User talk:Asartea/Archive 4

Tech News: 2022-10
 Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Problems
 * There was a problem with some interface labels last week. It will be fixed this week. This change was part of ongoing work to simplify the support for skins which do not have active maintainers.

Changes later this week
 * Octicons-sync.svg The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from . It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from . It will be on all wikis from (calendar).

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

21:15, 7 March 2022 (UTC)

Tech News: 2022-11
 Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes
 * In the Wikipedia Android app it is now possible to change the toolbar at the bottom so the tools you use more often are easier to click on. The app now also has a focused reading mode.

Problems
 * There was a problem with the collection of some page-view data from June 2021 to January 2022 on all wikis. This means the statistics are incomplete. To help calculate which projects and regions were most affected, relevant datasets are being retained for 30 extra days. You can read more on Meta-wiki.
 * There was a problem with the databases on March 10. All wikis were unreachable for logged-in users for 12 minutes. Logged-out users could read pages but could not edit or access uncached content then.

Changes later this week
 * Octicons-sync.svg The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from . It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from . It will be on all wikis from (calendar).
 * When using  to find localisation messages, it will now show all possible message keys for navigation tabs such as "".
 * Octicons-tools.svg Access to has been expanded to include users who have   and   rights through their group memberships. Before, only those with the   right could access this special page.
 * On the pages for diffs and revisions, there will be a link back to the main Undelete page with the list of revisions.

Future changes
 * The Wikimedia Foundation has announced the IP Masking implementation strategy and next steps. The announcement can be read here.
 * The Wikipedia Android app developers are working on new functions for user talk pages and article talk pages.

Events
 * The Wikimedia Hackathon 2022 will take place as a hybrid event on 20-22 May 2022. The Hackathon will be held online and there are grants available to support local in-person meetups around the world. Grants can be requested until 20 March.

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

22:06, 14 March 2022 (UTC)

Request for help with Edits
Hi Asartea, Hope you are well. I noticed you made some edits to the gender diversity section of the board room page and I was wondering if you'd be interested in helping me with a project. I'm trying to set up a page for a charity called "Board Apprentice" (https://www.boardapprentice.com/) which aims to end inequality in the board room. It was set up by charlotte Valuer, who is the former chair of the IOD and her primary aim was to train the next generation of business leaders by getting them to experience on company boards. I've written up the page and had ago referencing a draft of the page (it's in my sandbox) but I'm struggling with the referencing. Do you have the capacity to take a look at it and help me get it up to scratch or point me to where I'm going wrong? https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User:MIAAccount/sandbox&redirect=no Thanks so much MIAAccount (talk) 15:22, 21 March 2022 (UTC)

Tech News: 2022-12
 Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

New code release schedule for this week
 * There will be four MediaWiki releases this week, instead of just one. This is an experiment which should lead to fewer problems and to faster feature updates. The releases will be on all wikis, at different times, on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday. You can read more about this project.

Recent changes
 * You can now set how many search results to show by default in your Preferences. This was the 12th most popular wish in the Community Wishlist Survey 2022.
 * Octicons-tools.svg The Jupyter notebooks tool PAWS has been updated to a new interface.

Future changes
 * Interactive maps via Kartographer will soon work on wikis using the FlaggedRevisions extension. Please tell us which improvements you want to see in Kartographer. You can take this survey in simple English.

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

15:59, 21 March 2022 (UTC)

The Signpost: 27 March 2022
 * Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 20:48, 27 March 2022 (UTC)

Tech News: 2022-13
 Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes
 * There is a simple new Wikimedia Commons upload tool available for macOS users, Sunflower.

Changes later this week
 * Octicons-sync.svg The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from . It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from . It will be on all wikis from (calendar).
 * Some wikis will be in read-only for a few minutes because of regular database maintenance. It will be performed on at 7:00 UTC (targeted wikis) and on  at 7:00 UTC (targeted wikis).

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

19:53, 28 March 2022 (UTC)

Tech News: 2022-14
 Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Problems
 * For a few days last week, edits that were suggested to newcomers were not tagged in the feed. This bug has been fixed.

Changes later this week
 * Octicons-sync.svg The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from . It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from . It will be on all wikis from (calendar).
 * Some wikis will be in read-only for a few minutes because of a switch of their main database. It will be performed on at 7:00 UTC (targeted wikis).

Future changes
 * Starting next week, Tech News' title will be translatable. When the newsletter is distributed, its title may not be  anymore. It may affect some filters that have been set up by some communities.
 * Over the next few months, the "Add a link" Growth feature will become available to more Wikipedias. Each week, a few wikis will get the feature. You can test this tool at a few wikis where "Link recommendation" is already available.

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

20:59, 4 April 2022 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – April 2022
News and updates for administrators from the past month (March 2022).

Administrator changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-add.svg Firefly • Sdrqaz
 * Gnome-colors-view-refresh.svg Ad Orientem
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg Geschichte • Ryan Postlethwaite • Sabine's Sunbird • Wassupwestcoast



Interface administrator changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg Evad37

Guideline and policy news
 * An RfC is open proposing a change to the minimum activity requirements for administrators.

Technical news
 * Access to Special:RevisionDelete has been expanded to include users who have the  and   rights. This means that those in the Researcher user group and Checkusers who are not administrators can now access Special:RevisionDelete. The users able to view the special page after this change are the 3 users in the Researcher group, as there are currently no checkusers who are not already administrators.
 * When viewing deleted revisions or diffs on Special:Undelete a back link to the undelete page for the associated page is now present.

Arbitration
 * has been updated to reflect current practice following a motion.
 * A arbitration case regarding Skepticism and coordinated editing has been closed.
 * A arbitration case regarding WikiProject Tropical Cyclones has been opened.

Miscellaneous
 * Voting for the Universal Code of Conduct Enforcement guidelines has closed, and the results were that 56.98% of voters supported the guidelines. The results of this vote mean the Wikimedia Foundation Board will now review the guidelines.

Discuss this newsletter

Subscribe

Archive Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 18:12, 7 April 2022 (UTC)

Tech News: 2022-15
 Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes
 * There is a new public status page at www.wikimediastatus.net . This site shows five automated high-level metrics where you can see the overall health and performance of our wikis' technical environment. It also contains manually-written updates for widespread incidents, which are written as quickly as the engineers are able to do so while also fixing the actual problem. The site is separated from our production infrastructure and hosted by an external service, so that it can be accessed even if the wikis are briefly unavailable. You can read more about this project.
 * On Wiktionary wikis, the software to play videos and audio files on pages has now changed. The old player has been removed. Some audio players will become wider after this change. The new player has been a beta feature for over four years.

Changes later this week
 * Octicons-sync.svg The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from . It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from . It will be on all wikis from (calendar).

