Template talk:SPI archive notice

Problem with link to archives
Here, in the diff showing how the bot replaces the page with this template, I can see the line "This page's archived case(s) are at ....". However, if I look at the page directly I don't see that line.

The template renders that text only if there is some other text in the page (I even looked at the HTML source code to be sure). See how it appears when I add " " to the page. Looking at a diff also causes the template to render the text even if there is no other text in the page. --Enric Naval (talk) 15:45, 21 October 2009 (UTC)


 * I tried to make a few simple changes, but I couldn't get it to render. In summary, the "archived cases" link is :


 * invisible in the page:
 * visible in the diff:


 * --Enric Naval (talk) 09:00, 1 December 2009 (UTC)


 * Hum, I accidentally solved the problem by adding a period at the end of message that was giving problems. --Enric Naval (talk) 14:31, 1 December 2009 (UTC)

NOINDEX
Propose adding __NOINDEX__ per WP:DENY and WP:PRIVACY. All but one of the 22102 transclusions, that at Suspected sock puppets seem to be on investigation pages. That page could be excluded. All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 12:54, 8 May 2014 (UTC).

Here is a list of additional pages that should be excluded.
 * Sockpuppet investigations/SPI/Subpage - Awaiting Clerk approval
 * Sockpuppet investigations/SPI/Subpage - Open suspected sockpuppet investigations
 * Sockpuppet investigations/Test/Sub

Also
 * Pages outside Wikipedia namespace. These may be worth putting in a tracking category.

For a full list of anomalous pages see https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Rich_Farmbrough/SPI_notice_WLH All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 20:45, 11 May 2014 (UTC).


 * The three pages you mention already weren't indexed, I think indirectly because they used the checkuser template. The same should be true for all the pages that use this template. They should all be excluded from indexing anyway via MediaWiki:Robots.txt. We could probably make it more explicit/robust by adding __NOINDEX__ calls to some other templates, like this one -- is that what you're looking for? WB, by the way :) Amalthea  13:39, 12 May 2014 (UTC)
 * It seems like a good idea. Most of the 30 pages that were not covered by robots.txt were worthy of being NOINDEX'd.  And many thanks. All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 14:35, 12 May 2014 (UTC).

Please add __NOINDEX__ per the above discussion. All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 02:22, 7 July 2014 (UTC).


 * &mdash; Martin (MSGJ · talk) 09:10, 7 July 2014 (UTC)

The singular include the plural, and the plural the singular...
Would be nice to say: "This page is archived at..." instead of: "This page's archived case(s) is/are at..." All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 15:31, 8 July 2014 (UTC).


 * Since there seems to be no objection. All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 00:24, 6 November 2014 (UTC).


 * Looks uncontroversial - Yes check.svg Done GermanJoe (talk) 22:39, 7 November 2014 (UTC)
 * Thanks! All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 21:39, 10 November 2014 (UTC).

Better wording
Please change the wording from "This page is archived at…" to "For previous investigations, see…", which is easier to understand. Discussed at Wikipedia talk:Sockpuppet investigations/Archives/Archive15. The is a pretty minor edit that shouldn't require a broad consensus. Thanks, Oiyarbepsy (talk) 05:28, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

Template-protected edit request on 11 April 2018
Sorry if this isn't sufficiently UNAMBIGUOUS for you, but this template needs fixing! The first five articles that use this template on "What links here" (after the first one), viz:


 * Sockpuppet investigations/Prspiring →
 * Sockpuppet investigations/64.250.66.255 →
 * Sockpuppet investigations/Ericorbit →
 * Sockpuppet investigations/Ibaranoff24 →
 * Sockpuppet investigations/Roy Ward →

all consist of one line (shown), each of which generates two lint errors, viz:
 * Stripped tags	UL
 * Stripped tags	DIV

If you don't know how to fix this, rather than marking this as "answered", just leave it for someone who does know how! Thank you for your cooperation. Anomalocaris (talk) 18:58, 11 April 2018 (UTC)
 * Pictogram voting comment.svg Note: will leave for a couple of days, but we don't want requests sitting in the queue which are not ready to be made &mdash; Martin (MSGJ · talk) 20:42, 11 April 2018 (UTC)
 * ✅ simple fix that should do it Galobtter (pingó mió) 03:16, 12 April 2018 (UTC)
 * Galobtter: Thanks! —Anomalocaris (talk) 06:18, 12 April 2018 (UTC)

Template-protected edit request on 28 April 2019
Proposed changes. CUs cannot make global locks, and CUs can be contacted for other reasons if necessary but SRG/stewards is the only way for global locks. Removing the "Checkusers:" bit as anyone can make lock requests and is not a notice for CUs. qedk (t 桜 c) 18:46, 28 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Pinging per discussion. --qedk (t 桜 c) 17:33, 29 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Pictogram voting question.svg Question:, I've altered the sandbox. Does that version look OK to you? Advertised this discussion at Wikipedia talk:Sockpuppet investigations/Archives/Archive21. Cabayi (talk) 13:14, 30 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Made another slight edit. Looks good! Closing this till thread at SPI closes. --qedk (t 桜 c) 13:17, 30 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Reopening, please see WT:SPI. It's cool. --qedk (t 桜 c) 18:09, 9 May 2019 (UTC)
 * Yes check.svg Done &mdash; Martin (MSGJ · talk) 21:44, 12 May 2019 (UTC)

Renaming: identify previous master
If an archive is renamed, an older master having been identified, it would be nice if a line recording the link could be added to the top of the archive. Otherwise un-expert users might be puzzled by the initial entries.

