I noticed actually there are a number of new users in the list of number with no "bot" in the name, somea re bot, some run bots, and a renamed account - a quick look gets these to look at (I've not got anymore time at the mo)
So in attempt to do the final tidy I have removed the following as non bots - and added a couple more found
Alleborgo - runs AlleborgoBot
Deskana - admin account
Dlyons493 - retired user
EssjayTest - no live edits, 2 deleted
J.delanoy - retired admin account
KnightRider - not an account but found User:KnightRider~enwiki
Log title - not an account (but was in the list above?)
Pending deletion script~enwiki - no edits
ThisIsaTest -1 edit
Wikignome - retired user account
WOPR~enwiki - not a bot, but forwards to User:タチコマ robot - so added that to list - this also show us we have missed some - could check against Template:Bot transclusion on user pages (as too mnay other reasons could be on talk pages).
NavouBot - not an account (but was in the list above?)
TeckWizBot - not an account but redirect to User:RBot~enwiki that is
VixDaemon - not an account but redirects to User:VixDaemonBot that is
VshBot - not an account but redirects to User:O bot that is
ZwoBot - not an account but redirects to User:Zwobot that is
I suspect these are former accounts that have since been renamed and no longer exist, like our friend Animum_Delivery_Bot. Whilst an account that exists but has zero edits would be zero. ϢereSpielChequers10:30, 3 March 2020 (UTC)
I went with "-1" for nonexistent accounts because it seemed preferable to the script crashing and the report never updating. The report should probably just omit those users altogether, but meh. --MZMcBride (talk) 00:10, 4 March 2020 (UTC)
Incorrect Edit Count
I just wanted to know why my edit count appears to be incorrect. It was updated today, and it appears that I have 200 to 300 more edits than the list indicates. Could it be that the page I edited doesn't count towards my edit count or something? All help will be greatly appreciated. Scorpions13256 (talk) 18:40, 25 May 2020 (UTC)
There's also the difference (at least for me) in the number of edits that the edit counter shows in the 'basic information' section and the number in the 'global edit counts' line for en.wikipedia. The latter is usually ~50 edits lower, and it's the number on the list. Also, the bot runs the report once a day. If you start editing after that day's list appears, you'll need to wait until the following day for the numbers to change. BlackcurrantTea (talk) 04:58, 26 May 2020 (UTC)
Going backwards
The current list (see timestamp) is "as of 04:41, 02 August 2020" - yesterday morning it was "as of 04:00, 03 August 2020" and yes, the numbers are smaller than yesterday - Arjayay (talk) 07:26, 4 August 2020 (UTC)
I was looking through the top Wikipedians by edits, and was surprised to see that this set does not follow a Zipfian distribution. I was wondering if anyone had any thoughts on why this would be, and whether the infamous 23 editor cabal might be responsible for the statistical anomaly. VanIsaacWScont09:00, 1 May 2020 (UTC)
Vanisaac, No but I see some scholarship on Zipfian distribution of words on Wikipedia:
There are a number of possibilities here, Including: The theory that these counts do match Zipf's law exactly, provided you amalgamate all sock puppets known and unknown and measure by human rather than by account. The theory that we obey Zipf's law across the whole of Wikimedia but not on individual projects such as EN Wikipedia, and the possibility that we obey that law if one applies the appropriate weighting to minor edits. Room for several PhDs to be earned there.ϢereSpielChequers12:48, 1 May 2020 (UTC)
Or the more prosaic actual explanation, that you're looking at a four-way split between "editors who are running an unauthorised bot on their account", "editors who stick to the rules but are doing mass semi-automated high-speed editing", "editors who are very active but have multiple accounts" and "everyone else". Split those groups into four different charts, and you'll very likely get the neat clean curves you were expecting. ‑ Iridescent13:57, 1 May 2020 (UTC)
When I plot 1e+8/edits versus rank, I get a curve that closely matches a hyperbola, asymptoting to a line approximately parallel to y=x. It's a remarkably clean curve, more so than Wnt's curve fit done in 2009. ~Anachronist (talk) 07:31, 7 October 2020 (UTC)
How often is this list updated?
