Wikipedia:Village pump (technical)

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

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

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Frequently asked questions (see also: Wikipedia:FAQ/Technical)

Click "[show]" next to each point to see more details.

If something looks wrong, purge the server's cache, then bypass your browser's cache.
This tends to solve most issues, including improper display of images, user-preferences not loading, and old versions of pages being shown.

No, we will not use JavaScript to set focus on the search box.
This would interfere with usability, accessibility, keyboard navigation and standard forms. See task 3864. There is an `accesskey` property on it (default to `accesskey="f"` in English). Logged-in users can enable the "Focus the cursor in the search bar on loading the Main Page" gadget in their preferences.

No, we will not add a spell-checker, or spell-checking bot.
You can use a web browser such as Firefox, which has a spell checker.

If you have problems making your fancy signature work, check Help:How to fix your signature.

If you changed to another skin and cannot change back, use this link.
Alternatively, you can press Tab until the "Save" button is highlighted, and press Enter. Using Mozilla Firefox also seems to solve the problem.

If an image thumbnail is not showing, try purging its image description page.
If the image is from Wikimedia Commons, you might have to purge there too. If it doesn't work, try again before doing anything else. Some ad blockers, proxies, or firewalls block URLs containing /ad/ or ending in common executable suffixes. This can cause some images or articles to not appear.

For server or network status, please see Wikimedia Status. If you cannot reach Wikipedia services, see Reporting a connectivity issue.

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Edit filter graph links broken

Hey all. This was raised at Wikipedia:Edit_filter_noticeboard#graph_links_broken, but it appears the edit filter graphs, seen at [1], are not currently working and display an internal error. Would anyone happen to have an idea what happened to it? One idea that was raised over at EFN was that the log table may have been messed up by protected variables being introduced, but I'm not sure if that's the case or it's something else. — Preceding unsigned comment added by EggRoll97 (talk • contribs) 03:26, 23 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@EggRoll97: I'm about to get on a flight, but a quick look at the tool's error logs shows:

Filters: 'raise errorclass(errno, errval): ProgrammingError: (1146, u"Table \'enwiki_p.abuse_filter_log\' doesn\'t exist")'

And a check of the replicas does indeed confirm enwiki_p.abuse_filter_log does not exist. Courtesy ping to the tool's maintainer Danilo.mac — TheresNoTime (talk • they/them) 04:15, 23 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

The abuse_filter_log table was deliberately removed from the wiki replicas in gerrit:1077360, pointing to two Phabricator tasks I don't have access to. It's likely to remain broken unless Danilo.mac puts in an amount of effort that's basically rewriting the tool from scratch. * Pppery * _{it has begun...} 04:30, 23 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Hmm oddly enough, the graphs for dewiki still work: https://ptwikis.toolforge.org/Filters:dewiki XXBlackburnXx (talk) 17:44, 26 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I can not do anything while the abuse_filter_log tables are inaccessible. They were removed from replicas databases because some data in those tables are restricted, se T375751. Danilo.mac (talk) 19:49, 29 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Recent changes on mobile

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T378142

On mobile - Starting a few days ago, When I go to “recent changes” on my watchlist tab and click on an article, I no longer get sent to a page with the changes highlighted Instead, I just see the current version (without changes highlighted) and must take the additional step of clicking the history button to see the changes highlighted. Is this intentional, or has something glitched? Blueboar (talk) 16:42, 25 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Oh I thought that was just me (Sony mobile using most recent chrome on Android) Red Fiona (talk) 17:17, 25 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I’m on an iPhone… so it’s something that has changed at the WP side of things… not our devices. Blueboar (talk) 18:03, 25 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I think I see what happened here. If you can report this on Phab I can point the relevant people to it. 🐸 Jdlrobson (talk) 20:55, 25 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I can not report it on Phab, because I have no clue what Phab is. Sorry. Blueboar (talk) 11:53, 26 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@Blueboar: Phab, or phab:, is Phabricator, which is where all MediaWiki bug reports and feature requests are filed. A ticket has already been raised (by Danbloch at 21:02, 24 October 2024 (UTC)) - it's phab:T378142, as shown at the top right of this section. It's public, so is available to read without logging in there, but Phab doesn't accept anon editing so you need to log in to Phab if you want to comment. Fortunately, this is easy: there's a "Log in" button at the top of the page, and also a "log in to comment" button after the last post; your login and password are the same as for Wikipedia. If you do comment, you're added as a subscriber, and you get an email every time somebody else comments or updates the status. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 15:07, 26 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Not only on "Recent changes", but also on the mobile version of "Watchlist". And this also happens at the mobile "Watchlist" of Wikivoyage. --FredTC (talk) 10:28, 26 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

