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reflist regexp?

When you select "apply general fixes", AWB does a lot of interesting stuff. One thing is that it changes <references/> to {{reflist}}. It also converts any surrounding multi-column info into the reflist format. I'd like to reuse this code in my own bots. What regexps do you use for this purpose? Thanks, – Quadell (talk) (random) 01:05, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

It's not that simple - you can't make it with just regexes. See here, function FixReferenceListTags. MaxSem(Han shot first!) 06:47, 29 June 2008 (UTC)
Thanks for the link. It looks like most of what I'm looking for is in
(<(span|div)( class=""(references-small|small|references-2column)|)?"">[\r\n\s]*){1,2}[\r\n\s]*<references[\s]?/>([\r\n\s]*</(span|div)>){1,2}
Thanks! – Quadell (talk) (random) 13:10, 29 June 2008 (UTC)
Nononono, if you just use this regex w/o manually processing its results as we do in custom match evaluator, you'll end up inflicting lots of damage. Don't do it! MaxSem(Han shot first!) 13:17, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

I've been digging through the sourceforge code, and I'm not very good with c-sharp, but I don't see how it converts a bare <references /> to {{reflist}}. I see how it converts a <div><references /></div> to {{reflist}}, but it doesn't look like it would match without the <div></div>. The <div> and </div> each have {1,2}, meaning it will match if there are 1 or 2 divs, but not if there are 0. Am I missing something? – Quadell (talk) (random) 14:39, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

Watchlist

How do I disable the adding of articles to my watchlist when I tag talk pages? I have tried options but it doesnt seem to do anything. Great to know how. OOODDD (talk) 01:54, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

Click 'my preferences' (next to 'my watchlist' on Wikipedia- not on AWB) click the 'watchlist' tab, untick the 'Add pages I create to my watchlist' option. This will also stop pages you create manually being added to your watchlist, but it may be an option if there isn't a way to do it through AWB. Hope that helps. J Milburn (talk) 22:12, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

'Remove titles containing': case sensitivity

I love the 'Remove titles containing' feature in the filter. Great work guys. I have a question:
I can add (foo|Foo|bar|Bar) as a regex but how do I make the list case insensitive so that I only need (foo|bar) ? Lightmouse (talk) 19:28, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

(?i:foo|bar). MaxSem(Han shot first!) 19:34, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

Thats it! Thank you very much. Once again, thank you for this great feature, and your work on AWB in general. Lightmouse (talk) 19:39, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

Very simple bot question

I am someone with no programming knowledge/experience, but I have a very simple question about AWB bots- if I was to have an account registered as a bot, (I understand task requests etc, I just want to understand the technical side right now) could I then log into AWB with that account, load some settings and tick a couple of boxes meaning that AWB would then run the settings, but just click 'save' automatically? This would save me time, stop my edit list being clogged and mean that I don't need to type a single line of code, which would be fantastic. J Milburn (talk) 22:07, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, you would. Obviously, you cant do Typo fixing with an automated bot, but other AWB tasks, you can probably get approval for (if there is consensus/its the way things should be). —Reedy 22:22, 4 July 2008 (UTC)
Fantastic, thanks very much. I'll go and do the task request now. J Milburn (talk) 22:31, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

Interface improvements

Database scanner design improvements

.--------- Database dump scanner ----------.
|  ______ ____________.------.             |
| | Text | Properties | Dump |             |
| |------'------------'      '-----------. |
| | Database dump: |__________| <browse> | |
| | Site:      [sitename]                | |
| | URL:       [base]                    | |
| | Generator: [generator]               | |
| | case-type: [case-type]               | |
| '--------------------------------------' |
|                                          |
| <Generate>   Starting article: |_______| |
| Results:              Limit: |__3,000_↔| |
| .--------------------------------------. |
| | results list                         | |
| |                                      | |
| '--------------------------------------' |
| <Filter> <sort> <save|v>        <clear>  |
'------------------------------------------'
  • Tabbed interface unsure how to organize so speed increase are obvious. Above is an attempt at some of the ideas.
  • <siteinfo> nodes are displayed when a dump is loaded. Nodes are:
    • sitename – Site title
    • base – Main Page of the site
    • generator – MediaWiki version
    • case-type – What kind of case normalization is preformed
    • namespaces – List of namespace
  • Additional search parameters
    • Balancing regular expressions. e.g. count(<ref[^<>]*>) == count(</ref>)
      • Option to include/exclude disabled text (nowiki/comment/image gallery/timeline/etc…)
    • <timestamp> described as the last-modified date
    • Ability to search the <restrictions> field
    • Arbitrary number of search fields (similar to the normal FaR table) — Not needed with regular expressions
  • Clarify characters count is Unicode characters or binary bytes, if the former add a byte size option
  • Remove the menubar as options are relatively hidden
  • File open should be moved to main interface, possibly remember the last file opened
  • Larger progress bar in the statusbar with fractional or percent completed next to it
  • Result lists include extra values that are computed "for free". May include byte size, links, words, namespace, last modified, etc… (may interfere with simplify)
  • Add a Pause button
  • Ability to open the oldid revision of the page

— Dispenser 03:04, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

I can certainly see many benefits indoing this, some of the extra info would be useful to many people i suspect. —Reedy 19:07, 16 June 2008 (UTC)
As a thought... If you want to start making some diff's with designer changes, i can look at implementing them, and helping add the extra needed code and such. —Reedy 19:27, 16 June 2008 (UTC)
I've begun to implement some of the interface elements and have migrated all the menu items to the interface. — Dispenser 01:19, 21 June 2008 (UTC)
rev 2983 - Added it to the SVN. I've also made the code deal with the meta data bits (ie Name, Generator and Case Type), so they are now displayed on the form. —Reedy 20:26, 21 June 2008 (UTC)
rev 2984, rev 2985 make further improvements/tweaks. —Reedy 20:30, 21 June 2008 (UTC)

rev 2986 - Changed the radio buttons to checkboxes for the "AWB specific" like was prior done on the AWB SkipOptions.cs form (rev 2891) —Reedy 20:38, 21 June 2008 (UTC) rev 2987 - Added new scanner (if {{defaultsort}} is missing)). Also, put link from dump onto gui. —Reedy 20:52, 21 June 2008 (UTC)

New patch: rearranges tab contents and resized window so it can actually fit on a 800x600 screen and looking to designing the new controls to be flexible. Time field is given in ISO8601 and should be possible due to the formatting to be able to do inequality string comparison without parsing the date itself. Convert into list stuff should pop up when saving, preferably as option on the standard windows save dialog itself. — Dispenser 09:00, 29 June 2008 (UTC)
Just changed the patch, you had linked to an old one ;) —Reedy 10:57, 29 June 2008 (UTC)
Applied. Presumably some more stuff to be written into it? If you want some help with it, let me know. —Reedy 11:13, 29 June 2008 (UTC)
Could you implement the date check stuff? It should be pretty easy using just string comparisons. — Dispenser 19:55, 29 June 2008 (UTC)
The revision/last edited date? If so, should be able to do that fairly easily. —Reedy 11:47, 30 June 2008 (UTC)
rev 3018 adds that. Seems the namespace filtering is a bit messed up atm.. —Reedy 13:46, 30 June 2008 (UTC)
Its the same as it was. Just isnt the most self explanitory from the title of the group box. rev 3019 - Couple of designer tweaks, disabled "restriction" until its implemented. Dispenser, does anything need doing with the properties tab? —Reedy 14:47, 30 June 2008 (UTC)
Still, much work to be done, about 3/4 of that list up there done. Patch rename items for language translating, adds reflow contains, and minor tweaks. I think I have an idea of how to do the restrictions tab now. — Dispenser 02:04, 3 July 2008 (UTC)
rev 3027, maybe like ArticleActionDialog? Let me know if you need anything doing code wise. Thanks! —Reedy 09:18, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

Preferences design improvements

I have created a patch which adds tabs to the preferences dialog. It also adds (non-working) options migrated from the Options menu. — Dispenser 07:16, 21 June 2008 (UTC)

Cool, not a lot of point commiting this to the SVN until its complete. —Reedy 20:15, 21 June 2008 (UTC)
This is the final version more or less as I am unsure how to code the functionality to migrate the options from the menu to the preferences dialog. — Dispenser 09:00, 29 June 2008 (UTC)
Right. It should be fairly easy to do, as long as i know whats disappeared from where... Should be fairly easy to do. Will have a go. —Reedy 11:13, 29 June 2008 (UTC)
rev 3004 - I've disabled ShowTimer as i havent moved it (will do it now), and the "Add "using AWB" to when deleting or protecting pages" until i get the code implemented for that. —Reedy 13:34, 29 June 2008 (UTC)
rev 3005 - Just the using AWB one to sort. —Reedy 13:40, 29 June 2008 (UTC)
rev 3006 - Seems it was already implemented. —Reedy 13:45, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

List maker

I've re-implemented the Pseudo split button as requested. I am still wonder if it would be better to have the add page box above or bellow the box. If above it would give the logic that it represent the top item in the stack. — Dispenser 19:55, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

That would make sense to me aswell, really - logical design as you say. Havent applied this to the SVN yet. —Reedy 11:47, 30 June 2008 (UTC)
list/* patches, ready for applying to svn not prefect but better than what was there. Some comments added to the code where help is needed. (Note: I am getting frustracted making patches for these files since they keep getting blown alway) — Dispenser 02:04, 3 July 2008 (UTC)
Now in SVN, we can get some feedback based on this now. rev 3028/rev 3029 —Reedy 09:29, 3 July 2008 (UTC)
rev 3032 something wasnt happy before. That down icon has changed to an a with an accent though. —Reedy 09:50, 3 July 2008 (UTC)
It breaks the build:

C:\Projects\AWB\WikiFunctions\List\ListSplitter.resx(147,5): error MSB3103: Invalid Resx file. Could not load type WikiFunctions.AWBSettings.SpecialFilterPrefs, WikiFunctions, Version=4.3.2.1, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=null which is used in the .RESX file. Ensure that the necessary references have been added to your project. Line 147, position 5.

C:\Projects\AWB\WikiFunctions\List\ListComparer.resx(149,5): error MSB3103: Invalid Resx file. Could not load type WikiFunctions.AWBSettings.SpecialFilterPrefs, WikiFunctions, Version=4.3.2.1, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=null which is used in the .RESX file. Ensure that the necessary references have been added to your project. Line 149, position 5.

rev 3033 fixed it =) —Reedy 21:05, 3 July 2008 (UTC)


rev 3036 - I've converted the title normalisation code to C#, and added it (but not currently enabled, needs tests adding), for GF's. Regexes exist in the parser.. Not sure if the code can be used verbatim in the ListMaker.. (not sure if the interwiki bits are needed, the ListMaker just needs/wants the pagename without hte URL prefix, so IMHO, its just a couple of the regexes needed...? But it doesnt change URL's to the the "page name" for me (unless i've done something wrong)... Dispenser? Test page - [1] —Reedy 22:22, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

rev 3307 - Context menu bug seems to be fixed now. —Reedy 22:43, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

Main

Main patch which rename lot of things, does a little menu clean up, and re-implements shortcut keys using the MediaWiki keyboard shortcuts keys. Note: I've changed "Do not automatically apply changes" to "Apply changes automatically" so if one of you could correct save/loading of the variable I'd appreciate it. — Dispenser 15:30, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

Misc

About window tweaks to layout and refactoring the variable names.

rev 3016 —Reedy 11:45, 30 June 2008 (UTC)
Minor dialogs. — Dispenser 02:04, 3 July 2008 (UTC)
rev 3026 Thanks! —Reedy 09:15, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

MoveDeleteDialog - renames mostly, likely will need to be scraped at some point as it wont work well with the translation system. — Dispenser 15:30, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

rev 3042 —Reedy 15:47, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

AWB login problems on external wiki

I just downloaded and installed AWB on my computer for use on an external wiki (I won't post the URL unless it's necessary for resolution), and when I tried to test it out (previewing changes, not saving them ;) ), it kept complaining about me not being logged in, even after I tried logging in from IE and even checking the "Remember me" box. I think this may have to do with the URL structure, but I'm not sure (a sample URL layout would be wiki.site.com/index.php?title=Page_name; on a side note, I tried and failed a while ago to get the wiki to use shorter URLs, along the lines of wiki.site.com/Page_name (if anyone would care to help out with that as well)), nor do I know how to work around it if this is the case. Any thoughts? --Dinoguy1000 as 66.116.22.178 (talk) 08:03, 5 July 2008 (UTC) 

$wgAllowUserJs = true;
MaxSem(Han shot first!) 08:09, 5 July 2008 (UTC)
Aah, thank you, I'll try it out! --Dinoguy1000 as 66.116.22.178 (talk) 08:29, 5 July 2008 (UTC)
Hmm... that didn't do it... Any other suggestions? (BTW, I'm signing off for the night, so don't expect a reply for several hours now) --Dinoguy1000 as 66.116.22.178 (talk) 08:47, 5 July 2008 (UTC)
Which version of MediaWiki? Does it have $wgEnableAPI = true;? MaxSem(Han shot first!) 08:52, 5 July 2008 (UTC)
It's version 1.11, though the upgrade (from 1.6) was a bit "dirty" (see also MediaWiki talk:Common.js#Scripting errors on external wiki, I don't know if that might affect things, but figured it wouldn't hurt to mention). I don't know about $wgEnableAPI, I'll have a look. —Dinoguy1000 16:00, 5 July 2008 (UTC)
All right, I've added the line to the wiki's LocalSettings.php file, but can't test it on this computer since I don't have sufficient priveleges to install MS.NET 2.0... =P —Dinoguy1000 16:08, 5 July 2008 (UTC)
No good, AWB still complains of not being logged in. T_T —Dinoguy1000 22:19, 5 July 2008 (UTC)
Catch us on IRC, we'll investigate it live. (Though likely it's because 1.11 lacks something in metadata API) MaxSem(Han shot first!) 17:39, 7 July 2008 (UTC)
I'll see if I can, though admittedly I've never used IRC before. ;P I've also been trying to get one of the webmasters to upgrade the wiki to 1.12, but they haven't had the time to do it yet. —Dinoguy1000 22:02, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

What's going on in this page?

Can someone figure out what this edit is on the Celebrity sex tape page? http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Celebrity_sex_tape&diff=next&oldid=223848665 mboverload@ 04:10, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

Apparently, Plasticup used AWB to change "January 2nd 2008" to "[[January 2]] 2008". The MediaWiki software won't show a date in your preferred format unless the year is linked along with the month and day, so Michael Bednarek undid her change, redid it in a way that made the date correct, and made several other changes at the same time. Not a very descriptive (or polite) edit summary, but there you have it. Anyway, it doesn't have anything to do with AWB directly. ~~~~
We already spoke about the MediaWiki software update that applies your preferences to months+days without years (see Wikipedia:MOSNUM#Date_autoformatting) but I wrote this little regex to avoid the issue altogether:
Find: (January|February|March|April|May|June|July|August|September|October|November|December) ([1-9]|1[0-9]|2[0-9]|30|31)(st|nd|rd|th), (1|2)([0-9])([0-9])([0-9])\b
Replace: [[$1 $2]], [[$3$4$5$6]] Plasticup T/C 15:05, 6 July 2008 (UTC)
You must mean (January|February|March|April|May|June|July|August|September|October|November|December) ([1-9]|1[0-9]|2[0-9]|30|31)(?:st|nd|rd|th), (1|2)([0-9])([0-9])([0-9]) else the first part of your replaced year would be the ordinal. For those who are interested, probably a better regex would be (January|February|March|April|May|June|July|August|September|October|November|December)\s+([1-9]|[12]\d|3[01])(?:st|nd|rd|th)(,)?\s+([12]\d\d\d) replace with [[$1 $2]]$3 [[$4]]
Thanks Rjwilmsi 22:51, 6 July 2008 (UTC)
I wonder whether people here are aware that autoformatting is no longer encouraged. It hasn't been "mandatory" since some time last year. Please see Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style_(dates_and_numbers)#Date_autoformatting and associated texts. MediaWiki's autoformatting mechanism is regarded by many editors as one of its big disasters. Want the reasons? Tony (talk) 03:15, 7 July 2008 (UTC)
Yes I do, if you'll forgive my curiosity. I always thought the date auto-formatting was quite neat. Why did they decide to shelve it? Plasticup T/C 03:59, 7 July 2008 (UTC)
It hasn't been 'shelved', but is now optional, as there are advantages and disadvantages. So there are users who think on balance it's better to use date wikilinking (me for example), and users who think on balance it's better not to (such as TONY), at least for the moment. The bugzilla issue raised about it (2 years ago) to deal with the disadvantages hasn't resulted in any mediawiki changes, so unfortunately it's currently not possible to please everybody. Rjwilmsi 06:50, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

AWB unable to log in

I don't seem to be able to log in at all with AWB, I have been trying for several hours. Worked flawlessly the last time I used it, which was 30 May (see contribs.) It may be an IE related problem - I have IE 6.00.2900.2180. The error message is: "Check page failed to load. Check your Internet Explorer is working and that the Wikipedia servers are online, also try clearing Internet Explorer cache." Any ideas for what to do / is anyone else having this problem? Login page comes up fine with Firefox, and I did get it up *once* in IE during a window where it appeared to work briefly. Orderinchaos 16:33, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia has been up and down for me lately, perhaps that is the problem? I get an error about every 5 pages or so, which is quite a lot. Gary King (talk) 16:42, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

Carriage returns in footers

Moved from my talk page: begin

hello. your lightbot is great at rationalising datelinks, but it's screwing up footers by inserting carriage returns between {{DEFAULTSORT}} and {{Lifetime}} templates and the categories listings. --emerson7 14:53, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

The code that does that is part of AWB 'General fixes'. The developers will need to see an example to see what (if anything) is wrong. Can you give me an example page? Thanks. Lightmouse (talk) 19:21, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

hey! thanks for the reply. this is the first one i noticed. it looks like the bot is moving the {{|DEFAULTSORT}}/{{Lifetime}} templates from the top of the 'categories stack' to a position preceding the {{persondata}} . --emerson7 04:36, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

Moved from my talk page: end

I do not know what is wrong. Can anyone else help? Lightmouse (talk) 17:03, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

See Wikipedia_talk:AutoWikiBrowser/Bugs#Lifetime.2Fpersondata_order. It might be time to ask the developers for a new point release of AWB to roll out this fix (and a few others). Rjwilmsi 17:25, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

Unicodifying Mathematics articles

AWB likes to unicodify plenty of things, but this section of the MoS seems to support HTML versions of Greek Letters. I looked around and found this (old) discussion. No one has complained to me yet, but I accidentally unicodified a few maths articles. I can run out and undo them all, but I thought I would check here first. Is there a consensus on whether unicode should be applied indiscriminately? Plasticup T/C 01:28, 8 July 2008 (UTC)

Adding text

The Append/Prepend feature is great. However, for stub sorting, I sometimes want to add text (namely {{foo-stub}}) at the appropriate place for stubs (i.e. between categories and interwikis. How can I do this? (And thanks generally for all the great AWB work) SeveroTC 22:03, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

If you want it right before categories try: this. Is that where they need to go, right above the categories? §hep • ¡Talk to me! 22:11, 6 July 2008 (UTC)
Thanks, I saw that but usually they go after categories. The General fixes actually moves them there but I guess General fixes is done before Append/Prepend text. SeveroTC 22:13, 6 July 2008 (UTC)
Ah, sorry. I forgot how the system worked. I'm sure it's possible, some smart person will come help you; I promise. :) §hep • ¡Talk to me! 22:21, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

Use a find and replace: try find:(\[\[Category.+?)(\<\!--.+?--\>\n+)?(\[\[[a-z][a-z][a-z]?\:) and replace $1{{foo-stub}}\n$2$3 setting find & replace options regex and single line. This should work most of the time including times when there are comments like <!-- interwiki links -->. Rjwilmsi 23:07, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

Thanks very much, works a treat - except when there are no interwiki links (or anything after the categories), when it adds nothing :S SeveroTC 07:35, 7 July 2008 (UTC)
Okay, add a question mark on the end: find:(\[\[Category.+?)(\<\!--.+?--\>\n+)?(\[\[[a-z][a-z][a-z]?\:)? (I'm not at home so haven't tested it). Rjwilmsi 11:32, 7 July 2008 (UTC)
Hmms; this adds the text, but puts a line break into each category, so that:
[[Category:Category]]

becomes 

[[Category:
Category]]

SeveroTC 19:44, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

Okay, try this find:(\[\[Category.+?\]\]\s*\n)(?:(\<\!--.+?--\>\n+)?(\[\[[a-z][a-z][a-z]?\:)|\s*$) setting regex and singleline as before. If the categories are the last thing in the page, except for optional white space, it should work, as well as when there are interwikis. Rjwilmsi 20:31, 9 July 2008 (UTC)
Thanks for your help so far but I still have some difficulties. This one seems a bit hit and miss. It gets some but not others. An example of it not working is here. SeveroTC 23:05, 10 July 2008 (UTC)
I've made it simpler which seems to work, just using replace (\[\[Category.+?\]\]\s*\n), applied before General fixes. SeveroTC 23:27, 10 July 2008 (UTC)
On second thoughts, it doesn't always work. I'm confused. SeveroTC 23:37, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

Line breaks in equations

Moved from my talk page:begin
 This edit [2] managed to stuff up the formatting of the equations. AKAF (talk) 08:32, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

Can you be specific about which bit of the equation is now incorrect? I can't work out which bit is wrong, but if you let me know, I will seek advice on whichever piece of code is responsible. Lightmouse (talk) 17:19, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

It wasn't the actual equations that were damaged, it was because AWB removed the coded line breaks. <br> was used to linebreak the equation definitions, and because they were turned into simple carriage returns, the Wiki software ran them all together on the same line. This was an AWB problem afaik, and the article should have used bullets rather than line breaks to set them on separate lines, which has now been done by another editor. — Huntster (t • @ • c) 22:28, 7 July 2008 (UTC) Moved from my talk page:end

Is this part of a general issue with line breaks? Lightmouse (talk) 17:47, 8 July 2008 (UTC)

Regex applied to first instance of an item in a page

I sometimes get people asking if I can apply a different treatment to the first instance of an item in a page. I am not aware that this is possible. Does anybody know how to get regex to do this? Lightmouse (talk) 09:20, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

Try <find>^(.*?)Fred</find> and <replace>$1Bert</replace> (replaces first occurrence of Fred with Bert) setting the regex and single line options. I can't test this at the moment, but I think it will work. If further regexes below this one in the list modify occurrences of 'Fred', the first will already have changed before they are executed. Rjwilmsi 10:44, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. I looked around for the 'regex and single line options' but could not understand what I saw. :( Lightmouse (talk) 11:30, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

I meant two of the check boxes in the AWB find & replace dialogue. Rjwilmsi 12:39, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

Ah. I see what you mean. I wanted to add it to my script. But that seems to work and proves that it can be done. Thank you very much. Lightmouse (talk) 12:51, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

Okay, then try <find>(?s)^(.*?)Fred</find> in your script (reference: [www.regular-expressions.info/modifiers.html]). Rjwilmsi 15:55, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the suggested regex, if I can turn it into practical code, it will be very handy. I will investigate further. Lightmouse (talk) 23:08, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

Make list from Links on page is only giving 10 links in the list

I'm not exactly sure what's happening, but for some reason when I try to make a list from links on a page, it only gives 10 links, when there's clearly more than 10. Any ideas? –xenocidic (talk) 00:44, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

API issue? Using SVN (insert No. here)? — Dispenser 01:19, 9 July 2008 (UTC)
4.3.2.0 is the AWB version (I think that's what you're looking for?) How would I solve the API issue? –xenocidic (talk) 01:22, 9 July 2008 (UTC)
I just downloaded 3045 and it's the same, only returns 10 links. very strange. –xenocidic (talk) 02:55, 9 July 2008 (UTC)
rev 3049 - Was using [3], now its using [4]. So it will now get at least 500... Just need to make it continue, which i'll do later! —Reedy 10:26, 9 July 2008 (UTC)
rev 3050 - Will now continue. Also noticed that some of the other providers dont have a preset limit of the max (500), so set those in rev 3051 (Some seem to also need the continues..) —Reedy 10:36, 9 July 2008 (UTC)
Yes. Itz strange ...it is happening since 2 days.. The workaround is copy the stuff to a text file and import from there -- TinuCherian (Wanna Talk?) - 10:53, 9 July 2008 (UTC)
cheers reedy, I'll pick up that SVN instead. thanks, –xenocidic (talk) 11:30, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

Is a fix for this going to be released soon? Thanks. --Thetrick (talk) 13:59, 12 July 2008 (UTC)

Just pick up the latest SVN build here: http://awb.reedyboy.net/ (Maintained by Reedy, one of the AWB devs) –xenocidic (talk) 14:01, 12 July 2008 (UTC)

I have a list at User:NE2/US major railroad history that I'm comparing to Category:WikiProject Trains articles (recursive) and tagging any that aren't so tagged. But the final list includes nonexistent articles. I can't ignore nonexistent pages because I'm tagging the talk pages. Is there a way to fix this? --NE2 18:56, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

One way to do it would be to skip non-existent pages, but this would require the talk pages have at least something on them already. I'm sure there's a more elegant way to do what you want, and i'm sure someone will come along to help you out, but in the meantime you could try that. Of course, reading your original query would help. Another newbish suggestion would be to run AWB thru processing the main pages to make no change, skipping the non existent ones, re-add the ones that it didn't skip and converting to talk page. Again, a non-elegant solution from a mere AWB noob. –xenocidic (talk) 19:06, 14 July 2008 (UTC)
Another solution would be to replace all the links in the list with #ifexist parserfunctions :) --NE2 19:09, 14 July 2008 (UTC)
I know a program that would help doing that! ;> –xenocidic (talk) 19:15, 14 July 2008 (UTC)
Which works, except that I'll need to do several passes: "Warning: This page contains too many expensive parser function calls. It should have less than 500, there are now 1850." It's also inelegant as all hell, but who cares :) Oops - the link in the ifexist is treated as a real link. Maybe I'll find a workaround. --NE2 19:17, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

And I just realized that redirects will cause a problem too. I wish it was easier to simply skip a page and keep it in the list. --NE2 19:29, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

It would be skipped and added to the skipped log list... —Reedy 19:39, 14 July 2008 (UTC)
What is this skipped log list? --NE2 19:46, 14 July 2008 (UTC)
Try the "Logs" tab above the edit box. —Reedy 21:28, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

Newb needs help with Regex - find and replace with usernames in the middle

This is probably a really simple regex, but I'm still not too familiar with it.

I want to replace all instances of 

[[User:(username here)|(username here)]] with

{{user|(username here)}}

I know this probably makes you regex wizards /yawn but I've been poking around for a while and the lightbulb in my head hasn't lit up yet. =) –xeno (talk) 14:17, 15 July 2008 (UTC) 

\[\[User:(.*?)(|.*?)?\]\]

Replaced with 

{{user|$1}}

—Reedy 14:32, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

Hrm that's trying to replace all the instances with just 
{{user|}}
. –xeno (talk) 14:36, 15 July 2008 (UTC)
\[\[User:(.*?)(\|.*?)?\]\]

Missed an escape character —Reedy 14:42, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

Works great - thanks. –xeno (talk) 14:49, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

I am using AWB for the Hindi wikipedia (hi.wikipedia.org). I am trying to load a list of the talk pages of new users, for adding the welcome template to their talk pages. I can't seem to get AWB to load non-existent pages. On using 'Make from'='Specialpage' and Special='log/newusers', it only loads usernames that have existing userpages. I tried unchecking 'non-existent pages' from the Skip page, but it made no difference. Any ideas? -- Longhairandabeard (talk) 18:47, 18 July 2008 (UTC)

Special page work is broken, as per the bugs page. —Reedy 21:01, 18 July 2008 (UTC)

Assessing articles

Hi, how do you assess an article and then add its assessment class and importance to WikiProject tags found on the article's talk page using say Category:Unassessed-Class Devon articles. bsrboy (talk) 19:03, 18 July 2008 (UTC)

Make a list from that category, then use the Kingbotk AWB Plugin. —Reedy 20:58, 18 July 2008 (UTC)

AWB & Commons

Last few days I have a problem with using AutoWikiBrowser to modify pages on Commons. It loads the page in full (as far as I can say), than something "times-out" and then keeps on reloading the page for forever. It seems like AWB thinks that it is not done loading the page and some connection times-out. I am a new user to AWB and it worked fine for a while until yesterday. And now I run at the speed of 1-2 changes per hour, with occasional bursts, when it starts working again. I do have fast connection to the web. Is this AWB problem or Commons problem? Any ideas on how to overcome it? --Jarekt (talk) 13:32, 16 July 2008 (UTC)

Appears to be a temporary server problem. Though if it is consistently reproducible (for example, on a particular huge page), please let us know. MaxSem(Han shot first!) 18:02, 19 July 2008 (UTC)

Does it work with newer version of .Net?

Right now there's version .NET 3.5 out there. Does it work with that one or do I have to use the 2.0? Headbomb {ταλκ – WP Physics: PotW} 13:54, 16 July 2008 (UTC)

This is something I've been wondering about too. —Dinoguy1000 17:02, 16 July 2008 (UTC)
.NET still has some of the v2 libraries included.. But in theory, it should work with just the v3 framework, as v2 forms are there. However, they are designed to be seperate, so i've got 1, 1.1, 2, 3 and 3.5 on my pc... If you try it with just v3 installed, please let us know how you get on. —Reedy 19:36, 16 July 2008 (UTC)

Well I never tried AWB before so I don't really know if I'm the best guy to compare. I've downloaded .net 2.0 for now. I'll test drive AWB for a while then I'll switch. Headbomb {ταλκ – WP Physics: PotW} 18:26, 18 July 2008 (UTC)

It'd either work or it wouldnt, lol. —Reedy 20:59, 18 July 2008 (UTC)
.NET 3.5 includes all previous versions, so it's completely backwards-compatible. MaxSem(Han shot first!) 17:59, 19 July 2008 (UTC)

Line feeds

A user has been discussing line feeds with me at: User_talk:Lightmouse#White_space_editing_with_AWB. The discussion has ended now but I am sure this issue has cropped up before. I wonder if there is a guideline on this? Lightmouse (talk) 09:10, 19 July 2008 (UTC)

Well, as we all know an edit only to remove whitespace would likely be a waste of time. In this case though your bot has done valuable work at the same time and the external links section where the whitespace was removed from looks exactly the same before and after your edit, so I don't see what the user has to complain about. Rjwilmsi 09:52, 19 July 2008 (UTC)

I support the removal of line feeds. It never ceases to amaze that AWB 'general fixes' always manages to have a good defence to any challenge made. Good work guys. The only thing that I can think of is that the user wants a line feed after a heading. That appears to be the case in the example that he/she quotes. I am not sure what I think about that one, it seems similar to my preference for a line feed between comments on talk pages. Lightmouse (talk) 12:06, 19 July 2008 (UTC)

Using lists

I'm trying to import links on a page, but for some reason only the first 10 in alphabetical order show up. Why is this? - Diligent Terrier (and friends) 20:33, 19 July 2008 (UTC)

API Change. Try a svn snapshot as i've fixed it. —Reedy 12:14, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

Underscores

Wikipedia_talk:AutoWikiBrowser/Feature_requests/Archive_1#Smart_underscore_removal was feature request to leave underscore in mod_perl and other such links. Same problem no occurring with time_t. Rich Farmbrough, 10:57 20 July 2008 (GMT).

Yup, unfortunately, we've got a bit of a breaking change here. The Underscore and lowercase and underscore templates we used have been deleted. We've currently got no way of latching onto the {{DISPLAYTITLE}} of MediaWiki to be able to stop this, i've logged a bugzilla bug, but had no replies from it. [5], unfortunately, theres not a lot we can do atm —Reedy 12:17, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

Spellchecking with AWB

On AutoWikiBrowser Usage Stats I see that people use some interesting plugins - MS Word SpellChecker plugin, spell checker. I try to find this plugins, but can't. Can you help me ? --Movses (talk) 14:15, 18 July 2008 (UTC)

Please let me know if someone finds the answer. If this exists I need it for better RegExTypoFix development. --mboverload@ 15:46, 21 July 2008 (UTC)
The nice and widespread usage of AWB means that it might not even be a wikipedian that uses it. I have no idea who/where these are used. Most of the plugins are identifiable, just a couple of them aint. Why do you need it for regextypofix development mb? —Reedy 16:01, 21 July 2008 (UTC)
So I can easily find new misspellings. Right now I copy to MS Word for spelling. --mboverload@ 16:09, 21 July 2008 (UTC)
[6], and [7] —Reedy 18:37, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

User:213.216.199.6 some months ago suggested that interlanguage links should be “sorted alphabetically according to the name of the language, not according to the [ISO language] code”. I think that is wrong and does not make sense at all, because you cannot sort “فارسی”, “Беларуская”, “日本語”, “ไทย”, and “Deutsch” alphabetically—since there is no alphabet containing all of these letters. Also, a poll held 63 to 54 should be sorted based on the two letter code. Therefor I suggest someone changes the AWB function that re-sorts interlanguage links by local name. ––Bender235 (talk) 14:14, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

They are sorted by the Latin-alphabet-transliteration of the native name of the language, which isn't "wrong". Tally is 63 losing to 65 when you add in the "Best of both worlds: Two-letter code in source, Alphabetical in view" votes, who want to see it the way that AWB currently sorts it. The poll is also neither a policy nor a guideline. -- JHunterJ (talk) 14:45, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

Skipping every other article

When I'm using the Kingbot plugin to assess articles from Category:Devon geography stubs it will tell me there are no changes to be made to the article (as normal) then I click preview, assess it, click ignore then it takes me to the talk page where I fill out the assessment then I click save. The next article in the category comes up, but instead of telling me there are no changes to be made, so I can preview it, it skips straight to the article's talk page for me to assess it. The next article will be okay, but then the article after that I won't work again. It appears to do it for every other article, but for no known reason. It didn't use to do this, even with this category. bsrboy (talk) 00:05, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Simple regex help please

Hi. I'm having difficulty getting to grips with regex and AWB, so, if some kind guru could demonstrate how to do the following, I'm hoping it'll be instructive. If so, I'll try expanding Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser/Regular expression in return!

Task

Replace
{{templatename |parametername=string}}
with
{{templatename |parametername=string word}}
i.e. append " word" to whatever string has been set as parametername's value.

Sardanaphalus (talk) 13:32, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Depends on how restrictive you want to make it. Assuming you want a particular template and parametername, but don't care what the original string is, replace
{{templatename\s*\|\s*parametername\s*=\s*([\w\s]+)}}
with
{{templatename|parametername=$1 word}}
In the pattern, \s* is 0 or more whitespace characters, \| is a literal pipe (instead of a regexp alternate marker), \w is a word character (letter or number), so [\w\s]+ is 1 or more letters, numbers, and/or whitespace, and the parentheses around it capture it for use as $1 in the replacement string. This has the (intentional) side-effect of also removing unneeded whitespace in the template code; if you want to preserve the whitespace around the pipe or equals sign, those \s* should be captured as well. -- JHunterJ (talk) 13:50, 26 July 2008 (UTC)
That an interesting trick, so far I've only been using in the form [^\W\d] to capture alphabetical/non-numeric characters. Both should go into the manual. — Dispenser 16:57, 26 July 2008 (UTC)
You'll want to "\{\{" and "\}\}" for the braces —Reedy 22:02, 26 July 2008 (UTC)
I tested my strings with AWB; they work without escaping the braces. -- JHunterJ (talk) 02:21, 27 July 2008 (UTC)
In retrospect, I think you'd want:
{{templatename |parametername=$1 word}}
to include a space before the pipe. -- JHunterJ (talk) 02:39, 27 July 2008 (UTC)h

Hi again. Just found that AWB only seems able to return 10 links (listed below) from Template:American Civil War, even though it contains many more. Intriguingly (or maybe coincidentally) they all begin with "A". am I missing something obvious? Sardanaphalus (talk) 00:46, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

A. P. Hill · Abolitionism · Abraham Lincoln · Alabama Claims · Alabama in the American Civil War · Albert Sidney Johnston · Alexander Stephens · Allan Pinkerton · Ambrose Burnside · American Civil War

Nope, there was an api change. You need to grab a SVN snapshot - [8] —Reedy 08:14, 29 July 2008 (UTC)
  • Okay, I've downloaded and installed the update (rev3137) but I'm now finding AWB is giving me a sequence of "MissingMethodException in PluginManager.TestSkipNonExistingPages" problem dialogs, the first appearing while AWB loads and initializes. I also see that my previous default task and program settings aren't loaded or are lost and the same problem dialog reappears whenever I try to load some settings. Is a full "bug" report on the Bugs page required? Sardanaphalus (talk) 18:27, 29 July 2008 (UTC)
Just realized something. I usually lowercase filenames, as I've done with the rev3137 files, which has always seemed okay with AWB in the past. However, perhaps this is no longer true..? Sardanaphalus (talk) 18:36, 29 July 2008 (UTC)
Post it here and we shall see —Reedy 19:11, 29 July 2008 (UTC)
  • Here's the initial report:

[skipped]Method not found: 'System.Windows.Forms.CheckBox WikiFunctions.Plugin.IAutoWikiBrowserForm.get_SkipNonExistentPagesCheckBox()'. Call stack: at AutoWikiBrowser.Plugins.Kingbotk.PluginManager.TestSkipNonExistingPages()[skipped] Sardanaphalus (talk) 21:50, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

Update or delete the Kingbotk plugin. MaxSem(Han shot first!) 22:02, 29 July 2008 (UTC)
  • Yes, that seems to've fixed things, at least as far as loading and initializing the program. Thanks. (I did need to reconfigure and save the program preferences again.) I guess AWB rev3137 with an updated Kingbotk plugin will be bundled together at some later date. Sardanaphalus (talk) 22:14, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

AWB stops when mouse is not being moved or AWB window not active

is that intentional? i previously checked all the articles that I want to save and now I must sit and move mouse every serveral saved articles because AWB stops working, the same when I switch to another window and work on another things - AWB is stopped --84.234.42.68 (talk) 18:22, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

Avoid text in quotes or in wikilinks

I go to some lengths to avoid text in quotes or in wikilinks. I would like to make my code even more resistant to such things. I am sure this is an issue for several people. Does anybody have good suggestions that are easy to implement in regex? Lightmouse (talk) 09:08, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia_talk:AutoWikiBrowser/Feature_requests#Improve_HideText.HideMore.28.29 - Its related to that. Hidetext just needs patching to cater for more cases... —Reedy 10:10, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

Wow! That would be far better than any idea I had. Lightmouse (talk) 10:36, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

Regex question

Is there a way I can get AWB to replace a string in the following way?

Original text New text
foo bar
[[foo]] [[bar]]
[[xx:foo]] No change
[http://www.foo.com All about foo] [http://www.foo.com All about bar]
[[Image:Foo.jpg|Foo]] [[Image:Foo.jpg|Bar]]
{{foo|foo}} No change

Bart133 (t) (c) 18:17, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

Sub rule question

I have a question about sub rules which is a possible feature request , Is it currently possible for the sub rule to only apply if the main rule is triggered? Gnevin (talk) 13:34, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

Make list in the SVN snapshots

Regarding listmaker in the SVN snapshots, I'm confused by the new Special page listmaker as it only seems to list Allpages, which does not do anything for me. How does it work? Say I want to create a list of pages from Special:Newpages, how would I do that now? (I'm using AWB on WoWWiki). Kirkburn (talk) 09:51, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

You cant. The old method was very unreliable, so we're waiting on this MW bug. All pages should work, but you need to specify a page to start enumeration from. —Reedy 18:41, 6 August 2008 (UTC)
Okay. As WoWWiki is only going to be upgrading to 1.13 next, I will probably need to stick to the current release to keep that functionality. Hope that update makes 1.14 :) Kirkburn (talk) 17:02, 7 August 2008 (UTC)

Spellchecking

Moved to WT:AWB/T. MaxSem(Han shot first!) 22:26, 7 August 2008 (UTC)

Need help on some tasks

I've posted some new AWB tasks to Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser/Tasks.

The Transhumanist    00:42, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

Unicode again

An editor says that the following substition is anti-useful:

please see this change here: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Bulgarian_language&diff=216614260&oldid=216480357

[...]as non-unicode-compatible computers can't read the symbol it substitutes.

I'm too busy to even think about this ATM, just out the door in a second. Comments?

Rich Farmbrough, 13:23 3 June 2008 (GMT).

I don't know of any computers that can not read unicode. As far as I know even Windows 95 can do it with a patch from Microsoft. --mboverload@ 02:10, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

Is there a way stop this bot from messing up the spelling?

On more than one occasion I had to undo misguided "corrections" made by this bot. Is there a way to stop this from happening? JdH (talk) 20:43, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

Which "bot"? —Reedy 20:47, 10 August 2008 (UTC)
see Revision history of Woerden JdH (talk) 01:29, 11 August 2008 (UTC)
AutoWikiBrowser is not an automatic bot — edits made using this software are the responsibility of the editor using it. I encourage you to contact the user directly. --mboverload@ 02:08, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

AWB Hangs while Using Kingboyk Plugin

I am using Kingboyk Plugin+AWB for tagging for WikiProject banners for my bot. I observe that the AWB hangs for articles like Talk:Dave Magadan and Talk:Heathcliff Slocumb . One thing I noticed is that they all have {{WikiProjectBannerShell|blp=yes}} in these problematic talk pages.I tried even with the latest AWB SVN rev3254. Have anybody noticed this ?? -- Tinu Cherian - 07:06, 12 August 2008 (UTC)

Yup, and its reported on the plugin page. There seems to be a bug with the regex used for the template detection —Reedy 12:12, 12 August 2008 (UTC)
The issue happens only when |blp= follows just after WikiProjectBannerShell. -- Tinu Cherian - 12:24, 12 August 2008 (UTC)
Fixed in rev 3264. MaxSem(Han shot first!) 13:21, 12 August 2008 (UTC)
Thanks :) -- Tinu Cherian - 04:37, 13 August 2008 (UTC)
I used rev3272 from http://awb.reedyboy.net and found the issue is still there. eg: Talk:Butch Huskey -- Tinu Cherian - 05:15, 13 August 2008 (UTC)
Must be an old version of the plugin. It doesn't hang for me on that page. MaxSem(Han shot first!) 05:38, 13 August 2008 (UTC)
I used the Kingboy plugin ( 2.1.0.1 )that came with rev3272. -- Tinu Cherian - 06:16, 13 August 2008 (UTC)
Yeah, but this pre-release accidentally included old version. MaxSem(Han shot first!) 06:42, 13 August 2008 (UTC)
Okey.. Kindly let me know if we have a new SVN exe to download -- Tinu Cherian - 07:06, 13 August 2008 (UTC)
Try the rev3272a, i had forgotten to rebuild it —Reedy 09:36, 13 August 2008 (UTC)
It worked on this but hung on Talk:Chris Snelling . Sorry for dumping issues here :) -- Tinu Cherian - 10:04, 13 August 2008 (UTC)

Skip

I came here looking for information about the "Only whitespace is changed" option under the Skip tab because that function doesn't seem to be working for me. Interesting, that option isn't listed in the manual but is present in the screencap there. What gives? — TAnthonyTalk 22:59, 12 August 2008 (UTC)

{{sofixit}} The manual is maintained by the plebe users like you and me =p the devs are far too busy tinkering with code to worry about such things =). –xeno (talk) 23:03, 12 August 2008 (UTC)
That much I figured, but anyone have any idea what I'm doing wrong? — TAnthonyTalk 23:08, 12 August 2008 (UTC)
It might be Wikipedia_talk:AutoWikiBrowser/Bugs#White_space_bugGnevin (talk) 07:37, 13 August 2008 (UTC)

Category: living people

This issue came up before but I can't track down the discussion. Somebody on my talk page said:

  • You just added Category:Living people to the article which isn't really right, might need to tweak your script

I can see that there is a date of birth and no date of death. What is the right thing to do? Lightmouse (talk) 20:24, 13 August 2008 (UTC)

From the text at Category:Living people: "As per conditions set out in Category:Births of the last 123 years, each individual born after 1885 (if year of birth is absent, earliest period of activity should be extrapolated), whose year of death remains undetermined, should appear in this category. Individuals of advanced age (over 90) for whom no documentation has existed for a reasonable number of years, may be removed from this category and transferred to Category:Possibly living people."--Fabrictramp | talk to me 23:20, 13 August 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. Lightmouse (talk) 09:02, 14 August 2008 (UTC)

There are some feature requests relating to quotes and links. It would be very useful to be able to choose whether to make changes inside quotes and links. I am frequently asked about it. Are these requests just pipe dreams or are they realistic? Lightmouse (talk) 13:32, 14 August 2008 (UTC)

'Make list' - User contributions (all)

'User contributions (all)' is not in the make list for SVN3272. What happened to it? Lightmouse (talk) 18:09, 14 August 2008 (UTC)

It was removed. Why would anyone really need to do this? —Reedy 18:32, 14 August 2008 (UTC)

I need the entire list of my own contributions to prevent my bot editing the same article twice. I do not know of another way of doing that. Lightmouse (talk) 08:07, 15 August 2008 (UTC)

I concur with Lightmouse, this is a useful feature. I just did a few thosand edits by fixing a bot's bad grammar. The only way I did that is by getting their contributions. Also, if someone makes a buttload of bad edits with AWB (like replacing hippie with commie) then they may need to reload their own contribs so AWB can fix those buttload of bad edits for them. --mboverload@ 00:56, 16 August 2008 (UTC)

Links on a page problem

I don't know if this is a bug or if I'm doing something wrong (which is why I'm asking here), but I tried to make a list of links on a page for Canada at the 2008 Summer Olympics and while the page clearly has hundreds of links, AWB is only listing 10. -- Scorpion0422 14:30, 16 August 2008 (UTC)

Known bug, it's been fixed in "future" releases.--Fabrictramp | talk to me 14:54, 16 August 2008 (UTC)

"Software disabled"

I'm getting this when I try to use the log in option in AWB while attempting to run my bot. I've checked, and I'm still authorised. Is there something on my end that needs to be fixed?--Rockfang (talk) 19:06, 16 August 2008 (UTC)

Other languages

Sometimes if I'm visiting another language Wikipeida AWB suddenly logs out. Is it supposed to do that? I'm not actually editing the other Wikipeda just the English version. CambridgeBayWeather Have a gorilla 04:02, 17 August 2008 (UTC)

AWB? I'm still confused

Hi guys, I stumbled on this page a little while ago and after reading the description I am both interested in this software and slightly confused. So, here are my questions regarding the AutoWikiBrowser:

  1. Is it like Microsoft Word (or similar) except it is directly hooked up to Wikipedia? So, in other words, can you hit a bold button and see bold text instead of seeing apostrophes and have the program do all the translating into WikiMarkup for you?
  2. Why all the restrictions on its use?