A case in point is Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Soulspinr/Archive which was originally opened as Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Ontario Teacher BFA BEd. The first 20 entries concern Ontario Teacher socks but casual readers have to puzzle this out for themselves from any hints in the texts.

Something like "This case was originally opened under Ontario_Teacher_BFA_BEd and moved to Soulspinr in February 2018" would add clarity. --BalCoder (talk) 15:14, 22 November 2019 (UTC) BalCoder

Template-protected edit request on 3 March 2020
Copy changes from Template:SPI archive notice/sandbox. Per discussion at Wikipedia_talk:Sockpuppet_investigations and at 's request, added a section to the template to automatically link to a CCI page if one exists. creffett (talk) 02:20, 3 March 2020 (UTC) creffett (talk) 02:20, 3 March 2020 (UTC)
 * is an expensive parserfunction. How often is this template expected to be used on a page? Code looks reasonable otherwise. Izno (talk) 03:41, 5 March 2020 (UTC)
 * just once.
 * ,, I've added a test case and... let's return to the discussion on Wikipedia_talk:Sockpuppet_investigations where it'll have more eyeballs. Cabayi (talk) 08:28, 5 March 2020 (UTC)

Include sock-categories
I think it would be useful to have links to the categories of socks of the named master as part of the intro to an SPI page. That can make it easy to see all the known socks at a glance instead of diving into an /archive subpage with variable formatting and organization. Pinging User:CaptainEek who said (off-wiki) that it sounded useful. This change] adds it, and also includes counts. This is also useful for finding cats that should-be but haven't-yet been created. DMacks (talk) 19:54, 28 March 2021 (UTC)
 * I think this would be a useful addition indeed. Even if redlinked, that still makes it useful at a glance. And if its blue linked, means further investigation is warranted. CaptainEek  Edits Ho Cap'n!⚓ 19:58, 28 March 2021 (UTC)
 * I like it in principle, but the current implementation looks kind of clunky to me. I'll think on this. GeneralNotability (talk) 00:01, 29 March 2021 (UTC)
 * I agree:) How about a mock-up of:
 * DMacks (talk) 02:33, 29 March 2021 (UTC)
 * , I like that one. GeneralNotability (talk) 00:51, 30 March 2021 (UTC)
 * Sandbox-diff for it. DMacks (talk) 03:50, 30 March 2021 (UTC)
 * Implemented. DMacks (talk) 21:53, 6 April 2021 (UTC)
 * Implemented. DMacks (talk) 21:53, 6 April 2021 (UTC)


 * I would suggest removing the numbers next to the category links. The raw number of sockpuppets is usually not important to a case, and I fear that including the number will be counterproductive per WP:DENY, encouraging LTAs to rack up higher numbers. Mz7 (talk) 02:21, 7 April 2021 (UTC)
 * Reasonable point. Would it at least be useful to know if it contains any entries vs being empty? That helps keep us aware of the status...whether to bother clicking the link and whether there are unconfirmed that need confirming. Instead of ever displaying the actual number, it could just display the word "empty" (or "none"?) if it's empty. DMacks (talk) 02:53, 7 April 2021 (UTC)
 * Not so clear that "(none)" is an annotation of the second link. DMacks (talk) 06:12, 7 April 2021 (UTC)
 * Hmm, I'm not opposed to that, though I'll note that in general if the category is empty, then it's going to be a redlink. Nowadays, the sockpuppet template that populates these categories will get mad at you with a red banner if you forget to create the corresponding category, so in practice I don't think we need to worry about the case where the category has entries but is a red link. Mz7 (talk) 19:08, 7 April 2021 (UTC)
 * Someone had commented that a use of this is specifically to find those cats that should have been (but weren't) created. So that means there should be orthogonal indicators of "populated" vs "cat-page exists". Will try to think of other layouts tonight. DMacks (talk) 05:36, 8 April 2021 (UTC)
 * How about we only list those that are populated? A null list isn't so useful for investigation purposes. But if a non-null cat is a redlink, then patrollers know to create it.
 * —both populated
 * —both populated but someone goofed (patroller can fix)
 * —no "suspected" accounts
 * DMacks (talk) 13:51, 9 April 2021 (UTC)
 * I just noticed the addition; didn't think much about the numbers but can understand the concern voiced by Mz7 and agree with removing them. Having the links there is the main reason for the addition, and the latest proposal looks fine to me. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 23:35, 10 April 2021 (UTC)
 * Updated. DMacks (talk) 04:23, 11 April 2021 (UTC)
 * Updated. DMacks (talk) 04:23, 11 April 2021 (UTC)