So… is this going to be fixed? Or is it an intentional change in the way our watchlist works? Blueboar (talk) 12:51, 27 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

It has been fixed already, it will be deployed here this week. – Ammarpad (talk) 05:05, 28 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I can't speak for anyone else but it's working for me now. Thank you. Red Fiona (talk) 01:18, 30 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

For me it is also back to normal. FredTC (talk) 01:22, 30 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

mw-reverted tag is slowly showing

Hello everyone,

I'm noticing that the reverted tag is showing up slowly. When an edit is reverted, the edit has the "reverted" tag. However, I'm noticing that today it takes some time for it to show up. For example, I reverted two of an IP's edits, but the reverted tag is still not showing up. It will after a couple of minutes. Does anyone know why this is happening? Myrealnamm (💬pros · 📜cons) 22:23, 25 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

(I think this is a MediaWiki issue. I have to go.) Myrealnamm (💬pros · 📜cons) 22:26, 25 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@Myrealnamm: A delay is normal. See mw:Manual:Reverts#Reverted tag. I don't know whether the delay is currently longer than usual but a couple of minutes doesn't sound bad. PrimeHunter (talk) 22:51, 25 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@PrimeHunter It's been 30 minutes since Special:Diff/1254153601 and the "reverted" tag is still not showing. Where should I take this? Myrealnamm's Alternate Account (talk) 17:58, 29 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Just want to report I am having the same exact issue; I cannot see the reverted tag anywhere, and it's pretty annoying... win8x (talking | spying) 20:51, 29 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@Win8x It will come up in ~45 minutes from the time of the revert. Perhaps the “job queue” for this tag is getting “backlogged”, if that’s how it works? Myrealnamm (💬pros · 📜cons) 20:55, 29 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Wow. Yeah. For someone who likes to revert vandalism in Recent Changes this isn't quite useful 😅 win8x (talking | spying) 20:58, 29 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Well as soon as I complain about it, it looks fine again. Nice! win8x (talking | spying) 21:20, 29 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

The issue was https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T378385, fwiw. KHarlan (WMF) (talk) 16:00, 30 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I use this CSS rule to make the "Reverted" tag stand out a bit:

/* mark edits tagged as reverted */
span.mw-tag-marker-mw-reverted {
  text-decoration: wavy red underline;
}

If you want to try it out, it goes in your CSS. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 23:19, 29 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

How's that going to help when the tag itself isn't showing up quickly enough? Nardog (talk) 00:01, 30 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I find that it helps me to notice them when they *do* show up. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 00:03, 30 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

It has nothing to do with the OP then. Nardog (talk) 00:21, 30 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not forcing you to use it, nor am I saying anything along the lines of "your problem is that you have not done this". I offered the CSS rule not as a solution but as a potential visual aid for those who might find it useful - clearly the OP (see below) was interested enough to try it. Others may have done too, I don't know. But you're the only one who complained. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 17:59, 30 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@Redrose64 I'm trying it, it's not working, am I doing something wrong? User:Myrealnamm/common.css Myrealnamm (💬pros · 📜cons) 00:06, 30 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@Myrealnamm You have a typo in your css file. It should be span not spam. 86.23.109.101 (talk) 00:16, 30 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks! Myrealnamm (💬pros · 📜cons) 00:17, 30 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Well spam is usually reverted 😅. – 2804:F1...88:7F3B (talk) 01:04, 30 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Changing the name and title of article

Hello dear Wikipedians, I request the users who have access to change the name and title of the article to change the title of the article Najmeddin Shariati (TV presenter) to Najmeddin Shariati. Because there is no other person with this name and there is no existing article with this name. thanks 4ipid (talk) 09:29, 26 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Done - You can make such requests at Wikipedia:Requested moves. William Avery (talk) 09:39, 26 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Note: this page was deleted as "Duplication of draftspace submission by editor with a paid COI". --Ahecht (TALK
PAGE) 20:11, 28 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

This template must be substituted.

