User talk:Lightmouse/Archives/2008/July

silly rabbit

This user is now adding redundant statement to WP:CONTEXT. See also Wikipedia_talk:Only_make_links_that_are_relevant_to_the_context#Autoformatting_purposes. Tony (talk) 13:25, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Cathedrals of England

Thankyou, Lightmouse! Amandajm (talk) 13:36, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

You are very welcome. And it is nice to have good feedback. I appreciate it. Lightmouse (talk) 16:27, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

Lightbot

Why is it unlinking the years in Journey for Margaret and Junior Miss? Clarityfiend (talk) 00:21, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

Hi,

The reason for that is because the Wikipedia:Manual of Style (links) says:

• Do not use piped links to create "easter egg links", that require the reader to follow them before understanding what's going on.
• Avoid piping links from "year" to "year something" or "something year" (e.g., 1991) in the main prose of an article in most cases. Use an explicit cross-reference, e.g. (see 1991 in music), if it is appropriate to link a year to such an article at all.

I believe that the article is better without these links. If you disagree with the guidance or the edit, feel free to revert. I do not mind. Thanks for your feedback. Lightmouse (talk) 08:36, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

Thank you

In recognition of your contribution to the super-secret conspiracy to let robots take over Wikipedia 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)

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 [[1990 in comics|1990]] 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: Wikipedia: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 "[[yyyy in foo|yyyy]]" 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)

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 Wikipedia 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 [1]). 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 Wikipedia’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/wiki/Ray_Joseph_Cormier and maybe comment on the images in the article. Peace DoDaCanaDa (talk) 20:17, 4 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) ^{(talk / cont)} 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 ^{talk →} 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: Wikipedia 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)

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)

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)

4AD again

I posted this before [2], 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: [3]

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

I've found and fixed a bunch more of these (such as [[4]]) 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)

Cool. I see that Lightbot just edited Scott Walker (singer) and left the 4AD links alone. -- Foetusized (talk) 00:23, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

You are welcome. I am glad that it works properly now. Lightmouse (talk) 04:01, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

Years, Dates

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

Such date fragments should not generally be linked. Many dates are linked due to a misunderstanding of a mechanism called autoformatting. If you would like to know more, see wp:date, wp:context, and wp:link and their talk pages. I hope that helps. Regards Lightmouse (talk) 21:35, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

Lightbot

In the Westland Wasp article, Lightbot converted [[1962 in aviation|1962]] into [[1962]]. This seems really unhelpful in an aviation article.--Toddy1 (talk) 21:39, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

The question of piped links in general is being discussed at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (dates and numbers). Please join the debate there where your opinion will be valued. However, that particular article contained a piped links that actually damaged autoformatting. This is quite common and due to a widespread misunderstanding of how autoformatting works and how it can be broken. If you need more information about how it breaks autoformatting, the people at that page will let you know. Best wishes. Lightmouse (talk) 21:46, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

Uncalled for action

Hi,

Your bot is taking out link for dates for no good reason.

Pierre cb (talk) 00:31, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

I've responded at the user's talk page. Tony (talk) 03:02, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

Thank you Tony. Lightmouse (talk) 03:59, 7 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 [[1860]]-[[1863|63]] but did not change the dash. Here also revmoved wikilinks from [[1959]]-[[1963]] 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 [[1860]]-[[1863|63]] 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)

This edit by Lightbot: [6] changed ISSN numbers:

• 0896-0801 → 0896–0801
• 0038-0210 → 0038–0210

There's no MoS justification for such edits. --Francis Schonken (talk) 07:12, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

You are quite right. This is a false positive related to a supplementary task. See discussion in the rest of this section. I have removed the offending code. It will no longer change hyphens into dashes. Lightmouse (talk) 17:13, 7 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: Wikipedia 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)

I added a discussion section at Wikipedia_talk:Manual of Style (dates_and_numbers)#Bot removing links to metric units and said my piece there. No offense intended, of course. Thank you.—RJH (talk) 18:24, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

No offense taken. I am glad you took it up there, that is how policy evolves. I will be interested to see the response. Regards Lightmouse (talk) 20:58, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

lightbot and footers

I have taken the liberty of moving this discussion to Wikipedia_talk:AutoWikiBrowser#Carriage_returns_in_footers. I hope you do not mind. Regards Lightmouse (talk) 17:04, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

no problem at all....thanks for your help. cheers! --emerson7 22:44, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

ISSN

Comment and response now included in User_talk:Lightmouse#Suggestion. Regards Lightmouse (talk) 17:15, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

Date ranges between double square brackets?

Question: how does Lightbot handle date ranges between double square brackets?

Example:

• Iran Premier League (2001-2002) exists and is in that format linked from a few pages, see Special:WhatLinksHere/Iran_Premier_League_(2001-2002);
• Would Lightbot change that to Iran Premier League (2001–2002)? And if so, would Lightbot create the appropriate redirect (possibly by moving a page)?

See also relevant guidance at Wikipedia:Naming conventions (numbers and dates) --Francis Schonken (talk) 07:49, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

And see MOS: the hyphen needs to be an en dash. The page should be moved so the title is correct. Tony (talk) 10:26, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

See response at User_talk:Lightmouse#Suggestion. Regards Lightmouse (talk) 17:16, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

guidance brackets

Done! Note that I've streamlined the process. Copy straight from edit box onto a word document and use my specialised macros. One removes any upcoming [[word]], one removes the brackets around [[month day]] and inserts a hard-space between them (month day) and works on the inverted order too. Others transform full dates and insert the hard-space, but a a separate macro is required for each century, would you believe, and for br vs am formats. Makes it a breeze.

Then I just past back into the edit box with a stock invisible note at the top .

