Wikipedia talk:Rollback/Archive 1

Archive 1

Archive 2

Archive 3

The Article Thomas Cochrane, 10th Earl of Dundonald

Haven't you reverted my legitimate edits three times in 24 hours also? Isn't that edit warring? I thought that my cause was perfectly legitimate.

Duplications and forks

We already have Help:Revert#Rollback. Wikipedia:Revert used to redirect there, but this edit changed it to direct here instead. What should be done? At the moment, the pages are duplicating information and may end up contradicting each other.

From Help:Revert#Rollback:

Admins and users who have been granted access to the tool have additional "rollback" links, which:

• appear only next to the top edit
• revert all top consequent edits made by last editor
• work immediately, without intermediate confirmation diff page
• add automatic edit summary "Reverted edits by Example (talk) to last version by Example2", marking edit as minor

Rollback links appear on the User contributions pages, History pages and Diff pages. Note that in the last case rollback link can be misleading, since reversion is not necessarily to the old version shown (the diff page may show the combined result of edits including some by other editors, or only part of the edits the rollback button would revert). To see the changes the rollback button would revert, view the corresponding diff page.

Rollback works much quicker than undo, since it

• allows reverting without even looking at the list of revisions or a diff
• does not require loading an edit page and sending the wikitext back to the server.
• does not require a click of the save button.

On the other hand, it is not as versatile as undo, since it does not allow to specify which edits have to be undone (one may want to revert more or less edits than rollback does, or edits which do not include the last edit) and does not allow adding an explanation to the automatic edit summary.

Rollback is supposed to be used to revert obvious vandalism.

Rolling back a good-faith edit without explanation may be misinterpreted as "I think your edit was no better than vandalism and reverting it doesn't need an explanation." Some editors are sensitive to such perceived slights; if you use the rollback feature other than for vandalism (for example because undo is impractical due to the large page size), it's polite to leave an explanation on the article talk page or on the talk page of the user whose edit(s) you reverted.

If someone else edited or rollled back the page before you clicked "rollback" link, or if there was no previous editor, you will get an error message.

So two questions: (1) How much of this is needed here? (2) What is the best way to handle the two different pages? Carcharoth (talk) 12:40, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

Rollback for dummies

I don't know who gave me rollback, but I suddenly seem to have it. I've read this page, and I still have no idea what it does or where I can test it. What is the difference between rollback and undo? Need a test page; I've never wanted to be an admin because these tools scare me. Old dog, new tricks, scared to death to do something wrong, all that. I appreciate the trust someone bestowed in me, but this page doesn't help me know what the heck this button does. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 23:03, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

My advice is not to use rollback. It is a form of reverting used primarily against vandalism. See Help:Revert#Rollback (now updated from meta). Unlike manual reverts, or reverting to an old version of a page, or clicking "undo", rollback instantly reverts the edit, and enters an edit summary for you and makes it as a 'minor' edit. You also can't preview the change you are making, unless you look at a diff beforehand (but that negates the point of rollback being fast). The primary use of rollback is for vandal fighters who, once they've identified a particularly industrious vandal, will confidently warn/block them and then use rollback to undo most (or all) the edits made by that vandal (if they were the last edits on the page edited), without looking at the edits. It takes experience to do this. As I'm not a vandal fighter, I don't need and don't use the tool. If you aren't a vandal fighter either, I'd advise you not to use it. Carcharoth (talk) 00:50, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Thanks, Carcharoth; I get it, and I actually can use it. Tourette syndrome and coprolalia are frequently in the path of industrious vandals, and I often identify those sorts of vandals, and then have to go through and undo each vandal edit. So, you're saying that if TS is hit, I check the editor and find several vandalistic edits in a short time frame, then I would use rollback to get all the other edits made in the same time frame? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 01:01, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

I'm not entirely sure. Ask someone who actually uses the tool! :-) I think if the vandal had made the last three edits, then rollback would revert back over all of them (as opposed to three separate 'undo' actions). You could (and this is what I do) just find the last unvandalised version and revert to that (click 'edit' for the old version and then save it with a summary of "reverting to last unvandalised version"), and then manually check for good edits that were interspersed among the vandal edits. What rollback won't do is go back past other users. So if the sequence is vandalA-editor-vandalB-vandalA-vandalB - then rollback is pretty useless here. You have to do it manually. So at the end of the day, you still need to carefully check that no vandalism gets missed. I predict that some people will become complacent with rollback, and will start to miss vandalism... Carcharoth (talk) 02:20, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

A new question: lets say I have a vandal who's been making edits all day and a ouple of IPs add some useful info in between some of these edits. Does Rollback only undo a consecutive string of edits, or does it get all of the edits from the vandal appearing in the recent history? I am thinking it only catches the consecutive string, but haven't seen it in action versus large-scale nuttery. - Arcayne (^{cast a spell}) 16:17, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

Rollback will only revert the string of edits performed by the last user to edit an article. If someone else edited between, rollback will stop at that user's last edit. Which means that if there are some good edits made by someone else in the middle of a series of vandal edits by one user, rollback won't be of good use. You must manually revert the article to the last good version, and manually re-insert the good edits lost in the reversion. In other words, a headache. Húsönd 16:26, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

That's rather what I thought. Since I have you here, can you point to instances of abuse or mistaken usages of rollback? I'd prefer to know how something can go sideways - it helps me understand the path of the straight and narrow a lot better. - Arcayne (^{cast a spell}) 16:37, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

Rollback misuse is rare, at least I can't recall the last time I found a rollback ill performed. Basically, there are some common sense situations where rollback should not be used, e.g. to revert the edits of a user with whom you're having a content dispute, or the entire string of edits of a user editing in good faith just because his last edit didn't appear to be very constructive, etc. If you regret having performed a rollback, revert yourself. Húsönd 17:07, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

All good advice. Thanks. - Arcayne (^{cast a spell}) 17:46, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

Testing tools

Sandy makes a good point. Is there a place where people can safely try out rollback without doing any damage (I know, they can revert any rollbacks, but still, pointing to a sandpit somewhere would be good practice). Carcharoth (talk) 00:57, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Found it: Wikipedia:New admin school/Rollback. Carcharoth (talk) 00:58, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

I propose we set up a rollback sandbox, with a bot that reverts whatever anybody does 30 seconds after they make an edit including rollbacks by non-admins and admins, so people can get a feel for quick repetitive rollbacking. NoSeptember 15:07, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

With the intent of discouraging it, right? :-) Carcharoth (talk) 15:59, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Userbox?

Although I have not dealt with making them, I am wondering if one exists that those who have this feature from RfR could place in their userspace? Preferably like the admin userbox with the verify link, if that is possible. -MBK₀₀₄ 03:28, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

Something like this: {{User wikipedia/rollback}}? No verification link as with {{User wikipedia/Administrator2}}, but would be a nice feature-- Paleorthid (talk) 03:43, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

YES! Although the verification link would be a useful addition. I just haven't dabbled into that aspect and would be hard-pressed to do so. Perhaps a future upgrade? -MBK₀₀₄ 04:13, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

Question

So... what would be the major difference between this and Twinkle? What would this have over Twinkle? (just wondering) The Chronic 03:51, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Twinkle and other javascript-based revert tools work by going to the history, selecting the version to revert back to, opening its edit page and saving. Rollback just makes one request to the server and everything else is handled server-side, which improves performance and makes reverting slightly faster. Tra (Talk) 19:54, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Is it Popups compatible? If so, I'm soooooooooo interested. Though isn't popups even better because it's a single-click? WLU (talk) 21:57, 15 February 2008 (UTC)

Category?

there is Category:Wikipedia administrators. Should there be Category:Wikipedia rollers-backers or smth.? `'Míkka>t 20:17, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

We do already have Special:Listusers/rollbacker which is an automatically updated list of users with rollback permission. Tra (Talk) 20:52, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

I see it now. The problem is that I could not find it described anywhere. I made it more prominent in text. `'Míkka>t 20:21, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

"How it works" section

This is not how it works. Can someone of admins with good command of English describe it, please? (hint: the "rollback" function is available in at least two places). `'Míkka>t 20:42, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Special:Listusers/rollbacker.

Now I am confused even more. The wikipedia page says "he rollback feature is available to administrators and users with the rollbacker permission on Wikipedia " Now, the question is who are listed in the Special:Listusers/rollbacker. I am an admin, so supposedly this feature is available to me. But I am not listed in the Special page. Therefore I changed the article text to "A complete list of (non-admin) rollbackers can be found in the page Special:Listusers/rollbacker". But now I see that this Special page lists some admins as well. Please, whoever responsible to the feature, clarify. `'Míkka>t 20:57, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Basically, if you have the permission 'sysop', you can delete, protect, block etc and rollback pages. If you have the permission 'rollbacker', you can rollback pages. It is possible to have both the permissions 'sysop' and 'rollbacker' but the functionality available to you is the same as if you were just a sysop. I have altered that paragraph, to try to clarify it. Tra (Talk) 22:00, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

• I'm confused as well. I am not on this list, but I have rollback powers -- not only that, I have had rollback powers long before 9 January 2008 when, according to this page, this feature was supposedly implemented. All I had to do was install WP:POP, and since then I've been able to roll back edits with a single click. What gives? --M@rēino 15:54, 17 March 2008 (UTC)

  Popups is different to rollback. Popups works by using javascript to automatically find the page to revert back to, edit it and save it (basically the same as manual reverting but faster). Rollback is a server side tool where the browser makes one request to the server and the edit is rolled back. The two different tools are basically just two different ways of doing a very similar thing. Tra (Talk) 17:48, 17 March 2008 (UTC)

  So is rollback something that only people who cannot use javascript on their consoles should request? Or is the benefit to the server so significant that I should request rollback? --M@rēino 18:32, 17 March 2008 (UTC)

  There is a slight benefit to the server, in that you're making less page requests, although often it doesn't matter if you use rollback or popups. What you could do is request rollback and if you don't find you need it, don't use it. Tra (Talk) 21:33, 17 March 2008 (UTC)

  I'll buy that logic. I've filed a request. --M@rēino 22:17, 17 March 2008 (UTC)

Custom edit summaries

Non-vandalism rollback reverts should use custom edit summaries to help those reviewing such edits at a later date. I've tried to explain this here. I'm not sure, but possibly TWINKLE also does this now? I'm asking the authors of those scripts to comment here and help improve the wording - possibly a section on custom edit summaries is needed? Carcharoth (talk) 01:32, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

I've edited the "When not to use rollback" section as follows:

* I've turned it into prose.

* I've removed references to self-reverts. You don't need a custom edit summary to revert your own edits.

* I've changed the wording "consider using" to "use".

