This is an archive of past discussions with User:DatGuy. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.
Tyler
Hi DatGuy,
why is wikipedia a unreliable source?
(I know I'm not DatGuy, but hopefully he doesn't mind me responding to your question, I'm a talkpage stalker)
Hello, If you're looking for sources to use in a project or school assignment, I would recommend looking at the sources Wikipedia is citing. Thanks for asking! XboxGamer22408talk to me17:16, 25 March 2017 (UTC)
Sorry about that, I wasn't aware that page existed. DatGuy's response is correct, I'm generally not very inclined with articles, as I'm just a recent changes patroller. Generally speaking though, Wikipedia is good to get some basic information, not to cite a project or assignment with. XboxGamer22408talk to me22:25, 25 March 2017 (UTC)
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Recent changes
When you edit with the visual editor, you can see a visual diff as well as a wikitext diff when you review your changes. [1]
Problems
Special:AllPages was disabled for two days due to some performance issues. It is back, but the filter for redirects is gone as the cause of the performance problem. It still needs to be fixed. [2][3]
The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from March 28. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from March 29. It will be on all wikis from March 30 (calendar).
I have recently seen a number of reports by DatBot at Wikipedia:Administrator intervention against vandalism/TB2 with the comment "Tripped 5 abuse filters in the last 5 minutes" despite the fact that in every case the filter logs gave the last action as having taken place many hours earlier, in one case almost 28 hours before the bot reported to AIV. When I saw the first couple of these reports, I just thought it a little amusing, but when I realised it was happening frequently I no longer found it funny. The instructions at the top of Wikipedia:Administrator intervention against vandalism include "The warnings must have been given recently and the users must be active now" (emphasis in the original), and that applies as much to bot reports as to any others. Posting a large number of reports which have no chance at all of being acted on because they are totally stale takes up the time of administrators who check the reports, who could be spending the time on more useful work, such as dealing with valid vandalism reports. Can you adjust the bot's programming to stop it continuing to do this? The editor who uses the pseudonym "JamesBWatson" (talk) 14:17, 2 April 2017 (UTC)
@JamesBWatson: This is the second time this has occurred, and frankly, I don't know how to stop it. Sometimes, the SQL service that the bot uses is overloaded, so it stops giving information until it 'cools down.' Then, it sends in all the information at once. If this happens, could you disable the bot? Apologies, and to any talk page stalker, do you know of any way to prevent this? Dat GuyTalkContribs14:24, 2 April 2017 (UTC)
(edit conflict) Thanks for getting back to me on this. It makes sense that it could happen if the SQL service is sending data late, but would it be possible to get the bot to check the time stamps of the filter log entries, or would it be too difficult to get the bot to check the logs itself, rather than just accepting what the SQL service sends? Obviously, since I have no idea how the bot works I have no idea whether that would be feasible. I was intending to keep an eye on AIV for a while, and disable the bot if the stale reports continued, but I see that Widr has blocked the bot for three hours. However, just disabling this one task would be a less drastic solution to the problem than completely blocking it. Judging by the editing history of User:DatBot/Filter reporter/Run that can be done by replacing the contents of that page by "Stop", so I have done that, and I shall unblock the bot's account. If either of you, DatGuy or Widr, know of a good reason why that is not a good way of dealing with the problem, then obviously the block can be reinstated. I am going offline now, so I don't try to get me to do it: ask either Widr or another administrator. The editor who uses the pseudonym "JamesBWatson" (talk) 14:42, 2 April 2017 (UTC)
My understanding of bots is close to nonexistent, that's why I just blocked it (as was done the last time it malfunctioned), so I'll gladly let more knowledgeable folks help you with this. Widr (talk) 14:51, 2 April 2017 (UTC)
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Recent changes
The Save page button now says Publish page or Publish changes on most Wikipedias. The point is to make it more clear that the edit will change the page immediately. Publish page is when you save a new page and Publish changes when you edit an existing page. [4]
The tracking category Category:Pages with template loops is now added when a template loop is found. A template loop is for example when a template tries to use a second template that uses the first template. [5]
English Wikipedia now has cookie blocks. It will come to more wikis in the future. This is an extension to the autoblock system so when a user is blocked, the next time they visit the wiki a cookie will be set. This means that even if the user switches accounts and to a new IP address the cookie will block them again. [6]
Problems
Wikidata descriptions, aliases and labels that used some characters could not be saved. This has now been fixed. [7]
Changes this week
The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 4 April. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 5 April. It will be on all wikis from 6 April (calendar).
Meetings
You can join the next meeting with the VisualEditor team. During the meeting, you can tell developers which bugs you think are the most important. The meeting will be on 4 April at 19:00 (UTC). See how to join.
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Some older web browsers will not be able to use JavaScript on Wikimedia wikis from this week. If you have an old web browser on your computer you can upgrade to a newer version. [10]
New filters for Recent changes will come to Wikidata and Persian, Russian, Turkish and French Wikipedia on 11 April. The schedule has been changed to fix the user intent prediction filters for some wikis. User intent prediction means the filter tries to make it easier for editors to determine if the edit was made in good faith or not. Other wikis will get it later. [11]
The list of special characters in the wikitext editor and the visual editor will now have a group of Canadian Aboriginal characters. [12]
The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 11 April. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 12 April. It will be on all wikis from 13 April (calendar).
Meetings
You can join the next meeting with the VisualEditor team. During the meeting, you can tell developers which bugs you think are the most important. The meeting will be on 11 April at 19:00 (UTC). See how to join.
Future changes
Because of a data centre test you will be able to read but not edit the wikis for 20 to 30 minutes on 19 April and 3 May. This will start at 14:00 (UTC). You might lose edits if you try to save during this time. You can read more about this.
