This page is an archive of past discussions. 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.
Hi Tim1357. I think writing a bot to remove usage of non-free files from the userspace is a superb idea! However, as a suggestion, you may want to tweak the code so that the bot can differentiate between user talk archives and actual article drafts in the userspace; the bot's notice on my talk informs me that the file was removed from a userspace draft. My work as a sysop revolves around files/file usage and sometimes users don't use ":" when linking to files for reference, leading in the files being displayed. -FASTILY(TALK) 03:56, 17 January 2010 (UTC)
Done Thanks for the reply. I updated the message to include talk pages. Tim1357 (talk) 04:06, 17 January 2010 (UTC)
DASHbot Jan_Hammer
DASHbot posted to my talk page about Jan_Hammer being an UBLP created by me... but I have no recollection of it. Is age finally getting the better of me? Oliver Low (talk) 03:05, 20 January 2010 (UTC)
According to the pages history, it appears that you added this article back in 2004. It has grown significantly since then. The goal of the bot messaging users was to remind seasoned users (such as yourself) of the articles they created long ago. There is no pressure to add sources, rather a reminder. Thanks! Tim1357 (talk) 03:09, 20 January 2010 (UTC)
Cheers. Hopefully some good soul will see the template at the top and look up some sources. I still can't remember creating the article, which is slightly worrying... ;-) Oliver Low (talk)
Between the flags
Hi Tim,
I was perfectly capable of reading Wikipedia:CSD#G11 already. I would like to know what the content was, and how made it. "Between the flags" googles to be variously a clothing shop, a concept at the beach, and a NSW Health intiative. Would you please temporarily undelete it for me, or email it to me, or at least tell me something meaningful about the deleted content. Agesworth (talk) 02:17, 21 January 2010 (UTC)
I asked an Admin to undelete it for you and he said no. The article text is "Between the Flags (BTF) is a brand of Swim Gear and supplies sold nationaly around Australia, with items featuring the names of Surf lifesaving Clubs whose royalties from the product sales help cover the costs of volunteer life saving." Or something like that. Good luck! Tim1357 (talk) 02:23, 21 January 2010 (UTC)
Thank you. That is what I suspected, but I wanted to be sure. That is not the article I am thinking of creating. 02:29, 21 January 2010 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Agesworth (talk • contribs)
Your bot left me a little love note saying I created an unreferenced BLP article. I created the page as a stub nine months ago and made one edit immediately after. Despite its being a two-sentence stub, I provided two refs. Since then, someone added information that I tried to make sound less like it came straight from the subject's office. All of this is to say, please either improve how your bot chooses whom to notify or stop it notifying people. The notice did nothing but waste my time trying to figure out how I violated BLP rules, only to discover I hadn't done any such thing. -Rrius (talk) 06:37, 16 January 2010 (UTC)
That sure is weird. Is DASHbot only looking for {{BLPunsourced}}, and not actually checking for mis-tagged articles (ie, articles with <ref>, or a "References" section that has something in it)? I'm going to stop DASHbot for the moment. Josh Parris 07:52, 16 January 2010 (UTC)
Rrius, why did you tag with {{unreferenced}} when the whole time it's had two references? Josh Parris 08:52, 16 January 2010 (UTC)
Tim1357, Mr.Z-bot swapped Rrius's tag for {{BLPunsourced}}. I've left a note saying he, like you, ought to be checking for false positives. You both use Python, so it might be wise to share this code. drop him a line. Josh Parris 10:31, 16 January 2010 (UTC)
Ok, done. Feel free to hault the bot for any other reason. : ) Tim1357 (talk) 16:33, 16 January 2010 (UTC)
A neat bot and I appreciate the reminder, although it does appear to have its limitations. References that are merely bracketed urls it discounts, I guess? Technically the unreferenced tag is misapplied in such cases, it should say may be unreferenced, or needs more references, or needs a formalized citation style. Шизомби (Sz) (talk) 20:54, 16 January 2010 (UTC)
Umm right now the bot counts any appearance of ref tags, reflist templates, or a references tag. Sometimes urls are not used as references, so I did not include those. Tim1357 (talk) 21:30, 16 January 2010 (UTC)
DASHBot sends 'Unreferenced BLP' notification to creators of redirects.
DASHBot send me an 'Unreferenced BLP' notification for Rochelle Davis.[1] But I had created this as redirect after deleting a previous article. Somebody else expanded it to an article. In such cases the bot should no send this kind of reminder to the creator of the redirects or rather a differently worded one which is in principle a useful alert to the problem as e.g I can now restore the redirect for Rochelle Davis. Thanks. --Tikiwont (talk) 09:33, 17 January 2010 (UTC)
Yes, the bot has trouble with these cases. It is rather hard to determine if a user created a substantial amount of the page. Sometimes articles have weird histories, and the articles 'creator' was someone who moved the page, or in your case, made a redirect. Thanks for the response, Tim1357 (talk) 16:47, 17 January 2010 (UTC)
BLP search suggestions
Ta for the notifications, working on it. Noting all the search assists that have been tagged on - are those images free images or just a Google image search picking up everything? --Falcadore (talk) 10:14, 17 January 2010 (UTC)
They weren't, but I changed the template so that they were. Good idea! Tim1357 (talk) 15:18, 17 January 2010 (UTC)
Seth Hoffman page
Well, I only created the page, and put the list of his work on Prison Break. Someone else put the tidblits of informaton about this life, unsourced, and I deleted them. But if you need sources for the episodes of Prison Break, we have the credits of each episode...
Darkcook.