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

19:43, 11 April 2022 (UTC)

Tech News: 2022-16
 Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Changes later this week
 * Octicons-sync.svg The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from . It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from . It will be on all wikis from (calendar).
 * Octicons-sync.svg Some wikis will be in read-only for a few minutes because of a switch of their main database. It will be performed on at 07:00 UTC (targeted wikis) and on  at 7:00 UTC (targeted wikis).
 * Administrators will now have the option to delete/undelete the associated "Talk" page when they are deleting a given page. An API endpoint with this option is also available. This concludes the 11th wish of the 2021 Community Wishlist Survey.
 * On selected wikis, 50% of logged-in users will see the new table of contents. When scrolling up and down the page, the table of contents will stay in the same place on the screen. This is part of the Desktop Improvements project.
 * Octicons-tools.svg Message boxes produced by MediaWiki code will no longer have these CSS classes:,  ,  . The styles for those classes and   will be removed from MediaWiki core. This only affects wikis that use these classes in wikitext, or change their appearance within site-wide CSS. Please review any local usage and definitions for these classes you may have. This was previously announced in the 28 February issue of Tech News.

Future changes
 * Kartographer will become compatible with FlaggedRevisions page stabilization. Kartographer maps will also work on pages with pending changes. The Kartographer documentation has been thoroughly updated.

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

23:10, 18 April 2022 (UTC)

WikiCup 2022 May newsletter
The second round of the 2022 WikiCup has now finished. It was a high-scoring round and contestants needed 115 points to advance to round 3. There were some very impressive efforts in round 2, with the top seven contestants all scoring more than 500 points. A large number of the points came from the 11 featured articles and the 79 good articles achieved in total by contestants.

Our top scorers in round 2 were:


 * 1) Epicgenius, with 1264 points from 2 featured article, 4 good articles and 18 DYKs. Epicgenius was a finalist last year but has now withdrawn from the contest as he pursues a new career path.
 * 2) 🇨🇽 AryKun, with 1172 points from two featured articles, one good article and a substantial number of featured article and good article reviews.
 * 3) Bloom6132, with 605 points from 44 in the news items and 4 DYKs.
 * 4) Transgender Pride flag.svg Sammi Brie, with 573 points from 8 GAs and 21 DYKs.
 * 5) Vexilloid of the Roman Empire.svg Ealdgyth, with 567 points from 11 GAs and 34 good and featured article reviews.
 * 6) Panini!, with 549 points from 1 FA, 4 GAs and several other sources.
 * 7) 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿 Lee Vilenski, with 545 points from 1 FA, 4 GAs and a number of reviews.

The rules for featured and good article reviews require the review to be of sufficient length; brief quick fails and very short reviews will generally not be awarded points. Remember also that DYKs cannot be claimed until they have appeared on the main page. As we enter the third round, any content promoted after the end of round 2 but before the start of round 3 can be claimed now, and anything you forgot to claim in round 2 cannot! Remember too, that you must claim your points within 14 days of "earning" them. When doing GARs, please make sure that you check that all the GA criteria are fully met.

If you are concerned that your nomination—whether it is at good article nominations, a featured process, or anything else—will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on WikiCup/Reviews Needed (remember to remove your listing when no longer required). Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove your name from WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. Sturmvogel 66 (talk) and Cwmhiraeth Cwmhiraeth (talk) 10:39, 1 May 2020 (UTC)

The Signpost: 24 April 2022
<div class="hlist" style="margin-top:10px; font-size:90%; padding-left:5px; font-family:Georgia, Palatino, Palatino Linotype, Times, Times New Roman, serif;"> * Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 20:38, 24 April 2022 (UTC)

Tech News: 2022-17
<section begin="technews-2022-W17"/> Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes
 * On many wikis (group 1), the software to play videos and audio files on pages has now changed. The old player has been removed. Some audio players will become wider after this change. The new player has been a beta feature for over four years.

Changes later this week
 * Octicons-sync.svg The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from . It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from . It will be on all wikis from (calendar).
 * Octicons-sync.svg Some wikis will be in read-only for a few minutes because of a switch of their main database. It will be performed on at 07:00 UTC (targeted wikis).
 * Some very old browsers and operating systems are no longer supported. Some things on the wikis might look weird or not work in very old browsers like Internet Explorer 9 or 10, Android 4, or Firefox 38 or older.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe. <section end="technews-2022-W17"/>

22:54, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

Tech News: 2022-18
<section begin="technews-2022-W18"/> Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes
 * On all remaining wikis (group 2), the software to play videos and audio files on pages has now changed. The old player has been removed. Some audio players will become wider after this change. The new player has been a beta feature for over four years.

Changes later this week
 * Octicons-sync.svg The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from . It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from . It will be on all wikis from (calendar).

Future changes
 * The developers are working on talk pages in the Wikipedia app for iOS. You can give feedback. You can take the survey in English, German, Hebrew or Chinese.
 * Most wikis will receive an improved template dialog in VisualEditor and New Wikitext mode.
 * If you use syntax highlighting while editing wikitext, you can soon activate a colorblind-friendly color scheme.
 * Octicons-tools.svg Several CSS IDs related to MediaWiki interface messages will be removed. Technical editors should please review the list of IDs and links to their existing uses. These include,   and 3 others.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe. <section end="technews-2022-W18"/>

19:32, 2 May 2022 (UTC)

It's not vandalism - if you take a second to look at the edits
You'll see that I'm removing what is essentially a list of countries that someone has decided are worthy of being called Nazis (China, Japan, USA, Israel). Oh and all Muslims. But if that's the way Wikipedia rolls as an encyclopedia, fine, let me know, I definitely won't be editing again. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2403:5808:D56:0:2492:2A2A:2420:3C78 (talk) 19:16, 5 May 2022 (UTC)


 * Hi,
 * I understand your concerns, but repeatedly removing the material is not the best solution. Instead I would recommend that you leave a note on the articles talk page explaining your concerns. Hope this helps, -- Asartea   Talk  &#124;  Contribs  19:24, 5 May 2022 (UTC)

Tech News: 2022-19
<section begin="technews-2022-W19"/> Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes
 * You can now see categories in the Wikipedia app for Android.

Problems
 * Last week, there was a problem with Wikidata's search autocomplete. This has now been fixed.
 * Last week, all wikis had slow access or no access for 20 minutes, for logged-in users and non-cached pages. This was caused by a problem with a database change.

Changes later this week
 * There is no new MediaWiki version this week.
 * Incompatibility issues with Kartographer and the FlaggedRevs extension will be fixed: Deployment is planned for May 10 on all wikis. Kartographer will then be enabled on the five wikis which have not yet enabled the extension on May 24.
 * The Vector (2022) skin will be set as the default on several more wikis, including Arabic and Catalan Wikipedias. Logged-in users will be able to switch back to the old Vector (2010). See the latest update about Vector (2022).

Future meetings
 * The next open meeting with the Web team about Vector (2022) will take place on 17 May. The following meetings are currently planned for: 7 June, 21 June, 5 July, 19 July.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe. <section end="technews-2022-W19"/>

15:20, 9 May 2022 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – May 2022
News and updates for administrators from the past month (April 2022).