Thanks! It Is Me Here (talk) 09:55, 19 August 2008 (UTC)

Re 1: no, it's designed as a bulk editor rather than a content creator. Re 2, because it is designed to make lots of changes quite quickly, so access and use has to be controlled. Rjwilmsi 12:28, 19 August 2008 (UTC)
I see - so what sort of "bulk edits" would this be useful for? And are there any screenshots of it in action? It Is Me Here (talk) 12:48, 19 August 2008 (UTC)
Have a look at [9] to see the type of bulk edits we are referring too Gnevin (talk) 12:59, 19 August 2008 (UTC)
Oh, right, I see. Well, it does not look like I will benefit from getting this program, then (at present, anyway). Thanks anyway. It Is Me Here (talk) 15:28, 19 August 2008 (UTC)

AWB is a universal edit justification

It gets real tiring to see stuff like "removing expand template using AWB" [10]; I mean, I wonderfully thrilled that you're using AWB, it's one step less cool than having a trained monkey do your edits, but why did you remove that template? Isn't that what the edit summary supposed to explain?--Prosfilaes (talk) 15:04, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

Would you be more thrilled with an edit summary of "removing expand template" and the user not using AWB? Seems to me this isn't an AWB issue, it's an individual editor issue.
Since you are discussing my edits I feel the need to explain why I made them. It began with user:71.202.65.243 adding {{expand}} template to a large number of stubby articles about small moons of giant planets. However those articles can not realy be expanded—little is known about these moons. So I decided to remove templates, because they are pretty useless. AWB was necessary, because I did not have time to do this job manually (taking into account the number of articles).
I should admit that you are right and my summaries should have been more informative. I am sorry if I disappointed you. Ruslik (talk) 18:27, 20 August 2008 (UTC)
Best to talk to individual users if you don't like their edit summaries. If you do it in a nice way, you might get results. :)--Fabrictramp | talk to me 15:38, 20 August 2008 (UTC)
It's an individual editor issue? So dozens of editors decided to write messages in the exactly same form, carefully linking AWB every time? AWB encourages this behavior; I can't recall ever seeing a "using AWB" edit summary that was actually useful.--Prosfilaes (talk) 16:36, 20 August 2008 (UTC)
"using AWB" is forced unless it's a botflagged AWB user and should not be considered the justification for the edit - simply a note of which tool is used the same way Twinkle marks itself (TW) or huggle (HG). The fact that the user is using AWB is not a carte blanche to make insignificant, unnecessary, or simply wrong-headed edits. Please leave a message for any users that are doing this, just as you would if they were not using AWB. Note the tagline at WP:AWB: edits made using this software are the responsibility of the editor using it. –xeno (talk) 16:40, 20 August 2008 (UTC)
You might have misunderstood what I was trying to say. AWB only adds "using AWB after the user-provided edit summary, as Xenocidic pointed out. In your example, "removing expand template" was provided by the user.
Yes, AWB can make it easy to get lazy with the edit summaries (even I have been guilty of this), but again, that's the user, not AWB. I use Firefox which helpfully tries to fill in edit summaries for me based on what I've typed in that box before. If I get lazy and pick something less than helpful, is that Firefox's fault? No, it's my fault. And a friendly, gentle minnow is in order. --Fabrictramp | talk to me 17:23, 20 August 2008 (UTC)
Prosfilaes, can you please explain what your issue is and how we can help you. I can't really see how we are in any way related to a user with nondescriptive edit summaries...? --mboverload@ 17:00, 20 August 2008 (UTC)
And nobody is infallible. Also, about inappropriate edit summaries, surely something is better than people who leave none...? —Reedy 21:41, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

MAJOR ERRORS IN THIS SOFTWARE

What in the hell happened to AWB?!?!?! I downloaded the latest copy and it only lets me get 10 links from a page, which is pretty much useless. Then, I see in the archives that there's supposedly an update that fixes this, but that update is chock full of even more errors and every time I login I get nothing by the "microsoft debugger" asking if I want to debug the stupid thing. WTF?!?!?! Dr. Cash (talk) 23:42, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

1. Why are you shouting at the people who make this for free for you. 2. I can assure you that it is working fine for us on multiple operating systems. Can you go to Microsoft Update and make sure you are completely patched and have all the .NET Frameworks? Also, do you have any virueses, spyware, malware, etc? --mboverload@ 02:13, 11 August 2008 (UTC)
Also, please provide us the actual error your are getting. --mboverload@ 02:20, 11 August 2008 (UTC)
The links on page breaking wasnt our fault - thats a change in MW, not a lot we can do about that. We fix it, etc. Your the first one to complain, but there is plenty of other users of the software, very happy and contempt. If its "stupid", maybe you shouldnt be using it. And like mboverload says, unless you tell us what the errors are, we cant fix them. We arent telepathic, nor do we have some remote access to your copy of AWB. Auch, those errors, offering to debug it, are usually a pc config issue - Wikipedia_talk:AutoWikiBrowser#Frequently_asked_questions —Reedy 10:14, 11 August 2008 (UTC)
I have the .NET frameworks installed, the same file downloaded from the link on this page. Every time I go to login using AWB, it brings up the "Just-In-Time Debugging" window, and asks if I want to debug using the selected debugger. I even re-downloaded the .NET framework file and selected "repair .NET installation", and it still wants me to debug. So there are definitely major issues going on here. Dr. Cash (talk) 13:43, 16 August 2008 (UTC)

I haven't been approved for AWB yet, but try this... I hope you're good at computers, briefly... Go into Internet Explorer options, click advanced tab, and look for some check boxes for "disable script debugging" and check them. There might be 2 boxes. Takes longer to write it than fix. And someone please consider me for AWB even if I don't have 500 edits. I like to saw logs! (talk) 06:52, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

it's most likely your enivronment, not AWB. I'd suggest deleting your current version and redownloading it... the updater doesn't always work flawlessly. also, which .NET frameworks do you have? -ΖαππερΝαππερ BabelAlexandria 18:47, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

Is this software ever going to work again? :(

I keep getting the check page error every time I load AWB now (Check page failed to load, etc...) Any chance of whatever is causing this being fixed, as I think I've got AWB to work once in the last month. Orderinchaos 00:22, 16 August 2008 (UTC)

I think the question you mean to ask is "When is Geek Squad going to fix my computer so it can run AWB, which works fine for everyone else." =) --mboverload@ 00:53, 16 August 2008 (UTC)
wouldn't this be more likely to be something with Chaos's web settings? In a very strict environment, AWB might not be allowed to access the web, wouldn't that generate this error? I'm sure reedy or someone else would have some other ideas. I think we should try to be a bit more helpful to new users of the software... -ΖαππερΝαππερ BabelAlexandria 18:51, 21 August 2008 (UTC)
If you haven't already, double check your firewall settings and make sure AWB has full access. – iridescent 19:00, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

Changing Dates

Is it possible to use AWB to change the formats of date all in one go? For example, change "05/07/2006" to "[[2006-05-07]]". Thanks. - plau (talk) 13:28, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

yes it is possible to do a change like that, using the find and replace functions with Regex, also take a look here. If you have specific questions for a change you'd like to do, look at the AWB Regex page or ask here. -ΖαππερΝαππερ BabelAlexandria 19:25, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

I see that he corrected such a format at: List of Digimon Data Squad episodes. Frankly, I am surprised that such formats were used and survived for more than one edit cycle. Lightmouse (talk) 23:18, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

Actually, those were done by hand on a computer without AWB. - plau (talk) 11:36, 23 August 2008 (UTC)

Using on another wiki that has a different HTML structure

I tried to enter http://pinataisland.info in the custom project preferences but that site doesn't use a /wiki/Main Page structure, it uses http://pinataisland.info/viva/Main_Page . Will it be possible to use AWB there? –xeno (talk) 16:32, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

Mine gives me a login page and such... Ok, it wont load some of the project stuff... —Reedy 15:23, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

Script error when logging in?

I just changed my user name (approved before, approved now) and now whenever I load AWB and try logging in, I get the debugger popping up trying to debug a script error (and thus not being able to use it). Everything's updated to my knowledge, so I'm wodnering if it could be a monobook issue or something else...User:MrMarkTaylor What's that?/What I Do/Feed My Box 02:58, 23 August 2008 (UTC)

See the last 2 items of the FAQ above. —Reedy 08:00, 23 August 2008 (UTC)

I have used awb many times. Just downloaded newest; only get 10 links (includes redlinks) when I attempt to make a list. Ling.Nut (WP:3IAR) 22:06, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

Newest release? If so, its broken due to an API change in MW. Already fixed for next release —Reedy 22:41, 31 August 2008 (UTC)
So when can I get the one that works? Ling.Nut (WP:3IAR) 22:59, 31 August 2008 (UTC)
See the SVN snapshots link at the top of this page. Rjwilmsi 06:42, 1 September 2008 (UTC)

spacious--> spacitous

Write API on Production Wiki's

[11]

=D

Need to discuss with Max a plan of action for implementing this now!

—Reedy 06:32, 26 August 2008 (UTC)

Yay, moar comments on that page. MaxSem(Han shot first!) 18:24, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

Need Regexp help- Multiline Banner

My intention is to add the parameter "|music=yes" to {{WP India}} banner to certain categories related to the workgroup. I was able to add music=yes with advanced setting of 'Find and replace' for {{WP India}} for banners in single line like
{{WP India|class|kerala=yes}}

like
Find : {{WP India(.*?)}}
Replace: {{WP India$1|music=yes}}

But I am not able to do for banners in multiple lines like

{{WP India
|class=
|kerala=yes
}}

I tried using
Find : {{WP India\n(.*?)}}

and many other combinations , but it didnot work . Any idea how to do this ? -- Tinu Cherian - 04:58, 1 September 2008 (UTC)

Tick the box named SingleLine in the find & replace screen. Rjwilmsi 06:44, 1 September 2008 (UTC)
Thank you. Itz working ! -- Tinu Cherian - 04:51, 2 September 2008 (UTC)
I was wondering what that was for... --Izno (talk) 01:22, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

Montana → Mountaina

Can't see the error (and know nothing about regexes), can someone fix this one? – iridescent 01:29, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

Fixed by yours truly a few hours ago. Did you see someone make a mistake? --mboverload@ 01:49, 7 September 2008 (UTC)
Whoops! No, it came up as a false-positive on mine but I now realise I hadn't refreshed the typo list (begs humble forgiveness). – iridescent 01:53, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

I am getting false positives due to image links. This issue is not confined to AWB, it is the same for monobook scripts. I was asked at User_talk:Lightmouse/wishlist#Image_glitch_again if I could make the script highlight '[[Image:' and '.jpeg' and '.jpg' in the diff, perhaps by colour. I have no idea how to do it. Perhaps images could be removed before the code parses the text and then images replaced. Just scratching my head for ideas. Can we do anything? Lightmouse (talk)

You're doing that using normal F&R? In that case you just need to check the ignore external links, etc checkbox to make it ignore images. MaxSem(Han shot first!) 18:04, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

Actually, no. I have an AWB script that I add to 'Make module'. I also have a monobook script that a few other editors are using. I was entirely unaware of the checkbox you mention and I am delighted to know about it. However, I am not sure it will help me, unless I can take bits of the code and use it in the 'Make module' and in the monobook script. Lightmouse (talk) 18:22, 7 September 2008 (UTC) 

HideText ht = new HideText(true, false, true);

//. . .

text = ht.Hide(text);
// do your work
text = ht.AddBack(text);

MaxSem(Han shot first!) 18:35, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. As soon as I add:
  • HideText ht = new HideText(true, false, true);
The script stops working. Also, I presume that:
  • text = ht.Hide(\[\[Image:[^\]*\]\]);
  • my code blah blah
  • text = ht.AddBack(\[\[Image:[^\]*\]\]);
would work for upper case '[Image' but not lower case '[image'
Lightmouse (talk) 19:09, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

First, I can't help you with your script if I don't have its source. ht should preferrably be declared outside of ProcessArticle. Second, it's supposed to catch even [[ image:whatever]]. MaxSem(Han shot first!) 19:35, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

Sorry for not giving you the source. The monobook script is at:
I have various AWB scripts that could all benefit from your excellent tip. One is:
If I can get it working even in a basic form, I can build on that. I will try putting it outside ProcessArticle in the AWB script but there isn't a ProcessArticle in the monobook. This would be really great if I could get it working, false positives relating to images are a pain. Lightmouse (talk) 22:45, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

That wont work outside ProcessArticle, its got to be in a method. —Reedy 09:37, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

I am quite baffled by this. My knowledge of scripting is very basic. I would like to be able to avoid images for the whole script. Can this be done? Lightmouse (talk) 10:59, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

Fancy pasting your code somewhere so we can try and help? —Reedy 11:12, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

[12] - Done —Reedy 11:17, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

Excellent! Thank you very much. I have some further questions, if you don't mind... Firstly, does it just do images or will it do URLs too (if there is some reference, I could take a look for myself)? Secondly, is there an equivalent that would be suitable for User:Lightmouse/monobook.js/script.js ? I really appreciate your help. Lightmouse (talk) 11:55, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

Its just setup to do the [[Image:]] style. As for the script.js, it would be possible to probably write a javascript equivalent, but it wouldnt be a simple process. Are you wanting to change that to an AWB custom module at some point? —Reedy 12:17, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

If it does just images, that is a welcome step forward. Thanks. I have several AWB scripts and one monobook script. There is a lot of overlap between them all. The monobook script is useful because it provides eight toolbox buttons including 'delink all dates to dmy', 'delink all dates to mdy', 'delink common terms' and 'add metric units'. AWB does not provide options. Furthermore, a few other editors are using my monobook script without having AWB access. They are complaining about the false positives from images/URLs and so far I have been telling them that there is nothing that I can do. Lightmouse (talk) 12:29, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

AWB upon Talk pages corresponding to a category?

I got AWB running and can edit articles in a given category (Category:Barnstable County, Massachusetts Registered Historic Place stubs). However, I want to edit all the Talk pages of that category (in order to add them to appropriate wikiprojects), rather than edit the articles proper. This is to follow up after an editor who created stub NRHP articles without adding them to the NRHP wikiproject and/or to other wikiprojects that apply.

Is it possible to set AWB to work on the Talk pages corresponding to a given category? Any tips would be appreciated. I'll watch here. Thanks! doncram (talk) 03:54, 10 September 2008 (UTC)

Right click on list → convert to talk. Please read up the manual. MaxSem(Han shot first!) 05:58, 10 September 2008 (UTC)
Thanks! And I modified the manual's coverage to provide the essential info that you need to right click in the List area, as you suggest, in order to access the "convert to talk pages" operation and some other operations. doncram (talk) 22:15, 10 September 2008 (UTC)

Template to make AWB skip avariant spelling

Hi,

I know (or believe) that the various {{lang}} templates make AWB skip over foreign terms... is that correct? Second, more important question: is there a template to make AWB skip a word unconditionally.. when I know the spelling in the article is the correct one?

thanks Ling.Nut (talk—WP:3IAR) 05:38, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

First question (lang template) yes. Secondly, AWB typo fixes also skip the {{sic}} and the {{quote}} (and blockquote, cquote etc.) templates. Rjwilmsi 06:42, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

Dispenser strikes again

tools:~dispenser/temp/AWB_weekend_reviewed_13Sept2008.patch

  • Rearranging option menu for better grouping
  • Renaming a bunch of items for self-constancy and constancy with the way Windows does things
  • F&R been tweak with tooltips
  • Bigger buttons for often used function in toolbar
  • Bug 1505 (spam filter block) has since been fixed
Unresolved questions

This patch should be ready to commit, its a less comprehensive do over of the last patch uncommitted patch. — Dispenser 08:40, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

Oh, and im going to get the DBScanner protection level stuff done this weekend! —Reedy 08:50, 13 September 2008 (UTC)
I think the protection level stuff looks to be deprecated and might not be updated anymore with the mw:Protected titles table handling protection. It looks like the devs are moving towards unix style permissions on pages. So I've removed what I've done until its clear what is going to happen. — Dispenser 09:22, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

rev 3311 does all but the DBScanner changes. rev 3312 changes the more than and less than round in the Text tab, but seeing as I had already made a few changes, which i commited this morning (not seeing this, and the way the designer moves the file around for no reason at times), i cant work out if there are any other changes you made that im missing? If there is, let me know/please create another patch. Thanks! —Reedy 09:07, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

I think I removed the protection/restriction tab, and change "Ignore Redirect" to "Ignore redirect". Not much else comes to mind right now. I'll try helping out more after I get some sleep. — Dispenser 09:22, 13 September 2008 (UTC)
Cheers. —Reedy 09:33, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

SVN breakage

There's some breakage in the SVN version now:

Status Fixed in the next release
Description
Exception:InvalidCastException
Message:Specified cast is not valid.
Call stack:
   at WikiFunctions.Parse.FindandReplace.RowToReplacement(DataGridViewRow dataGridRow) in C:\Documents and Settings\RJW\Desktop\AWB_SVN\AWB\WikiFunctions\FindandReplace.cs:line 72
   at WikiFunctions.Parse.FindandReplace.MakeList() in C:\Documents and Settings\RJW\Desktop\AWB_SVN\AWB\WikiFunctions\FindandReplace.cs:line 127
   at AutoWikiBrowser.MainForm.LoadPrefs(UserPrefs p) in C:\Documents and Settings\RJW\Desktop\AWB_SVN\AWB\AWB\UserSettings.cs:line 344
   at AutoWikiBrowser.MainForm.LoadPrefs(String path) in C:\Documents and Settings\RJW\Desktop\AWB_SVN\AWB\AWB\UserSettings.cs:line 308

Rjwilmsi 12:55, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

To duplicate: Unknown
Operating system Microsoft Windows NT 5.1.2600 Service Pack 3
.NET FW Version Unknown
AWB version 4.3.2.1, revision 3314 (2008-09-13 13:44:43)
Workaround None
Fixed in version Unknown


Could you post/pastebin your settings please? —Reedy 13:03, 13 September 2008 (UTC)
rev 3318, Thanks! —Reedy 13:11, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

Move to AFD model for bugs and suggestions

Should be move the the AFD model of discussion for bugs and requests where by each bug is listed at a subpage and a template is used to link and sort them such as

Edit summary issue

Status New
Description Edit summary here links AWB to [[Category:Uncategorized_stubs]], which isn't correct. Rjwilmsi 17:39, 14 July 2008 (UTC)
To duplicate:
Operating system XP
.NET FW Version Unknown
AWB version SVN
Workaround
Fixed in version Unknown


Cool. Would love to know how it did that. lol. —Reedy 21:36, 18 July 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia talk:AutoWikiBrowser/Bugs/testbug2

Discussion

This model would allow the bug/feature requester to watch their specific issues and should provide a fast responce from users when devs request feedback Gnevin (talk) 10:50, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

Sounds like its a good idea to me. Makes life easier like you say, and makes it easier for archiving and such. Opinions of others? —Reedy 12:13, 12 September 2008 (UTC)
A other advantage of this is that it would allow categorisation of the bugs/requests. So that when {{AWB bug}} is added with status open, the template could automatically include in it Category:Open AWB bugs , then a dev could say this is a UI bug and manually add Category:AWB UI bugsGnevin (talk) 16:37, 12 September 2008 (UTC)
Category:AutoWikiBrowser new exception bugs, automatic category Gnevin (talk) 15:51, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

Extremely inconvenient

That way I can't keep an eye on every subpage, which is vital. Sorry, but I've undid all subpage-related changes. MaxSem(Han shot first!) 16:37, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Thus you watch the main pages like you already do , with no noticeable change Gnevin (talk) 17:47, 15 September 2008 (UTC)
What Max is presumably meaning, is that, with it being on subpages, we cant tell unless we're watching each individual one, if theres been activity. —Reedy 18:06, 15 September 2008 (UTC)
How do you currently tell , do you view the diff's as I know when I was watching the main pages i would miss dozen's of edits and so just removed it from my watchlist only going back every so often for bugs i suggested . Surely watching the sub pages would be a minor inconvenient when compare to the benefits of categorisation ,instantly seeing which bug/features are active not just the main pages, quicker reply times etc ? Gnevin (talk) 18:13, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Unrevert the changes and use Special:RecentChangesLinked to watch the categories they are placed in (which is a function of RecentChangesLinked). Does that work? --Izno (talk) 03:12, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

[[13]] seems to work anyway Gnevin (talk) 07:29, 16 September 2008 (UTC)
That means two watchlists to check instead of one. MaxSem(Han shot first!) 07:59, 16 September 2008 (UTC)
But your current watchlist is very patchy and lets stuff fall thru the cracks. Where as
A) Watching the sub page when the bug/feature is created
B) Watching the link above would give a more complete picture
Both of which also offer the advantages listed above Gnevin (talk) 08:03, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

Thanks all

Just like to say thanks to all the Devs who worked on the latest version of AWB, that is an impressive feature list for a update . Keep up the great work! Gnevin (talk) 17:23, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

=). I was just looking at that myself. A lotta changes!! Hopefully for the better ;) —Reedy 17:28, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

I was just thinking something similar myself. I have made a lot of good use of the filtering by title. It is a great application that just keeps getting better and Wikipedia is better for it. Lightmouse (talk) 17:31, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

Yes, thanks to the devs. Many fixes and improvements. Just makes me wonder whether it would have been useful to push out more regular releases (monthly?) to get fixes out sooner? Rjwilmsi 18:07, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

I would not recommend forcing an update unless it fixes something very important. This last update caused me a minor inconvenience because I was in the middle of something with two live instances of AWB. But I know it is worth it so don't treat this as a complaint, just information about context. Is there some lesser action that you could take, for example that would not affect the running application? Lightmouse (talk) 18:14, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

Yes, I didn't mean mandatory updates (unless there's some critical fix), just optional updates fixing bugs affecting some users, which could be made mandatory at a later date. Rjwilmsi 18:38, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

OK. Non-mandatory updates of the release version makes no difference to me, I always go for the latest SVN version. I think you just need to make a judgement, and that might involve time and/or significance of changes. Lightmouse (talk) 18:43, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

Generally, if your running, unless you get logged out you should be fine to carry on. Unless we really have to, (ie major critical bugs/broken stuff with MW), we wont disable the old version straight away. When we know its pretty much stable (ie no big show stoppers), ie a week or 2 later, we will probably think about disabling the older versions.
As for Rjwilmsi's point about more frequent release, it would be a good idea... Next stop, APIEdit! —Reedy 21:10, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

Aha. I had two instances running with different login names (one for me, one for my bot). The bot was running but the one in my name got logged out. For some reason, the update requirement stopped the bot running too. Lightmouse (talk) 20:19, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Am I being really stupid?

Where has the "clear list" button gone? It doesn't seem to be either an obvious button, or an option on the List menu. – iridescent 21:35, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

Right click, remove, all... Not the most obvious... —Reedy 21:39, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

Blank lines before stubs

I received the following report on my talk page:

I've noticed that (whilst making other edits) the Lightbot is collapsing the blank lines before stubs (for example, this edit). This seems to go against the guidance at WP:STUB:

It is usually desirable to leave two blank lines between the first stub template and whatever precedes it.

And was wondering if this is a fault with the bot, or if there is a some other guidance that says "never have two blank lines" or something? -- ratarsed (talk) 11:09, 18 September 2008 (UTC)

Can anyone provide an answer? Lightmouse (talk) 11:26, 18 September 2008 (UTC)

I don't have the answer, but I'm in favor of it. I also would extend my favor to the leaving of extra blank lines before navigation box templates at the bottom of articles. In both cases it keeps a little bit of space between the last line of content and the stub or template. — Bellhalla (talk) 17:09, 18 September 2008 (UTC)
Please, think of kitten!

I sometimes find that lists are limited to 5000. I recently noticed this on 'What links here'. Is this deliberate? Lightmouse (talk) 21:04, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

Yep. And this limit is active for all types of queries, except for recursive categories (200k). MaxSem(Han shot first!) 21:16, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

Aha. What is the reason for the limit and do you think it could be raised? Incidentally, I recently got 296,606 on a recursive category. Lightmouse (talk) 21:18, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

The reason is the same as why special pages return a finite number of pages: KITTEN! :P MaxSem(Han shot first!) 21:26, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

Ah. I presume that you are referring to server load. I had not thought of that. Lightmouse (talk) 21:32, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

Also "list from a category" limits to only 5000. Is there any way to override this? The reason being I am running a bot task on Category:Unassessed-Class Computing articles (18K articles ) and I am not able to stretch no more than the first 5000 entries -- Tinu Cherian - 10:36, 22 September 2008 (UTC)
Found a workaround, use an older version to get the list, save the list and use the latest AWB and import the list and then work on them -- Tinu Cherian - 05:33, 24 September 2008 (UTC)

help please: logging to file

I'm playing with the "logging to file" feature in AWB, but I don't seem to understand how it works. I have set the options "log to wiki code" and "verbose logging" and pressed Apply. AWB has created an empty log file on my desktop. However, the status section on the logging to file tab shows 259 lines written to the log file, but yet the log file is still empty. What am I missing? Thanks Rjwilmsi 19:56, 19 September 2008 (UTC)

Stop Lightmouse

Revoke User:Lightmouse's approval to use AWB. See Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents#Lightmouse again --Gerry Ashton (talk) 22:59, 25 September 2008 (UTC)

Please ignore this entirely unjustified complaint against Lightmouse, who is being vilified for removing autoformatting entirely in accordance with the Manual of Style, which deprecates it. I'm doing exactly the same thing, as are other editors. Colonies Chris (talk) 11:06, 26 September 2008 (UTC)

Agree with Colonies Chris Lightmouse/bot edits in compliance to the MOS. Occasional issues with his/her edits are addressed by Lightmouse when reported. Other editors' complaints arise as there's never 100% consensus over the MOS, particularly for dates where the guidelines have recently changed. All any editor can do is comply with the current MOS. Rjwilmsi 12:35, 26 September 2008 (UTC)

Thanks you for the support. Lightmouse (talk) 13:16, 26 September 2008 (UTC)

I am getting false positives due to image links. This issue is not confined to AWB, it is the same for monobook scripts. I was asked at User_talk:Lightmouse/wishlist#Image_glitch_again if I could make the script highlight '[[Image:' and '.jpeg' and '.jpg' in the diff, perhaps by colour. I have no idea how to do it. Perhaps images could be removed before the code parses the text and then images replaced. Just scratching my head for ideas. Can we do anything? Lightmouse (talk)

You're doing that using normal F&R? In that case you just need to check the ignore external links, etc checkbox to make it ignore images. MaxSem(Han shot first!) 18:04, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

Actually, no. I have an AWB script that I add to 'Make module'. I also have a monobook script that a few other editors are using. I was entirely unaware of the checkbox you mention and I am delighted to know about it. However, I am not sure it will help me, unless I can take bits of the code and use it in the 'Make module' and in the monobook script. Lightmouse (talk) 18:22, 7 September 2008 (UTC) 

HideText ht = new HideText(true, false, true);

//. . .

text = ht.Hide(text);
// do your work
text = ht.AddBack(text);

MaxSem(Han shot first!) 18:35, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. As soon as I add:
  • HideText ht = new HideText(true, false, true);
The script stops working. Also, I presume that:
  • text = ht.Hide(\[\[Image:[^\]*\]\]);
  • my code blah blah
  • text = ht.AddBack(\[\[Image:[^\]*\]\]);
would work for upper case '[Image' but not lower case '[image'
Lightmouse (talk) 19:09, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

First, I can't help you with your script if I don't have its source. ht should preferrably be declared outside of ProcessArticle. Second, it's supposed to catch even [[ image:whatever]]. MaxSem(Han shot first!) 19:35, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

Sorry for not giving you the source. The monobook script is at:
I have various AWB scripts that could all benefit from your excellent tip. One is:
If I can get it working even in a basic form, I can build on that. I will try putting it outside ProcessArticle in the AWB script but there isn't a ProcessArticle in the monobook. This would be really great if I could get it working, false positives relating to images are a pain. Lightmouse (talk) 22:45, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

That wont work outside ProcessArticle, its got to be in a method. —Reedy 09:37, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

I am quite baffled by this. My knowledge of scripting is very basic. I would like to be able to avoid images for the whole script. Can this be done? Lightmouse (talk) 10:59, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

Fancy pasting your code somewhere so we can try and help? —Reedy 11:12, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

[14] - Done —Reedy 11:17, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

Excellent! Thank you very much. I have some further questions, if you don't mind... Firstly, does it just do images or will it do URLs too (if there is some reference, I could take a look for myself)? Secondly, is there an equivalent that would be suitable for User:Lightmouse/monobook.js/script.js ? I really appreciate your help. Lightmouse (talk) 11:55, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

Its just setup to do the [[Image:]] style. As for the script.js, it would be possible to probably write a javascript equivalent, but it wouldnt be a simple process. Are you wanting to change that to an AWB custom module at some point? —Reedy 12:17, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

If it does just images, that is a welcome step forward. Thanks. I have several AWB scripts and one monobook script. There is a lot of overlap between them all. The monobook script is useful because it provides eight toolbox buttons including 'delink all dates to dmy', 'delink all dates to mdy', 'delink common terms' and 'add metric units'. AWB does not provide options. Furthermore, a few other editors are using my monobook script without having AWB access. They are complaining about the false positives from images/URLs and so far I have been telling them that there is nothing that I can do. Lightmouse (talk) 12:29, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

I have revived this issue because I have a question about how it works. I have code that delinks date fragments (i.e. does not delink autoformatting dates). It does this by protecting full dates and then delinking the rest. But the image avoidance code seems to be creating errors with dates in image captions. I have created a test page (User:Lightmouse/sandbox) and test script (User:Lightmouse/TestScript). Without the image avoidance code, the date in the image caption works as expected. With the image avoidance code, it does not protect the full date in the image caption. Even more bizarrely, if I add a solitary year just before the full date in the caption, it will work as expected. My suspicion is that there is something in the image avoidance code that is doing this. I would be grateful for thoughts. Lightmouse (talk) 13:14, 26 September 2008 (UTC)

Magic words

I think I remember some discussion of "magic words" int AWB's find and replce, such as %%TITLE%% ... is this correct? If so what are they, an do they work in advanced? Rich Farmbrough, 18:09 2 October 2008 (UTC).

As of the current svn rev:
%%title%%
%%titlee%%
%%fullpagename%%
%%fullpagenamee%%
%%key%%

%%pagename%%
%%pagenamee%%

%%basepagename%%
%%basepagenamee%%

%%namespace%%
%%namespacee%%

%%subpagename%%
%%subpagenamee%%

%%server%%
%%scriptpath%%
%%servername%%

Are the current working ones. The function is listed as being used in the Adv FaR rules. Some are duplicates of each other (ie title as that was awb only before, so the duplicate is the mw one) —Reedy 16:52, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

Code freezes

The code freezes for me sometimes. If I run it in non-bot mode, it is fine. It is also fine in bot mode as long as it does not save. When it tries to save, it freezes. Has anybody else found this? Lightmouse (talk) 22:29, 2 October 2008 (UTC)

Edits inside templates

I've noticed that it's not longer possible to edit inside a template. Why is this disabled? AWB is almost useless now.--Westermarck (talk) 13:59, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

It works for me. What are your find & replace settings? Rjwilmsi 16:34, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

Transclusions now truncated?

I like to run transclusions of WikiProject banners when I do my tagging so I don't visit articles that already have been tagged. After the new update it truncates the transclusions to 5000. Is there a way around this? It's my one beef with the update. Thanks for making some huge improvements. §hep • ¡Talk to me! 01:59, 21 September 2008 (UTC)

I have the same problem; the workaround I've been using is generating a cut-and-paste list from Special/WhatLinksHere and importing the resulting .txt file into AWB, which seems to work fine (albeit is a little clumsy). What would be nice is the facility to add New pages and New account contributions to the list (it used to be possible to import these via "Special page",but this option now seems to have been disabled), I used to find it useful to run these through AWB applying general fixes/stub sorting/deletion tagging as appropriate.
Also (I think this may have been asked before), is there any way to generate a list of articles with/without a given tag on the talkpage, other than generating a list of the talkpages transcluding said tag and search-replacing the "talk:" out of the article list? – iridescent 12:16, 22 September 2008 (UTC)
Found a workaround for the 5000 limit, use an older version to get the list, save the list and use the latest AWB and import the list and then work on them. -- Tinu Cherian - 05:35, 24 September 2008 (UTC)

Sigh. What limit of returned pages would be acceptable for users? Note that 'no limit' is not an option, as I wanna live :P MaxSem(Han shot first!) 17:01, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

The technical stuff goes over my head but I will take your word for it. I would be grateful if you could increase it to 10,000. Furthermore, we have previously discussed the idea of setting filters before search rather than after. That issue may be relevant here. For example, I often hit the 5,000 limit but post-filtration the number comes down to a fraction of that. Am I correct in thinking pre-filtration would save a few kittens? Lightmouse (talk) 18:02, 3 October 2008 (UTC)
No, servers will still have to find and serve these page titles to us, so live filtering will do nothing to reduce the strain on servers. MaxSem(Han shot first!) 18:10, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

OK. It is an independent issue then. Thanks for explaining it. Lightmouse (talk) 18:13, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

I forgot to ask... Does that apply even if we are pre-filtering by file type e.g. '(main)'? Lightmouse (talk) 18:18, 3 October 2008 (UTC)
This is literally just getting the list straight from the servers. —Reedy 18:35, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

I've just raised the limit to 25,000 in rev 3427, let's see what happens. MaxSem(Han shot first!) 16:10, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. I look forward to being able to download and try it. Lightmouse (talk) 16:13, 4 October 2008 (UTC)
25,000 is much better. Thanks! §hep • ¡Talk to me! 19:12, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

rev3427 uploaded to my snapshot site. —Reedy 19:27, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

I am using the increased limit now. It is much appreciated. Thank you. Lightmouse (talk) 10:26, 5 October 2008 (UTC)

Blank lines before stubs

See [15], and I'm sure I mentioned it here. AWB should leave (and preferably create) blank lines before the first stub template. Rich Farmbrough, 10:05 5 October 2008 (UTC).

Adden another newline in rev 3435. Your previous posts here were archived and thus remained unnoticed, that's why we have separate pages for bugs and feature requests. MaxSem(Han shot first!) 18:35, 5 October 2008 (UTC)

What happens when AWB gets an edit conflict?

What happens when AWB gets an edit conflict? I get a dialog that asks me to press OK and I always press it. But if I don't press it, will AWB halt or continue? Lightmouse (talk) 19:05, 5 October 2008 (UTC)

Older versions disabled

Why were the older versions disabled? I really enjoyed using the 4210 version instead of the other ones. I dont use it on wikipedia, but in my own personal wiki, so why cant i use an older version that suits my preferences better? -201.52.36.198 (talk) 21:49, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

When some important bug fixes are made the older versions are disabled. Rjwilmsi 22:39, 3 October 2008 (UTC)
But why? Some older versions suits my needs better than the new ones =O -201.52.9.114 (talk) 02:22, 6 October 2008 (UTC)
[16] - As you can see, the majority of the users are wikipedia users. Therefore, we periodically have to disable it as there are things get broken in AWB due to MW changes, or changes to ruling. Periodically disabling versions enforces the upgrade, as some people dont always. —Reedy 07:54, 6 October 2008 (UTC)

yay for multithreading! but...

i want to say first off, way to go to the devs on getting AWB from it's infancy, through OO, and now into multithreading! Even though it seems like all the feedback you ever get is complaining about bugs and asking, "well can i have this now?" I want you guys to know that your volunteer effort is appreciated - been waiting a while for an update :) My only question is that this is the first time i ever ran the updater successfully and for some reason my default settings reverted to a version i had about 2 months ago - i know it sounds bizarre but i'm not sure how it happened, any ideas? -Zappernapper 14:57, 5 October 2008 (UTC)

Hey! AWB did have multithreading before ;). The list making has been threaded off for a while :P —Reedy 17:45, 5 October 2008 (UTC)
As for the settings, its rather weird. It doesnt touch the settings files at all —Reedy 18:01, 5 October 2008 (UTC)
i didn't think it would... i know bizarre... oh well... sigh... -ΖαππερΝαππερ BabelAlexandria 14:09, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

Question

Using AWB, how do you search/replace carriage returns and other special ASCII codes?

This would enable multi-line search/replaces, and searching/replacing strings at the beginnings or ends of lines.

Please copy/paste your reply to my talk page, otherwise I'll probably never see the answer. Thank you.

The Transhumanist    21:30, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

Using regex. Contact me if you have a specific requirement you want help with. Rjwilmsi 22:04, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

It won't start

Hi there I'm having some diffculties running this. I have Windows XP home edition and I have Microsoft .NET Framework 3.5 and everytime I double click to start it nothing shows up. May someone help me with this issue? Rvk41 (talk) 04:55, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

Does it show up in task manager? If it's running in there, try ending the task and launching it once it's gone from task manager.Louis Waweru  Talk  17:32, 5 October 2008 (UTC)
I know the .NET frameworks are somewhat compatible, but you do need v2 AFAIK, even with 3.5 —Reedy 17:44, 5 October 2008 (UTC)
Reinstalling .NET might help, I may add. MaxSem(Han shot first!) 17:58, 5 October 2008 (UTC)

When I start it, it will show up in the task manager briefly and then it dissappears. I've reinstalled the framework and i still have the same problem Rvk41 (talk) 19:41, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

mac version, or equivalent?

is there a version of this software that's Mac compatible, or some equivalent Mac app? If not, would anyone object to me trying to make a port? --Ludwigs2 16:24, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

See the 3rd entry of the FAQ. Mac has more luck than other OS's... And i know it has been run successfully before via some method or another. But if you want to have a go, the source code is all freely available :) —Reedy 16:28, 8 October 2008 (UTC)
Jumping in here. I'm successfully running AWB on a non-Intel Mac at home running Virtual PC. (speed is lousy, though). I've heard a couple of users say they're running it on Intel Macs with Parallels. --Fabrictramp | talk to me 16:41, 8 October 2008 (UTC)
yeah, well, I have an old PPC, and I'll confess that I'm allergic to Windows (really; every time I have to use it I get a queasy stomach - lol). let me look at the source and see how much head-pounding it would take. --Ludwigs2 17:41, 8 October 2008 (UTC)
Theres a LOT of code. Mono isnt too far off being sorted, hopefully —Reedy 17:57, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

Resolution issues

Are there issues in the latest verion with resolution? I'm getting the various panels of the AutoWikiBrowser main window being cutoff on the right and bottom, almost like they are being resized slightly too big for the overall window. This persists when maximizing or manually resizing the window. I'm using Windows XP - I get this issue with 1280x800 and 1280x1024 resolution. Cander0000 (talk) 06:34, 12 October 2008 (UTC)

AWB - approved or not?

Moved from WP:AN

Hi; today, I tried to use AWB for the first time in a while. It claimed to need updating; I did so, but now, when I log in, it says "software disabled", even though my name's on the CheckPage. Any tips? Thanks! ╟─Treasury§Tag►contribs─╢ 15:01, 12 October 2008 (UTC)

Did you log in under the same username you're approved for (TreasuryTag)? Have you tried to login in IE separately, then use AWB? MaxSem(Han shot first!) 15:38, 12 October 2008 (UTC)
Yep, only TT :P I'll give the IE trick a go later this evening, I use FireFox usually, you see. ╟─Treasury§Tag►contribs─╢ 18:27, 12 October 2008 (UTC)

I'd like to know whether AWB can be helpful for tasks like replacing [list of dead external links] with Wayback Machine archived copies? Or is there a specifically appropriate alternative for this? trespassers william (talk) 13:18, 13 October 2008 (UTC)

'Under construction' templates

I am mentioning this here because 'under construction' templates are an impediment to multi-article editing. I think AWB may have been used to purge articles of stale templates. If, like me, you would like to make 'under construction' templates more efficient, please comment on the proposal.

People put 'under construction' on a page to say that they are actively working on articles. But then the templates seem to hang around on the article for hours, days, and weeks. It is sometimes difficult to get them removed because people say 'I haven't finished yet, I just have to get round to it'. Sometimes people even revert removal of the template.

A reasonable proposal (I think) is to merge the templates into one. The one template would have a fixed expiry time visible in read mode. If it expires, the editor would be able to refresh it but would have to take positive action to refresh it. The current fire-and-forget design would be gone. The expiry time would be consistent with real tappity-tap editing where fingers are pounding the keyboard e.g. 15 minutes to an hour.

For more details, debate, and voting, see: Wikipedia:Templates for deletion/Log/2008 October 13. Regards Lightmouse (talk) 16:46, 13 October 2008 (UTC)

Forcibily Upgrade?

