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Resolved

The web domain for the official German music charts has been changed without a proper redirect. These urls are being used by templates {{albumchart}} and {{singlechart}} and can be found on lots of pages. So updating the links may require a bot. If someone's bot has free capacity to do this, please perform the following operation:

On article pages, change http://www.charts.de/... → http://www.officialcharts.de/... (case insensitive).

Thank you. De728631 (talk) 14:30, 5 July 2014 (UTC)

De728631 Maybe we should use templates for this link in the future? -- Magioladitis (talk) 14:46, 5 July 2014 (UTC)
3,663 links. -- Magioladitis (talk) 14:48, 5 July 2014 (UTC)
 Doing... -- Magioladitis (talk) 14:57, 5 July 2014 (UTC)
Thank you for taking the job. I don't think though that we need to create a separate template like {{allmusic}} for officialcharts.de. This change of domain seems to have been a unique event and apart from that they kept the entire structure of their website. De728631 (talk) 15:04, 5 July 2014 (UTC)

De728631 should the publisher change from charts.de to officialcharts.de too? -- Magioladitis (talk) 17:08, 5 July 2014 (UTC)

De728631 I think we are basically done. The others are, most probably, through a template. -- Magioladitis (talk) 00:43, 6 July 2014 (UTC)

I just updated {{singlechart}}: 847 references with that change. There is a redirect from charts.de to officialcharts.de, so there's no particular rush in taking care of stragglers.—Kww(talk) 00:59, 6 July 2014 (UTC)
Kww thanks. I also updated {{allmusic}}. We are now done. -- Magioladitis (talk) 06:47, 6 July 2014 (UTC)
I also did some null edits but since there is a redirect that works there is no rush. -- Magioladitis (talk) 06:48, 6 July 2014 (UTC)
Thanks again. I have updated the {{albumcharts}} template so it now displays the correct publisher. De728631 (talk) 15:27, 6 July 2014 (UTC)

I did some more null edits because I also have missed some pages. 337 pages left. Most of them in non-article space. -- Magioladitis (talk) 14:49, 7 July 2014 (UTC)

WikiProject Architecture taskforce Historic houses tagging

Resolved

We need a bot to automatically tag articles for WikiProject Architecture/Historic houses task force. If they are already tagged for WikiProject Architecture than only add the taskforce tag "|historic-houses=yes". If not than add the WikiProject Architecture banner as well. Tag all articles in Category:Country houses and subcategories, except Category:Films set in country houses (no consensus whether is in scope) and Category:Castles in Scotland (separate WikiProject). Relevant WikiProject discussion is here. --ELEKHHT 02:35, 1 July 2014 (UTC)

@Elekhh: Please follow the steps at User:Yobot#WikiProject_tagging, then get back to us here. --Mdann52talk to me! 15:15, 1 July 2014 (UTC)

@Elekhh and Mdann52:: Elekhh is a member of the WikiProject, posted here and in bot's page. I also need to see that it was posted on WikiProject's page and I'll start doing the task after 3 days. I would help if the exact categories where given to me (no subcategories) because I've seen a lot of "ooops I forgot to exclude this one" cases. Thanks, Magioladitis (talk) 07:05, 5 July 2014 (UTC)

I already linked to the discussion at the WikiProject's page, so I'm not sure what else is expected. Listing all included sub-categories will take some time as there are hundreds of small categories. Is there no way to do it simply per above? Would you like them placed on a particular sub-page? Alternatively I could only list the ones with a larger number of articles as otherwise is almost easier to do full tagging manually. --ELEKHHT 12:50, 5 July 2014 (UTC)
@Elekhh: Post the list of categories anywhere it suits you and provide me the link. I'll do the rest. -- Magioladitis (talk) 12:53, 5 July 2014 (UTC)
Created a list at Wikipedia:WikiProject Architecture/Historic houses task force/Scope. Let me know if this suits you. --ELEKHHT 05:43, 6 July 2014 (UTC)

Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Architecture/Historic_houses_task_force#WikiProject_taskforce_tagging posted in task force talk page. I'll start tomorrow or the day after tomorrow of there are no disagreements. Thanks, Magioladitis (talk) 07:06, 6 July 2014 (UTC)

Starting. -- Magioladitis (talk) 21:50, 12 July 2014 (UTC)

5462 pages loaded. 3769 without the tag. -- Magioladitis (talk) 21:55, 12 July 2014 (UTC)

I'll have first to normalise pages with redirects as step 1. I'll finish this and continue in about 8 hours. -- Magioladitis (talk) 22:24, 12 July 2014 (UTC)

3769 tagged. Now starting the 1128 pages that that the banner but not the task force parameter. -- Magioladitis (talk) 09:37, 13 July 2014 (UTC)

@Elekhh: Done! -- Magioladitis (talk) 21:48, 13 July 2014 (UTC)

Group Bot

Is their a bot that groups wikiproject templates on a talk page into a multiple wikiprojects banner if more than two. If not their should be. Another job could be putting clean-up tags under multiple issues header if more than three (if not already done). NickGibson3900 (Talk - Cont.) 10:20, 12 July 2014 (UTC)

@NickGibson3900: BattyBot's task 21 adds {{WikiProjectBannerShell}}, and it running now. Bots that include AWB general fixes when they do other tasks will add {{Multiple issues}} if there are two or more cleanup tags on a page - I'm not aware of any that have this as their primary job. GoingBatty (talk) 12:27, 12 July 2014 (UTC)
Example of the first --Redrose64 (talk) 09:32, 13 July 2014 (UTC)

replace

I would like to request a bot that tags every page with {{User:NickGibson3900/Aus Worlds 2013}} to be tagged with {{Australian athletes at the 2013 World Championships in Athletics}}. This is because I would like all these pages together under 1 template. Thanks.

P.S. I'm sure this job can be added to an existing bot NickGibson3900 (Talk - Cont.) 18:54, 12 July 2014 (UTC)

@NickGibson3900:  Done --Mdann52talk to me! 11:47, 13 July 2014 (UTC)

remove image from articles

Resolved

File:'Head of a Woman', oil on panel painting by Sebastiano del Piombo (Sebastiano Luciani)2.jpg should be removed from all editions of Wikipedia, because it has NOTHING to do with Bona Sforza. --Ghirla-трёп- 06:47, 13 July 2014 (UTC)

@Ghirla: Needs wider discussion. --Mdann52talk to me! 11:38, 13 July 2014 (UTC)
What's to discuss? This is an idealized female portrait which some wiki-vandal (or fool) pasted into our article about the Queen of Poland. It was removed from that article a long time ago. Now it's time to remove it from other wikipedias too. --Ghirla-трёп- 15:36, 13 July 2014 (UTC)
P.S. The fake picture may be replaced with an authentic portrait such as File:Cranach the Younger Bona Sforza.jpg. --Ghirla-трёп- 15:41, 13 July 2014 (UTC)
@Ghirla: this page is not to request a global bot. Even then, IMO, this task is not appropriate for the bot; It is probably best to ask before removing the image. Therefore Declined Not a good task for a bot.. --Mdann52talk to me! 15:48, 13 July 2014 (UTC)

@Ghirla: It looks like the image from Commons is used on about 15 total pages on all wikipedias. If you are feeling bold and you believe that you are correct, just remove it. A bot is not needed for 15 simple edits. – Jonesey95 (talk) 17:27, 13 July 2014 (UTC)

Trams

Just wondering if @GoingBatty: was still working on the bot request for tagging pages. The archive can be found here.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Bot_requests/Archive_60#Trams

@Fremantle99: When I read the discussions you provided, I didn't see enough of a consensus to make me feel comfortable enough to make lots of edits. GoingBatty (talk) 01:54, 16 July 2014 (UTC)

Replacing toolserver functions

With the Toolserver now dead, various non-migrated processes have now stopped, WP:EDITS being an example. Would anyone be willing to take them over? ϢereSpielChequers 22:52, 16 July 2014 (UTC)

SuggestBot for articles you choose

I would like to request a bot like SuggestBot but the user can request articles so they can easily compare a set of articles. NickGibson3900 (Talk - Cont.) 03:58, 18 July 2014 (UTC)

Category:K League players

K League, The top division of South Korea, was renamed K League Classic in 2013 and now K League commonly means all professional leagues in Korea including first division K League Classic and second division K League Challenge, not specific a league. In other words, 'K League Classic players' include 'K League players' because two leagues are not different, just renamed. So all pages under Category:K League players should be moved to Category:K League Classic players.--z4617925 (talk) 01:29, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

@Z4617925: Once this is done, Category:K League players would have no entries. Should a change be made to the category structure so the empty category could be deleted? Thanks! GoingBatty (talk) 14:41, 20 July 2014 (UTC)
@GoingBatty: Yes, Category:K League players should be deleted after all pages in the category are moved to Category:K League Classic players.--z4617925 (talk) 01:56, 21 July 2014 (UTC)
@Z4617925: Once the category is deleted, are there any other changes needed to the category structure? Also, could you please provide a link to the discussion where consensus was formed to make this change? Thanks! GoingBatty (talk) 02:22, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

Replace literal hard spaces with corresponding HTML entity

Resolved

Per Wikipedia_talk:AutoWikiBrowser/Feature_requests/Archive_10#Replace_literal_hard_spaces_with_corresponding_HTML_entity I would like to replace hard spaces with normal spaces unless nbsp is required using AWB's logic. The list is based on a db scan to the June dump and contains ~20,000 pages. Any disagreements? -- Magioladitis (talk) 16:09, 22 July 2014 (UTC)

Um.... I think that falls afoul of Wikipedia:COSMETICBOT. Please refrain from doing this without securing a positive consensus establishing the exception to the rule. Hasteur (talk) 16:28, 22 July 2014 (UTC)
Hasteur, I think that is is this not more cosmetic as removing invisible characters that many bots are doing for a long time now. Since this change is instructed by Manual of Style and is not just a change for readbility is more than cosmetic. -- Magioladitis (talk) 18:47, 22 July 2014 (UTC)
Does it cause a difference in the visible prose you change? No? It's a cosmetic edit and therefore should not be done by itself. If the activity is done as part of some sort of bot operation, that's a different argument, but should not be done for the sake of fixing this cosmetic error. Hasteur (talk) 19:12, 22 July 2014 (UTC)
I would ask Magioladitis to rephrase the description of this bot. The description here makes it seem like the Unicode non-breaking space will usually be replaced with a normal space, but upon reading the linked post in Wikipedia talk:AutoWikiBrowser/Feature requests it seems that the Unicode non-breaking space will usually be replaced with the HTML entity; only if the HTML entity is invalid will it be replaced by a normal space. Jc3s5h (talk) 21:03, 22 July 2014 (UTC)
Jc3s5h you are right. Please add feedback at User_talk:Magioladitis#No-break_spaces. -- Magioladitis (talk)

I receive feedback/suggestions/complains on my talk page. Feel free to raise your opinion there. -- Magioladitis (talk) 06:07, 23 July 2014 (UTC) I abandoned the idea to perform this task as a bot task for now. AWB's logic expanded to cover some of these cases. I am working manually to gather more feedback. Please post any feedback/suggestions/complains on my talk page. Thanks. -- Magioladitis (talk) 10:41, 24 July 2014 (UTC)

Task done manually. -- Magioladitis (talk) 22:50, 4 August 2014 (UTC)

Placing from category to another category

Resolved

I would like to ask for replacing all subcategories from Category:Video games developed in Japan by company to Category:Video games by Japanese company, from Category:Video games developed in the United States by company to Category:Video games by the United States company and from Category:Video games developed in the United Kingdom by company to Category:Video games by the United Kingdom company. --Bedivere.cs (talk) 22:02, 17 July 2014 (UTC)

Bedivere.cs was this discussed on Cfd first? Can you provide us a link? Otherwise, you should go via WP:CfD first. -- Magioladitis (talk) 22:15, 17 July 2014 (UTC)
Task done. -- Magioladitis (talk) 17:20, 26 July 2014 (UTC)

Tagging for WikiProject Athletics

Resolved

Per instructions in my bot's page, the community should be notified for mass tagging to reduce errors. Tagging for WikiProject Athletics will start in 3 days in the categories given to me by User:Sillyfolkboy, a lead member of the project. The list can be found at Wikipedia:WikiProject Athletics/Categories. Please report any disagreements/doubts/concerns on my talk page. -- Magioladitis (talk) 17:34, 26 July 2014 (UTC)

Task done. -- Magioladitis (talk) 22:49, 4 August 2014 (UTC)

Marking inactive users on the list of members of a WikiProject

At various places on wikiprojects, there are some lists of members who signed up for some specific task or get involved in the project. I am thinking of a bot that could review some of these lists, check the date of the last contribution of each member, and if it is older than a year ago (say), then mark this user as inactive, either by moving him/her to a separate list, or simply add a small text after the name of the contributor. The lists on which the bot operates would be added to the bot on an individual basis (if the corresponding team is interested). The bot would not generate much traffic as the task could be performed every week, for instance, because we don't need to have a very up-to-date result.