Hello! When looking at Template:Single-purpose account, the page doesn't actually show what the template looks like, it just shows: This template must be substituted.

I looked at other templates that should be substituted and they show up as you'd expect them to. Even the (very similar) Template:AfD new user.

I assume there must be a way around that so we can show what the template outputs on the Template: page while still producing the warning elsewhere. Polygnotus (talk) 14:10, 26 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@Polygnotus

Fixed here. --Ahecht (TALK
PAGE) 20:09, 28 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Redlinks that are actually two (or more) links

In my recent quest to fix certain punctuation spacing errors throughout the project, I have coincidentally stumbled upon an inordinate number of situations where a link will occur along the lines of: "Bob speaks English, Spanish, and French"; or "Bob received degrees from Princeton University and the University of Texas". Now, obviously, we are not going to have an article on the combined topics of either redlink, but I am wondering if it is possible to generate a list of redlinks that are in fact combinations of what would be two (or more) blue links. BD2412 T 20:16, 26 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Media Viewer can't be disabled - gear is gone

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T378400

The gear symbol that you click on to disable Media Viewer has disappeared from all the pages I tested. Is that intentional and if so where do I file a complaint? Media Viewer forces me to go through dozens of clicks in order to get to what I need every time I go to an image page and is a colossal headache as I do this daily. Logging in to save the setting isn't an option for my situation for various reasons (i.e. for daily use of image pages separate from logging in to post this message) and even if it was it shouldn't be required

Please note that the Wikipedia help pages still tell you to use the gear as they always have. Auenwald (talk) 22:47, 26 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@Auenwald: There's a direct setting at Preferences → Appearance, it's "Enable Media Viewer". --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 23:22, 26 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Read my message again. I said logging in isn't an option. Auenwald (talk) 23:25, 26 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

How do I get rid of something I don't care about?

In my notifications, I got one telling me that a page I visited has data connected to Wikidata, where some relevant stuff can help or whatever. I do not care one single bit about that stuff. How do I stop these notifications and how can I delete a notification that I marked as read? Is Wikipedia tracking me? Nearly but not perfect (talk) 00:58, 27 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-echo Izno (talk) 01:32, 27 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Left side of table at Seaborgium is cut off on vertical mobile view

In vertical mobile view in Safari on iOS, I discovered a side table in the article Seaborgium that is cut off on the left-hand side, making the leftmost column impossible to read. This table is built using the {{Isotopes summary}} template system. –LaundryPizza03 (d c̄) 01:14, 27 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Should be fixed. Izno (talk) 01:31, 27 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Notices not working

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T378261

So when I click on Notices a little popup show up and tells my notifications. According to it I have 7 new notifications.

But if I press on it says I have no notifications. If I click on all notices it shows an error message: 7ab4ef4a-e38b-462a-ab56-edfdc2d62732] 2024-10-27 04:43:21: Fatal exception of type "InvalidArgumentException"

I am not sure what is going on, does anyone have any idea's? User Page Talk Contributions Sheriff U3 04:55, 27 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I've also noticed that the hexadecimal changes every time I reload the page, although I don't know if that means anything. Procyon117 (talk) 14:32, 27 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

This has been fixed, but the fix may take some days to arrive here. – Ammarpad (talk) 16:20, 27 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

it is working for me now. Thank you to whoever fixed it!!! User Page Talk Contributions Sheriff U3 06:49, 28 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

It worked once, now it is not showing them on the popup window.

They do show up when I click All notifications. User Page Talk Contributions Sheriff U3 06:55, 28 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Weird. I have this problem, but they don't work when I click "all notifications". (If you reply to this, ping me - I still get those, for some reason.) -- asilvering (talk) 16:44, 28 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Same now for me too. Procyon117 (talk) 16:46, 28 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Same problem for me the notifications icon shows I have alerts, but when I click on it I get the error message: [2b363018-cbbb-45da-8f73-056cf4cbd0de] 2024-10-31 12:53:02: Fatal exception of type "InvalidArgumentException". and the icon greys out. A temporary work around is to go to Commons and click on your notifications from other wikis. Then they can be read, but only on Commons once, then they disappear from Commons. Mysterious! Netherzone (talk) 12:56, 31 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I've found that I can read them if they get over 30 notifs or so. So now I'm banking a truly stupid number of notifications so that I can at least tell what discussions the most recent ones are for. -- asilvering (talk) 14:43, 31 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Don't let it get too high. If the counter reaches 99 and more notifs come in, the icon doesn't show 100, 101 etc. but 99+ and the only way to find out how many you really have is to delete some until it drops to 99 or lower. Unread notifs get automatically deleted after a while, I think that it's about 16 months. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 20:24, 31 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Mine are working for now. Hope that they will start working for you guys too! User Page Talk Contributions Sheriff U3 20:17, 31 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Wokrking now BombCraft8 ^{(talk) (contributions)} 23:26, 31 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Working now for me too. Procyon117 (talk) 02:47, 1 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

