Wikisource talk:Bots

Bot flagging section
We might want to write up a section for flagging bots, as well, since local bureaucrats can now do that.—Zhaladshar (Talk) 12:53, 5 June 2006 (UTC)


 * That's briefly mentioned under Community authorisation, which states "Once authorised, it will be granted a bot flag and may be run within the limits of these policy and guidelines". Is there anything else to say about bot flagging, beyond the procedure to obtain a flag? // [ admin ] Pathoschild (talk/map) 15:12, 5 June 2006 (UTC)


 * How long should bureaucrats wait before granting the flag? I believe the last time we got a bot flag here, the steward who assigned it waited a week before granting it.  Should we wait a similar amount of time?  Give people enough time to discuss the bot, especially if it will perform odd tasks?  Or should we just let the bureaucrats decide the appropriate length?—Zhaladshar (Talk) 00:53, 6 June 2006 (UTC)


 * I would suggest three or four days before running the bot to ensure that there is no opposition, and roughly a week of slow trial operation before being granted a bot flag. The trial period would depend on whether or not the bot is actually run in that period, of course. Wikipedia is rather vague on the time periods (see w:Wikipedia:Bots), but there are only a select few users empowered to approve bots; I think we should opt for wider community input on Wikisource. // [ admin ] Pathoschild (talk/map) 05:11, 7 June 2006 (UTC)


 * Agreed on all counts.—Zhaladshar (Talk) 13:25, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

encouraged tweaking
Encouraging performance tweaks to bots is just encouraging bad programming practice. Operators should be encouraged not to fix what ain't broke. When performance becomes unacceptable, that's the time to worry about it—not before. —Αναρχία 21:07, 6 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Programming practice is up to the individual bot operator. I see no problem making beneficial changes to Pathosbot whenever I notice something that could be improved. — {admin} Pathoschild 21:29:38, 06 March 2007 (UTC)
 * On the contrary, it's a matter of policy! I see no problem with tweaking either; it's encouraging it that's no good. —Αναρχία 02:38, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

Review of bot processes; managing ad hoc tasks
With the broader use of AutoWikiBrowser and Pywikipedia scripts that enable smaller and specific requests of ad hoc fixes, I would like to suggest a newer approach for the utilisation of bots on-site, and one that is more inline with how we have been operating anyway. It is the demonstration of the competence up front, and then allowing some latitude on operations. At the same time, I don't want a sea of red unpatrolled tags, so need a solution in that regard. So maybe a way to step forward is.


 * 1) Consideration of whether a proposed bot could be auto-patrolled, or should be given a bot flag
 * Part of this consideration is whether we are comfortable of running AWB and pywikipedia under a person's account, and some are used that way
 * 1) Intent of the bot: interwiki; specific repeated tasks; or ad hoc.
 * The first two can be readily addressed, by existing means, the last needs some regular oversight

I would like to propose that we have a greater allowance for competent bot operations to operate in ad hoc mode by requiring for the operators of the bot to state on Bot requests the tasks that is being undertaken, magnitude of the task, expected complexity of the task, so in effect we have a quick record of what is being undertaken, by whom, and when. Plus we should have a spot to record that oversight has been undertaken, eg.

To give a level of oversight, I would similarly propose that an increasing level of scrutiny, the higher level of risk of the bot operation, so — billinghurst  sDrewth  14:00, 1 June 2010 (UTC)
 * simple, small tasks — oversight of the bot operator (low risk)
 * small, complex tasks or extensive, simpler tasks — oversight of the process by another trusted contributor; following/during (medium risk)
 * larger, complex bot operations (high risk) are run through normal proposals for approval

Confirmation
A couple of minor change suggestions for next time. They have been lightly touched on elsewhere but here is probably the better place to discuss them. Jeepday (talk) 01:32, 17 February 2013 (UTC)

1. "Prompt user, give 90 days of notice" It has been suggested [//en.wikisource.org/w/index.php?title=Wikisource%3AScriptorium&diff=4300853&oldid=4300847] to lower this to 60 days.
 * We are about 40 days into Scriptorium and there have been 2 bot owner responses, both in the first couple of days and both supporting removal of the bots flag. Given this I would like to cut it back to 30 days warning. Jeepday (talk)
 * Sure, though would suggest that the period of time aligns with the confirmation period. Just simpler. Call it a ... minimum of 30 days ... and that gives us scope

