User talk:Rich Farmbrough/Archive/2011 February

Dan Goodwin

You flagged Dan Goodwin's page as 'written like an advertisement'. In that there's substantial material on the page, could you be more specific as to what you believe is 'advertising'. Thank you. Echandada (talk) 20:26, 31 January 2011 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Echandada (talk • contribs)

Y Answered on user's talk page. Rich Farmbrough, 14:07, 31 January 2011 (UTC).

Adding more string templates

Hello, Wikid77 here. This is just a reminder that I am continuing to add more string templates, to make string processing 10x times faster by having an optimized template ready for each type of use. In particular, thank you for writing Template:Str_repc and the others, to extend Wikipedia's options for combining strings. Our big hindrance had been the expansion depth of {str_len} (nested 9-14 levels) and {str_find} (nested 18+ levels), so I have written shorter variations of them:

• Template:Strlen_short - nested 3 deep, as a simple #switch to match short lengths.
• Template:Strlen_quick - nested 5 deep, as faster in lengths 1-60 than the optimized {str_len} nested 9-14.
• Template:Strfind_short - 5 deep, as 2-3x faster, plus longer 1-99 than {str_find} nested 18.

The "elephant in the room" of string usage seems to be {{Italic_title}}, used in 353,000 pages, so I am rewriting it to be 12x faster, with discussions on the talk-page. I firmly believe {Italic_title} has been using {padleft} over 65 million times (not a good use of resources!).
Meanwhile, I am concerned about talk of preventing the use of string functions in the future of Wikipedia, so making things 10x faster should improve the image of string-handling templates. However, there is good reason to avoid using string templates for static data, such as article titles, because the power of string handling is with checking variable data, not in italicizing titles which remain the same for years. Yet, I understand the need to auto-italicize genus/species but not phylum, class, order (etc.), so that is actually a good reason to have built-in string functions to find and insert strings based on infobox usage. Overall, this is a frustrating situation. -Wikid77 02:04, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

Y Answered on user's talk page. Rich Farmbrough, 06:09, 2 February 2011 (UTC).

What editing restriction do you have?

He asked inquisitively. DavidFarmbrough (talk) 06:04, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

Y Answered on user's talk page. Rich Farmbrough, 06:09, 2 February 2011 (UTC).

WikiED

I just plugged into WikiEd this morning as suggested. WOW. It's like graduating from a 3 wheeler to 2 wheeler (w/training wheels of course). Are you sure I won't fall and hurt myself? How is the Queens Awards project going. Any new assignments? Buster Seven Talk 15:31, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

SKye

Hi. Seems I got the category name wrong with Category:Populated places in Skye and Lochalsh. Can you quickly use AWB and rename all Category:Populated places in Skye?♦ Dr. Blofeld 16:48, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for that. Can you delete Category:Populated places in Skye and Lochalsh? I am gradually trying to whittle down Category:Villages in Highland by districts that all.. The problem is that most of them are tiny hamlets so the populated places naming is better.♦ Dr. Blofeld 18:12, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

Sydney / Sidney

I have just composed and uploaded an article entitled 'Fr Charles Sydney Beauclerk SJ' but I have now realised that 'Sydney' should be spelled 'Sidney'. I don't know how to make a correction to an article heading. Please help. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Segalen4 (talk • contribs) 09:53, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

 Done Just use the "move" tab. Charles Sidney Beauclerk is the correct article title, we avoid titles and post nominal letters in article names, partly because these can change over the course of a persons life. Rich Farmbrough, 13:44, 1 February 2011 (UTC).

Thank you, I'm very grateful. Segalen4 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 175.39.71.30 (talk) 20:31, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

SmackBot "template:"

Has SmackBot began to insert the code "template:" now? Why? See diff. Geschichte (talk) 22:27, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

Hm, no, not intentionally. In fact the more fully featured version removed such a redundancy. Thanks for letting me know. Rich Farmbrough, 22:30, 1 February 2011 (UTC).

Why don't you just toss all the code that is already AWB's code? -- Magioladitis (talk) 22:32, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

Because I'm not using AWB. Rich Farmbrough, 22:34, 1 February 2011 (UTC).

DEFAULTSORT

The addition of DEFAULTSORT in this edit appears to be strange place to put it. Keith D (talk) 00:02, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

Yes, thanks, known fixed bug. Rich Farmbrough, 00:30, 2 February 2011 (UTC).

Maintenance categories

Hi, I saw you removed the {{uncategorized}} cleanup tag from Fishes of Invasive species in canada. A few months ago, Bearcat edited Category:Category needed to read "An article is not considered to be properly categorized if it does not have at least one permanent content category". I'm not sure whether there's consensus for this or not, but since no one's objected to the change, the proposed deletion categories might not be enough of a reason to remove {{uncategorized}}. Feezo (Talk) 02:15, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

Y Answered on user's talk page. Rich Farmbrough, 14:08, 31 January 2011 (UTC).

Template talk:Expand

Could you also restore the talk page archives? Archive 1 Archive 2 Archive 3 --Tothwolf (talk) 10:37, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

 Done Rich Farmbrough, 13:44, 1 February 2011 (UTC).

Infobox problems

For the usages of {{Infobox England and Wales civil parish}} you have made this change to Anlaby with Anlaby Common which has broken the categorisation. As per the documentation East Riding of Yorkshire and Isle of Wright use the country field with a "the" in front as opposed to the county field to get the category correct with "the" in it. If you are making this change then the template needs revising to generate the correct category. Keith D (talk) 23:58, 27 January 2011 (UTC)

Y Answered on user's talk page. Rich Farmbrough, 00:07, 28th day of January in the year 2011 (UTC).
Rich Farmbrough, 00:07, 28th day of January in the year 2011 (UTC).

The other East Riding parishes you have just replaced the country with England without populating the county field. May be it is best to drop the category from the template and add it directly to all of the articles that use the template. In the case of Moreton cum Alcumlow I think that Cheshire East should be in the district field and Cheshire in the county field. Keith D (talk) 00:17, 28 January 2011 (UTC)

Probably should be "on" for the Isle of Wright. Another county, though not mentioned in the documentation, is the West Midlands which uses "the" in front of it. Keith D (talk) 00:33, 28 January 2011 (UTC)

OK, thanks. Rich Farmbrough, 00:34, 28th day of January in the year 2011 (UTC).

That was quick. Thanks for sorting it out. Keith D (talk) 01:50, 28 January 2011 (UTC)

SmackBot

Orphan tags belong below an AfD tag, not above. This edits changed the position of the tag from the correct position to the incorrect one, and made no other significant changes. This edit only replaced a redirect to a template with the actual template name, and thus made no significant change. It seems as if your most often used build (p604) is running without problems (from a sample check at least), while other builds (i.c. a595) are a lot more prone to errors. Fram (talk) 10:00, 26 January 2011 (UTC)

Yes I know. Rich Farmbrough, 13:39, 26th day of January in the year 2011 (UTC).

(AWB bug raised I think) Rich Farmbrough, 10:12, 2 February 2011 (UTC).

Roshven

If you have concerns over this page please start a discussion on the talk page. :)

Colinmotox11 (talk) 11:42, 2 February 2011 (UTC) [X] copied from User talk:SmackBot by Femto Bot, (possibly the smallest bot in the world) 11:55, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

Deletemenow

Do you really want this duplicate of Antjuan Tobias deleted? Is this some sort of test? Thanks, Borkificator (talk) 12:23, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

You passed.. :) No it is sometimes necessary to test on a page in mainspace for one reason or another. I use deletemenow so that people don't worry about whether to delete it or not. It rarely exists for more then a a minute, and I usually delete it myself before anyone notices it. Rich Farmbrough, 12:33, 2 February 2011 (UTC).