I can write the code for this bot, but I want to check first that it hasn't been done already. What do you think? -- Pintoch (talk) 14:32, 29 July 2014 (UTC)

  • Just a thought, but what may define inactive for one project may be very active for annother (or vice versa). If you do this you need to support a great many forms of "inactive" (Last contribution, Last edit to a page inside a related article to the project, Last discussion participated on in the project's talk page, etc.). There's also Dispenser's User Activity script that sounds like it does most of what you propose to do. Hasteur (talk) 15:17, 29 July 2014 (UTC)
@Hasteur: Thanks for the link, that's indeed very close to what I am looking for! You are right, the notion of "inactive member" is hard to define. But I think that for a start, simply considering that a user is inactive when he hasn't made a single contribution to the entire English Wikipedia would be already very useful. The users who remain active on another unrelated project might still think of removing themselves from the list. Running the User Activity script on Wikipedia:WikiProject_Computer_science/Participants rules out 128 participants. --Pintoch (talk) 16:18, 29 July 2014 (UTC)

Is automated recategorization possible yet?

According to Wikipedia's recategorization how-to guide: Pages in the category namespace can be moved but in a non-automated way which requires considerable post-move cleanup.

Does Wikipedia have any automated process for category renaming, or is it still necessary to re-categorize all pages manually after a category name has been changed? Jarble (talk) 19:48, 31 July 2014 (UTC)

@Jarble: It can be done fairly easily by a bot (eg. at WP:CfD, bit it would be far harder on a MW level to do it automatically. --Mdann52talk to me! 18:47, 3 August 2014 (UTC)
@Mdann52: Is it necessary to update the recategorization guide, then? Jarble (talk) 19:27, 3 August 2014 (UTC)

For a while now, I've been replacing mass search&replaces of largely bare external links that look like this:

http://www.timaticweb.com/cgi-bin/tim_website_client.cgi?SpecData=1&VISA=&page=visa&NA=<nationality two-letter country code>&AR=<00 or residence two-letter country code>&PASSTYPES=PASS&DE=<destination two-letter country code>&user=<something>&subuser=<something>

...and which are better handled with the {{Timatic}} template instead. After a while, I'm tired of doing it almost manually, instead a bot can be tasked with this chore.

The target articles are the main space articles listed at https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special%3ALinkSearch&target=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.timaticweb.com%2Fcgi-bin%2Ftim_website_client.cgi%3FSpecData%3D1

I've been using the Notepad++ regular expression engine over those article sources to do:

  1. search for: <ref([^>]*)>\[https?:[^\]\}>]+&NA=(..) and replace with: <ref\1>{{Timatic|nationality=\2
  2. search for: (\|nationality=..)[^\] ]+DE=(..)&[^>\]]+\]</ref> and replace with: \1|destination=\2}}</ref>
  3. search for: <ref([^>]*)>\{\{cite[^\}]+https?:[^\]\}>]+&NA=(..) and replace with: <ref\1>{{Timatic|nationality=\2
  4. search for: (\|nationality=..)[^\] ]+DE=(..)&[^>\]]+\|[^\|]+\|access and replace with: \1|destination=\2|access

This is quite imperfect - it ignores the exact link format under the assumption that if there's a &NA= argument, that's enough to recognize what we mean. It usually is, but sometimes there's also parameters like HEALTH=1 or AR=<countrycode> or EM=<countrycode> that can map into the health=, residence= and embarkation= template parameters. Or there's some completely different parameter. I was doing this because it was easy enough and it didn't care for permutations of the various parameters much, and then I was visually checking the results for any regressions. For a bot, the best thing would be to try to be more specific - search for any particular combination of parameters, and as long as the combination is all known, regardless of order - generate a link to {{Timatic}}.

Hope someone can pick it up. TIA. --Joy [shallot] (talk) 20:30, 3 August 2014 (UTC)

Portal Business and economics

Wikipedia:Help_desk#Business_and_economics_portal: two bots used to update the daily market indices and business news, the former seems to be working again, the latter stopped working Jan 26. The correct information is actually found on this page: https://en.wikinews.org/wiki/Portal:Economy_and_business

Lbertolotti (talk) 20:13, 3 August 2014 (UTC)

The market indices bot is working alright, but the data being uploaded is just plain wrong.Lbertolotti (talk) 13:08, 5 August 2014 (UTC)

Hi

Realtively straightforward task...

For a link of the form *.google.* look for the regex &hl=((.)*)& and replace with &hl=en&

Given this is the English Wikipedia, it seems reasonable to use the english language UI on Google where possible, and this is an ideal task for the bot.

A further task is migrating links of the form ^((.)*)'.'google'.'([a-z][a-z])(.)*) to being straightforward google.com links. For prefixs like books, scholar, news and groups it should be straightforward to do this. :)

An example API query for finding the links (mainspace only) is as follows (link) :

https://en.wikipedia.org/w/api.php?action=query&list=exturlusage&euquery=*.google.be&eunamespace=0&eulimit=500&euoffset=500&format=jsonfm

A bot should be able to make easy work of the results returned (provided it has an exceptions list, to cope with titles where the link should NOT be modified (like in the list of Google domains article.)

Sfan00 IMG (talk) 21:57, 5 August 2014 (UTC)

Idle Stopping Bot.

I have a webpage that goes idle every 20 minutes and logs me out. I'd like to to stay open and active while i'm asleep. May I request a bot to just disturb the web page while I'm afk?

Thanks — Preceding unsigned comment added by 50.174.157.80 (talk) 23:07, 5 August 2014 (UTC)

N Not done - This is a page for requesting work to be done on Wikipedia by bots. GoingBatty (talk) 23:49, 5 August 2014 (UTC)

Portal Business and economics

Wikipedia:Help_desk#Business_and_economics_portal: two bots used to update the daily market indices and business news, the former seems to be working again, the latter stopped working Jan 26. The correct information is actually found on this page: https://en.wikinews.org/wiki/Portal:Economy_and_business

Lbertolotti (talk) 20:13, 3 August 2014 (UTC)

The market indices bot is working alright, but the data being uploaded is just plain wrong.Lbertolotti (talk) 13:08, 5 August 2014 (UTC)

Hi

Realtively straightforward task...

For a link of the form *.google.* look for the regex &hl=((.)*)& and replace with &hl=en&

Given this is the English Wikipedia, it seems reasonable to use the english language UI on Google where possible, and this is an ideal task for the bot.

A further task is migrating links of the form ^((.)*)'.'google'.'([a-z][a-z])(.)*) to being straightforward google.com links. For prefixs like books, scholar, news and groups it should be straightforward to do this. :)

An example API query for finding the links (mainspace only) is as follows (link) :

https://en.wikipedia.org/w/api.php?action=query&list=exturlusage&euquery=*.google.be&eunamespace=0&eulimit=500&euoffset=500&format=jsonfm

A bot should be able to make easy work of the results returned (provided it has an exceptions list, to cope with titles where the link should NOT be modified (like in the list of Google domains article.)

Sfan00 IMG (talk) 21:57, 5 August 2014 (UTC)

Idle Stopping Bot.

I have a webpage that goes idle every 20 minutes and logs me out. I'd like to to stay open and active while i'm asleep. May I request a bot to just disturb the web page while I'm afk?

Thanks — Preceding unsigned comment added by 50.174.157.80 (talk) 23:07, 5 August 2014 (UTC)

N Not done - This is a page for requesting work to be done on Wikipedia by bots. GoingBatty (talk) 23:49, 5 August 2014 (UTC)

Bot to generate data for Wikipedia:List of Wikipedians by number of edits

Resolved

Since Toolserver went off line the page Wikipedia:List of Wikipedians by number of edits is no longer being updated (Also WP:10000)

A previous request was made by WereSpielChequers [1] but not answered. However as it was for all "non-migrated" processes it may have been a bit general for someone to take on, so I thought I would re-request specifically for this job only.

I'm not sure it it helps but this configuration page was left by MZMcBride (last edited 1 November 2013‎)

Yes, its a frivolous page with stats that have little real meaning (see all the caveats) - however as with games etc, statistics and comparisons are good ways to encourage some people. When I found it via another users userbox it gave me a lift to find I was in the top 5000. Basically I think its a bit of fun that is worth fixing if we can. Cheers KylieTastic (talk) 17:17, 28 July 2014 (UTC)

Hi KylieTastic. Wikipedia:List of Wikipedians by number of edits should update daily now. Additional discussion is here: Special:Permalink/619185964#BernsteinBot. Hope that helps. --MZMcBride (talk) 20:21, 30 July 2014 (UTC)
Hi MZMcBride, Thanks, good job Thumbs up icon 21:09, 30 July 2014 (UTC)
@MZMcBride: Great job! Any chance of updating Wikipedia:List of bots by number of edits/1–1000 too? Thanks! GoingBatty (talk) 01:05, 31 July 2014 (UTC)
What about the related page Wikipedia:List of Wikipedians by article count? Lugnuts Dick Laurent is dead 11:56, 4 August 2014 (UTC)
What about the related page Wikipedia:List of Wikipedians by article count? Lugnuts Dick Laurent is dead 07:14, 7 August 2014 (UTC)

Wikipedia requested photographs in X > Wikipedia requested photographs of people of X

Hi, I'm not sure if this is an appropriate task for a bot, but I thought I'd check. There are an enormous number of articles tagged with {{reqphoto|in=x}} that could be tagged instead with {{reqphoto|people of x}}. This would effectively move them, for example, from Category:Wikipedia requested photographs in Kenya to Category:Wikipedia requested photographs of people of Kenya‎. A bot could look for an equivalent sub-category, check the talk page for "Wikiproject:Biography" template to see if the article is about a person, and then swap one reqphoto template for another. Does that make sense? This could be done continuously, as people will continue to tag people with just the country. - TheMightyQuill (talk) 15:58, 30 July 2014 (UTC)

No response in a week. Do people think this is a bad idea, or was I just unclear in my explanation? - TheMightyQuill (talk) 16:02, 7 August 2014 (UTC)
If the talk page already has {{WikiProject Biography}} there is normally no need for a {{reqphoto}} as well - all that should be needed is to add |needs-photo=yes to the {{WikiProject Biography}}. Many other WikiProject banners (but not all) have an equivalent parammeter. --Redrose64 (talk) 16:17, 7 August 2014 (UTC)
Thanks for your comment, Redrose. However, by my reading, that parameter of the biography template wouldn't place the article in Category:Wikipedia requested photographs of people of X, so it doesn't solve the problem. - TheMightyQuill (talk) 17:48, 8 August 2014 (UTC)

List of telenovelas of Televisa

Hi, I wonder if there is a bot that can translate all references to the aforementioned article ?, translate from Portuguese to English.--Damián (talk) 03:02, 8 August 2014 (UTC)

@Damián80:  Done with AWB, with some manual edits too. GoingBatty (talk) 01:00, 9 August 2014 (UTC)
Thank you for your help :).--Damián (talk) 01:06, 9 August 2014 (UTC)

Create a BOT to alphabetize and organize categories automatically

Clearly a bad task for a bot, as shown by the consensus below. No further action needed. --Mdann52talk to me! 07:18, 5 August 2014 (UTC)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

As someone who has been doing this manually for years, I hereby dutifully beg of anyone who is technically proficient and knows how to create and run a bot that will:

  1. Automatically sort all Categories on each article and category page alphabetically;
  2. Create a uniform system for where to place categories on each article and category page that commence with numbers, such as years of birth/death, centuries, and any category that starts with a number/numeral.

