Wikipedia:Village pump (technical)

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The technical section of the village pump is used to discuss technical issues about Wikipedia. Bug reports and feature requests should be made in Phabricator (see how to report a bug). Bugs with security implications should be reported differently (see how to report security bugs).

If you want to report a JavaScript error, please follow this guideline. Questions about MediaWiki in general should be posted at the MediaWiki support desk. Discussions are automatically archived after remaining inactive for five days.

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Graph extension disabled per immediate effect

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T334940

Because of a security problem, the Graph extension has been disabled with immediate effect. More information will follow as it becomes available. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 09:03, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Okay, that obviates my coming here to report that {{page views}} is broken everywhere. I'll subscribe here, but if you report elsewhere, please add a link here, and a {{tracked}} template, as appropriate so I can monitor. Thanks, Mathglot (talk) 09:47, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

It's in phabricator as Phab:T334895, but the task is restricted. 192.76.8.66 (talk) 10:42, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Notes from T334940 — An update will go out later today, and in the meantime purging the pages cache should clear the raw wikitext — TheresNoTime (talk • they/them) 12:49, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

FYI An update will go out later today appears to mean "an announcement about the problem" and not a fix — TheresNoTime (talk • they/them) 13:13, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

An update has been posted on the wikitech-ambassadors mailing list, and it seems a MassMessage will go out tomorrow — TheresNoTime (talk • they/them) 23:41, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Problem with { { Graph:Chart } } ?

Article/section Ittoqqortoormiit#Population contains a { { Graph:Chart } } construct that does not display in the Chrome or Firefox browsers.

Notes: I don't know how to suppress WP formatting inside editing panes. A Web search and a reading of the WP manual of style did not reveal how to do this. I don't know how to submit WP bug reports, nor do I wish to know. David Spector (talk) 12:37, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

@David spector: The Graph extension has been temporarily disabled, see above. —Kusma (talk) 12:39, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Graphs disabled message

I have created {{Graphs disabled}} for use on significant documentation pages. It can just be blanked when graphs are working again but I suggest to not add it to numerous low profile pages when the problem is expected to be so brief. PrimeHunter (talk) 13:06, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Sounds good: a temporary problem that is being fixed; thank you. I hope all the uses are on "low profile pages". David Spector (talk) 13:16, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

I misread the intent of the template, but what I just did still feels like it works. See WT:WPAFC I'm not sure if this is a good solution as for those who are just browsing Wikipedia might not know what a template documentation page is and might be confused as to why the graph isn't showing. ― Blaze Wolf^Talk_{Blaze Wolf#6545} 13:27, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

It was intended for documentation pages about graphs. I have added an option |missing for places where a graph should have been displayed. That's a lot of places and I'm not sure how many temporary notices it's worth adding. It would be more practical if any use of <graph>...</graph> automatically displayed an interface message like MediaWiki:Graphs disabled. PrimeHunter (talk) 13:56, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

That would definitely help. And I realized that its intended for documentation pages after i Had already added it because I read it too quickly. ― Blaze Wolf^Talk_{Blaze Wolf#6545} 13:58, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

I for one oppose any need for a "Graphs disabled" message in mainspace; those in the know should just comment out graphs for the time being until this boondoggle gets fixed. (Hopefully this doesn't impugn on progress of inline SVG support.) – John M Wolfson (talk • contribs) 15:09, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

There is often associated content referring to the non-displayed graph. Commenting out the relevant parts may be non-trivial and it may not be uncommented quickly or at all when graphs return. The template can immediately be changed to display nothing when they return. If graphs were expected to be missing for a long time then a prettier but more work-demanding solution would be better but for a probably short term problem, I think it's good to have a simple option. PrimeHunter (talk) 15:24, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Graphs are a very important part for illustration on Wikipedia. From "Demographics" section of geographical locations to "Polling" & "Results" section of elections to articles on geological periods to articles on a specific genus. I'd suggest that MediaWiki:Sitenotice be called with the text "Due to some technical issues, most Graphs on Wikipedia are not visible. Inconvenience caused is regretted." I said, "most graphs" because some graphs also exist as svg/png on commons with should be visible, and readers should not have to face technical jargon like "extensions", etc. —CX Zoom[he/him] ^{(let's talk • {C•X})} 16:15, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

If consensus exists for a notice, something simple and non-obtrusive, to the effect of "Graphs are currently unavailable due to technical issues", no template boxes or red error text, or anything too flashy, would probably be best while this is sorted. It's already embarrassing enough that stuff like this happens in the current year, we shouldn't bring too much flash or attention to it while the devs work to fix it. – John M Wolfson (talk • contribs) 16:20, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Ahead of a proper communication that WMF is coming up with, I will say that it is now possible to display a custom message in place of the graphs, it is done by replacing MediaWiki:Graph-disabled content, empty by default, with a custom notice (such as an Ambox). There is also now a tracking category "Category:Pages with disabled graphs" showing the pages that used to contain graphs. The tracking category's name and description can be changed by editing MediaWiki:Graph-disabled-category and MediaWiki:Graph-disabled-category-desc interface messages. --Base (talk) 19:50, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

How about this? —CX Zoom[he/him] ^{(let's talk • {C•X})} 20:01, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

As source of inspiration, in Ukrainian Wikipedia we currently went with a standard Ambox icon and "There was supposed to be a graph or a diagram here, but its rendering is currently disabled for technical reasons. Please do not remove the code that is causing this message. Developers are already working on restoring the normal rendering of the graph or diagram." --Base (talk) 20:13, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

I find this one more precise and appropriate to be shown. Thanks for sharing. —CX Zoom[he/him] ^{(let's talk • {C•X})} 20:15, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

The missing graphs are probably confusing a lot of users so I have created MediaWiki:Graph-disabled with the suggested text. The text is still open for discussion but I wanted something out quickly. I guess there is no job queue to update affected pages so they have to be purged or edited to display it. See 4 Vesta#Physical characteristics for an example I purged. PrimeHunter (talk) 21:04, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

The ! in the red stop sign is quite alarming, while no action by reading user is required, not even by wikipedia editors.

