Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Tom.Bot 2

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The following discussion is an archived debate. Please do not modify it. To request review of this BRFA, please start a new section at WT:BRFA. The result of the discussion was Withdrawn by operator.

Tom.Bot 2[edit]

Operator: Tom.Reding (talk · contribs · SUL · edit count · logs · page moves · block log · rights log · ANI search)

Time filed: 19:16, Saturday, February 10, 2018 (UTC)

Automatic, Supervised, or Manual: automatic

Programming language(s): C# in AWB

Source code available: User:Tom.Bot/Task2 code

Function overview: Add Wikidata entity (aka Wikidata item/QID) via |from= to {{Taxonbar}}

Links to relevant discussions (where appropriate): Taxonbar/doc, Template talk:Taxonbar#Specifying the from/from1 parameter

Edit period(s): One-time bulk run, with smaller followup runs as needed

Estimated number of pages affected: ~30,000 3,500, per Category:Taxonbar templates without from parameter

Exclusion compliant (Yes/No): Yes

Already has a bot flag (Yes/No): Yes

Function details: Only adds |from=QID if the parameter does not yet exist, and only to pages with {{Taxobox}}, {{Speciesbox}}, or {{Automatic taxobox}}. Also skips pages with multiple {{Taxonbar}}s, duplicate QIDs, and null/malformed QIDs returned from the WP API.

Cosmetic changes piggybacked IIF the changes above fire:

  1. template aliases are all standardized to the proper {{Taxonbar}} template name
  2. |from=-parameter spacing around pipes | and equals = is borrowed from the first use of each, if exists
  3. {{Reflist}}, {{Commons}}, {{Wikispecies}}, {{Portal}}, {{Portal bar}}, & {{Authority control}} all have their first letter capitalized
  4. 1 blank line is added, if DNE, before {{Taxonbar}} when appropriate
  5. capitalize |status_system=IUCN
  6. remove |image_size= from any infoboxes it's not a parameter/alias on (i.e. {{Taxobox}})
  7. remove |image_width=<null> from any infoboxes where |image_upright= is preferred (i.e. {{Taxobox}})
  8. WP:GenFixes on

Discussion[edit]

It might be useful for me give a little bit of background on the relevant discussion linked. {{Taxonbar}} used to not need (and strictly so) a |from= value based on its previous behavior. Over the past month or 2, that behavior has changed to adapt to the needs of WT:TREE (via that and other discussions) to allow and encourage use of the |from= parameter as a means to easily track changes made at Wikidata ({{Taxonbar}} tracking categories are almost live, just pending consensus on a cosmetic issue). I've been applying this parameter supervised/manually for bot-created and/or small-size pages, so as not to clutter watchlists. What remains are pages > 2500 characters which have the potential of significantly flooding many watchlists.   ~ Tom.Reding (talk ⋅dgaf)  19:49, 10 February 2018 (UTC)[reply]