How's that? Tony (talk) 18:24, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

That is great. Have you considered (a) using your monobook or (b) getting an AWB account? It would be even simpler. I could help you. Lightmouse (talk) 20:54, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

Lightbot removal of br tags

Issue moved to Wikipedia_talk:AutoWikiBrowser#Line_breaks_in_equations. Regards Lightmouse (talk) 17:48, 8 July 2008 (UTC)

cite web

Thx for advice on the other matter. As for the template, I fear we're going to end up with just an editor's choice of blue-linked autoformatting, forcing the variety that is used in the main text of the article. I was hoping for black, unformatted, manually keyed in dates in the use of the template. Maybe that will be it, but I find it hard to work out what's going on. Tony (talk) 02:03, 9 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)

There may be a larger debate, and in broad strokes I can see where what Lightbot is doing is with in the guide lines. There a big "however" with that though...

The current guidelines allow for exceptions, something the bot doesn't. Even if there is a discussion of the current guidelines, it seems very pointed for the 'bot to be applying the guides while ignoring part of them.

That's what it feels like is being ignored. - J Greb (talk) 23:22, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

J Greb, thanks for your comment. Can you provide specific examples of where you believe guidelines are being ignored? Tony (talk) 13:11, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

The first change in the edit here and the fist change here. - J Greb (talk) 22:36, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

“Metric is ‘common’” bot

Lightmouse, it’s beginning to dawn on me that there is some bot running around de-linking metric units on the assumption that “everyone knows metric” and, further, that you are behind this bot. Please see my 00:22, 9 July 2008 (UTC) post here on Talk:MOSNUM. Greg L (talk) 00:49, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. This is not a separate bot, the bot for date delinking does a few supplementary tasks. Some tasks relate to units and this is one of them. All supplementary tasks are intended to be consistent with guidance and reason. I have now modified the code and it should now only to delink common units that are part of a conversion e.g. '6 feet (1.8 m)'. Anyone that does not understand feet can look at the value in metres and vice versa. I hope that seems reasonable to you. I am watching the debate at wp:mosnum, so I will see any further points you make there. Regards. Lightmouse (talk) 21:58, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

2000 AD

There's a slight issue with links to 2000 AD, since some of those are likely malformed links for 2000 AD (comic), which 2000AD also redirects to. Since 2000 AD is a dab page, not a year page, I don't think the bot should be removing them, since it doesn't meet its purpose. I notice above there is a similar issue with 4AD, so I should imagine the solution would be to implement similar coding. There are editors who fix the malformed links to dab pages, so it would be helpful to leave the links to the 2000 AD page alone, as well as links to the 2000AD redirect page. Granted it is a bit of a mess, and likely it may be too late now given how long the bot has been running, but c'est la vie. Thanks for your time. Hiding T 10:04, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

I enjoy the comic. Thanks for pointing it out. I will investigate the code and get back here. Lightmouse (talk) 10:05, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

Done. I have applied the '4AD' exemption to '2000 AD' and '2000AD'. Thanks. Lightmouse (talk) 10:10, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

• Ta. I'll get on and sort the incorrect links out going to 2000 AD. Hiding T 10:41, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

stubs

I noticed that the bot moves stubs to the very end of the article. You might want to reconsider this. Information in the article's code should roughly mirror the information in the article as it's presented, and stubs appear in the article above categories -- so that's where stubs should be in the code as well. I generally put stubs above navboxes (if any) and cats, which is where they work best in the article. Ed Fitzgerald (unfutz) ^{(talk / cont)} 18:35, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

This is a feature of AWB general fixes. The AWB sequence is said to be based on Wikipedia:Stub which says stubs should be:

• "placed at the end of the article, after the External links section, any navigation templates, and the category tags, so that the stub category will appear last."

Personally, I don't care which order is standard. So my opinion is not much help to any debate of this issue. Would you mind raising this at Wikipedia talk:Stub? Thanks. Lightmouse (talk) 21:16, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

FYI, the main reason for placing stubs after categories is so that normal article categories are shown before the stub cats, which really, in my opinion, should be hidden from normal view. It is mostly an aesthetic thing. — Huntster (t • @ • c) 21:31, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

Re: Stub tool

Thank you for notification.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 15:55, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

Date wikilinking

Your bot, Lightbot, removed all the year links from this article. Can you tell me why it did this? The approprate guideline is WP:CONTEXT#Dates which says "Stand alone years do not need to be linked but some users prefer it". If some users prefer it, I don't think your bot should be removing them in such a sweeping way. rhebus (talk) 07:49, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

Bot requests for removal clears for removal of randomly wikilinked months and days not years.Geni 08:15, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

I believe it's the other way around – month/day combinations are acceptable because they format according to user preferences. Gary King (talk) 08:17, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

You missuderstand. The bot is cleared to removes say july or 16 but not 2002.Geni 08:33, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

Even though it actually does remove years. ^Talk/♥фĩłдωəß♥\^Work 13:01, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for raising this here. This has been the subject of extensive discussions at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (dates and numbers). Would you be kind enough to read what other people have said and add your thoughts there? Many thanks. Lightmouse (talk) 09:27, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

Rhebus and Geni: Stand-alone century, decade, year, and month links have been deprecated for some time now, and for the past few years there has been a marked trend not to use them. The portion of text you cite at WP:CONTEXT is, in fact, an anachronism that has been overlooked in the updating of the guidelines on linking at MOSLINK and MOSNUM.

Briefly, the reasons for avoiding trivial chronological links concern the need to reduce the considerable link-clutter on WP that has led to the (1) dilution of high-value links, (2) slightly reduced ease of reading, and (3) tendency to look messy on the page, with a reduction in the visual attractiveness of the text.

The notion that it's interesting to browse chronological articles by hitting links in an article is increasingly regarded as diversionary browsing that discourages readers' focus on the topic at hand. The common rebuttal is that readers who wish to pursue this type of online experience can very easily tap three or four numbers into the search box to achieve exactly the same purpose without the disadvantages of bright-blue splotch.