Suggestion: use a 'information' sign, a white 'i' in a blue circle with the text:

"Sorry, we experience technical issues with this graph. It will reappear as soon as the developers have solved the problem." Uwappa (talk) 21:16, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

On 4 Vesta#Physical characteristics (screenshot of former display)

It looks a bit wonky for me because the notice has margins that squish it. It appears the notice has been propagated to all graphs on enwiki. SWinxy (talk) 21:21, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

I have toned it down to the default icon and no bold.[1] PrimeHunter (talk) 21:43, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Thank you. Suggested text finetuning:

"Graphs are temporarily unavailable due to technical issues."

The temporarily will indicate that a solution is on its way. Uwappa (talk) 21:55, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

I may not be editing for a couple of hours but other admins are free to make changes. PrimeHunter (talk) 22:01, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

I think this one would be better as "i" is for information pages. I actually like the unbolded text. And Uwappa's suggestion is good too. —CX Zoom[he/him] ^{(let's talk • {C•X})} 22:01, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

I don't think that image can be used since the file isn't protected. Galobtter (talk) 22:08, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

 Done seems reasonable. Galobtter (talk) 22:04, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

“The temporarily will indicate that a solution is on its way” lemme just do some expectation management here…. this extension is thoroughly unmaintained for over 6 years. I do not expect this to be quickly fixed. It should be noted that there were already discussions about potentially having to remove the entire extension even before the latest problem. I’m sure some ppl are looking into what is possible, but I’d be really surprised if this is fixed within a month. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 22:40, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

TheDJ, thanks for that. Expectation management is always helpful. If you have any insight into how fixing a problem like this is prioritized, that might help us at VPT understand whether we should work on implementing any workarounds in the meantime. As far as I can tell, this outage has affected at least 60,000 pages here at en.WP. – Jonesey95 (talk) 23:22, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

I agree that the notice feels squished. I had tried to apply the style parameter to width:100% so that empty space on either side can be eliminated but that overflowed the notice box on the right side which is not good. I guess someone has a better idea for it. —CX Zoom[he/him] ^{(let's talk • {C•X})} 22:05, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Okay, this one unsquishes it: {{notice|style=width:100%;margin:0;|text=Graphs are temporarily unavailable due to technical issues.}} —CX Zoom[he/him] ^{(let's talk • {C•X})} 22:07, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

I was trying just margin:0 but that didn't work. Thanks!  Done Galobtter (talk) 22:09, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

It looks good in the image frame and outside one. {{annual readership}} has been replaced with a custom notice by RedRose. SWinxy (talk) 22:18, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

The red icon is too disruptive and flashy. Text alone will do the job of explaining technical problems without calling undue attention to behind-the-scenes work. The current {{Annual readership}} notice is perfect. – John M Wolfson (talk • contribs) 16:10, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Category:Pages with disabled graphs

There's a bunch of pages linked to Category:Pages with disabled graphs but that category has never existed and I don't know what to do with them. —Lights and freedom (talk ~ contribs) 19:40, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

The category has now been created with an explanation. PrimeHunter (talk) 20:54, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Clarification

What is this "security problem", what does security have to do with little graphs and charts and things in Wikimedia articles? I wish we heard at least a little bit more of an explanation. ɱ (talk) 00:11, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

@Ɱ Code with vulnerabilities can ostensibly be "hacked" to use to run malicious code in places it otherwise couldn't. For WP:BEANS reasons, its best to not elaborate :) CaptainEek ^{Edits Ho Cap'n!}⚓ 01:19, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

What malicious code could be put in a graph box? 'Click here for a spam site'? Is it worth pulling it rather than fixing it quietly, if there's nobody actively misusing this code? ɱ (talk) 02:26, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

I don't know the security problem but mw:Extension:Graph uses JavaScript which means it intentionally runs code in the user's browser. See JavaScript#Security for some general problems. Some people disable JavaScript completely in their browsers for security reasons. PrimeHunter (talk) 02:46, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Do graphs really need javascript? Can't graphs be just server side generated images? Is javascript only required just for mouseover effect? Will we avoid all javascript by deleting the mouseover effect? Uwappa (talk) 06:34, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Graphs used to be server-side generated images, but that was removed because that was also showing its age, and in worse ways. I like the rollovers myself, as it happens, which were not possible before; the loss of course is that graph content isn't served to users who turn their JavaScript off. Izno (talk) 06:54, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Moving away from graphs

TheDJ said it: this extension is thoroughly unmaintained for over 6 years. I do not expect this to be quickly fixed. Moving away from graphs is going to be tough, but not impossible. Some graphs are fully automated (e.g. {{annual readership}}) while others are partially automated (e.g. {{Television ratings graph}}). Would this be desired by the community? SWinxy (talk) 01:18, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

