User talk:Cactus.man/Archive 16

Administrators' newsletter – December 2018
News and updates for administrators from the past month (November 2018). Administrator changes
 * Gnome-colors-view-refresh.svg Al Ameer son • Randykitty • Spartaz
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg Boson • Daniel J. Leivick • Efe • Esanchez7587 • Fred Bauder • Garzo • Martijn Hoekstra • Orangemike

Interface administrator changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svgk Chan

Guideline and policy news
 * Following a request for comment, the Mediation Committee is now closed and will no longer be accepting case requests.
 * A request for comment is in progress to determine whether members of the Bot Approvals Group should satisfy activity requirements in order to remain in that role.
 * A request for comment is in progress regarding whether to change the administrator inactivity policy, such that administrators "who have made no logged administrative actions for at least 12 months may be desysopped". Currently, the policy states that administrators "who have made neither edits nor administrative actions for at least 12 months may be desysopped".
 * A proposal has been made to temporarily restrict editing of the Main Page to interface administrators in order to mitigate the impact of compromised accounts.

Technical news
 * Administrators and bureaucrats can no longer unblock themselves unless they placed the block initially. This change has been implemented globally. See also this ongoing village pump discussion (permalink).
 * To complement the aforementioned change, blocked administrators will soon have the ability to block the administrator that placed their block to mitigate the possibility of a compromised administrator account blocking all other active administrators.
 * Since deployment of Partial blocks on Test Wikipedia, several bugs were identified. Most of them are now fixed. Administrators are encouraged to test the new deployment and report new bugs on Phabricator or leave feedback on the Project's talk page. You can request administrator access on the Test Wiki here.

Arbitration
 * Voting in the 2018 Arbitration Committee Elections is open to eligible editors until Monday 23:59, 3 December 2018. Please review the candidates and, if you wish to do so, submit your choices on the voting page.

Miscellaneous
 * In late November, an attacker compromised multiple accounts, including at least four administrator accounts, and used them to vandalize Wikipedia. If you have ever used your current password on any other website, you should change it immediately. Sharing the same password across multiple websites makes your account vulnerable, especially if your password was used on a website that suffered a data breach. As these incidents have shown, these concerns are not pure fantasies.
 * Wikipedia policy requires administrators to have strong passwords. To further reinforce security, administrators should also consider enabling two-factor authentication. A committed identity can be used to verify that you are the true account owner in the event that your account is compromised and/or you are unable to log in.

Obituaries
 * (Raymond Arritt) passed away on 14 November 2018. Boris joined Wikipedia as on 8 May 2006 and was an administrator from 30 July 2007 to 2 June 2008.

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Archive Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 03:36, 3 December 2018 (UTC)

Disputed non-free use rationale for File:Henri Huet, Cole.jpg
Thank you for uploading File:Henri Huet, Cole.jpg. However, there is a concern that the rationale provided for using this file on Wikipedia may not meet the criteria required by Non-free content. This can be corrected by going to the file description page and adding or clarifying the reason why the file qualifies under this policy. Adding and completing one of the templates available from Non-free use rationale guideline is an easy way to ensure that your file is in compliance with Wikipedia policy. Please be aware that a non-free use rationale is not the same as an image copyright tag; descriptions for files used under the non-free content policy require both a copyright tag and a non-free use rationale.

If it is determined that the file does not qualify under the non-free content policy, it might be deleted by an administrator seven days after the file was tagged in accordance with section F7 of the criteria for speedy deletion. If you have any questions, please ask them at the media copyright questions page. Thank you. -- Marchjuly (talk) 07:00, 28 December 2018 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – January 2019
News and updates for administrators from the past month (December 2018).

Administrator changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-add.svg Galobtter
 * Gnome-colors-view-refresh.svg Orangemike
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg BorgQueen •  Davidruben • Ocee • Revolving Bugbear • Theda • There'sNoTime • Timc • Tijuana Brass • Tristessa de St Ange

Bureaucrat changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg Addshore



CheckUser changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-add.svg Joe Roe • SilkTork
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg Euryalus • Newyorkbrad • There'sNoTime

Oversight changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-add.svg AGK • Joe Roe • SilkTork
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg Euryalus • Newyorkbrad • There'sNoTime

Guideline and policy news
 * There are a number of new or changed speedy deletion criteria, each previously part of WP:CSD:
 * G14 (new): Disambiguation pages that disambiguate only zero or one existing pages are now covered under the new G14 criterion (discussion). This is db-disambig; the text is unchanged and candidates may be found in Category:Candidates for speedy deletion as unnecessary disambiguation pages.
 * R4 (new): Redirects in the file namespace (and no file links) that have the same name as a file or redirect at Commons are now covered under the new R4 criterion (discussion).  This is db-redircom; the text is unchanged.
 * G13 (expanded): Userspace drafts containing only the default Article Wizard text are now covered under G13 along with other drafts (discussion). Such blank drafts are now eligible after six months rather than one year, and taggers continue to use db-blankdraft.
 * The Wikimedia Foundation now requires all interface administrators to enable two-factor authentication.
 * Members of the Bot Approvals Group (BAG) are now subject to an activity requirement. After two years without any bot-related activity (e.g. operating a bot, posting on a bot-related talk page), BAG members will be retired from BAG following a one-week notice.

Technical news
 * Starting on December 13, the Wikimedia Foundation security team implemented new password policy and requirements. Privileged accounts (administrators, bureaucrats, checkusers, oversighters, interface administrators, bots, edit filter managers/helpers, template editors, et al.) must have a password at least 10 characters in length . All accounts must have a password:
 * At least 8 characters in length
 * Not in the 100,000 most popular passwords (defined by the [//github.com/wikimedia/password-blacklist Password Blacklist library])
 * Different from their username
 * User accounts not meeting these requirements will be prompted to update their password accordingly. More information is available on MediaWiki.org.
 * Blocked administrators may now block the administrator that blocked them. This was done to mitigate the possibility that a compromised administrator account would block all other active administrators, complementing the removal of the ability to unblock oneself outside of self-imposed blocks. A request for comment is currently in progress to determine whether the blocking policy should be updated regarding this change.
 * Copyvio-revdel now has a link to open the history with the RevDel checkboxes already filled in.

Arbitration
 * Following the 2018 Arbitration Committee elections, the following editors have been appointed to the Arbitration Committee:, , , , ,.

Miscellaneous
 * Accounts continue to be compromised on a regular basis. Evidence shows this is entirely due to the accounts having the same password that was used on another website that suffered a data breach. If you have ever used your current password on any other website, you should change it immediately.
 * Around 22% of admins have enabled two-factor authentication, up from 20% in June 2018. If you haven't already enabled it, please consider doing so. Regardless of whether you use 2FA, please practice appropriate account security by ensuring your password is secure and unique to Wikimedia.

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Archive Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 21:38, 1 January 2019 (UTC)

Portal:Scotland
HUH?? What on earth caused you to do this https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Portal:Scotland&oldid=879623268 ??? Converting a maintained and well populated Portal into barely a stub of little relevant content that you then felt compelled to add Category:Portals with errors in need of immediate attention to (https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Portal:Scotland&direction=next&oldid=879623268). I'll put my good faith hat on and assume it was an error, but in the meantime I have restored the Portal to the last good version. -- Cactus.man   &#9997;  03:54, 25 January 2019 (UTC)
 * This is the Starship Enterprise calling Ceti Alpha V. Sorry, we thought you were Ceti Alpha VI. Oops. Didn't mean to destroy your living ecosystem. The planet (uh, portal) was targeted for regenesis, zeroing in on your transponder transmitting demolition code "box portal skeleton", indicating outmoded civilization slated for recolonization via the Genesis Device. But you've already revitalized, using alien technology. Very nice. Good thing you had the time reversion Degenesis Device. I've removed the demolition code, so the portal will be safe from evolutionary reboot in the future. Kirk out.  &mdash; The Transhumanist   06:05, 25 January 2019 (UTC)
 * P.S.: The error is known as a "truncation bug", and we're in the process of tracking down this rendering glitch that mysteriously cuts portals short, making them appear like stubs.
 * P.P.S.: Nice hat.


