Misplaced Pages

Revision as of 21:22, 6 July 2008

Conversion accuracy

Discussion moved to: Template_talk:Convert

Please respond to this:

Wikipedia_talk:Templates_for_deletion#Automotive_templates:_Template:Auto_hp_and_others.

Thank you

In recognition of your contribution to the super-secret conspiracy to let robots take over Misplaced Pages and make it crazily consistent, I award you this army of mini robots. Use it wisely, and long live the bot! :) Renata (talk) 17:08, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

Thank you very much. That made me smile and it is always nice to get praise. One comment like that makes it all worthwhile. Thanks. Lightmouse (talk) 17:13, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

Dates

When the bot removes the wikilinks from naked months, as it did on Child of Manhattan (film), is it possible for it to look to the immediate left and right of the month to see if there is a date number there, and instead of eliminating the wikilink, expand it to include the number? (i.e. "11 February" converted to "11 February" instead of "11 February".)

Not a big deal, just a suggestion. Ed Fitzgerald (unfutz) 16:57, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

I see what you mean. It is not straightforward but it might be possible. I will have a think about it. Note that there are several bots that specialise in adding the links to full dates. I do appreciate the suggestion though. Thanks. Keep up the good work. Lightmouse (talk) 17:11, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

Such date links are no longer encouraged. Please see MOSNUM, Ed. TONY (talk) 04:21, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

Similarly for instances where a user has over-wikilinked a date, for example 11 May 2008 instead of 11 May 2008 was converted entirely to plain text; 11 May 2008. Example here. Also, I do not think the bot should be automatically moving category links to the bottom of the page. Some templates (stubs, etc.) add categories but are ignored by the bot, so it can mess up the order of the categories when it does this. Of course these templates should normally be in the last section of a page, so if it checked for this and only moved categories from other sections it wouldn't cause much trouble – Ikara 22:26, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

Overlinked dates: Once you (i.e. 'one') start investigating dates, you will find all sorts of weird and wonderful ways in people manage to add blue links that are not helpful to autoformatting. People are *very* confused about why dates are linked. Frankly, I think the reason why nobody complains that autoformatted dates are broken is because few people care about it. I have tried in the past to fix and/or create properly autoformatted dates but I don't think it actually benefits the ordinary reader (most are not registered, most registered users do not use it, some use it but don't care much about it). Thus I concluded that my extra work was not worth it for me - but I am quite happy if other people want to do it. There is an ongoing discussion about this very topic at wp:mosnum and your thoughts would be very welcome there. Please join in.

Categories: The code to do this is embedded within AWB. It has a 'General fixes' option that is extensively discussed at: Misplaced Pages talk:AutoWikiBrowser. I do not know much about it. If you want to give me a specific question, I can pass it on to those people, or better still, simply raise the issue yourself at that page. Lightmouse (talk) 22:40, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

• Lightmouse, many people are perfectly happy no to have month and day linked. We just don't care about which one is first. Date autoformatting is no longer encouraged. Please see MOSNUM, other people here. TONY (talk) 03:42, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

Your bot converted a unit in an image filename

Hi Lightmouse,

Just a quick note to let you know that in this edit, your bot put a units-conversion template in a filename, resulting in a broken link to the image file.

Best regards, Fg2 (talk) 22:12, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

Aha. I think I have tracked down and corrected that part of the code now. Thank you very much for letting me know, I appreciate it.

Year in Foo

Is the 'bot supposed to be stripping these types of links from straight years? - J Greb (talk) 23:24, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

Short answer, yes. See WP:EGG, part of the MoS, which says such links are to be avoided...so-called easter egg links. There are alternative methods of presenting such links, as that page suggests, but oftentimes they add virtually no value to the article. — Huntster (t • @ • c) 06:12, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for the question. My answer is the same as Huntster's. Lightmouse (talk) 09:19, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

Surely neither of those reasons is really justified for the comics-related (1986 in comics-type) links, however. It's not an WP:EGG, since it's a link to the year as it pertains to comics news/debuts (which, for comics-related articles is far more worthwhile than worldwide news except in very rare instances), and is therefore highly neither hidden nor surprising, but very intuitive.

