Wikipedia talk:AutoWikiBrowser/Kingbotk plugin/Archive 1

FYI
If i've archived any section that still needs to be active, feel free to move it back to User talk:Kingbotk/Plugin Reedy Boy 19:17, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

ZIP file
I can't unzip your file for it isn't the right zipping format for Winzip 9.0. Lincher 01:05, 12 September 2006 (UTC)
 * Aargh... I made it in Winzip. Maximum compression. What's the error message? --kingboyk 09:26, 12 September 2006 (UTC)
 * I've just downloaded it from my web site and it opens in Winzip for me. I'll do the next upload with a lower compression level in case that's the problem. --kingboyk 09:55, 12 September 2006 (UTC)
 * The message is This is not in the Zip 2.0 format. Lincher 11:37, 12 September 2006 (UTC)
 * We're both using Winzip 9 so I'm not sure of the problem (and Google doesn't help). However I'd hazard a guess that it's compression levels so I'll not use the maximum (but not so portable) compression level next time. I'll get to work now so hopefully there'll be a new upload later. --kingboyk 12:41, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

Possible bugs?
Or could be user error -- I'm using Manual assessment for the first time and I have Cleanup checked and this is what is happening. The first one comes up (Zachary Taylor), but doesn't find anything to cleanup (which might be the case), however Preview is not red. I click Preview anyway, and then hit Ignore so I can get to the Talk page, popup comes up but it's already assessed so I hit Skip (so far so good I guess), but then it pulls up the next article and briefly shows me a comparison (with cleanup suggestions), but then a popup appears that says "Object reference not set to an instance of an object" and when I hit Okay, it shows me a comparison with the article being replaced with the Talk page contents... I'm doing Category:Virginia politicians --plange 23:33, 24 September 2006 (UTC)
 * Sounds like a bug. Are you using the latest AWB I supply with the plugin, or a version downloaded from Martin? That's important to know because when Martin first implemented events from AWB some of them didn't work properly; the AWB executable I supply is compiled by me from the very latest source code. I suspect, though, that it's a bug in the plugin rather AWB, possibly related to a change I made recently which hasn't been well tested. Somebody else said there was a problem when skipping in assessment mode so it sure looks and smells like a bug... sorry about that and I'll look into it when I get a chance. --kingboyk 18:17, 25 September 2006 (UTC)
 * I've just loaded it up and the preview button turns red as soon as we get the first article, Zachary Taylor. Again I wonder if you have an earlier version of AWB? Or perhaps you were doing another job before starting manual assessment and the plugin has some stale settings?


 * OK, now I hit Preview and then Ignore. Up comes the assessment form. Click Skip... and, yes, an error. However, in my test it doesn't affect the next page which loads normally and can be assessed normally.


 * Anyrode, I'll load the plugin up in the code editor and see what's happening. --kingboyk 21:43, 25 September 2006 (UTC)
 * I'm using your version -- I downloaded it right before I ran this... --plange 21:51, 25 September 2006 (UTC)
 * I've found the cause of that error box, am testing an altered version now... brb... --kingboyk 21:59, 25 September 2006 (UTC)
 * There seems to be a few things going wrong here. First of all, the error message box. Basic answer: A f*ck up :) Technical details: When I first designed this feature, I had it in mind that the talk page would load whilst the assessment box is being displayed. Of course, because the plugin is only a bolt-on to AWB and is never actually in control that approach wouldn't work: AWB would get the talk page and even if the assessment form was being displayed it would send the talk page text to the plugin for processing. The only ways around this would be to lock up the user interface, or introduce even more complicated state tracking (i.e. plugin gets article text and then has to decide whether to wait or not). In the end I had the plugin tell AWB to load up the talk page, and when we receive the talk page text we display the assessment form and don't pass control back to AWB until the form has been dismissed. Unfortunately when I made this change I forgot to change the way I tell AWB to skip the talk page if the Skip button is clicked. Since our code is running within AWB's ProcessArticle call, I should simply pass back a Skip=True variable and exit; AWB will skip and load the next page. Instead the plugin was firing an event into AWB telling it directly to Skip. It was then getting a null reference on a webcontrol object which didn't exist because AWB was loading the next page.


 * A second thing is the Preview button being red. This happens in reaction to several events from buttons and AWB, most notably it happens when AWB's web browser control says it has changed to busy state (started processing). In my test just now I've managed to simulate situations where AWB doesn't fire that event properly. If I start up AWB, login (my cookie doesn't get saved properly for some reason), hit Stop, and hit Start again, the button doesn't turn red because AWB hasn't sent a busychanged event. I've had a word with Martin about this.


 * I've run a few tests on my modified version and I can't get it to break (but my connection is slow and I want to get to bed). I'll upload it shortly and you can try to break it for me (if you do break it, let me know again exactly how. thanks). --kingboyk 23:44, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

A note about AWB versions: I think it's really more accurate to say that I upload the latest well-tested version of AWB with the plugin, not as stated above the newest. The bug fix upload I made yesterday - plugin version 0.7.1 - included AWB v3.3.0, which I know to be "good". The latest version (v3.4.0++?) from SVN was crashing, and I haven't tried v3.4.0 yet. Anyway, whatever, the point is please use the version of AWB I supply until such time as both the plugin and AWB are stable :) --kingboyk 14:44, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