Well, if you used information from the episode's articles, you can use the references too!Tim1357 (talk) 20:17, 17 January 2010 (UTC)
I got a note from your bot about this being an unreferenced BLP. Please note that this article, as first created it, was a direct translation from the corresponding article in German Wikipedia. Please also note that this person meets one of the criteria of WP:PORNBIO in that she has won a European porn industry award. Iamcuriousblue (talk) 18:31, 17 January 2010 (UTC)
You may use the references from the german wikipedia, as long as they are reliable and verifiable.Tim1357 (talk) 20:17, 17 January 2010 (UTC)
Three unreferenced articles
It's a long time since I wrote those articles, and the subjects no longer interest me. Feel free to delete them. Intelligent Mr Toad (talk) 19:56, 17 January 2010 (UTC)
I wont delete them. The warning was intended to remind users like yourself who may have not been aware that their article was an unreferenced-blp. What you do about it is entirely up to you.Tim1357 (talk) 20:17, 17 January 2010 (UTC)
DASHBot and Douglas Porch
Please rein in DB... the talk page has a complete list of source from Doctor Porch's own hand (well, via e-mail) as well as several book coveres. I will remove tags. V. Joe (talk) 01:34, 18 January 2010 (UTC)
Please stop your bot
User:DASHBot's behavior is becoming spam. It's notifying me about articles that I made some minor edits to years ago. Even worse, it's complaining about an article that has no references, when the article is just a redirect, so of course it has no references! I don't want it to notify me, and from the notes by other users above, lots of other users feel the same way. This should be an opt-in process. I'm raising this issue over at Wikipedia talk:Bots. —Lowellian (reply)
I have halted the bot pending investigation. Josh Parris 01:46, 18 January 2010 (UTC)
I stopped it as soon as i got the message, but thanks for looking out for me! Why are we calling it an investigation? Tim1357 (talk) 01:49, 18 January 2010 (UTC)
That's the English word for when you investigate something. Also known as poking around and having a sniff. Don't worry, I'm not the police. Josh Parris 02:14, 18 January 2010 (UTC)
Lowellian created Ryan Dusick as a redirect; Lowellian should not have been notified as the "creator" of an unreferenced BLP. Instead, the bot should find the first editor since the BLP was transformed into a BLP from a redirect (this will require a full reverse search of the history for the last point where it was a redirect, assuming a BLP could be transformed into a redirect multiple times - my view is, if someone changes it from being a redirect, they "created" the article). Josh Parris 02:14, 18 January 2010 (UTC)
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=David_E._Kendall&oldid=2825973 shows the first version of David E. Kendall was created by you as an article. This is one criteria used by the bot as selecting the user to leave a message for. The other is a history of major contributions, which you do not have: creation of a stub and a small change not long thereafter. This appears to be the bot acting in error. Josh Parris 02:14, 18 January 2010 (UTC)
Tim1357, how will fixes addressing these problems take to develop? Josh Parris 02:14, 18 January 2010 (UTC)
I think I will work on verifying that each user that created the article contributed more then a certian threshold of bytes to the page. Im just not sure what that threshold would be. Tim1357 (talk) 02:04, 19 January 2010 (UTC)
DASHBot's message
Hi -- I don't understand your message to me on January 19, 2010 regarding CONCEPTiCONS. Please explain how I can be of help -- Mig (talk) 21:49, 19 January 2010 (UTC)
Hmm, it appears that the page is incorrectly tagged as a biography of a living person. Sorry about that! Tim1357 (talk) 22:08, 19 January 2010 (UTC)
Album reviews bot work
Hey there, I was just wondering what the status is on Dashbot for WP:ALBUMS. I saw it was approved for the extended trial, but I don't really know how the bot approval process goes. Is it good to go? When will it be up at full steam? —Akrabbimtalk 01:44, 19 January 2010 (UTC)
I have bug right now and I am trying to fix it. Here is what I've done so far. Ill make it priority for the weekend. Tim1357 (talk) 01:56, 19 January 2010 (UTC)
Alright, cool. I was just wondering because someone's question at WT:ALBUMS reminded me of it since I hadn't heard for a while. Is there a way to see the bot's progress, like the number of album articles it has changed? —Akrabbimtalk 02:57, 19 January 2010 (UTC)
Sure, I can have it log for you. I think there is a toolserver thingy that can count them tough. Tim1357 (talk) 03:02, 19 January 2010 (UTC)
I would like to suggest moving the 'reception' section to after the 'track list'. For articles with short leads we are ending up with poor looking articles, an example is Footprints (album). I moved it lower on Space I'm In and don't think it takes away from the article. J04n(talk page) 13:22, 19 January 2010 (UTC)
I'd like to point out that WP:ALBUMS#Article body says to put the Reception before the Track listing. --Redrose64 (talk) 14:12, 19 January 2010 (UTC)
Redrose, I appreciate that but believe that this is an instance when WP:IAR should be considered, as moving the section will lead to a much better looking article. J04n(talk page) 14:29, 19 January 2010 (UTC)
Tim, could you keep an eye on WT:ALBUMS#Reviews in infobox? There is discussion on if we need to change anything about the way the bot is going about this. Thanks —Akrabbimtalk 13:34, 19 January 2010 (UTC)
Sure, watchlisted. Tim1357 (talk) 16:50, 19 January 2010 (UTC)
It seems the bot is off, but I got a message saying that a page I created was unreferenced human biography. I didn't actually write, I simply moved the page in question to make it a disambiguation page, and I guess it got turned into an article later. You should probably fix this. Here's the page, and the message is on my talk page. Page: Pooh (comedian)
--The Editor1 (talk) 18:37, 21 January 2010 (UTC)
Thanks for the reply! I am working on a fix to that very problem right now. Tim1357 (talk) 02:14, 22 January 2010 (UTC)
Cossina
Hello there, I noticed you are adding the section "Cossina" to many taxoboxes. I am wondering though, should that go at the bottom under genus? I really don't think it's a subdivision of a genus is it? Ruigeroeland (talk) 09:00, 22 January 2010 (UTC)
Hey Ruigeroeland! You are right, there is no subdivision for a genus. However, the template can parse out the parameters, so |diviso may come last in the template, but it will be put in the correct spot when the template is called. I hope that makes sense. I will try to put parameters in the correct spot from now on, so contributors such as you self can more easily read it. The thought actually never passed my mind before this. Thanks! Tim1357 (talk) 11:48, 22 January 2010 (UTC)
Hmmm.. It might be my lack of wiki-knowledge, but does that mean that it will be moved to another spot in the taxobox? Because I still see it as a subsidivision of the genus, and if it is not, it should not be visible on that spot, but higher in the taxobox tree, shouldn't it? I ussually just copy a taxobox when I make a new species, and I happened to make one today which has Cossina listed in (I think) the right spot, see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Notocelia_roboranaRuigeroeland (talk) 23:40, 22 January 2010 (UTC)
You were absolutely right! I was using the section parameter for botany, which has a different definition then of that of zoology. Nice catch! Tim1357 (talk) 02:20, 23 January 2010 (UTC)
Ah, great! Glad we figured it out! Ruigeroeland (talk) 11:51, 23 January 2010 (UTC)
Your request to join BAG
Congratulations, I have closed your request to join the Bot Approvals Group as successful. Go forth and approve bots... WJBscribe(talk) 15:53, 23 January 2010 (UTC)
Adding minor ranks to taxoboxes
Hi! You seem to be adding minor ranks to taxoboxes in a semi-automated process. Please note that, per WP:TX, minor ranks are normally to be avoided, unless explicitly mentioned in the article, or otherwise directly relevant to understanding the taxon's classification. For example, there would almost never be a need for adding subkingdom information to taxons describing families. Also, you are rearranging the order of some taxobox fields (such as putting "subdivision" above "subdivision_ranks") for no apparent reason, and against the recommendation at WP:TX. Please discuss such massive changes first. Thanks, Hqb (talk) 17:14, 23 January 2010 (UTC)
Oh! I was not aware of that! I thought we were supposed to put as much information in there as was relevant. Ill take subkingdom off my list. I reoredered subdivision before subdivision_ranks simply because that is what is the order it is given in the taxoboxes documentation. I changed that. Any other parameters you want me to skip? Tim1357 (talk) 17:24, 23 January 2010 (UTC)
The subkigdom was just the most obvious example; in general, you probably shouldn't be adding any minor ranks above the next higher major one for the taxon in question. E.g. for a genus, you might add tribe and subfamily fields (if they are not redlinks), but nothing above family. Note that this is different from the practice at Wikispecies, where all higher ranks are always listed.
As far as I can tell, the documentation consistently puts subdvision_ranks first, which is also the order they appear in in the displayed taxobox, making editing more intuitive. Hqb (talk) 17:33, 23 January 2010 (UTC)
I think that might have been a human error. So I removed everything above superfamily from my list, and reordered subdivision to be after subdivision ranks. Is that all? Tim1357 (talk) 17:46, 23 January 2010 (UTC)
That's all that I can see for now, but I'm not really an expert either. In any case, an automated taxobox-filling bot is surely something that needs to be discussed at least at Template talk:Taxobox and WP:BRFA to solicit comments from the relevant communities. Hqb (talk) 17:53, 23 January 2010 (UTC)
Ok, It is semi-automated, but if you think this is controversial, then Ill bring it to Template talk:Taxobox. Ill also spam some wikiprojects to see what they think. Believe it or not, as of about 2 hours ago, I became a member of the Bot Approvals Group. If I get consensus from the Wikiprojects, Ill drop at the BRFA page aswell. Tim1357 (talk) 17:57, 23 January 2010 (UTC)
Bot
Just a "thanks" for your bot's BLP-unreferenced talkpage messages, I've seen many of my articles get tagged "unreferenced" over the years and rarely bothered correcting it (typically articles I started in 2005, before we had such policies) - but having them all in one place like that convinced me to get off my ass, so I went and fixed half of them this week. :) Sherurcij(speaker for the dead) 23:06, 23 January 2010 (UTC)
Also working through my list - at about 40% through it, but just one week after this notification has begun I'm find articles being deleted, for example Barry Seton. If edittors were only to be given 1/2 weeks notice prior to deletion, that should been included in the notification. --Falcadore (talk) 08:41, 24 January 2010 (UTC)
The bot's notices weren't warnings; there was a recent spate of Arbcom-refered unilateral UBLP deletions that Barry Seton may have been caught up in - that deletion spree was not directly related to the Unreferenced Biography of Living Person notice you got from the bot.
