Wikipedia:Bots/Noticeboard
Here we coordinate and discuss Wikipedia issues related to bots and other programs interacting with the MediaWiki software. Bot operators are the main users of this noticeboard, but even if you are not one, your comments will be welcome. Just make sure you are aware about our bot policy and know where to post your issue.
Do not post here if you came to
- discuss non-urgent bot issues, bugs and suggestions for improvement. Do that at the bot operator's talk page
- discuss urgent/major bot issues. Do that according to instructions at WP:BOTISSUE
- discuss general questions about the MediaWiki software and syntax. We have the village pump's technical section for that
- request approval for your new bot. Here is where you should do it
- request new functionality for bots. Share your ideas at the dedicated page
| Bot-related archives |
|---|
Revoke flag for AvicBot
edit- AvicBot (t · th · c · del · cross-wiki · SUL · edit counter · pages created (xtools · sigma) · non-automated edits · BLP edits · undos · manual reverts · rollbacks · logs (blocks · rights · moves) · rfar · spi · cci)
Bot and operator both inactive for more than two years. Operator will be notified soon. * Pppery * it has begun... 00:03, 13 May 2025 (UTC)
- Sounds good, keep us posted. Primefac (talk) 12:56, 17 May 2025 (UTC)
- Notified the operator here around the time I posted this. It's now been more than a week, so it's time for a crat to remove the flag. * Pppery * it has begun... 16:01, 20 May 2025 (UTC)
Done — xaosflux Talk 18:34, 20 May 2025 (UTC)
BAG notification bot?
editI've noticed that a lot of the Wikipedia:BRFA requests have gone stale over the past few months. I'd like to help by creating a bot that adds BAG templates if nobody has responded to a request for a certain amount of time. I know that @AnomieBOT moves requests that have actually expired, and I don't intend to replace that functionality unless needed. The bot would add each template based on the current status of the request, as well as the last response. For example, if the bot is in the trial phase, and the latest message is from the requester and contains the phrase "trial complete" without the proper template, the bot would respond with the template. Or if a bot was in the request phase and had been stale for a couple of months, the bot would add the either Operator or BAG assistance needed template, depending on if the last respondent was a BAG member or not. There would likely be a template you could add to a request to prevent this, or set custom timing before the bot activates, similar to the Do not archive [until] template. The bot could also automatically deactivate templates if the proper user or user group responds. Does anyone think these tasks would be helpful? I'm only asking here because it directly impacts the BRFA process as well as the BAG, and I need toolforge access in order to implement it. JarJarInks٩(◕_◕)۶Tones essay 12:52, 16 May 2025 (UTC)
- No comment on most of that, but the Toolforge piece is independent of the BRFA process and you can request that anytime by following the process at wikitech:Help:Toolforge/Quickstart. –Novem Linguae (talk) 20:27, 16 May 2025 (UTC)
- I can't say this seems particularly helpful to me. If humans want attention, they can add the templates. A bot doing it renders them meaningless. Anomie⚔ 00:12, 17 May 2025 (UTC)
- Sounds like more hassle than it's worth. As said above, if someone needs my attention, I can be pinged; if I start getting bot-generated pings for BRFA, I will start ignoring them. That being said, if someone wants to clerk the "in trial" requests and add the appropriate {{BotTrialComplete}} if it's not added, be my guest, but from my recollection it's fairly rare for that to happen and thus probably doesn't need a bot. Primefac (talk) 12:58, 17 May 2025 (UTC)
- Thank you all for your feedback. I'll try to find some more important issues to work on. JarJarInks٩(◕_◕)۶Tones essay 17:01, 19 May 2025 (UTC)
- WP:BOTREQ might have some good ideas. –Novem Linguae (talk) 17:09, 19 May 2025 (UTC)
Reddit post
editSomeone on Reddit seems to be having trouble getting this interesting bot correctly listed for approval. Can anyone help? ꧁Zanahary꧂ 05:58, 27 May 2025 (UTC)
- Perhaps it was overlooked because it was never added to the main WP:BRFA page. I think the instructions
Your request must now be added to the correct section of the main approvals page: Click here and add to the top of the list, directly below the comment line.
For a first request: use {{BRFA|bot name||Open}}
For an additional task request: use {{BRFA|bot name|task number|Open}}
- might have been skipped by mistake. cc AidenD. –Novem Linguae (talk) 06:54, 27 May 2025 (UTC)
Inactive bots (August 2025)
editUser:WebCiteBOT - last edited 2015, operator last edited 2023.