Simple question
Hi, I want to use AWB to tag novels and biographies that still have no or  tag. When I make a list from the appropriate article category, AWB says it's the wrong namespace (of course it does). So how do I tag these articles when I do not want to select every article by hand? Errabee 00:22, 25 September 2006 (UTC)
 * Do a right click on one of the articles in the list generated by AWB and choose "Convert to Talk pages" - that should do it --plange 00:59, 25 September 2006 (UTC)
 * Thanks, that worked :) Silly me for not trying that :) Errabee 03:38, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

No new talkpages
I just ran you tool to add to a bunch of pages. Trouble is, several of them should have had tags added to their (nonexistent) talkpages, but they weren't). The XML settings are reproduced below:                                                    <findandreplacesettings enabled="False" ignorenofar="True" ignoretext="False" appendsummary="True" afterotherfixes="False" /> </FindAndReplaceSettings> <FindAndReplace> <replacerules enabled="False"> <rule name="Rule" type="0" enabled="True" /> </FindAndReplace> <summary text="re-categorisation per CFD" /> <summary text="clean up and re-categorisation per CFD" /> <summary text="removing category per CFD" /> <summary text="subst:'ing" /> <summary text="stub sorting" /> <summary text="Typo fixing" /> <summary text="bad link repair" /> <summary text="Fixing links to disambiguation pages" /> <summary text="Unicodifying" /> <summary text="use by-date category" /> <summaryindex index="clean up" /> <find text="" regex="False" casesensitive="False" /> <wordwrap enabled="True" /> <toolbar enabled="False" /> <bypass enabled="True" /> <ingnorenonexistent enabled="True" /> <noautochanges enabled="False" /> <skipnochanges enabled="False" /> <preview enabled="False" /> <minor enabled="False" /> <watch enabled="False" /> <timer enabled="False" /> <sortinterwiki enabled="True" /> <addignoredtolog enabled="False" /> <Kingbotk_Plugin ShowHideTabs="True" ShowManualAssessmentsInstructions="True" CategoryName="" ManuallyAssess="False" Cleanup="False" LogBadPages="True" LogFolder="E:\Program files\AutoWikiBrowser" LogVerbose="True" LogWiki="True" LogXHTML="False" SkipBadTags="False" SkipWhenNoChange="False" AlwaysLeaveAComment="False" AusEnabled="False" AusSport="False" AusPolitics="False" AusPlace="False" AusMilitary="False" AusLaw="False" AusCrime="False" AusV8="False" AusNRL="False" AusALeague="False" AusAFL="False" AusSydney="False" AusPerth="False" AusMelb="False" AusLakeM="False" AusHobart="False" AusGee="False" AusCanb="False" AusBris="False" AusAdel="False" AusAutoStub="False" AusStubClass="False" AlbumEnabled="False" AlbumAutoStub="False" AlbumStubClass="False" MilHistEnabled="False" MilHistWWII="False" MilHistWWI="False" MilHistWeapon="False" MilHistUS="False" MilHistPoland="False" MilHistNapol="False" MilHistMidAges="False" MilHistMemorial="False" MilHistMarit="False" MilHistJapan="False" MilHistItaly="False" MilHistIndia="False" MilHistGerman="False" MilHistFrench="False" MilHistDutch="False" MilHistClassic="False" MilHistChina="False" MilHistCanuck="False" MilHistBrit="False" MilHistAir="False" MilHistAus="False" MilHistAncNE="False" MilHistACW="False" MilHistStubClass="False" MilHistAutoStub="False" MilHistRmImportance="False" MilHistEarlyModern="False" SongsEnabled="False" SongsAutoStub="False" SongsStubClass="False" BioEnabled="False" BioLivingPerson="False" BioAutoStub="False" BioStubClass="False" BioActivePol="False" BioArtsEntsWG="False" BioMilitaryWG="False" BioRoyaltyWG="False" BioPoliticianWG="False" BioForcePriorityParm="False" BioBritishRoyaltyWG="False" BioNonBio="False" BioMusiciansWG="False" BioSportWG="False" BioScienceWG="False" AircraftProjectGenericEnabled="True" AircraftProjectGenericTemplateName="AircraftProject" AircraftProjectGenericAutoStub="False" AircraftProjectGenericStubClass="False" AircraftProjectGenericTemplateAlternateNamesYN="False" AircraftProjectGenericTemplateAlternateNames="" AircraftProjectGenericTemplateImp="Imp" AircraftProjectGenericTemplateCats="True" AircraftProjectGenericTemplateTempl="False" AircraftProjectGenericTemplateAutoStubYN="False" AircraftProjectGenericSkipRegexYN="False" AircraftProjectGenericSkipRegex="" GenericTemplatesCount="1" GenericTemplate0="AircraftProject" /> <preferencevalues enhancediff="True" scrolldown="True" difffontsize="150" textboxfontsize="10" textboxfont="Courier New" lowthreadpriority="False" flashandbeep="True" /> </Settings> Ingoolemo talk 03:52, 25 September 2006 (UTC)
 * Did you make sure to uncheck the "Skip nonexistent pages" box? --plange 14:18, 25 September 2006 (UTC)
 * I'm on my laptop at the moment which doesn't have AWB installed, but to try and nail this:


