Wikipedia:Village pump/August 2003 archive

Time bubble (wrong date in contributions)
Have we hit a time bubble? Look at my contributions, right down at the bottom, with red dwarf. I made that contribution today, but it's listed as June 2002! My account didn't even exist then! CGS 20:22 26 Jul 2003 (UTC)


 * Renaming a page creates a redirect page from the old title. This page is given the date of the old page. Why? I'm not sure. But that's how it is. --Brion 07:14, 1 Aug 2003 (UTC)

We're back!
Horary! We're back! CGS 13:05 28 Jul 2003 (UTC).


 * Thanks to Jimbo, or so it is said. While we're on the topic, I vote Eloquence be given root access. -- Tim Starling 13:12 28 Jul 2003 (UTC)


 * I second that. (don't know what it means, but it sounds a good idea! FearÉIREANN 13:26 28 Jul 2003 (UTC)


 * Suggest it on the mailing list. The Wikipedia's really got its fast stripes on now everyone thinks we're down. CGS 13:27 28 Jul 2003 (UTC).


 * That, and eggs in several baskets in other ways too. -- Cimon Avaro on a pogo stick

P.S. this message brought to you via 4 edit conflicts and counting.

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New Imperialism
Please see talk:New Imperialism for discussion of whether New Imperialism (currently protected) should include a link to a temp page. Please reply and vote there rather than here, to avoid duplicating arguments. Thank you for your co-operation. Martin 17:27 28 Jul 2003 (UTC)

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Help with images
I have uploaded Image: Sanya.jpg, but its far too big for the page (Hainan), and I don't have Photoshop or any similar software. Any help trimming it down or reducing it would be much appreciated.

I've also got a lot of other images for Hong Kong and Macau-related pages which I need help with Photoshop. If anyone has the time to assist generally, please contact me - David Stewart 03:04, 29 Jul 2003 (UTC)

Why can I not see a "Search" button? Tiles 08:15, 29 Jul 2003 (UTC)
 * Database problems. Systems slowed down dramatically on searches yesterday, so searching had to be disabled until the reason for the slow down has been found. -- JeLuF 08:35, 29 Jul 2003 (UTC)

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Decision making
Wikipedia is cool, but as an "user" more like a developer I still would like to have a chance to discuss important changes (like new TOCs). Couldn't there be something like a CfV in the Announcement section? For example, the new TOC could have been announced some weeks ago with something like "It's planned to introduce a new TOC-feature. If you want to discuss or test this feature, change over to metawiki/testwiki/whatever", so that it is possible for mere users to go into discussions about "big" changes without having to read the lists and the metawikipedia all the time? -- till we *) 10:25, Jul 29, 2003 (UTC)


 * It was announced on the wikitech mailing list, and discussed (a lot) over the past few months, and tested on the test server; however, I can appreciate that keeping up with all the various discussions going on Wikipedia is almost impossible. Perhaps a development log or somesuch?
 * James F. 10:37, 29 Jul 2003 (UTC)

I know that it was discussed a lot on mailing lists (or at least I suppose that), but what I want is exactly this: a filtered-down announcement for "big" (what ever that may be) changes early enough so that there is time for all of us to decide if we want to join that particular discussion. Big changes would be major new features (as the TOC) or the new logo or a fictional decision to kill the english edition -- and to find these I just don't want to read a technical mailing list which, I suppose, mostly argues about database tuning etc. -- till we *) 12:10, Jul 29, 2003 (UTC)


 * This was discused on the general mailing list a great deal - only the technical aspects on how to do it were discused on WikiTech-l. It has also been on the test wiki for at least a month. --mav

Okay, okay, okay -- it's not the dark cellar with leopard on the next planet. But why not make wikipedia even more user-participation friendly and inform about things like that in wikipedia proper, i.e. the announcements section, early enough? -- till we *) 12:18, Jul 29, 2003 (UTC)


 * Nice of you to volunteer for the daunting task of scanning the mailing list for relevant news and summarizing them on the wiki. I was hoping someone would do that.&mdash;Eloquence

I'm thinking about it, but wouldn't it be even nicer if someone who already scans the mailing list(s) for his/her personal use would volunteer to summarize big news? -- till we *) 12:26, Jul 29, 2003 (UTC)


 * Definitely. Feel free to ask the most active mailing list participants to do it. :-) &mdash;Eloquence

Votes in progress
There should be a page listing all votes - so that people can find them and vote. Pizza Puzzle


 * See List of ongoing votes. --Camembert

M.Becker's life story
discussion moved to Talk:Daniel C. Boyer

Edit disappeared
I attempted to edit, but my edit didn't appear on the page. My edit shows on Recent changes, but not on the page history. On Recent changes, the 'diff' links for my missing edit and the next edit have the same 'diff=' number, but different 'oldid=' numbers.


 * (diff) (hist) . . User talk:Maveric149; 12:58 . . 172 (Talk)
 * (diff) (hist) . . User talk:Maveric149; 12:58 . . Cyp (Talk) (Is page protection required?)


 * Unfortunately, it's gone. There's a known simultaneous editing bug which still hasn't been fixed..&mdash;Eloquence 13:16, 29 Jul 2003 (UTC)


 * Fortunately, it was still on my clipboard, but I retyped the edit summary, not knowing it was in recent changes... Just wanted to be sure it was a known bug... (Suppose it isn't possible to view the wikipedia source code in C/C++..?) &#1050;&#1089;&#1081;&#1087; Cyp 13:23, 29 Jul 2003 (UTC)


 * Wikipedia is in PHP, not C or C++, but you can view the source at Software. CGS 14:16, 29 Jul 2003 (UTC).