@SWinxy If by "this", you mean removing graphs altogether, no. Graphs are a fundamental aspect of conveying data, and this is an encyclopedia. Getting rid of coded in graphs would be a major headache, because they would need to be replaced by photos of graphs (photo-graphs :P), or other work arounds. CaptainEek ^{Edits Ho Cap'n!}⚓ 01:46, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Yes, coded graphs! Ditching graphs altogether would be a bit of a challenge... SWinxy (talk) 01:51, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Graphs are used on Wikisource to identify those works that are being read / accessed the most. The information helps drive our choices as to what publications we will put our efforts into next. We'd need a viable alternative before the extension is discontinued. --EncycloPetey (talk) 18:20, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

I think it's a bit premature to be worrying about removal/replacement. One of the suggestions on the public task is just to upgrade to a maintained version of the software package used and then do the remove/replaces necessary to fix the onwiki versions to the required standard. Izno (talk) 06:56, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

This. Don't jump the gun. This needs thorough analysis and then likely work. That can be between 3 days and 90 days or no further work at all. There really is no telling at this stage. Remember, everyone was working on their thing they are supposed to work on and now several people have been thrown into a big tumbling washing machines with work that is unscheduled and needs to happen next to other work they cannot let rest and delaying the rest, completely upending planning and scheduling. The only thing that might change anything at all, is expressing how much you appreciate and/or need graphs and how you use them. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 08:13, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

@TheDJ: well said, thank you — you should be a technical spokesperson or something..! — TheresNoTime (talk • they/them) 08:43, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Understood. I wanted to float the idea. SWinxy (talk) 16:55, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Hell no, we should be doing more inline code, with inline SVG support and whatnot, not less. In any event, I don't think anything will come of this in the long-term except hopefully more proactive maintenance. – John M Wolfson (talk • contribs) 16:13, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

+1 —CX Zoom[he/him] ^{(let's talk • {C•X})} 18:21, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Preventing future issues

Any plans by the WMF or volunteers to check all other official extensions for use of outdated libraries? Any plans to implement new processes to make sure libraries don't get out-of-date in the future? DFlhb (talk) 12:13, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

They (un-maintained extensions) are documented and supposed to be handled at phab:project/profile/3144/. WMF's CTO (Chief Technical Officer), miss Deckelmann, is supposed to handle that, but she has not done so yet. There is also a list over who handles which extension and service at mw:Developers/Maintainers. Any further questions should be answered by WMF.--Snævar (talk) 16:04, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Probably not in any systematic way. There doesn't appear to be enough software engineer time available to assign maintainers to all unmaintained software. Software gets created, then the software engineers / WMF teams move on to other projects. –Novem Linguae (talk) 19:37, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

There are some existing efforts here. libraryupgrader2.wmcloud.org is fairly prolific in updating outdated or vulnerable dependencies via gerrit change sets, see: https://gerrit.wikimedia.org/r/q/owner:tools.libraryupgrader%2540tools.wmflabs.org. But it has its limits and some changes must be manually reviewed. The Security Team also checks for outdated and vulnerable dependencies as part of any manual application security review request. And we are building out some SCA tooling for repos hosted at gitlab.wikimedia.org. These efforts could, of course, be expanded and accelerated. Though I would note that the way the Vega dependencies were "built" within the Graph extension was problematic, as they were not referenced within package.json and were therefore difficult to analyze, especially for an extension with no actual active maintainers. We're hoping to address this and several other issues in our current efforts to get the Graph extension reenabled on the projects. SBassett (WMF) (talk) 19:52, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Community Wishlist item for 5 years

FWIW, I'd like to remind that the Graph extension we are were using is very outdated and the community has been asking for 5 years to upgrade it to the latest build. In 2023, it was the #49 request in CWS: m:Community Wishlist Survey 2023/Multimedia and Commons/Update Vega to the latest build. I suspect that the security issue could've been resolved if it were upgraded. —CX Zoom[he/him] ^{(let's talk • {C•X})} 17:40, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Excellent link. This is yet another reason that I have given up on the CWS process. Regular editors, including myself, are not great at identifying which proposed improvements and projects are actually important for the continued operation of MediaWiki sites. Requests for shiny new features typically get a lot more support than boring stuff like "update the back-end software that drives a process that tens of thousands of pages depend on and for which there is no easy alternative". – Jonesey95 (talk) 18:48, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

It's outrageous how incompetent the WMF is. Everybody has known for years that the Graph extension was using outdated software and needed to be updated. This is critical software that is used in millions of pages. Nothing has been done for over 5 years! What were all the hundreds of paid developers doing in the meanwhile? Ita140188 (talk) 07:29, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

By that logic. Considering it is open source.... YOU also didn't do anything and thus you also are incompetent. There is too much code for the amount of developers, this is nothing new. Also it's not used by millions of pages. It's about 60 000 for en.wp, or just 16k articles. It's tiny compared to most extensions in use. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 08:30, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

Sorry for the million hyperbole written out of frustration, it is still a lot of pages that get a lot of views every day. This problem has been known for years and reported several times, it was just waiting to happen. If doing basic maintenance of the underlying Mediawiki software also should be the editor's responsibility, it makes me wonder why are we paying millions of dollars every year to WMF developers? What exactly are they doing? Ita140188 (talk) 09:52, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

There are literally feeds of the 30000 tickets opened and closed each year and all the change sets in gerrit where you can find that out. Running a top 10 website for a couple hundred wikis each with their own configuration requires a lot of work. Also, not everyone codes, there is testing, releasing, datacenter operations, the couple thousand of software projects made by users/editors, fundraising infrastructure for dozens of countries in the world, etc etc etc. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 10:50, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

Are they doing everything I want? Definitely not. Do they have the resources to do everything I want? Of course not. They have to set priorities, and disagreeing with your priorities is not evidence of incompetence.