 * Please ensure all AWB skip options are turned off
 * Inspect the log and skip log and upload them here if need be. The log's fairly detailed so if the plugin is doing the skipping it ought to have logged a reason why.
 * Please report back on this as I'd like to know the reason :)--kingboyk 18:08, 25 September 2006 (UTC)
 * I've loaded up the settings file you gave and it looks like you have "Skip non-existing pages" clicked. Uncheck that (and the cleanup options) on the "(2) Set options" AWB tab and it should be fine. I plan to implement a menu item soon to have the plugin set AWB up like this but at the moment you have to turn all AWB features off manually. (Basically, if you have "Skip non-existing pages" checked, AWB will skip the page and the plugin won't ever hear about it.) --kingboyk 21:34, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Plugin
Ok, this works well for stub tagging and all but for tagging articles after reviewing the is still a pain in the neck so if you have time could you tune up your plug-in in order that it would help the AWB user to one, add the WPBIO tag, then have checkboxes for every params. So if the article is class=B, priority=High, work-group-A=yes and so on, it would be nice that this could be done instead of having a bot-like program that won't help the assessing. Lincher 15:25, 11 September 2006 (UTC)
 * Yes, that feature is planned (it's actually in the screenshot overleaf) but it won't be in the first public release (which will be later today, once I've finished programming and testing the changes discussed here.


 * Basically, the intention is that you'll get your list of articles. AWB will load the article and (if necessary) clean it up. The plugin will place the talk page of the article next in the queue. You read/inspect the article and any AWB cleanup changes and hit save or ignore. The plugin loads the talk page and adds a WPBio template. You then type in** the class and importance. You can add any other params using a right click in the text box. Hit save, and get the next article. The plugin can do all of this already apart from the receive article then get it's talk page bit, which should be trivial. So, I'll try and get that implemented tommorow or Wednesday. Please try the interrim version later today though!!


 * Of course this was originally designed with high volume bot-style tagging in mind, specifically my own bot. That's why this feature isn't in the first version (that and me not thinking of it straight away ;)). --kingboyk 15:33, 11 September 2006 (UTC) **Not checkboxes initially, but I may well add that. Perhaps a pop up form when the article is being saved and AWB is loading the talk page.


 * Thanks for the quick and thoroughly thought answer. You are a wonderful technical king boy. Lincher 16:34, 11 September 2006 (UTC)
 * Thanks. Can you give me a ridiculously well paid job by any chance? :)


 * I don't think I'll be getting the manual assessments feature done today (it's nearly midnight). I think I've solved the technical challenges of working out how to implement it (usually by far the hardest part) so with any luck you'll have a new toy to play with tommorow. (And if you can't unzip it, we can try WinRAR or I'll put the unzipped files on the web). --kingboyk 22:46, 12 September 2006 (UTC)


 * Taking longer than I thought, sorry. I had the article/assessment form/talk page sequence working fine, but now I've added the /Comments form something has gone screwy. I imagine I've just got a few variables in the wrong places or something but as it's going to take a while to debug I'll return to it in the morning. --kingboyk 00:22, 15 September 2006 (UTC)

Next version of plugin will always run the second-chance regular expression, even if it finds a valid template
I wrote on User talk:Plange: One little glitch I just found: Talk:Michael Jackson contains a valid musician tag, and'' an invalid WPBio tag. It finds the valid musician tag, so it assumes that's job done and processes the page. The plugin wasn't programmed to run the "second chance" looser regular expression if it found a valid tag, I mean why would it?! :) I'm changing and testing that now - even if it finds a valid tag it will run the second chance regular expression to look for bad tags. I don't think it will impact performance noticably as these regular expressions seem to be very fast. --kingboyk 14:57, 21 September 2006 (UTC)''

This has now been changed. As I stated there, it shouldn't impact performance too much - whilst it won't trap many extra bad tags I think it's worthwhile. The plugin should (along with some other internal changes in the next version) now trap any bad tags you dare throw at it. Test it if you like and let me know of any problems! --kingboyk 16:08, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

Feature request from WP:NOVELS

 * Support as for the "Austrialia" and "Milhist" wikiprojects banners but for for the WP:NOVELS WikiProject. There are numbers of parameters which may need some explanation. The main ones are class and importance. ::  Kevinalewis  :  (Talk Page) / (Desk)  08:09, 21 September 2006 (UTC)
 * At the moment that template should work perfectly fine using the "generic templates" feature. The template doesn't appear to have any parameters unknown to the plugin which you'd want to be adding to talk pages in bulk. The parameters it has which the plugin doesn't know about (such as peer review, collaborations etc) are never removed if they have a value. If you need any help getting set up (I hope the instructions are clear but...) let me know and I'll help. You'd only need programatic support if you needed the plugin to actually tag with parameters it doesn't currently know about - and that mostly means workgroups and taskforces. --kingboyk 10:11, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for your response. I have been able to test the basic article processing on False Gods and Talk:False Gods which works fine. However I have two problems, we have a "seperate" pair of templates and  with obvious usage. Next I can't seem to get the plug in to tag Categories as such, trying on Category:Novels based on computer and video games this should get a on the talk page. In addition to these we do have another class that some of the others don't that is "List-Class" or just "List", which would need a on their talk pages. :: Kevinalewis  :  (Talk Page) / (Desk)  10:26, 21 September 2006 (UTC)
 * OK, that's quite a lot of points so I'll split my answers into sections:


 * The needs-infobox parameter is only used in manual assessments. It's not intended for high-speed bot tagging of talk pages - I can't foresee any situation where you'd know in advance that all the articles in your list need an infobox and, indeed, the needs-infobox parameter isn't an option in the plugin for any supported templates. This is how the manual assessments feature works:
 * Plugin receives an article. It adds the talk page to the article list, and makes the Preview button turn red.
 * Editor clicks Preview to read and assess the article
 * AWB loads the talk page and plugin displays a form with assessment options, including needs an infobox
 * Each template plugin which is supported is told of the options that it needs to add to the template, e.g, class, needs-infobox etc. Now, I don't think I could easily put functionality here for multiple infobox types without having to radically change things. I'd need extra checkboxes for the infobox types, and I'd need extra communication between the assessment plugin and the template plugins. All these features are encapsulated into seperate programattic classes, so that new templates can be easily bolted in. This change would mean changes in the underlying architecture and I just don't see the value.
 * Editor gets the talk page text in the AWB edit box, with changes made by the plugin. Now, here is where we could make a change. The reviewer has to inspect the talk page and make any changes before hitting Save. I could add your infoboxes to a context menu, so with a right click and a couple of mouse clicks they could choose the infobox-needed template and it would be inserted. I'm quite happy to make that change. I'm also happy to ship an XML settings file for your template.


