Wikipedia talk:List of administrator hopefuls

Clearing Category:Wikipedia administrator hopefuls with a bot?
This discussion was originally located at Village pump (proposals).

Hey, within a discussion at WT:RFA Balloonman pointed out quite correctly that Category:Wikipedia administrator hopefuls is quite useless to allow people to maybe find new candidates to nominate for adminship because it is completely bloated. So I wondered if it was possible to just set up a bot to remove the User wikipedia/Administrator someday-template (and it's clones) from the user-pages of all users who have not edited for 3-6 months to weed out the inactive. But I have no idea on how to do so or if that could be done just like that, it is removing stuff from other people's user pages after all...what do you think?  So Why  review me! 18:27, 15 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Personally, I think this is a great idea, so long as we can write the bot to leave a message on the user's talk page letting them know that the box has been removed.--- Balloonman  PoppaBalloon 09:16, 16 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Agree with - good idea . Cirt (talk) 16:18, 16 August 2008 (UTC)
 * I also agree with Balloonman. Inactive users aren't likely to become admins anyways. -- Imperator3733 (talk) 20:20, 16 August 2008 (UTC)

I guess I'll be the one to stand and object to the idea then. As far as policy is concerned, if a user wants to have a userbox that says they want to be an admin someday, it is their choice to have it on their page. Policy specifically allows any user to have anything (within reason) on their userpages, and they do not need the communities permission to do so. Forced removal of the userbox (or anything within reason from a userpage) would, in my opinion as an administrator, constitute vandalism. I don't care if the BAG approves a bot like this (and I don't think they will), I will block it for vandalism. -Royalguard11 (T) 00:31, 20 August 2008 (UTC)
 * What if the inactivity period were expanded, say instead of 3 months perhaps 6 months or even 1 year? Cirt (talk) 00:43, 20 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Or it simply added a parameter to the userbox suppressing the category? – xeno  ( talk ) 00:46, 20 August 2008 (UTC)
 * That is an even better idea. Cirt (talk) 01:06, 20 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Yeah, as I was reading Royalguard's comment, I thought the same thing, so it must be a good idea. :D  W ODU P  01:11, 20 August 2008 (UTC)


 * While users have great latitude on what they can out on their user pages, there are limits and community consensus trumps that latitude. It does not qualify as vandalism and if you were to unilaterally block such a bot that would be an abuse of your admin privileges. Blocking is not for implementing your own personal opinions.
 * That said, is your concern with only removing the user box? Would you be satisfied if the userbox was left, but they were still removed from the category? -- JLaTondre (talk) 01:10, 20 August 2008 (UTC)


