Wikipedia:Village pump (technical)/Archive 211

The reference list is not displayed!
The reference list is not displayed!

On Hannibal Alkhas the Reference list does not appear. I have tried this on User:اربابی دوم/sandbox first and there everything works fine. What is the problem? Can anyone help? Arbabi second (talk) 20:23, 26 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Don't use ; it is no longer supported and will not render in article space. Why did you choose to use that template?
 * —Trappist the monk (talk) 20:32, 26 February 2024 (UTC)
 * @Trappist the monk
 * Thanks for the response. But what can be done now? Arbabi second (talk) 20:46, 26 February 2024 (UTC)
 * As a quick fix I have changed each to . Based on Special:WhatLinksHere/Template:Citation/fcite I wonder how you found . It should not be used. PrimeHunter (talk) 21:57, 26 February 2024 (UTC)

Visual Editor seems broken
Whenever I try to open Visual Editor, I get "Error: Unable to fetch Parsoid HTML". The editor fails to open. Zanahary (talk) 07:04, 27 February 2024 (UTC)
 * if this is still a problem, please try turning off your personal javascripts (User:Zanahary/common.js and meta:User:Zanahary/global.js) then try again. — xaosflux  Talk 11:12, 27 February 2024 (UTC)

New articles from category by PetScan
Why some categories not load in PetScan? Eurohunter (talk) 19:47, 24 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Try asking over at Wikipedia talk:PetScan. If you have a repeatable bug you may also report it here. — xaosflux  Talk 11:14, 27 February 2024 (UTC)

Finding non-redirect articles that have class=redirect on the talk page banner shell
I'd like to find articles under a specific category that have a wikiproject 'class' hard set to 'redirect' in the banner shell, but that are not actually redirects. Is there a tool to do this? I took at look at PetScan but I don't see a suitable combination of filters. Thanks. Praemonitus (talk) 04:33, 27 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Praemonitus, I think ratings like that are automatically ignored. @Martin? — Qwerfjkl  talk  07:21, 27 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Yeah, redirects are detected automatically these days and any incorrect redirect values are just ignored &mdash; Martin (MSGJ · talk) 08:53, 27 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Please always give an example, in this case a category. Since a redirect category is not actually added by, I'm not sure which type of category and scenario you want. If I ignore part of your question and guess that you want pages which incorrectly have   without being attached to a redirect then we can use that the category is not added with a search like hastemplate:"WikiProject Astronomy" insource:"class=redirect" -incategory:"Redirect-Class Astronomy articles". PrimeHunter (talk) 12:23, 27 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Okay, the scenario I have in mind is for a 'redirect' article that is correctly set to 'class=redirect'. At some point in the future, an editor converts the redirect into a normal article (which I have done myself). If the talk page banner shell is not suitably updated, it could continue to be perceived incorrectly by the WikiProject(s). In my case the particular category is Category:Astronomy and its various sub-categories, but this scenario could apply to any category maintained by a WikiProject. I don't have a good example of this because finding one would literally involve checking tens of thousands of redirect pages. Praemonitus (talk) 17:50, 27 February 2024 (UTC)
 * It sounds like I guessed correctly. As mentioned, your scenario isn't really a problem since  is ignored. You can try for yourself to preview Talk:Astronomy with  or . It gives exactly the same result, both in the categories and WikiProject banner. I don't know any tools which look for   in the source text. If there were any article examples of your issue for  then they should appear in my above search but it only gives category talk pages. PrimeHunter (talk) 18:23, 27 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Thank you, PrimeHunter. Praemonitus (talk) 18:26, 27 February 2024 (UTC)

Special:RecentChanges and "created automatically" accounts
Sorry if this has been asked before, couldn't find it, but it's something I only now noticed: Recent changes only shows account creations that are listed as "was created" in Special:Log/newusers and doesn't show accounts that are listed as "was created automatically". Am I just missing some obvious setting or is this actually intended? – 2804:F14:80C5:3C01:95F6:953B:7E66:6B4C (talk) 08:31, 24 February 2024 (UTC)
 * This appears to be as designed (see T24914 for a very old note). As you noted, the Special:Log is the place to look for these if you are interested. — xaosflux  Talk 11:23, 27 February 2024 (UTC)
 * That's fair enough. Thank you for looking into it. – 2804:F14:80E5:6B01:F969:B861:B7FB:B942 (talk) 23:06, 27 February 2024 (UTC)

Issues editing Requested moves
See Wikipedia talk:Requested moves (cc: ). Whenever I try to save an edit to the Requested moves page manually, it times out with an error of [eb5dac88-ace2-499b-816a-64cf82089c3f] 2024-02-28 04:17:33: Fatal exception of type "Wikimedia\Rdbms\DBQueryDisconnectedError". The console is complaining about deprecated ResourceLoader modules, with a link to this page. A brief search suggests this might be related to. Any suggestions? Extraordinary Writ (talk) 04:43, 28 February 2024 (UTC)


 * That certainly does look similar. There is some additional discussion at Template talk:COVID-19 pandemic data. I'd note that WP:RM has 69,677 revisions, and suspected that the template's bug is related to that page's ~90,000 revisions. SilverLocust  💬 05:43, 28 February 2024 (UTC)
 * I looked up the error code, it's indeed the same problem as T354015. Matma Rex talk 05:52, 28 February 2024 (UTC)

List of recent stubs in project
Any string manipulators in the house? I'm trying to create a report of articles recently assessed as a stub in a WikiProject. The best advice I've received is to base it on the existing Version 1.0 Editorial Team/Anarchism articles by quality log report, but I'd like to process this page into just the names of the entries that were marked as stubs, i.e., any line that includes "Quality rating changed from -Class to Stub-Class" or "Quality assessed as Stub-Class" (for new articles). Ideally it would just be a bulleted list of the eligible, wikilinked articles with all the other text ignored/deleted. I believe this is possible with some form of Module:String replace/match on  similar to what is done in Template:WPVG announcements/shell but I'm not sure how to handle it without a regex lookahead. Can someone help, or have any tips? czar 23:22, 26 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Czar, really, when you want to find multiple matches you should use a module and iterate over the matches. That said, you can do it in wikimarkup:

Producing:


 * — Qwerfjkl  talk  17:42, 27 February 2024 (UTC)
 * What this does:I've used the pattern  to match any line containing "Stub-Class" (using truenewline because I couldn't find a better way to use newlines in sets).Because there are multiple matches, I've used For nowiki to iterate over each match.Then I've just used match on the string with the pattern, passing in the count from for nowiki—  Qwerfjkl  talk  17:48, 27 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Looking at Template:WPVG announcements/shell, it seems to just use patterns to remove the lines that don't match. I'm fairly sure that would require lookahead, as you say.
 * Here's an alternative approach, which splits the text into lines, and then only returns lines that match:
 * &mdash; Qwerfjkl  talk  19:17, 27 February 2024 (UTC)
 * @Qwerfjkl, excellent—thank you! I threw together a template here (Template:Recent stubs) so others can use it too.
 * If there's a better way to get the intended result with using a module and iterating over the matches, open to that as well but I have yet to venture into Lua-land. Would that version be able to exclude stubs that have been reassessed as another class? Right now Ōsugi Sakae in the above example was formerly a stub but is no longer. czar  21:37, 27 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Czar, you don't need a module for that, just a slightly more complicated pattern. I'm a tad busy right now, but I'll have a shot at it later today. — Qwerfjkl  talk  07:13, 28 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Czar, this should work. It checks if the last bolded thing is Stub-Class.
 * &mdash; Qwerfjkl  talk  18:20, 28 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Thank you! czar  23:21, 28 February 2024 (UTC)
 * &mdash; Qwerfjkl  talk  18:20, 28 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Thank you! czar  23:21, 28 February 2024 (UTC)

Is this a bug? Just me?
In the article Good conduct time, does anyone else see the thumbnail for Barber v. Thomas in this article as the transgender flag? Not sure how it relates to that case at all. Seems to be some sort of incorrect thumbnail selection?

Edit 1: this appears to affect multiple court cases per some off-site discussion.

Edit 2: same with this: List of United States Supreme Court cases, volume 559 and 560. Bug or vandalism?

TheForgottenKing (talk) 07:41, 29 February 2024 (UTC)
 * There was some template vandalism on 23 Feb, which included a template transcluded on these pages. Assuming there's been none since, it will probably flush through the system one day. With some combination of null edits, purges and refreshes the process can be sped up, as I think I've just done here. -- zzuuzz (talk) 08:03, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

Querying the user who created a page
How would one query the user who created a page? I don't see a relevant magic word, but the XTools gadget manages it somehow. (Asking for this use case)  Sdkb  talk 22:09, 28 February 2024 (UTC)


 * The "View history" link (at the top right of most pages) will list all edits, including the creation of a page, and show which editor made them. -- Verbarson talkedits 22:41, 28 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Lol I learned how to read page histories a few tens of thousands of edits ago; I'm asking about querying within a template's code.  Sdkb  talk 22:45, 28 February 2024 (UTC)
 * This cannot be done in wikitext. Izno (talk) 22:52, 28 February 2024 (UTC)
 * It's not what you asked for but, for this use case, is {{REVISIONUSER}} good enough? Certes (talk) 23:31, 28 February 2024 (UTC)
 * I think there would be way too many errors for that to work here. Any idea how XTools is doing it? <span style="border:3px outset;border-radius:8pt 0;padding:1px 5px;background:linear-gradient(6rad,#86c,#2b9)"> Sdkb  talk 23:47, 28 February 2024 (UTC)
 * It seems like it's using the XTools API. Graham87 (talk) 04:28, 29 February 2024 (UTC)
 * XTools is in JavaScript which has access to lots of things you cannot do in templates. For your use case, DYK nomination pages made with MediaWiki:DYK-nomination-wizard.js could pass the name of the page creator. PrimeHunter (talk) 10:23, 29 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Ah OK! Pinging @SD0001 as the creator of that wizard; would this be an easy change to make? <span style="border:3px outset;border-radius:8pt 0;padding:1px 5px;background:linear-gradient(6rad,#86c,#2b9)"> Sdkb  talk 13:59, 29 February 2024 (UTC)
 * It's not particularly hard, but I would rather leave it to someone else as I am short of time right now. – SD0001  (talk) 14:19, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

Anchor issue with LT/GT symbols
Did the latest software release introduce a change that could be affecting Module:Anchor? There are some issues appearing over at WP:ARC where the  symbols are used in section headers, such as in this revision. Those characters have been regularly used in section headers at the arb pages for a long time, so I'm wondering if this is a regression. GorillaWarfare (she/her • talk) 20:58, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

Foo>
It's a general MediaWiki issue at T358810, not a local module. It also happens here for the above section header  which at the time of writing renders as:

" data-mw-fallback-anchor="Foo.3E" data-mw-thread-id="h-Foo>-Anchor_issue_with_LT/GT_symbols-20240229220000">Foo>

It doesn't help to encode it as. PrimeHunter (talk) 22:05, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

Turn dark mode in editor off
I have never commented here so apologies if I'm in the wrong place, but whenever I go into the text editor on my phone (even as I write this) the text is displayed in white with a dark background as opposed to the previous norm (white background and black text); this also only applies to the editor as the rest of the site (including area around the editor) is like usual. I do not have dark mode turned on for my account (since I prefer it on Wikipedia) but do have it turned on for my phone's system (since I think it looks better). Is there a way I can do something to change my text editor back to how it was? Link20XX (talk) 21:00, 29 February 2024 (UTC)


 * This is happening to me as well. Cornmazes (talk) 21:37, 29 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Jon (WMF) (talk) 23:07, 29 February 2024 (UTC)
 * (A temporary fix has also been applied) Jon (WMF) (talk) 23:08, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

Yuuge page reader numbers
So, I was checking WikiProject Volcanoes/Popular pages for any article I had written and noticed that Mount Takahe is the second-most popular article in the entire volcanoes project with about 10,000 readers per day. Given the not very active page history I kind of wonder if the reader numbers are wrong. since you run the tool. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 11:48, 28 February 2024 (UTC)


 * Page Information says 9 views in the last 30 days. Monthly page views show a very odd pattern.  It's been FA of the day on the main page, but only in 2020.  Could it be some sort of meme?  Searching mainly shows articles from 2017, so it's not in the news. Certes (talk) 17:18, 28 February 2024 (UTC)
 * |Talk:Mount_Takahe A comparison with Tarrare (another high-read page) shows that Takahe's talk page is less read, so aye, it might be an artifact or a bug. JoJo Eumerus mobile (main talk) 18:37, 28 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Some site somewhere may be using it as an example of something. Johnbod (talk) 18:50, 28 February 2024 (UTC)
 * This is probably the all-too-common pageviews anomaly scenario, where bot-generated traffic appears human and is recorded as such.
 * Some site somewhere may be using it as an example of something – Indeed, we see this a lot. I believe Cleopatra is an example. I don't recall what site or app is using it, but that is why it continually remains in the top 10 most viewed pages across all of Wikipedia, and why we excluded it from the 2023 topviews report.
 * Page Information says 9 views in the last 30 days – that's the talk page. The subject page shows the correct pageviews count. The minor discrepancy with Pageviews Analysis is due to doing 30 days inclusive versus not, which I will fix at some point. &mdash; MusikAnimal  talk  22:02, 28 February 2024 (UTC)
 * According to something or another I read recently, Cleopatra specifically is our app. :) Izno (talk) 22:27, 28 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Cleopatra is Google Assistant. Talk:Cleopatra/Archive 5 says: it is one of the Google Assistant's suggested voice searches. When you press the assistant button on an Android, it might give you a prompt saying "Try saying: Show me Cleopatra on Wikipedia". PrimeHunter (talk) 00:30, 29 February 2024 (UTC)
 * The |Tarrare Mobile App reads are quite a bit lower than the |Tarrare Desktop ones, but the |Tarrare Mobile Web ones are again quite high. Using Tarrare as a comparison since that's indeed a meme. Is there a way to track down which bot might be producing the anomaly? Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 07:55, 29 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Upon further review, I've found one reference to Takahe in phab:T264455 by that correlates with |Gobi_Desert a spike in reader numbers ... but then they dropped off until 26 February 2021 where they rose again and remained high since. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 08:07, 29 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Made a Phabricator task and added a few more details. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 09:35, 1 March 2024 (UTC)

Possibly unrelated, but I found another odd set of statistics for Well he would, wouldn't he?, which has one day of intensive reading. Certes (talk) 13:43, 29 February 2024 (UTC)


 * No, that page just showed up on DYK on that day, see Recent additions. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 17:22, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

Overview
Global login leads to duplicate accounts for users who edit different sites like wikipedia or wikivoyage. I think we can improve this experience with better duplicate account prevention when creating accounts on sites.

In my case, i had a 6 year old wikipedia login, and later created a wikivoyage login. (my password manager only detects existing logins based on the login screen domain, which varies for wikimedia sites). Using the Wikivoyage login on WP did not warn me of account duplication.

We could add an interstitial during site-level account creation to check for a global account first. Also added branding on each site to inform users of network branding and how the login works across all Wikipedia sites.

Test case

 * STEPS TO REPEAT
 * 1) (in browser A) create account on WP
 * 2) (in browser B) create account on Wikivoyage
 * 3) (in browser B) edit articles on WP
 * 4) (in browser A) edit articles on Wikivoyage

User now has 2 accounts
 * ACTUAL RESULTS

Better education, notification and prevention of duplicate account creation. <small style="border:2px solid;border-radius:4px;padding:0 4px">Tonymetz 💬  23:21, 29 February 2024 (UTC)
 * EXPECTED RESULTS
 * "we" (the editors of the English Wikipedia) can't really do anything about this. However, you may file a feature request at phabricator and then advertise your task to gain support for your idea. — xaosflux  Talk 00:02, 1 March 2024 (UTC)
 * thanks for that <small style="border:2px solid;border-radius:4px;padding:0 4px">Tonymetz 💬  00:34, 1 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I entered a bug and thank you for the guidance.
 * Are the login pages Wikipedia pages (ie editable)?
 * Improved network branding would go a long way without any technical changes. <small style="border:2px solid;border-radius:4px;padding:0 4px">Tonymetz 💬  16:13, 1 March 2024 (UTC)
 * The top of Special:CreateAccount displays MediaWiki:Signupstart which can be created and edited by local Wikipedia administrators. We don't currently have a message there so we display the default MediaWiki message which is blank. See commons:MediaWiki:Signupstart for a message used at commons:Special:CreateAccount. The bottom displays MediaWiki:Signupend-https which is also blank. I don't know why the message has "https" in the name but I assume we could use the message for anything. I have never heard your complaint before so I guess it annoys few users. PrimeHunter (talk) 18:54, 1 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Huh? That's exactly how global accounts work. Each username belongs to a single Wikimedia user. Your global account information shows exactly what I would expect (i.e. both English Wikipedia and English Wikivoyage edits). If you wanted a completely different username on Wikivoyage (which isn't normally how things work here), you would have to create a separate (global) account. Graham87 (talk) 08:25, 1 March 2024 (UTC)
 * try to see it from a new user’s perspective who doesn’t know “global accounts”. They are just editing Wikipedia, wikivoyage etc from various devices. <small style="border:2px solid;border-radius:4px;padding:0 4px">Tonymetz 💬  16:04, 1 March 2024 (UTC)
 * If you have created a username at Wikipedia then you cannot create the same username at Wikivoyage but have to log in to the existing account to use that name. I guess you refer to a scenario where somebody creates another username at Wikivoyage without knowing that their Wikipedia account also works there. Do you want Special:CreateAccount at Wikimedia projects to list other Wikimedia projects and say that if you already have an account at one of them then you can use it without creating a new account? PrimeHunter (talk) 15:57, 1 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Yep that would help. Presently, there’s nothing on Wikivoyage that indicates their Wikipedia account works there.
 * Test out the login experience in incognito/private mode across multiple browsers and you will see what i mean. <small style="border:2px solid;border-radius:4px;padding:0 4px">Tonymetz 💬  16:11, 1 March 2024 (UTC)

QR code
Today, on mobile Wikipedia I saw an option to "download QR code", apparently it is available on every page (including user-pages). I haven't downloaded any, but what is the purpose of them? If it is just some sort of link, then is it really worth it? One can get the option to download it from the three dot menu. —usernamekiran (talk) 18:58, 1 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Apparently a bunch of people wanted it built in. It just makes a page link you can share elsewhere. You can also use Special:QRCode to produce the same. — xaosflux  Talk 19:09, 1 March 2024 (UTC)

Annoying language box user interface bug
Hello, I would like to complain about the language link box in the Wikipedia user interface in our new theme. When I click on it, I get a list of languages, but often just as I am pressing the language I want, the the languages jump down a line so that I inadvertently press the wrong language. Annoying. This leads me to the article in a language I don't understand. The reason for this is the "Missing in xxx and more" line that pops up in a delayed fashion at top. Presumably this line pops up because I am translator at Wikipedia, or has multiple languages listed at Wikidata. It also seems I sometimes get listed a language in the top simply because I have visited a Wikipedia page in that language. I don't know. But this feature/bug has been an annoyance for around a year now, and I'm surprised it hasn't been fixed yet (maybe no one has reported it?). I can't be the only one fed up about this. Proposal for solution: Make the place for this suggestion line at the top load from the beginning, so that the lines below don't move when it finally has loaded all the info. Sauer202 (talk) 17:41, 1 March 2024 (UTC)
 * The "Missing in" line is a feature of "Content Translation" at Special:Preferences. There is a "Discussion" link to mw:Talk:Content translation. The line will disappear if you disable the feature. PrimeHunter (talk) 19:45, 1 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the link. Are you suggesting that I open a similar discussion at mw:Talk:Content translation? I do not want to disable the feature, as I use it a lot. But I do want it to not function in such a crikey "pop-up-like" manner like it does now, it drives me insane. Bad user design, to say the least. It says "279,039 users are trying this feature." Sauer202 (talk) 19:59, 1 March 2024 (UTC)
 * The tool is used at many wikis. Discuss it at mw:Talk:Content translation if you want developers of the tool to hear it. The page says "Please provide feedback about the Content translation tool on this page." You can hide the "Missing in" line for yourself with this in, or meta:Special:MyPage/global.css to hide it at all wikis:
 * I don't know a way to keep the line but avoid the jumping. PrimeHunter (talk) 20:23, 1 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I don't know a way to keep the line but avoid the jumping. PrimeHunter (talk) 20:23, 1 March 2024 (UTC)


 * Thanks again, I have started a topic at mediawiki and will take it from there. Sauer202 (talk) 18:41, 2 March 2024 (UTC)

Maybe watchlist notices should use a pseudo element for brackets instead of putting them in
I think that, just like how V22's "hide" button used to look like before Zebra, the "dismiss" button in MediaWiki:Gadget-watchlist-notice-core.js should use the CSS pseudo-elements to display the brackets instead of putting it into the text, somewhat like this: This way, users could customize what the button looks like more. I could try and hack the code to do this myself, but I'm just asking if there's a good reason that this hasn't been done yet. Aaron Liu (talk) 23:07, 1 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Also, the dismissButton should be a button instead of a link, also like V22 did. Aaron Liu  (talk) 20:06, 2 March 2024 (UTC)
 * turn of the gadgets manually, add all this to your commons script files, then test it - in each skin - if nothing breaks feel free to open an edit request. — xaosflux  Talk 22:26, 2 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Okay, I didn't realize that was a way I could test it! I'll try this later. Aaron Liu  (talk) 22:27, 2 March 2024 (UTC)

Subtitle and jQuery
I have a script that adds a subtitle using mw.util.addSubtitle. I am currently trying to update it so that on the press of a button, it can change its own contents. Here are the approaches I've thought of:
 * 1) addSubtitle a jQuery object (which is a variable I'll declare beforehand) and use jQuery methods to update the contents.
 * 2) * This doesn't work because addSubtitle does not accept jQuery objects for whatever reason, nor does it return some sort of object that can be used to modify the existing subtitle we've added.
 * 3) Query the page for the ID of the subtitle I've added and change that.
 * 4) * This'd probably work, but when I implement it using jQuery, WMF's ESLint config warms me to "Avoid queries which search the entire DOM. Keep DOM nodes in memory where possible." Weirdly, a vanilla JS implementation doesn't give me any warnings.

Are there better ways that are eluding me, or should I just run with the second approach as my script doesn't constantly update? Aaron Liu (talk) 22:32, 2 March 2024 (UTC)
 * You can just pass the DOM object, as in  Nardog (talk) 22:53, 2 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Well, I don't think that'd work, as the button to update the subtitle is somewhere inside the subtitle (which is mostly untagged text) and I want it to update the entire subtitle instead of just the button Aaron Liu  (talk) 23:04, 2 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Then wrap the text in an element and keep a reference to it.  Nardog (talk) 23:24, 2 March 2024 (UTC)
 * As I've said when discussing my approach #1, addSubtitle does not accept jQuery objects: "Argument 1 does not implement interface Node.". Aaron Liu  (talk) 23:31, 2 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Notice . A jQuery object is just a container for a DOM element (or any object(s) for that matter, like an array), and you can access whatever it contains via bracket notation or .get. Nardog (talk) 23:35, 2 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Interesting, thanks. I did a bit more testing and just adding [0] right before the rpar seems promising for my approach #1. Thanks again! Aaron Liu  (talk) 23:43, 2 March 2024 (UTC)

Switching between mobile and desktop loses the section/anchor part of the URL
I don't know the real name of it. I am referring to the part of the URL that starts with the # and links jumps to a section of that name on a page. This part of the URL is getting lost when switching between desktop and mobile view, and vice-versa.

For example, I am visiting desktop view of the Help Desk at a specific section: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Help_desk#Removing_entries_from_%22Suggested_languages%22

I scroll to the bottom of the page, and choose to switch to the mobile view of this page. It takes me here: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Help_desk

But, I expected it to take me here: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Help_desk#Removing_entries_from_%22Suggested_languages%22

I don't know if this has previously worked. The behavior is the same desktop to mobile or from mobile to desktop.

It seems weird for it to be intentional. Why not keep the section/anchor part of the URL so that you end up in the same place on the same page? Otherwise you end up at the top of the page and then have to hunt for the section you want. Fine for small pages. For long pages with lots of sections such as the Teahouse or AN/I, its not great.

Is this a bug?

RudolfRed (talk) 04:01, 1 March 2024 (UTC)


 * The anchor is only known to the browser, not the server. Therefore in plain HTML you cannot preserve it. It requires Javascript to read out the anchor and add it to the link, but this too might be problematic, as you might have scrolled away significantly from that point in the page, so the value of such a javascript correction is pretty limited and might be more confusing even than the current behaviour of simply forgetting the anchor. It has always been like this. —Th e DJ (talk • contribs) 08:28, 1 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the information and the reply. RudolfRed (talk) 02:36, 2 March 2024 (UTC)
 * The part after the hash is properly termed the "URI fragment", see also 3986. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 10:35, 3 March 2024 (UTC)

Documentation for SSH
When I am on Toolforge, where I intend to work on a bot, it asks me to "Add your SSH public key". I am about to do that. It continues "See the help documentation for more information on how to generate and upload your public SSH key." When I click the link the help documentation, it goes to https://wikitech.wikimedia.org/wiki/Obsolete:Toolforge/Access#Generating_and_uploading_an_SSH_key. Is that correct? Should it say "Obsolete"? --David Tornheim (talk) 22:18, 26 February 2024 (UTC) PAGE ]]) 19:48, 27 February 2024 (UTC) PAGE ]]) 01:32, 28 February 2024 (UTC) PAGE ]]) 18:31, 3 March 2024 (UTC)
 * That's an outdated link. wikitech:Help:Toolforge/Quickstart has the steps for SSH login. – SD0001  (talk) 18:07, 27 February 2024 (UTC)
 * I think wikitech:Help:SSH is the correct updated link. --Ahecht ([[User talk:Ahecht|<span style="color:#FFF;background:#04A;display:inline-block;padding:1px;vertical-align:-.3em;font:bold 50%/1 sans-serif;text-align:center">TALK
 * Ahecht, not sure why this would need a phab ticket? I've changed the redirect target.<span id="Qwerfjkl:1709067546226:WikipediaFTTCLNVillage_pump_(technical)" class="FTTCmt"> — Qwerfjkl  talk  20:59, 27 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Ignore that last comment, clearly I misread.<span id="Qwerfjkl:1709067607146:WikipediaFTTCLNVillage_pump_(technical)" class="FTTCmt"> — Qwerfjkl  talk  21:00, 27 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks. For some reason, changed it back.  I am just as confused as when I first posted! --David Tornheim (talk) 00:40, 28 February 2024 (UTC)
 * The redirect was correct before Qwerfjkl changed it. It's the link on the toolforge page itself that needs to be updated. --Ahecht ([[User talk:Ahecht|<span style="color:#FFF;background:#04A;display:inline-block;padding:1px;vertical-align:-.3em;font:bold 50%/1 sans-serif;text-align:center">TALK
 * Okay. So should I just work under the assumption that the link should go to wikitech:Help:Toolforge/Quickstart rather than to the obsolete page? --David Tornheim (talk) 02:32, 28 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Could you answer my question immediately above? This page still links to the "obsolete" page.  Is there anyone who has the authority to correct it?   I would rather do things the right way the first time, and it would be nice if new users who follow me don't end up being just as confused by being led to "obsolete" documentation.  --David Tornheim (talk) 22:33, 1 March 2024 (UTC)
 * @David Tornheim see . They're working on it. --Ahecht ([[User talk:Ahecht|<span style="color:#FFF;background:#04A;display:inline-block;padding:1px;vertical-align:-.3em;font:bold 50%/1 sans-serif;text-align:center">TALK

Thanks. So while I was waiting to hear back, I went forward with wikitech:Help:Toolforge/Quickstart, and installed OpenSSH per the instructions there, and then followed these instructions and added a key prefaced with "ed25519". The instructions in point to, which say I should instead install GitBash and use a key prefaced with "rsa". Should I do that instead, or will it be helpful to have both OpenSSH and GitBash? --David Tornheim (talk) 19:44, 3 March 2024 (UTC)
 * David Tornheim, I've generated keys with both PuttY and GitBash. Both of those I did using "rsa", though I'm not sure if it actually matters. I found this on stackexchange.<span id="Qwerfjkl:1709501100300:WikipediaFTTCLNVillage_pump_(technical)" class="FTTCmt"> — Qwerfjkl  talk  21:25, 3 March 2024 (UTC)

Strange bug causing crashing /refreshing
Hello all, I have been experiencing a strange bug as of recently, where sometimes, seemingly completely random as of now, the Wikipedia site only allows me to delete or add 1 single character at a time when editing, and if I try to add or delete more, the site seemingly crashes and reloads automatically, undoing my edits and thus erasing any progress I made. Same thing also can happen when editing my own user page. Very, very frustrating. Any tips would be greatly appreciated. I am using a mobile Android phone. I was told to post here after posting this same request on the help desk. LoneWolf803 (talk) 20:14, 22 February 2024 (UTC)


 * Judging from the tags, I assume you're talking about the mobile web site (en.m.wikipedia.org), not the app, correct? What version of what browser are you using? What keyboard app (e.g. Gboard) are you using to add and delete characters?
 * Does it typically happen after the editing page has been open for a while, or as soon as you start editing? Nardog (talk) 22:46, 22 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks for your reply, correct, I am using the website not the app. I’m using the latest version (121.0.6167.178) (as far as I know, I’m 99% sure but I’ll double check and update this reply if otherwise) of Google Chrome. I tried using Firefox as well and had the exact same issue. And yes I am using the latest version of Gboard (again I’ll double check but I’m almost positive I updated to the latest). Never had an issue with Gboard before either. I also tried clearing cache to no avail. It happens seemingly randomly like I said. Sometimes it’s when I just start editing a page (for the first time even), sometimes when I’ve had it open for a while. Seems to be no pattern to speak of from what I’ve seen. Should I try deleting and re downloading my browser apps? Thanks again. LoneWolf803 (talk) 00:54, 23 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Hello, are you still available? LoneWolf803 (talk) 20:45, 24 February 2024 (UTC)
 * If it's only happening on Wikipedia, I doubt reinstalling the apps would help you. With no one else corroborating it's difficult to pin down what's happening, but you can report it on Phabricator.
 * What do you mean, by the way, to try to add or delete more [than one character at a time]? AFAIK you can't add or delete more than one character at a time with mobile keyboards, unless you're pasting something from the clipboard or you've selected a string. Exactly what action causes the page to reload? Nardog (talk) 23:25, 24 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Sorry, I didn’t get the notification for this reply until today for some reason. And what I mean by being only able to add or delete one character at a time (I should’ve been more clear about this) is that I can only add or delete one character at a time and then have to publish the edit or else it will crash and automatically reload the page. It just happened again. LoneWolf803 (talk) 06:50, 28 February 2024 (UTC)
 * @LoneWolf803 bug or not, please don't power through such a problem, it makes (as you've pointed out) dozens of edits - a quick ctrl+f search of your last 500 contributions shows that 292 were +1 or -1 length changes, if all of those were for this reason then that's way too many edits.
 * It also, along with the other 254 edits you have done to your own user page (the other 206 user page edits were +1 or -1, so presumably this bug), breaks the intended way that the automatic extended confirmed access right is supposed to work. – 2804:F14:80E5:6B01:F969:B861:B7FB:B942 (talk) 08:40, 28 February 2024 (UTC)
 * I am sorry. Yes of course all my +1 and -1 edits are due to this infuriating bug. I can’t help it. I am doing my best to get this bug resolved and was trying to demonstrate here what it is to try and attain a fix for it faster. Going forward, I will not make anymore edits if the bug occurs (like right now of course it is not) and will just have to wait it out I suppose. As I said, when I have time I will post on the other help page that was suggested. Thanks. LoneWolf803 (talk) 08:42, 28 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Bug? A number of people have reported issues of a similar nature with GBoard, with different applications. Possibly misbehaved app interactions? Sometimes phones just need rebuilds (like mine does now, it just locks and restarts around twice a day). Are you using WiFi or a cell site (direct)? Perhaps, if WiFi try a different device and try to replicate and remove your network as a possible issue?  Neils51 (talk) 23:58, 3 March 2024 (UTC)

Use API to mark watchlist item as read
Is there a way I can use JavaScript to mark a specific watchlist item as read? I've tried inspecting the event triggers of the mark-as-read button, but it references another function and I can't find which script file it comes from Aaron Liu  (talk) 13:15, 29 February 2024 (UTC)


 * You can use action=setnotificationtimestamp. This updates the underlying wl_notificationtimestamp column of the watchlist table. Omitting the timestamp parameters will cause the field to be set to NULL, resetting the notification status. If you are only specifying one page and don't want to mark any revisions newer than a specific one as read, you can use the newerthanrevid parameter, and MediaWiki will determine which timestamp should be used. PleaseStand (talk) 15:37, 29 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Wow, thanks! So if it's set to null, it's marked as read? Aaron Liu  (talk) 15:47, 29 February 2024 (UTC)
 * @PleaseStand I assume for log-type entries (e.g. blocked user, reviewed page...) one should set to-revid to the logid? Aaron Liu  (talk) 13:41, 2 March 2024 (UTC)
 * No, rev_id and log_id are different auto-incrementing sequences. For example, log_id=160348009 is a log entry for the creation of a category talk page today, while rev_id=160348009 is the first revision of a user talk page from 2007. The simplest option would be to just leave it out and only specify the page title, so the column is set to NULL. The drawback is that all existing recentchanges records for the title would be considered to be "seen", even ones that were for revisions or logged actions that happened in the meantime. If that's not good enough, use the timestamp parameter, but try to make sure that the timestamp is greater than (not equal to) that of the seen log entry, and that you aren't unintentionally setting it backward (especially because this could cause false "updated since your last visit" markers to appear on history pages). PleaseStand (talk) 23:20, 2 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Okay, I have a better understanding on what that API action actually does now. Thanks. Aaron Liu  (talk) 23:29, 2 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Omitting doesn't seem to entirely work. I tried, and afterwards the item still had a filled blue circle in my watchlist and visiting the history page still marks things "updated since your last visit".  Aaron Liu  (talk) 01:45, 4 March 2024 (UTC)

What Cookies are Used to Maintain Login
I have an extension that I use that allows me to automatically delete cookies from a webpage a few minutes after I close it. I would like to whitelist the cookies that Wikipedia uses to remember that I am logged in, so I don't need to log in each time I visit the site, but Help:Logging_in does not list which cookies are used to remember login.

Which ones should I whitelist? Cmdrraimus (talk) 03:03, 4 March 2024 (UTC)


 * @Cmdrraimus: All cookies starting with,  , and   are used for login. Cookies starting with   are used to prevent excess login notifications. For more information, see wmf:Policy:Cookie statement AntiCompositeNumber (talk) 03:11, 4 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Its not just one or two I need to allow, but a whole set of them. Seems a bit odd, but thanks. That should do it. Cmdrraimus (talk) 03:13, 4 March 2024 (UTC)

Outdent mobile vs desktop
Outdent appears to line up correctly in desktop view, but is misaligned in mobile view.
 * This line is indented by beginning with 12 colons.
 * This line begins with :, so it is indented one stop and preceded by a lines to show the change in indent from 12 to 1.

The lines match up correctly in desktop view, with the upward line corresponding to 12 indents and the downward line corresponding to 1 indent. However, in mobile view, the upward line is indented too far. YBG (talk) 18:18, 2 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Many other examples can be seen on them outdent documentation page. YBG (talk) 19:33, 2 March 2024 (UTC)
 * it's because people keep making assumptions that what works in one skin, also works in other skins. I wouldn't use outdent at all honestly. —Th e DJ (talk • contribs) 11:54, 3 March 2024 (UTC)
 * @TheDJ a couple of questions.
 * By people keep making assumptions, are you talking about template developers or template users? Or something else?
 * You say that you wouldn’t use outdent at all. I’m interested to know what you would do when a threaded discussion gets 12 levels deep? Would you Outdent without using the template? Or would you continue indenting more and more?
 * Just wondering —— YBG (talk) 23:16, 3 March 2024 (UTC)
 * YBG, not TheDJ, but there's outdent2.<span id="Qwerfjkl:1709536581331:WikipediaFTTCLNVillage_pump_(technical)" class="FTTCmt"> — Qwerfjkl  talk  07:16, 4 March 2024 (UTC)

Tech News: 2024-10
<section begin="technews-2024-W10"/> Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes
 * The <bdi lang="zxx" dir="ltr"> page (as well as the associated "Create a book" functionality) provided by the old Collection extension has been removed from all Wikisource wikis, as it was broken. This does not affect the ability to download normal books, which is provided by the Wikisource extension.
 * Wikitech now uses the next-generation Parsoid wikitext parser by default to generate all pages in the Talk namespace. Report any problems on the Known Issues discussion page. You can use the ParserMigration extension to control the use of Parsoid; see the ParserMigration help documentation for more details.
 * Maintenance on etherpad is completed. If you encounter any issues, please indicate in this ticket.
 * Octicons-tools.svg Gadgets allow interface admins to create custom features with CSS and JavaScript. The <bdi lang="zxx" dir="ltr"> and <bdi lang="zxx" dir="ltr"> namespaces and <bdi lang="zxx" dir="ltr"> user right were reserved for an experiment in 2015, but were never used. These were visible on Special:Search and Special:ListGroupRights. The unused namespaces and user rights are now removed. No pages are moved, and no changes need to be made.
 * A usability improvement to the "Add a citation" in Wikipedia workflow has been made, the insert button was moved to the popup header.

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

Future changes
 * All wikis will be read-only for a few minutes on March 20. This is planned at 14:00 UTC. More information will be published in Tech News and will also be posted on individual wikis in the coming weeks.
 * The HTML markup of headings and section edit links will be changed later this year to improve accessibility. See Heading HTML changes for details. The new markup will be the same as in the new Parsoid wikitext parser. You can test your gadget or stylesheet with the new markup if you add <bdi lang="zxx" dir="ltr"> to your URL (more info) or turn on Parsoid read views in your user options (more info).