 * class=List. OK, let me be frank here (no point beating around the bush, right?). Frankly, I think you shouldn't have that class at all. The classes were invented by the Wikipedia 1.0 team and we should go with the defaults. class=Dab, class=Template etc are fine, because those pages aren't articles and don't need to be assessed; they're outside the scope of WP1. Lists are articles and they should be assessed as articles. You know it's possible to have a Featured List, right? If your project gets a Featured List and you've tagged it class=List how's it gonna get into WP1? I think maybe I should add an item about this onto the WP1 assessments page as I've seen another project tag lists with class=NA, also incorrect. As I see it lists can be split up as follows:
 * Basic A-Z lists with no commentary. These should be categories.
 * Basic A-Z lists full of redlinks, primarily intended to help editors find new articles to create. These shouldn't be in article space at all, they should be worklists within the WikiProject.
 * Lists with commentary. These are articles. They should be graded as articles, and should aim for Featured List status.
 * I'll have a think about this issue but I take your general point. :: Kevinalewis  :  (Talk Page) / (Desk)  16:25, 22 September 2006 (UTC)


 * Category tagging. Did you feed a category into the plugin? If you fed a category it would have been skipped as an incorrect namespace. If you fed it a category talk it should have got a tag. If it didn't, turn on logging in wiki format (under the Plugin\Kingbotk Plugin menu) and upload the results please.

Hope that helps. Let me know if you want me to add the context menu I mentioned. --kingboyk 14:17, 21 September 2006 (UTC)


 * All it would need to add would be the characters when that option is selection on the plugin assessment form dialog and  when a "new" option was selected.
 * I'll have a think about this when I'm next updating. The easiest way to do it in the meantime is simply make a needs-infobox=yes parameter in your template, and have that transclude or subst Novelinfoboxneeded. I can add Novelinfoboxneeded and Novelinfoboxincomp to a context menu so they can be manually inserted too.
 * Can this plugin dialog load in the "current" settings for "Class" & "Importance" options etc., making it obvious what they currently are set to.
 * You mean, when you're assessing, the plugin has loaded the talk page, and pops up the assessment form? Put the current assessments onto that popup form? This is something else that would require an architectural change, although not a major one. The plugin tells AWB to load the talk page. It then pops up the form, and waits for a response. It then sends the talk page text along with the required parameter values to each individual active templating plugin. I guess I could add in some code to ask each plugin to analyse the current template values, if any, so they can be shown on the popup. Again, I'll have a think about that when I'm doing my next update.
 * Not sure I understand you - I start with "Novels" Category. then make list and all I have after trimming out a few unwanted ones are "Categories" so how to I get a list of "Category talk" pages then?
 * Right click in the AWB file list and select "Convert to talk pages". The plugin expects to receive the following:
 * Talk pages (including category talk and template talk) only in tagging mode
 * Mainspace articles only in assessment mode
 * Oh yes I have noticed that when you hit "skip" in the plug in assessment dialog, the program get's itself in a tangle as to what is an "article" and what is a "talk page". :: Kevinalewis  :  (Talk Page) / (Desk)  16:25, 22 September 2006 (UTC)
 * That sounds like a bug. I'll investigate, but I might need more exact details like what buttons were pressed and in what order, or a copy of the log. Definitely I want to nail this - it was quite difficult keeping track of what AWB was doing (there's stacks of events and buttons to monitor) so I wouldn't be at all surprised if something is messed up. When I have a chance I'll try it but if in the meantime you can supply more info or a log please do so. Cheers. --kingboyk 17:35, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

One thing I should have pointed out with regards to the class= parameters. The plugin doesn't currently check existing parameter values for "sanity" (this would be quite trivial to implement, and I probably will do it at some point). So, if it finds a class=List it will quite happily write that parameter back out to the talk page (or skip the page as "no change"). This is because it was originally designed for high speed bot tagging - add a template if it doesn't exist, add a living=yes if that doesn't exist, log and skip the page if it has a badly formatted tag, skip the page if the attached article is redlink. Whatever parameters are already there, put them back. In future I might have it inspect parameters and in bot mode log any unknown parms for manual inspection later, but that's not done yet. --kingboyk 18:04, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Runtime error
Steve, I'm almost sure that this is a problem with my PC, but I was wondering if you knew any reason why AWB would crash randomly. So far I've only been able to tag one article with it using a generic template for the Northern Ireland WikiProject. I re-downloaded version 2(?) of the .NET software which was linked to from one of the AWB-related pages and rebooted, but it still crashes.

If you've any ideas, I'd love to hear them! Cheers mate. --Mal 14:30, 26 September 2006 (UTC)
 * The latest SVN (source code) version was crashing for me too, but my latest plugin upload included an earlier version which I know to be OK. AWB crashes for me a a lot, but only after I've done many edits. (And, whaddya know, I just checked my active copy and it's crashed, but it did several hundreds first. It runs out of memory, which is apparently an Internet Explorer bug).