On the other hand, they were warnings, as any unreferenced statement in a BLP can be deleted at will, and the administrators in question may have decided that rather than leave a blank page for an article, it was quicker and easier to delete the whole thing. This is, of course, mere speculation.
Rjanag followed behind me and deleted all of those redirects, that was the largest complaint we had. I was opposed to delete redirects for two days, but I was overruled. Maybe I can replace the redirect with a one week notice to check Wikipedia:Article Incubator/Unreferenced BLPs/Australia, which will alleviate this concern.
There are 49,000 articles which editors are getting ready to delete. That is why we incubated the Australian articles, to give editors of the projects of interest more time to edit and decide what is encyclopedic and what is not.
Barry Seton is now fully restored. Thank you for your concerns, and I am sorry for the confusion this caused. Ikip 18:26, 24 January 2010 (UTC)
File copyright problem with File:325px-Summerbreeze.jpg
Thank you for uploading File:325px-Summerbreeze.jpg. However, it currently is missing information on its copyright status. Wikipedia takes copyright very seriously. It may be deleted soon, unless we can determine the license and the source of the file. If you know this information, then you can add a copyright tag to the image description page.
If you have uploaded other files, consider checking that you have specified their license and tagged them, too. You can find a list of files you have uploaded by following this link.
Sure, ill take a look. Im going away on a camping trip this week, but Ill make this a priority for next weekend. Tim1357 (talk) 00:08, 25 January 2010 (UTC)
Sounds like a great idea. Power.corrupts (talk) 01:06, 25 January 2010 (UTC)
A discussion has started on the RfC/BLP talk page about notifying WikiProjects (and editors at large). We could use someone with technical expertise to give us some idea about what bot options might be useful to WikiProjects. Could you help out with that? Could anyone else commenting here help out with that or some other aspect about notifying editors and WikiProjects about this problem? Please take a look, comment and volunteer here [4]. And thanks, Tim, for what you've already done. -- JohnWBarber (talk) 01:41, 25 January 2010 (UTC)
Hi Tim, there is already a Bot that does part of what we'd done for the Wikiprojects - you might want to check out user:wolterBot and User talk:B. Wolterding as there's no point reinventing the wheel. ϢereSpielChequers 02:01, 25 January 2010 (UTC)
Hi Tim, I already notified several of the projects. As we all discussed. I created more or less a full list of all projects yesterday 72 in all. I would be happy to send them to you or post them (probably on my talk page) Ikip 02:26, 26 January 2010 (UTC)
Question about notability
How many of the 49000 unreferenced BLPs article creators have you notified with your bot? Thanks in advance. Ikip 19:44, 24 January 2010 (UTC)
Rough estimate: About 14400 have been notified. I have about 3000 to go. Tim1357 (talk) 19:56, 24 January 2010 (UTC)
May I assume that is 17,400 authors of those 49,000 articles? ϢereSpielChequers 23:08, 24 January 2010 (UTC)
Well there was 23,000 authors of those 49000 articles. However, the author could have been skipped if:
The article in question had <ref></ref> tags.
They did not already have a talk page.
Im dealing with a bit of a bug right now, but do you think it would be appropriate for me to restart the bot, given all the controversy? Tim1357 (talk) 00:07, 25 January 2010 (UTC)
Of course it would be appropriate.
This sounds and feels wrong, I must have missed something. What is so shocking is not one editor who commented on the RFC has had dashbot notify them of a BLP violation. We have all the editors arguing about what should be done with 17,400 editors, and not one is actually going to be affected personally by this rule. I suspect that the vast majority of the editors are new editors who will be affected by the deletion of BLPs. Ikip 00:27, 25 January 2010 (UTC)
Hi Tim, I think it would be entirely appropriate for you to continue with your bot, as I don't think that anyone on either side of the BLP controversy was objecting to your bot gently reminding editors of unsourced BLPs they may have written long ago. Also just in case anyone is coming to your page because an admin had deleted their article without warning as an unsourced BLP, you could add a big sign saying that the deletion of unreferenced BLPs was completely independent of your bot and that requests for restoration of articles deleted as unsourced BLPs are welcome at WP:SJRϢereSpielChequers 01:20, 25 January 2010 (UTC)
Notifying active editors who have created unreferenced BLPs and have been notified by the BLP bot already
Tim1357,I am so impressed by your work. 14400 editors contacted only since December 26? Wow.[5]
I went through the dashbot edits two days ago, and I found every editor who after you posted the notice had modified their talk page, showing the most active editors. I deleted all replicas, which comes to 1339 editors. User:Ikip/list I also deleted the 297 editors who have commented on Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment/Biographies_of_living_people already.
Hello {{BASEPAGENAME}}, you wrote an article about a living person without references. Currently their is a discussion which will decide whether wikipedia will delete all 50,000 articles about a living person without references.
The two opposing positions which have the most support is:
opposes the deletion of unreferenced articles about a living person, except in limited circumstances:Editor Collect's position
Comments are welcome. Keep in mind that by default, editor's comments are hidden. Simply press edit next to the section to add your comment.
Please keep in mind that at this point, it seems that editors support deleting your unreferenced article if it is not sourced. Please reference your article to avoid this.
Thank you for your valuable contributions to Wikipedia. ~~
Ikip asked me to take a look at this. It's a good idea, but I imagine a ton of the users have stopped doing wiki. It would be cool to just notify people who have made an edit in the past 6 months or something. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) (contribs) 02:38, 25 January 2010 (UTC)
The list includes only editors who have edited from December 26, or later. thanks. Ikip 03:42, 25 January 2010 (UTC)
Its an excellent idea! Each editor alerted to the issue and who can help out is much needed.--Milowent (talk) 04:39, 25 January 2010 (UTC)
Agree. Please do! --Cyclopiatalk 10:09, 25 January 2010 (UTC)
I would suggest we hold off till the end of the RFC, firstly to see what is achieved by the first wave of notifications to these editors, (which I'm delighted to see is now running again). Secondly that we make the the second wave of notifications via the projects as this will bring some articles by long retired authors to the attention of active projects. However I do like the idea of a follow up at the end of the RFC - by which time hopefully some messages won't need to be sent as the editors will have referenced the articles they created. Also if a Bot was run to inform people of a live RFC it might be considered by some as canvassing. ϢereSpielChequers 11:09, 25 January 2010 (UTC)
I came across your bot here [6] (watching the Japan project for old reasons). This editor is dead, somebody had recently posted a farewell, NihonJoe kindly moved it to project Japan, so no harm done at all, nevertheless could look a little silly. Is there any (easy) way to avoid this? All bots are dumb, an error rate is acceptable, in particular under these urgent conditions. IMO the bot is doing highly useful work, just wondered if this glaring problem could be avoided. You should continue testing it small-scale so problems like this can be identified before you go big. Power.corrupts (talk) 14:11, 26 January 2010 (UTC)
Your refereed Latifur Rahman and my article is not same. --Anwarul Islam (talk) 10:38, 27 January 2010 (UTC)
All praise to DASHBot!
