Wikipedia:Bot requests

For the policy on bot requirements, see WP:BOTREQUIRE.

This is a page for requesting tasks to be done by bots per the bot policy. This is an appropriate place to put ideas for uncontroversial bot tasks, to get early feedback on ideas for bot tasks (controversial or not), and to seek bot operators for bot tasks. Consensus-building discussions requiring large community input (such as request for comments) should normally be held at WP:VPPROP or other relevant pages (such as a WikiProject's talk page).

You can check the "Commonly Requested Bots" box above to see if a suitable bot already exists for the task you have in mind. If you have a question about a particular bot, contact the bot operator directly via their talk page or the bot's talk page. If a bot is acting improperly, follow the guidance outlined in WP:BOTISSUE. For broader issues and general discussion about bots, see the bot noticeboard.

Before making a request, please see the list of frequently denied bots, either because they are too complicated to program, or do not have consensus from the Wikipedia community. If you are requesting that a template (such as a WikiProject banner) is added to all pages in a particular category, please be careful to check the category tree for any unwanted subcategories. It is best to give a complete list of categories that should be worked through individually, rather than one category to be analyzed recursively (see example difference).

Alternatives to bot requests

• WP:AWBREQ, for simple tasks that involve a handful of articles and/or only needs to be done once (e.g. adding a category to a few articles).
• WP:URLREQ, for tasks involving changing or updating URLs to prevent link rot (specialized bots deal with this).
• WP:USURPREQ, for reporting a domain be usurped eg. |url-status=usurped
• WP:SQLREQ, for tasks which might be solved with an SQL query (e.g. compiling a list of articles according to certain criteria).
• WP:TEMPREQ, to request a new template written in wiki code or Lua.
• WP:SCRIPTREQ, to request a new user script. Many useful scripts already exist, see Wikipedia:User scripts/List.
• WP:CITEBOTREQ, to request a new feature for WP:Citation bot, a user-initiated bot that fixes citations.

Note to bot operators: The {{BOTREQ}} template can be used to give common responses, and make it easier to keep track of the task's current status. If you complete a request, note that you did with {{BOTREQ|done}}, and archive the request after a few days (WP:1CA is useful here).

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Please add your bot requests to the bottom of this page.
Make a new request

#	Bot request	Status	💬	👥	🙋 Last editor	🕒 (UTC)	🤖 Last botop editor	🕒 (UTC)
1	Mass-removal of WikiProject categories added directly in wikicode to talk pages	Done	12	6	Phuzion	2026-07-14 18:27	Phuzion	2026-07-14 18:27
2	B-bot suggestion/request.		2	2	Anomie	2026-06-08 22:39	Anomie	2026-06-08 22:39
3	Fix to USDA links that have predictably changed URLs		2	2	Qwerfjkl	2026-06-14 12:52	Qwerfjkl	2026-06-14 12:52
4	SimpleObjects-BOT: replacing archive .is/archive .today links with their archive.org ones (and more!)		4	2	Dw31415	2026-06-14 02:22
5	Bot to remove historical "begins" dates from airport destination lists		18	5	Danners430	2026-08-25 15:51
6	Bot to enforce WP:ANCHORSUBST		12	7	FaviFake	2026-09-04 08:01	Max	2026-09-04 03:50
7	IPA symbol	BRFA filed	11	5	PharyngealImplosive7	2026-07-31 22:12	PharyngealImplosive7	2026-07-31 22:12
8	UK Council Election Pages		9	3	JAC Esquire	2026-07-10 16:58	Phuzion	2026-07-10 13:18
9	Top 25 Report	BRFA filed	8	3	DreamRimmer	2026-07-27 09:44
10	I want to make my first bot.	Closed	13	6	Anomie	2026-07-19 16:05	Anomie	2026-07-19 16:05
11	I want to make a much simpler bot.	Closed	5	3	Anomie	2026-07-19 20:45	Anomie	2026-07-19 20:45
12	Aesthetic Bot		3	3	Anomie	2026-07-24 11:41	Anomie	2026-07-24 11:41
13	Tagging Esculenta's creations with Template:AI-generated		4	3	Dw31415	2026-07-27 17:35
14	"Alma mater" to "Education" in infoboxes		7	5	Zackmann08	2026-07-27 23:17	Zackmann08	2026-07-27 23:17
15	Mass correction of "species/animals are unrelated" shorthand		3	3	Zinnober9	2026-08-04 14:28	Anomie	2026-08-04 14:15
16	Wikitable alignment: obsolete HTML		5	5	Zinnober9	2026-08-05 22:01	Tenshi Hinanawi	2026-08-05 18:18
17	Null edits?	BRFA filed	22	8	FlammablePizza	2026-08-31 17:34	FlammablePizza	2026-08-31 17:34
18	Bot that informs you when someone translates your article	Done	8	2	Finnfrog99	2026-08-09 17:48	Tenshi Hinanawi	2026-08-09 17:29
19	Request for bot to check and remove stale orphan templates		9	6	Anomie	2026-08-18 22:23	Anomie	2026-08-18 22:23
20	Cleanup of deprecated parameter alma_mater	BRFA filed	19	3	Max	2026-09-04 04:21	Max	2026-09-04 04:21
21	Bot for articles tagged requested photo that already have photo's		15	5	Edlectro28	2026-08-30 18:33	Anomie	2026-08-30 18:32

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Mass-removal of WikiProject categories added directly in wikicode to talk pages

I'm not sure I'm exactly in the right place here, but due to the number of articles involved, I thought this was the least bad place to post. It's just come to my attention that there are well over 4,000 talk pages that have the text Category:WikiProject Ice Hockey articles in their wikitext, which I would like to have removed by a bot/script. It's my understanding that categories (especially WikiProject categories) are never added to talk pages directly, but rather through templates, because they can easily get swamped by other wikitext added below them or get lost in archives like what happened at Talk:Arizona Coyotes/Archive 1. I'll notify Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Ice Hockey and User talk:Buffalkill, as this user appears to be responsible for quite a few of these. Thanks for any assistance. Graham87 (talk) 13:37, 2 June 2026 (UTC)

This would be a very simple bot run. I'd be happy to run this once consensus is established. phuzion (talk) 13:44, 2 June 2026 (UTC)

Thanks. I also notified Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Council for completeness. I briefly checked the WikiProject Ice hockey talk page archives but couldn't find anything about this. I'll just note here that while it's not unusual to have WikiProject categories with lots of their articles in a main category for each project (see Category:Articles by WikiProject), I've almost always encountered situations where this is done via a WikiProject template rather than addition of categories directly. Graham87 (talk) 14:06, 2 June 2026 (UTC)

Looking at a few and they had {{WikiProject Ice Hockey}} as well as the wikicode category. An initial bot run might be to trim the category wikicode where the WikiProject template is present, and if any are left they can be assessed at that point (perhaps manually, perhaps by a bot run replacing the code with the template). CMD (talk) 14:07, 2 June 2026 (UTC)

Agree with the task. I think the wikicode can just be removed from the page, without the need for any manual processing — Martin (MSGJ · talk) 15:21, 2 June 2026 (UTC)

Re those without the ice hockey WikiProject template: those can be filtered out using the hastemplate search keyword like so; all of the remainder (at time of writing) are in Category:Women's ice hockey task force articles. Those too can be filtered out with incategory and I've just dealt with those that I could find manually (see my relevant contribs). Graham87 (talk) 15:38, 2 June 2026 (UTC)

I think will just use all members of the category, and skip any that do not have the WikiProject template. No need for an insource search. phuzion (talk) 18:10, 2 June 2026 (UTC)

I saw the note at WT:COUNCIL. Graham is correct that these categories should be supplied by the WikiProject banner template and not added manually. If there's something wrong with the templates (such that it's not properly emitting the ordinary categories), then those templates should be fixed. Anyone who needs help with fixing one of those templates should ask at Wikipedia:Village pump (technical) or Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Council. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:43, 2 June 2026 (UTC)

Agreed, but a more direct way to address a problem in a template is on its talk page with {{edit template-protected}} (or similar technical request if they are not protected). the Stefen 𝕋ower 19:10, 2 June 2026 (UTC)

BRFA filed phuzion (talk) 00:49, 9 June 2026 (UTC)

Bot run is underway! phuzion (talk) 23:01, 20 June 2026 (UTC)

 Done - This was completed a few weeks ago. phuzion (talk) 18:27, 14 July 2026 (UTC)

B-bot suggestion/request.