Why does AWB forcibly upgrade to new version? I am seeing an issue with Kingboyk plugin not tagging for WP:INDIA and I am unable to check it out with other versions :( -- Tinu Cherian - 06:48, 13 October 2008 (UTC)

Things are changed that have to be rolled out. We will be doing another compulsory in the next few days to cater for Image changing to File, otherwise AWB could wreak havoc! As for the Kingbotk plugin, does any of the other plugins work? —Reedy 10:19, 13 October 2008 (UTC)
When I tried for another banner WPBiography, it gives this error " Bad Tag , Please fix it manually or kindly ignore " -- Tinu Cherian - 10:25, 13 October 2008 (UTC)
Fixed in rev 3448 —Reedy 19:07, 15 October 2008 (UTC)
Just curious, when will this change be valable without having to use SVN? I can't get my head around it. Great job guys! §hep • ¡Talk to me! 20:41, 15 October 2008 (UTC)
Next AWB release, or grab it from a SVN snapshot =) —Reedy 20:52, 15 October 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the snapshot, didn't realize it's been updated. §hep • ¡Talk to me! 21:07, 15 October 2008 (UTC)

Thanks Reedy, for the prompt investigation and fix. I tested the SVN.It is working fine -- Tinu Cherian - 04:54, 16 October 2008 (UTC)

Cleaning up unneeded piped redirects with AWB

Would anyone mind taking a look at this section on my talk page and letting me know there what they think? Thank you! :) rootology (C)(T) 13:11, 13 October 2008 (UTC)

There has recently been a discussion about this kind of tidy up at Wikipedia_talk:Only make links that are relevant to the context#Geographic example. The consensus was that simplifying, for example [[Troy, New York|Troy]], [[New York]] to [[Troy, New York]] is the right thing to do. However, this particular case is complicated by the fact that the Seattle article is one of the very small number of articles on US cities that isn't named in the standard form city, state. (Chicago and Philadelphia are the only other examples I'm aware of.) If you were making some more substantive change to the article at the same time, it would be OK to also convert [[Seattle, Washington]] to [[Seattle]], [[Washington]], but it's not worthwhile enough to be done as a freestanding edit. Whichever way it's linked, the reader can easily access the articles on the city (directly) or the state (via the city article), so there's no significant benefit. Colonies Chris (talk) 12:20, 14 October 2008 (UTC)

Regex help

I was wondering if someone would have any free time to help me with a regex. I'm currently using find and replaces, but my thinking is a regex would be cleaner? Anyways what I'm trying to do is assess a group of articles as low importance for one WikiProject banner. The possible banner names are OH-Project|WikiProject Ohio|WPOHIO|Wikiproject Ohio|WPOH, within that template if there is importance=low, then it skips. If importance=mid or high replace it with low, and if there is no importance parameter add |importance=low. Is this even possible, if you can do it I'm in absolutely no rush and wouldn't even be able to start the run until Saturday earliest anyways. I'd really appreciate the help, I feel like I ask for it a lot here. §hep • ¡Talk to me! 21:22, 15 October 2008 (UTC)

Post a little more info (with a couple of examples) on my talk page within 9 hours of this reply and I should be able to get something to you within 4 hours of that. If not, I'm away for the weekend so can help you, but not until late Monday. Rjwilmsi 22:59, 16 October 2008 (UTC)
Thanks! I hope if posted enough info on your talk. §hep • ¡Talk to me! 23:17, 16 October 2008 (UTC)

Removal of rights

User:OOODDD seems to do nothing but cause chaos with their AWB privleges. I have 2 other editors that will vouch that he abuses the tool and should not have access to it. §hep • ¡Talk to me! 02:50, 16 October 2008 (UTC)

I've removed his AWB access because history of his talk page shows numerous complaints about his tagings, and that he blanked them all. This is only a temporary measure, I'm waiting for detailed comments from all interested parties. MaxSem(Han shot first!) 04:58, 16 October 2008 (UTC)
Seems he blanked your message. §hep • ¡Talk to me! 22:16, 16 October 2008 (UTC)

Problem with logging

I've just updated my AWB to 4.4.1.0 version but unfortunately I cannot log in Polish Wikipedia at all. In the previous version (4.4.0.0) I had no problems with it. Now when I type login/password and try to press "Zaloguj" (Log in) nothing happens and the status of AWB is "Software disabled"?! (my os is vista). Regards, Patrol110 (talk) 08:05, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

I've sloved my problem, but I encountered another one, just have a look at screenshot. Btw, do you mind moving your project under free Gecko engine instead of f*** IE? Regards, Patrol110 (talk) 17:29, 19 October 2008 (UTC)
Sometimes it does that. Needs looking at. Should be already improved for next release. Try pressing the start button on the start tab, should enable it. As for the gecko comment, it might be possible, but if we have to start shipping loads of extra libraries to go with it..... We dont actually "use" the IE one. We use a browser from the .NET framework which is IE based. Hopefully, when some more of the API bugs get fixed up, we will be less dependent on the browser, as we shall be moving to the edit api. —Reedy 17:58, 19 October 2008 (UTC)
Thanks for answer! Now AWB works properly so that you are right I suppose :) Regards, Patrol110 (talk) 19:10, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

Images

Why are they no images?. Please add them. Without them it looks so dull :). --SkyWalker (talk) 14:51, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

Mono Compatibility

See here for current issues affecting AWB working successfully on mono.

Thanks

—Reedy 17:01, 21 October 2008 (UTC)

Additions to AWB suggestions

Don't know if this is the place for proposals (please educate me), but here goes anyway: I believe consecutive wikilinks, which should be avoided per MOS:LINK, should be added to the AWB suggestions. Everyme 10:34, 25 October 2008 (UTC)

You're welcome to add feature requests on the feature requests page. Please make it clear what you want, provide examples and link to Wikipedia manual/policy pages supporting the concept. Thanks Rjwilmsi 10:47, 25 October 2008 (UTC)

Using the tool for inconsequential/minor edits (date delinking)

Hey, I've removed the access to the tool of two users now for making excessive inconsequential edits (of this sort). In addition, looking at a recent BRFA, whether their task should be done at all seems to be rather debated, so I would class this as controversial use of the tool. Fyi :) Martinp23 12:25, 23 October 2008 (UTC)

They only seem to be doing what User:Lightbot is doing Gnevin (talk) 13:09, 23 October 2008 (UTC)
The approval for that task was also revoked. –xeno (talk) 13:11, 23 October 2008 (UTC)
Colonies Chris is using AWB to make the same kinds of controversial edits as the users whose AWB access was removed. Tennis expert (talk) 22:52, 26 October 2008 (UTC)
Could you point which edits exactly aren't needed? For example, here he changes things per MOS, and here he adds diacritics, which is also a good things. MaxSem(Han shot first!) 04:04, 27 October 2008 (UTC)
I'm confused about why "Italy" was delinked in [17]. --NE2 04:14, 27 October 2008 (UTC)
For example, Colonies Chris is deleting links to certain (but not all) countries, links to dates, and links to cities. These are the same kinds of deletions that other editors were doing before their AWB rights were revoked. Tennis expert (talk) 06:05, 27 October 2008 (UTC)
TennisExpert (who has not had the courtesy to tell me he was posting against me here) is not happy that I've been adding diacritics, despite the fact that I've been working within the consensus agreed within WikiProject Tennis (see my talk page for a discussion on the subject), and he's therefore trying to attack me via this page. All my edits are significant and in line with the MoS. Colonies Chris (talk) 08:55, 27 October 2008 (UTC)
Why did you delink Italy, and why did you create an "easter egg" link to Salvador, Bahia? --NE2 09:16, 27 October 2008 (UTC)
I delinked Italy in line with WP:CONTEXT#What generally should not be linked
"Items that would be familiar to most readers of the article, such as the names of major geographic features and locations, historical events, religions, languages, and common professions"
And I corrected Bahia because it links to the the state of Brazil by that name, but clearly what's meant in that context is the city formerly known as Bahia but now called Salvador, Bahia. Colonies Chris (talk) 09:56, 27 October 2008 (UTC)
OK - I understand the Bahia link, and it does appear that that was correct. But why did you leave Brazil linked? Isn't it a "major geographic location"? Where does the line get drawn? Should every country be delinked, or only European and English-speaking ones? --NE2 11:18, 27 October 2008 (UTC)
Yes, I probably should have unlinked that too, though no doubt someone would have objected if I had. But this isn't the place to debate that kind of detail. Colonies Chris (talk) 11:31, 27 October 2008 (UTC)
You're (Colonies Chris) obviously too busy doing hundreds (thousands?) of inconsequential/minor edits with AWB to check-out the facts before posting here. If you had, you would have seen that I have not objected to the diacritics you have been adding. And I have not "attacked" you. Geez. Tennis expert (talk) 18:33, 27 October 2008 (UTC)
This is just the kind of abuse and misrepresentation that other editors of tennis articles have had to put up with for a long time. You have a record of edit warring over diacritics and links and of refusing to accept any changes that you personally don't like, even though they're in line with the Manual of Style, while claiming it's because there's "no consensus", even though no other editor will come forward support your view. You had not even the basic courtesy to tell me you were posting against me here. Were you hoping to get me blocked without my even knowing it was being discussed? I've made tens of thousands of edits and not one of them was inconsequential, with AWB or any other way. Colonies Chris (talk) 20:16, 27 October 2008 (UTC)
I am interested in your use of AWB being treated in the same way that the use of AWB by other editors to make similar edits is treated. It's as simple as that. I regret that you're treating this as discourteous or an attack. Tennis expert (talk) 22:07, 27 October 2008 (UTC)
I think the participants in this discussion should be aware that you have been reversing many of my delinkings of dates and common terms, in direct contravention of the manual of style. You are clearly determined to have things your own way regardless of consensus, and therefore your views should have no credibility in this forum. Colonies Chris (talk) 11:54, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

Colonies Chris is doing good work by improving the signal to noise ratio of links. There seems to be a worrying trend here. People that don't like implementation of MOS guidance are misusing the phrase 'minor and inconsequential edits'. Something cannot simultaneously be:

  • inconsequential
  • controversial
  • too important to build into 'general fixes'

You can pick any one but you can't have two. Lightmouse (talk) 10:29, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

Let me say that Colonies Chris is a meticulous editor and bot-manager who has a fine track-record of fixing not just trivial links and dates, but typos, misspellings (particularly when it comes to non-English-language items) and the more subtle problems in links he encounters that would elude most editors. He is an important asset to the project and has been working away in the background for some years tightening up these aspects of articles. "Italy" should usually be delinked (see WP:CONTEXT).

I note that User:Tennis expert has had numerous squabbles with his WikiProject colleagues on the issue of diacritics and trivial linking, and has taken it upon himself to doggedly undo the good work of others and, on occasions, to confront them in uncompromising terms (ask User:The Rambling Man).

I do not understand the seemingly aggressive approach by some sysops to the use of AWBs to assist WP's editors at large in the massive task of bringing their articles into compliance with our style guides. I would be much more comfortable if the blockings we have witnessed recently were applied as a last resort after debate and clear communication, not as a first-resort expedient in the absence of any form of natural justice. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Tony1 (talk • contribs) 11:40, October 27, 2008 (UTC)

If Colonies Chris is doing a typo fix (including, I suppose, adding a diacritic if the consensus is that the absence is a spelling error)) on every edit then it's not a minor and inconsequential edit. Simply delinking is considered minor and inconsequential and (under the current policy) AWB should not be used for this task. –xeno (talk) 12:37, 27 October 2008 (UTC)
I always unlink etc, in combination with other fixes, but I don't agree at all that this sort of unlinking is inconsequential - articles are improved for having a clutter of valueless links removed. The AWB rule against inconsequential edits quite clearly had in mind the sort of change that's merely obsessive neatness but doesn't bring any visible benefit to the article (alphabetising the categories, for example), and it's being misused to attack editors who are actively improving WP by bringing it into line with its own Manual of Style - the edits that got Lightmouse and Closedmouth into trouble are not inconsequential, they are beneficial.
And I'll also note that one editor has accused me of acting 'nefariously' by performing spelling corrections and date unlinking in a single edit (he felt I should have done them separately). But of course, if I had, I'd now be in danger of being hauled up before the AWB police - or is this just a one-man campaign by Martinp23?. Colonies Chris (talk) 13:05, 27 October 2008 (UTC)
Sorry, I should have said "Martinp23 and his sidekick xeno". It's your opinion that unlinking dates is 'minor and inconsequential', but it's not mine, nor that of many other editors, and it clearly is not what the AWB rule had in mind. And by the way, this page is WT:AWB. Colonies Chris (talk) 13:20, 27 October 2008 (UTC)
Yes, I was confused as to where we were, and removed my comment. Anyhow, I'd appreciate if you'd AGF and cut out the petty name calling. Present consensus is that these edits are considered minor/inconsequential. –xeno (talk) 13:34, 27 October 2008 (UTC)
Xeno I disagree. I don't see clear consensus of the triviality of these 'delinking' edits beyond the opinion of yourself and Martinp23. I think these edits are of consequence and value, in compliance to the style guides, so must be allowed to continue using AWB (or indeed any other way). To block users from making such edits would first require a significant change to WP:CONTEXT and WP:DATE. To have blocked users' access to AWB before this discussion was inappropriate, per Tony1's comment. Note, any concern over lack of consensus over date delinking is a MOS/WP:DATE issue, not an AWB one, and secondly AWB is not just a tool for fixing typos. Rjwilmsi 13:56, 27 October 2008 (UTC)
See also this recently denied BRFA: Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Cleanbot which has more discussion on this. –xeno (talk) 15:34, 27 October 2008 (UTC)
  • (outdetn) Xeno, can you point to evidence of this "present consensus", please? On logical grounds, it's an intriguing mystery to me. Are you sure it's not just the opinion of you and your friend Martinp23? I'd like to see this assertion fully justified and evidenced, since it's a major claim. We need to be very careful at this point that justice is seen to be done. I note that administrators are bound by a clear policy that proscribes any admin action in which the admininstrator has a personal stake. This is related to the requirement to avoid a real or apparent conflict of interest. I'd like to be assured that this policy is being observed in any case in which AWB access or usage with respect to style-guide adherence is at issue. It's a critical point. Tony (talk) 13:59, 27 October 2008 (UTC)
Sure, just look through the archives of this page or the numerous times that these types of edits have been discussed at AN/I (i.e. [18]). –xeno (talk) 14:10, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

Lots of discussion, but no evidence of consensus that delinking is trivial. If you don't agree with implementing the MOS, just say so. Lightmouse (talk) 14:27, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

Again, conflating the issue. Enable typo fix -> Skip if no typo fixed -> Check every edit. Or have a bot approved for this task. This is not about the MOS, this is about AWB. –xeno (talk) 14:31, 27 October 2008 (UTC)
Is my eyesight that poor? I'm having a great deal of difficulty in locating exactly where this "consensus" is in the link that Xeno provided just above in support of his/her assertion that there is a "present consensus". Can you point out exactly where it is on that page (or elsewhere, if you mistakenly pasted in the wrong link), and I'd be grateful. In addition, please note the official policy concerning the requirement that administrators give "appropriate (as guided by Wikipedia's policies and guidelines) warnings prior to [and after] their actions". It does not appear that appropriate communication occurred before the blocking of Lightmouse's access to the AWB facility, for example, if several people here are still flumoxed by the lack of logic in the assertion that some edits in question are "inconsequential" (or aren't—my head is spinning). The lack of communication and the fog surrounding the claimed "present consensus" suggests that actions are being justified on the hop, although I'm quite ready to be convinced otherwise. Tony (talk) 14:57, 27 October 2008 (UTC)
Consensus has existed for quite some time that minor and inconsequential edits should not be the sole purpose of one's AWB edits. Your line of reasoning however, seems to center around the characterization of date delinking as a minor and inconsequential edit. While I see this as self-evident, perhaps you do not? A straw poll, then? –xeno (talk) 15:29, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

The whole purpose of AWB is to support small edits. The 'minor and inconsequential' edits rule was put there to avoid server burden for edits that are not noticeable like removing double spaces. It wasn't put there to permit one editor to stop another editor from carrying out good work. That is just abuse of power. Lightmouse (talk) 14:51, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

  • Sorry, one more point: I'm most concerned to see that when placing Lightmouse on a list of "blacklisted unsernames", User:Martinp23 has used the term "ban" rather than "block", which carries a quite different meaning and appears to be inconsistent with the remainder of the edit summary ("ban lightmouse, for now"). I wonder whether this can be explained. Tony (talk) 15:04, 27 October 2008 (UTC)
    • While I don't want to speak for Martinp23, I believe the reason was because Lightmouse had his access removed, did not address the issue for the removal, and then quietly re-requested access without seeking approval from the person who removed his access (then continued to make the "minor/inconsequential" edits presently under discussion). Thus, I gather he was placed on the banlist to prevent this from re-occuring. –xeno (talk) 15:27, 27 October 2008 (UTC)
Was this explained and discussed with LM or anyone else at the time? It seems like an arbitrary process in which such decisions could be wide open to abuse. The communication issue is just one. Tony (talk) 15:48, 27 October 2008 (UTC)
It is clear that a number of people here do not see any logic in this assertion. Indeed, my reading of what has been going on suggests that the charge has been trumped up on the basis of a pre-existing rule that was not created for anything like this purpose. It is important that this issue be resolved without delay—I'd have thought pure logic and a reading of the intent of the "inconsequential" rule would be enough to dispell such use of it; otherwise, it will be possible using this precedent at a whim to classify as "inconsequential" a large range of edits that spare editors the manual labour of complying with the style guides. It's clearly open to abuse. Tony (talk) 15:38, 27 October 2008 (UTC)
As suggested above perhaps the next step would be a straw poll to determine if this date delinking is something that is or is not covered under the minor/inconsequential edit umbrella. –xeno (talk) 15:50, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

Inconsequential/minor edits (Date delinking) break 1

Yes, date unlinking is of consequence

  1. date/common term delinking is of consequence, so is a valid use of AWB on its own. Rjwilmsi 21:10, 27 October 2008 (UTC)
  2. NuclearWarfare contact meMy work 00:45, 28 October 2008 (UTC)
  3. Lightmouse (talk) 10:57, 28 October 2008 (UTC) Date delinking is a valid use of AWB.
  4. Yes, date and common term delinking are consequential and beneficial uses of AWB. Colonies Chris (talk) 11:49, 28 October 2008 (UTC)
  5. The delinking of dates, other chronological terms, and common terms that most English-speakers are likely to be familiar with is of great consequence, since it significantly improves the workings of our wikilink facility through reducing the dilution of high-value links. The task appears to be ideally suited to AWB application, and it is proper that editors be spared the manual labour of complying with such important requirements of the style guides. Tony (talk) 13:12, 28 October 2008 (UTC)
  6. Looking at the examples given of "inconsequential" edits (removing whitespace etc. – all things that would be barely noticeable to readers of articles), delinking certainly doesn't seem to fall into that category.--Kotniski (talk) 14:58, 28 October 2008 (UTC)
  7. Yes, the delinking of dates is a consequential and beneficial use of AWB. It helps to apply the style guidelines and improves the linking system. The delinking of common terms, however, should be a bit more selective; how can one draw the line of common country names past the globally known countries. I suggest a more organized approach to how we delink these sometimes-valuable-when-linked terms. Dabomb87 (talk) 00:33, 29 October 2008 (UTC)
  8. Gosh, yes. It's a large and laborious task absolutely suited to AWB. Those prepared to do it should be commended, not upbraided. --Dweller (talk) 15:06, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

No, date unlinking is an inconsequential edit

  1. If there is consensus for date unlinking it should only be done during other more necessary edits such as typo fixing. –xeno (talk) 12:27, 28 October 2008 (UTC)
    Per a discussion below, I would probably be agreeable to delinking via AWB if it also made the date formats in the article consistent, but absent inconsistencies or typos to be fixed I still don't think simply removing some square brackets is important enough for mass edits. –xeno (talk) 15:16, 30 October 2008 (UTC)
  2. Date delinking should be done only with other, more substantial edits, whether using AWB or not. Don't clog up watchlists with edits that are trivial. --Fabrictramp | talk to me 14:58, 28 October 2008 (UTC)
  3. There is no reason to use AWB for trivial matters such as the removal of date links alone. --Ckatzchatspy 17:18, 28 October 2008 (UTC)
  4. As per xeno. There appears to be a lack of consensus for this change anyways per talk at MOSNUM. —Locke Cole • t • c 12:46, 29 October 2008 (UTC)


I am rather busy in real life and other volunteer commitments at the moment, so probably won't pay much attention to this in future. I must say that I am quite bemused by the fact that certain users are referring to myself and xeno as some sort of clique. Given that I've never contacted the guy off-wiki and have never really considered him/her as "sidekick", I feel that those claiming that we are somehow in collusion are doing us all a disservice.

Moving on from that, I am quite glad that there's a bit of a discussion here, though I must say that the namecalling on both sites is tiresome, and people should perhaps grow up.

Moving on again, I'd like to say for the umpteenth time that I have no opinion on the issue of delinking dates, in and of itself. Anyone seeking to claim that I am biased and trying to obstruct the progress of consensus is sadly mistaken. As I have stated on three talk pages now, I believe (this specifically said to Tony1, who seems to be under the impression that I'm removing access without informing people at all, despite that fact that he has argued with me across many a talk page), access has been removed for making minor/inconsequential edits only with the tool. Now changing a link does fall under this category - however, this isn't to say that the task cannot be done at all. As I have suggested to a couple of users, it may be possible to have the change added as a general fix to AWB. Failing that, those users who wish to use their own regexen within AWB shouldn't, and needn't, make thee changes alone. A suggestion might be to run typo fixes at the same time, and not make the edit if no typos are fixed. Those arguing so vociferously for using AWB to make such changes might like to look at the reasons that CleanBot was rejected, resolve those issues, and enter a new bot request if they can which, with community consensus, could run with a bot flag to fix all articles.

An idea might be for those who wish to change all existing articles to comply with the MOS by making this relatively minor change to actually develop a community consensus for such an action. What I'm saying is that there doesn't appear to have been much joined up thinking about how to make the changes. A decent discussion on one of the village pumps, linked to from the admin noticeboards and so on, could use the community's brainpower to come up with a doctrine for how to remove these links in an appropriate way (there are all sorts of potential "false positives" which could be weeded out this way), and of course this would be in keeping with the idea of developing a transparent consensus (as opposed to, say, a discussion on an MOS subpage which people have got bored with and are now ignoring (and this happens all the time - I'm not intending to show any disrespect to the MOS editors and their methods)). With a clear set of instructions developped by the community, a sensible bot, or better regexen or scripts, might be able to be coded.

Going ahead making these edits without a proper discussion and really widespread careful thought is likely to be a recipe for disaster. Martinp23 18:59, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

  • I'm afraid that this "poll" above has turned to mush: people are confusing two issues—whether the removal of date autoformatting and trivial chronological links should be done by AWB, and whether they are "trivial/inconsequential" in the first place (see especially Ckatz, who has conflated both issues). Whether the actions in question are trivial is the only thing that matters in terms of this attempt to use pre-existing rules to subvert good work that some people here just [[WP:IDONTLIKEIT|don't like]. It's a farce. You have acted way beyond your admin functions, and I believe that you have breached more than one admin policy rule. Tony (talk) 01:43, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

As long as we're considering whether date/common term unlinking is 'inconsequential', let's consider a few more questions:

Is removing excessive and valueless links in articles inconsequential?
Is adding diacritics inconsequential?
Is formatting journal, book and album names in italics inconsequential?
Is standardising capitalisation of section headings inconsequential?

Because it seems to me that the argument of those opposed to delinking is that any change to an article whch brings it into compliance with the Manual of Style but doesn't change its factual content is 'inconsequential' and shouldn't be carried out via AWB. This is so patently absurd that I can only think that either people haven't thought this through, or that just possibly that they're trying to obstruct the implementation of a part of the MoS they don't like by blatantly misusing a rule that was meant for quite another purpose. Colonies Chris (talk) 09:12, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

These are all good questions. May I add that if the opposers are ready to use this term "inconsequential" in what appears to be an entirely cynical way, they should be equally ready to delineate the boundary between what is consequential and what is not. Without this, the term is open to abuse, and presumably no one here thinks that the system should not be perfectly transparent. Tony (talk) 09:36, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Indeed. AWB is good for edits of detail across many articles and not good for copyediting. Normal editing is the opposite. Thus AWB has a bias towards small edits. Lets be clear, small edits are not inherently bad and AWB users should not be told that they can't do good work because each edit is too small. The rule against trivial edits is only there because of technical constraints such as server capacity and monitor lists (Watchlist, Recent Changes). It was presumably chosen as being better than giving each user a maximum number of edits, or a time period. We mustn't let the tail wag the dog, server capacity is there to permit editing and we should keep performance issues in proportion. Amongst other things, AWB is here to support edits that:

  • (a) are visible in read mode
  • (b) are something that people care about
  • (c) move Wikipedia towards the MOS

If the rule stops AWB users from making small edits like those (by coercion or by self-censorship) then it is the rule that is wrong, not the edits and we need to think of another way of working within server capacity. Lightmouse (talk) 11:04, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

To User:Locke Cole: any disagreement about the appropriateness of date delinking means such edits can not be trivial by definition, so the issue isn't an AWB one, it's a MOS/WP:DATE one. Which way are you having it? Rjwilmsi 13:42, 29 October 2008 (UTC)
  • Trivial in terms of the MOS and trivial in terms of the net effect of an edit are two different things... They should not be confused. Another issue, if these date unlinking edits are allowed to go forward, is the fact that when users blitz through these articles unlinking dates they often leave it in an inconsistent state with many different types of date formatting strewn throughout. (See User talk:Colonies Chris/Archive/2008/Oct#Dates). This should be strongly discouraged: should these edits be allowed to go forward, users should be instructed that they must ensure consistency before moving onto the next article. Otherwise, it should be left in its current state. –xeno (talk) 13:49, 29 October 2008 (UTC)
  • But you're forgetting that our poor readers have had to put up with these raw inconsistencies for many years. Delinking but not ironing them out is not at all damaging the text for our readers, and the great benefit is that it will bring the inconsistencies to the attention of the article's editors rather than concealing it. Date autoformatting has, indeed, been largely responsible for the poor state of our date formats. Tony (talk) 14:09, 29 October 2008 (UTC)
    • So you're saying leaving the article in an inconsistent state for all readers is a good thing? I think it's just script users being lazy missing an opportunity. Go the distance, or don't bother. –xeno (talk) 14:21, 29 October 2008 (UTC)
      • I'm almost speechless at the attitude of Smjg (on my talk page) and xeno here. When the unlinking I do brings the problems with inconsistent date formats to their attention (key point - their attention - virtually every other user had been seeing the problem all the time) - they blame me, and even spend time coming here and trying to stop me and Lightmouse and others from sorting out the problems that the unlinking has made visible to them. Did it for one moment occur to you that you might help to fix the problems yourself instead of coming here accusing hard working editors of being lazy? I think readers of this discussion will now make up their minds about what sort of person xeno is, and how much respect his views should be accorded. Colonies Chris (talk) 14:43, 29 October 2008 (UTC)
        • So you think it's ok to "delink and run" leaving the article in an inconsistent state for everyone? I call that lazya missed opportunity: just my opinion. Who is going to clean up after you? Making the article consistent at the same time as unlinking only makes sense, otherwise once its unlinked, someone is going to have to write ANOTHER script to find the inconsistencies. –xeno (talk) 14:49, 29 October 2008 (UTC)
  • I operate a script in which those inconsistencies are (with the exception of the problematic ISO dates) made consistent; but I quite understand the reasonableness of running a bot through to wake up the editors to the fact that they've been mish-mashing the date formats for some time in their article, and that they now need to roll up their sleeves and make them right. Rather than treating Lightmouse and Colonies Chris as monsters from the jungle, why not conceive them as good samaritans who are promoting collaboration with local editors over date inconsistencies. After all, it's usually the local editors who put in the wrong formats, because the real formats behind the DA are concealed from them, and its' easy to forget. Without the DA toy, it's harder to get it wrong when subsequently inserting a date. As for the "lazy" accusation, the shoe doesn't fit on our feet, I'm afraid. We work jolly hard to improve this aspect of the project, and engage with editors where necessary. Again, I call on you (xeno) et al. to lend a hand: the script would be a good start, (it delinks trivial common terms too, if you like) and you can transclude it very easily into your own monobook. Just let me know if you wish; we could do with your support. Tony (talk) 15:23, 29 October 2008 (UTC)
    • I'd be happy to try it out, and as much as "Colonies Chris" doesn't like being called lazy, likewise I don't appreciate his usage of the terms "AWB police" and "sidekick" - a bit of a pot and kettle situation I'm afraid. Can't both scripts be integrated, so that the unlinking and the consistency checks are done simultaneously? This would achieve the double-duty of making the edits less inconsequential. –xeno (talk) 15:28, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Xeno, you said delinking is inconsequential. Now you are saying delinking leaves articles in an inconsistent state. The former is an AWB issue, the latter is an MOS issue. As Rjwilmsi says, make your mind up. If you want to work with us to improve date presentation, rather than against us, then we will welcome your help. I could even give you some of the code that I wrote to make date formats consistent using AWB. Lightmouse (talk) 15:48, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Date delinking alone is an inconsequential edit imo (in the AWB sense), but if it is done at the same time as making the articles consistent in their date formatting, I think we might be in agreeance that this is an "consequential" edit, allowable by AWB and (probably - my eyes bug out when I go over there) supported by MOSNUM. –xeno (talk) 15:52, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Comment: Would it be possible, under this new system, to hit "dmy" for a total switch to dmy, or the same for "mdy"? I would love such a thing, as otherwise I would have to do what I had been doing with LM's slow, less-automated javascript-based script. NuclearWarfare contact meMy work 22:53, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Indeed Somebody please move forward with this implementation, as I'm sure that's likely the best way to work through this. Doing typo fixing as well at the same time - even better. –xeno (talk) 22:56, 29 October 2008 (UTC)
Posted a feature request here. NuclearWarfare contact meMy work 23:00, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

I support the feature request. I also support an end to censorship of date delinking by incorrect application of a rule related to performance fears. Date delinking on its own either has consequences or it doesn't. Which is it? Lightmouse (talk) 11:11, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

I agree totally with Lightmouse. This is increasingly looking like slight of hand, this manipulation of the concept of "inconsequential" to suit some other agenda. The process must be transparent and, as an administrator, Martinp23 is bound to communicate properly before and after any decision that affects access to AWB. Justice must be seen to be done: that is basic, and there is suspicion that Lightmouse has been treated very unfairly. Please dispel this suspicion. Tony (talk)
Please try to AGF here: as far as I know Martin has no firm stance on the issue of delinking in-and-of-itself (neither do I, for that matter). This is simply an issue of using AWB for what can be reasonably construed as minor edits. It is not simply a PERF issue but also a RC clutter issue. –xeno (talk) 15:19, 30 October 2008 (UTC)
The whole point of AWB is to make it easier to perform repetitive minor edits. This 'issue' of RC clutter is a nonsense. I frequently discover a spelling error and go through dozens of articles fixing that error - and frequently that will involve changing just one character in an entire article. Are you telling me I shouldn't do this because it clutters up people's watchlists? What about when I disambiguate a term - I usually work through all the articles that link to the term - shouldn't I be doing that either? Perhaps you think we should we have a warehouse somewhere where we can store up all these minor edits until there's enough of them to justify performing an update on an article? Colonies Chris (talk) 12:35, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

You are restating your belief that date delinking is inconsequential. Are you also foregoing your belief that date delinking has consequences? You can't have it both ways. If we can't make progress on this doublespeak, perhaps we need to go to ANI. Lightmouse (talk) 16:43, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

You can continue to tie me up in semantical arguments rather than helping things move forward if you wish, I stand by the assertion that simply removing some square brackets is "minor and inconsequential" in terms of the AWB rule against these types of edits. –xeno (talk) 17:01, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

You are not the victim here, the victims are AWB users that are being censored. We have a right to challenge the words you use to justify censorship. You went further and stated "Present consensus is that these edits are considered minor/inconsequential." and asked for a straw poll which voted 8 to 4 against. Unless you have any other evidence, we can all move on to using AWB without censorship of date delinking. Lightmouse (talk) 17:34, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

I didn't remove your access. –xeno (talk) 17:55, 30 October 2008 (UTC)
But you seem to be ambivalent about the need to declare that the censorship was perpetrated on contrived grounds. As Lightmouse says, you can't have it both way. Tony (talk) 01:36, 31 October 2008 (UTC)
I don't think censorship is what occured here. A rule regarding making many very minor changes to articles using AWB was enforced. I think that in order for such edits to be acceptable they should be included with things such as making all the dates consistent, and typo fixing and the like - and not unlinking dates that may have some significance to the article. I'm sure if Lightmouse were willing to proceed with this in mind, Martin would be amenable to reinstating his access - as he has done for the others whose access was removed. Moving forward should be the goal. –xeno (talk) 01:54, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

Script

Special:Contributions/John - Is users doing it with a script any (better/worse)/different than it being done with AWB? Hmmm. Its going to have to be one way for all, not one way for one, and another for the rest —Reedy 20:01, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

Is it possible to get a list of pages that appear in multiple subcategories?

I would like a list of pages that appear in at least two subcategories of Category:Predecessors of North American railroads, like New York, Boston and Montreal Railway (which is in Category:Predecessors of the New York Central Railroad, Category:Predecessors of the New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad, and Category:Predecessors of the Rutland Railroad). I know that I can recurse one level to get a full list of articles, and any repeated ones will be in more than one, but is there any way to pull out those repeated ones? --NE2 03:59, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

Use the UNIX/Linux command uniq -d. Windows versions from here. Rjwilmsi 07:56, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Determine whether typo fixing enabled in external module?

For an enhancement to my external module I'd like to be able to know whether 'enable typo fixing' is checked in AWB. Is there a method I can call to get the answer? If no I will raise a feature request. Thanks Rjwilmsi 13:59, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

There is now - rev 3493.
if (Program.AWB.RegexTypoFix.Checked) 
{
}
That should do =) —Reedy 09:22, 29 October 2008 (UTC)
Error: 'AutoWikiBrowser.Program' is inaccessible due to its protection level
Error: 'AutoWikiBrowser.Program' does not contain a definition for 'AWB'
Unfortunately, not quite ;) I will update the module documentation with this once it's working - are there any other similar accessible properties (is property the right term) to document too? Thanks Rjwilmsi 18:15, 29 October 2008 (UTC)
Lol, should've really seen that coming (was quickly added before leaving for uni this morning). I've sorted it, but its causing the VB .NET module to not play nicely —Reedy 18:46, 29 October 2008 (UTC)
rev 3494. VB .NET module currently broken, looking into it —Reedy 18:57, 29 October 2008 (UTC)
Oh, and you can access anything that has been exposed in the plugin interfaces —Reedy 19:56, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

<--Thanks, now awb.RegexTypoFix.Checked is the right thing to use. Rjwilmsi 20:38, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

God knows, the VB.NET module works fine. Think my checkout/build had become borked —Reedy 22:13, 29 October 2008 (UTC)
Seems "Variables.MainForm" can be used in exactly the same way. Ahhh welll —Reedy 11:10, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

Request to lift the ban on Lightmouse for date delinking

Discussion brought from request for access page

Permission should probably be requested from the person that removed your access to prevent wheel-warring... –xeno (talk) 19:06, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Agree, there seems to have been some to-ing and fro-ing recently and we'd need to be sure that concerns leading to removal of the tool have been addressed. --Rodhullandemu 14:34, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

Fine by me. Can you say how/when these concerns will be addressed? There are many editors involved here. Lightmouse (talk) 15:36, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

Martinp's latest comment at WT:AWB seems to indicate he is not against you having the access as long as you ensure that date delinking is done alongside other edits: such as typo fixing, consistency fixes, etc. Would you be amenable to going forward with this in mind? –xeno (talk) 15:40, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

We are going round in circles. Either the rule to protect the servers and protect change lists was misapplied, or it was correctly applied. We have seen no evidence that it was correctly applied. We don't need to do typo fixes just to avoid confronting an uncomfortable fact that an administrator simply made a mistake. Lightmouse (talk) 16:30, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

Well then I would suggest you petition direction to Martin to have access reinstated as another administrator granting your access without your reassurance that you would address the concerns he raised would be wheel warring. –xeno (talk) 16:45, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

Has Lightmouse (or the bot) agreed not to make the same minor inconsequential edits that it was making previously? (Apologies if the user has and I've simply missed it.) I think there needs to be a clear understanding that if the bot or user continues to make the same edits that caused its access removal previously, it will almost certainly be blocked if the inconsequential edits continue. --MZMcBride (talk) 21:05, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

We are going round in circles. Either the rule to protect the servers and protect change lists was misapplied, or it was correctly applied. We have seen no evidence that it was correctly applied. If you have new evidence that the rule was correctly applied, please provide it or take this to ANI. Lightmouse (talk) 23:37, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

Inconsequential edits are a waste of resources, clog page histories, and in general are a bad idea. "General fixes" in AWB exists for a reason, and I don't really need to justify anything to you. Martinp and several others have explained this to you. And I don't see any admin willing to restore your AWB access, so you can agree to stop the inconsequential edits or you can simply not have AWB access. --MZMcBride (talk) 23:40, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

What makes you so sure they are inconsequential when other people say they aren't? Just so that we are clear, I would be delighted if this were included in 'general fixes' as you and Martinp23 have suggested. Lightmouse (talk) 01:08, 1 November 2008 (UTC)
You seem to have found a way around this anyways by using a Javascript based editor to automate your date delinking: here, here, and here are just some very recent examples (your contribs are literally filled with these senseless edits). —Locke Cole • t • c 01:43, 1 November 2008 (UTC)
I have no opinion on the header's issue one way or another. But Locke, you need to remember that the rest of us here as volunteers just as you are. If one user decides they want to edit articles so they conform to a section of the Mos, I wouldn't call them senseless. If Lightmouse was chnanging every instance of the word "the" to the word "teh" I would call that senseless. These edits, no matter how minor you may want to call them (PS we have a box to check if our edits are minor), are in no way senseless. I think every individuals edits need to be looked at the same as everyone elses. I don't call the edits of someone who typo fixes senseless, but typo correction is mentioned in the same MoS dates are mentioned in. Consistency is key. §hep • ¡Talk to me! 01:51, 1 November 2008 (UTC)
I'm sorry, it's just frustrating considering the ongoing discussion at WT:MOSNUM over whether dates should be unlinked or simply "deprecated" and this editor insists on pushing his view forward and editing hundreds of articles while he knows discussion and alternate possibilities are being discussed. —Locke Cole • t • c 02:00, 1 November 2008 (UTC)
Locke, that script has been around forever. If an editor decides he wants to enforce the MoS and convert all dates to one form, why shouldn't he? NuclearWarfare contact meMy work 01:57, 1 November 2008 (UTC)
WP:MOSNUM doesn't represent consensus at present, it represents what a handful of editors insist on pushing on the rest of the wiki. It wasn't discussed widely, and at least as many editors supported the change have turned up over the past two months to complain about these changes only to be ignored. This has nothing to do with AWB, but it's just interesting to note that he's continuing on despite being asked multiple times on his talk page to stop. —Locke Cole • t • c 02:00, 1 November 2008 (UTC)
Locke, please don't resort to the same old list of strategies to discredit our style guides. They are, in summary: (1) there was no consensus; and (2) MoS is run by a small band of extremists. You need to accept that the removal of DA has wide support at WP, and that the style guides have said for some time not to link date fragments. I suggest you confine your arguments about MoS to MoS, rather than attacking the rights of users to run AWBs to assist WPians to comply with MoS.
I'm surprised to see that MZMcBride et al. above are still talking under the assumption that the removal of DA and trivial links is "inconsequential". No one here has rebutted my stated suspicion that the pre-existing rule about inconsequential edits is being manipulated to suit someone's agenda. Tony (talk) 02:22, 1 November 2008 (UTC)
I need do nothing of the sort. The simple fact is this: twelve, yes twelve editors decided to impose their view of date autoformatting on the rest of Wikipedia (which has millions of visitors and tens of thousands of editors). That simply does not work. I've already tagged the relevant section of WP:MOSNUM as disputed. You need to realize that twelve editors never decide something as far reaching as this on something that everyone has expected to "just work" for the past five or so years. Now I've tried to get some reasonable compromise on WT:MOSNUM but proponents of date unlinking (who I guess have no problem with the autoformatting so much as the links) are either ignoring the attempt or carrying on like it's business as usual (e.g. - Lightmouse (talk · contribs)). This is unacceptable and disruptive. And it must stop. —Locke Cole • t • c 03:21, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

I have no objection to people saying that date delinking is inconsequential.
I have no objection to people saying that date delinking has consequences (positive or negative).
Lots of us object to the doublethink where both are said to be true.
We can avoid pursuing this circular debate by taking up the suggestion made by several people (e.g. Martinp23, MZMcBride, Magioladitis) whereby date delinking becomes included in 'general fixes'. Lightmouse (talk) 11:41, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

  • Locke Cole, date autoformatting and the linking of chronological items are two different concepts and practices, despite their unfortunate entanglement when DA was first pushed. Please calm down; I'm quite willing to discuss the matter with you, even though it's rather old news by now; but I feel your tone has become a little bossy. Tony (talk) 12:00, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

Based on discussion in #Inconsequential/minor edits (Date delinking) break 1 above, where majority supported the concept of date delinking being worthy of change by itself, I'm going to reinstate Lightmouse's access (did someone else lose their access in that quarrel, too?) tomorow, if there will be no compelling objections. I suggest all users who want to use AWB for date delinking to write somewhere a detailed explanation of their actions with links to consensus here and there, and to provide a link to this essay in their edit summaries. Of course, the more thigs you change in one edit, the better, so don't forget to enable genfixes and RETF while performing such tasks. However, changing some articles to comply with MOS and not changing some others just because they didn't have a typo in addition to other problems simply makes no sense. MaxSem(Han shot first!) 12:23, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

Note that by "unlinking" I mean unlinking, not something else, so people who also change date format for no good reason will immediately get a nice indefinite disapproval from me. Also, I'd like to remind every AWB user to respond in timely and civil manner to every concern raised. MaxSem(Han shot first!) 12:52, 1 November 2008 (UTC)
(moved from User talk:MaxSem
Hi Max—your decision to grant LM access again was excellent and just.
You raise the issue of DA removal via AWB. (I've been one of the key movers and shakers in convincing the community to dump DA a few months ago.) It's not simple; my use of Lightmouse's monobook script, which requires the article-by-article choice of format, has shown me that quite some skill is needed to delink and fix dates. Not the least complicated issue is the country-related one; and where this is not in question (say, "History of space travel"), it's a matter of quickly assessing which is the predominant format where, as so often, there are inconsistencies. I shudder to think of the average AWB user learning to do this, so if the function were ever to be added, I think it should be accessed by a separate button, and users asked to use it only if they know the MOSNUM rules and have read the "how to" guide that someone (probably me) would need to write for the purpose.
The alternative is to incorporate a quick and dirty facility for simply removing double square brackets, which will remove DA but leave inconsistencies and wrong global choices (e.g., US format for a British rock star, or international format for NASA – yes, that used to be the case for the NASA article; and articles where, say, a quarter of the dates are formatted one way and three-quarters the other). I think this is Lightmouse's preferences, which shows a certain practicality. It would at least force the point when editors suddenly see the little messes in their pet articles that their readers have had to put up with for a long time, and is more likely to prompt the editors to get off their backsides and manually correct the dates.
I do, BTW, run a service that's not much used (not yet, anyway) for editors to list articles that need a script-assisted date audit, here. AWB followed by script treatment where called for might be the way to go.
Or we could leave it for now.
Thanks again. Tony (talk) 13:08, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

Thanks, MaxSem. I don't think anyone else lost their access because other editors accepted constraints (such as abandoning date delinking if typos had not been done) in exchange for not being banned. It has hardly been mentioned here but my AWB scripts also amend units of measurement. I am supportive of general fixes and have done so for many of my edits. I haven't so far used retf. I am happy to use these AWB options on the basis that you suggest. I sometimes reformat dates in accordance with the MOS (e.g. going through a list of American singer articles and setting them to mdy, Australian singer articles get set to dmy) but sometimes I simply pull up a list and delink them without changing the format - I am not as concerned about format as other people are. I am happy to debate the details outside this thread. I support what Tony says in the previous comment. Lightmouse (talk) 13:29, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