Now, if you're in a position to fund the development you want, I'm sure that they would pay attention. Even then they would have the final say on what to do when. -- Shmuel (Seymour J.) Metz Username:Chatul (talk) 11:06, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

Graph extension disabled

Yesterday the Wikimedia Foundation noted that in the interests of the security of our users, the Graph extension was disabled. This means that pages that were formerly displaying graphs will now display a small blank area. To help readers understand this situation, communities can now define a brief message that can be displayed to readers in place of each graph until this is resolved. That message can be defined on each wiki at MediaWiki:Graph-disabled. Wikimedia Foundation staff are looking at options available and expected timelines. For updates, follow the public Phabricator task for this issue: T334940

--MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 17:36, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Update on graphs: https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T334940#8798354

Over the last few days engineers have been exploring an approach that will add Vega 5 support for the Graph Extension. The goal is restore as much graph rendering as possible in the shortest timeframe. This aim to address the vulnerabilities found but most importantly to restore as much of the extensions previous state. We will also be updating the D3.js library from version 3.5.17 -> 7.8.4. The Vega 1 and Vega 2 libraries will be removed from the graph extension.

In terms of expectations:

• Initially the graph extension with Vega5 may only be supported on modern browsers (approximately 2017 or newer). This is due to some issues with ES5 builds and MediaWiki in the most recent versions of Vega. It’s hoped this can be resolved with a build step to restore functionality to MediaWiki's full supported browser stack.
• A compatibility layer that maps Vega 2 community graphs to Vega aims to allow current Vega 2 syntax to work with Vega 5, but our expectation is that some <graph> syntax might need to be updated in some places.
• We are building in some more sustainable error handling code. They will load and display an error thumbnail if the graph cannot be displayed. The purpose of this is to allow us to turn some graphs on and get a better sense of which graphs need to be prioritized. When graphs fail to render they will also send an error to our client logs so we can track them and later fix them.

Security will be reviewing the updated Vega 5 and D3.js libraries and the threat model associated with this approach, and release of the update is gated on a successful security review. We want to be as confident as possible that the approach is secure and correct.

We are assembling a small group of engineers from across a number of teams to see how much additional progress we can make on Graph between now and May 5, and will be working iteratively on our approach. We will continue to share updates along the way here on Phabricator. If we hit major blockers (e.g., security or library complexities we can't quickly resolve in the order of days or a couple weeks), we will be sure to share this information whilst we establish next steps. Our hope is that we can avoid difficult tradeoffs where we would need to keep Graph disabled for a long time, but we also need to acknowledge that this is a distinct possibility.

Seddon (WMF) (talk) 14:59, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

@Seddon (WMF), maybe you missed it, but ES6 is now the minimum required version of JavaScript, plus one or two functions from ES2017ish timeframe that @TheDJ has mentioned elsewhere (Promise.finally I think was one). So not sure why ES5 is mentioned above as the source of an issue? Izno (talk) 16:19, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

@Izno The short answer is that Vega provides either a full or what they term an ES5 build. They don't do intermediate builds. Seddon (WMF) (talk) 17:40, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

lol Izno (talk) 22:25, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

When will this be fixed?

It's getting kind of annoying that graphs have been disabled for this long. Is there an approximate time frame for when they will be working again? A day, a week, a month, a year, ever? Thiscouldbeauser (talk) 13:44, 23 April 2023 (UTC)

My hope is we can maybe restore some functionality in the next week or so. Seddon (WMF) (talk) 16:03, 23 April 2023 (UTC)

Cool, thanks! Thiscouldbeauser (talk) 11:58, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

category

I beg your pardon. I after creating User:UBX/Marina Diamandis and adding it in my own username page, I can see her category: Marina Diamandis below my username page. also my username has been added into category: Marina Diamandis - Are you able to fix it please? I don't know how and I am not! Regarding. NameGame (talk) 16:22, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Odd. The userbox template isn't adding the category to your userpage anymore, but it's appearing in the category. Purging the cache for either page doesn't help. Not sure! it might just go away after some time. SWinxy (talk) 17:04, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

By now, there is not "category:Marina Diamandis" in my username page anymore. But unfortunately I see my username NameGame has not been removed from category:Marina Diamandis. @SWinxy Thank you for your attention, I wish it'll be disappeared soon. NameGame (talk) 17:23, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

I made a null edit of User:NameGame. This removed the user page from the category page. A purge only affects the purged page but a purge of a category page doesn't update the listed pages, only the output of the wikitext in the category page. PrimeHunter (talk) 18:29, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Good to know. If that's the case, the advice that is linked to by "This list may not reflect recent changes." should be altered: (It may help if you purge the page.) SWinxy (talk) 00:51, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

I was unclear. I meant a purge of a category page doesn't affect which pages are listed. There is no way to get an updated list without already knowing which pages need adding/removing and making a null edit on each of them. PrimeHunter (talk) 01:28, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

My username has been removed from category:Marina Diamandis & I no longer see it in there. I appreciate your help everyone. I wish happiness to you all. NameGame (talk) 08:37, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

Converting links to Internet Archive links

Is it "standard practice" to convert all links in an article, all of which are working properly, to Internet Archive links, on the reasoning that doing so "prevents link rot"? Isn't it the case that by converting all the links to IA links, if IA ever goes belly-up, we lose all of the links that have been unnecessarily converted, whereas if they were left as they were, each separate source would have to go bad in order the same the same effect? Beyond My Ken (talk) 12:39, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

No, I am pretty sure it's not "standard practice" Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 12:43, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

Adding archive-url as a parameter is fine, done by bot like IABot, replacing the original url with an archive is not fine. Indagate (talk) 12:48, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