* I've changed the wording to say only use a script for large numbers of reverts. Of course we wouldn't be using a script for an individual edit, and using scripts in general for small numbers of edits isn't to be encouraged. --02:01, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

Rollbacking your own edits can be controversial. Remember Gurch rollbacking his rollbacking? That restored vandalism he had previously removed. It shouldn't be assumed that someone rollbacking their own edits doesn't need spot-checking. AGF should always be taken with a large pinch of salt when it comes to the content of the encyclopedia. I think less stringent checks apply more in places like your own userspace. Someone rollbacking their own edits to their own page is obviously not a problem. Rollbacking your own edits to George W. Bush might need checking. As for "using scripts in general for small numbers of edits isn't to be encouraged" - you do realise that most people have small scripts running in their .js spaces anyway? I think encouraging people to think about edit summaries and when they are and aren't needed is the key thing here, not some abstract "use of scripts" thing. Anyway, we've both had a go at it. Let's see what others say. Carcharoth (talk) 02:07, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

Back when I first got +rollbacker, I wrote a little script to add a [revert] link after [rollback] so I could rollback with a summary. I got a little help with it on VPT. It needs a little cleanup, but it makes a good standalone thing. Could it be adapted to serve the purpose? Tuvok[^T@lk/_Improve] 10:34, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

Maybe a list of such scripts could be made somewhere? I'm sure there are others around. Carcharoth (talk) 17:15, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

There are several scripts of this sort, including:

• User:Voyagerfan5761/rollbacksummary.js (mentioned above)
• User:Gracenotes/rollback.js
• User:Mr.Z-man/rollbackSummary.js

There are likely others. Each has advantages. I personally like the $user replace option for mine, and the non-intrusive addition of the "sum" item. It only works on diff pages at the moment. It would be beneficial to try to merge the scripts, in my opinion. Gracenotes^T § 04:07, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

Speaking of which, is there any way to make twinkle utilize the MediaWiki rollback feature instead of doing it the slow (javascript) way? Pumpmeup 04:25, 6 February 2008 (UTC)

I think there's been some discussion at WT:TWINKLE. I don't recall any comments recently, though. Perhaps it would be good to revive that conversation... Tuvok[^T@lk/_Improve] 05:11, 6 February 2008 (UTC)

Talk page templates

Hello. Thank you for this feature. A thought from new user, would it be helpful to mention communication with the person who is being rolled back? I think on the rollback intro pages Wikipedia:Rollback feature and Wikipedia:New admin school/Rollback? Or a link to Wikipedia:Vandalism would lead to the table of {{WarningsSmall}} templates which are not present in the Welcoming Committee set of greetings. I am taking this slowly and can see some of you are real pros at this. -Susanlesch (talk) 22:16, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

• I think I won't use this tool very often. It is alarming to get involved with this actually without any guidelines or admin training to support my interactions but I did add the template links to this article in case they help somebody else. Undid will be fine for me most of the time. Something for emergencies is nice though. Thanks. -Susanlesch (talk) 04:10, 15 February 2008 (UTC)
• After watching what other users do, no talk is expected so I use this. Just mentioning it because didn't want to seem ungrateful (maybe cautious). -Susanlesch (talk) 05:29, 26 February 2008 (UTC)

Twinkle

I currently fight vandalism with 'Twinkle'. Does this basically do the same as rollback? Should i switch to rollback, or just stick with Twinkle? Would i benefit more if i used both? All help appreciated :-) Thanks! TheProf | 2007 16:40, 29 February 2008 (UTC)

The rollback feature allows nonconstructive edits to be reverted more quickly and more efficiently than with other methods (Such as WP:TW. (User scripts have been written which mimic the functionality of rollback, but they merely hide details from the user, and are much less efficient, both in terms of bandwidth and time). Rollback links are displayed on page histories, user contributions pages, and diff pages. I feel that it really depends on how much time you spend doing vandalism reverts, and if you spend a good amount of time doing them then it can not hurt to have the extra button. Tiptoety ^talk 03:26, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

Proposal: Make this available to everyone

After a suitable testing period, single-article rollback should be made available to anyone without having to request special permissions. An "enable rollback" button in "my preferences" should be all that's needed to turn it on. The mass-rollback capability should require administrator action to turn on. I'm not sure what "a suitable testing period" is, but 6 months after the 1000th rollbacker started rolling back edits should be long enough. That should be in 3-4 months. Logic: Rollback doesn't enable anything that a user can't do already. Limiting the more-costly-if-you-goof-it-up user-mass-rollback will let admins revoke that permission if someone shows they cannot be responsible with the tool. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 01:56, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

I agree with your logic on that for the most part. One question I have is "does ease of access lead to ease of abuse?" And I guess the follow up would be "If so, does it matter?" I tend to feel that this is a feature that probably wouldn't make Wikipedia any more open to abuse than it already is, unlike, perhaps, page deletion or something. And in the end, it is still revertible abuse. I'd like to hear some counter arguments, but I think I agree with you, davidwr.

I'll share a personal experience. I use Twinkle, so I have rollback rights as well, lol. However, the first time I used it, it was accidental and I reverted a good edit instead of the bad edit. Pressed the wrong button. This, I suppose, might be an argument for its protection. I immediately corrected my error, however. It was easy to correct-- no harder of a correction than if I had blanked the page, redirected, or any other number of changes which are openly available. davidwr's argument makes a lot of sense to me, including his obfuscation but not-denial approach. The protection on this feature seems superfluous to me (not that I really care, because I will still use Twinkle). Looking forward to more discussion on this. WDavis1911 (talk) 23:38, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

On the other hand, I ran across an editor recently who asked for and received rollback rights only to lose them in less than a day for not aggressively rolling back non-vandalism. He continued aggressive improper reverts even after losing the tool though.

Personally, between the undo button and clicking on the most recent non-vandal edit, I find it isn't hard to make a reversion and it gives me a chance to write an appropriate edit summary. Rollback becomes useful when you have multiple vandalism edits across different articles by a single person. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs)/(e-mail) 01:36, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

Rollback icon--not a good idea?

I noticed the rollback icon on a user page recently. {{rollback}}. This doesn't seem like such a great idea to me. I find the admin icon very useful--it's the first thing I look for on a user page--but I don't really care if users I'm interacting with have the rollback tool or not. This rollback icon seems to me to foster the idea that rollback is a badge to show off, that it is something more than what it is. Is this icon useful information for other editors, or do other people feel the same way I do? Darkspots (talk) 17:17, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

I can't imagine how it'd be showing off. It's not as if rollback is that exclusive. All you have to do to get rollback is ask. —  scetoaux (T|C) 21:02, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

Rollback and watchlist

Is there a way to not auto-watchlist pages you rollback on? I have my settings that anything I edit gets added to my watchlist, but some pages I'm just reverting vandalism I discovered by looking at a vandals's contribs. Enigma ^message Review 17:55, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

Nope, this has been talked about before. I recommend that you use WP:TW if you are interested in something like that. Tiptoety ^talk 23:11, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

I do use TW to rollback sometimes, but regular rollback is easier. Was there a reason why a way not to watchlist wasn't implemented? Enigma ^message Review 23:19, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

It just never has been that way, even admins do not get it. Ask one of the developers, I have no idea. Tiptoety ^talk 23:21, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

Other WP

As I see, the feature is presently available on English WP only. Anyone knows when it will be possible to grant this feature to users on another language WP? --Tone 21:16, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

Although I'm not a contributor at other WPs like you are, I generally get the impression that the English WP has the most rigorous process for becoming an administrator of the bunch. How does that compare with your experiences? It seemed like the rollback feature here was a way to get a useful tool into the hands of more folks here than would want to go through RfA. Darkspots (talk) 21:32, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

If there's another wiki which you think should have rollbacker rights enabled on it, you would need to get a consensus from that community and make a request on Bugzilla. Tra (Talk) 21:41, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

Rollback auto edit summary

I would like to suggest that the rollback auto edit summary should be changed to reflect that the reversion was done using rollback, noting that the default edit summary for "undo" notes that the undo button was used, as do reverts with Popups, etc. --Philosopher ^{Let us reason together.} 02:37, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

His or her

Hey, I can't believe I'm on the talk page about this either, but an IP editor wants to get rid of the "or her". [1] [2] I disagree; I think the "or her" is harmless. Wikipedia:Manual of Style#Gender-neutral language advises us to use gender-neutral language when "this can be done with clarity and precision". I think we lose neither with "his or her" in this case. In any event, I'm not going revert him or her again about it without getting consensus here. Darkspots (talk) 01:55, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

I think the spelling of judgment/judgement is a bigger issue. Is it supposed to be written in American English? Enigma ^message 01:57, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

The American Heritage Dictionary that I have handy says the word is spelled "judgment", with "judgement" as an alternate spelling. Which spelling is British and which is American? Darkspots (talk) 02:12, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

"Judgment" is what's used commonly here in the Midwest United States, though both are technically correct. According to Judgment, it's the American spelling and the one with an "e" is the British. As for his/her, I personally prefer the generic "his", but don't have a problem with "or her" either. If it currently says "or her", I say leave it. It's not like it's doing any harm, plus saying "him or her" is grammatically correct. --Philosopher ^{Let us reason together.} 04:29, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

Checking our article had the answer, of course--I went over to wiktionary after the AHD, and it was pretty opaque about national variations. My mistake. I think the British spelling is fine for this page. I use the generic "his" myself, but in this context the gender-neutral phrase makes more sense to me. Thanks, Darkspots (talk) 11:27, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

Something curious I noticed

Did you know that the creator of the rollback page is a banned user? Wow. (NicAgent) Enigma ^message 01:59, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

Hey, Who's Who says he's "known to act in good faith". Guess Dr. Jekyll wrote this page. Darkspots (talk) 02:15, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

Ha, I've never read that page. "Known to act in good faith." I like it. Enigma ^message 02:31, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

Does it delete an article ?

Hi. Out of curiosity, if an article had been edited by only one person, would rollback effectively remove the entire article ? Note - I'm not suggesting this as a method of editing, I'm just curious as to what would happen if this was done. CultureDrone (talk) 12:10, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

No. The Rollback option will not appear if there is only one revision. Pedro :  Chat  12:33, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

If you mean one author making several edits, then it will send a "Rollback failed" message. Admiral Norton ^(talk) 23:24, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

Other wikis

Can rollback be granted to non administrators in other-language wikis ? -- CD 10:38, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

I'm not sure which, if indeed any, other WMF wikis have rollback for users other than +sysop. The original implementation for non-admin rollback was done here and was en.wiki only. Of course if another wiki wanted it they could file a bug report and get it; it would be up the wiki's community on the implementation and process for managing user rights though. Pedro :  Chat  12:10, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

As I can see, administrators here can give rollback rights, if a request is made to implement non-admin rollback in a wiki, would admins be able to give those rights by default or only bureaucrats or will that have to be requested too ? -- CD 14:54, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

It's up to the individual wiki. Initially there was thought that rollback could only be granted by 'crats here on en. This was changed to admins being able to manage the right. Other wikis could do whatever they wanted, and on at least one wiki (can't remember which might be es.wikipedia) all admins are bureaucrats anyway. Each wiki just needs to get consenus on 1) wanting the tool for non admins and 2) how they then give it out. Pedro :  Chat  15:02, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

OK, thanks-- CD 17:09, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

Rollback icon

I made a template to get the rollback icon in the title bar (below the "my watchlist", "my contributions" etc. links). Just add {{User:Admiral Norton/Rollback}} to a page. Admiral Norton ^(talk) 23:29, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

Limit?