 * Thanks for the explanation, err Kirk, and I'm glad you like my hat. I try to wear it as often as possible. I had no idea that still having "box portal skeleton" code in the Portal would mean it was targetted for a "restart" along no sub-page guidelines. Maybe there's been an announcement somewhere, possibly the newsletter and I've just missed it, But if not then perhaps there should be something hightly visible; after all to go from 44,673 bytes to 3,002 bytes with an edit summary of "restart portal" is somewhat of a shock to the sytem of an unexpecting editor, more "degenesis" rather than "regenesis". Good luck with defeating the euphemistically named "truncation bug" BTW. -- Cactus.man   &#9997;  14:43, 25 January 2019 (UTC)
 * I assumed all the "pox bortal keletons" had subpages. My bad. Will run a comparison against the "maintained" cats and specific portal maintainers list at wpport next time. Matter o' fact, should retro the batch this time. Thanks for the convo. Helped get the mental juices flowin'.  &mdash; The Transhumanist   15:37, 25 January 2019 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – February 2019
News and updates for administrators from the past month (January 2019). Administrator changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-add.svg Enterprisey • JJMC89
 * Gnome-colors-view-refresh.svg BorgQueen
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg Harro5 • Jenks24 • Graft • R. Baley

Interface administrator changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-add.svgprisey

Guideline and policy news
 * A request for comment is currently open to reevaluate the activity requirements for administrators.
 * Administrators who are blocked have the technical ability to block the administrator who blocked their own account. A recent request for comment has amended the blocking policy to clarify that this ability should only be used in exceptional circumstances, such as account compromises, where there is a clear and immediate need.
 * A request for comment closed with a consensus in favor of deprecating The Sun as a permissible reference, and creating an edit filter to warn users who attempt to cite it.

Technical news
 * A discussion regarding an overhaul of the format and appearance of Requests for page protection is in progress (permalink). The proposed changes will make it easier to create requests for those who are not using Twinkle. The workflow for administrators at this venue will largely be unchanged. Additionally, there are plans to archive requests similar to how it is done at WP:PERM, where historical records are kept so that prior requests can more easily be searched for.

Miscellaneous
 * Voting in the 2019 Steward elections will begin on 08 February 2019, 14:00 (UTC) and end on 28 February 2019, 13:59 (UTC). The confirmation process of current stewards is being held in parallel. You can automatically check your eligibility to vote.
 * A new IRC bot is available that allows you to subscribe to notifications when specific filters are tripped. This requires that your IRC handle be identified.

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Archive Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 02:15, 4 February 2019 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – March 2019
News and updates for administrators from the past month (February 2019).

Administrator changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-add.svg Evad37
 * Gnome-colors-view-refresh.svg There'sNoTime
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg Alex Shih • Brian • Mushroom • Nakon • Oscarthecat • PeruvianLlama • Ragib • Reaper Eternal • Rossami • Tom

Interface administrator changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-add.svg Evad37 • Galobtter
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg Ritchie333



CheckUser changes
 * Gnome-colors-view-refresh.svg There'sNoTime
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg Keegan • Ks0stm

Oversight changes
 * Gnome-colors-view-refresh.svg There'sNoTime
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg Ks0stm • Sphilbrick

Guideline and policy news
 * The RfC on administrator activity requirements failed to reach consensus for any proposal.
 * Following discussions at the Bureaucrats' noticeboard and Wikipedia talk:Administrators, an earlier change to the restoration of adminship policy was reverted. If requested, bureaucrats will not restore administrator permissions removed due to inactivity if there have been five years without a logged administrator action; this "five year rule" does not apply to permissions removed voluntarily.

Technical news
 * A new tool is available to help determine if a given IP is an open proxy/VPN/webhost/compromised host.

Arbitration
 * The Arbitration Committee announced two new OTRS queues. Both are meant solely for cases involving private information; other cases will continue to be handled at the appropriate venues (e.g., WP:COIN or WP:SPI).
 *  has been set up to receive private evidence related to abusive paid editing.
 *  has been set up to receive private requests for CheckUser. For instance, requests for IP block exemption for anonymous proxy editing should now be sent to this address instead of the functionaries-en list.

Miscellaneous
 * Following the 2019 Steward Elections, the following editors have been appointed as stewards: Base, Einsbor, Jon Kolbert, Schniggendiller, and Wim b.

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Archive Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 21:12, 4 March 2019 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – April 2019
News and updates for administrators from the past month (March 2019).

Administrator changes
 * Gnome-colors-view-refresh.svg Reaper Eternal • ThaddeusB
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg Bogdangiusca • Christopher Parham • Necrothesp • Schneelocke • Siroxo • Sarah
 * Pictogram voting rename.png →

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

Bureaucrat changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-add.svg DeltaQuad
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg Kingturtle

Technical news
 * In Special:Preferences under "Appearance" → "Advanced options", there is now an option to show a confirmation prompt when clicking on a rollback link.
 * The Wikimedia Foundation's Community health initiative plans to design and build a new user reporting system to make it easier for people experiencing harassment and other forms of abuse to provide accurate information to the appropriate channel for action to be taken. Please see meta:Community health initiative/User reporting system consultation 2019 to provide your input on this idea.

Arbitration
 * The Arbitration Committee clarified that the General 1RR prohibition for Palestine-Israel articles may only be enforced on pages with the ARBPIA 1RR editnotice edit notice.

Miscellaneous
 * Two more administrator accounts were compromised. Evidence has shown that these attacks, like previous incidents, were due to reusing a password that was used on another website that suffered a data breach. If you have ever used your current password on any other website, you should change it immediately. All admins are strongly encouraged to enable two-factor authentication, please consider doing so. Please always practice appropriate account security by ensuring your password is secure and unique to Wikimedia.
 * As a reminder, according to WP:NOQUORUM, administrators looking to close or relist an AfD should evaluate a nomination that has received few or no comments as if it were a proposed deletion (PROD) prior to determining whether it should be relisted.

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Archive Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 21:57, 7 April 2019 (UTC)

File:Rubha nan Gall lighthouse and MV Clansman ferry P ISLE.jpg
Be careful with categories for awards like Quality Image or Featured Picture. The crop isn't a featured picture so shouldn't be included in those categories. I've fixed it. -- Colin 12:04, 8 April 2019 (UTC)


 * Thanks for your message re the above file. That was my mistake, I forgot to check the categories after upload, so thanks for fixing them. I was making a header banner panorama image for en:Portal:Scottish islands when I saw your original image. It was perfect, both lending itself well to a 7:1 panorama ratio and in subject matter (what's more iconic to island life in the Inner Hebrides than a ferry sailing past your local lighthouse?). --Cactus.man 17:30, 8 April 2019 (UTC)

ArbCom 2019 special circular
   

This message was sent to all administrators following a recent motion. Thank you for your attention. For the Arbitration Committee, Cameron11598 02:27, 4 May 2019 (UTC)

Administrator account security (Correction to Arbcom 2019 special circular)
ArbCom would like to apologise and correct our previous mass message in light of the response from the community.

Since November 2018, six administrator accounts have been compromised and temporarily desysopped. In an effort to help improve account security, our intention was to remind administrators of existing policies on account security — that they are required to "have strong passwords and follow appropriate personal security practices." We have updated our procedures to ensure that we enforce these policies more strictly in the future. The policies themselves have not changed. In particular, two-factor authentication remains an optional means of adding extra security to your account. The choice not to enable 2FA will not be considered when deciding to restore sysop privileges to administrator accounts that were compromised.

We are sorry for the wording of our previous message, which did not accurately convey this, and deeply regret the tone in which it was delivered.