Could somebody, tell User:Rhain that (at User talk:Rhain#"Standard procedure") that, and User:CastJared (at User talk:CastJared#McSorley's Old Ale House) many of whose edits appear to be doing just that. This came in the context of the editing of these two users at McSorley's Old Ale House, which I attempted to revert. Beyond My Ken (talk) 12:50, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

No links have been replaced. For context, check this diff. – Rhain ☔ (he/him) 12:55, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

As Rhain noted, no links have been replaced. They've actually made the article better by adding backup IA links. Gonnym (talk) 12:59, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

The links are no longer the actual links, they are copies of the linked material, which means that we are trusting the Internet Archive to be accurately reproducing the New York Times article, instead of just trusting the New York Times website to be accurately showing its own article. Trusting IA is fine when the original material is no longer online, since we have no choice in the matter, but why are we allowing the use of what are essentially secondary links when the primary links are still available? This makes little sense to me in terms of guaranteeing accuracy. If this is policy, I think it's a mistake (and Rhain's citations of supporting policy do not seem to be to be relevant.) Beyond My Ken (talk) 13:03, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

The title is linked to the original URL as long as |url-status=live is set. Nardog (talk) 13:07, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

The original link hasn't been changed and is still there. They've added a second link. Please actually look at the citation text before reverting. Gonnym (talk) 13:07, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

If it helps, compare this ref to this one—the only difference is the extra "Archived from the original...". The rest of the ref remains intact. – Rhain ☔ (he/him) 13:09, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

OK, I stand corrected. Thanks to all for the education. Beyond My Ken (talk) 13:13, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

I asked User:HJ Mitchell the same thing a while back. Here's his viewpoint. 1AmNobody24 (talk) 13:16, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

@BMK: I see this is resolved but the point of adding the archive links now is that it is very likely that a link which works now will not work in a couple of years because websites change all the time with no thought for maintaining old information. Once a page has gone, it becomes very difficult (or impossible) to find and harder to be sure that what is found is actually what the original editor had in mind. Therefore, it is best if external links are archived now, while they are working. Johnuniq (talk) 23:03, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

Thanks, I appreciate the information. Beyond My Ken (talk) 01:51, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

I find archiving live links to be perfectly acceptable IF there's a possibility or a suspicion of the link to go dead. Pages for a live sports competition (e.g. rio2016.com)? Sure. books.google.com? Less so. DatGuy^Talk_Contribs 01:25, 22 April 2023 (UTC)

The New York Times? Beyond My Ken (talk) 03:02, 22 April 2023 (UTC)

iff? — Qwerfjkltalk 09:59, 22 April 2023 (UTC)

Copy options for indicator/tooltip in the Vector 2022 full/limited width toggle

Hey everyone, on the Rollback of Vector 2022 RfC talk page, there's a discussion about three copy options for indicator/tooltip. This is about some text that is to be shown next to the full/limited width toggle in the bottom right corner of the screen. It is a continuation of the discussion on our proposal for next steps following the closure of the Vector 2022 RfC. We invite you to review the copies and share which one you prefer. Thank you! SGrabarczuk (WMF) (talk) 13:39, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

Retrieve cross-wiki notifications

Today, I got pinged from a discussion in the Irish Wikipedia, something to do with User:Ritchie333/Irish Monopoly. Unfortunately I can't speak any Irish, so I cleared the notification with the idea I'd come back and run it through a translation utility to get the jist. However, the notification's now disappeared from my list, which only shows ones on the English Wikipedia. How can I get it back? Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 14:32, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

You need to go to the Notifications page on the Irish Wikipedia: https://ga.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speisialta:Notifications (same as ga:Special:Notifications). Cross-wiki notifications have several annoying bugs: another one is if you use the "small screen" version of Monobook or Vector2010, you get the red number, but you can't access the notification. (I then need to rotate my phone to be able to see what the notification is). —Kusma (talk) 14:46, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

I need technical assistance with a note

Basically, I was trying to add a note like I saw in this diff. I tried to do it here and it is wigging out.--TonyTheTiger (T / C / WP:FOUR / WP:CHICAGO / WP:WAWARD) 16:30, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

Fixed in this edit. The software was picking up the = in games=5.179 and treating all the text before that as a parameter name, meaning there was no parameter 1, which is why it complained about no content. Aidan9382 _(talk) 16:33, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

User:Aidan9382, Thx.-TonyTheTiger (T / C / WP:FOUR / WP:CHICAGO / WP:WAWARD) 03:43, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

Javascript errors continously pop up

This always seems to show up every time I click on my alerts or notifications...

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T335149

Hi! Whenever I click on the alert or notification buttons, there's always this "Javascript error" that pops up, and this distracts me from clearing my notifications. Does anyone know how to fix this? I thought it was the latest script I had added to my common.js page but apparently it continued after I removed it and even prior to the addition. Tails Wx 17:49, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

Not sure if this is what you're asking, but you can turn off those error popups by unchecking the relevant gadget — TheresNoTime (talk • they/them) 17:55, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

Since when were those turned on? Anyway, thanks! Now I won't have to contend with the errors no more! Tails Wx 17:57, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

I'm getting these new errors as well. I've had Javascript errors turned on for a while, and those red error messages pop up very occasionally, but they are more regular now when I click on the red notification bell. – Jonesey95 (talk) 04:24, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

I've also been getting these errors recently. — Qwerfjkltalk 06:15, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

This seems to trigger for me when I attempt to open the notifications menu. Looks like incorrect usage of classList.... —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 14:02, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

Will be fixed in next weeks update. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 14:06, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

British heritage railways page preview error

As raised here at its talk by another editor, the Page Preview for List of British heritage and private railways does not show up properly, providing this:

wt2html: wikitextSize limit exceeded

rather than the lead, not sure why, the page has two interactive map templates at the start however. The error occurs on Chrome, Edge and Firefox for me. DankJae 22:35, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

This is phab:T286355 where Jonesey95 reported the same page. PrimeHunter (talk) 22:56, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

AIV helper bot down again

Hi all.