same happens with me but 4 notices BombCraft8 ^{(talk) (contributions)} 15:01, 31 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Problem with my alerts bell

Hello, when I click on my alerts bell at the top, it says "There are no notifications", even thought I can see there are. When I then click on "all notifications", I get the following: "[5aff3dcb-50f3-4b16-9566-60ba693bfa63] 2024-10-27 21:50:42: Fatal exception of type "InvalidArgumentException". Any help would be appreciated. Thank you. Magnolia677 (talk) 21:54, 27 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Sounds just like my problem, just the other notification system.

I have been unable to test that one since I have no new Alerts. It does show my previous Alerts.

Hope that the fix gets released soon @Ammarpad.

User Page Talk Contributions Sheriff U3 03:53, 28 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Is there a technical page to report this?

I'm experiencing it as well. -- Very Polite Person (talk) 17:33, 28 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Not notified of reversion on Wikimedia Commons

I have my global settings to give me a web notification on edit reversions, as well as to show notifications cross-wiki. Indeed, I received a notification for a reversion on Wikipedia on October 1, 2024. However, an edit of mine on Wikimedia Commons was reverted on October 25, and I did not receive a notification. Would this be a bug I need to report on Phabricator or have notifications stopped being sent since October 21, my last notification? The number of notifications are the same on both platforms, which implies that particular cross-wiki setting is working. Thisisnotatest (talk) 08:15, 27 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Was it [2]? Is it listed at commons:Special:Notifications? PrimeHunter (talk) 21:20, 27 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

It was, and I see the notification is there, but I wasn't getting cross-wiki notifications and I rarely go to the commons site so I missed it. After some investigation, it appears to be related to my surfing Wikipedia with JavaScript off. But I also get some email notifications and that didn't happen. Thisisnotatest (talk) 06:52, 28 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@Thisisnotatest: If you disable JavaScript then many things will not work as intended. Is there an Email checkmark for "Edit revert" at commons:Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-echo? If so then what does the top say under "Send me:"? PrimeHunter (talk) 10:39, 28 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@PrimeHunter: Yes, there is a checkmark. And the Send me reads A daily summary of notifications. Thisisnotatest (talk) 06:53, 29 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Mexican peso N$ in Template:Dollar sign

The article on Mexican peso uses the symbol $ or Mex$ in the lede. The template output for Mexican peso is N$ which I haven't encountered before. Is this something to be rectified or there's some rationale for N$? Dora the Axe-plorer (explore) 11:48, 27 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Looks like, when they introduced the nuevo peso in 1993, they used "N$" as the symbol to differentiate it from the old peso that had used "$". But it also seems they may have dropped the N in 1996 or so once they got rid of all the old pesos. Special:Diff/307360806 that changed the template's output from Mex$ to N$ has no edit summary to indicate why it was changed, the user hasn't edited since 2010, and I don't see any contemporary discussion about it. Anomie ⚔ 13:46, 27 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Bug in "birth date and age" template?

The Walton Empey article has this template in the infobox:

which renders as "26 October 1934 (age 89)" for me here in Ireland where it's 27 October 2024. But his age should be shown as 90, not 89, unless I'm missing something. (Am wondering if it's due to the clocks changing (here in Europe at least)).--A bit iffy (talk)` A bit iffy (talk) 12:38, 27 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@A bit iffy: Template calculations are cached to improve performance. I have purged the page to force the calculation to be done from scratch, and it is now displaying "age 90". -- John of Reading (talk) 12:43, 27 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks. A bit iffy (talk) 13:16, 27 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

importer identification

Monkbot has been accused of making this edit at de:Reichman University. Monkbot does not, cannot, make interwiki edits. In that diff, the edit attribution is 'en>Monkbot'. That form of edit attribution indicates, as I understand it, that the edit was an import from en.wiki of text last edited by Monkbot. Since Monkbot did not do the import, is there a way to determine who or what did the import?

