Wikipedia:Village pump (technical)

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The technical section of the village pump is used to discuss technical issues about Wikipedia. Bug reports and feature requests should be made in Phabricator (see how to report a bug). Bugs with security implications should be reported differently (see how to report security bugs).

If you want to report a JavaScript error, please follow this guideline. Questions about MediaWiki in general should be posted at the MediaWiki support desk. Discussions are automatically archived after remaining inactive for five days.

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XTools Edit Count down?

Since yesterday, when I bring up my Edit Count from XTools, nothing has updated in two days. Specifically, the Actrion, Patrol figure. On the Basic information, it says "Latest edit 2024-08-03 03:11" which is in error. It also lists "Latest logged action" as 2024-08-03 03:06. Something on the stats end not working? — Maile (talk) 18:48, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

High replag means that all sorts of stuff that should update will not update until the replication lag goes back to zero. – Jonesey95 (talk) 20:42, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

Yes, there has been a high replag on both English Wikipedia and the Commons for two days now. It seems to have something to do with this. It's lasting longer than it was expected to take. Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 00:21, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

Yup. I noticed this one too, today. Ktin (talk) 00:38, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

Thanks for the input. It's been so many years since I've seen this happen, that I forgot the possibility of it. — Maile (talk) 01:39, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

Actually, it seems to happen fairly frequently, I'd guess monthly or every other month. It usually happens on Thursdays or Fridays. It becomes very evident if your editing relies on bot reports. They seem the most directly affected by these system lags. Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 01:50, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

So the replication lag has reached three and a half days. Is this situation normal or has something gone wrong and needs to be attended to? Can an end date be predicted or is it indeterminate? Nurg (talk) 22:25, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

I poked around and was unable to find a phabricator bug report, but my searching on phabricator does not work well. It looks T367856 accounts for this outage, but there has been no communication from WMF explaining why it is taking longer than the expected 26 hours and when it might be over. Maybe there is chatter on an e-mail list. Does anyone know if the WMF has uptime targets for their servers, including replag? With this one outage, currently at 92 hours, they will be below 99% uptime for the year. We had a 3+ hour outage in May 2024, a 4+ hour outage in June 2024, a 4+ hour outage in September 2023, and probably more. That's a good four and a half days of known downtime in the last twelve months for this valuable service. Not ideal. – Jonesey95 (talk) 06:34, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

There is no guarantees for replag. It is a best effort. We are seeing a lot of this over the last 2 years because Wikimedia are doing major rearchitecting of various database tables to enable them to keep scaling, and unlike the production environment the tools environment does not have the same level of support that would allow to execute these changes without impact. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 09:32, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

According to a post at https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T367856 nothing is broken. A process is running that may take 6 days – or maybe longer, or maybe not so long. Nurg (talk) 00:42, 8 August 2024 (UTC)

They're obviously working on Valve Time - X201 (talk) 07:11, 9 August 2024 (UTC)

Hooray, we are over 168 hours (one full week)! (175 hours at this writing.) That's more than a full week of database reports being out of date. It's going to be fun to mop up over a week's worth of mess when this outage finally gets sorted. – Jonesey95 (talk) 17:15, 10 August 2024 (UTC)

It's not a record. I seem to recall that about four or five years back replag hit two or perhaps three weeks. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 18:18, 10 August 2024 (UTC)

Yay! Quarry queries working, up-to-date again! wbm1058 (talk) 14:27, 13 August 2024 (UTC)

AfD Statistics not updating either

AfD Statistics https://afdstats.toolforge.org/afdstats has not updated since at least yesterday. I am assuming this is th same issue as replag — Maile (talk) 13:02, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

Working again, as of this AM. — Maile (talk) 11:33, 8 August 2024 (UTC)

Wikiproject Assessment tables not updating either

Reported at Wikipedia talk:Version 1.0 Editorial Team/Index. Same root cause? Nurg (talk) 23:48, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

PetScan

I'm assuming that WP:PETSCAN is affected by the same problem as well, because articles that I fixed a few days ago are still showing in the search results. - X201 (talk) 08:05, 8 August 2024 (UTC)

Template:Efn

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T371839

Template:Efn used with basic parameters would usually be displayed as ^[a][b] etc. But, in the recent days it's being displayed as ^{[lower-alpha 1][lower-alpha 2]} etc. Why is it? Vestrian24Bio (TALK) 01:20, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

Where? -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 05:06, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

Any page I see using it. Vestrian24Bio (TALK) 05:40, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

 Works for me Specific examples please. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 06:47, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

Windows 10 version history, Windows 11 version history

Screenshots: [1], [2] Vestrian24Bio (TALK) 06:56, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

"Rendered with Parsoid", as above (#Start a discussion notice on Talk pages) to your earlier question. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 07:39, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

Why is the Parsoid causing these problems and it isn't discussed anywhere on en-WP?? Vestrian24Bio (TALK) 07:42, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

Vestrian24Bio, because most people don't use Parsoid, so some templates break with it. — Qwerfjkltalk 08:33, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

Neither Windows 10 version history nor Windows 11 version history uses {{efn}}, please supply examples where {{efn}} is actually used and is a definite factor in the perceived problem. Also, your screenshots are unusable, as I can't find whatever it is I'm supposed to be looking for. Please follow the directions at WP:WPSHOT. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 14:41, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

The section Windows 10 version history#Channels transcludes {{Windows 10 versions}} which uses efn. I can see the ^{[lower-alpha 1][lower-alpha 2]} as described in the screenshot and the list then is a,b, etc. Could the transclusion interfere with the correct behaviour of efn?  —  Jts1882 | talk  14:50, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

I can see the problem on any page listed here. So, I took screenshots of 3 random pages:

• Aristotle – Lead paragraph with ^{[upper-alpha 1]}; Screenshot
• ASCII – Screenshot
• Apple Inc. – Screenshot

Vestrian24Bio (TALK) 15:44, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

I see no problem with any of these articles, logged-in or logged-out. If no problem is apparent when logged-out, but you have a problem when logged-in, that tells me that there's something unusual about your custom settings. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 17:39, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

"Rendered with Parsoid" as said above. Vestrian24Bio (TALK) 17:41, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

I don't see how that happens. According to mw:Parsoid, it's something to do with converting Wikitext to HTML. So, as all of our pages are written using Wikitext, and all of our readers are served HTML, the conversion process should be the same for everybody, and Parsoid must be that process. So why do I get something different from Vestrian24Bio? Has one of us turned off Parsoid, and if so, how and why? --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 20:21, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

It's not the default wikitext parser. If you opt into it at the bottom of Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-editing, you should see the [lower-alpha 1] misparse, too; I do, at least. —Cryptic 20:37, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

There is ongoing work in this area. I will file a bug. Izno (talk) 17:09, 5 August 2024 (UTC)

Looks like the CSS for phab:T156351 (that Parsoid requires rather than using MediaWiki:Cite link label group-lower-alpha) needs updating after Ieff73769, probably from .mw-ref > a[data-mw-group=lower-alpha]::after to .mw-ref > a[style~="mw-Ref"][data-mw-group=lower-alpha]::after (and the same for the other groups). Anomie⚔ 00:50, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

Yes, that would fix it, just a specificity issue it looks like. And the change looks deliberate, but 1) I'm not sure the impact was considered, and 2) I'm not sure that [style~="mw-Ref"] particularly is a nice selector for sundry reasons. Izno (talk) 01:11, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

I've made Anomie's change as a for-now solution while we wait for whatever is being hacked on by WMDE. Izno (talk) 02:54, 10 August 2024 (UTC)