What a Brilliant Idea Barnstar
Please accept this Barnstar for all the improvements of articles resulting from Dashbots gentle chidings ϢereSpielChequers 23:01, 24 January 2010 (UTC)
Hi Tim, I was just wondering if perhaps DASHBot could be persuaded to inform wikiprojects of unsourced BLPs in their remit in the same way that DASHBot has been informing authors? ϢereSpielChequers 23:01, 24 January 2010 (UTC)
I agree: it is a fantastic bot. --Duncan (talk) 20:15, 27 January 2010 (UTC)
DASHbot
Hi Tim, it looks like DASHbot added a note to User talk:Encyclopedist. That editor has been banned since 2006. Is it possible to exclude indefinitely blocked editors from getting messages from your bot? - Tbsdy (formerly Ta bu shi da yu) talk 13:06, 29 January 2010 (UTC)
Hmm, It looks like the bit of code I had to skip banned users did not work. Thanks for the notice! Tim1357 (talk) 23:17, 29 January 2010 (UTC)
Deprecated
Resolved
– 00:13, 5 February 2010 (UTC)
Just so you know, for edits like this, the word is actually "deprecated" ("depreciate" means to go down in value, like a house). Not that it's a big deal or anything, it's still clear what you meant; just thought I'd point that out :). Best, rʨanaɢtalk/contribs 03:01, 2 February 2010 (UTC)
Oh jeez. Thanks, I suck at spelling. :-) Tim1357 (talk) 03:12, 2 February 2010 (UTC)
Correct the non-free image bot's spelling
Resolved
– 00:13, 5 February 2010 (UTC)
Your bot worked perfectly and left me a message, but I encourage you to check your spelling though. "Non Free Images in you User Space" is the heading that the bot's message was under. PleaseStand (talk) 01:32, 3 February 2010 (UTC)
Spelling is not my forte, Done. Thanks! Tim1357 (talk) 02:39, 3 February 2010 (UTC)
DASHbot removed a non-free image from my userspace subpage:User:Jubileeclipman/(shadow) Quartal and quintal harmony. This was meant as a copy of Quartal and quintal harmony prior to my reducing it to its present (more relevent) state. No problem with the removal itself (I assume the article was also affected); just a question. Should I just remove all the potentially copyrighted images from all my subpages just in case they are non-free? I don't want to get into trouble obviously... --Jubilee♫clipman 02:07, 4 February 2010 (UTC)
WP:NFCC #9 prohibits the use of non-free images, such as File:Ravel Ma Mere l'Oye Laideronnette.PNG, on any page outside of the main article space. Therefore, using this image on your copy of the article in your userspace is not permitted. The article was not affected, just your userspace copy. Yes, when you're developing/improving an article via creation/copy in your userspace, you should not display non-free imagery. You can leave it as a link, as I've referenced the image above, or replace it with File:Example.jpg while retaining the actual file name in a comment, ala <!-- filename.ext -->. When you 'go live', you can then replace the example image with the actual image you want to use. --Hammersoft (talk) 14:41, 4 February 2010 (UTC)
Thanks for the explanation. I'll review my pages and remark out other potential nonfree images with a colon. --Jubilee♫clipman 02:08, 5 February 2010 (UTC)
A Question about Dashbot
Resolved
– 04:49, 5 February 2010 (UTC)
Hi. Dashbot hasn't done this, but I've been wondering: What if someone else adds a non-free image to someone else's user page and the user that has the non-free images on their user page is warned? For example: Z puts a non-free image on B's user page, but B is the one that gets warned, even though B knows non-free images are not allowed in the user namespace. Does the bot know if this happens, or would it warn B anyway? Just a random question. --Hadger 22:33, 4 February 2010 (UTC)
The message wasn't meant to be a warning, rather a notification that the bot changed the user's user-space. If you have received a message, you will not receive another, to keep from spamming user talk pages. To answer your question: No there is not an easy way to tell that 'B' added something to your page. The notification is to keep the bot from being to invasive. Thanks, Tim1357 (talk) 00:13, 5 February 2010 (UTC)
Okay. It didn't happen to me, but I was just wondering if the bot would do that, but I think it's a good idea to only give the notification once so the user page isn't spammed. P.S. I noticed your name goes by even numbers counting by two (what I mean is 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7). --Hadger 04:23, 5 February 2010 (UTC)
Heh, ok : ) Tim1357 (talk) 04:49, 5 February 2010 (UTC)
Jimmy Anselmo
Thanks for the information about the source for Jimmy Anselmo. I am friends with Jimmy Anselmo and he gave me the information verbally. How do I create a source for that kind of source? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Jcarlock (talk • contribs) 21:13, 31 January 2010 (UTC)
I hope thats what you wanted. Tim1357 (talk) 21:10, 7 February 2010 (UTC)
Close, but not quite. There are 7 State Senators from Philadelphia, but by sorting the Members of the Pennsylvania House of Representatives by residence I count 27 Representatives. There is also the possible difficulty of either a Senator or a Representative living outside the city but representing a section of the city. I know of one instance where a Representative living in the city has part of his district in Montgomery County. I don't know how you are generating these lists, but there should be at least 27 Representatives for Philadelphia, not counting overlaps where the member resides outside the city but has part of the district in the city. --DThomsen8 (talk) 13:23, 8 February 2010 (UTC)
Heh, that was weird. Right now the list includes the 26 (I only count 26) that are on the table. Can you give me an example of a "member who resides outside the city but has part of the district in the city." Thanks, Tim1357 (talk) 01:38, 11 February 2010 (UTC)
Actually, after making the request, I went about it a different way, by editing the Members of the Pennsylvania House of Representatives list, and producing my own list at User talk:Dthomsen8/Deeper/Test seven. Thank you for your efforts, though. There are members who reside and represent a district mostly in Philadelphia, but also represent parts of Delaware county or Montgomery county. --DThomsen8 (talk) 01:57, 11 February 2010 (UTC)
I hope thats what you wanted. Tim1357 (talk) 21:10, 7 February 2010 (UTC)
Close, but not quite. There are 7 State Senators from Philadelphia, but by sorting the Members of the Pennsylvania House of Representatives by residence I count 27 Representatives. There is also the possible difficulty of either a Senator or a Representative living outside the city but representing a section of the city. I know of one instance where a Representative living in the city has part of his district in Montgomery County. I don't know how you are generating these lists, but there should be at least 27 Representatives for Philadelphia, not counting overlaps where the member resides outside the city but has part of the district in the city. --DThomsen8 (talk) 13:23, 8 February 2010 (UTC)
Heh, that was weird. Right now the list includes the 26 (I only count 26) that are on the table. Can you give me an example of a "member who resides outside the city but has part of the district in the city." Thanks, Tim1357 (talk) 01:38, 11 February 2010 (UTC)
Actually, after making the request, I went about it a different way, by editing the Members of the Pennsylvania House of Representatives list, and producing my own list at User talk:Dthomsen8/Deeper/Test seven. Thank you for your efforts, though. There are members who reside and represent a district mostly in Philadelphia, but also represent parts of Delaware county or Montgomery county. --DThomsen8 (talk) 01:57, 11 February 2010 (UTC)
I hope thats what you wanted. Tim1357 (talk) 21:10, 7 February 2010 (UTC)
Close, but not quite. There are 7 State Senators from Philadelphia, but by sorting the Members of the Pennsylvania House of Representatives by residence I count 27 Representatives. There is also the possible difficulty of either a Senator or a Representative living outside the city but representing a section of the city. I know of one instance where a Representative living in the city has part of his district in Montgomery County. I don't know how you are generating these lists, but there should be at least 27 Representatives for Philadelphia, not counting overlaps where the member resides outside the city but has part of the district in the city. --DThomsen8 (talk) 13:23, 8 February 2010 (UTC)
Heh, that was weird. Right now the list includes the 26 (I only count 26) that are on the table. Can you give me an example of a "member who resides outside the city but has part of the district in the city." Thanks, Tim1357 (talk) 01:38, 11 February 2010 (UTC)
Actually, after making the request, I went about it a different way, by editing the Members of the Pennsylvania House of Representatives list, and producing my own list at User talk:Dthomsen8/Deeper/Test seven. Thank you for your efforts, though. There are members who reside and represent a district mostly in Philadelphia, but also represent parts of Delaware county or Montgomery county. --DThomsen8 (talk) 01:57, 11 February 2010 (UTC)
Talk page logo deleted by your Bot
Your Bot deleted a talk page logo on my talk page recently. What I have been doing is to create an article, or in this case just an Infobox organization template for an article, and after I get it properly formatted and the details filled in, I do a cut-and-paste to the mainspace live article. I have recently done this for the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society and the Public/Private Ventures articles, and some other articles on organizations based in Philadelphia. Sometimes I leave the sandbox version up for a while, especially if it is a newly created article and not just an addition to an existing article.