There's a village pump proposal here to abolish the "rollback limit". (Which surprised me since I wasn't aware of any limit - why isn't it mentioned on this page?)--Kotniski (talk) 09:11, 16 July 2008 (UTC)

This is still active. It's proposed to raise the limit from 10 to 60 uses per minute. Please contribute to see if there is consensus to ask the developers for a change.--Kotniski (talk) 08:30, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Chicken test

After you click on "rollback", is there any way to have a prompt "Are you sure (Y/N)?" before the rollback occurs? When using normal editing I force myself to use the "show preview" before any changes are saved and I am concerned I may have a quick trigger finger with rollback. Rgrds. --Tombstone (talk) 17:48, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

Nope. When you click on the link, the edits in question are reverted and you're immediately redirected. Admiral Norton ^(talk) 20:15, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

This would skirt the whole pith of rollback, which is a quick, one click means of reverting vandalism. Gwen Gale (talk) 20:16, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Rollback one's own talk page--placing the new text

So, the content of the new paragraph isn't in dispute. The placement of it, however, is. I prefer to see it in the "when to use rollback" section for two reason:

• It's permitted, not prohibited, even if it is discouraged.
• The way the rest of the "When not to use rollback" section is written, the paragraph as it is currently worded sticks out as an afterthought. That section read like a unified whole prior to this addition. Adding it after a sidenote about admins not being able to have rollback removed without being desysop'ed seems to lack flow.

Thus, even if it's kept in the "when not to use rollback" section, placing it ahead of the preexisting text in that section really seems better for readability and flow. Jclemens (talk) 18:50, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

I'm rather strongly for keeping it in the when not to section, since at most, it's not encouraged at all (even discouraged) and is more or less an artifact of admin-only rollback having been a bit abused but put up with. Gwen Gale (talk) 18:57, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

• Some backstory on this new addition can be found here. As I said at the tail end of that thread, "The reason I put it in the "When not to use" because while it's not presently prohibited, it's still in the realm of "probably shouldn't use it" (WP:CIVIL concerns). –xeno (talk) 18:38, 26 July 2008 (UTC)" No doubt we can work it into the section a little better, it was a rush addition, but I still think it belongs firmly in the "when not to use" section. –xeno (talk) 19:00, 26 July 2008 (UTC)
• I think that the use of rollback on non-vandalistic edits on one's talkpage needs to be either prohibited or allowed (without caveat). Less gray, more black-and-white is always good, in my view. I would have absolutely no problem with it being forbidden, nor would I have a problem with it being allowed. I just think we need to develop consensus one way or the other, and place it. S. Dean Jameson 20:21, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

• I'm in favor of allowing a user to define what constitutes vandalism within the context of their own talk page solely for the purpose of using rollback. That is, if I've told someone I don't want it on my talk page, and/or I find it offensive, I should have the right to rollback my talk page--I think that's consistent with other guidelines re: user talk pages. (Mind you, this is 100% hypothetical--I've never used rollback in this manner) Jclemens (talk) 20:28, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

• So, let's step back a bit and look at why we're here. An IP address filed an ANI about S. Dean Jameson using rollback on his own talk page. Would the updated page, as it stands now, 1) better educate any other user in SDJ's shoes that that action would be inappropriate, and/or 2) forestall any other use in the IP address's shoes from filing an ANI for such activity? As I see it, the answers are "maybe" and "no" in the current incarnation. I'm really seeing "permitted but discouraged" as a better placement than "prohibited but tolerated" as a better place, which will, in my mind, end up with "probably, if s/he read it" and "yes" answers to the two questions. Jclemens (talk) 20:20, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

The only worry about banning it altogether is there are several long standing, trusted admins who have been using rollback to tidy up their talk pages for years (though I'm seeing it less and less these days, I must say). Gwen Gale (talk) 20:27, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

One possible solution would be to prohibit it for rollbackers only. That would certainly clear up any confusion. It could say something like, "Rollbackers are prohibited from using rollback on non-vandalistic edits to their talkpage" or something similar. S. Dean Jameson 20:32, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Yeah but I'm afraid it would be WP:CREEP. Gwen Gale (talk) 20:34, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Then just say it's not prohibited, period. I don't care one way or the other, but it needs to be clarified. I'd prefer not to have my username associated with any ANI threads unnecessarily, and making it explicitly okay to use it in such a manner would proscribe future anon IPs from starting ANI threads about future rollbackers user of the tool in that way. More clarity, less ambiguity, I say. S. Dean Jameson 22:20, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

"Deprecated"?

To quote my favorite comedy (and this is meant "totally" in jest), "I do not think that word means what you think it means."

Seriously, though, what's your reasoning behind replacing "discouraged" with "deprecated"? S. Dean Jameson 20:16, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Hardly. Here's the dicdef. It's the standard IT term for stuff that's allowed but frowned upon. Gwen Gale (talk) 20:19, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Oh, it certainly is a more technical term, I agree. But will the majority of Wikieditors really understand it, even if it is a more technical term? Plus, I use "deprecated" ways of doing stuff in Linux all the time, because I've been playing with Unix for 20 years and have some old habits. I don't think that term adequately conveys the WP:CIVIL issues that might result from using rollback in that manner. Jclemens (talk) 20:23, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Oh, ok. <joke> How about holding up a silver cross and hissing then?</joke> Truth be told, I do deprecated stuff on FreeBSD now and then and feel untowards about it, but that's only me :) Deprecated is a strong word, widely known: This is an encyclopedia, not MySpace. Gwen Gale (talk) 20:30, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

It's much stronger (harsher) than "discouraged." Was that your intent? S. Dean Jameson 20:34, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

(ec) No disagreement that editors should know and understand it, just whether they will. Jclemens (talk) 20:35, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

It would be meant to stop folks from using rollback for anything other than vandalism, but not toss kittens (too high, anyway) if someone uses it on their own talk page for tidy ups. Gwen Gale (talk) 20:37, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Strange. I thought that "deprecated" means "overruled by a new version"… Admiral Norton ^(talk) 20:41, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Nope though you're not daft, since that's often the context but not the meaning. Same context here, by the bye. Let the longstanding admins keep doing it if they like but ward others off from the habit. Gwen Gale (talk) 20:42, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Edit summary after reverting

The edit summary after clicking on rollback says m (Reverted edits by [[User A]] (talk) to last version by [[User B]]). I think that 'version' should actually be 'revision' because 'version' sometimes doesn't make sense after using rollback. So 'revision' should be more correct. SchfiftyThree 22:15, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Giggy's wording

I support Giggy's changes, as they at least clarify the matter. The less gray area, the better, as I said above. S. Dean Jameson 03:46, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Oh, just realised a discussion above. Sorry about that. Anyone is welcome to revert (heck, they can even rollback ;-)) my edits if they wish. —Giggy 03:49, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

(edit conflict, no need for this cmt) I don't support his wording. Rollback is to be used on vandalism only. Gwen Gale (talk) 03:49, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Then replace it with strong wording the other way. Leaving such large grey areas is a bit frustrating for those of us who want to have some clarity on the issue. Getting my name dragged through Arbcom ANI based on the lack of clarity here really sucked. At least Giggy's wording gave some clarity to the situation. S. Dean Jameson 03:52, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

(ec, to Gwen) Your edit contradicts your edit summary and above comment. "deprecated" (per my reading of the above discussion) basically means it's allowed by (strongly?) discouraged, yet you say it should never be used for non-vandalism. Please clarify. —Giggy 03:53, 27 July 2008 (UTC) I won't mention the fact that you're also going against common practice (IMO at least).

I also agree with Giggy's wording, which has been found to be perfectly acceptable to the community on several occasions where it has been discussed. In fact, I cannot think of a discussion where it was decided it was not acceptable. Consensus is clearly in favour of the opinion expressed with Giggy's wording. Risker (talk) 04:00, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Ok, we've been over this many times. The policy says rollback should only be used for vandalism. When editors are given rollback, they're told it should only be used for vandalism. When rollback was an admin-only tool, a few admins used rollback to tidy their own talk pages. After rollback became a tool which could be given to non-admins, those (few) admins who had been using rollback to tidy their talk pages were none too happy about threads popping up on ANI about their "abuse" of rollback, so this has been put up with.

Civility worries come up whenever someone rolls back good faith talk page comments, because the rollback edit summary puts those good faith comments on the same level as vandalism. Hence, rollback should only be used for vandalism.

I suggest that the policy either be left as it was before today and that rollbacks to user talk pages end. If there is some tolerance still for rolling back good faith comments on talk pages, I suggest adding wording that this is allowed but deprecated (owing to the civility worries, which will not go away). Gwen Gale (talk) 04:15, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Then we need to gather consensus for your view of it, and we'll go with it. For now, I've removed the three words that cause the lack of clarity regarding use of rollback on rollbacker's own talkpages. Please don't readd them without consensus to do so. S. Dean Jameson 04:19, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Gwen Gale, not once has the community reprimanded someone for rolling back any edits on their talk page. Not once. It is impossible to say that it is deprecated, because it is not. Given some of the "good faith" edits I have seen some people rollback off their talk pages, the civility issue is often running the other way, not against the rollbacker. It is better to say up front that people can roll back edits off their own talk pages, period. That way we don't get into these silly discussions once a week on AN and ANI about whether or not the edit was good faith, and whether everyone should look in shock and horror. Let's just say it is okay on one's own talk page and get it over with, so there is NO civility issue at all. Risker (talk) 04:21, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

I concur with this edit. —Giggy 04:24, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

I can only say, please don't use rollback on good faith edits anywhere, it can be taken as uncivil, because the automatic edit summary flags a rolled back, good faith edit as if it had been vandalism. Gwen Gale (talk) 04:28, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Unfortunately, what with rollback being given to every Tom, Dick and Harry at one point ("what? you've been here two days and not messed up yet? here, have this tool!") and it's being used so widely, I'd suggest that people relax a lot more about that edit summary. There are literally hundreds of thousands of good faith edits that have been rolled back now, whether on user pages, by lack of understanding, or by an erroneous belief that the edit actually was vandalism. The community needs to understand that one of the side effects of permitting a wider use of this tool is the fact that different users interpret things differently, and the more users who can use the tool, the more interpretations there will be. If someone rolls me back, I'm not going to consider them rude; ill-informed, perhaps, but not rude or incivil. Besides, I'm sure there's a user or two who would consider any post of mine on their talk page to be "vandalism". ;-) Risker (talk) 04:43, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Until today this written policy said rollback should only be used for vandalism and that's what new rollbackers are clearly told. I think the policy page should be put back as it was. Gwen Gale (talk) 04:46, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

I agree with Gwen. It is a problem that due to the spread of the tool we have so many different uses of it, but I think the policy page should still state that use of the tool should be strictly confined to vandalism. Enigma ^message 04:51, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

The problem with that statement, Enigmaman, is that it's not accurate. What's acknowledged by everyone is that many admins have been using rollback for non-vandalism purposes for years, to maintain their own talk pages, and none have ever been sanctioned for it. While it might be simpler to have black-and-white rules, black-and-white rules that don't match up with community consensus do no one any good. Jclemens (talk) 04:54, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Policies are (hopefully) descriptive, not prescriptive. —Giggy 04:59, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Concur completely with Jclemens. As far as I can tell, anyone who has ever rolled back an edit on my talk page (and there have been several other editors who have done it, with my grateful thanks) have always been rolling back trolling, not vandalism. And yes, it has long been the standard that admins could rollback on their own talk page; this simply recognises that any user with rollback is obliged to meet the same standards as admins historically have. Risker (talk) 05:07, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Straight trolling is WP:vandalism (or more helpfully put, WP:Disruption so beyond the pale as to be vandalism). I understand what y'all are saying but rolling back a good faith edit is often taken as rudeness, or a hint that a good faith edit was thought of as vandalism by the rollbacker. I do think the policy should simply be put back as it was. Gwen Gale (talk) 05:21, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

