Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/HBC AIV helperbot


 * The following discussion is an archived debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. The result of the discussion was Symbol keep vote.svg Approved.

HBC AIV helperbot
Operator: HighInBC

Automatic or Manually Assisted: Automatic

Programming Language(s): Perl, MediaWiki(repaired and augmented)

Function Summary: Watch AIV. Check each reported user for current block. Remove users who are currently blocked from list with explanation in edit summery.

Edit period(s) (e.g. Continuous, daily, one time run): Continuous

Edit rate requested: X edits per TIME Reads 6x per minute. Writes up to 6x per minutes(once per vandal already blocked). Numbers flexible as always

Already has a bot flag (Y/N): N

Function Details: This bot is done. All I have to do is uncomment the save command. I have brought this up at Wikipedia talk:Administrator_intervention_against_vandalism/Archive_4 and it gained good support. This idea has also come up here: Bot_requests/Archive_8

Source code available here: User:HBC AIV helperbot/source HighInBC (Need help? Ask me) 03:13, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Discussion
More discussion on this page taking place here: Wikipedia talk:Administrator_intervention_against_vandalism/Archive_4.

As this has already been discussed and received no objections, and I see no technical problems with the bot, it is approved for trials. Please post diffs when done with 50 edits or so. — Mets501 (talk) 04:15, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Can the bot put the following in its edit summaries: The first edit looks great! alphachimp. 04:34, 3 January 2007 (UTC)
 * the number of users/IPs remaining on the list
 * whether or not the list is empty
 * link to the user's contribs or block page


 * Yes on all three counts. I already have it linking to the block page. Will work on the rest tommorow. HighInBC (Need help? Ask me) 04:35, 3 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Could I suggest that maybe it links to the blocking admin too? Or just a link to the blockee's talk page would probably be fine too, because admins should be putting {test5} or similar on the page. Then we might not need the long ugly link to Special:IPblocklist. -Royalguard11 (Talk·Desk·Review Me!) 06:01, 3 January 2007 (UTC)


 * Ya that link is ugly. Only internal links render in edit sumeries, I guess for good reason. I can have it link the the user's talk page instead of the user page, and leave out the link to the block log. Maybe add a link to contributions. HighInBC (Need help? Ask me) 06:26, 3 January 2007 (UTC)


 * What do you think of this? I am going to add something like 1 IP and 2 users remaining or list empty to the end tomorrow. HighInBC (Need help? Ask me) 06:42, 3 January 2007 (UTC)


 * Suffice to say, I'm in love. Any chance of having it automatically add and remove ? (I've asked for a lot already...this is purely icing on the cake  alphachimp.  07:49, 3 January 2007 (UTC)


 * I was thinking about it. No reason it should not do all the work it can. HighInBC (Need help? Ask me) 15:49, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

So far, I like. Syrthiss 14:28, 3 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Picky, but it needs a space between the blocked and the blocking admin name. ;) Syrthiss 16:41, 3 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Hmm an extra space. Hard to code, tricky... I think I can do it. HighInBC (Need help? Ask me) 16:43, 3 January 2007 (UTC)


 * I already made my first mistake, but I was running it attended(as I should be at this point) and caught it in less than a minute. Not fast enough for Metros232 though hehe. I will be more careful. HighInBC (Need help? Ask me) 16:45, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

How about covering the Administrator intervention against vandalism/TB2 subpage? You'd probably be able to get away with checking it only once every minute or so if you wanted to throttle down. alphachimp. 17:36, 3 January 2007 (UTC)


 * Ya, I just noticed that. I will have to modify the code to remember which page it saw it's name on and store the information in the job queue. I can read both pages at once with the Special:Export command so no worries there.