Bot policy violation

Your current "correct caps in header" edits seem to be a violation of the bot policy, "Bot processes may not fix spelling or grammar mistakes or apply templates such as in an unattended fashion". While some of the edits also make more substantial changes, many of them are only cosmetic, and some have errors, like duplicating the "name" parameter in the persondata here (and is there any reason to intrioduce lowercase when the other ones are uppercase?). You even introduce the birthdate twice (in different formats and case) in one edit[1]. Fram (talk) 11:54, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

The duplicate parameters work fine, so are not a real issue, however I have resolved that problem. The program runs against a list of list of 844 specific headers, and is an approved bot task. Rich Farmbrough, 12:25, 2 February 2011 (UTC).

Even now the most common is External Links it seems. Rich Farmbrough, 12:36, 2 February 2011 (UTC).

Could you give a link to the exact approved bot task? Looking through Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/SmackBot didn't return any obvious matches to this task, only Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/SmackBot XXIX was somewhat similar but not applicable here (only valid for pages in Category:Wikipedia articles incorporating text from the Air Force Historical Research Agency). And even assuming that having the same parameter with two different values doesn't cause problems for whatever tools use these parameters, it is still an error to introduce them. The change of capitalisation will not cause problems as such, but having bots that make our articles internally less consistent is not really the purpose of this... Fram (talk) 12:39, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

Modifying dates?

[2], [3]. -- Magioladitis (talk) 09:21, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

Hm... I just realised is the same article. Was it problem to the script or manual? -- Magioladitis (talk) 09:23, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

Known (fixed) problem. Rich Farmbrough, 09:23, 2 February 2011 (UTC).

I am getting confused. Do you use perl for the bot and AWB for non-automated edits from this account? AWB shouldn't be changing the case like in here (line 89). Sorry for the repeated messages. -- Magioladitis (talk) 10:59, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

Oh yes, that is just a stupid preservation of case caused as a reaction to the ridiculous AN/I threads. Nobody ever asked for preservation of case across template replacement, that I am aware of - it lead to the absurd "iMDB" usage, however that extent of paranoia would have seemed justified at the time, since accounts were being blocked for changing the case of a single letter, or less. Rich Farmbrough, 11:16, 2 February 2011 (UTC).

I tend to agree. After that we adjusted further and if the word is in capitals the casing could change. So, this mean we are past this casing fight? -- Magioladitis (talk) 11:21, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

I prefer sentence case, as we use for header, article names, page names and... well sentences, but I have never, despite what has been said, made indiscriminate changes to template casing. The actual preferred usage seems to be lower case for inline cite templates, sentence case for practically everything else, although clearly typing lowercase is less effort. Eubilides felt strongly otherwise, a year or so back. A lot of people, reasonably just don't want to see diff noise. If a name is being changed, a case change is not diff noise. So short answer is yes I beleive we are over the non-battle that some people were desperate to make into a battle. Rich Farmbrough, 11:28, 2 February 2011 (UTC).

Freezing point (disambiguation) listed at Redirects for discussion

An editor has asked for a discussion to address the redirect Freezing point (disambiguation). Since you had some involvement with the Freezing point (disambiguation) redirect, you might want to participate in the redirect discussion (if you have not already done so). Quest for Truth (talk) 23:49, 3 February 2011 (UTC) [X] copied from User talk:SmackBot by Femto Bot, (possibly the smallest bot in the world) 23:58, 3 February 2011 (UTC)

Merge

An article that you have been involved in editing, Anthony Hall (Buckinghamshire) has been proposed for a merge with another article. If you are interested in the merge discussion, please participate by going to the article and clicking on the (Discuss) link at the top of the article, and adding your comments on the discussion page. Thank you. Peacekeeper 1234 15:44, 3 February 2011 (UTC)

Some errors

Not for the first time, Smackbot removes text from hidden comments, making them much less useful: [4]. Other edits also have problems, like the incorrect name in the persondata here. The order of fields in Persondata is also non-standard[5]. And the aproval for this task has also not been provided yet, giving the impression that this is an unapproved, bot policy violating task. Fram (talk) 13:28, 2 February 2011 (UTC) [X] copied from User talk:SmackBot by Femto Bot, (possibly the smallest bot in the world) 13:40, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

Status update: Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/SmackBot 40

Template: Trial complete.. *

Edits by:

Last edit by BAGGER was by EdoDodo at 11:06, 4 December 2010 (UTC).
Last edit by me at 19:41, 1 November 2010 (UTC).
Last edit by anyone was by [[User:|User:]] at 11:57, 12 December 2010 (UTC).
Bottom edit was by Rich Farmbrough at 00:58, 6 February 2011 (UTC).

Femto Bot, (possibly the smallest bot in the world) 01:23, 6 February 2011 (UTC)

Bug in Smackbot?

Smackbot used a bizarre edit summary "Adding references section" when it repaired the refs and added an uncategrized template. However, the page was in around 12 categories, and Smackbot did not add a == References == section. diff Could it have anything to do with the pending changes protection? Reaper Eternal (talk) 11:36, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

There was already a references section. The bot knows a number of other things to try though (and as you can see I was "helping" it a little with the capitalisation of "recently") which is why it says "and/or general fixes" . With this particular run I tend to examine the leftovers manually, in this case someone else fixed the problem - which was someone closing refs with the same tag as they opened them. As to pending changes, I don't think it is a problem, although I had expected it to be. Rich Farmbrough, 11:51, 2 February 2011 (UTC).

As requested, please provide a link to the bot task approval for these changes

As requested, please provide a link to the bot task approval for these changes. Fram (talk) 13:04, 2 February 2011 (UTC) [X] copied from User talk:SmackBot by Femto Bot, (possibly the smallest bot in the world) 13:12, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

The Signpost: 17 January 2011

• News and notes: Anniversary celebrations; Foundation reports; local language problems; brief news

• In the news: Anniversary coverage continues; Thai government translates Wikipedia; brief news

• Sister projects: Upcoming steward elections, and a retrospective on stewards' work in 2010

• WikiProject report: Talking wicket with WikiProject Cricket

• Features and admins: First featured picture from the legally disputed NPG images; two Chicago icons

• Arbitration report: New case: Shakespeare authorship question; lack of recent input in Longevity case

• Technology report: January Engineering Update; Dutch Hack-a-ton; brief news

Read this Signpost in full · Single-page · Unsubscribe · EdwardsBot (talk) 19:21, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

Spaces in section headers

Spaces in section headers should not be changed en masse. They may be made consistent within an article, but they should not be changed from the version with spaces to the one without (or vice versa). You did this here, here and here. The same happened here, where you also add the Persondata parameters out of order. And you still haven't provided teh requested evidence of bot approval for this task, which otherwise is a violation of bot policy. Fram (talk) 15:19, 2 February 2011 (UTC) [X] copied from User talk:SmackBot by Femto Bot, (possibly the smallest bot in the world) 15:20, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

User answered by email. Rich Farmbrough, 15:26, 2 February 2011 (UTC).