I still think there ought to be some mention that it is discouraged or at least point out that it may be considered uncivil. –xeno (talk) 05:31, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

(R to Gwen Gale and to xenocidic) since nobody is going to be disciplined for rolling back on their own talk page, and it has been going on for years without anyone being disciplined, and every time the issue is brought up it is made clear that it is acceptable usage in the eyes of the broader community, it is much better to be honest than to imply that one is being rude by rolling back talk page comments. Disruption is not a rollback reason either, according to this page (it isn't a policy), and frankly I've seen people who were clearly (but subtly) trolling other editors on their talk pages go to AN and ANI and whine that they were treated rudely. That is exactly why it is acceptable to use rollback on one's own page. To be honest, historically it has never been discouraged, except in the last few months and only for non-admins. That to me suggests a subtle dig at those who can still have rollback yanked away from them at the whim of any admin; nobody would suggest an admin be desysopped for doing so. Risker (talk) 05:36, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Then let's at least say rolling back talk page comments is deprecated. Gwen Gale (talk) 05:39, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

I'm afraid I am not making myself clear. It is not deprecated. It is commonplace behaviour that has been accepted by the community for several years, without any suggestion that it was rude until a few people complained in the past few months. Every time the issue is raised, it is made clear that this is acceptable use of rollback. Exactly how is that deprecated? Risker (talk) 06:00, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

That's not what the policy says. Moreover, all new rollbackers are told rollback is to be used only on vandalism, so rolling back talk page comments is clearly deprecated, many times a day, by many admins. Nor do I support the use of rollback on any good faith edit. Gwen Gale (talk) 06:55, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

That isn't a policy, Gwen. It is a page documenting certain practices. If it was a policy, it would say "Policy" on it. We've both been here long enough to remember when "undo" was introduced, and some people were shocked and appalled that some editors used it on non-vandalism edits too. Rollback was introduced very much on the spur of the moment with a shaky consensus (it would not have been a large enough consensus for a successful RfA) and there was no discussion as to its rules before it was handed out willy-nilly. To this day, it all depends who's enabling the user right what message the recipient receives; one might assume all new users are told it is for vandalism only, but even the practice documentation page does not say that. There is nothing inherently rude in rolling back an edit on one's talk page. It wasn't considered rude when admins only had the privilege, and every time the issue is raised, it is consistently the consensus that it is not rude (or uncivil or any other word you want to use). Risker (talk) 07:21, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

It's ok if we disagree on rollback :) Gwen Gale (talk) 16:20, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Expanding permission to any 3RR exemption

I've been thinking: seeing as it's non-controversial and current practice to rollback edits within an editor's own userspace, simple vandalism, and by banned users, why don't we allow edits to be rollbacked if reverting is exempt from the three-revert rule? All it would add is banned users (in the letter), BLP violations, and undisputeable copyvios, which are nearly always rolled back without fuss anyway. Sceptre ^(talk) 17:54, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

Makes sense to me. Combining policies like this adds some cohesion and consistency. Jclemens (talk) 18:01, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

The only problem I see is that Rollback (in the browser) doesn't provide an edit summary. If you revert a BLP violation then you need to say it's a BLP violation because, unlike most vandalism, this might not be apparent from the diff. Undo or the rollback feature in Twinkle are better options for these kind of reverts. --Ron Ritzman (talk) 03:32, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

Unable to roll back

I've just started getting this message when I'm trying to roll back a page:

There seems to be a problem with your login session;

this action has been canceled as a precaution against session hijacking.

Please hit "back" and reload the page you came from, then try again.

I also can't revert using Huggle. I do have rollback privileges and this problem has only started today. I've logged out and logged back in, cleared my cache, checked my monobook.... Any ideas? ... discospinster _talk 00:09, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

Did you somehow disable cookies and forget? Gwen Gale (talk) 00:13, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

Nope. Apparently others are having the same problem, which is being discussed at the Village Pump: Wikipedia:Village pump (technical)#"Unable to proceed". ... discospinster _talk 00:15, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

Should be fixed now. Titoxd^{(?!? - cool stuff)} 01:11, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

Rollback for me

Hi: I have a question: would I have enough experience to use rollback? I was hoping to fight some vandalism with Huggle. Thanks! Magog the Ogre (talk) 18:02, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

You would likely be declined at WP:RFPERM due to a lack of vandal-fighting history. I'd suggest using Twinkle for a week or so to patrol recent changes for vandalism and then apply. –xeno (talk) 18:04, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

OK: I have Twinkle installed. Is there a specific tool? I tried looking at recent changes, and it just looks inefficient. Magog the Ogre (talk) 18:06, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

WP:POPUPS to help you preview the diffs. –xeno (talk) 18:07, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

Thanks, will do. Magog the Ogre (talk) 18:09, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

Once you have more experience and accuracy in reverting vandalism, along with showing you have knowledge about the rollback tool and what vandalism is, you'll probably be approved and granted the rollback feature. If you thin your ready, just ask at WP:RFR. Thanks, RyRy (talk) 01:33, 23 August 2008 (UTC)

Proposal to change wording of WP:ROLLBACK

How about we simplify the language of the following paragraph of the "When to use Rollback" section?

From: "Rollback must only be used to undo edits that are blatantly nonproductive, such as vandalism. This includes edits that are obscenities, gibberish, extremely poorly worded content, smart-aleck editorial comments, and other useless remarks that have nothing to do with the subject. "

To: "Rollback must only be used to revert vandalism and edits made in bad faith in mainspace. Banned users may also be rollbacked on sight as their edits are nonproductive."

To: "Rollback must only be used to revert vandalism and edits made in bad faith in mainspace. Edits by banned users may also be rollbacked in accordance with WP:BAN." ^{Incorporated Risker's suggestion.}

Rollback should only be used in the mainspace when the edit was made in bad faith. We shouldn't be reverting good faith edits, especially those of new users. This wording, "extremely poorly worded content" could refer to an edit made in good faith. Wording tweaks very welcome! Seraphim♥Whipp 14:58, 27 August 2008 (UTC)

Strongly support this. These are the terms under which it was approved in the first place. No real conversation has happened to widen the scope as it exists now. RxS (talk) 15:07, 27 August 2008 (UTC)

I'd suggest that the last sentence be changed to "Edits by banned users may also be rollbacked in accordance with Wikipedia:BAN#Enforcement_by_reverting_edits." (Someone feel free to make that link look prettier.) I think you are absolutely right about the concern that the "poorly worded content" phrase can be (and has been) misinterpreted. Risker (talk) 15:08, 27 August 2008 (UTC)

I use rollback against user space vandalism, and I guess others probably do as well. So, I'd suggest:

"Rollback must only be used to revert vandalism and other bad faith edits, such as gibberish, or obscenities. Edits by banned users may also be rollbacked in accordance with the Banning policy."

PhilKnight (talk) 15:13, 27 August 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, I think I confused the wording a little. What I was trying to say is that no good faith edit should ever be rollbacked in the mainspace. Perhaps we could add that to "when not to use rollback". Changing that other particular clause to, "Rollback must only be used to revert vandalism (in mainspace, project space or userspace)", would solve that. Seraphim♥Whipp 16:33, 27 August 2008

This works, though I'd be a little concerned about what constitutes bad faith. But I'd be fine with this. RxS (talk) 15:18, 27 August 2008 (UTC)

I agree with the proposed wording change. D.M.N. (talk) 15:15, 27 August 2008 (UTC)

I'd support the wording of "Rollback should only be used if reversion would be exempt from the three revert rule: use is restricted to reverting bad faith edits, such as vandalism, edits by banned users, and addition of material that unquestionably violates our biography of living persons and copyrights policies. You may also rollback yourself, or any edits in your userspace, provided that you do not restore any of the aforementioned types of bad-faith edits. If you do revert an edit, consider explaining to the user why their edit was reverted". I strongly oppose any wording that uses the word "must", because it causes needless restriction where the edit should be reverted, but doesn't fall exactly into the rules (such as ignoring hidden notes in articles). Sceptre ^(talk) 15:24, 27 August 2008 (UTC)

the rewording is actually dangerous when taken out of context - Banned users may also be rollbacked on sight as their edits are nonproductive.", this should NEVER be done 'on sight', you should always take time to see what the edit was about. If the banned editor has removed a clear BLP vio, then the person reverting is actually wrong (and legally becomes responsible for the vio) because our duty to the living figure is a higher duty than our need to enforce a ban on a user. --87.114.17.155 (talk) 16:02, 27 August 2008 (UTC)

Editors who introduce copyrighted material, or unsourced negative material about living persons should probably be reverted with an edit summary, instead of being rolled back. PhilKnight (talk) 16:06, 27 August 2008 (UTC)

I think we should encourage users to explain reverts on the user's talk page. You only get 255 characters for a summary, but you get a few thousand times that on a talkpage. Also, a user is more likely to read messages on their talk pages than in the edit history. Sceptre ^(talk) 16:38, 27 August 2008 (UTC)

I support a more restrictive wording but I'm not enthused about "bad faith" being the criterion, as it requires forming a theory of mind. Anyone who disagrees with me here is obviously editing in bad faith, right? I personally like "blatantly unproductive" and if I have any doubt, I use Undo instead and provide an edit summary even if it's just "rv nonsense" or "rv apparent mistake". Using up that whole extra 10 seconds totally sours my editing experience, but I manage to bounce back. As regards banned users/BLP vios - should there be some wording in there that you take responsibility for content you restore when you use rollback? Or that it is your responsibility to review the substance of the edit you are making, just as if you were doing it yourself? I dunno, just asking... Franamax (talk) 20:01, 27 August 2008 (UTC)

See response to PhilKnight regarding the "bad faith" wording. It was my mistake. Seraphim♥Whipp 20:40, 27 August 2008 (UTC)

And add one of my favourite edit summaries here, which covers some of the concerns when rollbacking a page blanking that may contain a policy-vio: "rv unexplained removal of text". Franamax (talk) 23:06, 27 August 2008 (UTC)

Whilst this is being changed is there any chance of emphasising the point that users should read text they are reverting back after text deletion / blanking? Having found quite a few instances of IP users being warned for removing text that turned out to be factually incorrect / hoaxes / BLP violations, I think that could do with a bit less speed and more care at times. -Hunting dog (talk) 22:11, 27 August 2008 (UTC)

I'm not following the exact wording being discussed any more. I'll propose a version here to replace the entirety of the first section and encourage Seraphim Whipp to also propose her current wording:

"Rollback is only used to undo edits that are blatantly unproductive, such as vandalism. Rollback can also be used in your own user and talk space to remove content when you don't wish to provide an edit summary. Edits by banned users may also be rollbacked in accordance with WP:BAN.