I'm curious because it says that the last revision occured on "09:50, 23 December 2019" and I'm pretty sure I fall into the top 10,000 now. Is it done yearly or is there no regularity to the updates? - DovahDuck (talk) 14:09, 12 October 2020 (UTC)
@Mysyq:Not done: This is a misuse of the WP:SPER process: the report is built by a bot, so if we were to edit the page to add links (and, btw, your link is to an article not a user page), the edit would be nullified by the next bot run. You would need to ask the bot operator to change the code; and this would be denied, see for example this section on this page. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 00:10, 29 January 2021 (UTC)
Don't worry about it. It's a bot-built page, so even if not reverted by somebody else, your changes would have been entirely discarded on the next bot run, typically round about 04:00 (UTC) each day. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 17:33, 6 February 2021 (UTC)
Is the number of contributions taken from Xtools or from beta (the option located above the screen of registered users on the PC)? Dr Salvus (talk) 16:55, 13 February 2021 (UTC)
@Dr Salvus: It's calculated as being the number of rows in your contributions that relate to actual edits, plus the number of rows in your deleted contributions that relate to actual edits. Actual edits are where you altered something in the text of the page, and exclude the following: page moves, image uploads and certain admin actions such as protection. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 22:56, 13 February 2021 (UTC)
Links to user pages
I'm sure that the users listed used to be linked to their user pages, whereas looking at the list now, this isn't the case. Is there a reason for this? PaleCloudedWhite (talk) 10:09, 23 June 2019 (UTC)
It's possible to link all the user names. Or we could fix the "was this user recently active?" logic to be less expensive. --MZMcBride (talk) 20:21, 26 June 2019 (UTC)
Only half of the user name total was linked. A previously-visible disclaimer stated that "A user name in black (unlinked) has not been used for editing in the last 30 days", which accounted for approximately 50% of the 10,000 user names. —Roman Spinner(talk • contribs)15:22, 23 July 2019 (UTC)
Yes, techie (compliment! far oustripping me!) MZMcBride commented it out "for now" and seems to have some clue where the problem lies. sirlanz16:21, 30 July 2019 (UTC)
Well remembered. I used to actively nominate at RFA, as well as set users as Autopatrollers etc, and this list was a good hunting ground, especially with the inactives unlinked. But I have a better list for autopatrol prospects and it may be a while before I do another RFA nomination. I don't know if anyone else is using this list for that sort of purpose. The other reason for only linking actives was that this is a huge page for anyone who doesn't have modern kit and a fast connection. I upgraded my kit a few years ago, so that no longer applies to me and I doubt it is anywhere near as common a problem as it was. So if you can't do a simple inactive active test such as whether an editor has the same edit count as when the report ran 30 days ago, then no major objection from me to losing the active/inactive test, just a twinge of regret. ϢereSpielChequers21:05, 21 August 2019 (UTC)
Mention on the page why there are no links. Else the reader will suspect the page author is not aware of how to do it. Jidanni (talk) 06:05, 21 November 2019 (UTC)
MZMcBride did not say it won't be done, they said "The query used to determine which users were recently active seems to have gotten considerably more expensive. For now, I've disabled that functionality". "For now" implies not necessarily permanently. What is wrong with expressing an appreciation for the prior functionality. 05:57, 21 February 2020 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by MB (talk • contribs)
I agree. If the activity indicator is too expensive, then linking all the names would still make the page more useful and would not add to the overhead. -- John of Reading (talk) 07:52, 29 January 2021 (UTC)
If enabling all the names to be linked is indeed no more labor intensive than leaving all the names unlinked, then I too will echo those Wikipedians who would welcome the sight of all-name linkage. —Roman Spinner(talk • contribs)00:11, 1 March 2021 (UTC)
Could the bot add an anchor per published userid? So that I can link to [[Wikipedia:List of Wikipedians by number of edits#DePiep]]. I just like to see my position as fast as I can. Thx. -DePiep (talk) 18:52, 23 September 2021 (UTC)
Hi! Sorry if you already discussed it (I couldn't find it in the archive): Isn't the "That's more than..." column in the first table "Registered editors by edit count" a bit unnecessary? I mean, it's funny and you can see that's the intention with the "!", but I feel that the column "then you rank in the..." is more than enough. Or what do you guys think? — Preceding unsigned comment added by VictorBenitoGarciaRocha (talk • contribs) 22:26, 26 December 2021 (UTC)
Would it be possible to have the bot run the same list with the exclusion of editors who have not made a material number of edits in the last 12 months? Would be interesting to see if it shows a materially different picture, and would help us monitor attrition amongst our most prolific editors. Reading the archives I see that Roman Spinner showed a few years ago that only about half the editors on this page are likely still around.