Above all, there's a growing attitude that chronological articles, while of some value per se, rarely add significantly to the reader's understanding of the topic at hand (a MOS requirement). The parody of a year article is one that starts by telling us that Princess Grace stubbed her toe at a dance on January 1; while this is probably an exaggeration, it does illustrate why there is widespread objection to year-linking. There's also a suspicion among some folk—unsupported by hard evidence—that those who have contributed to such pages are merely keen to maximise the "what links here" ratings. The principle of disciplined linking is gaining increased traction on the project, and—I believe—is a sign that WP has reached a certain stage of maturity during which contributors are keen to improve the readability and appearance of our text, and the quality of linking system that is such a valuable and distinctive part of Wikis.

I hope this is helpful in clarifying what I believe are Lightmouse's entirely good-faith reasons for running the bot. I think you'll find that he has applied it sensitively and has responded positively to criticisms and suggestions for technical improvements. I'm interested to hear your responses, and hope that you might decide to support his efforts. Tony (talk) 15:57, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

So you've made an argument for improveing the year articles. In any case you miss the point. The Bot is not cleared for removeing year wikilinks so we have no idea how aproprate it's removals will be.Geni 16:10, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

Ah ... I don't think I've made that argument at all. I said they may be "of some value per se. The thrust of my comments involved the utility of those pages as links. No matter how fine a year article, it's hard to imagine that it can generally satisfy the MOS requirement and move beyond the role of diversionary browsing. There may be a case for more specific utility in linking very early years/centuries/millenia, simply because there is much less information on those pages and they might be more effective in providing a reader with an overall view that historical period. This is very difficult for post-ancient chronological pages. I don't really want to get into a debate about this point, though, since it's long been accepted that year pages are not useful links. Tony (talk) 17:00, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

In reply to Tony1: I agree that yearlinks are rarely useful and lead to overlinking. So the question is, why is the section I quoted from WP:CONTEXT still there? And where else is there any policy/guideline/whatever regarding linking of dates? I guess the general WP:CONTEXT guideline advises against linking dates, since they are rarely directly relevant. However, WP:CONTEXT clearly needs fixed, and surely it should be fixed before fixing the article cruft.

In response to Geni: What do you mean by "The Bot is not cleared for removeing year wikilinks"? rhebus (talk) 17:07, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

Um ... I'd already done that. Thanks. Tony (talk) 17:21, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

see Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Lightbot.Geni 19:13, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

The bot certainly does not appear to be cleared for removing year links. Is there other approval for performing that role elsewhere? Hiding T 15:43, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

• Actually, the bot was indeed cleared for date fragments, and last time I looked, a linked year was a fragment of an autoformatted date. Furthermore, if this aspect you complain of was doing something not mandated by WP's guidelines, well you might have a little ground to stand on. But it's a requirement of MOSNUM and MOSLINK not, generally, to link single years. What is the problem? Tony (talk) 16:17, 14 July 2008 (UTC)
  • The definition at the approval was "links to solitary months (February), solitary days of the week (Tuesday), digits (16)." Nothing about years there and it is somewhat disinkgenuous to refer to links to years as fragments of an autoformatted date when there are other reasons a year may be wiki-formatted. Running bots to make contentious edits is frowned upon, and per WP:IAR the WP:MOS can be ignored if so desired. We don;t amend articles by dictat, yours, a bots or a coterie of editors on a project-space page. We do it through building consensus. Given that people seem to be contesting the removal of such links, it may be that the pages you refer to do not have community consensus as being best practise. Rather than trying to enforce such pages and seek to stamp out discussion it would in my mind be better to work out where consensus lies and what the wider community feels on the issue. It is entirely possible consensus has changed. Hiding T 13:03, 15 July 2008 (UTC)
  • Hiding, I have no wish to pick a fight with you. But may I point out that the styleguides that deprecate the linking of years alone and months alone were indeed established by consensus, and not yesterday either; this is hardly "by dictat, yours, a bots or a coterie of editors on a project-space page", which is a little unfair, I think, under the circumstances. IAR is a rather odd beast: it's kind of circular, in that IAR could apply to IAR and cancel itself out, couldn't it. When it's invoked, it comes under special scrutiny, since there's much support in WP for creating the kind of cohesion that MOS and other pages make possible, marking WP above the normal results of a google search. I've pointed out above that Lightmouse has gone to a lot of trouble to listen to complaints and to tweak the operation of the bot in response to many; this is far from your accusation of "trying to stamp out discussion". Please note that the bot is only semi-automated in that he scrutinises the results closely. Finally, when you say "people seem to be contesting the removal of such links", it is indeed remarkable that only a few people have taken issue on this page given the substantial number of pages that the Lightmouse has treated using the bot. That alone speaks for itself. Nevertheless, what you say is taken seriously here. Tony (talk) 13:25, 15 July 2008 (UTC)
    • I'm neither looking for a fight or a semantic or philosophical debate. We could argue the toss all day long. I don't really see the point in that, and I doubt that you do to. If you think I am being unfair in my words, consider it a reply in kind to your own unfairness. I've said my piece, and I'll withdraw. I don't see any value in this and you aren't likely to change your position. I don't see the need for such changes to be made arbitrarily, but I have a different opinion on what Wikipedia should be to you. It's a shame the broad church of the early days has gone, but I'd rather defend a better position than this one. All the best, and apologies for ruffling feathers, Hiding T 20:43, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

article 1800s

Are there plans to delete the article 1800s? Your bot is deleting the links to it. Jeff Smith (talk) 18:27, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

Jeff, not at all—I think you know that. For several years now, you must be aware that WP has evolved towards a more disciplined, selective approach to linking, especially of general chronological items such as centuries, decades, years and months where the destination article does not provide focused information that "significantly increases readers' understanding of the topic at hand". One of the most compelling reasons for disciplined linking is to avoid swamping authors' high-value links that are focused more directly on the topic. I see that the article you refer to starts as follows:

• Invention of the Jacquard loom in 1801.
• Ultraviolet radiation is discovered by Johann Wilhelm Ritter in 1801.
• Flag semaphore is gradually adopted by various navies of the world.
• Morphine is isolated from opium for the first time in 1804.