Rollback must always be used with care. If you restore text to a page, you are in effect making that edit yourself, so you should take care to ensure that the text does not violate any Wikipedia policies. When in doubt, use Undo with an edit summary to explain your reasoning."

The second paragraph pushes things a bit, but I think it's worth discussing. Franamax (talk) 22:44, 27 August 2008 (UTC)

That sounds much better :). As long as we get back to a version that can't be wiki-lawyered. Rollback is supposed to be used for the benefit of the encyclopedia and no one benefits when good faith edits are reverted and new users are driven away. Seraphim♥Whipp 22:54, 27 August 2008 (UTC)

For every IP that edits, about 99.9% of them don't register accounts. I would still like to see something encouraging people to explain the revert on the user's talk page; most IPs don't read the history of the article, but they will read new messages on their talk page. Sceptre ^(talk) 00:41, 28 August 2008 (UTC)

Realistically though, you should only be using rollback when the edit is so obviously bad that even the editor who made it knew it was bad. "My firend Paul is teh gay" and "asdasdasd" don't need much in the way of explanation when you roll them back. The purpose of the user talk comment in those cases is not so much to explain policy as to clue them in "oops, someone is actually watching me do this bad stuff". The class of edit that needs proper explanation on the user page is a little more complex, so maybe it's beyond the scope of rollback usage? You're actually talking about good editing practice in general. Franamax (talk) 02:37, 28 August 2008 (UTC)

The page should reflect that then; it'll solve messy situations like mine. I'm actually arguing for talkpaging newbies for all reverts. I also think that, if the user is knowledgeable that the edit is bad (i.e. has been warned against it recently, or common vandalism), it'd be fair game to rollback. Sceptre ^(talk) 02:45, 28 August 2008 (UTC)

Franamax, you've hit the nail squarely on the head. If a proposed rollback needs some sort of explanation as to why it was done, it shouldn't be used at all. That's why usage shouldn't stay too far away from pure vandalism.

I'm also uncomfortable with the proposed text "blatantly unproductive, such as vandalism". There's too much slack in what might be blatantly unproductive. For example, say a newbie added this to the New York Mets article:

In 1987 the Mets made a huge mistake by trading for outfielder Danny McSlow.

Now, assuming such a trade did occur, is that blatantly unproductive? Should you roll that back? It's easily fixed after all, and certainly not blatantly unproductive...but that's just the type of edit that gets rolled back on a new user without any real comment at all.

I think we need to make it clear how rollback is to be used:

Rollback should only used to undo edits that are blatantly vandalism. Rollback can also be used in your own user and talk space to remove content when you don't wish to provide an edit summary. Edits by banned users may also be rollbacked in accordance with WP:BAN.

Rollback must always be used with care. If you restore text to a page, you are in effect making that edit yourself, so you should take care to ensure that the text does not violate any Wikipedia policies. When in doubt, use Undo with an edit summary to explain your reasoning."

The bottom line is that if it isn't clearly obvious to a newbie why one of his edits was undone, then rollback should not be used. RxS (talk) 04:44, 28 August 2008 (UTC)

Well, first of all McSlow had a great arm, he just ran into injury problems. :) But no, I would never use rollback on that, I'd either try to improve it or revert it as "POV edit". If that kind of thing typically gets rollbacked, that would confirm my initial opposition to granting rollback to non-admins. Now we get into judgement, and an editor who would judge that as "blatantly unproductive" IMO should not have rollback rights. I hesitate though to label edits as vandalism, to me that's a bad word and calling people vandals doesn't usually help things (especially when it's a rotating IP and the next user gets called a vandal). I personally prefer, when it's persistent, to just drop a human written note on the IP talk page on the lines of "Your edits aren't helpful" - it works almost 100%. I guess I want to leave a little leeway in there for judgement and the occasional lapse thereof. This is going to get more important in about one week, when school starts up again, it's been a nice quiet summer at least on my watchlist! Franamax (talk) 05:11, 28 August 2008 (UTC)

McSlow was a drunk and a bum. Anyway, my point is that while you might not roll that back, many would (and do). I want to draw the line clearly enough to exclude rolling that kind of edit back. Your point about labeling edits as vandalism is a good one, but one that goes well beyond the rollback tool. That is, it's not specifically a rollback issue and can't be fixed by adjusting how rollback is used.

The thing is, we can say that an editor who thinks that edit is blatantly unproductive shouldn't have the rollback tool (or should have it revoked) but wouldn't it be easier and less work to prevent rolling that type of edit back by tightening the defintion of rollback usage in the first place? RxS (talk) 05:24, 28 August 2008 (UTC)

Good new wording. Suitable number verbs. bishzilla _ROARR!! 20:33, 30 August 2008 (UTC).

Removal

We shouldn't advocate removal of the tool for simple "misuse" - for all the support to assume good faith to the newbies, there is none towards the experienced editor. The assumption of good faith does not decrease if an editor's experienced. Thus, I propose we only remove the tool for actual abuse; i.e. systematically reverting all/a select user's contributions, or consistently poor judgement with usage of the tool (that is, if a random selection of a hundred reverts was sampled, ten should not've been undone [not rolled back, undone]). A key reason AGF exists is because it is human to make mistakes, but this page doesn't allow people to do so. Our practices should never be in opposition to AGF. Allow people more leeway; without it, it does more harm, because people who have had it removed for one or two mistakes per hundred reverts (such as myself) get chilled off from reverting edits that should be reverted for fear of unnecessary re-removal and admonishment. Sceptre ^(talk) 00:58, 28 August 2008 (UTC)

Reverting "non vandalism" edits that "should be reverted" can always be reverted the "old fashioned way" or with undo, Twinkle, or another script that allows an edit summary. Nobody says you have to use the rollback tool for these even if you have it. However, I would support cutting some slack to those who used rollback on non vandalism edits that were otherwise revertable. That is, give them a warning about it and tell them to use conventional reverts with edit summaries in the future. --Ron Ritzman (talk) 23:15, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

Why though? To me, you got two warnings when you were granted rollback - your first and your last. You were judged to be capable of understanding the policy and its conservative application. That's at least true now that we've tightened up the wording. Rollback was never intended to be a convenient way to revert things you don't like seeing, it was posited with a specific purpose. And by your own words, there are easy alternatives - so why put in place an infrastructure to track warnings (were they warned first?) when we can just keep it simple - abuse it, lose it? It's easy enough to get back, just convince someone that you're a responsible editor. Franamax (talk) 00:22, 1 September 2008 (UTC)

I can think of two borderline cases right off hand. One was when I was reviewing the edits of an RFA candidate, I found one case where he was using the rollback tool on edits where the editor was removing text from an article without an edit summary. Something that is viewed as vandalism by some but not by others but usually revertable. I left a note on his talk page about it advising him to use the "other methods" in the future. (still voted "Support" though) Another was my bad. While using Huggle I noticed someone adding a bunch of profanity to an article and promptly hit the big red button. It turned out to be the lyrics to the song the article was about, revertable but not technically vandalism. I apologized to the editor but said it was probably best that the lyrics stay out. (article later deleted so no diff) There are other possible scenarios involving edits that may or may not be vandalism depending on whose reviewing them. I wouldn't want to see someone loosing the broom because of a borderline case and a zero tolerance policy. IMHO rollback should only be removed without warning if it's being used on obvious good faith edits. --Ron Ritzman (talk) 02:02, 1 September 2008 (UTC)

Sorry Sceptre, but I disagree. Removal of this permission (and it is a permission, not just a tool) does not affect any editor's ability to contribute to the development and maintenance of the encyclopedia in any way. Its removal is as benign as the granting of the permission. Misuse is sufficient for its removal in my mind. It has nothing to do with AGF and everything to do with responsibility. Risker (talk) 02:21, 28 August 2008 (UTC)

Accidental misuse should never be a criterion for removal, nor should good faith usage. Wilful abuse can be a reason, but making mistakes is a key part of humanity, and it's better to reform than to punish. We should not expect constant perfection, because that notion is doomed from the start. Sceptre ^(talk) 02:28, 28 August 2008 (UTC)

The timing of this discussion probably doesn't work well for you Sceptre, and not to pick at a sore, but weren't you claiming that you didn't misuse rollback at all? That then calls into question your judgement and leads to you being asked (forced) to take the extra steps of hitting Undo and providing an edit summary. The purpose is to give you that extra opportunity to think about what you're doing. (I'm making no judgement on the details, imagine someone else's name in there and make a neutral assessment) In any case, we all managed to survive using just Undo until last February, so it truly is no big deal not to have the capability, it's just a pain in the butt sometimes. Franamax (talk) 02:47, 28 August 2008 (UTC)

Strike while the iron's hot. I'm saying I didn't misuse the tool this time to the level which would warrant removal. Removal #1 was abuse. Removal #2 was misuse due to a misinterpretation of the vandalism policy which transferred itself to RBK. Removal #3 is just a more lenient, but still allowed, usage of rollback which has been admonished for predisposition against me, for some because I have a history, and for some because they're trolls in editors' clothing. Sceptre ^(talk) 02:53, 28 August 2008 (UTC)

It'll probably come as no surprise that I disagree. Rollback was always suppose to be an easy come easy go tool. Editors need to meet a very minimum threshold to be granted the tool, and it is revoked with a low threshold of misuse. The process is low impact, low maintenance. What we don't want is an endless stream of AN/I threads debating about whether someone has misused the tool. An experienced editor is expected know the limits of how rollback is to be used, there's no good or bad faith involved. And in my experience no one has had it revoked over one mistake. If a change needs to be made it's tightening up the language used to describe how it's to be used. RxS (talk) 04:16, 28 August 2008 (UTC)

Yes and I should say, rollback is also very easy to give back once someone has learned how to stay within bounds wielding it. I see no need to make much fuss over granting someone rollback, taking it away or giving it back to them. Gwen Gale (talk) 04:35, 28 August 2008 (UTC)

Too much rollback

Is there a special page where you can report users who get too carried away with their rollback rights? --Crackthewhip775 (talk) 08:52, 28 August 2008 (UTC)

Beyond asking nicely on the user's own talk page? I don't think so, but the normal DR process should allow for that. Jclemens (talk) 14:51, 28 August 2008 (UTC)

Well, if you mean using rollback inappropriately, it can be (and often is) taken away from the offending user without much fuss. This page would work fine (someone will correct me if I'm wrong) if you want to bring someone's usage to a wider audience. RxS (talk) 14:58, 28 August 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents -- Gurch (talk) 21:45, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

Or you can just talk to any admin. Any admin can grant/remove rollback. --Philosopher ^{Let us reason together.} 00:44, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

Access to Special:UnwatchedPages for rollbackers

Is Special:UnwatchedPages page accessible for Rollbackers? Vjdchauhan (talk) 13:45, 29 August 2008 (UTC).

No. Admiral Norton ^(talk) 14:11, 29 August 2008 (UTC)

Watchlisting Rollback?