 * I will do that later, as it will require a substantial redesign. HighInBC (Need help? Ask me) 17:38, 3 January 2007 (UTC)
 * The edit summary looks a lot better now. Good work! -Royalguard11 (Talk·Desk·Review Me!) 18:02, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Testing results
The bot has done over 50 diffs now Special:Contributions/HBC_AIV_helperbot. I am still getting feature requests so I would like to extend the testing period until I have implemented them. Specifically removing the comments after a report may be prone to error. I will be manually watching this bot until I have finished adding features and it has succeeded in each of it's functions. HighInBC (Need help? Ask me) 19:22, 3 January 2007 (UTC)
 * No problem. Take as long as you need for the testing period. — Mets501 (talk) 19:28, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Comments on vandal reports
I found a small problem where the bot removes a vandal report and leaves the comments, this can be a problem because the comments may appear to refer to the report above. After a discussion here I have decided that the bot will remove every line below the vandal report until it finds a line with a or  in it.

This may remove improperly formatted reports, however the consensus seems to be that this is a good thing. Any comments on this approach? Can anyone think of a better way? HighInBC (Need help? Ask me) 19:14, 3 January 2007 (UTC)
 * That's what I would do (if I think of something better I'll let you know). I doubt that there will really be many (if any at all) improperly formatted requests, as the instructions are on the page and in the edit box commented out. Generally new users who are unfamiliar with wiki-syntax aren't posting on that page anyway. By the way, the bot's edit summaries need an extra space after the username/IP address and before "(contribs)".  Great work! — Mets501 (talk) 19:22, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Space added. HighInBC (Need help? Ask me) 19:24, 3 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Great! — Mets501 (talk) 19:28, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Any chance of checking/restoring the commented out area? New users sometimes accidentally add reports to that area, where they're difficult to act on. I'm not sure whether the best course of action would be to simply remove them, or move them down the the normal reports area. alphachimp. 19:27, 3 January 2007 (UTC)


 * Hmmm, I could yes. I will create a feature request page to keep track of all of these. HighInBC (Need help? Ask me) 19:31, 3 January 2007 (UTC)


 * Created: User:HBC AIV helperbot/Feature requests. HighInBC (Need help? Ask me) 19:35, 3 January 2007 (UTC)


 * Removing comments has been implemented, it seems to be working. It reports the number of lines it removed as comments(not counting blank lines which is also removes), this should help people recognize any mistakes it makes(such as removing improperly formatted reports). HighInBC (Need help? Ask me) 22:43, 3 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Awesome! And a space before "(Looked like comment(s))" would make it even better! :-) — Mets501 (talk) 22:50, 3 January 2007 (UTC)


 * I already added the space, it just had yet to be used. HighInBC (Need help? Ask me) 22:51, 3 January 2007 (UTC)
 * You might also want to adjust your removing comments feature; it just removed one which used Vandal instead of the lowercase vandal (I think that was the problem). — Mets501 (talk) 22:56, 3 January 2007 (UTC)
 * I believe you are right, I will make that pattern case insensitive. HighInBC (Need help? Ask me) 23:02, 3 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Fixed. I used the wrong regex altogether. HighInBC (Need help? Ask me) 23:02, 3 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Great! — Mets501 (talk) 23:03, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Oh no! — Mets501 (talk) 23:04, 3 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Yes, remanent of the old code, it should work now. I reversed the error instead of fixing it, then I fixed it. I am watching closely. HighInBC (Need help? Ask me) 23:07, 3 January 2007 (UTC)


 * Removing comments after the report now seems to be working well. HighInBC (Need help? Ask me) 17:33, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

From what I've seen as an onlooker, this bot does look great, and there's been a lot of enthusiasm for it on IRC. I don't have anything productive to add, but keep it up! :) Mart inp23 18:03, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Also servicing /TB2 subpage
The bot is now serving the bot report page. I assume this is within my range of testing approval as this is part of AIV. Once this feature is done being tested, I will consider my bot stable and finished testing in general. HighInBC (Need help? Ask me) 20:18, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Testing complete
I have implemented all of the major features, and tested them. I feel testing is complete. The first edit since the last change I made was here, and since then has performed over 100 successful edits. My source is here, requesting final approval. HighInBC (Need help? Ask me) 15:51, 6 January 2007 (UTC)
 * This bot will run with a flag. — Mets501 (talk) 17:55, 6 January 2007 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.