New Edit Summary: I was wondering if someone could help me formulate a new edit summary that all of us who are doing to the date unlinking could pick up. So far, I have been using "[[WP:AWB/T|Typo fixing]], [[User:Tony1/Information on the removal of DA|date unlinking]] per [[wp:dates]] and other", but I was wondering if that could be improved. NuclearWarfare contact meMy work 20:55, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

  • I’m coming late to this venue but am familiar with the issues. At least I think I am. Bot-assisted delinking should continue. We registered editors with our date preferences set are insulated from what is going on with autoformatting. But our I.P. users are seeing a thorough mess. Any bot which can A) delink dates, and B) ensure date formats are consistent within an article and have month names consistently and properly spelled out in body text, is a good thing in my mind. The disadvantages of needing to go in later and re-link that rare date that ought to be linked (what should usually be limited to high-value year links in intrinsically historical articles) is far outweighed, in my opinion, by the virtues of fixing Wikipedia for our I.P. users. Greg L (talk) 21:02, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

MaxSem, you said you were going to reinstate Lightmouse’s AWB access unless there were "compelling objections". Here they are: (1) As evidenced in several ongoing discussions, there is no current consensus to delete existing date links. Therefore, regardless of whether deleting those links is "inconsequential" or "minor", using AWB to delete them without consensus would be very disruptive to the project. (2) Lightmouse’s recent request to use a BOT to delete existing date links was denied on October 22. The reasoning was, "As evidenced by this discussion, this is still far too controversial a task for a bot, there is no consensus outside of the MoS talk pages that date autoformatting should actively be removed rather than simply discouraged, and these edits are too minor for a bot to be worth the effort." (3) Your reinstatement of Lightmouse’s AWB access could be interpreted as "wheel warring". Tennis expert (talk) 08:36, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

Please stop wikilawyering, now. 1) then mark MOS:DATE as disputed and proceed to its talk page to have it clarified. "should not" means "bad", "bad" means "sofixit". This is not an AWB issue. 2) This is not about giving him an approval for fully automated editing. 3) Nonsense. Read WP:WHEEL to find out why. I'll just add that AWB usage is not covered by WP policies and there's nothing that can prevent me from making a special version that will ignore all checkpages in the world. This issue was thoroughly discussed above, the opponents of unlinking suggested a strawpoll, and the strawpoll ended with 2/ for allowing such edits. Seeing that you had nothing constructive to add to discussion, I've approved Lightmouse, and can only advise you not to kick the dead horse. Not everything in this world go on as we like, sometimes it's wiser to accept this. MaxSem(Han shot first!) 08:52, 2 November 2008 (UTC)
(1) Your aggressive and condescending attitude is regrettable. (2) As for WP:WHEEL, here is exactly what it says: "A wheel war is a struggle between two or more administrators in which they undo one another's administrative actions...." Please explain why your approval of Lightmouse does not violate this restriction. (3) As for your surprising statement that "AWB usage is not covered by WP policies", please explain what supports the statement. (4) I have no idea what you mean by, "[T]here's nothing that can prevent me from making a special version that will ignore all checkpages in the world." (5) Only one person, xeno, requested a straw poll, and the results from that poll hardly support your action. (6) "Nothing constructive to add to discussion", huh. You are the one who requested us to post our "compelling objections". I did so. You ignored them without a logical explanation. It appears that you are the one making unconstructive contributions. Tennis expert (talk) 00:25, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

AWB access

I was wondering if I could appeal to have my ban lifted. OOODDD (talk) 19:06, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

Here is the discussion that was archived:

User:OOODDD seems to do nothing but cause chaos with their AWB privleges. I have 2 other editors that will vouch that he abuses the tool and should not have access to it. §hep • ¡Talk to me! 02:50, 16 October 2008 (UTC)

I've removed his AWB access because history of his talk page shows numerous complaints about his tagings, and that he blanked them all. This is only a temporary measure, I'm waiting for detailed comments from all interested parties. MaxSem(Han shot first!) 04:58, 16 October 2008 (UTC)
Seems he blanked your message. §hep • ¡Talk to me! 22:16, 16 October 2008 (UTC)
This is all about your typical responses to concerns about your usage of AWB, which include nothing but silent archival without a slightest attempt to respond or fix the mess you've created: [19][20][21][22][23] That's not exactly the behaviour we expect from a responsible AWB user. MaxSem(Han shot first!) 07:48, 2 November 2008 (UTC)
I personally haven't seen anything to support you getting access rights back. §hep • ¡Talk to me! 16:27, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

There is a difference between "making a mess" and disagreeing with another user's edits. In this case, there is only two editors who strongly disagreed with my edits. I was not going to revert my edits just simply because one lone editor disliked my edits. OOODDD (talk) 23:51, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

See where it says in large black letters Don't do anything controversial with it? Means what it says. If you're using AWB to make edits that there's a possibility of someone disagreeing with (aside from when you're indisputably in the right, such as correcting "jewelery" which always leads to 'but that's the correct spelling' protests from people who don't bother checking the dictionary), you don't seem to understand what it's for. – iridescent 23:57, 2 November 2008 (UTC)
I find this attitude (I was not going to revert my edits just simply because one lone editor disliked my edits) simply appalling. First of all, there is this graveyard of unanswered messages (so the problem goes far beyond simple misunderstanding of AWB guidelines; in fact, I had a misfortune to ask this user something else in the past just to be ignored as anyone else). Second, even if you are not going to undo what you've done, you are expected to at least acknowledge the inquiry. Third, none of the two most recent AWB-related inquiries were from the editors who "disliked" your edits; they merely pointed out that you had not correctly judged the needs of the projects for which you placed the tags. It was your full right to disagree with those assessments, but, again, you had to either explain why you don't believe the problems had to be fixed or to fix them (it was you who created this mess in the first place!). How would you like me coming into your house to re-arrange all your furniture because I feel that I know a better way to place it? Would you be happy to waste two hours putting everything back after I leave? This situation is no different—you are tagging the articles as you see fit, holding the opinions of the members of the actual wikiprojects in utter disregard. If a wikiproject does not want categories tagged, how is going ahead and tagging them anyway (and then silently refusing to restore the order) not "making a mess"? If, as you claim, you disagree with the wikiproject's practices, how about going to their talkpage and asking them just why the hell do they not want the categories tagged? Maybe they have a good reason not to, or maybe you are right, and they simply overlooked a useful practice. Either way, you need to talk before you shoot; you can't assume you know everything better than everyone else. Until you understand that, I will oppose allowing you access to any kind of automated editing tools, not just to AWB.—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); 16:35, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

Featured article template position

I have a question about using the AWB program on the Swedish wiki. With general fixes applied it insists on moving the {{UA}} template (equivalent of the english {{Link FA}}) before the categories. Is there any way I can fix this so they are placed between the stub templates categories and the iw-links as they should be? Njaelkies Lea (talk) 17:38, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

If what you say is correct then you've found a bug in AWB, so please post a bug report on the bugs page. Thanks Rjwilmsi 18:47, 3 November 2008 (UTC)
Ok, I thought maybe it was something I could set myself, I'll post it in the bugs page. Thanks. Njaelkies Lea (talk) 10:56, 4 November 2008 (UTC)
Will ask though of a possible namechange on svwiki first as I imagine all sorts of bots have a problem with this, I'll return with a bug report if unsuccesful. Njaelkies Lea (talk) 11:31, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Special Pages question

Used to be you could load a list of 500 or so newpages with AWB for cleanup etc. I haven't done this for some time, but when I tried to generate such a list through Make from: special page, I can't find a way to get new pages. Nor can I find anything in the help file or the archives. Was this taken out intentionally, or is there a trick to doing it now?--Fabrictramp | talk to me 17:09, 8 November 2008 (UTC)

Sheesh, just answered my own question. It's not under special pages anymore, it has its own section. Doh!--Fabrictramp | talk to me 17:16, 8 November 2008 (UTC)

Use it for unlinking in specific cases

Can I use AWB to unlink the years in date articles (January 1, etc.) as discussed here? Even though it is under the heading WP:MOSDATE, the reason for unlinking really doesn't have anything to do with that MOS discussion except that it would reduce a lot of unnecessary overlinking. I would be unlinking years like (d. [[1990]]) and nothing else. -- Mufka (u) (t) (c) 14:37, 13 November 2008 (UTC)

Another Regex/Module question

I was wondering if you gurus could help me out? What I want is for AWB to skip an article if it doesn't contain:
| image = NAME.(JPG/jpg)
Where there could be any numer of spaces between | and image, image and =, and = and NAME.jpg/JPG. Is this possible? Thanks. §hep • ¡Talk to me! 17:02, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

You can use \s* or \s+ or " *" or " +" (without the ""). + is 1 to unlimited, * is 1 to unlimited.
So, |\s*image\s*=\s*NAME.(JPG/jpg)
—Reedy 17:05, 14 November 2008 (UTC)
Wow, I need to pick up a book or something. Thanks! §hep • ¡Talk to me! 17:08, 14 November 2008 (UTC)
Sorry, I think I might have done something wrong with my request. I didn't mean "(JPG/jpg)" that was supposed to represent that it either has .JPG or .jpg . And NAME was supposed to represent any set of characters. Does that make sense? §hep • ¡Talk to me! 17:16, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

My first attempt would be to put this in the 'Doesn't contain' field and make sure you tick 'Regular expressions': 

(?i:\|\s*image\s*=\s*[^\s]+\.jpg)

That will work for any NAME that does not contain a space character. I think there are jpg names that contain space characters but I am not sure. If so, I can't think of a way of handling a NAME that contains a space character. Somebody else can confirm it. Lightmouse (talk) 17:22, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

Probably I'd just use this. Rjwilmsi 17:46, 14 November 2008 (UTC) 

(?si)\s*\|\s*image\s*=\s*[^\|}]+?\.jpe?g
What does the 's' in '(?si)' do? Lightmouse (talk) 17:50, 14 November 2008 (UTC)
s=Single line, i=Ignore case, m=Multiline, u=Unicode aware (\w match all alphabets) or that's how it atleast works in python. — Dispenser 18:00, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

And is there a reason for the question mark after the plus symbol? Lightmouse (talk) 17:52, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

I guess this is for a script to update the WikiProject Bird project banner to accurately indicate if there is a photograph of a bird (almost always the first photographs go in the infobox), and also to do count totals. Over 10,000 pages in the WPBirds WikiProject. see also: Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Birds#Needs-photo often missing for discussion. I thought this would be easy. Snowman (talk) 17:59, 14 November 2008 (UTC)
Rjwilmsi, your code work's great. Thank you. §hep • ¡Talk to me! 18:05, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

The regexp manual does seem to be lacking here, should improve. — Dispenser 20:03, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

I've found a big problem...

...and have posted a new task at Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser/Tasks, in need of somebody to solve it. The Transhumanist    01:06, 17 November 2008 (UTC)

Naming of notes

The bot is naming notes in an utterly ridiculous fashion. For example, in the above diff, it named a note "Qtd." because the abbreviation for "Quoted" was the first word in the note. In this article the mass of different choices is staggering. If I went back to work on this article, I would be entirely confused. Please compared the names with the other notes as well. The system makes no sense and will only make editing more confusing. Awadewit (talk) 18:59, 22 November 2008 (UTC)

I'd suggest speaking with the editor who made these changes, as far as I can tell this isn't something that comes standard with AWB. §hep • ¡Talk to me! 19:23, 22 November 2008 (UTC)
Thanks. I'll do that. Awadewit (talk) 19:31, 22 November 2008 (UTC)

skip pull down panel

This panel seems to only let me skip articles based on one word or phrase. How can I skip articles based on 10 or words, such as English, Canada, British, etc. Thanks Hmains (talk) 19:02, 22 November 2008 (UTC)

Click the Regular expressions box, then put in something similar to (English|Canadian|British). I think that should work, if it's wrong someone here will definitely chime in. Hope that helps! §hep • ¡Talk to me! 19:16, 22 November 2008 (UTC)
This works just fine. Thanks Hmains (talk) 19:49, 22 November 2008 (UTC)

deleting list items

Prior to the latest version of AWB, on the 'make a list' section of the main panel, there was a button to delete all remaining items in the list. This was very useful, but it has now disappeared. This forces me to go to the filter panel to remove everything, but this loses my current filter settings. Any other way to mass delete the list? Thanks Hmains (talk) 19:11, 22 November 2008 (UTC)

Right-click the list, select Remove, then select All. §hep • ¡Talk to me! 19:17, 22 November 2008 (UTC)
This works just fine. Thanks Hmains (talk) 19:48, 22 November 2008 (UTC)

?

Hi! According to WP:Stub: "It is usually desirable to leave two blank lines between the first stub template and whatever precedes it." But the general fixes of AWB gave only one line and put the stubies between the cats and the iw. Kind regards Doma-w (talk) 22:51, 22 November 2008 (UTC)

That's the correct spot for stub tags. The reason for the extra lines is just to put the stub category last in the list; they should not go after iw's. It always adds 2 lines when I do stub tags, do you have a diff? §hep • ¡Talk to me! 22:52, 22 November 2008 (UTC)
All the (unnecessary) edits done by User:Yobot as "substituting BD" gave only one line. E.g.: [24] Kind regards Doma-w (talk) 22:57, 22 November 2008 (UTC)
I ran a general fix on the page diff and the issue was fixed. What appears to have happened is that the botop didn't have the general fixes set. §hep • ¡Talk to me! 23:42, 22 November 2008 (UTC)
Or that it's only possible to run AWB general fixes before the bot's own script/replacements. Rjwilmsi 23:58, 22 November 2008 (UTC)

I asked the user why there is only one line and he answered : "About the lines before the stubs, I think you have to report it to WP:AWB. I am just using the general fixes of AWB." See here: [25] Kind regards Doma-w (talk) 08:59, 23 November 2008 (UTC)

I don't see how, unless his custom mod is overriding the general fixes. A gen fix above shows what AWB normally does. Devs? §hep • ¡Talk to me! 01:35, 25 November 2008 (UTC)

Running two instances with different usernames

I used to be able to run two instances with different usernames. That feature doesn't seem to work now. Is it just me? Lightmouse (talk) 11:39, 23 November 2008 (UTC)

Making list

I wish to create a list of pages to process using an user page, but if I insert in the Make list window a page like User:Tizio, AWB don't recognize it and don't create any list, or delete the entry if I put it near "+" symbol. What can I do? Thanks 85.18.66.24 (talk) 18:37, 24 November 2008 (UTC)

Have you selected the correct source? And then put it into the pages text box then clicked make list? —Reedy 22:46, 24 November 2008 (UTC)
I've forgot to say that the source is a subpage, like User:Tizio/Sandbox, and I want to do some tests with AWB on subpages also --85.18.66.24 (talk) 23:34, 24 November 2008 (UTC)
Try this: In the dropdown for Source select Special Page, click Make List, set the source to All pages with prefix (Prefixfinder), for Pages: put Tizio, for Namespace select User. That should generate 24 user subpages. Hope that helps. §hep • ¡Talk to me! 06:41, 28 November 2008 (UTC)

Renaming redirects doesn't work as it used to

I've used AWB to rename redirects in the past without any problems. What I want to achieve is simple: Some redirects point to page X, but they should point to page Y instead. Now, what I get is this:

  1. make list from redirects to Frost-free. This will produce a list like beginning with No frost.
  2. click the Normal Settings button and add the replacement from "Frost-free" to "Auto-defrost"
  3. press start

The first page AWB displays is No frost, but that doesn't get changed. Instead, AWB jumps right away to page Auto-defrost (even though it wasn't in the list) and tries to edit that. (It can't be in the list, since it isn't a redirect page).

I'm leaving this as is so that other people can reproduce the issue, but obviously I can't leave it in this half-baked state for much longer. I don't know if this is simply a bug, or some new "feature"; I really prefer the old way it simply worked; but for now, if someone could explain how to do the simple change of redirects with AWB, that would help already. Thanks! — Sebastian 06:40, 28 November 2008 (UTC)

You need to tell AWB not to follow redirects. Cant remember where it is atm, as dont have a copy to hand, hopefully someone who has, can help you out easily enough with it. —Reedy 10:05, 28 November 2008 (UTC)
It's under the 'Options' menu at the top left. Uncheck 'Follow redirects'. --Izno (talk) 14:26, 28 November 2008 (UTC)
Thanks a lot! (I'm not sure if this was still checked from when I last used it; if not then it may be worth considering turning this off by default.) — Sebastian 00:42, 29 November 2008 (UTC)

Image Policy

Why does it change Wiki links from underlines to spaces? Does this actually reduce page size? Cannot find any "policy" around what is included in "general" cleanup? -- Mjquin_id (talk) 16:37, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

its bad linking practice. βcommand 16:45, 21 November 2008 (UTC)
Why? — Sebastian 06:25, 28 November 2008 (UTC)
See A Concise Beginners Guide to Editing Wikipedia. §hep • ¡Talk to me! 06:35, 28 November 2008 (UTC)
Hmmm...but it seems pointless with images and things where the page name is never shown... I guess I also thought that it would cost time for the engine to translate spaces to underscores? Maybe not...Thanks. -- Mjquin_id (talk) 16:51, 28 November 2008 (UTC)
A Concise Beginners Guide to Editing Wikipedia even recommends using underscores! It seems there really is no reason to replace them, other than personal preference of the the programmer. But be that as it may; AWB is a good program, so maybe we should gracefully overlook such small idiosyncrasies. — Sebastian 08:34, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

Rules of use: Avoid making insignificant or inconsequential edits

The "Rules of use" section requires editors using AWB to "Avoid making insignificant or inconsequential edits such as only adding or removing some white space, moving a stub tag...". I have been involved in a discussion of this rule with User:TreasuryTag at User talk:TreasuryTag regarding edits such as the following which, he contends, do not violate this rule: [26] [27] [28] [29] [30] [31]. I am interested in whether I am misreading the rule and its relationship to such edits as these. -- Mwanner | Talk 15:13, 30 November 2008 (UTC)

Those all look minor to me, since there is a specific mention of both moving stub tags and removing white space. --Izno (talk) 15:18, 30 November 2008 (UTC)
The user seems to be making many valuable contributions by correcting typos. However, it seems (s)he hasn't set 'skip if no typo fixed' so some edits are being made consisting of only some of the trivial general fixes. While some general fixes are valuable on their own (bolding of article name, fixing external link format etc.), this user doesn't seem to be making the distinction. You're right to raise the query, and the user has not responded appropriately to your query. Rjwilmsi 16:00, 30 November 2008 (UTC)

I never remotely suggested that they did not violate the rule. I suggested that the rule applied not to individual edits but to my use of the tool and pattern of editing - and I contend that that is not in violation of the rule. The fact is, if I turn on "skip if typo fixed" then the software will not make general fixes, such as removing un-necessary
tags, moving stub notices (which is important if not essential) and fixing links_like_this_with_underscores. Is there any technical way around this? ╟─TreasuryTag►contribs─╢ 16:10, 30 November 2008 (UTC)

There is a simple, non-technical solution: don't save the edit if it's inconsequential. (As in "Check every edit before you save it." from the Rules of Use (again)). -- Mwanner | Talk 16:16, 30 November 2008 (UTC)
I check every edit before I save it, for mistakes. Having to make a moral judgement of whether or not it is inconsequential - a psychological construct - defies the point of AWB. As it is, I have a low rate of such edits and feel that I fulfill the spirit of the "avoid" rule. Please do not speak as if you know all about AWB - a short while ago, you were astonished ("that's crazy") to find that it automated edit summaries! ╟─TreasuryTag►contribs─╢ 16:35, 30 November 2008 (UTC)
The fact that I'm not especially familiar with AWB is really beside the point. What the rule asks of you is hardly a "moral judgement". It is a very simple rule. So far, three people have seen it as such-- two above, and one on your talk page. In the instances I found, in quite a short stretch of editing, there is no complexity at all-- they involved removing whitespace and moving tags. And if your instances of such edits are as rare as you say they are, it won't be much trouble to stop making them. -- Mwanner | Talk 16:43, 30 November 2008 (UTC)
I do not think that any reasonable interpretation of "avoid" sets the threshold as a percentage of edits. Avoid, I think, can be judged on its own merits without considering them as a share of larger edits. Phil Sandifer (talk) 17:05, 30 November 2008 (UTC)
  • Is this really that big of a deal? There are clearly non-minor edits (fixing underscored links), clearly minor edits (fixing non-displaying whitespace), and edits which may be minor but some consider important (moving stub/cat tags). Treasury Tag should avoid (as in make efforts to not commit) the obviously minor edits but the rest should be ignored (IMO). And what TT meant (I think) was that asking him to make a value judgment (As opposed to a "moral" judgment) for each edit was against the spirit of AWB. I'm not sure that is unequivocally the case. Rather, you shouldn't be forced to deliberate on a value judgment like that--if it looks minor, don't do it. If there is some doubt then I don't see the problem in just saving the edit. If, afterwards, someone informs you that the edit was minor, then look harder next time. As for the general approach of taking this rule and applying it literally, I would rather we didn't. Protonk (talk) 20:14, 30 November 2008 (UTC)

Well said, Protonk. TreasuryTag clearly wants to improve Wikipedia. Other editors may not choose to make such edits but as long as an editor makes more good edits than bad, Wikipedia improves. This rule is sometimes abused by people that simply don't like what another editor is doing. I am not suggesting this happened here but it happened quite recently in a battle over whether delinking dates is 'inconsequential'. We should be grateful to TreasuryTag for wanting to improve Wikipedia even in a way that may seem small to others and I say thank you, TreasuryTag .
The 'inconsequential edits' rule is not self-evident and it appears to be based on some pragmatic issue. Newcomers may find it discouraging to have this rule quoted without the reason for the rule. I can only imagine two reasons for this rule:

  • Somebody worried that Wikipedia can't afford to make too many edits. But see Wikipedia:Don't worry about performance
  • Somebody thought that other editors need protecting from seeing too many edits in watchlists, recent changes, article edit histories etc.

It is much easier to comply with a rule if you know the reason. I propose that we find out why this rule exists and add some text to the rule. Lightmouse (talk) 09:20, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

Well, look, if it's a bad rule, it should be changed. I don't see anyone proposing to do away with it. Personally, I find it difficult to see how such edits improve Wikipedia. I mean, take a look at an article before and after such an edit-- where is the improvement? Incidentally, I agree that TreasuryTag has done a lot of useful work. What got me looking at his edits originally was seeing a whitespace&tag-move edit to an article on my watchlist with an edit summary of "general overhaul", which seemed a rather grandiose description of a nothing edit. -- Mwanner | Talk 13:05, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

In order to criticise an edit, we need a reason why it is bad. If it does a small amount of good ('trivial', 'inconsequential', 'insignificant'), Wikipedia readers are better off. If it is neutral ('useless' 'unhelpful', 'waste of your time'), that is fine for Wikipedia readers too. It is only when there is harm that we need to worry. We have discussed a rule, not a reason. I propose that this rule is deleted unless it is modified to explain the reason for its existence. Lightmouse (talk) 13:39, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

The rule contains its own explanation; here it is in full: "Avoid making insignificant or inconsequential edits such as only adding or removing some white space, moving a stub tag, converting some HTML to Unicode, removing underscores from links (unless they are bad links), or something equally trivial. This is because it wastes resources and clogs up watch lists." (emphasis added)
One of the primary resources that it wastes is editor's time: every edit that shows up on a watchlist will cause one or more editors to take a look at what was changed (especially when accompanied by an unhelpful edit summary). What makes this edit worthwhile? -- Mwanner | Talk 14:13, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

I don't care whether an edit is worthwhile or not worthwhile. I am too focussed on watching for harm. There are always trivial edits and obscure summaries in Watchlist, RecentChanges, ArticleHistory. I can't get worked up about it. It is clear that it bothers you and I am not sure what to say except it doesn't bother me. Lightmouse (talk) 14:37, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

Surely watching for harm is easier if there are fewer unnecessary edits to wade through? The rule has been in place since January 8, 2006, when AWB was six days old. Apparently it has been thought a good thing by a lot of people for a long time. -- Mwanner | Talk 15:23, 1 December 2008 (UTC)
  • To answer your first sentence: I agree. Supervision is easier if there aren't many edits.
  • To answer your second sentence: I don't agree. A rule isn't good just because it has existed for a long time. The 'waste resources' assertion is a popular misconception in conflict with: Wikipedia:Don't worry about performance. Until proven otherwise, I don't believe that TreasuryTag has any significant effect on the technology of Wikipedia.

Lightmouse (talk) 16:19, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

I didn't say it was good because it was longstanding. I said that because it was longstanding, it appears to have been accepted by a lot of people. And if you agree that supervision is easier if there aren't many edits, doesn't that alone justify the rule? -- Mwanner | Talk 16:51, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

Developers PoV

We know that Wikipedia:Don't worry about performance exists, however, it doesn't mean that we shouldnt. AWB has had usage statistics since 3/3/2008. AWB has been used for over 5 Million edits since then, with nearly 2.8 million on the english wikipedia alone. This obviously doesnt include those where it wasnt reported, and other similar cases... Not sure what % total of the edits this accounts for, but it is significant. Most of the edits are on WMF wiki's, and in which case, accounts for well over 4 million edits. "Page edits since Wikipedia was set up 267,921,188" - 1% of the total number edits, in the last 9 months alone

We try and reduce the strain/load on the servers as much as possible, and with the API edit being open, we should be able to reduce this further (however, we are blocked partially due to some big API bugs, that mean we cant get a full implementation). This would reduce bandwith and similar constraints (same as bringing the diff's internal to AWB), and help further.

There is an outstanding feature request as to differentiating between that of changes (general fixes mainly), that have visual differences, and those that don't. I do agree, that those that only change whitespace and such by AWB, and therefore make no difference to the actual look/feel of the page, certainly are "bad"/"wasteful" edits.

Im wondering if its worth having an actual widescale community review/RfC type thing to see what the wider opinion of people is, and therefore try and establish some consensus for this

—Reedy 15:53, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

I don't think it needs an RFC, I imagine that people would vote to keep it (unfortunately). I like to think that people behave rationally even without rules. I think that most editors use AWB for significant edits most of the time. Only a tiny number of edits are insignificant. You probably saw this rule quoted in respect of date delinking. That was a dispute about the meaning of 'inconsequential' and we have seen similar comments here that the term is value laden. Perhaps we should update the rule to say that 'in most cases, inconsequential means invisible to the reader'. That would have avoided the dispute about date delinking and also address the points made by Protonk above. Lightmouse (talk) 16:19, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

I wonder if we can't solve this by a tweak to the tool: if all it finds in a given article are trivial changes, it shouldn't open it for editing. Isn't that the straightforward approach? -- Mwanner | Talk 16:51, 1 December 2008 (UTC)
According to your argument that a longstanding situation judged to have lasted the test of time, should not be changed: the option rather than restriction on AWB has existed for ages. We have the option to turn offthe inconsequential edits - which will in turn stop some good edits - and forcing it shold never happen. ╟─TreasuryTag►contribs─╢ 17:29, 1 December 2008 (UTC)
Once again, I didn't say that "a longstanding situation judged to have lasted the test of time, should not be changed," I said "because it was longstanding, it appears to have been accepted by a lot of people." We still do work by consensus around here, and longstanding acceptance is one indication of consensus.
And how, exactly, does my proposal stop good edits from happening? -- Mwanner | Talk 17:57, 1 December 2008 (UTC)
Unfortunately, while that approach seems straightforward, it will definitely hurt some users who are not making only minor edits. When AWB finds only trivial changes, but the editor is also manually adding significant content, AWB should not disallow the edit.--Fabrictramp | talk to me 18:10, 1 December 2008 (UTC)
That seems easy to handle-- the manually added content would override the minor-edits switch. -- Mwanner | Talk 18:20, 1 December 2008 (UTC)
I seem to have misunderstood what you were saying. I thought you were proposing removing the ability to edit that article -- perhaps you were proposing to remove the ability to save it? If so, that would work for me.--Fabrictramp | talk to me 18:45, 1 December 2008 (UTC)
No, you're right, I did propose initially that it wouldn't bother to open an article that only needed minor edits. But either approach would work. I dunno. It strikes me as a little odd to worry about losing the incidental, manual edits to articles that are being looked at only because they have extra whitespace or a tag out of place-- in that case you could almost as well have the tool look at a random selection of articles. -- Mwanner | Talk 21:09, 1 December 2008 (UTC)
I probably use AWB in a different manner than you're envisioning. I frequently use the list comparer to find the difference between two sets of articles, such as articles at WP:DEP and articles at Category:Dead-end pages, and work through improving every article in that set. I'd hate to lose that ability just because AWB thought there were only minor changes to be made, not allowing me to add things like refs. Sure, I could dump that list to a temporary user subpage, but it's not nearly as convenient.--Fabrictramp | talk to me 21:28, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

I don't see any need to limit AWBs function(s) at this time. But that's just me. §hep • ¡Talk to me! 21:38, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

Well, I'm not sure it needs limiting either-- I'm just tossing around an idea. And I'm seriously handicapped by not being a user. I'm just here because I didn't much like the way I saw the tool being used by one user. -- Mwanner | Talk 21:42, 1 December 2008 (UTC)
All of the edits appear to be within the realms of the stub guidelines. (Atleast the ones above were) §hep • ¡Talk to me! 21:55, 1 December 2008 (UTC)
I'm sorry, we must be talking at cross-purposes. I'm talking about the AWB rule that says "Avoid making insignificant or inconsequential edits such as only adding or removing some white space, moving a stub tag..." (from here), which, I contend, this edit violates. How do the stub guidelines enter into the question? -- Mwanner | Talk 22:15, 1 December 2008 (UTC)
WP:SS says to move the tag, I think part of the issue is that "inconsequential" edits need to be made more clear of exactly what they are. I wouldn't call all "General Fixes" minor and inconsequential. I think we must look at what the devs say and community approved guidelines, if all else fails just ignore everybody and do your own thing! I think the AWB "rules" are outdated and need to be updated to the current norm for what is and isn't appropriate use of the tool. This seems to be part of all the recent discussions here is that nothing is 100% clear-cut. §hep • ¡Talk to me! 23:33, 1 December 2008 (UTC)
Once again, the rule is spelled out at Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser#Rules of use: "Avoid making insignificant or inconsequential edits such as only adding or removing some white space, moving a stub tag, converting some HTML to Unicode, removing underscores from links (unless they are bad links), or something equally trivial" (emphasis added). The Rules of Use apply to using AWB-- they don't attempt to embody all other Wikipedia policy. Until and unless their is consensus to change AWB Rules of Use, it seems to me that they should apply to edits made with the tool. -- Mwanner | Talk 23:56, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

There also comes the case where the editor has to relaize that through the tool they are editing Wikipedia. Therefore the two guidelines should coincide and not push against each other. §hep • ¡Talk to me! 00:19, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

Very well-put! WP:SS encourages such edits; what is special about AWB that means it's not to be used for them, when that's what it's incredibly good at? ╟─TreasuryTag►contribs─╢ 16:31, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

Help

  • We need an "expert" list...
  • I need to add three lines to an Infobox on every player that has that Infobox...? The Category contains people that may, or may not have the infobox. Suggestions?

-- Mjquin_id (talk) 18:23, 30 November 2008 (UTC)

  1. Import the category
  2. Switch find/replace on and replace }} with lines you need to add}}
  3. Check the "ignore if no replacement made" box
  4. Stare blankly at a screen clicking the "save" box for as long as it takes.
I'd strongly advise making one change, then viewing the saved version in your browser (both in page view and in the edit window) to avoid any nasty surprises. – iridescent 00:25, 2 December 2008 (UTC)
And if step 4 drives you nuts, read the AWB help pages on the list comparer. If there are just 1 or 2 infoboxes in question, you can compare the list of players to the list of pages that transclude the infobox, and take only the pages that are in both sets. HTH --Fabrictramp | talk to me 00:36, 2 December 2008 (UTC)
(adding) When doing step 4, make sure it's only replacing the right }}! If there's an unsubsted template on the article (a stub template, for example), don't let it add the lines to that as well! – iridescent 16:40, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

Special pipe trick

Is there a way to do a category pipe trick that will look for a page name of January 1 and make the pipe January 01? -- Mufka (u) (t) (c) 17:23, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

AWB and web standards

In this edit [32] made with AWB, a ref was converted to be a named reference, in the form <ref name="Lent"/>. I thought per web standards the correct form was <ref name="Lent" />? Do I have this wrong? Hiding T 14:06, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

w00t, web standards don't know anything about that tag. MaxSem(Han shot first!) 14:47, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

Controversial edits by Lightmouse

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

One of the rules of use concerning AWB says, "Don't do anything controversial with it. If there is a chance that the edits you are considering might be controversial, consider soliciting comment at the village pump or appropriate Wikiproject before proceeding." Various discussions at various times have been held involving Lightmouse's use of AWB to make controversial edits, more specifically his use of the tool to delink dates and make other changes. He is now using AWB in full force to make these edits, often at the rate of more than one article per minute (for example, he edited 75 articles in 8 minutes using AWB on December 8, which is 9.375 articles per minute or one article every 6.4 seconds), which in itself appears to contravene the spirit if not the letter of the AWB rules. Also, concern has been expressed on Lightmouse's discussion page about his use of AWB to make the exact same edits in the exact same article numerous times, despite having full knowledge that these edits are erroneous. In my opinion, that constitutes "edit warring", although others disagree, in part based on an interpretation that the edit warring policies do not apply to "trivial" edits. All these issues need to be addressed in a comprehensive way, not only with Lightmouse but also so that other editors know the limits of AWB use, if any. Thank you. Tennis expert (talk) 23:37, 8 December 2008 (UTC)

Please stop forum shopping. This has been discussed at length in multiple places, including at least 2 RfCs which have been announced via {{cent}} and show a strong consensus to allow this. Also, a discussion here which you participated in and a subsequent follow up at WP:AN allowed any user to help set articles in line with the MoS. I understand that you don't dislike Lightmouse's edits, but the proper place to bring up your views right now is on the RfCs. - NuclearWarfare contact meMy work 23:48, 8 December 2008 (UTC)
You're saying that the rules of use concerning AWB were overruled sub silentio? In other words, it's now OK to make controversial edits with AWB regardless of the AWB rules of use and it's now OK to make several edits per minute using AWB regardless of the rules of use? And you're also saying that the ongoing RFCs support Lightmouse's actions even though the RFCs have not yet concluded? How odd that you would make these on-their-face dubious assertions, especially for someone who currently is a candidate for administrator. By the way, Date delinker, an alternate account of Ohconfucius (see his posts below), is making the same kinds of edits as Lightmouse using AWB. Tennis expert (talk) 04:18, 9 December 2008 (UTC)
"...even though the RFCs have not yet concluded?" Yes, it's all over bar the shouting.
"...especially for someone who currently is a candidate for administrator" How is that supposed to be relevant to anything? Ohconfucius (talk) 05:52, 9 December 2008 (UTC)
After looking at both RfCs, the debate in August, Featured Articles and Featured Lists (as well as the candidacy wikispaces [FLC and FAC]), Tony1's page of general consensus before the change to MOSNUM was made, and the relevant ANI thread posted on WT:MOSNUM, I would not say that Lightmouse's edits are "controversial". Dabomb87 (talk) 04:27, 9 December 2008 (UTC)
I feel they're controversial, but if he's not doing it with AWB he'll simply carry on with his own script, so it's a losing battle as far as I'm concerned. Unfortunate, really, because it's the encyclopedia that suffers in the end. —Locke Cole • t • c 04:34, 9 December 2008 (UTC)
  • "I feel they're controversial... Unfortunate, really, because it's the encyclopedia that suffers in the end." You have a right to your opinion - the community at large disagrees overwhelmingly. Ohconfucius (talk) 05:41, 9 December 2008 (UTC)
  • Care to point me to where they disagree? I see one RFC with questions asking which exact wording should be inserted (or not inserted) into WP:MOSNUM. I see another RFC asking if date linking purely to gain autoformatting should be "deprecated" (not removed immediately with bots/scripts/pitchforks). Anyone with even an inkling of understanding of the word "deprecation" knows that it means "stop using, but leave existing uses in place" or alternately "stop using, but remove existing uses in the course of normal editing". Or is there another RFC which establishes that date links should be "removed with any and all means necessary, including fire!"? —Locke Cole • t • c 05:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)
See this post from Iridescent: "See where it says in large black letters Don't do anything controversial with it? Means what it says. If you're using AWB to make edits that there's a possibility of someone disagreeing with (aside from when you're indisputably in the right, such as correcting "jewelery" which always leads to 'but that's the correct spelling' protests from people who don't bother checking the dictionary), you don't seem to understand what it's for." Tennis expert (talk) 07:08, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

Earlier today, Lightmouse edited 197 articles in 26 minutes (7.58 articles per minute or one article every 8 seconds). A proper use of AWB? I think not. Tennis expert (talk) 17:01, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

Lightmouse or the bot? Between 7-10 edits a minute is normal for bots, no matter what program they run on. Can we please keep the discussions in one place instead of constantly kicking the horse here? §hep • ¡Talk to me! 17:16, 9 December 2008 (UTC)
Lightmouse. I haven't said anything about his bot. Tennis expert (talk) 21:21, 9 December 2008 (UTC)
Just checking, I've seen some confuse the names. Either way, this isn't the appropriate ground for this discussion...yet. If the MoS goes back to say linking is fine and he continues to unlink, then it should be brought up here. There have been multiple discussions here and elsewhere and nowehere is there a solid argument for stopping his current action. Unless I missed something? §hep • ¡Talk to me! 21:44, 9 December 2008 (UTC)
Of course his actions are controversial. "Controversial" does not necessarily mean "prohibited." See my quote of Iridescent, above. That's why we have not one, but two, currently pending RFCs about date linking. And aside from that, there is the serious issue about using AWB to edit at the rate of approximately one article every 8 seconds. This is exactly the right forum to be talking about this because the AWB rules of use are at issue here. Tennis expert (talk) 22:00, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

Is there anything that says, don't edit reeeeeaaalllyyy fast? What we have is: Don't edit too fast; consider opening a bot account if you are regularly making more than a few edits a minute. Lightmouse has opened a bot account  DonePart1. If Lightmouse checked over, say, a CSV file and then just fed the edits through it shouldn't matter how fast someone edits. If the AWB rules of use are the issue, then don't throw off the discussion by complaining about a single user. Everyone's gone there rounds here and none of the Devs have expressed much interest in taking away userrights for Lightmouse as everything currently stands. But I think it would be much simpler to have this discussion once, in a central area, this place isn't visited by too many instead of all these different ones everywhichwhere.

Lightmouse and Date delinker (an alternate account of Ohconfucius) are the only editors that I know are violating the AWB rules of use concerning both controversial and too-speedy edits. But if you are aware of others, you are of course free to inform us about them here. Also, your argument that "others are violating the rules, so Lightmouse should be allowed to violate the rules, too" is illogical on its face. P.S. Don't forget to sign your posts. Tennis expert (talk) 03:48, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

Using AWB, Lightmouse (himself, not his bot) has just succeeded in editing 1,777 articles in 114 minutes, which is 15.6 articles per minute or 1 article every 3.8 seconds. Ridiculous abuse of AWB, in my opinion. Tennis expert (talk) 07:30, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

Tennis expert, I am both surprised and disappointed that you are still complaining about this issue even though it was discussed at length a couple of weeks ago and the consensus was against you. The recent RFC debate over delinking of dates shows a consensus in favour of data delinking, even if the minor details have not yet been agreed. Therefore the edits of Lightmouse do not count as controversial. Secondly, regarding your complaints over the speed at which AWB is used, surely the faster a user can make improvements to Wikipedia, the better? None of the database administrators have ever complained that such use of AWB has caused any performance issue for other users. I think you have no genuine basis for complaint and are trying to quote the AWB rules of use to the letter to add strength to your weak argument. Rjwilmsi 08:24, 10 December 2008 (UTC)
I am both surprised and disappointed that you would cite two ongoing RFCs, which are still almost two weeks away from closing, as evidence of consensus for anything. So, yes, Lightmouse's edits are controversial. And the AWB rules are the rules. If you don't like the rules, then advocate for their change. Until then, one of the rules deals with edit speed, which Lightmouse is flagrantly abusing. Tennis expert (talk) 15:24, 10 December 2008 (UTC)
Odd how it's the speed of his edits, not their make-up, that are now of concern to you. The faster, the better, indeed. I'd support the removal of the rule in question if it came to that point. - Dudesleeper / Talk 15:29, 10 December 2008 (UTC)
Try re-reading what I actually said. I have two points: using AWB to make controversial edits and the speediness of those edits. Lightmouse is flagrantly violating both rules. Tennis expert (talk) 15:42, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

It is odd that people think a complaint will succeed without a quoted edit. Evidence please. If there is harm, let everybody see the harmed article. Lightmouse (talk) 15:37, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

The "harm" is your flagrant abuse of the rules of use of AWB. The evidence is your edit history. I invite anyone to click on any of the thousands of articles you have edited in the last few days to see how you are making controversial edits (delinking dates) at a frenetic pace. Tennis expert (talk) 15:42, 10 December 2008 (UTC)
You are the accuser of harm, you supply evidence of harm. That is how fair trials work. Present evidence of harm or drop the case. If you think you have thousands of harmed articles to choose from, it shouldn't take you long. Lightmouse (talk) 16:01, 10 December 2008 (UTC)
Your last post proves that you do not understand the AWB rules of use (I have already discussed them - see my posts above); therefore, you should stop using AWB immediately. I invite you to re-read those rules and ask questions here until you are clear about them. Tennis expert (talk) 19:04, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

Just since my last "progress" report, Lightmouse (not his bot) has edited 2,347 articles using AWB. Tennis expert (talk) 19:18, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

I second your commendation. - Dudesleeper / Talk 19:26, 10 December 2008 (UTC)


I for one, am getting very tired of this debate. Granted, he should be probably using his bot account to save flooding RC lists, due to the edit speed, but other than that, he's not doing anything wrong. If it was deemed he was, he would've probably been blocked. If you've still got a problem, bring it up somewhere else, where greater opinion can be gauged. Keep up being a nusiance/effectively trolling, and i will happily block you. —Reedy 19:56, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

Don't edit too fast; consider opening a bot account if you are regularly making more than a few edits a minute.