 * But blocking can be used if a violation of policy has happened, which it would in my opinion. Users are allowed to have whatever they want on their userpage without having to be vetted by the community. One user can't just say "you can't have that on your page" and take it off. So yes, my concern is with that material on the page, the userbox. If you want to remove the category from the userbox, that would be fine.
 * I would disagree with selective categorizing per user. It is not the communities job to judge whether a user is "ready" for some category. If they want to be listed in a category, they are allowed to. To not let them would be elitist and would really be against the spirit of Wikipedia. Wikipedia is not some University with clubs and frats where certain users can say whether one user can be part of one or not. Everything steams from the principle that "Everyone can edit" and from being completely open about everything. There is no cabal that decides who is allowed to move up the Wiki ladder. Users are not ranked or judged good enough.
 * If some user wants to put something on their userpage and then leave and it doesn't violate policy, there's nothing we can do about it. We cannot just say "they're not coming back so who cares". Just look at usurp requirements. We can't just change old userpages just because they don't fit in our schemes. Some users will probably never be admins, but just like the idea of the userbox just like kids like the idea of being a policeman or firefighter when they grow up. But to say to them before they even think of ever applying to become an admin that they've "taken too much time"? It's elitist, and unwikilike. -Royalguard11 (T) 17:52, 20 August 2008 (UTC)
 * There's nothing elitist about uncategorizing an inactive user from that category. The bot will leave them a message letting them know and if/when they come back, they can clear the paramater. Those individuals will still be "findable" via "whatlinkshere", if someone decides they want to nominate an inactive user for adminship. We're not ranking them or judging them not good enough - we're just making a category a little easier to traipse through looking for possible (and active) admin candidates. Heck, if it would alleviate your concern, we can create a subcategory Category:Wikipedia administrator hopefuls who are inactive. – xeno  ( talk ) 17:56, 20 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Xeno is correct. The category's purpose is not to have a list of people who want the mob but primarily for other users to find suitable candidates to nominate. There is no elitism in that because it does only judge by the fact that those users are not active. Anyone can become active and can put that userbox back. So, yes, there is not a snowball's chance in hell that a user who has not edited for months will ever pass RfA. That is the reality. If it makes you happy, we could create a subcategory - but I'd rather call it Category:Wikipedia administrator hopefuls who are active. So that the original purpose of the category is served - being able to find suitable candidates.  So Why  18:16, 20 August 2008 (UTC)
 * In theory the main cat would be the active people and the subcat the inactive ones. – xeno  ( talk ) 19:57, 20 August 2008 (UTC)
 * As an admin, you really should be more familiar with WP:VAND and WP:BP then you appear to be. There is nothing in either that would allow you to make such a block if there is consensus for this task. Admins are not allowed to use the block button to implement unilateral decisions. Stick to making a rationale argument as to why this is a bad idea. Stating that you don't care about consensus and will block based upon your opinion alone is not acceptable. You are quite correct that there is not a cabal so don't act like you are part of one. -- JLaTondre (talk) 19:50, 20 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Removal of material would be vandalism. If someone came and deleted a userbox off my page then I would rollback it and warn them for vandalism. There does not appear to be "consensus" for the task either (we have like <10 users here in favour, hardly consensus for such a task). I'm not really sure when user categories were ever useful. They were on all userboxes to match the userbox with a category, that was it (then we stopped doing that because it was stupid). The category was made to match the userbox, not for the purpose to helping to find future admins. You can look yourselves, the category was made to match the userbox, that's it. I must say that if we have resorted to trying to find new admins through a userbox category, then RFA must indeed be more broken then I thought (it was always a bit of a dog and pony show anyways). -Royalguard11 (T) 23:20, 20 August 2008 (UTC)
 * If we take SoWhy's suggestion and break it off into Category:Wikipedia administrator hopefuls who are active, then we won't be making any changes to user's who cannot respond to their messages and have set their userpage the way they like it. That way they can stay in the category. Depending on the distribution, it may be softer on the number of edits. – xeno  ( talk ) 23:37, 20 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Removal of material is not inherently vandalism. If you think it is, then you really do need to reread the first line of WP:VAND. I am neither arguing for or against this proposal. I am not saying that there is consensus for this task. What I am saying is that your immediate threat to block was inappropriate. You should have made your objection known and had it discussed without immediately jumping to a block threat. This page is about proposing new ideas, discussing the pros and cons, and to determine if the there is consensus or not. It is not for a single editor to attempt to trump discussion by fiat, especially not if it's an admin trying to do that by threatening a block that has no basis in policy. The other participants have been willing to discuss and propose suggestions to address your concerns. You would have gotten the same response even if you hadn't threatened to block. People who see cabals often do so because they see admins trying to dictate their opinion. If you truly believe there should not be cabals, then don't act like that. -- JLaTondre (talk) 01:45, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Here here. And just because you block the bot, that doesn't stop another admin undoing your block, and then you can either wheel war or discuss the issue. Your threat of a block should be removed from the table because it has no bearing on the debate. Hiding T 13:40, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
 * The idea was more to create discussion about this. I admit, my threat to block was a bit over the top and I rescind it. -Royalguard11 (T) 18:19, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Good on you! Hiding T 22:30, 21 August 2008 (UTC)


 * Now all the bot has to do is add |nocat to the userbox and the category will be suppressed. This is the necessary modification for any clones of this userbox that include the category. –  xeno  ( talk ) 01:22, 20 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Thanks for taking the initiative to make that change. Cirt (talk) 02:35, 20 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Agreeing with JLT that this would not constitute vandalism but cleanup but I think, for the sake of avoiding arguments, that xeno's way will be more effective. The bot'd still have to leave a message at the user's talk page and explain the change though.
 * I think Royalguard will not object to this way as it leaves the userbox on the page and just delists it from the Category so the Category is more useful. So I decided to be bold and added Xeno's switch to the remaining clones (as far as I found them).  So Why  09:07, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

setting those who have edited within 6 months as "active" to add them to a sub-subcategory
if anyone can give me a list of people in the category who have edited within 6 months (I'm just not sure how to parse that) I can set the parameter to "active" which will put them into the subcategory Category:Wikipedia administrator hopefuls who are active, if this is an acceptable solution to Royalguard's concern. – xeno  ( talk ) 00:37, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Easy enough to do. It's simply the opposite of what the bot would have done (instead of checking if greater than 90, check if less than 90). I can generate the list and drop it on your talk page if you would like. However, that will only solve the original concern for the short term unless the subcategory is actively maintained (both in adding editors who don't use the parameter, but are active and in removing editors who stop being active). -- JLaTondre (talk) 01:45, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Shouldn't be a huge problem to parse the lists everyone once in a while, right? – xeno  ( talk ) 02:33, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Feel free to past the list at User:Xenocidic/sandbox and let me know when it's there. – xeno  ( talk ) 04:03, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
 * I'd rather the admin hopefuls category only contain active users. I don't want to categorize the inactive users in the main category and have a second, more awkward-sounding category for the group that this category is meant to categorize. I thought about agreeing to a separate category for inactive admin hopefuls, but that category would not be useful. Why would anybody want to find someone who wants to be an admin but who doesn't have a chance at passing an RfA? Let's just remove the category from those who are inactive.  W ODU P  03:03, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
 * I believe Royal still has an issue with that. – xeno  ( talk ) 04:03, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
 * I'm sorry that xe has an issue with that, but I think that this is the best solution. If we have cat:active admin hopefuls or similar and all of the inactive users are in cat:admin hopefuls, cat:admin hopefuls would be a useless category and would be deleted. There is no reason to categorize people who wanted to be admins when they were active, but who are no longer active. I think that it's important to remember that the purpose of user categories is to aid in facilitating coordination and collaboration between users for the improvement and development of the encyclopedia. Categorizing inactive users does not help.  W ODU P  04:20, 21 August 2008 (UTC)