Delay in global lock on account

𝕲𝕵𝕺𝕭𝕬𝕵 𝕺𝕽𝕯𝕰𝕶 𝕺𝕱 𝕾𝕬𝕿𝕬𝕹's account is global locked, even though their name is in title blacklist for only on English Wikipedia. Also, why was their account even given the permission to be created, so that they can make three edits and then get globally locked? Thanks, ExclusiveEditor _{Notify Me!} 16:11, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

What is a "gjobaj ordek" anyway? —Tamfang (talk) 06:04, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

@Tamfang: Typo for "global order", I think. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 17:08, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

This global account was created on another project, TBL doesn't stop autocreation. — xaosflux ^Talk 18:58, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

Adding transparency to make templates more dark-mode friendly

As someone who has witnessed the transition to Fandom Desktop which had a dark mode included, I want to suggest something that might actually be good for templates, and that is adding transparency to backgrounds (not to the font, just to backgrounds using rgba or hex codes) This could be done automatically but it might be better to do so in wikitext and may be a good addition to the manual of style. This would allow the text to be colored white (or whatever) and we would not have to auto-color stuff with backgrounds black. I wonder what level of transparency would be good for this. I was thinking 0.1 but there isn't a good way to check. Maybe this could be done as a bot task for inline styles and by interface admins for CSS sheets. Awesome Aasim 19:34, 6 August 2024 (UTC)

Maybe that is useful for the night mode gadget (I would not know), but for the vector-2022/minerva night mode using 'background:transparent' where the light mode color is white is frowned upon per Mw:Recommendations for night mode compatibility on Wikimedia wikis#Avoid using background: none or background: transparent. Snævar (talk) 21:58, 8 August 2024 (UTC)

No I do not think background: transparent; should be used. I think there should be partial transparency. Something like this:

Red

Yellow

Green

Try viewing like this and you should see that the colors should appear fine on both light and dark without any adjustments. Awesome Aasim 22:45, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

Wait that is so weird. Why is the text color being changed to this black color when background tags are used? I am just testing with safe mode and it is happening. Thoughts? Awesome Aasim 22:48, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

@Awesome Aasim: The text color is changed to black because a CSS rule was put into MediaWiki that automatically sets the text color to #202122 in dark mode if no text color is specified locally. If you don't want this to happen, you can simply add color:inherit; like this: Green. Andumé (talk) 01:06, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

For more information see phab:T358797. Andumé (talk) 01:16, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

I am still confused why was that task implemented? They probably should have just consulted with communities first as to how they would like templates and whatnot to be implemented. Using a light/dark mode switch would be ideal but having partial transparency would be easier to implement for template designers. Especially for the number of templates that use a combination of inline styles and TemplateStyles. I think there should probably be a task for adding transparency to inline elements. Awesome Aasim 16:09, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

@Awesome Aasim: I believe this fix was implemented because smaller wiki would likely not have enough technical contributors to fix the affected templates locally in a reasonable amount of time. Once all of the templates affected by the global rule are fixed, it can be disabled using MediaWiki:Wikimedia-styles-exclude. See https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Extension:WikimediaMessages#Disabling_styles for more infomation. Hope this helps! Andumé (talk) 22:48, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

Adding 'display:transparent' is a later stage thing and too soon to do now. Since you are mentioning templates and templatestyles, pages in the template namespace that are not redirects or subpages are 3047 and number of "styles.css" pages in the template namespace are 570. Disabling night mode styles from Wikimedia Messages needs to be done with other changes that make the whole stylesheet unnecessary. Snævar (talk) 02:27, 13 August 2024 (UTC)

Excessive "link added" notices

When a link to an article someone has created is added to a navbox, and someone subsequently edits any page in such navbox, regardless of the content of that edit, the user who created said article which was added to the navbox gets a notice that a "link was added" to that article, when that is not the case. I'm guessing the reason as to why mediawiki doesn't "register" that a link was added to a navbox in each transclusion of it has to do with the page not being purged until the next edit is made to it, but is there a way this can be fixed for link added notices? I'm aware one could just turn these off, but it does nevertheless seem like a bug. Flemmish Nietzsche (talk) 08:44, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

Not currently. From the perspective of Mediawiki, there is no difference between a link included in a page vs included via a templat, or rather what u describe a specific subset of templates. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 09:15, 7 August 2024 (UTC)

I'm having a similar problem; I got two notifications earlier today,

1. A link was made from ‪2027 Cricket World Cup qualification‬ to ‪2027 Cricket World Cup Qualifier Play-off‬. [3]
2. A link was made from ‪2027 Cricket World Cup Qualifier‬ to ‪2027 Cricket World Cup Qualifier Play-off‬. [4]

I got these notifications because I created 2027 Cricket World Cup Qualifier Play-off‬, but I don't have any of these pages on my watchlist or subscriptions.

I'm also confused because whenever a new notification arrives its also sent as a mail notification (only to those who preferred it). But, no mail notification is received when "A link was made" notification arrives... Vestrian24Bio (TALK) 10:06, 9 August 2024 (UTC)

These are settings per notification type, in your preferences, in the notifications section. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 09:50, 10 August 2024 (UTC)

"Remember me" not working as intended for me

Exactly as title. The checkbox states that it would last a year, yet sometimes I would find myself not logged in even though I am using the same device, same browser, etc. It is just a mild annoyance, but can someone give me pointers on how to fix this? Thanks in advance. —Mint Keyphase (Did I mess up? What have I done?) 01:26, 8 August 2024 (UTC)

Could happen if you log out on another device in the meantime. hgzh 10:51, 8 August 2024 (UTC)

But I am only using this one device logged in, and I'm quite sure my account wasn't hacked (hopefully(?)). —Mint Keyphase (Did I mess up? What have I done?) 11:23, 8 August 2024 (UTC)

Anything that clears or blocks your local storage (cookies) can invalidate your saved logon. Some browser or browser extension updates can cause this. — xaosflux ^Talk 15:10, 8 August 2024 (UTC)

FWIW I was logged out unexpectedly under similar circumstances on the day this was posted as well. I use Windows primarily with Chrome; if you also have a similar configuration, that *could* be an explanation. Graham87 (talk) 04:26, 9 August 2024 (UTC)

Well I am using windows and chrome, but this combination is probably so widespread that I would assume it is not where the problem is, or a lot more people would have reported this already. —Mint Keyphase (Did I mess up? What have I done?) 04:31, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

@Mint Keyphase: Do you use uBlock Origin like me? That's the only thing I think we could have in common. But even that would be a pretty common combination .... it could've just been bad luck. I suspect a lot of people wouldn't report being unexpectedly logged out, because it's a relatively minor inconvenience; I certainly didn't think to. Graham87 (talk) 12:10, 13 August 2024 (UTC)

Nope —Mint Keyphase (Did I mess up? What have I done?) 04:13, 14 August 2024 (UTC)

Using Linux + Chrome: I was logged out today, after a Chrome s/w update. -- Verbarson  ^talk_edits 15:38, 14 August 2024 (UTC)

How often does this happen? Every time you close the browser? Shut down the computer? Can you log in to other websites with the same browser and they persist just fine? Nardog (talk) 15:59, 14 August 2024 (UTC)

In Javascript, insert template in correct place (after hatnotes)

According to MOS:ORDER, DuplicateReferences has to insert maintenance templates at the correct place in the article (6. Maintenance, cleanup, and dispute tags). Is there a trick to ensure that the template {{Duplicated citations}} is inserted at the correct location? Polygnotus (talk) 12:14, 8 August 2024 (UTC)