- How fast is too fast? —Reedy 22:49, 11 December 2008 (UTC)
Obviously, "more than a few edits a minute". Lightmouse regularly violated this rule by about a factor of 5. Tennis expert (talk) 05:55, 12 December 2008 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Using database dump

I may have asked this question before but I can't find it in the archives. I don't know anything about using database dumps but it sounds like it might be useful to speed up a search&replace when examining the whole mainspace from A-to-Z. If that is what it is for, how do I do it? Lightmouse (talk) 10:53, 12 December 2008 (UTC)

You download the enwiki latest articles pages zipped XML (~4 GB) from Wikipedia:Database download and unzip it to a ~19GB XML file. Using the AWB database scanner under the tools menu you can perform regex queries against it to look for matching articles. The list of matches can then be brought into AWB. A scan for a simple/medium regex query takes about 15 minutes on a dual core PC. Rjwilmsi 12:04, 12 December 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. Is it quicker than the normal method? Lightmouse (talk) 12:11, 12 December 2008 (UTC)

It can generate lists of potential edits a lot quicker - And if you've a multi core machine, you can take advantage of it even further (thanks to Max). Though, they can be quite out of date, but it will reduce the number of pages you actually have to trawl. —Reedy 12:41, 12 December 2008 (UTC)

Excellent, it sounds just what I need. I think my pc is dual core. Do I have to do anything special to take advantage of that? Lightmouse (talk) 12:55, 12 December 2008 (UTC)

Nope, the DB Scanner will run multiple search threads if your pc is detected to be multi core. —Reedy 17:00, 12 December 2008 (UTC)

That is good news, thanks. Lightmouse (talk) 17:34, 12 December 2008 (UTC)

AWB question

I am wanting to use AWB on another wikia, but for some reason I keep getting the error "There was a problem loading the page" and won't edit anything. 68.226.0.35 (talk) 22:14, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

[33] - Choose the link at the top, and use that version of awb —Reedy 00:02, 4 December 2008 (UTC)
Now I just need my founder to realize how to give me 'bot' access. Do you know how to do that so I can tell him? 68.226.0.35 (talk) 21:05, 4 December 2008 (UTC)
Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser/CheckPage format —Reedy 21:14, 4 December 2008 (UTC)
I have that page set up, but it still keeps saying User name is not enabled to use this. and redirects me to that page you listed. 68.226.0.35 (talk) 21:51, 4 December 2008 (UTC)
The founder needs to go to special:userrights on the wikia and check the box or whatnot that says "Make this user a bot". However, you should set up a second account to become the bot. --Izno (talk) 22:31, 4 December 2008 (UTC)
(User rights log); 11:58 . . xxxxxx (Talk | contribs) changed group membership for User:xxxxx from (none) to Bots -> still tells me I am not enabled to use this... the checkpage is filled out correctly as well. 68.226.0.35 (talk) 18:43, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

Did you make sure to change your site preferences from the default enwiki? §hep • ¡Talk to me! 04:14, 13 December 2008 (UTC)

I'm not quite sure what you are asking there. How would I find out? 68.226.0.35 (talk) 04:50, 13 December 2008 (UTC)
Options ) Preferences ) Site ) Project : Custom & http:// is the URL before /Main_Page - 142.167.83.243 (talk) 07:34, 14 December 2008 (UTC)
That's greek to me. Is this admin options? I don't see Site or Project in my preferences. 68.226.0.35 (talk) 22:47, 14 December 2008 (UTC)
Look at the top of the AWB window. Go to Options, Preferences, then the Site tab. —Reedy 22:58, 14 December 2008 (UTC)
Wow, all this time, it was set on wikia (which should have been right) but it was applying an extra / after the wikia name and I didn't realize it. Changing it to custom and typing out the address worked. (Wish I had of realized that earlier) Thanks for the help. 68.226.0.35 (talk) 01:14, 15 December 2008 (UTC)
I think Max has already done some work to fix the "wikia" option for the next release —Reedy 09:57, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

No explanation of what this actually does

Like most mediawiki projects. This page has no explanation of what the program actually does, and why it is useful. I am sure it is somewhere but where? Please add a short paragraph at the beginning of the page explaining what this actually does. Inclusionist (talk) 03:58, 13 December 2008 (UTC)

The first paragraph... AutoWikiBrowser, sometimes abbreviated to AWB, is a semi-automated MediaWiki editor for Microsoft Windows 2000/XP/Vista designed to make tedious repetitive tasks quicker and easier... –xeno (talk) 04:01, 13 December 2008 (UTC)

Skipping

For skipping articles that contain a given string, is there a way you can give more than one string in the field? Thanks, -electricRush (T C) 21:17, 21 December 2008 (UTC)

You can make it regex and have it as capture groups (text1|text2).. —Reedy 21:22, 21 December 2008 (UTC)
So in the field would I just write something like (references|external links|unreferenced)? Thanks, -electricRush (T C) 01:09, 22 December 2008 (UTC)
Sure. Make sure the "Regular expressions" check box below it is checked. Be aware that characters such as . and * and ? have special meaning in regex, so if you need to use them, please escape them, ie \? —Reedy 10:34, 22 December 2008 (UTC)

What does 'What links here (all NS)" mean? The 'NS' bit isn't in the user manual. Lightmouse (talk) 00:22, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure it stands for namespace. §hep • ¡Talk to me! 00:25, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

Ah. A useful function. The terminology wasn't clear to me. Lightmouse (talk) 00:29, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

Bug archive

The autosorted bug archive is finally running after I realized how stupid I'd been. Hope this helps. §hep • ¡Talk to me! 04:29, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

Nice one! —Reedy 09:07, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

Having problems with lists from Whatlinkshere

Resolved
 – Issue fixed in SVN snapshot

I am unable to build a list properly using the "Source: Whatlinkshere". I am trying to update links of a page moved within the Wikipedia space but instead of the list I should get it just says "List complete" and gives a blank list. It is not the filters and it is fine generating lists on other spaces.

  • Note. I just tried "Source: What links here" and then "Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser". The only result it returned was AWB. Further I tried "Source: Whatlinkshere" and "Template:SPOTY", and it only returned mainspace pages, however "Source: What transcludes page" and "Template:SPOTY", returned the one missing result I expected to see.

I noticed something about a bug with special pages on Windows XP SP2, and I am running that, but am not sure that is the problem.

Thanks, Rambo's Revenge (talk) 15:46, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

By default, it returns just article NS. Look in the navigation bar at the top for the SVN Snapshots. Click on that, and download and use the version with the highest number. There is a what links here (all ns) —Reedy 16:28, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
Ok thanks, as AWB Updater said there was no update, I didn't investigate that avenue. I did not know there were subversions. All sorted with that download fix. Thanks alot, Rambo's Revenge (talk) 16:58, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
Yeah, subversion is used for development, some people build AWB themselves from source, others want newer versions but cant build it, so i do periodic builds and upload them! —Reedy 18:17, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

Okay, but what does it do?

I'm curious about the utility of this tool but I find the explanation of its function to be vague, far too brief, too technical, and downright cryptic. Would someone be so kind as to take the time to (in the least technical terms possible) explain the use of this tool to me? Assuming the vagueness isn't an intentional safeguard to prevent abuse, expanding the introduction to the tool might be a good idea. Much gratitude (in advance), --Pgagnon999 (talk) 15:17, 31 December 2008 (UTC)

Paul, AWB is a semi-automated MediaWiki editor for Microsoft Windows 2000/XP/Vista (a program that acts as an external editor for any website using the MediaWiki software, it is for Microsoft Windows 2000 annd later) designed to make tedious repetitive tasks quicker and easier. (a user can input a change the want done on every page, instead of retyping everything on each new page a new page will open automatically and they changes will appear, the change then has to be approved by the user) It is essentially a browser that automatically opens up a new page when the last is saved. (When one page in the list is edited, the next page is automatically edited) When set to do so, it suggests some changes (typically formatting) that are generally meant to be incidental to the main change. (AWB is generally used for minor formatting edits, whitespace removal, typos, removing underscores in internal links, etc.) For a detailed overview of what it can do you should check out the User Manual. Hope that helps. §hep • ¡Talk to me! 06:10, 1 January 2009 (UTC)

Trouble Getting Special Pages To Work

I have a problem getting a list made from special pages. My download is version 4420 and if I choose Source:Special page there are no other options to select which special page. I would like to list all the LonelyPages, but have no idea on how to do this. I have spent a long time searching the Internet for help and this is my last stop.

Thanks in advance for any help.

Steven 91.74.86.190 (talk) 19:52, 1 January 2009 (UTC)

Pressing make list on the special pages takes you to a subform. However, there is no API way to scrape the "lonely pages"/orphan pages, and the HTML ways were too unreliable, so these methods were removed. bugzilla:14869 has been open, but no progress on it yet. —Reedy 20:30, 1 January 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for the feedback. I guess we need to wait and see 83.170.103.96 (talk) 20:42, 1 January 2009 (UTC).

Yeah. Its not if, its a case of when. —Reedy 20:49, 1 January 2009 (UTC)

Editing talk page if a condition is met in its' article?

I was wondering if there is an easy way of editing a talk page if a certain string is found in the article. For example, if Lézignan-Corbières has the {{coord}} template used in it, then the {{LocateMe}} template (which is put in talk pages rather than the main article) should be removed from Talk:Lézignan-Corbières. Now this is easy enough to do manually for a single article, but what if you have a whole category of them you'd like to go through quickly? Please let me know whether there is a more effective way of doing this with AWB! Thank you. --92.105.100.193 (talk) 10:23, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

There might be a more elegant way to do it, but I use the list comparer for this. The steps sound complicated, but are fairly simple once you've done it. (And I'm on my Mac w/o AWB right now, so this is from memory.) First make a list in the main part of AWB of pages that transclude Template:Locate me. Looks like you want to add Template:Coord missing to that list as well. Then convert that list of talk pages to main space pages (the option is in the list menu). Then launch the list comparer (in the tools menu) and answer yes, you'd like your list copied in. In the list you're comparing that to, add pages that transclude Template:Coord. Choose compare, and the list you want to save are pages in both lists. Go back to the main AWB section, clear your existing list, and load the text file you just saved. Convert this list to talk pages (the file menu again), and these will be the pages with templates you need to remove.--Fabrictramp | talk to me 10:56, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
A-ha! A list comparing tool, excellent. I understand your explanation perfectly, but think I may have run into a little snag. When I try to make a list of pages that transclude Template:Coord, I get exactly 25'000 results, whereas there should be quite a few more. Am I right in assuming that this is AWB's limit? --92.105.100.193 (talk) 11:52, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
Yes, I believe it was the current release that knocked it down from unlimited to 25,000. See Wikipedia talk:AutoWikiBrowser/Archive 19#Transclusions now truncated.3F §hep • ¡Talk to me! 21:40, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

Leading spaces in category sort keys

A user has reported a problem with leading spaces in sort keys:

The MOS page discussion is this one. I can't remember if it was discussed here. If this is an issue, should 'General fixes' be updated? Lightmouse (talk) 16:35, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

AWB policy on double spaces

See recent Lightbot changes to Hydraulic ram for an example. The {{Hydraulics}} template is a standard infobox template that looks poor when is only separated from the preceding text by a single newline. It is impractical to modify the infobox template to adjust its top margin, and so it seems reasonable to continue to put two spaces before such end-of-page infoboxes. However, AWB bots keep removing these spaces. If pages with two empty spaces rendered the same as pages with a single empty spaces, then you could argue that AWB's should remove the space. However, because Wikipedia treats two spaces differently than it treats one space, AWB bots are modifying how the page looks, and that seems to go against the spirit of the "fix." Additionally, even if two spaces were treated the same as one by Wikipedia's markup interpreter, it may be useful for editors to add a little extra space to the source document for clarity. Do you have a comment? —TedPavlic | (talk) 21:16, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

You can force extra spaces by adding comments like <!-- Comment required for spacing, please do not remove --> where you need them. AWB itself can't tell when an extra space is needed, you need to tell it. --Closedmouth (talk) 12:01, 31 December 2008 (UTC)
I see this often when AWB removes 'extra' spaces before navbox templates on ship articles. Rather than making it incumbent upon editors to 'opt out' of AWB edits, why can't the behavior be modified to remove extra lines only if there are 3 or more? — Bellhalla (talk) 16:11, 2 January 2009 (UTC)
Exactly. It seems like these kind of edits are meant to tidy the source without changing the rendered article; however, removing two spaces does change the rendered article. Bots must be very careful when making changes that actually change how an article looks, and I don't think AWB (or its devs) are doing due diligence here. Additionally, I'm not sure I understand why this is a valid tidy. Are extra newlines a major nuisance that need bot attention? In many cases, aren't extra newlines added on purpose by an editor? —TedPavlic | (talk) 21:19, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

What do extra lines do? Lightmouse (talk) 21:36, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

In many cases they keep templates at the footer from looking crammed with the article text. §hep • ¡Talk to me! 21:43, 2 January 2009 (UTC)
Compare this version of Barbarossa-class ocean liner with this version to see an example of a navbox clash. — Bellhalla (talk) 22:00, 2 January 2009 (UTC)
I looked and couldn't see anything jump out at me but I don't know what I am looking for. Can you be more specific? Lightmouse (talk) 22:03, 2 January 2009 (UTC)
I see it now. It doesn't look bad to me but if you don't like it you should be able to change it, of course. Lightmouse (talk) 22:05, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

Is there an html code for a new line? Lightmouse (talk) 21:56, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia uses <p><br /></p> whenever there is a double space. —TedPavlic | (talk) 00:27, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

I'm not picking this up

I've been reading the manual, but I can't find a lot of the buttons/commands they're talking about about so I'm still very confused about how AWB works. Honestly, it doesn't explain how to use the software very well. It looks more like a reference guide for somebody who already knows how to use the software. I started with disambig, since that's probably what I do the most, but when I looked at the disambig section of the manual, I didn't see any of the following in the program:

...In the image shown, two links in the page have been found to disambiguate. For each link:

  • Left box — contains the link in bold and some of the surrounding text.
  • Selection box — select the change wanting to be made from the following options:
  • [no change] — default.
  • [unlink] — remove the link.
  • {{dn}} — adds [disambiguation needed] next to the link. Should be used when the correct disambiguation cannot be determined.
  • Variants — as specified in the "Variants" box in the "Disambiguation" tab.
  • Right box — editable box that displays what has been changed. Default change creates (or alters) a piped link. In the image, [[matrix|matrices]] is changed to [[matrix (mathematics)|matrices]].
  • Unpipe — unpipes the link. This would change [[matrix (mathematics)|matrices]] to [[matrix (mathematics)]].
  • Reset — clears the changes made for that link.
  • Undo — reverts all manual changes to the right box, including unpiping. This is equivalent to reselecting the current item in the selection box.

I see the Make list box, I understand how to make lists; I see the bar with the tabs at the top, Options, More, Disambig, Skip Bots, Start; I see the diambig page with Load Links and Variants and all that; but there is no dialog box with [unlink], dn, unpipe, etc. in it. I have made lists and pressed start and gone through the pages in my list but it doesn't do anything differently from when I normally edit pages in my internet browser: I have to find the wiki markup I want to edit and change it myself. Is my software perhaps not loading something or not functioning properly?

I'm really lost at this point. Any help would be greatly appreciated. --Hippie Metalhead (talk) 20:46, 3 January 2009 (UTC)

Note, the manual is sometimes quite out of date. Though, if you enable disambiguation, load links, make a list of what links to that disabmiguation page (i used Alien), when processing you should get a popup box with most of that.. —Reedy 23:47, 3 January 2009 (UTC)
That's what I thought. I don't get that popup box. Any ideas why it's not loading? --Hippie Metalhead (talk) 00:34, 4 January 2009 (UTC)
Nope.. Usually its something isnt setup right, or something not checked. It will only popup if that page contains links to whichever link your wanting to disambiguate... —Reedy 13:43, 4 January 2009 (UTC)
What do you mean "when processing"? After I make a list of what links to that disambiguation page, the list is made and that's it. It doesn't do anything after that. Is that the problem? --Hippie Metalhead (talk) 03:22, 5 January 2009 (UTC)
Look on the start tab and press the start button. —Reedy 11:35, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for removing bot tab for non-bots

Thanks for removing bot tab for non-bots. A small detail but nice and tidy. I know that it may seem that all you get is feature requests and issue reports but I really appreciate your work. Lightmouse (talk) 13:14, 4 January 2009 (UTC)

No problem. =) —Reedy 14:46, 4 January 2009 (UTC)

Running two AWB instances on two accounts (bot, normal)

I tried running two AWB instances on two accounts (bot, normal) but it won't let me. I was sure I was able to do it before. Is this possible? Lightmouse (talk) 19:43, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

I used to, but the sessions seem to get messed up now.. Im sure there must've been some MW change (SUL/auto project login?), as logging out of browser seems to log me out of all.. —Reedy 20:22, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

Question

Since I'm still a Linux geek who can't be one of the cool AWB kids because of the never-ending Wine incompatibility issue (GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR), I have a question (and a run for the tasks list to work on if the answer is favourable.)

Basically: can AWB do partial text substitutions, such as updating the URL of a web link which has changed part of its format? For instance, if a website changes its url format from http://www.crtc.gc.ca/archive/ENG/Decisions/1988/DB88-97.HTM to http://www.crtc.gc.ca/eng/archive/1988/DB88-97.HTM, is it possible to construct an AWB run that would make the "/archive/ENG/Decisions/" → "/eng/archive/" substitution while leaving the rest of the url intact since the base address, the year subfolders and the document numbers are remaining the same? Bearcat (talk) 03:20, 8 January 2009 (UTC)

Yes, with a simple "Find & Replace" it should be able to. §hep • ¡Talk to me! 05:22, 8 January 2009 (UTC)
Okay, thanks. I'll post a request to the task list shortly. Bearcat (talk) 05:57, 8 January 2009 (UTC)
I run AWB under VMware quite a lot, could you not do that Beercat? Rjwilmsi 12:08, 8 January 2009 (UTC)
You may talk to User:ThaddeusB who is the owner of User:DeadLinkBOT. But just doing a substitution without checking to see if the exist for that particular replace is bad idea. I have seen some organizations split directories and placed files into a different grouping (directories). — Dispenser 22:44, 9 January 2009 (UTC)

How do I use AWB to add a template at the top of an article?

How do I use AWB to add a template in an article (perhaps at the top)? There is a discussion about having a date format template inside articles that would record whether the format is day/month/year or month/day/year. Does anyone have suggestions as to how I would do this? Lightmouse (talk) 02:02, 13 January 2009 (UTC)

Prepend text on one of the tabs. --NE2 04:01, 13 January 2009 (UTC)

Thank you very much. Lightmouse (talk) 11:06, 13 January 2009 (UTC)

I would also like to do this with a monobook script e.g. User:Lightmouse/monobook.js/test script.js. I don't know if the AWB method will work for that but I will be grateful for code suggestions. Anyone? Lightmouse (talk) 12:43, 15 January 2009 (UTC)
var txt=document.editform.wpTextbox1;
if (txt.search(/{{template}}/gi) == -1)
{
txt.value='{{template}}\r\n'+txt.value;
}

—Reedy 13:20, 15 January 2009 (UTC)

Thanks. I got that to work but when I revisit the article, it ends up with two of the same. I could write code to delete any pre-existing template and then add one. But that seems like a bit of a hack. Somebody suggested having a condition but I don't know how to do conditionals. Lightmouse (talk) 13:49, 15 January 2009 (UTC)
Updated above? —Reedy 14:10, 15 January 2009 (UTC)

Unfortunately that didn't work and stopped the script from working properly. I am not sure if it knows about txt.search. Lightmouse (talk) 14:21, 15 January 2009 (UTC)

My logic was wrong - you only want to add it if it doesnt have it. Try that? —Reedy 14:36, 15 January 2009 (UTC)

It still didn't work with that code but User:Gimmetrow was involved in the discussion at my talk page (User_talk:Lightmouse#Dates_within_quotes). He examined the script and saw that txt.search should be txt.value.search. It works now. Thanks for your help. I would be even more grateful if you could help me with the code that would control the template location on the page (users might object if my template is always at the top of the article), the ideal location is yet to be defined. I am also trying to code to protect text within quote templates. I know this isn't a monobook script help page so feel free to tell me I am asking for too much. Regards Lightmouse (talk) 17:02, 15 January 2009 (UTC)

Anyone else getting "there was a problem loading the page"?

Anyone else getting "there was a problem loading the page"? I am using svn3712. Lightmouse (talk) 11:51, 15 January 2009 (UTC)

Doesn't happen with svn3672. Filing bug report. Lightmouse (talk) 12:02, 15 January 2009 (UTC)

Why?

Why after more than one year, do this software still have Wikia in the project dropdown list while we all know that it wont work on Wikia if we set it this way ?

The only way it work on Wikia is by selecting custom and entering a full site domain like fr.3d.wikia.com/ or fr.guildwars.wikia.com/ (with the slash).

Please, stop saying that it is Wikia's fault, because they dont want to do a symbolic link on a +3000 sites. You know (actually you might not know), i'm a programmer too and my main programming language is VB.Net 2.0 (but i use SharpDevelop), and as a programmer i really think that when we do a software that is supposed to do something, we find the way so it really does it. Or we remove the non working thing.

So i suggest that you remove Wikia from the drop down so that wikian who try this for the first time know they should use the custom instead.

TulipVorlax (talk) 10:04, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

That's funny, current SVN works absolutely fine using the "Wikia" option. [34] —Reedy 11:38, 18 January 2009 (UTC)
MaxSem just informed me that the last release didn't work, but was fixed shortly after. Sorry about that. —Reedy 18:41, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

Is it possible to limit the result of search list?

Question on the title. Bennylin (talk) 11:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

lmao, we cant win. We put some limits on and its too low for some, and too high for others. —Reedy 13:30, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

SVN build host down?

For some reason neither my ISP's DNS (Cox, 68.10.16.25) nor Level3's (4.2.2.1) will resolve http://awb.reedyboy.net and OpenDNS (208.67.220.220) resolves it to an IP (208.69.32.132) that doesn't respond. Am I the only one having this problem? -- Darth Culator (talk) 23:55, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

[35] - Its been moved... I fell out with dreamhost —Reedy 00:09, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

General fixes question

Generally, I like removing a redundant pipelink. However, during my last AWB run, I found that it was not only changing Dog to Dog, but dog to Dog. In many cases, accepting the changes would have screwed up the casing of a sentence. Is this a problem, a setting I missed, or neither?--SarekOfVulcan (talk) 22:08, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

It's a bug, the fix for which is in the SVN version and will be included in the 4.5 release, hopefully out this weekend. Rjwilmsi 22:25, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

reflist

Is this tool somehow automating the change from <references /> to {{reflist|2}}? If it is could you please make it stop, becuause there is no consensus or policy in favor of reflist, and there is certainly none for using two columns. In fact, in most cases <references /> is preferable.
—Apis (talk) 02:06, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

I haven't seen it do so. It's most likely a user script? Do you have some example diffs? §hep • Talk 02:22, 22 January 2009 (UTC)
I'm wondering because of this: [36].
—Apis (talk) 02:31, 22 January 2009 (UTC)
Definitely appears to be the user telling AWB to do that either with a Find-and-Replace or a custom module. I can't reproduce that action with the deafault settings using rev 3582. §hep • Talk 02:37, 22 January 2009 (UTC)
Ok, thanks for taking the time to check!
—Apis (talk) 02:40, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

"Software disabled"

I keep getting a "Software disabled" message when trying to log into AWB. I'm using version 4.4.2.0. I have IE 7.0 and WinXP. This message comes up both this account and my RockfangBot account. I posted a question like this awhile back, but noone responded. Any suggestions would be appreciated.--Rockfang (talk) 17:37, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

Using AWB on wu Wikipedia

Hello,

We have a problematic of conversion between traditional chineese characters and simplified chineese characters on [[:wuu:封面|wu wikipedia]. Currently I have a bot making the conversions using a conversion table, but it's very hard for me to make a good programm managing templates, links and interwikis.

As I use AWB on french Wikipedia I thing it's a good solution for us.

I would like to know if someone can help me importing the program there (including the Typo section, and maybe a list of authorized users). Please contact me at fr:User:Hercule (my home wiki) or wuu:User:Hercule (I'm admin and bureaucrat there)

Thanks in advance

--Hercule (talk) 12:40, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

wuu:Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser/CheckPage is now setup. —Reedy 18:43, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

Use on WikiSource and the Author: namespace

I was looking to do some further tidy up at Wikisource and found that I am unable to load pages from the Author: namespace as they (seem to) automatically filter out when making a list. Am I doing something wrong or is this a shortcoming in the current application? -- billinghurst (talk) 10:49, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

Have you double checked that under the List menu the option 'remove non-namespace' is not checked? Rjwilmsi 11:12, 24 January 2009 (UTC)
Ah! You are not just a pretty face. Thx. -- billinghurst (talk) 12:04, 24 January 2009 (UTC)
Its probably that, but the application is a bit over zealous with non standard namespaces (needs sorting, theres a FR bug open for it) —Reedy 12:06, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

Failing my attempts to filter list

I have prepared a list of pages with a transcluded template and I get 250 total; save that as a list (L1). Start a fresh list with pages that link to a Category, 354 total (L2). I am interested in the Category pages without the template transcluded, so start with L2 and filter ... Set operations = symmetric difference; open L1 (successfully) and Apply. All pages are removed from the list. Suggestions on what I haven't set properly? Thx. -- billinghurst (talk) 04:58, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

Known bug - Wikipedia_talk:AutoWikiBrowser/Bugs#Can.27t_find_difference_in_list_filter —Reedy 09:28, 26 January 2009 (UTC)
Ah okay. Naturally I was blaming my lack of competence. :-) -- billinghurst (talk) 10:13, 26 January 2009 (UTC)
The list comparer *can* be used to similar effect. Generate 2 lists, you've got which list has which unique items, and which are common. —Reedy 17:18, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

Uncat stub suggestion

Does anyone know why AWB would suggest an edit of {{Uncategorizedstub|date={{subst:CURRENTMONTHNAME}} {{subst:CURRENTYEAR}}}} on Indiana Jones and the Philosopher's Stone? It has non stub categories.--Rockfang (talk) 06:32, 27 January 2009 (UTC)

Known and fixed bug —Reedy 13:21, 29 January 2009 (UTC)

AWB policy on self links in first sentences of page

On the Vimperator page recently, SmackBot (due to AWB behavior) removed the square brackets around the "Vimperator" (a self link) in the first sentence. Wikipedia automatically converts self links to bold, and Wikipedia has the convention that when a page refers to its subject in the first sentence, that subject should be bolded. Hence, it is commonplace to use a self link in the first sentence as an alternative to an explicit bold.

As a consequence of the SmackBot "fix", the Wikipedia convention of bolding the entry name in the first sentence was broken. To fix, I changed the original self link to an explicit bold. However, I don't think the self link was a bad choice to begin with.

When AWB spots a self link in the first sentence (or two?) of a page, it should leave it alone. Agree? Or disagree? Thanks. —TedPavlic (talk) 13:36, 29 January 2009 (UTC)

I think that self-links are a poor way to bold something. Why not just use the markup? –xeno (talk) 14:03, 29 January 2009 (UTC)
I like content-based tags rather than explicit style tags. Relevant key words should be wikified the first time they are used, and that includes the main subject. That is the reason why self links get bolded, and Wikipedia bolds self links automatically exactly for this reason. I think this Wikipedia behavior is justification alone for AWB to stop doing what it's doing. All relevant keywords should be wikified, and that includes the main subject; it is wrong for AWB to undo that. —TedPavlic (talk) 14:13, 29 January 2009 (UTC)
Hmm, can you point us to where it says that in the style guide? (that the subject should be self-linked) –xeno (talk) 14:18, 29 January 2009 (UTC)
In fact, Wikipedia:Self-link explicitly says Per the Wikipedia:Manual of Style#Article titles, you should not use self-links to make the article name bold in the first paragraph. –xeno (talk) 14:25, 29 January 2009 (UTC)
Please find and quote the relevant section of Wikipedia:Manual of Style#Article titles. I've searched, and I can find little information about self linking or bolding. From what I see here, that line of Wikipedia:Self-link should be removed. —TedPavlic (talk) 15:13, 29 January 2009 (UTC)
And reinforced at Wikipedia:Manual of Style (links). It also makes strong comment about over and under linking that is relevant reading. -- billinghurst (talk) 14:44, 29 January 2009 (UTC)
Again, please find and quote a section that discusses using self links. The closest I can find is "Do not place links in the bold reiteration of the title in the article's lead sentence," but that refers to putting an actual LINK in the middle of the reiteration. It is not discussing the implementation of the reiteration. Following WPMOS, only the first instance of relevant words should be wikified. I believe the subject of an article is a relevant word, and I believe its reiteration (which always occurs in the first sentence) is conventionally bolded. I believe the reason why self-links are bolded is because they were originally meant to be used as reiterations. —TedPavlic (talk) 15:13, 29 January 2009 (UTC)
I don't think we should infer style guidelines from Mediawiki's technical behaviour. I think WT:MOS might be a better venue for this. Once consensus for the proper style is determined, AWB can fall in line (or continue as it were). –xeno (talk) 15:16, 29 January 2009 (UTC)
Okay. But in the meanwhile, AWB's behavior should be changed to substitute a bold for a self link when found in the first sentence of a page. Right now it strips all markup. In other words, AWB is being a nuisance regardless of what WT:MOS says; in either case, an editor has to go back and fix what AWB broke. —TedPavlic (talk) 15:23, 29 January 2009 (UTC)
If it's urgent you could make the request at Wikipedia talk:AutoWikiBrowser/Feature requests, but it may make sense to determine the MOS issue first. –xeno (talk) 15:26, 29 January 2009 (UTC)

In such situations AWB will convert the linked page title to bold as part of its general fixes (see this test edit of the page copied to sandbox and page title link changed). As this didn't happen here, I suppose that SmackBot doesn't use the AWB general fixes and has its own logic to remove self links. Best to ask SmackBot's owner to clarify. Rjwilmsi 17:58, 29 January 2009 (UTC)

Yes this is using general fixes, this bug has been reported before. Rich Farmbrough, 18:23 29 January 2009 (UTC).
Note there is a leading infobox. Rich Farmbrough, 18:34 29 January 2009 (UTC).
Testing this via sandbox or AWB unit tests it replaces the self link with bold as expected and as is desired. Was this done with AWB 4.5.0.0 as I rewrote the title bolding logic for 4.5.0.0? If it was with 4.5.0.0 then I'm at a loss. Rjwilmsi 23:45, 29 January 2009 (UTC)
No, almost certainly 4.4 variant, 4.4.4.2 probably. Rich Farmbrough, 15:40 30 January 2009 (UTC).
Then please update to the 4.5.x release when it's out this weekend to resolve this issue. Rjwilmsi 10:00, 31 January 2009 (UTC)

Visually indistinguishable special characters and bot conversion

I make frequent use of some special characters to ensure line-end word-wraps look appropriate in all cases. They are the non-breaking hyphen, which has the ISO Latin-1 code &#x2011;, and the non-breaking space, which has the HTML Entity name &nbsp;.

Pretty much everyone knows what the non-breaking space is for: you can code Then add a 25&nbsp;kg sack of and it will appear as Then add a 25 kg sack of… without worrying that it will do a line-end word wrap, like this:

Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetuer adipiscing elit. Then add a 25
kg bag of enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exerci back-strainuneum.

Similarly, the non-breaking hyphen, &#x2011;, prevents instances like this:

Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetuer adipiscing elit. The United States’ F-
22 fighter plane enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exerci tation kickbuttotis.

My trouble here is with User:SmackBot. It replaces the code with the rendered characters. The trouble with this is that other editors—even myself—can no longer see where these special characters are being used and copy them for use elsewhere in an article. Worse still, it appears that when some users copy swaths of text for editing in a text editor using various Barbarian OS machines, the special nature of the non-breaking characters is lost when they paste back into the article.

Now, at $100 per terabyte, the server cost of leaving these special characters as their code names is an average of about 6×10−8 ¢ per occurrence. All hundred of these special characters that I might use over a period of several months, still might be a “Greg L overhead” of 6×10−6 ¢. Multiplied by the 1000 or so like-minded editors who might be inclined to do as I do, we’re still talking 6×10−3 ¢. So cost isn’t a factor here; less than a penny.

It would be far easier for other editors—particularly less experienced ones—if they wade into our F-22 Raptor (for instance), if they can actually see F&#x2011;22 nearby and take a hint to copy and paste the thing instead of pounding away on the keyboard. And it would be infinitely easier for the editors who put them there in the first place and are still editing the article.

Don’t get me wrong here. I am all for having bots do cleanup where the rendered character is visually distinctive and identifiable and doesn’t have a visually identical cousin that functions differently. For instance, it is just fine if a bot converts the “Identical to” sign &equiv; to the easy-to-distinguish ≡ character (enlarged here for detail). You can see, copy, and paste the rendered character just fine. I’m talking about just a very special, small class of characters, where bots should not be changing the non-breaking space and the non-breaking hyphen (and perhaps the thinspace too) to their rendered character because they are indistinguishable from (or a little too similar to) their identical-looking regular-functioning counterparts. Greg L (talk) 03:40, 31 January 2009 (UTC)

Please summarise in one sentence what change you are requesting to AWB. Rjwilmsi 09:33, 31 January 2009 (UTC)
I'll try (two sentences): That AWB be changed to not convert all HTML entities to their raw unicode characters. Exceptions should be the various dashes, (except for a real space), and other similar characters and symbols which aren't easily typeable. —Locke Cole • t • c 11:44, 31 January 2009 (UTC)
The summary of the above is then please don't Unicodify the non-breaking hyphen &#x2011; as in Unicode it looks the same as a normal hyphen.
rev 3890 adds an exception for this character. Rjwilmsi 12:05, 31 January 2009 (UTC)
  • Single-sentence request: AWB not change the non‑breaking space (entity name = &nbsp; ISO = &#160;) nor the non‑breaking hyphen (entity name (decimal) = &#8209; ISO = &#x2011;) nor the thinspace (entity name = &thinsp; ISO = &#8201;) to their rendered characters because they are completely indistinguishable (or difficult to distinguish) from their regular cousins, the regular space and the regular hyphen). Greg L (talk) 02:44, 2 February 2009 (UTC)
Non-breaking spaces and thin spaces are already ignored. Non-breaking hyphen is ignored too after change above. Rjwilmsi 08:00, 2 February 2009 (UTC)

Notice of RfC

Notice: An RfC, here on a subpage of WT:MOSNUM is ongoing. The RfC covers the issue of whether dates in articles should be linked, whether bots should properly have a role in the delinking linked dates, and whether a date autoformatting tool that gives a special format of dates for the benefit of registered editors should become a project-wide standard.

The RfC has enjoyed only limited participation so far; primarily those editors who have been hotly debating the issues. It would be exceedingly helpful to get the widest possible participation in order to measure the “community consensus.”

If anyone here can think of other venues where this notice can be posted that will result in interest in participating, please advise or please post your own notice there. Note that RfCs are not simply “votes”; discussion and debate is a central component of the RfC process when it comes to determining the community consensus. Editors with great experience in the operation of bots would be greatly welcome so we can drill down to the true facts of what they can and can not do. Greg L (talk) 17:14, 2 February 2009 (UTC)

Regex find/replace help needed

Hope someone can help me with this. I'm new to using regular expressions and don't know if AWB can do what I'd like it to do. Just found out a wiki I'm working on frequently uses 3-character color codes within DIV STYLE tags, which apparently doesn't sit well with Internet Explorer (of course) and IE displays the wrong colors. I want to use regexes to find and replace all 3-character color codes. In my head it seems straightforward: Find all occurrences of "#[0-9a-fA-F][0-9a-fA-F][0-9a-fA-F];" and replace them with the same three characters, but doubled. For example, if AWB found "#eef;" it would replace it with "#eeeeff;". I've got the find string working just fine as shown; it's the replacement that has me stymied. Can I even do this? Because the color codes vary, I can't specify a static replacement string. Any advice is appreciated since I really don't want to do this manually. -- B.Rossow talkcontr 21:13, 2 February 2009 (UTC)

I would do it as follows:
Find: #([0-9A-F])([0-9A-F])([0-9A-F]) //With case-sensitivity disabled you don't need to explicitly specify both cases

Replace with: #$1$1$2$2$3$3 //The $1 matches the first parenthesis-enclosed group, $2 the second, etc.

Probably not the most efficient method, but it can be done using AWB's 'find and replace' system without needing to faff around with custom modules. Hope this helps! Richard0612 21:47, 2 February 2009 (UTC)

PERFECT! That's exactly what I needed. I was missing the parentheses in the Find portion, as I had tried the Replace string exactly as you provided it without luck -- just kept returning the literal $1$1$2$2$3$3. Thank you! -- B.Rossow talkcontr 22:08, 2 February 2009 (UTC)
No problem. Richard0612 22:34, 2 February 2009 (UTC)

For your information '\d' is another way of saying '0-9'. Thus you could also use: 

Find: #([\dA-F])([\dA-F])([\dA-F])

Hope that helps. Lightmouse (talk) 00:02, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

Where is 'add nbsp' in 'customised general fixes'?

Where is 'add nbsp' in 'customised general fixes'? I would like to do general fixes but eliminate the 'add nbsp' function. I looked in Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser/Custom_Modules#Customised_.22General_Fixes.22 but couldn't find it. Lightmouse (talk) 12:47, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

I'll have a look, i dont keep that fully up to date, just changed it as per some AWB breaking changes... It *might* be in another feature... Rjwilmsi would know specifically —Reedy 14:23, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

OK thanks. No hurry. Lightmouse (talk) 14:30, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

Custom module example updated. FixNonBreakingSpaces is the relevant function. Rjwilmsi 23:22, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

Thanks. Lightmouse (talk) 23:46, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

Adding navboxes

I want to use AWB to add a navigation box template to a number of articles, in this case {{Gwynedd}}. The easiest way I can see to do this is to use the append function to add the template. However, this appends the template below the categories and interwiki links. I have general fixes switched on, but it appears to apply the general fixes before appending. Is there any alternative way I can do this? —  Tivedshambo  (t/c) 19:00, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

Filtering based on history

Is there a way to filter edits based on the history? For example, I might like to ensure that a bot doesn't visit an article twice. Perhaps this is a 'skip if history contains <xyz>'. Lightmouse (talk) 02:15, 2 February 2009 (UTC)

Does anyone know the answer to this question? Lightmouse (talk) 10:35, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

Bot tab for AWB disappeared

It appears that Bot tab for AWB disappeared in the new version of 4.5.1.0 -- Tinu Cherian - 05:44, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

Log in with a bot account. It should automagically appear. §hep • Talk 05:48, 5 February 2009 (UTC)
Nope, the bot tab disappears when u logs in as a bot. Please check -- Tinu Cherian - 05:49, 5 February 2009 (UTC)
I did, what rev are you running? SVN 3911 (Snapshot label 3938) starts with no bot tab, when logged in as a bot it appears. Not the same for you? §hep • Talk 05:51, 5 February 2009 (UTC)
I am using optional update version SVN 3906. May be I need to check with the latest SVN , but http://awb.reedyboy.net/ is unaccessible for me -- Tinu Cherian - 05:57, 5 February 2009 (UTC)
That was moved to the toolserver tools:~reedy/awbsnapshots/ §hep • Talk 06:00, 5 February 2009 (UTC)
Thanks! It is working properly with latest SVN 3911 -- Tinu Cherian - 06:26, 5 February 2009 (UTC)
As I still work with 3909 and I do not find any way to update to a later version, this workaround does not work for me. Why does AWB suddenly not recognise my bot-bit anymore everywhere? The status line shows that I have a bot bit applied, but the menu option is gone once I login, and AWB is adding extra delays to the program so it waits 60 seconds between saving and loading a page. This all happened since the last 'upgrade'. Edoderoo (talk) 12:34, 9 February 2009 (UTC)
Go to the SVN snapshot page and update. Lightmouse (talk) 12:43, 9 February 2009 (UTC)
Thanks, that helped to update. The extra delay (restarting in 60.. 59.. 58.. etc) is unfortunately still there :-( Edoderoo (talk) 15:06, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

There is a link to 'SVN snapshots' at the top of this page. The delay is not a feature of AWB, it is a problem with Wikipedia servers. Try clicking on 'Start' or just wait it out. Lightmouse (talk) 16:27, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

Clicking start helps, but it is taking the 'automatic' away from AWB :-) If the cause is on the wikipedia-servers, it is just a coincidence that this always happens since the last update. On the other hand I have to admit that is not always happening, sometimes a few pages just snap through without a delay. Edoderoo (talk) 15:52, 10 February 2009 (UTC)
Still problems with "loading page to check if we are logged in " on Wikia - it was takeing ages, with the latest snapshot it seems to hang. Rich Farmbrough, 21:16 12 February 2009 (UTC).

Using AWB in commons?

How do you use AWB in Wikimedia Commons, for example if you want to make a change in a whole album of images (for example the Commons:Category:Adolfo Farsari)? Mikael Häggström (talk) 16:44, 6 February 2009 (UTC)

Or is it perhaps impossible? And if so, is there any AutoCommonsBrowser? Mikael Häggström (talk) 15:23, 8 February 2009 (UTC)

It works the same. Select 'Options', then 'Preferences', and in the site tab, change it to commons. You will also need to be approved on Commons to use it there, see commons:Commons:AutoWikiBrowser. mattbr 15:35, 8 February 2009 (UTC)
Thanks! Mikael Häggström (talk) 17:31, 8 February 2009 (UTC)

RegEx help

See User talk:Robert Skyhawk/Country Outline task list#Regex tasks. Could somebody give me some help with the RegEx parameters required to get these tasks done with AWB's find and replace? That, or is there a way to specify a new line without using RegEx? Any help is greatly appreciated. Thanks, Robert Skyhawk So sue me! (You'll lose) 01:02, 11 February 2009 (UTC) 

find="(th|nd|rd|st)(\]\])(\r\n?|\n)(\* \[\[Area of \]\]:)" replace="$1 most populous country$2$3$4"
find="(th|nd|rd|st)(\]\])(\r\n?|\n)(\* \[\[:commons:Atlas of )" replace="$1 largest country$2$3$4"
Set them regex and case sensitive, don't paste in the quotes. Rjwilmsi 19:09, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

Unable to log in

Since updating AWB it is not letting me log in. It says "Loading page to check if we are logged in." at the bottom and nothing else happens. Martin 06:41, 14 February 2009 (UTC)

Workaround: Log out; log in. Restart AWB. Rich Farmbrough, 20:28 14 February 2009 (UTC).

Removal of blank lines

When being used in de.wikipedia, AWB (with apply general fixes) removes the blank line between the person data (Personendaten) and the interlanguage links (see here). This does not improve readability, and it is even not compliant with the corresponding guidelines in de.wikipedia. Is there a way to disable this? --Ukko.de (talk) 09:50, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

 Donerev 3973 On de wiki ensure there's a newline between persondata and interwikis. Rjwilmsi 19:21, 17 February 2009 (UTC)
Thank you! --Ukko.de (talk) 19:57, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

Delinking

Is there a way to automatically delink all multiple wiki-links when editing a page? I hate clicking the button over and over again. -download | sign! 02:58, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

Hell no; there are very good reasons for multiple links. --NE2 03:05, 18 February 2009 (UTC)
OK, I just thought all the duplicates were useless. Thanks for your help! -download | sign! 03:21, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

Filtering with regex

Is there a way to filter out anything that ends with X, but keep titles containing X elsewhere? --NE2 07:18, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

Filter --> Remove titles containing 'X$' without the quotes and set as a regular expression. Rjwilmsi 07:58, 18 February 2009 (UTC)
Ah - thanks. --NE2 08:10, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

Right-click menu

When you right click on the list, you can "add selected to list from". Why doesn't this option have all the ways of making lists, like what links here from all namespaces? --NE2 10:01, 19 February 2009 (UTC)

It could, but by default, i suspect, most of them aren't needed, so its just done on request... It would get rather big tbh with them all in... —Reedy 11:46, 19 February 2009 (UTC)
There isn't another way of doing it, is there? --NE2 14:08, 19 February 2009 (UTC)
I can add them if they're requested.. It could be done iterative to do all of them, but then we'd need a blacklist to remove certain ones that aren't appropriate... —Reedy 14:10, 19 February 2009 (UTC)

Regex search/replace matching

Is there a way to match not two consecutive new lines?

[^\n][^\n] doesn't work, as it will only match no new lines.