This is great material for diversionary browsing—I'd enjoy reading the list myself per se, but it is not appropriate as a link from any article that just happens to mention "the 1800s". Tony (talk) 13:32, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

Planet designations are not units

Your bot erroneously interpreted the planet designation OGLE-2003-BLG-235Lb (in the article OGLE-2003-BLG-235/MOA-2003-BLG-53) as representing a weight in pounds (lb) and changed it to OGLE-2003-BLG-235 lb. This is not correct. 86.151.1.149 (talk) 23:09, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

As you say, that is not correct. I will investigate to see what made it do that. Thank you for bringing it to my attention. Regards Lightmouse (talk) 12:07, 17 July 2008 (UTC)

Wikismile

Hello. Just thought I would drop you a wikismile. No reason. Just felt like it. Keep up the good work. Okiefromokla ^questions? 03:43, 18 July 2008 (UTC)

Thank you. Lightmouse (talk) 09:22, 18 July 2008 (UTC)

Converting acres to km2

Please stop changing conversions for acres to square kilometers. The hectare is the common unit of measure in the metric system to measure areas of land, as is the acre in the English system. Please fix your bot so we don't have to continually revert your edits. Thanks. -- Gmatsuda (talk) 23:22, 17 July 2008 (UTC)

Hi, thank you for your comment. Please can you give examples. Lightmouse (talk) 23:23, 17 July 2008 (UTC)

And you've just done it again with Martlesham. Please stop changing hectare to km2, where hectare is the appropriate unit. --Phil Holmes (talk) 14:53, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

Your bot has converted those units in several articles related to camps that Japanese Americans were imprisoned in during World War II, such as Manzanar, and most recently, Heart Mountain War Relocation Center‎. -- Gmatsuda (talk) 01:03, 18 July 2008 (UTC)

I cannot see where my bot has edited those two articles. Of the two articles you mention, I can see that I personally edited Heart Mountain War Relocation Center‎. I can't see anything wrong with the edit. Large units are suitable for large areas. Small units are suitable for small areas. There is nothing wrong with the unit 'square kilometre'. You will indeed see the hectare used in some official and farming contexts but the square kilometre is more accessible for ordinary people. Word-for-word translation can be useful for guidance but it is not definitive, otherwise fuel economy of non-US cars would be quoted in America as quarts per 70 miles. I do not mind you disagreeing. Nor do I mind you reverting. I certainly have not edit warred over it. I appreciate you bringing this to my attention. Lightmouse (talk) 01:39, 18 July 2008 (UTC)

FYI: You (not your bot...sorry) edited the Manzanar article on 02:58, April 26, 2008, and that was just the last of your edits. Didn't say anything about an edit war... -- Gmatsuda (talk) 03:59, 18 July 2008 (UTC)

Ah, I only looked at the last 50 edits. I see it now. Thanks.

White space editing with AWB

Please don't make edit mode whitespace changes with AWB, as you did at Annie Oakley (diff). I seem to recall that somewhere in automated editing guides it says not to make article whitespace changes. Edit mode whitespace changes are also trivially controversial, being perhaps a bit like British vs. USA English spellings. Over several years I've personally added hundreds of edit mode whitespaces following section headings in articles to make long articles more readable at edit time. (Please reply here if desired) Milo 12:51, 18 July 2008 (UTC)

The white space edit is not something that I made a decision to do. It is a feature of the AWB 'General fixes' option. Since it is a generic issue that applies to AWB itself and all its users, would you be kind enough to raise it at Wikipedia talk:AutoWikiBrowser? Thanks. Lightmouse (talk) 17:39, 18 July 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the info. Based on my experience, the AWB honchos are part of a clique that owns the encyclopedia. Chances are "they" have made a decision and that's the way it is, so I'll pass. Milo 20:50, 18 July 2008 (UTC)

OK. Thanks for bringing this to my attention. Lightmouse (talk) 08:05, 19 July 2008 (UTC)

Bot problem - images

Your bot is sometimes breaking images by editing date ranges within the image filename - see for example Franciszek Maksymilian Ossoliński. Colonies Chris (talk) 13:48, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

Yes that is an error. I was asked to change the length of little lines (hyphens, dashes) in year ranges. I do not care much about that issue and it is somewhat of a scope digression for the bot. I foolishly thought that adding such a feature was a simple way of increasing net happiness. As you have seen, it produced false positives so I removed it. That section of code was live between 4 July and 7 July and that is why it affected that article. See: 'Suggestion'. Thus the issue should not happen again. Thank you for fixing it. Lightmouse (talk) 14:20, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

Conversions in titles of cited articles

Hello. I have noticed that you added the conversion template to Kamil Hornoch. When I wrote it, I cited an article called "Novae discovered in M81 galaxy using G2-3200 CCD camera on 10 in telescope". The titles of the cited articles should definitely keep their original form and therefore I removed the template here. Jan.Kamenicek (talk) 18:53, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

You are quite right. That was an error. Thank you for correcting it. Lightmouse (talk) 19:37, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

Delinking date forms like Month Year or Year

I was trying to find your approval for this task, but all I could find was Wikipedia:Bots/Requests_for_approval/Lightbot, which does not address it. Can you point me to the authorization? Christopher Parham (talk) 02:00, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

Never mind, I see this is addressed in your archives, and that you've stopped running the bot for now. Christopher Parham (talk) 02:09, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

Overwriting {{convert}} defaults - from (acres) to (m2) instead of (ha or km2)

Is there a specific reason why you overwrite the units provided by the template? hectares are much more convenient for the size. -- User:Docu