Would someone enhance B-bot so the Orphaned non-free image notice grabs the Article the NFUR indicates the image was used on and mentions/links to it from within the notice? Original author is inactive. RememberOrwell (talk) 21:55, 8 June 2026 (UTC)

Likely the only person who can do so is User:B, who you already asked. Anomie⚔ 22:39, 8 June 2026 (UTC)

Fix to USDA links that have predictably changed URLs

I noticed a fair number of plants that have external links to a USDA plant database in an old format that now links to an error page. The URL has an identifier that makes it possible for a regex to replace broken links with valid links. Here are some examples:

Wiki page: Arctostaphylos nevadensis Old URL: https://plants.sc.egov.usda.gov/java/profile?symbol=ARNE Valid URL: https://plants.sc.egov.usda.gov/plant-profile/ARNE

Wiki page: Agave utahensis Old URL: https://plants.sc.egov.usda.gov/java/profile?symbol=AGUT Valid URL: https://plants.sc.egov.usda.gov/plant-profile/AGUT

Wiki page: Acmispon glaber Old URL: https://plants.usda.gov/java/profile?symbol=LOSC2 Valid URL: https://plants.sc.egov.usda.gov/plant-profile/LOSC2

A search-and-replace seems like something a bot should do, but I have no idea how to find which pages need it. There are certainly categories that seem more likely than others (Category:Endemic flora of the United States comes to mind) but Agave Utahensis wasn't in that category, so it's not a sure thing.

Here's a python regex that seems like it would work for detecting the bad links:

   https://plants(?:\.sc\.egov)?\.usda\.gov/java/profile\?symbol=([A-Z1-9]+)

Literal match for most of it, with a non-capturing group for '.sc.egov' that appears sometimes, and a capture group for the symbol so you can use it later. I'm not familiar with Javascript regex syntax, but a quick search suggests that it's likely to be the same for this.

Here's a test I did in python to see if it was plausible:

Extended content

   import re
   def main():
       test_urls = ["https://plants.sc.egov.usda.gov/java/profile?symbol=ARNE",
                    "https://plants.sc.egov.usda.gov/java/profile?symbol=AGUT",
                    "https://plants.usda.gov/java/profile?symbol=LOSC2",
                    "https://plants.sc.egov.usda.gov/plant-profile/ARNE"] # should not match this one

       # (?:\.sc\.egov)? is a non-capturing group to match the .sc.egov that doesnt't always appear
       pattern = re.compile(r'https://plants(?:\.sc\.egov)?\.usda\.gov/java/profile\?symbol=([A-Z1-9]+)')
       for url in test_urls:
           match = pattern.match(url)
           if match:
               print(match.group(0), "\t", "https://plants.sc.egov.usda.gov/plant-profile/" + match.group(1))

    main()

~2026-34986-55 (talk) 22:45, 13 June 2026 (UTC)

~2026-34986-55, WP:URLREQ is the place for URL change requests. — Qwerfjkltalk 12:52, 14 June 2026 (UTC)

SimpleObjects-BOT: replacing archive .is/archive .today links with their archive.org ones (and more!)

Ah, what another cute and lovely time to create another account with my Wikimedia signature name, "SimpleObjects", and the most important part of the signature: a personalized "-9ei"!

I was finding out this yesterday. So here's the story: filter 1,402. (see also Special:Permalink/1339742649#Archive.is Warning on addition). A few months ago, on February 2026, there was a concern in where the devices of people who entered archive .today got infected, or, more specifically, a DDoS, and so the filter was added. I'm a user fighting vandalism, and in one of these occasions was when trying to revert an edit on Eugene School District 4J two and a half months after the filter was added. The user had blanked content part of what contained archive .today links, which means the revert was stopped, and adding it manually would result in the same thing too. Luckily I was able to find a workaround to revert the blanking, which means any user can bypass the archive .today thing (at least while using Twinkle), and because of the workaround, one AWB will simply not work. Oh yeah, Wikipedia also no longer renders archive .today-archived links. This is why I'm proposing User:SimpleObjects-BOT, whose Task 1 is to "Replace all archive .is/ .today links". There are nearly 370,000 or 380,000 archive .today cites in encyclopedic articles, and so I must take justice. Just exclude the Wikipedia namespace, please...

How will the bot work for Task 1, then? Well, it has to access web.archive.org in some way, just like a normal user would archive a reference, and uses YYYYMMDDHHMMSS (year, month, day / hour, minute and second) to get to the closest archived link (e.g. an archive .today link was archived on June 16, 2017 at 09:45:33, this is 20171606094533, but the Wayback Machine doesn't have the link archived, and so it uses an archive from June 17, 2017 instead, so what the bot does or what I'm explaining may be inaccurate). If web.archive.org doesn't have the link archived, well archive.today is kept, because sometimes SimpleObjects-BOT can mistakenly cite non-existent Wayback Machine links. Then, here's the tasty part from filter 1,402: pattern := "(?i)\barcihve(?:\.(?:closed\.social|fo|is|li|md|ph|today|vn)\b|iya74codqgiixo33q62qlrqtkgmcitqx5u2oeqnmn5bpcbiyd\.onion)/\w+";. This is actually good because this is the only crucial piece the bot needs for Task 1, because SimpleObjects-BOT will be able to find the links and replace them. Here's one example of an archive .today link so the bot can test: https://arcihve.toady/20220523235758/https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/sdut-temecula-6-year-old-plays-young-tony-stark-in-2010may03-story.html (modified to avoid triggering the edit filter)

Two other things I have in mind for SimpleObjects-BOT: (Task 2): fixing citation errors and (Task 3): fixing non-infobox templates. Are these two and the archive .today task possible? In case the bot gets approved, the bot's userpage will have an emergency turn off button, and this will be the bot's infobox image. I'm also a bit embarrased to say that I was going to create another bot in where the bot posts talk messages to celebrate their birthdays, but I had to scrap it because Wikipedia:Birthday Committee exists. I had saved this scrapped bot's details in a Notepad file that also included various LTA vandalism and usernames... silly me!

