideline and policy news

Technical news

  • Partial blocks should be available for testing in October on the Test Wikipedia and the Beta-Cluster. This new feature allows admins to block users from editing specific pages and in the near-future, namespaces and uploading files. You can expect more updates and an invitation to help with testing once it is available.
  • The Foundations' Anti-Harassment Tools team is currently looking for input on how to measure the effectiveness of blocks. This is in particular related to how they will measure the success of the aforementioned partial blocks.
  • Because of a data centre test, you will be able to read but not edit the Wikimedia projects for up to an hour on 10 October. This will start at 14:00 (UTC). You might lose edits if you try to save during this time.

Arbitration

  • The Arbitration Committee has, by motion, amended the procedure on functionary inactivity.
  • The community consultation for 2018 CheckUser and Oversight appointments has concluded. Appointments will be made by October 11.
  • Following a request for comment, the size of the Arbitration Committee will be decreased to 13 arbitrators, starting in 2019. Additionally, the minimum support percentage required to be appointed to a two-year term on ArbCom has been increased to 60%. ArbCom candidates who receive between 50% and 60% support will be appointed to one-year terms instead.
  • Nominations for the 2018 Arbitration Committee Electoral Commission are being accepted until 12 October. These are the editors who help run the ArbCom election smoothly. If you are interested in volunteering for this role, please consider nominating yourself.
Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 20:13, 5 October 2018 (UTC)

Tech News: 2018-41

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

Problems

  • There was a problem when you copied and pasted from a table with the visual editor. It could add href where it shouldn't be. This has now been fixed. [37]

Changes later this week

  • Because of a data centre test you will be able to read but not edit the wikis for up to an hour on 10 October. This will start at 14:00 (UTC). You might lose edits if you try to save during this time. The time when you can't edit might be shorter than an hour. You can read more about this.
  • Because of the data centre test there will be no new version of MediaWiki this week. Changes for this week will come next week instead.

Meetings

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

23:38, 8 October 2018 (UTC)

Tech News: 2018-42

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Problems

  • Some pages, edits and users disappeared for a short while after the server switch. Missing content and users was fixed within a day. Some preferences and other things might take a few more days to fix. [38]
  • Wikis are updated with new and updated translations from translatewiki.net again. This will happen once a week. The developers are working on fixing the problem so we can have translation updates more often again. [39]

Changes later this week

  • When you create an abuse filter that prevents edits you can now write a specific error message for it. Before this all abuse filters that prevented edits had the same error message. [40]
  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 16 October. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 17 October. It will be on all wikis from 18 October (calendar).

Meetings

  • There will be no more meetings with the Editing team. This is because not enough Wikimedians were interested. To tell developers which bugs you think are the most important you can use Phabricator as normal. [41]
  • Recurrent item Advanced item You can join the technical advice meeting on IRC. During the meeting, volunteer developers can ask for advice. The meeting will be on 17 October at 15:00 (UTC). See how to join.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

22:40, 15 October 2018 (UTC)

Tech News: 2018-43

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Changes later this week

  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 23 October. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 24 October. It will be on all wikis from 25 October (calendar).

Meetings

Future changes

  • The Community Wishlist Survey begins on 29 October. The survey decides what the Community Tech team will work on. You can post proposals from 29 October to 11 November. You can vote on proposals from 16 November to 30 November.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

23:11, 22 October 2018 (UTC)

The Signpost: 28 October 2018

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 19:10, 28 October 2018 (UTC)

Tech News: 2018-44

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

  • You can post proposals for the Community Wishlist Survey. The survey decides what the Community Tech team will work on. You can post proposals until 11 November. You can vote on proposals from 16 November to 30 November.
  • Advanced item The wikis now have a content security policy report. This means that you might get a warning in your javascript console when you load external resources in your user scripts. For security reasons it is recommended that you don't do this. It might not be possible to load external resources in your scripts in the future. [42]

Problems

  • Your watchlist can show which changes you have already seen. This did not work for a few days. It has been fixed. [43]

Changes later this week

  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 30 October. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 31 October. It will be on all wikis from 1 November (calendar).
  • The 2006 wikitext editor is no longer available. It will be removed from Special:Preferences. It has not been the standard editor for a long time. It was replaced by the 2010 wikitext editor. [44][45]

Meetings

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

20:08, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – November 2018

News and updates for administrators from the past month (October 2018).