I didn't see an option in the "My Preferences" section to automatically watch pages you rollback on. Does anyone know if there's an option/tool somewhere that will do that? Thanks in advance. --Philosopher ^{Let us reason together.} 00:50, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

I cross-posted this question to the village pump as I'm very interested in the answer too. Franamax (talk) 04:47, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

It an edit, so it applies under "Add the pages I edit." Admiral Norton ^(talk) 19:06, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

Actually, I have that enabled and it still doesn't work. I had a hunch that maybe it was because I was only in the "Administrators" group and not the "Rollbackers" group...but adding myself to Rollbackers didn't make a difference.  :( Maybe the developers simply never added the option. --Philosopher ^{Let us reason together.} 19:20, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

Poor huggler's watchlists would explode if that happened =) –xeno (talk) 19:27, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

How strange, coz my rollbacks are always promptly added. I have all "add pages" options enabled, but I don't think it plays a role here. Admiral Norton ^(talk) 19:30, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

Per the cross-posted link I gave above, it seems that rollback is specifically intended to not update the watchlist (I haven't looked at the actual code to be sure, but have no reason to doubt the statement). It also seems now that the whole rollback kerfuffle was oriented toward making things easier for auto-vandal-fighters, not us ordinary joes. That's just my impression, but if true it disappoints me greatly - by my lights, when I use rollback, by definition I want the article added to my watchlist, the article was just vandalized - what better candidate to keep watching? Franamax (talk) 05:30, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

Huggle has an option to automatically add reverted pages to your watchlist -- Gurch (talk) 15:55, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

That probably explains my rollbacks appearances in watchlist. Admiral Norton ^(talk) 17:44, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

Script to automatically watch pages you rollback on:

if (wgAction=='rollback') addOnloadHook(function(){
 if (document.getElementById('ca-watch') && window.wgAjaxWatch) wgAjaxWatch.ajaxCall()
})

Add this to your monobook.js if you use default Monobook skin. Script will probably break if developers change ajaxwatch.js. —AlexSm 18:35, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

Rollback own edits in article space

Under Wikipedia:Rollback feature#When to use Rollback, the times when rollback may be used include:

• edits that are blatantly unproductive
• edits to ones own user and talk space
• edits by banned users

Can rollback be used to change ones own edits to an article? For example, if I make a sequence of edits but soon decide they are bad. It seems that this use of rollback should be acceptable, at least in some cases. — Twas Now ( talk • contribs • e-mail ) 01:06, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

I can't imagine anybody complaining about it but never underestimate wikilawyers. Hell, if we enforced this we would have to derollback everybody who uses the "undo" function in Huggle. --Ron Ritzman (talk) 01:30, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

I think self-rollback is bad because it doesn't specify a reason. You're leaving other editors to ponder if it was an accidential click and whether they should contact you to ask about it. —AlexSm 04:44, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

While I usually don't self-rollback, I don't see any reason why it shouldn't be allowed - you're allowed to delete an article you created (speedy - G7), so why not rollback an edit you made? --Philosopher ^{Let us reason together.} 04:59, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

I can only reiterate my previous comments: rollback was designed to quickly (without custom edit summary) revert vandalism. Note that the correct comparison would be deleting your own article without any deletion summary. —AlexSm 06:13, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

Except your edit/rollback remains transparent to anyone who checks, whereas your deleted article is visible to only a small group of users. — Twas Now ( talk • contribs • e-mail ) 06:21, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

And what if I undo my own edit and leave no summary besides the usual "Undid revision 123123123 by XYZ…", is that better? If they don't understand why did I revert my edit, people should assume I have my own reasons to undo my own edits. Also, it isn't that easy to accidentally make a rollback. Admiral Norton ^(talk) 19:38, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

Situation when rollback does not work

From what I can tell, rollback does not work in a certain situation. If a user vandalizes an article, and then self-reverts the edit so the article is completely restored, you cannot rollback those edits. I know, I know, what is the point of rollbacking "nothing" -- well, the point is mere principle, that's all; at least the history will then show that that particular user committed vandalism, and it also will keep other editors from wasting their time to compare edits to see the user self-reverted. Just thought that I would point out a situation when rollback does not work. Rgrds. --Tombstone (talk) 06:28, 18 September 2008 (UTC)

In that case, could you use good ol' Undo to provide an edit summary "rollback vandal edits..."? It's possible you'd need to add a null edit on top of the RC's first, but the traditional method works wonders. Franamax (talk) 09:45, 18 September 2008 (UTC)

If they've reverted themselves anyway, it's probably not worth wasting any time over. It's a pity such edits are not automatically removed from the edit history, but that's an issue that has nothing to do with rollback. --Kotniski (talk) 09:53, 18 September 2008 (UTC)

Well, wasting time is what happens when you have to compare the 2 edits just to see they self-reverted. Whereas if the edits could be rolledback, then someone else won't waste their time. Undoing the edits and adding a manual summary works OK, but this was one of the points of rollback -- so you wouldn't have to undo. It's NBD, but I just thought I would point it out because it took me a good 10 minutes to figure out why rollback wouldn't work (I thought maybe my privileges were revoked). It might be worthwhile to note this on the project page. Rgrds. --Tombstone (talk) 10:15, 18 September 2008 (UTC)

Revision history of Limerick

I'm trying rollback at the moment, at the moment my roll back is 2 hours earlier than the former edit, and i have to set it back to 20:12, 19 September 2008 86.40.255.83 to correct it for a fix, but i can't, any suggestions about it ? Mion (talk) 14:31, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

The latter seems to be Wikipedia_talk:Rollback_feature#Situation_when_rollback_does_not_work, so only time difference is left. cheers Mion (talk) 14:53, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

Roll back is fixed. Mion (talk) 16:27, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

Guidelines for requesting rollback?

Well, I have been reverting a lot of vandalism lately using undo, and I was thinking about requesting rollback. However, I was reading the requests for rollback page, and it looks like they are looking for a certain number of edits/time on Wikipedia. I am pretty much new, and my edit count isn't that high, so if somebody could tell me where these guidelines are at before I decide whether to request rollback or not, it would be much appreciated. Thanks! Inferno, Lord of Penguins 16:33, 30 November 2008 (UTC)

Hi. I'm wondering if you are not quite as new as you say, given the impressive use of markup on your 7th edit. Have you other wiki experience? Anyhow, in answer to your question there are no guidelines for granting rollback. It is up to the individual admin granting them. Nevertheless I've noticed over time there are fewer and fewer admins clerking these boards and geernally those that do are in very rough agreement.Generally -

• A minimum of 200, ideally more, edits. (250 edits to your user space does not cut it for me - 150 mainspace edits might).
• At least a week or so of editing.
• Most important - A good use of twinkle or undo to show proper identification of vandalism.
• No recent 3RR or edit waring notices.
• No very recent blocks.

These are kind of my standards but do seem to be replicated across those who clerk this board, although exact numbers will of course vary. What is interesting is we put minimum standards on AWB yet not on rollback. Perhaps the time has come to (slightly not totally) codify this if it helps new editors before asking. Pedro :  Chat  22:17, 30 November 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the reply! I've got a while to go, seeing my edit count as of this edit will be 44, but that's fine (I'll wait until my edit count is around 250-300-ish before I apply, I think). As for the markup (That's what it's called! =]), I picked up on it by view-sourcing random userpages, you can find some pretty cool stuff by doing that. Anyhow, back to editing, and thanks again! Inferno, Lord of Penguins 23:02, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

Rollback and Twinkle

Hello, I am considering applying for rollback, but first I'd like to know how well it behaves with Twinkle. I've been using Twinkle to deal with vandalism and I want to be sure that they are compatible. For that matter, would there be any benefit in me having rollback? What I mean is, does rollback make Twinkle any faster? Thank you, LovesMacs (talk) 02:40, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

Never mind, I got my answer from reading this talk page! LovesMacs (talk) 08:37, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

I have written some instructions about how Twinkle and rollback work on the main rollback page. Please feel free to edit it for clarity (and correct any mistakes!). LovesMacs (talk) 23:49, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

uw-rollbackremoved

Someone has recently created {{uw-rollback}}, which was moved to {{uw-rollbackremoved}} shortly after. Please join in the discussion at WT:UTM#New template: uw-rollback regarding the formatting and use of the template. In particular, is the assertion by the template's creator that "users who abuse the rollback feature should not be given any warnings" true, or should a warning (optional or required) be created at {{uw-rollback}}? Anomie⚔ 13:43, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Where should rollback link appear?

I have had rollback privileges for a while, but today I noticed that the link now appears next to every item on my watchlist, whereas it didn't before. I like having the feature, but I am a bit uncomfortable with all the places it appears, since it would be easy to click by accident. I would suggest that it appear only in diffs. After all, you should know for sure what you are reverting before doing so, and that would also reduce the chances of a mistake. PSWG1920 (talk) 23:45, 28 January 2009 (UTC)

Hmm, yes so it does - I hadn't noticed until you pointed it out (and the same for recent changes which I'm sure did not show rollback). Anyone got a link to a bugzilla that switched this on? Pedro :  Chat  23:50, 28 January 2009 (UTC)

mw:This_week's_updates - this was a planned "upgrade" although I find it a little scary as it's pretty easy to make a wrong click, particularly on track pads / touch screens. But there you go. Pedro :  Chat  16:25, 29 January 2009 (UTC)

Which is why I think that button should be less frequent, not more. I see no reason for it to appear at any place other than page diffs. PSWG1920 (talk) 16:31, 29 January 2009 (UTC)

• You can supress them in the watchlist/rc (if you desire) with this CSS hack (add to monobook.css:

/* hide rollback from Recent Changes */
.page-Special_RecentChanges .mw-rollback-link {display:none;}
/* hide rollback from Watchlist */
.page-Special_Watchlist .mw-rollback-link {display:none;}

(source: WP:VPT#This week's software updates (permlink)). –xeno (talk) 16:33, 29 January 2009 (UTC)

Note that you can also remove it from Special:Contributions if you like by using .page-Special_Contributions as the first class. — TKD::Talk 17:06, 29 January 2009 (UTC)

I did that, and for me the rollback button was gone from Special:Contributions pages for months, but has now reappeared. How do I hide it again? PSWG1920 (talk) 16:40, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

I don't mind having it on my watchlist- it's very effective, especially with popups enabled. Only one question- I have a gadget enabled that opens a user's contribs whenever I roll back one of their edits- this does not work if I roll edits back from my watchlist... is there any way to solve this? Thanks, Lithoderm 01:22, 31 January 2009 (UTC)

Who cares about rollback priviledges

Why work for rollback priviledges when all you have to do is edit an old revision of a page to get it back? Daniel Christensen (talk) 01:38, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

It's not really much of a privilege, to be honest. It just makes things a little easier. I don't know why such a fuss is made about it.--Kotniski (talk) 09:10, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

In most cases, I find it more convenient to do "in browser" reverts using Twinkle or Popups. However, rollback is required to use Huggle --Ron Ritzman (talk) 02:11, 14 March 2009 (UTC)

Rollback for soapboxing?

Hi, just got rollback today. If you look at the three undos in a row that I did to Jane Roberts today, I think you'll agree that they were justified under WP:SOAP. Due to the firm instruction to use rollbacking only for vandalism, I would not have used it in this instance. But, are there plans to allow an expansion of rollback to such situations, in the future?--Goodmorningworld (talk) 18:37, 13 March 2009 (UTC)

Doubtful, "soapboxing" is too subjective. Use undo with an edit summary. If you're talking about the fact that you had to do three separate undos, you can edit the old version of the article prior to the changes and save it with the summary explanation. –xeno (talk) 18:58, 13 March 2009 (UTC)

I would definitely not have used rollback for those edits, they were good-faith but misguided. An edit summary is important in cases like that.