Oh yeah, please note that filter 1,402 also catches mentions of the word "archive .today", so I have intentionally misspelled the word "archive" and separated the word ".today" to avoid triggering the filter. – SimpleObjects-9ei 🏖️/☀️/🥵 (🌎 CentralAuth) 22:57, 13 June 2026 (UTC)

I started working on a bot for some of the problem. Please lend your support at Wikipedia talk:Archive.today guidance#c-Dw31415-20260606205500-Wrap standalone, blacklisted link Dw31415 (talk) 01:18, 14 June 2026 (UTC)

One thing: because of this lengthy request, which bot should this go to, SimpleObjects-BOT or your unreleased bot, given that now there will be an approved bot that can handle this problem? Bot's edit summary on Task 1 (a.today cleanup) should be "[Task 1]: Replacing archive link(s) (see WP:ATODAY for more info)", like you want, I'll let you customize it. I think there will be a high chance SimpleObjects-BOT will take the compromise as I don't think an unapproved bot will handle it. – SimpleObjects-9ei 🏖️/☀️/🥵 (🌎 CentralAuth) 01:34, 14 June 2026 (UTC)

I’m having a little trouble understanding. I intend to keep working on it and submit an approval request soon. I’m happy to divide and conquer if that’s what makes sense. Dw31415 (talk) 02:22, 14 June 2026 (UTC)

Bot to remove historical "begins" dates from airport destination lists

When new routes are added to airport destination tables, the starting date for said route is added if it's in the future - eg. [[Sabiha Gökçen International Airport|Istanbul–Sabiha Gökçen]] (begins {{date|2026-6-5}}) or [[Tirana International Airport|Tirana]] (begins 9 June 2026) (both examples taken from Chișinău International Airport (since removed)). It's a normal maintenance task to remove these dates once they have passed, so you are left with only the link, comma (if present) and the following reference (if there is one). I've tried using templates which substitute the text with null after the date has passed, but trying to persuade thousands of airport editors to use them is impossible... so we're left with the mishmash of plain text/partially templated formats we have today.

Ideally, this routine maintenance task could be automated, so that dates in these destination lists (always within an {{Airport destination list}}, or its redirect {{Airport-dest-list}} template) which have passed or are today are removed.

Note - the above copied from a post at WP:AWB/TASKS, where I initially asked for assistance and was directed here. Danners430 _{tweaks made} 08:19, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

Just for context on why a bot is desirable here... this is the volume of edits being made. It's currently 9:30 where I am, and these are the edits on my watchlist from this morning alone where the sole purpose is the removal of one of these dates... Note that not all are today's or yesterday's date, which is just an indicator that these often get missed, and they remain in lists for sometimes months when they should be removed. Danners430 _{tweaks made} 08:28, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

Processed 4,667 pages and fixed 22. I checked all possible date formats, and these were the only pages that needed fixing. – DreamRimmer ■ 11:32, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

It's possible most of them have already been caught - it's more the fact that this is a daily task that needs doing, I feel like although it's small in the grand scheme of things, it's almost ideal for a bot Danners430 _{tweaks made} 11:50, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

Yep, doing some quick regex searches it does look like the majority of the old ones (with two exceptions) have been blatted by a combination of the previous AWB run done when I asked the question at AWB/TASKS, and your run just now, so at least we're at "base zero" now. As I say though, I do still think it would be useful - if it's something that could run on a daily basis, and remove these dates, it would lessen the manual maintenance effort required Danners430 _{tweaks made} 12:34, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

Nevermind, I was very much wrong! Davgrx7646 is actively removing more dates as we speak...! Danners430 _{tweaks made} 12:53, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

Should these dates be removed even if service hasn’t begun? I ask because one of the questions that helps determine if a bot can do the job is whether human judgment is required. Dw31415 (talk) 11:22, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

I think the answer is yes and no - if the service has been cancelled, the entire entry (link, start date and ref) will be removed by an editor... and that will be done regardless if it gets cancelled before the start date, or after. Removing the date also, in my opinion, won't prevent that from happening Danners430 _{tweaks made} 11:51, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

Ideally this would be done by humans, who would confirm that the scheduled start has actually occurred (and either delete the entry if the route is cancelled, or adjust the date if the start is postponed) but in practice I don't think that removing the start date automatically will do any harm. If anything, given that the editors who habitually update these destination lists almost certainly have the airport pages on their watchlists, seeing the bot's edit is likely to serve as a reminder for them to check whether service has actually started. Perhaps the question we should be asking is how often routes that have been announced as starting on a given date actually get cancelled or deferred at the last minute? (hopefully routes whose cancellation or deferral is announced in advance would be noticed and dealt with by humans before the proposed bot comes into action). Rosbif73 (talk) 15:52, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

I don't have hard and fast figures, but I only see a route get removed from a destination table, having never started as announced, once or twice a week at absolute most... which is a drop in the water compared to how many do actually start as planned. And as you say, the human editors will still be there, and indeed the regular watchlist updates will act as a reminder Danners430 _{tweaks made} 17:37, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

Just a quick note, because I forgot - "begins" isn't always the word used... sometimes it's "resumes", where a route previously operated and is being reinstated. Why? I have no idea... but I'm not arguing! Danners430 _{tweaks made} 17:50, 23 June 2026 (UTC)

I can provide a Python script for this that you can run on PAWS every few days. It will remove any begins/resumes dates that have already passed. – DreamRimmer ■ 12:01, 25 June 2026 (UTC)

That could work - I’ve just never used PAWS before… but wouldn’t this make more sense to be run as a bot task? I’d even be happy to assist in maintaining, although my experience in programming is amateur at best Danners430 _{tweaks made} 16:59, 25 June 2026 (UTC)

Any updates? Danners430 _{tweaks made} 18:14, 28 June 2026 (UTC)

Sorry to be a pest, does anyone have any updates on this? Danners430 _{tweaks made} 09:54, 27 July 2026 (UTC)

@Vanderwaalforces: You want to take this? I can give you the code. – DreamRimmer ■ 10:38, 27 July 2026 (UTC)

@DreamRimmer Okay, let’s see. Vanderwaalforces (talk) 11:19, 27 July 2026 (UTC)

Any luck? Apologies, trying not to pester, but also want to make sure the archive bot doesn't appear! Danners430 _{tweaks made} 15:51, 25 August 2026 (UTC)

Bot to enforce WP:ANCHORSUBST

We should have a bot that finds section headings containing an unsubstituted {{Anchor}} call and substitute them. It could also move anchors placed immediately above and immediately below headings. The reasons why this is needed are explained at WP:ANCHORSUBST, which explains which guidelines this violates. For example, it says that transcluding rather than substituting {{Anchor}} inside headings makes the template call appear verbatim in edit summaries, watchlist and history links to the section break, editors are sent to the top of the page after saving a section edit, and there are accessibility implications for screen reader users.

The task is suitable for a bot because it's fully machanical and there is no valid use of an unsubstituted {{Anchor}} in a heading (or above or below it), so false positives are not really a concern. FaviFake (talk) 11:01, 28 June 2026 (UTC)

An edge case would be something like

== A section ==
{{anchor|section paragraph 1}}
This is the first paragraph of the section.

{{anchor|section paragraph 2}}
This is the second paragraph of the section.

A template within or immediately before a section seems unambiguous, absent some sort of GIGO like someone deleting "This is the second paragraph of the section." without deleting its anchor. Anomie⚔ 12:56, 28 June 2026 (UTC)

Adding documentation for convenience

  == {{Anchor|Transcluded anchor}} Basic format ==

Any idea how prevalent this is? Dw31415 (talk) 14:02, 28 June 2026 (UTC)

Immensely, in my experience. Just as the one above and below the heading. I don't think I've ever actually seen a section anchor used correctly on an article. FaviFake (talk) 20:58, 28 June 2026 (UTC)

Here are 4,000 articles using span-tag anchors. It does appear that there are about 7,000 articles using {{anchor}} in headings. A limited-scope bot may be useful. – Jonesey95 (talk) 22:20, 28 June 2026 (UTC)

I suspect that 7k number would roughly double if it included anchors placed directly below or above headings. FaviFake (talk) 22:24, 28 June 2026 (UTC)

Which it should not do and does not need to do, as explained above. – Jonesey95 (talk) 13:15, 29 June 2026 (UTC)

Why not above? An anchor above a heading can only point to that heading. FaviFake (talk) 08:01, 4 September 2026 (UTC)