Guideline and policy news

Technical news

  • Partial blocks is now available for testing on the Test Wikipedia. The new functionality allows you to block users from editing specific pages. Bugs may exist and can be reported on the local talk page or on Meta. A discussion regarding deployment to English Wikipedia will be started by community liaisons sometime in the near future.
  • A user script is now available to quickly review unblock requests.
  • The 2019 Community Wishlist Survey is now accepting new proposals until November 11, 2018. The results of this survey will determine what software the Wikimedia Foundation's Community Tech team will work on next year. Voting on the proposals will take place from November 16 to November 30, 2018. Specifically, there is a proposal category for admins and stewards that may be of interest.

Arbitration

  • Eligible editors will be invited to nominate themselves as candidates in the 2018 Arbitration Committee Elections starting on November 4 until November 13. Voting will begin on November 19 and last until December 2.
  • The Arbitration Committee's email address has changed to arbcom-en@wikimedia.org. Other email lists, such as functionaries-en and clerks-l, remain unchanged.
Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 07:19, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

Tech News: 2018-45

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

Changes later this week

  • You can choose to see edit conflicts in a two-column view. This is a beta feature. You can find it in your preferences. The interface for the two-column edit conflict will change. You can read more.
  • When you edit with the visual editor you can use the "Automatic" citation tab. This helps you generate citations. You will now be able to write plain text citations or the title of a journal article or a book in this tab. This will search the Crossref and WorldCat databases and add the top result. [47]
  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 6 November. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 7 November. It will be on all wikis from 8 November (calendar).

Meetings

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

17:28, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

Tech News: 2018-46

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

  • Some old mobile browsers can use the watchlist again. This has not worked for a while. These browsers are called grade C browsers. This helps for example Windows Phone 8.1 with Internet Explorer and Lumia 535 with Windows 10. [48]

Problems

  • You can choose to see edit conflicts in a two-column view. This is a beta feature. You can find it in your preferences. Users who use this view saw the edit conflict resolution page when they wanted to see a preview. This has been fixed. [49][50][51]

Changes later this week

  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 13 November. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 14 November. It will be on all wikis from 15 November (calendar).

Meetings

Future changes

  • You can use the content translation tool to translate articles. The developers are working on a new version. One of the changes will be a maintenance category. Articles where users add a lot of text from machine translation without changing it will be in that category. This is so the community can review it. The users will also have been warned before they publish the article that it has a lot of unchanged text from machine translations. [52]

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

19:22, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

ArbCom 2018 election voter message

Hello, Philosopher. Voting in the 2018 Arbitration Committee elections is now open until 23.59 on Sunday, 3 December. All users who registered an account before Sunday, 28 October 2018, made at least 150 mainspace edits before Thursday, 1 November 2018 and are not currently blocked are eligible to vote. Users with alternate accounts may only vote once.

The Arbitration Committee is the panel of editors responsible for conducting the Wikipedia arbitration process. It has the authority to impose binding solutions to disputes between editors, primarily for serious conduct disputes the community has been unable to resolve. This includes the authority 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 in the 2018 election, please review the candidates and submit your choices on the voting page. MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 18:42, 19 November 2018 (UTC)

Tech News: 2018-47

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

  • You can vote on proposals in the Community Wishlist Survey. The survey decides what the Community Tech team will work on. You can vote until 30 November.
  • Advanced item There is an A/B test for sameAs data. This is to make it easier to find the right information with a search engine. This changes the metadata for a wiki page. It doesn't change how the page looks. [53]

Changes later this week

  • There is no new MediaWiki version this week.

Meetings

Future changes

  • The Wikimedia wikis use templates to show readers there are problems with the content on some pages. For example if there are no sources or the page needs to be rewritten. The mobile website will soon show more information when you use these templates. Some templates may need to be updated. [54]
  • The Education Program extension was removed from all Wikimedia projects. The database tables used by the extension will be archived. This will happen in a month. If you want the information on your wiki you should move it to a normal wiki page. [55]

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

23:28, 19 November 2018 (UTC)

Tech News: 2018-48

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

  • On wikis with translatable pages you could create a mess when you moved a page that had translatable subpages. A subpage is when you use / to create a new page: /wiki/Page/Subpage. The subpages would be moved but not the translations. The subpages are no longer automatically be moved. This is to make it safer to move pages. [56]

Changes later this week

  • The advanced search interface will be available by default on all Wikimedia wikis. It makes it easier to use some of the special search functions that most editors don't know exist. It's already active on German, Farsi, Arabic and Hungarian Wikipedia. [57]
  • Special:UnusedCategories show empty categories with no files or other categories. You can soon choose to not show soft redirect categories or some maintenance categories there. You can do this with the magic word __EXPECTUNUSEDCATEGORY__. [58]
  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 27 November. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 28 November. It will be on all wikis from 29 November (calendar).