Since you have not provided any evidence of your claim that this bot task is approved (not here and not by mail, which is not the best way to address such things anyway), despite four requests by me to do so, I have blocked the bot. Please don't restart the "Correct cap in header and/or general fixes." or anything similar before you have shown some evidence that this has approval. I have no objection to you unblocking the bot solely to continue with the "build p605" edits, which hve approval and don't seem to be problematic (or at least have a much lower error rate, and a much higher benefit rate). Fram (talk) 15:36, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

The number of requests is irrelevant, I am not here to run around after your little tantrums,much as you would like it. Rich Farmbrough, 16:00, 2 February 2011 (UTC).

Rich Farmbrough: you may bot unblock your own bot, so I have reblocked accordingly. Please sort this issue out in civil discussion. To request review of the block you may post at WP:AN but you may not unblock it yourself, as that is tantamount to self-unblocking. — Martin (MSGJ · talk) 16:10, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

what part of I have no objection to you unblocking the bot solely to continue with the "build p605" edits,' didn't you read? Rich Farmbrough, 16:15, 2 February 2011 (UTC).

You didn't say that would continue solely with those edits, so the situation was not resolved. — Martin (MSGJ · talk) 16:24, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

OK I'm sure we'll satisfy the milk monitor with some documentation sooner or later. Rich Farmbrough, 16:27, 2 February 2011 (UTC).

Well the task has been running since some time in 2006, but I haven't found the authorisation yet (this was back when things were a lot more informal) I have searched through the archives I can find. Rich Farmbrough, 20:49, 2 February 2011 (UTC).

Guys this is silly to block a good bot for removing useless spacers in the headers. I know that the argument about spaces or no spaces is an old and subjective argument but I personally agree with this edit when its done with other things. I don't think we should be removing them as a sole edit but if we are there doing other things like adding persondata then we should get rid of them (a nd change image to File while where there). These spaces are a waste of space and harddrive space even being there. They are ugly when viewing the article in edit mode and make it more difficult to view the article when you have spaces around everything. If yuo don't like the bot or don't want it to edit and want to create your then just say so but to continue to block this bot for these silly stupid reasons is just wrong. --Kumioko (talk) 20:58, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

Indeed, I would say 5 years unopposed for a task (except for one guy who thinks "mixed martial arts" is a proper noun) pretty much counts as consensus. Rich Farmbrough, 22:56, 2 February 2011 (UTC).

The block was for a variety of reasons, not just for "removing useless spacers in the headers". It was for running an unapproved task (until evidence of the contrary has been provided), with edits that violate bot policy (WP:BOTPOL#Spell-checking), contained errors (using the same parameter in Persondata twice with a different value) and inconsistencies (again in persondata, moving parameters out of order for no reason, and changing the capitalisation of one of the parameters while leaving the others with another capitalisation), and finally also removed spaces from headers even when all the headers in the article were in the same style, which is the kind of edit no bot or AWB user (or basically any user, even manually) is supposed to make per WP:MOS. Bots shouldn't be used to implement some personal layout preference to a large number of articles, when such preference is not supported by a clear policy or guideline, and has no benefits whatsoever. Fram (talk) 08:09, 3 February 2011 (UTC)

By the way, your AWB edits need more careful consideration as well, two errore and two dubious edits in four edits is a bit high... There is no reason, when a parameter is used twice to remove the one parameter that is in the right place, and to keep the one that is placed out of order[6]. You did the same here, but have at the same time made the capitalization of the parameters inconsistent. On to the actual errors: here you removed the actual full date of birth from the Persondata, and kept the one that only had the year (and was positioned incorrectly of course, and which has now been capitalized differently as well), and here you removed the correctly placed and capitalized one, and not only kept the one out of order, but changed the parameter name to something non-existent. Four AWB edits, none of them an improvement to the Persondata, two of them actually making things worse, none of them reverted or corrected. Fram (talk) 08:43, 3 February 2011 (UTC)

Well you are wrong as usual. Rich Farmbrough, 09:45, 3 February 2011 (UTC).

Care to explain how? Did you not remove the full birthdate from Graham Watt, and did you not include an incorrectly named parameter in Kutraleeswaran? Or are you just making things up, like when you stated after the reblock by MSGJ "what part of I have no objection to you unblocking the bot solely to continue with the "build p605" edits,' didn't you read?", even though SmackBot did not restrict itself to build p605 edits but mostly restarted the task that got it blocked in the first place? If you want to be trusted and to convince me (or probably most other people) that I am wrong, you'll have to provide more than just an empty denial. Fram (talk) 09:52, 3 February 2011 (UTC)

In Barry Trail a duplicate field is removed. Improvement.

In Alessandro Riguccini a duplicate field is removed. Improvement.

Rich Farmbrough, 10:02, 3 February 2011 (UTC).

So because two things which I didn't complain about are improvements, pointing out the other things that happened in the same edits and which made it worse or were actual errors are "wrong"? Very Orwellian, but not actually helpful or correct of course. Fram (talk) 10:14, 3 February 2011 (UTC)

And while your current AWB edits don't have the errors of the first four anymore, they still decapitalize the parameters they fill in for no good reason (note that the standard, as described at the template and Wikipedia:Persondata, are capitalized parameter names). Fram (talk) 09:56, 3 February 2011 (UTC)

Standard parameter names are lower case. This template was imported form the German Wikipedia without due care and attention. The docmentation has not kept up. Rich Farmbrough, 10:02, 3 February 2011 (UTC).

Sorry but I have to agree with Fram in some parts. I see two problems in introducing lowercase parameters in Persondata:

1. people not using the latest AWB's snapshot will get confused introducing errors because of this inconsistency.
2. the vast majority prefers uppercase parameters for this one. Rjw's bot and AWB use uppercase characters. -- Magioladitis (talk) 10:05, 3 February 2011 (UTC)

You are right that earlier AWB's had problems, but that is now resolved - the UPPERCASE parameters are an anomoly. And it is only because of AWB (which effectively RJW's bot is too) that there are so many persondata set up. Rich Farmbrough, 10:11, 3 February 2011 (UTC).

I would actually make it a GF to change these to lowercase. Rich Farmbrough, 10:17, 3 February 2011 (UTC).

I find it completely unnecessary to force the code change for that. All capitals are easier to find and make clear that this template is an exceptional on-visible template. -- Magioladitis (talk) 14:19, 3 February 2011 (UTC)

I also agree that, for the purpose of the person data template, using uppercase for the template parameters would be better. --Kumioko (talk) 16:28, 3 February 2011 (UTC)

So, Rich, can you please try to gain some consensus for what you are doing? Maybe you think you are making easier for people to read but I and many other think you don't. -- Magioladitis (talk) 10:25, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

Sure we can do something. Rich Farmbrough, 13:27, 4 February 2011 (UTC).

Similarly, I believe that there is no consensus for the moment to replace "references" with "reflist" (like here). Fram (talk) 13:49, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

I don't think I have to show consensus for every edit I make. Rich Farmbrough, 14:17, 4 February 2011 (UTC).