Administrator changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-add.svg Colin M
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg David.Monniaux • Fribbler • Grue • Kpjas • West.andrew.g



CheckUser changes
 * Gnome-colors-view-refresh.svg Ks0stm

Oversighter changes
 * Gnome-colors-view-refresh.svg Ks0stm

Guideline and policy news
 * Following an RfC, a change has been made to the administrators inactivity policy. Under the new policy, if an administrator has not made at least 100 edits over a period of 5 years they may be desysopped for inactivity.
 * Following a discussion on the bureaucrat's noticeboard, a change has been made to the bureaucrats inactivity policy.

Technical news
 * The ability to undelete the associated talk page when undeleting a page has been added. This was the 11th wish of the 2021 Community Wishlist Survey.
 * A public status system for WMF wikis has been created. It is located at https://www.wikimediastatus.net/ and is hosted separately to WMF wikis so in the case of an outage it will remain viewable.

Arbitration
 * Remedy 2 of the St Christopher case has been rescinded following a motion. The remedy previously authorised administrators to place a ban on single-purpose accounts who were disruptively editing on the article St Christopher Iba Mar Diop College of Medicine or related pages from those pages.

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Archive Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 23:33, 9 May 2022 (UTC)

Tech News: 2022-20
<section begin="technews-2022-W20"/> Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Changes later this week
 * Some wikis can soon use the add a link feature. This will start on Wednesday. The wikis are . This is part of the progressive deployment of this tool to more Wikipedias. The communities can configure how this feature works locally.
 * The Wikimedia Hackathon 2022 will take place online on May 20–22. It will be in English. There are also local hackathon meetups in Germany, Ghana, Greece, India, Nigeria and the United States. Technically interested Wikimedians can work on software projects and learn new skills. You can also host a session or post a project you want to work on.
 * Octicons-sync.svg The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from . It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from . It will be on all wikis from (calendar).

Future changes
 * You can soon edit translatable pages in the visual editor. Translatable pages exist on for examples Meta and Commons.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe. <section end="technews-2022-W20"/>

18:56, 16 May 2022 (UTC)

Tech News: 2022-21
<section begin="technews-2022-W21"/> Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes
 * Administrators using the mobile web interface can now access Special:Block directly from user pages.
 * The www.wiktionary.org portal page now uses an automated update system. Other project portals will be updated over the next few months.

Problems
 * The Growth team maintains a mentorship program for newcomers. Previously, newcomers weren't able to opt out from the program. Starting May 19, 2022, newcomers are able to fully opt out from Growth mentorship, in case they do not wish to have any mentor at all.
 * Some editors cannot access the content translation tool if they load it by clicking from the contributions menu. This problem is being worked on. It should still work properly if accessed directly via Special:ContentTranslation.

Changes later this week
 * Octicons-sync.svg The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from . It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from . It will be on all wikis from (calendar).

Future changes
 * Octicons-tools.svg Gadget and user scripts developers are invited to give feedback on a proposed technical policy aiming to improve support from MediaWiki developers.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe. <section end="technews-2022-W21"/>

00:19, 24 May 2022 (UTC)

The Signpost: 29 May 2022
<div class="hlist" style="margin-top:10px; font-size:90%; padding-left:5px; font-family:Georgia, Palatino, Palatino Linotype, Times, Times New Roman, serif;"> * Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 20:45, 29 May 2022 (UTC)

Tech News: 2022-22
<section begin="technews-2022-W22"/> Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes
 * Octicons-tools.svg In the AbuseFilter extension, an   function has been introduced to check if an IP is in any of the ranges. Wikis are advised to combine multiple   expressions joined by   into a single expression for better performance. You can use the search function on Special:AbuseFilter to locate its usage.
 * The IP Info feature which helps abuse fighters access information about IPs, has been deployed to all wikis as a beta feature. This comes after weeks of beta testing on test.wikipedia.org.

Changes later this week
 * Octicons-sync.svg The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from . It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from . It will be on all wikis from (calendar).
 * Octicons-sync.svg Some wikis will be in read-only for a few minutes because of a switch of their main database. It will be performed on at 07:00 UTC (targeted wikis).
 * The New Topic Tool will be deployed for all editors at most wikis soon. You will be able to opt out from within the tool and in Preferences.
 * Octicons-tools.svg The list=usercontribs API will support fetching contributions from an IP range soon. API users can set the   parameter to get contributions from any IP range within the limit.
 * A new parser function will be introduced: <bdi lang="zxx" dir="ltr"> . It will replace existing templates named "=". It will insert an equal sign. This can be used to escape the equal sign in the parameter values of templates.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe. <section end="technews-2022-W22"/>

20:27, 30 May 2022 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – June 2022
News and updates for administrators from the past month (May 2022).

Administrator changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-add.svg Tamzin
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg Barek • Darkwind • Geometry guy • ProcseeBot • RoyBoy • Sean Whitton • Valereee • Visorstuff • WAvegetarian
 * Pictogram voting rename.png →



CheckUser changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg Ivanvector

Guideline and policy news
 * Several areas of improvement collated from community member votes have been identified in the Universal Code of Conduct Enforcement guidelines. The areas of improvement have been sent back for review and you are invited to provide input on these areas.

Technical news
 * Administrators using the mobile web interface can now access Special:Block directly from user pages.
 * The IP Info feature has been deployed to all wikis as a Beta Feature. Any autoconfirmed user may enable the feature using the "IP info" checkbox under . Autoconfirmed users will be able to access basic information about an IP address that includes the country and connection method. Those with advanced privileges (admin, bureaucrat, checkuser) will have access to extra information that includes the Internet Service Provider and more specific location.

Arbitration
 * Remedy 2 of the Rachel Marsden case has been rescinded following a motion. The remedy previously authorised administrators to delete or reduce to a stub, together with their talk pages, articles related to Rachel Marsden when they violate Wikipedia's biographies of living persons policy.
 * An arbitration case regarding WikiProject Tropical Cyclones has been closed.

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Archive Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 17:55, 2 June 2022 (UTC)

Tech News: 2022-23
<section begin="technews-2022-W23"/> Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Changes later this week
 * Octicons-sync.svg The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from . It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from . It will be on all wikis from (calendar).
 * Octicons-tools.svg A new <bdi lang="zxx" dir="ltr"> function can be used in abuse filters to replace parts of text using a regular expression.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe. <section end="technews-2022-W23"/>

02:44, 7 June 2022 (UTC)

Tech News: 2022-24
<section begin="technews-2022-W24"/> Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes
 * All wikis can now use Kartographer maps. Kartographer maps now also work on pages with pending changes.

Changes later this week
 * Octicons-sync.svg The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from . It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from . It will be on all wikis from (calendar).
 * Octicons-sync.svg Some wikis will be in read-only for a few minutes because of a switch of their main database. It will be performed on at 06:00 UTC (targeted wikis).
 * Starting on Wednesday, a new set of Wikipedias will get "Add a link" . This is part of the progressive deployment of this tool to more Wikipedias. The communities can configure how this feature works locally.
 * The New Topic Tool will be deployed for all editors at Commons, Wikidata, and some other wikis soon. You will be able to opt out from within the tool and in Preferences.