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe. <section end="technews-2024-W10"/>

MediaWiki message delivery 19:45, 4 March 2024 (UTC)

Excessive indentation of block quotations
I've noticed in recent weeks that elements have gained additional indentation, which is a terrible waste of space: "" doesn't have this issue, even though it uses internally:

This might only be on mobile, I haven't checked on desktop. Hairy Dude (talk) 11:46, 3 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Hairy Dude, those appear identical to me, on desktop.<span id="Qwerfjkl:1709466627739:WikipediaFTTCLNVillage_pump_(technical)" class="FTTCmt"> — Qwerfjkl  talk  11:50, 3 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Your screenshot shows they're not identical; the first has larger vertical margins. And Hairy Dude specifically said it's about the mobile interface. Nardog (talk) 11:53, 3 March 2024 (UTC)
 * So it does, 8px of padding apparently.<span id="Qwerfjkl:1709466978205:WikipediaFTTCLNVillage_pump_(technical)" class="FTTCmt"> — Qwerfjkl  talk  11:56, 3 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I tried to fiddle with Blockquote/styles.css to make the two renderings match, but it looks like I am doomed to never understand how CSS works. In any event, the OP wants less vertical space, not more, so that wouldn't really be a good fix. The MediaWiki developers have been messing with vertical space between elements recently, which might have something to do with this discrepancy. See and its predecessors. It appears that every time they change something, there are undesirable side effects. Their suite of test cases is probably not extensive enough. – Jonesey95 (talk) 16:19, 3 March 2024 (UTC)
 * the OP wants less vertical space That's clearly not what he wants, if you read his last paragraph. Nardog (talk) 00:20, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
 * What skin are you using? Izno (talk) 17:51, 3 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Presumably Minerva.<span id="Qwerfjkl:1709490308776:WikipediaFTTCLNVillage_pump_(technical)" class="FTTCmt"> — Qwerfjkl  talk  18:25, 3 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I'm seeing excess vertical space around the tag version in Vector 2022. Using the Inspector verifies that <blockquote ></blockquote> uses, applying   in the tag-only section, while the template applies   to   to the same tag. – Jonesey95 (talk) 18:50, 3 March 2024 (UTC)
 * If it's mobile, it's probably the same cause as . DLynch (WMF) (talk) 17:50, 4 March 2024 (UTC)

Other gallery template
Hi, is there an alternate gallery template which works like Random slideshow? Such template would be really useful for article I'm working on right now. Best regards Kazachstanski nygus (talk) 21:12, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Random slideshow images are not allowed in articles, I think. There is probably a guideline somewhere. If you want to show multiple images in a small space, <gallery ></gallery> tags are useful. See Help:Gallery tag for more information. – Jonesey95 (talk) 21:22, 5 March 2024 (UTC)

Toolforge tool/bot to send email notifications
As initially discussed here (and at phab) the ability for bot edits to trigger watchlist notifications via email has been disabled. The only suggestion provided (i.e. "we're not going to undo this") has been to create a toolforge tool to trigger these notifications. I do not have the knowledge or expertise to do so, hence a request for someone to do so, with (as suggested) the ability for users to input their watchlist key to trigger the tool. Primefac (talk) 12:11, 4 March 2024 (UTC)
 * And for what it's worth, I get why this was done, my parentheticals are more cheeky commentary than anything truly negative. Primefac (talk) 12:20, 4 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Just checking - your ask involves: (a) giving someone else your private watchlist token, and likely also your email address (b) have them watch your watchlist for you (c) have them send you emails about your watchlist changes? (And have them do this via a program that they will write, maintain, and operate - possibly with some screening/flood parameters)? — xaosflux  Talk 10:38, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
 * FWIW a COTS RSS->EMAIL service may be able to accomplish what you want via Syndication — xaosflux  Talk 10:49, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Oh, so I can give someone else my watchlist token that isn't even involved with Wikipedia... Primefac (talk) 12:33, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Unfortunately, yes. There are some commercial services that do that - so the benefit would be that it could be ready to go and likely has ongoing support. — xaosflux  Talk 14:05, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Yes, that is exactly what was suggested. In the meantime, I suggested creating a tool in toolforge to do the work for you, you could potentially create a generalized one that users could "sign up" by providing their watchlist token. So one person would need to create and maintain the tool and others could just use it (and don't need to re-invent the wheel). Please don't insinuate that I am being unreasonable when I am simply asking for what I was told to ask for. Primefac (talk) 12:33, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I don't think you have an unreasonable ask, just trying to outline all of the components for anyone that wants to take this up. For example, filtering parameters may be useful if you still want to use on-wiki email relay for non-bot flagged items. — xaosflux  Talk 14:07, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Fair enough, my apologies for the tone. Primefac (talk) 14:15, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
 * As an short-term solution, you could use the PageProbe extension in Firefox, or try to find something similar. The main problem with it is that it can not deal with an full watchlist, if something goes off your watchlist while you have not taken a look it is gone. It can check the watchlist however often you want (do not go under 10 seconds). You right click the first item in your watchlist, select "track content" and edit the tracker to your liking. It takes some time to get right, but works on it's own when you are satisfied with it. It will show up with it's icon and the number 1 when your watchlist has updated. The extension will only check your watchlist while your browser window is open and your computer on. Once your watchlist is updated open both the extension to clear the counter and your watchlist. Snævar (talk) 22:06, 5 March 2024 (UTC)

What makes Visual Editor not generate ref names?
I've started using User talk:Nardog/RefRenamer, but it only works on refs that already have names. Surprisingly, many of mine don't. For example, in Special:Diff/1209797986, I used VE to add a ref, but the generated   tag didn't get a   attribute. What did I do to VE to make it not like me? RoySmith (talk) 15:45, 5 March 2024 (UTC)


 * RefRenamer is a great/fun tool (though I wonder how much churn it will create as users continue to re rename based on personal preference). To your point, the example Diff has only a single instance. Generally it's a good idea not to use ref names when there is no reason. Wait for future editors if they need it (in most cases they never will). One might say you are being prepared, but really it clutters the article, adds complexity, and is one more thing to deal with (name conflicts etc). In fact, RefRenamer even defaults to removing ref names that are singular. There might be a rule or guideline somewhere. As for VE, I don't know, maybe it's built-in to not add ref names for single refs. -- Green  C  16:01, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
 * VE developers didn't spend any time on this issue at development. The only rationale I can ascertain was the general "source editing will be a thing of the past so we don't have to care about certain qualities", well-named references being one of those qualities. There was a community wishlist item on the point that scored highly that went nowhere. Izno (talk) 16:35, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Why should it be named if it's used only once? Nardog (talk) 01:17, 6 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Agree with ; if it doesn't have one, it doesn't need one. That said, nobody is stopping you from optionally adding refnames directly to the citations. Also, iirc RefRenamer does permit you to add a name to a ref that is unnamed; it isn't the default option, but it allows you to add unnamed refs to the activity table from the list of other refs in the article, and from there you can supply a name. At least, that's what I recall. Mathglot (talk) 01:34, 6 March 2024 (UTC)
 * It does allow you to optionally rename refs whose names were not autogenerated, but it currently doesn't support adding names to refs that aren't named at all. Nardog (talk) 01:37, 6 March 2024 (UTC)

Speech synthesizer access to Wikipedia articles for the visually impaired
A user suggested that Wikipedia pages should include a link to a spoken version of the page. Speech synthesis is sufficiently inexpensve these days that I think the Wikimedia Foundation should investigate the possibility. @JoshuaSzafranowicz created a draft article, Draft:My suggestion is to add a voice box type of allowance to read off all articles to the user. That was the wrong way to make the suggestion, so I am adding it here and pinging the user. Eastmain (talk • contribs) 17:53, 5 March 2024 (UTC)

PAGE ]]) 18:18, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Most visually impaired people that need it will already have screen reader software available on their device. I don't see any advantage to doing it server-side. --Ahecht ([[User talk:Ahecht|<span style="color:#FFF;background:#04A;display:inline-block;padding:1px;vertical-align:-.3em;font:bold 50%/1 sans-serif;text-align:center">TALK
 * The closest thing we have to that is Phonos, but it can not deal with anything close to an full article. See mw:Help:Extension:Phonos for instructions. See also c:Category:Spoken Wikipedia - English for audio files of old versions of English Wikipedia articles. I do agree tho that an voice box for an full article on Wikipedia itself is not necessary. Snævar (talk) 22:21, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
 * As a screen reader user, I completely agree with the replies to this thread. Graham87 (talk) 02:53, 6 March 2024 (UTC)

Wikidata error
Gangari dialect is showing "" I don't know how long the error has been there (I haven't check Category:Pages with script errors for a while). Module:Endangered Languages Project has recently been edited by but I'm pretty sure there is no problem there. Stumbling around, it seems the problem is that for, the first property in has no   field. That first property is. The module should not die if  is missing and something could be added to avoid that, but I'm wondering why the problem has arisen. Any ideas? Johnuniq (talk) 04:11, 6 March 2024 (UTC)


 * Temporarily fixed but code needs improvements &mdash; Martin (MSGJ · talk) 04:30, 6 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks, I would never have thought of that change at . I might look at patching the module later but it uglifies the code when trying to handle all of Wikidata's quirks. Johnuniq (talk) 05:27, 6 March 2024 (UTC)
 * It's something that's caught me out before! Lua throws a wobbly if you try to access a.b.c unless you first check that a.b exists, and before that to check that a exists. I'll take a look later &mdash; Martin (MSGJ · talk) 08:39, 6 March 2024 (UTC)

Should be fixed now. Just a bit surprised that (a) this issue has never occurred before and (b) RexxS made this mistake at all! &mdash; Martin (MSGJ · talk) 10:22, 6 March 2024 (UTC)

Weird issue where Vector 2022 is being forced on a single page.
So I use desktop Vector 2010 on mobile, and have a global preference set to enforce it. But when I go to Sockpuppet investigations/PaullyMatthews ( I was checking back on a report I made ) I get Vector 2022 forced. I can't find any reason why this page is forcing Vector 2022 (it's archive is doing the same). No other pages are effected, not even other SPI pages. -- LCU A ctively D isinterested  «@» °∆t° 22:40, 22 February 2024 (UTC)
 * I also saw that, and also on some other SPI pages. I'll bet it was a WP:THURSDAY feature. I've refreshed and purged a few times and it seems to have now gone (for me anyway). -- zzuuzz (talk) 22:50, 22 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Probably not, this has been happening to pages translcuding special pages (PrefixIndex in this case). See /Archive 210#One page looks like Wikipedia does now. Nardog (talk) 22:54, 22 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Force-refreshing the SPI page has fixed it for me. This wasn't the first time; I recall some other time that an editor at VPT found Vector22 being forced and the link to it caused me to see it as well. SWinxy (talk) 04:53, 23 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Happening on Module:RoundN too. SWinxy (talk) 02:50, 25 February 2024 (UTC)
 * I get Vector 2022 instead of my preferred Monobook on Featured article candidates/Dorothy Olsen/archive1, three times out of four reloads. —Kusma (talk) 23:00, 22 February 2024 (UTC)
 * If I purge the archives and refresh I get the proper skin, but if I refresh again it's back to 2022. -- LCU A ctively D isinterested  «@» °∆t° 23:10, 22 February 2024 (UTC)
 * I'll just add that I've seen the same thing RoySmith (talk) 23:44, 22 February 2024 (UTC)
 * @STei (WMF) I'm guessing this may be related to the Edit Recovery feature you rolled out earlier today. RoySmith (talk) 00:36, 23 February 2024 (UTC)
 * I also have it on Sockpuppet investigations/PaullyMatthews (my default skin in Vector2010). But a hard refresh fixed it, and presumably hardest refresh would do the trick too. 🌺 Cremastra (talk) 00:57, 23 February 2024 (UTC)
 * I've purged and refreshed the page, still the same problem. I'm using the desktop site on mobile, so the hardest refresh isn't an option (and why Vector 2022 is so very thoroughly broken for my purposes). -- LCU A ctively D isinterested  «@» °∆t° 02:25, 23 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Wow, this is bizarre. I'm now getting V22 on Sockpuppet investigations/PaullyMatthews and Featured article candidates/Dorothy Olsen/archive1!  Looks like it's somehow sticky to those pages. RoySmith (talk) 02:34, 23 February 2024 (UTC)
 * I'm working my way through all the FAC pages listed at WP:FAC. So far, it's pretty repeatable that each /archive1 page I open up, it opens in V22.  Doesn't seem to matter if it's a FAC I've ever looked at or not.  Some unreproducible number of page reloads eventually gets me to the non-V22 version. RoySmith (talk) 02:57, 23 February 2024 (UTC)
 * I noticed this at Articles for deletion/¡Tchkung! (2nd nomination). Extraordinary Writ (talk) 06:52, 23 February 2024 (UTC)
 * I likewise have the issue on this page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Log/2024_February_24 Cortador (talk) 19:08, 24 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Can confirm I'm having this problem on certain random pages, all under the Wikipedia namespace (mostly AFDs and SPIs), and it usually goes away when I refresh. I also have Vector 2010 as default.  Liliana UwU  (talk / contributions) 02:44, 25 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Late, but I have also been getting this once every few weeks for the last year or so -- one page (sometimes an article, sometimes a template, sometimes a userpage) will just randomly become obsessed with being in Vector 22 regardless of my own settings, CSS, et cetera. It is quite disruptive. <b style="font-family: monospace; color:#E35BD8"><b style="color:#029D74">jp</b>×<b style="color: #029D74">g</b>🗯️</b> 09:36, 7 March 2024 (UTC)

Wrong skin on just one page
I use the "Vector legacy (2010)" skin and all pages display as they should. Except one: WikiProject Canoeing and Kayaking. This page displays using the new Vector skin. Why? — GhostInTheMachine talk to me 09:49, 23 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Yep, I see it — GhostInTheMachine talk to me 09:52, 23 February 2024 (UTC)
 * It's a bunch of pages, upstream regression. — xaosflux  Talk 15:35, 23 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Yeah, but this one doesn't fit the pattern of transcluding Special:Prefixindex (which typically happens on sub-pages to create the back-link header). @GhostInTheMachine is this reproducible for you? RoySmith (talk) 15:50, 23 February 2024 (UTC)
 * @RoySmith that page does indeed transclude prefixindex, it is in the navbox. — xaosflux  Talk 15:56, 23 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Ah, interesting. So now I'm wondering why I can't reproduce the problem on that page :-) RoySmith (talk) 16:11, 23 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Oh, now I just got it in V2022. Weird. RoySmith (talk) 16:16, 23 February 2024 (UTC)
 * The page is still being evil ... — Preceding unsigned comment added by GhostInTheMachine (talk • contribs) 17:00, 23 February 2024 (UTC)
 * I get the wrong skin on a number of module pages, but not all. Ones with the wrong skin include Module:Clade, Module:Biota infobox and  Module:Goalscorers, but  Module:Taxonbar and Module:Autotaxobox shows with the skin in my preferences (MonoBook). — <span style="font-family:Arial;background:#d6ffe6;border:solid 1px;border-radius:5px;box-shadow:darkcyan 0px 1px 1px;"> Jts1882 &#124; talk 17:37, 23 February 2024 (UTC)
 * For me the first three also appear in the wrong skin, but the last two don't. It will be interesting to learn what's causing this. -- LCU A ctively D isinterested  «@» °∆t° 18:45, 23 February 2024 (UTC)

I've got the same issues as the people above but also with Articles for deletion/Log/2024 February 23. It seems to resolve for a bit if I changed to the new skin and back in a different tab and refresh, but it reverts to the issue later. Shaws username. talk. 22:00, 23 February 2024 (UTC)


 * I also stumbled across this - a random selection of AfD date pages appear in Vector 2022 for me. This RfA is in V2022, but this one appears in V2010. Bizarre! —Ganesha811 (talk) 15:48, 24 February 2024 (UTC)


 * Same, but some logs don't have the issue. Glad it's not my system. Star   Mississippi  18:09, 24 February 2024 (UTC)

Shifting "skins"
Sorry if this has been brought up already but I do a lot of work on AFD daily log pages and they keep shifting skins. The layout can even change when I refresh the page. The view I don't want is a small middle column and two wide columns on either side. I'm used to the old view with a large middle column that has the majority of content and a top menu and only a right-hand side columns. There was a message at the top of a page that mentioned XFD discussion so I uninstalled that feature but it hasn't changed things for me. I have a week of AFD daily logs open in tabs and about 5 pages have the old view and 3 pages have the alternate view. Refreshing the page helped this morning (the view would switch back) but that doesn't work any longer. I've looked at my Preferences but nothing has changed there, still Vector Legacy.

It's strange how the layout of content really affects how I work and I find this new view, with tons of white space, off-putting. Any ideas how I can return things to normal for all AFD daily log pages? Thanks for any suggestions. Liz <sup style="font-family: Times New Roman; color: #006400;">Read! Talk! 05:19, 24 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Sounds like the same problem as Village_pump_(technical) Where there are some cases where a page will use the new skin instead of the user's preferred skin.  Or is this a different problem you are seeing? RudolfRed (talk) 06:02, 24 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Well, Articles for deletion/Log/2024 February 17 was one particular page that just kept showing the alternate, white space skin (I should really learn their names). I did find I could hide the right-hand side menu which helped. But I just refreshed this page and got the old style came back so who knows? But this time, I was running into this phenomena on AFD daily log pages (as mentioned in the message below this one). I should have known it was a system bug, not just me, so thanks for moving my message to join others that mention similar problems. Liz <sup style="font-family: Times New Roman; color: #006400;">Read! Talk! 20:07, 24 February 2024 (UTC)

Technical summary
To summarize what's going on in a non-technical way, this appears to be a bug related to Special:PrefixIndex, which is used to generate the back-link header that's seen on subpages. A subpage is basically any page that has a slash in its title in certain namespaces (possibly all spaces except mainspace?). And what I'm calling the "back-link header" is the collection of links that take you back to the parent page. This is commonly seen in process pages such as WP:AfD, WP:SPI and WP:FAC. If you're seeing this on one of those kinds of pages, that explains it. If you're seeing this on a page that's not a subpage, that's a lot more interesting, and please post your exmples here. RoySmith (talk) 19:28, 24 February 2024 (UTC)


 * That is incorrect. The breadcrumb links have nothing to do with this. It's happening on pages where Special:PrefixIndex is transcluded, usually via templates like Featured article tools and SPI archive notice. Nardog (talk) 19:43, 24 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Oh, I thought the back links also called PrefixIndex. In any case, thank you for the correction. RoySmith (talk) 19:49, 24 February 2024 (UTC)

Theme switching back and forth
I use the Vector 2010 theme, but have noticed that on a few AfD pages it switches to some sort of different, worse, minimalist theme. When I click "switch to old look" it takes me to the user page where it shows I am using the old look. Most pages are fine including this one. Is this a bug? SportingFlyer  T · C  22:32, 24 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Yes. See above. * Pppery * <sub style="color:#800000">it has begun... 22:35, 24 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks! I absolutely detest Vector 2022 - anything I can do to help? SportingFlyer  T · C  14:28, 25 February 2024 (UTC)

Skin changing
Beginning yesterday, whenever I visit a page starting with the prefix Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/, the page is displayed in Vector 2022 (I think?). Every other page, and those pages in edit mode, display in the skin I have set, which is not that. Anyone know what is causing that? Nikkimaria (talk) 02:33, 26 February 2024 (UTC)


 * Same issue for me and the FAC I have open at the moment. Very annoying - looks like it's a bug that will hopefully get fixed soon. PCN02WPS  ( talk  &#124;  contribs ) 05:01, 26 February 2024 (UTC)

Status
I've just been chatting with some of the WMF RelEng folks on IRC. I don't want to speak for them, but I will say that they're aware of the problem and working on it. The best thing for most of us to do at this point is to let them do their thing and watch for status updates. It looks like doing a hard reload (hold down the shift key while reloading in Chrome; I assume soemthing similar on other browsers) gets you back to your configured skin, so in the meantime, that's a viable workaround. RoySmith (talk) 15:35, 26 February 2024 (UTC)


 * Unfortunately such refresh options are not available on mobile, and even clearing all site data for Wikipedia doesn't clear the issue from all pages. -- LCU A ctively D isinterested  «@» °∆t° 22:35, 26 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Sadness. RoySmith (talk) 22:39, 26 February 2024 (UTC)
 * ActivelyDisinterested, in Firefox for Android, a long tap on the reload button is a hard reload. —⁠andrybak (talk) 12:44, 2 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Unfortunately not the same in Chrome. -- LCU A ctively D isinterested  «@» °∆t° 16:09, 2 March 2024 (UTC)

Resolved?
This is no longer happening for me, so I think it's been resolved. Can anyone else confirm?  NW1223 &lt; Howl at me &bull; My hunts &gt; 18:56, 27 February 2024 (UTC)


 * Yes, the fix has been deployed yesterday (or this morning, depending on your time zone: T336504). Matma Rex talk 23:19, 27 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Every link I check is working correctly now, thanks to all involved. -- LCU A ctively D isinterested  «@» °∆t° 16:12, 2 March 2024 (UTC)

How do i cite a default configuration file bundled with an Operating System?
(Copied from Teahouse per advice of User:ExclusiveEditor)

While editing the macOS text editing shortcuts section of Table of keyboard shortcuts, I got a table of all available shortcuts by dumping the system default configuration file with plutil(1) (you may notice that I mentioned it to support my edits in the edit summary). I think it's beneficial to cite it in the article, but don't know how. WP:CITE has no mention of configuration files, a quick google search turned up nothing either, so I came here to ask. Hym3242 (talk) 16:02, 7 March 2024 (UTC)


 * @Hym3242 the most important thing is to reference it, styling is secondary. A quick search for how to cite software came up with this. While using a citation template is handy, it is not required. So just  and you can let someone else worry about that. (They may chime in here with a better idea of course!). Note, no part of this response is a measure of if your source is actually a good type of source or not. —  xaosflux  Talk 16:50, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Thank you! I know this may not be the best type of source, but in defense of my choice, macOS has many very useful but undocumented (in the official documentation/support pages/manpages) keyboard shortcuts that I hope to cover, and there are only two main ways to know about them: through Q/A sites / personal blogs, or by basically reverse engineering the software. The first one is obviously not generally acceptable on wikipedia. Hym3242 (talk) 18:17, 7 March 2024 (UTC)

HotArticlesBot stopped running
, which builds lists of the most edited articles in each wikiproject, normally runs at 2:45am ET every night but last night did not run. I reported it to an operator very early this morning, but there hasn't been a response yet. This isn't a very critical bot, but wikiprojects use the results. Stefen Towers among the rest!  Gab • Gruntwerk 19:00, 6 March 2024 (UTC)
 * For the main wikiproject I work on, I created a query at Quarry to replicate this bot's results, in case anyone needs it. Just substitute your project's category of included articles, and you're all set. Stefen Towers among the rest!   Gab • Gruntwerk 20:40, 6 March 2024 (UTC)
 * StefenTower, have you tried database report?<span id="Qwerfjkl:1709834390765:WikipediaFTTCLNVillage_pump_(technical)" class="FTTCmt"> — Qwerfjkl  talk  17:59, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Yes, as a matter of fact, while working on Quarry queries yesterday, I discovered it, and immediately found a use for it, separate from this matter. As for HotArticlesBot, it got restarted last night. But at least now I know I have a potential way to replace it if it goes away. Thanks for the suggestion at any rate! Stefen Towers among the rest!   Gab • Gruntwerk 22:51, 7 March 2024 (UTC)

LibreOffice now only shows "Fresh" version but not "Still" version
LibreOffice offers two concurrent versions: "Fresh" (hot off the press) and "Still" (stable, proven), however now it shows only "Stable" - this is not an adjective that The Document Foundation uses to describe either of its versions. See:


 * Download LibreOffice

Currently, LibreOffice offers two concurrent releases:


 * v24.2.1 If you're a technology enthusiast, early adopter or power user, this version is for you!
 * v7.6.5 This version is slightly older and does not have the latest features, but it has been tested for longer. For business deployments, we strongly recommend support from certified partners which also offer long-term support versions of LibreOffice.

I posted a comment on the LibreOffice talk page on 2023-10-02, but there has been no response since then. I realize that this issue is connected to Wikidata, maybe Wikidata cannot handle two concurrent versions? Is there a work-around? Enquire (talk) 05:45, 8 March 2024 (UTC)

List of State Of The Union Reports
Despite making over 1000 edits over many months, the wikipedia android app cripples me from creating my home page or any other new page, such as List of State Of The Union Reports, also responding on Talk: pages requires work-arounds. 3MRB1 (talk) 09:31, 8 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I suggest you try mobile web editor via your browser. — xaosflux  Talk 15:20, 8 March 2024 (UTC)

Articles without talk pages
There are over 100,000 mainspace articles without a talk page: 1857 Faroese general election. Is this normal/expected, or a breakdown in a process somewhere? I noticed it in my logs while running the bot reftalk. -- Green  C  16:04, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
 * @GreenC, I suspect the answer to your question is the same as your answer to my question about ref names: YAGNI :-) RoySmith (talk) 16:09, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
 * GreenC, I think my bot is approved to create them, if that would be desirable.<span id="Qwerfjkl:1709656615074:WikipediaFTTCLNVillage_pump_(technical)" class="FTTCmt"> — Qwerfjkl  talk  16:36, 5 March 2024 (UTC)


 * There's isn't anything inherently wrong with non-existent discussion pages. — xaosflux  Talk 16:44, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I would support adding talk pages where they don't exist. Especially if you also set it up with archiving set to the default setting of 4 talk sections minimum before archiving. Many editors are hesitant to start a talk page, and even more are hesitant to set up talk archiving. Or completely unable to do so due to lack of knowledge and time. --Timeshifter (talk) 16:53, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Only 100,000 out of six million? That seems pretty good. I think creates talk pages as a hobby. They might have something to contribute here. – Jonesey95 (talk) 17:17, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Way back at the dawn of time (ten or eleven years ago, if not a bit more), I believe there was at least an unofficial policy of creating talk pages for all articles for which they did not exist, with one or two WikiProject templates if nothing else. This would get the articles onto the radar of one or two projects interested enough in the subject to take a look and refine what was there. I did a lot then, and so did a handful of other editors ( springs to mind, for one). I think it's still a useful task, though I don't know how active many WikiProjects are any more compared to where they used to be. -- Ser Amantio di Nicolao Che dicono a Signa?Lo dicono a Signa. 17:22, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
 * My YAGNI comment above notwithstanding, I think @Timeshifter makes an excellent point. We encourage editors to discuss things on the talk pages so we should be working to remove any barriers to that happening. RoySmith (talk) 17:23, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
 * The redlink for the talk page on 1857 Faroese general election takes you to page with a "Start a discussion" button so I assume the page is automatically created when someone does. No real barrier there. Creating talk pages is useful for adding projects and importance ratings and there are people who routinely do this for the Tree of Life project. I suppose the 100,000 articles without talk pages don't have an obvious home in an active project. — <span style="font-family:Arial;background:#d6ffe6;border:solid 1px;border-radius:5px;box-shadow:darkcyan 0px 1px 1px;"> Jts1882 &#124; talk 17:50, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
 * When you're a newbie, everything that doesn't work exactly as you expected, or has an extra step, is a barrier to entry. RoySmith (talk) 17:59, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I'd say the page with "Start a discussion" button was easier to understand for a newbie than the talk page where they have to select "edit" or "+". — <span style="font-family:Arial;background:#d6ffe6;border:solid 1px;border-radius:5px;box-shadow:darkcyan 0px 1px 1px;"> Jts1882 &#124; talk 18:11, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Jts1882, I believe they will see an "Add topic" link.<span id="Qwerfjkl:1709662694122:WikipediaFTTCLNVillage_pump_(technical)" class="FTTCmt"> — Qwerfjkl  talk  18:18, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
 * . Before the talk page was started the red link took me directly to an edit window. But it did not have a spot for a talk section heading. So it is confusing. Not as easy as the "add topic" link that takes care of the equal signs for headings.
 * By the way does anyone here use an iphone? Please help with this template test:
 * 
 * --Timeshifter (talk) 18:36, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Jts1882, I suppose the 100,000 articles without talk pages don't have an obvious home in an active project. I doubt it, because I ran Bots/Requests for approval/Qwerfjkl (bot) 19 on all the talk pages that were missing then.<span id="Qwerfjkl:1709661736658:WikipediaFTTCLNVillage_pump_(technical)" class="FTTCmt"> — Qwerfjkl  talk  18:02, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
 * @Timeshifter It seems that you disabled the feature that shows a nice message on non-existing talk pages; try re-enabling it at Special:Preferences (below "When I visit a discussion page that hasn't been created yet:") and see if you still think that they need to be created. Matma Rex talk 12:46, 6 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I don't have a problem creating new talk pages. I have been editing many years. I am more concerned with new editors. I just chose that preference. Just to see what it offers. Do you know of a non-existing talk page I can check? If it makes adding a new topic to a non-existing talk page simple, complete with a header line, then maybe that should be the default setting for all users, both logged in and not logged in. --Timeshifter (talk) 13:27, 6 March 2024 (UTC)
 * For an example, you can try at Talk:1859 Faroese general election (at least until someone creates it to make a point, like they did at Talk:1857 Faroese general election, which was given as an example earlier in this thread).
 * That preference is already the default for all users, you must have turned it off in the past. Matma Rex talk 13:57, 6 March 2024 (UTC)
 * . I remember now why I disabled it. It only provides a limited editing toolbar. Something I hate anywhere I see it: Mediawiki.org, Fandom community forums, etc.. If some editor wants to discuss tables or references, they can't do so with the first post on a talk page. The full functionality of the wikitext or Visual Editors are needed for that. It seems like some developers are always trying to sneak in these limited editing windows on all wikis. I sometimes don't use the "Add topic" editing window on talk pages, and here on the Village Pump, for the same reason. I start a new topic with the wikitext editor instead. So I think the full editing toolbar should be in that first post editing window. At least in the source tab. --Timeshifter (talk) 15:24, 6 March 2024 (UTC)
 * What about WP:TALK which says "Do not create an empty talk page simply so that one will exist for future use." Johnuniq (talk) 00:28, 6 March 2024 (UTC)
 * It is just busywork (ie waste of time) creating talk pages with nothing but bannershell or talk page header. Only create them if you are going to add a project, or say something useful. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 00:36, 6 March 2024 (UTC)
 * There is no need to put anything on the talk page at first. A period will do for starting the talk page. It's not a waste of time if it helps encourage more discussion from newbies. WP:TALK should be changed. Apparently, from this discussion, it was common in the past to start talk pages. --Timeshifter (talk) 01:32, 6 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Be careful what you wish for! To respond to a comment way above, many talk pages never have any threads, let alone enough to warrant archiving. Also see earlier comments in this thread that also mentioned articles without talk pages (and the links therein). Graham87 (talk) 03:22, 6 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I think a talk page should automatically be created when an article is started. Along with archiving being set up. It hurts nothing to have it set up. Since it is automatic it doesn't do anything until it is needed. I see so many talk pages with messed-up archiving, or none at all. I also think links to talk section headers should be permanent links that work even when the talk section header name is changed. Without having to set up anchors. --Timeshifter (talk) 03:46, 6 March 2024 (UTC)
 * "Since it is automatic it doesn't do anything until it is needed" Nope ... the bot has to check whether it needs archiving every day. Each check might not take that long in the grand scheme of things, but it would definitely add up over millions of pages that mostly wouldn't need archiving. Graham87 (talk) 06:26, 6 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I have seen various discussions about templates, substitution, bots, server load, etc.. And the developers have always said it was not a problem. And I don't see why an archiving bot would have to check every day. If server load ever became a problem (which I doubt), then the bot could be set to check only when the page is edited, and not more than once a day. --Timeshifter (talk) 12:10, 6 March 2024 (UTC)
 * The problem is that archiving bots are not run by MediaWiki. They are run by individual members of the community, and thus WP:DWAP does not apply. lowercase sigmabot III is run by, who last edited 20 months ago. A feature to check only when the page was edited does not exist, and I doubt someone who last edited over a year ago is interested in setting that up.<span id="HouseBlaster:1709785984416:WikipediaFTTCLNVillage_pump_(technical)" class="FTTCmt"> <b style="font-family:Courier New;">House Blaster </b> (talk · he/him) 04:33, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Also, I was curious: ClueBot III is currently set to archive 10,617 pages and lowercase sigmabot III is set up on 37,550. Given there are over six million articles, there is no way the bots can handle being set up on all of the pages.<span id="HouseBlaster:1709786227540:WikipediaFTTCLNVillage_pump_(technical)" class="FTTCmt"> <b style="font-family:Courier New;">House Blaster </b> (talk · he/him) 04:37, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks for Don't worry about performance link. It says the opposite of what you are saying. It says that if there is a problem sysadmins will fix it. And that they have done it many times already. Regardless of whether the problem was at the system code level, or with templates edited by users. So, "Don't worry about performance". The Brion Vibber quotes are illustrative of the point. He was the chief sysadmin for awhile. And adding archiving to all talk pages would probably require developer help. So stop worrying. Or as Brion Vibber said (upper case letters are his, emphasis is mine): "I made a general recommendation not to go running around saying THE SKY IS FALLING THE SKY IS FALLING about templates BASED ON SUPPOSITION AND PARANOIA." --Timeshifter (talk) 13:48, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Let me try again: we don't have to worry about performance of MediaWiki (the software that Wikipedia uses). The archiving bots are not part of MediaWiki. And if we were to do this, it would not require developer help. We would need to run a bot to add the code to all talk pages, which is trivial.<span id="HouseBlaster:1709831286038:WikipediaFTTCLNVillage_pump_(technical)" class="FTTCmt"> <b style="font-family:Courier New;">House Blaster </b> (talk · he/him) 17:10, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Bruh moment. Every single day?! There isn't a way to specify that e.g. talk pages that haven't been edited in xyz days only get checked every week?? <b style="font-family: monospace; color:#E35BD8"><b style="color:#029D74">jp</b>×<b style="color: #029D74">g</b>🗯️</b> 09:16, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Nope. Graham87 (talk) 12:30, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Maybe not currently. But there is no reason that the template couldn't be changed to check only when the talk page is edited, and not more than once a day. If it needed to be done due to server load, then developers would make sure it happened. According to WP:DWAP. See my reply to HouseBlaster higher up. --Timeshifter (talk) 13:53, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * It is not the template which would need to be changed, it is the bot. The template just tells the bot what to do, if that makes sense. <b style="font-family:Courier New;">House Blaster </b> (talk · he/him) 17:20, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * The template just adds a backlink to the page, visable from WhatLinksHere. It doesn't "call" the bot to edit the page, as it were.<span id="Qwerfjkl:1709832947224:WikipediaFTTCLNVillage_pump_(technical)" class="FTTCmt"> — Qwerfjkl  talk  17:35, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * According to WP:DWAP, however it is done (templates, bots, system code, etc.), the sysadmins can handle any problems with server loads. That's not our problem. They will intervene as necessary to fix problems. So we can add archiving to all talk pages now. --Timeshifter (talk) 18:50, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Sysadmin intervention would probably consist of just blocking the bot, if it managed to cause problems with the stability of the site. I doubt it would come to that, though; even if it ran all day doing nothing but visiting every talk page, the servers wouldn't feel it. So you don't have to worry about the bot (any bot) taking Wikipedia down, but you do have to worry about the bot doing what it's supposed to, and the real problem you'll have is that it won't be able to process all pages in a day that way. I doubt sysadmins would help with that.
 * That's assuming it really works as naively as you say; there are many obvious ways to do this better (e.g. checking the API equivalent of Special:RecentChangesLinked, or checking the date of latest edit to the page, which can be done in batches of 500), and I would hope the bots already do something like that. Matma Rex talk 19:04, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * WP:DWAP doesn't magically make everything possible, no matter how inefficient it is.<span id="Qwerfjkl:1709839298576:WikipediaFTTCLNVillage_pump_(technical)" class="FTTCmt"> — Qwerfjkl  talk  19:21, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * That will clutter our watch lists adding archiving to pages that may never need it. Why not just add it to pages over a certain size? Hawkeye7   (discuss)  19:06, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I don't see talk pages on my watch list unless the talk page is edited or archived. The default setting for threads being archived is after there are a minimum of 4 threads. And only after the latest post in a thread reaches a certain age. And then only when there is a 5th thread started. Just adding archiving does not cause a lot of talk pages to show up instantly on watch lists. Because it takes awhile to reach those minimum number of threads. Many talk pages never get 4 threads. --Timeshifter (talk) 19:43, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * The default value for minthhreadsleft in Lowercase sigmabot III is actually 5 and that for ClueBot III's equivalent, minkeepthreads, is 0. Here's Lowercase sigmabot III's Python source code and that for ClueBot III in PHP. My Python is only beginner-level and my PHP is virtually nonexistent so I'm not 100% confident about the bots' exact mechanics, but I can't find any fancy API calls in either of the above links. We're getting way off-topic from the start of the thread though. Graham87 (talk) 12:01, 8 March 2024 (UTC)

Please see: User:Lowercase sigmabot III/Archive HowTo. It says minthreadsleft = 4 in the 2 copy and paste bits. I have copied that several times to talk pages. Farther down there is a table of parameters that says 5 for minthreadsleft. I don't think we are way off-topic. --Timeshifter (talk) 15:57, 8 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Timeshifter, yes, that's when the parameter is manually set.<span id="Qwerfjkl:1709917757905:WikipediaFTTCLNVillage_pump_(technical)" class="FTTCmt"> — Qwerfjkl  talk  17:09, 8 March 2024 (UTC)

Source of Rapid Transit OSM Maps?
There's an outdated map at Kolkata Metro. I wanted to update it, and noticed that data is extracted from Wikidata, but there is no map in there. I tried reading the template documentation but couldn't understand much of it. Can anyone explain in layman's terms, where is the data coming from? And how to I update it? Thanks! &#8212;CX Zoom[he/him] (let's talk • {C•X}) 13:22, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * The information is at OpenStreetMaps. It always confuses me. If you go to the Wikidata page for the system,, under you have the six lines. If you go to each line they have a  where the map shape information is or should be. E.g.  links to the OSM relation 8034179. I think that is where the editing is needed, but I never got further than this. I only reply to point you in the right direction. Hopefully someone  can provide a fuller answer soon. — <span style="font-family:Arial;background:#d6ffe6;border:solid 1px;border-radius:5px;box-shadow:darkcyan 0px 1px 1px;"> Jts1882 &#124; talk 14:11, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I've added the for the system at Wikidata. If you follow that to OSM relation Kolkata Metro (13994939) you can see it only has three members for lines 1-3. — <span style="font-family:Arial;background:#d6ffe6;border:solid 1px;border-radius:5px;box-shadow:darkcyan 0px 1px 1px;"> Jts1882 &#124; talk 14:25, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Thank you. &#8212;CX Zoom[he/him] (let's talk • {C•X}) 17:27, 8 March 2024 (UTC)

Thoughts on DPL3?
I know Extension:DPL is used somewhat on Wikinews but is quite resource heavy. I wonder how would DPL3 work on Wikipedia? I think there would need to be some optimizations to make it work well, and we would likely have to limit the namespaces that DPL works in. Maybe there is a way to get a less resource heavy and more optimized DPL4 that has all of the features of DPL3 but without the performance problems of it.

Some uses I can see for DPL3 include getting the number of transclusions of a template, listing all of the pages proposed for deletion alongside their reasons, etc. Awesome Aasim 20:06, 8 March 2024 (UTC)

Severely shortened watchlist
I have thousands of pages on my watchlist. I have it set to show me the 250 latest items from the last seven days. I know there are that many items to show. But for some reason, without checking any of the "do not show" boxes except my own edits and wikidata, I am only seeing 15 items. If I hide bots, I get a normal-looking watchlist (without the bot edits). If instead I uncheck wikidata, I see more changes, but still nowhere near 250. Anyone know what is causing this and how I can get a full watchlist view that includes the bots? —David Eppstein (talk) 07:34, 9 March 2024 (UTC)


 * @David Eppstein perhaps you have another filer (such as a namesapce filter) on. When you use this link does it work? — xaosflux  Talk 11:14, 9 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I wasn't filtering for namespace, but now it seems to be looking normal again. —David Eppstein (talk) 15:45, 9 March 2024 (UTC)

Bot that maintains GA nominations page is down
ChristieBot, which maintains WP:GAN, is down, and I don't know what the problem is; I would appreciate any help. It's particularly annoying as there is a backlog drive going on at the moment.