Thanks in advance, 159.83.4.148 (talk) 00:03, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

(?!(\r\n){2}) ?? —Reedy 00:09, 22 February 2009 (UTC)
Thanks for the speedy answer! You guys are great! 159.83.4.153 (talk) 00:32, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

Basic instructions

I confess I'm clueless about how to use AWB for a basic chore like cleaning up wiki links to dates. I've read the documentation, which merely describes what the user interface does, not how to use it, assuming you already understand stuff I don't. AWB appears to presume developer-level knowledge (e.g., use of REGEXP), which I am not. Where can I go to get a more basic understanding of how to use AWB for basic, repetitive tasks, like cleaning up multiple links to dates in an article like that found here? Gracias! -- btphelps (talk) (contribs) 15:19, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

For something like delinking dates you'll need to install a custom module. For basic tasks, find-and-replace, general cleanup...that is gone over a bit in the user manual with links under the banner that explain regex, find-and-replace, and how to use the database scanner. It should be noted, though, that currently editors cannot use AWB or any other auto or semi-auotmated tool to delink dates due to an ArbCom injunction. §hepTalk 05:00, 22 February 2009 (UTC)
Thanks for the info, I'll look into the modules more, though they too appear to assume a programmer's level of knowledge. I knew about the AWB date injunction in January, and am surprised it's not yet resolved. Thanks for the clean up on the dates on 33rd Infantry Brigade. That was a laborious task. 09:56, 23 February 2009 (UTC)
Unfortunately, that is pretty much true. Althouygh, you can use VB or C#, and vb can be easier for "non programmers" to get going with... There isnt much we can actually do to simplify it, as this, and plugins are designed for the advanced user/current programmers. Although, usually if you ask nicely on here, someone can/will help you out. —Reedy 12:44, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

Database Scanner

In "Text Searching" is it possible to include several search words (like "Slika:" and/or "Image:"). I need this for :sl. Regards, --Klemen Kocjancic (talk) 14:58, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

Make it regex? Then have a multiple capture group? —Reedy 17:10, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

How can I do it? Can you write a code? TIA! Regards, --Klemen Kocjancic (talk) 18:27, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

(Image|Slika): —Reedy 19:19, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Thanks! Will try it. Regards, --Klemen Kocjancic (talk) 09:14, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

Difficulties with custom module

I am having difficulties with the custom module. It won't compile unless I comment out the lines (look at this in edit mode):

//

 //	a.FixHeaderErrors(Variables.LangCode, false);
 //	a.AWBChangeArticleText("Fix non-breaking spaces", WikiFunctions.Parse.Parsers.FixNonBreakingSpaces(ArticleText), true);
 //	a.AWBChangeArticleText("Sort meta data", parsers.SortMetaData(ArticleText, Name), true);
 //	a.EmboldenTitles(false);
 //

Even when I have those lines commented out, the code doesn't do anything when I run it on an article. What am I doing wrong? Lightmouse (talk) 14:32, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

I suspect, its refactoring of the Article object... This on the latest svn snapshot? —Reedy 20:05, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

Bot tab in 4.5.1.0?

Hi! I haven't used AWB in a while, but recently logged in with BotanyBot, which is on the checkpage, to do some quick category moves. I logged in to the BotanyBot account, generated a list, but the bot tab still said it was only for approved bots. Then I made a manual edit, which finally made the lower right-hand corner turn green and list User:BotanyBot there, but the bot tab disappeared... Any ideas? --Rkitko (talk) 18:38, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

Grab an updated SVN snapshot. —Reedy 20:05, 1 March 2009 (UTC)
Ah, thanks. I should have tried that first. --Rkitko (talk) 20:53, 1 March 2009 (UTC)
How do you grab an updated svn snapshot? Do I download everything from [37] downwards? Hiding T 13:35, 12 March 2009 (UTC)
tools:~reedy/awbsnapshots/ —Reedy 13:36, 12 March 2009 (UTC)
Thanks. Hiding T 14:10, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Template substitution

How do I use AWB's template substitution feature? I've tried listing "Foo", "Template:Foo", and "{{Foo}}". Nothing seems to work. —Remember the dot (talk) 03:01, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

If its a template on this list, just turn on general fixes and it'll get subst'd automagically. –xeno (talk) 22:16, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

AWB problems

Since recently a lot of AWB-users on nl-wiki have troubles with this program. The core problem is that on our wiki, AWB is replacing {{references}} at the bottom of our pages into {{Unreferenced|date=februari 2009}}. We have {{references}} as template, but we do not have and do not want to have the template unreferenced. This unreferenced-template is even added if there are references on that article! So far we see, we can't switch it off in some way, it seems. Auto-tag switching off seems not enough and still it occurs. We like to use AWB on our wiki, and are very thankful for the work developers put into it, but on nl-wiki we work for a large part different from how the users of en-wiki work. What we would like is the ability to switch off (easy) each function which we do not use (and en-wiki does use). Thanks in advance! Greetings - Romaine (talk) 14:18, 8 February 2009 (UTC)

This arises from a different use of a template with the same name on two wikis: on en wiki {{references}} is a cleanup tag meaning 'this article needs more references' (etc.) whereas on nl wiki (Sjabloon:References) {{references}} acts like <references/> i.e. instructs the wiki software where to show the list of references. The AWB tagger will add a date to undated {{references}}, which is going to be completely wrong on nl wiki. This date maintenance functionality is part of AWB general fixes, so gen fixes will need to be disabled to prevent this on the current AWB version. We, the AWB developers, are already aware that the tagger needs an overhaul, this is just another example of why it's needed. Thanks Rjwilmsi 14:48, 8 February 2009 (UTC)
The same problem occurs with adding {{Uncategorized|date=februari 2009}} to pages with no category. Also this template isn't wanted and can't be used this way, as we work differently on nl-wiki. I hope these things can be easily switched off with the next upgrade. Greetings & thanks! Romaine (talk) 23:35, 17 February 2009 (UTC)
I'll add exceptions to ignore the above on nl wiki. The current tagger logic doesn't normally care about the wiki language, perhaps it should, but I can resolve the issues above quite easily. Rjwilmsi 13:51, 18 February 2009 (UTC)
 Done rev 3977 and rev 3978 Exceptions added for nl wiki. Rjwilmsi 18:51, 18 February 2009 (UTC)
Thanks Rjwilmsi. I'm am an enthousiastic dutch user of the program and I see that version 3978 is the one with includs the solutions of our problem. But how do I install 3978? I am working with 3906 and if I check for updates there are no more; greetings Japiot (talk) 00:03, 2 March 2009 (UTC)
Use the SVN snapshots link at the top to manually download a newer release. An updated official release will follow sometime soon. Thanks Rjwilmsi 17:46, 5 March 2009 (UTC)
In the past days we have had problems AWB is replacing {{CU}} or {{cu}} in {{Cleanup|<date>}}, while cu/CU is our template for a flag of Cuba. We hope this can be fixed as well. If I can assist in helping out what templates or other things we have/are used to on nl-wiki, I can help, just let me know. Thanks! Greetings - Romaine (talk) 14:07, 14 March 2009 (UTC)
rev 4068 Another exception to ignore it on nl-wiki. Rjwilmsi 14:46, 14 March 2009 (UTC)
Maybe it is better to skip all the language-depending changes regarding templates. Then we have no risk of getting in touch with new hidden side-effects. Greetings - Romaine (talk) 15:06, 14 March 2009 (UTC)

Possibility

Some time ago the name of the image-namespace changed from "Image" to "File", with both prefixes still working. On nl-wiki, instead of "Afbeelding" the namespace is now named as "Bestand". To make the confusion less for new users, we better would use only 1 prefix as much as possible (but without doing extra edits for it). So the question is if it is possible to change (when other edits are made on a page with AWB and "general fixes" is on) to set that "Image", "File", and "Afbeelding" as prefix of files, are automatically changed to "Bestand"? Thanks for the development with AWB! Greetings - Romaine (talk) 13:38, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

It is possible.. On en.wp, by default, there is no reason to do so, so hence, hasnt been implemented. It can, however, be implemented for other wiki's on request... —Reedy 23:21, 28 February 2009 (UTC)
IF you can, please do. Thanks you! Greetings - Romaine (talk) 14:00, 14 March 2009 (UTC)

AWB as a bot

Sorry if the answer to this question is too obvious for you AWB veterans, but can AWB be used as a bot without any additional software? That is, could one get a bot account and use AWB to perform some action, say a search and replace, which would go automatically without any operator input (after proper bot approval, of course)? Thanks. 159.83.4.148 (talk) 23:31, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

Yup. Would need to be on a wiki with no checkpage, or if it does, be listed under "Bots" on the checkpage. —Reedy 23:32, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

Article text in custom module

In a custom module, ArticleText is only the text before the DEFAULTSORT, Categories, and interwikis. Is there a way to access the ending portion of an article, or, preferably, the entire article including the end parts? Schmoolik (talk) 18:05, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

The custom module is passed EVERYTHING as it is (/with any updates AWB may have done before it got to the custom module part) —Reedy 18:53, 12 March 2009 (UTC)
Thanks for your reply. What a silly mistake: in my testing, I appended something to the end of ArticleText and it showed up before the DEFAULTSORT, leading me to my false conclusion. When I turned off genfixes, it left it at the end as expected.
One more question, though. In your response, you say that AWB may update the text before sending it along to the custom module. As I discovered, genfixes are done after custom module processing, so what is done before? Schmoolik (talk) 21:40, 12 March 2009 (UTC)
A no bots check.. So you can ignore that comment! Custom module is first up! —Reedy 21:44, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Special pages

This is quite possibly operator error (or as we say at work, "the problem is the nut behind the controls"...), but I was so desperate that I even read the manual. :)

For a question about fully protected user talk pages over at WP:AN, I was trying to get a list of those pages to load into the AWB list comparer. (Basically, the list you get at Special:Protected pages, limited to user talk space.) However, when I try to use "special pages" as the source for "make list" in AWB, I can't figure out how to tell it the source is Special:Protected pages. When I click "make list", I can specify the namespace as user talk just fine, but all the options I try to specify protected pages aren't working. Any clue what I'm doing wrong? And if I'm doing nothing wrong, and clue how I can load this info into AWB? Thanks!--Fabrictramp | talk to me 22:14, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

Due to the faff and much aggro caused by parsing (badly) HTML to get special pages done, i removed that. It is being migrated to API requests, as and when they are available. Or at least, in any case, should be. The Protected pages is implemented (although, it could be buggy). If you select special pages, make list, protected pages in the new drop down box, no target page, and select a namespace of user... It should then go away and give you a list of results...
User:!!
User:00a00a0aa
User:12.75.22.13
User:130.216.191.184
User:137.222.91.92
User:149.68.7.90
User:162.83.209.26

etc... —Reedy 22:29, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

As an aside - "extra = "&apprtype=edit|move&apprlevel=sysop|autoconfirmed";".. Its doing Semi and fully protected special pages, which edit and/or move protection.. If you just need level=sysop or similar, let me know, as its really simple to implement. —Reedy 22:31, 10 March 2009 (UTC)


Thanks! Just to be clear, since I don't see protected pages in the drop down box, do I grab the latest AWB version or sit on my hands for a bit for a newer version to appear?--Fabrictramp | talk to me 22:38, 10 March 2009 (UTC)
And by drop down box, I mean the one that appears after choosing special pages and make list. I didn't expect you to read my mind, honest. ;-) --Fabrictramp | talk to me 22:41, 10 March 2009 (UTC)
Thats a point. Grabbing an updated SVN snapshot will provide you the functionality =). Just looked at the changelog, as i couldn't remember when i had added it. But like i say, if theres any cases (or if you think its worth me just blanket doing them edit/move sysop/autoconfirmed, etc) you want adding, i can do so VERY easily =) (and i did gather that ;))—Reedy 22:42, 10 March 2009 (UTC)
I grabbed the lasted version you had compiled, and it's working like a charm. Thanks! The first run I looked at (protected pages where the editor has a {{retired}} template gave just 32 matches, so I think we can look at these one by one with no problem. Wonderful!!--Fabrictramp | talk to me 23:05, 10 March 2009 (UTC)
Cool.. =) Like i say, if you think i should add them, just let me know.. —Reedy 23:19, 10 March 2009 (UTC)
(haven't looked) if we're not able to isolate the levels of protection, that functionality would be excellent. –xeno (talk) 23:21, 10 March 2009 (UTC)
(unindent).. It would be possible, its just dealing with it, and all the boundary cases and such... The ListMaker/Special pages thing needs a redesign, but i can provide that functionality easily if its deemed useful (as it would seem to be!) —Reedy 23:22, 10 March 2009 (UTC)
yea, the case that led to this section was a search for fully protection user talk pages that shouldn't be. –xeno (talk) 23:24, 10 March 2009 (UTC)
So.. to do it properly.. Unprotected, semi protected, full protected. Edit and move protection... 6 Possible cases? —Reedy 23:28, 10 March 2009 (UTC)
Yes, that would be proper. Quick and dirty would be we need to make a list of fully edit protected pages. No emergency here -- just something that came up because of a particular user issue that's been resolved.--Fabrictramp | talk to me 23:45, 10 March 2009 (UTC)
Not sure why i didnt think of this before... Good programming means code reuse. Why didnt i think of reusing the edit/move protection control? Duh! —Reedy 14:32, 11 March 2009 (UTC)


rev 4063 does it —Reedy 15:12, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

Good man. thanks. –xeno (talk) 15:13, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

There's actually the following conditions as far as I can see

  1. unprotected
  2. unprotected, move semi-prot
  3. unprotected, move protected
  4. semi-protected
  5. semi-protected, move semi-prot
  6. semi-protected, move protected
  7. protected
  8. protected, move semi-prot
  9. protected, move protected
  10. protected, move protected, cascadeing.
Rich Farmbrough, 18:24 18 March 2009 (UTC).

Image Replacement

I've tried using the find and replace feature to replace an image with another. After I generated the list from the Image Links and started AWB, it skipped over all the articles. Am I doing this wrong, or is there a skip setting that I didn't change? Thanks! -download | sign! 03:21, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

Sorry; figured it out. -download | sign! 03:49, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

Unreferenced

It would be cool if AWB could automatically tag articles with {{unreferenced}}. Could a developer please look into it? -download | sign! 23:12, 22 March 2009 (UTC)

No, please don't do this "automatically" or on a large scale. The unreferenced tag is really only helpful if other people are actively working on the article. If you would like to remedy the problem of unreferenced articles, it's more effective to add the references than to add loots of unreferenced tags. — Carl (CBM · talk) 23:39, 22 March 2009 (UTC)
I agree there. but, why at all do we tag articles with Unreferenced, deadend, and such. Others such as "cleanup" and "npov" aren't softwrae definable... —Reedy 13:18, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Passed Away --> Died

I've noticed, using AWB, that RegEx Typo Fix changes "passed away" to "died". Is there any reason/discussion regarding this? Thanks. -download | sign! 03:18, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

WP:EUPHEMISM. Mr Stephen (talk) 07:58, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

Re-ordering footnotes (<ref>s) in text

Here for example. I'm not sure of the logic behind this, I can see value to re-arraning in numericla order, but not what is happening here. Rich Farmbrough, 15:22 21 March 2009 (UTC).

The only problem is the changes in the infobox part, the rest of the changes correctly reorder the references to be in numercial order. What's happened in the infobox is that the strength2 field is above the strength1 field so the rendered order is not the same as the order in the raw text of the article. The AWB logic goes on the order in the raw wikitext. The solution for this article would be to reorder the two fields in the infoxbox so that the displayed order is the same as the raw text order. This won't make any difference to the displayed article, but would prevent the few needless changes within the many correct changes by AWB. Rjwilmsi 18:55, 21 March 2009 (UTC)
Rich posted here after me posting on his talk page. I'll repost here, since the above comment is not what I was talking about.
Why does smackbot reorder references?
E.g. here. At times, the order might not matter, but in general, I find ordering useful. For example, if one sentence contains two facts that should be sourced, the first reference should source the first fact. There might also be other cases in which one does want the order preserved (order by date or relevance). Having a bot order all these by, what I guess, is alphabetic, messes all that up. --Xeeron (talk) 10:39, 21 March 2009 (UTC)
Smackbot is still reordering footnotes. --Xeeron (talk) 22:59, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

I'll add my confusion to this. Why has AWB changed from the first to the second version, here?

as Australia fielded an unchanged team.[19][20][34][29] Australia ...
as Australia fielded an unchanged team.[19][20][29][34] Australia ...

Mr Stephen (talk) 23:49, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

ROFL! make that from the second to the first. The original was in the right order, AWB made an odd change. Mr Stephen (talk) 00:03, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
If a sentence contains different references for different facts then surely the references should be at the end of the phrase rather than the end of the sentence, otherwise this is unclear to those reading the article (what if there are two facts and three references etc.?). For the Neil Harvey article, there could be a bug, I'll have a look at what's going on later. Thanks Rjwilmsi 11:16, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
That might be the case (even though I notice that often refs are put at the end of sentences for aesthetic reasons), but that still leaves the case of ordering by relevance. Or many other reasons for a specific ordering that editors might have that elude me now. I still don't see the reason for having a bot change the ordering that editors chose. --Xeeron (talk) 13:04, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

rev 4118 Fixes bug over Neil Harvey article. Rjwilmsi 18:33, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Well done. Mr Stephen (talk) 19:39, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Bot tools

Bot tools such as Auto Save are no longer working for my bot on Fable Wiki is this something new? I used to be able to use the Auto Save feature there... Also, my bot does have bot status on that wiki... --GW-Shadowphoenix (talk) 05:18, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

Which version? —Reedy 23:58, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
I currently have 4.5.1.0 but I am updating as a type, maybe the update will fix the problem. --GW-Shadowphoenix (talk) 14:42, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

Vote on date autoformatting and linking

The issue of date linking and AWB has been discussed here so people may be interested to know that the Vote on date autoformatting and linking is now open. All users are invited to participate. Lightmouse (talk) 15:10, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

Edit summary in other language Wikis

I just tried to use the AWB RegExpTypoFix in the German Wikipedia and I noticed that it works quite well - except for the edit summary, which is in English. I didn't find a way to edit or disable this automatic summary, so I can't use it because it's the wrong language. Finally, I found this discussion in 2008. Am I right, that still just a generic wording for the German Wikipedia needs to be supplied? That would be easy... --Ukko.de (talk) 20:30, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

Yes, that's right. You would need to provide German translations for the following two phrases: " using " and ", typos fixed: "(As in: typos fixed a --> b, using AWB). Thanks Rjwilmsi 20:41, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
I suspect "mit" would probably suffice for using.. Although, im not sure how we'll actually best implement this.. As it hasn't been done for any other language yet.. —Reedy 20:49, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
Variables.cs line ~525. Seems to all have been done before. Rjwilmsi 21:33, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
lol. Lot on my mind atm, completely forgot about that! —Reedy 21:36, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
rev 4115 - my crap german translation... Haha (let us know if you want something else) —Reedy 10:37, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
"mit" will be perfect instead of "using". I didn't find a translation of "typos fixed" in the code. The full translation would be "Tippfehler korrigiert" or short "Tippfehler". However, "Schreibweise" appears to be even better, this is a more general term meaning "spelling" or "syntax".
So the source code is prepared, but it still has to be activated? --Ukko (talk) 21:47, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
Just a svn snapshot uploading will do it (for those using it from then on)... Which do you want for the typo fixing? :P —Reedy 22:59, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
"Schreibweise" please for the typo fixing. Thank you! :-) --Ukko (talk) 19:37, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

Done rev 4120 —Reedy 19:53, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

Thank you - it works. :-) --Ukko (talk) 21:40, 2 April 2009 (UTC)

How to generate a list from a toolserver page

I'm good at reading directions, but this one has me stumped. :)

JaGa has made a very cool list here at toolserver.org that I'd like to be able to bring into AWB for tagging. Except I can't figure out how to make an AWB readable list from the page. Clues, please? (Preferably in non-tech speak *grin*).--Fabrictramp | talk to me 16:00, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia_talk:AutoWikiBrowser/Feature_requests#HTML_scrapper_for_listmaker would probably be worth implementing.. And/Or an XML'd version of it.. Getting him to make an XML outputted format of the page would be useful ;) —Reedy 16:04, 4 April 2009 (UTC)
I think I actually understand that. :)
Looking at the list brings up the further question of why AWB has missed pages like Active Sitting when I generate the DEP list from the data dump. I can't find a single version of the article that has had links. Unless the categories are fooling AWB. *scratching head*--Fabrictramp | talk to me 16:11, 4 April 2009 (UTC)
With it in an XML format.. An AWB List maker plugin should be writable in less than 30 lines or so of code.. =) —Reedy 17:32, 4 April 2009 (UTC)
JaGa was able to add a downloadable text file to the page, so I'm a happy camper now. :) --Fabrictramp | talk to me 20:39, 4 April 2009 (UTC)

Customised "General Fixes"

Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser/Custom Modules#Customised "General Fixes" looks very useful. But how can the following line, which was commented out, be used?

a.AWBChangeArticleText("Sort meta data", parsers.SortMetaData(ArticleText, Name), true);

Attempts to compile the code with this included (uncommented) are unsuccessful, due to "Name" being undefined. Is this the section which would do things like moving stubs to the proper place? In my testing, that general fix doesn't work and I assume it's because I can't get the above line to work.

Also, is the Customised "General Fixes" info up to date, or have more general fixes been implemented since that was written?

Thanks, 159.83.4.148 (talk) 22:30, 20 March 2009 (UTC)

This list has recently been updated. That line should compile just fine when uncommented provided you declare a variable called "Name", or simply change it to be "ArticleText" which is one of the variables passed in to the custom module. Thanks Rjwilmsi 23:37, 20 March 2009 (UTC)
I've updated the page now. —Reedy 23:51, 20 March 2009 (UTC)
Thanks for updating it, but it doesn't work. I copied everything exactly, but it doesn't perform any fixes. I changed the return line to return "test"+a.ArticleText; and it did add the "test" so I know the module is running. Note: attempting to assign a value to a.ArticleText produces an error stating that WikiFunctions.Article.ArticleText is read only. Could that be the problem? I'm using version 4.5.2.0. 159.83.4.153 (talk) 01:20, 25 March 2009 (UTC)
The Customised General Fixes code on that page does not have any effect at all. It returns ArticleText completely unchanged. The only way I can do any general fixes is to check the "Apply general fixes" box to do them all. The selective capability would be very handy to have available, so if anyone knows how to fix it, it would be appreciated. Schmoolik (talk) 01:30, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
Does anybody know how to make this work? To reiterate, the code provided does not perform any general fixes. It does absolutely nothing. I've tested some of the other modules on that page and they work fine, but this one does not. Try it for yourself: uncheck the general fixes option, install this module, and see it do... nothing. Can anybody fix it? If not, the nonfunctional code should be removed from the page. Thanks. 159.83.4.153 (talk) 00:31, 7 April 2009 (UTC)
I've made a further update, please try it again. Thanks Rjwilmsi 08:12, 7 April 2009 (UTC)

IW in custom projects

Hi, i'm using a custom project and im trying to sort interlanguage links but are being completely ignore, it is this wikipedia only? can it be set per wiki? im using 4.5.2.0 --Cizagna (talk) 00:23, 5 April 2009 (UTC)

Its specifically for certain projects/languages within awb. Currently, there are no provisions on how to select the IW sorting order for custom wiki's. It would be possible though.. —Reedy 09:27, 5 April 2009 (UTC)

Different Meaning

I don't know if some users know this but the AWB is actually a far-right, white supremisist, extremist organisation in South Africa. The equvilant of the KKK in America. I know we can't change it now, but how would you like a programming software called KKK? --Bezuidenhout (talk) 19:22, 7 April 2009 (UTC)

Further reading: Afrikaner Weerstandsbeweging. –xeno (talk) 19:24, 7 April 2009 (UTC)
AWB is ambiguous; see AWB (disambiguation). It doesn't have a primary topic, unlike "KKK". -- JHunterJ (talk) 18:56, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

Image → File

Shouldn't general fixes automatically change Image: to File: ? –xeno (talk) 18:47, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

Does it need to be changed? Wikipedia:Images indicates that they are interchangeable, but not that one is deprecated. -- JHunterJ (talk) 18:51, 9 April 2009 (UTC)
Ah...perhaps you're right. Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals)#Image → File ← that's where I got the idea. –xeno (talk) 19:26, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

Check for category

Greetings,

I run ListasBot, an AWB plugin written in C#. ListasBot attempts to fill in the "listas" parameter of {{WPBiography}} templates whenever possible. It's been suggested to me by another bot operator that I should have this bot attempt to fill in the "living" parameter as well, based on whether or not the page is a member of Category:Living people or Category:Possibly living people. Can anyone suggest a good way to check to see if a given page is a member of a given category, without retrieving the entire category and searching for it in the list? Thanks, Matt (talk) 22:12, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

Do it in reverse? Query the API for a list of Categories that the page has on it? —Reedy 06:45, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Couple of issues

  • I've set AWB to flash and beep when it's ready to make an edit, under Options > Preferences - but it doesn't!
  • The bot timer keeps counting down from ~45 seconds, and delaying me, though I'm not a bot.

Anyone got the answers? ;-) Thanks! ╟─TreasuryTag►contribs─╢ 08:11, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

The latter is the restart timer (not the bot timer), which starts when AWB has trouble saving a page, either a problem with the wiki servers or a problem with your internet connection. Rjwilmsi 09:02, 13 April 2009 (UTC)
Is there any way to reduce it or turn it off, do you know? ╟─TreasuryTag►contribs─╢ 09:03, 13 April 2009 (UTC)
No, though it's capped at 60 seconds, and you can always press stop then start to immediately process the page. If it happens all the time it means your internet / the wiki you use has connection problems, which AWB can't do anything about. Rjwilmsi 09:42, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Just plain find?

I've got my list of files up that have been found by a program to have bad ISBN numbers, but I can't figure out how to simply search the source of the file for "ISBN", ctrl-F simply moves me one character forward. I don't want a find and replace, since these have a variety of issues.Naraht (talk) 05:50, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

What are you entering in the text box? —Reedy 06:45, 13 April 2009 (UTC)
Duh, I figured it out now. :(Naraht (talk) 03:30, 18 April 2009 (UTC)

Common problems

I notice that this AutoBrowser keeps taking out the "th" at the end of every date. I think it should be corrected to leave in the "th". thanks South Bay (talk) 20:19, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia doesn't use ordinal numbers. --Izno (talk) 20:46, 12 April 2009 (UTC)
Could you please explain why it doesn't use ordinal numbers. South Bay (talk) 21:32, 12 April 2009 (UTC)
Because the WP:MOS for dates has decided as such. Probably better asking on WT:MOSDATE#Dates for a better answer —Reedy 06:44, 13 April 2009 (UTC)
Also, why does it freeze up every couple minutes. South Bay (talk) 22:32, 16 April 2009 (UTC)
Most likely related to your computer/setup. Otherwise we would be having a lot of reports as to it doing that. —Reedy 09:58, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

Activating Find and Replace

I'm having problems with AWB recognizing that I've added anything in Find and Replace, it just doesn't seem to see them. I've got the checkmark checked in the Find and Replace box on the Options tag, I've got two entries in the table in the Normal Settings pop-up (change ISBN-13: to ISBN and change ISBN-10: to ISBN) and neither seems to be running even though I've got the enabled checkbox checked in each line as well. I've tried stopping and starting again, Do I have to add them with the AWB stopped? Ideas?Naraht (talk) 03:41, 18 April 2009 (UTC)

If you've got 'ignore templates...' enabled at the top left then your ISBN fixes likely won't be applied. Rjwilmsi 06:54, 19 April 2009 (UTC)
Nope, ignore templates is *not* selected. Still no clue.Naraht (talk) 01:48, 20 April 2009 (UTC)
Can I ask, why are you changing them? Mr Stephen (talk) 07:03, 19 April 2009 (UTC)
One of the categories of things to be fixed in Wikipedia:WikiProject Check Wikipedia, if it is ISBN only, then a link is formed by wikimagic to a booksearch page. See the references in Electronics for an example.Naraht (talk) 01:48, 20 April 2009 (UTC)
Stop me if you already know this. Sometimes an article contains the plaintext "ISBN-13:", which, as you say, WikiMagic won't recognise. Sometimes the article contains the template ISBN-13, which renders as "ISBN-13:". Obviously AWB won't pick up the second. At least one of the articles at Wikipedia:WikiProject Check Wikipedia#ISBN wrong syntax (CodeFixer) (the very first one, Malnutrition]) fits this description. Using AWB on a plaintext example of ISBN-13: (in Model-based testing) works fine for me. Mr Stephen (talk) 19:42, 20 April 2009 (UTC)

Cant save in AWB

Something strange happen to my AWB for last 4 days I am unable to save a single page with it. I am a regular user at Commons for about a year and never had that problem before. I log in, start a job replacing some templates. AWB performs replacement correctly, I press green button save, status turns to "saving" and noting else happens. I am able to perform the same changes and save in Firefox and IE. Saving also do not work in Bot mode. I reboot my machine (standard Windows fix) downloaded new version of AWB (AutoWikiBrowser_rev4218.zip) and still no luck. Any ideas? --Jarekt (talk) 03:17, 19 April 2009 (UTC)

One more reboot and everything is working again. --Jarekt (talk) 04:00, 21 April 2009 (UTC)

Is it possible to check a user, and find their history of Redirects and merges?

I want to check through a certain user, and find in their edit history, every time they did a merge or a redirect somewhere. Is that possible? Dream Focus 18:59, 21 April 2009 (UTC)

Please be advised that Dream Focus has accused other editors of secret bad faith mergers[38] in an WP:AN/I dispute. --Farix (Talk) 19:36, 21 April 2009 (UTC)
Because I've seen and filed complains previously about people doing that. With this tool, I will be able to confirm just how often they do this. Is there any legitimate reason why you wouldn't want someone to be able to quickly compile a list showing how many times an article they nominated for deletion, got voted Keep in the AFD, and they then replaced it anyway without any discussion? Dream Focus 19:41, 21 April 2009 (UTC)
AWB probably isn't the best tool. Generally, just open the editor's contributions, show 500, and look for an edit summary that begins with "Replaced page content with...". --EEMIV (talk) 19:53, 21 April 2009 (UTC)
Is there any way to just save their entire edit history to a file, and search through it? If someone has made over 50 thousand edits, it is a chore to go through all of them page by page. Dream Focus 19:58, 21 April 2009 (UTC)
&limit=5000 –xeno talk 20:01, 21 April 2009 (UTC)
That doesn't work too well on someone who honestly makes 5000 edits in a month and a half. No exaggerating here. Any faster way to sort through it? They have list already that show the results from AFD. Is there a way to check all AFD that ended with Keep, not no consensus or merge, but Keep, and then see if those articles are still there, or if someone went ahead and defied consensus and merge/redirected them anyway? Dream Focus 22:31, 21 April 2009 (UTC)
There's no elegant way to do that with AWB. a toolserver query perhaps, but that's well beyond my area of expertise. –xeno talk 22:39, 21 April 2009 (UTC)

Permission of use

I am posting here to get permission to use the awb application. Any help of admin would be appreciation. Thanks. OOODDD (talk) 03:40, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

This I believe is a technical, not a permission issue - you're already on the check page. Have you tried logging out and logging back in from AWB's file menu? –xeno talk 04:15, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

Import a spreadsheet table into Find/replace matrix?

Is it possible to import a list of find and replace changes? i.e. –xeno talk 02:39, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

Not as it stands.. So the question, i suppose, is, would it be possible? Maybe.. Though, there's a few different formats... —Reedy 02:41, 22 April 2009 (UTC)
I knew you'd come through for me =) I'm sure Excel can save in whatever format you decide is best. heck even just importing from a wiki page would work... –xeno talk 02:43, 22 April 2009 (UTC)
At work we use Excel professional to generate XML based on an XSD. If we made an XSD for the find&replace section of the AWB XML settings you could generate that portion of the XML and paste it into the AWB settings. Rjwilmsi 06:58, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

It should be fairly easy to do this with pywikipediabot. Just use a batch file to call replace.py several times, e.g. 

replace.py "{{Template:User Bawls}}" "{{User:UBX/User gets caffeine with BAWLS}}" -ref:Template:User_Bawls -namespace:2
..

This can be improved by using a regex for the first part of the replacement. There is also template.py that can do that even better, as it includes a regex for all variations to transclude a template. -- User:Docu

Hmm, thanks both for the suggestions. –xeno talk 12:35, 22 April 2009 (UTC)
I tried Rj's suggestion and ☒N Failed, hard (couldn't export it after I pasted in the F&R changes - something about nonstandard data or some such). checkY Docu's suggestion is working well for now, though if a user is using more than one of the userboxen the bot will have to make multiple passes since it only runs one F&R at a time... –xeno talk 15:47, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

RegEx?

Does AWB use regular expressions for its general fixes? If so, would it be possible for me to view the RegEx so that I can add some of it to CodeFixer. (although I understand that that text would need to be licensed under the GPL, correct?) Thanks. –Drilnoth (T • C • L) 14:52, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

Yes. Yes, under GPL, though beware that some of the regexes use features specific to the C# implementation of regular expressions. Just follow the links on the main page to check out the SVN source. Start by looking at AWB/WikiFunctions/Parse/Parsers.cs for many of the genfix regexes.
I do wonder however whether having the logic in two tools is worth the effort/really necessary? Rjwilmsi 17:23, 23 April 2009 (UTC)
Good point; thanks. –Drilnoth (T • C • L) 02:06, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

Screen resolution

It took me a while to figure out, but I came to the conclusion that AWB can't work with 600x800 screen resolution. I couldn't see the bottom of the "Edit box", which caused some mistakes (I checked and fixed them later manually). Nor could I see the "Filter" box in the "Make list" corner. When I used higher resolution, I saw all of these.

Is this known? Can AWB be made to work (that is, to show all of itself) in 600x800 resolution also? Debresser (talk) 23:46, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

There has been some discussion about this before. AWB just needs a higher resolution. I don't think it's unreasonable as it really needs a more powerful CPU than what I'd expect to live with an 800x600 monitor. Rjwilmsi 06:11, 24 April 2009 (UTC)
Ok. Thanks. Debresser (talk) 08:53, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

Preview, pre-parse modes not working

In the last couple of days, both the preview and the pre-parse mode seem to have stopped working reliably. Preview always did take an age, but it usually came up in the end. Pre-parse works sometimes for a few articles, then activates the 'restarting in ...' feature. Have I done something silly with my settings, or has something somewhere else changed? Mr Stephen (talk) 19:53, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

Pre-parse mode has a bug in it, which I resolved today. See the bugs page for info on that. Rjwilmsi 17:55, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

New releases

What is the easiest way to find out whether there is a new release of AWB? Anywhere to sign up? Debresser (talk) 18:02, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

Watch Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser/History, or http://toolserver.org/%7Ereedy/awbsnapshots/ –xeno talk 19:09, 25 April 2009 (UTC)
Thanks. Debresser (talk) 19:25, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

Pre-Parsing

I'm new at this, I'm an editor on the DC Wikia. When I'm using pre-parse mode, it's highlighting all of the things I want skipped and seems to be removing all of the items I need fixed from the list instead. Are they being saved somewhere else, or am I just losing them and I have to start over again?

MrBlonde267 (talk) 20:50, 25 April 2009 (UTC)
They will be placed in the logs tab on the bottom right. It sounds like you've configured your skip options incorrectly so AWB is skipping what you want to keep. Rjwilmsi 20:25, 28 April 2009 (UTC)

Section edit summary after last section

When edits are performed only on items such as DEFAULTSORT, categories, stubs, etc., AWB (SVN 4267) uses a section edit summary, even though these items are not part of the preceding section (External links, References, or whatever). MANdARAX • XAЯAbИAM 20:03, 28 April 2009 (UTC)

If, for example, I press edit next to the External links section on the Tiger Woods article, it gives me access to the external links AND categories and interwikis. While I agree that you may consider categories and interwikis to be outside of a section, they are technically in the last section of the article (on en wiki at least and assuming they are correctly placed), so that's why AWB calls it a section edit. Rjwilmsi 20:22, 28 April 2009 (UTC)
That's why I posted here rather than filing a bug report. Still, I prefer it the old way and, since what I'm doing now is fixing/adding DEFAULTSORTs, I've gone back to version 4.5.2.0. Can section edit summaries be made optional? MANdARAX • XAЯAbИAM 20:41, 28 April 2009 (UTC)

Customised "General Fixes" still not working

Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser/Custom Modules#Customised "General Fixes" is still not working. A minor problem is that one line doesn't compile correctly. More importantly, comment out that line, and it still does nothing. Let me see if I understand correctly what it's supposed to do. I can uncheck the general fixes option in the main AWB window to disable the default general fixes behavior and install this module with any general fixes I don't want performed commented out, and all of the remaining ones should be done. Right? But what it actually does is absolutely nothing, returning ArticleText completely unchanged. 159.83.4.153 (talk) 21:47, 20 April 2009 (UTC)

Third line up from the end, change "ArticleText" to "a.ArticleText". There's something similar in "Fix categories", but I don't know what that does.
  • a.AWBChangeArticleText("Format sticky links", WikiFunctions.Parse.Parsers.StickyLinks(WikiFunctions.Parse.Parsers.SimplifyLinks(a.ArticleText)), true);
Mr Stephen (talk) 22:35, 20 April 2009 (UTC)
Yes, thanks, well spotted. I've updated the page. Rjwilmsi 23:08, 20 April 2009 (UTC)
BTW, how can I de-activate the insertion of "&nbsp;" ? -- User:Docu


Just to be sure, you are enabling the module and making it??? —Reedy 13:55, 21 April 2009 (UTC)

Not sure if this is in response to my question, but I think &nbsp; is inserted through the list of typos. -- User:Docu
It's not, the function is FixNonBreakingSpaces(). Rjwilmsi 18:10, 21 April 2009 (UTC)
I tried it setting it to false (with [39] in SVN 4218), but on Clendinning Lake (this version) it still tries to convert 98.5 km to 98.5&nbsp;km. "General Fixes" was de-activated in "Options". -- User:Docu
The boolean flags don't control whether it runs or not. If you don't want the fix to run then comment it out. Rjwilmsi 11:12, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

I am with Docu on the issue of nbsp. I like General Fixes but dislike insertion of nbsp. I have never managed to solve the issue with Custom_Modules. So I gave up. I would be happy if somebody tells me that they have it working. Lightmouse (talk) 18:24, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

Is it not in the Manual of Style, twice? Mr Stephen (talk) 19:53, 22 April 2009 (UTC)
Its "FixNonBreakingSpaces" that does the work, comment out that line (// at the start) and it will stop doing it for you. —Reedy 19:47, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

Yes, I guessed that was the appropriate code. I think I tried commenting it out. I noticed this discussion and I am interested to see if Docu gets it working. I will try again myself too. I would, of course, be much happier if nbsp was taken out of general fixes but I won't press on that. Lightmouse (talk) 19:53, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

I got it to work now, thanks. I added some text to the sample. -- User:Docu
Trying to work on WP:CHECKWIKI #37, I just found that the line enabling the definition of a DEFAULTSORT key is missing in the sample code. -- User:Docu
It's not as the line is SetDefaultSort and it's there. Try changing FixCategories on the line below to pass in a.ArticleText instead of ArticleText. Rjwilmsi 17:27, 23 April 2009 (UTC)
Thanks, that made it work. -- User:Docu

Thanks, Rjwilmsi. Your edits fixed it. I still get a compilation error (No overload for method 'Mdashes' takes '2' arguments), but when I comment out that line, everything else works. This should be very useful. Thanks again. 159.83.4.153 (talk) 17:20, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

The newer version of Mdashes (not in the 4.5.2.0 full release) needs ArticleTitle as the second argument. Rjwilmsi 17:52, 25 April 2009 (UTC)


Which line is needed to activate the move of all header from "===" to "==" if no "==" is present? [40] -- User:Docu

Add this line. Rjwilmsi 10:15, 29 April 2009 (UTC)
a.AWBChangeArticleText("FixHeadings", WikiFunctions.Parse.Parsers.FixHeadings(a.ArticleText, ArticleTitle), true);
Thanks, that works. -- User:Docu

Is it possible to pull a value from an infobox field and then chop it up and put it into a different ref?

Moved discussion to User talk:Xeno#Is it possible to pull a value from an infobox field and then chop it up and put it into a different ref?. --MZMcBride (talk) 02:48, 30 April 2009 (UTC)

Comment requested

Comment is requested at Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/ListasBot 5 regarding whether or not there should be a bot that would make non-visible changes to the {{WikiProjectBanners}} and {{WikiProjectBannerShell}} templates so that KingbotK would be better able to handle those pages. Matt (talk) 17:45, 30 April 2009 (UTC)


AWB general fixes module for python

Is there a simple way to call the general fixes module from pywikipedia bot? -- User:Docu

Which is it? (which file?) Theres an external program function in AWB which was designed for this sort of purpose... —Reedy 16:50, 2 May 2009 (UTC)
The approach would be the other way around (if I understand the function you mention): use AWB from within pywikipediabot to use the general fixes applied by AWB. pywikipediabot has a general fixes module (called "cosmetic_changes.py") that can be called when running other parts of the package, but compared to AWB's general fixes, it's a bit short. -- User:Docu
If it can start under Linux, maybe it's possible for python under Windows. -- User:Docu
Python works fine under windows. —Reedy 00:03, 3 May 2009 (UTC)
I should probably be asking this the python people, but how do I configure: 
 text = AWB.generalfixes(text)
. I will have a look at the WINE stuff though. Thanks. -- User:Docu
Can Python even reference/use the .NET libraries directly? —Reedy 01:40, 3 May 2009 (UTC)
Apparently. Docu, I've created commonsfixes; it may be something to look into. I'd like backport HTML to CSS module into AWB someday. It would be nice to have one central general fixes module. — Dispenser 09:36, 3 May 2009 (UTC)
I will look into commonfixes. Maybe you could contribute some safe parts of it to the main pywikipedia module. At WP:VPT, there is a discussion of that one. Apparently it was reviewed recently and approved to run unsupervised with the standard settings. -- User:Docu

WINE Mac/Linux

Wikipedia:Huggle/Wine and the WINE bug has now been closed.. [41]

Seems it should be possible..

—Reedy 21:34, 2 May 2009 (UTC)

On wine 1.1.9 AWB loads, but login fails and touching the listmaker crashes it. Rjwilmsi 21:47, 2 May 2009 (UTC)
On wine 1.1.20 AWB loads and login fails due to a "User Check Problem Check page Failed to load" error. Everything else but page loading seems to work fine. :) Making a list works, changing preferences, list comparer, etc. It's a little slow, but so is my computer. The check page error says to check my internet explorer is working. It is, I installed it with ies4linux and the executable is in the normal wine location: .wine/drive_c/Program\ Files/Internet\ Explorer/iexplore.exe So I'm logged into Wikipedia through Internet Explorer, but AWB doesn't seem to know where IE is or something like that. Any ideas? - Taxman Talk 14:02, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

Wiki search (text) only returns 1000 results, how to get the next 1000?