Hi, can you give an example edit? Lightmouse (talk) 11:28, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

There is a series in lake related infoboxes, e.g. [7] -- User:Docu

I think articles are improved by using units that are more accessible to ordinary readers. That particular one is an example where a conversions were missing and where excessive 'lk=' parameters were being used. Regards Lightmouse (talk) 11:35, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

The conversion was not missing in the infobox and the use of "lk=on" made the unit more accessible. -- User:Docu

You are right to say that the article had some conversions conversions present. It also had some conversions missing. I agree with you that where an editor chooses to use a less accessible unit instead of a more accessible unit, a link will help reader if they take the trouble to investigate further. Feel free to revert the changes if you think the article will be improved. Lightmouse (talk) 11:48, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

(ec) I agree about avoiding the hectare, but would prefer to see 0.26 km^2 than 260,000 m^2. Thunderbird2 (talk) 11:42, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

OK. Thanks. Guys, feel free to make whichever changes you want to improve the article. There are three important issues here:

• The presence of conversions for metric readers throughout the world
• Giving priority to more accessible units over less accessible units for ordinary people
• Reduction in excessive linking of common units

Regards Lightmouse (talk) 11:48, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for your reply, but I'd rather that you don't change other articles in the same way, as there doesn't appear to be a consensus for this. As a side note, in general, I think you do a great job cleaning up units and adding conversion. -- User:Docu

Thanks for your supportive words, Docu. I agree; IMO what makes Lightmouse's work so valuable is his senstivity to editor feedback and his willingness to refine the scripting on that basis. I was about to agree with your preference for ha, but I've thought through this and wonder whether ordinary folk in metric countries (like mine) have a clue what a ha looks like, and how to visualise large values of ha. I think what we do need to avoid, where possible, extremely large values, such as Thurderbird's 260,00 m^2. I'd add to this 1920 acres, and 2500 ha. Do you agree? On the linking issue, I'm disappointed that our unit articles provide lots of information that the reader doesn't need to know about the unit, and make it very hard to visualise the unit, in relation to the other system and larger/smaller units within the same system. We need to solve this problem. Tony (talk) 16:49, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

Second that (re support for Lightmouse & his bot). Tony: can you give me an example of a units article that you'd like to see improved? Thunderbird2 (talk) 18:52, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the comments. In response to Docu, I will try to be more sensitive about this issue and I appreciate your feedback. Lightmouse (talk) 19:36, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

Thunderbird: it's not so much a matter of improving units articles—they're probably OK as they are. I just think they don't hit the spot in the particular instance where readers hit a common link to them. Those readers have almost certainly heard of the units, but have little idea of their size, both in relation to their own system (km to miles, for example) or in relation to familiar visual representations (say, of the Statue of Liberty or some other public icon or scene). I'm proposing that we should write a centralised article that provides just this information, easily packaged in visual terms. What does a hectare, an acre, a square mile, a square km look like in terms of an aerial photograph of a suburb? That would be more useful, don't you think? Tony (talk) 02:59, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

Yes, I see what you mean. Not something for me though - no good with pictures I'm afraid :( I wonder if there's a units project somewhere ... Thunderbird2 (talk) 10:25, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

I tend to agree with Docu and Tony. If converting units, you should convert to a unit of similar proportion— sq mi -->km²; acre -->hectare; mile-->km—unless it is the norm to use a different unit for a certain purpose. I think in acres' case it would be the norm to convert to hectares. I see square meters as being very out of place in that conversion. It would be like 65 square metres (101,000 sq in). Yea it can be done, but it's out of place. —MJCdetroit ^(yak) 13:19, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

Its a fair point. Word-for-word translation of the unit can help novices translate units (i.e. mi to km, yd to m, lb to kg). However, as with language translation, it is part art and part science. If word-for-word translation of units was compulsory, non-American cars would have their fuel consumption quoted in 'quarts per 60 miles' and recipe translation would be weird due to the failure to convert between weight and volume. Just because a Japanese person has quoted litres because it is meaningful to Japanese people does not mean that Americans must read about quarts. I think that people experienced in unit translation have to use word-for-word translation as just one of many factors, it is part-art and part-science. Lightmouse (talk) 19:43, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

Image tags

Please be careful not to correct text within image tags such as image:Herschel 40 foot.jpg|thumb|left|William Herschel's 49 inch telescope to ((convert|40|ft|m|sing=on)).jpg|thumb|left|William Herschel's 49-inch (1,200 mm) telescope[8]. It wrecks the image link. Thanks. Fountains of Bryn Mawr (talk) 04:26, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

Ah yes. I usually catch those but that one slipped through. Thank you for spotting it. Lightmouse (talk) 18:34, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

How about internal links? Siding Spring 40 inch Telescope was a red link anyway, but I'm not sure Siding Spring 40-inch (1,000 mm) Telescope is an improvement. [9] Rl (talk) 16:28, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Oops again. There were so many 'inch telescopes' without metric conversions that I was determined to fix them, perhaps I dropped my guard. Two errors in such a short period is a statistical certainty but not a trend, I assure you. Thanks for spotting it. I have corrected it. Regards Lightmouse (talk) 16:43, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Out of curiosity Lightmouse, why not just exclude anything within wikilinks? That would certainly solve the problem. I can't think of too many instances where you would want to convert material within wikilink displays in the first place. — Huntster (t • @ • c) 22:49, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

I do check for wikilinks. But checking makes the code complicated so I can only check two characters either side. I do not currently know a way of checking an unlimited number of characters either side. Lightmouse (talk) 07:49, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

addLink

In most cases, you can directly replace addLink with addPortletLink and remove loading Omegatron's function. addPortletLink is part of the common javascript everyone has. Gimmetrow 21:26, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

I have done it now. I do not care why it is deprecated. I assume that there will be no difference to me or anyone that sees edits made by this script. Let me know if that is not the case. Thank you very much. Lightmouse (talk) 08:13, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

User:Lightmouse/monobook.js/script.js

User talk:Gimmetrow tried out the script in my monobook.js: importScript('User:Lightmouse/monobook.js/script.js'); and reported to me on my user page that it worked just fine for him/her. I have removed a few add-ons from Firefox 2.0.0.16 to no avail. I have wracked my brain trying to figure out why your script does not work for me.