Edit request
Typo fix: "on meta" → "on Meta"; "or Checkusers can send" → "or checkusers can send". Thanks. User:1234qwer1234qwer4 (talk) 19:37, 21 June 2021 (UTC)
 * . I changed "meta" to "Meta" (and changed an ungrammatical "or" to a semicolon while I was at it). However, WP:CheckUser is inconsistent about what the proper casing is for the user group "[Cc]heck[Uu]ser", using "CheckUser", "Checkuser", and "checkuser" at different times. I've actually been meaning to raise the matter on the talk page there for a while now. Probably best to standardize casing in the policy itself before changing any templates. -- Tamzin  (she/they) &#124; o toki tawa mi. 20:05, 21 June 2021 (UTC)
 * @Tamzin Thanks. The template is already using "checkuser" in the same sentence where "Checkuser" is used, so I suggested a standardisation at least locally. User:1234qwer1234qwer4 (talk)  20:07, 21 June 2021 (UTC)
 * I'm gonna post at WT:CheckUser about it, and personally see no reason to standardize without knowing what to standardize to. If another template editor or sysop wants to change it to enforce internal consistency, though, I have no objection. -- Tamzin  (she/they) &#124; o toki tawa mi. 20:09, 21 June 2021 (UTC)
 * ✅ per WT:CheckUser -- Tamzin  [cetacean needed] (she/they) 02:22, 7 September 2021 (UTC)

Template-protected edit request on 4 August 2021
This is based off the following issue at this request

Every instance of needs to become 0, since a thousand separator is needed. Yleventa2 (talk) 13:50, 4 August 2021 (UTC)
 * ✅ I did not use formatnum. See mw:Help:Magic words for more information. Terasail [✉️] 14:12, 4 August 2021 (UTC)
 * I see, thanks Yleventa2 (talk) 14:18, 4 August 2021 (UTC)

Marking cases as historically stale
Wotcha - I think it'd be fairly useful to have a new parameter to denote the historical "confirmed trail" is now stale. I've made some edits to the sandbox. The message could say:

'''A clerk or checkuser believes all historical technical data to be stale in this case. CheckUser should normally only be requested if sleeper accounts are likely.'''

Thoughts? ~TNT (she/they • talk) 06:56, 30 August 2021 (UTC)


 * I think this would be useful. It gives non-CUs an indication of whether CU would be useful to run. Ideally I'd want to see clerks only add this if a CU says the case is stale. This is because CU wiki may have historical information about the case making a CU check useful or socks may be being blocked/confirmed without filing case which would give the link back to the older cases. Dreamy Jazz talk to me &#124; my contributions 10:50, 30 August 2021 (UTC)
 * I guess my question is what standard practice is among CUs when the CU trail is stale (I've been given answers before, but I don't know how much the CUs agree). Do you require a technical trail that connects a sock to the master, or will you accept a technical trail that leads to a "proven" sock as CU-confirmed? (this is why I messed around with the altmaster parameters a lot when I was starting as a clerk, but that definitely isn't something everyone uses). More generally, do we need to rethink how we do tagging when the CU trail is cold? GeneralNotability (talk) 16:25, 30 August 2021 (UTC)
 * The words "standard practice" are a little alien to the CheckUser corp, but I'm happy to stick my neck out and say that we tend to accept that a trail is still "live" whilst a CU-confirmed proven sock is not stale. You'll see I sometimes explicitly state a "new sock is ✅ to sockmaster via CU-confirmed sock A" ~TNT (she/they • talk) 07:09, 31 August 2021 (UTC)
 * I tend to agree except that I think some CUs would be willing to call it confirmed if it's to a proven sock and still matching what they expect to see based on the CU log. Callanecc (talk • contribs • logs) 07:56, 31 August 2021 (UTC)
 * I think it's an interesting idea, but I have two potential concerns:
 * with the recent updates to the CheckUser extension, any account that isn't locked may well become non-stale again without ever editing again
 * the CU-log (and/or the recollections of CUs familiar with a particular case) may still come in handy sometimes (e.g. when there are relatively static IPs involved)
 * I'm not sure how large the impact of those two factors would be, but I do worry a little bit that a statement that checks should not be endorsed unless there are sleepers might make us miss things. --Blablubbs (talk) 17:37, 7 September 2021 (UTC)
 * Sure but there's a difference between requesting CU and endorsing (or self-endorsing) a request. If the clerk thinks a check might be useful hit the endorse button and let a CU make the call. But I can see a use where the accounts involved are (very) long stale as it also suggests that perhaps it isn't the right sock master given the huge gap in time. Callanecc (talk • contribs • logs) 06:26, 8 September 2021 (UTC)