AWB rules? "# Don't do anything controversial with it. If there is a chance that the edits you are considering might be controversial, consider soliciting comment at the village pump or appropriate WikiProject before proceeding." Considering that there recently have been ANI discussions and Village pump discussions over these changes (not by you, but the same replacement), they clearly are controversial. In general, yes, evety AWB edit should be an edit for which a consensus exists, tacit our outspoken. This change (and the persondata one, and the spaces in section headers one) have no such consensus and are otherwise inconsequential (things don't work better after these changes), so why not just skip them? Fram (talk) 14:40, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

Any reason why you are still changing the capitalization of Persondata from upper- to lowercase? Even ignoring the cases where you add new persondata in lowercase, there are still ones like [7], [8] and [9] where the rest of the edit is improving the article, but for some reason the capitalization is changed as well. Fram (talk) 09:53, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

Yes, I agree. This has to stop unless consensus is reached. I 'll start a discussion in Persondata. -- Magioladitis (talk) 10:49, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia_talk:Persondata#Uppercase_parameters. -- Magioladitis (talk) 10:55, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

Speedy deletion nomination of Template:Xrefx

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Thank you for experimenting with Wikipedia. Your test worked, and the page that you created has been or soon will be deleted. Please use the sandbox for any other tests you want to do. Take a look at the welcome page if you would like to learn more about contributing to our encyclopedia.

If you think that this notice was placed here in error, you may contest the deletion by adding {{hang on}} to the top of the page that has been nominated for deletion (just below the existing speedy deletion, or "db", tag; if no such tag exists, then the page is no longer a speedy delete candidate and adding a hang-on tag is unnecessary), coupled with adding a note on the talk page explaining your position, but be aware that once tagged for speedy deletion, if the page meets the criterion, it may be deleted without delay. Please do not remove the speedy deletion tag yourself, but don't hesitate to add information to the page that would render it more in conformance with Wikipedia's policies and guidelines. If the page is deleted, you can contact one of these administrators to request that the administrator userfy the page or email a copy to you. — This, that, and the other (talk) 09:54, 11 February 2011 (UTC)

Nomination for deletion of Template:Year header

Template:Year header has been nominated for deletion. You are invited to comment on the discussion at the template's entry on the Templates for discussion page. — This, that, and the other (talk) 09:52, 11 February 2011 (UTC)

Capitalising templates

I am missing something here. For a long time now you have been making, and are still making, mass automated edits capitalising templates. I thought this was just a matter of personal preference, making no operation difference to Wikipedia at all. But if this was the case then you wouldn't be wasting all these computer resources on such an unpleasant exercise, since it would look like you just wanted to show content editors who don't share your personal preference that you can use an automated tool to bulldoze and control them. So, please would you let me know what this is really about. Then I can see the light and start happily capitalizing templates too. Thanks. --Epipelagic (talk) 00:34, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

I take it you are referring to the article Swarm behaviour? In which case it "is about" readability and consistency. {{Externalimage}} is an un-spaced template name, and barely readable, whereas its target is {{External media}}, the space making it more readable. Rich Farmbrough, 00:55, 9 February 2011 (UTC).

Snoqualmie, Washington

Someone has messed with the Snoqualmie, Washington Page - the "Location" has trash in it. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.136.218.242 (talk) 20:50, 11 January 2011 (UTC)

Proposed deletion of Nemesis (novel) (disambiguation)

The article Nemesis (novel) (disambiguation) has been proposed for deletion because of the following concern:

No incoming links, incorrect title syntax, near-impossible search term

While all contributions to Wikipedia are appreciated, content or articles may be deleted for any of several reasons.

You may prevent the proposed deletion by removing the {{proposed deletion/dated}} notice, but please explain why in your edit summary or on the article's talk page.

Please consider improving the article to address the issues raised. Removing {{proposed deletion/dated}} will stop the proposed deletion process, but other deletion processes exist. The speedy deletion process can result in deletion without discussion, and articles for deletion allows discussion to reach consensus for deletion. JaGa^talk 00:49, 14 February 2011 (UTC) [X] copied from User talk:SmackBot by Femto Bot, (possibly the smallest bot in the world) 01:03, 14 February 2011 (UTC)

pop culture section in Guadalajara

I see youve eliminated about all of the pop culture section in the article. I tried eliminating it entirely (its nothing but trivia) but it got put back. Lets hope your edits stick. Ill do what I can.Thelmadatter (talk) 03:12, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

Check your AWB edits before saving

Using AWB, on the Skatemill article, you changed the “Unreferenced-Stub” tag to a “Refimprove” tag here. Trouble is that this article is unreferenced, so the tag should not have been altered; and also your tagging was a duplicate tag as this article had been previously tagged for Refimprove since November 2010. I undid your edit here with the edit summery “please check your AWB edits before saving”. Inexplicably, again using AWB, you removed the Unreferenced tag and restored the duplicate Refimprove tag here. When using AWB it is important that you carefully check your edits before saving, and even more so when another editor has taken his time to correct your previous editing error. Dolovis (talk) 22:27, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

Yes you are quite right I missed dupe tag. There is a reference, albeit a dead link, and to the image rather than the text. Notice that the refimprove was added the day after the ref, and is the correct tag for the article. There should be no articles with both refimprove and unrefernced tags(unless they are "unreferenced section").

SmackBot

In this edit, why did the bot date a template that does not support a date parameter? Also, is it really supposed to be changing {{italictitle}} into {{Italic title}}? Ucucha 14:41, 13 February 2011 (UTC)

It does support a date, and yes {{Italic title}} is the actual template name. Rich Farmbrough, 14:44, 13 February 2011 (UTC).

Your edit

Hey! Just wanted you to know that your edit to 2009 Esiliiga made a mess in the standings table. Pelmeen10 14:28, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for that, I found the error inthe regular expression, but he ultimate cause is still a mystery. Rich Farmbrough, 16:08, 8 February 2011 (UTC).

2010 Bulgarian film

In Blofeld's absence, may I suggest this film for a start? --Ser Amantio di Nicolao^{Che dicono a Signa?}_{Lo dicono a Signa.} 14:52, 14 February 2011 (UTC)

Thanks used. Rich Farmbrough, 07:10, 15 February 2011 (UTC).

SmackBot

Very annoyed that you killed all my changes to the Sapient Corporation page from Feb 16, and reverted to information that is outdated and inaccurate.

Can you revert to how the page looked, end of evening Feb 16th, then tell me specifically what you want fixed?

Editing our profile is SO not user friendly. Requires coding skills to make changes then random editor decides to make copy changes even though his information on the company is not accurate or up-to-date.

User talk:Dlabar

this edit was not by SmackBot. And it's not your company profile, its an article about it. Suggest you discuss with the editors involved. Rich Farmbrough, 14:24, 18 February 2011 (UTC).

CloudSafe

Hello, CloudSafe was tagged by you because of WP:N, could you please have a look at Wikipedia:Deletion_review#CloudSafe and remove the tag? Best, Roberto valerio (talk) 16:29, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

Check the history, someone else added the tags, and it looks like the DRV isn't complete yet? Rich Farmbrough, 17:57, 18 February 2011 (UTC).

Eugene Masonic Cemetery article

Thanks for requesting a citation. I don't have a hard copy of the necessary book at hand right now but am taking steps to provide the information required. Thanks also for adding a couple of links to other articles, if indeed you were the person who did that.

CRBW (talk) 16:31, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

Sadly I was probably neither of the above people. User:LordVetinari is the one to thank. Rich Farmbrough, 16:34, 7 February 2011 (UTC).

blixt

I think you missed the olafdfull among all the project boxes: [10]. Cheers. ^walk victor falk ^talk 06:50, 15 February 2011 (UTC)

I expect you are right, but I haven't edited the talk page for that article. Rich Farmbrough, 07:10, 15 February 2011 (UTC).