If I click one of the date tabs at the top, I get "Script assisted. Units/dates/other" in my edit summary box. However, nothing changes in the article. If I save it, nothing shows up in the history.

Is it something I am unknowingly doing wrong? Regards, —Mattisse (Talk) 19:27, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

It is very strange. Try these steps:

• Install the latest version of Firefox
• Go to the 'Tools' menu and select 'Options'.
• Select the 'Content' tab.
• Make sure that 'Enable Javascript' and 'Enable Java' are both checked.
• Clear your cache.
• Try again and let me know.

Regards Lightmouse (talk) 09:16, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

I did all of the above. My Firefox is the newest version of 2.0.0.16. It is not Firefox 3, but that should not make a difference. I have fiddled with removing removing "Gagdets" checked and other options. User talk:Gimmetrow used the version of my monobook.js that has a few other scripts in it, so it is not that. Besides, I removed all previous scripts and tried it that way already . Also, I removed some of the Firefox add-ons I had. Some, like "Tab Mix Plus" I kept. Could it be something like that? —Mattisse (Talk) 18:33, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

I works fine on Firefox 2.0.0.16. Add-ons could be a problem, try it without any add-ons. Try it with Internet Explorer. Otherwise, I am out of ideas. Sorry. Lightmouse (talk) 18:39, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

User:Lightmouse/monobook.js/script.js

Could you please disable it for all namespaces except for the article namespace? You can do this by using if (wgCanonicalNamespace == ''); when wgCanonicalNamespace is empty, then it is the article namespace. One reason is that it should only be used in the article namespace. Another is because a lot of tools are used in other namespaces, namely Twinkle and Friendly in User Talk, so now when I'm editing a User Talk page (like right now) the page is at least twice as long horizontally. Gary King (talk) 03:48, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

I have added

• if (wgCanonicalNamespace == '');

Feel free to examine the code to see if I have done it properly. Please test it and let me know if it works. Thanks Lightmouse (talk) 09:02, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

The tabs appear to be present only above the edit-windows of article pages. Do you get the same, Gary? Tony (talk) 11:11, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

That didn't work for me – I see you have added if (wgCanonicalNamespace == ''); . Replace that with if (wgCanonicalNamespace != '') return; Gary King (talk) 18:37, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

I added the code that you suggested but it did not work. I tested various other pieces of code but without success. So I commented it out. If you have another suggestion, I will try again. Lightmouse (talk) 21:49, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

I got it working at User:Gary King/unlinker.js. Gary King (talk) 00:09, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Glad to see it. Feel free to explore the functions of each tab. Let me know if you have any comments. Lightmouse (talk) 09:04, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Noticed something

{{Km to mi}} is responsible for quite a few of the linkages. The template, however, is a bit of a tangle with conditional codes so is not an easy matter to unlink. Just thought I'd make you aware of this one. Orderinchaos 18:31, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

OK. It is much better than it was. Thanks for your help. Lightmouse (talk) 18:40, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

No worries. If you spot any others which relate to Australia (I blatted one in the road template already) feel free to drop me a note. Orderinchaos 18:42, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Edit to Washington, D.C. by lightbot

re: this edit: Can you have the bot not convert direct quotations. Also, in this case, the bot converted incorrectly. 10 miles square is 259 km², not 16 km². (10 miles square != 10 square miles). —D. Monack ^talk 21:46, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

And even if it was 10 square miles we were talking about, the correct conversion would be ~25.6 km², not 16 km². Sarcasticidealist (talk) 21:52, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

You are right. It should not have converted the quotation like that. Thanks for spotting it. Lightmouse (talk) 22:06, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

'lightbot' edit failures to Lakeside Apartments District, Oakland, California

please stop' ...your 'bot' from making edit faIlures to the Lakeside Apartments District, Oakland, California that are extremely tedious to repair manually. Thanks,Critical Chris

P.S. - this is worse than being unhelpful.Critical Chris (talk) 21:56, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Somehow a comma got into the convert template. I will find out what is happening and fix it. Thanks for bringing it to my attention. Lightmouse (talk) 22:10, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

2000 Summer Olympics medal count FLC

As a major contributor to the review, could you return to this featured list candidate and reassess it please? The Rambling Man (talk) 07:29, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

Random question

Hey, are years not supposed to be made wikilinks? Aepoutre (talk) 18:54, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Not unless there is a good reason. Which article do you have in mind? Lightmouse (talk) 18:56, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

I had just noticed Lightbot's edits, and was only confused because I had seen a very good many made into wikilinks when I first started editing and spent a lot of time myself making them so. Is there a particular guide you can direct me to, in order to determine when years, dates, etc. should be made into wikilinks and when they should not be? Aepoutre (talk) 19:05, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

I think it's one of those things that has changed over time, and probably originated at a time when the encyclopaedia was a lot smaller than it now is. The number of links to any given year, especially the last few, are through the roof, and that sheer quantity of database linking doesn't actually achieve very much for our readers (when was the last time someone actually clicked a year link in an article?) The only reason we have date linking at all, really, is because the MediaWiki developers haven't come up with a better way to format dates according to user preferences. I link full dates but never years, if it helps - although that's just my personal practice and others at either end would disagree. Orderinchaos 19:22, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

If you want to read the current guidance, it is at:

• Wikipedia:Manual of Style (dates and numbers)
• Wikipedia:Only make links that are relevant to the context

Regards Lightmouse (talk) 19:26, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Awesome. Thanks! Aepoutre (talk) 21:07, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

Perhaps inadvertent deletion in section

The unit conversions in U.S. Fire Arms Mfg. Co. are great. The bot deleted brackets on some dates, such as on 1855 which would probably be helpful since most people are not blessed with ektagraphic memory and cannot recall what they learned in high school history about what was else was going when Sam Colt built his armory.