It's also not valueless for much the same reason - listing a comics series as starting in 1995 is of considerable value, since it sets that title in the context of other releases of the same year, and even month. It also provides links to the core Comics Years pages which allows them to be added to and made more inclusive. Moreover, there is NO better way of presenting such links, and the ] piping is quite in keeping with the WP:EGG example:

"After the earlier explosion in Bombay,..." ntnon (talk) 18:09, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

Small clarification from something that was pointed out to me in following this up with others: Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style (links)#Dates (3 sections up from WP:EGG) does provide areas where a "Year in foo" pipe is acceptable. Mainly this is in sections where space is tight — infoboxes, lists, and tables — and adding "(see also:Year in foo)" isn't a good option.

So let me rephrase my original question... Is the 'bot operating in a mode where all occurrences of "]" is being stripped out, or are the cases being looked at to allow for the exceptions? - J Greb (talk) 22:34, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

Why duplicate wikilinks?

In the same paragraph on Rickey Henderson, this bot wikilinked "1976" twice. This goes against WP standards -- there is no need to wikilink every instance of something.

I think this bot's logic needs to be updated before it continues running. Timneu22 (talk) 00:51, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

I'm looking at the diff now, and see no date links added at all. Conversely, the bot has removed multiple stand-alone links per design. Everything appears to be in order there. If I'm missing something, please make a note of it. — Huntster (t • @ • c) 06:16, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

Thank you, Timneu22, for the comment. You are not the first person to interpret unlinking edits for linking edits. You will not be the last. It may be something to do with how diffs are shown on the screen. As Hunster says, everything is in order. Can you look again please and confirm that you can see it unlinking? Lightmouse (talk) 09:25, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

Yeah sorry about that. Cheers Timneu22 (talk) 01:12, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

Suggestion

Hello, I wonder if you could modify the bot to be even better. Could it replace year-year or year - year into year–year? (note the en-dash) That way the dates would be fixed to comply with WP:DASH. Renata (talk) 06:03, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

It could. I will investigate, thanks. Lightmouse (talk) 08:54, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

Done. If you find an example page, I can demonstrate it. Lightmouse (talk) 09:17, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

In this edit it did not change the dash for years Alexander ruled (1492-1506). Or was it before you implemented the change in code? In this one it did change (yay! :]) In this one it removed wikilinks from ]-] but did not change the dash. Here also revmoved wikilinks from ]-] but did not change the dash...Renata (talk) 18:15, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

Excellent idea! TONY (talk) 04:22, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

Let me state upfront that this bot is not designed to fix dashes or hyphens. Frankly, I do can't see the difference. I do not care what length the little line is. However, I am always keen for support and it seemed simple to add a crude piece of code that would fix some (but not all) instances. Please bear in mind that I had to design the code to avoid false positives and that inevitably means it will miss some.

The method of avoiding false positives is to only change the hyphen if the following is true:

• the pair of solitary year links have two word characters at the left and two word characters on the right
• as above but with a comma or period after the second solitary year link

That is why it missed the date in parentheses. I have added an extra piece of code that has the following test:

• the pair of solitary year links is within parentheses.

So that should address one of the issues you raise.

They issue relating to ]-] is because it defines 'year' as 4 digits. I am cautious about extending this to include two digits. The last thing I would want is a complaint about a false positive on an issue that I don't care about. If you can guarantee that there are no circumstances under which xxxx-yy is a valid string, then I can update the code.

If this bot is not efficient at this supplementary task, then it might be better to cease updates for the task or withdraw the code for that task. It would be better to leave it to somebody that fully understands the hyphens - dash issue. This comment seems negative in tone but it is not intended that way. Lightmouse (talk) 09:52, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

Unit link removed

Lightbot removed this link to the meter unit in the article on radio station KCDX. I think it is useful for US readers, many of whom are unfortunately not familiar with some metric units. Why does Lightbot do this? --Blainster (talk) 16:23, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

Hi,

Thank you for your question. If you look at wp:context, you will see that it says:

• In general, do not create links to ... Plain English words, including common units of measurement

and it has a footnote giving examples of 'common units of measurement'. The meter is one listed.