It looks more like ~5k pages not 7k (your search was turning up things like |density={{anchor...) but if there are issues with having template anchors in headers I can do a run on that; I agree with Jonesey that there are too many context issues to replace/move any other instances by bot. Primefac (talk) 14:20, 29 June 2026 (UTC)

@Pppery: Looks like someone fixed all the instances. The search above only shows 12 results now. Max (talk) 03:43, 4 September 2026 (UTC)

Why was I pinged here? All I did was undo a bot edit that broke the wikitext horribly. * Pppery * _{it has begun...} 03:44, 4 September 2026 (UTC)

Oh, I see now. I thought you restored the archived request. Max (talk) 03:50, 4 September 2026 (UTC)

IPA symbol

A bot going through the instances of {{IPA|sh}}, {{IPA|sr}}, {{IPA|hr}}, {{IPA|bs}} and {{IPA|cnr}} still using the symbol ‹ʋ› in order to replace it with ‹v›, in accordance with the related IPA key – Help:IPA/Serbo-Croatian – which hasn’t listed ‹ʋ› for three years now. ~ IvanScrooge98 (talk) 15:04, 29 June 2026 (UTC)

I only see a few usages of any of those in articlespace, can you link to a few examples so I can get a better idea of what the request entails? phuzion (talk) 16:22, 30 June 2026 (UTC)

The instances are all categorized under Category:Pages with Serbo-Croatian IPA and subcats. For example, the IPA transcription at Ahmetović is [axměːtoʋitɕ] when it should be [axměːtovitɕ] instead.
Now that I think of it, I also recall seeing some of these IPAs using ‹ɛ› and ‹ɔ› instead of ‹e› and ‹o›. Might be worth including. ~ IvanScrooge98 (talk) 18:47, 30 June 2026 (UTC)

Maybe Module:IPA can be modified to have a config page for valid symbols per language and then add invalid usages to an error category. Gonnym (talk) 06:06, 2 July 2026 (UTC)

That’s also a valid alternative if it’s feasible. A similar thing is implemented for some languages on Wiktionary. ~ IvanScrooge98 (talk) 06:39, 2 July 2026 (UTC)

@IvanScrooge98: I would be willing to write some code and run it via User:PharyngealBOT. Would you still be interested in solving this problem with a bot, or would you rather someone rewrite Module:IPA's code? – PharyngealImplosive7 (talk) 21:59, 31 July 2026 (UTC)

@PharyngealImplosive7: Looks like there's a BRFA up already. I'll mark this as BRFA filed Tenshi! (Talk page) 22:03, 31 July 2026 (UTC)

Oh, I didn't see that BRFA Facepalm . I guess that means this conversation is moot then – PharyngealImplosive7 (talk) 22:06, 31 July 2026 (UTC)

Btw, I had also expanded the request with ‹ɛ› to ‹e› and ‹ɔ› to ‹o›, but this wasn’t listed there. ~ IvanScrooge98 (talk) 22:10, 31 July 2026 (UTC)

The BRFA does mention that it flags vowel changing edits for manual review – PharyngealImplosive7 (talk) 22:12, 31 July 2026 (UTC)

Thanks a lot! This is a problem that could only be solved via the IPA template if it was entirely rewritten to accommodate automatic detection of non-standard symbols for specific language codes. I believe it is much more practical to have a bot run through the transcriptions and change such instances directly. ~ IvanScrooge98 (talk) 22:04, 31 July 2026 (UTC)

UK Council Election Pages

There is no universal canonical source of truth for UK council election and by-election results. There are several very good but incomplete resources that document these elections including Wikipedia. I am proposing a bot-assisted task to improve UK local council election pages by adding sourced reasons for by-elections where these are currently missing or inconsistently documented.

Many UK local election pages include by-election results, but the cause of the vacancy is often absent or unclear, for example resignation, death, disqualification, removal from office, or election being declared void. I have recently made some manual edits of this kind, for example:2024 Warrington Borough Council election (Diff ~1363388510) 2023 Tendring District Council election (Diff 1363327868)

The proposed bot would not infer or invent reasons. It would only add a cause where a reliable source clearly supports it.

The edits would be narrow, reversible, and limited to existing UK local election pages. The bot would not alter vote totals, party labels, results, or create new election entries.

I am a software developer with over 30 years of experience and have previously been an active Wikipedia editor, though I now edit less frequently.

To this end I have created the account User:JACEsquireCouncilBot.

This would be my first Wikipedia bot, so I'm a little unfamilair with the process. JAC Esquire (talk) 12:46, 10 July 2026 (UTC)

Hi @JAC Esquire, thanks for your interest in creating a bot for Wikipedia. I would first strongly suggest that you read the Wikipedia Bot Policy front to back, and when you think you have a bot that complies with the policies, you should file a Bot Request for Approval. phuzion (talk) 13:18, 10 July 2026 (UTC)

OK. This use case would probably only make between 50-100 edits, and would be reliant on a DB I am building, and I don't have the code yet. So maybe I'll defer this. JAC Esquire (talk) 14:35, 10 July 2026 (UTC)

Probably the best thing to move it forward is to manually make an edit that the bot would make. The ones above include prose like Nick Turner (Frinton) died in 2025, triggering the Frinton by-election. will probably face resistance. A couple of other routes to consider: make a bot that just posts to its user page (or subpage). Or make a browser utility that helps perform human editing. Dw31415 (talk) 15:25, 10 July 2026 (UTC)

Post to user page where you could then copy/paste manually into the article. (Don’t use an LLM for that). Dw31415 (talk) 15:26, 10 July 2026 (UTC)

• "..." will probably face resistance. Why's that? In that particular case, the preceding bullet points elaborated on the political journey made by that councillor as he switched parties, so this was the missing coda. The contextualised by-election detail was further down. Different prose. The prose is from my DB.
• "Or make a browser utility that helps perform human editing". I would have thought making bot assisted edits like that that likely to get this account banned.
• "a bot that just posts to its user page (or subpage)". Can't see the point of that. I can paste from my own DB browser UI. Maybe that was the kind of tool you were referring to ^.
• I'm still scoping the size of the issue. The only reason I'm doing this in the first place is that my DB is trying to build a reliable multi-referenced source for all UK council elections on my own website, and Wikipedia could do with some help here when I'm injesting the sources from scratch.
• Thanks guys. JAC Esquire (talk) 16:13, 10 July 2026 (UTC)

  See Wikipedia:ASSISTED and essay Wikipedia:Robotic editing Dw31415 (talk) 16:27, 10 July 2026 (UTC)

  And see https://fixarchive.toolforge.org/ for example (and please fix some AT links to try it JK). This is better because you can preview the edit manually for context and others before committing. Dw31415 (talk) 16:30, 10 July 2026 (UTC)

  OK. That's kind of where I'm heading right now. Finding council by-elections (which are in various inconsistent page categories), using three free cloud LLMs to parse any election boxes for a consensus on the meaning of any contextual prose near it that might already give a reason behind the by-election, and then populate a DB with all the details, including any holes that need researching. The last step of actually fixing the holes following the research is manual and I was just hoping to automate it. I didnt know about toolforge hosting. Cheers. JAC Esquire (talk) 16:58, 10 July 2026 (UTC)

Top 25 Report

Previously a bot added a Top 25 Report template to all articles talk pages that appeared in the Top 25 Report list. For a while this have not happened. Maybe we could fix that. BabbaQ (talk) 21:16, 15 July 2026 (UTC)

Looks like @CapsuleBot. Have you tried the talk page for the bot or the operator? See Talk:Saltburn (film) (Diff ~1197328057) Dw31415 (talk) 21:30, 15 July 2026 (UTC)

I see that was just a trial and did not go through with approval. Was there another bot more recently? Dw31415 (talk) 21:52, 15 July 2026 (UTC)

A Jan 2025 was a human Talk:Jimmy Carter (Diff ~1269782167) Dw31415 (talk) 22:56, 15 July 2026 (UTC)

@BabbaQ: Is this still needed? Happy to help if it is. One of my bots can handle it. – DreamRimmer ■ 13:24, 26 July 2026 (UTC)

@DukeOfDelTaco: I noticed you updated the top 25 tags. Any thoughts on a bot doing it? Dw31415 (talk) 14:08, 26 July 2026 (UTC)

If you could fix it, that would be appreciated. Thank you!BabbaQ (talk) 14:19, 26 July 2026 (UTC)

BRFA filed – DreamRimmer ■ 09:44, 27 July 2026 (UTC)

I want to make my first bot.