I was prompted by the WMF via phab:T357554 to upgrade to the new toolforge environnment. I made the suggested Python code changes, and ran into some problems when I tried to submit via the toolforge jobs command so I reverted to the code that was running earlier today (and I've checked that the reversion really did happen) and reenabled the cron job. Now when it runs it fails immediately with

ModuleNotFoundError: No module named 'importlib.metadata'

During handling of the above exception, another exception occurred:

Traceback (most recent call last): File "www/python/src/GANbot.py", line 20, in    import pywikibot File "/data/project/shared/pywikibot/stable/pywikibot/__init__.py", line 21, in    from pywikibot import config as _config File "/data/project/shared/pywikibot/stable/pywikibot/config.py", line 60, in    from pywikibot.backports import (  File "/data/project/shared/pywikibot/stable/pywikibot/backports.py", line 206, in     import importlib_metadata ModuleNotFoundError: No module named 'importlib_metadata'

Why is it now complaining about importlib.metadata? I tried exiting the tool and going back in via "become ganfilter" in case something from the toolforge job submit had changed the working environment but that didn't make any difference. Any help appreciated. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 20:47, 8 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I have now managed to resolve at least one of the problems with the new toolforge version and it is giving me the same error about importlib.metadata on that version as well, so I seem to have the same problem both ways. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 20:56, 8 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I've just realized that the bot stopped running just a few hours before I began working on it; I hadn't noticed it wasn't running. That means the problem is not related to the change to toolforge.  Per a suggestion on phab I removed the PYTHONPATH environment variable but it is now complaining that it can't find pywikibot.  I currently have PYWIKIBOT_DIR set to the .pywikibot directory in my tool's environment.  If memory serves that's created at the time I built the tool.  I tried removing the PYWIKIBOT_DIR but that didn't help, so I'd be grateful for any pointers to anything else I can try. Mike Christie (talk - contribs -  library) 22:22, 8 March 2024 (UTC)
 * This looks to be partially because you're using the shared pywikibot installation which I wouldn't recommend as it can be changed without you knowing about it. It's also present at different locations depending on whether you use the Grid or Kubernetes. Feel free to add me as a maintainer – I can help sort it out. – SD0001  (talk) 10:03, 9 March 2024 (UTC)
 * , done -- thank you very much. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 10:41, 9 March 2024 (UTC)
 * @Mike Christie I have created a fresh venv using the python3.11 image. Inside a webservice shell with the venv activated, I ran . Please create a   with the list of dependencies and versions so that this would be smoother in the future. The   file was incompatible with the latest version of pywikibot (9.0.0) so I've moved that to   and created a basic new config file.I validated a one-time run by running: The first two commands here should always be run before installing dependencies or running any python code, as the python version on the bastion is different from the one on k8s.To automate it as a cron job,   should work, though I have not tested it. Once you confirm this works, set it up in a jobs.yml file so that in the future if any changes are required, you can just tweak the file and do  . –  SD0001  (talk) 12:16, 9 March 2024 (UTC)
 * -- the job ran fine -- thank you. I tried running the same three commands that you ran, just to check that I understood what was going on, but   fails with "No such file or directory".  Is there something I'm missing?  Re the requirements.txt, the packages the application imports are: urllib.parse re datetime pywikibot pymysql operator sys time dateutil.parser os configparser.  I have put these in a requirements.txt in www/python/src though I would assume some of these are natively installed and don't need to be there; let me know which and I can remove them if necessary.  Also, I've changed GANbot.py back to the toolforge code, which means configparser is probably not needed; I left it there in case I have more trouble getting the toolforge code to work. Mike Christie (talk - contribs -  library) 14:22, 9 March 2024 (UTC)
 * And I meant to add that I have scheduled the job with the command you give and will check the results shortly. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 14:24, 9 March 2024 (UTC)
 * @Mike Christie failure must be because you were not in the home directory. Sorry, I should have mentioned   so that it works from anywhere (once you have done , of course). It should be  , edited above. –  SD0001  (talk) 15:40, 9 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Mike Christie, just pywikibot and pymysql need to be in requirements.txt (per https://docs.python.org/3/library/)<span id="Qwerfjkl:1710002027170:WikipediaFTTCLNVillage_pump_(technical)" class="FTTCmt"> — Qwerfjkl  talk  16:33, 9 March 2024 (UTC)
 * And python-dateutil. The versions should also be included (in pywikibot==9.0.0 format). The live versions can be via . –  SD0001  (talk) 16:39, 9 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Have updated requirements.txt, and the activate is now working so I am able to do one-off runs. Thanks again.  Will set up the scheduled job next. Mike Christie (talk - contribs -  library) 17:08, 9 March 2024 (UTC)
 * The scheduled job is working too. Thank you for all the help.  I will create the yaml file and work on a few other cleanup issues such as possibly using the toolforge env vars rather than the config but this is now resolved. Mike Christie (talk - contribs -  library) 17:30, 9 March 2024 (UTC)
 * – Novem Linguae (talk) 18:11, 9 March 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia Data Issue: Who Do I Report This To?
Some Wikipedia articles are being attached to separate and distinct Wikipedia articles. This appears to be to increase viewership from search engines. For example, an article about X is attached to an article about Y. The article becomes X,Y and clearly draws search engine results to X. Who do I report this. It is very complicated.

Starlighsky (talk) 23:16, 9 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Please provide an example of exactly what you are seeing; what you expect to see; and why you think there is a technical problem. — xaosflux  Talk 23:23, 9 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I just did. To me, at this point, I should contact technical support because publicly giving examples could cause me to be harassed. Starlighsky (talk) 23:29, 9 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Can you explain what "attached" means here? Is someone copying and pasting text from article X onto the end of article Y?  Is it a comment about titles, that we have articles on Paris, on Texas and also on Paris, Texas?  Does "attached" mean "wikilinked", and you feel that a certain article should not link to a certain other article?  An example would really help us to understand what problem you may have found. Certes (talk) 23:45, 9 March 2024 (UTC)
 * All I know is that they take two thing unrelated. For example, it would be an article about sea turtles which is attached to an article about a specific car dealership. So it ends up being "Wikipedia: Specific car dealership.Sea Turtles".
 * It appears to be a way to increase search engine results for the car dealership. The mechanisms get more complicated, but that is the basic idea. I really need to contact technical support. Starlighsky (talk) 00:00, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Is this a problem with some particular search engine (such as Google, Bing, DuckDuckGo, etc.) returning "Wikipedia: Specific car dealership.Sea Turtles" when you type in some search term? If so then the problem may not lie within Wikipedia.  Six articles mention both car dealerships and sea turtles, but they seem to be legitimate entries without undue weight.  For example West Edmonton Mall contains both a dealership and an aquarium.  Unless you provide an actual example stating clearly where you are looking (e.g. reading Apple), what you see, what you expected to see and what is wrong, we are unlikely to be able to help you further. Certes (talk) 00:24, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Here is an example:
 * John Murray Anderson's Almanac - Wikipedia (alquds.edu)
 * Whereas, it should be like this:
 * John Murray Anderson's Almanac - Wikipedia Starlighsky (talk) 00:37, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I think this is some kind of sleazy SEO thing that the operators of those websites are doing. I don't know if we can really do anything about it (although I do note that they're just serving the Wikipedia logo with that page, which is trademarked, so maybe that has legs?) <b style="font-family: monospace; color:#E35BD8"><b style="color:#029D74">jp</b>×<b style="color: #029D74">g</b>🗯️</b> 04:48, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I think alquds.edu has already been reported to the WMF for unauthorised use of WP trademarks. Nthep (talk) 07:13, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
 * The article you linked is at https://wiki.alquds.edu – which is not Wikipedia, just a mirror of it, so there is nothing anyone here can do about what happens there. Mirror sites which copy some articles from Wikipedia, or even all articles from Wikipedia, are permitted as long as they comply with the Terms of use. But no one here can dictate what they do on their own website, unless they are violating the Terms. Mathglot (talk) 05:06, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Yes, Al Quds is simply taking Wikipedia's content, which does not have the problem described here, and adding advertising. As Wikipedia is not adding the problematic text, and does not control or endorse Al Quds, the complainant's only recourse is to contact Al Quds and ask them to change their mirror. Certes (talk) 10:13, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
 * The user-generated content can be freely copied and redistributed in compliance with CC-BY-SA/GFDL, but using the Wikipedia name and logo is a trademark infringement. Nardog (talk) 10:26, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks to everyone for your help and insight. I just wanted to point it out to Wikipedia. I personally don't have problems with it, though. It seems the university appreciates U.S. cultural topics like Broadway shows and so on. I did want to report it in case it was something more serious. Starlighsky (talk) 13:34, 10 March 2024 (UTC)

AI helper
Hello! Has there ever been talked about developing an AI helper for article editing/creating? I was tutoring in a wiki-activity today and one of the participants asked if there was such a thing. We were dealing with EnWiki and SqWiki (my homewiki) and even though we mentioned the possibility of help venues such as the Teahouse (or its equivalent in SqWiki) they explained that they were hoping for real-time artificial tutoring that could overseer their progress and fix any/most arising technical problems. I'm pretty sure in the age we live in that plan is not too farfetched so I was wondering if there has been any concrete work in this direction. - Klein Muçi (talk) 13:53, 6 March 2024 (UTC)
 * So I asked chatgpt what it thought about using AI to "create or edit articles" on Wikipedia. While it agreed that it had some benefits, it also mentioned the following concerns:
 * * The possibility of creating biased content.
 * * The likelihood that the results might re inaccurate or incoherent.
 * * Possible perception of AI undermining the "collaborative and volunteer-driven" aspects of Wikipedia.
 * * Risks associated with violation of copyright and responsibility for content.
 * Fabrickator (talk) 17:26, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Fabrickator, hello and thank you for your interest! I would say my question wasn't exactly related to that. I meant having an AI helper that knows guidelines, manuals of styles, policies, etc. and helps the user follow them and face their technical difficulties that they may encounter along the way, for example, helping them use citation templates correctly or how and when to format a part of text as bold, how to sign up in discussions, etc. Its main purpose wouldn't be to help with the content per se but rather with using Wikipedia properly, policy/technically wise, what help venues like the Teahouse and wikimentors already do.<span id="Klein_Muçi:1709889767844:WikipediaFTTCLNVillage_pump_(technical)" class="FTTCmt"> — Klein Muçi (talk) 09:22, 8 March 2024 (UTC)
 * There are some learning helpers, they are not A.I. and do not need to be. An old one is The Wikipedia Adventure which teaches English Wikipedia guidelines and editing. Growth Team features also teaches users through tasks, and it is upto your community to configure it in line with your policies. Edit check is the newest one, it is going to be a group of tests within the editor s (VisualEditor and Wikieditor ) that tell the user what to do. The first item in Edit Check will be an reference check, that tells an user to reference text if it is long enough. That length is configurable by your community. As for how to style citation templates, they should just let Citoid and RefToolbar autofill the citations for them.--Snævar (talk) 10:14, 8 March 2024 (UTC)
 * How do you know Edit check will support WikiEditor? Nardog (talk) 10:57, 8 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Oh, I am just confusing it with an different project. Information overload.--Snævar (talk) 14:44, 8 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Yes, thank you! Even though I'm more old school myself, I've seen that new editors love the VE so those are already appreciated. The only problem is that all these tools lack what they wanted in the first place: An AI wikimentor.
 * They were being helped by us at that moment and they expressed the need to have the same help and guidance all the time in real time, a mentor, 24/7. That's how AI was brought to attention. - Klein Muçi (talk) 14:01, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
 * ChatGPT can already answer most questions related to wikipedia editing. You probably don't need a dedicated AI as all wikipedia policy and guidelines pages are open and were presumably part of GPT's training data. – SD0001  (talk) 11:11, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I thought that as well. If GPT can be an AI wikimentor, then the question could be rewritten to ask for better integration of GPT with Mediawiki?
 * (BTW, I use GPT extensively myself but I've yet to try and ask it about policies or MOS so I'm not sure how it does with those de facto.) - Klein Muçi (talk) 13:55, 10 March 2024 (UTC)

Move with subpages succeeded – redirect not created for one subpage
I recently moved Draft:Article length bar to Template:Article length bar. This successfully moved 12 pages and created 11 redirects, with a missing redirect for Draft:Article length bar/styles.css. This is fine with me and I'm not asking for either a change in behavior, or an explanation; I'm posting this solely as an FYI to the community in case there are those who would want to know about this, as it does seem odd behavior. Adding. Mathglot (talk) 02:51, 9 March 2024 (UTC) P.S. I have a Move succeeded screenshot showing one red link, if anyone wants it. Mathglot (talk) 03:04, 9 March 2024 (UTC)


 * This is normal. There is no such thing as a redirect in CSS. Izno (talk) 05:02, 9 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I just created a manual redirect there—Draft:Article length bar/styles.css, not that I need it—so if the Move process wanted to do it, presumably it could. If one *shouldn't* create a redirect because of the .css extension, that's another matter, but then it shouldn't let me create one, either. Mathglot (talk) 06:39, 9 March 2024 (UTC)
 * The redirect doesn't work if you try to import CSS from the page so it's misleading to have a redirect. A redirect is just a wiki page with certain code which is interpreted in a special way by MediaWiki. You can save anything in wiki pages, including invalid CSS like . PrimeHunter (talk) 10:18, 9 March 2024 (UTC)
 * It's not exactly invalid CSS, but it's only partially valid. If we have a page Foo.css containing the single line  what we have is (i) a valid [//www.w3.org/TR/selectors-3/#id-selectors ID selector] matching any element having the attribute  ; (ii) a valid [//www.w3.org/TR/selectors-3/#descendant-combinators descendant combinator] (the space); and (iii) an [//www.w3.org/TR/selectors-3/#attribute-representation attribute selector] that would match any tag of the form   or , except that it is malformed by being enclosed in an extra pair of square brackets (how various browsers interpret those is not documented). What this "stylesheet" does not have is a [//www.w3.org/TR/CSS21/syndata.html#rule-sets declaration block] (a pair of braces enclosing a declaration list); but whilst an empty declaration list is valid, I believe that the pair of braces is required. So consider it to be a do-nothing style sheet; but it certainly isn't a redirect in the MediaWiki sense of the word. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 16:12, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I've deleted it. Indeed it is misleading to have a page like this. There isn't even a need for the original draft page redirects now that the page is main template spaced. Izno (talk) 16:51, 9 March 2024 (UTC)
 * For cases where there may be other uses of a given style sheet than an accompanying page/template, the original CSS file could be replaced with a CSS  rule to include the  file at its new location (unless   has been configured on English Wikipedia to block it, assuming the page's content model remains sanitized CSS). However I agree in this case, there's no purpose for it. Draft pages should just have references to them updated. isaacl (talk) 18:59, 9 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks, all; this has been enlightening. Mathglot (talk) 19:09, 9 March 2024 (UTC)

General edit notice
When I edit any article I see a notice saying:

"Content that violates any copyrights will be deleted. Encyclopedic content must be verifiable through citations to reliable sources."

Where is that text kept, and where can I suggest changes to it? Andy Mabbett ( Pigsonthewing ); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 21:36, 10 March 2024 (UTC)


 * I think it's MediaWiki:Editpage-head-copy-warn. Its talk page might be a good spot to discuss changes. – Novem Linguae (talk) 21:42, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Yes, there's already discussion at MediaWiki talk:Editpage-head-copy-warn. Certes (talk) 21:47, 10 March 2024 (UTC)

Graphs: What now?
The recent conversation on T334940 has made what people have been afraid of pretty clear: Extension:Graph isn't coming back any time soon, and probably never. I think it's about time we come up with a "temporary" solution.

We have two problems to solve:
 * 1) A replacement for the old graphs needs to be made and then dropped in.
 * 2) Editors should have a way to make new graphs in a standardized manner without resorting to a photo editor.
 * 3) * Ideally, these graphs are easily updatable by new editors. This would be quite difficult though. I think a reupload of a file is going to be the minimum possible 'resistance'.

While we're at it, it'd be nice if our solution worked for the other wikis too.

For problem 1, my first thought is for a bot to download and build the graphs locally, and then upload them as SVGs and replace them in the affected pages. A tall order. I'm willing to look into it but I find it unlikely to be within my skills.

For problem 2, as TheDJ suggested, A toolforge tool could be the way to go. Snowmanonahoe (talk · contribs · typos) 15:55, 6 March 2024 (UTC)


 * Read mw:Extension talk:Graph/Plans. It covers what options there are instead of Extension:Graph and what those options can not do. There is also a list there, over the most used Extension:Graph templates on all Wikipedias. Snævar (talk) 00:04, 7 March 2024 (UTC)

PAGE ]]) 15:09, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * For plain, horizontal bar graphs, I made for Category:Orphaned articles at the Progress section to "get it done". My initial thoughts were "something" better than "nothing". I understand this will not work for pie charts, & complex graphs. Regards, JoeNMLC (talk) 02:38, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Pie charts will use Module:Piechart, an CSS+HTML based graph. Any interactive feature is gone. I did ask the devs if the graph system in Wikidata Query System could be used at T357161, it would be for Wikidata-based graphs only. Snævar (talk) 10:06, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Sad and embarrassing. <b style="font-family: monospace; color:#E35BD8"><b style="color:#029D74">jp</b>×<b style="color: #029D74">g</b>🗯️</b> 09:15, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * What's especially embarrassing is the number of tickets such as and  proposing alternatives that have been declined by the WMF as "we'll take a different approach", but no "different approach" has materialized. --Ahecht ([[User talk:Ahecht|<span style="color:#FFF;background:#04A;display:inline-block;padding:1px;vertical-align:-.3em;font:bold 50%/1 sans-serif;text-align:center">TALK
 * One a related matter, has there been any movement on the possibility of using some form of SVG inline in articles? While full SVG could have security problems, a sanitized SVG (akin to the CSS in templatestyles) could be safe. This would be useful for creating graphs. — <span style="font-family:Arial;background:#d6ffe6;border:solid 1px;border-radius:5px;box-shadow:darkcyan 0px 1px 1px;"> Jts1882 &#124; talk 15:16, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Keep in mind that SVG's, although they are uploadable are shown as png's. Although mw:Manual:$wgSVGNativeRendering exists to send SVG's to the client, it has not been enabled on WMF wikis. So, the landscape is not looking good. I mean, if they are not going to trust SVG's to be sent to clients from WMF wikis, then why should inlike SVG's be worked on? There clearly still is distrust towards SVG's. Your feature is covered in T334953, T334372 and T66460. So far these tasks have negitive comments. I would say inline SVG is not going to happen. Snævar (talk) 12:59, 9 March 2024 (UTC)
 * The only negative comment I see across all of these tasks is specific to client-side inline SVG. As discussed on T334372, it very much makes sense to have inline SVG that is still server-rendered. I would say this is quite feasible. The task just hasn't caught the attention of the right people yet. – SD0001  (talk) 06:56, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I find that post perplexing. You were the only person at that phab task to mention server-side rendering - specifically, you wrote the inline SVG can be server-rendered. It doesn't need to render on the client . If the SVG is inline, it must be rendered client-side. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 22:03, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Please read comments 2–4 in the task. What makes you think if it's inline, it must be client-rendered? Math and Score extensions today allow inline use of Latex/LilyPond, that doesn't mean they render on the client. – SD0001  (talk) 22:29, 10 March 2024 (UTC)

Shortcut box too wide when placed in tmbox
Example.

Please note the very wide shortcut boxes at the top of the example page (search for WP:NEWCSD and WT:CSD). Normally shotcut boxes are the same width as their text. In this case they're about triple or quadruple the width of their text. Any idea what is causing this? I think I saw this in one other place too but I forgot to write down the page.

Related: Wikipedia talk:Criteria for speedy deletion/Header, Template:Shortcut – Novem Linguae (talk) 02:28, 11 March 2024 (UTC)


 * An incorrect edit in pursuit of supporting dark mode. Izno (talk) 03:29, 11 March 2024 (UTC)

Changelog?
I noticed undos now automatically make the revision id into a clickable link like some other Wikis did (I no longer need to do it manually or use my script, awesome :D) - where can I read about such changes, is there a changelog? – 2804:F14:80C6:A301:70C8:DCC8:4027:D6BB (talk) 00:54, 11 March 2024 (UTC)


 * MediaWiki talk:Undo-summary. Looks like the change in MediaWiki took place last May, but here the message was overridden so it wasn't affected until recently. Nardog (talk) 03:27, 11 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Ah, I thought it was a per-wiki thing. Still, good change. Thank you for requesting that Eyesnore. – 2804:F14:80C6:A301:70C8:DCC8:4027:D6BB (talk) 03:56, 11 March 2024 (UTC)

Unable to find lint errors
I'm trying to fix two lint errors on Everybody's Got to Learn Sometime (unclosed div tag and unclosed table tag, as reported by LintHint), one or both of which is causing the article to display incorrectly on mobile, with all sections under "Other versions" getting collapsed into that section (very similar to this issue I previously asked for help with). The issue is, I can't find any div or table tags in the source, let alone any unclosed ones. What's the best way to find where exactly the issue is? Suntooooth, it/he (talk/contribs) 13:57, 11 March 2024 (UTC)
 * That section has a col-begin without a col-end. I don't know any clever way to spot this kind of error; I compared the markup for that section with the markup of the preceding sections. -- John of Reading (talk) 14:19, 11 March 2024 (UTC)
 * @Suntooooth looks like it is within the col-begin or col-2 templates. — xaosflux  Talk 14:23, 11 March 2024 (UTC)
 * thanks for the help! I removed all the col templates - nothing seemed to break and it fixed the issue, so I'm not sure why they were there in the first place. Good to know that col templates can cause lint errors like that! Suntooooth, it/he (talk/contribs) 14:34, 11 March 2024 (UTC)

Tech News: 2024-11
<section begin="technews-2024-W11"/> Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Changes later this week
 * Octicons-sync.svg The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from . It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from . It will be on all wikis from (calendar).
 * After consulting with various communities, the line height of the text on the Minerva skin will be increased to its previous value of 1.65. Different options for typography can also be set using the options in the menu, as needed.
 * The active link color in Minerva will be changed to provide more consistency with our other platforms and best practices.
 * Structured data on Commons will no longer ask whether you want to leave the page without saving. This will prevent the “information you’ve entered may not be saved” popups from appearing when no information have been entered. It will also make file pages on Commons load faster in certain cases. However, the popups will be hidden even if information has indeed been entered. If you accidentally close the page before saving the structured data you entered, that data will be lost.

Future changes
 * All wikis will be read-only for a few minutes on March 20. This is planned at 14:00 UTC. More information will be published in Tech News and will also be posted on individual wikis in the coming weeks.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe. <section end="technews-2024-W11"/>

MediaWiki message delivery 23:02, 11 March 2024 (UTC)

A more robust editnotice loader
I am working on a module editnotice load that can more robustly load editnotices. Some of the features I am adding include:
 * Support for category notices without the use of JavaScript (but it is a bit intensive of post-expand include limit for big articles)
 * Moving pages does not necessitate moving editnotices (using PageID)
 * Possible removal entirely of the traditional /Editnotice for user page editnotices, but backwards compatibility for the latter

I am doing tests on test.wikipedia.org. Unfortunately there isn't a method to extract out the categories from a page so I had to use a costly Lua hack. testwiki:Special:EditPage/Taylor_Swift. I want to see if there is room for improvement. Awesome Aasim 18:54, 12 March 2024 (UTC)

Problem with map
Does anyone else see a problem with the infobox on WonderWorks (museum)?— Vchimpanzee  •  talk  •  contributions  •  16:57, 12 March 2024 (UTC)
 * The article has no co-ordinates, as it's a multi site establishment. infobox museum appears to automatically add a map but here has no co-ordinates to work on. I've added no to the infobox to switch the map off. Nthep (talk) 17:13, 12 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Nthep, I assumed the issue was to do with Wikidata, has coordinates.<span id="Qwerfjkl:1710264479167:WikipediaFTTCLNVillage_pump_(technical)" class="FTTCmt"> —  Qwerfjkl  talk  17:27, 12 March 2024 (UTC)
 * The infobox makes mapframe code which produces a map made by mw:Extension:Kartographer. Kartographer can pull data from OpenStreetMap. I don't know the details but I guess OpenStreetMap has data which reflects there are multiple WonderWorks locations, unlike the Wikidata item which only has coordinates for the Orlando, Florida location. The map ends up in water west of the Florida peninsula. PrimeHunter (talk) 20:37, 12 March 2024 (UTC)
 * It's called the Gulf of Mexico. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 21:00, 12 March 2024 (UTC)

Gadgets at Wicipedia Cymraeg
Wicipedia Cymraeg (Welsh Wikipedia) does not have a gadgets tab at cy:Special:Preferences. Therefore, to use gadgets, it is necessary to load them into your personal common.js and/or common.css files. Gadgets may be imported from another Wikipedia, and this is easy for gadgets that are pure CSS - for example, for "", our MediaWiki:Gadgets-definition file has the line  which indicates that this gadget has a CSS file but no JS file, thus it may be anabled at Wicipedia Cymraeg by adding the line   to cy:Special:MyPage/common.css. Done, tested, working, no problem here.

However, if the gadget has a Javascript component, for example, "", our Gadgets-definition file has the line  which indicates that this gadget has both a JS file and a CSS file, plus some dependencies. What is the best way of loading the JS file into cy:Defnyddiwr:Redrose64/common.js together with its dependencies? -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 22:26, 13 March 2024 (UTC)
 * cy:Special:Version shows mw:Extension:Gadgets is installed. The gadgets tab should appear automatically if an interface administrator creates cy:MediaWiki:Gadgets-definition with at least one valid gadget. There are two interface administators cy:Arbennig:ListUsers/interface-admin and one of them is active. PrimeHunter (talk) 23:53, 13 March 2024 (UTC)
 * The active one is, and if they wanted gadgets they would presumably have set some up by now (see Village pump (technical)/Archive 180 from four years ago). Based on that, I have done this, but I don't know if that's the correct way or not. It seems to work, but I don't know if it's causing undesirable side-effects, or is using outdated code that may fail at any time. It would have helped a lot if you had said "using this basic framework, you pass in these values here and here. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 01:03, 14 March 2024 (UTC)

Problem with link to article...
When I use the link to the Wikipedia article, which is Ager, Yellen, and Bornstein, Inc. - Wikipedia ,

it goes to Ager, Yellen, and Bornstein, Inc - Wikipedia with the following odd repetitious message:

Ager, Yellen, and Bornstein, Inc.
Starlighsky (talk) 00:18, 13 March 2024 (UTC)


 * Hmm... I am not having this problem. Ager, Yellen, and Bornstein, Inc. Ager, Yellen, and Bornstein, Inc. Did you try adding ?safemode=1 to the URL and seeing if you have the same issue? If so it could be an issue with a user script. If not it might be a browser extension or your own browser. Awesome Aasim 00:38, 13 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Where do you see the broken link? The title Ager, Yellen, and Bornstein, Inc. ends in a period so the url also does:  Many programs will omit the period when they see the url as plain text and try to convert it to a clickable link. That also applies to MediaWiki: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ager,_Yellen,_and_Bornstein,_Inc. The "Did you mean" message was made to help readers who clicked such a link somewhere. PrimeHunter (talk) 01:05, 13 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks! Starlighsky (talk) 01:33, 13 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Probably could just drop the "inc" on an aside. Izno (talk) 16:55, 13 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I dropped the period, and it is working now. Starlighsky (talk) 22:55, 13 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Naming conventions (companies) says to not include Inc. PrimeHunter (talk) 00:29, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I just did exactly that. Problem solved. Starlighsky (talk) 01:58, 14 March 2024 (UTC)

Templates stop working after a certain number (of templates) is transformed (timeout/load protection?)
The page in question (Missing Wikipedians) is a large list of Wikipedia users, Template:User2 is used extensively throughout the page.

Somewhere around the middle of this section, templates turn into link to the template used, instead of whatever should've appeared in place of said template.

Examples:
 * Template:User2 shows up instead of
 * Template:Mop Template:Former admin shows up instead of

Purging doesn't help. The last known good revision dates back to 22:40, 31 October 2023

--Moon darker (talk) 04:52, 14 March 2024 (UTC)


 * See Help:Template. ԱշոտՏՆՂ (talk) 05:28, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks, that's exactly what it felt like, but I somehow missed that limits page. Moon darker (talk) 06:20, 14 March 2024 (UTC)

Bug in the "What links here" function?
After a multi RM, I went back to fix double redirects. When doing so, I discovered a possible bug in the "What links here" function.

What happens is that there first seems to be one [double] redirect only. I fix it, and then return to the "What links here" special page. I refresh: the changed redirect now shows in expected place – but then one or two new redirects appear in the list!

Why didn't they show before? I think the issue is somehow related to the sorting order in the "What links here" page: after the "Wikipedia" article name space, which is shown last (possibly except for "Wikipedia talk"), the function does not expect more pages – so it doesn't even try. The list in the function wasn't always sorted on article name space, was it?

I have saved the last article in the multi RM for a technician to "debug" if they wish: List of people associated with Wadham College, Oxford. There is a single double redirect (and articles linking to it), but I expect more to appear after it's fixed.

P.S. This appears – at least to me – unrelated to the 500 limit on showing links to redirects. Few articles link to the articles in the RM, even if you include links to redirects. HandsomeFella (talk) 07:00, 14 March 2024 (UTC)


 * Is it possible that the unlisted pages were triple redirects, and that your fixing something else turned them into (less bad) double redirects? WhatLinksHere lists double redirects, indented, but I don't think it recurses into them to list triple redirects.  For example, if R3 redirects to R2 redirects to R1 redirects to article A, R2 is listed indented within R1 but R3 is not listed.  If you then fix R2 to redirect directly to A, R3 will appear indented within the top level redirect R2. Certes (talk) 09:44, 14 March 2024 (UTC)

Edit summaries forgotten
Until late last night when I started typing in an edit summary field it came up with precious summaries that started with the same letters. This was very useful for some of the work I do, eg fixing Category:Harv and Sfn no-target errors. At some point late last night it stopped doing this, and likewise this morning. I haven't changed any settings on WP or on my computer. How do I make it start remembering edit summaries again? Thanks, DuncanHill (talk) 11:27, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I'm pretty sure that behaviour originates in your browser, not in any Wiki software. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 14:35, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
 * It does not remember your past edit summaries because something cleared or stopped using your autofill cache in your browser. It is only possible to help if you say what browser you are using. Maybe the website of the browser knows more than people here. You can ask here for a list of your edit summaries, if you find that useful. Snævar (talk) 14:19, 11 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Browser is Edge version 122.0.2365.80 (Official build) (64-bit). As I said, I haven't changed any settings on it. DuncanHill (talk) 12:29, 13 March 2024 (UTC)
 * This is not a feature coming from us. Browser-configuration of such a feature is using in the "autofill" or "forms" configuration of your browser. Certain privacy extensions may suppress this as well. — xaosflux  Talk 13:57, 13 March 2024 (UTC)
 * As I said, I haven't changed anything. If it helps, no other forms or autofill behaviour has changed, even on Wikipedia. Just edit summaries. DuncanHill (talk) 14:06, 13 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I didn't know that Edge could remember edit summaries. Internet Exploder certainly couldn't. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 14:17, 13 March 2024 (UTC)
 * @DuncanHill is this when using discussion tools, the standard editor, or both? My browser never remembers these for DT. — xaosflux  Talk 14:23, 13 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I don't know what discussion tools are, so presumably the standard editor. The change in behaviour happened in the course of the evening. DuncanHill (talk) 14:31, 13 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Discussion Tools. The primary setting is at and there are several more at . -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 14:41, 13 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I don't use any Beta features. On the Editing prefs page under "Discussion pages" "Enable quick replying", "Enable editing tools in source mode", and "Enable topic subscription" have all been ticked (but not by me, I am sure). The problem is on all pages, not just Talk. DuncanHill (talk) 15:01, 13 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I've just unticked those and it doesn't seem to make any difference. DuncanHill (talk) 15:05, 13 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Find and click on three dots in the top right of your browser window, click "Settings". On the page that appears select "Privacy, search and services" on the left side. Go to the "Clear browsing data" heading. Open "Choose what to clear every time you close the browser". Find if the option for autofill is on or off (should be off). Snævar (talk) 10:56, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
 * It is off. It's always been off. I think I mentioned that "I haven't changed any settings on WP or on my computer". The only change in behaviour has been to one field on Wikipedia. DuncanHill (talk) 11:01, 14 March 2024 (UTC)

Gadget that helps edit templates via TemplateData
TemplateWizard is great when you want to add a new template, but it doesn't work when you want to edit an existing template. Is there any existing tool or gadget that can help here? VisualEditor is great but it doesn't work in talk/wikipedia namespaces. ԱշոտՏՆՂ (talk) 03:57, 14 March 2024 (UTC)


 * It does, you just have to do the work to turn it on yourself. See an example. Izno (talk) 15:31, 14 March 2024 (UTC)

Can't find what's linking to this miscapitalized redirect
See this "what links here" list of articles linking to 1985 PBA Reinforced Conference Finals. Usually, it's easy to find and fix links to miscapitalized redirects, but in this case there are two linking articles that I've been unable to find the links in. Can anyone explain or help or fix these? Dicklyon (talk) 00:57, 15 March 2024 (UTC)


 * Look through the templates at the bottom. One of them appears to be coming from Template:NCC 1985 PBA Reinforced Conference Champions. Zaathras (talk) 01:22, 15 March 2024 (UTC)


 * Look at What links here from Template space. You should edit the template to use direct links only, see WP:NAVNOREDIRECT. DuncanHill (talk) 01:41, 15 March 2024 (UTC)


 * Indeed. I thought I had looked there, but I guess I missed it. Dicklyon (talk) 01:48, 15 March 2024 (UTC)
 * But seems like only one of the two is found via templates. I'm still struggling with the one remaining. Dicklyon (talk) 02:23, 15 March 2024 (UTC)
 * @Dicklyon: It seems it's the word "Finals" in the Infobox PBA conference template at the top.
 * Seems like it's automatic, the code for it is:
 * I wonder if it's alright to make that lowercase? – 2804:F14:80C6:A301:CF7:6618:2E02:A732 (talk) 03:01, 15 March 2024 (UTC)
 * As to how I found it, I opened "inspect"/devtools on Chrome (F12?) and CTRL+F searched for "1985 PBA Reinforced Conference Finals" in the Elements tab until I found what element it was.
 * – 2804:F14:80C6:A301:CF7:6618:2E02:A732 (talk) 03:04, 15 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks. I lowercased it.  Hopefully that nails it. Dicklyon (talk) 03:51, 15 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks. I lowercased it.  Hopefully that nails it. Dicklyon (talk) 03:51, 15 March 2024 (UTC)

Auto-Purge
Is their any script/ template on Wikip so if put in a page, every time any user refreshes/ visits the page, it auto purges. For example I could put it in my random number generator, so every time anyone visit/ refresh the page, its gets purged. Exclusive Editor Notify Me! 11:01, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
 * No. You can't force other users to perform actions. — xaosflux  Talk 14:16, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
 * The page refreshes to show latest version every time. It need not force anyone to perform something? Exclusive Editor  Notify Me! 06:25, 15 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Pages are cached to improve performance. An auto-purge function could allow malicious users to overload the servers. -- John of Reading (talk) 07:27, 15 March 2024 (UTC)

Some pages not appearing in the Watchlist
I've observed that some pages (for example Muhammad Aurangzeb) are added to my watchlist at Special:EditWatchlist but are not appearing in the watchlist itself at Special:Watchlist. Does anyone know why this might be happening? Saqib (talk) 10:26, 14 March 2024 (UTC)


 * Your watchlist options may exclude the page. For example, I exclude my own edits.  If you do the same then your edit to Muhammad Aurangzeb won't show up and the page might not be on your watchlist unless the time period covers the previous edit too. Certes (talk) 13:03, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
 * If you're suggesting that pages last edited by me won't show up on my watchlist, then why do the rest of the pages, where I'm also the last editor, appear on my watchlist? --Saqib (talk) 14:14, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I can't see what options you have set, so I'm making blind guesses and may well be wrong. In the "Watchlist Options" panel, on the "Hide:" row, I have a tick to the left of "my edits".  That means a page doesn't appear if its only recent edits are mine.  I still see pages other people edited, even if I also edited them.  This may or may not be causing what you see, or there may be another of the Hide: options filtering out the pages.  If not then I apologise for wasting your time. Certes (talk) 15:01, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I'm unable to find any watchlist settings which show the latest edit to Muhammad Aurangzeb. PrimeHunter (talk) 15:39, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I have the same issue. Firefangledfeathers (talk / contribs) 15:44, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
 * If you use this link with all filters and scripts off does it work? — xaosflux  Talk 18:18, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
 * The page (Muhammad Aurangzeb) is appearing now in the watchlist, on its own. Strange. --Saqib (talk) 20:20, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Having added Muhammad Aurangzeb to my watchlist, I can replicate this. My settings are:
 * At :
 * "" - disabled
 * At :
 * "" - 250
 * "" - enabled
 * "" - enabled
 * "" - disabled
 * "" - disabled
 * "" - disabled
 * "" - disabled
 * "" - disabled
 * "" - disabled
 * Viewing the page history shows five edits for 14 March 2024 (03:27, 06:33, 17:23, 20:19, 22:42) but with the above settings, plus on-the-fly settings for 3 days and (Article) namespace, my watchlist shows only four edits for the same date (03:27, 17:23, 20:19, 22:42). There are none missing for either 13 or 15 March. I can see nothing in the flags and tags for the 06:33 edit that might cause it to be filtered out. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 12:00, 15 March 2024 (UTC)