Future meetings
 * The next open meeting with the Web team about Vector (2022) will take place today (13 June). The following meetings will take place on: 28 June, 12 July, 26 July.

Future changes
 * By the end of July, the Vector 2022 skin should be ready to become the default across all wikis. Discussions on how to adjust it to the communities' needs will begin in the next weeks. It will always be possible to revert to the previous version on an individual basis. Learn more.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe. <section end="technews-2022-W24"/>

16:57, 13 June 2022 (UTC)

Tech News: 2022-25
<section begin="technews-2022-W25"/> Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes
 * The Wikipedia App for Android now has an option for editing the whole page at once, located in the overflow menu (three-dots menu Ic more vert 36px.svg).
 * Octicons-tools.svg Some recent database changes may affect queries using the Quarry tool. Queries for <bdi lang="zxx" dir="ltr"> at English Wikipedia, Commons, and Wikidata will need to be updated. Read more.
 * Octicons-tools.svg A new <bdi lang="zxx" dir="ltr"> variable can be used in abuse filters to avoid affecting globally active users.

Changes later this week
 * Octicons-sync.svg The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from . It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from . It will be on all wikis from (calendar).
 * Users of non-responsive skins (e.g. MonoBook or Vector) on mobile devices may notice a slight change in the default zoom level. This is intended to optimize zooming and ensure all interface elements are present on the page (for example the table of contents on Vector 2022). In the unlikely event this causes any problems with how you use the site, we'd love to understand better, please ping Jon (WMF) to any on-wiki conversations.

Future changes
 * The Beta Feature for DiscussionTools will be updated throughout July. Discussions will look different.  You can see some of the proposed changes.
 * Octicons-tools.svg Parsoid's HTML output will soon stop annotating file links with different <bdi lang="zxx" dir="ltr"> attribute values, and instead use <bdi lang="zxx" dir="ltr"> for all types. Tool authors should adjust any code that expects: <bdi lang="zxx" dir="ltr">, <bdi lang="zxx" dir="ltr"> , or <bdi lang="zxx" dir="ltr">.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe. <section end="technews-2022-W25"/>

20:16, 20 June 2022 (UTC)

The Signpost: 26 June 2022
<div class="hlist" style="margin-top:10px; font-size:90%; padding-left:5px; font-family:Georgia, Palatino, Palatino Linotype, Times, Times New Roman, serif;"> * Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 22:30, 26 June 2022 (UTC)

Tech News: 2022-26
<section begin="technews-2022-W26"/> Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes
 * Octicons-tools.svg Wikimedia Enterprise API service now has self-service accounts with free on-demand requests and monthly snapshots (API documentation). Community access via database dumps & Wikimedia Cloud Services continues.
 * Octicons-tools.svg All Wikimedia wikis can now use Wikidata Lexemes in Lua after creating local modules and templates. Discussions are welcome on the project talk page.

Changes later this week
 * Octicons-sync.svg The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from . It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from . It will be on all wikis from (calendar).
 * Octicons-sync.svg Some wikis will be in read-only for a few minutes because of a switch of their main database. It will be performed on at 06:00 UTC (targeted wikis).
 * Some global and cross-wiki services will be in read-only for a few minutes because of a switch of their main database. It will be performed on at 06:00 UTC. This will impact ContentTranslation, Echo, StructuredDiscussions, Growth experiments and a few more services.
 * Users will be able to sort columns within sortable tables in the mobile skin.

Future meetings
 * The next open meeting with the Web team about Vector (2022) will take place tomorrow (28 June). The following meetings will take place on 12 July and 26 July.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe. <section end="technews-2022-W26"/>

20:01, 27 June 2022 (UTC)

WikiCup 2022 July newsletter
The third round of the 2022 WikiCup has now come to an end. Each of the sixteen contestants who made it into the fourth round had at least 180 points, which is a lower figure than last year when 294 points were needed to progress to round 4. Our top scorers in round 3 were:


 * ICS Zulu.svg BennyOnTheLoose, with 746 points, a tally built both on snooker and other sports topics, and on more general subjects.
 * Bloom6132, with 683 points, garnered mostly from "In the news" items and related DYKs.
 * Transgender Pride flag.svg Sammi Brie, with 527, from a variety of submissions related to radio and television stations.

Between them contestants achieved 5 featured articles, 4 featured lists, 51 good articles, 149 DYK entries, 68 ITN entries, and 109 good article reviews. As we enter the fourth round, remember that any content promoted after the end of round 3 but before the start of round 4 can be claimed in round 4. Please also remember that you must claim your points within 14 days of "earning" them. When doing GARs, please make sure that you check that all the GA criteria are fully met. Please also remember that all submissions must meet core Wikipedia policies, regardless of the review process.

If you are concerned that your nomination—whether it is a good article nomination, a featured process, or anything else—will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on WikiCup/Reviews Needed (remember to remove your listing when no longer required). Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove your name from WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. WikiCup judges: Sturmvogel 66 (talk) and Cwmhiraeth (talk) MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 12:50, 3 July 2022 (UTC)

Tech News: 2022-27
<section begin="technews-2022-W27"/> Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Changes later this week
 * Octicons-sync.svg The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from . It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from . It will be on all wikis from (calendar).
 * Octicons-sync.svg Some wikis will be in read-only for a few minutes because of a switch of their main database. It will be performed on at 07:00 UTC (targeted wikis) and on  at 7:00 UTC (targeted wikis).
 * The Beta Feature for DiscussionTools will be updated throughout July. Discussions will look different.  You can see some of the proposed changes.
 * Octicons-tools.svg This change only affects pages in the main namespace in Wikisource. The Javascript config variable <bdi lang="zxx" dir="ltr"> will be removed from <bdi lang="zxx" dir="ltr"> and be replaced with the variable <bdi lang="zxx" dir="ltr">.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe. <section end="technews-2022-W27"/>

19:30, 4 July 2022 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – July 2022
News and updates for administrators from the past month (June 2022).

Administrator changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg AA • Gwalla • Ioeth • Laurascudder • Moriori (deceased) • Nat • Rfl
 * Pictogram voting rename.png →

Bureaucrat changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-add.svg Lee Vilenski



Interface administrator changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-add.svg Nihiltres

Technical news
 * is a new variable that can be used in abuse filters to avoid affecting globally active users.

Arbitration
 * An arbitration case regarding conduct in deletion-related editing has been opened.

Miscellaneous
 * The New Pages Patrol queue has around 10,000 articles to be reviewed. As all administrators have the patrol right, please consider helping out. The queue is here. For further information on the state of the project, see the latest NPP newsletter.