  • Approved for trial (10 edits). Please provide a link to the relevant contributions and/or diffs when the trial is complete. --slakr\ talk / 07:39, 22 February 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • Trial complete. Edits. The bulk of this task has been completed by me and others in the interim while managing to avoid watchlist complaints.   ~ Tom.Reding (talk ⋅dgaf)  13:01, 22 February 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose this bot, as it makes articles worse. Ancistrocheirus used the from parameter[1], which caused it to point to the wrong Wikidata item. Not having the parameter automatically makes it point to the right Wikidata item and fetch the correct database IDs[2]. This has however been reverted by this bot owner[3], who doesn't seem to understand what the parameter actually does or why it is often better not to have it. Fram (talk) 16:20, 26 February 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • This is one example of how |from= is useful. It seem like it is you who do not understand what this parameter actually does, nor its usefulness. I see no participation by you at WT:TREE nor Template talk:Taxonbar, so I suggest you get up to speed before making such claims.   ~ Tom.Reding (talk ⋅dgaf)  16:29, 26 February 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • Your link shows how the category is useful to find errors at Wikidata. Which is not the purpose of enwiki. The "from" value you suggested at that discussion was the "wrong" value, and the value already present was the right one anyway. So thanks for providing another example of where you apparently didn't exactly understand what happened. Fram (talk) 16:44, 26 February 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • This is a time-condensed example of how |from= is useful. If the WD item changed weeks, months, or years after its original assignment, there is no persistent way for WP editors to know nor react to that, unless they happen to be online and watching their watchlist that day. |from= provides this service.   ~ Tom.Reding (talk ⋅dgaf)  16:49, 26 February 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • Which are all very good arguments not to use Wikidata of course, as it is a wiki and such problems can (and do) happen all the time. Fram (talk) 16:59, 26 February 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • So take it up with the WMF to discontinue Wikidata? BRFA I'm afraid is not the right venue...   ~ Tom.Reding (talk ⋅dgaf)  17:02, 26 February 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • Jeez. Very good arguments not to use Wikidata "in enwiki articles", not arguments to discontinue Wikidata completely. We are not a reliable source either, and Wikidata should never have imported enwiki as a reference either, but that's not an argument to discontinue enwiki either. Fram (talk) 05:40, 27 February 2018 (UTC)[reply]
The bot had nothing to do with the changes at Ancistrocheirus. The article was moved from Ancistrocheirus lesueurii to Ancistrocheirus on 26 October 2017. Wikidata has had an item for Ancistrocheirus lesueurii since 2012 and an item for Ancistrocheirus since 2014. When the enwiki article was moved to the genus title, the linked Wikidata item remained the species. Tom added |from= for the species on 30 Jan 2018. On 31 Jan 2018, a Wikidata editor (perhaps alerted by Tom's edit) changed the linked Wikidata item from the species to the genus. IMO, the mix up in this case (and potentially with other monotypic taxa) is more of a problem with Wikipedia's model, than with Wikidata's model (although it isn't helpful when Wikidata stuffs all the interwiki links onto a single item). Plantdrew (talk) 19:38, 26 February 2018 (UTC)[reply]
hmm... *scratches head* so I'm not entirely sure how the edits the bot did made a change to the page. If most of these aren't going to have a marked effect on page rendering, it might be considered a WP:COSMETICBOT. --slakr\ talk / 18:17, 26 February 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Correct, they made no visible changes at the time of the edit. However, the page will change if or when the Wikidata item pointing to the page is changed (i.e. it's replaced with another item, or it's simply removed). At that point, 2 1 visible changes will occur: 1) the WP page will be added to a tracking category for followup, and 2) the {{Taxonbar}} will contain 2 lines instead of 1 (the first line will be to the new Wikidata item, the 2nd line will be to the old item). |from= is required for this functionality.   ~ Tom.Reding (talk ⋅dgaf)  18:44, 26 February 2018 (UTC)[reply]
No, the taxonbar will only show two lines if you have two from parameters. If you only have the one which points to the "wrong" Wikidata item, then you will only have one line. Again, see what happened at Ancistrocheirus in your preferred version. The official Wd item was Q18519508, but the taxonbar had a "from" for Q2015219, and only one line for Q2015219 was shown. Fram (talk) 05:40, 27 February 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Ah, that's not the desired {{Taxonbar}} behavior; I'll bring it up at template talk. The tracking category was correctly added, however.   ~ Tom.Reding (talk ⋅dgaf)  14:07, 27 February 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Followup: that behavior was discussed, but never enacted due to the expense of multiple WD queries. The tracking category (which requires |from=) enables editors to find these cases anyway, and is less expensive. I've <s>'d the relevant parts above.   ~ Tom.Reding (talk ⋅dgaf)  16:22, 27 February 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Exactly so. We cannot simply rely on the link back to this Wikipedia being correct at the Wikidata item, because it can be changed at Wikidata at any time, and we won't necessarily know. However, if we explicitly link to a Wikidata item via |from=, then if the link back is changed at Wikidata, the discrepancy will be picked up by our tracking category. Peter coxhead (talk) 22:16, 26 February 2018 (UTC)[reply]

{{BAG assistance needed}}   ~ Tom.Reding (talk ⋅dgaf)  13:53, 5 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

 On hold. Needs wider discussion. After reviewing prior discussions (Template talk:Taxonbar#Specifying the from/from1 parameter in particular), while I find support for the task, and excellent arguments for it, I do not see a clear consensus for it yet. I suggest creating a specific RFC on the matter of whether specifying |from1= in {{taxonbar}} is best practice or not. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 21:12, 17 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Headbomb: Category:Taxonbar templates without from parameter is now down to 332317 entries, so very soon I think the bot won't be needed; we can clean these up by hand. Peter coxhead (talk) 09:12, 19 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Withdrawn by operator.   ~ Tom.Reding (talk ⋅dgaf)  10:57, 19 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. To request review of this BRFA, please start a new section at WT:BRFA.
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