The obvious method is to make a long list of all the templates, and all redirect to those templates (and filter out those that are not used in mainspace), that should appear above the maintenance templates. But that quickly turns into a giant list and a lot of work. Isn't there a smarter way to do this? Is there some kind of Javascript library I can import? Polygnotus (talk) 16:09, 8 August 2024 (UTC)

Figured it out (somewhat) by stealing getting inspiration from Twinkle's code. [5] which uses morebits [6]

regexes

const shortDescriptionRegex = /\{\{\s*short description\s*\|[^}]+\}\}/i; const displayTitleRegex = /\{\{\s*(DISPLAYTITLE|Lowercase title|Italic title)\s*(\|[^}]+)?\}\}/i; const hatnoteRegex = /\{\{\s*(hatnote|main|correct title|dablink|distinguish|for|further|selfref|year dab|similar names|highway detail hatnote|broader|about|other uses?|redirect|see)\s*(\|[^}]+)?\}\}/i; const articleStatusRegex = /\{\{\s*(Featured list|Featured article|Good article)\s*\}\}/i; const deletionProtectionRegex = /\{\{\s*(db|delete|prod|proposed deletion|ArticleForDeletion|AfDM|pp|protected)\s*(\|[^}]+)?\}\}/i;

Polygnotus (talk) 05:59, 10 August 2024 (UTC)

RFPPI's automatic section title

I am unsure which talk page is the intended place to ask for this since most redirect to WT:RFPP (which, if it was the intended place, is protected), but is there any way to change the form (the Request protection button), so that it does this automatically? – 2804:F1...20:147 (talk) 20:26, 8 August 2024 (UTC)

The above is saying that the "Request protection" button at Wikipedia:Requests for page protection should insert a colon in front of the title if that title is for a Category (so the result is a link to the category rather than something which puts the page in the category). That is above my pay grade but might involve ?withJS=MediaWiki:Request-page-protection-form.js at MediaWiki:Request-page-protection-form.js. Johnuniq (talk) 00:19, 9 August 2024 (UTC)

Ah, reading the code it seems that the formatted text comes from the template values in Wikipedia:Requests for page protection/Forms-configuration.json.

Is there any side effect to just adding the colon in the section titles there? It seems like that's what the pagelinks template already does (and many others).

I won't request an edit there because I already started this, and because I'm not sure if it's that easy. Thanks for this info. – 2804:F1...20:147 (talk) 03:11, 9 August 2024 (UTC)

Just to be clear, that is my question (and if yes, my suggestion) now. Does simply doing this change at the aforementioned JSON work for fixing this?:

−

=== [[$title]] ===

+

=== [[:$title]] ===

– 2804:F1...92:7B79 (talk) 16:36, 9 August 2024 (UTC)

Add A Fact experimental tool from Future Audiences

The Future Audiences team at the foundation is launching Add A Fact, an experimental tool for adding information to English Wikipedia from outside the website. You can download the extension from the Chrome store here: Add A Fact. For now, an (auto)confirmed English Wikipedia account is required to submit facts with this extension.

The idea was developed and workshopped with Wikipedians at WCNA 2023, demoed and tested with Wikipedia community members as part of our team’s regular monthly community calls.

Here is a short demo video on the extension:

A quick how-to —

1. While reading any secondary source on the web (a news item, a scholarly article, etc.), you can open Add A Fact and highlight a short claim that you may want to add to Wikipedia.
2. An LLM will check if the selected claim is related to any existing Wikipedia articles, and will present information about whether the fact is fully, partially, or not present in these articles. You may also search for an article of your choosing.
3. Once you select a Wikipedia article to add your fact to, Add A Fact will give you the option of sending a pre-filled template message to the talk page of the article, which includes the selected text, any additional comments you’d like to add, and a structured citation. This message will be signed under your Wikipedia username.
4. If the URL of the source you are on appears on WP:Reliable_sources/Perennial_sources, you will receive a warning message about your source’s reliability (but will still be able to add a suggested fact from this source). If the URL of the source you are on appears on the spam blocklist, you will not be able to add a suggested fact from this source.
5. To limit any potential misuse/spam, Add A Fact users will be limited to sending a maximum of 10 facts per day during this early experimental period.

We've answered some common questions on our FAQ.

Add A Fact seeks to prove or disprove a hypothesis about how we might continue to sustain and grow Wikimedia projects in a changing online knowledge landscape. In this case, we’re seeking to understand how people can make editorial contributions off-platform (that is, without going directly to Wikipedia.org), and if generative AI can support or hinder this process.

If you use the tool, please give us your thoughts anonymously via the feedback form on the extension, in this VP thread or on my subpage. DErenrich-WMF (talk) 16:09, 9 August 2024 (UTC)

No Firefox support? Why not? Which APIs are you missing? Polygnotus (talk) 20:49, 9 August 2024 (UTC)

@Polygnotus: FF doesn't support service workers in manifest v3 but I actually think there's a way I can work around this (looking into this today). FF support is on our radar. DErenrich-WMF (talk) 21:06, 9 August 2024 (UTC)

Thank you. The tool looks interesting but I strongly dislike Chrome. Polygnotus (talk) 21:20, 9 August 2024 (UTC)

If its a chrome extension then, It would work in Microsoft Edge as well. Vestrian24Bio (TALK) 00:19, 10 August 2024 (UTC)

I dislike Edge even more strongly, for very similar reasons. Polygnotus (talk) 00:30, 10 August 2024 (UTC)

If it's a a chrome extension, it will work on Vivaldi, which is better than all previously mentioned browsers, imho. Another possibility is Opera, which can also use the extension, but Vivaldi is better. (We can take this offline to my UTP, or yours, if you wish to go into more detail about browsers.) Mathglot (talk) 00:01, 13 August 2024 (UTC)

It is unfortunate that the video demo shows someone suggesting a press release for a source on a medical topic, which would surely not pass WP:MEDRS. MrOllie (talk) 21:33, 9 August 2024 (UTC)

That's a good point. We tried to have the tool warn you about unacceptable sources but encoding all the nuances of the rules is hard. But doing this better is something we should look more into. DErenrich-WMF (talk) 23:05, 9 August 2024 (UTC)

Having the demo advertise a kind of edit that should never be done is hardly a "nuance". Wikipedia got a good reputation for how it handled the COVID crisis precisely because editors stuck to standards that your demo tells people to avoid. XOR'easter (talk) 21:11, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

The message left on the talk page, will that include some template or tracking category, so that editors can easily find a list of facts to be added, and act upon them? Otherwise, especially if the facts are posted on lesser-watched talkpages, it'll be like shouting into the void. --rchard2scout (talk) 06:30, 10 August 2024 (UTC)

It doesn't currently use a tracking template but that's planned for the next minor release. For now you can find the relevant edits by using hashtags DErenrich-WMF (talk) 17:21, 10 August 2024 (UTC)

Will we be able to find out how many facts posted to talk pages have been reviewed and used in articles, as opposed to rejected, and how many have not been considered at all (eg because of being on a less-watched page)? In what other ways will this tool be evaluated? For example, how might we detect an increase in, as the close of Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/IncidentArchive1160#User:Drbogdan, persistent low-quality editing, and WP:NOTSOCIALNETWORK issues put it, mass-adding content based on low-quality popular science churnalism to our science articles, expecting that other editors will review it and determine whether to improve or remove it, leading to an indefinite community block? NebY (talk) 01:56, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

Once the experiment is complete (probably in a few months) we will put together a report with our findings. See for example the report for the last project we did. The metrics we're looking at are the kind of things you'd expect: number of users, number of edits, number of reverts, etc. But probably more importantly we're also collecting qualitative evidence (e.g. discussions like this one, feedback forms or by manually looking at the edits being made). DErenrich-WMF (talk) 04:09, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

@DErenrich-WMF Reverts aren't a meaningful metric for this tool. The tool will post on the talk page and talk page posts are rarely reverted. The only revert metric that would be useful would be the number of resulting additions to the article that are reverted, but that would be very difficult to collect.