SmackBot

Ed Whitson. The use of the word "likely" in my opinion makes the "By whom?" unnecessary. Read an old article about Whitson, and I think you will see that this is a reasonable statement. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.3.20.47 (talk) 11:44, 16 February 2011 (UTC)

SmackBot merely dated the tag. However glancing at the article I would suggest that there is no need for a forward looking statement in the lead and "is best remembered for" woudl be better, backed up with more detail and cites in the body. Rich Farmbrough, 22:22, 16 February 2011 (UTC).

Question regarding SmackBot: When template dating

Howdy. With this edit, why was the template dated February 2011 instead of May 2009?--Rockfang (talk) 01:59, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

Y Answered on user's talk page. Rich Farmbrough, 13:35, 23 February 2011 (UTC).

Good luck

I just wanted to tell you good luck on editing. Although I admit you have done some edits that were unneeded I also don't think its worth all the attention that you have been getting from Fram and some of the other editors. Its clear to me at this point that some of them won't stop until you are either banned or you give up in frustration. There is an old mantra that says "If you don't do nothing, you can't get blamed for nothing but if you do a lot there is a lot you can get blamed for." Wikipedia doesn't like editors like you and me that do a lot of edits. They like editors that do 1 or 2 edits and don't disturb anything. Anyway that's just my opinion of late but I wanted to wish you good luck anyway. --Kumioko (talk) 03:16, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

I'd mostly second the above. However with that said I think it is clear you do need to discuss the "type" change in a wider forum. I think in certain cases it could be a good idea; but, to take an example, on the Wikify tag it is effectively useless to the WikiProject's needs. --Errant ^(chat!) 10:41, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

It does depend on the project. There are a whole bunch of subject specific templates on the one hand ({{Chemical importance}} for example), and requests for breakdown by type/subject/project on the other. This simply gives the ability to create "by topic" sub cats, it does not require anyone to do it. Rich Farmbrough, 17:50, 18 February 2011 (UTC).

Many thanks Kumioko. Rich Farmbrough, 17:58, 18 February 2011 (UTC).

Nomination for deletion of Template:Related template

Template:Related template has been nominated for deletion. You are invited to comment on the discussion at the template's entry on the Templates for discussion page. -DePiep (talk) 13:15, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

Insertion of adverts in racquet articles

Hi Rich. User:Gbatterh (Special:Contributions/Gbatterh) continues to add and reinsert a commercial website for racquets in the Squash (sport) article and others. For example,

• Squash Racquets

Can you help? It's on the verge of 3RR. --- (Bob) Wikiklrsc (talk) 16:44, 26 February 2011 (UTC)

Talkback

Hello, Rich Farmbrough. You have new messages at Wikipedia talk:Template messages/User talk namespace.
Message added 11:50, 26 February 2011 (UTC). You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.

Nomination for deletion of Template:All interwikis same name

Template:All interwikis same name has been nominated for deletion. You are invited to comment on the discussion at the template's entry on the Templates for discussion page. Magog the Ogre (talk) 04:54, 17 February 2011 (UTC)

Talkback

Hello, Rich Farmbrough. You have new messages at Wikipedia talk:Template messages/User talk namespace.
Message added 17:06, 26 February 2011 (UTC). You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.

Use of Huggle

Hi Rich,

I'm quite new to using Huggle (and actually new to WP:RCP too). I notice that for some IP vandalism you leave a message on the talk page, while for others you don't - you just revert. Please could you tell me how to decide which to leave a user message for? Thanks  — Amakuru (talk) 22:30, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

Y Answered on user's talk page. Rich Farmbrough, 22:48, 23 February 2011 (UTC).

Re CT

There are strong incentives for people to make it worse, but bit by bit we'll get it there... The mere existence of the article strikes me as a problem, a kind of Okrentian response to that other kind of terrorism with which we are most definitely not at war. On the other hand, there's one line in there which probably ought to be removed for lack of notability, but really should be removed because it illustrates just how deep one has to dig for examples of the article's supposed subject: It cites a bomb plot or somesuch by a fifteen (sic.) member militia. - Simon Dodd { U·T·C·WP:LAW } 00:22, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

AWB requests

Hi Rich. I have some things needing doing. First is List of regencies and cities in Indonesia, The first two provinces are done but can you use AWB to add Category:Regency capitals of Indonesia to all of the articles in the capital columns which are the seats of the regencies. The other thing needing doing is to go through Category:Populated places in Caithness, Category:Populated places in Nairn and Category:Populated places in Lochaber and change the map from Scotland to the relative district like this.♦ Dr. Blofeld 16:31, 25 February 2011 (UTC)  Done

Regencies

• Fef is not what you expect.
• Bula redirects to the Phillipines
• Ilaga is a Christian Militia
• The kepi is a cap with a flat circular top
• Parigi is a village and a mandal in Anantapur district in the state of Andhra Pradesh in India
• Seba is a drum and bass producer
• Soe is a village in Orava Parish, Põlva County in southeastern Estonia.
• Waris is a drama created by PTV,
• tigi is apparently Toni & Guy

These pages are disambiguation pages:

1. Baros
2. Benteng
3. Koja
4. Martapura
5. Piru
6. Raha
7. Sentani
8. Simpang Empat
9. Sorong
10. Tahuna
11. Buol
12. Maba
13. Mamuju
14. Tanjung Balai

Rich Farmbrough, 02:39, 26 February 2011 (UTC).

These places have no infobox:

in Caithness

• Berriedale, Highland
• Scrabster
• Reaster
• Haster
• Ham, Caithness
• Burnside, Highland
• Achreamie

in Lochaber

• Glenborrodale
• Tarbet, Lochaber
• Grigadale
• Glenachulish
• Blarmacfoldach
• Achriabhach
• Achnaha
• Tomdoun
• Strontian
• Glenuig

in Nairn;

• Geddes, Highland

Rich Farmbrough, 11:40, 26 February 2011 (UTC).

Typos

Heh, yeah, sorry.... I did kinda try to explain it to him at first. I'll try to get him to understand that (for me) typing his name is like playing finger twister. :P Ion Zone (talk) 15:34, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

Cool. Rich Farmbrough, 22:48, 23 February 2011 (UTC).

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Status update: Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/SmackBot 43

Template: A user has requested the attention of a member of the Bot Approvals Group. Once assistance has been rendered, please deactivate this tag by replacing it with {{t|BAG assistance needed}}. . *

Edits by:

Last edit by BAGGER was by Tim1357 at 03:04, 18 January 2011 (UTC).
Last edit by me at 13:22, 1 January 2011 (UTC).
Last edit by anyone was by [[User:|User:]] at 03:04, 18 January 2011 (UTC).
Bottom edit was by Rich Farmbrough at 06:19, 2 February 2011 (UTC).

Femto Bot, (possibly the smallest bot in the world) 06:49, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia:London Gazette Index

That looks like it was a lot of hard work. Very Useful. Well Done. --DavidCane (talk) 22:06, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

I agree but I wouldn't be surprised if one of Rich's fans doesn't come back and say he's link farming or that its unencycloipedic. --Kumioko (talk) 22:29, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

Thanks David. Chuckle @ Kumioko.. I still have to chase the London Gazette for certain missing issues. Rich Farmbrough, 22:52, 2 February 2011 (UTC).