To see an example of just how tedious this process can be, see this article I just alphabetized the categories manually: before and after. Whoever will undertake this will be doing Wikipedia a great service because it will create order out of the growing chaos as tens of thousands of categories are added and mushrooming, and instate a built-in system for finally automatically alphabetizing categories (after they have been inserted by an editor of course) and placing them in the correct alphabetical and number sequence thus making it easier for any users and readers who search and read categories to locate any categories in a rational manner that are now often just a hodge-podge jumble of scrambled categories, the more notable the topic the more categories on that page and the more jumbled they all are. Wikipedia has all sorts of bots to check spelling, wikify some things, check on citations and even fix them, etc, so it would be greatly appreciated by us poor "categorizers" who just cannot keep up with this at this rate. Thank you so much to anyone who will finally undertake this long-needed improvement that stands to benefit all editors, users and readers of Wikipedia. I will notify a few related talk pages about this discussion in order to centralize it. Thank you, IZAK (talk) 08:42, 4 August 2014 (UTC)

Note that The order in which categories are placed on a page is not governed by any single rule (for example, it does not need to be alphabetical, although partially alphabetical ordering can sometimes be helpful). Normally the most essential, significant categories appear first. - quote from Wikipedia:Categories#Articles. There are many cases where it is more sensible for a group of related categories,not necessarily alphabetically adjacent, to appear together. In some cases the editor(s) of an article will have added the categories in a thoughtful order; in some cases, of course, the categories are in random order. This bot won't be able to distinguish those two situations. PamD 09:30, 4 August 2014 (UTC)
And note that the requesting editor's own "after", linked above, would not have been done this way by the bot: Category:Government ministers of Israel is first, where the bot would have placed it after Category:Education ministers. PamD 09:33, 4 August 2014 (UTC)
And also: Stub categories are placed come last in the list of categories. This happens automatically when a stub template is added at the foot of the article, as the categories it generates are placed after existing categories, but as far as I know this is intended and accepted to be the best position for these cats. Would the bot look out for stub cats and leave them at the end, or file them in among the other cats, A-Z? PamD 09:47, 4 August 2014 (UTC)
@PamD: While the bot could reorder the list of category links, I don't see how it would be able to reorder categories generated by templates, including stub categories or navboxes, such as Category:Government ministers of Israel in the example above. GoingBatty (talk) 17:53, 4 August 2014 (UTC)
  • Oppose The sensible order for cats is rarely alphabetical; for instance, Category:Companies established in 1980 and Category:Companies disestablished in 2014, when specified in that order, is chronological, but not alphabetical. Often, placing similar cats together is useful. In the edit in question, I see that the categories Category:Alignment (political party) politicians Category:Israeli Labor Party politicians Category:Ratz (political party) politicians Category:Ya'ad – Civil Rights Movement politicians which are very much related, have become widely separated. Similarly, Category:Israel Prize women recipients Category:Israeli women in politics Category:Israeli women's rights activists Category:Women in the Israeli military. --Redrose64 (talk) 10:29, 4 August 2014 (UTC)
    And see also Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Categories/Archive 4#re alphabetizing categories on the article pages. --Redrose64 (talk) 10:33, 4 August 2014 (UTC)
    To build on Redrose64's comments, many highways group their "Transportation in X County, <state>" categories in geographical order to match the order of the counties presented in several spots in the article (the list in the infobox, the junction list template). Alphabetical order is useful, but it isn't the only way to do things logically. Imzadi 1979 → 10:46, 4 August 2014 (UTC)
  • Oppose – as pointed out already, editors and projects often have good reason for their placement of categories. The nominator's argument that alphabetically sorted categories help readers to find categories they're interested in is a furphy because category names follow no regimented naming system. I also consider edits like the one offered at Shulamit Aloni disruptive: the revision history tells me that 44 characters have been added, but the total jumble of the categories in the diff view make it impossible to ascertain what was added; I would probably revert such an edit. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 11:48, 4 August 2014 (UTC)
  • Oppose - I could see creating an program that editors could selectively run when they want to alphabetize the cats in a specific article (so they don't have to do it by hand)... something that was optional. I would oppose a bot that runs in the background and automatically alphabetizes the categories in all articles. As has been noted by others, sometimes some other system of organizing the categories makes more sense... and in such situations we don't want the cats to be alphabetized. Blueboar (talk) 11:52, 4 August 2014 (UTC)
  • Oppose for the reasons given above. -- Magioladitis (talk) 15:22, 4 August 2014 (UTC)
  • Oppose per above. This kind of proposal comes up periodically but I still have no idea why anyone would think it's a good idea. Alphabetical ordering of categories is little better than jumbling them up randomly. It does not help readers find them nor give them any sensible ordering. Alumni categories, for example, follow the form of "[SCHOOL] alumni", so alphabetizing would necessarily split up a subject's education-related categories. Career-related categories also follow different forms depending on what is being subcategorized; writers, for example, follow forms that include "[XX]-century writers", "[NATIONALITY] writers", "[GENRE] writers", and "Writers from [LOCALITY]". Lest the OP propose that we then rename all categories to serve the purpose of alphabetizing, my first answer would be "No. Just...no." My elaborated, follow up answer would be to point out 1) category names have been chosen over the years, often through many interminable renaming discussions, to be the most grammatically proper and clear, and renaming them to serve some other purpose would undermine that prime function of telling readers and editors what contents they should find in them; and 2) many categories intersect different facts in one category, such that there is no way to prioritize which fact gets the benefit of the alphabetization. postdlf (talk) 16:12, 4 August 2014 (UTC)
  • Oppose per above and agree with Blueboar on manual tool if needed. GoingBatty (talk) 17:48, 4 August 2014 (UTC)
  • Repeat after me, categories are generally worst when sorted alphabetically! Doing this, either manually or by a bot is vandalism at its worst, especially after someone has put all or some of the entries into an order by importance or relevance. I would even oppose an tool to assist doing this manually since that would be mostly abused. So of course I strongly oppose this request. Vegaswikian (talk) 18:11, 4 August 2014 (UTC)
  • Oppose Categories are better when sorted semantically, with the most relevant first. This is because a reader (using this system for navigation to similar articles) will often not be looking for a category that already have in mind. As a result, alphabetising categories serves little purpose because that is a useful arrangement only when trying to locate elements that are known. That said, I would approve of a proposal that births/deaths/living people categories should always be first listed on biographies as a standard. SFB 18:46, 4 August 2014 (UTC)
  • Support: I'm going to be contrary here and suggest that the problem with ordering categories according to some "logical" scheme is that such a scheme is often not obvious to other editors. Unless some conventions develop (e.g., for biographical articles, dates of birth and death come first, followed by categories related to the subject's education, and so on), an alphabetical arrangement of categories would arguably make it easier for editors to scan through the list. Even if the first part of the proposal does not pass, I agree with the proposer that it would be helpful for a bot to ensure that the block of categories is in a consistent place in each article. — Cheers, JackLee –talk– 20:50, 4 August 2014 (UTC)
    Bot tasks must be consistent with Wikipedia's current policies and guidelines. It's reasonable to propose that categories be ordered in a uniformly alphabetical manner, but this is not an appropriate forum. (Wikipedia:Village pump (policy) or Wikipedia talk:Categorization would be.) —David Levy 23:27, 4 August 2014 (UTC)
  • Oppose. As discussed above, the requested bot task is inconsistent with Wikipedia's conventions. —David Levy 23:27, 4 August 2014 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Discussion re-opened at VPP

Please see Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)/Archive 114#Create a BOT to alphabetize and organize categories automatically. Thank you, IZAK (talk) 22:37, 5 August 2014 (UTC)

Tech help required to improve categories

Please see Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)#CatVisor and User:Paradoctor/CatVisor#Planned features if you are willing and able to assist this innovative WP project move along it would be greatly appreciated. Thank you, IZAK (talk) 23:03, 12 August 2014 (UTC)

WikiProject Disambiguation

Could a bot add {{WikiProject Disambiguation}} to the talk pages of all disambiguation pages (pages using {{Disambiguation}}, or with a name ending "(disambiguation)"), please? Note that many, but not all, such pages are currently red links. (Project notified.) Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 10:46, 3 August 2014 (UTC)

I disagree with this task. I do not see the necessity of adding {{WikiProject Disambiguation}} just for tracking reasons. we can already do this via checking which page transcludes the given templates. Was this task really requested by the WikiProject? Moreover, this will produce many new talk pages with no discussion at all. I think this was one of the reasons that tagging for this project was abandoned but I can't find the corresponding discussion. -- Magioladitis (talk) 11:59, 3 August 2014 (UTC)
(edit conflict) Who said the task was just for tracking purposes? The template informs editors of where they can discuss matters relating to disambiguation. A name ending "(disambiguation)" is not a trackable template. Creating new talk pages is not a bad thing to do. There is a link to where I notified the project, in my post, above. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 12:36, 3 August 2014 (UTC)
(edit conflict) @Pigsonthewing: BRFA filed GoingBatty (talk) 12:03, 3 August 2014 (UTC)
@Magioladitis: I submitted the BRFA before your comment. Since Wikipedia:WikiProject Disambiguation#Templates states that we should not use {{WikiProject Disambiguation}} to create talk pages that have no discussion, I stated in my BRFA that my bot would not do so. If the WikiProject has other requirements for when the template should (or should not) be used, they should add it on the template documentation and the WikiProject documentation. Thanks! GoingBatty (talk) 12:33, 3 August 2014 (UTC)
I've no idea why the project page says that, but it seems a ridiculous limitation. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 12:37, 3 August 2014 (UTC)
You have no idea why? The above response from Magioladitis didn't convey to you that some editors oppose the practice?
If you mean that you don't know why said opposition exists, I assume that you don't frequently engage in tasks that involve preemptively checking multiple talk pages for relevant comments, only to find that one after another after another contains no discussion at all and was created solely to store a WikiProject tag. Red links serve a valid purpose. —David Levy 17:09, 3 August 2014 (UTC)

I am not against WikiProject tagging but this should imply that the WikiProject agrees with the tagging. I am a member of WikiProject Disambiguation since 2006 and I do not recall any discussion on requesting mass tagging of all disambiguation pages. -- Magioladitis (talk) 16:33, 3 August 2014 (UTC)