European Figure Skating Championships
We have encountered a strange technical bug while inserting new templates into the tables for this article. The issue is visible beginning with 1978 on the Pairs table. I do not see where something was entered wrong at that point that would cause all of the subsequent templates to not display properly. Any advice would be appreciated. Pinging Hyperion82. Bgsu98  (Talk)  20:43, 14 March 2024 (UTC) PAGE ]]) 05:57, 15 March 2024 (UTC) PAGE ]]) 17:32, 15 March 2024 (UTC) PAGE ]]) 06:05, 15 March 2024 (UTC) PAGE ]]) 17:16, 15 March 2024 (UTC)
 * See WP:PEIS. The rendered page is too big. If you ask nicely, someone here might be willing to modify FS medalist to use the flagicon module, which should help. – Jonesey95 (talk) 21:12, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I sure would appreciate any assistance in this matter. I'm sure the user who created that template would not mind at all. Bgsu98   (Talk)  21:33, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Pinging, who will probably be able to figure out what I'm doing wrong at FS medalist/sandbox. – Jonesey95 (talk) 22:02, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Just a quick observation. FS medalist/sandbox's arguments are being checked by Module:Flag when the module calls Module:Check for unknown parameters. These arguments will fail the check: 3, altflag, dap, dap2, flag2, link2, noflag.
 * Seems like this line of code should change to "false" like the rest so the check doesn't occur for "icon". Not sure why it is different or why the check is even needed?
 * Jroberson108 (talk) 05:02, 15 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I somewhat understand what is happening, but I don't understand why it is happening. The Module:flag braces appear to be properly closed before they get to 3= and dap=, which are intended as parameters for FS medalist/sandbox, so I don't see why Module:flag is able to see those 3= and dap= arguments. I'm missing something. – Jonesey95 (talk) 05:32, 15 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I switched it to Module:Flagg, which seems to be working. It doesn't have all the extra checks and is what the other module calls too. Jroberson108 (talk) 05:53, 15 March 2024 (UTC)
 * @Jroberson108, Jonesey95: is designed to be a wrapper for  that is a 1:1 replacement for . The module checks for unknown parameters because the template does. If you don't want the check, you can use  instead. --Ahecht ([[User talk:Ahecht|<span style="color:#FFF;background:#04A;display:inline-block;padding:1px;vertical-align:-.3em;font:bold 50%/1 sans-serif;text-align:center">TALK
 * @Jroberson108, Jonesey95: is designed to be a wrapper for  that is a 1:1 replacement for . The module checks for unknown parameters because the template does. If you don't want the check, you can use  instead. --Ahecht ([[User talk:Ahecht|<span style="color:#FFF;background:#04A;display:inline-block;padding:1px;vertical-align:-.3em;font:bold 50%/1 sans-serif;text-align:center">TALK
 * You can also add true to the module call to prevent it from looking at the parent template's parameters. --Ahecht ([[User talk:Ahecht|<span style="color:#FFF;background:#04A;display:inline-block;padding:1px;vertical-align:-.3em;font:bold 50%/1 sans-serif;text-align:center">TALK
 * @Jonesey95 I'll look at cleaning up FS Medalist tomorrow. Currently it has flagicon nested inside two levels of #if nested inside unbulleted list, which means it's being quadruple counted towards the expand size. --Ahecht ([[User talk:Ahecht|<span style="color:#FFF;background:#04A;display:inline-block;padding:1px;vertical-align:-.3em;font:bold 50%/1 sans-serif;text-align:center">TALK
 * @Jonesey95 I have a draft at Template:FS medalist/sandbox that cuts the PEIS by 60%, but it's waiting on an edit request to Module:list. --Ahecht ([[User talk:Ahecht|<span style="color:#FFF;background:#04A;display:inline-block;padding:1px;vertical-align:-.3em;font:bold 50%/1 sans-serif;text-align:center">TALK
 * Substing the whole medalist section, apart from cite web and the "Cumulative medal table" section (they do not like being subst), brings PEIS down to 1,982,442/2,097,152 bytes. Snævar (talk) 21:48, 14 March 2024 (UTC)

Hello not sure where to put this
Where do I go to ask WMF to support WikiLovesiNaturalist or similar in maintenance, uptime, expansion? The iNaturalist to Commons pipeline is precious and invaluable and having it kinda automated with license checks and all the metadata connected is Very Very Good. Not sure how to pursue this but it's spring and my social media is rich with "check out this rare wildflower I saw" posts and I want to create stubs for them all but WikiLoveiNat is having uptime challenges which slows down the stub-illustration process. Thanks in advance for guidance. jengod (talk) 00:13, 11 March 2024 (UTC)


 * Looks like the maintainer is @Jon (WMF). Pinging them so you two can connect. – Novem Linguae (talk) 02:25, 11 March 2024 (UTC)
 * TYSM @Novem Linguae and hi @Jon (WMF) 👋 I love your tool and wrote about it in Signpost which I hope you saw: Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2024-02-13/Gallery
 * jengod (talk) 02:29, 11 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Hey there! I maintain this tool in my volunteer time. You can file bugs at https://github.com/jdlrobson/WikiLovesINat/issues and I'll look into them pretty swiftly. I've created https://github.com/jdlrobson/WikiLovesINat/issues/15 to make a note that I should make it easier to contact me!
 * What uptime challenges are you experiencing right now? It uses the API at https://query.wikidata.org/ and I see that appears to be running slower than normal. Is that what you are referencing? Jdlrobson (talk) 22:53, 15 March 2024 (UTC)

PAGESIZE as inexpensive alternative to #ifexist parser function
Can I assume that the PAGESIZE magic word is not an expensive parser function? E.g., this is cheap:

I use #ifexist when I must in templates, aware of its status as an WP:EXPENSIVE parser function. I attempt to minimize its use, and I document it on the /doc page so users are aware of the implications. However, it recently occurred to me that I can do better. The huge majority of the time, I don't care to distinguish between the cases, a) page does not exist, and b) page exists but is empty. Given that, if PAGESIZE is not expensive, I plan to replace all of my #ifexist functions with an #ifeq PAGESIZE instead:

Am I missing something, or is this a good strategy for reducing the number of expensive parser functions in templates where the conditions 'pagesize=0' and 'page does not exist' are handled equivalently? P.S. I tried alternatives: #if won't work, cuz a '0' string is true; and #ifexpr won't work, unless you formatnum-protect pagesizes > 999; #ifeq was briefest. Mathglot (talk) 03:39, 15 March 2024 (UTC)


 * "Expensive" is pretty relative - the cost isn't really in counting or anything in the case of ifexist but in the fact that the system needs to make a trip to the database to know whether the page exists. The valuable thing is that ifexist will trigger updates in the page it's used on when the page you're checking for existence starts existing. IDK if that is guaranteed for PAGESIZE. I also don't know if PAGESIZE needs a DB call; it's not marked as such, but that doesn't mean much.
 * That said, unless you're making a template that will be called many times a page, one or two checks for existence breaks no bank (we're allowed up to 500 expensive functions a page). Izno (talk) 04:17, 15 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks, yes, I know about checking the PP limit report, and some of these templates are conducive to being used in a table of lots of articles so could eat up a lot of the 500 limit, possibly exceed it although that hasn't happened yet. Also, the ones I have in mind are designed chiefly for Talk space, so it's less serious if hitting a limit does break the page, but still. Maybe  or  would know about the DB call question? If it's no better than #ifexist, then no point in changing these templates, but if it is better, there could be a real upside, and a tool to improve a lot of templates. Mathglot (talk) 05:13, 15 March 2024 (UTC)
 * If you're not bothered about the page's existence being updated (perhaps you even want to keep a historic record of whether it existed at time of writing) then you could subst: the #ifexists (or #ifeq workaround). Then you could add pages in batches of much less than 500, so the one-off parsing would work each time.  I'm not sure whether this fits with your use case. Certes (talk) 18:02, 15 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Nice tip. Wouldn't work exactly for my use case, but a modification of it might. It involves a trick I saw somewhere which saves a subst without executing it the first time (maybe split up by a self-closing noinclude in the middle of it, or something like that), and then next save, it is substed. This would allow what you are saying to happen in two saves, with the first one containing a trace of the visible subst, meaning we could wait a week or whatever period, revert to the first save, let it subst again, thus saving a weekly snapshot of existence, so to speak, which might be good enough. Does that sound like it would work? Mathglot (talk) 23:29, 15 March 2024 (UTC)
 * That's worth trying and may work, depending on exactly what you want to achieve. Help:Substitution may be useful, even if your case is not recursive. Certes (talk) 23:59, 15 March 2024 (UTC)

Well, looks like I answered my own question; PAGESIZE is no better: see PP limit report for User:Mathglot/sandbox/500 ifexist workarounds – it is maxed out at 500. Darn. Oh, well. Mathglot (talk) 05:36, 15 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Added a couple of explanatory notes at Help:Magic words; feel free to adjust. Mathglot (talk) 05:54, 15 March 2024 (UTC)
 * The limit is there for a reason. People trying to bypass the limit are essentially trying to break the servers. Which means that such a hole will be plugged. MediaWiki is not a generic database or generic compute platform. If you want to do very complex things, at some point you will have to write an extension and take into account the many restraints that apply to efficiently serve up data. —Th e DJ (talk • contribs) 08:41, 15 March 2024 (UTC)

harvnb refs won't link back to "mother ref"
At Governor General of Canada, I've used Template:Cite canlaw for a reference (currently number four). As there's no field in that template for an author, in order to use Template:Harvard citation no brackets for subsequent references (68, 75, 77 through 80, etc) back to the same source, I tried to do as instructed at Template:Harvard citation no brackets and add |ref= to the canlaw template. However, in article space, none of the harvnb references link back to the "mother ref". Anyone have a clue why and how to resolve it? ₪  MIESIANIACAL  16:04, 16 March 2024 (UTC)
 * does not support ref. You can wrap the  template with  to work around that limitation or you can edit  to create an anchor ID from ref.   is the simpler solution.
 * —Trappist the monk (talk) 16:25, 16 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I got it to work. Thank you. -- ₪   MIESIANIACAL  17:22, 16 March 2024 (UTC)

Badly legible lengthy talkpage Talk:Limburgish
Hello,

maybe that is an unusual comment for this talk page. Talk:Limburgish is a talk page which is not only difficult to read and not formatted properly, all of which partly is caused by me. What can I do to render the talk page in line withg the rules?

Kind regards Sarcelles (talk) 21:06, 10 March 2024 (UTC)


 * Answered on that talk page. Andy Mabbett ( Pigsonthewing ); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 21:40, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
 * It was halved by an archive bot. However, the disputes are unresolved. Sarcelles (talk) 16:55, 11 March 2024 (UTC)
 * By now, further parts of the article have been removed by bot. Half a year ago, an author using changing IP adresses caused hustle across Wikimedia by forcing decisions. This user seemed to refuse to differentiate between German Wikipedia and other Wikimedia projects. Sarcelles (talk) 21:02, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I would like to know how I can rewrite its content with respect of both intelligibility and the rights of other authors. Sarcelles (talk) 23:39, 16 March 2024 (UTC)

Magic word that only removes the inline ToC
Recently, the inline TOC at WP:RFA2024/I was replaced with a manual one. This was done through the ? Aaron Liu (talk) 00:30, 17 March 2024 (UTC)
 * That seemed like it worked. Are there any possible accessibility concerns for this approach? Is there a more suitable HTML5 element than ?  Aaron Liu  (talk) 00:34, 17 March 2024 (UTC)

Subtitle and jQuery, again
A while ago, I asked about how to pass a jQuery object into mw.util.addSubtilte. @Nardog suggested basically converting the object into an HTMLElement through accessing [0], which worked. However, it has a weird caveat: it duplicates the element when I run .html(newHTML) or similar functions on it, and the duplicated element will be nested under the original element. His initial suggestion of wrapping it inside a parent element does the same thing. See User:Aaron_Liu/Watchlyst_Greybar_Unsin.js for my current implementation. Is there some way I could deduplicate this thing? Aaron Liu (talk) 21:57, 16 March 2024 (UTC)
 * It looks like you're returning what is supposed to be the outer HTML in getWatchlyst. .html replaces the inner HTML, not the outer HTML (which you can't do without replacing the element altogether). Nardog (talk) 01:48, 17 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Ah.... oops. Really wonder how that happened. Thanks! Aaron Liu  (talk) 02:32, 17 March 2024 (UTC)

Custom inline talkpage CSS causing weird bugs for mobile
Continued from User_talk:Awesome_Aasim:

It seems as if mobile users are not seeing the full talk page, instead getting everything collapsed to a "learn more about this page" message. I found that not only my talk page does this, but other stylized talk pages like , etc.

I get that the mobile experience sucks on Wikipedia, but this might be something that might need addressing ASAP. Can we maybe look into it? Maybe it needs a Phabricator report. Awesome Aasim 20:31, 16 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Without looking at the details, there are three things that might be causing this: (i) the use of level 1 headings; (ii) the placement of the TOC in the third section, instead of before the first heading; (iii) the use of unclosed tags in the first section that persist to the foot of the page. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 20:43, 16 March 2024 (UTC)
 * @Redrose64 If you see Cyberpower's talk page, which I linked to as a second example, the same notice is there. It is some sort of HTML thing happening I think that is confusing mobile. It is not happening on your talk page, either. I checked another talk page and that one functions correctly. It is some half baked piece of code that is causing this. Awesome Aasim 22:48, 16 March 2024 (UTC)
 * To make things even more confusing there is no option to "read as wiki page" as previously on mobile. Awesome Aasim 22:49, 16 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Fixed User talk:Awesome Aasim, as Redrose64 mentioned, some missing div closing tags. Jroberson108 (talk) 23:53, 16 March 2024 (UTC)
 * @Jroberson108 That is not much of a "fix"; rather a bodge around a broken patch on mobile. It has been fine for mobile users until recently... BTW MW auto closes div tags, etc. at the end of pages I believe. RR's talk page BTW does not have any of this "Learn more about this page" business; I think what is supposed to happen is the first section is supposed to be displayed up there. But it isn't, and here we are.
 * Maybe I can get around this with templatestyles.css for now but it still feels very bodgy. There are dozens of Wikipedian talk pages that are decorated in a similar manner to mine; if all of them are broken then it is something that should be reported to Phabricator. Awesome Aasim 01:30, 17 March 2024 (UTC)
 * As an aside, autoclosing of div tags by MediaWiki hasn't been my experience in the past, for talk pages using it to put a background box around the main content area. Is that a behaviour that has changed? isaacl (talk) 02:18, 17 March 2024 (UTC)
 * @Isaacl I just tried in my sandbox with this markup:     and the DOM shows them as this:      . That might not mean that it was autoclosed in the source but something is going on to fix this. Awesome Aasim 04:20, 17 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Phabricator task opened: T360268. Hopefully it gets fixed. Awesome Aasim 15:57, 17 March 2024 (UTC)
 * There are other issues with your page on Minerva like the "Add topic" button appearing over the categories unless the level 1 "Talk" section is opened. This may be due to having multiple level 1 headers, something against WP:LEVELONESECTION. Also, if you are going to add HTML instead of wikitext, try to keep it valid and test it in the different skins. See Help:HTML in wikitext. BTW, the main content area you are allowed to edit isn't the end of the page, so invalid markup might affect what comes after it. Jroberson108 (talk) 03:43, 17 March 2024 (UTC)
 * User talk:Cyberpower678 has unclosed div tags; User talk:EEng doesn't, and nor does mine. If you see a problem that affects some pages but not others, look for the common factor: in this case, the presence of extra page borders on the problem pages. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 00:24, 17 March 2024 (UTC)

Sticky header template for tables. Need iphone and Android testers
Concerning sticky headers on tables. See this popular template, and new testcase styles discussion: The opinions of more experts would be greatly appreciated concerning any possible improvements.
 * Template:Sticky header
 * Template talk:Sticky header

This is a template I started, and has been improved by Jroberson108. Some tests are being run, but I am the only iphone user doing the tests, and Jroberson108 is the only Android phone user doing the tests so far.

We need other cell phone users to look at the sandbox pages in their cell phones in both portrait and landscape orientation. The current template styles work very well now for iphone users (at least for me using iphone SE 2020 in mobile Safari, Firefox, Edge, Chrome, Opera) no matter the width of the table. In both portrait and landscape view. I do not need to zoom out, or change the font size.

I am worried that there may be less iphone users able to see sticky headers on tables with these new styles. Because some of the new styles are specific to my iphone SE 2020. So I would like some other iphone users to compare the results of the old and new styles:
 * Template:Sticky header - current styles.
 * User:Timeshifter/Sandbox244 - current styles. More tests and table widths.
 * User:Timeshifter/Sandbox243 - testcase styles. More tests and table widths.
 * User:Timeshifter/Sandbox245 - testcase styles. Narrow 3-column tables only.
 * Template:Sticky header/testcases - testcase styles. Intro may be incorrect since changes have been made. Not as many table widths.

I would also like some other Android phone users to look also. And tell us if the new styles are better or worse in portrait and landscape views. Specifically, one should not have to zoom or change font size to see sticky headers. But it may be required. Table widths shouldn't matter either. But they may. Be specific when comparing the old and new styles.

The main effect of the new styles is to allow non-sortable tables to have sticky headers on desktop and cell phones. But that was never a big problem because it is easy to add class=sortable to a table. And sort under if necessary.

If the new styles affect iphone and Android phone users positively, then the new styles should go live. But if they are negatively effected by the new styles, then the new styles need to be improved. And advice from experts is requested in any case. --Timeshifter (talk) 13:40, 26 February 2024 (UTC)
 * I don't have time to read through the (extensive) discussion on the template pages, but here are my observations (appropriately displayed in a table):


 * My viewport is 396px wide in portrait, and 760px wide in landscape. (...which is really weird scaling, because the physical display is 1080x2340.  Huh.)  Hopefully that's of some help. LittlePuppers (talk) 23:10, 26 February 2024 (UTC)
 * I have the same experience on my Android. Jroberson108 (talk) 23:32, 26 February 2024 (UTC)

. Thanks! Am I correct to assume that all table widths worked in Firefox Android landscape without zooming? Were any of the tables wider than landscape view? I just added some columns to a couple wide tables to make them into really wide 12 or 13-column tables. Here: User:Timeshifter/Sandbox243. --Timeshifter (talk) 00:23, 27 February 2024 (UTC)


 * User:Timeshifter/Sandbox243 is the only one wider on my Android Chrome landscape where I have to zoom out to make it sticky. It pushes beyond the main content area making the whole page wider, but the text is still readable. Without zooming, the edge of the screen ends inside header 9. "Test sticky-header (no caption)" too, which the edge ends inside header 12. Jroberson108 (talk) 01:15, 27 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks. I just increased that one to 13 columns. I created some 12 or 13-column tables for the current styles too: User:Timeshifter/Sandbox244. Does the sortable table there require zooming to be sticky in landscape? --Timeshifter (talk) 01:47, 27 February 2024 (UTC)
 * It appears that with either version of the template (old or new), if there is any table on the page wider than the default width, no headers will be sticky until the page is zoomed all the way out. LittlePuppers (talk) 02:03, 27 February 2024 (UTC)
 * I agree, for User:Timeshifter/Sandbox243 in landscape you have to zoom all the way out for a table to be sticky. Also, if all the sections are open (all tables in view), then no tables are sticky unless you zoom all the way out.
 * For User:Timeshifter/Sandbox244, nothing is sticky except "Test sticky-header (sortable)", which requires zooming out to be sticky. Jroberson108 (talk) 02:24, 27 February 2024 (UTC)

I am still looking for an iphone user to look at this. , I vaguely remember you having an iphone. And you created the sticky header gadget: --Timeshifter (talk) 14:32, 27 February 2024 (UTC)
 * MediaWiki:Gadget-StickyTableHeaders.css
 * MediaWiki:Gadget-StickyTableHeaders.js
 * Special:Preferences


 * I have a very busy week, I can't make any promises until the weekend. —Th e DJ (talk • contribs) 10:04, 28 February 2024 (UTC)
 * OK. Just bumping this to keep it out of the archives. --Timeshifter (talk) 00:01, 3 March 2024 (UTC)
 * They seem to work fine on my iPhone 6s in Safari and Chrome. —Compassionate727 (T·C) 20:28, 3 March 2024 (UTC)

. Thanks! Did you check the the old and new styles by checking sandboxes 244 (old) and 243 (new)? It is the comparison that we need the most. Do you see sticky headers on the widest sortable tables without having to do anything special? On both sandboxes? --Timeshifter (talk) 21:24, 3 March 2024 (UTC)


 * Erm, I only looked at 243. I looked at 244 just now and the headers are not sticky. (I thought that was expected?) The width of the table doesn't affect anything beyond the fact that I have a small screen and wide tables are inherently less readable anyway. —Compassionate727 (T·C) 00:12, 4 March 2024 (UTC)

. Thanks again. It looks like your iphone 6s screen and viewport is the exact same size as my iphone SE 2020 screen and viewport: I fixed something on sandbox 244. Could you look again at the wide sortable table here: On my iphone in Safari, Firefox, Chrome, Edge, and Opera: The wide sortable table is sticky in sandbox 243 and sandbox 244. --Timeshifter (talk) 12:57, 4 March 2024 (UTC)
 * https://yesviz.com/iphones.php
 * IPhone
 * User:Timeshifter/Sandbox244
 * User:Timeshifter/Sandbox243


 * Sticky headers work in those sections in Chrome and Safari. In fact, they work in every section in sandbox 243, but not 244; in sandbox 244, all of the tables in sections 1, 2, 3, 7, and 8 are NOT sticky in both Safari and Chrome. —Compassionate727 (T·C) 21:12, 4 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the full review of all sections! The current CSS does not work on non-sortable tables. Those are the sections in 244 that are not working for you. I get the exact same results as you.
 * I am wondering if only users with small iphones get such good results. The testcase CSS is specifically pointed at iphones with the smaller viewport size found in iphone 6, 6s, 7, 8, SE 2020, and SE 2022. They all have the exact same screen size and viewport size. See:
 * https://yesviz.com/iphones.php
 * --Timeshifter (talk) 22:08, 4 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I don't see any reason not to go live with the new styles. No issues have been found. If there are issues, then editors can simply bring it up on the talk page. Jroberson108 (talk) 07:02, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
 * As I stated before, if the current styles work perfectly (for sortable tables) on all iphones, but only for smaller iphones with the proposed styles, then the new styles are not a net improvement. In that case the new styles only help with nonsortable tables. Nonsortable tables were not a serious problem in comparison. Because it is easy to make a table sortable. And sortable in a way that does not make the table wider (via sort under). Plus the new styles would break some of the tables; those with multiple header rows. We would have to go back and change the class on those tables from class=sticky-header to class=sticky-header-multi. So let's just relax and wait for some later iphone model users to show up. If the new styles work for them, then the new styles are a net benefit, and I would support them. --Timeshifter (talk) 13:00, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Well, FWIW, they work properly when I switch to mobile view on my laptop. Presumably if they work on both the smallest phone screen and a computer screen, they'll work on anything in between? —Compassionate727 (T·C) 15:04, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
 * What brand and model is your laptop? It is possible to switch to mobile view from a desktop PC too. Link is at the bottom of all Wikipedia pages. But I don't think it gets the same results as the mobile view on a cell phone. I vaguely remember that problems ensued when I tried this method before. --Timeshifter (talk) 15:16, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
 * And if they don't, then editors can easily mention it on the talk page like any normal issue, which these changes are additive. It's not a big deal. If the old styles are kept, then the same mobile fixes would need to be applied to fix Android issues, so comparing them like this is nonsensical. Also, mobile isn't the only fix, so I wouldn't get hung up on it. Jroberson108 (talk) 15:17, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Apparently, there is no improvement for Android sortable tables. LittlePuppers wrote: "It appears that with either version of the template (old or new), if there is any table on the page wider than the default width, no headers will be sticky until the page is zoomed all the way out." You agreed with LittlePuppers.
 * We are not sure if there is any improvement for sortable tables on most iphones. We don't know whether sortable tables are sticky on most iphones (those larger than my small one) on both the current or proposed styles. --Timeshifter (talk) 15:36, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
 * It seems like you don't understand the Android issues either. When tables are sticky on Android, horizontal scroll on wide tables don't work. LittlePuppers and I have both said this. Minerva adds horizontal scrolling to tables for an improved mobile experience on small screens, which occurs at Minerva's device break point (width <=720px). On Android, sticky breaks that preexisting feature making the experience worse and causes a readability issue when zooming out. It's not a matter of "no improvement", but "worse". This may be the case on other non iPhones. You mentioned that horizontal scroll still works on your iPhone, so exceptions were added for Minerva's small screens. You wanting every iPhone model in existence to test this is ridiculous. Again, if there are other issues, then it can be mentioned on the template's talk page and those changes would be additive. Jroberson108 (talk) 16:08, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I only want to see what is happening on any iphone larger than mine. Which is most iphones. --Timeshifter (talk) 16:23, 5 March 2024 (UTC)

Request for comment from other iphone users
I am looking for iphone user(s) with a bigger screen than iphone SE 2020 or iphone 6s. I am not sure if the current CSS, or the testcase CSS, works on bigger iphones at all. Or if it does work, how well it is working. Because some of the CSS is specific to my iphone viewport. See previous discussion. This is not a voting RFC. This is just another attempt to get some input from other iphone users. I left a message awhile back at the computing reference desk, but no one showed up here from it. --Timeshifter (talk) 13:22, 4 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Why on earth do you think that a full-blown thirty-day formal WP:RFC is the best means of gaining the attention of iPhone users? -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 09:06, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Actually, I like it. RfCs should be a method of requesting comment from other users when a large scale is needed, not a vote on policy. The current system is far too bureaucratic. 🌺 Cremastra (talk) 19:58, 13 March 2024 (UTC)

I have seem many RFCs that lasted less than a week. I already tried getting more iphone users a couple other ways. I just asked for help at Help:Desk. Iphone users: To make this as simple as possible please tell us if sticky headers work without problems in this section: And tell us what iphone model you have. --Timeshifter (talk) 13:14, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Current styles: User:Timeshifter/Sandbox244
 * Proposed styles: User:Timeshifter/Sandbox243


 * @Timeshifter Tldr, tested both testcases on 14 Pro Max is working.  — Paper9oll  (🔔 • 📝)  06:26, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks ! So those wide tables had sticky headers in that specific sandbox section in both sandboxes? In both portrait and landscape orientation on your iphone?
 * Tldr is fine, because those 2 sandbox sections are all I am concerned about right now. --Timeshifter (talk) 12:34, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * @Timeshifter For portrait, both sandboxes is working. For landscape, only the first sandbox is working.  — Paper9oll  (🔔 • 📝)  12:47, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * . "For landscape, only the first sandbox is working." Are you referring to sandbox244? --Timeshifter (talk) 13:05, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * @Timeshifter Yes  — Paper9oll  (🔔 • 📝)  13:46, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks again . Well, that's too bad. That means that the proposed styles are a step backwards for most iphones. I (with my smaller iphone) see the same thing you are seeing with the current styles for sortable tables (that section in sandbox244). With the current styles I see sticky headers working perfectly in sortable tables in landscape and portrait view no matter the width of the table (that section in sandbox244).
 * Most iphones in use nowadays are bigger than my smaller iphone SE 2020.
 * For sortable tables the proposed styles work the same as the current styles for my smaller iphone. This is because the proposed styles address my specific smaller viewport size. --Timeshifter (talk) 14:12, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * What about "addditive" do you not comprehend? Jroberson108 (talk) 14:31, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * What about "patience" do you not comprehend? You are approaching WP:NPA and WP:TALK problems again in your passive aggressive tone. Please remain collegial in our discussions. What's the rush? Why go backward in some areas if it is not necessary? If you truly believe that you or someone else will figure out a solution for all iphones soon, then we can wait. If it is going to take months or years to improve, as it did in the past with sticky headers, then that is even more reason to wait. It is easy to make tables sortable. I did it several times in order to use the sticky headers template. And sort under makes it possible to do so without increasing table width. So right now, nothing is really "broken" with the current styles in any serious way. --Timeshifter (talk) 14:41, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * For the page and orientation that's not sticky, can you provide the width and height from https://whatismyviewport.com/? Just the large font, not the rest. If you use multiple browsers, can you provide them for each if they differ. Jroberson108 (talk) 14:28, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * @Jroberson108 Portrait is 375x630px and landscape is 710x292px. Browser is iOS default browser (Safari).  — Paper9oll  (🔔 • 📝)  14:36, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * , can you test the one that wasn't sticky again? Jroberson108 (talk) 14:50, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * @Jroberson108 Both are working now in both orientation.  — Paper9oll  (🔔 • 📝)  15:19, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks. It just needed an exception added. Jroberson108 (talk) 15:36, 7 March 2024 (UTC)

I have been trying to wrap my brain around those exceptions in the proposed CSS: screen and (width: 710px) and (orientation: landscape), screen and (width: 667px) and (orientation: landscape), screen and (width: 375px) and (orientation: portrait) The pattern is obvious for my iphone SE 2020 (375x667px). See my viewport listed here: I suggest substituting this for the iphone 14 Pro Max: screen and (width: 932px) and (orientation: landscape) If it works, then exceptions could easily be added for all iphones. By using the page linked just above. ---Timeshifter (talk) 20:07, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * https://yesviz.com/iphones.php


 * I wish it were that easy, but they gave their landscape viewport width as 710px and their test worked. No exceptions are needed for a width over 720px, so a width of 932px is already covered and redundant. If you recall, your iPhone viewport height was different from the listing too. Multiple browsers were a bit different in viewport height, but the width was consistent. Jroberson108 (talk) 20:59, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * So this block resets the mobile table's BACK from scrollable blocks to normal tables... in orientation mode for very specific widths ... I don't get why.. why not for all widths over portrait phone sizes ? What would break on my much larger desktop screen ? I'm confused. —Th e DJ (talk • contribs) 22:19, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * No issues on desktop. Basically overriding Minera's device breakpoint of <= 720px causes issues on Android and maybe some other untested devices. The issue is that the table's horizontal scroll doesn't work when sticky, which a wide table pushes beyond the main content area making the page wider, and requires zooming out to see the entire table before it's sticky making the text on the entire page more unreadable the wider the table is.
 * Apparently this same issue doesn't occur on iPhone since the horizontal scroll works. The code Timeshifter posted comes from the sandbox (see comments) at the bottom and is an attempt to get it working on only iPhone at that break point, which I know widths alone aren't enough to target only iPhone, but its all we have since he wants it working. Fixing horizontal scroll on Android would be ideal, but the only solution I've found is moving the horizontal scroll to a div wrapper, which isn't possible with this template. The div wrapper solution is something I did on the COVID sticky styles that you helped fix. Jroberson108 (talk) 23:16, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I created User:Timeshifter/Sandbox246 so I could test your sticky gadget found in gadget preferences. The sandbox has no sticky templates. On my Win 10 Pro desktop in Firefox your gadget worked on all tables there regardless of width (including the 16 column table). Except it did not work with nonsortable plain tables. It worked with sortable plain tables. And it worked with nonsortable wikitables. On my iphone it did not work in that sandbox in Safari and Firefox. In both portrait and landscape view. --Timeshifter (talk) 23:39, 7 March 2024 (UTC)

Could you check another browser besides Safari? What is its viewport here: And are the tables sticky in sandboxes 243 and 244 in landscape and portrait view? Maybe like with my iphone SE 2020 the landscape viewport width stays the same across browsers.
 * https://whatismyviewport.com

Your screen size (6.7 inches) is the largest size iphone screen size. So we would need viewport sizes for all iphones. I count 10 different iphone viewport sizes here (sort that column): That must be the viewport size not counting the navigation bars.
 * https://yesviz.com/iphones.php

I wish there was a page listing the actual viewport sizes with the navigation bars. --Timeshifter (talk) 22:40, 7 March 2024 (UTC)


 * @Timeshifter Please see below.
 * Safari
 * 375x630px (portrait)
 * 710x292px (landscape)
 * Working for both sandboxes in both orientation.
 * Chrome
 * 375x636px (portrait)
 * 710x319px (landscape)
 * Working for both sandboxes in portrait. Not working for Sandbox243 in landscape.
 * Firefox
 * 375x609px (portrait)
 * 710x279px (landscape)
 * Working for both sandboxes in both orientation.
 * Edge
 * 375x644px (portrait)
 * 812x306px (landscape)
 * Working for both sandboxes in portrait. Not working for both sandboxes in landscape, would autojump to end of page when scrolling through each tables.
 * Brave
 * 375x626px (portrait)
 * 710x294px (landscape)
 * Working for both sandboxes in both orientation.
 *  — Paper9oll  (🔔 • 📝)  09:12, 8 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks for that thorough report! I wonder why Chrome did not work in landscape in sandbox243? The viewport width is the same as the others.
 * And in Edge did it work for narrow tables in either sandbox in landscape? Please close all the sections, and then go to a section with narrow tables. We have seen this sometimes where any visible table wider than the screen causes all tables not to have sticky headers (even narrow tables on the same page).
 * These 2 sandboxes only have very narrow tables:
 * User:Timeshifter/Sandbox245 - Proposed styles.
 * User:Timeshifter/Sandbox247 - Current styles.
 * --Timeshifter (talk) 16:49, 8 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the extensive testing. Edge landscape seems to be doing some weird stuff like maximizing the use of the landscape viewport area or something, so I can't speak to that. The Chrome landscape result does seem odd since it's also 710px.
 * Making it so Android still has horizontal scroll on tables and sticky works on iPhone for Minerva width <= 720px is becoming increasingly difficult. Ideally, the Android horizontal scroll should be fixed if possible so targeting only iOS isn't needed.
 * Maybe will be able to figure out a fix for the horizontal scroll or an easier way to target only iOS perhaps with a combination of ,  , and other   styles? Maybe there is a class that MediaWiki adds to the   or   element to identify iOS that I'm unaware of?
 * Doesn't seem like TheDJ has the time right now, so it seems like your only blocker is the new styles not working on 100% of the iPhones. I can modify it so it works on all iPhones and the Android issue persists just as it does on the live styles. This way the rest of the fixes and improvements can move along. Hopefully this satisfies everyone and TheDJ can find the time one day to fix the rest. Jroberson108 (talk) 02:49, 9 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I prefer to wait until the other 8 iphone viewport sizes are sticky in the proposed styles. I don't want to go backward on iphone sticky tables. Right now with the current styles they are working amazingly well. Considering how difficult it has been to get people with 2 iphone screen sizes (4.7 inch and 6.7 inch), it could take months to find people with the other 6 screen sizes, and 8 viewport sizes. As I wrote before I count 10 different iphone viewport sizes here (sort that column):
 * https://yesviz.com/iphones.php - and 8 screen sizes (a different column).
 * Maybe while looking for them someone figures out another solution. I think maybe we should keep the current styles, and you and/or others can concentrate solely on Android. And not worry about nonsortable tables at all. I think Android tables being sticky without problems is far more important. If we end up with Android and iphones being sticky without problems, but we can't combine that with nonsortable tables, then I am still very happy with that. It would be a great improvement. --Timeshifter (talk) 04:46, 9 March 2024 (UTC)
 * @Timeshifter As requested, Sandbox245 and Sandbox247 is working on both Chrome and Edge in both orientation with no issues. @Jroberson108 As for Chrome, I forgot to mention that on Sandbox244 and Sandbox243, in landscape, it will autozoom out to fit the entire table into the screen itself as if I'm viewing it in Wikipedia's desktop view hence maybe that explain why despite having same 710px as Safari which doesn't do autozoom out to fit.  — Paper9oll  (🔔 • 📝)  06:43, 9 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Yeah, sounds like the Chrome width changes, but you can't get the width value on the other site since it's content isn't wider than the screen. To make matters worse, that width would vary based on how wide the table is when the autozoom out happens. Jroberson108 (talk) 07:41, 9 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure what you mean by "backward on iphone sticky tables"? The change I propose on the sandbox styles is to make sticky work on all iPhones without having to add viewport widths for each device. The Android horizontal scroll issue would still exist. This part would work just like the current (live) styles, so all iPhones remain sticky.
 * I'm not abandoning the fix for Android, just removing it as a blocker so the other fixes and improvements can go live. The Android fix can still be worked on and added at a later time once fixed. I'm still hoping TheDJ or someone else might have a better fix that doesn't involve device widths, whether it be now or later. But, the other parts of the sandbox styles don't depend on the Android fix. Jroberson108 (talk) 07:25, 9 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I updated the sandbox styles so you can see what I'm talking about. The new styles should work on all iPhones now without needing to add viewport widths specific to devices. The same way it works on the current (live) styles. Fixing the Android horizontal scroll issue, which the issue also exists on the current (live) styles, is a secondary task. The sandbox styles can now replace the current styles. The Android fix can still be worked on separate from the rest of the styles whether it be adding the device widths back and continuing with that or some other solution. Please test and let me know if it works. Jroberson108 (talk) 14:12, 9 March 2024 (UTC)

Testing proposed styles #2
and. I cleared the cache of all 5 browsers on my iphone SE 2020: Safari, Edge, Firefox, Opera, and Chrome. See:
 * https://www.google.com/search?q=cache+clearing+on+iphone+browsers - I have it summarized on a card I keep handy.

At User:Timeshifter/Sandbox243 the proposed styles #2 work amazingly well. All tables are sticky no matter the width. Whether in portrait or landscape orientation.

Class=sorttop is not a problem except with class=sticky-header-multi (same as the first proposed styles). This is true for both wikitable or plain table. The table is still sticky no matter the width. But the sorttop rows with that class are sticky after sorting.