I think it is reasonable to place a logo on my talk page this way, and indeed, your Bot missed another example in my sandboxes. Could your Bot be programmed to do its thing on logos left on the talk page for some limited time period, say a week or a month? --DThomsen8 (talk) 17:37, 6 February 2010 (UTC)
Probably not. There's no way for a bot to be able to tell if a non-article namespace page is a development article or not without the user tagging it with something to indicate it is such. Even if a user did tag it, it's still outside the bounds of policy to host non-free content on a non-article namespace page. I proposed a change in the policy to permit such uses, but it was not accepted. See this discussion. Thus, no, I'm sorry we can't permit it. You could use File:Example.jpg to test layout. Also note that non-free images in templates is not permitted. --Hammersoft (talk) 18:55, 6 February 2010 (UTC)
Is the use of the logo on Public/Private Ventures permitted, or not? Image is Publicprivateventures.gif--DThomsen8 (talk) 20:37, 6 February 2010 (UTC)
Yes, as that is a main article namespace page. --Hammersoft (talk) 22:06, 6 February 2010 (UTC)
ARTICLE EXPANSION
Hi Tim, could you please help expand the below article with reliable sources, references, external links, disgography, etc? Unfortunately with the best of intentions I simply do no know how to add the information that is standard for this San Francisco California based artist. Below are some links that should be helpful, and there are numerous references on the web as well. I would appreciate you or anyone else who actually knows what they are doing since I don't. Sincerely, Jets (Jets23615 (talk) 03:05, 2 February 2010 (UTC)) 02/01/2010
The Message
Hello Jets23615! Thank you for your contributions. I am a bot alerting you that 1 of the articles that you created is tagged as an Unreferenced Biography of a Living Person. The biographies of living persons policy requires that all personal or potentially controversial information be sourced. In addition, to ensure verifiability, all biographies should be based on reliable sources. If you were to bring this article up to standards, it would greatly help us with the current 46,613 article backlog. Once the article is adequately referenced, please remove the
Hey, sorry about being a bit slow about response. Basically, you add a source by putting a verifiable and reliable source between two <ref> tags. For example, if you put <ref>Google.com</ref>, the [[WP:API|]] puts 'Google.com' in the reference list. Here is a good place to start learning how to write good articles. Ask any other questions here, or put {{helpme}} on your talk page, along with your question. Thanks! Tim1357 (talk) 00:13, 5 February 2010 (UTC)
Moved from other section. Tim can you help with the URL's provided? I will watch the first one and try to learn from there, thanks. (Jets23615 (talk) 15:49, 5 February 2010 (UTC))
Ok, ill do that and leave a message on your page when I'm done.
Non Free image bot Barnstar award
The Wikignome Award
I was unaware of the policy, "Relative newby" here Weaponbb7 (talk) 05:12, 3 February 2010 (UTC)
Times 2 billion. Long overdue! --Hammersoft (talk) 16:55, 3 February 2010 (UTC)
Aww shucks. Tim1357 (talk) 00:13, 5 February 2010 (UTC)
BOT took out a fair-use image
Hi Tim
DashBOT hit my sandbox and deleted an image that is considered fair use. The image is on Wikipedia (File:Dorabella.gif) and is used in an article on the Dorabella Cipher. A copy of that article is being worked on in my sandbox so that the eventual corrections are done at one go rather than piecemeal.
I've shut down the bot per instructions and I assume it's OK for me to revert to the earlier incarnation of my page. Any problems, please let me know.
Many thanks, AncientBrit (talk) 20:54, 3 February 2010 (UTC)
Tim, I've undone the shutdown. The bot acted correctly, and I've reverted his re-insertion of fair use imagery onto his sandbox page. I'll shortly explain the matter to him on his talk page. --Hammersoft (talk) 21:03, 3 February 2010 (UTC)
Yep, I understand the problem. I'll survive (but only with the help of copious quantities of Absolut). How practical would it be to include a warning about this aspect? There was no mention of any issues when Wikipedia's own instructions advocated using a sandbox to test stuff first. Just a thought... Best, AncientBrit (talk) 18:45, 4 February 2010 (UTC)
And once again it was shutdown, this time by User:AkankshaG[12]. I've reverted on the dashbot image work shutdown page, and explained to him that the bot acted properly, and reverted his re-addition of non-free content to the sandbox article DashBot took them off of. --Hammersoft (talk) 22:30, 3 February 2010 (UTC)
AncientBrit, I encourage you to change the message template however you like at User:DASHBot/FAIR. Tim1357 (talk) 02:12, 5 February 2010 (UTC)
Hi Tim. Thanks, but I was referring to Wikipedia Help suggestions that advocate the use of the sandbox when testing edits. It would appear there are two sandboxes - one is virtual, hosted by Wikipedia and cleared every twelve hours or so, and the other is a testing area attached to a user's page (which is what I was using). References to either of these don't contain a warning that images might be deleted by DASHBot. Changing DASHBot's message of course won't impact those instructions. I understand that it's policy to disallow non-free images in user sandboxes - I was just suggesting that perhaps anywhere in Wikipedia's pages where there is a suggestion to use a user's sandbox for testing, the caveat might be included. Or, of course, Hammersoft's proposal might be revisited :) AncientBrit (talk) 03:27, 6 February 2010 (UTC)
An interesting idea. I would be behind it. I suggest leaving a message at the Village Pump to see if there is community consensus. Tim1357 (talk) 18:43, 7 February 2010 (UTC)
Done The reviews will be listed alphabetically. Tim1357 (talk) 18:25, 7 February 2010 (UTC)
Bot problems
The bot for moving reviews to reception is all good in moving them, but it loses all the italics in the references and does not organize them in alphabetical order. So, how bout a bot for fixing up that mess? Dan56 (talk) 20:33, 31 January 2010 (UTC)
Hey Dan56, thanks for your comment. Because there are so many variables with this kind of bot task, it is difficult to code for all the exceptions. Could you give me an example edit where you think the bot made this error? Perhaps also make an edit and give me the diff of the type of edit that you would want in the future. Thanks, Tim1357 (talk) 20:36, 31 January 2010 (UTC)
Album review move: Migration of Review-Christgau template
Hi, it seems the bot doesn't know what to do with the {{Review-Christgau}} template, see The Clash (album), other than tat and the italics it seems to be going well. J04n(talk page) 20:37, 31 January 2010 (UTC)
Here is another example where the Christgau template went wrong: Waking Up the Neighbours. – IbLeo (talk) 22:12, 31 January 2010 (UTC)
Hi Tim. As promised, I have investigated how to handle {{Review-Christgau}}. This is a bit tricky as the template generates at the same time the source, the rating and the link. So we need to decompose these three informations. Please find below how I believe it should be handled.