 * I know, I was thinking more along the lines of an option to set the preferred viewing language, like the new option for the preferred date format. (I was saying what I'd prefer, not what is possible, although after thinking about it, it wouldn't surprise me if there actually did exist some PHP/C++ converter, but I'm not sure the result would be very good, especially with being translated twice...) &#1050;&#1089;&#1081;&#1087; Cyp 09:30, 30 Jul 2003 (UTC)

Larousse problem back
I keep getting the following.

Host 'larousse.wikipedia.org' is blocked because of many connection errors. Unblock with 'mysqladmin flush-hosts'

It took 40 minutes to get on to wiki recent pages. My watchlist is inaccessible and every second page gets the above message. I am finding wiki at this stage almost unusable. FearÉIREANN 18:12, 30 Jul 2003 (UTC)


 * Yes, the database needs to be flushed. You would think this is something we could automate?  MB 18:54, Jul 30, 2003 (UTC)


 * Can't you flush through the web SQL interface? I know it's now banned, but was it possible? CGS 20:28, 30 Jul 2003 (UTC).


 * No and no.&mdash;Eloquence 20:40, Jul 30, 2003 (UTC)


 * This is a wonderful project, but I've been a contributor since July 25 and the system has been down two of the 6 days. Is this typical? Marshman 21:19, 30 Jul 2003 (UTC)


 * Price of success - number of users/editors keeps outpacing the infrastructure improvements. Somebody improves the internals, it's better for another couple of weeks, then starts bogging down again.  I believe there are more technical performance improvement projects that are awaiting hackers. Stan 21:59, 30 Jul 2003 (UTC)

It took me 41 attempts to get into this page because of this problem. I have made 19 attempts to edit one talk page. I cannot use by watchlist. I cannot get to my talk page. I cannot edit anyone else's talk page. Sorry the language but I am so frustrated. I have cleared my cache but nothing seems to work. I cannot even guarantee I will be able to save this. If this sort of problem is not sorted out soon people will just give up on wikipedia. FearÉIREANN 22:26, 30 Jul 2003 (UTC)

I'll second that I've been having the same problem, could someone explain why it's happening and whats causing it. I'v noticed the wikipedia seems to have gone haywire since the new Table of content thingies were introduced G-Man 22:39, 30 Jul 2003 (UTC)


 * It is my professional opinion that the main reason for the problems is this article. Things should calm down a little later.  Come back in a couple hours.  MB 22:48, Jul 30, 2003 (UTC)


 * Hmm, or maybe not, the site stats don't indicate an increase in traffic. MB 04:21, Jul 31, 2003 (UTC)


 * Why blame the TOC? It's been like this before the TOC thing. Don't blame TOCs or sysop queries to the database or anything else anyone doesn't like. Apologies for the censorship Jtdirl. Angela 23:35, 30 Jul 2003 (UTC)


 * Hey, it's back. The errors were happening every single time for me for the past 8 hours or so. -- Jake 03:47, 2003 Jul 31 (UTC)


 * And more than difficulty getting on or staying on. My watch list was wiped out 24.94.86.252 04:12, 31 Jul 2003 (UTC)
 * I take that back. System tells me I've logged on successfully, then drops me back to anomymous as soon as I move on from my logged in page -- Marshman 24.94.86.252 04:16, 31 Jul 2003 (UTC). How would I report this problem, or are others also unable to procede after logging on as other than anonymous?

Today's problems have nothing to do with the software updates, which made things faster. They are related to Larousse hitting an internal connection limit on Pliny, which nobody without root access could take care of. Unfortunately, we only have a couple of administrators with root access -- Brion, who is on vacation, and Jimbo, who is a bit slow. Hopefully, we will 1) get more servers and 2) get some full or at least part time employed admin once we can start taking donations (in a couple of weeks or so).&mdash;Eloquence 04:33, Jul 31, 2003 (UTC)


 * The problem, according to the MySQL manual, is some sort of network error. Apparently TCP connections between larousse and pliny are getting broken unexpectedly. I suggest setting max_connect_errors to a very large number, as a workaround -- Tim Starling 08:31, Jul 31, 2003 (UTC)

I'm giving up for now. THis is something I do not understand about the data base. I can see that others are making changes under their loged in names, but I simply get bumbed out as soon as I leave my login page. Even earlierwhen the system was essentially all but crashed, I see Recent Changes progressing. Maybe try again tomorrow. Maybe I'll get an answer or the software will be back to normal. One can only hope. Marshman


 * You've probably got cookies disabled. -- Tim Starling 08:31, Jul 31, 2003 (UTC)
 * You are exactly right. I slept on it, awoke and remembered that when the system was "down" yesterday, I tried a different security level for cookies to reduce popups.  I forgot this might impact on my performance here.  I'm back now Marshman 16:59, 31 Jul 2003 (UTC)

Could not connect to DB on 130.94.122.197 etc Angela 23:50, 31 Jul 2003 (UTC) (This is my 999th edit by the way - you can vote on what the 1000th will be)
 * Not again? Getting this on about a quarter of the pages I go to;

More (and different) search problems
I've figured out where these articles TITLED IN ALL CAPS are coming from; they're the result of a search that comes up empty. People just click "Edit this page" and away they go.

Last time we used Google for an extended period there was a search box on the empty results page that would take the search argument, add "site:wikipedia.org" to it automatically, etc., would it be possible to code that back in? At the very least though that page shouldn't be editable. - Hephaestos 07:08, 31 Jul 2003 (UTC)


 * I've changed it so that it doesn't end up with all upper case titles. Hope that helps.&mdash;Eloquence 11:12, Jul 31, 2003 (UTC)