For the Arbitration Committee, -Cameron11598 21:03, 4 May 2019 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – May 2019
News and updates for administrators from the past month (April 2019).

Administrator changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-add.svg HickoryOughtShirt?4 • RexxS
 * Gnome-colors-view-refresh.svg Necrothesp
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg Bratsche • Kyle Barbour • Kzollman • Madman

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

Bureaucrat changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-add.svg Primefac

CheckUser changes
 * Gnome-colors-view-refresh.svg Reaper Eternal

Guideline and policy news
 * A request for comment concluded that creating pages in the portal namespace should be restricted to autoconfirmed users.
 * Following a request for comment, the subject-specific notability guideline for pornographic actors and models (WP:PORNBIO) was removed; in its place, editors should consult WP:ENT and WP:GNG.

Technical news
 * XTools Admin Stats, a tool to list admins by administrative actions, has been revamped to support more types of log entries such as AbuseFilter changes. Two additional tools have been integrated into it as well: Steward Stats and Patroller Stats.

Arbitration
 * In response to the continuing compromise of administrator accounts, the Arbitration Committee passed a motion amending the procedures for return of permissions (diff). In such cases, the committee will review all available information to determine whether the administrator followed "appropriate personal security practices" before restoring permissions; administrators found failing to have adequately done so will not be resysopped automatically.  All current administrators have been notified of this change.
 * Following a formal ratification process, the arbitration policy has been amended (diff). Specifically, the two-thirds majority required to remove or suspend an arbitrator now excludes (1) the arbitrator facing suspension or removal, and (2) any inactive arbitrator who does not respond within 30 days to attempts to solicit their feedback on the resolution through all known methods of communication.

Miscellaneous
 * A request for comment is currently open to amend the community sanctions procedure to exclude non XfD or CSD deletions.
 * A proposal to remove pre-2009 indefinite IP blocks is currently open for discussion.

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Archive Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 00:37, 5 May 2019 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – June 2019
News and updates for administrators from the past month (May 2019). Administrator changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg Andonic • Consumed Crustacean • Enigmaman • Euryalus • EWS23 • HereToHelp • Nv8200pa • Peripitus • StringTheory11 • Vejvančický

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

Guideline and policy news
 * An RfC seeks to clarify whether WP:OUTING should include information on just the English Wikipedia or any Wikimedia project.
 * An RfC on WT:RfA concluded that Requests for adminship and bureaucratship are discussions seeking to build consensus.
 * An RfC proposal to make the templates for discussion (TfD) process more like the requested moves (RM) process, i.e. "as a clearinghouse of template discussions", was closed as successful.

Technical news
 * The CSD feature of Twinkle now allows admins to notify page creators of deletion if the page had not been tagged. The default behavior matches that of tagging notifications, and replaces the ability to open the user talk page upon deletion.  You can customize which criteria receive notifications in your Twinkle preferences: look for Notify page creator when deleting under these criteria.
 * Twinkle's d-batch (batch delete) feature now supports deleting subpages (and related redirects and talk pages) of each page. The pages will be listed first but use with caution!  The und-batch (batch undelete) option can now also restore talk pages.

Miscellaneous
 * The previously discussed unblocking of IP addresses indefinitely-blocked before 2009 was approved and has taken place.
 * The 2019 talk pages consultation produced a report for Phase 1 and has entered Phase 2.

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Archive Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 09:48, 8 June 2019 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – July 2019
News and updates for administrators from the past month (June 2019). Administrator changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg 28bytes • Ad Orientem • Ansh666 • Beeblebrox • Boing! said Zebedee • BU Rob13 • Dennis Brown • Deor • DoRD • 1 • Flyguy649 • 2 • Gadfium • GB fan • Jonathunder • Kusma • Lectonar • Moink • MSGJ • Nick • Od Mishehu • Rama • Spartaz • Syrthiss • TheDJ • WJBscribe
 * 1 's access was removed, then restored, then removed again.
 * 2 's access was removed, then restored, then removed again.

Bureaucrat changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg 28bytes • WJBscribe • Wizardman

Interface administrator changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg MSGJ • TheDJ

CheckUser changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg Beeblebrox • BU Rob13 • DoRD

Oversight changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg Beeblebrox • BU Rob13 • DoRD • GB fan

Guideline and policy news
 * A request for comment seeking to alleviate pressures on the request an account (ACC) process proposes either raising the account creation limit for extended confirmed editors or granting the account creator permission on request to new ACC tool users.
 * In a related matter, the account throttle has been restored to six creations per day as the mitigation activity completed.
 * The scope of CSD criterion G8 has been tightened such that the only redirects that it now applies to are those which target non-existent pages.
 * The scope of CSD criterion G14 has been expanded slightly to include orphan "Foo (disambiguation)" redirects that target pages that are not disambiguation pages or pages that perform a disambiguation-like function (such as set index articles or lists).
 * A request for comment seeks to determine whether Office actions should be a policy page or an information page.

Technical news
 * The Wikimedia Foundation's Community health initiative plans to design and build a new user reporting system to make it easier for people experiencing harassment and other forms of abuse to provide accurate information to the appropriate channel for action to be taken. Community feedback is invited.

Miscellaneous
 * In February 2019, the Wikimedia Foundation (WMF) changed its office actions policy to include temporary and project-specific bans. The WMF exercised this new ability for the first time on the English Wikipedia on 10 June 2019 to temporarily ban and desysop . This action has resulted in significant community discussion, a request for arbitration (permalink), and, either directly or indirectly, the resignations of numerous administrators and functionaries. The WMF Board of Trustees is aware of the situation, and discussions continue on a statement and a way forward. The Arbitration Committee has sent an open letter to the WMF Board.

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Archive Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 21:19, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

Converting portals to more transclusion
I had largely avoided the portal controversies, though lately have tried to make a reasonable case that many of the currently extant portals could and should be kept. With some automation many deserving candidates could be maintained even by a small group of interested users, while we sort out what the thresholds should be. I am pleased with how Portal:Scotland came out and was wondering if you could provide a brief description (possibly with diffs) explaining your procedure. I can figure out the template use but the Lua list confuses me a bit. Would you be willing to provide some guidance as to the steps you took? BusterD (talk) 19:19, 7 July 2019 (UTC)

Keeping focused discussion at TfD
In your original comment in the discussion at Templates for discussion/Log/2019 July 9, you said the following:


 * The conclusion of the nomination is blatantly incorrect and I'm surprised that this nomination from a very experienced editor (well familiar with templates) would conclude such.
 * And when did the nominator have such concern that our readers would be "misled" and become confused? She's spent the last 4 months or more on an anti-Portal crusade screaming from the rooftops, that readership numbers are extremely low, categorising them variously as virtually non-existent or risible. Oh well it looks like a "risible" number of readers will be "misled", or in truth rather better informed. The template is in Portals for a purpose and was designed accordingly to be informative for readers without having to navigate away from the Portal. Therefore, absolutely no need to delete it, and I'm sorry to say this BHG, but this is more part of the WP:JDL agenda of the crusade to delete anything and everything "Portal", cherry picking arguments and moving goalposts around to suit.

I ask that you please refrain from making comments like this at WP:Templates for discussion. We should not need to stoop to ad hominem attacks to refute arguments that we disagree with, and doing so leads to off-track discussions. I also request that you strike this part of your comment as a commitment to productive discussion.

I understand that that BHG escalatated this, but that doesn't excuse your original comments. I have made a similar request to BHG to strike comments, so I am not "taking sides".