RevisionSlider will change how you move between revisions. This will be available on the test wiki from 11 April. It will come to other wikis later if users like the change. You can test it and give feedback.
The BAG Newsletter is now the Bots Newsletter, per discussion. As such, we've subscribed all bot operators to the newsletter. You can subscribe/unsubscribe from future newsletters by adding/removing your name from this list.
Sure. Just some questions. Is English your native language? Did you create an account with a specific target in mind, such as reverting vandalism? Or are you attempting to receive as many user flags? Dat GuyTalkContribs06:43, 7 February 2017 (UTC)
Sorry the answer took so long, yes, my native language is English, yes, my target was to improve aviation related articles, and no, the only user right I'm interested in is Rollback. Anything else? - ZLEA(Talk,Contribs)13:26, 6 April 2017 (UTC)
Thank you for making a report on Wikipedia:Administrator intervention against vandalism. Reporting and removing vandalism is vital to the functioning of Wikipedia and all users are encouraged to revert, warn, and report vandalism. However, it appears that the editor you reported may not have engaged in vandalism, or the user was not sufficiently or appropriately warned. Please note there is a difference between vandalism and unhelpful or misguided edits made in good faith. If the user continues to vandalise after a recent final warning, please re-report it. Thank you. RegalHawktalk21:06, 8 April 2017 (UTC)
@DatGuy: The AIV report I was referring to was made by your bot, and my notice was meant for it. I did not realize that DatBot redirected to DatGuy, so I apologize for that. RegalHawktalk21:12, 8 April 2017 (UTC)
Hi, DatGuy. The link to the online version of the linguistic atlas "Sprach- und Sachatlas Italiens und der Südschweiz" seems to me appropriate just as the links to the "Linguistic Atlas of New England", "Linguistic Atlas of the Upper Midwest", "Linguistic Atlas of the Gulf States" which are also external links and follow immediately in the text.
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
Recent changes
You can add ?safemode=1 to the end of the URL on Wikimedia wikis to disable your personal CSS and JavaScript. Example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Literature?safemode=1. This means you can test if a problem is because of your user scripts or gadgets without uninstalling them. [14]
The Wikiversity and Wikinews logos are now shown directly from the configuration and not from [[File:Wiki.png]]. If you want to change logo or have an anniversary logo, see how to request a configuration change. This is how it already works for other projects. They can request logo changes the same way. [16]
Problems
Because of a data centre test you will be able to read but not edit the wikis for 20 to 30 minutes on 19 April. This will start at 14:00 (UTC). You might lose edits if you try to save during this time. You can read more about this. This will also happen on 3 May.
Changes this week
There is no new Mediawiki version this week. This is because of the data centre test.
Meetings
You can join the next meeting with the VisualEditor team. During the meeting, you can tell developers which bugs you think are the most important. The meeting will be on 18 April at 19:00 (UTC). See how to join.
Page Previews will be turned on for logged-out users on a large number of wikis in May. It could be postponed and happen later. Page Previews shows readers a short part of a linked article when they rest their mouse pointer on the link. This is to help them understand what it is about without leaving the article they are reading. Page Previews used to be called Hovercards. Users who have tested the feature can give feedback. [17]
From next week, user scripts using very old deprecated wikibits functions will show errors. These functions have not worked since 2013. You should fix or disable broken scripts. You can see examples of how to upgrade scripts. [18][19]
Can you configure your bot to remove users who are blocked? DeltaQuadBot did that when it handled that task. The bots that remove reports on the main UAA page do not remove reports on the bot reports subpage. —MRD2014📞contribs02:57, 22 April 2017 (UTC)
What I'm saying is that when users were blocked, DeltaQuadBot would remove them. Your bot does not remove accounts automatically, which means that administrators have to remove them. —MRD2014📞contribs13:59, 22 April 2017 (UTC)
Good evening from Calabria,
I'm writing to say hello, thank you and know how you are. I'm pretty good for now. I also write to you because I saw your timely intervention on Gerit Kling's page, I was wondering if you could intervene for the page I reported, would you kindly kindly improve the quality of the page? Right and not more than 10 minutes of your precious time, I have seen that you speak German much more than me. Well, in anticipation of your good and certain answer, I thank you in advance of true heart, and if I can do anything for you, I am at your complete disposal. A greeting from Coreca, Calabria--Luigi Salvatore Vadacchino (talk) 19:03, 23 April 2017 (UTC)
Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.
When administrators, bureaucrats and stewards make a user a member of a user group they can now set an expiry date. A user group is for example "administrators" or "bots". This means that they can give someone user rights for a limited time. This is similar to how blocks and page protections can be limited in time. Special:UserRights will have new options for this. You can read more about user groups.[21]
Problems
Since the data centre test last week the content translation tool has been disabled. This is because of a database problem. It will be back as soon as the problem has been solved. [22]
Changes this week
The GuidedTour extension will be enabled on all wikis. This is a tool to explain to new users how to edit. [23]
Wiktionary will handle interlanguage links in a new way. The Cognate extension will automatically link pages with the same title between Wiktionaries. For this to work all old interlanguage links have to be removed. You can read more about this. [24]
The new version of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 25 April. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 26 April. It will be on all wikis from 27 April (calendar).
Meetings
You can join the next meeting with the VisualEditor team. During the meeting, you can tell developers which bugs you think are the most important. The meeting will be on 25 April at 19:00 (UTC). See how to join.
@Stefan2: I'd bet it's my internet. It runs at 0:00 AM my time, and my internet is very on-and-off. Also, it doesn't reduce tiff files. I'll also run it manually if I see the backlog is getting big. Dat GuyTalkContribs13:45, 27 April 2017 (UTC)
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