Discuss this newsletter

Subscribe

Archive Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 13:28, 10 July 2022 (UTC)

Tech News: 2022-28
<section begin="technews-2022-W28"/> Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes
 * In the Vector 2022 skin, the page title is now displayed above the tabs such as Discussion, Read, Edit, View history, or More. Learn more.
 * Octicons-tools.svg It is now possible to easily view most of the configuration settings that apply to just one wiki, and to compare settings between two wikis if those settings are different. For example: Japanese Wiktionary settings, or settings that are different between the Spanish and Esperanto Wikipedias. Local communities may want to discuss and propose changes to their local settings. Details about each of the named settings can be found by searching MediaWiki.org.
 * The Anti-Harassment Tools team recently deployed the IP Info Feature as a Beta Feature at all wikis. This feature allows abuse fighters to access information about IP addresses. Please check our update on how to find and use the tool. Please share your feedback using a link you will be given within the tool itself.

Changes later this week
 * There is no new MediaWiki version this week.
 * Octicons-sync.svg Some wikis will be in read-only for a few minutes because of a switch of their main database. It will be performed on at 07:00 UTC (targeted wikis).

Future changes
 * The Beta Feature for DiscussionTools will be updated throughout July. Discussions will look different.  You can see some of the proposed changes.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe. <section end="technews-2022-W28"/>

19:23, 11 July 2022 (UTC)

Global bot approval request for Dušan Kreheľ (bot)
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I apologize for sending this message in English. .

In accordance to the policy, this message is to notify you that there is a new approval request for a global bot.

The discussion is available at Steward requests/Bot status#Global bot status for Dušan Kreheľ (bot) on Meta.

Thank you for your time.

Best regards,

— Thanks for the fish!  talk •contribs  21:07, 11 July 2022 (UTC)

Tech News: 2022-29
<section begin="technews-2022-W29"/> Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Problems
 * The feature on mobile web for Nearby Pages was missing last week. It will be fixed this week.

Changes later this week
 * Octicons-sync.svg The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from . It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from . It will be on all wikis from (calendar).

Future changes
 * The Technical Decision Forum is seeking community representatives. You can apply on wiki or by emailing TDFSupport@wikimedia.org before 12 August.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe. <section end="technews-2022-W29"/>

22:58, 18 July 2022 (UTC)

Thanks
Thank you for resolving the issue with User:Bradv/endlesscontribs.js in my absence, and thanks to Enterprisey for implementing it. And sorry for being MIA - I will try to be around more often, despite other real-life obligations. – bradv <sup style="color:transparent;text-shadow:0 0 0 red;font-size:60%">🍁  15:13, 19 July 2022 (UTC)


 * @Bradv no problem, just happened to stumble across the bug and spot the problem. Also please don't feel sorry for going MIA; real life is always more important than this website. -- Asartea   Talk  &#124;  Contribs  15:50, 19 July 2022 (UTC)
 * Any time, plus what Asartea said. And thanks for making the script in the first place. Enterprisey (talk!) 04:46, 20 July 2022 (UTC)

Tech News: 2022-30
<section begin="technews-2022-W30"/> Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes
 * The www.wikibooks.org and www.wikiquote.org portal pages now use an automated update system. Other project portals will be updated over the next few months.

Problems
 * Last week, some wikis were in read-only mode for a few minutes because of an emergency switch of their main database (targeted wikis).

Changes later this week
 * Octicons-sync.svg The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from . It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from . It will be on all wikis from (calendar).
 * The external link icon will change slightly in the skins Vector legacy and Vector 2022. The new icon uses simpler shapes to be more recognizable on low-fidelity screens.
 * Administrators will now see buttons on user pages for "" and "" instead of just "" if the user is already blocked.

Future meetings
 * The next open meeting with the Web team about Vector (2022) will take place tomorrow (26 July).

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe. <section end="technews-2022-W30"/>

19:25, 25 July 2022 (UTC)

The Signpost: 1 August 2022
<div class="hlist" style="margin-top:10px; font-size:90%; padding-left:5px; font-family:Georgia, Palatino, Palatino Linotype, Times, Times New Roman, serif;"> * Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 00:37, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

Tech News: 2022-31
<section begin="technews-2022-W31"/> Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes
 * Improved LaTeX capabilities for math rendering are now available in the wikis thanks to supporting <bdi lang="zxx" dir="ltr"> tags. This completes part of the #59 wish of the 2022 Community Wishlist Survey.

Changes later this week
 * Octicons-sync.svg The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from . It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from . It will be on all wikis from (calendar).
 * The Realtime Preview will be available as a Beta Feature on wikis in Group 0. This feature was built in order to fulfill one of the Community Wishlist Survey proposals.

Future changes
 * The Beta Feature for DiscussionTools will be updated throughout August. Discussions will look different.  You can see some of the proposed changes.

Future meetings
 * This week, three meetings about Vector (2022) with live interpretation will take place. On Tuesday, interpretation in Russian will be provided. On Thursday, meetings for Arabic and Spanish speakers will take place. See how to join.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe. <section end="technews-2022-W31"/>

21:20, 1 August 2022 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – August 2022
News and updates for administrators from the past month (July 2022).



Administrator changes
 * Gnome-colors-view-refresh.svg Valereee
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg Anthony Appleyard (deceased) • Capitalistroadster • Samsara

Guideline and policy news
 * An RfC has been closed with consensus to add javascript that will show edit notices for editors editing via a mobile device. This only works for users using a mobile browser, so iOS app editors will still not be able to see edit notices.
 * An RfC has been closed with the consensus that train stations are not inherently notable.

Technical news
 * The Wikimania 2022 Hackathon will take place virtually from 11 August to 14 August.
 * Administrators will now see links on user pages for "Change block" and "Unblock user" instead of just "Block user" if the user is already blocked. (T308570)

Arbitration
 * The arbitration case request Geschichte has been automatically closed after a 3 month suspension of the case.

Miscellaneous
 * You can vote for candidates in the 2022 Board of Trustees elections from 16 August to 30 August. Two community elected seats are up for election.
 * Wikimania 2022 is taking place virtually from 11 August to 14 August. The schedule for wikimania is listed here. There are also a number of in-person events associated with Wikimania around the world.
 * Tech tip: When revision-deleting on desktop, hold between clicking two checkboxes to select every box in that range.

Discuss this newsletter

Subscribe

Archive Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 08:44, 5 August 2022 (UTC)

Tech News: 2022-32
<section begin="technews-2022-W32"/> Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes
 * GUS2Wiki copies the information from to an on-wiki page so you can review its history. If your project isn't already listed on the Wikidata entry for Project:GUS2Wiki you can either run GUS2Wiki yourself or make a request to receive updates.

Changes later this week
 * There is no new MediaWiki version this week.
 * Octicons-sync.svg Some wikis will be in read-only for a few minutes because of a switch of their main database. It will be performed on at 07:00 UTC (targeted wikis) and on  at 7:00 UTC (targeted wikis).

Future meetings
 * The Wikimania Hackathon will take place online from August 12–14. Don't miss the pre-hacking showcase to learn about projects and find collaborators. Anyone can propose a project or host a session. Newcomers are welcome!

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe. <section end="technews-2022-W32"/>

19:48, 8 August 2022 (UTC)

Tech News: 2022-33
<section begin="technews-2022-W33"/> Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes
 * The Persian (Farsi) Wikipedia community decided to block IP editing from October 2021 to April 2022. The Wikimedia Foundation's Product Analytics team tracked the impact of this change. An impact report is now available.