If you think this is unreasonable, I would be happy to discuss this further (I'd prefer to keep the discussion here, so it will all be in the same place, but you are welcome to reply on my talk page if you really want to). Retro ( talk  &#124;  contribs ) 16:18, 10 July 2019 (UTC)


 * Thanks for your message . I agree with what you say and I'm glad to see you've also collapsed the latest exchange. I'm not proud of what I wrote, but I find BHG to be the most infuriating editor I've ever had the misfortune to interact with, mainly because of her compulsive need to respond negatively to EVERY opposing comment (just view any of her MfD or CfD nominations and you'll see what I mean). I just get so frustrated, especially with the name calling and her "flexible" portrayal of "facts" judiciously plucked in a quote and twisted to make it look as if the opponent is being unreasonable and she is somehow a victim. So far we've had around 4 months of MfD's where The Transhumanist was constantly referred to as "the portal spammer, TTH". I asked her to consider dropping that in future nominations, because I felt it was disrespectful and not language becoming of an experienced admin. I don't think it went down too well, and from that point onwards its been a bonfire everytime our paths cross.


 * So far I've been called "Mr Longspeech Cactus", been labelled a "portaleer" (part of the "portal Platoon"), a "perma-rage editor" and more. I've also been accused of "ranting" in almost anything I post in connection with the whole Portal saga. Well, eventually if you fire enough shit, often it sticks, and the accusation becomes reality. I know I should keep calm and rise above it, but my perception is that BHG is just doing it to get me to respond in such a way, so she can say "Look everybody, Mr Bad Man Cactus .... I told you so". That's why I even suggested a voluntary mutual IBAN to her but she probably hasn't seen it - I think it was in one of the exchanges you, very wisely, collapsed. Anyway, I'm off to do something soothing now - I'll try to keep calmer.
 * Thanks for the intervention and trying your best to smooth things over. Best wishes. -- Cactus.man  &#9997;  17:38, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – August 2019
News and updates for administrators from the past month (July 2019).

Administrator changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-add.svg Johnuniq • Kosack • Valereee
 * Gnome-colors-view-refresh.svg Ad Orientem • Ched • Gadfium • Jonathunder • Nick • Yelyos
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg Bald Zebra • Beetstra • Doug Bell • Journalist • Ruud Koot • Splash • Voice of Clam

Interface administrator changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg Dinoguy1000

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

Oversight changes
 * Gnome-colors-view-refresh.svg Beeblebrox
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg RickinBaltimore

Guideline and policy news
 * Following a request for comment, the page Office actions has been changed from a policy page to an information page.
 * A request for comment (permalink) is in progress regarding the administrator inactivity policy.

Arbitration
 * Editors may now use the template Ds/aware to indicate that they are aware that discretionary sanctions are in force for a topic area, so it is unnecessary to alert them.

Miscellaneous
 * Following a research project on masking IP addresses, the Foundation is starting a new project to improve the privacy of IP editors. The result of this project may significantly change administrative and counter-vandalism workflows. The project is in the very early stages of discussions and there is no concrete plan yet. Admins and the broader community are encouraged to leave feedback on the talk page.
 * The new page reviewer right is bundled with the admin tool set. Many admins regularly help out at Special:NewPagesFeed, but they may not be aware of improvements, changes, and new tools for the Curation system. Stay up to date by subscribing  here to the NPP newsletter that appears every two months, and/or putting the reviewers' talk page on your watchlist. Since the introduction of temporary user rights, it is becoming more usual to accord the New Page Reviewer right on a probationary period of 3 to 6 months in the first instance. This avoids rights removal for inactivity at a later stage and enables a review of their work before according the right on a permanent basis.

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Archive Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 19:23, 3 August 2019 (UTC)

Population of Ukraine
Can you edit population of Ukraine in infobox and leave only crimea and 42 millon to be clear and fine? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2a01:111f:e1a:a400:d520:c7a1:1efd:adb1 (talk • contribs) 08:28, 8 August 2019 (UTC)


 * Hello, this is an article content issue. Please raise the issue on the article talk page and seek a consensus for your suggested change. Please also be aware that Ukraine falls within the discretionary sanctions restrictions authorised by the Arbitration Commitee placed on Eastern Europe articles. I would advise you to familiarise yourself with the guidance for editors in relation to this matter before you make any edits to the Ukraine page. -- Cactus.man  &#9997;  19:12, 8 August 2019 (UTC)

Talk
Would you be willing to remove the part in parentheses you left in your post at my talk page? It is based upon a series of tendentious subjectivity that was said earlier by a user who I have since made a truce with. I don't want to see it anymore. North America1000 20:39, 22 August 2019 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – September 2019
News and updates for administrators from the past month (August 2019). Administrator changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-add.svg Bradv • Chetsford • Izno
 * Gnome-colors-view-refresh.svg Floquenbeam • Lectonar
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg DESiegel • Jake Wartenberg • Rjanag • Topbanana

CheckUser changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg Callanecc • LFaraone • There'sNoTime

Oversight changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg Callanecc • Fox • HJ Mitchell • LFaraone • There'sNoTime

Technical news
 * Editors using the mobile website on Wikipedia can opt-in to new advanced features via your settings page. This will give access to more interface links, special pages, and tools.
 * The advanced version of the edit review pages (recent changes, watchlist, and related changes) now includes two new filters. These filters are for "All contents" and "All discussions". They will filter the view to just those namespaces.

Arbitration
 * A request for comment is open to provide an opportunity to amend the structure, rules, and procedures of the 2019 English Wikipedia Arbitration Committee election and to resolve any issues not covered by existing rules.

Miscellaneous
 * A global request for comment is in progress regarding whether a user group should be created that could modify edit filters across all public Wikimedia wikis.

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Archive Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 00:36, 7 September 2019 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – October 2019
News and updates for administrators from the past month (September 2019).

Administrator changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-add.svg Barkeep49
 * Gnome-colors-view-refresh.svg Beetstra • KillerChihuahua • Kusma
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg Arcadian • Extraordinary Machine • Xeno
 * Pictogram voting rename.png JamesBWatson →

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

CheckUser changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg Courcelles • SilkTork • Timotheus Canens

Oversight changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg Courcelles • SilkTork • Timotheus Canens

Guideline and policy news
 * Following a discussion, a new criterion for speedy category renaming was added: C2F: One eponymous article, which applies if the category contains only an eponymous article or media file, provided that the category has not otherwise been emptied shortly before the nomination. The default outcome is an upmerge to the parent categories.

Technical news
 * As previously noted, tighter password requirements for Administrators were put in place last year. Wikipedia should now alert you if your password is less than 10 characters long and thus too short.

Arbitration
 * The 2019 CheckUser and Oversight appointment process has begun. The community consultation period will take place October 4th to 10th.
 * The arbitration case regarding was closed.  While there will be a local RfC focus[ing] on how harassment and private complaints should be handled in the future, there is currently a global community consultation on partial and temporary office actions in response to the incident. It will be open until October 30th.

Miscellaneous
 * The Community Tech team has been working on a system for temporarily watching pages, and welcomes feedback.

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Archive Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 11:54, 2 October 2019 (UTC)

Portal Templates
Hi Certes, thanks for agreeing to have a look at my request for possible improvements to Portal templates/modules as I mentioned on 's talk page. Apologies for the delay in responding, but real life got in the way (as it tends to do), and also for the long post, but I want to explain it clearly. Thanks also for the enlightening link to ongoing discussions and collaborations between "Deletioneers" in the "Portal Deletion Squadron" (PDT - what's wrong with hurling back a pejorative term or two when they're launched at Portal defenders relentlessly and usually at random?). The PDT seems to consist of four primary operatives now, BHG, RMcL, NewsH and MarkS, all equally committed to the cause and zealously parroting the standard "party line", of rigorously quoting verbatim the POG sentences about broad topics, large numbers of readers and maintainers, and treating this like they are statements of imperatives: of absolute requirements, whilst conveniently ignoring the obvious ambiguity of the actual wording of "should be" and "likely to". I think I'll stop there or I'll get over-exasperated about the continual misrepresentations and false allegations by the squadron members. I'll probably post a separate set of observations about that issue in due course, or on some portal discussion, at the risk of being labelled a "Portalista", a fantasist, a mendacious dissembler, a purveyor of FUD, a defender of abandoned crud, a user lacking in comprehension skills, a user of Humpty Dumpty English, as only working on portal because they are fun, etc, etc, etc .... Grrr ....