Source
The "Source" column must obviously be [[Robert Christgau]].
Rating
Here are the substitution rules that I have found.
Current Review
"Rating"
{{Review-Christgau|XXX|album=YYY}}
{{Rating-Christgau|XXX}} <ref>[http://www.robertchristgau.com/get_album.php?id=YYY Robert Christgau Consumer Guide Review]</ref>
{{Review-Christgau|album=YYY|XXX}}
{{Review-Christgau|XXX|artist=YYY}}
{{Rating-Christgau|XXX}} <ref>[http://www.robertchristgau.com/get_artist.php?id=YYY Robert Christgau Consumer Guide Review]</ref>
{{Review-Christgau|artist=YYY|XXX}}
{{Review-Christgau|XXX|name=YYY}}
{{Rating-Christgau|XXX}} <ref>[http://www.robertchristgau.com/get_artist.php?name=YYY Robert Christgau Consumer Guide Review]</ref>
{{Review-Christgau|name=YYY|XXX}}
{{Review-Christgau|XXX|cgurl=ZZZ}}
{{Rating-Christgau|XXX}} <ref>[ZZZ Robert Christgau Consumer Guide Review]</ref>
{{Review-Christgau|cgurl=ZZZ|XXX}}
XXX, YYY and ZZZ are variables:
XXX is the rating.
YYY is the search key (can be an album-id, an artist-id, or an artist name).
ZZZ is a URL to a site other than Christgau's owns which reproduces his Consumer Guide.
Note that I have enhanced {{Rating-Christgau}} to support the letter grade ratings (e.g. B+) to make your job easier.
{{Review-Christgau}} has an optional parameter "review"; I must admit that I don't understand it's role and I have never seen it validated. I suggest that you tell your bot to skip to keep those instances of the template where "review" is validated (supposedly very few). We can then migrate them manually once the bot has finished all the others.
Examples
I have manually corrected the 18 articles that use {{{Rating-Christgau}} and have already been migrated by DASHBot (my edit is called "Manually fix Christgau review"). For each album you will find the old Review wikitext and the new wikitext for the Rating column. It might help you to better grasp the above rules.
{{Rating-Christgau|dud}} <ref>[http://www.robertchristgau.com/get_album.php?id=9477 Robert Christgau Review]</ref>
Hope this helps. Otherwise, don't hesitate to ask. – IbLeo (talk) 23:02, 2 February 2010 (UTC)
Thanks for cleaning up my mess! Tim1357 (talk) 00:13, 5 February 2010 (UTC)
Hey, I am only happy to help. – IbLeo(talk) 20:52, 5 February 2010 (UTC)
If you want to get DASHBot quickly going again on the review moves, I suggest that the migration of {{Review-Christgau}} could be done in a second pass. WDYT? – IbLeo(talk) 12:44, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
Just noticed that other people also spotted the loss of italics. Follow my link above to find an example. Cheers. – IbLeo (talk) 20:51, 31 January 2010 (UTC)
Album review move: Into unexpected section
I also noted that sometimes the reviews are moved into an unexpected section. Examples: The Presidents of the United States of America (album)("Release history") and New Jersey (album) ("Unreleased songs"). Is it possible to enhance the bot to fix this before you run the bot again? –IbLeo (talk) 23:10, 2 February 2010 (UTC)
Thank you. I have manually fixed above two articles. – IbLeo (talk) 20:43, 3 February 2010 (UTC)
Album review move: No References section
I noted that when the article does not have any references, the bot simply leaves the link in the Album review box instead of creating a reference. Example: Showtunes (I have added the section for the Christgau review, but you can look at the other). Would it be possible to enhance the bot so a References section are added to the article and references created? Or am I too ambitious here? Anyway, I am off to bed. Thanks for your patience. –IbLeo (talk) 23:13, 2 February 2010 (UTC)
Tim, to clarify, I don't see this as a showstopper for DASHBot to go ahead with the move. Cheers. – IbLeo(talk) 12:36, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
Album review move: Template:Arprose has been moved
Hi Tim, please be advised that somebody moved {{Arprose}} to {{Album ratings prose}} yesterday. Consequently it would be good if you change the bot accordingly before you restart it next time. Please also note that the template takes a date parameter that's used in certain categories. In other words, the exact format to use is {{Album ratings prose|date=February 2010}} . SmackBot already updated the articles that DASHBot changed last weekend, for example here, so you don't have to worry about that. – IbLeo(talk) 20:50, 5 February 2010 (UTC)
Regards
MJC ;-) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.96.126.146 (talk) 14:03, 11 February 2010 (UTC)
FrescoBot 2
Hi Tim! Few weeks ago you suggested to prepare a "whole laundry list of general fixes" for FrescoBot 2. So I distilled several link-related fixes in one single task. Please take a look and tell me your opinion, thanks! -- Basilicofresco (msg) 16:16, 12 February 2010 (UTC)
You tagged Black and decker pecker wrecker with a reason of "Wikipedia is not an urban dictionary". However, WP:CSD very specifically says "The following are not by themselves sufficient to justify speedy deletion. 1. Reasons based on Wikipedia:What Wikipedia is not. ... 4. Neologisms."
Please be careful to use CSD tags only where one of the actual criteria applies. Thank you. DES(talk) 01:59, 16 February 2010 (UTC)
Ok, thanks. However I used my head when I tagged the article, as anyone can see that the article was most certainly unsuitable, and had no potential to be worthy of it's own article. I understand that newly coined words or expressions have potential to be suitable articles, but this one in particular did not. --Tim1357 (talk) 02:20, 16 February 2010 (UTC)
Granted, in fact I re-tagged as G3 vandalism. But since CSDs often only get two sets of eyes, it seems to me that care and strict adherence to the criteria are important, more so than with most other sorts of edits. DES(talk) 03:08, 16 February 2010 (UTC)
Bot message
Resolved
– 02:28, 21 February 2010 (UTC)
Regarding [13]. No image here. Non-free files perhaps? SunCreator (talk) 02:11, 21 February 2010 (UTC)
I updated the message to reflect that, good catch! Tim1357 (talk) 02:28, 21 February 2010 (UTC)
Very neat that you can update message so easily. One more images -> files amendment. SunCreator (talk) 02:55, 21 February 2010 (UTC)
BAGBot: Your bot request DASHBot 8
Someone has marked Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/DASHBot 8 as needing your input. Please visit that page to reply to the requests. Thanks! AnomieBOT⚡ 08:59, 20 February 2010 (UTC) To opt out of these notifications, place {{bots|optout=operatorassistanceneeded}} anywhere on this page.