Also, the bot deleted some good citations of films in which Thell Reed used the company's product because of its historical accuracy. In so doing, it left that section nonsensical: " two 2000 film Shanghai Noon". I don't want to lose your handy unit automatic conversions, but don't you think the "Films" section should be reverted? There, the 2007 link was piped to 2007 in film. Is there anything you can do about that, or should I revert the whole thing and just go through it and apply your suggested edits manually? Though I have tried it, I am no whiz with AWB. Newportm (talk) 20:21, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Something is weird there. Thanks for bringing it to my attention. I will need some time to investigate and fix whatever is happening. Please just revert the whole thing. Thanks. Lightmouse (talk) 22:09, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

I figured out how to repair it by using the history page. That saved me from having to do away with your handy unit conversions; definitely like 'em. All okay. By the way, if adding the word "stop" between the lines on the bot's talk page will stop it, will additions such as "Please 'stop' the bot," etc. do the same thing, or does the bot look for the unadulterated text string: stop (just curious)  ? Newportm (talk) 22:22, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

I can give you a tool to do unit conversions in any article with just one click. Just let me know. The bot will stop if the page is different when you press 'Save page'. Lightmouse (talk) 22:28, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

On the "External links" section of the Broken beat page, you deleted the site Commercial Break, one of the few places that reviews the aforementioned genre, (along with related music). There's plenty of reviews and samples of broken beat music throughout Commercial Break. At the same time, you've left in Goya Music, undoubtedly a leading exponent of the genre, however the firm has gone into receivership and no longer trades. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Saul OGrady (talk • contribs) 10:39, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

You are mistaken. I did not make those edits. Perhaps you are confusing me with the subsequent editor. Lightmouse (talk) 16:41, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for replying so promptly. Upon closer inspection, I see you are correct. Please accept my apologies. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Saul OGrady (talk • contribs) 00:01, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

Joseph Standing

Lightmouse - Thank you for adding metric values to the Joseph Standing article. Matthew R. Lee (talk) 13:47, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

You are welcome. Lightmouse (talk) 20:45, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

Furlong

The bot added redundant conversions to Furlong. Just how automated is this bot, anyway. If it is totally automated, it should be shut down permanently. If it is semi-automatic, the operator needs to exercise greater vigilance. --Gerry Ashton (talk) 20:40, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for identifying furlong as a false positive. I do take great care and I believe that the error rate is very low. Unfortunately, I apply changes to a *lot* of articles and a low error rate will occasionally result in a few false positives. I appreciate your feedback. Lightmouse (talk) 20:43, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

Year in film

Hello. On 20 Million Miles to Earth, the bot stripped away a "year in film" link, which are appropriate (and frequent) in film articles. Ed Fitzgerald (unfutz) ^{(talk / cont)} 10:21, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Thank you. It should not do that anymore. Lightmouse (talk) 10:30, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. Ed Fitzgerald (unfutz) ^{(talk / cont)} 10:32, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Conversion accuracy

Discussion moved to: Template_talk:Convert

Please respond to this:

Wikipedia_talk:Templates_for_deletion#Automotive_templates:_Template:Auto_hp_and_others.

Figure out script problem

When I disabled wikEd in Firefox, your script worked just fine! —Mattisse (Talk) 18:37, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

I have no idea what 'wikEd' is but I am glad that things worked out for you. If you have any further questions, just ask. Lightmouse (talk) 20:44, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

It's an add-on to Firefox that highlights certain types of text in the editing window to make editing easier. If someone else has problems with Firefox, wikEd could be it. Thanks for your wonderful script. —Mattisse (Talk) 14:36, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Aha. Thanks. Lightmouse (talk) 14:37, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

lk=on

Why is the bot removing "lk=on" from conversion templates? I believe the MOS says that the first occurence of a unit should be linked, and the bot is removing this from many of my articles. Karanacs (talk) 21:29, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

The guidance at Wikipedia:Only make links that are relevant to the context says:

• do not create links to ... plain English words, including common units of measurement

and it gives a few examples of common units. Where a conversion is provided, the usual argument for a link (access to conversion factors) does not apply. This topic was extensively discussed recently. But I would be quite happy if you wanted to raise it again to see what people think now. I appreciate you asking. Lightmouse (talk) 22:03, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the link to the previous discussion. I don't usually follow MOS pages because the discussion often scares me. Karanacs (talk) 01:11, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

It often scares me too. Lightmouse (talk) 09:01, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

I'd change the bot so that it did not de-link acres and hectares (unless it was multiple links). They are certainly not as "common" as foot, inch, mile, and metre. Thanks —MJCdetroit ^(yak) 16:22, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

I agree that they are probably not 'common' (first tier) although they might be 'commonplace' (second tier). I think that there are two principles here:

• links for units without a conversion - common units do not need a link because they are similar to plain english.
• links for units with a conversion - the conversion itself provides support

I would be happy to make the change you request, I had been thinking of making it anyway. I am just sharing my thought that there is a tougher test for units with conversions than for those without conversions. I think it has already been acknowledged in the discussions and perhaps it is worth mentioning in guidance. Lightmouse (talk) 16:36, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Definetly second tier, but not obscure. The times when there are not conversions should be pretty rare in any case. Happy editing. —MJCdetroit ^(yak) 16:59, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. On that basis, should we have guidance, and what should the guidance be? Lightmouse (talk) 17:33, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Bot edit

I didn't stop it, 'cuz it's probably just a fluke but in this edit the bot broke an image link, probably thinking it was a unit. - Trevor MacInnis (Contribs) 13:09, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. You are right, just a fluke but I can fix it too. Thanks again. Lightmouse (talk) 13:12, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Perhaps the bot should ignore the date articles. Recent edits to February 13 and February 12 removed links that are appropriate. -- Mufka ^{(u) (t) (c)} 15:28, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

You are absolutely correct. That was a mistake, thank you for spotting it. Lightmouse (talk) 15:34, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Lightbot guide for editors?