I hope you're still open to having a look at the technical issue as I see it with the Portal Templates. If so, it might be informative to have a look at Portal: Scotland (P:SCO)  as I've currently restructured it. Basically it always had a large number of Selected articles, Selected Pictures, Selected quotes etc which were developed or "maintained" over a number of years from approx 2007 - 2012. Then real life took over, as is the way, and upon returning to editing, I was horrified to find WP:ENDPORTALS was in full swing. Then TTH seemed to take up the largely dormant WP:PORT and came up with many interesting ideas, which seemed to have some merit. It was about that time that I first interacted with you ( and came to the observation that you are indeed a "template/Lua guru", despite your modesty). You were most helpful in resolving some of my technical queries. Anyway, long story short, TTH just went berserk with the automated tools and the rest is history. Mass MFD's and a subsequent drip feed of individual ones.

It seemed to me that several common themes, on technical issues, emerged from those discussions:


 * 1. Numerous subpages with vulnerable Content Forks;


 * 2. The sheer number of sub-pages and long term maintenance implications;


 * 3. The frequent and numerous appearance of the dreaded "Lua script timeout" error, rendering the Portal in question virtually unusable;


 * 4. Inflexibility of the "purge" mechanism to refresh content. (a two step process every time);

At the time of completion of the two Mega-MFD's by BHG, it was obvious to me that P:SCO suffered from most (if not all) of the above problems. So I resolved to solve them, each in turn:


 * *1 was relatively easy to solve via use of the Portal Transclusion Templates;


 * *2. See Later, where the crux of my query lies ...


 * *3 At the time of starting to re-construct / re-vamp the Portal (approx Feb 2019, I think), I had approx 105 Selected articles, Over 80 Selected pictures, 95 Selected biographies ( I had added these in to ensure "broad" coverage of scope) and 107 Selected Quotes. There was also the addition of 23 panorama header images (rotating capability). for added scope. Needless to say it was a usability nightmare; Error Script central erupted and that was with me using a pretty fast PC with cache cleared between re-loads. Totally unusable for readers. The problem was solved by resorting to a tabbed layout  and splitting content equally between tabs. Less than ideal, but workable enough.


 * *4 I decided to experiment with the random "slideshow mode" of presentation of individual sub-boxes (much the same as was developed for "random Slideshow"). This would obviate the need for a two stage "purge" process, which is very clunky and counter intuitive for new users, who Portals are supposed to cater for. The problem as I saw it was the need for flexibility (in a carefully considered, hand curated set of articles/ images etc). That seemed to be a major theme of the MFD's .The articles I was dealing with ranged from 1-2 line lede sections to pretty comprehensive discussions of the topic (eg Holyrood Palace and the Scottish Reformation and often, images that I felt could be improved upon. The usual method of invoking the template (with selected defined parameters), followed by a list of articles to apply those parameters to ensures that all articles in the list follow the selection of parameters. This results in a selection of unevenly sized article intro's and, often, less than optimal images.

I ended up using transcluded article content on many sub-pages (not ideal, but an improvement). The subpage transclusions specify the paragraph numbers and chosen image individually, to suit the selected article / biography. The wiki mark-up is much along the lines of:

What would be useful in my view would be a situation where the relevant parameters can be applied individually to the articles in the list, rather than collectively. In other words picking up the parameters individually from the list of items e.g.: That way the transclusions are directly into the Portal thus eliminating the need for subpages, and each item in the portal-boxes can be equally balanced for size of content and image choice can be more appropriate, rather than a default article one. The wiki mark-up would be much along the lines of:

I'm not sure if any of this is possible, but it would be very flexible if it is. I hope that I've explained things clearly, but if not drop me a note and I'll try to clarify. Anything you can do would be greatly appreciated. -- Cactus.man  &#9997;  00:04, 11 September 2019 (UTC)


 * Thanks for all the hard work, . That's a very clear explanation of the remaining problems.


 * You've already found the best way to deal with both numerous subpages and vulnerable content forks. (Unfortunately, many portals fixed in that way were reverted on the grounds that they selected topics with the help of a template or category, and most such cases then sailed through MfD with the rationale that the ancient version the nominator just resurrected was junk.)  We should avoid cases where someone has hand-crafted a summary that is better than the lead and is diligently maintaining it, but they are few in number and can probably go through the bold-revert-apologise process.


 * Lua timeouts occur on the Wikimedia server. Browsing on a better PC won't help.  One solution involves creating a handful of subpages, as you've already done with Portal:Scotland/Tabs, etc.  The subpages are normally generated along with the main page, giving no benefit.  However, we can prepare a complex subpage in advance to contain only simply text which can be transcluded quickly.  This development is in progress.  See Bot_requests/Archive_79, which has applications beyond ITN.


 * You can add a one-click purge here (Appearance section; third item) but that's a per-user setting. Purge box appears to flash up a confirmation dialog which goes away without me clicking Yes (and presumably does the purge). If it does the same for you, rather than obeying some clever confirm=no option I set years ago and forgot about, then that could be a way forward.


 * And finally, on to the meat of your query. Originally we had just Transclude lead excerpt which displays one article and only needs one set of files=, paragraphs=, etc.  Now that multi-article templates use the same module, I agree that one set of parameters may not fit all articles.  It should be easy to implement in the module but the template syntax is tricky.  I think the example above could be made to work but I don't know of an existing template which handles multiple parameters with identical names, distinguishing them by position, and that technique might well be frowned upon.  We also need to distinguish between files= which should apply to all articles (current usage) and files= which should apply only to the last article.  One answer is files1= etc. but that involves some counting if only the 37th article needs special treatment and is an accident waiting to happen when someone deletes article 13 without changing the numbers below.  The best compromise I can think of is to use an escaped parameter separator within parameters:


 * A less conventional alternative is a single character that can't appear in article titles: one of # < > [ ] | { } . "#" is in use for transcluding a section, angles appear in more=&lt;br> etc., "|" delimits the real parameter and "[" introduces an external link, so reluctantly we're left with "]":

| Doune Castle]paragraphs=2-4]files=1
 * That's more concise but totally unintuitive. Better suggestions welcome.


 * By the way, files= only accepts numbers. Accepting filenames would be a separate enhancement.


 * Hope that helps, Certes (talk) 10:25, 11 September 2019 (UTC)


 * Thanks for the detailed reply Certes.


 * As usual, very helpful and informative. I'll start experimenting with your suggestions and hopefully can get a suitable outcome to eliminate the sub-pages I've just got some further questions / comments:


 * I already have the "one-click purge" set in my preferences, but it has no effect. I still have to manually click the purge button on the rsultant screen. I'm using Firefox and I suspect there's some conflict with one of my extensions, Can't be bothered to troubleshoot to find which one is the culprit (it's normally one that I'm not prepared to do without anyway!).


 * The use of the  escape character looks promising, and I agree that it's preferable to using  . A quick test suggests to me that the pipe character needs to be included or the template just bypasses the desired listed file. I also seem to be unable to get the articles to accept the alternative escaped parameter. See User:Cactus.man/Sandbox/P-Sco where the following wikitext produces the non-desired results:


 * Scottish reformation still produces paragraphs 1-3, rather than just para 1.
 * Picts shows file1, rather than 2.
 * Edinburgh is bypassed completely due to the missing pipe character before the escape character.
 * Doune displays correctly per the default parameters set in line 1.


 * Am I making some horrendous schoolboy error, or have I misunderstood your suggestion?


 * Is it correct to assume that the template for file numbers traverses no further than the lede section?. If so, is it possible to search in further sections for images? As an aside, I've been having trouble to select any images at all. The parameter should select the image in the infobox but doesn't. I seem to remember there was some discussion about this on the Wikiproject pages some time ago, but I can't recall the details or what the solution was. Any comments would be helpful.