Problem in Dowdy–Ficklen Stadium article

Hi Rich. Could you have a look at this? I added some links to the Dowdy–Ficklen Stadium article which I thought were appropriate to the article and this other editor (User:PGPirate), without discussion, keeps taking them out calling them either firstly "linkspam" or secondly "vandalism" -- neither of which I've ever engaged in in my six years editing Wikipedia. Cf. this attempt to discuss it also. --- Wikiklrsc (talk)

Thanks, Rich, very much for adding some civility to this matter. In no way had I or will I ever add "linkspam" or "vandalism" to any article. I had been researching another topic, on the manufacture process of the new scoreboard for this stadium, and in doing so, found some relevant links about the actual stadium. There seems to have been some confusion about the ranking of this new scoreboard, etc. So the information I found on another related topic whilst researching, I thought relevant to this article on the stadium. A comment made by User:PGPirate quoting "So stop putting your spam on the article" just isn't either the true case or useful or even civil. Thanks for your kindest help and attention. --- (Bob) Wikiklrsc (talk) 00:01, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

SmackBot

Why is my article being deleted? I was hoping for more contributors to flesh it out which is why I made it so sparse. SuperSaiyaMan (talk) 20:10, 5 February 2011 (UTC)

Y Answered on user's talk page. Rich Farmbrough, 20:40, 5 February 2011 (UTC).

Star Wars: The Clone Wars (season 2 finale)

Hello, I was looking over the Star Wars Pages and noticed someone put a Speedy Deletion Tag on Star Wars: The Clone Wars (season 2 finale). could you look over this.174.29.90.139 (talk) 02:09, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

Speedy was already declined. Rich Farmbrough, 03:27, 7 February 2011 (UTC).

Persondata shouldn't follow defaultsort blindly

It looks as if AWb (or your version of it) is following the defaultsort to fill in the persondata, even when the defaultsort is completely different from the article title (because of a move, an error, or whatever reason). I would think that the article title should get preference over the defaultsort, or else that you should skip page with such discrepancies. E.g. [11] and [12]. Fram (talk) 09:53, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

Yes and no. AWB is not as smart as it should be, in particular cases I override it, - Roman numerals get reinstated for example - and there are other cases where it should use slightly different rules for persondata than for DEFAULTSORT, which I can't recall at the moment, but meant to log a bug over. On the other hand if the DEFAULTSORT is set by human editors, why should a script presume it is wrong? Maybe this is a discussion you could have at the AWB pages, you can quote me there. On the third hand, since no actual use for {{Persondata}} has been defined, any discussion about it is a little moot. Rich Farmbrough, 10:07, 7 February 2011 (UTC).

Thanks, now at Wikipedia talk:AutoWikiBrowser#Persondata shouldn't follow defaultsort blindly. Fram (talk) 10:38, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

Also, adding or deleting templates isn't minor according to WP:MINOR. I suppose this applies even to templates with no actual use... -- JHunterJ (talk) 14:00, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

Good point. Fixed. Rich Farmbrough, 14:12, 7 February 2011 (UTC).

The Contribution Team cordially invites you to Imperial College London

All Hail The Muffin Nor does it taste nice... 09:54, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

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Status update: Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/SmackBot 40

Template:  Approved.. *

Edits by:

1. Rich Farmbrough at 19:41, 1 November 2010 (UTC).
2. Gigs at 02:44, 2 November 2010 (UTC).
3. Rich Farmbrough at 09:18, 3 November 2010 (UTC).
4. Rich Farmbrough at 07:02, 5 November 2010 (UTC).
5. Gigs at 13:21, 5 November 2010 (UTC).
6. Rich Farmbrough at 13:38, 5 November 2010 (UTC).
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8. Jarry1250 at 11:57, 12 December 2010 (UTC).
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10. Tim1357 at 02:09, 8 February 2011 (UTC).

Last edit by BAGGER was by Tim1357 at 02:09, 8 February 2011 (UTC).
Last edit by me at 13:38, 5 November 2010 (UTC).
Last edit by anyone was by Tim1357 at 02:09, 8 February 2011 (UTC).
Bottom edit was by Tim1357 at 02:09, 8 February 2011 (UTC).

Femto Bot, (possibly the smallest bot in the world) 02:35, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

SmackBot task 40

Nice task, some minor problems. In some instances, the sort added to a category (mainly location-based ones) is not the best one: while e.g. here this is solved perfectly, in cases like this, this, this or this the sort added to one of the categories is not the correct one, since it is redundant to the cat (England vs. English, Dominican, ...). Finally, a capitalization error here (new instead of New). Fram (talk) 08:02, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

Yes I contemplated making it a little smarter by pulling semi-specific matches like "England" but figured that this was going too far. However the "Southeast Asian Games" example is probably worth replicating. Rich Farmbrough, 08:07, 8 February 2011 (UTC).

Thanks. I note that you are working on or have corrected some other problems as well (year in science articles), so I'll let you get on with this without further interruptions. Fram (talk) 08:54, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

Hope Abbey article

I see that you left several warnings on the revised Hope Abbey article. These are obviously boiler plate, but I found them patronizingly insulting, which appears to be contrary to the established Wikipedia policy of treating newbies with restraint. Let me ask, as gently as I can, what cleanup you had in mind. The edits I've made were precisely to clean up an inferior previous article. Though I confess to being new to the Wikipedia community, I've had many years of experience writing and editing, yet I don't have a clue what you want to see cleaned up, and you have left no hints.

CRBW 17:16, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

Y Answered on user's talk page. Rich Farmbrough, 21:57, 8 February 2011 (UTC).

SmackBot - New Citations for Peter Allen Golden entry

Hi.

I'm new to Wikipedia. Please forgive me if I'm making some newbie mistakes. I saw that you felt the Peter Allen Golden entry needed more reliable third party sources and fewer primary sources. I have now added a dozen reliable third party sources, including The Worrall Community Newspapers, The Times Union (Albany), The Associated Press (in The New York Times), Independent Media Review Analysis, Israel Behind The News, The Daily News (New York), The Record (Troy), Publishers Weekly, Commentary (magazine), The Jerusalem Report and the New York State Bar Association. Please let me know if this satisfies you. And again, I'm new to Wikipedia so forgive me if I haven't followed the proper protocol. Any other advice you can give would be appreciated. — Preceding unsigned comment added by DuncanCrary (talk • contribs) 20:49, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Y Answered on user's talk page. Rich Farmbrough, 22:07, 9 February 2011 (UTC).

"{{Source need translation" ... is getting changed to "{{Verify source..."

SmackBot is changing {{"Source need translation ..." is getting changed to {{"Verify source ...". I don't think this is a good idea. The fact that a translation is needed to make a source work for an article is a very different message than a mere "we need a better source here" -- or at least, that's my take on it.

Here is the example I saw where SmackBot did this: [13]

Has some discussion occurred somewhere to get rid of the {{"Source need translation..." template? As far as I know, it was still listed in the Wikipedia:Template messages/Cleanup last week. Cheers. N2e (talk) 21:01, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

It was redirected to {{Verify source}} on 20 December by User:Bsherr. Rich Farmbrough, 21:50, 9 February 2011 (UTC).

Thanks for the response. I don't get how we are to make an inline tag requesting a translation of a source so that it is verifiable by readers of English... Hmmm. N2e (talk) 06:25, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

Well, I do slightly favour not doing that. It is a little too far in my opinion, "page needed" "year needed" etc are about as far as I would go on an article page. There is, or was, a WikiProject dedicate to translation, which would seem a good place to ask, better in fact as you need to address translators rather than readers with such a request. Rich Farmbrough, 04:03, 11 February 2011 (UTC).