Comment. Some previous discussions do exist:
  • Mentioned in this discussion, see Template:Talkheader/doc#Usage for where the project derived guidance about not placing template on otherwise quiescent talk pages.
  • Also mentioned here is another bot, User:SMS Bot, which was approved for a similar task for other projects (though I think it was excluded from disambiguation project talk pages).
FWIW, while I formerly was ambivalent about the project template on talk pages (inclining towards negative where the only edit to the talk page was to add the template), I am less so these days, largely because the bot that puts out article alerts uses the template to identify pages to include in the reports. older ≠ wiser 18:43, 3 August 2014 (UTC)
Such a setup makes sense only if the WikiProject Disambiguation tag reflects a determination of exceptional importance/significance to the project. If the tag merely indicates that the talk page belongs to a disambiguation page (as the above request seems to suggest), why doesn't the bot compiling the alerts simply include pages from the disambiguation categories? —David Levy 20:08, 3 August 2014 (UTC)
You could technically reprogram the Alert and WP bots to make a special case for disambiguation pages, but in absence of such an effort, this is a reasonable solution. --Joy [shallot] (talk) 07:16, 4 August 2014 (UTC)
To what does "this" refer? —David Levy 15:08, 4 August 2014 (UTC)
This == this request == simply tagging their talk pages. --Joy [shallot] (talk) 16:05, 7 August 2014 (UTC)
In that case, I disagree that "this" is reasonable. "In absence of such an effort" refers to a fundamental lapse. Deploying a bot to insert "hundreds of thousands" of redundant tags (instead of tweaking a bot to recognize the tags already in place) is unacceptable, especially given the issues discussed. —David Levy 13:14, 13 August 2014 (UTC)
I agree that disambiguation page talk pages should be tagged, that way the two WP-based bots can provide standard notifications when things change. Any claim that having the WP disambiguation header on disambiguation Talk pages is discouraged - is arbitrary and void, because I've made probably hundreds or thousands of such edits and never had any issues. I'm going to remove that from the project page now because it does not reflect consensus. --Joy [shallot] (talk) 07:06, 4 August 2014 (UTC)
I agree that disambiguation page talk pages should be tagged, that way the two WP-based bots can provide standard notifications when things change.
Again, disambiguation pages are categorized as such, so tagging their talk pages for that purpose is massively redundant and counterproductive. Red "talk" links exist for a reason.
Any claim that having the WP disambiguation header on disambiguation Talk pages is discouraged
We're referring specifically to talk pages that are otherwise unused/nonexistent. No one has asserted that it's harmful to tag a talk page containing discussion.
- is arbitrary and void, because I've made probably hundreds or thousands of such edits and never had any issues.
You've dismissed others' concerns (and unilaterally deemed a longstanding instruction "void") on the basis that you've never noticed an issue?
I don't understand why you regard the distinction as "arbitrary". You needn't agree that the ability to identify an active talk page's existence/nonexistence via the "talk" link's color is important, but it's a standard MediaWiki function (and one that obviously matters to others).
I'm going to remove that from the project page now because it does not reflect consensus.
I've reverted. That text was added in January 2011 (following this exchange), with no subsequent discussion establishing consensus for the mass creation of talk pages to store the tag. —David Levy 15:08, 4 August 2014 (UTC)
This green format is very odd to reply to inline, but in any case, I'm not going to try to engage in this kind of a Usenet-style point-by-point flamewar because that would be counterproductive. My main point is that the tagging of talk pages with WikiProject banners so that the relevant article changes appear in the WP bot and Article alert bot output - is something very much productive, because it would enable more people to more easily keep track of literally hundreds of thousands of disambiguation pages. If your main point is that we don't need a bot doing hundreds of thousands of edits to accomplish something that can be accomplished with a different technical implementation - then we're in full agreement. But someone should actually do that alternate implementation. --Joy [shallot] (talk) 16:05, 7 August 2014 (UTC)
I'm sorry that you perceive a "flamewar". I'm simply addressing your comments to the best of my ability.
Indeed, "someone should actually do that alternate implementation". That's why I suggested it. —David Levy 13:14, 13 August 2014 (UTC)
With regard to the arguments from Dec 2010 about keeping empty talk pages actually empty - they're contrary to the standard practice of WikiProjects across Wikipedia, one that has existed for as long as I can remember. There are countless talk pages out there that are merely tagged for WikiProjects. This was commonplace even before there were WP bot and Alert bot usages. --Joy [shallot] (talk) 14:39, 4 August 2014 (UTC)
There are countless talk pages out there that are merely tagged for WikiProjects.
And many editors oppose that practice. But it's arguably less problematic in the context of articles, whose talk pages are more likely to generate discussion and less likely to contain information of relevance to certain types of maintenance tasks. —David Levy 15:08, 4 August 2014 (UTC)
(Never met one. Until now, I guess. --Joy [shallot] (talk) 16:23, 7 August 2014 (UTC))

I'm opposed for whatever it's worth. Makes moving over dab pages significantly more annoying for no benefit – these pages are all in the mainspace cats anyway. Jenks24 (talk) 18:18, 4 August 2014 (UTC)

(For the Nth time...) the benefit would be that the WP bot and the Article alert bot would actually have full coverage of the project scope. --Joy [shallot] (talk) 16:23, 7 August 2014 (UTC)

The fact that a disambiguation talk page is unlikely to have much traffic is exactly why it should be tagged with the project template; editors need to know where they can take a query for discussion, and where it will be seen by interested parties. Such tags serve our readers and occasional/ novice editors. Assisting them should not take second place to things like the convenience of gnoming editors who do things like moving pages. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 09:39, 13 August 2014 (UTC)

Again, the actual disambiguation pages already contain tags (Template:Disambiguation and its relatives), which currently link to Help:Disambiguation. Directing the pages' visitors to Wikipedia:WikiProject Disambiguation could be accomplished more effectively by simply expanding those tags accordingly. Unlike articles, disambiguation pages are Wikipedia-oriented (so there's no need to confine meta-content to their talk pages). —David Levy 13:14, 13 August 2014 (UTC)

I am against the tagging of redirects (unless it is done at their creation), the talk pages of dabs and redirect talk pages pages because although there may be some benefits to some editors that has to be weighed against the problem that it causes problems with moves and causes a lot more requests for technical moves at WP:RM. -- PBS (talk) 09:53, 13 August 2014 (UTC)

The most important thing for me is that for any tagging the WikiProject members should agree with it. If a projects does not pages to be tagged then nobody should tag pages for them. For instance, some WikiProjects do not want some namespaces tagged. -- Magioladitis (talk) 11:58, 13 August 2014 (UTC)

Cleanup of Category:Cephalotes

Hi, I need some help with formatting of about 130 articles in Category:Cephalotes; most articles look like this and this. What to do: wikilink "ant" in the lead and change Cephalotes to Cephalotes in the infobox and lead. If possible, I'd very much appreciate if someone could add | binomial_authority = (blank parameter) to the bottom of the infobox at the same time. Thank you, jonkerz ♠talk

@Jonkerz: I'll look into this, and start tomorrow. As it is a run of less than 200 edits, I'll do it from my main account, as opposed to waiting for a BRFA to go through. --Mdann52talk to me! 17:58, 16 August 2014 (UTC)
Thank you, Mdann52! jonkerz ♠talk 18:38, 16 August 2014 (UTC)
@Jonkerz: Task completed sucsessfully, 132 edits made. Can you please check a sample to ensure all is well? :) --Mdann52talk to me! 16:06, 17 August 2014 (UTC)
@Mdann52: I checked a bunch and they all look good, thanks! :) jonkerz ♠talk 16:37, 17 August 2014 (UTC)

Cyberbot II is misbehaving. Can we fix this issue?

This bot appears to be posting the same message over and over on some pages. See the discussion here: User_talk:Cyberpower678#Cyberbot appears to be malfunctioning on some pages Jarble (talk) 21:12, 16 August 2014 (UTC)

I have removed the template from the page where it is spamming the talkpage. I don't know the code, but maybe this edit resulted in the bot not understanding the template anymore? --Dirk Beetstra T C 10:52, 17 August 2014 (UTC)
My talk page would've been more than sufficient. I'll have to look into it. Also it parses the template. It should be able to understand it.—cyberpower ChatOnline 12:43, 17 August 2014 (UTC)

revert section blanking bot

Could a bot (I don't know if there is already one) that reverts all edits that blanked a section without any summary in the edit summary. Thanks, TheQ Editor (Talk) 16:32, 14 August 2014 (UTC)

Sounds like the sort of thing User:ClueBot NG probably would detect. BMacZero (talk) 15:34, 18 August 2014 (UTC)

Talk page fixes to vital articles

Could a bot apply AWB talk page general fixes to the pages in Category:All Wikipedia level-1 vital articles, Category:All Wikipedia level-2 vital articles, Category:All Wikipedia level-3 vital articles, and Category:All Wikipedia level-4 vital articles? This is something that Magioladitis/Yobot have been doing for a while now, and it would be great if a bot could do this task for these pages, especially since WP:TPL has been updated for {{Vital article}}. Malerisch (talk) 17:39, 18 August 2014 (UTC)

Malerisch I can do that at some point. Perhaps next week. -- Magioladitis (talk) 17:43, 18 August 2014 (UTC)
Okay, thanks for the prompt response! Malerisch (talk) 17:47, 18 August 2014 (UTC)
  • Oppose It is a bad idea to apply genfixes to any talk page. Discussions may be about some problem text in the article, with examples; a genfix run will destroy those examples. Any refactoring of a talk page must respect WP:TPO. --Redrose64 (talk) 23:51, 18 August 2014 (UTC)
  • Oppose. In addition to the reasons stated by Redrose64, it's just annoying to have minor fixes of this type made to the fleeting contents of talk pages. Jc3s5h (talk) 01:44, 19 August 2014 (UTC)
@Redrose64 and Jc3s5h: Just wish to note that the genfixes applied to articles and talk pages are different. In my experience (from applying genfixes to talk pages), comments are very rarely, if ever, changed, and the genfixse mainly affects formatting (inc. wikiproject banners etc.) Therefore, I fail to see how changing the text would be a major issue. --Mdann52talk to me! 14:41, 20 August 2014 (UTC)

Minor planet bot

Hello all; could somebody please make a bot to redirect non-notable numbered and named minor planets to the correct lists, subject to the terms at WT:AST? The bot would need to redirect minor planet articles to lists such as list of minor planets: 10001–11000 subject to the following criteria:

  • Article has one or no external links.
  • Article was created by the users ClueBot II or Merovingian
  • Article is less than 2000 bytes
  • Asteroid is numbered above 2000.

It would be nice to see a list of the articles that would be redirected before actually carrying out the operation, but I personally would be satisfied if I saw a trial run of 100 edits with no errors. StringTheory11 (t • c) 19:13, 20 August 2014 (UTC)

Tagging articles for a WikiProject

Could a bot tag any article with the words "election", "elections", "referendum" and "referendums" in their title with {{WikiProject Elections and Referendums}}? Cheers, Number 57 17:30, 7 August 2014 (UTC)

Number 57 Pro Forma Where is the consensus discussion for this? Hasteur (talk) 21:00, 8 August 2014 (UTC)
The matter arose because the article alert bot for elections and referendums missed an AfD on an election article. I raised the matter at the bot's bug page, and was told that it was because the article wasn't tagged for the WikiProject, and that I should ask here for a bot to tag the articles that have been missed by editors (I'm certainly guilty of not tagging the 2,700 election articles I've created). Cheers, Number 57 00:13, 9 August 2014 (UTC)
@Number 57: You may want to discuss your request at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Elections and Referendums#Tagging articles for inclusion in this WikiProject. There would be a few false positives, such as some of the articles listed on Election (disambiguation). GoingBatty (talk) 20:36, 9 August 2014 (UTC)
Unfortunately the project is very inactive, so I doubt it would get a response. Is this really needed though? It's hardly a contentious issue. Perhaps everything that is within the category trees Category:Elections by year Category:Referendums by year then? I can't think how any article would get into those category trees without actually being an election or referendum. Number 57 16:41, 10 August 2014 (UTC)
There have been a number of cases where somebody asked for a WikiProject banner to be added to the talk pages of all pages in a given category and its subcats. A bot was sent in, and after a few hours somebody complained that it was tagging far too many pages where the WikiProject was clearly inapplicable. Recently, new rules were brought in to cut down such problems (see also Wikipedia:Bot requests/Archive 60#WikiProject talk page tagging), and one of those rules is that the category list needs to be explicit - it cannot be framed as "everything that is within the category trees X and Y" (another is the notification of the WikiProject whose banner is to be applied). --Redrose64 (talk) 13:21, 11 August 2014 (UTC)
I've notified the project, but compiling a category tree is going to be a massive job. Very disappointing that such a level of bureaucracy has been introduced. Number 57 13:41, 11 August 2014 (UTC)
Asking for some CYA when you're requesting us to tag anywhere from 0 ~ infinity pages with a very inactive project (disrupting any existing project banners on the page) is not buerecratic, it's doing our due diligence as bot operators. If the project is so inactive that you can't marshal a affirmative consensus why should a project of 28 members get to stamp their mark on anything that has your 4 magic words or the list of categories to be tagged? Hasteur (talk) 14:50, 11 August 2014 (UTC)
I appreciate that some level of carefulness is required, but the current system, despite the amount of work that is required, doesn't seem effective at avoiding the problem you refer to (Yobot recently tagged many articles for WP:WikiProject Athletics that weren't even remotely related to the subject (e.g. Baldwin III of Jerusalem). Number 57 15:05, 11 August 2014 (UTC)
@Number 57: That error was due to the unfortunate inclusion of Category:Commons category with local link same as on Wikidata appearing on Wikipedia:WikiProject Athletics/Categories (beware: AWB lists gave parents of the source category, as well as children). Aside from that single (admittedly horrendous) oversight, vetting of the 4000+ athletics categories meant that that was the only source of error.
The benefit of this model is that, even though that single category listing caused big issues, Yobot actually had a list of valid things to untag. No more human interaction was needed than your message at the talkpage and the owner's action to untag articles from the erroneous category. Despite the scale of the error, it was fully reverted by the bot within 40 minutes, so little damage was done.
I think you are underestimating the man hours required to manually review and untag thousands of bot-tagged articles. On the plus side, my review of the athletics category structure for this task actually helped resolve lingering problems on the category side too. SFB 16:43, 17 August 2014 (UTC)