The bot is designed to be compliant with that. A good place to debate/question/clarify the policy is at Misplaced Pages talk:Manual of Style (dates and numbers). You can, of course, just revert the bot edit if you like. I hope that helps. Regards Lightmouse (talk) 16:35, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

The guideline says "in general, do not create links". It does not say "remove them on sight". Having said that, I think automatically removing these links is reasonable, even though an article about a U.S. AM radio station is an arguable exception to "in general".

Suggestion: Perhaps an open invitation to revert the more discretionary bot edits, posted at User:Lightbot or in the edit summary, would make life easier for editors like Blainster.

--Hroðulf (or Hrothulf) (Talk) 09:06, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

Lightbot

Lightbot this is vandal (example ). Please stop. LUCPOL (talk) 18:08, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

Vandal is a strong term. I assume good faith in you, please assume good faith in me. Can you say which aspect of the edit is not an improvement for readers? Lightmouse (talk) 18:18, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

User_talk:Tony1#Removing_excessive_links

Responded Gary King (talk) 18:19, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

I will move the technical discussion over to here so that Tony's page doesn't get full with this. Anyways, now it gets interesting because the only automatic way to format dates is by linking them. Otherwise, we will most likely have to build our own parser for dates, unless you know of another way? I can get on that and then show you when I'm done. Gary King (talk) 18:26, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

Could we move the discussion to Template talk:Cite web? I would prefer it to be there or at least not on this page. I hope you don't mind. Lightmouse (talk) 18:28, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

Okay Gary King (talk) 18:31, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

Thank you. I appreciate it. Lightmouse (talk) 18:32, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

• Excuse me, but isn’t this yet another case where slick, user-sensitive formatting will only work for A) registered editors, B) who’ve taken the time to set their user prefs? If so, unregistered I.P. users would see what? Please explain as I don’t know. If I.P. users see dates that are in any way inferior to well-thought-out, fixed-text dates (where due consideration is given to the subject and readership), then I don’t see the point of the effort here. Is there a way to tap into Misplaced Pages’s awareness of the reader’s I.P. address (country of origin)? Greg L (talk) 19:23, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

I appreciate your thoughts Greg but the active discussion is now at Template talk:Cite web. I hope you do not mind if I ask you to make the same point over there rather than here. Regards Lightmouse (talk) 19:34, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

• Will do. Greg L (talk) 19:51, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

Cannabis Culture & Cost

Eleven years ago The Ottawa Citizen published four consecutive Editorials in four days calling for the legalization of Cannabis. Calling the Editor to commend him for such bold action, it was suggested an article be submitted for payment if published on the Op-Ed page. On submission, the Editor said, "Now we're going to have to shit or get of the pot."

It was published as a Letter To The Editor with the heart and guts edited out so that no reader would have a clear perspective or understanding of the issue. If you're interested, you can read the article in the discussion here http://en.wikipedia.org/Ray_Joseph_Cormier and maybe comment on the images in the article. Peace DoDaCanaDa (talk) 20:17, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

Date links in stub templates.

I have taken the liberty of taking the generic issue relating to infoboxes, stub templates, etc, to Wikipedia_talk:Manual_of_Style_(dates_and_numbers)#Date_links_in_infoboxes_and_stub_templates. I hope you don't mind. Lightmouse (talk) 19:07, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

Lightbot

Metric units are not necessarily commonly understood in the U.S. I don't believe it is helpful to remove links to metric names from scientific articles.—RJH (talk) 03:35, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

Hi,

I understand your point that metric units are not understood in the US. However, this is a matter of policy not merely my opinion. It is quite an important and general issue for many editors and many pages. Would you mind raising it at the page where the policy is formulated: Misplaced Pages talk:Manual of Style (dates and numbers)? I would be happy to see what other people think. Regards Lightmouse (talk) 06:43, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