Smackbot edit: Saudi Arabia

Hi, There's been a citation needed tag put into this article today by Smackbot. There is a citation, but it's at the end of the para because the citation covers other issues in the para. I reverted and gave an edit summary, but Smackbot reverted again. I've left it now - but could you take a look please. Thanks. DeCausa (talk) 22:17, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Y Answered on user's talk page. Rich Farmbrough, 22:28, 9 February 2011 (UTC).

Clearwater River (British Columbia)

As a newbie, I don't understand the AWB reference you added to this article today about additional citations needed. There were no references in the original article and I have added two, one of them being a book I wrote on the area. These are the two authorities on the river, I don't know what other references you are looking for. Roland Neave (talk) 04:24, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

Y Answered on user's talk page. Rich Farmbrough, 03:50, 11 February 2011 (UTC).

You might consider....

... getting a bot flag. This can get annoying :P --- c y m r u . l a s s ^{(talk me, stalk me)} 05:56, 10 February 2011 (UTC) [X] copied from User talk:Femto Bot by Femto Bot, (possibly the smallest bot in the world) 06:16, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

Working backwards I guess you are talking about the recent changes pages, so I need to check that I set the bot attribute. Rich Farmbrough, 03:27, 11 February 2011 (UTC).

 Done Rich Farmbrough, 03:49, 11 February 2011 (UTC).

Template:ISO 639 name

Lots of transclusions of Template:ISO 639 name zh-Hani, but yet no template? Plastikspork _―Œ^(talk) 02:44, 11 February 2011 (UTC)

I created it, I hope that someone will decide exactly what zh-Hani stands for, as it can be a specialist area. Rich Farmbrough, 03:29, 11 February 2011 (UTC).

Persondata again

Parameter out of place and duplicated. [14]. -- Magioladitis (talk) 22:13, 14 February 2011 (UTC)

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HELP!!

Can you please help me out with this article-Ooty? I was editing the infobox when suddenly the whole article went out of shape. It's LIVE now! Please help--Suraj T 07:11, 15 February 2011 (UTC)

Hello, Rich Farmbrough. You have new messages at Surajt88's talk page.
Message added --Suraj T 07:28, 15 February 2011 (UTC). You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.

I'm sorry, but arent citations allowed in this infobox?--Suraj T 07:31, 15 February 2011 (UTC)

Good to see someone was able to take a successful crack at it. I was sitting there stumped for awhile, and my attempts to fix it all failed pretty badly.--Yaksar (let's chat) 07:53, 15 February 2011 (UTC)

Picture upload troubles

Hi there. Do you have time to please assist me here? I've uploaded a CD cover from Earl Klugh's album Life Stories - unfortunately Wikipedia's server did not indicate during the upload that a file with the same name exists. The box with "Ignore any warnings" was not activated in the upload formular. As a result of the upload, the original picture used in this article is now overwritten with the file which I uploaded. I've reverted my edits on the file, yet the new file still remains. Could you please assist and delete / or rename the file which I've uploaded and undelete the original file? Thank you. Amsaim (talk) 18:21, 16 February 2011 (UTC)  Done Rich Farmbrough, 18:26, 16 February 2011 (UTC).

Thanks very much. Is there any way to check before uploading a picture file if a picture with the same name already exists? Amsaim (talk) 18:32, 16 February 2011 (UTC)

Just type "File:xxxx.jpg " in the search box. Rich Farmbrough, 22:23, 16 February 2011 (UTC).

Ok, thanks for the info. Amsaim (talk) 08:07, 17 February 2011 (UTC)

Allegedly unreferenced pages

Thank you for this, but when you update an "unref" tag to "refimprove", you should probably be changing the date, too. WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:29, 16 February 2011 (UTC)

It's a matter I gave some consideration to, however it is certainly true that an unreferenced article needs its references improving, therefore the earlier date is also valid, moreover it is the rule AWB uses, so I decided to go with it. If you think it's an important distinction, it might be worth bringing up at the AWB talk page. Rich Farmbrough, 22:20, 16 February 2011 (UTC).

Editing restriction violations

I haven't checked your edits for a few weeks now, but it is obvious that you are again violating your editing restrictions, making many AWB edits which have no effect on the page (yes, they remove a category you first created to be able to do the edits, but that's rather circular reasoning). The templates you changed, and the parameters you replaced, wored just as good before the replacement as afterwards, e.g. [15][16][17][18][19][20][21] ... Some others even hadn't the excuse of the self-created category.[22]. Here you add an incorrectly dated, and not needed, wikify tag. I note that you were also still changing the capitalisation of some of the Persondata parameters, despite clear opposition [23][24]. This one is a truly incorrect example of that. And here you change the capitalisation of all of them, which makes them consistent, but changes the general appearance to your preferred minority one. Still removing spaces from headers as well[25]

Basically, these are all things that have been discussed with you before, and for which you have an editing restrictions and subsequent blocks. Is there any reason you are still doing them despite all this? Fram (talk) 12:31, 17 February 2011 (UTC)

They don't work as well. The category is not simply removed a typological category is added. The wikify template on Eric Baus is slightly odd - certainly the date has a known cause which I have rectified - perhaps the bare URLS are a contributing factor to AWB's tagging algorithm, or maybe simply the link density is unreasonably low. Of course it is nice to see you welcoming consistent template parameters. As for your last example, I really can't answer as to why every character changes in every edit I make, I can only apologise for causing you such distress and bother, and such creating such a confusing diff that you doubtless developed a migraine trying to understand it. Rich Farmbrough, 12:52, 17 February 2011 (UTC).

Actually I retract that, Eric Baus was eminently wikifiable. Rich Farmbrough, 12:54, 17 February 2011 (UTC).

ANI discussion

Since you just continued with you edits despite the previous section, I have now started an ANI discussion at WP:ANI#Violating of editing restrictions by Rich Farmbrough (again). Note that you just continue with the errors listed above, like adding an incorrect month with your wikify tag: [26]. Fram (talk) 12:54, 17 February 2011 (UTC)

Help in Estonian Wikipedia

Hi. You helped us some time ago, which I really appreciate, and I wonder if you could do it again? So could you replace:
1) "[[Pilt:Med_1.png|Or]]" with "{{Kuld}}". Kuld
2) "[[Pilt:Med_2.png|Argent]]" with "{{Hõbe}}". Hõbe
3) "[[Pilt:Med_3.png|Bronze]]" with "{{Pronks}}". Pronks
The link is the place, where to find these. Thanks :) Pelmeen10 (talk) 13:09, 17 February 2011 (UTC)

Ok should be done soon. Rich Farmbrough, 13:23, 17 February 2011 (UTC).

Great job, and fast too. Thanks. Pelmeen10 (talk) 14:58, 17 February 2011 (UTC)

Something more:

• "[[Image:Med 1.png|Gold]]" → "{{Kuld}}"
• "[[Image:Med 2.png|Silver]]" → "{{Hõbe}}"
• "[[Image:Med 3.png|Bronze]]" → "{{Pronks}}"

Articles from one category to another (et:Kategooria:Suusatajad)

• et:Kategooria:Itaalia suusatajad → Kategooria:Itaalia murdmaasuusatajad
• et:Kategooria:Rootsi suusatajad → Kategooria:Rootsi murdmaasuusatajad
• et:Kategooria:Norra suusatajad → Kategooria:Norra murdmaasuusatajad
• et:Kategooria:Saksamaa suusatajad → Kategooria:Saksamaa murdmaasuusatajad
• et:Kategooria:Soome suusatajad → Kategooria:Soome murdmaasuusatajad
• et:Kategooria:Venemaa suusatajad → Kategooria:Venemaa murdmaasuusatajad
• et:Kategooria:Eesti suusatajad → Kategooria:Eesti murdmaasuusatajad

Would be great, thanks. Pelmeen10 (talk) 12:13, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

What do you think, do you have time? Pelmeen10 (talk) 15:05, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

I'll have a look. Rich Farmbrough, 15:54, 24 February 2011 (UTC).