Onceinawhile, it would indeed be possible, but not probable, given the limited resources and our dependence on the kindness of those who are willing to dedicate and donate their time and energy to this project which, in this case, means the kindness of MZMcBride. As you can see from the exchange at Archive 12#Can a list be created of only active users? [cont'd], those who ask for more are free to invest their own energies towards the fulfillment of their desires. —Roman Spinner(talk • contribs)00:09, 8 January 2022 (UTC)
I don't see why it would be difficult. Just add an if-then loop that knocks out any editor with-out at least one date later than today minus twelve months. Kdammers (talk) 04:40, 9 January 2022 (UTC)
The coding isn't difficult, agreeing a definition of currently active editors is less easy. But the big stumbling block is likely to be finding a willing bot operator. ϢereSpielChequers06:19, 9 January 2022 (UTC)
Many editors rack up a lot of edits by using automated tools. I'm interested to see number of edits that exclude automated ones. Is that possible to determine? ~Anachronist (talk) 15:14, 27 July 2022 (UTC)
I'd like to see this, too, Anachronist. How should automated tools be defined, and is there a way to do that in the software? XTools includes manual uses of undo, pending changes reverts, redirects, and page moves in the same '(semi-)automated' category as Huggle, Twinkle, and HotCat: that seems a bit off. BlackcurrantTea (talk) 07:39, 1 August 2022 (UTC)
I don't know, but many are tagged. Maybe a first step would be to count edits that aren't tagged by known automated tools. ~Anachronist (talk) 19:43, 1 August 2022 (UTC)
Of course not. As an extreme example, should O.J. Simpson be removed from NFL yardage lists? He ran them he gets them. Maybe a better question is how many of these site-banned editors have been banned for a long time and, depending on the seriousness of their on-site deeds, have possibly rehabilitated themselves or otherwise matured and could be offered another chance (even if they haven't asked for reinstatement). Randy Kryn (talk) 18:39, 6 September 2022 (UTC)
I think blocks should be noted in some way. I was inspired to post this by seeing Lugnuts listed with user groups "ECo, EM, IP, N, Rv". At first, I was surprised to find that advanced permissions weren't removed from blocked users (this obviously isn't the place to discuss whether that should be the case). But my second thought was that, if user groups can be listed, it shouldn't be hard to list block status as well. And I came to the talk page to suggest that, only to find there was already a thread about it. Plantdrew (talk) 02:30, 8 October 2022 (UTC)
@Plantdrew: Non-indefinite blocks will expire at some point; non-expired blocks (including indef blocks) may be appealed. If a block expires, or is lifted before expiry, rights that were held before the block continue to be held. Rights are removed for their misuse; the block might have been for a reason unrelated to any rights held by the user. Anyway, if you want to change how such matters are handled, this is not the place. Try WP:VPR. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 20:21, 8 October 2022 (UTC)
Some users request that they are blocked for a period of time (WP:SELFBLOCK) - typically to finish an assignment of some kind, without being tempted to edit - they don't lose their rights, nor should they be discriminated against by being labelled as blocked. The idea of an additional status is not as simple as it may at first appear. At the risk of going back over old ground, I think the reinstatement of links to users who have edited in the last 30 days, or whatever time period, would be helpful for this as well - I simply don't understand how we did it for years, and then it suddenly became too "expensive" in processing time. - Arjayay (talk) 20:44, 8 October 2022 (UTC)