—Trappist the monk (talk) 13:22, 27 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Special:Log shows the import log entry. Anomie ⚔ 13:49, 27 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 13:59, 27 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

"View logs for this page" at top of page histories includes the import log. PrimeHunter (talk) 10:28, 28 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Check the notablity of this article and after approval then delete the speedy delete template

Hello dear Wikipedians. This article (Najmeddin Shariati) was created once before in an unprincipled manner and without citing reliable references. For this reason, it was deleted under the title of not notablity and fame with the Wikipedia:Articles for deletion. But this time I created it with basic editing and citing more than 20 reliable references from official Iranian news agencies (Because this person is Iranian) that independently covered the news of this person. Please review this article and its references and after approval, delete the speedy deletion template. This person's article is available in Persian Wikipedia, and its notablity and fame was confirmed by the administrators and editors of Persian Wikipedia according to the reliable sources mentioned in it. If you think this is a stub article. Add the stub template to it and let it stay. The final decision is yours. very thanks 4ipid (talk) 19:51, 27 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@4ipid, I do not see how any of that is part of a technical question or concern. Please feel free to request assistance at WP:VPM or elsewhere, perhaps WP:Peer review. Izno (talk) 21:55, 27 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

What happened to the display of diffs in the article history?

In the Article History, "Compare selected revisions" brings up the Diff page. It used to be in two columns (as shown at Help:Diff#how it looks). Now for me in the last few days it has started showing just one column with the changes shown only by color. I don't like this, how can I change it back? I didn't change any preferences or anything. I fooled around with my preferences but nothing helped.

Help. Herostratus (talk) 00:49, 28 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Sounds like you turned on the "Inline" toggle above the diff. Nardog (talk) 02:16, 28 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Server lag

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T378320

All day long my bots have been complaining

Login failed (3) : Server has reported lag above the configured max_lag value of 5 value after 5 attempt(s). Last reported lag was - Waiting for 10.64.32.13: 33996.650783 seconds lagged

Any idea what is going on? Hawkeye7 (discuss) 04:23, 28 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I reported the same problem earlier Special:Diff/1253816940/1253822334, then deleted it because the problem resolved, and now its back. It appears to be Enwiki specific with lag times of 6+ hours (normal should be 0-10 seconds). It looks like a DDOS or misconfig or something. The immediate solution is to simply remove &maxlag from your API requests. -- GreenC 04:39, 28 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

This is also causing my bot which updates the case table at WP:SPI to go down starting around 18:40 Oct 27: CRITICAL: Exiting due to uncaught exception MaxlagTimeoutError: Maximum retries attempted due to maxlag without success. Is there a phab ticket for this yet? Mz7 (talk) 05:42, 28 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Should be better now that I removed a broken replica from the calculations. Taavi (talk!) 06:08, 28 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@Taavi: Nice, looks good! [3] Waiting for 10.64.16.89: 0.378559 seconds lagged. Was just about to open a phab ticket when I noticed things were working now. :D Thanks so much! Mz7 (talk) 06:15, 28 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Change user name to camelCaps?

My username Thisisnotatest is pronounced incorrectly by screen readers. Is there any way for me to change it to ThisIsNotATest, capitalizing each word "This Is Not A Test" so it will be pronounced correctly? Thisisnotatest (talk) 07:29, 28 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

WP:CHU. You can request whatever name doesn't already exist, which you can check at Special:CentralAuth. I might suggest spaces, which I suspect will be more likely to be pronounced correctly.... Izno (talk) 07:35, 28 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I say what the admin says, read Changing Username. Should give info on changing your username. The Master of Hedgehogs ^(converse) ^(hedgehogs) 16:02, 28 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Many screen readers, including the two most common ones for Windows, JAWS and NVDA pronounce each capitalised word in a CamelCase phrase separately. Screen reader users get used to all sorts of things being mispronounced; I don't think a single username on a website is that high a priority (I'd give it practically a 0 out of 10, honestly). Graham87 (talk) 02:48, 29 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Conditions for WP:MOVEOVERREDIRECT

Hi friends, do we know if there are any additional conditions to allow a WP:MOVEOVERREDIRECT, beyond the stated "single line in the page history"? In the last 24 hours I've tried to move three articles: two from draftspace to mainspace, and one within mainspace. All moves were to usurp redirects that only had one single line in their respective page history, however they all resulted in an error.