The HBC AIV helperbot5 is down again, it hasn't made an edit since 23:37, 20 April 2023 UTC.

Apparently the bot was down previously in earlier April, due to a scheduled outage of the Toolforge framework that it runs on.

However, this time I don't see any planned outage notices anywhere?

Just wanted to bring awareness to this. I've already notified the bot owner.

Regards, — AP 499D25 (talk) 11:04, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

You mean I have to remove entries manually after I make a block?! What is this? Les Mis? ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 12:10, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

Unfortunately, yes. It's like manual transmission! Tails Wx 12:17, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

Not sure what happened here but I've restarted it now. — JamesR (talk) 13:43, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

Why not reactivate the other HBC AIV helperbots so that this does not happen again? Lightoil (talk) 13:58, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

Template that supports multiple sets of parameters

Given template {{A}} which supports parameters 1-4 but I have multiple sets of parameters, I can do:

{{A|red|255|0|0}}
{{A|green|0|255|0}}
{{A|blue|0|0|255}}

I believe Wikimedia templates allow one to invoke a template once but pass it multiple sets of parameters but I have been unable to find the relevant template documentation. I found it several months ago so I'm fairly certain it is supported. So, instead of the above, I can do:
{{A| red|255|0|0 ; green|0|255|0 ; blue|0|0|255 }}

The template syntax is probably not quite correct (i.e. semi-colon set separator) to distinguish the multiple sets of data. RedWolf (talk) 20:40, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

The template would need to support unnamed parameters |5=, |6=, etc., at which point you could write:

{{A|red|255|0|0|green|0|255|0|blue|0|0|255}} and the template would work just fine. A few templates have been set up to work like this. Off the top of my head, the only one I can think of is {{Video game release}}. – Jonesey95 (talk) 21:21, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

If you're asking if there is an inherent feature of template syntax so that one invocation of a template will automatically be turned into multiple invocations, no, that doesn't exist. The template in question would have to be coded to support processing multiple sets of parameters, as you describe it. To do it in a way that supports unlimited sets of parameters (within underlying resource constraints) would require the template to be implemented with a Lua module. isaacl (talk) 01:29, 22 April 2023 (UTC)

{{For loop}} with explicit values (option 2) can do something like this without having to code the wanted template for it. PrimeHunter (talk) 02:52, 22 April 2023 (UTC)

I'm certain that within the last few months there was a thread, not necessarily at VPT, about passing a table (or possibly an array) as a parameter into a template or module. It was explained that this was not possible, but the OP persisted in asking the same question with variations. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 14:10, 22 April 2023 (UTC)

Maybe it was Wikipedia:Village pump (technical)/Archive 202#Try making templates. PrimeHunter (talk) 20:16, 22 April 2023 (UTC)

Possibly, although I seem to recall a greater amount of not-getting-it. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 21:38, 22 April 2023 (UTC)

Dark mode icon

I was looking at the user menu at the top right on the main page, and I noticed that the icon next to the dark mode toggle was doubled.

File:Engwikibug.png

I am using Safari v16.4 for iPadOS, if that helps.

DrowssapSMM (talk) 01:54, 22 April 2023 (UTC)

@SD0001 and Xaosflux: It looks like the workaround is no longer needed. Can you see if this patch works? Nardog (talk) 03:01, 22 April 2023 (UTC)

Thanks. I add several links in my personal JavaScript and they all got the dark mode icon before in Vector 2022. Now they get no icon. PrimeHunter (talk) 03:32, 22 April 2023 (UTC)

Oh, it looks like we've been using portletId where it should have been portletLinkId all this time. My bad. Nardog (talk) 03:45, 22 April 2023 (UTC)

Sorry I was away, not sure if something is pending me? If it is a page that needs to be synced/updated that doesn't have an open edit request, please drop one of those in the meantime. — xaosflux ^Talk 16:47, 22 April 2023 (UTC)

@Xaosflux: No worries. Can you sync the JS on testwiki with the patch? Nardog (talk) 13:04, 23 April 2023 (UTC)

@Nardog  Done https://test.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=MediaWiki%3AGadget-dark-mode-toggle.js&diff=565660&oldid=558089 — xaosflux ^Talk 13:24, 23 April 2023 (UTC)

I have experienced this multiple times before, mostly on pc, but never got around to reporting this. Thank you. —CX Zoom[he/him] ^{(let's talk • {C•X})} 19:40, 22 April 2023 (UTC)

Looking for categorization reporting tool

Moved from Wikipedia:Help desk § Looking for categorization reporting tool

 – 🦝 Shushugah (he/him • talk) 10:16, 22 April 2023 (UTC)

Hi there! I'm looking for a tool that would do the following:

• Allow you to enter a page (from any namespace) and a category
• If the page is included in a subcategory, then return a result showing the entire category path from the category entered to the category on the page (i.e. category, sub-category, sub-sub-category,...)

I'm asking because I've created a recursive list of talk pages within Category:Wikipedia infobox backlog, and many of the pages in the result don't seem to have a parameter such as |needs-infobox=yes. Thanks! GoingBatty (talk) 02:55, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

Help if possible

Greetings everyone,

I'm in need of assistance with the "New articles" section on Portal:Algeria, as it is currently not functioning properly. To be honest, I have no clue how to address the issue.