The makelist via wiki search (text) only returns 1000 results, is there a way to tell it to get the next thousand? –xeno talk 15:14, 5 May 2009 (UTC)

Not currently... Not exactly sure why its limited to 1K, unless its a slow query.. —Reedy 15:18, 5 May 2009 (UTC)
Listed as a slow query in the code, hence the 1K limit... —Reedy 15:00, 6 May 2009 (UTC)
Gotcha. It would be nice if it could retrieve the "next 1000". Though, the task is almost done so if this is difficult to program, don't worry. –xeno talk 14:59, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

AWB

Is it possible to not have to keep clicking save when you're doing a large job (>100) in AWB??? From,
Limideen 14:45, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

That would be bot mode. On en-wiki you need authorisation from WP:BAG. On 3rd party wikis I believe bot mode is always enabled (but I never edit outside of Wikipedia). Rjwilmsi 14:56, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

SVN builds

How do you download the SVN builds? I can get to the toolserver page and click download, but where should I be putting the file? Do I need to delete other AWB files? Thanks. –Drilnoth (T • C • L) 13:26, 9 May 2009 (UTC)

Yup, just extract the zip and replace the current files. Don't use the ones currently uploaded as they wont work (due to the version bump). Will get a new one up soon. —Reedy 13:27, 9 May 2009 (UTC)
Okay, thanks; just wasn't sure if the current files needed to be deleted or what. Could you let me know when you have the new one up? Thanks. –Drilnoth (T • C • L) 13:34, 9 May 2009 (UTC)
rev 4300 is now up. —Reedy 13:45, 9 May 2009 (UTC)
Okay; thanks for the help. –Drilnoth (T • C • L) 14:57, 9 May 2009 (UTC)

Article issues

Slick work on the article issues tag in the new release. Thanks!--Fabrictramp | talk to me 16:49, 9 May 2009 (UTC)

Or not. Bug report filed. ;-)--Fabrictramp | talk to me 17:00, 9 May 2009 (UTC)

Restarting

The newest version still gets stuck an awfull lot. I made some 200 fixes yesterday and it got stuck about 25 times. And a new problem is that the clock doesn't stop ticking for restart even after I restart it manually before. I hoped so much the new version would not get stuck so much... Debresser (talk) 17:53, 10 May 2009 (UTC)

It's your internet connection. I get the same on my PC but not my laptop (except mediawiki server problems). Not much AWB can do it the save fails or times out. Rjwilmsi 18:59, 10 May 2009 (UTC)
Okay, on investigation, AWB is getting an error which was not being caught. The problem is I can't explain the error. rev 4315 adds logic such that if the error is found the start button is pressed by AWB (normally this means the page is saved but is re-processed, and AWB will probably then skip it with 'no change', so Wikipedia records the edit as normal, but AWB doesn't). This fix has missed the 4.5.3 release, but we need to do something better before the change goes into a full release anyway. Rjwilmsi 21:31, 10 May 2009 (UTC)
That sounds better. Good luck with it. Debresser (talk) 23:08, 10 May 2009 (UTC)

Edit summary issue

Looks like the new version of AWB prefixes the last previous headings of the page to the Edit summary like this. This wasnt the case earlier. I am using AWB Version 4.5.3.2 SVN 4312 -- Tinu Cherian - 16:10, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

Its a section edit summary. And i suppose, as you're adding it, it probably does. Hmm —Reedy 16:36, 11 May 2009 (UTC)
I guess it wasnt the way earlier. Only what specified on the Edit summary part was passed on earlier -- Tinu Cherian - 02:45, 12 May 2009 (UTC)
It's peculiar and it messes up my meticulously crafted edit summaries; can we nix it? =) –xeno talk 20:51, 13 May 2009 (UTC)
Didn't it get added as a feature request?? —Reedy 22:58, 13 May 2009 (UTC)
But of course! ;> –xeno talk 23:52, 13 May 2009 (UTC)

Single replacements

How can I explain to AWB to replace something only once? When I e.g. replace

[[Category: with {{Reflist}} [[Category:

(which means I just add a references list), AWB adds it for every category in the article. And I need it only once, of course. Debresser (talk) 23:15, 10 May 2009 (UTC)

For one way to do this, see WP:AutoWikiBrowser/Custom Modules#Inserting text just before categories. MANdARAX • XAЯAbИAM 19:22, 11 May 2009 (UTC)
Thank you, but that is code for a very specific case. Is there a general way to force AWB to fix just the first instance of something? Debresser (talk) 19:37, 11 May 2009 (UTC)
In the advanced find&replace it has an option "Apply No. of times", defaulted to 1, doesn't this work? –xeno talk 20:53, 13 May 2009 (UTC)
Unless I don't know how to use it, it doesn't. Debresser (talk) 21:32, 13 May 2009 (UTC)
"Apply No. of times" won't work in the way desired here because what it seems to do is to apply the given regex the number of times specified, but each time applied the regex engine is asked to replace all matches. So I think that option is designed to be used to apply multiple times rather than any attempt to restrict logic to replacing the first only. The desired logic here could be achieved using a custom module. Rjwilmsi 20:53, 14 May 2009 (UTC)
That sounds like "abacadabra" (or "avada kedavra"). Debresser (talk) 21:18, 14 May 2009 (UTC)
Suppose you are looking for XXX. If you match "XXX, not preceded by XXX, followed by the rest of the document" you will match what you want. Something like (?s)(?<!XXX)XXX(.*) => YYY$1 Mr Stephen (talk) 21:39, 14 May 2009 (UTC)
In this particular case if applied after gen fixes the first cat will have a blank line before it I think. Rich Farmbrough, 15:46 16 May 2009 (UTC).
That's right! So that's my solution in this case. Thanks. Debresser (talk) 18:49, 16 May 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia's default formats being changed using AWB

I have left a message on the talk page of a user of AWB, but have not received an answer. Since this is a matter of principle which may affect other users, I'd like to see a discussion here:

I just noticed this edit which changed the default formats around headings. Now this isn't some earthshaking matter, but I just wanted to share some observations with you. The Wikipedia defaults are that there are spaces in the heading between the text and the equals signs, and a blank line between the heading and the first line of text. You can check this by making a test edit here. Just click the "new section" tab, put in some letters in the "subject/headline" box and also in the body. Save it and then edit it. You'll see what I mean. I don't know why those are the default settings, but I find it easier to edit when they are left it place. It makes it easier for my old eyes to spot heading breaks, among other things. If you're going to make such changes, you're working against default settings and can keep going forever. It's futile effort, and it makes editing more difficult for me and probably others. I'm sure there are more important things to do. Thanks.

Is this a proper use of AWB, or is it a violation? -- Brangifer (talk) 14:12, 15 May 2009 (UTC)

Interesting point. I'd have to say I agree with you that AWB should strive towards adherance to a Wikipedia default formatting rather than vice-versa. –xeno talk 14:15, 15 May 2009 (UTC)
I agree with your arguments that this is Wikipedia style. And that it should be. I'm sure just droping a note to Rich Farmbrough will settle the issue. Debresser (talk) 14:33, 15 May 2009 (UTC)
OK no problem. its' not a big deal, most editors manually use the other style and this has been noted before. Rich Farmbrough, 14:45 15 May 2009 (UTC).
Interesting. Would you remember where? Debresser (talk) 14:55, 15 May 2009 (UTC)
The styles seem kind of mixed; I personally prefer headlines without spaces between the text and the equals signs, but that's just me. I see it both ways, and tend to just leave it as it is in articles with an established style. –Drilnoth (T • C • L) 16:19, 15 May 2009 (UTC)
Just out of interest the "default" remains in about 9 million headings, the other way in about 13 million. The previous time this came up was on someones talk page a couple years back. I could seaarch. Rich Farmbrough, 17:35 15 May 2009 (UTC).
I wonder how those figures have been affected by changes made by editors or bots? -- Brangifer (talk) 05:53, 16 May 2009 (UTC)
Well completely. All 13 million headings without space have been made that way by an editor choosing the spaceless style. Rich Farmbrough, 21:25 21 May 2009 (UTC).
According to the Manual of Style, both the spaces within the heading and the blank line after it are optional. (The only "default" is that there should be a blank line before the heading.) MANdARAX • XAЯAbИAM 18:46, 15 May 2009 (UTC)
Thanks for the link to WP:HEAD. It answered a few questions I had for a long time. I saw it before, but forgot about it. Debresser (talk) 18:52, 16 May 2009 (UTC)
I hadn't noticed that wording, and have been referring to the default used by Wikipedia's software. I wonder if those who wrote that guideline were aware of the software's defaults? Defaults should be consistent, and I suggest that the wording in the guideline be brought into line with the software's defaults. There are other types of defaults we use, and they are established to limit overloading of servers and to limit conflicts among users. We should be working to make them consistent and have them applied. There are plenty of other areas where individual freedom is allowed here. We shouldn't have to be using time on such things, and consistently using defaults saves lots of time, sort of like why it is an advantage to be either right or left handed, and to have habitual ways of doing many things. It saves time and energy, and reduces confusion when making quick decisions. -- Brangifer (talk) 05:53, 16 May 2009 (UTC)

I don't think this is one of the general fixes. --NE2 06:36, 16 May 2009 (UTC)

Bots and nobots

I just need some clarification: Does checking Ignore {{bots}} and {{nobots}} cause AWB to skip articles with them on it, or does checking it disable automatic skipping of pages with them? Thanks. –Drilnoth (T • C • L) 22:03, 13 May 2009 (UTC)

If you tell it to ignore that (ie check the checkbox), it wouldn't just skip the page like it would've normally if it had nobots on it disabling access etc —Reedy 22:55, 13 May 2009 (UTC)
Okay, thanks. That button just seems kind of confusingly worded. –Drilnoth (T • C • L) 23:09, 13 May 2009 (UTC)
Suggest an improvement? ;) —Reedy 23:13, 13 May 2009 (UTC)
Maybe just a tooltip or something saying "Checking this box will cause you to edit pages with the {{bots}} and {{nobots}} tags on them. By default these pages are skipped." –Drilnoth (T • C • L) 23:17, 13 May 2009 (UTC)
"Disregard" rather than "Ignore" might be better verbiage, since "ignore" has a specific meaning for AWB. –xeno talk 13:55, 14 May 2009 (UTC)
That would probably be good. –Drilnoth (T • C • L) 14:23, 14 May 2009 (UTC)

rev 4325 Tooltip added. Rjwilmsi 20:43, 14 May 2009 (UTC)

Great; thanks. –Drilnoth (T • C • L) 20:47, 14 May 2009 (UTC)
Did you change it to "disregard" as well? Because it doesn't ignore it, it clearly recognizes it, but disregards it =) –xeno talk 21:03, 14 May 2009 (UTC)
Wording is "Checking this box will cause you to edit pages with the {{bots}} and {{nobots}} tags on them. By default these pages are skipped." Rjwilmsi 15:03, 24 May 2009 (UTC)

change parameter value in a template

Is there a good syntax to change the value of, or remove, a template parameter? What I want to do is go through some articles using {{WPBiography}} and under certain conditions remove yes from the parameter needs-photo or remove the parameter totally. Problem is there are many permutations of number of spaces between the pipe and equal signs. I cannot figure out a successful syntax. Traveler100 (talk) 12:56, 24 May 2009 (UTC)

A regular expression like find: ({{WPBiography *\|(?:[^{}]+?\|)? *needs-photo *= *)yes replace: $1 should work to remove the yes from the parameter with AWB's standard find & replace option, with regex checked. As I understand it you wouldn't need to remove the whole parameter, just the yes to deactivate the hidden category listing. Rjwilmsi 15:00, 24 May 2009 (UTC)
thanks I would never of worked that out. Does not appear to work on multi-line entries but it helped me to understand a little about the syntax and have now found a solution.Traveler100 (talk) 18:33, 24 May 2009 (UTC)

Stats

What happened to these? They seemed OK recently yet they now look broken. Rich Farmbrough, 19:42 23 May 2009 (UTC).

Which stats? [42] ? —Reedy 19:46, 23 May 2009 (UTC)
Those ones can't be right. Only 100,000 saves in over a year? Rjwilmsi 15:04, 24 May 2009 (UTC)
Hmm. Looks like somethings happened to the database. I've poked Kingboyk... —Reedy 19:22, 24 May 2009 (UTC)
[43] - Those go upto somepoint on the 19 May.. The stats then start from the 20 May... We're investigating it. —Reedy 11:46, 25 May 2009 (UTC)

Lifetime template placement

I have been approached about the placement of the lifetime template and I tend to agree with them that placing lifetime after the categories is not the best. Here is 1 discussion Template talk:Lifetime#Placement and on my talk page.--Kumioko (talk) 19:02, 26 May 2009 (UTC)

Puzzled

RETF copy of the rule. 

<Typo word="Breakage" find="{{(Close paraphrase)(\|[^=}]*)*}}" replace="{{$1$2|date=May 2009}}" />

run on Disaster preparedness and Emergency Response Association gives this.

there are no problems AFAICS with other templates. It surely shouldn't match?

Rich Farmbrough, 01:16 28 May 2009 (UTC).

I think the "*)*" is the problem. Try removing the second star. Rjwilmsi 07:57, 28 May 2009 (UTC)
Yes the star is un-needed as it is written. However it shouldn't be a problem. It should simply match
with or without the star. Admittedly with the * it has several ways to match it, and more back-tracking to do than without. I will try instead: (\|[^=}\|]*)* which should al least be faster. Rich Farmbrough, 12:03, 28 May 2009 (UTC).

Of course the * also makes the element optional, which I need. Rich Farmbrough, 12:11, 28 May 2009 (UTC).

(\|[^={}]*)? Would give the same result faster I think. Rjwilmsi 12:44, 28 May 2009 (UTC)

OK Still doesn't work on just that article... more testing when I get time. Rich Farmbrough, 16:08, 30 May 2009 (UTC).

Using AWB on Custom Web-sites

Is there a help section for using AWB on a Custom Web-site?

In Sept 08, I was using AWB to update our internal Wiki site but it then failed and MaxSem(Han shot first!) told me that there was a problem with our installation of MediaWiki see my discussion page. We are now using the latest version of MediaWiki but I still can not set the Preferences > Site to use our own installation of MediaWiki www.local.spadental.co.uk/wiki -- Cjchilling (talk) 16:58, 28 May 2009 (UTC)

You're using a strange setup. You seem to have nearly done the "Pretty links", but not quite. "/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page" should really be working as "/wiki/Main_Page". Then your scripts directory should be at "/w/" with api.php and such in there... —Reedy 18:01, 28 May 2009 (UTC)
What are the "Pretty links"? As far as I know we took all the defaults when installing MediaWiki. We do not have a sub-directory called wiki/w/ the api.php has been installed in the root wiki/ folder. What do I need to do to make this installation "normal"? -- Cjchilling (talk) 21:15, 28 May 2009 (UTC)
Its not a physical directory, its done with .htaccess and URL re-writes. For example, you'll see on wikipedia its http://site/wiki/Page, except when your editing or using the api, when its http://site/w/api.php etc. See mw:Manual:Short URL —Reedy 22:05, 28 May 2009 (UTC)
This article refers to installations on Apache, can you use .htaccess on an IIS server and if so what would I put in the file to redirect for an installation which the MediaWiki root is phyiscally at e:\www_wiki\wiki ? --Cjchilling (talk) 22:47, 28 May 2009 (UTC)

According to [44], your wiki lacks numerous API actions that are needed for AWB to work. I don't know what's the cause, but AWB needs at least action=query just to begin working with your site. This action is present in default API setup and needs something intentional to be disabled. 62.140.253.8 (talk) 14:55, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

FYI, Users who use the SVN Snapshots

As of the snapshot using rev 4394, I've made some changes (as per rjwilmsi's feature request), i've change the control that is used for the article textbox.

I've fixed problems introduced with the new control (diff's etc).. As far as we've seen its still working the same, though there may be a few little niggles and annoyances...

If you could just let us know if you find something wrong (specifically related to edit control/diff etc), and make sure the version is recorded...

All should be fine, but you never know. But hey, you're the ones living on the edge ;)

—Reedy 23:58, 28 May 2009 (UTC)

Some minor observations (SVN 4395):
  • Successively clicking on a link in the "Multiple wiki-links" box highlights the links in the edit box, but they're usually displaced somewhat. The error appears to be cumulative, as links farther down the page tend to be off by more. For one where they're off by a lot, see John MacDougall (UK politician).
rev 4412 - I suspect the Find was broken too, that should fix it aswell if it was! —Reedy 21:00, 1 June 2009 (UTC)
  • External links appear to be active links, with a cursor change on mouseover, but clicking on them does nothing. I would rarely want to go to these links from here, so this doesn't really matter to me.
rev 4421 - Disabled —Reedy 10:49, 2 June 2009 (UTC)
  • Text copied and pasted from the diffs to the edit box is in a different font.
Thats cause its rich text.. Must be a way to change it. —Reedy 20:53, 1 June 2009 (UTC)
  • With the "Auto focus end of the edit box" option turned on, it no longer positions the edit box text completely at the end of the file, instead ending halfway through the last line.
Can't duplicate. It works fine on the pages i've tested.. Test case? —Reedy 20:53, 1 June 2009 (UTC)
This is such an extremely minor thing that I almost didn't mention it, but it seemed that you wanted every tiny thing. It may be so minor that it was happening for you but you didn't even notice it. On any page which is long enough that the edit window scrolls, it doesn't automatically go entirely to the end as it used to. The bottom of the last line is cut off, and you can click to scroll the final part of the line. If it's not doing it for you, it may just be an idiosyncrasy of my computer. MANdARAX • XAЯAbИAM 08:20, 2 June 2009 (UTC)
Hmm. It was more trying to fix changes made.. I've noticed that on some pages the last character (] of an interwiki) seems to be missing, but there when it saves.. —Reedy 10:49, 2 June 2009 (UTC)
MANdARAX • XAЯAbИAM 00:02, 1 June 2009 (UTC)
Thanks, all seem quite likely minor bugs related from the change of the control. Most should be easily fixable, we found a few big ones and sorted those... Users make finding the rest much easier =) (I'll either get to look at these later today, or it wont be till wednesday afternoon/thursday) —Reedy 06:33, 1 June 2009 (UTC)
This will be because the find is based on the txtEdit with \r\n notation, but needs to be passed the converted one with \n notation. Rjwilmsi 20:12, 1 June 2009 (UTC)
rev 4412 as above =) —Reedy 21:00, 1 June 2009 (UTC)

Bot timer

I'm trying to resolve a lot of links to a disambiguation page (IIT), but finding that AWB stops and keeps me waiting for up to a minute between edits, with a message "Restarting in...". Is there any way to avoid this? It's slowing me down and making this useful job take far longer than it should! I wondered if it was connected with busy times, pressure on server, but it was happening 16 hours ago and again now. PamD (talk)

(e/c) If you have the account set up as a bot, you should be able to change the amount of time in the "bots" tab. If your account isn't set up as a bot, then I have no idea (but I'm not an AWB developer). –Drilnoth (T • C • L) 14:50, 31 May 2009 (UTC)
Update after e/c: If it says "Restarting in...", then there would seem to be a bug. –Drilnoth (T • C • L) 14:50, 31 May 2009 (UTC)
It says "Bot timer:0" beside the "Restarting in nn". I'm using version 4.5.3.2, in case that's relevant. PamD (talk) 15:05, 31 May 2009 (UTC)
You may want to just try upgrading your AWB then and see if it goes away... it looks from Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser/History like the current SVN version (you can download it here) fixes a bug with AWB timing out. –Drilnoth (T • C • L) 16:17, 31 May 2009 (UTC)

Spanning over languages

Hi there

I wanted to write a plugin for a very specific task, but after browsing through sources I'm not sure if it's even possible - maybe you guys could help me.

My idea was to create a module to help translating articles from wikis in other languages. This module would check interwiki and based on this findings would fix internal links. For example, I copy article from en.wiki to my sandbox on pl.wiki, then run module on this sandbox. AWB checks articles linked in sandbox, but on en.wiki, checks if it has interwiki to pl.wiki, and fixes this links in my sandbox. I've done this in pywikipediabot, but I wanted to have a similar functionality in AWB. But as far as I could see, in AWB I can work only on one chosen wiki. Is that right? --leafnode (talk) 09:39, 28 May 2009 (UTC)

Yes, you're right, so AWB is not the tool for your plugin. Rjwilmsi 17:39, 28 May 2009 (UTC)
It could be.. You can create your own instance of an ApiEdit object in a plugin or custom module (more tempted to use plugin), and have that fetch article text from remote wiki's... —Reedy 18:02, 28 May 2009 (UTC)
Thanks Reedy for a hint - it helped and plugin is working flawlessly :) --leafnode (talk) 13:13, 3 June 2009 (UTC)

Use of Template Substitution - questions

New to template substitution, is there examples of what is seen as it progresses? I am not seeing it action so not sure whether it is me, or my expectations. On WikiSource, I am trying to subst: in our Author template for linked though non-existing author page, and getting no subst: action.

  • Set for enWS
  • Logged in with my bot account
  • have list of non-exist pages
  • Enabled Find and Replace
  • In Template Substition, have {{Author}} as the one line,
    • Tried with and without Recursive expansion
  • Appending text which is happening
  • Skip function is properly set

Guidance? Thoughts? Thanks. -- billinghurst (talk) 12:40, 3 June 2009 (UTC)

Not to worry, problem is resolved. Nothing different that I can tell, just started working after a SAVE of the profile. <shrug> billinghurst (talk)

Null-edit

What is the easiest way to null-edit multiple pages with AWB? Can such function be build in? (I often need to null-edit multiple pages when some admin has made an uncarefull edit to a template and a group of articles got listed in a certain error category and is cluttering up that category.) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Debresser (talk • contribs) 23:12, 10 May 2009 (UTC)

IIRC the ability to make null edits was removed because it's an insignificant change and AWB shouldn't be used to circumvent the job queue. –xenotalk 16:39, 11 June 2009 (UTC)
It is usefull in certain cases, as mentioned above. If that circumvents the job-queue, so be it. Where should I post a request to return this feature? Debresser (talk) 20:30, 13 June 2009 (UTC)

Question: Max speed?

Is there a maximum speed that AWB works at? I wonder because I just looked at a user's contributions and he or she was apparently getting 7-9 edits per minute, all marked as being made with AWB, which seemed fast for an semi-automated program, especially one that says you should check every edit and not edit too quickly. The speed seemed bot-like -- could AWB actually be utilized to get that velocity? Ed Fitzgerald t / c 08:41, 8 June 2009 (UTC)

AWB has no set maximum speed, so 10 edits per minute is possible, though a user might be thought of as breaking the rules if they edit at that speed a lot. Rjwilmsi 10:01, 8 June 2009 (UTC)
I just wanted to chime in on this one. Not sure if I am the culprit here but I have done that on a few occassions depending on the changes I am making. Whenever AWB comes out with a new version I go back through my watchlist and a few other things so update them for new changes (like the references thing from the last one). Typically though I can't get more than 5 or 6 a minute because internet speeds vary and it takes time for AWB to load the page.--Kumioko (talk) 13:06, 8 June 2009 (UTC)
No, it wasn't you! Thanks to both of you for the information. Ed Fitzgerald t / c 23:48, 8 June 2009 (UTC)
I can go quite a bit faster than that. When I'm doing simple link corrections, it only takes a second to visually confirm that the old link is properly correcting to the new, so I'll open two or three AWB windows side by side and basically pop them as quickly as I can see the change. bd2412 T 06:26, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

I find that adding two lines between he end of the External links section and any following template gives a nice bit of white space. Can AWB do this for us? -- Alan Liefting (talk) - 09:05, 9 June 2009 (UTC)

If you provide a link to the agreed documentation that supports this as an agreed standard then yes, it can be done if you raise a feature request. Rjwilmsi 11:13, 9 June 2009 (UTC)
I would be against such a proposal. Debresser (talk) 20:32, 13 June 2009 (UTC)

Is it possible to preparse subst/magic words?

For example, can you add {{subst:PAGENAME}} and then run a regex on the resulting text, or do you have to make two passes? --NE2 16:30, 11 June 2009 (UTC)

%%PAGENAME%% should do what you're after.. It does it internally to AWB... —Reedy 17:54, 11 June 2009 (UTC)
Awesome! --NE2 18:57, 11 June 2009 (UTC)
It doesn't seem to work. --NE2 19:06, 11 June 2009 (UTC)
Ah, it's lowercase %%pagename%%. Got it now. --NE2 19:07, 11 June 2009 (UTC)
If your example is indicative of your intended use (adding DEFAULTSORT), and you plan on doing it for any people articles, note that %%key%% will give you AWB's best guess at a human name sort key. MANdARAX • XAЯAbИAM 19:19, 11 June 2009 (UTC)
Nah, I plan to do it for railroads, per Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Trains#DEFAULTSORT for railroads?. --NE2 19:20, 11 June 2009 (UTC)

Replacing underscores in image file names

From User_talk:Kwamikagami#Quincy.2C_Massachusetts (please respond on this page, not Kwamikagami's):

Hello, I am wondering about this edit. What is the purpose of removing the underscores from the filename? I understand that when MediaWiki serves the commons page for the image, the underscores are converted to spaces in the page title, but the actual filename has them, and would be the name given in a "Save as..." dialog by the browser if a reader clicked the image to go to the raw database URL, http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c2/Quincy_MA_geography.png. I and hundreds of other editors save files with names using underscores, what are your reasons for making an unnecessary name change in the image link? Sswonk (talk) 13:59, 12 June 2009 (UTC)

That is an automated part of WP:AWB. I was making a different change, and the file change was added in for "free". I don't know the programmers' reasons for deleting the underscores, but it's something that's happened with every article I've edited with AWB for at least a year. kwami (talk) 19:27, 12 June 2009 (UTC)

Can someone please explain this behavior to me, and how to tell AWB users to disable it? Sswonk (talk) 19:46, 12 June 2009 (UTC)

I'm failing to see any problem by doing this... Spaces and underscores are treat the same. If it was causing problems, surely someone would've brought it up before? —Reedy 01:11, 13 June 2009 (UTC)
I have been editing for 2+ years and this is the first I've seen this particular result from an AWB run. Yes they are treated the same by MediaWiki but they are not the same. The two problems I personally have with replacing underscores with spaces are: 1) It is a pointless exercise, since as you state the characters are equivalent in the context of filenames, it's editing for editing's sake and thus a waste of processor time. It also adds marked edits to diffs that just get in the way of an editor checking for changes. and 2) Offline file systems don't treat the two characters as equivalent. So, I save a couple of keystrokes typing in a name with underscores searching for a file on my system, rather than having to escape the spaces or place quotation marks around the entire name. If I see something in a file I want to change and then upload as a new version, with the underscores I can just copy the name from an article edit box and do a localhost search or paste the name into a "File open" dialog which will choose it from a long list, rather than having to deal with typing manually to get rid of the spaces. It just makes no sense whatsoever. If anything, it should change spaces to underscores since that is how the file gets named at upload time and how the name is stored/presented in the URL. The actual filename always has underscores, i.e. some_file_name.png, not some%20file%20name.png. I see absolutely no advantage to this behavior on the part of AWB and several disadvantages. Sswonk (talk) 02:41, 13 June 2009 (UTC)
I think that the underscores should be removed. I think that MediaWiki automatically removes them from image names on upload, but the URL shows them with underscores just like it does for every other MediaWiki page... this is Wikipedia_talk:AutoWikiBrowser, but you don't link it that way. Even files where an underscore wasn't originally put in the name (e.g., File:Symbol portal.svg) show them in the URL and when you click "save link as"... that's just the way that it works. If there were actual underscores in the image names, you would be able to see them. See Wikipedia:Naming conventions (technical restrictions)#Spaces and underscores for some more details. –Drilnoth (T • C • L) 03:00, 13 June 2009 (UTC)
No, it is the other way around. Internally, spaces become underscores. From How to edit a page:

Internally, the first letter of the target page is automatically capitalized and spaces are represented as underscores (typing an underscore in the link has the same effect as typing a space, but is not recommended).

The parenthetical comment refers to a link, i.e. don't do "The [[United_States]] is...", simply use spaces to avoid the link appearing as United_States. That I can see. But, filenames are not links, they are not visible to readers. Neither are piped links, so [[:File:Symbol_portal.svg|Symbol portal.svg]] is perfectly OK regarding the recommendation to not use underscores in links. I am repeating, changing "_" to " " in filenames is a wasted edit, clutters diffs and increases editing time when copying a filename from Wikipedia edit boxes into local system search or open dialogs. When I wrote "If anything, it should change spaces to underscores..." above I would not actually suggest doing that since that would be a wasted edit as well. They should simply stay however they were entered, except in the case on non-piped links. Sswonk (talk) 03:36, 13 June 2009 (UTC)

(od) I haven't seen any additional comment here. There should be a program change to the way AWB handles underscores inside double brackets, i.e. [[File:Some_image_name.jpg|etc...]] should not be changed to [[File:Some image name.jpg|etc...]] for the reasons I give above. The internal database key name and resulting served filename URL always use underscores, spaces are only used when serving plain text strings of the filename for perceived legibility. Further documentation can be found at this page. I will be filing a bug for this AWB behavior asking that the underscores in filenames be left untouched and stating that underscores should only be converted to spaces where they interfere with the final rendered appearance of links, as in the [[United_States]] --> [[United States]] example above. Sswonk (talk) 13:33, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

Spaces

In [45] this edit I saw AWB is used to removed spaces in headers. I remember a discussion here about this same subject. If this is a "fix" of AWB, then it should be removed IMHO. In case it is not, I will drop a note on the editors talkpage. Debresser (talk) 20:38, 13 June 2009 (UTC)

Such spaces around headers are not changed by any of AWB's general fixes. Rjwilmsi 20:45, 13 June 2009 (UTC)
It was my edit. At the time I had not come across any discussion of what should be done so I figured that I had seen more articles without spaces than with. I saw it as a matter of internal conformity lacking any guidance the contrary. I have since reversed my thinking after seeing some discussion somewhere. There seems to be no clear statement in the MOS but I notice that when adding a new section to a discussion page the software inserts spaces. Perhaps this could be spelled out somewhere to save poor editors grief. I have noted that AWB is very conservative in its fixes so it is probably best assume any unusual behavior is the responsibility of the editor using the software. --droll [chat] 21:07, 13 June 2009 (UTC)
Given that spaces/no spaces makes no visible difference to the markup of the page I don't imagine the MOS would (even could) have a policy, and struggle to see why anybody cares much about it. Rjwilmsi 22:51, 13 June 2009 (UTC)
The MOS does say that it doesn't matter: Spaces between the == and the heading text are optional (==H2== versus == H2 ==). MANdARAX • XAЯAbИAM 23:16, 13 June 2009 (UTC)
Which is why I wanted to be sure that it is not an automatic edit of AWB. Thanks for the reply. Debresser (talk) 00:29, 14 June 2009 (UTC)
My thinking is that, since many articles have some headers with spaces and some without, it is worthwhile making all headers in an article conform to one style. I'm a retired programmer and I find messy code to be obnoxious. I realize that obsession is not shared by all. When I use AWB it is very easy to cleanup little things like that. If there are small improvements I can make while editing the article for some other reason I do it. If it had my druthers I'd add the functionality to the general fixes. I'm I off track? Does this sort of fix incur unacceptable overhead? If I'm off in left field please let me know. --droll [chat] 22:20, 14 June 2009 (UTC)
A general fix could be added for that if you raised an AWB feature request after gaining consensus at the MOS talk pages first. Rjwilmsi 11:12, 15 June 2009 (UTC)
I also do not like the spaces and think that it looks messy as well. I have been told in the past by some editors however that they leave the spaces because they have bad eyesight and the aditional spaces help them to see it clearly. I also think that doing these as the only change may fall under the rule of not using AWB for minor edits so it would only be done if other changes are made as well.--Kumioko (talk) 12:33, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

Using on WikiSource

I have been using AWB successfully on WS. We have the Page: namespace, however, when I try to find links to that namespace it is problematic on whether links are found. For example from s:Index:Omnibuses and Cabs.djvu for links on page it fails to find any Page: namespace links. Yet, if I use What transclude page (all NS) for s:Template:Blank page it finds a plethora of pages. When I try via Special page, I see the Page namespace in the drop down list, yet I cannot find pages in that namespace. It may or may not be a bug, and without knowing more, I cannot really request it as new feature. Some guidance would be appreciated. Thanks. billinghurst (talk) 14:54, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

For links on page... The links aren't actually in the page.. They're from that pagelist thing. Its also a djvu... The API is just giving us [46]
For The special pages.. I get a list of new pages in the Page namespace fine.. Which provider are you trying to use? —Reedy 18:44, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

x2

Hello!

Please, correct a mistake in AWB:

button х2 = <sub> Subscript text </sub>: by pressing the button the allocated text, it turns out <sub> text </sub.

also the same with x2--Mariluna (talk) 06:10, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

Thanks, rev 4546 —Reedy 18:09, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

Keeps alphabetising when I don't want it to

I'm trying to take the list from User:MZMcBride/Sandbox 4 which is ordered by size, but every time I load it in AWB it's ordered alphabetically. I have "keep alphabetized" turned off, but it just refuses to order itself properly. Halp. --Closedmouth (talk) 06:20, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

It's the API, [47].. Im not sure if this is a change, but i didn't think it always had done that... —Reedy 09:05, 22 June 2009 (UTC)
That's, er...odd. Can't imagine why that would be done. At the moment it doesn't matter, I've removed the ones I don't need manually, but thanks for looking into it. --Closedmouth (talk) 09:34, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

Duplicate but nonfunctional Make list option

There are two "Make list" options labeled exactly the same: What links here (SVN 4537). As far as I can tell, the first one doesn't work. MANdARAX • XAЯAbИAM 17:54, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

Fixed in rev 4580. I'd done some code consolidation (noticed 2 list providers were all but the same), and didnt put a new title on it. It is What redirects here, and it does work :P —Reedy 18:01, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

Unbalanced brackets found

I'm seeing this status get detected often but I can find no evidence that the status is true. I've tried having it highlight the first instance and I still see nothing. Combing through the page manually, I find no such unbalanced bracket. Does this feature actually work? -- Mufka (u) (t) (c) 21:41, 26 June 2009 (UTC)

Yes, it works. Grab the latest SVN snapshot and if you check Options -> "Highlight first unbalanced brackets if found" the unbalanced brackets will be shown in red in the edit box. Rjwilmsi 22:24, 26 June 2009 (UTC)
I had 4532 and it had the alerts and the check box but it didn't do anything. New version looks better. -- Mufka (u) (t) (c) 22:54, 26 June 2009 (UTC)

Newest snapshot not enabled

The newest snapshot, SVN 4658, Version 4.5.3.3 (shouldn't that be 4.6.x.x?) is not enabled. MANdARAX • XAЯAbИAM 19:40, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

Nope, the release came after the snapshot. I'll get a snapshot up in a bit. —Reedy 19:44, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

Protect, delete, move

Before posting this as a bug, I wanted to see if I'm just missing something. I've been exploring the use of the protect, delete, and move buttons. When I click any of them, I get the same dialog box that looks like it is just for deleting (the box title is delete and all of the summaries are CSD summaries). Am I missing something? -- Mufka (u) (t) (c) 18:15, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

Meh. It should be the same box, just slightly different.. I'll have a look. I wouldnt be suprised if most of it doesn't work also.. Which if is the case, i dont really care about (unless its trivial fixes), as it will be fixed nicely when the ApiEdit work is finished (ie v5) —Reedy 22:16, 30 June 2009 (UTC)
rev 4696 - Seems when i was refactoring the code, i didnt do a good job of copy pasting. Thanks. —Reedy 19:23, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

Possible problem with reference logic

I wanted to let you know that someone has complained to me about the reference cleanup logic. Apparently when references are placed within tables they leave a space between the pipe and the reference. I looked at the MOS but I didn't see anything about placeing refs within tables so I wanted to bring it up. Not really a bug or a new feature and likely isn't a problem at all but I wanted to let you know all the same. --Kumioko (talk) 14:36, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

Error message list

I would like to see a list of error messages and solutions in a seperate section of the manual. Any takers? Not my forte so I will leave it to others. -- Alan Liefting (talk) - 06:39, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

I think this is probably a good idea, though, would be best waiting till the v5 beta's/RC's, as a lot of the error messages will be changing and be handled in a different way! —Reedy 15:49, 5 July 2009 (UTC)
When will the V5 be released if I might ask. If it will be in the next few weeks I concur but if we are looking at a september or october release then I think we should put something out sooner. --Kumioko (talk) 16:53, 5 July 2009 (UTC)
With the progress being made, it could be before the end of the month.. We now have a compilable version in the SVN, which will save.. We've just gotta finish reattaching everything then start bug hunting on it. —Reedy 20:53, 5 July 2009 (UTC)
Great thanks. --Kumioko (talk) 21:02, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

Updates

It seems that AWB checkes for updates automatically. Can that be turned off? Debresser (talk) 14:01, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

No, it's important that people use the most recent version to prevent damage to Wikipedia. 62.140.253.9 (talk) 14:06, 6 July 2009 (UTC)
Well, it depends exactly what you mean... AWB checks to see if the current version is enabled, and also if there is a newer version... Are you meaning checks for optional updates? Rather than forced updates. But the anon is right, updates are usually to fix bugs to prevent harm to wiki's, and reduce the duplicate reports of bugs. —Reedy 14:40, 6 July 2009 (UTC)
Ok. Thanks. Debresser (talk) 19:06, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

Defaultsort

Now that AWB automatically inserts a defaultsort tag into articles that don't have one, I'd note that the function needs to be changed slightly, as it also forces an unwanted change to "all words in the defaultsort capitalized no matter what" even in articles where the defaultsort tag is already correctly entered. Frex, it tries to change {{DEFAULTSORT:Gonzalo, Duke of Aquitaine}} to {{DEFAULTSORT:Gonzalo, Duke Of Aquitaine}}, which we don't want.

The function should be set such that if a defaultsort tag is already present in the article, it does a case check only on the first letter of the tag and leaves the rest of it alone. Bearcat (talk) 03:34, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

Hmm, there has been a lot of editor discussion over the defaultsort. The guidelines at the time of implementation where that all words were capitalised in the defaultsort, but editors even disagreed with the guidelines. I'm now disinclined to make further changes because somebody will just disagree. In version 4.6.0.0 you have an option (Options menu) to prevent AWB making any additions of/changes to the defaultsort, so I suggest you turn that on if the AWB defautlsort logic isn't to your liking.

Auto-expanding text selection

This only seems to have started happening since I installed 4.6. Whenever I attempt to select text in the edit window the selection auto-expands to what it thinks I want to select. Is there anyway to turn off the auto expanding aspect, so that I can have standard non automatic text selection back?- X201 (talk) 13:15, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

Seems to be related to the rich text box... —Reedy 19:13, 3 July 2009 (UTC)
[48] - But it doesnt seem to help. —Reedy 21:09, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

We need to turn off AutoWordSelection but there's an MS bug explained here. There's a workaround given at the bottom, but I don't understand it. Rjwilmsi 15:35, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

rev 4700. Somewhere else did suggest setting it to true then false, but i didnt try that, just tried setting to true. —Reedy 17:30, 4 July 2009 (UTC)
Thank you so much for fixing it! This annoying and irritating "feature" is so ubiquitous in Windows programs that I figured there must not be a way to turn it off when using Rich Text, so I didn't bother mentioning it. I'm glad someone else did. I should've remembered that you guys can fix just about anything! MANdARAX • XAЯAbИAM 23:32, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for fixing it. It was irritating the hell out of me. - X201 (talk) 14:52, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

Thanks also! Romaine (talk) 16:05, 8 July 2009 (UTC)
Thanks from me as well. Amazing how such a little thing can be so irritating, and how big the relief is when it's fixed. As usual, chocolate chip cookies have been shoved into the disc drive. Assuming that odd sound doesn't mean anything bad, they should appear on your desktop in a jiffy. ;-) --Fabrictramp | talk to me 21:20, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

displaying boxes

With the latest update, how do I change the default display font, so that I see something besides boxes? kwami (talk) 08:02, 9 July 2009 (UTC)

Options -> Preferences -> Editing and saving is where you can change the font. Rjwilmsi 08:35, 9 July 2009 (UTC)
Thanks! kwami (talk) 10:44, 9 July 2009 (UTC)

Typos fixed: sq. km → km2(?)

Hi, I wonder if someone could help me. I'm not sure if I have AWB set up incorrectly (or have made an error somewhere else?)

I made this edit with AWB, giving the edit summary of: (clean up, typos fixed: sq. km → km2 using AWB)

I have been questioned on why I made the edit, by an administrator, stating that the "edit is in direct contradiction to the Manual of Style"

I have read the relevant section in MOS, but I'm still not clear on what exactly the policy is on this and where I went wrong.(?) :-(

Some pointers would be appreciated. -- Marek.69 talk 00:28, 11 July 2009 (UTC)

OK, your reading list consists of:
Once you've done that, compare your edit (from "214 sq. km (82.6 sq. mi)" to "214 km2 (82.6 sq. mi)") to what the output would have been if you'd employed {{convert}}, i.e. "214 km2 (82.6 sq mi)". That template is so heavily used it could not survive were it not in line with site guidelines. I'm sure there's a bit in the template's documentation which says specifically "sq. km. is no longer supported" but I can't find it off-hand to see whether it was as a unit specification when using the template or as an output unit. I hope you have better luck.
The short of it, though, is that km2 is the accepted multiple of the SI unit and is how I would expect it to be written. If the MOS says otherwise, I'd suggest that it's the MOS which needs review. ClickRick (talk) 00:46, 11 July 2009 (UTC)
I've looked at your talk page and I now see the point which the other user is making, and that's to note that the units should be spelled out (e.g. "square kilometers") on first use, but can be abbreviated thereafter. Again I point to {{convert}} which can easily enough generate "214 square kilometres (82.6 sq mi)". However, given that it was already abbreviated as "sq km" which is definitely non-standard, the edit to "km2" is easily justified. I hope this helps you. ClickRick (talk) 02:59, 11 July 2009 (UTC)
Hi ClickRick, Now that you've explained it, it is a lot clearer. Thank you for your help :-)
I've read the above articles and think I get it now. The info on the {{convert}} template will come in useful. Thanks for taking the time to explain.
Cheers Marek.69 talk 22:51, 11 July 2009 (UTC)

skipping blank cells or parameters?

Is it possible to pre-parse to skip a blank parameter in an infobox?

There are several thousand articles with mountain infoboxes, and I'd like to verify the pronunciations are formatted correctly. First I'd like to pre-parse to eliminate all articles which do not have the "Pronunciation =" parameter followed by some text. Many of the articles do not include the parameter name at all, or include certain common formattings along with it, both of which are easy cases to exclude, but there are 800 hits left, many of which include "Pronunciation =" but with no following text. Is is possible to include a line return or something in the search, so that these are excluded as well?

Thanks, kwami (talk) 22:04, 11 July 2009 (UTC)

Something like

(?si){{\s*Infobox mountain\b.*?\|\s*pronunciation\s*=\s*(\||}) would be a regex matching on infoxboxes with the pronunciation parameter given with no value (assuming "infobox mountain" is correct). Rjwilmsi 22:35, 11 July 2009 (UTC)

Thanks! That works perfectly.
(Do you know why pre-parse will not run most days? Server load? Also, if you double-click 'start' while the restart timer is running, it will count down 2" at a time, so that 60 seconds only takse 30.) kwami (talk) 22:08, 12 July 2009 (UTC)

Database scanner and redirects

This could well be operator error, so I'm asking here rather than making a bug report.

I ran the latest database dump through AWB (4.6.0.0, XP Pro) to work on the new DEP list. I chose "at most 1 link" and "ignore redirects" in the "page text properties" box. User:Fabrictramp/Sandbox2 has the resulting list. However, I notice there are redirects sprinkled throughout this list; 12:34:56 7/8/9., 276 Bus Route, and Angadipuram railway station are just a few that popped out at me. Should I have unchecked the "ignore redirects" checkbox? Something else?--Fabrictramp | talk to me 21:33, 12 July 2009 (UTC)

I just reran with all the same parameters but with the "ignore redirects" unchecked, and got 0 matches. --Fabrictramp | talk to me 21:56, 12 July 2009 (UTC)

Alt text

There has been a lot of chatter lately relating to Alt text and I wonder if ther eis anything that can be done in AWB to help facilitate alt text being added to articles? I admit I don't know exactly what functionality to request but I wanted to post this here as a general suggestion in case someone has some ideas. -Kumioko (talk) 15:19, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

searching for 2+ pipes; search limits

Can we search for pipes in a template, not counting the pipe that's part of the template itself? Or, equivalently, can we search for tranclusions of templates that contain more than one pipe?

Also, can we bypass the 25,000-article search limit?

(details) There is a template, {{IPA-pl}}, which converts Polish orthography into IPA; each letter or digraph is separated by a pipe. This is unlike the other IPA-xx templates, which simply accept the IPA as input and use pipes for various switches. Now, IPA-pl has been bot-added to thousands of articles, and this requires very little manual maintenance. However, there are an unknown number (perhaps 500 or so) of tranclusions which use the IPA as input, and these need to be checked for accuracy and consistency. I'd like to rd these to {{IPA-pol}}, but to do that I'll need to be able to pre-parse 18,000 tranclusions to eliminate the 17,000 that contain more than a few pipes (probably 3 to be on the safe side).