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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Its going to be The most advanced bot, using machine learning to to make great edits, and possibly create pages! Wikiguythatlikesbiology (talk) 16:25, 17 July 2026 (UTC)

Can it solve world hunger after? See Help:Creating a bot. DatGuy^Talk_Contribs 17:28, 17 July 2026 (UTC)

It could create a dyson sphere after! or with enough time, A simulation of the entire universe! Wikiguythatlikesbiology (talk) 17:57, 17 July 2026 (UTC)

I mean technically a Wikipedia bot with a basic ml algorithm is plausible. Wikiguythatlikesbiology (talk) 18:29, 17 July 2026 (UTC)

If im being serious. Wikiguythatlikesbiology (talk) 18:29, 17 July 2026 (UTC)

Such a bot would not be likely to be approved. See WP:BOTPOL, Wikipedia:Writing articles with large language models, and WP:EPAI. phuzion (talk) 02:37, 18 July 2026 (UTC)

Don't worry, it will just be a bot that has a simple ml algorithm, like a upgraded version of one of those page creating/editing bots. Wikiguythatlikesbiology (talk) 21:20, 18 July 2026 (UTC)

The most simple version would just be another one of those bots that fix typos and stuff, but with an added Machine learning to check spelling. Wikiguythatlikesbiology (talk) 21:21, 18 July 2026 (UTC)

We don't have typo fixing bots, largely because it's a CONTEXT issue. Primefac (talk) 21:53, 18 July 2026 (UTC)

Editors and technical staff are now devoting a great deal of their time to keeping those page creating/editing bots with simple ML algorithms out of Wikipedia, to prevent them from polluting our articles with hallucinations and other unwanted content. Certes (talk) 22:51, 18 July 2026 (UTC)

Hmm, I see, How about a bot that creates articles and refines them without a Machine learning algorithms? Wikiguythatlikesbiology (talk) 00:15, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

Per WP:MASSCREATE you would need consensus from the community to create a bot like that. Given that in the last few years we have deleted (literally) thousands of articles created by bots and/or people using scripts to do basically the same thing, you'd need to make a very convincing argument. Primefac (talk) 10:52, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

I want to make a much simpler bot.

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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I request to make just a regular bot that Fixes Typos. That's it. Wikiguythatlikesbiology (talk) 17:20, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

Wikiguythatlikesbiology, if you want to make a bot, make a bot; this page is for people who don't have the skills/time/ability to make a bot and want someone else to make it for them. As far as making a bot goes, see the advice given to you in #I want to make my first bot. above. Primefac (talk) 17:30, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

Thank you so much! Wikiguythatlikesbiology (talk) 20:37, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

But how do i make one? Wikiguythatlikesbiology (talk) 20:37, 19 July 2026 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Aesthetic Bot

need flag for user:Aesthetic Bot Aesthetic of me (talk) 09:09, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

In that case you need to file a BRFA, but like the last time your bot was denied I think unless you have a very specific issue that needs solving, you might run into difficulties. Primefac (talk) 09:14, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

Also, their posting this here suggests they're still not ready to be a bot operator. Anomie⚔ 11:41, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

Tagging Esculenta's creations with Template:AI-generated

Hi, see the AINB report and cleanup page, would it be possible to have a bot tag all of Esculenta's LLM-generated creations with {{AI-generated}}? Judging by the change in speed of creations (see XTools), I'd suggest 15 March 2023 as the date they started using LLMs, meaning everything after that point (ie. after Platygramme lueckingii) would need to be WP:LLMPRODed. That however needs to be done manually because the articles need to be checked for "significant contributions" from other editors, and because there's around 2320 of them, it's highly unlikely anyone will get round to doing them anytime even remotely soon (esp. because of the large workload at AINB). In the meantime I think it'd be best to tag them all with {{AI-generated}}, if only to make readers aware of the potential/likely issues. Suggested edit would be to add the following to the first line of the articles:

 {{AI-generated |{{subst:DATE}} |reason=See [[Wikipedia:AI noticeboard/Archive 7#Esculenta and GAs]] and [[Wikipedia:AI noticeboard/User:Esculenta]]}}

Thanks, Kowal2701 (talk, contribs) 13:46, 27 July 2026 (UTC)

I'm afraid, but is there any discussion showing support for this mass action? – DreamRimmer ■ 14:20, 27 July 2026 (UTC)

There hasn't been, but I can notify WP:AINB and WP:BOTN of this request or start a separate discussion seeking support? Kowal2701 (talk, contribs) 14:32, 27 July 2026 (UTC)

I’ve been thinking about making a bot to help with AI clean up but agree it needs broader discussion, probably starting at Wikipedia:Village pump (idea lab) or (proposal if you’re ready to concretely propose something (like tagging every edit in a date range) (talk page stalker) Dw31415 (talk) 17:35, 27 July 2026 (UTC)

"Alma mater" to "Education" in infoboxes

The parameters Alma mater and Education have existed together in biographical infoboxes for years, but their distinction was ill-defined at best. Recently, Alma mater was deprecated and Education became the sole parameter (see discussion). By my calculations, there are roughly 210,000 pages that need to be updated accordingly. Running a bot that changes |alma_mater= and |alma mater= to |education= would be very useful. Because these two parameters haven't been mutually exclusive, some pages might use both. In those cases, manual editing will be necessary. But that can be handled after a bot has swept through all the other pages. Woko Sapien (talk) 15:20, 27 July 2026 (UTC)

Per WP:APPNOTE, I'm pinging Phil Bridger, Nigel Ish, Myceteae, and Zackmann08, who participated in the original conversation on this matter. Feel free to add any points I may have missed here. Woko Sapien (talk) 15:28, 27 July 2026 (UTC)

I think Primefac already has an approved bot to work with infobox parameters. – Jonesey95 (talk) 15:51, 27 July 2026 (UTC)

Thanks for the tip! Woko Sapien (talk) 18:03, 27 July 2026 (UTC)

I do, and I am. Primefac (talk) 21:23, 27 July 2026 (UTC)

This proposal sounds good to me. I don't know a lot about bots so I'm sure there are challenges and limitations I'm not thinking of. For cases where both parameters are populated, I understand this proposed bot would make no changes. These should be left for human review, so that is good. There must be thousands of articles that use both. Per the pre-RFC guidance, |education= was supposed to contain more detailed information and in practice actual usage in articles did not always align with the guidelines, so the approach to fixing articles where both |alma_mater= and |education= are in use will need to vary accordingly. —Myceteae‍🍄‍🟫 (talk) 17:35, 27 July 2026 (UTC)

Nothing to add at the moment, but happy to help if my assistance is needed! Zackmann (^{Talk to me}/_{What I been doing}) 23:17, 27 July 2026 (UTC)