 * Simply modifying the category should not be a problem. If it is, we need to delete WP:UCFD too. How is removing a category from all user pages fine while removing a category from inactive user's pages vandalism? And then modifying a category on active user's pages is fine? This is just silly, just add the |nocat parameter to inactive user's pages. Mr.Z-man 04:37, 21 August 2008 (UTC)


 * Personally, I'm not sure that removing it subjectively from userpages (active vs. non-active) is going to not be disruptive.


 * Based on the discussion above, I'm going to nominate the category for discussion at WP:UCFD. - jc37 10:21, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Ok, nominated. - jc37 13:39, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
 * My objection is that we are unfairly ranking members of the community. Removing the category is just unbiasedly deleting it, while giving certain users different categories is subjectively ranking them. Besides the different user rights levels, users are not ranked according to some standard. -Royalguard11 (T) 18:25, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

no futzing with categories or people's userpages - just generate a list from it

 * Can a bot add every person in the category to a list along with the date the person last edited. That way everyone gets to have their cake and eat it. The userbox is probably more intuitive than adding yourself to a list, and if the bot patrols once a week the list is maintained. Thios idea is so good I must be missing something. Hiding T 11:37, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
 * That would be the same thing but rather messy. I think the list should, if done, be in sections like "People who has edited this week", "...this month", "...the last 90 days" and within these sections alphabetical, but with the last edit time I guess. I think that would be a easy modification to make and the list could be added to the Category as a subpage, couldn't it?  So Why  11:50, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Yes, using the main category to create a list that is routinely updated would be easy. It's actually easier from a bot perspective than the original suggestion as only one page needs to be edited. Multiple sections is fine also. Including it in the category makes sense. -- JLaTondre (talk) 12:00, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Good to know. Let's see if Royalguard is happy with that :-)  So Why  12:24, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
 * That would probably work without having to futz around with people's userpages or categories. Make it sortable by last edit date. – xeno  ( talk ) 12:30, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
 * I have code lying around that can do nearly all of this - currently used to update WP:LA. In particular, the bit that maintains List of administrators/Inactive would be essentially identical to what is being talked about here. -- Rick Block (talk) 14:27, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
 * In the words of a great man....make it so! – xeno  ( talk ) 16:52, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Xeno is right. It would save JLaTondre any hassle with bot requests as you already have a Bot running and just need another task added to it and it can be done within minutes. We can have a list of administrator hopefuls who looks the same as WP:LA and the userbox can serve a purpose again. Great idea!  So Why  17:09, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Works for me. Just a list of who's in a category by last edit is a fair list. People can interpret from there instead of just by what category they're in. -Royalguard11 (T) 18:31, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
 * has now created an initial (partial) version at List of administrator hopefuls. I have already provided some feedback but I think the others here should be able to do so as well. I think he did great work, what do you think? :-)  So Why  14:30, 25 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Alright. It's not what I expected, I thought that it would be a list of all users in the category sortable by last edit date, but a list of category members who have made 30 edits in the previous three months that's sortable by first edit date is okay, too. It works.  W ODU P  00:18, 26 August 2008 (UTC)
 * That's why I posted it here, so Rick can get input. I think he will add a list of all category members as another section as well :-)  So Why  09:33, 26 August 2008 (UTC)
 * The remaining members of the category will be added, with "last edit" date. The point of using "first edit" date for the "active" editors is that it shows how long they've been around (although not necessarily active for the whole time) and won't change frequently (which permits a significant performance optimization as well - the tool doesn't have to check contribs of these users unless the previously collected data is not enough to show they're active).  For less active editors, the last edit date will show how long it's been since they edited (which, if they've left project, won't change ever again).  -- Rick Block (talk) 14:50, 26 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Hmm...is there a way to ignore users who are admins by now but still have the UBX somewhere on their pages? Alternatively, could the bot do such a check and leave those users a message to remove the UBX? I noticed it with WBOSITG for example...  So Why  15:40, 26 August 2008 (UTC)