Changes later this week
 * Octicons-sync.svg The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from . It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from . It will be on all wikis from (calendar).
 * Octicons-sync.svg Some wikis will be in read-only for a few minutes because of a switch of their main database. It will be performed on at 07:00 UTC (targeted wikis) and on  at 7:00 UTC (targeted wikis).
 * The Realtime Preview will be available as a Beta Feature on wikis in Group 1. This feature was built in order to fulfill one of the Community Wishlist Survey proposals.

Future changes
 * The Beta Feature for DiscussionTools will be updated throughout August. Discussions will look different.  You can see some of the proposed changes.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe. <section end="technews-2022-W33"/>

21:07, 15 August 2022 (UTC)

Feedback request: Wikipedia technical issues and templates request for comment
Your feedback is requested &#32;at Wikipedia:Village pump (miscellaneous)&#32; on a "Wikipedia technical issues and templates" request for comment. Thank you for helping out! You were randomly selected to receive this invitation from the list of Feedback Request Service subscribers. If you'd like not to receive these messages any more, you can opt out at any time by removing your name. Message delivered to you with love by Yapperbot :) &#124; Is this wrong? Contact my bot operator. &#124; Sent at 02:30, 16 August 2022 (UTC)

Tech News: 2022-34
<section begin="technews-2022-W34"/> Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes
 * Two problems with Kartographer maps have been fixed. Maps are no longer shown as empty when a geoline was created via VisualEditor. Geolines consisting of points with QIDs (e.g., subway lines) are no longer shown with pushpins.

Changes later this week
 * Octicons-sync.svg The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from . It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from . It will be on all wikis from (calendar).
 * Octicons-sync.svg Some wikis will be in read-only for a few minutes because of a switch of their main database. It will be performed on at 7:00 UTC (targeted wikis).
 * The colours of links and visited links will change. This is to make the difference between links and other text more clear.

Future changes
 * The new [] button helps newcomers get answers. The Editing team is enabling this tool everywhere.  You can turn it off in your preferences.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe. <section end="technews-2022-W34"/>

00:10, 23 August 2022 (UTC)

Tech News: 2022-35
<section begin="technews-2022-W35"/> Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes
 * The Realtime Preview is available as a Beta Feature on wikis in Group 2. This feature was built in order to fulfill one of the Community Wishlist Survey proposals. Please note that when this Beta feature is enabled, it may cause conflicts with some wiki-specific Gadgets.

Problems
 * In recent months, there have been inaccurate numbers shown for various at Commons, Wikidata, and English Wikipedia. This has now been fixed.

Changes later this week
 * Octicons-sync.svg The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from . It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from . It will be on all wikis from (calendar).
 * Octicons-sync.svg Some wikis will be in read-only for a few minutes because of a switch of their main database. It will be performed on at 07:00 UTC (targeted wikis) and on  at 7:00 UTC (targeted wikis).

Future changes
 * The Wikimedia Foundation wants to improve how Wikimedia communities report harmful incidents by building the Private Incident Reporting System (PIRS) to make it easy and safe for users to make reports. You can leave comments on the talk page, by answering the questions provided. If you have ever faced a harmful situation that you wanted to report/reported, join a PIRS interview to share your experience. To sign up please email Madalina Ana.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe. <section end="technews-2022-W35"/>

23:02, 29 August 2022 (UTC)

The Signpost: 31 August 2022
<div class="hlist" style="margin-top:10px; font-size:90%; padding-left:5px; font-family:Georgia, Palatino, Palatino Linotype, Times, Times New Roman, serif;"> * Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 23:57, 31 August 2022 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – September 2022
News and updates for administrators from the past month (August 2022).

Administrator changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-add.svg DanCherek • DatGuy • Femke • Z1720
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg Aldux • Graham Beards • Nyttend



Interface administrator changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg Mr. Stradivarius

Guideline and policy news
 * A discussion is open to define a process by which Vector 2022 can be made the default for all users.
 * An RfC is open to gain consensus on whether Fox News is reliable for science and politics.

Technical news
 * The impact report on the effects of disabling IP editing on the Persian (Farsi) Wikipedia has been released.
 * The WMF is looking into making a Private Incident Reporting System (PIRS) system to improve the reporting of harmful incidents through easier and safer reporting. You can leave comments on the talk page by answering the questions provided. Users who have faced harmful situations are also invited to join a PIRS interview to share the experience. To sign up please email Madalina Ana.

Arbitration
 * An arbitration case regarding Conduct in deletion-related editing has been closed. The Arbitration Committee passed a remedy as part of the final decision to create a request for comment (RfC) on how to handle mass nominations at Articles for Deletion (AfD).
 * The arbitration case request Jonathunder has been automatically closed after a 6 month suspension of the case.

Miscellaneous
 * The new pages patrol (NPP) team has prepared an appeal to the Wikimedia Foundation (WMF) for assistance with addressing Page Curation bugs and requested features. You are encouraged to read the open letter before it is sent, and if you support it, consider signing it. It is not a discussion, just a signature will suffice.
 * Voting for candidates for the Wikimedia Board of Trustees is open until 6 September.

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Archive Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 11:11, 1 September 2022 (UTC)

WikiCup 2022 September newsletter
The fourth round of the WikiCup has now finished. 383 points were required to reach the final, and the new round has got off to a flying start with all finalists already scoring. In round 4, Bloom6132 with 939 points was the highest points-scorer, with a combination of DYKs and In the news items, followed by BennyOnTheLoose, Sammi Brie and Lee Vilenski. The points of all contestants are swept away as we start afresh for the final round.

At this stage, we say goodbye to the eight competitors who didn't quite make it; thank you for the useful contributions you have made to the Cup and Wikipedia, and we hope you will join us again next year. For the remaining competitors, remember that any content promoted after the end of round 4 but before the start of round 5 can be claimed in round 5. Remember too that you must claim your points within 14 days of "earning" them, and importantly, before the deadline on October 31st!

If you are concerned that your nomination, whether it be for a good article, a featured process, or anything else, will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on WikiCup/Reviews Needed (remember to remove your listing when no longer required). If you want to help out with the WikiCup, please do your bit to help keep down the review backlogs! Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. The judges are Sturmvogel 66 and Cwmhiraeth. MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 12:43, 3 September 2022 (UTC)

Tech News: 2022-36
<section begin="technews-2022-W36"/> Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Changes later this week
 * Octicons-sync.svg The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from . It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from . It will be on all wikis from (calendar).
 * Octicons-sync.svg Some wikis will be in read-only for a few minutes because of a switch of their main database. It will be performed on at 07:00 UTC (targeted wikis) and on  at 7:00 UTC (targeted wikis).
 * Octicons-tools.svg On Special pages that only have one tab, the tab-bar's row will be hidden in the Vector-2022 skin to save space. The row will still show if Gadgets use it. Gadgets that currently append directly to the CSS id of <bdi lang="zxx" dir="ltr"> should be updated to use the <bdi lang="zxx" dir="ltr"> function instead. Gadgets that style this id should consider also targeting <bdi lang="zxx" dir="ltr">, the new id for this row. Examples are available.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe. <section end="technews-2022-W36"/>

23:19, 5 September 2022 (UTC)

Question from Foxmilder (15:12, 9 September 2022)
Hello,

My name (or, more accurately, the ironic pen name I found slightly amusing and ended up stuck with indefinitely) is Fox Milder.