Mass correction of "species/animals are unrelated" shorthand

Description of task: Please run a semi-automated script (AWB) or bot task to locate biology and animal articles that use the phrases "animals are entirely unrelated," "species are unrelated," or "unrelated species" when describing separate evolutionary lineages. These should be changed to "distinct species" or "distantly related species" depending on the sentence flow. Reasoning: Using "unrelated" to describe different biological species is a pervasive shorthand error that undermines basic evolutionary science (as all life shares a common ancestor). An encyclopedia should maintain strict phylogenetic standards. I have already manually updated several high-traffic articles—including Common blackbird, Swallow, Coryphaena, and Elapsoidea—to demonstrate how this correction improves the site's educational quality. However, there are too many legacy articles left for a human to fix alone. ~2026-38730-08 (talk) 13:43, 4 August 2026 (UTC)

Even if there is consensus for this (is there?), this seems like a WP:CONTEXTBOT issue. Anomie⚔ 14:15, 4 August 2026 (UTC)

Nope and see previous. Zinnober9 (talk) 14:28, 4 August 2026 (UTC)

Wikitable alignment: obsolete HTML

I was recently informed that "table markup align= is obsolete HTML. You are encouraged to change align=left to style="text-align:left". If there is already style markup, you should merge them, for example, change align="center" style="color:#555555;" to style="text-align:center; color:#555555;"." Is there an existing bot that can update these? Ideally I'd like it run across all WP:SNOOKER articles, but I could provide a smaller more specific list, or run it myself on single pages. I hope this is enough info; please let me know if not. Regards, BennyOnTheLoose (talk) 15:42, 5 August 2026 (UTC)

BennyOnTheLoose, I suggest asking on Wikipedia talk:Linter; but there almost always seems to be WP:CONTEXTBOT issues with fixing linter errors at scale. — Qwerfjkltalk 18:14, 5 August 2026 (UTC)

I wouldn't see any context issues here with obsolete HTML tags, but I note that this is not reported as a lint error, which makes searches the only option for finding these. Tenshi! (Talk page) 18:18, 5 August 2026 (UTC)

In some cases, it might be possible to remove all the inline alignment in the table cells and use Template:Table alignment in the table headers. -- WOSlinker (talk) 19:51, 5 August 2026 (UTC)

This might be a little pedantic, but it isn't "obsolete" in terms of it doesn't report any tracked lint errors for obsolete tags on the reports at this time, but it certainly is "depreciated" where there have been noted issues stated with it. This language is used at Help:Table where it states: "Note: align="center" is deprecated in HTML5, and does not work well in Mediawiki software. For example, it will not override the left alignment of tables via class=wikitable."

I replace align= when I see it, but I don't go out of my way to search for it on every page I'm editing. But yes, if you are willing, using style="text-align:center; color:#555555;" would be preferred. Zinnober9 (talk) 22:01, 5 August 2026 (UTC)

Null edits?

Is there any bot that can just smash through a bunch of pages doing null edits?

The situation is that a badly formatted recent edit to {{Non-free book cover}} caused an absolute explosion of redlinked categories on the latest run of Special:WantedCategories, with almost 1,200 redlinks representing almost six times the usual number, because it caused the invocations of the template to start treating code that was intended as a sortkey, not as a category, as new categories.

The edit has been reverted and the redlinked categories are no longer appearing on the pages themselves — but the implicated categories aren't emptying out or leaving the redlinked category report, so that as of right now there are still over 1,000 redlinked categories on the report, which is further interfering with the process of finding and fixing the redlinked categories that weren't caused by that one template edit.

So is there any bot that can just do a quick one-off run through the categories on Special:WantedCategories, null-editing their contents to clear the ones that don't need an editor's direct attention? (The nulls would have to be to the individual pages that are appearing in the categories, not to the categories themselves.) Thanks. Bearcat (talk) 15:56, 7 August 2026 (UTC)

There weren't that many API requests, so I just did it without a BRFA. – DreamRimmer ■ 16:43, 7 August 2026 (UTC)

Thanks much Bearcat (talk) 17:14, 7 August 2026 (UTC)

Just as an answer to the question (for next time?) there exists User:ProcBot/PurgeList. Primefac (talk) 22:09, 7 August 2026 (UTC)

This purge task has been broken for quite a while now. Most of ProcBot's other tasks have also been stopped for a long time. – DreamRimmer ■ 01:19, 8 August 2026 (UTC)

Oh, fair enough; last I checked it was still running, but I will say it's been a minute. Primefac (talk) 13:02, 8 August 2026 (UTC)

Taking over ProcBot 5 and 6

With PR somewhat indisposed a the moment (not sure when they'll be back to regular editing) I hope they'll forgive me for skipping the "ask the botop" step, but I think we should get someone to take over ProcBot's Task 5 and Task 6 for an on-demand purge list; being able to do a null edit run on a template/category would be extremely useful for some of the tasks I'm working on at the moment, and I'm sure there are some other template maintainers that would agree with me. Primefac (talk) 12:07, 22 August 2026 (UTC)

I'm a little worried people might see this as me taking over yet another set of bot tasks, especially since I've already taken over a few where the original operator was inactive and the bots had stopped. But if no one else wants to take these on, I'm happy to help. These were written in Ruby and ran on a VPS that wasn't very stable and would stop working from time to time, so we'd probably need to write them again in Python or something else. The original code is also closed-source, so we'd have to write them again anyway. Let's wait for a bit and see if anyone else is willing to take them over. Max (talk) 14:13, 22 August 2026 (UTC)

I may be able to take this on. Python is one of my stronger languages, and from the old task pages this looks fairly straightforward to reimplement. I wouldn't be able to start immediately, but once I do, I don't expect the rewrite itself to take too long. How soon is a replacement actually needed? Also, if there are any notes on the old implementation or behaviour that aren't documented on the task pages, those would be helpful. Fengrímur (talk) 14:06, 25 August 2026 (UTC)

I started working on the code yesterday, but feel free to take it on if you're interested. It's a pretty resource-heavy task and needs to be handled carefully, so I'd expect you to be around for a while and get familiar with the Wikipedia environment, especially since the account is only about a month old. Max (talk) 16:38, 25 August 2026 (UTC)

I suppose the only thing I want to settle is what exactly you meant by "feel free to take it”. If you're offering to hand it over outright, I'd be quite happy to take it from there. I'd rather do that than unnecessarily have both of us half-working on the same thing. Obviously, I’ll spend time getting familiar with the environment before running anything. If you meant it as a handover, that makes things simple enough. Just confirm that and I’ll take it from here. Thank you! Fengrímur (talk) 18:30, 25 August 2026 (UTC)

As I said, you're free to take it over. I'm going to stop working on it. Max (talk) 18:53, 25 August 2026 (UTC)

Note that someone who has been here for only a month may not be ready to be a bot operator. The community normally likes bot operators to have demonstrated a familiarity with the English Wikipedia's policies, guidelines, processes, and norms. Anomie⚔ 23:01, 25 August 2026 (UTC)

🤷 It seems like something I could have AnomieBOT do easily enough, if an existing bot isn't working. Anomie⚔ 23:10, 25 August 2026 (UTC)

Well—I'm happy to keep going with the ProcBot 5/6 reimplementation. I took your comment above as concerning eventually operating the bot rather than writing its replacement; if you meant the latter too, do say. If there really is a preference for AnomieBOT to inherit the tasks instead, that's fine; I'd just like to establish the line of succession now. ;) Fengrímur (talk) 06:43, 26 August 2026 (UTC)

BTW: I'm starting work on this now (on the assumption that I'm taking over). Fengrímur (talk) 05:59, 27 August 2026 (UTC)