Can you test in all browsers too? If you get the same results, then this is an improvement over the current styles since it works with nonsortable tables too. And so I would support going live with it.

and. Are your Android phones better or worse with proposed styles #2 compared to the current styles: User:Timeshifter/Sandbox244? --Timeshifter (talk) 16:04, 9 March 2024 (UTC)


 * I agree that sorttop is a known issue on the current and sandbox styles, and not something fixable (it has a bug report). On Windows and Android, more things work and are sticky. On Android, the table's missing horizontal scroll and having to zoom out on wide tables for sticky to work is the same on the current and sandbox styles, so no change, as expected. No zooming out is needed if the only table that's visible is narrow and fits the portrait width like in "Test sticky-header (sortable). Narrower tables", so font size is unchanged and remains readable when sticky, which is the same in both. Jroberson108 (talk) 16:30, 9 March 2024 (UTC)
 * @Timeshifter Not sure what to test so I just expand every section on Sandbox243 on Safari, Chrome, Firefox, Edge, and Brave. Working in both orientation for all 5 browsers.  — Paper9oll  (🔔 • 📝)  06:11, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks. It looks like the Chrome and Edge landscape view problems in sandbox243 are gone too. --Timeshifter (talk) 15:24, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Draft:Template:Sticky_header/doc is a draft of the new documentation that will replace the current one to explain the new styles. Feel free to edit it. Before replacing the live doc, the "/sandbox" text will need to be removed.
 * Most of this was discussed at Template talk:Sticky header, but I'll re-explain it so everyone is aware. After going live with the new styles, existing tables using the obsolete  class (used on row wikitext) will need to change to the   class (used on table wikitext). Also, existing sortable tables with more than one header row (multiple) will need the   class changed to the new   class. The large majority of the tables using this template have one header row and use the   class, so they won't change.
 * If you think something might have been overlooked and more style changes are needed even if it is a better class name, then now is the time to mention it. Jroberson108 (talk) 16:52, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
 * It's up to you. If you feel comfortable with the Android situation without additional testers, then go live. If not, wait a few days for LittlePuppers. As for the new template doc it looks fine by me. I may make changes and additions later. I may not have a lot of time the next few days. --Timeshifter (talk) 02:42, 11 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I don't have an issue with going live with the Android issue and don't feel additional Android tests are needed. I'm just indicating I'm ready, but look it over one last time to make sure because tables are going to have to be manually changed after going live. If a class name changes after going live, then it's more work. If everyone is comfortable that this is more functional and easy for editors to use, then I may go live tomorrow or the day after. Jroberson108 (talk) 04:00, 11 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Class names for the new styles are fine by me. --Timeshifter (talk) 04:16, 11 March 2024 (UTC)
 * The new styles went live earlier today. Jroberson108 (talk) 06:34, 12 March 2024 (UTC)
 * , I just got back in town after being away for the past week and a bit so I don't have the time to look at this right now. Ping me again in a couple days if you still need me to look at something. LittlePuppers (talk) 01:13, 11 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure where to put this because of how long this thread is, but both styles look the same to me under the sortable section on my iPhone 14 Plus. You should also be able to simulate screen sizes under Firefox. Aaron Liu  (talk) 12:36, 17 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks, but sandboxes 243 and 244 are now using the same CSS styles since the new styles went live on March 12, 2024.
 * This thread is closed. --Timeshifter (talk) 19:22, 17 March 2024 (UTC)

Losing vertical scroll bar when editing
In the last day or so, I've been losing the vertical scroll bar when I'm editing articles. I'm using Firefox version 123.0.1 on Windows 10. It only happens when I'm editing articles. For example, it's fine while I'm typing this message. It's not that I lose the entire window: If I make a change in the edit window, then press tab, the cursor moves to the edit summary window, even though the scroll bar has gone. It's not just the scroll bar - I can't page up or page down either. Any ideas? Thank you. 76.14.122.5 (talk) 17:43, 17 March 2024 (UTC)


 * It seems to be an issue with Firefox. Using Brave works OK 76.14.122.5 (talk) 17:45, 17 March 2024 (UTC)
 * The Tab key is supposed to take you to the edit summary box. That is how HTML forms operate: the tab key moves to the next focusable object in the form. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 23:14, 17 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Yeah. I know. I mentioned that to emphasize that only the scroll bar is lost - other functionality works as intended 76.14.122.5 (talk) 04:03, 18 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Sounds like something is setting  of  to hidden. Try turning off extensions if you have any. Nardog (talk) 00:32, 18 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks! I'll try to figure that out. I have a bunch of extensions installed, so finding out the culprit may take time. Maybe one was silently updated in the past couple of days and broke something. Thanks for the hint! --76.14.122.5 (talk) 04:06, 18 March 2024 (UTC)
 * You can also try to create an account and save the below in . See also Why create an account? for general benefits.
 * PrimeHunter (talk) 09:39, 18 March 2024 (UTC)
 * PrimeHunter (talk) 09:39, 18 March 2024 (UTC)

What if we had an AI to suggest edits along the lines of edits typically made by good editors?
What if, for example, an AI could look at the last few-thousand non-reverted mainspace edits made by the top several hundred editors across several sets of metrics (most good articles, most edits, most thanked for edits), and then look at the whole rest of the corpus and find and suggest fixes for standing issues similar to things that were fixed in other articles by the good editors? I have a hunch that an AI doing that would suggest a lot of good basic spelling, punctuation, grammar, and style fixes. BD2412 T 02:36, 18 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I'd hope that 'good editors' make their edits on the basis of actually understanding what they are doing. LLMs don't have the capacity for that. If they did, we could get them to write the articles for us, and we could all retire... AndyTheGrump (talk) 04:10, 18 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Sounds similar to the scripts that some already use to trace the basic and simple edits. I am not sure AI would help with more advanced edits that require remotely understanding the text, as AndyTheGrump notes, although I would be interested in the results it suggests out of pure curiosity. Do people usually give thanks for spelling, punctuation, grammar, and style fixes? CMD (talk) 04:25, 18 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I do for edits to articles I've created (and I know of other editors who do this). I also might thank a user for an edit of this type that is particularly astute. I've been thanked a few times for reverting vandalism as well. I wouldn't support using AI for this sort of thing though ... there's way too much scope for false positives. If such a project was to be undertaken, each edit should be carefully reviewed by an established editor. Graham87 (talk) 06:35, 18 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I use semi-automated processes (not AI) to suggest (not make) gnome edits. One of my activities is to spot links which are incongruous and might be intended for a different topic with a similar title, assess them manually, and fix if appropriate.  For example, if an article links to Apple but is about iPhones rather than fruit, it might benefit from a piped link to Apple Inc. instead.  AI might be able to trawl our articles for similar cases and bring them to our attention for human triage.  I expect that AI might be helpful with other types of error too, the key feature being that they follow a pattern but are hard to find with existing tools. Certes (talk) 14:48, 18 March 2024 (UTC)
 * My understanding is that there are existing spell, grammar, and style checkers that have long used AI models. If someone builds a tool trained on Wikipedia edits, I'm sure there will be editors interested in testing it. isaacl (talk) 06:50, 18 March 2024 (UTC)
 * There's a lot of hyperbole out there. We (TINW) have been slinging around the term AI for half a century, but despite getting some extremely useful tools, we aren't there yet, and sometimes the results, including grammar and spell checking, look like artificial stupidity. Use only for suggestions and apply sanity checks. -- Shmuel (Seymour J.) Metz Username:Chatul (talk) 16:43, 18 March 2024 (UTC)

Tech News: 2024-12
<section begin="technews-2024-W12"/> Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes
 * The notice "Language links are at the top of the page" that appears in the Vector 2022 skin main menu has been removed now that users have learned the new location of the Language switcher.
 * Octicons-tools.svg IP info feature displays data from Spur, an IP addresses database. Previously, the only data source for this feature was MaxMind. Now, IP info is more useful for patrollers.
 * Octicons-tools.svg The Toolforge Grid Engine services have been shut down after the final migration process from Grid Engine to Kubernetes.
 * Communities can now customize the default reasons for undeleting a page by creating MediaWiki:Undelete-comment-dropdown.

Problems
 * RevisionSlider is an interface to interactively browse a page's history. Users in right-to-left languages reported RevisionSlider reacting wrong to mouse clicks. This should be fixed now.

Changes later this week
 * Octicons-sync.svg The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from . It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from . It will be on all wikis from (calendar).
 * All wikis will be read-only for a few minutes on March 20. This is planned at 14:00 UTC.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe. <section end="technews-2024-W12"/>

MediaWiki message delivery 17:37, 18 March 2024 (UTC)

Blank lines at bottom
I see below every page (up the last hr line) a blank space like three or maybe four blank lines. I don't know why. I'm using the old Vector interface. This happens only here in en.wiki. --ZandDev (msg) 21:56, 16 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Does it happen if you log out? Does it happen at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Example?safemode=1? PrimeHunter (talk) 09:45, 18 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Yes this happen also if I'm logged out (so with the new Vector interface) and with safemode=1 (I had already tried that before) and also with Firefox instead of Chrome. But now I noticed that if I pin the floating index to the side the empty space at the bottom will be reduced. —  Zand Dev  17:39, 18 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I cannot reproduce a 3-4 line gap with Vector legacy but I see it with Vector 2022 in desktop, both at Example and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Example?safemode=1. The gap is only so large if the window is wide enough to show a search box at top, and both the sidebar and TOC is hidden. PrimeHunter (talk) 22:01, 18 March 2024 (UTC)

Substituting templates with the visual editor
I tried to apply prod to an article using the visual editor and I got a warning saying that I had to substitute the template. But I could see no obvious way to do this with the visual editor. &mdash; Martin (MSGJ · talk) 09:05, 19 March 2024 (UTC)
 * See Help:VisualEditor. PrimeHunter (talk) 09:20, 19 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks I'll give that a go. Would be nice if there was a tickbox or something to substitute a template, or if that could be set as the default for templates like this &mdash; Martin (MSGJ · talk) 09:51, 19 March 2024 (UTC)
 * VisualEditor has a feedback link. It doesn't look like VisualEditor can add subst to an existing template call. The slanted pencil icon to the left of "Publish changes" can switch to the source editor. PrimeHunter (talk) 10:29, 19 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I added this to the docs, just in case it helps &mdash; Martin (MSGJ · talk) 10:31, 19 March 2024 (UTC)

Country demonyms
Once again, I've come across a situation where the changeover of a category from "manually coded navseason and categories" to "preformatted template that autogenerates everything" broke categorization because of a difference between the demonym our category is actually located at and the demonym autogenerated by the template.

The category was, and the act of switching it over from Navseasoncats to Educators by nationality and century category header caused the categories for Category:20th-century Kyrgyzstani people and Category:Kyrgyzstani educators to get replaced with nonexistent redlinks at "Kyrgyz" instead of "Kyrgyzstani". I brought a similar case to VPT last year when the same thing happened to a Tajik/Tajikistani category — and as I said that time, I don't have the depth of knowledge necessary to know whether the categories should be at Kyrgyz or Kyrgystani, but either way it is necessary that whichever form they're at the template uses the form they're at rather than generating redlinks for the opposite.

For the moment I've had to work around the problem by wrapping the template in suppress categories and manually readding the category declarations that were on it before the switchover, but that virtually defeats the entire purpose of the switchover — so could somebody look into how to resolve this? Bearcat (talk) 15:57, 13 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I would probably revert the edit, drop a note on the editor's talk page, and maybe post a note at Template talk:Educators by nationality and century category header. This doesn't seem like a VPT problem until you have contacted via the usual mechanisms. – Jonesey95 (talk) 16:30, 13 March 2024 (UTC)
 * It's not an error on Smasongarrison's part. It was a perfectly reasonable edit where they did the right thing and it had unintended side effects not caused by them, not a mistake they made that discussing with them would solve. Bearcat (talk) 20:22, 13 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks for your diligent gnoming, but sometimes getting the problem fixed is better than working around it. That editor created the template in question and added it to the category page, so their talk page or the template's talk page seem like good places to start. Coming here to "Once again..." at VPT every time someone inadvertently links to a red category might not be the best way to resolve problems. Shit happens. I have fixed this problem by tracking down the problem to Module:Find demonym. I have edited the module; see my edit summary for details. If other pages or categories were depending on "Kyrgyz" to be output from that module, they may malfunction, but the module is currently consistent with the vast majority of relevant category names and with Module:CountryAdjectiveDemonym/Adjectives. – Jonesey95 (talk) 21:19, 13 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I'm glad to hear that this was resolved. And, now I know that find demonym exists, so that's exciting! I can definitely build in a check to see if the demonym breaks. Mason (talk) 21:37, 13 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Certainly is an error on Smasongarrison's part. Although the change seemed reasonable, it needed much fuller testing, and the related modules to be fixed. This is a change management problem and templates and modules need a lot more care in implementing changes. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 22:21, 13 March 2024 (UTC)
 * If you don't know what to do, leave it for others to fix it. Using hacks such as suppress categories just hides the problem and does not fix anything. Gonnym (talk) 21:41, 13 March 2024 (UTC)
 * It's neither my job nor my responsibility to do nothing. Every time Special:WantedCategories updates with new redlinks, every single category on it has to be created or wiped out immediately, with no "do nothing" exceptions for any reason ever, because the list has to be cleared to absolute zero before the next time it updates. The report has a hard numeric limit beyond which it cannot detect additional redlinks at all, so there cannot be any do-nothings that don't get fixed and carry over from one report to another, because every one of those that fails to get resolved pushes the list closer to that cap — so the list getting cleared to zero each time it runs is mandatory and non-negotiable, and I will take no lectures or clapback from anybody about it. Bearcat (talk) 22:41, 13 March 2024 (UTC)
 * "Immediately"? It looks like the page was last updated more than 17 hours ago, so presumably we have at least that long to resolve problems. Also, it looks like the numeric limit is 5,000 links, and there are 138 links on the most recent report, so claiming that every single entry, without exception, needs to be removed before the next update also seems hyperbolic. Exaggeration and hyperbole might do well to be replaced by a bit of AGF, discussion, and patience. Maybe there is something I do not understand, but that's how it looks from here. – Jonesey95 (talk) 23:02, 13 March 2024 (UTC)
 * If I leave behind one now, then I'm automatically surrendering any argument that there's any need to clear even one of the other 137 anymore — if I give one redlinked category any special dispensation to stick around unresolved because reasons, then I have to let them all stick around unresolved because why should they be treated any differently than the one I'm not dealing with? Plus, 138 is lower than usual for that report — 200 is more normal, and even then it's only that low because most established editors know that redlinked categories are verboten, and would be a lot higher than that otherwise. So if I don't deal with 138 categories now, then it's 338 by Saturday, and 538 by next Tuesday. And then word gets out that redlinked categories are fine and dandy now, so their use explodes so that there are 2,000 redlinked categories to deal with by next Friday, 4,000 by the Monday after that, and the 5,000 limit has been hit by Easter Weekend. That's why the fact that there is a limit always has to be taken into account regardless of how far away from it any one particular generation of the report may seem to be — because if redlinked categories aren't dealt with right away, the problem doesn't just slowly grow at a rate of only 130 categories every three days: it goes supernova the moment word gets out that redlinked categories aren't considered a problem anymore, and the limit thus gets hit within two to three weeks at most. Bearcat (talk) 00:04, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Aside from the fact that there are two permanent residents on that category report, negating your entire thesis, that kind of slippery-slope, catastrophic, Manichaean thinking is simply not necessary. We have WP:CATREDLINK, a guideline that explains that an article should never be left with a non-existent (redlinked) category on it, so nobody should reasonably conclude that the existence of one or two red-linked categories on a report for two or three days will inevitably lead to human sacrifice, dogs and cats living together, mass hysteria. For word to get out that red-linked categories were suddenly acceptable, the guideline would have to change, which is unlikely. In general, it's better to resolve problems properly than to work around them and possibly sweep them under the rug. It can sometimes take a few hours or days to resolve problems properly, as it did in this case. That's OK. – Jonesey95 (talk) 01:56, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Would it be possible to fix another case, while I'm here @Jonesey95? Would it be possible to add Korean as an option? I'd like to be able to use variants of these templates on categories like: Category:20th-century Korean physicians, but right now, Korean doesn't come up. It doesn't red link, but it just doesn't output a nationality at all. Mason (talk) 19:37, 15 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I have added "Korean" per the good explanation at Category:Korean physicians by century. I have not tested it; please do so. – Jonesey95 (talk) 01:39, 16 March 2024 (UTC)
 * thanks! I'll test it right now :) Mason (talk) 01:53, 16 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Looks like it's behaving as expected :) Mason (talk) 01:55, 16 March 2024 (UTC)
 * @Jonesey95 I found another three. Could we add Turkmenistan, Uzbekistani, and Kazakhstani to the list? Mason (talk) 12:44, 19 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Uzbek, Kazakh, and Turkmen already appear in Module:Find demonym. The category names do not match these accepted terms. For some reason, Module:CountryAdjectiveDemonym/Adjectives contains different variants on the demonyms. I don't think this dual system can be maintained. – Jonesey95 (talk) 14:54, 19 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Hmmm... that's tricky. Mason (talk) 21:18, 19 March 2024 (UTC)
 * The only thing that ever counts as any sort of "resolution" of a redlinked category problem is a full solution that makes the redlink go away entirely, and the problem is in no way resolved by anything short of the redlink going away entirely. Either I make the redlink go away or VPT fixes whatever technical problem is causing an autogenerated redlinked category, because if the redlink doesn't go away then the problem hasn't been resolved, and nobody gets to dictate that I have to leave redlinked category problems sitting unresolved. The existence of two isolated "joke" userspace categories that people have tried to get deleted at CFD in the past, and failed to get any sort of consensus that they were actually as problematic as redlinked mainspace categories are, is not counterevidence against the serious problems caused by redlinked mainspace categories, and a redlinked mainspace category hasn't been "resolved" in any way until it goes away. Bearcat (talk) 01:18, 17 March 2024 (UTC)

AFD Stats 500 Internal Server Error
AFD stats https://afdstats.toolforge.org/afdstats.py does not load but says "Stats 500 Internal Server Error". Since I have no issues with my system, I am assuming this is a toolforge issue to be dealt with. — Maile (talk) 17:37, 18 March 2024 (UTC) PAGE ]]) 21:33, 19 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Also left this message at . — Maile (talk) 18:20, 18 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Probably to do with the grid shutdown just above.<span id="Qwerfjkl:1710787528481:WikipediaFTTCLNVillage_pump_(technical)" class="FTTCmt"> — Qwerfjkl  talk  18:45, 18 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Wow ... I hope Enterprisey has a backup plan in the works. You never know what you'll miss until it isn't available anymore. — Maile  (talk) 02:15, 19 March 2024 (UTC)
 * @Maile66, Enterpriset The tool itself was moved over to Kubernetes a couple of months ago. However, it looks like there was an issue on toolforge's end with moving the python interpreter over when they shut down grid engine. is implementing a fix, but at some point the tool will need to move over to uWSGI or a custom build container. --Ahecht ([[User talk:Ahecht|<span style="color:#FFF;background:#04A;display:inline-block;padding:1px;vertical-align:-.3em;font:bold 50%/1 sans-serif;text-align:center">TALK
 * And it's back now. Sorry about that. Taavi-WMF (talk) 22:12, 19 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Hooray! — Maile (talk) 22:25, 19 March 2024 (UTC)

Gadget being used by -1 users
Script doc auto is reporting a negative amount of users in gadget pages like MediaWiki:Gadget-ProveIt.js and MediaWiki:Gadget-metadata.js. Probably a problem with Module:Gadgets' get_usage function. –  14:35, 19 March 2024 (UTC) PAGE ]]) 19:28, 19 March 2024 (UTC)
 * To see gadget usage, use Special:GadgetUsage. For help with that module you may want to follow up on its talk page - perhaps ping the author. — xaosflux  Talk 14:46, 19 March 2024 (UTC)
 * @Hilst That template actually relies on Module:Gadgets to read GUS2Wiki. updated that page a few days ago and added   to the end of the counts in CSV format. Not sure what the 8 means, but either that would have to be removed or Module:Gadgets would have to be updated to parse it out correctly. --Ahecht ([[User talk:Ahecht|<span style="color:#FFF;background:#04A;display:inline-block;padding:1px;vertical-align:-.3em;font:bold 50%/1 sans-serif;text-align:center">TALK
 * Ahecht, I was unaware GUS2Wiki output was actively being used for anything. The script didn't run for a while and I recently ran it again. The ,8 is caused by phab:T313336. It used to be 2300 which GUS2Wiki removes, but somebody changed the namespace number so I'll have to adjust it as well.<span id="Alexis_Jazz:1710885061792:WikipediaFTTCLNVillage_pump_(technical)" class="FTTCmt"> — Alexis Jazz (talk or ping me) 21:51, 19 March 2024 (UTC)
 * The number change was presumably caused by the Gadget namespace being removed. In any case, thank you for fixing the problem. –  23:06, 19 March 2024 (UTC)

New alias for template namespace
On Wikipedia, it'd be great if an alias for the  namespace was created, such as how   is an alias to the  namespace, which would allow for faster searching of templates in the search bar.

For that, I would propose either, or. Please state which you prefer below, so I can add a task in phabricator! Cheers,  Coco bb8  (💬 talk • ✏️ contribs) 12:19, 14 March 2024 (UTC)

PAGE ]]) 15:24, 14 March 2024 (UTC) PAGE ]]) 17:56, 14 March 2024 (UTC) PAGE ]]) 21:10, 15 March 2024 (UTC)
 * You might like to read Perennial proposals &mdash; Martin (MSGJ · talk) 12:38, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Great, thanks @MSGJ!  doesn't seem to be listed there, however. Could that work as a new proposition?  Coco bb8  (💬 talk • ✏️ contribs) 13:43, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
 * While these sort of things COULD happen technically (assuming the value is not in collision) - it very much likely won't be. For one: why? Templates are already directly short-cutted to via . —  xaosflux  Talk 14:15, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
 * The advantage of a namespace shortcut is that I don't have to type  in the searchbox when I want to visit a template to read its documentation, which I do a lot. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 14:32, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
 * @Xaosflux, @Michael Bednarek: Yeah, that's what I was getting at: when editing you for sure can use, but for looking up the template docs in the search bar typing in   eats some time, which is where   could be handy.  Coco bb8  (💬 talk • ✏️ contribs) 14:56, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
 * @Cocobb8 If you're using the older Vector skin you can use User:Ahecht/Scripts/TemplateSearch to replace  in the search box with   automatically. I've tried getting it to work on the newer Vector 2022 skin, but it's not reliable. --Ahecht ([[User talk:Ahecht|<span style="color:#FFF;background:#04A;display:inline-block;padding:1px;vertical-align:-.3em;font:bold 50%/1 sans-serif;text-align:center">TALK
 * Ah great thanks, but it'd be great to have something that works on all skins just like   Coco bb8  (💬 talk • ✏️ contribs) 15:26, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I did some debugging on the script, and it's now working better in Vector 2022 and Minerva. It should also work on most older skins, including Monobook, Modern, and CologneBlue. --Ahecht ([[User talk:Ahecht|<span style="color:#FFF;background:#04A;display:inline-block;padding:1px;vertical-align:-.3em;font:bold 50%/1 sans-serif;text-align:center">TALK
 * Installed, works nicely on Vector 2022! There is a very minor issue that when shift is still held when typing in, the field will stay 1 second on   and then go back to  . It will however go back to   once the shift key is released.  Coco bb8  (💬 talk • ✏️ contribs) 18:01, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
 * @Cocobb8 Try it again now. I think it was fighting with Vector 2022's autocomplete function, but I figured out a way around it. --Ahecht ([[User talk:Ahecht|<span style="color:#FFF;background:#04A;display:inline-block;padding:1px;vertical-align:-.3em;font:bold 50%/1 sans-serif;text-align:center">TALK
 * While Ahecht's script works in the on-Wiki search box, that workaround for the lack of a system shortcut is not a complete solution. It still leaves edit summaries and custom search boxes in browsers unsolved. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 00:00, 16 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Excellent, works perfectly now!  Coco bb8  (💬 talk • ✏️ contribs) 14:28, 16 March 2024 (UTC)
 * FWIW, this was recently proposed and withdrawn from the wishlist (meta:Community Wishlist Survey 2023/Archive/Create an alias for the Template namespace) — xaosflux  Talk 15:24, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
 * That was for  though, not    Coco bb8  (💬 talk • ✏️ contribs) 15:26, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Also, this isn't really a technical challenge - it is possible and some projects have done it (e.g. ganwiki who even changed alphabets and made T:-->模板: in T355854). You would need to make a proposal, have it well advertised and well attended, and gain community consensus for the change. — xaosflux  Talk 15:26, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Would phabricator be all right or is there another space to propose it?  Coco bb8  (💬 talk • ✏️ contribs) 15:28, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
 * No, it would need to be here on-project. Once approved by the community, then the technical task would opened at phab. See Requests for comment for how to write a RFC. At a minimum it should be listed at WP:VPR. — xaosflux  Talk 15:30, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Ok, will do later this week  Coco bb8  (💬 talk • ✏️ contribs) 15:31, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
 * @Ahecht, @MSGJ, @Michael Bednarek, @Xaosflux: Proposal created.  Coco bb8  (💬 talk • ✏️ contribs) 14:40, 16 March 2024 (UTC)
 * User:Cocobb8, I like your proposal, but it's not an RfC and thus an informal discussion. It will have a better chance of being implemented if was a formal RfC. Follow the instructions at WP:RFC for converting your proposal into an RfC. Xaosflux also said this above. -- Green  C  14:58, 16 March 2024 (UTC)
 * ✅, sorry for dis-regarding this  Coco bb8  (💬 talk • ✏️ contribs) 15:10, 16 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I would like to point out that it.wiki has already implemented this (with ). I was astonished when I found out that en.wiki does not have this handy functionality. --  Zand  Dev  13:57, 20 March 2024 (UTC)

Android app cache
Edited pages do not update within the app, but they update when viewed in an Android browser. I tried clearing the app cache. 3MRB1 (talk) 04:18, 20 March 2024 (UTC)
 * pencil button fails on this page. I had to edit whole page instead of section or new section. 3MRB1 (talk) 04:23, 20 March 2024 (UTC)
 * @3MRB1 I strongly advice you do not use android app, they were poorly written by WMF engineers, without enough testing. Anyway, I didn't find an edit from you just before 04:18, 20 March 2024. -Lemonaka‎  08:47, 20 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Can you please not throw FUD around ? They work just fine within the stated limits of functionality that they provide, you just don't like them. —Th e DJ (talk • contribs) 09:42, 20 March 2024 (UTC)
 * @3MRB1 so you started an edit in the app, saved, and then the page in the app did not show the new version ? Does it do this consistently ? And is it for all articles or was it specific to one article ? —Th e DJ (talk • contribs) 09:44, 20 March 2024 (UTC)
 * @User:TheDJ : Gridiron Club edits from oldid=1214459798 to oldid=1214628526 did not show, after save, in the new version. Now they do show the new version. This has happened before with other pages. I did a lot of small changes from oldid=1214459798 to oldid=1214628526. I think it may have stopped updating after the first few. 3MRB1 (talk) 21:49, 20 March 2024 (UTC)
 * @User:TheDJ : What are the stated limits of functionality of the Wikipedia Android app? 3MRB1 (talk) 21:49, 20 March 2024 (UTC)

Android app: Pencil button
Pencil button fails on this page. I had to edit the whole page instead of a section or making a new section. 3MRB1 (talk) 22:04, 20 March 2024 (UTC)

Page view numbers: categorising articles
If you have the average number of page views for an article, how can you discover where that fits in the spectrum of views that different articles have? I am looking at one with an average of 919 views per day over the past 30 days. Guessing at some "big hitters", Taylor Swift has 71,811 per day, World War II 27,762, etc. Obviously there are plenty of articles with a lot less traffic – but getting an overall impression of the statistical distribution is not easy. Has there ever been an attempt to display this sort of information: something like a tabulation of number of articles banded into different ranges of page views? Or perhaps a graph? ThoughtIdRetired (talk) 09:38, 20 March 2024 (UTC)


 * At the top end, we have User:HostBot/Top 1000 report summarising output from the topviews tool. I don't think we have anything that says Obscure Garage Band is our 3,456,789th most viewed article. Certes (talk) 11:57, 20 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Well there is Category:Lists of popular pages by WikiProject ... Graham87 (talk) 08:31, 21 March 2024 (UTC)

A better way to recognize sockpuppets
Hello, I came up with an idea, a person will definitely speak some unique words of their own, and everyone's wording habits will also be different. If these are put into the language processing model, we can better identify some sock masters who evaded inspection by forging IP/UA, using forged MAC and free email addresses. We used to compare these users by ourselves, however, Artificial intelligence is far better than humans in this regard. They can create wording fingerprint for comparison. Yep, I mean that we may create a model based on voice, tense and wordings. Some grammatical errors can also help us to investigate connections among accounts.

Here's some technical barriers, for example, how to get all the contributions from a user by Api? Which model should be used?

And also, some policy barriers, for example, who can use such tools? How to avoid abusing such tools if they are easily got? -Lemonaka‎ 08:45, 20 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Lemonaka, I wonder if this causes any legal concerns. I'm unsure if this would be considered "personal data" under the GDPR.<br style="margin-bottom:0.5em"/>It's an eternal cat-and-mouse game though. Bing, say "Hello Wikipedia, how do I edit an article?" the way Sherlock Holmes would have said it. Certainly, my dear friend. Allow me to channel the great detective, Sherlock Holmes, as I utter these words: “Ah, Wikipedia, my dear fellow, pray enlighten me on the arcane art of editing an article. The game is afoot!” 🕵️‍♂️🔍
 * <span id="Alexis_Jazz:1710933400094:WikipediaFTTCLNVillage_pump_(technical)" class="FTTCmt">— Alexis Jazz (talk or ping me) 11:16, 20 March 2024 (UTC)
 * @Alexis Jazz Ha, I found this Wikipedia Signpost/2022-11-28/Opinion -Lemonaka‎  13:25, 21 March 2024 (UTC)

Can someone tell me if Citoid is having issues, I'm getting errors when trying to make refs
Hi all

Today I tried to make refs from NPR and New York Times and both of them failed, I know I've cited these sources before which suggests there's an issue. Is there any way someone can test if Citoid isn't working properly, and/or report this as a bug? Here are the failed refs (I tried them several times)


 * https://www.nytimes.com/2023/10/29/world/middleeast/gaza-blackout-internet-israel.html
 * https://www.npr.org/2023/11/21/1196978502/here-now-anytime-draft-11-21-2023

Thanks

John Cummings (talk) 07:42, 19 March 2024 (UTC)


 * Citoid uses zotero under the hood. Querying zotero directly (using zbib.org) gives result for both urls, but Citoid fails. So, it is not even an upstream issue. Just file a bug on phabricator, there is not much that can be said about this. Snævar (talk) 20:14, 21 March 2024 (UTC)

Problems with Twinkle
I am trying to rollback some vandalism using Twinkle, but if I click ok "rollback" or "vandalism" it doesn't do anything, instead of reverting the edit and opening the user's talk page, and sometimes the words "rollback", "vandalism" to click don't even appear. Any ideas? Thank you so much 14 novembre (talk) 15:44, 20 March 2024 14 novembre (talk) 09:47, 21 March 2024 (UTC)


 * @14 novembre Are you using the full version of twinkle or twinkle mobile, which you are loading via your minerva.js file? Did the issues start a couple of days ago when you installed redwarn and User:Lupin/Anti-vandal tool? 86.23.109.101 (talk) 19:08, 21 March 2024 (UTC)
 * 1) I am using TwinkleMobile, when I use the full version the problems don't exist
 * 2) Yes, the issues actually started roughly a couple of days ago, so the start problems may easily coincide with the installation of RedWarn and Lupin's tool.
 * Kind regards 14 novembre (talk) 21:01, 21 March 2024 (UTC)

Portal:Oklahoma
Hi, This page is full of red error messages. Yann (talk) 21:25, 21 March 2024 (UTC)


 * It looks OK to me now. Do you remember the text of any of the messages?  This problem is usually caused by a timeout when the page is rendered at a busy time or several complex excerpts are randomly selected simultaneously.  The last edit is by me a month ago but was trivial and shouldn't have caused the issue.  Pinging  who made more substantial improvements and may be interested. Certes (talk) 21:49, 21 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Sometimes I see "The time allocated for running scripts has expired." If I purge the cache the messages disappear. Schierbecker (talk) 21:53, 21 March 2024 (UTC)
 * That's probably the most common technical problem with portals. It's currently at 6.259 seconds out of a maximum of 10, which is usually normal and safe.  Most of that is in Transclude files as random slideshow within General images.  That's only pulling in 27 images (from History of Oklahoma, Geography of Oklahoma and List of municipalities in Oklahoma) so I'm surprised it's so slow.  I wonder if we should commission a bot to detect such error messages, do a purge and log a report if the purge didn't fix things. Certes (talk) 22:17, 21 March 2024 (UTC)

12 Hour Time Format vs 24
Hi everyone, I was referred here from Teahouse. I was changing some settings for my account under the appearance section and set my preferred date/time format. All the options are only in a 24 hour format however, and I personally like the 12 hour format. Does wikipedia have an option for this? Special:Preferences Haris00911 (talk) 16:37, 21 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Not in the normal manner, although I expect somebody has knocked up a script at some point. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 17:50, 21 March 2024 (UTC)
 * User scripts/List shows two scripts. I haven't tried them. PrimeHunter (talk) 19:23, 21 March 2024 (UTC)
 * You might like the Gadget called "Change UTC-based times and dates, such as those used in signatures, to be relative to local time". – Jonesey95 (talk) 23:42, 21 March 2024 (UTC)

Autocollapsing navbox problem
When a navbox is the only one in an article it shouldn't collapse when it's set to autocollapse. So why at Chopper (film) Template:Andrew Dominik collapses? I don't see anything in the article or template code why it does that. Mika1h (talk) 20:30, 21 March 2024 (UTC)
 * It happens because Multiple issues at top is also collapsible. It seems unfortunate that this affects a navbox. PrimeHunter (talk) 20:49, 21 March 2024 (UTC)
 * The script that picks up  looks for the presence of two or more collapsy objects.  counts as collapsible. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 21:04, 21 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks – I always wondered why the same navbox was randomly shown or hidden without any prompting in the wikitext! Is this feature really useful, or just confusing?  If I hadn't spotted the pattern after 16 years of editing, perhaps some casual readers haven't either. Certes (talk) 22:39, 21 March 2024 (UTC)
 * @TheDJ has previously suggested restricting autocollapse to certain types of collapsible content. I'd be generally supportive of restricting it to sidebar with collapsible lists and navbox at least as a start, but there may be other templates or places where we've generally treated it as valuable... but someone would have to at least do some thinking about what those might be (Category:Collapse templates might be a good start to review). Izno (talk) 02:13, 22 March 2024 (UTC)

Coord?
Am I missing something? At Blue Plains Advanced Wastewater Treatment Plant, I'm not seeing the coordinates display, despite coord being present. Other articles have the same issue. Has there been some change that turned this off? <span style="border:3px outset;border-radius:8pt 0;padding:1px 5px;background:linear-gradient(6rad,#86c,#2b9)"> Sdkb  talk 18:47, 21 March 2024 (UTC)

PAGE ]]) 20:43, 21 March 2024 (UTC)
 * @Sdkb I suspect this is related to MediaWiki talk:Vector.css? Pinging the int admins from that discussion: @Izno @Xaosflux @TheDJ. 86.23.109.101 (talk) 19:11, 21 March 2024 (UTC)
 * The recent update was undone. Can you confirm that that page was working, in Vector 2022, previously? Also note, it make take a few mins for the undo to take affect. (test link in v22). — xaosflux  Talk 20:37, 21 March 2024 (UTC)
 * (On my last page load, I'm seeing them in v22 now). — xaosflux  Talk 20:38, 21 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Looks like it has to do with the loss of, as the default   includes  . --Ahecht ([[User talk:Ahecht|<span style="color:#FFF;background:#04A;display:inline-block;padding:1px;vertical-align:-.3em;font:bold 50%/1 sans-serif;text-align:center">TALK
 * Yes, that change as implemented by Xaosflux would have caused this issue. The suggested changes if both had been done should not have based on my testing that prompted the edit request. Izno (talk) 02:19, 22 March 2024 (UTC)

Signature error
I have had my signature for a long time, but it is now showing "Your signature contains invalid or deprecated HTML syntax". This must have happened fairly recently. The specific error is Lint errors/night-mode-unaware-background-color. Since I'm not sure how to fix this, can someone help? Ianmacm (talk) 16:17, 22 March 2024 (UTC)
 * That looks like a false positive for this new error, which is supposed to be hidden and not affect signatures, according to WMF staff. I have filed with a simplified version of your signature illustrating the problem. – Jonesey95 (talk) 16:54, 22 March 2024 (UTC)
 * , the short answer is that they want you to specify color:inherit in your signature code wherever you use "background" without a color:
 * ;color:inherit ;color:inherit
 * You'll also have to remove a few characters from your signature to make it fit. czar  17:21, 22 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks, this is all a bit beyond me, could you suggest a new version of the signature that would work?-- ♦Ian Ma c M♦  (talk to me) 18:51, 22 March 2024 (UTC)


 * Actually it seems to have displayed correctly here.-- ♦Ian Ma c M♦  (talk to me) 18:52, 22 March 2024 (UTC)
 * The developers deployed a patch to prevent this new Linter rule from applying to signatures (for now). If you want to future-proof your signature and keep it under 256 characters, this may work:  – Jonesey95 (talk) 20:39, 22 March 2024 (UTC)

Question for Go (language) programmers
For any of you who are minimally familiar with how Go modules and packages and their paths are organized and fetched, I could use assistance. It's specifically for Wikipedia. I'm currently trying it locally on Windows command line, but will eventually need to use the SSH on Toolforge. I'm trying to run a COPY of the this code on my machine. I downloaded "main.go" and tried to run that. I did the standard commands like:
 * % go mod tidy
 * % go mod init
 * % go run.

The problem comes from
 * import (
 * "yapperbot-frs/src/frslist"

or
 * % go get yapperbot-frs/src/frslist

I have also tried adding the prefix "github.com/mashedkeyboard/".

I get variations of this error:
 * go: github.com/mashedkeyboard/yapperbot-frs@upgrade (v.0.0.0-20200707114840-05dc9ccea578) requires github/mashedkeyboard/yapperbot-frs@v.0.0.0-20200707114840-05dc9ccea578: parsing go.mod:
 * module declares its own path as: yapperbot-frs
 * but was required as: github.com/mashedkeyboard/yapperbot-frs

Any ideas? Is it a problem with the go.mod on github, or something I should be doing to my local copy to avoid the error? I'm new to Go, but not to programming. --David Tornheim (talk) 07:04, 23 March 2024 (UTC)


 * Not sure if this is it, but in the tried and true method of googling the error (which appears to be 'declares its path', no 'own')  I found this:
 * https://stackoverflow.com/questions/61311436/how-to-fix-parsing-go-mod-module-declares-its-path-as-x-but-was-required-as-y
 * The answer mentions a "replace directive", which appears to now be documented here (old link not available). – 2804:F1...19:9747 (talk) 10:03, 23 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks. I'll try that.  I did find this thread on Google before coming here (to handle a different error report while trying to solve the same problem).  Hopefully one of these works. --David Tornheim (talk) 10:33, 23 March 2024 (UTC)

Problem with a tracking category
Recently GA added "football" and some synonyms as valid GA nomination subtopics. This has apparently caused those articles to show up in Category:Good articles without topic parameter; see User talk:Hilst. What causes articles to be put in that category? Is there another location where the list of valid topics needs to be updated? Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 10:35, 23 March 2024 (UTC)


 * I'm guessing Module:Good article topics/data? That module is used in Module:Good article topics, which is in turn used by Template:GA/Topic.
 * The documentation for GA/Topic says the following: "This template serves as a lookup list for GA topics in templates such as Article history and GA."
 * Note: The table of values in the documentation and in the category will not be updated automatically, that one is in GA topics – 2804:F1...19:9747 (talk) 11:23, 23 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks; will update as needed and see if that fixes everything. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 11:45, 23 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Looks like that fixed it; thanks. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 12:04, 23 March 2024 (UTC)

Making the Article Wizard JavaScript
I want to ask if we can consider coding a JavaScript article wizard in a similar manner we have a JavaScript File Upload Wizard? It would allow for stuff like prefilling of draft pages, etc. Awesome Aasim 19:22, 23 March 2024 (UTC)


 * I'm spitballing here, but we already have something similar in the form of DYK-helper/wizard, perhaps by using   together with adapted source code from the DYK-helper/wizard interface, something similar to what you're describing could be created. — Mugtheboss (talk) 12:12, 24 March 2024 (UTC)

Haitian Creole infobox problem
w:ht:Circle (Alaska) has a red link instead of an image. I think that w:ht:Template:Infobox kolektivite tèritoryal is meant to pull an image from Q974350, but even setting it locally doesn't work, and I can't figure out how to suppress the redlink.

I ran across this while trying to remove articles from the maintenance category at w:ht:Kategori:Paj ak lyen fichye kase. Does anyone have any ideas about what's gone wrong? WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:07, 21 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I have worked around the problem, but it seems like ht:Diskisyon_Modèl:Infobox_kolektivite_tèritoryal would be a good place to start instead of the English Wikipedia VPT. It looks like that template uses Template:Wikidata, which appears to be a copy of the French template, so fr:Discussion_modèle:Wikidata could also be a good place to ask for help. – Jonesey95 (talk) 00:17, 21 March 2024 (UTC)
 * The only editor who has ever replied on that page hasn't edited for three years now. The Haitian Creole community is basically two and a half people.  (I'm the half.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:38, 21 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Previewing  without parameters produced an image below the infobox heading on ht:Circle, Montana but a broken file link on ht:Circle (Alaska). The cause was that  (Alaska) had two images which both had normal rank. I changed one to preferred rank  and it works now. The infobox might be recoded to just pick one image if there is no preferred rank but I'm not trying that. PrimeHunter (talk) 20:36, 21 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I recently added the second image to the Wikidata entry, and the bug was happening before I did that. (I agree that both that I should have specified a preferred rank and that the infobox template needs work.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:59, 22 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I have changed the preferred rank to the original image as a test and   now fails. I guess the problem wasn't having two images but one of the Wikidata fields in the original image. It has three more fields than the new image, and a more complicated name with periods and commas. PrimeHunter (talk) 16:27, 24 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:18, 24 March 2024 (UTC)

Tech News: 2024-13
<section begin="technews-2024-W13"/> Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes
 * Octicons-tools.svg An update was made on March 18th 2024 to how various projects load site, user JavaScript and CSS in Vector 2022 skin. A checklist is provided for site admins to follow.