The functionality seems pretty inconsistent, wondering if there is any rhyme or reason RachelTensions (talk) 17:17, 28 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@RachelTensions: You probably need the Wikipedia:Page mover user right. Per WP:Page mover#delete-redirect, if that page is a single revision redirect with a different target, the delete-redirect right may be used to eliminate the need for round-robin page moves by allowing page movers to delete the redirect, regardless of the redirect's target. – wbm1058 (talk) 18:06, 28 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Ah ok that makes sense, single line in the page history and the redirect must already be pointing to the article attempting to be moved. Re-reading WP:MOVEOVERREDIRECT I must've overlooked that. Thank you! RachelTensions (talk) 18:13, 28 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

(edit conflict) It states there is a redirect to the old title with a single line in the page history. Was that the case for the moves you attempted, or were the redirects you were trying to overwrite pointing elsewhere? Anomie ⚔ 18:11, 28 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Template parameters question

Sorry if this has no value, but I've recently (yesterday?) discovered that things like {{AIV|=p}} transclude into (which is just {{p}}). Upon some investigation I've found that it appears to be that a |= parameter replaces all {{{|safesubst:}}} instances in the template being transcluded with the provided parameter (that's why it expanded as the emoji template).
Why does this happen? Is this documented anywhere/does it have an use? I've had trouble searching. – 2804:F1...F0:9FE8 (talk) 19:47, 28 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

{{{x|y}}} means "the value of parameter x, otherwise 'y'". Therefore {{{|safesubst:}}} means "the value of the parameter with a blank name, otherwise 'safesubst:', and |=p is setting the value of the parameter with the blank name to "p". This is why you should use safesubst<noinclude />: instead to break up the substitution. --Ahecht (TALK
PAGE) 19:55, 28 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Ah, I see. I guess the noinclude thing is mentioned at Help:Substitution#Recursive substitution? Thank you for the detailed response. – 2804:F1...F0:9FE8 (talk) 20:32, 28 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Tech News: 2024-44

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Updates for editors

Later in November, the Charts extension will be deployed to the test wikis in order to help identify and fix any issue. A security review is underway to then enable deployment to pilot wikis for broader testing. You can read the October project update and see the latest documentation and examples on Beta Wikipedia.
View all 32 community-submitted tasks that were resolved last week. For example, Pediapress.com, an external service that creates books from Wikipedia, can now use Wikimedia Maps to include existing pre-rendered infobox map images in their printed books on Wikipedia. [4]

Updates for technical contributors

Wikis can use the Guided Tour extension to help newcomers understand how to edit. The Guided Tours extension now works with dark mode. Guided Tour maintainers can check their tours to see that nothing looks odd. They can also set emitTransitionOnStep to true to fix an old bug. They can use the new flag allowAutomaticBack to avoid back-buttons they don't want. [5]
Administrators in the Wikimedia projects who use the Nuke Extension will notice that mass deletions done with this tool have the "Nuke" tag. This change will make reviewing and analyzing deletions performed with the tool easier. [6]

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MediaWiki message delivery 20:53, 28 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Gadget/js to force me to ping

I want a gadget or custom js that forces me to ping at least one person everytime I reply to a message.

This is because I reply on help desks and patrol newcomer comments a lot and I feel they really need a notification from me as they are new. But I keep forgetting.

In its simplest form the script would check for the "@" symbol anywhere in my reply and if missing prompt me to add one. Of course the option to dismiss would be great. More complicated forms could use regex to check for at least one userpage link.

I would need it for en.wiki, commons and meta. Let me know if it's possible. I am mainly on a mobile device, using mobile and desktop interfaces interchangeably, if that makes a difference. Commander Keane (talk) 11:11, 29 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Request to Move Draft for AfC Review

Hello, I'd like assistance moving my draft from my user sandbox (User:Abuibrahim100/sandbox) to Draft:Admas Pee for AfC review. My account isn’t autoconfirmed yet, so I’m unable to move it myself. Thank you for your help!