Redrose64 - I am aware of that, hence my comments "At the risk of going back over old ground" and "I simply don't understand how ... it suddenly became too "expensive" in processing time". On 23 June 2019 MZMcBridestated "The query used to determine which users were recently active seems to have gotten considerably more expensive. For now, I've disabled that functionality." As was pointed out in the discussion you linked, "For now" does not imply that it is permanent. Furthermore, near the top of that discussion. MZMcBride stated "It's possible to link all the user names." If we are going to fiddle with this list's parameters, I would prefer to see all entries linked to the user's contributions - which apparently is possible (or was possible over 3 years ago) with little or no processing implications. A link to the user's contributions would immediately show their status:- indefinitely blocked, temporarily blocked (including the period and reason), partially blocked (including which articles) etc. and would also show when they last edited, partially compensating for the inclusion of all editors, rather than just those who edited in the last 30 days. This would provide more information than simply identifying currently blocked editors, as is being suggested above- Arjayay (talk) 11:51, 9 October 2022 (UTC)
As for expense, doesn't the foundation reimburse or pay bot owners for the cost of their bots and improvements to the bots? Bots maintain Wikipedia, part of the donation pitch by the foundation and their public statements. Randy Kryn (talk) 13:33, 9 October 2022 (UTC)
No, WMF does not pay bot operators. They have helped with coding and maintaning a few bots, but most are maintained entirely by volunteers. As for linking users, the linked discussion is outdated. Database replicas were redesigned in 2020, which allows running more powerful queries that weren't possible before. For example I couldn't have run something like query/64398 before. Linking userpages is similar to that, so it is worth trying again. ಮಲ್ನಾಡಾಚ್ ಕೊಂಕ್ಣೊ (talk) 13:58, 9 October 2022 (UTC)
ಮಲ್ನಾಡಾಚ್ ಕೊಂಕ್ಣೊ, words fail me, but "ridiculous" comes to mind. Bots designed and created by volunteers initially encompass part of their personal contribution to Wikipedia as volunteers, but that seems much different than those same bots continuously operating on a minute-by-minute basis (or daily, as the bot that maintains this list usually functions) for years or decades in benefit of Wikipedia. Due to the way donations are asked for and the reasoning put forward in asking for those donations by WMF (as well as the income put into the large and hopefully growing endowment), it would seem that bot operators should not only be reimbursed or actually salaried (or paid as outside consultants?) in part or in whole for their ongoing bot operations (and maybe almost required by the way WMF words its donation requests) but retroactive funding doesn't seem outside of the scope of their work. Full disclosure: I do not operate or write for bots, and have as much computer tech savvy as a good 19th century writer. Randy Kryn (talk) 15:18, 9 October 2022 (UTC)
A second "yikes" question this brings to mind. Are all important bots backed up by the Foundation somewhere? What if an editor who runs an essential or accepted as essential (like this page of user interest) bot decides they're done with it, had enough of Wikipedia, and packs it up and takes the bot offline. If backup by WMF of bots stored and operated by the bot operator is not being done - and I have no idea if it is or isn't - might I politely request that WMF, for the sake of the site that it funds and greatly maintains, get on this pronto. Thanks. Randy Kryn (talk) 16:18, 9 October 2022 (UTC)
If a bot goes offline, another operator can take over the task. Transition is easier if the bot is open source. Otherwise it just gets abandoned as has happened with many old bots.As I had suspected, it is no longer resource intensive to link to users. My quick attempt to replicate the current list query/67985 took just 17 seconds with link to userpage and also list whether they are currently blocked. @MZMcBride can you check this and see if you can add it to the bot? ಮಲ್ನಾಡಾಚ್ ಕೊಂಕ್ಣೊ (talk) 17:51, 9 October 2022 (UTC)