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

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe. <section end="technews-2024-W13"/>

MediaWiki message delivery 18:53, 25 March 2024 (UTC)

Reply script not loading properly?
For few days now I've been having trouble with the reply button: after I reply to one comment, the reply button will disappear and I have to reload the page to see it. Quite annoying when I want to leave multiple comments on the same page. This happens in English and Polish Wikipedia, in differne browsers (Chrome and Edge), and in two accounts I checked (I've an authorized alt). Is this a known problem? I am using the modern Vector skin and I haven't changed anything in my prefs/added new scripts/etc. recently AFAIK. <sub style="border:1px solid #228B22;padding:1px;">Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus&#124; reply here 03:44, 24 March 2024 (UTC)


 * @piotrus . In this case, I suggest you may have to reset all previous settings in your preference and carefully setup your preference all over again. Secondly, force to stop and clear your browser data and log into your account again. Hopefully this might help. While i don't guarantee that this will work for you, but this steps does solve a lot of browser issues. Goodluck. <i style='padding:5px; box-shadow:0 0 1px 1px #ffffff, 0 0 2.5px 2.5px rgba(0,0,0,0.16);'><i style='color:darkblue;font-style:italic;font-weight:bold;'>Thisasia</i>  (Talk)</i> 11:03, 24 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I use no skins (duh) and it happens to me too. I wasn't sure if that didn't always happen, but I only noticed it in the past few days as well. – 2804:F1...7E:615D (talk) 07:18, 24 March 2024 (UTC)
 * You do use a skin, everybody does. If you read Wikipedia on a desktop or similar, your skin is Vector 2022; if you read Wikipedia on a mobile device, your skin is Minerva Neue. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 13:11, 24 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I meant that more in the "I'm using the default everything because I am an IP" sense, but sure, Vector 2022 then. – 2804:F1...14:BCC4 (talk) 21:31, 24 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Same thing happens to me in Monobook. This is new behaviour; a week or two ago I could use "reply" several times on a page without reloading. —Kusma (talk) 11:37, 24 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I also see this on Vector 2010. I don't believe that I have changed anything relevant. Certes (talk) 18:07, 24 March 2024 (UTC)
 * @Piotrus Thanks for reporting this, I filed it as T360863 and it has already been patched, and the fix should be deployed here next Thursday. Matma Rex talk 20:31, 25 March 2024 (UTC)
 * @Matma Rex Thank you! <sub style="border:1px solid #228B22;padding:1px;">Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus&#124; reply here 22:40, 25 March 2024 (UTC)

Problem with a script
I have most certainly installed this script: User:MPGuy2824/MoveToDraft, but it doesn't work. Any suggestions? Kind regards 14 novembre (talk) 22:23, 25 March 2024 (UTC)


 * @14 novembre your script, User:14 novembre/common.js is a mess. Clean up all the invalid javascript in there. — xaosflux  Talk 22:29, 25 March 2024 (UTC)
 * The problem is . You need to completely remove those two lines, i.e.  because they are not JavaScript. If you really want the functionality of User:MPGuy2824/MoveToDraft.js, you need to follow the directions at User:MPGuy2824/MoveToDraft exactly as it says. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 23:16, 25 March 2024 (UTC)


 * @14 novembre Though this none javascript code of yours aren't necessary, but if you wish to ever leave a none javascript code, then you must stringify and wrap them with the (Template string[``]) ending with a (semi colon [;]), so in your case this is the right way to go about it . <i style='padding:5px; box-shadow:0 0 1px 1px  #ffffff, 0 0 2.5px 2.5px rgba(0,0,0,0.16);'><i style='color:darkblue;font-style:italic;font-weight:bold;'>Thisasia</i>  (Talk)</i> 03:21, 26 March 2024 (UTC)

How to fix excess reply indentation
Hi, I'm wondering how one can fix excess reply indentation, as seen in this discussion. IOHANNVSVERVS (talk) 21:50, 25 March 2024 (UTC)


 * od. You can also do something like  (copy and paste in) if you want it to line up exactly. LittlePuppers (talk) 22:09, 25 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Does one have to manually add the template and the specific number of outdents (# of :s) to each individiual reply? IOHANNVSVERVS (talk) 22:16, 25 March 2024 (UTC)
 * You do it . I took it to a maximum of eight colons, but that's an arbitrary level. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 23:04, 25 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Brilliant, thank you IOHANNVSVERVS (talk) 23:09, 25 March 2024 (UTC)

Shouldn't this outdenting be done automatically when a certain number is reached? IOHANNVSVERVS (talk) 23:12, 25 March 2024 (UTC)
 * No, becauae sometimes you don't want that to happen. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 23:17, 25 March 2024 (UTC)
 * True, but very rarely no? Wouldn't it be better to require some sort of coding/template (like &lt;nowiki>) to prevent the automatic outdenting rather than the other way around? IOHANNVSVERVS (talk) 23:46, 25 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Talk page discussions - including this one - are performed by abusing HTML definition lists. I don't want to discuss the history of why we do it that way, it goes back more than twenty years and is very complicated. Suffice to say that attempts to change the way that discussions are formatted have frequently failed. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 09:42, 26 March 2024 (UTC)
 * "It goes back more than twenty years and is very complicated." — Yeah, I figured as much. Thanks for the explanation. IOHANNVSVERVS (talk) 09:52, 26 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Attempted by providing tools or attempted by exhortation? Making it easier for people to do what you want can go a long way towards convincing them to do it. -- Shmuel (Seymour J.) Metz Username:Chatul (talk) 13:10, 26 March 2024 (UTC)

Greenlandic #Babel messages are actually Danish
Hi! Posting here in the hope someone with the right editing permissions can fix this, because I don't have an account on translatewiki.net and the user who initially reported this issue said they found that even creating an account didn't give them sufficient editing rights to edit the pages there: The Wikimedia hashtag-#Babel system's messages for Greenlandic are actually Danish: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, N. Wikipedia's and Wiktionary's native, wiki-internal Babel templates, OTOH, have the relevant Greenlandic text (see wikt:Template:User kl-1, wikt:Template:User kl-2, etc), if someone can copy it over. (I posted about this some years ago and someone fixed kl-0 but not, I now notice, any of the others.) &#45;sche (talk) 02:37, 26 March 2024 (UTC)
 * None of the linked messages have a history tab so none of them have been created. That means a fallback language is used per mw:Manual:Language. For Greenlandic the first fallback language is Danish which makes sense. Greenland is an autonomous territory of Denmark and Greenland says: "The majority of the population speak both Danish and West Greenlandic Kalaallisut (the most populous Eskaleut language). They have been used in public affairs since the establishment of home rule in 1979. In practice, Danish is still widely used in administration, academics, and skilled trades and other professions." Many small languages have translated relatively few MediaWiki messages. It's done by volunteers and is always a work in progress since new interface messages are often added. PrimeHunter (talk) 09:30, 26 March 2024 (UTC)
 * https://translatewiki.net/w/i.php?title=Special:MessageGroupStats&group=mediawiki says Greenlandic has 47,478 untranslated messages out of 48,004 so they have translated 1%. Many languages are worse. PrimeHunter (talk) 09:36, 26 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I would be happy to copy them over to Translatewiki, but I don't know which translations are correct. Even looking at the very first template, they are different on different projects:
 * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template:User_kl-1: "Una atuisoq kalaallisut mikisuaqqamik paasisinnaavoq."
 * https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Template:User_kl-1: "Una atuisoq kalaallisut mikisumik tapiisinnaavoq."
 * If you know the language, or know someone who knows it, I can help copy their translations to the right place. Or they could go to https://translatewiki.net and become a translator themself. Matma Rex talk 14:48, 26 March 2024 (UTC)

reFill & reFill 2 not working?
I have tried to run both of these citation-fixers several times today and every time I try to run them I get a FAILED An error has occurred. So is it me or is it the system... Shearonink (talk) 13:58, 26 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I only seem to have this issue when I attempt to run it on an article I am working on atm - Joseph Yablonski. Shearonink (talk) 19:19, 26 March 2024 (UTC)
 * hello @Shearonink I'm not very clear about your message but do you mean you are having difficulties with the Auto citation when try to add references? If that's the case, then here is a quick tips on how I usually bypass that.
 * First use a different browser that is not logged in with your wiki account, run the Auto citation again and after when successful, then comeback to your main browser in which your account is logged in and try again ✅
 * I'm not sure of the cause of this technical problem, but this usually occur to me when I have used the Auto citation several times. Hence the only option is to try with a different browser that is not log in with your account. If this isn't the problem u are talking about please explain further. <i style='padding:5px; box-shadow:0 0 1px 1px #ffffff, 0 0 2.5px 2.5px rgba(0,0,0,0.16);'><i style='color:darkblue;font-style:italic;font-weight:bold;'>Thisasia</i>  (Talk)</i> 01:53, 27 March 2024 (UTC)

Some wikilink t(r)ails
Should be completely wikilinked or are we OK with the status quo? That's $linkTrail in MessagesEn.php. This has become more obvious since the change of wikilink colors. Ponor (talk) 11:21, 27 March 2024 (UTC)
 * → Batman's (see Help:Link)
 * → Worldschmerz (see Help:Link)
 * → bezantée
 * → Víkingsvöllur
 * → ponorić
 * If you are asking about possibly changing the linktrail rules in MediaWiki then it's not controlled by the English Wikipedia. T47126 has old discussion. If you are asking whether we should write  to produce bezantée instead of bezantée (where ée is not link colored) then it isn't mentioned in Manual of Style/Linking but I would certainly say yes. You can post a suggestion to the talk page if you want a guideline about it. PrimeHunter (talk) 11:41, 27 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Yes, I am asking about possibly changing the linktrail rule. Help:Link seems to suggest that the first two examples should be completely wikilinked, and they're not.
 * There was an attempt to fix this, which was reverted here, but things might have changed with the old dependencies by now (and there are other ways to do it anyway).
 * Any change to MessagesEn.php needs local consensus, which is why I’m asking here. Ponor (talk) 11:54, 27 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Help:Link describes Batman's as the right thing, which is a reasonable but debatable opinion. Ignoring WP:OL, Worldschmerz also seems right. as World tells the reader nothing about schmerz (though Weltschmerz does).  The others are a bug.  The good news is that its ticket's priority was raised to Low ten years ago, so the WMF may find the funding to fix it real soon now. Certes (talk) 11:55, 27 March 2024 (UTC)
 * @Certes, if Batman's produced Batman's at some point, the meaining of "this does the right thing for possessives" might have been different. It, for me, surely looks ugly as Batman's now. Where they mention, it's said "this rule also applies", where by "the rule" they mean that the trail should be wikilinked, I believe.
 * I am not here to discuss the particular examples, I only used the -schmerz example instead of the one generic one in Help:Link. The question is purely technical. Ponor (talk) 12:16, 27 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Yes, it doesn't say what "the right thing" is other then implying it is however the page looked when the text was written. That may well be with the 's also linked.  If so then we should be fixing this globally in MediaWiki rather than by editing all the wikitext to work around a bug. Certes (talk) 12:31, 27 March 2024 (UTC)

How to create an anchor for a table row?
Help:Link refers to Help:Table but that deeplink is broken. Uwappa (talk) 01:46, 26 March 2024 (UTC)


 * Would Anchor in the first cell of the row suffice? Stefen Towers among the rest!   Gab • Gruntwerk 02:07, 26 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Yes, that would be a working workaround.
 * Yet, there seems to be a way to create an anchor for a row. How? Uwappa (talk) 02:16, 26 March 2024 (UTC)
 * The workaround is the solution here because HTML tables don't provide for jump links within the table structure, as far as I know. A link is an inline object, after all. And cells contain inline objects. Stefen Towers among the rest!   Gab • Gruntwerk 02:42, 26 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I think "id=" does what you're looking for, e.g. the "2023" row of the table in Oscar Piastri starts with "|id=2023R" and Oscar Piastri takes you directly to that row of the table. DH85868993 (talk) 02:53, 26 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Interestingly they assign the ID to a table cell rather than a row, from the page source thusly: <td id="2023R"> Stefen Towers among the rest!   Gab • Gruntwerk 03:24, 26 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I have fixed the link to .  should be in the row start  . Anchor can be used in cells but then the link may take you to the first text of a vertically centred cell without displaying the top of the row. PrimeHunter (talk) 09:48, 26 March 2024 (UTC)
 * PrimeHunter describes the correct technique here. just adds extra complexity, and can only be used inside a cell, whereas the   attribute may be used on any of the following: (i) the   that begins the table; (ii) the   that marks a caption; (iii) the   that marks a new row; (iv) the   that begins a header cell; (v) the   that begins a data cell. The main difference between the last two and using  is that the former place the id on the cell itself, whereas  places the id into a span element somewhere inside the cell, not necesarily at the beginning. Therefore, use   in whichever table element is semantically correct, this aids accessibility. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 12:52, 26 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Thank you both for the information. I guess I haven't worked with with tables enough to know things this sophisticated could be done with them. Stefen Towers among the rest!   Gab • Gruntwerk 16:03, 26 March 2024 (UTC)
 * The five places that I described for placing an  attribute may also be used for   and   attributes. These are among the [//www.w3.org/TR/2021/SPSD-html52-20210128/dom.html#global-attributes-2 global attributes] that are valid on all HTML elements. I suspect that some of the others, such as ,   and  , may also be used in the same positions. I should, at some point, look into carrying out proper tests and writing it up, perhaps in Help:HTML in wikitext. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 20:21, 27 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Yes, the |- id="section link anchor name" works like a charm for a row. Thanks. Uwappa (talk) 17:35, 27 March 2024 (UTC)

City park missing outline on map
Today, I discovered Shawnee Park in Louisville had incorrect coordinates in its infobox and WikiData, and so I corrected all that and tried to ensure WikiData for Shawnee Park has the data that its sister flagship parks in the same city, Cherokee Park and Iroquois Park, have. Now, I'm wondering why Shawnee Park won't show its boundaries in red on the map like is done for the other ones. Is there a setting somewhere I'm missing? Stefen Towers among the rest!  Gab • Gruntwerk 20:50, 25 March 2024 (UTC)


 * Am I asking in the wrong place? Is there a spot to do map-related requests? Stefen Towers among the rest!   Gab • Gruntwerk 16:00, 26 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I've moved my question to the Help Desk as I found another park article with an inaccurate boundary, and I'd like to get these fixed. Stefen Towers among the rest!   Gab • Gruntwerk 16:54, 27 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Explanation given on Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Maps. The Equalizer (talk) 20:22, 27 March 2024 (UTC)

Source quality tags
Could we add source tags (independent or not, is it reliable or not, etc) which are starting to be visible in visual editor as an opt in. I think it would help when writing a new draft and doing a self check of its notability, and to assist reviewers in carrying out their reviews (reviewer adds such tags for each source and instructs draft author how to view these tags to aid the new author in understanding which sources are better and which are worse). There could be semi-automated tagger which suggests in edit mode to tag youtube sources as unreliable, for example. Gryllida (talk, e-mail) 00:15, 28 March 2024 (UTC)


 * @Gryllida I would oppose the "semi-automated tagger" part of this proposal. Whether a source is reliable or not depends upon context, and is often not a binary yes/no question - it is not the case that all YouTube videos are unreliable, for example. If the BBC uploaded an old documentary to YouTube that could be a perfectly reliable source for some information, or it could be hopelessly outdated (and indeed, different parts of the same video could fall into both categories). An interview posted on YouTube could be used in an WP:ABOUTSELF manner, or it could fall afoul of WP:BLP. This kind of thing really needs to be done using editorial judgement. 86.23.109.101 (talk) 13:45, 28 March 2024 (UTC)

"As Session Musician" section for Ry Cooder article is invisible in Safari
I can see it in Firefox. But in Safari, the article ends with that section heading. And if I search for "Hiatt" on the page, it's highlighted in the invisible section, but I still can't see any text. I'm using Safari 17.4 and running Mac OS Sonoma 14.4. I also posted this to the article's Talk page. Peterh6658 (talk) 02:17, 23 March 2024 (UTC)
 * . – Jonesey95 (talk) 04:41, 23 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks! Why was it visible in Firefox but not Safari? Peterh6658 (talk) 07:14, 28 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Going to, using Firefox 124, I see that the page is in two columns at that point. The left-hand column has the "Soundtracks" and "As Session Musician" subsections, plus the "Films" and "Written works" sections and the beginning (4 refs) of the "References" section; on the right, we have the remainder of the references, plus the "External links" and navboxes. This two-column layout ends after the navboxes but before the categories box, so something in the MediaWiki software is injecting sufficient tags at that point to finish the page neatly. Viewing the HTML source  shows that this is indeed the case: there are  tags at each of the four positions that the Wikitext has a , there are  tags at each of the two positions that the Wikitext has a , plus four  tags before the category box where I would expect there to be two - one to terminate the last navbox and one to end the page content.
 * This imbalance was caused by that removed a  from the bottom of the "Soundtracks" subsection and subsequently replaced it with a . This meant that with the  being still at the top of the "Soundtracks" section, and another just below the "As Session Musician" subheading, there were then three nested, only one of which was subsequently closed. It could be that Safari doesn't like nesting in this manner; I can't test it, because the most recent version of Safari for Windows (Safari 5.1.7) was way back in May 2012. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 16:25, 28 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks, Red rose64 &#x1f339;, for teaching us "Drawling, Stretching, and Fainting in Coils." (reply inspired by the song of the latter's same name by the band Bruford on their first proper album, said song being in turn inspired by you-know-who) Peterh6658 (talk) 17:45, 28 March 2024 (UTC)
 * The Mock Turtle's Story is where I remember it from. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 19:04, 28 March 2024 (UTC)

Watchlist feed filtering doesn't work
Syndication describes how to use an RSS feed with a watchlist tokem. However, when I try it, the filtering parameters don't seem to work. The documentation for these parameters is at mw:API:Watchlist feed. Here are some tests:<ul><li>Watchlist feed with hours=72 (hours does seem to work)</li><li>Watchlist feed with hours=72 and wltype=categorize - this shows an edit for me, which isn't a category change</li><li>Watchlist feed with hours=72 and wlshow=bot - this shows an user edit for me, which isn't a bot edit</li></ul>Am I missing something here?<span id="Qwerfjkl:1711574521143:WikipediaFTTCLNVillage_pump_(technical)" class="FTTCmt"> — Qwerfjkl  talk  21:22, 27 March 2024 (UTC)
 * @Qwerfjkl try building your query using the guided form here, see if you get the results you expect, and if the string is in the same format. If the string format is different, the documentation may be outdated. If the results are wrong, you can open a bug report on it. — xaosflux  Talk 12:52, 29 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Xaosflux, just tried it, seem to be a bug in the api. I'll try to file a ticket.<span id="Qwerfjkl:1711717462350:WikipediaFTTCLNVillage_pump_(technical)" class="FTTCmt"> — Qwerfjkl  talk  13:04, 29 March 2024 (UTC)
 * T361367<span id="Qwerfjkl:1711718300933:WikipediaFTTCLNVillage_pump_(technical)" class="FTTCmt"> — Qwerfjkl  talk  13:18, 29 March 2024 (UTC)

IPA symbols
I’m not sure if this is a Wikipedia issue or a me issue but I thought I might as well mention it.

The issue is how the tense alveolar lateral approximate symbol (a.k.a $⟨l⟩$ with a tense symbol) having a weird space after it which is odd since it isn’t there on Wiktionary. E.g. display similar to . 2001:BB6:B84C:CF00:39A0:EB40:5711:F8C2 (talk) 12:41, 28 March 2024 (UTC)


 * You must be referring to the IPA on the Áed Oirdnide article. After a small bit of messing around, I found that this seems to be an issue with MinervaNeue, as there is no space when I view it in desktop mode (Vector 2022). — Mugtheboss (talk) 12:13, 29 March 2024 (UTC)
 * More likely, it’s just font specific issue, and it just depends on the character fallback chain that the browser calculates depending on the fonts installed on the device. —Th e DJ (talk • contribs) 19:31, 29 March 2024 (UTC)

Mobile site: Clarify "bytes" in page history?
Just encountered this Twitter thread where someone looked at a page history on mobile, and thought that the bytes ± indicator was actually part of an upvote/downvote system. This isn't the first time I've seen someone make this mistake. On desktop, the bytes ± number appears right next to the total bytes and lots of other dense information, which I think makes it clearer that it's not a voting system, but on mobile it's more ambiguous. Perhaps it would make sense to add the word "bytes" on the mobile site? Just a letter "B" could work if "bytes" doesn't fit – not everybody would know what it means, but at least they'd be less likely to think it's a voting score. – Iago Qnsi (User talk:IagoQnsi) 21:54, 24 March 2024 (UTC)


 * The "hover text" on that explains it is bytes, but it is otherwise absent there. Adding a units label to that would best be done upstream, you may make an enhancement request with the details. — xaosflux  Talk 10:17, 25 March 2024 (UTC)
 * The hover text in mobile page histories is MediaWiki:Tooltip-last which says "Difference with preceding revision". In user contributions it is MediaWiki:Rc-change-size-new which says "$1 bytes after change of this size" (I added "of this size" in 2017). Desktop uses MediaWiki:Rc-change-size-new in both page histories and contributions. PrimeHunter (talk) 16:08, 25 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Looks like you get the "size-new" if you have "advanced mode" enabled in mobile, and the other if you are not in advanced mode. Both are not very useful for the use case of non-hovered viewing. — xaosflux  Talk 17:12, 25 March 2024 (UTC)
 * In this case we seem to have quite a few choices, but since Cifaldi has taken an interest it may be worth a Twitter user telling him that he's welcome to donate photos he owns the copyright to, which can influence which photo(s) of him we use in the infobox of Frank Cifaldi. — Bilorv ( talk ) 22:45, 29 March 2024 (UTC)

Infobox
Hi, what is the process for directly generating data into an infobox from Wikidata? Riad Salih (talk) 18:15, 29 March 2024 (UTC)


 * Riad Salih, it is done using Module:WikidataIB. An example of a template which uses this module is Template:Infobox bridge. —⁠andrybak (talk) 12:04, 30 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I thought that we discouraged this, on several grounds - such as verifiability and the potential for undetected vandalism. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 13:49, 30 March 2024 (UTC)
 * The relevant RfC did not reach a general consensus, but to quote the close there is a consensus on one point: if Wikipedia wants to use data from Wikidata, there needs to be clear assurances on the reliability of this data. I don't think anyone has yet come up with a convincing way to provide that assurance. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 15:14, 30 March 2024 (UTC)
 * There's other 1,000 articles where the 'reference' from Wikidata is just an error message, see Category:Module:Wd reference errors. -- LCU A ctively D isinterested  «@» °∆t° 21:36, 30 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Correction: the reference from Wikidata is being rendered as an error message. Actual data does exist on Wikidata that the template can't render properly. * Pppery * <sub style="color:#800000">it has begun... 23:02, 30 March 2024 (UTC)
 * That's a difference without a distintion, the effect in Wikipedia is the same. The reference in Wikipedia is an error message. -- LCU A ctively D isinterested  «@» °∆t° 23:52, 30 March 2024 (UTC)

Misattribution of page reviews
I created a redirect page, and a human editor reviewed it. Unfortunately the title was a typo. I moved the redirect to the correctly-spelt title, and User:DannyS712 bot III okayed that.

In my notifications, it then appeared that the human had okayed the new title, and the bot had okayed the old typo one. I don't think this is intended behaviour. For redirects, it might give the impression that an editor has approved a highly inappropriate redirect.

I now think I should have RfDd the redirect before moving: Redirects_for_discussion/Log/2024_March_31

HLHJ (talk) 17:04, 31 March 2024 (UTC)

New script warnings with use of marriage
I just noticed today that I see the following script warnings when using "Show preview" for any edit that includes use of marriage.

There have not been any recent changes to marriage, so I guess that there has been a change in an underlying module or template.

I also see it when logged out using: Any ideas on how to track this down? &mdash; Archer1234  (t·c) 02:54, 1 April 2024 (UTC)
 * OS: Microsoft Windows 10
 * Browser: Microsoft Edge Version 123.0.2420.65 (Official build) (64-bit)
 * Skin: Vector legacy (2010)
 * Google Chrone Version 123.0.6312.86 (Official Build) (64-bit)
 * Opera One(version: 109.0.5097.35)
 * Fixed. * Pppery * <sub style="color:#800000">it has begun... 03:11, 1 April 2024 (UTC)
 * With this edit to Module:If preview, for the record. Graham87 (talk) 10:16, 1 April 2024 (UTC)

Tech News: 2024-14
<section begin="technews-2024-W14"/> Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes
 * Users of the reading accessibility beta feature will notice that the default line height for the standard and large text options has changed.

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

Future changes
 * The Wikimedia Foundation has an annual plan. The annual plan decides what the Wikimedia Foundation will work on. You can now read the draft key results for the Product and Technology department. They are suggestions for what results the Foundation wants from big technical changes from July 2024 to June 2025. You can comment on the talk page.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe. <section end="technews-2024-W14"/>

MediaWiki message delivery 03:33, 2 April 2024 (UTC)

Buttons on the top panel, in ce.wikipedia.org
The buttons of connected gadgets, for example, the wikifier after updating the page are mixed in the middle and back to the right. Where can this be fixed so that the buttons do not move and leave in one place, right or left, please help? In Russian, all the gadget buttons on the left. Here is the screen where I noted these buttons, when they went to the middle. Thank you! Takhirgeran Umar (talk) 22:01, 1 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Your post is confused. ce.wikipedia.org links to an English Wikipedia article but you apparently refer to source edit pages at ce:. ce:MediaWiki:Gadgets-definition has the line:


 * AlignTemplateParameters[ResourceLoader|default|hidden|type=general|actions=edit|dependencies=ext.gadget.registerTool,jquery.client]|AlignTemplateParameters.js
 * It loads ce:MediaWiki:Gadget-AlignTemplateParameters.js by default but hides it in preferences. The gadget adds some buttons to the edit toolbar. Compare to safemode which doesn't have the extra buttons. The position of the buttons vary between page loads for me and you apparently want the position to be fixed. I don't know how to control this. PrimeHunter (talk) 22:59, 1 April 2024 (UTC)
 * @PrimeHunter. On this screenshot everything is ok, I want them not to go left or to the center. Sorry I don’t know English, I write with Google translator, I hope now more understandable. Takhirgeran Umar (talk) 23:24, 1 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Here they went to the center. It is necessary that they stay all the time on the right. Takhirgeran Umar (talk) 23:30, 1 April 2024 (UTC)
 * I see this problem through the Mozilla Firefox browser. Takhirgeran Umar (talk) 07:07, 2 April 2024 (UTC)

How do I stop the "Changes recovered" cache?
I started typing a reply to a discussion at ANI and a new edit happened so I refreshed to see it (that edit closed the discussion). The problem now, is that every time I go to ANI it tries to do the "Changes recovered" thing where it scrolls to that topic and says Loading..., and normally would have loaded my reply, but since it's closed it gives up after a bit. This happens every time I go there now, I have tried starting another reply on another section and cancelling that, but no luck. – 2804:F14:8093:5F01:BD93:DDC2:7C48:C2EC (talk) 01:03, 1 April 2024 (UTC)


 * You have to temporarily unclose the thread (I usually just comment out the top and bottom templates), this will allow you to close the reply window, and you then revert the changes so the thread is closed again. I ran into this exact problem yesterday and had to temporarily re-open and re-close a thread. -- LCU A ctively D isinterested  «@» °∆t° 13:50, 2 April 2024 (UTC)

Indented tables
I just realized, that it is possible to indent tables.

This seems like an accidental feature, that could easily be broken with the next CSS change. But I think it is quite useful on talk pages, and should be kept. Especially discussions about illustrations become unwieldy, when too many thumbs pile up on the right.


 * Here are some images. We should use them to illustrate this article. --Albertus Durerus Noricus (talk) 11:11, 1 April 2024 (UTC)
 * {| class="wikitable mw-collapsible mw-collapsed"

!colspan="4"| some images
 * Duerer Underweysung der Messung 010.jpg
 * Duerer Underweysung der Messung 011.jpg
 * Duerer Underweysung der Messung 013.jpg
 * Duerer Underweysung der Messung 014.jpg
 * Duerer Underweysung der Messung 018.jpg
 * Duerer Underweysung der Messung 019.jpg
 * Duerer Underweysung der Messung 021.jpg
 * Duerer Underweysung der Messung 093.jpg
 * }
 * These images are too monochrome, and houses are better than spirals. --John Doe (talk) 12:34, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
 * {| class="wikitable mw-collapsible mw-collapsed" style="text-align: center;"
 * These images are too monochrome, and houses are better than spirals. --John Doe (talk) 12:34, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
 * {| class="wikitable mw-collapsible mw-collapsed" style="text-align: center;"
 * {| class="wikitable mw-collapsible mw-collapsed" style="text-align: center;"

!colspan="2"| some other images
 * colspan="2"| Shed with conic dormer.png
 * Shed with conic dormer; top.png
 * Shed with conic dormer; roof.png
 * Shed with conic dormer; front.png
 * Shed with conic dormer; side.png
 * }
 * Shed with conic dormer; roof.png
 * Shed with conic dormer; front.png
 * Shed with conic dormer; side.png
 * }
 * Shed with conic dormer; side.png
 * }

So my suggestion is just, to recognize this as a feature, that should be kept. Watchduck (quack) 14:13, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Please see Help:Table.
 * Indenting with colons (ab)uses HTML definition lists, and in HTML, tables may be used inside all three kinds of list - definition, ordered and unordered. It's highly unlikely that the feature will be removed, certainly not with the next CSS change. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 14:47, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
 * In addition, indenting tables is liable to cause this lint. Please don't. Izno (talk) 20:30, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
 * It would probably be easy to replicate the indentation with CSS classes. I think it would make sense to combine  into something like  . The indentation depth could be added with a dash, so the first line would look like  . But counting colons is not something people like to do. Would it not be possible to make indented tables official, so that   would be translated into a table tag with class  ? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Watchduck (talk • contribs) 23:05, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Feel free to file a feature request. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 23:21, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
 * No, it's not really reliably possible to do that in the current parser. It may be more possible in the future.
 * As for the text, there has been discussion about supporting multiline content in lists better already that would involve some new wikitext and would help us support more use cases than just tables. You can look on Phabricator for that if you want. Izno (talk) 00:53, 3 April 2024 (UTC)

Trying to understand table stylings
At 2018–19 Big Ten Conference men's basketball season, the rankings section has borders while neither the coaches section nor the preseason national polls section shows borders, but they all seem to be styled by the. What makes one section present cell padding/border and the others not?-TonyTheTiger (T / C / WP:FOUR / WP:CHICAGO / WP:WAWARD) 18:27, 29 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Many of the cells are missing quotation marks in .   produces  . Without quotation marks, only some of it is included in the style. The documentation at CollegePrimaryStyle should probably be updated to say that if it's assigned directly to   in a cell then use quotation marks. The documentation seems to currently assume it's used as a parameter in a template which adds quotation marks. PrimeHunter (talk) 19:14, 29 March 2024 (UTC)
 * To expand on that:  is a HTML attribute, and attribute values must be quoted unless they consist entirely of the 64 characters A-Z, a-z, 0-9, hyphen-minus and full stop. When you use something like   this contains several characters which are not among the 64: there are three colons, four hashes, three semicolons, several spaces and a comma. How this is treated will depend upon the browser. Some may reject the whole attribute outright; some will ignore everything after the first 'invalid' character (the first colon), some may ignore the lack of quotes and process the whole value as if it were quoted. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 20:39, 29 March 2024 (UTC)
 * , Neither style=“; width=75” nor style=“"; width=75 seems to be the proper correction for style=; width=75 in the Preseason national polls section.-TonyTheTiger (T / C / WP:FOUR / WP:CHICAGO / WP:WAWARD) 21:23, 29 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Well, no. The first one is invalid because you're trying to put  inside a   attribute, and it's not valid CSS. The second one is invalid because you've put a semicolon after the closing quote - after the closing quote of an attribute's value, only two characters are valid: (i) a space; (ii) a greater-than character  . -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 21:57, 29 March 2024 (UTC)
 * style=“” width=75 does not work either.-TonyTheTiger (T / C / WP:FOUR / WP:CHICAGO / WP:WAWARD) 22:04, 29 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I don't see any recent (later than 20:39 today) related edits at 2018–19 Big Ten Conference men's basketball season - are you doing this elsewhere? -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 22:20, 29 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I am not going to save stuff that makes the table break when I hit show preview. How would you make those other two tables show the secondary color for the borders?-TonyTheTiger (T / C / WP:FOUR / WP:CHICAGO / WP:WAWARD) 22:44, 29 March 2024 (UTC)
 * User:TonyTheTiger/sandbox/2018–19 Big Ten Conference men's basketball season test is the failed test.-TonyTheTiger (T / C / WP:FOUR / WP:CHICAGO / WP:WAWARD) 04:27, 30 March 2024 (UTC)
 * , thoughts on my test?-TonyTheTiger (T / C / WP:FOUR / WP:CHICAGO / WP:WAWARD) 04:46, 30 March 2024 (UTC)
 * You didn't use straight quotation marks. PrimeHunter (talk) 12:02, 30 March 2024 (UTC)
 * The HTML spec permits the use of either U+0022 QUOTATION MARK (") or U+0027 APOSTROPHE (') as value delimiters; by implication, the “ and ” characters are not delimiters but are treated as part of the value itself. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 13:02, 30 March 2024 (UTC)


 * In a related matter, can you help me interpret the differences between and . It seems the former tries to use the true primary and secondary school colors, but the latter seems to use one of the two that constrasts well against white text. Is this correct?-TonyTheTiger (T / C / WP:FOUR / WP:CHICAGO / WP:WAWARD) 16:00, 30 March 2024 (UTC)
 * In both cases, the work is done through Module:College color. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 16:06, 30 March 2024 (UTC)
 * What do those 5 colmns of contrast mean and how do these two draw from the three columns of colors?-TonyTheTiger (T / C / WP:FOUR / WP:CHICAGO / WP:WAWARD) 17:17, 30 March 2024 (UTC)
 * There are three columns of colour dabs, headed 1, 2 and 3. The first three of the five contrast columns show how each of those relate to one of the others - 1/2 is for colours 1 and 2 in conjunction (either text of colour 1 on a background of colour 2 or text of colour 2 on a background of colour 1); similarly 2/3 is for colours 2 and 3 in conjunction; and 3/1 is for colours 3 and 1 in conjunction. The last two, 1/w and 1/b, are for colour 1 in conjunction with white or black respectively. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 18:31, 30 March 2024 (UTC)
 * It seems that uses 1 & 3 and  uses 1 & 2. Is that correct? Or are there some conditions?-TonyTheTiger (T / C / WP:FOUR / WP:CHICAGO / WP:WAWARD) 18:58, 30 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I think I am up to speed. Thx.-TonyTheTiger (T / C / WP:FOUR / WP:CHICAGO / WP:WAWARD) 04:50, 31 March 2024 (UTC)

Missing team at Module:College color
At Village_pump_(technical) above, User:Redrose64 introduced me to Module:College color. While editing List of Men's Soccer Academic All-America Team Members of the Year, it came to my attention that MSU Denver Roadrunners do not seem to be listed. How can we get this corrected?-TonyTheTiger (T / C / WP:FOUR / WP:CHICAGO / WP:WAWARD) 07:09, 3 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Make an edit request at Module talk:College color. Details including exact colors would be needed. Johnuniq (talk) 09:02, 3 April 2024 (UTC)

Cewbot has decided that there are no vital articles
The bot is removing the "vital article" parameter from every talk page, in alphabetical order. Can someone put it to sleep until its operator can sort it out? Pinging, who might know what is going on. &#126;~ AirshipJungleman29 (talk) 15:19, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Does User talk:Cewbot/Stop this stop it when you fill in the form?  ——Serial Number 54129  15:26, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
 * No. &#126;~ AirshipJungleman29 (talk) 15:36, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Bloody hell they last edited 17 and 6 hours ago!  ——Serial Number 54129  15:28, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Rogue bot, clearly. I have no knowledge of technical stuff, so I didn't want to break anything further. &#126;~ AirshipJungleman29 (talk) 15:31, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Me neither! I hope you don't mind; I copied it over to ANI for more eyes. etc., as it certainly counts a (hopefully temporary!) 'chronic behavioural problem' :)    ——Serial Number 54129  15:36, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
 * I've blocked it for now. <b style="color: teal; font-family: Tahoma">HJ Mitchell</b> &#124; <span style="color: navy; font-family: Times New Roman" title="(Talk page)">Penny for your thoughts? 15:42, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Thank you for putting it out of its misery. LegalSmeagolian (talk) 15:47, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks, very much for stepping up there. Now... can anyone mass-rollback over 1000 edits?! :)    ——Serial Number 54129  15:52, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
 * @Serial Number 54129 I can from a technical perspective with a few clicks. But might it not be better to wait for the botop to fix the bot and then let it fix its own errors? Is it an emergency now that the immediate problem is resolved. <b style="color: teal; font-family: Tahoma">HJ Mitchell</b> &#124; <span style="color: navy; font-family: Times New Roman" title="(Talk page)">Penny for your thoughts? 15:56, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
 * ooo... i didn't notice this follow up. I have rollback all the changes up till when the issue started after seeing someone rollbacking the changes one by one in my watchlist, and I thought I would save them the trouble and time spent going through some 1,600 edits. – robertsky (talk) 21:19, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
 * @Robertsky: About that, now that I'm looking closer, it seems your rollbacks and @Remsense's undos reverted multiple edits at once in various talk pages - only the most recent edit in each talk page appears to have been part of this malfunction (usually 10 bytes changes?).
 * I'm hoping the bot will fix those when it's fixed. Does anyone know if it will? – 2804:F14:80EC:AB01:D0C2:97E3:6645:A903 (talk) 21:46, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Yeah. I wanted to circle back to specific ones, ended up partially undo one, i.e. Special:Diff/1216941066, as it was getting real late at where I am and I was knocked out. – robertsky (talk) 14:34, 3 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Robertsky is duly thanked for his service :)   ——Serial Number 54129  16:48, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Odd that at WP:Database reports/Vital articles update report it says "36135 talk page(s) to edit (The amount of talk pages to edit exceeds the value of talk_page_limit_for_editing on the configuration page. Do not edit the talk pages at all.).", and yet the bot was happily trying to edit anyways. – 2804:F1...45:A903 (talk) 20:59, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
 * In case this helps any, here are the 250 edits near and before the beginning of the malfunction: – 2804:F1...45:A903 (talk) 21:18, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
 * In general, this is the wrong forum for a bot malfunction. You should post in some order to the operator's talk page, WP:BOTN, and/or one of WP:AN/WP:ANI for the appropriate attention. ANI is most likely to get an immediate block, and you have to notify the operator of the post there regardless. Izno (talk) 21:45, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
 * @HJ Mitchell I'm sorry, I didn't notice that the configuration was corrupted. I've restored the profile, please unblock the robot, thank you. Kanashimi (talk) 22:24, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Also, it should be enough to report it on the User talk:Cewbot/Stop page, without blocking it, because this bot is also responsible for other operations. Kanashimi (talk) 22:26, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
 * I've taken some precautions so that in the future, when this happens, the robot will stop editing. Kanashimi (talk) 22:31, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Progress report: I am re-running the robot to recover the error. Kanashimi (talk) 01:27, 3 April 2024 (UTC)
 * ✅ Kanashimi (talk) 03:25, 3 April 2024 (UTC)

Multiple lines per entry tables
Is it possible to format a regular table so that there is a large entry or two on a lower row, the way that tv show episode tables are formatted? —blindlynx 22:39, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
 * @Blindlynx Yes, you can use  to specify how many columns a single cell will span:

PAGE ]]) 23:51, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
 * --Ahecht ([[User talk:Ahecht|<span style="color:#FFF;background:#04A;display:inline-block;padding:1px;vertical-align:-.3em;font:bold 50%/1 sans-serif;text-align:center">TALK
 * I assume from your edits that this is about List of genocides. In a sortable table you can add  from Help:Sortable tables. You may also want something like   to show what belongs together:


 * PrimeHunter (talk) 02:49, 3 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Thank you! —blindlynx 14:40, 3 April 2024 (UTC)

Introducing Edit Patrol: Assisting Rollbackers on the Wikipedia Android App
The Mobile Apps team has recently released a new feature in the Android app to assist rollbackers in patrolling from their mobile device without leaving the Android app. Edit Patrol is a suggested edit that allows users with rollback rights to view the recent changes feed, with access to undo, rollback, thank, and post talk page messages.