I'm relatively new to editing, and I am told that you have been assigned to be my mentor. I don't really know precisely what that entails, but there are many aspects of Wikipedia editing of which I know very little, and I am keen to learn how I might best go about making a positive contribution to the site.

Currently, my main area of focus when editing Wikipedia is best described as aesthetic or stylistic: Having spent years occasionally encountering instances of messy, inelegant writing in the articles I read, I decided I would contribute, where possible, by (hopefully) improving upon awkward passages, grammatical errors, and so on.

As a current university student, I am often warned of the alleged unreliability of Wikipedia by lecturers, tutors, and other academic staff. I object to this assessment of Wikipedia, which I tend to hold in higher regard than do my teachers and peers.

My suspicion is that the academic reputation of Wikipedia as a source of information suffers for the fact that articles are often written in an awkward and/or disjointed style, presumably a by-product of the collaborative, democratic means by which articles are written and edited.

I'm not a particularly active editor, and my goals here are rather modest. My primary aim in editing Wikipedia pages is simply to harmonise the contributions of various editors, standardise the authorial voice of articles, and improve the general readability of Wikipedia.

Is there anything I ought to know about engaging in this kind of editing? More specifically, are there any established norms of etiquette I should be aware of regarding purely stylistic edits? It's important to me that my edits do not come across as tendentious, pedantic, or critical of other editors' contributions.

Can you offer any advice in regard to this? --Foxmilder (talk) 15:12, 9 September 2022 (UTC)


 * Hello. Although I am not Asartea, I would like to butt in by mentioning the Manual of Style, as it’s a good place to start when looking for guidelines and consensus regarding stylistic edits. Hope this aids you in your editing, Mugtheboss (talk) 18:17, 9 September 2022 (UTC)


 * Asartea put your question out into a chat room for input, as a slight disclaimer for why someone else is answering. First, welcome!  Don't worry TOO much about rules and regulations - there are far, far too many policies out there to expect newbies to know them all at first glance.  Just pay attention to if people revert your changes afterward, and if they do, see if they cite a policy or the like in their edit summary.  It's to be expected that there may be some "School of Hard Knocks" learning of the rules.  I will say that the Wikipedia Manual of Style is a good thing to read if your main interests are stylistic, if you are willing to read one page of policy first.  (Wikipedia has so many policy pages due to 20 years of accrued discussions...  no easy fix for that.)
 * For when you see an article written in a seemingly awkward or disjointed style, I will recommend potentially checking the "history" tab first, and maybe looking at what the page looked like a month ago / a year ago. Sometimes an uncaught vandal, or a well-meaning but clueless editor, storms in and disrupts things, and the easiest fix is also the simplest - undo their contributions, and presto, disjointedness gone.  No need to waste your time "fixing" something that shouldn't have been added in the first place.
 * You wrote something interesting above: "standardise the authorial voice of articles". I don't want to draw implications from this statement you didn't intend, but I'd be careful here.  Mark Twain, Charles Dickens, and Jane Austen are all celebrated 19th century English authors, but nobody would ever confuse one's writing for the other.  In the same way that trying to "fix" Dickens by trying to make him read like Twain doesn't really help and will probably hurt, it's okay for different articles to have different styles, because they're maintained by different editors.  This is especially true across domains - mathematics editors may have one style, military history editors have another style, and so on.  (See Sacred Cod for one example of a rather goofy style for an article that's basically harmless.)  For sure, nobody will complain about fixing simple grammar errors, but changing a "good" version of valid style A into valid style B may attract some criticism.  Notably, we have a policy WP:RETAIN on the most famous case of this, national varieties of English.  For articles without a strong link to one variety of English, Wikipedia uses the style of English of the first major contributor usually.  There's a similar policy on citation style, WP:CITEVAR.  Anyway, the principle of RETAIN goes a bit beyond just British vs. American English: it's to not make changes for the sake of changes, because then there'd be inefficient edit warring back and forth.
 * For things you should know and how to avoid breaking social norms: In general, you should be fine as long as you don't edit war to force your changes through, and you don't make tons of changes so quickly that it looks like a bot account or attempting to do a "fait accompli." It's also best to avoid certain controversial style topics (e.g. race capitalization, person-first terminology) that draw a lot of heat.  If someone reverts you...  well, technically there's a Wikipedia policy Ownership of content that says nobody "owns" a page.  But in practice, if you're just offering stylistic changes, there's something to be said for deferring to the preferences of the long-term maintainer of the page.  Maybe best to let it lie unless you're really sure they're wrong, in which case talk it out on the article talk page rather than edit warring, where you can ask why your change was undone.  90% of copyeditors / proofreaders do their jobs in peace and make solid changes, so I really wouldn't worry too much - this warning mostly comes up if you happen to be in the 10% of controversial or contested changes.
 * Anyway, good luck with your editing of Wikipedia! I hope the "danger scenarios" above don't sound too scary - to be clear, I think they're unlikely to happen.  You can always ask Asartea for a check-in or check of your edits to see how things are going 100 edits later or the like. SnowFire (talk) 18:46, 9 September 2022 (UTC)


 * ding ding ding! — Mugtheboss (talk) 20:09, 9 September 2022 (UTC)
 * @Mugtheboss: First of all,
 * Thankyou for this tremendously detailed response. There's a lot of stuff in here that I had wondered about, and I appreciate you telling me directly, saving me the time and effort of trying to find the various policy documents in which these principles are elaborated. I am particularly grateful for your advice regarding national varieties of English, and your suggestion to avoid those few areas where questions of style are closely intertwined with political and cultural controversies.
 * Regarding my stated desire to "standardise the authorial voice of articles", I ought to have been more clear. I have no desire to standardise authorial voice across articles — to do so would be injurious to the democratic, internationalist orientation of Wikipedia. What I have in mind is the "smoothing over" of clashing authorial voices within individual articles. I don't have the level of experience to understand why this happens, but I often encounter articles in which the transitions between sections or paragraphs feel slightly jarring, as though the writing style or POV of the text has suddenly changed.
 * Nevertheless, I take your point. I notice now, for instance, that I spelled the word "standardise" in the manner that is natural to me as a speaker of Australian English. But if I were to use the same word while editing an article written in American English, the appropriate spelling would be "standardize". I suspect I will have to remind myself of this particular principle. I can comfortably write within the conventions of British English without much mental effort, but I find writing in American English requires more conscious attention.
 * Finally, regarding the more controversial aspects of language use: I have reasonably deeply-held political views regarding some of the issues mentioned, and my feeling is that it would be unwise for me to involve myself in controversies that overlap with my personal biases. I have a reasonable sense of what I am capable of being dispassionate and objective about, and where my limits lie. My preference, more or less, is to simply avoid subject areas where my participation might give rise to the reasonable apprehension of bias.
 * Thanks again for your advice. Foxmilder (talk) 04:09, 10 September 2022 (UTC)


 * Hello and welcome to Wikipedia! All the advice mentioned above is excellent. My advice for a beginner, after reading the basic manuals, tenets and etiquette, is to choose a recent article and prove his editing abilities. If your main interest is prose itself, I would recommend Jacques Abeille as a recent article that could use a boost in writing quality. Good luck and may Fortune smile at you! DemianStratford (talk) 20:16, 9 September 2022 (UTC)

Tech News: 2022-37
<section begin="technews-2022-W37"/> Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes
 * The search servers have been upgraded to a new major version. If you notice any issues with searching, please report them on Phabricator.