@Number 57: compiling the category tree it's very important because it had proven to be broken many many times. Even restricting to level 3 depth in the past ended in unpleasant situations. Bad tagging already has cost me many hours of my life and I would like to reduce the risk as much as possible. -- Magioladitis (talk) 17:11, 17 August 2014 (UTC)

OK, I have compiled the category tree here. I've also notified the WikiProject, and there has been no objections to getting a bot to do the tagging. Can this proceed? Number 57 18:28, 17 August 2014 (UTC)

@Number 57: If the project is semi-active what good will be done if we give them more pages to check? -- Magioladitis (talk)

Btw, I won't proceed to any tagging unless your add your name as a member of the project. I want to be sure that the person requesting the bot tagging is related somehow to the project. Any mass tagging with a WikiProject banner should enjoy the support of the WikiProject itself. -- Magioladitis (talk) 22:33, 17 August 2014 (UTC)

The reason I'm doing this is so any election/referendum-related article alerts (AfDs, RMs etc) will be picked up by the article alert bot. This issue primarily arose because the election/referendum feed only works when the articles are tagged for the WikiProject. But as you can see from the link GoingBatty provided above, I'm not the only one who wants to see articles tagged.
I've added my name to the list of members, although as you can see from the project talk page, I have been a member for several years. Number 57 08:29, 18 August 2014 (UTC)
The presence of a WikiProject banner on a talkpage is not the only means by which ArticleAlerts picks up pages to list. Something like a year or two ago, I put together an explanation of why two tennis biogs were listed at Wikipedia:WikiProject Tennis/Article alerts, even though neither had a talk page and therefore no {{WikiProject Tennis}} - it soon became apparent that the common factor was that both biogs used {{Infobox tennis biography}}. If you look at Wikipedia:Article alerts/Subscription list#T, you'll see that the Tennis entry has both the WikiProject banner and Infobox shown. If there is an infobox that is used on most (all?) election articles, it should therefore be possible to do something similar for elections. Let's assume that it's {{Infobox election}}, so locate the relevant {{ArticleAlertSubscription}} at Wikipedia:Article alerts/Subscription list#E - it presently has one parameter, |project=WikiProject Elections and Referendums - so add both of the following: |banner=WikiProject Elections and Referendums |infobox=Infobox election More at Wikipedia:Article alerts/Subscribing#Subscribe via an Infobox and the "Combinations" subsection immediately below. --Redrose64 (talk) 20:00, 18 August 2014 (UTC)
Unfortunately I don't believe the infobox is a useful parameter as far as the bot is concerned; it's not universally used (it's largely limited to national elections in developed countries - it has just under 7,500 transclusions, which is only the same as the number of categories I've identified - I would say that there are at least five times that many articles, if not more), it doesn't take into account articles that are not about specific elections (i.e. constituencies, wards, electoral systems etc), nor does it cover referendums. Number 57 20:05, 18 August 2014 (UTC)
Regardless, relying on the presence of a WikiProject tag on an article's talk page is an artificial constraint. The bot could be programmed to recognize articles listed on arbitrary pages (e.g. Wikipedia:WikiProject Elections and Referendums/Article alerts/List/A). There's no need to create thousands of talk pages (which, as discussed above, causes problems). —David Levy 16:28, 19 August 2014 (UTC)
That relies on creating a list and then maintaining it – can a bot do that? And my experience is that most of the talk pages are there, but just not with this tag on yet.
TBH, I'm getting rather disheartened here - I was specifically told elsewhere that the only way to get the bot to recognise the articles was to tag the talk pages. I was then told that the only way of getting this done was to compile the category tree. I then spent rather a lot of time compiling a list of over 7,000 categories with articles in that needed to be tagged. Now I'm being told that this was a waste of time? This really has not been a positive experience. Number 57 18:29, 19 August 2014 (UTC)
That relies on creating a list and then maintaining it – can a bot do that?
Absolutely. From a programming standpoint, it's a similar task (albeit one entailing far fewer edits). The bot – utilizing exactly the same data – would simply compile the articles' titles on specified pages instead of tagging their talk pages. If some articles were included accidentally, the resultant WikiProject notifications would be the only ill effect.
And my experience is that most of the talk pages are there, but just not with this tag on yet.
In principle, I don't object to the tagging (automated or otherwise) of talk pages containing actual discussion, assuming that false positives are avoided.
I was specifically told elsewhere that the only way to get the bot to recognise the articles was to tag the talk pages.
That refers to the bot's current programming, not to an inherent technical barrier. The most sensible solution is to eliminate that limitation (by either expanding the bot's detection methods or supplementing it with an additional bot), not to invest that effort in a bot task rooted in the present deficiency.
I was then told that the only way of getting this done was to compile the category tree. I then spent rather a lot of time compiling a list of over 7,000 categories with articles in that needed to be tagged. Now I'm being told that this was a waste of time?
I'm certainly not telling you that. Irrespective of the particular implementation, the category tree would serve as the underlying data. Instead of tagging the talk pages of articles in those categories, a bot could list the articles' titles somewhere. It might even be feasible to skip that step and simply watch the categories' contents directly. —David Levy 19:30, 19 August 2014 (UTC)
I appreciate the sentiments, but I'd rather just get the talk pages tagged. It's standard practice for article-based WikiProjects (as opposed to disambiguation pages, which you referred to above as being problematic) - I'm a member of two other ones, and as far as I'm aware, every article under their auspices is tagged. After all the faffing around here, I'd really rather not get involved in a request to change the way the bot operates, as this has done more than enough to sap my morale. Can we just get on with it please? Number 57 21:13, 19 August 2014 (UTC)
I appreciate the sentiments, but I'd rather just get the talk pages tagged.
I oppose your request (in its current form). When multiple methods are feasible, it's every bot owner's responsibility to pursue the least harmful approach.
Given that the WikiProject is "very inactive", whether any bot task is warranted is debatable. If one is initiated, it should cause as little disruption as possible. You'd "rather just get the talk pages tagged", but the decision isn't yours alone.
Is there a consensus for mass tagging among whatever participants the WikiProject has? If so, on what is it based? (How is the goal of improving a "very inactive" WikiProject's notification system adequate justification?)
It's standard practice for article-based WikiProjects (as opposed to disambiguation pages, which you referred to above as being problematic)
It isn't standard practice for "very inactive" WikiProjects.
Any tagging of this nature is potentially problematic, especially when it entails the creation of new talk pages (which your request encompasses). The question is whether some benefit to Wikipedia outweighs the potential detriments. In my view, you've yet to cite one. Nonetheless, I suggested a means of accomplishing the desired objective without causing collateral damage (even if your category tree turns out to be overly inclusive). You've dismissed this idea without even allowing bot operators to comment on it first.
Frankly, your unwillingness to consider alternatives (even on a technical level, with no impact on the actual reports) doesn't inspire further cooperation with your pursuit.
After all the faffing around here, I'd really rather not get involved in a request to change the way the bot operates, as this has done more than enough to sap my morale. Can we just get on with it please?
"I find it less stressful than seeking a better solution" isn't a valid reason to send a bot on a tagging spree, let alone one initiated on behalf of a "very inactive" WikiProject. —David Levy 01:12, 20 August 2014 (UTC)
Well, hopefully someone else will be more reasonable and approve my request. Number 57 07:06, 20 August 2014 (UTC)
Despite your inability to demonstrate that it's backed by consensus, even within the WikiProject itself (assuming that such a thing is possible, given its "very inactive" state)? —David Levy 08:24, 20 August 2014 (UTC)
I don't know if you read the earlier part of the discussion, but both GoingBatty and I made reference to the request from another project member for assistance in tagging articles two months ago. Number 57 08:33, 20 August 2014 (UTC)
Yes, I read that part of the discussion. I've quoted your reply to GoingBatty (in which you noted that "the project is very inactive" and expressed "doubt [a discussion invitation] would get a response") several times.
I'm confused as to how an editor's request for "help from anyone in tagging or assessing election-related articles" constitutes consensus to send a bot on a 7,424-category spree (on behalf of a WikiProject whose inactivity precludes discussion of the task, including its scope). —David Levy 11:54, 20 August 2014 (UTC)
My point is that despite the project not being very active, at least one other editor has requested the same thing within the last couple of months - that's about as good as it's going to get. Apart from you, no-one has raised any objections to tagging the articles, and as I said earlier, I don't believe your objection is reasonable given normal procedures on Wikipedia. But in anticipation of more obstructionism, I'm now contacting every listed project member directly to try and get some more people involved so you have a consensus (or not) to see. Number 57 12:24, 20 August 2014 (UTC)
My point is that despite the project not being very active, at least one other editor has requested the same thing within the last couple of months
"Help from anyone in tagging or assessing election-related articles" is not "the same thing" as a 7,424-category bot task.
- that's about as good as it's going to get.
Yes, because the project is "very inactive". So what will the tagging accomplish?
Magioladitis inquired above. You replied that "the reason [you're] doing this is so any election/referendum-related article alerts (AfDs, RMs etc) will be picked up by the article alert bot." Then what?
Apart from you, no-one has raised any objections to tagging the articles,
You see no other objections above?
and as I said earlier, I don't believe your objection is reasonable given normal procedures on Wikipedia.
And as I said earlier, mass tagging isn't a normal procedure for inactive WikiProjects.
But in anticipation of more obstructionism,
You mentioned "getting rather disheartened". The feeling is mutual.
In addition to expressing my concerns, I suggested an implementation that I believe would better serve the Wikipedia community. Despite not seeing a clear benefit to the reports' existence, I sincerely attempted to assist in their compilation. You needn't agree with me or approve of my idea, but there's no need to label my response "obstructionism" or complain that you're "rapidly being worn down by the unhelpfulness of people on the page".
You've continually conveyed that you resent (and deem unreasonable) any response other than compliance with your current request (and are uninterested in even discussing alternatives). This is not a collaborative attitude, let alone one consistent with a WikiProject (intrinsically a collaboration within a collaboration).
I'm now contacting every listed project member directly to try and get some more people involved so you have a consensus (or not) to see.
Are you familiar with Wikipedia's canvassing guideline? Your message is far from neutral.
You seem to be missing the point. Summoning the members of an inactive WikiProject to endorse your request won't demonstrate any actual value in tagging the articles' talk pages. If these editors normally don't participate in the WikiProject (hence its aforementioned inactivity), of what consequence is their accession?
To be clear, I certainly don't intend to belittle anyone's good-faith input. Individually, these editors' opinions count as much as anyone else's. But assembling as a group solely to give thumbs-up to an endeavor requiring no further action on their parts (at its proponent's urging) isn't indicative of encyclopedic collaboration. —David Levy 14:13, 20 August 2014 (UTC)
Yes, of course I'm aware of WP:CANVASS. I asked people to comment - I didn't tell them which way to comment. There has already been three responses, all positive, so that's a total of five people from the project in favour. Number 57 14:29, 20 August 2014 (UTC)
Yes, of course I'm aware of WP:CANVASS. I asked people to comment - I didn't tell them which way to comment.
You noted that you're "getting rather frustrated by the attitude of the people at WP:BTR" and implied that we're obstructing "progress" (mirroring your comments here and elsewhere).
There has already been three responses, all positive, so that's a total of five people from the project in favour.
Did you read my above reply in its entirety? —David Levy 14:53, 20 August 2014 (UTC)
Sorry David, I did read your response in its entirety, but I really don't see anything productive coming from continuing to discuss this with you. You've made your opposition quite clear, and I'll wait for the input of some other people to this thread. Number 57 15:10, 20 August 2014 (UTC)
To confirm, you decline to explain how the "very inactive" WikiProject will utilize the information contained in the reports. Correct? —David Levy 15:15, 20 August 2014 (UTC)
No, I don't decline to explain that, as I already have. See my comments at 08:29 on 18 August 2014 about the Article Alert Bot. One of the commenters on the Project page has also mentioned the same reason. Number 57 15:28, 20 August 2014 (UTC)
I quoted your 08:29, 18 August 2014 message above. You stated that "the reason [you're] doing this is so any election/referendum-related article alerts (AfDs, RMs etc) will be picked up by the article alert bot." This will result in the generation of the reports to which I referred above. You've yet to explain what a "very inactive" WikiProject will do with the information contained therein. Reiterating that it will be obtained doesn't answer the question. —David Levy 17:13, 20 August 2014 (UTC)
It means the active editors (most of the project editors are active, but rarely post on the Project page, which is why I described it as inactive) have a chance to spot relevant AfDs, RMs etc. Number 57 17:54, 20 August 2014 (UTC)
Thanks for clarifying. You seem to be describing an ideal case for the type of alternative setup that I suggested above (because it's helpful to notify interested editors of relevant article issues and unhelpful to point other users to an inactive WikiProject, especially when this entails creating new talk pages). —David Levy 18:20, 20 August 2014 (UTC)
I'd rather editors were pointed to the Project, so then it might have some more activity. Of course, this is not the main point of the tagging, but it is definitely a beneficial side effect. Number 57 18:23, 20 August 2014 (UTC)
That's understandable, but the needs of Wikipedia's general users take precedence. A WikiProject certainly can seek to expand via such promotion, but it's expected to be operational (and capable of serving as a resource to newcomers) before initiating the level of tagging that you request. Otherwise, the encyclopedia's talk pages would be littered with banners pointing to WikiProjects that never got off the ground (thereby frustrating editors and souring them on the entire concept). —David Levy 19:02, 20 August 2014 (UTC)
And that's understandable if you're talking about a new project, but this one has been around since 2009, and it is operational. I wish I'd never used the phrase "very inactive" - it's not as active as I'd like, but it's not dead by any means. If people post on its talk page, I usually respond, as you can see for yourself. Number 57 19:10, 20 August 2014 (UTC)
If the WikiProject isn't "very inactive", that's a different story. Whether this is the case seems questionable. —David Levy 19:26, 20 August 2014 (UTC)
People can judge for themselves by checking the project's talk page. Number 57 20:01, 20 August 2014 (UTC)
Agreed. It's a subjective matter. Heretofore, I've simply gone by your description, but I understand that you regret that choice of words. —David Levy 03:33, 21 August 2014 (UTC)