Instead, a viable metric would be the proportions of talk page facts that were implemented, rejected, or not acted on. If tool postings used a format similar to {{Edit semi-protected}}, this might be feasible. It would also be immediately helpful to reviewing editors.

It is a bit surprising that the experiment hasn't been designed to allow meaningful reporting and evaluation. Is there some need to to start the experiment regardless, or can you build suitable metrics into it before release? NebY (talk) 14:45, 13 August 2024 (UTC)

Let's please find a way to make this tool avoid good and featured articles. The last thing we need is to be experimenting with new users and our content that has actually gone through some sort of content peer review. Hog Farm _Talk 21:21, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

And, more generally, there should be a way to say "we don't want add a fact here" on a specific page. This is similar to {{no newcomer task}} which already exists for Growth Team edits. * Pppery * _{it has begun...} 21:24, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

I concur with these suggestions. XOR'easter (talk) 21:42, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

Flip the script in your next project

Yes, that's interesting; I have it installed (on Vivaldi) and will be trying it out.

But I have a proposal for you, that imho, would be far more useful that I would like to bring to your attention. Basically, it means flipping the script on Find-A-Fact and doing it in the other direction. That is, finding an assertion on Wikipedia (possibly with the aid of the Category populated by {{cn}} tags), highlighting it, opening your next extension, which goes to AI and tries to find a reliable source to verify it. (It would possibly use WikiProjects listed on the Talk page to better target its search, and would be aware of perennial sources, as well as the WP blacklist, WP mirror sites, and other helpful exclude- or include-criteria.) It would read the source(s) (up to max-sources maybe?) and then pop up or fill a box with the citations, optionally augmented with better wording (Reword (y/n)?) for the assertion that currently exists in the article. At that point, there could be two paths (Talk or Article?): if user wants to go the Talk page route (default) then you do something similar to what Find-a-Fact does, and compose something for the talk page. If they want to go the Article page route, then you open the article in Preview mode, add the citation(s), optionally replace the existing assertion if AI was able to compose a better one and user selected that option, and show a Diff of the new version you are proposing, along with a canned edit summary. (Note that this flow, i.e., OpenPage-AddChanges-Preview-Diff-and-Wait, is similar to what some user scripts do currently, such as Nardog's RefRenamer script.) Then, user either accepts the change, optionally modifies the edit summary, and hits Publish, or they Cancel, or they go back to the extension box, altering options and checkboxes and hit Apply to try again with a different set of options. How does that sound? Mathglot (talk) 00:35, 13 August 2024 (UTC)

No one should even contemplate working on this until the tools for automatically generating citations are actually fixed. The damage that just one editor was able to do affected thousands of pages and was so thankless and dispiriting to repair that the volunteers gave up. XOR'easter (talk) 00:04, 14 August 2024 (UTC)

Getting Cite errors and CS1/CS2 errors for an article via the API

I want to get information about Cite errors and CS1/2 errors via the API. The input should be the title of a Wikipedia article and the output should be either a list of cite errors or a list of CS1/2 errors (or a combination).

The articles are in Category:Pages with citation errors and Category:CS1 errors. There doesn't appear to be a separate category for CS2 errors.

CS1/CS2

If I add {{citation |first=bar |title=foo}} to my userpage I see:

foo {{citation}}: |first= missing |last= (help)

On this article I can see that the API reports that there is a CS1 error, but not what the actual problem is. I have added the CSS found here so I can see the specific CS1 error when viewing the article in my browser. But how can I get this information via the API? It looks to me like Module:Citation/CS1/Configuration generates the error messages; does the fact that the error is generated by this Lua script mean I can't get this information via the API? Or do I have to get the rendered page to get the actual HTML and search that for error messages?

Is it possible to detect (via the API) if an edit causes a CS1/CS2 error before actually making the edit?

There are roundabout ways, but otherwise, the answer to does the fact that the error is generated by this Lua script mean I can't get this information via the API is yes. Each error emits a category but you will only know which categories go with which citations by using something like the mw:API:Expandtemplates on the source wikitext. If you don't care about knowing which templates have which issues, you can use the categories API. Another solution is to get the HTML and then search for the relevant classes with e.g. mw:API:REST API though I think there are other APIs one could use (even ignoring screen scraping).

Is it possible to detect (via the API) if an edit causes a CS1/CS2 error before actually making the edit? Only with something like the above. Izno (talk) 02:27, 10 August 2024 (UTC)

Cite error

On Brainwashing I see a cite error on ref 87: Cite error: The named reference they-never-said-it was invoked but never defined (see the help page). Which API call should I make to get this information? I assumed it was this (Sandbox).

Is this also handled by a Lua script somewhere? What is the URL? It looks like its using MediaWiki:Cite error references no text but I can't seem to find a Lua module referencing that. Is it in a MediaWiki extension written in PHP?

Do I have to get the rendered page to get the actual HTML and search that for error messages?

How would I detect (via the API) if an edit causes a cite error before actually making the edit?

It looks like I am at least able to find errors before they happen with action=parse, but those are warnings from the parser, not the Lua script(s). Is that correct?

These errors originate from mw:Extension:Cite. You can explore the documentation there, but I do not think there is anything to indicate errors in an API. Besides whatever categories are emitted, as discussed above, but that would not tell you which references caused an error I believe. Izno (talk) 02:30, 10 August 2024 (UTC)

Bot

Which bot, if any, is running on Category:Pages with broken reference names to find the most recent revision that contains that refname so it can be restored? Shouldn't be too hard to write, right? Can the InternetArchiveBot do that?

Polygnotus (talk) 23:43, 9 August 2024 (UTC)

AnomieBOT. Izno (talk) 02:19, 10 August 2024 (UTC)

@Izno: Thanks a lot! This is a con of the Lua stuff, but there are a lot of pros. Lots of food for thought. Polygnotus (talk) 05:55, 10 August 2024 (UTC)

Using Twinkle to tag articles

I apologise if this has been asked already.

I have noticed a problem with accessing all of the tag options when using Twinkle. I switch between mobile to desktop when I need to use Twinkle, in most instances the full drop down menu is fine, I can scroll up or down to find the correct message I need. When trying to add a welcome message for new users the scroll doesn't work though. I can only access the initial few welcome messages but that's it. I also have the same problem with tagging articles in the mainspace. I've found an article published to the mainspace and it doesn't have any references. I wanted to tag it as such but I am unable to scroll down the menu to the correct option.