2. We posted the confirmation with this message "Bot flag will be reconfirmed automatically unless at least three established users oppose, which will trigger an election with decision by simple majority. Loss of flag does not prevent edits, only impacts recent change visibility." which is nearly identical to the admin confirmation message. Given the what we saw here Admin and Bot re-confirmation are not same. It gave us a procedural redo that does not add value to the project.
 * Proposed reword - "Bot flag will be reconfirmed automatically unless; if at least three established users oppose unanimously with no users supporting, then the right will be removed; three or more oppose and one or more support this triggers a vote, with a decision by simple majority. Loss of flag does not prevent edits, only impacts recent change visibility." Jeepday (talk) 01:32, 17 February 2013 (UTC)
 * ^^ text changes — billinghurst  sDrewth  13:31, 17 February 2013 (UTC)


 * Updates Completed. Jeepday (talk) 12:24, 5 March 2013 (UTC)

Important: maintenance operation on September 1st
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The Wikimedia Foundation will be testing its secondary data centre. This will make sure that Wikipedia and the other Wikimedia wikis can stay online even after a disaster. To make sure everything is working, the Wikimedia Technology department needs to do a planned test. This test will show if they can reliably switch from one data centre to the other. It requires many teams to prepare for the test and to be available to fix any unexpected problems.

They will switch all traffic to the secondary data centre on Tuesday, September 1st 2020.

Unfortunately, because of some limitations in MediaWiki, all editing must stop while the switch is made. We apologize for this disruption, and we are working to minimize it in the future.

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 * You will not be able to edit for up to an hour on Tuesday, September 1st. The test will start at 14:00 UTC (15:00 BST, 16:00 CEST, 10:00 EDT, 19:30 IST, 07:00 PDT, 23:00 JST, and in New Zealand at 02:00 NZST on Wednesday September 2).
 * If you try to edit or save during these times, you will see an error message. We hope that no edits will be lost during these minutes, but we can't guarantee it.  If you see the error message, then please wait until everything is back to normal.  Then you should be able to save your edit.  But, we recommend that you make a copy of your changes first, just in case.

Other effects:


 * Background jobs will be slower and some may be dropped. Red links might not be updated as quickly as normal. If you create an article that is already linked somewhere else, the link will stay red longer than usual. Some long-running scripts will have to be stopped.
 * There will be code freezes for the week of September 1st, 2020. Non-essential code deployments will not happen.

This project may be postponed if necessary. You can read the schedule at wikitech.wikimedia.org. Any changes will be announced in the schedule. There will be more notifications about this. Please share this information with your community. User:Trizek (WMF) (talk) 10:30, 31 August 2020 (UTC)

Important: maintenance operation on October 27
This is a reminder of a message already sent to your wiki.

On Tuesday, October 27 2020, all wikis will be in read-only mode for a short period of time.

You will not be able to edit for up to an hour on Tuesday, October 27. The test will start at 14:00 UTC (14:00 WET, 15:00 CET, 10:00 EDT, 19:30 IST, 07:00 PDT, 23:00 JST, and in New Zealand at 03:00 NZDT on Wednesday October 28).

Background jobs will be slower and some may be dropped. This may have an impact on some bots work.

Know more about this operation.

-- User:Trizek (WMF) (talk) 09:25, 26 October 2020 (UTC)

Data retrieval
Is this section accurate? Surely the restriction of automated scraping (via the API or not) is not really "our" (i.e. enWS) problem and would fall under the purview of the general WMF Terms of Service, if there is even such a thing?

The enWP wording (w:Wikipedia:Types_of_bots) is just to recommend that use you use a DB dump because it'll be faster and easier than doing it all over the API. I suggest we adopt a similar recommendation. Inductiveload— talk/contribs 19:23, 23 April 2021 (UTC)


 * It is not wrong. While it is not our problem, nor ours to enforce, I don't think there is anything inaccurate with the statement not the link. Quite happy with clear statements. — billinghurst  sDrewth  23:44, 23 April 2021 (UTC)

Server switch
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The Wikimedia Foundation tests the switch between its first and secondary data centers. This will make sure that Wikipedia and the other Wikimedia wikis can stay online even after a disaster. To make sure everything is working, the Wikimedia Technology department needs to do a planned test. This test will show if they can reliably switch from one data centre to the other. It requires many teams to prepare for the test and to be available to fix any unexpected problems.