Abuibrahim100 (talk) 19:25, 29 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@Abuibrahim100 Your sandbox is already is the queue for review. There's no need to move it to Draft:Admas Pee yourself -- the reviewer will do that for you if necessary. That being said, your draft cannot be approved in its current state because it needs citations to significant coverage in reliable sources that are independent of the subject of the article. All the sources cited are either to companies writing about themselves (which is not independent) or to Wikipedia articles (which are not considered reliable sources since anyone can edit them). --Ahecht (TALK
PAGE) 20:08, 29 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Searching for pages by category and talk page content

Does anyone know how you would search for all of the pages in a certain category whose associated talk page contains a certain string in its source? So, for instance, what search would return all of the pages in Category:Princesses in Greek mythology which contain "WikiProject Classical Greece and Rome" in their talk page's source? – Michael Aurel (talk) 07:18, 30 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Can be done in PetScan. Put that category name in "Categories", then go to "Templates&links" tab, put that template name there with " Use talk pages instead" checked. – SD0001 (talk) 08:25, 30 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks. – Michael Aurel (talk) 08:35, 30 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Persistent snackbar

I'm on Firefox 131.0.3 on Android 14. I have User:SD0001/find-archived-section enabled in my gadgets (and also mw:Extension:DiscussionTools in my Beta features, which has no effect on mobile).

As of recently (probably last Thursday), the snackbar popup I get from an archived / missing section link has stopped unpopping-up until I navigate away from the page.

Can anyone replicate / report to phab? Folly Mox (talk) 11:59, 30 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

For clarity, my other snackbars (e.g. "Redirected from Wikipedia:vpt") pop away normally. It's just the archived section one that persists. Folly Mox (talk) 13:03, 30 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@Folly Mox: User:SD0001/find-archived-section makes a message starting with "Looks like the discussion". Your screenshot is from a newer MediaWiki feature which starts with "This topic". The box goes away when I tap it outside the link in iOS on an iPhone, e.g. at User talk:Citation bot#Bot does nothing. Are you saying the tap doesn't work for you, or did you expect the box to disappear by itself? I don't have an Android device for testing. PrimeHunter (talk) 13:53, 30 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

That popup is generated by DiscussionTools, not the gadget. You can dismiss a popup on Minerva by tapping it (around a link if it includes one). Nardog (talk) 00:26, 31 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

You can also accidentally dismiss it by clicking the space between the lines of a multi-line link, which I've managed to do multiple times :c. – 2804:F1...9E:DCD8 (talk) 00:35, 31 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

That's the DiscussionTools notification. It's supposed to stick around until you interact with it. Could you confirm whether it's dismissed if you directly tap on it? (If it is, it's working as-intended. If not, that's a bug we should fix.) DLynch (WMF) (talk) 02:45, 31 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Apologies for the delay everyone; yesterday was exhausting. After constructing a test case, I can confirm that the snackbar disappears properly when tapped. I feel like the persistence is new behaviour(?) but understand why such a message would be intentionally left around until interacted with.

Perhaps removing the snackbar once e.g. the editing interface is opened might make more sense: it does look like a bug in the screenshots I posted (to me, anyway).

And apologies for throwing the find-archived-section gadget under the bus: I wasn't previously aware that Mediawiki had incorporated the same functionality until reviewing the documentation for my OP above.

I guess I was also wrong about DiscussionTools having no effect in Minerva: I don't see the "people in conversation" or "subscribe to thread", but upon reflection I suppose the linkable timestamps that point straight to a comment supplanting the prior requirement of diff hunting must be part of the extension as well. Folly Mox (talk) 12:58, 31 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Mobile editing and the reply tool don't reload the page when editing and then the popup remains. I don't know whether something could be done to make it disappear automatically on those actions. PrimeHunter (talk) 13:27, 31 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

mw:Help:SourceEditor is pretty uninformative on this point, but maybe one of the devs who frequent this venue knows which hook triggers the opening of the edit interface and can add a snackbar disappear function there? Folly Mox (talk) 17:49, 31 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Script to highlight new users

Is there a script to specifically highlight new user (non-EC)? I know there are ones for highlighting by usergroup, but I'm looking just to highlight new users. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 17:25, 30 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