Most of the Twinkle options are fine, such as CSD, I can scroll down to view all the options. It seems to be a problem with Welcome messages and article tagging. Am I doing something wrong? Thanks in advance, Knitsey (talk) 15:42, 10 August 2024 (UTC)

What OS/browser are you using? Nardog (talk) 20:15, 10 August 2024 (UTC)

Hi Nardog, Google chrome. Is that what you mean? Knitsey (talk) 20:30, 10 August 2024 (UTC)

Google Chrome is your browser. "OS" is short for Operating System which is most likely Microsoft Windows (other options are Linux and Mac OS). Polygnotus (talk) 01:53, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

Polygnotus, I completely missed the OS bit! Android, version 14 if that makes a difference. The scroll down options always used to work. I've been on a Wikipedia break for about 8 months, come back and those two sections no longer scroll. Knitsey (talk) 02:13, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

So you're on a mobile device or tablet? And nothing happens even if you swipe down? Is the desktop mode on? Nardog (talk) 02:49, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

I use my mobile. Switch to desktop to use Twinkle. It is just those two menus that I can't scroll down... Welcome messages for new users and the tag menu on articles.

The Twinkle menu for vandalism warnings is fine, I can scroll down on that. The same for CSD, I can scroll down on that too.

With Welcome messages, I can always go back to using templates for now. I'm just curious as to why those two drop downs and whether it cwn be fixed. Knitsey (talk) 03:01, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

By the desktop mode I mean the "Desktop site" in the Chrome menu. Is it checked? Nardog (talk) 03:32, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you mean? I go to the bottom of the Wikipedia page and click desktop view. Knitsey (talk) 03:43, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

Warburg Institute italic title

Can someone take a look at the Warburg Institute article? The title is being italicized (when it should not be); it uses {{infobox journal}} later in the article, which auto-italicizes, but it's set to "no" as the template says so presumably this should not be happening. Aza24 (talk) 01:35, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

@Aza24: I removed the underscore in the "italic title" infobox parameter and it looks like that was the issue. DanCherek (talk) 01:44, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

Oh, strange—Thanks! Aza24 (talk) 01:45, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Long-term abuse/List

Some of the entries are referring to historic/stale accounts. It's hard to gauge. I was thinking add a column, "Page last edited". Is this information available somehow, given the name of a page, return the date of last edit? It's not a perfect solution but some information is better than none, recent activity will be more visible. -- GreenC 04:19, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

I believe it is mw:API:Revisions: example. In my limited experience, it can foul up if strange things occur. I forget exactly what but it was something like the user had been renamed, or maybe a revision deletion? Johnuniq (talk) 05:59, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

@GreenC: given the name of a page, return the date of last edit - yes, see Help:Magic words#Page revision data. Let's assume that the LTA habitually targets pages in Category:Civil parishes in Oxfordshire. We might have this partial list:

• List of civil parishes in Oxfordshire Crouch, Swale 20240805195559
• Abingdon-on-Thames 10mmsocket 20241202161439
• Adderbury Martinevans123 20241004135945
• Adwell Redrose64 20240527201450
• Alvescot GoingBatty 20220123234127
• Ambrosden 86.182.168.130 20240601130830
• Appleford-on-Thames Entranced98 20241203110737
• Appleton-with-Eaton Jonesey95 20240811134932

--Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 09:51, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

User:Redrose64: Thanks! Special:Diff/1239727454/1239797852 .. surprisingly most are recent 2024-2024. -- GreenC 16:20, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

Tool limits on mobile version

Moved from Wikipedia talk:Village pump

What's the technical or by design reason for the limitations of the editing tools on the mobile version? Many of the tools that you can add through code particularly don't seem to show up in any form in the mobile format. Is there any features pipeline to introducing this functionality? Iskandar323 (talk) 10:47, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

Countervandalism, Twinkle and a few other tools work recently on mobile. I would recommend making a wish entry at Meta:Community Wishlist/Wishes. In short I agree that mobile lags behind desktop which is concerning considering the future of editors is mobile. ~ 🦝 Shushugah (he/him • talk) 12:18, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

In large degree this is due to having to make very conscious decisions about where to provide such options, as space per page is limited. As very few people think about this, there is also very little progress on it. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 09:02, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

Strange behaviour for en embedded infobox

I just copy-edited the article on Philip Noel-Baker, which had a separate infobox (actually the {{MedalTableTop}}) with Olympic medals, which I embedded into the main infobox.

A rectangle now appears below the medals. What have I done wrong? HandsomeFella (talk) 15:48, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

The answer is in the template documentation: "Do not use {{MedalTableTop}} or {{MedalTop}} inside an infobox." – Jonesey95 (talk) 17:06, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

It's possible to embed a medal table in an infobox without using those templates but there were other problems. A separate medal table looks OK to me. PrimeHunter (talk) 21:26, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

If there's bad code in MedalTableTop, shouldn't that be fixed? HandsomeFella (talk) 01:21, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

There isn't bad code in MedalTableTop as far as I know, you just used it wrong. It was never intended for infoboxes but for stand-alone tables. It adds a table start {| but an infobox is already a table. PrimeHunter (talk) 01:33, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

@HandsomeFella: OK, I worked it out. In this edit, you were trying to stuff the whole medal table into the caption of an embedded infobox, viz. the |name= parameter of the {{infobox sportsperson}}, and a <caption>...</caption> element may not contain tables as descendants. Instead, you should have used the |medaltemplates= parameter, and omitted the {{MedalTableTop}}, as in

| awards           = [[Nobel Peace Prize]]
| module           = {{infobox sportsperson
| embed            = y
| name             = Philip Baker
| medaltemplates   =
{{Medal|Sport|[[Athletics (sport)|Athletics]]}}
{{Medal|Country|{{GBN}}}}
{{Medal|Competition|[[Athletics at the Summer Olympics|Olympic Games]]}}
{{Medal|Silver|[[1920 Summer Olympics|1920 Antwerp]]|[[Athletics at the 1920 Summer Olympics – Men's 1500 metres|1500 m]]}}
}}
}}

'''Philip John Noel-Baker, Baron Noel-Baker''', {{post-nominals|country=GBR|PC}} (1 November 1889 – 8 October 1982),

This does still create a double-border situation, but the spurious empty box is gone. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 15:37, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

It needs embed = yes. PrimeHunter (talk) 17:41, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

Thanks. That fixed the problem that I mentioned below. Now my problem is that the sportsperson box ignores the name= parameter. Like so many other people, peers included, he competed under another name, so it's needed. HandsomeFella (talk) 17:46, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

The main name parameter is for display above the infobox but that doesn't work for an embedded infobox so it's omitted there. The other name parameters can be used but the field label displays as Native name, Birth name, Full name, or Nickname. The label cannot be changed and none of them apply here. I see no good option and would just omit it. PrimeHunter (talk) 18:04, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

Thanks. But if the Native name, Birth name, Full name, and Nickname parameters are available in embedded mode, surely the Name parameter could be made available too, couldn't it? HandsomeFella (talk) 19:04, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

It could be suggested at Template talk:Infobox sportsperson. Native name, Birth name, Full name, and Nickname are treated the same in embedded and non-embedded: As fields inside the infobox. Name is outside the box in non-embedded so it's not possible to treat it the same in embedded. It would be possible to place it inside the box instead of skipping it, or to introduce another parameter. What should the field label be? I think "Name" alone is a little confusing when the whole infobox is already named. Is there any common term like "Athlete name", "Competing as", or something? What if they competed under two names, e.g. new surname after marrying? And if the name is a variation of an already shown name then is it really necessary to show it? Your example article is called Philip Noel-Baker, the infobox says "Born Philip John Baker", and you want to add "Philip Baker" to his sports career in the infobox. That seems a little redundant to me. PrimeHunter (talk) 02:52, 13 August 2024 (UTC)

Thank you. I have tested it now (in preview), and it seems that the "sportsbox"

1) does not "fill out" the main infobox – in this case infobox officeholder – to its full width, and

2) aligns to the right within the main infobox.