The feature is currently available on Indonesian, French, and Spanish Wikipedia. We hope to make it available to English Wikipedia rollbackers in the coming month, and then to all wikis.

You can learn more about the feature and its development on our project page. Edit Patrol does not intend to replace existing patrolling tools, rather fill some gaps that have been highlighted in the mobile space. Prior to writing a single line of code, the team conducted interviews with patrollers and conducted a comparative review of existing patrolling tools. Throughout development, we have continued to incorporate feedback from members of the community. We prioritized collaboration with communities that have traditionally had difficulty utilizing existing tools, specifically folks using mobile devices.

After initial release, we heard requests to add access to user talk warning templates in the talk page message flow. Users are now able to search and use user talk warning templates as part of the tool. For languages that do not have user warning templates, the team reviewed messages across languages & created 10 example messages that will be preloaded into the app: you can learn more about those messages and leave feedback here.

The feature currently allows users to view the feed of recent edits for only one language wiki at a time (the primary language set in their app), but we are interested to hear if there is a preference from multi-wiki rollbackers to have the ability of patrolling multiple languages in a single feed.

Please check out with more information, and a  of the feature to learn more. If you have any questions or feedback, we welcome it on the project’s discussion page, or please attend our open demonstration hours for this feature on Google Meet on the 26th of April 2024 at 18 UTC (You can determine the right time in your time zone using a time zone converter tool).

Looking forward to see you all.

--ARamadan-WMF (talk) 15:21, 3 April 2024 (UTC)

Interlanguage links
Not sure where this should be reported so if there is a better place let me know. At the top of Kenn Borek Air the Spanish language link leads to es:Plantilla:TCAOC rather than to es:Kenn Borek Air. The link at https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q1738781#sitelinks-wikipedia seems to be correct. So where is the error coming from? CambridgeBayWeather (solidly non-human), Uqaqtuq (talk), Huliva 16:35, 3 April 2024 (UTC)


 * . Now moved to Wikidata. Izno (talk) 17:03, 3 April 2024 (UTC)
 * I'm sorry I must be missing something. Your link is to TCAOC. CambridgeBayWeather (solidly non-human), Uqaqtuq (talk), Huliva 17:12, 3 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Oh. I get it now. edit to the template messed with the Kenn Borek entry. CambridgeBayWeather (solidly non-human), Uqaqtuq (talk), Huliva 17:14, 3 April 2024 (UTC)

WP:PEIS
PEIS is becoming an issue for one of our larger articles, Donald Trump. An editor is currently stating because of PEIS we cannot pre-emptively archive sources as prescribed at WP:DEADREF and WP:ARCHIVEEARLY. The current limit is 2MB, and has apparently been set to that for decades. The initial reasoning was to prevent denial-of-service attacks through large complex pages overwhelming MediaWiki. But with the significant change in processing power since that initial limit (and the growing complexity of pages on Wikipedia), it is time to revisit that limit. I'd actually suggest at least doubling it to 4MB, but a higher value may be reasonable because (again) computational power has increased a lot since that initial limit was created. The linked task has been active since 2018 (six years ago). I'm not entirely sure what is needed to change this setting, but if you were waiting for an actual article to hit the limit, we're here. —Locke Cole • t • c 17:35, 1 April 2024 (UTC)

PAGE ]]) 18:35, 2 April 2024 (UTC) PAGE ]]) 15:22, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
 * FWIW this was also discussed last December; the Phabricator discussion you link above reminds me very much of the one about increasing the Lua memory limit, and I hope he won't mind me saying this, but my suggestion is: ping Tim Starling and/or leave him a talk page message—and if you can identify any other dev who seems to have expertise in this area, ping them too—so he can at least give a second/informed opinion on whether increasing this limit is reasonable. Maybe the answer is no, but maybe the answer is yes, since much has changed since the limit was set 18(?) years ago. &#45;sche (talk) 20:33, 1 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Looks like he has email turned on, so sent him an email directly with a summary of the situation. —Locke Cole • t • c 22:22, 1 April 2024 (UTC)
 * At the time (18 years ago), long articles about US presidents like George W. Bush took about 30 seconds to parse, and by imposing limits, we were trying to keep user-visible latency down to around that figure. Now today Donald Trump takes 9 seconds to parse, so we can congratulate ourselves for directing some small part of the enormous hardware performance gains to an improvement in user-visible latency. But, you might say, human patience remains the same, so we should increase the limits by a factor of 3 or so, allocating the remaining performance dividend to editors so that they can increase the size and complexity of articles by that amount. However, a cloud on the horizon approaches — Parsoid read views are imminently coming, and Parsoid does Donald Trump in 21 seconds. They have staked their claim on half of the gap between current and historical performance. Wirth's law in our context is the process by which performance improvements are greedily consumed by various stakeholders, all hungry for clock cycles, up to the limit of human tolerance for latency, and you might well complain that editors here are getting the crumbs. Parsoid performance is quite sensitive to the number of tags on the page, and if you were optimising for it, removing unnecessary archive links would be a reasonable step to take. So the limit is still doing its job. -- Tim Starling (talk) 01:20, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Archive links aren't what I'd call "unnecessary", especially as they've taken a hammer (disallowed ALL archive links for URLs that are still live) to the situation instead of a scalpel (disallowed archive links for specific sources known to be reliable/persistent).
 * Regardless, the overarching point is, we have language at WP:CITE that says we should be proactive in archiving sources to prevent links from going stale/dead. All things being equal, around 99.9% of the project follows this guidance and archives are added either automatically or semi-automatically using scripts. What we're running in to here is a technical restriction, however, in WP:PEIS. On an article as critical as one for someone facing numerous legal challenges, being the current party-nominee for a Presidential election, and otherwise being very much in the public eye, it seems like pre-emptively archiving sources would be more desirable, not less so.
 * Forgive me, but the initial reason for this was seemingly related to fears of denial-of-service attacks abusing markup and causing the site to stall or fail completely. Not to force editors to limit what can be done with articles. —Locke Cole • t • c 03:05, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
 * That article needs to do better at WP:SUMMARY given its current size of 425 kb wikitext. Cut the article down by a third to a half of its current size and you won't be running into template expansion issues anymore. Izno (talk) 05:03, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
 * I agree. An article that is close to hitting the limit is a great candidate for WP:SPINOUTs. Even if we have the technical ability to raise the limit, it may be beneficial to keep it the same, in order to discourage the creation of articles that are too big. – Novem Linguae (talk) 05:16, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
 * You'll get no argument from me. My primary concern is going into a US election season with archives banned for a page that is BEGGING to be as verifiable as possible. Sometimes sources are paywalled. Sometimes sources go down temporarily. Sometimes sources move because of a site restructure or an article getting renamed. The list of reasons to have archives available on a page like this is far longer than the list of reasons not to. My goal with this was to find the least disruptive (to the regular editors of Donald Trump to make the page editable and get back to including archive links. If someone thinks they can split it off even more than it already is, be my guest. —Locke Cole • t • c 05:27, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Given the Donald Trump article is already split into myriad existing subarticles, so long as the sources used in Donald Trump are the ones used in the relevant main articles (if they're not they can be copied to the main articles), they can be archived at the relevant main articles and so preserved in case they are later needed. CMD (talk) 05:05, 3 April 2024 (UTC)
 * You're welcome to bring that up at WT:CITE where archiving is prescribed as a way to avoid dead links. I do think it's a bad idea to carve out exceptions like this though, as these archive links are also useful to our readers. Having them absent entirely on some pages creates an inconsistent experience, and again, WP:V is policy and WP:CITE works to standardize how we make our articles verifiable. —Locke Cole • t • c 05:17, 3 April 2024 (UTC)
 * I don't think universal pre-emptive archiving is expected, nor is it exceptional to not have universal archiving. I've even seen mass archiving reverted. CMD (talk) 15:25, 4 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Completely agree. If you've got to the point of fiddling around with reference templates to try and make you article work, your likely well past the point it's should better summarised or split. -- LCU A ctively D isinterested  «@» °∆t° 13:53, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Worth bearing in mind that the limit here is only partially technical - it also serves to limit articles to a reasonable size. Computers may be able to handle doubling or even quadrupling the limit, but would the articles produced actually end up being readable? If you attempt to print out the current Donald trump article it runs to 26 sides of A4, with 12 pages being the article text, that seems awfully long for what is supposed to be a high level overview of a topic. Would a 50 or 100 page long article actually represent an improvement? 86.23.109.101 (talk) 10:36, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
 * In that case there should be a limit on article size, not post-expand include size (which in 90% of cases is driven by nested templates-within-templates or modules-within-templates such as navbox and navboxes, flag, coord, and cite web (et al.), none of which appreciably increase article size). --Ahecht ([[User talk:Ahecht|<span style="color:#FFF;background:#04A;display:inline-block;padding:1px;vertical-align:-.3em;font:bold 50%/1 sans-serif;text-align:center">TALK
 * It is possible to reduce the limit of how big the article can be - Manual:$wgMaxArticleSize, but that will stop any edits to articles that are bigger than the limit and edits that make the article bigger than the limit. The largest page on the english wikipedia in any namespace is Arbitration_Committee_Elections_December_2018/Coordination/Mass_message at 3.6 MB, where as the limit is probably 1.5 GB. This limit could be reduced to 4MB, but any reduction beyond that would require splitting the pages first. Snævar (talk) 11:48, 4 April 2024 (UTC)
 * You could easily reduce the WP:PEIS of that article from ~1.8MB to 1.1MB by using, , , etc. instead of cite web, cite news, cite book, etc. --Ahecht ([[User talk:Ahecht|<span style="color:#FFF;background:#04A;display:inline-block;padding:1px;vertical-align:-.3em;font:bold 50%/1 sans-serif;text-align:center">TALK
 * That's a good tip. Implemented here, it brought the PEIS down to  as expected. —Locke Cole • t • c 15:40, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
 * IMO that's a bad suggestion. We normally avoid using  or other parser functions directly in articles as it makes the wikitext even harder to understand. Anomie⚔ 16:01, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
 * It's fiddling at the edges of a problem, rather than dealing with the scale of the article. -- LCU A ctively D isinterested  «@» °∆t° 16:09, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
 * I agree. But it's better than the references not working. The fact that PEIS almost always results in tech hacks that don't even clearly improve parsing time rather than the article getting smaller. It's an interesting question (which could possibly answer) whether  is actually meaningfully faster to parse that . Because it's largely things like that the the PEIS limit is forcing people to do, not split articles.  The only exception I can think of to this, where an article was split which probably wouldn't have been otherwise, is List of Ang Probinsyano seasons FKA List of Ang Probinsyano episodes. * Pppery * <sub style="color:#800000">it has begun...  16:10, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
 * You miss my point. Getting the references to work again by trimming cite templates or using invoke is a waste of time, you can get the references to work again by better summarising the articles or splitting content. The former just leads to more fudges and janky hacks to cram in more minor details, while the latter leads to editors thinking about what should or shouldn't be included in the article. -- LCU A ctively D isinterested  «@» °∆t° 15:34, 3 April 2024 (UTC)
 * It is a suggestion for edge cases of articles like this one. And if you have issues with it in the general, you might review how Module:Sports table is being used. I have seen one complaint of Module:Sports table, but it seems that no-one else has had large issues with it.... Izno (talk) 17:06, 3 April 2024 (UTC)


 * Just pointing out that at least 73 pages were directly split off from or are related to Donald Trump. I don't understand what these two edits are supposed to do on the page or how the second one follows from the first one: Reduce WP:PEIS and WP:PEIS improvements from WP:VPT courtesy of User:Ahecht. The first "improvement" increased the size by 270 bytes, the second one by 5,842. Space4Time3Continuum2x 🖖 16:52, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
 * "Post-expand include size" is not the size of the article. It roughly means the total amount of wikitext generated by templates/modules, with wikitext being sent through a template/module more than once being counted multiple times. Thus, by reducing the number of layers of templates by one, those edits did improve the PEIS. * Pppery * <sub style="color:#800000">it has begun... 16:56, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Let's be very clear. This discussion is about increasing the PEIS limit and related topics, not about the Donald Trump article. No matter what happens here, any change to the article's current consensus item 25 would need a new consensus at Talk:Donald Trump. The same goes for any talk about splitting or trimming, and there's currently an open discussion about that. Thanks guys. &#8213; Mandruss  &#9742;  04:39, 3 April 2024 (UTC)

Christianity
Hello, anybody here who could help with this? I wanted to remedy my mistake (missing }}, but apparantly there is the new link to about.com which I never made. suggested to ask here. Thank you for your time. Lotje (talk) 03:25, 5 April 2024 (UTC)


 * I restored your edit except for the part removing the }} from note 4, and except that the three about.com refs are still removed. They were added years ago, apparently before the site was blacklisted, and now cannot be added again without requesting at MediaWiki talk:Spam-whitelist that the urls be whitelisted (or by only using the archived links and not the live urls). But I think all three are adequately replaced by other existing references for the same claims. <small style="color:#667;background:#fff;border:2px solid;border-radius:.4em;padding:0 .3em">SilverLocust 💬 04:59, 5 April 2024 (UTC)

Another time lag
Hello, VPT,

There is another time lag going on that is interfering with the work of some bots and database reports I rely on. Is there any way to tell how long this will last? It's at 7:19 hours right now but I know these lags can sometimes last for days. Sorry, I know that this question has been asked before (maybe even by me) but I'm not sure where else to go to for answers since these lags have become so common lately. Thanks for any help you can provide. Liz <sup style="font-family: Times New Roman; color: #006400;">Read! Talk! 17:07, 4 April 2024 (UTC)


 * It seems to have been resolved, that page now shows zeroes across the board. Matma Rex talk 00:34, 5 April 2024 (UTC)


 * Perhaps a different kind of time lag on my end. For  instance, the very page we are on now, has this message at the top: "Unable to fetch revision data. 3,632 watchers, 15,473 pageviews (30 days) · See full page statistics".   — Maile  (talk) 13:05, 5 April 2024 (UTC)
 * This one also seems resolved. — Maile (talk) 14:32, 5 April 2024 (UTC)

Ignored request
At Template talk:Infobox sports award, I posted a request for new feature on March 16 that seems to be getting ignored.-TonyTheTiger (T / C / WP:FOUR / WP:CHICAGO / WP:WAWARD) 03:35, 4 April 2024 (UTC)

PAGE ]]) 15:20, 4 April 2024 (UTC)
 * @TonyTheTiger: has already replied on the template talk page. --Ahecht ([[User talk:Ahecht|<span style="color:#FFF;background:#04A;display:inline-block;padding:1px;vertical-align:-.3em;font:bold 50%/1 sans-serif;text-align:center">TALK
 * The page has eight watchers. Only two of them have looked at the page recently. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 16:29, 4 April 2024 (UTC)
 * That information is normally only available to admins, who don't see an exact number of watchers/inactive watchers if it's less than 30. Graham87 (talk) 09:03, 6 April 2024 (UTC)

Quarry
I realize that this is Wikipedia, not Wikimedia or Wikitech, but when I try to run queries on Quarry as part of my editing jobs, I get the following message


 * Wikimedia Cloud Services Error
 * This web service cannot be reached. Please contact a maintainer of this project.
 * Maintainers can find troubleshooting instructions from our documentation on Wikitech.

Will this impact this project, too? Or is this an internal problem that just the developers need to worry about? Thanks for any tech help you can provide. Liz <sup style="font-family: Times New Roman; color: #006400;">Read! Talk! 23:42, 6 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Never mind, it's back. Liz <sup style="font-family: Times New Roman; color: #006400;">Read! Talk! 00:36, 7 April 2024 (UTC)

504 Gateway timeout
There is a request https://xtools.wmcloud.org/articleinfo/en.wikipedia.org/Scientific%20method which is yielding a 504: Gateway Timeout, for an xtools process taking over 900 seconds. The article is scientific method. How might we address this? Perhaps by requesting an off-line run for xtools? Thank you, -- Ancheta Wis   (talk  &#124; contribs) 12:07, 5 April 2024 (UTC)


 * @Ancheta Wis that external tool has a report an issue function, use this link to do so. — xaosflux  Talk 13:42, 5 April 2024 (UTC)
 * There was a report for scientific method as of 09:45, 7 April 2024 (UTC). Thank you. --Ancheta Wis   (talk  &#124; contribs) Ancheta Wis    (talk  &#124; contribs) 09:45, 7 April 2024 (UTC)

Detecting MediaWiki:Recreate-moveddeleted-warn from pywikibot
When I retrieve a page in pywikibot and it doesn't exist, I would like to be able to tell if it previously existed. The bot doesn't have the admin flag, so the only way I can think of to do this is to detect that MediaWiki:Recreate-moveddeleted-warn is displayed to the user. Is there a way to see that this is the case in pywikibot? Or is there another way to see that the page was previously deleted without requiring admin privileges? Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 13:01, 7 April 2024 (UTC)
 * I'm not familiar specifically with pywikibot, but there should be an interface to pull the logs from the api, e.g. for Baroness D’Souza, or  for User:Pawangurjarinc.  Parse that for type==delete && action!=restore, or type==move && action==move && params.suppressredirect==true. —Cryptic 13:42, 7 April 2024 (UTC)
 * The logs might work --  returns a generator over pages deleted starting at that timestamp.  I don't see a way to filter by name, and I don't want to search the entire deletion log but in some cases I'll know the approximate time of the deletion so that will help.  Thanks. Mike Christie (talk - contribs -  library) 14:25, 7 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Looks like the page param gets put directly into letitle. —Cryptic 14:33, 7 April 2024 (UTC)
 * I don't follow? The generator gives me the pages, so I can get the title from x.page.title; I just can't send a request to only see logs for a specified page.  Or am I missing something? Mike Christie (talk - contribs -  library) 14:49, 7 April 2024 (UTC)
 * I'm looking at https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/plugins/gitiles/pywikibot/core/+/refs/heads/master/pywikibot/site/_generators.py#1348. Totally untested, but site.logevents(page='User:Pawangurjarinc') should translate directly into my second api link above. —Cryptic 14:54, 7 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Works like a charm. I was looking at this page, which doesn't give that parameter.  Thanks! Mike Christie (talk - contribs -  library) 15:09, 7 April 2024 (UTC)

Can we give users the ability to set up editnotices in their own user space (including subpages)?
I am repeating this issue from MediaWiki_talk:Titlewhitelist.

The reason I think we should do something like this is to deprecate stuff like the old user page editnotice (which I quickly figured out did not work with user subpages a long time ago (like 4 or 5 years ago), when WP:EDN at the time implied so). I think these editnotices should be something similar to how user CSS, JS, and JSON is handled where only the user and specific other users are able to create and edit them. This is better enforced by an edit filter because a user should be able to create editnotices in their own user space (but not others). I also created a draft message MediaWiki talk:Abusefilter-disallowed-editnotice/sandbox for this same purpose. This only would affect "Page" and "Group" editnotices, not "Protection" or anything similar. Awesome Aasim 23:15, 6 April 2024 (UTC)


 * As this entire scheme requires building an abusefilter just to stop most of it, I think it's a poor idea. — xaosflux  Talk 23:52, 7 April 2024 (UTC)

Sister projects template at Phoenix, Arizona
In the "external links", an editor has added links to two different (and appropriate) Wikivoyage articles. I looked at Template:Sister project links to see if there was a way to add both links to the template on the right. Thanks! Magnolia677 (talk) 11:54, 7 April 2024 (UTC)


 * It doesn't look like it's possible with the current implementation of the template. You could use Wikivoyage for one of them, but it might be more accurate to link Phoenix from Phoenix, Arizona, and link Greater Phoenix from Phoenix metropolitan area. --rchard2scout (talk) 07:48, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
 * So remove "Greater Phoenix" from the external links? I'd be fine with that, as it would neaten the external links. Magnolia677 (talk) 09:28, 8 April 2024 (UTC)

Retrieval of canonical name for Unicode code points?
@JMF and I were mulling over the fact that every time an editor would like to use the template to print a specific Unicode character formatted with its code point and canonical name, we have to also enter the canonical name. Immediately, it's clear we have to pluck an index from a 150k-entry long list if we want to automate that, but it seems possible. Is this ill-advised? Remsense 诉  18:32, 5 April 2024 (UTC)
 * My initial thought is that pulling the name from WikiData would avoid duplication of this information on Wikipedia. (It might be nice to have a way to flag when there is an officially acknowledged mistake in the canonical name, but I can't think of a concise way that would be readily understandable to a casual reader.) isaacl (talk) 18:48, 5 April 2024 (UTC)
 * My first take is that an automated process is likely to be more re;iable then manual entry by an editor. Something like should render as  while  should render as . -- Shmuel (Seymour J.) Metz Username:Chatul (talk) 20:02, 5 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Module:Unicode data can do this already: &rarr; .  If there's a frontend template that invokes it like that, I don't know what it is offhand. —Cryptic 20:26, 5 April 2024 (UTC)
 * What! I swear I checked. In that case, it's crazy that it's not implemented in the #1 editor template to directly use it. Thank you! Remsense  诉  20:31, 5 April 2024 (UTC)
 * What about &rarr; ? That seems to be missing. -- Shmuel (Seymour J.) Metz Username:Chatul (talk) 12:49, 8 April 2024 (UTC)

Weird text on Google Chrome infobox
There's definitely something fishy going on with Google Chrome's infobox with this specific text: // {type:package} // {generate:true}

[Elegibility & Benefits]->[Elegibility Search] [Remittances] -> [Remittance Search] [Notifications] -> [Notification Search] [Check Claim Status] -> [Claim Search] [Submit a Claim Online] -> [Patient Search] [Physician/Provider Directory] [Remittance Search] -> [Search] [Notification Search] -> [Search] [Claim Search] -> [Search] [Patient Search] -> [Search] [Eligibility Search] -> [Search] which apparently looks like an internal medical system! Purging the page does nothing (and in fact it shows in previous revisions). Also, it seems to not appear in other pages that you would expect like Firefox or Safari (web browser), however at the same time is probably not caused directly by the page itself. - 2001:4453:5D2:6E00:6714:4FAA:820F:4DA9 (talk) 13:59, 8 April 2024 (UTC)


 * Vandalism at Latest stable software release/Google Chrome. I've reverted it. the wub "?!"  14:02, 8 April 2024 (UTC)

Database error
While attempting to view Special:Log/ST47ProxyBot, the page times out with a "Database error", and gives the following error message:

Not sure if this is an issue that's just inconvenient or one that could be abused, if the latter, feel free to delete/redact my comment. —Locke Cole • t • c 08:23, 8 April 2024 (UTC)


 * This may be a bug (for users with many logs, Special:Logs always fails) - waiting a bit to see if it clears or if someone has more information. In the meantime @Locke Cole you can view that accounts logs if you specify the log type first (here are the "block" logs) — xaosflux  Talk 10:28, 8 April 2024 (UTC)


 * This is already reported (for this very use case) in T325062. — xaosflux  Talk 10:30, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
 * At least it's not an urgent issue. =) Thanks! —Locke Cole • t • c 17:18, 8 April 2024 (UTC)

Tech News: 2024-15
<section begin="technews-2024-W15"/> Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent changes
 * Web browsers can use tools called extensions. There is now a Chrome extension called Citation Needed which you can use to see if an online statement is supported by a Wikipedia article. This is a small experiment to see if Wikipedia can be used this way. Because it is a small experiment, it can only be used in Chrome in English.
 * Octicons-gift.svg A new Edit Recovery feature has been added to all wikis, available as a user preference. Once you enable it, your in-progress edits will be stored in your web browser, and if you accidentally close an editing window or your browser or computer crashes, you will be prompted to recover the unpublished text. Please leave any feedback on the project talk page. This was the #8 wish in the 2023 Community Wishlist Survey.
 * Initial results of Edit check experiments have been published. Edit Check is now deployed as a default feature at the wikis that tested it. Let us know if you want your wiki to be part of the next deployment of Edit check.
 * Readers using the Minerva skin on mobile will notice there has been an improvement in the line height across all typography settings.

Changes later this week
 * Octicons-sync.svg The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from . It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from . It will be on all wikis from (calendar).
 * New accounts and logged-out users will get the visual editor as their default editor on mobile. This deployment is made at all wikis except for the English Wikipedia.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe. <section end="technews-2024-W15"/>

MediaWiki message delivery 23:34, 8 April 2024 (UTC)

Is there any way to get pageviews statistics for a Media Viewer page on Wikipedia?
Hi all

Does anyone know if there is any way to know how many times an image was viewed in Media Viewer? It looks like from the URL that Wikipedia has a separate URL for each location on each language Wikipedia an image is viewed. E.g

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Potato#/media/File:Patates.jpg

I'd like to know this information for all images in a Commons category but I realise that this may be difficult.

Thanks very much

John Cummings (talk) 09:10, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
 * See also T235588 which could encompass this. — xaosflux  Talk 10:24, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks very much, do you happen to know any other way of getting the info? Even just for individual pages would be really helpful. John Cummings (talk) 11:39, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
 * There are server logs, but they are not readily available for public review. — xaosflux  Talk 13:05, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
 * https://pageviews.wmcloud.org/mediaviews/?project=en.wikipedia.org&platform=&agent=user&referer=all-referers&start=2024-02-01&end=2024-04-06&files=Patates.jpg
 * But we don't track the mediaviewer specifically as far as I know. —Th e DJ (talk • contribs) 14:11, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Hi thanks so much, can you tell me exactly what this is measuring, is it all views of the image on all articles its used on + media viewer or something else? John Cummings (talk) 20:53, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
 * its all views of an image, in any size in any form. —Th e DJ (talk • contribs) 07:41, 9 April 2024 (UTC)

Draft:Ardenza Enormous image
I have just created this draft, but the image is highly oversized. I have tried both default image size and then 250px manual. What's the problem? Kind regards 14 novembre (talk) 🇮🇹 18:45, 9 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Answered at WP:THQ, please don't ask same question in multiple venues. RudolfRed (talk) 19:28, 9 April 2024 (UTC)

Question about threads at DRN
This is a question about the opening of threads at the Dispute Resolution Noticeboard. In particular, exactly where is the specification that sets the Do Not Archive Until date in a new thread that is opened by what appears to be WP:Dispute resolution noticeboard/request and WP:Dispute resolution noticeboard/Header? It appears that the Do Not Archive date is being set to two weeks after the case opening date. This means that cases that have been open for more than two weeks and have no activity for 48 hours are being archived. I am planning to change the archival parameter so as to wait 72 hours rather than 48 hours, but I would also like to set the Do Not Archive Until date to start out three weeks rather than two weeks after filing. Active cases often do not get resolved in two weeks, and do not always have activity in 48 hours. So can someone please tell me where the Do Not Archive Until date comes from? That is, where is the computation done? Robert McClenon (talk) 18:20, 6 April 2024 (UTC)
 * It's in Template:NewDRNsubmission, essentially as, and is 30 days from the time of filing. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 19:28, 6 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Thank you, User:Redrose64. That is interesting and puzzling.  Then why was Do Not Archive set to 1 April 2024 in Dispute_resolution_noticeboard/Archive_244, which appears to have been filed on 18 March 2024?  The thread was archived because there was no activity for 48 hours and it was after 1 April, so the bot was honoring the parameters.  I will look at the template in more detail in a while, but I am puzzled.  I thought that there might be a technical answer.  I am still sure that there is a technical answer, but it is even more complicated than I would have thought.  Robert McClenon (talk) 19:52, 6 April 2024 (UTC)
 * . It rules out one theory of mine, viz. that the DNAU timeetamp was modified after filing. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 22:11, 6 April 2024 (UTC)
 * So the DNAU timestamp was indeed "wrong" for some reason. Thank you for doing the research.  Robert McClenon (talk) 04:38, 7 April 2024 (UTC)
 * If someone used the clickable button at the top of the DRN page to make a request, the report text is defined by the javascript behind it, which has the DNAU set to 14 days. You can see the wikitext it creates at MediaWiki:DRN-wizard.js. Aidan9382 (talk) 07:49, 7 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Thank you, User:Aidan9382. So that is indeed setting the DNAU timestamp to 14 days after filing.  Whoever thought that disputes would normally be resolved in two weeks was being very optimistic, maybe because they thought that there would be dozens of volunteers, one working each dispute.  How do I request that the 14 be changed to 28?  Robert McClenon (talk) 15:16, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Attempt to edit the Javascript page, see the button that says "submit edit request", click that, then make the request. An interface admin will be along Soonly. Izno (talk) 16:44, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
 * If you look at MediaWiki talk:DRN-wizard.js, you'll see that at the top there is a request from August 2012 to set it at 14 days. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 18:39, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Change requested as discussed, and made by interface admin. Thank you for the information.  Robert McClenon (talk) 04:36, 10 April 2024 (UTC)

Bug with Special:Search or just me?
I'll preface by saying this is minor, since you can just search again without going back. I am using Google Chrome, desktop, and today I noticed some odd behaviour with search: So, in short, if I search for something from Special:Search and then navigate back to before that search happened and then try to search for something else, it will always just repeat the first search. – 2804:F14:8090:C501:686B:E2D5:C69E:9592 (talk) 02:07, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
 * 1) I went to Special:Search (technically an archive search, but it is happening with just the base one too);
 * 2) I typed a search term and successfully searched it;
 * 3) I clicked back on my browser (it took me to the search page, with the search term I typed in the box - this is expected);
 * 4) I then cleared the box and typed a new search term and clicked search again;
 * 5) The term that was searched was the one I had searched the first time around, not the new one I typed in.
 * I see the same with with Edge, which is based on Chromium, so it has some commonality with Chrome. I'd guess its browser caching or some cookie wierdness.  RudolfRed (talk) 03:21, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
 * I can't reproduce this for some reason (the input is empty for me after I press "Back"), but this is very similar to T354107, just with the "Back" button. Jack who built the house (talk) 03:06, 9 April 2024 (UTC)
 * And it searches fine when you try?
 * By the way I looked at the inspect element, and it does look like the image shared in that bug report - in fact, if I go back and try searching and repeat that a few times, there will be a new element for each of my new searches (though it always searches the first one).
 * So yeah, I think that is the same bug. – 2804:F14:8090:C501:E8D8:2D74:117E:F93D (talk) 03:55, 9 April 2024 (UTC)
 * When I press "Back", the search input is clear for me. So the state of this page is not cached. This is probably why it works for me to search again. Jack who built the house (talk) 04:55, 10 April 2024 (UTC)
 * It does the same thing for me - Win11, Firefox 124.0.1 Black Kite (talk) 04:01, 9 April 2024 (UTC)

I think I understand what is causing this bug: If you stop the browser after this function is done (the bug report), these same conditions will be there when you try searching again. – 2804:F14:8090:C501:E8D8:2D74:117E:F93D (talk) 05:51, 9 April 2024 (UTC)
 * 1) When clicking search it calls the setSearchSubmitTrigger function in ;
 * 2)  is the actual searchbox element you type in, in line 60 that text is processed and saved to a variable, and in the next lines that value is put in a new, hidden,   element. This new element is created with a   attribute copied from the searchbox element (this hidden element is the one with   in the image in that bug report);
 * 3) In line 65 the value of the searchbox's  attribute ("search") is then cleared, the search then proceeds using the hidden element;
 * 4) The bug then, is that when you navigate back on Chrome (and I guess Firefox), the page doesn't get (down)loaded again (browser cache?). The searchbox and this hidden element are still in the page and in this post-search state.
 * 5) When you search again, it creates a new hidden element with a name attribute set to an empty string (because it's copying from the searchbox one and that one was cleared). When the search proceeds it then reuses the hidden element that has the name attribute set to "search", which is the one created in the original search.
 * I'll copy this your message to the task. Jack who built the house (talk) 04:54, 10 April 2024 (UTC)

Compare select revisions
Don't know if this is quite the correct forum to be posting this: When one views 'edit history' on any given article, selects the different versions, and then clicks on Compare select revisions, the pale yellow used to highlight deleted mark up is barely visible. Esp when only one character in a sentence or paragraph has been deleted, which is virtually impossible to discern sometimes. Is there any way to change the (very) pale yellow used to highlight deleted characters to a more visible tone or color, perhaps orange or gold? — Thanx. -- Gwillhickers (talk) 17:34, 9 April 2024 (UTC)


 * You can define any colour you like in your personal CSS, e.g. add to User:Gwillhickers/common.css this line:
 * .diffchange background-color: orange; Uwappa (talk) 20:16, 9 April 2024 (UTC)
 * That won't work at all. This should work:  it goes in . -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 22:48, 9 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Redrose64's CSS suggestion is correct. Uwappa (talk) 11:20, 10 April 2024 (UTC)

Discussion at Module talk:Wd § Getting Template:Update tracker working with qualifiers
You are invited to join the discussion at Module talk:Wd § Getting Template:Update tracker working with qualifiers. <span style="border:3px outset;border-radius:8pt 0;padding:1px 5px;background:linear-gradient(6rad,#86c,#2b9)"> Sdkb  talk 14:03, 10 April 2024 (UTC)

Table of Contents can't display some statistics symbols
(I'm posting it here since this place gets more traffic than Wikiversity). We have a statistical page in Wikiversity which includes statistical symbols in the headings. While there's no issue with those symbols shown in the body of the page, the Table of Contents is bugged whenever these symbols are used. Does anyone have the solution to this problem? <b style="color: #0000FF;">OhanaUnited</b><b style="color: green;">Talk page</b> 21:16, 10 April 2024 (UTC)
 * This is likely to be, an unresolved bug from November 2021. – Jonesey95 (talk) 21:24, 10 April 2024 (UTC)
 * The first problem heading is  which contains <math ></math> markup. The problem that you observe is why our MOS:HEADINGS says For technical reasons, section headings should ... Not contain <math> markup. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 22:33, 10 April 2024 (UTC)

Anchor
I am having trouble putting an anchor at a specific row in List of cover versions of Led Zeppelin songs. In particular, I want an anchor on the song "That's the Way". I tried but loading the page with the anchor in the URL didn't seem to take me there. I looked at the documentation at which told me to try but I'm getting the same issue (also, I'm not certain how to encode quotation marks if I go the id on the row route). I'm sure I'm missing something obvious here. Kimen8 (talk) 16:31, 10 April 2024 (UTC)
 * List of cover versions of Led Zeppelin songs currently takes me to the table entry as expected. The previous revision (with, no quotes) also works for me.  What are you trying to do? —Cryptic 16:40, 10 April 2024 (UTC)
 * This is what I figured. Something with my browser, even caching, who knows. I tried incognito and it didn't work. Good to know the current version works.
 * Do you know how to escape quotes using the row id anchor? Or should I just use the anchor template in that situation?
 * Thanks for your help.
 * Kimen8 (talk) 17:11, 10 April 2024 (UTC)
 * The documentation at the first bullet point in Template:Anchor says to use, and - without actually having tried either - I'd expect   to work too.  The same is likely true when using id=, which looks better to me since it takes you to the top of the table cell instead of the top of the text in it.  But stylistically speaking, List of cover versions of Led Zeppelin songs is more likely correct than List of cover versions of Led Zeppelin songs anyway, even if you're piping it as something like "That's the Way". —Cryptic 17:23, 10 April 2024 (UTC)
 * On the matter of anchors in tables, please see Village pump (technical)/Archive 211. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 18:59, 10 April 2024 (UTC)
 * In rowspan="4" the rowspan will be 4, without the quotes.
 * Likewise, in id="That's the Way" the anchor will be That's_the_Way, without the quotes (underscores replace the blanks).
 * So List_of_cover_versions_of_Led_Zeppelin_songs works well, as it should do
 * but List_of_cover_versions_of_Led_Zeppelin_songs does not work.
 * You were doing fine putting an anchor. The misunderstanding was in referring to the anchor. Uwappa (talk) 04:49, 11 April 2024 (UTC)

Is there anyway to change the clock in preferences so it shows BST?
Right now it shows UTC so it is an hour behind real time in the UK. Thanks. Doug Weller talk 09:21, 11 April 2024 (UTC)


 * Special:Preferences scroll down to Time offset, Time zone. Uwappa (talk) 09:26, 11 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks, but although I see it I don't see a way to get it to change what I see. Doug Weller  talk 10:06, 11 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Click the "Time zone" field and select Europe/London. PrimeHunter (talk) 11:39, 11 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Which "clock" are you referring to?
 * Uwappa and PrimeHunter above are talking about the display of times in the watchlist, page history, and other special pages.
 * If you're talking about the UTCLiveClock gadget (""), docs at the top of mw:MediaWiki:Gadget-UTCLiveClock.js specify what to add to your common.js or skin.js to change the timezone.
 * If you're talking about the timestamps shown on comments in discussion pages like this one, there's a CommentsInLocalTime gadget ("") to adjust the display, but I believe you'll have to live with UTC in the editor like the rest of us around the world do.
 * HTH. Anomie⚔ 11:56, 11 April 2024 (UTC)
 * @Anomie Thanks. @PrimeHunter@Uwappa Apologies for not being more specific.  Doug Weller  talk 12:06, 11 April 2024 (UTC)

Contributions link dropdown
Is there a .css or .js way to disable the dropdown ? - FlightTime  ( open channel ) 14:09, 11 April 2024 (UTC)