 * What I'd recommend Mal is use AWB for a while with the plugin DLL deleted from the AWB folder. See if AWB works OK on it's own. If it doesn't, it's a question for Martin. If it does, come back here and we'll try to discover what's happening!


 * You might also want to try the latest version of AWB from WP:AWB, which is newer than the version I supplied in my latest upload but not as new as the crashing version which I got as source code. --kingboyk 14:41, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

OK I'll try running AWB without the plugin (deleting the plugin's DLL) for a while now and see if it crashes. I'll report back here either way. --Mal 16:25, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

Hang on though... just read the AWB page and it notes two possible problems:


 * 1) It uses the Internet Explorer core, so if you have problems, make sure your IE is working. Make sure you have logged into Wikipedia using IE.
 * 2) A buggy monobook.js can often cause IE to display blank pages or crash AWB.
 * I don't use IE - I use Firefox. I never log into Wikipedia with IE (although I have done in the past).
 * I have no idea if my monobook is buggy as I just copied the code from another editor, and added a couple of other things to it.

Have you any idea whether either of these two things would be responsible? I'd be happy to remove my monobook for a while and do a test, or use IE (with the default settings etc that Martin suggests.. if you think that's the first thing that should be tested.

AWB crashes quite quickly for me. I'll not do anything until I get your reply. --Mal 16:33, 26 September 2006 (UTC)
 * Well, if it's still crashing without the plugin please move the thread over to WT:AWB (I'll probably reply there anyway if I can think of anything ;)). The logging into Wikipedia thing is a red herring; if you haven't logged in lately using IE and don't have a cookie AWB will load the login screen. You can forget that as a cause. Other than that I'm not sure but Martin or another user can probably help. --kingboyk 16:49, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

OK I'll try the first suggestion (removing the Kingboyk plugin) in a few minutes. --Mal 16:54, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

Heaps of questions
Hi there how are you? Sorry I'm not an expert in these things but I'm interested too! So basically, this bot adds assessment template to article's talk pages, right? So, um, is there any user who have to work or run the bot? If not, how can the bot know which ones are related to Indonesia and which ones are not? Another question is, can this bot automatically tags the assessment scale and importance, of course after we set the standard. Sorry for the stupid questions. Cheers -- I   mo   eng  05:30, 29 September 2006 (UTC) I hope that answers your questions. --kingboyk 11:30, 29 September 2006 (UTC)
 * "this bot adds assessment template to article's talk pages". Yes, but it's not really a bot in the way you're probably thinking. At the present time it's more of a templating extension to AWB (a set of regular expressions and conditional code). It does have some features which help with unattended operation (such as making decisions about which pages to skip, and logging them; and giving AWB a nudge if it freezes up), but it's not a bot. It depends on AWB to control the process and the user to supply a list of pages. In the future I might make it more of a bot, where jobs can be defined and the plugin will do them maybe one after the other or on a schedule, perhaps even have it trawl categories and find articles for tagging. Currently it does none of those things.
 * As above, AWB controls the list of pages and these must be set up by the user. The usual way is to find articles on the subject by loading in categories.
 * Only a human can assess articles. That I can think of there are 3 groups of articles on Wikipedia which have already had some form of human assessment which a bot can exploit: they've been given a stub template, or they have a FA or a GA badge. The plugin can automatically tag articles in stub categories with class=Stub. It doesn't do anything with FAs or GAs as most projects have already tagged those articles manually (it's naturally the first thing most new assessment projects do!) but if it's needed and worth my time I could certainly add support for tagging those automatically. Indeed the plugin could even be written to recognise the FA and GA templates which are placed on talk pages. I'm not sure it would be worth the time it takes to write or the extra complexity (and extra exposure to possible errors though).
 * I'm interested in using this tool, actually. Is there anything we (Indonesian project) have to submit, or request? As I saw different stuff for different WikiProjects. I really want to start using it as soon as possible. Cheers -- I   mo   eng  10:30, 1 October 2006 (UTC)
 * WP Indonesia looks like a "generic template" to me, so just follow the instructions here.
 * If you can't follow those, I'll create a settings file for you.
 * You said on my user talk you're having problems downloading it, can you be more specific? --kingboyk 10:49, 1 October 2006 (UTC)
 * Its 4 am here, I'll try to set it later. About the download, I have downloaded a compressed folder called AWB plugin. Is that the only thing I need to download? Because when I run the AutoWikiBrowser, it said I need something else. Cheers -- I   mo   eng  17:56, 1 October 2006 (UTC)
 * Maybe you don't have the Microsoft Dot Net Framework Version 2? Follow the instructions at WP:AWB. Other than that, the zipped folder you get from me should contain everything you need, yes :) --kingboyk 19:54, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

So now I have got the software, or that thing. But I cannot log in. Please help. Also how can I make a new configuration for WP:INA? Cheers -- I   mo   eng  10:15, 5 October 2006 (UTC)
 * You need to ask questions about AWB at the AWB talk page, you'll have a wider audience there including the developer of AWB. I suspect you may not be listed as a registered user though?