Is there any way to fix that? I found no align parameter in either infobox. In the sportsperson box, the width parameter goes to the image. The double-border situation feels like a minor problem. HandsomeFella (talk) 17:43, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

Search error with <𐀍>

FYI, if I search for Linear B <𐀍> on a page, I get a hit for all ASCII spaces. — kwami (talk) 00:05, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

How are you searching? If you search a viewed page with a browser menu or a shortcut like Ctrl+f then you are using a browser feature and not a MediaWiki feature. The browser will determine what happens. I get the same result in Firefox. If you search a source edit box with the magnifying glass icon to the far right after clicking "Advanced" in the default toolbar then it's a MediaWiki feature. It works for me, e.g. when editing Linear B. There are also other tools which can make searches. PrimeHunter (talk) 01:25, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

Thanks. Something screwy with Firefox then. — kwami (talk) 01:35, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

Can confirm, it's a bug in Firefox. And checkbox "Match Diacritics" doesn't help (it usually does). —⁠andrybak (talk) 12:26, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

What's with the look of Special:PendingChanges?

I'm begging whoever is in charge of this to revert to the previous look. LilianaUwU ^{(talk / contributions)} 00:25, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

Do you mean the the changes described in T191156, which were deployed around the end of June/early July? --rchard2scout (talk) 07:13, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

Yes, specifically this. LilianaUwU ^{(talk / contributions)} 16:29, 14 August 2024 (UTC)

Enabling mw-no-invert in navbox headers

I cannot seem to use the titleclass parameter in {{Navbox}} to ensure that the headers of Template:Shades of color navboxes are preserved in dark mode. A {{colored link}} instance in the header will also need to have noinvert enabled using the new parameter noinvert=yes. –LaundryPizza03 (dc̄) 04:04, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

Harv warning issues...

Reba McEntire has 13 "Harv warnings" in its references. (I have Wikipedia:User_scripts/Requests/Archive_4#HarvErrors.js installed.) All the warnings are coming from the multi-reference sources - Ref #205, #210, #211, #214, #216, #222, and #224. The sfn/Harvard cite system can be tricky to get the coding right...
I have run into this issue before on another article and I still cannot figure out how to fix it. Could some of you technical/referencing/wikicoding wizards take a look at the article and respond here with what is wrong and how to fix it. I would very much appreciate learning 1) exactly what is going wrong and 2)learning (and then remembering) how to fix the issue so 3) please let me fix the problem at the Reba article myself. Thanks, Shearonink (talk) 16:28, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

It appears to have been the asterisk (*) inside <ref>...</ref>. I removed the asterisks and added a line break between the two cites in one place, which cleared the problem. See the Medley citation. I didn't fix the other cases. Donald Albury 17:05, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

That is not the correct fix. The warning message is telling you that the citation is notlinked from an {{sfn}} or {{harv}}-family template. If you want to suppress the messages, in the cs1|2 template set |ref=none:

{{cite web |last=... |first=... |title=... |date=... |url=... |ref=none}}

—Trappist the monk (talk) 18:36, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

But why then is "ref=none" necessary for the second citation below, but not for the first?

*Reba in Concert (1992)Sources for 1992 tour:

*{{cite magazine|date=February 22, 1992|title=Reba in Concert|magazine=Billboard|volume=104|issue=8|page=31|location=Nashville, Tennessee|publisher=BPI Communications|issn=0006-2510|access-date=October 23, 2020|url=https://worldradiohistory.com/Archive-Billboard/90s/1992/Billboard-1992-02-22.pdf|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200808083051/https://worldradiohistory.com/Archive-Billboard/90s/1992/Billboard-1992-02-22.pdf|archive-date=August 8, 2020}} :::*{{cite news |last1=Pareles |first1=Jon | title=Taking the Country Out of the Country Singer |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1992/10/26/news/review-music-taking-the-country-out-of-the-country-singer.html |newspaper=[[The New York Times]] |location=[[New York City]], [[New York (state)|New York]] |date=October 26, 1992 |access-date=October 23, 2020|archive-url=https://archive.today/20201023023153/https://www.nytimes.com/1992/10/26/news/review-music-taking-the-country-out-of-the-country-singer.html |archive-date=October 23, 2020|ref=none}}

Donald Albury 18:59, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

Each cs1|2 template creates a CITEREF anchor id as a link target for {{sfn}} etc templates. The anchor id is listed in the warning message, for example, the anchor id for your second example is: CITEREFPareles1992. The CITEREF anchor id is created from author names (only the first four) and the year portion of the date. The Billboard template does not have any authors so a CITEREF anchor id is not created. The warning script is smart enough to recognize that nothing can link to a cs1|2 template that does not have a CITEREF anchor id. Because there is no CITEREF anchor id, it is not necessary to suppress it with |ref=none.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 19:20, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

OK. So there are fixes that will take care of the "Harv warning" issues. I'll puzzle my way through and fix stuff. But can someone again explain, as if to a non-coder - lol which I certainly *am* - 1) exactly why the bundled cites are not working as intended and 2)why this issue isn't discussed and explained as if to a non-coder in the Help:References and page numbers#Shortened footnotes & in Help:Shortened footnotes#Bundling citations & in Wikipedia:Citing sources#Bundling citations. If I've noticed - and I am certainly not one of the most prolific editors around here - at least 2 instances where the bundled citations are throwing Harv warnings then there have to be many, many more. Thanks, Shearonink (talk) 01:38, 13 August 2024 (UTC)

I mean, I've used "ref=none" quite a bit but I guess I don't understand, in these cases why it is necessary... Shearonink (talk) 01:47, 13 August 2024 (UTC)

Answers:

1. What do you mean by: the bundled cites are not working as intended? What about those cites is not working? Are you claiming that they don't work because the user script is marking them with warning messages? (this version (permalink) of the article)
2. Likely because these messages are only available to those editors who have included a user script in their common.js that emits such messages. In your common.js you have installed User:Trappist the monk/HarvErrors.js. That script has a documentation page (current version not authored by me so perhaps more understandable than what I might write).

When the warning message appears, it is generally not necessary to do anything except to look for typos in the surnames and dates. If {{sfn|Green|2024}} is supposed to link to {{cite book |last=Greene |date=2024 |title=...}} and these are the only pair for Green(e) 2024 you will get three messages:

For the sfn: sfn error: no target: CITEREFGreen2024 (help) Harv error: link from CITEREFGreen2024 doesn't point to any citation.

For the full citation: Harv warning: There is no link pointing to this citation. The anchor is named CITEREFGreene2024.

All because of a simple misspelling. When there really isn't Greene 2024 (with an 'e') short-form citation linking to a long-form citation, the script doesn't know that so it prompts editors to check. This same applies to the date; Green 2023 will cause the script to emit the same basic messages. If a short-form is not needed, editors can set |ref=none to suppress the warning message. It is not necessary, but is a courtesy to editors coming after you so they don't waste their time trying to find a matching short-form citation.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 13:37, 13 August 2024 (UTC)

Why is Wikipedia going backwards?