Yes, but those linked-to articles aren't much help to US readers who aren't familiar with them. Can you lobby for the creation of a decent page that visually compares the metric/US units in size? TONY (talk) 08:35, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

lightbot and footers

hello. your lightbot is great at rationalising datelinks, but it's screwing up footers by inserting carriage returns between {{DEFAULTSORT}} and {{Lifetime}} templates and the categories listings. --emerson7 14:53, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

The code that does that is part of AWB 'General fixes'. The developers will need to see an example to see what (if anything) is wrong. Can you give me an example page? Thanks. Lightmouse (talk) 19:21, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

De-linking years and ersa

I have taken the liberty of moving this issue to Wikipedia_talk:Manual_of_Style_(dates_and_numbers)#Date_links_are_required_to_populate_.27What_links_here.27_for_year_pages because the issue raised is important and generic. I hope you don't mind. Lightmouse (talk) 19:30, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

Bad edit by Lightbot

You've got to prevent Lightbot from doing edits like this one. It said "third century BC". Lightbot changed it to "third century". Can you see how that could easily mislead the reader about which century it was? Can you go back and look over the bot's edit history and correct the ones where it did that? Michael Hardy (talk) 23:12, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

Aha. I have updated the code to stop that happening. I had a look back and could not find another instance like that. Thank you very much for bringing it to my attention. Regards Lightmouse (talk) 09:58, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

Your bot

Hi,

Your bots user page is currently not inline with the Bot policy, more specifically,

The bot account's user page should identify the bot as such using the {{bot}} tag. The following information should be provided on, or linked from, both the bot account's userpage and the approval request:

* Details of the bot's task (or tasks)
* Whether the bot is manually assisted or runs automatically
* When it operates (continuously, intermittently, or at specified intervals), and at what rate
* The language and/or program that it is running

Please rectify this ASAP.   «l| Ψrom3th3ăn ™|l»  (talk) 12:55, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

Can you be more specific about where it is out of line? Also feel free to raise a query at wp:mosnum. Thanks. Lightmouse (talk) 13:55, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

Follow up to #Year in Foo

I have taken the liberty of taking the generic issue relating to infoboxes, stub templates, etc, to Wikipedia_talk:Manual_of_Style_(dates_and_numbers)#Date_links_in_infoboxes_and_stub_templates. I hope you don't mind. Lightmouse (talk) 19:04, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

Actually, yes I do.

Your 'bot is doing a run around the material at WP:MOSLINK. Moving the issue raised, without any comment from you as the 'bot runner, to an MoS talk page, especially one other that the source of the issue, feels like you're say "Not my issue."

It is your issue since you are using the MoS as part of the reasoning for the 'bot. The MoS has an explicit section allowing a link use/style your 'bot doesn't like. Either fix your 'bot or explain, where you moved the discussions to why you would like to see an MoS other than the one the talk page is attached to amended to eliminate the exceptions.

- J Greb (talk) 19:19, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

I thought that your comment was sufficient to prompt debate from others but if you think it is insufficient without comment from me then I will add something. Raising a comment on a MOS talk page is not intended to upset you. Nor is it intended to avoid the issue. Quite the opposite, inviting other people at the guideline page to debate it is addressing the issue head-on in an appropriate forum. I hoped that you would be happy about that. Even if you are not, I hope that you will accept that I am acting in good faith. Regards Lightmouse (talk) 20:42, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

4AD again

I posted this before , and you had said that you fixed User:Lightbot to make this "correction", but it has happened again.

The page 4AD is for the record label, not the year.

Diff with the problem edit:

Thanks again -- Foetusized (talk) 15:05, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

I've found and fixed a bunch more of these (such as ]) and am not sure this was ever fixed after I pointed this problem out earlier. -- Foetusized (talk) 16:18, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

I did indeed make provision in the code for the record label when I said I did. However, it happened again for a different reason. Sorry about that. I do appreciate you letting me know. Thanks. Lightmouse (talk) 18:57, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

Years, Dates

why that? --TheFEARgod (Ч) 21:22, 6 July 2008 (UTC)