Does this bot need a request/approval?
editA fairly new user appears to me to be using an unauthorized bot to perform semi-automated edits. Their responses at their UTP are cooperative and responsive. I am uncertain of the precise requirements for use of bots, other than that generally, they need approval. Could someone here please review the discussion I raised at User talk:GrinningIodize#Use of unauthorized bot? and chime in there as needed? Thanks, Mathglot (talk) 17:55, 27 August 2025 (UTC)
- I'd see this as approximately the same as a personal user Javascript or WP:AWB. One of those doesn't require permission from anyone. The other does. There is a slightly larger issue in that many of these edits miss on WP:COSMETIC aspects and as they are semi-automated the user should stop doing them on that dimension. Izno (talk) 18:13, 27 August 2025 (UTC)
- If this requires approval, where would I file to obtain the necessary privileges? On the note of double-space fixes, I am sorry about that and will no longer do it. GrinningIodize (talk) 18:40, 27 August 2025 (UTC)
- WP:BRFA. I have some doubt a grammar-fixing semi-auto bot without a full list a priori of what you were intending to fix would be approved, but maybe you know literally everything you're interested in correcting...
- Personally I think this is pretty close to WP:AWB, which has its own request area at WP:PERM/AWB.... IDK where that leaves you. Izno (talk) 18:54, 27 August 2025 (UTC)
- I know exactly what types of grammatical errors I wish to correct, in their exact format, but I cannot make guarantees on the exact articles scanned and corrected. GrinningIodize (talk) 18:56, 27 August 2025 (UTC)
- No guarantees about where is fine. Izno (talk) 21:17, 27 August 2025 (UTC)
- I know exactly what types of grammatical errors I wish to correct, in their exact format, but I cannot make guarantees on the exact articles scanned and corrected. GrinningIodize (talk) 18:56, 27 August 2025 (UTC)
- If this requires approval, where would I file to obtain the necessary privileges? On the note of double-space fixes, I am sorry about that and will no longer do it. GrinningIodize (talk) 18:40, 27 August 2025 (UTC)
- What this user is doing falls under unapproved bot use. It should be clear to all users whether an edit is made using a semi-automated tool, manually, or fully automated. Since they are running it directly from their local machine, there is no way to know whether it is semi-automated or automated with a fixed delay. They should not do that. There are some tools like PAWS where minimal semi-automated editing is allowed using Python scripts, but the way they are doing it is not. – DreamRimmer ■ 18:25, 27 August 2025 (UTC)
- The difference is obvious, because a fixed delay is fixed and the review time of a person is not. GrinningIodize (talk) 18:41, 27 August 2025 (UTC)
- Wait, I just realized something: the latency of submitting an edit renders that point moot. Nevermind. GrinningIodize (talk) 18:45, 27 August 2025 (UTC)
- Then if the script that they are using is available to others for review, that would be acceptable? Tenshi! (Talk page) 18:56, 27 August 2025 (UTC)
- That wouldn't help, because it doesn't prove what code I'm actually using myself. GrinningIodize (talk) 19:37, 27 August 2025 (UTC)
- Same could be said for AWB, you can modify the code and compile it yourself and no one would really know if its the same version as the published version without being able to check your local machine. Tenshi! (Talk page) 19:47, 27 August 2025 (UTC)
- Agreed. The transparency argument is foundationally absurd. GrinningIodize (talk) 20:02, 27 August 2025 (UTC)
- Same could be said for AWB, you can modify the code and compile it yourself and no one would really know if its the same version as the published version without being able to check your local machine. Tenshi! (Talk page) 19:47, 27 August 2025 (UTC)
- Yes, I don't really understand that argument myself I suppose. WP:AGF is relevant at BRFA as elsewhere, and if someone should say they'll be semi-auto, they're probably going to be semi-auto (and we can usually sort out when it is clearly not). It is nice to get the source in general as we like being able to see it ourselves and also recreate it if the bot is implementing a workflow, but I expect typo fixing wouldn't be necessary on the latter point. Izno (talk) 21:19, 27 August 2025 (UTC)
- You can see the source code here. GrinningIodize (talk) 22:51, 27 August 2025 (UTC)
- @Tenshi Hinanawi: No, what I meant is that using semi-automated tools always applies relevant tags to edits, so it is easy for others to know that an edit was made using semi-automation. On the other hand, edits made using semi-automated scripts from the local machine, even if they ask for user confirmation after every edit, do not apply tags, so we actually do not know what type of semi-automation process they are using. – DreamRimmer ■ 01:00, 28 August 2025 (UTC)
- I do not see any issue if the same semi-automation script that asks for user confirmation after every edit is used on PAWS, because that would apply a tag and we would know it was made using a script. People may complain if the edits they make are not in line with the guidelines, but here I am only talking about the process. – DreamRimmer ■ 01:07, 28 August 2025 (UTC)