 * I'll have a look now. --kingboyk 12:41, 5 October 2006 (UTC)
 * OK, you weren't listed as a registered user at AutoWikiBrowser/CheckPage. I've added you. Now please make sure you read the instructions at WP:AWB - AWB is a powerful tool. Happy editing! --kingboyk 12:46, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

Roadtest
Awesome work! I just used the manual assess for the first time and it worked really nice! I especially loved how it works well with Generic templates too (marking something that needs an infobox also added that param to my generic tag). I could only find one bug, but it didn't stop my ability to use it. It seems that whenever the plugin finds something to clean up on the page and I then preview it and then click Save, a popup comes up that says I need to supply an edit summary even though I'd left the edit summary at the default of "clean up" -- I hit ok and it moves on to Talk and does record a summary... this again happens if I check that I want to leave a comment (great feature, BTW!!) and I don't have any changes to the talk page template (so I hit ignore) and the edit summary warning pops up (even though nothing's changing on that page).

Anyway, great work!! I have some "nice-to-haves" that I'll just list but by no means is this essential, etc., so if it's hard or you're short on time, don't worry about it :-)
 * If I'm doing a manual assess, is there a way to add activepol to the popup assessment? What I'm doing as a workaround is that I read the article and see that they are active, so I then click on the Bio tab so I can check that box, and then move on to the talk page to assess, which works fine, except for my wee brain keeps forgetting I'd checked that and so then I accidentally tag the next couple of very dead politicians with it :-)
 * On the comments thing, which again, is very cool!! I thought of a couple more auto-flags:
 * Expand lead per WP:LEAD
 * Format the article per WP:MOS with appropriate section headings

Thanks a ton! --plange 06:33, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the review, glad to hear it's working :)


 * The "no edit summary" box comes from AWB, but of course the plugin is responsible for making sure that box is never empty. A bug, but I won't be trying to replicate it/fixing it just now as I have a headache :( Onto the todo list it shall go. (Probably won't be too difficult to nail, perhaps clicking preview then save is confusing it)
 * "activepol" is of course WikiProject specific. As I explained to WP:NOVELS, the manual assessments popup is currently WikiProject agnostic. It basically collects some universally applicable info from the reviewer, and then sends those parameters to each templating plugin. I'm not saying it can't be done, but I'd have to think about a) how to do it (and whether it should be user configurable or hard coded) b) whether it's worth the time. In the meantime, you're aware of the context menu in the edit box aren't you? Once the assessment popup has gone, right click in the AWB edit box and use the following menu item:
 * Insert tag/WPBiography/Activepol
 * Sure thing on the Comments auto-flags, if you'll make use of them I'll add them! --kingboyk 13:04, 5 October 2006 (UTC)
 * Cool! I didn't know about the context menu, that should work perfectly! No need to change the assessment popup for 1 project... On comment auto-flags, definitely will use them, esp. the lead one --plange 15:25, 5 October 2006 (UTC)
 * I'll get a new version out this weekend with the new buttons for those 2 flags. Have done a bit of coding today for updates to, and a fix for, the WP Australia template, but it's slow going as I'm not feeling too well... Probably tommorow then. I'll also allow the "nudge" feature to be turned off, if I can find somewhere to squeeze in the checkbox and label! --kingboyk 22:43, 6 October 2006 (UTC)
 * I'm unexpectedly a bit tied up with FAC work, so I'll attend to this as and when. --kingboyk 17:17, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

Bug with auto-stubbing
I've been working through the physics articles, tagging them with auto-stub enabled. The plugin has been classifying a number of articles as stubs, where they aren't, for example The Wigner Medal. The settings I'm using are: Mike Peel 22:25, 6 October 2006 (UTC)
 * More options: none selected
 * Start: none selected, custom summary
 * physics: name 'physics', importance 'importance', Cats 'Cat', templates "NA', auto-stub (in template properties), auto-stub (configuration)
 * Plugin: skip: N/C
 * The plugin doesn't know if an article is a stub or not. If you have auto-stub turned on in the config section, it'll tag it as a stub, end of story. The idea is you only use that feature on stub categories. (For the plugin to auto-stub "intelligently" would mean having to load each page as well as each talk page, and then looking for a template name with "stub" in it. I could add a feature like that, but I'd take some persuading that it would be safe to run it in bot mode). --kingboyk 22:31, 6 October 2006 (UTC)
 * Ah, OK, I've misunderstood that function. I thought that it used the "intelligent" method. Thanks for the clarification. Mike Peel 22:34, 6 October 2006 (UTC)
 * Not terribly useful I think, because stub templates already add articles into cats. Just tag your stub cats seperately. Job done. Now go clear up your mess! (not too many I hope!) :) --kingboyk 22:36, 6 October 2006 (UTC)
 * It makes sense now that I think of it, and I'm now working my way through the stub categories with auto-stub on before moving on to the other categories. The 'mess' I made is all cleared up - it was only a couple of dozen articles. Mike Peel 11:58, 7 October 2006 (UTC)
 * Excellent. Thanks very much. --kingboyk 12:04, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

I'm working on a small update this weekend; I'll try and get a warning notice in there or rename the feature to avoid a repeat. --kingboyk 11:50, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

Requesting help and suggestions
''Moved from Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Biography/Automation

I have seen this biography project add the project banner to many of its articles using a bot. Can I request help with similar addition of WP India to all India-related articles. Any suggestions for doing it will help too. - Ganeshk  ( talk ) 17:34, 21 September 2006 (UTC)
 * Person to talk to would be User:kingboyk --plange 17:38, 21 September 2006 (UTC)
 * Well, not really - I'm using AWB, it's not magic :) I can't possibly take on other tagging jobs at the moment, so you'll have to find someone else with a bot account or apply for your own (if there's too many to do it manually).