Which goes to show how fragile the bot structure is here. Bots can be turned off by their users and suddenly a big hole opens in Wikipedia. If a few more bots are switched off the regular operation of the site would be severely threatened. To repeat from above, the Foundation fishes for donors by promising to maintain Wikipedia - that's what donors pay tens of millions of dollars for the WMF to do. These bot creators and operators are not regular editors who edit at any time. They function at a different level. The major bots like Bernstein have to run all day or at least every day, and need to be fixed at home, at the users own expense, when something goes wrong. Or just as easily be switched off when their operators have major concerns such as MZMcBride has addressed on his talk page about this bot retirement. "Looking to replace it" sounds like a hope and a prayer. WMF collects tens of millions of dollars annually to maintain Wikipedia, but something seems broken somewhere between the accounting department, the bank, the promises to donors, and the people, such as MZMcBride, who play a large and key role in actually maintaining it. Randy Kryn (talk) 12:37, 11 October 2022 (UTC)
Wrong edit number
I noticed that the bot has stopped updating this list. This list still has me at 83,980 when it should be at 84,470. Catfurball (talk) 21:41, 7 June 2022 (UTC)
Catfurball, please read quite a few comments down in the middle of the section below "What to do with site blocked editors on the list?". The operator of this bot has retired it since the Foundation has blocked him from what seems to be major bot positions. Randy Kryn (talk) 17:41, 13 October 2022 (UTC)
Or see User talk:MZMcBride where discussion about his block and the bot is in progress. I haven't read it since it was only a few comments in, so I don't know if anything is being resolved. I hope so. Randy Kryn (talk) 21:49, 13 October 2022 (UTC)
Change article to make it clear it is frozen/not being updated
Following on from an addition in the first section of this talk page, made today, I think we should endorse the article to make it much clearer that the list was frozen on 10 October 2022 (UTC) - I know it says that in section 5, but I think it should be made clear at the beginning of the lead. Rather than my just being WP:Bold, I would like to suggest adding "as of 10 October 2022" after "This is a list of Wikipedians ordered by number of edits in the English-language Wikipedia." in the lead. Any objections / comments? - Arjayay (talk) 17:57, 13 October 2022 (UTC)
The text should be accurate, and since the bot has become frozen and the numbers not being updated then the edits seem reasonable. Randy Kryn (talk) 19:01, 15 October 2022 (UTC)
I am curious if creating a "List of Wikipedians by content added" has been considered. I think those with a high number of edits probably use bots to make edits mass scale. I think a measure by content added might be more meaningful, if possible. OvertAnalyzer (talk) 19:41, 6 September 2022 (UTC)
List of Wikipedians by characters added to Good Articles, List of Wikipedians by characters added to Featured Articles, List of Wikipedians by characters added to the 100 /1,000/10,000 highest-viewed articles, List of Wikipedians by characters added to notice boards drama boards. – wbm1058 (talk) 13:11, 13 October 2022 (UTC)
I think that should be "was" a Wikipedia:List of bots by number of edits, since that was also frozen on 10 October 2022 along with this list. Let's try and get the main list back up and running before adding complications for the Bot designers (complications which, personally, I see as encouraging verboseness) - Arjayay (talk) 18:03, 13 October 2022 (UTC)
My favorite thing to do is tighten sloppy language. I once added up the byte-count of all my edits (in article space) and found that the sum was slightly negative; i think the median was -3. —Tamfang (talk) 14:12, 18 October 2022 (UTC)
So, HaleBot has taken over BernsteinBot's duties updating the subpages that make up this list. Let's thank Legoktm for coming to the rescue. LizRead!Talk!05:42, 20 October 2022 (UTC)
Yes excellent stuff; thanks. One 'question' though; note the blue links have returned. As I recall these were 'turned-off' – must be 2 or 3 years ago – as were corrupting the page somehow. Thought it might be worth mentioning. Eagleash (talk) 04:15, 23 October 2022 (UTC)