Is this feasible? kwami (talk) 00:42, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

It's entirely feasible, if I've understood your need correctly. What I think you'll want to do is pre-parse, keeping only those articles which match a regular expression for this template. The regex will be built from:
  • two opening braces (to match the start of start the template)
  • possibly some white space
  • the template name (to match the correct template)
  • possibly some more white space
followed by a repeating group containing:
  • a pipe symbol
  • one (though possibly more?) character
and that group repeated 3 or more times. This ought to be close:
\{\{\s*IPA-pl\s*(\|.){3,}
—ClickRick (talk) 01:58, 16 July 2009 (UTC)
Thanks, Rick! Yes, that looks like it should do it, if I'm following the conventions correctly. If I want a hit for one or two characters between the pipes, would it be maybe (\|(.){1,2}){3,} ?
I suppose to weed out all the hits, I could have change IPA-pl to IPA-pol if contains {{IPA-pl but not (\|(.){1,2}){3,} ? kwami (talk) 08:01, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

Russian - English

My Windows is a Russian Windows, and that is also my standard in the regional parameters of Windows and for programs that do not support unicode. But the default language of Windows and IE8 is English (USA). Up until yesterday I had no problems at all. Suddenly today I started editing with AWB and after a few edits - all of itself - I started typing Russian. This happened a few times. Even if I change it back to English using ALT+SHIFT, after the next edit it happens again. The only difference I remember between yesterday and today in AWB is that I taught AWB to replace "reflist" by "Reflist" (capitalisation) today in Advanced settings. Removing that didn't help. In Windows or IE8 I didn't make any related changes today.

Anybody has an idea what is going on here, and how to edit in English? Debresser (talk) 22:38, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

Is this an issue that you have only experienced in the latest version of AWB (4.6.0.0)? Rjwilmsi 19:07, 17 July 2009 (UTC)
Yes. To circumvent this problem, I have temporarily changed my Window language setting for programs that do not support unicode to English and it worked fine. But I can't afford to continue like that, because I have other programs that won't run this way. Isn't there some way to work around this? Or has there been a change to the program? Debresser (talk) 18:29, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

How do I filter article talk pages by content in the article?

I'm trying to clear out and/or update the various WP:CANADA unassessed/unknown importance/NA-importance categories. I'd like to be able to filter the list of Category:Unassessed Canada-related articles by whether the article includes stub}} in the text, but I only want to see the talk pages for the given articles. Is there a way to do this? → ROUX ₪ 18:54, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

I think you could use AWB's pre-parse mode to first go through the list of articles and remove those based on your stub criteria, and then use the list option to convert them to their equivalent talk pages. Rjwilmsi 19:22, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

Piped stubs

AWB does not recognize stubs which erroneously have pipes: {{xxx-stub|yyy}}. This is a situation I occasionally encounter (e.g., Alice Mak, Christopher Janney), in which users mistakenly think that it supplies a sort key in the same way as a piped category. I don't know of any stub templates which expect parameters, so I believe that AWB would be safe in discarding the parameter, or using it to make a DEFAULTSORT if one doesn't exist already. In any case, the stub should be processed as other stubs are. On the other hand, it's not a common thing; should AWB be expected to deal with every little error users may make? MANdARAX • XAЯAbИAM 08:45, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

I don't think people usually expect it to be a sortkey - it seems to me that they think {{stub|foo}} is the same as {{foo-stub}}. PamD (talk) 13:50, 17 July 2009 (UTC)
Both because of the doubt as to what is intended, and because of the relatove low occurence, I think that AWB should not get involved. Debresser (talk) 14:11, 17 July 2009 (UTC)
In all of the instances I've run across (there were more than the two I was able to find and list above), it was used as a sort key. But, since it has no effect, handling the parameter isn't important. The main thing is that AWB should recognize it as a stub and move it to the proper place, which it currently does not do. Note that in both of my examples, the offending stub is misplaced and isolated from the other stubs. I'm fine with AWB not dealing with this situation, but that decision should be based solely on the relative uncommonness. MANdARAX • XAЯAbИAM 19:34, 17 July 2009 (UTC)
I've just fixed over forty of these, all of which I found in art stubs. All but one of them were misplaced, and AWB did not move them to the correct place. In fact, for the one that was already correctly placed, AWB attempted to move the DEFAULTSORT and categories below it, thus effectively putting the stub into the wrong place. In all but five instances, the erroneous parameter which was added to the stub was intended to be a sort key. In four of the remaining ones, the parameter was a date (maintenance tag style). The other article's stub had WPBiography parameters (needs-infobox=). In all cases, I removed the parameters and moved the stubs to the correct place. MANdARAX • XAЯAbИAM 01:06, 21 July 2009 (UTC)

Regex help - move hidden span to start of column

Resolved

At List of downloadable PlayStation games, we need to move all the hidden span tags in the 3rd column to the start of each row (ahead of the flagicons).

i.e. 

|{{flagicon|USA}} <span style="display:none">2008-07-24</span>July 24, 2008

becomes 

|<span style="display:none">2008-07-24</span>{{flagicon|USA}} July 24, 2008

Thanks in advance! –xenotalk 18:28, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

No idea what syntax AWB uses, but in general it's something like this:
Find: ^\|[ ]*\{\{flagicon\|(.*)\}\} <span style="display:none.*">([\d-]*)</span>(.*)
Replace: | <span style="display:none;">\2</span>{{flagicon|\1}} \3
--MZMcBride (talk) 18:47, 20 July 2009 (UTC)
Had to rejig it a little bit (replaced \{\{flagicon\|(.*)\}\} <span style="display:none.*">([\d-]*)</span> with <span style="display:none;">$2</span>{{Vgrelease/region|$1}}), but it worked great! Thanks. –xenotalk 19:23, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

Disambig

OK...I'm new to AWB, but I have figured out enough to run the WikiProject plugin, so I'm not completely stupid. I'm now trying to use the disambig tab to disambiguate undercut. I check the box on the tab to enable it type in "undercut" as the link to disambiguate and then hit the "load links" button. All that works fine. For my list I do a "what links here" to undercut. I then go and hit the start button and all I get are a bunch of ignore pages. What am I doing wrong here? Thanks ahead of time. Wizard191 (talk) 02:57, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

It works - check skip reasons. Most likely, it skips due to lack of general fixes. 62.140.253.6 (talk) 16:30, 20 July 2009 (UTC)
I've looked at all of those and made sure none of the boxes are ticked. It doesn't actually skip the page, it just comes up and say "no changes" and then tells me to press the ignore button. Wizard191 (talk) 18:23, 20 July 2009 (UTC)
Ok, something more is definitely screwed up with my setup. No matter what I put in for a "find and replace" it doesn't work; always comes up as "no change". It seems that AWB can't properly search the article contents. Please help... Wizard191 (talk) 02:43, 22 July 2009 (UTC)
I was having that problem a few days ago and then mysteriously it started working again. i just assumed it was something with my computer. --Kumioko (talk) 02:46, 22 July 2009 (UTC)
I'm thinking it something with my settings or .js script because I've tried it on two computers, but I'm not sure. I've never gotten it working because I just started using the program last week. Wizard191 (talk) 02:50, 22 July 2009 (UTC)

searching by table class

AWB just gets more and more handy.

Is there a way to search by table class? I can get a list of most IPA transcriptions through the various templates which are (conveniently) needed to display them in IE, but there is also class "IPA wikitable", with which there is no need for the templates. Is there some way I can build a list of articles which use this table class, and then limit my search to within the tables? kwami (talk) 07:22, 21 July 2009 (UTC)

is there a video showing the features of this software in action?

I'm trying to decide whether I'm interested in this software. Is there a video demo, e.g. a youtube video, of this software in action? Agradman talk/contribs 18:21, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Nope, has been no prior need for it. —Reedy 18:55, 23 July 2009 (UTC)
I think it might be worthwhile if someone were to create such a tech demo. For my own part, I really didn't start using AWB until much longer after I heard of it... Just because the description just didn't really do it justice and explain how easy it is to use, and the like. –xenotalk 19:04, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

AWB in bot mode stopping periodically for no particular reason

I'm running an automated task with the WP:Plugin++ , for some reason it stops periodically for no identifiable reason... Thoughts? –xenotalk 19:20, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Pretty sure it is happening after saves, not skips... The last three it stopped on were:
–xenotalk 19:32, 23 July 2009 (UTC)
It's probably just timing out after failed saves. Rjwilmsi 20:02, 23 July 2009 (UTC)
Any way to have AWB automagically start itself again? –xenotalk 20:05, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Problem with another editor's use

I have a problem with another editors use of AWB. They're removing wikilinks to major countries and cities. Not all countries and cities, just systematically removing important links like Brazil or England and Tokyo or Paris from articles. This editor is, as I read it, under a twelve month ban from ArbCom on mass stylistic changes for their previous delinking efforts. Has there been policy change that I don't know? Is this a problem, or is this what AWB is supposed to be used for?-- Patrick {oѺ∞} 19:26, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

See WP:OVERLINK... Very common countries like that are often de-linked. I'd have to know who it was to look at the AC restriction and see if it applies. It could be argued that edits like this violate the insignificant changes rule, though. –xenotalk 19:29, 23 July 2009 (UTC)
If it is who I think it is, it doesn't apply because the restriction is for date de/linking and reversion of changes which are principally stylistic, whereas this is making changes. –xenotalk 19:41, 23 July 2009 (UTC)
Okay, I just want to make sure. An example of I'm seeing is like, a list of places, with the sentence "Foo Inc. has branches in the United States, France, and Peru." Here "United States" and "France" are being delinked; Peru is not. I don't understand the difference, and why the delinking is occurring in the first place.-- Patrick {oѺ∞} 19:43, 23 July 2009 (UTC)
Hopefully he's not just doing it to be pointy. I agree that in cases like that, it's peculiar to have some linked and some not. Especially in the one about the airline. –xenotalk 20:00, 23 July 2009 (UTC)
The use of AWB is problematic because the guideline is somewhat controversial, given that it was never properly discussed. Furthermore, the choice of what is "very common" is also a matter of opinion, and has never been established. I'd say Patrickneil is free to restore the links if he deems it appropriate, but the use of AWB should definitely be examined. --Ckatzchatspy 20:34, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Filtering the list builder

I wanted to post this here before I suggest a new feature but I have been using the list builder tool within AWB a lot and I have run into some issues with comparing lists. Due to the number of people that have persondata, infoboxes or other things I often find that AWB cannot pull them in and stops after about 25000. Which is fine, however when I am compating that list to another such as Medal of Honor recipients I get a lot that fall out, that actually do have it but are not pulled in with the 25000. My suggestion is to have a way to progressively scan, for example if I put in Medal of Honor recipients and then persondata it would only look at the Medal of Honor recipients list (less than 2000 articles) with persondata. This would allow me to see which articles need different things like infoboxes or persondata templates without have to look article by article. --Kumioko (talk) 20:30, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

There's a plugin that ships with AWB that gets rid of the 25000 limit, at least for bots and admins. –Drilnoth (T • C • L) 20:39, 23 July 2009 (UTC)
Thanks thats good to know...but alas, I am neither. --Kumioko (talk) 20:42, 23 July 2009 (UTC)
Just throwing it it there, but you could create a bot username and we could grant it bot-access to AWB for list-building purposes only... As long as you didn't use it to edit without going thru BRFA. (If no one objects to this) –xenotalk 22:31, 23 July 2009 (UTC)
I'd be happy enough to allow this. No reason the account couldn't be used for supervised AWB edits also. —Reedy 23:23, 23 July 2009 (UTC)
Thats ok with me too. Do I need to create a seperate account or can I just use this one? --Kumioko (talk) 00:40, 24 July 2009 (UTC)
You'd need a separate account, because otherwise all of your edits would be marked as being made by a bot. –Drilnoth (T • C • L) 01:37, 24 July 2009 (UTC)
Actually I think it's the bot flag (i.e. the ones 'crats grant) that sets the bot flag. We could grant bot-level AWB access to Kumioko's main account as long as they didn't run it in autosave mode. –xenotalk 03:27, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

(undent)New account created, Kumioko4U. If you want me to change to something else that ends in bot (like kumiokobot) let me know.--Kumioko (talk) 03:23, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

I approved the account for bot-level AWB access. As suggested by Reedy, you can use the account to do AWB edits, just please don't run it in auto-save mode without first getting approval at WP:BRFA. –xenotalk 03:27, 24 July 2009 (UTC)
I won't thanks --Kumioko (talk) 03:38, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

Is it possible to build a list of , e.g. , "Pages in categories linked on page"

Resolved
 – Functionality already exists as "Add selected to list from", though it isn't all-encompassing. Thanks, NE2. –xenotalk 13:16, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

i.e. someone gave me a page with links of categories they want me to tag. In order for me to build this list, I have to first massage it into the form I can paste into AWB's list builder (|Professional baseball teams in Indiana|Protected areas of Indiana|...) and then paste it in chunks AWB's entry box can handle.

It would be much easier to be able to point AWB at the page directly and build a list of pages in categories linked on page. This is just an example, it would be nice to do this for all of AWB's sources, i.e. build list of pages that transclude pages linked on page, etc.

Is this already possible somehow? If not I'll file a proper feature request. –xenotalk 13:03, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

Are they category links (ie it has a colon before the category)? Or is the page categorised? As i suspect, if they're links, categories on page wont do it? —Reedy 13:05, 24 July 2009 (UTC)
They're links, but even if they weren't, I'm not looking to build a list of the categories themselves, but to build a list of the pages in the categories linked on the page. So it's two steps, one to grab the categories ("links on page") and one to grab the pages in this categories (pages in categories linked on page). (see http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User:Xenobot/sandbox&oldid=303674173 - I don't want a list built of the 800 some-odd categories, I want a list build of the 25000 some-odd pages in those categories) –xenotalk 12:11, 25 July 2009 (UTC)
If you're lucky, you can select the generated categories, then leftright click and choose pages in category from "add selected to list from". If it's not in there, support Wikipedia talk:AutoWikiBrowser/Feature requests#"Apply to selection" in "make list" box?. Support it anyway, because it's a good thing to support. --NE2 13:07, 25 July 2009 (UTC)
That's exactly what I was looking for, thank you. –xenotalk 13:16, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

Plugin++ upgrades?

It seems Kingboyk is on a short break, I was wondering if the requested changes at WT:Plugin++ could be easily implemented; especially the BLP issue (WT:Plugin++#Put templates below the BLP template), but also, the auto-GA/FA/FL tagging request. –xenotalk 04:23, 26 July 2009 (UTC)

Merging duplicate references (part 2)

Earlier this year, it was agreed that identical citations should be combined. This, however, is problematic. When the footnote itself uses the {{Harvcol}} series of templates to link to the actual citation, merging individual citations that happen to thave the same number of pages can be more confusing. To illustrate: at Spanish phonology, if someone clicks on a superscript 47 to see the citation, they'll be unable to know which superscript letter refers to where they left off in the article, a b c or d. It also doesn't make sense, as it makes it seems to imply that a reference with page 515 is a different source from a reference with page 517. I'm sure there are many cases where combining references like that is appropriate, but it shouldn't be automatic. I've been told that this is "default AWB programming" so perhaps the default should change, though the capability still be available. — Ƶ§œš¹ [aɪm ˈfɻɛ̃ⁿdˡi] 16:58, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

Personally, I don't see any real problem here, although I'm not completely familiar with that citation style. With the letterscript, if you used an inline footnote like [2] and go to 2A B C D, you can still tell where you came from by A) seeing which of those letters are highlighted as already visited or B) by just using the browser's back button. I also don't see how it implies that a reference to a source's page 515 looks any more different from one to page 517 than it did before... if anything, it makes it easier to figure out that each one is the same source, IMO. If this conflicts with style guidelines, then maybe the autoreplace could just be turned off on pages which use {{Harvcol}} and related templates, so that footnote citations can still be merged. –Drilnoth (T • C • L) 17:32, 27 July 2009 (UTC)
I don't see how combining individual footnotes that happen to be the same page makes sourcing clearer. If e.g. Trager (1942) is cited five times, they're all the same source no matter what the page number is, so combining the page 222 citations makes the other non-222 citations look like separate sources. At the very least, it's more confusing rather than less.
I'm not sure what the style guidelines are (they may be neutral to this issue) but turning off autoreplace for the {{Harvcol}} templates sounds like a good alternative to my initial suggestion. — Ƶ§œš¹ [aɪm ˈfɻɛ̃ⁿdˡi] 21:13, 27 July 2009 (UTC)
I'm sorry, but I don't see your argument at all. Are you saying that
  • Jones (2009:75)
  • Jones (2009:75)
  • Jones (2009:75)
  • Jones (2009:75)
  • Jones (2009:75)
  • Jones (2009:100)
is better than
  • a b c d eJones (2009:75)
  • Jones (2009:100)
and that the second is confusing? And it's because readers will recognise that in the upper example Jones (2009) is one book, but in the lower example they will think it's two books? Mr Stephen (talk) 21:35, 27 July 2009 (UTC)
Yeah, you've got it. I'm sure people can figure out that they're the same source either way, but combining them impedes this understanding. What I don't understand is how the second option would help, as you seem to say, in understanding that Jones 2009:75 is the same source as Jones 2009:100. — Ƶ§œš¹ [aɪm ˈfɻɛ̃ⁿdˡi] 22:21, 27 July 2009 (UTC)
Well, I don't think that either is more or less obviously the same source. To my mind, the point is that the the reference list is more compact and the wiki-markup is cleaner. WP:WPCHECK lists fixing 'Reference duplication' as a 'Top priority' task, FWIW. Regards, Mr Stephen (talk) 23:17, 27 July 2009 (UTC)
Sorry, I forgot to check to see if you were a different person than above. Thanks for the heads up. — Ƶ§œš¹ [aɪm ˈfɻɛ̃ⁿdˡi] 23:22, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

removal of "tm" from within quotes

There are a few articles which I have watchlisted for quite a while, and one is the Phil Bolger article. On that page is a quotation from Phil Bolger where he writes wryly or sarcastically about a Suburban™, deliberately using the trademark symbol ™ to indicate his emphasis of the excesses of consumerism. About once every few months some well meaning editor does an AWB sweep and improperly deletes out the 'tm' symbol, and this is getting repetitively annoying. [49] is but one example of several. I believe that the policy of not using the ™ symbol to represent 'tm' makes sense most the time, but not all the time as with the case where ™ is used within a direct verbatim quotation. I request that AWB bot be modified to not remove the ™ symbol if it is used from within the {{cquote}} template. Thanks. SaltyBoatr (talk) 00:01, 28 July 2009 (UTC)

Just add a {{sic}} tag around it, like so: {{sic|hide=y|™}}—Chowbok ☠ 00:26, 28 July 2009 (UTC)

Regex for lowercasing?

Is there any way to have a regex find/replace change the case of words, like BNSF to Bnsf? --NE2 02:40, 26 July 2009 (UTC)

The easy answer is to do a case-insensitive match for bnsf and replace it with the required version. On the Find/Replace dialog, make sure "Case sensitive" is not checked. Does that help? ClickRick (talk) 22:20, 27 July 2009 (UTC)
I'm talking about something more general, like ([A-Z])([A-Z]*) to $1lowercase($2). --NE2 04:59, 28 July 2009 (UTC)
There is no way to do that with a simple application of regular expressions; it would require custom code to be written. However, given that there are many cases (typically abbreviations or initialisms) which should be left all upper case I would normally say that it is safer to aim to change the ones that you specifically know need changing. What is your specific requirement - maybe there's another way that AWB can help? ClickRick (talk) 08:21, 28 July 2009 (UTC)
I'm implementing custom DEFAULTSORTs for railroads; the AWB default is to only capitalize the first letter of each word (so BNSF is between Bingham and Burlington) but railroads have special rules for adding spaces and omitting words. Right now I'm manually fixing those. --NE2 08:56, 28 July 2009 (UTC)
With that specific requirement and that degree of complexity, I think a custom module might be a better answer. This would give you full programmatic control over the change. The alternative – of adding code into AWB to do it – would depend on whether the articles to which those rules apply can be easily identified, perhaps by having a particular category. ClickRick (talk) 09:11, 28 July 2009 (UTC)
I think I'll stick with the manual changes :) Most railroads don't have that sort of capitalization anyway. --NE2 09:30, 28 July 2009 (UTC)

New home for offwiki AWB stuff

tools:~awb/

Now the WMF ToolServer can do "shared"/project accounts, we are starting to move things to there. Snapshots are moved, the current MoMA report. The updated (multiproject) TypoScan is there, but still under development. Need to do a new scan.

AWB Usage Stats will be moved at a later date

—Reedy 21:39, 31 July 2009 (UTC)

DEFAULTSORT

OK there are a bunch of issues here, and I think we need a wikiproject to resolve them.

  1. Human names
    1. Specials need to come from rules or human intervention. I did a bunch of "listas" based on suffixes of (band) or "X of Y" using the pagename (but see below, should maybe be "X Of Y")
    2. Copying from/to "listas"
    3. Identifying names that shouldn't technically be sorted "Last, First"
  2. Multiword titles
    1. If we are going to add a defaultsort with capitalised words to these we need to do substantially all of them
  3. Mix of the above
    1. For example in Bexhill-On-Sea category we might end up listing "Sackville, Zia" before "Sackville Road" [or is it after?]
  4. Disambiguators
    1. There is no special treatment for dab parenthesis, and not all parenthesis in article names are for dab purposes so they should be retained to avoid this:
      1. John Smith (Welsh politician)
      2. John Smith (wrestler)
      3. John Smith (BBC executive)
      4. John Smith (comics)
      5. John Smith (filmmaker)
      6. John Smith (poet)
      7. John Smith (American football)
      8. John Smith (murderer)
      9. John Smith (athlete)
      10. John Smith (footballer born 1921)
  5. Project specials
    1. Where a project has a special ordering this should be explicit to the project categories: this is consistent with the "principle of least astonishment" So for example the railroad project wants, effectively, to drop "Railroad" or "Railway" from the end of the sort-key. This makes some sense "London Railroad" would come before any "London and Footown Railway" entries (although one could argue that those used to using indices will not find it) , but this sort key is useless to other categories, for example "Companies owned by J.D.Rockerfeller" . And these cats are likely to be added without realising that there is an extra space in the sortkey.


Also "Mozzam Begg" (for example, E&OE) might be technically sorted best at "Mozzam Begg" (but maybe not, it's an Indian name, but he has lived in the UK, his families phone would have been listed under Begg) but people will look under "Begg, Mozzam". So should we be looking for rotating sort-keys?

Rich Farmbrough, 15:43, 30 July 2009 (UTC).

About the railroad sorting: yes, there's a conflict for railroads that have only one word in the name, but this is relatively rare, and in other cases the special sorting is still good for all categories - Chicago, Milwaukee and St. Paul Railway should come before Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul and Pacific Railroad whether the category is defunct Minnesota railroads or Minneapolis-St. Paul metropolitan area. --NE2 16:05, 30 July 2009 (UTC)
Yes but why should it come before Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul and Pacific Jello Company? Further if the Jello WikiProject has similar ideas they may be trying to sort that as something with three spaces or "Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul and Pacific₳Jello Company" or some other clever sorting trick. Which is why I would be inclined to make anything non-standard explicit to those categories. If you want help doing this for railroads I would be happy to provide it. Rich Farmbrough, 16:12, 30 July 2009 (UTC).
Having said that I agree the problem is more likely with shorter names e.g. [50]. Rich Farmbrough, 16:27, 30 July 2009 (UTC).
Why would there be a Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul and Pacific Jello Company? Conflicts are going to be very rare, especially compared to the benefit of doing it for all categories. Even in your example of Cleveland Railway (Ohio), the extra space makes sense in all but two categories, to which I added a manual sortkey (and if a Cleveland streetcars category is created, even those will disappear). --NE2 17:40, 30 July 2009 (UTC)
This is classic WP - every example of failure can be fixed when it is pointed out. It's why I created User:Rich_Farmbrough#Things_that_stayed_too_long - to remind us that in truth problems persist for a long time. I would prefer to see a solution for railroads that doesn't break anything else, at the least, and at best one that is cromulent with other project specials (which are widespread - but as far as I know don't use the DEFAULTSORT magic word - for the good reason that using it assumes everyone knows the project secret code, whereas not using it only assumes people using the project cats know it) as far as it can be. Rich Farmbrough, 04:48, 1 August 2009 (UTC).
Furthermore the conflicts are going to occur precisely in proportion to the usefulness of the double space, while, as you rightly point out, "Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul and Pacific"+space+space as a prefix will be unlikely to cause problems in general categories, it also causes no problems in any of its many railroad cats with only one space. Rich Farmbrough, 05:02, 1 August 2009 (UTC).
But the space in Chicago, Milwaukee and St. Paul Railway is needed so it comes before Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul and Pacific Railroad. --NE2 12:11, 1 August 2009 (UTC)
I understand. Rich Farmbrough, 21:02, 1 August 2009 (UTC).

Skipping regex, is it possible to have "Single line" ? Also perhaps more robust skipping

Is there a way to turn on "Singleline" regex for the skip dialog? It would also be nice to put multiple skip options so the skip log can be more relevant than including many different options (in|a|bracket). If there's an easier way to do this, please let me know! =) –xenotalk 04:59, 3 August 2009 (UTC)

It could be modulised.. Something more like the normal FaR dialog (Advanced Skip Options?).. —Reedy 06:34, 3 August 2009 (UTC)
If you specify "(?s)" without the quotes at the start of your regex it will be singleline. Rjwilmsi 13:11, 3 August 2009 (UTC)
Yes, something like that.
Perfect, thank you! –xenotalk 15:58, 3 August 2009 (UTC)

Maxlag?

AWB seems to take maxlag into account now which is good. Curious: what value is it using for this? It may also be a good idea to provide some visual note that AWB has not taken some action due to maxlag, right now it just seems to give you a timer that some users might not understand. (Unless this is something else...) –xenotalk 14:53, 4 August 2009 (UTC)

5 if you're on checkpage's bots list, 20 otherwise. 62.140.253.6 (talk) 14:54, 4 August 2009 (UTC)
Thanks... and am I correct in my assumption that when AWB inexplicably says "Restarting in x seconds" it's because of maxlag?–xenotalk 14:57, 4 August 2009 (UTC)
Actually in this case I think it was because of a bad page name. –xenotalk 15:05, 4 August 2009 (UTC)
For future reference, it can also be because of a bad regex, such as one with mismatched brackets. DAMHIK,IJK,OK? ClickRick (talk) 15:44, 4 August 2009 (UTC)
Yes, I've seen that too... Some kind of notification for the dummies among us would be helpful =) –xenotalk 15:49, 4 August 2009 (UTC)

API editing is very fast! Nice job gents

Nice work on this new "API edit" version. It's amazingly quick. I am thinking to myself "is this thing shitting me?" and check the contribs to ensure that yes, it really did do it that fast.

Is it possible to preview the actions AWB is planning to make whilst the bot timer counts down? It would be nice to be in automated mode but be able to eyeball it once in a while. –xenotalk 00:44, 5 August 2009 (UTC)

Faster for the user, easier to maintain for the developers (ish) and nicer to the servers. Win, win, win situation ;). There are a few changes that need to be done, interface wise to tie it in nicely, like your prior comment that it needs to notify that its obeying maxlag, and hence is counting down to be able to save. This would probably be an easy (and useful for users) addition.. —Reedy 06:25, 5 August 2009 (UTC)
Yep, the note after 10 maxlag skips was good (which is how I figured it out =), even a tiny note in the countdown would be helpful (Restarting in xx seconds due to maxlag). –xenotalk 16:23, 5 August 2009 (UTC)
Yeah.. I think this sort of thing are going to be the main things that needing doing for it to become a proper release.. And a few minor bugfixes etc. We need to look at sorting these, and then getting a public beta/pre-release out, and increase the usage to get much more people using it.. —Reedy 06:27, 6 August 2009 (UTC)
So, just a general question, now that AWB respects maxlag, is it OK to take off / greatly reduce the countdown timer for saving? In the past, I've tried to keep my bot to 10 edits per minute due to not knowing what maxlag is, is this now unnecessary? –xenotalk 12:01, 6 August 2009 (UTC)
Thats a point tbh. I dont see why we need an arbitary limit now the bot is following maxlag.. —Reedy 14:25, 6 August 2009 (UTC)
Roger Roger I'm taking the shackles off contributions to see what happens =) –xenotalk 14:31, 6 August 2009 (UTC)
I usually set it to 0 anyway... I'll check with Max and look at removing it :) —Reedy 14:48, 6 August 2009 (UTC)
Well, actually; I wouldn't remove it... What I would do is give the option I queried about above, the ability to preview the diff that AWB presents you whilst in manual mode, and let the timer count down. This way people can have automated editing, but still eyeball a diff once in a while. –xenotalk 14:54, 6 August 2009 (UTC)
Feature request: Wikipedia talk:AutoWikiBrowser/Feature requests#Preview the diff AWB plans to commit while bot timer counts down

How to use dynamic "find and replace"

i was wondering if the parameters of the find and replace could change dynamically

for example, lets say i want to find the name of the article, and then paste it into a section in an infobox

if i need to elaborate , please tell me--Tim1357 (talk) 00:58, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

In reply to your example, you can use %%title%% to insert the article title in your "replace" text. MANdARAX • XAЯAbИAM 01:19, 8 August 2009 (UTC)
I think you could also use the CURRENTPAGE template (I think thats what its called). You can also do it using a module but thats a bit more of a challenge. If you have something specific in mind let us know what it is and maybe we can give you a more descriptive answer. I do this quite a lot so depending on what you want I may have something close already that we can tweak and make work. --Kumioko (talk) 03:29, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

Where are the resources on these types of templates?--Tim1357 (talk) 20:22, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

Two Values for the "Skip if contains" feild

how do i have AWB skip an article if it has either X or Y--Tim1357 (talk) 12:56, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

Use "(X|Y)" without the quotes and check "regular expression". If your expressions use special characters then paste them here and somebody will advise further. Rjwilmsi 13:15, 8 August 2009 (UTC)
Further to that, download the regex cheatsheet here: http://www.addedbytes.com/cheat-sheets/regular-expressions-cheat-sheet/ and you need to precede any "metacharacters" with \ in your expression, if you have any. –xenotalk 15:33, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

Thank you so much this answers so many of my questions--72.171.0.149 (talk) 17:24, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

What transclude page in namespace

Resolved
 – Use makelist->special page->what transcludes page->(select namespace)

Is it possible to do make a list of http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special%3AWhatLinksHere&hidelinks=1&target=Template%3AAsbox&namespace=10 ? I can't make a list of what transcludes and filter for template because I am hit by the 25,000 limit. –xenotalk 03:19, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

I have that same problem and recently requested a dynamic list builder. If the list builder where modified to allow the users to select wether we want a different join (inner, outer or union) for lack of a better word that would be super. --Kumioko (talk) 03:33, 8 August 2009 (UTC)
Thanks for reminding me I just re-read the thread and now realize what Drilnoth was talking about "There's a plugin that ships with AWB that gets rid of the 25000 limit, at least for bots and admins. –Drilnoth (T • C • L) 20:39, 23 July 2009 (UTC)"
I thought he meant it was built in, I see it's now in the /NoLimitsPlugin directory! cheers. –xenotalk 03:48, 8 August 2009 (UTC)
errr... this is still going to generate a shit-ton of pages of transclusions to process due to the number of pages that asbox is now transcluded on. So, still some value in the functionality to restrict to a namespace. –xenotalk 03:50, 8 August 2009 (UTC)
Special page list providers are ns selectable.. —Reedy 13:17, 8 August 2009 (UTC)
I figured that's why there was a separate "All NS" option... but how? =) –xenotalk 15:36, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

I win. rev 5160, rev 5161 —Reedy 18:47, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

 Works for me Thanks =) –xenotalk 19:09, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

List of "minor" general fixes?

What is the list of general fixes that are considered "minor" for the purpose of skipping? I can't find one. Thanks! –Drilnoth (T • C • L) 16:55, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

Not sure how far Rjwilmsi got with implementing it. —Reedy 06:10, 14 August 2009 (UTC)

Need approval/setup for other Wikis?

Hi, I've been doing a lot of work on www.honwiki.net recently, and I was wondering if I need to put in a Request for Approval here to use AWB there? Also, does anything special need to be done to make AWB work on a different MediaWiki Wiki? Like a CheckPage? --Niightblade (talk) 04:14, 14 August 2009 (UTC)

No, and no. You can setup a checkpage on the local wiki if you want to use stuff like typo pages (and want to tell awb where it is, etc), or restrict user access there. —Reedy 06:08, 14 August 2009 (UTC)

Show categories on preview

I noticed a while back, but hadn't looked into yet, that when previewing pages after making an edit in the edit box, the top frame does not show the categories assigned to the article. This came in handy when categorizing articles, to double-check that the category existed (i.e. wasn't redlinked) before saving. Maybe during a past update to AWB, but I can't place the exact date. (in fact around the same update that the preview now shows only the page content, not any of the wikipedia navigation) Any chance this is a setting or a configuration somewhere? Cander0000 (talk) 02:26, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

This was changed to bring rendering internally, to reduce loads on the WMF servers. Diffs provide the best representation of what was changed/added/removed.. —Reedy 18:12, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

C-sharp/Windows? vs. Python/Linux

Is this really viable? Wouldn't Java be a more suitable preliminary solution that can involve just any operating system up to including making an applet variant? Or maybe XUL? As it is, and will be for a time, the C-sharp environments on other OSes than Windows will be very unstable, I've seen lots of projects ceased based on the environment being unstable and changeable.

As an experiment, anylang and any-OS would be OK, but for regular development the programming language chosen should be as conservative and cautious as possible. Personally I'm on Linux because of the great availability of programming languages and tools, and I believe there are many programmers opting that way. But I don't believe in OS wars and PL wars, so I'm just stressing the conservative and cautious points, not the alleged advantage of this or that. ... said: Rursus (mbork³) 08:15, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

Project page says:
AWB does not yet work with Wine.
which annoys me very much considering the above statement:
Please note that problems with AWB on Wine/Mono or Wine/.NET are not reportable AWB bugs.
How will it ever going to work with Wine/Mono or Wine/.NET if you don't accept bug reports? The net effect will be a boycott of Linux programmers, unless the development philosophy changes in it entirety. ... said: Rursus (mbork³) 08:41, 18 August 2009 (UTC)
AWB wouldnt work on WINE due to some weirdness, but also, mono there was quite a few things that weren't implemented, so no chance of awb working on it. Saying that, it does now actually work (according to MaxSem) on Mono... So this can maybe be changed. It was more there so we didnt get bug reports of problems that weren't actually AWB's fault etc. Some things have to be worked around, and we have added some code for this into AWB to help the running on mono. This is all mainly due to the lack of major dependancy on the web control, and more on the api. tools:~awb/mono
As for the Java comment, for a start, none of the AWB developers are Java developers. Granted, it is fairly syntactically similar to c#, but would requires a major rewrite, and hault all other production. Note the fairly large amount of code, and how far it dates back ;)
I shall update the documentation later regarding wine/mono. —Reedy 09:00, 18 August 2009 (UTC)
I accept all that as good reasons, since I suspected that Mono was the Achilles Heel of C-sharp combined with all other OS:es than Windows. Learning a new programming language is not that easy, especially when trying to get a big functional work horse alive and going: it is coding coding coding without any apparent success for a long time – a typical case of boring and stressing programming. Still I think Java is the least bad of programming language choices in this case, but it is up to someone knowledgeable enough to startup a similar Java project. (DISCLAIMER: I'm not a Java lover, I detest all programming language – without exceptions!). ... said: Rursus (mbork³) 11:40, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

SelectedSummary always saved as "Clean up"

When saving settings, SVN 5208 always saves SelectedSummary as "Clean up" rather than whatever the summary was at the time of saving. MANdARAX • XAЯAbИAM 08:42, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

Surely, this is a bug? :P —Reedy 09:00, 18 August 2009 (UTC)
rev 5239 - Fixed, seems i missed the option when moving code about. —Reedy 18:28, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

1 or 2 lines before stub templates

Just in case anybody here wants to take part in this discussion, which will have a possible effect for AWB. Discuss it on that talkpage, please. This is just a notice. Debresser (talk) 16:26, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

Error on SVN snapshot page

  • Notice: Use of undefined constant GLOB_BRACE - assumed 'GLOB_BRACE' in /home/project/a/w/b/awb/public_html/snapshots/index.php on line 23 Warning: glob() expects parameter 2 to be long, string given in /home/project/a/w/b/awb/public_html/snapshots/index.php on line 23 Warning: Invalid argument supplied for foreach() in /home/project/a/w/b/awb/public_html/snapshots/index.php on line 23 –xenotalk 15:18, 19 August 2009 (UTC)
Due to a ts webserver change to solaris. I'll fix when im home —Reedy 16:08, 19 August 2009 (UTC)
Fixed now. —Reedy 18:08, 19 August 2009 (UTC)
Thanks muchly. Can't build at work =] –xenotalk 04:53, 23 August 2009 (UTC)

What is the thresh-hold for an Orphan according to AWB?

What is the thresh-hold for an Orphan according to AWB? Does it exclude list articles? If so how does it know? How about non-main space? Rich Farmbrough, 06:05, 23 August 2009 (UTC).

And for clarity the thresh-hold for adding and for removing. Rich Farmbrough, 06:06, 23 August 2009 (UTC).
AWB considers an NS 0 (Article) page an orphan, if it has no mainspace links to it (including lists), "WhatLinksHereExcludingPageRedirectsListProvider". It is removed on the same criteria. —Reedy 06:26, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

Placement of footnotes templates

See Template_talk:No_footnotes#Placement_of_this_template that there is no longer consensus that the {{Nofootnotes}} template should be placed at the top of the references section. Many editors feel that the top of the article is a better place. In view of this, the requirement has been dropped from the template's documentation page. That would mean for AWB, that the template should not be moved automatically to the references section any longer. The same would hold true for the {{Morefootnotes}} template. Debresser (talk) 18:53, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

Hm, "Many editors" I don't think the number that are for and against together can be classed as "many". And (re)starting a discussion from 2007 and changing the documentation...? Maybe you should say

See Template_talk:No_footnotes#Placement_of_this_template that there is no longer consensus, now that I have posted there, that the {{Nofootnotes}} template should be placed at the top of the references section. I and a couple of others feel that the top of the article is a better place. In view of this, I have removed the requirement from the template's documentation page.

Rich Farmbrough, 04:31, 23 August 2009 (UTC).
Perhaps I was a little bold, but it remains true that the placement of these two templates does not have consensus, and that - as you phrased it so eloquently - "no automated system should be methodically moving the tags". Debresser (talk) 06:03, 25 August 2009 (UTC)
I second this. Placement of certain reference-related maintenance tags is an ongoing debate. AWB's behavior regarding this is a problem, especially because it causes SmackBot to automatically move the tags if they're placed in the "wrong" position. Until the matter is settled in the Wikipedia community, no automated system should be methodically moving the tags across all articles. The issue has been raised at SmackBot's author's talk page, and he suggested commenting here, so here we are. Please look into this soon. Thanks. Equazcion (talk) 23:25, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

This could be a version thing. Maybe the svn moves them down, because I think 4.6 moves them up. However its really not a big deal, having attracted only about 1 comment a year on the talk page. Personally I have some sympathy for moving the tags to talk space or making many of them invisible. Rich Farmbrough, 04:24, 23 August 2009 (UTC).

Best person to comment on this, is probably Rjwilmsi. He's been doing the changes to things like this. —Reedy 09:19, 26 August 2009 (UTC)
The feature request was Wikipedia_talk:AutoWikiBrowser/Feature_requests/Archive_5#Move_nofootnotes_to_the_references_section and made by User:Magioladitis. I don't care what the policy is, I just actioned the feature request. If the policy has changed to not have these templates in the references section then let me know and I'll disable the logic to move them in AWB. Rjwilmsi 11:23, 26 August 2009 (UTC)
That what I came to do here. Is this post enough? Debresser (talk) 12:06, 26 August 2009 (UTC)
I'd guess so, if this is the case/its causing arguments when no clear policy. —Reedy 18:16, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

controversial practice: AWB changing cites etc.

  • I think people there are worried that AWB will gobble up harvard or other style citing. It only combines identical refs, I've mentioned that there. –xenotalk 04:18, 25 August 2009 (UTC)
I also so no benefit from having exact reference duplicates. Its wasted extra text, and displays to the end user the same. Though, i suspect when Xeno is suggesting is probably right. —Reedy 06:22, 25 August 2009 (UTC)
Well the argument for repeating the references is that this reflects normal practice in printed works and most places on the internet, so that footnote numbering is in sequential order. The display is not actually the same to the end user. Additionally, it presents problems in frequently edited articles where the parent reference may be deleted in future revisions, although this is probably not an issue for most FAs. Christopher Parham (talk) 18:16, 25 August 2009 (UTC)
On articles where such a citing strategy is being employed purposefully, one might consider using the {{bots|deny=AWB}} template. –xenotalk 18:20, 25 August 2009 (UTC)
I agree with xeno here. Duplicate references are almost always a Bad Thing™, IMO. In the rare cases where having them separate is needed, then you can use {{bots}}. But really, I don't think that an article with the same reference duplicated multiple times would ever make it through a process like FAC... having the same reference in the code multiple times A) makes maintenance harder (if one of the refs is changed, the others might not be and they would become different over time), and B) takes up more space in an already-long references section. (full disclosure: Merging refs with AWB is one of my bot's tasks). –Drilnoth (T • C • L) 18:26, 25 August 2009 (UTC)
Consolidation isn't required or encouraged by the relevant style guidelines so it's not an issue for FAC. Christopher Parham (talk) 18:42, 25 August 2009 (UTC)
It is described at WP:REFNAME, which is a guideline. And I know that it would certainly be an issue for me if I were an FA reviewer. But maybe I'm just picky. :) –Drilnoth (T • C • L) 19:02, 25 August 2009 (UTC)
It is described, not required or encouraged; to quote that guideline, "the use of named footnotes ... is a matter for editorial judgment." In general, these guidelines are pretty explicit about not taking a stance on which of the many acceptable formatting options should be used. Christopher Parham (talk) 19:31, 25 August 2009 (UTC)
  • please, please please do not mess with the citations. I had a bunch of <ref>Miller, 2007</ref> in my article, it changed them all to say '<ref name="Miller, 2007">Miller, 2007</ref>. Not just the first one... all of them. It also changed all the <ref>Snider</ref> to say.<ref name="Snider">Snider</ref> It didn't actually remove any redundancy, in fact, it made the text more annoying and less readable and --more redundant--. Refs and citations are the worst part of wikipedia because they make the text not 'human readable', and if we start getting bots in here trying to 'fix' them, instead of fixing the basic system, we are going to end up with perl. Keep your hands off my citations, you damn dirty bots. (cyborgs, whatever). Yes I am aware of all the reasons for using name=, i use it sometimes, but not all the time. And I know all about the FA and that, i dont care about getting an FA. I care about having text that can be edited by a human being. As for readers... history books are full of reference pages that have 10 'ibid's in a row... they dont combine them all into one thing. It is not some weird thing that people do for no reason, or because they dont understand how awesome name= is.... it is based on a reference and citation format that has been around for decades if not centuries and that readers understand. Thank you.Decora (talk) 01:43, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

IS this an error?

An imagemap in 90482 Orcus contains a self-link. AWB removed it. Arguably the entire part of the imagemap that self links isn't needed - an editor says the self-link is needed for the mouse-over. I might question th evalue of the mouse-over anyway. But... Rich Farmbrough, 21:28 21 May 2009 (UTC).

There was a bug report/fix for imagemaps recently. Besides that, personally, I think the self-link is highly confusing. -- User:Docu
According to mw:Extension:ImageMap, it doesn't look like it's possible to specify names w/o links. -- User:Docu
It appears not. I wonde rehterht to go back to this user. Rich Farmbrough, 19:42 23 May 2009 (UTC).
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