Note also that by judicious clicking of the radio buttons in the article history, you can "Compare selected versions" and undo all three at once with an edit summary like "rv 3 good-faith edits - this qualifies as soapboxing". Franamax (talk) 21:15, 13 March 2009 (UTC)

I'm sorry for being so dense but how exactly would I do this (undo all three at once)? I understand xeno's helpful tip but not yours. Click on which radio buttons?--Goodmorningworld (talk) 10:04, 14 March 2009 (UTC)

On the history page, there are two columns of radio buttons. When you first bring up article history, the top edit has the right-hand button bulleted on and no buttons appear directly below it; the 2nd edit has the left-hand button bulleted and the rest of the edits have unticked radio buttons in the left-hand column. Click the left-hand radio button for an edit farther down in the list - now you will see pairs of radio buttons show up for the intervening edits. This lets you now click a right-hand button other than just the top edit.

For [3] as it appears now, click the button next to Soul fire's "last good" edit; then click the right-hand button at 24.122's "last bad" edit three lines above; then click Compare selected versions and you will see a diff for all three edits together.

If you hadn't already edited the article and 24.122's edits were on top, you would just click the button next to Soul fire's edit, Compare and Undo them all with one edit. Note that the summary field is blank when you undo multiple edits, so you need to fill something in at that point. (Also note that you really should have provided edit summaries in each of your separate reversions too)

zeno's way works too, but I think you run the risk of overwriting someone else's later edits when you do it that way.

And looking at those edits again, the first one of them removed sourced content, so I'll backtrack on where I suggested above labelling them as good-faith, I would still not use rollback but would summarize as "rv soapboxing, removal of sourced text". Franamax (talk) 23:53, 16 March 2009 (UTC)

Housekeeping

Per Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/Incidents#MBisanz_removing_rollback_facility_for_inactive_users, I'm proposing the following be added at Wikipedia:Rollback_feature#How_to_apply_for_rollback:

Administrators may remove rollback rights from indefinitely blocked accounts, users who have actively retired for more than six months, and accounts inactive for more than a year. Rollback may be re-granted to any returning user who did not leave under a cloud.

Thoughts? MBisanz ^talk 21:51, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

No problem, but what's the benefit? Pedro :  Chat  21:54, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

To expand - indef blocked accounts are just that so no issue there. Retired / inactive may represent a hack threat but it's minor to say the least. We don't desysop (at present) due to inactivity and we certainly don't "de-autoconfirm" so I really can't see how this helps. Yes, rollback can be a malicious tool if used with such intent, but as we can locally remove it (as opposed to +sysop / +crat) the damage in the event of a hacked account would be negligible - other than that this just looks like more work for no gain. Pedro :  Chat  22:07, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Well to document some of the housekeeping scenarios I've come across:

PMDrive1061 (talk · contribs) Admin who had a redundant userright

Banime (talk · contribs) User banned by arbcom for harassment

Watershipper (talk · contribs) Under 500 edits, large retired notice

Ecoleetage (talk · contribs) Indef blocked for something

Lawrence Cohen (talk · contribs) User contacted me to tell me he won't be returning

PinpointBot (talk · contribs) Bot test never put into operation

Proto (talk · contribs) Alt account of an admin who hasn't edited in awhile

EconomicsGuy (talk · contribs) Disabled account of a retired user

AGKbot (talk · contribs) Test bot account of a retired user

Monobi (talk · contribs) User RTV'd

Bpeps (talk · contribs) User RTV'd

Mercury (talk · contribs) Account disabled

Catherine de Burgh (talk · contribs) Moved to new account

Sandy Donald (talk · contribs) One edit in 2008

Mclovin (talk · contribs) Alt humor account

DB II (talk · contribs) Inactive alt account

Jaeger123 (talk · contribs) User retired

Lithoderm (talk · contribs) Compromised account

N1RK4UDSK714 (talk · contribs) Indef blocked

Barneca sock 1 (talk · contribs) Alt account of retired admin

NKbot (talk · contribs) Indef blocked bot

Aitias (alternate account) (talk · contribs) Indef blocked alt account

TestEditBot (talk · contribs) Indef blocked bot

UserDœ (talk · contribs) Retired user

SXT40 (talk · contribs) Alt account of retired admin

RFRBot (talk · contribs) Superseded bot

There are several other types like inactive editors, never active editors, etc, seems like a basic housekeeping task that unlike adminship, can be handled entirely at a local level. And well editing an online encyclopedia is a lot of work without much gain . This just seems like an easy task so that people can view the rollbacker list as an active list. Such a practice is already done with Bots, Account Creator, and IPBE and it has worked fine there. MBisanz ^talk 22:17, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Sounds fine to me. No concerns. - Rjd0060 (talk) 22:21, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Rollback is supposed to be no deal at all: I think that adding this rule would overinflate the importance of what is supposed to be only a simple tool. For example, how do you define "under a cloud"? There are plenty of users who are under ArbCom sanctions or aren't in good enough standing with the community to become administrators, yet they have rollback. I don't have any opinion on the block exemptions and account creation rights, but rollback is a simple tool. Currently administrators aren't desysopped for inactivity, and they, if hijacked, cause more harm than rollbackers. I think time spent on seeing what rollbackers are inactive or not could be better spent on improving articles (such as sorting out BLP issues, adding content, or just copyediting). This all being said, I don't see any problem with removing rollback from indefinitely blocked users, for, by default, they are blocked and don't need the tool. Acalamari 22:30, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

I went ahead and struck the "cloud" clause per your reasoning. And obviously I am waiting on this discussion before doing anything else. MBisanz ^talk 22:52, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Echo Rjd. Should be standard. Synergy 23:01, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Sounds standard - redundant userrights on inactive accounts pose problems of not meeting new standards for rollback that develop, or for compromise. Rollback is easy come, easy go - easy go applies here Fritzpoll (talk) 08:33, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Isn't there a better way to spend your time? Does this clutter up something somewhere? II | (t - c) 08:51, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

This looks like a solution looking for a problem to me. It causes more work for everyone involved with no actual benefit. If we remove rights from inactive accounts, shouldn't we start with those that can cause actual problems if abused? You know, like adminship? --Conti|✉ 11:18, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

In line with a lot of the comments on the ANI thread, I can't see any advantage in doing this and a lot of potential harm in it. — Martin (MSGJ · talk) 12:18, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

• I'm sorry I just can't see any benefit except that the "number of users with rollback" figure may be more accurate - and given the "number of admins" magic word does not equal the number of people using admin tools and the "number of editors" magic word is an equally meaningless figure - what does it matter?
  • Abandoned compromised accounts is a non starter of an argument really, as outlined at ANI. It's far easier to start a new account, make 150 edits and just get rollback if you have mailicious intent.
  • Editors who are blocked can't use rollback because, well, they are blocked.
  • Yes, redundant rights (e.g. sysops with the rollback flag) could be removed but there don't appear to be any at present and this is really minor. Every new admin could modify their own rights to remove rollback as an introduction to the interface.
  • Inactivity seems to be against the spirit of any "tools" - you have them because you are capable of using them - not because you must use them. Pedro :  Chat  12:54, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Yes take them away from indef blocked users if only to keep the list of rollbackers in check. But why take away tools from someone who has not misused them just because they are inactive. No admin is ever required to use their tools, and neither should a rollbacker. Let them be idle, let them come back in 2 years and fight vandalism. I don't see the problem that this would solve. Chillum 00:40, 30 April 2009 (UTC)

Rollback vs undo for attacks

Hi. A quick question - if an editor amends a page to include abusive, inflammatory or other attacks, is the use of rollback justified on the basis that it 'wipes' those comments from the article, as opposed to undo which leaves the comments in a previous version ? I'm asking as I've just used rollback for this purpose and wanted to be sure this was a justifiable use. Thanks. CultureDrone (talk) 10:56, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

Ok, ignore that silly question - rollback doesn't wipe the offending article versons...d'oh :-) CultureDrone (talk) 11:04, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

Ip rollback

I saw an Ip who obviously didn't know much of Wikipedia guidelines commenting on an article, I checked his edit history, and he had Rollback. K. How is this possible? he did have a couple hundred edits to his name, but judging by him wanting to create an article for something so small it isn't even big enough for it's own section, and wanting to add an obviously unreliable source, and that he is an Ip; I could only wonder how he got rollback. I know a guy (TJ Spyke) who si probably in the top ten when it comes to anti-vandalism (he has 50,000 edits, and at least 10,000 are anti vandalism), and he doesn't even have rollback (as far as I know, because I have never seen him use it), so how does an ip get it? Altenhofen 00:08, 30 April 2009 (UTC)

Diff? In theory an IP could install Twinkle in the browser rather than the monobook. If an admin created them a monobook, they could run Twinkle as well. I don't think it would've been native rollback. –xeno ^talk 00:20, 30 April 2009 (UTC)

You can just fake the edit summary to look like a rollback. Chillum 00:36, 30 April 2009 (UTC)

Yep, and in that case that would be exactly what the IP did (since we can't assign userrights to IPs). My other thought was that perhaps it was a user whose name looked like an IP, I remember seeing a user with an impossible IP address like 347.x.x.x or something –xeno ^talk 00:44, 30 April 2009 (UTC)

User:31.415.926.535 (GuD)? However, I remember coming across an IP huggler. Just when you think you've seen it all... —Admiral Norton ^(talk) 17:11, 30 April 2009 (UTC)

98.220.43.195 was the ip. Altenhofen 23:03, 5 May 2009 (UTC)

I don't see anything resembling rollback from that IP... He has used undo, but that's available to all editors. –xeno ^talk 23:05, 5 May 2009 (UTC)

check his edit summaries, lots say [rollback] [vandalism], with "rollback" in light blue, and "Vandalism" in red, just like a real rollback. Altenhofen 23:26, 9 May 2009 (UTC)

Those links are added by Twinkle and aren't part of the edit summary. –xeno ^talk 16:14, 19 May 2009 (UTC)

Ok. Altenhofen 21:39, 19 May 2009 (UTC)

rollback vs. undo

The difference between the two is unclear to me. So they leave different edit summaries... I assume that's not the only difference?