- I'll second that general statement - the script is being named in the edit summary, the rate of editing is not obscene (i.e. no one has complained) and while we do have to assume good faith that the following statement is true, the edits are being verified by a human before being made. Summary: no BRFA necessary (and based on the nature of the task/script, I think there would be CONTEXT issues preventing a fully-automated bot anyway). Primefac (talk) 01:21, 28 August 2025 (UTC)
- I do not see any issue if the same semi-automation script that asks for user confirmation after every edit is used on PAWS, because that would apply a tag and we would know it was made using a script. People may complain if the edits they make are not in line with the guidelines, but here I am only talking about the process. – DreamRimmer ■ 01:07, 28 August 2025 (UTC)
- That wouldn't help, because it doesn't prove what code I'm actually using myself. GrinningIodize (talk) 19:37, 27 August 2025 (UTC)
- The policy doesn't (and shouldn't) distinguish edits made on local machine vs PAWS. All of that's required is that edit summary or tags should indicate if the edit is semi-automated. I see all the edits have a "WikiClicky" prefix, which is reasonable, although making it a link that people can click to learn more about the nature of the tool would be preferred. TL;DR I don't see any violations of the bot policy here. – SD0001 (talk) 05:24, 28 August 2025 (UTC)
- It may be a good idea to use a hashtag in the editsummary, if you don't have a WP:TAG. https://hashtags.wmcloud.org/ Polygnotus (talk) 05:26, 28 August 2025 (UTC)
- I see little about "hashtags" that are any different from the existing prefix (only that there's a tool indexing them). Overall a wikilink is probably better than either, as it can lead people to an explanation page about the tool. Anomie⚔ 13:59, 28 August 2025 (UTC)
- The main point is that the process should be transparent so that everyone can easily see when an edit is semi-automated. If there is no information about WikiClicky, we will not know what it is. That is why I feel edits from local machines are a problem because they do not apply tags and the user does not give any indication in the edit summary that it is semi-automated. On PAWS, even if the user does not mention it, the applied tag shows that the edit is not manual. – DreamRimmer ■ 05:55, 28 August 2025 (UTC)
- I want to make it clear that I am not talking about bots that run on local machines, as it is obvious from their bot suffix that they are automated or semi-automated. I am talking about normal accounts using APIs on a local machine. – DreamRimmer ■ 06:05, 28 August 2025 (UTC)
- @DreamRimmer: Your insistence on "local machines" is confusing or misleading. A program running on a "local machine" can use OAuth (and so get a tag for the OAuth consumer) just as well as one on any other machine. And program running on another machine could just as easily use BotPasswords, or deprecated main-account action=login, or correctly or hackily using action=clientlogin (and so get no automatic tag) as one on a local machine. About the only real difference is that an in-browser user script is a harder to run from somewhere other than a "local machine", as you'd likely need to run it through some sort of remote desktop software. Anomie⚔ 13:59, 28 August 2025 (UTC)
- I know that OAuth can be used and gets a tag for the OAuth consumer, but I explained it poorly earlier as I was on mobile, so I missed the part where GrinningIodize mentioned that they have registered an OAuth token. I was looking at the edits they made and did not find any indication that they were made semi-automatically. From what I have seen, people generally use OAuth for Toolforge tools and bots, and I have not seen anyone register a dedicated OAuth for running a script from a main account on a local machine terminal. I was reading it as if a user was using BotPasswords. If anything I said was confusing, it is because I did not explain it properly, and I apologise for that. – DreamRimmer ■ 14:55, 28 August 2025 (UTC)
- @DreamRimmer: Your insistence on "local machines" is confusing or misleading. A program running on a "local machine" can use OAuth (and so get a tag for the OAuth consumer) just as well as one on any other machine. And program running on another machine could just as easily use BotPasswords, or deprecated main-account action=login, or correctly or hackily using action=clientlogin (and so get no automatic tag) as one on a local machine. About the only real difference is that an in-browser user script is a harder to run from somewhere other than a "local machine", as you'd likely need to run it through some sort of remote desktop software. Anomie⚔ 13:59, 28 August 2025 (UTC)
- I want to make it clear that I am not talking about bots that run on local machines, as it is obvious from their bot suffix that they are automated or semi-automated. I am talking about normal accounts using APIs on a local machine. – DreamRimmer ■ 06:05, 28 August 2025 (UTC)
- It may be a good idea to use a hashtag in the editsummary, if you don't have a WP:TAG. https://hashtags.wmcloud.org/ Polygnotus (talk) 05:26, 28 August 2025 (UTC)
- The difference is obvious, because a fixed delay is fixed and the review time of a person is not. GrinningIodize (talk) 18:41, 27 August 2025 (UTC)
Note: cross-posted at WP:Help desk#Clarification on bot/semi-automated edit policy?. Mathglot (talk) 18:43, 27 August 2025 (UTC)