My sandbox
Thanks for informing me of this policy, I was not aware of it. I just want to point out that there was another non-free image which the bot missed. I've removed it (The Sun (Gotcha).png), but you may want to check for yourself. Rtdixon86 (talk) 20:41, 20 February 2010 (UTC)
I updated the bot so that it should work with <gallery> tags. Tim1357 (talk) 02:29, 21 February 2010 (UTC)
Hi. I am concerned that the 'log' aspect of DASHBot's operation is infringing Wikipedia:OUTING#Posting_of_personal_information in the Wikipedia:Harassment article. While I approve of the removal of non-free images and keeping a record of removed non-free images may be acceptable, I question linking them to the pages of users they were found on, and think this should stop as it is technically 'outing' and a harassment. I quote from the Harassment page: 'Posting another person's personal information is harassment, unless that person voluntarily had posted his or her own information, or links to such information, on Wikipedia.'
I see a link to my Userpage in the log. What say you? Caspar (talk) 20:31, 19 February 2010 (UTC)
If I may step in in Tim1357's absence: feel free to remove your information from the log. One of the conditions placed on Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/DASHBot 5 was this log so that inadvertent removals could be reversed. And, finally, I don't quite see how recording what images were once kicking around in your userspace could be considered any kind of personal information; wasn't the image there at some point, and can't that be determined by examining the appropriate history page? Josh Parris 09:54, 20 February 2010 (UTC)
Hi Josh Parris. Yes, I'd like to make several points in respect to your reply:
If it is required that a log is kept, then could it be kept secret by the bot's operator and only they can reverse an inadvertent removal? Would that still satisfy Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/DASHBot 5?
In reference to your final point:
Yes, the image was on my userpage for many to see. But people were not brought to my userpage specifically because of the (assumed) illicit image use and had their attention drawn to it by a link that effectively says 'follow the arrows to a slimy criminal'. Now even if that isn't exactly what goes through user's minds, it's that sort of a thing to imply, and I'm not happy with users navigating to my userpage for solely that reason, especially if it's unproven. If users were to navigate their way through the wiki wilderness and naturally end up on my userpage for another reason, I will usually have no problem with that. And after some poking around they see that an image on my page, and the way it is being displayed, is an unjustified use of a non free image, I'd prefer that they discreetly tell me this on my talkpage only, and if they feel strongly enough about it to have to delete the image too, then I'm okay with that too. But to advertise my userpage, in a negative sense, all grouped together elsewhere with others, I think is overstepping the line enough to mention it.
And to add:
From my point of view, it seems the ethos of the DASHBot's log can seem 'guilty until proven innocent, therefore name and shame first', which is the opposite of how the law works (at least here in the UK). This should be reason enough to keep the log private. For example, if a crime is committed here in the UK, the police have the power to end the matter with what's called 'a caution' - no court case follows, and the perpetrator receives no criminal record, and their crime goes unreported in the public domain. The 'caution' itself is enough of a 'slap on the wrist' to alert the less dishonest person to the error of their ways. Repeated breaches of the law obviously require the police to bring the perpetrator into the criminal justice system. The DASHBot has bypassed any chance of 'a caution' and gone straight to 'criminal record', which I think is rather heavy-handed. Whether it breaches Wikipedia:OUTING#Posting_of_personal_information is almost irrelevant. It's the heavy-handedness that I have a problem with, and deleting my username from the log fails to mollify me as it is still clearly readable in the history comparisons, and the act of removing it myself implies even more guilt, unfairly levelled at me.
Now my personal information that I have decided to keep on my user page, is what I decided to keep on my userpage. If links to it are made in a negative light, I may have to re-decide what I keep on that user page. I didn't give my consent for that sensitive link to be made. Even if all this is not what is meant in the Wikipedia:OUTING#Posting_of_personal_information, then maybe the benefit of the doubt should be given to the fact that it may. Maybe this should be brought up with Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/DASHBot g5 and whoever suggested it should be a requirement to have a log kept like this, which although it has a function of usefulness, it also has by default, an unforgiving hard line and 'finger pointing' aspect to it.
Can I suggest:
If it must have reversability, then the DASHBot should be rewritten so that its reversability is on the users page, not elsewhere. If you think that's too lenient, and that a lot of users will simply undo the bot's work, then I'm sorry, that's just the price to be paid in order to protect the identity of first time offenders. As a suggestion, perhaps the DASHBot should secretly keep a record of first time offenders, and only 'name and shame' them later if it had to redo its work on that user, because the unruly user reverted the DASHBot's original deleting edit. (And that the bot was going to do this is made clear to the user in the first instance, as a threat. Maybe most users will not revert). I think this is a subtlety in the way that the DASHBot should behave that should be recognized in its design, so as not to 'tread on the toes' of the more sensitive of us, especially if we are involved professionally in the respect of copyrights, and were genuinely in the belief that we were committing no crime in this instance.
Better still, how about a precursor DASHBot that simply seeks out non free image use (like currently) but then only warns the user to remove it themselves, threatening compulsory removal and 'outing' if not removed by them after a certain time period? (A generous time period to allow for those of us who spend more time in real life). I'd have removed the images in a heart beat if I'd received a message like that. Far more even-handed I think. Caspar (talk) 13:35, 20 February 2010 (UTC)
Hey Caspar, thanks for the in-depth reply and list of your concerns. To start, the only thing that the bot must do is remove the non-free images. It is in wikipedia's best legal interest to do so. Moreover, I think you may be missing the point of the log. It is not a 'criminal' record, more a record so that bot-errors can be quickly and efficiently reverted. If I may offer some solutions:
Place a banner on all log pages stating that it is not a criminal log, nor any condemnation of the users listed, rather a log to fix bot errors.
Rename all the links so that they do not mention the name of the page. (example User:Tim1357 would be replaced by [14])
Have the logs hosted off of wikipedia, but still public.
Tell me what you think about those ideas, and again, thank you for your comments. Tim1357 (talk) 02:24, 21 February 2010 (UTC)
Hi. Thanks for replying Tim1357. I agree that Wikipedia's legal interest be put first, and if the bot must remove the images without hesitation, to impress third party copyright holders, then so be it. And I get a hint that it is a technical limitation of Wikipedia that no page can be locked or hidden from viewers (other than you programmers who may need access to it), yes? If so, then your first two points will suffice, for me, to go enough of the way to quash the negative effect of the log. But please don't host the log elsewhere, if it's going to be public, as that doesn't sound too good!
Will you be able to retrospectively add the explanatory banner to logs that already exist? And for that matter replace user names with a symbol in existent logs? I'd appreciate that on my entry (Feb log). Moreover, can user names be deleted, then the history itself deleted to totally erase any existence of the user name having once been in the log? Caspar (talk) 13:10, 21 February 2010 (UTC)
BAGBot: Your bot request DASHBot 9
Someone has marked Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/DASHBot 9 as needing your input. Please visit that page to reply to the requests. Thanks! AnomieBOT⚡ 06:32, 23 February 2010 (UTC) To opt out of these notifications, place {{bots|optout=operatorassistanceneeded}} anywhere on this page.
Mya template
Hi
A tip: I've replaced several of your plain links to the Toolserver timeline with the {{mya}} template. As you can see in Homo habilis, the result looks virtually the same, but the link is better and the wiki code a lot cleaner. Check this diff for example. --Fama Clamosa (talk) 14:48, 23 February 2010 (UTC)
Neat, I didn't even know about that template. Tim1357 (talk) 16:38, 23 February 2010 (UTC)
Template wording
You were correct to remove a non-free image from my talk page, User talk:hulmem. However, would you please consider rewording the template. The template includes the statement, "In the future, please refrain from adding fair-use files to your user-space drafts or your talk page." This assumes I (the subject of the talk page) added the fair-use files; however, that is not the case here (and I imagine in other cases for other users as well). Someone else added the fair-use file to my talk page. I would think the appropriate action for the bot would be to remove the image, leave me a note letting me know it was removed, and if I didn't add the image, leaving a note for whoever did (if that can be determined) asking them not to add fair-use files to a talk page. I think many people would find it a little annoying to be accused of doing something they didn't so. Thanks --hulmem (talk) 05:41, 27 February 2010 (UTC)
Adding a project to DASHBot: clarification
Should we hold fire until this is fully approved? If/when adding, do we just add the project category to the list at User:DASHBot/Wikiprojects or should we use the provided template at all times? Or is there some other official mechanism to use? Thanks --Jubilee♫clipman 15:45, 28 February 2010 (UTC)
adding your name does not do anything yet, without an approved bot. Sometimes you just need to be bold ;) Good to see you around again Jubilee. Okip 05:59, 1 March 2010 (UTC)
Hoax Telegram
Hi there!