Add Navboxs

Add this templates, each one in its articles.

--Vivaelcelta {talk  · contributions} 02:51, 22 August 2014 (UTC)

@Vivaelcelta:  Doing... GoingBatty (talk) 00:53, 24 August 2014 (UTC)
@Vivaelcelta:  Done GoingBatty (talk) 01:31, 24 August 2014 (UTC)
@GoingBatty: Thank you. --Vivaelcelta {talk  · contributions} 00:49, 25 August 2014 (UTC)

Trouble communicating with bot operator, request for new bot maintainer

I am one of the editors over at WP:TAFI and a project participant has provided a bot that maintains several mundane tasks like administering our nomination page, adding and removing templates, sending out project notices and such. The code for all functions are available on the bot maintainer @Theopolisme:'s github page, with the "tafi_" prefix.

Essentially the bot maintainer is busy and is unavailable to make changes to the code. Several attempts to get in touch with them have been unsuccessful. I request that another bot maintainer absorb these already approved tasks, somehow these specific tasks from the other bot be stopped, and the new bot maintainer be able to make some of the changes we have been discussing over at the relevant discussion area. --NickPenguin(contribs) 16:21, 14 August 2014 (UTC)

+1 to this request, as another TAFI editor. A list of tasks, with links to BRFAs and individual source codes, is at Wikipedia:Today's articles for improvement/Automation#Bot_tasks. Stopping Theo's bot should be easy, there are links to disable individual tasks at User:Theo's Little Bot. - Evad37 [talk] 09:38, 17 August 2014 (UTC)
No comments in 10 days? Is no one able to help our project? The individual TAFI processes can be disabled without disrupting Theo's other bot functions, if that is a concern. We just need someone who is willing to take over and maintain the code for us. --NickPenguin(contribs) 13:19, 23 August 2014 (UTC)
Note that the code is CC-BY-SA, so copyright/licensing problems isn't an issue - Evad37 [talk] 00:44, 26 August 2014 (UTC)
Hopefully the lack of response doesn't continue. --NickPenguin(contribs) 01:03, 26 August 2014 (UTC)
{{[ping|NickPenguin}} the issue I can see here is you want the code overhauled. The problem is that only the origional maintainer is likely to know what their code did, and which parts to change to make stuff happen, so they are the best people to make the changes without the entire code being rewritten from scratch. Unfortuantely, requests such as this often go unanswered for that exact reason - it is too complex to rewrite sections if you don't know exactly what it does. --Mdann52talk to me! 07:17, 26 August 2014 (UTC)
(repinging @NickPenguin: as the above ping was malformed – Evad37 [talk] 08:21, 26 August 2014 (UTC))
So would we be better off just requesting that new code be written? It seems a bit counter-intuitive that not giving details of the existing code/tasks would get a better response, but maybe that's just the way it is. - Evad37 [talk] 08:21, 26 August 2014 (UTC)
@Mdann52: I took a quick glance at the code in question and it seems fairly comprehensible to me, someone with limited coding experience from 10+ years ago. If it is easier to scrap and rebuild, I would submit a request that someone does that, and re-implement the existing code base with some changes (which will follow). --NickPenguin(contribs) 13:02, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

I haven't analysed the code in detail, just commetning on why you may have not recieved a response. --Mdann52talk to me! 13:38, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

Fair enough. Perhaps you know of someone who might be interested, that may not regularly check this page. --NickPenguin(contribs) 14:45, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

Erwin85Bot replacement

Can we please have a replacement for Erwin85Bot (especially the Catcount task). Or is there already a replacement? NickGibson3900 - Talk - Sign my Guestbook 00:28, 23 August 2014 (UTC)

@NickGibson3900: Would {{PAGESINCATEGORY:categoryname|pages}} meet your needs? Documented at Help:Magic words. --Bamyers99 (talk) 18:05, 2 September 2014 (UTC)
@Bamyers99: Thanks, thats exactly what I need. NickGibson3900 Talk 05:46, 3 September 2014 (UTC)

Request a bot

I want a bot thats why I'm in wikipedia not only to help it but to make bots i love robots and like programming i request to make a bot that can revert vandalism and more. — Preceding unsigned comment added by JohnPaulH1 (talk • contribs) 02:46, 27 August 2014 (UTC)

Reverting vandalism is a very difficult task and is already handeled quite well by ClueBot and the many other vandalism tasks. This is not a page to request that a bot be provided to you, but a page for you to suggest a new "task" that a bot could do. Hasteur (talk) 18:37, 27 August 2014 (UTC)

 Not done -- Magioladitis (talk) 08:48, 4 September 2014 (UTC)

Jacobfeliciano1 (bot)

I would like to create a bot account because I want to automate tasks and revert vandalism faster. It is really hard to find vandalism so I would like a bot to help me revert vandalism.

Bot info:

 Not done Magioladitis (talk) 08:48, 4 September 2014 (UTC)

The database reports are still broken

The list of Broken section links hasn't been updated in over a year. Will it be possible to update this list so that we can repair these broken links? Jarble (talk) 05:43, 21 August 2014 (UTC)

Report is (was!) built by BernsteinBot (talk · contribs), so this is a question for MZMcBride (talk · contribs). What say you, MZ - is this another of those reports that died because of the toolserver replag problems? --Redrose64 (talk) 09:22, 21 August 2014 (UTC)
@MZMcBride: Is the list of broken section links likely to be updated at any time in the future? Jarble (talk) 04:08, 24 August 2014 (UTC)
Hi Redrose64 and Jarble. Most database reports died as a result of the death of the Toolserver (there's now Wikimedia Labs instead). While the Toolserver often had database replication lag, that isn't really relevant here. This particular report happened to break before the rest of the other reports and I'm not sure why off-hand, though I vaguely recall seeing error e-mails. The relevant report setup and configuration information is available here, for anyone interested: Wikipedia:Database reports/Broken section anchors/Configuration. I don't currently have any plans to fix this report specifically, but perhaps I could be persuaded. --MZMcBride (talk) 05:55, 24 August 2014 (UTC)
@MZMcBride and Redrose64: Broken section links are still very common on Wikipedia. Are there any other tools that can help us to identify and repair them? Jarble (talk) 06:02, 24 August 2014 (UTC)
@Jarble: The problem with these is the job is unsutable for a bot to do, for odvious reasons. If the database reports are gone, there is little we can do to help, as it seems the infrastructure used previously is gone for good. --Mdann52talk to me! 09:08, 28 August 2014 (UTC)
@Mdann52 and MZMcBride: Until the database reports are fixed, it will be impossible to repair the broken links without manually searching for them. Jarble (talk) 01:02, 2 September 2014 (UTC)
@Jarble: I have coded a replacement for the Broken section links report. I will run it manually probably once a month. --Bamyers99 (talk) 04:31, 5 September 2014 (UTC)
Bamyers99: Sweet, thanks! Can you please post your source code somewhere (e.g., Wikipedia:Database reports/Broken section anchors/Configuration)? --MZMcBride (talk) 05:12, 5 September 2014 (UTC)
@MZMcBride: The source code has been posted. --Bamyers99 (talk) 14:05, 5 September 2014 (UTC)

Converting between British OSGB36 Grid References and latitude and longitude

Would it be possible for a bot to convert the British OSGB36 Grid References to latitude and longitude (and vice versa)? Wikipedia has an increasing number of lists using Template:EH listed building row (these include listed buildings and scheduled monuments). Many have been been created in connection with "Wiki Loves Monuments" which is currently running in the UK (and several other countries). The data sheets provided by English Heritage give the Grid Ref (example) however wikipedia mapping systems use lat & long.

I have manually done the 58 on the list at List of Scheduled Monuments in Bath and North East Somerset, but have another 600+ to do on lists detailed at Scheduled Monuments in Somerset. Others are working on those at List of Scheduled Monuments. Many thousands more can be seen at Category:Lists of Grade I listed buildings in England by county, Category:Grade II* listed buildings & Category:Grade II listed buildings in England by county etc. I believe very similar templates are used by Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland (but I've not been involved with them). If someone thought the job was possible a much fuller list could be produced.

Details of the Ordnance Survey National Grid are available but the technical issues of any conversion between this and the other Geographic coordinate systems is beyond me, but User:Pigsonthewing suggest I ask here to see whether it would be possible either for a one off bot run or ongoing tool?— Rod talk 13:59, 9 September 2014 (UTC)

Lists of artists - please split dates

Could someone (with a bot, or perhaps AWB) split the date column in each of the sixteen lists under Wikipedia:GLAM/Your paintings#Artists by birth period (you can ignore the "Popular painters" list), into separate birth and death dates, and make each of those columns sortable? Watch out for "circa" and "active" dates!