"⚠️(insecure)" when installing AutoEd

I was trying to install AutoEd, specifically this preset using Enterprisey's script installer, however, it says "⚠️(insecure)" right beside the install button. Should I still install it? — ‎‎‎hhypeboyh 💬 • ✏️ 22:43, 30 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

That script imports many additional scripts, including at least one personal user script of a retired user who would no longer maintains said personal script. I wouldn't use it for that reason, but I don't immediately see any thing malicious in it. The primary maintainer is listed as @Plastikspork:. (Perhaps Plastikspork can work on deprecating that load-in from retired user User:Jerome_Frank_Disciple). — xaosflux ^Talk 22:52, 30 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

The specific technical reason script-installer is declaring the script insecure is that it can be edited by admins rather than interface admins as a result of being in the project namespace rather than the MediaWiki namespace. And I, back when I was still an admin, was the one responsible for adding someone's personal script to the mix - the script in question is so trivial it hardly needs "maintenance" so that's not really an issue. * Pppery * _{it has begun...} 23:21, 30 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

The general risk is that that account could be compromised, and with the account being unused this could be unnoticed, and then used to insert malicious code which would be executed by others who imported the prior codes. Just like with any imported script, you need to trust everyone who may modify the script. — xaosflux ^Talk 00:01, 31 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Might be trivial, but some maintenance might be in order if it can do this:

[[:File:IL CONSOLE USA IN VISITA ALL’UNIVERSITÀ DI PAVIA (28250236188).jpg]] → [[:File:IL CONSOLE USA IN VISITA ALL'UNIVERSITÀ DI PAVIA (28250236188).jpg]]

File:IL CONSOLE USA IN VISITA ALL’UNIVERSITÀ DI PAVIA (28250236188).jpg → File:IL CONSOLE USA IN VISITA ALL'UNIVERSITÀ DI PAVIA (28250236188).jpg

—Trappist the monk (talk) 00:15, 31 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Adding article input to Template:Welcome cookie

Hello all,

When using Twinkle to welcome new users, I am unable to add an article input to the Welcome Cookie Template like I can for some of the other welcome templates (e.g., "I noticed your contributions to Article")- it would be great if I could do this so I don't have to leave a separate message. Let me know if I am making any sense.

Thank you!

JuxtaposedJacob (talk) | :) | he/him | 06:50, 31 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

That template is protected, however you may discuss improvements to it and propose edit request on its talk page here: Template talk:Welcome cookie. — xaosflux ^Talk 17:14, 31 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Are articles moved from userspace to mainspace not indexed?

So, recently I created FoodPharmer in my userspace and later moved to the mainspace. I keep noticing that search engines (Google, Bing) do not show this if you search "FoodPharmer Wikipedia" or "Revant Himatsingka Wikipedia". But the DYK page on him created 4 days after moving the page and his picture uploaded 8 days after (yesterday) shows up in the search results. This makes me wonder, is the article not showing up because it was initially in userspace (not-indexed)? —CX Zoom[he/him] ^{(let's talk • {C•X})} 16:35, 31 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@CX Zoom Newly created articles are not indexed in search engines for 90 days, or until they have been patrolled. See Wikipedia:Controlling search engine indexing#Indexing of articles ("mainspace") 86.23.109.101 (talk) 16:43, 31 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Ah, makes sense now. Thank you very much! —CX Zoom[he/him] ^{(let's talk • {C•X})} 16:57, 31 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Overlapping IP range blocks?

How do overlapping range blocks work? For example, with these two:

51.191.128.0/17 blocked (block-evasion) on 2024-10-31T14:55:40Z by JBW until 2025-02-21T19:11:00Z. anononly: False, account creation blocked: False
51.191.0.0/16 blocked (block-evasion) on 2023-11-27T22:25:01Z by JBW until 2025-01-21T19:11:00Z. anononly: False, account creation blocked: False

An edit from 51.191.128.1 would (if I've done the math right) be in both ranges. In this particular case, both blocks have the same effect, but what if one was a hard block and the other a soft block? Which would apply? RoySmith (talk) 03:14, 1 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

The union of the blocks applies - you have to be able to edit through both blocks in order for the edit to be allowed. * Pppery * _{it has begun...} 03:22, 1 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]