It was more than a couple of years ago, and the problem wasn't corruption, it was loading time. Things have moved on, many people have faster access to the internet, and I'm hoping that few or no users of this page now have problems loading this page. But if anyone does please speak up. Linking active editors does make the list more useful for spotting potential candidates for extra userrights, but otherwise I'm not sure of the benefit. Anyway, All hail halebot, saviour of this page! ϢereSpielChequers10:43, 23 October 2022 (UTC)
It wasn't to do with loading time (client side) but with processing time (server side), see this post. So I really don't think that internet access times will be a factor. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 15:59, 23 October 2022 (UTC)
Today's update to this list has suddenly added User:BG19bot - a deactivated bot that last ran in February 2017, so I cannot imagine what triggered its addition.. Please could this be removed, as the list is not supposed to include bots - thanks - Arjayay (talk) 13:54, 1 February 2023 (UTC)
It is being done by Halebot, see e.g. for today. It is just this page is not really a list but a collection of subpages, each of which is updated individually.--Ymblanter (talk) 11:40, 22 February 2023 (UTC)
What's a "successful" editor? And why not explain that (or wikilink to it) in the table that distinguishes between "successful" and "all"? Which list am I on? Don't answer that third one. AndyJones (talk) 13:04, 28 April 2023 (UTC)
Q𝟤 I don't know if your "creation" is in anyway related, but the pre-existing lists did not update correctly this morning. - Arjayay (talk) 09:54, 26 May 2023 (UTC)
Q𝟤 Let us be clear, have you actually altered anything? including "the settings of the robot", or anything else? - Arjayay (talk) 18:50, 26 May 2023 (UTC)
I'm glad you're here. I saw a robot about updating this information before, but I just can't find the content that allows the robot to create the first 15,000. As long as you can change the robot's settings to the first 15,000, you can complete the request Q𝟤𝟪18:52, 26 May 2023 (UTC)
Q𝟤 you are still not answering the question "have you actually altered anything? including "the settings of the robot", or anything else? " - Arjayay (talk) 18:58, 26 May 2023 (UTC)
No Aidan9382 it is not correct. Only about 20% have changed, and these are significantly lower figures than their actual edits (Our No1 editor, Ser Amantio di Nicolao, only doing 6 edits in a day?). I can cite the figures for mine - according to the update I did no edits in the 24 hours since the previous update, whereas, as shown in my contributions, I actually did 210 in that period. - Arjayay (talk) 19:29, 26 May 2023 (UTC)
User:WereSpielChequers That has been proposed before (here), as have several other options. It seems that the problem is with processing time (server side), which is why identifying active editors (edited in the last 30 days) was dropped for over 3 years, although that was eventually reinstated. Personally. I'm not sure that extending the list to 15,000 is very helpful, and it certainly needs an evaluation of the impact on server resources, before it is implemented. - Arjayay (talk) 15:18, 27 May 2023 (UTC)
I know an active only list has been discussed before, the issue is when will increasing IT resources make this viable. One of the things about Moore's law is that excessive IT overloads eventually turn into insignificant ones. ϢereSpielChequers00:33, 28 May 2023 (UTC)
10,000 is a nice round number. 15,000 doesn't have a very good feel to it. I'm not gonna pretend that I am not aware of where I am on the list, but it also shouldn't be the reason we edit. Now, where's my update? Mr.choppers | ✎ 01:51, 31 May 2023 (UTC)
I don't see any pressing need to expand the list to 15,000. A list of active Wikipedians would be more useful is a way to create it could be figured out. {{u|Sdkb}}talk06:55, 31 July 2023 (UTC)
The latest list (2023-01-02) suddenly includes MalnadachBot and Cydebot at the top of the list - KasparBot at 11, CmdrObot at 112, ProteinBoxBot at 299 - there appear to be more bots further down - Arjayay (talk) 15:18, 2 January 2024 (UTC)