Changes later this week
 * Octicons-sync.svg The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from . It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from . It will be on all wikis from (calendar).
 * Syntax highlighting is now tracked as an expensive parser function. Only 500 expensive function calls can be used on a single page. Pages that exceed the limit are added to a tracking category.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe. <section end="technews-2022-W37"/>

01:47, 13 September 2022 (UTC)

Tech News: 2022-38
<section begin="technews-2022-W38"/> Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes
 * Octicons-tools.svg Two database fields in the <bdi lang="zxx" dir="ltr"> table are now being dropped: <bdi lang="zxx" dir="ltr"> and <bdi lang="zxx" dir="ltr"> . Any queries that rely on these fields need to be changed to use the new normalization field called <bdi lang="zxx" dir="ltr"> . See T299417 for more information. This is part of normalization of links tables.

Changes later this week
 * Octicons-sync.svg The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from . It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from . It will be on all wikis from (calendar).
 * In Kartographer maps, you can use icons on markers for common points of interest. On Tuesday, the previous icon set will be updated to version maki 7.2. That means, around 100 new icons will be available. Additionally, all existing icons were updated for clarity and to make them work better in international contexts.

Future changes
 * In a group discussion at Wikimania, more than 30 people talked about how to make content partnership software in the Wikimedia movement more sustainable. What kind of support is acceptable for volunteer developers? Read the summary and leave your feedback.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe. <section end="technews-2022-W38"/>

MediaWiki message delivery 22:13, 19 September 2022 (UTC)

Tech News: 2022-39
<section begin="technews-2022-W39"/> Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes
 * Octicons-tools.svg Parsoid clients should be updated to allow for space-separated multi-values in the attribute of links. Further details are in T315209.

Changes later this week
 * Octicons-sync.svg The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from . It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from . It will be on all wikis from (calendar).
 * Visual diffs will become available to all users, except at the Wiktionaries and Wikipedias.
 * Talk pages on the mobile site will change at the Arabic, Bangla, Chinese, French, Haitian Creole, Hebrew, Korean, and Vietnamese Wikipedias. They should be easier to use and provide more information.
 * In the     namespace, pages ending with will be treated as JSON, just like they already are in the      and      namespaces.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe. <section end="technews-2022-W39"/>

MediaWiki message delivery 00:27, 27 September 2022 (UTC)

The Signpost: 30 September 2022
<div class="hlist" style="margin-top:10px; font-size:90%; padding-left:5px; font-family:Georgia, Palatino, Palatino Linotype, Times, Times New Roman, serif;"> * Read this Signpost in full * Single-page * Unsubscribe * MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 00:00, 1 October 2022 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – October 2022
News and updates for administrators from the past month (September 2022).

Administrator changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-add.svg ScottishFinnishRadish
 * Gnome-colors-view-refresh.svg Staxringold
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg Ahoerstemeier (deceased) • Ched

Interface administrator changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg Cyberpower678

CheckUser changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg GorillaWarfare

Guideline and policy news
 * Following an RfC, consensus was found that if the rationale for a block depends on information that is not available to all administrators, that information should be sent to the Arbitration Committee, a checkuser or an oversighter for action (as applicable, per ArbCom's recent updated guidance) instead of the administrator making the block.
 * Following an RfC, consensus has been found that, in the context of politics and science, the reliability of FoxNews.com is unclear and that additional considerations apply to its use.
 * Community comment on the revised Universal Code of Conduct enforcement guidelines is requested until 8 October.

Technical news
 * The Articles for creation helper script now automatically recognises administrator accounts which means your name does not need to be listed at WP:AFCP to help out. If you wish to help out at AFC, enable AFCH by navigating to and checking the "Yet Another AfC Helper Script" box.

Arbitration
 * Remedy 8.1 of the Muhammad images case will be rescinded 1 November following a motion.
 * A modification to the deletion RfC remedy in the Conduct in deletion-related editing case has been made to reaffirm the independence of the RfC and allow the moderators to split the RfC in two.
 * The second phase of the 2021-22 Discretionary Sanctions Review closes 3 October.

Miscellaneous
 * An administrator's account was recently compromised. Administrators are encouraged to check that their passwords are secure, and reminded that ArbCom reserves the right to not restore adminship in cases of poor account security. You can also use two-factor authentication (2FA) to provide an extra level of security.
 * Self-nominations for the electoral commission for the 2022 Arbitration Committee elections open 2 October and close 8 October.
 * You are invited to comment on candidates in the 2022 CUOS appointments process.
 * An RfC is open to discuss whether to make Vector 2022 the default skin on desktop.
 * Tech tip: You can do a fuzzy search of all deleted page titles at Special:Undelete.

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Archive Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 11:42, 1 October 2022 (UTC)

Tech News: 2022-40
<section begin="technews-2022-W40"/> Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes
 * Kartographer maps can now show geopoints from Wikidata, via QID or SPARQL query. Previously, this was only possible for geoshapes and geolines.
 * The Coolest Tool Award 2022 is looking for nominations. You can recommend tools until 12 October.

Changes later this week
 * Octicons-sync.svg The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from . It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from . It will be on all wikis from (calendar).
 * Talk pages on the mobile site will change at the Arabic, Bangla, Chinese, French, Haitian Creole, Hebrew, Korean, and Vietnamese Wikipedias. They should be easier to use and provide more information. (Last week's release was delayed)
 * Octicons-tools.svg The <bdi lang="zxx" dir="ltr"> API module will require a CSRF token. This module is documented as internal and use of it is not supported. [5]
 * The Vector 2022 skin will become the default across the smallest Wikimedia projects. Learn more.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe. <section end="technews-2022-W40"/>

MediaWiki message delivery 00:21, 4 October 2022 (UTC)

Tech News: 2022-41
<section begin="technews-2022-W41"/> Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Changes later this week
 * Octicons-sync.svg The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from . It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from . It will be on all wikis from (calendar).
 * On some wikis, Kartographer maps in full size view will be able to display nearby articles. After a feedback period, more wikis will follow.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe. <section end="technews-2022-W41"/>

14:06, 10 October 2022 (UTC)