 * You might want to try my AWB plugin, but note that it doesn't currently support the special parameters of your template e.g. for workgroups. I don't have time to add that support at the moment but if you need it I might be able to do it in the future. I'm only offering to do this for WikiProjects which have at least 5,000 pages untagged (reason: it takes me a long time). --kingboyk 18:28, 21 September 2006 (UTC)
 * That's what I meant (wasn't volunteering for you to do more work!) -- I just couldn't remember the link to your plugin.... --plange 19:11, 21 September 2006 (UTC)


 * Thanks for the information. I have a bot account. I have used AWB to do some updates in the past. I will check the plug-in and see if I can run it myself. -  Ganeshk  ( talk ) 19:40, 21 September 2006 (UTC)
 * Basically, if all you want to do is tag talk pages with your banner, or perhaps auto-tag stubs, you can certainly do it with the plugin (or vanilla AWB of course). If you want to do more fancy tagging, that is setting parameters for workgroups, you'll have to find a way to do it standard AWB or ask me to add specific support for your template to the plugin. Hope that helps. --kingboyk 19:47, 21 September 2006 (UTC)


 * Kingboyk, How do I check how many articles are untagged? Since you said you might add support if there are more 5000 untagged pages. Category:India stubs and Category:India have many sub-categories of articles that need tagging. Please advise. - Ganeshk  ( talk ) 19:58, 21 September 2006 (UTC)
 * Build a list in AWB is a good way of checking. Once you've listed the top category you can follow subcategories by selecting all the categories in the AWB file list and right clicking, select Add to list from category. No matter how many articles you have I just have too much of a backlog to commit to doing it right now, but catch me in a couple of weeks and I'd almnost certainly be happy to help. --kingboyk 20:11, 21 September 2006 (UTC)


 * Okay. Will contact you in a few weeks. Thanks, Ganeshk  ( talk ) 20:54, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

Kingboyk, It's been two weeks. :) Can I request the plug-in to support India WikiProject please? Thanks, Ganeshk  ( talk ) 01:52, 9 October 2006 (UTC)
 * You can ask but it doesn't mean you're gonna get :) Not immediately anyway!


 * India is a major topic and without counting how many pages you have tagged and how many not, I imagine you have a lot left to do and so I would be happy to help. However, I have plenty on the go still, including real life jobs and a todo list for the plugin. I'll add your request for full support of this template as a reasonably high priority item on the todo list.


 * In the meantime, if you want to use the "manual assessments" feature fully you'll need to add auto= and needs-infobox= parameters to your template. See WPBiography. You can also make a start using the plugin's "generic template" feature. For example:
 * Category:Indian sportspeople stubs - no workgroup, just a WP India tag and a WP Biography tag with the sports workgroup set to yes, and both templates auto=yes and class=Stub
 * Category:Indian business biography stubs - WP India, WP Bio, auto-stub
 * Category:Indian writer stubs - WP India, WP Bio with arts & entertainments workgroup, auto-stub
 * Category:Indian singer stubs - WP India, WP Bio with musicians workgroup, auto-stub
 * If you add an auto= parameter, all of those categories and many others can be tagged up by the plugin without any further changes from me. That'll give you something to do whilst you wait for full support. Also, if you fix up the template with auto= I'll add an XML settings file for WP India as an interrim solution and maybe tag up one of those categories (Category:Indian singer stubs probably) using my bot, as an example.  --kingboyk 12:43, 9 October 2006 (UTC)


 * Thanks for accepting my request. I have added the "auto" and "needs-infobox" parameters to WP India project banner. I will test using the generic-template feature later today. - Ganeshk  ( talk ) 17:16, 10 October 2006 (UTC)


 * I have tested the plug-in. It's worked perfectly with a generic template. I have asked for bot-approval for this. I am currently waiting on the approval before further runs. Thanks for putting my request on high-priority on your to-do list. - Ganeshk  ( talk ) 16:01, 12 October 2006 (UTC)
 * Excellent, thanks for the report. I'll try and get full support into the update-after-next. I'm currently working on improving the logging feature (about 50-70% done at a guess). --kingboyk 16:09, 12 October 2006 (UTC)
 * Good work! Can I beg a favor? When you do another run, if they're biographies, can you also activate the WPBiograhy plugin so that it will help us out too? Thanks a ton! We're also keep track at WP:BIOA of which stub categories we've run through.... --plange 19:07, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

Your advice
I now read in detail your edit about your bot in the Wikiproject history of Greece. I am a bit ignorant about these things! So, I have some basic questions: Before downloading, do I have to ask to be allowed to use AWB in Wikipedia talk:AutoWikiBrowser/CheckPage? What is a AWB folder? I create it where? Should I add parameters of the banner of the Wikiproject History of Greece (WPHOG)? I know this stuff is boring for you, but I'd appreciate any clarification of my current confusion! Thanks in advance!--Yannismarou 10:36, 13 October 2006 (UTC) Hope that helps. --kingboyk 18:04, 13 October 2006 (UTC)
 * You need to be a registered user of AWB, yes
 * Just unzip the file to a folder on your hard drive, and you'll get a load of files including the AWB executable, my plugin etc. Just click AWB and off you go.
 * Your template looks fine for basic tagging. You don't need to add the extra parameters unless you want to use them. If all you want to do is put your project's banner onto talk pages you're good to go I think.
 * Thanks! I'll be back in case I need further help.--Yannismarou 18:26, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