 Doing... Rich Farmbrough, 21:31, 25 February 2011 (UTC).

 Done Rich Farmbrough, 01:40, 26 February 2011 (UTC).

Thanks again. Pelmeen10 (talk) 16:56, 26 February 2011 (UTC)

SmackBot; Bongwater's "The Big Sell-Out"

How familiar are you with the music of Bongwater? Because your bot tagged two items in the article with a "Says Who" tag. I'll send you a sound clip of "Ye Olde Backlash" if I can find it. ----DanTD (talk) 00:26, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

Well, usually the response is simply "SmackBot didn't add the tags, merely dated them" - in this case I couldn't even see that. Rich Farmbrough, 17:51, 18 February 2011 (UTC).

About additional citations for verification for an article

Hello, sorry about my ignorance in Wikipedia procedures. In an article in which I participate (Flag of the Falkland Islands), appears a sign on top saying that the article needs references, posted by you. I looked for references and added them, but several times they have been removed by a user who says that the page doesn’t need them, but the sign saying that the article needs references is still there. So I add them again, and the user returns to reverse the changes. I think he hasn’t a logical argument to do that. I am asking to you what should I do? Another times, there were other people involved reviewing, but no this time. Thanks for the reply! (Moncho2002 (talk) 09:21, 20 February 2011 (UTC))

Perhaps you can succeed where others haven't that more cites are required for unverified facts, not as he persists in doing to add foreign language cites for material that is already cited. Good luck. Wee Curry Monster talk 14:54, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

Answered on article talk page. Rich Farmbrough, 15:53, 20 February 2011 (UTC).

Status update: Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Femto Bot 4

Template: A user has requested the attention of a member of the Bot Approvals Group. Once assistance has been rendered, please deactivate this tag by replacing it with {{t|BAG assistance needed}}. . *

Edits by:

1. Anomie at 23:45, 21 February 2011 (UTC).

Last edit by BAGGER was by Anomie at 23:45, 21 February 2011 (UTC).
Last edit by me at 23:19, 4 January 2011 (UTC).
Last edit by anyone was by Anomie at 23:45, 21 February 2011 (UTC).
Bottom edit was by Anomie at 23:45, 21 February 2011 (UTC).

Femto Bot, (possibly the smallest bot in the world) 23:48, 21 February 2011 (UTC)

Yadolah Dodge

The article was tagged as poorly referenced. I added some references (essentially ISBN codes for the books he wrotes) and links to other internal Wikipedia articles (the publishing companies Springer, Wiley and Oxford, well known to the scientific community). The biographical notice is available from a short notice here. If you think is ok can you remove the tag ? Let me know anyhow. All the best. --CH-stat (talk) 15:23, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

Y Answered on user's talk page. Rich Farmbrough, 15:24, 22 February 2011 (UTC).

1970s in Andorra

Has been expanded. Thanks for sorting out the decades.♦ Dr. Blofeld 15:24, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

Excellent! Rich Farmbrough, 15:26, 22 February 2011 (UTC).

Thanks. Maybe I'm a bit overzealous with wanting year articles for each year of each country. Maybe decades would be best as a start and can branch out late if they have a lot for each year... Its definitely a detailed historical timeline which is needed I think f we are truly to be comprehensive...♦ Dr. Blofeld 17:11, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

I'm sure year articles will come in time, remember Andorra only has slightly larger population than Stamford. Rich Farmbrough, 18:23, 22 February 2011 (UTC).

The Signpost: 21 February 2011

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Read this Signpost in full · Single-page · Unsubscribe · EdwardsBot (talk) 18:18, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

untitled

died preparing an attack “ on the apostate Rushdie”. http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/article531110.ece Pär Larsson (talk) 17:04, 21 February 2011 (UTC) [X] copied from User talk:SmackBot by Femto Bot, (possibly the smallest bot in the world) 22:27, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

ANI backlog

Rich, I don't want to sound pissy, and I appreciate that you're the only admin who's bothered to reply to my request at ANI—thankyou for that—but is it considered acceptable practice for a request to languish unresolved (and almost entirely uncommented on) on ANI for five days? I don't think I'm being entirely unreasonable in thinking that a better response is warranted. I had hoped that an admin would step in and revert the latest batch of vandalism, but since that request was ignored, I've had to do it myself.- Simon Dodd { U·T·C·WP:LAW } 03:20, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

I wish mine went without comment I am getting pounded by comments but people seem to like discussions these days so someone should be along soon enough. You may want to check and see if it got archived already. If a string goes 24 hours without comment the bot will auto archive it. --Kumioko (talk) 04:13, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

Well it is not unreasonable. Unfortunately the denizens of ANI (I am not generally one, being too busy working on content pages, if not content) tend to be people who are drawn by thorny issues (and also a number of fans of drama, it has to be said). I did make a fairly half-hearted attempt at Wikipdia talk:ANI to try to revert the focus to incidents, but I'm not sure what happened. Unfortunately also, since admins are volunteers, there is little that can be guaranteed, I was however surprised to see something being completely missed like that. Rich Farmbrough, 13:48, 23 February 2011 (UTC).

Huggle

Hi the bug is fixed but you still use old version I think you don't see my reply or dunno why you did not do it Petrb (talk) 21:12, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

Thanks . Rich Farmbrough, 22:48, 23 February 2011 (UTC).

Why Merge?

Hi Rich. Regarding this, do you really think it is necessary to go through the entire Merge bureaucracy? The page could be PRODed, and all relevant material (if any) will be added to Indian Institute of Technology Bombay. Is there any reason to think that starting full Merge procedure will get any more responses than the PROD did? --Muhandes (talk) 20:48, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

IF it is prodded then mereged by the back-door it would be a copyright infringement. Rich Farmbrough, 22:03, 24 February 2011 (UTC).

I see your point. Frankly, the page seems copypasted from the website, so I did not worry much for copyright, but lets go with it. I created a formal merger proposal. --Muhandes (talk) 08:13, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

Merged References problem

Thank you for your help. I had just left a message thanking you at my Village pump Merged Reflinks entry right before you left your message on my talk page.  :-) Crakkerjakk (talk) 23:29, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

Auto = Yes

FYI - edit, JeepdaySock (AKA, Jeepday) 16:26, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

Heading text

Hi Rich. I'm doing some cleanup and came across this edit of yours. If that was a scripted edit you may consider adding some logic to the script to remove empty "Heading text" sections entirely rather than tag them as empty, since they're almost certainly just an edit test. Cheers, 28bytes (talk) 20:58, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

Thanks , looks like that's what the "enhanced" tool bar inserts. "Headline text" is what the normal tool bar inserts - and I have logic to remove that, although it is often turned off. Rich Farmbrough, 22:09, 24 February 2011 (UTC).

Ah, interesting, I didn't know there were two different "flavors" of that. 28bytes (talk) 22:15, 24 February 2011 (UTC)