 * All the best. -- Cactus.man  &#9997;  19:14, 11 September 2019 (UTC)


 * The only mistake you're making is assuming that the Lua code already handles this new syntax, when at the moment it's just an incomplete proposal. Adding | now breaks things, because the module naively looks for an article called "Scottish Reformation|paragraphs=1", but it's the right syntax and should work later.  I'm working on the changes in the sandbox but they're not ready to test yet.
 * Yes, the template for file numbers traverses no further than the lede section (or whatever section is specified with the Article#Section syntax). Originally the module only supported Transclude lead excerpt, which does exactly what it says.  With some work we could look further for files.  For the many pages that currently use a blanket 1 and often show no file, that would make new images appear, which may or may not be helpful. Certes (talk) 19:32, 11 September 2019 (UTC)


 * Thanks for that, I suspected it would be some sort of cock up on my part. I'll leave you to work on it in peace. Cheers -- Cactus.man  &#9997;  19:54, 11 September 2019 (UTC)


 * It's hard to test this change with the slideshow templates, because their /sandbox versions invoke the sandbox version of another module but the original version of the module I'm working on. If you want to look at what I've done so far, you can use the "Transclude ... excerpt/sandbox" templates, e.g.


 * in which 2 picks the Picts because it's the second article. The other articles will be ignored unless you change that number.


 * I've found one limitation of the syntax. more resets the "click here for more" text to the default of "Read more...".  There's no way to make it disappear only for this article.  We can probably live with that. Certes (talk) 20:08, 11 September 2019 (UTC)


 * The parameter overriding seems to work well - bravo! Hopefully, transferring it to the slideshow version template will be a straightforward exercise. The more limitation that you mention won't be an issue for me, I always have it set to the default "Read more" anyway. Keep up the good work :) -- Cactus.man  &#9997;  22:03, 11 September 2019 (UTC)


 * I've released the changes. There's one more gotcha: I used 1 etc. in my example above, because I got no output with unnamed parameters.  I realised what I was doing wrong: the = in the page option was making them into named parameters, e.g. a parameter called "Scottish Reformation|paragraphs" with value 1.  Unnamed parameters do work but you'll need to escape the = signs:


 * I've documented the changes in Template:Transclude lead excerpt/doc etc. but I haven't changed the slideshow documentation: that's another layer that other editors have added on top of the underlying code that I wrote. I hope that does at least some of what you need and will be useful for others. Certes (talk) 11:44, 12 September 2019 (UTC)


 * Thanks so much for doing all this. I think I've got the gist of what needs to be done now - off to experiment. At least I'll be able to transclude articles/ biographies directly into the portal now, maintaining a balanced size of text excerpts and removing the need for sub-pages. I can live with the occasional less than ideal (IMHO) image, so I'll start converting the body of the portal shortly. Hopefully that's even less ammunition for the deletioneers to pounce upon.


 * As an aside, and not wishing to burden you further, if you have any ideas about how to pass in a named image parameter as opposed to a number, that would be superb. I wont even bother you with my half-baked ideas (all based on a primitive and cringeworthy, rudimentary understanding of programming). Thanks again for all your hard work on this. -- Cactus.man  &#9997;  12:30, 12 September 2019 (UTC)
 * I've now added support for a named image parameter. Because a list would be difficult to parse (image names can contain commas, etc.) you can only have one named image file, but it's compatible with the previous enhancement so you can vary it per article with Article|files=Myimage.jpg.  I'll add that to the documentation. Certes (talk) 13:31, 12 September 2019 (UTC)


 * Thanks Certes, impressively quick work :) Will give it a go. -- Cactus.man  &#9997;  16:09, 12 September 2019 (UTC)


 * A quick query: using a custom image works brilliantly, and it places it inside a thumbnail "box" as expected, but there's no caption. Is there any way to add a bespoke caption for custom images too? Thanks. -- Cactus.man  &#9997;  19:19, 12 September 2019 (UTC)


 * Yes, though the coding gets a bit intricate. See this demo. Certes (talk) 19:48, 12 September 2019 (UTC)

, I've been working through the alternative markup you developed for customising the random slideshow templates for selecting paragraph numbers, custom images and image captions, and things appear to be working pretty well. The only issue I have found is in trying to incorporate internal wikilinks in the custom captions. I've been following the 'Two Banana' flavour for the coding using the caption text as the value of the fileargs parameter. The following code works fine:

But, when I try introducing a wikilink for "Dundee Law" using square brackets, it breaks with an error :

Per the code below: {{Transclude excerpts as random slideshow| paragraphs=1-3| files=1| more= | Dundee{{!}}files=The Dundee Law - geograph.org.uk - 63200 (lighter ground).jpg{{!}}fileargs{{=}}The Dundee Law }}

Wikilinks in excerpt captions
Do the square brackets for the link need to be escaped in some way, or is there a simple fix for this? Or have I made another embarrassing Schoolboy error? Any help in these troubled times would be appreciated. I hope you can devote some attention to this, I know it's disheartening when you get continually bad-mouthed as I see has happened again in your case at the recent Proposal_to_delete_Portal_space. Keep up the good work, some of us do appreciate it. -- Cactus.man  &#9997;  12:01, 25 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Thanks for your support. To be honest I only really read the first insult from each editor; I think further attacks say more about them than about me.
 * and   get interpreted before reaching the caption.  Like the pipe, they need to be escaped twice:   and   .  See !(( for the templates involved.  I wonder if we should produce simpler templates for these: something like .  Example written out in full:


 * WOW! Great stuff, but yes, the coding is becoming very complex. Once I've got my head around the complexity and am comfortable using it, I'll start to introduce it.The only lurking problem I can foresee is that it's in danger of becoming a new rationale for deletion: (Delete overly complex code, likely to discourage possible maintainers from volunteering, leading to future maintenance problems and early abandonment. Yet further evidence that the Portalista's treat Portals as a personal play ground, likely to ultimately lead to another sea of abandoned, crud). God knows, it's likely to make it's way "magically" into WP:POG as a requirement that code should be simple vanilla wiki markup! So I think your suggestion of producing a simpler template is a sound idea. -- Cactus.man  &#9997;  21:43, 25 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Good points. I've just knocked together Doubly escaped wikilink, which simplifies the above example to (edit to see source):

– Certes (talk) 22:17, 25 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Thanks for this, makes life a lot simpler I think.
 * Just FYI I amended the template to include a missing parameter 2 of "Yellow fruit" in the example given in Template:Doubly_escaped_wikilink/doc. I think I've understood correctly and the example should read:
 * Perhaps you should cast an eye over it to make sure It's correct. Thanks -- Cactus.man  &#9997;  22:59, 25 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Perhaps you should cast an eye over it to make sure It's correct. Thanks -- Cactus.man  &#9997;  22:59, 25 September 2019 (UTC)

Viewpoints
Greetings Cactus.man: I notice POG still being utilized in various areas of Wikipedia as though if it's still a guideline, after it was demoted as a guideline. Here is my 2 cents:
 * In the event you were not aware of it, this discussion, which was closed on 26 September 2019 (UTC), is specifically what led to POG being demoted from being a guideline. At the discussion, it was determined that "there is clear consensus that the "Portal guidelines" are not, in fact, official guidelines."
 * Below is detailed information regarding why POG was never valid as a guideline in the first place (in my words). I have posted it in collapsed form to keep your talk page tidy.
 * I am surprised to see users on Wikipedia in various areas still referring to it as though if it is a guideline, when in fact, it was never valid as one in the first place.