Unfortunately, because of some limitations in MediaWiki, all editing must stop while the switch is made. We apologize for this disruption, and we are working to minimize it in the future.

You will be able to read, but not edit, all wikis for a short period of time.


 * You will not be able to edit for up to an hour on Tuesday, 29 June 2021. The test will start at 14:00 UTC (07:00 PDT, 10:00 EDT, 15:00 WEST/BST, 16:00 CEST, 19:30 IST, 23:00 JST, and in New Zealand at 02:00 NZST on Wednesday 30 June).
 * If you try to edit or save during these times, you will see an error message. We hope that no edits will be lost during these minutes, but we can't guarantee it.  If you see the error message, then please wait until everything is back to normal.  Then you should be able to save your edit.  But, we recommend that you make a copy of your changes first, just in case.

Other effects:


 * Background jobs will be slower and some may be dropped. Red links might not be updated as quickly as normal. If you create an article that is already linked somewhere else, the link will stay red longer than usual. Some long-running scripts will have to be stopped.
 * There will be code freezes for the week of June 28. Non-essential code deployments will not happen.

This project may be postponed if necessary. You can read the schedule at wikitech.wikimedia.org. Any changes will be announced in the schedule. There will be more notifications about this. A banner will be displayed on all wikis 30 minutes before this operation happens. Please share this information with your community. SGrabarczuk (WMF) 01:23, 27 June 2021 (UTC)

Server switch
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The Wikimedia Foundation tests the switch between its first and secondary data centers. This will make sure that Wikipedia and the other Wikimedia wikis can stay online even after a disaster. To make sure everything is working, the Wikimedia Technology department needs to do a planned test. This test will show if they can reliably switch from one data centre to the other. It requires many teams to prepare for the test and to be available to fix any unexpected problems.

They will switch all traffic back to the primary data center on Tuesday, 14 September 2021.

Unfortunately, because of some limitations in MediaWiki, all editing must stop while the switch is made. We apologize for this disruption, and we are working to minimize it in the future.

You will be able to read, but not edit, all wikis for a short period of time.


 * You will not be able to edit for up to an hour on Tuesday, 14 September 2021. The test will start at 14:00 UTC (07:00 PDT, 10:00 EDT, 15:00 WEST/BST, 16:00 CEST, 19:30 IST, 23:00 JST, and in New Zealand at 02:00 NZST on Wednesday, 15 September).
 * If you try to edit or save during these times, you will see an error message. We hope that no edits will be lost during these minutes, but we can't guarantee it. If you see the error message, then please wait until everything is back to normal. Then you should be able to save your edit. But, we recommend that you make a copy of your changes first, just in case.

Other effects:


 * Background jobs will be slower and some may be dropped. Red links might not be updated as quickly as normal. If you create an article that is already linked somewhere else, the link will stay red longer than usual. Some long-running scripts will have to be stopped.
 * We expect the code deployments to happen as any other week. However, some case-by-case code freezes could punctually happen if the operation require them afterwards.

This project may be postponed if necessary. You can read the schedule at wikitech.wikimedia.org. Any changes will be announced in the schedule. There will be more notifications about this. A banner will be displayed on all wikis 30 minutes before this operation happens. Please share this information with your community. SGrabarczuk (WMF)  01:10, 11 September 2021 (UTC)

Bots need to upgrade to Pywikibot 6.6.1
Dear bot operators, bots running Pywikibot must upgrade to version 6.6.1 otherwise they will break when deprecated API parameters are removed. If you have any questions or need help in upgrading, please reach out using one of the Pywikibot communication channels.

Thanks, Legoktm (talk) 18:02, 22 September 2021 (UTC)

Your wiki will be in read only soon


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The Wikimedia Foundation tests the switch between its first and secondary data centers. This will make sure that Wikipedia and the other Wikimedia wikis can stay online even after a disaster. To make sure everything is working, the Wikimedia Technology department needs to do a planned test. This test will show if they can reliably switch from one data centre to the other. It requires many teams to prepare for the test and to be available to fix any unexpected problems.

All traffic will switch on . The test will start at .

Unfortunately, because of some limitations in MediaWiki, all editing must stop while the switch is made. We apologize for this disruption, and we are working to minimize it in the future.

You will be able to read, but not edit, all wikis for a short period of time.