 * You can disable Content Translation in if you don't use it. Nardog (talk) 15:14, 11 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Should of looked there :P Thanks. -  FlightTime  ( open channel ) 15:40, 11 April 2024 (UTC)

Weird behavior with PAGELANGUAGE and ifeq
You are invited to join the discussion at mw:topic:Y2o9jrgkmckm2hv4. Aaron Liu (talk) 17:18, 11 April 2024 (UTC)

Show edits by edit summary?
Is there a way to show all edits by edit summary? Via a web interface. For example, show all edits that contain the string "WP:URLREQ#herbaria4.herb.berkeley.edu" such as Special:Diff/1165643139/1218392247. -- Green  C  13:26, 11 April 2024 (UTC)
 * GreenC, you mean other than a SQL query? If it's just for one user you can use this tool.<span id="Qwerfjkl:1712847888304:WikipediaFTTCLNVillage_pump_(technical)" class="FTTCmt"> — Qwerfjkl  talk  15:04, 11 April 2024 (UTC)
 * User:Qwerfjkl: That's perfect, thanks. It works.   --  Green  C  16:23, 11 April 2024 (UTC)
 * That tool is in the box at the bottom of your contribs page, fifth from the left as "Edit summary search". -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 17:00, 11 April 2024 (UTC)
 * I should have known about this a long time ago. -- Green  C  17:41, 11 April 2024 (UTC)

Why doesn't this code work?
I have a script at User:TheTechie/tut.js. The function  is supposed to return something, but it returns undefined. Even ing the returned wikitext returns something, but returning it or assigning it to a variable and using it in   still returns undefined. Browser: Chrome 122.0.6261.137 (either stable or LTS) Can someone help me here? Thanks ---  thetechie@wikimedia  :  ~/talk/  $  01:34, 11 April 2024 (UTC)


 * First off, are you calling getPage from somewhere? I don't see a call to it in the code currently.
 * Second, have you tried step debugging it in Chrome Dev tools? Press f12, ctrl shift f to search for getpage, place some breakpoints inside by clicking on the line number, then run the code. Hover over variables and hit f10 to see what the code is doing. – Novem Linguae (talk) 02:14, 11 April 2024 (UTC)
 * @Novem Linguae Sorry, I meant that  stores value in a variable called , which when used in  , is equal to  . When the wikitext got in   is  ed, it returns something, but when the wikitext is assigned to a variable and used in   it is undefined. As for the dev tools thing, I'm currently kinda busy and can't use devtools right now, I will when I get the chance. Sorry for the confusion.   thetechie@wikimedia  :  ~/talk/  $  15:36, 11 April 2024 (UTC)
 * I installed your script just now and took a closer look. The  codepath never runs because nothing calls it. Are you saying you need   to run so you can set the wikitext variable to something other than undefined? If so you need to put   somewhere. – Novem Linguae  (talk) 16:07, 11 April 2024 (UTC)
 * No, when gettext runs it returns undefined. Thanks ---  thetechie@wikimedia  :  ~/talk/  $  17:01, 11 April 2024 (UTC)
 * @Novem Linguae I fixed the call issues, but it still returns undefined. (Hint: To run the offending function, click the TUT in the menu and select "Arc" and enter a page name). Thanks ---  thetechie@wikimedia  :  ~/talk/  $  17:13, 11 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Unrelated tip: it's hard for other developers to read your code if you abbreviate. I'd suggest expanding TUT, arc, arch, arcTo, sm, etc. to use their full names. – Novem Linguae (talk) 22:52, 11 April 2024 (UTC)
 * doesn't have a return statement, so it won't return anything. If you want to make it return Promise, it needs return statements on line 16 and line 31. See promise chaining. – SD0001  (talk) 16:20, 11 April 2024 (UTC)
 * @SD0001 As stated above, if I try to return it, it just returns undefined.  thetechie@wikimedia  :  ~/talk/  $  16:45, 11 April 2024 (UTC)
 * What is  and how do I make it return it?   thetechie@wikimedia  :  ~/talk/  $  16:46, 11 April 2024 (UTC)
 * update: if I run the function the second time, it gets the variable and it isn't undefined. I'll be looking into this, just wanted to update you both though.  thetechie@wikimedia  :  ~/talk/  $  17:25, 11 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Also I appear to have done something on accident which causes the portlet to not appear, even though the function to add a portlet is called. Any help is appreciated.  thetechie@wikimedia  :  ~/talk/  $  21:54, 11 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Try changing lines 118 and 119 to...
 * – Novem Linguae (talk) 22:57, 11 April 2024 (UTC)
 * I see, thank you!  thetechie@wikimedia  :  ~/talk/  $  00:05, 12 April 2024 (UTC)

Missing Article for improvement
This week's Article for improvement seems to have gone missing. There was one last week, and there's one scheduled for next week, but there's none for this week:

Articles for improvement/2024/15/1

BentSm (talk) 03:50, 12 April 2024 (UTC)


 * If I'm understanding MusikBot correctly, it was supposed to have posted the schedule for week 15 to Wikipedia talk:Articles for improvement on the 18th of March at 00:05.
 * Doesn't seem like it did that (don't see any sign of why).
 * No errors at User:MusikBot/TAFIWeekly/Error log, except for an error on the 8th (which despite that error it seemingly worked anyways? ...) – 143.208.238.195 (talk) 05:09, 12 April 2024 (UTC)

Can we make AfD notification smart enough to notify the editor who turned an existing redirect into an article, rather than notifying the editor who merely created the redirect?
As a redirect-happy editor, I get these all the time. I make a redirect somewhere because the subject is mentioned, but not independently notable. Some other editor comes along and turns the redirect into an article. A third editor nominated the article for deletion, and who get's the notification? The editor who turned the redirect into an article? No, it's me. How hard is it to make the obvious fix to this? BD2412 T 23:16, 7 April 2024 (UTC)


 * @BD2412 can you be more specific about this "notification" you are referring to? echo doesn't have a trigger that fires when someone discusses deleting a page. — xaosflux  Talk 23:51, 7 April 2024 (UTC)
 * I mean the actual notice sent to the talk page when an AfD is initated, as with User talk:BD2412. BD2412  T 00:00, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
 * I believe that'd be part of WP:Twinkle. Not entirely sure who maintains the scripts/how to fix this though Soni (talk) 00:13, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
 * @BD2412 thanks. Mediawiki doesn't do this in core, and there are many many ways someone could be notified similar to that. In your specific case you seem to be referring to this edit, and that the editor made (possibly unknowingly) a bad edit - correct? That edit claims that it was made with the help of the PageTriage extension, so you may want to report a bug about it. — xaosflux  Talk 00:13, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
 * (do I need to ping you, by the way? Are you watching the discussion already?) The editor didn't make a mistake; the notice is sent automatically from the editor's account when the editor uses certain tools to nominate an article for deletion. BD2412  T 00:29, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
 * (yes please use ping I don't use "subscribe" echo notifications) As I noted above, based on the edit tag this user appeared to use an extension to help them make this edit; if this isn't the desired behavior for that extension it can be reported to the extension maintainers using the link I provided above. (Had this been a different tool, such as Twinkle, there would be a different set of volunteers to look in to it). — xaosflux  Talk 00:48, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Could this possibly be already open issue T225009? — xaosflux  Talk 00:53, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Not 100% sure, but it looks like it. That has been unactioned for a long damned time, though. BD2412  T 01:05, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
 * That happens a lot. And when it is something in software, it needs to be addressed by a limited number of developers for that software (there are currently over 200 open tasks for that extension alone). This is not something that we can fix here on the English Wikipedia. — xaosflux  Talk 01:28, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
 * I have long had a similar annoyance, which I have mostly ignored. As an AFC reviewer, I sometimes move a sandbox draft that has been submitted for review into draft space.  This creates a redirect from the sandbox to the draft, and I appear to be the originator of the draft.  Either six months later, or much later, I get a notice that "my" draft has been deleted as G13, an expired draft.  I think that this is the same issue, in which the creation of a redirect confuses Twinkle.  Is this the same issue as User:BD2412 is reporting?  Robert McClenon (talk) 15:10, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
 * @Robert McClenon is this an example of what you are describing? The resultant page appears to maintain the original creator. If the new page is being made by copy/paste you would be listed as the author. — xaosflux  Talk 15:55, 9 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Yes, User:Xaosflux, that is what I was describing. If a page that I moved from a sandbox to draft space is ignored for six months, I then get a G13 notice that it was deleted.  Yes, I don't consider myself to have been the draft creator, but I do get the notice.  No, I do not create the draft by copy-paste.  I dislike copy-pastes as much as the admins who have to do history-merge to correct for them.  Yes, there is a persistent minor problem with who Twinkle thinks is the author.  Robert McClenon (talk) 16:15, 9 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Yes, I see that this was first reported five years ago. There is a persistent minor problem that has been around for so long that the bug has the status of a naturalized citizen.  Robert McClenon (talk) 16:20, 9 April 2024 (UTC)
 * @Robert McClenon thank you, from your notes above this specific error is only coming from Twinkle, correct? Twinkle issues can generally be addressed on-wiki, it just takes someone to write patch for the script. — xaosflux  Talk 17:08, 9 April 2024 (UTC)
 * User:Xaosflux - Yes, to the best of my knowledge this is a Twinkle issue. Robert McClenon (talk) 04:34, 10 April 2024 (UTC)
 * I don't believe that any notification is technically required, the obvious fix would be to get rid of notifications... But I don't think thats what you mean. Horse Eye&#39;s Back (talk) 15:59, 9 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Actually, if I am the one who turns a redirect into an article, I would want to be notified if that article is nominated for deletion. BD2412  T 16:23, 9 April 2024 (UTC)
 * The watchlist seem to fill that role for most, personally I almost always hit the little star when making a redirect or unredirecting. Horse Eye&#39;s Back (talk) 17:00, 9 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Some editors don't use watchlists, and would still like to be notified that their work is being tagged for deletion. Templates on user talk pages are the "gold standard" for notices to editors, and so are required for noticeboards, where pinging is not a substitute.  Some editors may not care about these notifications, but other editors either want them or should receive them, so that editors who do not care for them can ignore them.  Editors who receive misdirected notifications, as are being discussed here, sometimes ridicule them.  Robert McClenon (talk) 04:34, 10 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Thank you for mansplaining Templates to me... Including the completely irrelevant information about templates related to noticeboards when we're discussing AfD notification. Next time resist the urge. Horse Eye&#39;s Back (talk) 16:17, 12 April 2024 (UTC)

citoid not working for some refs that used to work
citoid (VisualEditor automatic citation generator service) is not working for some refs that used to work. including NY Times. see T362379. Jeremyb (talk) 18:02, 12 April 2024 (UTC)

Search function and redirects to anchors
Using the search function at the top of the page for a case with a redirect to an anchor brings the reader to the top of the redirected article, not to the anchor, which is not convenient for the reader. Is this behaviour intended? This seems to be a significant down-side of redirect to anchors for me.

The following example is for illustration (the question is not about this specific example): There is a redirect for Facial expression recognition. The search function will show Affective computing as a result. Clicking on it leads to the beginning of this article, which itself does not contain "Facial expression recognition", because the anchor leads to "Facial affect detection". Kallichore (talk) 19:08, 12 April 2024 (UTC)
 * I opened T362442 on this. Feel free to voice support there, good chance some search dev is going to say this is a feature not a bug. — xaosflux  Talk 20:55, 12 April 2024 (UTC)

Issue with Search Feature on Wikimedia
I conducted a search for "Solar eclipse of 2024 April 8" on Wikimedia.

Expecting a concise and accurate description of the page, I was disappointed by the search results.

Here is the link to the search results

Upon clicking, I found metadata in Hungarian, which is unusual, as the page is new and not previously associated with Hungarian. Additionally, no image is displayed.

Metadata: Solar eclipse of 2024 April 8 eclipse solar del 8 de abril de 2024; 2024. április 8-i napfogyatkozás; 2024ko apirilaren 8ko eguzki eklipsea; eclipse solar del 8 d'abril de 2024; Sonnenfinsternis...

Could the search feature generate metadata that accurately describes the page's content and include an image from the page? AceSeeker (talk) 23:53, 12 April 2024 (UTC)
 * When you search for that string on the English Wikipedia, you get reasonable results, as far as I can see. It looks like you did this search on Wikimedia Commons, which is different from the English Wikipedia, and which editors here are not responsible for. It appears that the Commons page that is the first result uses a template called {Wikidata Infobox}. The page description that you are seeing appears to be the names of the corresponding page as listed on Wikidata at d:Q2620078. I don't know why that template on Commons pulls in that data, but you could ask about it at commons:Template talk:Wikidata Infobox. – Jonesey95 (talk) 00:07, 13 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Thank you for prompt response and clarifying that the issue may be related to the template {Wikidata Infobox} on Wikimedia Commons. I'll follow up on the commons:Template talk:Wikidata Infobox page to address this matter. Appreciate your assistance! AceSeeker (talk) 00:25, 13 April 2024 (UTC)

Section links in mobile edit summaries
I opened a phabricator issue about this but then I realised I should have discussed it here first. So, when using the edit button for the lead section on mobile (I'm on mobile web, I have no idea if the app is different), no section link is included in the edit summary. On the other hand, on desktop when the "Add an [edit] link for the lead section of a page" gadget is used, a section link is correctly added. In my opinion, mobile should be updated to match desktop's behavior. Nickps (talk) 14:09, 13 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Desktop uses MediaWiki:Gadget-edittop.js, where the section edit summary was added ten years ago in . -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 17:51, 13 April 2024 (UTC)

Reset password issues
Not sure if this is the right place, newbie editor.

So I was trying to reset the password for my old account, Lovecodeabc, so I requested password resets. However the resetting of passwords did not work, and it seems that if I send a password reset on Special:PasswordReset for my email, it works, but not for my username. Additionally, the temporary password emailed for the Lovecodeabc account does not work. I just want to have the Lovecodeabc username back. Any suggestions? Lovecodeabc(tm) (talk) 14:12, 13 April 2024 (UTC)


 * The only way to reset a password is by email, and only if you had previously registered and confirmed your email to an account before you forgot the password. Special:PasswordReset always requires both a username and a password, and will only send a reset if both of them match. You can also only do one reset per day in most cases. The first username you mentioned does not appear to have an email registered, unless you specifically reconfigured it to be for reset only and not for wikimail. — xaosflux  Talk 14:54, 13 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Special:PasswordReset only requires one of username and email address. That's why it says "Fill in one of the fields to receive a temporary password via email". User:Lovecodeabc has not specified a valid email address. The message is different if you have a valid address but have chosen to disallow mails from others. I guess you entered the email address for Lovecodeabc(tm) and the mail says so, not Lovecodeabc. PrimeHunter (talk) 16:30, 13 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Oops, forgot that Send password reset emails only when both email address and username are provided. is off by default! So yes, it will send you reset links for ALL the accounts you have under an email address - but again if the email address was never confirmed to the account it won't. — xaosflux  Talk 16:54, 13 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Well, I got a password reset email for Lovecodeabc: ScreenshotLoginTechIssues.jpg Lovecodeabc(tm) (talk) 20:26, 13 April 2024 (UTC)
 * I did a test. "This user has not specified a valid email address." at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:EmailUser?wpTarget=Lovecodeabc can both mean the account never saved an email address and never confirmed it (see Help:Email confirmation). A temporary password can be sent to an unconfirmed email address. I don't know why the password didn't work for you. It's also odd that your screenshot says "lovecodeabc" with lowercase "l" (unless it's an uppercase "L" in a weird font). The first character of usernames is automatically capitalized. If you wrote it as "lovecodeabc" when the account was created then I don't know whether the lowercase "l" is stored somewhere and can still be retrieved in some situations. Anyway, the account only has 19 edits and can just be abandoned. Special:Contributions/Lovecodeabc only shows unimportant userspace edits and Special:CentralAuth/Lovecodeabc shows no edits at other wikis. If you really want the username then you could try Changing username/Usurpations. It's usually only for accounts with no edits but rare exceptions are made. First check several times in different browsers that a temporary password doesn't work. PrimeHunter (talk) 23:41, 13 April 2024 (UTC)
 * No, there wouldn't be any record of the original case. That's an uppercase "I" in the screenshot. There is an account called Special:Contributions/iovecodeabc, created seven days after Special:Contributions/Lovecodeabc. Suffusion of Yellow (talk) 23:56, 13 April 2024 (UTC)
 * @Suffusion of Yellow: My account is Lovecodeabc, not Iovecodeabc. Sorry for the confusion!
 * @PrimeHunter: I'll look into Changing username/Usurpations. I've checked Mozilla Firefox on Ubuntu 22.04 and Safari on iPadOS. Are there any issues with those two browsers? I haven't used Google Chrome to try it yet. (also, isn't Google Chrome based on Chromium/WebKit, same as Safari)?
 * Lovecodeabc(tm) (talk) 00:44, 14 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Is it possible you also created the account User:Iovecodeabc with your email address and wrote Iovecodeabc at Special:PasswordReset but tried to log in as Lovecodeabc with the temporary password in the mail? That would certainly explain why it didn't work. PrimeHunter (talk) 01:33, 14 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Oh yeah, it never occured to me to check the user page of Iovecodeabc! Lovecodeabc(tm) (talk) 01:39, 14 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Everything technical appears resolved now. Lovecodeabc hasn't stored an email address (or has an unknown and unconfirmed address) so it doesn't work to write Lovecodeabc at Special:PasswordReset. Iovecodeabc has stored an email address so it works to either write Iovecodeabc or the email address, but it only sends a password for Iovecodeabc. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:EmailUser?wpTarget=Iovecodeabc indicates the email address is not currently confirmed but that can be done as described at Help:Email confirmation. Zzyzx11 wrote there that you need a confirmed email address to reset your password but an unconfirmed stored address is apparently enough for that. Confirmation is required for other email features. PrimeHunter (talk) 02:27, 14 April 2024 (UTC)

Can't edit
Hello guys, it's been a few hours and I can't edit any page on Wikipedia not even my userspace. Prior to this, for about 30 mins I had an issue checking the page history revisions of a particular page. While checking the page history, it seemed to glitch with an error saying "Unable to stash Parsoid HTML." I couldn't compare the revisions of other editors. Normally I'd ignore such issues thinking something related to "Wiki Sever" is going on, but now it's getting me worried. <b style="color:#000;">Rejoy</b>2003(<b style="color:#060;">talk</b>) 14:11, 14 April 2024 (UTC)


 * Also see help desk post. 97.113.173.101 (talk) 14:21, 14 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Actually, now it's broken for me on iPhone. GoutComplex (talk) 14:36, 14 April 2024 (UTC)
 * I see page history perfectly, but it's just editing that won't work for me on PC. It works fine on phones. GoutComplex (talk) 14:33, 14 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Well I'm on phone, I can't edit nor check history properly apparently due to "glitching." <b style="color:#000;">Rejoy</b>2003(<b style="color:#060;">talk</b>) 14:36, 14 April 2024 (UTC)


 * that's odd, you did just edit this page though? see https://wikitech-static.wikimedia.org/wiki/Reporting_a_connectivity_issue and also how to report a bug. --Jeremyb (talk) 14:35, 14 April 2024 (UTC)
 * I'm also getting ""Unable to stash Parsoid HTML" on Chrome on Windows 11. Same thing on Firefox on Windows 11.  Looks like Microsoft Edge on Windows 11 works properly.
 * On Android 14, I get a different error, "Error, can't load the editor". ReferenceMan (talk) 14:37, 14 April 2024 (UTC)
 * After 1 successful edit, Microsoft Edge now gives the same error, "Unable to stash Parsoid HTML."
 * ReferenceMan (talk) 14:44, 14 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Same issue, Firefox on Windows 10. Mrchikkin (talk) 14:42, 14 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Okay I can edit now, but still there's still minor glitch or bug (along with the Parsoid HTML pop-up) while checking some history of some pages. I tried to login into my account through Opera browser, the good thing is I can edit back. Probably something's up with Google chrome or Firefox. <b style="color:#000;">Rejoy</b>2003(<b style="color:#060;">talk</b>) 14:45, 14 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Same here, the visual editing is not opeing on my phone, and opening sometimes on Desktop. Grabup (talk) 15:17, 14 April 2024 (UTC)
 * I can't edit again, looks like an on and off relationship with my browser. <b style="color:#000;">Rejoy</b>2003(<b style="color:#060;">talk</b>) 15:20, 14 April 2024 (UTC)
 * I'm also getting the same error message saying, "Unable to stash Parsoid HTML". But what's weird is I tried using the Legacy renderer instead of the Parsoid; But it still says: "Unable to stash Parsoid HTML". I don't understand how come a problem with the new Parsoid renderer, could be effecting the Legacy renderer also. 𝓥𝓮𝓼𝓽𝓻𝓲𝓪𝓷24𝓑𝓲𝓸 (ᴛᴀʟᴋ) 15:20, 14 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Whatever the problem was, it seems like its fixed now. Both visual and wikitext editors are now working in both renderers. 𝓥𝓮𝓼𝓽𝓻𝓲𝓪𝓷24𝓑𝓲𝓸 (ᴛᴀʟᴋ) 15:24, 14 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Still not working on mobile. Grabup (talk) 15:26, 14 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Same here not working for me too (Android 13 user). <b style="color:#000;">Rejoy</b>2003(<b style="color:#060;">talk</b>) 15:35, 14 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Seems fixed for me too. GoutComplex (talk) 16:58, 14 April 2024 (UTC)
 * The problem disappeared when I asked a question about this error at the Teahouse.  TWOrantula  TM (enter the web) 15:26, 14 April 2024 (UTC)
 * For context, I'm editing on Google Chrome with Windows 11 installed.  TWOrantula  TM (enter the web) 15:30, 14 April 2024 (UTC)


 * Possible related to T356157 - added info there. — xaosflux  Talk 15:27, 14 April 2024 (UTC)


 * ...I can edit my user page, apparently.  TWOrantula  TM (enter the web) 15:37, 14 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Nevermind, I can't do it anymore.  TWOrantula  TM (enter the web) 15:38, 14 April 2024 (UTC)

Changing "input element" to "anchor element" and then making anchor elements unselectable
Hi, after the title of articles, and after final rendering, an expression appears as "translate links from en to fa". Bug scenario is that when we want to select the title, if we suddenly extend the selected region, for example for Wikipedia article, the texts of "Toggle the table of contents" and "en" and "fa" would be in our clipboard. So after pasting the clipboard, the total clipboard text would be:

To solve this problem, we should apply these styles:

But the element type for "en" and "fa" is "input" and we can not make "input elements" unselectable, so please convert "input element" to "anchor element" for "en" and "fa" and then apply the above styles. Thanks, Hooman Mallahzadeh (talk) 16:46, 13 April 2024 (UTC)


 * I guess this is related to a userscript, not part of the standard user interface. Without that script installed I don't see quite what you're talking about. I suggest asking at fa:MediaWiki talk:Tofawiki.js or consulting Ebrahim. --Jeremyb (talk) 02:46, 14 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Hooman Mallahzadeh: This was proposed here User talk:Ebrahim/ArticleTranslator.js but was making breakage in some other browser so I applied another solution which supposed to not have the issue which apparently isn't imperfect in your case though I couldn't reproduce your issue . Guess the best way forward is to add your username to a blacklist for the tool so you can develop your own version and after that if your version covers all the use cases on all the different browsers we can merge the versions. Does that sound good? Just please keep your changes to minimum possible for the ease merging back the versions. Thanks −ebrahimtalk 06:27, 14 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Ok, I can reproduce this, it only happens on double clicks (and not in triple clicks?), and only happens in Chrome and not in Safari and Firefox. Changing those input elements to editable anchor elements isn't that easy, in fact it initially was like that before this edit and some users weren't able to edit them when needed and having that with user-select: none makes users not able to select the text inside to modify the actual language code. −ebrahimtalk 06:56, 14 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Hooman Mallahzadeh: Should be fixed now by this. Thanks! −ebrahimtalk 07:22, 14 April 2024 (UTC)
 * @Ebrahim No the problem is not resolved! To correct that, at this page and at the lines 340 and 341, you should convert input element to anchor element like this:
 * @Jeremyb-phone The problem for the "Toggle the table of contents" persists for all users, this code makes that unselectable.
 * Would you please do something to apply this style? Thanks, Hooman Mallahzadeh (talk) 08:47, 14 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Regarding the user script (not toggle part), unfortunately that solution will disturb the tool on other browsers and things like this can happen on double/triple clicks on Safari (at least it once it used to be). I'm testing with all three browsers (Chrome, Firefox and Safari) but suggestions that have given to me were fixing one browser issue making the other major browsers worse so maybe I can add you to the blocklist of the tool so you copy the script and use your version, then if your solution could work on other browsers on my testing I can apply it to the main script also. −ebrahimtalk 09:23, 14 April 2024 (UTC)
 * @Ebrahim Such problems (inconsistencies between browsers) arise from bad design of codes. Maybe you should refactor this Javascript code. Implementing codes layer by layer such that one layer be completely independent of other layers would probably solve this bug and other similar bugs. Hooman Mallahzadeh (talk) 09:49, 14 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Hooman Mallahzadeh: Some of the mentioned inconsistencies are documented browser bugs like this one https://issues.chromium.org/issues/40249785 −ebrahimtalk 17:26, 14 April 2024 (UTC)

British Library web archives
The British Library instance of Wayback Machine has been down for a while, weeks or months. Could anyone located in Britain verify if this link is working? Maybe there is a regional policy block: http://www.webarchive.org.uk/wayback/archive/20100602000217/www.westsussex.gov.uk/ccm/navigation/your-council/election The links exist in 736 pages. -- Green  C  16:05, 14 April 2024 (UTC)
 * It's down for me in London. Looking at their twitter account (https://twitter.com/UKWebArchive) they were subject to a number of cyber attacks at the end of last year. This British Library announcement and this BL blog suggests it might take months to fix some services. — <span style="font-family:Arial;background:#d6ffe6;border:solid 1px;border-radius:5px;box-shadow:darkcyan 0px 1px 1px;"> Jts1882 &#124; talk 16:49, 14 April 2024 (UTC)
 * User:Jts1882, thank you very helpful. -- Green  C  02:06, 15 April 2024 (UTC)
 * I think (though I'm not totally sure) that if you have an account/membership you can still access the pages.<span id="Qwerfjkl:1713167056991:WikipediaFTTCLNVillage_pump_(technical)" class="FTTCmt"> — Qwerfjkl  talk  07:44, 15 April 2024 (UTC)

"Template parameters changed" appearing on every template on page when "review your changes" clicked
Hi there, I started having this issue today that's making it nearly impossible to edit.

When I click "review your changes" after editing a page, "template parameters changed" appears for EVERY template on the page, even if I have not changed any of them. Here is a screenshot I took (uploaded to Imgur). I tried disabling all my user scripts, and I am still having the issue.

I am using Firefox version 124.0.2, on desktop, and my browser is up to date.

I would really really appreciate any help with this. Thank you so much for any help. HeyElliott (talk) 19:13, 11 April 2024 (UTC)


 * Also, it's not an issue with any of my extensions, as I'm still having the issue without extensions. HeyElliott (talk) 19:21, 11 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Am I right in thinking that today is thursday? -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 20:54, 11 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Same thing happens to me. At first I thought I messed up somehow. (I'm using Chrome, so it's not the browser). Nikolaj1905 (talk) 11:07, 12 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Hey all, I've left the results of the investigation in the phab task, but this is a one-off disruption because of changes in contents of data-mw attributes of template content wrappers in Parsoid HTML. When cached HTML (generated by older production code) is compared with new HTML (generated by new production code that went out this week), you will see these noisy diffs reported by the visual diff code which compares HTML (not wikitext). But, you shouldn't run into this in subsequent edits. Sorry about the disruption. SSastry (WMF) (talk) 13:43, 12 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the explanation. I thought page diffs are based on Wikitext.  Can you explain why in this case it is comparing the output HTML instead of the Wikitext?  RudolfRed (talk) 19:54, 12 April 2024 (UTC)
 * There are two kinds of diffs. One is the wikitext diffs - the kind that is most commonly used. Visual diffs need to compare the rendered output and hence it compares HTML. SSastry (WMF) (talk) 09:26, 15 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks so much for your quick fix on this and the reply, I really really appreciate the work y'all do on this site! I've still been having this issue a few times today but I assume that's just because of the cached stuff, and it'll fix itself? (Sorry, I don't know much about caches and HTML and such.)
 * Thank you again, and I hope you have a great day! HeyElliott (talk) 19:57, 12 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Sorry to reply again, but I'm still getting the error often. Do I need to clear my cache or something? Again, sorry, I'm not super knowledgeable on this stuff. Thank you! HeyElliott (talk) 03:20, 13 April 2024 (UTC)
 * You don't need to do anything on your end. If the page is edited across the deployment date, that first edit will have this problem in visual diffs. You could forcibly clear the cache of the page via the purge query parameter if you wish and then look at the visual diff again - that should fix the problem in most cases. SSastry (WMF) (talk) 09:29, 15 April 2024 (UTC)

Tables next to each other
Is there a way to put two tables next to each other instead of having one underneath the other? Flaming Hot Mess of Confusion (talk) 00:59, 15 April 2024 (UTC)
 * There are many ways to do so. See Template:Col-begin for some options. – Jonesey95 (talk) 02:37, 15 April 2024 (UTC)
 * One way is to use CSS, float: left.


 * <p style="clear: left;">
 * Uwappa (talk) 12:43, 15 April 2024 (UTC)
 * But remember that tables next to eachother on mobile are problematic most of the time. —Th e DJ (talk • contribs) 12:47, 15 April 2024 (UTC)
 * I discovered recently that floating tables is disabled in mobile using  in the CSS. So those two tables are arranged vertically in mobile view, despite being so narrow. I discovered this when trying to make a template more responsive. — <span style="font-family:Arial;background:#d6ffe6;border:solid 1px;border-radius:5px;box-shadow:darkcyan 0px 1px 1px;"> Jts1882 &#124; talk 12:50, 15 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Hmm, weird. Yes, tables arranged vertically even if plenty of horizontal space available.
 * A less elegant alternative: nested tables. Uwappa (talk) 13:13, 15 April 2024 (UTC)
 * See Help:Table/Advanced for a solution which only wraps when needed, both in desktop and mobile. PrimeHunter (talk) 14:04, 15 April 2024 (UTC)
 * See Help:Table/Advanced for a solution which only wraps when needed, both in desktop and mobile. PrimeHunter (talk) 14:04, 15 April 2024 (UTC)

Solar eclipse of April 8, 2024
I believe that File:2024 Total Solar Eclipse (NHQ202404080102).jpg taken by NASA photographer is superior to the image now in the infobox of the article. In particular, it shows the Solar prominences much more clearly. However, I cannot figure out how to replace the image in this particular infobox. By the way, the photo was taken in Dallas, not in Indianapolis where the current image was taken. Any assistance would be appreciated. Thanks. Cullen328 (talk) 00:11, 15 April 2024 (UTC)


 * Man, that's a tricky infobox. Looks like you need to change it at Module:Solar eclipse/db/200. I think. Zaathras (talk) 00:23, 15 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Already switched it out at Special:Diff/1218973782. I have no idea why it has to be so complicated. Suffusion of Yellow (talk) 00:25, 15 April 2024 (UTC)
 * and, thank you very much. I have been editing for 15 years and have never edited a module, and would have no idea how to do so. Cullen328 (talk) 00:38, 15 April 2024 (UTC)
 * LOL. Complexity is the enemy that looks like a friend. --  Green  C  18:05, 15 April 2024 (UTC)
 * @Cullen328 I'm oppose this change because the image you're proposing has noticeable noise around the corona. In addition, there is already an image of the solar eclipse in Dallas, Texas in the gallery. √2   (talk)  06:03, 15 April 2024 (UTC)
 * sounds like the technical question is resolved and now it's an editorial issue. take it to the article's talk page? Jeremyb (talk) 06:51, 15 April 2024 (UTC)
 * However, Indiana was the most viewed state for the eclipse and now this Wikipedia page is making it look like it wasn't.
 * Although the photo from Dallas shows the finer details, the photo from Indianapolis shows us a greater aesthetic and the fact that Indianapolis was the hotspot for viewing the eclipse based on weather throughout the day and a bloom in tourism.
 * And it was the first total solar eclipse for Indianapolis since September 14, 1205.
 * And if it weren't for the weather forecast ahead of the event, Texas would've had more visitors than it did as many went to Indiana for the best spots. Eric Nelson27 (talk) 23:00, 15 April 2024 (UTC)

Tech News: 2024-16
<section begin="technews-2024-W16"/> Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Problems
 * Between 2 April and 8 April, on wikis using Flagged Revisions, the "" tag was not applied to undone edits. In addition, page moves, protections and imports were not autoreviewed. This problem is now fixed.

Changes later this week
 * Octicons-sync.svg The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from . It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from . It will be on all wikis from (calendar).
 * Default category sort keys will now affect categories added by templates placed in footnotes. Previously footnotes used the page title as the default sort key even if a different default sort key was specified (category-specific sort keys already worked).
 * A new variable <bdi lang="zxx" dir="ltr"> will be added to abuse filters. It tells how many seconds ago the last edit to a page was made.

Future changes
 * Volunteer developers are kindly asked to update the code of their tools and features to handle temporary accounts. Learn more.
 * Octicons-tools.svg Four database fields will be removed from database replicas (including Quarry). This affects only the <bdi lang="zxx" dir="ltr"> and <bdi lang="zxx" dir="ltr"> tables. Some queries might need to be updated.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe. <section end="technews-2024-W16"/>

MediaWiki message delivery 23:26, 15 April 2024 (UTC)

Allow 2FA for more users
I wanted to ask, why is two-factor authentication restricted to the oathauth-enable group (meta:Help:Two-factor_authentication), and would it make sense to make 2FA more available?

I got a notification recently that there were recently multiple failed attempts to access my account, so I looked into enabling some kind of MFA. Allowing this for most/all users seems sensible since it would help prevent account compromises, and mult-factor auth is pretty common these days.

Catleeball (talk) 22:15, 15 April 2024 (UTC) Catleeball (talk) 22:15, 15 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Notifications of the kind you mention merely mean that somebody went to Special:UserLogin, entered your username, then had at least one try at guessing your password, and failed. This sort of thing happens to most of us from time to time, and is rarely worth worrying about - unless you habitually log in somewhere public, where somebody might be watching over your shoulder to see what you type. The way that I deal with it is to (i) always log out when finished editing, this kills all login cookies (regardless of which device they are stored on); (ii) change password from time to time, always doing so when in a private location; (iii) always use a strong password; (iv) don't use the same password on any other website (but note that because of WP:SUL, your password at French Wikipedia, Commons, Meta, Wiktionary etc. will always be the same as your English Wikipedia password). -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 22:51, 15 April 2024 (UTC)
 * 2FA is allowed for all users, just follow the instructions at SRGP. It may seem like a pointless song-and-dance, but the idea is that saying "I have read the instructions" to a human has a greater effect than clicking an "I have read the instructions" button on a form. You'll be more likely to take the importance of backups seriously, and less likely to waste people's time after you lock yourself out of your account. I don't if that actually works in practice. Suffusion of Yellow (talk) 23:17, 15 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Did you mean to link the page for stewardship requests when you put meta:SRG there?
 * I saw that the oathauth testers group was allowed to sign up at Special:OATH, but I wasn't finding where in the documentation it said how to self-enroll for that group. Catleeball (talk) 23:28, 15 April 2024 (UTC)
 * I fixed the link; that should be SRGP. However, so long as you have a strong password that you do not use on any other site, you should be fine. You don't have any advanced permissions, so anyone attacking your account is going to move on to the next one after a few tries. The only exception is if there is a "catleeball" (or similar) account out there on some other site, with the same (or similar) password. If that site has been compromised, then it might only take a few tries to get in to your account. Suffusion of Yellow (talk) 23:48, 15 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Short answer: because if you screw up, you lose your account. WMF does not provide staff for an end-user helpdesk, and also doesn't collect other things that would maintain a reliable second-factor for recovery. — xaosflux  Talk 15:43, 16 April 2024 (UTC)

I can't add a paragraph break after a table
At Head injury, after the "Hematoma type" table, the text starts on the same line, i.e. to the right of the table, even when I add two new lines or  after the table to try to put the next paragraph on a separate line. How can this be changed? (In case this is relevant: I'm viewing the page with the "Vector legacy" skin in Firefox 124.0.) - LaetusStudiis (talk) 15:30, 16 April 2024 (UTC)


 * How is it now? I added a clear — xaosflux  Talk 15:40, 16 April 2024 (UTC)
 * The table was set to float left, possibly in a misguided attempt to align the text left. Gonnym has removed that now. Izno (talk) 16:23, 16 April 2024 (UTC)

pagelinks normalization
Hi, you might be aware that pagelinks table is being normalized (T299947). I want to give enough time before dropping the columns. So here is the notice that the data has been fully populated in all Wikis except Turkish Wikipedia and Chinese Wikipedia (and these two wikis will finish in roughly a week). This means if you have tools or database reports in English Wikipedia that relies on pl_namespace or pl_title, you need to switch them to use pl_target_id ASAP. The rough estimate is that the old columns will be gone in a couple of weeks.

I was asked to make an explicit note here (one and two). Let me know if you have any question in the ticket. Thank you and my apologies for inconvenience. You can read more why we need to do this in T222224. Best ASarabadani (WMF) (talk) 12:18, 15 April 2024 (UTC)

PAGE ]]) 16:29, 15 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Thank you for the notification. Like the earlier templatelinks change, this will break to many on- and off-wiki tools (some of which may be unmaintained), and it's difficult to assess the likely scope of the damage.  Here is a list of affected database reports, but there are plenty of other ways to use the table such as Quarry.  Pinging, who will probably be one of many with work to do. Certes (talk) 12:30, 15 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Pinging as well. --Ahecht ([[User talk:Ahecht|<span style="color:#FFF;background:#04A;display:inline-block;padding:1px;vertical-align:-.3em;font:bold 50%/1 sans-serif;text-align:center">TALK
 * ... and (Articles with links to drafts),  (Missing Wikipedians),  (Linked incorrect names) who maintain active database reports using pagelinks. Certes (talk) 20:19, 15 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks. I'm aware. Hope to update scripts before the end of this week. --R'n'B (call me Russ) 20:58, 15 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Would it be possible to add a view to the database which simulates the old pagelinks table by joining the new pagelinks table to linktarget? Then, updating our software would be as simple as replacing the word pagelinks by the name of the new view throughout.  We would need to check that the performance hit of using the view is not significantly worse than what we will suffer anyway by adding the linktarget table explicitly. Certes (talk) 20:07, 15 April 2024 (UTC)
 * @Certes We sometimes do this to provide backward compatibility for short period of time but the main use of views is to hide private information (e.g. suppressed usernames, etc.) and adding layers of b/c increases complexity and has led to accidentally such information getting leaked and because of that we are avoiding to add b/c unless absolutely needed. I hope I have given enough time to people to update their tools. I"m sorry but this is something we have to do. ASarabadani (WMF) (talk) 10:05, 17 April 2024 (UTC)