 * Well, it's just code. Ignoring or indicating admins would be fairly easy.  Leaving a message less easy.  I'll put it on the to do list.  Perhaps it's time to move this discussion to Wikipedia talk:List of administrator hopefuls? -- Rick Block (talk) 16:08, 26 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Are there admins still in the category? That seems like something that's pretty quickly changed if someone is sysopped.  W ODU P  02:32, 28 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Well, sometimes you have the box on a subpage you once transcluded but have forgotten about now. But it still shows then, just see the example I cited. I think a quick check would be better than going to the list and ask all admins to remove thos subpages or worse, removing the UBXes from there yourself.  So Why  16:25, 28 August 2008 (UTC)
 * I'll probably get around to working on this some more this weekend. My initial thought is that if we simply notate in this list which users are already admins (I could probably separate them into their own sublist) it would be simple enough for someone to manually post a message to the user.  I wouldn't expect that this will be a very common occurrence, so it hardly seems worth automating the notification. -- Rick Block (talk) 18:40, 28 August 2008 (UTC)

Bugs
Please note things that are not working correctly here. I will start: Also, I think a bot should do the update periodically from now on. But that is Rick Block's decision to make when he has the time.  So Why  17:17, 31 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Sorting by "First Edit" does not work correctly (date format should be YYYY-MM-DD for that I think)
 * Sorting by RfA number will not work because the amount is always the same for everyone. Also, if there are more than three, they should be listed, for example has six of them by now and the list should list them.


 * The date sorting works if the day number is always two digits. I'll fix this.  And I intend to work on the previous RFA issue as well.  I fully intend to add this as a task for user:Rick Bot. -- Rick Block (talk) 18:18, 31 August 2008 (UTC)


 * Still working on it, but I've posted the output from a new version of the tool. The date sorting is fixed and the previous RFA listing now shows up only if there is at least one (and includes all that exist). This version doesn't check if users are admins, and still doesn't include users with less than 30 edits in the last 3 months.  -- Rick Block (talk) 02:00, 1 September 2008 (UTC)


 * Admins and less active users are now included in their own lists. If anyone notices any problems please let me know (here is fine). -- Rick Block (talk) 03:13, 1 September 2008 (UTC)

On RFA
I gather that the list is automatically created, but this could be highlighted more clearly to prevent people from manually updating or inserting data. I've reverted one such edit as it linked to a current RfA as that is not in line with the current definition of the column. Is this also what the bot does? Well, if not we'll see with the next update. In case we would want to highlight ongoing RfA here as well, it should be done differently in any case, e.g by transcluding User:SQL/RfX Report. --Tikiwont (talk) 13:18, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

Proposal: New level of editing activity
Pretty much every candidate on this page is in just one subcategory - 30 edits in the last 3 months. Now, that isn't really a high indicator of activity at all. I was wondering if we could split this table up into multiple ones, perhaps 50, or 100, or 250, or 500, or 1000+ edits per month. That should help nominators out in looking for good admin hopefuls that are active now. NuclearWarfare  contact me My work 22:49, 3 October 2008 (UTC)


 * I would second that. I dont know if its my computer but for some reason the page is almost impossible to navigate. Though i am not an admin, 30 edits is indeed low for 3 months. I have no authority to propose a number but if i were at least 50~100 edits in 3 months would be a good indication of a healthy but not exagerated commitment to editing. Anyway again its not for me to throw out a number and various factors can effect this such as exams etc. Ottawa4ever (talk) 20:00, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

Sorting "Previous or current RfAs"
The current revision has the list sorted mostly alphabetically. I propose that for each user, count the number of RfAs, pass in that number as the first parameter of sort, and pass in the links as the second parameter. — LOL T/C 13:36, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

User20
Please replace User20 with User6. 96.50.14.127 (talk) 17:36, 2 October 2011 (UTC)

I had the first Userbox on my user page
However, I am still not on the list. It's been there for about a week. Drla8th! (talk) 22:30, 21 April 2012 (UTC)


 * I'm having the same problem. Having at least one of the three user templates on my page and after several months still not on the list. Adamdaley (talk) 00:16, 8 November 2014 (UTC)


 * The bot updates the list twice a week (Wednesday and Sunday mornings, US time), using as its cue membership in Category:Wikipedia administrator hopefuls. Drla8th! is (at least currently) in the list.  Adamdaley is not in the category.  Did you perhaps subst the template when you added it to your userpage?  -- Rick Block (talk) 15:46, 8 November 2014 (UTC)

Bot
Can a bot remove the names of users who are inactive for six months? 0 edits in past six months. -- Marvellous Spider-Man  03:40, 10 June 2017 (UTC)