 * You will not be able to edit for up to an hour on.
 * If you try to edit or save during these times, you will see an error message. We hope that no edits will be lost during these minutes, but we can't guarantee it. If you see the error message, then please wait until everything is back to normal. Then you should be able to save your edit. But, we recommend that you make a copy of your changes first, just in case.

Other effects:


 * Background jobs will be slower and some may be dropped. Red links might not be updated as quickly as normal. If you create an article that is already linked somewhere else, the link will stay red longer than usual. Some long-running scripts will have to be stopped.
 * We expect the code deployments to happen as any other week. However, some case-by-case code freezes could punctually happen if the operation require them afterwards.
 * GitLab will be unavailable for about 90 minutes.

This project may be postponed if necessary. You can read the schedule at wikitech.wikimedia.org. Any changes will be announced in the schedule. There will be more notifications about this. A banner will be displayed on all wikis 30 minutes before this operation happens. Please share this information with your community. 

Trizek (WMF) (m:User talk:Trizek (WMF)) 21:24, 27 February 2023 (UTC)

Your wiki will be in read-only soon


Read this message in another language •

The Wikimedia Foundation tests the switch between its first and secondary data centers. This will make sure that Wikipedia and the other Wikimedia wikis can stay online even after a disaster. To make sure everything is working, the Wikimedia Technology department needs to do a planned test. This test will show if they can reliably switch from one data centre to the other. It requires many teams to prepare for the test and to be available to fix any unexpected problems.

All traffic will switch on . The test will start at .

Unfortunately, because of some limitations in MediaWiki, all editing must stop while the switch is made. We apologize for this disruption, and we are working to minimize it in the future.

You will be able to read, but not edit, all wikis for a short period of time.


 * You will not be able to edit for up to an hour on.
 * If you try to edit or save during these times, you will see an error message. We hope that no edits will be lost during these minutes, but we can't guarantee it. If you see the error message, then please wait until everything is back to normal. Then you should be able to save your edit. But, we recommend that you make a copy of your changes first, just in case.

Other effects:


 * Background jobs will be slower and some may be dropped. Red links might not be updated as quickly as normal. If you create an article that is already linked somewhere else, the link will stay red longer than usual. Some long-running scripts will have to be stopped.
 * We expect the code deployments to happen as any other week. However, some case-by-case code freezes could punctually happen if the operation require them afterwards.
 * GitLab will be unavailable for about 90 minutes.

This project may be postponed if necessary. You can read the schedule at wikitech.wikimedia.org. Any changes will be announced in the schedule. There will be more notifications about this. A banner will be displayed on all wikis 30 minutes before this operation happens. Please share this information with your community. 

MediaWiki message delivery 01:21, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

Your wiki will be in read-only soon


Read this message in another language •

The Wikimedia Foundation will switch the traffic between its data centers. This will make sure that Wikipedia and the other Wikimedia wikis can stay online even after a disaster. To make sure everything is working, the Wikimedia Technology department needs to do a planned test. This test will show if they can reliably switch from one data centre to the other. It requires many teams to prepare for the test and to be available to fix any unexpected problems.

All traffic will switch on . The test will start at .

Unfortunately, because of some limitations in MediaWiki, all editing must stop while the switch is made. We apologize for this disruption, and we are working to minimize it in the future.

You will be able to read, but not edit, all wikis for a short period of time.


 * You will not be able to edit for up to an hour on.
 * If you try to edit or save during these times, you will see an error message. We hope that no edits will be lost during these minutes, but we can't guarantee it. If you see the error message, then please wait until everything is back to normal. Then you should be able to save your edit. But, we recommend that you make a copy of your changes first, just in case.

Other effects:


 * Background jobs will be slower and some may be dropped. Red links might not be updated as quickly as normal. If you create an article that is already linked somewhere else, the link will stay red longer than usual. Some long-running scripts will have to be stopped.
 * We expect the code deployments to happen as any other week. However, some case-by-case code freezes could punctually happen if the operation require them afterwards.
 * GitLab will be unavailable for about 90 minutes.

This project may be postponed if necessary. You can read the schedule at wikitech.wikimedia.org. Any changes will be announced in the schedule. There will be more notifications about this. A banner will be displayed on all wikis 30 minutes before this operation happens. Please share this information with your community. 

Trizek_(WMF) (talk) 09:30, 15 September 2023 (UTC)