AWB
Hi Kingboy, the plugins menu has disappeared in the latest version of AWB. Any suggestions? -- Lost (talk) 07:11, 12 November 2006 (UTC)
 * I know Martin was going to make some changes to the plugins API, so maybe it's that? I don't really have time to work on the plugin at the moment so my advice is to roll back to the last known working version of AWB (perhaps the one I supplied?) If Martin has removed that version from the "current" list I'll ask him if I can put it back on. Failing that I'll have to look into it, won't I? :) Thanks for the headsup. --kingboyk 10:07, 12 November 2006 (UTC)
 * Thanks.. I'll ask him for the link to the previous version -- Lost (talk) 10:10, 12 November 2006 (UTC)
 * OK. Please keep me posted. --kingboyk 10:23, 12 November 2006 (UTC)
 * Kingboy, Martin says that its better to use the version that would be available with your package as he is not sure which version is most compatible. Now where is your package? I can see a link for the plugin download but does that contain the AWB also? -- Lost (talk) 15:27, 12 November 2006 (UTC)
 * Ok, I downloaded an old version from sourceforge and its working ok now. Thanks -- Lost (talk) 15:47, 12 November 2006 (UTC)
 * But, yes, for future reference my package contains AWB too. --kingboyk 16:55, 12 November 2006 (UTC)
 * Ok thanks a lot. -- Lost (talk) 17:53, 12 November 2006 (UTC)

Queries
Hi Kingboy, doesn't the plugin recognise class=Image? It gives class=NA instead of class=Image. Also, any luck with the India specific plugin yet:)? -- Lost (talk) 14:48, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
 * Haven't got around to doing the India plugin yet, sorry. I'm actually busy off-wiki (trying to install some wikis and get a wiki farm and WP mirror going!) so development has to be on hold for a while. The good news is that I've given User:Reedy Boy developer access so there's 2 people to pester now :)


 * It doesn't recognise class=Image. There's no need for it to as far as I can see, as WP1 doesn't assess images. --kingboyk 15:35, 26 November 2006 (UTC)


 * Hehe, thanks.. I am quite good at pestering (part of my day job:). &mdash; Lost (talk) 15:48, 26 November 2006 (UTC)


 * Oh Dear =P. Aside, i will be happy to look at doing this. Im not going to make a start tonight, as ive got some outstanding peices of work to complete, and a few other commitments. Tommorow at college, i've got free time, and after college i can spend some time getting to know the code. I should then be bale to make a start! Reedy Boy 20:12, 26 November 2006 (UTC)
 * Reedy Boy has started work on this. However, it'll take him a while to get up to speed I imagine as the code is quite complex. We also had a strange issue where some longstanding code once in SVN wouldn't compile. No idea why, but I've rewritten the offending pieces but haven't tested them. On top of that there are some API changes in AWB to integrate. Reedy Boy will have to give you an estimated arrival date but I can say work has started. Cheers. --kingboyk 13:58, 1 December 2006 (UTC)


 * Thanks guys. The project really appreciates your help!! &mdash; Lost (talk) 08:55, 2 December 2006 (UTC)

SVN
I'm willing to give SVN access to VB.NET developers who want to help with development. In particular, if you want to add features to wikifunctions2 or fix any of the known bugs. Give me a shout if you're interested and let me know your level of competence. --kingboyk 15:47, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

Comments from first time user
First very good tool!!! Really useful! Some comments/questions:
 * 1) How do I filter away pages that is already assessed?? Or maybe I should do this is some other way, I use a category to get the pages to assess, can I find not assessed pages in a better way?
 * 2) If I assess a page that is already assessed the popup box should already have the current values filled in?
 * 3) It would be nice with a standard comment where the assessment parameters where added, like assessed using plugin, High, B-Class
 * 4) I guess this is more of AWB, but anyway, it would be nice if you could pre-read the talk page, so that the change to the talk page is faster, I guess it is mostly bandwidth dependent now.
 * 5) And of course, it would be VERY nice to not even have to go through the AWB handling of the talk page, just have the popup and assign and then go on to the next page, but that I assume needs major changes to how AWB works?

Anyway very nice tool, now only 500 more pages to assess :-) Stefan 02:54, 26 November 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the feedback Stefan! Sorry for short answers and directing you elsewhere, I have to dash! --kingboyk 15:40, 26 November 2006 (UTC)
 * 1) You'd have to filter your lists against the "assessed articles" categories. AWB can do this, but it involves loading up multiple article lists and then some CPU bashing when it removes duplicates. If you want to try and need more help, please ask at the AWB talk page.
 * Yes, I guess it should. If it doesn't already do that please add it to the attached page as a minor issue for fixing.
 * 1) You mean in the edit summary? That's a nice idea, add it to the todo list please :)
 * 2) Would be difficult because of the way the plugin interracts with AWB. Techically possible but not a 5 minute job so I won't be doing that for now.
 * No, this one is possible I think (the plugin could tell AWB to save the page and move on) but I figured folks would want to review the changes. Maybe it could be an option.

Thanks!
Thanks Kingboy and Reedy Boy for your help with the India plugin. I see a completely new section called... What exactly does that section do? Also, I did a small test run. Its running great except for one thing. It is not adding the template to red talk pages. Do I need to check something somewhere? Thanks again &mdash;  Lost (talk) 15:36, 5 December 2006 (UTC)
 * Figured it out &mdash; Lost (talk) 15:39, 5 December 2006 (UTC)
 * ...and all is OK? --kingboyk 19:11, 5 December 2006 (UTC)
 * Its working great!!! Thanks. And the log is happening too.. &mdash; Lost (talk) 14:52, 6 December 2006 (UTC)