 * At its inception, the page never received actual formal discussion to be enacted as a real English Wikipedia guideline page. There are many reasons why:
 * The gist of the lead for the portal was added subjectively and unilaterally by one user in 2006 (diff), and no discussion appears to have actually occurred about it until relatively recently. Guidelines should be decided upon via consensus, not by a unilateral addition of content from one user. Meantime, the page has been treated as an actual guideline, despite the content being based solely upon one person's opinion, which furthermore, was added to the page at its infancy.
 * Furthermore, the page was shortly thereafter marked as historical (diff), with an edit summary stating, ", not an active proposal per lack of talk page activity; suspect lack of advertisement".
 * After this, and importantly, the historical template was removed (diff), with an edit summary stating , "removed historical tag; this was not intended as a proposed Wikipedia Guideline , but merely guidelines as in advice for portal creators." (Underline emphasis mine).
 * Per the diffs, the page was not even intended as a proposed guideline from the start, and no consensus was ever formed for the content therein. The page was intended from the start as an information page. It's actually rather a farce that the page was somehow converted to a guideline page, because there doesn't appear to be any meaningful discussion leading to that change. It's like someone just slapped the Guideline page template page on it and it just simply stuck thereafter, sans any consensus.
 * Furthermore, the lead of the present WP:POG page is worded as an illogical and bizarre syllogism. Some users have been stating that if a portal does not receive what they deem to be adequate page views or maintenance, then the topic itself is somehow not broad enough. Of course, this standard could not be used anywhere else on Wikipedia, because people would reject this as absurd. For example, the Music article does not receive a great deal of page maintenance, yet the topic itself is obviously broad in scope, both in terms of the topic itself and in terms of the amount of related content available on English Wikipedia. The manner in which this syllogism is worded on the page is subjective and inferior, and has been misused to define topical scope as based upon page views and page maintainers, rather than upon the actual scope of a given topic.

Anyway, just my 2 cents. Any ideas from you regarding the matter would be appreciated, as I appreciate learning from the viewpoints of others. Also, check out my user page for more general portal information and observations, if you'd like. Thanks for your work on Wikipedia. North America1000 18:51, 18 October 2019 (UTC)


 * Greeeeetings back at ya, thanks for the note.


 * Yes, I was aware that WP:POG was declared a failed Guideline and of the closure discussion, and that it's never been a valid guideline all along. That's something I've highlighted in my postings to Portal_talk:Australia. It's a view I've held for sometime, an had always believed that the Portal opponents were dishonestly pushing the wording of the guideline as though they were mandatory requirements (repeatedly quoting the key passage word for word, vebatim, as though they were policy). If there's been any "sneakiness" in this whole squalid debacle, that's it right there.


 * In my view, that wording has always been capable of valid interpretation that large numbers of readers and maintainers is a desirable state, rather than a necessary state, for a Portal to exist. It's a statement of desirability, rather than of imperatives. A Broad subject area can be read into the statement as being an imperative, but not large numbers of readers or maintainers.


 * It does say after all: " .... should be about a broad subject area, likely to lead to large numbers of ....", and not: " .... a broad subject area, which must lead to large numbers of ....". That's where I would argue, ironically, that it's BHG who has the comprehension deficiency. It could be a reasonable argument to deploy in any deletion review, but the likely success of such a tactic would depend on the strength of any other deletion arguments. I wouldn't bet my house on the outcome of any review. Those are just my initial thoughts, I'll post anything further if it springs to mind.


 * Anyway, it's good to see that you seem to be hanging on in there, keep up the good work. -- Cactus.man  &#9997;  20:15, 18 October 2019 (UTC)

New message from Northamerica1000
North America1000 20:40, 3 November 2019 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – November 2019
News and updates for administrators from the past month (October 2019).

Administrator changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-add.svg GermanJoe • Girth Summit • Kees08 • Nosebagbear
 * Gnome-colors-view-refresh.svg DESiegel • GB fan • MSGJ • Voice of Clam • WilyD
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg DeltaQuad • Fang Aili • Pakaran

Bureaucrat changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg DeltaQuad • Pakaran

Interface administrator changes
 * Gnome-colors-view-refresh.svg MSGJ

CheckUser changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-add.svg L235 • Mz7 • SQL • ST47
 * Gnome-colors-view-refresh.svg Ivanvector
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg DeltaQuad

Oversight changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-add.svg L235 • Mz7 • ST47 • Stwalkerster • The Blade of the Northern Lights • Xaosflux
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg DeltaQuad • DGG • Julia W

Guideline and policy news
 * An RfC was closed with the consensus that the resysop criteria should be made stricter.
 * The follow-up RfC to develop that change is now open at Requests for comment/2019 Resysop Criteria (2).
 * A related RfC is seeking the community's sentiment for a binding desysop procedure.

Arbitration
 * Eligible editors may now nominate themselves as candidates for the 2019 Arbitration Committee Elections. The self-nomination period will close November 12, with voting running from November 19 through December 2.

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Archive Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 21:15, 3 November 2019 (UTC)

Workshop for the creation of new Portal Guidelines
Hello Cactus.man. There is currently a workshop going on about the creation of a new Portal Guideline: User talk:Scottywong/Portal guideline workspace. Your insights and ideas would be appreciated. --Hecato (talk) 16:32, 14 November 2019 (UTC)

Google Code-In 2019 is coming - please mentor some documentation tasks!
Hello,

Google Code-In, Google-organized contest in which the Wikimedia Foundation participates, starts in a few weeks. This contest is about taking high school students into the world of opensource. I'm sending you this message because you recently edited a documentation page at the English Wikipedia.

I would like to ask you to take part in Google Code-In as a mentor. That would mean to prepare at least one task (it can be documentation related, or something else - the other categories are Code, Design, Quality Assurance and Outreach) for the participants, and help the student to complete it. Please sign up at the contest page and send us your Google account address to google-code-in-admins@lists.wikimedia.org, so we can invite you in!

From my own experience, Google Code-In can be fun, you can make several new friends, attract new people to your wiki and make them part of your community.

If you have any questions, please let us know at google-code-in-admins@lists.wikimedia.org.

Thank you!

--User:Martin Urbanec (talk) 21:58, 23 November 2019 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – December 2019
News and updates for administrators from the past month (November 2019). Administrator changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-add.svg EvergreenFir • ToBeFree
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg Akhilleus • Athaenara • John Vandenberg • Melchoir • MichaelQSchmidt • NeilN • Youngamerican • 😂

CheckUser changes
 * Gnome-colors-view-refresh.svg Beeblebrox
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg Deskana

Interface administrator changes
 * Gnome-colors-view-refresh.svg Evad37

Guideline and policy news
 * An RfC on the administrator resysop criteria was closed. 18 proposals have been summarised with a variety of supported and opposed statements. The inactivity grace period within which a new request for adminship is not required has been reduced from three years to two. Additionally, Bureaucrats are permitted to use their discretion when returning administrator rights.
 * Following a proposal, the edit filter mailing list has been opened up to users with the Edit Filter Helper right.

Technical news
 * Wikimedia projects can set a default block length for users via MediaWiki:ipb-default-expiry. A new page, MediaWiki:ipb-default-expiry-ip, allows the setting of a different default block length for IP editors. Neither is currently used. (T219126)

Arbitration
 * Voting in the 2019 Arbitration Committee Elections is open to eligible editors until Monday 23:59, 2 December 2018 UTC. Please review the candidates and, if you wish to do so, submit your choices on the voting page.

Miscellaneous
 * The global consultation on partial and temporary office actions that ended in October received a closing statement from staff concluding, among other things, that the WMF will no longer use partial or temporary Office Action bans... until and unless community consensus that they are of value or Board directive.

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Archive Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 02:47, 2 December 2019 (UTC)

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Cactus.man, Have a great 2020 and thanks for your continued contributions to Wikipedia.

– 2020 is a leap year   – news article. – Background color is Classic Blue (#0F4C81), Pantone's 2020 Color of the year Send New Year cheer by adding     to user talk pages.

–  North America1000 22:01, 30 December 2019 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – January 2020
News and updates for administrators from the past month (December 2019).