Then, if the death year is 1943 or before, please apply a pastel green shade (say, #98FB98) to the cell background; if it's 1944, a pastel amber (say #FFA500).

That would facilitate some further work I'm planning. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 18:14, 9 September 2014 (UTC)

Bot operation for Moscow Metro stations

I want a bot operation for my (+100) edits yesterday which changes: 

|map_type      = Central Moscow grayscale.png

to: 

|map_type      = Central Moscow
|AlternativeMap= Central Moscow grayscale.png

Also: 

|map_type      = Moscow Ring Road grayscale.png

to: 

|map_type      = Moscow Ring Road
|AlternativeMap= Moscow map MKAD grayscale.png

Thank you. -- Sameboat - 同舟 (talk) 22:51, 11 September 2014 (UTC)

No need for a bot for this; I'll just do it with AWB. Jackmcbarn (talk) 22:54, 11 September 2014 (UTC)
 Done Jackmcbarn (talk) 23:20, 11 September 2014 (UTC)

Reverting unnecessary additions of interwikis (coord with Wikidata)

There are still occasionally editors who unnecessarily add interwiki links where Wikidata has already set up the link to the other language page(s) e.g. this recent non-improving interwiki addition. Could one of the bots revert added interwikis in cases where:

  1. the article linked is already established via Wikidata
  2. the interwiki points to a non-existent article in the other-language Wikipedia

Of course, there could be other types of unproductive interwiki changes on articles that warrant a bot revert. Dl2000 (talk) 21:34, 4 September 2014 (UTC)

Good idea; and any bot that does this should also leave the editor who added the link a talk page message, explaining how things have changed. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 14:39, 9 September 2014 (UTC)
There already is a bot that goes through and do this (AFAIR), so another one seems unnessecery. --Mdann52talk to me! 07:27, 11 September 2014 (UTC)
Anybody know which bot is currently doing that, if any? There used to be MagnusA.Bot which updated interwikis, but is now retired since its functions were for the pre-Wikidata era. If we can get the [citation needed], then we could confirm how frequently it functions and whether this case can be closed. Dl2000 (talk) 23:19, 13 September 2014 (UTC)

Little AWB task

Could someone please create the following redirects? Note that some of them already exist; I just supplied them so you'd know that I'd not missed any.

Extended content

With Washington being an unambiguous term, "Washington license plates" ought to exist, and the term "license plate" being an Americanism, we need not worry about the Georgia plates being confused with registration plates from Tblisi. Nyttend (talk) 21:21, 11 September 2014 (UTC)

@Nyttend:  Done! In the future, it may be better to request little AWB tasks at Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser/Tasks. GoingBatty (talk) 00:44, 15 September 2014 (UTC)
Thank you. I've never seen that page; it's only at this page that I've ever made a request that was fulfilled with AWB. Nyttend (talk) 01:08, 15 September 2014 (UTC)

Portal:People's Republic of China removal

The above portal was made into a redirect to Portal:China after a recent MfD: Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Portal:People's Republic of China (2nd nomination), but still seems to be in hundreds of articles. The problem is that in many if not almost all cases it's now a duplicate, as Portal:China already is linked in those articles. I.e. it needs removing, usually from the portal box, when China's already listed. E.g. something like:

{{Portal|People's Republic of China|China}} -> {{Portal|China}}
{{Portal|China|People's Republic of China}} -> {{Portal|China}}

Though it would also need to handle cases with other portals listed. Too many to easily be done by hand, is it something a bot could do?--JohnBlackburnewordsdeeds 23:06, 13 September 2014 (UTC)

@JohnBlackburne: Should the bot also change {{Portal|People's Republic of China}} → {{Portal|China}} ? I noticed they display different wording and icons. Thanks! GoingBatty (talk) 00:22, 15 September 2014 (UTC)
I did not think of that but it sounds like a good idea; replace all, removing any resulting duplicates. Probably they should all be replaced even if the icon weren't an issue; it's not like a redirect in article text which does not need 'fixing'. Its more like a See also link or category that should match the name.--JohnBlackburnewordsdeeds 01:08, 15 September 2014 (UTC)
@JohnBlackburne: BRFA filed. GoingBatty (talk) 01:49, 15 September 2014 (UTC)

Wolverine (comics) fixes

Per the discussion at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2014 August 28#Wolverine (comics), this redirect is imminently likely to be made into a disambiguation link. Several thousand links need to be changed from Wolverine (comics) to Wolverine (character). Sounds like a job for a bot! bd2412 T 01:10, 14 September 2014 (UTC)

Based on the conversation at the RfD, it sounds like a job for a semi-automated tool where a human reviews each edit before saving it. GoingBatty (talk) 00:29, 15 September 2014 (UTC)

Bot to update Template:POTD commons

This template is theoretically an important link to Commons. Theoretically. In fact, it hasn't actually updated since November 2012 from what I can tell. If the template is to become relevant again, it needs updating, and this updating needs to be systematic.

Alternatively, if there is some easy way to update from Commons directly - Lua, say - that would work even better. Adam Cuerden (talk) 05:42, 17 September 2014 (UTC)

I can write up a bot to do this in the next week. Jason Spriggs chat 22:14, 22 September 2014 (UTC)

Request to fix "bgcolor" markup

In the past few months, the markup bgcolor="#XXXXXX" (with X substituting for the individual colour code) has stopped working for mobile users as it is no longer supported by the browser. The issue has been raised at VPT, and has been recognised by Bugzilla (ID #66413). style=background-color:"#XXXXXX" has been provided as an alternative markup.

Discussions among regular editors of the Formula 1-related articles have discovered the extent of this problem. It affects every single season, driver, team and car article in almost every motorsport discipline. I am certain that it affects much more of Wikipedia, but as I only occasionally edit outside motorsport articles, I have no idea where else it might be used, much less the scale of it.

Consequently, it was felt that fixing this issue is too much for a group of editors to resolve on their own. As such, it was decided that a BOTREQUEST was the best way forward. Here is the proposal:

Change the markup bgcolor= to style=background-color: in order to fix the issue for mobile users.

This may only be something that affects mobile browsers (for now), but we at the Formula 1 WikiProject have always edited with the belief that mobile users should be accomodated when and where possible. Prisonermonkeys (talk) 01:04, 7 September 2014 (UTC)

@Prisonermonkeys: has there been discussion on this? I'm going to give this a few days, then unless there are objections, I'll probably press on and get it done ASAP (there was an RfC at the VP which I closed a while back supporting this sort of change). --Mdann52talk to me! 05:55, 7 September 2014 (UTC)
@Mdann52, most of the discussion has been limited to user talk pages, including mine, but mostly on Tvx1's (and if you can get the two of us to agree on something, then it's usually a good idea). There has been some discussion at VPT, which has since been archived, but is mostly limited to explaining the reasons why the old markup doesn't work, and later acknowledging it as a bug with Bugzilla. And there is a notification of plans to come here on the Formula 1 WikiProject, so they are aware of what is going on. But there hasn't been extensive discussion, mostly because very few of us edit from a mobile. It's really been limited to myself, Tvx1, GyaroMaguus and DH85868993. Prisonermonkeys (talk) 07:15, 7 September 2014 (UTC)
Two points. First, style=background-color:"#XXXXXX" is invalid markup, so a simple change of bgcolor= to style=background-color: won't work. The opening quote needs to be after the equals sign, as in style="background-color:#XXXXXX". Second, even if the correct markup were used, it will have undesirable results if the table row or cell already has a style= attribute - no more than one per element (row or cell), may be used: if there are two or more on the same element, many browsers will ignore all except the last one. Therefore, these conversions wouldn't work as intended:
  • |bgcolor="#XXXXXX" style="text-align:center"|data to |style="background-color:#XXXXXX" style="text-align:center"|data
  • |style="text-align:center" bgcolor="#XXXXXX"|data to |style="text-align:center" style="background-color:#XXXXXX"|data
Fortunately, when two style= attributes are desired, their values may be concatenated using a semicolon as a separator. So,
  • |bgcolor="#XXXXXX" style="text-align:center"|data becomes |style="background-color:#XXXXXX;text-align:center"|data
  • |style="text-align:center" bgcolor="#XXXXXX"|data becomes |style="text-align:center;background-color:#XXXXXX"|data
The VPT threads are Wikipedia:Village pump (technical)/Archive 127#Background colour on mobile devices, Wikipedia:Village pump (technical)/Archive 128#Tables / HTML and Wikipedia:Village pump (technical)/Archive 129#"bgcolor" issue. --Redrose64 (talk) 10:18, 7 September 2014 (UTC)

I'm happy with whatever solution can be found. It's quite difficult to follow results matrices in particular without the colours. Prisonermonkeys (talk) 11:20, 8 September 2014 (UTC)

@Mdann52: Given there has been no objection to the objective of this request (i.e. to fix the markup), either here or at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Formula One/Archive 41#Bot request, are we now in a position to make further progress on this? DH85868993 (talk) 01:54, 15 September 2014 (UTC)
@Prisonermonkeys and DH85868993: yeah, I'll get working on this ASAP (likely next week at the latest; I'm away this weekend). Can I have the list of pages that need changes made, or is it everything with a WPF1 banner on the talk page? --Mdann52talk to me! 15:36, 17 September 2014 (UTC)
Technically, it's anywhere that the bgcolor= attribute has been used. It doesn't just affect F1 articles: see for example British Rail Class 86#Fleet details. --Redrose64 (talk) 16:23, 17 September 2014 (UTC)
Most of the career statistics tables in WP:HOCKEY's scope would be affected as well, however in our case the way these tables display on mobile (Android-Chrome, at least) makes this a non-issue as the fields remain clearly aligned and separated. But there are undoubtedly thousands of articles with a bgcolor=x formatting. Resolute 17:15, 17 September 2014 (UTC)
@Mdann52: If you want to restrict the run to just F1-related articles then yes, running it over anything tagged with the WPF1 banner would be appropriate. (I'm wondering if it possibly makes sense to restrict the initial run to just the F1-related articles, and if that all goes well, then run it site-wide. But if you want to run it site-wide from the start, that's fine too). DH85868993 (talk) 23:04, 17 September 2014 (UTC)
Right, I'll get going with this ASAP. This will, no doubt, take a while to complete. 07:32, 18 September 2014 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Mdann52 (talk • contribs)

Also remove Portal:Republic of China

As per the discussion above concerning Portal:People's Republic of China, please remove links to Portal:Republic of China, and replace them with a link to Portal:Taiwan (if it is not already present) because this portal was converted into a redirect 3 years ago. Best regards - TheChampionMan1234 05:45, 17 September 2014 (UTC)

@TheChampionMan1234: BRFA filed. GoingBatty (talk) 20:01, 20 September 2014 (UTC)

Page correction BOT

This bot has been listed to Requests for approval and trial approve could come soon. For the trial to be successful, please give it a bot flag. Wikipedian 2 (talk) 09:30, 29 September 2014 (UTC)

Duplicate sentences

I recently came across a duplicated sentence within an article. Would it be possible to run a bot that listed articles containing duplicated consecutive sentences and paragraphs, or is this just too large a potential use of CPU power? ϢereSpielChequers 10:47, 1 October 2014 (UTC)

MediaWiki synchronization bot

As has come up recently at Wikipedia:Village pump (technical)/Archive 130#Changing the interface texts for users who have Wikipedia configured for British English, it was proposed that we have a bot to synchronize the MediaWiki namespace pages for en-gb and en-ca. The bot would have a configuration page, editable only by admins, which has the words which are spelled differently; it would then create clones of all existing general MediaWiki: namespace pages (other than .css and .js) for en-gb and en-ca, fixing the words on this list (except in names of pages and formatting codes). Obviously, this would need to be an adminbot, since MediaWiki pages are editabl only by admins. The bot would do a single run on the entire MediaWiki namespace, and then watch for mnew changes in that namespace and redo the pages accordingly. עוד מישהו Od Mishehu 17:03, 15 September 2014 (UTC)