Thank you in advance for any help that can be provided. Riad Salih (talk) 12:38, 22 April 2023 (UTC)

@Riad Salih: See User:AlexNewArtBot#How to add feeds to the new article bot. PrimeHunter (talk) 12:56, 22 April 2023 (UTC)

Templates being wrapped in nowiki tags when using the reply function

Has something changed with the reply function? I was posting a message including a template, and it was wrapped in nowiki tags. I've just tried to do something similar here, and instead a mass choose Template popup opened. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested ∆transmissions∆ °co-ords° 14:22, 23 April 2023 (UTC)

Ignore me, I see a Visual editor option has been added (and made default). Using the Source option restores the expected behaviour. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested ∆transmissions∆ °co-ords° 14:51, 23 April 2023 (UTC)

@ActivelyDisinterested: You've got me curious. According to WP:VE the Visual Editor is disabled on Talk and Discussion pages. What page were you replying on that it let use use visual editor? RudolfRed (talk) 19:48, 23 April 2023 (UTC)

The original issue was with this edit to Talk:Patricia Wald. But as I write this I have the option to switch between Visual and Source, in the top left corner of my reply. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested ∆transmissions∆ °co-ords° 20:09, 23 April 2023 (UTC)

Top righ hand corner for me on this page. Doug Weller talk 20:41, 23 April 2023 (UTC)

Interesting, thanks for the replies. RudolfRed (talk) 22:29, 23 April 2023 (UTC)

This is about the Reply tool at mw:Help:DiscussionTools. It has a visual mode with similarities to VisualEditor. PrimeHunter (talk) 01:38, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

Thank you, that clears up my confusion. RudolfRed (talk) 18:40, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

Wasted space at the top and bottom of <gallery> element

There is a lot of wasted space at the top and bottom of <gallery> element. Seen here using Pesticide browser extension.

Why is there a huge white wasted space at the top and bottom of <gallery> element? This pushes the gallery much lower than it should be. In this picture of 118th United States Congress, the html for Senate gallery is coded above the composition table, in order for them to hang from the same line, but a reader sees it some three lines down. It being down, further pushes the House diagram to the down, which both further push the images lower than where it should be. —CX Zoom[he/him] ^{(let's talk • {C•X})} 14:32, 23 April 2023 (UTC)

mw-gallery-slideshow gets margin: 4em 0; somewhere outside Wikipedia. 4em is the top and bottom margin. I don't know why it's so large. You can change it with for example <gallery style="margin: 1em 0;" .... PrimeHunter (talk) 16:02, 23 April 2023 (UTC)

Thanks I reduced the margin to 0em, and it works, but is there some way it could be fixed backend? —CX Zoom[he/him] ^{(let's talk • {C•X})} 19:44, 23 April 2023 (UTC)

That's quite unusual use of <gallery>...</gallery> to begin with. Why would anyone put it inside a floating table?? Should be {{multiple image}} or something like that. Ponor (talk) 12:21, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

For now, {{multiple image}} may work. But, in 117th Congress page, there are 33 images for the House composition, so this slideshow version is the one that works best for every Congress article. —CX Zoom[he/him] ^{(let's talk • {C•X})} 12:48, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

New font: many important buttons are missing on mobile

Moved from Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals)

 – Nardog (talk) 11:39, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

I dislike Wikipedia's new look with a burning passion for many reasons, but one of the most annoying is how so many the buttons, including such important ones as the search bar, don't even work on mobile unless you switch to the mobile view (and kill categories). Please don't just say "just use the mobile view" because it should be obvious by now that it's not nearly as functional as the desktop view. Thanks. w.i.k.i.w.a.r.r.i.o.r9919 05:28, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

WikiWarrior9919, here is my suggestion: Use the fully functional desktop view on your mobile device, and switch back to the good old fashioned Vector 2010 skin. Get the details at Wikipedia:Vector 2022#How to turn off the new skin. That will allow you to avoid two different types of shenanigans imposed on mobile users by the Wikimedia Foundation. Cullen328 (talk) 05:41, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

FWIW, I find Timeless much better on mobile, because it's the only skin that properly scales to fit the screen. Sojourner in the earth (talk) 05:47, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Well, what about users who are too lazy to log in? (Which is admittedly me sometimes.) w.i.k.i.w.a.r.r.i.o.r9919 06:14, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Tough shit? --Jayron32 15:51, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

1. What if you genuinely like Vector 2022, consider it an improvement over Vector 2010, and don't want to switch back? And you think everything is fine except for the mobile search bug?

2. What about people who can't create accounts because they use Wikipedia at school, on VPNs, using mobile data, etc.? "Just create an account at home!" Well, what if you only want to browse Wikipedia and not edit? w.i.k.i.w.a.r.r.i.o.r9919 16:38, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

All my buttons work. Can you give a more accurate description ? —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 07:05, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

I'm also confused. The recent changes to Vector didn't change any font AFAIK. The desktop search bar and other buttons work fine for me in a mobile browser. Although it shouldn't be a huge surprise that if you opt to use an interface specifically designed for large screens on a small screen, instead of the one specifically designed for small screens, it's a bit more fiddly. – Joe (talk) 07:11, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Joe Roe, the misnamed "desktop" site is fully functional on contemporary smartphones using Vector 2010. My edit history for the last 12 years demonstrates that. "Fiddly" is an almost incomprehensible term to Americans. To me, a Californian, it comes across as "resembling a violin used for dance music or bluegrass music" although I am sure you meant something else. Cullen328 (talk) 07:45, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