Administrator changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-add.svg Dreamy Jazz • Newslinger • Rosguill
 * Gnome-colors-view-refresh.svg Deor • Spartaz • Xeno
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg Angusmclellan • clpo13 • Edgar181 • Matthewedwards • NCurse

CheckUser changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-add.svg Bradv • Casliber • David Fuchs • Maxim • Newyorkbrad • SoWhy • Xeno

Oversight changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-add.svg Bradv • Casliber • DGG • David Fuchs • Maxim • Newyorkbrad • SoWhy • Xeno
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg Someguy1221

Guideline and policy news
 * A request for comment asks whether partial blocks should be enabled on the English Wikipedia. If enabled, this functionality would allow administrators to block users from editing specific pages or namespaces, rather than the entire site.
 * A proposal asks whether admins who don't use their tools for a significant period of time (e.g. five years) should have the toolset procedurally removed.
 * Following a successful RfC, a whitelist is now available for users whose redirects will be autopatrolled by a bot, removing them from the new pages patrol queue. Admins can add such users to New pages patrol/Redirect whitelist after a discussion following the guidelines at Wikipedia talk:New pages patrol/Redirect whitelist.

Arbitration
 * The fourth case on Palestine-Israel articles was closed. The case consolidated all previous remedies under one heading, which should make them easier to understand, apply, and enforce. In particular, the distinction between "primary articles" and "related content" has been clarified, with the former being the entire set of articles whose topic relates to the Arab-Israeli conflict, broadly interpreted rather than reasonably construed.
 * Following the 2019 Arbitration Committee elections, the following editors have been appointed to the Arbitration Committee:, , , , , , , , , ,.

Miscellaneous
 * This issue marks three full years of the Admin newsletter. Thanks for reading!

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Archive Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 20:06, 4 January 2020 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – February 2020
News and updates for administrators from the past month (January 2020).

Administrator changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-add.svg Ergo Sum • Nick Moyes • QEDK • Wugapodes
 * Gnome-colors-view-refresh.svg Dennis Brown
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg Aude • BrownHairedGirl • CALR • Jengod • John Reaves • J.smith • Kim Dent-Brown • K1Bond007 • MECU • Refdoc • RHaworth



CheckUser changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg Opabinia regalis • Premeditated Chaos

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

Guideline and policy news
 * Following a request for comment, partial blocks are now enabled on the English Wikipedia. This functionality allows administrators to block users from editing specific pages or namespaces rather than the entire site. A draft policy is being workshopped at Partial blocks.
 * The request for comment seeking the community's sentiment for a binding desysop procedure closed with wide-spread support for an alternative desysoping procedure based on community input. No proposed process received consensus.

Technical news
 * Twinkle now supports partial blocking. There is a small checkbox that toggles the "partial" status for both blocks and templating.  There is currently one template: uw-pblock.
 * When trying to move a page, if the target title already exists then a warning message is shown. The warning message will now include a link to the target title.

Arbitration
 * Following a recent arbitration case, the Arbitration Committee reminded administrators that checkuser and oversight blocks must not be reversed or modified without prior consultation with the checkuser or oversighter who placed the block, the respective functionary team, or the Arbitration Committee.

Miscellaneous
 * Voting in the 2020 Steward elections will begin on 08 February 2020, 14:00 (UTC) and end on 28 February 2020, 13:59 (UTC). The confirmation process of current stewards is being held in parallel. You can automatically check your eligibility to vote.
 * The English Wikipedia has reached six million articles. Thank you everyone for your contributions!

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Archive Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 15:05, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – March 2020
News and updates for administrators from the past month (February 2020).

Administrator changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-add.svg Money emoji
 * Gnome-colors-view-refresh.svg Athaenara • DeltaQuad
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg Fishhead64 • Kudpung • Mikaey

Bureaucrat changes
 * Gnome-colors-view-refresh.svg DeltaQuad

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

Oversight changes
 * Gnome-colors-view-refresh.svg DeltaQuad

Guideline and policy news
 * Following an RfC, the blocking policy was changed to state that sysops must not undo or alter CheckUser or Oversight blocks, rather than should not.
 * A request for comment confirmed that sandboxes of established but inactive editors may not be blanked due solely to inactivity.

Technical news
 * Following a discussion, Twinkle's default CSD behavior will soon change, most likely this week. After the change, Twinkle will default to "tagging mode" if there is no CSD tag present, and default to "deletion mode" if there is a CSD tag present.  You will be able to always default to "deletion mode" (the current behavior) using your Twinkle preferences.

Miscellaneous
 * Following the 2020 Steward Elections, the following editors have been appointed as stewards: BRPever, Krd, Martin Urbanec, MusikAnimal, Sakretsu, Sotiale, and Tks4Fish. There are a total of seven editors that have been appointed as stewards, the most since 2014.
 * The 2020 appointees for the Ombudsman commission are Ajraddatz and Uzoma Ozurumba; they will serve for one year.

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Archive Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 11:20, 2 March 2020 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – April 2020
News and updates for administrators from the past month (March 2020).

Administrator changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-add.svg Cabayi • Lee Vilenski
 * Gnome-colors-view-refresh.svg Boing! said Zebedee
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg Jonny-mt • MarkGallagher • PeaceNT
 * Pictogram voting rename.png →

Bureaucrat changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-add.svg SilkTork • WereSpielChequers

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

Oversight changes
 * Gnome-colors-view-refresh.svg Someguy1221
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg Daniel Case

Guideline and policy news
 * There is an ongoing request for comment to streamline the source deprecation and blacklisting process.

Technical news
 * There is a plan for new requirements for user signatures. You can give feedback.

Arbitration
 * Following the banning of an editor by the WMF last year, the Arbitration Committee resolved to hold a Arbcom RfC regarding on-wiki harassment. A draft RfC has been posted at Arbitration Committee/Anti-harassment RfC (Draft) and not open to comments from the community yet. Interested editors can comment on the RfC itself on its talk page.

Miscellaneous
 * The WMF has begun a pilot report of the pages most visited through various social media platforms to help with anti-vandalism and anti-disinformation efforts. The report is updated daily and will be available through the end of May.

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Archive Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 07:00, 1 April 2020 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – May 2020
News and updates for administrators from the past month (April 2020). Administrator changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg Gnangarra • Kaisershatner • Malcolmxl5

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

Oversight changes
 * Gnome-colors-view-refresh.svg HJ Mitchell

Guideline and policy news
 * Discretionary sanctions have been authorized for all pages and edits related to COVID-19, to be logged at WP:GS/COVID19.
 * Following a recent discussion on Meta-Wiki, the edit filter maintainer global group has been created.
 * A request for comment has been proposed to create a new main page editor usergroup.
 * A request for comment has been proposed to make the bureaucrat activity requirements more strict.

Technical news
 * The Editing team has been working on the talk pages project. You can review the proposed design and share your thoughts on the talk page.
 * created a script that will show a link to the proper Special:Undelete page when viewing a since-deleted revision, see User:Enterprisey/link-deleted-revs.

Miscellaneous
 * A request for comment closed with consensus to create a Village Pump-style page for communication with the Wikimedia Foundation.

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Archive Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 01:19, 2 May 2020 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – June 2020
News and updates for administrators from the past month (May 2020). Administrator changes
 * Gnome-colors-list-add.svg CaptainEek • Creffett • Cwmhiraeth
 * Gnome-colors-list-remove.svg Anna Frodesiak • Buckshot06 • Ronhjones • SQL

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

Guideline and policy news
 * A request for comment asks whether the Unblock Ticket Request System (UTRS) should allowed any unblock request or just private appeals.
 * The Wikimedia Foundation that they will develop a universal code of conduct for all WMF projects. There is an open local discussion regarding the same.

Arbitration
 * A motion was passed to enact a 500/30 restriction on articles related to the history of Jews and antisemitism in Poland during World War II (1933–45), including the Holocaust in Poland. Article talk pages where disruption occurs may also be managed with the stated restriction.

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Archive Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 13:27, 1 June 2020 (UTC)