It's not clear to me where the copies would be made from. Let's say that the local copy of MediaWiki:Exif-colorspace differs from the system default, and that the local copy of MediaWiki:Exif-colorspace/en-gb also differs from the system default. Clearly we leave local MediaWiki:Exif-colorspace alone, but what will local MediaWiki:Exif-colorspace/en-gb be updated from - (a) local MediaWiki:Exif-colorspace or (b) system default MediaWiki:Exif-colorspace/en-gb? --Redrose64 (talk) 19:26, 15 September 2014 (UTC)
From the local. עוד מישהו Od Mishehu 19:55, 15 September 2014 (UTC)
"which has the words which are spelled differently" could be problematic, as replacing "center" with "centre" for example would break any inline CSS using that alignment, and replacing words in other context could break templates or links for example. Anomie⚔ 11:46, 16 September 2014 (UTC)
How easy would it be for a bot to recognize these situations? Links are clearly simle to identify (the word comes after "[[", without a pipe (|) or the closing brackets), as can both template names and parameter names. עוד מישהו Od Mishehu 13:53, 16 September 2014 (UTC)
I think a bot for this would be a really bad idea. We should really just set up MediaWiki to give us a way to prefer local customizations in US-english over default messages in British English. Jackmcbarn (talk) 14:36, 29 September 2014 (UTC)
A patch is waiting for your review. :-) See the plan: bugzilla:46579#c43. --Nemo 13:35, 5 October 2014 (UTC)

User Sandbox Tag-o-bot

I'd like to see a bot that looks at user sandbox pages that do not have the {{user sandbox}} tagging, and apply that tag (especially to newly created pages). Seems like a trivial request, but I've seen a lot of new users creating what would be a CSD-U5 (not-webhost violation) or U11 (promotional use of userspace) in sandbox space. By removing this tag, they remove the embedded __NOINDEX__ from it, thus having it show up in Google searches. I don't know if that's deliberate (i.e. there's a guide somewhere telling how to keep a promo page on WP) or if they just don't bother to read the "edit below this line" in their sandbox. Either way, I think this tag should be put back on when removed. An additional benefit is that it allows truly good-faith editors to then click the nice big "Submit" button for AfC to then evaluate. Thoughts? Comments? CrowTalk 15:09, 13 September 2014 (UTC)

How exactly should it identify "user sandboxes" that need the tag? I have a bunch of sandbox pages for which that template would be useless and annoying. Anomie⚔ 18:49, 13 September 2014 (UTC)
Chiefly the "main" sandbox of the form [[User:x/sandbox]]. Such a bot would be opt-outable of course. CrowTalk 19:53, 13 September 2014 (UTC)
What about blank pages? No point in having Special:Mypage/sandbox consist solely of {{user sandbox}} if the user had previously blanked it. Nyttend (talk) 17:41, 16 September 2014 (UTC)
"AND pageisblank=false? CrowTalk 22:04, 16 September 2014 (UTC)
I am making a bot for this called Roccerbot. I need some help. How do I find all the user sandboxes, not onee certain sandbox, which needs the {{user sandbox}} template? User sandboxes aren't categorized (but maybe we could make a category?). PhilrocMy contribs 14:31, 29 September 2014 (UTC)
@Philroc: Something like select page_title from page where page_namespace = 2 and page_title like '%/sandbox' from tool labs will work. Jackmcbarn (talk) 14:36, 29 September 2014 (UTC)
@Jackmcbarn: I'm using pywikibot, and I'm writing this in Python. What should I do? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Philroc (talk • contribs) 14:48, 29 September 2014‎ (UTC)
@Philroc: The language doesn't matter. It just matters that you host your bot on tool labs so that it can connect to the database. Jackmcbarn (talk) 14:56, 29 September 2014 (UTC)
@Jackmcbarn: Will do, thanks. PhilrocMy contribs 14:57, 29 September 2014 (UTC)

As part of the project mw:Archived Pages, the Internet Archive has been preserving every URL linked from dozens Wikipedias for several months now. They're waiting for us to move next. The next logical step is that a bot goes around looking for dead links (either those already marked as such or new ones found with weblinkchecker.py/reflinks.py) and replaces them with archived links automatically. Any volunteer? Legoktm already wrote an example code but no longer has the time to work on it. Ideally, the bot would be written in a way that can scale to other languages and projects, e.g. by not relying too much on specific local templates and parameters. --Nemo 09:01, 1 October 2014 (UTC)

That would be brilliant. Do they archive at about the same time as the link is added to Wikipedia? If so it would be good to offer this as alternative, at least for sites where the content is likely to have changed. A step beyond this would be to offer this as an alternative where the internet archive page and the current link no longer access the same content. ϢereSpielChequers 10:42, 1 October 2014 (UTC)
If I remember correctly, I saw the links are archived within 24 hours or so. This is just from a sample manual check on a few dozens wikis though. --Nemo 13:29, 5 October 2014 (UTC)
Pages are often archived when a user requests archiving, not within 24 hours. The archive.org spider isn't that fast.
Also dead links will also show up as 404 pages on archive.org. It is best to use the earliest known snapshot. Archive.org is notorious for archiving dead 404 pages as well as useful ones. ~Amatulić (talk) 07:44, 8 October 2014 (UTC)

"First began" and "Upon its release"

Can a bot replace every instance of "first began" with just "began"?

I'd like to just outright delete "Upon its release", because in 99% of cases it's redundant. It shows up everywhere in articles about movies, albums etc. I suspect this may be more complex, though. Popcornduff (talk) 16:47, 7 October 2014 (UTC)

What if it's intentional, such as inside a quote? WP:FDB#Fully automatic spell-checking bots. --Redrose64 (talk) 17:22, 7 October 2014 (UTC)
I suspect there are too many uses within quotes, and some legitimate usages ("They first began to do this and only subsequnetly realised that they would have to do that"?): try using AWB and casting a quick human eye over each instance. PamD 17:31, 7 October 2014 (UTC)
I don't see what's necessary about the "first" in "first began" in your example, but maybe I'm not understanding it properly.
I realise there will be exceptions that may make the idea unworkable. How does it work with other text fix bots? Do they have lists of exceptions? Do they rely on editors reporting/reverting false positives? Popcornduff (talk) 22:27, 7 October 2014 (UTC)
Which "text fix bots" do you have in mind? --Redrose64 (talk) 23:04, 7 October 2014 (UTC)
Aha! I had always assumed AWB was a bot, but now I look it up, I see I was wrong. I'll look into doing some of the changes I'm thinking about using AWB, maybe. Thanks. Popcornduff (talk) 23:19, 7 October 2014 (UTC)
A straw man example of a valid instance of "first began": "Two brothers agreed to a footrace. On Monday, the first began to walk, while the second began to run." I do not claim that this construction exists in an article, but I would not let a bot loose to blindly change all "first began"s to "began".
I have found the new search tool to be helpful in finding phrases, even within wikicode, that I would like to examine and potentially change. YMMV. – Jonesey95 (talk) 04:24, 8 October 2014 (UTC)
Your example's a good one. Thanks. (But yeah, I did say in 99% cases it's redundant; I'm not claiming it's always redundant. edit: oh, I only said that about the second suggestion, I'm a moron.) Popcornduff (talk) 12:03, 8 October 2014 (UTC)
How about also "They at first began to build ..."? Going through using AWB plus human intelligence would be best. PamD 13:03, 8 October 2014 (UTC)

Create Draft-class categories

Would anyone be able to create about 1000 categories of the form Category:Draft-Class xyz articles. We have recently added this class to the extended quality scale (see discussion) leaving a bunch of categories which need creating.

Templates with missing categories are tracked via Category:WPBannerMeta templates with missing assessment categories, most of which relate to the missing Draft-class categories.

The categories can be created with 

{{cat more|Wikipedia:WikiProject PROJECT}}
{{cat class | topic=TOPIC | class=Draft}}
{{Category TOC}}

where

  • PROJECT is the name of the WikiProject
  • TOPIC is the naming scheme of the assessment categories (often this is the same as the project name)

Can anyone help with this? Thanks — Martin (MSGJ · talk) 12:04, 6 October 2014 (UTC)

@MSGJ: is there a list anywhere of articles that support draft-class already? If so, I may be able to do a simple list compare, and sort this out soon. --Mdann52talk to me! 11:56, 7 October 2014 (UTC)
@Mdann52: thanks for your response. Projects which already have a working category can be viewed at Category:Draft-Class articles. Unfortunately there is no list of non-existent categories: there is just the tracking category Category:WPBannerMeta templates with missing assessment categories mentioned above. — Martin (MSGJ · talk) 11:54, 8 October 2014 (UTC)

Wouldn't it be better to have a bot create the populated cats (and tag the empty ones)? Creating 1000 cats where most will be empty (there are at the moment some 1000 Draft talk pages) seems like overkill. From the 59 draft cats we already have (Category:Draft-Class articles), no less than 25 are empty. Fram (talk) 11:59, 8 October 2014 (UTC)

And five days later, we are up to 52 empty cats... Fram (talk) 10:20, 13 October 2014 (UTC)

Produce a list of articles

WP:NRHP maintains lists of historic sites throughout the United States, with one or more separate lists for each of the country's 3000+ counties. These lists employ {{NRHP row}}, which (among its many parameters) includes parameters to display latitude and longitude through {{coord}}. For most of the project's history, the lists used an older format with manually written coords (e.g. a page would include the code {{coord|40|30|0|N|95|30|0|W|name=House}}, when today they just have |lat=40.5 |lon=95.5), and when a bot was run to add the templates to the lists, it somehow didn't address the coordinates in some lists. With this in mind, I'd like if someone could instruct a bot to discover all WP:NRHP lists that are currently using both {{NRHP row}} and {{coord}}. I tried to use Special:WhatLinksHere/Template:Coord, but it didn't produce good results: since {{NRHP row}} transcludes {{coord}} when it's correctly implemented, all of these lists have links to {{coord}}. As a result, I was imagining that the bot would perform the following procedure:

  • Go to each of the pages linked from WP:NRHPPROGRESS. All of our 3000+ lists are linked from this page, and virtually nothing else is, so this would reduce the number of false positives
  • Check to see if the page transcludes {{NRHP row}}
  • If the page does not transclude that template, record it in Results and go to the next WP:NRHPPROGRESS-linked page
  • If the page transcludes {{NRHP row}}, check to see if the characters {{coord| are present in the code of the page (basically a Ctrl+F for the code). My primary goal is to see which pages transclude {{coord}} directly, and searching for the string of text seems to be the simplest course
  • If the page transcludes {{coord}}, record it in Results; if not, don't. Either way, go to the next WP:NRHPPROGRESS-linked page

"Results" could be a spot in the bot's userspace. Since the bot won't be doing anything except editing the results page, you won't need to worry about opening a BRFA. Nyttend (talk) 01:49, 15 October 2014 (UTC)

@Nyttend: If you need these results updated regularly, then a bot or script is the way to go, and I'll leave that to the regular experts on this page. But as a one off, I've done it using AWB's "preparse mode" and created User:Nyttend/NRHP row and coord for you. -- John of Reading (talk) 13:48, 15 October 2014 (UTC)
Thank you! This is a one-off thing, since people don't add new coordinates this way to lists that don't already have them this way. And it definitely helps that you supplied the list of articles that didn't have {{NRHP row}}; I asked for this in case we had articles that never got converted to the {{NRHP row}} in the first place, and it's good to know that everything has been converted properly. Nyttend (talk) 13:51, 15 October 2014 (UTC)

Add articles to the newly formed WP:Tejano

I don't know how to use bots and the taskforce is too large to go one by one adding articles to WP:Tejano. Best, .jonatalk 18:37, 15 October 2014 (UTC)

Here are some important categories for the bot to cover:

Tejano music, Banda, Duranguense, Jarocho, Ranchera, Mariachi, Norteño (music). Erick (talk) 21:17, 15 October 2014 (UTC)

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