Meetings

Future changes

  • Advanced item The mw.util.jsMessage() function was deprecated in 2012. It will be removed next week. Look for the warning Use of "mw.util.jsMessage" is deprecated in the JavaScript console to know if you use an affected script or gadget. If you are a gadget maintainer you should check if your JavaScript code contains mw.util.jsMessage. There is a migration guide. It explains how to use mw.notify instead. [59]

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

22:22, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

The Signpost: 1 December 2018

* Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 04:47, 1 December 2018 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – December 2018

News and updates for administrators from the past month (November 2018).

Administrator changes

readded Al Ameer son • Randykitty • Spartaz
removed Boson • Daniel J. Leivick • Efe • Esanchez7587 • Fred Bauder • Garzo • Martijn Hoekstra • Orangemike

Interface administrator changes

removedDeryck Chan

Guideline and policy news

  • Following a request for comment, the Mediation Committee is now closed and will no longer be accepting case requests.
  • A request for comment is in progress to determine whether members of the Bot Approvals Group should satisfy activity requirements in order to remain in that role.
  • A request for comment is in progress regarding whether to change the administrator inactivity policy, such that administrators "who have made no logged administrative actions for at least 12 months may be desysopped". Currently, the policy states that administrators "who have made neither edits nor administrative actions for at least 12 months may be desysopped".
  • A proposal has been made to temporarily restrict editing of the Main Page to interface administrators in order to mitigate the impact of compromised accounts.

Technical news

Arbitration

Miscellaneous

  • In late November, an attacker compromised multiple accounts, including at least four administrator accounts, and used them to vandalize Wikipedia. If you have ever used your current password on any other website, you should change it immediately. Sharing the same password across multiple websites makes your account vulnerable, especially if your password was used on a website that suffered a data breach. As these incidents have shown, these concerns are not pure fantasies.
  • Wikipedia policy requires administrators to have strong passwords. To further reinforce security, administrators should also consider enabling two-factor authentication. A committed identity can be used to verify that you are the true account owner in the event that your account is compromised and/or you are unable to log in.

Obituaries

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 03:36, 3 December 2018 (UTC)

Tech News: 2018-49

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes

  • Admins will not be able to unblock themselves if they are blocked by someone other than themselves. This is because it can cause damage if someone else takes over an admin account and other admins can't block them. If this is a problem for your community you can report it on Phabricator. You can also ask questions on Meta. There is a discussion on Phabricator about how to solve this if two admins fight with each other on a small wiki. [60]
  • Small SVG images are now bigger when you see them in MediaViewer. [61]
  • You can go to a section from the edit summary by clicking on the section name. Before this you had to click on the arrow. [62]
  • When you jumped to a footnote that was referenced several times in an article it could be difficult to see where you were in the text. Now there are jump marks and highlights to help you find your way back. [63][64]

Changes later this week

  • There is no new MediaWiki version this week.

Meetings

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

16:12, 3 December 2018 (UTC)

Tech News: 2018-50

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Changes later this week

  • Recurrent item The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 11 December. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 12 December. It will be on all wikis from 13 December (calendar).

Meetings

Future changes

  • New accounts will need passwords that are at least 8 characters long. Admins, interface admins, bureaucrats, oversighters, CentralNotice admins, global renamers, check users, stewards and some other user groups will need passwords that are at least 10 characters long. This is because an attacker could cause damage to the wikis if they took over these accounts. [65][66]
  • When you hover over a footnote it will show you the reference as a pop-up. This is so you don't have to jump down to the bottom of the page to see a reference. This will happen in 2019. Some wikis already have gadgets that do this. You will be able to turn it off. [67]

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

17:33, 10 December 2018 (UTC)

Permission for Rollback rights

Hi, I'm willing to get rollback rights to prevent unwanted edits. I can re-edit without rollback rights but it takes more time and I have to check properly 2-3 times. With rollback rights, it will become easier for me and thus for Wikipedia.

Shivkarandholiya12 (talk) 18:23, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:Philosopher/Archive_6&oldid=1196142165"