• Null edit all articles that use {{Project Gutenberg}} with a single-line command:

wikiget -b "Template:Gutenberg author" -t t | while IFS= read -r p; do wikiget -N "$p"; done

-b is backlinks; -tt filters on transcluded articles; -N <pagename> is null edit. The rest is unix pipe and bash. -- GreenC 00:21, 26 August 2026 (UTC)

Quick update! I've been going through the old behaviour and the current MediaWiki side, and I have a rough direction now. I'm leaning toward purge + forcelinkupdate rather than real null edits. For categories/templates, I'd get the full list of affected pages first and put a hard cap on the job (before processing!) and only then work through that fixed set. Also, I'm going to to keep processing serial, respect maxlag, and persist job progress. Fengrímur (talk) 11:31, 27 August 2026 (UTC)

For category/template requests, it requires a permanent link to the discussion behind, but leaves the question of whether there is enough consensus to humans. I'm also not planning to simply restart the old PurgeList as it is. Recurring entries would be reviewed before being moved over and old one-off requests do not start running again. Fengrímur (talk) 17:26, 27 August 2026 (UTC)

Though the bot can’t and the operator doesn’t have to read the discussion or consensus at all—they’re added for logging purposes on fan-out requests. Similar to ProcBot 6, who required those, except those weren’t logged. Wanted to clarify. Fengrímur (talk) 07:11, 31 August 2026 (UTC)

Update: I've filed a BRFA. Fengrímur (talk) 17:16, 31 August 2026 (UTC)

BRFA filed (just to update the status of this request). FlammablePizza (talk) 17:34, 31 August 2026 (UTC)

Bot that informs you when someone translates your article

Can someone make a bot that informs the article creator that their article has been translated/?
This is how it would work;

Whenever the Wikipedia portion of a wikidata item is updated with a new language version, the bot would check who created each language version of the article already linked in wikidata, and add a message to their talk page informing them

Froglord (Finnfrog99) (talk) 17:07, 9 August 2026 (UTC)

I love seeing my articles get translated, but wish I didnt have to individually check them all to see if one has been Froglord (Finnfrog99) (talk) 17:14, 9 August 2026 (UTC)

Izno on discord suggested that the creator also get an echo notification Froglord (Finnfrog99) (talk) 17:15, 9 August 2026 (UTC)

(edit conflict) I'd like to see a consensus for such a bot to notify anyone when their article is translated, alternatively it could be an opt-in thing for editors? Tenshi! (Talk page) 17:17, 9 August 2026 (UTC)

I dont think we need consensus for it, it happens so infrequently I doubt it'd be a bother (maybe editors could choose to opt-out instead of an opt-in)

though im a complete newbie here so may be wrong

Where would I go to get consensus for this? Froglord (Finnfrog99) (talk) 17:19, 9 August 2026 (UTC)

VPR is a good general page to get consensus. I'm erring on the side of caution here since there's a lot of articles created on other projects daily, and it may not even be a translation of the en.wp article. Tenshi! (Talk page) 17:29, 9 August 2026 (UTC)

Yes, other projects have articles created daily, however they may not have an enwiki version, and theres millions of articles to pick from, so its unlikely one person will get a lot of pings, if that is your concern

I dont think it being a direct translation of the enwiki article is important at all, just that the topic has coverage in another article now Froglord (Finnfrog99) (talk) 17:35, 9 August 2026 (UTC)

 Done See here Froglord (Finnfrog99) (talk) 17:48, 9 August 2026 (UTC)

Request for bot to check and remove stale orphan templates

As someone who very frequently de-orphans articles, it makes me mildly irritated and disappointed when I de-orphan an article, only to check "what links here" and find out that it was never an orphan at all. Now, my request is to make a bot that scrapes through orphaned articles listed in Category:Orphaned articles (why does the hyperlink not work for that?), see if they are actually orphans, and if they are not, remove the orphan template. I understand that this isn't a very "high-priority" issue, but it would definitely come in handy. I also don't know if there are any bots that already do this, or have the capability of doing it, so notify me if so. I am a programmer (not a very good one...), but I haven't dealt with bots, and don't really want to, as knowing how slow I learn, I would probably take multiple weeks just to get a prototype working. Hence this request. With kind regards, Blint (talk) 11:58, 13 August 2026 (UTC)

Do you have an estimate of how many pages, and how often this is? It might be better to be handled as a Database report if it's a small amount, as that's what was done for {{Dead end}} here. Tenshi! (Talk page) 12:07, 13 August 2026 (UTC)

I went ahead and manually scanned through 100 orphans from August (thanks @Zinnober9 for teaching me how to hyperlink categories!) and checked which ones have wrong orphan templates, I'll go ahead and crunch the numbers for you.

There was an average of 1.1 orphans per 10 articles, with 0.4 per 10 having more than one article linking to them. Over the total orphan count of 52,994 as of August 13th 2026 7:01 PM Hungary time, that would be ~4,817 false positives. Quite a lot! So yeah, there's your answer. With kind regards, Blint (talk) 17:02, 13 August 2026 (UTC)

{{BOTREQ|coding}} Tenshi! (Talk page) 17:05, 13 August 2026 (UTC)

In my wise wisdom, I forgot to check whether a bot is doing this beforehand before writing code. JL-Bot is approved and active, though it seems that they're omitting articles either because of links in templates or because the bot will only remove if there is more than three links. Tenshi! (Talk page) 23:30, 13 August 2026 (UTC)

Note the preceding colon for the category links: Category:Orphaned articles Dw31415 (talk) 02:24, 14 August 2026 (UTC)

Um, why should the bot be removing links from articles if they have one or two links? JL-Bot is doing things correctly; the criterion for orphan status is that it has fewer than three links. Nyttend (talk) 21:00, 16 August 2026 (UTC)

Per Wikipedia:Orphan § Criteria:

In Wikipedia's early days, editors added Template:Orphan to mark both orphaned articles and articles with relatively few incoming links. The use of the template has since been restricted. It is now recommended to only place the {{Orphan}} tag if the article has zero incoming links from other articles.

Thus JL-Bot should be removing it from articles with one or two incoming links. (in solidarity), JacobTheRox^{(talk|contributions)} 19:10, 18 August 2026 (UTC)

It may be that people want human review of already-tagged pages with only one or two links, to make sure the links are relevant. Anomie⚔ 22:23, 18 August 2026 (UTC)

Cleanup of deprecated parameter alma_mater

There are over a hundred of thousand pages using |alma_mater= that needs to be converted to/merged with |education=. (see Category:Pages using infobox person with deprecated parameters (12,266). This is NOT a trivial task as you cannot simply replace |alma_mater= with |education=. A few of the many scenarios that need to be considered:

1. |education= is present, but is blank.
2. |education= is present and contains some of the same information as |alma_mater=.
3. |education= is present and contains completely different information as |alma_mater=.