I'm also an American, and I find "fiddly" to be a perfectly cromulent word. Anomie⚔ 12:02, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

"Fiddly" is perfectly understandable to this American. And I have never had a problem with other Americans not understanding my use of it. Did you perhaps mean to limit your comment to those Americans north of the Mason-Dixon line or west of Texas? --User:Khajidha (talk) (contributions) 12:09, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Canadian here and I understand it. It just means something that needs to be fiddled with. Immanuelle ❤️💚💙 (talk to the cutest Wikipedian) 12:40, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Ex-Californian here and although I've never heard the word "fiddly" before, I assume it means something that needs to be fiddled with to work properly. Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 16:58, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

No, it's as in wikt:fiddly#Adjective entry 1. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 17:33, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Ah yes, everyone's favorite Wikipedia game "My dialect is different than yours!" --Jayron32 15:53, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

When I press the magnifying glass, nothing happens. I literally can't access the search function, forcing me to either temporarily switch to the more zoomed-in mobile mode and then have to switch back, or directly edit the URL.

I apologize if this conversation has been had hundreds of times on Wikipedia already, but... what's the use of forcibly switching the entire wiki to a new interface when said interface is janky and half-baked? w.i.k.i.w.a.r.r.i.o.r9919 16:34, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

You haven't said what version of which browser you are using or anything. You are the only person with this problem so far, so likely it is something specific to your setup. Either the browser, the extensions, ad blockers, userscripts or gadgets. Which of those, is impossible to say from the outside without more information. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 08:11, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

also.... why is this even on the proposals page ????? —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 08:12, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

Yes this should be moved to WP:VPT Galobtter (talk) 08:24, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

how do I remove the image showing the state of TX from Chacon Creek?

Even if I reduce the article down to just a stripped down infobox the state of TX map still appears, at least in the preview:

{{Infobox river
 | name              = Chacon Creek
}}

Even if I change the name from Chacon Creek to, say, Chacon Crzzzeek, the state of TX image still appears.

Any ideas? TerraFrost (talk) 21:39, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

That displays because 1) it fits the criteria to be a page image and 2) it is the only such image on the page.

If you had an actual picture of the creek somewhere in the infobox it would likely display instead. IznoPublic (talk) 21:47, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

Template:Infobox river is one of those annoying infoboxes that pulls some of its data from Wikidata, in this case via Module:WikidataIB. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 21:58, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

Click "Wikidata item" under "Tools" to see where the image comes from. You can override the Wikidata image with |image=. There doesn't appear to be a documented way to omit an image. |image=<nowiki /> currently works by producing an empty cell. PrimeHunter (talk) 22:34, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

@TerraFrost: If you have a better image to use, File:Map of Texas Highlighting Chacon Creek.png could probably be added to MediaWiki:Pageimages-denylist to force the other image to appear. Home Lander (talk) 22:39, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

MediaWiki:Pageimages-denylist is about images which cannot be selected by mw:Extension:PageImages. They can still be shown in articles. I don't think TerraFrost is thinking about the page image but just about what is shown in the infobox. We only use MediaWiki:Pageimages-denylist for images which are transcluded into many articles. Last year the extension got a new feature |class=notpageimage for use in the page itself. See mw:Extension:PageImages#Can I exclude certain page images? PrimeHunter (talk) 23:14, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

I have moved the map (which is not an image of the creek) into locator map image (P242) and it no longer displays in the infobox — Martin (MSGJ · talk) 04:42, 25 April 2023 (UTC)

Tech News: 2023-17

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 date-selection menu on pages such as Special:Contributions will now show year-ranges that are in the current and past decade, instead of the current and future decade. This feature request was voted #145 in the 2023 Community Wishlist Survey. [2]

Problems

• Due to security issues with the Graph extension, graphs have been disabled in all Wikimedia projects. Wikimedia Foundation teams are working to respond to these vulnerabilities. [3]
• For a few days, it was not possible to save some kinds of edits on the mobile version of a wiki. This has been fixed. [4][5][6]

Changes later this week

• All wikis will be read-only for a few minutes on April 26. This is planned for 14:00 UTC. [7]
• The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 25 April. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 26 April. It will be on all wikis from 27 April (calendar).

Future changes

• The Editing team plans an A/B test for a usability analysis of the Talk page project. The planned measurements are available. Your wiki may be invited to participate. Please suggest improvements to the measurement plan at the discussion page.
• The Wikimedia Foundation annual plan 2023-2024 draft is open for comment and input until May 19. The final plan will be published in July 2023 on Meta-wiki.

Tech news prepared by Tech News writers and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

MediaWiki message delivery 22:01, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

Interactive cropping tool?

I find the int cropping tool (template) to be invaluable, but difficult to use. Is there an interactive version that I'm not finding? Maury Markowitz (talk) 11:35, 25 April 2023 (UTC)

If your target is to create a cropped file and overwrite the existing one with it or create a new file, then you may use https://croptool.toolforge.org/ —CX Zoom[he/him] ^{(let's talk • {C•X})} 13:08, 25 April 2023 (UTC)

How to name /doc subpage?

I want to create a subpage for a /doc page, say for a supporting (documentation) table. What is a good naming convention?

A. Always end with /doc: {{Infobox foobar/option-table/doc}}

B. Below /doc: {{Infobox foobar/doc/option-table}}

Only consideration I know of, IIRC: in module space, a doc page is recognised & handled by (B) name ending /doc. (A) has easier page listing. DePiep (talk) 13:23, 25 April 2023 (UTC)