First, you removed the article title when you hover a link, now when you click a link while previewing or close a tab/window when editing there's no more warning message. Can they please be restored? Nearly but not perfect (talk) 20:01, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

Works for me. Perhaps you inadvertently altered your Preferences? Or forgot to log in, so you have only default preferences? Mathglot (talk) 20:18, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

@Mathglot: Both work for you? Can you please tell me how to enable both things that I listed? Nearly but not perfect (talk) 20:20, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

For the first, try: Appearance > Reading preferences > Enable page previews. Or, are you talking about the page url appearing in the status bar of your browser (often at the bottom border)? That would be a browser preference, I believe. Mathglot (talk) 20:32, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

@Mathglot: The URL appears, but if an article links to "Page" then I want to see the text "Page" when I'm hovering over the link. Nearly but not perfect (talk) 20:48, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

@Mathglot: It worked. But how can I get the warning before I close the tab to come back? If you don't know, I hope omeone else can do it. Nearly but not perfect (talk) 20:50, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

The text when hovering rarely appears. Nearly but not perfect (talk) 20:56, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

(edit conflict) I don't quite understand the other question, about closing a tab. It sounds like it might be a browser question, but I don't know for sure what you are seeing. Can you explain step-by-step what you are doing, using a concrete example? E.g.: 1. open the NameOfArticle article in (name of my browser) on (type of my device). 2. (do this) 3. (then do that) 4. ... . RESULTS: Expected: (what you expected to happen) Result: (what happened instead). Thanks, Mathglot (talk) 21:01, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

For some years now, Windows has had a feature where the taskbar shows icons for currently-running applications, and if you hover over one of them it shows you what is currently displayed by that application, in miniature - scaled at a ratio of approx. 6:1.

The latest release of Firefox (129.0) has added a similar feature: if you have two or more tabs open, and hover over a tab that doesn't have the current focus, it shows you what is currently in that tab - but scaled at approx. 4:1. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 22:45, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

If "Enable page previews" is enabled at Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-rendering or "Navigation popups" is enabled at Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-gadgets then you are supposed to get a preview of the page content when you hover over a link to an article. If they are both disabled then you are supposed to see the page name. Or more accurately, the html for the link has a title attribute which is the page name, and most browsers will display the title attribute when you hover over a link. Are both preview preferences disabled? If you still don't see the page name then what is your browser? PrimeHunter (talk) 22:56, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

@Mathglot: When I'm editing something, I would make a change. Before I save it, especially when I'm previewing, when I close the tab, there used to be a warning on Chrome (I'm using Chrome on Windows 10) "Leave page? Changes may not be saved" or something. That disappeared. Nearly but not perfect (talk) 04:23, 13 August 2024 (UTC)

What is your setting at Preferences → Editing → Warn me when I leave an edit page with unsaved changes? --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 06:55, 13 August 2024 (UTC)

@PrimeHunter: Enable page previews is enabled. Navigation popups is disabled. Is that's what's causing the text to not appear when hovering above a link? Nearly but not perfect (talk) 04:23, 13 August 2024 (UTC)

It's a possible cause. You can just try to disable it if you want the page name but not a preview of the page content. PrimeHunter (talk) 11:57, 13 August 2024 (UTC)

Various anomalies involving contrib history of IP-like usernames ending in -xxx

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T370413

On a CIDR-range contribs search for Special:Contributions/193.133.134.0/24, I happened to find contribs for two "IP addresses", namely:

• 193.133.134.178 (talk · contribs) – about 18 edits in 2002
• 193.133.134.xxx (talk · contribs) – couple hundred edits, 2001–2002; but if you click that contribs link, no edits are listed

The anomalies/question:

1. why is CIDR search even picking up the second one, if that's just a normal, registered username, which to my understanding, it should be?
2. Otoh, maybe it isn't, because the link User:193.133.134.xxx doesn't do what I expect, namely going to a user page or to a create-page preview, but it does neither, instead going to the Contributions page. Huh??
3. Clicking the contribs link Special:Contributions/193.133.134.xxx shows an empty page, but the CIDR/24 link shows a couple hundred edits; wtf? Following any of the links shows they really did make early edits to those pages, such as:
   • rev. 427352463 at Motorcycle on 15:06, 8 October 2001 (-43,537b, ok, but that anomaly I'm aware of)
   • rev. 280709 at Steel on 09:07, 1 November 2001
   • rev. 277553 at River on 11:21, 9 November 2001
4. It's not just that one IP-xxx: the early history of Alfred Hitchcock shows a bunch of them: 152.163.195.xxx (talk · contribs), 152.163.197.xxx (talk · contribs), 62.253.64.xxx (talk · contribs), 205.188.197.xxx (talk · contribs), 193.133.134.xxx (talk · contribs), 205.188.198.xxx (talk · contribs), 64.12.101.xxx (talk · contribs), 64.12.104.xxx (talk · contribs). Clicking any of the contrib links for those goes to an empty Contribs page, despite their all having at least one edit at Alfred Hitchcock.
5. Bonus question: that rev id for Motorcycle above has a lot more digits than I would expect for an early edit. What's up with that?
6. If you go to the contribs link for 193.133.134.xxx and click Search (link) the result shows a red warning complaining about invalid username. But if you replace 'xxx' with 'yyy' and Search, it is valid. udpated to add #6; by Mathglot (talk) 22:09, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

What's going on here? Mathglot (talk) 20:25, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

Some very old versions of the software stored IP addresses with the last octet replaced by .xxx, and the current software still recognizes them as IP addresses. I don't know why they aren't showing up in contributions, though. The reason the Motorcycle revision has so many digits is because it was manually imported in 2011. * Pppery * _{it has begun...} 20:42, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

Thanks. Either someone fixed #2 super-quick, or something else is going on, because now the red link in #2 goes to a create-page preview, as I expect, but it didn't before. Mathglot (talk) 20:51, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

I would guess the temporary accounts work has potentially caused a problem here. Izno (talk) 21:18, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

That makes a lot of sense. Do you know someone from that project we could ping to solicit a comment? Mathglot (talk) 21:21, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

Temporary accounts aren't enabled here yet, so they shouldn't be doing anything relevant. * Pppery * _{it has begun...} 21:54, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

The accounts aren't, but that doesn't mean there haven't been refactorings to support them that are live. Izno (talk) 22:02, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

Redacted addition point #6 might support that, as IP-xxx seems to be supported in some places (CIDR contribs) but not others (point 6). Mathglot (talk) 22:12, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

I created T370413 about the inability to display contribs from addresses stored with xxx; I can't get them from the /24 range though. Graham87 (talk) 07:15, 13 August 2024 (UTC)

@Graham87: Thanks. The CIDR/24 link will show, if you go to Preferences > Gadgets > Advanced, and check "Allow /16, /24 and /27 – /32 CIDR ranges on Special:Contributions forms". Mathglot (talk) 07:23, 13 August 2024 (UTC)

@Mathglot: Oh yeah that gadget; I used to use it but no longer do so because Wikipedia supports range contributions natively now. Graham87 (talk) 07:39, 13 August 2024 (UTC)

So, you do see the contributions for the range, now? If not, maybe this is a case where the native support doesn't match the gadget in one circumstance? Mathglot (talk) 07:55, 13 August 2024 (UTC)

I did not see it before, but enabling the gadget allows it to be seen. CMD (talk) 08:06, 13 August 2024 (UTC)

Indeed. Graham87 (talk) 12:06, 13 August 2024 (UTC)

How does that gadget work? Perhaps it is just doing a prefix search? If so, it would find 193.133.134.xxx and that would be a problem in the gadget. Johnuniq (talk) 08:22, 13 August 2024 (UTC)

get amount of revisions via API

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T147676

Is there no way to get the amount of revisions of a specific page from the API (except to use the continue parameter, which could take a while)? List of WWE personnel‏‎ has 58k revisions according to Special:MostRevisions and a non-bot can request 500 via the continue method so that is 116 API calls to know how many revisions there are... Or I can use the rendered history page with limit=5000 instead of the API which would still take 12 calls (each of them taking ages). This information must be stored somewhere, right, cuz Special:MostRevisions and Special:FewestRevisions exist. The REST api gives me 20 max so that would require 2900 calls. Polygnotus (talk) 22:59, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

It's not available in an official API. In the meantime, you may use the XTools API. Nardog (talk) 23:18, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

We don't deserve Nardogs; thank you! Polygnotus (talk) 23:28, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

Tech News: 2024-33

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

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• AbuseFilter editors and maintainers can now make a CAPTCHA show if a filter matches an edit. This allows communities to quickly respond to spamming by automated bots. [7]
• Stewards can now specify if global blocks should prevent account creation. Before this change by the Trust and Safety Product Team, all global blocks would prevent account creation. This will allow stewards to reduce the unintended side-effects of global blocks on IP addresses.