Is there a "user guide"(sic) anywhere?

Editors have to assume that Lightbot will visit their creations at some point in the future. How should they author things so that the 'bot works best? I've a couple of specific questions, but I suspect they might be FAQ. Andy Dingley (talk) 15:40, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

• How do I stop Lightbot changing something?

"the 1500 horsepower Triplex swerved" (from Daytona Beach Road Course) turned into "the 1,500 horsepower (1,100 kW) Triplex swerved". This isn't useful. "1500 hp" was only there as a stylistic device (it was more like 1300hp anyway) and there's no point in providing a metric conversion outside of the spec. infobox, let alone an over-precise or just plain inaccurate one. Is there some markup (<nowiki>?) that has the minimal effect, other than to make Lightbot et al. avoid it?

• How do I keep Lightbot away from "example" markup?

Slashed zero includes an example of Unicode / HTML / numeric entity reference markup that needs to be preserved as an example markup for U/H/ner. Lightbot flattens it (and breaks it). Changelog here

I do not fully understand the use of 1500 horsepower in that context, perhaps that is an indication of something more fundamental. If somebody is writing in the absence of international context, they can be casual about using units. They can say things like the '1500 horsepower car swerved'. They can also say 'doubling the square footage of the room' rather than 'doubling the area of the room'. They can say 'increased horsepower' or 'increased wattage' rather than 'increased power'. It is similar to saying 'a doctor must know his patients'. There is some effort required to write in a gender neutral way, particularly if you have little experience of it. But it becomes natural after a while. The same applies to international and neutral use of units.

"If somebody is writing in the absence of international context, they can be casual about using units." In the context of MoS considerations, do you mean "can" as "they are permitted to" or "it happens that"? Whether editors ought to take i18n language to the extent of avoiding such constructs, the problem is that they do use them, and are likely to keep using them. All that's meant here was "the big impressive car", but "horsepower" is IMHO an acceptable way of suggesting this in any English language context. It's not necesary to understand the magnitude of that many horsepower in a quantitative sense, merely to appreciate it qualitatively. Andy Dingley (talk) 16:26, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

As far as example markup is concerned, that is not a Lightbot feature per se, I think that is a feature of AWB that I can switch off. I will investigate and see.

I appreciate your feedback. Some of these points may be of wider interest so I would not mind at all if you raised them at wp:mosnum. Regards Lightmouse (talk) 16:00, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Compound units.

The bot needs to be aware of and avoid messing with compound units. In this edit it converts "foot-lamberts" to "-foot (4.9 m)-lamberts". This is not acceptable. The SI unit is "candela per square meter", by the way.--Srleffler (talk) 16:57, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

That should not have happened. I do go to some lengths to avoid such things but those did slip through. After seeing your actions, I have investigated and fixed a couple more. Thank you for stopping the bot and bringing it to my attention. Lightmouse (talk) 17:00, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Some difficulties w Lightbot

Two recent edits by Lightbot did not improve the articles. The first, here, removed a wikilink to kilometre but retained the mile wikilink. The second, here, inserted a calculated metric equivalent in the middle of a quotation.

Neither one was particularly heinous, but incorrect I believe. FYI, Madman (talk) 20:35, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

The first issue you raise is about removal of links to common units. The guidance at wp:overlink says not to link to plain english terms and common units of measurement. It was widely agreed that a kilometre is a common unit. It was only later that the guidance included a mile as a common unit. There are still some people that think it is wrong to delink miles and will complain to me if I delink them.

The second issue you raise is about quotes. You are right that quotes should not be treated the same way as non-quotes. It is quite difficult to avoid this kind of error although the actual error rate is very low. I often catch them but that one slipped through. Now that I have looked at the actual text, I think it was probably assuming that all readers would be from the non-metric community. A paragraph containing three non-metric units without conversion is an unnecessary barrier to the metric readership. If non-metric units are in a reference, there is always a way of making the article accessible to metric readers. In this case, I have rewritten the text accordingly. Thank you for spotting that and bringing it to my attention, this is how articles get better. Lightmouse (talk) 22:38, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

A similar case here. Two land speed record cars: Sunbeam 350HP & Sunbeam 1000HP, with units in their titles had wls to their pages trashed. Surely 'bots should recognise a wl. and leave well alone? Andy Dingley (talk) 21:54, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

It does seem reasonable to think that titles in wikilinks can be left alone. Humans can do this very easily but it is not obvious to me how to code for it. I do have measures inside the code to trap a few instances but not all circumstances. I have long wanted to do this for all circumstances but not had sufficient knowledge or skills. I appreciate you asking and I will ask for further advice. Lightmouse (talk) 22:38, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Lightbot date

Hi, I noticed your bot made this edit, where the date had the space between the comma and the year wrong (July 26 ,2006). Instead of moving the space, it delinked the year. It'd be nice if it would fix the space instead since this is probably a common typo or just ignore it since it seems like the date autoformatting takes care of the problem itself. Thanks. --Dougie WII (talk) 22:31, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Actually that is the first time I have seen that form of typo. There are many weird and wonderful ways in which people combine dates and links. I do fix several of them, particularly those that break autoformatting but I am always coming across new combinations. I will have a look and if I can find a simple way of fixing it without introducing more errors, I will. Thanks for raising it. Lightmouse (talk) 22:44, 31 July 2008 (UTC)