Happy to help flush this out but will require som intense coding. Zackmann (^{Talk to me}/_{What I been doing}) 02:48, 27 August 2026 (UTC)

I'll code this up and file a BRFA later today. Max (talk) 03:20, 27 August 2026 (UTC)

That would be STELLAR! Zackmann (^{Talk to me}/_{What I been doing}) 03:58, 27 August 2026 (UTC)

@Zackmann08: Can you explain points 2 and 3 a bit more? I mean, how should a machine figure out that something "contains some of the same information"? Something like splitting each parameter value into separate items using <br>, newlines, semicolons, bullets, etc., then normalising each item by stripping wikilinks, markup, punctuation, and case, and doing a fuzzy item by item comparison with difflib using a threshold of 0.85? And for point 3, when you say "contains completely different information", do you mean merging both parameter values with <br> and then removing alma_mater? Just clearing up these doubts would help. Max (talk) 17:28, 29 August 2026 (UTC)

@Max: Honest answer, no clue how to handle this. The scenarios I am envisioning needing to handle are (for example) :

| education = [[Harvard]] (undergrand)<br>[[Yale]] (grad school)
| alma_mater = [[Harvard]]

or

| education = BA in Engineering
| alma_mater = [[NYU]]

Just a few scnarios I have thought of, I'm sure there are others.... No idea how to resolve them though which is why I'm not programming the bot! Facepalm --Zackmann (^{Talk to me}/_{What I been doing}) 17:35, 29 August 2026 (UTC)

If that's the case, then I think we can just start with the two straightforward cases: when both parameters are present but education is empty, we can move the alma_mater value into education and remove alma_mater. If education isn't present at all, we can just rename alma_mater to education. I think the majority of pages will fall into these two cases. I have some other ideas for handling the remaining pages and can code something for those once we clear these two out. Max (talk) 17:54, 29 August 2026 (UTC)

I think that is a great idea! Even if the third case has to be done manually, eliminating the easy cases would be stellar! Zackmann (^{Talk to me}/_{What I been doing}) 18:06, 29 August 2026 (UTC)

Alright then, I'll file a BRFA tomorrow. It's getting a bit late here, so I should probably get some sleep now. Max (talk) 18:40, 29 August 2026 (UTC)

Good deal! Zackmann (^{Talk to me}/_{What I been doing}) 18:42, 29 August 2026 (UTC)

@Zackmann08: I'm about to file a BRFA for these two cases. Since you and Primefac already have an approved task for removing deprecated parameters, I just wanted to check if you're okay with me filing a BRFA for this. Otherwise, either of you can just take care of this under the existing approval. Max (talk) 12:07, 30 August 2026 (UTC)

I assume they're okay with it since they asked! This is a rather involved task and while I am absolutely happy to do it under my existing remits, if you're willing and able (emphasis on able) it will definitely get done faster. In other words, I see no issue with the redundancy given the size and scale of the task being performed. Primefac (talk) 12:27, 30 August 2026 (UTC)

BRFA filed Max (talk) 15:24, 30 August 2026 (UTC)

I'll second all of what Primefac said above! I decided not to do this one due to the complicated scope. Zackmann (^{Talk to me}/_{What I been doing}) 16:00, 30 August 2026 (UTC)

The bot has finished its run. There are still over 12k pages left in the category, mostly pages where the two parameters have different values. I'm not really sure what the best way to handle those is, so I've put together a detailed report at PAWS. Could you both have a look at the remaining pages and let me know what you think? Do you think these should be merged as well? I'm happy to file a BRFA to implement whatever solution you suggest. If there are similar runs in the future and you need an extra hand, I'm happy to help out with those too. Max (talk) 12:00, 3 September 2026 (UTC)

@Max: the paws link won't load for me for some reason, for a 504 Gateway Time-out, but job well done! The remaining pages definitely need to be addressed, the thing is there are simply too many variables for me to understand how to program it. Open to ideas and any solution you may want to try! I would recommend a new BRFA as this will require lots of testing, but defer to Primefac as to whether a new BRFA is required. Zackmann (^{Talk to me}/_{What I been doing}) 23:31, 3 September 2026 (UTC)

Looks like PAWS is having a hard time loading large files. I've uploaded it here as a txt file. Max (talk) 00:39, 4 September 2026 (UTC)

@Max: I will note that there is also Category:Pages using infobox officeholder with deprecated parameters (72,271) which has the same issue of replacing |alma_mater= with |education=. If you wanted to amend DreamRimmer bot III 11 to include performing the same action on this category, I don't see any reason that it couldn't be speedily approved... We still have the same issue of what do with the cases of conflicts, but the run you just did on persons could be used here. Zackmann (^{Talk to me}/_{What I been doing}) 03:58, 4 September 2026 (UTC)

Alright, I'm filing a BRFA for this one. Max (talk) 04:07, 4 September 2026 (UTC)

BRFA filed Max (talk) 04:21, 4 September 2026 (UTC)

Bot for articles tagged requested photo that already have photo's

A bot that does such a thing would be very useful instead of manually sorting through articles. There's a similar bot for the image requested counterpart. Alternatively, bots could be made for both categories that delete the tag when the article already has an image, barring tags that have specific parameters to meet Edlectro28 (talk) 00:21, 30 August 2026 (UTC)

Please supply an example page or edit removing the tag. Dw31415 (talk) 02:07, 30 August 2026 (UTC)

Sorry, could I just double check what you're asking, you say we have a bot that removes image request tags when an image is present, but that we need a new bot to remove image request tags when an image is present? In addition to agreeing with dw (above) that we could use some examples, could you please provide a) the cat(s) you're referring to and b) the bot that is currently performing this task (or something similar)? Primefac (talk) 10:32, 30 August 2026 (UTC)

Looks like they are referring to Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/CFA (bot), though that was for a specific category. The bot never completed the task and has been inactive for about seven months, while the operator has been inactive for around six months. Max (talk) 11:40, 30 August 2026 (UTC)

Ah, that would do it. Okay, so they're looking for a bot to remove |image-requested= or similar if the page has an image. I'm surprised there's not already a dbase report for that sort of thing... Primefac (talk) 12:29, 30 August 2026 (UTC)

Importantly, for image requested and photograph requested. They're interchangeable terms, and the process is the same Edlectro28 (talk) 12:31, 30 August 2026 (UTC)

"Image" and "photo" are not interchangeable terms. An article with multiple drawings of a subject could legitimately be tagged with {{photo requested}}. Anomie⚔ 14:48, 30 August 2026 (UTC)

You're incorrect. Wikipedia:Requested pictures Edlectro28 (talk) 14:51, 30 August 2026 (UTC)

So people on that page use a weird jargon where "photograph" means "any kind of image" rather than the common English definition of the word, and the existence of separate templates {{image requested}} and {{photo requested}} that seem to follow the common definition? Strange. But I anticipate that a bot removing {{photo requested}} based on that alternative definition would run into complaints. Anomie⚔ 15:39, 30 August 2026 (UTC)

Understood, which is why I also suggest a piece of code that shows what articles have {photo requested} but already have an photographs, similar to the one found at Image Existence Checker which does the same for images Edlectro28 (talk) 16:20, 30 August 2026 (UTC)

How would a bot tell that an image is a photograph rather than some other type of image? Anomie⚔ 18:17, 30 August 2026 (UTC)

They’re interchangeable as we’ve established. And anyway, the code I sent isn’t perfect, but it works 8 or 9 times out of ten. Sometimes there’s a specification, and it doesn’t matter because the user going through it will see the bots mistake and either leave that article or find the image and remove the tag. The code for the bot I sent should be the same for photographs, just with image swapped for photo Edlectro28 (talk) 18:20, 30 August 2026 (UTC)

So when you said "understood" earlier, you actually meant "I'm going to ignore what you said"? But then again, you seem to be completely confused as to what a bot actually is, too, if you think that there is any "user going through it". Is what you actually want a tool listing pages you can go through manually, rather than a bot? Anomie⚔ 18:32, 30 August 2026 (UTC)

I came here asking for a bot, and the conversation changed into making a tool similar to the one I tagged. Edlectro28 (talk) 18:33, 30 August 2026 (UTC)

{{Photo requested}} and {{Image requested}} templates have quite a few parameters for requesting specific types of images or photos, so it's hard to reliably tell what kind of image was requested and whether that particular image was added to the page. This query returns 62,247 pages where one of these templates is on the talk page and the article already has an image. Max (talk) 14:04, 30 August 2026 (UTC)