Project updates

• Nominations are open on Wikitech for new members to refresh the Toolforge standards committee. The committee oversees the Toolforge Right to fork policy and Abandoned tool policy among other duties. Nominations will remain open until at least 2024-08-26.
• One new wiki has been created: a Wikipedia in West Coast Bajau (w:bdr:) [8]

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MediaWiki message delivery 23:19, 12 August 2024 (UTC)

Remove redirects and redlinks from my watchlist

Is there an easy way to remove redirects and redlinks from my (long) watchlist? Bubba73 ^{You talkin' to me?} 06:01, 13 August 2024 (UTC)

Do you mean when viewing Special:Watchlist? Here's a CSS rule that hides both:

/* hide edits to redirects and redlinked pages from watchlist */
li.mw-changeslist-line:has(a.mw-redirect),
li.mw-changeslist-line:has(a.mw-changeslist-title.new) {
  display: none;
}

It goes in your CSS. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 07:23, 13 August 2024 (UTC)

You can also use Special:EditWatchlist to check all the titles you no longer want, and remove them entirely. — xaosflux ^Talk 08:49, 13 August 2024 (UTC)

If you install User:BrandonXLF/GreenRedirects then redirects will be green at Special:EditWatchlist and elsewhere. Redlinks are already red there. PrimeHunter (talk) 11:52, 13 August 2024 (UTC)

• I want to remove them entirely. My list is so long that I don't want to go through them looking for ones in italiacs. Bubba73 ^{You talkin' to me?} 15:07, 13 August 2024 (UTC)

If you are willing to copy-paste Special:EditWatchlist/raw to a public wiki page like User:Bubba73/Watchlist then I can look at trimming it with some regex, ifexist and Module:Redirect#IsRedirect, probably 500 or 250 pages at a time due to a MediaWiki limit. Then you can copy it back. I may not have time today. If there are pages you watch with a time limit then I don't know whether the limit will be remembered. PrimeHunter (talk) 15:28, 13 August 2024 (UTC)

@Bubba73 My User:Ahecht/Scripts/watchlistcleaner script does exactly that. --Ahecht (TALK
PAGE) 16:46, 13 August 2024 (UTC)

Thanks, that sounds like what I'm looking for..

Resolved

Bubba73 ^{You talkin' to me?} 18:04, 13 August 2024 (UTC)

TOC not displayed for non-logged in users

I know this must be an extremely dumb question, but please bear with me.

I have just finished drafting a long article (7,000 words readable prose) in my User space. I asked a friend for comments and was told there is no Table of Contents (TOC). This seems to be the case: unless you are logged in (which my friend wasn't), an article displays with no TOC. This seems to hold for any article, in mainspace or otherwise.

Can this really be true? It makes long articles very difficult to read for readers who are not logged in (i.e. most of them). I have tried forcing a Table of Contents with but it makes no difference.

It seems kind of difficult to believe that the average, casual reader of Wikipedia articles doesn't see a Table of Contents (unless he/she knows to force the display).

Am I missing something obvious, or is there a way of fixing this problem? Ttocserp 23:27, 13 August 2024 (UTC)

@Ttocserp I'm guessing the page is User:Ttocserp/Slave-owning slaves? The TOC works on that page. The person viewing it may have a narrow screen, and in the default vector-2022 skin the TOC will collapse in to the icon to the left of the page title. Have them check there. — xaosflux ^Talk 23:30, 13 August 2024 (UTC)

If they are on mobile, the contents may be between the lead paragraph and the first section. — xaosflux ^Talk 23:31, 13 August 2024 (UTC)

Thank you, I believe you are right that it has to do with the default vector-2022 skiin. That said, it doesn't fix the basic problem i.e. the Average Joe doesn't get to see a TOC. My friend has a big, wide laptop. Ttocserp 23:37, 13 August 2024 (UTC)

The TOC does appear in Vector 2022. Nardog (talk) 23:42, 13 August 2024 (UTC)

Then I am totally bewildered. Is there any kind of technical fix? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Ttocserp (talk • contribs) 00:00, 14 August 2024 (UTC)

For what? Nardog (talk) 00:02, 14 August 2024 (UTC)

The non-display of the TOC in what must be quite common circumstances.Ttocserp 00:07, 14 August 2024 (UTC)

Can you provide a screenshot of the page with no TOC appearing? Anomie⚔ 00:10, 14 August 2024 (UTC)

Does this help? The TOC is viewed by clicking the symbol made up of three dots and three lines, to the left of the page name.

To show the Table of Contents in the Vector 2022 closed state (not logged in)

NebY (talk) 00:32, 14 August 2024 (UTC)

Ok, I now see that the problem is not what I thought it was. A TOC does display down the left-hand side, but only a rudimentary one (only level 2 headings). So I guess to fix that I have some learning to do.Ttocserp 00:36, 14 August 2024 (UTC)

Some of the headings, for example the one for Add A Fact experimental tool from Future Audiences on this page, should have > symbols beside them. Clicking the symbol opens the further levels. NebY (talk) 00:47, 14 August 2024 (UTC)

The lower-level headings are there too, just collapsed. Nardog (talk) 00:48, 14 August 2024 (UTC)

The TOC is collapsed on that page because there are more than the number of headings that allow for an automatically expanded TOC (I think 19). See T333801, T317818, T333017, and probably more tasks. – Jonesey95 (talk) 01:08, 14 August 2024 (UTC)

Message About Unfamiliar Device

About 24 hours ago, I accessed Wikipedia on my cell phone from a car for hire, but was logged out. I went through the process of entering my password for my mobile account, and was logged back on. I then received an email saying that I had accessed Wikipedia from a device that I had not used recently. That wasn't accurate; it was the same cell phone as I have been using for about six months. My question is whether that message really means that I logged on to Wikipedia from an IP address in an unfamiliar IP address range, because I was using a satellite connection. Or was my device unfamiliar because I hadn't logged on in a few months because I had stayed logged on?

I do not have a security issue. I am just wondering whether it really means that I accessed Wikipedia from an unfamiliar IP address range, or whether it means that my device is unfamiliar because I haven't logged on from it for months because I have been continuously logged on. Robert McClenon (talk) 17:29, 14 August 2024 (UTC)

My Wikiscan stats stopped updating in 2023

Hi, I have noticed that my contributions stats on English Wikipedia haven't updated on Wikiscan since November 2023. [9] However, they still update for my contributions on other projects, like French Wikipedia. [10] Is there anything I can do to fix this? Thanks! – Odjob16 Talk 17:40, 14 August 2024 (UTC)