Edits that have been undone still show up in the history and can be permanently linked to by non-admins. Maybe edits that have been rolled back differ in that regard? TerraFrost (talk) 16:11, 19 May 2009 (UTC)

By default rollback provides a default edit summary that can't be edited. Undo provides a pre-filled edit summary that can be added to or replaced. A default rollback edit summary is typically only appropriate for vandalism. –xeno ^talk 16:13, 19 May 2009 (UTC)

Clicking "rollback" may also cause several edits to be undone at once, if the last several edits were all made by the same user. The "rollback privilege" really isn't as big a deal as it sounds - all it means is that you can save yourself a few clicks as long as you're careful about when you use it.--Kotniski (talk) 16:20, 19 May 2009 (UTC)

So it saves you from having to copy / paste text from the last good version in the event of multiple successive acts of vandalism? If that's the main reason one would want it, it might be a good idea to add that to the article, I guess TerraFrost (talk) 16:38, 19 May 2009 (UTC)

That was never really necessary, you can view an old version, click edit, then click save if you want to rv to the old version without having to copypasta =] –xeno ^talk 16:40, 19 May 2009 (UTC)

Rollback and own watchlist

I'm pretty new to the feature and would like to share what happened to me just now: I used rollback on Namibia, on a new COI account whose edit seemed to be entirely unconstructive. However, I checked after the rollback, and I had actually reverted all four of this user's edits, three of which I did not see in my watchlist. I've since been going through this policy page and realised

1. That this is exactly what the page says rollback does (d'oh) ;)
2. That I should not have used rollback in the first place (new user, and maybe not blatantly unproductive).

Now, these edits would have had to be reverted anyway, and I will improve my understanding of this policy. But three questions I would have:

1. Could a warning be implemented if the user attempts to revert more than 1 edit with rollback, as this cannot be seen from the watchlist? Alternatively, should the rollback button maybe not appear there?
2. Could a clarification be made in the policy as to what multiple edits may be reverted by rollback? - It seems to be the only feature to do that in one go. Ignore this one, just realised I could still manually edit and save an historic version.
3. Relating to this, is a rollback of multiple, non-vandal edits okay if complemented with an appropriate explanation on the user's talk page as I have done? (Help:Revert#Rollback suggests it is, Wikipedia:Rollback_feature suggests it isn't.)

Thanks, Pgallert (talk) 09:03, 7 September 2009 (UTC)

Rollback to prior version

There are times while using Huggle that it states that reverting user A will revert back to a version from user B that has been rencently reverted. I've seen editor's do this using popups when multi IPs attack a page quickly making Huggle difficult if impossible to clean up. Is there a way to revert to a specific edit using Huggle? Thanks ♠ B.s.n. ♥R.N.contribs 01:28, 15 September 2009 (UTC)

Use the first blue arrow to go back in the page history to the version you want to revert to, compare it with the current revision with the fourth blue arrow and press R to revert. It will leave an edit summary like this[4]. —SpaceFlight89 04:51, 16 September 2009 (UTC)

Thank you. That really helps ♠ B.s.n. ♥R.N.contribs 17:45, 16 September 2009 (UTC)

Disabling rollback in watchlist

Anyone know how I can disable the rollback button from my watchlist?--Tznkai (talk) 17:16, 21 September 2009 (UTC)

Don't believe you can on the watchlist as a rollbacker; however, should you want to undo rather than rollback an edit (such as to give a reason) you could alway click the diff tab and it gives the choose whether to undo or revert.♠ B.s.n. ♥R.N.contribs 09:55, 25 September 2009 (UTC)

Oh, I know that, I just want to get rid of the button for stray clicks.--Tznkai (talk) 13:20, 25 September 2009 (UTC)

.page-Special_Watchlist .mw-rollback-link {display:none;} in your monobook.css will do that; see Wikipedia:Village_pump_(technical)/Archive_55#This_week.27s_software_updates. —SpaceFlight89 14:18, 25 September 2009 (UTC)

Thanks.--Tznkai (talk)

Removing rollback privilege

This page doesn't explain how to have someone's rollback privs removed. Last night I had a gang of kneejerk reverters with rollback pounce on my legitimate edits trying to remove some garbage from an article, accusing me of vandalism and threatening to block me for it! They obviously didn't bother to look at the edit or even the edit summary. Shoot first and don't ask questions later is an irresponsible use of the tool, and shouldn't be tolerated. Is there a way of turning off the hair trigger for people who abuse it? -67.39.251.254 (talk) 12:59, 15 October 2009 (UTC)

Changes

User:Ncmvocalist made this group of edits today. I'm not sure that I agree with them all and think they need discussion. This was likely spurred by reference to violation of this guideline at Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Dbachmann 4.--Doug.^{(talk • contribs)} 15:49, 15 November 2009 (UTC)

Can you be more specific - what do you not agree with?--Kotniski (talk) 16:51, 15 November 2009 (UTC)

I saw them this morning and was thinking the same thing, though I hadn't got around to examining them properly. I don't like those changes (though I mean no offense to Ncmvocalist him/herself). Edits by banned users are certainly not obvious or examples of blatantly unhelpful edits (as they will be logged out), nor is it obvious what's going on if there is a post on the talk page, and doing such is very difficult for recent changes patrollers. • Anakin ^(talk) 17:41, 15 November 2009 (UTC)

I agree - if you're reverting an edit just because it was made by a banned user, you should give that as an explanation in the edit summary and not use rollback; similarly if the explanation is on the talk page.--Kotniski (talk) 17:49, 15 November 2009 (UTC)

There has been a side discussion on this at User talk:Rd232 where Rd232 has suggested we sandbox a substantial clean up of the page; while keeping the substance of the guideline. I agree with this line of thinking. My major concern with Ncmvocalists changes is that we never talked about them. Fixing a comma or re-writing a confusing sentence is one thing but this is too substantial for us not to look over more carefully before we implement, as your comments show.--Doug.^{(talk • contribs)} 18:52, 15 November 2009 (UTC)

I updated this guideline which is lagging significantly behind actual practice - that's all. The ArbCom ruling was very specific on all those points. I think there's a very simple rationale for that; banned users should be taking as little community time and resources as possible when they violate their ban, given how they burn out the most productive contributors (which resulted in exhausting community patience). Their edits are considered accordingly. In an ideal world, CU could go through all requests and put a stop to socks as they appear on-site, but it's just not possible. It takes days for those technical details, while behavioral issues are all that good faith established contributors can rely on - we need to assume good faith on this point. Indeed, if you rollbacked or reverted such a rollback, that would be even worse. It would be sad if recent change patrollers are more concerned with convenience and looking through (or biting) established contributors edits marked with rollback rather than the more pressing issues that need to be looked into. Doug and Rd232 opened a user conduct RfC recently over something similar to this, and their poor handling of a situation was what resulted in them being the ones strongly criticised. This goes to show: when you choose to proactively intervene in a situation, there is a legitimate expectation that you take proactive steps to investigate before taking the action (whether this involves checking through the contributions, talk pages, etc, or even if you need to talk to or ask the rollbacking user directly - you need to do that even for obvious vandals sometimes). We can nitpick all we want; it won't change the unfortunate problems facing this project - we need to be more tactful in dealing with them. Rollbackers are responsible for their actions: if they wrongly assumed logged out users as banned users, or are gaming the system, there are mechanisms to deal with that. Given the implications though, rollbackers tend to take care before characterising a user in that sense. I hope that makes sense (and apologies for the lengthy background/rationale). Ncmvocalist (talk) 04:26, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

I can sympathize with all of that, but it doesn't change the fact that if you roll back a banned user's edit with no edit summary, other editors watching won't know that the user is banned, and (if the particular edit was prima facie constructive) will assume that it's you being disruptive, and will waste their time trying to deal with the situation in what will probably turn out to be the wrong way.--Kotniski (talk) 09:52, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

"By banning a user, the community has decided that their edits are prima facie unwanted and may be reverted without any further reason." It is a matter of principle that banned users are treated no different to obvious vandals; that is the reason a specialised edit summary is not afforded to them in the first instance. Rollbackers, of course, take responsibility for their edits. It is not my, or the community's problem, however, that certain recent change patrollers are not willing to assume good faith and gather the facts first, even if that means waiting for a few minutes for the rollbacker to provide an explanation elsewhere (eg; tagging the banned user with the appropriate tags; noting it in a subsequent edit summary, etc.) or if it means approaching the rollbacker directly first as a measure of good faith. Ban policy trumps this concern by a long shot. Ncmvocalist (talk) 18:01, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

It's not the banned user I'm worried about; the edit summary is not afforded to them, but to other good-faithed editors who may be watching. Why make both parties do the extra work you talk about at the end when you can solve the problem straight away by providing an edit summary originally?--Kotniski (talk) 19:01, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

Other good faithed editors will understand what is being said about the edit/editor marked with rollback. FWIW, I patrol recent changes quite often so I'm not clueless on it either - it's not enough to just go through the edit; you need to look beyond that. In that sense, it's not really any "extra work" beyond what should be done. Banned users can turn around and call the reverting party the banned user; rollback is not granted to banned users. Ncmvocalist (talk) 19:24, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

Ban policy says nothing whatsoever about the use of rollback, so I don't see what it's got to do with this. It says that we are free to revert a banned user's edits. How we do that is entirely up to us. And giving a reason for a revert that's probably going to raise some eyebrows seems like a splendid idea to me. Encouraging users not to give one, on the other hand, doesn't. --Conti|✉ 19:06, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

Oh, that's a separate matter. The ArbCom principle spoke about what was permissible - that's my point. So I don't want it specifically discouraged. That said, I am ready to support not specifically encouraging it either. Can we agree on those grounds? If so, I'll be happy to remove it. Ncmvocalist (talk) 19:19, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

Huh

I just got rollback rights and i dont know how to roll back without having to look at the diffs Parker1297 (talk) 22:40, 21 December 2009 (UTC)

If you're not looking at the diffs, how do you know you should be using rollback instead of undo? You could try enabling the "popups" gadget in your user preferences, then you can hover over the "diff" link in your watchlist or page history and a popup window will appear with the diff shown. But you do have to look at each edit before using rollback, otherwise you might find it gets taken away quickly. Franamax (talk) 00:54, 22 December 2009 (UTC)

Rollbacker obligations

Does the rollback feature carry any obligations? Once you are a rollbacker, do you have to use it or else get de-rollbackered? --The High Fin Sperm Whale (Talk • Contribs) 23:27, 22 December 2009 (UTC)

Nope. Just don't misuse it. Basically, don't use rollback on anything except stuff that's so obviously wrong that it doesn't require an edit summary.--Father Goose (talk) 02:55, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

Also, if User I makes a productive edit to a page, then User II makes another productive edit, then User I makes an unconstructive edit, can the second edit by User I be reverted without reverting his first edit? --The High Fin Sperm Whale (Talk • Contribs) 23:03, 26 December 2009 (UTC)

I believe that's how it works, yes. It'll rollback all edits made by the most recent user, and stop at the most recent edit by the user before him/her.--Father Goose (talk) 05:52, 27 December 2009 (UTC)

Also, I didn't understand the part about adding custom edit summaries. Could someone show me how to do it? --The High Fin Sperm Whale (Talk • Contribs) 19:48, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

Change the templates

*Current: (Reverted 2 edits by 88.88.88.88 identified as vandalism to last revision by 99.99.99.99)

• Should be: (Reverted 2 edits by 88.88.88.88 identified as vandalism to last revision by 99.99.99.99)
• Replace User: with Special:Contributions/ for it to make sense.

mechamind90 17:12, 5 March 2010 (UTC)

Those look like Twinkle summaries. You may want to make your suggestion at WT:TW. The edit summary of the rollback feature discussed on this page looks like:

Reverted edits by 88.88.88.88 (talk) to last revision by 99.99.99.99

MANdARAX • XAЯAbИAM 21:09, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

As suggested. I've posted the section over there now. mechamind90 03:26, 29 May 2010 (UTC)