I have now uploaded the same file, tagged as my own work (since I own the document and it was sent to my Father) and released to the public domain yet, it keeps getting deleted. How can I go about fixing this? Thank you Belleami (talk) 19:15, 1 March 2010 (UTC)
Hi Tim1357. Just wanted to let you know that I have fully protected User:DASHBot/image indefinitely because I counted 10 incidents where the bot has been improperly shut off in the past month. After doing the math (meh), I found that in the 22 days User:DASHBot/image has been in existence, the bot has been shut down improperly approximately once every 2.2 days. At this rate, DASHBot isn't going to get anything done. If you object, please don't hesitate to let me know and I will remove the protection. Regards, FASTILY(TALK) 02:44, 24 February 2010 (UTC)
Well I object for a number of reasons. First, the notification left at the user's talk page indicate an ability shut the bot off (which now does not exist for the vast majority of people this bot affects. Second, the edit summary includes a link to shut off the bot that does not exist. Third, in prior iterations of a similarly functioning bot, there's been massive anger at inability to shut the bot off. Fourth, the bot was approved with the understanding that there would be a shut off ability, not a shut off ability restricted to administrators. Fifth, there are multiple people watching User:DASHBot/image, and have corrected the improper shut offs each time. Sixth, once every 2.2 days it not at all onerous. Further, the shutoffs have not significantly impacted the bot's ability to dramatically reduce the load of content violations seen every day on the list. It used to average over 1000 every day. Now, it's never over 300. It is conducting its work just fine. Seventh, when a user does shut it off improperly, it is a clear signal that the user needs to be educated about our policies beyond the information left by the bot. This gives us an opportunity to educate them; an opportunity I have taken multiple times, and with pleasure. Protecting the shutoff page hasn't and won't produce any beneficial effects. If it were being shut off multiple times a day and the list of content violations not decreasing in size, I could see a point. That's not the case here, nor will it be if the last near month is any measure. --Hammersoft (talk) 14:16, 25 February 2010 (UTC)
Please see my reply here. Hammersoft, just a friendly suggestion, you're looking for vandalism to revert, Special:RecentChanges is a good place to start. Regards, FASTILY(TALK) 04:02, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
Excuse me? --Hammersoft (talk) 16:25, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
Hey man, take it easy!! I'm on your side here. Tim, the both of us are awaiting a decision from you. When you've got time, it'd be cool if you could indicate your opinion. Best, FASTILY(TALK) 02:31, 27 February 2010 (UTC)
I think it is important for the shutoff to be accessible. It's no big deal for me or Hammersoft to revert a shutoff, and I'd rather have it be over-used then underused. Tim1357 (talk) 04:34, 27 February 2010 (UTC)
Can we please unprotect it then? --Hammersoft (talk) 18:06, 2 March 2010 (UTC)
Done Sorry for the inconvenience. -FASTILY(TALK) 08:04, 3 March 2010 (UTC)
Possibly around 20% of articles tagged as unreferenced BLPs have references
Create a bot to remove those tags? Just throwing up this idea....Okip (formerly Ikip) 03:32, 8 February 2010 (UTC)
I was considering that myself. However, instead of having a bot remove the tags, perhaps we can simply generate a list of articles that are tagged, but are suspected to have at least some references. Tim1357 (talk) 03:38, 8 February 2010 (UTC)
as always, that is a good idea, maybe all articles with the blp unreferenced tag and the text: http:// in them? (indicating an external link) Should I make a formal request at bot requests?Okip (formerly Ikip) 19:18, 12 February 2010 (UTC)
Taking over the bot request where Betacommand left off?
As you see from the section, there are several wikiprojects which are willing to do this. I envision only 6-7 projects as a test for now.
Thank you so much. Okip (formerly Ikip) 19:24, 12 February 2010 (UTC)
A simpler request would be just to have Tim scrape my reports and post those on wiki. As for the request above I can (and already have) run reports to miss tagged unref BLPs. If its something that is requested I can get it to a more regular report schedule. βcommand 02:21, 13 February 2010 (UTC)
Okay, this is a little above my technical abilities, so forgive me if I am incorrect, would this allow daily scrapes? Thanks again for your hard work laying a firm foundation Betacommand. Okip (formerly Ikip) 03:11, 13 February 2010 (UTC)
yes. basically he would be fulfilling the last step of the bot process that would transfer the data on wiki. copy/pasting the generated reports to wiki pages. βcommand 03:13, 13 February 2010 (UTC)
knock knock, I know you are busy Tim, but can you let me know whether this is okay? Okip 10:47, 20 February 2010 (UTC)
Sure, ill do it right now. Tim1357 (talk) 02:08, 21 February 2010 (UTC)
hi tim, I notice you have a pretty active archive bot, so I am here because I don't want this to be archived prematurely without everything being taken care of first ;) Thanks again for all of your magical work. Okip 05:57, 1 March 2010 (UTC)
Hello tim, anything new on this bot, thanks again for your efforts. Okip 12:41, 4 March 2010 (UTC)
Hi Tim, should I ask another admin? I see you are busy with other projects. Okip 19:13, 7 March 2010 (UTC)
Non-free fair usage image removal
This is about the third or fourth time DASHbot has played a part in removing an image that I have correctly cited for fair use within Wikipedia. I am still developing the article before releasing it from my Sandbox, and I need to see how everything plays out in test-stage. I checked other like-industry articles and found that the article for Baker Hughes is the closest in comparison to image usage and representation. For the time being, as your talk page cites, I have turned off DASHbot. Thanks.
97.65.238.170 (talk) 20:16, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
Hello 97.65.238.170, and thank you for voicing your concerns. I am sorry to say that all fair use images need to be used on the main article space, in order to protect wikipedia's legal intreats. In short, I suggest you find some sort of place holder image so that you can get the formatting right, and add the image when you have moved it to the main space. Tim1357 (talk) 03:32, 6 March 2010 (UTC)
For the record, I had no idea those images weren't free. Most of what I did there was swiped for a proposed split from the Coney Island article. I'll have you know I've hidden all images. ----DanTD (talk) 02:08, 9 March 2010 (UTC)
Please do not take the bots actions the wrong way. You are, in no way, blamed for those images. DASHBot even removed some images from my usersapce not just a few days ago! Tim1357 (talk) 02:10, 9 March 2010 (UTC)
I would have tagged it that way but for the fact that the word turns up zero google hits and that the user who made it has a history of adding made up words. JoshuaZ (talk) 03:22, 11 March 2010 (UTC)
Ok, then {{db-hoax}} is probably better. Tim1357 (talk) 03:24, 11 March 2010 (UTC)
Done Thanks for the reply. I updated the message to include talk pages. Tim1357 (talk) 04:06, 17 January 2010 (UTC)
--Cyclopiatalk 10:09, 25 January 2010 (UTC)
Resolved
